Deals

When we lived in Utah, I LOVED going shopping with my sister Jade and finding the best deals we could. It varied from $0.47 clothes from Old Navy to a case of bananas for $3.00! The better the deal, the better my day was.

The deals are not near as exciting here in Lethbridge, but once in a while we will get a $0.94 clothing sale...again, it is only once-in-a-blue-moon-while.

I have a friend that is living in Florida. In addition to being an amazing photographer, she is now my coupon hero! If you are interested in how to save a couple of bucks (or in her case...almost $800 to date), you can check out her blog here.

Knowledge is power...and in this case, extra money!

Reflections

The other night, Sawyer woke up crying in his sleep. I usually let him work it out himself, but he didn't seem to want to calm down. So I quietly went into his room and picked him up. He settled right down and snuggled in. As I rocked with him in the darkness of his room, I started to contemplate on how blessed I have been to have the priviledge of holding FIVE sweet, sleeping babies in my arms. Yep, FIVE of them!

This got me thinking about each one of my children and how truly blessed we were to have five HEALTHY babies and to have them here with us still; to watch them learn and grow and mature.

As Sawyer is our last, I thought back on all the months of being sick with morning sickness (that only happened at night). Gaining 35 lbs with each one and not quite loosing it all in between each one. Hearing that first heart beat...five different times. Getting ultrasounds done and being surprised with the announcement of what gender each baby was at birth...NOT at the ultrasound.

This also brought back the scary memory of being told that baby #4 (Cardiff) had a choroid plexus cyst on the right side of his brain, found during a routine ultrasound. I remembered how terrified I was that something would be wrong with him. These particular cysts are often signs of genetic diseases like Down Syndrome or Trisomy 18 (which is always fatal). Again, I was calmed as I remember going to the Temple with Wayne and feeling comforted that I would be able to take care of and raise this baby and that things would be all right.

As soon as he was born, almost before the doctor could say "It's a BOY," I asked, "Is he okay? Does he look all right?" He was...he was perfect just like the others. What a blessing Cardiff is to us. And today, I took him to his first day of pre-school. He was so incredibly excited!

After rocking my last baby back to sleep, I put him back in bed and gave thanks for a home filled with joy, laughter (usually) and the smiling faces of Emmy, Azia, Parker, Cardiff and Sawyer. Oh, how I LOVE them!

First Day of School 2009

FIRST DAY OF

SCHOOL 2009

Wow, when did my children get so old? This year Emmy moved up to Middle School! YIKES! If she is old enough to be in middle school than I must REALLY old! Wayne took Emmy to her first day at Gilbert Paterson Middle School. She is in grade 6 this year. She didn't want him hanging around too long and making a big deal of things, so as soon as she saw her friends, she said to him, "I see some of my wierd friends, you can go now." She has always done so good on her first days...never a tear or any apprehension.

Azia moved up to Mr. Roesler's grade 4 class at Agnes Davidson. Since there is only 1 class of each grade in the English track at the school, she knew almost all of the kids there already. There were some new move-ins and she quickly made some new friends on the first day.

Parker makes the jump to full-day school in grade 1. His teacher is Mrs. Simons and she seems very nice. Like Azia, he too knew most of the kids in his class from Kindergarten. There were some new faces, but he was thrilled to see his school friends again.

So that leaves me at home with my two little guys, Cardiff and Sawyer. I figured Cardiff would soon realize how boring it is hanging out with me all day, every day, so he will soon start in pre-school. Cardiff will be busy with his own school activities 2 afternoons a week. I think this will be really good for him...both socially and verbally. The pre-school he is enroled in has on-site speech assistants and pathologists. I know this will be a huge asset in continuing his progress with articulation. Unlike the other 3 kids, I think his first day will not be as smooth...but I guess we'll see.

August trip to Utah

There aren't too many people who venture to the same country/state more than 4-6 times in a single year...but we do! We took one last summer trip to Utah in August and much fun was had. Here's a glimpse of what we did...

