113-2011

My quilt is FINISHED!!!

I stayed up late last night and finished the binding by hand (I can’t imagine when they had to make the entire quilt by hand!) then I threw it in the washer first thing this morning to give it that “crinkled” quilt-look. Ahhh…

I was so relieved to have it done! I have always wanted to make a quilt- since I was a little girl, and my great-aunt made me one and sent it to me. I’m already planning my next one. Now, I know a whole bunch of things that I WON’T do! :) I wouldn’t want anyone to look at it up close- but hey, it’s my first attempt…

My only problem is, I don’t know where I’m going to put it! I tried it as a throw on the couch, but it just really doesn’t look right with our current wall colour. Maybe after we paint in the summer? Maybe on a girl’s bed? I had planned to make it queen size, but it doesn’t quite drape over the bed like it should.

 

And a picture of the back, just for fun…

I wanted something that would POP and hide stains… ha! Hiding stains, is a must in this house!

Woo… going to cross “Make a quilt” off my bucket list!

112-2011

Forgive the crummy quality- that’s all I’ve got.

On another note- you may not be able to see Keona’s face, but you sure can’t miss her bag! She was trampling over little people to get that chocolate!

We gave Jeddy and Ella, a 30 second head start. Plus, we purposely put some stuff down at their level so they could find it right away.

The last place prize goes to… Eve!

Notice the pout? Ha! Her sisters just kept beating her to everything! Though after this picture, she found a stash of eggs behind a picture frame!

I counted the big eggs and lifesavers, but I have a feeling we may still find some little chocolate eggs hiding here and there.

 

We relaxed the rest of today. Like, stayed in pyjamas, watched movies, played games, and ordered food.

It was the perfect day off!

111-2011

Easter Egg Hunt 2011

Sponsored by Grandma

 

Scott and I had serious trouble not eating all this loot while we were hiding it! I’m pretty sure he stashed quite a bit in his pockets…

I got to go out for dinner tonight with my Mom and my sister. We didn’t embarrass her and have them come sing to her or anything- we just enjoyed a nice dinner and chat together. It was a nice reminder of old times.  :) Just as we were finishing dinner, Scott called to remind me to pick up some Easter eggs while I was out. Oh yeah, it’s Easter weekend! After we dropped my sister off at her place, we went to Shoppers on the way home. We usually just do eggs, but I decided to throw some different prizes in there this year to surprise them. Then my Mom decided to grab Lifesavers cause ‘the girls could put them in their purses’- then we saw white chocolate bunnies, and Cookies and Cream eggs!… Then, my Mom decided that she was paying for all of it because she didn’t know what to get the kids for Easter anyways. Scott and I are placing bets on who will find the most.least tomorrow! Keona destroyed them all last year…

 

Had a great night out with you, Mom! Love ya.

110-2011

Why do the boys get all the lashes?

 

Tonight, the kids choir sang in church- they did a great job. All I could hear was Eve, but I’m sure the rest of them were singing too. :) After church, the adult choir had to practice their Easter musical, so I took all the kids to Tim Horton’s. Several of us had Boston Cream donuts… Mmmm… The kids, love their fruit smoothies- I’m not such a big fan. Maybe in the summer when it’s hotter outside?

Anyhow, Elijah has this problem- where he can’t admit it when he’s fallen asleep. He could have been asleep the entire hour long drive home from church, drool running down his chin, and he will INSIST that he was just resting his eyes. He really believes it too! So tonight, when I went in to take a picture, he woke up. I said, “It’s OK just go back to sleep, hun.”

His reply, “Oh, I wasn’t sleeping!”

Me: “Yes, you were, bud. You were snoring.”

Him: “Well, if I fell asleep then what time is it?”

(It was really about 9:30pm- he had only been asleep for about 10 minutes)

Me: “It’s past midnight! You’ve been asleep for a loooong time.”

Him: “Oh… No it isn’t. Really?! I guess I was asleep…”

I’ll tell him the truth in the morning. Then, he’ll tell me that he was just resting his eyes.

109-2011

“Mom, can I please do school during Ella’s naptime? Cause I just really want to play with her this mornin’…”

 

How could I say no to that?

108-2011

Photo courtesy of Scott

 

It’s better than the one before where he focused on the couch in the background. :)

 

Today, I forgot that I was supposed to pick my brother up after school.

Thankfully, my Mom called and reminded me before it was too late.

Elijah’s lowest test score today, was 97%. He got 100’s on the rest.

We didn’t lock him in the van when we got home.

Keona is more than halfway done her first blanket that she is crocheting.

Watching Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy with the kids, has become a nightly event.

I remember being amazed by how smart my mom was when I used to watch Jeopardy with her as a kid.

Scott barbequed steak for dinner.

