THE BIG 4-0

So it came and it went, and now I'm 40. I feel like I've been turning 40 all year, so I'm glad it's finally over with!

So many things happened and changed this year, and though it was overall an amazing year, it was very stressful too. I am glad we don't have so much on our plate this December (a year ago we were going through restoration of the basement and endless showings of the house). I am busy with my new job and just getting through each day with the kids and their individual needs and sports/homework. Nevermind the usual laundry, cooking and cleaning! I have yet to buy any Christmas presents, so I guess I'd better get on that! I hope you are enjoying the final craziness before Christmas is upon us!

AIR TIME!

Workin' girl

I haven't had much of interest to put on this here blog. My days are so full of mundane tasks, which really aren't blog worthy! We have been busy and just finished hosting a massive thanksgiving weekend with my family. Other than that, I'm busy driving the kids to and from their activities (sports and music). I wasn't really enjoying the "on call" work, and have been quite lonely, so I decided to apply for a permanent part time position. I got the job and start next week! It is at the "Pathways to Home" program of the seniors home. It is a wing where most of our 6-8 clients come from the hospital, but are still too weak to go home. It is our teams job to get them back into shape, and doing their daily activities again. Some clients have been in the hospital for months and have that condition where they've been babied (institutionalized) and don't even know how to put their own socks on anymore. It takes a bit of hard work, but generally our clients get strong enough to get back home. I'm excited to be part of the team and hope it isn't a challenge to juggle the work/family life.

Happy 17th, Amy! (our first baby)

Amy is the leader of our slew of children. The oldest of our nieces and nephews, the first baby we loved as "our own blood". I still remember meeting her for the first time, and now she is in GRADE 12, learning to drive and as tall as her mom. Yikes. I guess I am getting old after all.

Back to SCHOOL

Summer was great and needed, but long and exhausting. We are all glad to be back to some routine. Here's to grade 10, 7 and 4!

The last hoorah

We just had a week of super fun with the Davidson clan. Thought I should post some pics. We went to McGuire Lake to do some family photos with an "actual" photographer, but I brought mine along for some fun...can't wait to see the real ones, as Bri and I aren't in any of these ones either... We sure love our family and have had such great times with both sides. Now I'm back to work for three days and then it's the weekend before school starts!?! How did that summer just go so fast. It was one of my most busy yet, and definitely so great to have so much company to help us pass the time.

Summer

Summer is so long and lazy and fast and exciting all at the same time. I do love it, though it is a true marathon. I try to keep up with the house while running kids to and fro and keeping them quiet so Greg can work. It is the busiest and yet not! I do not miss the practicing piano, lunch making and homework AT ALL. I am having a hard time with the fact that we're in the middle of August already. I haven't accepted much work because it just becomes tricky to farm out the kids. We have been away just a little as our main holidays were done in Mexico! We did do a five night trip down to the coast and Bellingham. Greg and I also snuck away on our own for four nights to Edmonton for the Folk Fest which was absolutely incredible. Anna and her kids came up and stayed at our place for just over 3 weeks and we were good Salmon Arm tourists that packed in all the fun we could. Greg's siblings are coming up this weekend now and then we'll have a few days off before we're back at er'. We've been loving our new house with it's small garden, lovely air conditioning and space to spread out. I particularly love it's location to Little Mtn. and have hiked up it at least 30x just this summer. Most of those times were with Anna, which was great to do together. Well, I'm hoping to make jam today and need to catch up on housework, so I'd better run. I'll leave you with a few pictures!

The new HOME

We are in and settled in our new house.

