Hello?!

Good New Year's Eve to YOU!!

If you don't read Keziah's blog then you may be wondering how we are all doing. The last time I wrote on here, we were sitting in the hospital on Christmas Day, waiting for our daughter to come out of surgery. We stayed in until Boxing Day and have been home since. She is healing well (for more on that you can always click on Keziah's Journey, one of the tabs on top.).

Our internet is working, but intermittently. Just when I have a moment to update here with pictures, it shuts down again. We are still dealing with the after affects of the ice storm.

It is working now (obviously) but I don't have time to upload some pictures. I hope you don't mind to wait until next year.....;o). I look forward to blogging more once things are figured out with the internet and the problems we've been experiencing.

For now, I'd like to thank you for reading this blog (I have no idea who is all reading it, but someone must be if I look at my stats.....;o) and sharing a comment or two.

We would like to wish you all a safe and Happy New Year's Eve, as well as many blessings in the year 2014.

Still There?!

Yes, we are still here. We've survived the snowstorm, only to have a week of complications with Keziah's incisions, then went through an ice storm, lost power for 26 hours, still don't have internet connections, and have gone back and forth to Sick Kids 3 times. The 3rd time is right now, on Christmas Day. As I write this, Keziah is in the operating room. The only reason I can write on here is because we are at the hospital, which has wi-fi, so I can update here.

Once things settle down and we get our internet restored, I will be able to update with pictures of all the happenings. Believe me, there has been lots!!!

In the meantime, we would like to wish you a very happy Christmas, and God's blessings in the new year.

The White Stuff

So how was your weekend? As snowy as ours?! Probably if you live anywhere that this big blue blob of a storm traveled:

Early Saturday morning, we welcomed our first snowstorm of the winter season. Wait - isn't Fall still here? You are correct. Winter doesn't officially start until next Saturday, but hey, we'll take the white stuff for now.

By the time the storm was done, it left us with 30 centimeters of snow. That is a foot!! For some of you that may be nothing, and for others, that would be hard to imagine. By the time it was done 24 hours later, everything was covered with a beautiful white blanket of snow.

Like many cars in the area, Lincoln's was no different: snowed in.

We were able to get out late Saturday afternoon to enjoy a gift exchange with some good friends (pictures of this, as well as an explanation as to why and how we got home safely later that night, car-less, next time).

Nathan was busy throughout the storm, helping out his guys wherever he could. I was home for most of the storm, thinking about all of the workers out there, plowing and shoveling. It was a big storm but thankfully the snow was light and fluffy. So plowing/shoveling it was "easy" (I use that term carefully as I can't imagine shoveling snow for hours on end), easy in the fact that it could be pushed. Hard though in the fact that when you plow condominium sites, there isn't a whole lot of room to put the snow. While all of them were out there, sweating away and working, I was busy inside making 2 big pans of chili, another crock pot of spaghetti, and a whole lot of cookies, to feed these hungry workers when they get back after such exhausting work, which must have been enjoyed because hardly anything was left!

While I as busy baking and cooking, someone did spend sometime outside to enjoy all this snow!

Not only did Nathan plow for a few hours to help out, he also did some shoveling, shoveling one of the most important paths ever....the path to our hot tub :o)

And so we now wake up to such a beautiful scene. I can't wait until the sun shines again. Then it'll just be so gorgeous! It just baffles me how much snow is out there when I think of how it takes one snowflake at a time to land on the ground. It also never ceases to amaze me that every. single. snowflake. out there is different from one another. Our Awesome Creator did it again....showing His almighty creativity and power.

"He spreads the snow like wool and scatters the frost like ashes." Psalm 147: 16

P.H.R.F.T.L.

Yes, yes, I know. I missed last week's Pretty, Happy, Real, Funny, Thankful and Love installment. Oh well......I am not about to blog under pressure and so I skipped a week. This one will make up for it :o)

Pretty:
Our Christmas tree!! I did make the mistake of asking Keziah what colour lights she would like on the tree - colourful or white. Duh. Of course she wanted the colourful ones whereas I much prefer white ones. Brings back memories as a kid.....as a family we often went to Ottawa or Quebec during the Christmas break. On the way back home, which was once New Year's Day was over, my siblings and I used to count how many people still had their outdoor lights lit up. We also all came to the conclusion that everyone who had white lights were boring. The colourful ones were so much better. Funny how things change as now I think that the white lights are beautiful and the colourful ones are so tacky! Oh well. I should have known better than to ask a 4 year old girl, who likes anything glitzy :o)

Happy:
Living life through my children's eyes makes me happy. Seeing them carefree and secure makes my mother's heart a happy one. I love watching them just be kids, living up and loving childhood, enjoying all that comes with it, which is mostly imaginary play. Lately, Keziah is into giving "shows". She is always the dancer and Lincoln is always the "show-er-off-er" (label given by her :o).

And this time, Lincoln was quite happy to be in the audience. He was not alone :o)

Real:
Last Saturday we headed out and met up with some real animals! Some real sheep and camels!! Lincoln wasn't too sure about these real things that moved and made noises.

