FaceTime’ing with Dad last weekend

My boy is feeling better today. Hooray! He went a couple days last week with a high fever, eating nothing, just nursing. He whimpered and he was extremely snuggly and sensitive. If someone looked the wrong way at him, he cried. Today is better. He’s eating again and he only cried when his buddy Kesler came near him. My boy has a big personal bubble.

Both girls had Friday off from school. Liliana always has Fridays off, but Kaylie had it off for … something. It seems as though she has at least one day a week off. It sure didn’t feel like, when I was a kid, we had as many days off as she has. Usually on days I don’t have to leave the house, we have a pajama day and don’t do much. This past Friday, however, my friend Chris suggested we hang out and since her son Nathanael (Liliana’s four-year-old friend) was coming with her, I let Kaylie have a play date, too. (Is it still called a play date when kids are 10-going-on-11?)

I’m not really a fan of play dates. I mean, having kids over when their parents are also over is fine, but the kids of people I don’t know? School friends and such? Not a fan. I just … I don’t know what it is. I’d just rather avoid them. Because, as Liliana always tells me, I’m a bad parent. But, I’d rather Kaylie have a friend over than have her go to a place where I don’t know the parents (and I don’t like meeting parents)(I HAVE ISSUES, OKAY?).

Chris and I spent the day baking, and you’d think we’d have had a lot to show by the end of the day, but I ate six muffins and the brownies kind of disappeared and the cookies were just really tasty. It’s all gone already, is what I’m saying. It’s a good thing I made that coffee cake yesterday so I’d have something to eat for breakfast today.

Noah suggested that Chris and I have a girls’ night, so we did. Chris’s husband came for dinner and then took their son home, Noah went to hang out with his mom (and subject her to Centre Ice hockey), and the three of us (I let Kaylie stay up) watched Runaway Bride and ate popcorn and chocolate. Oh, and I fell asleep and stayed asleep through most of the movie. Whoops.

Saturday morning was the usual gymnastics/ballet/Tim Hortons (it kills me that there is no apostrophe in Tim Hortons)(related: I have issues) shenanigans and after lunch we headed to my favorite one-year-old boy’s birthday party. I didn’t pay too much attention to the address on the FB invite and just assumed it was at Kesler’s house. Except nobody was there. So I checked the invite, apologized to my family, and typed the address into google maps. I forgot to put in a teeny tiny letter and we ended up at the wrong house. Again. Whoops. So this time I double AND TRIPLE checked that I had the address right and we showed up at the party an hour late. But we were right on time for cake, so I’ll call it a WIN.

Mr. Kesler will have to share the title of favorite one-year-old boy in 16 days (!!!), so we had to celebrate. Kesler downed his birthday cupcake in record time. It was quite awesome to watch. Especially since I didn’t have to clean him up.

Oh, and Saturday was also the first day of the spring run of 7 Days.

I missed the winter run, so I was looking forward to this one. And here’s Sunday’s shot:

Sunday I went for my first run in three weeks. I let my head/neck/shoulder pain take over the last couple weeks, but through the magic of muscle relaxants, I could finally move again. Woot. It always takes me forever to get my butt out the door to go running. I’m a professional staller/procrastinator. And I’m quite lazy. But, when I get back, I’m always glad I went. And then I fall down dead in my couch groove from the overabundance of physical activity.

We have dinner at the in-laws with Taygan every Sunday evening, and since Sue had just gotten back from vacation a couple days before, we had her, Taygan, and Andrew at our place instead, which means that we had people for dinner twice in three days, which is very weird for us hermits. It gave me an excuse to cook, though, which was quite nice because I haven’t been doing much of that lately.

It’s weird how time just disappears. Every time I turn my back, it’s the weekend again (which is not a bad thing) and then it’s Monday and then the end of March and then HOLY CRAP MY BABY IS ALMOST ONE. I’m way behind on blog reading (sorry about that), there are a bazillion shows piled up on our DVR, and there is some shrimp in my fridge that should really be thrown out already. And both Noah and I went to bed at 8:30 last night. Well, he fell asleep on the couch until 2am and I went to bed intending to go to sleep but fell down a Facebook wormhole and then couldn’t sleep until almost midnight. Lame.

