Our 4th Anniversary Part 1

Itinerary:
4pm - Arrive in Wakefield; check in to Wakefield Mill
5:30pm - Dinner Chez Eric

6:30pm - Walk around Wakefield before doors open at the Black Sheep Inn

7:00 - 11:30pm - Melissa McLelland concert

The Crocuses in our Garden

Another visit with the Broersmas

My sister, Diana, and her family came for a visit 2 weekends ago. Here are some pictures from the weekend.At breakfast. Nethaneil being goofy.
Micah...propped up by Mike's unseen hand.

We took the kids for a walk. This is Elyssa...she doesn't like the wind...after this picture we covered her face completely with that blanket and she didn't complain at all.

This is the Ottawa River....semi frozen.
Both Elyssa and Hadassah can appreciate a good cup of yogurt.
Mom feeding Micah.
Reuben playing with his nephew.

My brother with Nethaneil.
Grampa reading stories.
And we end where we began...with Nethaneil's goofy grin.

Sleepover

Our Christmas gift to Karin and Josh was to babysit their daughter. So, this past weekend, we picked her up Saturday morning and brought her with us to Local Heros for breakfast. She surprised by eating a huge pancake! It seemed like a lot of food for a little girl. Then I dropped Reuben off at home and took her grocery shopping with me and then we went to the library. At home we had some lunch and then she slept for 2 hours.This is part of Elyssa's lunch. Yep, half a lemon...she doesn't even flinch.

These are the books and movies we got out of the library.

After her nap, we played playdough and made a train out of some nesting boxes.

We had my parents over for dinner and then had some vanilla pudding for dessert. Here, Reuben is trying to bond with her but she just gave him one of her famous withering looks.
She went to bed alright...if alright is crying herself to sleep for 1/2 an hour. Karin said to leave her for 1/2 an hour and that was exactly how long it took for her to fall asleep. Amazing! The next morning, she woke me up at 5:15am...apparently, this is sort of normal. It probably didn't help that she had a racking cough. I tried to get her to sleep a little bit longer and then Reuben took over and helped give her breakfast while I caught a few more winks.
As you can tell, it's the wee hours of the morning here.

We love you, Elyssa...but maybe we'll wait to have a sleepover until you can stay in bed later than 5:15am. I don't know how my sister does it....she's amazing!

Winterlude 2010

No renovation updates this time...although, Reuben is slowly but surely finetuning the surface of the walls in the foyer...it's Winterlude season here in Ottawa.

It's always a bit of a struggle for me to don all that winter wear, head downtown and really enjoy myself in the cold, wet winter but with my hubby by my side, it was actually really fun!Us on the canal.Reuben being his goofy self.

Us on an ice sculpture.My favourite snow sculpture. That evening we enjoyed a Basia Bulat concert. She's the one sitting down. If you get a chance, you should give her a listen.

Some other highlights of the day include my joining the group on an ice slide...thought I was too old to enjoy such things...but it was a thrill! And eating a beavertail with freezing cold hands...the only way to enjoy them.

We had company last weekend too. Reuben's sister and her friends. Sorry, I don't have any pics of them. They are a good group. Reminded me of Winterludes in the way past when groups of my friends would come to Ottawa and we'd stay up way too late...I think we stayed up way later than these kids (oops, no, they are not kids!) did:) They are a good group and we hope 2 of them will end up here for school;)

Next on the event list, babysitting my 2 year old neice, Elyssa. We'll be picking her up tomorrow morning and her parents will pick her up after church tomorrow. That's right, we'll be taking her to church with us. Wish us luck!

A relaxing day

Today was a great day! You might wonder what exciting thing we did today to make it so great. Well, today was so great because we did nothing exciting. In fact, we didn't even leave the house. We slept in. We made a hearty egg and bacon breakfast. We did dishes. We did the second coat of "rhubarb" on our walls that had been needing it for so long. We did some vacuuming and general tidying. We put the door back on the bathroom. We added some grout to our new floor where it was lacking. We prepared for Bible Study. We did some laundry. It was such a relaxing but productive day.
To top it off, we finished watching this great tv series/DVD called "Long Way Down". It's about these two guys who drive their motorcycles from the northern tip of Scotland to the southern tip of Africa. It's just extraordinary. Besides the scenery, the wildlife and the people of Africa, I just love hearing their Scottish brogues through the whole thing. If you ever get a chance, please do watch it. It will inspire you to travel for sure!

Hope y'all had a great Saturday, too.

Foyer and Bathroom Floor

Our house renovations continue with laying down a new floor in the front hall and powder room. First, here is a picture of our old door...so you can see the improvement. Although it's from the inside.

