Hot Child (ren) in the City

Hot hot hot. Well, not Iowa hot, but we have hit 31C, so hot for Alberta

The open house was on Saturday, and we pulled the trailer out of the driveway and over to the church so it was out of the way.

Since I haven't heard from the realtor, I don't know how it went, but there haven't been any offers on the place yet, so the right people must be waiting for God to say GO!!! I hope he does soon. We still have the little ones sleeping out in the trailer, to keep the mess down in here, but it is amazing how well we can trash things.

In keeping with my computer trend, the PC did a major crash yesterday after installing some kind of wonderful update from Windows as it shut down the night before. It couldn't even find a startup disk. Had to reload windows on to one of the hard drives, and then spent the rest of the afternoon trying to fix the partitions on the other two drives so they would show up in windows again.

Caleb had his first driving lesson last thursday, and we have only been out once since then. I'll take him again today to get some more miles under his belt. He drives again on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday this week, and then once more at a yet unscheduled time.

This weekend is the big slo pitch tournament, so we'd really like to get out of town, but with Caleb driving, that won't happen until probably Sunday.

Well, Caleb and I are off for a drive! He needs 40 hours of practice along with his lessons, so they say, so here we go!

P.S. - Sell house sell!

The Future is Fiendly

Yep. Exactly the level of incompetence one has come to expect. Closed the business in February, and started a transfer of the internet service contract to Edson Alliance church, so I wouldn't have to pay 2,000 bucks to cancel it.

The transfer got cancelled in April, but nobody told me. Called in June, and they said to disregard the bill. Called again in June and they said to still disregard the bill. Then they called me to say it had been cancelled, but they could reopen the transfer, if I paid the bill in full up to date.

Now it is cancelled again. Called and they said that they weren't involved in the transfer of internet services, only phone lines (funny they hadn't told Steve or I that over the past 5 months). So on to Telus sales, and they set it all up so Steve only had to call them. Steve phones them and finds out that they can't transfer only the internet, but he has to take the whole bundle - phone line included.

5 months later, and I'm back where I started, owing Telus for another two months of service in a building that I have no access to.

So, we're back to cancelling the service, and paying the huge bill, unless there is a way to get the new cancellation fee of a meagre 150 bucks to apply to me, but it would appear it's only for contracts signed after may 2008.

It is amazing. Absolutely amazing. On the upside, until the house sells i'm not paying anybody anything. The old blood from a stone thing...

Open House!!

The big news is that our house is having a public open house on Saturday July 25 starting at 11:00 AM

Please pray that we will have a buyer from the open house, or before the open house.

Please pray for calm hearts and minds as we try to get the place cleaned up and ready for the open house, with 8 kids in it.

It's an Owl's Life...

I feel like an Inuvikite. Can't seem to be tired enough to go to to bed before 2:00 - 3:00am, and then when 9:00-am rolls around, it feels really early... So much for the getting up at 5am to run mornings. By 9 Dagmar is up and hungry, and the house is starting to move around, although Abram and Elowyn seem to be on the same late night schedule, so they are not really awake at 9.

I was wondering why I have these numb fingers on my left hand, and thinking I just needed to get some fish oil in me, and then last night Tanya remembered my amazing slip off the step of the trailer in Moose Jaw last month. I recall telling her then, if I have symptoms of whiplash later, this was the cause. Then shortly after that these fingers have been numb, my neck is sore, and I keep waking up with headaches. Hmmmmm. Whiplash. And one of my chiropractors is in Inuvik. I went to Hinton yesterday and was adjusted, so that's a good thing. Maybe I need to go to Inuvik to wait for the house to sell, so I can get checked a couple times a day.

But, since we're in limbo with this whole home selling issue, I guess I'd better wait for the house to sell. I hate waiting. Maybe God is trying to get me more comfortable waiting before the house sells.

This week is a week of trying to keep the house clean enough to show, even though we don't have any showings booked yet. Caleb has AMA driving on Thursday, and Josh and Megan Rigby's Alberta wedding thingy is on Saturday, so we'll probably try to stick around here until then at least. Caleb Drives next week on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, but he probably wouldn't mind if we left him "Home Alone" for that.

