I figured that Liliana and I would try to be productive on our first day of just the two of us. We went to sign the girls up for swimming lessons only to find that at the three pools closest to us, all the classes for Liliana’s age were FULL. Awesome. We signed Kaylie up and I told Liliana that I’d take her swimming myself, as she was quite disappointed that we didn’t get to sign her up. I DESPISE putting on a bathing suit and going into what Noah calls “people soup”, but the kid loves to swim, so I’m going to take her swimming. We also hit up the library (INTERNET!), Walmart, and Old Navy.

Running errands with just one child is SO easy. Alone, both my kids are pretty easy to have around. Together, well, let’s just say that they’ve got a little bit of togetherness cabin fever. This back-to-school thing could not have come soon enough.

There’s not a whole lot happening that I’m missing blogging about except that this weekend my youngest brother Brandon and his wife Roxanne are coming to visit and we’re pretty stoked to see them. We’re heading to the zoo and going geocaching. If hell freezes over, I’ll even write about it! With pictures!

Being cut off from the internet when you live in a new place where you know NOBODY makes for a very lonely existance. It reminded me of the time last fall when my marriage fell apart and then I was diagnosed with Lupus and then they said JUST KIDDING! It’s just arthritis! No wait. Never mind. We really have no idea why you’re all puffy and splotchy and why random limbs all of a sudden double in size but here, let us hook you up to an EKG for six hours and then make you leave the hospital with a horrific stomach bug in addition to everything else which will cleanse you of all the fluids that were in your body and make you run to the bathroom and wonder do I sit or do I put my head in the toilet bowl or do I grab a bucket so I can do both? All this while I was going through a very antisocial time and I was working 60 hours a week and I’d shut down my blog after a nervous breakdown and I just didn’t know what to do with myself anymore.

It’s kind of like that but without the marriage problems and without the 60-hour work weeks and without being wrongly diagnosed with a terrifying disease. As much fun as that was.

Since I mostly interact with my friends online (or by text message) (I’m not much of a phone person), not being online means that I miss posts about babies being born (or not born) and really, seeing photos of newborns and reading birth stories is how I got addicted to this Internet thing in the first place.

At least withdrawal from the internet isn’t as bad as withdrawal from antidepressants. There are no lightning bolts in my brain and I’m not vibrating and I’m not seeing things that aren’t there. (Or are they?)

I was up half the night with Liliana, which is not normal. Don’t hate me for saying this, but she’s always been a great sleeper. From Day 1. She never had her days and nights mixed up and has been sleeping 12-hour stretches (with brief feeding breaks when she was really tiny) since she was 12 weeks old. So, when she wakes up in the middle of the night crying or screaming, it’s obvious that something is wrong. She was given some Tylenol two nights ago and again last night because I didn’t know what else to do. She also ended up in bed with me and I am not a fan of co-sleeping. I’m selfish and I like my space and I like my kids to be in their own beds. Unless they’re sick.

She woke up this morning barely able to speak and sounded pretty hilarious. Noah decided to stay home with her since I only work two days a week and didn’t want to miss a day and he works outside and it’s supposed to feel like 38C (100F) outside and heatstroke just isn’t all that fun. (Both of us love staying home with them, so we usually either take turns or decide what makes the most logical sense.) (Or who’s more likely to get scorched by the sun.) Today was supposed to be Kaylie’s last day of daycare before she starts school next Tuesday, but I’m pretty sure she’s happier to spend the day with her dad.

It’s hard to tell sometimes whether Liliana’s sick or not because she doesn’t let anything hold her back. She ate her breakfast just fine and was quite chipper as they drove me to work this morning. Noah then took her to get checked out and she apparently has swollen tonsils and an ear infection. Poor kid. I checked in on her early this afternoon and Noah said that she’s almost completely lost her voice, which means that he’s not had to deal with much fighting or yelling today, which really isn’t all that fair but I guess I should feel special that my children save their fighting and yelling for when I’m home with them and Daddy is at work.

I hope you’ll forgive me for my lack of blog reading and commenting and writing and that you’ll be patient while I try get through this horrible internet-less time. First-world problems are so harsh.

Have you entered to win that cruise yet? WELL WHY NOT?

So, THANK YOU! (You know who you are!)

Do you see that little speck on Liliana’s shirt? It’s not leftover dinner. (That’s what’s on her face.) It’s a mosquito.

They are INSANE this year and there’s been some West Nile going around from them as well. July was so uncharacteristically wet that they’ve bred like mad and now we can’t go outside for more than 3.2 seconds without getting 482 bites. Thankfully, August is supposed to be proper prairie weather so maybe they’ll back off a little bit.

That is all.

We didn’t have time on Monday to hit the beach by the camp, so we made sure to hit it today after we got Kaylie.

I got my tattoo touched up two weeks ago and kind of realized I wasn’t supposed to be submerging it after it was already submerged. Whoops. Oh well. It felt SO GOOD to have my feet in a lake again. It’s a rare time when I miss Terrace, but being in that lake made me miss Lakelse pretty bad.

