Kids – Page 4 – xangelle.com

Day 4 – Grand Caymans

We were headed to the Cayman Islands and expected to be able to get off the ship sometime mid morning.

Before the trip even started we had signed up for the Port Adventure to the Beach. I figured that as much fun as some of the other adventures might be…..the kids really wanted to just swim, and swim and swim and swim and SWIM. And, taking the different ages of the kids into account and Angelica’s fitness level….the beach just seemed like the best place to be for our family.

The day started out much like the night before had ended off….grey and muggy with some showers off and on.

In order to get off the boat, we needed to board a smaller boat which then taxied us to the docks. The Cayman Islands did not have the capability for the cruise ship to dock. And so around 11am, we lined up at the bottom of the cruise ship to start the “tendering” process. As we pulled away from the cruise ship, it started to POUR. The air was still warm, but it was definitely wet.

It took about 10 minutes for us to get to the dock and as we stepped off the boat, it was still raining. We were a bit early to meet up with our Port Adventure Group and so we walked around the shops on the dock of the Grand Caymans….and while we were popping in and out of the little shops looking at souvenirs the rain stopped.

Finally it was time to head to the beach, and we, along with approx 100 others, got onto the buses and headed out. The bus driver was a fabulous tour guide. He talked non-stop for the 15 minutes it took to drive down to the beach that we were going to. He had a lot of interesting facts and stories about the Cayman Islands and the scenery was incredible.

We finally showed up at the beach and again, it was raining….we all huddled under the beach’s small covered area and listened to the beach host explain a few things and then…….then they released us and we headed out to claim our very own little patch of heaven on the beach.

The weather couldn’t seem to make up it’s mind and it alternated between raining and not raining. In fact, the Cruise people came by to let everyone know that the buses would be available to take us back early if we wanted because of the bad weather.

I’d say that more than half of the people returned to the ship, but seeing as we had come to the beach with the point of getting wet…..we weren’t planning on going ANYWHERE.

The water was warm, and the air was warm, and we had umbrellas to cover our stuff; and so we just swam and played in the sand. It was SO. MUCH. FUN.

The baby fell asleep after about an hour of playing in the water, crawling on the beach and throwing the sand; and so we wrapped him up in a damp towel, put him on a beach chair under an umbrella and he slept for about an hour. On most of our Port days, he had a good hour nap….I think he was just so worn out from the excitement of it all.

It was so much fun to swim in the warm, BLUE ocean water, when all we are used to is a slightly grey/brown freezing cold ocean experience.

Jon rented a jet-ski and took the three older kids out for turns. We also rented some snorkel gear and the kids had a blast just swimming around, trying to find different fish and shells.

Jeremy LOVED snorkeling. He snorkeled for the entire time that we were at the beach (3 hours). He collected some very cool looking little shells. This was pretty much what he looked like for almost all of the time that we were at the beach.

Josiah LOVED the beach and figured out that he could actually swim while we were at this beach. I think that the combination of the waves lifting him helped and for whatever reason he was very confident and was SO excited to actually be out swimming. He didn’t go very far away from the shore, and stayed very close to us but he was actually swimming, on his own!

Starting to swim in the Cayman Islands is a pretty cool life experience.

The rain had eased up a bit and the weather was actually pretty nice. It was warm, but we were not being fried to a crisp by the broiling sun. I was actually pretty happy that it was a bit cloudy because then I wasn’t stressing about sunscreen and making the kids wear shirts and hats and trying to avoid sunstroke.

They could just play without being nagged at. It was a win/win for all of us.

About an hour before we were scheduled to leave, the rain started up again and then…..

Can you see in that picture? Click on the photo to make it bigger…..

Yes, Lightening. We had Thunder and Lightening and it was kinda of cool. It was far enough away but still….it was interesting.

The bus returned for us around 3:30pm and we headed back. The last call for boats to the cruise ship was at 4:30pm and there was a HUGE line up. So instead of looking around a bit, we just got in the line up and headed back to the ship.

It had been a WONDERFUL DAY and we had so much fun. The rain didn’t dampen our spirits, in fact, we were SO looking forward to being at COZUMEL the next day and heading to the beach AGAIN!

If you are interested in looking at all the photos from the Grand Caymans, click here!

I didn’t take too many photos because I was concerned about getting water and sand in my camera.

I’ve gotten a few questions and I’ll be answering them when I talk about the next sea day (which is day 6) so if you had any questions about our trip or wondered about something, let me know and I’ll be sure to do my best answer them.

A Day at Sea

By Monday (October 3rd) we were more than ready for a quieter, slower, more peaceful day. We had been going, going, going for the past 3 days and it was wearing a bit on all of us.

