Just a plain ol' Tuesday

No major excitement here today. Kids seemed a bit aggravating at times today, must be the full moon! They were fine this morning, playing around happily, then they started fighting over lots of stuff & I decided to divert them by baking cookies. This took us to lunch & then we ate & I suggested going outside. They didn't immediately resist so I thought I was on to something. Ha! Foolish woman! Sweetie insisted on wearing a heavy zip up jacket over her Tshirt. This made it bulky under her snowsuit and immediately sent her into hysterics. I offered her a different sweater that wouldn't cause the same problem and tried to ignore the screaming. Then Honey got upset about something else and Lovey developped some problem or other and all 3 were crying about something at one point. I kept getting myself ready wondering just how illegal it would be to go for a walk by myself and leave them home!!! They noticed I seemed to be getting ready without them & decided to join me. We got outside & then it was all fine. The driveway was a bit slick from the rain so they mostly stayed on the snowbanks but not before Sweetie wiped out & banged her cheek. Niiiiiiiiiiiice. oh well, bruises add character don't you think?

They decided to try & climb the trees which didn't do much for the snowsuits but they had fun & winter's almost over (isn't it???? tell me it is!) and these suits aren't going to fit next winter so they might as well go out with a bang! :) Unfortunately when you scrape tree bark, it can flake off & fall in your eye which kept happening to them. I'm sure it was uncomfortable, probably even painful but oh man I wasn't in the mood for more screaming. I tried to find whatever was in there & got some bits out & couldn't see anything else but they could feel something! After a few episodes of this I knew I couldn't handle much more freaking out & suggested we go inside. Then Honey & Sweetie got upset about something else and the screaming started all over again. I brought Lovey inside & let them calm down out in what we like to call the "crying porch". Sometimes the pitch or decibel that they are hitting is just about enough to send me round the bend & a little distance & noise barrier never hurts. After a few minutes they gave up on the waterworks and were ready to come in. They got their stuff off & ran off to play, no problem.

Actually Sweetie is having a monster fit right this very moment. Screaming and crying up in her bedroom. The atrocity we've committed? She doesn't want her hair curly. It's 11:18pm!!! Like I'm going to get out the flat iron & hair gel?!? Well what initially set her off was that she had to pee. Murray took her to the bathroom & as soon as she sat down she screamed at him, NO PEEEEEEE! and then had the longest whiz in history while maintaining her screwdriver through the brain noise. This led to the problem with the curly hair and evolved into "I only want a sheet, not BLANKETS!"

Holy crap 11:28, screaming still full tilt. I gotta go do something about that! I feel bad for the girls that are trying to sleep up there!

Whirlwind trip ie Stupid Winter Weather

We were supposed to go away for the weekend to visit Murray's parents but on Friday the weather conditions were terrible & the roads were crap too so we parked it for the night. Murray was secretly (well, not that secretly) glad about the delay as he got to play his game Friday night. (bad road conditions do not keep a good defenceman down). He said it was a good thing he showed up as there were only 4 other players crazy enough to go out in that weather for a ridiculous game at an ungodly hour. (he may have left out the part after "players" ;)) They had to borrow players from the other team but he got a goal and an assist & they won their game. (does it count if you didn't actually use your own team to do it???)

All the kids & grandkids, thank goodness for the new kitchen layout!
The boys hanging out while us girls were out on the town.
Me & my Mr. Bojangles

A little after 5am Saturday, Sweetie is having trouble in her room & needs to come sleep with us. "Sleep" being a loose term for what she had in mind. She rolled & wiggled, she talked with Bunny, she got too hot, she needed a drink and on and on it went until 6:45 she decides she'd rather be in her own room. then she slept in til 9am. Talk about annoying! Keep us up for almost 2 hours in the middle of the night, then bail when her sisters are almost ready to get up & then lounge in bed til half the morning's gone. Oh Sweetie, just WAIT til you're a teenager & want to sleep in. We will get you back & we're prepared to wait a decade to carry out our revenge. Muahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!

