Bread

Her hands, weathered from years of hard work.  His hands, so young, learning from hers.

Little brother joins in, but soon asks for his hands to be clean again.  Big brother continues to knead beside his Nana.

Big sister joins in, but soon abandons the work... she'd rather play and draw. 

His young hands continue to knead the bread. 

Making bread memories. 

Visit with Nana & Papa

After learning that Dad had been diagnosed with esophageal cancer, we tried to figure out the best time to go home to visit so the kids could spend quality time with Papa. As everything seemed to be moving fairly quickly with respect to procedures, we decided that a late November, early December visit would likely work out best. Jon had to stay here to work, so the kids and I flew home.

We spend 11 days making memories. We even spent 2 nights at Nana & Papa's, in their small country home.

Dad, who wasn't going to decorate for Christmas since his surgery is scheduled on the 21st, decided to put up the deer for the kids.

Leaving was difficult... it's always somewhat difficult to leave family and return to our Thunder Bay home 2,400 kms away. This year it was especially difficult knowing what Dad will be going through over the next few weeks with surgery and recovery. On a positive note, Dad is still not experiencing any symptoms and is able to eat (I'm pretty sure he and Abby cleaned up several pounds of bacon while we were in NB). The specialist initially thought that the tumor was the size of a ping-pong ball. A follow-up scope showed that it was the size of a pea! Praise be to God!

Remembrance Day

Last year I wrote this post, vowing that our children would attend the Remembrance Day ceremony because it's important for them to know history, the history of our family, and of the sacrifices made so that we could live in a peaceful nation.

This year, I arranged for someone to teach my Little Seedlings class and we left playschool early to attend the service.  The boys watched people laying wreaths and poppies on the cenetath.  After the service, the boys left their own homemade poppies alongside the Legion ones... 

Tears rolled down my cheeks as I stood with my family watching the aging soldiers from WWII march past.  They boys won't truly understand... I can't truly understand... the enormous sacrifice.  But I want our children to grow up knowing the importace of honouring and remembering those who fought for our freedom.

Sometimes it's just easier...

to not post anything or

to post about pumpkin carving

than to post about my dad's cancer diagnosis

or my tendency to binge on Halloween candy

or how it's been months since I've done anything substantial on my dissertation

or how little I care about finishing it... ever.

Sometimes it's easier to just pretend that everything is going well and to post pictures of pumpkin carving & cute little Gomers in their Halloween costumes.

Carving up our Pumpkin

Teaching Accountability

We've done chore charts with stickers and chore charts with check marks. After a week or two we become less consistent and the novelty of the new chart with carefully chosen stickers has worn off. One of our "systems" gave Abby a dime for every chore that she completed. As a member of our family, I really wanted her to learn responsibility and contribute to household chores without having to pay her. Even the dime system fizzled.

THEN, I found Accountable Kids quite accidentally. Truly, I'm not sure how I stumbled upon their site. As I navigated through their site and read reviews I quickly realized that it was what I'd been searching for and then some.

Accountable Kids is more than just a chore chart. It's a unique positive parenting program teaching children responsibility and accountability.

Because they value their customers' opinions, they offer a rebate for doing a review of their program after implementing it for 30 days.  Even without the rebate, I likely would have "reviewed" it here because I love it and want to share how it is working in our little family.

Each child has their own 5-peg board. The first peg holds their reminder cards. The kit comes with oodles of options for "chores" (brush teeth, clothing, pajamas, dishes, car care, yard work, etc.) and even a few blank ones. All the reminder cards have 5 bands of colour on the bottom. For chores we determined to be "morning" chores, we cut off the bottom 4 colours leaving only the yellow band. For "day" chores the bottom 3 bands are cut off leaving red at the bottom and for "evening" chores, the two bottom colours are cut off so blue is at the bottom. This colour coding of chore cards helps children know what chores are to be completed when.

At the beginning of each day, all the cards are on the first peg. As chores are completed, the kids turn their cards over and move them to the second peg. Each of the cards have a corresponding picture so even our almost 3-year old can participate. After all the yellow "morning" chores are on the child's second peg, a ticket is given. A ticket is given after the completion of "day" and "evening" chores as well. I LOVE this part of the program. A ticket can be exchanged by the child for a priviledge. In our house so far this has been 30 minutes of TV or 30 minutes of computer time. This has really made a shift in our family, for all of us. It has made TV/computer time a priviledge, not a right.

Just as tickets are given, they can be lost for inappropriate behaviours. Jordan usually loses his reward card for biting or hitting instead of using his words. Abby usually uses hers when she is rude, unkind, or refuses to do what she has been asked to do. Jude usually uses his for incessant whining. It works very well! Usually they have only to lose one ticket and their behaviour changes, although we have had 3 tickets lost in one "episode".

