My family life

Nearly Christmas

2009-12-11T14:00:00.004-04:00

To start off, here are some summer pictures.

And also some soccer pictures. Here are Makayla and Hayden at their soccer jamboree in August 2009.

Makayla is now 4 1/2 years old, and as of this morning, she measures 44 inches tall and weighs nearly 38 lbs. She is as tall as some 5 year olds and frequently gets mistaken for being in kindergarten already. She will be starting school in September 2010. The district has a whole year of pre-K activities for the kids to get ready to go to school. Clay and I attended the parent's meeting at the beginning of November, and then Makayla and I both went to the introduction to the school at the end of November. She loved participating in all of the activities. I think she will do well in school since she just loves to learn. She is starting to sound out words which impressed one of the teachers at the school when she said: "You really know how to sound out your letters well." She can also do some basic math addition and subtraction. If I tell her how many more bites of supper to take, she will start eating them and then tell me how many more bites she has left to take (subtraction). It catches people off-guard when she does this because it's just not expected at her age.

Makayla dressed up as Violet from the Incredibles for Halloween this year. She had no desire to be a princess or anything girly. She said right from the start that she wanted to be a superhero.
Makayla is back in tap dancing this year. Megan is her teacher and there are no boys in her class this year. They are going to be dancing to "Disco Duck" and "Cowboy Joe" which she insists on calling "Cowboy Joke". I am interested to see what kind of costume they get that will go with a country tune AND a disco dance.

Makayla is also taking some swimming lessons. The class is "Preschool 1" and the goal of this class is mainly to get the kids to trust their lifejackets. Makayla has been very afraid in the water and doesn't want to be let go even with a lifejacket on, so I thought this class would be good for her. I never dreamed how brave she would be by the end of the class. Her last (8th) session is this Sunday, and for the last couple of classes, she has been venturing out in the water doing the doggie paddle with her lifejacket on all by herself. She never liked water in her face, and now you can splash her, and she doesn't even flinch. She will hold her breath and put her whole face in the water. I told her teacher Tristan how impressed I was at what he had been able to teach her in such a short period of time. I intend to sign her up for "Preschool 2" after Christmas because I don't want her to lose this momentum. By next summer, she will be having a blast in the campground pool.

Makayla is also attending preschool again this year. There are 7 kids who are going: Makayla, Sabrina, Hayden, Jenna, Sienna, Marley and Ashton. They have been practising for the Christmas concert which takes place next week.

This is the first day of preschool 2009.
Here is a picture that the preschool teacher took of the kids playing with the parachute. They were bouncing "Purple Teddy" on it. Makayla carried "Purple Teddy" around with her for several weeks and since he was a FREX toy, he couldn't withstand all the abuse that he was exposed to. I convinced her to exchange "Purple Teddy" for another one, which she named "Yellow Teddy", and she continued to carry this guy around for a few more weeks. We've finally weaned her off of carrying these teddies around at all.
This was a field trip that the kids took to the apple orchard to pick apples.

I'm thinking that Makayla will be a lot more outgoing this year at the concert. She has been showing a more outgoing side to her personality lately. This summer, we had somewhat overcome her fear of my leaving her, and tried to get her to be more independent. In October, she went back to crying if I was leaving her. She tried this out at Tobi's one Monday morning, again at tap dancing that night, and then continued with it on Tuesday at preschool. I really didn't want to go through that whole phase again since it was awful the first time around, so I tried to nip it in the bud quickly. I tried to appease her on Monday at Tobi's and after half an hour of sobbing, I just had to leave. (Tobi told me that she quickly stopped within minutes of my leaving.) On Monday night at tap dancing, I drug her back to the car when she wouldn't stay in class and she knew I wasn't happy. She quickly changed her mind and said she would stay in class and dance. So we went back in, and she did wonderfully. On Tuesday morning at preschool, she didn't want me to leave her, so I promptly told her that she had a choice: it was either preschool or Tobi's, but being with me wasn't one of the options since I had to work. She decided that once I put it that way, she would stay at preschool. I had a couple more times that I had to be harsh with her, but it seemed to work and now she runs off into tap dancing class or swimming lessons on her own and doesn't even look back for me. I have to admit that it's a bit sad that she doesn't need me as much, but independence is a personality trait that I definitely want her to have. At this past week's tap dancing class, the parents were invited in to watch what the kids had learned so far, and she was one of the most outgoing kids by answering the teacher's questions and even hamming it up a bit. I was really proud at how far she had come.

Christmas is coming in a couple of weeks. Makayla and I wrote up her letter to Santa together. She has been more influenced this year by the television commercials, so in her letter, she requested Hot Wheels, Twister Hopscotch, and a new DS game, along with some surprises. She is a huge fan of Spongebob Squarepants, so anything with him on it will be a hit. She helped me decorate our tree too. I have to say, it actually went quicker with the two of us working at it even though she can't reach any higher than 4 feet, and it was more fun than doing it alone.

Summer is here...I think

2009-07-16T14:54:00.006-03:00

It has been forever again since I've updated this blog. Well, it is now mid-July and we've finally gotten some decent summer weather over the last week. We have had a very long spring and it has been extremely rainy around here this year.

I noticed in my last post that I mentioned that we were looking at new travel trailers. We did find one that we liked even better than the one I mentioned. It had a wonderful bunk room for Makayla that we just couldn't pass up. We moved it to our new lot along the river at the Hartt Island Campground on Mother's Day weekend. We got some lovely weather in May, but starting in June, the weather got rotten and rainy so we hadn't used the trailer a whole lot. Unfortunately, we found out that the trailers 2 slide-outs leak a whole lot. After a hard rain one Saturday night, I went to make Makayla's bed when I realized how wet her bedding was. She thought that maybe she had peed the bed, but I knew that wasn't the case. I peeled the mattress back and we saw how wet the wood underneath was, not to mention that the bunk above her was soaked even more. I felt underneath her bed and the carpet was soaking wet and the water had started to get the wood wet that made up the frame of her bed. The fortunate part of this story is that it is still under warranty and I'm glad we found out about this sooner rather than later. We called the dealership and told them about what happened and that we would be in to talk to them first thing Monday morning with the pictures we took of the mess. The sales manager was very apologetic when we arrived and he could hardly believe that not only did the trailer leave the manufacturer that way, but it also left his dealership. Quality control at the manufacturer should have caught the fact that the slide-outs were not sealed properly as it was very evident to Clay and me when we climbed up to see where the water was getting in. They offered us a trailer to use in the meanwhile while they figured out what they were going to do. We loaded our trailer up and brought it to the dealership and then we transferred everything over to the loaner trailer and brought it back to our campground lot.

Clay stopped into the dealership last Friday to get something for the loaner trailer, and the saleman that was still there gave Clay an update on our trailer. The dealership is definitely going to fix our trailer, but as of right now, the sales and service managers are trying to get the manufacturer to agree to give us a new one. Either way, he told us that we should probably get comfortable in the loaner trailer as this negotiation could take a while.

This is the water that soaked through the mattress to the bottom bunk where Makayla sleeps.
Her bunk beds are the part that slide out and the carpet and the foam underneath were just soaked. It's hard to show how wet the carpet was in a picture, but Clay's knees were getting wet just sitting there. And you sure could smell that the carpet had been wet on Monday when we brought it back to the dealership. You would have thought that there were a dozen cats living in there and used the carpet as their litter box.

This is underneath Makayla's bottom bunk. The wood frame is all wet (dark orange part) and the carpet is soaking wet. The wood was so swollen that the drawers you see wouldn't even pull out anymore.

This is the top bunk and how wet it was underneath the mattress.

This is a picture of the water drops seeping in from behind the trim and going down the wall. We just aren't sure how much water got in between the walls too.

The bottom of the curtain and one of the bench seats were wet. This is on the second slide-out.

This is the top of one of the slides. As you can see, the seal and tape are partially ripped off.

Another view of the seal on the slides.

We were very disappointed that this happened since we didn't even suspect that something like this was even a possibility since the trailer was new. We are going to be patient and hopeful that this issue gets sorted out in the best way possible.

Summer 2009

2009-07-16T10:52:00.009-03:00

Let me fill you in on what Makayla has been up to over the last few months. She finished up her year at tap dancing and here is a photo of her with her costume on. She just loved her "tap dress"!

She and her group danced to "I'm a Little Teapot" as well as to a version of "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star". Here is a YouTube link that another parent posted. Makayla is on the left of most of the video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rEUCzhyyEo

There were 2 tap dance shows that were to last approximately 90 minutes and the kids were to stay backstage with the daycare personnel they had there. The ladies told me that Makayla struggled a bit being backstage without Mommy the first night (cried most of the time although it didn't appear that way when she was onstage dancing), and they suggested that I stay with her the following night. Makayla had been going through a phase where she seemed to dislike me leaving her anywhere even if she used to love to go, like preschool, tap dancing and even her sitter's house. So I stayed with her and kept trying to see if she was comfortable enough for me to leave, but we never got to that point. Since I knew when her dances were because I had watched the show the previous night, I brought her to my seat with me and we watched the show until it was time for her to go back to get ready to dance. She had no problem with me dropping her off so long as she knew that I was going to be there to get her once her dance was finished. I did go back and she came and watched the rest of the show with me and her father.

Here is our family shot after the show was finished. Makayla received flowers and a CD from Nana.

This is Makayla with her friend Tharen from her dance class. Tharen was born at 24 weeks as a twin, but his twin didn't make it. He is a great kid. His mother enrolled him in tap dancing to try to help his stability on his feet improve. He sure has come a long way from the beginning of the year.

We were already enjoying the campground by mid-May and here is Makayla doing one of her favourite things there - playing basketball. It's amazing how much she isn't nearly as scared of the ball as she was last summer. She was always a bit timid when she would try to get the ball in the net last year, but this year, she has no fear.

On June 4th, Makayla had her last day at preschool for this year. Here she is at the house before we left that morning.

Makayla went to preschool with 5 other children. The ones in black hats will be starting kindergarten in the fall while those in white hats will be going back to preschool in September. Here she is receiving her diploma.

Makayla had a very proud mother and 2 grandmothers to see her at the graduation.

Makayla's birthday is June 6th and originally I had told her that she could have a Nintendo DS when she turned 5, since that is how old her chum at the sitter's was when he got his. However, she has REALLY wanted one since last September and after she had proven to me this winter that she knew how to use one (she showed me how it worked!), I decided that she was able to handle one for her 4th birthday. Not to mention that when I asked her what she wanted for her birthday, she replied with "I would REALLY like to have a real DS." So here she is the morning of her birthday playing her "real DS". She was very excited to finally have her own.

Here is the river view from our trailer on the morning of Makayla's birthday.

And here is the birthday girl!

Makayla wanted a minigolf party at the campground, so we invited all of her preschool friends, her cousins and some other kids we know to come have a game. It was so much fun to watch the kids running around the minigolf course, which they had all to themselves since the party was at 11am. I have to say that this birthday party was by far the most relaxing and enjoyable one that I have planned for Makayla.