The night before, we had been notified that there was going to be a special breakfast with the Disney Characters the next morning.

The kids needed to be woken up almost every morning of the cruise, they were just so tired out from the previous day’s activities. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but on this particular morning, we slept in longer than we should have and had to rush to make it to breakfast on time.

“Rushing” is not necessarily the most amazing way to start the day, eh?

We did manage to make it down to breakfast on time with our camera’s and autograph books and we ordered breakfast and waited. It was so cool to see how excited the kids were to see Mickey and Minnie and the others. From the 14 year old all the way down the the 4 year old….the air was just buzzing with the anticipation and excitement. For the record, my one year old was NOT excited about meeting Mickey and Minnie….not that he had any clue either way, but when they did come around……he was….well, he was terrified, to put it mildly! He did not like them AT ALL! It was pretty cute!

Before Breakfast even arrived at the table, the Character’s started visiting…

We met Minnie and Micky,

and Pluto….

and Goofy…

It was so fun!

While we were finishing up our breakfast, our head server came over with some special hats…

So Cute!

Maid Marion…

Robin Hood…

Pirate Jon…

This one has me a little lost…..Any Ideas?

After breakfast, we wandered the boat a little, did a little swimming, played in the arcade, had a small bite to eat and then made everyone take a nap. The kids had been hanging in there pretty well, but they were a bit snippy with each other and I figured it was something that a small nap would help…..and it did!

We woke up just before the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party was about to begin and so we hurried down to have “a spot of tea” with Alice…..

There was “apple juice” tea and oatmeal cookies and we all learned how to have a proper Queen’s tea party….we even learned about manners. And then the Mad Hatter came in and things livened up a bit….

“Clean Cup! Move Down!”

The kids wanted to get their picture taken with Alice and the Mad Hatter and so we lined up after the tea party.

By the time the tea party was done, we had enough time to rush back to our rooms, and get dressed for dinner and head back on down to dinner….sometimes it felt like all we were doing was eating.

The kids were so excited because they got things like hamburgers & fries and chicken nuggets & fries for almost every meal (except breakfast).

Can you see the Ketchup Mickey on Siah’s Hamburger?

Or How about Goofy’s paw print?

The Gluten free dinner’s were okay. They were pretty bland and definitely not creative, but once I started asking for specifics….like I chose salmon one night and it came really dry and completely unseasoned…and the next night I asked for it again with a lemon dill sauce…..and it was AMAZING!….it was much better. I didn’t figure I was going to get dessert but this night they brought out the MOST DELICIOUS Chocolate mini cake. And Jon thought to take a picture….YUM!

The nicest part was that it was both Gluten and Dairy free and so Siah could have it and he was SO EXCITED. When he saw this picture on my screen, he said, “Mom, that cake was DELICIOUS, right?” Yes, baby! Yes, it was!

When we got back to our rooms, we were greeted by this friendly fellow…

It looks like Judah is going to “take him on”…

As we went to bed that night, this was the view out our balcony…..

The temperature was still hot and muggy but it had been a grey and cloudy day. We were looking forward to our day at the beach in the Grand Cayman’s and as the ship gently rocked….we drifted off to sleep!

If you’d like to see the whole set from this day, click here!

Do ya have any questions for us, about our cruise? Let us know and we’ll try our best to answer them for you!

Day 2 – Key West

After a good sleep, we woke up on Sunday morning ready for the day.

We headed down to the restaurant for Breakfast.

We found that to get through breakfast took just over an hour which was longer than we’d like, but it was mostly because we had to special order the food for Josiah, Judah and myself….but, the food really was delicious.

After Breakfast, we had some time to explore the boat because we weren’t docking into Key West until just after noon.

We decided to head on up to the pools to see what fun we could have up there for a few hours.

There are three pools on the boat. The adult only pool (that we never even got a chance to check out), the Goofy Pool (that’s the one that Jeremy is in, in the photo above) and a Mickey Pool (that is more suitable for littler kids).

Attached to the Mickey Pool is a Water Slide and Josiah must have gone down the slide over 30 times…

Over and Over and Over….

He had SO MUCH FUN! And we were loving watching him have so much fun! The girls were a bit bummed that they were too tall for the water slide, though! Because Judah is still in diapers, he wasn’t allowed in the pools, but they had this cool little water play area over to the side of the Mickey pool and we let Judah play a little in there.

He had a BLAST playing with the water fountains, but he kept trying to sit on them….it was so funny!

We were really enjoying the hot weather and the sun.

It was so nice to just be able to sit and relax….although I was worried about us burning in the freaking amazing sun. Thank God for Sunscreen!

The ship was getting close to Key West and so we decided to go and get ready to go ashore.

