Ru ~ dig deeper

^{Retroactive happiness…}

^{December 18, 2012}

• Snow! White, bright, fluffy, and not too cold. Isak was thrilled, Iris was slightly uncertain at first. We went to school early so the kids had time to play. There was much frolicking and building of tiny snow people.

• The car got stuck in the Big White, but M. made it to work okay thanks to a thoughtful co-worker.

• Shining up the family and going to the Christmas concert at the school, which was very cute and funny. All the kids did a fantastic job.

• Curling up together with cocoa and a late night movie.

The long weekend was timely, our friends wedding yesterday was lovely – ideal weather and lots of fun. Now moisture has returned, but I’m not minding the rain so much today. It’s light and bright.

We all slept in a bit this morning (oops) but M. has time off, so we picked up morning speed and he dropped Isak off in the nick of time. Bracing for the busy. We have various errands to run today, so the coffee is on and we’ll aim to hit the ground running. Momentum feels good.

• Basic house maintenance: dishes, garbage, recycling, compost
• Eat well, drink plenty of water, and take vitamins/supplements
• Exercise/movement for 1 hour minimum: walk, yoga, Wii fit+
• Flylady Mission of the Day: Clean under the bed, sock drawer
• Reading & homework with Isak
• Laundry: wash, sort, put away
• Me time: bath, bubbles, book
• Family game / adventure
• Transfer new photos
• Downtime w/M.
• Joynotes

• Bedtime reading with Isak: Prince Caspian: Chapter 12
• Continue December Happiness entries
• Call/write Norm re. software
• Narrow down computer
• Library
• Bank

• Sign insurance papers, drop off bank papers
• Hardware store: find/price things on the list
• 30 min. cleaning/decluttering Isak’s room
• Sort junk to remove from new place
• Sort something in the garage
• Call Dr. re. Iris immunization
• Touch base with 3 friends
• DVR: watch/delete 1 hour
• 1 level DKCR with Isak
• Hand wash party dress
• Return 3 messages

• Find somewhere to sell/donate old car
• Iris: Update immunizations
• Replace computer

Shakespeare’s Insults: Educating Your Wit, released on a cold and rainy day last November near the art school on Granville Island.

This one was journaled twice this week – first in Vancouver, then in New York. I look forward to christening the new neighbourhood with books. I’d very much like to reach the 100 released goalpost sometime this summer. Anniversary’s on the horizon, that’ll be a good kick-start.

We had a busy but inspiring weekend and are glad it’s a holiday and we can skip work/school. It’s a beautiful, bright spring day – we’re busy tidying up the family to head out to the wedding of some longtime friends. Uncertain how long we’ll be out, so we’ll try to finish what we can later in the day. To love! And friends! And friends in love! (clink!)

• Basic house maintenance: dishes, garbage, recycling, compost √
• Eat well, drink plenty of water, and take vitamins/supplements √
• Exercise/movement for 1 hour minimum: walk, yoga, Wii fit+ √
• Flylady Mission of the Day: Clean under the bed
• Reading & homework with Isak
• Laundry: wash, sort, put away √
• Me time: bath, bubbles, book √
• Family game / adventure √
• Transfer new photos √
• Downtime w/M. √
• Joynotes √

• Bedtime reading with Isak: Prince Caspian: Chapter 12
• Continue December Happiness entries
• Call/write Norm re. software
• Narrow down computer

• Scrub, rinse, trim, and polish the entire family √
• Wrap wedding presents for P + V √
• Attend P + V’s afternoon wedding √
• Touch base with 3 friends √
• DVR: watch/delete 1 hour √
• Post weekend clean-up √
• 1 level DKCR with Isak - He wanted Lego Star Wars instead…
• Outside time √
• Library - Closed, bumping to tomorrow
• Bank - Closed, bumping to tomorrow

• Find somewhere to sell/donate old car
• Iris: Update immunizations
• Replace computer

I’ve had Season 1 on the DVR for months, I just hadn’t set aside the time to watch it (after hours). Lately I’ve had some insomnia creep in and have been up late channel surfing and watching whatever happens to be on, which is something I don’t like to do, so I decided to fire up the first of these and ended up addicted and watching half the season over the next couple of nights. I’m looking forward to everyone going to bed so I can indulge some more…

^{Retroactive happiness…}

^{December 16, 2012}

• A lazy morning starting with a big family cuddlepile.

