Saturday, December 31, 2011

The tale of two strollers....

So one of the gifts we discovered T desperately wanted was a doll stroller. It was a only slight interest expressed until she got a doll for the preschool gift exchange 10 days before Christmas. Then it intensified.

What do you want for Christmas, T? A stroller for my dolly and Bart.

When her maternal grandparents arrived and asked what else she might like for Christmas, a stroller was at the top of her list. The local mega mart had a *pink* one for like $12. Perfect. It got bought without T even noticing it. Excellent.

Nan wrapped it and T unwrapped it Christmas morning. Fantastic, a happy kid.

All was well under the two other little eyes spied said stroller. R thought it was magnificent. He could walk around and push the stroller, until his sister screamed at him that it was hers!

R is still a little shy on his feet. Mainly because he is very very cautious and seems to be afraid of hurting himself. The stroller gives him some practice time on his feet and acts a balance aid.

He does have a push toy that does the same thing but it is big and bulky and doesn’t allow for the more precise navigation of the umbrella stroller allows. My child likes to cut the curves rather close.

So off to the only option for finding a blue stroller, Amazon.com. With a few clicks, we had an backup Blue (R’s lovey) and a blue stroller shipped our way.

Peace has returned. R has a blue stroller and T, a pink one.

_MG_9875

The smile says it all!

The-stroller-races

Let the stroller races begin!

Ronan-and-his-stroller

A boy and his favourite ride!

The Santa Phone

Like most parents, S and I spent the better part of the lead up to Christmas reminding T that she’d better behave or Santa wouldn’t bring her any gifts. She’s at the right age to understand Santa and what he does every year.

Being T, she asked how Santa would know if she was good or bad. I told her Mommies have a special phone that is a direct line to Santa to report any bad behaviour. That seemed to satisfy her.

That was until Christmas had come and gone. Post gift giving, she had a few moments when she wasn’t on her best behaviour. I told her if she didn't shape up, I would send her gifts back to Santa.

Of course, she asked how I would do that.

I told her I’d use my special phone to contact Santa, get a return mailing label and send it back to the North Pole (just like Amazon.com!). Okay that answered that, right? Not so much.

She then turned to my mom who was sitting next to her and asked Nan where she kept her phone. My mom looked at me rather perplexed, not sure what to say as she’d missed the previous discussion about gifts being returned.

I explained that T was referring to the Santa phone that mommies have to contact Santa. Again, T asked where Nan keeps her Santa. Nan, rather smartly, told T she couldn’t divulge its location. That answered that right? Not so much.

T then asked me again where I kept my phone. I told her my underwear drawer.

Where’s your underwear draw? She asked again.

I told her in my dresser but now that I had told her where it was I would have to move it.

And with that, that was effectively the end of that.

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Christmas!



Stockings 2011 Pt. 1



Stockings 2011 Pt. 2



T and the Christmas tree 2011



R and his new cars



I knew it...



...It's my stroller!



How high can I lift my leg?!



Pink is a boy colour too...R liked T's stroller so much, several fights have ensued so we have a blue stroller on order...it arrives Thursday!

The lead upto Christmas in pictures!



T and her buds



The Bakers Two



Gryffin's ready for T to go back to school!



R is looking forward to 2012



GG and R

Saturday, December 17, 2011

Dear Santa, I'm just not that into you!

So S had his Christmas party a few weeks ago. As usual they had photos with Santa set up. Its free so we generally get a picture.

Last year, it featured T with a strained smile, eagerly grasping her gift that 'Santa' had given her. Each kid in attendance gets a gift based on age.
BTW, T loves Santa. She always hello to the statuette we have on the front porch. She's also quite into Christmas movies of late. She even watch Disney's live action Scrooge, despite it being a little scary but not as bad as the b/w version.

Back to this year's Santa picture. We don't force our kids to go see Santa and we might have to rethink things next year after this year's stellar performance.

Normally, R is a very gregarious little man with a slow smile. He's not one to make majorly strange, at least as of now he doesn't. But apparently a fat guy in a red suit with a big beard changes all that.

Here's the photographic proof (sorry its a photo of a photo so not super great quality). And for the record, I love R's shirt but black is so not his colour. My little bad boy!

Thursday, November 17, 2011

Out takes from the Christmas card photo session!



Random moment of cuteness while I checked my setup....if he had a moustache, he would like just like Uncle Lenny!



The ubiquitous Bart, he has to weasel his way into every photo...



