Congratulations!!

John's brother just called and told us that he's engaged and we are thrilled thrilled thrilled. Congratulations you two. Another amazing sister-in-law!!! AHHHHHH!! Yippppppeeeeeeeeeeeeee! (Did we mention how excited we are?)

Winding Down

How was Halloween for us? Picture this. A beautiful little "Dorothy", a "scarecrow", a "very cute witch", a "tin-man", and ...a Frog? Yes a frog. After working endlessly on these costumes, and then spending a week trying to get sam to wear his...Sam refused to be the lion and instead dressed up as a frog. There is no FROG in the wizard of oz!! Ruined! My theme...was ruined:)) Perhaps I may have tried too hard:) Note to self: Next year...don't sweat it as much. (Luckily I did get some photos last week of everyone dressed up so scroll down to see them.) Notice i'm NOT posting pics of my little frog today. grrrr.

Having said that, it was definately a fun night. John celebrated his 32 birthday as well which made festivities extra great. Gotta love the moments when ya get to celebrate "John"!! I think I have the best husband in the WORLD! His parents came over for crepes and of course the tradional 32nd annual "Ghost cake with flaming eyes".

After dinner...time to Trick or Treat.
Abby...and I had been looking forward to this for weeks. Infact there may have been moments when I might have been skipping right alongside her I could hardly contain myself. Sam and John joined us for a bit of the evening. By the end of the night I think Sam started to grasp the concept of Trick or Treating. For the most part though he wanted only to hold his little chocolate bar (his first of the night) tigthly in his little fist, and heaven help the person who tried to pry that little candy away from him. When it came time to taking more candy he wouldn't because he refused to loosen his grip on the one he already had. Talk about missing the forest for the trees! Oh well. Sam is content.

Today has been much quieter. (is that a word) Took down the decorations because let's face it, after the holidays... decorations just look bad. Died my hair...dark. Bought some of these from Bellababies , Ate the last peice of John's birthday cake, but mostly just tried to get back to a normal routine.

Noticed some Christmas commercials today. Already? ... Can't wait.





John- Happy Birthday! XOXOX

Halloween Week!!!!!

K as a premise to this very long post, I must say, I LOVE Halloween. Christmas is nice, valentines is ok but Halloween, is my favorite day of the year. I love every thing about it- the pumpkins, trick or treating, dressing up... I am really quite over-the-top about this holiday and I'm not ashamed to admit it. Our costumes are ready, with some of us having two costumes. (seperate events of course:)) The house is decorated and we've been baking up some goulish recipes. Most of them have tasted as scary as they've looked but hey it's all good.

Perhaps my love for this holiday has something to do with the fond memories I have of halloween as a child. When it came to celebrating holidays, nobody did it better than my Dad. We'd almost always help him make a homemade pizza, then we would get into our costumes an hour before leaving the house (thus becoming overheated and cranky) and then ...finally...it would be time to go trick or treating. Dad thought through this outing carefully making sure that we stopped at the local dentist (for a toothbrush) the milkman (who gave away chocolate milk), and the Cooks (who always gave away the big chocolate bars.) We cleaned up. When we got tired, and no sooner than that, we would head home and dump all of our "loot" into a giant roaster and then the four of us kids, wide eyed and brimming with excitement would just sit and marvel at all we got. Of course it was an unspoken rule that the coffee crisp bars were off limits. They belonged to Dad! Even after we grew up and had kids of our own he would still buy a ridiculous amount of candy, WEEKS in advance and dump it all into that same vat of a roaster, and just wait for the moment that he could divide it up and deliver it to each of his grandkids.

I've often thought about how much more enjoyable holidays have become to me since having kids. It is fun to be able to go back and experience that excitement all over again through the eyes of our little ones. That said we've been busy celebrating already! Here is some of the scary things we've brewed so far.



My sister Jewel sewed this Dorothy dress for Abby! She's amazing.



John is so patient. He's willing to go along with whatever silly things I try to orchestrate. He'd probably be fine with not dressing up at all!!!



Lovely. Doesn't he play the part of the cowardly lion well. Personally, I think he is crying because he has no c -c- c- courage:)


I made this costume up for John last minute because I knew he really didn't want to show up at the High school on Wednesday and teach a bunch of high school students, dressed as the tin man. (We likely will all wear different costumes at different times throughout the week.)

We've got a lot planned! "Boo at the zoo" in Calgary...Halloween party on Tuesday...pumpkin carving...trick or treating on Wednesday...Johns Birthday (on halloween day).... The next 7 days will be a lot of FUN!


Monster toes and fingers.

