Coaldale - a holiday?

I find myself in Coaldale. Infact I've been here now for 7 days, with 2 remaining. I packed up the kids and headed East with my parents after they were done visiting us over Thanksgiving weekend. I came for some time away... perhaps I had a bit of a holiday in my mind when I pictured "time away". But it's been just the opposite. I will try not to go into too much detail, for I fear giving everyone else the headache I've just gotten rid of myself. It was a bitter sweet reunion with my Alberta home. It's always nice to drive into the prairies again (Kevin would say otherwise - he's a BC man thru and thru) - the sunsets are huge, the sky is bluer than blue, the air feels big! We arrived Wednesday just after midnight, which apparently screwed up my son's perfect (really, it was good!) sleeping schedule; then Atalie woke up the next day with an incredibly sore mouth (an I-tooth is coming thru - excruciating apparently), and a fever of 39 degrees, which continued for 2 more days; Aiden in the meantime, had developed a stuffy nose which prevented him from sleeping at night and would frequently wake up crying b/c he couldn't breath well; my Mom helped me take the kids into town so Atalie could see a doctor (finding an open clinic was an effort in itself, never mind pinning her screaming-self down on the examining bed to let the doc look down her throat) and get her some antibiotics for her developed throat infection; the next day she woke up crying, red bumps everywhere and itchy, puffy eyes - apparently my daughter is allergic to Penicillin... we head back into town to the clinic to get a prescription for new medication and preceded to drive to 3 different pharmacies to retrieve it; I then spent a good hour or two that day, making phone calls and visiting the local bank branch regarding our mortgage (I won't mention the name of the bank, though it is tempting) to get a hold of our bank representative in BC b/c she hasn't been returning our calls or dealing with our loan increase properly for the last 2 weeks and we have a $16,000 bill due that day, only to receive a negative response that we won't be receiving help from the bank to pay for this rather large bill - oh well... more important things to worry about in the car anyways (crying, hungry things); meanwhile, I'm getting very little sleep, am suffering a sinus cold and have an increasing headache, for obvious reasons. My saving grace has been parents to help (when they can, mostly evenings) and Kevin, who came down to visit unexpectedly, for Saturday evening and all day Sunday! :) Infact, only today do I feel almost myself and mostly caught up on sleep. Aiden has also taken better to sleeping at night and Atalie is almost herself again (except for teething). Thank the Lord!! The next 2 days will (hopefully) be spent doing "holiday-ish" things, like visiting family and going for walks to the park. Then on Saturday we'll head to Calgary to meet Kevin and spend a day making decisions on interior house things (cabinets and flooring at Ikea - yeah!!!) and meeting up with my 2 good buddies for dinner at a delicious restaurant - again, yeah!!! Then head home - home, sweet home. I'd like to put up a few pis of the week here so far, but I'm tired and need to go to bed. I'll get to it eventually;) I'm sure you can understand. Goodnight! (hmm... I guess I really did go into detail.. guess I needed to vent again!)

the roof is on

Here are some pictures of the house. We worked like mad men over the weekend and I worked hard last week to get the roof shingled. I don't think I will ever do it again. I'm really glad it's done

A long looong loooooong night.

Let me give you (though you may not be interested, I need to vent!) a rundown of last nights events. 9:45pm - Contemplating going to bed but Aiden remains awake 10:30pm - Make it to the bedroom in an attempt to put Aiden to bed 12:00pm - Aiden falls asleep 12:13pm - Aiden wakes up and fusses (hasn't pooped all day) 12:30pm - Aiden falls asleep 12:44pm - Aiden decides he's hungry 1:05am - Aiden falls asleep 1:15am - Aiden wakes up and Mom has had enough - he comes into bed with us 3:30am - Dad puts Aiden back into his crib b/c Mom is uncomfortable 3:35am - Atalie wakes up miserable and crying (she's sick) 3:40am - Dad gives Attie Tylenol and brings her into our bed 3:45am - Aiden is hungry again but falls asleep in his crib after eating 6:20am - We all wake up b/c Atalie is wrestless and Aiden is hungry again 6:25am - Dad puts Atalie back in her crib, Mom changes Aiden's diaper (finally pooped!) 6:45am - Aiden poops again 7:25am - Dad gets up for work and comments on how our kids must be conspiring against us 8:30am - Aiden wakes up to eat yet again 10:23am - Mom gets up 10:25am - Aiden is hungry 11:01am - Mom finally gets to eat breakfast and shower:) I figure I got an interupted 8 hours of sleep at the most and Kevin, a meager 5-6(?) hours... he's currently on the roof attempting to shingle. Good thing he's got angels!

Thanksgiving Weekend

My (Kendra's) family came for Thanksgiving this year:) We put them all to work however;) Mom made lots of food and did lots of dishes, Dad did electrical and Tyler helped with building the chimney and papering the house (they both helped Kev put the windows & doors in as well). Here's some "around the house" pics: Lots was accomplished this weekend, as I mentioned... the chimney was framed in, the walls were papered, the electrical was started on the main floor and the windows & doors went in. Our "answer to prayer" roofer turned out to be a dud (completely unreliable, to make a frusterating story short) so we've convinced Dad to stay another day to help Kevin put the shingles on tomorow. Woohoo! Thanks Dad!! Here's some house pics:

more Israelsons:)

Jeff (Kevin's brother) and Kristy and fam. swung by for a visit Tuesday, to help on the house and catch up on lost time. It was so good to see them again - I don't even know the last time we saw some of our family. That would largely be due to this house project we've got going here... so little time for escaping anywhere! Anyway here's a few pics from their visit. Jeff's birthday is today so we had an early celebration with some cake. The kids dug right in:) ...as did Atalie:) This little guys turned 1 month old on Tuesday.

Sheets & Shingles

Kevin swapped work over the weekend with our friend who is also building a house. He had the help of a couple of friends to sheet the roof on Sunday, and will have the help of a local roofer to sheet the roof today... infact he was working on the house himself yesterday, having a heck of a time trying to figure out how he was going to learn the art of shingling while doing it quick enough to be finished in a couple of days. I asked God to send someone his way to help with the roof, when Kev later told me that a roofer came by to offer his services! WOOHOO! PTL! I tell ya, Canal Flats has some fantastic people. God bless em! Anyway Kev's brother Jeff, and his family, are here visiting us for a couple days. So Kevin is making the most of Jeff's help by attempting to get the roof done today and begin putting doors and windows in tomorow. We're hoping that when my brother (Tyler) comes to help on Saturday the two of them will be able to finish the doors and windows, thus being ready for my Dad to wire the main floor on Sunday/Monday. Otherwise, the wiring will have to wait a week or so until he can come back. But without further ado, here's some current pictures: