When Will I Learn?!!

I'm not sure how many time this has happened in my lifetime...I've lost count, but this Friday I found myself in the same predicament again...I had decided to take both the kids outside for some fresh air and a walk around the neighbourhood. I got them all bundled up, put Emma-Lyn in her stroller and stepped outside. I noticed that Gerry and Sharon's van wasn't there so I thought it wise to lock the door...then I checked my pockets...no key. Oh my...where was my brain?!! Apparently on early Christmas vacation!!

I decided to keep up with our plans and we went for a walk around the neighbourhood (I did not inform the kids of our current condition) We walked around looking at everyone's Christmas decorations and splashing in puddles. All the while I was trying to come up with some sort of plan. I had high hopes that the MacLeod's would be home by the time we got there and everything would be fine.

That didn't happen. So to the backyard we went to play...well Sean played while I tried all the windows and doors...no luck. Then I looked over to the neighbour's house...Could they possibly have a key?!! It was worth a shot so off we went...no dice. Sigh, but they were kind enough to offer their phone. I made some quick calls to find out that Gerry and Sharon were at camp and would not be back till much later that evening (it was barely noon at the time) I then made my best decision of the day and called Bonnie and asked if we could crash at her place for the day. She was more than happy to have the lot of us in and was able to ask her husband to come pick us up. I was ever so thankful!! We had a lovely time together! The night before Sean had mentioned that he wanted to go to Bonnie's house again...guess he got his wish!

Emma-Lyn ready for our walk around the neighbourhood.

Emma-Lyn and Hannah playing in Hannah's room.

I absolutely LOVE this girl's grin!!

Say it with me, Awwwwwwwwwwwww, that's so cute!!

A Snowman and Sledding!!

Ahhhhhh, what a fun afternoon we had! The crispy snow has turned into packing snow and we got right into it and made us a snowman! Sean was tickled. He was just so excited and kept saying, "We're making a snowman together!" Oh, and another funny side note, on our way to the mailbox, he sprung into some spontaneous prayer of thanksgiving! He said, "Thank you God for the sunshine, thank you God for the snow and thank you God for the mail." So funny. And when he found out that we were going to church tonight, his eyes lit up like a Christmas tree and he says, "I LOVE going to church! DO YOU?!!" I'll have to quiz him a bit more and find out what he loves most about going to church.



"You know, Mr. Snowman, I think this could be the beginning of a long beautiful relationship!"

"Here, let me get that for you..."

"What do you mean rain makes you melt?!"

"Oh yeah, I'm loving this!!!"

She is a Force to be Reckoned With...

My sweet baby girl who may only seem the size of a peanut, is not one to be trifled with! No Siree, Bob! Take this evening at supper for instance, everything was going great. I had served Sean and I our pizza and was spoon feeding Emma-Lyn her cereal when it happened. Baby girl pitched a fit...the funny part is that I had just begun wondering if she would ever do her little screams anymore...I need not wonder any more. She screamed! Oh, she was not thrilled. And at first, I couldn't figure out why. She loves this type of cereal, nothing was pinching her, Sean wasn't pestering her so what in the world could be causing her so much grief... Then it hit me, she was sorely unimpressed by the fact that she was NOT eating what the rest of us were eating. She's always been the type to try whatever you might have in your hand but really had never made too much ado about it. Well, I guess tonight was the last straw, she would have none of this and was not satisfied until I shared some of my pizza with her! Which she utterly enjoyed...Go figure!

On another note, weaning has begun in full force now. When she started solids, I began giving her a bottle after her supper while still nursing her before bed time and through the day. Well, now I nurse her just once in the morning. I have to admit that it's always been my favourite nursing time for her. I usually just bring her into bed with me and enjoy snuggling in the warm blankets and being with her. I don't know when I'll give that feeding up, I enjoy it too much and I hope she enjoys that quiet snuggling time with me too! :) She is my sweet little peanut! (Yes, Auntie Karina I'm stealing your nickname! :)

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas

Well, with our first big snowfall of the season on Saturday, I felt it was the perfect time to get the Christmas decorations up. Sean thought this was a fantastic idea too! He enjoyed taking out all the ornaments for the tree and helping me put them up. Emma-Lyn was plain old fascinated with everything. She's managed to grab the baby Jesus from our Nativity scene a couple of times, so now I sorta set up a blockade around the tree to keep her little hands out of trouble.