Am I caught up now? Oh, right, here’s my Canadian Family post from last Thursday. It’s about thermometers. Alrighty. I think that’s it now.

Happy Monday!

Thanks for all the book recommendations the other day. My book list is growing and I’m looking forward to getting to all the ones you suggested. We went to the library yesterday and I paid my $36 in fines. Yes, you read that right, because one of my kids decided to lose a book and do you know what happens when you lose a book? You have to pay double the retail price. Or that’s what I’m thinking anyway, because how can a kid’s book cost $36?!

***

I think I briefly mentioned something about having two babies starting in March (oh, here it is). I had to do something sucky a couple weeks ago. I quit my job. And then I quit another one. And another one. And another one. (That was FOUR, if you lost count.) I didn’t do it because I didn’t like my job(s). I really enjoyed all of them.

I shook the entire day that I distributed resignation letters. I felt like I was letting people down. When I left for my mat leave, I told everyone that my plan was to return, but I didn’t give any absolutes. Secretly I hoped that I wouldn’t be returning, because I really, really wanted to be able to stay home with my yet-to-be-born baby and his sisters. The girls were so excited when I was done work and I was so excited to pick Liliana up from daycare on the last day. Her daycare was less than stellar and I hated dropping her off.

The thing is, though, like I said, I really liked my jobs. I enjoyed working. I had four great bosses, awesome colleagues, and great hours. My job situation(s) could not have been better. But, I started stressing about daycare the moment I started my mat leave. I looked around, I called about 20 daycare centres, I looked on kijiji, I looked in the paper, I asked friends, I asked on Facebook. Nothing. Either the place sounded sketchy or they were full with a long waiting list. I asked about rates, and after doing the math — paying for two kids in full-time care and one kid in after-school care — I realized we’d just be breaking even. It wasn’t worth it financially for me to go back. The tiny bit that I would bring home after paying for daycare was not worth the stress/anxiety of having to be away from Preston and Liliana. (Kaylie loves school and loved her school’s after-school program, so I didn’t worry about her.)

So, I get to stay home. Between freelance writing and looking after a friend’s baby (20 days older than Preston)(they are hilarious together, those two), I’ll make as much as I do right now from maternity benefits, so financially it will be fine. It was such a huge load off my shoulders when this decision was made and I am looking forward to this year so much more now.

***

Russ has shown this music video in church a couple times, and again this past Sunday. I love it. It challenges me and makes me think about what more I could be doing for those less fortunate.

click here if you cannot see the video

***

Kaylie didn’t want to go to school this morning. I made her go anyway. Is that mean? I’m hoping they talk about the gun incident last Thursday, and the importance of NOT bringing guns to school. You’d think it was a given, right? Apparently they’ve been having lockdown drills, but when an actual gun went off they … did nothing. Am I wrong to be angry about this? Maybe I’m just overprotective? Expecting too much? I’m forcing myself not to think about it today.

***

There is an intersection near our house that changed a couple months ago. Whereas the stop signs used to be facing north/south, they now face east/west and for some reason, even though I drive through this intersection every day, I usually still stop where there used to be a stop sign and I feel very uneasy if I go right through the intersection without stopping. Is this weird? Is this stupid? Did I even have to write this? Am I boring you to death with the mundane? I should just go back to my book and stop bothering you?

Kaylie and I barely made it home on time, but with 15 minutes to spare, we did make it. She went right to bed, and I got ready for bed and walked into the living room as the clock struck midnight. Noah was there with his egg nog, ready to press play on the first Christmas song of the year. I went to bed, much to his dismay. He’d wanted me to stay up and decorate with him, but midnight was already three hours past my 9pm bedtime and I was exhausted after spending 3.5 hours in the ER with Kaylie.

Over the following days and the weekend, we unpacked all the Christmas boxes and put up most of the decorations. The girls were stoked to decorate their rooms.

