A little bore.....snore

So I just went to upload all my photos off the new camera into iphoto. I had forgotten that I was messing around with RAW and now will have to go through Bridge. So no photos. 

Not that I have anything exciting to show anyway, I am rather boring lately. 

I lay around and let Dave do stuff. The floors are sticky and the fridge needs cleaning. There are piles of stuff on every surface and I want to get it all cleaned up. However after just sweeping and vacuuming I am toast and need an hour nap. Thank goodness Dave does laundry and dishes otherwise it would be rank in here too!

 So friends this is the state we are living in and please bear with us. I am hoping that my energy picks up again soon but at the moment sleep and lazing (and peeing fifty thousand times a day) is all I have on my schedule.

You can still come see me but I am just warning you!

There is this poem my mom used to have up on her wall in her foyer. I think I need a poster of it on my door.

Although you'll find our house a mess

come in, sit down, converse.

It doesn't always look like this

Some days it's even worse.

True, folks, so true!

A new baby...but not the real kind

Yes I have a new baby and it intimidates me more than a real one.

I got an early birthday gift almost a week ago. (my b-day isn't until next month)

Thing is there is a learning curve. I know there is a learning curve with all babies but this one does come with a manual. Problem is that it is just not English to me.

 Every picture I take is blurry or out of focus. I feel like a need to enroll in a camera class for dummies!

It is the Nikon D90 and there are some pretty  exciting features. Live view is a new thing and so is the video mode, however this camera has also been hanging out with its big brother the D300 and a few things rubbed off on it. This is supposed to be a good thing but I am finding it rather scary. If any of you have any pointers or know of sites that could help I am all ears!

I am feeling rather lost right now!

So rather than sit and read the manual I stuck with the familiar...reading learning books with Kaitlyn. Maybe this is a sign that my brain truly has turned to mush.

So off I went with my trusty old point and shoot. Not that this is a bad camera by any means, it has served me rather well. I was just finding that I was wanting more.

On with my distractions. A parcel came in the mail and it sure was exciting for a certain girl. This was something that she had chosen online and was waiting quite patiently for its arrival. It now goes where she does and is always filled with various treasures.

To nab one of your own go here.

And you can see that since I have been so frustrated with learning about my camera I have been choosing to fiddle in photo shop instead. (The above was inspired by some of Kim's awesome shots)

And some more in the area of distractions.

The moments when they nap together are not often and when it happens it is cherished.

Double peace!

Oooo, and I cannot forget this! When old friends come to town it is such a treat. Visiting with Maria was so bittersweet. We chat non stop as if we still see each other ever week rather than once or twice  a year. And then saying goodbye is always so hard, I just wanted her to say forever! Miss you already girl!

Back to the camera stuff. Every day I spend some time adjusting and fiddling with buttons. And whala.....I took a half decent picture! (this is the only one from the new camera in this post)

Now I am counting down the hours till my photographer in the making cousin gets here, I hope he can clear up a few things for me so I feel a little more comfortable with all this.

This baby is something else!

Oh, and on the incubating baby front for those of you wondering how things are going. I am still feeling queasy and yucky, starting to feel fatter and still really tired. Food still stinks and don't come near me with meat. Not tuna, chicken, beef or pork, non of it, yuck! Even the dirty dishes...like ones I just ate off of make me feel sick. Dave has been the biggest life saver and has taken over dishes every night, love the guy!

Now I am going to try and read some of that camera manual, see if I can become half educated before my tutorial tonight.

Have a good one!

Missing you

More than a week! I know, it feels like ages!

I have meant to get on here every day since last weekend but I have been wiped. By the time I get the kids to bed I fall asleep with them in their beds. 

So here is what is new. 

Last weekend Dave's sister and brother in-law came to visit with their two chic magnet boys.

Kaitlyn was drawn right in, then again she has always loved them.

We met them out at the lake for the weekend with plans for long walks and jaunts to the park and with warm fall weather in mind. Lesson learned. Listen to the forecast.

We had to make a morning trip into the city to gear up with socks, hats and mitts to combat the cold.

Then I was worried the whole weekend that I wasn't feeling sick enough. I had been so tired and nauseous the week before and had had a cramp and sharp pain just before leaving to head out there. 

