family, family, family!

I've got an eclectic mix of pics to share over the last many weeks.  I pulled several of family gatherings that we've had.  We got together for Jan/Feb birthdays- which includes all but one of the Muirhead clan who is the month before, Victoria, Brian and Emora.  It was nice to do a party, even though several couldn't make it.

Speaking of birthdays, Andrew, my brother and his wife Andrea made a very special trip to the Fort to celebrate with Emora.  I realize now that I didn't get a pic with Andrew!! and this one with Andrea in it is blurry.  Anyways, they took the birthday girl to the city and spoiled her rotten!  They bought her gifts including 4 pairs of shoes!  I thought them coming and taking her out to swim (her choice) and eat out (also her choice) was her gift, but there was more!  That was last weekend.  We got to play games and Andrea did some baking.  They were also here for the birthday bash, so that was fun.

This weekend, Lin and 2 of her kids came for the weekend.  And I now see I didn't get a pic with Josh.  They made it here in time to get to check out our first Fort Winter Festival.  Apparently these used to be quite the famous event a couple of decades ago.  It has been resurrected and we loved it!  The kids sang Sat. on the ice palace stage, I got to take part in a spike driving contest, we played mini golf on the frozen lake.

The kids and I tried skating on the ice too in the maze.  Emora and I didn't last too long at that- too much snow on the ice for our liking.

We also walked the maze and despite how easy it looked, got lost twice.

We went on a sleigh ride and the kids played on the mounds of snow made from all that snow removal.

It was a fabulously beautiful day.  Only about -1 C and sun shining- a perfect day to get out.

Thankfully I had brought our leftover lunch with us, because the kids needed replenishing several times, but a little respite in the van and they were ready to get back out and enjoy the festivities.

So fun to get to see cousins more often now that we are all within some hours drive.

Today was back to regular programming- with the school schedule.  And now that it's evening, they are back to fighting too.  I guess I should go referee a bit... until next time ;)

Party on!

Emora and I drove out to the Muirhead farm one morning for Lanelle's birthday party.  It wasn't all that cold, but there were 4 of the brightest sun dogs I've ever seen.  They were huge and brilliant.  Emora and I enjoyed watching them all the way out for the drive.  Sun dogs usually appear when it is very cold, so I'm not sure why they were there.  For my southern friends, they are rainbows or bright white lights that are on either side of the sun.  Often there are just 2, one on each side, but this time they were doubled up on each side.

The kids found the costume stash and enjoyed dressing up.

It was fun to make crafts and the adults all got in a wonderful visit and terrific lunch too.

This picture says it all-- cousins are awesome!

When it was time to leave, we couldn't find any of the kids!  We looked and looked.  Finally, I heard giggles in the tub.  I knew something special would greet me when I moved the curtain, so I got my camera ready and found this!

Teacher Dom

It's so interesting to watch our children's personalities come out.  Ivan could play legos all day and loves to be with his friends, but really doesn't enjoy school work much.  I remember having to teach him how to hold a pen so that the right tip could be on the page to make marks.  Ivan still doesn't like to write much.  Then comes number 2.  Dominique wouldn't stop writing.  I remember punishing her for writing on walls, herself, the furniture...  She loves to write and do "school work".  Now that she is in grade 1, she has homework, a reading record and spelling words.  She loves it all.  The minute she gets home from school, she gets her books out and does school with Emora and every other willing "student" (ie. stuffed animals), they can find.  Fortunately Emora enjoys being her student, because Dominique likes to be the teacher and doesn't want to have the roles reversed!

When Dominique is at school, Emora also enjoys to write and do Dominique's spelling words and her letters, but she is not as passionate about it as Dominique was.  She does LOVE to color most of all and likes to do puzzles and games.

Fortunately Ivan does like to read and has even realized that it is a good way for him to de-stress.

We are enjoying our week off for winter break.  It's too cold to enjoy the sunshine outside today, but the kids all have play dates, so they are happy to be with friends.

