Family Fun Monday!

I'm still tying to organize my blog. I just love how some people have set things they write about each day. I've got my wednesday's figured out thanks to Shan's What's Cooking Wednesdays, but that's about it. The rest of the days I just blah, blah, blah, about whatever comes to mind. I'm thinking a Family Fun Monday might be a cool idea. That way, one day when I am famous and I have 10's of 1000's of Mom's reading my blog they may share with me their ideas for fun things to do with the kiddies. ;-)

So here's our Family Fun activity of the week. Bowling!! Bowling has changed since I was a kid thanks to three really cool (?) inventions: velcro shoes, automatic scoring, and bumpers. Now even the little-ones can do up their own shoes, no one has to remember how the scoring works, and there is no such thing as a gutter ball.

Hmmm.

Is that progress or not? Are we being too easy on our kids? Isn't it good to learn how to tie your shoes? That's an important life skill. And, recording your own bowling scores was a fun math activity. Another important life skill. And, what about learning to loose gracefully: to suffer the horror of a gutter ball, pick yourself back up off that highly polished floor, and throw yourself a spare. Stuff of life, no?

Ahhh, well. If you try not to get too philosophical about it all you can really have a fun time with the kids. We did. And, look at these pics! Ahhh. So cute. They bowl me over. Ha ha ha. Okay. I'm sorry.

Now...
what you've been waiting for...
the results of the movie quiz!!!

Again, Karen of Virtually There is the movie Queen. Very impressive. Thanks for stopping by to play. And, yes, Harrison Ford circa "Raiders of the Lost Arc" just can't be topped. He would definitely be on my laminated list (see side bar) except I think he may have actually gotten too old for me now (funny, cuz I didn't think he was too old for me when I was 12). Or, maybe, it's that whole skinny lawyer girl thing that's thrown me off. Anyway...

1) Indy, "Raiders of the Lost Arc". Rahr.
2) His mom to John Cusack's character in "Grosse Pointe Blank" (She didn't remember him. Kinda' sad. And, yes, he is a handsome devil).
3) Sally in "Charlie Brown's Christmas". I just thought that was too funny.
4) Clark Griswald in "Christmas Vacation". This movie makes me, literally, cry laughing every time I see it. When he starts beating up that plastic Santa on his lawn...ohhh, it's hysterical.
5) "When Harry Met Sally". Of course. So many great lines in this movie. Such a great movie. Meg and Billy were so great together and they were both at their prime here. If you love romantic comedies, this one is the best.
6) Ferris to Cameron in "Ferris Beuller's Day Off". My favourite scene in this movie is actually the one in the art museum where Cameron is staring into the Seurat painting - noticing how the little girl's open mouth just disintegrates into the pointillism - her voice not being heard? Like his? Very deep. :) So cool and beautiful.
7) "Swingers". Vince Vaughn is so money.
8) This one is from "Pretty in Pink". Classic 80's. Yep. Gotta' love the Duckman. I would have rather Molly chose him. I thought he was way cooler than "Blane".
9) I threw this one in there because it reminds me of my university days. Hanging out, drinking cheap white wine with my housemates, and watching Peter Sellers in "The Party". I don't think I ever saw this movie without the cheap white wine so I have no idea if it is actually as funny as we used to think it was. At the time, though, watching Peter Sellers play an Indian man named Hrundi V. Bakshi trying to talk like a cowboy ("Howdy Partiner") was GOLD, Jerry, GOLD!
10) "The Wedding Singer". This is the point in the movie when you just know Robbie Hart has fallen in love with Julia because he is starting to quote the little things she says...that he obviously thinks are cute. So sweet. Ahhhhh. This is really an under-rated little movie, I think. So much fun. Especially if you are a huge fan of 80's music. Watch for the fantastic cameo from Steve Buscemi. Hilarious.

Okay. There you have it. So much fun. Thanks Shan. Makes me want to watch some of those for the 8-seventh time. Plus, I have to watch Old School! I can't believe I haven't seen that one, yet.