This is Makayla with all of her preschool buddies - Makayla, Emma, Hayden, Macy, Sabrina and Connor.

This is a picture of all of the kids who attended the party - Hayden, Jessi, Makayla, Emma, Sabrina, Macy, Gracie, Paige and Connor.

Here are the kids sitting on the hill behind our trailer.

This is the golf-themed cake that I ordered from Sobeys. Not your usual cake for a birthday party, but it seemed very appropriate.

This was Makayla's other favourite gift from her birthday - her scooter from Grammie.

Here is a picture of Makayla trying on Daddy's hard hat.

Just after Makayla's birthday, soccer started. She is playing with kids aged 3 and 4, although this is her first year playing soccer. She loved it the first practice, but I had a problem getting her to play the second week. She started crying and wouldn't go out on the field even if I came with her. I was at a loss about what to do. If she hadn't liked it so well the first night, I would have thought that maybe soccer just wasn't for her. During the week before the third practice, I tried to entice her with some rewards she would get IF she played, but if she didn't play, then we were going straight home. Once we got to the field, she was doing well before the coach arrived, then once the organized part started (as organized as you can get with 72 preschoolers and their parents crammed into 3 small soccer fields), she came back to me and wanted to go home. I knew that my rewards weren't working, so we marched back to the car, all the while I'm thinking "How am I going to handle this so that she will go play?" When I got her to the car I warned her that once we got home, she would be going into "time out". Well, she didn't like the sound of that at all. I told her that she had one more chance to get up to that field and play soccer. She ran all the way back and had a wonderful time playing the rest of the practice. And we haven't had a problem since. I think she was a bit intimidated by how physical soccer can be and she was nervous of her coach. Once she realized that her coach is a really nice guy and she just has to push right back when she's trying to get near the ball, this whole experience has become much more enjoyable.

This is another of Makayla's favourite activites - riding her bicycle. She isn't as nervous on her bike as she was last summer. We have taken some great bike rides on the trail right by our campground.

On her 4th birthday, Makayla was 42.5" tall and weighed 36 lbs.

She recently had her first sleepover with her cousin Gracie, which Daddy supervised since Mommy was out of town.

I asked Makayla if she wanted some strawberries, and her response to me was "I'm allergic to red food." When I reminded her that ketchup and licorice are red (2 of her favourites), she was confused as to how to resond. Now she will say that she is allergic to red food, but not to ketchup and licorice.

When I told her that her soccer team was called the Jays, she thought that I meant the letter J, so she figured her friend Josh's team must be the K's or the L's.

When she was showing her sitter how to play one of her DS games, she got frustrated when the sitter couldn't get it, so Makayla says "Oh, just let me do it!"

Her friend Josh got his hands dirty while they were playing outside, so he wiped them on the back of Makayla's shirt. She turned around and said to him "I'm not a wipe, you know!"

When asked to spell her dad's name, Makayla spells out CLAY. When asked to spell my name, she writes MOM.

She has started to try to sound out words. She nearly spelled Snoopy with very little help from me, just by sounding out the letters.

Makayla is extremely observant. I put up new curtains in the living room while she was at her sitter's and didn't tell her, and she noticed immediately, even before she got into the living room.

Makayla has been telling me that I am always right. I wonder how long that will last!

Winter update

2009-03-20T15:34:00.004-03:00

This winter has been a long one. The weather is finally starting to improve, so hopefully it will be over soon. We have been enjoying ourselves this winter by doing some snowmobiling. Here is Makayla waiting patiently for Daddy to take her for a ride.
Makayla and her cousin Gracie had some pictures done in March. Grammie wanted to have some updated ones of the girls and I think they turned out very nicely.

I took Makayla to see the Doodlebops when they were in town. What a great show they put on. I have to say it was one of the better ones that I've taken Makayla to. It was a kids concert and there was no story to try and follow.

Here are Makayla and Hayden doing the "Bounce" out in the aisle. They had a blast.

Makayla has been asking for a Nintendo DS since last fall. I thought that she was far too young for one, so at Christmas, we picked up a Leapster for her in hopes that she would be satisfied. She was....for awhile. Now she has started asking for a DS again. I have watched her use other kids' DS's and she can get around one really well. She probably could handle one, but I just feel like I have to draw the line somewhere. She is our only child and I don't want to spoil her too much. One day when I picked her up at her sitter's, she was holding this blue piece of construction paper in the picture below. I asked her what it was and she showed me and told me it was her DS. As you can see the arrow pad and buttons are all drawn on there. Then she found the lovely purse in the playroom at her sitter's and asked if it could be her DS case. So now she amuses herself with this piece of paper and the purse. I'm not sure how long this will hold her off for, but I have a feeling she is going to be asking for a DS for her birthday coming up in June.

In the last week, Makayla has learned to snap her fingers and she can recite our telephone number. It amazes me how quickly she picks this stuff up. On the other hand, she calls popcorn - "corn pops" and she calls the cereal Corn Pops - "porn cops". No matter how many times I explain it, she still says it the same way. I think she likes the way I laugh at her every time.

The tap dancing costumes arrived this week so we got to bring it home. It is very cute. It is a black bodysuit with a green tutu. The other class of kids the same age have the same costume with a purple tutu. They start rehearsals in April to get the kids ready to dance on the stage for the show in May.

I took Makayla to her 3 1/2 year old screening this week. She did a wonderful job. She spoke with the nurse who was doing the testing and wasn't at all shy. She passed the eye test with flying colours. She could see every row on that letter chart. During the hearing test, there was one tone that she couldn't hear in her left ear. I have been a bit concerned lately about her hearing. But I wasn't convinced that this "hearing problem" wasn't just that she had selective hearing. The nurse told me not to be too concerned, that it was probably just a bit of fluid in her ear that would sort itself out. Their instrument to look in the ears was broken, so she couldn't be sure what the issue was. Makayla has her annual appointment with her doctor in June, so I will bring it up then.

We're looking at upgrading our travel trailer for this summer. We've been looking around and doing some price comparisons. There was a used one that we looked through and loved last summer, but we didn't love the price. When we were back in the market this year, I thought I would look up this RV place's website to see if they still had that unit, and they did. And for a much better price this year. They have discounted it by 33%. The price is much more in our comfortable range and if we still like it as well when we look at it next week, then we will probably try to hammer out a deal.

January 2009

2009-02-04T14:42:00.002-04:00

Makayla with my sister, her Aunt Christy.

Makayla is growing up so quickly. I just know she is going to be starting school before I know it. Makayla is fascinated with the way people pronounce words. She has corrected me several times on the way I pronounce "garage". I sometimes say it like "garadge" and Makayla will correct me by saying "Mommy, you said garadge, but it's garaaaage." One day when I told Makayla that Grammie was going to keep her for a Saturday, she was so excited because Grammie usually takes her to lunch. Grammie pronounces "lunch" by emphasizing the "ch" at the end. Makayla told me how Grammie pronounces lunch and also proceeded to tell Grammie when she was with her that Saturday. So funny!!

Makayla still hasn't picked which hand she wants to write with. She is equally comfortable using either hand and writes legibly with both. She will switch hands before you even know she has. She loves to write on her white board. She can spell and write out her name as well as some of her friends' names (Amber, Connor, Hayden). She spells CAT and DOG. She recognizes MOM and DAD. When I write them on the board, she knows that MOM is me and DAD is her dad.

She has been practising her math skills too. She can count by 2's all the way to 10. She is able to do some simple addition and subtraction.

She loves to play games. She got the Candyland game for Christmas and we played it all the time after that. I got Chutes and Ladders just to change things up a bit for me. She didn't quite understand how to get around the board the first time we played, but she was a pro by the second time. And just last weekend, we taught her to play the card game "Go Fish". She knows her letters and numbers so it wasn't too much of a stretch for her. We call the aces A's and the queens Q's, etc. She is a bit clumsy trying to hold the cards, but that will improve.

Makayla has a 3 1/2 year old screening that the Public Health department conducts scheduled for the end of February. There is a list of things that the kids are supposed to be able to do by this age so they will test them on those things, plus there are free eye and hearing exams. My neighbour and her son went this week and she wasn't overly impressed with the way they conducted the testing. I'm not too concerned about it and I am certain that Makayla will make it through the testing just fine.

Christmas season

2009-01-09T15:37:00.007-04:00

Christmas was a blast this year. Makayla was so into it. She wrote her letter to Santa and was so excited to see his reply come in the mail for her. In her letter she asked for a Thomas the Train game and some cars. Once the letter was sent, she became a bit more specific in that she wanted a race car game. I wasn't entirely sure what she meant by this, but it was evident that it was important to her because that is what she told everybody when they asked what she wanted for Christmas.

The season started off with Makayla's dance class. Usually the parents are not allowed into the room to watch the kids, but we were allowed on the last class before Christmas. I thoroughly enjoyed watching them. I was impressed at how well Makayla follows the teachers. She is really interested in this class. I also took some videos of the dances and when I put them on our TV, Makayla will actually dance to them. We've struggled to get her to show us some of the things she's learned, so this was also a nice treat for us.
Later on in the week, her preschool class had their Christmas party. I wasn't aware that we were supposed to invite grandparents and such (I went alone). I just figured it would be kind of like the tap dancing thing and the parents were allowed in to see how the kids were doing. They got up on stage to perform the Christmas songs they had learned, and this is how they were positioned when they first got up on stage. Makayla has the 2 boys from the class glued to her sides. The teachers wanted to fill in the gap so they asked Hayden, the boy on the left to move into the middle. He said "No, I want to stand beside Makayla." Then they asked Connor, the boy in the middle to move down a bit. He also said no, that he wanted to stand beside Makayla. So from the audience, I ask Makayla to move down a bit.

And the boys stuck right with her. They performed their songs, or I should say, the teacher performed the songs while the kids stood and looked at her.

Here is Makayla having a snack with her best buds Connor and Hayden. Even the teachers told me that she is their little tomboy.

One of the highlights of our Christmas tradition is the trek out to the Christmas tree farm to cut down our tree. Unfortunately it was freezing cold this year so Makayla didn't want to stay out there long. We cut down the first nice tree we found. Clay made an attempt to look for another nice one, but with Makayla practically crying to get back in the truck, we decided to just stick with the first one. It turns out that this was a wise decision because the tree was absolutely the most beautiful one we've had in our 10 years of marriage.

Here is Makayla before she was completely frozen.

We cheat and use a chainsaw to cut our tree down.

Now we just had to load it on the truck.

On Christmas Eve, Makayla's sitter had a Christmas party for the kids. I was already off work but we did make a point to attend since I knew that she had invited Santa to come. Here are all the kids at the party.