Love my trio and all their differences!  It wouldn't be nearly as interesting or challenging or enriching if we were all the same.  Each of them brings a flavor to our family that helps us to grow and experience life more fully- and it's never ending- they grow, have new interests, build on their strengths, learn through their struggles and discover new things together.  So thankful for our trio!

Hawaian day!!

At -45 the buses don't run to pick up kids from school, however, the school is open and running anyways, because lots of kids don't get bus service, including mine.  It was that cold on Hawaian day- where we got to pretend it was warm, wear our summer duds (in the cold gym) and have a pretenda colada from the School Community Council.

Today it has been snowing non stop- big fluffy wet flakes.  I parked in the front- out of fear of getting stuck in the alley and the van is covered in snow.  I shovel, wipe the snow off, go to the bank, am there an hour and the van is once again totally covered in snow- you can't even tell that I shoveled.  But I managed to get Emora to walk with me to the school without throwing a fit.

She even got a shot today without throwing a fit.  She only threw a fit when I got her colors wrong when painting her nails today.  It was a pretty bad fit, but the moments of non-fits give me hope that she is maturing and maybe growing beyond the tantrum stage.  Of course we all throw tantrums, but maybe with a little less volume, tears and drama would be nice.

I told the kids that once it got nice, we'd dig out an igloo/quinzee.  So we dug this weekend and it's pretty cool.  With all this extra snow, we should be able to enlarge and expand on it.

Ivan tried Tae-kwon-do in town, but didn't like it- however, he kept insisting that he wanted to join Kellen at karate.  So he tried it out and says he loves it.  I didn't want to have to drive and it really does take up a whole evening a week (maybe 2- if we try to make it for all the sessions).  I hope he'll stick with it though and enjoy it.  It would be cool for him to grow up doing something with his cousin.  It was a nice group of people and not so bad a drive as I had first thought.

We are looking forward to our winter break.  The kids will have the week off from school and we are starting it with a visit from Uncle Andrew (my brother) and Auntie Andrea (his wife) and a party- birthdays for Jan/Feb.!  So awesome!!  I hope it will keep being nice and warm and that we will get to go sledding, have play dates, go skating and enjoy the break from routine.

Hint of spring

The weather was so gorgeous today.  Warmer than it has been and sun shining with blue skies, but I couldn't convince Emora to go out with me.  If it's this pretty tomorrow, we may just have to walk to Gymboree or I'll force her to go with me to the beach with Saba.  I like slow Mondays though.  After having all three kids to torment each other all weekend, it's sweet to have Monday and not need to go anywhere and be able to do some recovery.  Emora and I got some of the house tidied up, did a load of laundry, got muffins made and played games.  I also got a nap.  I haven't had a nap in ages, but I watched all the Lord of the Rings movies this weekend, mostly with Brian which caused a lot of late nights, so I was crashing today and it was so lovely to do some catch up ;)

Speaking of catching up, I don't have any new pictures to share!  Gasp! I know, wow-- but my computer is neat in that it saves pics in it's photo program for one year, so when I open it, the first pics in are from a year ago that day.  I found a pic of about a year ago with the cousins and one from Christmas.  I thought they would look so much older, but just the 2 smallest look really different to me.

Tonight was zumba.  It has been so much fun and we had a glow in the dark night with glow sticks.  The kids had a blast, so they wanted to continue the party once we got home.  We did Just Dance 4 and Just Dance kids and I finally had to call it quits.  That's about 2 hours of tons of movement and my body is saying that's quite enough!  So fun though.  Time for some heat on these sore muscles... I hope I can move in the morning!

oops!