One night we decided that if each child had 3 tickets, we could have a movie night. Jude and Abby both had enough, but Jordan only had 2. Before we said anything, Abby offered Jordan one of her tickets so that they could all participate. Because she had shown kindness and an unselfish attitude, we awarded her a "Best Behaviour Card", a card that can be used as a ticket to pay for a priviledge. The best behaviour card helps us to reward the kids for something that we think is very special and helps reinforce positive behaviours. Jude received a best behaviour card today when he offered to carry Abby's backpack to the house for her after school. Another day he received one for listening really well to his gymnastics coach.

Tickets and Best Behaviour Cards are kept on the 3rd peg. "Bonus Bucks" are also kept on the 3rd peg. Children have the opportunity to earn money for extra chores, the ones that we don't mind paying them for. We decided what these chores would be and placed the Reminder Cards for these chores on the 5th peg. The kids can, at any time, take one of the cards and complete the chore. For example, during our first week, Abby folded 3 large baskets of clothing and placed them in the appropriate basket to be put away in drawers and closets. She worked for 45 minutes and earned 2 Bonus Bucks ($2). Jude is my dusting guy. Jordan is my window guy. At the end of the week their Bonus Buck cards are exchanged for real money which they each keep in jars they decorated.  It's teaching the kids delayed gratification and about earning their own money to spend how they wish.

What about the 4th peg? Glad you asked because it's one of my favourite parts! The 4th peg holds the Special Date Card. For each day that the child has successfully completed all 3 sets of chores, a star is added to their Special Date Card. After 10 stars the child is able to go on a special date with whoever they choose. Abby chose Daddy for her first date night. They went out for supper together and then played together at a local park. I got to go with Jude! We went for supper at the mall, checked out toys at Zellers, got ice cream and then headed to the Marina where he used our old camera to take pictures. Jordan and Jon are the next to go out together.

The board is supposed to be placed in a visible place in the home. We chose the dining room. The only problem we've encountered with this is that many of the kids' chores are done upstairs (brushing teeth, putting dirty laundry in the hamper, etc.) so they will run up and down stairs to see what is to be done next or to turn over their cards.

Overall, the program is working very well for our familyand I've already recommended it to several friends (two have already ordered their kits!).  Check out Accountable Kids.  They even have a video outlining the whole program on their Home page. 

Trusting

I love these pictures of Jude lovingly cherishing and protecting a little toad that his cousin Joey found for him at my sister's cottage in NB.  Although this little creature was likely frightened when he was taken from what was familiar, he was safe and protected in these sweet little hands. 

Looking back over these pictures made me think about how we're not all that different than that little toad :)  Sometimes God places us in unfamiliar situations, we're frightened and yet He gently holds us.

 

Abby's Sunday School homework this week was about how God is "Incomprehensible". 

Who has known the mind of the Lord?  Who has been his counselor?  Romans 11:34

They looked at the life of Job.  As we went over her lesson from last week, we talked about God's sovereignty. I shared with her about how even though God chose for Josh and Jonah to be with us here on earth for just a short time and it was difficult and sad when they died.... that we chose to trust God. 

I chose to believe that the One who holds the Universe in His hands...

The One who holds me in His hands....

... will never let me go and has a perfect plan for my life,

even when I can't see it,

even when His ways are incomprehensible. 

My job is to trust Him. 

Who has known the mind of the Lord?  Who has been his counselor?

Emptying

I haven't really had any recent pictures that I've wanted to post, nor any older ones for that matter.  We're settling into our fall routine of school and Sunday school, gymnastics and Little Seedlings for the boys, dance and Sparks for Abbs.  We've started using the Accountable Kids program which is seems to be going well (I'll blog more on details another time).  I'm loving being at home, mostly.  At least when I was doing my internship I felt I had an excuse for not having a clean floor or dusted shelves or folded laundry or homemade bread or delicious culinary creations with homegrown food.  Now, I feel that I should be able to keep on top of all of it and still have ambition to finish my doctorate that has just taken way too long.  I feel like I should be able to give oodles of attention to my little people while they are still little and to my amazing husband. Yet, I'm still falling behind. Then, I get frustrated at myself for falling behind...

I read something tonight that didn't just pass through my mind, but stuck.  Pam Vredevelt wrote "I used to think that raising children was more or less a task of shaping and guiding a future generation. I still do. But I also think God uses children to shape parents.  And the trials that come into our family circle aren't necessarily to make us 'better'.  They are to 'empty us out' so that God can fill us up with more of Himself."

