In Sickness...

It seems that every year around this time the whole family gets sick. Yuck.

Mary was sick for 2 days, she had the flu and spent most of her time in the washroom, I don't think she even ate anything for 2 days. She is better now and has gone to school the past two days.

Sebastian is sick today with a fever, he has slept on the couch most of the day. PJ would not go to school, I thought she was feeling better and did not want to go to school without Sebastian, she surprised me by sleeping all morning and waking up to have a small lunch and going back to bed around 1:30 for another nap.

Quentin made it through the morning using an entire box Kleenex on his snotty nose. He went right to bed when I asked him to take a nap.

I am not feeling well either. It seems like everyone in the house has something different, some of us have a cold and others have the flu. I had an upset stomach, but now I have a cold. If I could get a good nights sleep I am sure I would feel better, but the kids have not slept well for two weeks. I am getting a bit frustrated with the whole thing.

Paul is feeling well, I kind of hate to mention it, I don't want to jinx him. I am taking Cold FX, it is a homeopathic that is supposed to work well. I wanted to try Airborne, but it is a US Product and I can't get it here.

In Button News, I went ahead and made the button holes today. I don't really want to send an unfinished shirt and I don't really want to send any work for mom. I have not been able to get out of the house today to find any buttons.

I have a lot of wonderful Thanksgiving photos to share, I will post a few at a time just keep things interesting.



A good photo of Debbles and I.



A cute photo of Paul and Quentin snuggling. Quentin was a bit overwhelmed by all the people and he spent a lot of time with Paul and I until he got more comfortable.



Mary is decorating some turkeys made out of rice crispy treats that Carolyn made for the kids.



Here is The Giggle Queen supervising as Filet slices and dices for us.

The Button Debate

Here is the shirt I made (am making) for Darryl for Christmas. Not to shabby, cut out on Sunday and almost done by Tuesday.

Almost. Here is where I need your help. I have looked in both of the stores in Kamloops that carry buttons and I can't find any I like. That is not entirely true, I found some really nice green buttons that I like and they match Darryl's eyes, I bought all 4 of them. Does anyone know how to turn 4 buttons into 10?

I thought the shirt would look cool with some leather buttons. Kamloops has cows, but no leather, go figure. Here are my ideas:

1. Find 10 buttons that I can live with do the button holes and sew on the buttons.

2. Do the button holes and send the shirt to mom to see if she can find some cool buttons in Buttonland to sew on the shirt when it arrives in California.

3. Mail shirt as is in case the buttons mom finds are not 1/2" and my button holes may be the wrong size.

Who knew buttons could cause so much trouble? I will call Fabricland and see they if they received "the button shipment" and maybe that will solve my troubles. I don't really want to drive all over town for buttons, we have had a lot of snow the past few days and I don't like to drive more that I have to on the roads. The roads should be better in a day or two.

Turkey for Me and Turkey for You...

Happy Thanksgiving. It is one of my favorite holidays. I realize that Canadian Thanksgiving has come and gone, but here at the Ouimet house we celebrate both of them (why not have turkey twice!).

Canadians don't do Thanksgiving as well as Americans do, so I have taken it upon myself to teach all the Canadians I know how it is done. I don't mean to upset any Canadians out there, Thanksgiving is just bigger in the States than here in Canada, no harm no foul (hehe). So we have for the second year in a row invited tons of friends and family to our house and asked them all to bring a dish. I am cooking 2 turkeys, 1 ham, 1 cheese cake, 2 apple pies, I also make the stuffing and the mashed potatoes.

We are expecting about 40 people, the same as we had last year. Keep in mind that at least 10 of those are children the oldest being 7 years old. We are going to have a wonderful time. I will be thinking of my family in California and here and Canada and keeping in mind how blessed I am and how much I have to be thankful for.



I took the turkey photos when the kids had the farm field trip, I have been saving them for you.

Emotional

Debbles is helping me with my dirty work today. I will pause a minute here to let any male readers get rid of the image of Deb and I having a pillow fight in our lingerie. Debbles has been on the phone for me for a good portion of the last hour.

She has called 2 travel agents and the broker who the tickets were purchased from. She is getting more answers than I have along the way. She is cool, professional and won't take no for answer. I am so emotional about the tickets I can hardly listen to her side of the phone conversation without screaming in frustration or crying my eyes my out. It is a true friend that is willing to take on the entire travel industry for me.

Quote of the week: "We have received terrible service from a travel agent here in Kamloops and quite frankly this situation is just unacceptable."

