"Bag! Bag!"

Whenever Henry wants desert, instead of asking for "treats", "candy" or "cookie" he shouts "BAG, BAG", this all started at Halloween when we kept the kids Halloween treats inside their bags and would let them get a treat or two after dinner. So now it's a common word here at our house, tonight for dessert we asked Henry do you want some bag?, and Henry will say "Yes." Weird eh?

We decided to take the kids out for dinner since we weren't going anywhere tonight, and I had a gift certificate from one of the kids I coached soccer for, so we went out to Kelsey's. It turns out it was reservations only, but they had a table open so we were lucky. The place was packed, dinner options were limited to a special menu. The kids were thrilled because they counted down to yell Happy New Year! It turned out to be a really nice night out.

Happy New Year's Eve Everyone!
Jason

Rats.

Today we went tobogganing, it was great fun. The hill we went to was complete ice and when Jack and Hannah slid down it, they went so far the turned into specks in the distance... well not really, but they did go quite far. We even put Henry in the sled and Dana pushed him down and I tried to catch him at the bottom. He had a very scared face but was smiling and screamed "Again, Again" after he knocked me over with the sled.
We came home from sledding and ate lunch and now Hannah is just finishing up some homework, which she got a lot of during the holidays and Jack is playing Star Wars with his action figures. Dana just took off for the gym and Henry is fast asleep.



This morning at 8 am there was a knock at our door, it was our 12 year old babysitter. I went to the door in my robe and she told us her Grandmother died last night so she wouldn't be able to babysit the kids tonight. I feel for her, she looked quite upset. We were really looking forward to going out for New Year's Eve, as we missed last year too because I had the flu. We had offers to bring the kids out, but it's just too much on a night when we were looking forward to going out - just the two of us as adults. Thanks for the offers guys. So tonight we will just stay in and have a fire and a few drinks and bring in 2006 quietly.

Last night the Yule family came for a nice visit, the kids were busy playing downstairs by themselves well into the night. It was good to catch up and for the kids to have a nice long time to play.

More Christmas Pictures

As promised here are a few more pictures from Boxing Day. We spent the day quietly at home, mostly organizing and putting together toys and reading instructions - why didn't Santa bring pre-assembled toys? Dana got to the gym tonight and I went to swimming.
The kids are all feeling a little sick with the sniffles, Hannah with a bit of a fever and chills - not enough sleep lately maybe. I have to get Henry on tape, he walks around the house saying "Ho Ho Ho, Merry Miss-Miss" Hope everyone is enjoying the time off - if they have any. - J

Chatham Christmas

Christmas x2

I hope everyone had a great Christmas. We all had a wonderful Christmas, busy, but we were able to see both Dana's family and mine, and that's what Christmas is all about.

On Christmas eve, Dana's family came by for snacks and a little caroling. Hannah, Jack and Henry's Great-Grandfather read "The Night Before Christmas" before sending the kids off to bed, they went to bed excited but finally managed to fall asleep after an hour or so. On Christmas day they didn't wake until 7:30 which surprised me, and we opened Santa's presents and each others. We visited with Dana's family and then traveled to Chatham to visit my family at Ann's house. The drive back home last night wasn't fun, as there was a lot of traffic and snow on the 401. Tonight we had a very nice turkey dinner at Dana's parents and another fun visit.
I'll let the pics do the talkin', and I post more tomorrow - J

Merry Christmas

The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe

Tonight Dana and I took Hannah and Jack to go see "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe". Eri and Mike came over to babysit Henry - thanks guys. We drove downtown, parked the car and bought the tickets for the movie, then we hopped on the subway and took it down to the Eaton Centre where we got off and went to look at the window displays at The Bay. The displays were all about the movie we were about to see and were done so well. It was fun to be downtown a few days before Christmas. After looking at the windows a few times we went in the Eaton Centre for some dinner and then walked around looking at the Christmas decorations and dodging the last minute shoppers. We jumped back on the subway, the kids were thrilled about the subway part, and got back to our stop just in time to see the movie.
The movie was really well done, I have never read any of the books until Hannah and Jack received it for Christmas one year from Dana's Aunt. They both loved the story so much and the movie really did the book justice. Sometimes I think I would like any movie because it's just so nice to be out to a movie, but this one was really good. The kids both fell asleep on the drive home and are glad to be back in their beds sound asleep, dreaming no doubt about the White Witch and Narnia.

Things I like; by Hannah

hannah
purpole
fethrs
jems
jack
henry
mummy
daddy
2005
christmas
rodolph
cat
seele
pingwin
julia
amy
friends
(Hannah typed this herself...)

Hulk Smash!

Henry came upstairs with these crazy Hulk boxing gloves that Uncle John gave the kids one year. They say "Hulk Smash". Henry was showing me how he boxes Hannah in the head, I said "oh Hannah are you alright?" She replied, "It's okay Daddy, I told him to do that, Do it again Henry" As long as there is no one crying. Although when Dana came home from shopping Henry boxed her too, and Dana wasn't impressed - thanks a lot Uncle John!

