Living Loving Breathing Boys

It’s the day after … 

(It’s a uterus pinata … see there are other people that think like me… I’m planning an adios uterus party when I am better!)

The boys are (except Josh, of course) are still sound asleep at 8:45 am.  Even Sanj.  I love the peacefulness of mornings like this.  The weather is still gorgeous, giving the illusion that summer is lingering.  It’s the day after our Thanksgiving Dinner, leaving today to relax and enjoy without the pressure of “Is that turkey done?”  Since 9/10 we are the hosts, days like yesterday are fatiguing.

My  mom arrived yesterday evening which means, today, my “last supper” will be something yummy!  I shopped for all the essentials that are needed to keep the house running smoothly, or semi-smoothly while I am “vacationing.”  I bought a wack of new socks to replenish the sock bin, as that bin seems to have depleted.  I bought juices boxes, sandwich meats, snacks and all that jazz for lunches.  I took all the laundry to the Wash, Dry and Fold, since I did not have time this  week to keep up with it this week, so I’ll have to put it away and can leave knowing each boy’s drawers are full of clean underwear.  I even washed and changed sheets so my babes are sleeping on cleaning smelling sheets.  I wonder if Shopper’s Drug Mart is open?  I forgot to buy new toothbrushes for each, something I wanted to do.

Going on “vacation” requires a lot of planning when you are leaving your babes.  Sanj will have his hands full, driving them to school, picking them up, homework, hockey… my mom will help with meals and laundry.  Friends are helping with some of the meals.  It will all be good.  I hope to focus fully on my recovery.

Someone asked me if I am sad about losing my uterus?  I am not really the kind of person that lets that define my womanhood.  I have so much that defines me.  Yet, I have always had this secret dream of becoming pregnant “by accident” and having twins.  I always wanted twins.  Now that dream will be bid farewell.  lol  So, no, there isn’t much sadness to losing my uterus.  I am actually delighted to be able to plan my life without the monthly interruptions of cramps, pain and frustration.

I am scared though.  Today, finally is here with not much to occupy my mind.  And so, that nagging fear of going under, of trusting my body to a surgeon… someone whom I hope studied lots rather than partied, who I hope didn’t drink too much coffee before handling dangerous instruments on my body, someone who knows my uterus versus say my spleen…  so there is fear now that is occupying my thoughts as I count down the hours.  I am scared of my IV.  I hate IVs.  I am scared of that yucky feeling when you wake up from anesthetic.  I am scared of the promise of pain I will feel.  I am scared of all the unknowns.

I hope for success.  I hope for no complications.  I hope for peace.  I hope for well behaved kids while I am out.  I hope for being back to normal very soon.

My little “vacation” is T-minus 22 hours and counting.  Tomorrow at 8 am I’ll be in the OR.  Please, if you have a moment, could you say a prayer for me?

Thanks.

Happy Thanksgiving. 

Don’t you LOVE when God get’s all in your face with His presence?

I absolutely love it!
I love seeing Him!  I love feeling Him! I love when I don’t have to depend on simply faith to see His presence!

Today God said, “Be still, Reema and Know and Feel that I AM God.”

It’s all about the pies.  You know that crazy project that I am tackling with no prep time… that will hopefully produce and sell over 700 pies… well I’m been losing sleep over it.  Just simply because I have never done it before.  Just simply because in order for this to happen, I need people to come out and help.  It is the single most frustrating thing, recruiting volunteers, so often.

Last night I lost a lot of sleep, making lists over and over in my head.  I kept sending myself little messages of “Don’t forget …”  I kept trying to play it out, the assembly line, over in my head.  I was stressing about knowing we’d have enough help.  Then before I knew it, it was 4:50 am, when Zach set the alarm for, the time Sanj has it set for.

My friend, a former Rhema family, met with me to spend time as we shopped for measuring cups, picked up the huge order of pie plates and pie boxes.  She then told me she would go home, get her two daughters (it’s a PA Day for most schools) and come help me.

I had put the word out that I needed to divvy up three huge boxes of shortening into 2 lb squares.  I needed to cut up butter into little 1 inch bits to for each pie.  I put the word out.  I didn’t hear definite answers from anyone.

