Elisa’s Day

summer is winding down, but as illustrated above, much fun was had on our second trip to stay with my dad while the older girls did their pottery class. the weather was sub-par and the drive was a bit longer this time ( which i’ll get into more in a bit ) so the younger girls and i spent most of our mornings in town, killing time, instead of going all the way back to the cottage. which meant a lot of wandering around downtown, a lot of time spent in the park and also the library ( unfortunately the early years center up there is closed for the entire month of august, it would have been nice to have that to do ) luckily they do have this great park right downtown. molly hearts swings.

the older girls really liked pottery, and this time around the class was at the actual college as opposed to the highschool. what a neat school.  the highschool is on the edge of town on the side closer to my dad’s, but the college is through town and then several minutes out the other way. making the drive almost 25-30 min. but it was worth it to get to see the college and the girls got to use the actual pottery class room.

and even though the weather was not the best, kids just don’t care. they swam every afternoon. they even scored an extra day, as my plan to pack up friday morning while they were at class, scoop them up and drive home right from the college, was dashed down by a slow firing kiln. the pieces were not cooled off enough to unload by noon. so our options were to wait around until 4 or have them shipped. so we just waited and the kids were happy enough to have one more afternoon in the water. all in all a good week. one day we even drove to the next small town to hit it’s little ice cream spot, just for the fantastic climber my dad had spotted earlier in the week. there it is right behind the local ice cream shack…..the best climber ever, this is what we need to build in our back yard.

i came home to a lot of cleaning and organizing to do since school is only a week away now, and a truckload of beans. we over planted beans for sure. now i’m just trying to give them away as much as i can. plus birthday craziness. september is really dreadful as far as being overwhelming. first is my mom’s birthday, then hannah’s, then school starts, then ryan’s birthday and then sidney’s. and then the fair, which is a big deal around here too. just pure crazy for 4 full weeks pretty much. just typing that sentence made me a little panicky.

we had a lovely day in the city on sunday. we saw the truly amazing shop bill has put together there. we ate good food and did some crazy people watching in the market. i got a $7 cowboy hat to wear in the garden . we did some tattooing. we enjoyed the good company. we ate some more good food. the baby charmed all around with her “look how cute i am” smiles followed by “but still kind of shy” head ducks and said “hi” over and over and to as many people as she could.

really the only hard part about going to the city is time allotment. we have few good friends left in the city, so when you’re only there for the day, the very hardest part is trying to find time to see them. and when you only get to the city a couple times a year, it makes it even worse. so this time we just decided to just stay in the market for the day. because i hate clock watching while he’s tattooing, or having to say no when he asks if we want to grab food after. and because i hate rushing from one friend to another. then we end up clock watching there too. how long can we stay?….how late is too late to start the long drive home? how long will the already tired baby last at another stop? so it was a quick in and out visit. which was nice. it was nice to not always be rushing off somewhere else. so what we really need to do is start getting into the city more, so we can have a nice, dedicated visit with other friends too, not be trying to bounce between them all in one day. and now that the kids are ( baby especially ) getting older, hopefully we’ll only have more and more opportunities to sneak away for a day here and there in our future.

really, any excuse to eat in the city. according to ryan, i only go to the city to eat. i’m still thinking about how good the tacos and guacamole we had in the market were.

that’ll keep the sun off

and all caught up ( sidney took this for me, it’s not in focus but you get the gist )

well hopefully we’re done with sickness for awhile. olivia just finished her second round of Rx in a month, as did sidney ( olivia did in fact have a nasty ear infection, and surprise, sidney had tonsillitis ) in light of these two facts, we wrapped up our school year a few days early. i mean, don’t get me started on the absurdity of making the kids go right until the 30th even though marks for report cards go in the second week of june. so with both kids sick again last weekend, i decided to call it a year and told the school as much. and so, with that, our summer begins. thank goodness. looking forward to some sleeping in and some lack of schedule.

busy weekend last weekend, ryan’s mom was here and it was another rainy day at the market. so when my usual veggie guy pleaded with me to take some strawberries off his hands because he was never going to get rid of them in the rain, what could i do? $10 later i have a flat of strawberries ( that he continued to pour pints on top of as i picked veggies ) that i need to do something with. normally i only make raspberry jam, i’m not a big fan of strawberry, but the kids like it, so i kinda thought i might make some anyway. so we did. lots of jam, and one delicious strawberry pie. then sunday we blew through our egg surplus with a ridiculously huge pound cake recipe ( it takes 24 eggs ) and muffins and cookies. at least it solved my end of year gift dilemma for the kids teachers. so wednesday i dropped by the school to grab any last bits of stuff ( and report cards ) and drop off a pound cake for the office, and mini pound cakes plus jam for the teachers.

we had some birthdays too. someone turned one, which is hard to believe.