• The craziness of the pipe in the bathroom bursting was caught shortly after it happened, which was just before we were heading out for hours and hours. Nightmare avoided, not filth-water, and a relatively easy fix.

• The Great Truffle Roll 2012! Year six! Good times, laughter, tea, cookies, pesto pasta, and the rolling of scrumptious chocolate.

^{December 17, 2012}

• Martial Arts games: fun with big foam bats.

• Strange weather – violent and beautiful.

• Minty bubble-baths and Irish Cream

• Festive old-school stop motion animation and popcorn with the family.

Top 10 Things To Do This Weekend

^{Entry 600!}

• House: Go by, measure things, make plans, start cleaning up
• Bedtime reading with Isak: Prince Caspian: Chapter 12
• Martial Arts: High Gold Belting Ceremony
• Continue December happiness entries
• Wedding: Buy gift, buy/choose clothes
• Movie and popcorn with M.
• Bust some garage clutter
• Family adventure outside
• Sign insurance papers – Will have to bump, bank closed
• Look into car pick up – Cash for Clunkers?

I can’t believe I’m actually checking this one off! This has been a dream of ours for what seems like forever.

We got the keys yesterday, the Realtor left us a card and a lovely gift basket (wonderful and practical – tools and gift cards and things we can use!) and we spent the next couple of hours there wandering from room to room, looking in drawers and cupboards, making plans, measuring spaces, and feeling giddy and glad. The kids ran up and down the stairs, rolled around on the floors, danced around the patio space and watched clouds go by from balcony, went out to the little playground for a while… they’re so excited. We all are. We definitely feel like we’ve made a very good decision and will all be very happy there.

Very best of luck to anyone else looking for their place to call home.
I’m happily, happily checking this off my list at long last.

^{Now if we can just survive the moving process… but that’s a new goal that can take the place of this one.}

It’s FRIDAY! We don’t have a lot planned for today, which makes it a good day to relax and celebrate and start making new plans for the month ahead. The more we plan things out and break them down the smoother things are going to go. It’s going to be crazy, but as long as we can schedule sanity breaks, we should get through it all okay. Happy Friday!

• Basic house maintenance: dishes, garbage, recycling, compost √
• Eat well, drink plenty of water, and take vitamins/supplements √
• Exercise/movement for 1 hour minimum: walk, yoga, Wii fit+ √
• Flylady Mission of the Day: Clean tub faucets, vacuum
• Reading & homework with Isak √
• Laundry: wash, sort, put away √
• Me time: bath, bubbles, book √
• Family game / adventure √
• Transfer new photos √
• Downtime w/M. √
• Joynotes √

• Bedtime reading with Isak: Prince Caspian: Chapter 12
• Continue December Happiness entries - Worked on photos
• Sort 1 box or bag in garage √
• Start a new donation box √
• Movie & popcorn (part II)
• Narrow down computer

• House buying stuff: Done! Finished! Time for new plans! √
• Prep for new belt ceremony tomorrow √
• Put on some music – dance! √
• Call/write Norm re. software
• Touch base with 3 friends √
• DVR: watch/delete 1 hour √
• 1 level DKCR with Isak √
• Outside time √
• Brainstorm √
• Relax √

• Find somewhere to sell/donate old car
• Iris: Update immunizations
• Replace computer
• Buy wedding gifts

^{Retroactive happiness…}

^{December 15, 2012}

• Waking to light snow! Not a lot, but enough to make the world feel retuned.

• Silly kid affection overflowing on a relaxing Saturday morning.

