Googly Eyes Part Two

My love of googly eyes is no secret. However, you may not know that I love fake mustaches as well. Kaedo is also a fan of these two extremely cool items. Luckily Craig puts up with our antics, and while he may roll  his eyes, he doesn't say anything.

So, when I say "our house is a little quirky", I'm not joking. One night, Kaedo put googly eyes on the light switch plates all over the house and as we had two mustaches, we added those too.

What the hell, if you can't have a little fun in your own house, what can you do? I must admit, the only draw back is half the time I think there is a bug there before I realize it is only our comedic genius!

Week 1 and a shout out!

And so it begins! The boys took this picture themselves. A good start to year 5. What do you think of our new gnome? We've never had one that sits, or one that's a bobble head! Lots of firsts with this guy. Unlike the other ones, he lives in the house as he is part of our eclectic decorations.

Want to give a big shout out to Sterling for designing the header and look of the blog for this year. He has got a small design business going and this is part of it. Any one needing business cards, stationery, blog header design, etc - he's your guy! He did my business cards and they are great. He's been asked by a teacher at school to do some design work as well as setting up a website. He's doing some other business for another client and some paid work for me. He's doing great. Hopefully it will put a few extra bucks in his pocket.

The Big One-O

Today is the big 10 - 10 years ago the boys and I moved to Ontario. Craig had been here a couple of months already, so it was just the three of us on that day. Man, was I scared. Would I hate it? Be too homesick? Hate Ontario? Would their school suck? Doctors suck?

10 years later I can say that the only place I'd rather live is overseas. A new adventure. I don't regret moving across the Country. We have a wonderful life here. The boys go to great schools. The extra-curricular activities are abundant (and we've done them all - except hockey and lacrosse). The doctors are great and our neighbors are fantastic. Can you ask for much more?

I rounded up a bunch of pictures from over the years. They in no way show even 10% of our lives. I must have 10,000 pictures from the last 10 years. They have grown up here. This is their home. And while we still miss our families, this is where we belong.

So, Happy Anniversary to us!

Argos Game

Bat Boy - stunning - love this picture!

Sterling still has the best hair around

Bowler!

Damn they're cute!

Canada Day 2004 - Ontario Place

So many hours of fun - Thanks Anti!

Christmas Lists, when they used to actually write lists

Last Christmas

Kaedo

My Guys

We've always been a bit nuts - this is just the proof!

Disney 2010 - Our first family vacation

The drive-in

Fall Clean-Up - 2012

First Bike Ride to school - 2008

First movie without us - I sat in the parking lot the whole time! haha

So cute!

Bigger pool for bigger boys - thanks Anti!

My guys!

Re-Cap

While I have no idea what started the gnome picture 'phenom', I am so happy we are back for year 5. We're going to give the blog a little refresh, introduce our new gnome and get the first picture on Sunday.

I thought for sentimentality sake I would post previous years week 52 pictures.

My oh My! From little boys to young men! 

A special thanks to K, P and family for providing us with our year 4 gnome. He is now in his new home, hanging out with his gnomies (groan - that was a bad one).

week 52!

And here it is - Week 52. Another year. 208 weeks in a row we have done this. Amazing. What's more amazing is that they have signed on for another 52! I wonder what kind of adventures their new gnome will get into this year. I'm thinking we should take him along on some of our adventures and get some pix. 

No necks were harmed in the making of this picture!

What the Hell?

Shoe shopping with Sterling is like having a root canal - without the good drugs. Painful, noisy (the grinding of my teeth) and time consuming. However, when your child has blown out their shoe right to the sock level, you can either wrap it in duck tape or buy new shoes.

The shoes he really wanted at first were $80 - which got a loud and vigorous "hell no!" from me. Unless he can cure cancer wearing those shoes, he's not getting them. Aside from that, we're not even talking about runners, they were more like glorified deck shoes. Did I mention they were too small?

Sterling has in his head that he doesn't want his feet to grow over size 13, so even if he's cripple, those are the ones he's getting. Not on my watch. The kid needs a 14. So we found the only pair of cool 14s in the place and these are them. I keep telling him that his feet are not done growing but some schmo whose name shall not be mentioned (CK) said he figured he was done growing. The clerk told us, YA, not so much - "he'll probably end up with a 16 or 17". I've been saying it all along. So really now it's just a case of mounting some bindings on those skis and he'll be good to go!

In other great news - Tar.get phoned me yesterday and my lost sunglasses were retrieved. I'm so happy. Off to get them this morning!

OH, and if  4am is too damn early, 5am is just damn early!

4am is just too DAMN EARLY!

Yee Gads! I was up, showered and lookin' my prettiful self by 4:20am this morning. That is too early in my mind, at any time. I don't sleep too much any more. In my darkest of days I would sleep about 18 hours a day, but I am happy to say, there are not too many dark days in this household. LOVE THAT!

I think that a lot of that is that my family is happy. Is it a chicken or the egg situation? If mom ain't happy, no one's happy? Or is it because everyone is happy,all is well? Maybe a little of both.