I hesitated to take Makayla to the mall to sit on Santa's knee since I didn't think that would go very well. Once I knew that Santa was coming to this party, I decided to avoid the mall altogether. She was fine with sitting on his lap, but I really think it was because her pals Hayden and Josh jumped up on his lap without any trouble and she was going to follow suit.

The funniest part of her seeing Santa was when my mom asked Makayla if she'd seen Santa at the party. Makayla answered yes. Then Nana asked her whether Santa gave her anything. Makayla said yes. Nana asked her what he gave her. Makayla's response was "Not a race car game" which she said with a little pout. I reminded her that Santa was coming to our house that night and he may be planning to leave the race car game here.

Makayla being cute on the floor.

Makayla, Daddy and Snoopy on Christmas Eve.

Makayla and Mommy in front of the beautiful tree.

Makayla standing in front of the new electric fireplace. Cookies and chocolate milk (as Makayla requested for Santa) on the mantle.

On Christmas morning Makayla woke up to find that Santa did bring her a race car game (one of those tracks with the cars that go around using the remotes). She was ecstatic! She also loved her Leapster (which she began calling her DS) and her absolute favourite thing has to be the Candyland game my sister gave her. I can't even count how many times we've played that game since Christmas day.

We went to a pot luck party on Boxing Day for all of our close friends and their kids. It's an annual event and so much fun. This was the first year when I didn't really have to hover around the kids since Makayla was good to go on her own. The hosts' daughter is a few months younger than Makayla and totally into Polly Pockets, My Little Ponies, Littlest Pet Shop, etc. Makayla doesn't enjoy playing with these toys at all. Give Makayla a toy car and she's good to go. So the girls got out the Polly Pockets and such to play with. They handed one of the dolls to Makayla while they all played. Makayla held it for a second and then laid it down on the table and said "My girl is sleeping" and walked away. She spent most of the evening playing with the 5-year old son of one of our friends. They alternated between drawing on the Magnadoodle and playing the kids laptop.

We visited some of my extended family in Campbellton just before New Years. My grandparents still live there. My uncle and some of his family traveled from Ontario while those of us in the province drove up to see them. It is a 4-hour drive which I wasn't looking forward to but Makayla was a trooper and never complained during the whole drive up and back.

We spent New Years with our neighbours and had Chinese food. We were going to let the kids stay up until midnight, but Makayla fell asleep on the couch around 11. Our neighbours' son made it to midnight though. We had a great time.

Completed rec room

2009-01-09T15:32:00.002-04:00

Our rec room was completed just shortly before Christmas. We are so happy with how it turned out. The two things we wanted for the room were an electric fireplace to warm it up a bit since it is in the basement, and a new TV. With the generosity of our parents who gave us money for Christmas, we were able to get both.

Such a long time since my last Makayla update

2008-12-08T14:21:00.003-04:00

I guess I left off my last Makayla update post saying that we had gone to the Thomas the Train show. Here are some pictures from that show.
Here Makayla is with our neighbour's son Hayden at the Thomas show.

Makayla had 2 costumes to pick from this Halloween. I got her the Princess Fiona costume which she wore to her preschool Halloween party, but she chose to wear her Jojo the Clown costume when she was out trick or treating. Here she is with her friend Jessi.

We got home Halloween night and only got Makayla to bed around 10pm. By 4:30am she had woken up with the stomach flu. Here she is feeling very sick the next day. She is the best sick kid in the world since she never complains. Her dad could take some lessons from her!!

Since we missed out on our fall pictures that I intended to have done, we settled for some homemade Christmas pictures. This is one that I took to use on our Christmas cards.

At the last minute, I bought Makayla and me some tickets to go see the Franklin Christmas show. She was pretty excited to see it. She should be thrilled with the Doodlebops tickets that she is getting in her stocking this year.

She loves to colour and write her letters and numbers. She can now count as high as 50.

We wrote her letter to Santa last week so we could give it the letter carriers during the Santa Claus parade. I asked her what she wanted Santa to bring for her and she decided that she wanted a computer game and some cars. This girl is definitely not much into dolls. She has an advent calendar that she gets into every night before bed. She loves to find the chocolate that she is allowed to eat that night. She knows that when she gets to 24, that is the night that Santa will come.

She is hardly shy at all. Since the renovations have been going on, she understood that some people would be coming into the house. Well didn't she surprise me when the painter arrived on Saturday morning and I was in the shower, she went downstairs to chat with him. I would have thought that she would barricade herself in the bathroom with me, but that wasn't the case at all.

I think preschool and tap dancing have helped with her shyness. She is still loving both activities. They have learned their first dance for the tap show - "I'm a little teapot". They have been measured for their costumes, now we will have to wait and see what cute outfits they pick out for the kids. There are about 12 kids in her tap dancing class and she is one of about 5 that pay close attention to the teachers. Some of the other kids dance for a bit and then like to do their own thing. Some just stand there and watch. But Makayla is taking it all in.

I'm excited for Christmas this year since she is going to be so much fun to watch. I'll be sure to take lots of pictures.

Renovations in progress

2008-12-08T13:18:00.005-04:00

We are right in the middle of more renovations. We had taken a break after the furnace was installed but we wanted to get some more stuff done before Christmas was upon us. We decided to hire a crackfiller/painter to do some minor wall repair and major painting, as well as a carpenter to put up some new drywall in the basement where the wallpaper refused to come off easily. We also picked out some new laminate flooring for the carpenter to install.

Here is our living room before. The walls were a light grey colour that was long overdue for a paint job.
Here is the living room after with it's warmer beige walls that match the dining room and kitchen.

This is the hallway with the light grey again.

Now with beige.

Here is the before picture of the foyer. You can't really tell because of the lighting in the picture but the top part is light grey while the bottom part under the chair rail is where I removed pink wallpaper.

Now the foyer is completely painted in beige.

Here is the basement family room. The brownish bottom part is wallpaper which was put right on after one coat of primer. It pulled off the sheetrock paper as I tried to remove it. No crackfiller would have been able to smooth that wall out properly.

You can see the job on the wallpaper removal that I did.

The is the family room with the new sheetrock installed and the carpet removed.

The flooring will be installed today and the painter should be able to get back in there by Tuesday.

We also had our bedroom painted. I guess I didn't take any before or after pictures of that but it looks very nice now.

100 things

2008-11-28T09:29:00.002-04:00

Stealing this from Sheri. 100 things - you have to bold the ones you've done. Play along!
1. Started your own blog
2. Slept under the stars
3. Played in a band
4. Visited Hawaii
5. Watched a meteor shower
6. Given more than you can afford to charity
7. Been to Disneyland
8. Climbed a mountain (Does climbing the White Mountains in a car count?)
9. Held a praying mantis
10. Sang a solo
11. Bungee jumped
12. Visited Paris
13. Watched a lightning storm at sea
14. Taught yourself an art from scratch
15. Adopted a child
16. Had food poisoning
17. Walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty
18. Grown your own vegetables
19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France
20. Slept on an overnight train
21. Had a pillow fight
22. Hitch hiked
23. Taken a sick day when you’re not ill
24. Built a snow fort
25. Held a lamb
26. Gone skinny dipping
27. Run a Marathon
28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice
29. Seen a total eclipse
30. Watched a sunrise or sunset
31. Hit a home run
32. Been on a cruise
33. Seen Niagara Falls in person
34. Visited the birthplace of your ancestors
35. Seen an Amish community
36. Taught yourself a new language
37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied
38. Seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person
39. Gone rock climbing
40. Seen Michelangelo’s David
41. Sung karaoke
42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt
43. Bought a stranger a meal at a restaurant
44. Visited Africa
45. Walked on a beach by moonlight
46. Been transported in an ambulance
47. Had your portrait painted
48. Gone deep sea fishing
49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person
50. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris
51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling
52. Kissed in the rain
53. Played in the mud
54. Gone to a drive-in theater
55. Been in a movie
56. Visited the Great Wall of China
57. Started a business
58. Taken a martial arts class
59. Visited Russia
60. Served at a soup kitchen
61. Sold Girl Scout Cookies
62. Gone whale watching
63. Got flowers for no reason
64. Donated blood, platelets or plasma
65. Gone sky diving
66. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp
67. Bounced a check
68. Flown in a helicopter
69. Saved a favorite childhood toy
70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial
71. Eaten Caviar
72. Pieced a quilt
73. Stood in Times Square
74. Toured the Everglades
75. Been fired from a job
76. Seen the Changing of the Guards in London
77. Broken a bone
78. Been on a speeding motorcycle
79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person
80. Published a book
81. Visited the Vatican
82. Bought a brand new car
83. Walked in Jerusalem
84. Had your picture in the newspaper
85. Read the entire Bible
86. Visited the White House
87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating
88. Had chickenpox
89. Saved someone’s life
90. Sat on a jury
91. Met someone famous
92. Joined a book club
93. Lost a loved one
94. Had a baby
95. Seen the Alamo in person
96. Swam in the Great Salt Lake
97. Been involved in a law suit
98. Owned a cell phone
99. Been stung by a bee
100. Totally copied a post from someone else's blog to your own
43/100 I actually got more than I thought I would

My problems with Snoopy - Advice needed

2008-10-24T11:19:00.006-03:00

My mood has not been good this week. I have been short-tempered with everybody at work, home, everywhere. I think it might be the change of season or maybe the fact that it's darker earlier in the evening and I feel like I don't have as much time to accomplish everything.

I know a HUGE part of my mood is my dog Snoopy (7 year old beagle/basset hound mix). Her anxiety level is through the roof. She is great all day but starts panicking as soon as we shut the lights off to go to bed. It started a couple of years ago when she was scared of thunder which isn't unusual for dogs. Then we figured she must have attributed rain to the thunder so then she was afraid when it would only rain, which is pretty frequently in the spring and fall. Then it was wind that she was afraid of in addition to all the rest.

At this point, I took her to the vet to see what they could do to help me. The vet prescribed a medication to help ease her anxiety. That worked to level her out overall, but it didn't help on those nights with rain/wind/thunder. So I took her back to the vet last fall when they prescribed a sedative to use during those nights. It worked well at the time.

Last year, she became terrified of new noises or changes in the house. Last fall, we replaced our carpet with hardwood flooring and it took her months to get used to that. It was to the point this past spring that we were going to find her a new home because we just couldn't handle her anxiety.

We decided to see how she was during the summer at the campground because she hadn't handled it well the summer before. This summer, she was as good as gold. You couldn't find a better dog at the campground, but she wouldn't carry that same demeanor home with her. So our weeknight sleeping was spotty at best.

Now with the new furnace we installed this summer with its new noises, she had started waking at 3-4am every night and whining and pacing until we get up for the day. Then as soon as we're up, she will go find her bed and lay down and sleep. On these nights, I've tried ignoring her, going to her, being strict with her, being affectionate with her, and no method seems to work. Not to mention that I just don't have the patience to deal with her when I've been woken up in the middle of the night. The medication doesn't seem to help anymore either. I give her the sedative before bed just so we can all get some sleep, and she's pacing when the lights are turned off and she won't settle down.

