Snow day

Today was a snow day, the first of the season. I was going to be off with Lucy anyways, so what's another 2 kids.

Things are generally good. A close friend at work has decided to leave the GoC. Lucy is super cute with her songs and piggy tails. Alice continues to be sharp as a whip in grade 2. Isaac is getting used to JK but with the long days, at the end he's Just Done™. Laura continues to be super awesome.

With the weather getting colder, we're not biking anymore. I was hoping to be taking the LRT by now, but it doesn't look like it will be operational until it's almost biking weather again. Biking continues to be the fastest way in and out of downtown compared to driving or bus.

I wish that I was blogging more, but usually by the time the kids are in bed and all the stuff that we need to get done is finished (or not even that), I'm just so, so done and I wouldn't be able to write anything coherent. Isaac is generally sleeping much better and staying in his room all night. Lucy... well, so either makes her way into our bed at 11, 1, 3 or some other random time. Sleeping in our house isn't smooth yet, but it's getting there. It's a long road.

I'm just going to sit here on the couch a little longer while the instant pot cooks dinner, the snow gently falls, and I sneakily eat stolen kids Halloween candy. nom nom nom...

A great date

The other night we went out for a date. Laura has been making sure that we go about once a month, for sanity, for marriage maintenance, for a chance to eat our own meal without cutting up someone else. It has been good.

The other night we went out to the tavern on the falls (by bike of course). It was lovely and we had a nice time. The view is great and as the temperature turned cooler, they offered blankets. Nice touch.

Lovely sunset

Lovely company

We thought that there was something to do with lights on Parliament, so when we were done we moseyed over to the hill and arrived 2 minutes before the show started. It was nice and I was happy we went.

Lovely lightshow

After that we wanted treats (of course) but the coffee shops were mostly closed, the market would have been too busy. We both had a little bit of a cold, and I was tired by this point so I suggested we head home. Know what was on our route home? Yes, the Palestinian Festival and they have treats, so we stopped.

Lovely treats

It seemed that everything just worked out while on that date. Good times.

Cottage Life

We spent some time at the cottage after the long weekend. It was fun and I'm very happy with the moments we had together.

I took Alice out in the back hatch of the kayak and paddled down to twin rocks. I stopped paddling and we drifted close to a loon and her 2 babies. It was the closest I've ever been to a loon - I could see the spots on it's back without my glasses. She dove under us and swam to the opposite side from her babies and called to draw us away. We carefully headed away and then I went out with Lucy sitting with me. I kept us much, much farther away but the mom did the same trick again. Lucy was very happy to see the "baby balloons".

Another time the 5 of use paddled over to "poopy island" and went exploring there. Another time we all went out in kayaks to the swamp. Lucy was with Laura and Lucy feel asleep right away. Alice cried and didn't want to paddle so she held onto the big red kayak and I towed / dragged her kayak all the way down the lake. At the end she was paddling so quickly I had trouble catching up with her.

One of the nights Laura and I went out and lay down on the dock to look up at the shooting stars. We watched the milky way and the huge lightening off to the east. We were brave with the sounds of the dangerous carnivorous squirls that were hunting us (spoiler: we got away). I miss the stars. I wish that we could often go outside and just look up at the wonder that is all around us.

We spent a lot of time swimming, jumping off the dock (not Isaac or Lucy). Alice jumps with reckless abandon and is so good with all the kids - "Oh look, there are fishies!". Isaac "jumped" off the lowest rung of the ladder which is a big improvement over not going in the water at all. Lucy had a good time in the water but insisted that she wore her lego crocs. When she would get in, she'd say "I did it!" with immense pride.

It was a good time.

Just floating along

Constantly on the lookout for more fishies

It's all about the form. Grace, beauty, huge splash. She's got it all.

Kayak passengers are best passengers.

The Western Fleet. Alt title: 5 people, 3 kayaks.

Mr Smiles.

Showing grandma the frogs they caught.

Uncle Phil and Isaac in perfect form.

Similarities and Differences

I love watching the kids and seeing how they react to things. How they view the differently from their siblings and how they might view them the same.

Alice keeps surprising me with how smart and clever she is. Not like book smart (even though she may be that as well), but how she can figure out things with only the barest of clues. How she can separate truth from fiction. She's going to be a hard one to fool with magic tricks. She loves cuddles, but on her own terms. During a cuddle you're likely to get a flailing elbow or foot to your face.

