Our plans for the next two weeks

Jim is on holidays for the next two weeks...ah..whatever shall we do with such freedom? :)

1. Clean and empty the trailer and put it to bed for the winter. That is both good and bad. It means no more camping, but it also means another job done.
2. Jim wants to build a tv stand then....
3. We can rearrange the living room -- I like it!
   
4. Help his mom tear out her kitchen floor and the bottom cabinets
5. Clean this house and get ready to leave for a week starting Monday
6. I go to coffeebreak Wednesday morning with Justin. and the library Friday morning.
   
7. Jim changes the oil in Quinn (the van) in prep for going to Algonquin for FYBO.
8. I need to decide if I'm going to try to attend part of a weekend conference. Hard to decide because Justin is still not well, and there's a scrapping thing in Kitchener which is free, and I'd like to meet Kim and she'll probably be at the conference - but not sure if doing the Friday night is a good idea since I'm tired this week and night driving isn't such a good idea and.....Oh...I just don't know. I'd also like to do some more rearranging here at home of stuff....that I can do best if Jim ain't around.... There's just too many decisions to make!
   
9. Give Sassy dog a good bath and brush-out (not in that order)
10. Pack food for Jim and Sassy.
    
11. Jim goes to FYBO this coming weekend. He leaves Thursday a.m. comes back Sunday p.m. He takes the Sassy dog with him.
    
12. Pack bags for our mutual vacation week.
    
13. Next week we go to Toronto where
1. We stay at a good friends house.
2. Go the Royal.
3. Have a dinner and movie night.
4. Leave Justin with Eva (Jim's mom) for three days.
5. Meet Eva somewhere between Toronto and London to exhange Justin.
   
6. Have Justin with us Wednesday to Friday morning.
7. Bum around Toronto taking in various sites and attractions.
   
8. Leave Justin with Judy (Friday morning to Saturday evening).
14. And we'll return on Sunday.
    

Hopefully we'll have a good time away. If not, well...that will really suck, but we'll survive.

Hallowe'en at the Pinery

So we came back a bit early.

We went up on Friday night to Pinery Provincial Park to do a wee bit of camping. The Pinery has a hallowe'en weekend every year which we discovered last year was a lot of fun. A whole whack of people from the MFCC were there as well. We arrived shortly after lunch, got all set up, did a bit of visiting, and had supper out at the Colonial in Grand Bend... by the way, I do not recommend eating there... although the staff are friendly, the food.. leaves a wee bit to be desired. Jim had a classis meeting in Ancaster on Saturday so he went home to sleep so that he didn't need to arise so early in the morning on Saturday.

We both ended up missing the potluck...Jim because of the meeting, me because Justin was sleeping. Well.... I did get a hotdog! :) Erik (an MFCCer) was a real doll - he and his son David, and another lad (Lewis) split our wood for us so I could build a nice fire. I had hoped to surprise Jim with a nice warm fire to sit by... that plan didn't quite materialize due to inclement weather and a power outage.

We had intended to stay until Sunday afternoon, but while Jim was at his meeting, the power went out early afternoon. That meant...a COLD trailer. Not fun. It was actually warmer outside than inside for a while --- so we went visiting, Justin played, got soaked, got changed, and thought to go out again...but then the wind picked up. Since he is still battling an ear ache I thought a strong wind and a little boy were not a good mix. Ever try amusing a 15 month old in a trailer that is cold for 3 hours unassisted? With two largish dogs who wanted to be in as well? Not my idea of fun. We did problem solve though.... the boyo played on the the table (it was flattened to bunk size) and the dogs stayed by the sink. Then it was time to go trick or treating which was a good deal of fun. Met lots of nice folks too.

Justin dressed up at "baby Mickey and his toys" which is one of his favourite books. He'll do that again on Tuesday in the neighbourhood.

Jim returned at 6 p.m. to a trailer with the awning up. He wanted to know what happened with that, I didn't know as I'd been out with Justin treating. But Oz and Us said a couple of people were at the trailer working with the awning. I told Jim that my best guess was that the awning came loose yet again in the wind and that the neighbours were helpful. :) I mentioned the power was out and that we were cold that perhaps going home would be an option as having a cold trailer and earachy boy didn't seem a good plan. He agreed. I stayed with the boy in Oz and Us' trailer (it was warm...ah the beauty of a hard side with propane heaters ... mmmm.....) Yes, I may convert to the 'darkside'. The power stayed out until 730 pm, by which time the trailer was basically packed up.

We were home by 820, put the boy to bed, put the trailer up again, and relaxed. :) I recalled what my Sunday School lesson would be, hubbie did something else and the boyo slept. And now it's Sunday morning, Sassy's been walked....Riley well...he didn't come and I didn't think to look in the living room (he ALWAYS sleeps in the Kitchen) and since I couldn't find him I just walked Sassy so they're out in the backward and he'll have to wait till after church for a walk.

Enjoy your day all!

