My Birthday 2008

What a lovely day for the most part this turned out to be.

nice walk with Sassy in the morning. Weeded front gardens and gave weeds to the rabbits.

Canned peaches, chatted with Jim's mom who came up to play with Justin and to visit for my birthday. I'm 43 years old today. I have 13 jars of peaches and 4 jars of cherries. We had planned to do a picnic lunch with Eva but Justin fell asleep on her lap. He slept from 10-330. (seeing as he was awake at 230 in the a.m. I figured letting him sleep was a good idea!)

Got the lawn mowed and the main floor fairly well cleaned. Not perfect, but then again, it never is. :) I'm getting more proficient at it though!

Had a shower, got things organized for supper and then mom and dad arrived for supper. We had a lovely meal. Mom and Dad gave us this really nice picture of Justin. It's just a superb picture. :) Sausage on a bun with cucumber salad for supper. Conversation and laughter.

Then after supper I showed off my bunnies. They are sick right now so I"m treating them with meds. NOT FUN to have sick bunnies. Some of my bunnies are angry because I'm not letting them out to do "their thing" at all. Nor am I petting them much since I want them to GET BETTER!

Oh...My sister gave me Chicken cannisters! They are wonderful! Okay...she gave one to me and one to Jim. But they are MINE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! They will fit in well in my chicken kitchen. :) We have an animal book room, a chicken kitchen and a duck bathroom, though Justin commandeered the ducks from the bathroom to be momma duck and baby duck. Some day they will be rehung in the bathroom. :)

Judy and Henry arrived bringing dessert of cheesecake (the unbaked type), very yummy. Had more conversation and laughter. it was a very pleasant evening. A great way to spend a birthday. :) A nice day it was. :)

End of July, our life continues

So Today Jim, Justin and I are running up to Trail's End Market to ship out some bunnies. Hoping to get there early so that we can get bunnies into early cages as opposed to late ones since I don't wish to be in London almost all day waiting for bunnies to sell.

To read up on our vacation go here.
To read up on what happened after our vacation go here.

Um what else......raccoons have been visiting the backyard. Scared one of the bunnies bad enough that it heart-attacked on me.

Sassy's been feeling spunky some evenings. When she's like that we chase balls in the backyard. :) Good to see her feeling spunky.

My squash plants are definitely well on their way to taking over the backyard. Wish they had stayed the bush plants they were supposed to be. ARGH!!!!! Makes it difficult to manage the gardens well when one has squash growing out everywhere.

Justin has learned he likes gooseberries. Raspberries I think are still his favourite. But gooseberries....they are good too.

Jim fixed the O2 sensor and the muffler on the car. YEAH!! my man is good! :)

That's it for now...gotta run.

A cold, long days, and gardening

In the last two days I've sold 7 bunnies. Did cut people deals a bit, but overall, still made more than if I sell them as meat rabbits. :)

What else...oh..as you can tell from the header...we've had colds in this house. Jim started it all off last week, Justin caught it this week. It's one of those nasty sit in your sinuses type of colds.

Justin was a bit better today but his breathe has been simply atrocious so I'm thinking tonsils are also involved. So despite his eating today, I'm taking him to the doc tomorrow to see if needs to be medicated to help his tonsils heal up a bit.

Rod DeKoter and his boys are coming up for a visit tomorrow. They'll arrive mid-afternoon and stay for supper. Should be fun. Rod and Jim have been best friends for years. Good people. His wife is visiting her parents who are not doing very well unfortunately.

Justin helped mommy pull weeds this morning in the garden. Well...okay...he didn't really help. Tagu tried to help...but mommy often sent Tagu flying through the air to escape the bad weeds (Really...he was escaping...really!) :)

Rabbits enjoyed those weeds too! Well..except for Moss who's a bit on the picky side for greens eating as of yet.

Got the kitchen and living room cleaned today! YEAH!!! tough job but we got'her done. Had prayer meeting at the house and Jim's office is way too overflowing with books...we need a bigger office I'm a thinking! Too many books...can one ever have too many books????? So we needed to have the rest of the house livable. Found more toys to put out in the garage sale.

Oh...had a garage sale last week. It rained. I still have lots to get rid of. Thinking, if the weather holds nice, I'll sell again on Saturday morning. See if I can't get rid of more "stuff" that I just don't be needing in my house any more. Made a 1/3 of what I am hoping to make overall, but we'll see how it all goes.

Anyways, think that's about it. Talk more again I'm sure in another two weeks or so. :) Cheers!

It's into June

Okay, our family over the past three weeks or so.

Busy. :) That would be a good way to describe it.

Jim's had LOTS of meetings. I"m looking forward to summer when he has a few less meetings. It'll be like having my hubby back!

Justin's been growing and learning lots. He made me laugh and cry tonight.
Laughter amidst frustration. He decided he would make a nice bunny nest tonight. Guess what he used???? laundry...both clean and dirty AND all the clothes from his room...every single last piece that he could find and reach. MY laundry..of the drawers he could open. Ditto with Daddies..... oh my.......NOT fun trying to put it all away again. Though by the time it was bed time Justin was eager to help mommy get his clothes back where they belonged. :)

We had a bit of a visit at Nancy's tonight (next door neighbour). She's back in school full-time to become an office administrator. Her son and niece were playing out front so Justin thought he'd join them. I invited Nancy to have me help her garden anytime she needed help.

Justin helped me plant the crab potatoes. yes...you read that right. I had some stuff not come up on the garden, and thought...oh right, I hadn't planted potatoes why not plant some? I had some potatoes growing 'eyes' so I asked Justin if he'd help me plant them. Well..those crab potatoes were all tired and they had to go to bed and sleep under the ground. They were hiding! :) it was fun listening to all his little boy talk with those crab potatoes. :) he then helped me replant my beans. Next week I may replant some lettuce and transplant my ground cherries to where I want them growing.

We've had mice and baby bunnies born. I always like new life.

My niece Ange got married. Monty seems like solid rock of a guy. He's a tattoo artist from Alaska. I got called a crackpot at the wedding because I'm daring to home-school Justin. :) I was quite taken aback at first and then I figured....older lady, not "up" with the times. We chatted a bit afterwards and she amended her crackpot statement to "those who home-school are rather different". I thanked her for that compliment. :)

My main man Jim....he's a handy man. He's almost done building this really cool workbench in the garage. :) YEAH!!!!! Looks good thus far. Hopefully it will prove to be as functional as it looks. :) I'm rather proud of his abilities.

Oh.. that reminds me. I was talking with one of the ladies at work today and not sure how we got on the topic but I mentioned that I trusted Jim implicitly (not to have an affair). She was shocked. She said...you do realize that we live in Huron county right? I said so? I wasn't raised here, neither was my man, and I trust him implicitly. She was just confounded and so very intrigued by the notion. I find that rather sad. Probably should have found a way to bring God into the conversation, but I didn't, and it was a short conversation.

as to me...I've been working on spring cleaning the house. One room per week is my goal. This week I got the main bedroom cleaned. Got the back yard tidied up as well. I've managed to get a few other things done this week as well but you all don't need to hear all about that. :)

Anyways, it's getting late. I'm tired and going to bed. Keep well all.

The Zoo, May 22, 2008

Actually posted by Annette but the pictures are on Jim's computer. :)

So we went to the zoo on Thursday, the Toronto Zoo. Boy, did we have fun. :)

Justin had a blast seeing different animals, sitting on stones shaped like animals and just running around seeing things. He played with another little boy named Aaron, pretended to be a cat frequently, and just was a good boy. Surprised me that he managed to stay up ALL day and well past the time we got home. We all went to bed at the same time. A frequent request, whenever he saw something that he really liked was "Justin want go in there too." "go in there too?"

Some pics....NOTE: these are from the camera that died on us. It has been in process of dying for a while, so to have it completely die wasn't a shock, but was a disappointment. So some of the pictures are not so good, some were completely unrecognizable, I picked the best of the lot.

