i don't blog: Feeling Happy

Life these days is feeling pretty good. It kinda feels like all the star are finally aligning.

• Kids are really enjoying the summer. I am glad we didn’t have them in full-day camp/daycare all summer. They love riding their two-wheelers (we are now past training wheels altogether in our house), playing street hockey, grounders at the park, chalk on the driveway, or just playing with little toys while being outside;

• We are all enjoying friendships with our neighbours - the kids love playing with all their friends on the street, and CJ and I really like hanging out on the street, talking to our neighbours. I love the fact that Seb and Kenzie can just go door to door asking if Matthew and Lucas, or Jacob and Jordan, or Olivia, or Zuhal and Adris can come out to play.

• CJ and I have started a new approach to parenting. We have started to be tougher on the kids but in a more patient and less reactive way, if that makes sense. So far (knock on wood) the kids have been reacting well. For example this morning Sebby brushed his teeth with no complaining, helped fill the bird feeders, and helped tidy his toys. Kenzie has done two loads of laundry, tidied the shoes and helped CJ fold laundry.

• I love the way our friendships here have growth into such relaxed, supportive and fun relationships. I love that the adults are all friends (the boys go mountain biking together, the ladies get mani’s and pedi’s together, we all watch movies together and love to get together at each others houses or out at a local pub etc)

• Work is going really well for both CJ and I. He just finished a huge project that he has been working on for other a year and is getting many commendations from around the company. I have had the opportunity to work with some great people in my company and to work on some very cool projects. I’m challenged and getting a lot of satisfaction. It’s a great place to be.

So all in all… I am happy. Life isn’t perfect - it never is. But I have very few complaints these days. I am not ready for the summer to end. We have another camping trip in a couple weeks that we are looking forward to. We even rented a pop-up trailer for this trip. I have a feeling we might just love it!

Last weekend it was CJ’s birthday weekend. It started off with Zoe sleeping over on Saturday night. First we were invited to Andrea’s for a bbq. We took Zoe with us and had a nice evening (despite the cousins fighting and egging each other on – ugh).

Cutie Jordana

CJ’s birthday cake

The kids were worn out from the day and ended up falling asleep pretty quickly. In the morning, CJ, Brian, and John went for an early morning mountain bike ride. When CJ came home the kids were super excited to celebrate CJ’s birthday . Here is a little video of the kids singing happy birthday. It all went great until Seb went to give CJ and hug and spilled hot coffee all overt the two of them.

Luckily they both recovered well and we were able to open CJ’s gifts outside. Sue and the girls were going for a run and stopped by on the way – they ended up hanging out with us instead and were there for CJ’s gift opening.

After playing outside for a few hours, Zoe was picked up, and the Ingram’s all came inside and had afternoon naps – LUXURY!! Shortly after waking up, we took the kids to Gay’s house and headed over to the Hunt Pub. We met up with Bev and John and Sue and Brian and enjoyed some appetizers and drinks to celebrate CJ’s b-day.

And to top off a fun evening we all came back to our house and watched Forgetting Sarah Marshall – a hilarious movie!!!

So this week Kenzie and Seb had swimming lesson with big Seb and Sophie. They each had private lessons – two kids and two instructors in the pool for two 30 minutes lessons It was quite a week for both Sophie and little Seb - both of whom decided that this was the week they were going to learn how to swim. All four kids did great and they each got badges at the end of the week. I brought my camera yesterday.

Kenzie’s lesson