Matt is fake hunting in Tionesta for a few nights. When I say fake hunting, I mean, he isn’t a hunter, but he’s going to go into the woods and keep his brother and dad company. He’s been wanting to go for as long as we’ve been together, it just never worked out.

Shortly after Matt drove away, I packed the kids in the car and we headed to the store to get some supplies. What kind of supplies you ask? Canvas and paint.

She had fun. It was a great afternoon.

• Post-post Thanksgiving breakfast?  Bacon, cranberry sauce, and homemade yeast rolls.  Mmmm.
• My mom said my wild rice stuffing was the best wild rice stuffing she had ever had.  I glowed.
• Fiala’s face is chewed up with bad eczema sores still, since the outing my husband and I had for our anniversary.  I explained her medical plight way-too-many times to concerned extended family (and family friends) who inquired about her face.
• HOWEVER, in the most encouraging news in almost three months of The Total Elimination Diet “Adventure,” I had decided in advance that Fiala and I would eat a normal Thanksgiving dinner and just suffer the consequences, rather than bringing garbanzo flour and lamb meat to my in-laws.    In what might be TMI, she has since had 100% totally healthy poop.  Previously, any time I veered even a tiny bit from the TED “safe” foods, she would get green, mucous-filled poop immediately.  Now, obviously, she is still having major skin issues, so I am not yet ready to abandon the TED, but her having normal poop after eating a normal (gluten-free) meal leaves me HIGHLY encouraged.
• We did not go to our appointment with the pediatric g.i. doc on Friday the 20th.  This is a point of disagreement between my husband and I.  I would have liked to keep it.  However, I totally understand his point:  We spent near $1000 on near-countless visits to the pediatric allergist, what with $50 co-pays, medication, and childcare for those doctor visits.  Fiala was subjected to a variety of uncomfortable tests.  For that $1000 and our sweet baby’s discomfort, we were given very little useful information from a doctor who eventually dropped us, saying he couldn’t be of any more help.  The MOST effective thing, so far, has been the TED which, other than the cost of food, is free.  My husband’s stance is, “Why subject her to countless tests and spend a bunch of money to get iffy results?”  MY contention is that perhaps through some tests, we could get a better handle on how to proceed, instead of just guessing.  Obviously, this issue is not yet resolved.  I’m holding off on pushing one way or another, though, until at least after Christmas.
• On Wednesday, we got a notice of “no show” from the ped g.i.  This was after I TWICE canceled the appointment with more than enough advance notice.  Grr.  I’ll have to take it up with them on Monday.

There’s nothing like rocking your child to sleep and joining her in her slumber. I did it all the time with Aiden and also with Alyson. I even fell asleep holding Caedmon a time or two.

And now the tradition continues…

I caught a squirmy one!

We had a fish and chippie lunch at Schnappers, a lovely shack by the beach, followed by a stroll down the pier to see the boats. Sean and Finn were enthralled by the fishermen and squealed like piglets when one of them caught a squid, which narrowly escaped Death By Crocs as Finn tried to dance an Irish jig on it.

I bought some succulent looking scallops from a fishing trawler moored to the pierside and Shameless Finn took the opportunity to ask “Uncle Fisherman” for a ride on his boat so he ended up being given a free little tour the trawler and was super pleased with himself. Everyone here is very chilled out about letting Finn do stuff to their boats, kayaks, boogie boards etc, so he is getting braver and braver about asking! The other day he asked a policeman whether he could drive their car and that was the only time he got a polite rebuff… Oh well, there’s always the fire station round the corner.

Some pics!

So we’ve just enjoyed a beautiful weekend at Woolleys Bay with the kids and some friends. It was amazing weather… highlights include the kids (and the dads) painstakingly spending an hour creating this amazing fortress using dead flax flower heads, flax leaves as the ‘rope’ and sand and rocks to reinforce it… and 4 year old taking the whole lot out with one uncanny yet incredibly accurate hurl of a rock he pulled out of the creek! Hard to be grumpy with him, cause man, what a shot – you should have seen it!!! And then the fish guts… we had enjoyed a great kiwi dinner (a bit of salad and three types of red meat!) and the kids were just tucking into pudding when our 2 year old friend turns around with half his chocolate fish and says, “Dad, I don’t want to eat the guts!”

