I'm so fickle, oh so fickle.

So it seems I have a few people worried that something horrid has happened which has caused me to go private. Let me reassure you that nothing has happened. In fact, things are pretty good. Minus the fact that I am suffering from post Christmas lack of money. But that's a common Emma ailment, since I also suffer from spenditallnowitis.

No, the sad reality is that it seems that all the happening bloggers on facebook belong to Blog Networks. And I want to join too. I want a list of blogs I read in my sidebar. But...I do not want my family and friends reading this blog. So I thought I would create a family friendly blog. I was just going to go to Wordpress and have the option of password protected posts, but then I thought "Do I really want IRL people emailing me for the password or my mother saying 'What is going on!?' " Yeah. Not so much. So I am going to keep this blog and make it private and then have an open blog that goes on facebook.

I'll probably use this blog more, because there is a lot of stuff going on that I am not quite ready to share with the IRLers. Like William finding his 25 year old daughter on facebook. That was a bit of a shocker. Along with his newfound determination to go back to Australia. I'll save that story for when this blog is offically private. I'm going to leave it open for a week or so, you know for those stragglers who don't get here that often. I think you need a gmail address for an invite to a private blogspot blog. I have that for some of you, not for others.

Change is in the air.

I am moving. Not to sure where to yet. Wordpress maybe for the password protected posts. Leave me a comment or email me at emmamcdonATgmailDOTcom if you want the new link once it is up.

Christmas Crazy From the Land Down Under.

Burgh Baby is hosting a bit of Christmas Crazy and while I do love all things Christmasy I have neither the money nor the space to go all out. A post from 2 days ago shows you a bit of my decorating and though I did not take pictures of Christmas towels I assure you tha they are in all 3 bathrooms. I am surprised by the amount of people who don't put Christmas towels in their bathroom.

Today I am posting, totally without permission and stolen off of facebook, pictures of William's mother's house in Melbourne. I said myself in that same post from 2 days ago that I didn't fully feel the Christmas spirit until the snow arrived and I just don't know how Australians do it. Not only is there no snow, it's the middle of bloody summer! It's unnatural is what it is. Imagine trying to cook a turkey dinner in 40 degree heat. Do they even play Let It Snow on the radio there?

My MIL, a very kind and lovely woman, is a wee bit fond of knickknacks. When the shelves in the 2 pictures below are not full of snowmen, Santas and other assorted Christmasy decorations (minus, I note, the fun filled Hallmark snowman we sent her a few years ago) they are full of pictures and other assorted garage sale knickknacks. Now I'm a pretty cluttered person myself, but her shelves make my eyes hurt.




A white tree. My SIL sent her this tree all the way from Scotland as she couldn't find one in Australia. No offense to any white tree lovers out there, but I hate and despise them with all of my being. My mother shocked me this year by buying a white tree. I was appalled and called her all sorts of grinch like names. Have I said my mother and I are very different? Her white tree is themed in red and silver, while I buy into the theory that your tree reflects your life story with ornaments that are loved and have a tale behind them. Anyway, back to the MIL...They do have a regular normal green tree as well, in the sunroom, but I could only steal so many pictures.


Deer in the garden in the back yard.


The front of the house.


The inside of the carport.


Carport roof.


I am not sure how much decorating the average Australian home does, but I am told that people do stop and get out of their cars to take pictures. But, for me, it just doesn't look right without snow.

Happy Birthday Holly!!

Everyone's favourite anglophile turns 31 today! (Which would make her exactly 4 years and 3 days younger than moi. Bitch.) In honour, or perhaps in spite of, turning the dreaded 3-1, Holly opened up her blog to questions. 31 of them to be exact. Today she answers those questions and is hoping to hit 100 comments (frankly I'd be pleased with 31, which is exactly the number she had a couple of hours ago when I read her post) so, if you happen to be a lurker at Holly's blog, or have yet to visit her, do so today, learn a little bit about her and throw a happy birthday her way.

Hope you have a fantastic birthday Holly!

The most wonderful time of the year. Or is it?