Here's the pictures of what our floor looked like. Lovely pink ceramic tile and white tile in the bathroom.
Under the pink tile was a layer of laminate flooring.



After Reuben got the floor down to bare plywood, he screwed it down all over to minimize creaks and squeaks. Then we cut out and lay down this Schluter product that helps to level the floor.




Our friend, Carl, helped Reuben install the Schluter under flooring and the new ceramic tile. They grouted it on Saturday and it looks great!

Our new Front Door

I can't find a decent picture of our old front door, right now, because I'm at work. But this is the new one. It still needs some trim both inside and out but it sure is a lot nicer! I used to have to fight to get my key in and out of the lock because it was a copy of a copy and now it's so easy. Thanks to Dad Helder who helped Reuben install it.

Hadassah Sings her ABC's

Names

Is it weird for everyone when they meet someone with their name? I feel like my name is really unique (not necessarily in a good way, I'm still undecided as to whether I really like it or not) so I don't meet people with my name very often.
This morning I had to find someone named Irene and I walked into this sea of cubicles and someone said "can I help you find someone?" and it was really strange to say I was looking for Irene. It was kind of an out of body experience.

I'm an Aunty Again

This is my new computer desktop picture.

Welcome to my world, little Micah Timothy! Guess what? I already love you and I haven't even met you. This is very sad, I know. But I will see you in 2.5 weeks and maybe you will be able to give me a smile by then!?

He was born on October 29 to my little sister, Diana.
His happy siblings are Hadassah(2.5) and Nethaneil(1.5).

Micah loves getting kisses from them.

Yesterday

Yesterday was a crazy day. I got some Islam "gospel" tract in the mail at work. All the way from Alexandria, Eqypt. That's right...addressed to me specifically and had my current work address on it. I googled it and apparently a lot of people working at University's around the world get the same thing. It was in French, too. Weird!
Then, when I got home I decided to make Chicken Parmesan and Scalloped Potatoes for dinner (well, I had decided to make it on Friday night when I was making my shopping list). Never do this, especially after a long day at work. The recipes I have are from close friends so I knew they would be good but I didn't read them too clearly before I started and seriously, each dish takes about 6 pots/pans/baking dishes to make!!!! And many steps. I was unprepared:(
And then, to top it off, I went to lift up the tin foil to check on the potatoes in the oven without an oven mitt on because I know that tin foil doesn't get really hot and I can usually touch in with my bare hand. Yeah, well, there was steam. And just for that one second that the steam touched my finger caused such excruciating pain for 2 hours! I immediately put my finger under the tap running water and yelled for Reuben. He googled to make sure we were doing the right thing, which we were. But all the sites were saying it should cool down within 15 - 20 minutes and it didn't. I ate dinner with my finger in a cup of cold water and then I sat on the couch and kept trying to take my finger out of the water but after about 5 seconds it would feel like it was on fire so I'd have to plunge it right back in. So, I burned it at around 6:10pm and finally, while talking to my sister on the phone at around 8:30pm, it felt ok to take out of the water. sigh!
I showered with my hand in a washcloth...that was interesting...
This morning, it's ok, tender but not blistering so that's good.

What adventures will I get into today.
By the way, the food was amazing!!!!

Being Accomplishy

Today is an accomplishy day. Last night, I whipped up a batch of overnight french toast and we had that for breakfast with orange juice and a cappuccino from our Tassimo. Reuben went to go help out at the manse so, I made some muffins and then I pulled out the paint and did one coat of Munroe Bisque in our den (the front room with the bay window) and on our staircase wall.
Then I went to Bulk Barn and when I got back, it was so beautifully warm and sunny that I did what I've been wanting to do for the past couple of months. Clean out the car! I vacuumed it and washed down the inside. I couldn't wash the outside because we already put our garden hose away for the season. We need to rustproof the car soon so I'll wait till that's done before I bring it to the carwash.
After some general clean up and making of dinner, I am so ready for relaxing.

Elyssa turns 2!

My neice, Elyssa, turned 2 yesterday so my sister had us and my parents over for supper. I made her some legwarmers for a present. She didn't like them but I think they just didn't feel nice on bare legs and also, she was very interested in the present she had just opened from my parents (a Playmobile set of a catamaran sailboat with female sailor). Since I only made 1 legwarmer to see if it was the right size, I have to make the 2nd one now. This is a nice project because it hardly takes any concentration at all. The legwarmer is all one colour and has no increases, decreases or fancy yarnovers to worry about.
The unfortunate thing right now is that I hardly feel like knitting because by the end of the day my wrist and hand is very sore. I use a mouse and type all day as part of my job. sigh!

Anyway, here's a video I took last night of Elyssa. She can say Micah really clearly (Diana's new baby for those who don't know) but for some reason the end got cut off.