Guess who stole the show...

...with all her animation.

It is almost 10 minutes, so watch if you want, but the best part is around 3:30-5:00 minutes. M's parents are in MX for the winters, so have never seen our kiddies on Christmas morning - this is our way of being able to share it with them. Never realized how animated I am as well. Apparently Christmas morning is quite exciting at our house! :)
It was a good Christmas this year - started with M being off from the 23rd to the 4th of January - YEAH! And on the 24th we met my parents for supper, then Christmas Eve service at church, then off to the Zoo for ZooLights. We got home around 10 p.m. and needed to give the kiddies their Christmas jammies to wear to bed so they were ready for Christmas morning gift opening and video. K cried the entire time, she was so exhausted. M and I got jammies too this year - loving mine! Fleece, how can you go wrong with fleece? In the morning we got downstairs after I prepped and Daddy got into position with the video camera and well, you can watch the video. We took it slow this year - opened the stockings and R's gift from Santa first, then only a couple other ones. We then had breakfast and went back to gift opening after that. Were only finished at about 11:30. R was less hyper and demanding this year. Maybe had something to do with the girls' having gifts and sharing the limelight with them. It was good.
After we were done opening all the gifts under the tree, M asked me if we were finished and I said yes. We'd agreed not to exchange gifts this year and I had shopped for all my own - the stocking ones that we did do. He all of a sudden pulled out two more bags from behind the tree.

I was more than a little surprised. In one was a gift that his company gave us - turkey carving set - very nice. Also a nail set and bod lotion and salt scrub for me. Then in the other bag, I opened it up and there was a SPENCE gift bag in there! (For those of you not in Canada, Spence is a diamond store. :) He had bought me a beautiful white gold necklace with a Herculean knot and diamond chips. Sorry the picture is not that clear, but you get the idea.

My parents came in the afternoon for supper and M and I actually tidied up in the evening. This year I was convinced not to expect Christmas Day to be any different than any other day. With children you are doing the same things that you always do, actually even more as you need to put toys together and clean up after the gift opening. It is nice to have low expectations and then anything bigger than that is a bonus. It made for a wonderful, relaxing Christmas.
On Boxing Day, we braved the mall - went at 8:30 - out by noon - to get some clothes. Even took the kiddos and they did amazing. I love my kids, they are such a blessing. M got a new leather jacket, some sweaters and a hoodie. I got a pair of jeans, a sweater and 3 hoodies from my new favorite store, Aeropostale. They have the softest hoodie material of any I have found yet. I actually got our 4 hoodies for $50 bucks and they are good quality hoodies.
In the afternoon we headed down to my parents - my aunt, uncle and cousin were at their house - I had not yet met my cousin, they adopted him from Russia 3 years ago and they like int he States. D is just over a year older than R and the boys had such a great afternoon playing together. My other aunt ad uncle and my gramma were also in town, so there is lots of family stuff going on. On Sunday we went to my aunt's house in Airdrie for a big family get together. R had so much fun playing with cousins. Though he and the girls have no first cousins, my cousin and cousin's kids are the same. It's kind of nice because presently my cousins' daughter and son have no cousins either, though they have lots of opportunities in the future for it to happen.
Today we went to the mountains for an outdoor day. R got his first piece of gear - SNOWSHOES - for Christmas and we wanted to try them out. He took off in those things like he'd been born with them attached to his feet. I will upload video of our day tomorrow.
Well, that's all for now. Hope everyone's Christmas was as good as ours!

