BOYS WILL BE BOYS :)

October picture update!

2011-10-30T13:48:00.000-07:00

The weather in October turned out to be quite beautiful! Tried to spend as much time outside as possible because all to soon we will be couped up indoors!

Our church had their annual corn roast. We went out to a beautiful acreage, got to cuddle cute kittens, eat very delicious corn and a lot of other good food, play soccer and of course the boys had tons of room to run around and explore!

Kids enjoying their delicious supper!

We had some Ocotober creative lunches and of course once this happened one day this was requested for lunch for the next 2 weeks :)

Enjoying playtime!Typical morning at the Froese house. Boys wake up and watch treehouse.

A little blury, sorry! Small desk in my kitchen that is always a fun place for everyone to play.

And then we had our first broken bone, which I am sure will not be our last. Tristen fell down the stairs at my mom's and cracked his wrist. He was such a trooper even after they took it off and decided he needed another one for one more week.

We finally made it to a Rider game with our friends! To bad they were having the worst season ever, but it was really really fun. Although I think next time we will go in August, it was quite chilly :)

I love October, the leaves are incredible, its perfect time to pull out my Christmas tunes and the plans for Christmas are in full force! It has actually been a very busy month. We have been away alot and Jeff has been away a bit more and very busy at work. I have to give myself many reminders about what his job entails especially when I feel like he's especially busy. We have been looking forward to Mondays and just using it as a family relaxing day! I have really been enjoying playing soccer once a week, joining a community splurge club and catching up on some serious scrapbooking!

We are fallin' over here

2011-09-17T20:02:00.000-07:00

I love fall! It is by far my most favorite season and this past week it was time to get out the fall stuff. My lovely leaf wreath for my door, warm colored table runners and best of all pumpkin scented candles. I have to say I am not looking forward to the amount that these crazy boys are going to have to be indoors in a few short months; but we used up as much sunshine as we could these last few days.

Always some sort of imaginative game going on from the stairs.
My brother was out at the end of August and gave us a great start on our fort, we have been patiently waiting for sand and this was the week!

A view from the top. Aiden has very high ambitions for this fort and hopefully his awesome dad can umm fulfill all those requests. Jeff did make their treasure chest for this pirate inspired fort. I think this will be where it stays until spring, but happy we at least got a start!

As in many households, Aiden started preschool. He is loving that there are actually some more boys in his class. Very happy that we decided to put him in for 2 days a week.

Rylen is trying very hard these days to play catch up to his two older brothers. This is one moment when he finally succeeded!

So the loader dumped this over our fence. Unfortunatly he couldn't quite reach our sandbox to directly put it in there. So the persistent being that I am, convinced Jeff that we could use a rubbermaid container to move this to the actual sandbox. (no we do not have a wheelbarrow and yes that is our next investment) In there excitement the boys decided they would do some temporary sledding.

The boys were awesome at filling up icecream pails and dumping them, after a while Aiden exclaimed it sure would be nice to stop for a nice cold Coke! We were in agreeance!This is where he was most of the time spectating!

And finally this! And this has been bliss! the boys have had a hard time playing in the backyard since there isn't much for them to do. They were constantly begging to play in the front with their bikes, but then I felt like I had to supervise them. I love that they are excited to be in the back now and I can get them out of my hair for a bit :)

It is my goal to get some of the awesome ideas I am finding on Pinterest put to good use. We made these cool fall trees. We have several more crafts to attempt and I have a few sewing projects. I did make the boys a really cool table tent, but forgot to take a pic.We love fall, the crispness, the colors and the anticipation of pumkins and Thanksgiving. We have already tried on winter gear and I am very happy that most things still fit from last year! Gearing up for that white stuff to fall probably sooner then later :)

Happy First Birthday to my Smiley Ryley Bear :)

2011-08-29T20:16:00.000-07:00

I always feel like the first year just flies by and so many milestones are mastered! Rylen you are one of the most smiley, cuddley, content and talkative baby! You have been doted on like crazy by your two loving brothers and watched in longing at wanting to do what they are doing. In typical Froese fashion you are a bum scooter and boy are you fast and now your brothers aren't quite so doting as protective over their stuff :) You love to be rocked and to rub your face into anything soft, you LOVE puppies and go a little crazy when you see them on TV, you love your brothers antics and are their best audience, you love to eat anything off the floor, you love to clean out my kitchen drawers, you scoot like crazy when you hear the bathtub running.... Rylen you have such a sweet disposition and we all love you so much! happy, happy first birthday!

There was a party, there was balloons, there was cake, there was presents, there was family, there was friends and there was a sweet party boy!

Can' wait to see what the next year holds and how much more your vibrant personality is going to come out!

Froese Family Recap!

2011-07-08T13:12:00.000-07:00

About time I suppose! To finally give a little update on the Froese Fab Five :)

Trying to be inspired to do some decorating in this house, it definitely comes and goes- lots of factors, time, money, boys cooperating, inspriation etc. but I did get this frame done for Rylen and I am hoping to do some similar for the other boys.

In March we took a family trip to Edmonton, Jeff had received tickets to a Flames and Oilers game for Christmas, so we decided to spend a night in Edmonton and just do a bit of a family holiday with the boys. Complete with walking the pirate ship, the waterpark and rides. The boys had a BLAST! It was good to spend some good quality family time!

We were oh so happy when this crazy white stuff finally went away and out came the glorious sun!

In April we officially moved the last of our things out of our Warman house. We were packed to the gills and then remembered on the way home that we had ordered bar stools in Battleford that we had to pick up. We were definitely "squeezed" in the van! I kind of had to reprocess moving all over again, when our house was officially sold and empty. Shed a few more tears, longingly stared at my beautiful new kitchen, locked the front door for the last time and we all chorused "good bye house, we'll miss you" (get a little teary just writing that)

Easter was mostly spent here in Meadow, managed to get somewhat of a good picture of all three boys!

We did get out to my mom's for a bit and did a little Easter hunt there! Unfortunately Aiden had already spotted his basket when we pulled in the driveway :) We had to rehide his, crazy boy!

Aiden has been in preschool, and although I have had to lower my expectations alot! He did have a great time and did some fun field trips. We were off to the farm in the picture below- a few mintues out of town was this great farm with nearly every farm animal you could think of and tons of babies! I did miss the education and structure of his old preschool (Mrs. Mitchell you were incredible), but really wanted Aiden to have some social stimulation as we adjusted.

I coached Aiden's soccer team in May and June, I loved it! The kids were so great, and they caught on very quickly to some simple skills, however, playing an acutal game was actually quite entertaining! We have a few things to work on for next year :)

End of May my lovely sil and Jeff's brother came for a weekend visit. We celebrated all of the boys birthdays, yes we are a little behind, but I decided to make a treasure chest cake that Aiden had been eyeing up for a while and it left much to be desired, but the boys liked it and it tasted good!

Only boys in Jeff's family! Kai, Aiden, Tristen, Noah and Rylen- so Handsome!

We hopped on a plane on the last day of May and headed to Abbotsford for Rosanna's wedding. The boys had a chance to play with there cousins there, and had such a good time with my nieces and nephew! It was a bit of a whirlwind trip since Jeff headed off to Winnipeg for credentialing mid holiday, but it was good to be busy while he was gone.

My beautiful nieces!

We headed straight to family camp for church when we got home from BC, not even spending a night in our beds. I didn't have my camera the entire time, so a little disappointed about that. However we had an incredible time and can't wait for next year!

Since then it has rained and then rained and then rained and then rained oh yeah and then rained a bit more. For Father's day we made an inpromtu trip to Cold Lake, this is the road we were forced to travel and we couldn't turn around because we would have been very stuck. It was an adventure but one we hope we won't repeat to soon!

Finally the sun did come out a few weeks ago, the boys have been addicted to being outside and enjoying snacks and the works out on the patio.

Preschool ended off with a Track and Field day! What a gorgeous day!

and then in the evening they had a preschool windup at the spraypark with pizza!

It has been a great start to the summer- we finally feel like we are adjusting, feeling at home dispite the days of loneliness and missing our friends and family like crazy. I have probably had the harder time, since I am home most days which is very different for me. I love to be busy and have really prayed through some tough days. I love that I was able to embrace the VBS program here and have been filling my days with preparations for that. Cannot believe we have been here for 1/2 a year already- time does fly and yet seem to stand still all at the same time. The rest of the summer will be busy with VBS, working at camp, and possibly seeing family.

That's all for now folks!

Sew EXCITED :)

2011-02-23T18:45:00.000-08:00

I am very priviledged to have gotten my grandma's sewing machine! With our move so close I can taste it and a big house waiting for some serious sewing projects, I can't wait to get started! I was going to attempt some couch covers for some furniture my mom is passing down to us for one of our living rooms, however, I decided the cost of fabric and the trickiness of getting the measurements wasn't worth it. So instead I found a bargain on slipcovercanada for 30 dollars a slip cover and I can't wait to make all the accessories to go with it.
I have been doing some simple baby blankets, but ready to have the space to do some bigger projects!

Happy Valentine's Day!

2011-02-14T14:01:00.000-08:00

My Handsome Valentine's dates minus 1 !
To my Aiden! What I love most about you is your sweet and sensitive nature. Your usually very understanding to your brother and love to help with your baby brother! I love how much you have learned without me even realizing. How much you can spell and write and understand puzzle books and things! I LOVE your cuddles and when you say "I love you mom, your the best!"

Tristen, I love that mischievious smile and that everyone thinks you look far to innocent to ever get into trouble. I love that you light up at the sight of any type of sporting equipment and you are soo good at all the sports already! I love that you snuggle with me every morning and after every nap! and I really love when you say " I love you mama!"

Our smiley Rylie bear! It's true, I love that you smile at anyone and everything! I love that you laugh when my hair tickles your nose and when I blow raspberries on your neck. You are the cutest, chubbiest, fun loving baby in the world and I am so lucky to have your sunny personality!

I love these boys! They light up my life:)

A Glimspe into our new life in Meadow Lake.

2011-01-24T09:06:00.000-08:00

Sometimes it is still hard to believe that we moved our entire family away from everything familiar to a place where everything is strange and we don't know anyone. In actuality, it is only 2.5 hours from home, but being further North just feels like you are in the middle of nowhere. After our crazy couple days of packing we officially moved on New Year's Day! Thankfully my mom took the boys which really helped to keep things calm. We were completely overwhelmed by the help of our new church family. Over 20 people were here to help us unload, we also brought my sister in law and a couple from our caregroup was already up here visiting family so they helped as well. It was so nice to have a least a couple familiar faces. We went hard that afternoon unpacking as much as possible so that the kids could settle in a bit easier. We headed back to Warman to drop off our rental van and pick up our boys and drove back to begin this crazy adventure! Below are some pics of our new place.

Life in a 2 bedroom apartment is a lot of different things, frustrating, overwhelming, tiring, exhausting and has taken a major attitude adjustment on my behalf. Its a challenge to try to get the kids up and down 3 flights of stairs and Tristen in particular has really been throwing major fits about this. I find I would rather just stay home and not bother going out.

I have been so thankful that the boys have been sleeping well together in their bedroom, they rarely wake each other up and still have a bit of space to play even though they are altogether. It is hard for Aiden however, when the other boys are sleeping for naps, there really isn't anyplace for him to have quiet time, so the TV is on a lot more for him. Speaking of TV, ahhh it drives me crazy how much it has been used. As much as I try to find other quiet things for them to do so there isn't too much running and jumping, Tristen still cannot sit still do many quiet things except the TV. I told Jeff what a rude awakening the kids are going to get when we move, I think I am going to tell them its broken :) I know the boys are having a tough time, their behaviour has been pretty challenging and I know its because they don't know how to express their emotions properly.

Probably the most challenging is missing our friends and family especially this week when my Grandma has been really sick. It is soo hard to try and make new friends and not feel like we are dying of loneliness. That being said, we have felt so much love and care from the church, invitations for meals, unexpected giftcards and baking on Jeff's desk, and a genuine care of the people. Aiden has been enjoying a new preschool and Jeff has been adjusting to his new work lifestyle- it's hard to find his groove, but he has been having awesome nights with the youth and he is really enjoying what he is doing. I know that God has called us to this and it is soo rewarding to see how much Jeff just fits his role and this is exactly where he is suppose to be!

We are anticipating our big move to our "big" house (to us anyway :) We are getting possession on March 1st and excited to be in a great neighborhood, in a crescent, that backs the school.
I think this post has felt a little "down", in all honesty this has been really, really hard for me. I have wanted to go home more than once and have desired the normalcy of our old life as well. I do keep reminding myself that it will get better and once we are in a house it will feel better as well. Please continue to pray for us.

Christmas part 2 :)

2011-01-18T08:35:00.000-08:00

Jeff had a couple of weeks off over Christmas, which was awesome! Since we have been married he has never had time off at Christmas. Since we were visiting my mom's on Christmas Day, we decided to have our family Christmas on Christmas eve. So the night before we gave the boys the Berestein Bears Christmas, which has the whole Christmas Story in it. I can't even describe Aiden's excitement that we were finally going to open the presents under the tree! Well my love language is definitly gifts and I love the presents part I won't even deny it!

What excitement in the morning, stockings and treats and of course guitar pancakes!

Rylen looks a little unsure about all the festivities!

Aiden had been asking for a real police man outfit and I lucked out by getting both of these at the Costco auction for 5 dollars a piece. He was absolutely thrilled.

I decided to finally invest in one of these playmats for Rylen, also worth every penny. He spends hours laughing and talking to the hanging items. Tristen also loves to crawl under there with him and talk to him.

We ended off our day with the Christmas eve service at Church and then some icecream at McDonalds! It really felt like we were able to spread Christmas out this year, which I think our kids appreciated being able to have some breaks.

Christmas at my mom's! Always more quiet without my brother and sister in law and their kids. Miss them so much at Christmas, but still had a great day with my mom and then with some extended family in the evening.

Matching jammies from Grandma

On the 27th we had our Loewen family Christmas at the Waldheim church. It was the perfect place for the kids to play and the rest of us to have fun playing games, eating and visiting. Always Always the highlight of my Christmas!

Aiden convinced all the "boys" to come have "supper" with him!

This year each family had to bring a "Minute to Win it" game! So fun, dispite the cheaters pictured below :)

It was actually really nice over the Christmas week. Jeff tried to take the boys out, but you can't see that Tristen in crying his eyes out in the toboggan

As much as I enjoy Christmas it was a little hard this year, knowing we had to be in Meadow Lake for January 1st, but also unsure as to where we would be living. On the 28th we finally secured an apartment, which gave us a few days to pack up our whole house and start dividing between what we would store back home and what we would take. It was a VERY emotional week, with many tears and feeling very overwhelmed! But we did it! To be continued.....

Our busy December!

2011-01-14T07:13:00.000-08:00

Wow in a way it seems like December was such a long time ago and not just a few weeks! Normally December is fairly quiet for us, but this year it was actually pretty busy and filled with lots of parties and other fun activities. Of course I attempted to take the boys' Christmas pictures, but didn't have too much success. However I did think that they looked incredibly cute in their Christmas dressy ness!
Rylen at 4 months!