Isaac has clearer cause / effect feelings and actions. He needs his cuddles, his attention. When he doesn't get them he physically hurts someone or something. I've got a lot of things that I need to glue together. He'll say "You look beautiful today" to anyone and means it. The moment we're out of eyesight of Laura, or even before, he'll say how he misses her very much. However he can also drive me nuts. Example: the other day he snuck inside the neighbours unoccupied and unlocked house. I thought that he was there but he wouldn't come when I called. He was hiding under the 7yo's blankets in bed. That was a wasted 35 minutes. shakes fist at sky

Lucy is a happy child but is very vocal if she's protecting something or wants something. She'll give a running hug like her big brother. She's sporty like Isaac too. She loves shoes and clothes like Alice. She's a tidy baby and doesn't want things to be a "mess". She'll try to collapse my windpipe while I'm trying to get her to sleep just to make sure that I remember who's boss. Unlike her siblings, when I make a hand puppet she looks at my face rather than my hand.

They are all a joy. They are all different.
And they have a plan.

(wait, is that the children that have a plan or the cylons?)

How to cleanly uninstall older versions of Java on Mac

I never remember how to do this, so I'm linking to the excellent blogpost of How to cleanly uninstall older versions of Java on Mac

Eye-gack!

Lucy is at that super cute stage where she can sort of say some words, but they of course aren't correct. Not yet. She will walk around calling for Isaac and it sounds like "Eye-gack!". She calls me "da-dee". Alice is "ah-la" or similar. Mommy of course is quite clear.

Cute times.

Daddy daughter day

On Monday there was no school and no work for me. Things 2 and 3 had daycare and Laura had work so we had a Alice and daddy day. Originally I had planned to take Alice up to the bus and act surprised when the bus didn't show up, but she was getting quite distressed that she didn't have a lunch made so I stopped that. A joke is fun, but distress is bad.

We biked over to Canadian Tire (the kids favourite place to go to for some reason) and did a little shopping. Got her some new special biking gloves. Then over to the mall for coffee, juice, and cookies before seeing Coco. Alice held my hand or was hanging off my side the entire movie. Pixar knows how to tug on the heart strings. After that we had a special time where she got lunch at the mall. For some strange reason I wasn't hungry).

While she was eating her lunch, she was studying people. I was just watching her eyes. I think that I could lose days staring at my kids eyes.

We came home. Played lego spaceships. I watched her play more. Then she went over to play with the neighbour for a bit.

It was a good day.

The Greatest Things

I feel that I've been successful at work. I think that I've done Good Things™. Things that I've been proud to have done and have others use to make their (work) lives easier and a bit better.

I come home and look at the messy house, the stuff I have to clean off of the picture frames / walls in the kitchen, the stains that I don't think I'll ever get out, the piles of unwashed or washed and unfolded laundry, and the drywall that needs to be repaired in many places.

I look at my kids.

They are the thing that I'm most proud of. The thing that I'm happiest to have played a part in. I feel that raising our kids will be my greatest work, my magnum opus.

I smile as I settle into a couch cushion on the floor surrounded by drifts of toys.

Smiles

I'm very lucky, I have a digital picture frame on my desk at work. It makes me smile a dozen times a day. I really am happy with our family, even if there are rough patches.

Patches being lack of sleep, or doing so much for The Littles. The other day I left work at 4 pm, picked up the younger 2, went home, got dinner, the nighbours dropped off Alice (thank FSM for that), got them fed, brushed, storied, and eventually in bed around 9 pm. When the kids are older, what else am I going to do with that 5 hour window? Unfortunately this usually means by 9:30 pm rolls around my brain is just so dead that I can't do creative things like blogging. I miss blogging. I miss documenting the little things that the kids do to make me smile. But I know that this will come back. It's just a bit of a slog until then.

But do you know what you can do with the kids when it's a tough slog? Cuddle them. Race them. Tickle, dance, hug away their tears, play I-spy, hop on 1 foot, talk about Spider-Man, watch them discover things for the first time, help them learn. In other words it's not all bad.

I'm extremely lucky with how much time I can spend with the kids and Laura. It doesn't seem fair in the world. It's not. But I'll still take it.

Now to end this to see if I can help a crying toddler.

New level, sort of like the last

Today I signed the paperwork for me going from an acting position to it being permanent. I'm very glad that people like what I do enough to think that I can do more. I think that I could do a lot more too, but like everything in government right now that is tied to the unmovable mountain of SSC. I've got plans, but at this point it looks like people much higher in the chain can't move them either. So it's not me and I can rest easy that it's not a personal failure.

This position feels like a unicorn that I found eating carrots in my vegetable garden, while realizing that I never planted a vegetable garden.

I try to work well. I think that I do. I'm told that I do.

It's nice that this has happened. It's nice to feel that people are happy with my work.