Gelezen in de Gazet van Antwerpen:
Wie in frituur Skyline in de Gemeentestraat op 3 december zijn frieten bestelt, krijgt er gratis een optreden van Axl Peleman bij.
Achter de toog werpt een apetrotse Tesse Van Bouwel vakkundig de frieten op en neer. “Wij zijn heel fier dat Axl komt spelen. Iedereen moet komen, want het is hier altijd gezellig. In onze frituur heerst altijd een smakelijke sfeer en dat weten de studenten maar al te goed. En vooral, we hebben de lekkerste frietjes van de hele stad.” Tesse schreef zich enkele weken geleden in voor Frietrock. Dat is een wedstrijd waarbij twintig friethuizen een privé-rockoptreden kunnen winnen. Frituur Skyline, dat dit jaar twintig jaar bestaat, was bij de gelukkigen. Om te weten of er nog een frituur in je regio meedoet, stuur je vanaf 29 november in een sms’je ANT naar 3108. The Kids, Guy Swinnen en Venus in Flames staan alvast ook op de affiche. De wedstrijd kadert in de Week van de Friet.

Meer info is te vinden via www.frietrock.be.

We have a double kids’ collapsible chair, TIGER PRINT, given to us by a friend.  I don’t know what it is about girls and animal prints, but Audrey loves this chair.  We recently moved it into her room.  It makes me happy when Fiala crawls up into the chair, and the girls sit together.  My sister and I did NOT get along until we were teenagers, and my parents didn’t do anything, really, to foster better relationship between the two of us.  I do my best to encourage good relationship between my little girls, though, plus, they just seem to naturally get along well. 

Yesterday, we were driving to Costco to pick up pies for Thanksgiving.  I had woke in the middle of the night with a fever and spent the morning in bed trying to get better.  By 2, I had given up hope of that and decided that those pies weren’t going to wait for a healthy me.  We piled into the car… the kids looking adorable and me, looking like death warmed over.  I felt like pooh but couldn’t help but have my spirits raised when I heard this conversation unfold.

Emma: “Gerrit, I need to talk to you about your ears”

Gerrit: “What?”

Emma: “You know you don’t really have elf ears, right?”

Gerrit: “Yes I do!”

Now, this was news to me.  I hadn’t heard anything about elf ears yet but apparently, he’d mentioned it to her before.

Emma: ” But Gerrit, elf ears go up to here.”

Gerrit: “Nuh ugh, not baby elves ears.”

Emma: “Right, but you’re not a baby.”

Gerrit: “Well, not kid elves ears too.  And I’m a kid.”

Emma: “But Gerrit, elf ears are pointy at the top too.  Your ears curve around like mine and mommies.”

Gerrit: ” Well, mine point a little.”

Emma: “No Gerrit.  Yours are curved like this” moving her finger and drawing in the air.  “All people’s ears curve like that and elf ears are pointy not curvy.”

Gerrit is obviously not liking how this debate is going so he decides the diversion tactic…

Gerrit: “Emma, it’s elves not elf.  Mommy, Emma’s saying it wrong.  She said elf and it’s elves.”

I jump in to explain the proper use of elf vs. elves.  Then remove myself from the conversation.

Emma: “Gerrit, you really don’t have elf ears.”

Gerrit: “Yes, I do.  Stop talking about my ears, Emma.”

Emma: “But Gerrit, if you had elf ears you would be an elf.  Then Santa would take you for rides in his sled.  But he doesn’t cause you’re not!”

Gerrit, getting pretty upset now: “Emma, I said stop talking about my ears!  I asked you 2 times now!!”

The whole scene quickly took a nose dive from there.  I stopped my silent laughter when Emma told me (as punishment for his yelling at her) that next time they have a sleepover, she didn’t want to sleep next to Gerrit.  He started crying because he thought that was so mean.  I played the role of mediator, brushing aside the whole issue of elf ears.  But would it be so bad for him to believe he’s just a tiny part elf?  Maybe he thinks Legolas is his real father

I fell asleep last night at 8pm. I woke up this morning at 4am. I feel very out-of-sorts. Usually when I see 4am, it is from the stayed-up-too-late side.

