My dare devil

Well, Just a quickie to let everyone know we had a pretty good weekend.
Our plan was to, at some point, get the kids out sledding.  It is entirely pathetic that Jesse has yet to go sliding.  He really only started enjoying snow this year, and the temperatures have just been so cold or stormy on the weekends, or the kids were sick, or we had plans.... BUt finally a decent weather weekend lined up with a bit of free time.

Sunday after naps, we decided just Dave would take Jesse.  Janna and Robyn were just waking up from naps, and I needed to make supper.  Jesse was all geared up, and the boys went to a hill just a 5 minute walk away.

Well, JEsse is my sensitive soul!  And he is incredibly cautious.  So, apparently Dave had to stick him on the sled and push him down by himself, as Jesse was humming and hawing over making the plunge.  No tears or anything.  He said it was fun, but then said he had his own idea after this for going down the hill.

SO, for the next half hour, Jesse scooted down the hill inch by inch on his butt.  No sled needed.  Dave said it would take him like 5 minutes(beaming!) and then he would climb back up and do it again.

Here are some shots of the turkey!

What a nut!  We'll have to attempt this again with all 3, and maybe Janna's daring spirit and glee will inspire him to do some more "real" sledding.   Thanks for reading! I'm Out:)

Family Day Weekend

I spent  Friday on an emotional roller coaster for no apparent reason..... Every little thing kept making me cry?!   I missed my mom and dad and brothers so much that we seriously considered driving through the night to Fredericton on Friday night to spend 2 days with them, then turn around and come back on Monday.  I think my hormones are doing something weird right now...... I'll keep you posted on that....

Anyways, I am happy to report that I had a super fantastic and much needed weekend without any tears!  Dave watched the kids first thing in the morning on Saturday so I could get some fresh air and space.   SO, I did the groceries, and gassed up, and some odd errands as well.  Then I had a good half hour left of time to go to Tims and sip on a coffee all by myself. I just enjoyed being unattached to anything or anyone without anything to do for a bit.  I felt like I was living a lie a bit!  By the weekends, I find myself really needing some time away from the house to recharge and come home a better mommy.   And after my morning out, I came home refreshed and in a good place.

 I took over the kids and lunch while Dave tackled some light school work, and decided to try switching a few pieces of furniture around with them to put in the last hour before naps.  Growing up, I was one of those kids who switched the set up of my room every month, and would also convince my parents to let me re-arrange their cupboards or furniture as well.  I just really like change in these ways!  Anyways, it had been almost a few months since I'd moved anything around the house, and so I started switching some stuff around.  One thing led to another, and I kept trying new things.... put the kids to bed....tried some more things.... Dave finished up his marking, and helped me move around stuff to try more things....kids woke up and we left them playing in their rooms while we tried more things... FINALLY, I got what I wanted!  We currently have our dining room turned into a little play room, and our dining room table in with the living room.  I like it!

Jesse was very excited to have supper “in da living room?!” shortly after, and when the kids went down for bed, Dave and I went out for a date.  We had a gift card one of 5 restaurants.  Perhaps we should have made reservations knowing it was the weekend following Valentines.  But, we hit up Milestones and were disaspointed when we heard it would be over an hour wait.  Time out without the kids is precious, and I didn’t want to spend it CRAMMED in a loud bar waiting for a table.   So, we decided to check out Montana’s (also a choice with our gift card)  which was directly next door.  They also had a crazy wait time.  We hopped in the van, and drove to a different Montana’s that rarely seems to have a long wait, and agreed we could wait the 15 minutes they said it would be.  Like, 2 minutes later, we were called, and our date night was saved.  We ate a ton of yummy food and chatted away, just like we were young’uns again J

Sunday was busy just getting everyone ready and out the door for church on time, but we made it only a few minutes late.  We joined a ton of friends and their families for lunch afterwards, and the kids were very good considering we pushed them almost 2 hours past their normal nap time.   They crashed when we got home, and when they woke we put on a newly rented film: Ratatouille?  Jesse loved it, and we had just enough time to eat and get the kids down for bed at a decent hour.  Oh 8:00, how I love thee.

