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Hi All!
Below is a link to my new blog!
Please copy this link to your favorites as I won't be posting on blogger anymore.
http://kvandergaag.wordpress.com

Beautifully Inadequate

I read this blog on a regular basis and kinda liked this article and thought it'd be a good read for any mom out there :)

Click this link:
Beautifully%20Inadequate

Good Friday

Well we're or I should say I don't have much to do today since Tyler is trying to pump out another draft of his thesis by tomorrow for his adviser. I just finished editing ch. 1 and am waiting for ch. 2 to make its way over. The end is near though, we're in the last month and he'll hopefully be defending around or on the 29th of April!! :) A little bit later than we initially thought but it gives him about 1 more week to work on it.
2 weeks ago Tyler was playing hockey and got elbowed in the head by a goon. He was out for 45 seconds (bad concussion) and rushed to Royal Columbian hospital for a cat scan to check for damage. Thankfully nothing is wrong, he is recovering well and it seems it may be a while before the headaches stop and he can play sports again. Ironically, I was in a first aid course all day and had no idea this had all happened and came home at 4:00 to a weird message on the phone and about 5 other missed calls from a guy on the team.

I took a Child Care first aid course mainly just for my own piece of mind, but also b/c I can then babysitt other kids and at least have the knowledge to help them if something goes wrong. I also have been looking into registering to train for a postpartum doula. I just can't decide if it's a good idea or not. So with my first aid done now that's one step completed toward training :)
Anyways that's about all I've got for now.

Finally, a decent one of them :)

Together they tackle the stairs. Usually you see one of them trying to go down but in totally the opposite direction of the stairs :)

The end of February

Here's some more pics from last month. We (very last minute) decided to head out to Vancouver for the Olympics one night. It was pretty neat being there in all the excitement. Probably the only time I've ever casually walked through downtown Vancouver. I still love the feel of being in a big city and thinking of how it's so normal for thousands of people everyday b/c they live and work there and to them the rat race is totally normal. I had the same thing being in Sydney AU, I loved being able to walk everywhere and just jump on a bus to get somewhere 10 mins away. Plus I could people watch almost all day too. I'd probably hate living it in a month if it ever really happened in my life

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Watching some Olympic hockey on the computer. We only got french Olympics on our TV :)

And playing with Dad outside is always more fun :)

Big White

So from Feb. 15 - 19th our whole Versluis family made a trip out to Big White. We had a great time up there and it was nice to see all 8 grandsons together at one time, which can also be quite crazy too. Jayden spent the better part of the first two days there not sleeping, but then seemed to get better the last too days. He got around the village in our handy (welfare :) superstore bin, which I got a few laughs at and "wow, that's a good idea" from a number of people.

Jayden knows what they're for just not quite how to put them on. This was the day after we got back :)

January

Man a month sure goes by fast! This one might be long post :) Anyways January made for a pretty busy month so that's probably why if flew by. On the 8th Tyler went to the Okanagan to play hockey for TWU, the team seems to be winning some more games lately so if you've got tickets there next home game is going to be in the beginning of March which I think is the playoffs. TWU is hosting so they automatically get a spot in the playoffs. Oh yeah and on the 23rd Ty got hit from behind playing hockey by a yahoo who scooped his feet out from under him while going hard for the puck and so end result was Ty's feet higher than his head when he hit the boards, helmet fell off before he hit the ice and a very mild concussion that made him leave and go to ER that took less than 45 min for a Doctor to look at. He called me from the arena so I didn't freak out and was ambulanced to the hospital so he'd get fast service. So thankfully, just a sore neck and back and tiny cut on the forehead.
Then the next week we stayed at Jackie & Brad's for 5 days watching the 3 musketeers while they went to San Diego for Brad's work. Thought it would be more work than it was, although the 3 VO boys got the flu, Ty had to clean up their puke, I don't know what I was running on b/c I got little sleep, but in the end it was a good 5 days, no injuries until 5 min after J&B got home ;) and enough house sitting for about another year! For some reason or other I was useless at taking pictures there and almost all of them are blurry or not of something worth blogging.
Another big thing, to us anyways, is that we're looking for a house in Hamilton. We now decided that we are going to try and stay until the beginning of August. At first we were looking and thought that if something came up we'd get a few houses together, go look at them decide and then move. But with Tyler's thesis deadline coming up very fast and the amount of time he needs to finish it we decided to completely stop looking and wait until about March or April to get serious again.
Speaking of Ty's thesis, for the last week and a half he's been working on the thing for about 10 hours a day, he wrote 8 pages in one day once (4 pages used to be a good day) and he still has 1 more week to go crazy with it. Meanwhile, me the good supportive wife have been bringing him breakfast and lunch to his office everyday and listening to his though process and I still don't understand anything about what he's writing ;) So yeah he spends about every waking hour studying and writing Justin Martyr stuff.
So that's about it I think, we're going to Big White with the whole Versluis clan for a week on Feb. 15th so I should have some pictures then.

