frozen in time

well i am inspired by kimara who blogs all the time and i never ever do....so here goes.....it is november 23 2010...and its winter....well not REALLY winter but mother nature has played a dirty nasty joke on us and sent us old man winter super early and he is angry!the temperature outside today was a chilly -34 with the windchill.....our month so far has been quite eventful,dylans football windup was at the beginning of november....and none too soon...lol...i luved to watch my boy play his first year of football but never once did i think when i signed him up that i would be sitting in the stands freezing my butt off,no regrets tho...hes so fantastic at every sport he chooses!After football was over it was on to volleyball season for alexis,whom i might add is now officially 6 feet tall.....and only 13 years old....a couple more inches i would like but then stopping the growth would be a goodthing as i worry about her finding a hubby as tall as her:P......back to her volleyball....she of course did amazing and learnt alot this year!Now we are thrust into basketball season.With both my girls trying out for senior team my nerves were a wreck hoping they would both make the team,i didnt want one to make it and the other to have to go on intermediate,makes my life a whole lot easier this way.....so yes.,,,,they make the team!!!However it is a bittersweet moment this year letitias other friends also tried out and never made the team:( also not having london with us in brooks to play will sure be a different view from the stands:*( i am saddened for this....but i must also say i am super excited that london also made her team in her new school in medicine hat!My partner in crime aka kimara....will be missed by me in the stands,,,,im sure it wont be the same not having her there with me:(. We look forward to watching london play tho...and im sure we will get to scream at eachothers games once in awhile:)

Well last week we the wandlers decided to treat our family to their first NHL hockey game....calgary flames against chicago blackhawks...(which letitia beleives her hubby is playin for that team) jonathan toews...lol...anyways we were so excited for this day to arrive and it finally did...but of course not without some challenges....the weather had decided not to cooperate at all...the worst snow storm ever decides to grace us a couple of days before we go...so of course the highways were not in the best of shape,but we wandlers let nothing stop us and prevailed and went and enjoyed ourselves fully!With december fast approaching our thoughts are quickly turning to christmas and shopping and of course where and what we will be doing for christmas this year?Nothing is settled yet,but im sure something last minute if anything will be planned!quentin will most likely be working so likely it will be close to home if not at home itself.

Upcoming holiday week next week for quentin and i and had alot of plans to get alot done,but of course plans were made to be changed and lets just hope we can get some christmas shopping done!!Well this concludes my first blog in probably a year or so....so much has happened and i wish i was a better blogger so i could have it to look back on for when i lose my mind.....lol...but perhaps somethings are better left not remembered...haha....missing our dear friends who have moved on to medicine hat to a wonderful acreage and look so forward to spending lots of time there in the future creating new memories with them in their new adventure!!TA TA FOR NOW......time to get some beauty rest....or should i say hibernate...goodnight:)

THANKSGIVING

WELL HERE WE ARE thanksgiving is upon us and the cold weather has blessed us once again!What???blessed us???ahhh well you all know what i mean...lol....anyways i just stopped in to tell why i am so thankful this wonderful time of year...however i am always thankful everyday but one does seem to slow their world down for a day and truly think of why we should be thankful!

I am thankful for my wonderful,understanding supportive husbandof ten years,,,,and heres why...
I get sick he heals me,im sad he holds me,im happy he shares laughter with me,im scared he comforts me.....but most of all im me and he loves me!
I am thankful for my children,,,,,because simply they are mine!I have put alot of effort into molding them into wonderful people and i think that they are truly that,,,,about 71/2 years ago i was very sick with cancer and i was very scared and thought i would never be well or even survive to see them grow and flourish into adults.I conquered the cancer but before i did i wrote them each a little letter knowing how very loved and important they are to me,,,,thanks to god i never had to give them those letters,however i have had the opportunity to tell them everyday how very great they are and how thankful i am to have them in my lives!
I am thankful for my parents.....i sometimes take the time i have with them for granted however i knnow they are getting up in age and now i think back to how great they were when they raised me and took good care of me and i thank them for that and continue to be there when i need them....
I am thankful for my friends.....in life one can never have too many friends,i have had alot of friends in my life but truly only a few whom i have carried on through life with.....my friends have truly enriched my life throughout the years and im positive i will continue to have such great loving friends in you,,,,and for that i thankyou!!
last but not least i am thankful to the lord and for allowing me to be here and to be experiencing this world and life with the most amazing people and the most amazing experiences.....

