Catching up...

I am going to try and catch up on the past week and a half. In that time, I had company for a couple of days and I was out of town. There were only 2 days at home - lots of laundry done on those days!

I spent the weekend two weekends ago with my friend Ronni and her family at their cottage. What a great place that is and wonderful and gracious hosts her family is. Mark and I have been there before and always enjoy it. Ronni has two GREAT kids - they are 9 & 8.

I remember the first time I had spent time with Ronni and her kids and the first thing I noticed was how great she was with them. She parented the way I did in my head - if that makes sense. All the things that I said I wanted to do - she was doing, the way I would react was the way that she reacted, the way I think I would discipline the kids is the way that she disciplined her kids. All round, I think she - and her hubby - are fantastic parents and wonderful friends.

Here is Mark enjoying is H*arry Potter book and his Caesar by the water - life doesn't get much better then this!



Here are a couple of pictures that me and the kids took over the weekend. They asked if they could take some pictures for themselves and here are some samples of them.

No weekend away is complete without good friends, good food and good times and this weekend accomplished all three, plus some good weather and good swimming!




Apparently the kids enjoy landscape pictures!! They did take a couple of pictures of each other, but I don't want to post them here.


Part II

Mark and I were home and working for 2 days and then Dianne and her daughter Jordyn came into town. Dianne was one of the first friend I had in university. I was living away from home and NOT on campus but in a basement room with an odd lady. I was the only person from my high school to go to this university and I was feeling lonely and sorry for myself. I decided that this was NOT the university life that I wanted or envisioned. So one day while I was in line at the cafeteria, with my back to the 'eating' area, I said to myself "after you pay you are going to turn around and find a seat beside someone and sit there and introduce yourself" and I did!! Dianne and I became fast friends and she was my roommate (along with 3 other girls) the next year. We lived together for a couple of years and during our last year in university, her parents moved to Calgary. When we finished school, her and I packed up her car and hit the road and drove out to her parents new place in Calgary. Dianne was convinced that she was only going to stay for 6 months until she got organized and came back to Ontario...MANY years later and she is still there!

Two years ago, Dianne adopted a wonderful little girl who is almost 6. She is lovely and Dianne is a GREAT mom. When I picked them up from the airport and we were driving and Jordyn said MOM and I MELTED! It was so great to hear Dianne referred to as mom!

Dianne too is a FANTASTIC mom! She is SO great with Jordyn and they just compliment each other so well! Dianne too is the kind of mother that I want to be with my kids!

Here we are - Jordyn took the picture of Dianne and I - she might have a future as a photographer!




It was GREAT to meet Jordyn and to see Di again.

More to come on catch up...

Sunday!

Today was a busy day – as are many days with Mark and I!

We were out of the house at 7:45am to drop by Kelly & Chip’s house to pick up some baby things that they are letting us borrow. They are finished with them and graciously asked us if we would like them. THANK YOU!

We were gone from their house by 8:45 and on our quest to find a place to wash the car. I just couldn’t take it anymore. All my pants, coats, gloves etc are COVERED with salt. Today was a sunny day, so everyone wants to wash their car when it is sunny so it wont (hopefully) freeze. We tried at 7:45 at THREE places and the line was too long. On the way to mom’s house from Kelly and Chip’s, we located one of those do it yourself places. Mark said – do you want me to do it? I said – No I am good thanks, you just stay in the car. Well by the time I had soaped up the car (NOT using the brush as it was frozen in it’s stand), my hands were just about to fall off from cold, my hair was frozen from the mist and my feet were soaked. Mark took over and rinsed while I tried to warm up! BUT we did get a clean car out of all of this. Then we were off to Mom and Phil’s place. They live in a bungalow and have an unfinished basement…with all that space I am sure that they won’t notice a bunch of baby things accumulating in one corner (unless of course they are reading this…).

From there we were at Dawn’s house by 9:30 and she made us a wonderful breakfast and we had a great visit – a little rushed as we had to get out and make it to our next stop.

We quickly stopped by home to change and get ready for our adoption agency’s Chinese New Year celebration party. We were already late. It started at noon and we didn’t get out of the house for the second time until noon.

We were they by 12:30.

We were meeting up with Dolores & Shawn, Rhonda & Josh, Nicole & Tim, Paula & Brett and Rebekah & John.

Paula and Rebekah were manning the registration table and Dolores and Shawn were in charge of the ‘pig mask’ craft table. The rest of us were just there for the festivities. However, since we were sitting at the craft table, we thought we should partake in the making of the masks - here are our creations! There were other craft tables too and Mark thought he would try his hand at Origami - here are the results...The reason there are three are because the first one he did to try. The second and third ones he did because kids sat down and asked him how to do them. The person who was in charge of that craft table (who was MIA) was not as dedicated as Dolores & Shawn were!!

While sitting at the craft table with Dolores to keep her company, a lady sat down with a plate of food, her coat on, NO name tag and a pile of books. We were looking at her curiously…we (Dolores, Rhonda and I) were thinking that she didn’t ‘belong’ there. Well when she asked “So what is this all about - is this a kid’s event?” our suspicions were confirmed. She focused in on Mark with these questions and being the gentleman that he is, he answered her array of questions. Since she was Russian, she kept inquiring whether she could adopt from Russia or not. Mark was trying to answer her questions on the Russian adoption process and then she just got up and left – an odd incident…

All in all, it was a nice celebration. While we were there, Mark recognized a man on the other side of the room. He went over to talk to him and low and behold, it was his former junior high school principal. Bill and his wife Julie, happened to be selling their wares there and they have a website - you can click here.

We left the party about 2:45 and headed to the Pacific Mall with Dolores and Shawn, Rhonda & Josh and Nicole & Tim. What an interesting experience that was. Just getting into the mall and finding a parking spot was an adventure. Mark and I had never been there before. We made a couple of purchases – 7 of them and only 4 were worth anything...wink wink!

From there the 8 of us left and headed to the restaurant for dinner. We were meeting up with Paula & Brett and Rebekah and John again for dinner. We were at the Mandarin and with 14 people, I really wish that they had round tables. You only seem to talk to the people beside you on either side and don’t really get a chance to converse with everyone together. Regardless, we still enjoyed it. We are just going to have to get together again with everyone in smaller groups to have a better conversation.

The Mandarin all but kicked us out as they had another group booked for the table. We all said our goodbyes and off we went.

Thank you to everyone for a wonderful day!