A Good Few Days!

We had quite an exciting week before Emry went back to school!  The kids and I managed to go swimming everyday last week, and was it ever the week to go, it was so hot everyday!  We also were able to have our road into "our" yard made, and the rest of the farm yard smoothed out!  Gravel was also brought in for our road!  Jared was busy ripping out caraghana's in Myrna's backyard to open it up a bit.  Although it is not all beautifully landscaped quite yet, her backyard looks so much better, it is so nice to be able to look out her kitchen window and see something besides caraghana's, now you can see the little play house and the two big poplar trees with the hammock swinging between them!  On Saturday Dave was out and together he and Jared started on the electric fence between the barley and grass they seeded here on the home quarter!  Neither of them felt like finishing it up that evening, they only have gates left to do, and I hear they are the annoying part of fencing!  So Dave gave Jared a hand with our house!  Dave cut all the drip caps to fit around all the windows while Jared tacked them up!  It worked so smoothly!

The west side of our house!

The south side of our house!

Our beautiful road!

The front of our house, facing east!

The north side of our house with some of the siding up!

Dave and Jared

Our old boy, Martin.  He will be eleven this next March!

Calum got his hair cut Saturday evening, and for some reason he did not want to.  He kept saying it hurt me!  As soon as Mynra cut a little bit and he realized it did not hurt he was fine!

To continue on with the excitement of the week, Myrna invited Dave and Char and the kids out for Sunday dinner.  Rachel was already here with her two little guys, only Lalainia and Jason couldn't be here!  It was nice to be together, and as usual the kids all had a great time playing together!  Sunday afternoon for the adults was a lot less exciting, it seemed to be a sleepy Sunday afternoon!  And to end the evening off, Myrna's home teachers came over and Calum and Liam turned into wild animals!  They were running around chasing each other and making very loud noises!  Liam was carrying Calum's big Whinnie the Pooh bear around and Calum was running around in only his diaper, so I put Pooh's little red shirt on Calum.  He really looked so cute and the boys had a good laugh over it!

A very cute and chubby Jonas asleep on Myrna!

This little man seems to sleep much better when he is propped up, much like his older cousins, Calum and Armin!

Dave having a Sunday afternoon nap!

Armin is totally enthralled with little Jonas!

Calum as Whinnie the Pooh!

Monday the kids and I made rice krispie squares for Emry's lunch and bread, although my bread didn't turn out that great we did enjoy a warm and fresh loaf for supper with our Whelsh Rarebit!

Tuesday, finally a little peace!  Emry returned to school after a fun filled summer, her hair is a little green from all the swimming we did!  Calum is back to his normal quieter self without his sister here to pester him, although now I don't have anyone to keep a close eye on Armin when I have to run out of the room for a quick second!  Armin will once again have to be attatched to my hip!

First day of Grade Two!

