March 29, day away

Yesterday Justin and I spent the day away from home.

First we stopped off at Jo-Anne's house. She's a cousin, Justin is learning to call her Aunt Jo-Anne though since Jo and I go way back and it somehow seems wrong to me for him to call her just Jo-Anne, so... anyways, we had a nice visit. She's in the middle of year end stuff for work and has oodles of reports to get done, life is a bit hectic for her a the moment. We'll stop in again for a visit again I think. :)

Then we went to the market to check things out there. Picked up some Maple Syrup. Used $20 of the money I got for selling the golf clubs.

Off then to see "kat" about some chicken she promised us for the dogs. She did a no show. Rather frustrating that. Ah well....

Visited with Jacky for a short while at her job as well. Brought her the puzzle that I found for her oh.... too long ago. So glad that she liked it! Justin almost lost his favourite "Ta-gu" (also known to the rest of the speaking world as "tiger" to Jacky's tablemate, but Jacky rescued him for Justin. :)

Had a short visit with Barry at his job. Totally surprised him! :) Didn't stay too long as Justin found everything there just fascinating, he was tired, I was tired, and well... Barry had to work!

Stopped in at Wal-mart on the way home and actually found some rubber boots for Justin to wear. Only one pair fit him (other than some yellow ones that Justin wouldn't put on) so he has some "cars" rain boots. They should stay on him a bit better than the other ones even though these are still a bit big for him. Needs growing room though.

Then home. Thought about surprising MaryLou but since Justin was so tired I thought that might not be the best idea, so we just headed home. Justin fell asleep just before we got home so I kept driving since that way I knew he could get a 45 minute nap in.

Tried to go out for Dinner with Jim at the Malibu but service was very off tonight. Justin ended up losing it so we left. We ended up having dinner at McD's. Quite the let down after thinking.... Pickerel dinner with salad bar, but hey...what do you do?

So that was our day. Jim's day wasn't quite as productive, but he did okay. Today on the other hand, he'll be gone all day to London. First for a meeting with another pastor, then to work at mom's until he can visit with some parishoners later in the day. Justin and I will go to the Library, he'll have a nap this afternoon and I'll find something to do around the house (other than read a book). Probably clean the upstairs of the house. :)

Today's jobs done!

So today was such a nice sunny day outside..... I couldn't stay inside for the life of me. Fortunately, my boyo agreed with me.

So...after breakfast I did the dishes, had a shower, got a load of laundry in, and then off to the dentist. Justin stayed with Daddy. On the way home I stopped and purchased some postage stamps.

When I got home Justin said ENOUGH WITH BEING INSIDE. he wanted to go "side". So...out we went. I learned quickly that cleaning out the old stinky pool was a really good idea! Boy fell in. Ooh...what a stink! Took his shirt off, and then cleaned the pool. Took him inside (a battle) to get cleaned up a bit and redressed.

After he finished getting mad at me for not letting him make a complete mess of the bathroom with Daddy having a nice bath! We went outside to do some flower bed cleanup. Justin also was good at helping me take a break by helping him climb Sassy's aframe. I also took breaks by working Sassy on her agility.

YEAH FOR SASSY...she's finally figured out how to go around something and still get the right entrance to the weaves! YEAH!!!!

Suddenly I realized I had a red-cheeked boy AND it was 1 p.m.! Boy where did the time fly???

So inside for lunch. Justin wasn't terribly hungry but a banana got downed quickly.

Off to bed with bottle (he was SO TIRED). and yes, I know..not a good practice but hey... sometimes yah gotta do what yah gotta do.

While he napped first got another load of laundry in then..... I got the meat done for the dogs. Seemed to take forever to get done. I got enough meals made for 45 days...which usually turns into bit more since occasionally I don't feed the dogs a meal. Woohoo! I won't have to do dog food next month at all! YEAH!!!!

Did some more laundry, opened the boy's door up, got louder in the house as I really wanted him to start waking up as it was 500 p.m. afterall!

While waiting for him to wake up I cleaned out the guinea pigs.

Justin up for 515, we sat and read a while, then out to walk the dogs at 530ish. Jim came with! yeah! We like daddy coming with us.

Justin ate supper while we walked, I had supper when we got back, Jim wasn't crazy about what was on the menu so he had soup later in the evening.

After our walk Justin and I were outside again. He was VERY insistent upon this. So I raked and took "over the aframe" breaks with Justin (I think he thinks it's a slide). Once again, Sassy worked for her ball. :) Justin is trying to figure out how to convince Sassy to take a ball that he throws. Sassy won't though....looks at me, and then runs to get a "safe" ball. :) A good thing I think at this moment for the two of them. It is good though to see Justin trying, and for Sassy to double-check with me. It's what I want from them.