I got all my errands run on Monday, which was damned near a miracle. I seldom get everything done that I plan for in an outing. Tuesday was my father’s birthday and I remembered to call him! I didn’t remember to mail him his birthday present, but maybe I can manage to get that done either today or Friday.

I have been killing time with romance novels. Usually, during the school semester, I have no time to read. But we are having a break right now and I have read 7 of the 8 Bridgerton books by Julia Quinn. Nice books if you enjoy fluffy historical romance. Which I do. Mental candy. Nothing substantial, but sweet and filling. I have a bunch of western romances by Linda Lael Miller to read next. I think they are historical too, but I am not sure about that. I have the 8th Bridgerton book and then 2 related books to get through before I go on the LLM though. I believe there are 10 LLM, as well as there being 10 total of these Julia Quinn ones. The LLM are all related as well, same family, like the Bridgerton’s only they are the McKettrick’s.

My sister, her son and her partner are coming to my house for Thanksgiving. We are going to have a pork roast, sweet potatoes, asparagus and broccoli. I also have salad makings. I think they are bringing a dessert, but I am not sure. Plus, I am not really concerned because I don’t like too many dessert foods anyway. My teenager would be thrilled if they brought pumpkin pie, but I heard a rumor that there was a pumpkin shortage this year.

I’m having a very peaceful week without the little kids here. I love them dearly, but they are loud and rowdy. My husband has called every night at bedtime. They have much more energy than he does! He is worn out before the parks close and they are still going strong until the last ride allowed. So far they have been to Disney’s Magic Kingdom, Sea World and Universal’s Islands of Adventure. I think that today they are going to EPCOT. I know they will be going somewhere on Friday, but I forget where. Hubby lost his cell phone on a roller coaster ride at Sea World. He called it about 50 times using his mother’s phone. No answer. They checked the lost & found several times, but no luck. Then the next day, late in the day, they phoned Sea World’s lost & found and asked again and they had a phone that matched his description. But they can’t get it to power on, so they aren’t positive. He is going to go there Thanksgiving morning on his way to Ocala and see if it is his. It sounds like it is broken whether it is his or not. So, I reckon we are going to have to get him a new phone.

The question is, do we change our service too? We use AT&T. We have been with the same company since we first got cell phones back in October 1999. It is decent service, but not fantastic. I think we finally need to get a phone for the teen as well. His friends call my cell all the time. I don’t really mind, if I am not using it, he may as well. But it can be annoying when I am out running errands and the phone keeps ringing for him and he isn’t with me. If we have to get 2 new phones and add a line to our service anyway, we may as well look at all our options instead of just out AT&T options. I was thinking maybe we’d be able to find something that cost a bit less than what we are paying now, but I doubt we’ll find that. Plus, we have never had text service and I think the teenager is going to insist on having text. *sigh* I hate to be the one responsible for all the cell research, but hubby would just walk in and choose a phone and change nothing and be thrilled with his plan. I will not be thrilled.

It’s tough to think of stuff to say at 5:15am. So, I am done for now. Y’all take care, and please, for the love of naps, sleep later than I did!

This week I decided that Amber would do her book report that is due on December 8.  I am doing this more for me than her, because I know how I will have to push, plan, explain, yell, and curse under my breath just to get this project done.  [An aside: What ever happen to reading a book and writing a page or two book report?  Why are the kids required to be creative, which means the parents have to be creative, which then means money spent on things that may or may not be used and can not be used for anything else?  Just asking.] I need time for all of that to take place and, of course, I like making my daughter’s life a living hell.  You know, because it is just so much fun for me.

 I took time on Saturday to reread the directions, to confer with SoHubby on what might be needed and ideas, and made a list of things to get.  Then on Sunday, we did a bit of running around trying to find all the supplies that Amber would need for HER project.   Amber wanted no part of this; she was mad that we didn’t let her go to her friend’s house.  How dare we make her do her homework.  And how dare her homework be something that took more thought than the 10 minutes a night she usually spends.  Amber is a smart girl.  It is proven every semester with her report card of straight A’s.  It is further proven that she doesn’t study, more like I am too busy being a human pacifier that I don’t know she had to study until it is too late, but she still makes A’s on her test.  However, she tends to hurry through things and makes silly mistakes.  It is pure torture to make her stop, think and take her time on things.  So while in Target as she stomped away with arms folded scrawling that if she got an F on this project it would be her father and mine’s fault.  I lost it.  LOST IT!  I had taken time out of my weekend to help her and how DARE her  sassing me.  I bent down, grabbed her arm, got in her face and explained to her in a stern voice that if she didn’t be quiet and show some interest in this project then I was going to put everything back and she could just find her own way to the store, get her own supplies with her own money and do her own DAMN project on her own. 