This is Tagu's big brother.

and Dumbo too!

Herein lies fascination with one of the three big aquariums we saw.
BIG fish.

The family of Warthogs, or as Justin and I say, pigs!
He stared at these fellows, asking, where mommy pig?

It was interesting to note that there were Ducks and Canada Geese in almost every exhibit, except where the big cats were. :) Wonder why?
This seemed like an early batch of goslings, looked at least three days old.
What young lad can resist going through a natural Tunnel?
Here Justin played with Aaron for a while.

Doesn't my hubby take good pictures?

I must so recommend going to the zoo in the spring.
The crowds are less.
The animals are out more.
There is room to explore and not get bumped into by people and it is WAY quieter. :)

We will most definitely go to the zoo again in the spring.
Just don't buy the ice cream! WAY too expensive. No more promises by mommy to buy ice cream at the zoo! (promises aught to be kept don'tcha know!)

Family Update

Just thought I should post an update here again. it's been a bit, granted i do post things on my blog too, so it's not like I have been doing nothing. :)

Anyways, Justin is almost over his cold. Last night was the first night in almost a week and a half that I didn't have a little boy joining me in bed OR waking me up to come wipe a nose or give him a bottle or ... (you get the picture).

Mom and Dad were supposed to come up today, but Dad isn't. It will just be mom for Lunch and then shopping afterwards. Justin may stay with us OR go to gramma's for an hour or so.

What else...my newest batches of bunnies contain some really cool colours. I'm thrilled with that! I'm hoping one or two of the neat colours is female and then I can considering keeping. :)

Most of my garden is planted. Want to purchase some celery yet, plant more lettuce and so forth. But trying to spread out the lettuce a bit so it doesn't all come all at once.

Next week is holidays for Jim, will spend most of the day around here. the week after Jim goes to the Banner. and then back to regular routine. Jim's rather tired of work, needs a break. So next week he's off! :) He'll work on vehicles, moving rose bed and start work on the patio, we'll take a day trip to the zoo. I work Friday and then Saturday and Sunday we'll go camping up at the regionals and help out there. Monday morning Jim leaves for the Banner and comes home on Friday late. Should be an interesting two weeks.

Not much else to say, so will close off here.

Life Does Not Always Go as Planned

Yesterday I had planned to be out and about with Justin in the morning. Garage-saleing, pop in at the Agility sale in London and so forth.

BUT that changed when Justin mentioned that penis hurt and hard to pee. Checked him out, he had an "owie" down there. Took him to the doctor. Doc says either a yeast or a bacterial infection, probably yeast. Need to treat it with Monistat Derm for a week. IF that doesn't clear it up, then he gave me a sample of some other stuff to apply.

Justin is NOT pleased! I hate making my little boy cry twice a day. I just hate it! Not on my list of things I enjoy at all.

I hope the monistat clears it up soon, I really, really do!

Though I have to admit, Justin made me laugh yesterday. I asked the doc what causes this. He mentioned it was quite common in little boys learning how to pee and keep themselves clean, and that circumcised boys don't get this. We just need to continue to encourage Justin to keep himself clean down there.

When Justin and I got back to the car he asked "want go see circumcise mommy? Go now mommy?" I laughed! :) Told him Oh buddy, we can't go see circumcise, we just can't do that. :) So how would YOU have answered that one?

On a different note. A lady called me up from Windsor yesterday, asked me a lot about my bunnies, mentioned how she just wanted a pet bunny and she likes how the coats turn out on the lop-rex crosses. Said she was going to come up around four to get one. She never showed up to my knowledge, but later in the day I noted one of my youngsters was missing. I have to ask myself, did she show and was really quiet about it and helped herself OR did a bunny get out and get cat-nabbed? I really don't know. I'd rather it be curious bunny escaping than to think that someone could have slipped into our backyard without me noticing (or Sassy either). That idea just doesn't sit well with me.

Anywho, we have a missing bunny and an unhappy boy (only when his mommy is administering stuff to him). Other than that, Life is very much blessed of God in our household.

Middle of April

I've just realized I haven't done a family update lately. :)

So.... what have we been up to lately?

about this lad of ours ---

• Justin's favourite word lately is NO. He's fairly straight forward, everything is NO! It's a bit frustrating at times. BUT overall he's still a pretty good lad.
  
• We've learned that right now water is absolutely fascinating...making rivers and waterfalls, sitting there and watching it. I've learned to watch him carefully with water because he'll dump it in places you really don't want it -- found him one day dumping loads of water into the mouse food container (it still had mouse food in it) I had to lay it all out on a sheet to get it all dried again. ARGH! Silly lad. :) AND he's learned the joy of throwing water at people. :) Fortunately he's fairly easy to out-run at this point in his life.
  
• He likes to be silly - he'll do something and I ask what he's doing...'Justin silly boy!' will be the response...and sometimes it is safe, harmless and silly, and other times it likes "no Justin, that's not silly, that's wrong...don't break the rabbits food bowls".
  
• He's learning to dance to music (just not mommy singing). BUT he likes to tell mommy what to sing so we often sing.
  
• He likes to go to Toddler Time, but he hates it when Missy sings the clean up song. Has a fit at home when I sing it too. Not sure if it's for the same reason though. :)
• Hoping to start swimming with him at the local pool soon. Should be fun to do that again.
• He's learning his abc's and 123's and colours. Fun to watch his mind at work. He just likes to KNOW stuff right now.

Jim

• wrenched his back/shoulder the other day not sure who, resulted in some pain and resultant lack of sleep. Found it difficult to do some things. Found he liked having a couple of back rubs through it all :)
• has sent off his paperwork to go to the Conference at the end of May. I'd drawing a blank right now as to what the conference is. But it's a pastor's conference.
  
• Continues to work hard at his job
• Is trying to get the front fender off of the Sunrunner so that he can learn how to fix the rust on it using sheet metal (or something like that). He also has plans to fix the brake lines on the Mazda as they are starting to rust up a bit. Anyways, he apparently has two more screws to get off and the penetrating oil is taking it's time to do it's thing.
• Disappointing....We got a plecko, added it to Jim's peacock aquarium, they promptly got ICK, Jim treated the tank, two fish died..and then Jim realized that he neglected to remove the carbon from the filter. Removed that, treated them again, the ICK cleared up. ARGH!!! Lost some good fish. Jim's hoping we can replace them today. So that was a disappointing thing over the past week.
  

Annette

• uh...my life...always the hardest to come to......
• My bunnies are fun! I like raising bunnies and selling the offspring. Fun work. I like seeing the different colours and personalities. Customers can be odd to deal with but I think that's pretty normal. Not bad money even if I sell the babies cheap. I've had people out from Missausaga, St.Thomas, Kitchener and of course London for them. Amazes me when people are willing to drive 1.5 hours (or more) for a bunny, but I sell to them. :)
  
• I'm starting to plant my gardens, my radishes are starting to come up already. :) I hope the spinach and lettuce come soon too. Justin is learning to stay out of the planted gardens --- I put a brick on them to help him remember.
• I've had fun learning to do build rabbit cages. :) I use old lumber and free stuff from the lumber yard. I'll have to I think buy one more piece of plywood, but other than that, should be done. I want to get the cages up off the ground but haven't figured out a cost effective way of doing that yet. Any thoughts...let me know. :)
  

Sassy, Sparks and various critters.

