Cake For Breakfast

There’s something you should know about this little girl Well, actually two things. First, the girl doesn’t do ANYTHING unless she’s ready to do it, and we’ve noticed, ready to do it perfectly! Otherwise, it doesn’t happen. Second, up until now, I thought I had one child out of four who wasn’t a big art/craft nut. You see, well, I married into an artistic family, my, husband’s artistic, my mom’s crafty, and, up until Sophia, all three kids were fully and totally into artsy/craftsy things. Me? I can draw a stick man Though, in my defense, I can cook a primo meal and my art and craft lies in food, not paint, but, there are times, when everyone who surrounds me can DO, I wish I could too. It’s fleeting…LOL but it happens.

But you see, Sophia showed no interest in arts and crafts. Not one time during her 2 months in preschool did she draw anything (and we had told the preschool people not to expect it or push it either), no scribbles on paper around the house, nothing. I knew she could write her name, and write it well; not that I taught her, she did it herself; because I had seen her do it on our pantry door. We have a large, freestanding, press-board pantry that we use for books. It’s what we measure the kids on, and we’ve told them to decorate it anyway they want It sort of satisfies that urge to colour on walls too! So I’d seen her write her name…but she just had no interest, at the time, in anything artsy/crafty.

Until last week She ran over with a picture she drew, which, the second I saw it I knew exactly what it was…and it was so neat!! She drew Peep, Quack and Chirp from this program:

http://www.peepandthebigwideworld.com/

She explained that though she didn’t have red markers to draw Chirp, she used green and besides, you can tell by the beak

So, it shows again, that when it’s up to her and she’s ready….BOOM!

Or, that’s my story and I’m sticking to it!! Seriously though, even though we’ve only had “winter” for about 10 days, I’m way over it. I want spring, and want it NOW!! It’s been COLD, dammit, really really cold….and I don’t do cold. And yes, I get the irony of living in Canada and not doing cold. At least with all the climate changes, the 6 months of winter we had my first year in the province is now like, oh, 6 weeks..if that? So it’s doable for me, but I still do not like it AT ALL!

This year I realized though, that it’s going to seem like a much shorter winter. With the time change happening in mid-March instead of mid-April, it’ll seem nicer, sooner, and really, we’re at the 28th of January already? And we’ve only had cold/snow for a week? Eh, not so bad. Right????LOL This is me, telling myself that…..while I shiver!

Good Golly we got snow, snow and MORE snow yesterday. Which, the kids love!! Me, not so much, mostly because A: everything was closed, and B: we’re stuck in the driveway because the plowguy hasn’t come by…which he should have by now. But hey, it’s really pretty!!! Even if the river STILL isn’t frozen!!!

Oh, and that’s food colouring they’re using to paint the snow….which they then made into snowballs to freeze in the freezer for the first day of summer

I think oftentimes parents think that
parenting should be less time-consuming than it is. The fact that it takes a
lot of energy and effort most certainly isn't the children's fault -- it's
the reality.

True.

And beyond that, it seems common for people to think unschooling will
take less time than school or school at home.
It works best when it takes more time.

Maybe it would help to think of being an unschooling parent as
dancing with you child - you mostly lead because you're more
experienced and you see the bigger picture more than your partner
(your child). But think about what someone does when they "lead" in
dancing. They don't shove the other person around and they certainly
don't force their partner to do something they really don't want to
do. They have to be sensitive - they recognize that their partner
might want to turn or dip or move forward or backward and they "lead"
them to do what seems to be their inclination. And they guide their
partner into doing other things that they might not think of on their
own. But - anyway - there is still leadership and guidance.

And it’s been COLD for the last two days After our snowfall on Monday, we then got news that we’d be in “extreme wind chill” watch. Ok, great, we live in the North, this is more like it. (Note to all readers, I hate the cold….LOL) Since we had been under a “heavy snowfall warning” for almost 72 hours with nary a snowflake, I didn’t really believe Mr. Weatherman that it would be all THAT cold, especially since it’s been warm for this time of year. Apparently, it was Mother Nature’s turn to laugh at us.