Sounds like a good idea.  I mean I don’t remember my mom putting much effort into my projects.  She might have bought some poster board, but the rest was up to me.  My only instructions from her was to get it into school on time.  It seems that these days schools are requiring so much more than just some graphs on poster board.   Amber has to recreate the book she read for her book report.  That’s right she needs to read it, write it in her own words and then be creative enough to make it look like a book.  Don’t tell me there are second graders out there that can do that totally on their own.  Hell, I needed SoHubby’s help  just for ideas on what supplies she might need.  This is only the beginning, too, I have seen the future and it ain’t pretty.  One of  our friend’s daughter had to make a car that ran on its own.  WTF?  Seriously, WTF?  If I would have known about the cars that needed to be built out of nothing, nursing bras that needed to be snapped while holding squirming babies and complicated train tracks that I would be required to put together I would have forgotten about that Liberal Arts degree and got something more useful, like an engineering degree. 

I thought the Target incident was a one time thing.  Amber was mad that she had to do homework, spend time with her oh so boring parents when she could have been at her friend’s house having a grand time.  I mean, even though the house is similar to ours, it is way better and so much cooler.  Not to mention her friend’s mom is so great that Amber would sell her right arm if she would just adopt her.  I would soon find out that Amber is trying on a new attitude and we are simply disagreeing about its fit.  She thinks her britches are fitting just fine and I think that her they  are way too big for a 7-year-old girl.  Along with the too big britches comes a sense of entitlement, a smart mouth and the attitude of a 16-year-old.  It takes every fiber of my being not to scream and shake her.  Somehow I am thinking that shaking her might just shake that smartass right out of her.  It hasn’t been proven, so I will continue to grit my teeth and try to be civil. 

Today, we stop at Wal-Mart for some Christmas shopping. [And yes, I know some of you will see only this and give me the "YOU go to Wal-Mart?" speech.  Yeah, yeah, times are tough all over.]  I stopped in the Wal-Mart salon (Can you call it that?) to see if they sell a certain hair product that I use.  The “lady” (a transgender stylist) asked if we needed help.  Amber took a liking to her and begged for me to get her bangs trimmed.  This pissed me off for a couple of reasons: 1. I have been asking her to get her bangs cut for months, now.  She had decided she was going to let them grow out, because one of her friends doesn’t have bangs. and 2. We just came from having pictures taken.  When I told Amber that we could get her bangs trimmed for half the price at Wondercuts she went into the whining,” buuuuuut Mooooom” voice.  Here is where everyone tells me you should have stuck to your guns.  I admit I kicked myself wondering why I didn’t just say no and be done with it.  Mainly, I didn’t like being put on the spot like that in front of another person and didn’t you just read I had just come from having pictures taken with three kids.  And one of those kids was Sam, who I apparently tortured by taking his shoes and socks off.  I was worn down to the nub.  After we left I explained to Amber that we need to be frugal with our money and that she can’t be so impulsive.  When I got the “it’s only money” look, I grabbed her face and told her that she needs to leave that princess attitude behind.  We ain’t living in no castle.  Can’t you tell, we are at da Wal-Mart?

