Give Children Some Credit!

Ok so most of you probably do already! But I can't say I have given my children enough credit the past couple of years. Recently I started doing an Early Childhood diploma and am learning a lot but most of my experiences in seeing how children learn hasn't been from the readings but from actually watching them.

I think my first lightbulb moment was when Logan a few months ago started using full sentences. I thought "Wow she's grown so much!". As any parent of a young child knows, you are usually the only one who can understand your child's garbled speech when they first start using words and sentences. So I began picking up on her sentences and the way in which she said them because a few months ago it was pretty garbled. Andrew and I were reminiscing one day of Logan's younger days and watching some videos. I think we were watching a video where she was about 18 months and those of you who know Logan know she was always a chatterbox. Well to my surprise I understood what she was saying in the video! At the time of the video you could hear me in the background saying "Yeah yeah yeah" to her but I didn't know what she was saying...I thought it was just meaningless chatter. Now that I know the way she says specific words, I could actually pick up what she was saying and it was very clear to me...poor Logan all that time trying to communicate and me just nodding my head. So because of that lightbulb moment, I have been focusing more on Fox's words and his communication.

I am slowly learning but yesterday at the playground, he all of a sudden started screaming and grunting "bbb bbb bbb bbb". I thought he was just excited until I looked up and saw he was looking at a bus and shouting "bbb bbb bbb bbb". Obviously he was trying to say "bus" and point it out to me so I got really excited and pointed at the bus and said "Yes it's a big bus!".

Sometimes I question the whole learning through play thing but again I got to see it with my children this morning. Our friends Tim and Janet gave us this amazing construction type of toy with plastic screws, wheels, etc. I love creative toys like that because they are imaginative and children can be creative. Well I had hid it in the closet because they are only allowed to have 1 toy with pieces out at a time (otherwise things end up everywhere!) and the duplo was out. I left them alone and they managed to get it out of the closet by themselves and were playing with it. I walked into the room and Logan was building something all by herself. I sort of just did the "Cool look what you are making" and she looked at me and said "Mum I make a helicopter". I was amazed that she had made this by herself and knew exactly what she was making and you know what it was a pretty amazing and creative representation of a helicopter. I was so proud so I snapped a picture.

Give children some credit...they are amazing!

Busy Busy Busy...

My apologies again for a delayed blog post. We have been busy busy busy! As you remember last month I started school. Well what I remember school being is very different from what it is especially with 2 small children. I am struggling to find the will to get through this program and the time to complete assignments. I sit down to do assignments and the kids just hang off of me which makes it very difficult.

The whole family was sick during my last week of the in class portion of my program and I fell quite behind. Almost 4 weeks later and I've fallen even more behind in school. It's tough when you have kids...even tougher when you've constantly been sick. During my first week of placement Logan and Fox got Gastroenteritis and so me and Andrew didn't get any sleep that week and were constantly doing laundry. I had to take 1 day off my placement to help them out. This past week I got it and so nothing has gotten done and I had to miss 4 more days of placement which means I lose 1 week of my break where I need to make it up.

I'm quite frustrated as me and Andrew already never see each other while I'm working basically 8-4 mon-fri and he works from home during the week and 10-9pm saturday and sunday. Throw on top of that everyone being sick for a month now with different things and that equals a loooong month. Hopefully this next month will be better than this last one :)

Otherwise not much is new. Kids are doing well. Logan has grown heaps in the last couple weeks mentally. She's talking so much and explaining things and strings sentences together. It's pretty weird that she's communicating like that because I still think of her as a baby but at the same time, it's becoming so much fun to be with her. Her tantrums are starting to subside and it's becoming easier to explain things to her and reason through things. She is loving preschool and learning all kinds of new things and experimenting with all kinds of new experiences. Fox is also doing well, he's starting the tantrum phase *sigh* but hopefully he won't be as bad as Logan was. He's a bit better natured. He still loves his cuddles and is starting to say "mama" and "dada".

Here's some recent pics of the kids enjoying their sand pit and me playing uke with Fox:

1 Year and Counting...

Well, we've been in NZ for 1 whole year now, I meant to post something on our anniversary but it was so hectic. Better late than never? If anyone still reads this since I never update anymore! haha...