and finally started crawling, which means i can’t turn my back on her for a second or she’s into the kids book shelf, trying to stick her finger in a light socket, chewing on the kids dirty shoes……general ‘baby on the go’ mischief. i’m definitely in that same bittersweet place i’m sure all mom’s go with the last baby, glad it’s all coming to an end but sad to see it go. i’m finding myself very undedicated to trying to get her on bottles, i am both so ready to be done nursing and so aware this is my last time. even when i felt like maybe we wouldn’t have more before, i always knew there was a [good]chance we’d have more. but with this, the very last baby, it’s so much harder to let that go, even though i want to. and there has been sleeping through the night. which i hope means sooner then later i can split the girls back up two and two, because if i have to listen to hannah and the older girls spend many more early mornings arguing in bed, i may just loose my shit. don’t ask how i plan to split them i haven’t decided yet. the obvious, older two, younger two maybe, but  maybe i mix it up a little too? who knows.

and someone turned six. also hard to believe.

our traditional birthday pancakes, which you get on your actual birthday since you get a cake at your party and two cakes was too many. olivia decided to ask for money for her birthday this year, because she really wanted to take gymnastics, and the only money in our budget for extra curricular right now goes to swimming lessons ( no body needs to know how to walk a balance beam to save their own life so….. ) so that is what she got from all the grandparents and aunties. and she is very excitedly waiting for the fall session to start up now. my mom also gave her a leotard to wear ( which she desperately wanted as well ) and a new book, that she estimates to be about a 4th grade reading level ( based on the vocabulary ) that olivia is already half way through. i am definitely glad she’s in the french, i could see her being much less challenged in a regular class.

and this weekend, i think we’ll have to forgo any going away to spend the entire weekend trying to catch up on all the outside stuff we fell behind on due to the last three weeks of rain. i heard this was the most rain to ever fall in june. and i’d believe it if all the standing water everywhere is any gauge. i just really hope that our garlic and potatoes don’t get rot.

well, one more coffe and then time to get moving. my step dad is away and so his morning chores fall to me, which means there are birds waiting for me to start their day.

my final thought today is, you know the only good part about having to wake a baby up from a nap? getting to snap the elusive ‘cute sleeping baby’ photo without any concern that it might wake them up.

now i just can’t wait until there are raspberries and veggies to add to the bowl too.  man real strawberries are good. the very first one eaten made all the work worth while.

i have written, had to abandon half way through, and then never returned to, several updates. june is just a crazy month of work outside and end of school stuff and birthday parties……..so yeah.

today is bake the cake for olivia’s party tomorrow. ( which i will ice tomorrow morning while ryan is doing the swimming lessons/farmers market/pick up ballons run ) then i must try and clean my house to a semi-presentable level for tomorrow. and run into town when ryan gets home for the food for the party ( picnic outside, olivia’s choice ) and any other last minute stuff i need. oh and finally plant the last tomato seedlings which have been sitting outside on the deck in pots for weeks now. oh and take some pictures of the baby…..today one of my goals is to take some pictures of the baby. ryan was always the big picture taker around here. but now he’s not here so much and the pictures are much fewer and far between for it.

time to get the girls up for school.

miss molly had me up at 5am this morning. but since that was the first time she had me since going to bed around 10 last night, i’ll take it !! man. there are no words that can describe with any justice how good it feels to get a solid 7 hours sleep. lets leave it at that.

so here i sit, house quiet, kids still in bed, drinking my coffee, staring out the window behind the laptop. reminds me of last spring. baby wasn’t here yet, ryan and i were sharing the van, and on days i needed to have it, i’d get up at 5 and drive him to work ( before you call social services, don’t forget grandma and grandpa are here too, nice that there is pretty much always someone in the house for just such occasions ). those mornings were so much nicer then the rushed mornings when my alarm goes off at 630 and it’s straight into the morning routine. though clearly, not nice enough for me to just set my alarm earlier and get up earlier every day …….haha……

the calm is nice. because the rest of my days are feeling a little…..well, insane. it’s just that time of year. so much to do outside,  on top of the so much there always is to do inside. it’s hard to keep on top of it all. today i definitely have to do a big clean, since we have ryan’s mom and stepdad coming for the long weekend. there going to help out, ryan’s mom will be helping us get the garden in and his stepdad will be doing some odd jobs. and the last week or so, since the weather turned nice again, we have just been outside every free second, in the flower gardens, and keeping on top of the berrys we planted last fall so they don’t get choked out by grass….add in the odd play date and that’s it. something had to give. the house is the only logical thing. someday, my kids will be older and my house will be clean again. this is what i keep telling myself anyway.