These instances just make me scared for the future.  When Amber was younger we could afford to buy her anything and I practically did.  Once Sam came along, I started curtailing the frivolous spending and teaching the kids that we can’t have everything we want right when we want it.  It was sinking in, but it is a hard fight against peer pressure and the power of commercial TV.  Let’s face it, my kids may not have everything their peers have, but they are not suffering one bit.  I thought by giving Amber an allowance, requiring her to buy certain things  and making her save would do the work for me, but I have to be a constant reminder that money doesn’t grow on trees and there is hard work behind every dollar that is spent.  It is a hard road and I hope that one day she will get it.  I have already started the talk that if you are in our house after you graduate high school then you need to work or go to school.  Hell, maybe even both.  I hope the entitled sass talking little girl that is here, today, will be a much wiser girl in the future.  It is making me rethink any preconceived ideas I might have had for when my kids become teenagers.  That beat up old Chevy that they pay for themselves is looking better and better with every sass talking entitlement word that comes out of her mouth.  Her brother and sister are going to be pissed. 

Apricots on the lawn

We’re here Australia! It’s been a hectic week as we moved the 3 little ones from Singapore to the sunny Mornington Peninsula last Thursday.  Milo just arrived this morning as well but he’ll be in the Quarantine Motel for a month till he stops acting crazy (hopefully!) but we have been promised that we’ll get him on Christmas Eve, just in time for him to unwrap a juicy bone.

The new house is not going to be ready for another couple of months so we’re renting a beach house opposite Mills Beach in Mornington town, about an hours drive from Melbourne CBD. It’s a lovely seaside town full of quaint little shops, a long pier, many beaches and a view across the bay to the distant skyscrapers of Melbourne.

We have a couple of new nannies, Kathryn does Monday – Weds and Jess does Thurs – Sat morning. Sunday is the day of unrest. We also have a cheerful and efficient housekeeper named Cassie who won my mom over when she arrived at our doorstep with an arsenal of cleaning products and mops and started scouring the floorboards like a tasmanian devil. I think we’ll call her Tassie.

So far the kids have taken to Nanny Kathryn (they haven’t met Jess yet) quickly as she is very keen on getting them outdoors-  most mornings she takes Dylan for a stroll to Main Street to charm the townsfolk, in the afternoon she spreads out a picnic blanket under a tree in the garden or a suntent and gets the kids out there for snacktime, and she made chocolate fudge with Sean this afternoon as well.

My mom travelled down with us as well to spend a week here and help us settle in, so it’s been a pretty smooth transition, we’re pretty lucky! Especially since my mother’s a household Nazi, her talents have been put to good use organising the various cupboards and cleaning away the hordes of spiders and cobwebs which would otherwise have been consumed by Dylan. Now everything is in shipshape and the floorboards are spic and span thanks to mom and Tassie.

The kids are extremely happy,  especially Finn who is over the moon that he can go to beach everyday and see the all the yachts. Today he asked a jetski owner if he could sit on his yellow jetski and the owner said yes, so he spent 5 minutes going vroomvroom on top of the thing. Then he saw a red kayak along the beach and asked the kayak owner if he could sit on it as well, (so shameless!) and the man who owned it was kind enough to strap Finn in the seat and tow him up and down the beach.

Finn has also been allowed to “drive” the tourist trains at the depot while they were being cleaned, various ditchdiggers, steamrollers and bulldozers, an antique red tractor, a ride-on mower and a boat trailer…  I’m a little worried as none of his requests  “can Finn Finn ride on it pwease uncle?” have ever been turned down by strangers yet and I caught him looking at a helicopter overhead with an appraising eye today!

Dylan has been familiarising herself with all the new things to put in her mouth and has consumed a vast quantity of carpet fuzz, fireplace muck, a tiny ball of aluminum foil (most of it was fished out from her mouth in time) and fistfuls of beach sand. Oh well. I guess it was about time the Leahy family had a gastronomical adventurer! She has very rosy cheeks and nose now from all the walks and looks the very picture of a plump cherub. She is an angel baby except for when she’s having her bottom washed as the water is very cold over here!

Sean is still in absorption phase and nearly fainted today when we took him to see the new house and saw the 3 acres of lawn between the house and the dam that he had to mow. Then he saw the hammock on the verandah and embraced it so intimately he had to be surgically removed from it at the end of the visit. He also caught a crab on the beach today but we decided it was too small for chili crab. Sean also found a “Halo Encyclopedia” in the Dymocks bookshop the other day so his appetite for violent computer game data has been temporarily sated.

