House Tour: Installment One

Installment One: Corrina's Craft Corner

I have neglected to provide a real house tour since we moved into our place almost a year ago. I have always meant to, but felt that things were never really decorated and in place. Slowly we have been getting there, so here is a mini series I will be doing. It won't be a once a week guaranteed post. Rather, it will follow a schedule of rooms that are clean and I have time to photograph!

I am just so thrilled about this new space I created for Corrina so I thought I would start my tour with Corrina's Craft Corner

Here is a link note: You can also see this craft corner development here, at Flickr.

Otherwise, let the tour begin.

This is Corrina's new little craft corner/space! The table and chairs, as well as the white shelf are from Ikea. I've been hoping for a space like this for about 10 years, either for myself, or my child. I finally had the time and energy to put it together tonight, but it has taken a lot of forethought. I bought the white shelf about 2 years ago. We do not live near an ikea so our trips to ikea are very premeditated. I loved this shelf the minute I saw it in the catalog, picked it up when we were at the store, and stuck it in my basement until I had the perfect spot for it. Originally it was to be used for organizing deskish things by out computer, but as soon as our daughter became interested in crafting I instantly reallocated it's use to her space. It's perfect!


The "Corner"
I surprised myself when I found that we did not even have enough displayable craft items (that we wanted at Corrina's reach) to fill the shelves! I like it this way though.
Some orange juice containers covered in wrapping paper, are helping corral felt pens (markers, I am told), and glue sticks. The top shelf has some foam beads that we string and string again, and of course pencil crayons for those days when fat markers are just too cumbersome.

What better way to organize and ikea shelf than with Ikea plastic bins! There are little pads of paper slid in beside a tub of crayons and a tub of foam & Dora stickers. The tops shelf has an unopened christmas present and a christmas tag (aka I had nothing to put here).
Why the heck is there an unopened Christmas present still linger around? For Christmas I did a craft supplies stocking and this little parcel just got skipped over in the enamorement with glitter!
I love jars. Always have, always will. Corrina will also love them by the time I am done with her! Inside: googly eyes, star and circle sequins, a glitter shapes shaker, and of course buttons!
Above I've hidden some small things away in tins: pompoms, glitter containers, mini clothes pegs, and stick on jewels. There is also a little box of beads with elastic string and pipe cleaners, for those jewelry making days when Corrina just has to have a new necklace to go with her dress-up outfit.
The smallest jars I have ever seen came from an English hotel Grandma and Grandpa stayed at. These were the jams for the morning breakfast. I think Grandma shoved a few extra's in her pocket knowing we would all love them!
I love that in North America we get plastic jam packets, and in England they get real little glass jars. I think I'm moving!
I found child sized ripply/zig-zag/wavy/scalloped (whatever the decorative ones are called) scissors at the dollar store. Corrina can actually cut with them, whereas I can hardly shut my adult sized ones sometimes. Maybe I need some new ones...
Scissors are out of her reach here because I am all about prevention: prevention of hair cuts, random re upholstery, baby doll surgery, wall carvings, manicures, and purposeless cutting up of fun foam, the most likely to actually occur.
It's about prevention people.
I love how easy it was to use wrapping paper to glue around this recycled orange juice container. The paper was already curled up from living around a tube, so it naturally conformed!
Nothing new here really, just age old reuse and beautifying!

It's just so pretty I can't stop looking, although you're most likely thinking "I can!!" Tough Toast.


We use the space around shelf to hang up art from home, daycare, and other activities. You can't see it very well here, but the paper on the very right wall is a "seasons" mural Corrina and I paint together each season. It's a great way to teach Corrina some must-know vocabulary, show her letters and words, teach her things that go together, learn about weather, and inspire our other art projects. The list is endless really.

