Attempt Number Two

I am going to try to recreate our missing year in a few quick posts.
I am not the kind of person to have a blog.
That has probably become obvious with my erratic posts.

But I miss a few blogs I used to read. They inspire and remind me why I do, what I do. Also, I miss keeping track of our life. Something beautiful is captured when I blog our days. I see the grace where I otherwise see lists done and undone. So here is our year in review.

Sally my sponsor and all around wonderful lady made this Easter treat for my children. It is a doll with a hard boiled egg inside. I can't remember the name of it.

What did my children think of it?

That would be three thumbs up.

During this time baby number four was busy growing and getting ready for her big debut.
Morning sickness does not fit what women really go through.
Thank you April for your advice. I talked with Ann my midwife, and the pills really helped.

We're Back...........

After a very long break I am back on the web. A lot has happened in the last forty days. The kids and I were baptized at the Eater Vigil and Craig and I were confirmed. It was so beautiful. I hope to have pictures up soon.

Also our family is eagerly anticipating a fourth child sometime in early December. We are having trouble coming up with boys names so if anyone has ideas please share them. For those of you that heard we were house shopping, we have decided to renovate our house instead.

Thought of the week.

Anger bites the hand that feeds it: us.

- Ann Voskamp

Wowzers

We got back from Regina last night and we had so much fun. But I will post about that later. For now I wanted to post this picture.

Evan received Pokemon coloring pages for Christmas and has been coloring and cutting them out all week. He is very proud of them and so he should be. As you can see they are adorable. Then the other day I saw this drawing Mikayla made of one of them. I was impressed, especially with the facial expression.

Making an effort to grow.

I have been growing spiritually over the past year. I do not usually mention this because my faith is new. I feel the need to protect it, for it is too precious to treat carelessly. Often I will read a blog and it will speak to me. I don't want to forget the truth that these posts brought, but my memory is not the greatest. In an effort not to lose what I have found I am going to link my favorite post of the week. Something that speaks to me spiritually. My link today is to a post on patience/gratitude. It has made me take a deeper look at my life and realize that I have so much to be grateful for.

First Day on the Job

The windchill was -45 and their paper route is long, but take a look at their proud faces.
Who could ask for more.

Meet Claire

I have wanted to make room in my life for more I that love. In my quest I stumbled on Dawn's file crate system. I am searching for a way to organize my thoughts, plans and responsibilities. I spend far too much time planning and re-planning my days. I believe that I may have found a system that will work for me. But despite the impression I may give, I am not one to jump into something. After pondering the idea I mentioned it to Sarah, lo and behold she had been thinking of trying the very same thing. Inspired we headed out to Staples. A few days later my kids wanted a playdate with her kids, giving us the perfect opportunity to compare our file crates and share ideas.


Isn't my file crate cute? I have grown quite fond of her.
So I decided to give her a name, meet Claire.
(a.k.a. "Claire" from the Rheostatics)
There is a line in that song
"let me see you save a mind that isn't there.....".
I feel that sums up my hopes.



Anyway, I wondered onto Sarah's blog the other day. She posted about our crate's playdate.
She has come up with many great ways to use her system. I may have to steal some of her ideas. So far I have used Claire to tame the paper clutter beast I created in the last five years. I own two address books but I could never find an address when I needed one. Now I will have one address book and it has a home.

I have made myself a weekly planner. This has already saved me from forgetting to renew my license, and it gives me peace of mind to know that everyone's birthday and anniversary is right there where I can not lose it. Just this afternoon I jotted down our confirmation # for the hotel in Regina. I don't need to think about it again I'll know where it is when I need it.

I also created a household binder. So far it holds my weekly menu plans, the recipes for each week, and all our contacts. It will eventually keep my daily, weekly and seasonal chores, our homeschool schedual, the kids chore charts, and gift ideas as well.

I have a daily clip board where currently holds today's recipes, history handouts, a science experiment, a french game and a todo list for the day.

I have used my file crate to place things to sort for the weeks to come. Homeschool ideas for next month have been thrown into the last folder of this month. The front ideas folder of this month holds two sheets for the Precambrian Period, we were studying this but decided to put it on hold while we focused on magnetism. There is a slip with a web site I need to check into before the kids doctors appointment on the January 27th, as well as a few sheets on attachment parenting. I have wanted to turn my rambling thoughts from the parenting course I took into a few words of inspiration. I intend to print these inspiration thoughts and put them up to remind me through the day.



As unwieldy as my system may seem it has already given me peace of mind. I don't have to remember everything I have Claire to take care of that ; )