Road Trip...to Saskatchewan

One reason why I don't post as much on my blog any more is because of the problems I am encountering with Blogger. I have tried to rearrange the pictures, but I am beyond frustrated already...so here they are in no particular order!

The first picture is of Wyatt crying, obviously. He did pretty good travelling, but when he was tired or hungry, he complained. Life isn't always roses! :)

The second picture is of the church Mike spoke at - and the whole purpose of our trip! We arrived at the church just after 3 pm on Saturday afternoon and got a quick tour of it. It had a total of fourteen benches, seven on each side of the aisle. I think each bench would comfortably seat five people. After church on Sunday, we went down to the basement and ate a potluck lunch together. Including the seven of us, I think the total attendance for church that morning was 35.

Here are the kids eating the trail mix we made on Friday afternoon.

Below...the four older children slept in the same room at the house we were staying at. It was a newer house built by a couple who go to the church pictured above. They had built it as their retirement home, but then the mining company came along and pretty much turned their lives upside down. Anyway, they had moved out in fall since a house had pretty much fallen into their laps. In the meantime, this house will stand empty until the mining company takes over in October 2011. Here are Caleb and Joshua - and Wyatt - in their "bed".

Sam the dog. He was a BIG hit with Caleb & Joshua!

Below, the Saskatchewan sign as we drove into Saskatchewan. The weather in Manitoba was a little blustery and the Yellowhead highway was rather snowy, but it cleared up as we headed into Saskatchewan and the highways improved to perfect driving conditions.

A pram for Natalee's dollies!!! So much fun for her! Don't tell anyone, but I also saw Caleb and Joshua pushing it around too! :)

At the family's home where we went for supper on Saturday evening, there was an amazing homemade rocking horse. Andrew really enjoyed it. I was tempted to try it out too, but I didn't think that would be appropriate.

Wyatt checking out the cat. The cats were very gentle and used to small children.

Again, the house we stayed at. The kitchen was great! It was huge! Here are the kids eating their snack on Saturday night. And Wyatt had a great time exploring the (empty) kitchen cupboards.

Here's the food they left for us. Basically, they only needed to provide us breakfast for Sunday. They also added in some snacks for the kids and there was even more food in the fridge. It was great! Mmmmm, fresh home made bread!!!

A cool church along the Yellowhead...

Catching up

I call the above picture, "Desperate Times Call for Desperate Measures." Maybe it's teething, maybe it's something else, but at times, Wyatt refuses to nap. If he gets in a 5 minute nap on the sled on the way to school before lunch, he will not nap in the afternoon. That makes for a long, long day for all of us. So on this specific day, he fell asleep as we were on our way to pick up the boys. I brought the sled in and he slept through lunch. We brought the boys back to school after lunch and came home...I brought the sled in again and let Wyatt continue his sleep. He woke up at about 2:30 and he was not exceptionally happy then either...

Andrew and Natalee licking the leftover pink icing...

The cookies we decorated for Valentine's Day! Very yummy!

Wyatt in his Canada Olympics get-up.

Wyatt & Natalee

Our silly young ones.

Wyatt in the baking cupboard...

Natalee sitting her basket.

More Christmas '09

Andrew received a 3D gingerbread house puzzle for Christmas. We had a great time putting it together on Christmas morning. I wasn't sure if he would have the patience to do the whole puzzle at once, but he did a really good job.

Natalee and two of her dollies, in her Christmas pj's.

Our Christmas supper!

Our personal cook, working on the turkey.

Natalee got a box of dress-up clothes which should explain the next three pictures.

Christmas Day 2009

Andrew got some weights for Christmas. He sometimes joins me when I do my work-outs. Hopefully he can manage 2 pounds! :)

Joshua got a Star Wars lego set which he proceeded to put together all by himself in the basement without any help.

Caleb got some crystal. No, actually he got a King Bakugan from Joshua. Yes, exactly! :)

What a smart 1 year old! Wyatt got a toothbrush in his stocking and was already ready to put it to use, even with the packaging on it!

This is the first year we have made a birthday cake for Jesus. I tried to make a Red Velvet cake - I think I overbaked it, but it was okay. We iced it with white buttercream icing and decorated it with crushed candy cane. This is a new tradition we plan to continue on with.

Natalee's first haircut

On December 5th, Natalee and I had our first "girls afternoon" and headed out to my hairdressers for Natalee's first haircut. She was pretty excited and nervous by the time we got there, but my hairdresser did a good job of distracting her with some giant hair clips.




I wonder what next time will be like! :)

Making stuff

Christmas trail mix - pistachios, dried cranberries, honey-roasted peanuts, and dark chocolate chunks.

Christmas cookies! The boys had a great time with the sprinkles.

Joshua's lego ships. Just a few of them.

Spinach pancakes. Yummm! Really, you have to try them before you judge them!

Catching up

It's been a while since I last posted and lots has happened in the last 5-6 weeks! We had a wonderful December and a very fun Christmas. Tomorrow, it's back to school and back to work.

First, here's a little more from November and Wyatt's birthday.

Opening up Wyatt's birthday present on Saturday morning (November 28th).

Wyatt's new "camera face" and also his green frog.

This is what the birthday boy received from the family for his birthday!

Yummmm, chicken lasagna! Yes, the camera flash is SO bright! :)

Wyatt's Birthday Party

Blogger is not letting me rearrange my pictures...so here they are in reverse order. Perhaps start at the bottom so this makes more sense. Above, Natalee cuddling with Wyatt's praying bear.

His favourite present - a box! :)

Not too messy!

Yummy cupcake! He really enjoyed the icing!

He was totally enthralled with the candle flame!

Wyatt grabbed a piece of raw broccoli and enjoyed sucking on it.

Look who's one year sweet!

The finished product!

Caleb cut the marshmallows for the eyes and drew on the mouths.

Andrew put the marshmallows on the cupcakes and Joshua dotted the eye balls with icing.

Halloween

Natalee dressed in the clown costume (underneath) with the puppy costume over top. She really enjoys putting on clothes. Andrew with his pirate hat, and Wyatt with his cat toque. The toque didn't cover his ears, so he didn't wear it for trick-or-treating.

Carving our pumpkins on Friday night. Wyatt had a good feel of the pumpkin guts and he seemed pretty impressed. Here are our finished jack-o-lanterns:

The other part of Wyatt's costume. Yeah, he REALLY loves his Mummy! :)

Halloween evening before the candy hunt begins! Caleb and Joshua in their glow-in-the-dark skeleton costumes, Andrew as a pirate, Natalee the puppy, and Wyatt the baby.

I think Joshua might be allergic to his costume. He wore it at school on Friday afternoon and when he came home, he complained of being itchy so I took a look and found THIS. Thus began the hives saga which got much worse Saturday night after trick-or-treating but today has been a lot better. These huge welt-like areas come and go, along with the intense itching. Some of the welts have been bigger than the size of my hand. Not fun.