Saturday, December 06, 2008

it's december?!?

so big change: we are moving. our time of living in-house with ben and jen is coming to close. this is a sad event that i suppose needed to happen eventually, only it has arrived a little quicker than foreseen. Ry has been feeling the weight of his almost daily commute to St Paul for homework, school time and work. A lot of what we do centers in St Paul and so we've decided to locate ourselves there. We are excited to have a place of our own, as well as the prospect of not relying on our car for daily life. There is a park, grocery store, beautiful walking street, window-shopping shops, Ry's university, Ry's coffee shop (2nd home), and many friends are all within walking distance! Our apartment, in a 5-plex, is on the upper level which will take some time to adjust to, but owen loves the steps. We'll have 2 bedrooms and a small office so Ry can a paper-writing place to call his own (also will function as a room for guests;). Oh, and the bathroom has a heated floor and a claw foot tub! It's a beautiful apartment though it needs a little love, like a fresh coat of paint, and some good decorating (erin is helping me here).

and so, this advent season is a little more stressed than usual. Stressed is the wrong word. I would like to be able to take care of all details about the apartment now, and have all things I need to do before we leave for ontario DONE however that is not possible. So, I am making myself feel stress while there actually aren't the circumstances. Oh well. I will putter away at what i can control and be content with that. we move into our apartment the day after our flight back from ontario so we plan to be packed before we leave. we'll see if that happens...

ry is writing and writing and writing his final papers. we leave for Christmas in Ontario on dec 16 and we've decided that he really must be done this semester's class work by that point because there is no way he will have time while we're away.

Come the new year, I will pick up a third day at work. This feels fine at this point; i certainly have been spoiled to only need to work 2 days. But with having our own apartment comes more financial need. And so I will work one more day. Also: Sandy now works at my office! yay! and so, my job is sandy-erin pleasant. perfect.

owen has been doing well with this whole cold-weather thing. i wasn't sure if he would be okay to staying inside more (he spent SOO much time outside while it was warm), but he's been doing fine. Also, he really loves playing outside in the cold. He also is a-okay wearing mits, tuque, and boots. He actually loves his boots (i think this is partly because boots = outside). He rides his bike outside, though i do see this option coming to an end soon, as we just got a little dump of snow last night. Parks are still fun for him, even though he slips around on the ice and snow and his arms and legs are more padded and thus harder to maneuver and control. But he just wants to play play play.


We drove to Winnipeg one weekend, to visit Steph. It was a good time, and a lot road time. Lucky for us, owen is a good traveler.




my apple pie




cozy & enjoyable thanksgiving (US)


Tuesday, October 21, 2008

autumn

a few random photos from the past while. our autumn has been fun, full of lots of adventures outside, birthdays, visiting friends, and good time spent at home.

He LOVES parks, especially slides.





When Ry was a boy, he had a teepee, his size, to play with. That has now been passed on to Owen, who mainly uses it now to put his new teddy down for night night. This process involves whispering and tucking in with is blankie.








Owen is in love with apples; he eats them whole, and down to the core. Also, raw carrots and cucumbers are a favorite. The carrots must be raw, though. Cooked vegetable (unless pureed) are not okay.

Owen's birthday was on October 8th. He really enjoyed opening the present we gave to him.


Turning TWO seems to have made some changes in Owen's disposition. He's way more outgoing, and he has times of serious craziness. He has an easier time being with other people when we are not around.

This video is an example of his craziness. he did this about 10 times, until i made him stop. I was afraid of him smashing his nose, or breaking a limb.

Saturday, October 18, 2008

The Slide

Owen is obsessed with this video! He asks to watch it all the time. Not kidding. And when he watches it, it's not just once, but as many times as we will allow. He smiles at the same spots in the video every time he watches it. It's hilarious.