 I felt on top of the world the whole weekend. Not a great feeling to have when you are pregnant. I was quietly freaking out inside and spent one night up sitting watching the embers dye down in the stove praying and meditating.

I came to a point where I was ok with the idea that we may have lost the baby.  The Lord is in control and I had to just let go and go with the flow and see what He has in store. I always struggle with this giving it to the Lord and then trying to take the control back. 

So I carried on having fun all weekend and stayed extremely busy. I love seeing relatives and miss seeing them frequently ever since we moved here. It really was a huge treat to have them out.

Ethan was thrilled to have his cousins around and spent nearly every moment with them....well except when they were out shooting each other during the air soft wars.

One of the big outings of the weekend took us to the local market garden in search of veggies for supper and a pumpkin or two.

Ethan listened to them. Not sure what they said but he had to check the biggest ones out.

And he wanted to take one home. 

Since it wouldn't budge he settled on a much more portable one.

On with the weekend and Sunday. 10 am and the turkey went into the oven.

Thanksgiving dinner for 24 people was at our place. With the day getting colder and colder by the moment we spent most of it inside by the fire preparing for family to arrive.

It was a very relaxing and easy dinner, the easiest I every hosted. Then again the fact that everybody that came brought a dish was what made it. All we had to do was the turkey, stuffing gravy and veggies while the guys hung out around the BBQ all afternoon basting a huge ham.  Home made buns, amazing salads, potatoes, sweet potato, pies, tables and chairs were all  brought by others. 

 It was awesome!

Half way through dinner there was a cry from one of the kids, "SNOW!"

As soon as the main course was gobbled down we all rushed out to get our first taste of the white stuff.

As the snow kept falling dessert was eaten and the talk about sledding started. We could hear a neighbor out revving his machine and it was then only moments before Dave had his out.

Rides through the park were soon under way.

An awesome Thanksgiving day wrapped up with fireworks. Thank you Dave!

The snow continued to fall through the night and in the morning we awoke to a beautiful white blanket covering all the green.

Ethan was so excited to explore the snow with his trucks and then the snow people building began.

Monday was a warm melty day out there and we spent it in shorts and t-shirts. As the day came to an end we packed up and headed back into the city.

My worries about being pregnant were still heavy on my mind but as the day wore on and we said good bye to our company the sickie feeling once again came back. 

Every day it has been worse ever since. I gag bad when I go near the fridge and the thought of meat....repulsive!

I am glad I am feeling gross again however the tiredness that has overtaken me is something else. Dave has been doing all the dishes and laundry and cleaning. I am like a bump on a log at this point. So this is why I have been absent, I have hardly turned on the computer to check e-mails every other day. I will have a lot of catch up reading to do when I feel a little better. 

I miss you guys!!!

I had forgotten what it was like when there are no comments and e-mails from you. Victoria's Secret sales notices is all that has come in in the last two days. Not so exciting!

Anyway, I am off to lay by the fire and watch Ruby and Max with the kids.

xoxo

Missing daddy and bleck

This week has been stretching. I am feeling tired and sick and when I look at food I really don't want it. I wake up and only want one thing and that is what I HAVE to eat that day. 

Fries, burgers and other fast food have been on the list as well as apples, tomato soup and grilled cheese. Anything else, yeeeck!

And nothing fills the void either, I must have what I crave. This is a new one for me. 

And please do not put something I front of me that I have already had this week, ooooeeee!

Today I had pizza buns for lunch. Prepping them was ok. Eating them, another story.

Problem was that I had had the same thing last night for supper. It was good then, it was on my list of had to haves. Today, not so much.

That is enough, this writing about it is making me feel worse and I have yet to take my vitamin today.

Anyway I have been missing Dave. This was the week that he had to spend out of town and it felt like he was gone forever. I missed him more than ever and I am guessing it was because we could see him. 

In the evenings we would both log on to I-chat and although it was choppy it made it real and seeing each other made the distance seem more.

He gave us a tour of his hotel room and we did the same with the new furniture arrangement in the living room. Now we are counting down the moments till he arrives. Yay!

Anyway I am off to gag down my horse pill of a vitamin and get back at the laundry.

Have a great weekend!

