Garden Ornaments

pig

cow

chicken

More Backyard Fun

these were a fascination for a while

buried by mom!

He likes his fort. it's a good place for 'bob' to hide from 'spud'

Rolling down a hill

Justin is a good helper

we have a stool that well...is rather tippy for Justin.

So yesterday when Jim and I were out bipping around we found a different stool for Justin. One that we needed to put together ourselves, but it looked less tippy than the one he has currently.

While Jim was reading, Justin and I got busy putting it together.

Justin was a good helper putting on the thingey's that hide the screws. :)

Crafts with a boy Child

We were out at the Dollarama a bit back, I discovered they have wooden crafts that one can make. Costs a dollar. Gives a lad and his mom something to make together. They are very simple, just glue and let dry. Justin likes putting the wheels together, I like having him figure out which piece goes where based on the picture in the front of the box. Makes him think.


Yesterday afternoon we added a train and a plane to that line up.

the rabbit that you see out front? that's another craft we did...it's from Jan Brett's website, the author of one of Justin's favourite books "the Mitten"

and the truck....well...it is stuffed to the gills with 'tiles' or 'mail'....depends entirely on the day. Sometimes those tiles make huge accidents on rail lines, other times the mail trucks are kept busy all day long, and sometimes they just make fine cargo for train trucks to carry around.

Lots of fun little squares of construction can be.

Who would a thunk it? I like doing crafts with my boy child! :)

Mommy I.....

There are several things Mommy like to hear...

Mommy I can help!
Mommy Look what I did.
Mommy, help me with?
Mommy I learneded this......

Mommy's often don't like to hear....

Mommy I helpeded you wash the floor! Muck helpeded too! He's a big helper!

this after one has put away mop and pail....
then comes into kitchen to see sponges littering the kitchen floor with cold water well....EVERYWHERE!

yes, he helped.
yes, I didn't get angry.... I suppressed that with oh Justin, what a big help you were! Let's go find some towels now eh? let's dry up the floor! wow...isn't it all clean!

NO! We're not washing the floor again. It has to dry now.

I'm tired of this....

I have a cold.

This household for the past two months has been struck with one illness of the other.

I'm getting rather tired of it.

can we please be healthy again?

on a more positive note: Mom and Dad came up Tuesday? I think it was.
we had a lovely visit. :)

Mom was gracious and pointed out a lovely cobweb I had that I promptly destroyed with glee! :)

Beginning of February

So it's the second day of February...ground hog day I think. (do I really care???) :)

Spent most of the night sleeping last night, interspersed with the noise of Justin coughing (to me is seemed like coughing his lungs out). Don't like the cough, but overall he doesn't seem rattlely in his breathing so I'm not too concerned yet...but if he's still coughing really hard by mid-week I'll probably take him to the doctor just for a once over.

Jim is getting a sore throat...here's praying that it doesn't become a full-blown cold. he's been running a bit short on sleep lately so we're letting him sleep in a bit this morning.

Justin's been enjoying watching LOTS of movies lately. Mostly on Thomas the train. :) he likes Thomas that boy does. :)

we watched ratatouille the other night...that was fun. Nice movie. We'll need to watch Wall-E this morning because it has to go back to the video store this afternoon and there's no point in renting a movie without watching it!

Lots of fun yesterday afternoon playing out in the snow. we even dug out the sand-box since Justin needed a truck to carry snow with. it was SO nice out. :)

Jesse came over with his doe Bailey to get her bred to Baskin. That was an experience in itself! He was willing..she was a bit more....reticient shall we say. BUT he got the job done. I had a disappointment this week with losing a litter of baby rabbits. Hopefully won't have that happen again.

Anyways, I think that's about it. Talk more another time.

This weekend Past

This past weekend Justin went to visit his gramma.
She offered to have him as she didn't have to work on Monday this week so could have him for an extended period of time.

He's apparently had a very good time. Playing out in the snow, going to her church (lots of children), playing with Thomas, watching TV, helping gramma work on her things and so forth. They've had a great deal of fun.