I’m actually enjoying the hockey playoffs.

Ella, changer her outfit atleast 10 times today.

She left every single piece of clothing, on her bedroom floor.

I fell asleep on the couch, during the hockey playoffs that I’m enjoying so much.

 

And… that’s about it for my Monday randomness!

107-2011

Today, we left our house at about 8am, and it was sunny out. I thought we had a nice day in store. None of the girls wore tights. The boys, just wore sweaters. We stopped for breakfast, and it was getting kind of windy. Then, we thought that we saw a few snowflakes. It couldn’t snow, right? Halfway to church, it started to drizzle. The drizzle, turned into a downpour. The downpour, turned into snow, which turned into a blizzard on the highway! Around lunch time, all that snow, turned into hail. This whole time, my girls were walking around with bare legs. Oh, and I forgot to mention the wind! It tried to blow Eve away on her walk to the van Sunday night. (pictured above)

Come on, summer!

106-2011

It was our monthly visit at the senior’s home this Saturday. We got there and we were setting everything up, as one of the workers came in and said, “Oh! I better go tell Ernie that you guys are here. He said he wasn’t coming down unless it was your family!”

This man, is such a sweetheart. Usually he brings down some sort of candy for the kids. Ella and Jeddy, are his best buddies. This week, he didn’t have any candy, so he brought down his change jars and counted out 7 equal piles of change for the kids. He gave them 35 cents each. Jed, right away wanted to know what he could buy with his money. I thought about it for a second, and then said, “How about timbits!?” He liked the idea. Ernie laughed listening to the kids talk about pooling their money for donuts, and then gave them another dollar for their donut fund.

Scott, preached a bit longer than he usually does this week- and he noticed some of the seniors starting to drift off, but Ernie, told him that his sermon was too short. Ernie, always waits around until all the other seniors leave to chat with us, and he is always in tears when we leave. He is such a sweetheart.

105-2011

 

My Mom, in the church office.

It was my Mom’s birthday, so I took all the kids into her office with a Tim Horton’s tea and a muffin with a candle in it, to sing Happy Birthday to her! They all gave her hugs, homemade cards, and of course a little gift. Then we said bye and headed home.

Oh wait, that’s not what we did!

We said ‘bye’ headed outside, and decorated her car with balloons and a big neon “Happy Birthday!!!!” poster on her windshield. In the process, 2 balloons blew away, and I was chasing them across the parking lot as the kids yelled out the van windows, “Run Mom! Run! You can catch it!!!!” I did catch one. The other one was too fast for me. The kids were disappointed in me… ha!

Happy Bithday, Mom!

Can’t wait for our girls’ night out!

101 to 104- 2011

I know, I’m behind in my blogging. But I have an excuse. A really good one! Last weekend, my hubby bought me a brand, spanking, new laptop! I have spent every spare moment this week (which really hasn’t been that many moments) trying to move files over and get everything set up on here so that I can use it!

So, forgive me for the squished 365 post.

101

Monday after school, we were coming home from picking Robbie up, and all the kids raced in from the van. (If you’ve ever been to our house, you know how our parking is behind the townhouse) So, I unlock the door, go in and put my stuff down, head back out to check on the kids, and Elijah comes running around from the back crying. Like scared, sobbing crying. His big sister, had closed the van door behind her, not knowing that he was still in there, and I clicked the lock button- not knowing he was in there… We have the childlock on so the backdoors can’t open from the inside, and it took him a minute to figure out that all he had to do was climb up front and open a door. Poor guy. Thirty seconds later, he was down in the window well with Jed and the toads, and he forgot all about being left in the van.

102

I spent about an hour today, teaching the girls how to crochet. Keona, already had a good idea of what she was doing, but the triplets- oh my… it may be a few months before I attempt to teach them again! We went to Michael’s on Monday night, and picked up some yarn that was on sale, for Keona to make her first blanket. I’m impressed by her colour choice. Can’t wait to share the final product!

 

Oh, and I haven’t given up hope on my quilt! I finished the top of it today. Just gotta find time to put it all together and quilt it now…

 

103

The kids think I’m a genius- buying them an egg timer, to time their music practice… Really, I’m just tired of being asked, “How long did I practice for, Mom?” As if I have a stop watch in my head. It’s working well so far. Other than the fact that they like to set it for random times, so that it goes off first thing in the morning and scares me half to death. Not as bad as the cap gun though…

 

104

“Can I run now, Mom?”

That’s what she was saying right before I told her to smile for the picture- hence, the “cheeeese” face.