Don't Quote Me

Time for a little Movie Quote fun thanks to my pal Shan at Tales From The Fairy BlogMother (who, I think, is the only one who ever actually reads my blog anyway...but, that's okay, i'll still play). :)

Can you guess these oldies but goodies?

1) It ain't the years, honey, it's the mileage.
2) Hey. You're a handsome devil. What's your name?
3) All I want is what I have coming to me. All I want is my fair share.
4) Hallelujah. Holy sh*t. Where's the Tylenol?
5) All I'm saying is that somewhere out there is the man you are supposed to marry. And if you don't get him first, somebody else will, and you'll have to spend the rest of your life knowing that somebody else is married to your husband.
6) You killed the car.
7) You know I used to wait two days to call anybody, but now it's like everyone in town waits two days. So I think three days is kind of money. What do you think?
8) His name is Blane?! That's a major appliance, that's not a name!
9) Howdy partiner.
10) She said it wasn't jacket weather anymore.

Let me know if you know `em!

You Are Soooo Brooteflu, To Me.

It's almost the end of March. It is Spring. It is supposed to be about 8-10 degrees out at this time of year but, right now, it is snowing outside our window. It has been snowing for-ever. I've had enough of it, thanks. I think Maddie has, too. This is the little drawing she did tonight after dinner and this is her view out the window.

I can't wait to see the sun again. I kind of remember what it looks like and I seem to recall that a sky can actually be blue, but that memory is getting fuzzy.

In other news...

Maddie also announced that she is now creating her own blog. Here is the first entry. It is all about her. In case you can't make it all out it says - I am pleasant, I am smart, I am friendly, I am quiet, I am kind, I am creative, I am beautiful. She wrote all those words out herself. Pretty good, I think. When I was five I was just learning how to print my name - not sounding out all kinds of words. I'm impressed. And, again, there's that self-confidence! I wonder when the world will come along and try to beat that out of her. Hopefully never. I suppose, as she gets older, she will need to become a little less vocal about just how great she actually is but I hope she will always know it.

And, I know, I'll never stop telling her.

Baked Cod Fillets with Roasted Potatoes

Tonight was a "eating healthy" kinda' night with not only fish, but a low-fat fish recipe. Here is the ingredients list:

2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
6 medium garlic cloves, thinly sliced
1 tsp each thyme, salt, and ground pepper
2 lbs (about 6 med.) red potatoes, scrubbed and sliced into bite-sized pieces
1 med red onion, halved and sliced 1/4 inch thick
1 28oz can diced tomatoes, drained
6 cod fillets, 1 inch thick (about 6 Oz's each) - can substitute Arctic char, catfish, trout, red snapper, grouper, or tilefish.
1.5 tbsp sherry vinegar (garnish)
1 tbsp basil (garnish)
1 lemon, cut into wedges (for serving)

Mix the first six ingredients in a large bowl, then spread out into a 13x9 baking dish. Cover with aluminum foil and cook at 425 for 15 mins. Uncover and cook for about another 45 mins. until potatoes are tender (stirring occasionally). Pat dry fish fillets with paper towel, season with salt and pepper, and nestle in the potato mixture. Return to oven and cook for 10-15 minutes until fish flakes apart. *Drizzle with the sherry vinegar (if you can find it) and garnish with basil. Serve with lemon wedges.

Notes: We could not find sherry vinegar at Fortinos and the lady working there said she had never even heard of it...so I just skipped this part of the recipe. The recipe also called for fresh herbs of which Fortinos had none. Bad day for Fortinos, I guess, so we just used the dry herbs. I totally forgot to include the lemon wedges and I feel this was entirely Shan's fault as she distracted me during this part of the meal prep. I did, however, add some "Mrs. Dash - No Salt Added - Citrus and Pepper Seasoning".

The meal is only 320 cal., 6 g fat (only 1g of which is the evil kind), with 34 g of protein and 4 g of fibre. :)

Verdicts:

Daddy: "6 out of 10. Some of my potatoes weren't cooked enough and we should have used fresh fish instead of frozen. It would have been much better with fresh fish. We'll go to the fish market next time. Still, it was pretty good. I'd eat it again. But, with fresh fish".