Heard sounds of rain in Idaho, but it wasn't rain...instead, it was BUGS hitting our windshield to the point of not being able to see out very well!

Stopped for a quick family picture in front of the Idaho Falls Temple.

Went to Hogle Zoo.

Wayne filmed a music video for one of his Christmas songs.

Wayne did a concert at UVU with Sam Payne, Mercy River and Michael Dowdle.

Went swimming at our-new-favorite-pool but had to evacuate before even getting wet due to a d-i-a-r-r-h-e-a accident! Ummm, yeah....GROSS!

And with that, we say good-bye to another summer.

Broadway comes to Calgary

We had the wonderful opportunity to take our 3 oldest kids to see "The Lion King" in Calgary. It isn't often that we get Broadway plays in our neck of the woods, but we knew that we wanted to see this one.

We left Cardiff and Sawyer with Wayne's parents for the day then drove the extra 1 1/2 hours up to Calgary. We detoured to a couple of piano stores on the way to the theatre. (That is a whole new blog entry to come....!)

The play was AMAZING!! The singers were great, but the costumes and puppetry were truly breath-taking! I almost teared up in the opening scene as all of the animals came on stage...including the HUGE elephant that came down the aisle of the Jubilee to get to the stage.

This seems to be the year of shows/plays for us. We will be going to NYC with Jade and Mike in October over Canadian Thanksgiving and we will be seeing Wicked, Jersey Boys and Stomp. Then in November, we will head back to Utah to see the So You Think You Can Dance tour when it stops in Salt Lake. Too much fun to come!

The Wedding

A few months ago, Tami, the daughter of our pseudo-grandma Deb, got engaged. She thought it would be "fun" to have her wedding and reception in our backyard. We were happy to oblige...since we do have the room.

Her big day was on Friday. We gathered at our house the night before to prep all of the food and make final decoration arrangements. Let me just say...um...it was an interesting night. There was a stressed out mother-of-the-bride, future in-laws unsure of what was going to happen, a bride and groom who just wanted to be married privately that night and a bride in the middle of a "small" emotional break-down. We still had no definite idea of what they were envisioning or what they were expecting.

The week leading up to the wedding was anything but summer-like. The temperatures dropped into early spring-like numbers and then the clouds moved in. Like any bride, Tami was a bit stressed and concerned about EVERYTHING! She continued to tell us her plans of her garden wedding...even though the forcast was for thunderstorms on Friday.

I finally pulled Deb aside and asked her if anyone had talked to Tami about a back-up plan. With a 90% chance of rain, I thought it would be a good idea for her to be prepared NOT to have it in the backyard.

Friday morning came. Deb called and asked if it was too late to move it to the church. Uhhh...YEAH! We had no way of transporting decorations, which we finished at 1am, and there was no secondary location mentioned on the invitations, which meant everyone would come to our house anyway. So, with that we proceeded to transform our house into the best wedding location possible.

By 1pm, all of the furniture had been moved out of the main floor. There were no more family picutres on the wall. The family room was decorated even more than the picutre shows. By the time the ceremony started, the clouds opened up and the rain started to pour down. I know everyone was glad we still didn't try to set things up outside.

Following the ceremony, we "magically" transformed the family room in to the reception room with 7 round tables and seating for more than 50 people.

It really was a beautiful wedding and everyone was happy in the end. It is amazing how things just fell into place that day. I truly think this is how it was supposed to be and I am so GRATEFUL for all those how helped make my house the perfect place for Tami and Mike's wedding.

Frogs

We live on the prairies. Our backyard backs on to an open field. I would've expected mice...but not FROGS!

So far, we have found 1 dead frog (ewwwww!) and 2 live ones, jumping around on our basement carpet. I don't know how they are getting in or where they are coming from, but the kids are slightly freaked out and I am a little more grossed out. I don't do well with creepy-crawlies or anything that is slimy or slithers...or jumping amphibians of any kind.

Again....EWWWWW!