Christmas Letter 2009

December 2009
Merry Christmas
I just wanted to include a quick update letter with this family picture. 2009 has been a good year. R turned 4 in October, with A and K now 18 months as of the end of November. Time is flying by. I am loving being at home with them and being able to spend all day watching them grow, and become their own people, seeing their personalities shine through and know that I will be there for it all. A and K are constantly on the go – just started walking well, everywhere and into everything. They are both cuddlers, love people, though K is a little more outgoing. A’s favorite pastime is eating – she will eat constantly if you let her. For a while they were two pounds apart in weight, but since solids have come into their lives they are now at half a pound difference. K especially loves to sing, for the past month or so “Up above the world” from “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” has been in her head, though it comes out like “Up up ba da wah, up up ba da wah…” again and again. So cute.
R has been involved in swimming lessons and music lessons this fall and loving every minute of it. He loves music and his favorite carol right now is “Joy to the World” which he calls the “Kevin song,” because as we all know it says “…and Kevin and nature sing…”  He and Daddy try to go swimming every Friday night at the Cochrane pool and the girls and I join them sometimes. We also go to Mom’s group with a few friends of mine every other Wednesday – we have 7 kids now between the three of us, so it is a bit hectic in the house at times, and so much fun. I have also been attending a Ladies Morning Out at Center Street Church on Thursday mornings, so we are a little busy at times.
I started working out with a trainer in April – I had hurt my back after the girls were born and needed someone to show me how to do exercises properly and just get into shape – I had strength, just no endurance as Christine says it. I also got accountability this way and Christine is awesome. She comes once a week still and we have adapted my routine several times as I develop endurance. I am proud to say that I can now do pushups, with my knees up on an exercise ball! For someone who could barely do 5 “girly” pushups before this is HUGE!  I also did a running class that ended last week and found that I enjoy running, especially by myself. There is something about getting away from everyone, my heart pumping, the music going in my ears, with my feet hitting the pavement in rhythm that makes me feel good.
This year I have been working part-time in my home doing advertising for a company called Melaleuca – The Wellness Company, which I have loved as I am able to work around my kids. We absolutely love the products that they manufacture, so wanted to share that with other people.
M is still working at MW Energy Corp, going on three years in January. They cut back to 1/3 of the staff that they had last January and M is one of those that stayed. Everyone picked up the slack, pitching in wherever it was needed and they have made it through these tough economic times well, starting to produce once again this fall and it looks like things are going nowhere but up and up. It is nice that he is working back in the HR role now that he was in before all the cutbacks. He was able to go to Missouri at the beginning of October to see their sites there and talk with the employees, put some names to faces and see what their needs are for health care. MW has been an awesome company to work for, very much a family feel and we have been blessed to be employed by such a company. M is able to help out in making it a great place to work and that feels good.
One of the blessings that have come from MW is that all the staff was given every other Friday and some other days off this summer (wonder who the fabulous HR person who suggested that was? And the great president who agreed to it – thanks again, B! ) and we were able to not only get in a trip to M’s parents place with a surprise birthday weekend (mine) just the two of us to Seattle, but 5 camping trips as a family – Drumheller, Bow Valley, Glacier National Park, Waterton National Park, Boulton Creek – and three overnight trips for M – one solo hike, one kayaking trip and a group glacier hike. Our kids learned to enjoy camping and boy, did we ever have things down to a science. And yes, we were in a tent – you read it right – three kids, two adults, one tent. Our tent is HUGE and it is so great for our family. We will definitely be doing it again next year. We also went to Las Vegas, baby, the last weekend in October for the U2 concert. It was on our bucket list and what better place to get a good deal than Vegas. We enjoyed the longest time away from the kids since R was born in 2005. Thanks to my parents for taking care of our kids during our trip to Vegas and M’s parents and sister for taking the kids during our trip to Seattle. We are so blessed to have awesome family!
Well, that is all except I wanted to let you know that the family picture was taken at the Calgary Zoo, one of our favorite places to visit, in the Transalta Rainforest. The gorillas’ home is there and they are one of the animals we enjoy the most – we also LOVE the hippos and giraffes. This summer we (the kids and I) visited the Zoo every week for almost two months with our good friends the Lows. It is so much easier to get along and keep entertained when you can RUN, isn’t it?  (For the pictures, if you got the vertical one I am holding A and M has K, and in the horizontal one, I am holding K and M has A.)
Hope you all have the most wonderful of Christmas seasons and the very best of everything in the New Year!
Love from K, A, R, M and R
(Sometimes you have to shake things up and sign off from youngest to oldest. Yes, I am older than M, but it is less than 6 months, so no teasing about cougars, OK? )

Wordless Wednesday - Christmas 2009

Compare this one with last year's...

