Do you like my new shoes?

This is a new game from the last couple of days. Evelyn wears the rings from her stacking ring set like high heel shoes and walks around the house seeming very pleased with herself.

We are having a lazy day. Lots of laying on the couch and watching TV. I can hear the anti-TV groans from some of you already. But, we are enjoying ourselves. I have been getting some reading done too. It is snowing again - which is funny, because our thermometer says +10 c!. I am tired. Ethan slept very poorly last night.

I heard from Ryan last night. He is at a workshop for youth in general - not just aboriginal youth. The participants are supposed to be 14-20 yrs old. The kids from our school are 13-15, so they are amongst the youngest there. Ryan was pretty excited about the speakers and said the kids were starting to participate and were really listening. They are quite close to the ice fields in Banff / Jasper, so they may visit them before coming home.

Ryan brought home an iridescent pink cowboy hat from our local store before he left. I just had to try it on Ethan. I hope cowboy hats do not become a staple of his wardrobe, but, he looks pretty cute!

FYI, I changed the blog settings so anyone can comment, even without a blogger account. Please sign your posts though, so we will know who is talking!

Where have the days gone?

I have been wanting to update for several days, but they have flown by without a quiet moment to update.

Evelyn has a new game she loves to play. I cover her ears with my hands and mouth words, then take my hands away, and actually speak. I don't think she knows I am just mouthing the words. To her mind, covering her ears miraculously stops all sound and does not just mute it slightly. So, this evening, she asked to be picked up. I am holding her with one arm. She wants to play her new game and puts my free hand to her ear. Then, she gets mad because she can't put my other hand to the other ear. I tried to explain that my arm was the only thing holding her up, and she would fall if I covered her ear, but, gravity's nuances are still lost to her.

I have spent a couple days re-arranging and organizing and cleaning the 'playroom' in the basement. I put up a second shelf unit and hung a rack for the dress-up outfits. I finally unpacked all the children's books and put them out on the ledge. We have some really great books! I think it is time to start thinning out the board books and put some new stories in the rotation! I also figured out how to hang the jolly jumper from a beam. I just had to nail some floor board scraps into the beam to form a ledge for the jumper to hang from.

Ethan enjoyed the jumper(though he does not look like it in the picture!). He just keeps getting more handsome as he grows! Ryan and I both think his eyes are getting bigger, and his nose is more in scale with his face now. He is looking more and more like Evelyn did. He really does not like to sit in chairs. He will fuss and fuss until he is either put in the exersaucer, jumper, or laid down under his gym.

He had been sleeping poorly again, so I spent the last few days putting him on a very strict 3 hr routine during the day. I rarely pay much attention to the clock, though our routine is pretty constant, but, I knew I had to get at least 6 feeds into him during the day if I was going to let him cry it out at night. It worked, and we are back to 8-9 hrs at night. He used to do 11 hrs at least 2 times a week, but we have not got back to that yet. At least I am feeling sane and human again!

Evelyn had fun rediscovering some of her dress-up clothes. She created a 'fairy ballerina bunny' costume that she was quite pleased with. Evelyn found my old 'My Little Ponies' and 'Cabbage Patch Dolls', so I washed them and their clothes and gave them to her to play with. She really enjoyed the ponies and placed all of them on top of our trunk and delighted and exclaimed over each one. Her favorites were the baby ponies and the unicorns. I could remember that my favorites were also the unicorns. I think I liked them because they had the deepest coloured hair.

Next day brought 5 loads of laundry and I also opened our 'dish barrel' for the first time since we left Calgary. I dug out my china teapots and a few plates to display. I missed that stuff! I wish I could display more.

Today, we went to Boyle to return some bottles, get groceries, look for a spring coat for Ethan, and fill our water jug. Evelyn threw several small tantrums in Fields. That cut short the search for a coat. We then went for lunch at a cute little bistro that has the best fries. Then groceries, and home.

My future shop photo order arrived today, which was exciting. I experimented with collages as a way to fit lots of pictures on a scrapbook page. I then had the collages printed as 8x1o 's. Here is the 'bellypicture' collage, and the one of all the family pictures from our last trip to Victoria. I made about 4 others. I like how they turned out. I printed them as 4x6's as well, and I think that I could cut out some of the little pictures and use them as embellishments on the page layout.

Ryan is at a leadership workshop for aboriginal youth this weekend. The photo and video project the school has been working on will be presented. I think the Premier's of both Alberta and BC will be there. It is a great opportunity to show off the pics and stories that the kids have done. He is back on Sunday evening. So, I am in for a long weekend!

Oh! Evelyn has pooped on the potty twice in the last few days. She is asking to go, then will sit and wait until she does. I am very excited. She takes her diaper off as soon as she pees now, but has only peed on the potty once. Her new favorite book is the 'Potty Book' and she listens to it so intently when I read it. Each time after she had a successful potty time, she asks to read that book again. She also always remembers to ask for her candies. "3 candies!" (one for sitting, two for going #2), (she would get one for going #1 - two total- if she actually ever does it!) We give her gummy bears. I feel like we are finally making some real potty progress!

So, I guess THAT is where the days have gone!

Pina Colada Muffin Recipe

The kids and I went to church today. Evelyn had a blast playing with another little girl named Elizabeth. There was a potluck after the service and the girls amused themselves playing with a pool noodle. They had a sort of tug-of-war going on. Elizabeth is much more aggressive than Evelyn and she won every battle. Evelyn never seemed to mind though, she would just switch from tug-of-warring, to trying to catch the end of the noodle again as Elizabeth swung it around. The whole time, they were both squealing with excitement. When they got bored of that, they switched to the game of running around the sanctuary and climbing up and down the steps to the stage.