Mommy: "The potatoes were fine, you big baby. I think it would have been much better with fresh fish, too, though. And, it's a bit too 'tomato-ey' for me".

Maddie: "10 fingers up! I really liked it. Don't feed me onions, though, I don't like onions. And, how was the service? Did you like how I put out all the place mats, and allll the forks, and allllll the water, and no one had to do anything?"

Jamie: "Thumbs up to the dinner, Mom. But, thumbs down to the water. I would have rather juuuiiiceee or soy milkshaaakkke or something else than just water. Thanks the the dinner, Mom, it was really, really, really, lovely". [she is too cute]

So, there you go. My advice...make sure your potatoes are really nice and soft before you add in the fish and go for fresh fish. I have no idea how it would taste with the sherry vinegar, or the fresh lemon wedges, but...you'll have to let me know if you try it that way.

:)

And that is What's Cooking Wednesday!!!!!

Great Family Traditions

The Easter Bunny knows Mommy has to work all weekend so he was kind enough to postpone his visit to our house for a time when we could actually all spend it together: thus, Easter came a couple of days late over here. We did have a big family dinner on the weekend, and the girls got to go on an egg hunt with their cousins at Grandma's place, so that was okay. But, there's nothing like watching the girls' eyes light up when they see Mr. Easter Bunny's footprints all over the house. This is a family tradition handed down from my Mom. When I woke up on Easter morning as a child and saw those little bunny footprints on the carpet that smelled so sweet...kinda like baby powder...I knew the Easter Bunny had really been to our house. It was so fantastic. It was like seeing the glass of milk gone and a couple bites out of the cookies on Christmas morning: proof positive that Santa had been there. This is one of the great parts of parent-hood - remembering what it was like to be so innocent and seeing that sense of wonder and joy on your children's faces. Priceless.

Thank-you Easter Bunny.

Tastes Just Like Chicken.

Wow.

This blog has been pretty boring lately, huh?

Well, what can I say? It's been busy. That, and I've been feeling a bit un-creative, I guess. Part of the problem is that both of my wee ones got sick over the March Break. This made doing anything fun or exciting pretty impossible so we promised them we'd do some fun stuff last week. Probably the most fun adventure was going to the Butterfly Conservatory in Niagara Falls. I just love it in there. Jamie refers to it not as the "Butterfly Conservatory", but as "Jamaica!" It feels like Jamaica in there. Nice and warm and nice and humid. Just wish I could have brought a book and had waiters serving me "Island Mystics" while I was at this Jamaica. But, still, it was lots of fun. If you are looking for something cool to do on a little day-trip with the kiddies this is a good choice. One word of warning: do not allow any pictures of yourself to be taken. You will not look good. Trust me on that one.

We also made it out to The Book Depot in St. Catharine's. The girls always like going there because there is a huge kids' section and they always get to pick out a couple of books to bring home. Also, there is a cute little toy train that circles around the whole kids' books section. It was off when we got there, but the man who works at the store turned it on for the girls when we arrived. That was nice of him because, really, seeing the train is Jamie's favourite part. She's a bit of a tomboy, that one.

Speaking of tomboy - we also took Jamie hockey skating last week. Can I tell you how adorable she looks out on the ice in her little hockey helmet and black skates? When I was little girls wore white (figure) skates and boys wore black (hockey) skates and that was that. Now, I guess, you have to decide which type of skates your daughter is going to learn on. I suppose after watching me try to learn how to stop with hockey skates on, Dave decided the girls would be learning with the black skates. I learned with the white ones and to stop I would just drag my toe and the picks would stop me. Now with the black skates there is no pick on the toes. You don't want to try dragging your toe to stop with hockey skates. Trust me on that one, too. You tend to just go ass over tea-kettle if you do that. I wish I could do the cool, swooshy, side-stop that the boys do but, much like driving a stick, its one of those things that I just seem completely incapable of learning. Jamie will do much better than I. Stupid picks.

What else?

ahh, yes, Easter!

