Daisy!

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6921534.stm

Not sure whether this is the exact article I meant to post the other day....but its along the same lines...

I'm not racist but I do have strong feelings about how you should act if you move to another country...I may joke about Canadians putting cheese on everything but for the most part I feel its important to 'live like Canadians' and be proud of Canada sa our new home....we are lucky to live here.....I don't want to turn Canada into a little England....

I guess I just found - living in a highly Asian-populated city in England, that many people moving to Britain refuse to become 'British'...they instead wish to turn England into a financially better version of their homeland...and the government is so scared of offending people that they agree with anything....and now there is very little Great about Great Britain...you can't even fly the flag without risking offending people.

So I don't think people need to act 'white' to feel British but I do really think people should try to be a little more 'British' if they have chosen to live there.....

If I moved to Quebec I would learn to speak French....but people who move to Britain often refuse to learn to speak English so you have entire cities where all the signs are written in Urdu......

Ok...getting off my soapbox! Its great to see you Daisy! How are you enjoying Summer? I miss our homeschooling Summer from last year......it seemed to go on forever....school summers are so short.....

Last nights sunset...

First page in months.....

Here is the scrapbook page I did on Sunday.....my first page ina long time! Its ok. I showed it to Lloyd and he said 'Wow I love the bling!!' I had to laugh...he knows the term bling from when I was in the Iron Chef Scrapbooking contest ;)

I took the picture in bad light and when the glue was still wet.....all that icky white glue can't be seen any more ;)

The end results........

Abigails cookie couldn't even be lifted off the table to be photographed lol.....but they had so much fun :)

Sugar cookie decorating......

I knocked up a batch of sugar cookies this afternoon for the children to decorate.....Susie has a friend sleeping over tonight and it kept them quiet for an hour this evening :)

Sam LOVES decorating cookies...he takes the whole activity VERY seriously..... ;)

Hero....

Charlie takes a break from being the chickens hero........

After the rain.......

Jasper makes some friends........

Stormy skies.....

A few pictures of the rainy skies over the last couple of days....the last two pictures are from this afternoon....

Hahaha! Guard pig.....

I just looked out of the kitchen window and there was Mr Fox......in his gorgeous red coat......skipping across the grass away from the chickens! Our free range chickens! He looked up at me through the window!! So I run to the back door and I see Charlie and the chickens racing after the fox!!!

Charlie is chasing the fox away......and the chickens are running beside Charlie as if to say 'hey Mr Fox....you met our bodyguard huh??????'

So funny! Good for Charlie - she loves her chickens!

It was a very beautiful Fox though!

Wonderful news!

Lloyd phoned with some GREAT news this morning...the other week we had the appraiser come round to value the property....he didn't ask any questions or have a good look round the property at all....and the value he came back with was shockingly low...we panicked! Could we really be THAT wrong about the value???? So we sent them some similar properties and also sent them a list of things we have done to the house (ie new well, new furnace, new air conditioning, new gas fireplace, new bedroom.....and a few other things...

They got back to us today to apologise - the apprasier was wrong about a LOT of things - including the fact that he said we had 5 acres! noot the 16+ acres we really have.....so basically they will be getting back to us on Friday with a new and improved appraisal :) we knew we couldn't be that wrong about the value of this place...it still needs a lot of work (new kitchen, new bathrooms...barn needs to be pulled down etc) but for the location, size of land and house we knew it had to be worth more than the amount that stupid guy said.......he was here about 10 minutes and didn't ask anything about the house at all! Duh! He was more interested in Jasper the kitten!

Our Tuesday...

WE got up early this morning and I drove the boys into town to the bus station....they have headed to West Ed Mall for the day to use up some free passes they had...Laurie won them at Christmas and they run out TOMORROW!!! Then we ran to Sobeys, grabbed a few things, ran to carmels to pick up some books and then headed home...tidied round a bit and then at lunchtime Susies friend arrived...her Mom and brother stayed for a while - met Charlie and the chickens......then we all came in for lunch.

Since then the children have all been playing...they are dressed up in ball gowns right now and wearing the tiaras that they just created from a craft kit I bought the other day....

I have been reading my Homeschooling Horizons magazine that arrived in the mail....

It rained this morning for a little bit....more in town than here at home...but its nice and cool because of it. Tomorrow will be hot again and we are heading to the lake...

Lloyd is picking up the boys from WEM after work..they phoned to say they had arrived there fine and were off to Galaxyland for some fun!

Not much planned for this evening......hanging out outside if it stays dry....relaxing inside if its rainy....the kids can bake some cookies and decorate them I guess......

PUSH!!!!!!!!

The children TRYING to push one of the hay bales on Marys land......not as easy as it looked hehehehehehe!

Country girls........

This afternoon we walked up onto our neighbours land to take some pictures by her haybales......I think this will become an annual tradition.....we did the same last year....

Monday half over.......

I had a Doctors appt this morning to get new prescriptions....I took a book hoping to have a quiet hour in the waiting room...showed up early even and wouldn't you know it...they showed me straight in...the Doc was in in seconds and I was out within 5 minutes....

Had to wait AGES in the Pharmacy because I needed so many different tablets etc but eventually we escaped and Susie and I had lunch in Tims.....

We stopped off in Canadian Tire for school supplies (Susan your organization has pushed me into being prepared early too!) and a few other things......then ran to Walmart hoping to get a parasol for the lake..no luck at either store......

Home again.....much earlier than planned.....Laurie has a friend here and the boys are all playing baseball outside.....Susie is playing Bowls with Sam...Abigail is playing with her calculator...she desperately wanted one so I grabbed a $3 solar powered one from Walmart and she is thrilled....she's kind of in love with math!

