a busy upcoming month

Wow it's April already! Time really has flown by, it seems like yesterday that company was here, when in fact they had left a week ago. So much is happening this month as well for us. We hope to move to the Perth manse for the summer but that has to happen the 25-26th of April, and then we leave for Texas all being well, on the 29th! We FINALLY have everything in order for Aaron's passport etc! So in just about 2-3 weeks we should have his passport yippie!! And then we'll have fun figuring out his visa to be able to return to the UK. :S Another story for another time lol.

I had a walk today in the not so great weather... (it wasn't too bad). Kind of windy and then a bit of rain and then sunny again. 30 minutes of this walking and I'm tired - yes, perfectly fit I am not! I had to go to the Surgery/Clinic for Aaron's 6week check, he's obviously doing well with weighing in at 12lbs! Lots of questions were asked about immunizations...ugh, why am I so uncomfortable with the idea of giving shots to such a young child when it is the norm?? Both of my children aren't immunized (yet?) I wish I had more info about the actual shots. Rach?:D

Constantly battling with Amelia...runny nose, making messes...disturbing Aaron. She loves to take his pacifier out of his mouth, and then put it back in and repeat and repeat. Not very enjoyable at all for Aaron for he gets frustrated with her! Anyways...now Amelia is needing attention along with my kitchen...the endless duties of a mother/housewife!

Sorry not very many pics at the moment, but my batteries for the cam are being "refueled". :)

A lovely week, but it is already over!

We had Joe, Care, Julia and Jenna here for a week and I can't believe they are gone already!! Time has flown by with them here, and I'm already missing them. The place really does seem empty without kids running around, and adult voices talking amongst one another. I do look forward to seeing everyone in Texas!

At the moment Jett and I and the kids are trying to recover from colds. Sabbath morning I felt so awful I didn't get to church, but in the evening I felt a whole lot better so I ventured to at least get one service, which I managed.

Here is a pic of Amelia with herself buckled partway in her carseat. This was taken the weekend Jett was in Larne. She did this herself, and wasn't too pleased to find out the consequences...I had a good laugh.

On one of the nights that our company were here, Julia and Amelia were roughousing (sp) in the spareroom on the mattress...it was nice to see them playing with each other.
Amelia especially liked bouncing on the edge.
Jenna joined in as well.


Here is all three, but mainly the two were the ones most interested in the Planet Earth DVD.
A picture of the three divinity students. Left to Right: Alan McColl, George MacDonald, and Jett Smith.
Now a picture from today... as you can see, Amelia still loves to buckle things...I suppose she decided her brother should be buckled in his car seat it is safer...you never know what could happen with Amelia around! ;)
A little more of an upclose of my wee bub.
And another, he was nearly smiling for the camera however my camera doesn't take the pics fast enough!! Mom as you can see, he is fitting into that size 3 months outfit here!
I think I erased a pic of Care and Jenna but I'll post it another time perhaps. But for now, I need to get my dishes done and Amelia off to bed, whichever comes first!

Funny Duck toy causes...

A dancing Amelia! My mom bought this toy for Amelia.

Thought this was a nice pic

Taken at Sheena's

A wee video hope it works!

...no ideas for a good title here...

And thinking of a title is just wasting more time that I don't have. Let's see how long it will take before Amelia decided to push buttons on me...or start to scream or be bad etc. Hmm, how do people keep up with a blog? I was caught reading Leah's post just before writing this and all of a sudden I thought "oh...if I don't post anything soon Amelia will do such and such and Aaron will wake up and Jett will come in saying why I haven't gone to bed yet..." etc. Sooo, I actually didn't manage to finish reading Leah's post (sadly!) and I haven't checked a few other blogs in a while either...oh well. Ok must load some pics up!

Having two kids is somewhat of a challenge (of course!). I'm still trying to figure out how I'm going to go back to cloth diapers with Amelia...but for now I'm enjoying the "ease" of disposable or are they giving me ease? Amelia has a rash and I think it has a whole lot to do with using disposables (and I'm using Pampers so you would think that is a good brand).

So, we've been a busy household for the past two days (and I've been a busy, overtired, housewife and mom). Busy that is with terminating my PR in the States (now why is it soooo easy to terminate PR, but excruciatingly difficult to get it in the first place?? I suppose it is a good thing it was easy cause I would have gotten upset over more stress of paperwork...ugh) And we've been working on getting Aaron to be a citizen of the US, for as it stands right now he appears to have no citizenship of any country. Sooo we thought we had all the right things and we get to the Consulate today only to find out that we need the "long form birth certificate" not the abbreviated one which we had. Ugh, it always always happens to me to run into some mean US official, or something is not going to workout with getting documents for the US. Ach well, by the end of this I'll know what to do next time.

I thought this pic was cute, Aaron of course is kind of a blob not being able to move much but still cute nonetheless.

Steph you wanted to see her eat...well this is the closest I got. We've been trying to give her, her own plate of food now but she still would rather have us feed her (well the majority of the time).

Quiche and carrots mmm!

Jett took this pic (I just erased Daddy and put Jett there instead...I guess it is true you start to call your husband Daddy when you have kids!!).

And here is Amelia talking on the phone to her one and only Daddy. She really is beginning to say more words now, the newest being Apple and duckie. Their conversation went something like this:

Daddy: Hi Amelia! (ok it took a few of these "hi Amelia's" before she responded)
Amelia: Hi
Daddy: Where's Aaron? Where's the baby?
Amelia: A-a-a-,
Daddy: Can you say baby?
Amelia: Baby.
Daddy: Yeah. Where's Mommy?
Amelia: Mama.
Daddy: Are you being a good girl?
Amelia: good girl (or close to that)
Daddy: Yeah. Are we going to go bye bye?
Amelia: bye bye.
And then lots of baby talk started on Amelia's end.