The last thing we did was put up the tree. We put up our fake tree, much to Noah’s disgust. We wouldn’t be able to get a real one for another week at least, and he didn’t want to wait that long. The more Christmas for Mr. Christmas the betterer. Noah did most of the other decorating, but left the tree to me and the girls.

Noah’s favorite part is the village. He set it up last year, but likes it better when I do it. I was a grinchy grinch last year, so he did it himself, but this year he said I was in charge of it.

Preston has already rolled/backed himself into the Christmas tree and tried to pull it down on himself.

I’ve been in a bah humbug-type mood about Christmas thus far. Kind of like a what’s the point? about the tree and the decorating and the gifts and the baking. Christmas is a celebration of Jesus’ birth, so what does Santa Claus have to do with it? I’m bringing you down, aren’t I? Sorry about that, I’ve just been in Liliana mode — questioning everything. I try to keep most of it to myself, as Christmas is Noah’s VERY favorite time of year and I don’t want to ruin it for him.

The lights, though, aren’t they pretty?!

Saturday mid-morning was when things went downhill again. I got back from the breakfast with Shona and had to take the girls to gymnastics and ballet. I was exhausted and was feeling kind of off. I sat near the washroom during Liliana’s ballet, but it wasn’t until we were walking back to the car that it finally hit me. We walked past a certain fast-food chain and I had to hurry Liliana across the parking lot so that I could make it to the bushes. It’s a good thing she isn’t bothered by seeing my breakfast backward.

I spent the rest of Saturday either in bed or in the bathroom, but I was thankful that (a) the kids hadn’t had it near this bad, (b) I got sick on a weekend when Noah was home to take over, and (c) I got sick (two days) after our Thanksgiving dinner, so I could partake in it. Gravy, people. GRAVY. I’m pretty sure that for me it was more like food poisoning rather than a stomach virus. I won’t tell you why I think that, because I want you to like me, not curse my name.

On Sunday, everything stayed down (although some things were still going down too fast) (ha!) (you’re welcome) (and sorry) and I lived off Powerade. I was thirsty. I had to supplement Preston with my freezer stash of milk on Saturday, as I was quite low on fluids, but by Sunday I was good to go.

Today is the first Monday this month that nobody has had to be at the hospital at daybreak for surgery, nobody is puking, and everybody is seemingly healthy. Kaylie is home this morning, but I’m not too sure if she’s sick or “sick”. She says she doesn’t feel well and has a headache, but she has a hearty appetite and only has a slight fever. I’m giving her the benefit of the doubt, but she seems a little more concerned about watching Netflix than anything else. (Are you done with the computer yet? Can I watch it on your iPhone? Can I watch TV on the couch?)

At her age, I’ve started to get skeptical, as I often faked sick to get out of going to church and school around the same time (sorry mom and dad) and I’m not seeing much proof of the sick. She loves school and most often can’t wait to go, but sometimes girls are sensitive and friendships and bullies can make life quite difficult. I went home “sick” from school for those reasons a number of times. (I’ve never, ever called in “sick” to work, just so you know.) (Not that you asked, but I’m defensive, so THIS IS WHAT I DO.)

I have no witty way to end this post, so I’m going to leave you with two of my favorite Instagrams from the weekend. Happy Monday, y’all.

little man with the sticky uppy hair

bedtime giggles with dad

Both girls expressed interest in fall activities. Kaylie really wanted to do gymnastics again (she did it when she was six or so) and Liliana really wanted to dance.

Kids activities are stupid expensive, but we made it work. I knew I wouldn’t be able to handle having a bazillion kid activities on a bazillion nights a week, so I made sure both were on Saturday, at the same time. It works out quite great – Noah stays home and watches football with Preston while I take the girls to their girly activities. They’re loving it.

As quickly as the leaves appeared this spring, they disappeared this fall. One day all the trees were green, the next the leaves were orange and falling.

Liliana informed me that she can’t wait until winter because she wants to make snow angels in the snow, instead of leaf angels in the leaves. I will soon disown her and Noah for talking about winter and Christmas before I am ready for either.

I wanted to get some photos of the kids in the leaves, so Noah raked up all the leaves in the front yard for me. He’d just raked up all the leaves a couple days before, but that weekend they fell in such abundance, that it had to be done again anyway.