However, Keziah was absolutely thrilled to ride a real-live pony!!! (We were real proud of her as usually something like this scares the pants off of her. I guess she figured it was too cold to lose her pants....;)

Funny:
My sister and I got together this past week so the kids could play and we could chat. While they were playing, we thought we could squeeze in a workout. We put the video on and before we knew it, we had an audience sitting behind us, all lined up, watching us as we sweated and grunted our way through the exercises. Nothing like making you feel self-conscious with a peanut gallery who don't have a problem at all with stating the obvious. "Mom, you are doing it wrong." "Why did you stop? She didn't" ('she' being good ol' Jillian); "You're all red!".

They must have thought it looked like fun, because it didn't take them long to join in!

Thankful:
We are very thankful that we have finally dealt with the last bit of leaking in the basement (and if you ask Keziah why it was wet downstairs, don't believe her answer, which is it was all mice pee. I have no idea where she came up with that, but I overheard her telling that to someone. Eeeeewwww!!) Anyway, the work is now done and hopefully we can finish off our basement in the near future!

I was thankful the kids were being entertained by the workers.......

....and even didn't mind the dust that came up stairs! It just felt good to finally have our whole basement sealed up!

Love:
Before I vacuumed up all the dust (and vacuumed up, washed the floor, vacuumed up and washed it again), I couldn't help wanting to feel like I was 17 again. Yes, I am so corny. But I am in love.....with this man that has been in my life for over 18 years. So blessed.

Our Days

Yay! The sun came out today!! It sure has felt like it's been awhile since we've seen the sun. We've had a lot of grey damp days which has kept us inside for the most part.

Life has slowed down considerably now that Keziah has her bubbles. Every week we are and will be travelling back and forth to have her bubbles filled, but they cannot fill them if she gets sick. That means we are limiting her social schedule. No more gym for awhile (she always joined a program while I worked out), no more birthday parties etc. We do still go out and about, but for the most part we are enjoying our time at home. I am an extrovert and so there are some days that I can find difficult, trying hard not to feel cooped up. But this too shall pass. I keep reminding myself to enjoy each day at home, the freedom of doing whatever and whenever, because in less than a year, I will be tied up with a schedule that is out of my control (when Keziah starts school).

The kids are enjoying themselves at home, playing together. Can you find Keziah?! It is her new hiding spot :o):

When it is oh so quiet in the family room, I know now not to assume they are doing things they shouldn't, but to take my camera and snap a few pictures. They LOVE looking at books.

Keziah is slowly easing out of her naps. What a difference a few months makes. Last time she went without naps was back in August. And every day without a nap meant a 4:30 pm melt-down. Now she can go a few days without a nap - and without a melt-down! While she may not nap so much anymore, we stick to the whole "quiet" idea. This may mean resting on the couch with mom....

.....or doing a craft (so much easier to do when Lincoln is sleeping).

And when we aren't playing, crafting or reading, there is always the option to talk on the phone :o)

(don't ask about the socks. They are very rarely on her feet. I am just glad to know they aren't on the floor for once, which is usually under the kitchen table after kicking them off even before breakfast is over.)

We have set up our Christmas tree, slowly making the house somewhat festive. Nathan and I never grew up with a Christmas tree (in fact, they were frowned upon), and so that leaves me wanting to do some research on the history of the Christmas tree. If I find out anything interesting, I'll share it with you.

And So It Starts....

This past Saturday, we were able to get together with Nathan's side of the family for a gift exchange and supper. At least this year there was no ice/snow storm, and so we were able to enjoy the festivities at a decent hour (last year it took us 3 hours to drive a 35 minute drive, arriving past 9:00 pm).

Keziah and Lincoln (and us) were spoiled rotten again, with things like books, puzzles, games, trucks, cars, and most importantly, candy.

Unfortunately in the mad dash to get there on time (still was late....), I forgot the diaper bag at home. While the diapers were definitely needed, it was the camera that I threw in the diaper bag that was missed the most. And so the following pictures were taken from a phone. This means less than stellar quality. Oh well.

The best part of these evenings though is not the material gifts we've received, but time and memories made with our families. With lots of cousins (14 all together on the Helder side, with one more on the way in May, D.V.), as well as grandparents, there is always fun happening. We all more or less get along (or have learned to bite our tongues - some of us with bigger teethmarks on our tongues than others), and so do the kids. This is a blessing in itself! My brother in law is a paramedic and he has stated before that the number of domestic calls escalate during holiday time. While I can see why this can happen, it still is a sad reality. Thankfully though, so far when we've gotten together with Nathan's family, we haven't had to call the police or paramedics. Yet. :o)

Here is Kez with 4 out of the 6 girl cousins. At one time we had something like 10 kids under the age of 3. You can imagine how those years went (Kidding....while it felt like 10 under 3, I think it was around 6 under 3.). Now, the older ones clearly outnumber the littlest ones, and so it is really neat to watch them get excited for each other as they open gifts.

Later in the evening, a movie was put on. Here is Kez with 4 out of 7 boys. 3 minutes after the movie had started, Keziah was the only one left to watch while the boys went back to terrorizing a stuffed ladybug downstairs (hence the swords, bandanas and cowboy hats in the picture).

And so, the season of giving has started. And so has the overeating. Sigh. Good thing Jillian Michaels and I are on a first name basis.