More Critters

A couple weeks ago we adopted Lulu. She missed the turkey shipping truck at a friends house so we thought Tom our male would like a friend. He seems more then happy with our pick!

We have two kinds of ducks. One white ugly ones called Muscovy ducks I'm not sure what the official name of our other ones but they look just like mallards. Last spring we started with 8 babies now sadly we're down to 2. I've been hoping that these ones would sit and have ducklings but they don't have the hang of it. One of our other Muscovy just hatched out 7 babies today though. She's been sitting for what seems to be forever. Tonight we went out to discover the little yellow babies. They kids are so excited. Now the hard part is keeping the raccoons away from them. We put them in a large cage tonight - hopefully that works.

We leave tomorrow for the weekend so it's up to Grandpa to hold the fort while we're gone.

Have a good weekend,

Michelle

A long weekend #2

Well Sat morning as I'm trying to get ready for the party my sister in law Cheri calls me to let me know they're coming to camp tonight at the pond. OK so I try not to panic. No problem I'll get through the party (from 1- 4) then I'll pack up to camp. I'm not a very good spur of the moment girl.....Once all the girls leave I find the tent, grab sleeping bags, food for supper back there, breakfast and lunch, and anything else I could think of.

For anyone that doesn't know "the pond" is on our property. It consist of a couple ponds, a shed a part field and is the perfect spot to camp. If we need anything we just can bike up to the house. It's the best. So by 6:00 we were packed (still haven't heard from Dan who is moving and processing cows) Mike, Cheri and my niece Alex show up and to the pond we go. The kids just love camping. They've been asking since the spring so when we've got company of we go.

Although the weekend was busy we had a great time. Dan showed up that night and stayed with us and actually stayed part of the next day. My other two sister and brother in laws came along with Dan's mom. It was a great family weekend that ends up being worth the stress.

Michelle

A long weekend #1

This year for Kaitlin's birthday we had a hard time planning the guest list. You see she's friends with so many girls and has been invited to so many birthdays (4 which have been girls from J and S kindergarten. Getting her to cut the list down was not easy, and I admit I hate to leave friends out. At the time I thought 12 girls- not all will be able to make it, the day will be fine.

Well of course I started to get a little worried as the day got closer. Dan was gone all day so that left me with 12 girls plus my own kids. As it turned out Travis went to a friends house and 1 girl couldn't make it. One other girl came but was too scared to stay without her dad. A friend came to help me which I really appreciated....Thanks Tammy!!

The afternoon went really smooth. I wasn't sure what to expect or what I was getting myself into! The girls overall were great. They played, made fairies, ate cake, opened presents and played some more. I was glad when it was done so I could breath again but my day wasn't close to being done yet......

My little girl

Yesterday my biggest little girl turned 7!! Can you believe it? Where does the time go.....She's in this in between stage right now - not quite ready to give up her dolls and toys but slowly growing out of some. It wasn't long ago that she loved Dora.

Now she loves to dance, sing and skip. For her birthday we got her a mp3 player. She loves it. I figured it would be something she would use for a long time. Now she's going around the house singing her little heart out. I neglected to think that now when I want to talk to her she can't hear me!

I do miss the cute innocent little girl but I have to say it is exciting that she's getting old enough to do fun girl things together. When she's older I can imagine us girls going and getting pedicures or are hair done together. (Something I don't do now but will be fun as a mother/daughter date)

Kaitlin is very excited that she has now lost 7 teeth. She has to tell and retell everyone. It's funny to listen to her talk now. She has this attitude coming out ....sometimes bad and sometimes just makes me stop what I'm doing to listen more. Overall she wonderful. I can't wait to see how she grows and changes. I just hope I can be a good role model for her. I think back to my younger years and I can hear my mom saying payback is bitch!

Michelle

Father's Day

What first started as Dan gone haying turned into a great day. I took the kids to the beach for some of the afternoon then met up with Dan at home.

After saddling up horses we took the kids riding. They all loved it. It's something there's just never enough time for. I wish Dan could be around more to do this. The cutest part of the day was Kortney. Once we put her on the horse she didn't want to get off! Whenever we tried to get her off she held on saying nooo, ride horsey!

Travis also surprised us by wanting to ride the horse by himself without us leading him around. He and Dan ended up taking the two horses and checked on a field of cattle. It was wonderful to see him riding confidently by himself.

Hope everyone's day was a great one too!

Michelle

School projects

Travis gluing sticks.
sorry this is out of order. Here are just 2 of the over 20 projects.
The outside of Travis' cabin. The roof is bark and the cardboard tube is a chimney. The roof lifts up to show the inside.

A couple weeks ago Travis started building a log cabin for a project for school. It was to be done at home using only "natural products". Nothing was to be bought from a store. No problem, Travis had fun going to the bush, collecting twigs to glue on a box and decorating the inside of his cabin. It looked great and he was so proud of it.