Well some of you may be asking...what the heck is going on in your lives? I've heard all these rumours. So yes Andrew has officially dropped out of law school. It wasn't for him and it was too expensive...end of that story. So naturally you might be wondering then what the heck are we still doing in NZ? Well I've enrolled in a 1 year Grad-Diploma program in Early childhood education (equivalent to a 3-yr undergrad degree), because it was on Immigration's long term skills shortage list, Andrew was eligible for a work visa. They took it off the list right before Andrew applied for the visa but it came through anyways, God wants us here obviously. So I'm on a student visa in a 1 yr program that finishes in November and he's on a work visa. Why early childhood? Because I love working with kids, it will help us stay in NZ, and also it fits us for where we are in our lives right now, especially if we have more kids (ie: you can take your kid to work), oh and super flexible hours. It seemed like a perfect fit. Once I graduate I'm eligible for a graduate work visa if I can find a job, and that makes it easier to stay. Otherwise we'll be back March 2013 (when our visa's expire). So the next 8 months will be extremely busy because Andrew will be working full-time, I'm in school full-time and the kids are still at home with us....how do we juggle it you ask? We're just that awesome! Ok we have some tactics:

1) We have a schedule
2) Andrew works 20 hours from home
3) I am doing my program via distance (except for 3 x 5 week placements)
4) Logan has started preschool 6 hours / week (3 on tues, 3 on thurs)

Life will be busy but I think this year will be a lot of fun!

I don't want to make this post too long but just wanted to tell you very quickly about our summer. Summer was pretty terrible this year, cold and rainy. I had put all my winter clothes away and on very many occasions regretted it. However there were some awesome things this past summer. Andrew's dad and step mom came out to visit us for 4 weeks in December. I was a bit nervous about how it would work out in our 2.5 bedrooms apartment with 4 adults and 2 young kids (more for their sake) but I think it worked out really well and we had a great time having them here. Logan absolutely loved it and was so excited to have them here. They were up in the north part of the south island when the Dec. 23 swarm of quakes hit so I'm glad they missed it. They came and picked us up and took us to Kaikoura which is 2.5 hours north of Christchurch. We were pretty rattled and thankful that we could all get away. It kinda ruined Christmas but I think we had a really good time in Kaikoura for 2 nights, so Christmas was just a bit different.

We also went out to the westcoast (Greymouth) for a few nights. That's about a 3.5 hour drive west of Christchurch. It's a pretty dull town but the scenery is absolutely stunning.



There were lots of great family friends walks to do and lots of cool scenery to explore. I definitely would like to go back there. This is one of my favourite sum-ups of Greymouth but I think it's funnier if you've been there:



In the never-ending story of our children. They are both doing great. Logan has started preschool 6 hours a week and loves it. When she turns 3 she is eligible for 20 hours for free (I love NZ). Fox is still scooting and tries to pull himself up but has only been successful twice in the last 3 months.

Here's us giving Logan dance lessons:



As some of you remember, I sent out a youtube video of Logan riding a little trike for the first time when she was about 19 months old. Well here's Fox on the same trike recently :) We're in the process of getting Logan onto 2 wheels, so Fox inherited her old bike:



That's all for now folks....Miss all our friends and family dearly!

Pirates and The Ocean

Ahoy there Matey!

I realized I only update this blog once a month. Very pathetic I know!!!

So in all things that are new here we go...We've finally found a church community and feel so much happier and settled now that we have people to pray with and live in community with. Definitely makes being here a lot easier!

The aftershocks have been mellow for a while so we are feeling a bit better and less nervous. I'm sure there will be more big ones but it's nice to have a break from them either way!

We drove down to Lake Tekapo and Mount Cook, it was beautiful and magnificent. We went on a big hike there and Logan was a champ. It was only a 3.5 hour drive to get there. It was awesome. Pictures can be seen by clicking here.

The water is back open!!! The City council has given the all clear to go back in and it's not contaminated anymore. So we can go surfing very soon! When the water warms up a bit! It's still very cold!