Clay and I got fed up again a couple of weeks ago and we did find somebody else who was willing to take her, but I chickened-out at the last minute. I figure she is our dog and we should be the ones to help her. I couldn't shake the guilt that I felt about giving her away.

So I really started working with her to improve the nights. I bought books and new leashes for training and I swear, Cesar Millan from the Dog Whisperer on National Geographic channel is my new favourite TV show! In the 2 weeks, she is doing much better with the furnace noise during the day, but we've had to resort to having her spend her nights in the garage so that we can all get some sleep. My current plan is to try the garage nights for a couple of more weeks and then introduce her back to the house while we're babysitting my parents' dog for 2 weeks so they can both be in the house. She always does much better when the 2 of them are here. I sometimes wonder if having a second dog might help her behaviour, but I just can't take the chance of getting another one and being wrong because I really don't want the full-time responsibility of another dog. Anyway, I wrote an entire book about my issue with Snoopy and what I could really use is some suggestions on how others might deal with this.

October 2008 update

2008-10-20T14:58:00.002-03:00

We are well into fall now. I intended to get some fall family pictures done, but we have been busy and never got around to it. Now, it's quite cold out so I doubt we will get them done. I might see if we could do them this weekend but we are supposed to get snow flurries on Wednesday, so it could be wet.

Preschool and tap dancing are going very well. Makayla loves both of the activities. I work very close to my house, Makayla's sitter's house and the preschool. I had intended to bring Makayla to work with me in the morning and take her to preschool then pick her up when it's over, however, I didn't realize how much of my job seems to take me away from the office on the preschool days (Tuesdays and Thursdays). I have had to get my neighbour whose son goes to the same preschool to take Makayla to preschool at least twice since it started a month ago and when neither she nor I could take the kids one day, they had to miss a class. This week was supposed to be fine, but then something got cancelled on Monday and rescheduled for Thursday at 11am when I'm supposed to be picking Makayla up. I believe that my neighbour can get her that day though. I just hadn't intended for my neighbour to have to help me so much. Thank goodness we're pretty good friends too.

Makayla can now count to 20 without getting mixed up at 15 like she used to. She loves manipulating numbers. She always counts how many kids are at the sitters in the morning then she will break it down to how many girls and how many boys. She has started to ask me about addition, like she will ask "how many is 4 and 4?" I explained how she could use her fingers to add up the numbers and she has started using this technique. She likes the alphabet too and even tries to spell some words. She knows CAT, DOG, YES, NO, MAKAYLA, JOSH. I can't determine if she is going to be right- or left-handed. She can write her name equally well with either hand and she doesn't seem to favour one over the other whether she is writing or eating. I guess time will tell.

Her favourite word lately is "actually" and her favourite colour is light blue. I can't count how many times she's told me that her "favourite colour is blue, ACTUALLY it's light blue". She can now dress and undress herself. Some shirts give her some difficulty going over her head, but overall I can get her some clothes and she can get them on. I did catch her getting frustrated with her pants the other day when she said "Oh, these friggin' pants!" Not cute. I will watch my mouth more carefully from now on.

Makayla and I went to a Thomas the Train live show this weekend. It was quite a pricy event and to be honest, it wasn't that good. If my neighbour and her son hadn't been going, I probably wouldn't have gotten tickets since Makayla isn't a huge Thomas fan. My neighbour purchased the tickets back in May and we got 3rd row floor seats. The seats were awful. You would think that sitting that close, you would have no trouble to see. I wished we had been sitting in the stands because I know the kids would have actually been able to see the show without having to stand on their chairs to see over the adults heads. It was extremely loud too. As soon as the show started, you could hear some kids around us start wailing because they were scared of how loud it was. Overall, the show was too expensive and not very entertaining. Makayla seemed to enjoy it though and that was the main reason for going.

Starting new things

2008-09-24T16:14:00.003-03:00

Makayla started preschool on Tuesday, September 16. At first I was worried that she would be shy and wouldn't want me to leave her there, but that was not what happened at all. She was a bit hesitant at first seeing all the kids she hadn't met before. I helped her change into her indoor sneakers and encouraged her to go play Play-Doh with some of the other kids. The parents were all hanging around waiting to see if their kid was going to need them. Makayla warmed up quickly and soon she ran up to me and said "You can leave now. I'm going to stay here." I didn't leave right away, just in case. So she came back up to me and said "I told you that you could leave now." I guess that was my cue. So I was the first parent out the door.

The preschool that is operated by the Boys and Girls Club takes place on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9 to 11am. Makayla comes to work with me at 8am for an hour and then I drive her to preschool for 9. I pick her up and take her to her sitter's then I stop at home for a quick lunch and head back to the office. If my schedule doesn't allow me to take her to preschool, I have a neighbour whose son also goes to the preschool who has agreed that we will help each other out when things come up. Makayla's sitter has also agreed to take her sometimes as long as I give her notice since she has one other girl that she looks after that she needs to get a car seat for.
Makayla has enjoyed preschool so far. She actually brought home some "homework" the other day. It was just a worksheet where they have to trace the letter B, but she was so excited about it. She hasn't been opening up much about what they are doing at preschool. When I ask her, she just changes the subject like she doesn't want to discuss it. She opened up a bit after Tuesday's class, so hopefully she will share more. I miss not knowing what's going on in her day.

Makayla also started tap dancing on Monday, September 22. She wasn't shy there either and she loved the class. The parents were allowed to stay and watch the first night, but starting next week, we have to stay out while the class is in session. There were about 12 kids in her class, two of which were boys. There is another Michaela in her class and my Makayla stayed glued to her side throughout the entire class. So cute. She followed the teacher very well and really seemed interested in what they were learning. The teacher was wonderful with the kids. She never stopped the entire half hour and was constantly doing something with them. Makayla was played out when the class was over. She can't wait for next week.

Fall is here

2008-09-11T15:44:00.002-03:00

The weather has gotten cooler in the mornings and evenings, and that is the sure sign that fall has arrived. We enjoyed our summer at the campground although the weather wasn't that spectacular this year. I think that I heard that we had 20% more rain in July/August than average. Makayla learned 2 new things this summer at the campground:

1. To ride her bike (with training wheels) all by herself

2. To swing without anybody pushing her

I am very proud of her for working hard this summer to figure these things out.

Next week she starts preschool for 2 mornings each week. She is excited for this and has been asking me almost daily when she starts school. I talked to the coordinator and she told me that there are 7 or 8 kids registered, so it's a very small group, but they are all kids that Makayla will go to school with.

I also signed Makayla up for tap dancing. She has been mesmerized with anybody dancing at various events we have gone to, and even on TV's "So You Think You Can Dance". After she was registered she told me that she needed tap shoes and a tap dress, so I had to comply. I will post a picture as soon as I take one. These classes start in a couple of weeks.

Our vacation

2008-08-13T16:14:00.004-03:00

Clay, Makayla and I were on vacation last week. The weather was rainy and cold all week. We tried not to let that bring our moods down, although I admit that I struggled with that a lot. The week started off with me taking Makayla for her 3-year old pictures.

My mother sewed Makayla's outfit for these pictures.

On our way home from getting the pictures done, I had to stop at the office. I left Makayla strapped in her car seat while I went in for a few minutes. As a side note, my office is in a rural area and it is essentially a small minihome with lots of windows (can walk through the entire office in less than 15 seconds) where I parked right next to the door. I didn't even think about whether she might have to pee since she hadn't said anything, but when I got back in the car, she was crying and saying that she tried to tell me that she had to pee but I wasn't there. And unfortunately, there was a wet car seat. I changed her pants and put a plastic grocery bag down and got her home within 5 minutes since we live that close to my office. I took the car seat out and brought it into the house. Makayla looked at the car seat in the basement and then a few minutes later, when we were all upstairs in the living room, she says "You guys, we have a big problem. My car seat won't fit in the washing machine." She was so serious and we just had to laugh. I showed her how the seat pad came off and how we could wash it.

At the campground, where we stayed during our vacation, Makayla loved to point out all the "spider nets" that were around. As much as I correct her and say that they are spider webs, she still insists on calling them spider nets.

I took Makayla to her first movie at the theatre. We went with Clay's cousin and her two kids to the movie "Wall-E". I didn't particularly enjoy the movie, but Makayla sat still through the whole thing and thoroughly enjoyed the popcorn we shared.

We took the 2-hour trip to Magic Mountain which is a water park with lots of waterslides. Unfortunately the day was really cool to be in the water so we didn't stay long. Instead, we went across the road to a place called the "Boardwalk" where they had a park, go-karts and bumper boats. We had a blast over there.

During the week, we had some nice campfires and roasted a ton of marshmallows. Makayla has built sandcastles, played some mini-golf and enjoyed riding her bike around the campground.

Now we're back to the usual schedule and we're adjusting just fine. Now last night, Makayla fell out of her bed for the first time. Clay and I were just getting into bed around 11pm when we heard a thump. I knew that the dog was laying down so we both figured it had to be Makayla. We went into her room and she was climbing back up into bed, but she wasn't even awake. She snuggled back in under the blankets and we never heard from her until 6:30 this morning when she had no knowledge of falling out of bed.

Our summer is quickly coming to an end and with the weather being so awful, it feels like we only had about 3 weeks of summer. I am signing Makayla up for preschool in the fall. It is for 2 hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I am also planning to get her into a dance class since she seems to enjoy that.

August 2008 renovation update

2008-08-13T15:58:00.002-03:00

The reno checklist:
New roof - Complete
New insulation/siding - Complete
Removal of the wood/electric forced air furnace - Complete
Installation of heat pump - Complete
New air exchanger in our new utility room in the basement - Complete
Taking our wood furnace and installing it in the garage - I'm not sure when the furnace guy is coming to do that, but hopefully soon since our garage now looks like a tornado blew through it.
Painting and putting laminate flooring in family room - To be completed this fall
Painting living room, hallway and master bedroom - To be completed this fall
Putting a second bathroom in the basement - On hold
Finishing our backdoor entryway (build closet/shelves, hide washer/dryer in a closet) - On hold

The reason that we are putting the second bathroom addition and finished entryway on hold for the time being is because we have spent quite a bit of money so far and want to try to sell one of our building lots to help pay the credit line down before we continue. We put a "for sale by owner" sign up on the 2-acre lot we were originally planning to build on since it is all levelled and ready for a house (which we did when we thought we were going to be building there). Not to mention that there is a lot of house construction activity in the area and we thought it would be the best time to put it on the market. Since putting the sign up last week, we have gotten 5 calls on the property. We have a pretty big price on the land since there is no work for somebody to build on the property. We're not desperate to sell it, but the money will help with the rest of the renovations.

