Twas the days after Christmas and all through the house

Twas the days after Christmas
and all through the house
wrapping paper was scattered,
being chased like a mouse

by kittens so excited
to play in the mess
while 4 children sat nestled
happily playing their DS.

My story could go on
I could make it rhyme
but really I'm exhausted
and don't have the time.

The New Year is coming and
resolutions are mounting
I got a giftcard from HomeHardware
and my purchases I'm counting

New Drywall. New Paint.
A light fixture or two
I'm going to make this house
look almost as good as new (i said ALMOST)

The reno did start
a day or so ago
beginning with that wall
that really had to go

So now I am cleaning
and purging and fretting
Do I have room for this airhockey table?
On this I'm not betting.

There's laundry to do
and some shelves that need clearing
I'm enjoying my space
but the end of the year is nearing.

As our contract is finished
an openhouse we are hosting
as we tell stories with old friends
and to a new future we are toasting.

I wish you all a sweet end
to the year 2008.
My wish for you all is
that next year is GREAT!

Happy Holidays! See you in 2009!

Seriously? Seriously! Seriously!!!!

The furnace has been jacked up to 25 and has been running continuously for the past 3 hours so WHY is the house getting colder not warmer? Why?Why!Why? Mother Nature has got to cut me some slack cuz I simply cannot afford to even open the Hydro bill at this rate never mind pay it. My hands are so cold I can barely type and I feel a breeze on my back as I sit here. The cold is seeping in through every thin wall and crack imaginable and it's so so depressing. Someone please turn off the A/C outside. I so wasn't kidding when I was asked what we were doing for Christmas and I said....'don't know about the rest of them but I'm planning on being in Florida'.

The Good - The Bad - The Fugly

The title pretty much sums up how I'd describe the first 15 days of December. Only 9 more days till Christmas and really I'm not feeling the usual pre-holiday stresses. Too busy with the normal everyday ones that I haven't even hit Christmas-is-coming-and-I'm-so-not-ready on the stress-o-meter....yet. But it's coming. I can feel it.

Still light on the 'good' these days but still managing to keep sane with only the occasional melt down. The 'bad' snuck in and bit me on the backside. My mom's scope tests scheduled for 7am almost two weeks ago but were cancelled at the last minute due to medication conflicts with the procedure. After much eye-rolling it's been rescheduled for the first week of January. They tried to reschedule it for last week but again a medication conflict which is a good thing because we wouldn't have shown up. She got way sick last week. We thought at first she had a stomach bug (which has definately made the rounds through town...and my house) and I thought we'd dealt with that reasonably well but then discovered, after a routine blood test, that her potassium had dropped too low - dangerously low. The symptoms were so similar to the flu though that we totally missed it. When she wasn't feeling better...actually getting worse by this weekend I hauled her into the ER where we were pleased to hear her potassium levels had returned to normal BUT (and it's a really big BUT) at some point while her potassium was too low, she may have had some sort of heart trouble. Blood tests done in the ER showed markers that indicate she many have recently experienced a heart attack. Can't say for sure when but the marker levels have since decreased so I don't think there's any lasting issue. In the mean time she still wasn't feeling well......but why was a mystery. A mystery until the doctor pressed on her face and she went through the roof in pain. We had a huge d'uh moment when we realized the worsening of her symptoms on Saturday had nothing to do with potassium or the flu. She has a sinus infection. 24hours of advil cold and sinus and some anti-biotics and she says she feels like she might live (always a good thing) and is getting stronger by the day. Will the fun ever stop???

But wait. We haven't got to the FUGLY part yet. And this is definately F-n Ugly! We waited 25 days and now it's official. We've definately lost our contract. We will wait till the holidays are over before we seriously start crunching numbers and see just how deep in the shit we are and see if there is any way we can sustain the business on just the one contract. Shutting down completely leaves the business (which is it's own entity thankfully!) with a huge debt and our safety net of hauling scrap metal in to help pay that down dropped out from under us when our buyer informed us the price had bottomed out. Could anything else go wrong? Doubt it. We've pretty much covered all the bases here.

So we face 2009 with the prospect of unemployment and are trying very hard to be optimistic and think of this as a new beginning. It's terrifying though. After almost 14 years of being self-employed we are forced now to find work with someone else. Al has already picked up the books and has been studying to get his class 1 license and he should be able to find a job relatively easily. I'm not feeling as optimistic about my options. No matter what happens though, 2009 is definately going to be quite different than what we are used to around here.

I'm keeping busy this week, trying not to think too much about the future and focus on the here and now. And the here and now involves a little home reno and furniture moving.....9 days before Christmas....cuz I'm crazy that way. It might not be the greatest timing but if it solves some of the family dynamic issues we've got going on around here and improves the amount of living space we have - then it will all be worth it. It's kind of my Christmas present to myself and my sanity. I just hope the project moves along quickly because I really need to get that Christmas tree put up...and finish shopping.