Today we went to a Pirate Market at the New Brighton Mall that's less than a 5 minute walk. It was awesome. It was like a community outdoor market that was pirate themed with a pirate band and puppet show for the kids etc. All in all it was sooo much fun! I really LOVE the area we are living in. It was a bit dull in the winter but I can tell it's REALLY going to pickup and be an awesome place in the summer. Even now it's great! For pictures from the pirate market click here.

We are definitely feeling more positive about staying. I love Christchurch, the earthquakes suck but they have to calm down eventually right?! I hope so!

Here's a video of Logan dancing at the pirate market:


and her dancing with a pirate:



and here's a video of me and Fox playing ball...sorry about the fuzziness!

Doubts and Birthdays

This past week has marked a milestone in our little girls life. She turned 2 and I still can't believe. I guess I'm going to be saying that pretty much until she's an adult right? I can't believe we have a 2 year old! It was a great birthday for her, She got lots of gifties from us and her Grandparents and all in all it was a great day. However it was a particularly difficult day for me. It was one of those moments that made me realize how homesick I actually was.







I miss our friends and family. I really miss the interaction between those friends and family and our children. It was one thing I loved about everyone, how great they interacted with Logan and Fox and I really miss it. Nobody here loves our children like at back home and skype does make it easier but it's not the same.

It got me and Andrew talking about what we really want in life. Right now we are torn. Christchurch is not what we thought it would be...and yep I can pretty much blame it all on the Earthquake. Besides the constant living in fear of aftershocks, the earthquake changed a lot for us other than that. Yes Andrew came here for Law school and yes he's enjoying it. We also came for a lifestyle change and a better life for our kids. We didn't know if we were going to stay beyond the 4 years or not but we wanted to give it a try. After the earthquake things changed drastically. We adapted quickly to the boiling water and the terrible roads and the non-functioning toilets. Those were minor annoyances and didn't rattle our views about coming here. One of my reasons for coming was I love the Ocean. I love swimming in it and surfing in it but the water is so contaminated you can't even go near it. We all got gastro from the beach a few weeks ago. What used to be a vibrant city is now a dead town. Nobody's really around, everyone is transient. People are all dealing with something whether it be insurance claims, chemical toilets, emotional turmoil, construction, moving, staying, going, who knows? All I can describe Christchurch as right now is transient. It's very difficult to live in it right now not knowing anyone...and the problem with an Earthquake and the severe destruction it caused in this city and the ongoing ones means it's not an easily fixable problem and it's not going to be fixed overnight.

We just don't know if we're willing to dedicate the next 4 years to living among this and spending the amount of money we have to spend to be here on this kind of experience. There are many factors to be considered, one being our future in Toronto which seems bleak as well. We do have friends and family there who mean the world to us but the cost of living in Toronto is too high. We'd never own a home, we'd be treading water the rest of our lives. We do feel a bit trapped right now and it's difficult. We've also talked about wanting another child (Don't worry not right now!) and we're not sure how this would work with our NZ plans right now. They deport pregnant non-residents because their maternity services are too stretched apparently, and it would cost more to go home and have a baby than to just have one here. We don't want another child right now but also not in 6-7 years.

Lots to think about and big decisions to make. I did find myself giddy when the new rebuild Christchurch plans came out this week, but then was quickly disappointed that even the basic things are going to take 5-10 years to rebuild. We always said we'd give it a year and the year isn't up so I don't want to say how we feel yet because right now it changes often. I definitely know that visitors would help ease the homesickness *wink wink*

In other news, Fox is getting lots of Toothies. I can't say enough how cute he is. He is absolutely adorable!! Pictures don't really do him justice but he's just the happiest most content little guy. However he is absolutely terrified of strangers. Logan would walk away with anybody when she was a baby. But Fox wails! We had my friend Ruth and her friend Kaitlyn stop in from Canada last Thursday. They were on a NZ road trip and stopped in to see us which was sooo great. It was so nice and comforting seeing a familiar face. Anyways point of the story was Fox wouldn't stop crying, he was inconsolable. I felt so bad for them. I always hate it when babies cry at me. Fox is a complete chicken. I can't put on Baby Einstein videos for Logan anymore because he cries at the puppets...seriously! the puppets?!
Anyways here's a picture of his toothies:





Here's a couple extra videos. Our kids are awesome, this is pretty much what I walk into every afternoon after their nap is done.



