Moving

We are moving next week. Yes, you read that right. Next week!
We purchased my brother in laws house in mid april and get the keys this coming Saturday.
Andrew (Joey's brother) accepted an employement opportunity in Milton, ON (near Toronto). He started work on April 21st. His wife and little girl, Isabella, are moving down with him this Saturday (May 3rd).
You can image we are very busy. Between doing all the little projects here to get done in order to sell for a good price, packing, taking care of three little ones, and then moving and unpacking.... What have we done.
The new house is only 12 minutes driving from door to door to our church. I will know be able to walk to playground and the really cool mall with an indoor playground. We will also be closer to some good friends... mind you we are leaving some behind too. At times, I get sad about leaving to home... but others I am excited about a new one.
The new house has four bedroom on the 2nd floor. The twins will continue to share a room, and the 4th bedroom will be a chapel. If any of you know of anyone needing to give away or even sell some church pews, or kneeler, statues, religious picuters or Icons, tabernacles ( a far fetch... but you never know - we can't even think of asking for permission to have Jesus in our home if we don't have a home for him), candles holders,..... We love Eastern church things but anything that would create a place of reverence could be good.
The new home also has a bathroom on each floor... a real bonus for potty training especially when the home is mainly carpeted.
And the kitchen/ eating area is much bigger, the living room as has wood burning fireplace, and we know have a dinning room - which will be a play room for now. The backyard is still fairly big... not as big as here but for that we would have to go to the country. We will be nice walk to the bus terminal hence we can go down to one car if need be.
Jacob is very excited about the new house. All he asked for was for his walls to be blue... everything has to be blue... his bike, the juice he drinks, the clothes he wears.... it's his favorite color. ANd voila the his new room already had blue walls... that worked out.
That said he is starting to be worn out with all the movement and busyness of all this. He started hitting Esther on the head again. Poor sweety. Why oh why do boys have to pick on their sisters. He never picks on Daniel... just Esther.
Anyways got to get packing and painting.
God bless,

Tips for WW

I have bit hte bullet and I am back on WW (weight watchers).
Many of you now that between my pregnancy with Jacob and the twins I lost 98lbs. (in about 10 months) with this program.
I had vowed not to gain so much weight with the next pregnancy, but little did I know I would be having twins. So, here I am again... needing to loose weight again.
This time around, I am doing the program on my own. With three children in diapers, and two on formula and no maternity leave pay coming in the financial scene is just not the same.

I have decided that I will post from time to time some tips that are working for me, or that others have shared work for them. As some of you have expressed the desire to shed some pouds too. I also hope this will make me feel more accountable.

Here we go:

tip #1:

Once you are done your meal or snack go brush your teeth. Even pull out the mouth wash and swish, swish it all around in there. You will love the fell and fresh taste so much that you will not want to disturb it. And how tasty is food after brushing your teeth. -yuck.

tip #2:

Drink one glass of water per hour that you are awake. This will help you keep you hydrate and able to drink all 6-8 glasses of water needed in one day. Another trick is before having that diet cola or that zero points flavoured water, make your self drink one glass of water. Or fill up a big glass, mug of water and drink the water with a straw. You will be amazed at how much more water you will drink via a straw then without. Keep your water near by you all the time.

tip # 3:

We are precious, we are not a garbage can.
Our kids leftovers go in the garbage can, not in our mouths!!!!


tip #4:

Everything and I mean everything that goes in your mouths get written down in your food log.
Because of this last week, I caught myself eating a cracker from Jacobs plate. Honestly, it was just going in, without my realizing it. Amazing.

Please pass on any of your tips to me. I would love some fresh ideas.

'till next time.

late winter update

It is March,... I feel like say spring update... but with so much snow on the ground, it just doesn't seem right.
Hence, late winter...

Daniel and Esther are weighing in at 22 lbs 6 oz each. Yes, they are the same weight.
Daniel mesures 28 1/2 " inches tall and Esther is 27 1/4" inches in height.
So Alba, you are winning over Vijay. (ever since the baptism Alba and Vijay have been cheering their prespective God Child on to out growth the other... )
They are now 7 1/2 months old and are both becoming mobile in their own ways. Esther is very determined to explore and observe her world. Daniel loves his cuddles and he just doen't get it why he cannot touch me, hear me, taste me, feel me, see me all at the same time ALL THE TIME.

Jacob is 40 1/2 " tall. His weight is at 37 lbs and 4 oz. (the twins together out weight him!).
He is approaching his 3rd birthday this coming June. WOW!
His language has developed dramatically over the last few weeks. The expressions he is saying ... it makes me realize what I say.
Jacob is learning to share with his brother and sister... which is not easy. I am teaching him that everything is God's and he lets us take turns using things. He corrected me this week when I said 'yes, that is yours'. His reply was... no GOD!
Jacob gives the best hugs and kisses and cuddles... and is a great prayer partner.
Last week, I witnessed him rolling his sister on to his lap, rocking her and telling her that it's Ok, it's ok - just like I do. Of course, by the time I got the camera out and ready , he rolled her off him. Oh Well, that is why God gave us memories.

Joey is turning 31 in a few days. For once his birthday is not during lent.
Got to go...

Snowed IN

The city has received ovwer 400 cm of snow this winter....

it is good for us that we have had two melts before the gigantic dump last week.

Before each melt the snow was creepy up to the level of our baywindow.

One of the melts actually allowed me to discover that racking pine needle is much easier when the ground is frozen...

I can only imagine how high the snow banks would actually be...

The streets, especially the side streets, remind me of our trip to Regina...

Here are some pictures of what we are facing...