I see from my non-existant photos that I need to #1 take pictures and #2 upload them.  We haven't been doing much eventful anything, and the weather is so weird, we don't know if we are coming or going.  A day (or 2?) ago, it was so nice out and sunny- but I couldn't convince Emora to go for a walk or outside for anything.  To her credit, I've told her and her siblings to go out to play and that it's nice out- not having realized that there was a nasty wind and she came in crying that she was cold.  So there is a trust factor that I have to recognize here!  She is enjoying playing with and making friends lately- so that's been nice.  She loves her "programs" as she calls them and is generally a great helper with all I do.  I had the kids help clean the house this weekend and realized that I've trained her better at cleaning than the others!  This hasn't been intentional, but during the day, part of the time, I clean and she wants to help, so we do it together.  My big kids didn't have a clue as to how to clean the bathroom.  It was a bit of work for me to be teaching them and keeping them on task, but wow, the house got cleaned and we had time left in the day to play! ;)

Emora and Kayda were having some time together and Kayda asked her mom if they could play on some techy thing they've got.  Her mom said no, so they made their own (ipad?) and "played games" on them.  Emora made one for Dominique also and wrote her name on the back of it.  And no, this picture is not reversed, she wrote it from right to left, but I was quite surprised that she could do all those letters!  She read her first word the other day while we were at the optometrist's office ("up"), so yesterday we made a book for her with words and pics of easy things where she can flip the caption with different sections... I guess I need to take a picture of it, too hard to explain... 

We need to go skating tomorrow.  I hope I can get her out!  I've been missing skating.  There is a new recreation coordinator and I don't know if that is why, but they aren't posting public skate times on the weekend anymore and that was a highlight of our week, so I need to get out so that we can find out what is going on and plead that we get an hour on the weekend back again!  Dominique really loves it and is the only time she gets to skate!

The kids were driving me batty tonight, but then things settled down and went well.   I think we are all suffering from cabin fever.  This winter has been so wiggy and we are not getting out enough.  I'm already dreaming of spring and a kayak and swimming in the lake... ahhh, some day it'll come!

Emora's room transformation

If you are on facebook- sorry for getting this double!
We started with Brian scraping off the acoustic on the ceiling.

Then he painted it "Utah blue".  I started freaking a little at this point, the blue is not what I'd imagined.

Had some "helpers".

We thought this was a pretty orangy yellow, but lo and behold it's screaming yellow, intense, loud, insane yellow.  At this point, I was really freaking out.  Brian was saying it's fine and no you can't add white and blue or whatever else you are thinking, we got it we're using it.  Meanwhile Emora was dancing and exclaiming that she loved it!  oye oye!

I was really having to give it over and be at peace with it, because I was now seeing that these colors are insane and what I see in product packages.  I was thinking it would be elegant and a bit more serene.  I'd copied the colors from examples on the net from a wedding, a classy living room, a chic house... but somehow, it wasn't giving me the same vibe!

Obviously lighting changes everything.  This is still that yellow wall, but with the butterflies, it actually fits!

I tried a new technique with the clouds.  I like my old way better, but this blended nice with the walls since I added a lot more color to the clouds than I ever have before.  I also wanted to break up the clouds, so I flung white on them.  That made me happier ;)

All done!  We still need to put gloss on them, so they don't get wiped off, but I'm waiting until they are good and dry and need to buy some more gloss.

Emora helped out some of course, but only how and when she wanted to!!

SEE- I told you- industrial yellow- her room is the same color as the broom! ack!

These curtains came with the house, only they didn't darken the room enough and they looked grannyish to me, but now they match her room perfect!  They glimmer blending with the white trim and have little flowers on them.

My sister sent a package of 3D butterflies with Emora's birthday gift.  They were gorgeous in white, but Emora kept saying she wanted them colored, so we tried painting one and it was really beautiful.  The paint worked great on them and I let Emora paint some too.  These were no fail butterflies!  Even when they ran, it just added to their appeal.

All done- I should have taken a pic of her whole room set up, because her rug is perfect with this room now and her bedspread and stuff... I'm glad I didn't mess with the colors after all!  Best of all, it pleases the little 4 year old and it's done!!  We can try to return the household to somewhat sane.

I painted this a couple of years before I moved here and am shocked now at all the symbolism.

