oh boy, it's happened again...

Let me first start out by saying that the past week-ish has been a whirlwind...Orange turned 5!!! She's now a BIG KID...She did friend parties and family parties and well just partied it up! lol.
There will be no more babies here, so this is quite the moment...*sigh*

Also, school started again! THANKYOU GOD!! It truly is the most wonderful time of the year! lol. Hero just started Gr 4 yesterday...and well she was super excited the say the least...this is the year of the big kid side of the playground...she starts french this year...things just get harder(which she thrives on!)...she has her first male teacher this year, which we are both kinda excited about...he is AWESOME...i wonder if he's married...lol JUST JOKING!! lol.

Orange starts SK TODAY...she has a new teacher which for right now she is very happy about...she seems to be kinda happy about going back...but i know that the tears will start up the second we get there...I just hope that MrsM can get her through it...I do NOT want the kid who cries in gr 1!!! She's such a smartiepants, I just want her to LOVE school like H does!!! *sigh*
So think of us today please.

OK...so regarding the title of todays entry....a couple months ago I had that pivotal moment where 2 ppl said to me within hours..."wow, God really set you up for this one...look at all the support..look at how he provided for you...just WOW"...and I may have rolled my eyes at the time...but it really hit home and got to me...and then i realized "WOAH, you guys are sooooo right"...
Well, the same thing happened yesterday to me again...2 different ppl said the exact same thing to me within hours...can't say what...but it's really weighing heavily on me...I thought that i was moving on...and this has been a MAJOR setback...
I am one of those people that believes that things happen for a reason...and so when 2 people say the same thing on the same day in 2 separate events...it's a BIG DEAL...
I don't know what i'm supposed to do now...I wish that i could just freeze time for a little bit so that i can THINK...am i supposed to pray about this?? Anyone wanna walk me through that?? lol...*sigh*

reading, more reading, and then communion!

Ok, so this week has been hell on me to say the least...but i think that i'm doing well under the circumstances...I've noticed that my coping/acceptance is getting better/quicker...
So my neighbour came over the other day in the midst of the crisis and handed me a devotionals/prayers type of book from Angus Buchan(faith like potatoes...highly recommend this movie!!) and said "here, this will help, try it"...well i read the ENTIRE book(or year) in less than 24 hrs!! And then when that was done i realized that i NEEDED to keep going...So i turned to "Pivotal Praying" which i am VERY close to being done, and wow, that is a very good book too!!! And then i asked people "what's next, help me"...and the answer is "Captivating"...So I will wash my new mug and start that while we wait for the laundry..lol...
I NEED these books, i NEED answers, i NEED help, i NEED God to guide me cause i feel like i am just wandering around in circles....but i feel that i am getting there...little by little i know...
Want to know how i know? I took Communion today. I knew that i needed to do it. I was ready this time around. I cried(well, i cried a lot this morning, and made some others cry too)..The tears were for so many things...grief...relief...healing...strength...EVERYTHING.....It will be alright...i know.

The house has closed.

WOW. Today the house officially belongs to someone else. I went back this morning to take some pictures and say goodbye and get some closure.
It's really hard to believe. But at least it was empty so it made it a tad easier. Apparently a couple neighbours said goodbye to N and sent their goodbye's through him to me, etc etc...I think that I'll have to send them cards and say goodbye to them, they were such good neighbours to us for the 3 yrs we were there.
WOW. It's done and over. Time to move on....

I cooked! and out of a REAL cookbook!

So today i continued on my quest for supermomness....i cooked...cooked out of a REAL cookbook! and it was fun and wonderful and tasted amazing, and it wasn't even that hard!!! (well actually the chopping of the shallot was a royal P.I.T.A, i have never teared up so badly from an onion in my life!!!!)

So you say...Umm Hey C, WHAT did you cook?! Well I cooked Chicken with Tomatoes & Zucchini from the Williams-Sonoma Cookbook...and it was divine! :D

(oh and for you foodies out there, i'm sorry if the presentation isn't top notch. i am obviously just learning! lol)

I will most definitely be cooking from a REAL cookbook again in the near future!!! It was an experience!!

**edited to add: oh my gosh! how did i forget to mention what the kids thought?! They thought it was great, but then again anything that has black olives in it is A-OK in their books! lol

$7 for all this?!

So today was another day of working on my Supermomness(it's a word now folks! lol).....I'd heard on a moms forum that there was an awesome place just outside town to pick your own veggies and CHEAP! So I decided to woman up and take my kiddos to that place! IT WAS AWESOME! We picked all the stuff in the above picture(plus 1 more cucumber and one more pepper--we gave them away before the pic)...for get this $7!!! and really it was more about the EXPERIENCE! Orange LOVED picking the corn!! and Hero braved the prickles to pick the cucumbers and the zucchinis! NOW the goal is to get them to EAT the veggies! lol.

