This age...

I originally meant this blog to be more of a daily "OMG _____ did this today and it was so cute" or frustrating, or endearing or whatever.  My kids are at such a fund age right now and they will grow up so quick.  I wanted to remember all of the cuteness and things that come out of their mouths at just the wrong, or right, moments.

I haven't been doing that as much as I want to, and some of the things that come out of their mouths or the things that they do, really are priceless.

Take Cammie for example...the other day while I was otherwise occupied, she took the jar of peanut butt one of her siblings so kindly left open and decided to use it as styling gel.  Fortunately she took her arm out of the sleeper before delving into the peanut butter up to her elbows and smearing it all over herself.  This has earned her the reputation of now being into her "busy" phase and requiring "constant supervision".  Another incident at Grandma's house has also earned her another title of "PF".  She loves to flush things down the toilet...unfortunately something went down the drain that shouldn't have and an incredibly valuable thing was lost...but worthless at the point it was flushed.  Good thing we love the little rotter.

Brooklyn is also at a priceless age...the things that come out of her logic filled brain just make me laugh.  conversations with her are quite funny.  She was playing with her favorite stuffed Hippopotamus earlier today while I was cleaning up.  I came across one of her little pet shops, picked it up off the floor and asked her to put it away...she gave me a look, took it and I figured that was the end of it.  When I found another littlest pet shop, I again called her over and gave it to her.  This time she sighed, took the toy and said "Mom, I just don't have time to be doing this right now.  I am busy taking care of my Hippo." She stored the LPS toy in her bed and went about doing her thing.

My brain doesn't store enough in it anymore.  I know these moments will be gone soon and I would like to share and store more moments from all five kids in this blog more often, so one day I can come back here and remember these days.

"I have truly made a mess, Mommy."

Being a leader....

As I have mentioned in posts previous, my husband and I try to be involved in the school as much as we can.  We like to offer our services to them in almost anyway we can spare.  I have a great amount of respect for teachers and the amount of work they do for our children.  They give themselves over and over to help them succeed and so many times the parents at home don't do anything to continue on or foster their work.

My husband and I are members of both the fundraising committe and the advisory committee for our school.  Both aspects are important to how the runnings of the school impact our kids and the funds they have available for certain activities, feild trips and equipment.  With a declining rural population, the school budget can not be expected to make due on it's own.

I find some weeks that the positions are a great frustration.  We have close to 300 students in our school.  5-7 parents come to the fundraising committee and only a couple more come to the advisory council.  We do have a greater percentage of people willing to give their time during field trips and a few willing to give their time in the classrooms, but for the most part, parent involvement is very small in our school.  This is an issue with a lot of schools so shouldn't be overly frustrating.

It does bug me though.  Some of these other parents are my friends.  I hear them complain and try to run down or degrade the decisions that are made in the school, yet they are, for the most part, to lazy to come to the meetings to voice their opinions or suggest change.  If they were too busy, worked in the evenings, had young kids they couldn't get away from, or some other valid reason, it would be less frustrating.  The truth is they are just too lazy to support or make a change in their kids school.

Our school has a gaming license...we need a certain amount of volunteers to work these casinos, and bingos.  The funds derived from them are huge in the support of the school, and we have so many issues trying to find the low number of parents to help out at each one.

Another frustration is the person who is the chair for our fundrasing committee.  Being a leader involves having a positive outlook, being in support of your goals and the objectives we do to achieve them, having an open mind and a willingness in spirit.  Without any of these things the group will not be able to survive and function the way it should.  Our leader for this oraginization lacks all of these attributes but does seem to enjoy having the "power" to control and dismiss others input based on her knowledge.

Without the leader displaying the right attributes how are we supposed to get beyond the limitations of the group and reach out to the parents to encourage involvement?  It starts at the top and sometimes the top needs to be blown off of things.  I'll let you know how that goes....

Hawaii

My husband and I had our Anniversary this week.  9 years together.  It's been a wonderful ride!  We have a very different relationship than most people.  We don't have a couple hours a day together and weekends, like I imagine most people do.  Since we have met, we have worked, and eventually lived together.  In 9 years, the number of nights we have spent apart can be counted on one hand.   It's the lifestyle we lead.  Some people would be sick of their spouse if they were within a few feet of them at almost any time of the day.  For us, it works.

We were married in Maui.  It was a beautiful Hawaiian day...the wedding was on the beach.  Our first daughter was there with us, she was 4 months old.  My best friend came to take pictures, witness and nanny while we got out to enjoy the sights Hawaii had to offer.   So our anniversary is a day we remember commiting to each to each other, and a day we think of sand, ocean and salty air.

We have been back to Hawaii a number of times since then.  Most recently was almost 4 years ago.  We packed up the kids and headed out to Maui.  It was a trip that was planned with very little funds as we had just gotten out of the restaurant, and were at what we would probably consider on of out lowest times.  We booked a 2 bedroom ground floor condo that opened up to a lovely garden area, you walked through it to get to the pool, a lovely green space and the ocean.  We stayed a month and became even more familiar with our favorite places.  We adopted a routine of an early morning beach day, a trip home for Sydney's nap, then an afternoon at the pool with the kids.  We spent less than $50 a day for our entertainment, food, toys etc. Our days were spent just dedicated to the family, being together, story time, and relaxing.  We grew as a family, and the kids grew and matured so much during that time.