Sean just loves the snow! I think we've been out in it every day! We throw the snow, draw in it, build little houses (it's the crispy, sorta jig-saw puzzle snow) and just stomp around in it. I can't wait to get some more snow that's more of the packing variety so we can make some snowmen together.

"I love this time of year!!"

"This one is actually pretty tasty!"

"Hmmmm, I think I'm gonna like this Christmas stuff..."

In case you're wondering, he's trying to see his breath.

My bundled up little boy.

Would You Look at That..My Little Ol' Blog Won an Award

My friend Kim at Five's a Party as awarded me the following award:

This blog invests and believes the PROXIMITY - nearness in space, time and relationships!These blogs are exceedingly charming.
These kind bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in prizes or self-aggrandizement.
Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers!
Deliver this award to eight bloggers who must choose eight more and include this cleverly-written text into the body of their award.

1) Amanda at Ordinary Miracles
2) Melissa at Menita's Mommy's Musings
3) Stephanie at Gwendolyn Exploring Life
4) Miriam at Miriam's Moments
5) Carrie at Mommy Brain
6) Mike at Brannigan's Law
7) GiBee at Kisses of Sunshine
8) Mike at Something About Parenting

Will That Be Paper or Plastic?

Tonight my sweet loving son told me that I look like a bag. But neither paper or plastic...nope. Apparently I look like a teabag!! What a great guy!

Why My Son is a Genius...

I know what you're thinking, every parent thinks that their kid is the smartest. Well this time it's true! Just joking. Why I think that Sean is just so uber-intelligent is because of something he did today. First, I should tell you that we have the Baby Mozart, Baby Bach and Baby Einstein tapes, which Sean likes to watch now and then. Anyhoo, today while I was looking for some music to put on I came across a Baby Einstein CD and since it said classic lullabies on it, I thought it would be nice for some quiet, soothing background music.

Sean recognized it right away as being Baby Mozart and I thought, okay well that's neat he knows how the Baby Mozart sounds and this is exactly like it so yeah, that's cool. Then the next track on the CD is a piece by Bach called, Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring. Sean looks up at me right away and says, "That's not Mozart, that's Bach!" Now that, I thought, was pretty clever of him to distinguish just by listening.

He is such a funny guy. We were having people in this evening for supper so I got Emma-Lyn fed and was going to bathe her (normally I get the kids in there together) and Sean thought this was cool. He got to run around the house while she played in the tub. So at one point, I think he was pretending to be a car and he drove into the bathroom to inform me that I was his Darling and that Emma-Lyn was his Good Girl. I just laughed and got such a super sweet and super big hug from him! He's such a sweetie pie too, like at night he'll ask me to rub his back for him and I do and as I go to leave he'll always thank me and usually says that he feels better now. Cute eh?!

And if you didn't think he was cute before, I think this shot pretty much says it all. :)

Party Part Two

Before scrolling through the pictures here I suggest you click here first and read about the party and get the first few pictures and then come back here for the rest of the photos!! :)

Abby loved putting together her puzzle...

And then they were all in on the action. You know what they say, three heads are better than one! ;)

The whole gang together!

Cake Time!!

Good Times!!

Two very lovely mothers...

What happens to two very lovely mothers when the kids have had too much cake and not enough nap!!

It's Party Time!!!

It came as a bit of surprise this morning when Bonnie called and asked if this afternoon would be a good time to do the kids' birthday party. But I was game so I quickly found my party supplies and swung into action. Sean was delighted to say the least! The kids did great! Emma-Lyn slept through most of it but when she did get up and saw the living room with it's new adornments she was thrilled!! She just couldn't get enough of looking at the balloons!! So cute. Can't wait to see what she'll think of the Christmas tree. (I'm just itching to get the Christmas stuff up!)