It truly doesnt get much better than this,,,,,we are all happy,healthy,and loved....what more could anyone want?
Happy thanksgiving my friends and family!!!i love you all!!

summers flying by

well here i am again today is friday the 14th of august ,let me tell you i can't beleive that it is already the middle of august and we feel like the summer truly has not arrived yet!We have had nearly maybe ten hot days all summer long .However we havent let it ruin our summer we have done alot this summer,i think this has been our busiest summer of all!Between camping,visits,edmonton trips jasper icefields emerson bridge blood indian lake newell echo dale park and the final thing so far we have done was our trip to calgary where we went to see wrestling at the saddledome!!How fun was all that,tons of fun and lets not forget tons of money.We were in sylvan lake this summer,we stumbled upon this outdoor waterslide park there so we decided to get a cheap room across from the waterpark and slide all day long!How fun was such a blast.Later that night quentin and i decided to go for a walk to some bars and see what the nightlife was like.It was rather boring as it was a sunday we were there,but we did meet this man and woman as we were walking by this one place,the man said hi there and we responded politlely and said hi,he then proceeded to chat with us,they were a very nice couple from fort mac,down on holidays.We ended up going to sit and have a drink with these people and this complete stranger said something to me that made total sense,he said ya know we only get one chance at this life and we need to enjoy it to the fullest and take it all in!He said he makes 5 dollars he will spend 8 dollars to enjoy what life has to offer.....it really makes sense to me that if we sit back and work work work and never play we will not get what life has to offer!That was at the beginning of our trip we knew it was going to be a blast from there on!Off the next day we went to edmonton and stayed at west ed mall for three nights....lots of shopping and we spent a whole day at the waterpark which we totally luved it was soooo fun,we are all about water!Went for supper at a nice restaurant in the mall down this aisle of restaurants...so cool..we then went back to the room ready for another day of fun the next day at galaxy land....which was not as fun as the waterpark however we still enjoyed it....then we changed rooms that night into our fantasy theme room...the lady at the hotel was nice enough to give us this room for 139 dollars and it was incredible....hot tub right in the room and a view of the city we couldnt beleive our luck!!The hot tub was constantly being filled up and the kids luved it.....that night the girls went to the imax theatre to see harry potter.while dad and dylan and i rested and chilled out in the room with room service nachos and pizza...ahhhhh....lol...next morning we rose to have a hottub again before we packed up and left for our next adventure,we headed to jasper...yayyy....trailer in tow we stayed in a campground right near the village,did some exploring and shopping in jasper and found a neat little restaurant where we ate and then headed back to the campground to set up the tent trailer.We then went exploring in the campground and the kids found some elk and carribou right walking around the campground,cool,,,,bedtime in the tent trailer,i never slept at all cause i was so worried about the bears coming into our tent trailer...lol...not sure what i would have done if they would have but needless to say i stayed awake..haha...packed up in the morning and off to drive the mountains...ahhhhh how gorgeous....we got to go to athabasca falls they were soooo nice,then continues our drive through the mountains til we found the icefields and stopped there for a few hours to tour on a bus on the icefields...how fantastic this was,ate on the mountain and then loaded up for mre mountain driving....we got to see 2 bears so exciting kind of sad though....they were right up on the roads and people we getting out of their vehicles to get as close to them as possible,you could see how scared these beas were and they just wanted to cross the road to get to the waters.....nonetheless stillblessed we could see such a free wild creature of god.....homeward bounds we were exhausted and broke but we had the time of our lives that im sure the kids will never forget:)

FATHERS DAY!!

Well here i sit fathers day has nearly come to a close and i thought i should write this note to let my hubby know how very much i love and appreciate who he is and what he does for this family....so here goes...

