Catch Up If You Can
I've been totally slacking over the last while with my blogging. I am vowing to do a better job of it this year. I have so much to say! This post will be a catch up post for some of our unreported things and happenings.
Adam had a pretty successful hunting year this year. Our freezer is full for another year with deer and a bit of elk. The girls and I were lucky enough to go out early one morning with Adam on a hunting day. The weather was perfect and the mountains were spectacular! We are so lucky with where we live.
We didn't get any big animals on our trip, but Adam and Calli had a grouse stir-fry for dinner that night!!
While in the city one day in November we decided to pay a visit to this incredible project along Memorial Drive. Here is a link to the news story about it. The four of us spent 1/2 an hour wandering amongst the crosses and reading the names of the fallen soldiers from the Calgary area. I was glad to hear that they will put this display up every year now. It sure puts things into perspective.
Adam is a part-time, on-call firefighter from our local Fire Department here. On his days off from his actual job, he gets to work at the fire hall. In November we were lucky enough to attend the Firemans Ball! It was a night to dress up and have a great dinner and a little dancing with members of our community. There were hundreds of people at the Ball, including the mayor and some of the councillors and we had a really great time.
Our cat has recently decided to stage a takeover and has been spending more and more time on Nellie's bed, meaning Nellie has to take a back seat and lay on her other bed by the front door. Seeing as Horsie is 14 years old and runs the pet part of our household, Nellie has no choice but to go along with it. So it was to poor Nellie's embarrassment when Marin dressed up in her toque and Horsie happened to walk by and see. You can just see what Nellie is thinking by the expression on her face.
Two weeks before Christmas, Adam finally decided to mount our tv on the wall of the living room. He set about cutting a hole in the gyp roc in preparation for installing the mount and wiring everything up through the basement.
Adam completed the installation of the tv mount and the conduit and wires, then re-gyp roc'd the wall and finished it off by painting the whole thing!
Our very clever friend came by and spent 8 hours wiring the tv up to the speakers and the Wii and the cable and even a spare computer we had! So we can now surf the net, listen to iTunes etc through our living room tv, and even control the iTunes via our iPhones! It's very confusing, but cool. We rearranged some of the furniture....
...and this is the final product, all decorated for the Christmas holidays.
Now that the Christmas tree is down, we'll move the furniture around again for everyday use. But first we have to decide where we want everything to be!
Marin had a little Kindergarten Christmas concert that I got to attend. The little kids were so very cute in their little Santa hats and singing Christmas carols in French! I was a pretty proud Mama!!
I know this picture is terrible, but you can see Marin in the foreground there with her Eiffel Tower shirt on, and I especially love all the adult hands holding cameras out! I wonder if the kids were intimidated!
So there is a little bit of catch up. I still vow to do a better job at blogging. I think it's an excellent reference for my kids to look back on eventually. And I love that I'll be able to show them so many of their adventures in the future!! See you soon.
I'm not sure if you know but, I have had Crohns Disease for 22 years. It's been an on and off struggle for me. Right now, it's a bit of an on struggle. I am managing it ok for now and I am happy where I am with it. Things could be perfect, but they aren't and I am resigned to being ok with that. I'm not sure if my perfect is the same as everyone elses perfect.
A few months ago while I was in my Gastroenterologist's office, I noticed a sign advertising a new Crohns/Colitis study. Being that it was just a study and didn't involve taking any experimental drugs, I decided that I would participate. I met with a person from the study team and decided to recruit Calli while I was at it. The purpose of the study is to take specific samples from Calli and I as well as answer questions about the basis of the study; The GEM project stands for genetics, environment and microbial. Being that I have active disease, I didn't have to do quite as many tests as Calli did. They hope that Calli never gets sick and in the long run can compare her results with another girl her age with similar living conditions etc. If Calli ever does become diagnosed with Crohns, they will take more samples from her and hope to do tests to determine exactly what changed in the makeup of her DNA etc., further progressing towards the link to a cause and a cure for Crohns.