I am having a hard time believing it is only 8 more sleeps until Christmas. It took me a while to get into Christmas this year, usually I am pulling out Christmas CDs in July and starting my shopping. Money was tight this summer so I didn't start as early as I normally do. Money is still tight, but I have had a bit of help from my own Father Christmas (aka my Dad) and some fantastic sales so I have managed to do pretty good. Of course, I have still yet to get Taylor and Liam's big gifts (an iPod touch for Taylor and a PSP for Liam). It was so much easier when they were little and you could buy 10 or so gifts for the $200 plus it now costs to buy one single gift for a teenager. But as much as I worry, I know that we are very lucky. Everyday in the paper there is a column about Adopt-a-teen, where low income families are given a $50 Wal-Mart gift card for their teens. As of today, 4000 teens still were in need of a gift card. I can't even imagine that being all my kids would get, so definitely, I know that we are blessed.

The other thing that was keeping my normal Christmas spirit at bay was the lack of snow. I can't believe I just said that! I always say that I would like the snow to arrive Christmas Eve and to be gone by New Years but really, it just isn't Christmas until it is white. I really don't think I could live somewhere warm. Or somewhere rainy, for that matter.

Normally, as soon as the Halloween decorations come down the "snow" ones go up (and stay up until mid-March, when I am finally absoultely sick to death of the snow!) But, with the exception of Remembrance Day there was no snow in November. I put off putting up the snow decorations until the last weekend of November.

Snowmen in the hallway.


In the last few days we have plenty of snowflakes to wish upon.


Put up the snow decorations and bring on the snow! Liam built this fort that Saoirse loved playing in.


Once the snow decorations were up it was time to get ready for the Christmas decorations. I just bought this one at a craft fair and although it is technically a snowman, he will only come out for the month of December.


He's perfect for our fireplace-less house. No more untying stockings from the bansiter. They tell me he can hold the weight of all our full stockings so we shall see.


A mish mash of decorations...the tree at the back was made by Saoirse in layschool last year, and the pine cone is from this year. On the right hand side you may notice a glass candle holder, it has an etching of Mary holding Jesus. I bought that for my Granny when I was about 13, it was one of the few things that remained with her for the next 15 years and when she passed away my aunt gave it back to me.


The Christmas tree, partially decorated. It is still only partially decorated. The girls keep removing decorations to play with them and they don't seem to make it back onto the tree. Saoirse is quite concerned over what ornaments belong to who and quite can't understand why Liam and Taylor have so many more than her and Sophie. I have told her that as they move out and have their own trees their ornamaments will be given to them and she is now laying claim to numerous ornaments. "Can I have this one when I grow up and have my own tree Mummy?"


I love these bells. I bought them about 8 years ago at a home craft show. They are hanging this year on my garage door so that I see them whenever I come in or go out.


So I'm feeling the Christmas spirit now. I constantly have the radio set to a station that has been playing Christmas music since the end of November. I wish I could find my Time Life Christmas Treasury CDs because it has about 4 songs I love that I never hear and have on no other CDs. I need to wrap a whole lot of gifts. I am stalking the Christian television station to make sure I watch all the Christmas episodes of Facts of Life, Happy Days and other retro sitcoms. We are reading multiple Christmas related books daily. I am pretty happy. I am excited to see how much Sophie will love Christmas this year. Everyday she says "Mummy! Guess what?" and when I say "What?" she says, with absolute glee, "Christmas!!!" How can you not love Christmas when you have little kids around?

When Joseph beat up Baby Jesus

As a child did you ever read the book or see the TV movie (with Hot Lips from MASH- I'm really dating myself here!) The Best Christmas Pageant Ever? If you haven't and you have a child between 5 and 10 I highly recommend either book or DVD.

It is all about a family of 6 very naughty children who take over the church Christmas play. I was given reason to think of the Herdman kids today when the playschool's very own Ralph Herdman beat up Baby Jesus during the playschool field trip.

