Deep Freeze

I haven't been blogging because, my fingers were frozen? No, I just haven't had the time, but here I am lucky world!! Back for another short report on our goings on.

This week has been a bit of a shake up in the Davis house. Wes has been taking Gavin to school. After a rather bad end to last week, Mommy is done trying to convince, cajole and force her oldest to go to school. Its Daddy's job now. He can do it for a while. After all, if Gavin refuses to go in what is Daddy going to do, take him to work?

So, the girls are enjoying the mornings of sleeping in and not braving bitter cold. Its a bit of a relief for me too, less conflict in my world is a good thing.

Today I was the volunteer for the morning at Gavin's school. It was fun. I discovered what a weird bunch of pickles grade oners are! Ha, its not just my kid - they are all like that!

Bronwyn had dance yesterday. Nearing the end of class I could tell that she had to go to the bathroom. There was only a minute left, so I just took her out. When she was done, I tried to get her to put her winter stuff on. She FREAKED out. She kept crying, "All I want to do is dance with the girls." I thought she'd understand that class was just about over, but no. All I can say is that I sure learned my lesson!

What has Mari been up to? Sheesh - got an hour! Lets just say she is a mischief and a goof ball.

I haven't been taking pictures. I'll try to get some in the next little while and post something worth looking at.

It has arrived...

So my prediction that this is the year that we finally evade winter is, well, wrong! Winter landed last night. Unfortunately and in typical Calgary style it came suddenly. So there was rain, freezing rain, slush and then snow.

How do I know this? Since it happened in the night? Well, I can tell by the layers that I shovelled this morning. By the way shovelling is man's work!

Luckily I didn't have to use the van until this afternoon and there was time to figure out how to get the van doors open. They were frozen shut.

This morning, I had to break in to get Gavin's car seat so he could go to school with the neighbors. The only door that would open was the driver side. So I got in and crawled over the front seat to the back. As I did this my butt touched the visor and I got stuck in the rear by the poppy I had tucked up there (so it wouldn't POKE ANY ONE).

So winter has arrived. Today is our busy day. So I get to do all our running around in the snow. Yeah!

Loose ends

I'm feeling a bit restless this weekend. Not sure why. My husband is likely right, it probably is just my "hormones."

I'm just sort of bored and feeling lacking in purpose.

I think we get going at such a pace that when life settles down for a moment or two I don't know what to do. And I have time to sit and look around... at ALL THE PROJECTS THAT NEED DOING! Then I feel overwhelmed and get up to find something else to do. Vicious cycle!

I've been trying to get Christmas organized, get photos etc uploaded and presents ordered. I try to do about 90% of my Christmas shopping on line. I'm not much of a shopper and I dislike crowds. The Internet is great for avoiding people, except Facebook, its littered with them.

I sometimes, while I am doing dishes (usually while I'm doing dishes) wonder what life would be like if we lived in Africa. Poor in Africa. I imagine myself trying to find ways to wash the one cooking dish I own so as not to use up any precious water. It would be like camping, except most places we camp around here have access to potable water. Then I think about how much STUFF we have. And how much of it is necessary. Very very little. That usually get me thinking about going through the kids toys and weeding them down, and OTHER PROJECTS THAT NEED DOING AROUND HERE!

I realize I'm rambling. But that is OK with me, if I wasn't rambling on here, I'd be sitting on the couch doing puzzles or making lists of ALL THE THINGS I NEED TO DO!

Sigh.

Falling back

The dreaded time change happened this weekend. It is so hard on the kids. Today Bronwyn fell asleep after school. You wouldn't think that shifting one hour would take such a toll on them, but it sure does.

They were up very early on Sunday morning, their internal clocks not being at all aware of the shift that happened overnight. So I took advantage of the extra time and the nice sunshine to get a few pictures before heading off to church. Mari is not the most cooperative. The other two are more than willing to pose, but, well... Gavin likes to have action shots, you know, of him throwing a football at the camera! Bronwyn loves to pose, it just involves a lot of odd faces and strange hand gestures. I don't know, all I ever did as a kid was stick my tongue out at the camera. At least I was predictable.

Speaking of predictable, I was thinking today that it is likely less difficult to wrestle an alligator than get Mari in her car seat. At least an alligator is predictable, Mari not so much. But, you say, alligators bite, well so does Mari!

I really feel in my bones that this is the year we will skip winter. I just know it! It won't come! I'm so sure of it. Just keep the great weather rolling in.

Parental discipline

Gavin has taken to "disciplining" us when he is unhappy. Today he told Daddy, when Daddy corrected him for not listening in the bathtub, that he would take away one of his privileges. "I'll take away your truck." I guess he is struggling with the difference between a privilege and a necessity, since Daddy needs the truck to work and feed the family.

He told me earlier in the day, when I refused to continue reading with he and his sister as they were fighting too much, that he would call my Mom and Dad and tell on me. This didn't cause me to shake in my boots. I asked him what they could do to me. He said they would make me stay at their house for a week. Well now! That would be punishment indeed.

Or course Bronwyn started crying because she didn't want Mommy to go away for a week.

He is trying to exercise his authority, he just needs to do some fine tuning on his methods.

Little story

Gavin is at school and the girls are just playing around. Mari has a little block of wood and is pretending it is a microphone. She can really belt it out!

I just wanted to tell this little story. Thought Bronwyn's many fans would get a bang out of it.

The other day Wes got up early to go to Rona to order some windows for a job. He asked me to help him find the car keys, since they weren't where I normally leave them.

We searched and searched. I was really distracted and frantic, not being able to find them. I sent him off with my spare key, and I continued to look for my keys. Bronwyn was the only one home with me since the other two went with Daddy. I was walking around muttering about needing to find my keys.

Bronwyn offered to help me find them. I thought that was so sweet of her and thought it might not hurt. So I started wandering around again looking for my keys. She came and took me by the hand and led me to the kitchen. She pulled up her little chair to the counter. I said, "Where are you looking?" She pointed to my green junk bin. I said, "Honey, I would have never put them in there." She nodded and said, "Try there." So I started digging. I was just proclaiming that they weren't in there either, when I saw a metallic flash and quickly grabbed my keys.

I turned to her with great surprise and said, "How did you know they would be there?"

She looked up at me with a beaming smile and said, "Because I put them there."

Hang on to your hats

We had the busiest week.

Bronwyn had her Halloween party for preschool on Monday. Mari tagged along and had a blast.

Gavin had a party on Friday at school and that was exciting too.

Saturday was his birthday party. The good news is no one called the cops in to shut the party down. A bunch of very excited young kids = a whole lot of noise! It was great fun. Gavin wanted a pirate party and was pretty specific about what he wanted for a cake. I looked and looked and looked for a little pirate boat. But couldn't find one. I know that now when I go shopping I will find three or four in each store. GRRRR!!

Wes helped me out and together we made a little boat. I did the bottom part he took care of the sails. Team work!

I was barely standing by Sunday morning, but off to church we went and then for lunch with friends and then home to get ready for trick-or-treating. Wes took the kids while I stayed home and handed out candy. One for the cute kid at the door, one for me, and on and on.

Today, I am working very hard at doing as little as I possibly can. That is my goal. I may have to do the dishes, but for now I'm putting that off.

Hope you all had a candy filled weekend.