(on a sidenote: i didn't make it to the mall with the girls, but I WILL YET! lol)

A new leaf and GOAL OF THE DAY!

Ok, so going to see Julie & Julia the other night has sent me into a frenzy of brain activity..i think that i need to see more thought provoking movies more often!! I now know that i need to set some kind of goal for my life....it's been driving me crazy..my kids are getting BIG and I am going to be turning 30 in 3 mo!!...I think that i know what my goal needs to be, because it's always been in the back of my mind...
I am going to do more about this "supermom" ideal that i have in my head! I was chatting with a friend last night and i expressed that i'm kinda like a scaredycat...there are soo many things that i just don't do for whatever reasons..and it's STUPID..like SERIOUSLY STUPID...my whacked out brain is holding me and my kids back and i hate it so i am going to REBEL i tell ya!

TODAY i am going to take my kids out shopping, actual shopping, for no reason but to just look at pretty clothing and shoes and accessories. I honestly don't think that i have EVER taken my kids shopping "together" without one of them being confined to a stroller(so like that would be a WHILE ago!)...and my kids are WELL BEHAVED!!! What the heck am i so afraid of?! Well i plan to "get over it today". And i may even buy some stuff and NOT RETURN IT LATER!!! lol.

sick, bleh, grumpy...

So i went to the dr this morning, it was already booked, just a check in session...and so i bring up that i can't eat, that it makes me sick, the compounding weightloss, etc etc...
So now she's concerned, and was going to put me on something but then didn't, told me to desperately try to "graze" for a month and if i'm not better than something needs to be done...eek!! what the heck!
SO I try desperately to graze today, make sure i'm eating good foods in tiny amount...and gradually i get sicker and sicker as the day progresses...i've been in and out of bed all day...this sucks...I am uber nauseous and crazy tired...and yet i can't sleep...GRRRR...
Maybe i'll go and make some tea and try grazing again tomorrow...i feel like such a cow! lol.

anyone got any good ideas/advice?

purge, purge, organize, and purge...

Well in my anger the other day i removed all the special momento/keepsake boxes that i had left at the house...i wanted it all back and NOW!!

Well, this morning i started sifting through the CRAZINESS, it's unbelievable all the stuff that was kept! I went from 2 large boxes of wedding crap down to one medium box, and i'm sure that'll get smaller yet again when i make the decision about the wedding gown...i've been thinking about ditching it since before the separation and well now i just want to set fire to the damn thing! lol.(joking!)...

Now i just need to weed through about 4 rubbermaids of 1st outfits and keepsake crap that people gave the girls that has always sat in a box, etc etc...

There is nothing like living in a small apartment to give you that swift kick in the tooshie to start purging and organizing! I just hope that i don't overflow the dumpster out here!! lol.

I Can Move on Now

Well it's been a very interesting 2 days..but it is safe to say that I know why my marriage failed now, and I am able to move on...and wowza does God work in mysterious ways!

My poor friends and neighbours!

Well, it seems that i am back at kind of square one so to speak...My house sold on what would have been our 9 yr anniversary...and once again the finality(?) of everything has hit me like a ton of bricks. I have been on the verge of tears/crying since Friday when the offer came in...and then when we accepted it on saturday...and then on sunday when i had to sign for my copy...and then today when i had to sign for my waiver thingie...and i'm sure tomorrow when the sold sign goes up(if that's tomorrow)...and then there comes emptying out the house....and seeing him rent an apartment...I cry when someone asks how i'm doing...I cry when...oh lord, i just seem to cry...

I AM A MESS. I AM AN ABSOLUTE MESS. I am up late, and then up again early...my mind doesn't stop...THIS SUCKS.

The New Art for my Bathroom!!

Check out the new art i have in my bathroom!!! It's soooo cute.....and the GIRLS made it!!! (i did a bit of touching up on h's stripey one, and i did the paint marker outlining on a's circley one)....I LOVE THEM!!!! :D

I did a LAYOUT!!! :D

WOWZA, i did my first layout again after like 7 months of no-scrapping-just-cardmaking...and man oh man it feels great! I LOVE IT! I came home just before the stroke of midnight last night and just wanted to keep going!!(but i didn't! lol).

Enjoy!

FOR SALE!

Well, it's up for sale FINALLY, and well it's certainly emotional...I thought that I was fine with it, but i was there cleaning up just before the open house today and as we left people were starting to show up and well...it hit me...they are there to possibly BUY MY HOUSE and you know...LIVE THERE...and well it didn't leave me feeling so good. It looks fabulous, i want to live there!!