We went to Fort Edmonton, which is a historical park. Well, as historical as a city that only just turned 100 a few years ago can get. After we had visited one of the houses where the kids baked cookies, sang songs and made a Christmas ornament using sheep wool we walked next door to the church. The park interpreter said we would tell the story of the birth of Jesus with the children playing all the important roles. All the roles actually. He chose one of the sweet looking little girls to play Mary. A wise choice he made. Then he said to a boy in the front row "You can be Joseph." I looked at him as the boy jumped up and said "Are you sure about that?" Not such a wise choice was made this time.

I posted these photos on facebook earlier and the mother of Mary pointed out that it looked as though Joseph was practicing karate. He may very well have been. Mary is clearly looking over at the interperter and thinking "Dude! Are you crazy!? Do you not know what this kid is capable of?"



This picture was supposed to be of Mary and Joseph journeying to Bethlehem. Mary is no fool and knew that counting on Joseph to get her there was just not on. She was way ahead. Bringing up the rear is the donkey, who was quite pissed off at being a donkey and let her displeasure be known by pretty much refusing to move.


This is quite a sweet picture is it not? Joseph, proudly showing off the newborn Jesus to two shepherds. Don't let the camera fool you! Joseph had already beat on the poor baby Jesus. You could look at it and say it looks as though those 2 shepherds are protecting the baby, but really? I'm pretty sure one of them would have been all for throwing the baby out of the cradle. I had to call out to Joseph by his real name to get him to stop hitting the doll while the story was being told and afterwards I said to the interpreter "So is this the first time Joseph has beat up Baby Joseph?" I was a bit surprised to find out that it was not. Afterwards one of the mum's (Mary's) was telling me that last week he had come to school with scratches all over his face. When she asked what happened he said his sister had done it with a knife. She is two!!! But you know, if that's what he does to her dolls at home, I'm not sure she is entirely to blame. Even if she does look evil.


This is the class, minus the one child who refused to participate at all. My very own angel (who really is compared to Joseph!) is in the left hand corner with the purple sweater. And note Joseph there...I think he is looking at the star that led the wisemen to the stable.

Emma (sort of) reviews Twilight.

Crap. All the pictures are reversed and I am way too tired to change it. Start from the bottom ok?

So I'm a pretty late convert to the world of Twilight mania. I read the books in about a week this summer, and have since been overloaded with Twilight mania by my 13 year old daughter. Like today, we went to pick up the very last Twilight shirt from Chapters which was supposed to be hold for me only to find out that someone had grabbed it before the sales guy got to it. Bitches and bastards. So we went to the embroidery store and had a Team Edward shirt made (you might catch a glimpse of it in the picture below). That is parental dedication, my friends. So is allowing your daughter to go to the 10 pm show on a school night.

I don't know how Edmonton ended up being one of the markets where the show would open a day early, but really? I'm not complaining. And neither were all the teenagers in attendance, some of whom were dressed as though they were sure Edward would jump out of the screen and have his way with them. Seriously? You need to wear a short black dress, which I am pretty sure would have been totally appropriate for grad?

Oh, right the movie.

Since my pics are backwards let me start with the end. I went to the movie with my friend Fiona, her daughter Avery (the little tiny one there, who I swear is 9! And who's favourite movie is some freaky horror film. Something like Saw 2 or along those lines. So don't judge her mother for taking her to the rather tame Twilight. Judge her for letting her daughter watch movies like Saw 2!),Taylor and Taylor's friends Dana, Marissa and Taylor. This is a photo of the 5 girls.



The arrival of James, Laurent and Vitoria at the baseball field.


Jasper and Alice. Jasper sort of freaked me out. He was so odd looking and made all these weird faces. I had pictured him as so much better looking! Alice, however, is almost exactly as I pictured her.


Bella and Edward.


Edward. When I first saw Robert Pattinson, I thought "There is no way that guy is good looking enough to play Edward!" But would anyone have been? In the book they are made out to be these absolutely amazing looking creatures, and I am not sure there is a single actor out there who could have met that goal. He's grown on me though and I can't imagine another Edward. I might have to read the book again to see if his image works while reading the story. The only real issue I had with Edward was the lipstick. I see no Oscars in the future for the makeup artists on this film.