• Sassy is doing well. Her leg tends to bother her at times. She hasn't had an issue with Justin at all lately! YEAH!!!!!!!!!!! But the weather is so nice lately she can be outside alot, and we're outside a lot too, so it's not like she's been abandoned. :) Justin's getting older and realizing that rushing a dog is NOT acceptable. She goes for walks to the park with us, rides in the car to the store (Short trips), and plays ball a lot. :) She also ALWAYS gets a good morning walk, the evening walks vary as to what's going on in the house and with Jim.
• Sparks continues to be a nice Tom Cat. He has some annoying habits that we'd like to break, but not sure that we can. He's a cat, they can be fairly particular.
• The fish...the guppies are doing well, they are very colourful which is one reason why I like them. The Kribs are growing well, we have at least one female. They assist in keeping the guppy population under control :) Also hoping to get a breeding pair so I can sell any resultant babies. That would be nice. :)
• Jim's put some new light bulbs in the tank upstairs with the south americans cichlids so they show off their colours really nicely.
• Guinea pigs, we have four girls and one boy right now. the boy is new so going through a hold stage. He was a young girls pet who simply doesn't have enough time for him. We'll see if we get youngsters from them or not.
  

That's about it I think.

Feel free to leave a comment that you've been by. :) Always nice to get comments...just click on the little comments box. If you do anonymous (because you don't want to open a blogger account) that's okay...just sign your name please. :) have a great day!

Maybe We Should Do This For Our Old Clothes

A boon and a blessing

So yesterday Eva (Jim's mom was here). She had promised Justin she would sleep over at our place when he got back from Oma and Papa's. She's very good at keeping promises to little boys.

Anyways, she said she'd stay with him while Jim and I stopped at the Doc's office to get my hand checked out. Saw the Practical Nurse who works for them. She thought that my hand should be doing pretty good by the middle of the week, but I'm to keep it wrapped until it's all healed up and to continue watching for infection. She said that I need to monitor that longer than I might think I need to. So...I'll keep a close eye on things. She wrapped it up again for me, used a new to me dressing (some antibiotic treated non-stick dressing) and it well...suffice it to say I tolerated it as long as I could and then I ripped it off. The heat generated by it caused all my healing blisters to flair up again. We stopped at shoppers' drug mart to pick up some new stuff and I washed my hand well and redressed it. That pain I'm not to desirous of repeating. I'll stick with the Melaluca triple antibiotic for sure (that and unmedicated non-stick pads)!

We continued on our way to London. Picked up a couple of mini rex bunnies from a fellow who had thought he might donate them as pet food. I figured I could give them a better home than that! One I think will end up being blind in the one eye, he mentioned that eye had been bad since birth and recently had been worse again. he'd been treating it with eye drops and I'm continuing the same.

BUT I ALSO got some clothes. God was good to us. We stopped at Pennington's. I really, really wanted to find some dress pants to replace the ones that got burnt in the fire. I found some. Also found some other pants, and some undies (yes, a number of them burnt too!). Then we scratched the scratch and win ticket and got 50% off! Go figure that! So I picked up a couple of shirts as well! We got $200 worth of clothing for $100....and much of what we purchased was on sale already. :) Pretty cool God's providence in that ain't it? :)

Got some clothes at Wal-mart too. I'll want my mom to shop with me sometime this spring to see if I can find another shirt to go with these pants I got, I don't have much that goes it them and they are really nice light pants to just wear to church or out and about and so forth. But a "NICE" shirt will make it work well for church.

Anyways, Jim and I were chatting about how much I had wanted to build 2-3 rabbit hutches this week and couldn't because of my hand. And I decided I would ask mom (eva) if she would stay over and help me...I figured the worst that could happen is she'd say no, she'd rather go home. She said yes! We got two cages built (Jim and Justin helped a bit as well). We discovered that we can work together rather well. (my lessons with Jim have paid off). I have a happy buck (lop-hop) who is simply delighted to be in a cage where he can hop around and being a crazy buck! :) Scruffy didn't much care as he'd been in a fairly big cage for a while already (originally Lop-hop's but Scruffy didn't try to escape from it and a smaller cage was easier to lop-hop proof!).

Grammer (Justin's word) stayed for a bit in the afternoon and just played with Justin. He had a blast. She wanted to stay to do the dishes up and said Mom...go home. Leave the dishes, they'll get done sometime.

This weekend has proven to be a boon and blessing to me in many ways, God's providence clearly seen in many ways. And I've learned a bit more about the fine art of patience when healing. Should stand me in good stead as my life continues! :)

Update on my Hand

So it's been 5 days.
My hand is getting a better. It still has moments of "ouch"....sometimes of my own doing when I forget it and try to push off something with it. NOT a good idea by the by.

The smallish blisters around the outside of my hand are going away.

The three-four large blisters haven't busted open which is good...gives the skin underneath a chance to heal.

The large area on my thumb doesn't ache constantly and actually looks pretty good. :)
The large area on my palm is still sore, but it's in a area where it feels every twinge of movement, it's healing more slowly but I'm okay with that, since it makes sense to me.

I'm not falling asleep for no apparent reason during the day anymore. and yesterday I had so much energy in me I could almost burst. I used that energy to do up the church newsletter and to start a webpage for my small critter business.

I see the Practical Nurse today at the Doctor's office. I'm imagining she'll give re-wrap it all up and then give me some more bandages for wrapping (or I'll have to buy something which is fine). I'm hoping to find a new pair of dress pants today to replace the ones damaged in the fire. Oh, and I'll need some pants for work as well....those I'm hoping to find at value village or a thrift store somewhere.

On a practical note - If I'm careful I can catch a jumping boy child (using my wrist instead of my hand). :) If I wrap my hand in plastic I can have a shower! :) I can't manage dishes yet. If I wrap my hand in a bag I can pick up baby bunnies to check on them :)

My parents were great with taking Justin for four days. He did really well with them. Was a happy boy and listened and slept when he aught to and so forth. Showed Oma his strong sense of determination at times, Her comment "he certainly knows his own mind doesn't he?" :) Oma learned that when he's a hungry boy child that he is definitely a hungry boy child. :) And that yes...he likes being tickled (as long as one doesn't overdo it). He plays really nicely by himself said Mom and Dad to me, more than once. So it was good to hear a good report back. It's like I know my boy is a good boy with strong determination....but it's good to hear the same from others. :)

Driving Instructors

FIRE!!!

Well, we had a little excitement this morning. I had just woken, and was still in that half asleep state that is common upon waking up. I heard the smoke detector go off downstairs, but I knew Annette was up, and figured she was cooking bacon or something else that commonly triggers the detector. Well, it kept going and going. Then I heard a yell from downstairs, "JIM HELP!" I got up and went down and upon looking into the basement saw a lot of smoke. Ran the rest of the way down to see Annette dumping water from the tap on a small fire among our laundry. Apparently a pile of laundry fell over against the furnace and go set on fire. Thankfully, Annette came in from caring for the rabbits, heard the alarm and went to see what was up. All that was damaged was various items of clothing, towels, sheets and the like.

Annette burned her hand when she grabbed what she thought was a towel, but which turned out to be a melted plastic laundry basket. So after we got the fire out, we called a member of our congregation who could take care of Justin (Thank-you Margaret M.), and after dropping off Justin headed to the ER.

Even though there really were no other people there, they took their time treating Annette. Partly I think to see how bad the burn was. But after some Toradol, Tylenol 3 and some liquid from the Novacain family that numbed the worst injured parts of her hand, they tried to clean the plastic residue off, with no success. The doctor said it shouldn't cause an infection problems and should come off as the skin sloughs off in the next while. The put an antibiotic cream over the hand and wrapped it in gauze, and we headed home.

Due to Annette only having one hand to work with we asked if her parents could take care of Justin for a couple of days, and my mom can to help with the clean up. Hopefully tomorrow when she goes in to the ER again to have her dressings changed and see how things are healing, we will find that all is healing well.

That about updates our fire adventure. I'm sure Annette will add to it when she can type again.

Busy Weekend

So wow...was this weekend ever busy!