I tried to get updated road conditions but there was nothing new online since the evening before & it didn't look too great then. Eventually I got in touch with someone on the phone who said things were good so we packed up & left. We didn't arrive there til almost 3pm so most of the day was shot. However, the roads were clear & the screaming was almost non-existent so that beats an 8 hour stormy snail's pace trip any day. It didn't leave much time to do anything else & I had to cancel a get together with my friends but I did get to go out with my female in laws for the evening as planned so all was not lost! We had a great time & Nancy even suggested we do it annually.

When the girls arrived, there were treats waiting for them. They each got their very own box of valentine's chocolates with a little teddybear on top. They thought the boxes were pretty but were really much more interested in the bears!

Karen was kind enough to take me shopping so I could get a few things I've run out of & Flowergirl joined us so I got to spend time with her too. I haven't seen her in months & talking to her on MSN just doesn't cut it! We had fun shopping & got lots accomplished. Most importantly, I got something done that Murray has been unable to do despite intensive searching on his part. We have a dual DVD system for the car that Murray's parents got us in hopes of making the travelling to visit them less painful & it has made car trips MUCH better. In the pre-DVD days there was generally at least 1-2 hours of screaming which was a little hard to ignore, even with earplugs (yes we really did use them!). With all the kicking going on in the backseat, the cables between the 2 monitors got damaged and unless the 2nd player's cable was twisted just so, it didn't work. On the trip down, I couldn't get the 2nd one to work at all. So Lovey couldn't see the 1st movie & when I switched the players for the next one, Honey couldn't see it. I decided that just wouldn't do and went to an electronics store today. I really try to avoid Sunday shopping but I was feeling a little desperate. The first store I went into didn't have the mono to mono cable I needed but suggested a set of stereo ones that he thought would work. Karen knew there was another store nearby so we checked that out too & they did have the right ones. Time invested: 25 minutes. Money spent: $18 ($9 of which is refundable once I return the stereo one) Kicking Murray's butt: PRICELESS! : ))))) Driving home with kids contentedly watching movies: INVALUABLE!!!!!!!!

Everybody loves Flowergirl!Flowergirl hosted a "secret meeting" with the kids & their animals.
Lovey, Honey, Flowergirl & Sweetie (Flowergirl is where Lovey got her middlename)




Grampy entertaining the girls

Our trip was short but sweet, hopefully next time Mother Nature will take it easy on us & we can enjoy a whole weekend away.

Happy V Day!

My favourite Valentine! Love you hawney!

The girls had a pretty awesome Valentine's day yesterday. It was off to a hectic start as we raced off for gymnastics for 9am but we made it despite the stormy weather. School was closed but luckily, not the gym! Everyone else made it today too so it was more fun than last week.

After the lesson was over at 10, all the kids went over to the climber thing (slides & tunnels, netting etc) and played. and played. and played. We were the last ones there & at 3:30 (yes, FIVE and a HALF hours later) I had to drag them out of there. I have no idea how long they'd have stayed in there if it had been up to them but it was close to 4pm when we got home so that was long enough. Luckily I'd come prepared this week & there was enough lunch to keep everybody happy and they had their drinks to keep them hydrated. Not surprisingly, they slept pretty well last night!

When we got home, there was a surprise in the mailbox! A Valentine's package from Grammie & Grandad. This went over like gangbusters of course. They looooooooooove getting mail addressed to themselves and to have treats on top of that just about put them over the moon. It was quite exciting to rip into those goodies and they were very happy with their loot. They decided to stick their stickers into their valentine cards and have been keeping everything in the gift bag it came in & carry it around or put it on their nightstand for safekeeping.

Ice Ice Baby...

Ok, first of all, how many people remember that song? Anybody else still think it's good? : ))) LOL

this one is pretty close to what I'm going for. I used my telephoto lens & set it to macro so that helped isolate the iciness but still not "amazing"

So I'm still in pursuit of my perfect "ice" picture but got some ok ones yesterday. I can't quite seem to get the hang of framing it so the sparkliness is captured. These looked way more impressive to the naked eye, now why can't I see it behind the lens??? I want that perfect beautiful winter icy calendar shot and now that it's eluding me, I'm becoming obsessed with it. Eventually I will have my way.