We’ve just finished used the “basket of goods” CPI method of analysis to calculate Sean’s new pocket money and Sean determined that his weekly allowance should be 4.5 bottles of Gatorade or 2.5 comic books, so that works out to about $12.50. We rounded it up to $13/week and threw in the extra duties of mowing the lawn, collecting firewood, minding the babies on weekends, helping in the kitchen, making bottles in the morning, catching flies and bluebottles and carrying groceries in from the car. I think he regrets asking for a wage increase now…

Mark and I are completely exhausted from the shopping of the past week. I think we’ve been to Target and Coles about 3.5x a day since we’ve gotten here. And bought about 273 baby things that we didn’t think were important to bring along but found absolutely indispensable since! I have also become well acquainted with our lady postwoman as she has already delivered quite a few goodies necessities from Amazon.com, shopbop.com and babysgotstyle.com.

The weather has been extremely fickle – one afternoon we were out sunning ourselves and complaining about the 37 degree heat and within a few minutes a storm came in and the temperature dropped to 20 degrees! It actually made the papers the next day… I’ve now learnt that layering is the key to survival in Melbourne. That and cashmere. And online shopping. And nannies.

Right not Mark is watching “The Castle”, a hilarious Australian “comedy classic” on telly, and I’m about to go to bed. You may not believe this but I actually get up at 7-8 am most mornings these days. It’s impossible to wake up later in the country, especially in summer, especially with Dylan caterwauling to be rescued from her sleepsack. But we sleep earlier and better as well, the fresh air is amazing. So I’m off to bed now, do feel free to drop us an email! We miss you all!!!

Some pics:

Kids’ school Thanksgiving projects tickle me so much. The Boy brought home turkeys he made with each feather representing what he is thankful for.

The top one’s feathers say:

I an Thankful for being smart

I am thankful for being helthy

I am thankful that I have a house.

I am thankful for the food I eat.

I am thankful for my school.

I am thankful to be an America.

I am thankful for my pearnts. [parents]

I am thankful for my family

I am thankful for Grooms cake ice cream

For myself, I’m less thankful for the last item as it has contributed probably three pounds to my current physique. From Blue Bell’s site:

Groom’s Cake Ice Cream is a luscious chocolate ice cream with chocolate cake pieces and chocolate coated strawberry hearts, surrounded by swirls of strawberry sauce and chocolate icing.

The bottom turkey’s feathers say:

Food

Peearents

earth

money

Strangely, this was the turkey he made at church. I’m struck by how much more thoughtful the turkey feathers from school are. Perhaps The Boy is just tired after a long day when he gets to weekly church school and finds that his creativity has dripped away by that point.

Today his class did a Thanksgiving play and then made cornhusk dolls. I got a kick out of the one he made:

It’s a cornhusk Army man. I love it.

I have much to be thankful for.

I feel sorry for me, and I hate that.

Claire had a pretty bad cold Friday night into Saturday, which in turn led me to call off for the first 8 hours of my shift. Why would I call off? Here’s a brief look at what I went through.

At 11 o’clock Friday night, Claire and I were sitting on the couch watching Yo Gabba Gabba. This is the kid who puts herself to bed if it’s past 9.

At 11:30, she rolls over, looks at me, says, “Mama, I sick.”

At Midnight we turn on the Pops station on the satellite and attempt to sleep.

At 12:15 I have an elbow in my neck and a stinky foot in my eye.

I managed to get her to go to sleep in her bed from 12:30 to 1 without much difficulty.

Enter 1 AM.

She was up every half hour screaming bloody murder, then looking at me (who was sleeping next to her, or attempting to) and saying, “Cuddle Mama, I sick.”

Flash forward to last night. Luca and his snotty nose. Who is he and why is he not like Claire one bit? Oh yah, because he’s the second child. We are notorious for being awesome and tend to fly under the radar. This is the kid who was hit by Claire with a rubber mallet when she was ‘rotating her tires’ on her trike. The kid who pulled himself to stand using a wheel and busted his little tooth through his bottom lip. That kid. All this, and NO EXTRA FUSS.

So when he was up A LOT before midnight, I felt so bad. He could only sleep sitting up. I can sympathize. When I was pregnant with Claire, I could only breathe when sitting up, so the last few weeks I spent pregnant with her was spent sleeping sitting up.