Today is Family Day in Ontario, so Dave had the day off.  Our plan was originally to get the kids out sliding on a good nearby hill, but there was CRAZY wind chill today, so we hung around the house all morning enjoying our new set up.  We dug out some new coloring sheets, and also some pieces to Jesse’s train tracks we had stored away, and the kids were great just playing quietly on the floor with us. 

After naps, however, we were all itching to get out.  Not a whole lot was open that didn’t involve spending money.  We decided on Tim Hortons.  Usually the kids and I will just share a 10 pack of timbits, but today I let them each have a whole donut.  They were pretty stoked.  

Afterwards, we let them run off their sugar high at the gym for a while before coming home for supper. We had another new recipe for supper: Sweet potato and green bean  dish with a chicken and sauce.  It was pretty good!  We tried to Skype Dave’s parents with the kids before bed...But Robyn was needing to nurse and go to bed, and Janna was wanting to climb on me, and Jesse kept popping in and out of the picture, and so it was certainly a less successful chat than I’d hoped for. Oh well, what can ya do?

The night is still young...and Dave and I have a bag of Doritos we’ve been saving to pair with an episode of Friday night lights.  SO, I must be on my way.  Thanks for reading. I’m out!

Ps.  The night is really not actually young.  9:00 is pretty close to retirement for us ;)

   

balentimes week

Tis’ the conclusion of Valentines week for us.  I do realize, that it is actually only one day,  but I like to spread out fun holidays!   I really like the smaller holidays: vday/st. Patricks/easter/ that kinda thing...  Don’t get me wrong, birthdays and Christmas are wonderful!  But, as a parent, I find kids can kind of crash during these immense days of gift giving and tradition pushing J  Smaller holidays, aren’t stressful or pricey, and I’ve enjoyed doing little things all week to celebrate.

We kicked off the week stickering and folding cards for all of Jesse’s buds... each day we incorporated hearts or red things into our meals, clothing, and crafts.  I had a stack of valentines’ books to pull out for the week, but it just hit me now, that I forgot! 

Anyways, when the day arrived, Jesse was so excited as we’d been “building up” to the day.  He was totally psyched with his window stickers in the morning!  We got out to a friends for a playdate, and we all enjoyed the bright streamers and paper chains that decorated the Potter’s house.  Jesse enjoyed giving a spongebob valentine to pretty much everyone he saw that day.  Newborns, adults and Cooper included! 

We had pancakes as a special supper, and gave the kids a chocolate marshmallow heart for dessert.   Jesse kept saying all day, “This is the best balentimes day ever!”  And everything we encountered was, “And this is my balentimes day breakfast...and my balentimes day lego time...and my balentimes day van ride...”  And when he let out a monster fart at the table, “Oh Mommy! That is my balentimes day toot!”  What a boy.   Janna and Robyn, of course, just went with the flow.  They had some special bonding time after Jesse went to bed J

Dave and I are celebrating this weekend.  We have a few restaurant gift cards, and so Katie is gonna hang around the house one night  after the kids go to bed sometime in the next few days, so we can get out for dinner.  Pretty much my favorite thing.  Quality time and food!    Dave did make me a very nice card, though...and that was just great for me.  I know I’m loved. 

Today, though, I think the kids and I will conclude the Vday activities with making some pink peppermint playdough.  A friend posted the recipe she had made with her kids, and I wanna try it out.  We’ll see how the rest of the day goes... I d o have lots to do around the house, including a new recipe for supper.   I will be attacking cider glazed pork chops with creamy herbed polenta tonight....

I have really been enjoying making one new recipe per week!  We’ve had lots of different yummy things...most of them out of my Canadian living or chatelaine magazines.   Keeps dinner time interesting, but not too pricey or too much work with just tackling one new recipe per week.  I’m a big sale shopper and try to plan affordable gluten free meals based on what’s on sale... and so sometimes things get feeling boring.  This has been keeping things a bit fresh and fun.  I’ve also decided to try one new kiddie lunch thing per week- Gluten FULL – as I also find we can get into the same rut of a handful of the same things all the time.  Today, I made pizza muffins?!  They had little bits of cheese, pepperoni and red peppers in a muffinish/pizza crustish batter, and then you could top em with whatever... I REALLY loved them.  The kids just found them ok.  They both picked away at them..but probably only ate 1 of the 2 I gave them...  Here they are with the recipe before hitting up the oven:

Anyways, kids are up. Gotta run. Thanks for reading. I’m out!