Because there isn't much to say...

about our lives this past week, we'll just put up a couple of pics o f the random things that have kept our kids busy the past few days.



Abby and her cousin Mya made cinnamon buns together this week. And when I say cinnamon "buns" I really mean "big fat mounds of dough that have been played with for 20 minutes and then covered in butter and sugar. ...hold the cinnamon" Yummmm:))))



With Halloween coming up soon (my FAVORITE holiday!) we decided to clean out the dress up box. We emptied out the old and boring stuff and made a trip to two local bargain stores to stock up on better dress ups. Abby and Sam have been busy this week playing Fireman, doctor, something that requires abby be dressed like a genie in a cowboy hat, and of course...Ariel. I love this pic because it captures John's mood this week perfectly. Doesn't he look tired. It was a busy week for him:(


Jessica of course is perfectly content to play on her own. Of course how could she not have fun when she's making a mess like this!



The kids enjoyed this sunday evening game. It is a variation of keep away I guess, only we like to call it "pass the carbon monoxide detector".

Nope. It doesn't take much to keep us happy!

Talk of the town...

Jessica has graduated from eating puree veggies and fruit to the real thing. Yesturday she had real, fresh, PEAS! It is the cutest thing to watch her little eyes focus on her little fingers as they pinch a pea and then very slowly ...brings it up to her mouth...trying the whole time to get it in. Soo darn funny to watch. Meal time takes a bit longer these days but it is fun to think that she's starting to "grasp" the concept:))

Ok that really isn't the talk of the town, infact nobody but me really seems to care that Jess is eating solids. The town did hold elections on Monday...and that was the talk of the town. It is so fun to get to vote. I think it is one of John's and my favorite things to do. Many people here seemed to want a change and that is what they got. The new mayor, and most of the newly elected members of town council won by a landslide. Hopefully good things will come as a result in the next few years. If any of you are in a town/city with elections coming up...get out and VOTE!!!

Sunday at our house...

This morning I worked very hard to compile two church bags that were full of snacks and books/toys to keep the kids happy for the LONG one hour sacrament meeting. I felt very proud of the contents of those bags, thinking perhaps this might be the week that our kids sat quietly for the entire meeting. However, Sam discovered these bags while John and I were busy getting ready and he did enjoy them. He enjoyed dumping everything out and throwing things around. Abby came to us in absolute tears. When I asked her what was wrong, she said through her tears, "Mom...Sam is ruining SUNDAY for EVERYONE!" He later redeemed himself by staying in nursery the entire time without crying...or being mean to anyone. Good day for him.


I dressed my girls in the two cutest dresses ever. My sister Jewel had sewn them for her girls and has since lent them to me. Today my kids looked adorable! They were clean, happy, and they all matched (right down to the pony in Sams hand). Spontaniously I decided we needed a family photo. I had to photograph the kids in these outfits. So we hauled everyone out, posed took the pictures,...and were late for church. When I got home this was the photo we had.


Aside from the fact that the lighting was Terrible, I was so upset to not see all of the kids. When I asked John why he didn't get the kids outfits in it he said one word. ..."headshots?" lol:) Clearly John didn't appreciate the significance of that moment. Clean kids,...happy kids,...kids with nice hair...kids in cute home made outfits... May never happen again, but take my word for it...they looked great and did great today!

Abby, Sam, Jess and I enjoyed a nice Sunday walk this afternoon. The weather was beautiful! There is something about nice sunny day, this time of year, that I particularly enjoy. Perhaps it is partly due to the fact that I know it could easily be snowing instead. Makes me really appreciate the mild weather. All in all a great day and we almost feel ready to start the work week. ...almost.



PS: I don't mean to brag but we have the most pleasant baby you could ever imagine. Seriously I dare you all to have a baby who is happy 24/7, sleeps 9 hours straight at night, and cries ONLY when her old brother is sitting on her. What a doll!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Tomorrow is officially thanksgiving here in Canada, but for our little family the celebrating is almost over. On Friday we drove up to Calgary to have a thanksgiving dinner with my siblings and their fams. I am so amazed at how well my sisters can pull off a grand meal, and it is always so nice to get together with them and to get to the city for a bit. John kept laughing at how "rushed" I was the whole time trying to squeeze as much out of our one day in the city as I possibly could. Visiting, a trip to walmart, a jog with my sis, and seeing some of our favorite former neighbors...we tried to do it all! Saturday afternoon we returned home for a thanksgiving dinner with Johns family. Several of his siblings travelled up, and it was a great time. Aside from the fact that you'd never find a better chef than John's Dad, we also got to see our little niece Brooklyn be blessed. We've so often missed out on these family events seeing as most of John's family live in the states, so we were glad to have been able to be a part of that. Family is just the best and we are so grateful for weekends like this to remind us of how lucky we are. We wish we could have seen all our loved ones, but we were sure thinkin of ya!!


