He'll have to marry someone who is bald.

I always thought I'd put my biology degree to good use when I had kids. I took bug classes, bird classes, plant classes, and even studied some marine life. I dissected a number of animals too - and for the most part wasn't too grossed out. So it shouldn't surprise me that my boys LOVE the dirt and any kind of creepy crawly they might find while excavating the back yard.

"Look mommy - it's a WORM, isn't he HUGE?"

"Look mommy - slugs!"

"Look mommy, it's supposed to be freaking summer and I am wearing a polar fleece outside!" (Ok, I made that one up - but hell, it is raining outside, it is June 18th, and I am beginning to think that the tourism industry should brand Vancouver as a place that has the best natural sunblock on earth - and you don't have to pay a dime). I digress....

"Look mommy, a cute ladybug!"

CRABS!!! And yes, Nicholas did pick it up.

It does come as a bit of a shock to me that the most innocuous things freak Nicholas out. Like cheerios. On the floor. If he is sitting at the table, he will not get down if there is a cheerio on the floor near his chair. There have been many a day I have seriously contemplated placing a ring of cereal around his chair to keep him still for more than five seconds.

Oh, and spiders. He loves them. He picks them up and counts their legs. Remember Fred?

Fred lived in our old house. His relatives (the bigger version) live in our new house. In the bathroom downstairs where we have to bathe the kids because the main bathroom in the house is out of commission (long story that involves an toilet, a useless wax ring, and the previous owner of this place who probably wanted to save a dime and had the bathroom done on the cheap).

Nicholas got out of the tub last night, and as I was drying him off he started screaming. I thought his whole body was going to erupt into flames. But no. He had a stray strand of my hair ON HIS FOOT. If any strands of hair touch his body that aren't his, he freaks out. The spiders - those are his friends. My hair - the enemy that must be destroyed.

Summer is a few days away....

Today, once again, I broke out the winter jacket to take the kids to school. It is freaking June 17th and I am freezing my ass off. I know I have bitched and whined in the past about the rain and cold, but holy shit this is just plain stupid.

And now back to your regularly scheduled obligatory cute photo of Renee (note the clothing - she should be in shorts and a t-shirt by now).

Number two...

We were out at a park the other day and came across this sign. I instantly thought of our neighbours and how good this sign would look in their front yard. Facing their front door. Of course, they'd have to teach the dog to read it because they obviously don't give a shit where their dog does his.

What a kind gesture.

"Mommy, mommy, mommy your hands are so cold!"

I had just been marking assignments downstairs, in the part of the house that Ken referrs to as the "experiment in cryogenics", and even though it is JUNE and we should be enjoying some sun and warmpth, we on the wet coast are still basking in temperatures that have barely reached double digits in the last couple of weeks.

After a couple of hours struggling with papers (and cursing at students who so obviously didn't read the outline or the criteria for the assignment - do you know how hard those are to mark???) my hands are almost blue with cold. I have always had an issue with cold hands, but in this weather in the downstairs of the house it is made exponentially worse.

When I come upstairs to re-fuel on caffine or chip the ice of my digits, I try to find the closest warm body to try to warm up my hands. My kids are my polar opposite as far as temperature is concerned - it could be a snowstorm outside and they will be running around the house in shorts and tee-shirts while I am still wearing my thermals INSIDE. Nicholas in particular is like a little hot water bottle, so as soon as I find him, I pin him down and shove my hands up his shirt. And OMG he FREAKS OUT. Screams non-stop, and giggles all at the same time. As soon as I take my hands out, he asks for more. Weird how that works.

So last night, my darling child comes up to me and cups his hands around my face.

"I love you mommy" he says.

"I love you too sweetie"

"Are my hands cold?"

"No sweetheart, they are nice and warm"

"I warmed them up for you" he says.

"That was nice Nicholas - how did you do that?"

"I had them down my pants".

This is what you get when you send a six year old your business cards.

When we found out we were pregnant with Renee a couple of years ago, Ken and I decided that we were going to have to sell our little house and bite the bullet to get something bigger. Our original plan when we bought our cosy home when we first got married was to one day knock it down and build. It was a good location, big lot size, and within walking distance to schools and other great amenities. Once we found out Renee was on the way that plan went out the window.

Next step in the grand master plan was to find an real estate agent. I knew of one guy we had met in one of the kids music classes and the thing I really liked about him was that he knew we might be looking to sell - and all he did was give us his card, and tell us to call him. No pressure, no annoying follow-up calls, and no mention of houses when we saw him each week. I really liked that about him. So when we did find a house we thought we might like, we called him and asked him to arrange for a showing. He did, and we all clicked.

We learned that he was fairly new to the business and had a marketing background. So he worked his ass off for us when we did finally find the house we eventually bought. Once we bought our new house, we had to list ours. And again, he did a great job. We have referred him to friends and would use him again in a heartbeat.

The one thing he does is keep in touch - so each birthday, anniversary, etc, we get a card. And every single card has a couple of business cards in it. If we saved them all I am sure we would have dozens by now. Mr. Agent sent a card to Ethan last week - and when Ethan opened it he got really excited. He thought that the business cards that were inside were some form of money. Once he realized they weren't, he asked what he should do with them. I told him to do some art, and we would send it back to Mr. Agent. And so he did.

It's Junevember

"I hope you don't mind that we got Ethan a birthday present" one of our neighbours told me today. "It isn't something I'd buy my boys, but I thought he'd like it".

I wasn't too sure what to make of what she said - and for the record, I really really like this lady - we met because her son and Nicholas are in the same preschool class, and as it turns out her older boy and Ethan are the same age too. We get along great and her kids are super.

So when we got home Ethan opened the gift and it was a spiderman web-blaster. Now I know what she meant - it is strictly an outside toy, so Ethan put on his winter jacket, and ventured out into the pouring rain to make a mess of our deck. And he loved every second of it. This stuff is a pain in the ass to clean up as well, so it will be payback time when her son turns six next month.

Where does the time go?

Six years ago today Ethan was born. Hard to believe how fast time goes and how fast kids grow up.

He has been looking forward to today for awhile - he gets to pick what he wants to eat for lunch and dinner - so he picked sushi and quiche. I have made some really pathetic cupcakes for dessert tonight - thankfully his six year old palate is not too discerning at this point.