Happy 3 monthday to Robyn and happy siblings

Where has the time gone?!  Robyn is 3 months old today.  I think 3 months has got to be one of the cutest ages.  Still so tiny and cuddly, but learning how to make lots of cute facial expressions and noises.  Here she is a few days ago... I was trying to get a smile out of her to send a card for my dad’s birthday... but she was very hungry, and just kept making funny noises and  faces trying to communicate that to me!

However, first thing in the morning or after a nap, she is all grins!  I took my camera in to her room this morning at 6:30 to get a few bright and early shots.  I didn’t have to do a thing to get these, just walked into her room and looked at her.

It's pretty crazy, in that Robyn is wearing all the same outfits that Janna sported at one year!  She is in 3-6 months stuff...so it's not that she is huge...she is just average, and Janna was such a wee little thing.  

Janna is also full of "silent cheer" this morning.  Janna has very little voice, as she continues to take random screaming fits over the sound of the plows.  Luckily, it’s been less at night time these days, and more during naps.... which I can deal with much better.  Anyways, this morning, she found a hat I had left outta the closet, and it has inspired giddiness in her!  It was knit by Nana, and is just the cutest thing!  Here she is running around. 

She also wants to show the camera that her nails are painted just like mine!  Well, they were....they are mostly chipped now....

Jesse has been reading my chatelaine magazine all morning long.  He is fascinated by the fact that there are so many ideas in it- and not just one story.  He will examine a page, and then flip it around and ask me what it’s about. “ Well, Jesse, that is an idea for an outfit.. It’s something mommy could wear...and it tells me how much it costs and where to buy the different things..”  Jesse then asks me how much it costs, where would I buy it?  Do I like it?   The section on food was the funniest..” What is this about? How do you make it?  That sounds like a BAD idea for supper, mommy...”  At one point he beams,            “ Mom! This page is about make-up, I think!  Do you like that make-up?”     Kind funny.  As I was snapping pictures of Janna, he asked me to take a picture of him on his current magazine page.  He told me this looked really good...

So, just wanted to check in.  Things are going well, here.  Kids are still all healthy, Dave and I had ANOTHER school night, Date night, and the weather is warming up a bit.  I’m crossing my fingers spring comes early, but trying to enjoy the little treasures winter holds.  Valentine ’s Day is tomorrow, and Jesse is very excited about it, so we’ll try and make it special for him.   Perhaps I will post tomorrow about our day?  Well, that’s all for now,   thanks for reading, I’m out. 

sleep schedules, Dave's job, and cobwebs

Well, I claimed Febraury to be the month of redemption for the pathetic and sick January we experienced.  So far so good.  Everyone is healthy and happy, especially my little roly- poly- Robyn.  I have been lucky that Robyn continues to sustain a great sleep pattern and habits.  She still pulls out an 8 hour stretch right off the bat at night, and a few times a week makes it right until 5 or 6 am for me. 

The downside of this “early awesome sleeper”, seems to be that she is also “early” in needing her crib to sleep.  She is no longer very portable while she sleeps.  She fights hard to stay awake in the car, but will often fall asleep if she is really tired.  However, as soon as I stop and start jostling around the car seat, she wakes up wanting to see the world and what is going on.  Even if I take her out of the car seat and see if she’ll pass out in a sling or if I soothe her, she is just too interested in what is going on around her.  So, we are sort of stuck in the house for a good chunk of the morning and afternoon. There are 2 opportunities we have to get out.  One is right after her morning nap for the hour before lunch time, or right after her afternoon nap (the hour before supper).  These are tricky times as in the morning the other kids are hungry and getting tired for their naps.  And in the afternoon, I’m trying to make supper and get things ready for Dave’s arrival home. 