The heat pump is now installed and operational. I love it!! There is so much more room in our basement and we won't have to be storing wood down there either. The dog is going to need some time to get used to all the new noises that the system makes. She is a pretty anxious dog to begin with and any changes are really hard for her to adjust to. She will get used to it just like she had to get used to the hardwood floors.

Funny things that Makayla says

2008-07-22T11:11:00.003-03:00

Makayla has said some of the funniest things lately.

1. "Oh yeah. Oh yeah. I'm a winner baby." She sings this to a little tune and throws a dance in too. Sometimes she interchanges "winner" with "loser" which we try to discourage. She sang this little ditty one day at the basketball court at the campground while she was trying to get her ball in the hoop.

2. "Excuse me. Are we going back to the campground?" She says this with a British accent which she learned from a little British girl at the campground. Clay and I didn't think that she would notice the girl's accent since kids her age tend to talk so differently anyway. But she must have picked up on it because she surprised us with this line one weekend. Now we get her to say it all the time.

3. "Don't mess with the John Deere hat." She has had to say this line to many kids at her sitter's. She LOVES her John Deere hat and wears it all day every day. The kids try to get her to take it off and this line is her response. Hilarious!!

Makayla turned 3

2008-07-03T16:02:00.004-03:00

I have been meaning to describe my little girl now that she is 3-years old. Her hair is still just as blonde as can be and has the most beautiful ringlets that really show when it is humid out. She is over 39" tall and weighs 32 lbs. The doctor said her weight is a bit low for her age and her height is above-average. Makayla is a very good-natured child. She impresses everybody she meets by how easy-going she is. I can't count how many times people have told me how they can't believe how easily this child goes to bed at night. She very rarely throws a tantrum. She is able to tell me how she is feeling so we are able to work things out by just discussing the situation. She thinks very logically, so much so that it scares me how logical this 3-year old is. We had some issues with Makayla being sassy to me and Clay just over a month ago and we had to give Makayla her first time-out. She hasn't forgotten it and still refers back to that time and how she doesn't want to go into time-out. She is also much more outgoing than she was previously. There has been such a difference between how shy she was around her 2nd birthday to how she is now. She is still cautious, but not nearly as shy as before.

We have been going through some phases over the last couple of months. The first phase included Makayla waking up way too early in the morning. She would get out of bed anytime after 5:00am. This seemed to start when the days were getting longer and the sun was rising earlier. I used to tell her that it was still dark out so she had to go back to bed, but I didn't have that excuse anymore. There were some very early mornings for a few weeks, but she came out of this phase recently, and I can't say that I miss it.

Shortly after this phase ended, another started. The next one includes her being scared of having a bath. She would become irrational and scream when I would turn the water on in the tub. She didn't want too much water in the tub and she didn't want it too hot. I would try to distract her by turning the water on and then taking her into her room to get undressed for her bath. She would try to get out of my grip and run to the bathroom to turn the water off. I wasn't putting more than a couple of inches of water in the tub and I would prove that to her when we got to the bathroom, but she just didn't seem to trust me. I seem to think she might have been scared of losing her toys down the drain, but I have no idea how that relates to the water being too hot or too high. I explained to her that her toys couldn't fit down the drain the same as the toys couldn't get sucked up by the vacuum (which her sitter had to prove to her recently as she was having a similar reaction at her house when she would start the vacuum cleaner). This phase seems to be ending right now. Yay!! I'm sure there will be another phase to take this one's place, and I'm confident that we will conquer it as well.

Makayla found a mole on her arm. She is used to seeing them as I have many moles on my body which she used to call boo-boos until I explained that they don't hurt like a boo-boo does. She was so proud to be able to tell me that she had a "polka dot" like Mommy has.

Makayla is able to spell her name if you ask her, and now she is learning to write it. She can write all of the letters really well but she struggles with the K. She tells me that the K is "tricky".

Makayla has a little lump on the back of her neck. It showed up when the black flies came out in full force and she had some bug bites on her neck. I figured it would go away when the bites healed. But those bites healed and others have come and gone since then, but the lump is still there. It isn't an open sore, it isn't itchy and it doesn't bother her at all when I feel for it. Since it's been there for nearly a month, I thought it best to get it checked out by her doctor, so we have an appointment next week. Hopefully it's nothing to be concerned about.

Makayla's 3rd birthday party

2008-06-25T15:16:00.008-03:00

We had Makayla's 3rd birthday party at the campground where we set up our trailer for the summer. Our campsite backs right onto the playground so it's a wonderful place to be with several 2- to 4-year olds.

Here are the kids at the party playing with the sand toys.
Makayla is patiently waiting her turn to climb the rope on the playground.
Did I mention that it was extremely difficult to get the kids to get off the playground to come over for cake and ice cream? It was another Dora party this year.
This is the one bite of cake that Makayla enjoyed before she begged to go back to the playground.
Here are the 3 girls at the party. We were down by the river looking to feed the ducks, but there weren't any ducks around.
Overall, the party went really well. It was really low-key with some hamburgers/hot dogs for lunch, cake and ice cream for dessert and some presents. I was very relaxed, when I am generally not when I am hosting a party. Everyone pitched in to help when Clay and I needed it. Most of the people who were there are telling us that their kids want to come back and play again this weekend.

Another renovation update

2008-06-25T15:07:00.004-03:00

New roof - Complete
New insulation/siding - Complete
Removal of the wood/electric forced air furnace - Completed early
Installation of heat pump - Heat pump is on order. Should arrive by July 10. Installation after that.
Taking our wood furnace and installing it in the garage - The furnace guy is going to install it now that it is removed from the house. He found a buyer for our electric forced air furnace.
New air exchanger in our new utility room in the basement - Furnace guy is also installing this along with the heat pump
Putting a second bathroom in the basement - Probably to be done this fall
Finishing our backdoor entryway (build closet/shelves, hide washer/dryer in a closet) - Probably to be done this fall

Here is the area in the basement where the wood/electric forced air furnaces used to be. Most of the stuff in this picture has now been cleared out of the basement.

The furnace guy ran these water lines in preparation for our new heat pump.
This is the area of the basement that will become another bathroom, laundry room and entryway.

Renovation update

2008-06-19T13:31:00.005-03:00

The new roof was installed last week and the house is almost completely done in the new siding. As of this morning, they just had a little bit around the front door, then they were going to work on the garage. Makayla doesn't think our house is crazy anymore. Now she just calls it the dark blue house.

The garage should be all finished when I get home from work today.
So to take a look at my reno checklist:

New roof - Complete

New insulation/siding - Should be complete by end of today

Removal of the wood/electric forced air furnace - To be done by furnace contractor in July

Installation of heat pump - Heat pump is on order. Should arrive by July 10. Installation after that.

Taking our wood furnace and installing it in the garage - Another job for the furnace guy

New air exchanger in our new utility room in the basement - Furnace guy is also installing this along with the heat pump

Putting a second bathroom in the basement - Probably to be done this fall

Finishing our backdoor entryway (build closet/shelves, hide washer/dryer in a closet) - Probably to be done this fall

Uncle Eric's wedding

2008-06-09T10:58:00.003-03:00

The wedding was beautiful. The day was not too hot, nor too cold. We were all comfortable in our short sleeves without sweaters, but the black flies were awful!! Makayla did an excellent job as the flower girl. She walked up the aisle with the bride's nephew who was the ring bearer. Clay stood at the back with the kids and told them to walk towards me since I was videotaping the wedding from the front of the church.

Here is Makayla posing for the photographer. I can't believe she sat so still for her.

Here are me and Clay with Clay's brother Eric (the groom in the tux).
Here are the 2 brothers and their wives - Cara and Eric, Clay and me.
The entire family is in this picture. I was surprised that Clay's parents stood next to each other for this picture since they usually can't stand to be in the same room together. Eric is holding his daughter Gracie.
During the reception, I gave the toast to the groom. Clay was supposed to do it but he hates speaking in front of a crowd whereas it doesn't bother me. We voted that I would probably do a better job. I think the toast went over well as people seemed to enjoy it.

My mom was invited to the wedding, so after the reception she took Makayla home to her house for a sleepover so Clay and I could enjoy ourselves at the dance, which we took advantage of. We caught up with a lot of old friends from the area where Clay grew up. We had a blast and stayed until the dance ended. It was a great day!

House renovations

2008-06-09T10:29:00.009-03:00

We really do love our house and the house we were going to build was almost exactly like it, just slightly bigger. I actually like our current lot better than I think I would have liked the one we were planning to build on. Not to mention that landscaping is already done where we are. Our renovation plans include:
New roof
New insulation/siding
Removal of the wood/electric forced air furnace
Installation of heat pump
Taking our wood furnace and installing it in the garage
New air exchanger in our new utility room in the basement
Putting a second bathroom in the basement
Finishing our backdoor entryway (build closet/shelves, hide washer/dryer in a closet)

Here is how it looked before we started doing any renovations.

Clay has always hated the light blue siding colour from the time we moved into this house 7 years ago. It's never bothered me, but it will look brand new when we get finished with it. Here is the colour we are going with. Here is the part under the deck where we fixed the boards and studs. As you can see, we didn't have to tear the deck off, we just had to remove one board to check the damage. They are going to leave the deck about an inch away from the house when they replace the board so that the seepage won't happen again. The siding was all removed. The siding was removed from the garage too. Look at our big mess in the yard.The roof is being replaced today and the siding should be installed by the end of the week.

Our house is OFF THE MARKET

2008-06-09T09:57:00.002-03:00

Since our house hadn't sold, nor were we getting any showings, Clay and I were making arrangements to do some renovations to our house instead. On Wednesday, May 28, out of the blue, our realtor called to say that we had an offer. Nobody had even looked at our house in 2+ months so we couldn't understand who would make an offer. She said that there was a military couple from Alberta being posted here and they loved our house online and wanted to guarantee that it would still be here for them to look at on Friday. Their first offer was a good one. It was actually our bottom line and that is the price where they were starting from. Clay and I debated that evening whether we would even counter the offer since we had made the renovation plans, but we decided to counter since we figured if we could get lots of money for the house, then we might as well try. So we countered on Thursday morning. The couple arrived Friday morning to look at our house and loved it. The countered our offer and by 12:30, we had agreed on a price. And it was $5,000 more than our bottom line. We were pretty excited....until the next day, when the home inspector came.

So Saturday afternoon, Clay and I are out looking at new houses being built to get ideas for siding colours and window styles, etc. and we get a phone call from our realtor. She says that the home inspection went very badly (and our house is in very good condition) so we couldn't figure out what could possibly have happened. There really wasn't much, but the little things he did find, he made mountains out of them. He stepped over the boundaries of his job description from home inspector to contractor and he gave the couple estimated costs to fix some of the problems. And he blew them way out of proportion. One of the issues was that there had been water seepage under out deck so the boards and studs were rotting. He told them that the deck would have to be torn down and rebuilt, the wall would have to be repaired, the patio door replaced, etc., to the tune of $23,000! So that is what they dropped their price by. I laughed on the phone to our realtor and said "No way!" Then they wouldn't give us any time to find our own contractors to get accurate quotations to fix it. I gave them our bottom line price and told them to take it or leave because I wasn't wasting contractors' time on the weekends to come out to our place if the buyers were just going to walk. They came back and said that they were backing out. Clay and I took this as our sign that we should take our house off the market and continue on with our renovation plans. (And by the way, the following Monday/Tuesday we fixed all the boards and studs under our deck, replaced our patio doors all without tearing our deck down, and for less than $2,000. Oh well, their loss.)