Preston thought the leaves were pretty much the tastiest things he’d ever eaten. And ladybugs are full of protein, right?

Kaylie told me the other day that she likes the outdoors, she just doesn’t like to be in in the outdoors. The exception, of course, is when Noah (or I) is out with her.

In other news, I need to learn how to take action shots. I kind of suck at them.

I know this is a lot of photos to throw at you, but I knew you wouldn’t mind.

And, with that, I think I’m caught up.

Phew.

Master Preston is quite surprised that he was the cause of my lack of blogging. He wasn’t aware I did anything besides care for him. Well, little guy, there isn’t anything I’d rather do, but I’ve got to do something while you’re sleeping!

With all this drama about my photo computer crashing and my lack of Photoshop, my photos went unedited for a couple months. But! I picked up a $15 card reader and a one month free trial of Elements and now I’m good to go. Now I’d better find my copy of Elements before my trial is up. Wish me luck!

I’m doing some retro blogging here, and posting a bunch of photo from August. What? I want to remember the splash park days when we’re in the middle of the predicted coldest winter in 20 years. I tried to get the girls to the splash park as much as possible this summer, but it still wasn’t as often as I’d have liked. Babies! They steal so much attention!

We had such an amazing, beautiful, sunny summer. It almost made me forget that winter was growing closer every day. I don’t think I’ve enjoyed a summer as much as I did this past one; our winter was long, and I tried to drink every last drop of heat I could.

August seemed to slip by so quickly. Lake visits and play dates and backyard trampoline jumps with the sprinkler and all of a sudden Kaylie started school. Whoosh.

I forgot to tell you this, Bethany, but when I picked up the dottery bowl I painted, the lady said that it was one of her favorite pieces she’d seen in a while.

The quote is from a Firefly episode: Out of Gas (I think).

I had to tell her, though, that the idea was not mine. I told her about you and she showed me a couple pieces that others had done with mine as inspiration. So, my dear friend, your dottery empire is growing by the minute.

Kaylie had been begging me for weeks to make up some magic mud for her.

The stuff that is corn starch mixed with water? It’s pretty much the coolest thing ever. I accidentally added too much water at first, and after I’d added the entire box of corn starch and there was still too much water, I had to let it sit for a couple hours to drain off the excess water before the girls could play with it.

Hours of fun, they had. There was chalky pink goop all over our front steps for a couple weeks, until the rain finally washed it away.

I know there was much more to August than I can remember, but I wasn’t picking up my camera that much at that time and if I don’t have a photo of an event, odds are it will not be remembered. I’m trying to fix that, though. I’ve been attempting to take at least one photo every day. I’m posting them up there to the right, at the top of my sidebar. I’ll probably miss a day or two here and there (like yesterday), but I’ll try not let that bother my perfectionisticness too much. Oh, and speaking of … I haven’t taken my shot for today yet. I’d better get on that.

6:30am wake-up call
Feed Preston
Wake Noah
Make muffins
Have shower
Drive Noah to work
Go back home
Get kids ready for the day
Feed Preston
Drive Kaylie to school
Sign Kaylie up for gymnastics
Drop Noah’s phone off with him
Go back home
Try twice to print forms I need
Fail twice
Feed Preston
Pick up Noah for meeting
Drop younger kids with inlaws
Go to meeting
Pick up younger kids
Drop Noah back off at work
Get gas
Pick Kaylie up from school
Feed Preston
Get a couple groceries
Pick up Noah
Get McD’s drive-thru
Go home for 1/2 hour
Feed Preston
Pick up Kaylie’s friend
Drop Noah, Kaylie, and K’s friend at the church for kids’ club
Sign Liliana up for ballet
HAVE LILIANA YELL AND SCREAM AT ME BECAUSE I WON’T LET HER RUN INTO THE OTHER PEOPLE IN THE MILE-LONG BALLET SIGN-UP LINE AND WHY CAN’T SHE DANCE AND WHY ARE WE JUST SIGNING HER UP BECAUSE SHE WANTS TO DANCE NOW AND WHY WON’T I LET HER PLAY WITH HER FRIEND BECAUSE SHE WANTS TO RUN AND DANCE AND RUN INTO PEOPLE AND I WON’T LET HER DO ANYTHING AND ALL THIS WHILE THE LADY WITH NO TEETH IS TRYING TO TELL ME ABOUT HER TWO-WEEK VACATION SHE IS ABOUT TO GO ON UP NORTH IN AN FOUR-SEATER AIRPLANE AND DID I KNOW THAT HER DAUGHTER HAS NEVER BEEN ON AN AIRPLANE BEFORE AND THAT HER DAUGHTER WAS GOING TO MISS THE FIRST BALLET CLASS AND LILIANA IS STILL SCREAMING AND YELLING AND ALL WITH THE SCREAMING AND YELLING MAKE IT STOP!
Feed Preston
Pick up the trifecta of church people
Drop Kaylie’s friend off
Stop at Safeway to get saline
Go home
Get the kids a bedtime snack
Feed Preston
9:15pm all the kids go to bed
11:00pm my brain finally starts to unwind from the day