My sister in-law Heather is the one we call on every get together to make dessert. It is no wonder why when she produces pies like this! Pecan Pie or good ol' apple. Pumpkin? okay we'll try all three. lol:)




This is my brother Chad...ready to eat I guess:)) I'm posting this pic only because he seemed to be the victim of much heckling by all of the nieces and nephews. It was pretty funny to hear these little kids telling "cop jokes" and teasing him the way they did. They did have a good leader...AVA!







This is our celebration with John's family. Their meals are legendary and the company is great! We sure love you guys.
The highlight was having an intimate little baby blessing for our newest niece at home so that Grandma could be a part of it. What a nice evening... and what a DOLL!!!


So that was our weekend:) We hope you all are enjoying thanksgiving as much as we have.

I YAM all over these dishes!

We had a ward enrichment dinner last night in which they served several turkey dishes, (in efforts to demonstrate the many things you can do with your turkey leftovers.) I think I tasted some of the best Yams I've EVER had. If you like yams...you'll love this. I'm also including two other recipes they shared as well.



Happy Thanksgiving!!!


Praline Sweet Potato Bake

3 cups cold mashed seet potatos
1/3 cup of milk
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
1 egg
1teas. vanilla extract
1/2 teas. salt

Topping:
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup chopped pecans
3 TBSP flour
3 TBSP melted margarine

In a bowl, beat, the first 7 ingredients until fluff. Transfer to a 1 1/2 qt baking dish. Combine the topping ingredients until blended. Sprinkle over the top and bake @ 350C uncovered, for 30-35 minutes or until golden. This serves 4-5 people. IT IS AMAZINGLY good!!!


Turkey and Rice Casserole

4 cups leftover turkey
2 cups regular rice
Water mixed with bouillon cubes (approx 5 cups of water)
Mix water mixture and rice and cook in pan until rice is done. Add one onion sauteed and 2 can sof cream of mushroom soup to the rice and chicken mixture. Add dried parsley, salt and pepper to taste. Put in a casserole dish.

Mix 2 cups of bread crumbs with margarine and poultry seasoning. Brown crumbs in frying pan. Sprinkle on top of mixture.

Bake at 350C for 30 minutes. This casserole freezes well!


Deep Dish Pumpkin Pie

1 can pure pumpkin (28-29 oz)
1 can evaporated milk (13 oz)
1 tsp ginger
1 tsp nutmeg
3 tsp cinnamon
1 cup sugar
1/2 tsp salt
3 eggs

Mix all of the above ingredients together. Pour into a 9X13" pan. Glass pans work very well. Sprinkle (from the package) one yellow cake mix on top of the pumpkin mixture. Melt 1/2 cup of butter and drizzle on top of the cake mix. Pecans can be used on top if desired but are optional.

Bake @350C for 50 minutes. It is great served warm. Serve with whipped cream!

These are some dishes that we will be enjoying in the near future. (I think it would be a lot of fun if someone created a blog in which we all could just post favorite recipes) An online recipe book.
Anyways, here are my faves... Try them this weekend! Enjoy

There was a moment...

...a very breif moment today when my children were all in the same place, doing the same thing...and there was peace. Sam was not pushing Abby, or pulling Abby, and Abby was not slamming doors. No one was spilling water, nothing was being thrown, and most importantly...no one was upset. Don't you love those moments when they are together and all is well? I had to take a picture as it really only lasted a few minutes.
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Yes looking at this you'd think they actually love eachother:)) There is something about watching my kids sleep that almost makes me want to wake them up and play with them and love them better than I had during the day. ...almost

Nationals...

This weekend Waterton held the National Wilderness Festival, so I decided to take the kids out there for some fun. We'd planned to attend a animal costume workshop together but when we got out there I was so taken with the beautiful fall colors that the kids and I spent the afternoon taking photos instead. It was cool to see the deciduous trees around the lakes so full of color while the pines behind them were all covered with snow. A bit of Autumn and Winter. Gorgeous!


This reminded me of the years we spent in Edmonton. The last week of September was when the trees along the North Saskatchewan looked the best, and all of you up there are probably enjoying that right now!

We arrived an hour late for the kids workshop. (I felt so bad.) Still, we had a great time.
We did stop and have spaghetti before heading home. I love this picture of sam. Anybody ever seen "strange brew"?