Friday...Good Friday. Had a service in the morning, then Jim had a funeral home visitation. I had work. Thank goodness for Eva being around...she was able to watch Justin while I was at work and while Jim was at the visitation. The Good Friday service was apparently really good....I had no chance to listen to it as Justin did not want to go to the nursery and there was no way he wanted to go into church. He was quite adamant that Grammer get out of Sunday clothes and play with him and Mommy was to go to work! He was 32 months of profound determination. :)

Saturday we had the funeral service. Really good service. Justin sat in service until the sermon started and then we took Marcus' boy with us down to the nursery. It was rather funny at one point....Christopher started to cry and Justin's response to that was "throw him out!" (in reference to my oft repeated threat of "I'll throw you out the window") Made me laugh, which made Justin laugh and become the helpful little boy I know him to be. :) He made Christopher stop crying by his playing antics. :)

Sunday, sonrise service, breakfast and morning service. Then off to see my Sister. We had a family gathering there to celebrate birthdays and Easter. We had a lovely time. Justin hunted for Easter eggs, and had a lot of fun playing with his cousins. Tired boy fell asleep on the way home and went straight into bed.

A good weekend, but rather exhausting. :)

Building with a boy child

My boy and I worked hard today.

He hammered,

I hammered.

Together we got those nails into the wood.
I thought I was making a new rabbit cage.
He said, "we making crib for kitties!"I could not change his mind. :)
(can you see his Sparks and then Tagu in the train?
Giant Cosmos and baby Cosmos and little cat are there too really!)

Did we get finished?
Not today, 7 p.m. came much too fast.

He even learned today that thirsty, hard-working people
can drink juice right out the jug!

And one tired boy had a nice fun bath and crawled into bed.
Ah...but did we have fun. :)

For the Video of this, go here.

Justin's Current Favorite

Today Justin kept asking me for Diesel 10 on 'puter. I kept searching youtube, but had to google Diesel Ten to find out what episodes he was in. I found he was in the movie "Calling All Engines." This is now Justin's favorite.

Travis on my bum?

see these? Justin's are somewhat different, but you understand the concept. :)

Justin LOVES THEM!!! I have underwear I don't have a struggle putting or keeping on him! (so I guess I love 'em too!)

He made me laugh today.
I put on the Travis undies him. Justin was fascinated. "travis on my bum?"
"wanna see him, travis on my bum, mirror mom mirror? travis on my bum see him?".

here I had to lift him up so that he could see travis on his bum in the mirror. :)
I laughed.
I told him, yes, see, there is travis on your bum.
his response "wanna see travis gain!"

But by then my back was saying "Stupid woman, put that boy child down!" so I did. :)

My Back

If anyone reads this blog and feels inclined to pray.

I shoveled snow on Saturday...heavy stuff at the end of the driveway. I must have done something wrong since my back did not appreciate my effort. By the end of the day I was not in good shape. Not good, but I will survive. makes me thankful for days when my back isn't spasming as much. :)

and to think ...I've shovelled oodles of snow this winter without a problem....

Ah well...God plans things out differently than I would, but grants also the grace to deal with it.

March 4, Ear Check-up

Today Justin had his 6 month check up at Dr. Raymond's office in Strathroy.

His ears are good.
His tubes are still intact.

His tonsils are big but not infected. If they get too big they will be removed or if get white spots on them he'll be put on an antibiotic. They will need to be monitored. I can see his tonsils very clearly if he sticks out his tongue at me. To me they look HUGE! :)

He doesn't have a lot of wax in his ears which is a good thing.

From an ENT perspective he's in good shape.

Yesterday Visit

So yesterday Justin and I headed up to Mom and Dad's for a visit.

The whole way down Justin kept up this litany.
Where we going mom?
To Oma and Papa's house?
What do there mom?
I don't know Justin, visit I think, what do you want to do there?
Play with TOYS! was the delighted response.

Granted, after 10 minutes of this the conversation was getting rather old for me...but hey...what do you do when it's just the two of you in a car? You point out trucks and silos and farms and tractors. And manage to intersperse those into the conversation, and when all else fails... get "tagu" to help you drive the car (and be scared off all the transports on the road). That's what you do! :)

Anyways, had a lovely visit with my parents.
Helped mom with a computer problem.
Justin played and played and played some more.

We left a bit later than expected because the first attempt at downloading a thing that mom needed failed, and I wanted to get it all installed for her as well.

Justin fell asleep soon after we left.
Slept when I brought him into the house.
Slept even after Jim tried to wake him up.
Slept after I got him up.
Finally I held him in my lap so he could watch Thomas on my computer. That helped him get going again. If he'd gone to bed for good at 430 he would have been up WAY to early for me.
We had a BAD supper...pizza, but it fit for a end to a tiring day.

To read up on how I got him into bed at the close of the day, go here.

It's been a Spell

So it's been a spell since I've updated everyone. Not a whole lot to say either!

Okay...let's think here.....
This past weekend Jim and I headed out of town so that we could go to a teaching conference. We stayed at another Pastor's house as they were very close by. it was nice to stay with them and get to know them a bit more. Jim knows Doug better than I do, but the family seems quite nice and Doug is just this sweetie of a man. :)

This teaching conference was hosted by the Discipleship Committee of the RCA, Ontario Classis. The conference was put together to explain Vantage Point 3 and LOH (which official name escapes me at the moment). Anyways, LOH is based on Vantage Point 3 which is an adult discipleship/leadership training course. It lasts for three years, costs mega-bucks to be part of, but the classis is willing to reimburse some of that cost. LOH is directed toward youth, cost is more reasonable and includes a yearly retreat. Both sound good, but I have to admit I have some hesitancy toward it.

My hesitancy toward Vantage point 3 stems a lot from my irritation in the morning session where the Speaker used a lot of pop-psychology language where I ended up thinking...so what exactly is he trying to say here? Can't you just find a normal way of talking rather than using all these stupid catch phrases that don't mean anything.

My hesitancy toward LOH comes from
1. why should we pay for a conference that we might not be able to attend? Why should that cost be built in? Does it (and I never got this answered) include the price of accommodations (the standard answer to such like questions was "depends a lot on the churches and the region involved). Tells me nothing, even if it is true.
2. Most churches, if they put a bit of work into it, could develop a similar program for a lot less financial outlay on the whole. $100 per student per year (for 2-3 years)translates into a lot of cash. Cobbling something else together could quite effectively do just as good a job. Granted, means a bit of work on the part of the church, but that's what we're in ministry for...to do the best job we can with the resources God has granted us, to further the kingdom of God.

Enough of that. :)

Justin, while we were gone, had LOTS of fun with his grammer (Jim's mom). Tunnels, trains, tents, snow, popcorn and laughter all round. :)

I've posted my bunnies for sale. Have 12 to sell. I'll give kijiji a couple of weeks to do it's thing and then I'll just bring those I don't want to the market in London and sell them there. I potentially have two of them sold already. YEAH!!! :)

This coming weekend Jim is off to the Classis meeting in Welland, Justin and I might go to the Market in London and we're visiting my folks on Thursday (Justin and I, Jim has to work).

What else? Can't think of anything off the top of my head so I'll just close off then.

Update on my bunnies

So, all my young bunnies are sold! YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Most I sold for $10 a piece, two for $8 each, most went to decent homes as far as I know, and three I sold at market for not as much as I wanted, but ah well... at least I didn't have to feed them and I didn't want to risk being stuck with them either. :)

One lady came out at 11 p.m. to get her bunny she was so eager. Dragged her boyfriend along for the ride. Came out from London.

Sent one off yesterday to a lady who is hoping to start breeding her own bunnies. Had a lovely chat with her and her two little ones.

We're left with the two that I really wanted to keep as replacement girls so life is good. :) Oh...and the one non-grower that I still have no clue what I want to do with. Not sure that I can leave her with the piggies indefinitely.....

Some of Justin's favourite on-line places

As an aid to my hubby

some favourite pages of Justin's

colouring pages

• Disney CARS colouring pages.
• bob the builder colouring pages ... same company with CARS
• blue clues :)
  

Activity Sites

• thomas the train
• bob the builder
• pbskids for caillou, berenstain bears, and clifford.