Fall, you hit hard and fast, don’t you?

Also in the middle of her pink eye, I had a couple super-fun attacks. Morphine, FTW! I’m having an ERCP on Friday, and hopefully I’ll finally have my cholecystectomy very shortly after that. (I don’t know why it has to be done in two procedures, I just want it OVER WITH.)

In other, more fun news, I (finally) edited photos from the last month – our lake trip and our BC trip. I know, right? IT’S ABOUT TIME. (SORRY FOR THE ALL CAPS.) (IT’S JUST BEEN THAT KIND OF WEEK MONTH.)

The week before we went to BC, my friend Lisa invited a bunch of us out to her cabin for a couple nights. The drive out there was under two hours, a perfect distance for my three goobers.

Before we left, I laid out the ground rules for the trip, one of them being that the girls had to be kind to each other in the car. Liliana replied, “Aren’t we taking the van?”

On our second beach day, Lisa brought the boat out on the water and the girls got to go tubing for the first time. I wasn’t sure how Liliana, the girl who is terrified of running bath water, would handle it. She LOVED it. Tubing with my girls was probably the most fun I’ve ever had with them. Seeing so much joy on their faces totally made my week. As we were flying across the water, Liliana says to me, “Remember that Barbie song, Mama? Queen of the Waves?”

It was a full, loud, incredibly fun couple days. Liliana loves the lake so much. She could play in the sand for hours and hours and hours.

We ate, we played in the sand, we swam in the lake, we played lots of games, and we watched movies late into the night.

We left after lunch on Thursday, as Noah’s sister Talitha was flying in that night and we were really looking forward to seeing her and introducing her to Preston.

But, then my dad called with the news about my Opa and I wanted to get to BC as soon as I could. Noah and I worked out all sorts of scenarios, changed our minds a couple times, and finally Kaylie, Preston, and I took off about 48 hours later.

Our first stop was Alberta, to visit friends we hadn’t seen in about eight years.

Carmen and Bobbie have a daughter Kaylie’s age, and both girls were stoked to play with each other. Most of the friends of C & B and Noah & I have little kids, so Kaylie and Zoe were excited to have someone their own age to hang out with.

Kaylie’s biological dad lives in the same city, so she got to hang out with him as well. He took both girls to a movie and to see Kaylie’s cousin she hadn’t seen in a couple years.

Before the movie, Kaylie and Zoe raced down the slip ‘n slide and had a water fight. It was so, so hot, the cold water was the perfect cure.

I’ve had a lot of women take an instant liking to my baby, but it’s rare to have a guy do it. Carmen snatched up Preston and my arms welcomed the break.

The last time K & Z saw each other, it was 2003 and they were this big:

They’ve grown a bit since then:

Our first day of traveling was a mere six or so hours. The next day, we went all the way to my Opa’s house – a 16-hour trek. I’m an efficient traveler, but we had to stop every two or so hours to feed Preston or get gas or to stop for Kaylie to use the washroom EVEN THOUGH SHE JUST WENT.

