Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Morning Mama...







I am not a morning person. I took these pics upon arriving home this morning after dropping Ben off. As it gets later and later here that the sun actually comes out, we all sleep later and later. Last year, I had an abrupt awakening after we moved here and Ben started pre-K here. There was no car-line drop off...so this became a bit of a pain traipsing through the snow and such to get to his door where you stand around with the other parents and chat until the bell rings. But at least last year his school started at 12:50pm. This was awesome because I at least had time to make myself somewhat presentable. This year his school starts pretty late, I think, for a morning start time..at 8:45am. But still my priority is to wake up in enough time to get Ben fed and dressed and out the door...not really worrying too much about myself. I am generally up enough to be coherent, but my head is still in a fog...and for some reason my sense of smell has not completely kicked in yet. Strangely enough often times when I arrive at Ben's school the moms are looking so cute and chipper with hair and make-up freshly done and stylish looking clothes on. I on the other hand often arrive with wet hair...that as you can see from the above pics is quite crazy and frizzy and I try to put on a little make up, but generally go with the spare frosty gloss that is in my make-up bag that is definately not quite my color. Most of the time I can't see as well when I first wake up and do not pay attention to the details of my base coverage...to see if it is blended in the way I normally would. My clothes end up being easy throw on clothes...so upon arrival to his school...I am sure I look like a prime candidate for Style Jury, or What Not To Wear. If only the cameras were secretly following me!! I generally try to make a little conversation with Ben because I am about to give him up for the day, but if he talks constantly in the car on the way to school, I have to sweetly say, "Lets just be quiet right now, mommy is trying to wake up."
If Collin has pooped his pants I have to rely on Ben to tell me, because as I said before, I still can't smell well at this point of the morning...so it is possible that Collin could be running around the other kids with a stinky diaper...although I do change it as soon as he wakes up every morning!
I will make eye contact with the moms and have a little conversation in the mornings, but if one of the dads talk to me, I think to myself, "I bet he is thinking that he is so glad that His wife doesn't look like I do in the mornings!" Don't get me wrong there is the occasional day that I wake up, refreshed and ready to go, and look decent, but I think they are the minority. I am not really posting this because I want to change my ways...as I said before, I like my sleep and I need it...and I actually think it will get worse as the winter progresses...considering now it is still pretty dark at 7am...and in a few months it will be 8ish....I do generally have my act together by the pick up time! But I need to know, am I the only one? Do you all look refreshed and cute in the mornings? Maybe I just need an earlier bedtime!
CB

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Mops' Trip to Canada!





























We have been blessed this week by getting to have Brenda(aka Mops) come to visit us over the last week. We have had such a great time! She was able to come up on Thursday in time for Ben's birthday party. She has been a HUGE help to me! I am not used to having a relative and an extra hand around here. I have gotten to make supper without two little boys running around my feet, I got to go to the grocery store alone...which is something that almost never happens! Not to mention all of the little things she has done to help around the house and to entertain the kids. We have truly enjoyed her visit. It has been nice to have some company! On Sunday after church we took a short trip to Banff, then drove up towards Jasper to the Columbia Ice fields and spent the night there and then we went to Lake Louise on Monday. It was a beautiful drive.
A couple of the pics posted are pics that she took.


You may ask yourself, "Why are there no pictures of you in this Carrie?" Well, the answer to that is..I had hotel hair...which consists of a partial blow dry and no chi...and also, it was a fat day...but I know I need to take a good pic of Mops and I on a good hair day sometime soon!:) We did take a couple of pics together to have for the books..It was one of those days when I looked at the pictures and said to myself...well, at least these will make good BEFORE pictures!;) I am trying to be better about posting more pics of myself...so lets not get too picky! Brenda however, looked so pretty!


We love you Mops! And we are so glad you could come up here to see us! And I personally am so blessed that I got to spend such a great time with you!




CB

Saturday, September 19, 2009

Star Wars Extravaganza Birthday Party

















Ben's 5th Birthday Party was a Star Wars Extravaganza! We had about sixteen little Jedi's running around the house. Only two of them were little girls, but I think they all had a great time! When they all got here, they all decorated their own "Jedi" vests, which I had cut out of brown paper bags. Then we played a blindfolded poster game...you put the asteroid sticker on the correct target Star Wars target...they did really well! Then they were each given some inflatable light up light sabers that I had found online..and the light saber wars began. We took them all down to the park for a game of , "Capture the Darth Vader and the Blue Light Saber" (really capture the flag...but we called the other) The actual game only lasted for about 2 minutes...until both were captured then they just wanted to have more light saber battles on the playground equipment. We came home and had Yoda Sodas...which was just rainbow sherbet and sprite...and Darth Vader and Storm trooper cupcakes. I think the Yoda Sodas were the biggest hit with the kiddos. Ben got some AWESOME gifts which he has been playing with ever since! And we ended up the party with an animated episode of 'The Clone Wars'.

One lesson that I learned....even though I tried to organize activities...all off the little boys ages 5-10 really just had the best time running around the house with their light sabers! Ben had a great time! Thanks to Mops for helping decorate the cupcakes and all of the preparing and setting up and cleaning up!! A few of the moms stayed at the party and helped us...thank you so much for all of your help! One mom even helped take some of the pictures. I think they turned out really cute! I would like to say all of the ideas for the party were original...but I really found most of them online. In most of the pics Ben would not smile...I asked him if he had been sad and he told me, "No, I told you I just did not want my picture to be taken!" Okay, well I totally know how that feels! He crashed out early on Saturday evening and so did Collin! Sunday morning as soon as Ben woke up he came downstairs and said, "Mommy, I had so much fun at my party yesterday. It was great!" That made it all worth it! Here are some links that were helpful!

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Becky and Jana come to Canada!




























My friends from Illinois, Becky and Jana came up to visit this past weekend. I felt so honored that they decided to come all the way up here! We had such a great time and a wonderful visit! The time went way too quickly! It was great to get to show them our church here on Sunday. It is always neat when the people you know can actually visualize where you are, and meet some of the people you know. We had a great time doing some fun things. We went out for dinner with Earle, we walked the shops in Kensington, randomly going into an open house, we stayed up late watching episodes of Glee and cracking up and we spent all day yesterday in Banff going horseback riding, took the Gondola up Sulphur Mountain and hiked to the top and then shopping in Banff. I love these girls! They warmed my heart! Thank you ladies for coming up here! You are so special to me! And thanks also to Earle for watching the boys the whole time and taking Monday off so I could go up to Banff with the girls! He did it the whole weekend without complaint! Now sadly, I'm off to take them to the airport. Good times, ladies, good times!

CB




CB