We painted this boring, white, press board shelf red when were first married. Actually, I was pregnant, and Dave was using tremclad because the lovely lady at the hardware store said that this would really be the only paint that would stick to a press board, melamine coated shelf. This was the worst painting experience ever. The priming sucked, the painting was awful and gooey, the clean up was horrific, and I had to stay out of the picture, in the bedroom, the entire time so as not to poison our unborn child with fumes.
This shelf started as my craft cupboard, transitioned into a pantry in our second apartment, and has regained it's original purpose of holding all things craft related.

Yes, I know, everything is red. I had a red organizing theme in our last place. This handy little basket hold alot of fun foam, some papers, and a few coloring books. Corrina is oblivious to it for the most part, until the scissors come out. She is a cutting maniac. This is not the best way to store this stuff, but it's working for now!
The craft corner exists within our dinning room. Such an odd little nook just needed to be filled with a place to create.
This is the little crafter herself. Of course, she is not crafting in this photo!

Or in this one.
Or in this one.
Or this one.
Like I could leave these adorable photos out!
This is how she feels about not crafting! Actually, this was her pulling a fake frown for the picture. The other similar picture of her above is the joy she experienced after pulling a fake frown!

Okay, here is a photo of the space in use.


Well, that is one little section of our house! Tour completed! I hope you are inspired, or at least in awe of me. Either is fine. Don't you think I should be included on this website? I do! Maybe they will discover me!

A Christmas of the Muppety Kind

Hope you enjoy 'em! To be continued...

A snippet of so many different things

Lots going on here! We've had a busy last few weeks, with paper writing (thank goodness it's over, for at least 2 more weeks), decorating for Christmas, attending events, and having good friends over. Corrina's language is continuing to develop at a rapid pace. She has most of her Christmas words down, and is able to share her imagination and daily thoughts with us using language now.
Here is a little conversation with Corrina:


Oh, FYI, the glasses are lens-less! Just for looks!

Today Dave got up with Corrina, leaving me to dream about selling my house (which I was very pleased to learn was just a dream when I woke up... often I get confused and it takes minute to return to reality and shake the emotions from the dreams. When I awoke it was to footsteps coming up the stairs. I turned to the clock, saw it was 9am, and thought "oh no, I'm in for a lecture about sleeping in too late..." and jumped out from under the covers. And then Dave began, but with words I did not expect AT ALL: "Get back in bed!" He practically barked it! Anyway, I can forgive him his yelling when the sight that follows is a tray of breakfast and Corrina carrying a little flower. This is the third breakfast in bed I have ever had. It was divine.

Speaking of bed, that is where I am heading again. Tomorrow I intend to begin my day with some major iron pumping at the gym, followed by some intense present selecting. I hope to get it ALL done tomorrow. You see, the truth is that I haven't begun at all. It has taken me a week to shed the stress of writing papers, but now that I have my creative mind back I can get down to giving (for, they say, it is, after all, better than receiving!)

Teeny weeny update

We've not been up to anything profound recently.
Taking the time to put up a few Christmas decorations. I love white twinkle lights. They are everywhere in our house!
This is probably the most accurate image of what we've been up to. I have been trying to work on some huge papers, with little success, and Dave has been working hard to putting together a stunning Christmas Muppet Diorama. I can't wait to be finished for the semester, something that seems like it is never going to happen. Even more so, I can't wait to see what Dave is going to come up with this year. This would be a really great place to link to diorama's past, but I don't have that kind of energy right now.
We've been eating food, and looking cute.
And wearing adorable clothing (thanks mark and rachel, last year! Corrina is really into these right now, and often chooses them over other clothes!)

Here is the music I am most likely listening to while I try to focus on my paper

** Disclaimer: I don't like the naughty word in the second song.**
Otherwise, enjoy

Winter is upon us

The first snow of the season, in our first house, with our wonderful international volunteer exchange program (IVEPer) person experiencing snow for the very first time!

