Elisa’s Day

really very exciting, after having been without one since sometime in mid december.

ryan is gone all day for a cpr course, so it’s just me and the kids, and two swimming lessons to figure out. i can take hannah with me, and hope she’ll be content to watch from the bench on the side of the pool for a little more then an hour, even though it’s in the middle of her nap time ( though she is old enough now, to skip the odd nap without too much fall out, but usually tested out doing something more interesting then sitting on a bench ) or i can take her to my friends house and she’ll stay home with her little one and my little one, and i’ll take her oldest with me, he is in sidney’s class. i haven’t decided which option appeals to me less yet. but i’d better call her soon i guess and see where she is on the whole thing. sheusually has to bring her little guy, and he loves swimming so he spendsthe whole time whining that he wants to get in the pool too ( not a problem i anticipate with hannah ….hahaha ) maybe they would amuse each other? hmmmm

but first, i’m going to make some muffins, something i have sadly, sadly missed doing on these cold winter mornings.

feel like i should update, but not a whole lot going on. still cold, still dreary. still no stove. really, nothing new.

i was making some progress on ryan’s scarf, but i’ve done something confounding, doesn’t seem to be a dropped stitch, something else. i managed to un-knit back to it properly ( i hope ), but now i can’t go farther until my mom gets home from work and helps me fix it.

so i guess i’ll just fold laundry instead. and there you go, most boring update ever.

well, another round of swimming lessons down. another long half hour in the pool with hannah, clutching onto me for dear life, repeating over and over, “no, don’t want to” but our one small breakthrough came in the fact that she can stand in the very shallowest part ( it’s actually a bench, but wide enough for the toddlers to stand on ) and that is okay. she even consented to let me reach through and pull her through the hoop, while the other toddlers launched themselves through for their mommies to catch on theother side. but small steps. sidney and olivia loved theirs today, again, and both surprised me again at how much they did.

sadly, the weather did not pull itself out of the negative double digits in time for swimming……..stupid winter. plus it’s slowing down my knitting, because it makes my hands much, much too cold to knit when it’s so cold in here. at this rate ryan’s scarf should be done by spring. i keep hearing rumours of lovely temps around -10….but i’ll believe it when i see it i guess. until then it’s nasty wind chills and -25.

ryan has volunteer to take sidney to a birthday party she has tomorrow, a chore usually reserved for me. but i don’t actually know this family, and it’s a tobogganing and possible snowmobiling party, and i am uncomfortable leaving sidney under the supervision of someone i don’t really know for those kind of activities. ( i guess that makes me overprotective, or a control freak or something, but i don’t care ) just slightly more uncomfortable, mind you,  then i was with the thought of spending several hours outside freezing my ass off to stay and supervise. then….yay….ryan stepped in and offered to go. he will actually participate and have fun, and make sure sidney is safe, so it’s all good. i may take the other girls to visit my grandma and aunt. well see how motivated i am to leave the house when the time comes.

well, like i said in the comment forum below, the last movie i saw in the theaters was Cars, before that, probably the last movie in the new star wars trilogy. i don’t get out to the movies too often. it’s probably good that the theater here in town sucks, because if we had a decent theater in town i probably would be tempted to go more often, i do really like movies. as it was, twilight wasn’t still playing here, only 3 screens means pretty quick turnover, so we headed off to peterborough, where they do have a nice theater and sat in comfy, stadium style seats, to enjoy our mediocre movies.

it actually wasn’t so bad ( it wasn’t so great either ) it was probably about exactly as disappointing as i expected it to be, but oddly, for completely different reasons. somehow, they managed to really mess around with the events and time lines really a lot, but still give you the feeling they stayed true to the book, which is odd. maybe because they stuck to a lot of the original dialogue ( which can come off pretty cheesey btw, for some reason less cheesey to read then to hear out loud ) just put it in different places, no doubt to move the story along quicker. i thought the actors did a decent job of conveying the internal dialogue we all knew was there ( did anyone go see it who hadn’t read the book? ) which isn’t easy considering how much internal dialogue there is. i found the lead actor odd, sometimes quite attractive, sometimes just odd looking……..huh.