We hadn’t chosen to go on a “Port Adventure” at Key West, but we did decide to just go ashore and see what we could see and find. We couldn’t go very far because Angelica couldn’t walk very well and definitely not very far; and the HEAT…..well, it was a whole lot hotter and more humid than anything we were used to.

The kids found Key West to be a bit difficult because of the heat and humidity but we did still manage to find some fun things to do and see.

We got some gelato…and sat on the steps of this old museum (I think it was a museum!) to eat it.

The baby slept!

Found a tiny baby coconut that had fallen to the ground…Jeremy was pretty excited about it.

It appeared quite busy and so we carried on down the road until we found this alley…

There was a whole bunch of things to see and shops to look through and the best part…according to the kids….there was shade and even a place to sit.

We managed to pick up a few souvenir’s at the little shops. I LOVED the old cobblestone roads…cruel as this might sound, I’d LOVE to go back there WITHOUT the kids. There was so much to see and some really cool pictures to take (if we had the time and just a few less things to juggle).

We got back to the ship and had just a little time to relax before we needed to head on down for dinner. I pulled out my camera and snapped a few pictures. I couldn’t understand why the pictures looked so fuzzy! My camera was all fogged up because it had been so warm outside and we were now in the cold air conditioned room.

Regardless of the fog, I still liked these pictures of Judah….

Here is one shot of Jeremy…

We managed to get all dressed up and down to dinner on time.

I really, REALLY liked getting dressed up for dinner. In fact, I’m thinking about having a dress up dinner at our house once a week.

After dinner, we went back to our rooms to change and when we got there we found this….

While we were at dinner, each evening, the Room Hosts would turn down the beds for the night and leave some amazing folded towel animals. It was a lot of fun to come back to the room after dinner and find out what animal they had created each day. There was even a class at the end of the week that Jeremy went to, because he was so excited about the “Towelgami”.

Jeremy and Josiah went to the Kids Club, and Xandra went to the Pre-Teen Group (and stayed until midnight, the crazy girl). Angelica and Jon and Judah and I relaxed a bit and attempted to get the room a bit more organized.

Angelica was still feeling pretty weak and tired; and she stuck pretty close to Jon and I for most of the trip.

It was a pretty good day and as we headed to bed for the night, we were looking forward to the next day which was a whole day at sea while we traveled to The Cayman Islands.

If you’re interested in seeing the whole set of pictures from this day, then click here.

The set of pictures is a bit out of order because there are downloads from 3 cameras.

Orlando and Day 1 of the Disney Cruise

We woke up on Saturday morning and sometime in the night we had played musical beds…

Well, actually just Geli and Jon switched rooms because apparently Jeremy was breathing heavy and it was bothering Angelica.

As it was the beginning of one of her chemo cycles, she was on the steroid Prednisone for 5 days and it makes sleeping difficult…so little annoyances become HUGE annoyances. Anyway, she crawled into bed with me and Judah; and Jon went and slept in the other room with Jer.

We got everyone up and repacked all our stuff because we had to have it ready for pick up at 8:30am as that is when it was being picked up to be sent to the boat. We grabbed a quick breakfast and then headed out to where the shuttle would take us to the ship.

It was about an hour’s bus ride from the airport to Port Canaveral and when we got there we got in touch with my cousin who lives in Florida. She lives about 2-3 hours away from Port Canaveral but Charlene and Jeff and all 4 of their kids had piled into their van early that morning and drove up to see us. We snapped a quick picture while we were waiting to connect with them…

It was SO HOT! So much hotter and WAY MORE HUMID than we were used to, but it was WONDERFUL at the same time. We were LOVING the heat and the sun. This next picture has nothing really to do with the story, but my little dude is just so cute so I had to throw it in….

Charlene picked us up and we drove to the closest Mcdonalds as we figured that would be the easiest and most comfortable place for all “9” of our kids to hang out and burn off some energy while we (the adults) got a chance to connect and chat.

Cousins

It was SO AWESOME to be able to connect and hang out and see them and chat and…..well, I could just go on and on. It was such a HUGE bonus to this already wonderful trip and I am so grateful and thankful that we got the opportunity and that Charlene and Jeff went so out of their way. You guys are amazing!

We managed to get a few pictures of both Char and I and of all 8 million of our children…

We even got some nice stranger to take one with the Jon and Jeff included….

I so wish that we lived closer to each other. It would be so fun to be able to get together more often. Jeff and Charlene are amazing people and their kids are such cool little people!

They took us back to the Port because the kids were starting to freak out about “getting on the boat” and so very reluctantly we said good bye.

It took a while to get signed in and registered and our pictures taken and all of the other stuff required to get us on the boat and the kids were thankful for the couches and movies playing all over the Disney Terminal.