So this afternoon I took the kids to the mall in search of some good sushi (and french fries). After a good feed of raw fish and deep fried spuds we were heading over to the car when Ethan asked me if it hurt when he was born. I told him that yes, it hurt, but after it was all done it didn't hurt anymore. He then asked if I said "ouch". Um...yeah....that among some additional colourful phrases. In fact, the first thought I had when I found out I was pregnant with Nicholas was "holy crap - I have to give birth again!". When I found out I was pregnant with Renee I just about fell over in shock, and then remembered how painful the birth of the boys was. I had no way of knowing that her birth was by far the worst on the pain scale (and I thought it got easier).

Alot has changed over the past six years - and if someone told me I'd have three kids and my career pretty much on hold I would have told them they were crazy. One thing that hasn't changed though is that Ethan STILL sucks his fingers. Maybe that is something we should work on for next year.

Ready, set, Action!

Ethan has always been a pretty active kid, so this year we decided to try him in lacrosse. For those of you who aren’t familiar, you can check out the background of the game

here. I probably should have read that myself before this past weekend where I found myself asking one of the parents a few questions about the game. Too bad I picked the wrong person to ask – he looked at me like I had three heads. I openly admitted I knew nothing about the game – but ask me about hockey, rugby or even cricket and I am all good.

Lacrosse is a hell of a workout – running non-stop for the most part. Ethan loves it. He does keep asking when soccer starts again though – I think it is a bit hard to make friends when your teammates are always wearing face masks and the only way you can figure out who the kids are is by looking at their shoes. I kinda miss the soccer too (OMG did I just type that???). The parents were more laid back, and it seemed like the kids had more fun.

Lacrosse is a pretty physical game - even for the little ones. I can't even imagine how it must be when they are older. One thing I am not fond of though are the dads who scream and yell at their FIVE-YEAR OLDS during games. It is a wee bit unsettling. Of course not all the parents are like that, but there are a couple who treat the game like it is the gold medal match of Olympic hockey and their kids are earning million dollar salaries.

I really like the coach. I am not sure what happened at the beginning of the year, but apparently no one stepped up to coach, so one of the dads said he’d do it. He has openly admitted he doesn't know alot about lacrosse, but he is very good with the kids, and a couple of the dads who do know the game help him out. There is one guy in particular though to fancies himself as "coach" and he knows his stuff about lacrosse, but he has rubbed me the wrong way on more than one occasion when dealing with the kids. There is just something about this guy in particular that really annoys me. During one game he was “helping” and he picked Ethan up by the scruff of his jersey and pushed him while yelling, “run!” I was gob smacked – and my first reaction was to yell at this clown to get his greasy meat hooks off my kid. Anyone who knows Ethan knows that he is one of the most coachable kids around – does what he’s told and really pays attention. And he hustles. No need to grab, shove and yell at him. I didn’t do anything – but if he had touched Ethan one more time I was going to let him have it.

At any rate, I was at one of Ethan’s games this weekend to take pictures – it was a beautiful day, the game was outdoors (three cheers for natural light!) and Ken was at home to taking care of the other two rug-rats so I could focus on getting some good shots. I was in the players box waiting for the kids to get organized and just generally trying to figure out the best place to take pictures without getting in anyone’s way. Mr. Annoying came over to me and asked what paper I was from. I told him I was with Ethan. “What do you mean, “You’re with Ethan?”” he asked me. Funny coming from him – I’ve been at countless practices, a few games and even had the occasion to speak to him a handful of times. I told him I was Ethan’s MOM and the penny dropped. And so did his face when he realized his son wasn’t going to be in the paper (and to be honest, his son is a great player). His attitude did a complete 180, and he went back to pretending I wasn’t there. Too funny.

Little miss Diva

THIS makes a rough day worth it.

I might be old but....

Now that I am teaching (sort of) I am doing alot of marking of assignments that my online students send to me via e-mail. What shocks me is some of the e-mail addresses (changed somewhat for privacy - but you get the idea):

What's up bitch at gmail dot com
supersexydog at hotmail.com
party princess 69 at yahoo.com

I have about 50 students and I'd say about 10 have questionable e-mails....entertaining for sure, but professional - I don't know about that.

A cheering section would be nice.

A few nights ago I went out for dessert with some girlfriends that I hadn't seen in ages. We all went to high school together 20 years ago and they are the type of friends that you can go ages without talking to them, but when you do meet up it is like you just talked to them a week ago.

So here we are, the four of us on a night out without our husbands and without our children - and what do we talk about? You guessed it. Men and kids. We mostly talked about kids, and just generally supported each other in the decisions we made regarding parenting. It seems that we constantly run into people who tell us how we should be doing this or that when things are going wrong and yet when we do something right there isn't a whole lot of recognition for the hard work it took to get there.

One of my girlfriends told us about a incident that happened with her son. He had taken to peeing outside - something that I can totally relate to as my boys think that using the bathroom is a major inconveniece when building the dirt super-highway in the backyard. So when her son decided to pee in his sandbox she told him that he needs to come inside to go to the bathroom. So he did, and while he did another pee, she told him that she was just going to go upstairs to get his bath toys so he could play with them in the toilet. "EWWWW....gross" was his reaction. Then she said to him "think about what you did outside" - and the lightbulb went off. So instead of yelling at him to get inside to do his thing, she calmly made her point - and he got it. That was a great parenting moment. Wouldn't it be nice that when we had a great moment with the kids we had our own little cheering section - much like the BC Hydro ads here where they cheer every time you save energy.

Love Thursday

I came across this photo the other day, it was one that I took years ago with an old film camera. The quality isn't all that great, but honestly I don't really care as it is the expression on Ethan's face that I love as he is getting a thorough cleaning from Max.

Happy Love Thursday!

Love Thursday

Spring has sprung - finally. Here on the wet coast it has been, well.....wet. And cold. And SO NOT May-like-weather.

Last week I took the kids to a local marina, and we came across a group of baby geese. So cute and fuzzy and cute.....yes they are a pain when they get older (and you should have seen all the goose poop we had to negotiate to get this shot!), but when they are babies they are irresistible.

Happy Love Thursday!

I'm off to bed....well, maybe not.

Ever since starting my "side gig" tutoring a couple of classes online for a local college my personal down time has been significantly curtailed. I am home with the kids all day, and then at night once they are in bed I do work. When I am done work, I need to decompress - I can't go straight to bed without just relaxing first, which usually means surfing the net or watching a bit of TV.

