Paint-o-rama

After living in an all tan/beige house Darrel and I are ready for some COLOUR in our lives. We are painting the master bedroom and the bedroom that will be our home office before moving in. In both rooms three walls will be the neutral creamy beige colour. In the bedroom the red will go on the wall behind our headboard and the yellow is going in the office, on a yet to be determined wall or possibly wallS.

Part of me wants to paint everything before we move in, but that's the part that forgets how much work it is and doesn't acknowledge that we have two children under the age of two. So, moderation in all things is perhaps the better course of action. Besides, better save some of the fun for another time right?

  

A couple of pictures of my babies. Jack is at that stage where he is sort of little boy but still baby yet. As is evident by the sippy cup dangling from his mouth juxtaposed with the rough and tumble tonka truck play and his desire to fill Darrel's big shoes.

Eric has mastered sleeping with one eye open, sometimes I think of him as my little lizard as he is so good at this. I caught him smiling in his sleep the other day. Honestly this baby sleeps sooo much, it is fantastic. Such an easy going little guy. I am blessed.

 
  

Another Great New Product

When my muffin pan needed to be replaced I purchased these silicone ones. They are FANTASTIC!! You don't have to use muffin liners or grease the pan and the muffins still pop right out. You never have to worry about scratching the non-stick finish. Best of all you just toss them in the dishwasher and they come out completely clean. Sigh, they make me happy.

Finally Caught It!

Eric has been smiling for about 2.5 weeks, but his little grin disappeared every time I ran to get the camera. Today however I was sneaky. Knowing how much he loves to smile at himself in the chrome razor plug cover I brought the camera along for a diaper change. What a cutie!

  

How I Feel

Life is a good , but I am also frustrated. At points I feel like I'm putting in time but not really enjoying myself. This bothers me on a number of levels.

1. I live in one of the wealthiest countries in the world, I have more than enough to eat, and more clothes than I could wear in weeks, I have an education, we own two vehicles and a computer, nevermind central heating, I'm married to a good man and I have two healthy, precious boys -compared to many in the world my life is luxurious and full of blessings.

2. I really do believe life is about choices and what you personally decide to make of it -so I should just decide to get on with living and make the most of it.

3. Is my unhappiness, well really more like a lack of satisfaction, something that can be solved? In one form or another I feel like I've struggled with this my whole life. WHAT THE HECK IS MY PROBLEM!?

Hmmm -sorry this wasn't supposed to be a downer post...the layout really is about the little things I can do to keep my spirits UP. Well. I feel like I'm being too honest in a public forum, but on the other hand maybe being "real" will produce its own kind of satisfaction.


  

A Good Quote

Saw this quote recently, and laughed to myself.

I like long walks, especially when they are taken by people who annoy me.
- Noel Coward

Amen!

Bath Time for Jack

Jack has always loved bath time, even as an infant. All I have to say is bath time or tub time and he starts toodling down the hall and hanging on the edge of the tub.

  

Only a Week Ago

 

These photos are all from last Sunday, it seems like a life time ago with the sudden temperature plunge. Now we are all bundling up before we leave the house. Sweater and coat weather is here!

 

You can see some of Darrel's garage sale finds in these pictures. The tonka truck and the tricycle were $2 and $2.65 respectively. Come to think of it the bike trailer is a garage sale find from last summer. Darrel does have pretty good garage sale luck!

  

Our House

Darrel made this funky model of the interior of our house with Google Sketch Up. As you can see the closets are not in the bedrooms, but overall it is a pretty accurate mock up.

The fuschia room is the master bedroom, the light green is the main bathroom.

The closed off area at the back left corner is the back entrance, there are split stairs, going up to the kitchen and then going down to the basement. We are both getting pretty excited about moving in. 15 days to go. A lot of our conversations lately are about how we want things set up or decorated.

An Uneventful Month

Not the most exciting month of Eric's life as you can see as I'm putting in things like "Mom and Dad bought the house in Bon Accord" but how do you write a timeline about an individual who mostly sleeps at this point.

  

Postpartum???