But here’s the magical thing. After midnight, it was like he said to himself, “Body, quit producing snot. Brain, shut down now,” and he slept! I mean, sure, he was still up every two or so hours, but that’s almost normal for him.

Now I’m sick. (I know boo hoo.) The worst part, though is that Matt’s on a business trip, so no extra sleep for me. No help during the middle of the night. And no breaks. How the hell do single mothers do it?!?

At the point in time, Luca is full of pears, milk, Motrin, and his vitamin.

Claire is full of peanut butter sandwich and pear merlot juice (it’s JUICE, NOT ALCOHOL…made from the finest merlot grapes in California, thank you Bolthouse Farms.)

Both kids are slathered in Vicks Baby Rub and I’m spent.

C’mon Wednesday!!!

Ah, a lot going on for me these past few days! Friday was the last day of school for my children before a week-long holiday for Thanksgiving.

Saturday morning, my husband and my two littlest and my mother-in-law left for Orlando Florida. They plan to visit Disney’s Magic Kingdom, Universal Studios, Sea World and Universal’s Islands of Adventure on Sunday through Wednesday. How very busy and tired they will be. I imagine the little ones will be full of energy and bouncing the entire time, but my husband and mother-n-law are going to be wishing for naps! On Thursday, Thanksgiving itself, my husband will drive up from Orlando to Ocala and visit his father and step-mother. They are having a lot of folks in to their place for turkey and trimmings. They live in a small neighborhood with a lot of other retired people and asked, practically begged, hubby to bring the kids for the day. I am not sure how my 8 and 9 years olds are going to do in a house full of old folks, but they are going. Hubby’s stepmother is much more of the old school about children than we are, she expects seen-not-heard most of the time and when she wants to hear them it is because she is trying to engage them in conversation about their motivations and life aspirations. Which, really, maybe I am a bad mommy, but my 8 and 9 year olds do not have firm life aspirations as of yet. I foresee an unpleasant day of running in the house and talking too loudly and not remembering to say ma’am often enough and possibly pinching and biting each other.

My teenager opted not to go to Florida with the rest of the family. He wanted to stay home and meet up with his friends a lot. Since he has only had 4 or 5 friends in his entire life before this school session, we decided this would be a good thing. So he is home with me. I have classes part of this week and did not go out of town.

Later on Saturday, I had plans of my own! I met up with my geeky girlfriends for a Mexican dinner out and then a movie in. We watched Lost in Austen, which was very amusing! I hadn’t even heard of it before we planned this Geeky Girl’s Night. It was about a British girl obsessed with Pride and Prejudice who accidently switches places with Elizabeth Bennet. She can’t figure out how to switch back, and everything she touches or says goes to absolute hell-in-a-handbasket and she practically ruins the entire P&P story and the lives of nearly every character. Obviously, there is a happy ending, but it is not an easy road to get there. I quite enjoyed it and wished I had a copy of my own. I need to get one, so I can see it again and make hubby watch it. He actually loves Jane Austen’s movie versions, though he has never read any of the books.

On Sunday, underslept teenager and I headed out to visit my sister. She is having a baby! (though not til April) She and I went out and did some baby registry stuff while her son and mine stayed at her place and played. Although we didn’t do a whole lot and there isn’t a description of the day really, I did have a great time. We discussed baby names at one point and decided Russella was possibly the worst name any of us had ever made up. We spent ages trying to come up with addresses for everyone that I will need to invite to a baby shower later on. Sister is going to have two showers. One from her friends and one from her family. I will host the family one. It is a long way off still, the end of February, but we thought being prepared in advance might be handy. My sister’s one child is 13, so she has absolutely nothing left from when he was a baby. My youngest is 8 and I thought she wasn’t going to have anymore, so I have absolutely nothing left. So she needs everything you can imagine a new mother would need. Her gift registry reads like a baby store inventory list. I think it’ll all be fun though.

I got home before midnight both Saturday and Sunday. But, I failed to get to sleep at a proper hour either night. Saturday I was awake until 4am and Sunday I turned the lights out at 2am and then tossed and turned for who-knows how long. I really hate that I am having a revisitation of the insomnia fairy. After classes are done for today, I have about a thousand errands to run. I need to go by the insurance office and pay for the van. I can’t find any bill for that and I am sure it was due before now. I need to stop in at the post office. I need to go to the Home Depot. I have to grocery shop. I am sure there is more, but that is all I can remember right now. Oh, sorry for so long between updates, I have been a busy girl.