Quentin...the day i met you i could never have imagined the perfect family man you would soon turn out to be!I a Single mother(not by choice) however i found my self in this situation two very very young girls,thinking to myself i would be alone and raising them all alone.Never looking for anyone,but there you were!You offered help when i needed it ,moving into my own little place and we grew as friends,you and i were certainly meant to be!So for this i have to say THANKS to my exhusband,,,,,for letting me go,and for walking out of his two adorable little girls lives....cause without that happening...you and i would never be and the girls im sure would have never had such a wonderful and loving up bringing as they have had with you as their daddy!!SO heres a tribute to you as the DADDY of my three wonderful kids!!HAPPY FATHERS DAY QUENTIN! Any man can be a father.......But it takes a REAL man to be a DADDY!!!We love you!xox

winding down and unplugging

well here it is almost the final days of school is upon us ...again...how often we look forward to the final days of school..as quick as the school year is over we all tend to go our seperate ways for the summer and go on our own little adventures..creating new memories and perhaps new friendships......i often worry about my girls and that they will have true and valuable friendships in life and i am thankful that they both have such wonderful friends....i dont think i could have hand picked better friends for them.....i want to say i would love to be selffish and keep our london and her family here FOREVER!!however i also relaize that if i was in the same predicament i would move in a heartbeat....saddened as we will be when that day arrives.....we know that this is a forever friendship:).....onto much happier things..now...our daughter alexis will be going into grade seven this coming september...wow....who would have thought this would come so fast..i now have to watch two girls go through this flirting with boys and giggling in the hallways of the junior high school.....i really should get a lock on those basement windows and doors like kimara says,,,lol....my dylan will be heading into grade 4 already...he struggles with his work however is a whiz at social studys...loves to learn about the world and world events.....maybe a little politician in the making...hehe....guess we will have to teach him how to lie!:)......
Last weekend we as a family,,,,went to blood indian for the first time since an uneventful august last year....when i left there last year ...august i swore never to camp or even go back to blood indian ever again...for reasons that pretty much all of us know...lets just say we had a life changing experience and didnt want to remember it.However we ventured back this past weekend and had a wonderful time fishing and teaching the kids how to fish as we all had rods this year....dylan can actually cast out pretty far!Letitia caught the first fish of the weekend...haha if you can call a 3 inch fish a fish....but nonetheless it was a fish...i released it back into the lake only to have it die from the eye injury from the hook...sorry little fishy:(......anyways we drove around a bit that saturday and noticed a motorhome with a guy that looked alot like my brother inlaw....so we pulled over and sure enough it was my oldest sister and my brother in law....they too were out on the other side of the lake fishing and camping....so we had a nice visit with them...only to find out my parents were also arriving later that day...so we all enjoyed our time out at blood indian...caught a few fish and had a nice visit...soon off to lake newell on july 1st for a couple of days..that will be our next camping adventure....til next time keep fit and have fun!!:) haha

the test....and i passed!!:)