I know my guys like not waking up to an alarm. I know they like not having to make their lunch, they like having their breakfast served to them, being taken and picked up from school. They like knowing mom is around. And mom likes it too. Right now my life revolves around them. Am I too involved? Some would say yes. Do they? No. They need guidance and attention more now than they ever did in their lives. Now is when they make critical choices that can make their lives so much better or pardon the expression, fuck them up royally. While I (and Craig) have some, ok a lot, of control over their lives, we will do everything we can to make sure these are the best of years for them.

Let's face it, all ages have its problems. But being a teenager really sucks sometimes. Sterling has switched his friendship group at school after finally deciding he was sick of being treated like shit. We had a lot of tears about that, and let me tell you, it wasn't pretty. I'm quite hideous when I cry.  Haha - who am I kidding, I'm always fabulous! (kidding) It was very hard to see Sterling so upset and Craig and I were very worried. We had to pull out one of those "you should never do that" tricks, but it worked and is still working. Both my guys are ladies men, having a group of girls they eat lunch with. Kaedo's group I know, Sterling's I don't, but they are both happy.

I think Craig is too - after all it's football season and I swear the NFL plays 6 days a week. As long as he doesn't watch Tosh.2.0 in our bed, I'm happy to fall asleep listening to the game. He doesn't eat pizza 3 nights a week, he doesn't have to clean up the dishes and when I remember, I iron his shirts. We are lucky to have our Sunday morning date and while I know the extra pressure is there for him to provide for us, he is wonderful at what he does and we work together to make a life for our family.

I guess what I'm saying, is that I am embarrassed to admit that when I was a working mom, it made no sense to me why other moms with school aged children didn't work. I know now that I do work, just in a a different way. I carpool, make lunches, breakfasts, suppers, snacks. I wash clothes, fold and put away. I get oil changes, take cars for service and take kids to appointments. I go to the movies one Friday morning a month to see the shows no one else will see with me. I deal with the schools, I sit on the council, I volunteer my time if and when necessary. I shuttle kids to their friends house, the movies and other activities and I get to spend time with my dog.

I'm not justifying what I do, or being at home. I write because it is a concrete way of looking back and saying, "this was my life on this day".

And you know what? I am happier now than I have been in years. Truly. I woke up one day and thought, "you know what, today will be a good day, just like yesterday, and the day before that". That's big for me. Really big. Mental Illness has consumed me for the better part of 20 years. I will no longer allow that. It may have brought me to my knees, but it will not take me down.

Heart or Bum?

This potato came in a bag I bought last week and it looked so much like a heart that I couldn't bear to chop it up. Kaedo took a picture of it and now I'm not sure if it looks like a heart or a bum. Either way it is still on my kitchen counter.

In Other News,
Went to the specialist yesterday and learned that my Thyroid is doing much better! Yay! AND I'm down 8lbs. That is actually a bigger deal to me than the rest. How twisted is that? Anyway - my TSH is perfect, the nodules have come down in size and I don't have to have any more tests for another 6 months. Best off - no needle biopsy! Thank god! Thrilled I'm off the hook for 6 months as I can't stand my Endocrinologist. Total douchebag!

Tuesday

So, thank you to all the fam for sending the kids home with money still left in their wallets. They promptly proceeded to buy speakers and a sub-woofer each for their rooms. To say I have heard (and felt) too much bass, along with the same 3 songs played over and over and over and over again would be an understatement. Just to be clear - bass and me - we do not see eye to eye. In fact it is more stomach to eye. I want to puke by about the third song, my stomach is so upset. I wonder what the neighbors think. hmmmm

We also learned some interesting things about Ketchup. Our poor babe is virtually blind. He walks right into things and no longer moves out of the way. He stands in front of the oven, got nailed by the front door today, and is continually getting side-swiped as we just aren't used to him being underfoot. He comes down the stairs part way when prompted, but not the entire way and it is hard to get him to go up. The boys hate walking him as he is very slow and bangs into things (power box) if they are not very diligent. He is still our sweet, lovely dog, but he is no longer the Ketchup we have spent so many years with. My heart is heavy but filled with love for this amazing dog.

Random Pix

Kaedo took apart this calculator that didn't work anymore. Then he changed things around a bit. Still didn't work. 

My other pair of Doc Martens. Have had them for about 3 years. LOVE THEM! First time wearing yesterday. No mom, I didn't wear capris. I wore rolled up jeans, thankyouverymuch!

Some more of our decorating. These are made with kids books from the 50s and 60s. Top shelf - milk glass, which I love, a Brer Rabbit from Winnie the Pooh that my uncle gave me somewhere between 1972 and 1975, and a Sprite bottle that Kaedo loves. Middle shelf - Football player coin bank I gave to Craig for our anniversary, and a cigar from Cuba from K and T. Bottom shelf - Craig's Donky.Kong game he got as a kid - and it still works.

We have been collecting some colored vinyl and have made a collage on one of the walls in the dining room area. The picture doesn't show it well, but it is pretty damn cool.

Lastly, in our never ending love of googly eyes, Kaedo added these to our Ketchup figurine. Because, who doesn't love a good pair of googly eyes?

Week 51

Week 51! Oooh lala! One more week, then the unveiling of our new gnome. Right now he's sitting in a car in our front room. Yes, you read that right. A car in the front room. We have quite an eclectic thing going on here!

The boys volunteered for the Terry Fox Run this morning for 3 hours, passing out orange wedges and water, and in Kaedo's case, scarfing down as many TimBits as he could. We picked them up at 11:30am then headed to our favorite flea market. A brief stop at Cost.co, and then we came home. We spent the rest of the afternoon finishing up the decorating in the dining room.

I'll take some pictures tomorrow to show.

Busy here but that's better than being bored.

Christmas officially started today as Kaedo and I listened to Boney M while doing the Secret Santa for everyone. It was quite funny. Did I mention it was Boney M on my record player? Well, not THEM on the player - that would just be weird - it was their Christmas album. Glad I cleared that up.

Plant Love

Kaedo has developed a real love of plants and planted peppers before leaving for holidays this Summer (which Craig tended for him). He even dried the seeds from one of the peppers, re-planted them and built a self-watering system for it. Very cool. I am a little concerned that the back door of my kitchen is going to have a row of plants lined up in front of it all winter. Then I remember he could have worse hobbies! He recently bought a new pepper plant and transplanted it and has added it to our home decor. It looks really good. He also helped me transplant some succulents into tea cups, and (correct me if I'm wrong, mom) a 30 year old Christmas Cactus into a planter that suited our decor. Even with a retro as our house is, the 1970's ceramic pot didn't quite go!

Succulents in tea cups. Love these. The last one doesn't like it's new home so I have transplanted it again and we'll see how it does. 

hmmm

This blog seems to have gotten away from me. It seems that even as I start my day no later than 6am I still am busy at 8:42pm. Who would have thunk it.  Right now I am depending on my fridge calendar so I know what days I am in charge of carpool so I don't leave any kids standing at the flagpole waiting for me. Who would have thought I might break under the pressure. Just kidding. Although it does seem much more important when you are trying to get other people's kids to school on time or picked up on time. When it's your own you call the school and say, "he'll be 10 minutes late". With other kids - not so much.

I seem to have my hand in a few different pies right now and am enjoying myself. The house still looks great and I still love it. The record player is a huge hit but I must say we do not have near the collection I thought we had amassed. I am quite sick of Def Leppard and when I saw that Craig was putting on Bon Jovi this morning, I promptly went out.

The weather here has been 30 but my doctor told me today that it is to get into the single digits within the week. I never look at the weather. I figure if I can wear jeans, a sweater and my Doc Martens, I am a happy woman. Speaking of Doc Martens, I figured that because it was September, it was time to pull them out - so I did. Did I mention I wore capris?

Thanks Craig, for these beauties! I love them!

Week 50

Week 50 - man - 2 more weeks, then we retire this cutie, and I don't mean either of the kids.
As you can see, Kaedo isn't at his best but is still smiling, albeit a little hesitantly, despite the last few days. As he always holds the gnome, he was adamant he get to again yesterday.

At camp with his school last week he fractured a cervical vertebrae and we have spent a lot of time in hospital through the weekend and just tending to this poor guy. I will tell you that our health system worked for us this weekend. While we had a hiccup part way through the process, once that had been realised, Kaedo had a CT Scan within 15 minutes of returning to hospital.

While I won't go into all the details, I will say he is a brave, compassionate kid, who is way kinder than either his dad or I. We spent part of the morning in school, talking to Guidance and the Principal, changed his timetable and made some modifications that will help him over the next little while. He is happy, so we are.

More regular blogging to come. This weekend, it just wasn't a priority.

A Day at the Beach

On Friday, to end our week of holidays together we chose to head to the beach. It wasn`t very warm, and the beach wasn`t too busy, so we had fun. Here are a whole bunch of pictures about our exploits. Both Kaedo and Sterling learned to love the beach this summer with all the wonderful opportunities to both see the ocean and boat and fish on a lake. Sterling has said he will surely own a boat when he gets older and Kaedo says he would love to live on the beach (not as a hobo, I hope).

Craig and Sterling playing Frisbee

Man-made waterfall

Markings in water looked like snake skin - probably an oil slick!

Kaedo on the rocks - exactly where he wanted to be

Our very first `selfie` - maybe it should be our Christmas Card?

Kaedo's sand sculpture

We had a fun couple of hours. I made sandwiches and we packed a ton of water and our books. We hung out, chased seagulls (well, Sterling did) and had a nice day. 

We are officially down two days of school and there have been a few growing pains, but I think we're ok. Kaedo is leaving in the morning for sleep away camp with his grade 9 class and he is being so chill about it. I'm proud of him. He totally rocks!