Tonight We Celebrate!

Wednesday I had the pleasure of having a day off in order to attend my third convocation at the U of M.  I am not perfectly sure, but I do think this makes me the first Yost sibling to reach such a feat.  Yes my degrees are BSc, BEd & PBDE (Post-Baccalaureate Diploma in Education), no Masters or PhDs to be found, but heck.  For those who are unaware I took a pile of courses pretty much with the sole rationale of receiving a raise.  Yes, that's right, my unionsociety doesn't want good teachers rewarded with better pay, rather simply those who feel like sitting through more painful classes at the University.

What was great was getting to spend the morning with Teresa and Frances.  I decided to make this post the moment Teresa came running to me as I took a moment in the bathroom saying "Daddy, I put Frances on my bed so she can't play with my toys".  I immediately ceased my actions and sprinted to her bedroom where there was Frances, in crawling position a foot from the edge of her bed.  Yes that is right, Teresa now picks up and carries Frances around the house, sometimes helping by taking her away from Rowdy's dish, sometimes just because.

Beyond that some of the craziness in our house has included Teresa being her crazy old self, but now Frances is getting in on the action.  Frances loves chasing Rowdy while crawling (at breakneck speed), but is now beginning to stand up on her own, pulling herself up on the couch.  Today Cara has felt what she believes to be a tooth and Frances has learned how to take one arm out of her shirt.  Lastly Frances continues to eat new and interesting 'food', and I guess I should mention that Teresa is now a skirt girl.  If we try to put pants on her it is met with the weeping and gnashing of teeth...

So tonight Cara and I are off with friends for dinner.  Tonight we celebrate!

Teresa doing two of her favorite things - making sure Rowdy is healthy and having a tea party...

Yes, that apple is as big as her head.

I can't believe Cara didn't post this.  The only way to get 8 month pictures of Frances alone.  Lock Teresa out...  Actually Teresa & I went to 'shave'.  Teresa gave her forehead a clean shave.

My hat has become a new plaything for Teresa.  Doesn't she look smart?

8 Months

Frances' 8 month birthday was actually on Sunday, but I did not take her pictures then because, well, it was cloudy. You see, I hate the flash on my camera, and I don't like the look of pictures taken with a flash. So, the only sane solution was to wait until we had a day with some sun of course. But I digress, on with the actual subject of this post.

In her 8th month of life, the biggest development with Frances has been her ability to crawl. She is pretty speedy actually, and is making a very cute nuisance of herself. In the positive column, Frances is now free to roam and explore her surroundings, which makes her happy. In the negative column, she is obsessed with Rowdy's water dish, and I usually have to pull her out of it a few times an hour. Rowdy has not been able to eat a meal in peace either, as Frances also enjoys watching him eat, and likes to get as close as humanly possible.

She loves to be where the action is, and follows me throughout the morning as I do whatever it is I have to do that day. Since Teresa often plays by herself, it's nice to have a dishes companion. She loves to hang on to my legs and try to stand. She hasn't succeeded yet, but she grins the entire time. That is one of the best things about Frances, she is always smiling, usually happy, and is just a delight, a pure joy.

Thanks Giving

This past week and a bit have been hard. Ken and I have both been trying to cope with our profound sorrow. There are, however, still many reasons to be thankful. Here are four of mine (yes, I am counting the pie).

I am a professional...

No, not a professional blogger,but it does irritate me when I (or Cara - but in the spirit of marital bliss I would never say that :) make simple mistakes. Maybe you can forgive me for the issues we have been dealing with for the past week, but I am sorry that some videos have not been embedded properly. Here is the one I meant to link to yesterday...



As always I pray my simple daily works enrich all the lives of those I meet and that those works and prayers life the immortal soul of Tyler Dyck to our heavenly father.

Amem/

More Videos...

Today we are in Steinbach for Cara's cousin Tyler's funeral.  Please take a moment to pray for his immortal soul and her family in this time of need.  In order to whet your insatiable appetite for all things related to Frances and Teresa I am clearing out my YouTube vault which I checked into when I made videos Monday.

So here are a few videos, and if you want a bit of a trip down memory lane go to my YouTube page.  On occasion, you may be rewarded by a new video ahead of blogging if you go there, or Facebook.