Finally, FINALLY…it was time. All the papers were signed and the kids were registered and we could go onto the boat….You walk through that Mickey and into the walkway that takes you right into the boat.

And with that, our Cruise…..Angelica’s Wish Trip officially started. It was SO exciting. We went up to the Promenade to be apart of the big Kick off Party….

There was music and dancing and shiny metallic streamers to shake and…….. well, it was pretty emotional to just be there.

Right in the middle of all of all the excitement and partying, Judah just couldn’t take it any more and he just fell straight asleep. My sweet boy, he’d done so well with all the travel and the different planes and bus ride and hotel and he just couldn’t take it one moment longer.

To say that we were excited is such an understatement. It was AMAZING to just be there. We sat up on the deck while the party carried on and watched the boat push off from the dock. It was a bit surreal to realize that we were finally here after months of thinking and dreaming.

It had been a pretty exhausting 2 days of travel and so we just sat for a moment and relaxed….

Then it was time to go and get dressed for dinner. They require you to dress up a little for dinners and I loved it….it made the dinners just a little bit extra special to have to get dressed nice and then the kids were on their best behavior because it felt extra special…We were seated at table 28 and it was RIGHT BY THE WINDOW. Just after we sat down to eat, we were treated to an AMAZING sun set..

That first day is a bit of a blur because we were so tired, but we basically walked around the ship a bit after dinner and then we headed back to our rooms and finally with much effort (because they were a little buzzed on the excitement of it all) got the kids into bed. The next day we were going to be getting off the boat at Key West and we couldn’t wait to go and see what Key West was like….

If you’re interested in seeing the rest of the pictures from that day, click here!

We’re Baaaaa-aaaack!

Well, it’s Wednesday night around 5:30pm and I think that aside from sleeping…this is the first time I’ve sat down since we’ve gotten home.

Yah, things have been a bit busy, a little insane and to top it all off, we’ve been EXTREMELY exhausted!

Fun Times!

We had an AMAZING trip – a HUGE THANKS to Children’s Wish – without them, Angelica’s Wish Trip would have not been a possibility. We are so blown away by the generosity we have been shown.

I think that I’m gonna break the trip up into a few posts because there is just WAY TOO MUCH to share and it would be the worlds longest post if I tried to combine it all into just one.

It seems like forever ago that we were trying to get everything ready to go….

I climbed into bed just after midnight and tried to get my brain to settle down but it didn’t work very well. I’d been going, going, going for the past 3 days and had a horrible time to settle. I fell asleep shorty after 1:00am and woke up at….

It was a miracle….the baby slept through the night….well, he slept all the way from when we put him to bed until we picked him up and put him in the carseat to drive to the airport.

Here she is….the “Wish Girl”. Awake and ready for her trip….well, mostly awake but Oh! So! Excited!

We finally were all in the car and ready to go….

All I’ve got is camera phone pictures and so the quality is not that amazing!

We made it to the Airport perfectly on time and got checked in. There was an issue with us checking in…..a boarding pass for Judah never printed off….and there was quite a kufuffle as they tried to get one printed for him. Finally they printed an extra one of ours and crossed out our name and write his name on instead.

By this point, the kids were hungry and we had about an hour until our plane boarded….Jon went looking for something that would be gluten-free so that Judah and I could eat it as well…

….at this point last night, I had to take Angelica to physio and then it was a whirlwind of bedtime activities and now it’s 8am on Thursday morning….and sometimes I just wish my life would slow down for a while…

Jon eventually found something that was safe for us to eat and soon after we boarded. The whole concept of flying in an airplane was almost as exciting as the Cruise…..the kids were enthralled with the “tv’s” in the back of each chair…

We finally settled in for the 4.5 hour flight to Houston. The early morning excitement (and the Gravol that I fed them) took it’s toll and a few of the kids slept.

The baby woke up midway through the flight and of all the kids, he was the most difficult to entertain and even then, he did SO good!

We had enough time in The Houston Airport to find some food and pick up a souvenir or two and then we headed to our gate and waited there for a while. Trying to find gluten-free food on the go and in unfamiliar places is not the easiest, but fortunately there are enough places to choose from and we were able to find food every time we needed it.

Josiah was so excited about the idea of the airplane and he just watched out the window at all the activity as the airplane taxied up to the tunnel and unloaded and loaded up all the luggage….

We finally boarded the second flight to Orlando and although the kids were doing so well, we were all getting tired. We ended up traveling for 10 hours that day and we were all tired out by the end of the day….add in a 3 hour time change and there is a recipe for a disaster, but it all went so well. I have some pretty amazing kids, if I do say so myself.

We showed up in the Orlando Airport and spent some time trying to figure out where our luggage was and where we were supposed to go and finally we got checked into the Hyatt and found our luggage and went to grab a quick bit to eat…..this was probably the worst part of the day.