I noticed (while my kids were playing Nickjr on the computer:) that today was also a "National Day of Play". Yes another one of those "national" days that I almost missed! So we decided to step away from the computer for a bit and do just that...play. We went on an Alphabet hike. During our hike Abby had to (equipped with a camera) take a photo of something that started with every letter of the Alphabet. She had to do it in the correct order as well. I was surprised at how creative she was. For example when we could not find something that started with K abby decided to just make one. Of course. So for those tricky letters we cheated a little bit constructing them out of sticks or stones. A lot of fun!!
Abby's photo of a Buck...for the letter B.


Other news...sam has had an ear infection. He's been on stinkin antibiotics for 6 days now. I can't wait until he is done that because we literally need to pin him down and restrain him just to administer a measly 5 mls. He's like Jekyll and Hyde this one!!:))


Jessica has started pulling herself this week and resting on her knees and even attempting to stand. This is a little to early for her to be doing this though, and usually results quickly in a rollover onto her head.
John is keeping VERY busy at work. He's always home at a great time but is usually marking papers, writing tests, or planning lessons until late in the night. Anyone who thinks school teachers are the most underpaid professionals ever, say "Aye!"

Does anybody have a tissue ??

Word of the day...

ENTROPY! My school teacher husband came home the other day and used this word only minutes after walking through the door. At the time I didn't know what it meant, (but I've since looked it up) and yes it does describe what I was feeling at that moment quite well. It had been one of those days. You know the kind...when you pretty much have to count to 10 every 10 minutes and remind yourself, "I love my life...I love my life."



Lucky for us though, when things start too feel too busy and overscheduled, we can just head to the mountains for a rejuvenating afternoon of this...



and this...



and this! We could have watched these sailboats all day.



It was a perfectly relaxing afternoon, and the perfect end to a busy week.

Oh by the way in case you are wondering the definition of ENTROPY is A tendency towards disorder within a closed system; chaos; opposite of order.

Yes dear...point taken:)

Happy SNOW DAY!!!

...ok my TWO most favorite things ever are: 1) Fall, and 2)the first snow fall of the year! When my sister called this morning a little before 7:00 and told me to look out the window, for a breif moment I thought she was playing a joke. Sure enough though I opened the blinds to see the most beautiful snow blanketing our freshly mowed grass.
Even better- it is STILL SNOWING! Abby, who is usually my late sleeper, heard my excitement and climbed out of bed. We donned our hats and mitts and headed out to enjoy it before everyone else woke up. Trying to cram every great thing we love about the snow into our limited time was actually a lot of fun. Snowangels...then a snowman...then snow tracks around our entire property! I really enjoyed this moment with Abby this morning.


There is something about the first snowfall that makes me want to dig out the christmas boxes, turn on some "Christmas with the Mini Pops" (yeah I know but I love it!) and bake some cinnamon buns. Seeing as it is only mid-september I may just bake.


More exciting news to report: Abby is learning to write! She's been in pre-school for 3 officail days and although they don't teach these little four year olds to write, something about getting to go "to school" has abby ready for some learning. I decided to just go with it. I took her out and bought her a special pen and "homework book" because you know, at this age, homework is the BEST! On the way home Abby would ask me how to spell certain words. Words like Mom, Dad, Sam, Ava.... I would spell them out for her expecting to see some scribbles and make believe writing. By the time we got home and I looked in her book I was surprised to see the real words. She really wrote all those names. Mind you the letters look rough but they are correct none the less! Imagine that! Somewhere in that cute little head of hers were all those letters just waiting to get out. Even better she said, "and look mom I even spelled "TAD!" Sure enough there it was T-A-D. Now she keeps busy writing words and lining them all up along our sofa. My job is to come to her store and Buy a word from her. Clever:) I love seeing Abby enjoy letters, and she just beams every time she writes a real word. Something clicked for her this week. It was the most exciting thing ever! (almost exciting as the newly fallen snow:) Now I'm only wondering one thing...who is TAD?
(Incase you can't tell- this does say SAM)


I'm pretty much winning with Abby right now, and our fun time in the snow has solidified to her that I am infact the best mom ever! However, incase I get to optimistic, Jessica is a different story. For the past 10 days she has not been herself. My usually cheery, perfect smily girl has been grouchy, clingy and downright mean at times. "Somethings wrong." I'd often say to John, but I'd just chalk it up to teething. Unfortunately I think I've gotten a little bit too relaxed as more of my kids are born. I finally took her into the Dr, after a really bad night only to find out that though she is teething, she's also battling a "RED HOT EAR INFECTION!" Great. That only took ten days for me to get my act in gear. Yup when it comes to Jessica, I'm feeling more like the crapiest mom ever right now.