Kristianna (IVEPer) really wanted to eat snow!  And she did.  Corrina really wanted to copy her!  We told her the rule about yellow snow, and brown snow, and any snow that has been at all touched by anything, human or animal or machine.  She is just going to stick to eating fresh snow off of trees!  She wants to make snow cones with juice and sugar.  It is so neat to re-experience snow!

The other gal in the photos is another IVEPer also from Indonesia.  Kris and her get along very well.  We all played together.  And the man in the picture below is not Dave, it is Hardy, the IVEP coordinator for MCC.  He has children our age, but is a fun, goofy person!

Thanksgiving to Halloween

I have photos!

And here are all my words to accompany them. We have a fabulous thanksgiving visit with Claire. Her photos are excellent, please do go look if you haven't already. I really wish we lived closer to our family. It is just wonderful to sit down for a cup of tea and conversation with people who have always just been there. It is comfortable.
Thank you Claire for treating us to your time and friendship, and for the gifts you brought, and the gifts you gave! We couldn't have asked for a better thanksgiving (well, maybe it would have been nice if Corrina was well so we could all sit at the table together... but otherwise!)

Corrina had a cold for about three weeks. I always suspect an ear infection after the first week or so, but I just hate all the antibiotics she has become immune to over the years (all 2.5 yrs!) so I try to wait as long as I can in hopes that it will clear up on its own. Never does... but now she is feeling better. Dave was also sick, and then I became sick. Of course, all these illnesses had to wait until a week before I had a paper due, and the worst for me had to hit the night before my paper was due! I am thankful that I have understanding professors who grant extensions. Unfortunately this means I have to write quality papers so they continue to see the worth in giving me extensions.

On to Halloween. It is rather interesting to explain Halloween to a person who has never celebrated it, but has heard all the bad things about it. Kris was more than willing to participate in the childish aspects of Halloween, like carving pumpkins, creating costumes, and of course enjoying the candy (way too much candy...)!





Corrina spent the day in this adorable pumpkin dress. One of the youth from church, whom this dress belonged to when she was 4, lent it to us for Corrina to enjoy. She went around the entire day saying "Pumpkin dress" excitedly. She has wanted to wear it every single day since Halloween. I had to tell her it was dirty so she would part with it for church today. It was partial truth!
With illness, and papers, and general stress and overload we just decided to dress Corrina as little red riding hood! She loved wearing her cap and carrying a little basket around!

When Corrina first received her implants it took her about three months to learn a new word. This was with multiple repetition and games. Of course so much time has passed since then, her hearing is more refined, and her cognitive ability for syllable, sound, and word recognition has developed overtime. At the beginning of the month we were amazed that she learned the word pumpkin within one week. So, we were blown away when within about 3 hours she learned the phrase (two words!) Trick or Treat! We talked about the phrase all day long, and we showed her that when she went to a house and said Trick or Treat, she would get Candy. She was very excited and did her best to emulate the sounds, but her attempts in the beginning sounded nothing like the phrase... however, with enough positive reinforcement (CANDY) she was announcing "Trick or Treat" loud and clear at each open of a door! While that is the amazing part, the bit that makes me feel oh so proud is the fact that she said thank-you to so many people without me even needing to prompt her!
So, while I don't really love the gory side of Halloween the actions sure to boost a little deaf girls opportunities for learning new words! We really do have to take every opportunity to teach her what we can!
Oh yes, a comment on the photo above: Dave carved an excellent Tiki Pumpkin with such great teeth. Take a closer look! It's so neat!
Just this morning we had the lovely experience of finding our pumpkins smashed on our sidewalk. A rather interesting experience for a little gal who was so proud of her baby pumpkin! Oh well, another opportunity to drive home the word "sad". She recovered just fine and even helped to pick up all the pieces!
I don't know why but this photo (yes, a little blurry) kinda reminds me of....
...this photo. A 2.5 year follow-up. I think it's just the layout and visible height difference. Neat to see though!