It was one o’clock.  I started cutting up the butter, as the shortening just overwhelmed me, not knowing how to even begin.  I felt my chest start to panic a bit.  There was so much to do.  If I didn’t get the prep work done, this would delay the making of the pies, which in turn would effect the amount of pies we are able to produce.

A few minutes after one, in walked help.  I love that God gives me enough time to begin doubting and then wham… in walk the most wonderful volunteers.  Here’s the neat thing, none of them are still at our school.  They are former Rhema people, well, really once you are a Rhema, you are family, we just don’t let go!

I was overwhelmed with the effective and quickness as which all the work was done.  We even folded 75% of the pie boxes.

I have faith that God is at the helm of this project.  I have faith God will send people we need to be successful.  I have faith that TEAM APPLE PIE will be awesome.  I have faith I will sleep tonight.

🙂

I love seeing a God sighting!

It’s Friday, my favorite night of the week.  I hope you have a wonderful night.

xoxo

All in a day…

It’s 9:59 pm and I just returned from our ballroom dancing lessons.  I can’t even remember the begin of this day, it seems so long ago… and with a list that had no end, my day seemed to just go on.

With the impending rains, my head seems to take a rhythm of its own and bang on all day.  The pounding has been non stop for 3 days now…  hoping for relief soon.

We learned the box step… and then on to the cha cha.  Hate that one… way to fast… Sanj told me to stop jogging… lol  He is way to intense, as he is with everything he attacks in life.  I looked at him at one point and said,  “This is suppose to be fun…” as his face seemed so intense and he replied or grunted out, “It is.”  Hum… lol  I love our teacher.  She is a sweet girl with a sense of humour.  I told her we’d have her over fun dinner and and then grab some private lessons.

Today, we had to start our day off very early.  SYATP… See You At The Pole… (google it) is a student lead initiative … very cool.  We gathered around the flag pole at 8 o’clock this morning… (yes, that is crazy early)!  We sung a song and then we’re led in prayer by some of the students for our school, our community and our country.  All over the country, perhaps even North American students were doing this at their flag pole.

(You can check it out here , if you are interested in doing this with your school).

There’s a fundraiser that has been happening for a long time by a sister high school of ours… Home made apple pies made from scratch… sold  just before Thanksgiving every year.   This year they are not doing it.  The cliental is there.  People know to come get their pies this time of year.  Yesterday someone mentioned it to me… that it wasn’t happening.  At first I just looked at her and said, ” no thanks, not interested.  So not my thing.”  In fact, just watching them do they work (they used our school kitchen to work) was so discombobulating.  Yet as I did the math and realized the big chunk of money that  was possible to make… my mind started to roll.  (How I hate that!)

I am still working on raising funds for our play ground.  The last big piece of the puzzle is still waiting for the monies to be raised.  $20,000 is that last bit of the puzzle.

Monday and Tuesday  I will be part of a wonderful team of people making 700 plus apple pies from scratch!  They are delicious, juicy and absolutely fabulous.

Folks order by the dozen and give them as gifts.  Since they are not baked, you can freeze them.  They are amazing gifts.

$10 each.  If you are local and interested, call 705-743-1400 for details.
Don’t wait… they go fast.

Plus… the best part of this is that God has wrapped His huge arms around this project.  I feel it and see it.  Everything has come together so incredibly in the last 12 hours.

I know may think I am crazy.  But… sometimes you just have to jump in with both feet.  Then following this is our Thanksgiving Dinner for Seniors we do at our school.  (It is one of my favourite days of the year).  Then there’s our Thanksgiving… and then Tuesday… my surgery…. no more cramps.

It’s a crazy week… but then… I have weeks to recoup.  How I will stay still is  for that long?  Sanj suggested I should take up Sudoko.  Haha.

It’s single parenting for me … tomorrow till Monday… the benefit of his leaving tomorrow is that I’ll get to watch Grey’s Anatomy in PEACE!!!  When Sanj is home, he is mocking and being sarcastic the whole time!  Maddening!  Do I keep a running commentary of how stupid it is to spend 4 or so hours of walking around a course trying to get a little white ball in a hole?  And for what?  And how dumb to do that over and over?