Silly brothers!

My handsome boys!

We wanted to have Rylen dedicated before we moved, so at the beginning of December we were able to do that. Always such a special time and just thought provoking to make that promise to God.

Aiden was my very good helper in the kitchen, I did a fair bit of Christmas baking and I did it early so we could enjoy it for the rest of the month!

We also had Christmas at the Lodge with our church. We went to Blackstrap Lodge and had a church service, a big turkey dinner, lots of visiting and lots of playing for the kids!

Then....... we celebrated our Tristy bears 2nd BIRTHDAY! He loves animals, so I decided to do this simple barn cake! He loved it and it was really easy to make, so it was perfect.

He was definitly into the presents this year, which made it really hard to keep him out of the Christmas ones after he had his birthday.

Tristen is a VERY active little man, and he LOVES anything to do with sports. We found this great t-ball set that turns into a gold set. It was the perfect gift for him!

Our very cute birthday boy in his new birthday pajamas!

He had a friends party as well!

Tristen is by far one of the funniest kids I have ever met, he loves to be the clown and he has this angelic face that hides a lot of his potential naughtiness. He loves to cuddle with his many blankets and his sippy cup. He is passionate about sports and definitely a bit of a TV junkie. He is slowly starting to play a bit better with his brother and his language is developing at a crazy rate.

Aiden also had his preschool program. It was very cute, however he clammed up a bit and didn't actually participate all that much :)

They made these cute bake a cake gifts for their mom's.

They also had time to decorate cookies, here he is with his good friend Oakley.

The same day we had our girl's lunch Christmas party, I think this year was little surreal because it felt like I was doing a lot of lasts with the impending move looming in the near future. I felt like I just wanted to soak up all this normalacy and store it away for my lonely days.

We then headed to Jeff's parent's the weekend before Christmas, and had Christmas there. The boys had a great time playing with their cousins Noah and Kaiwren. Yes there are all boys on Jeff's side.
The highlight of course, present time!

and of course a good wrestling match by all the boys!

Noah, Aid and Trit

Ry enjoying some Auntie time.

Well that takes us to the Christmas week. Which I will blog about a little later. Also have some pictures to share of our new digs. A little glimpse of our Christmas!

A candid look at change

2010-11-22T08:32:00.000-08:00

At the risk of rambling, I feel like I need to share about the changes that are happening on the Froese Front. Did I mention I don't handle change very well and everyday I have to remind myself that being comfortable is not what God has called us to be.
The process of moving our family to Meadow Lake is proving to be a very faith driven journey. Many frustrations in the past week are starting to take there toll on all of us, not one call about our house, limited housing oppurtunities in meadow (and the one we really like has flooded in 2008 and 2010, the city says they are working on the problem but do you take the risk?), feeling like the different style of church is going to be quite an adjustment, wanting to explain this transition to Aiden so it's not a huge surprise, wondering which realtor would be best and the list continues...
I know that God will be faithful and everyday Jeff and I remind ourselves of that, but still there are tears and doubt that we really did make the right decision...
I have struggled with getting in the Christmas spirit this year since the thought of packing our entire house the week after Christmas is looming... everything seems to be "well this will be the last time we do this in this house.... the boys won't remember our first home and how much we loved it...
Our friends have been awesome and encouraging, and Jeff and I have had many talks about how much we are going to miss our friends and the comfort of those friendships and starting over and finding where we fit in and with who.
Even as I write this I remind myself we are NOT called to be comfortable!
I am so blessed to have an amazing husband that is called to serve as a Pastor, smart and healthy boys who I know will adjust just fine and gifts I know I can use in this new chapter in life.
I am not really sure how to end this so I am just going to leave it at that.

2010-11-02T09:16:00.001-07:00

Happy 2 month birthday Rylen!

As you can see our not so little Rylen is really chunking up and at times sports a triple chin that I find absolutely adorable! He had his immunizations on his 2 month birthday on the 28th and weighed in at 13lbs 14 oz and 23 1/2 inches long! He is a SUPER baby and is very content with sitting or laying and watching his brothers. We have had quite a few nights of sleeping through, but nothing super consistent, I don't think it will be too long though, which is awesome!
Having some quality time with daddy!

Soaking in some friend time! It's starting to sink in that we don't have much time left with friends!

This has been the consumption of our time for the last few weeks and I do mean non stop, Jeff has worked incredibly hard, putting in backsplash, flooring, finishing a bulk head and closet, plus helping me with projects I have been doing. We will officially be putting our house on the market next Tuesday! Consistently praying for God to take away my anxiety about all the details surrounding that. We are then heading to Meadow Lake the next weekend to look for a house.

The boys are super helpful with renos!

Aiden insisted that his baby and Rylen needed a picture together!

Rylen has finally started smiling a lot more, he is still pretty stingy and makes us work for them, somehow the boys have an easier time than mommy or daddy. But in true Froese boy fashion he is taking his time!

I don't know if there has ever been a baby that has been so loved by his brothers, he constantly being kissed and hugged and held and Tristens saying many times "Hi Ry Ry, Hi Ry Ry"

Trying to encourage the soother instead of fingers and thumb, but I might be losing that battle! So far I haven't had a thumb sucker...

All decked out for the weekly Rider Game. The boys have definitely caught Jeff's energy about sports and both enjoy watching football and hockey.

This is typical Tristen. He is definitely my cuddle bug and is often carrying all 4 of his blankets around with his sippy cup.

Aiden wanted me to take a picture of his creation this morning. He loves doing anything creative. I am wanting to get him some real lego for Christmas.

In other news, I think most people have heard that we are moving to Meadow Lake. 1 and 1/2 hours north of North Battleford. Jeff is going to be the Youth/Associate Pastor at the MB church up there. It means we have been spending countless hours finishing our kitchen renovation and I have been packing many boxes to declutter before listing our house. Lots of emotions are part of this process. I know that God provided this oppurtunity and I know he will be faithful in all the details of this move for us.... but in true human fashion I continue to worry about everything and I am daily confessing my worry wartness. Several times a day I will be saying in my head "cast all your cares on Him because he cares for you and do not be anxious in anything but in prayer and petition let your requests be made known to God"

Everyday I feel differently. I am looking forward to getting our house done and getting it sold and finding a house out there. I think there will be some definite peace in that. Sometimes I selfishly wonder why this is the path God has choosen for me... why can't I just stay in my house I love, near family and friends that we love, a church and school that we are comfortable with and so on.... but as Jeff constantlly reminds me... God isn't trying to set us up to be miserable, he has our absolute best interest in mind even though it might be a hard road and lots of things are changing. God is constant!

Please continue to keep us in your prayers, especially all the details regarding selling and buying and packing and all those "things"

One Month Post!

2010-09-28T22:10:00.000-07:00

Crazy that I am already posting a one month post for Rylen! He is doing sooo well! He still very mellow and rarely cries. We had our first 6 hour stretch of sleep yesterday, so wondering how these next nights will go. He has really started to pack on the chubby cheeks and weighs 11.1 lbs!

Silly brothers! Slowly starting to juggle life with 3 very wild boys!

Lov'in life with these 3 crazy boys, wanting to post a comparison between all 3 boys at the same age. Still not really sure who he looks like, but have an inkling that he may turn out to be a redhead! His hair is soo light!

Happy one month birthday Rylie pie!

A quick couple of weeks!

2010-09-10T12:44:00.000-07:00

Well we have 2 weeks down and things are going pretty well! Rylen is by far my most content baby so far, rarely crying and sleeping ALOT (which I always forget is normal in the first while). He is doing really well at night and eats every three hours, but does do some 4 hour stretches and 5 hour ones. Unfortunately my boys that used to sleep until 8 all the time have decided to wake before 7 the last 2 weeks. Which would be fine, but Rylen usually eats at 6 and then I feel like I don't really fall asleep for that hour. I forget how much you adapt to fitful sleeps, Rylen is doing so well at night and I am the one having trouble sleeping!

He is trying so hard to smile already, instead he has this wide open mouth and smiling eyes, can't wait until that smile reaches his mouth.

He is still a bit too light for this chair and he really doesn't like it too much since I think it interrups his constant sleep :)

The boys spend much of their time doing this. Music is playing and they are singing with their guitars. Tristen seems to be heading down the music road too, however he is incredibly skilled at baseball and hockey already and is passionate about both. Aiden is really good at bossing Tristen around and Tristen is pretty complacent and usually does what he says. The boys love Rylen, sometimes a little too much, but they have defintely pushed many boundaries in the past weeks. Our weather doesn't help, being cooped up inside.

Last week we did have some sunny, cool nights that we managed to take some family walks. Rylen all bundled up!

As an baby, he loves attention and his brothers talking to him and just being in the action. The boys will yell and carry on, have the music blaring, vaccuming and what not and he sleeps :)

Sporting his super cute outfit from Auntie Rosanna!

Just love him soooo much!

I think life is going to be soo fun and crazy with these crazy crazy boys in it! Can't wait to continue to see all of their individual personalities come out!

I am always glad when the first 2 weeks are done and I am back to feeling more normal. Feels like next week we can get out more and it's finally Aiden's much anticipated first day of preschool! Many things I still hope to can before it's too late! We are also gearing up for a job interview in Meadow Lake on Sept. 24-26, ask for your prayers concerning that but more on that in awhile!

Rylen Kade Froese!

2010-09-03T15:12:00.000-07:00

So so excited he is finally here! We have come to the conclusion that we only know how to make one flavor babies :) But boy (no pun intended) do we think he is sweet!

In true blogging fashion a disclaimer for below and the awaited (for some) labor story:

On Friday morning I had another dr's appt. Feeling pretty discouraged and wanting the baby to come so bad before my cousin Rosanna left, I didn't feel very hopeful when the dr. started discussing inducing me 10 days later. She asked if she should sweep my membranes one more time and I said sure, third times a charm right? Really not thinking it would work at all and not getting my hopes up! Enjoyed a trip to Old Navy after my appt and then a delicious lunch! Started having a couple of contractions around noon. They kept up until the later evening, but never getting closer and not really increasing in intensity so I didn't really think anything was happening. At around 10pm I told Jeff well they are still coming maybe we should have taken the kids to my mom's instead of waiting to call her in the night if something happens. We decided to wrap them in blankets and take them over. I still wasn't thinking this was really it. I came home and promptly went to bed trying to rest as much as possible. Woke up at 1am and thought wow they are still pretty far apart but kind of getting more uncomfortable. I decided to have a bath thinking I refuse to be sent home like I was with Tristen after having a bath at the hospital and the contractions stopping. I started to get really really uncomfortable. Received a funny text from Rose who was at a friends and told her to go to bed I think I'm still ok. In half an hour I changed my tune and texted her back that we were on our way, woke Jeff and met her at the hospital. Now this is were the story takes a turn for the worse. I was very adament that I want to be there in time to have my epidural, I do not have a high pain tolerance and would NEVER choose to opt drug free! Well our hospital is a learning hospital so we alway have residents until the end. I have always had a really really good experience, unfortunately not so lucky this time. The resident was convinced I was only 4 cm and the head was not down. "I thought seriously all was good this morning how is that possible, but your the dr." A nurse double checked me and said NO she is more like 6. They called a senior resident, who was also as helpful as a wet noodle and decided to send me for an ultrasound. The entire time my contractions are getting closer and closer and I am starting to get really annoyed! Well the senior resident didn't know how to run the ultrasound machine and took FOREVER to get it done. At this point my thoughts are starting to turn just a wee bit fatal toward this "dr". I am finally led to the labor and delivery room, where the nurse proceeds to waste another 15 min trying to get my IV in. The anesist (sp) is patiently waiting, I go to sit up and my water breaks... checked again 8 cm, sit up again to have the epidural and Rylen decided to late time to make my appearance. Laid back down and I was fully dialated. At this point the nurse and resident start arguing whether I can push or have to wait for my real dr. They make me wait for 20 min. (leaving out the descriptiveness of this part, but there was an abundance of tears!!) The dr finally arrives and 4 min later our precious, worth all that craziness, adorable baby boy was born. I thought he was perfect and I was once again completely awestruck at the wonder of this incredible process. God is soooo good, I will have a few words for Eve when I get to Heaven :)

I have been feeling really good, the first week is always hard. Still pretty sore, but looking forward to feeling back to normal and just getting into a routine!

Introducing the boys to their new baby brother! They were pretty excited!

Very proud big brother, Aiden has been so good to Rylen and LOVES to hold him and kiss him. Tristen is still learning that we need to be gentle around the baby and is very eager to have him in the swing so that he can be held :)

Me and my boys! I think I am in for a very "interesting" experience with all these boys but I can't wait :)

Such a good baby, super super content so far and he always surprises me when he actually cries.

Spends a lot of time doing this!

First bath at home!

Love when he's finally awake!

Story time with daddy!

So much love!

I always know that God's timing is perfect but I always worry and fret before and get so impatient, but in the end God was so good and Rylen came at the perfect time! Some peticulars:

8lbs 11 oz (same as Tristen)

21 3/4 inches long

Arrived at the hospital at 2:30am and he was born at 5:58am.

So much love to you my Ry guy!

2010-08-03T10:04:00.000-07:00

A bit of a catch up post! We participated in our church camping trip just for the days. We rigged up our own little system, which I think ended up working out really good. Jeff had was a week into his healing from his table saw accident, so it was good to get our minds off of that for a bit.
The kids enjoyed hanging out in their chairs and having the "camping" experience.

On the 30th of June we set out for our family vacation to Vancouver, WA and Abbotsford BC. Jeff and I still can't believe how awesome the boys travelled dispite getting quite turned around in the Montana mountain range and driving for almost 15 hours straight. We had great hotels that we stayed in and we were so excited to finally reach our friends Kristi and Anthonys.

Stopping for a meal in Waterton National park!

We were able to take in the Oregon zoo, which was awesome! The boys had such a good time and the zoo was beautfiul!

Loved that they had a farming area, with a petting zoo and John Deere tractors.

Aiden was a little apprehensive about petting these guys.

Enjoying a great picinic for lunch!

Taking a family snapshot! yes I am huge and that was only the beginning of July!

Saying goodbye (this pic should have been last) Yuck! But so glad that they feel so much closer now that they are home from Australia!

Enjoying 4th of July fireworks! What a great night!

mmmm also indulged in a yummy elephant ear while we waited!

After we left the states we headed up to my brother and sister in laws! For a week of major heat, cooling off in their pool, relaxing and just enjoying some awesome family time! Our summer just isn't complete if we don't head up to BC and I always consider it my second home!

The boys were doted on like crazy by their older cousins and it was a nice break from parenting for us :) Aiden enjoyed a date with uncle Ray to the John Deer store and Tim Hortons, spent an awesome day in Stanley Park, Red Robin for Supper and a trip to IKEA. As usual the vacation wasn't long enough- but it was really really nice to get away. Our June felt very very stressful with lots of stuff going on and we desperatly needed a break from our life!

