May 1st started with rain and cranky children. Ok cranky Mommy too… We did manage to jump into our schoolwork with both feet – after all Farmer Boy had to tell us all about how he spends a Saturday night. Then draw some pictures from the trip and of course do a little math.

Boys at work

What was glaringly absent was the beginning of our move to our new rental. We had a bit of a delay on that one in the form of a lack of communication from the potential new landlord. We knew he was getting down to the line on his repairs and that he was most likely rushing around trying to get them done but with no word it was time to contact our second choice (which was equally nice and willing to wait for the 1st to pass to hear from us as they had not had any other concrete and respectable interest). As usual life is always the hard way round for this family, at least lately! 

We did finally hear from #1 late Tuesday night… Ken was right, he had been rushing around trying to get everything done so we COULD move in. Sadly he could not, but is willing to refund our deposit AND if we cannot get into a place when it IS finally done it is still ours. He could not give us a move in date though so basically that is that. 

The kids are very frustrated… and I can’t really blame them! With the rain as well it is hard to keep them occupied. We are all done with tv… missing our things and in need of the ability to reorganize our life and our priorities to make us all happier. Ken works so hard to try and make our life better, I just want it to all work out so we can have more of his time and energy directed at happier things. 

Echo and Duke

I have gotten some crafty items in the mail recently from eBay… I know have ribbon AND clips to continue with my bow making

Wednesday was another wet day. Math focused for schooling… and of course frustrated children for the win. Trinity started working on her birthday present – a jewelry box. 

Sticking on the pretties... she did some by the instructions and others... winged it

Pretty much we held down the fort and waited for the email… it took a bit as #2 was stuck out of the city longer than they thought but they were able to confirm that we could have their rental. We just need to wait on them to return to the city. So that was a HUGE load off the shoulders mid afternoon. Of course you depend on nothing but the keys in your hand. 

I found my glue gun after a little searching and with the help of some of my new ribbon and the new alligator clips off eBay was able to finish some more bows. I need to take some time soon and lay out everything I have made and see how much I have all together. 

I love these, they are all on alligator clips

In purple

Baby's First Christmas

Some more purple

I have talked a couple friends who are already working on their contributions for our craft table! Pretty exciting!

And that leads us into Thursday… can’t the week just end already?? And by end I mean end with us comfortably (or even uncomfortably) ensconced in our new rental. The kids are done done DONE and ready to get into their own space again. We did sneak out while Echo was sleeping and Ken working away at his computer and went to the store to get slurpees. A bit of a chilly walk but the signs of spring are here and there.

My boys

Such a girly girl

The kitty we met on our walk

We did continue with Farmer Boy. This chapter we learned about how different Sunday could be. Everything from the hoop skirts (which Gavin drew for our book) to sitting silently in church and then coming home and doing the same. Boy were they glad we don’t have to sit still ALL DAY on Sundays NOW. I don’t think they fully understand why Almanzo had to. I think we are all looking forward to Sunday when we plan on getting back into Sunday School. Much easier now that we have a working van of our own. 

Random Echo picture.. I had an extra

One step closer to regular life. The next step is to refocus the schooling. I look forward to having all my supplies at hand again. We are still planning to make paper in the summer and of course there are a few museums etc I would like to take the kids to! Thank goodness we can plow through summer and get back to where I had hoped to be when I started this academic year. 

It is amazing how life goes up and down and around the corner. I can honestly say we have had many more adventures than I ever though we would. Not sure if that is really a GOOD thing… I wish I could remember who wished us an interesting life together at our wedding… though they may be glad I can’t remember as I am not 100% sure I would thank them! 

A touch of spring... just because

Anyway, in celebration of getting one step closer to normal Reinsch-Johnson life (which everyone tells me is nowhere NEAR normal for the rest of the world!) I do believe I will craft. After all I have some featureless owls to do, bows to discover and of course that WIP that is skulking around that I have not touched in a month (OOPS!). 

Baby girl

Oh, another Comic-con find… a lovely leather book. This was hand done and marked down to 20.00. I am not sure what all I will put in there but it is absolutely LOVELY! They are done by a husband and wife duo called PHASHA. I love mine, though I wish there would have been one this size with a fairy on it!!

So lovely!

The weather is keeping my kids focused firmly OUTSIDE! Thursday (I know, my bad… too lazy to blog these past two days!) it warmed right up to the point where I was hacking away at the compacted snow on our sidewalk with just my boots and long sleeved shirt on! This is a rather bad thing for our front walk as our eaves leak like a sieve and pour cold water right onto our front walkway which then ices up horribly! This was a great indication that it is time to drag out the rubberboots. I had to hunt a little as (of course) I could not remember where I had put the bag of them but we were successful. After lining all the pairs I did have up it was very clear that we had a pair that FIT each foot (except Echo) BUT on further inspection Emanuel’s pair simply was not in good enough repair for a 3rd boy to wear them (Cracks down to the lining certainly defeat the purpose). So we will be heading out to ValueVillage and other consignment stores to see if we can find a budget pair for my boy with the ever growing feet! Oh and Echo too… though I am not overly optimistic on finding a pair THAT SMALL. 

Too bad the spiffy shark pair need replacing

But... we still have snow!

I managed to get out to Dollarama that night… Karyn had taken her kitty to the vet to have him checked out (a perilous activity as Dare is NOT people friendly beyond his beloved Karyn) earlier this week and received the diagnosis of DIABETES! So we had to go out for some poutine to commiserate. (did you know that to get insulin for a cat you have to go to a regular pharmacy??) Luckily enough the Dollarama is right in front of the New York Fries so two birds with one stone (well three really as the pharmacy Karyn uses is also in this mall). Anyway, I picked up a GREEN binder and some dividers for our Ireland/St. Patrick’s Day work, some socks for owls (Easter themed of course) and some other random items. I hope to splurge on some more socks later in the month but for now two pairs is enough. 

