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Evelyn and Ethan having a tug of war over Ethan's hat.



Ethan blowing some serious Raspberries

I have posted fairly frequently this past week, so please check out the older posts in the archives etc so you won't miss anything! ;-)

Evelyn surprised me by telling a story about her birthday today. She remembered so much more than I thought she would. It started like this:

Evelyn is playing in her room with her kitchen. She says "Nana, kitchen. Birthday. Birthday party. Eat cake. Bunny cake! Open presents. Kitchen present, Nana" Translation: Nana gave me this kitchen for my birthday. She was at the party. We ate bunny cake (which was very exciting). Then we opened presents and Nana gave me this kitchen!

I thought that was pretty impressive. I had even forgotten that I had made a bunny cake. She was looking at her birthday pictures earlier. I guess that jogged her memory a bit.

Evelyn also set up a lovely tea party for me in the bathroom today. Note the 'cookies' made of barn yard animal puzzle pieces. She loves tea parties.

Facebook

Wow, as if I did not spend enough time on the internet as it is! Now there is 'Facebook' a database that connects you and every person you have ever known - to every person you have ever known. It made me think of the meaning of the word 'friend'. Most of my Facebook friends are people I have not heard from in almost 10 years! They were my friends, back then - now, they are acquaintances. It is nice to hear what they have been up to though!

These distant friends shared some of my most embarrassing moments and awkward growing-up phases. They were the sounding boards that I developed my life philosophies with. They knew me before braces, with acne, in all my pubescent awkwardness.

In many ways, it is comfortable to let those past relationships rest. It makes you believe you have started fresh and never had those awkward times. You have always been the person you are now...right? Renewing some of these connections has brought a barrel of red-faced moments to my doorstep. Then again, those moments were forming moments that shaped me into who I am now. And really, teenagers are so self-centered, they probably forgot all my blunders and only remember their own (which I have forgotten).

I did not expect all these memories and long forgotten emotions to surface when I joined this new craze. I am sure there are other 'Facebook' users who read this blog. What do you think?

On the plus side, should my high school class ever get a reunion organized, the 'Facebook-ers' in the group will have already done the "what have you been up to?" conversation and could maybe have some real discussions!

Just my rambling thoughts...

Our 'new' vehicle

I am not quite sure what to call it. It is not a van, or a car, or a stationwagon, or an SUV. It is a crossover vehicle. So, what do I call it? Basically, if an SUV married a station wagon and they had kids, that is what our vehicle is.

It is a 2005 Ford Freestyle. It seats 6 and all the seats other than the driver seat can be folded down to hold a lot of cargo. When and if we ever finish the basement, this will be invaluable.

I was surprised to discover in my research that the gas mileage is almost the same as our little Honda. About 10L/100km or approx 32 mpg.

So, I went and picked it up on Friday, after the snow melted and the roads were cleared. So far, after about 350 km, I am very pleased.

Winter is not done with us...yet

I woke during the night and noticed that the alarm clocks were off and everything was eerily quiet. I heard the wind pounding the house and deduced that the power was off. I got up and stumbled out to the pantry closet to find our flashlight. 4:30 am. Yuck. I peeked out the windows and saw faint outlines of the trees covered in white. 'Snow? AGAIN!?' I crawled back to bed and tried to fall asleep again. Not much success on that front. at 5:30 am, Ethan woke to feed, then at 6:45 am Evelyn woke for the day. We still had no power. No power means very limited water, and no heat. I am so glad the temperature was mild today. If this was during a -35 cold snap, I don't know what we would have done.


So, the power came back around 7 am, then off, then on, then off several times until 1 pm. It seems to be on for good now. We got about 6 inches of wet snow that is starting to melt now. It was very windy last night, but all is still now.

Ryan still had to report to school as this is a 'snow day'. If we lived in Lac la Biche, he would have had to report to a school there and hang out there for the day.

The kids and I spent the morning playing and colouring. Evelyn and Ethan had a little tug of war. I took a video clip of it. When Ryan gets home, I'll ask him to YouTube it for me. Ethan has recently gotten very adept at grabbing things and can now judge distances more accurately. This has upset Evelyn a bit because he grabs for her, touches her, and can take toys in his reach.


At lunch, I offered Ethan some rice cereal. He did very well with it, until he developed red patches and small welts all over his cheeks and chin. I looked at the ingredients and saw that the 'rice cereal' touted as being an ideal first food was full of oils and chemicals I could not name. I need to pay closer attention to labels. I doubt that Ethan reacted to the rice, but any of those other ingredients could be to blame. Next time, I am just going to try a veggie, or egg yolk, or avocado. Rice and cereal can wait. I was impressed by how well he managed the food in his mouth. I made the cereal thicker than I intended, but he still managed to swallow it! I have been debating introducing solids. I think I will just offer them at lunch for a while. If we skip, we skip. No big deal.

I also took some pictures of Ethan in an old sweater and hat of Ryan's. I like having the kids wear stuff that has heritage and a story. I hope that our grandkids will be able to wear some of the clothes that Ryan wore too!