I didn't take nearly as many pictures as I thought, but that is a little snippet of our holiday! I actually turned 30 a couple weeks ago and we had a really fun visit from our cousins this last week, so I have something else to post very soon. I got a new camera for my birthday, so I have been taking lots more pictures and finally my kids will look like they had a childhood :)

Today I am making my list for my hospital bag, 3 1/2 weeks to go before my due date- but I feel ready to go! I have felt quite uncomfortable, tired and done this time around... trying to just enjoy these last weeks and get as many projects done as possible to make the time go by quickly! Looking forward to this new little person entering our family soon and the craziness of having THREE kids (we will officially be outnumbered) !

Kitchen Destruction and Easter!

2010-04-13T09:21:00.000-07:00

HAPPY EASTER FROM THE FROESE FAMILY

Our Easter was really good this year, we were suppose to go away for the weekend but I was relieved it was cancelled so that I could meet my cousin's beautiful baby girl!

We had a Good Friday service at our church, I ended up reading the crucifixion story to my group of toddlers- then it was really fun to get excited with them for Easter Sunday!
Our Tristy boy is finally got the walking thing down- and its very cute to watch his confidence grow. The boys had a really good time looking for their easter treats. We had really hoped to do a hunt outside- but it wasn' t that nice. To be honest it was hard to explain to Aid why he gets treats at Easter and hoping by next year I can think of a good way to explain it.

Here she is, Karis in her beautiful Sunday dress (yep definitely hoping for a girl this time around) Isn't she precious! and so so so good! Cheryl lynn not sure if you still read this but it was sooo awesome you guys could come and we could oooh and ahhh over Karis.

Aiden's best friend at family gatherings- Cousin Steph!

and we have been working like crazy to finally do some renos on our kitchen, the above pictures are from when we first moved here and then just the painting we did.

We started by taking out our wall between the kitchen and living room. Love it- then Jeff build a walk in pantry- I am so happy with how it turned out, since it was his first attempt at framing. So proud of him!!!!

I was so excited to finally move all our stuff into the new one and take down the old closet that Aiden as a baby and now Tristen were always cleaning out

This is how it looks so far! Just waiting for our new cabinets and flooring and Jeff to put in a bulkhead for my light over the island. Hoping by the first week in May everything should be done!

Crazy that I am already 21 weeks into this pregnancy- wishing I could get rid of this nasty cold but other than that I have been feeling great. Really enjoyed the nice weather we did have and waiting for it to come back. Boys are getting bigger and can already play really nice together as well as fight :) Looking forward to getting their room ready and also getting my bedroom painted before baby. Next week is our ultrasound, I think we are going to find out what it is, but much to the dismay of some, going to keep it a secret! So few surprises in life- hope we can do it!

Happy 3rd Birthday to my Aidey Baby!

2010-02-08T08:14:00.000-08:00

On Saturday was Aiden's birthday! We had a blast celebrating his friends birthday the previous Monday and then had a little family party on Saturday. Aiden was thrilled that G and G Froese came for his birthday. Of course he had been talking about having a guitar birthday for months. So I was really excited to find some cool guitar decorations on my visit to BC. Aiden just had this permanent grin on his face all day!
I LOVE LOVE birthdays and love to make them special, I want our kids to always feel like its their really special day! We didn't do anything super fun, but Aiden picked his all time favorite breakfast of pancakes and just got some really good daddy time. We wanted to go skating, but I wasn't on the ball on getting him some skates, so he is going to have a special skating date in the near future :)

Of course he was super spoiled by lots of presents! My brother found him this really cool little cordless drill, that has a battery that snaps off just like daddy's and he has spent the last couple of days "fixing" my house!

Aiden Loves "Happy Birthday" and it was very fun for it to finally be sung to him :)

So excited to use this when the snow melts, my mom got the boys this for both their birthdays and they love it already!

Aiden has also been enjoying his bike from us, but gets a little frustrated with the peddles, so we are going to take him somewhere like church where he can ride on a smooth surface in the basement.

It was a great day! I can't believe how much Aiden is growing and maturing, it is really crazy! His imagination is incredible and as much as he loves his toys, he is often playing with daddys belts, my scarfs, string, wooden spoons and I love listening to his play. He has also hit the independence phase, which I am actually enjoying. I am discouraged from coming in the bathroom now, and he has been dressing himself. The other morning I was totally asleep when I hear this voice right in my ear " these pants are very tricky for me" and hes standing there pullup off, underwear on and nothing else. Hoping he can go to preschool this fall, he is on the waiting list of one and I am registering him in another one in the next town which he should be able to get into.

We are expecting baby number 3 in August and I think this will be great for Aiden to get out once or twice a week and be able to do something just for him! Although right now he isn't to fond of the idea, I know he will love it!

As much as growing up is hard to watch as the babiness totally fades away and this little boy emerges it is sooo awesome to watch! love you lots Aidey skunk!

Happy 1st birthday Tristen!

2009-12-13T18:36:00.001-08:00

hard these days to find an interest in blogging but here it is hours old, Tristen is ONE!

This Christmas things have been so surreal, thinking how big and uncomfortable I was last Christmas and how many prayers I sent upward beggin to not be in the hospital for Christmas. and it worked out fine! and today we celebrated my honey's 1st birthday, with lots of friends and family!

We always start the day out with our presents to our kids and just cuddling and hanging out. I think Aiden was a little more excited about T's presents then T himself :)

I had a really hard time finding a good theme, since I had to let the baby einstein theme go due to the outrageous shipping. So I decided on a balloon birthday. and it actually turned out pretty cute!
My cake however was a bit of a disappointment and after I do Aiden's guitar cake for his birthday I think its store bought cakes from now on :)

The birthday boy, very excited about the cake, excuse the red cheeks, very very bitter cold this last week and has totally dried his skin out.

and that priceless moment! so thrilled that he wasn't as worried as Aiden about getting his hands dirty and got right in there!

unfortunatly the red icing left quite a stain, so he will look a little clownish for the next few days! So happy!
Thought I would do a little comparison, since everyone comments how much my boys look alike. Now that I FINALLY cute Tristens hair, yep they do look like brothers:)

We love you so much Tristen and we LOVE how you are your own person and have your unique personality! Can't wait to see how God uses your precious little life:)

Happy 10 Months Tristen Ryder !

2009-10-13T11:32:00.001-07:00

Today Tristen is 10 months old! and we still think he is VERY cute:) I was having a nostalgic moment the other day, thinking wow Aiden is definitley not a baby anymore, becoming more and more a little boy and Tristen is quickly leaving his baby, dependent self behind as well. I have another official bum scooter. How do you get your kids to crawl normal ?? We haven't figured out how he does it but some how he get from one end of the room to the other. He LOVES Aiden and has recently started crying and carrying on if Aiden is downstairs and he is upstairs. Sometimes Aiden will include him in his play but more often than not he still quite a bother to him with his grabbing and chewing important things to Aiden. He's still not much of a solids eater and may be having some issues with milk products. But I will have to continue to try those out.
He is definitely a mommy's boy! and very cuddly. Aiden was very much a daddy's boy and still is so I am treasuring my mommy time with Tristen. He loves snuggling with blankets and splashing up a HUGE mess in the bathtub. I love his curles in the back of his head and have no idea how I will ever be able to cut them!

Not to be forgotten, Aiden had a super time digging out all my potatoes with daddy and was very helpful in picking them all out of the dirt and putting them in the bucket. I was really happy with my pail full of fresh potatoes. Thankfully we got all our yard work done before the snow arrived.

When my niece Alyssa was here, we went and did a build a bear for Tristen, named Trit Trit. Aiden loves it and is he is often playing with his and Tristens and treating them like real babies. I often hear myself being repeated out of those little lips :)

I realize I am really not much of a picture taker and better step up so my kids don't feel deprived when their older. I just never remember my camera or think of taking pictures. Thus the few posts. Anyway we are really busy getting ready for our Faith River Cafe at the end of November. We are doing a comedy this year and really enjoying it. If you are interested in coming let me know, tickets go on sale on November 1st for 10 dollars. Can't believe Tristen will be celebrating his 1st birthday in 2 short months and Christmas with be here again! YEAH!

Tristen is 9 Months and Summer update!

2009-09-14T14:18:00.000-07:00

Well I have to admit I have lost a zest for my blog with facebook around definitnely contemplated more than once if I should continue it, not to say this is a pity call for those reading this just my own wonder if it pays for me to keep it up. Any how, my Tristy boy was nine months yesterday! Growing like a weed, finally eating solids, starting to bum scoot, and definitley enjoying egging on his brother a bit more:) Not sure if we are going to make it to his first birthday before his official first haircut, his hair is sooo thick and super curly when its wet, but getting a bit long now!
This is often his look, I call him my serious boy, but when he does start smiling or laughing it is all to precious, we just have to work a little harder to get them. He loves to observe and I can't wait to see what his personality will develop into as he grows!

Tristen definitely enjoyed water a lot more than Aiden ever did and spent a lot of time sitting in this baby pool that we have, I made it pretty warm which probably helped but he also enjoyed any of the pools we went to over the summer as well.

All the boys enjoying the summer weather!

Aiden's cousin Kaiwren came for a weekend to our house, with mom and dad, the boys aren't together that much but sure played well together. Kai was being silly sitting in the exersaucer :)

Aiden still claims hes the baby sometimes or gets a bit jealous of all the things Tristen is using that used to be his, he insisted on having his breakfast in the high chair one morning.

The last two weeks in August my nieces and nephew came for two weeks. So fun and Aiden was absolutely spoiled by their attention.

Above: Aiden was very serious about his golf game. Below: my beautiful nieces, Rachel and Alyssa

Enjoying grandmas landscape cart, Alyssa is 8 but she loved playing with Aiden which was awesome, also loved bossing him around, which he didn't mind most of the time.

Grandma and her grandkids.

As of this week Tristen is finally eating solids, he had a really hard time with the cereal, just didn't like it. But I kept giving it to him and now he loves it. The veggies thats another story, strong distaste, would be putting it mildly. I have now realized if I mix some apple sauce in the veggies, he will eat them just fine! Yeah! He also LOVES table food and eats dry toast, cherrios, cheese and is going to have yogurt this week. Definitley loves the sweet stuff as well.

After the two weeks, we travelled with the kids to Banff to meet my brother and sister in law. My mom flew with Tristen, which was great! As you can see we were a little packed in the van, plus we had a car topper! No one complained and it was a great road trip complete with treats, the best part!

We stayed at the Douglas fir resort and chalets. HIghly recommended! It had this huge play place, a water park, tennis courts, small store and awesome little suites with full kitchens.

Daddy and Aiden enjoying the play place.

Of course we took the gondola up the mountain, so beautiful and something I have never done. I really enjoyed it and Banff in general.

Tristen decided to wake up for the ride down.

Crazy boys!

Enjoying one of many beautiful parks in Banff.

We took a boat cruise on Minnewanka Lake.

Enjoying the Upper Hot springs. The water was wonderful!

View from the top.

We took a hike around Johnson Lake, around the WHOLE lake which was really beautiful but not as stroller friendly as we thought.

Brother and sis and family.

Enjoying the last day!

We spent one night in Calgary, did the zoo with just our family, we had a perfect day and Aiden was completely overwhelmed, but definitely enjoyed it! I love the zoo, so it was as me as much as for the kids.Our 2 nights we spent at Jeff's parents in Three Hills. Aiden of course had Papa wrapped around his little finger and was in his glory playing with Papa. (and Annie their dog)

That rounded off our summer vacation! What a great week!

Usually I kind of dread fall, because we get so busy and Jeff is back into youth and meetings all the time. But this year I have really been looking forward to reconnection with our caregroup, doing the nursery and toddler room at church, decorating my house for fall and looking forward to the changes we hope are coming this year for Jeff. As much as I would love to elaborate on that I will leave it at that, but as the time is right I will share more. I have been working a lot more, mostly nights, so I don't have to worry about daycare and that is working out really well for us. Wishing you all a good start to this new year and whatever busyness this fall brings for your families!

We Survived!!

2009-07-31T09:26:00.000-07:00

Well we did it! We embarked on a road trip of mass proportions! The same day that Jeff left to lead of youth on a missions trip to Texas, the boys and I hopped in the van and went for a long long long ride to Uncle Ray and Auntie Sam's! Wow it was pretty crazy, you take for granted the little things another set of hands does, that we had to keep stopping for, like putting in a new movie. The first day we made it 12 hours to Valemount BC. Tristen had a pretty nasty night, waking every hour with a fever. The next day he cried quite a bit because of course I had like 2 doses of Tylenol left not thinking I would need it, so he really need medicine, but not one gas station carried infants tylenol for the next 2 hours. Ahhh that was frustrating, finally found some in Clearwater and the rest of the trip he slept a fair bit. Aiden rarely slept and choose to talk my ear off for most of the way even when his movie was playing. Could have been a lot worse :) Took some pics of the trip up.
Unfortunately we spent our first night in the ER because of Tristen's fever, thought we had lucked out to get into a bed really quickly but ended up waiting 3 1/2 hours and finally left because I couldn't keep my eyes open. To make a long story short, took him to a clinic, he was misdiagnosed with strep, sick pretty much the whole time, got thrush from the antibiotics he didn't need, and finally slept through the night the last night I was there. Pretty exhausting, but so thankful I was with my family epecially when I was missing Jeff so much. We did manage to have lots of fun in my fams backyard....paradise for Aiden, pool, trampoline, treehouse with a slide and swings, hottub (which we didn't need since it was 30 above the entire time:)

We spent a day out on the beach, Stanley park has this really great pool right on the ocean, what a super day! Tristen even managed to have a really good day!

I was able to have a fun playdate with my friend Leanne and her son Lucas, and my cousin Yvonne and her kids Kyra and Jayce. We were hoping to meet the new sibling of Lucas', but he was born the day we left:) Finished off with a yummy lunch at Old Mcdonald's as Kyra calls it.
Spent some time at Mill Lake park, playing and watching the ducks!

My last night my family threw me a surprise birthday party! Very fun!

How quickly the 2 weeks went, missed a trip to the America's and meeting my good friend Natalie, never seems to be enough time! Missed you Nat! I think the boys were much looking forward to seeing daddy as was I. I never function well when he's gone. Rosanna had the "privledge" of driving back with us and I am so thankful. Made the trip a lot more fun! We made it to Edmonton the first day, the next was my birthday and so we shopped at W. Ed for a few hours, a great birthday filled with tons of treats and then made it home at about 10pm. So excited to wake up in the morning and see Jeff! Aiden wouldn't stop hugging him for the rest of the day and miraculously Tristen was a 100% as soon as we got home, but Aiden got the flu, still trying to get rid of the runs for him. Crazy, but all in all very worth it and I can't wait to hang out as a whole family with our families at the end of the month!

Tristen is 6 MONTHS!

2009-06-16T14:11:00.000-07:00

Well a half a year has passed! Isn't that crazy, Tristen is 6 months old and he just keeps charming us will more and more of his personality! He is a VERY content baby, seldom cries, smiles easily, only laughs for mommy usually, LOVES his brother, and quite the lazy little baby bear. He has rolled over once, has no interest in sitting, but does expend a fair amount of energy in his exersaucer:) The boys usually have a little cuddle with me in the morning in our bed while we watch daddy get ready for work!
Yeah he looks pretty happy, but seconds later he was pretty certain this tummy thing was not his thing!