I think this is a movie that would appeal to both fans of the series and someone who hasn't read even one book at all. There are things that bothered me as a reader, the biggest thing being the first kissing scene. In the book it is almost like a peck, whereas in the film it is quite intense and not short at all. Jessica wasn't a bitch like she quickly became in the book. Charlie's house wasn't tiny. I don't think it came across in the movie that Edward felt like cold marble. Cold they explained, marble they did not. Little things, but things I noticed.

The casting was pretty good, keeping in mind that no actor is as beautiful as we picture those immortal vampires to be. The scenery was gorgeous...watch out for when Edward takes Bella on her first vampire flight.

The 2 hours and 1 minute I spent watching Twilight literally flew by. I don't think I have ever had a movie end as quickly as this one did. I highly recommend you go see it.

Oh, and my apologies to Fiona who had to listen to me taking pictures (most of which can be found on facebook) and video as well. I took video of the movie starting, thinking that all the girls would start screaming. But I guess the manager's request that they keep it down worked. There were a few yelps when Edward had his first scene 5 or so minutes into it. Or maybe it was longer. As I said, it flew by. And yes, the manager really did come in shortly before the movie started to ask that the screaming be kept to a minimum.

Anyway, go and see it. Go, go, go.

Too-late-for-Musical-Monday Tuesday- Love, Love, Love

Guess who I'm going to see tomorrow???!!! I am so excited. Like pathetically excited. But whatever. Expect crappy too dark pictures the moment I get home tomorrow night.



So James? You, me, Oilers dressing room? You can pretend I am skinny and I will pretend you have a sexy Glasgow accent instead of that posh English one.

Tis the Season *EDITED*

Do you realize it is November 14 (birthday of Andrew Cox, who I had a huge crush on in junior high, he looked just like Gordie from Stand By Me!) and that I have yet to start making my Christmas cards. I better get on the ball hey? So I need to know if you would like a card from me, because I would certainly like to send you one. I send bloggers homemade cards, my family gets the Hallmark ones. Priorities and all that. So leave me a comment, send me an email (emmamcdonnellATshawDOTca or emmamcdonATgmailDOTcom) and I will add you to my list.

Now I am off to stalk Andrew Cox on facebook.

UPDATE: Do you know how many AC's there are on facebook? Over 500! Luckily, we have a mutual friend and so he popped up at the top. I messaged her to make sure it was him and it was. So I sent a message. And he returned it. And I could see his profile. And he still looks like Gordie! ACK! I totally felt like I was in in Grade 8 again. And I wished him happy birthday. I bet he think's I'm a freak.


Christmas cards 2006.

Thursday 13- 13 reasons why I am not doing Thursday 13 today

I had a Thursday 13 post all sorted out in my head. I "borrowed" the idea from Crunchie Mummy, who did it quite a long time ago. It was to be 13 children's books we love in our house. But! I didn't get it done. Surprise, surprise. Here's why...

1) It requires effort. As in looking for pictures of said books online.

2) I was going to do it last night but at 1 am my internet, cable and phone all went down. My provider had called earler in the day to say that they would be doing repairs at some point, but really? 1 AM? What are we night owls meant to do with no TV or internet? I already know the answer. That's not what I did.

3) I couldn't do it today because...

4) it goes against my self imposed rule of not ignoring my children to blog. (Technically, yes, I could be currently considered to be ignoring my children...one is dressing herself in winter gear WHILE NAKED and the other is watching Retro Teletoon. I don't think they will mind me ignoring them for 10 minutes.)

5) I need to wash the dishes.

6) I need to vaccum the livingroom.

7) And the stairs and upstairs hallway.

8) I need to do laundry.

9) I will need to make lunch and dinner at 2 different points throughout the day.

10) I need to put away laundry.

11) I need to watch over my 2 oldest children as they clean their rooms today.

12) I need to make birthday invitations for Saoirse's party, which is next Saturday. I need 11 (10 to give out, one to scrapbook.) I have made one.