To believe that my sweet little boy is turning three is sometimes hard to believe. He is growing so much! He loves to learn and he's getting the knack of trying new things. Right now he especially enjoys the alphabet. He knows how to spell his name and loves to point out his letter (S) any time he sees it whether we're at home or out doing errands! He's also beginning to get the idea of the different sounds the letters make which is really neat! He's also becoming more independent with potty training. Most times I can remind him to go and off he trots to the bathroom to get things done all by himself. That's not to say he doesn't still have an accident now and then but that's more the exception these days. The other day I was reaching for something but accidentally knocked it over and I muttered "Oh nuts.." and Sean just looked up at me and said most matter of factly: "Nuts are for Jumpy Squirrel!" I just laughed, what a fella!

Here are our party pictures:

Here is Sean waiting in great anticipation!

Cracking open the presents!! Lindsay got presents too just didn't get it in the photo.

The three amigos! I made the ponchos for the girls.

Sean loved his new helicopter.

Just Another One of Those Things..

Got my nose stuck in a book again. This time it's a book called Boundaries, I had it given to me by a friend of mine and it has been a tremendous read. And tonight I came across the following passage and thought it was worth sharing:

"It's scary to realize that the only thing holding our friends to us isn't our performance, or our lovability, or their guilt, or their obligation. The only thing that will keep them calling, spending time with us, and putting up with us is love. And that's the one thing we can't control."

A Week Has Gone By Already?!!

Wow, where did the time go? Things have been fairly quiet here. Marko and I went to dinner with his boss and his wife on Monday night which was really nice. I don't often get to spend time with them and they're really a delightful couple. Besides which, I love a Scottish accent! (Yes, they're both from Scotland.)

Marko had Tuesday off which was also very nice! We went for what turned out to be a rather chilly walk on one of the Confederation Trails. After which we popped into our good friends Mike and Nancy's place. They just bought it and they were in the middle of renos. I was super excited to see the place and now I can't wait to see it once it's all done.

Through, the week I've been working on Christmasy things and trying to think up what to do for a little boy who is turning 3's birthday. I'm not sure I'm quite ready to tackle making a monkey George or Thomas the Tank Engine birthday cake!! LOL! I've really been fighting the urge to start Christmas decorating. I've promised myself not to start until November 25th...I think a month before Christmas is a reasonable amount of time. I'm usually quick on the draw to take it down, like the day after New Years. So it's not like it'll be sitting around till February!

This weekend we had some friends over to play Pit and on Saturday night Jennie and I went to an Arts Extravaganza. It was really neat. They had the church all set up like a coffee house. I loved it. And there were people there I hadn't seen in quite awhile! During one segment we got to grab a basket of materials and set to decorating it which was a lot of fun. I worked on it with Jennie and Natalie. While ours didn't win any prizes we had a lot of fun just trying to make it into boat...which Natalie accidentally dropped on the floor. So then it really was performance art, going from ship to shipwreck!! Good times! Our friend Bonnie was also there with her hubby and they won the award of most original!! Soo cool!

And now just a little plug for an upcoming event at our church. If you happen to be in the Charlottetown area this December 7 around 6:30 pm, be sure to drop into the Charlottetown Bible Chapel to take in this year's Sunday School Concert!! This is Sean's first concert. I can't even begin to imagine how he's going to handle this but I'm sure it'll be great entertainment!!!



My Boys in a Box! Sean loves playing in this old box. I used to have it stuffed with old clothes but I've gone through and sent most of it on to goodwill and now we can actually get into Sean's closet!

Baby girl with Sean's Pake hat on and trying to figure out how this ol' sippy cup thing works!

Such a sweetie!

Just walking along and sipping away!

My two fine lads on our most chilly walk!

Happy Birthday Daddy and Grammie Peric

Birthday Cake from lauraperic on Vimeo.

Friday was Marko's birthday and today is Grammie Peric's birthday. On the cake I have an assortment of candles and a number which is the age of Daddy and Grammie added together. Can you guess how old they are?!! :)

For Marko's birthday we went to The Dundee Arms for supper. It was simply scrumptious! I love dining there. It's a really cozy atmosphere and the food is delicious! And it never hurts to have a 10 dollar gift certificate!! After supper we had the gang in and played some Singstar. Marko and I got to sing a duet together. We sang Lets Call the Whole Thing Off by Ella Fitzgerald and Louie Armstrong. What a HOOT! Marko did an awesome job as Louie. He sorta sounded like a muppet. It was so funny that I had a hard time trying to sing after laughing so hard.