My family is huge. Both my parents come from Dutch families of eight. It may look like there are a lot of people in the above shot, but we were still missing at least 10 family members. It was great to see everyone again, even if it was under less-than-ideal circumstances.

On the Tuesday morning, we went up to the cemetery to lay my Opa to rest. Everything was done by the family, with no funeral home involved at all. I’d never seen it done like that before, but it was peaceful and intimate.

I don’t do well with grief or people grieving around me. I guess I don’t know anyone who does do well with it, but it makes me incredibly uncomfortable. I don’t know what to do, how to act, or how to react. I was glad I had Preston with me so I at least had something to focus on. We laid our names in Scrabble tiles on my Opa’s casket before it was lowered into the ground.

I hated driving away. I didn’t like the idea of leaving him there, all by himself. I had to keep reminding myself that he wasn’t there anymore, and that he was in a place so much better than this earth – singing bass in the heavenly choir, cancer-free.

The comic relief was when someone would say something about Tom & Jerry (Opa’s friend and Opa’s nephew) and they’d have to switch to saying Jerry and Tom.

We went down to the cafe for lunch and then across the street to the church for my Opa’s memorial service. It was packed. He’d lived more than 50 years in a small town and he was loved by everyone. There was standing room only. As I stood there, singing hymns and listening to the voices around me, I’d forgotten what a church full of people singing hymns with all their strength sounded like. It was incredibly beautiful and powerful.

I was surprised to see some Terrace people there, who had come to support my mom. It was comforting to see familiar faces, though, in a crowd of people I didn’t know (besides my family members).

My uncle and cousin from my dad’s side came as well.

The cousins spent a lot of time playing Opa games – games he’d taught us and played with us.

And, of course, we (they, not I) played soccer.

We had a bonfire both nights we were there.

What’s that you got there, Erica? The biggest, most gigantic bottle of super-sweet juice-tasting wine I ever did see/taste?

We spent the day after the memorial cleaning out everything from Opa’s house, choosing what we wanted and giving the rest away. It was weird and unsettling. I felt like a greedy vulture. I justified it by telling myself that (a) Opa wasn’t going to need any of his stuff anymore, (b) he didn’t want anything thrown out, and (c) nobody else wanted the things I took home. I’d be perfectly happy if I never had to do anything like that ever again.

When we were done all that needed to be done, I followed my dad to Terrace and stayed there a couple nights.

I was feeling very anti-social and went there primarily to see my grandma.

I also got to see Ann

and Tamara, though,

and Kaylie got to see her friends Kendra (we forgot to take a photo with her),

Michaela,

and Kessa.

I also randomly ran into Debbie and got to chat with her for 2.3 seconds. I wish I’d had more time (and will) to visit with more friends there, but I just didn’t. As soon as the memorial service was over, I just wanted to go home, but I knew I’d regret not making the extra 4-hour round trip to see my Grandma, and I’m so glad I got to see her. She’s an amazing lady and I wish I lived closer to her so I could visit her more often.

I decided to break up the trip home into three instead of two. That 16-hour day was much too long, and I figured that three 8-ish-hour days were much better. I wanted to make the trip as fun for Kaylie as I could, so we spent the first night in a hotel so that she could play in the pool(s).

To make it as cheap as possible, we got a room with just one queen sized bed. It was … squishy. Kaylie had a lot of fun, though, and inserted herself into a game of piggy in the middle as soon as she got into the pool. Introverted my kids are not.

The next morning we had breakfast with our friends Rob, Jodi, Reece, and Morgan. Kaylie and Reece are only weeks apart in age and Jodi babysat Kaylie for the first couple years of her life. She was the most incredible caregiver I could have imagined. It was so good to catch up with them.

We traveled to Edmonton that day and stayed with my Aunt Daisy and Uncle Roy. We had dinner with them and Aunt Yvonne and my cousins Brett and Darcy, Kaylie played a bunch of Wii, and we had grilled cheese and mango for breakfast.

We finally came to the day we were to go home, but before we left, we hung out and had lunch with my friend Jackie. We hadn’t seen each other since before her oldest (7-year-old) son was born.