A few weeks ago, Ella started showing an interest in Barbies for the first time. My first thought, was “Oh! I have to go buy her a Barbie of her own!” Then, I thought better. Been there, done that, ruined the novelty of it all. So, she continued to play with the two Barbies that have survived my purging. Well, today at naptime, Jeddy decided that it would be fun to pop the head off of her favourite Barbie. The head wouldn’t go back on. I was mad, Ella was devastated. I texted Scott, and it went like this…

Me: Your dumb boys just popped the head off of Ella’s favourite Barbie for NO reason, and now she’s crying.

Scott: LOL!!!!!!

Me: not. funny.

When Scott got home, he sent Ella and I to Toys R Us to get her a new favourite Barbie. She chose the “tangled one.” All night, she just sat there on the couch staring at her new Barbie. Tomorrow, she’ll have to find Ariel so they can have a tea party!

100-2011

Sunday, at Mandarin…

 

He actually fell asleep at the table. I think he may have been up a little too late last night!

In fact, we all were! After lunch, we parked the van in the church parking lot, reclined the seats, put our feet on the dash and passed out for almost 2 hours!

The kids were scheduled to sing tonight, and Elijah did his first solo part tonight! He did an amazing job. :) Eve, did great on her part as well. I was playing the piano for service and didn’t want to have to worry about playing an offertory, so I asked Keona to! She was more than happy to play, and did so without a flaw!

I can’t wait. A few years time, and I’ll never have to do a pathetic job of playing the piano for anything! Thank you, Keona. ;)

99-2011

Taken moments before midnight…

 

Well, we had a full house tonight! Scott and the guys hung out and played xbox, while the girls chatted and eventually played half a game of Phase 10. The kids, played on Tracy’s ipad2. Jed’s favourite, is “Mad birds” as he calls it… The guys chipped in and bought him a paintball gun. He was thrilled. We ate, and enjoyed time with friends. After almost everyone had left (except the people in the picture) it finally dawned on me, that I hadn’t taken a single picture the entire night. Soooo… this is what I’ve got! Sarah, Adam, and Kay stayed around for another game of Phase 10. I think that we finally crawled into bed around 2am, and will have to wake up at 6am to start hair for church. Yeah, we were probably up too late.

But it was worth it!

98-2011

My 30 year old hubby!

 

We went to Swiss Chalet for dinner tonight after dropping the kids off at Scott’s parent’s house. When we were finished eating, Scott asked for the bill and the waitress told us that it had already been taken care of… Hmmm? Then I remember seeing the manager peek around the corner at us while she was on the phone, and we both figured that it must have been his dad. The waitresses came out and did this loud clapping/chanting Happy Birthday song for him with a piece of cake, it was great. We went back to his parent’s place to switch vehicles, and Scott’s dad asks him, “So, how was your dinner?”

Scott: Oh, it was great. We were sitting across from this couple, and they came out and started singing happy birthday to the guy and he was like, “Um… it isn’t my birthday…” So the waitress told them, “Oh, well someone paid for your meal!”

Ha… I think he may have had his dad for a second or two, then we all had a good laugh over it. :)

97-2011

It’s a successful night, if I can fit the remainder of the dishes, in the sink.

 

Keona stayed up to help me clean up the mess from cooking and baking all the food for Scott’s birthday party! Three packs of lasagna noodle, 6 cans of tomato sauce, 3 of paste, 2 green peppers, 4lbs of ground beef, and 4 blocks of cheese later… :)

I’m so glad she came downstairs to help me, cause I was beat!

96-2011

 

Like my striped socks?

Me too!

With my pyjama pants…

 

A few weeks ago, our Pastor and his family were away so we were having midweek service at Scott’s parent’s house and Scott was preaching. I got ready in a hurry- put on my black dress, teal cardigan, new necklace, and… ugh! I was out of nylons. (as per usual) I decided to just throw on my striped socks, since I was wearing my knee-high boots and no one would see them anyhow. Except, that I forgot we were going to a HOUSE and not the church. When we got there and I took off my boots- Scott had quite the laugh. I opted to go barefoot…

 

P.S. I wasn’t planning to take a photo of my socks, but it was 11:30pm and I realized that I hadn’t taken a 365… :)

95-2011

My little cutie. Or one of them, anyways!

 

I asked if I could take a few pictures of him- he asked if he could have a chocolate milk. I think he’s learning from his Uncle Robbie!

Busy day today! Diagramming sentences and geometry, piano lessons for the girls, a “gorilla lunch” (minus the crickets) as a part of science, post office runs, photo editing and crocheting, pizza for dinner, last Leaf game of the season and an early bedtime. Again.

Yep, still feeling sick. Scott, more so than me.

Today, Elijah broke Jed’s lego ship, so Jed broke Elijah’s game, so they started threatening to choke eachother… Where do they learn this stuff???

They didn’t actually try to choke eachother, but a fight did break out in my livingroom.