Jayden loves mashed potates and beans, he was even trying to lick the bowl out b/c he couldn't get what was left with his spoon.

Boxing Day walk at Fort Langley

On Boxing Day morning we went for a walk with some people at Brae Island Regional Park at Fort Langley. It was very cold and foggy, but made for some great pictures for the cards my Mom and me are making. Most of the kids did pretty good considering how cold it was, although Jayden kept taking his gloves off and his fingers were freezing half way into the walk.

By the look of his face you can tell he was woken up to go on the walk. He really likes his tuque :)

I still can't believe how calm the Fraser River was that morning

Christmas

Well Christmas has already come and gone and it's 2010! This means a lot of stuff for us, watching 3+1 boys for 3 days, Big White in Feb, finding a home in Hamilton, Tyler graduating in April and receiving his Masters in Biblical Studies, the move to Hamilton, hopefully some camping, smashing good-bye party, and of course the reason for most of this madness, Seminary in September for Tyler :) Enough about the future, here's some pics of the Christmas season:

New pajamas from Oma!

New toy, you can just see his excitement ;)

Vandergaag grandkids group shot (they all got a teddy from gramma).

He managed to find both soothers and comes to the kitchen to show me.

He then dropped them and was trying to put both in his mouth :)

more to come...

More of the Birthday Boy

We had the grandparents over on Wednesday and a birthday party on Thursday for Jayden. The party went really well considering the amount of kids and the size of our house and Jayden is loving all the new toys he got.
As soon as he found the button that starts the tractor he was done unwrapping :)Checking out the cool truck from Gramma & Grampa:
Big cousin Aaron was Jayden's handy helper with the new trucks and gladly showed the little kids how to use them :)

And some birthday cake!

Jayden's 1st Birthday!!

Well the little guy (well not that little I guess) is already 1 ! Man does time fly! It's hard to imagine what life was like prior to a year ago. It's amazing how these little people make such a huge difference in your life. You not only revolve around them but your life is forever full of silly things they do or learn and constantly laughing at how goofy they act and what type of reaction they'll give you next :)

Here's his 1 year portrait:

A couple since birth as well:
and the hair :)

Jayden Walking

So within the last week or so Jayden went from just standing to taking steps to walking around our house. He's very proud of himself and gets really excited when he's walking. He's now just started being able to bend over and pick things up :) This video is when he just started taking steps.

The last few weeks

Well I haven't posted much in the last few weeks, it's mostly because whenever I went to post I couldn't think of anything. But now looking back at my pictures of October I guess we did do a few things.
In the beginning of the month we went to Tyler's Titan hockey game opener. Just about the whole family was there from both sides I think and along with tons of friends which was nice to see. The Langley Events Center wasn't full as was hoped ;) but approx. 500 people showed.





"Opa! Wear you're hat backwards"
- Thomas








Then one day we went to Oma's house to help pick the kale. Well Jackie and me picked along with our big helpers Nathan and Jaxon and Jayden helped Oma wash the kale. At first he didn't realize there was water in the tub but then he got a bit deeper and started really "helping".

Jayden has found his new favourite thing in our house. My drawer I throw all my misc. plastic, bottles, baking stuff etc. etc. in that he beelines to about 5 times a day. He manages to literally throw out the rolling pin every time without hitting his toes. I'm still waiting for it to happen. Every bottle nipple he pulls out he must think is some type of soother, so he starts sucking on it.