Apparently I did a lot of catching up with people on this trip. It was nice to have a lot of fun on a trip that also contained a lot of sorrow.

I’d wanted to quickly hit up Ikea, but Kaylie desperately wanted to go on some rides at West Edmonton Mall, so I caved and let her fit as many rides into two hours as she could.

The Edmonton –> Saskatoon trek was the hardest of the entire trip. We stopped at least every hour to feed or soothe Preston. He cried so much, Kaylie and I were so stressed. But, I wanted to get home before it was dark, so we had to just let him cry sometimes, doing our best to soothe him. We got home just as the sun went down. Noah had cleaned the entire house while we’d been gone. It looked incredible … until I unpacked the van and turned it into a disaster.

In all, we traveled about 4,000k (I forgot to reset the odometer until we were half an hour outside the city). It was a bittersweet trip, but I’m glad we took it because I would have really regretted not going. I couldn’t have not gone.

So, that was July.
Good and bad and ugly and beautiful.

The last couple weeks? They have been taxing. We got back from a fun, relaxing couple days at a friend‘s cabin at Shell Lake and before I’d even unpacked, I got the call from my dad that my Opa had died. I immediately started planning a trip to BC and we left two days later.

Kaylie, Preston, and I were gone for 8 days and I haven’t unpacked from that yet because of (laziness and) recovering after more gallbladder attacks. I’ve been eating a fat-free mostly-sugar-free mostly-gluten-free mostly-vegan mostly-boring diet for about two months now. Do you know how hard it is to keep up to feeding a nearly-20-lb baby on veggies and fruits and water? I need a pepperoni pizza BAD. But, I’m 12 lbs below my pre-pregnancy weight, so there’s that.

I mentioned that Noah and I have been doing some hardcore de-cluttering this week and it’s been exhausting. I also had my friend’s four-year-old all day yesterday. He is like a male version of Liliana. They get along SO well and have so much fun together and I love that. But, let’s just say it didn’t take me long to fall asleep last night.

So, today, I packed up all the kids and we headed to Pike Lake. I haven’t been to many (any) of the lakes nearby and figured this was a perfect day to discover one of them. It seemed to be the closest one to town, meaning there was most likely cell service, meaning I could call Noah if I had an attack.

I was shaking with anxiety in the morning for no apparent reason. I could feel my heart beating wildly and couldn’t slow it down. As soon as we got to the lake, it all melted away.

It was a perfect day. Sunny and 24/75 degrees with a cool breeze. Liliana is a perfect kid at the lake because it’s impossible for her to be bored. She dug holes, rolled in the sand, and crawled around in the water. Kaylie built sand castles, fished for minnows, and floated around on her tube. Preston slept for an hour or so in his stroller and was happy the rest of the time. It was exactly what I needed to unwind from the last couple weeks of crazy.

The best part of being gone all day? There was nothing to clean up when we got home.

7 years since Noah and I started dating
6 years since he proposed
28 years of Noah
20 years of (my sister) Erica
7 years of blogging
10 years of Kaylie

and then there were things like:

the fact that Kaylie was gone 14 nights of the month (some with me, some without me)
the Lake trip we went on
the Telkwa/Terrace trip we took to celebrate the life of my Opa
the visit from (Noah’s sister) Talitha and that she finally met Preston
the two ambulance rides and multiple hospital visits because of my stupid gallbladder
the fact that I am, once again, not at BlogHer

I have so, so many photos to edit and upload and right now Noah and I are in the midst of going through every single thing we own and getting rid of as much as possible because we live in a little house and we have too much stuff. Yesterday we did Liliana’s room and half of Kaylie’s room and filled up our curbside garbage can. Seriously.

And then there’s the thing about me making dentist appointments for me and the girls today and what the heck am I going to do with Preston while I’m in the chair? I’m counting on Netflix on my iPhone to keep Liliana occupied and Kaylie to keep Preston occupied.

And have I mentioned that Liliana has never been to a dentist before? Have you met Liliana? Then you will know why I am worried. And why there will be stories to tell afterward.