Friday I drove him to school to drop it off and I was blown away. (the grade threes built cabins, the grade fours built castles) Well some of the projects took two people to bring them into the gym. They were all very fancy. I couldn't believe it. I had no idea the projects were going to be that elaborate. Some of them actually had logs crissed crossed together like a cabin with gardens and whole farms on the outside and even outhouses. They were amazing...obviously there was a lot of parent involvement. Last night the parents could go in to view the projects. I promised Travis we would go and see. (through all of this Travis hasn't complained about his project or said anything)

When we got there last night his teacher was there. I told her I was surprised how big the other projects were. Another mom came in and we got talking. The teacher made the comment that she doesn't expect the kids to do everything on the project. In fact in the some of the kids comments in the written part they answered their favourite part of the project was working with mom or dad. I was floored!! Here I'm looking at these cabins and castles thinking the parents must have done a ton of work on these. I just figured it was the child's project which meant the parents can help but not do it for them!!! I wish she would have wrote a note to the parents saying parent involvement expected. So stupid me made a sarcastic comment "Well Travis did most of it himself, I definitely didn't do half of it!"

Anyway, I feel like I failed Travis by not helping him do more. I mean I did help him but I didn't realize how fancy the other projects would be. It's stupid really. I feel sick about the whole thing. I just hope Travis gets a good mark since his is really good just on a smaller scale.

I'm not sure why this is bugging me so much....You always here people talking about parents taking over and doing the projects and I assumed that's not what the teacher wanted. I guess next time I know.

Michelle

You've got to kidding!

OK, I today I finally have to vent about my oven. First of all in Dec are then three year old oven stopped working. The stove top still worked but apparently the timer in the oven went. It finally was fixed the beginning of Jan.
May 7 same thing happened. The oven quit (with a bang and some sparks that scared the shit out of me!) No problem we'll just have to use the BBQ for a week or so....well I'm still BBQing. The guy came yesterday and we find out we also need a new keypad that he'll have to order. Now we've dealt with this man before and he's always been great. So I smile and say "that's OK, see you next week" Really what else can I say. The timer should have been here a lot sooner but there was some mix up.
Thank goodness it's BBQ season although I must say I'm getting a little sick of it. I've went from Dan doing it mostly to now I've BBQ ed 2 cakes, pizza, fish and chips, and tonight a rhubarb crisp (on top of the normal BBQ meals). My friend was right you really can BBQ anything! It's still seems easier doing it the normal way though.
So hopefully life will be back to normal this next week and I can have some options of what and how I want to cook it!

Another small step

This week we did something I've been waiting to do for three years. I should back tract a little. Four years ago we built our house in a pasture field. There aren't any trees around the house except are bush which is down our lane way. Since are first summer here I've been wanting the "yard" to be leveled, planted with grass and to plant some trees. Well Dan did buy grass seed three years ago but it has been yet to be planted! Are lawn is all grass and weeds (pasture) that we cut as if it's a normal yard. I've actually got used to it and it doesn't look too bad. (It's a bit bumpy to cut though....I do that job) So ya, I try not to bitch too much every year since I know it's not on the top of Dan's to do list but let just say he knows I'm not very happy with the whole situation.

Well last week Dan actually bought some trees!! Yes two apple and two maple. It's a start but I'm thrilled!!! The other day I looked out and said "Look there's a bird in our tree!" Dan just laughs at me. Tonight we finished planting the two apple trees are yard is slowly coming. I've got other plans for more flower beds and a patio but who knows I might have to wait another few years for Dan to have time to do that. It's very frustrating for me. I wish we had the money to just pay someone to do it. Oh well....for now I'm happy with my four trees. I think Dan thinks it will be enough to hold me over for a while - we'll see :)

Michelle

A long week

This past week has been busy and long. Last Sat Travis had four friends sleepover for his birthday. It actually went really good. Everyone played great and had fun. I was surprised how well they all were. I wasn't sure what I was getting myself into but they played and entertained themselves so the hardest thing was feeding them. Five 9 year old boys eat a lot of pizza, chips and lemonaid. In the morning Dan cooked pancakes but I think most of them were still pretty tired out.

The rest of the week wasn't so good. Kortney, Kaitlin, Dawson and myself ended up getting the stomach flu. Not nice. Kortney got it the worse. It was a long week of cleaning up puke. The bug was strange. One minute they were getting sick then next they were up and playing again. It was very on and off. Travis and Dan so far have missed the bug and hopefully will stay that way.

Last night Dan surprised me by taking the boys to the demolition derby at the Clinton spring fair. I took the girls to Goderich to do some shopping. Kaitlin loves going with me without the boys. We stopped and got flurries at McDonalds which made the night special too.

Today Kaitlin had a sleepover/birthday party to go to and the boys had a birthday party to go to this afternoon. It's been a quite day for me without all the kids. Tonight a good friend phoned me up to get a coffee and chat. It was really nice. She's moving in a couple months and I'm going to miss her lots. I'm excited for her but sad that she's leaving. Good friends are hard to come by....I'll miss our nights out to talk. She's going to be 2 hrs away soon so we're going to have to rely on the phone and computer more.

Oh ya and about the picture of Travis - this week at school he got to meet an author he really likes. His teacher is always trying to get the boys reading and enjoying reading. She found these books and Travis loves them. The series of them are called And Then It Happened by M&L Wade. I haven't had a chance to sit down with them to find out what all the fuss is about so I'm curious. I sent money to school with him to by the set of them. Tonight while I was cutting grass he made himself comfortable and was reading. I had to take a picture.

So that's an update on the Hoggarts week. Hope everyone else is enjoying this summer weather.

Michelle