It got DAMN COLD….we were sitting at -36C yesterday. That’s -32F. That’s cold! DAMN COLD!! Two things made that very very weird though. The first, is that although it’s THAT cold, it hasn’t been cold enough to completely freeze over the river in front of our house. Now, mind you, this river usually freezes pretty nicely in, oh, November or December, and usually by now people are skating and snowmobiling and whatnot….but, um, no, it’s not frozen solid, and the parts that are frozen, aren’t thick at all. So, yesterday, the river was considerably warmer than the air, so it was steaming. It was the most bizarre thing to look out the window onto the river and see steam And no, I didn’t get a picture, because I was afraid I’d freeze the camera!!!

The other weird thing is that it’s supposed to be +2 tomorrow. Yeah, above freezing. And people wonder why everyone’s feeling under the weather lately and can’t figure out why?? Our temps are fluctuating 40 degrees in a day and we’re not going to feel it??LOL

So, we’re apparently going to thaw in the next couple of days. Sad thing is, it’s been beautiful looking out, but it’s been too damn cold for the kids to enjoy it. Eh, there’s always tomorrow, right?

*~*~**~*~UPDATE*~*~*~*~*~

Ok, apparently we’re under ANOTHER snowfall warning…..for tomorrow. Woo! Maybe instead of the traditional January Thaw, we now have the January Blizzard?? Ah well, it’s going to be warmer…so that’s something!

I had the last theme up temporarily since I just wanted this site up. But I had a little bit of time last night, so I spent it redoing the site and making it “pretty” It’s funny how it’s easier and easier each time I do something like that, to make it work, instead of having to beat my head against the wall trying to figure out what I did to screw it up. I must be getting better…..

So, the new look….makes me hungry, how about you??

Though it wasn’t so white until this morning Around 7am it started to snow…and by 11am, this is what outside looked like. Consider for a moment the fact we had RAIN Saturday and it was about 14-15C (around 55ish F). It’s not cold out actually right now…warm enough to be out in a sweatshirt to take some pictures, and it’s supposed to turn to rain, but the kids are THRILLED!!!

The first set were taken December 18th, the rest, 30 minutes ago And yes, it looked like the first one, through Christmas, until today…..

Monday, December 18, 2006

Monday, January 8, 2007

Whew, it’s been a long couple of weeks around here. And that’s not even with us being all that busy even. I’ll run through our holidays and what we were up to in December

Let’s see: Christmas parties for the kids were a couple of days over the holidays. We did a massive, fast shopping blitz mid-December, and for once, we were done ALL our shopping a week before Christmas. Yes, a week!!! Everything! Even Andrew

Christmas Day was really nice!! The kids loved their gifts (THANKS MOM!!! You nailed the PERFECT gifts for all four of them….and yes, thank you notes are forthcoming!!) and even Andrew and I got each other the perfect gifts…not one gift was a flop Sophia got a bike and Dora’s Kitchen, the three older kids got a xbox 360, and I got a professional pasta machine!!! Not only that, THE one I wanted. I got a chair massager for Andrew, which has been well loved already. We had a chinese buffet for supper that night and it was delicious!!

Then we all got sick!!! Just colds, but for a couple of days each, starting on the 27th, and by my birthday on the 30th I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to get sick since we had new years eve plans….yup, screwed myself on that one. We had people over on the 30th, and I woke up the 31st sick! It was only a cold, but it’s a holiday, and, well I had plans, dammit!! We decided just to do it some other time. We had friends over on New Years Day for a BBQ and that was a load of fun since no one had to run off and we just sat and socialized all evening.

We’re still recovering from the holidays I think….LOL The kids all feel better so that’s a bonus, though Andrew and I are still slightly sick.

But the holidays were really nice and calm and quiet but a lot of fun as well, and we survived them Though I didn’t make any resolutions, I’m going to “try” to post more….try being the operative word!!! I get in internet-fasts from time to time….LOL
The week of Christmas was a green week. We had no snow. Not a flake. We finally got a sprinkling of snow on Boxing Day, but really, not enough to even count as snow at all!!! And, since it rained on New Years Day, it’s like a skating rink outside.