New Jammies!

Patience got several pair of the cutest jammies ever! She's in a lovely lavendar and brown pair tonight, but she wasn't too cooperative when it came to modeling them. So you'll kind of have to use your imagination.

Gotta love her...

Happy 17th Birthday, Nathan!

Here he is in all his glory!

Nate got home around 4:00 from his fundraiser and went over to the berry farm to get his favorite pie: custard berry. Then Waneta made him his favorite cake: Black Forest! To add insult to injury, she also brought home Chinese food for dinner. Needless to say, no one was even a little hungry by the end!

Nathan is now downstairs watching his birthday gift from us...that new hockey movie The Rocket.

Patience and Babadee

Patience loves Babadee.

When we headed south this morning, she realized we were going to Val's when we hit the border crossing. From that point on she said, "Babadee, Babadee's house," for a long time.

When we got about five miles from Val's, she switched to, "Thank you, Mom," until we got there. It was very cute (okay, it did get annoying after awhile).

New Duds!

A bonus of our visit with Val was that we retrieved two boxes full of clothes that my mom sent up for Patience! She is now the proud owner of an adorable Old Navy winter wardrobe in size 3. Pictured here is her new corduroy jacket and cowboy boots!

Also in the box were a couple of duplicates that my mom had purchased for her in the past! Imagine that! So Auntie Babadee is going to take them to her Old Navy and turn them into some other fun things.

Thank you Mom & Lee!

Visiting Valarie...

This morning I woke up with a brilliant idea! While Nathan worked at the horse show (cadet fundraiser) and Don and the other boys worked on the trees, I would take the girlies to visit Babadee!

Normally I would just stay home and do laundry and housework, but today I threw caution to the wind!

I read on her blog that she was going to be doing yardwork all day long, so I knew she would be home, so I drove down and surprised her! Of course, our visit really cut into her productivity, but we had a lovely little visit and Patience got her "Babadee" fix! I got to see Lindsay and Kelsey, but Miss Hailey was at a friend's house.

Jordyn Noelle

She just gets cuter each day...with the exception of her hair, which needs something! She is now in the annoying habit of running her hands through her hair while she's eating, getting food all over it.

She's growing up quickly: pulling up on everything, eating finger foods, working hard at getting what she wants, and getting more independent. We're having fun with this last baby : )

Only a Lab...

...would tolerate being "walked" by a toddler.

Patience now refers to Storm as "my dog," and because she moves her s's from the front of words to the back, it sounds like she calls him "dumbs," which we all get a kick out of (except Nathan).

It looks like we have a future 4-H dog handler in our midst! Val, you'll have to put aside a puppy for Patience : )

Patience is Climbing the Walls....

Literally!

Here is a perfect example of why Patience needs 24x7 attention. If she can get into any trouble, get hurt, or make a mess, she will!

I've already been told (1000 times) that I should get her into gymnastics. I'm looking into it...

Homemade Laundry Detergent

Okay, I'll be the first to admit that I'm a little off-the-wall, especially when it comes to doing things the old fashioned way and to saving money (usually those two go hand-in-hand).

My latest frugal homemaking endeavor is making my own laundry detergent. It's easy, and the stuff works just as well as the commercial stuff! Now, if you don't have five children and a farmer husband, you might not do as much laundry as me, so you might not need an inexpensive althernative to Tide or Cheer. But if you're interested, here is the link:

http://www.thefamilyhomestead.com/laundrysoap.htm

One of the things I like best about it is that there's no scent. I find the commercial detergents too smelly!

Now, if you're a fabric-softener type of person, here's a recipe for that, too!
6 cups water
1 cup white vinegar
2 cups hair conditioner
Mix together (don't shake...it'll foam) and use 1/2 cup per load. If you get the hair conditioner at the dollar store, this is dirt-cheap. The conditioner helps with static cling AND gives the clothes a mild scent...so chose a conditioner that has a smell you like!

One more thing! If you have an automatic dishwasher, you don't need to buy that expensive detergent! Just use 1 part washing soda, and 1 part borax (both are ingredients for the laundry detergent, too).

That's it for right now! I'll post later with exciting news and adorable pictures : )

Okay...

I just realized all of my titles either end in ! or ...
What's up with that?!?

Not QUITE Clear on the Concept...

Okay, here's the funniest thing that happened yesterday. Don took Patience out to "work," which basically means that she comes back muddy and needs a bath right away, and that the clothes she's wearing will be in need of some masterful laundering.

After her bath, Patience insisted on dressing herself. This is how she came out of her room... with her panties outside of her jammies! She never fails to entertain us!

She didn't have a nap yesterday (not that I didn't try!) so after her long afternoon of "work," she fell asleep at the dinner table. Literally. Right in the middle of chewing her Ceasar salad. Don carried her in and put her to bed, and she slept until 7:00 this morning. She woke up starving.

On a bright, bright note, my good friend Heather started her own blog! If you want to see her husband, her son, her daughter, and even her dog (but not her), you can click on "Heather's Front Porch" in my links to the right.