Lately I have been surfing the net a bit more, and reading many more blogs. The latest two that I have been sucked into (and I mean that in a good way - the bloggers are so talented) are
sweet|salty and matt, liz and madeline. Almost every time I visit these two particular sites I cry. I cry for the loss they have both experienced. I can't believe how two complete strangers can have such an affect on me, but they do - and every time I think stuff sucks or I am feeling shitty I really need to remember how lucky I am. The internet has a strange way of bringing people together, and sharing people's loss and pain. You want to reach out and give hugs and try to do something, anything to make things better, to make things right. Yet they never will be. So it is now and hour after I told Ken I was heading to bed. And I am sitting in front of my monitor looking at pictures of a beautiful wee baby girl and bawling my eyes out.

His mouth will get him in trouble one day....

The kids grandfather (papa) came by today to help me out a bit so I could run some errands, sans children. Today I re-discovered what it is like to grocery shop ON MY OWN. When I go grocery shopping, I usually take all the kids with me and I have a list, AND I know where everything is. We are in and out pretty quick. Today I discovered the hidden treasures in the isles that I usually avoid at all costs. I even got to stop and sample some free food. Yeah, my life is that exciting.

When I got home, Nicholas and Papa were in deep conversation. I have no idea what they were talking about, but near the end Nicholas called my dad a "hoser". Now if you are Canadian, you know what that means, but if you aren't, here is an excerpt from Wikipedia for your reading pleasure:

Hoser is both a slang term and a stereotype, originating from and used primarily in Canada.[1]
Like the very similar term hosehead, it originally referred to farmers of the Canadian prairies, who would siphon gas from farming vehicles with a hose during the Great Depression of the 1930s. The expression has since been converted to the verb 'to hose' as in to trick, deceive, or steal - for example: "That card-shark sure hosed me." Hosed has an additional meaning of becoming drunk - for example: "Let's go out and get hosed."
The term "hoser" refers to an era in hockey before the ice resurfacing machine came into use. The losing team had to hose off the ice. The term "hoser" can then be construed to mean loser.

I haven't heard that term in years. I have no idea where he came up with it. My dad thought it was hilarious. "My grandson just called me a hoser" like it was almost cool (it isn't).

Later on in the day, the boys were playing outside. We have a great backyard, totally fenced in, so the kids can run themselves silly out there and I don't have to worry about them. I peeked out and busted Nicholas peeing on one of my plants. "Nicholas!" I yelled at him "why are you peeing outside?" And my son, in all seriousness looked at me and said "because I can". Isn't that the truth.

Look at that red hair!

This one is for Kate

This is little miss Renee and her mop of red hair. We were outside on a beautiful sunny day - still cold though - damned weather. The sun hitting her hair was just perfect.

I swear, one day she'll be sitting in the back of the classroom on St. Patty's day and when the teacher asks "Who's Irish" her hand will shoot up into the air and she'll say "me, me, ME!!!". She'll be the only half asian kid who can play the Irish card - all due to the red hair.

Love Thursday

There are a million reasons I love this picture. The hair sticking up (anyone rememeber "our gang" with alfalfa, buckwheat and spanky?). The lone "puff ball" just waiting for Nicholas to blow the little seeds everywhere. The baggy saggy pants. The fact that he was in such a rotten mood when I snapped this, but you'd never know.

Happy Love Thursday! Visit Shutter Sisters for more amazing pictures by many talented photographers.

Mommy's little "helper".

One of the hardest things to do when you have more than one child is trying to find time to spend with each of the kids. Renee sucks up alot of my time and attention because she is the baby - although she is really good at keeping herself occupied, and her brothers (for the most part) are great entertainers. In fact, right now Ethan is explaining the finer points of farting to his little sister. And she is loving it. But I digress....

Nicholas and I usually get to spend a couple of hours together on the days he doesn't have preschool. Renee naps in the morning, and Ethan is in Kindergarten, so Nicholas loves his one on one time with me. And what he likes to do best is bake. I love baking too, but I have to be careful because said baked goods must get eaten at some point, and if they are lying around, I will usually munch away mindlessly.

Yesterday we baked banana bread. This recipie is one that I have modified and tested until it tastes just like the kind Starbucks sells (a side note - banana bread sold in Starbucks in Canada is VASTLY different from it's US counterpart - my kids will not touch the US banana bread - go figure).

Every time I get ready to bake and start getting out bowls and stuff Nicholas comes running, grabs a chair and positions himself right in the middle of all the action. He is quite a good helper - and so because he is so good at helping me, he wants to be rewarded with the fruits of our labour that don't make it into the baking pan. As you can see below, he is not one to waste any batter!

Me too!!!

Poor Renee - relegated to the inside while her brothers and dad play hockey on the deck. If she is anything like her mother she'll be out there with them in no time.

Hey Ma, this one's for you....

I know you were in a bit of shock when I told you yesterday that it was SNOWING here. Well guess what? It snowed again today. It is all melted, but still - it is almost April for goodness sake. Hope you are having fun on the beach in New Zealand. I am not jealous at all (does the sarcasm shine through?).

I am sure that many people think that it snows all the time in Canada - hell, I even met some people in California that I managed to convince we lived in igloos. Really, I am not lying. But snow in late March? In Vancouver? Pure and utter crazy stuff.

Thoughts on dog poop.

The one thing that I really miss about our old house is our neighbours. We had great people living on both sides of us, they were both older, retired couples who called us "the kids" and kept watch over the house when we were away. They adored the boys (they never really got a chance to know Renee) and often bought them small trinkets when they went on vacation. In fact, both Ethan and Nicholas thought that when you went trick or treating at halloween you were supposed to get candy AND presents from everyone because our neighbours would make gift bags for them.

As much as I love our new place, we don't have the same closeness with the neighbours here. I have met a few people, but for the most part everyone keeps to themselves. We have a set of neighbours on one side of us that we were warned about when we moved in, but I took it with a grain of salt - I just thought that I would form my own opinion when we met them.

They are a young family like us, mom, dad and two kids. They were very nice to us when we moved in. We exchanged pleasantries when we saw each other. But they were odd. Couldn't quite put my finger on it, but we were told by more than one neighbour that they have done their fair share of pissing people off. And over the past few weeks, I can honestly say that I haven't been too impressed either.