My, how they have grown!

Wordless Wednesday - Christmas since kids

Just remembering Christmases gone by - thought I'd share some pics. They all started out so little, didn't they?

2005

2006 (No, that is not M in the Santa suit, just couldn't find one with the family)

2007

2008

A very small Christmas party

So Saturday was to be our 4th Annual Girls' Christmas Party with my book club and all our gal pals. This year I had asked R & A from my Mom's Group to come too, and we were all looking forward to it!
Turns out Saturday in Calgary - not so fine of a day weather wise. We got a blizzard on Friday and the community that my friend C who was hosting the party lives in, the only access road to the community was closed down. So... party was postponed, much to the dismay and regret of R & A and myself. So, we decided to have a party anyway, bring our goodies to share, our gifts to exchange and just have a nice evening visiting and eating and relaxing without the kids. My hubby was out for the evening being designated drivers with A's hubby for a Christmas party that their former neighbour's car dealership had so we already had a babysitter. A had cancelled hers as it had been last minute and their family doing them a favor, so R and I went to A's house. The fun part was that R's car was blocked into their back carport because quite a few neighbours had parked their cars haphazardly in the alley. So... M went and picked her up and I drove her home. It was an extra hour and a half of driving for us, but it was well worth it! It was funny, because when she called me to tell me that she couldn't drive and would need a ride, I had to call her back as we needed to figure out logistics. It took me a little while to phone her, and in the meantime her husband was telling here that it wasn't likely that we would come pick her up and to be prepared for that. I was so thankful for my own DH and how he knew that this was really important to me and made a way for us all to be together. We had such a good time, if we hadn't of gotten together, I would've really missed out.
I just love spending time with these ladies. They look like fun, hey? :) Good friends - a blessing from God!

Me, and the beautiful ladies R and A

(I don't normally have a double chin, but we were in a hurry to get going - you start gabbing and lose all track of time and my babysitters were waiting. Still had to take R home after this.)

Christmas Baking

Today I went to my sister's house and we made Christmas baking. I had the entire day, without my kiddies. First time I have done that while in the same city as the twincesses. It was really great to have time with just my sister... we baked, had lunch (paninis made on her grill), talked, sang and danced. It was so much fun. I love being close in proximity to my sister, even though sometimes the time between our visits are long.
This year I am so much better at baking - less instruction and more getting in there then other years (C usually has to give me step by step instructions and tell me what to do next.) 6.5 hours later we have 4 different kinds of cookies - 40 cream wafers, 25 of orange cookies and 24 chocolate shortbread with candy cane sprinkles. The 4th is an orange cranberry pinwheel that you have to refrigerate overnight and then cut and bake the next day. They are all SO good and I will take a picture another day to show you. Can't wait to try the pinwheels once they are baked. Mmmm, Christmas baking.

Guilty Confession

I have something a little embarrassing to admit - I enjoy some boy bands. Especially the videos. A little because I like the moves they all do in unison or one after the other (actually it is not that bad as I kind of laugh at how silly it looks), and a lot because I LOVE the harmonies that they usually have. The words to the songs are usually a little juvenile , or way too old for these boys to be singing or the young ladies who are their target audience to be listening to. Or, if you are OLD like me (yikes, I am getting closer and closer to 35 everyday!) it is a little silly to be listening to teenagers sing those songs. My DH teases me mercilessly when he catches me listening to or *GASP* singing along to them.
The reason why I brought it up is that I was curious after watching this week's episode of GLEE whether or not the actor who plays Artie (Kevin McHale) was actually in a wheelchair. He is not, was actually in a boy band called NLT and dances well. I had to check it out. They apparently split this year. Then I found that they did one Christmas song - Silent Night - that is beautiful and you can listen to it here if you care to. There is nothing I like MORE than good Christmas music and doing beautiful harmonies and a new arrangement to the classic carols is awesome.
Good thing I am going to my sister's tomorrow to Christmas bake - we can listen to her *NSYNC Christmas album!

