Mother Nature has a funny sense of humour because..............

ahem, it's SNOWING outside right now! They weren' t kidding when they said 10-15cm of snow tonight! It started after school and it hasn't let up at all! In fact, now the wind has started and it's blowing all over! I can't even see across the lake atm.....waaaaaaaaahhhhh, I'm sooooooooo done with winter!!!!

Time to hang up one pair of hockey skates...........

Michael's team fought the good fight this weekend, but unfortunately they lost to a much stronger team that should be playing either AAA or AA level hockey!! The whole thing was just lousy from the get go.....really rough play on their part, as well as horrible officiating. I could tell the outcome from the get go. Michael's ok about it....I think he's ready to move on to soccer.

We win...........we advance to round 3!

Bring on Winfield.....round 3 of the playoffs for Michael's team starts next Saturday.....and we're ready! (insert maniacal laugh here)

The boys got to play game 2 vs. S. Okanagan at Prospera yesterday. Playing in that arena is always a great time for the boys....kind of like playing in the big leagues!

It was my turn to sell 50/50 tickets and I sold the most to date! The jackpot was $160. Not bad eh?

Michael woke up full of a cold, so he's home from school today. I took the others to school, stopped to pick up some stuff for dinner tonight and when I called home he didn't answer. I became concerned when I tried again and still no answer. I ran up the stairs calling his name with no response.....only to find him asleep in his bed under his duvet!

Stews in the crock pot, homemade chicken soup is cooking on the stove.It smells GREAT in here!

Playoffs round 2...............

Michael's team is now in round 2 of the playoffs, and they're out of town today. We just won in OT!!! Woo Hoo! Game 2 is here tomorrow.

Jacob's team is in a tournament this weekend and they've won both games so far. Tonight they get to play during the Rockets intermisson and are VERY excited!

Images from Granny Margaret's Life

http://www.mem.com/ViewImages.aspx?ID=2851088

Today was Granny Margaret's Funeral

My heart swells today with love for our boys. They were wonderful participants in their great granny's life and today she would be proud of them for their participation of her funeral mass. My husband was heavy hearted as he stood at the pulpit today to deliver a speech about his granny. I love him, and today my heart broke for him as I sat and listened to the many stories he had about this wonderful lady, and how blessed we were to have had her in our lives for so long.

Unfortunately, Jason wasn't able to attend the funeral, but he was here in spirit and sent along a note for Andy to read.

The funeral service was beautiful, the soloist had the most beautiful voice.

We are home now briefly to change clothes and then will join everyone for dinner at Andy's parents.

God Bless you Granny Margaret.

A poem about Granny:

Her smile can light up a room, her presence is of grace Her opinions are heard without one word but by the look upon her face Her touch is so gentle, her heart as big as the moon Her spirit is kindhearted and warm as a summer’s afternoon Her hair a river of gray, her eyes radiant as the sun Her time she’ll take no matter how long until the work is done Her kisses are so soft, her hugs preferred from the rest My granny is mine forever and ever and she’ll always be the best.

High School.........

Christopher had a really good day at high school yesterday. They all made the gr. 7 students feel welcome. They started the day off with prayer in the gym, and then were split into three groups who then rotated through the classrooms and other stations. Snack and lunch were provided.

All in all they had a fun day and a 'taste' of high school.

Last night Andy and I attended a parent meeting at the school. Got to meet all the teachers and see the school. Wow, it's so hard to believe that we have a child old enough already to go to high school!

Yesterday the gr. 6's held a science fair. Michael and Emmet's project was on Explosions. They did a really good job of their display board and got 77% on their written report.

Its another snowy day here today. Cold out too. I'm quite tired of it already. The poor little cedar trees we planted have been thinned by all the deer we've had in our yard lately. Andy thinks the trees will rebound once the weather gets warmer, but I'm not so sure.

Dad is a the hospital this morning for a colonoscopy. We're all praying that it goes well and everything looks good.

Tonight are the prayers for Granny Margaret.

Andy's Granny...........