Aiden enjoyed the parade in Warman this past weekend, with my cousin Michael!

He walked a way with ALOT of candy!

Back to Tristen, I took some 6 month shots of him at the park the other night! He was actually in a fairly cooperative mood- he really doesn't like the camera and will rarely smile, the little turkey!

This one is my favorite!

Funny picture, but definitely shows his "awww" for his brother!

I have mentioned before but I will say it again, I love having 2 boys and I am so hoping that they continue to love each other and be each others best friend- Jeff warns me of the fights to come and I expect that, but I still am looking forward to Tristen being able to play more with Aiden and for them to just enjoy each other's company!

The boys and I are really looking forward to heading to BC for a couple of weeks in July- Aiden has been talking constantly about Auntie Ro za za za, Uncle Ray, Auntie Sam, matchew, rashell and sissa- he can't wait to see you guys!

Swimming and sweetness:)

2009-05-26T12:36:00.000-07:00

Jeff was going to be gone for the weekend to YC, so we decided to finally take Aiden swimming, which we have never done. He hasn't been much for colder water in the past, so I wasn't sure what to expect. But is was crazy and had little fear of the water...yikes! He did so awesome! Tristen never cried, but I don't think he really enjoyed it since his little lip quivered the entire time- I ended up cuddling him in a towel for most of it! Definitely looking forward to the summer and hanging out at the splash parks and pools!
I mentioned Jeff was gone for the weekend, I really dread when he's gone and the time just seems to drag. I tried to have a lot planned for the weekend, and I ended up picking up a shift at work on Sunday, so it wasn't to bad.
Just some recent pics I took of the boys! Aiden is sooo funny with his brother and is often playing "going to work like daddy", he has his lunch kit, kisses both T and I goodbye and tells us to have a good day. It makes me laugh every time! His imaginative play is just crazy, Jeff came home from Edmonton with this ride on thing from Ikea that rocks back and forth and Aiden immediately got on it and crouched down and "drove" his motorbike-stopped after a couple of seconds and said oh oh forgot my helmet...grabbed something random to put on his head and he was off again. He is obsessed with this 1 dollar lawn mower I picked up at a garage sale...sooo I have been trying to use it as a reward for going poo on the potty, he totally knows how it works but we are going on day 20 of cleaning you know what out of gitch! Aside from the one time he told Jeff at the pool that he had to go and did in the potty at the pool...thank goodness that could have been bad. Kind of running out of ideas and really hoping he catches on soon. Not my favorite thing to do everyday!!
Tristen is enthralled with his brother and loves sitting in his exersaucer and just watching him, Aiden will often include him in his play and Tristen just sits there and smiles...he finally found his voice so the screeching begins! The noise in this house is sometimes crazy, but I love it and I love that Aiden seems to have this super zest for life and I think his brother will follow suit! Could make for some very interesting days in the future, the trouble these 2 monkeys are sure to dream up together! Have to say i LOVE boys, especially mine (lol)...I recently splurged on a double stroller and have been enjoying the freedom that I have to go to the park and shop in peace...definietely worth it. Well I am off to fold the last load of laundry and finish planting the rest of my garden...

2009-05-12T11:30:00.000-07:00

I strain my ears and yes all is finally quiet in this house. Tristen is entering that familiar stage of sleeping well only in his crib. This morning I took Aiden to the park, thinking Tristen would sleep the entire time, but instead he watched and fussed and then was downright mad when we got home and I finally put him in the crib. But now both have settled and while enjoying the quiet I can update you all on the Froese house.
Tristen is 5 months old tommorow! I am definitely seeing more and more of his brother in him and he is a SUPER baby! I always tell people I though Aiden was an exceptional baby and rarely fussed, but Tristen is even better and I think well stop while were ahead.....ahh probably not! Tristen has been sleeping through the night now for a few weeks and boy am I enjoying it. I call him my serious boy, even though he smiles a lot, he also observes with this serious expression a lot of the time. Just like Aiden he is taking his time, moving about, quite happy to just stay put, although he has discovered that his bouncy chair bounces and that the exersaucer is fun if he actually attempts to move around a bit. With all the energy that Aiden expends around here I am quite happy to have a "lazy" baby!

The tales of potty training continue in our home as well. Aiden has been doing really awesome with the peeing part, and after bragging yesterday to a friend that he hadn't had an accident in weeks, he has had three since yesterday late evening and this morning. AHhh, seems now that we took the treats away to encourage going number 2 on the potty, since that has been a bigger issue with little successes, he has regressed with the peeing as well. Maybe not, maybe he was just having an off morning and I have been going longer with taking him to go...but all in all he has been doing really well and I am so glad I didn't start with pull ups, I think he responded way better to just underwear...now i have pullups for back up but I call them gitches so he doesn't really think he can go in them :) That's my ramble about that!

Mother's day we went to Kinsmen park with my mom and had a picnic on what was a beautiful day. Aiden was absolutely thrilled to ride the merri go round and the train!

We took a long walk by the river!

We've done very little family pics in the last while so we got in a few, Tristen seemed to have issues with looking at the camera, but they still turned out alright!

My cutie boys!

I actually took this one the week of Easter and I love it, so I had to share it!

Looking foward to the summer and my list of projects, as well as a road trip to BC with just me and the kids, yep that should be an adventure... and just totally soaking in this weather and all the fun stuff that summer brings with it!

My boys

2009-04-29T14:49:00.000-07:00

It's finally finished!

2009-04-06T18:45:00.000-07:00

With much anticipation I have been waiting to post the finished product of Aiden's room! Jeff painted (as well as I) for what seemed like forever, but it was worth it. and I love it! Completely what I had hoped it would look like!
Just a little photo shoot of my boys today!

Have a super day!

Picture Post

2009-03-23T08:21:00.000-07:00

Happy 4th Anniversary honey!

3 months

2009-03-13T13:02:00.001-07:00

Goodness this is turning into a monthly blog! Not intentional I promise. Things are humming along in the Froese household. This week has been especially busy, hosting events, a baby shower, the MB Conference at our church that we are hosting a couple for and just a bunch of extras. Tristen also had his 2 month shots yesterday and weighed in at a whopping 14lbs 10oz. Can't believe I was ever worried:) I think he is starting to look more and more like his brother and his hair is getting quite a red tinge (much to his dad's dismay). He loves to watch his brother and is finally smiling like crazy and talking away. I think I am going to have another talker on my hands, YIKES!
A familiar scene in our room in the mornings!

Thank you to Auntie, zan zan zan (Rosanna) for my very fun bumblebee hat, it has gotten quite the use already!

Just chillin' surrounded by stripes!

My sister-in-law Sam gave us this carrier awhile ago and in the interest of some fun things we could do this summer, we took it out to see if Aiden would still fit in it. He loved getting rides from mommy and daddy and then his (used to be mine) cabbage patch had to have a few rides from him as well. Yes he does play with dolls but he is a very adjusted little boy :)

Doing one of his favorite things!

Finally sort of captured the smile, boy he makes me work hard for those.

I could sit and watch him smile all day!

Of course big brother needs to be in the majority of the pictures as well!

And so ends another week in the Froese house, really looking forward to getting out this week for our anniversary and Jeff is finally painting Aiden's mural on his wall. I will definitely post pictures of that when its done!

Tristen is 2 months!

2009-02-19T10:03:00.001-08:00

Well actually he turned 2months on Friday the 13th...
Things were going really well with Tristen, probably one of the most content babies ever! Until last Monday he caught a really nasty cold and by Sunday I was getting quite worried about the cough and congestion. I took him to the ER and they said he had a bronchial infection. Quite common in kids but a little worrisome in such a little peanut. He couldn't give Tristen anything, but told me specific things to watch for in the next day or two. Thankfully today he seems to have fully recovered, no coughing yet today and eating like crazy. Thank you Jesus. I tend to be quite paranoid and was proud of myself for waiting until Sunday to actually take him in, even more relieved that it wasn't something more serious.

Tristen is still working on the neck support thing, Aiden trying to help!

Favorite time of the day, bathtime! He's really starting to splash!

My curly boy, I love his wet hair look!

Aiden continues to be very helpful, sometimes unfortuantly for Tristen. I think Tristen will grow up to tolerate a lot!

Life with two boys is pretty awesome and crazy at the same time. Sometimes I long to work a bit to get out of the house, since some of the days can get pretty long-but I am so thankful for this time and definitely don't want to wish it away! I can't wait for spring, to finally head outdoors in some decent weather!

Celebrating 2!!

2009-02-17T13:41:00.001-08:00

On February 6th Aiden turned 2! He had a little friends party with his buddy Oakley, since their birthdays are in the same week. I found this awesome picture of a train cake, so we picked a train theme for them. It was super cute! I have mentioned before I think, that Aiden loves singing Happy Birthday, their was a bunch of birthdays before his, so he was pretty pumped when it was finally time to sing it to him! Even yesterday in the van, we were waiting for Jeff, and sang it at least 10 times, interjecting different names.
On his actual birthday, it was a Friday, we took him to his first hockey game. What a guy, we were worried we might only get to stay for a little bit but he ended up sitting mesmerized for the entire game. We were pretty impressed.

On Saturday night we had a family/caregroup birthday party for him. I decided I didn't have enough energy to do another cake, so I did cupcakes instead. Yeah they were almost more work, but they turned out really cute. Yes Uncle Dustin was kind (that was sarcastic) to get Aiden a much desired drum set. Actually its not that bad and pretty funny to see him try to rock out with his drums and his guitar at the same time.

Fun with balloons after it was all over!

A lot of the time I look at Tristen and think wow this was just Aiden, now Aiden is two! thats crazy! Aiden has such a funny personality and I see so much of Jeff and myself in him. He is obsessed with guitars and I do mean obsessed. He uses pretty much anything thats around as one. He also loves cleaning. He sweeps my floor at least three times a day and is getting really good at actually keeping stuff in the dustpan and throwing it in the garbage. So yeah my floors are usually quite clean lol.

He can pretty much say anything now and uses pretty full sentences, often referring to himself in the third person. Aiden help, Aiden do it, and so on. He plays super well independently and will often just be looking at books quietly. For this I am sooo thankful.

He loves his brother and is always saying good morning Tristen, anytime of day, and "hey buddy". I never had a sibling close to me in age, so I am pretty excited for him to have a best friend that is his brother (hopefully).

Aiden loves Boz, the big green bear. He watched it every morning in our bed and then starts his day, hes never been much of a TV watcher, but suddenly has a fascination with the movie robots. He actually fell asleep to it yesterday, yes that would be a trait from his mother, for anyone that knows me, I ALWAYS fall asleep in movies.

So much more about my precious boy- hoping soon we can attempt the potty training thing. We tried one day, but there was not one sucessful moment so I am going to hold of for a bit more and try again in a bit.

Happy Happy birthday to my bunky bear!

Life

2009-02-04T14:57:00.000-08:00

Hanging out in the snow, on some of the very few nice days we had. Aiden is very worried about getting snow on his boots lol Thus the tears!
Home with the boys, Tristen is finally chubbing out! And he is so much more awake and alert, he was 7 weeks on Saturday!

Best buddies, these brothers, if only Tristen new how much!

Cousin Kaiwren's birthday! Aiden has been so stoked about singing Happy birthday, he loves it and wants to sing it all the time. He's pretty pumped for his own birthday, its on Friday but we started his friends party today. That will be another post. Aiden had such a blast at his cousin's!

My mom's birthday was yesterday, and we went to this really cool restaraunt at the Sheraton Cavelier called Windows. Very yummy food and quiet, it was really nice.

Last but not least Aiden's new look these days, winter boots, pajamas, bib and a hockey stick that is either a guitar or a hockey stick. I was going to take just his picture, but he insisted he sit on Tristens lap, ahh I reasoned that maybe standing beside would be fine!

Birthday post to come soon!

Ride em' Cowboy!

2009-01-22T11:15:00.000-08:00

So Jeff is really paranoid that Aiden is going to grow up to be a cowboy, ride horses, drive a loud pick up, play country music on his guitar and that sort of thing. So my friend Janet got all these cute things for her son for his pictures, since they do live on a farm and we thought it would be fun to try them on Aiden. We thought they turned out pretty cute, I think he would make a GREAT cowboy, right honey!!

January 13th, Tristen is 1 month:)

2009-01-13T09:40:00.000-08:00

Wow time is just trucking away! We are pretty much in a routine at our house, the highlights being that Tristen and Aiden do tend to nap at the same time, which is great and Tristen tends to only wake once at night, after we put him down at 11:30. You would think I would be on top of the world with my rest, but I still tend to feel tired a lot.
Tristen has been so spoiled with new things, I took these pictures this last weekend! Hoping to find a good birth annoucement one. This outfit is compliments of Auntie Kristi in Australia! I love it!
Christmas from Auntie Jolene, so cute!

My cute boys! Aiden is still doing well, very full of energy and constantly making us laugh as well as making us frustrated. He is really good at being naughty when he knows I am feeding Tristen. But like this morning he has just played and played, he has quite the imagination and I love watching that. He LOVES Tristen and is very quick to "help"! I am so thankful for that, I can handle the behaviour, if it was directed at Tristen would be a lot worse.

Just chillin'

My cutie boys, sorry it should be the other direction!

One of my favoritesAnd so my blogging comres to an end, with a hungry baby and toddler!

Christmas and a baby Tristen update.

2009-01-02T09:10:00.000-08:00

Wow its hard to believe that Tristen will be 3 weeks old tommorow! Crazy! Its hard to say that we are actually in a routine yet, Christmas was crazy and we were rarely home, which was great but at the same time exhausting for everyone. Physically I am feeling ALOT better, but still feel rather sore after a really busy day or lots of running around. Emotionally its always hard after family leaves, I have Rosanna here for the weekend and then its back to reality and trying to find normalcy. Aiden has been doing alright, he LOVES his brother, but has really taken advantage of being "2". Again its hard to find a balance when you are constantly away from home, so I think with some routine we should be able to nip some of that attitude in the bud:) Tristen is a really good baby, causing me to wonder at times, is this normal, he rarely cries, sleeps fairly well, usually only waking at midnight to feed, 4 and 7. So I am really thankful for that. I am curious if he's gaining weight, always anxious about that, so I am hoping to get a doctors app't for him on Monday! I think I will feel more at peace knowing he's growing at the proper wieght, he still feels like such a peanut!

