Going Batty

A couple of nights ago I went to bed early and was sleeping peacefully, when Adrian came barging in. He’d been downstairs watching a movie. “There’s a bat in the house!” he exclaimed. After I recovered from being jolted awake, I was suddenly thrust into terror. A bat!!! In the house??? How? I reacted quickly…by hiding under the covers. Adrian came back in the room asking for the nets I'd bought the kids for pond dipping. He thought he could try to catch it. I stayed under the covers. “Now it’s upstairs!!” he reported, helpfully. I was royally freaking out at that point. What if it finds it's way into our room? I got up and quickly shut the door and then returned to my post under the blankets. What if Adrian doesn’t catch it?? I’d have to deal with the thing the next day. “I’m gonna open the door and see if it’ll fly out!” he called. Oh God. Please fly out. Please fly out. “Yup. It flew out”, he said.

Sigh. Relief. But then I couldn't sleep. I kept imagining more bats. No. There couldn't be anymore, right? Even though we didn't know how the one bat got inside in the first place. An hour later I finally eased myself back to sleep. The next morning I was telling my friend, L, about it and she nicely informed me that her aunt once had a bat infestation in her house. Apparently, they were all in her attic. Great! Now when I walk into a room (especially in the basement) I can’t help looking up to the ceiling for a bat that may or may not be there. Oh yeah. I’m getting Adrian to look in the attic this weekend.

Swimming with Friends

J is at a horse back riding camp all of this week for the whole of each day. On Tuesday and Wednesday R had friends over to swim. Today we had the neighbours (Colours of Dawn) over. She brought her three girls plus two others that were with her for the day. R was so out numbered! He was the typically annoying boy, though, and kept splashing them and trying to dunk them. What he forgot though, was that there was five of them, and only one of him. Oh yeah. They ganged up on him good. And it was good, too. He had a blast.

R's friend, L.

Afternoon at the River

While J is at her horse back riding camp, I keeping R occupied doing play dates with his friend. His friend L came over yesterday, and they played in the pool. Afterwards we met his mom at the river with her day home kids. It's a lovely place to hang out with the kids. You do have to be careful, though, because the current is swift. We put our chairs in the water to be close, and to dabble our toesies, of course.

Tiger Cutie

Some of the older girls were doing face painting at the year end picnic for our home-school program. J (DD) loved it, but R (DS) wasn't into it.

"Summer timmmme and the livin' is easyyyy..."

We have summer weather! Hoorah. And with that hot sticky weather comes days spent by the pool (and some time doing yard work), and less time on the computer.

Housework is a challenge for me normally because…well. I don’t like it! But I’m having a harder time these days keeping up with the house because we’re outside so much and when we’re inside I’m tired. Well, that’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it.

I might get a chance to get on here later today to catch up with reading and maybe even do a post. I hope you all are enjoying summer where you are.

I really do love singing that summertime song from which I stole the title for this post:

Summertime and the livin is easy

Fish are jumpin and the cotton is fine

Oh your daddys rich and your mama is good lookin

So hush little baby, dont you cry

One of these mornings

Youre goin to rise up singing

Then youll spread your wings

And youll take the sky

But till that morning

Theres a nothin can harm you

With daddy and mommy standin by

Happy Canada Day!

We enjoyed a wonderful Canada Day celebration last night at the family of Colours of Dawn. Awesome food, great conversation, and a delightful fireworks display. The kids had a marvelous time, too, and met some new friends. And the 15 minutes or so of torrential rain just added to the excitement.

I don't have any pictures because I actually forgot my camera. Someone (I think it was Peter)commented on my previous post reminding me to bring my camera. When I read it I thought: OF course! I NEVER forget it. And then I go and forget it. I was jinxed I tell ya!

I'm very certain that Dawn will show photos of the evening on her blog soon, and maybe Sirdar will too.

It was a great time, guys. Thanks again for having us!

We have another party tonight at some friends from the next subdivision. Looking forward to the food - uh, I mean fireworks - there too.

Pool Time

(picture from last summer)

I hope the weather smartens up soon. It doesn’t feel like summer has started because it just hasn’t been that warm.

