I stink at this.

I always find my way onto the computer, but only for minutes at a time, so I never fell like I have enough time to blog a proper blog. Adeline is whining right now and Penny is stuck in her highchair so we will see how this goes:) We are having a good summer so far. I took the big kids on a bike ride last night and it was nice to bike around the community with them at a normal speed. I am so excited for Penny to turn one so she can ride in the trailer. I think I will start 3 weeks early and bike the kids to school in September. I would think that I would have to go to a sports store to find a helmet that will fit her tiny little head properly... I can't imagine Walmart will have what we need. Maybe they will, I haven't looked yet. I had a dream last night that I was holding a newborn and bawling my head off because I was done having babies. I feel my family is complete, but I know I am going to miss this little baby stage so much. I always feel so torn. I am exhausted, Penny doesn't sleep well, and I really want her to grow up so I can watch her less cloesly, but at the same time I want her to stay little. One of the tough things about having a baby right now is our garden which we are very excited about. We are growing peas, carrots, lettuce(we ate some last night and it was great!) onions, beans, tomatoes, potatoes, strawberries and raspberries. However, our backyard has so many mosquitoes right now and I saw 3 perched on Pennys head when I was trying to pull weeds yesterday so that ended abruptly.
Preston starts his shirt work MOnday. He has been at this new job for a month as a maintenance electrician, and he has learned enough to start shift. It means he will now work 4 days on, 4 off, 4 nights on 4 off. They are 12 hour shifts rotated between 4 electricians. He is very excited about this job. It was the longest interview process he has ever had to endure, and as long as the plant is there, he hopes to be there...mee too! I am tired of moving and uncertainty.
I am so envious of my friend Kristen who hates running and has been doing it for a while now and getting results.(shout out Kris!!) WHy am I so lazy? I saw this hot bodied woman crossing the street the other day and I told Preston to stop looking becuase I will never have her body and he said I totally have the right build to have her body...I just have to workout. Well, maybe with a boob job:) SO, I went on that bike ride last night and we will see with Prestons shift work if I can use the days he has off productively. And we just booked a cruise for Feb so I am hopng that a goal to have a hot bod by then might help motivate me.
My SIL has just decided to home school her children and I applaude her for trying it out..because I never would:) I like my kids going off to school and giving me a break! In all honesty, I would do it if I had to, but Clayton was sad the school was ending before it ended, so as long as the system is working for us, I am sticking with it. However, I am making an effort this summer to to some teaching. See if I could do it if I had to. I have some work books that I am hoping to make them do a couple of pages every day or two and I have some great I ideas for field trips. I also liked her idea of using everyday situations for learning...like baking. They can help and I can teach them the rules of a recipe and do some math with the measurements. What I want to see is me not saying "forget it! Go outside and play!" So, good luck to me:)
Thats really it with us. The kids got their report cards. CLayton is about a B average student who excels in math, but his teachers say of he focuses, he has a lot of brains. Focus will be a tough one. Kayla is now consistant in everything kindergarten, except for a few social things like distracting others and not paying attention...sounds like focusing is a family problem:) Adeline is almost 2 and can throw some wicked tantrums...it's hard not to laugh and Penny is crawling now. Boo.

Olympic Torch

We were able to go see the Olympic Torch realy in Okotoks. It was within waling distance from our house so I took the babies out to see it. I only did it because the weather was nice. I don't really have much interest in the Olympics. I rarely watch them, all though I try sometimes because I feel bad if I don't for some reason. I keep up on how many medals Canada has won, but that is it. I'm glad I went the the realy though, it made me feel patriotic or something:) ANd it was convenient, it was half way to the kids school, so I just finished the walk and picked them up afterward.

2010

I never blog when I actually have something to say, and then when I sit down to blog, I feel like I'm trying to come up with some thing to say. Lets start from the top. Preston registered for school. He is doing some PLC courses to gain more programming skills. He loves to troubleshoot stuff, and this will help him. He'll be going to school Monday and Wednesday evenings. Me, I get to spend more time alone with my lovely children:) It will be a little hard to have him away more evenings a week. Somedays, he works into the evenings, so I'm afraid he will never be home now. RIght now I am tring to do flylady. I'm sucking at it. I've been on day 2 for 3 weeks - shine my sink and put on my shoes. I can't get past it. I think I will have to modify her program to fit my lifestyle. I am also trying to start up a business with my dad. Well, it's my business but he is my sounding board and my technical assistance. It's hard to explain right now. It has to do with hair clips and such, but it is hopefully different from all the hair clip makers/sellers out there. I just renewed Prestons business licence so now I can get a membership to the warehouse I need to get my cheap supplies. We will see...
Clayton LOVES school and I'm so glad becuase it's easy to get him up and out the door. He just got his first birthday party invitation of the year. The party is an hour long. 1 hour. There is no point in me going back home....so I will shop close by. Oh, that is another one of my goals. To only shop once a week. So far I have done well. I don`t like to make do, so I go to the store regularly. I am going to simplify by only going once. I`ve done it for 2 weeks now. WOo hoo.
Kayla is a challenge. She is constatnly asking to have a friend over. CONSTANTLY. She is stubborn and says Ì`m NOT going to school` but she always does. ANd she always says `no`to me. I can hardly wait for her teenage years:) She has her moments though where she is sweet. She gives lots of hugs and kisses and sometimes she will try to clean for me or Preston `to make us happy` but only if SHE wants to. She gave her first talk in church on Sunday and spoke very well.
Adeline is adorable and fun and exhausting. She climbs everything and falls down stairs. She loves to eat play dough and watch crazy christmas light videos on the computer. Penny smiles like crazy these days but it is very obvious she loves her mommy. Preston thinks she doesn`t like him. I think he tries to make her cry so he doesn`t have to hold her. Well, I am going to attempt toboganning today. It`s hard with all four cause Adeline needs me to go down with her, and Penny needs to just sit in the cold stroller. But it`s worth Clayton and Kaylas smiles:)

My littlest cutie. She unfortunately had full blown baby acne on her blessing day. Of course, now it's all cleared up. She has been sleeping pretty good at night. However, in the day she always wakes up when I try to put her down. I don't have much else to say about her becuase all she does is eat, sleep, poop and cry right now.
Preston took his test a few days ago to confirm the vasectomy worked and we didn't get a call back so ew assume there were no stragglers. However, I am terrified of getting pregnant again. I have heard so many stories of oops and we already had our oops. I need to get over it realize what will be, will be...