Chris wants to go over to his friends house so I will drop him there in about 30 minutes.....

Tomorrow the boys are off to WEM for the day on the bus......together!! they have free passes to use up by Wednesday......Susies friend arrives tomorrow and is sleeping over....tomorrow we will pop to the splashpark in the afternoon and then Wednesday we will go to the lake for a few hours....I'd like to go while the weather is cooler as it is supposed to heat up again by Thursday....

Christie said she might pop over tomorrow which will be fab as I haven't seen her in like FOREVER!!!!! And I have to call Samantha back and see if she wants to meet us at the lake too......

I feel quite stressed about plans etc and I'm nto sure why......but it feels like we are crazy busy when really I don't think we are.....

I got my form back from Family Services.....so I passed the check re. being allowed to work with children......I still havent been to the police station to get my criminal record check done though.......I should do that this week....I still have not heard from my boss...or my assistant.......I still have panic moments when I think I shouldn't do the job when things are this disorganized.....but I really do want to do the job.....and Samantha says I only ahve to give 3 days notice if I hate it.....so I could quit on Thursday and not have to go back again!

So we shall see......

I should go and take Chris to his friends house.....then I think I may go for a walk up by the hay bales with the kids.....take some pictures.....

I miss Val.....I know I don't normally see her that often - once a week maybe but I am used to get emails from her, reading her blog and getting comments on my blog from her.......I miss her whle she's away on vacation....

Oh and Lloyds best friend booked his tickets...he arrives for ten days or so on September 4th.....he's very excited.....I warned him that life in a house with 5 kids can be crazy ;)

Beautiful!

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/6913271.stm

Can you imagine walking through these fields? How wonderful that would be!

Gggrrrrrr

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/6920877.stm


I have very strong thoughts on this.....and on the state of Britain today.....and the multi-cultural nation that it is.....

Yet another pathetic Prime Minister.....

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/6920877.stm

The World owes the US a debt for its act on terrorism????? Is that a JOKE????? OMG!!! What is he talking about???? What a complete and utter suck-up!

When is the UK finally going to stand up for itself and speak the truth???? When will the UK get a PM like Hugh Grant in Love Actually????????

boring...

Evenings without Lloyd are so boring......I've scrapbooked...watched a little Forest Gump with Chris.......watched a little weather network.....checked whats up at LP.....taken photographs of clouds and sunsets and scrapbook pages.....read a little....

And its been boring.....Silly really but I just love spendning time with him - its much more fun when he's around....

Memory games...........

On Friday I set the children a memory challenge....I covered a tray with 30 small items and covered it.....I uncovered it for about a minute and let them see everything......then I recovered the tray and they ahd to list all the things they had seen.......

Susie and Abigail worked together and got 13....Chris got 13...and Laurie won with 17.......its a harder game than it seems ;)

Heathers Hawaii......

Everyone should take a trip over to Heathers blog and see her pictures of her recebnt trip to Hawaii......really makes me want to go there......

It looks as though you had a dream vacation there Heather.....and child free too!!! I am sooooo jealous! ;)

www.myeclecticblog.blogspot.com

Oliver......

Check out the 'Post Secret' posts this week (link to right)......there is one about a Mom who smokes weed and scrapbooks at night.........made me laugh out loud!!!!!

Sadly thats not my secret...its my ambition hehehehehehe!

One day..........sigh!

Quiet evening ahead....

Lloyd is about to head into town with Laurence to the movies......they are off to see the Transformers movie at long last......

Chris has cycled to the local garage with his friend who works there....then he phoned to say could I go pick him up - uh.....NO! You got yourself there you can cycle back! lol! Cruel Mother that I am ;)

Susie is so tired from being awake much of the night too....Abigail is OBSESSED with her 'learn to read' books...she is obsessively reading a Nemo storybook...again and again and again......which is wonderful except when you have just woken up and she comes running in wanting help!

Sam and Susie are now at the table playing Connect Four and I have distracted Abigail by getting her to drawer pictures of Nemo and write things like 'Just Keep Swimming' at the top......

My plans for this evening? Read.......scrapbook....write some letters maybe.....

What are you all up to? How do you spend your Sundays? Whats for dinner? I'm doing a spinach pizza from Costco with salad.....never tried it before so I hope its good!

At the playground.....

The children had fun at the playground for a while but the heat was just awful.......as you can see in the bottom picture though...Abby didn't want tleave...I think she will be thrilled to spend the day there this week :)

Paddling fun....

Paddling in Miquelon Lake today......it was soooo warm and sooo tempting and we can't wait to go back to swim!

Miquelon Lake...

Having heard great things about Miquelon from Val...and then reading Cori's reviews on LP...we finally ventured down to Miquelon Lake.....

Miquelon Lake Provincial Park is located just SE of us really....not far at all but we had never been...mainly because the entire park was closed last year for renovations....

We had heard that since it reopened in June it was wonderful with clean sand and clean warm waters........I plan to go there this week with the children so I wanted to know where it was...what the parking was like etc and if it was suitable for me to take all 5 kids and maybe a friend or two for the day.....

Well its LOVELY! The sand is so clean and soft (and HOT!) and the water was warm and clear and just soooo inviting! We didn't stay long because the heat was just awful and we hadn't planned to swim or anything - just have a drive to see what was there....but we paddled and the children played at the playground.....and I sooooo wanted to swim! So we will be back there at some point this week to swim and sunbathe and relax for the day :)

I think its going to be a place that we go a LOT...so close by...so convenient and so much fun for my older three as they outgrow the splashpark in the next year or so......

Susie and I walked into the water and she was grinning and saying how it even smells like the beaches back home - and that there were even seagulls flying about and she wondered if they were after her chips! (One stole a fry from her when she was little on the beach in England)