Owen is 6 !!!

Okay so the little man, my youngest, my baby isn't so much a baby anymore. He's 6 already! Happy Birthday Dude. His birthday was last Tuesday and we had a rocking good party for him that afternoon. Of course he wanted a Bowling party and he invited a pile of friends (which i'm happy to report didn't all show up...cuz quite frankly that would have frazzled me beyond repair). I also invited the older sisters of a couple of his friends along to play with Emily too. All together there were 12 kids...can you say CHAOS! They had a great time bowling and eating and opening presents - which all took way less time than I'd thought so we then had to entertain and keep the kids busy for 25minutes before their parents came to pick them up. Fun Stuff Baby!

Owen had a great year this past year and has really grown so much in so many ways. He had a rough go of Kindergarden last year with quite a few moments of stress, with him not wanting to get up in the mornings or go to school at all. He had some issues with a bully of sorts in his class room and at daycare which has all been sorted out. This year is completely different. He's up and eager to go to school each day (except for the pile of days he's been sick...which is a whole lot!) At some point over the summer we discovered the little critter could read! Totally shocked us. I'm so happy to have one more 'reader' in my house. He loves to read and takes great pride in it. I was worried that all the school he'd missed the first few months of the year would set him back but he's ahead of where he needs to be reading wise so all is good. Last year was his first year of YBC bowling and he did amazingly well. He's back in bowling again this year and loves it and of course he is Ukrainain Dancing again this year too. Right now he's loves playing with Webkinz and also with his Nintendo DS games - most recently his new Pokemon Diamond game. He loves all things Pokemon especially the 'action figure' type toys. Any kind of plastic figurine that he can make up pretend games with is what he really loves. His imagination is really something so witness. Our little guy is really growing up. Not the shy little thing he used to be, hiding any time anyone spoke to him. He's really come out of his shell. It's hard to believe but my baby's growing up more and more each day and turning into a confident, funny (way funny), imaginative young boy. Happy Birthday Owen. Momma Loves You!!!

The Craptastic VS Fantastic Ratio

So we are skipping ahead almost 5 months since my last post. I'm such a wonderful blog updater. Not. I'm torn between just forgetting the past few months existed and just starting from this point and moving forward or rehashing the highs and lows of the past few months of chaos and confusion with the occasional burst of creativity to keep me sane thrown in.

There are pros and cons to both but I guess since the past 5 months did exist and I can't erase them from my mind entirely and lets face it, what's happened happened and will continue to happen so I might as well face it and at least recap it.

July was.....so long ago. I'd posted a few tidbits and even published a post a few weeks ago that had been written in July. I'm trying to think back. I'm sure we had some high points and did some fun 'summer' things but really all I can think of is that we worked hard and it rained lots. My mom continued to battle the recurring pneumonia-like symptoms with some good weeks and bad weeks. Thankfully, she had a good week near the end of the month when these people came to visit.
My neice Tami and great neice Rowan spent a day here with my mom and except for the couple hours they spent in the ER after baby fell and smacked her teeth into the table, it was a great visit. Mom finally got to meet her Great Granddaughter. I took a couple 4 Generations pictures of Mom, William, Tami and Rowan with my brother's camera but I didn't think to take the picture again using the camera I had borrowed for the occasion...so until my brother gets around to sending me that photo you will just have to imagine it.

August long weekend we did the usual, traditional things. Spent a fortune on wrist bands and the kids rode the rides endlessly and since I'm still camera-less...no pics. I can't believe it. An Icelandic Festival without the traditional pictures to doccument it. It's not like I don't have dozens and dozens of pictures of the kids riding the same rides year after year but it's cool to compare the pictures from years past and see how much they've grown. We watched the parade Monday morning from Russel's front yard and had a BBQ lunch. A few of us walked down to the park after lunch and I splurged on henna tattoos for myself and the kids - well almost all the kids. Owen fell asleep in my arms so he didn't get one. That kid could sleep anywhere. My day at the park was cut short though by a call from my mom. Her good week had come to an end and she was having trouble breathing again. Back to the ER - again. She ended up having reactions to a few new drugs the dr gave her and by the end of that week I had practically moved in with her - not wanting her to spend much time on her own because she was so weak. Durring that time I bounced back and forth between her house and mine trying to keep up with groceries, laundry and dishes at both places and spending what time I could with my kids. A few days later I took her back to the hospital and finally, after 2 months and at least 8 trips to the ER she was admitted. There was a lot more to her problems than just pneumonia. That was just a symptom - a side effect of what was really going on. Before they could figure out what the real problem was though she became completely unstable and for about 12 hours I was really really worried. At one point on her 2nd day there, there was talk about transfering her to ICU in the city. Fortunately they were able to get her stableized. A small miracle. I found out weeks later that the doctor had been nervous about transfering her to the city because he didn't think she would survive the trip. Scarey!!!! In the end it turned out that the pneumonia she'd been battling was a side effect of her heart issues, which were being complicated by fluid build up in her body which was a result of her thyroid being out of wack. They adjusted her thyroid meds and in no time she was feeling a million times better. Unfortunately she ended up spending her 70th birthday in the hospital but we made the best of it and I brought in a cake and presents and the kids and Al and I set up a little party for her. I spent a lot of time bouncing back and forth between home and the hospital for 11 days and it was hard on my physically, emotionally and mentally but I wouldn't have wanted it any other way. As long as I knew she was okay - I was okay. August really was a blur. Other than the whole hospital stay, I don't remember much. Somehow I managed to get the kids ready for school to start after the September long weekend.

