Just about a whole month has gone by without a post. We've been busy!
Michael and I took a short trip to Cambodia at the end of June, leaving Grace and Jasmin with Abba and Imma. They did wonderfully well having their parents away for 10 days, enjoying all the new things Abba and Imma and Uncle Jamie had planned for them. When we returned at the beginning of July, Grace and Jasmin were ecstatic to have us back though!

None of us had time to readjust properly as the very next day more Frasers arrived - from Calgary and Hamilton area. A full household: 7 children under 6 and 9 adults! Lots of fun :o)




We managed to visit Parliament, discovered a fantastic park (Brewer park, with a water slide and run-through fountains as well as lots of slides and climbing frames), have a BBQ with Michael's family, go swimming, browse the Byward market... a busy crew we were! We also had lots of time to catch up with each other over games of Settlers and cups of tea at home once the kids were in bed or taking a break with a video.






Now we are making our way back into "normal" life, having said good bye to everyone after a fantastic mini reunion (we were missing 3 siblings). I have lots more pictures but I'm having trouble posting them, so this will have to do for now :o)

Our lives lately have been filled with finishing the basement - we said we'd paint and get the carpet laid. The carpet is being laid today, so the last few days have been nothing but painting and tidying up. The girls have been so good! Grace thoroughly enjoyed helping Mommy paint, but Jasmin had more fun relocating the cans of paint over and over! They "helped" all morning - but with breaks for more normal play - hence the flower garland and green bead necklace.
Grace's painting:
We had happy chatter for an hour or so as we painted. She decided mommy was painting the grass and trees (I was edging) and she painted a tiger and a giraffe. This one is her giraffe. I didn't get a picture of her tiger before it evolved into a bushy tree that she said he was hiding behind. Not bad, eh? When the room was all finished, she kept asking where her giraffe was... hiding in the forest is what she settled on as the best answer :o)

Making us feel better in the middle of mess and stress: a bath, carefully done hair, matching dresses, and a wonderful hug moment :) It made Mommy feel more on top of things to have clean and happy girls... The race is still on to get all our house put back together, but at least now the main floor is back to normal.

This week's added complication is that we are fighting a tummy flu bug. Grace has been sick since Saturday, and Jasmin seems to beginning her turn today. Meaning Mommy gets lots of unasked for snuggle time... I love it, but why now when there is SO much I must get done for the 20th when family comes to stay? Practicing self-control and patience to enjoy snuggling sick kids in the middle of mess and stress...

We have tumbled through a tipsy-turvy week of basement and living room renovations... and I'm still trying to put things back together! It surely didn't help that I was away this weekend at a ladies' retreat. Well, it didn't help the house mess, but it did help me take a proper break! I surely hit the ground running when I got home though: last week's cleaning had been skimped on or missed entirely, the living room still needed the baseboards painted in order to be put back together, Grace and Jasmin don't ever stop making fun messes or needing to be fed, we'd managed to miss our grocery shopping day last week so we REALLY needed to shop...! And the rest of the week looks about the same as we blithely agreed to paint it and get the carpet laid ourselves instead of having the contractors do it. At least it has been rainy and cold so I don't feel bad about not getting our girls outside or to the park :o}

Speaking of weather, Sunday morning it all but snowed! The "rain" was almost floating and more than one "drop" looked like snow on our windshield. I'm glad my friend and i had decided to forego the extra adventure of tenting for the retreat - it was cold and rainy... except for Saturday afternoon when we got to canoe up the lake! We got really close to a fishing loon and watched a red-winged blackbird chase away a great blue heron from its nesting ground.