Monday, October 29, 2012

Last times with two before there are three

Last Sunday, given that I was coughing and Hope was under the weather too, we decided I should just keep the girls at church for worship and then come back once preaching started, since cold noise is not pleasant during any service. :o) 
I was going to put on some children's music once we got home, but it ended up I just boiled the kettle, made some tea, and enjoyed the sound of quietness while playing with the girls in the living room.
Joy-Belle loves her play kitchen. I haven't decided yet it we will actually return it to the basement play room once the basement is refinished, as Joy plays with it every single day right now.
Joy made her own kind of tea and served me some while I was colouring with Hope at the dining room table. Thank you to Auntie Chloe for the fall outfits for the girlies! They love them!
Peeking out from her frolic time on the couch so Mommy could take her picture.
We normally have Home Group on Sunday evenings, but as a couple of us were sick, and one of our leaders was also sick, it was cancelled. So, with a full Sunday evening ahead of us, and too brisk of temperatures outside for us sickish ones, Josh decided we would watch a movie with the girls.
Homeward Bound or Robin Hood (the animated one) were our two choices, and at the mention of "dogs and cats" the girls got all excited, so we knew Homeward Bound was the choice! Josh bought it off of iTunes, and let it download while I got snacks ready, and we had a jolly old time on the futon together, while watching it on Josh's laptop. :o)
Hope had been asking all weekend if she could "do beads" and since I was planning to do some sewing on Monday, I held her off till then, telling her she could do beads while Mommy and Joy sewed. :o) Just like any activity she hasn't done in a while, the beads kept her occupied for hours and hours!
Meanwhile, Joy played with her doll and some sewing supplies at my feet or on the bed beside the sewing machine, and like pressing "the button" for Mommy. I let the girls press the back-stitch key if they're around when I need it, because it fascinates them to be allowed to be involved, and the key does make a jolly little "beep" when you press it.
Trying hard to beat these colds before the baby comes, it's been sweater time at our house, which Hope loves. :o) I love having little people to help me when it comes to uncomfortable tasks like bending down over my baby-belly to re-stock the toilet paper under bathroom sinks. But of course, you can't just do it all boring like... you have to twirl with the TP rolls which are giant bracelets first!!
Thanks for being my helper, Hopey! Like her slippers? Her ladybug ones were in sad condition, having holes on the bottom from her frequent wearing of them, so I got her some new ones the day we went shopping together this week. God blessed me with friends who let me drop Joy off at their house to play while Hope and I went shopping together. Since she had a cold I didn't want to leave her there, and since she loves shopping and doing things with "just Mommy" I took her with me. I pushed her in the cart for only the first 20 minutes or so, and then told her she had to walk because she was getting too heavy for Mommy to push. :o) She had great fun picking up low-shelved items and putting them in the cart for me, and "chasing me" down empty aisles. :o) She even twirled her way down one aisle, which made a fellow shopper send a grin my way!
It begins.
Over three months have passed since our summer flood in the basement, and now, two small weeks before baby is due, we are happy to have insurance workers in our home hanging drywall and insulation and all those good things. :o)
One standing joke we have in our house is Hope's love of purple. When we lost some of our walls due to water damage she cutely told us the new ones we put on should be purple (she was talking specifically about baseboards at the time of the conversation). Well, we explained to her that we weren't going to have purple baseboards or purple walls, except maybe one feature wall in the guest room. She reconciled herself to the fact, and we carried on. That brings me to this picture. :o)
We asked for some form of insulation to be put on the exterior wall that runs along our stairwell, as there was none there previously, and the stairwell gets mighty cold and damp in the winter months. They put up this foam insulation, and I could just see the cogs turning in Hope's little head when she looked at it, because, as you can see - it's purple!!! :o) I had to tell her it wasn't going to stay a purple wall, because the guys were going to put drywall and paint over it, but it was a cute and memorable moment in this saga for sure!
 Simple fun on a Saturday. These two showed up each pushing their dolly stroller with one of Daddy's winter gloves on. :o)
Cute little girls. :o) I'm so blessed.