And then of course there's the ever popular YouTube with it's various thomas the tank engine clips. :)

Challie's Contest

You'll notice in the sidebar a link to Challies new Contest.
He is giving away this month the following:

Three prizes will be awarded as follows:

• First prize: Five Films Gift Pack: Still Standing: The Stonewall Jackson Story, Inherit the Land: Adventures on the Agrarian Journey, The Eden String Quartet: A Bountiful Blessing, A Journey Home, The Peasall Sisters: Family Harmony.
• Second prize: New Films Pack: Still Standing: The Stonewall Jackson Story, Inherit the Land: Adventures on the Agrarian Journey.
• Third Prize: Still Standing: The Stonewall Jackson Story.

Yesterday Out of Town

Yesterday the whole family took our normal Monday let's get out of town day.

We went to London where we stopped to pick up mom because of a little boy's persistent request that we take gramma to the Train store.

Once there he gleefully showed gramma the trains that he didn't have. He then winnowed it down the two that he just had to have. Hard choice for a wee lad.

Gramma chose to spoil him.

He chose an Emily (with her two green coaches)






And a Sir Handel with his two red coaches.








So we have one very happy little boy who refused to nap for gramma. he had new trains! gramma was too much fun!

he apparently ate like a horse for gramma.

Jim and I had a nice day out. We just hung out together. didn't have a lot of shopping to do so we just went willy-nilly here and there. Fun to do that once in a while.

I should add this since Jim found the answer to a query.... we passed a protest of some sort or other and wondered what FARC was all about. Jim found the answer here.

They were among hundreds of thousands estimated to have marched at the same time in 185 cities around the world to protest the actions of FARC (the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia).

Sold Bunnies

So today we went to London, went for a couple of reasons.

1. sell bunnies
2. get some bouillon from Watkins at london market - used rabbit money to buy this! :)
3. pick up duckweed from mom's (that she picked up for us from a freecycle person) - made the fish happy when I stuck it in aquariums.

Sold Bunnies
3 mini rex to a pet store for $36
4 other bunnies at the Trail's End Market for less money than I wanted but it worked out over all.

For a grand total of about what I expected and less than what I hoped for. :)
In retrospect from a cost effective perspective would have been better to kill the older bunny that I brought in. Only got a bit for him, he probably weighed in at 6-7 lbs. So he would have given me more dog meat than what I got for him monetarily. BUT seeing as I liked this little boy, at least this way I can think that just maybe he's got a bit of life left in him, instead of thinking of him as dog food, a life I hope as a breeding buck in someone's rabbit program. :)

But of the three littles ... one had a bad eye so I consider anything I got would be a give-me. especially since originally I thought I had no choice but to keep her, but her eye was looking pretty good this morning, just a touch of cloudiness so I thought...she can leave! The others I just didn't want to feed up to a decent weight for butchering, so I got more than what they were worth weight wise. So that's good.

And the mini-rexes selling for $12 each...well..that's just way cool! :) As that's more than I think they were worth meat wise. So...Life is good. Was even able to pay Jim back for buying rabbit food. Good to surprise one's hubby once in a while. :)

I have left three bunnies that I want to sell. And if I don't sell them privately for $10 each then I will bring them to the market in 2-3 weeks. Bring them in early, hopefully have them at a better spot for selling (early sale better price from what I could observe).

One very curious mini rex. He weighs 1.25 lbs. Love this bunny, very tempted to keep him. He is such a curious soul. Always ready for the next adventure. He has pretty good form, not perfect, but he's young yet. I expect he'll mature into a solid buck. Part of me would like to keep him for my breeding program, and yet I wonder if I should or not. Have time to decide. Of course, if I get a solid cash offer for him he's gone. :)



Two mixed breeds.

• A tan and white female weighing at about 2 lbs. She's a nice young doe. Would keep her but she has a sister who looks almost the same with a slightly better temperament and is bigger than her by 2 oz. Doesn't seem like much, but when I want a larger meat rabbit, size matters.
  
• A tan male coming in at 1.5 lbs. --- this one Justin just really enjoys him. He is very placid and tolerates a little boy picking him up. Quiet and somewhat shy. Nice rabbit, if he'd been a female I'd want to keep him for his body build.
  

So...if my readers live close by and want a bunny...well... let me know, I'd be happy to help you out. :)

My Dog and My Boy

It was fun yesterday....After a day doing onions (I had gotten 20 pounds of onions cheap three weeks ago and finally had time to do them up - dehydrated some and chopped others up for the freezer) and taking breaks to play with the boy. Justin had slept in late so didn't have a nap, at 4ish he was starting to get pretty tired, so I thought to myself... I need to get out and do something with him. We don't need each other getting frustrated and mad so.....off we went to the park with Sassy.

Sassy LOVES the park. :) So does the boy child. :)
I had neglected to bring gloves for myself so we didn't go for a walk. That idea just seemed perfect to freeze my hands off! Instead we went to the snow-covered playground equipment and had fun on it. There I could keep my hands in my pockets or tucked up into my sleeves and stay warm for the most part. Justin wasn't allowed on the big children's section since it looked too slippery for my taste with a little lad. Proved to be a good choice as the wee children's section had plenty of zip for him.

Justin and Sassy had races down the slides. :) Who was first? Who was second? (they have two slides side by side...first was one side, second was the other). Who could do ready set go first? Could Sassy wait for Justin? Could Justin wait for Sassy? Who could get to the bottom, get themselves upright and get to the stairs for another go round? We had a blast for 20 minutes. Then with wet bottoms and cold hands we went home again.

I also thought it fun hearing comments from passers by. "Look! that doggie is sliding mommy?" "Yes, she is being a silly dog isn't she." "Look mommy boy playing with doggie!" :) Made me grin watching those smiles and hearing those comments. :)

We got there just in time for Daddy to take the car and head off for his meeting. He would normally have taken the van but flat tire and broken bolt nixed that plan!

Things I like Doing with My boy

I love listening to my boy child play. Hearing his conversations with his Tagu, watching him play out the scenes from his Thomas videos (particularly all the crashes), seeing him get creative with the toys that he has - sometimes using them in ways I hadn't thought of before.

He sometimes will draw me into his play time. "mommy, come sit on floor" and then I'm given a toy and we play. :) But I have to mind that I don't have the wrong toy. :)

But what I love most right now is when he comes and helps me with stuff. From cooking supper last night when he helped me put the sour cream into the stroganoff. One ever so small (to me) scoop at a time and I mix it in. When he tries ever so hard to help and he spilled the hamburger on the counter and I hear an "oh oh...mommy clean it?"

When I was organizing/tidying my rooms upstairs on Tuesday, he totally refused to go to bed, Mommy was doing stuff and he could help! (at least I think that was part of his refusal). All the things he could help me move and discoveries that could be made. fun fun for a little boy.

When he's helping me with stuff he is ever such a helpful, obedient little lad. Not like when he is seriously playing and then I need him (or rather would like him) to do something....oh my....that's just asking for trouble. But we're learning and growing together in that.

He's a good boy. :)

"throw you out the window"

When I first had Justin I had some significant postpartum stuff that I needed to deal with. I survived and so did Justin, though I have to admit there were some pretty scary times between the two of us. One of the things I said at the time and occasionally meant was "I'll throw you out the window". I learned to turn that into a fun thing. (YEAH!)

Anyways, it became one the things I say to Justin on a regular basis "I can throw you out the window" or more recently "I can throw you into the snow bank!". :) Justin says no and giggles. :)

As far as I remember this is how the latest episode went: The other night I was doing something, heard Jim laugh and then came when he called me. He said "listen to Justin". Here's my boy playing with his beloved Tagu saying "Justin mad at you" "Justin throw you out the window" (as he tosses Tagu over the back of the big lazy boy) and then go rescue him. he did this over and over. I laughed. :)

Did make me very much aware of how much this little boy sees AND hears what I am saying.
Oh...that I end up being a good example of Christ to him (despite my threats to throw him out the window)....which I would never do. :)

Radical Alteration

My plans for the day: have my devotions, walk Sassy, care for bunnies, get the boy up, make breakfast, go to Toddler Time, come back for lunch, Justin to bed, work on more organizing.

