Praise the Lord!

Mom, James and I have arived safely at Kryna's house. I was begging the Lord that border crossing would go well. I've never been to Canada before and had pictured that it was a foriegn land. As it turned out crossing the border was less stressful than paying toll during rush hour. Hallelujah! Every 100 Km or so they have these wonderful little service centres much similar to our rest areas only these are complete with gas station, fast food, and of course Tim Hortons. All through our trip I was dieing to stop at one just because, well we don't have them. Every time we came to one James was sleeping, about to sleep, or in the last case he opened his eyes as we whizzed past at a mear 140km. At this point there was only one more service centre before we got to Kryna and I wasn't going to miss it. By the time we rolled up to it our gas tank was empty and I was about to burst seeing as I had been holding it since just over the border. I pulled up to the gas pumps and looked up at the signs, one stating Self Serve and the other I swear said Self. Ok, simple enough. Then I spotted signs above the pumps one said 1/2, the other 3/4. What? 1/2 self serve! What is 3/4 self serve? Moooooommm! Oh wait...oh no, never mind. As I tried to hide what had just happened, Mom burst out, almost histerical. Yes, the signs were for pump 1 and 2 and 3 and 4. Ok, so we have those in the States too but how was I to know most everything is the same in Canada.

Man and the Dishwasher

Buying dishwasher detergent can be overwhelming if you let it be. The choices are endless and each product seems to offer its own set of benefits. Powder, Liquid, Gel Pack, Powder Tab, With Jet Dry, Without Jet Dry, Eco Friendly, Chemical Laden, which will it be? The gel packs offer the added convenience of a dissolving outer layer while most powder tabs are individually wrapped in an ordinary wrapper very similar to that of hard candy. I prefer to buy Seventh Generation powder detergent that is both effective and eco/human friendly. Mom prefers Cascade Gel Packs with Dawn. What I prefer and what I buy are often two different things. Nowhere in Harrison carries Seventh Generation products so in order to buy this elusive powder I have to travel a half an hour to the nearest Target. This is neither practical nor cost effective so in most cases I buy whatever is cheapest at my favorite local scratch and dent discount grocery store. Through the course of our marriage we have probably used every kind of dishwasher soap on the market. Recently we ran out of Seventh Generation so I picked up a damaged box of Electrasol PowerTabs on my next visit to the Discount Grocer. The performance was spotty (yes pun was intended). Sometimes were better than others but honestly this was disappointing. Tim commented on the problem as well and we decided we had just become accustomed to our new found favorite. This was our conclusion until a few days ago I was unloading the dishwasher and found a PowerTab in the bottom of the dishwasher neatly wrapped in its wrapper looking like it had just showered but forgotten to towel off. I tried not to laugh as I hauled the mangy little thing over to Tim and asked if he realized that these wrappers did not melt and needed to be removed. He smiled at me sheepishly and stammered "How am I supposed to keep up? Melts doesn't melt, powder, liquid?" I smirked and asked how long he had been doing this. He thought just this once. Today I laughed out loud when I found no less than three more PowerTabs still in their wrappers lurking in the bottom of the dishwasher.
I'm thankful we have the chance to laugh about this, some men seldom help out around the house, but Tim jumps in taking out the trash, loading and unloading the dishwasher, changing diapers and giving bathes. I must give credit where credit is due.

What's in a Name?

In Harrison, my hometown, recently there opened a business called Haute Dog Boutique. Shortly there after this Haute Dog Boutique closed its doors. I can't help but think that the hot pink signage and the pretentiously witty name had something to do with its early demise. In this same town we have a very cute little store by the name of Groomingdales. This store boasts of similar items and services as the Haute Dog Boutique, yet it seems to have no trouble keeping its doors open. This furthers my suspisions of the power of a name. How much more important a name must be when attatched to a human being. I have never understood it but there seems to be a real conection between a person's name and thier personality. I know you're thinking "no, no, its thier upbringing and dna". While I agree, very seldom do I meet someone and think that thier name does not suit them. Risky business I tell you, this naming a child. In Tim and my relationship it seems that it is my job to provide the names and his job to veto them. It works. From my research it seems this is the way most couples opperate. At this point we aren't investing a whole lot of thought into it, we'll wait till we know which sex's names to spend our time on.

Meet the Bunny

Last Tuesday we met with my new OB Dr. and also had our first ultrasound. I was so happy because up until then nothing had happened. The Dr. that delivered James isn't in OB anymore so I had been seeing a midwife and she was terrible . I felt really comfortable with the new Dr. and the staff at the office was awesome. According to the ultrasound tech everything is looking great. It was too early to tell if it is a boy or a girl yet so we have to wait 7 more weeks till we have the second ultrasound. The heart rate was 157 which is considerably higher than James' was. Maybe a girl? Everyone says that I am having a girl this time because of how sick I've been . Its all speculation of course though. I have no idea. I kind of think that it is a girl, but not really for any reason at all. The whole time that we were having the ultrasound done she/he wiggled and bounced away from the pressure. The nurse said that it is a very feisty baby. James was no push over either though. That child never sat still and thought he needed a uterus the size of Texas. The official due date is June 15. Yay! It will be here before we know it.

I Heart Huckabee

Love Actually

Every year at the beginning of the Holiday season I have to watch Love Actually. For me this is usually in late October but I am running behind this year so I have not yet watched it. It is such a random movie I can't explain why I like it so much. I would never have thought this would be a movie that I watched year after year. I think maybe I like it because it feels so real to me and yet in the end it makes me happy. For some people it may be Its a Wonderful Life, for me it is Love Actually. Last year I tried watching Its a Wonderful Life for the first time. I'm sorry but I didn't find the wonder. I suppose this may have come from my dislike of Jimmy Stuart, who knows. When we were children we always went to my Grandma for Christmas. She had a finished basement that was quite comfy. One of the rooms had a TV and while the whole adult family was upstairs playing lively games of cards all of the grandchildren piled into the aforementioned room in the basement to watch Frosty the Snowman, Rudolf and various other Christmas classics.
What's your Holiday movie?

Lots of Halloween Fun

On Halloween James dressed up like a Rooster and hit the town. By hit the town I mean went out to lunch, to Wal-Mart, and to get his picture taken. He was/is still getting over his Pneumonia so that was all the fun he could take but it was great. I even let him have a Reeses peanut butter cup that our neighbor lady brought over for him. He thought that was about the best thing he had ever tasted. He's not allowed to have candy normally so it was a big treat. I bought Teddy Grahams for our Trick-or-Treaters but only four showed. Apparently we were the only house on our street that had our porch light on.

"Ba-Ba"

"Look at me, flappin my wings"

We have massive amounts of leaves fall in our yard every fall. Tim blows or rakes them all up and this year James got to jump in them. It was really cute because if you watched him he looked a little OCD. He would pick up a leaf from his one side and put it on his other side. He kept doing this one by one. Should I worry?