Debauchery

We had a great time this weekend, the rotary vacation draw was a good time. We did not win anything but we did have a blast. We brought our staff along with us and made it our employee Christmas party, of course we had Mary with us and Linfields joined us as well. Here are some pictures for you to enjoy. I did not any photos of Paul in his suit, but he did look hot.



Here is Filet showing a little nipple (hehe, now you can reach my blog by googling 'little nipple')
I know he was drinking Gin and Tonic, I also know that he even if he was drinking water all night long we would be likely to have this same photo of him.



Who is behind the mask? That is Carolyn, our massage therapist. She is a gifted healer with a wonderful sense of humour, can you tell? She danced all night she is a hoot.



That is me in the black in pink dress, Carolyn and the lovely lady in the blue dress is our resident girl with tiny sharp needles: Rebecca, who is our accupucturist.



I could not help but post this photo for you. I think those are Paul's fingers as he attempts to take some pictures.



Mary with her date, she picked him up there at the party and danced the night away with him. If you look carefully in the photo you will see Roxanne with her date, Roxanne is on exchange from Belgium. I believe there is a conspiracy to send only the most beautiful women on exchange, it is how they keep the travel industry in business, don't you all want to go to Brazil and Belgium now? Bonnie is in France making an entire nation of French men want to come to Canada for all the lovely Canadian women. It's a good system.



I took this picture of Paul and I and for some reason the camera flash did not work properly, but I love the photo.

Friday Fatigue

I am feeling tired today, I think it is just the end of the week fatigue setting in. The kids have not been sleeping well for some reason and that of course directly effects the sleep of the adults in the house.

Last night I woke up because I was to hot, well it took me at least 5 minutes to realize I was to hot because there was an extra body in my bed. Sebastian had crawled in and I did not even know it. I was going to get up and move him to his own bed but I drifted off to sleep again, only to wake up an hour later because I had no room. This time when I had a look around I realized there 4 people in our Queen sized bed: Paul, Sebastian, PJ and myself. Add Mary and Quentin and we would have had the whole family in there!

I really loved the comments regarding the wheel, even from the testosterone corner where they think they are not spiritual. Sit down with a beer, a cigar, and good friends and I bet I could make a liars out of the both of you, we all take care of our spirits in different ways.

I am most interesting in the healing aspects of the program, but I intend to work hard to get the most out of it. I will let you all know how it goes.

It is 9:00 and I think I am ready for bed. Tomorrow is a busy day and we have that Rotary function that night, so it will be a late one. A good nights sleep will do me some good. Wait until you see the suit Paul bought, we had it tailored to fit him just right and he looks hot in it. I will get photos I promise.

I will also post photos of one happy foot, I finished my first sock. It took 2 phone calls to mom for some knitting help but it was fun to do. I will start the next after some progress on the baby blanket, I have to keep that thing on schedule and I am a few rows behind due to sock love. (Really, I just needed to finish something and the sock was the best choice)

I feel like I am rambling, it is my tired brain. Good night!

The Medicine Wheel

"The Medicine Wheel is a fourfold path to knowledge and power. It is a path of personal transformation and beauty, dedicated to the healing service of the Pachamama (Mother Earth), of Great spirit, and all of their children.

I begin my journey of the Sacred Medicine Wheel December 9, 10, and 11th. It is a journey through the four directions (it will be 4 weekends, each 5 months apart). We start with the Fire of the South which is the direction of the past. I see it as an opportunity to let go of issues or baggage from the past, to allow my spirit to move into the present.

Here is a link that will tell you about Incan Shamanism, all of the directions and what they represent. I have linked you to lengthy page, but if you can get through it you will have a great idea of what I will be up to. Click Here if you want more information

I feel like I have already started on my journey. I feel like the universe has thrown up road block after road block to test me, to see if I indeed have the strength and the level commitment I need for this path. The plane tickets are the most obvious example of this, the tickets booked by Paul as a 'surprise' for me, booked carefully around the dates of the Wheel, only to have the dates of the Wheel change to the same date as the trip to California. I don't think I need to tell you again how the tickets continue to test me.

I can think of more examples: how about the registration form? Do you know how many times I 'lost' it? How many times I took it to the office to write a check for it and forgot to bring it home. How long it traveled in my bag before I finally sat down and got the check in the mail?

I have no idea what hurdle I will have to jump next, but the check has cleared and I am committed, even if we have to eat the cost of the plane tickets. (Corinne had a great idea that I have not followed through on, she asked if we paid for the tickets with our visa and we did, I am going to call the Visa company and see if they can help me, perhaps I have traveler's insurance with them?)