This family has a large dog. We don't really see it (and I say "it" because I have no idea if it is male or female) that often, and rarely hear it bark. Barking doesn't bother me, and I love dogs. I have never seen them walk the dog, and I know that this neighbour FREAKS OUT if there is any dog doing it's business on his lawn. So here is the kicker - for the past few weeks, their dog has been crapping on our lawn. Often two or three times A DAY. For the longest time we couldn't figure out who was doing it, but we knew the dog was big - and very regular. When I have to change diapers all day the last thing I want to do is clean up crap from a dog that isn't mine.

We finally figured out it was their dog when I caught him crapping at midnight one night. I wasn't in a position to go over to the house at that time, but I thought I would deal with it in the morning. So I picked up the poop, but it in a bag and put it in their garbage can. For days both Ken and I tried to talk to them, but they weren't home or not answering the door. We took to flinging the poop on their lawn, but that didn't work either. Finally we wrote a note - basically saying that their dog was using our lawn as a toilet, and asking them to pick up his poop. There hasn't been any poop again - and there hasn't been any apology either. Weird. If I got a letter like that in my mailbox, I'd go over and talk to the neighbour, and perhaps even bring a peace offering. I have no idea where the dog is pooping now, they still let it out to roam at night and they still don't walk it. Ken did say he saw one of our other dogless neighbours picking up crap off her lawn yesterday though.

Love Thursday

I am not a girly girl. Never have been. And I thought that if I ever had a little girl I would never go crazy with the pink, the dresses and the hair stuff. For the most part I haven't, but I did find these funky hairbands at a local shop and I had to try them out. Too cute for words. I think I may be living a bit of girly girl through Renee. Happy Love Thursday!

Just another day.

I have never been a fan of Valentine's day. When I was young and geeky in high school I certainly never got a rose or chocolates or anything of the like. I didn't have a boyfriend in high school, so I always felt sorry for myself on February 14th and spent the day wondering what the hell was wrong with me. I had lots of boys who were friends, but that was because I was a gym rat and played alot of sports. They never saw me as a "girl" but rather a passable basketball player with a half decent jump shot.

I often thought "well, maybe this is the year that I get something from someone". And each year I was disappointed. When I was in university I dated a bit, but was always single on Valentine's day. It didn't bother me as much then - I had alot of single girlfriends so we all got together and gorged ourselves on chocolate and tried to convince ourselves that someone somewhere was missing out big time by not having us as girlfriends.

My first real valentine was Ken. I told him that I wasn't a big fan of Valentine's day, and that he didn't have to get me anything (ok, I did ask for a card, but that was it). A couple of days before Valentine's day he had a hair appointment (I am laughing as I type this - he now has NO HAIR) and the hairdresser asked him what he was getting me for Valentine's day. He told her that I said to only get a card, and she proceeded to tell him that I didn't mean that and that I would be pissed if he didn't get me anything. So he went out and got me a spa package. An expensive one. And what did I get him? A card. Nothing else. Just like we agreed. And I felt like crap.

Last night Ken told me that he was sorry, but he got me nothing this year. He has been so busy with work that he hasn't had a chance to go out and get a card. I was ok with that - I have been so busy at home that I didn't get him anything either. At least we are on the same page. In all honesty, I'd rather Ken come home on June 22nd or any other regular day with an armload of flowers and tell me he loves me. He doesn't need February 14th to do that.

But this year, I have really enjoyed Valentine's Day - because of the boys. Each of them worked hard on Valentine cards for their classmates, and they both came home with an armload of cards and treats from their friends - and most of them handmade. They spent about an hour on the floor going through all their cards, and talking about their friends. It was nice. It is what Valentines should be about - all the kids made and got cards. They had small parties at school. At five and three it is all so innocent and fun.

My gummy wonder.

Last night I did something I swore I would never do as a parent. I bundled up my screaming baby and put her in the car and went for a drive. At midnight. The intent was to try to get her to calm down, but if that didn't work, I was on my way to the hospital to see if they could figure out what the hell was wrong. I am sure it is her teeth - she has been teething for what seems like months, but nothing is coming through. I swear she will be walking before she even pops one tooth through.

The poor little bugger was screaming for about an hour before I decided to put her in the car. Honestly, I had no idea what to do with her. You'd think that with her being my third that I would have a bit of a clue, but after giving the tylenol with no change and her absolutely beside herself I was at a loss. So I buckled her in, started driving and within five minutes she was asleep. Mission accomplished - that is until I had to get her out of the carseat. That is why I never liked the idea of using the car - none of my kids transfer well from the car to the house, so I figured that I had better drive for awhile before the attempt to get her out of the car, up the stairs and to her room. Sure enough, as soon as I pulled in the driveway and turned off the engine she woke up. Screaming. O...M...G. Got her to bed, and she settled down - for about an hour and a bit. And then she was at it again. I KNOW as a parent this is temporary - but holy crap, I am getting too old for this. On a good day I look like hell. Today I think I scared most of Ethan's kindergarten class. Let's hope tonight is a better night - and if not, it will be a movie day for the kids tomorrow while I crash on the couch - that is if Renee will nap.....which she didn't do today. OY.

Love Thursday

There is many a time I have seen a baby and I think to myself - "You are SO CUTE I could just eat you up". Well, I guess my son thinks pretty highly of himself - he had a good go at his reflection.

Checking him out.

Today Nicholas got his "report card" for his swimming lessons. He failed. Oops, sorry, he didn't fail, he needs to "re-register in the same level". Now I would never tell him that he failed - he had fun, and he learned a few new things that his ex-competitive-swimmer-mom and ex-lifeguard-dad couldn't get through to him. For that I am thankful to the kid who was teaching him.

I call his teacher "the kid" because he is barely into his twenties. To him, I must look like a washed up suburban housewife who barely keeps it together, and on a good day, will manage to slap a coating of lip balm on before leaving the house. So when he handed Nicholas his report card for the class the first thing I did when I got home was to see if this "kid" was on Facebook. Sure enough he was. And even more astounding, his profile was open for all to see. So I had a look. Nothing on there shocked me - photos of drunken university parties (hell we all did that - thankfully digital cameras weren't around in those days for me), his background, what he took in University, yada yada yada. I am sure that he would have been shocked that an old fart like me is on facebook. It reminds me of the conversation that I overheard a few days ago of a few teens discussing facebook and what other options to use because one of the kids discovered that his mom was on facebook. He told his buddies - and there was silence, followed by "Dude - your MOM is on facebook?". Yes, we are slowly taking over the world.