A regular site in the kitchen

Jayden Discovers the Toilet

The other day the bathroom door was left open and as I was washing the dishes I heard water splashing around and thought, "where is that coming from?" Quite quickly I realized Jayden was, no doubt, playing in the toilet! He even thought of taking his rubber ducky in so that he could play too :) So of course before I bathed him and changed him because he was soaked I had to take a few pictures.

Start of Fall

Things are getting nice and busy again. I'm doing a bootcamp twice a week, had my first one last Saturday and I'm still sore. But it's pretty fun and it's helping me get my but in gear and be more active. I also started coffee break today, it was just a social but it seems like it will be a good bible study. Our theme is "How Bright is Your Torch?" kinda like the Olympic theme but changed up a bit :) and we're studying a book on the parables of Jesus. There's a good mix of ladies in the bible study, along with a bunch of new Moms so I'm looking forward to it.
Tyler is also quite busy as usual during the school year. He's teaching catechism again this fall which is going well and he also has the TA stuff to do for a couple of profs at Trinity. So he's getting that teaching experience under his belt:) Tyler also decided to try out for the Trinity Titans hockey team this year. He's on the team which he's quite excited about, but he's not quite ready to play yet because his shoulder isn't quite healed up. The opening game is Oct. 2nd at the Langley Event Center and he'll be playing. I'm told to tell everybody because they want a full house. It's going to be very busy with hockey, but the coach is quite flexible and I don't have to worry about this taking over our lives ;)
Jayden has learned to stand up while holding onto something now. His crib was the last place he figured out, but it hasn't been a nightmare because he knows how to plop down onto his bum. He's quite proud when he finds a new place to stand and starts flapping his arms everywhere and then falls. The nursery wasn't so great last Sunday, as I was babysitting and taking care of other kids while he climbed up my legs and fell about 4 or 5 times, hitting his head and then screaming.

I don't know how many pictures I have of him like this.

He also finds my camera to be a nice toy and so taking pictures is always a challenge because he attacks me. As you can see.

September Long Weekend

So we went on our last camping trip of the year to Shuswap. I had never been to Shuswap so now I can say that I've been there, done that and will probably go back if given the chance. We spent one afternoon at the beach and then Sunday we got rained out with some serious downpours that Jayden loved watching. We did manage to keep dry though through the rain, but without campfires at night it got pretty cold! Another interesting part of it was that we were the only couple with a baby. It was probably an eye opener for the two expecting couples:) as Jayden was teething and not so great at night and they were also amazed at home much stuff you have to bring for just one kid. Tooth #3 has arrived, and that's 3 teeth in about 1 month and there might be more coming. Besides the cold weather we had a really good time with a bunch of fun couples :) I really did a bad job of taking pictures, so none to post of that trip:(
I finally finished making the pillow cases that I started about 4 months ago :) The reason I started them was because my nephew Jaxon wouldn't sleep with a big pillow and I found a small kid's pillow at a store and told my sister that I could easily make a pillow case out of some nice soft cotton material. Well I made one and then stopped, so now there done, finally! It doesn't help I started them in the summer when sewing is the last thing I feel like doing :)

Well that was just a quick post for now. Have a great day!

Surgery & Lake Whatcom

On August 20th Tyler went for shoulder surgery. He had a cyst an inch by inch big in his shoulder socket. It had given Tyler a constant achy pain in his shoulder for the last 3 years and it wasn't until about a year ago that he thought he should go for an MRI to see what was wrong. It especially got sore after he would use it a lot during work and usually after a few days of working he couldn't get his wedding band on because his hand would swell up. If you remember the story, that's why we thought his wedding band was too small the night before our wedding day, and the morning of our wedding he went to Spence to get a bigger ring so that I'd be able to put it on during the ceremony :) We didn't clue in what was going on until a few months later...Anyways so he's recovering quite well and should be good as new in a couple of weeks. If you look closely at the picture you can see 3 small incisions that were made during the surgery to remove the cyst.

Since Tyler's off work we thought we should take some more holidays and so all of us Vandergaag's headed out for Lake Whatcom in Washington to a 3 day family holiday. Jayden really wanted to go kayaking but Dad said he wouldn't be able to reach over the edge to help paddle ;)

The Vandergaag grand-kids Whatcom 2009