A Good Reader

Dana had a talk with Jack's teacher and I think she will keep a closer eye on him (when using scissors). He has been testing us at home too quite a bit so we'll just have to ride this
one out and see what happens and just keep on him about his behavior.

I have to say though that Jack's reading has come so easily to him so far, he is sounding words out and knows a lot of the sounds letters and letter combinations make. When he started JK in September we were both worried because he didn't know all his letters in the alphabet yet. I thought Hannah learned this quickly but Jack has really picked up on this fast, hopefully it will continue. Both Hannah and Jack love books, even Henry sits in his rocking chair by himself and looks at books for 10 minutes or so a day, it's great and a lot of it comes from Dana, she has pushed books, books and more books - and it has paid off. - J

Happy Birthday Kristy!

The weekend seemed extra long somehow...no one had to go to work and a lot of the last Christmas stuff got done.
Hannah had 2 birthday parties to go to - her social life is sometimes hard to keep up with.
Jason & I both had a lot of shopping to get done still which was a bit of a nightmare on the last weekend before Christmas!
We made a gingerbread house & the kids played in the snow. Then this evening we helped decorate Mom & Dad's tree and had pizza & treats.
Tomorrow I will help out in Jack's class for an hour in the morning. I try to do this every Monday morning and I'm glad for the chance to see Jack in his school setting. I have been feeling slightly uneasy at how out of control the kids in his class seem to get, knowing that Jack is a kid who needs to have limits set, but thought I was overanalyzing the situation. However, Friday Jack told me on the way home from school that he had cut his shirt with his scissors at school. I assumed it was an accident until I saw his sleeve had been snipped in several places around the cuff. I asked him if it was an accident and he said, "no" kind of sheepishly. (Kids are so honest!) Then he said that Mark did it too, but that he (Jack) did it first! Oh great, couldn't he have been following a bad idea instead of coming up with one...Mark's Mom is going to kill me! So after telling him that that was very wrong and asking why he did it, I asked him what his teacher said. Apparently, she told him that I could sew it for him!! Am I overreacting or should he not have a) been supervised with scissors and/or b) gotten in trouble for this?! I'm going to delicately address this tomorrow morning...wish me luck! -Dana

shovellin'

Well, we did get quite a bit of snow, but it's been a beautiful, sunny, mild day. Which meant that Henry didn't mind hanging out with me while I shovelled the driveway for over an hour! Usually he gets bored & cold, but he picked up his shovel & actually helped for awhile! Only in Canada would we consider it a balmy day at 1 degree Celsius! - Dana

Happy Birthday John!

Snow's Coming...

You would think it is going to be the storm of the century or something... the media is making it seem like this snow storm that is supposed to come today is going to be massive - 15-20 cm is enough for me, but it's not like the time Toronto called in the army... I just heard on the tv "4-5 hours until the storm!"

Hannah lost another tooth, actually she pulled it out herself. It was pizza day at school yesterday and she said that it was so loose she didn't want to loose it in her pizza. Then she said "during lunch all we talked about was teeth" - that would be a funny conversation, 5 kids sitting around talking about teeth. Hannah put her tooth under her pillow and wrote a letter to the tooth fairy asking "can I pleese keep my tooth?" - she washed it clean last night, she wanted to help out the tooth fairy to make the job easier. When I was tucking her in, she asked what the tooth fairy looked like and I said "I'm not sure, no one has really seen one", she then told me about how in the backyard she once saw sparkles in the grass and is convinced there are fairies living in the backyard.

I think I broke Henry of his 2 bottles of milk a night routine...he slept fine, now we just have to get him off of them all-together, and the milk budget will drop drastically. I have a hard time picking him up he feels like he weighs more than Hannah and Jack combined.

Jack brought home some artwork from school, I held it up and said "it's fantastic, what is it?" He said " I forget what it's called"
Me - "It starts with a M," trying to prompt him along
Jack - "Manure?"
Me - "No not manure, Menorah" I tried not to laugh. It was a nice Menorah - I didn't even know what a Menorah was at his age. Hannah then joined the conversation and told me a few things about Menorah's. - J

Whaaa Happen?

We did have a great time decorating the tree yesterday, it was a nice weekend overall. Dana went out with the other Mom's on Friday night and on Saturday night we went out with Kristy and Brent for drinks and conversation, it was such a good time that we stayed for almost 2 hours longer than we planned....and no I didn't freak out because we were not on schedule! See - I'm flexible.
I did pay the price a little on Sunday though because I was participating in a swim meet. It was a pentathlon- 50 metre Butterfly, Backstroke, Breaststroke and Freestyle - then a 100 m I.M. and then 2 relays - which I didn't want to do (the relays) but was talked into it by my teammates. I did well overall, still waiting to see the final results, but had a personal best in 2 of the 5 events I was in, so I am happy overall. Today I feel very sore though and I went to sleep at 8:30 last night - something I never do. - J

Tree trimming...