Winter Wonderland

It appears as if winter has arrived. What happened to Fall?

Keeefer I am sure these pictures will help you with your winter withdrawal issues, you may want to put on your parka and get a hot toddy.



Marrianna (Mary) has already seen snow twice since living in Kamloops, but both times it had snowed at night, she had yet to see it falling out of the sky. Well, we ordered up some snow for her. Here she is playing in it while it comes down for her on Sunday evening. She had great time playing it while I BBQ'd steaks for dinner.



You can't get the Brazilian foot wear off of the girl, even in the snow. She did slip my boots once her feet got cold enough. Of course I wear a size 10 and she is a size 7 1/2. I will ask Debbles when she gets home (She is in Mexico for our first snowfall, just to smart that one!) if she has an extra pair she is a 7 1/2 too!



Trampoline: not just for summer fun.



I took this picture today on my way home from the grocery store. It started snowing early this morning and it has not stopped since. This the intersection of Pacific Way and Hugh Allen Drive, right at the bottom of the hill, we live at the top just 5 minutes up the road.

Today was my first time driving the van in the snow. Paul had snow tires put on it, but I was worried about how it would handle in the snow. It was just fine, I took my time and went at my own pace. Everyone was driving with caution the roads were not salted and graveled yet and in spots there is ice under the snow, I thought about staying home, but our cupboards were pretty bare. I am very pleased with the van at this point, it fits our needs well and is nice to drive. (I never in a million years thought I would be saying that!)



Sebastian helped me shovel the driveway. He sure knows how to make it fun!

Quote of the Week

Did you think I had forgotten? I thought I would slip this in with only a few hours of the week left.

This weeks quote is brought to you by Sebastian:

Sebastian: "Why?"
Sebastian: "Why?"
Me: "Sebastian, Do you ask why because you want to know the answer or because it drives me crazy?"
Sebastian: "Because it drives you crazy."

Thanks for stopping by, see you next week.

Sunday Fun

We took the kids skating today, you should see Sebastian skate now, he has improved so much. He spent the whole time playing hockey with some other kids. I see I am going to have to save up a hockey fund as well as a college fund.



Quentin and I having fun.



PJ is enjoying skating much more this year than last. Paul got her a little helper, I don't know what it is called but she holds on to it and pushes it in front of her while she skates. She just takes it out onto the ice and skates all around doing her own thing. As you can see she is having a wonderful time.





Here is a picture of Paul pushing some of the kids around with a hockey net. I don't know who is having more fun him or the kids. You can see Quentin, he is the little one on Paul's right and then PJ is one of the kids in the middle in the pink coat and blue helmet. I know the boy in the hockey gear is named Jaden and I don't know the other girls name. Sebastian is on the other end of the ice playing hockey.



Meet the newest member of our family the very brave and the very beautiful Marrianna. She is here all the way from Brazil through the Rotary Exchange program, and we are lucky enough to be hosting her for a few months. The beauty is obvious, but the bravery...This was her first time on ice skates, PJ helped her along. She did very well, you could see her confidence increase a little as spent more and more time on the ice. A few more laps around the rink and she will be a world class skater.

I am sure you will see much of her on the blog as we share in her new experiences. I am hoping that her family will stop by and have a peek at what we are all up too and perhaps even post some comments, I am sure Marrianna will be happy to translate the Portuguese for us.

Today was a day of firsts for her, she woke up this morning to the most snow she has ever seen in her life, what a treat to be a part of that. It was just a skiff and is all melted off now but there is more to come as we head into winter. Next time we get some snow I will get a photo of her huge smile and of the snow for you.

Google Earth

I am often the last to learn of the cool things, the fun and amazing things available to all of us on line for free. So you may have already checked this out. But do a search for Google earth and download the little program that pops up and then play around a bit.

Put your own address and see what happens. I found the resolution to be much better in large cities and better in the States than here in Canada. Try putting in places you always wanted to see: Paris, The Grand Canyon. I even tried the Twin Towers in NY. I had so much fun that the program is living on my desktop and I have played with it several times already.

Mom the view of your house is amazing, as is Dad's. Shannon I do not know your address but I did check out Dad's duplex where you once lived.

Here We Go Again

I am not sure what is going on, perhaps the moon in a phase that is just good for my techincal mojo, but can't seem to get any of my technogadits to work for me these days. You know the camera story already, you will remember the internet connection fiasco, yesterday's lost blogger post, to top all that off I can't seem to manage to put a new CD on my iPod. Perhaps I just need to go lie down and try all this again next month. Or I could give it try for you today...