Baby Penny

So we had our baby, as I'm sure most of you know from Facebook. Here is our story....assuming the kids are kind enough to let me get through it. Sunday night I went to bed and woke up around Midnight and was having a few random strong contractions. So I wandered around the house for a couple of hours wondering what was happening. I finally woke Preston up around 2:30 and told him I thought I was in labour. Now, if this were my first baby, I probably would have waited. There was no rhythm to the contractions and there were strong ones and weak ones. But, since my last labour went fast, I was worried about it going too fast and I was having some really strong contractions that I had to breath through, but again they were very random. Finally I said lets go. I don't think Preston was thrilled becuase I forsaw a long wait at the hospital, but he knew he didn't have a choice. Anyways, we got there and I was 4-5cm so they put me in a room and put me on antibiotics becuase I was positive for strep B this time. It was good we went early becuase if you don't get the antibiotics atleast 4 hours before you deliver, they want to keep you and the baby for 48 hours! Anyways, the contractions slowed and seemed to have stopped for an hour. Frusterating, but good to let the antibiotics do their thing. After 4 hours, they broke my water. It didn't feel like things were progressing after that. I was still having the odd strong contraction every 15 minutes and some 'fake' contractions the nurse called it. I had her 1 1/2 hours after they broke my water. I never really had regular contractions. I had 2 contractions that were 6 minutes apart and then I felt with the next one like I could push. She said I was 10 cm so I started to push..and she came out. Pretty lame labour but I'm not complaining:) ANyways, when she was born, they put her on my and she wasn't crying. She was a good colour but she started to turn purple pretty quickly becuase she had a lot of fluid in her lungs and couldn't breathe so they took her over to the table and sucked out the fluid and put her on oxygen for a minute. Because of that, they had to do a few extra tests on her while we were in the hospital. They also had trouble controling my bleeding afterwards so they put me on oxytocin and then shoved some sort of medicine up my butt to help my uterus contract. They pushed on my stomach so hard to help get the clots out...it was worse than the labour. The rest of my hospital stay was pretty uneventful. I went home the next day to a brand new house with movers here and everything everywhere so I started bawling when I got here. Then an hour later, the RS showed up to help unpack stuff. it was pretty overwhelming. Anyways, we are 3 weeks old now and she slept 4 hours straight last night...so we are getting a little more sleep.

Here we are

So we are in Calgary and it has been a really interesting week. I have been sleeping worse than I have in a long time. I'm trying not to count the little hours I am sleeping every night anymore....it doesn't help things. I bought us a house. It is in Okotoks. Preston hasn't seen it yet. I am nervous for that incase he hates it. He has seen photos, but it is never the same. We have certainly learned that. I spend a lot of time on the phone between lawyers, agents, moving companies and utilities etc. I hate the phone. I also spend a lot fo time driving. The kids started school last week in Okotoks and we are living in North Calgary for the next few weeks. 3 hours of driving a day! I hate that too. Tomorrow we are going to hang out at Kamilles in Okotoks so then I will only have to drive 1.5 hours. The kids have been keeping me busy too. Even though we are at grandmas, I am trying to do most of the child tending myself and without Preston it is getting tiring. I need someone to complain too. And I am 37 weeks this week! I hope I go early this time. Like next week, when my mom is here (she is driving my van out here)and Preston gets here. Two grandmas and a daddy all in the same house....I'd get lots of rest:) Shows over...kids have to go to bed. More later.

This was Aug 23

o most of you have heard by now that we are moving back to Calgary...well, Okotoks. Close enough. We are leaving next week. Adleine is already there and I will have been an entire week without her by the time I get there with the other kids. We miss her so much, but at the same time it has been sooo relaxing. I didn't relize how much time I have to give her everyday and how hard she is on my 36 week pregnant body. Preston will be driving out with Jordan on Sept 5th to join us. Jordan will be joining us for a bit hoping to get a good job. He's been struggling here to find one. You may have heard rumors as to why we are leaving. The common one, that my parents are passing around, is taht I hate everyone here:) Let me clarify. If you ask Preston, he will say we aer moving back because of PST, preperty taxes, and his hourly wage. I will tell you, it is becuase he misses his family nad his best friend. It is probably a little bit of both. Preston didn't really make the decision for us to go at this time though. He kept talking about how he wanted to go back 'at some point' and I said 'lets go now' I don't want to keep uprooting the kids now that they are in school. I an very torn between my desire to stay here in a town I like, around my family, and being in Calgary with all the kids cousins and stuff. That is where my family gets confused that I hate everyone. I wont lie, that it is a perk, that in Calgary I have a mother-in-law who can babysit when I need her to, cousins for the kids to play with, and family gatherings are geared more towards the kids, not shutting up the kids:) My siblings just haven't reached that part of their lives yet....but it is not my reason for moving! Anyways, that's the story. My only fear is having this baby on the airplane:)