My actual day thus far: had my devotions, walked the dog, get home to ..... water on the floor. Oh...what's this? Discover the guppy fish tank has sprung a leak and had done so when I took Sassy for a walk...how do I know this? The floor was dry when I crossed the same spot earlier. Just a mere 45 minutes earlier! Good thing I came in the house first instead of going right to bunny care. :) Wasn't God good?

Quickly I rescued what fish I could find. We had...four males, four females, two middling youngsters, and about 8 babies. We now have four females, two males, two middling youngsters and I was able to find at least 5 babies, two of which I know are still living. :)

I heard "I need milk" call from Justin so he got that. Then I finished setting up the new aquarium. They are now housed in a 5 gallon aquarium. Quite the difference for them from a 35 gallon. But they are swimming.

Then I emptied the gravel out of old aquarium...boy...quite the significant hole in the seal!
Justin made the job a bit harder as he "helped", but hey...at least he wanted to help!

We'll set that somewhere to dry. Jim plans to do some research to see if it is fixable, and then we'll try again. :)

Got some food out for Justin to eat, and put a movie on for him. Then I cared for the bunnies, ate a small bowl of cereal to hold me over and will see what I can figure for the rest of the day.

There won't be any toddler time this morning. I am disappointed about that, but God decided that I needed to do something else this morning. :)

NOT what I had in mind for the day.

A Good Couple of Days

There I was Tuesday, reflecting over the day and realized that even though I didn't feel very productive over the course of the day I actually was. I managed to, despite having a dentist appointment in the morning, managed to complete all the laundry, make a supper, and do some work in the upstairs rec. room. Didn't get as much done as I wanted to, but I didn't expect the freezing to hurt like a son of gun when it came out either (so I read until it was finished coming out). Jim had an executive meeting that took most of the afternoon/evening to handle.

Then Wednesday came around...I managed to have a great sleep on Tuesday night! YEAH!!!!! I don't get many of those. Anyways, got all the paperwork sorted out from the masses of piles upstairs, got that done in the morning. Got tons of dog food made (Sassy is set probably for the next three months), the dishes done, a nice supper made, played with the boy child and even had time to relax with my sweetie. I even ate healthy almost all day long! What can I say...the boy child's goldfish crackers were a bit too much of a temptation. :) Jim got some visiting done and some work on his sermons...not as much as planned because he unfortunately didn't sleep so well on Tuesday night.

Today I plan (I hope) to finish the rest of the upstairs rec room. Clean out the piggies for sure and the rabbits if the weather cooperates (needs to be mild enough mid-morning). Play outside with Justin for a bit. What else....Make supper of some sort...oh...bacon cheeseburger pasta. :) And just generally keep myself busy...I'm pretty good at that. :) I assume Jim plans to work on sermons today...probably won't see him too much here at home.

Justin & Annette Celebrate the Birth of Our Lord

One of the things that Annette has done from before we got married, was through the season of Advent up into Christmas, she would do daily Advent meditations and light Advent Candles. This year she used a book that has various pull out pieces that will form a Christmas scene, one per day of Advent. Justin enjoyed this a great deal, and so we thought we would capture it on video. This was done a little different than they would usually do it because all the characters had fallen over.



This second video is the same thing, but more in keeping with how they would do it each day through Advent. It also shows the thing the Justin enjoyed above everything else, blowing out the candles.

Snowblower AAARRG!

I finally got the snowblower back together today. The problems started back on the 17th of December. I had to shovel some snow out at the end of my in-laws driveway so we could go home. In doing so I injured my back. When we got home there was about 18" of snow in the driveway, so I waded through it and started up the snowblower. All went well until the very end when the one handle mount snapped. That made it impossible to run or control the snowblower, so I dragged it back to the garage and figured I would fix it later.

First I got a welder, and once my back felt a little better welded on the mount again. After that my back hurt more, so I couldn't continue.

When my back felt better (several days later) I cleaned up where I welded and primed and painted it. Doing this caused my back to hurt more again, and I had to wait to continue.

When my back felt better (several days later [do you see a pattern developing]) I started to bolt things back together, got the handle on, and all the controls connected, only to realize I needed to flip the blower up on its front end to get at two of the mounting bolts for the handle which are inside the area occupied by the drive assembly. The bolting of what I could get to re-aggravated my back, so I couldn't continue.


When my back felt better . . . I put the blower up so I could remove the access panel, tighened up the other two bolts that hold the handle, and replaced the access panel. Amazingly enough, this didn't bother my back too much. With everything back together I started up the blower and at first everything seemed to work, until I realized the front augers and the blower were running even though the control handle was not depressed. Weirdly enough when I pressed down the control, the auger and blower stopped. Somehow things got reversed. I took it out and using the reverse controls blew some snow to make sure everything was working. Now to figure out what made the one control work in reverse.

Again I dragged it back to the garage, but by now the gas was low enough I could flip it up on the front end, and I opened the access panel. All looked well in there, so I flipped it back down and opened up the shroud that covers the belts. Sure enough, somewhere in my working on the snowblower I had put the belt that drives the auger and blower on incorrectly. A quick change and replace the shroud. Flip it up and replace the access panel (only to notice on of the mounting points had rusted off--Oh well something else to weld in the future) and it is back together and functioning properly. Now to blow out a path to the church so I can work in my office over there in peace and quiet.

Watch it 'Gain!

A Justin Moment

Sometimes I think I should not ask my boy child questions.

The other day we were in the basement and he was playing with this large toy train of his. It's one that loudly plays music. he'll often say it's singing when it's doing so.

Anyways, he was playing with it and calling it a Mommy train. It mommy train mommy. He kept telling me this.

So...I foolishly opened my mouth and said.... Why is it a mommy train Justin?

His response..... because it noisy!

I have to admit...I laughed.
I have to admit....so did Jim when I told him.
I have to admit.... so did the entire family when Jim rather graciously told them too!

What??????? I don't talk and sing that much!!!!!!!! Really!!!!!!!!!!!!

My Family Christmas Gathering

So yesterday, Jim's mom joined us as we went to my family Christmas gathering.

For the most part, we had a LOT of fun.
I was a bit of a forgetful person and didn't bring a change of clothing and diaper for the boy child, so after he had a rather long nap he had soaked through what he had brought so he ended up saying these wet clothes are uncomfortable and ran around pants-less. Ah well...he is just a wee lad. Led to a bit of a battle at the end of the day....Caroline had a forgotten GIRLS pull-up in her car, Justin did NOT want to wear it, he wanted his CARS (boys) pull-up and this minnie mouse was just not going to cut it. With some sweet talking and quiet time with mommy and then a good distraction from his oma we managed to get them on for the car ride home (I insisted because he hadn't pooped yet! and that was a mess I didn't want to deal with in the car) Turned out to be a wisely won battle. :)

For food we had lasagna, taco casserole, and egg/meat casserole that I brought. Jim also brought the leftovers of salad he made for our at home dinner. Mom provided desserts and buns. Jim's mom also brought a couple of desserts. The food was good. :) Conversation around the dinner table was good.

We read the Christmas story, mom read an interesting piece that she found in the paper, and Jim read a story with a Christmas theme he had found for the Church program.

We also had a gift exchange: mom gave us our amaryllis. this is a yearly tradition and one that I very much look forward too. :) This year she gave money to the Christian Blind Mission (I think I have the right mission) on our behalf as well. Thought that was rather cool. Justin gave out his jars of candy that he helped make. Most everyone thought that was rather cute. I think I had chosen well with the small gifts that I chose for everyone. They seemed happy none-the-less and all I aim for is a smile on people's faces.