Applesauce

Last week our family went out to get some more apples. We had gone out earlier with Gramma to pick apples at Farmer Jacks and Justin had a blast.

He had so much fun getting two apples and then putting them in the bright red buckets we had been loaned for picking.

Sassy (in the back ground) enjoyed chasing and eating some of those apples.

BUT, I didn't have enough for just doing apples up. The ones we picked were nice eating apples for the winter. They store lovely in our cold cellar. So we went back to get some cheapies : empires and macintosh.




Yesterday while Justin was napping I decided to make applesauce. It was going well, and then he woke up. Of course he immediately thought that helping his mommy was just the thing to do!

He had a hoot! :)

He stirred, he mixed, he got his fingers into jars. He had so much fun....

Mommy learned a valuable lesson....DON'T dress the boy in white if you think he might want to help! Just don't do it!

What do you think, does he like it?
Do you think he got messy enough? :)

A couple of updates

1. My Aunt's (Annie (Jan's wife) from in holland) surgery went well. They'll know in a few days if the growth was cancerous or not.

2. My mom-in-law got us an appointment with a doctor that she knows. He is hoping to get us in with a doctor in Ilderton who is bringing in a couple of new doctors. Would be nice for Justin to have a family doctor. He noted that Justin's ear has not healed over completely, and wants to see him again in two weeks to see how he is doing. He was a VERY nice doctor. If I could have a nice doctor like him for our family, it would be really nice. :) But time will tell. If the ear hasn't healed in two weeks he may refer us to a ear, nose, and throat specialist.

3. My dad is slowly continuing to improve. Bad weather makes his joints feel worse. But overall he is thinking more clearly, and walking more upright. He is taking less meds as well which is a good thing. It will still be a long road to complete recovery. He continues to have a lot of muscle spasms.

October 11

My mom and sister and sister-in-law have this yearly tradition. Each year they spend one day out shopping for clothes together. I've tended not to go along. I can't say I'm real keen on clothes shopping. I do the minimum and now that I'm married, my hubbie takes care of that for me a lot. I tell him I need new stuff, and he keeps his eye out. He has more of a knack for it than I do. :) Who would have expected that as a good side-benefit of being married!

But yesterday Justin and I chose to go out with them. My aunt is visiting from Holland so it made for a nice day out. I went up the night before and it was really cool.. my aunt showed me all the pictures of her grandchildren (my cousins and their kids). It was fun to get to know them a wee bit. :) My mom wanted to get a new Sunday outfit for the fall/winter as she needed a new outfit.

Since I HATE shopping for clothes I said I'd go for the morning only, besides the fact that staying all day would be too hard for Justin to do. But thought it would be fun to get out with the ladies. It was!

Justin and I took breaks and went to the disney store where he climbed up this mountain of stuffies. He tried hard to convince me that he needed not one but TWO winnie the pooh stuffies. at $25 I said...I THINK NOT! He cried but...ah well, a boy needs to learn he can't have EVERYTHING he wants. :)

Mom didn't have success before lunch. We ate at Subway in the food court. Justin loved the kids toy that came with lunch. Then off to the pet store to enjoy the critters there. Justin just LOVED the mice. Just absolutely fascinated by them. :) We had fun, but then off to the car while Justin napped as I drove home. I went home a different way, called Jim when I wasn't sure where to turn and got home in two hours. It was a good day away and I'm glad I went along this year. :)

He's learning.....

My boy Justin is learning to eat with a spoon.

This mornings breakfast was "applesauce breakie". It is a mix of applesauce and cottage cheese.

He gets stuff on the spoon, and then as he brings it to his mouth it somehow gets turned upside down so half lands on the table top or his shirt, and the other half in his mouth.

I helped him finish. :)

Perforated Ear Drum

That's what my boyo Justin has. It's not fun.

Apparantly he had an ear infection that went unnoticed. Go figure that.

Part of me is feeling like I'm a really bad mom to not have noticed. He played, he laughed, he talked, he had a couple of nights of being REALLY tired, but otherwise he acted like himself.

No pulling of the ear, no running a temp for a few days, just a quiet normal little boy.

All we had for signs was a high temp on Wednesday night, not wanting to sleep or lay down. Made for a hard night for mommy. Then Thursday I saw stuff coming out of his ear. Took him to emerg (without a hospital card!) so hopefully we won't be billed. Discovered that his temperature had a reason for being...and his ear drum is perforated. (from the ear infection).

He was put on meds and advised to take motrin for pain. Hopefully the meds will work really well.

The advice is to get a family doctor so that we can get a referral to an ear, nose and throat specialist. Generally ear drums heal quite nicely. The concern is that it might affect his hearing from fluid build-up. Getting a family doctor is tough so... Jim's mom knows a doctor who MIGHT be able to get us a referral to the appropriated specialist. :) Hope so! :)

Meanwhile, we'll put ourselves on a list to see if we can get ourselves a family doctor.