Happy Anniversary!

A lot can change in six years.

Six years ago today, Andrew and I started this blog. 3096 blog posts later and we have two children...David's in Grade One, Elisabeth starts Kindergarten next year. We've moved a bazillion times and finally ended up back at home.

Yeah, a lot can change but a lot stays the same.

Happy Anniversary, Project David.

Sometime over the summer, David found a ring. It's probably one of Lizzies that lost whatever decorated the top. Now though it's just a plain band with a circle. David wears it religiously. Has done since at least July. And when people ask him about it, he tells them he got married this summer. To his sister.

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Today someone came up to me at school to comment on what a nice family I have. They were motivated to do so when I introduced my brother who had come to pick up the kids with me. We had four kids to pick up and not enough room in our vehicle so Dave offered to walk home with Ashlie. I think that's what made this mom comment on how all my family is "so nice".

She went on though to talk about the little kids. And how she often sees David walking hand in hand with either Jade or Elisabeth. Or Jade and Elisabeth walking hand in hand. And she thinks it's sweet.

I'm glad. Cause the whole marrying his sister thing could have been a little weird.

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I missed blogging about so many things because September was so busy. In a nutshell, David's school has a lot of split grades. Jade is in the Grade One-Two split and David is in the Kindergarten-Grade One split. We were not happy about this at first for so many reasons, but now that we've had a couple of weeks to get over it, we've decided there's not much we can do about it. David loves his teacher (that was the one thing that made me decide not to fight for him to be moved - I do think he got the better teacher). He has made a lot of new friends and he seems to have adjusted to Grade One better than some of his peers in the other class.

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We switched churches some time ago. We're back in a Baptist church, but one much closer to our home. As it turns out, there are lots of boys David's age and there's a kids' club he can go to on Thursdays. I think this will be a good fit for us. Elisabeth was really upset about our old church because she says the music was always too loud. And she would never go to Sunday School. She loves the (more traditional) music at our new church and she adores her Sunday School teachers. Also, it is one of the friendliest places I've ever been. I hope we can make this our church home. I'm ready to get involved again.

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The last piece of news I'm going to blog about tonight is that (if you hadn't noticed) I'm watching a very sweet little boy five days a week for five hours. It was a tough decision for me to make since I had also made it through interviews for a sweet government job that actually combined techy stuff with writing - a perfect fit for my skills. And also good money/benefits. In the end, I really felt like it wasn't time to go back to a 'real job' and I'm so glad I didn't. I love this little boy I watch (so do the kids) and I love being able to walk David to and from school. I still can't be quite as involved as I'd like at school (I'm trying to be professional about the day care), but at least I'm there every day AND we really love our new family member.

That's it for now.

Playdate

Today one of Lizzie's little friends spent the day with us. We spent the morning playing because we had our other little friend with us. Once he went home we grabbed our lunches and headed to the playground. Where my two little charges were very happy to pose for pictures.


For some reason, this guy decided he should make lots of crazy faces for me. It only made him cuter.

Doncha think?
Ben was so sweet about pushing Lizzie on the swings.


And more posing.


And a little dancing.

Apple Season

If you haven't noticed, I've been trying to stock our freezer and pantry with lots of fresh, local produce for winter. Berry season is over, but luckily apple season is here. With that in mind, last Friday we headed east to the Apple Barn. I hesitate to give away my secrets, but hey...

...can I just recommend that if you don't have to go on a weekend, you don't. We made that mistake last year and it was just miserable. There were way too many people to enjoy anything. Parking was a nightmare, the crowds were insane.

This year we went straight from school on a Friday afternoon and the difference was incredible.

Anyway, the first stop was the Mater truck at the entrance to the farm:

ooooh...look at all the pumpkins!

David figuring out how the pumpkin pricer works.

We promised the kids we'd come back and play just as soon as we'd picked our apples. So we grabbed a bag and a wagon and headed to the orchard to see what was ready for picking.

There were three varieties ready and of the three, we picked mostly Honeycrisp.


Then we headed back up to the bouncy cushion.

And the crazy slides. Scary?

I guess they weren't that bad. He loved them.

Lizzie really liked the bouncy cushion. (by the way, have I mentioned on here that Elisabeth decided that she doesn't want to be called Tink any more? Or Ellie? Or Libby? Or anything except Lizzie? And she stipulated that it has to be LizzIE, not Lizzy. I think it suits her.)

The kids finally tired of the bouncer and so we moved to the petting zoo.

David loved the bunnies. In fact, I couldn't get him out of there!



Unfortunately, my camera is still having light issues. Argh. But you get the gist.

Good times. I've processed about half the apples. Frozen bags of apple slices, made two different kinds of apple sauce (plain and blueberry apple) and made three loaves of apple bread. Yum. Now I just have to decide whether to make more apple sauce or whether to make muffins with the rest...

Lizzie has a new job

And I think it's safe to say that she loves doing day care. But can you blame her? Check out how cute her charge is. AND he lets her snuggle him almost as much as she wants.

David's first day of Grade One

(yes, that is a Christmas wreath up behind David's head. Don't you leave yours up all year?)

Back to school means back to skating

It's September. That means it was time to strap our skates back on and get back to skating lessons. Here are the two bugs right before we left for their first lesson. Why the long faces, kids?

Oh thank goodness, I'm so happy to see some smiles! David was VERY excited. Every time his instructor would suggest a new activity, he would pump his arms and exclaim, "YES!" It was good to see him so enthusiastic about something.

And off they go!

Dad spent two weeks with us in early September. Since he was staying with us, I asked him to make my favorite dinner. We came home from church and found him slaving away.

Oh yummy. Turkey in Mushroom sauce. Usually over rice, but we had it with mashed potato this time.
And then, since all the uncles were present, we took a picture of Dave and another one of his clones...

Back to school hair cuts

Elisabeth and I got our hair cut. Lizzie got a trim and some curls. I got a trim and highlights. Lizzie looks mad here because she wanted a chin length asymmetrical bob and her hair coloured a dark red. Yes, I am serious.

My hair looks pretty good here. But since the day I got it cut it's faded to a brassy orange and I haven't been able to style it like this once. Booo. Elisabeth finally persuaded me to cut her hair again too.
We compromised on the length and I talked her out colouring it red. But she was pretty happy with it, I think.

So today Braylon was playing in the puddles at the school. Elisabeth asked me what he was doing. I say, "That's how babies learn, by touching things." Elisabeth bends down, sticks her hand in the puddle and says, in a disgusted tone, "Well I didn't learn anything!" and stomps off.

Happy Birthday Mayah!

The first Saturday in September was Mayah's birthday so of course we had to head to Chilliwack and celebrate! Elisabeth played with the balloons.

David played with Mayah's toys.

And then there were party games. We love pinatas!



But our favorite part of any party is the cake. See, my kids have their plates out and ready.

Picking up Grosspapa

Grosspapa arrived for another two week stay. We were a bit early picking him up, so decided to watch the planes land - and stretch our feet - at the park nearby.


We played a quick game of tag...until we got distracted by aircraft!

Once Grosspapa couldn't escape, we headed for Steveston to explore.





This is David trying to push Grosspapa over the railing into the sea.

And then a return to his supersweet self.

Grosspapa stopped to chat with some dog owners, so we did an impromptu photo shoot against a barn building.


Only Tinky didn't want to.

And hey! The buildings in the heritage shipyard were open! YA :)






Grosspapa mugged for the camera.



Then we posed for pictures.


And David reenacted some pictures from the other day!






The End.