Countdown

It's ONE MONTH until Christmas! YEAHH!!!
{I will update this later, but need to get to tidying before supper. TTYL}

Christmas has come to the E household!

Today I decorated! YEAH! I love Christmas - I started Christmas music in our house on the 1st of November and usually the decorating happens on the 25th of November, but this year I decided to take advantage of M being home and able to unearth everything from under the stairs. (Our storage under the stairs is EXTREMELY organized, however the Christmas decorations are only used once a year, so they are a little harder to get to then other things.) While the twincesses were in bed for their nap I unpacked everything and started putting it up all over the house. Some things I put int he same place yearly, but others have moved this year from their usual spot. R has claimed a couple of items for his room - my miniature tree that is about 8 inches tall is now in his room, as well as a festive Russ teddy bear Broose that is dressed up like a moose or reindeer. I got A out of bed a little while ago and her face was fun - it just lit up and she keeps on exclaiming over things she is noticing, trying to get me to realise that there, Mommy, right there is a holly spring on the lamp! It's exciting, Mommy! (She's also really interested in the laundry I have to fold and R's undies, but that is another story. :) K got up and had much the same reaction - Oooh! They are so excited.
One of my favorite things to do while I am unpacking ornaments is to look at the different ones we have and remember who gave them to us, or if they are our yearly ornaments (we, as many families, each get one ornament a year) then I try to remember that year and what we were doing. Some were mine from when I was a kid growing up. M has one that was his as a child, it is extremely special as it is the only one we have, so I actually didn't put it up this year as I don't want it accidentally getting broken by the girls. I also have Snowbaby ornaments that I collect that are really special to me - they have not been out on the tree since the year R was born. I just don't want to risk any of them breaking and until my kids are aware and listen well not to touch my tree, I think I will not chance it. I do have out my Snowbabies nativity set. M got this for me the first year that we were in our house. After we got married and I started decorating my own home, I started looking around for a nativity set that looked like the characters were acting out the story, rather than a nativity that depicted what the artist's eye saw. Just my own preference for my own home as I have seen so many beautiful nativities over the years in people's homes. Anyway, M had been refinishing a china cabinet that we had gotten from his granny years before that was an awful dark brown paint and he made it into a beautiful honey color. He surprised me one night when I got home with the finished product with the Nativity inside it so I could enjoy my gift throughout the Christmas season. It has graced the top of the cabinet every year for the past 6 years now.
Christmas is going to be fun this year with three little people all excited - I can hardly wait!

They're up!

I put up our Christmas lights today - yeah for me! Now I just gotta get M to run extension cords and we can plug them in...

Yeesh... lights and running

Crumb - I forgot to post yesterday! I was writing it in my head while I was running and then got home and started reading my book club book - shown to the right (which I needed to finish for tonight's meeting) and I forgot. Aaahhh! Well, guess I will just have to do two posts today to make up for it. :) The book was good, a little confusing at times as it has 3 time lines, but good, for anyone who wanted to know - go to the library and borrow it out.
So last night I was going to write about how I was feeling better yesterday - went and traded in my old incandescent Christmas lights for a coupon for 50% off new LED lights. Sad thing was that my old incandescent lights were still in the boxes from when I bought them 4 years ago. We have not put up Christmas lights for 5 years, I think. I have big plans every year - grandiose ones to make our house look so Christmas-y and inviting and I never get it done. Usually it gets put off as it seems like it is way too early to put them up and there is no way that I am climbing onto the roof and I have to plan ahead that it needs to be on M's "honey-do" list and then the snow flies and I feel badly that it is too COLD to expect him to go out on the roof - he may slip. So this year, I think I will get them put up on my railing ASAP, because I can do that myself, no climbing required, and the next nice Saturday, M can put up the roof ones. I am considering doing strings of lights on stakes up the sidewalk, but am thinking this is just a tripping for R waiting to happen. So, when do you put out your Christmas lights?
I also went running last night - figured it had been awhile since my last run and I needed to get out there and do it again - tomorrow (Tuesday) is my running class and I need to get to it. I was surprised to learn that I ran (and walked) 3.8 km in 23 minutes. I think that is not bad for someone who was sick the two days before. I am looking to get myself to 5 km in 30 minutes as according to my friend A, that is what you should aim for. OK, that's what I will aim for. I know I can walk 4.4 km in 30 minutes, so running 5 shouldn't be far behind.
That's all for this post. TTYS! :)