The kids must have felt bad that I wasn't getting that look that I wanted so they started chucking ice chunks at the garage. I asked them what they were doing!?!?! and Lovey said "trying to make the garage sparkly for you Mumma!"

I am Princess, hear me roar!

Snack time at the royal court

Another day in princess land! They're back on a pink princess dress kick & are putting these on pretty much as soon as breakfast is over. Honey seems to prefer her velveteen Christmassy dress but still maintains her princess status. It's all in the way one carries herself & not tied up in the apparel.

Princesses travelling incognito...

don't forget the flounce & flourish at the end of your twirl...

and what every royal household needs, more princesses! Teena & Boo came over Wednesday afternoon. It took me forever to convince my royal darlings that they should go outside. The major obstacle to getting dressed in snowgear is that "princesses don't wear pants" (or socks either). With all the snow I was trying to get enough space cleared so Teena could park when she got there but as it turned out, the dawdlers foiled my plan. We had just gotten the shovels out when they pulled up & parked on the side of the road. So we just let the kids play instead.

We're gonna rage around the clock tonight......

Well it wasn't really tonight but the other night Sweetie was in fine form! She'd woken up crying because she had to pee. So the obvious fix for this would be to go the bathroom, right? One would think. However, this infuriated her to no end & she started crying & hollering as soon as I sat her down. She'd almost have you believe you were mistaken, that she did not in fact need to do any such thing, were it not for the violent stream of urine I could hear hitting the water. Thinking I'd now wrap up this little visit, I got her pj's back in order and started to carry her back to bed. Wrong again. She was still furious. Something about the pants or underpants or pj's was wrong. Too rimply. or was it rumbly? Either way, I was screwed! Hoping she'd be tired & drift back to sleep once I got her back in bed, I proceeded to tuck her in but she just kicked off the blankets, still mad about the rimpli/rumbli-ness. So I try to rearrange her clothing to see if that might mollify her. Negative. THAT'S NOT HOW I DO IT!!!!!!!!!!!! She had herself worked up to a pretty good frenzy at this point so I just laid there with her, trying to wait it out. Tears were streaming down her face. I felt bad for the poor little thing & wiped her cheeks. MY TEARS!!!!!!! I WANT MY TEARS! PUT THEM BACK!!!!!!!!! If I could have squeezed a drop out of the sleeve I'd used, I totally would have. The volume & intensity of this little fit was UNbelievable. Murray was sure I'd skewered her with a hot poker and came up to put an end to the torture, only to find out I was the one suffering! She was still going strong & I'd run out of "soothing" ideas so I decided to let him work his magic on her. Not ten minutes later he came stomping down the stairs with the screams of "MY TEAAAAAAAAAAAARS!!" following behind him. I let her stew for a little while. I turned on her light to see if maybe that would help. I asked if she wanted to go sleep in my bed for awhile. That got her attention but she was still pretty keen on the screaming thing. I closed her door & left & got myself ready for bed. When I came back & asked again, she was ready & settled right down. We got in bed, said some prayers and after awhile she was ready to go sleep in her bed.

Oh It's Lovely Weather for...

More snow but sooooooooo pretty! Great big fat fluffy flakes that drifted down without amounting to a whole lot so we could still go on the sleighride today. It was this month's family fellowship event & it was a big hit. There were two packed sleighs, almost all the seats were filled with parents & every parent had a kid in their lap and there still wasn't enough room for everyone. The teenagers ended up waiting for a sleigh to come back & going for a ride on their own. From the sounds of it, it's just as well. They were a rowdy bunch & I think they all got thrown off the sleigh at least once. They were all soaked when they got back but they were all smiles!

The girls enjoyed the horses & we spotted several deer in the woods. The snow was still falling as we went but it wasn't cold at all. When we got back to the lodge we had a potluck supper and then all the kids ran wild. They had a girls club and were all piled in this corner with cushions barricading them in & keeping boys out I assume. LOL They had a great time running around with the other kids & we ate well & had an enjoyable time ourselves. My cousins were there too so that was an added bonus!