bubble boy

I love my children. LOVE THEM. But lately they drive me crazy!! Where are on earth do they learn such behaviors like hitting one another as though they are golf balls, and biting clothes and trying to drag one another away, and grabbing by the neck and falling backwards? (OK, so its always a certain brother doing the action, and a certain other always crying in reaction.) Why are boys so mean? Where did all this energy and aggresion come from? I thought I put a stop to it when we stopped watching Lion King (that definitely explains the biting).
What are you supposed to do? Ignore it and hope it stops? Try to bribe it with the thought of a treat? Lock it away in the corner in a time out? Cause none of these seem to be a solution. Someone should invent a force field that goes around a child that you can turn on and off with a remote that prevents siblings from being able to make contact. That would sell.

lost in translation

A two year old is good for many things. Today Enoch had a blowout so I sent Levi to ask his Daddy for a onesie. With a very confused look he said, "Daddy, I need a monkey." "You need a monkey?" Daddy replied. Levi then shook his head and said clearly, "No, Mommy needs a monkey." Luckily Josh had overheard our previous conversation and knew what Levi was really talking about. I love having a helper so eager that he is willing to get anything for me, even a monkey.

sasklife

Saskatoon is incredible!! We have enjoyed more time outside this summer than I can ever remember. (Something has to make up for the terribly cold winters here!!!) These are a few pics from the other day.

newly wed 10

Ever heard of the freshmen 10? The 10 pounds that new students tend to gain their first semester being away from home,
eating all of that cafeteria food as they are cooped up in their dorms studying? The same thing happens when you get married. All these years I have been blaming my "few pounds" on the fact that I have birthed two children. Nope. I have come to realize my hubby is to blame. When we were dating, did I ever order a burger at Wendy's? NO. A lovely garden salad would do, with a side of water. Did I ever drink root beer, or any other pop for that matter? NO. It was and is so unhealthy that I swore never to drink it after the nutrition class I took in college. Did I make terrific meals everyday (OK, not quite every day) to satisfy the appetite of a 6'5" gladiator? NO. I was happy with a baked potato and salad, or maybe even some fruit and chocolate. But I think the real reason why I dont mind eating all this disgusting, yet oh so yummy food, is that my hubby is real good at making me oblivious to the fact that I am carrying around some extra love. I can eat ice cream sandwhiches by the dozen, and he just joins in on the party. I make cookie dough for eating, and all he cares about is that I save enough dough to a bake a few cookies for tomorrow's lunch. I am not complaining about having a man that loves me any way, shape or size, but shouldn't I take into account what my arteries have to say, too?

blogger apathy

I am sorry to admit that I have had no entries all week. My time has been consumed by the prospect of having to give a talk in church on Sunday. Topic? Snore fest, I mean civic duties. Thus, all of my own creative writing juices have been spent writing, deleting, and re-writing a talk that has less to do with voting and parliment, and more to do with, well, I am not quite sure yet.... Hopefully I will be less apathetic to my blog duties in the near future once this is over with.

st daddy's day

Happy Father's Day to all the father's in my life.

My dad, who has always been such an example of service and love and faith to me.

My father-in law, who has shown me love from the time I entered the family, and has shaped his son into what he is now.




And to my hubby, who is such a good daddy it is no wonder that the kids light up whenever they see him and like him way more than me. I love you all.

