happy sister mornings

Isaac went off to school today - especially excited because it was a fundraiser day for Telemiracle, and he got to pay $1 to wear pajamas to school. How fun is it to wake up, have breakfast, take of your pjs *then* put on pjs to go to school?

The girls had a typical morning home. First, they dressed up and spun around to music.



Then they hugged, which often turns into spinning and falling down.


Then they took turns being the baby and mom, feeding each other food they made in the play kitchen.


What a fun morning!

part way there

the girls room is on it's way. with some juggling of placement, we're almost finished. Rob is in the city for work stuff in the next 2 days, and is picking up (hopefully!) some shelves for the wall above the "tea table". There is some art-work to come for that vast expanse of wall...no re-doing our first apartment's blank walls here. Also, the blue chair will be sprayed lime green, when it finally is warm enough to get out to the garage to do it.

a happy 2 year old, on first viewing of her new bed




"I can touch the ceiling!"


The new beds, lights installed. Probably will never be this tidy again.



Moved the dresser and bookshelf.


The dress up and tea corner. Waiting for the last minute touches....

The best-laid schemes o' mice an 'men

to quote Robbie Burns....

Aaah, yes. Plans. What looks like a great plan on paper, isn't always so in reality.

The beds came. We had purchased a set of bunk beds that could either be stacked like bunks, or as two separate twin beds. Given the girls young age, we thought that up and down bunks may be a bit too grown up at this point. It's not easy to find bunks these days that are possible to be separated that are a) not too boyish or b) too expensive. We thought we had such a set.

then we assembled them. The space had been measured out, and made sense. We had not factored in the height of the headboards and footboards of the beds being just so tall and, well, present in the room. It's not a big bedroom to start with. Once we had the beds in there, it was obvious that we either needed to get rid of the girl's dresser, or knock out a wall in order to have enough space in the room for them to still be able to play in the room.

We took another approach, and stacked them as traditional bunks. It wasn't quite what we were going for, but it seems to work!

pictures to follow.

bye bye baby beds!

we took the big step this week, and moved the girls out of their little girl beds. Ruby was getting big for the crib mattress, and we had a friend going to Calgary who offered to get us stuff at Ikea. Ahh! A plan was hatched, and came together quickly. Big girl beds would be bought, little girl beds moved out and put into the yard sale pile. Here is one last look at the room as it was.

busy winter days

Time is going by so quickly here, despite the cold, house-bound days. We've been in a deep freeze for quite some time now, and are currently under yet another wind chill warning. This morning, it was -25C with a wind chill of -37C...and it's supposed to get colder. It hit -56C with the wind last week. The house is keeping us warm, and we're thankful for a good working furnace. See all the ice and frost on the basement door? Even the hinges are frosted up.


The kids have been making the birthday party circuit lately. We had a fantastic "Family Fun Day" the other week, including swimming, lunch out, a movie rental (Ratatouille, which they loved seeing on the big screen in Saskatoon), followed by tobogganing the next day. That was actually the last day we were able to play outside, it's been too cold since then. Ruby had a mini-getaway with mom to Saskatoon, while the bigger two went to a bowling birthday party. Isaac's Wii bowling skills served him well, although word is that he found a way to cheat. cheat at bowling...who knew!?

the girls at Aubrie's garden birthday party



We're dreaming about tropical vacations these days, and wondering if it's better to go away and have to come back to the cold, or to just wait out the winter. I think our next "big vacation" may just be a road trip to the Edmonton Ikea for new beds for the girls. How exotic!