hannah went with a friend to his gymnastics class this week. it’s a ploy, “bring a friend day” obviously, to get new kids signed up. and it may have worked for us. hannah just really loved it a lot. and we stopped doing kindergym a couple years ago because it was just too expensive to have three kids signed up all the time. but i could put just hannah in the last 6 weeks of class for a pretty decent price. of course the other girls will be upset. but ryan pointed out that they are going to art classes this summer, and hannah is not ( too young ) so maybe that evens things out. maybe also, it just can’t always be all fair all across the board. i think i will sign her up.

the art classes…..so excited. one of the employees at the early years center, heard me talking about staying at my dad’s on the march break and started talking about how much she loved it up there. how every summer she would rent a cottage and sign her kids up for these amazing art classes put on by the art college up there. the classes took up the morning and then then afternoon was spent on the beach. and i thought to myself, well that does sound pretty awesome. so i asked me dad to get me a brochure and found two classes i wanted to sign them up for. he even offered to pick up the tab for one, which was great (even though the prices were really very good too ) so it’s all set. in july we’ll be staying for 4 days and they’ll be taking “picasso pizazz” and in august it’s “pottery for kids” which, wow, how fun is that going to be? i thought about taking a pottery class too, but alas, they had no adult beginner classes. and the age group is 5-7 so they go in the same class which is nice for them, some sister fun time. and the littler girls and i will chill at grandpa’s on the beach for the am and the older girls have all afternoon on the beach as well. i am really looking forward to it ( though we will all miss ryan )

well, both older girls have wandered down, looking for breakfast, so i guess i better get moving, so i can get them off to school……. lots to do today.

lots of black coffee and home made brownies. so good.

3 kids are playing a board game together and the smallest worden girl is pounding out her little baby heart on the piano. it’s a little melissa and doug mini piano. it’s a big hit with the nine month old set as i remember from my niece’s visit last summer, and molly agrees.

it’s been cold here the last few days, which sucks. but apparently it’s going to be very warm by next weekend so i’m holding out hope. ashley posted a picture of a tulip, it’s been too yucky to go on a search for green here, but i wonder if we did, would we find any? from the window it’s a sea of dreary brown.

had some friends from the city here yesterday for a visit which was awesome. although i did feel a little like all we did all day was eat. they brought lunch and then there was the above mentioned brownies. and grandma’s spaghetti sauce with homemade french stick. and apple pie. so good. and i sent them home with some homemade raspberry jam. because once you’ve tried homemade i don’t think you can ever eat weird gelatinous store jam ever again. the girls had a blast with their three little dogs. three of the best behaved little dogs i have ever met i might add. my grandma was also here, at my mom’s, with her new little dog. plus my mom’s dog. for a brief moment in time the dogs outnumbered the children.

molly did not go down for her regular afternoon nap though in all the excitement, which is probably why she woke up at 2:30 am all bright eyes and “da da da”s. never a good sign when that happens. good thing i always have some movies pvr’d for just such and occasion. nothing like being up for a couple hours in the middle of the night.

nothing exciting on tap for today. some cleaning up, maybe i’ll pull out the easter stuff. i can’t believe easter is already next weekend.

ryan and i have a huge cleaning and organizing job to do in the basement this spring, during which i hope hannah’s missing birth certificate turns up. though i am not holding my breath at this point, you never know.

march break is upon us, so far so good. some quiet days at home before we head off to my dad’s place to stay in his cottage ( which sits about 20 feet from his house….long story ) i hope the nice weather holds out.

ryan and i have been teaching the girls how to play cards. it started with family game nights and qwirkle, which i mentioned a few posts back. but qwirkle is a bit advanced still for olivia. sometimes we forget olivia is only five. because she tries ( and succeeds most times ) so hard to keep up with sidney that we tend to lump them in together. and sometimes 21 months makes no difference ( like the fact they both read at the same level, in fact, olivia is probably a better reader then sidney at this point ) but sometimes it makes all the difference. she understands the game well enough, she just doesn’t quite have the attention span for it yet. anyway……i’m wandering away from topic here.

so we got talking about all the games we used to play as kids. for both of us it was a lot. i remember spending so much time playing games with my cousin as kids, so many games. you know, the old days, before there were video games, and when cartoons only played on tv on saturday mornings, there were games. and since we’re kinda running our house like it’s 1984 what with the no video games or computer time and minimal tv, well we need to fill our time, so a quick google for the rules of crazy eights ( because neither of us could remember ) and we were off and running. and the very best part, they can play each other. so got 10 minutes to fill? lets play crazy eights.

love it.

then rummy. they picked it up pretty quickly too, olivia is actually a bit of a card shark. even hannah is learning her suits, often we play “teams” so that hannah is on someone’s team and can hold some cards and throw cards.

we had some friends over and got talking about the same thing, and it ended with some more idea’s of old games i want to get and with us having to haul out the ol’ fireball island to show them since neither of them had heard of it. and then of course the girls wanted to play. so there was some very very exciting games of that. now the quest for more games is on.