Okay a few more pictures and then I need to be getting ready for bed!

This is the way your supposed to wear a hat...lol, why do hats always do this? Thank you Melissa for the cute hat...I thought you might like to see my manny actually wearing it. :)

And here I pulled it up a bit. Ok must be off! :)

Mom's Visit

I can hardly believe that 2 weeks has passed already and now mom is just arriving in Toronto to snow and lots of it. I hope she makes it home safely, although I wouldn't mind if she flew back over here and stayed with us! Mom was a great help for me here...and I'm just slightly worried what the next couple of days are going to be like for us. Amelia and Aaron both have colds at the moment but they are (I think and hope) starting to clear up.

Here is the castle gates or entrance to Edinburgh Castle from being here you can overlook on both sides to see...

Arthur's seat in the back...and the old town below.
And some hills and the new town on the other side.
Like I said we went to many places on Saturday and Greyfriar's churchyard was included here are a few pictures of that. Below is the well known picture of the monument(?) put up for the covenanting martyr's.


Here is mom in the tour bus that we took earlier that week.
And here is my lovely mother coming back from grocery shopping...she walked the one way and got the taxi back.
Amelia holding Aaron (with Oma very close beside Aaron!)
Aaron in the tub.
This is one way to get her to somewhat smile for the camera...playing peekaboo!
Daddy and Aaron...
And a close up of the little sweetie sleeping.
Don't ask me where she got her attitude, but at least she likes her toast and jam. :)
Well, I should save the other pics for the next time. Now I can't wait for Care and Joe to come over! :)

Busy Saturday!

After a week of horrible winds and rain...and just downright coldness today of all days was bright and sunny...still windy mind you but at least it was bareable! Soo...I decided this has to be the day I take mom into the old town of Edinburgh! FINALLY! So...with just a wee map to go by I took my mom out to see St.Giles Cathedral (was surprised at how large it is...I don't seem to remember much from the time I was there in 2003), and then went up to the Castle gates, then I took her down to see the cute statute of Greyfriar's Bobby, the churchyard and the Covenanter's prison and the monument (or is it a monument?) and then to see the Grassmarket. It was ALOT of walking and pushing with a double stroller fully loaded with kids and bags...so I am tired as is mom! We stopped at Starbucks for a quick cup of coffee, got upset at Comcab taxis' and finally got a taxi from Central Taxis to get home (£8!?). After lunch and a quick snooze, we again got out to a small shopping centre to shop for clothes! Anyways, we got some KFC for dinner and now I'm writing this when I need to be getting ready for bed and for tomorrow. Aaron is supposed to be baptized tomorrow. Anyways, I will get pictures up soon of my mom's trip! :) For now I shall end this!

Pics from last Saturday

I haven't posted in a while (it wasn't that long ago really was it?) but obviously we've been busy taking my mom out to see places it can be rather hectic with two kids who have different nap times and feeding schedules. It has been rather cold, windy and rainy here too so that hasn't helped the experience either! Anyways, I finally managed to get mom to see more of the old part of Edinburgh city...but it was by tour bus and that really didn't do justice at all. I'm really hoping she can get out again but the weather seems so unpredictable and cold, I suppose we'll just have to wait and see!

Last Saturday, Miss Mackenzie invited us for dinner (Rach and MJ were there as well) and the following are a few pictures we took.

Mom keeps telling me that my boy is an early smiler and is so alert etc.
Not a good picture of the family, but I doubt we'll have a good picture until Amelia properly sits (at least) and smiles!
Mom and the kids...we tried with Amelia to no success.
So we ended up just having mom and Aaron...but that didn't seem to be successful either! :)

Anyways, I should start on ironing as it is building up after so many outings and not enough time at home for household work! I have more pictures to post up but will wait for another time. :)

Just a few pics :)

My cute son :)
My overtired daughter...
Aaron again
Somebody was in a bad mood...

Off to make coffee for Jett!!

one last pic

since blogger hasn't allowed anymore then 4 photos in a post (must be a bad night?) here is the last pic which both moms will like I'm sure! :) I've had to post 3 times to get all these pictures in...but this one likely is the sweetest one :)

Our outing to Arthur's seat

Don't worry I didn't even attempt to climb it, we just walked on the ground level a wee ways, it was chilly but the sun was out. We decided to stop by the pond...

to see some Swans...


ugh I look quite awful here...very bad angle. :S

Teething or Tantrums??

You would think we are not getting enough sleep because of my little boy needing to nurse throughout the night, but in fact it is completely the opposite, he is quite good in the night (for now) and rather it is his teething sister that has decided to keep us awake at 3ish in the morning. I think she is also throwing tantrums or fits whenever something goes slightly not her way or wrong in her mind. Yesterday must have been the worst day ever for all of this! I have never gotten so frustrated with her since Aaron was born, but she was utterly impossible to soothe...crying to screaming, etc for nearly the whole day. Ugh, it has left both Jett and myself very tired and it certainly doesn't help when your trying to take care of a newborn.

Today however, she has been almost the opposite with a few fits during the beginning of worship this evening...I hope no more are to come but you never know with an 18month old!! Anybody have advice on how to treat this little ladies tantrums?? I'm all open for it!

So here is a pic of the wee upset Amelia...

And then a pic of a drink Daddy decided to give Amy.

This was the outcome of this "drink"...

And what was this "drink"? Take a guess...:)

Well, blogger isn't letting me post the rest of the pics so will have to do that in a new post... :)