So, any outings we have are brief:  a trip to the grocery store for just a few ingredients, a power- play date, a drive to do some banking and then pick up Dave from school, that sort of thing.  Which is fine with me, actually.   It is hard managing the 3 of them in public for too long!  More often than not, though, I have been asking people to come over here to hang out.  That way, Robyn can sleep, and the kids can get longer visits in with friends.  I really appreciate people coming to hang out at my place these days.   Life feels a bit slower with spending more time around the house, and much time nursing, but still full of life.

The nice thing about nursing Robyn and slowing down these days, is the chance to watch my kids play on their own.  Previously, I was either doing my own work and asking them to play by themselves, OR right on the floor playing with them.  When I nurse Robyn, I snuggle on my favorite chair near the toy corner.  The kids realize I’m busy and don’t bother me for things or to play, but often will play with toys near my feet.  I just sit there and watch their little eyes and brains light up while I feed the baby, and it’s really nice.   They can be totally whiney and seemingly needy for attention while I’m doing work in another room over, but just having me there keeping an eye on them, often seems to satisfy their need.

I’m reading a really interesting book called the 5 love languages of children.  It’s co written by the author who wrote the popular one on love languages in marriage.  It talks about identifying what ways make your child FEEL most loved. We all love our kids and often express it to them in the way that would make US feel loved, but often a parent and a child speak a different love language.  Do you know yours and your mates?  I am a physical touch and quality time person.   Dave is most definitely words of affirmation.  There is also acts of service, and gifts.   The book has been reminding me of how important it is to “fill up their tanks” with their love language so that they can be at their best.  

Anyways, it’s been really enlightening in certain ways, and a great refresher of simple things as well.

 The other thing that has been really exciting is my life is SEMSETER 2!  So, this is Dave’s fourth year of teaching.  We heard that by year 5 you have your stride and things are much easier, and we’re finally feeling that light at the end of the tunnel with this new semester.

I heard several people talk about year one of teaching being very hard.  Many people likened it to hell.  Well, it was certainly a challenging year for Dave.  Having to prepare units and lessons from scratch for HOURS every night, along with the endless marking involved in his subjects took up ALL OF HIS TIME!  Add in the stress of trying to figure out his teaching style and finding his groove with the school and extra-curricular activities, it was pure NON ENDING WORK!  This was the year we just had Jesse as well, and I was adjusting to mommy-hood and sleep deprivation.  The whole thing is a bit of a blur.  My most vivid memories are the times Dave would come home and start researching other career options: could he go to school for a year and be a librarian?  OR do tech support?  Maybe he could get a job with OC transpo??  He even considered one day, calling back the church to see if he could get back his part time custodian job....Oh how we longed for time together.  Dave longed for doing something either than school for  16 hours  (literally) of his day.

Year 2 was a bit better than the first.  However, he switched from teaching mostly history to mostly English.  So, it was still hours and hours of work for all new courses.  I think that year he talked about getting his doctorate and switching to teaching “more interested” university students.  We considered moving back to the Maritimes and crashing with our parents while he found different work.... However, we both thought that if he could stick it out a few years, he would love it and be great at it.

Last year, year 3, Dave had mostly the same courses.  He went from  16 hours of work a day to maybe 12?  It was still a lot with now having 2 kids, and less sleep and all that jazz.  He worked hard to take the lessons he’d already thrown together and make them better and more useable and all planned out for the future.  I think he only had a few days of considering alternate work that year.  Teaching missionaries kids in Africa was something he’d bring up.  Or teaching younger kids with less prep work up north all came across the computer screen a few times.  

This year, Dave has not had ANY “Let’s switch career days.”  He had a few courses last semester that he continued to work many hours tweaking so that he felt good about his material.  He also spent lots of time developing some new units within his courses....but nothing that had him up all night (aside from a few days nearing the end of exams)  This semester he is doing courses that he has been teaching since year 1 and 2, and so he has lots of practice teaching them, and is happy with the lessons he has from the past.  He can literally just review what he needs to do for tomorrow, and make some photo-copies and go! 