Easter owls

I have actually been working on a lovely stack of bows this week. I finished my special post surgery bow for Echo made out of ribbon I saved from a wand of Trinity’s that broke. Since I was already working on that one I figured I might as well do a bunch more to make dragging out the glue gun worthwhile. That got me going to the point where I had to take TWO nights to finish most of them. I also have to start hunting for a good deal on alligator clips as I am about out of those. I tried some new styles, glued my tiny bows on slightly differently on some of the clips and played around with colours. If nothing else I have some surplus to use for gifts! 

Not the best photo but what looks whitish is actually pink on these. The post surgery one is on the right.

Echo has finally cut THREE of her 4 upper teeth…her left front, incisor and right incisor (all on Friday)… They are just BARELY cut through. Hopefully this will cut down on her diaper rashes! She is rarely crawling now and all out walking everywhere. It is a little bittersweet… she really isn’t a “baby” anymore, though she IS my baby. Seeing her grow up is a joy, but the reminder that she is my last baby is there. Of course, she IS tiny so that makes it easier… or so I tell myself!

Getting to be such a big girl!

We were alerted to a movie to watch on Netflix – The Secret of Kells. Add popcorn with butter on it to that and I had 4 VERY quiet kids! Of course we had to incorporate some sort of activity afterwards so I used a sheet my sister in law gave me that has a box for a picture and then lines for some writing so that they could write about and draw their favourite portion of the movie. Reading week is to be soon after St. Patrick’s Day I think which will require many of these sheets! And a nice large stack of books for the whole family to enjoy! 

Movie time

I had Kathy come over last night for a visit. We did a run to Macs for snacks (noms), had dinner, visited and cleaned my pantry and tupperware cupboard. I know, riveting! BUT we had fun doing it and now I can actually get anything I need out of that darn pantry without fuss! It wasn’t a lengthy visit but it was a great way to end my week. Good company AND I accomplished something I really needed to sit down and do! 

We took some time to sort out a portion of my bedroom (don’t ask, it has NEVER been completely the way I wanted it!) and I found MORE ribbon! A piece from Trinity’s birthday cake – either her 1st or 2nd, and a piece I used (way back when) as a belt when Trinity was itty bitty. I am thinking they will have to become hair things… though I do believe I was saving one for scrapbooking. I am so far behind on my paper crafting! However, my table full of ribbons and half finished bows is beckoning much louder than my stacks of papers… and once I get those done (and run out of clips to attach them to) well we shall see. 

The top one is the one off of the cake

Today we had a visit from one set of grandparents. With Gypsy in tow of course. This was our first time seeing Mike since he got back from Jamaica so he had some stories to share before he had to run off to an appointment and leave us with Grandma and Gypsy to visit with. 

Going for a walk in the sun... which turned into a walk to the convenience store where they convince Grandma to buy them EACH a slurpee!

Mom also brought all the costumes she made since the last batch! THAT will be a separate entry as there are NUMEROUS costumes… so tomorrow I will be trying them on the kids (well one a piece) and taking pictures as well. I want to take them in on a weekday as Sunday School is always a little rushed and with daylight savings this weekend as well… well time goes by so quickly on a weekend! 

I figure it is time to give a little sneak peek at my WIP… the details are starting to be much more clear now – as is ANY missed or half done stitches (and there have been, I think 2 found so far). Every day I try to spend a minimum of 30 min on this piece and it is starting to pay off. I have high hopes that I will see the end of this one BEFORE the middle of the year… now if anything else will progress while I do – well you know me, MANY projects makes Lisa a happy girl. 

Yup, that is a mandolin!

Other than that I have a sick baby and a sick Emanuel on my hands… so we are not exactly restful here BUT we still have a week and a half until the big day for our baby girl which is plenty of time to get over this! Hopefully over the next week I can get a lot more accomplished. Life just seems to be rushing its way to the 21st with a vengeance! 

Poor sick baby

Today we watched some videos with Irish dancing. I definitely have to share them both. Trinity also coloured an Irish Dancer today. You can find her on Education.com right HERE. 

We finished assembling some simple games – the Currclick Irish themed matching game (seriously check out their site and search St. Patrick’s Day… this is the freebie, link on right side of my blog), and then another from Education.com – a math activity – Pots of Gold. Not overly difficult addition and subtraction but a good revision and a chance for the boys to teach their brother.

Filling the pots with gold

We did our “smelly shamrock” craft today… pretty simple – you need either to print out the shamrocks on green paper or do what we did and have a template (great practice with cutting shapes), some green jell-o (I used jell-o brand, I wonder if the no name brand would smell as good… white glue and paint brushes. You can find the instructions HERE. We will have to see how smelly they are tomorrow, but we have plenty of jell-o powder to make more. 

Applying the glue

We coloured some simple Celtic knots, Our favourite UK site has some great St. Patrick’s Day printables. You can find some HERE.

With Emanuel and Trinity's knots

It was library today so Karyn, myself and Trinity and Emanuel made the trip to the downtown branch. Karyn alerted me to the fact that there is a substantial teen rated manga section in the upper levels… so I now have some reading to do! I still want to PURCHASE the back Gin Tama volumes but for now I can catch up and enjoy them, temporarily. AND the first 3 of Mushi-shi… YAY. 

Craft time

Books!!

We have a couple crafts to get working on over the next few days… I just need to find the time to make one of them myself first. I am hoping that we can just keep on having bits of fun through out the next two weeks and still find progression occurring… I have a few more books from the library to read tomorrow and of course more videos to watch. And that WIP to come back to… I promise more pictures are to come! 

A moment of quiet play before Baby Sister of Doom attacked!