We asked for a gluten-free meal and the chef even came out to talk to me about it and then when the meal came, I ate a bite and then looked closer and was sure that there was barley in the rice mixture….I asked about it yes, they had given me the regular portion….I was pretty thankful that Judah had refused a bite when I had offered it to him but was pretty upset that they had messed up like that. I left and went back up to the room while the rest of the family finished up their food. The restaurant was so apologetic, and did give me a gluten-free dinner after that, but it really set me up to feel very stressed about food for the rest of the trip…..

Having said that, if that was the worst part of the whole trip that day….then the day went pretty well, considering that we woke up at 3am and traveled ALL DAY and didn’t get to sleep until after 10pm Florida time.

We finally got everyone to sleep, even though they were SO excited about heading out on the cruise the next day.

If you’re interested in seeing any more photo’s from our first day, click here!

Day Two……and a half.

If the rash on Geli’s back and thigh showed up on Sunday night then we are on day 2 and a half of this stupid cycle.

After she was admitted on Monday they started her on an anti-viral mediciation that is used to treat Shingles. Typically if a child gets a virus there is not too much that they can do other than just let the virus run it’s course, but with this particular virus….the one responsible for Chicken Pox….they can give a course of the drug, Acyclovir. Right now she is on an IV medicine, but can switch to an oral med if her body heals up quickly.

Doing Homework after school on Monday

And that is what they’ve done. She in on a 7 day treatment plan and basically they are waiting for the rash to blister up and then start to crust over…..disgusting, eh? But, that is what happens and so that is what we are looking forward to.

The rash started out not too badly on Sunday night and Monday but by Tuesday morning it was worse. One good thing though….the actual “blisters” within the rash were really tiny. It’s pretty nasty looking, but I think that she is starting to get better now. She has not had too much pain. On Sunday night and Monday she said that there was pain where the rash was at about a level 2 out of 10 and that there were times where it would be “shooting pain” and that shooting pain was at about a 4 out of 10. The worst pain was when someone would touch the rash and in order to get a sample to “test” they had to do a scraping….yah and the first sample didn’t have enough to get a good test and so they had to do it a second time. Sucks, eh?

Short Nap in the Stroller

Yesterday she said that it maybe hurt a little bit more, but for the most part it was okay. This morning it doesn’t really hurt at all and when the resident came in to see Geli, she was pleased to see that some of the rash has already started to scab over which is earlier than they would have expected.

He just crashed on Monday night

Thank you so much for your prayers and encouragement and support. It means so much to us.

Here are a few things to pray about….

We’d love to see Geli (and Jon) be healthy enough to come home by the weekend.
We are still praying the little boys don’t get Chicken Pox.
We are hoping that Geli will be able to catch up on all the school work that she’s missing this week without feeling overwhelmed.

So Proud that he climbed up on the stool by himself

As much as this is frustrating, I’m trying to look at the positive side of things. While in the hospital, Geli has been able to have the Physio Therapists come in and look at her and work with her and they will continue to do so every day that she is in and once she leaves, they will be able to be in contact with a Physio Therapist out here and to be able to communicate with them exactly what Geli needs as most of her issues are as a result of the chemotherapy. Some of the drugs actually damage the nerves and it can take some time before the nerves heal. Some of the drugs cause muscle damage and that can also take a while before the toxicity flushes out of her and her muscles are able to recover and rebuild. And on top of that there is muscle atrophy, just from lack of use…..

It actually fits in the garage now! Thanks, Momma!

This is such a tough road to walk out but at least now we have a “sort of” “somewhat” plan moving forward. On top of that Geli was able to hear that all this physical crap is “normal” for someone who has gone through what she’s been through and that it will take her probably 6 months to recover from the damage that the chemo has wreaked on her system. It’s so good to hear that this is all a part of the journey.

I mean, it’s horrifying to go through this and yet there is a certain level of comfort in knowing that this is part of the process. It’s a horrible HORRIBLE process, but she will come through it.

4 Boxes and 2 bags of recycling after the big clean up

And so we carry on. The kids at home are doing okay. I’m doing okay. I’m tired. Even more tired than usual, but possibly less tired than earlier this year and so that’s a good thing.

Monday was a tough day for me and I’m so thankful that my Momma came over and spent the day with me and then she slept over and was around for the morning on Tuesday. She helped me to get my garage cleaned out from all the camping crap that we just “dumped” in our garage in our efforts to unpack the camper at warp speed at 10pm the night we came home.

Signs that your child is a climber.

