Sorry posting has been light this week (light meaning NON EXISTENT - I know, I know, I really was trying to be good) but every once in a while a little job sneaks its way into my life and eats up all time not devoted to sleeping or updating my blog. Note that I didn't mention children, spending time with the children. Frankly my children are driving me insane at the moment ... all of them. Big ones included.

Once I can actually spend time downloading pictures I will post some of the photos from the KICK ASS early Halloween-themed birthday party I threw for Jakob on Sunday. Complete with magician (Tricky Ricky: http://www.handsonent.com/tricky-ricky), black dragon pinata, mini scavenger hunt and costume contest.

A bit of a digression, I just checked in on Jakob and his lava lamp looks exactly like a dead fetus in a bottle of formaldehyde. A bit freaky. Wish I had my camera handy.

Anyway, back to the party. It was perfect! There were enough activities that were timed so beautifully that as we finished the final event, the costume contest with awards handed out, the parents began to show up. And the day was spectacular so all 10 kids stayed outside THE ENTIRE TIME!

Fast forward a few hours, the phone rings and one of the kids at the party has lice. Fast forward to yesterday and now Jakob has lice. And as I'm treating him and going through his head carefully with an eagle eye, pulling out little lice corpses and nits, Arthur the old cat starts scratching and making a hideous racket - yes, he has fleas. In just over one hour I had one child and two cats treated, one child checked, pillows and blankets in the dryer on high and entire house sprayed.

Then, I drank. The end.

Why, when you just want to get ready to meet friends, does your son sneak into the bathroom with his DS and poo for 30 minutes. With the door locked. The bathroom with the make-up bag, the hairbrush, the toothbrush, the extra strength muscle relaxers... everything that I need. Come on already! How he does he even stand the smell for that long?

Of course I should be happy he opted for the upstairs bathroom with the door closed when it wasn't that long ago he would sit in the powder room minus the door, treating it as his own personal little pooping room, while we all passed out near dead on the kitchen floor.

I can only hope he doesn't have his recharger and that the battery is getting low because otherwise, he could be in there until morning.

I love this! Especially since I'm still recovering from being doored last week. How can we get these on all cars?!

I do believe there will be some celebrating tonight!

I have my last class in Acrobat (not acrobatics sadly) and I have never had such a useless instructor (I'm loathe to call him a teacher because he's NOT) in all the years of schooling I have under my belt. He is a total waste of oxygen - though to be kind, he does have a nice speaking voice. Which you don't hear because he's actually talking about the program, instead because he's complaining to the girls in the back about how tired he is, or how he's only had a granoloa bar, or look, here's a few pictures of my twin brother's daughters.

Stop whining I want to scream, you do not know how many guys are currently living in my house! Do not mess with me!

My friend Ted (who's taking the course with me) and I are positive we must be on camera, that Ashton Kutcher will jump out at any moment and yell "PUNK'D!" And then I will grab whatever fashionable knitted hat he has on his head and let him run away. Because how can anyone really be this bad unless on purpose? And with each class, he just lets the bar fall lower so that you now trip on it as you enter the class.

But whatever, just give me my A, I'm one step closer to getting my certificate, and after a few glasses of wine I won't even remember your name.

But the object of this post wasn't solely to complain about useless waste of oxygen instructor guy - though that did feel good!

I thought that I would post a picture of my teenager! Do not be afraid, it's not a scratch and sniff blog, you can't smell him. You can admire how cute he is though!

And in this picture do not be confused, it is him, not an 80-year-old man hiding under heavy blankets. He was just tired from not sleeping virtually the entire weekend. Of course this is only minutes before his friends & family party is about to begin.


But in some ways, he does take after his father (also taken minutes before the guests arrive... and yes, that is a tv remote in one hand, beer in the other).


And finally a rare moment in my house when the kids are NOT fighting, calling each other horrible names, swearing, wrestling on the floor, Satch dragging Jakob by the foot out of his room...when they love - well, tolerate each other.

I never realized what a poet the neighbourhood crazy man is.

While walking home with Satchel and Jakob, taking advantage of a gorgeous afternoon by stopping by Starbucks for their child's size hot chocolate with whip cream and lots of chocolate sprinkles, there he was in front of us, muttering away.

Sheer brilliance, this little number:

"God bless Adolph Hitler
For he invented lemonade
And the dish ran away with the spoon."

Then he noticed us behind him, following him down streets and around corners.

He yelled:

"Good looking wicked woman! Say that five times fast! Good looking wicked woman, good looking wicked woman..."

I said to the boys that I do believe I just received a back-handed compliment.

Back during the Labour day weekend, which feels like a million days ago, my niece and I made our annual pilgrimage to Wilson NY where we threw ourselves into serious outlet mall shopping, wine drinking, magazine reading and finally TARGET! shopping.

As male farting contests (between the over 40 group) continue in my kitchen, I can only think back to those 3 pure days where no one asked me for anything except the salesclerk requesting a credit card, a waiter wanting my menu choice, or my niece asking if I would like a top up on my glass of wine...and I realize that one weekend a year is NOT enough to keep me sane. Not even close.

Time to start recruiting the girlfriends.

TARGET! withdrawal alone is making me shake!

While shopping that weekend, I found these three little guys at Pier One of all places. Tucked in with the stinky candles and over-the-top home decor, they really needed to be mine! With their mix of materials, bulging eyes, Tim Burton-esque design - they needed to join the bling and the peacocks that I have been decorating my living room light fixture with. And with Halloween coming up, they are perfect!

I'm back my internet friends!

I would love to write that I spent my extended vacation somewhere fabulous - perhaps close to a small vineyard in the south of France where I would sit with the locals, make up french words and consume their wine while counting sunflowers and thinking about the direction this little blog should take.

But truth be told, I fell in love with Twitter. A sordid little love affair where all my thoughts were condensed into passages 140 characters or less. And it just felt so right...yet so wrong..and so dirty...and so gratifying! But it wasn't enough, though I will still keep tweeting, so I have returned home to where I belong and I'm sorry it took so long.

I also felt I had to take a break just to think about what I wanted to do with the blog. Do I end it? Do I still have stories to tell now that the renovation projects have dwindled until next year (the porch is still not finished but I do have a couple of photos of the progress). Are my stories even that interesting? Probably not, but frankly BETH scares me and now that I have an email instructing me to get my act together...well, it's time to begin the ride again.

But just to let you know, the 13 year old? With the changing brain? STILL INSANE. And we have a new addition to the family - Paul's oldest brother has been living with us for the past month. Oh yes, another beer drinking, xbox playing GUY which now makes me weep into the phone begging my neighbour to let me take refuge in her home from all the testosterone and farting and swearing and urinating into the toilets WITHOUT closing the door...and thankfully she has yet to say no.

I have to get back to my homework so I will end my first post in what feels like forever with a couple shots of the front porch.




And I promise, I will be back tomorrow!