• Unexpectedly hearing from a very old, very dear friend (a solid best in the teenaged years) that I’ve been out of contact with for close to 10 years. I’d so been hoping to someday be in touch again – it was wonderful to hear from her and see she’s happy and healthy and doing so well.

• More birthday festivities for my nephew (the actual party). Dress up time for the kids, fun, pianos, and cake!

• We left the party with my dad to go cut down a Christmas tree and made it there just before the gates closed. We got a lovely tree and warmed up by the fire-pit with hot cocoa that had candy canes melted in it. Wet but wonderful.

• Deciding to stop at Ikea on the way back for delicious meatballs and mashed potatoes. Nomnomnom.

Today we pick up our keys! How marvelous. The whole family is heading over to the new house this evening to receive them and have our first unescorted visit to what will be our home. Sigh.

M. has solidified his time off this month and next, and hopefully there will be good news about all the things that we need to do before moving in (particularly the ceilings). I’m happy that the sky spray that surprised me this morning has scuttled off to reveal blue skies and that a long weekend is just over the next bump in the road.

Looking for locks…

• Basic house maintenance: dishes, garbage, recycling, compost √
• Eat well, drink plenty of water, and take vitamins/supplements √
• Exercise/movement for 1 hour minimum: walk, yoga, Wii fit+ √
• Flylady Mission of the Day: Wash bathmat, 27 donations/returns, bathroom toss 2/3
• Reading & homework with Isak √
• Laundry: wash, sort, put away √ X3
• Me time: bath, bubbles, book √
• Family game / adventure √
• Transfer new photos √
• Downtime w/M. √
• Joynotes √

• Continue December Happiness entries √
• Start a new donation box
• Narrow down computer

• House buying stuff: PICK UP KEYS! Then walk around the new place feeling both elated and terrified, pop the cork √

• Solidify time for insurance meeting over the weekend (Sunday PM?) √
• Bedtime reading with Isak: Prince Caspian: Chapter 12
• Hand wash clothes + martial arts uniform √
• Contact P + V re. wedding Monday √
• Sort 1 box or bag in garage
• Touch base with 3 friends √
• DVR: watch/delete 1 hour √
• Movie & popcorn (part II)
• 1 level DKCR with Isak √ X2
• Watch baby H. at 5 √
• Clean kitchen √
• Outside time √

• Find somewhere to sell/donate old car
• Iris: Update immunizations
• Replace computer
• Buy wedding gifts

Today we close on our house! Funny, this grand event doesn’t require anything of us (today at least), but it’s an exciting goalpost and means we’ll have keys in our hands tomorrow. I need to focus on not just how stressful fixing/packing/moving is but how fantastic it is to finally reach this huge goal and look forward to starting a fresh new chapter in our lives.

Today is also Isak’s last day at his martial arts school. Saturday he graduates to a high gold belt. I need to start thinking about seriously cleaning up this place before next month when the landlord will be bringing people through to try to re-rent it. The sooner we can get the new place move-in ready the better. Fingers crossed the ceilings haven’t been painted so we can scrape them off easily. Hopefully we’ll have enough time and energy left to watch the DVD I picked up from the library.

Huzzah!

• Basic house maintenance: dishes, garbage, recycling, compost √
• Eat well, drink plenty of water, and take vitamins/supplements √
• Exercise/movement for 1 hour minimum: walk, yoga, Wii fit+ √
• Flylady Mission of the Day: Wash bathmat, 27 things to give away
• Reading & homework with Isak √
• Laundry: wash, sort, put away
• Me time: bath, bubbles, book √
• Family game / adventure √
• Transfer new photos √
• Downtime w/M. √
• Joynotes √

• Bedtime reading with Isak: Prince Caspian: Chapter 11 √
• Continue December Happiness entries
• Narrow down computer

• House buying stuff: CLOSING DAY!!! Wait for confirmation, then pop a cork of some sort √
• Solidify appointment with our insurance guy (to sign paperwork) √ This weekend…
• Attend last martial arts class √
• Touch base with 3 friends √
• DVR: watch/delete 1 hour √
• Start a new donation box
• 1 level DKCR with Isak √
• Watch baby H. 4 – 6 √
• Weed possessions
• Movie & popcorn √ Half…
• Outside time √
• CELEBRATE! √

• Find somewhere to sell/donate old car
• Iris: Update immunizations
• Replace computer

^{Retroactive happiness…}

^{December 13, 2012}

• An early morning with chai and mandarins.