But well, there is nothing that i can do about it, so i hope for an extremely quick sale so that i don't need to face it too much.

ALSO, since last posting on here we are finally in the new apt...i saw the date of my last post was June 20th...and we moved in here on July 03rd, so thankfully we didn't need to wait much longer! :D

We're getting settled here and it's nice and quiet and we have FABULOUS neighbours(tee hee) but it's OH SO BEIGE! and well i don't have much in the line of things for on the walls because i left most of them behind due to them "not being mine"(so to speak)...Right now i am VERY PATIENTLY(or not! lol) waiting for a lovely friend of mine to make a painting for my place...i bought her a 22x28 canvas, and apparently it's still WHITE. lol. But you can't rush pure genius so i sit and wait. :)

Will post pics of the apt as soon as it's not embarrassing! lol.

Yes, we are all still alive...

So I haven't felt up to blogging lately...or more that it's just been painful for me...I guess that i was just hoping that this phase of my life would pass QUICKLY...but that doesn't seem to be happening....
The girls and I are living here at my mothers house. Wasn't a good situation when i was younger and it's an even worse situation now...my mother is an alcoholic. It sucks. You'd think that with your granddaughters living with you in your home, you'd want to rock the grama thing, but well, that hasn't happened...she's barely functioning as a human....again, it sucks.
BUT there is a light at the end of the tunnel...we're moving out soon...how soon? well, i'm not exactly sure, but well...soon. Hopefully no longer than 3 wks, but we'll see...it's all just up to how long the people take fixing up the apt so we can move in. PRAY that it is BEFORE July 15th PLEASE, a LOT of my friends are going camping and i need their help to move, BIG TIME. For this move I will NOT be asking N to help me move...i want to do this "myself"!
OH! and duh, how did you get an apt when you don't have a job?! lol...i HAVE a job now!!! Well, kinda. It kinda came out of the blue and well i can't argue...I clean houses tues/wed/sometime saturday and i actually kinda like it, and it kinda pays decent! woo hooo!
Hmm...what else...I've taken up a bit of knitting thanks to my lovely dutch girlfriends...I now have 3 dishcloths made for the new place...now if only i can remember the dutch word for them...shoot.

And i think that i have run out of things to say at the moment, that, and my laptop is slightly overheating on my lap here and well my thighs feel like they're on fire and (lol) NOT in a good way!!! rofl.

so 'nightie night all.

blog is kinda on hold

so life is getting crazy...moving is VERY close on the horizon...just finishing up at moms house(well enough that we can at least move in! but it'll certainly be more cleaning/organizing after we get there)...
And i just need to get off the computer and focus on my girls and myself. I need to make us happy....and that is all for now...

Kids 1st Day!

isn't EVERYDAY kids 1st day?! it sure seems like it sometimes! lol.
But today was infact "kids 1st day" here. Where many businesses open up and have fun activities for families to do for FREE! (i love that word! lol).
Here is what we did...
9:40~ made pinwheels at chapters
10:15am~ made jewellery trees at Rona
11am~did an educational scavenger hunt at the archaeology museum, and then made mini clay pots.
noon~decorated chef hats and cupcakes at Loblaws(yum!)
12:45~painted trees at scholars choice
1:15~ got cool aprons and woodworking craft at HomeDepot(were tired and needing lunch so just got them and left)

Next we decided to be bad and grab some lunch at McD's and play at the playplace, but as we sat down to lunch i got a textmessage from a friend that they were at the park and come join them...so we ate quick and drove across the city to the park.
There we had a blast flying kites, climbing trees, playing on the equipment, snacking, etc with friends and a TROOP of kids! lol
We finally got home about 4:30 EXHAUSTED!!!
Now i need to get off my bum and make dinner...wahhhh!!! no fair!!!
(oh and a quick document about the GORGEOUS weather today~~~23 degrees and mainly SUNNY! wowza!) EDITED to add that when i went to grab pizza for dinner tonight at 6 it was crazy sunny and 28 degrees! and now at 11pm it's still 24 degrees and WARM!!! *sigh*

Moving...ugh.

So with separation comes MOVING...we weren't too concerned about us moving out that quickly because we knew that it was important to keep H at the same school till the year was out....but things have changed.
N was here this week to start taking measurements and get working on fixing up the house(because we need to sell ASAP)..well, we thought the girls would be ok with N stopping by here and there...WRONG...couldn't be more wrong at all! A had an ABSOLUTE MELTDOWN, it broke my heart so badly and made me cry...she couldn't figure out why mommy couldn't make daddy come back, because i'm magic...(don't ask, she just believes that mommies are magic)...it was the saddest thing ever...
SO because of this, and because of watching what a friend had to go through trying to sell her house over the past month, i've realised that this is not something that i am willing to put my family through, so we're outtie...in approx 2 weeks. YIKES.