Every time Evelyn passed the sanctuary, she would say "Dance! Dance!" and start twirling in a circle. It made me think of Psalm 150:4 "Praise him with tambourines and dancing. Praise him with stringed instruments and flutes." and of 2 Samuel 6:14 "Wearing a linen ephod, David danced in the LORD's presence with all his might." It is my hearts desire to see her love God, delightedly dance in His presence, and be a woman after His heart.

When it was time to go home, Evelyn threw a beautiful 2-year-old tantrum and screamed all the way to the car and the whole time I strapped her and Ethan into their seats. I gave her warning and chances to say goodbye. I don't know what more I could have done to reduce that tantrum! It was a real doozie!

In other news, Ethan has started to blow 'raspberries'. He is a droolie boy to begin with, but now, he is totally soaking his bibs and shirts! I have had to wipe sprayed spit off my face more than once. I was very careful not to model the 'raspberry' to Ethan, but he figured it out anyway! I remember remarking at how NOT droolie Evelyn was as a baby. I was so happy about that because I find drool and spit really gross. It turned my stomach - even as a nurse! I did get a little acquainted with it as Evelyn began to cut teeth. I am glad I had that easy initiation, because I feel better able to deal with Ethan now. I'm glad I have developed a stronger stomach. Oh, he is starting to sit up on his own too!

As I packed up my leftover banana bread muffins after the potluck, I received rave reviews for one type of the muffins. (I had experimented with 4 different recipes about 3 weeks ago when I was given about 25 very ripe bananas by the owner of our local store). I brought 3 of the versions for the potluck. I will type up the 'winning' recipe so you can try baking some yourself!

Pina Colada Banana Bread

3 cups flour
2 cups sugar
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
3 eggs
1 1/4 cups veggie oil
2 tsp vanilla
1 can (8 oz) crushed pineapple, DRAINED, Reserve 1/3 cup juice
1/3 cup pineapple juice (reserved from canned pineapple)
4-5 medium mashed bananas
1 cup shredded coconut

In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, salt, baking soda and cinnamon. In another bowl, beat the eggs, oil, pineapple juice and vanilla; add pineapple and bananas and coconut. Stir into the dry ingredients just until moistened. Pour into 2 greased loaf pans, or about 24 lined muffin tins (2/3 full).

Bake at 350 degrees for 60-65 min for loaves, 25-30 min for muffins. Cool for 10 min before removing to wire racks. Loaves and muffins freeze well!

yield: 2 loaves, or 2 dozen muffins (or a combination there-of)

Golden Peach and Coconut Muffins

This is another recipe I tried recently and really enjoyed as well.

1 1/2 cups flour
1 cup sugar
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1 cup shredded coconut
2 eggs
1/2 cup veggie oil
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 can (15 1/4 oz) sliced peaches, DRAINED and finely chopped. Reserve 1/3 cup peach juice.
1/3 cup peach juice from canned peaches.

In a bowl, combine the dry ingredients. in another bowl, combine the wet ingredients. Stir wet ingredients into dry, just until moistened. Fold in chopped peaches.

Fill paper lined muffin cups 2/3 full. Bake at 350 degrees for 25-30 min. Cool for 5-10 min before removing to a wire rack.

yield: 1 dozen muffins.

Have fun baking!

The Artist is in the house!

Evelyn expressed her artistic side on Monday. We have finger painted with 'Colour Wonder' paints before, but only once have we used real paints. I noticed that 'colour wonder' paints don't keep their colour for very long, and I wanted some art that would last.

She loved squishing the paint on the paper and would try to pick the paint up like a cheerio rather than dipping her finger in it. Many of her pictures went un-named, but there were several "Bouncy Ball's" and a 'But-a-fwy' (butterfly). Evelyn loves having her hand prints done and we also did some foot prints too. Her feet have really grown the past 6 months or so. I got a foot print of Ethan too and a squished hand print.

After the finger painting, we switched mediums to felt pens. Ethan got involved with the felts too and created his own masterpiece. I put the pens in his hand, but he did all the drawing!

When the drawing fun was done, I brought out the play dough. Evelyn loved cutting out the little shapes and then stacking the 'cookies' on the back of her hand. I think she imagined they were stickers. We rolled out 'worms' and then I made a little dog with a ball, which later morphed into a penguin-looking-duck with an egg. Evelyn had fun making the dog chase the ball and the duck eat the egg.

While we were doing all this, Ethan was happily playing in his exersaucer, drooling and making monster noises. I can't remember Evelyn ever making noises like Ethan does. He makes these growls at the back of his throat and then makes a 'awrh!' sound. It must be a hard-wired boy thing! He likes to put washcloths in his mouth and has become an accomplished thumb sucker too.

Today, we are doing laundry, cleaning the bathroom, and vacuuming. Evelyn loves to be my helper and will switch over the laundry from the basket to washer to dryer to basket again. She knows to stay out of my way when I fold. I am a bit anal about how the clothes are folded. She tries to help vacuum too by holding onto the handle and moving it with me. When she tires of that, she usually will ride the canister and follow me around on it.

Tomorrow, we are going to Edmonton to buy a car seat/ booster for Ethan. He is already too long for his infant seat. I am not sure how I will manage grocery shopping and errands without the seat for him. I think I will have to use my backpack carrier and hip hugger carrier a lot more often. Evelyn was 8 months old when she out grew her infant seat. She was able to sit on her own, so she could sit in the grocery cart or on the floor when we were out. What am I going to do in a restaurant? Or church?

Anyway, time to go make lunch. "cot-cheese!" (cottage cheese) is the requested item, maybe some KD with tuna too....

We're back online!

Finally we're back online with high-speed Internet. We'll be updating regularly with pictures and stuff from our home up north.

Beverly, Ryan, Evelyn & Ethan