In house, Justin had a cup of yogurt, a bottle of milk and then he grabbed "Ralph" and brought him upstairs. Put Ralph to bed and wanted to go to bed himself. Got mad when I had to "get him" ready for bed. Ah wee ones! :) He settled quickly though.

I got the dishes done. Got my bed remade and then sat and watch "house" with Jim.

it was a good productive day. Tomorrow I will finish the laundry and have another hopefully "outside" day with Justin. I want to start turning over my gardens.......

Sister's Birthday

This is a picture of my sister when we went shopping for a day with Tante Annie from Holland.

So Judy, my younger sister, is 40 years old... just so you know... I was nice and didn't pull a lot of 40 year old jokes on her. I tried very hard to be nice to her.

Anyways, she celebrated it yesterday by having an open house at her place. We got there just as my parents were leaving so our timing was perfect. Caroline had neglected I think to tell mom and dad that we were bringing stuff there for Marisa. Anyways, Marisa (they weren't there due to her illness), now has, or is at least close to having, my keepsakes from my summer in Haiti. This will help her with her project.

It was funny. Mom and Dad said that the house was filled with young people. I went in expecting to see hordes of teens, and it was mostly people my own age. It was funny. :) Differences in ages I suppose. :)

Anyways, Judy, as usual, had a nice feast laid out for us. All types of goodies, a nice looking house, and a bunch of people enjoying each other's company. Sometimes she amazes me, makes it all look so effortless. Justin had fun playing with cars, Jim had a nice visit with Henry, and I chatted with Becky (when she got home from work) and a couple other folks. We were only there for an hour as Jim needed to get back for preaching the evening service.

I'm glad we went. :)

Our weekend

So this past weekend Jim had a pastoral assignment in Kingsville for preaching. We thought to save time so we headed up to Mom's for the weekend. It saved us an additional 40 minutes driving and meant that Justin could sleep longer in the morning.

Justin spent Sunday with Mom while Jim and I drove the 2.5 hours to the other church.

Jim preached the same sermon he did the Sunday before and I found it just as interesting the second time around. He can really change sermons! :)

We had a lovely visit at Flo and George's house. Flo did this really nice cave painting that I told her if she ever wanted to do another...she was more than welcome to give it to me. They served PECAN pie!!!! boy...what a nice way to make my man smile! :) AND they had almond fingers which I really like as well...hmm.....think someone told them our favourites? Buns and cheese for lunch and then we headed back to London.

Monday we brought in some of our old books to used book stores. Gained around $80 in cash and trade-in value. Can't complain too much about that! One store even took books I didn't expect them to, and thought I would have a hard time selling so that was just bonus. :)

Did our shopping, visited with Mom and then headed home.

Was a good weekend (other than Tanse dying that is).

Tansy Died

We lost our Tansy this weekend.

We picked her up at an over-crowded pet store. VERY fortunate that as a wee young one that she wasn't pregnant at the time. She needed some growing and maturing time.

She was never a strong pig, but she was gentle. VERY timid, but a nice little pig. Long-haired. Had a funny head....more pointy than our other ladies.

She absolutely LOVED green peppers....it's the only time we would find her standing up for herself. Anything else was ...ah... whatever...but green peppers...she would push to the front of the pack every time. :)

She had one litter, almost died from it, of the six born, one survived, who became a lovely boar. Her health demanded that she never be bred again.

She caught a cold about 10 days ago. Not sure how, just kinda crept up on her. We thought she rallied on us, and well....she didn't.

She was a good pig in her own quiet way.

Toronto Sportsmen Show

We had fun. This is where we went.

We met a couple people from church while we were there, chatted just long enough to say hi.

Lots of good booths, lots of friendly people, many booth people were happy to rock the stroller for Justin while Jim and I filled out ballots.

Fascinating some of the pictures of fishing resorts. Also saw some of the biggest fish (sturgeons) and people catching them. Wow... big fish. Can't imagine bringing them in.

Seeing things with the eyes of a toddler. BO! he said very excited as he saw the taxidermy birds. MOO! to the moose.

And boy oh boy.... the fun of climbing on ATV's, boats, canoes and so on. The life for a wee boyo. Fun Fun!

We had hoped that Justin would fall asleep early afternoon, but although he was very tired that didn't happen until later on. Made for lots of slow walking and quiet areas as we tried to help him sleep so he could cope with the rest of the day.