On February 7th, 2009 our beloved mother, grandmother and great grandmother, who lived to celebrate her 96th birthday, passed away peacefully. Margaret endured much pain after her stroke, but she fought valiantly, for six years in an extended care facility, to be with the ones she loved. Margaret lived for her family and was deeply loved by them. Daughters: Anne Marie (Manuel), Fran (Jim), Chris (Gordon) and Joey have been blessed to be surrounded by a mother’s unconditional love, kind heart, unselfish spirit, delightful sense of humour and courageous ability to overcome challenges. Granddaughters Anette and Michelle and grandsons Andy and Jason cherish their Granny’s gentle spirit, strength of character, great stories and storytelling ability. Margaret’s eight great grandchildren are proud to have a Great Granny who lived to be 96. Margaret lived through the pain of war immigrating from Romania to Austria, then Poland and finally to Germany. In 1948, Margaret with her husband Johannes (John) immigrated to Canada with three children and a single wooden suitcase holding all their belongings. They worked tirelessly at Stewart’s Nursery and within a few years purchased their own orchard. Margaret worked in the fields, orchard and packing house around the clock for many years so that her children could have a better life, and indeed she accomplished her goal. We cherish the time we had with our beautiful mother, honour her spirit, and are comforted to know that she is now in a more peaceful place. Prayers will be recited at Valleyview Funeral Home, 165 Valleyview Road on Thursday, February 12th, 2009 at 7:00 PM. Funeral Mass will be at St. Theresa’s Catholic Church, 750 Rutland Road N. on Friday, February 13th, 2009 at 11:00 AM. In lieu of flowers donations can be made to the Heart and Stroke Foundation or Children’s Hospital. Condolences may be sent to the family by visiting www.mem.com

Class of 2014............

Tomorrow is a BIG day for Christopher....he gets to spend the whole day at High School with all the Gr. 7's! I'm to drop him off in the morning and the school will divide them into groups for the day. Snack and lunch will be provided. He's pretty excited about it all....I on the other hand am not quite ready for the 'leap' to high school! gulp.....because I'm definitely not old enough to have a kid going to high school! lol

It really hit me today when was reading the letter from the Principal at the high school....class of 2014.......that sounds so weird to me......how could it be that he's THAT age already?

Thankfully, we still have a few more months left of Elementary School where all the boys are.....next fall we'll have 2 schools to get to in the morning!!

We Won!!!

Michael's hockey team has advanced to round 2 of the playoffs!

What a game this morning! Awesome hockey. All the boys played well.

Maria

Andy's Granny..........

We received a phone call today from Andy's aunt Joey. Granny Margaret passed away this morning.

She lived a long time........96 yrs! It's still sad though as she was such a great lady.

We will miss her. The boys will miss her.

I love that our boys have compassion. Michael was saddened by the fact that his Dad had tears in his eyes when he got the phone call. God Bless him, I hope he continues to have a heart like that through out his life.

We did manage to get a hold of MIL/FIL in Mexico. They're be flying home this week sometime. Andy found out where Jason is staying in Hawaii and we called there tonight. I don't think he'll be flying home for the funeral as they just arrived in Hawaii today.

Why do they wait till the kitchen is clean before........

they decide to fry up some eggs? It's not like they could have done that before I spent a half hour in their emptying the dishwasher, loading it and wiping down the counters!

Jacob just decided that making some nachos in the microwave would be a GREAT idea too, and of course Nicholas followed suit!

Chris is at a Confirmation Retreat all day today and we're meeting him at the 5:30 pm Mass.

Dinner out tonight.........yippee!

This is too funny and so true about people today......

This was sent to me today. It's so funny and so true!


http://barefootmeg.multiply.com/video/item/56

Update on the past week or so...........

Seriously, it's FEBRUARY already???? Oh my!

The boys have all had colds lately, with Nicholas and Michael needing antibiotics for their throats. Both are better now. Then Jacob and Christopher came down with a tummy bug...and not to leave mom out of the picture, I came down with it on Monday evening. We all had stomach cramps and were running for the bathroom, but no vomiting thank goodness.