Love Thursday

shutter sisters is a new blog I have found recently - and here is my contribution to "Love Thursday". One of my favourite shots of the boys after an afternoon of playing in the dirt.

Housebound.

I don't do well when I am housebound. As of today, I have not left my house for four days. Yes, four days with three kids (who have also been housebound) you get the idea. One of the main reasons that I haven't gone anywhere is the insane amount of the white crap that decended since late Saturday. By some estimations, we have received 40 centimeters (almost 16 inches) of snow. Makes driving in these parts just stupid, so I don't go anywhere. At our old house we lived on a bus route, so at least we could get out of the driveway. Up here, there are no plows on our street, so it makes for interesting navigation (translation - lots of sliding and praying) to get to the main roads. Every time I get in the car and have to tackle snow I am reminded of the time when I was 16, driving a V8 Chevy in a blizzard and learing in a hurry that "hitting the breaks" does not translate into stopping. Best physics lesson EVER.

The kids have had a blast though. As much as it is a royal pain in the ASS to get them dressed to go outside, I know that they will stay out there for hours, so it is all well worth it.






Being housebound has also forced me to get a bit creative with cooking - creative because my dumb ass didn't do the greatest job of making sure we had enough of the staples in the house. Of course who knew that we would have so much bloody snow - but I digress. When your three year old only eats about five things in the whole world, and you run out of two of them, one resorts to desperate measures. I actually baked bread and managed to convince him that the world would not come to an end if he didn't have a glass of milk - is there such a thing as white food colouring?

What the hell am I going to do when they have TWO MONTHS off?

Well, tomorrow it is back to the grind - school, music classes, soccer, swimming, skating, poking my eyes out with a sharp stick....

I have enjoyed the holidays with the kids, but I am thankful to be getting back into routine. The only one who has had anything resembling a routine in this house over the last two weeks has been Renee - she could get all her naps, eat in her high chair for all her meals and not worry about being carted here and there. Tomorrow that all changes - and I hope I am not in a world of hurt once Renee's routine gets all out of whack.

Ethan loves school and he is so excited to be going back. I am not sure if I have mentioned it before but I just ADORE his teacher. I am lucky that I get to help out in the classroom from time to time and I am just gobsmacked at how much the kids are learning. Such a change from preschool - I didn't care for his teacher at all (although Ethan liked her so that is all that really matters). I am all about fun when kids are learning, and his teacher is just amazing at ensuring the kids are having fun and learning all at the same time.

Nicholas can't wait to get back to preschool either - he just loves his teachers (different than Ethan's) and I think he is a bit sick of looking at me all day.

I have no idea what the hell I am going to do with them over the summer, I just wish they could go to school year-round (like they do in New Zealand). I guess I have a few months to figure it out...

Argh...Facebook.

I have been on facebook for awhile now, and it has been really interesting catching up with old friends that I had lost touch with. I kinda like the virtual mode of keeping in contact as I am a bit of a homebody and not the most social person on the planet.

The other day I experienced one of the downfalls of facebook - someone put a picture online of me when I was in University, and it is NOT the most flattering picture. Even if I wasn't on facebook, there is no way to stop someone from posting pictures if they want, at least this way I know they are out there. I have many friends who have yet to succumb to the facebook craze (minus Miss A - who swore up and down she would NEVER join and lo and behold she is now a facebook member), and I have seen pictures of them posted (none that are really bad, but some that are a bit unflattering). I thank the good man above that I went to University and high school at a time before digital cameras, so any photos of me need to be scanned and uploaded - hopefully a task that is too much of pain in the ass for anyone to bother with. The world would be a much better place if no-one had to look at pics of me when I had the "looks like something crawled up on your head and died" hairstyle (thanks to my husband for that comment).

Jingle balls, jingle balls.....

For the past couple of weeks we have seen this reindeer blow up in the front lawn of a house that we pass on the walk to school. Perhaps it is just my mind that is in the gutter, but every single time I looked at this, my eyes went right to the berries....

Short lived happy dance.

This morning I was doing the "I'm done my shopping" happy dance. No more malls, no more crowds, no more crap. Well, I just got an e-mail from Amazon.ca, telling me that my items that were supposed to arrive within the next day or two won't be shipped until FEBRUARY. Shit. The dance was short lived. Somehow I should have known this would happen.

What do they DO at school????

Renee has been sick. All month. Between teething, croup, a couple of nasty colds and fevers I am surprised we are both able to function. I KNOW she is functioning because my toothless nine month old is pulling herself up on things and figuring out how to climb stairs. My gummy wonder will be walking before she has teeth.

I don't ever remember the boys being this sick for such a long time. I remember the odd cold and teething pains with the occasional bout of croup, but nothing as bad as poor Renee has had to deal with. This lack of sleep is turning me into one bitchy momma. At least when I had one sick baby I could nap in the afternoon. Now if I fall asleep I am likely to wake up from my slumber with my face decorated with non-toxic marker.

So this has made me wonder why Renee? The only thing that I can come up with is that Ethan and Nicholas spend their time at school licking all their friends and happily sharing the nasties they bring home with their baby sister.

I rock...yeah right.

So much for posting every day for the month of November. I suck. However, this couple rocks - this has been making the rounds on YouTube and Facebook - I wish I'd thought of it first. Enjoy!

Just about the smartest 8 month old EVER!

We just got back from a road trip to Portland. Yes, we drove 7 hours each way with a baby in the car so we could SHOP. On the way home I sat in the back of the mini-van to entertain Renee. But as you can see, she did all the entertaining.....


Peek-a-boo! from anna on Vimeo.

Why?

Why does my husband insist on buying Halloween candy at Costco in September?
Why do we go through more than one box of said candy before Oct 31st?
Why did we only get three kids this year?
Someone is testing my will - and I am losing big time. I was actually going to count how many of those tiny bars of chocolaty goodness I eat in one day, but decided not to because really, I don't think I want to know.

I think I'll be hitting the pool tonight.

Random shots from today.

Here are some of the reasons I love this time of year....