This first project is my bathroom project. Strange that I have no sense of oddness typing the phrase 'bathroom project'. It is not what you think, I work on this one while Sebastian has a bath. He is old enough to bath on his own, but due to the great number of neighborhood bear sightings he is afraid to be in the bathroom by himself. So I supervise and chat with him while he gets clean and I knit on this mitten. You would be surprised how quickly a project moves along even if you knit on it only 15 minutes a day. I finished both PJ' s and Sebastian's winter hats using them as bathroom projects and they only took about a week for each one. Anyone want to order up a bathroom hat?



This project started out as my travel project, but it has a cable pattern I have not yet mastered so it is living on the kitchen counter now. I guess it has become my kitchen project, you know the one you pick up and knit a row on while the cookies are in the oven. I guess I need to bake more cookies, it is coming along very slowly.



This one is my traveling project, it lives in the bag I drag with me everywhere I go. I started it a week ago today at Paul's hockey game. It is my first my sock and has grown to be almost 7" in only a week of travel time. It has seen a lot of Kamloops in a week, it has been to a Blazer game, where it never came out of the bag, it went to the dentist with me and always comes along to pick the kids up at school. I understand why people knit socks, they knit up quickly and travel well.


This next project answers the question am I a process knitter or a product knitter? It is a sweater that is all done except for the seams. Only two seams and this lovely sweater is ready to wear, I keep thinking I will get to it when I get bored of one of my other projects. I guess this makes me a process kind of gal, maybe I enjoy learning new techniques better than I like the finishing things. How about if I commit right now to having this one seamed up by the end of the weekend? See how much you are helping me?



Ah, this lovely scarf, the Branching Out Scarf. I love the pattern, I enjoy making lace. I am not in love with yarn, it is to stiff for this project and needs to be ripped out and turned into something ealse. I would like to knit this up in a lighter weight yarn. I don't quite yet have the heart to rip back all that lace, I think this one will sit right where it is until spring makes me feel like lace. Right now I am happy with winter wools.



Here is my favorite of everything I have going on right now. I am enjoying the color work, I am learning new stuff with every row. It is a baby blanket and so it is on a schedule, as long as I knit 2 or three rows on it a day it will be ready in time for the baby. I am glad I decided to learn how to work with so much color. I no longer feel intimidated by color work projects.

Mom got me hooked on Sally Melville's books and I now have all of them. I use them more than any other knitting books I have for looking up how to do something. I recently bought book three on color and it had some great tips in it that have made the blanket go a bit faster.



This last picture is the baby blanket a few days ago. See the bend in the knitting needle. The blanket was in a basket and Quentin sat on it. That is a lovely size 3 Addi that he bent with his baby bum. He also managed to get about 50 stitches off the needles, it took some colorful swearing and little fortitude but I got things back on track.

Well thats all. I tried to spell check this but of course it is not working for me right now, so love me with all my typos.

I have been on and off the phone with the travel agent during this post. It seems the bar has been raised and it will now cost me $300. a ticket to change the dates on the plane tickets. And remember when Paul said it was a direct flight? Well it is not, there is a layover in Seattle I have one hour to get me and 3 young children to baggage claim and through customs. Yippie. I don't know what to do. I am in tears right now. These tickets are now up to about $3000.00.

Do I just forget about the wheel and go on the trip so I am not out so much money?

Damn it!

I just spent 40 minutes blogging about knitting with great pictures and now my post is gone. I don't have the patience to try again right now.

Baby it's Cold Outside

And other random thoughts.

Winter is here, Kamloops is crystal clear and cold. We even had a bit of snow.

I had some great pictures of Paul and Filet playing hockey for you. I also had some great knitting photos for a while post on knitting for your reading enjoyment. When I went to download the pictures the camera told me in no uncertain terms that there where no photos on it. Worse yet, the camera said this, "memory card failure".

I only had about a dozen pictures or so on the card, but as it turns out the card has indeed failed and I had to replace it. Apparently it is not all that uncommon. There was an upside, I bought a 512 card to replace my 256 card for about a quarter the price what the 256 card cost me a few years ago. Now I have more memory (if only it were that easy to grow my own brain power) and will try to get more hockey pictures of Paul for you.

I also promise a knitting post for you this week.

We went to the Blazer game on Saturday night. The kids had a great time and the Blazers ended a 4 game losing streak by beating the best team in the league. They one last night as well but we did not go to that game. (I am going somewhere with this, I promise.)

We came home from the hockey game to the first snow of the season. Just an inch or so but enough to keep the kids entertained almost all day Sunday.