The girls never do this kinda thing!

I’m still getting used to this brother stuff, as the boys get older. They get along really well for the most part. I mean, when Elijah was going to his best friend’s birthday party- he was upset that Jeddy couldn’t go with him. But every once in a while, it’s like they just feel the need to duke it out. Then everything's fine again!

Boys…

94-2011

She asks her Daddy to tickle her…

We’ve all been sick off and on for the last two weeks. Scott was pretty bad this weekend and he’s home from work today. I’ve just been exhausted. I think my body must be fighting it off, as I’ve only had a bit of a cough. Hoping it stays that way!

So, forgive me if I’m short on words…

My bed is calling.

93-2011

“They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.”
-Lam. 3:23

 

I would have been having a baby this week.

That was the thought running through my head during my pity party this weekend.

Today, I kicked myself in the behind and reminded myself to dwell on the positive. All the things I DO have. To be content. In whatever state I’m in.

“…for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content.”  – Phil. 4:11

I made a promise to myself, and God, to stop being such a pessimist.

So, faithless.

To find something to rejoice about in every situation.

“Rejoice in the Lord alway: and again I say, Rejoice.”   -Phil. 4:4

And as if God was listening to my thoughts at that very moment, I went to practice a piano song with Eve- and two of the keys were sticking. Completely out of the blue. They would go down, and not come back up without being lifted. That’s a problem. I took a deep breathe and decided to open up the piano to see if I could figure it out- to no avail. Nothing looked wrong.

Now my thoughts run to,

 Ugh, I JUST had the piano technician here to fix a key and she did it for free. Which was a TOTAL blessing, but it isn’t going to happen again.

What was I thinking buying an old piano???

This thing is going to cost me more to fix than it did to buy!

Lord, WHY???

I called the piano lady, holding back tears, and after listening to my description, she said it may be something small in-between the keys, OR… it may be a bigger problem. I got off the phone with her, and hesistantly (really, I was already expecting the bigger problem) I slid a card between the keys, and out popped a penny. Thank you, Ella.

Then I realized- I had failed already.

Literally, 20 minutes after telling the Lord that I was trusting Him, and that I was going to find something to rejoice about in every situation. I was ready to cry over stuck piano keys. As if He couldn’t take care of such a simple problem.

“And he saith unto them, Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith? Then he arose, and rebuked the winds and the sea; and there was a great calm.”
-Matt. 8:26

I am so thankful for His grace. For a chance to start fresh, and try again tomorrow.

“Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.”
-Heb. 4:16

92-2011

On Saturday, after our mission’s breakfast at church, the kids and I went to my mom’s house for the afternoon.  My little brother had on a new shirt that he had just bought, and after telling him how great it looked on him, I asked if I could take his picture! With kids, usually I’m the one doing the bribing to get a good picture… With my little brother however, it was the other way around…

“I’ll let you take my picture IF you come out and play basketball with me.”

He didn’t have to ask me twice- deal!

After I grabbed a few shots, he destroyed me at basketball. I haven’t played in so long. All that running and jumping… Let’s just say that I’m out of shape. Not to mention, the girls seem to think that basketball is a contact sport and they were attempting to tackle us. They also successfully tackled eachother several times. In the mud. In their church dresses. They were a mess. Rob, just kept shaking his head at them.

 

After fulfilling my end of the bargain and playing basketball for a bit, I went inside to find Prayer teaching great-grandpa how to play Wii bowling. I’ll have to share those pictures later.

 

Oh, and Ella made progress today- she actually let Grandpa hold her! Without freaking out! When we got home, Scott asked her if she was nice to Grandpa… Her response,

“Yes. Grandpa’s so funny.”

*thinking*

“He’s very, very dark.”

*thinking*

“But he’s just black!”

We couldn’t hide our laughs!

We used to think that she was scared of him because he’s black, but she isn’t scared of other black people. She would go to everyone on my dad’s side. Even my uncle, who’s black and about 6’5”…  We may never know what was so scary about Grandpa…

91-2011

Danica

 

Today, I got to photograph my niece! Sounds strange, “niece”…  Photographing babies, is not my favourite. I love babies and I love taking pictures, but the two of them together- not so much. Though this little one, she made it easy. I only heard one little peep out of her the whole time, and nothing a soother didn’t fix.

Then, to make my day even better, my hubby surprised me with a date night! We drank our Starbucks down by the lake and watched a lady training her show dog. I told Scott that I want a dog. He promised me one when we move. :) Then, we stopped at the grocery store and picked up muffins for the church breakfast in the morning. I was going to bake muffins… but then I ran out of time didn’t feel like it. Oh well, maybe I’ll put them on a platter and let everyone think that I baked them. ;)