Public service announcement

In the past month there has been some traffic to this blog from people googling "haircuts". More specifically, this post has come up when people have googled the following:

MOM HAIR CUTS
plagiocephaly haircut
haircuts for one year old boys
kid haircut vancouver bc
haircuts for young boys
mommy haircuts
children haircuts in vancouver bc
children haircut vancouver
children's haircut west vancouver bc


Of course I am probably just going to increase traffic because of this post, so as a service to you I am going to share with you my secret of a great kids haircut. I have found that the local barber has been the best for my boys. I did take them to my hairdresser once, and I would go back to her with my kids in a heartbeat if she didn't book three months in advance (!!!!) and wasn't a half hour drive away.

I used to take the boys to the fancy kid places that charged an arm and a leg, and yes the cars were cool and the kids were entertained, but more often than not my kids looked like they had a fight with the weed wacker when they got out of there....

As for Renee, I am not sure what I am going to do with her yet - I am not sure if the barber will be the best option, but when she is ready for a haircut, we'll probably try them out first.

My degree is FINALLY good for something.

When I graduated from University in 1994, I had no idea what I was going to do with my life. Fresh out of school with a biology degree, I soon learned that in order to get a great paying job, I needed more schooling. All of my close friends that I graduated with went on to further their educations and deplete their bank accounts.

After farting around for awhile and doing a bit of travelling overseas, I finally decided that I should grow up and figure out what I wanted to do in life. So I went to a technical school, got a diploma in safety, and started my crusade to make everyone's world a safe one. That lasted until Ethan was born, and after my year of maternity leave I went back to work. The small wrinkle in the whole plan was that in order to make the world safe, I had to be ready and willing to travel at a moment's notice (which doesn't work well when you have a baby) and I had just got to a point where I was burning out and needed to find another avenue in the job department. Luckily I was able to do a new job that I really enjoyed, and I have yet to be sick of it (maybe that is because in the last 5 years of being in this job, I have been off work for about 2.5 years for maternity leave!).

Up until very recently, my biology degree hasn't been of much use. However, now that I have boys I am finding it is coming in very handy when we talk about trees, bugs and birds.

We have a beautiful backyard, and are fortunate to have a variety of wildlife. The other day I was sitting on the deck with the boys and we were identifying different birds in the yard. When I was an undergrad, one of my electives was a birdwatching course and I actually learned a thing or two. My trusty Peterson Field Guide has come in very handy, so when we see a bird, the boys want to see where it is in the book. Of course to hold their interest, I also use my "What bird did THAT" book which outlines in great detail what the shit of different birds looks like when it hits a windshield. Since my boys are obsessed with all things poop, burps and farts, this is right up their alley.

Christmas cards

I took a card class this morning with a couple of friends - and this is the result. These cards aren't too fancy, the idea is that you could do a whole bunch to send to friends and stuff. My friends won't be getting these for Christmas though - I think I'll stick to the tried and true family photo montage.

The sneaky mommy.

A couple of weeks ago I tuned into Oprah when Jessica Seinfeld was promoting her new book "Deceptively Delicious".



The premise of the book is sneaking in various items to your meals that your kids won't normally eat. Since Nicholas is a very picky eater, I thought it might be worth it to order the book. Nicholas still won't eat meat, eggs, cheese, fish....the list goes on. He does eat alot of healthy stuff though - whole grains, fruits, some veggies, flax, milk, yoghurt and nuts to name a few. I figured any new ideas I could get would be great.

When I was online ordering, I decided that to save on shipping costs, I'd also purchase "The Sneaky Chef"



I thought that I'd get two books with great ideas of how to make better meals for my kids. After having a better look at both books, it was surprising to see that alot of the recipies are quite similar. Since I have bought the books, I have discovered that there has been alot of activity in the blogging world discussing how Jessica ripped of Missy. Interesting stuff. Personally I really like Missy's book and have used it much more than Jessica's. Nicholas is a big fan of the sneaky chef's chocolate chip cookies (made with pureed chickpeas). Jessica's recipe is very similar, but with whole chickpeas (which wouldn't work in this house).

In addition to the cookies, I have also made both author's recipies for brownies (Jessica's has spinach and carrots in it, Missy's has spinach and blueberries). Nicholas took one bite of Jessica's and said they tasted funny, but he did eat Missy's with little complaint (he does love blueberries, so that may have something to do with it). So I guess in this house the jury has concluded that Missy beats Jessica.

NaBloPoMo

Well it is here, National Blog Posting Month. Which pretty much means that if I am up to it, I post something EVERY DAY. Not too sure if I can do it, but it can't be any worse than say eating the 200 or so candies that we have lying around the house because we were TOLD to expect huge numbers for Halloween, but we only got THREE kids. If I do a post for every time I feel the urge to eat chocolate, I'll have multiple posts per day, and I may get skinny.

Wish me luck.

Out of the mouths of kids - part two.

When we bought this house at the beginning of the year, one of the things we knew we would have to do was get the roof replaced. So for the past two weeks, we have had roofers here during the times it hasn't been raining - and since we are in Vancouver, they are here about once day per week. At the rate these guys are going, I think that they will still be putting on the new roof a couple of months from now, and I may just have to invite them for Christmas dinner.

One day last week as I was leaving the house I was trying to be extra careful as there were cedar shingles strewn all over the driveway from the old roof that the guys were removing. I had Renee in her carseat and I was holding Nicholas' hand trying to make sure that he navigated the mess without too much trouble. Unfortunately, I wasn't watching myself too closely and I stepped on a nail that went right through my shoe and into my foot. So off to the doctor I went, with all three kids in tow, and got my tetanus shot and a week's worth of antibiotics.

That night as Nicholas get his pajamas on he got his foot caught. "Jesus C****t", he said. Ken stopped in the doorway, turned around and said "Nicholas, where did you hear that?". "That is what mommy said when the nail went into her foot". So Ken came downstairs and told me what happened. I figured that since I had only said it once, and if we don't over-react when he says it, hopefully he will forget it and keep his mouth shut.