Unfortunately things haven't been smooth sailing health wise with everyone else either. I ended up in mid august with a sinus infection and then just as mom was being discharged from the hospital I ended up with Strep. A couple kids have been on antibiotics for strep this fall as well and then there was the upper respiratory cough that just wouldn't go away and then when it does it comes back a few weeks later anyway. We've also gone a couple rounds of a stomache virus and had a bit of the ol' pink eye as a chaser. Fun stuff. The schools just aren't surprised anymore when I call to say one kid or another won't be there because they are sick again. By early November Owen had missed more than 3 weeks of school and Tyler wasn't far behind on his own statistics. I sure hope the new year brings much health to my entire family. Even with missing so much school though, everyone is doing pretty good. Owen is reading like crazy and it is such a cool thing. Tyler is doing remarkable well in highschool. I was really worried because it is such a different environment and the courses are set up so different than they were in middle school. Aside from his science mark dropping because he'd missed an entire week prior to his exam he's doing really well. Emily loves everything about school and is involved in every extra-curricular activity available to her. Aarica is enjoying school - most days. She continues to be an emotional teen roller-coaster but has been more involved socially than ever before. She's been hanging out with some friends (including a boyfriend0 lately and went to her first party on halloween night and just hung out with friends, ate pizza, played video games and had a great time. She's growing up. If she'd only do it with a little less drama it would be a lot more enjoyable to watch.

Business wise we made it through the summer and were about to enjoy the slower pace of the winter season. We figured things were heading towards fantastic. We finally have reliable equipment and what older equipment we do have will be okay for the next little while so we can start saving up some money to replace it at our own pace. We were also looking at an expansion into another line of work and were beginning to look into means of funding such an expansion. Things were looking good. Then boom. The world came crashing in. Nothing has been made official yet and probably won't be for another week but unofficially it looks like we have lost one of our major contracts. After 12 years of holding this contract - for a job that we created - we've been given a huge kick in the teeth and we are almost certain the contract will be awarded to another contractor. The initial news of this hit us hard. Very hard. Our first reaction was 'what are we going to do now' and feeling like this was the end of the world. Now, after a lot of talking and soul searching we've collectively decided this might not be the end of the world....just quite possibly the end of our business. This contract ends December 31st and our one other contract is up at the end of March '09. In all likely-hood we will not be bidding on the 2nd contract at all and will just let the business slowly fade into the horizon. The new truck we just bought last year will have to be sold to pay out the lease we will no longer be able to afford and since the company also has a huge debt in the form of an operating overdraft at the bank, we will continue to run the business in a small way, doing side jobs and hauling scrap metal in for recycling in hopes we can generate enough money each month to put towards the huge operating overdraft that we've aquired over the years. In the mean time it looks like for the first time in almost 14 years Al and I will need to go out and find jobs working for someone else. BIG SCAREY CHANGES but in some ways they are good changes. We've both decided it might be nice to not have to worry about work 24/7 like we do now. No matter what happens - 2009 is shaping up to be a very different kind of year for us.

So the Craptastic vs Fantastic Ratio is a little out of whack these days. Way more crap than good stuff. But the good stuff sure does help make the bad days bearable. These kids make the bad days bearable.


They are all doing good in school, driving us nuts at home with their fighting and bickering but are still good kids. They are all enjoying bowling again this year. We've been to one tournament already this year (with Al and I both bowling too as the 'masters' in the tournament) and have another coming up in a few days. Emily and Owen are both dancing again too and their first performance of the season is coming up in a couple months. Owen's birthday was a few days ago (that get's it's own post) and everyone is looking forward to Christmas this year and we are going to try hard to keep the news of business from putting a sad note on the holiday spirit.