Christmas morning we did stockings at our house and then went over to my mom's with the rest of our presents and spent the day there! I love presents, so I am usually more anxious than the kids to open them, we ended up waiting until 11:) ahhh
Hanging out and doing the presents thing! So spoiled, all of us!
The 26th we were at Jeff's grandparent's, than the 27th with Jeff's family and then the 28th with my Loewen family! Like I said a little crazy, the pictures below are from Jeff's family. Aiden was quite taken with his cousin Noah, and managed to stake his claim on many toys before his little cousin Kaiwren could have them. Like I said definitely turning into the challenging 2 year old! It was a good day with lots of food and again presents.
Although things were definitely challenging with a newborn over the Christmas season, I was really relieved that Tristen came early. I could really enjoy Christmas without worrying about his arrival. I think he is already a people person, since he quite enjoyed being passed around from person to person. All in all it has been a good couple of weeks, I am much looking forward to a date with Rosanna on Saturday night, Jeff will be holding down the fort, which he is quite capable of and I am really thankful for that. I am looking forward to a few hours of freedom!

Since my Christmas cards are still sitting at Costco, Jeff, Aiden, Tristen and I are wishing you all a Happy New Year and blessings in the upcoming months!

An exciting week!

2008-12-15T16:57:00.000-08:00

So last week started out as any week. We had our mom's Christmas party at my friend Alicia's. Us mom's traded scrapbooking stuff and the kids exchanged presents as well. I had a little reindeer craft for the kids to make and we ate tons of food. Aiden was thrilled with his stuffed horse, who hasn't really left his sight since not even to go to bed. He is clutching the poor thing:) At this point I was feeling pretty normal, but also really ready for baby to arrive!

So Wednesday I had a doctors appointment and she decided to check me. Oh she said you are already 2 cms dialated would you like me to strip your membranes? Bring it on I said! She then proceeded to tell me that something should happen in 24 hours if it worked. That night I hosted our caregroup party and I was getting quite regular contractions by like 6pm. I enjoyed the party for the most part, made sure my house was clean after and went to bed. I woke up at about 4 with fairly intense contractions and by 5am they were 5 minutes apart. So we called my mom over and went in to the hospital. I was sent to assessment where they said I was 3 to 4 cm dilated. Now we were getting excited. However at 10:30am they asked if I wanted to sit in the jacuzzi tub. It was awesome however it stopped all contractions and I was sent home by 3pm. Yeah I cried, I was so disappointed! However they gave me a 2 day pass so I could bypass paperwork if something happened in the next 48 hours. My nurse said most women are back in that time, I was a little pessimistic, yeah right I thought!

Friday I went to work as normal, sort of had contractrions all day, decided to go to WalMart in the evening and do some Christmas shopping. I was pretty uncomfortable a few times, came home, went to bed and then woke at 1:30am with pretty intense contractions. By 2am I ran my own bath just to be sure, and by 2:30 we were heading back to the hospital and I was QUITE uncomfortable at this point and wishing an anisithist was travelling with us lol!

I arrived, sent to assessment for 3 minutes to determine I could head straight to labor and delivery since I was 6 to7 cm. Yeah! Unfortunately I got stuck at 7cm and proceeded to have a very long night and most of the rest of the day. Trying a million different positions, walking around, bouncing on a ball and pretty much standing on my head. Finally I fully dialated, but the baby had yet to drop. It was pretty much decided that if the OB came in and thought it hadn't dropped enough I would be going upstairs for a section. Cried again. My amazing doctor came in and said, I think you could try pushing. They did have the entire c-section gang in my room, however, by miracle from God, and a hoover, Tristen Ryder Froese finally came into the world at 5:04pm. Weighing 8lbs 11 ounces, 22 inches long and 2 weeks early. Can you believe the size if I had gone all the way?! I was so pumped! The most awesome thing to experience. I have a lot of recovery to do and very careful sitting in the next while. But so far oh so thankful I got experience what I did.

Of course he was born in the coldest week ever, -42 with the wind, so we didn't have a lot of company, but sure appreciated everyone that did make it out. Aiden was absolutely thrilled that the baby was finally here and kept kissing him and wanting to carry him. I think he will be very helpful!

Tristen has a bit of a heart murmer and is a little Joundis so we stayed for two nights. We arrived home today and so far he has just been sleeping sleeping sleeping and eating fairly well.

We are so grateful to God that he had his hand in this and just planned everything so well, I will have almost two weekes to heal up before Christmas and hopefully just enjoy it to the fullest.

Thanks to everyone for there encouraging words of late and praying for us!

We think he's pretty cute, heres a comparison of Aiden and then Tristen!

Random

2008-12-04T18:11:00.000-08:00

My two favorite men, hard at work, helping me make popcorn balls. Yeah you would think three batches would be sufficent, however, they are disappearing at a rapid rate. So I think I will be making a couple more batches. I made about six other Christmas goodies and have one more to make and then I am done. Get a few meals into the freezer, but some diapers and I think we are ready for this baby! 3 more weeks from tommorow! I can't believe it and I can't believe that Christmas is so close.
Aiden and his buddy Oakley. Yeah, Aiden talks about him constantly and I mean all day everyday, anytime we get in the van to go anywhere he thinks we are going to see him. I babysat this morning and I had to just sit for a few minutes and watch them. They are so funny. What one does the other must do!

Riding the hockey stick horsey's! Those hockey sticks are either hockey sticks, horseys or guitars, depending on Aidens mood!

I finally remembered to take a pic of Aiden in his big boy bed, not a lot of room for him after all the stuff that must be in the bed. Aiden has been caught out of his bed a few times, but usually to gather a few stray stuffies that I forgot or to get a book to look at in bed. Can't say that really matters, however when I come in, he's pretty quick to get back in bed and after one warning doesn't usually try it again. I am really thankful for that!

Well over the next couple of days I am hosting 2 Christmas parties, so a few more things to do for that, I LOVE hosting so its really not that intense! Anyway thought I would just do a little update, still hoping a bit that this baby comes before Christmas but also daily confessing to God that I know he's in control and has the best timing picked out. (a little hard to keep myself convinced of that, thus the daily confessions:)

Froese family November happenings!

2008-11-20T11:07:00.000-08:00

I seriously can't believe its already the end of November! Our house has been a bustle of activity with baby preparation, Christmas decorating, Christmas shopping, leading care group, working extra shifts at my other job and dealing with a small episode of the flu. (always makes me want to clean extra hard)
Aiden loves to help and has been really good at helping mommy with cleaning, putting baby stuff away and just being a really good boy with his independent play. I love that! Sometimes I just sit down and watch him as he interacts with his toys, bosses his favorite monkey Choo Choo around and does silly things!
We are finally really getting the hang of using a utensil! Aiden LOVES cereal and will pretty much eat it for any meal!
We have had an exceptionally warm November, and yesterday we FINALLY had a good snowfall! Yeah! Now my Christmas decorations look a little more in place. Aiden is all bundled up and ready to go outside. However he has been quite concerned about getting "no" snow on his shoes. I got him some boots this week and now he seems fine. Silly guy!
Just me and my best bud CHoo Choo, yes Choo choo has to wear diapers and try on the baby bibs too...

Aiden and his favorite guy in the whole wide world, yes he looks grumpy, obviously my photoshoot was cutting into his play time with daddy!

For some reason Aiden loves to sit on his stool and have his feet in his toy basket and he will play for long periods of time

Last but not least, 5 weeks to go....wow...I feel really good, just really tired a lot of the time, and for someone who NEVER naps during the day I have definitely found myself asleep on the couch during Aiden's nap. Again I am really big! I was hoping I would stay a bit smaller this time, since I haven't gained near the weight I did with Aiden, but no such luck. My last doctors app't I had actually lost some weight, but the baby grew 2 cm, so my doctor concluded I must be feeling a lot of pressure under my belly. Yep, quite painful, so I guess there is a good reason for the continued weight gain, gives those little peanuts a place to go.

I love Christmas and I am trying not to get to anxious about when baby Froese will make its appearance, but as much as I tell myself not to worry I still do. Sometimes I think a little to much that its still going to come before Christmas, but I keep giving myself reality checks that I could very well go into January and that's ok. (Yeah that works for about 5 min) Anyway I love that I have Christmas to distract me in these last weeks, really hoping my family can come this year and really excited about Aidens first Sunday school program.

Well that's all for now, need to write out my grocery list for my Christmas baking!

Finally my BC trip, Halloween and what we have been up to lately!

2008-11-06T07:09:00.000-08:00

So two days after New York, I took off with Aiden to Abbotsford to see my family and the infamous CELINE DION concert! Aiden traveled super well, however, I forgot how squishy the seats are with a toddler, never mind being 71/2 months pregnant as well. But we made it and had a super time. Some of the highlights:
Sing star! Yes I really was a star, I finally have proof that I do not sing well!

Kids were more into guitar hero, and well Aiden was my niece Alyssa's little shadow and constantly making her giggle with his antics. I think she quite enjoyed bossing him around all the time. Oh well he took it:)
Yes they have a dog and yes Aiden took quite a liking to sitting in Rascals kennel! Gross! to me whos NOT a dog lover or even liker.

Finally getting ready for the concert! Oh my word we were so excited, had a delicious supper at Sammy J Peppers and then it was off to GM Place to FINALLY see Celine. We only had the tickets for like a year!

Here are all of us, beautiful, excited and absolutely pumped!

Yes and it was incredible, words cannot describe, considering we were upgraded to SECOND ROW seats. Yeah, Celine came out on our side and everything, my friend Shauna was the one who got to shake her hand! It was awesome, that's all I will say, its hard to explain unless you were there!

More family time, family movie night and just hanging out! It was so nice after crazy New York to just relax. However, Jeff was quite ready for us to come home and I was ready to see him as well. Aiden has a really hard time not seeing his dad. To say he is a daddy's boy is quite an understatment. I hear about daddy ALL day, and he won't leave Jeff alone when he's home! I feel really blessed actually that Aiden loves his dad so much, I still get my moments and maybe this next baby with favor me:)

So Aiden is quite the character these days, continuing to expand his vocab like crazy! He talks all the time and I mean all the time. He loves to be the centre of attention and do things to make us laugh, particularely singing Halleluah at the top of his lungs and giving Jeff timeouts and pretending to cry with him and then gives him a hug.

He LOVES to look at the Wish Book especially the guitars, which is his new obsession. Seriously, my mom found one of my little guitars, if we even mention Grandma, he immediately starts talking about his guitar thats there and will barely acknowledge us or Grandma when hes there.

Aiden was the same as last year for Halloween this year, a skunk, he was just so cute and it still fit him. We went to a church alternative, but were a little disappointed with the set up so we didn't stay long, we went "trick or treating" at a couple of family members houses, and then came home. It was good and Aiden was really good about keeping his costume on! He also has quite an obsession with treats now and thinks they are fair game anytime. It has brought out some of his terrible twos, which I think we have officially began. I have seen some nasty tantrums already, but he has also learned some hard lessons about whos in charge, so it hasn't been to bad. yet.

Playing some games and seeing the animals, definitely his favorite parNovember 1st was Jeff's 30th birthday! Yep he's old! I threw him a house party, it was really fun, with tons of food, old age bingo, and a WII bowling tournament, which I kicked butt in, much to my competitive husbands dismay!

I did a whole wall of pictures of him as a kid and then up to present. It was really fun to pull out those old pictures! I had a Calgary flames theme going..thus the red black and yellow. I also had the guests bring 30 of something, lets just say we have a lot of COKE for a very long time. Had some fun with 30 mentos and a diet coke, and a lot of gum as well.

Some after fun with the balloons.

So after all the trips and parties, I have felt pretty wiped but at the same time felt the nesting syndrome like crazy. I have cleaned out closets, pantries and offically moved all of Aiden's things into his big boy room. Yes he is in a big boy bed and can't believe how easily he transition. He still doesn't get out, he just yells from his bed "daddy, all done" "out". Which I really like, who knows if that will keep up but I will take it for now. He's only fallen out twice, so I think we are almost ready to take the blankets away, he has a little toddler bed, so its not that far to fall. When Jeff finally starts and finishes the mural for his wall, I will post some pictures.

So I have been cleaning the nursery like crazy, washing everything, getting the sleepers out and put away and making a list of last minute things I need. Which is surprisingly small for the second baby.

Aiden has been having some fun taking out the baby things and experimenting with them. I really makes me see what a big boy he's become.

Well I think thats long winded enough for one day! I am officially 33 weeks tommorow, yeah 7 more to go, I have been pretty anxious about when this baby is coming lately, especially so close to Christmas. I am trying to reassure myself that it doesn't matter, but I really don't want to be in the hospital for Chrsitmas, I love Christmas and also don't desire to have my baby share its birthday with Christmas, but I do know in my heart, God has it all worked out and we will make the best of the situation no matter when it happens!

Well I took a shift at the Crisis Nursery today, so I better get moving and get some things done before then! Have a great day everyone!

The life of the rich and famous or us just pretending in the bustling city of New York:)

2008-10-27T13:09:00.000-07:00

So on October 9th, Jeff and I headed off to Manhattan, New York! Jeff had been at has been at his job for 5 years, so his service award was a flight anywhere in North America. We chose New York, and what an awesome choice.
Here is just a really small glimpse into our 5 days there.
Aiden stayed with my mom, so it was like our last final hurrah before the craziness of another child begins:)
Our first night we arrived at our hotel, were upgraded to a deluxe suite with a jacuzzi tub, which ended up being very nice after the TONS of walking we did. We had dinner at an awesome pizza place called John's and then saw the Lion King. I can't even describe how awesome that was!

Our hotel was 2 blocks from Times Square, the happening place, thousands of people even at midnight. Pretty intense!
We had a pass for a hop on hop off bus for 3 days, so we took the double decker bus everywhere, there was always a different tour guide and dispite having to take the same tour to get places, the guides always had new stuff to say!
Macy's is the largest department store in the world. It has 11 floors and takes up an entire city block. There windows for Christmas take 2 years to make. We did a lot of browsing, not to much actual shopping because of the crazy prices, but we did find some really awesome deals on clothes and shoes, souviners and some very cute maternity shirts at the GAP for a steal! Jeff was a real trooper as we went from one store to the next.

Rockefellar Centre, where they light the Christmas tree.
Ground zero, a have a whole new understanding for that tragedy after having stood right there and just imagined the horror of those two buildings collapsing. Especially with the proximity that everything is.

We took a night time tour and had an awesome view of the Manhattan skyline from Brooklyn.

We took a ferry out to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. This was the middle day of our trip and we were starting to get tired and a little overwhelmed, so we didn't go in to either one, but the ferry ride was quite enjoyable since we had such awesome weather!

The world's largest Toys r Us, complete with a ferris wheel and a Statue of Liberty made out of lego.

Carriage ride in Central Park, definitely one of the highlights for me!

Having my picture taken with the Abercombe and Fitch model:)

The view from the top of the Empire State building, incredible! We were 86 stories up!

Our last night, we did more shopping and ate at the Hard Rock Cafe! What an awesome trip, we would highly recommend it if you ever get the chance.

But we were also happy to come home to Aiden, we missed him ALOT!

Two days later I took off to the Celine Dion concert in Vancouver, spent a week with my family with Aiden. More about in the days to come!

Prego pic and random pics!