Fast forward a few days. Nicholas is playing with my dad in our rec room. I get home from running some errands and ask how things went. Dad tells me that Nicholas is quite good at balancing on the furniture. He proceeds to describe a game they were playing where Nicholas climbs up one side of the couch, walks across the top and jumps off the end. After about the fifth time of doing this (!!!!) he stubbed his toe. So my dad tells him to put a pillow on the floor and aim for that. So he does. And misses. And says as clear as day "Jesus C****t!!!". Dad says it is one of those times that you want to burst out laughing but you can't. So he tells Nicholas that isn't a nice word. Nicholas goes up on the couch again, jumps, misses and cusses. So my dad tells him to say Geronimo instead. So once again, Nicholas balances on the couch (did I ever mention that safety is my background???) jumps off, and says "geron....geromemee....geronmoo....oh Jesus C*****!!!!".

Out of the mouths of kids...

This year "back to school" was quite a time in our house - Ethan started kindergarten, and Nicholas started preschool.

On Ethan's first day, he was so excited and couldn't wait to meet all his "new friends" and play with all the toys. Since we just moved into the area where we are now, we didn't know anyone at the school, and since Ethan is my oldest, I didn't really know what to expect.

Well, that first day consisted of going to school, staying for about 10 minutes to take attendance, and then leave. Ethan promptly told me after that episode that he would like to go back to preschool and that kindergarten pretty much sucked (well he didn't exactly say that, but it is what he meant).

As the week went on, kindergarten was one hour per day. Just enough time for him to be convinced that school was pretty cool, and as long as he got to play it was all good. One hour wasn't quite long enough for us to go back home though, so when Ethan was at school, Nicholas and I went for long walks to kill time until we had to pick him up. We are lucky that the school is close to a big forest and a good sized lake, so we would walk around those areas and explore.

One morning, we came across a man walking his weiner dog. Nicholas was in love. "Look at that puppy mommy" he yelled at me as he ran towards the poor terrified dog to give him a cuddle (we are working on the whole asking-the-owner-if-we-can-touch-the-dog thing, but Nicholas usually forgets until he is just about on top of the poor terrified animal). Luckily this dog didn't freak out, but she wasn't overly interested in Nicholas and just wanted to get on with her walk. Unfortunately for her, the owner was only too happy to talk to Nicholas.

After a few minutes, Nicholas thanked the man for letting him pet his puppy. The owner then told Nicholas that the dog wasn't a puppy at all, since she was 8 years old she was an "old lady". Nicholas gave the dog a snuggle and we were off.

A few minutes later, a woman was walking towards us with her small dog. Nicholas in his best three-year-old voice (with no volume control) yelled out "hey mom, look at that old lady"! Of course he meant the dog, but she didn't know that. She just gave me a dirty look, muttered something under her breath and stormed past us. Honestly, I was just barely able to keep it all in with out exploding into fits of laughter.

Happy sack and man tubes - part deux

Yesterday was a big day in our house. It was the official event marking the end of ever having another child (well, I guess it is official when Ken is confirmed to be shooting blanks).

I wrote about his consultation for the snip way back in October of 2005. Yes, it was almost TWO years ago that he went in, talked to the doc, and picked up the infamous bag of recovery goodies that would help him through this very trying and traumatic event. Note the sarcasm from a woman who has given birth three times with no drugs, and nothing more than a couple of expired extra strength tylenols to take home after delivery. I am thankful though that Ken got a case of cold feet at that time and didn't book his actual snip, because if he did, Renee wouldn't be here now.

After Renee was born, I was 100% positive that I don't want more kids. So Ken had to go for consultation #2, I told him that if he left the doc's office without an appointment WRITTEN IN PEN in his calender it would be grounds for divorce.

All last week I think he was sweating bullets. He had a countdown every morning that went something like this:

"Anna, in only X more days, I will make the ultimate sacrifice for this family - and I will need at least a week to recover, as I have been told it will feel like I have been kicked HARD in the nuts"

As you probably can imagine, response each morning varied and after I had heard numerous times about how much prep work was required (shaving, washing, etc) I offered to give him a good swift kick myself and we could just get it over with. I think Ken seriously considered it.

Yesterday morning he went into the office, and got to chatting with a gentleman in the waiting room who had just had the procedure. Ken said he didn't look too good, and the only advice he gave Ken was to "take the lollypop when they offer it to you". Huh? You get a lollypop?

He later found out that the lollypop is designed to get your mind off the "business at hand" so to speak. Before the snip itself, Ken found himself sucking away at his lime lollypop while a kind nurse candidly pointed out that his shaving skills left much to be desired so she would need to "clean things up down there". I don't think Ken will ever look at a lime lollypop the same way again.

The procedure itself took seven minutes. We are told recovery time will take about seven days. Ken did well, and he is recovering nicely. Considering it is only the day after I am pretty impressed. The only hiccup so far is that Renee managed to give him a baby kick to his newly neutered parts, just to remind him that us women stick together, and she didn't want him to get off too easy. That's my girl!

I forgot

A few nights ago before I went to bed something happened and I thought to myself "now that is a great thing to blog about", and at the time I thought that I really should write it down because I may forget. But of course I didn't write it down. And now that I have had a couple of completely sleepless nights thanks to my wee teething baby girl, I have no idea what the hell was so damned interesting that I would put it out there in cyberspace. But I am sure it was good and riveting. You'll just have to trust me on that.

Coulda, shoulda, didn't...and now I'm paying for it.

I just finished watching a bootcamp show on tv. I really should sign up for something like that to help me shed some of this baby weight. Of course, the fact that my hubby just walked in the door with an oreo cookies and cream blizzard from Dairy Queen won't help in my quest for sveltness. What's worse is that I wasn't even hungry. My brain told me to put the blizzard in the fridge after a few mouthfuls. My hand kept scooping all that ice creamy goodness into my gullet. My brain said "stop". But I didn't. And now that I have finished the whole damned thing I feel like I want to barf. As my good friend J says, "tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes". Perhaps tomorrow starts my new run at sveltness.

Tis the season....

For weddings! I was recently going through some photos I had taken at weddings, and here are some of my favourites from two that I was at in the past years. I was going through a bit of a "sepia" phase...

Here is my friend D and her new husband (well, not so new anymore, they have been married for three years!)

And here is my brother and his wife (happy 2nd anniversary guys!). She looked stunning....

holiday? Today was a holiday????

A funny thing happens when you find yourself a stay at home mom. Being on maternity leave is wonderful, but there are no holidays.

When I am not on maternity leave I work part-time for the government (ok, insert joke HERE). When I worked, I loved my holidays. I looked forward to them and started counting down about a week beforehand. AND contrary to popular belief, us government workers have the same holidays as everyone else.