For us Hawaii symbolizes the commitment we have made to each other, a commitment we again addressed to our family in a time where we didn't know where our lives were taking us.  We were without employment, $2000 a month rent payment for our acreage, looking at relocating into lands unknown and starting up a risky and unstable business venture after just being dumped out of one.  We needed a place to regroup and refocus.  Hawaii was that place.  It gave us a month away from all the stress, the daily what ifs and oh no's, a month dedicated to just loving and being thankful for what was around us.  A month of noncompulsary family time.

It's been almost four years since we have taken the time to recommit.  Our family has grown and two of our little ones have only known their parents surrounded by all the stuff that needs done.  One is probably to young to remember a time when all we had to do that day was whatever we wanted to.  We are starting to plan a trip back to the islands.

Next year will be our 10 year anniversary.  We want to reach that milestone surrounded by family and ocean, standing in the sand, smelling the salty air, watching the whales romp past.  We want our kids to experience the time of just relaxing and play with no work or chores to get in the way.  It's not the most practical way to spend out money but it will be the most worthwhile.  Sometimes we must do the least logical in order to maintain and strengthen relationships and bonds.  Hawaii does that for us.

Balance...

With everything in life there needs to be a semblance of balance.  I have a tough time doing that occasionally.  I find myself drawn into a project and allow it to consume me, sometimes to the exclusion of all else.  I call it my addictive personality, but really it's a lack of appreciating balance.

I am a stay at home mom with five kids.  With that there is a certain amount of flexibility allowed.  There isn't a set schedule to do everything that needs to be done as one sick or uncooperating child can throw the whole thing off.  Included in the child care there is of course housework, laundry and meals.  I am fortunate to have a wonderful, helpful husband who is also at home as much as I am to help keep this all in check.  With five kids and a 1100 sq foot house, the laundry and clean up is almost a constant job.  You can clean one room and by the time you get the next room done, the last already looks as though a tornado hit it.  Do we really need three square meals a day and all the clean up and time that entails, especially with 7 people eating?

I also have the dogs and the dog kennel.  That of course is very time consuming.  If there wasn't both of us here to take care of the daily clean up, feeding, exercise, and playtime/training that they need, it wouldn't be possible.  Fortunately, the aforementioned 5 kids help a lot with the playtime and socialization aspect but the grooming, bathing, marketing, travelling and customer relations does take up a significant amount of time.

Of course I have mentioned the start up of our new website www.puppysearch.ca.  That is continuing to grow and go well but anyone who has created a website from scratch can probably tell you, the most time consuming thing is the SEO building and building link backs.  Advertising and programming can only get you so far, you need to let the search engines know you exist by having other websites acknowledge your there.

Five kids also ad work in other areas.  We aren't  your typical soccer or hockey parents carting off the kids to a different game or practice every day but there are outside commitments that do consume time.  There is playschool once a week, we try to volunteer for almost every field trip and outting or special lunch/event at school.  My husband and I are both executives/representatives for School Council, The Parent Advisory Committee, and Playschool Association.  Most of the time these aren't a huge committment...a meeting here and there every month or every other month.  We have committed ourselves though as the fundraisers and organizers for the new school playground.  We will need to contact and arrange funding donations and donations to silent auctions/fairs etc in order to hopefully erect a new school playground for 2012.

So with all these balls in the air I am having to learn that balance is required.  Do I set up my schedule to focus on one thing for each day of the week?  Monday's housework and Laundry, Tuesday is Website, Wenesday is Fundraising, Thrusday is dog grooming, etc?  Do I try to divide the days up and commit and hour or two to each endevour?   Do I try cloning myself and my husband?

Somewhere in the midst of all the to-do lists, website updates, chores and email, I need space for noncompulsory time for the husband, the kids, and myself. 

I need to make sure that I don't just fully commit myself to all the causes and take the time to play, have fun, love, enjoy and relax.

Balance.  Something I have never been especially good at.  I have issues ignoring the "stuff" that needs to be done in order to have the relax time.  I often start working at 7:30 and not quite until midnight, and then try to fit in some relax time.  I had my knee surgery and instead of taking a break, I created the new website.  The surgeon and nurses commented on my low iron levels and asked if I ever felt tired...I asked them "Compared to what?"  I have five kids under the age of 9, what is the current baseline for energy vs tired?  I

Holidays...

Whoo Hoo...They are over for another year.  I love them but It's at this point, as the kids are getting on the bus and being ferried away to school, that I am always happy to see the holidays leave.  It's not usually for most people's reason.  I'm not always eager to have the kids gone and I prefer the unstructured days when they are home.  It's nice to see the holidays leave, along with all their hustle and bustle, and for life to resume it's normal hum drum.

It was a great year this year.  We were able to celebrate a little early with my mom up here close to home.  Then it was a car ride 5 hours away and two nights in a hotel to spend Christmas eve and Christmas down with my dad and family and hubby's parents and family.  Two dinners, lots of excitement, a sing a long, some pool time at the hotel and back home.  Next came a wonderful cookie baking and decorating day for the kids with a couple of close friends of ours, a new hedgehog and hermit crabs welcomed into the house, skating party for new years with my younger brother and sister spending a couple of nights and to wind it all up, yesterday was a 3D movie experience for the kids with one of their favorite Aunties.

Today they are on the bus and back at school, the sun is starting to come up, the chores are calling and normal life resumes.

What a wonderful time we had with family.  What fortunate kids I have.  So many people to care about them and love them and welcome them into their homes.  Thanks again to everyone for their generosity this season.  Hope your holidays were as wonderful as ours.