I enjoyed the Golden Whistle Retriever trials. Was unable to see them all due to a very busy boy running ALL over the place (even while wearing a harness) who suddenly decided he had had enough! (the trials were the last event of the day that we were staying for). So he had enough, I had enough and so we left. :) But we did see dogs hesitate at the water pond. One dog did everything it could NOT to get wet... rather funny that. I don't think the handler ever got it to go into the water. One older (looked female from the build) dog that did a wonderful job on a blind send. Straight through the water and back. Nice line just like you want to see. We also saw a fake duck take out a fake goose. That was funny. AND one fake duck tried hard to take out one of the black labs.....dodged quickly that dog did! :)

Justin was TIRED! Long day for a 20 month old. He fell asleep on the way home, I took a wee bit of shut eye and Jim got us home safely. :)

Got home at 11 p.m. to a very poopy kitchen. OLD DOGS>>> ARGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

March 14, update

Okay... I've recently realized I haven't updated you all on our lives recently.

The dogs - Riley continues to age, sometimes poorly, sometimes not. He slips and slides on the ice. Occasionally has diarrhea, is starting to smell "old dog", but still is soft mild-mannered dog, who tries to be good. he really tries. he enjoys treats for running away from Justin. :) Loves to go for long walks along the river.
- Sassy...become "FAT DOG" over the winter. She is currently under a lose weight regime, sorta like the other female in the house. :) Winter was hard on us that way. Hoping to get her into an agility trial in May.

The cat! LOVES Jim. Loves to sleep with Jim. Loves to run away from the boy (not that I blame him, I wouldn't appreciate a tail grabber either). Remains a nice cat.

The piggies - the four we have left are good pigs. Tanse had a cold recently, seems to be getting better though. Topper enjoys the stuffed fish he has for a cage mate. Helps him eat. Tasha and Itch continue to be good pigs though their dominance roles appear to be switching. Itch gets first dibs on everything lately.

Justin... ear surgery was a success. he talks more, and more clearly. Has more words to his vocabulary. He can sign please, more and milk- though not always appropriately. Goes through spells of favourite words, one week it was HAT. hat this, hat that. On hat, off hat. Has our coming in the house routines down pat. Coat off. Boots off. and will come after us if we leave any of the fore-a-mentioned on.

Jim. These past two weeks have had their challenges for him. Sometimes it's hard to be pastor. But it's had its good moments to. He had a lovely visit in Whitby with a pastor friend and his wife. He learned stuff at a workshop (he likes that!). He got a tool so he can properly fix the brake lines on his Sunrunner.

Me... well..life continues! I had a good visit this week with one of our shut-in ladies. Made a new meal that Justin and I like. The house is not looking like a tornado recently passed through, but does need a bit of work done. I had a good visit with my parents last week, and then good shopping and visiting in Kitchener. The weather is warmer so I'm able to get out more with Justin. AND my sprained foot is for the most part, feeling pretty good.

My brother-in-law Paul continues to heal from his recurrent illness, which helps my sister be less worried. Last word was that he wasn't better yet.

My dad is back to puzzling. their basement has been all fixed up. Looks pretty good. He still has pain, hates being shut in during the winter. They are looking to sell the farm this summer and move somewhere in town.

My neice from my middle brother is doing a project on Haiti that I can help her with IF I manage to get my Haiti stuff up to her before it is due. Kinda neat that I went to Haiti and therefore have some things she can use. :)

So I think that's about it. talk more next week! :)

Getting expensive.....

There was a preacher whose wife was expecting a baby so he went before the congregation and asked for a raise.

After much discussion, they passed a rule that whenever the preacher's family expanded, so would his paycheck.

After 6 children, this started to get expensive and the Congregation decided to hold another meeting to discuss the preacher's salary.

There was much yelling and bickering about how much the clergyman's additional children were costing the church.

Finally, the Preacher got up and spoke to the crowd, "Children are a gift from God," he said. Silence fell on the congregation.

In the back pew, a little old lady stood up and in her frail voice said, "Rain is also a gift from God, but when we get too much of it, we wear rubbers."

And the congregation said, "Amen."

A Little Old Lady

LITTLE OLD LADY
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A little old lady is walking down the street, dragging two plastic garbage bags with her, one in each hand. There's a hole in one of the bags, and every once in a while a $20 bill is flying out of it onto the pavement.
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Noticing this, a policeman stops her.... "Ma'am, there are $20 bills falling out of that bag."
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"Damn!" says the little old lady....."I'd better go back and see if I can still find them. Thanks for the warning!"
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"Well, now, not so fast," says the cop. "How did you get all that money? Did you steal it?"
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"Oh, no", says the little old lady. "You see, my back yard backs up to the parking lot of the football stadium. Each time there's a game a lot of fans come and pee in the bushes, right into my flower beds!
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So, I go and stand behind the bushes with a big hedge clipper, and each time someone sticks his little winkie through the bushes, I say, $20 or off it comes!"
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"Hey, not a bad idea!" laughs the cop. "OK, good luck! By the way, what's in the other bag?"
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"Well", says the little old lady, "Some of them don't believe me."