Makayla is going to be 3!

2008-05-27T16:40:00.003-03:00

Makayla is going to be a flower girl in her Uncle Eric's wedding a day after her 3rd birthday. This is the dress that I got for her at Children's Place on sale for $20. It isn't as formal as other dresses, but the wedding isn't really formal. The only thing I was told was to get her a white dress. Makayla loves this dress and she is so comfortable in it. The bride was happy with it when I sent her this picture, so that is all the say so that I need.

I can't believe that my little girl is going to be 3 years old in just over a week. I have planned her birthday party for a couple of weeks after the wedding at our campground site which backs onto the playground. I invited 3 of her friends as well as her 2 cousins. She doesn't do well with big crowds, so I tried to keep it small. We're just going to do a barbecue, some cake and ice cream and playing on the playground. Her best friend at daycare was so excited to get the invitation yesterday. We left it addressed to him in his home mailbox, so he got it when he got home yesterday. He couldn't wait to tell me this morning that he got his letter and he couldn't wait to come to the party.

As for presents, I had so much fun picking stuff out for her. She loves pretending to take pictures so I got her one of the kids digital cameras. She loves to play basketball at the court at the campground, but the balls are all regular sized, so my sister got her a small pink basketball. My parents are getting her her first bike. She will have a blast learning to drive this around the campground. Makayla also loves to play air guitar, so I found a pink Bratz guitar where she can strum the strings, push the fret buttons or just pull the whammy bar. Each of them make lots of guitar noises. I can't wait to see her reaction when she gets these gifts.

Makayla can count to 13 without any trouble. It starts getting tricky after that. It goes 12, 13, 16, five-teen, 14, then she just gets confused. She likes to work on getting it right though.

She told me her first "knock knock" joke last week. It went:
Her: Knock Knock
Me: Who's there?
Her: Boo
Me: Boo who?
Her: Don't cry. It's just a joke!
I couldn't believe that she was able to get through the whole thing without stumbling over the words. She must have learned this at her sitter's since we don't often tell knock knock jokes at our house.

Overall Makayla went through the past year without much trouble. She was a very good girl and rarely threw temper tantrums...like she might have had 6 all year. Now that she's nearing 3, she's getting a little attitude. I don't like the sauciness so we've had to be tough with her. Up until now, I haven't had to put her into time-out, and it's not because I'm lenient, she just never did anything that warranted it. In the past few weeks, I've had to threaten a time-out due to her attitude, and she would change her tune. This weekend, I had to break down and give her her first time-out. It worked at the time and now when she starts to get nasty, I just remind her what will happen if she isn't nice. So far, so good...

Status of our house

2008-05-27T16:15:00.002-03:00

As of right now, we haven't shown the house in over 2 months. We dropped the price by $5,000 when we came back from our vacation, but still no bites...not even any lookers. The price of gas isn't helping make our house look anymore attractive either with it being 10 km from town. As of today, the price of gas is $1.29/L which translates to $4.88/gal. So buyers can buy a house closer to town for more money than our house, therefore closer to their work (presumably) and shopping, and end up saving the difference in gas. I can hardly blame buyers for not being interested in even looking at our house. However, I am not that interested in building another house that I am willing to give our current house away at a low price.

The house we wanted to build is almost identical to the house we currently live in. We just figured we could sell our place, make a tidy profit, and be able to afford to build a brand new house for not much more mortgage than we currently have. As the price that we would be able to get for our current house goes down, the amount of our mortgage on the other end would go up, and we are not interested in that. So this is our plan of action...

Our real estate contract ends at the end of June. In the meantime, we are getting quotes to do renovations at our current house to make it everything that our new house was going to be. This includes changing out our wood/forced air electric furnace for a heat pump, replacing the roof, replacing the siding on the house and garage, adding a full bathroom/laundry room in the basement, and completing the entryway complete with closets and shelves at our back door area. And we're not changing our listing price, so if somebody comes along and is willing to pay, we will sell and build. Otherwise, we will let the contract run out and start into our renovation projects in July. We intend to fund this renovation project with the sale of our other building lots, so we still won't have as much into this house as we would if we built a brand new one. Not to mention that our landscaping is already done here which is one thing we weren't including in the price of our new house.

I will let you know how this turns out.

Aly Update

2008-05-22T15:09:00.002-03:00

Aly's mom found another place for Aly to go until she is finished her part-time job in June. T told her that it wasn't necessary to take her out now, that she would continue keeping her until June, but she started at the new place this week. For 2 years, Aly's mom has had Aly on a waiting list for a daycare at the school she wants her to go to, but the waiting list is years long and I think she is still 15th on the list or something. Ultimately she wanted Aly to go to the school's daycare program and T was just an interim daycare provider. I sure hope Aly gets the care and attention she deserves.

As an aside, I haven't had any trouble dropping Makayla off at T's anymore. She is excited to go there again.

Trouble at the babysitter's

2008-05-08T14:07:00.002-03:00

Over the last couple of months, I've noticed that Makayla hasn't been as excited to go to her sitter T's as she used to be. It wasn't really obvious at first, but I could tell there was a slight change.

Makayla is a kid who likes her own personal space and doesn't like other kids up in her face. She comes by this honestly as I am the same way. There was one little girl, Aly (2 1/2), who is a very "in your face" kind of kid. She was always excited when Makayla got there and would come up very close to greet her at the door. I would try to block Aly a bit so that Makayla could get her coat and boots off. This seemed to work.

During this time, problems had been escalating with Aly. Aly wasn't listening to T and she was being very rough with the other kids, some of them only 14 months old. And the younger ones were starting to imitate some of the more negative sides of Aly's behaviour. T had a chat with her mom to find out what sort of discipline she was using at home for these sorts of things so the sitter could be consistent. The mom's response was "I just ignore it." T knew that ignoring it wasn't an option at her house since the other kids were getting hurt.

I'm not sure I can adequately describe this woman. The mother (25 years old) just finished up her education degree, so she thinks that she knows quite a bit more about how to deal with children than most people do, because she read it in a book somewhere. She would recommend books for T (who has looked after children in her home for 14+ years) to read. The mother would belittle T and often criticize how she was looking after her daughter. But yet, even when she wasn't working (spring break, etc.), she still brought her daughter to T's because she needed a "me day". She would threaten to take her daughter to another daycare (which T secretly hoped would happen). Not only that, but the mother criticized some other parents (myself included) because our children weren't including her daughter often enough for her liking. On top of that, she had the nerve to tell off T's husband when he dared to look at her thong when she bent over in front of him. There is no love lost between this mother and many of us.

I knew her teaching job was coming to an end at the end of April, and secretly I was glad since I suspected that Aly's behaviour was affecting how Makayla was enjoying her time at T's. Just before she finished, she found out that she had gotten a part-time job at the school for 2 mornings a week for 6 weeks. So she asked T to keep her daughter during that time and possibly another day each week since she would need at least one "me day". She would then be off for the summer.

Aly came back on Tuesday. During that morning, after some pretty serious incidents, T realized that she just wouldn't be able to keep Aly any longer than the end of June. T has only ever had to recommend to 2 mothers that their children would be better off going somewhere else, and she really struggles with this since she wants to please everybody. But she figured that since Aly's behaviour was deteriorating instead of improving, she was obviously doing something wrong with her and she might be better served going somewhere else. When she brought this up to Aly's mom, she started blaming Makayla (not yet 3) and another kid that they weren't including her daughter enough which is why she was acting out. This comment (and others) reminded T why she had to do this.

I think a lot of Aly's issues stem from wanting attention from her mom. Her mom is a great one for telling us all what the books say about raising children, but I think she's spending too much time reading and not putting the information to good use on her own child. She has great intentions when it comes to how she wants to help the kids at school, but she should really start at home with her daughter. T has mentioned that she is certain Aly understands when her mom drops her off for her frequent "me days". T has even caught the mom driving by her house after work (i.e. going home for some more "me time") without picking up Aly. I really feel for this child because she is a good kid.

Punta Cana vacation

2008-05-08T13:23:00.010-03:00

Clay and I returned from Punta Cana, Dominican Republic one week ago. We usually go away with other couples, but we couldn't convince anybody to go this year. Due to that, we decided to stay at a 5* resort since we didn't have to concern ourselves with anyone else's vacation budget. We even splurged and upgraded our room to a swim-up room. Well, it was worth every penny!

We stayed at the Majestic Colonial.
From the time we arrived in the lobby, we were in awe at how beautiful this resort is.

Once we got to our room, we couldn't believe that we were fortunate enough to stay here for a whole week. Every room at the resort is a suite. We were greeted with champagne when entered our room.We had a nice large room with lots of space to unpack.
There were even the double sinks in the bathroom area. I didn't get a picture, but the shower was big enough for 3 people.
The whirlpool tub in the middle of the room was a nice feature. We noticed in the newlyweds rooms, the maids would set up a bubble bath for when the couple returned to their room.
This was the extra we got with our swim-up room upgrade - an outdoor Jacuzzi tub and our own lounge chairs which were much more comfortable than the regular ones.
There is no way that I could adequately explain the pool. It ran throughout the middle of the resort. It started near the lobby and ended down by the beach. It must have been 1/2 a kilometer long. There were about 5 bridges that crossed it so you could get from one side to the other. There were a couple of jetted areas in this pool. The water in those areas wasn't any warmer since it was just a part of the regular pool.

Now the beach was out of this world. I have never been anywhere with such a beautiful beach. You could walk for miles in either direction. There were all kinds of chairs and shade umbrellas so you didn't have to get out at the crack of dawn to reserve your seats for the day. We spent our mornings on the beach and our afternoons next to the pool.

One of my favourite parts of the trip was when Clay and I went parasailing. He has wanted to go for years, but I've been too chicken. He finally convinced me...and I loved it. We will definitely do this again.

Overall, Punta Cana was lovely and the resort was the best I've ever been to. I would highly recommend it to anyone. In fact, we may even be back there next year!

Makayla update

2008-04-08T15:26:00.002-03:00

Makayla will be 3 years old in two months. As of now, she knows her left from her right and has started to recognize words and not just letters. She recognizes her name as well as some short words (cat, me, no, yes). She loves to play games on the computer. She knows how to put the CD in the computer, start the game, play it and shut it down all by herself. She has some Disney preschool games that she loves to play.