We love it! I do feel like I'm on a kind of vacation and soon I will have to pack my bags and leave this place. But no! It's our home and I love it and feel incredibly blessed and thankful. Every day we have silly smiles on our faces as we enjoy the novelties of the perks it has, like in-ground sprinklers, double sinks, a walk-in pantry, a hot tub, a garage, a large basement and room for Riley, storage out the wazoo and space for everything. It really has everything we were looking for, and more. We had a very good moving day. We had hired movers, which arrived bright and early at 7:30am. We didn't even have the keys to our new place yet! I showed them around the house and they were relieved with how little there was (really?) and how packed and ready it was. I didn't feel super ready though, as I was still doing my hair in the bathroom as they were loading up the bedroom stuff! I had to strip the beds and wash/pack the final dishes we had eaten off for breakfast. It seemed odd that the day you are living in one house, you can leave it and completely move to another one! By 9:30am, the three mover guys had the entire truck full and ready to go to the new place. We got the keys at the same time and went to see our new home. We hadn't been in the place since we had our inspection back in January or so! It was so different without any furniture in it, and was just HUGE. I got to direct traffic and furniture, and had left my dad at home in charge of the old house, and busy vaccuming. A few other friends and family joined him to clean and tidy up the last things there. In no time at all, the movers had unloaded most of the things and went back for a quick pick up of random shed things. They came back within half an hour and drove their big truck down to the basement door and dropped everything off there. I think they were done the whole move by 12:30pm. It was incredible. Not only that, my family and a friend had cleaned what I had left (a bathroom, the fridge and the floors), so they were done at the same time! Every box was in it's room and all the furniture in place. Greg and his mom were setting up beds, and my SIL and friend were setting up my kitchen. My aunt and mom had come too, and were setting up curtains, closets and book shelves. My FIL had driven Shea home from piano and picked up Riley from school. It was so great to have all the help. The kids had never seen the place, so when they came home from school, it was quite exciting. The next few days were crazy with getting things set up, buying things like coat hooks, garbage cans and rugs to put in places. I drilled many holes in the walls for drywall screws and mounted a massive gorgeous mirror we got from our realtor. I got the kitchen/dining room prepped for painting (lots of filling holes, sanding, and washing). On Tuesday morning (5 days after we moved in), the painting began. Kristy and Pam are professionals, so they had the kitchen done in no time. On Wednesday, I spent the day getting Liam's room ready for painting. It needed more help, as the previous paint job had bled onto the ceiling and the baseboards. So I found ceiling paint and baseboard paint, and got those cleaned up. Then I washed and filled and sanded the holes, removed all the plug plates, etc. On Thursday the girls came again, and they had Liam's room done by lunchtime. It looks so good, and Liam was thrilled. We put pictures up on his walls, and he has a new night table and curtains, and his room looks great. What an improvement from having a pink and yellow room for 5 days! He didn't complain, but you could tell that he was sure relieved to see the lime green and grey! Now I've put the paint brushes away and have been doing yard work. The yard is great and doesn't have too much to do besides weeding. They had pulled many plants out, and in one spot I built a rock divide as the garden didn't really have an edge to it. There were patches in the yard where pots may have been? so I bought some dirt to spread out and planted some grass seed. I have lots of room for tomatoes, beans, carrots, and sunflowers. I may add some zucchini, lettuce and peonies yet this summer. I don't think I'll plant berries this year, but should be able to find a spot for them. I could add raised beds eventually, but for now I'm going to enjoy what I have. I have less grass to mow than at our last place, as we have a lot of rock area, driveway and woods. There is a perfect gravel area for our trampoline and a fire pit. I'm so thrilled I won't have to drag the hoses around the yard to water, as it's all set up automatically. The boys are enjoying the basketball hoop on the garage, the ping pong table we just bought at a garage sale, the whole basement of the garage to scooter and play hockey in, the trampoline, the trails nearby for biking, the hot tub and their rooms. Liam now has a much closer ride to school, and though Shea has to travel almost double what he did, he is doing well on his bike. We tend to join him on our bikes, on the way there, to keep him company. I still feel like I have a lot to do, with sorting the garage stuff and a few random boxes. But all in all, we feel quite at home and have all our main things unpacked and set up well. Getting the bedrooms, kitchen, bathrooms and bootroom in order is definitely the priority. I was supposed to be working the last two weeks, but it hasn't been as busy as they anticipated. It has been nice to have the time off to settle in. I will be going back next week for three days for sure. I need to put some before/after pictures on here for you, but as usual, they are all on my phone. I will do that soon. I still have some furniture to buy, and will eventually paint the rest of the house. I think I will leave that til winter and just fill some of the holes and do touch ups for now. Can't believe that after all that time, and SO much work, we're here! :)

2 weeks!