Anyways… it’ll be a good weekend.

Hope your’s is a good one too!

Oh, but I first have to get through Thursday…

There is 6 minutes left in this day that I was born… and I have to say that it was a wonderful day.

I love my birthday!

Is that weird?  So many people today made mention of how they love that I love my birthday… so I thought I would try and explain what it means to me…

Life… the first 20+ years was rough.  It had a lot of pain and disappointment despite the love that was there.  Then there was the next 20 years… lots of changing, growing and an abundance of love and blessings.  There were still many times of hard stuff… but I was changing and growing.

Maybe since I turned 40… I realized that it, life is what I make of it… the good, the bad and the really hard stuff… it’s all in my power to learn from those moments and grow from them.

My birthday has become a celebration of me… by me.  Is that weird?  Maybe.  Today, I had a wonderful day.  I went to the spa and had a massage (which was fabulous) and then a facial (which wasn’t as great).  Then Sanj and I had lunch and then I spent the few hours left writing at Sanj’s office.  I loved all the Facebook greetings.  I realized that it didn’t matter what I did today… because it really is a celebration of God’s faithfulness to me.

How I love my life today, at this moment.  It isn’t perfect.  Yet … I have a wonderful husband, whom I adore… and who loves me back.  I have 6 sons who makes my life a constant adventure… and they love me… just as I am … even when I am ugly.. they get over it and love me inspite of myself.  I have such joy… from all things that are in my everyday life… from my friends, family, my faith, my writing, my community… I could keep going…

Yet… really God has been SO GOOD TO ME.  Regardless of whether I deserve it, He has blessed me with abundance.  Even the hard stuff, the pain, the hurts and disappointments… He has showed me how to make them into huge blessings.

A birthday is a day that I can be so greatful for all the love and goodness that truly overflows from my heart… and today, I felt the love.  Today, I felt such gratitude for the gift of my life.  I am grateful that I am here.  Today… allows me to remember that.

It really is a Happy Birth-day!

Thank You, Jesus.

YAWN!!!!!!!

That’s me this morning as I woke up at 6 a.m. to get my older two up and off to spend the day at Wonderland.  Oh my goodness, a week from today is school!  How ever will we get our totally spoiled bottoms out of bed so early?

Not really looking forward to that part of…  yet September is one of my favorite months… it welcomes my favorite season, as well as my birthday!  I love my birthday!  This year I will be 43 years old!  Wow, hard to believe, especially when I can remember my parents being this age!

Usually I have big plans on my birthday… a party of sorts, fundraising for something near to my heart in lieu of presents… this year, not so much.  Maybe it will be a low key kind of year.  We’ll see.

My 35th birthday Sanj rented a limo and we went to Toronto for dinner.  It was so fun.  Sad to say, most of those “friends” are not really active in my life anymore.  Sad.

My 40th, we had a dinner and cruise and a fundraiser for Rhema.  We bought a piece of playground equipment for the JK/SK class.

My 41st was a back yard party.

My 42nd was a Indian Dinner at our house to fundraise for new bathrooms for the boys school.

That leaves this year… Sick Kids Hospital is on my mind.  It is such an incredible place.  Truly another world.  How sad that world has to exist.  Yet the little bits of monies I could fundraise seems almost worthless… although I know it isn’t.

Last night we watched the video of PEI.  High definition is really something!  I almost felt like I could walk into the ocean.  Oh how fun it was!  It made me  committed to take more videos.

*** My Max Update:

We went and had the endoscopy done last Friday.  As usual, Max was a trooper.  We got there in record time, hitting not traffic, so we had a lot of waiting time.  Apparently they had to try 3-4 times to get the IV in.  My poor sweet boy.  I am so glad I didnt’ see that.  It makes me so anxious to watch them do that.  They think that the cream works, to freeze the hand.  It doesn’t.  At least not on my kids.  So my poor child felt that pain… and said it really hurt.  🙁

The doctor, who was a sweet Aussie man, came out and chatted with me.  The scope seemed normal.  They took tissues to biopsy.  They want to do another scope.  I don’t know that name… but Max will have to stay awake … they will insert a tube down his nose and then they will have him eat to they can measure the contractions of his esophagus. (If you know the name of this, can you tell me?)  This is not a pleasant procedure.