Thursday, September 25, 2008

a whirlwind september

What a month this has been! It was kicked off by the rouleau's staying with us for a while. That was a treat! It was amazing to be able to relax and just spend time together. A couple days after they left, I say goodbye to Owen and Ry, and flew to France. I was away for 8 days, helping my boss put on a workshop. It was a good experience, and super enjoyable to have personal relationships become a part of my job (rather than it just being me and the copier). Erin was there with me, and we had a lot of fun together. Her fiance, ben, came on the scene at the end of the week, and we had good time with him and exploring the beautiful city of Beaune. On the final day of the conference, a sinus cold settled in on me; i felt terrible, but i was so grateful that the cold held off until my work was over. the next day i flew home. And WOW was it ever wonderful to be with ry and owen again! I missed them so. But we weren't home for long! We all hoped on a plane in a couple of days, to fly to St Stephen for a week. It was really great to be with our friends there. We miss it out there! We never made it to ocean, but we were able to reconnect with a lot of people, as well as see some of what we love about New Brunswick. Now it is the last week of September. My job for the week is done, and Ry has some hours to put in tomorrow, but then we'll be able to relax. It is so nice to go through mail and paperwork here and feel organized again. Travel is fun, but i certainly do feel scattered around and thinly spread at the end of it all.
Our church retreat is this weekend, but we're only going for one day. We are excited to get to know more people at our church; it's a slow processes, getting acquainted and establish relationship, but there are amazing young families that we foresee future friendship.






Here are some photos from my time in Beaune, France:





Here was our 'station', the "SCC Initiation Workshop" registration desk.



One of the reasons that I'm happy to be home:

Monday, September 08, 2008

vive la france

well i am currently sitting at my registration desk at the mercure hotel, in beaune, france. i thought I would take some time (now that i finally have some!) to post some pictures and to write about my time thus far.



We departed Minneapolis at 3pm on Friday. There is a 7 hour time difference with France, it is earlier here, as it is East and the sun rises on French ground before Minnesota. So we basically flew and fastforwarded time so instead of landing at 11pm, we landed at 6am. We had planned to sleep on the plane so we'd 'wake refreshed' and ready to play in Paris. Well, we didn't sleep on the plane. Our little France jaunt was fun because we were in Paris and we stopped and the Louvre, walked along Rivere Seine, and we could the see the Eiffel Tower close by. Our TGV (fast train) ride into Beaune from Paris was 2 hours, and finally arrived at our hotel at 7pm. We met up with the other meeting organizers for supper at 9pm and we got into bed at 11. It was a super long long day(s), so we slept hard that night. On Sunday we put in a 13 hour day. And yet, with all that said we could not, for the life of us, fall asleep. We were up until 5:30 am. no joke. We slept in, didn't hear the alarm at all, and woke up to Roger's phone call. He was wondering where we were. We shot out of bed so fast and got into work mode but have felt crazy all day. But we're in good spirits. Tonight is a 'free' night, meaning there are no evening events planned. We aren't going out for supper, but we're going grocery shopping to bring some food and wine to our hotel room. We'll watch a movie and call it an early night. We're excited to have a quiet night. and HOPEFULLY sleep. I'm afraid that we're going to get sick, with all this sleep-loss.

Our spirits are high though our sleep levels are low. We miss our families like CRAZY but we have each other.

So I'll leave you with pictures of Paris.













Thursday, August 07, 2008

he can see!

well, we decided the barrette and top-of-the-head pony tail were too confusing for people. I'd been asked, "oh, who is that?" by neighbors that would see owen all the time. Apparently when just wearing a diaper and barrette his looks change drastically and he's not recognizable.

Anyway. I cut his hair. He looks so grown up now! i can hardly believe it. Here he is!






In other news, we're super excited to get ourselves to Ontario. We'll soak up the family time, farm time, and from the sounds of it, some lake-front time. We leave Friday evening, with Daryl and Sandy, and we'll drive drive drive. We're stopping for breakfast at Mike and Brenda's - it will be great to see where they live, and to visit for a wee while. And so, I just have to get through another day of office work. woop woop!

Friday, August 01, 2008

see ya later oldie



dear old trusty car:
you served us well, taking us from minnesota to new brunswick to nova scotia to ontario. you drove so well, but now your final days have been set.

and so we've retired you from our family and now drive:



We love our new car, it's an upgrade and is 10 years new rather than 17. we just bought the car yesterday and so far i've driven it to work, and we took it to cannon falls. it's a beauty and it drives great!*


Tonight we tried to take a couple pictures together. owen was NOT into it. so this is what came out. some good ones, but keep in mind i've kept off the 8 that were terrible.


Tuesday, July 22, 2008

it's a garden day

owen has been IN LOVE with playing outside. i have no problem with this. today was a beautiful morning, though i can feel it's going to be a scorcher soon.

we have a screen door that leads to our outside step. owen always pushes on the screen, and he's pushed so much that there's now a portion of the bottom part of the screen that is not attached to the door. anyway, this is owen's drop-spot. he likes to pass things through this little hole; his cars, his water, his little yarn ball, etc.


owen and i like to sit on the steps together. he usually will take my hand, from where ever i am, and have me sit here with him.


and, since it was such a lovely day, i decided to photograph some of our garden.