She has been faithfully using the toilet since 2 weeks ago and hasn't had an accident. Last week, she started waking up dry in the morning and now doesn't want anything to do with a wet bum. There were a couple of nights where she woke up in the night to pee, but overall, she has been sleeping fine and waiting until morning to pee. I have to start paying attention to when she is drinking in the evening so I can stop her with enough time before bedtime so she won't get up in the night. The funniest part is that she has been sleeping in a twin bed with a bed rail for quite some time, but she still won't get out of bed herself. She still calls for me to come get her out even though she can get out on her own.

Clay and I leave to go to the Dominican Republic in just over 2 weeks. We're really looking forward to the trip as this has been a long winter. We've been prepping Makayla about her staying at Nana's house while we're away. She was fine last year when we went away and I know she will be fine this year, but she is the type of kid who needs to know stuff in advance. She doesn't work well with no notice.

Still so much snow!

2008-04-02T11:18:00.003-03:00

Our house hasn't been showing that much as we still haven't had the best of weather. We just start to get some nice mild days and then it snows again. Our realtor tells me that the whole real estate market in the city is slow right now due to the weather. She says that buyers want to see what is under all that snow. Unfortunately it could be July before that happens!

Here is what our house looked like in the fall.
Here it is now. We are buried in 4 to 5 feet of snow around the house. Our plowed snowbank next to the garage. We needed a loader to push that snow up there. This is our back walkway that has walls of snow around it. Now you can appreciate why I don't bother shovelling it anymore. My arms can't lift the snow up on top of that snowbank. Here is all we can see of Makayla's swingset. There is a slide and a Little Tikes car parked beside the swings, but we haven't seen them as they have been buried since December.
I am counting down the days until our vacation in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic!

Potty training - Follow-up

2008-04-02T11:15:00.002-03:00

I think we have potty training down as we've had no accidents since last Wednesday. Makayla is still a bit nervous to poop on the toilet, so she will hold it until she urgently has to go. But she will use the toilet at that point.

She woke up this morning and I could hear her calling to me "I have to go pee" over and over again. I went in to get her, and lo and behold, her diaper was dry. We went to the bathroom where she peed. I guess we'll see if this dry diaper in the morning thing happens more often.

Potty training - Weekend

2008-03-31T12:50:00.002-03:00

This weekend, potty training went awesome. In fact, it wasn't even like training. Makayla just told me when she had to go or thought she had to go. There were absolutely no accidents and I even took her out for lunch at a restaurant. I knew last week that if we were determined, she would get it this time, and it worked. I am so pleased.

Diapers were the last "baby" thing that Makayla used and now we've said goodbye to them (except at bedtime). It is a good thing because who wants to change diapers on a toddler, but it is also a sad time to think that she's growing up and isn't my baby anymore. Sniff, sniff.

Potty training - Day 4

2008-03-28T15:53:00.002-03:00

Makayla has still got the hang of it today. She broke my heart this morning though. She got on the toilet first thing, but she had already peed in her diaper, so she didn't pee anymore in the toilet. She got off and said "Mommy isn't proud of me anymore." I told her that I was proud that she tried to go pee on the toilet. I told the sitter about her statement, so she has also been trying to tell her how proud she is when Makayla just tries. Clay is going snowmobiling for the weekend which is good, so now I can concentrate on helping Makayla with potty training instead of Clay wanting us to go all over the city. It would be hard to practice potty training when we are dragging the kid all over the place.

In this process, I have to say that most of all, I appreciate Makayla's sitter. It has been a joint effort between us, but she has mostly dealt with it all week since I've been at work through the day. I have appreciated her advice and support in the process. She is a wonderful person and I can't tell her enough how much she means to both Makayla and me.

Potty training - Day 3

2008-03-27T16:11:00.003-03:00

We're part way through Day 3, and I have to say that today is going extremely well. She peed in her diaper before I went into get her this morning, and she told me that outright. I dressed her and off we went to her sitter's. She had a glass of milk around 9:10, and within an hour or so, the sitter knew that Makayla was holding her pee based on her stance (knees twisted inward). She would keep asking if Makayla had to go pee, but she would say no. At around 11, the sitter explained that sometimes your tummy hurts and so when you pee, it won't hurt anymore. Shortly after that explanation, Makayla said she had to pee. Away they went to the bathroom and then she asked "Can you hear it?" They had a big hooray with all the kids and called me to let me know of her success. By 3pm, I had received 2 more phone calls. One about a poop in the toilet and one more about peeing. Each time Makayla had told the sitter she had to go. She is still wearing the same pants that I dropped her off in this morning! I had been so focused on finding what incentive would work for Makayla, that I think I overlooked the obvious...she didn't know what I meant went I asked her if she had the "feeling" that she had to pee. She didn't know what the "feeling" felt like. After the sitter's explanation of her tummy hurting, I think she is putting it together.

Potty training - Day 2

2008-03-27T16:07:00.002-03:00

This day started out about as well as Day 1. Makayla had a few messes, but she did poop on the potty in the afternoon. She had another pee mess before I picked her up at the sitter's. I made her sit on the toilet before she went to bed. I waited her out since she was holding it and wanted to wait for me to put on her bedtime diaper so she could pee there. She sat for 45 minutes on the potty, but she finally peed. She was excited that I was proud of her and she would say "Mommy is so happy!"

Potty training - Day 1

2008-03-26T11:59:00.002-03:00

Day 1 went about as well as can be expected. At the beginning of the day, Makayla wouldn't tell her sitter when she peed. She would just pee and carry on. Makayla peed on her sitter's couch and floor and ran out of panties, so the sitter resorted to using another kid's underwear. She ran out of pants too, so I took her home with her snowpants on. We resumed the same routine at home of going to the toilet every 20-30 minutes. She peed on the kitchen floor, but like she had by the end of the day at the sitter's, she had told me that she had to pee while she was peeing. She was really freaking out when she peed at the end of the day, so hopefully this is a good sign and she will start recognizing the feeling before she has to pee and not want to have wet pants. Thinking good thoughts for Day 2.

Potty training...ugh

2008-03-26T11:34:00.007-03:00

We are back at potty training again. Makayla and I have been working on it off and on since last September. We start trying and then she doesn't seem ready, so I back off for a month or so. Now, she is only a couple of months away from her 3rd birthday, so Clay and I have decided that potty training must work this time. In the past, I have tried various incentives to get her to use the toilet (stickers, money for her piggy bank, candy, etc.) and they haven't worked. I've also used pull-ups with cool alert as a transition from diapers, but she doesn't see them as any different, so this hasn't worked. This time I am trying to appeal to her sensitive side, thinking that she might be more motivated to go to the toilet if it makes Mommy happy, but Mommy is disappointed when she doesn't go. We're also going cold turkey on the diapers. A cold, wet bum has got to be an incentive to want to use the toilet, right? Her babysitter is on board with this method too. We hope that when she realizes that we're both determined, she will cave. I welcome any and all advice.

The Backyardigans

2008-03-26T11:26:00.003-03:00

Makayla and I went to see the Backyardigans show at our local theatre. At first we met up with a friend of mine and her daughter for supper at "Old McDonald's" and to play in the playplace for a bit. Then we ventured down to the show. The show was very impressive and Makayla thoroughly enjoyed herself. Here she is waiting for me to get downstairs so we can go.

She picked out a Pablo toy to have as a souvenir of the show.
Here they are - the Backyardigans!!! It's a bad picture since we were in the back row.
Here is Makayla dancing in the aisle at the end of the show. She was bouncing up and down with all the other kids.

Random stuff

2008-03-19T11:00:00.002-03:00

Clay is still trying to get over his ear infections. The right ear, which had progressed to an inner ear infection a couple of weeks ago, still isn't quite right, so he has to go back to the doctor this week to see about it.

Makayla and I are going to see the Backyardigans show at our local theatre. I took her to the Big Comfy Couch show last spring and she loved it, so I know she is going to enjoy going this year even more. Unfortunately the weather is calling for some nasty stuff tonight through Friday. The temperature is supposed to be really mild tomorrow so hopefully it will just mostly be rain and not several inches of snow. We're supposed to meet a friend of mine and her daughter for supper before the show, so hopefully she will be able to make it as she lives an hour away.

Our house is still for sale. We had two showings last week. One of them said that the house was too far out of the city, which we've heard time and time again, so nothing new. The other couple also looked at our neighbour's house that is also for sale. Our neighbour's house is beautiful in my opinion. They have 3 completely finished levels, open concept, at least 4 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms, nice big rooms. Compared to our split entry house with 4 bedrooms and 1 bathroom, no open concept, and good sized rooms but not huge. We heard our neighbour's feedback before we heard ours. The couple said that their house was too small. Once I heard that, I knew that ours was going to be a dollhouse in their eyes, which it was when we finally got the feedback. Moving on...

We're still struggling to get our property deal worked out. We were told that by tomorrow, the government will have signed off on the deeds so then the property can be transferred into our name. We are so anxious to have this deal completed. One of the people buying a building lot from us is chomping at the bit to get his house building started. I guess he's bringing a bulldozer in this weekend to start clearing the lot. We did get approval for this from our government contact since he said it's just a formality for the minister to have to sign off on the deed transfer and it will be our property shortly. We have had the building lots surveyed and we do have approval for the building lot too, so it's just a matter of getting property transferred into all the appropriate names.

Makayla, my mom and I went on a big shopping trip a couple of weekends ago. Clay had gone out and I really wanted to get out of the house but didn't know what Makayla and I should do. I made a list of some things I needed to buy and off we went to the mall. We stopped at my mom's house since they had just redone their kitchen countertop and sink and I wanted to take a look at the finished product. She heard we were headed to the mall, so she wanted to join us. So off we went. Makayla had a blast. Nana tried on clothes, Mommy tried on clothes and even Makayla tried on some clothes. I found her a cute dress that she is going to wear as a flowergirl for my brother-in-law's wedding and some adorable shoes. I found a nice new spring coat for myself and Nana picked up some new clothes for her trip to Las Vegas and Key West. I know this trip was just one of many that we girls will have over the years. I was just so glad that Makayla enjoyed herself so much.

Easter is this weekend, which snuck up on me. I got Makayla a few little chocolate treats and some for Clay too. I got her a Shrek puzzle and some new crocs and bathing suit for summer. She enjoyed the Easter egg hunt we did last year so I'm excited to see how she does this year.

Another blog

2008-03-19T10:58:00.000-03:00

I started another blog showing all of my cross stitching work.

http://angela-crossstitching.blogspot.com/

ARMY

2008-03-11T16:39:00.004-03:00

Makayla asked last night if Daddy would play the "ARMY" game. Clay and I looked at each other, not knowing what the "ARMY" game was. Makayla slid under the coffee table and asked "Where ARE ME?" I guess she meant hide and go seek.

I finally finished!