I am already sick to my stomach thinking of it.  I told Sanj that next time he is going to have to come with me.  I am not strong enough to cope with this alone there.  I felt so vunerable.  I was so scared while Max was in.  Too many ER shows.  You know how they are when they come out of surgery.  They are so groggy.   They look so sad.

So, we are still no further along with a fix.  I keep praying.  When I am at Sick Kids praying, I feel guilty.  There are so many really sick kids there.  Their parents are so strong.

Jesus, it IS time for You to come. 

Please.

 I love this picture!

This was taken at the CN Tower… my mom went with us, it was her first time going there.  It was so windy up there and my mom’s hair (well, everyone’s hair, really) was flying high.  Josh just started laughing his belly laugh as he watched my mom’s hair!

Last night we had a crazy thunderstorm!  It was a fabulous show!  There was the low growly thunder, that made me feel like I was in Jurassic Park… there was no need for turning your lights on, as outside there was a incredible lightening show… and the rains came down and God reminded us of His presences.  It wasn’t just for a few minutes where you were left wanting more but rather for at least an hour, it went on.

I was scared.  I love a great thunderstorm!  Yet there were tornado warnings for all over the place.  How can you see a tornado in the dark?  I went and googled the signs, since Sanj was calmly snoring away.  The signs did not give me any peace.  By the time you hear the train like noise, it is probably to late.  By the time you see the streaks of light on the ground, from the poles being hit, it is probably too late.

All I really had was prayer.  I prayed for safety last night… and surrender my fears over.  It made me think of the disciples in the boat, crying out to Jesus to save them.  I always felt that Jesus was a little harsh on those poor men.  🙁

It’s gorgeous outside today.  There are no real signs of the storm, thankfully (well, at least in our yard).  We are going camping (yurting) this weekend.  I am looking forward to it, although half the boys will be gone with hockey play offs.  Our last summer fling.

I have really mixed feeling about summer ending.  As the weather changes, I’ll be happy to rid our house of all the pesky  bugs, especially those fruit flies!  They seemed to have come from no where and decided not to leave!  I love the fall weather, my favorite season.  I love the changes of colors that comes as well as the cute outfits that one can wear… I love sweater weather!  Yet this changing of season means that snow is around the corner.  That means hockey follows.  That means cold arenas, stinky smells and annoying hockey parents.

I have mixed feeling about the end of summer.  This means my boys are gone most of the day.  It means those horrid wake ups, rushing and lunches.  I enjoy being with the boys for the most part… as long as they are busy, it’s great.  Or if they are lazy, it’s great.  It’s when they get bored…. Lord have mercy!  Yet, this time that they are at school means time for me to do what I want/need.  It means that if I want a play date, I can do it.  It means that I can at least look at crossing off those 1002 things that I’ve been meaning to do since forever.

Yet it means homework.  It means nagging. It means dealing with the rat race… that are kids’ lives today.  I have to sign the boys up for swimming lessons again.  Josh, Zach, Max… then there are guitar lessons for Jordan.  Tyler, and Sanj will continue Jujitsu and Zach has joined them.  (He looks so cute in his outfit)!  There is the 3 boys and their Youth Groups.  There is hockey times six.

Summer!!!!!!! Don’t go away, yet!!!

2 weeks till school starts.  

🙁

NOOOOOOOOO!

I had a busy day yesterday, driving to Toronto to the Apple Store to deal with some of our broken devices.  Unfortunately, do to carelessness of my tribe, I knew that none would be covered by the warranty.