No joke, Mom it was this big!



Oh, Mumma, I'm so over this!

Thursday, November 10, 2011

Christmas Card Preview

Thought you might like an early preview of this year's Christmas card! Considering I threw it together in 20 minutes, not bad if I do say myself. I got T's dress at Goodwill for $2 (yes that is a 2) and Ronan still fit his good outfit from the summer. Presto a Christmas card picture!

I've discovered some fun photo editing techniques so I'm starting to integrate them into my photos. Enjoy!



Mothers lock up your daughters!



Ahhhh!



My little princess!

Saturday, November 5, 2011

I felt the earth move under my feet....

...literally!

About five minutes ago, we had what I think was an aftershock from the 3 minor earthquakes that occurred near OK City this morning. There was a bit of rumbling. S was in the basement and I doubt he even felt anything. I know I felt something sitting at the kitchen table.

It started slowly, I thought it was just the wind, then it got a little more vibrating, the cupboard doors rocked a bit but not strong enough to knock anything down. I had just finished up putting up Round 1 of the Christmas decorations and none of them fell from their precarious perches so it wasn't too bad.

I know I'm not crazy because I checked out Facebook immediately (because isn't that what we all do in a crisis?) and a few friends (who like me are spending an evening in front of the PC and the Tube) commented about feeling the tremors.

Oh well, I can cross experiencing an earthquake off my bucket list if I had one!

Monday, October 31, 2011

Pumpkin Patch and Hallowe'en 2011

As promised the long awaited pumpkin patch pictures and some from today.

T was a 'good' witch and R was a cat, a witch's familiar if you will. It was the same cat costume T wore her first two Hallowe'ens. The witch costume was new from Target but worth it. She loved it! It was a little big so I had her wear a turtle neck under it.

Pumpkin Patch 2011







Talia Swing Pumpkin Patch 2011



Hallowe'en 2011

Talia Hallowe'en 2011

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Islay Corners Photography is live on Etsy!

A little shameless plug, my Etsy store is live! I will be adding items and switching items out but I wanted to test the waters to see if I get any bites!

http://www.etsy.com/shop/IslayCorners

I've also updated my photo blog (www.islaycornersphotography.com) and I will be making a few tweeks in the coming days so stay tuned!

Shameless plug done!

Back to tending to a sick R. He started throwing up this morning so everyone but T is suffering from lack of sleep! He is doing better and ate a big lunch, I just hope it stays down ;) I've already done 3 loads of laundry this morning! R's little buddy Blue did need a bath before this morning but after the initial sickness session, he really needed a bath!

Monday, October 24, 2011

She is a Super Hero Princess Girl!

T has a few Hallowe'en parties for her various activities. I don't want her wrecking her "Good Witch" costume so I pulled this super girl costume out from my stash. I got it post Hallowe'en last year at Target for like $2 because it was missing the cape and boot covers. To 'enhance' what parts of the costume I had, I got some stretchy headband ribbon and two white flower hair clips at Hobby Lobby (@$10). I wanted yellow flowers but they had every colour but yellow...so white it was! Its more serviceable anyways!

I haven't sewn the headband or belt yet but I clipped them together with the flower clips so she could wear it today. I found some red velveteen in the remnants bin for $3 at Hancock and tada, a cape! It needs some Velcro but a clip I had did the trick for now.

She is a Super Hero Princess Girl!





Saturday, October 22, 2011

Long Day...

I promise I will update this with pumpkin patch pictures soon. I wanted to update those interested in how things went at my second craft show. In fairness, the craft show was put on by a local special needs group. That being said, perhaps I should have just given them a donation and saved my time. Lots of oohs and aaahs and business card taking but that's it.

It wasn't well attended or promoted and I made a sale of three cards. That's it, for six.long.hours. A friend stayed with me so it was a wonderful chance to catch with her however, I would have loved to be a smidge busier seeing as I put a lot of effort into getting ready for today. Oh well, it was for a good cause and no one was very busy sales wise at all. And now I'm all set for the Christmas bazaar in three weeks!

I thought you might be interested in my display! S helped me out with some display stands from some scrap wood we had in the garage. I'm quite happy with how the setup went today, I think I've got a winning display and somehow just need to turn all the ooohs and ahhhs into dollar signs.........






Sunday, October 9, 2011

Isn't this how you build a fence?