• Fighting a cold with uncommon valor. And grapefruit juice.

• Isak’s joy in choosing cookies we’d decorated for his classmates.

• Looking forward to a fancy dinner out tomorrow.

^{December 14, 2012}

• Had a great parent teacher meeting then returned to horrible news on every station. I could hardly wait to get back down to the school again and spent the afternoon hugging the kids extra tight. All hearts out to Connecticut.

• My parents came by to watch the kids so M. and I could attend the annual company dinner downtown. A very nice place with wonderful food and wine (bacon seafood chowder, chicken pasta, Blasted Church, tiramisu and coffee), great people to share a meal and lots of laughter with. It helped to shake off a bit of darkness.

• Funny post-its stuck to bus shelter glass.

• Coming home to sweetly sleeping kids and kissing their heads a few extra times.

^{Retroactive happiness…}

^{December 12, 2012}

• It stopped raining after a wet, wet week, and everyone was healthy.

• Skipping school to go ride the Xmas train in celebration of my nephew turning two! Really entertaining for all 5 of the kids with us, and the birthday boy was suitable impressed. Very odd elves in the tunnel and lots of shiny things.

• Good times with Santa. He gave us candy canes and glittery reindeer food (later we joked about what festive findings glittery reindeer food could lead to).

• Talking Subway bent members of the gathering into going for Indian food at a place we’d never been that turned out to be absolutely fantastic.

• Thinking I’d lost my camera case and then finding it velcroed to my mom’s tush.

• Discovering a vast new playground.

• Bright leaves.

More Very Important Things to do today – I can’t believe we close on the house tomorrow! It’ll feel fantastic to have all that end of things behind us so we can launch ourselves at the craziness of renos, packing, and moving.

The rain seems to have stopped, which is nice – the school has a big field trip today and the kids were all very excited about it. I’ve been trying to baby my back and it feels on the mend which is a bonus – this isn’t a great time to throw my spine out of whack. SO much to do… but for some reason I’m feeling a little bit less overwhelmed. I could have sworn it was Thursday already though.

Main focus for the day: Collect DP from bank! Meet with lawyer! Switch bills at new place!

• Basic house maintenance: dishes, garbage, recycling, compost - 3/4
• Eat well, drink plenty of water, and take vitamins/supplements √
• Exercise/movement for 1 hour minimum: walk, yoga, Wii fit+ √
• Flylady Mission of the Day: Check bathroom supplies √
• Reading & homework with Isak √
• Laundry: wash, sort, put away
• Me time: bath, bubbles, book √
• Family game / adventure √
• Transfer new photos √
• Downtime w/M. √
• Joynotes √

• Continue December Happiness entries √
• Narrow down computer

• House buying stuff: Collect bank draft, meet with lawyer, make downpayment, pay closing $ √!
• Call gas/hydro companies to have bills switched over to our name (for tomorrow?) √
• Make an appointment with our insurance guy (to sign paperwork) - Sent e-mail
• Bedtime reading with Isak: Prince Caspian: Chapter 11
• Send Isak to Science World (w/extra snacks/drinks) √
• Touch base with 3 friends √
• DVR: watch/delete 1 hour
• Peruse kids beds at Ikea √
• Go for brunch with M. √
• Watch baby H. 4 – 6 √
• Weed possessions
• Outside time √
• Rest back √
• Library √ Paid fine, picked up Lincoln.
• Relax √

• Find somewhere to sell/donate old car
• Iris: Update immunizations
• Replace computer

Monday returns! It was a busy but fun weekend. M and I celebrated our anniversary with a bit of much needed escapism (a movie and Indian food) while my folks looked after the kids. We sent a big carload of baby things to our friends who are expecting which cleared out some space, finished and sent in our taxes (huge relief), and had some decent family time flanked by decluttering and house moving prep. The only down side was somehow lifting a sleeping toddler wrong and monkeying up my back, so I’m taking it easy on lifting today.