2008-09-24T17:54:00.000-07:00

Well here I am 27 weeks and 2 days, 89 days to go! Yes, yes I know I am really big, and feeling rather self-conscience about it. Actually been having real issues with my size lately, which seems petty I know. So far things are going pretty good, this pregnancy like I have mentioned before is very different, carrying way higher, feeling a lot more tired, feeling a lot more done, very weepy (about anything really), and out of breath a lot quicker. My guesses are going to a girl, but I still wouldn't be surprised if it was a boy.
Just some random cuteness! Aiden has really taken to reading books lately, he will often be found sitting downstairs, on his big boy bed, or in his crib looking at books and reading them to himself.

He LOVES, LOVES his day, no seriously I think more than the average child and does everything the same as him! Can't wait for him to come home, and yes I am still called daddy as well, except when he's hurt then he'll say "mum"lol

Just being silly:)

Enjoying bathtime, although Aiden is very obsessed with anyone being in the shower and is ready to hand us the towel when we are done and often throws Jeff's lunch kit in there in the morning to make sure he doesn't forget it!

Aiden wanted Jeff to sit in this empty shelf with him, persistently asked him to sit, until he did. He still talks non-stop and say pretty much anything we tell him too. He has a pretty big vocabulary although some of his jibberish is still only understood by us, but he is talking pretty clear.

We are constructing a new desk in our basement and Aiden loves to sit in there and shush his baby. I think he thinks its his little house. Pretty cute!

Yep we still think he's pretty cute, we are waiting for our trip to New York to be done and my trip to Abbotsford and then we are going to do the big boy bed. It's all set up and all his toys are in his new room, so hopefully the sleeping part won't be to big of an adjustment. A few minor adjustments to the nursery and then that should be ready to go as well. I went through Aiden's rubbermaids of clothes and a rubbermaid of girls clothes my sister gave me, had a blast ogling over how tiny everything is again. Crazy how much you forget!

Well time to get ready for caregroup!

Sept long in Calgary

2008-09-15T08:15:00.000-07:00

On our way! Aiden travelled very well, he got really excited that DQ had a little play table and was quite happy to play there while we waited 35 min for our food. He slept a good portion of the trip, which ended up completely messing up his first night at Jeff's parent's among other new surroundings he wasn't used to. Our first day in Calgary was a little rough since Jeff and I were very exhausted!
We did Callaway Park first off. I had never been there so it was fun to see what it is all about. Aiden loved the few rides he could go on, but especially the horse ride with Grandpa!

The log ride, which I was most disappointed not to go on. It was a rather chilly day, so everyone who was wet, was a little cold after, maybe I am not so disappointed!

We did the zoo on Sunday, I also never been there, well maybe when I was super little, didn't remember it at all. I loved it, I wish it hadn't rained all day so we could have enjoyed it more. Aiden was also in his glory and probably could have sat by the gorillas all day and watched them.

Some of the fun animals!

Random pictures of my cutie nephews Kaiwren and Noah, well Noah might not like being called cute anymore:) Oh and my great looking sister-in-law:)

Yep would definitely like to return on a sunny day, although we all look pretty hot in our ponchos!
A quick family pic on Monday before we headed out!

A quick pic with Grandma and Grandpa!

Enjoying IKEA, actually Aiden slept for most of it, which was awesome! We had great success with some new things for Aiden's new room (pictures later when its done) and we bought a mystery box in the as is section which turned out to be this cabinet that Jeff had now fashioned into a very trendy computer area!

Aiden travelled fairly well on the way back, aside from getting a really nasty bum rash that left him pretty uncomfortable, he did sleep a good part, lucky him. That certainly is a very boring drive and my legs were feeling pretty cramped by the time we got home.

All in all a fun weekend and very glad we got to travel at least a tiny bit this summer.

Well last night was a very rotten night with Aiden, not sure what was going on, I hate trying to guess and hate being sleep deprived even more, I am going to try and put him down this morning and maybe catch up on some sleep myself.

Just asking for your prayers

2008-09-07T18:51:00.000-07:00

This morning my sister-in-law's dad passed, please pray for her and their family. Pray that God would be especially near with the decisions that have to be made, safety for people travelling and some sort of comfort in the middle of it all.

August fun!

2008-09-03T15:14:00.001-07:00

This post is long overdue. Our August has been our "holiday", with lots of family visiting and then a trip to Calgary that I will post about later.
I should start off by saying that our adjustment to J leaving went really well, Aiden occasionally went into his room the first few days and said "wherd he go?", but that's about it. We have moved most of Aiden's toys into that room so that he can start adjusting to being in there, since this week I hope to start napping him in the big boy bed.
J did come back for a weekend of respite, and that weekend definitely confirmed out decision that we had done the right thing, I am very much enjoying this time with Aiden, and feeling alot more relaxed, with fewer headaches. The other foster mom is having quite a hard time, so we chatted for a long time and I tried to give her a few options that work, unfortunately she said if it doesn't get better in the next while, she will be unable to continue caring for him since she has 5 other children. That part of it just makes me sad for him and wonder where he will end up, but I know that God is watching out for him.
So in the middle of August my brother Ray and his wife Sam and two of their 3 kids arrived for a visit, Rachel spent a week at Redberry. The project of one day was suppose to be our deck, however like most projects in the Froese and Wollf household, it ended up being a 3 day project, since a lot was rotted and needed to be reinforced. Oh well rather do it right now than have to redo later.
Here is our deck before, quite the eyesore! and no railing so I was very nervous with Aiden going up and down.
Everyone hard at work, us ladies had the priviledge of taking out the nails of all the old boards, not a very fun job I must say!
Of course where there are tools, there is Aiden and he enjoyed "helping" or just watching Uncle and daddy.

The finished product, we are uncertain whether we want to replace the non treated boards that were still in good condition, or if we want to paint the rest of the railing brown. I think we are leaning toward replacing the rest, I really like the look of treated wood.

We had some time to do some fun stuff, icecream at the double decker bus, watersliding/swimming, shopping, and of course lots of good eating!

Last evening at the park! As always the time wasn't long enough, but I was so thankful that they could come.

Fortunately its only 47 more sleeps until Celine in Vancouver, however I am a little paranoid, since my mom heard that some airlines aren't letting women over 27 weeks pregnant fly. Anybody heard anything similiar?

2008-08-12T21:00:00.000-07:00

Well Thursday has come and gone and we survived and even thrived. I brought J to his home on Thursday morning and he was so content to be there, he barely said good-bye to me. The new foster mom was a little ataken back by all of his stuff, since her last foster daughter came with nothing from her previous foster home. Hard for me to believe, how can a child have nothing after living in your home? Anyway it has actually been a quick adjust, which I think is confirmation that we were really ready for this. Aiden seems to be fine, occasionally walks into J's room and says "no all gone" meaning he is all gone. It's a bit creepy in the empty room, so I filled it with Aiden's toys so he can start getting used to the room for his new room.
This was at the last event we had for our mom's group, we took some group pics of the kids for J's book-unfortunately I am not allowed to post those so I thought I would post this one of Aiden and his buddy Oakley.

This last Friday we had a little staff pool party at our Pastor's house. Aiden had a blast with their kitty and bunny running around, as well as the with the other 2 girls that were there.
He wasn't too crazy about the very cold water! But managed to enjoy a bit of it.

He much preferred sitting on the stairs and splashing his feet like crazy!

Trying out their hammock, that was pretty fun!

Peek-a-boo!

Aiden was 18 months on the 6th, wow hard to believe. He is growing and learning so quickly, he talks non stop and LOVES to be centre of attention. He has almost completely lost his shyness and has quite taken to my brother and his family being here this week. There is not a day that goes by that we don't laugh at something he does. He is so funny. Everything he does he does with great passion.

Prego pics to follow, getting quite the belly, even though I don't feel quite as big as the first time hopefully I can stay a bit smaller. I am plugging away at Aiden's scrapbook, hoping to get it done by the time the baby comes. But I am taking a little break this week to have a vacation with my family, the part of my summer that I have been waiting for alllllll summer. Tommorow our deck it being redone by my loving husband and brother, can't wait!

time for sleep

The time has come.....

2008-08-05T11:33:00.000-07:00

Well on Thursday at 10:30 I will officially say good-bye to J. Wow! You think you prepare yourself for this and are so ready for this, but man its been a weepy sort of day today. I finally told him on Sunday at the breakfast table and he said "I think I'm going to love that!"...ok that's great. Then yesterday I started sorting through all the toys and going through his clothes and he said
J: " oh I get to take those toys?",
Joc: "of course they are yours you got them for Christmas and your birthday and other special times."
J: "oh that's great, i like that"
Then by lunch time I could tell he was getting a little apprehensive and started asking lots of questions about his new house and who is going to be there. I tried my best to reassure him, with the zero detail I know about his new home. I think that is when I really started to get anxious about the move, however this morning I spoke to his worker and confirmed the time. I found out he is going to be closer than I thought, I don't know how much I can say but I was relieved that he may even still see some of his friends from time to time and I can still keep an "eye" on him-but not really. I just felt better, I also get to take him to his new house and the switch doesn't have to happen at the office, so it will be nice to chat with the new mom and just settle J in.
Tommorow is a really fun birthday party and then telling his friends that he's leaving and then the good-byes over the next day or two and trying to continue reassuring him without losing it myself. I think I tried to distance myself over the past few months, knowing this was coming and thinking it would be easier, but it really isn't. I am really thankful my family is coming from BC as a good distraction and then a Calgary trip at the end of the month!
On another note the placement unit is begging my to take a baby, ohhh a baby, Jeff said NO! We are taking a break Jocelyn, ok, but its a baby........(good thing my husband thinks with his head and not just with his heart-he keeps me thinking clearly and that I really want some special time with Aiden before the baby comes)
All in all you can just pray for us this week, especially for J that he will just have a really fun home and settle in really well!

First date!

2008-07-28T16:20:00.000-07:00

Well this past Friday J was finishing up his DVBS week at my mom's church, my mom was helping with the kids' hotdog lunch so I took Aiden to work with me so he wouldn't get in the way. I was at church all by myself with him and so I was so glad that he had come. I decided that I have never had lunch just me and him so I took him to McDonald's and had a little date. He was so excited and ate sooo good that I got a little weepy at that moment in itself and decided right then that I need more Aiden time.
mmm chicken nuggets...

Aiden was so good, I still can't believe that I can set up the playpen in my office and he will just go in there and fall asleep, even though the phone is ringing, printer is going and I am rolling in my squeaky chair. What a good boy:)

I also celebrated my birthday last week Thursday. We just went out for appetizers and browsed one of our book stores for some travel books for New York (more about that later). Then on Friday, Jeff took me to this really cool place on the river, not quite what we expected but still good, and then we went shopping with coffee from Starbucks, my favorite thing. I was able to score a bunch of maternity pants for a real steal so I was really pumped. I can still technically wear all my clothes but they are getting a little uncomfortable, so its great to have some new stuff to wear to work.

I can't believe I am a week and a half from being half way in my pregnancy-tommorow is my ultrasound so I am pretty pumped about that!

well I am exhausted after a full day of making raspberry jam, so I am off!

Family wedding and Family fun!

2008-07-24T09:59:00.000-07:00

My cousin Kim and her beloved Daniel, tied the knot this last Saturday in a beautiful ceremony and reception. Jeff and I had the priviledge of doing the Emceeing (not sure thats a word). But we had a blast and Jeff even let me say a cheesy joke or two. This is the only really good picture I got, all the all pics were blurry and dark, not sure if it had anything to do with the fact I was overly hormonal and couldn't stop crying! We also hired a sitter for the first time, this great girl from our church. Things went really well, Aiden is rather shy, but he didn't cry at all and went down for his naps and bedtime with no problems. YEAH! It is so nice to have someone to fall back on when family can't always help.

Sunday Jeff was preaching at our church and so some family came to support him, which was awesome, thanks so much for coming you guys! Then my uncle offered us some tickets to the raceway for the afternoon, with my mom offering to keep the kids it was a very hot but fun afternoon. Then like so many Sunday's I was throwing a pity party for myself that we don't have any friends and they never call us to hang out and then our wonderful friends Kev and Leanne called us up to go to the park with the kids and have a little picnic. It was a gorgeous evening and a great end to the day.

Aiden likes water but we've discovered on his own terms, he doesn't care much for our new pool, however, he does like to sit in his tiny tiny paddling pool or splash in the spray park. What a kid!

The two buddies enjoying a yummy fish cracker snack:) They are so cute!
I mentioned before that Aiden loves to sit on the naughty spot and read books, not sure how effective this is going to be as a discipline action, but I guess I will have to get creative. What's with the hitting?! Seems to be the new phase and so hard to reason with the guy about why it hurts mommy and our friends and daddy and so on...any ideas?
In other news, J's paperwork is in for his transfer, it actually has been for awhile but like everything takes forever. However, it sounds like it will happen in the next few weeks. Lots of things to prepare for him, not just physically but emotionally as well. Doesn't help that I cry about everything right now and this is going to be rough even though we are very ready for it. Much scrapbooking to be done, however, not my favorite thing to do so I really need to get motivation to get moving so it will be done for him. Anyone interested?

2008-07-07T18:14:00.000-07:00

I have great intentions of updating more frequently but life just gets in the way. My mom's group celebrated our only girl "babies" 1st birthday. It was a super hot day and unfortunately Aiden had been spiking a major fever, so we didn't get to stay to long. His fever lasted for four days, he did get a tooth however we are certain now that he picked up some sort of parisite at the lake we were at. He also got swimmers itch. Ahhh it was awful, he had it the worst around his mouth and inside, which means he couldn't eat very well, and then his legs and bum. Very uncomfortable for a little peanut! My doctor misdiagnosed it as impetigo, which I am very familiar with since we get impetigo outbreaks at work all the time. However, you try to trust your doctor but after a few days, I knew it wasn't impetigo. I talked to some other people at church and their family had gotten it the week before our camping trip, so were pretty sure it was the itch!
My "little" cousin Bryan graduated from high school at the end of the month (sure been a long time since the pyramid Bry) Aiden didn't make it through the ceremony, Jeff had to take him home since he was still sick, which meant we missed my cousin Miranda's grad the next day.
These are a few of Aiden's favorite things to do. Jeff's aunt dropped off a table his Grandpa made, Jeff played with it as a kid, so its pretty special that we got it. Aiden loves have snack there and playing with his dishes. The puppy kitty book is his absolute favorite and can say and pick out all the balls in the book. Playing with Dad is a huge highlight at the end of the day and he absolutely loves rough housing and teasing and wearing Dad out! :)

Jeff had a ball tournament this last Saturday, I played as well however I was kicked off the team when an umpire found out I was pregnant. I guess the National Slowpitch League has a rule against pregnant women playing. I was outraged to say the least! Anyway it killed me to watch but I did, we spent a lot of time in the car through out the day since the wind was really bad and Aiden has a pretty nasty cold. It was good to be done by the early afternoon, yeah the team sucked out but had fun, I said its because I wasn't there:)

Aiden also carries the bench from his table everywhere, mainly the coffee table to have more snacks. Yes my little munchkin is a little addicted to snacks. I would love some healthy snack ideas from anyone out there, especially ones to take in the diaper bag. He loves fruit, dry cereal and yogurt and has discovered a new love for gummy bears!