Here's them doing the Row Row Your Boat song :)




Here's a picture of Logan and Fox passed out in the car on a recent car trip...so cute!

There's Something in the Water...and babies

Good Morning!

Today is a beautiful day. The sun is shining, the birds are chirping, children are happy. The sound of Fox chirping in the background and catching Logan out of the corner of my eye dragging toys around in circles makes me pretty happy.

Andrew has started back to school now. It's the first time since we moved I've been at home alone with the kids and it's been great so far. This is the first time ever we have lived in an apartment with ground access and it's made my life that much more enjoyable. I'm not too lazy to use stairs but lugging 2 children down the stairs (or up) with a stroller and whatever goodies I'm bringing back with me (groceries etc) was quite exhausting. Therefore, I never ended up going out much. Now our stroller is in our front hallway and to get out of the house by myself, I just throw the kids in and walk out the door. Life has gotten so much easier for me. Now I can take them to the playground everyday and get out of the house more regularly.

Andrew has been doing really well in school, getting A's and stuff. I'm really proud of him, he's working really hard. He also got that job I was writing about in my last post where he gets to work from home...yay! It's great for all of us and so far it's going well.

I'm super excited but sad at the same time. Our two friends Jonathan and Christina are going to have a baby girl any day now and I am so excited for them but sad because I can't be there to meet her! I remember both of my pregnancies coming to an end and the excitement and joy you feel is wonderful as you begin parenthood. They are both going to be wonderful parents! One of my other best friends is also pregnant. Mary-Beth and her husband Matthew are expecting as well, and I think she is due in December sometime so Congratulations to them as well. I am so stoked for Mary and Matthew. I've known Mary since I was 19 and she is one of the most amazing women I know and they will make such great parents as well! I'm sad I can't be there though :(

There's something in the water! The last few days have been brutal for all of us including the kids. The city has been heavily chlorinating the water since the earthquake for obvious reasons and I'm not sure if they've been scaling it back or if the chlorine has been getting to us but we've all been feeling super sick from it. The poor kids for their stomachs hurting and the bad diaper rash this is causing, and poor us for having to change their really gross poops 5 times a day! We've started to boil water today and here's hoping it helps!

Until next time...

Fox and 30 years behind pt. 2

So our little man has been growing like crazy. He's so much quicker than Logan was at her age, not to compare because every child is different. I only say that because I'm used to a different pace of development and he shocks me everytime. We took out this gumball machine at the toy library this week for Fox, it's the same one my mom bought for Logan's 1st birthday and it took Logan a while to get the hang of it at 12 months...but Fox has figured it out so quickly. Here's a video of him playing with it (he's 8 months by the way).



Other than that, an interesting thing happened to me last night. I've taken up jogging and I've always said I hate running on treadmills and on Toronto streets and people always thought that was an excuse! Well it wasn't because I am absolutely loving running on an Ocean beach, it's beautiful and since I am overweight right now, the sand is very forgiving to my knees! Anyways I basically run down the beach and then back. As I'm running down the beach, I see a group of people with quite a few dogs. I think to myself this must be some type of dog group. I get closer to the dogs and find it strange that all these people are holding on to their dogs. They all start barking at me which I find odd. I run very close to the water because I have fun when a big wave comes and I have to dodge it. So I am running at water's edge and there's a large piece of driftwood/tree stump. I am kinda not paying attention because of the barking dogs right there and I almost step on the wood and then trip over my own feet and keep running. It wasn't until I was on my way back up the beach that I realize that this large piece of driftwood is actually a seal! I very very large seal! I was about 1 foot away from it and had almost stepped on it! I couldn't believe it! I felt very dumb that I hadn't even noticed it on the way there and hadn't put 2 and 2 together with all the barking dogs. Well I guess I can sum it all up by saying That's New Zealand! It does make me nervous though when the water opens and I can go surfing. Seals aren't exactly friendly, but I think that seals aren't normally on this beach and it was a one-off.