but the most dissappointing part was actually the effects, use of and lack there of. i guess it’s a hard thing to put on screen. and i’m guessing twilight, not working with a huge, blockbuster style budget or resources. but it seems like the effects that were there, could have probably been skipped all together, really, speeding up the film to make it look like he walked around the car really fast, did we have to see that?  there must have been a better way to convey that, and the tree climbing…..yeah…..wow, so bad……. and most dissappointing was the vampires themselves, sometimes very pale, sometimes more average, sometimes looking like people wearing way to much pancake ( hey, i hung out in  a lot of goth bars in the day, there is nothing worse then someone  in too much pancake ) and i know there is post production ways to make people look…….more………like they should have looked, they should have looked like the elves in lord of the rings, no pancake, no stubble……just ethereal. but hey, i’m sure lord of the rings, whole different budget and resources.

but, even though i’ve written about them in boring detail, they were pretty minor annoyances in a pretty entertaining movie, what the hell, i’ll watch it again, when it comes out on video, so it couldn’t have been that bad.

that’s right, i’m leaving the kids home with dad and i’m headed out for dinner and a movie with my mom. i’m looking forward to it too. even though i see my mom way more now, then i ever did when we didn’t live in the same town ( let alone the same house LOL ) i don’t spend the same kind of time with her. like if she came to toronto and we’d spend the whole day shopping. or she’d come stay with us for a few days in tweed. now it’s more like an hour here, 10 minutes there, so an evening with mom sound nice……plus we’re going to see twilight, which i was surprised to find still in theaters at all, i had assumed i’d be waiting until march to see it when it came out on video.

ryan, of course is relieved i didn’t try and convince him to go with me, though if turnabout is fair play, i believe that i sat through the entire stinker Wanted, only so ryan could see angelina’s butt for like 1.8 seconds, so he should have to come watch the pretty vampire movie with me. but i’m just not that mean.

it is still so cold here. so cold that yesterday morning ryan actually drove the girls up to the top of the driveway to wait for the bus, since it was probably well below -30 with the windchill. a little warmer today, a balmy -19 right now. though ryan tells me sidney’s eyelashes were frosted up from her breath, as she ran around to keep warm this morning waiting for the bus. i know that in only a few months spring will be here, but right now that seems to stretch before me in an endless swath of cold and snow.

well, i guess the best i can hope for is that we’re out of the negative double digits by tomorrow when i have to go to the pool. the winter session is always less busy, and now i really see why, dragging yourself and the kids out to swim in this weather does really boarder on ridiculous.

enough with the brutal cold snap already. i really really hate being cold. a lot. i have yet to own a house ( and we move a lot ) with a decent, even heating system. but at least usually, it’s a freezing upstairs to a hot downstairs, or ( like our last place ) a cold downstairs to a sweltering upstairs. but at least SOME part of the freaking house was warm. this place has some serious heating issues. and that leaves no place warm once we drop below -5. it sucks an unbelievable amount. and we’re torn on the solution. it’s an old wood/oil combo furnace in the basement right now, and ryan would like a new one. but for the same approximate money, we could also get a high efficiency oil furnace AND a main floor wood stove, i hate having to make these big decisions with very little first hand info. all i know is by next winter there will be something better then what we have now, or i’ll be forced to head south.

and just to annoy even further, i don’t believe i’ve yet mentioned, our oven died about a month ago. yeah….so we spent about a week researching what we would get. our options are limited, since it’s a built in wall oven, and there is no real place to put a regular upright stove anyway. the problem with wall ovens…not so popular in the average middle class kitchen, more of a high end, want to spend $3000 just on your stove kind of thing. but we finally picked a decent one we could afford. and they said, oh yeah, maybe before christmas, but we DEFINITLY have it to you before the new year. yet here i sit, 10 days into the new year, and still no god damn stove. i really hate it when stores say they can do something they can’t. apparently, only after my constant calling and threat to cancel my order was it discovered that it wouldn’t in fact be here “any day now” but it was not in the warehouse at all like it was supposed to be. and it wouldn’t be coming at all. and shouldn’t you have figured that out, say, a few days after i ordered it, and not after 3 weeks of no stove and constant hounding from me? the new promise, that i put no stock in btw, is that i will be getting a slightly more expensive make, same features, for the same price, this week coming up. i, of course, will believe it when i see it. and i even got on this tangent because, when it’s really freaking cold, i usually bake, because it warms the kitchen up and makes the house smell nice. and i can’t even do that. but today i did finally break down and make cookies and brownies in my mom’s oven. i’m low on lunch stuff for the kids, so i did rice krispie squares yesterday, cookies today, and tiny muffins tomorrow. then i throw them in the freezer and pop them into lunches as needed. ( the brownies were for me….with chocolate butter cream icing….mmmm ) i also froze small tupperwares of peaches for lunches, this summer as an experiment and they worked great, but i am low already, i’ll definitely have to do twice as many next year.

