tiffany's spot

I've always wanted run a half marathon. This last spring I was pregnant, so that was a beautiful excuse for not doing it. I'm a bit of a chicken. The year before that I thought about doing it, started running in the winter, and then slacked off near the end of winter. I told myself that I wouldn't be able to get ready for it in the amount of time I had left. The year before that - pregnant. This year I've decided to do it. For real. To stop myself from flip flopping on whether or not it's something I can actually manage to do without dying somewhere along the trail, and eventually deciding against it, I've signed up. That's right. I am now officially registered for the half marathon on father's day. Seriously, I know I can do it. I may have to have a few walk breaks, but I know that I can do it. In the fall I went on a few runs that were just over 6 miles in length, within months of having Elliot. I go to the gym and can run 6 miles in an hour, even wit

In only a few more days the holiday season will wrap itself up for yet another year. I like Christmas. I don't necessarily like all the preparations and the worry all through the month of December, but Christmas morning is great. I also kind of like when it's all done. I don't really consider myself "through it" until I've managed to put away all the decorations and gifts. I'm still working on that. I'm also using facebook these days as a handy procrastination tool. It doesn't help when everyone else is at home cleaning and not facebooking and giving me new things to read. This year was Elliot's first Christmas. Too bad the camera crapped out on us and I have next to no pictures of the event. I may have to dust off the video camera and get some pictures of her beside the tree before the whole thing is just a pile of needles and dust on my carpet. She'll never know that I took the pictures days after Christmas. A Christmas tree can drink

Okay, I'll tell. I put down what I was doing in the kitchen and headed for the living room. It was early in the morning, and still dark outside. It's amazing how much the lit-up Recycling Truck and Wagon resembles a Portage la Prairie Santa Claus parade float. At least when you're five. Kind of makes you wonder about the quality of some of the entries in that parade . . .

It occurred to me today that I never gave you the answer to my Two Truths and a Lie blog post. These were the three options, one of which was untrue: 1. I can hold my breath underwater for almost three minutes. I have yet to join a swim team or sport where I can put this to use. 2. I was born with a hole in my heart. My mom was devastated when she found out she'd have to fly with me to Toronto to have heart surgery. 3. I made my on-stage theatrical debut in the high school musical rendition of Mission Impossible. From there I disappeared into obscurity, but will always have the memories. The answer? #1 is the lie. I cannot hold my breath that long. Although, I've never tried. For all I know, I can go for days but I haven't discovered it yet. #2 is true. I was born with a hole in my heart. My parents were told that when I was old enough we'd all have to fly off to Toronto where the surgery would be. They didn't do it in Winnipeg. When my parents went back for a

The other day, the kids were up at the happy bright hour of 7am. Actually, they were probably up earlier, but the GoodNight Lite keeps them in their beds (somewhat). I was in the kitchen making toast and grumbling through my morning. The kids were in the living room watching t.v. Then Jordan yelled "Tennyson, look out the window! It's Santa!" I could hear the thumping of little feet as he ran to join her. Jordan's yelling "Mommy! Come and look, it's Santa! Santa from the parade!" I figured one of the neighbors had set up an impressive front yard display, and told them I'd come in a minute to see. I could hear them both yelling hi Santa and banging on the windows. Then Jordan yelled "No Tennyson, keep looking, he's leaving!" Leaving? Okay, now I was really curious. Why would someone be out Santa-ing about on my street at 7 in the morning more than a week before Christmas? I dropped what I was doing and headed to the living room window. B

Christmas is only ONE sleep away. Can you believe the amount of time we put into Christmas only to have it fly by like The Flash? Or The Streak? Me neither. I also cannot believe that although Christmas is only one sleep away, we will be having our second family gathering today. By the time Christmas morning arrives, it's already 2/3 over. Crazy stuff. I think I'm actually ready. I've wrapped my gifts . . . oh wait, I still have to go shopping for ingredients to make the dessert I'm going to bring today. I also have to pick up pictures from the photo lab at Walmart, also for today. Okay, so I'm not entirely ready. I'm sure I can do all of that stuff by 1 o'clock, right?

As if I haven't blogged in eight days. I think I must have, and then some hacker got on here and deleted them to make me feel bad. I'm sure that's what it is. My kids are getting bigger. Mitchie got his first hair cut, and looks like a miniature big boy. I'm thinking that I'll have to potty train that little imp soon. I have been kind of putting it off, partly because I do a lot of running around in the mornings, and soaking wet pants and car seats are no fun. But mostly, it's because I hate potty training. I'll admit it. Potty training sucks. To be honest, I haven't had any desire to start. I know, it probably just sounds lazy, but it's so easy having him in his diaper where everything is nice and contained and I can just pretend he's a toddler that doesn't need to learn anything big just yet. There are no logs down pant legs, no pants soaked to the ankles, no pudding in the gitchies. Ugh. I'll start as soon as diaper gym and school take

Steven's outside making the kids a skating rink. I know, it's 10:13 pm, and it's cold out there. I can't imagine shoveling a giant hole in the snow covered yard and spraying water around with the hose when it's minus 26 degrees Celsius (3.2'F) is a whole lot of fun. That's why I'm not offering to help him. I'm a little lazy about getting myself excited to hang out in the snowy backyard, especially to work. My excuses today were: I don't have proper snowy backyard boots to wear. The zipper is busted out of one. It wouldn't have likely stopped me from going tobogganing or something a little more fun. I wanted to vacuum. Not that I ended up doing that. I had to feed the baby. For hours, had Steven checked the clock. Making supper. Going to Zumba (yay!) And simply: Nope. It's too cold. Let me get you some hot chocolate. I don't much like being cold. I don't go on about it all the time. We're all in the same room/town/city/country.

The only downside about knowing that I was going to have a girl the last time that I was pregnant was not preparing for a boy too. I know it sounds silly, but generally we have names picked out for either a boy or a girl. We have little clothes ready for a boy or a girl. This last time? It was all about Elliot. We didn't even bother picking out a boy's name just in case. I kind of feel like the little Boy That Could Have Been got ripped off a little. Poor little would-be guy. Steven and I always had a harder time picking out boy names than girl. Somehow we agreed on Tennyson. Odd, because it's kind of a different name. It amazes me that we both liked it. We argue a little over who thought it up first. I kind of let him think he did. Near the end of my 3rd pregnancy, I finally got fed up and told Steven that I really liked Mitchell, and since he didn't hate it we were going to use it unless he came up with something we liked better. It's not that he didn't like

I feel like I should blog. I'm sure my life is very interesting to others, even when it's not to me. Wait, I mean, it's very much so. I kind of forget about blogging, truth be told. I'm one of those people who slows right down with blogging as soon as things get busy. So, when I have lots of things to talk about, I talk about nothing. Go figure. Christmas events are in full swing already. This last Friday was the Santa Clause parade here in town. The kids loved it. They liken the Santa Clause parade to Halloween, except that the candy-givers come to you. They stand there on the side of the road with their bags open and wait for people to drop candy in. I'm not sure that they're even all that interested in the floats themselves, except for the Santa float. They love Santa. On Sunday we went to the Christmas party put on by my mom's work. She likes to sign us up to go. Someday when I have grand kids I'm sure I'll want to show them off too. We were one

A photographer from this area took some pictures of our family a little while back. CLICK HERE for a sneak peak of the session. I think they're fantastic!