We haven’t been able to show you many of the fun things we have been doing recently!  While we have been in our busiest stretch of the tour, we have had our opportunities for fun times and to connect with important people!

We are about to take a short breather from the tour and have nothing but good times. . . but in the meantime, please enjoy some of the photos chronicling our recent fun activities!

Jackline got to play an organ in Vancouver! Thanks Joanne for teaching us how to play!

Joan got on the organ too!

 While we were in Vancouver, we were hosted by Evergreen Bible Church.  The kind folks from the church and our host families arranged for our kids to be able to tour the Pearson Air Museum!  Thank you so much Traci, Sharon, and all you others!

Penny takes a test flight!

All of us with our hosts at Pearson Air Museum!

As you may have read, many of our choir members have been able to meet their sponsors while on tour this year.  Unfortunately, not all of our members’ sponsors live in the area; but, they of course all are excited that their child is here on this unique adventure!  Ssenyonga Frank was able to call his sponsor on my phone and the shine of his smile could have made it all the way to his sponsors across the continent!

Frank with his sponsors on speaker phone!

The majority of our wonderful host families are those with either grown children, children about our kids’ ages, or without children at all.  Sometimes we get an exception, and it’s always a fun experience for our kids to see some younger adults who care about them and want to know them!  Big thanks to Holly in Tacoma for hosting our girls and showing them so much love!  They still talk about you!

Jackline, Brendah, Holly, & Saffina

Thanks everyone for following our blog!  As always, more updates to come!

This is the last day of my gratitude journal because, starting tomorrow, things for the hubby and me will be very, very busy.  There’s a lot more that I’m thankful for, and I have been thinking about trying this.

Anyway, today I am grateful…

64.  …that we have a vehicle that runs and gets us where we need to go.  We are blessed with two vehicles, actually, and while they qualify as old, God has been good to us and they run.

65.  …the daughter found a group of young people, a couple groups actually, with whom to associate.  She has been working three jobs for so long, I think she has missed out on the social parts of life for quite a while.

66.  …that my oven is self-cleaning.  I really appreciate the wonders of modern technology.  It’s cleaning itself right now, as a matter of fact.  Now if I can just remember to wipe it out before I bake something, it’ll all be good.

Our sweet Charlotte Rose is 5. (Tomorrow, if we’re trying to be official.)

I must admit, I don’t remember a lot of details about her newborn days, mostly because she was so much easier than her sister’s first few weeks.  My girls are only 19 months apart, and although some things were hard those first few weeks, Charlotte was like a stroll in the park.  A fast labor, and then the doctor handed us this beautiful, dark-haired, red-rose-lipped chubby baby.

We named her Charlotte Rose, and called her Blueberry for short.

Now, she is such a big girl and we enjoy her more than we ever imagined.  She and her sister are attached at the hip (and the hands), but they are still so different from one another.

Charlotte is our sensible girl who loves math, counting, solving problems, and playing with her brother.

She’s a fantastic reader, and loves to sing with us at church especially.  Her laugh is giggly, chubby, and contagious, and she still has a slight lisp which adds to the charm and sweetness.  Always ready to serve her mommy and daddy, and she’s sure to check that she’s done her work thoroughly. She’s her daddy’s girl, for sure.

We can really tell she’s growing lately, and I’m sure that most of you know:  there are few things more wonderful than watching your children grow and learn, and to watch their little personalities get bigger and bigger.

Happy, happy birthday, sweet Charlotte.  You are a gift to our family, and we can’t wait to see what this year brings in your life.

Took an hour and a half, but Ethan’s hair is finally cut.  It’s always a toss-up between money spent at the “haircut store” and the hassle of bringing five kids on errands, and the exorbitant amount of time it takes me to cut his hair.  I’m happy with it, he’s happy with it, and my hubby is happy with it, though, so that makes it worth it.  I think.

(Previously, his hair was BELOW that tee shirt collar.  It was the longest ever.  So, now it has just a wee bit of length to it.)