We had a lovely Easter dinner with the outlaws on Saturday and I even had a nice new hair-do for the occasion. Of course, that hairdo cost 250 bucks, three hours of my life, and a really nummy, I am sure, dessert with my cyber-friend The Fairy Blogmother. But, really, my hair was getting so long and scraggly that even hubby was telling me to get it cut. You know it's bad when. He likes to say, "You know, you aren't exactly a 25-year-old anymore. Don't you think it's time you got your hair cut?" I won't tell you what I like to say to him.

Anyway...

maybe it's these cutie-pie cakes that reignited my creative spirit. I made them to bring to the Easter dinner. Aren't they cute? Well, you can only see one in the picture. His friend is off to the side. They had little tails and everything! We felt awfully weird about cutting them up. I will say...I never ate rabbit before...but this one was pretty sweet!

Happy Easter!

That's My Girl!

I found this today while Maddie was at school. It is a fun little activity that she did with her Dad while I was at work. There is a list of words and the idea was for her to print the name of a friend beside each word that she thinks best describes that friend. Did ya' notice which "friend" she feels is the most "creative"?

Gotta love the self-confidence!

I think she is pretty creative, too. And, I hope she always will be.

On that note...

So Davey just got back from Timmies with the girls (he always gets me a coffee in the morning because he is just that great) and he asks me if I want to hear part of a conversation he had with the girls. Ok. Sure.

Little Jamie was asking if she is going to have another birthday. Dave told her "Of course! You'll have lots of birthdays. Just look at all the birthdays your Grandmothers have had". At this point Maddie joins in on the discussion: "You even have birthdays when you're dead...you just don't get any cake".

Then she adds, "You may get a party hat on your rock, though".

Ok.

So...

HAPPY ST. PADDY'S DAY EVERYONE!

Ordinary Life

Last night I finished reading the book, "Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life". This is a really clever and entertaining book; I really enjoyed it a lot. The author, Amy Krouse Rosenthal, writes random little excerpts on different words or phrases from A-Z based on her life experiences. The first entry is "Amy", oddly enough. The last entry is "You": this was intentional on her part.

One of my favourite entries is the one for the word "Sexy". For this entry, in her own version of the encyclopedia, Amy writes, "Sexy: Jason looks especially sexy when he takes off his suit jacket, rolls up the sleeves of his dress shirt, loosens his tie, and plays Pig with the kids". I asked Davey what he thinks is sexy after reading that passage and he said, "Casual. Not a lot of effort put into it". Ohhh-kay. Then he said, "Like you...when you are in your pink pajama bottoms in the morning and your hair is all messed up". Ahhhhh. So sweet.

For me, I think he is looking pretty sexy when he comes home from working all day in the summer and I can see the salt stains on his shirt from working out in the heat, and his hands are covered in dirt, and he has his secateurs hanging in their leather pouch on his belt. He smells like freshy cut grass and sweat. Somehow, it is very cute. Or, when we are off on a walk and he's got one girl on his shoulders and he is holding the other girl's hand...and I can just step back for a moment and watch him, with them, and appreciate how much they love him and how he adores them...and I just feel so lucky for it all. I think he looks the most adorable in those little moments.

It's funny how we both like the opposite of what sexy is supposed to be and, instead, appreciate the casual even messy version of the people we really love. It's not the suits, or the dresses...fancy shoes or hair-dos...heck, you don't even have to be clean! You just have to be the one we love, sharing life's day-to-day routines - totally comfortable, totally relaxed, totally "sexy".

Mommy's in the kitchen!

I cooked something! I cooked something! Ohhh...I am just so proud of myself. You see, Davey is the cook in this family. I was a vegetarian for a number of very important, informative, years so I never learned how to cook meat properly. It was only when I became pregnant with my first daughter that I started to eat chicken again (I guess the zygote wanted something more than tofu). I still don't eat cow or pig, but I do eat chicken and fish. Problem is...I tend to cook the crap out of it. I'm so worried about giving someone food poisoning that I just cook it and cook it until the juices are not only running clear, but they've run out.