Before I bore you to death with the talk of weather I’ll move on. It’s on my mind lately because we’re finally setting up our pool. It’s one of those large soft sided ones, and it’s a big pain in the butt to put up. We love it once it’s up, but it’s the before and after that I detest. I was a little worried that it wouldn’t be in that great of shape because we didn’t store it that well. It should be completely dry when it’s put away for the winter, but last fall I had some difficulty.

We drained the pool, which takes awhile. It is over 5000 gallons of water after all. Then I borrowed my dad’s wet/dry shop vacuum and sucked up the puddles. The next step is to use towels to finish drying the rest. Keep in mind that the sides are flopped down, so it’s quite an arduous task physically crawling around underneath the material. The first year I took the pool down this method worked like a charm. Last year, however, it decided to rain before I was finished. So, everything I had just dried was now wet. I proceeded to dry the pool again, but it rained...again! In the end, we just wrapped up the pool and put it away. The pool is fine, though. Not icky or mouldy. Whew. A relief because those pools aren’t cheap to replace.

So, now I have the pool out there waiting to be filled. It’ll be a couple of days before we can swim in it, and even then it’ll be verrrry cold. We’re actually buying a heater for it this year. It’s a wood burning type. Doesn’t that sound cool? Adrian found it online. I’ll show a picture once it arrives.

Good for Everyone

I found this on My4Kids. I was curious enough to check out my own blog. I guess I'm not that naughty. How 'bout that? I'm gonna have to step up my game. I was hoping for a PG rating a least. I did chuckle when I read this:

This rating was determined based on the presence of the following words: fart (1x)

That must have been the reference to musical fart machine we played with at the science museum...uh oh!! I said it twice now!! I wonder if it'll affect my rating.

A Great Weekend with One Scary Bit

We had a great and busy weekend.

Saturday morning was spent frantically cleaning my house. For some reason I let it become a complete tip, and then when I’m about to have guests I have to stress myself out by cleaning for 3 hours straight.

After the cleaning frenzy, my friend, G, and her daughter came over. Adrian was away getting his canoe certification for the Junior Forest Wardens and her husband was away on a business trip. We were able to visit on our own for hours and it was awesome! The kids played so well together, too. I pulled out the paddling pool since we don’t have our big one set up yet and they played in and around that for quite awhile. Then in the evening we sat around the fire and roasted hot dogs. Well, G and I sat around the fire while the kids ran all over the acreage. They didn’t leave until after 10:30 pm. It was a marvellous visit.

On Sunday we went with my parents (and my friend’s son) to the Telus World of Science. They had free tickets to see Dinosaurs Alive on the IMAX screen. The movie had spectacular effects. After the movie we roamed around the museum for awhile.

The kids enjoyed the weather station where they stood in front of a green screen and pretended they were forecasting the weather.
My dad got in there with Dd. It kinda looks like he's strangling her, but he's not!
Ds always like this stationary bike where you have to peddle hard in order to get the light, radio, and train to work. The boys are building a bee hive here.
The big piano is a huge hit, too.
The Body room has many fun activities including this musical fart machine.
My dad.Dd on a huge tongue.

The only hiccup was losing Dd. We were looking at some displays on the second floor, and decided to move on to somewhere else. "Let's go" I said to the kids. I actually thought she was with us. Next thing I know we can't find her anywhere. It was like in a movie. I ran around frantically trying to find her, all the while imagining the worst. It felt like forever but it was only a minute or two. The place was so busy, and I just couldn't see her anywhere I looked. I quickly walked up to one the museum attendants and told him that I couldn't find my daughter, and told him what she was wearing. Then immediately started running around again searching. He got on his radio, and said. "Okay, we have a missing girl. Her name is #$, and she's wearing a pink dress with denim carpis". I was happy someone was helping but it also made it real that my daughter was gone! "Mam", he says. "They have a girl matching that description down at the front desk." What?! How did she get down there?!! I looked down over the railing and sure enough. There she was. Relief just washed over me, but then it was quickly replaced with concern for Dd. She must be so scared. I could see her little face from where I was standing. I ran down to her, and gave her a huge hug. It was such a close call. Apparently an attendant saw her on her own and took her down to the desk. It happened that fast. This time it was a museum attendant, but it could have been a sicko taking her that fast. Scary scary scary. And it's my fault for not watching more closely. Well, I've learned my lesson.