During the storm, just before we went to bed.

The is a two step to the ground... but not anymore.

In the morning....

Why do they call these Storm doors...

we just can't get this door opened anymore due to the amount of snow.

Thank God, that in the summer when I decided to take the "storm door" off the front doorway and didn't get around to putting back on.

Thank you Joey for shoveling us out.

Jesus may be our "SuperHero" but you are definetely our Amazing Hero. Love you.

stickers

Kim and whom ever else is interested.

Here is what I started with Jacob a little while ago.

Basically, I wanted a way to deal with all the bad habits we adapted while I was on bed rest with the twin pregancy and the time when the babies were very little.

I do time outs for physical hurts to other (hitting, pulling hairs, smacking on the head,...) and for obvious not listening. (this means when we remind him of a rule, bu looking him in the eyes and saying "Jacob we don't draw on the wall" ... he says oh! and then he does it again in the next 5 minutes.

Some times when we do a time out (sitting by himself on the couch, or arm chair - sitting near him, holding him spot, or looking at him reinforced his behaviour. hence he is by himself and we go on with other things) he gets up before we tell him he can, we tell him to sit back down, if he gets up a second time , he gets brought upstairs to his room, I close the door... he cries and cries after 1 minute i go to him and hug him, reassure him that I love him, but didn't like what he did. I make him say sorry. (at first that was a real battle... if you want more on this let me know)

Basically you have to figure out what is so horrible for your child that it will motive them not to do that bad thing. And not to over use this thing. For Jacob not being able to do what he wants is bad, but being in his room by himself and knowing that I am upset at his behavior is horrible.

We tries all sorts of things before this one, and we were thinking nothing would work and he would continue to hurt his baby twins forever. But finally wisdom came to us. It might not be the best or what phychiatrist recommend but it is what works for us.

As you see from the pictures, we decided to deal with the bad habits or the habits we wanted to instill in Jacob by rewarding with stickers. You can get great stickers at the dollars store. We use simple smiles, stars, cars, Thomas the tank engine, Dora,... what ever we get that we think he would like. I sit him down a few times trought the day and go throught the list of what we did and didn't do.... "DID you wake up in your own bed this morning?" Yes, oh great you can choose a sticker... he then puts his sticker in that spot, sometimes he wants me to put on the sheet, Then we go "DId you wash your hands before breakfast?" No, on well no sticker for that one, maybe we can get one for this tomorrow, I will put a sad face on this to know we will work on this tomorrow" and so on. If there is something on the sticker sheet that for some reason could not of happened Ex: snack at the table, and we were outside for snack time, then I put a bar through that, so that I know it's not anyones fault that it didn't happen.

Make sure to put some things on the sheet that are easy for Melody (or your child) to do, so that they see/ understand how it works and it encourages them.

As you also see,

Jacob can save his stickers for things that motive him.

This is working so, so.

He does know that if he gest lots of stickers in the day we get to go to the park all of us together , he loves that. It has however meant that we have at the park, in the dark,... but my days are going a lot better.

We have used sheets on t he wall but are thinking to swithchinh to a scrap book format so it is portable, and he can save the stickers for longer.

Some days we miss it, and that is ok. This way he does get dependent on this.

Any othe questions, let me know.

All the best

The other tricks that have help the jelasie (sp?) are:

-make sure she/he knows they have special time with just you.

(first thing in the morning, playing a short but fun game together, having a tickle fight, a cuddle in bed, or a bath/ shower together. This way there I want/ need mommy / daddy tank is filled up atlest a little bit. hgaving time throught the day to give a hug here and there, really helped Jacob, as well as knowing that on the days that i have help he will get alone time with me just before nap. We have also done dates with Jacob. Just mommy and Jacob go to the musuem, or just daddy and jacob go for ice cream, or a real treat just mommy and daddy go with Jacob for sushi - his favorite food. when money is an issue... daddy and Jacob play in the back yard or Mommy and jacob play in the basement and the other are on the main floor.)

-In stead of saving give me a minute over abd over again, set a timer for the amount oftim you need, or says when this basket is all empty we can do that. Make sure to follow throught even if he or she is now playinh independently, otherwise it will not work next time.

-when your busy with the toddler (changing a diaper, or cleaning up a mess) and the baby or babies cry out for you, reassure the baby that you will be there soon and point out to the toddler that "See, daniel has to wait for mommy, because mommy is busy with you."

-when the babies nap -sometimes at the same time, Ioccassionaly try to turn a blind eye to the state of the house and the undone chores and play with Jacob. It is amazing what 5 minutes of unnterrupted with mommy can do.

-Also, just bending down to his level and saying I love you, works great too.

anyhow, this is what is workinh for us now... with Jacob.. who knows for the twins.

Come to Family Camp June 20 to 23, 2008

Come celebrate the center of our faith with us.

While many of us cannot attend the 49th Internation Eucharist Congress in Quebec City, We can attend a family camping retreat on the same weekend as the Congress. What a great way to celebrate jointly with the Church.

We will be gathering on Friday, June 20th, 2008 to Sunday, June 23rd, 2008 at on a spacious lot in Aston, ON (about 30 minutes from the center of Ottawa) to camp, eat, share, have fun all while deepening our faith and knowledge of the Eucharist.

Our last family camp was themed on the "Armor of God". It was a great success. All of us, from the 2 month old to the oldest adults had lots of fun, and grew stonger in their faith. Never the lest to say that strong friendships were formed.

As before, lots of spaces will be provided for people to set up their tents, camper trailers or motor homes. Camping over is encouraged but not necessairy.

More to come later.