Andy's finally decided to start taking Fridays off again, and I'm so glad as he's been a really grouchy guy lately. He needs a day off where he can run errands and get stuff done, or just exercise so that he feels better and not so tired.

Yesterday Michael's class went cross country skiing. It was a beautiful day, and we had fun. It is however HARD work getting up those hills, and I was hoping that around the next bend we'd come across a nice little Starbucks and perhaps a bench to sit and enjoy my latte on,but no such luck!

We're into playoff season for Michael's hockey team. Unfortunately the series is tied with Merritt atm, and we HAVE to win this Saturday or we're hanging up the hockey skates till next season. Seems that his season went by so quickly, but in fact he's been playing since September. Really great group of parents, so it will be kind of sad to have to say goodbye to everyone. Think positive though,these are the come back kids and haven't lost a game all season.....the tied so many games though!

The other boys still have hockey till March.

We're all looking forward to our trip to Disneyland! Wish we were there now so we could get away from all this snow!

Oh,this morning at 6:55am I was woken up by this really loud screaming that seemed to be coming from outside....but then I thought it was one of the boys dreaming so I went upstairs. Christopher was at his window and he says"mom come here, did you hear that screaming?" I looked out the window expecting to see some animal dying in my backyard, and there it was............ A WOLF up in the hill behind our house! OH MY! Apparently he was howling at his friend and then he/she showed up and they sauntered off into the hills! It wasn't a coyote because the tail wasn't bushy like one that a coyote has, and it was BIG and blackish grey. I wish I had my camera. Anyway, it freaked me out that's for sure!

A little funny from Jacob yesterday:

"Dad, look at my muscles they're getting bigger" (as he makes a muscle flex in his bicep while holding his breath and grunting to make the 'muscle' pop out)

Andy: "wow Jacob it is getting bigger"

Jacob: " Ya, and look I have a six pack"(as he lays down on the kitchen floor kind of doing a crunch all while grunting and holding his breath again). " See Dad, do you see it, it's a six pack, count them!"

Oh my! Then Michael and Nicholas had to lie down and see if they too had a 'six pack'

Third headache this week............

Migraines! I could live without them...they used to come sporadically. Since last week I've had three 'episodes' that were heading into migraine territory.

I had these weird lightning bolts in kaleidoscope colors last week, then I took my Advil, and went to bed. Managed to escape the vertigo that comes with my migraines.

Had slight vertigo and then the headache started the other day in Trail, so I took my Advil straight away and the headache never materialized.

Today while at Office Depot I got that same spinny feeling and took my Advil and went straight home to bed. I fell asleep at 10:30am and woke at 1:15 pm this afternoon!

I still have a minor headache, and NOTHING got accomplished today at home! Uugh!

Tomorrow I'm going x-country skiing with Michael's class. I know it's good for me, but it's sooooooooo cold out! Wahhhh!

Stay tuned for an update tomorrow!

Hockey Tournament Update..........

Man alive, it is freakin freezing here in the booming(not) town of Rossland, BC!

I have yet to regain feeling in my fingers and toes. The rink was sooooooooo cold that even with the small little heater on above where we were sitting, you could still see your breath!!

We are here for Michael's tournament. Jacob came along too because he really wanted to ride on the chartered bus! It's a 4 hr trip here through windy mountain passes filled with snow! We left home on Friday morning ...had to get up at 3:35 a.m. so we could catch the bus which left at 5 a.m. Michael and I slept on the bus, but Jacob only slept for 20 mins,and then proceeded to stay awake ALL day until we got back to the hotel after the evening game!! I was about ready to collapse, and probably fell asleep before Michael that night.

Unfortunately, the boys lost both games on Friday so that meant they played at 7:30 this morning. Michael had to be up at 6:00 a.m. I got him up and dressed/fed and out the door as they were all going on the bus with the coaches. I then went back to bed....just for 10 mins, and woke up 2 hrs later! Jacob was still snoring away but I had to wake him up or we'd miss the entire game! Turns out we only caught the third period, and the boys lost that game too. We had one more game in the afternoon and we managed to WIN that one....21-1! Seriously, they could have spread all those goals out between the other games and maybe we'd have done better than last place. Oh well.