So my 30 years behind segment. We sat down with our neighbours for a cuppa the other day and she was born in Toronto and grew up in Scotland but went to McMaster for Uni. We had a good rant about New Zealand housing and how behind the times they are. Apparently they said things are changing and there are some new requirements for new houses being built. What is wrong with the housing you ask? Hmm well let's just ask what is central heating? They wouldn't know what you were talking about in NZ. Most houses have paper thin walls with no insulation. Remember here you don't have basements so the houses are built on very small foundations which is why when the earthquakes happen you see some houses that have basically been picked up and turned 45 degrees and dropped back down...because the foundation was all of like 1 foot? So most of these houses don't have floor insulation either or ceiling insulation. That is problem number 1.

Problem number 2 is the terrible heating solutions that they've come up with here. Well it's more like what heating solution? I've seen fire places but haven't really seen one's that pump the heat to the other rooms and without any insulation, you'd have to have the fire going 24/7. Then there's portable heaters (oil, halogen, fan etc). Those aren't really a great solution with kids because they touch it and get burned, and also they don't really produce heat to a large area. Then there's my favourite heating non-solution: heat pumps. Basically all a heat pump is is an in-wall heater (some are external that are mounted to the wall) that blows heat with a thermostat. They don't really work well because 1. The thermostat isn't accurate because it's reading the temperature of the room right where the heater is and 2. 1 little heatpump is not going to heat your whole house let alone even the room it's in 3. Apparently heatpumps are incredibly inefficient which leads to crazy power bills especially if you have an uninsulated house. I've read on forums that people building houses here who come from other countries ask them to put in central heating and the tradesmen don't even know what that is. People get by ok in Christchurch or northern cities but what about down in Invercargill? I can't imagine how cold houses down there get!

Problem number 3 is that windows and doors are not made to insulate. Most aren't double glazed and I always see huge gaps in doors and windows here that people can't be bothered to change. I keep seeing these thermal insulating curtains advertised and I just keep thinking "OR you could just put in proper windows". What good does an insulating curtain do when you open it and all the cold air just comes through the window? Although speaking to one NZ couple a few months ago, it seems it is still very very expensive to make the switch to good windows and doors.

So basically our solution to this problem? We almost never use our fancy heat pump (realtors make such a big deal if a house has a heat pump) because it's in the living room and we're really only in the living room during the day and the cold is tolerable with a sweater and slippers. At night however it gets really really cold (It can go to below 0 degrees). Please think about that in Toronto when it is 0 in November or December and imagine that with no insulation or proper heating...COLD, if the power goes out, people could die! We have a portable heater in the kids room and shut the door at night. I hate having a portable heater because it just freaks me out because it's such a fire hazard especially when you have aftershocks knocking it over. We don't have a choice though, it just gets way too cold in there without it. The heat pump won't reach the bedrooms so it just stays off at night. We close our bedroom doors and we had a heater as well. We found an electric mattress pad though on sale for $39 and bought it for bed and I have to say it was the best investment ever! Andrew just rolls his eyes because I talk about it so much, but finally I am actually warm at night! Our rooms stays an ok temperature as long as the doors stay closed and sometimes on really cold nights we have the mattress pad on and the heater on. We have 2 duvets equalling 700gsm of wool in our comforter. So it just shows you how cold it can get here. Luckily I am pretty sure our walls have insulation as well as we're a middle unit so insulated by the other units beside us. I can't imagine how cold it would be in an uninsulated place. brrr!

Anyways that is it for my post! My last and final thing is a prayer request. I explained in a previous post about the difficulty in Andrew finding a job. He's had a couple leads and a couple interviews. Please pray that one of these pans out. One job is working from home again and this time wouldn't violate his visa conditions. It sounds like a great opportunity for us so please pray it works out!

Also for those who don't know about my photo blog...I have started updating it again. Click here to see it!