While bathing Liliana, Noah called me in to show me that she’d been sunburned. I didn’t believe it because I’d lathered her in sunscreen. Apparently I missed a spot. Parenting fail. Whoops. Poor sensitive-skinned kid. I don’t worry about sunscreen so much with Kaylie’s dark Portuguese skin, but the younger one’s a different story.

I got a bunch more photos, even though we only spent an hour at the beach. I wish we had more time there, but I wanted to make it back to Saskatoon in time for Liliana to be in bed on time. More photos to come. You’d understand my exhaustion (and therefore laziness) if you’ve ever spent 10 hours in a confined space with one Liliana Wilson Pony.

She was doing this a couple months ago, and I tried to solve it using a technique that worked for a friend, but, well, THAT DIDN’T GO SO WELL. So, we’re back to Square One.

I finally got Liliana’s CD player/alarm clock set up (she likes music when she goes to sleep) and figured that I’d teach her to stay in her bed until after 7:00am. Thanks to her older sister and the awesome day-home she attended in Regina, she’s known and been able to recognize her letters and numbers for quite some time. When I put her to bed, I pointed to the first digit of her clock and explained to her that she had to wait until there was a 7 to get out of bed in the morning. She seemed to get it and when I left her room after tucking her in, she was staring intently at the clock.

I put her to bed at 7:55pm. (Usually she’d in bed at 7:30pm, but we were at the in-laws’ place for dinner and got lost in an episode of America’s Got Talent.) Five minutes later, it was 8:00pm and she yelled that THE SEVEN IS GONE. I told her that meant that it was time to go to sleep. At 8:07pm, she yelled again that THERE IS A SEVEN AND IT’S TIME TO GET UP.

After trying to explain that there had to be a seven as the FIRST digit, I figured I’d make it easier for her.

Problem solved.

She awoke the next morning at six something and yelled “MOM!” from her bedroom. Already this was an improvement because she was still IN her bed. She said to me, “Mom! There’s no seven!” Besides a trip to the bathroom, she stayed in bed until seven, when she yelled, “MOM! THERE’S A SEVEN!”

Now if I can just teach her to sleep in until NINE, I’ll be set.

Here’s hoping for more storm-free days!

(As much as I love thunderstorms, the girls go a bit nutso when they don’t get outside.)

Liliana: “Mamee, I have an owie.”

Me: “I know babe.”

L: “Can you get it off?”

Me: “I can’t get it off, it has to heal.”

L: “Can you get it off though?”

Me: “It has to heal, honey. It will heal while you’re sleeping.”

L: “Oh. Can I go to sleep now, Mamee?”

I sometimes find it hard to explain things to her – like trying to ask her where she put Noah’s jump drive when she doesn’t know what a “jump drive” is. But I know I have to write down the things she says that make me smile and melt like an ice cube in 40-degree heat because sometimes she’s a little less melty and a little more screamy.

She found my popple stash.

Remember them? Maybe?

The box also contained many of my other childhood stuffed animals. Like this giant bear.

Liliana wasn’t paying any attention to the box, as she was busy playing with toys that Kaylie usually has hidden away.

I took off this afternoon to see if I could finally find a couple bedside tables for the bedroom and some sort of shelving for the closet.

Side note, I saw these lilies as I was pulling out of the garage. They’re right behind our fence. When I was growing up, my mom had a bunch of these in the flower garden that went along our back deck. I haven’t seen them since.

Anyway, we’d searched for hours and hours for the furniture items yesterday and this morning at every home store that we could find. I didn’t see anything that I even remotely liked. I happened to spot Value Village on my way to my first stop and figured I might as well venture in there.

I spent a lot of time in thrift stores when I was a kid and have stayed as far away from them as possible since I moved out of my parents’ place almost 10 years ago. But, I was pretty desperate by this point.

It paid off.

I found exactly what I was looking for. And I found two of them. That matched. For $10.

SCORE.

I had to vacuum out the drawers and used a bazillion Lysol wipes on the outside, but I love them.

I also finally found shelves for my closet at Jysk (why does Saskatoon not have an IKEA? SERIOUSLY?). I may or may not have sliced my hand open while putting them together. And then I may or may not have sworn at them while trying to get them in my closet.

Maybe. What? The kids didn’t hear me so it doesn’t count.

I thought you all should know that I took the camera to the pool this past week and DIDN’T FORGET IT THERE.

I know you’re all proud of me.

Prior to this trip to the pool, Liliana had been GLUED to me every time we went in there. I didn’t blame her, as she couldn’t touch the bottom.

This last trip, though, I bought her some little water wings. I also discovered that she COULD touch the bottom at the very beginning of the shallow end.

She was pretty proud of herself. She kept trying to go after Kaylie, but would find that she couldn’t get a grip on the bottom anymore, and she’d go back to where she could stand.

We’d bought a bunch of little water guns for Kaylie’s birthday party last weekend, and the girls had them in the pool as well. Liliana hasn’t yet discovered that hers can SQUIRT WATER because she refuses to let go of it for me to teach her.