Jim and I went to a movie on Saturday afternoon...Inkheart. It was a good show. Have to admit, some things seemed silly to me...like what was the point of dressing the girl up in some old greyish dress? That just seemed odd. But overall, not a bad show. Good triumphs over evil.

Yesterday I found it very relaxing to just be able to go to church and LISTEN to a sermon. To not have to mind a toddler who either wiggles and makes noise (which gets people tsking) or that I need to take out to the quiet room (so we can have sunday school). Both make it difficult to heed the sermon. So that was rather nice.

Toilet training basically complete

So I had promised Justin if he went three nights without wetting his diaper/pull up, that he could try going to bed without one.

Last night he did so! YEAH!! No accidents.

He did get me up at 4 00 a.m. though, crawled into bed with me and kept me up until I threatened him..GO TO SLEEP or we won't go to Missy's today (playgroup). He really wanted to go to playground so he settled right down again. Slept until 8 a.m.

He had fun at Missy's, didn't play with trains at all, played with cupcakes and the play kitchen. T'was all good. :)

Shopping, then home for lunch...which he took upstairs because he was going to play (I think he missed his trains). Silly lad...and today I'm too tired to make a point of where he eats.

Cheers!

January Updates

January has been A COLD month!

I am slowly getting better from the bug that inflicted me in one way or the other throughout December. Doctor tests revealed nothing. I find I still need to focus on blander foods lest my digestive system react negatively.

Jim is doing well.

Justin is starting to figure out the whole toileting thing at night. Sometimes he gets up and goes back to sleep, other times he's up at 230 and raring to go. Jim and I tend to disagree with him at those times and then it's just a matter of trying to keep him quiet enough that SOMEONE can get some sleep. :)

I've managed to sell most of our baby guinea pigs. Justin has requested that we keep one of the Rainbow ones, so we've done so. Just three left to sell, two are spoken for.

One of Jim's cichlids has a mouthful of babies. He caught her today and put her in a net holder for live bearers. She's unimpressed, but hopefully those babies will survive. :)

My guppies are starting to multiply well. My hope is to sell them, but if for some reason I cannot, they will make good supplemental food for the cichlids.

Hmm...now what else?
Not a whole lot. We're having snow tonight. Kinda pretty, but rather miserable to work in. :)

I'm Blogging Through Calvin's Institutes

I decided to read through Calvin's Institutes this year. As I started to do so using the Reformation 21 schedule, I found that I desired to blog this as well, so I have started to blog my way though it.

First Post
Second Post
Third Post

Kerussomen Christon Estauromenon: Calvin's Institutes 1.4.1 - 1.5.1

Scrapbooking with a toddler helping

Jim was tired today, so I thunk to myself...how do I feel like I'm relaxing today WHILE keeping the boy child quiet and out of his father's hair?

Scrapbooking!

yes...I actually dared to try to scrapbook with a toddler.

it was actually fairly fun.

We looked through albums, laughing and talking about how much he has changed.
We looked through pictures and figured out which ones we wanted to scrap with, and which were "HIS!" (those we put in a small album of his own), and which ones would wait for another day.

Then we actually worked at it.
It takes MUCH longer to actually do it when a toddler helps. :)
It means you add things you didn't intend to .... like train and car pictures. It means usually toddler words to explain things. it means using markers that he chooses.

It was a good time together and I think worked to meet the ends of all concerned.

Annual Tinholt Potluck

Today our annual Tinholt Potluck was held at the Drayton Reformed church.
Jim stayed home and mostly slept. He's still not feeling the best.

We all had a good time.
I had a chance to connect with aunts and uncles and cousins.

Justin had fun following "the big girl" around (his cousin Marisa).

Good food.
Fun with card games.
Conversation.
Singing.
Prayer.

Can a person ask for anything more?

Prayer request though: my Aunt Hen's brother has passed away.