Things here have been pretty quiet. Both Sean and Emma-Lyn are getting more independent. Emma-Lyn is so thrilled with the walking thing! It's more of a shuffle but it is soooo cute and she can really get around! Sean for his part is stepping it up by going to the bathroom all by himself. He'll tell me he has to go and I'll tell him he may and that he can do it like a big boy. And off he goes and takes care of business! What a little fella.

I've been busy doing Christmas baking and other little Christmas projects. A friend asked me the other day if I had cracked out the Christmas music yet and I had to admit that Sean and I have been sining them since, oh around the middle of October!! It was Sean's idea. He saw the children's Christmas tape and wanted to listen to that so that we did! He really seems to enjoy singing along with it.

A funny little story to end on: Today as we were driving about town, we passed by the Cows Ice Cream Store (for those of you who may not know, according to Reader's Digest, Cows ice cream is the best ice cream in Canada!!) Anyhoo, As we pass by Sean says, "Look Mommy! There's an icicle! No, an ice cream from the good cow....The happy cow." Marko and I both giggled.

Had Ourselves a Snap-happy Sunday!

We had a very lovely Sunday. While I'm not the biggest fan of snow, I do get a little excited when it does start to fall. I think it's more when the white stuff is still coming down in droves by the end of February that it really starts to wear my nerves thin. So this morning I was all excited to see the snow falling outside our window and I pointed it out to Sean, who also got quite excited. His exact words: "It's snowing Mommy, can I make a snowman?!!!" Thankfully, not today but I think it's going to be a hoot to build a snowman with him when we do get a good dumping of snow.

We enjoyed our Sunday services. Although, first meeting didn't go as well as I had hoped. I had to take Sean out twice to settle him. But he really enjoyed his Sunday school class and Emma-Lyn apparently is a hoot in the nursery or so said the attendant. I enjoyed the message during second meeting. I think my favourite quote from it was: "You're not ready to live until you're ready to die." It really struck me when he said that. He told us how he had been held at gun point. In fact his assailant had the gun to the back of his head and had cocked it and threatened to kill him. His response was, "Go ahead kill me, I know I'm going to heaven." You just can't threaten someone with heaven. That was cool.

After lunch and naptime we headed out for a little Sunday afternoon drive. We just love going for little trips here and there, never all that far but, just nice to get out and maybe take a few photos. So that's what we did and I thought I'd share the pictures I took. God's creation just never ceases to amaze me!

Golden Evening

Autumn Harvest

Sunset Blaze

Quiet Solitude

Field of Gold

Drumroll Please....

We have a winner of my bloggy giveaway contest, it is: ladymeme123!! This lucky contestant will be receiving this picture:

Sun and Sea

Congratulations!! And thanks to all of you who participated. I really enjoyed reading everyone's comments and finding out why some pictures stood out for people.

Just Been Thinking About Some Stuff...

Have you ever found out about something and just couldn't get it out of your head? It's just so interesting that you just continue to ponder it in your heart?

I have recently. I've been doing a lot of reading and when I say a lot, I mean A LOT. Ever since I read Corrie Ten Boom's story I've had such a hunger to read about missionaries and the like. I've read 4 or 5 others now and I hope to read more. It's seems to be a hunger I just can't satisfy enough. Each new story reveals so much more and yet also continues to tell the faithfulness of God.

The book I'm reading now is about Keith Green and this is where I've read something that I love to just keep thinking about. I've heard and read about Christ's crucifixion many times and been touched by it but, now with this added bit of information I'm brought to a new understanding of it again.

So here is the tid bit that's been giving me food for thought. The Psalms haven't always been numbered and back when Jesus walked among men, it was standard procedure to draw people's attention to a psalm by calling out the first verse. So for instance, if you wanted to remember Psalm 23 (a fairly popular Psalm today) you would say, The Lord is my shepherd. Well, when Jesus was dying on the cross he said, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" This is the first line in Psalm 22. So, there even on the cross he was directing people's attention back to the Word of God. And in fact if you read Psalm 22 all the way through it is as though you are looking at the crucifixion itself and the resurrection and on into the future. It is so exciting to me to think about that and know that my Lord lives.

Just thought I'd share. Maybe you already knew that, maybe you didn't and maybe you don't really care but it's just been something I've been thinking about.