It’s nice to have a yard, a driveway, a carport, trees… not to mention the house.

I love him so much.

We left a bottle of water in the freezer while we went to church so that it would be chilled when we got back. Imagine Ray’s surprise when he poured himself a cup and this happened.
cup of ice

Neither of us had seen anything like it. The water was just so close to the freezing point that it turned to ice in the glass.

We’ve almost got the “library” unpacked but we need one more book case in order to get all the books out of boxes. I’m really excited about it. We did not have room for our books in our old place. We had books in every room of the house — except the bathrooms — plus more in storage. If I was looking for a specific book it was very hard to find it. Now, all of our books are going to be in the library and I think that it is quite reasonable for us to call it that. We have 4 bookcases FULL of books already up and, as I said, we need at least one more. Two of them are quite large bookcases, too. We haven’t begun organizing the books yet, we just threw them onto shelves willy-nilly. Setting up a system is going to a big job.

When we moved in, all of our helpers commented on all the boxes of books. Our brother-in-law said that they could probably have fit all the books in their home into ONE box. Well, not us.

I’ll try to get some pictures of the house up soon.

Today we got to see the RCMP Musical Ride. It was awesome, but I would have enjoyed it more without Jessica and David hanging on me asking how much longer it would be and begging to go home. (Sarah and Daniel liked it, and Samuel just liked being outside playing in the grass.)

Our puppy is big and getting bigger. And what do we do about playful puppy bites? She has never been aggressive but her play is rough and she is too big for that to be allowed. She has to learn to keep her mouth off of people. And also, not to jump on people.

I think I’m looking forward to school starting. My children just need more mental stimulation than they’re getting and when they’re bored, I’m miserable.

I’d better go to bed, it’s almost 1.

Yesterday we met my brother, Curtis, and his family in Calgary. They had come down to go to the zoo and didn’t have time for coming any further south than that, so they invited us to drive up and join them. I’m not even going to talk about the details of trying to get ready to go and meet them on time. We arrived there later than planned, but had a really nice afternoon together. (I got to meet my baby niece, Erin, for the first time! She’s 7 months old.) Here are some pictures. My nieces are both beautiful, of course, but I don’t have permission to post pictures of them, so that’s why I’m not showing them off more.

It was a lovely day.

One more.

Anyone want to lease 5 children? They’re great at making noise, making messes, breaking things, and disposing of any kind of edible treat that you might have been saving for yourself. They have plenty of energy and run on candy, no batteries required! Call now! I’ll throw in the puppy for free!

*****

You know, not only do I miss my mother as my mother and my friend, but I also really miss all that grand-parenting that she should have been here to do.

My mother-in-law has eleventy-six grandkids and does not have time to babysit my kids unless it’s an emergency…. You know, like when I’m about to give birth to another one. (OK, she does not have quite eleventy-six grandkids. But it’s a lot.) One night of free babysitting is a poor reward for 9 months of pregnancy… especially if you’re just going to spend it in labour anyway.

If MY mom were still around, she would love to babysit my kids. Maybe not every day, and maybe not all at once, but she would love it. I’m not joking.

*****

So, uh, any takers?

Rose is already up to 32 pounds and I’m afraid we might have to move to Bridwell Island.

At dinner time, Samuel (as usual) did not eat much of his supper.

Before I got a chance to clean up, I left the room for a moment and came back to find Rosie jumping up to clean off the highchair tray. I put her outside and began to clear the table and high chair, and load the dishwasher. I put Sam’s leftovers in Rosie’s dish for when she came back in. I was pretty sure that she’d enjoy it more than he (apparently) had.

Then I went back to the dining room for more dishes.

When I came back into the kitchen, Samuel was eating his own leftovers out of her dish. Ew.

Later, I was eating potato chips. Rosie clearly wanted some but I wasn’t sharing. I told her potato chips weren’t good for puppies.

So then Samuel gets in my face, trying to grab some, pointing and saying, “Yum!” He doesn’t really doesn’t talk at all, so this impressed me and I gave him one… which he promptly fed to Rosie.

We had to let him do it again so that we could get a picture.

Since the day that I said that I had internet access, I have actually had it only intermittently, and not that often, so I haven’t been receiving email, reading blogs, or checking facebook in about a month now. And it hasn’t killed me. Who knew one could survive so long without the internet?

Anyway, guess what? We got a puppy! (I did consider adopting a dog from the animal shelter or a rescue group but, to make a long story short, we ended up getting a puppy.) The advertisement said she was a border collie but once we actually went out to look at her, and spoke to the seller, it was pretty obvious that he doesn’t really know what her genetic make-up is. She’s at least part border collie. But, of course, once the kids saw her there was no going back.

She’s all black, with a white spot on her chest that is so small we didn’t even realize she had it until after we got her home. She has big, brown, puppy-dog eyes and a sweet face. And she weighs over 26 pounds at 10 weeks old… I think that she’s going to be rather a larger dog than I was counting on. (Sigh.) But she seems fairly calm and well-behaved (for a puppy) and very eager to please. Obviously she wants to chew everything that she can get her mouth on, and she has to be watched all the time and taken outside every couple of hours, she is a puppy but everybody loves her and I think she’s going to grow up to be a very good dog. (I just hope our couch is still all in one piece by then.)

The children have named her Rose (or Rosie).

^ Baby Rose having a little snooze.

^ Sarah and Rose

Sarah, as you can see, is very happy with our new addition.

Finally, my own computer is set up again! It’s been almost 3 weeks since I’ve been able to use it. In between, I’ve occasionally been able to use Ray’s laptop, but it’s nice to have my own computer set up. We are not all unpacked and organized — I’m thinking it may be a while before we are totally unpacked and we may never be organized… but we’re finally at a comfortable stage. I’m very happy about that.

My brother is here visiting. The first person from my side of the family to visit in our new house. I should go and visit while I can.