Mine sister Judy gave me some new figures for my village. Justin got a Mighty Machines DVD and a whack of cars/trucks. Boy....did he have fun playing with those. took them all to bed with him too! :) Took him a while to wind down from a busy day having ALL his family together and new trucks and cars to play with.

Life was good.

Oh....can't forget the bunnies. Brother Fred and his family gave us their rabbits. These bunnies were purchased for the girls but weren't being appreciated (aka played with) anymore so Fred had asked back in November (I think) if we wanted them. He told me they were small bunnies so I expected bunnies the size of what we have here at home. WRONG! They might not be big meat rabbits....but they are definitely bigger than what we have here at home. :) They are currently housed in the garage until I can figure out where to put them next. I'm thinking I might put them outside in the bigger cage (it's well wind protected though not warm) and put the three smallest bunnies in the garage in my big cage...they'll have more room that way. I'd have to build them bigger nesting boxes though...... but no rush on that.

Must admit though, I am looking forward to having a nice quiet day at home today. :)

Merry Christmas to all

Yesterday Jim's mom came over.
We had a lovely dinner, followed by opening presents and just having a nice time together. Justin hadn't napped during the day so he went to bed at 730 p.m. We stayed up and watched a old movie with Cary Grant. Wasn't too bad. I kept waiting for something bad to happen and when it did I wasn't surprised. Wasn't thrilled with the ending, but over all not a bad movie.

Today we have a Christmas morning service at Church and then we're off to visit with my parents. I'm bringing along the salad Jim made yesterday...it's good! And also a casserole that I haven't made before. We'll have to see how that goes over. :)

Anyways, that's it. Talk more another day.

You all have a Merry Christmas now! :)

Justin wanted me to post this one!

and this one too!

This is YouTube Just for Justin

This Most Recent Weekend

So, This weekend was a busy one.... and yet a bit slower than expected.

Friday night...our open house. Boy was it ever fun! Lots of people showed up. Conversation, laughter, a couple of small presents for Justin, bundles of coats and lines of shoes on the floor. The fact that the cat was unimpressed being locked in the office, and the dog got cold locked in the garage were small prices to pay for such a nice evening. And next year I get to do it again! Oh what fun! :) People seemed to enjoy the baking that I had done, the house was nice and clean (thanks Jim's mom for helping!), and it was just very nice. :)

Saturday afternoon we headed up to visit Mom and Dad overnight because Jim had a classical appointment to preach in their church. The biggest snowstorm to hit Canada this December thought it would take the opportunity to hit us HARD! When I walked Sassy in town for her morning walk I thought hmm....the weather is drivable, but I wouldn't want to go too far. When I arrived home I learned that there were many road closures due to poor driving conditions. So we stayed put. We had hoped to go home later in the afternoon, but the roads didn't reopen until 630 pm. and having a boy that didn't nap, not having things packed to go, made returning home in the dark an undesired option. So we stayed over another night.

It was nice staying over. We played a couple of games. Ate some good food (my mom is great cook). Jim got mom's email straightened out a bit. Justin had fun playing trucks. It was odd not getting out to church, but safer to stay home. Most church services were canceled as well. Boy did we ever get a lot of snow!

Justin had a good nights sleep, we left around 930 Monday morning. got home 1114. Parked on the road because boy oh boy did we ever get a lot of snow. Justin and I waited until Daddy got a path blown out for us. I got the boy into the house, got some food out for him to nibble on while Jim got the driveway cleaned out, and blew out some paths in the backyard for Sassy dog and me to the composter and shed. Then I cared for the critters...boy where they hungry! But they all survived the storm and cold. My baby bunnies have grown and are getting hair. :) And the wee mice are old enough now to start exploring their surroundings. So they will be ready to ship out in another couple of weeks. :)

Once that was all cared for Jim wanted to head to London as per usual for Mondays. We surprised mom. She willingly cared for Justin though since he was all happy to see Grandma. Jim and I finished our Christmas shopping. :) We did make it an early return though. I was beat, Jim was sore from shoveling, and I thought it best not to overextend our welcome at gramma's. Justin fell asleep on the way home, so he went to bed right away. I walked Sassy, did my finances and then did my exercises while relaxing with Jim downstairs.

Overall a good weekend.

Open House Tomorrow Night

So our open house is on tomorrow night. Haven't gotten quite all the baking done that I intended, hopefully can rectify that today. Most of the house is cleaned and put together. Jim isn't happy with the tree yet. Some things we can't put up until the party because of a toddler lad. :)

Justin is feeling better. Jim was very achy starting Tuesday night and through yesterday. Hopefully he'll be feeling good today.

Yesterday Kathy called me up in the morning, wanted me to help her get a Turkey, so I told her to call Hayters and then we could run errands together. It was a fun time.

What else?

Oh yesterday afternoon we stopped into see Susan. She had surgery a while back and she's looking pretty good now. Her colour is good and she's able to do things more readily now. It was a nice visit. Justin had fun playing as well. It was fun watching him with the bird. they have a somewhat unfriendly cockatiel, Anyways,...this bird just LOVES children apparently. Justin had lots of fun talking with this bird, and having this bird sing back to him. Just fun. VERY loud, but fun. :)

That's it. Today I hope to get Justin to toddler time for an hour, then pick up some milk, sour cream and _____ Drawing a blank right now. And this afternoon I want to make some cookies, clean the book room a bit more and then say done with it! :) oh ...perhaps bring up some more tree decorations and tell my hubby to have at it. Perhaps the train too. :)

But right now, devotions sound good and then perhaps seeing if Justin wants to walk Sassy with me. So toodles for now! :)

He Made me Just hoot!

Okay, debated posting this, but I also don't want to forget it.

Yesterday, Justin feeling somewhat better, me feeling just whipped from whatever bug has been floating around our house.

Justin not really wanting to eat yet.
Me eating puffed rice because well...it's a comfort food, it's easy, and it keeps a tummy feeling happy.

Anyways, Justin sees me eating this.
He wants some because it's new and different.

The conversation went something like this:
"I eating head off" Justin showing me a puffed rice missing one pointy end.
me - "You are? Oh good boy, are you going to eat his tummy too?"
boy child carefully turning the puffed rice around and biting off other end "I eating penis!"

I cracked up. I just couldn't contain it. :)

Told Jim later.
his response.... I should have caught that on film...it would have be worth 10 grand through America's Funniest Videos. I cracked up again. :)

What can I say.....family humour. :)

December 5

Jim saw an Owl last night sitting on the window ledge outside the bathroom. Rather neat huh?

We have baby mice. I was shocked. Went out a bit more than a week ago, planning on killing the ladies as I was NOT going to bring them in the house for the winter. Anyways, they had babies! A whole whack of them. This morning I checked on them (as I do in the mornings to feed and water) and their eyes are opening. 10 days old they are now. :) Some very pretty ones in the mix too. not that is matters, ugly or pretty they bring in 75 cents each. But they are handling being outside just fine. So thinking I'll just keep the ladies and one male from the litter over the winter. In the spring I can get me a new male and keep babies from a litter or two and start all over again.

Bunnies are doing well over the winter too outside. They keep quite cozy. I'll breed them in February to hit the Easter crowd and that's good timing as they'll be able to go out on grass too in April so they won't get overcrowded.

What else...Sassy's old injury is bugging her again.

Jim had a couple of crazy busy week's but this week is a bit easier.
Justin got over one cold just to get another one. :( ah well..life of a toddler.
My foot is feeling a lot better, my back is stiff in the morning lately...not much I can do about that, just keep moving! :)

That's it!

Two Messes Cleaned

So Justin has been demonstrating interest in pouring 'water' out of my bleach containers and other such bottles so I thought I NEED to get them up and out of his reach. As in as soon as possible!