Main focus for the day: Make sure everything is 100% in place for when we meet with the lawyers tomorrow morning (gulp!), meet all set commitments, rest

• Basic house maintenance: dishes, garbage, recycling, compost √
• Eat well, drink plenty of water, and take vitamins/supplements √
• Exercise/movement for 1 hour minimum: walk, yoga, Wii fit+ √
• Flylady Mission of the Day: Tidy bathroom hotspots, 27 fling √
• Reading & homework with Isak √
• Laundry: wash, sort, put away √
• Me time: bath, bubbles, book
• Family game / adventure √
• Transfer new photos √
• Downtime w/M. √
• Joynotes √

• Reconnect with an old friend in our new neighbourhood √ Sent msg.
• Continue December Happiness entries
• Narrow down computer

• House buying stuff: Call bank re. downpayment draft, choose + solidify insurance √ Whew!
• Bedtime reading with Isak: Prince Caspian: Chapter 10 √
• Prep for school trip to Science World √
• Help with teacher appreciation lunch √
• Martial arts class, prep badge paper √ He got two!
• Touch base with 3 friends √
• DVR: watch/delete 1 hour √
• Update Flash player √
• Weed possessions √
• Outside time √ Before the rain…
• Rest back √
• Update fb √

• Find somewhere to sell/donate old car
• Iris: Update immunizations
• Replace computer

It was a particularly slow and stressful slog this year (so much going on, so many papers and digital whatnots to dig up) but all has now been sorted and as of an hour ago… filed X2!

We should have a decent return coming in just in time to spend it on things like paint and drywall and moving costs and perhaps a new hot water tank (maybe even a nice bottle of wine to enjoy on our new balcony?).

Next year will be even more complicated after house buying and investment cashing and self employment vs. mortgage interest and such… maybe it’ll be time to hire someone to do this. It’s a huge relief to be done for this year though – like a cool breeze that actually blows out the flames.

^{BeeQ had this one on her list back in ‘09, I couldn’t resist.}

I Loved Spirograph when I was a kid, and deeply coveted the set some family friends had back in the 70’s. I’d kicked myself for not picking up an old one I saw in a second hand store last year (even though 2/3 of the pieces were missing) and was considering checking out one of the newer versions when Isak was given a fantastic and intact old-school set which we’ve had great whorly dizzy whizzy fun with.

Fun! Creative! Full of great educational math-y skills! Plus it’s extra glorious when done with metallic jewel toned pens… well worth tracking down (thanks e-bay/A.!).

^{Retroactive happiness…}

^{December 11, 2012}

• Coming home for coffee after getting utterly drenched in the morning rain.

• Real mail in the mailbox! Festive and friendly.

• Elementary school art walls. “The flowers are starting to be dead.”

• Plans to skip school tomorrow (which is just a half day anyhow) to go to my nephew’s second birthday party and ride trains.

• Relaxing in my green velvety comfy pants, having apples and tea.

• Playing Pictureka and making fantastic Spirograph art.

Top 10 Things To Do This Weekend

• House: Re-read Purchasers Statement of Adjustments, talk to insurance/mortgage brokers
• Bedtime reading with Isak: Prince Caspian: Chapter 9
• Drop off big carload of baby donations for friends
• Work: Check PC laptop for transcription software
• Continue December happiness entries
• Do something for our anniversary!
• Finish and send 2012 taxes
• Bust some garage clutter
• Family adventure outside
• Recycling depot