Tonight the boys went to the aquatic center and swam for 2 hrs. They're winding down now with a glass of milk and a pb&j sandwich. I'm ready for bed. We head home tomorrow.

Andy, Nicholas and Christopher are in 100 mile house for Nico's hockey tournament. They drove there on Friday. Andy said it was a loooooooooooong drive into the middle of no where! It's absolutely freezing cold there too. Today he sent me a text message saying that his privates had frozen and fallen off! lol, what a funny guy!

Nicholas is playing very well and scored 1 goal in the first game, a hat trick in the 2nd game, and a hat trick in the third game tonight! He also got player of the game tonight too!

Ah, it will be nice to be back home tomorrow. Tournaments are all finished for Michael and his team starts playoffs the first week of Feb. The other boys all play till mid March....we're almost on the downhill slope.................to Spring! Counting the days till we see and feel the sunshine again.

The 44th President of the USA!

Today I witnessed history!

Today Barack Obama was sworn in as the 44th American President!

It gave me goose bumps to watch it all.

I've recorded it all for the boys to watch later on.

Here's a link with footage of the events of the day.

God Bless Obama.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/20/obama-inauguration-speech-ceremony

Asleep!

Finally Jacob is asleep!!

Michael's heading back to school tomorrow. We just found out his hockey tournament schedule, and that we have to be on the bus ready to depart at 5 am! Waahhh! That is going to be horrible! That means getting up at 3:45 am when no one should be awake! lol

We play 2 games on Friday. One at 10:45 and the other at 7:30 pm. It will make for a L O N G day that's for sure.

Why is it?

That bedtime was an hour an a half ago, and I still have a 7 yr. old that's wandering the halls? The other three have been asleep for an hour, but no way will Jacob settle down to sleep!!!

I'm watching Jon and Kate plus 8 and marvel at how Kate can just point to the corner if one of her kids isn't behaving and they ACTUALLY go to the corner!

Apparently the night owl wants me to lie down with him............stay tuned for a report! lol

Also, I can't believe how diligent I've been in blogging the last few days! Good on ya Maria!

Home sick today.........

Monday....three boys at school and one home sick today!

Michael has a throat infection and is currently on antibiotics. He also has a really bad cough.....although I haven't hear him cough in hours now.....hmmm back to school tomorrow....I have WAY too much to get done and organized before heading out of town this week for a hockey tournament!

Both Michael and Nicholas have out of town tourneys this coming weekend so that means Andy and I are going opposite directions on the highway....last time for the season....but then there's playoffs to contend with and I'm not sure where that will take us.

Apparently the deer are loving our succulent cedar trees that were planted in the fall. We found a family of deer eating the cedars on Saturday morning. They're not frightened either as the papa deer was eyeballing me as I drove by! I stopped and watched then(sorry Andy!) they were so darn cute! Today Andy wants me to go to Buckerfields store to buy burlap sacks so that we can cover the trees before they eat them all!

Trascending: Words on Women and Strength by Kelly Corrigan

This video clip was sent to me by the numerous wonderful women in my life. I watched it with tears as I related to what she was saying. It's so true!

Love you all!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_4qwVLqt9Q

Pizza and movie night.......

Pizza and a movie.....that's what we have planned for tonight.

Although Christopher had other plans because he wanted one of his friends to come over and have a sleepover. Normally I'd say yes, but it's been awhile since we've had any ALONE family time, and I don't think it's wrong to have said no.....he does though and has been just a joy since he got home from school today.

Christopher's team was in the newspaper today!

http://www.bclocalnews.com/okanagan_similkameen/kelownacapitalnews/sports/37720704.html

Had dental work done this morning and the freezing came out about an hour ago. It's made eating a challenge, and quite funny for the boys to watch!

Busy weekend of hockey coming up with 4 games tomorrow, and three on Sunday.

What is it with boys and wrestling????

I so don't get the whole wrestling thing!