Christmas Slide Show

I hope that you all had a wonderful Christmas... ours was good, though so many gifts in one day was a little overwhelming for R. He was a little crabby by the end of the day and figured that everything was all about him. It took until 10:30 for him to go to sleep. We had my family come over here as it is easier with the kids to have naps and go to bed at home. Mom and C brought food and we all chipped in to get the meal on. It was a good day!
I figured it would be easier to share all our Christmas photos if they were in a
slide show. ENJOY!

Have a great week between Christmas and New Year's. We are lucky this year - DH is off until the 5th! We saw M, K and their boys yesterday and we have quite a few plans for this week - starting with today, a movie day! So far we have watched "Horton Hears a Who!" and we are on to "Ratatouille" which R got from DH's parents for Christmas.

Christmas Letter 2008

Hello Family and Friends!

I am not doing the traditional Christmas letter or card this year, as we have been keeping you all up-to-date throughout this roller coaster year. Let's just say that much has changed, but the three little people in our house have certainly made it worth every minute. A and K are great, finally sleeping through the night, growing like crazy and becoming little persons of their own. They love laughing and jumping and playing in their exersaucers. They are grabbing everything that comes near them and shoving it into their mouths. They adore their big brother and Daddy, watching their every move. R is growing up fast it seems. He is definitely a little boy now, not a toddler or a baby anymore. It is sad, but inevitable. He loves music, videos - with Wall-E being the current favorite - playing outside, his friend James, and his sisters. He also enjoys Daddy and spending time with him. They even go out for "coffee" to Starbucks weekly to have some "guy time". He is a great hugger and luckily for Mommy still loves to give kisses to her and will ask for tickles and kisses over and over. He still enjoys helping Mommy clean the house too - hope that is something he keeps for years to come! :) He daily says something that will make us laugh and comes up with such interesting comments it is so fun to see his mind working and being stretched. HIS power to reason through things is already developing which surprises, but is incredible to see.

DH is still working at MegaWest Energy Corp. It has been two years now and he is doing the HR role. This year they hired on a HR consultant to teach him more of the job than he had been taught so far - there wasn't anyone in the company that had the background and knowledge to guide him. He is learning all sorts of new things and the thing I love is how my husband surprises her often with how he thinks and does things and the solutions he comes up with for potential problems or just the daily HR running of the company. (I am so proud of my husband, gotta brag him up when I can! :) He is also loving being a Dad to R, A and K, spending time with them when he can and loving every minute of it.

I am busy being mom and running our household. I am so thankful for my son and TWO daughters, I feel so blessed by God to have all three of them. I am enjoying getting together weekly with my friend A and her boys - R's friend J - and hopefully in the new year the other two moms we used to get together with can join us again as they both just had babies too. The total kid count for the 4 families is to 9, with R being the oldest at 3 years, 2 months. It's crazy, really! I also just started a new business venture - I am doing advertising for a company called Melaleuca, The Wellness Company. I am getting out of doing Tupperware as I just don't have time to be a part of a party planning company anymore. I have about $900 worth of inventory in my house right now (that's after I've already taken 40% off!) to sell, so if you are interested, I can send you a spreadsheet! :) I am hoping to get back into photography this year (DH and I are trying to find a hobby we can do together) and want to take some courses on PhotoShop and other editing. I am still trying to keep up my blog at www.raynasjourney.blogspot.com if you ever want to drop in. I am hoping to start a giveaway site in the new year specifically for Canadians. Sounds like I am busy, but it is good and manageable right now. I will add the dreaming stuff as time allows.