Therefore yesterday I undertook to clean out the walk in closet. Reorganized it a bit so that I could put the cleaners up high. Took a few things out, added a couple of things to help with storage. Then I put away the summer shoes, got out the winter boots and voila.. A safe area. :) Also a clean organized area. Won't drive me nuts anymore. :)

Then I thought...hmm...been wanting to tackle the linen closet, why don't I do that as well? Found the knee braces for my hubbie.....knew I had put them some place safe. :) Rearranged and fitted things around a bit better, today I'm hoping to get the rest of my table clothes in there as well.

So two big jobs done and in-between I played with the boy child, made supper, read for 1/2 hour, went to physio appointment, did up all the dishes, got 1/2 the table cleaned off and got all the laundry done. WooHoo! I had a productive day. :) Nice to have those days. :)

This Summer

Not sure if I ever posted these. Justin and I went to visit Teo and Sieka from church one day this summer. Jim was not with us, not sure anymore what he was doing. Anyways, Teo took these pictures of our boy child. Teo had sent these to me as a reminder of Justin on the lawn mower. :) Thanks again Teo! :)

His Sense of Humour is Developing

So last night I was doing dishes, Justin came in to "help". I asked him instead to let the dog in the house.

Off he toddled. I hear him at the back door (just like two steps away). Sassy coming? Sassy he yells. Then I hear the door open, then a giggle as the door shuts.
Sassy coming? He giggles. I hear the door open, I poke my head around the corner asking if he needs help only to see a boyo closing a door carefully just as Sassy tries to get in the house. He did this again. Sassy was being very patient.

I said "Justin are you teasing the dog?" He looked up at me and chortled.

I opened the door and let the dog in. :)

Told Jim about it. His response... He must have learned it from his mommy who likes teasing her animals too. :)

Our vacation - November 2007

Plain and simple.... we had fun.

We stayed with Jen and Mark. I got to know these people when I started to work with their son Matt. Matt is a great young man who has Cerebral Palsy and is confined to a wheelchair. Anyways, they moved off to the Greater Toronto Area, I got married and life somewhat changed. Anyways, Jen is one of my friends where it is easy to just pick up where we left off. Nice to have that.

Anyways, they were gracious enough to let us use their home as "home base". They have this HUGE dog named Bear (appropriately enough). Their daughter is off at University, and both boys are still at home. We arrived Monday night and just had a nice visit.

Tuesday and Wednesday we were off to the Royal Winter Fair. Justin slept in a bit late on the Tuesday so we got there a bit late. I had forgotten to pack his stroller so first off we picked up a cheapie one at Zellers. We made Tuesday Justin's day to just explore and play. We went through the various Children's exhibits -- the animals, the crafts, and the Hands on stuff. Justin had a blast. He saw pigs, chickens, lambs, cattle, goats, llamas and so forth. He tried very hard to climb into various exhibits.


I can climb up! Really I can!


Jim and I both thought it cute that Justin wanted to introduce his beloved Tagu to the various animals that he met.

The colouring was a huge hit as well. :) He had such fun organizing the crayons and markers and then choosing just the right picture to colour. The area that they did this in had all sorts of really nice posters that we could bring home as well. We spent a fair bit of time here. In the back part of this exhibit they had children painting horses. Justin wasn't quite old enough to do this and he probably would have wanted to just take everyone else's horses anyways. So we kept him away from that. :)

And then it was off to see some exhibits. Booths with food, free samples, interesting items and people. Just stuff to look at and sample, or in Justin's case...to play in. :) Here he's playing with farm equipment in a sandbox of canola seeds. While he played, Jim wandered booths and I chatted with the sales rep. Nice man, farms canola out in Alberta and is an elder in a Baptist church out there. He started to get tired 530 ish so we headed off 'home' again. It was a nice family day.

Day two. We got there fairly early in the day. Spent the morning walking through booths since we didn't see most of them the day before. Justin started off his day convincing his mommy that he really, really needed her to buy "Bertie". it was a bus at a british display....looked much like Bertie the bus from the Thomas the train show. A good day long amusement for a little boy.

I started getting a bit tired so we went over to the horse arena hoping to catch a show. We did! Justin enjoyed the horses...watched carefully until being a toddler caught up to him. He got away from me at one point -- crawled an entire row of seats and out the other end. I made people smile when I walked around the seats saying "looking for a toddler" and here he was little head grinning at me from under a seat. :) I took him up around the top so he had a good chance to run around like a crazy boy. Fun fun! we made four big loops until he started to walk a bit drunk like. So back down to our seats where I cuddled him in my lap and he promptly fell asleep. He had a good 2 hour nap.
And I got to watch a horse show in relative peace and quiet. :) We saw jumping, big horses pulling carriages, and carriage derby practice and much much more. Lots of fun.

Overall a very good day.

Home again, we all crashed after a visit with Jen and Mark.

Thursday we went to IKEA in the morning. had lunch there as well. Justin ate well, I was quite pleased. Home to our home to just relax a spell.

Friday off to London so Justin could visit gramma. We first stopped at the doctor because Justin's been saying owiee and crying and I wanted to know what was up with that. Plugged ears (too much ear wax) was the diagnosis. Not fun. So oil drops and see if it comes out. He missed our weekly gramma time so this was important to him. He had fun. Jim and I went out for a really nice dinner. Gramma brought Justin home for us so we could just take our time.

Saturday we had a nice supper at Judy and Henry's. Judy, my sister, is a good cook. Meatloaf with boiled egg in the middle, potatoes and various veggies. Becky was there but soon headed off with a friend to go shopping, and Shane had a friend over. Justin played with trucks and various small animals. A nice visit for all.

Sunday morning Justin was TIRED. He had a cold, and there was no way I was getting him out of the house. No, stay home day, stay home day? Was his plaintive request. So Daddy went to church. Mommy and Justin stayed home.

As An Aid to my Hubby

Jim told me that if he doesn't read and write it down he won't remember what Justin's chores are around the house.

1. Helps feed the fish ... does this twice a week or sometimes more often
2. Helps feed the baby bunnies
3. Helps to wash the cups (especially HIS sippy cups) while Mommy washes the dishes (or while he's playing in the sink)

So now my sweetheart has a ready and able list to go by. :)

Challies Contest

Jim, Camping with the Men

So Jim is an active part of the Pop Up Explorer group. Each year a bunch of men go camping up at Algonquin park the first weekend in November. A bunch of Canadians and Americans. They drink beer, burn Tiki huts, have conversations, and I'm assuming perhaps do some walking about.

Jim calls at least once a day to just say how things are going.
He's been rather disappointed by the "vileness" of some of the campers this year. Finds it discouraging. He's still having fun talking with some of the more "grown-up" of the men, and some of those men he is really enjoying getting to know better, but some of the rest overrides a bit. He is looking forward to coming home. :)

Our days are mostly outlined here and here and here. Go check them out if you desire.

What else did we do this week that I failed to mention?

1. Dug up my "not hardy for winter" bulbs. Planted daffodil bulbs leftover from Jim's mom.
2. Got the composter all dug out and our new garden all filled in.
3. Brought the baby bunnies inside to get tamed up a bit.
4. Cleaned the house, seemed like umpteen times, especially with a boy child following after..... I would like this house clean before we leave next week.
5. called Jen (a friend in Ontario), we can stay with her and the family next week. They are in Oakville which will make a daily drive into T.O. a bit shorter.

Basically managed to keep fairly busy. Good thing that.

Today I'm not sure where I"m going to church. Mom and Dad's anniversary as well. Have to pick up Justin. Part of me just wants to go to London now, find a church, then wait for Justin and Mom to come back from Woodstock and then come home, let Justin nap and wait for Jim to come home. But that doesn't seem efficient to me somehow ...and tempts me too much to do stuff on Sunday that I don't need to be doing. Anyways, first I have a dog to walk.

Boy.... is this house ever quiet...........