of the top of my head i remember spending hours with daniel ( my cousin, oh hi collinses who read my blog ) playing ( fireball island aside since it’s already mentioned and in play ) cards, so many cards, yatzee, backgammon, clue, scotland yard, and crokinole, which i had forgotten about until above mentioned friends reminded me of it’s existence ( it was at my grandma’s house, a big old wooden one, our main toys there, that, a metal doll house and tons of those porcelain animals you got with your tea )

and for whatever reason, seeing sidney and olivia sitting playing a few hands of cards together is extremely satisfying. and reminds me that they are all getting older so quickly. i kind of still think of hannah as my baby, maybe just because the gap between her and molly was the longest. but clearly that isn’t the case.

another one survived ! this year everyone came here, which was especially nice for us being the only ones with small kids and a baby. at full attendance we think we’re around 35? but we have already gotten the whole family together twice this summer so not everyone made the trek for thanksgiving this year. we had about 25 this year. our great room still has all the furniture pushed to the sides with four full sized tables set up in the middle. the kids enjoyed having their own personal tables to sit at for cereal this morning.

even with two ovens and stoves, it was still madness at the end to get everything ready and on the tables, partly due to the fact that we had our very own turkeys, and so with 25 people we felt we had to cook two to be on the safe side. so we had a turkey in each oven. but everyone still pretty much ate at the same time. grandpa made one of the ducks too, i didn’t try it, but word on the street was it was good. i ate a small bit of stuffing, with hopes miss molly won’t pay too much ( and make me pay ). to compensate i passed completely on the super garlicky caesar salad…..the things we do for babies!

the girls had so much fun. it’s exciting for me to see them getting older and more comfortable with everyone. they love love love playing with all my teenage cousins, and they all play with them tirelessly, that is a good bunch of teenagers i tell you. they are all so great with my girls it’s crazy. we did have plans to set the playstation up for teenagers after dinner, but apparently too much fun was being had with the connect four and perfection games to care. ( the perfection game is old school, found at value village and then ryan managed to get it working when it was discovered to not in fact work )

the baby was passed around endlessly, and everyone marvelled at how big she seems already. the girls shamelessly hawked their school fundraiser magazines and received many compliments on their paper bag turkey centerpieces and fall coloured paper chains strung up everywhere. just a great day.

and this afternoon we’re off to my dad’s, for ham instead of another turkey. but first i think there is a piece of pumpkin pie with my name on it. holidays mean pie for breakfast around the harmer family.

even though sept.has had the most consistently nice weather of the whole summer, it is still feeling very much like winter prep around here. the fair has passed for another year, and much much fun was had. we did some math and figured that the price of the wrist band was equal to enough tickets for (approx) ten rides, and i’m pretty sure my kids went on every single ride at least ten times…….so yeah……we ate so very much junk food, threw darts to win junky prizes, marveled at the fancy chickens and perused the crafts and other entries. i really love the fair and the family tradition it’s becoming. molly was so good as well, a trouper considering we were there for about 7 hours.

and today was spent on the above mentioned winter prep. ryan stacked the last two cords of wood. i spent the day sorting clothes. out with the summer, in with the winter. sort the still good for next season from the too smalls to be packed away for the next in line. getting through it all is a good, 2 or 3 day job in all i’d say. a job i loath.

and today i also unpacked all the 3-6 and 6-9 month clothes too. and i started sorting out the teeny tiny clothes. the best ones for consignment, the rest for the thrift store. it made me a little sad. the clothes not so much, but the bassinet……. this week we’ll put the crib together and the bassinet will also go to consignment. the little white bassinet that all the babies slept in. until they couldn’t fit anymore. i’ve always hated packing away the bassinet because it meant the babies were getting big. and now it isn’t just getting packed in the basement for the next baby, but it’s going. sigh.

at least our bedroom here is huge. lots of room for the crib. it was a tight fit in our old place.  then some much needed cleaning out and organization of the upstairs as well. some shuffling of furniture, i think we’ll need a dresser in our room for baby clothes, so very many baby cothes. and hannah has two dressers in her room right now. and i think i’ll start painting the bathroom next week maybe. we’ll see. it’s fall cleaning, since i was too pregnant to be bothered with spring cleaning.

we have about one more month before the snow flies.

well, much fun was had in the big city. restaurants, hotel rooms, fancy dresses and dancing. it’s all good. the wedding was lots of fun though ryan and i were a little disappointed to be in toronto and not get to “do anything” like visit friends or head out to kensington or something……we had originally thought we might sunday, but man oh man, hannah ( mostly ) was just way to tired after her long night so we just headed home. it has inspired me though,  i really want to go for a few days with no “event” to do so we can just take the kids and do some fun stuff in the city.

tomorrow is the fair. everyone is pretty excited. hope it’s as fun as it was last year.