Well, that is all at our household. I am including pictures that our friend H (http://heathermoll.typepad.com/heather_moll_photography/) took in September.

Merry Christmas to you all!

Looking 100% better

Life is going oh, so much better in the past few days. I finally decided on Thursday that the girls were not going to get fed in the middle of the night anymore. I would feed them before I went to bed and then they could eat after 5 a.m. The first night was a little rough - between the two of them they cried between 3:20 and 5:30 off and on. But Friday, there was only about a half hour total of crying. Saturday was a little worse with A crying for 20 min every other hour. But, last night, last night made it all worth it! I fed them late because I'd gone to WalMart for the last of the Christmas gifts, and then had a quick shower when I got home. They ate around 12 a.m. and then slept straight through to 8:30 for A and 9:00 for K! Whoo hoo! I feel GOOD today! They have also been going longer between feedings during the day and sleeping better for naps. Hindsight is always 20-20, but I wish I'd done this sooner!
DH and I had a date on Saturday afternoon and he is going to be home on Wednesday afternoon until the 5th. I am looking forward to it.
Happy holidays people! I will hopefully be writing between now and Thursday, but just want everyone to have a great Christmas season... I pray it is filled with family, friends, love, laughter and thankfulness for the little Baby in a manger who gave so much up to come to this earth to save us 33 years later.

You gotta love the hair in the 80s!

This song has been in my head for 5 days now! Thought I would share... Watch for a rare glimpse of Bono without sunglasses.

If you want to see the remake, click here.

Merry Christmas to all! (It's a little long, but you'll want to bear with me to the end)

Merry Christmas everyone! I hope that you are having a wonderful Christmas with family and friends and that you are enjoying celebrating the birth of Jesus.
Our family has had a busy few weeks. There is a nasty flu going around Calgary and two weeks ago I was supposed to drop off R at my neighbour's house so that I could go get my Christmas shopping done. She phoned me the morning of and let me know that her son was sick and that her daughter had been sick earlier in the week. So, shopping was out that day. We planned that I would bring R over this past Thursday and would go shopping then, but that morning I went into R's room to discover that he had thrown up in the night and there went my best laid plans! On Wednesday we had been at my parents for the day as my Grandma on my dad's side was here visiting, so I was hoping that R's flu was not the one going around that took out whole families one at a time. Turned out he only threw up twice and had a fever and everyone else he came into contact with has stayed healthy. Thank God - honestly, I was praying so hard, because who wants to be sick over Christmas!
So Friday we went shopping, both R and I and he was an ANGEL! We were in and out in 2 hours and I got everything that I needed - I had a list of all the things I needed and the places I was going and we got it done. In the afternoon we picked up DH after work and he and R went to Chapters while I got the last grocery shopping I needed to done. That evening we started on the painting downstairs. And we painted Saturday afternoon while R was in napping, and after he went to bed in the evening and finished it yesterday afternoon while he napped - the painting is DONE! YEAH! My back hurts badly, but it is over - I rollered the entire basement and M edged and did the finicky work and we got it done. We are putting down the flooring this week and Dad is coming on Saturday to help hang door and put up our canopy garage that we got for Christmas from Mom and Dad and C and M. And then the basement is usable. We can move a lot of the toys downstairs and have a little sanity upstairs again. But I got ahead of myself.
On Sunday we went to church and then to my parents where we had Christmas dinner, then opened presents. I got a Snowbabies music ornament, a sweater and Corelle "Urban Black" dishes - 8 place settings. I was happy! My dishes were wedding presents - so 10 years old - and beginning to chip on the edges and they took up so much room in my cupboard. DH got the phone he was wanting and R got... well, a lot of things. I'll tell you all about them on his blog in the next few days. We went to my aunt's house for dessert and spent some time with my grandma and cousins as well as aunt and uncle there. DH, R and I stayed overnight at Mom and Dad's, DH went to work in the morning and R and I picked him up at noon.
As everything had been insane the past week, not as I planned it to happen, our house was a mess last night and I cleaned up after we got home from the Christmas Eve service. It was a bit of a later night the past several for me.
This morning we got up and R had a bottle while DH read the Christmas story, then we opened presents. DH and I only exchanged stockings as we are going to Riverdance in February. I got shower stuff from my sister-in-law and we got chocolate and money from my in-laws. It's going towards living room furniture, which I am going to look for tomorrow morning, maybe get a Boxing Day special. Mom and Dad came over in the afternoon and we all spent time together and had supper - ham, my favorite! It was a relaxing kind of Christmas Day. It was a good thing.
I realise that the last few months my blog has been a bit sporadic. I have been finding it a bit difficult to find things to write about because the things that have been most on my mind I have written about elsewhere. Two months ago today DH and I found out that we are going to be parents a second time over!