What a nice end to a busy weekend. Everyone took an hour out of their busy schedules to help us decorate our tree and it was really appreciated. Eri & Mike are in the middle of moving and can't possibly have an hour to spare, but here they were with Bennett and great spirits! They helped me out of my miserable mood I was in when they arrived. And Mom & Dad seemed pretty relaxed and content to have all their grandchildren in one room...as loud and chaotic as that can be. Anyway, it made my weekend, thanks! - Dana

Unbreak my blog

Well the blog looks fine to me, not sure - I think Dana was having some problems at home with it. I woke up this morning to 10cm of snow and a very long drive into work, it didn't help that I woke up when I was supposed to start work....I came home early yesterday and slept all afternoon - I felt like I got hit by a truck - just wiped out, my eyes were all swollen and my joints ached, but this morning I feel great, except for a headache. I think I was dehydrated or something.

It's Friday! Yeah! I have to get a Christmas tree today...we are going to decorate it on Sunday afternoon. Dana is going out tonight with the mom's from school for dinner and tomorrow night Dana and I are out with friends and Sunday I have a swim meet. What a crazy weekend and it hasn't even started yet.

I watch Survivor and what's the deal with Lydia? She's just coasting along and while we are talking about her - what the heck is a fishmonger anyway?

The kids have begun their Christmas countdown. We still haven't bought/found what they asked for from Santa. We better get on that, Mary gave me a lead on where to get Yugio cards and I still have to find this talking pony that Hannah asked for.

Looking back I sure rambled on here... oh well - Have a good Friday!

test...

Our blog looks broken

Busy night

Jack had his last skating lesson this afternoon which meant that it was a family skate. Poor Jason, I'm a lousy skater so Henry & I watched. Then to McDonald's for dinner & straight to Hannah's last night of jazz which meant there was a show for the family to watch. The kids went to bed pretty exhausted, but I think Jason was even more tired than them! - d

Safe at home

So to continue, the last time I drove down to London I was in a scary accident on the 407 going to work at a figure skating event in London on a winter morning....exactly the same as this event I just went to...left the same time in the morning, went to the same city, drove the same route and went to work on another figure skating event in the winter - very weird. I drove down the 407 very carefully and white-knuckled it most of the way and made it to London safe and sound. It was a busy event and glad to be home, I didn't get in until after 2 am and I am back to work at 7 this morning so I am not on that much rest. I'm not that tired yet....but Jack has skating tonight and it's a family skate and I can't really imagine skating around with 50 kids.

As for the previous post about schedules.... I admit it I schedule everything. I schedule everything in my brain, how long it will take to do the smallest of tasks for no reason...a bit of a control freak about it I guess, but it's just how I work. I have been thinking that I should loosen up a bit and relax, but now that it would be missed - forget it.
The weird thing is I was never like this, I was the complete opposite. Disorganized, no schedule to think of, then came kids and I have turned to this crazy schedule system. I think it's the only way I can get anything done and not miss anything important. Dana's a good sport about it most of the time, except when we go on a road trip and I have to leave at a specific time that I made up for no reason and we don't - the day is ruined... that will be my New Years resolution - to relax on leaving on time....Serenity now, serenity now.

Schedules...take 'em or leave 'em...

Although I will miss Jason terribly this weekend while he's in London, a little part of me was looking forward to altering the strict schedule we live by. We got up later this morning, ate breakfast later, oops, got to Nicola & Peter's for lunch later than we meant to, had dinner later. But the kids should be off to bed by now & something tells me they're not quite ready. And the interruption in their routine has definitely affected them. They're a bit wilder and when Jack accidentally flushed his car down the toilet, he & Hannah were absolutely inconsolable! I hate to admit it, but Jason just might have been onto something with his army schedule. - d

Help!

Hannah wants me to get her an N Sync CD for Christmas...do I have to? - d

Christmas Specials

The kids are cozy upstairs watching 'Santa Claus is Comin' to Town', it's an old favourite of mine, one that Dana never saw before.

I am off to do a figure skating event for TSN tomorrow and won't be home until Monday. It's in London, On, and I will try to call you Aunt Mary, but I don't know if I have that much free time. Last time I drove to London, well let's talk about that when I get back...

It was a P.A. Day today for the kids, Jack went to a friend's house and Hannah went next door to John & Dorothy's house to do Christmas crafts with her. She has the kids over one at a time to make a special craft and a Christmas card for Mom and Dad... very cute and Hannah had a great time today. Jack was there last week and really liked the special attention. Here is Hannah's craft she made and the card... - J

Parent-Teacher Interviews!!!

The night I always dreaded, hoped that it wouldn't happen but always did. I remember wishing that my Mom would decide that she didn't want to go, but that never happened. Ever.

Hannah and Jack got their report cards yesterday at school. Jack is doing well, he has to practice his printing and colouring, but is getting along quite well. A bit of a monkey sometimes, but he's 4. Hannah's report card was good too, she is doing really well reading and adjusting to the 1-2 split. No issues with both so we are very proud of them.

Tonight we went to the school for the parent-teacher interview, but it's a little different from what we had as kids, it's a student-led interview. Hannah sat with us while the teacher talked about her, how she is doing, what her goals are for the rest of the year - oh I don't know ... playing? No, but it was interesting, Hannah was oddly quiet during the whole thing, but sprang back to herself when she showed us her desk and the projects she has been working on. That was our first parent-teacher-student-led interview and by my calculations we will be doing this for the next 15 or so years. - j