A few cute moments

Some days we all leave the house together. I go to practicum, Corrina goes to daycare, and Dave goes to work. Other days just Dave takes Corrina and I stay home to read/study. Today was one of those days. Corrina understands that Mommy stays home, and she goes in the car with Daddy. It is fabulous to actualy explain things to her and have her comprehend what is going on. She must feel less frustrated too. Most of the time, to me at least, she seems like a 4 year old stuck in a 1.5 year olds mouth. Wow would that be tough. She is trooper though.
Today while we were getting dressed I told her that I was going to be staying home and she was going to play. I told her I was going to school. She understood, but did not like this. We talked more about what was happening. I told her I was going to stay here to read a book. She seemed happy to hear that and finally put on her clothes! Just after she stepped out the door to leave with Dave she turned around, looked at me, say "Mommy read book", and came back inside. Dave and I were telling her she had to go, and I was going to stay, thinking that she was sad and wanted to stay too. However, she had something else in mind. She went over to her book bin, found a big one, and gave it to me saying "Here Mommy, read book!"
This is amazing, for a few reasons. First of all, she understands! Second of all, she remembers! We have been working for a number of months to develop auditory memory, which means we have been trying to teach her to hear, listen, and retain the directions or info she hears. Brain development really flourishes within the first year of life, when children normally develop this ability through 'natural' listening and hearing. Corrina only started when she was 1yr5mnths. When we first started we worked on one item memory, at two we moved to two, and now we have passed three and are working on four! Her ability to remember between getting dressed, eating, and getting out the door that Mommy was going to be home reading a book is amazing to me! Plus, it was just so darn cute that she brought me a book to read. What a treasure.

Here is a little more cuteness for your day. Don't get the wrong impression, she isn't usualy this cooperative, just this cute!

Fish Training Kit

Got a Goldfish? Want to teach her to play fetch? Play sports? Now you CAN with just one hour a day for a week with the fabulous R2 Fish Training KIT!


Soccer, football, limbo, even eating from your fingers. Who knew your little Goldie was capable of so much!

Now I know what you're thinking. That cant be real, yeah right. But Good Morning America believes, so maybe you should too.

Okay okay okay. So maybe this is dumb to you, but to me, this is MAGIC. Harry Potter and the Fetching Fishy. I gotta go watch that video again! SO cool.
-DAve

Just a little more

With blogging I go up and down.  Most of the summer I was down, not really putting too much time into blogging, but now I am feeling a little more up.  Enjoy it though, because it really won't last long.  I have some large assignments coming up so my time at the computer will move from blogs to word processing!  Goody...

To start, here is our yard now!  Tomatoes have been slow in winnipeg this year and mine have only been going red for a few weeks now.  But boy are there alot left on there to harvest.  I think I might have to pick them and ripen them inside, and then thrown them in the freezer to use in sauces later this year!

Here are the Nasturtium I was so worried about.  The growth on the other side of the fence is even larger, and unfortunately has more flowers!!  Good thing our neighbor doesn't mind me intruding on his yard!  Last summer he says it was garbage everywhere, at least this summer it's flowers!

Corrina was doing a little posing for me today

I was going to add a cute little video, but it won't upload right now.  I will try again later.  

Hope everyone is enjoying autumn as much as me!

From Summer to Fall

Here are all the photos I forgot to put on our blog this summer:
A still life painting perhaps (with help from mom!)
Tammy's wedding!  Best friend from BC!

Dancing with a kindred spirit at the wedding reception!
Flying kites at Grandma's and Grandpa's house!

I have so many more pictures, thoughts, and adventures I want to share with you, but I am running out of time today.  I am off to bake this cake for my birthda!y

Babies Babies, everywhere!

Between now and November I know 5 people who have either had a baby or will have a baby very soon!
Here are two BEAUTIFUL new ones:
Jan and Paul's little Guinevere
and
Jodi and Ryan's little Seth
Welcome to the word new little friends.

Can't wait to see/meet the rest!

