This is hard...

I guess I didn't realize how hard potty training is. Ok... hard isn't the right word. Maybe time consuming is better. We had a pretty good day yesterday, Deakon went potty 5 times- even number 2 for the first time... and we had 2 accidents. Today he has gone twice and had one accident. He gets so "busy"(his words, not mine) playing that he won't stop to go. I feel like that is all we talk about now. AND... I am sick of not getting out of the house. The only good thing is that he is starting to tell me that he needs to go so I know that he has a bit of a clue. I have 50 diapers left... and I plan on NOT buying anymore, hopefully giving them away or something so wish us luck!

Potty Week... update

Potty: 3 Floor: 1

Naptime diaper: 1

Pretty good day... we'll see how tomorrow goes!

We've been staying busy!

We have definitely stayed busy these past few weeks. We got new callings in our ward and mine is PRIMARY CHORISTER... fun, right?

WRONG... the first 2 weeks I was a complete mess. I couldn't get any of the kids to listen to me and I didn't know the words to some of our main songs for the presentation coming up in October. I finally got a grip last week and spent a few afternoons googling ideas and giving some honest thought and prayer as to how to do this well. I spent Saturday morning putting together a few game-type ideas and had a game plan for Sunday. AND... it payed off. I felt so much better about everything and can't wait to "steal" more ideas and use them with the kids! Wish me luck and PLEASE let me know if you have any advice.

Our next big news is that I am dubbing this week as Potty Week! The picture below is from Deakon a few weeks ago. Since then, I haven't been consistent at all so this week I am staying home for a few days, drowning Deakon with fluids, and letting him run around like a wild indian. Today was our first big day. Score... toilet 1, floor 1. Not too bad for 5 hours. We'll see how it goes after nap time.

We have taken a small temporary cleaning job in town here for the lab to rack up a bit of extra money for christmas time so that has been taking up a bit of our evenings. Luckily we can go after Deakon is in bed and Gramma and Papa and listen for him.

I am sad to see summer ending a bit, but am excited for Fall. We will definitely be missing those traditional Skyline Football games. Good luck Dad!

Enjoy some random pictures of Deakon:
pretending to sleep in the basket

Deakon's "poise" (purse)


For a few days, everytime we would leave the house he would back up this bag or his backpack with toys and bring it with us in the car. When I first asked him what he was doing, he looked at me like I was dumb and told me, "I gettin my poise ready"

GIVE ME JUICE!

After reading the first 2 little things I wrote about being pregnant just now, I realize what a huge baby I was being. I did completely jinx myself and started my good old days of nausea on August 3rd- the day after we almost died in the hail storm. I have been sick every single day since then and it totally sucks. It helps if I keep my stomach full of food, but everything sounds so gross that I can barely eat somedays. OK... not everything sounds gross... GLUTEN sounds fantastic... I would eat a big bag of flour right now if I could. I just want a huge slice of pizza, or a jr hamburger from Mcdonalds, or any single thing from the bakery at Safeway... or crackers, or just a slice of bread.... Oh gosh, I feel as though my life might be over. Now, I know what all of you Celiacs out there would tell me right now- just make these things or buy them at the yummy bakery in Cochrane. NO... my pregnant tummy says NO to them. I made cupcakes... they were ok. I made cookies... they were ok. I have a pizza crust in the freezer from the GF bakery (which I absolutely love!) but just thinking about it makes me want to puke. 2 weeks ago I went through an entire loaf of GF bread, but now thinking about eating it makes me queasy. MY BABY WANTS GLUTEN... and I just want to cry about it... :( The only thing that I can't possibly get enough of it JUICE... not crappy juice, 100% pure orange and apple juice. I need more now...

ENOUGH being a crazy pregnant lady... I will tell you the good news. My cycle was completely off for May and June so I had no real idea of how far along I was so my doctor sent me for an ultrasound on the 13th.(happy birthday Meri!) I got to see my little tiny blobby baby with a heartrate of 155 and the knowledge that won me a 10 minute massage of my choice via personal massage therapist, Kyle. (STILL NOT BELEIVING ME COMPLETELY AT THIS POINT) I also found out that our due date is MARCH 27th, 2010! (a very happy 19th birthday to my baby brother STAKE) It was great to see something in there and is helping me try and eat something everyday so baby will grow. With Deakon, morning sickness went away over night during week 13 so please pray for this to happen again... oh wait- you guys don't know that this is going on... I guess I will just pray for myself.

We haven't decided when to tell people... I feel like I am going to pop out a lot sooner than last time so we better decide soon. Would it be completely rude to not tell my family until I show up in December being 26 weeks along? I feel like it would be...

Be jealous...

I am totally getting ready to make these.... it's ok if you are jealous. They are my favorite chocolate chip cookies of all time!

http://glutenfreebetty.blogspot.com/2008/09/grandma-dupaixs-chocolate-chip-cookies.html

Rocky Mountain House

A family at Doreen's work (retirement home) who have a parent residing there, decided that this summer they would give back to the staff and offer up their property and home for people to use this summer. They rent it out, but because their renters moved out early, they had all of July and August open until new people move in this fall. Doreen gladly reserved this past weekend for us and we had so much fun. After our deadly incident :) it was nice to sleep under a roof, although unfurnished. We had the beautiful scenery of the 153 acres, a roaring campfire, quading trails, AND a bathroom and kitchen with appliances and water. What a way to spend the weekend. I didn't think to get our camera out until late Saturday morning while we were out finding some great trails. Deakon was so excited to ride the "bike." He even packed his own helmet. Ron and Doreen gave us a good couple hours alone to roam around and then we went down to a camp site to find a table for our picnic. Thanks for inviting us along parentals... and for buying me a loaf of incredibly delicious bread from the one and only GF Patisserie!

We found a post along the trail so I tried to take some pictures of us:

Picnic time!

Cow Land... Carstairs, Alberta

i love camping!

for august long weekend, we decide to head out to our friends' property in carstairs for a night out.

we are soooooooooo excited!

5:00 PM : original meeting time...

5:25 PM : we show up

5:45 PM : jenn and justin finally show up

6:00 PM : we leave for carstairs

6:15 PM : arrive at property, excited to drive the jeep through a few fields, smells like cows!

6:25 PM : arrive in desired, fenced area

proceed to clear the 3 foot wild grass and thistles with wild feet-stomping and the rolling of old fence posts

6:35 PM : chuck old fence posts at dead trees

6:45 PM : set up tents, see lightening in the distance, prepare for light drizzle:

7:00 PM : men drive out to find rocks for our fire pit

7:05 PM : use the time to take cute pictures of deakon

while wishing that i had a better camera

7:15 PM : still waiting for men, chit chat around the dug up hole that will soon be a fire pit

7:20 : men bring back many rocks for fire pit. have light drizzle of rain for 15-20 minutes. start fire.

7:20 PM : men sit around picking off burrs and itchy something. deakon is massively dirty by this time

7:25 PM : with no dinner started yet, deakon helps himself to chocolate teddy grahams while frolicking in the grass

7:30 PM : chilling before starting dinner

8:00 PM-12:30 AM: make hot dogs and chicken and veggies on the propane grill and in the fire. eat lots of chips and veggies and dip. drink pop out of tiny little glasses. put deakon to bed although he keeps yelling goodnight to everyone for what seems like hours. attempt to take cute couple pictures... SOME could not do something so simple. cook up delicious s'mores and share stories around the fire. start seeing lightening, but decide that we will just get a light drizzle like we had earlier. clean up camp and head to bed.

dan and kate... plus eight:

jenn and jo-jo:

us:

1:15 AM : mostly settled and just drifting off to sleep when i keep hearing one corner of our tent flapping up- freak myself out thinking it is a gopher. feel the ground looking for hole with gopher in it. find no gopher- sanely start listening and hear the wind and thunder.

1:25 AM : HUGE gust of wind shoves our tent almost in half. the wind doesn't let down. heavy rain starts and the top rain fly feels like it is doing absolutely nothing. we grab the thickest blanket we can a shove it against the tent. hail starts shooting us wildly. our fingers are instantly bruised by golf-ball sized pellets raining down on us. kyle thinks to get deakon out of pack-and-play. he is looking around like we are crazy, his hair and blankets are soaked through. by now we are sitting with the thick blanket around our shoulders holding the tent up against the wild wind, praying that the rain fly doesn't fly completely off, shaking from the cold, listening to the cracking trees, holding deakon under the only dry blanket we have while he is yelling, "i ok, i ok." we want to run for the jeep, but decide that we have to wait until the hail stops.

1:45 AM : wrap deakon up the best we can and make a run for the jeep

2:00 AM : sit in jeep waiting for storm to calm down a bit before breaking camp

2:15-3:00 AM : men and kate break camp and take pics. we decide that we have no choice but to drive the hour home and get deakon into warm clothes. pack our soaked equipment and drive a bit crazily through the bumpy fields, hoping not to hit any cows. deakon is squealing in the back, "oh, fun" arrive at main road, say good-night and good-bye and the last thing i hear from kate is, "let's do this again!" we COMPLETELY agree!!!! Minus the hail, we had a blast!

aftermath of the storm:

this was the hail... after a bit of melting.

i saw those babies hitting us, they were huge!!!

our tent afterwards, even though the rain-fly didn't do much to help with the side-ways rain, we were glad it stayed on so we weren't completely soaked:

hail build-up:

jenn and justin were not so lucky. their fly flipped off with the first gust and they were left with the completely mesh sides, welts on justin's back, swollen fingers from holding up the tent for jenn, and bent tent poles.