Dreams

This obviously doesn't include all my hopes and dreams, just a few of them. I should have included "I hope to become a super photoshop user", part of the reason I did this layout was to see if I could learn to put text on a circle. Mission accomplished!
 

Before and After Part Deux

When Anne was here last week helping us post surgery she knocked a couple things off of our to do list. (I really do have the BEST mother in law!) We wanted to turn the bed of gravel in front of the house into a flower bed. I started digging out the gravel, and Darrel and Anne finished the job. Anne brought her little cultivator with her and dug up the bed and added peat moss. She also dug up a garden spot for us behind the garage. This little description is somewhat false because this also involved digging out lots of quack grass and nasty weeds and then breaking up the hard ground with a shovel prior to rototillering it. So Anne/Nan/Mommie Dearest did more than her fair share of work when she was here. We were teasing her about making lists of to do items when she visits in the spring. :)

I am really excited to have beautiful flowers in front of our house next summer and have tasty vegetables growing in our own backyard. Again, many thanks to Darrel and Anne for their hard work!

 
 

Before and Halfway to After

I have had some requests for pictures of our recent home improvements. I've been hesitating as they are not finished, but I'm also anxious to show off our hardwork, so here it is, where we currently stand.
 The original kitchen, lovely fake wood panelling with copper accent handles.
 We have painted the cupboard doors with brown hammer paint. It's slightly mataellic with a dimpled finish, and pretty indestructible. Perfect for covering up beat up particle board cabinets! We have yet to paint the ends of the cabinets that need to be done in house. This paint is very fume-y so perhaps right before we leave for Calgary next weekend. Then the house can air out after. Then we are going to paint the walls and put in a new tile back splash...but at this rate that may be a spring project. :)
 The entry way as it was when we bought it, actually no, this is improved. Darrel has just finished painting the ceiling and doing a bunch of patching and sanding. You can't see it in this picture but the lower half of the entry way door is very scratched up from a large dog attacking it. (previous owners) Oh, and we've already removed the trim that they put in that was VERY poorly cut, so this really is an improved state from how we got the house.
 And the entry way as of last night. Wall paint pretty much done except a couple of touch up spots and the door painted with the hammer paint. The door turned out really good -Darrel did a great job. This weekend we may even get the trim up. Then we (by we I mean Darrel) only have to stain and cut some oak boards that the coat hangers will be mounted on. I must say I really really love my husband. This project was originally my project but he has been the driving force behind actually getting stuff done in there. You are great honey!

Here Comes Trouble

Trouble comes in many forms around here. Eric emptying drawers and Jack 'helping' me with the hose.
 
 

14 months

 

What Possesses a Child To...

Ok, sorry for this graphic post but you know if you can't share the craziness of life with small children with your friends and family who can you share it with?

Jack just came out of bed, diaper in disarray under his pajama bottoms, and carrying the third car to Eric's toy train. He dumps out some liquid from it onto the floor. I'm still not up to full speed post surgery so I'm thinking, "where'd he get the water?" Then I smell it, um no, not water, pee. Lovely. So our son who up to this point has refused to do anything with the potty but shove handfulls of toilet paper down and then flush repeatedly has now taken to peeing in other containers. We're most likely in for more of this behaviour as before we could sternly say, "NO, that's naughty, we only go pee in the potty!", we both ended up laughing. Then he thought it was hystericaly funny and was laughing as well. What can you do when faced with a 2 year old who thinks the world is his potty? It's either laugh or start weeping. It's at times like these I wish I were Catholic and could start saying alms or prayers to the saint in charge of small children... or mother's sanity. They might keep me from hyperventilating in the days/weeks/months ahead.

Zoo Night

There have been a few perks to Darrel's job with the city. One of them happened this past Friday, employee appreciation night for Community Services staff was held at the zoo. What a great family event! They provided hot dogs, hamburgers, drinks and ice cream sundaes for dessert. It is fairly amusing that the highlights of the evening for our boys had nothing to do with animals. Jack was in love with the fire trucks that were there on display (he even got to sit in one and 'drive' it), and every time he saw the little train that was giving rides his face lit up and he shouted "TRAIN". We ended the evening with a ride on the carosel, another hit with both boys. It was one of those last warm evenings as summer rolls into fall, and I'm glad we got to spend it outside together. 
 
 
 .

Alive and Kicking

Thanks to all who were thinking/praying for me today. My surgery went well, I am now back home and resting with the bliss of Tylenol 3's to keep me happy. The team at the Royal Alex were quite good to me, except for not wanting to feed me as they were worried about nausea. That was quickly remedied by a Wendy's drive thru stop on our way back home. I won't hold it to much against the nurses because while they were stingy with the food they were quite generous with the pain killers, and kept doping me up with morphine. I enjoyed the most uninterrupted sleep I've had in the last two years this afternoon, heavenly. I came through with flying colours, didn't even throw up in post-op, a first for me, and indeed a wonderful change. I passed the whisper test (the doctor whispering into my formerly defunct ear and now the apparently working ear), prior to them packing it with cotton. Next week when the packing comes out we'll be able to tell how well everything has truly turned out. This time they did do some of the work from the outside of the ear, thus making a small incision between the edge of my face and my ear. This is great for garnering extra sympathy and support. Jack gets the idea of "mommy has an owie" a lot better being able to actually see something.