Dr Horrible on Seasame Street (sorta)

Link!

thought some of you might appreciate this!
-DAve

Days of Summer Three: Summer Food Part I

Summer brings the most fulfilling activities, which also sometimes happen to be the most delicious! For instance, strawberry picking!

Dave, Corrina and I picked 12, 4 L pails of strawberries, and had quite a time figuring out what to do with them all. My oh my, did it take alot of shuffling to fit all those plump berries into the cool fridge so they could keep until I could get my hands on them.

I had many ambitions for creating delectable strawberry dishes, from shortcake to scones, to pies. In the end we froze most of the berries, turned many into jam, ate 2 strawberry crisps, and dehydrated a pail into perfect cereal pals!


We've been having fun doing strawberry smoothies and shakes, and even went wild and made fresh strawberry daiquiri's.

I contemplated making freezer jam but decided against it for a few reasons. One, Corrina is allergic to fresh strawberries (but did phenomenal at abstaining from eating the berries while picking!) but can eat cooked berries, and two, my wise woman sources tell me the taste and texture of the cooked jam tops the freezer version.

For the Jam I used the less sugar certo pectin for a few batches and regular for a few, following the directions inside the package for each. I actualyl found the regular batches to be a little too sweet. It also bothered me that for the regular certo there are 7 cups of sugar to 4 cups crushed berries, whereas the less sugar certo called for 6 cups of berries to 4 cups of sugar. The only difference is shelf life: regular lasts 1 year, light lasts 6 months. However, I imagine the shelf life won't be a problem, as we are almost done an entire pint of jam already!
The hustle and bustle surrounding the berries was very energizing to me. Washing, hulling, cooking, slicing, and just being consumed by a nutritional task brought me a lot of joy. Won't be quitting my day job sadly (or school, as it were!), although I have thought about becoming a chef or pastry chef before.

We 'tested' Corrina's allergy to fresh berries and few times, so we had the chance to watch her devour a sweet fresh strawberry. She definately looked at us with that "How come you've been holding on on me... these things are amazing!" and came back for me. It became very tricky to monitor her for hives because our test got a little out of control since every time I turned around she was helping herself to another berry! In the end we only found one little cluster of hives, but this only happened about 5 days after eating a few berries a day. Corrina was not bothered by them and they disappeared quickly. We are still sticking to cooked berries for the most part though. My next adventure will be to make cooked strawberry popsicles. I plan on mashing and boiling the strawberries for a short bit of time, letting them cool, and putting them into molds. I doubt they will need sugar to be delicious, but I may reach for a teaspoon of honey if necessary.

Wow, with all this talk about fresh strawberries I really wish they weren't all frozen. Oh well, I guess I will just have to have a handful of the fresh Saskatoon berries that fill my fridge this week! That's another post though!

We've been married for four years now! Yippy!

Days of Summer: Two

First cutting of Zinnias from our garden! I appreciate that you sent me the seeds to grow mom. What an excellent little gift to slip inside a letter. I'll have to remember that next spring.
There is just one thing that is not right about these Zinnias. Do you see those little holes on the bright pink's leaf? Well, some of the leaves in the garden are almost all eaten up. Who or what is doing this? Slugs ate all my butter leaf lettuce, and I did not act in time to stop them. But if I can I will do my best to keep the Zinnias safe. Although, I guess they are feeding some special little bugs... but I want flowers this summer more than bugs. Great, now I am feeling so disconnected from nature the way the world works without human destruction. Really though, if you know what is eating the leafs, please leave a little comment, perhaps with a suggest as to how to fix this problem.

I have been absolutely amazed to see flowers and vegetables burgeon from seeds. I still do not believe that these flowers had their very beginnings, their first steps if you will, in the spare bedroom as seeds. And now, here they are, back in my house again! The cycle! I am sounding like an empty nester, so I'll stop.
What are you growing right now? What is blooming in your garden (take that literally or figuratively!)
Now go, get on with summer, or commenting!