Good Morning All,
It has been a while since the last post as the author has been quite busy living the life of a happy, sweet teenager.  So, I guess to fill you all in, I will attempt to write a little and share our life during the past few months.  We are now settled in to our lovely home in Fort Smith, and are enjoying the latest heat wave of summer.  My "garden" is coming along nicely...peas, tomatoes, green and yellow peppers.  This has been my first real attempt at a garden, and I must say I enjoy the feeling of gratitude that accompanies picking fresh peas and tasting the sweet flavor.  Having attended a gardening workshop early this spring, I was able to communicate with fellow gardeners, and some of their enthusiasm has rubbed off!  I absolutely feel that growing our own food, without the use of chemical intervention, will give us great reward.

See the green pepper?

The children are now sleeping, and it seems that time with them is dwindling...we have made it a point to spend at least a few minutes each day, usually around the supper table, discussing their day and trying to communicate.  They seem to go in every direction and if we are not careful the days will slip by without having any sort of conversation with them.  We recently purchased a new boat, and spent all day Sunday on the Slave River.  It was a glorious day, and it was just us....the six of us with no interruptions, just quiet talk, and when we arrived at Hook Lake, the kids jumped in and had a  refreshing swim.  This was a day to cherish, and all of the kids said how much they enjoyed this day.  Time with each other really is priceless!

Sunset on the Slave

Refreshing and fun!

So, throw away/unhook/step away from technology, get close to nature, grow your own food, and enjoy your families...God is so good, and if you haven't already done so, read "One Thousand Gifts" by Ann Voskamp.

i can see the light!

January 2nd, 2012!

WELL HELLO! first off, i figure i better apologize to all my dedicated readers who've been waiting patiently for a new post.........THAT HASN'T BEEN PUBLISHED YET! here's the thing, guys. soooooooooo much has happened since septermber! the house looks spectacularrrrrrrrrrr! like, we're so close! dad's hoping to be in there by mid-january! EEEK, so excited!

SECOND, i'd like to send out warm holiday wishes to everyone :) hope you all had a fantastic christmas and a happy new year :):):):) i know i did! haha, lots of time spent with family and friends, almost all of it enjoyed ;)

ahah, school starts up tomorrow (boooo), so i guess it's back to routine! well, sorta. we're slowly starting the process of packing up, so that definitely interferes with the normal schedule! 

like i said before, the house looks so amazing! dad hung all the doors today, and has them all trimmed in, the place has been painted for a VERY long time, the kitchen is up and running, and the first flush took place on new years eve! so i'm gonna stop talking now and upload some pictures. good plan, in my opinion! 

our very cherry kitchen :) looks way more orange in this picture than it actually is, ahaha. 

 rebecca, posing in the kitchen!

 the living&dining room! 

 ORANGE OFFICE, sooooooo excited!

 rebecca admiring her purple walls :)

my amaaaazing bedroom! seriously love it, haha, best room in the house!

 isaiah's blue room.

 daniel's super green bedroom! no kidding, that place is like, neon.

 view from someones window, haha. snow and scrap pieces of wood!

the view from the top of our stairs, haha.

 mom and dad's room. it's green, doesn't really look like it in this picture, BUT IT IS!

 their ensuite.

 this is the family room. that is our family.

love this picture of dad!

 kitchennnnnnnnnnn!

 isaiah lookin' fine!

 view to the basement. it'll be unfinished until further notice so that we can move in - work on it later, yano?

painting the baseboardssss

 painting trim like a pro.

dad eating his high class meal at his high class table..

September 18th, 2011
HEY, GUYS!
reading through my last couple posts, i realized that i introduced you to a robin and then never followed up with news of the visitors!
brace yourselves though.. the ending isn't a happy one :(
we were expecting the robin's eggs to hatch a couple days after we left for nova scotia......which they did! three little baby robins (who i don't have pictures of) came into this crazy world...inside our house! sadly though, micheal, who was working on the house while we were away came in one morning and found the three little babies and their nest on our floor.. dead :( HOW SAD! it really is quite unfortunate, but yano. there was nothing we could have done :(
on a happier note though, recently, we discovered the water line to our house! WEOOOO, now, i had no idea what the significance of this discovery was until dad filled me in!
turns out that since we found the water line, we don't have to pay the town to dig up the road and find it! ..and according to the father, it would have been a TREMENDOUS cost.. SO YAY! WATER! ..however, even after we've been connected and stuff, the water isn't working for some reason! thankfully though, it's the town's expense to figure out why it's not working!
it's weird because the pictures below are sort of like Déjà vu! you're probably thinking "wait.. what? you've dug up a big chunk of your yard to find the water line before?" ...and the answer is yes. when we first moved to port hawkesbury, nova scotia back in 2008, we bought a VERY old house. 150 years old or something like that! anyways, our plumbing and water randomly stopped working and since it wasn't a problem within the house itself, dad had to borrow a little tractor and dig up our yard. as it turns out, one of the pipes had collapsed and wasn't allowing water (or other stuff) to pass through! sure, it doesn't sound THAT bad.. but paint this picture in your mind... six people, no toilet, one week. TALK ABOUT GROSS. hahaha, i had planned to upload pictures of the first "big dig" as well.........but those pictures aren't on this computer! ..so i'll get them up later :)

OH LOOK, a tractor :)

 DIRRRRRRRRRTTTTTTTT.

 it's like a perfectly placed tunnel right to a door that isn't supposed to be there :)

 just diggin' away :)

 muskwa debating whether or not she should jump!

 water pipes :)

 aweeeeeee :)

 we dug the hole by hand, obviously ;) 

SO MUCH DIRT. 

 oh look, dad's building a temporary fire pit :)

 momma and the pizza!

 PIZZA!

 lol, rebecca.

 rebecca's friend saaaaaaam :)

 beautiful.

 technology rules. 

 isaiah being a curious little fella.

 micheal coming down off the roof with a 50 pound bag of shingles!

and again! 

 climbing the treeeee.

 cutee :)