Sunday Paul went up to lift evacuation at Harper mountain and I stayed home and played with the kids. We had a great time, we played in the snow and then had some breakfast. We followed that up with a long walk around the neighborhood, playing in more snow and skating on the frozen puddles in our snow boots. We followed all that fun up with eating cold apples in the hot tub. It was a great day of spending time together and just having a good time.

I wish I could post a great snow picture for you here but I don't have one, I replaced the camera's memory card, but there is not to much snow left for you to see. Don't worry there will be more.

Hockey Night in Canada

See the little guy in the red jersey? That is Sebastian playing hockey with the Kamloops Blazers he had a great time and his hockey is improving so quickly it just amazing to watch. He would skate into the net behind the Blazer knock a puck out of the net, skate to the puck and then hit it back into the net. He is very funny to watch as he does not have to duck or anything to skate right into the net, he short enough even on his skates to just scoot right in and retrieve the puck.

Tonight The Giggle Queen and I are going to watch the big boys play hockey. We are going to go sit in the stands and watch Filet and my DH go to hockey school. I promise to take the camera with me and have some pictures of the big boys playing hockey for tomorrow's post.

Catch Up

I am finally online again, I will spend today's post on catching you up a bit on the last week. Here is a photo of the crunched up van. As you can see the damage is minimal, but it still makes me mad. The bumper is all scraped up and the license plate is pretty much FUBAR, it lives on the floor of the front seat right now, I stomped it into shape, but it still wont hang on to the front bumper anymore.

I need to get a new one to cover the scratches in the front bumper. It sucks to buy a new vehicle and have it scraped up already. Okay enough negative energy.

Let me tell you why I was off line for so long. Our online service is paid for by the office and is automatically billed to our office credit card on a monthly basis. A few months ago Paul had misplaced his wallet, I told him to wait a day or two and see if it showed up and then to call in the cards as lost or stolen if he did not find is wallet by Monday. He jumped the gun and called everything in stolen and then found his wallet an hour later in the truck or in his shoe or something. I said, "I told you so better you erred on the side of caution honey."

Telus tried to bill the card that was reported stolen and of course it did not go through. Rather than contacting us they just disconnected our service. After 3 phone calls, 2 nights and 2 hours on the phone, we had things straightened out and I was online again.

Thursday night is Paul's hockey night, last Thursday after a night of hockey and trip to the Ballet (read strip bar) where he stopped for, "the best burger in town and a beer." He came phone and could not find his wallet.

Friday morning the phone rings bright and early, it is Scotia bank, "Have you lost your wallet?" I think that Scotia knew before Paul did that his wallet had gone missing again. In fact the RCMP knew before Paul did that his wallet had been stolen out his back pocket while he was oggleing the naked girls at the Ballet. He paid cash for his beer, his cash was in a different pocket. RCMP arrested a man for using Paul's credit card sometime on the same night that Paul's wallet went missing. Paul is no longer allowed to the Ballet without adult supervision and has a 10:30 curfew on hockey night.

Telus tried to automatically bill our credit card for our monthly fees and guess what? Scotia bank knew the card was stolen and refused the charges, Telus disconnects my service again. We seem to have things sorted out now, but all in all a pain in the @$$. It has resulted in Paul being teased unmercifully by me and all that have heard the storey. Karma.



Here are my sassy new glasses. I have been suffering from terrible headaches for a few months, a trip to the eye doctor, and I got 2 new pairs of glasses and new contacts and now TADA! No more headaches. I know I look a little freaky in the photo, that is because it is a self portrait and I am looking at Sebastian in the other room with the camera held out in front of me. I don't think I usually look so weird, but who knows. I notice my self image and what I actually look like don't always match up.

Not in a bad way. Here is an example: I remember being pregnant with PJ and walking by a bunch of windows while walking down Victoria street on a sunny day. Saw a woman in the reflection of the glass, and thought to myself, "Wow, look at that huge pregnant woman." Then I was shocked to realize the woman was me! I my own mind I was just not quite as big and pregnant and ripe as the woman I saw in the reflection. I did not feel as large and pregnant as I looked, see not a bad thing.



I think this is a cool photo, it is one of the kids dancing at a Halloween party. Here are few more for you.





PJ was a princess, Sebastian was Spiderman, Layne was a mermaid, and Quentin was dressed in a very cool tiger costume that Shannon made, but he got to hot and would not wear it. He did wear it to trick or treat in, but we did not det a photo of it. PJ was so excited to trick or treat that she left the house with no shoes on. Paul did not realize she had no shoes until she complained that her feet were cold!