Here's a video of Teresa in some new dress-up clothes and dancing for daddy...  You may note that this was shot prior to her birthday when you listen to some dialogue.

I think you may notice that over time we are going to have a number of videos titles, in some way or another, that Frances and Teresa love playing together.  Here's another...

Tyler Jordan Dyck, 1985-2009

It is with incredible sadness that I made this video which is being shown at his viewing tonight and his funeral tomorrow.  Tyler was always such a happy, wonderful person to be chatting with about our shared interests.  I still can't wrap my head around it.

You will be dearly missed.  We love you.  We will cherish our memories.  We will meet again.



FYI: I used Viddler because YouTube limits videos to 10 minutes. I have an auto-post appearing tomorrow. Expect blogging to be light over the next week.

Frances Crawls!

Yes she can!  And just like Obama 'can' does not mean 'actually does any positive action on a regular basis'

Here are two videos that are about a month apart.  The most recent video is a few days old.  You will see her move about a bit, and strike a yoga pose.  Unless she has an impetus she will just cry to be moved.  She can ably flop down and get into a crawling position but really doesn't care to move about.  We aren't sure why, but I think she just doesn't want to live up to her sister's perviously set exacting standards, which I fully understand.

About a month ago now, although long it involves many cute Teresa moments too:


The most recent video, almost all Frances all the time:

The Last Weekend of the Season...

It is with a touch of melancholy that I always approach the end of August at Grand Beach as it means I must return to work.  That in and of itself is not the issue, it is rather that I get used to being with my family for those months and miss them tremendously when I first return.  There is also a certain sense of pining for my youth as I know that next year will be different than this one and I will love next year with my children, but that they will never get this year back and I hope that they love the beach every bit as much as I did in my childhood.  This August when we left it was almost the perfect example of pathetic fallacy as it was a gloomy, rainy day.  It was though in another sense a beautiful day as I took Rowdy for a long walk and swim and spent half an hour observing the bald eagle flying for fish and had a wonderful time with my parents and kids


Coming back to shut down the cottage is a task that I find equally sentimental.  It marks the last time I will be at the lake for more than half a year, unless I should prevail upon my family the joyful (when rare) experience of a few days in December at the cottage.  Just as my life has shifted back to work from pleasure, the weekend is always more about work than pleasure.  This year I had to sprayfoam the underside of the cottage along with the normal shutting down, and I was well on my way to getting it all done as I was nibbling away at the work to be done Saturday and Sunday.  I did though get to bring Teresa and Frances down to the chilly sand on Saturday, and on Sunday I took Rowdy for a rare walk and swim on the front beach down to the channel and back.  We were awaiting dinnertime and then the last cleaning of the year when that touch of melancholy I feel was washed away with stunned sadness as we were suddenly dealing with a tragedy in Cara's family.  We quickly finished out tasks shutting down the cottage and went straight home...  I can't speak for next year but this year I pine not for my youth.


We had forgotten out camera, but packed the video camera.  As such I took some video of the beach.  The first video is of Teresa, Cara & I playing with glow bracelets and sparklers.  I know that it is dark, but that's the best time to play with these things silly!  The second video is of the changes in and around Grand Beach since the summer.  It ends with me going for a swim, but the battery dies due to the cold temperature.  I was massively irritated when I got out as I did three dives to make certain Yosts happy, even though I didn't want to, believing they would all be on film forever.  Cara can vouch for my wetness when I got home.

Don't fret Bessie, you were scrumptious!

This will not come as a surprise to those who know me, but autumn is my favourite season, by far. Summer is usually too hot and spring tends to be too damp, but autumn, well, autumn rocks it out. The chill of the outdoors tends to make the house feel cozy, and fresh bread tastes better when its cold out, as does apple pie and roast chicken. I love roast chicken, but I never make it in the summer, for obvious reasons. We got a great deal on chicken from the local Hutterites, so yesterday I roasted a chicken (Bessie, in honour of one of Teresa's favourite books), and served it with a mixture of white and sweet mashed potatoes and fresh bread with butter (not margarine). Yesterday, dinner was delicious!