But I made this! And...it was really good. Dave was very excited but he was also becoming a little concerned. "Well, I want you to cook" he said, "I just don't want you getting better at it than me". I don't think that will happen, but in honour of my bestest cyber friend in the whole wide world, I will be making the effort to cook once in a while (like, once a week. baby steps. baby steps) and participate in the great "What's Cooking Wednesdays!!"

Here's how to make my fabulous "Chicken and Pasta avec Beuree D'arrachide" - that's "peanut butter" for those of you who didn't grow up in the Canadian school system.

(Oh, and as you can see from the title...it is not allergy friendly. But, if you don't have allergies and you do like peanut butter...you'll love this!)

Ingredients:

3 chicken breasts cut into bite size hunks (get your hubby to cut the meat if it grosses you out)

2 gloves of garlic

3 tbsps of peanut butter

2 tbsps of Honey-Garlic Sauce

1 lime (the juice of)

a dash of hot sauce

a sprinkling of curry powder

1 apple (cut into bite size chunks)...this was really good...next time I may add 2 apples

3/4 cup of coconut milk

1/2 cup regular cow milk

a little bit of cilantro (fresh would be nice)

a little bit of basil

and some broccoli florets

and some penne noodles (or, any type of noodles, really)

Directions:

Brown your chicken in some e.v.o.o. while the water for the penne noodles is coming to a boil. Add the rest of the ingredients, down to the broccoli florets, to the pan once the chicken is cooked (i.e., no longer pink in the middle, but not dried up into hard little nuggets). Let all of these yummy ingredients mix and mingle in the pan while you start cooking your noodles and get your broccoli florets into your steamer. Once the broccoli is cooked you can add that to the pan, too. You will *need* the broccoli because it is a very bland colored dish without it. Once the noodles have cooked, drain them and add them to the pan as well and kinda' toss them all together.

Put the food on a plate and wipe around the side of the plate so it looks pretty and clean. Add a sprinkle of fresh or dried cilantro around the edge of the plate. This is called "plating" and it will make your family think this is a super fancy meal. Oh, la-la. (yes, i'm being a smart a**). ;-)

FAMILY REVIEWS:

Dad: "It's good. really good".

Mom: "I don't care what you people say, this is good".

1st born daughter: "It's good Mom, but can I go lie down now, I'm tired".

2nd born daughter: "Ohhhh...this is really good, Mom!"

(I asked her after she got her ice cream for desert which she liked better....dinner or her ice cream...and she said, "Dinner!!". So young to be so good at sucking up).

Bon Appetit!

What are YOU into this month?

What am *I* into this month?

How great of you to ask! Here are my answers (boy...the writing is just *riveting* isn't it? This is why you should not create blog entries when tired. Unless you have gone right passed tired into over-tired and giddy. That's pretty fun, usually). Oh, wait. Is this what I was into last month, or what I will be into this month? Or, is it more just "what's goin' on, lately?" I'm so confused. And, can someone explain "Mr. Linky" to me? Any relationship to "Slinky" from Toy Story?

What were we talking about?

The Thing I've been Working on the Most: Well, generally, I'd say the thing I've been working on the most is trying to learn all about the ancient art of "Scrapbooking". I've read many books, many magazines, and many websites with their corresponding forums. I'm trying to learn everything there is to know before I go out and spend $300 on all the stuff, as it will turn out, I didn't actually need. Once I am a complete expert...then I will try a page.

TV Show I Used to Love but Now Hate and Refuse to Ever Watch Again: Big Brother. How sad. Why did they go and put it on in the winter? Was it due to the writer's strike? All the big t.v. execs thought, "Well, hey, why don't we just shove Big Brother up on the air again? That would be easy enough"? And, they didn't have enough time to scrounge up some interesting contestants or a less moronic theme? Sure doesn't compare to the days of Sloshy. Ah well.

TV Show I Sometimes Hate But Really Like this Year: Well, I never actually hated it but I guess I used to think he was a bit too mean...Gordon Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares. Now I think he is probably a really nice guy and "Are you taking a pi**?" is one of my favourite new sayings.