My mom doesn't get back from her vacation until LATE LATE tomorrow night or sometime Monday, and then well I will be FREAKING OUT for the next little while until this move is complete. There is literally SOOOO much to do and soooo little time.

Please please pray for us.

Easter Eggs!!

Ok, let me explain....i kinda let easter creep up on me....this separation has thrown me for a loop....so NORMALLY we do the hardboiled eggs and then use the decorating kits and dip them and whatever...

This year, we managed to find a 7-11 that had eggs, we left them raw, I just grabbed as much craft crap as i could find and let them go nuts!! I think they turned out pretty awesome! (except i am still questioning the R.I.P eggy jr one and the red/gold ones that are "fire"?! (i'm wondering what goes on in the head of my 8 yr old?! lol)

(top eggs are Ally(4) eggs, and bottom are Hayley(8) eggs)

Easter is coming!

Ok, I will try desperately not to make this entry all doom and gloom! But it seems to follow me wherever i go! eek.

So this weekend is easter weekend...i am trying so hard to just figure it all out...generally i would plan it out myself anyways, but with N gone i am now FORCED to figure it out on my own, and well i don't like to be forced to do anything! lol.
Friday is a school holiday, so it will be nice to relax(i hope) and just spent some time with the girls, maybe we'll decorate for easter, put up the easter tree and make some resurrection buns! ...N is taking them for dinner on fri night...Saturday i think we just have regular stuff going on...N takes them to bowling and they spend the day together, I think we'll decorate some eggs when they come home...and then Sunday is Easter, N will come over and we'll watch the girls hunt their chocolates and then girls and i are off to church...i think that night I'm going to book a hotel and that way we can just relax and play in a pool...but who knows...we'll see....I'm not too sure yet if the friday night dinner is easter dinner with his family or just a dinner...and well my family is leaving me and going on vacation thursday for 10 days so it'll basically be just me and the girls.

I'm feeling heavy hearted

Tomorrow, March 26th, is my grama's birthday. This is the first one since her passing last june...
I miss her so much and wish she was still here to talk to, she was such a good person.

March Break catch-up!

Well, it's been march break this past week, and if there is one thing that i wanted to do, it was make sure the kids had a great time...get out there and explore and have fun! (and not spend too much money, cause i don't have it! lol)
Monday we decided to take a bit of a drive and check out the Butterfly Conservatory...they had BugFeast going on, where you got to sample food/drink that involved bugs being in it!? The girls tried out the ant and almond cookies(which were apparently awesome), and i tried out the Beetlejuice(which was lychee(etc etc) fruit juice which these monster beetles floating around in it(dead)...Mmmm! lol.
Before coming home we also had to check out Chuck E Cheese of course! we LOVE that place!!! :D
Tues was a daddy day, and they were off to Niagara Falls...
Wednesday they were back with me and we were off to Rondeau Provincial Park to check out the tundra swans....well they weren't there due to crappy weather(for some reason it was thunderstorming there until about 10 mins after we left and it was suddenly back to sunny again?!lol)....so then we drove over to the Aylmer Wildlife place and there they were...a TON of tundra swans! :D
Thurs was another daddy day...they did their piano lessons and then headed off to the sugar bush for pancakes and exploring...
and Friday they were back with me for just a boring day out and about...lol.
Today they were back with daddy again for bowling league and then some time with grama and grampa...and tonight we're going to celebrate their cousins 14th bday with some dinner at east side marios! YUMMMERS! :D

public service announcement #1

So this wasn't exactly what i had in mind for my first entry back on the blogging wagon, but it is something that i've had happen recently and it is still bothering me.
I realized the other day that i have become far too comfortable on the internet and forgotten about how the internet can be a dangerous place and you really shouldn't EVER let your guard down. I recently had someone start IM'ing me(and then Email me!) from the most innocent of places and well it kinda left me with a yucky taste in my mouth, and well from those who i talked to about it, well a really bad panic attack....I'm sure it was probably nothing and i'm sure it was innocent, but nonetheless there are weirdo's out there and we should be mindful of that. It also reminded me to once again talk to my daughters about the internet and why there are rules and how we should use it, etc...
*and i will step down off my soapbox now, thankyou*

And we're up and running!!

Ok, i need to blog. I can't live without my blog! lol. We're soooo back! :D
So, did you miss me??

~formerly scrappymom with punkyandpapaya.blogspot.com~