Holidays

We spent last week in Oliver, BC at lakeside.bc.ca What a great time we had. This is place I remember coming to when I was younger. With our 4 kids we stay in the Cabanas. You bring all your camping stuff minus the tent. We even have a sink with cold water and a couple of outlets, maybe that is why I can do this sort of camping for a whole week. The weather was fantastic. We have been waiting for this family holiday cause our one to Oregon was cancelled till next summer. A couple of weeks before we left Faith learned to ride her bike on two wheels and while we were at the campsite Nate learned. The whole campsite was cheering him on! Nate is now also out of is baby seat and into a booster. My baby is growing up. Part of me is delighted to see him take off on his bike and part of me is a little sad. My parents also came up for 2 nites to surprise the kids. It was nice to have them to there with us. Mark also just purchased kayaks for us all. Faith and Nate still have to ride in our boats but Mark did find out the hard way that Faith is able to use the orange boats and he had to go for big swim after Faith. We had tons of fun using to kayaks too. We came home to lots of clean up but it was well worth it. I canned 40lbs of peaches that we picked up in Keremeos. We are now on our countdown till school starts. I think I have everything in order and ready to go, supplies, curriculum, etc. I am aiming not to over schedule us. The 3 oldest will be taking piano. Faith is taking Ukranian dancing. Nash and Jess are playing soccer and all 4 will be taking swim lessons. There is still alot of play time and down time in all that. Now I am praying for right attitudes from everyone. They say that want to be homeschooled so I will continue to work with that until the Lord shows us different.

PS Mom if you want to see pictures on my blog bigger just double click.

There is so much more to post about our summer. This was just a highlite, perhaps there will be more to come later.

Lil' turkey

Who wouldn't sleep well on a tummy full of cookies. I baked cookies today cause it was much cooler than it has been and my Natester kept helping himself. Every time I turned around he had another one in his mouth. I finally said put them on the counter and go up to your room. I told him he should rest and that he did.
I have never had a child challenge me the way he does. He has made me re-think my parenting and sometimes I am just at a lose. He says and does things I have never had a child do. He gets into things I have never had a child get into. He can also be so cute....thankfully! He says this thing,...."Mommy I miss you". How can he possibly miss me when we are together every minute of every day? I still treasure it.
PS He just woke from his nap and asked if he could have more cookies...what a guy!

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words

If a picture is worth a thousand words than this post is worth a few million. I am so far behind so to bring our life and goings on up to date, I thought I could just post some pics. These go from most recent to the end of May.

Roller blading with Aunt Deedy

July 1st Canadian eh'

July 14th Faith had her adenoids and tonsils out

Father's Day morning
We all surprised Mark wearing Oregon Duck shirts. If it's Dad's team, it's our team too!!

A visit to Sooke to see Mark's parents. Mark and his Dad hanging out on the front steps.

Playing in the pool with Papa. It got abit carried away and there were a few bare bottoms showing. hehe

At Faith's ballet recital. Faith was a puppy..so cute!

Baseball season ended in June. Nash tried being catcher, definetly not his favorite position.

Jess loves to pitch.

May 25 Jess turned 10..time sure does fly.

I also just had a very small gathering of 15 grads at a friends place for our 20th reunion. It was fun, visited with everyone and talked about everyone else. Hopefully we will pull off a big 25th reunion.
Our Oregon trip was cancelled firstly because the 3 bedroom did not come available like we thought it would, Mark got transferred to Save on here in Abbotsford as Assistant Store Manager and his holidays changed and Faith had her tonsils out which was a last minute part of the operation. The recovery time is much longer than just having her adenoids out. It is good we are staying home and not doing much. I am working on my attitude cause I was really looking forward to this holiday time.
I most sign off cause I am being paged in 4 different directions and we have nothing to eat for dinner.

Summer's here

We have been done school now for almost 3 weeks. We have slept in, played tons and just enjoyed some down time. Ball season wrapped up a couple of weeks ago. Some seasons are better than others but the kids had fun. Last weekend Mark and I went away for the nite for the first time in 5 years. It was so relaxing. We went to Whistler, ate, slept and had some uninterrupted time. Thank you to our friend Kelly who came and stayed with our kids.
The kids have been loving the pool in the backyard and time with friends. Today we went to the lake with friends, had a great time and got abit of sun. Nash and his buddies have been riding bikes tons and playing in our back forty (weird term). The picture shows the good clean fun they had the other day. They said they got muddy doing jumps and then decided to have a mud fight. What can a say but, 'hang on I'll get the camera'.
My Grampa from Moose Jaw went into the hospital on Friday by ambulance. He collapsed and was not breathing. My moms siblings were called and they all arrived Friday nite. My cousin Shelan came too and spent the weekend. Grampa is now the cardiac ward and waiting to find out some results. He is in so much pain with his shingles and waiting for a different cast to be put on his ankle after rupturing it a month ago and now his heart is beating irregular and there is some issues with his stomach. Poor Gramps. It is very hard to see him in pain and very discouraged. I know this has been very hard on my mom. I know the Lord will not give her more than she can handle. Praying that Grampa heals quickly.

Great Thought

I love this...

"The Bible calls debt a curse and children a blessing; but in our culture, we apply for a curse and reject a blessing, something is wrong with this picture." Doug Phillips

Been Forever

I know it has been forever since I blogged. Either I feel too tired or too busy but the month of May is too important to just skip over. Faith turned 5 and lost 2 baby teeth. She was so thrilled and so brave. I really thought she would be freaking out when they were coming out. Jess turned 10..double digits..no going back now. We visited the SPCA, fed some dogs and held some kittens and watched Hotel For Dogs with her friend. Both birthdays were very fun and relaxing. I also turned a year older and a wee bit wiser. We enjoyed some time at Chapters and dinner at the Olive Garden as a family. This month has been a bit challenging on the homeschool front. Keeping the kids focused and motivated has been tough but we overcame and we now have only one week left!! As I post this, it makes me think about Nash. It has really only been this last month that Nash is taking off in the reading department. Ya hoo!! I was actually getting worried but he is enjoying reading on his own now and attempting some difficult books. Wonder what kind of lil'student Faith is going to be. She seems quite motivated right now but time will tell. We are all looking forward to our summer break!

Too Busy

How has our weeks gotten so busy? I am tired so this weekend while Mark works late for 4 nights, I am going to get to bed very early. This afternoon I put a note on the door 'Resting..please do not disturb' The nice weather has brought the kids out, which is great but sometimes we just need some down time and a break. So all the kids had a little quiet time in their rooms and then we watched a movie together before dinner. It was nice that it was quiet for a while. I think I can take alot..noise..comotion..things going on but finally when I am tired, it all has to stop. This is just a quick glance at our week....

Mondays - am school - pm ballet and baseball
Tuesdays - am Regent school - pm swim lessons
Wednesdays -am school - pm ballet and baseball
Thursdays - am piano & school - pm babysit 3 kids
Fridays - am school(every 2nd Friday Learning Center co-op) pm free time ..aaaahhh

In all that there is still friends and birthday parties, errands and school planning.

How do kids go to school all day and then still have activites and lessons and any play time? I am really looking forward to the year end of some activites. We are aiming to finish school up mid June. School is going well. I can not believe Jess is almost through grade 4. We are currently working on an Explorers Unit with Nash and all enjoying that. I love that I know what they are learning and where they are at. I am learning so much too and how fun to be doing it with my kids.

My goal is to bed in bed by 9:00 each nite so on that note..."Good Night, Sleep Tight"