Currently, Nicholas is watching Drake and Josh on TV and Christopher has Jacob in a hold and is pretending to 'slam' him on the couch! WTH? Jacob is of course screaming at the top of his lungs and laughing and I'm losing my mind with all the noise and the fact that the TV keeps getting L O U D E R!!!!!!!!!!

Uugh, I break it up, get them to change gears and then it starts all over again...... 90 mins till bed time, 90 mins till bed time, 90 mins. till bed time...................

Great..........chicken pox!!!

Not the kind of phone call you want to receive from the parent of the kid yours was playing with and even had dinner with last night!!!

Apparently Nico's friend Drew woke up covered in chicken pox this morning! LOVELY!

Thankfully all our boys were vaccinated....although so was Drew apparently....hmmmm, we watch and wait, tick tock, tick tock......I'll freak if they all get them now!

Waaaaaaaaahhhhh!

Jacob

Jacob's teacher says that he's a leader in the class. He's been working so hard at school, and sometimes she has to tell him to put his pencil down and go out for recess as he's so focused on getting his work done! lol

Back home from the tournaments.......

Funny how the weekend goes by so quickly when you're having fun.....the boys teams did well with Michael's team coming in third at the Kamloops Pee Wee Tier 3 tournament and Christopher's team WON the Enderby Bantam House tournament!! Michael's team had the worst draw...not only did they have to play most of their games on the Olympic size ice, but they also had to play till 10:00pm both nights. That meant bed time was after 11 pm and then up at 5 am on Sunday. We met the other Kelowna team in the semi final. I so hate that team! The parents are a nightmare too. But it wasn't meant to be and we lost in a shoot out. Andy was with Christopher in Enderby this weekend and he said that Christopher played really well and in one game he scored 2x and had 2 assists. He also got the hard hat award from his coach(for the hardest working player on the team). Way to go!

Right back at it on Monday....the house was a minor disaster, and it took me awhile to get the laundry caught up.....it's washed and dried but not folded yet. Floors are vacuumed and washed and counters are sparkling!

The fog was something else earlier today. It's finally lifted now and I can see the lake from the kitchen window.

Andy's parents gave him their car, so he's taken that to work today. It's a newer car than he had....although I'm sure it came with strings attached.

Looks like it will be another busy week, but no hockey tournaments this weekend.Yay!

Ok better get back at it. The Christmas decorations need to be put away, and I'm guessing they won't jump into the boxes themselves(darn). Most of them are put away already last week, but the last little bit is taking it's time being put away as I don't have the energy to get it all done atm. At least the main floor of the house is orderly and clean. Not enough hours in the day...and I have a first communion meeting to go to tonight.

The snow is melting slowly and it's nice to see a bit of the concrete again....I was thinking it was going to be April before we saw it again with the way the snow kept falling and falling.

Dinner is cooking in the crock pot too so that will be nice to come home to tonight after Nicholas hockey practice.

Re-cap of the Christmas Holiday 2008

It seems that December flew by at such a speed that I didn't get the chance to blog about our day to day happenings.

Here's a re cap:

The boys finished school on Dec. 19th and their cousins Julianna and Matteo arrived on the 20th. The amount of snow we've received so far has been unbelievable. We've shovelled more than we'd hoped,and it still keeps coming down!

On December 23rd we had our family and some friends over to celebrate Christopher's 13th Birthday. It was a fun evening, lots of good food and fun.

Christmas Eve was spent at Mass with mom, dad, Mina, Carlo and all the kids. Christopher was an usher at the afternoon Mass. He looked so handsome all dressed up. Hes growing up so quickly, and is such a nice boy. I hope he continues to grow into the young man I know he can be. We all had dinner at mom and dad's and then went to Uncle Sal's for dessert. I kind of miss the days when we ALL got together for dinner. Times have changed since Nonno Giovanni died, and it seems that some of our extended family has become distant. Sad really as I have such fond memories from my childhood and even through to three years ago, when my cousins. aunts and uncles were so much a part of our lives. I still invite everyone over for the boys Birthdays. Sometimes everyone comes and sometimes only one of my cousins and aunt and uncles comes. Nonina is getting older and it's harder for her to get out. I love it when she's there though and it's so wonderful for the boys to have her in their lives. All this talk of families has me thinking that I've never typed out Christopher's birth story, so I will have to do that and add some photos. I'm on my laptop atm, so don't have access to his baby photos.