I really have felt this extreme shift in our lives just this week.  Dave took Monday night off entirely for his small group, and then last night he told me we were having a date night at home with some wings and Friday Night Lights.  He left all his lap top at school even!  We have not watched a show together in months, and on a school night?!  It was incredible.  I forgot how much I liked this guy and spending time with him DAILY!  I had gotten used to spending time with just him on Sunday nights.

I’m so happy for him right now.  All his hard work is paying off, and some much needed time to himself and for us, is currently possible!  Now, he is a perfectionist, AND he believes in continued learning and education.  So, he will definitely be tweaking his courses as he can, and there is tons of marking and extracurricular work to be done.  But, I think it’s something that will take just an hour or so nightly, not the whole evening.  So excited for him!!!  I am also so proud that he stuck it out!  I don’t think I could have...

I’m also excited for myself.  Getting more time to spend with him, but also a little more help around the house.   Dave works so hard, that I hate to ask him to do much around the house as he has so little time to himself.   But, this week, Dave, on his own accord, replaced the 8 burned out bulbs that we’ve been missing around the house the past few weeks. 

Actually, my initial reaction was “thank you- but can you please turn around and replace all those with like  40 watt bulbs instead of standard ones??!!!”  You see- we’ve been without hallway lights for a while now...and before that, some of the bulbs were burned out inside so the intensity was way less.  Once he put in these new beasts, I could SEE ALL THE DIRT AND DUST that was previously hiding in the shadows.  Oh my...the cobwebs, and dust, and grimy fingerprints along the walls.  It was enough to make me keep the lights off for a few days until I had time to tackle it.  I cleaned up the hallways today while the kids were sleeping, and now I can use lights again!

I always think of my good buddy, Leah.  I nannied her kids for a year, and they had a glass table at their house where the kids did most of their eating.  All her friends always commented on how brave she was to have that table with the 2 young kids, as you could See every spec k of dirt and grime so clearly.  She would always say that she liked the glass table because she COULD SEE everything that was there, and therefore, clean it properly.  You wouldn’t imagine the amount of food and slime and dirt that gets caked on the BOTTOM of your table from toddlers.... If you don’t regularly clean there, you might want to check that out.   Although...maybe you don’t.

Anyways, enough of my rambling for now.  Thanks for reading, I’m out.

longing for Sunday sunday....

SO... growing up we very rarely had dessert.  It was a once in a while very special sort of thing.  However, when marrying Dave, I realized that some people have dessert every night!  Well, I’m not huge into baking- let alone working with gluten-free finicky flours...but I do try to bake him something every few weeks as his love language really is words of affirmation tied with food!

Then, I realized that finicky 2 year olds do much better eating their supper if there is dessert at the end.   So, I don’t go crazy with this, but try and have something sweet at the end of the meal.  Sometimes it’s a cookie, but more often it is some fruit, or a few chocolate chips, or a big marshmallow.

So...you can understand the excitement when we started adopted “Sunday Sunday” as a new tradition in the new year.  The kids have been overjoyed to get to make their own Sundays after supper on Sunday nights.   The chocolate, fruit, nuts, and SPRINKLES all on top of ice cream... they are in heaven.

Well, tonight Jesse suggested we have Sundays.  I told him those were a special thing for Sunday, and that I didn’t have the ingredients.  “Ok,”  he replied, “ We can just have plain ice-cream then.”   When I told him we were out, he assured me I was forgiven and told me that some chocolate would be just fine.  I told him that we didn’t have any chocolate sauce either.  He resorted to,  “How about some bananas?”   We were actually out of bananas, and he sighed and told me he would go and find something for dessert.  He stormed into the kitchen and I heard him poking through the fridge and cupboards,    “Sprinkles, Mom!!!  We can have sprinkles for dessert!!!!”  I told Jesse that sprinkles were not really something to eat on their own, and he sighed and went back into the kitchen.  “I know mom!  We have cantalow (cantaloupe)!  I would love some sprinkles on canatalow for dessert”

So, because I love my boy, we made some sprinkled cantaloupe for dessert.  (Dave and I opted out of adding the sprinkles on ours!)  That’s all for now.  Gotta run.  Thanks for reading.  I’m out.