Things are going fine here.  I wouldn't say that we're in the midst of trials, but I am feeling emptied. 

Emptied from parenting children who wake up cranky insisting that because it's still dark that it can't be morning-time, children who can't find 'anything' to wear in their full closets and drawers, children who hit each other with wooden trees from their train set, a preschooler who still choses to poop in his unders than in the toilet...

Emptied by a doctorate that I no longer have any ambition to complete...

Emptied by cleaning a house that doesn't stay clean more than a few minutes & preparing meals that are often met with complaints...

"They are to 'empty us out' so that God can fill us up with more of Himself."

Lately it seems as though I've forgotten (again), that I can't do it on my own, not even the little stuff.

Worm Relocation Project

We took the pool down yesterday. After a few grey days with no solar heating, the pool was a nippy 60 degrees Fahrenheit (about 15 degrees Celsius). The pool set-up was considerably easier and more fun than take down, although the kids did enjoy splashing in the pool when it got down to 12". After a few hours of draining, drying, sweeping and folding up the pool we removed the ground sheet. There were oodles of earthworms of various sizes that had taken residence under the pool. The kids took it upon themselves to relocate them to holes in the yard (thanks to our energetic puppy). They played for hours, trying to keep the worm families together, starting worm schools, carrying them around...

Jude's First Day of School

Update...
Jude had a great first day of school!  He played with a little boy named Austin.  He thought this was great because "now there are two Austins", including the purple kangaroo on Backyardigans :)  He still thinks his teacher is "really nice", but she still hasn't bought sand for the sand table :)

This sweet little boy started JK this morning. He was nervous and a little worried that his teacher wouldn't know where to find him or that he would not be able to find his classroom by himself. After I reassured him, he got excited again. Abby was a fabulous big sister and I have no doubt that she made sure he was with his teacher before she ran off to play on the playground after getting off the bus.

His teacher is Mrs. Krista McCarville. After meeting with her last week, he thought she was "nice" and "beautiful" :)

Jordy and I are having a home day. It's a little quiet.

Transitions.

Back to school...

Last night I laid awake for 2 hours after going to bed. Part of me was excited for Abbs to be entering Grade 1. Part of me grieved that she is now entering Grade 1. My little girl is not so little anymore. She'll spend nearly 40 hours/week in school and on her way to and from school on the bus. We had such a fun, relaxing summer. I'm not ready for Abby to be in school, let alone for 5 days a week. I really missed having her around today. I missed cuddling together and reading her Little House books together. I missed watching her play. I missed watching her pretend that she was breaking horses, galloping around the yard saying, "gaddup", "gee", "haw" and "whoa"...

Jude meets his teacher tomorrow. He'll find out when he gets to start school. I'm not sure I'm ready to see my not so little boy climbing the stairs to get on the bus and be away from home for 8 hours a day, even if it is only 2 or 3 days a week. Jordy will miss him. I'll miss him.

Transitions.

Abby had a great first day of school.  So far, she loves Grade 1.  On a scale from 1 - 10, she gave it a 10 :)

Papa's Surprise

When we arrived at my parents' country home, my dad announced that he had a surprise for the kids. Although it was drizzling, we all made our way to one of his gardens where he had carved each of the kids' names into different pumpkins. As the pumpkins grew, the etched names looked like they had just grown that way.

Jude was impressed that "his" pumpkin had grown the biggest! Jude is very much into comparisons these days, especially in relation to God. He'll often say that something is big or cool, but quickly add, "but GOD's the biggest!" Apparently he is "cooler" than God though :)

Sundress, Braids & a New Bonnet

While we were in NB, we visited Kings Landing Historical Settlement which depicts life in the central Saint John River Valley in the 1800s.  The Little House book (On the Shores of Silver Lake) that we just finished spans 1879-1880.  The wagon driver dropped us off at the General Store where we bought Abby a bonnet and a slate.  Auntie Win came with us, which was a treat for all of us!

We ate lunch on a little hill overlooking the river behind a house that had this swing.  After lunch, the kids picked acorns while they took turns on the swing.  Two very friendly little squirrels came from the riverbank, playing and heading for the acorns.  All the sudden, one of the squirrels flew at Abby's dress! As we all looked at her, still quite shocked that a squirrel had just flown at her, she explained that the squirrel had taken an acorn out of her hand!

Any thoughts on what this bench is called or its use?  It's brilliant!The bench the boys are sitting on was in one of my favourite houses.  It was just a small cottage where six children had been raised.  The cottage was one room.  A couple children slept with their parents, a couple slept on the trundle bed (that went under their parents' bed during the day, and a couple slept on a straw mattress that fit inside this bench when it flipped down.