Last week was also quite the week for head injuries for our three precious little ones!  Well, mostly Thursday to be exact!  It started out just before we left to go Visiting Teaching!  I had left Armin on the floor in the living room with Emry while I went into the laundry room to get our swimming suits out of the dryer, all of a sudden I heard a few loud crashes, and then screaming both from Emry and Armin.  He had crawled to the top of the stairs and before Emry was aware of where he was we propelled himself down, all the way to the bottom!  We did have a gate there, but it was starting to pull out of the wall, so Myrna decided to take it down and get a new one!  She did get a new one the day before this happened, however she hadn't quite made it home yet from staying with Rachel!  I checked him over really well, and I couldn't see any apparent injuries.  The next thing happened at the hospital, of all places!  I had to get my blood tested so all three kids and I waddled into the little lab room, I was holding Armin and told Emry and Calum to sit on the floor by the door, I sat with Armin in the chair where they take the blood.  The chair has a special arm that comes down in front of you so you can rest your arm on it while they are poking at your veins!  I always seem to have either Calum or Armin on my lap and it has always worked just fine, until this past Thursday!  Calum wanted to put the arm down and before I could see what he was trying to do he slammed it down right on top of Armin's head.  The under side of this particular arm is all hard plastic.  It left a red mark.  After I got Armin settled I gave him to Emry to hold while I took care of Calum, so he couldn't get into anymore trouble.  Well, Emry sat on the same chair with Armin while I was holding Calum and the lab technician was getting everything ready to take my blood!  I had put Calum down when the tech gave me back my health care card to I could put it back in my wallet, well before I could even blink an eye Calum again wanted to put that arm down, this time it crashed on Emry, hitting her right above her left eye, there is now a greenish bruise just above her eyebrow!  The next head injury happened at the swimming pool!  When we are done swimming I always put Calum and Armin in the shower to warm up while I get dried off, Armin just lays on his tummy and slides around.  Calum had gotten out of the shower and when he went to get back in he slipped and hit the back of his head on the ledge of the shower, causing him to bump into Armin which made him bump the front of his head on the same ledge.  Armin now has a greenish bruise in between his eyes at the top of his nose, and a purplish bruise on his cheek from falling down the stairs earlier that same day!  Sunday night when I was putting Emry to bed she took Armin from me to give him a hug, but when she lifted him up over her head to give him a little ride she forgot how close she was to the top of her bed and banged his head into the sharp edge of her headboard.  He also has a purplish bruise across his forehead.  She felt terrible, I think she cried as hard as he did!  However, we made it through the week, and despite all the head trauma's we had a good last week before Emry went back to school!  I am looking forward to having her back at school to learn and grow some more, the house it a little quieter, did I say a little...well I take that back, at this very moment Calum is running around our room with a headband on his head, holding a pen and using it as a sword all while pulling all of Jared's ties down and attempting to walk around in daddy's big hiking boots!  School cannot come soon enough for him I am afraid!

The bruise on his cheek and the top of his nose are starting to go away, the one across his forehead is still quite purple!

Still the happiest boy on the planet!  He makes the same kind of gagging noise Calum made at that age, we think it is his way of laughing!

Sleep Over Fun

Lily is four years old and absolutely loves her older cousin Emry!  The other day we went and picked Lily up because Gilbert was going to the city with Grandma Debbie, Maryssa and his idol and older cousin, Owen!  Lily was feeling a little left out so Arren called me to see if I would mind taking Lily swimming when we go!  Of course I didn't mind, Emry and her always have so much fun!  After swimming I asked Emry if she would want Lily to spend the night, she decided she did and as soon as we told Lily, she was beside herself with excitement!  We hadn't thought of the idea until after swimming so she didn't have anything packed for a sleep over, Emry very excitedly loaned Lily a pair of jammies, and even said she could use her toothbrush!  I am not sure if either of them even brushed their teeth, so I think we are safe to say no germs were shared!  The girls played with dolls, and barbies, and even got Calum in on the fun of playing with the barbies, oh and dressing up too!  They all came out of Emry's room in princess outfits and crowns!  Calum was even bowing and calling Lily, "Her Majesty!"  It was a good time, with lots of giggles!  When Jared came home from work Emry told him to guess who was sleeping over.  Before he could utter an answer Lily jumped out and yelled, "ME!"  She was poking Jared and giggling at supper, Jared said it will be scary to see what the two girls will be like at 12 and 15!  I don't really even want to think about that yet, but I am excited that they will probably still be having sleep overs and still giggling like little girls, I hope they always stay best of friends!

Swimming Lessons Round Two!

Last week Emry and Calum both had swimming lessons.  Emry redid her level 4 and Calum did his first level of preschool, Starfish!  They both did very well and they both passed!  Emry was all alone in her class which I think really helped her stay focused, her dives really improved from her first round this summer, as did her front crawl, back crawl, glides and bobs!  She was able to bob under the water and touch the bottom of the deep end by blowing out all her air!  She was so proud of herself and so was I!

In Calum's class it was him, Liam and Bowen!  They too had a blast and by Wednesday Bowen was going under the water without anyone forcing him too!  I didn't get in to see Ashton's lessons but he did very well too and also passed!  Despite the chaos of the week they all did very well with their lessons.  I love our little pool and since it has been redone it is 100 times better!

For some reason Calum had to wear a pair of Emry's sunglasses and would not take them off during his lesson!

Bowen with his head under the water!

Calum would swim through this hoop under the water all by himself, there was always a lifeguard on the other side to get him!