Okay, I'm off to put the house together! Wish me luck!

Uh Oh, Cheerio!

Jordyn has pretty much perfected the art of eating Cheerios... with a few minor exceptions. She had no idea this cheerio was stuck to her face... she thought we were all laughing at her just for fun!

By the way, Mom, did you notice what she's wearing?

Sharks Shut-Out!

Don and Nathan had a great time last night. Nathan had a better time than Don because the Sharks won 2-0!

It's a beautiful morning here. Hopefully today I can get outside and do a little cleaning up. I'm kinda getting tired of the place looking like a construction zone!

More later...

Go SHARKS!

Don and Nathan are at the Canucks vs. Sharks game right now! Don picked Nathan up from school and they went in early to avoid traffic and to have some dinner. I hope they have an awesome time.

This game was our gift to Nathan for his 17th birthday. I can't believe that's not a typo! I have a 17-year-old! It really doesn't seem that long ago that I had my first little baby. He's turned out exceptionally...

Dylan had a volleyball game today. They won the first game but lost the set : (

Sean came home for lunch today! I can't believe we didn't think of that before! He also came home yesterday. It's a lot of fun. Patience can't believe her good fortune to have Sean at lunchtime!

There's really not much else to report. I'll try to be more imaginative tomorrow!

Yummy....Zebra!

Happy Monday!

Not much to report here. Nathan and Dylan are still at school for play rehearsal and volleyball practice. Sean is at a friend's house, and Patience is downstairs in our new little t.v. room watching The Incredibles. Don is commuting home from Vancouver, and Jordyn, as you can see, is occupied with Noah's ark and the little farm. A ham and baked potatoes are in the oven, and life is generally in order.

Mom and Lee, I hope you're having the time of your lives! Val, thanks for updating your blog! I'm looking forward to a new picture of the puppies, who must have changed a lot in a week...

Cheers!

Why We Don't Use Our Fireplace!

Jordyn has been standing more and more. I'm pretty sure she'll be walking in the next two months. Darn.

On a brighter note, Don has the yellow family room nearly done! He's working on trimming the doors right now, but we need to make a trip to Home Depot to get some more trim before he can finish. We were going to go tonight but we just decided to stay home and enjoy a nice bottle of merlot with our barbequed steaks instead! That will leave just the "mud room" portion of the basement to do. But there's no big rush for that.

Nathan worked all day at Krause's. Sean spent most of the day at his friend's house, and Don and I have been home with the girlies. The weather is absolutely gorgeous, hence the barbeque tonight.

And on a much brighter note, my parents are flying over the Pacific even as I type, headed for Hawaii. It's their fourth anniversary : ) So, Mom and Lee, when you read this post, know that I was thinking of you, and I was jealous! Please have a Mai Tai for me : ) No one deserves to spend their anniversary in Hawaii more than you two.

More later, to be sure...

Another generation....

...of carbohydrate addicts is born!

Tonight's supper: three pizzas, a loaf of french bread (what's left of it!), and a bottle of merlot!

Have a great weekend!

The Bookends!

Well, it's taken 7 1/2 months, but Nathan finally decided that Jordyn is getting fun and cute and all of the attributes that make Patience wonderful. He's just not a small-baby type of guy.

Last night Nathan and Dylan and three other members from their 4-H club went to be servers at a dinner, put on by the Langley Agricultural Advisory Committee, for about 100 guests including members of parliament, mayors, councillors, and other people who are in the position to make decisions about agriculture in Langley. I went to pick the kids up at about 7:00; imagine my surprise to find my 5 members, between 14-16 years old, walking around with bottles of wine, making sure everyone was "topped up!" No, this would not be legal. And they were serving lawmakers! Hello?! Oh, not to mention it's against 4-H rules!

D.W. Poppy has a 1/2 day today. Dylan is off at noon today for a weekend retreat for Senior Chamber Choir. Nathan is home at noon to do who-knows-what. Sean, poor little guy, has a full day of school!

And that's our Friday so far. I'll update you with anything newsworthy or any adorable pictures...

"I Wanna Go Downstairs!"

Here's Jordyn trying to get downstairs after her daddy closed the gate and then went down there! The nerve!

Meet the Teacher Night!

I just returned from meeting Sean's grade 6 teacher, Mr. Thompson, or "Mr. T." Basically, I'm super-duper impressed. He's going to be perfect for Sean. He is a woodworker and the kids make log cabins, bird houses, and other fun stuff. He plays highly competitive volleyball and track and field, so he has high expectations for them in P.E. He is the school IT guy, and he hopes that all the kids know as much as he does by the end of the year. Oh, and he's very dramatic. He wears costumes and gets into character to teach certain things. He's way outside the box, but it sounds like he's going to make it a really fun year for the kids. He has really intersting ways of dealing with discipline. For example, for minor infractions, he has the kids write a "Once Upon a Time" short story where the main character does what they did. Yes, Sean has written one already! His main character sharpened all of the librarian's pencils when he was supposed to be researching rivers...