Adam's Mom came with us the day I took my brave little Calli to the hospital for her blood tests and to meet with the study co-ordinator. I was very impressed with the fact that somebody from the Childrens Hospital was acting as the study co-ordinator to deal with any offspring and/or healthy siblings of patients with Crohns!! That took the pressure off bringing Calli to the big hospital and being treated like everyone else. They take more time with the kids at the Childrens Hospital and treat them like kids, which I love. Calli had some freezing cream slathered on the spot on her arm where they were going to take her blood and was able to keep that on for a good 1/2 hour while she answered all the questions she had to answer. Afterwards, we brought her over to the lab where they drew blood. She was great...until they couldn't get any more blood out to fill up the vials! The lady taking the blood was going to have to"do another poke" in the other arm to get enough blood for the study, which in turn induced tears in my little girl. Luckily, they determined that they had enough blood for the study and Calli didn't have to get another needle!
I'm happy we are participating in the study and that my kids are so willing to help, knowing that they will not receive any benefits from all of this, but that they may help others eventually. Marin is going to sign up when she's old enough too!
Adam had a pretty successful hunting year this year. Our freezer is full for another year with deer and a bit of elk. The girls and I were lucky enough to go out early one morning with Adam on a hunting day. The weather was perfect and the mountains were spectacular! We are so lucky with where we live.
We didn't get any big animals on our trip, but Adam and Calli had a grouse stir-fry for dinner that night!!
While in the city one day in November we decided to pay a visit to this incredible project along Memorial Drive. Here is a link to the news story about it. The four of us spent 1/2 an hour wandering amongst the crosses and reading the names of the fallen soldiers from the Calgary area. I was glad to hear that they will put this display up every year now. It sure puts things into perspective.
Adam is a part-time, on-call firefighter from our local Fire Department here. On his days off from his actual job, he gets to work at the fire hall. In November we were lucky enough to attend the Firemans Ball! It was a night to dress up and have a great dinner and a little dancing with members of our community. There were hundreds of people at the Ball, including the mayor and some of the councillors and we had a really great time.
Our cat has recently decided to stage a takeover and has been spending more and more time on Nellie's bed, meaning Nellie has to take a back seat and lay on her other bed by the front door. Seeing as Horsie is 14 years old and runs the pet part of our household, Nellie has no choice but to go along with it. So it was to poor Nellie's embarrassment when Marin dressed up in her toque and Horsie happened to walk by and see. You can just see what Nellie is thinking by the expression on her face.
Two weeks before Christmas, Adam finally decided to mount our tv on the wall of the living room. He set about cutting a hole in the gyp roc in preparation for installing the mount and wiring everything up through the basement.
Adam completed the installation of the tv mount and the conduit and wires, then re-gyp roc'd the wall and finished it off by painting the whole thing!
Our very clever friend came by and spent 8 hours wiring the tv up to the speakers and the Wii and the cable and even a spare computer we had! So we can now surf the net, listen to iTunes etc through our living room tv, and even control the iTunes via our iPhones! It's very confusing, but cool. We rearranged some of the furniture....
...and this is the final product, all decorated for the Christmas holidays.
Now that the Christmas tree is down, we'll move the furniture around again for everyday use. But first we have to decide where we want everything to be!
Marin had a little Kindergarten Christmas concert that I got to attend. The little kids were so very cute in their little Santa hats and singing Christmas carols in French! I was a pretty proud Mama!!
I know this picture is terrible, but you can see Marin in the foreground there with her Eiffel Tower shirt on, and I especially love all the adult hands holding cameras out! I wonder if the kids were intimidated! 
So there is a little bit of catch up. I still vow to do a better job at blogging. I think it's an excellent reference for my kids to look back on eventually. And I love that I'll be able to show them so many of their adventures in the future!! See you soon.
Comments
love the tv and that you are watching the fire log channel. very funny.
marin looks very sweet at her concert.
hope we can see you soon, we'll have to come visit.
nice to have a catch up....
have a great day!
Awesome update. Thanks for keeping us abreast of the goings on in your lovely life.
xo suzie