The CD I Can't Stop Listening To: The soundtrack for the T.V. show "Rescue Me". I love that show, and I love the music. They should put out another C.D. soon: mine is getting worn out. Never mind that...how 'bout a new episode. "The best actor playing the best character in the best show" USA Today. I think my favourite song is "Fell on Bad Days" by Rubyhorse.

My favourite Blog Entry this Month: Peas and Carrots (what can I say? they're just so cute).

Blog I am Always Visiting: Tales from the Fairyblogmother. It has become part of my morning routine...a cup of Timmies and a Slice of Life.

What I am Most Looking Forward to Next Month: Possibilities. ;-)

Empty Cupboard, Full Heart.

Huh...?! huh...?! {she says across cyber-space while pointing at her newly, cleaned-out, cupboard).

Pretty good, right? :-)

All the crap has been cleared out of the cupboard. I still have a big bin of movies to go through (to see which ones have been scratched beyond play-a-bility, and which ones still have some life in them), and a huge stack of photos to organize but, still, I'm happy with my progress.

You know what else makes me happy?

My little girls. Both of them. But...right now...let's talk about what an incredible cutie-pie Jamie is, okay?

So, last night we are tucking the girls into bed and taking turns singing them their good-night songs. Dave was singing to Maddie while I was hanging out by Jamie's bed. The lights are out and it is all quiet except for Dave softly singing, "Twinkle. Twinkle", and I'm just petting Jamie's hair. She looks up at me and whispers...

"Mommy - thank-you for helping me to get better".

(sigh. My heart still melts when I think about it)

She is only three. Why would she even think to say such a thing? So cute. So adorable. So sweet.

I just love her to little teensy-tiny bits.

Project: The Cupboard from Hell.

Some people have a junk drawer. I have a junk cupboard.

I wanted to clean this out today: that was going to be my project/horrible undertaking of the week. But, thanks to yet another snow-storm last night I've been busy trying to keep the girlies occupied today instead. We made a trip out to the library and they played in there for a long time. Then, they each got to pick out one book and one movie. Maddie choose "Monsters, Inc." and Jamie choose "The Incredibles". Of course, we actually have both of these movies (in that junk cupboard somewhere) but I think they were both scratched up by Jamie as a baby, anyway. I really need to go through all those old movies and see which ones still work and which ones can be trashed. It's not good to keep all this junk around. Very bad Chi.

So, it will be my project tomorrow. Think I can get it done in one day? There is a lot of stuff in there (including our old junk drawer. Ya, embarrassing. We tossed it up there the other day when we were ripping apart our kitchen which is also getting updated). I have decided that when I get it done my reward will be a "scrapbook supplies shopping spree". Well, maybe not a spree, but I will go get enough stuff to at least start something with all those hundreds of photos that are up in that cupboard. But, I will put it away in a highly organized manner. Promise.

I'll post pictures of the new improved cupboard when I'm done.

You can keep me honest.


Oh, and Jamie is feeling much better now! Back to her old happy self. :0)

Damn You Particle Board!

Well, I guess particle board doesn't count as wood. (See the second entry on my gratitude list from yesterday). I knocked on my little Ikea desk and, oh, maybe an hour or so later my daughter was in excruciating pain from the most sudden onset ear infection symptoms known to man-kind.

You see, she was playing downstairs - watching “Barbie and the 12 Dancing Princesses” which is like a little dance class for her. It’s so cute to watch her attentively watching the animated ballerinas and follow their every move. She’s so adorable. But, I digress. Anyway, she is playing downstairs, watching her movie, and coloring and she brings up a beautiful picture for me that she colored. She had rolled it all up to be a special surprise for me to open. “Close your eyes, Mommy. Close them. Cloooose them. Cloooose them. Now, Open Them!”. This is one cute little kid, I'll tell you.

Then she asks to do some “magic painting”. So I get out her magic paint book and she sets to work on that. Everything is great and she is happy-go-lucky. Once she finished her painting she got up to go see her Dad in the living room.

“Come on, Jamie” he says, “get some clothes on and we’ll go shopping”.

Jamie starts crying. (Hmmm. That’s weird. Guess she doesn’t want to go shopping.)

“I don’t wanna go!!” she screams.