Christmas Day!

The boys got all sorts of new gadgets: A cell phone for Christopher, digital cameras for Christopher and Michael, a new PSP for Jacob and new ski boots for Nicholas. Lots of PS 3 and PSP gmes, DVD's. I bought Andy a new watch which he loves and he got me this fantastic lap top computer! I'm loving it! One thing we did learn though this year, is that we seem to have been caught in a situation where some of the boys feel they're hard done by compared to what some of their friends received for Christmas. It's ridiculous, and makes me crazy. Next year we may just go away for Christmas and that can be their gift!

On the 27th we spent with Mina and Carlo taking the kids to a movie and other stuff.

Dec.28-Jan 2nd:

BIG WHITE!!!

We stayed in the nicest chalet at the ski hill. It had three bedrooms, lots of space and a great view of the Monashee Mountains. They got lots of snow while we were there, but it was COLD!

Had dinner at Jen and Tim's pizza one night and then yummy ham the next. I cooked a Turkey for New Year's Eve and we completely gorged ourselves......it was delicious, but then we all felt like we needed a nap afterwards!

New Year's Day:

I cooked dinner for all of us and for Jen, Tim and their kids. We had spaghetti and meat sauce. I don't know if it's the fresh mountain air that makes all the food taste so good, but man alive this spaghetti sauce was amazing....if I don't say so myself!

I didn't ski alot....it was nice to just hang out by the fireplace in the chalet, and the day to day stuff like laundry, and dishes weren't such a chore when I could putz around in complete quiet most of the day, It was nice.

Headed back to Kelowna on the 2nd.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Christmas Concert 08

It was only Jacob in the Christmas Concert this year as the primary kids put on a singing show!

The gr. 2's looked so cute all decked out in green and red. Jacob sung his heart out. It was very cute.

Here's a photo of Jacob and Sophie. Sorry it's not the best as I was far away from the stage.

42 cm.............

That's how much snow we got over the last few days....and it's still coming down. Today driving was really treacherous....poor visibility and slippery.

I can't believe that tomorrow is the last day of school for the Christmas break.....it feels like it should only be Thanksgiving. Yet another school year is whizzing by.

Here are some photos of all our snow, and Nicholas and Jacob hard at work shovelling!

When will this snow stop???

Hi everyone, and greetings from snowville! Oh my, it started snowing yesterday and we've received over 20 cm of snow already and it's STILL coming down. I kind of see the beauty of it all, but that's really been clouded by the fact that my arms and back are KILLING me from all the shovelling we've been doing!

Oh ya, and throw in two hockey tournaments this weekend...one here for Michael, one out of town for Christopher and 2 in town games for the other boys! I think I'll become a bear, what a great idea, I could be hibernating right now!

I called Andy who's out of town with Christopher, and begged him to buy a snow blower......that could be my Christmas, Birthday and Anniversary gift for the next 10 yrs, I don't care.....at this point I'm desperate....we just came inside to warm up, and looked outside and the entire driveway is covered again....now I wouldn't complain normally because I like shovelling, but our driveway is almost 300 ft. long on a downhill slope no less. Uugh, it exhausts me to think that after Michael's next game we'll have to come home and re shovel the beast again.


They haven't ploughed our street or subdivision yet and some yahoo down the street used his snow blower and blew all the snow into the middle of the road in a pile..I didn't see it as the driving conditions are white out and 'hit' the pile which threw a ton of snow onto my windshield causing me to lose vision all together, and after the wiper blades cleared it I see this man jogging on the sidewalk laughing at me.....whatever buddy, I'm glad you got a chuckle out of it! Needless to say I've called the city road works and told them to get up into the hills where we live soon before someone causes an accident!

On a good note the boys teams have been winning at their tournaments! Christopher got player of the game today, and Nicholas got 1st star at his game this morning.

I'm going to soak in the tub. My body aches!