swimming was interesting. hannah spent her entire class clinging to me like a terrified monkey, saying  “no want to, no want to” and “i get out now”  while i spent the entire class very aware of just how many tattoos i have in a bathing suit, though all the other mom’s were all very friendly ( i was actually there with a friend and was surprised to see another friend there as well….but still, even for them, knowing i have a lot of tattoos and seeing them all at once, two totally different things LOL )

but sidney and olivia loved their classes today ! olivia fell shy at the exact moment she was supposed to go to the instructor, but i walked her over and the girl offered to hold her hand while they walked to the pool and that was it, she was in. she did all the things they were supposed to , even put her face in the water, which is a huge improvement on the terrified monkey clinging of this past summer. and sidney was definitely braver then last time already, and i bet she moves on to the next level after this round.

i finished the final book. sadly. i hope there are more, it was enjoyable. i’m kind of reading the draft for the other one online ( same story as the first book, different persons perspective ). apparently the author decided to not finish it after it was leaked, but made the draft available anyway. i’m half heartedly reading it, mostly because i hate reading things like that, on the computer, but it’s almost 300 pages, so i can’t bring myself to print it off either. so i read 20 or so pages here and there. and i’ll watch the movie when it comes out i guess, though i expect it isn’t as good as the book, few ( any? ) movies ever are.

one of my mom’s students lent her the final book. and she’s gone to work. it’s very tempting to go grab it. but i know if i do, i’ll spend the better part of the day reading and i really have so much to do.

i think the most annoying part is all this work ( that i admittedly have been putting off for months ) is mostly for a company we are no longer even operating. but hey, the government cares not for details like that, so i still need to file for the small part of the fiscal year we did operate. and i left the job at my dad’s about 90% finished, when i became entrenched in holiday stuff and realized i better get on this other book keeping. so i really have to finish that off for him too. and sooner then later.

ryan and i have been watching the lord of the rings. well, originally he started watching while i was reading eclipse, so i missed the first one. but i came in part way through the second one and am looking forward to finishing the third one off tonight. i’m actually more listening then watching. because i’m working on my knitting, which is going well, with sidney’s scarf now finished off and hannah’s off to a good start. and hannah’s i even cast on myself. then ryan has requested a black one, and my step dad a green one…..so a few more scarves in my future yet. i guess i’m off on my first yarn shopping venture soon.

so that’s it, of course, in the end i’ll probably still go get it and read just a few chapters as a break this afternoon. sitting at this tiny little desk for hours on end is no good for me right now at all. but hey, i’m all about compromise anyway, so a few chapters can’t hurt, plus no point in obsessively reading the entire thing as quickly as possible since it’s the last one.

oh yeah, and i have to locate a bathing suit today, because hannah has her fist swimming lesson tomorrow, i can’t forget that.  hannh, who is, by the way, getting so big, never ever stops talking ( asking for things mostly ) like right now….”come on mommy, waddle like a a penguin with me” she says so many cute things, i can’t even think of specific examples right now. two is such a cute age. and sidney….crazy…..she’s just like a real, big kid, right in front of my eyes. and olivia, stuck in the middle. generally annoyed with her lot in life right now. you hear a lot about “terrible twos” but i have so far found four to be an unpleasant age, for everyone concerned. not big and not small. i remember sidney going through the same. although olivia is at least excited to have her own swimming lesson this weekend, after watching sidney go on her own last time. hopefully the enthusiasm doesn’t wane when it’s actually time to get into the pool.