“Jamie!” I say (with my `shocked at such horrible behaviour' Mommy voice), “Go get dressed. We are going shopping”.

“I don’t wannnaaa goooo! My ear hurts”. (Hmmm. That’s an unusual thing to say to try and get out of going shopping.)

We asked her if she just banged her ear. She yells “No!” I look in her ear and it isn’t even red or anything. Maybe she’s just tired.

So, we put her down in bed to have a little nap – thinking she’ll feel better after a sleep. But, she keeps crying. And crying. And crying. This is not like Jamie. Jamie is one of the toughest kids going. I’ve seen her walk straight into the corner of a wall so hard it made her fall backwards and all she did was say “ouch” and continue on. So, now I’m worried. I make an appointment with the doctor and start looking stuff up on the internet (why do I do that? It just stresses me out more to read about all the horrible things it could be – other than the obvious). Dave picks her up to take her to the doctor's and now there is a little bit of red-tinged fluid on the pillow. Now I’m really freaking out!

The doctor can’t visualize her eardrum well enough and sends her to emerg. where he’s called ahead to have two specialty doctors ready to have a look at her. They took her up to the special “ear section” of the hospital and did some work on her and they determined that she has a severe middle ear infection with a pin-sized hole in her eardrum. One of the doctors said it would actually be better if the hole was a bit bigger because then it would drain better and after some cleaning, and further information and instructions, Jamie was finally allowed to go back home.

“I want to go home! I want to go home!” she screamed the whole time she was being poked and prodded and having her temperature taken for the 5th time.

Flash forward a few hours and she has just woken up from a very, very, late afternoon nap (the shot above is of my poor little girl in the middle of that nap), and I asked her how she is feeling.

“Good”, she said.

The doctor said that her ear would be extremely painful for the next 2-3 days and we have her on children’s Tylenol along with her other meds….so you just know she is thinking, “I’ll say `good’ and then, maybe, they won’t take me back to the doctors”.

Tough little kid.

How was your weekend?

Hi there.

It's Monday morning. Woo-hoo!!! I know, you think I'm crazy. But, you see, Monday mornings for me are like Saturday mornings for almost everyone else in the world. After having my second daughter we decided it would be better if I was able to stay home with the girls during the week and just work on weekends. So I work Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Every week. Kinda' sucks because I haven't seen much of my friends in a looooonnnngggg time. Not to mention, most of them are in the "we have decided we don't want to have any children" camp. Not that there is anything wrong with that. It's just that between working all weekend, every weekend (and I start at the crack of dawn, too), and having children...the ability to keep in touch with my old friends has grown a bit difficult. They are still partying on the weekends and I'm in bed by 10. Ahhhh, how life changes. But, that's okay. I certainly wouldn't change it for the world. I'm pretty lucky to be able to work on the weekends and stay home with my girls during the week. I know that. But...all the same...T.G.I.M!

I'm always so grateful that it is Monday - that maybe I will make that the theme of the day (I'm still trying to figure out what I am doing with this blog): Gratitude Mondays!

Here are ten things I am grateful for (and this is just off the top of my head):

1. My wonderfully wacky family - all of whom I love to bits.


2. Everyone is healthy (I'm knocking on wood right now).


3. Our nice cozy home which is smack dab in the middle of a really terrific little neighbourhood.


4. Tim Horton's Coffee.


5. My really sweet dogs (our Corgi boy who is almost 12, and my Newfy girl who is almost 2 - hard to believe the Newf is the "little" sister).


6. All the cool people that I get to work with (and the fact that, generally, the "non-cool" ones are not around on the weekends).


7. Sucralose


8. The fact that I am "Biologically Young". I've actually been told that by more than one medical professional and I will continue to cling to it likes Dumbo's feather).


9. The fact that I am not living the life of that poor woman who was on Oprah Winfrey's new show last night. The one with the two, little, 3 year old twin daughters - whose husband went to work at the fricking Home Depot, for gawd's sakes, and ended up getting shot dead by robbers. I've almost stopped crying about it now.


10. The fact that I have just about everything I ever wanted. How lucky am I?

"Thanks!"