YES, WE ARE HAVING A BABY!!!!

We are so excited! The little one is to arrive on the 3rd of July, so the day before my birthday. I felt a little nauseous for weeks 5-7, but got past that. I have been insanely forgetful and scatterbrained in the past 2 months, it's quite awful for me and extremely frustrating for DH. I started a blog for this little one the day I found out, but I have it private, only I can read it, which I think I will continue for a little while yet - not ready to share it yet with anyone. DH hasn't even read it. :)
So that is our news. If you got our Christmas letter you already know, as we told in it. We are 13 weeks tomorrow, so now into the 2nd trimester. At the end of January we get the ultrasound so we can officially "meet" this little person. R calls the baby "Nemo". Another tidbit for you...
Anyways, I am starting to babble and not make sense, so I will write more another time and get myself to bed now. Again,
Have a very Merry Christmas!

My Week

This past week has been a bit of a busy one. Last week DH was home to work on the basement. It was so nice to have him here, though he was downstairs most of the time doing mudding and taping and sanding. Not too fun of a job and extremely messy - dust everywhere. I helped him clean up a few different days and the first day even though I had a mask on my nose and everything were still covered in the fine dust. On Sunday, we made it usable again - good thing as I NEEDED to do laundry and couldn't get into my laundry room as it had plastic stapled over the door. Anyways, now we got to start on the priming. Maybe we'll be done for Christmas!?!
Speaking of which, I still have not put up my Christmas decorations and I am beginning to get a little depressed about it. I look forward to Christmas and decorating every year and then it just seems to fly right by and this year will be even worse as it'll be 3 weeks less that I get to have the wonderful Christmas lights and pretty decorations. Oh well, we will be doing it this weekend, for sure!
Saturday my book club had their annual Girls Christmas Party at my neighbour C's house. It's always fun! We had a gift exchange and I, of course, gave something that had Tupperware in it. Apparently the ladies liked my gift as it was stolen (yeah, it was a "Chinese" gift exchange where you have numbers and can steal a gift twice) and then some people wanted to order some. I ended up having 6 people order things through my Christmas party, which is not bad at all! :)
Monday I had a Tupperware party at my friend K's house. Only 3 people besides the two of us showed up, but we had fun anyway - it was very casual - I did no presentation, we just talked, I have my stuff out and they could ask questions. It was an enjoyable evening, though I was out late again.
Tuesday I had A here for an hour and a half - C and I have begun a babysitting exchange. While she goes to speech therapy with J, I have A every other Tuesday a.m. and then she takes R the other two weeks. Then I took R to A's to put down for his nap and went to an appointment with DH, then back to A's for Mom's group. A cold has been making its way around our house, so I really didn't feel well in the afternoon at A's and when R and I came home I just rested. DH has the cold pretty badly.
On Wednesday, R and I went for chiro appointments, then for groceries. It took DH an hour and a half to drive home after picking up our Subaru at the dealership that only takes half an hour normally to drive home from. There was around 15 accidents on the road that DH heard about when he was driving.