And now I can actually park our van in there which is a HUGE HELP as we had been parking it out on the road outside our townhouse complex. Now I don’t have to schlepp the diaper bags and kids and other assorted crap out to the van when I want to leave….I can just huck all that stuff in from the comfort our our own garage. YAH!!!

I still want to share about our time away up at the lake and also about Jeremy’s official diagnosis. Lets just say that the last half of the summer was not uneventful.

Down time for me, before bed

Currently, the baby is sleeping and has been sleeping for just over an hour. I am shocked and amazed and and fully expecting him to wake up any minute as he NEVER sleeps this long. Mind you when you half wake up and won’t settle from 11:45pm until 12:20am and then are up again at 2am and at 4 am and at 6am and then up for the day at 7am……you’d think that you might be slightly tired, no???

Well, I’ve got to get going and the battery on my laptop is about dead, so with that….I’m off.

Oh, one more thing…Geli reads the blogs and comments when she’s in the hospital so if you have a quick hello or a cute joke or a funny story, I know that she’d appreciate it. She’s a little bored and she’s not allowed to leave her room unless she wears a mask and heads right outside. They’ve got her in isolation to protect any other kids with compromised immune systems……and isolation….is not as cool as you might think it could be.

Thanks again….YOU ARE AMAZING and WE APPRECIATE YOU!

Routine & Advice

Well, today was the first full day of school for our older 3. Angelica and Alexandra are in High School and Jeremy is in Elementary School in Grade 6. Siah and Judah are at home with me.

It seems odd to me that I’ve got such a HUGE spread from my 1 year old to my oldest in Grade 9; but that is what happens when you’ve got a 7 year spread in between the 3rd and 4th child.

I am SO looking forward to getting back into a routine of some sort. There is something just so comforting about knowing what to expect and when to expect it. The past 14 months have been anything but routine. While I normally look forward to September and the newness and routine that it brings, I find that this year, more than ever before, I am craving the comfort that routine brings.

When the older kids headed off the school this morning, the two littles and I headed out to the grocery store. It’s never “fun” taking the kids shopping, and this morning was no better; but it was different. Different because this is a NEW SEASON…..and I have a NEW PERSPECTIVE. It’s amazing how a life threatening disease will impact you both negatively and positively.

I’m looking forward to doing things with the boys. I’m looking forward to establishing new routines and to the give and take of learning. Them learning how to behave in different situations and places; and me learning to read them and to know when and where to take them and at which times…..it’s a whole season of learning for everyone.

The shopping trip today would have been infinitely better if Judah would just stop screaming. He has this unbelievably ear piercing shriek and he kept screaming over and over and over. The people around us would put their fingers in their ears, I’m assuming to stop the ringing…..it’s that bad! And I’m not sure what to do? How do you tell a baby to stop screaming? My current method is to firmly tell him “no” and to gently cover his mouth to stop the screaming. I’m not interested in smacking or flicking and he doesn’t take a soother. He’s only 14 months old and……..? Yah? Anyone? Anything? He’s been doing it for a while but it has never bothered me before; but then I’ve spent the past year mostly at home and so, I didn’t really think anything of it.

I think he learned it from his older brothers. When they “disagree” on something….there tends to be a bit of shrieking; and while I can talk to Jeremy and Josiah, or put them on time out, or send them to their rooms…..it’s a little different for a baby, no?

So, what says you? Any advice on the shrieking? And what do you think about routines?

Ambleside

Last Tuesday we woke up and it was just another day.

This summer has been a bit of a bummer. It has not gone exactly how we had planned or expected and while nothing terrible has happened, it’s not been as relaxing as I’d hoped!

Around 9:30am, I decided that if the kids and I could get the house cleaned and packed and ready to go by 11:30am – that we’d head out to the beach. At this point, I still wasn’t sure which beach I would head to as they are all about an hour away from us, but I was determined that we were not going to just sit at home and do nothing for one more day.

The kids were pretty excited and we managed to get everything ready and done just after 11:30am and so off we went.

As I pulled out of the driveway, I was still unsure about where we should go…I was contemplating 3 different beaches…White Rock, Spanish Banks and Ambleside.

In the end, Ambleside in West Vancouver won out mostly because I could park and be on the sand in about 20 steps and with 5 kids in tow and all our gear – the close proximity to the beach, the parking spot and the bathroom were key factors in my decision.

Traffic was NON-EXISTANT and we made it there in just under and hour. The weather was not AMAZING, but neither did it suck. It was one of those days, where it was cloudy, but there was still the possibility of getting a burn if you didn’t take the right precautions.

As soon as we hit the sand, the boys were gone, headed straight for the water. Jeremy stopped long enough to point out a good spot that he figured I should put the blankets down on and I agreed, it was a pretty good spot.