Daddy and Aiden sitting on the naughty mat:)

Favorite toy-Daddy!

Well that's been the last few weeks! Aside from a gross migraine this morning and afternoon causing me to miss work, things have been really good at the Froese household. Looking forward to an upcoming Loewen wedding, swimming in our new pool, and eating lettuce from my garden!

Church Camping at Pike Lake!

2008-06-25T09:33:00.000-07:00

Wow, what a super weekend we had this last weekend camping with the church. We headed out to Pike Lake, which is only like half an hour from our house, on Friday and spent until Sunday basking in the +28 heat. My Aunt was awesome enough to keep J for the weekend, so we just had a totally stress free, enjoyable weekend. I grew up going to Pike with my school, the lake used to be really gross so they have a pretty awesome pool with a water slide. However, they have cleaned the lake up fairly well, so we still played in their as well.
Aiden LOVED the water, especially the slide, and the pool noodles. He far, far exceeded our expectations by just being awesome. He just had a great time, he slept from 10:30 until 8:30 both nights, dispite our very, very noisy neighbors. It was such a great experience.

Hanging out at the lake!

Bath time!

Snug as bugs in our tent!

Playing in the tent! Yes we had a wonderfully, huge airbed!

Aiden is always doted on by the church girls:)

Jeff had a priviledge of baptizing another one of our youth.

We came back to a super busy week, with our youth grad party last night, which was pretty crazy getting ready for. But now youth is officially done, and our summer can begin. I have been feeling a lot better lately, and hoping that my visit to the chiropractor will continue to help with the headaches. We have some pretty big decision to make is the next little while, regarding job stuff and things like that. Here's to a sunny week:)

Catch up!

2008-06-15T15:20:00.000-07:00

To start, happy happy father's day to the love of my life! I realized I kind of did these pictures mixed up. So these are the most recent.
My mom and I took Jeff to the Seager Wheeler Farm for lunch today, it was awesome. I thouroughly enjoyed like 2 bowls of cabbage borscht among other things.
Aiden LOVED all the animals and it was fun to tour around some old buildings and just hang out.

My mom felt like she was back on the farm:) Right mom!
The lunch as I mentioned was awesome, everything was homemade, with yummy waffles with toppings for dessert. So so good.

A little peek at the last couple of weeks. Some particulars you might be wondering, I am due on December 27th, yeah not really the timing we planned, but I am keeping my fingers crossed that I am late.

This has actually been a really challenging pregnancy. Last month I had 2 migraine headaches that completely made me bed ridden for two days. I thought that was a thing of the past, unfortunately, this week they came back with a vengenance and pretty much consumed my entire week. I was finally able to see a doctor who diagnosed me with hormone induced migraines. The bad news is you can't tell when they are going to come, the good news if you call it that, I finally got some medication to stop the vomitting and allow me to eat, but nothing really for the headaches. Its just been really hard for me to have Jeff stay home from work, or have my mom have to help all the time because I literally couldn't do anything. I am so so so thankful for Jeff and my mom and all they have done to just help. This has been a good weekend, with just a dull headache, I can live with that. I am also seeing a really awesome chiropractor that believes she can really help me out by getting my body back in line. I'll take it!

Onto happier things, like my boy, he really makes us laugh a lot lately. His homemade vacuum.

His new fun thing to do!

Quite the showman!

We were able to do the children's festival a couple weeks ago, it was awesome except for getting completely terrentially rained on our walk back to the car.

My other favorite picture from our little photoshoot.

We are looking forward to this weekends church camping trip, and hopefully just keeping it together around here, health wise. Wishing you all a great week!

2008-06-04T20:33:00.000-07:00

Merry Christmas to the Froese Family:)

Just me and my boy

2008-05-26T09:42:00.001-07:00

Well on Thursday afternoon Jeff took off for YC Edmonton with our youth group. Yeah not my most favorite times when Jeff is away. I find I get really weepy about everything, my phone is silent and I wonder "did I have friends", and I am just done parenting by the end of it all. However, this week my wonderful Aunt and Uncle offered to take Jeremy from Friday night to Sunday afternoon. In all honesty, nothing has ever felt so needed in my life. I continue to struggle parenting Jeremy, continue to be frustrated by everyone's opinions on the situation and how they would parent him differently, and feel like I am up against a brick wall when I ask my friends around me for parenting advice and I am stuck with, "I don't know what I would do". Not very helpful when you feel like you are at the end of your rope. There that is off my chest along with the tears on my cheeks feels really good to just get out.
In the awesomeness of it all, Aiden and I got some really awesome bonding time and just time to pour all of my attention on him and not feel guilty. He wondered around a lot and asked for da da. Try explaining to a 1 year old that he will be back in a few days. Since our car was home he also thought Jeff should be around. What a funny guy. I just literally soaked it in, enjoyed going to bed at 9:30 and going on breakfast, and lunch and supper dates with my honey. Yeah hard to cook for two. Anyway here's just a couple pics since my camera was totally dead and I forgot to charge my batteries. I think I have mentioned before that Aiden absolutely loves, loves the vacuum. We were getting so annoyed at him always playing on ours that Jeff made him his own little vacuum with one of the metal bars and an attatchment. It literally keeps him busy for hours! However he does enjoy using mine the best and squeals in delight when we turn it on.

Helping me water the plants, hmmm a little thirsty himself I guess. I worked pretty hard this weekend and got most of my bedding plants in, dug a new bed for my tomatoes, and just tidied up our yard. Only my garden left to plant this week and my spring duties are done! What a refreshing weekend, and I was oh so glad when Jeff crawled into our bed at 1:30am this morning!

On a side note, Jeremy will be leaving at the end of August, please pray as we try to get through these next couple months with patience and understanding and most of all love. Also as we prepare ourselves, but especially him for this next major transition.

Mother's day and so much more!

2008-05-12T09:08:00.000-07:00

Definitely time for a new post, I feel like I haven't really had my camera out lately, but I managed to get some cute pics of the last couple of days. Just as a side note, we have been sent another general letter from Social Services that we are NOT to post pictures of the kids online, so unfortunately I need to listen and no longer post pics of J. He is still with us, everything we were working towards seems to have fallen through in terms of his adoption, his worker quit last Friday and so on. Very frustrating! Hopefully in the next while the casestudy we are waiting for from his adoptive family can be done quickly in Alberta and things can start to move forward.
So yeah, here is my little honey doing some "helping". That would be his favorite thing these days, he is very interested in doing whatever we are doing.
Just drivin' my car!

Hanging out at the track, it was very COLD!

Building my mom's mother's day present. Aiden is in there like a dirty shirt!

Funny hair after nap! LOL

I couldn't resist, one pic of J and Aiden in my mom's mother's day present, Landscaping cart.

That's all for now, hope all you mom's had a great day!

Oh boy!

2008-04-21T09:33:00.000-07:00

Yes this is what we woke up to this morning, Aiden pointing at his sucky and yes half of it was gone. My immediate thought, oh my word, he ate half his soother. I did end up finding most of the pieces in his crib thank goodness. We do have a problem, however, because I noticed his soother needed replacing awhile ago and couldn't find the MAM soothers anywhere except at Toys r Us and they didn't have his size. So we were in a little predicament for morning nap, but he saw me put it in the garbage and I explained its broken. He then threw the soother holder in there too, sooo I put him down for nap, he seemed ok, I did throw in a smaller soother I had that he wanted nothing to do with before. But I walked in there a bit ago and he's fast asleep sucking on that one. Phew! It's probably a good time to get rid of the soother, so maybe we will try that for afternoon nap. Needless to say it did freak me out a bit, since a bit ago I had a house full of women for a beauty control party and we couldn't find his soother, and he screamed for hours.
Yes Aiden still only has 4 teeth, however, he can eat an entire apple including the core, if we aren't watching him closely and keeps eating. It cracks me up! He is very proud of himself, and no we don't usually eat in the living room, however, he opened up Jeff's lunch kit and found this one.

He is officially walking, YEAH! I really wanted him to have a good hang of it before summer, thinking playing outside would be a lot more enjoyable. This weekend he just took off and now he's walking everywhere. If I can finally get my videos going I will try to upload one.

SPRING FUN!

2008-04-16T10:09:00.001-07:00

Finally some awesome weather and J could finally take his long awaited spin on his new bike. We think he did awesome, he biked all the way to Grandma's which is across town. For never having biked he did great!
Yeah for sunshine!!!!!!!!!!!!
Aiden and I braved the swing, last summer he threw up everywhere after being on the swing, this time he was just fine! What a big boy!Saturday we took two walks, in the evening we went to the park and the boys had a blast, I guess Aiden's tummy if fine, since he went round and round on the merry-go-round! J was everywhere, he didn't know what to do first!

Aiden can hardly stand it when Jeff is on the deck and he can't go outside, instead he gives daddy kisses through the screen. I want to get an outdoor rug, so there aren't so many slivers then he can have a blast on the deck!

Well things have been going alright with J lately, aside from the bed wetting which is driving me crazy, he just started again, however, this morning dry! YEAH! we made a big deal about it, since we know he can get up and has up until now, so we are hoping its going to stop now. Although things have been going well, we are sensing that we need a bit of a break from the behavior and so would like to take some respite. However, social services is so backed up that they asked us to find our own.

Anyone willing? We are thinking of May 22-25 weekend, Jeff is at YC and when he's not here things are always more stressful with J. There is a bit of pay involved and some paperwork. Funny to be asking this on here, but I thought of a list and thought well maybe I am missing someone and I really hate asking people, even for babysitting. so this is my way out:)

Have a super day!

I FINALLY did it!

2008-04-10T08:24:00.000-07:00

Well after much slack from the people around me and having 3 people comment on what a cute girl I had on my Saturday shopping trip, I decided to finally give Aiden a haircut. I had a really hard time with this! I LOVED his long hair, but to save his image we went to a cute salon called "Beaners" that is just for kids.

He actually did really good and sat pretty still-he had one melt down about the cape and another because he thought he was done. But really he sat very well!
Excuse MY hair it is in desparate need of a new look. My cousin is studying hairdressing and going to start cutting in a couple weeks, so she said she had something really funky to try in my hair. Anyway, this isn't about me...

Umm not sure what that look was!

OK I am being silly, but there is goes, probably the most photographed haircut ever:)

This is before.....

This is after, what a little man.....the hairdresser had a hardtime cutting it too especially his curls so we kind of left it a little longer. But I think he at least looks like a little man!

Just because he's really cute in his little man haircut!

Well that's my silliness...now if only my husband would follow suit.....

Back to my spring cleaning, many walls to be washed and closets to clean out!

not sure what to call this post!

2008-03-31T09:13:00.000-07:00

This one picture pretty much sums up what our Easter was like this year. The Thursday before Good Friday, I started coughing and it went downhill from there. I was pretty much in bed for the next 5 days. I did manage to get ready for Easter Sunday, after throwing up three times before we left, we did make it to church. I knew my brother Ray, his family Sam, Matt, Rachel and Alyssa were going to surprise my mom at my Grandma's house, so I really didn't want to miss that. However, Aiden really started going down hill on Easter Sunday as well. The next week was a lot of coughing, runny nose, fevers, throwing up and genuine uncomfortableness for Aiden and I. I felt like I totally missed out on a really fun week with my family. I definitely cried a few times. You know when your in the moment, you feel like your never going to be better and forget what its like to feel normal. I still have some really awful nauseausness and no appetite(No I am not pregnant and yes I am sure) Aiden has been slowly on the mend, he's finally got his appetite back, however, he has been sleeping really poorly. I don't know if its a fight of the wills, since we took him into our bed alot last week. Last night we just let him cry it out and eventually he finally settled. Very frustrating not knowing if theres a problem or he's just being stubborn.
I did manage to have my niece and nephew over for a sleepover. Matt and Jeff had a Lord of the Rings marathon downstairs. The kids and I watched movies and ate treats upstairs. I put the boys to bed and then Alyssa and I watched another movie, at 11pm she nudged me and said "uh Auntie the movies over and you slept through most of it" oops!

Since I couldn't get it together on Sunday to do the boys Easter treats from us. They did them at my mom's with their cousins. Aiden's was a little obvious:) But he loved it.

J had a blast looking for his basket, we told him little clues and he went on a hunt. It was pretty fun!

The rest of my family looking for their treats!

Jeff was having some fun with the camera yesterday. Aiden loves to sit in anything and be pulled around.

I have a great video of Aiden finally walking. He still will only do it when he's in the mood, but he is doing it a lot more without our prompting. Yeah!

Happy Happy 4th birthday to our J-boy!

2008-03-21T17:16:00.001-07:00

Well the looooooong anticipated birthday was finally here! I mean J has literally been talking about a racecar birthday since October. Yeah March is a really long way away from then. But it finally arrived.
I just had our normal mom's group of friends over. He was so excited to have them all here for his birthday.
I did make the cake, sorry I didn't get a better picture of it. But is was a Lightening McQueen Cake.

The games of course! Lightening McQueen fashion of pin the tail on the donkey and then Red Light Green Light. The kids actually got pretty good at it.
The much anticipated presents. So so spoiled!
Then a little craziness with the tissue:)
Yup a little pooped out from the party. It sounded rather quiet downstairs a bit after everyone had left and this is how I found him.
Then our present to him, which was a new Thomas bike. He was pretty pumped! And he is already getting a good hang of using the petals!
Happy birthday buddy! We are so happy that we had a chance to celebrate the big day! We love you lots. *Actually his birthday is today however, all of his friends were sort of busy today, so we pretended it was on Wednesday*

Another week

2008-03-13T18:47:00.000-07:00

This is my display for my epicure parties. I took a picture so that I would remember how to set up at a party. I had my first one and it went pretty good, I had a few blunders and a few questions I had no idea how to answer. It's actually quite fun and I am excited to do more. I think I probably have 3 more on the horizon and my good friend is doing a book party this week, so its going well.
Yeah looking really sick. Actually we returned from picking up Jeff from work yesterday and J started complaining of leg cramps and he didn't really want to eat. He had a bit of a fever and so I gave him some tylenol, hoping it wouldn't turn into the full fledge flu. Then Aiden started throwing up a bit, however he does that quite a lot. To make a long story short we did go to care group and the kids were ok and seemed to be ok today, not fluish really but a little off. Thursday is a hard day, since Jeff goes straight to youth after work, so i don't see him until late. I am feeling a little "kidded out today".

Aiden's new faviorite pasttime. Amusing himself with boxes:)

And I am trying to let go of my "oh my goodness" what a mess my son makes as he indepentely tries to feed himself with a spoon. He has gotten to the point that he won't take food from me very much anymore. Let's just say its a very messy breakfast when its a porridge morning.

Hmm, I just feel ready for spring to come, its been really nice and the snow is melting a lot. My deck is totally clear of snow since my great husband shoveled off quite a mound of snow a couple days ago when I had a craving for a barbequed hotdog. The weeks are going by quickly but it still feels like a bit of a slump. I have so much scrapbooking that needs to be done for J, that I need to get my act together, but feeling so unmotivated, so instead I began planning out my yard for this spring and all the shrubs and perennials I would like to plant.