Our buggy visiting his grandparents

Sierra and Marisa (my second oldest brothers' children) are visiting my parents Thursday - Saturday. Mom mentioned that if I wanted, Justin could come as well. This way Justin can visit Oma and Papa and get to know them better while the work load of caring for a toddler is not too much for Oma.

Justin likes playing with Sierra though he says..."she's bossy", but then in his next breathe tells me "but she plays Thomas with me". So it all kind of evens out for him I think. :) Sierra for the most part plays well with him too...mostly remembering that he is three and not eight so patience is sometimes called for. :)

I like my boy getting to know his extended family. I do hope to instill in him the importance of family in him. Not just caring for immediate family but seeing that family has a broader picture to it. This will help I think in him seeing that the family of God is bigger than just our immediate circle but includes people beyond as well.

We'll be picking Justin up again on Saturday when we have a big family get together in Drayton. Should be fun.

Having Justin away allows Jim and I a bit of breather room too...after a month of various illnesses striking our household...it's good to just relax and not have to be too concerned about much beyond each other. :) We even had a chance to sit for a while. Was good that. :)

Something I want to remember Justin saying

Yesterday Justin and I were up in his room chatting.

In the course of the conversation he was mentioning things that he liked. So I asked him.... what do you like most Justin? what are your most favourite things?

"I like my trains, and I like you guys".
"Mommy and Dad are my favourite, and my trains too."
"And my kitty, I like Tagu too!"

Made me smile it did! :)

Illness continued

So Justin remained ill throughout the whole holiday season.

From vomitting to diarrhea to just general lethargy and not eating.

BUT we had a good Christmas. Justin played and played and played some more.
We had a nice visit with gramma.

Bunnies were born.
The dog was missed.

I had a lovely chat with my sister Joan and brother Bill on the phone.

Jim had a good nap.
We watched a good movie.

Presents to each other were enjoyed.

God has truly blessed us.

This Christmas Week

Snow, snow and more snow.

Sick boy child.

Two adults with head colds.

Snow, snow and more snow.

But hopefully selling another bunny today. :)

Our Open House

So we had our annual open house today.

We had fun.

We had a whack of people show up in the morning/afternoon. Justin had a lot of fun playing with a friend of mine...totally tuckered her out.

The weather turned snowy later afternoon so we started to expect that most people would stay home...that turned out correct as only one couple came over tonight and they were out because they had work to do at the church as well. :) It was nice to some focused time with them as well.

It was a good day. Justin was wound up and bagged by the end of the day. I'm glad we planned for some down time as he very much needed it.

I, as normal, made too much in the way of food BUT I had planned that I would bring much of it over to the church for the Christmas program tomorrow. Anyways, that's it for the day... it started WAY to early for me (330 with a buggy crawling into the bed). But it's ending early...I'll be in bed by ten. YEAH!!! Now to shut this thing down, grab a glass of wine and I'm off to bed...ah...but that does sound good. :) NIGHT!!!!

New Easter

New Easter was a rescue rabbit.
She was well-loved by Justin the whole week that we had her. We had to unfortunately bring her back to where we got her because we needed to exchange her for a different new easter.

The new rabbit is called....new new easter. :)

Rice Krispy Balls/squares

So for the past two weeks I"ve been trying to find the time and the boy will power to make rice krispy squares. I wanted to make them WITH the boy child and he's been steadfastly refusing.

But yesterday I said "I want to make rice krispies, anyone want to help?"
"I help mom, I want to come too".

So we made rice krispies.

I mixed and stirred while marshmallows melted. Justin threw them in the pan and ate as he went (good thing we had extras) :). I stirred in the rice krispies...even to the point of breaking one of my wooden spoons. It was fun.

Once ready, most went into a pan. Some made it into balls...those balls were promptly eaten by a boy child. the squares well....let's just say a certain OTHER boy (man) thought he should eat them too. Rice krispies....meant for Christmas..might not make until then. :) ah well...they are a perennial crowd favourite aren't they?