We laid the blankets out and put the baby on them and he instantly crawled the edge of the blanket and picked up handfuls of sand and hucked them ALL OVER THE BLANKETS! At that point, I moved him over into the middle of one of the blankets and then took possession of that blanket. The girls shook all the sand off the other blanket and ATTEMPTED to keep it sand-free…….between the baby and the 3 year, it was a losing battle. I didn’t even try to stop him from loading up my blanket and to be honest, I just didn’t care.

The kids played and played and played and played.

The weather was perfect….warm enough that you could just wear a tank top, but cool and cloudy enough to keep just about everyone else from coming to the beach.

The kids tried to go in the water and the girls went in past their waists…..crazy kids. Josiah went in but decided that he didn’t want to go in, but then fell in and so that was that.

He came up and got a towel from me but from that point on, he was a sandy mess….it was…..AWESOME! sort of….

The kids were playing so nicely together and except for the occasional squabble between Jeremy and Josiah, it was the best couple of hours that we’ve had in a while.

I was able to just sit and then every once in a while retrieve Judah and bring him back to the blanket….and then he’d start crawling back towards the water again stopping every now and then to pick up some random object and put it in his mouth.

The kids splashed in the water, made a sand wall, dug a hole, buried Jeremy, and played on the playground. We ate lunch and had snacks and went to the bathroom and the only mildly upsetting time was when we lost Josiah for about 90 seconds. He had come back with me (from the bathroom) and was right behind me. I guess, when we walked over the cement wall and onto the beach, he stayed on the wall and walked back along it towards the bathroom. I made it back to the blanket (which was about 10 feet away) and sat down. Talk to the girls about how the baby was when I was gone, turned around and Siah was gone…..Xani and I ran around like chickens with our heads cut off and fortunately, the lady next to us spotted him on the wall back by the bathrooms…..I had a short little chat with him and after that, he stayed pretty close.

The biggest downside to the day was when Jeremy decided to not feel well about an hour before we had planned to come home. He was complaining of a headache and an upset tummy and stopped playing, wrapped his head in a towel and lay down on the blanket. Then he wanted to go and sit in the van and was moaning loudly about needing to barf.

After that, We packed up pretty quickly and headed home….unfortunately, the traffic was just starting and we had about an hour and a half drive from West Vancouver back to Langley. FORTUNATELY, Jeremy slept the whole way home and that seemed to help a little. He never did end up barfing (Thank God!) and by the next day he was 100%, so who knows what his issue was????

It was an awesome day and we will definitely be headed back there before the summer is over.

If you’re interested, you can see all of my photos from our Ambleside Adventure by clicking here!

Round Up

So, I have a few photos and videos to share with you….and so I thought I’d try to throw together a montage….or basically just a list of pictures and videos with some (less than) witty banter kinda wrapped around it…..

Last Sunday, my brother Tim and my sweet nephew Max popped over for a quick visit….Max is just SO darling and he’s smiling and coo’ing up a storm. He is just one of the most darling little men in my life.

Earlier in the week…..like possibly on Monday or Tuesday, Jon and I took the kids for a walk and when we got to the boardwalk there were young owls up in the trees. It was SO cool to see them so close. They were screeching if they felt scared and we tried to be as quiet and respectful as possible, but between Jeremy and Josiah…..we weren’t as quiet as I’d have liked to be….

I think that it was Wednesday that Jack came over for a quick visit while Debbie ran some errands. Judah and him were having so much fun pulling the diaper wipes out of the container. They just kept coming and coming and coming…

On Thursday, the boys and I went for a walk. We go for walks to entertain the boys, to wear them out, to keep them from destroying the house……and to keep me from getting any fatter…..

Just across the bridge, on the path close to our house I came across these mushrooms. Aren’t they cool looking? Anyone have any idea what kind they are? We didn’t touch them, but they were too pretty to not take a picture of!

We live in one of the most beautiful places, don’t we? This is literally 5 mins from my door. I LOVE British Columbia!

We went to one of the many parks around our house and I watched Josiah climb this thing over and over and over. Every time he did it, I would panic a little (after all he’s only 3), but this kid is part goat (ha ha ha) and has been climbing since he was very little and hardly EVER falls….and so I try not to freak out and wrap him in bubble wrap and keep him tied into the buggy sitting beside me….

I forgot to put shoes on Judah and he was going all howler monkey on me at being stuck in the stroller and so I just let him play in the rocks……

Those rocks…….GROSS! Judah was FILTHY when I picked him up to walk back home. He looked like he was a powdered doughnut….only covered in dirt and dust and who knows what other filth. So disgusting! But he enjoyed himself and that’s what’s important, right???? I’m still not so sure of that, but oh well!

I also find that the days we go out for walks….the kids sleep SO MUCH BETTER! Case in point…..