Friday, October 26, 2012

Thanksgiving and the middle of our October

Josh flew home late Friday night, just in time for Thanksgiving Long Weekend! Yay!
I had dashed out to run some errands on Saturday, and brought back Timmies for us.
I occasionally ask the attendant for two extra-small cups and lids, so Hope and Joy can either share my tea if I'm getting tea, or so I can make them tea at home and they can have it in cups just like Mommy and Daddy.
Josh was getting ready to BBQ, and the girls were burning off some energy out on the deck. :o)
Reading in the recliner before naps on Sunday afternoon.
So thankful for a hubby who loves on our children and lets them be close to him. :o)
The start of a wee bit of Thanksgiving decor.
More stories on Sunday evening. We all enjoyed having Daddy to ourselves for a whole long weekend after being without him for an entire week.
Finished off the decor with some winter mums from my gardens. And changed up the pinecones a bit. :o)
Holiday Monday was a productive day for Josh and I, and Hope helped that situation greatly by saying she wanted to talk to Uncle Avery on the phone. So I sent a text message down to the farm folks to see if that would be a possibility, and that took care of Hope for a whole hour for us! :o)
Yes, she really did talk that long, cycling through Uncle Avery, Uncle Luke, and Granny I think. I even got to say a few words to Luke before their phone battery was beeping because it was low. :o)
Our simple Thanksgiving dinner. I made fresh buns for Josh and the girls, (and a bunch for the freezer for after the baby comes) and since I actually like Brussels sprouts I bought some and cooked them up for my treat. And of course, turkey and gravy and cranberry sauce, and spinach/fruit salad with feta cheese.
And for dessert - homemade cranberry apple cider and gluten-free pumpkin pie. After only unsuccessful attempts at making gluten free pie crust from scratch, I decided to bit the bullet and buy a couple pre-made shells and see how they were. Best $6 I ever spent! :o)
Hmm. Think she likes the cider?
Guess she's figuring it out. :o) She didn't like the pie, but I wasn't expecting her to either. :o)
Daddy had to go back to work on Tuesday, and so the girls and I resumed our simple routine of days at home. I think I had been cleaning up the kitchen from breakfast when Hopey brought me this tray. "Mommy, I brought you a pretend snack. There's a pan for you to cook eggs, and there's lettuce and tomato for your veggies. And there's a blue teacup for if you want tea, and the pink teapot has a pretend lid on it, so you can pour yourself more tea if you want." I asked her about the toy car also on the tray, "Is that for me to play with if I get bored while I eat my snack?" To which she replied, "Um, yeah!" :o) I did take a video of the whole sequence, but it was too large to upload here. :o) 
Bring on the worship music for my little ones!
It's so cute how Joy follows Hope's lead.
Amazingly, they both shared the same little chair without getting upset at each other. :o)
I have done a bunch of cooking and baking for after the baby comes, but mostly "normal food,"  so I knew I needed to take a day and bake some gluten free stuff for myself. :o) Four things done in one day was great, and I just made an activity out of it, going slow so the girls could do it with me. :o) At one point, Hopey questioned me on why I wasn't sweeping up the mess we were making on the floor! So I just told her that the floor was dirty anyways, and I only wanted to sweep up once, so I was just going to wait till we were done all the baking and sweep up the big mess at the end.
I did make one pan of Rice Krispie squares with puffed rice cereal instead of the Krispies, and the girls had been eyeing the marshmallows ever since we bought them together at the store. :o) So finally, they got their chance to have some marshmallows for a snack!
Hee hee - Joy looks like a little football player because she had a sweater vest with a hood on it on underneath her apron.
The girls always put the muffin papers in the tin for me when I am baking. We decided to let Joy try to do it this time, but that went sideways pretty quickly, and having Hopey come to the rescue was not a peaceful resolve in Joy's mind, so Mommy quickly finished up while they were distracted with their much-desired snack. :o)
I'm thankful for the large windows in our living room that do let in some lovely sunlight in the long months of winter here. :o)
More colouring. :o) She asked me to draw shapes again, and since I had exhausted the list of the usual things like square, heart, star, rectangle etc, I drew her music clefs and music notes. She loved it!!
At lunch one weekday, Hope actually finished her food first (a RARE occurence in our house) and Joy decided she wanted Hopey to finish feeding her instead of Mommy. I knew it was rice, and that it was going to make an even bigger mess than the one that currently decorated the chairs and floors, but I decided it was worth it to add to the mess and let them have at it while I started on the other clean up.
It was a good recipe for laughter, and Joy did eat some more, and I did get it all cleaned up later.
Playtime after bath.
I always give them the stiff cardboard roll when we finish a box of Tinfoil, and it makes a good trumpet or spy glass for a few days until it eventually "disappears". :o)
Josh and I were blessed to be able to take in a weekend parenting course together at our church while a friend babysat Hope and Joy for us. :o) It was their first long time with someone other than family, and I was much relieved to see them and the babysitter still smiling when we got home.
Amanda, the friend who was watching them, brought some books her parents used to read to her, and forgot them at our house, so Hope was quick to request one of them as her bedtime story that night. :o) Amanda told me Hope had been read to for several hours in the day! I believe it too! Great way to learn and fill the imagination. :o)

A week at home without Daddy

We got back from Denver on a Saturday afternoon. After picking up groceries and unpacking the essentials we all collapsed in our own beds for some sleep. Sunday was church in the morning, naps in the afternoon, and Home Group in the evening, as well as getting our suitcase emptied the rest of the way so as to re-pack Josh for his business trip on Monday. We did make it all the way around, and off he flew for a week of business in Indiana. :o) Phew! Busy. :o) 
It was cold and crisp back home in Alberta, so time for scarves. I had some scarves along in Denver, but it was so warm there I hardly used them.
As you can see, Hope and Joy wanted to wear some of Mommy's scarves themselves.
I was using the Vita Mix for something and they both decided they wanted to watch instead of going to the other room.
They make me laugh!
A quiet evening in Mommy's room while Daddy was away. I think I needed to fold laundry, which was dumped on my bed, so I put on a movie for the girls to watch while I tried to get some folding done. We have had the couch awkwardly stashed in our room, as the futon from the basement is currently in our living room where this couch normally goes because the basement is still under re-construction from the flood.  
Morning playtime in the sunbeams in the living room after their baths. :o)
Me at 35 weeks.
So grateful for this one shirt that still fits all the way around me. :o)
I was being indecisive with my camera flash. :o)
I love how children can make a game out of almost everything. :o)
A single friend had joined us for dinner that evening, so the girls were running across the kitchen to her...
...and then back again. Then they would ask "Say 'Ready-set-go' Mommy," and I would, and they would take off from the wall for Deborah where she was sitting. They had been running into me before, but my tummy had had enough exterior bumps and I wanted to take pictures so I told them to run into Deborah instead. :o)
Little miss cheeky! :o)
Doesn't this just say: "Here I come, Miss Adorable!!!"