A mother's love

In this dark days of winter, it is good to reflect on the joys of being a mother and the ways that I am striving to love my girls well...

• I sleep on less than 6 inches of bed when one of the girls comes to me in the middle of the night with a "bad dream"
• I strap on ice skates to be with Pookie as she tries to skate during a school trip
• I watch countless shows about Disney Princesses
• I defer to Pookie's superior fashion sense when it comes to getting dressed in the morning
• I wear pink
• I sit through hours of gymnastics classes, church activities and birthday parties so that the girls are comfortable in going
• I allow forts to be built willy nilly around my house
• I pull out paints 15 mins before dinner so that an art show can happen
• I organize playdates...which I think are the most ridiculous things ever!
• I plant gardens with them

Those are my thoughts on this dark January day....new post on a book I just read here....

What's up January?

I feel like I have blog posts coming out of my ears, but some how never sit down to do them!

For us, we are starting January off with bang! We have decided to sell our apartment in Vancouver...at least try anyhow. Although having a real estate empire was fun, it would be more fun to have money in the bank instead of giving it away all the time. So, with many prayers launched, the sign is up and people are coming through. 5 showings in 2 days, but no offers. I'd forgotten the rollercoaster ride that this is. You know that sickening feeling of going up and the plunge down...good times.

The other news is that I am contemplating working full time. At a job that would require me to come in every day and stay for 8 hours. I haven't had a job like that in 10 years and I won't lie, it is daunting. The upside is a good pay cheque, the downside is that Bear would have to be in daycare for a day or two and I would lose my precious freedom. I hope to decide/figure it out this week.

So, there you go, two weeks into January and big changes are afoot!

Hello 2010!

Whoa...that kinda snuck up on me! I'm not much for New Year's resolutions, so I have no grand unveiling of plans for this year. What I can tell you is that I think that 2010 will hold some big decisions/changes for this little VanderKuip clan...that's all I'm saying about this new year. Some Advent reflections...I love the fact that the girls are getting older. I posted on my other blog some of my thoughts, so go there. We skyped with Hubby's extended family on the Sunday before Christmas which was both awesome and a bit heart wrenching. We skyped with his immediate family on Christmas day and saw our nieces and nephews open their gifts from us "in person" which was also cool. We spent Christmas day with my family which was good, full of food and spoiling the girls! New Year's Eve was spent with good friends and good food. We did the East Coast ball drop with the kids at 9pm which was about 10x cooler than the actual midnight celebration that the adults did...although we had fun sparkling apple juice. There is something about kids just excited about life that makes everything so much better! Here are some photos of our Advent season...Enjoy!

Our one day of snow!



Church pageant, our lamb and angel




Christmas Day (please note there are no pictures of rumpled parents!)



Christmas Outfits



We are thankful for 2009 and are looking forward to what 2010 holds for our little family!

Tweaking the Blog

I love reading. I love reading blogs of friends, of people I wish were friends and just anything random that comes across my screen. On my other blog, Trust my Path, I have 'deep blog links'. People smarter than me in the ways of faith. Here on this blog, I have friends. And that is the best reading ever!

First week of Advent in review

For the first week of Advent, Nov 29-Dec 6 was the launch of our Advent box and a TV free week. I won't lie, it was a challenge! I realized how much I used it as a 'babysitter' and how intense it is to be totally present to the girls all the time. They did play a lot on their own, but we also did a lot of family stuff. Here are some pictures documenting our time:

#1 - Paint everyone's toenails, even Daddy!


#2 - Build a fort and eat dinner in it



#3 -Play a game together. No picture for this, but we played Bingo and UNO

#4 - Have a play bath. No pictures for obvious reasons, but the girls had a pink bubble bath.

#5 - Make a Christmas craft - Mason Jar Lanterns



#6 - Get our Christmas Tree.


#7 - Bake Cookies...somehow I missed getting a picture of that...
#8 - Have a Christmas Party...again, no pictures but tons of friends and an all around great night.
#9 - Go out for ice cream as an afterschool snack to the local ice cream parlor.
#10 - Make teacher presents. We did start this, but didn't get done.

So there you have it, the first 10 days of Advent!

A confession

They say confession is good for the soul. I hope so, because I still feel sick about it.

Yesterday I lost it on a grand scale. Beyond any shadow of a doubt, my temper was in full form. I was so angry, I could have punched a hole in the wall. (and just about did). Why?

Here it goes...a few months ago my beautiful eldest daughter decided to feed the fish in our fish tank. Instead of taking a pinch of food (like she has done a million times before), she decided to shake the can of food into the tank. The WHOLE can!! Needless to say that despite my frantic efforts to remove the excess food, a ton landed on the bottom of our 20 gallon tank. And because it is a massive effort to clean the tank, I procrastinated until a fish died and the tank was turning green...(read: yesterday)
Since we are having a Christmas Open house on Sunday, I decided that I needed to roll up my sleeves and get'er done. After scooping out a 100 lbs of water, 8 terrified fish and disgusting slimy filters, I was just working on cleaning the actual tank (2 hours later). Pookie asked if she could feed the fish in the bowl. I said sure, because of course she had learned her lesson last time and has again fed the fish properly many times since the incident. She dumped half a can in there! Half a can of food! As I am in my third hour of cleaning the #$#!* tank! That is when I blew sky high. Venom spewed out of my mouth onto my little girl, words of shame and frustration cut her to pieces and then I sent her to her room so that I could try and calm down. Meanwhile Bear is looking at me with trepidation wondering if by her very presence she would incur that same wrath.

Sigh. In that moment I realize the lie that I've been telling myself for years. That I have my temper in check. That the rage that was ever present in my youth is tempered by wisdom and self control. And that familiar sick feeling was back, the feeling of shame and remorse.

Of course Pookie had known instantly what a mistake she had made with the food. I could see it in her eyes when she told me. But it was like I couldn't stop myself.

I called Pookie down as soon as I was cleaned up from the fish slime. She came to me, head drooping and tears in her eyes. I got down on my knees and lifted her eyes to mine...and told her how sorry I was for losing my temper, how wrong I was and asked for her forgiveness and told her that I loved her. And Pookie, ever so much more grace-filled than me forgave me, hugged me and told me that she loved me.

And so we move on from this, but I am scarred...and I am left to wonder how Pookie is scarred.

Is confession good for the soul? Probably. But more importantly this posting will serve as a reminder to be more grace-filled to my girls. To make life to be less about me and more about them. And to remind myself that the beast still lingers in me...

Advent is a'coming!

I didn't grow up in a home that celebrated Advent or Christmas as Jesus' birthday. I think sometimes that drives me to find traditions for my little family that will be both memorable and Christ filled. I have been doing the Advent candles with the girls for the past few years, but this year I wanted to do something a bit more. Then a friend blogged about an idea and I think I'm going to do it.

The Advent Activity Calendar from the Kiddley archives gives lots of ideas of what to do.

What would you add to the list?