My flopped go at a sloppy quicky

First I have to say that if you are my sister in-law (aka, Lori) please stop reading now and click away.

 Fast.

I don't want you to see what I have been up to this afternoon because it is something that is for you and I don't want you not to be surprised.

Please wait to read this until I have seen you this weekend.

Thank you!:-)

Secondly, I just realized that from my title some of you might have your minds in the gutter. Get them outta there! There is non of those shenanigans going on around here.

Just messy art, quick messy art.

Ah, whew!!

So I have a custom order portrait sitting in my studio (once upon a time my dining room) and I have been waiting for the time to get it started. It is detailed and I will need to be precise. However it has been a few weeks since I last painted and I had a big messy itch to get out. While the kids were playing with Auntie Em this afternoon I decided to give the messy, sloppy brush stroke painting style a shot. Emily was here to play with the kids for an hour and what you see above is (almost) what I banged out in that time.

This painting is inspired by a picture my sister in-law showed me over a year ago and I have been wanting to do this for her for some time.

After Emily left the kids settled down with snack so I snuck back over to the table for a few minutes and added her hair. During that time I should have been watching Ethan (who was sitting right in front of me) more closely because he was getting busy painting his body with a marker. (see a few photos later on below)

After the kids went to bed (early---Hallelujah!!) I added the finishing touches and there you have it. Above with no flash and below with a flash.

My sloppy quicky. It took just under three hours and normally a painting this size would take double that time.  Then again I would have planned it out better and blended to create even color transitioning.

 I am actually not so happy with it. I free handed it and am not sure I will wing it like that again. I do like to plan my paintings more precisely. I am also not happy with my sloppy technique. I had in mind these wild brush strokes and I am just way to uptight or something and have to have crisp lines. I still managed to get a lot of wild strokes in but I had in mind one of those paintings where when you stand up close you don't know what it is and it just looks like blobs of paint and when you back up it is this stellar piece.

I think I need to take a 'how to relax and wing it' class or something.

Kaitlyn was also inspired to create and decided to draw uncle Phil. Dude has long legs!

Then since the kids wanted to paint I dug out their water colours and we went to town splashing and dotting and creating cards. 

Please ignore the chocolate donut all over her face, she was multi tasking.

Kaitlyn claimed mine right away saying she had to write a message about cleaning up in it for her babies.

And now I will leave you with this.

A few moments of distraction and this is what I get!

And of course it was the green apple smelly Crayola kind.

Thank goodness it was washable!

Country time and a pumpkin hat

Saturday turned out to be a warm and sunny beautiful day. 

After lounging around all morning we got off our duffs and headed out to the lake for the afternoon via back roads. It is fun to do this every  once in a while and this time we got to see parts of the valley we had never seen before.

Once out at the lake we busied ourselves with cleaning and organizing to get ready for Thanksgiving weekend. 

And of course with kicking back a little. The relaxed atmosphere out there practically demands it.

Back in the city with lists of things to do and crafts to be made for the weekend. More on all that later in the week.

Sunday was another lazy day. We only managed a few minutes in church and ended up leaving between the bread and wine. Kaitlyn decided she really wanted to sit on my lap for the service and not go to her Sunday school class. 

Ethan seemed happy enough to stay but  after a few minutes the teacher came to find me. So much for that idea. He was freaking out without his sister there and couldn't be calmed down. After 5 minutes of sitting in the hallway with him Dave and Kaitlyn came to join us. Rather that spend the whole service in the foyer we headed home. 

After lunch Kaitlyn and I went out to a baby shower.

She loved the baby and wanted to hold and play with him non stop. Then when it was time to open gifts she got right in there and opened every single one, passing the card and gift to the new mommy. (Of course this was at the invitation of the mom)

On to today. Gymnastics day. A few weeks ago Ethan dropped out of his class. He is quite content to sit on the bleachers playing with his cars and watching Kaitlyn in her class.

So much for that!

When we got home there was a package in the mail. 

I had thought it would be for Kaitlyn but they are happy to share it.

Is it not the cutest little hat ever?!

If you want one of your own check them out here, she does custom orders too if they are all sold out.

Thank you Beachmama, we love it!!

Especially the old man way;-)