Now that I am at home I am kinda floored when a holiday comes. Today was one of those days. It was BC day. I totally forgot. Ken was home from work, so I just assumed it was Sunday - until he didn't go paddling. I tell you, I get all screwed up when a holiday is thrown in the mix. The kids are totally oblivious that a holiday is here. They still get up at six. There is no such thing as sleeping in on a holiday when you have three young ones.

I am also kinda hesitant to go anywhere when there is a holiday. There are lineups at ferries and borders. In hot cars with three kids, two of whom need to pee RIGHT NOW and there is not a toilet or bush in sight. And all the stuff you need to bring - strollers, playpens, toys, blankets, food....the list goes on. What happened to the carefree backpacking and roaming the world days? Oh yeah - we grew up. We got a minivan. We have to fill it full of crap every single time we go out. So it is just that much easier to stay home and enjoy the "holiday".

Little Miss Hair

Quite the lid on my wee girl....

CRAP

Ken just got back from the storage locker with the last load of boxes that we put there before we moved. When we put the house on the market in January, we had to do some serious de-cluttering to make the place look better (HGTV would have come in REALLY handy then). Since we had absolutely no storage at all we had to rent the locker.

Our house was a rancher, about 1700 square feet. Our new house is about 2800 square feet, and guess what? We can fill every space in this new place. People who have visited us in the new house have commented on how we have managed to fill all of the rooms even though this place is so much bigger than the previous house. And this was BEFORE we emptied the storage locker.

I just about fainted when I saw the FIRST vanload of stuff. And by vanload, I mean pull-out-all-the-seats and fill up the van to the top. So much so that the bumper was not too far off the ground (a lowered minivan - we have reached a whole new level of cool).

I must admit it is a bit like Christmas - opening up each box to see what I haven't missed at all in the last 6 months. I have only opened up three boxes today - mostly thanks to my newly teething daughter who won't let me leave her sight for a second. My poor mom is going to faint when she sees the spare room, which up until yesterday had a bed, a nightstand and a light. Now she will have to share the room with a desk, and ab-roller, and about 14 boxes. We won't even go into what is in the closet. My mantra of "if you can't see it - it doesn't exist" still reigns supreme.
I am almost starting to think we should have had a garage sale and just sold all the boxes un-opened. Kinda like a grab-bag of sorts. Twenty bucks a box – you might get a box full of toys, or a box full of CD’s. At any rate, I doubt I would have missed any of it.

Why?

Ever since we moved a couple of months ago I have become and HGTV and TLC addict. Not only because this house needs ALOT of work (and I can't think of any designs to save myself) but because we now have cable. In our old place all we had was bunny ears, but since they didn't work in the new house, we decided to bite the bullet and pay for tv. "Treehouse" is now a part of the boys' vocabulary .

The other day I was watching "A baby story" while feeding Renee. When I used to watch it I would cry happy tears - probably because at that time we were trying for kids, and I had NO IDEA how painful childbirth could be. Now that I know we are done with the babymaking, the show doesn't have same effect on me (I still get a bit emotional when the baby is born, but not like I used to). The other day though I was so pissed that I turned the show off. There was a young girl who was in labour and obviously was given an epidural - she was having contractions while getting her nails done at her bedside, and just after the doctor checked her and told her she was 10cm, she pulled out her phone book and started calling all her friends to come to the hospital because she was just about to push. I kid you not, she must have called at least five people, giggling and laughing telling them that "OMG I am 10 cm, and cool, I'm going to push and have a baby".

I distinctly remember being 10cm with all my kids. And I was in NO position to talk, never mind call my girlfriends. I was in so much pain. And yet watching this show made me ticked that maybe I missed out on something by not having an epidural (first kid was by choice, the other two, not at all). I cannot even begin to put into words the pain. With Renee, I asked for the epidural at about 11 am, they came to test my blood about 40 minutes later, and then NOTHING. Renee was born at 2:15 pm. It was like they totally forgot about me. Sigh. At least I know that I never will have to give birth again!

AHHHH.....

You know the feeling when you have found the PERFECT piece of clothing? I am the first to admit that I don't have the most up-to-date or edgy fashion sense. Most days if I get a clean pair of pants and shirt on that match I am doing well. I recently bought a couple of pairs of light cotton pants with the intention of wearing them around the house - they fit well, were lighter than sweat pants and cheap. Little did I know how comfortable they were, or that I would even wear them out in public - especially when the tag says the pants are from the "sleepwear collection".

The first time I wore the grey pair was to the movies. I was going for comfort, not style, and I knew that no-one would be paying any attention to me, so what the heck. I loved the fact that I was comfy, and it felt almost as though I was at home hanging out on the couch.

Last week it was so gross and rainy here in Vancouver (surprise!!!) that I decided to wear the dark blue pair to the boys soccer class. I have never in my life received so many complements - not on the pants, but on how good I looked for just having had a baby. These pants hid my weight - and hid it well. I love them so much that I feel like I could be Oprah - I want to give a pair to everyone in the audience (and I so totally could afford it as there are only two of you!)

Stuff

Three months is a long time to leave a blog neglected. I get so ticked when I look at blogs I regularly read and they haven't been updated in a few days. And it isn't as if I don't have blogging moments. Many a time during the last few weeks something would happen and I'd think - I really need to blog about THAT.

I have been busy with the kids, Ethan is driving me a bit crazy as he is now done preschool and he has to look at my ugly mug every day - so he has developed a bit of an attitude in part because he isn't seeing his friends as often as he'd like. "Whatever mom" has been uttered on more than one occasion, and the stomping and dirty looks have increased exponentially since the end of June. Maybe this is just a part of being five. I hope not. If that is the case it will be pure hell once Nicholas reaches that point.

Speaking of the second born, I think we can now "officially" say he is potty trained. He regressed when we moved and when Renee was born, but now he is doing very well. Thank goodness. Of course now that I have put that down in black and white I have likely jinxed myself.

Little miss Renee is doing great. I can't believe she is four months already. And the hair on that child - it is what EVERYONE says when they first see her. I have stopped trying to do anything with it and I just leave it in the natural mohawk. What the hell - it looks cute on her.

She has also started to suck her thumb - which is great at night - if she wakes up she just pops her thumb in her mouth and soothes herself back to sleep. We have had a few nights where she has slept through the night and it makes for one less grouchy mommy.