So, my planned trip to Edmonton to pick up our 'new' vehicle and go to WalMart had to be postponed. I hope the roads will improve so I can go tomorrow. I will post a picture when we have it.

Oh, this picture is from yesterday. Ethan managed to contort himself into a mess. Then discovering he was stuck, he became very frustrated. I had to laugh when I found him. It reminded me how helpless my little boy still is.

Full Body and Close Up

Odd title... I just decided to respond to an add that West Edmonton Mall had on their website for amateur models. I 'entered' Evelyn, Ethan and myself. They only contact the people they are interested in, so I may never hear from them, but, getting the pictures was fun anyway. IF we are selected, they pay you with a mall gift card and a print of your photo. I had to set up our camera on the tripod with the timer to get shots of me :-D

These are the 'winning' recent shots:

Nap Time

"Dan-ol and Bwee-ann napping!" Says Evelyn. I took them out to join our tea party later this morning and Evelyn got upset that I had disturbed their nap! Thank you Auntie K. Evelyn loves her little playmates!




Many of you may think Ethan is a chubby guy because of his large birth weight. I thought I would post this pic from last night to show that he is really a long and lean eating machine! He LOVES having baths and has never cried during a bath (except for his very first one in the hospital).

"Hola, horses!"

Evelyn has really taken to playing with her Little People as of late. She particularly likes putting Dora and Boots in the big castle. She'll set them up, serve them dinner and put them to bed. In case you're not a watcher of Dora the Explorer it's a cartoon where Dora speaks some Spanish. As a result, Evelyn has now added a little Spanish to her vocabulary.

This clip is just a little piece of her playtime.

Spring is coming!

We enjoyed a short visit
from 'Auntie' Karissa. Evelyn really loved Auntie and started to go to her to ask for things she thought I would say 'no' to. A couple of times, I had to wave my hand and say "hello! do I even exist?" Evelyn was sad to see Auntie (and Mom) leave for our Scrapbooking get-away.

We took Ethan with us, and Ryan and Evelyn had their longest ever 'Daddy-Daughter time'. Ryan took some neat pictures of Evelyn through the window of her 'little people' barn. Evelyn's bottom left eye tooth is so close to erupting. Hopefully, that will happen soon.

When I got home from my get-away, it was wonderfully warm outside. We all played outdoors in the sun. Our lot has the most snow left by far. The school's field has completely melted and even our next door neighbors have lost most of their snow. We still have at least a foot left, but that is about 2.5 feet less than we started with!

Ethan has really been working on reaching for things and has gotten much better at judging distances and manipulating his hands. He is starting to reach for my food and drinks when I have him on my lap at the table. We think he is either in a physical growth spurt, or, a developmental growth spurt, or he is teething. Whichever the real cause is, it is making for one very cranky little boy who is not sleeping well AT ALL!

Spring is Finally Here...We Hope.

Finally, it looks like the warm weather is here to stay and the snow's finally melting. The result - puddles galore. Needless to say there's a little girl in our family who loves her puddles.

I know you're probably looking at the piles of snow and wondering what this girl is doing in merely a t-shirt. Well, it was warm today so have no fears. She won't be getting a cold this weekend.

Happy Easter

We had a good Easter Dinner and Egg hunt. Evelyn even found the eggs that I forgot about. She got lots of goodies from church too.

We went for a walk to the school today and Evelyn found all the muddy puddles. She fell onto her knees in a big deep puddle and kept on going. Brrrr!

Ethan is being a cutie. He is still gagging himself with his teething bar on a regular basis. He will be coming with me to my scrapbooking get away from tomorrow to Thursday. I hope he sleeps well!

No Pictures, sorry

Ryan has had the camera for the past few days, and I did not take any pics today.

Evelyn has discovered that she can tickle other people, and, that her Mommy is very ticklish! Now I have to watch out for little fingers!

She is getting much more intricate in her 'make believe' play too. When I watch her play I can hear her talking to the toys and saying things like "Dora, say 'map'" "Hola, Dora!" "naptime, bed" "Wake-up, morning Dora! clothes?" "eat, table" She still needs to master the connecting words like "eat AT THE table... or put your clothes on?" But I can understand what she is thinking when she moves the toys around.

The other day she told me 'Amy' was going to have a nap. So, we laid her on the couch. When I came back a bit later, I saw that Evelyn had covered her up with a blanket, given her 'Teddy' to cuddle and, interestingly, placed a tiny bed under her head! The little bed belongs to her Dora Castle and is about 2 inches long. 'Amy' is a normal sized doll (about 16 inches long). So, Evelyn either did not consider the size relationship, or, she was using the bed as a symbol of an appropriately sized bed. Either way, it was very cute!

So, I have one child tickling me, and another discovering how to pinch! Ethan is a VERY good pincher. He likes to target the back of my upper arm and my neck. I fully expect to see bruises in the mirror tonight! OUCH! He has also started to pull hair. Evelyn has been the target on a few occasions already. She is not impressed by this new skill. She has been pretty good about it though. She just stands still and yells "NO! NO! NO!..." Poor kid.