I'm just waiting another 20 minutes for my next dose of happy pills then I'm off to bed. Thanks again for all of your love and concern! K

Busy

Have you ever noticed how the more things you add to your life the more efficient you become, and it seems like you accomplish more. When I only have one or two things on my plate I am a procrastinator. I am lulled by the security of only "a couple of things" to think about or do. But when I have a gazillion things I become a crazy woman, managing the minutes let alone the hours of my day. My heart rate stays up at a higher pace and my anxiety level stays elevated while I try to make sure I multi-task everything into completeness. There's positives and negatives to this. I do get a lot done but I also drive myself crazy. Right now is one of those times. I have taken on a lot, had my husband/family take on a lot, and I'm starting to think yikes, but I'm also super pleased with all the progress!

Right now we are:
-painting the entry way and back door
-painting the kitchen cupboards
-hauling away all the old wood from behind the garage
-preparing a garden spot
-digging the gravel out of the beds in the front yard and preparing to plant bulbs.
-working on no less than three contract projects (Darrel has one for Vansco, I have two for Apprenticeship, and I'm negotiating one with NAIT later this week).
-then there's our church callings: Darrel just got a second (although small) calling as the ward website coordinator.
-I have a new Beehive class presidency to train
-we attended stake leadership on Saturday

Added to all of this, I'm having ear surgery tomorrow morning and I'm starting to wonder if I'm seriously crazy, or just stupid. :)

But I do love this burst of productivity, hooray Andersons!

And one for Eric

 

So Tired!

 On Monday we met Karly, her Mom Gayle, Maddy and Luke at Ikea for some shopping and lunch. The kids had a lot of fun together. Jack was crying as we left because he wanted to spend more time with Maddy and Luke. :( He was pretty wiped out from all that excitement, he slept on the way home and then I woke him up and brought him in the house. Apparently though he was all spent because he promptly fell back asleep in the arm chair. Poor tired boy!

H2O

 Our food storage/emergency preparedness item this month is water. We got these cool jugs in a box from the Mill Woods Stake, they had some left over from one of their projects. The water has to be changed in them every six months. The beauty of the box is that they stack up to three high so you don't have to use as much floor space. It took me a good half hour to fill these 8 eight boxes, I've still got four left but I've given myself permission to do that next week. It feels good to be making progress in this area. I feel like as the individual at home full time (really the CAO or Chief Administrative Officer of our home), my "job" encompasses so many things. Regular every day feeding and care for the troops, cleaning, scheduling maintenance like oil changes and furnace cleaning, disaster and emergency preparedness, procurement, nursing, and the list goes on and on. I do quite enjoy these little tasks/chores when I feel like I can tackle them one piece at a time, rather than stressing about having it all done right now. And since we aren't fabulously wealthy food storage has to be budgeted and purchased gradually so I can take on one piece, complete it and then move on.

Morbid Thoughts

 Do you ever wonder what will happen to your kids if both you and your spouse die? I do at times. Aside from the practical, (who are their guardians etc.) I sometimes wonder if anyone else will know how to show them the love that we've created. Who else would know that Jack loves to have his back rubbed at bed time while I sing three special songs to him and that he asks for them in a particular order, "Beam, Star, Child of God". Who else knows that Eric goes bananas when I pretend to be a puppy and lick his cheek. It's these little nurturing parts of motherhood that truly give you satisfaction and you hope that they make an impression on your children. You hope that you've stamped yourself on to them, their memories, their souls, with your love.

yeah, so I'm getting teary. No more thoughts of dying!! But it's also just nice to document the little things that make this Jack our Jack.

Independent

 Jack is becoming more and more independent lately, and he's willing to tell us if something is not how he thinks it should be. The positive side of this is when he excitedly tells us, "me did it" or declares "me running" as he races down the sidewalk. Yesterday as we were doing a puzzle together he took apart some of the pieces and said to me, "that's not right" with a very concerned look. It was pretty cute.

The more challenging times are when he says, "move Mommy!", "don't like it" (he picked that up on our trip), or the ever present "NO!". Even when he's being *mouthy* I love how chatty he's becoming. It's always fun to see what he's going to say next. What a boy!

Beach

 One of the things I miss most about the Okanagan is going to the beach. It's fun to take the boys and introduce them to the pleasure of cool lake water, a sandy bottom and dazzling sunlight. Love it!

Home Again Home Again

We're back home after a 13 hour day on the road. It seems we picked the best week ever to be gone from home. They paved the street in front of our house and we would have had to park 3 blocks away for three days while the work was going on. Not so fun with kids. We are so excited for our new, smooth, non pothole riddled road!!

We had a really nice time my family, our thanks for taking care of us so well.
We went to the best fish and chips place in Enderby with Mom and Dad. In fact it was called, "BC's Best", how could you go wrong with a name like that? My face looks like I'm grimacing, I think the sun was in my eyes, it certainly wasn't the food or the company!


Eric loved my parent's dog, Emma. She is very nice, quite gentle. He would drop bits of food of his high chair for her. Emma knew that if Eric started saying uh-oh she should come running for snack time too!


We had a fun time at the beach with Aaron, Amanda, Madison and Graham. Aaron and Amanda brought all the beach toys and entertained the kids.

My Mom and Dad can't stop finding toys for the kids at thrift stores and garage sales. This is the boys playing on the musical pony, very very popular! (Hmmm, videos aren't downloading off my camera...will have to add this later.)

I also had a really great time at Rhonda's wedding. It was so nice to see her so happy, radiant and in love. Also good to hang with the girls before and after the wedding. Rhonda, a slight smirk on her face, could be because she was having photos taken with her grandma.





Marta and I. She looked really fabulous in that green silk dress. will miss this girl when she jaunts off to Scotland next week.





The wedding party, they looked so nice in the sunset light. This was a lesson in shoe wearability. It is a miracle that neither Marta or Jess broke their neck trying to walk on those rocks. All in all a beautiful wedding and a fun time with friends. I wish all the best to Rhonda and Joe as they start their new life together.