Well the kids are finally in bed and I believe I should clean up the after math. Goodnight!

Shower and Shanigans!

2008-03-03T07:47:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I hosted a shower for my sister-in-law Angela and baby Kaiwren. It was a fun afternoon of oohing over little tiny outfits, eating food, and exclaiming over every sound that came out of little Kai babies mouth. He's so precious and I LOVE his hair!
My other sister-in-law Jeanna made this fun diaper cake, I love the decorating, however since the last shower for my friend Janet I learned to put my duck centerpiece in the living room. Last time everyone thought it was punch and almost drank my duck pond:)

A few recent shots of the boys! We took out Aiden's exersaucer to free up some room in our storage room, he was pretty excited to see his old "friend". He really does enjoy cuddle time with dad, he was just out of sorts. He's been pretty snotty, owly, and finally cut his two top teeth last week. Thus the soiled bunny hug in picture 4. He loves to be pulled or pushed in anything. He has now completely mastered the stairs. Down is still precarious for me so he is still supervised. But on Saturday I turned around and he was half way up the second flight of stairs to upstairs. Yes the impending haircut is coming up soon, its just soooo hard I LOVE his long hair.

Silliness with the plethra of balloons we had around here for the shower. Jeff thought it would be funny to put a pair of his sweatpants on J and fill them with balloons. However he weighs a little more than a peanut so he couldn't pop them. It was pretty funny however. With that is the sad part, it looks like J finally has a courtdate on March 11th and he will become a permanent ward of the state and be moved to a longterm fosterhome. Honestly, not really sure how I feel yet, or how quickly this process is going to go. It's going to be hard, however, with some very hard days in our past, there will be some relief as well. I am actually trying to block out most of the emotion right now and praying that a really super family will come along that can deal with his needs appropriatly. For right now we are not that family and as absolutely hard as its going to be we cannot commit to long-term right now.

February

2008-02-20T08:27:00.000-08:00

I apologize for the lack of communication. However February has turned into a very busy month. Aiden's birthday came and went and then I hosted a shower for my good friend Janet and baby Elijah. I haven't felt super camera friendly lately so this is the best I have for right now.
Aiden LOVES balloons and was very excited about his birthday balloons for weeks after. What a crazy 1 year old he is. This week he started actually standing independently for awhile. He definitely has his dad's stubborness (LOL) and will not practice walking at all unless he's cheating with both our hands. He is totally on homo milk now and we are pretty certain his "allergy" was just a harder adjustment to the milk than most kids. He loves to cuddle in our bed and play kissy face. He eats anything, however lately I think he might finally be getting some more teeth and is more picky. He still only has his two bottom teeth. He is pretty funny driving his cars and making the "brummmm" noise.

We had an episode of him breaking my one of the pieces in my lovely Crystal trio from partylite. Ahhh and he ended up cutting his finger. It wouldn't stop bleeding so I tried putting a bandaid on. He wasn't to impressed and did manage to get it off. I love his chubby hands:) Aiden had his 1 year shots today, yuck I always feel sick. He was pretty devastated, the only part was finally weighing him again and he is a whopping 24lbs 4 ounces, 30 1/2 inches long and has a big head! Actually he is in the 75th percentile for everything. So I am happy with my big guy!

Jeremy has been doing well, loves all the company we have been having. It has been a very challenging couple of months and definitely some wondering in there if we want to keep doing this. We definitely want to see Jeremy's placement out, but we have no idea how long it will be and the longer it is the more I worry. We are at a place of certainty that we don't want to have a permanent placement, meaning until he is 18. I honestly don't think I have the patience for the types of needs he has at this point and with some of the symptoms of FAS they only get worse with age. It's been 6 1/2 months and already we see things that are getting worse. However, it will be incredibly diffucult when he leaves. and I choose not to think about that. He is super stoked about a race car party, his birthday is on March 21 and he talks about it everyday, so we are hoping he is at least here until then. There has been alot of shuffle with his workers, so I am assuming it will be awhile yet.
Among other things, I started my new job at the church. This is my second week and it is going well. A lot of stuff to learn and I feel I have only brushed the surface. The boys go to a good friends on Tuesdays and then are with my mom on Fridays. As we drop the boys off on Tuesdays and drive to work together, Jeff and I are so thankful that I don't have to work full-time and admire the tons of people that have that routine everyday!
I am also a new epicure consultant. I love their products and have wanted to sell it for awhile. Epicure is a lot of food items, dip mixes, salad mixes, chocolate products and tons more. I don't want to do this hard core, but if you would like to do a party let me know, I could use the practice. Or if you love the product and just need to replenish I can totally do that as well. There that's my pitch!
Of course this month was the most awesome because my cousin Rosanna came out. What more need I say, breakfast at Wagon Wheel, shopping at Lululemon, dinner and a movie and a lot of talking and treats!
Love you muchly my Rosabella, and miss you tons.

Hopefully I can take some better pics of my boys this week, that's all for now folks!

The Party:)

2008-02-07T16:51:00.000-08:00

Aiden and his good friend Oakley were born 5 days apart and so we celebrated their friends birthday together. We went to Enchantaland, this cute coffee parlor with tons of play stuff for kids under 6. It was really nice to have the party elsewhere than our homes. Much less cleanup:) The only disappointment was that is was crazy busy so we didn't get a table until close to the end. I did helium balloons with little bags of 5 cent candies tied to the bottom as favors!
Aiden is obsessed with doors, quite a few tears, since kids did want to go in and out and didn't care if he was there. So I had to settle for curious george since Jeff thought the price of Baby Einstein partyware online was a little outrageous, soo the curious george was super cute anyway.
All the presents....wow he was so spoiled and so many new clothes which is awesome since he's running out of shower gifts!

We had my mom and Jeff's sisters over for our evening party! I was pretty proud of his cake, not totally perfect, but it turned out cute!

Aiden really enjoyed his cake, I made his own little one. He was pretty messy, but pretty excited to eat that much sugar. Needless to say he was a little harder to put down at bedtime.
And the great accomplishment of 1 year hood, is mastering the sippy cup. Yeah! I just let him continue drinking without the plug (very messy) and once he totally had the hang of that, I stuck it back in and he was a pro. I am pretty anti-juice, I have seen too many kids with rotten teeth. He's pretty excited when I put even a tblsp of a.j in his water.

Too my bunky bear, aidey baby, hunk of skunk, skunky bunk, aidey skunk, cuite honeybear (just to name a few:)

2008-02-05T10:52:00.000-08:00

Ode to Aiden- born February 6th, 2007

These pictures are in order however they aren't by month, just some of my favorite shots over the past year!

Happy Happy Birthday Aiden!! I can't believe he is really 1 years old. What an incredible year that will forever shape who I am as a mom.

Aiden was such a great baby, I think he slept most of his first 6 months, you can ask my Auntie Cheryl about that. Aiden had such a calm temperment and an easy smile. I have loved every stage that Aiden has mastered, however I love his one year old showman. He loves to be the center of attention and does so many silly things that make us laugh all the time.

Here are the things he started doing as a one year old!

Playing catch with daddy!

Climbing up the stairs!

sleepin in my crib
pots and pans are my absolute favorite thing!!!!!!
eating is a close second if not tied for first
Jeff was always worried we would have a bald baby since my nieces were very bald for a long time, so I had to prove to him that we have the opposite. I think he looks really cute in ponies!

what a card!

talking on the phone to dad or waving at the top of the stairs anytime during the day "bye bye, da da"
We love you so much Aidey baby-

lots of love Mommy, Daddy and J.

Long overdue

2008-02-05T08:14:00.001-08:00

He is here and again I am WRONG! Congrats to Jeff's brother Jason, his wife Angela and big brother Noah. Baby Kaiwren Thomas is here:) Yep a boy, I was so sure it was a girl I even bought girl things for them LOL! But I am so pumped that Aiden will have a boy cousin!
Look how precious he is, excuse my husbands face. I didn't end of getting the best pictures. He was 9lbs and 6 ounces and 22 1/2 inches long. Born on January 26th, my brothers birthday which is great for memory. I am glad that Aiden will have a boy cousin that has the same stature, there will be a bit of competition in the playfighting. At the hospital however he was just intersted in poking his eyes and pulling his hair. Already letting Kaiwren know who the boss is!

Proud Uncle, Aiden checking out the competition!

I forgot these!

2008-01-28T09:14:00.000-08:00

MEXICO:)

2008-01-28T08:12:00.001-08:00

Finally I had a minute to blog the awesome pictures from our holiday to Puerta Vallarta Mexico! As a reminder my mom took us as our Christmas present this year.
Here we are anxiously awaiting our first flight. That was the worst one, since we had to take an evening flight so Jeff could still work that day, we had to fly to Edmonton, wait for 3 hours, fly to Calgary and then finally to Abbotsford. We arrived there on Friday night, and then flew a straight through flight to Puerta Vallarta on Saturday afternoon with my brother and his family. I got to spend Saturday with my cousin Rosanna and she graciously drove half of us to the airport, to lunch and then back to the airport. A bit of a gong show. But the kids were so excited and ALL of them flew soooo well. Aiden had really good sleeps on all of the flights. We felt really thankful! What follows is a ton of pictures and surprise, surprise only a fraction of what I took!!

We spent a LOT of time eating, we were at an all-inclusive, so everything was free and there was always food available. For dinners they did fancier affairs, which was really awesome, I ate a lot of shrimp and Jeff ate a lot of steak. The one restaraunt we could only reserve once in our week, it was more formal, so it was fun to get all dressed up!
Aiden's sleeping throughout the week. He did really good, and we discovered on day 3, if we brought his playpen out, he would nap in there just fine!
Our routine for the day, was wake up, lather up with sunscreen, put on swim suits, eat breakfast, and then camp out at the pool for the rest of the day. Yep it was the life. It's definitely feels like a vacation, sitting in my beach chair, having someone serve me drinks! The disappointment in it all was the weather, it was warm, but not hot until our last day! Disappointing for the potential tanning we were aiming for.
Our beach had a pretty mean currant, so we didn't spend much time down there. I much preferred my beach lounger at the pool anyway:)
Fun times with family!
Yep we were pretty happy!
We took a bus downtown to the big market, the girls had their hair braided down there. We did a bit of shopping, but didn't find to many things that we were into.
The bus ride was pretty fun! A little bumpy if you ask the guys sitting in the back. However, Aiden still fell asleep on it LOL. We walked the boardwalk downtown, there were some really awesome sand sculptures, Bubba Gumps (yes totally based on Forrest Gump, with the best popcorn shrimp I have ever had) and a few more markets!
Aiden's entertainment was the birds, he LOVED to chase them and if we gave them food they would come right up to him. Of course he loved the water and was quite content to have his cousin Rachel push him around in his car. He also had a lot more "treats" than usual!
We booked on tour to a cove called Las Calatas, we took a boat and were able to do some whale watching as well. All of us girls however, became very sea sick from the choppy water and thankfully they had some drugs aboard for us to take. Alyssa was very ill and promptly fell asleep after the drugs. It was also awesome that my mom offered to keep Aiden back at the resort! That could have been crazy!
Jeff had the awesome oppurtunity to go scuba diving. The highlight of the trip for him and he said one of the best things in his life that he has experienced (besides meeting me).

There is nothing like standing on the ocean floor and seeing all of God's amazing creations just swimming around you and above you. I wish I would have been brave enough to do it!

The kids and us, were able to hold lots of different creatures. A monkey, a parrot and an owl! They had tons of stuff to do on the beach, the inner tubing on the waves was really fun. My nephew also did some snorkeling and we did a bit of hiking.
The last day hanging out. One last drink at the swim up bar, of course it was +30 our last day. Jeremy was the only one excited to leave, since it ment another ride on the airplane!
I honestly can't believe its over. So much anticipation and then, yikes, its all done. I was able to spend a couple days at my brother's before heading home. That was really awesome, Jeff did fly Sunday morning, but I was really glad the kids and I didn't have too. Since we only got back to my brother's at 2:30 in the morning and then Jeff flew out at 7am. Yeah I was a little tired, since my son was on Mexican time and was wide awake when I returned from the airport. I think he was ready to come home, he didn't sleep very well those last nights and we ended up taking him to the clinic thinking he had an ear infection. He didn't but he did manage to catch a nasty cold, which is still hanging around. Hoping it will clear up soon or maybe some teeth will pop out.

All in all the kids did really really well and were surprising well behaved. However they did have 6 other people to dote on them.

Already it has been crazy around here, I have a brand new nephew as of Saturday, but he deserves his own post so I'll try to do that later. Then just trying to settle back in, I have my interview at the church on Tuesday and then Aiden's birthday is coming up next Wednesday. Yeah, January is almost over!

He's finally here!

2008-01-11T11:27:00.000-08:00

Well I guess I have to admit that I am in fact wrong! Elijah Lane Buhler was born January 9th, 2008 to Janet and Sheldon Buhler. And he is in fact a boy and not a GIRL, I was so sure. Anyway I am so excited, Elijah is the last of our babies in our mom's group, poor Caley, she is the only girl in this batch. Oh well I am sure in the future she will be thrilled with her "selection!"
I am so excited he was born before we left and now I am hoping my new niece or nephew will hang on until we get back. Sorry Angela but that is really my wish:)
Isn't he precious, and only 7lbs 10oz, quite a peanut to my hefty 9 pounder!

So everyone thinks Aiden has my eyes! What do you guys think? LOL

Well its going to also be a crazy month of the babies turning one, 3 of the boys have birthdays in the next four weeks. Jarrett was pretty good at opening those presents!

And poor Caley girl, looking so sad with all these boys!

We tried to get a group shot, however, this was the best before one of the other started crying. Of course my son the performer!

Well that's it, in a few short hours we will be boarding a plane and heading off to Abbotsford to pick up the rest of the fam and then heading out to sunny Mexico on Saturday.

I am just painting my nails, and praying my boys will finally settle for some naps before a very long afternoon. J is so pumped that today is finally the day to go on an airplane.

No posts for almost two glorious weeks!

January 1st Fun:)

2008-01-04T12:16:00.000-08:00

We headed out to a place called Hilly Side on New Years day with my Loewen family. Its near the village that I grew up in until I was 14, so it brought back some really good memories. There is a place at the bottom of the hill that has bales and a firepit. So although it was cold we could get warm by the fire. We did lots of sledding and snowmobiling.
Aiden had to enjoy the festivities from inside the car. He has a rotten cold, comlete with coughing, runny nose and congestion. He was pretty cooperative, but I know he would have loved to be outside.

My Aunt and Uncle brought their snowmobiles, so we could have rides up the hill. J was in his glory getting a bunch of rides. Jeff took me for a little spin and proceeded to crash us into a bush and we both flew off. I was more worried about the snowmobile than us. He still claims I got startled and pushed his arm and it made him turn down the embankment, making us crash. I guess I finally faced my fear of falling off a ski doo.
After the outdoor fun, we finished off the day with a yummy chinese food dinner.