Ethan has impressed both Ryan and me with is reaching and grabbing skills. He spends much of his play time in the exersaucer and has just mastered pulling a teething bar into his mouth. I am sure Evelyn did not do that until she was about 7 months old. This evening, while we ate supper, Ethan was shoving this teething bar so far into his mouth he was making himself gag. Yet, he continued to shove it in. I guess cause and effect relationships are still a developing skill for him. We just laughed at him and eventually rescued him from himself.

So, Ryan is off for Spring Break until April 16th. It is nice to have help dealing with Evelyn. Some aspects of a 2-year-old's development are very trying. They can really wear you out. But, this age will not last, and I know that I will probably yearn for it in the future. I remember thinking "I wish I could keep her this age" when she was little, just crawling and furniture surfing, and again a few months ago. But, kids don't stay one age. They grow and enter new ages and I know I will probably wish I could keep her at those ages too. I guess I just have to love and savor every age because I will only get to go through it with her one time.

I have been looking for some poems that express the ups and downs of toddlerhood. Here are a few of my favorites:

The Finest Age

When she was only nine months old,
And plump and round and pink of cheek,
A joy to tickle and to hold,
Before she'd even learned to speak,
Her gentle mother used to say:
"It is too bad that she must grow.
If I could only have my way
Her baby ways we'd always know."

And then the year was turned, and she
Began to toddle round the floor
And name the things that she could see
And soil the dresses that she wore.
Then many a night she whispered low:
"Our baby now is such a pearl (or joy)
I hate to think that she must grow
To be a wild and heedless girl." (or boy)
But on she went and sweeter grew,


And then her mother, I recall,
Wished she could keep her always two,
For that's the finest age of all.
She thought the same thing at three,
And now that she is four, she sighs
To think she cannot always be
The youngster with the laughing eyes.

Oh, little girl, my wish is not
Always to keep you four years old.
Each night I stand beside your cot
And think of what the years may hold;
And looking down on you I pray
That when we've lost our baby small,
The mother of our woman will say
"This is the finest age of all."


What Did I Do Today?

Today I left some dishes dirty;
The bed got made around 3:30.
The diapers soaked a little longer,
The odor grew a little stronger.
The crumbs I spilled the day before,
Are staring at me from the floor.
The fingerprints there on the wall,
Will likely be there still next fall.
The dirty streaks on those windowpanes
Will still be there next time it rains.
Shame on you, you sit and say,
Just what did you do today?


I held a baby till she slept,
I held a toddler while he wept.
I played a game of hide and seek;
I squeezed a toy so it would squeak.
I pulled a wagon, sang a song,
Taught a child right from wrong.
What did I do this whole day through?
Not much that shows, I guess that' s true.
Unless you think that what I've done,
Might be important to someone,
With deep green eyes and soft brown hair,
If that is true...I've done my share.

Mom

(Susan Holton)

I remember when I could read an entire
chapter, some days even an entire book
at one sitting without interruptions.

I remember when I could work for hours
at a time in my study;
the hours were dependent on me
not on nap.

I remember when I knew no one with children
and had no idea what 2T meant.

And I remember when no one called me mommy
and when no little arms wrapped themselves
around my neck, no little kisses or hugs were mine.

And I prefer today.

Potty Training Woes

I tell you Gramma, I'm in a mess,
that is why I'm sending this s.o.s.
my mom has started a new campaign-
she thinks I am old enough to train.
and I tell you, Gramma, that all this strife,
is taking the joy plum out of my life.
She won't let me have any peace at all,
and shows no mercy, even when I bawl.
She grabs me up (scares me to death)
and acts afraid to take a deep breath.
and I try to make a quick retreat,
but always end up on that goofy seat.
she brings a cracker for me to nibble,
and sweetly begs for me to "dribble".
so, I comply with her beck and call,
then watch as she wipes up floor and wall
now I really glory in all the loud praise
though I'll never understand in all my born days-
but if it pleases her and makes her glad,
I'll try to be a helpful lad.
but now , Gramma, I must say goodbye
'cause here she comes with that look in her eye!
I'll hide right here and await my fate,
for she doesn't know it, but she's a little late!

(I think this poem was written in the early 1900's by Judith (Johnson) Torell)

Northern Alberta April

Okay, I have lived in Alberta for about 6 years now, but, this winter seems to be hanging on longer than usual. I am so restless and anxious for spring.

This was the view from our front window on Saturday.

We had a good run of +10 temps and even a couple rain/slushes. The snow is s l o w l y melting away. We are down to about 20 cm. We had over 3 feet in the drifts and about 2.5 feet all over. I am done with it. I have had enough! Our 'road' is a muddy quagmire, I still can't see any grass, and all the melt freezes into a skating rink at night. WHERE ARE THE APRIL SHOWERS!

This is our version of a picnic. Indoors. Evelyn loves to set up picnics. She will move everything around to different locations about 4 times a day. Sometimes 'Teddy' is the guest of honor, sometimes it is 'Dora', other times it is Ryan or me. Sometimes we have lunch on a blanket on the kitchen floor, but, it gets a bit messy.

SPRING! WHERE ARE YOU???!!!!!