Sam is...a mystery to me. He's a very active little boy and continues to be the one that requires the most effort. Yet he can be the sweetest little man ever. He isn't always...but he CAN be. He can probably say about fifteen words, but he communicates best with his hands. Is this normal? Abby had such a huge vocabulary by this time. Anyone out there with advice on how to get a stubborn boy to talk...I'd love it!
That pretty much sums up the fun in our lives at this moment. Hope you are enjoying a beautiful snowy day where you are!

Smokin' Good Times....

John here (in the blogosphere)

Just some quick shots of our weekend get together with family. Thanks to everyone for coming and be sure that we'll do it again soon! Our fire pit is officially open, to use some old scouting terminology. Thanks as always to Tanis, Jewel, and Heather for organizing all the good food and to Chad for the professional photography. I'm telling you, after a long fire ban, there's nothing better than a fireside Tim Tam Slam! Remember, you're all welcome around our campfire anytime! (cue in Man from Snowy River theme now...)

Time out!!

Sunday Sept 9th 2007

I just got back from Calgary late last night. I had the BEST time with my sisters. Jewel and I left our husbands to fend for themselves and the kids while we went up to stay with Crystal. We got some shopping done, ate lots, ate some more, visited my mom and dads grave, and attended a portion of "Time out for Women." I ran into so many old friends there from pretty much every place John and I have ever lived. I feel like we accomplished an awful lot and it is amazing how much you can do without kids:)

Thank you Crystal for the awesome place to stay, and thanks Heather and Chad for always feeding something delicious. The Thai subs and drinks were AMAZING!

I did miss Sam and Abby A LOT though, and by the time we started back home on Saturday night, that van couldn't get me to them fast enough! I felt rejuveniated though and when I walked through my front door, the kids were such an awesome sight. Abby ran to me and the first thing she said was, "Mom! I was good, and I shared with Sam EVERY TIME!" Hmmm. How about "it's so nice to see you?" Nope-must've had something to do with the fact that I promised her a prize if she'd be good for Daddy. She doesn't miss a beat.

Speaking of "beats," we attended a ward party earlier in the week. It was held out at the "Great Canadian Barn Dance." We had such a fun time and Abby and Sam Loved dancing. Watching Sam made me think of a comment his Uncle Jordan had made that "Sam definately dances to the beat of his own drum."

It was nice to see Johns brother and his wife this week and their little daughter Libby. Here is a photo of Abby with Libby. They had just come from Hawaii!



Other exciting news this week was the arrival of another little neice named Brooklyn. She came almost one month early but we are thrilled that she is doing so well, and we can't wait to see her!!


It was a fun week and now it is back to the busyness that is our life. Abby officially starts preschool tomorrow, dentist appointments, work, weeding and the fact that we woke up frozen this morning has us worried.


Our little furnace seems to be a little broken. After hours of deliberation with John about this I determined that our furnace problems just might have something to do with the burnt wires and smokey smell. Now we need to get someone in to give us a more educated assessement then that one. This doesn't look good. Ahhh...I think I NEED A TIME OUT!!:))))

Our FIRST week

I love this time of year!! The weather has cooled significantly and already some of the leaves on our trees are starting to change color. I often find myself savoring the little things that make this season a personal favorite.

It has seemed like we've enjoyed a week of FIRSTS in our little family.

* We finally completed painting our "first" home. John and I tackeled this project wanting to get it done quickly... and we did. In two days (or should I say nights:) our walls had a lovely shade of either dune white or kingsport grey. It is funny what a facelift a coat of paint can give, and now only those who saw the walls beforehand will ever appreciate how they look now. Glad that is finished!

* John had his first day of work this past week. School began on the 29th and he is officially MR. Hardy. On Thursday I needed to drop something off for him and as I glanced into his Chem class and saw him teaching I couldn't help but think he was definately the "Coolest" teacher that I'd ever seen.

* I went fishing this week, and for the first time ever brought along 6 kids. (Two of my own and four of their friends) That obviously marks my first mental relapse as well. Needless to say nothing was caught, and I likely will never do that again:))

* Abby had her 1st day at pre-school. She spent Wednesday morning at the school meeting some of the staff and being assessed by them. She is such a bright little girl and she is so excited to finally be going to school! As a parent, I LOVED watching this little girl...MY FIRST...do so well.

* Sam got stung by a wasp for the first time. What is with the wasps this year? Has anyone managed to NOT get stung?

Jessica...well okay no firsts for her this week. But trust us, she's as adorable as ever!