So, I've been feeling a little blue the past week. Perhaps a touch post-partum. Eric will be 8 weeks old on Saturday, and I feel like my hormones have tanked. Darrel and I were talking last night though and I think that there's other factors at play. Mostly I think that we're in this apartment, and it doesn't have a lot of light. The windows go down quite low to the ground, so I don't like leaving the blinds open because I feel exposed to the world, hence it's quite dark. I leave the living room ones open but there's a large overhang in the front and it's on the east side so in the afternoon there's just not that much sun. Plus, I feel like life is on hold. We are waiting to move into the house, and waiting to paint and figure out what has to be done. I don't feel like putting in the effort to get to know people here when I'm moving in a month...and I'll be an hour away. So I'm feeling a little isolated, and light deprived, compounded with the hormone dive I'd say it's explainable. But today was better, hooray. I am starting to learn the trick of how to get Jack to nap during the day. He's been napping a good 1.5 hours every afternoon this week, without me driving him around, so yay for me! And while getting things crossed off my chore list does make me feel good I'm not beating myself up over what doesn't get done. So hopefully we can all stay positive here. As a treat for myself I ordered the West Wing Season 5 DVDs, I'm quite excited!! Man I love that show. It really is ER for political junkies. Even after season 4 when the got different writers and it wasn't as snappy, I still love it. Sigh, and it's over. Oh well, all good tv series must come to an end right? We have decided not to get cable when we move. Having it these past three months has made us realize how little we need it. We hadn't had it since we bought the house in Winnipeg and we both prefer not having it. Don't get me wrong, I quite enjoy TLC and HGTV, but life won't end without them, I'll probably not waste so much time, and do more reading. However, we will be getting high speed internet. I honestly don't know how people live without the internet! I use it ALL THE TIME. So there you go, some people probably think that's crazy, calling internet a necessity, so to each their own.

My other focus lately has been on food storage. I've been trying to buy extra every time I grocery shop and figure out what we need for emergency supplies (medecine, bandages, water etc.) Our prophet has counseled us that we should have two years of food supply, and hopefully we will never need it, but if that day comes I will feel stupid if I don't have anything as we've been warned repeatedly. I haven't wanted to amass large amounts until after we move, why move it twice, but I've been price comparing and figuring out what we need. If any of you are interested you can find guidelines on amounts and how to store food at this website, Provident Living.

Church in the Fort

We went to church in our new ward this Sunday, just to check it out. It's a small ward in Fort Saskatchewan. People seemed super friendly and nice and excited that a new family was moving into the ward. Kjersti Erickson, who I knew from Lethbridge days is actually in that ward as well. She teaches in Redwater, another little town to the north. It was so nice to see a familiar face. The primary president already asked if I played the piano. :) seems like every ward in the church is short piano players.

Jack and Darrel just got back from a bike ride, only the second time the bike trailer has made it out this summer, but next summer I hope to take the boys out a lot.

Eric is growing a lot, he seems to look different every day.

Well, guess I better wrangle up some food to feed these guys.

  

Random Thursday Thoughts

So, a couple of observations for today's post.

1. Someone sent this link to Darrel, thinking, hahaha, what a crazy idea. Yeah well, this Mom would gladly pay money to have something like this product.

The Baby Keeper

Basically it keeps your kids wrangled while you use a public restroom. Any Mom has struggled with this problem, what to do what to do with your active toddler while you use the washroom. Unless there's a huge handicapped stall, you can't fit your stroller in and take them with you, you can't leave them outside as some crazy will snatch them, and you sure don't want them to catch typhoid by licking the floor in the stall or some other crazy thing. (For those without kids you think I'm joking, ha, if only I were. I am continually appalled by the things Jack will put his tongue on.) So sign me up, I'll buy it.

2. Drive through done right!
The people at Starbucks sure know how to treat someone. I used to wonder at the popularity of Starbucks, but I totally get it now. I pop through about once a week on my morning "put Jack to nap" drive. They are always happy, quick, pleasant, and full of wishes for a great day, and the thing is they sound like the really mean it. They make me happy at 10:30 am, and I'm only buying steamed milk. Imagine what they do for the poor coffee drinking soul at 7:00 am! A powerful hit of caffeine, and a bright perky barista who knows your name -a recipe for success.

Summer Winding Down

I really do not want summer to end, yet I am looking forward to things that are to come, like moving into our house, painting and decorating it, hallowe'en and pumpkin carving, visits from family and leaves changing colour.

Darrel's birthday this weekend, it was fairly low key. It did make me think about how much I appreciate him and all that he does for us. I know he tries really hard to be the best he can. And as we were shooting off homemade water rockets yesterday I thougt to myself that he definitely is unique as well as "Handy AND Handsome". I'm a lucky girl.