Calum jumped off the lifeguard chair, at one point it was the only thing to make him stop whining!

He ended up doing a belly flop and didn't want to do it again!

Poor little Liam was only able to swim Monday and Tuesday, by Wednesday his eye was so swollen, red and goopy!  Luckily I had a doctor's appointment Wednesday afternoon so I took him with me to see what the problem might be with his eye!  The verdict....PINK EYE!  I also had it, so together we were given drops and ointment!  Poor little guy, it was like we were torturing him when we put the ointment in his eye!  We had quite the system though and by the time he went home on Saturday it wasn't nearly as traumatic!  One of us would kneel overtop of him and hold his arms down and pull down the bottom part of his eye lid, while the other one would hold his head between our knees and hold open his upper eye lid, and squeeze the ointment on the inside of his bottom lid!  Thankfully I had the eye drops and it was so much easier, I could even do it myself!  As a precaution I also picked up a bottle of Polysporin Eye drops, they are used to prevent the spread of the bacteria from pink eye, so Wednesday night Lalainia and I lined up all the other five kids and put two drops in each of their eyes!  It was also quite the ordeal, Ashton did great, Emry not too bad, Calum wasn't pleased, Armin didn't know any differently, and Bowen freaked out!  But the result, no one else got pink eye so what we did must have worked!  It was funny when I was at the doctor with Liam I asked if swimming lessons were out, of course I knew the answer but I thought I had better check, Dr. Wade said he cannot be around any kids, oops!  That was merely impossible since his parents were in Calgary at the Children's Hospital with a very sick little Jonas!  We knew it wouldn't be that big of a deal if all the kids did get it, pink eye isn't a life threatening disease!  Happy to say we made it through the week all of us in one piece!

Emry and Bowen played lego all week, together they built some pretty neat things!

Thursday night the kids had a movie night in Grandma's sitting room, they watched "Horton Hears a Who" and had popcorn, all except Emry and Ashton, neither of them like popcorn so Emry had plain chips and Ashton had a chocolate covered granola bar!  Friday afternoon Lalainia and I took 4 of the 6 kids into the pool, they had a great time, and Bowen was a mad man diving under the water looking for diving sticks!  Ashton, Emry and Calum spent most of the time jumping off the diving board!

Friday night everyone except Jason was home and we had a BBQ.  Jonas was discharged from the hospital so Jared and Rachel came to the farm too!  It was so good to see little Jonas looking so much better, he was laying on the floor wide awake kicking his legs and flapping his arms up and down, a huge improvement from the Saturday before.  It truly was a good week, I know at times I would get frustrated with the noise level but the kids were really all very good, just typical kids without a volume control!  I enjoyed helping as best I could and I am so happy all has turned out well!  We have noticed a pattern within the Puzey family whenever we all try to get together through the summer, someone seems to get sick, and not just a little sick, hospital worthy sick!  When the entire family went to Radium a few years ago Emry got really sick.  We took her to Vulcan and an X-ray showed some kind of air bubbles throughout her tummy, so they sent us up to the Children's hospital.  It started with her throwing up as soon as anything touched her tummy.  In Calgary they didn't see anything serious with her tummy but she was extremely dehydrated so they gave her four bags of intravenous fluids and let us go home.  We decided to still go out to Radium and just kept her full of liquid, by the end of the week she was a lot better but at least five pounds lighter.  Next summer we hope things are different and we will again try to do swimming lessons with all the kids, because it was a lot of fun and the kids really seemed to enjoy spending a whole week with each other!  I loved being able to spend the week with Lalainia, I really do admire her and just being around her so much was a ton of fun, next year I look forward to spending it with Rachel too!

Ashton made some of the kids into robots by taping a lego antennae to their shoulder and then using his remote control, also made from lego, he would command them to do something, and they had to repeat back the command in a robot voice!  Dave wondered why with all a robot can do they still talk with a mono tone voice without any inflection to it!  It  really is something to wonder about!

Despite the stress and chaos, I was able to lose 1 pound!  I am pretty shocked, I actually didn't get any exercising in, but maybe keeping track of 6 kids under the age of seven is exercise in itself!  I vow to do better this week, but I am happy with the progress so far, at least it is moving in the right direction!