Merry Christmas, Happy New Year

So, with Christmas Eve only three sleeps away (EVERYTHING is counted by sleeps in my house), I thought I would take a few minutes to update everyone on all the craziness of this year, as some of my extended family and my very close friends read this blog to keep up on our family news.

At the beginning of 2009, I was working part time at the store, one day a week at the daycare, and babysitting Tues/Thurs (miss that little one sooooooo much). I had planned to keep up this kind of blend of stay at home/working mom until the girls began public school in Fall of 2010.

Then in February I discovered a part time teacher education program with evening and weekend classes that would accept me with my credentials and experience. The program would take 2 1/2 years to complete and I would have a Master of Science in Teaching. Wow! Little did I know how much this one click on a link on the internet would drastically change the course of our future.

After attending an information session, and speaking with former teachers (of mine) and other contacts who work with the local school board, I decided I would apply for the fall of 2009, then defer my acceptance by one year, which would slate me to start Fall of 2010. I was accepted, and in interim, I am working on the "catch up" courses they have asked me to take (a computer course, children's literature, and history). I will officially begin attending grad school at SUNY Potsdam in the MST Ottawa program Sept 2010. For those of you who don't already understand, this is my life's dream, and my life's work come to fruition. All I have ever wanted to do was teach, and now I will be doing just that.

So there's me in a nutshell for 2009. Schoolwork, work, and kids.

Winter 2009, the girls participated in pre dance, and while they enjoyed it, Mackenzie did not want to continue. Laura did a second session, and then decided she preferred gymnastics like her sister. Both girls were taking swimming lessons at a local gym.

We bid goodbye to our baby B in April, as the looming summer vacation season and future tuition costs meant that I needed to work out of the house more. We do miss her, but it was the best decision for us in terms of our future needs. Around this time, the daycare I worked at announced they would be expanding, by building a completely new daycare, and Pladec would become Pladec and Pladec East. This meant some major changes were expected for my part time position.

In June, we enjoyed a three day mini vacation in Niagara Falls. We saw the sights, had a day at Marineland, spent some time with the butterflies, and just hung out. This trip went amazingly well, the only thing I would have changed would be to remember the laptop power cord so the girls could have watched a movie at night to fall asleep. I will definitely be planning one or two of these little mini trips for the coming warm season.

The rest of the summer, when I wasn't working, we had trips to the cottage, took in the buskers festival, and spent a lot of time at Grammy and Grandad's house with our bikes (nowhere to store our bikes inside at our house, so its safer to keep them in Sydenham).


In September, when things slowed down, we were able to head for the Toronto Zoo to see the Sharks at Stingray Bay exhibit in which we got to pet stingrays. Unfortunately, the sharks would not come out from under the waterfall to allow us to pet them. We had a blast, and again, it was a day that went so well, that we will be doing the zoo many times this coming year.

Laura is on the right in this picture, Mackenzie is on the left. They are two months shy of five years old in this picture.







Having our picture taken on the Komodo Dragon, Mackenzie in front, Laura in the back.







The girls also started their final year of Montessori school in September. By October, both were attempting to read three letter word, and Mackenzie excelled and is now able to sound out simple four and five letter words. She is zooming through our home readers. Laura is learning using a combined phonetic and whole word approach, and is doing very well with her reading too. She can recognize words such as the, and, she, dog, and is trying to sound some three letter words out as well. She is excellent at paired reading and story telling. I am so proud of them both! They are taking Red Cross swim preschool lessons and are doing very well, and are taking Kindergym at a local club, and again, are doing a great job. They have already told me they would like to try soccer in the summer.

In November, the twins turned 5. We had family and a couple of friends over for a party at our house. It was an enjoyable day. Also in November, we had to declare our interest in positions at the new daycare, or interest in changing our current position in the old daycare. Since I knew that my position would not exist beyond the next few months, I proposed to the board that I be the cook, with certain scheduling conditions. They offered me the position, I accepted it and will be working as a full time cook/ECE relief staff at the beginning of the new year. What a huge change that will be.

That brings us up to Christmas, we still have baking to do, and presents to deliver.

This year, I will pick the girls up from Christmas with Daddy's family on Christmas Eve, take them to my parents home where we are staying the night and having Christmas morning. The girls will then be picked up for Christmas with Daddy (and others) mid afternoon, leaving us adults to nap, have dinner, and enjoy some quiet time. I think it is going to be one of the best Christmases in recent years.

Merry Christmas everyone! Happy New Year! All the best for 2010~!