Emora's party!

When I asked Emora if she liked a princess or butterfly theme better, she said she liked both-- so they were butterfly princesses.  They decorated a treasure box, a tiara and butterfly body for their loot back that looked like a butterfly (thanks to pinterest).  We had several games- princess bingo which I'd made for Dominique's party, some races and musical games and a treasure hunt with jewelry prizes for their treasure boxes.

It was fun, but birthdays always surprise me.

No matter how simple it seems, it is always a lot of planning and exhausting!

I told our guests not to worry over gifts and that we are great with recycled/passed on toys/treasures.  It was the best.  The kids shared some of their loved toys, brought homemade cards and some bought stuff too.  They were really, really generous!

Although they look like they are quite a bit different in ages, the girls were all 4 or 5 years old.  Alana- in the orange dress is actually the oldest of the lot and kept telling us how OLD she was ;)

It was great though because they all got along marvelously and enjoyed the games.  With Ivan and Dominique, they are so close in age that they can "share" the same friends-- but I feel like Emora is always having to play tag along- so it was nice to have kids who appreciate and are at the same level as her to enjoy the same games and activities with.

The only sad part was that Emora's cousin Lanelle was sick and couldn't make it. Her heart went out to her cousin and as soon as the party was over, she was using her new colors and paper to write her cousin a note- "mommy can you write- Lanelle, It's ok, I'm sorry you had to throw up. You're welcome". 

Hope you are having a great weekend!  I'm going to go paint a bedroom now ;)  YIPEE- I love color- although I'm a bit anxious to see how the colors look on the walls!

Emora turned 4!

Emora was quite excited to turn 4.  She doesn't show her enthusiasm with exuberance, but you can tell she is proud of herself and excited with the attention she is getting.  First, I finished her portrait.  Then each of us got her a little something as a gift for her actual birthday day.

Polly pocket, lego friends, a memory game- we love LOVE games and some doll furniture the right size for the girl's polly pockets- which I am actually not a big fan of!  Their clothes are very tiny and easily lost and easily cried over-- these many losses!

She had a party while the others were at school- to the huge protesting cries of the bigs.  The theme of the week was "life is not fair, you get to do things she does not get to do, would you just be happy for her already!!"  Something like that...

Actually, in some ways, this little trooper has gotten the short end of the stick.  We've not always had parties for her, she got a rug for her birthday our first year here and this year she gets a room transformation.  The others did not have to wait for a birthday for that.  We had to paint their rooms with the renos, so they got to pick colors from the getgo.  However, Emora's room was functional and not overly hideous, so it was never a priority to paint her room how she would like it.

And to complicate matters, Emora doesn't have distinct color preferences, so we've had a hard time figuring out how she would like the room painted for the next decade or more!  Ivan has favored green since he was a baby and Dominique has always loved pink, but Emora is our rainbow girl- so we have gone with a butterfly theme.  I found a great web site where you could pick a room and then try out different colors on it.  The room had similar colors to Emora's bedspread, so we tried various ceiling, trim and wall colors.  I'd been leaning toward doing a blue ceiling with clouds (I miss having a room with clouds and Emora likes blue quite a bit).  I'd thought to do green walls as something different, but as we got looking it all looked so boyish to us.  So then she suggested a purple sky- there were some examples of that on the internet... then she kept choosing cheddar cheese orange for her walls.  I'm not kidding!  So we did a compromise.  I went a few shades lighter on her cheese orange/yellow for the walls with a blue sky.  It was close to some of the color samples we saw on the internet.  I was thinking more of a yellow color, but I did want her to be able to "choose" as loosely or strictly as you can with a 4 year old!  I did promise her some orange butterflies in the mix.  She is very excited to watch our progress.  We've moved her downstairs to the guest room, where she had a sleepover with her siblings already.  It feels nice to get to spoil her some too- especially since the others had their special flourishes in their rooms for a couple of years already.

What did your room look like when you were growing up?