well, it very quickly went, saturday/sunday New Moon, sunday/monday Eclipse and here we are. but the fourth book is sold out, everywhere around here, and the waiting list at the library is silly long……so i guess i just keep my eyes open for it and hope it turns up. until then i can get back to my regularly scheduled life. i waded through all the laundry i didn’t do over the holidays sunday night ( while my mom was still reading eclipse, leaving me with no vampire romance to fill my time -insert dramatic sigh- ) and yesterday i did refrain from reading all day to begin catching up on some way over due book keeping, which needs to be done in a desperate way. today i finally went grocery shopping, i had been putting it off after blowing our grocery budget in december with lots of holiday extras. but i have lunches to make again, so it had to be done. now i have to try and restore order to my kitchen ( oh how i hate putting away groceries, so much more then the actual shopping )  and then back to the book keeping.

busy weekend coming up, the swimming lessons start back up, only this session i have hannah in ( with me….hmmm bathing suits and public change rooms….who’s idea was this anyway ) on friday, the older girls in on saturday back to back and then it’s a birthday party for the kids sunday, a toboggan party if we get some snow between now and then. i guess we’ll see.

oh, and i did get started on sidney’s scarf next. very excited to be actually be making something, and since i have no real aptitude or love for sewing, knitting i am enjoying much better. i think i’ll look for an easy blanket or something next ( i’ll stick with square or rectangular objects for now…..though olivia has requested rainbow socks – yeah, of course she has - )

i read twilight. all 500ish pages of it. obviously it was a collection of circumstances that made that possible, the kids still enthralled with their new stuff and playing quietly, a long nap from miss hannah, a movie in the afternoon, dad making dinner and an evening of nothing but reading. i wasn’t sure i would like it, or that i wanted to like it, over hyped teenage vampire romance….for real? but then really, who am i kidding? i watched every single episode of buffy and angel last year, obsessively. i think it’s probably a given, buffy fan, twilight fan. so when my mom borrowed it from my cousin ( as a highschool english teacher she likes to know what her students are reading ) and offered it to me yesterday i figured why not. i really do love books, even though i rarely read them any more. in my pre-child life i read a lot of books, and often in a short amount of time. in fact, when ryan and i went to mexico in 2005 ( the only significant amount of time i have ever spent with no kids, well, since having kids ) i read at least 5 novels i can remember in that one week. that’s just how i am i guess. if i am really enjoying a book, it is very hard for me to put it down at all. and that is very hard to do with kids. so i thoroughly enjoyed it. i sat with my feet up, ate the last of the christmas treats ( including some awesome home made carmel corn from my aunt ) and just read it. all. is it a literary masterpiece? of course not, but did i expect it to be? nope, good old fashioned fun reading. now i wish i could get my hands on the others. though i doubt i’ll have opportunity to finish one in a day again, i still am looking forward to finishing the rest of the series. if i didn’t expect there was a waiting list i would probably head into the library today. i may still call them.

i did manage yesterday, before my mom brought the book by, to get all the christmas decorations put away…..mostly. i am always amazed at how empty the house seems after they come down, even though that is the way it is most of the time. and i am always very happy to put them away and do a big clean and find a spot for all the new stuff.

christmas was great, if not a little long, but that is standard. the kids got a lot of really cool stuff this year, hand made stuff, and books and puzzles and only a few, well chosen, high end toys ( for the most part, my dad is always good for some department store crap, but even that wasn’t so bad this year, mainly a lego set with dora and diego characters, which the kids have played with every single day since they got it on the 20th, so really, how much fault can i find in it? ) lots of family and great food….one minor mishap, with ryan’s mom falling ill right after we arrived, meaning we had to turn around and come right home…..ahhh the drive to ottawa, how i hate you. but she is recovering quickly and will probably head down our way some time this month. and i did get to use the first five hours in the car to finish off my very first knitting project. ryan gave me needles and three balls of wool for christmas, one scarf for each girl. my mom, an accomplished knitter much to my surprise, did cast on and off for me, and was handy to fix any little mishaps, but hey, i knit a scarf, which is pretty cool.

back to regular life on monday.