Celebrating Life

Its been kinda crazy around here, but that's nothing new right? Hehe. Friday morning Ariel and went over to do some laundry at Dad and Rita's place and ended up going over to Nana and Papa's old house to clean out the attic. There was a large dumpster brought in and we needed to figure out if there was anything worth saving up there... needless to say, not really.

Ariel wasn't impressed with Daddy's old skeksis costume. (Yes he made it, we have video of him walking around Vancouver in it, lol).


I found some of my old college art projects and I may post some of them up here in a bit. Ariel was enjoying playing in the dumpster, aren't I a nice mommy. Lol. Don't worry, nothing bad in there at that point.


By the time we were finished it was lunch time, and Ariel was totally exhausted. We went home for a nap and then had to get ready to leave for a surprise party.


My friend Cindy from high school was turning 30 this year and her parents were throwing a surprise for her. The biggest surprise for me was seeing Cindy with short hair, I have never seen her like that in my whole life. She always had a long ponytail, so that was a real kick.


It was a nice evening filled with fun and food! That was such a good cake!


Ariel was trying to make friends with the 3 different dogs there. Jasper wasn't that interested as you can see.


The next morning Ken was home, oh that was such a treat. I love having him home on weekends. We got packed up and headed off to Sienna's birthday party! Ariel was very excited and talked about her friends and parties all the way there. Here is Ariel and the birthday girl Sienna.


The theme was fish, so the backyard was decorated so nicely and they had 2 pools and a bounce house set up for the kids. Lots of fun, and Ariel loved every moment of it.


She was a little concerned about the temperature of the water at first. She slid down, poked her toe in and said 'COLD' and proceeded to crawl back up the slide. Lol, what a nut. Eventually she was in the water, but it took some time.


A group picture was attempted, and for the amount of kids, I think it looks pretty darn good. Especially since they are all wearing the fish hats too. Ariel really liked hers and wore it home.


After the party was over we headed over to do some more laundry at Dad's. Since they were gone, we got a pizza, did the laundry and watched the food channel. Ahhh, so relaxing. On the way home we stopped by the house to see how the dumpster loading was going. Papa's old shed was gutted and emptied. I never realized how big it actually was. Crazy.

Today we woke up to rain... lots and lots of rain! We went to church and Ken got to do the children's story... so Kermit helped him out. Ariel went up and listened today and did pretty well for the most part. She did try and climb up on his knee at one point (but only because she did that in the practice). Thanks Kara for being up there with her.


After zipping home for a quick bite of lunch, we came back to the church for Irene's memorial service. It was really hard like I knew it would be. It just strikes such a chord with me and revisiting everything I have dealt with losing my mom. It was a lovely service and very touching and reflective. They had brought Irene's flower pots from her garden and had them set up in the entry way, very beautiful.


Ken and I had promised to help with clean up, so we were thankful our little friend Chloe was able to continue to help with Ariel. She watched her in the nursery during the service, such a HUGE help. Ariel had a ball with her, and was sad when it was time to go.

She wasn't sad long because we had been invited over to Stella's for dinner to get to meet Kara's friend from school, Jaks. Ariel seemed to really like her and when looking at her face she noticed a chunk of her bangs hanging in her front of her face, she pointed it out and said 'tail'! Yes, Jaks has a tail on her face. Haha. Needless to say that got a good laugh.


To try and make Jaks feel better I then shared how this week while getting dressed I had on white underpants and Ariel came up to me and said 'Momma... diaper'. I shook my head and said, 'no, not a diaper, Momma's big girl pants.' Ariel didn't seem to agree and said again, 'no, Momma diaper... stinky diaper.' I BEG YOUR PARDON! Ariel sure is saying some funny things these days. I have to try and remember to write them all down, such a silly girl.

As we were eating, Nana called and told us the house had SOLD! Yes, its both exciting and sad. Its going to be a quick closing because the house will be getting demolished. That's the hard part, but then I don't know whats worse, seeing it and knowing someone else is in it, or not seeing it at all. Either way, with so many houses on the market, I am so glad it sold as it was a huge burden. So its a big answer to prayer. Yay.

The week is slowly filling up... hoping for some sun so we can get some walking in. Looking forward to our big family dinner on Wednesday when my cousin comes into town with his girlfriend. So lots to come as August slowly winds down... weird, its almost September! Wow.