Well, off to make some stew, and clean the kitchen so that it looks like nobody lives here.

Who Loves ya Baby?!!! That's right.

Water water everywhere...

Wow. Technology. It has it's ups and downs.

Up - posting to your blog over your tethered iPhone

Down - When your card from your camera cracks, it still lets you take lots of pictures, but you can't get them off the camera to post on your blog, leaving you to put up some lame picture you took with your webcam in your trailer.

Camped at Cold lake provincial campground for the past couple nights, and it looks like we're here to stay for the next couple nights too, judging by the activity in the campground. Even if we wanted to move, we might wind up in WalMart or at the end of a dirt road, since all the sites are full.

We have a decent spot here, with power, and it's high enough for the internet to work, and sort of secluded, so here we'll stay.

As for excitement - during our short drive up here from Moose lake, the realtor called to say that my neighbor (the RCMP officer) called her to say that his basement was flooded, and it was my fault because my downspouts weren't attached to the house. He also called the town to say the same thing. Strange that he didn't just go out and fix them. As it turns out, it isn't looking good for his insurance to pay, so he feels it will be a liability issue for me, and my insurance company is going to have to pay (or me, I guess). I'll talk to my insurance company when we get home and see what they have to say about all this.

My other neighbor, (the Fabulous Fontaines) went over, and fixed the downspout issue, and got it all put back together. I guess the kids probably kicked off the pipes back there or something. My basement is okey fine and dry.

I took the little ones to the beach yesterday, and they had a blast playing in the sun, digging in the sand, and going up to their knees in the very Cold Lake. Elowyn took a bit of a deeper plunge. While we were building an amazing moat on the beach, she decided without anyones knowledge to go for a float on a boogie board, by herself. The next thing I knew there was a teenager carrying Elowyn, soaking from head to toe, on to the beach. It had only been maybe two minutes of sand castle building and she had gone out, capsized, and been saved, all without me knowing anything about it. I thought she was still beside me digging in the sand. To quote Count of Monte Cristo "Zitara, God sees you out of the corner of his eye". I feel so blessed to still have an Elowyn today.

Today we took a trip to the Cold Lake Fish Hatchery, and had a tour. The little ones caught little fish in a net, fed and held some medium sized rainbow trout, and even got to pet a larger rainbow. Liam complained all the way there because it was going to be "Boring!" but he had a blast once we arrived.

Well, I guess we're off to the beach again, a little later today, to prevent burning the hides off the kiddies and their Dad.

We have another showing tomorrow at 11:45, so please pray that these are the buyers we're waiting for. I may have mentioned it before - "I hate waiting"

Moose Lake Memories

Yep. Here we are. At the provincial campground in Moose Lake. Just the 7 of us.

Caleb, Ethan and Palmer are at AWANA camp up here by Bonnyville, and that leaves the 7 of us to hang out, and breathe. Today we went over to Cold Lake, to check out some other spots where we could camp as well. With the wind there were some nice whitecaps on Cold Lake. We even did a little off roading in the suburban, and almost got stuck in some really soft sand on the south side of Muriel lake. I had visions of having to press the old OnStar button to have them come rescue us from "way off the beaten path", but with some back and forth, and lots of backing up, we were out of there.

We've even done some of the standard "camping" things. Last night was smokies, over the fire, followed by marshmallows. Tonight was barbecued hamburgers. We found a nice spot, with power, near the playground, and the little ones have been having a blast over there. Today was cold and windy but we walked down to the beach to check it out, and when it warms up there seems to be a desire among the littles to do some beach time.

In sharp contrast to Inuvik, we have few to no mosquitos to deal with. Pretty unusual for Alberta really..

On the house selling front, still no news. We had two more showings on Sunday, but our realtor had her baby on Thursday, and has been a bit busy being a Mom to keep us posted on how they went. No offers yet, and I'm pretty sure we would have heard about that.

Well, I figured out how to tether to the internet on the ol' iPhone, so perhaps we can do a few more posts this week, but it's almost 2am - my bedtime!

If I can figure out how to get pictures off my camera (the xd card is kinda broken and won't plug in to this computer) i'll post some here tomorrow!

