Ex Ex Pat Scheiners

 Last weekend, we had a couple more firsts: our first houseguests and our first family dinner!  And Brad's first time using his Komodo Joe. David, Blair & Jackson came up for the weekend.  They were officially the first people to sleep in our guest room and on the trundle in Drew's bed.  Drew and Jackson had a big time playing Rocket League on the Xbox, playing with David's disc golf outside, and playing football with our neighbour Bennett.  They were so happy to have each other!  I am so happy to see them playing together. For our first family dinner, we had David, Blair and Jackson; Mum Mum; and Andi, Christian and Levi.  It was so nice to have some of the family in our house.  I made lasagna and my mom made a salad.  After dinner, we used our firepit for S'mores.  We need to work on our first starting abilities, but everyone enjoyed the s'mores.  I remembered why I kept a few of the kids old toys: for Levi!  He had a big...

The kids are fully into their activities now.  Drew is enjoying his new soccer club, Elite FC.  He has practice two days a week, and games on Saturday.  The park where they train is massive!  It reminds both Brad and I of Richmond Park.  I even saw deer there yesterday!  They do teams by year here, so Drew is on the 11 team as he was born in 2011.  Which means that he is one of the youngest, and also one of the smallest, but he doesn't let that deter him. And Alison has said that she enjoys her new gym more than her old gym, which I am so happy to hear.  She wasn't so keen at the start.  She has her first practice meet next weekend, so they have been learning their routines.  She has now decided that bars is her favourite apparatus, but she still really dislikes the vault.  They keep the springboard a bit far from the mat for her liking.  It makes me happy to see her back doing what she loves. We are hoping to find a drama clas...

One month to the day, we have been reunited with the not as essential items that we had from London.  Once again, the house is packed with boxes and paper and random pieces of furniture in the middle of the living room, suitcases in the hallway.  There are broken down boxes and open boxes full of paper everywhere! But, the kitchen is nearly all unpacked, and I was able to make pasta and chicken parmesan for dinner last night.    (thank you for your help, Mum Mum!) The girls have unpacked (nearly)all of their boxes, which just means that there are piles and piles of all the random trinkets that girls collect.   The most challenging bit of unpacking is trying to find a spot for all the random momentos and trinkets.   (I will not say if it is my least or most favourite part of the process.)   Hopefully by the end of the weekend, we will have a bit of a control in all the kids rooms.  Drew has so much less stuff than the girls.  He basically ...

 Saturday started early....Drew had an 8:00 soccer match about at 20 minute drive away for his debut with Elite FC.  He was a bit hesitant about going because he doesn't have his kit yet.  But I am sure his team is glad he showed up because he scored a hat trick in his debut, and the final score was 3-0!  He was very happy.  He told Brad on the way home "I wouldn't be where I am without Dundonald and Coach Jason.  So true, they have given him such a good foundation for strategy and teamwork. While the boys were at the soccer field and the girls were still sleeping, I was able to drop Archie at the vet for grooming, picked up the washer at Lowe's, dropped off some dry cleaning and picked up my groceries at Kroger.  All completed in 40 minutes without leaving my car once.  I am undecided if that is good or bad that I didn't leave my car.  It definitely made for a quicker outing, but that meant there was no walking. The boys were back when I got...

 All the deliveries this week had gone as planned: Air shipment: check Storage shipment: check Furniture: check Mattresses - check Sofa for the basement - check Washer & Dryer - not so much.  I got a call around 9:30 for delivery of my "2 dryers"!!!  What, you mean I didn't order and washer and a dryer?  Oops.  Thankfully, I was able to place an online order for the washer and it was in stock in the store close by.  I guess that means I will have wait a few more days to do the large pile of laundry that is accumulating.....and Brad will just have to install the washer.

This post is from Wednesday, September 30!  For the first time since March, I am in my house by myself (with Archie!).  It is eerily quiet, but so good.  It is so odd for many different reasons.  I could get used to this. I do love my kids and my husband and I have enjoyed spending time at home with them, but I am so happy to just sit here and try and get my house organised. Yesterday was CRAZY.......the movers arrived around 11:30, which was a bit later than expected, but it was ok because it gave Brad a chance to assemble some of the furniture while we waited.  At first, there were 6 movers and one of the first things they did was take a huge chunk out of the wall down to the basement while taking the ping pong table down.  Oops, so the main guy in charge left with one truck to get some spackle to repair the hole.  While he was gone, three of the movers had to leave to go to another job and the truck with the remaining boxes of our stuff was on the t...