So last weekend, the neighbour with the dogs and S decided it was high time to fix the fence. A decent strong wind could have knocked it over apparently. I could do the same thing to my kitchen cupboards with a sledge hammer but according to my husband the fence takes priority...the eternal bickering over the kitchen continues....

Back to the fence. Friday night S, T and R sat out in the backyard and took down our side of the wayward fence. T helped pull down boards and knock out nails. R supervised from his Muskoka chair.

Thursday night the neighbour's wife had thrown her back out so that threw a bit of a wrench into the plans. Regardless, S and S (the neighbour) got started on the fence Saturday afternoon. T helped carry boards. We had to get things tidied up early as S had a poker game chez nous that night.

Sunday while R had his nap, I took T to see the 2D version of the Lion King. After the movie was done and all of T's questions during the movie were answered, we returned home. T preceded to help carry boards again and generally help out.

T and R tried playing in the yard. R has started up T's old trick of sticking his finger in someone's mouth. If I didn't know any better, I think my kids will end up working in the dental field. They are/were both obsessed with teeth!

By Sunday night, the fence was finished with a few minor tweaks. The neighbour's newest four legged friend (a 5lb black and tan chihuahua) is a bit of a Houdini. If the fence was even slightly too high, she'd escaped so some of the boards had to be lowered despite the gradation of the fence.

Here's some shots from the adventure that was the fence building!



Isn't this what everyone does when they wear their Hello Kitty rain boots???



El Supervisor!



Pounding out nails



Can't help, might break a sweat!



Momma, take a picture of me!!!!



Because he's just so handsome!



Come on just say ahh!!

Saturday, September 24, 2011

The day that was...

As promised, here's an update on today's craft sale.

I got up at 5am, arrived at the venue for set up at 6:10am (it was still dark outside) and got a great parking spot in the dark empty parking lot! It made for a very quick retreat at the end of the day!

I somehow (using my Herculean muscles) managed to get all my stuff into the venue in 1 trip. I don't count moving in the card table seeing as I carried that in when I registered.

It took me about 45 minutes to set up. The pottery guy next to me arrived before me and was still tearing down when I left at 2:20pm this afternoon. He had a lot of pieces that all required wrapping and shelving he had to put up and then tear down. It made my setup look small.

As I have said, this was my "throw it all at the wall" sale and see what sticks. I started to really doubt my stock and pricing most of the day. My neighbours had done this sale before and had had really good results. Today nobody had an exceptional day unless you had a really great product that people really wanted to buy.

What was the difference today from the previous few shows? The difference today was there were a lot of other activities (Breast Cancer run etc), kids recreation activities have started up and oh yeah, the weather outside was freaking gorgeous. When the heat is over a 100F, those at the Farmers Market are all over A/C and the indoors. When its nice out, not so much.

My day started out with the lady who organized the event. The State tax folks had paid her a visit and wanted their share. Since I have filled out but not submitted my tax paperwork so having signed up as a hobbyist, I have to submit taxes somehow to the state. I was planning on using this sale as my sales test as to the frequency I suspect I will need to remit taxes so this just kinda complicates things but nothing that a call to the state capitol won't fix. And of course a cheque remitting taxes due.

Next came the clock watching. I started off thinking I might do okay. But as the clock ticked onto 10am, I started to envision a very bad day. I almost sold a matted 5x7 at one point but I am not really ready to take cheques so I lost a sale because the potential customer didn't have enough cash. Note to self, be willing to lower the price a smidge under special circumstances. And figure out a way to accept cheques without the fear of bad cheque writing....

Thankfully I had a couple of friends keep me from crying and helped put things in perspective. And loads of ohhs and ahhhs about how wonder my photos were as people stopped to look but keep their wallets firmly shut.

By about 10:30am, I got my first sale. I could barely handle it. I was speaking with a man about mats and matboard when a lady selected two cards and proceeded to the matted prints. She ended up buying two cards. Yay a sale! I stifled the urge to jump up and down screaming.

So all in all, I made my entry fees back plus a little. I learned many lessons, the first one being plug in your phone the night before so the battery doesn't run out. If I had, I would have a picture to show you of my display!

I think I'm going to limit it to one show a month or maybe two as we get closer to Christmas. Many folks took my business cards so maybe I will get some business traffic. But that's for tomorrow.

