A Good Day (and a Brain Dump)

Despite waking up to yet another day of dark dreary weather, it didn't rain (much) today and by the afternoon it was beginning to be more sunny than overcast. We were all thrilled to be able to leave the house and spend the afternoon working and playing outside.

This is how the girls are feeling so far about our Canadian summers ;oD.

I mowed the lawn and did some weeding. (There's tons more of that to be done yet, but I'm happy for the little snitches of weeding time). The Engineer push mowed, trimmed trees, and started teaching Bella how to ride a two wheeler. She spent a huge portion of the afternoon scootering around on it. By suppertime, she was already able to balance. She'll be riding on her own by the end of a week I'm sure!

The afternoon was not without screaming girls angry about not getting their way, not wanting to share, or not wanting to wait their turn, but the tantrums are becoming shorter and less bold all the time. There are longer periods of peace. When it is just me home with them, I still don't let them out of my sight, but when everyone is home, I'm comfortable knowing where they all are and just keeping an ear out.

Bella and Peanut's English is exploding! Peanut cracks us up with her words because she has such a teeny tiny voice and will mimic any word you say to her. We're really really encouraging them to use their words instead of just pointing and whining. This is very difficult for Bright Eyes as she prefers to say nothing and hope you can read her mind or understand her grunts. Oh, she can talk! She's very verbose when she is angry about something. I'm pretty sure our distant neighbours have heard her rage :o)!

Happily, their eating habits are improving too. Well, not so much the eating with their hands, and mouths open, and wiping their faces on their shirts, but what they will eat! Tonight we had pancit. Granted pancit is Filipino, but it has lots of veggies in it! I like to put bok choy and carrots in mine. Bella and Bright Eyes scarfed it down like it was their last meal. Bella even had a second helping and said, "I like!"

Speaking of eating, they shocked me the other day with what they ate. We were all in the van on the way to the older girls' music lessons and I opened a bag of jalapeno chips. Squirt won't eat them and the other two older girls will eat them in moderation. The little girls wouldn't leave them alone. At one point Peanut kept rubbing her lips because of the heat, but I think she was the one that ate the most. She even went back to them after eating her bun. Crazy girl!

The four youngest girls and I all have colds. The two little ones are so stuffed up they can't even breathe through their noses. There's quite the chorus of snoring coming from their room when they sleep. The colds don't seem to bother them though.

The girls love the hose even though the water is frigid. They will laugh and screech and get themselves soaking wet and then shake and shake from being cold and wet. Today, I gave them a warm shower, put them in their jammies, fed  us all supper, and shortly after that they were all off to bed. I sit in their room or just outside their door until they all fall asleep. If I don't some one always gets worried and upset. I am still amazed at how quickly they fall asleep and that they sleep through the night.

We made it through a year of school -- not home schooling. After being home schooled for five years I was sure the kids would bring home every illness known to mankind when they started in the fall. Instead, I learned we have very healthy kids! They never missed a single day because of a cold or anything else either. They had the occasional cold, but no fevers, no vomiting or anything until... Thursday night. Beans woke up about midnight feeling downright ill. By morning it had passed (no pun intended :o)), but she was very tired. She slept most of the day. Funny thing is, I learned that her friend ended up sick through the night too. Hers must have started earlier because she went to school. We have a suspicion that it was the fries or the ketchup that they ate earlier in the day that caused the problem. They were on a school trip and shared a plate of fries.

There is only one thing left to do on our home renovation/addition, and that is have the backsplash under the kitchen cabinets put up. We still haven't chosen tile though, so I don't think it'll happen any time soon. Perhaps we'll be able to go and look next Saturday. I know our tile guy would like us to get our act together on that, so I think we had better make it a priority.

Wishing you all a restful weekend!