Yesterday was interesting. It started off pretty normal, cleaning house and trying to get things down around here. Just before I was going to put R down, DH phoned to see if we could pick him up from the CTrain as his cold was bothering him so much he couldn't concentrate at work. We did and R fell asleep for 2 minutes in the car. When we got home, he talked and complained for an hour before I went in there. He was feeling hot and his nose was running, so I gave him Tylenol Cold and rocked him for a long while. I finally put him down and he cried - but I was the heartless mommy who let him and went to have a shower - when I got out 10 minutes later he was fast asleep and slept for 2 good hours before I went in to wake him at 5 (I was scared he wouldn't go to bed if I didn't! :) DH slept through everything from quarter to two until five! I got an hour sleep in myself - yeah! My parents came over for supper and then stayed to babysit R while DH and I went to a Friends Church Leadership Christmas party. DH is going to be doing some speaking at church and this was a way for us to get to know some of the people who are in leadership there. We felt it was pretty important that we go or we would've stayed home due to DH's cold - though after his long nap and some Tylenol he was feeling able to function. I am glad we went and I am thankful for our church. People went out of their way to introduce themselves and strike up a conversation with us. It made us both feel good as well as confirmed our decision to make Friends Church our home church. We are very thankful to God for our church and the people we have gotten to know as a result.
Well, I gotta go, I have a Tupperware order to put in this morning and I gotta get a hold of K to do it. She decided to go to Arizona for a week, so this may be fun!

After a day of Christmas baking...

On Saturday, after Christmas baking, we had 5 different kinds of goodies. C had made the Spritz cookies (the ones in the middle) before R and I even arrived. Then we made the peanut butter cookies with Hugs on top, the Orange cookies (so good!), the Cream wafers (Sandwich cookies with icing in the middle) and the gingerbread men. Looking forward to enjoying these!
Thanks C and Mom for Saturday, it was such fun!

A Child's Christmas

OK, so I have had the most comments ever on the last post (I think). Apparently we all have favorite Christmas music from our childhoods and love to reminisce about them. So, because I love music and in the interest of trying to remember more music from my childhood and where little bits of song that are floating about my head belong, please share with me your childhood favorites. Read the comments on the last post if you want to see what's all be covered and you don't have to be original - we can share favorites. Hey, I loved hearing that Mark's favorite Christmas album when he was a kid was "Sunshine and Snowflakes." It's cool when you discover you have things in common like that with someone you have known a long time or with people who are new friends.
Oh, it doesn't just have to be Christmas music - any childhood music is great.
(A big thank you to the person who can tell me what Christmas album this line came from - "What can I give to the king, Give to the one who has everything. " That's all I can remember right now, but the tune is going through my head again and again and it's all Rob's fault! Grrr! :)

Sunshine and Snowflakes

Oh, I almost forgot that I got a CD in the mail yesterday that I ordered on Tuesday from http://www.sweet-music.com/. It is a Christmas CD of kids singing called "Sunshine and Snowflakes". We had it when I was a kid and actually did it as a Christmas production when I was in grade 5 or 6 (do you remember which one, K?) I played it right away last night and knew all the words and everything. It was written/produced in 1973 and the cool thing is that it sounds "new" still. I am so happy with it! I love being able to share music I loved as a child with R. Apparently my dad found some old records of our when we were kids and our friend R works with a guy who can transfer them over to CDs, so I am going to get more of them done. Cannot wait! I'm going to bring my Sunshine and Snowflakes over to C's tomorrow so we can listen while we Christmas bake! (I'm pretty excited about Christmas baking, can you tell!?! :)