2008-03-04T14:55:00.004-04:00

I have finally finished this cross stitch project that I've been working on since August 2007. It is a Thomas Kinkade design and it caught my eye the moment I saw the picture. Usually I can breeze through these projects relatively quickly, but there was a ton of detail in this one. I am extremely happy with how it turned out. Unfortunately it will have to stay tucked away in a drawer until I get it framed when we get our new house built.

Do you see the resemblance?

2008-03-03T14:51:00.004-04:00

Makayla is convinced that these 2 guys are one in the same. Do you see the resemblance?

The first is Prince Charming from the Shrek movies while the second is Eric Stromer from the HGTV show "Over Your Head". I watch HGTV quite a bit and I was surprised the first time Makayla looked at the TV and said "Mommy, it's Prince Charming!"

Makayla loves to play the computer. I never dreamed that she would be capable of playing a game all by herself at her age of less than 3, but I was wrong. She started by learning on her Leap Frog "My First Computer" that she got for Christmas. It is a keyboard that includes a small mouse that plugs into the TV. I showed her how to use this and she was a pro by her third time using it. She would occasionally ask me to play on our real computer, but I figured she was too young. I showed her a Mickey Mouse kindergarten game that a friend of mine gave me since her kids had outgrown it, and Makayla was keen to try the game herself. I showed her how to run the mouse, which she pretty well knew from playing with her Leap Frog computer. Now, she can sit and play the games without any help from me. I told Clay that she is going to be showing him how to run the computer before long.

We haven't had any more house showings, but we've been so overwhelmed with snow, that I'm sure nobody is interested in looking at houses right now. I know that I am tired of shovelling snow. The snow banks in our backyard are currently over my head, and we're calling for another foot of snow on Wednesday. The snow seems to drift into our backyard and hardly touches our front yard. I've decided that I'm not shovelling the walkway in the backyard again, so we'll just have to start using the front door for the rest of the winter. Even Clay was in agreement with this.

One year ago, I was sitting on a cruise ship in the Caribbean. Oh how I wish I were sitting there again!! I just have to keep thinking, less than 2 months before we go to Punta Cana.

Nothing much new

2008-02-29T09:44:00.002-04:00

Not much has been going on in the last week. Clay and Makayla got sick last weekend so I spent the first of this week dealing with that. I had to take Monday and Tuesday off work so Makayla could stay home and rest. Makayla is not a cuddler, so when she woke up on Monday night all feverish around 9:30 and wanted to snuggle with me, I jumped at the chance. We snuggled up in the rocking chair for an hour when I convinced her she should try to go back to bed. Clay figured that I would be sick by the end of the week after that, but it was so worth it. By the way, I'm not sick yet.

We had another house showing last week. The couple loved the house and the garage, but thought it might be too far out of town. They did have our house in their top 3 and were considering the distance from town. I was glad that there weren't any complaints about the house so I didn't spend the entire weekend trying to fix them. We haven't heard back, so I'm assuming they probably went with one of the other 2 houses. That's alright because the spring season will be coming soon and more house lookers will be out.

The land we bought has a little issue with it. The government owns a strip through the front of the property as well as through 3 other properties adjacent to us. We knew this when we bought it and we took it upon ourselves to spearhead the resolution to this issue. We contacted the other affected landowners to convince them to go ahead and purchase the strip from the government. They weren't in a hurry to do anything about it as they weren't trying to sell building lots off their properties like we were. Fortunately, we convinced them all to go ahead with this. It isn't going to cost a lot of money and it will be better for everybody in the long run. As of yesterday, the government had given our lawyer all the relevant information and hopefully we will have this resolved within a couple of weeks. We're really keen to get it resolved as we have 2 buyers who want to purchase building lots from us. We can't do these deals until we own the entire property. We really would like some of this money in our pockets.

Makayla is going through a spell where she is whining and talking baby talk a lot and it's driving me and Clay crazy. She knows how to speak like a big girl, so we have to keep reminding her of that. I think she is copying some of the kids at the sitter's as I can hear one of the kid's voices coming right out of her when she talks this way. I am looking forward to this phase being over.

On a happy note, I think that Makayla is getting closer to being potty trained. This week, she has told me a couple of times when she is peeing. This is a huge step for us. Now I have to focus of getting her to the toilet a lot so we can start catching it. I told her sitter and she confirmed that Makayla had been telling her too. Yay!!!

Makayla loves any kind of juice. This week, I introduced her to Kool-Aid. She started calling it regular juice to distinguish it from the orange juice or apple juice. If you could only hear the way she says "regular". It is hilarious.

Getting closer every day

2008-02-19T15:46:00.002-04:00

Today, Clay and I went into see a mortgage specialist to see if we could get pre-approved for a building mortgage. Within just a few minutes we were all approved. The mortgage lady happened to be a girl that I went to junior high school with, so it wasn't quite as formal as far as bank meetings go.

Now we just need our house to sell. It has shown 4 times in just over a week which, in my head, I know is a lot. Clay keeps telling me to relax and that it will sell quickly. I really don't want it to sell right away as we would have to move in with my parents for a longer period of time, but I would like to know that we have a buyer so that we can continue on with our building plans (and I wouldn't have to keep my house spic and span all the time). We plan to live in our travel trailer as much as we can, but that isn't even possible until at least May.

I have one more issue to gripe about regarding house showings. Out of the 4 showings we've had, two of the groups have commented that the house is too far outside the city for them. Don't they already know this before they even book their appointment to look at the house? I mean, shouldn't they have already driven by? I guess I would have if I were in their shoes, but maybe the realtors are just suggesting they look at our house. Even still, they should know as soon as they drive into the driveway that it is too far away from the city for them. Okay, I should just be happy that we're getting showings. I just get my hopes up for an offer when someone walks through, only to hear that the house isn't in the right location. I'm done griping now.

House showings

2008-02-15T09:58:00.002-04:00

We've had the house listed for less than 2 weeks, and we've had 3 showings so far. It's been 7 years since we sold our previous house so I was a bit out of touch with the whole real estate market. When we sold our previous house, we didn't have Snoopy, so there were no issues if somebody wanted to come see the house. We just kept it clean and tidy and we could show it at a moment's notice. This time, we do have a dog that I need to pick up before every showing. It's really not a huge deal as I only work 5 minutes from my house. I have to say, I was expecting that we would be getting a bit more notice about showing our house.

For our first showing, our realtor called me with 5 hours notice. That was fine. I had all kinds of time to grab the dog and do a quick run through with the vacuum, etc.

The second showing was during a snowstorm, so I had actually written the day off for house showings since I didn't think that anybody would be out on the roads that day. We had less than 2 hours to get ready for that particular showing. Fortunately it was a Sunday so as soon as we heard about it, Clay went outside to plow the driveway while I shovelled the walkways and did the same run-through as during the previous showing. We managed to leave with half an hour to spare.

As I posted yesterday, we had an snow/ice storm late into Wednesday night and our power was out from midnight on. I was in town and away from my office (i.e. further away from home) when I got a phone call from my dad telling me to return a call to my realtor. I called her back and was told that somebody wanted to look at our house in 45 minutes. I told her that our power was out so it might not show very well, not to mention that the yard was a mess after the storm with tree limbs down and one tree flowered open into our driveway. She told me that it was a military couple being transferred to our area and they had to buy a house within the next 2 days since the storm had already shortened their house hunting time. I jumped in the car and drove home as quickly as I could considering the awful road conditions. It took me 10 minutes longer than it normally would have on good roads, so now I only had 20 minutes to tidy up and with no water or electricity available to me, it was definitely a challenge. I'm not sure when they arrived, but we never heard anything back in terms of an offer.

The notice we've been given has been getting progressively shorter. Forty-five minutes is about as short as I can go. I want to sell my house and be available for showings, but yesterday was a bit ridiculous. Probably if we had gotten an offer, I wouldn't be so frustrated about it today.

Ice storm

2008-02-14T14:10:00.003-04:00

Yesterday was a miserable day in terms of weather. The snow started at around 8:00AM and came fast. By lunchtime, we had nearly 6 inches and the roads were beyond awful. My dad called and told us all to call it quits for the day and go home. The roads hadn't been plowed, so I creeped up the road in the one set of tire tracks on the road. Thankfully I didn't meet another vehicle, so I was able to stay where I was. I picked Makayla up at her sitter's and we went directly home. I was never so happy to see my driveway! Once we got home, the freezing rain started. It rained for hours. I'm not sure when it stopped, but I do know that our power went out shortly after midnight and still isn't on now at 2:30PM. There is a power line on the ground just down the road from our house and no sign of any service trucks there to fix it. I'm not holding out much hope for having power after work. We may be bunking with my parents tonight.

Unfortunately, due to me picking up Makayla early, she missed the Valentine's Day party at the sitter's house. I don't think she was that upset since she's still quite young to understand. Instead, I gave her the Valentine's Day present that Clay and I had gotten for her. She got some Dora books, some chocolates and her favourite thing ever - two puzzles. Makayla would put puzzles together for hours. She can manage 24 piece puzzles on her own. I also got her a 48-piece Shrek puzzle, but I put it away for her birthday in June.

Makayla has been asked to be a flower girl in her uncle's wedding this summer. I got her a dress this week in a size 3 and there is some room to grow, but not too much. She was really excited to try it on, but she was just as anxious to get it off too. The bride asked me how I thought Makayla would make out as a flower girl. I had to be honest and say that I just didn't know as kids can be so unpredictable. I'm not in the wedding so I can focus on making sure Makayla can perform her role. She is going to be adorable.

My first post

2008-02-11T14:35:00.000-04:00

I've been keeping an online journal about Makayla, but I find that lately, I've been tending to document things that have nothing to do with her and it seems inappropriate to use her journal as a place to record things like that. So today, I decided I would finally start a blog that would encompass our entire family life.

My husband and I have a lot of things going on right now. We recently purchased a piece of land that we intend to subdivide into 7 building lots. We currently have 2 people interested in buying lots and we would like to keep at least 2 for ourselves. Due to the fact that we now own this property, we would like to build a new house this summer. So, that led us to list our house for sale. We listed just over a week ago and already we've had two showings, but no offers yet. Since we don't know if/when our house will sell, we've been looking at house plans so we can hit the ground running when it does.

Makayla is our only child and we have no plans to expand our family anytime soon. We're both quite happy with our family size at the moment and don't feel any urge to add on. That's not to say that we never will, but we're going to keep things the way they are for the time being.

Makayla is now 2 1/2 years old and she says some of the most comical things. C and I were out with her and she says from her carseat "I can't get my bless you out." She had to sneeze, but it didn't come. If she only knew how often that happens to me!

The other funny thing is that she doesn't quite understand why we have to leave the house when people are coming over during a house showing. She thinks they are coming to visit us, so she gets a bit confused. We returned home last night after the showing and Makayla asked me where all the "people" were. I told her that they had left already because they were there to see the house and not us. Hopefully it sells quickly so she won't be confused for too long.

Well, that my first post. I sure hope I can keep this updated!