boys choir

What started out as a celebration of Enoch's ever-increasing machoness, turned into an all-night concert. Huh? Yesterday morning I went to get Bo-Bene out of his crib, and he was sitting up! So we had to change the mattress height on his crib before we put him to bed; the only problem was that we decided to wait until 10pm (what on earth were our kids still doing up, I have no idea!) to make the switch. Then in addition to the crib lengthening, we also decided to throw the kids into the same room. It had to happen sooner or later, and the idea of having an office/study made us opt for much sooner than later. So we moved around Levi's furniture, put up Enoch's crib, and crossed our fingers. Soon enough we had a 2-part choir, in perfect-pitch, ear-piercing unison. Levi asked for Enoch to go back to his own room, and Enoch asked (with sobs instead of words) for the same. We did manage to calm Levi down with the promise of a cookie in the morning if he stopped piping-in whenever Enoch started to wail. And they both calmed down. All was well (or so we thought).
So being the eager-beavers we are, we started moving all sorts of furniture into our freed up room; the computer, my scrapbooking, the guitars, books, filing, speakers, shelves, school work.... And we couldn't stop there, the closet needed to be reorganized, old artwork admired that we hadn't looked at in years ( do you do that, get side-tracked down memory lane when your cleaning?), and photo albums sorted. Not to mention the warm-hearted "debates" of where to put things that spouses normally have between one another whenever there is a room that needs organizing. We stayed up till 2 enjoying our newly acquired room, but no sooner than our eyes had shut and our zzzs started accumulating, we were awoken by screams that did not stop for a couple of hours. Nothing we did could convince them that this is not only what we wanted, but what they wanted as well. I hope last night is not a sign of things to come! I sure don't want to give them my new room back. It's my precioussssssss.
PS. Mom- go ahead and mark up all the grammer problems, I'm sure you've got the itch.

following the leader

This one is for all you grandparents whom, I flatter myself, actually care about the fact that Enoch can crawl and use his munchkin little arms and legs to get him around. At first I fancied that his crawling was a gift to me--that he would now prefer crawling/exploring to being carried in my arms all day as I try to make dinner (facebook), fold clothes (read novels), and sweep the hardwoods (eat chocolate). Instead, all his crawling has meant is that he now can follow me into every room of the house and ask for me to pick him up. Doh!

special thanks

Time and time again Josh and I are reminding our eldest to remember his pleases and thank yous. I took the kids to a new park (thats a big deal to Levi, he loves to play in new places) and as we were leaving, Levi thanked me for going to the park with him. Its funny how such a short sentence can melt my heart and let me push the kids home on cloud nine.

zoo view

One of Levi's favorite things to do is go to the zoo. He loves it so much he remembers to be thankful for it in his prayers. In Saskatoon it is free all winter, and we went almost weekly as soon as the snow started to melt. We are now proud members of the Saskatoon Zoo Society, but I have to admit that I do miss the dinosaur park and other exhibits that Calgary has to offer.

ode to bloggermoms

As I sit here waiting for my dough to rise, I find that in the quiet hours of the afternoon as my kids are asleep, something draws me away from the laundry that needs folding and the dried dishes that need to be placed in the cupboards. I can not help but sit at my mac and search the wonderful blogs that many women use to reach out to the world and show off their incredible families, amazing talents, and firm faiths. Thanks to my many friends who entertain my day as they share their lives on line. To all you moms out there, this blogs for you!!

hairy scary

These are before and after pictures of Levi and his second hair cut done at home....the latter is a demonstration of how good of a hairstylist I am.... we make sure to try to keep his head covered whenever feasible. Sometimes, however, we are unable to hide the sorry attempt with a hat (at church for instance), and so we then resort to using as much gel as possible. Levi usually ends up rather upset by the end. Poor kid, I am sure he will end up writing a book about us one day. Reminds me of the days when my mom used to cut my hair, she would just line it up in the back and cut a straight line. I think that she did a much better job, though. No novel writing yet on my part.

the face of the next generation.....

Enoch has this awesome goofy face that we have been trying to capture on camera. This doesn't quite do it justice, but you get the idea. He loves this face. When you pick him up, he does the face, when you feed him, he does the face, when he meets someone new, he does the face. Whatever he feels, he does the face. Let's just hope he grows out of it before he enters kindergarten.

who wants a dog? grow a garden!

I am not sure why I love gardening. I am not really good at it, I have already had a few casualties this spring due to my inexperienced thumb. However, the sight of something growing because I planted it excites me, even further is the satisfaction of eating something that was grown in my own backyard. I can even see it in the same light as having kids; sort of a prepatory step for the other. You have to feed it regularly, clean it, keep it warm, and watch it grow.... of course I don't plan on eating my own children, though.

back in the habit

It looks like Josh is starting summer school tomorrow. Due to a little glitch in scheduling, he needs a chem class sooner than later, so off he goes for 15 fun filled days of lecture and lab. Seems like the poor guy will never ever ever get a break.