well this time last weekend i was out at the campground with 9 kids ......alone.....!!!EEEk it was letitias 13th birthday bash, she wanted to do something extraoridinary this year and well i didnt want to clean up a house full of teens again and certainly didnt want to go anywhere extremely public with all these girls,as we know how loud that could get,so silly me i said hey why dont we go camping??She immediately loved the idea,and i immediately regretted saying it....lol....so here were are its friday and i was finishing up at work around 1130 in the am,went home and quentin was home for lunch from work and we began hitching up the trailer and loading up a bunch of stuff...
Off to the campground i went ,we stayed at the lake newell campground in h125 and i gotta tell you it was the nicest spot in the whole grounds!We were right in front of the lake,had a volleyball net right behind us...the toilets were a walk across the street...and the playground was right by us too.So i began to set up the tent trailer by myself and think i did a pretty good job!I waited til i got all the girls so they could set up their tent.
oh i forgot to mention i had invited a friend of mine out for the night,shes 29 and thought that she would be alot of help since i was gonna be out there by myself with all these kids!
So i finished up setting up the trailer and other stuff,,,,unhooking get all the electrical set up loading water,,,,etc....then i left and went in for the girls,,,and one boy,,,,sorry dylan:( we all loaded in the van...which i might add was not the most legal thing to do,but i drove very carefully:i anyways we were off to the lake with tons of stuff and kids in hand...or in van,,,,lol.....tell a bunch of teens to pack lightly cause they were only stayin for one night well some of them brought hair straighteners..makeup kits,,,,,haha and one even wore a dress!!I was already about to see the exciting evening i had in store for me!So when my friend FINALLY decided to show up...around 4 when she was supposed to arrive by 1 not bad only three hours late...lol....i should have told her 10 and she would have been there on time.We set up two tents...one for sleeping...and one for stuff and changing in...cause i thought with that many girls and that much stuff...they need ONE area to keep their stuff.
The whole tent,for their stuff was totally full!!the girls proceeded to pick out their spots of where in the other tent they were going to sleep...and yes it was a big tent and they all had lots of room!!Not that any sleeeping went on anyways....:)......It was kinda neat being around all these teenage girls as i was having some flashbacks of my own teen life with my friends...all the giggling and joke pranking going on was deja vu ....lol.....we all were just kinda eating whenever we wanted.....to start the fire letitia had gotten this firestarter item from london for her birthday and we all gave it a try....needless to say i was going to start the fire with a LIGHTER cause it seemed to be taking for ever.....but then erin kidd decided she was not going to give up and there would be no lighting the fire the old fashioned way,,,,with a lighter....she was determined to start it with this flint....and about 20 minutes later,,,,,she did it!!!Finally we got supper on the go.....lol....they all had hhotdogs hamburgers...smokies and more.....it was a great time as they all enjoyed cooking over the fire.Some of them enjoyed playing with the fire a little too much for my comfort but that was put a stop to in a hurry....:)....after they all ate they got a volleyball game goin and then went to the beach to hangout and swim in the ice cold water.....crazy teens.....oh did i mention my helper was just hangin out.....lol....ahhhh well i guess its a lesson learnt on my part,,,,soon it was getting dark and time to get the fire ready for marshmallows and smores.....yummmmm.......the girls too enjoyed all that ......then it was off to bed.....tent,,,,,tenttrailer....for some rest at around 1130......it was supposed to be quiet time...hahahaha...well lets just say a bunch of girls in a tent know nothing about being quiet....i secretly loved the laughter and chatting coming from the tent all night cause i knew they were having a great time.Finally my last "girls go to sleep" was at 430 in the morning....i then heard nothing more so i knew they had laughed themselves out,,,,,i woke to chirps of birds and sun peeking through the trailer.....so up i got to start our breakfast fire,,,,i got 36 boxes of mini cereal out with some milk and then got out a loaf of bread to make toast over the fire......one by one the girls heard me up and started writhing out of the tent.....they all made there way over to the table and well they ate alllllll 36 boxes of cereal...some even roasted weiners for breakfast and smokies too,,,,,ewwww,,,,,,then we were all around playing in the sand....some wanted to straighten their hair and shower....lol.....divas......those are the ones you know will travel from hotel to hotel when they have their families,,,,lol......anyways i just thought i would document my camping experience with all these teenage girls....i wonder how many boys ears were ringing the night we were out there...cause im sure they were giggling about boys.....lol...oh and as for my helper.....hahahahahahaha yeah i now know if i decide to do this again...i can do it alone!!:)

another mountain

well here we are today is monday,the day after mothers day....which i might add was not sooo great for me as a recognized mother,but we won't drudge that up again.Yesterday was a bit of a struggle and after a sleepless night of talking,discussion with my husband and our family as a unit.....we've made a decision of which i am proud of yet upset at the same time.A month or so ago we were discovering more about our friends lifestyle and religion,sure hope i'm wording this right...anyways...as we have been on this short yet educational journey, it has brought up alot of questions and discussion in our own lifestyle and relgious choices.To sum it up we have the utmost respect for our friends and the life they lead and we are sooo proud and happy to have them in our lives,however we have chosen to stay with our lifestyle and our religious beliefs which are not a whole lot different...just practiced differently .I write this a reminder to myself of this trying time coming to this choice,and also to thank the lord for bringing so many wonderful people into our lives as friends.I listened to this song today ...not for the first time but for the first time i REALLY listened to it...its called the climb,by miley cyrus.Believe it or not it hit home in alot of ways and it truly is a song of the times in our family,we only can say we look forward to the CLIMB and want the whites to know we luv you and appreciate you as our friends.I really dont know how to end this note ........:another day another task another climb