Life is moving along, and the BIG MOVE is two weeks away! The move is in full swing. I am spending hours daily trying to sort through things as I pack them, and making sure I'm not bringing useless crap to the new place. It is a lot of work! Thankfully I haven't had to work much and have had lots of time to do this well. We had an amazing time in Mexico. Our all inclusive resort in Nuevo Vallarta was all we could have hoped for. The food, activities, amenities, beach, weather, entertainment were all wonderful. We fully enjoyed all the resort had to offer us and didn't hardly leave. We did do one bus trip to Walmart! a snorkeling excursion, and a family excursion by bus to a neighboring surf town. We were busy and enjoyed two full weeks of sun, boogie boarding, eating and I enjoyed not thinking of meals, cleaning or showings! I gained 5 pounds, thanks to all the pina coladas! Our boys had a great time too and want to go back. We left with sweet tans, many good memories and pictures of the beautiful place. I hope we can return one day, and we're so glad we forked out the money and time to just get away after a really stressful past few months. The weather has been great since we got home, and it has been helpful so I could sort out the greenhouse, shed and empty the pond. I will most likely need to mow soon as the green grass is growing fast! I am getting a little sad as I walk about the yard and look at all the lovely things I planted and will have to leave. But I am so excited about a new yard and the potential there. There is a little wooded area at the back for a hammock and a fire pit. I'll have to start a new veggie garden and my berries, but I have a good source for plants so it shouldn't be a problem! I will have to give you a tour of the new place once we are moved in. The boys haven't even seen it yet. The only thing we have to do to the place is paint. The boys rooms have some pink and mauve, so we will do it shortly. The main living space is very 80's with burgundy, taupe and greens. (see what I mean?!) I hope to have time to paint that away immediately which will help to make it look so much brighter and new. I bought a refinished china cabinet on kijiji and it is so perfect for the bump out spot in the dining area. I will appreciate the extra cupboard space as the new kitchen isn't very big. I have many big ideas and plans for the house and hope that it will really meet our expectations as this move has been SO much work! I have no doubts that it will, and am hoping it will be the perfect house not only for us, but for all those that we host. The tween/teen stage with the boys has been hard. It seems like there is a challenge with every stage, right?! It doesn't help that we are so busy with our selling/moving, but they don't seem to give us a break!! We also have so much homework going on, that needs moms attention. We haven't put up the trampoline, so with that, a basketball hoop, a lower empty garage for skateboards, a wooded area, hot tub and cul de sac...I'm hoping they will be fully entertained! We know the neighbor has three older girls, but there are lots of other kids nearby we hope they meet. All my photos are on my phone these days, so I apologize for the lack of photos. You will have to check them out on facebook! I may not get time to write on here til we are at the new house, which at this point, even with this house mostly packed, seems like a dream. It is hard to imagine being in another house in the same town. Can't wait! See you on the other side!

SOLD!

Three months later, and we are done! House is sold. Moving out in April. CA-ray-ZEE!

Suzanna

I have the cutest new niece! It actually felt bittersweet going down to meet her, as she may be the last for our family. My siblings are done having children, and I'm pretty sure three each is enough for the Davidson clan. So ya...this is the baby. She is darling and we will enjoy loving her forever. So sad that babies grow so fast.

Heading South!

This house business is taking WAY too long! We have had over 24 showings and an open house. I have cleaned endlessly and am SO sick of it. A few weeks ago we finally got our first two offers. We have accepted one, though they had to sell their house. Within three days, they sold theirs yet it took a few weeks to get all subjects removed, but now they can remove their subjects on our place. Phew. I just want it all official so I can start packing! And speaking of packing, we are going to MEXICO for spring break! We have a countdown going on and are already packing our suitcases and buying extra bathing suits. The kids haven't really been far, and not on a plane, so they are so excited!! We will be sure to take lots of pictures to show you later. I was hoping to have a beach body. I have lost 12 lbs since Christmas just by cutting carbs and sugar, but the last few pounds aren't budging! I have been exercising too, but haven't figured out how to stop eating as much!! Wish me luck!