We had sat down to watch a quick video before bedtime and within 5 minutes of snuggling with daddy he was GONE! I love it when bedtime is that easy.

On Friday, my brother came over to finish my hallways and stairs, and Daisy and Max came for a quick visit too….I love sleeping babies….probably because mine hardly ever sleeps…..

and with that…..we’re finished this session of Round Up!

Ponder Park Adventure

Yesterday morning, Jon and Geli had to be at BC Children’s Hospital at 8am…..this meant they had to leave our house at 6:30am……YUCK!!

We (Myself, Xandra, Jeremy, Siah and Judah) packed up and headed out to my sister’s house. They’ve just bought an acreage and it’s an unbelievably gorgeous piece of property and when they are done remodeling…it’s going to be an even more amazing home!

We decided to walk the pipeline in the park close to their house and if all went well, we should end up at a little creek where the kids could puddle around for a little bit.

Neither Debbie nor I had ever done this exact “walk” and yet we decided to take 5 children and one double runner stroller…..I’m not exactly certain what we were thinking and yet off we went.

We reached the park and then headed down the path. There were SO MANY berries and the kids were in heaven picking and eating…the huckleberries and salmon berries were delicious. We reached a fork in the road and veered to the right and headed into the tall grass. After about 2 minutes, we reached the pipeline.

By this point we were 4×4’ing with the buggy and I was just glad that it was a jogging stroller because there was not way that a regular stroller would have handled the grass or the uneven ground. As we looked ahead, we saw a hill sloping downward….

That hill sloping away from me…..that the kids are running down…..that was just the small hill….it got worse, much worse!

There was a second much steeper hill, that I never ended up getting a picture of, because it required both Debbie and myself to hold to buggy. At one point, I looked up the hil behind us and commented on the whole “if we are going down we are gonna have to go back up and how bad that was gonna suck” business! But, we could see the creek and we were so close and so we carried on.

Of COURSE we wore appropriate foot wear……

Here we are at the bottom of the hill. The boys laughed and giggled the whole way down the hill….

Jeremy was the first one to get in the creek and everyone else followed quickly after. The water was FREEZING!!!!! Like, actual pain, hurt your feet freezing, but the little babies, didn’t seem to care…they just wanted to get into the water and to play with the mud…

This little one was more interested in balancing on the rocks and trees than actually getting into the water…..at one point he fell and scratched his leg and then showed me the scratch and told me that the fish had bitten him….it was pretty cute.

Diesel (the dog) was so funny. She kept sticking her head completely under the water and picking up rocks that were bigger than grapefruits and pulling them out of the water….at one point Jack decided to throw her a stick…

So of course he had to pick up the largest stick the he could find…..

He is just SO CUTE, isn’t he?

The littlest boys were in HEAVEN playing in the mud…..

Judah would FLIP OUT anytime I tried to remove him from the mud. This is the little boy who will settle instantly if you take him outside or put him in a bath….this combines the best of both….outside and in the water….

The creek is in the bottom of a…….valley? There are two steep grassy hills on either side of the creek. This is the hill of the other side of the creek – the side we did not walk up or down…purdy, ain’t it?

Here is shot of the creek……this is such a pretty, pretty area.

We stopped playing long enough to have quick snack break….those dairy-free, gluten-free oreo type cookies are sure delicious and the extra sand and mud makes them even more delicious….

Then we packed everything up and took a look up the hill….here is a god shot of it….can you see Josiah in the bottom left corner….yah, it was pretty huge. And after this hill……there is a second one to climb…

We started out with both Debbie and I pushing the buggy together and that worked for a bit, but then it got difficult and Judah started screaming and the wheels kept turning around and wouldn’t lock still and I got tired and Debbie ended up wrapping the dog leash around the front bar on the buggy and pulling while I pushed….We had many rest breaks and at the top of that hill that I showed you….Josiah sat down and refused to go any further.

On the trip up the first hill, he had been hanging off my back pockets and the buggy and whatever else he could find to get some help to get up the big hill and he was officially POOPED! I didn’t blame him and yet we were already pushing 50 pounds of baby up the hill added on top of the buggy and I didn’t need to carry another 40 pounds of Siah on top of that.

Aunty Debbie lured him up the second hill with promises of a piggy back ride once we reached the top….and HE MADE IT.

We finally made it back to Debbie’s house and had some lunch and then packed everyone up to head home.

On the way home, my little man fell asleep. He climbed the hill, but the hill won!

I tried for about 5 minutes to get him to wake up and that was not happening. He was SO tired! And so I let him sleep.

It was a great adventure but I don’t think we’ll be taking the buggy back down to the creek any time soon…or ya know…like EVER!

You can see more pictures from our great adventure here!

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