Right now, I just need a good night's sleep (I have no feeling from my mid calf down to my toes) and I have to order some more supplies. I am completely out of supplies and if I do get any orders, I have no pictures or mats/cards to make the items with. Besides, maybe I can sell some mats/mat boards sets at my next sale! I'm thinking maybe bringing a file folder with prints too just in case someone wants to buy some....oh the entrepreneurial spirit is strong but the bank account isn't too willing!

I will try to update everyone with some stories about the kids when my fatigued brain recovers!

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

A pictoral update


T trying to take a picture of the sunset, like Momma.



Powered by T, drive by R....look out world!



Shortly before the first hair cut....


The day after the hair cut.


Thursday, September 1, 2011

In other news...

A couple of emails, an application and $35 later, I'm licensed and officially allowed to operate a home-based business! Hooray!

When I get my Etsy site up and running I will forward the link along. For now, please feel free to enjoy some of my newer posts at www.islaycornersphotography.com

As I've mentioned previously, I am setting up a business to see if anyone wants to buy my photo greeting cards and matted prints. I've sunk a decent chunk of personal savings (a step above what I shoot lens amount) so we will see what sticks.

Originally, I have planned to take things slowly and maybe wait until the new year. After a phone call and putting my name on a vendor waiting list, I got the chance to be a vendor at an upcoming craft show! Yippee! I'm scared out of my mind!

I'm taking the "throw everything at the wall and see what sticks" approach to photo selection. I've got about 100 photo cards and about 50 prints. Thank goodness for Internet ordering and back to school sales, that's all I can say!

I would love to sell out but in reality if I can make my entry fees back, I will be thrilled. Heavens, if I can sell a print or even a card, I will be over the moon!

In other news, the kids are doing okay.

T is not liking Mommy being busy with her own stuff but she is handling it okay. That hasn't been the normal flurry of activities for her lately since most kids are back in school. She has met her new teacher, the new Miss Cindy (her preschool teacher last year was also a Miss Cindy) and she is excited to get started. I think she's going to love it. And whose kidding who, so is Mommy who misses her spare time!

R is busy practicing creeping around the living room but finds his hands and knees are still a faster mode of transportation. He hoists himself into a yoga position called the downward facing dog (legs together, butt in the air and hands down in the front). He has also taken to grabbing anything and everything that T has her hands on...I believe the phrase "Little brothers!" has been used quite often around here!

Must run and get back to sweating my behind off...we broke the record as of yesterday for the most number of days of 100F (@36C) in a given summer...the last record was set in the Dust Bowl during the Great Depression. Gotta love Kansas and air conditioning!

Saturday, August 6, 2011

My little monkey man

In the last few weeks, R has really lost a lot of his babiness. I swear I put him down for a nap and he wakes up more a little boy than a baby. He is also becoming much less my placid timid little baby and more T 2.0 (or as I like to say, R2T2).

Oh well, he has a very chatty role model and he not only looks like T, he is also starting to act like her too. Lord have mercy.

He loves books, trucks, sheep and his sister. Book is in fact that is his word for just about everything. He can say Mumma, kinda of but there are few other words that come out clear as day sometimes but not others. He can say Yeah when asked a question, I swear I've heard Ta when he hands something to me or vice versa. However, book is the one really clear word.

I've read him similar books to those I read to T at the same age and he seems to have the same literary taste as T. He has a book, "Who says baa?" about a lamb who has lost his baa. He loves this book (score one for the Dollar section at Target where I got the book) so we picked him up a car buddy (from the zoo gift store while we were picking up T from zoo camp). Its a small fluffy lamb named what else? Baa. He even got to visit sheep at the zoo (while waiting for T to finish her zoo camp) on Friday but R started crying, the sheep were just too loud.

He has also developed a great love of bananas and toast. Two food items T hated as a toddler. He is not too into meat, something T loved at this age. He has tried to feed himself with a spoon a few times (I hold the spoon and he pulls it to his mouth and won't let go).

R has learned to climb onto T's 'stage' (the low ledge at the base of the fireplace) however, he hasn't learned how to get off of it. He just grunts until Mumma saves the day. He crawls faster than I can walk. He has also developed an unhealthy interest in the garbage can and the toilet seat.

He does pull himself up a little and we are working on standing with assistance. One thing both my kids have in common other than great cheek bones and my nose is that they are very hesitant about walking. Some kids start walking at 8 months, my kids seem to be very timid in the mobility department. Both kids didn't roll 'on schedule' and R, at 13 months adjusted age still isn't walking yet.

He will get there, I have no doubt and I will long for the day, he could only crawl in a few months. Below are some pictures from today!