God Bless you all, and keep on praying for that house to sell, unless you WANT us to run out of money and move in with you ;-)

Frayed, frazzled, feeling faint...

Still waiting...

In the rain...

Parked the trailer at Whitesides, and Dan took us out on the town. It was great fun, and great food at Sam's. Then off to a movie (the proposal - quite funny). Unfortunately, while we were out with Erin and Dan, the deluge started. When we got home after picking Jayden up from her Montana excursion, it was well after midnight, and dark, puddly, and muddy. The walk to the trailer was like slogging through quicksand. Jayden lost her shoe on the way to the house. The next day was very messy getting everyone loaded up, and out of the house. Used 4 wheel drive to pull the trailer out of the muck, and moved on to Kures house.

The whooping cough is doing better, although Elowyn did a great job yesterday with a huge coughing spell. I was holding her and Abram, and by the time I knew I was in trouble, my shirt, and her pj's were covered in her partially digested supper. God blessed us by having a shower nearby, and shampoo, and soap, and clean pj's and clothes, and...

We had a wonderful time visiting with whitesides, and today we had a great weenie roast with Bransons and Kreils and we've had fun with Grammie here in spruce view, but nerves are very frayed. The uncertainty of it all, waiting for the house to sell, wondering where $$ are going to come from while Dad's not working... it seems to be wearing on everyone.

The trailer is still not really working well for us, as no one has found the spot for clothes, and dirty clothes, and the dishes and the garbage can pile up, and the mud from the rains is tracking in, and .... Life is a bit crazier than usual. I apparently do not have Elaine's organizational skills.

Tomorrow we will head back to Edson, mow the lawn, do the laundry, and pack the boys to go to Camp next week. Hopefully we can regroup and get a bit more organized. I can see the benefit of the bus with about 10x the storage space we have in the trailer, and bigger tanks, and instahot hot water, and a generator, and more room, and ...

Did I mention I hate waiting?

Well,

"But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint."

Isnt' there anything I could'a do to speed things up?

I feel like Indigo Montoya... I hate waiting.

The house is listed, and with 5 of the 8 kids at their cousins in Big Valley, it's possible to clean up the house. It has been shown 3 times so far, but no offers yet, although I AM EXPECTING one today! Even Elowyn wanted to stay down there, and is apparently having a great time without us.

I am now officially an unlicensed chiropractor, I changed my status to inactive, so as to save $2500-3000 that we totally don't have until the house sells. As long as I become active within 3 years, I will only have to take an open book jurisprudence exam, and pay 150 bucks to be reinstated.

Today I will haul some garbage to the dump, and do some tiling downstairs. Then we're off to big valley, and the kids for a couple days again. We are waiting.

Waiting

Waiting

Once the house sells, then we pack up, move out, and get the bus, and then we are back on with our lives (not that we're not living now, but it's patience practice)

Maybe God will say "I have some rope up here..."

Well, we're off again!

After a slow start on Tuesday (following a leisurely breakfast at the Holiday Inn Express, and two hours of trying to start a bus that clearly is having some battery problems) we headed back to Canada.

The trip home from Kalispell was equally beautiful, since we opted to go back over the going to the sun road from the other side. Walked with the little ones through the water on the weeping wall, a 40 metre wall of rock with little waterfalls splashing down it's entire width. It was sooo beautiful, and refreshing too!

We stopped to take the obligatory "Kids at the border" picture with Elowyn and Abram, since it was their first trip to the USA.

Now we have moved the Trailer to the Whiteside cousins house and today it's off to Edmonton (with Tanya and whatever kids don't want to stay with Whitesides) to pay The College of Chiropractors up to date and make sure they have my change in status form all squared away. I'll be unable to practice chiropractic until I reactivate my status, but in the meantime there is no further dues, marketing dues, continuing education, or any of that stuff till I reactivate.

Then we'll head to Edson to see how Caleb is doing, and to do yet another Dump run, and do some tiling of the basement bathroom, and put some lattice up on the fence. Then back here to Whitesides and then ???

We pray that this house sells quickly, so we can get on with the rest of the adventure. Hanging in Limbo is no fun at all, and if it lasts too much longer I'm going to need to get a job at walmart or something until it sells. $ gets extremely tight when you are an unemployed bum ;-)