I love the Mac people.  Given, the first lady was useless.  Then the other 2 guys were incredible.  They replaced an iPad, iPod, with cracks… free.  They said this is a one time deal… I was so grateful.  Then I had my Mac Air that had issues that would cost over $5oo that they decided to “eat the cost this time.”  I am so pleased.  I called Sanj and said, “How much do you think I spent at the Apple Store?”  He replied… “$1000.”  So I told him all the repairs cost nada.  Then I asked since I didn’t spend the $1000, could I have it?  He wasn’t quite as generous as my Mac dudes.

Then we stopped at Hollister, just to pick up a couple of things for the boys for school.  Usually I give them limit and steer them to the clearance section.  The store had a sign, “30% off the entire store.”  As I checked out, the guy was ringing my purchases, I was about to pee myself.  I just bought a pair of Hollister jeans for one of the boys for $6.00!!!  As the guy continued to ring our purchases, I looked at the boys and said, “Go get more stuff, quick!”  To a shopaholic, there is nothing better than a ridiculous sale!

Oh Happy Day!

The boys ( well some of them) are in ball hockey camp that Ferndale Bible Church is doing this week.  Yesterday was the first day.  As we went to pick up the boys, Josh said, “Can I go?”  I almost had a heart attack!  My child, the one that doesn’t leave my skirt ever, was asking to go to something.

Without blinking, I confirmed that it was OK for Josh to sign up and then we went to Sanj’s office to relay the news.  Josh wanted to do hockey … and on his own accord!  (I think he really thought I was going to put him in ballet, because today he said, “Hockey is better than ballet, right?” lol

The cool thing was that Sammy, who is volunteering time to help, was Josh’s coach.  Josh, at pick uptoday, first said, literally to me, “Can you wipe my bum?” Then he told me had made 500 goals.  Sammy translated:  “He made one goal.”  He had a great time!!!  I was so proud!

I do hate hockey.   Yet seeing hope of my child actually cutting the cord, even for hockey, is … well special.

I am excited for Josh.  I think he is actually growing up right before my eyes.  He seems a bit more eager about learning.  Maybe school this year could actually be spectacular for him.  OK… maybe we can go for a good year!

Oh, my sweet baby!

it’s sunday.  this is usually a day i feel like cooking a big supper.  today is no exception!

(loved the ripples in the sand on the beach in pei)

i have a yearning for special k loaf.  if you grew up adventist, you know what it is.  i love it with mashed potatoes, drowning both in brown gravy.  yum!  of course for my meat lovers, i’ll likely make a meatloaf.  add some green beans and it’s supper!

i even feel like making dessert.  oh, what to make?  i have been thinking of making red velvet cake or monster cookies.   the thing with cookies is i tend to get impatient after the first batch.  that’s the a.d.d. in me.

just thinking of this meal has my tummy growling!

this week is a busy one.  the boys, 2 of them will be at the ferndale bible church ball hockey camp.  sammy is helping out with it.  tyler will likely be golfing.  we are camping this weekend… so i need to get everything ready.  and on friday… finally is max’s g.i. scope.  the doctor’s app’t that we were suppose was postponed till after the scope.

tick tock… the clock is ticking loudly at the approaching of school.

ugh.

i feel like i spend a great deal of my life trying to be or get organized.  yet that means the co-operation of everyone.  somehow i seem to always be back on the drawing board.

today’s my mom’s 75th birthday!  happy birthday, mom!

the weather is calling for severe thunderstorms.  do you ever notice that never is really the case?  of course, i suppose if it’s going to storm, it would be great for it to do so after all my boys are home.  sammy and tyler are playing in the golf club championships.  i really hope that they are having fun.  once they are home, it can storm all it wants, while we eat our yummy supper.

max said he would make the cookies (obviously with much supervision).   monster cookies have all the elements of a delish cookie:  chocolate chips, m&ms, oats, peanut butter…  yum!!!  i could add nuts, for the crunch factor but then the boys would be picking them out.

did you eat ramen noodles as a starving student?  i actually saw a cookbook of recipes to make with those noodles… how crazy is that?  or just google ramen noodles recipes.   it is one of my comfort foods, still.

the best part of summer is the leisurely way i can often wake up.  i am going to miss not being able to get out of bed after 8 am.  🙁

what are you going to miss about summer?