Kaylie finally found her goggles and spent most of her pool time under water.

I haven’t had her in swim lessons since we moved here, as I don’t really see a point if she’s completely independent in the water anyway.

We’re going to miss our pool when we move.

Liliana and I went to Saskatoon yesterday so that I could have a job interview. It ended up being not so much an interview as a when can you start, what days would you like to work, what would you like to be paid kind of thing.

I’m pretty stoked about it.

I left Liliana in Saskatoon with Noah for the weekend. Kaylie was at a sleepover at her friend’s place. This meant that I had Friday night FREE.

After having it just us three girls for the last couple weeks, my free night was AWESOME.

I stayed up late and slept in until 10am.

WONDERFULNESS.

I was up before Kaylie was due to be home.

Kaylie got hit in the face with a book by her friend right before she was dropped off. I figured she’d develop a shiner as the day went on, but so far it’s just a bit swollen.

*

Kaylie’s soccer team is in a tournament this weekend. They lost their first game early this afternoon, but won their second game 8-O. Kaylie was in net for the second half, but got pretty bored as the ball was on the other end of the field the majority of the time.

Kaylie and I got to spend this evening just the two of us. After her game at 5, we made popcorn, and watched Flicka 2. It kind of took me back to the time in our lives, pre-Noah and pre-Liliana when it was just the two of us. It wasn’t so bad. (Don’t tell the other two.)

Her last game is at 8am tomorrow morning. Whomever scheduled that game is going to get a beating. I don’t think I’ve EVER had to be anywhere that early on a Sunday before. She and I are heading to Saskatoon to pick up Liliana and see Noah for Father’s Day right after her team photos at noon.

Apparently I like to fit as much into a weekend as I can.

Liliana’s daycare provider had a wedding to prepare for today and I couldn’t find anyone to watch her, so Lili and I got to spend the day together. I love days where I get to spend one-on-one time with one of my girls. It doesn’t happen often, especially now that it’s just the three of us for the next couple weeks.

We brought Kaylie to school and spent the next couple hours shopping for Kaylie’s birthday party tomorrow. After dropping our purchases at home, we (finally) went to visit Laurie and her newborn baby girls. I haven’t seen her in way too long – I don’t even think I saw her her whole pregnancy! I’m such a good friend. I explained to Liliana where we were going and she was quite excited to see “Angry and Organ”.

Upon meeting Avery and Morgan, Laurie said that I had to do the hold-both-babies-at-the-same-time thing. She didn’t have to tell me twice. I’ve never held newborn twins before and I can honestly say that I could do it ALL DAY EVERY DAY. They’re still so tiny that my arms didn’t get that achy there’s-no-blood-left feeling.

I forgot my camera, but I did have my phone with me.

Liliana and the girls’ big brother Reid went to play downstairs and gave Laurie and me a chance to catch up.

When she came back upstairs, I asked Liliana if she’d like to hold a baby.

She said yes. I wasn’t sure how she’d handle it, but she did really well. And then told me that she was “all done”.

After lunch we (picked up my camera and) headed to Anna’s place to hang out and give Ethan his replacement rocket ship. He lent Liliana his rocket ship many months ago and Liliana has literally played with it every day since. It’s been in bed, at daycare, in the bath tub, EVERYWHERE. It’s got paint wearing off and some pieces missing. So, I found an identical brand new one online and Liliana got to give it to him today.

I love visiting with Anna. I feel like she’s one of those people who just “gets” me. Except when she said that she thought my kid was bipolar because she goes from laughing to crying to laughing to crying all within three minutes. Then I pointed out that her kid had his foot on the restaurant table. (Did I mention we took four kids four and under out for dinner? We’re good like that.)

Liliana and I had an awesome day, I’m so glad that I got to have it off. I miss play dates and I miss hanging out with my friends and our kids. It seems that week days are the only good time to do things like that, as evenings are filled with soccer and dinner and baths and bedtime and weekends are usually a bit crazy. As much as I really enjoy working, I really enjoy NOT working even more.

When Liliana and I got home, the door buzzer went. It was my book being delivered. I Will Carry You by Angie Smith. I am SO looking forward to curling up with it.

On our way to pick Kaylie up from her friend’s birthday party, Liliana asked if we were going to the babies’ house. When I told her, no, we’re going to get Kaylie, she said in true Liliana fashion, BUT I WANT TO GO TO THE BABIES’ HOUSE! Apparently little “Angry and Organ” made an impression on her.

I didn’t recognize Kaylie when she came to the door of her friend’s house. Her hair is usually up in a ponytail with a head band.

The birthday party she was at included a trip to the hair salon. The face paint was from the Play Day (end-of-the-year sports day) that she had at school today.

As much as these two goobers have kept my head spinning these last couple weeks, they also make me smile, shake my head, and laugh more than any other human beings on earth.

Especially when one wears an orange (her favorite color) shirt that says “My momma says I’m special” and one insists on wearing her sunglasses upside down.