13) I am going out to dinner with my Grade 8 girlfriends. Not my girlfriends from Grade 8, but friends who all have children in Grade 8.

And that, my friends, is why there is no Thuraday 13 today!

Remembrance Day...Lest We Forget

In honour of our soldiers past and present...




And to my Remembrance Day baby...happy fourth birthday, Saoirse!

Musical Monday- Catch My Disease

This song by Ben Lee is a few years old, but it is one of my favourites. It is my most played songs on the old iPod. Well, it was before my daughter synced her itunes to my ipod. And now I have nothing unless I want to listen to Hedley and the Jonas Brothers. While I will admit to having one Hedley song on my playlist, I don't fancy listening to 20 or so.

Embedding was disabled on the video versions (shame, I love the video) so this is a live version.

You can just slap a great big "Nablopomo failure" sticker on my forehead.

So much for 30 posts in the 30 days! I made it to 6, actually I had day 7 almost completed when I walked away from an almost finished post and then got distracted. And then I got sick. I went to bed at 10.30 and at about 11 I thought "Oh no, my post! Ack, fuck it!" and then I lay back and watched 20/20.

So I failed. But not really. Because you know what? I really enjoyed posting this week. Sure it was trivial stuff (though I did love the Thursday 13 post on my kids names) but I had fun. There was no pressure, I wasn't out for comments. I did receive some comments from new people and so had an opportunity to discover some new blogs, adding to my ever growing list of "I really like you! But I have no time to read you!" blogs.

And I am okay with this too. I am going to update my sadly neglected blogroll and google reader and just go through the list, with the goal to get to every blog at least once a week by doing a Monday A-E, Tuesday F-K sort of thing. I'll see if it works. Oh, and commenting on at least one post. I need to start commenting!

I better start searching for the NaBloPoMo failure widget. I'm quite proud of myself.

Thursday 13- Names

My four children have 13 names between them, 4 first (obviously), 7 middle and 2 last names. Today I will share with you how those names came about. And my regrets. Oh, I have regrets!

1. TAYLOR. This is my mother's maiden name. My grandparents had no sons and I thought this was a nice way to honour them and allow their name to carry on through one more generation. When I was 8 months pregnant they released the top names of 1994 and wouldn't you know it- Taylor was in the top 10. This stressed me out as I was not a fan of popular names. It was too late to change it though, my nan and granddad were thrilled. Plus I was still sure she was a boy and would be called Liam. Other choices for a girl were Aidan and Carson. I still love Aidan, but I am glad I didn't use Carson.

2. ELIZABETH. I gave her father the choice between Emily and Elizabeth (after Laura Ingalls Wilder's middle name) and he chose this one because it was his grandmother's name. I foolishly did not make the Elizabeth Taylor connection until after her birth. Oddly, enough I found a year later that my father's grandmother was called Elizabeth Taylor. I was unaware that there were Taylors on both side of my family tree.

3. JUDE. My paternal grandmother, a very devout Catholic, was ecstatic that I had named my daughter after St. Jude. I let her think that, but it was really the middle name of River Phoenix, my teenage crush. Sorry Granny.

4. LIAM. I picked this out when I was 14 and just going through my obsession with all things Irish. It too had a huge burst in popularity in the mid 1990s but I knew I would not change it. I still shake my fist at Liam Neeson and that damn Vanity Fair cover that said "The Liam King." Liam means 'strong protector' and as the only boy with 3 sisters it is definitely a name that suits my Liam.

5. SEAMUS. My brother's middle name is James and this is the Irish version.

6. FORREST. Chosen by Liam's dad as this was a family name. If I had my way it would have been Padraig.

7. W....F...D. Oh, how I hate this last name. My ex and I almost split up before the wedding because I was so resistant to taking it on as my own. Part of my issue is that he was never adopted by his stepfather, although he took on his last name. I much preferred his birth name of Kerr.

8. SAOIRSE. William disliked it, calling it a Fenian name. The only way I got to use it was if I agreed not to have her baptised as a Catholic. I agreed, had an awful labour and emergency section, and he said "You can have her baptised if you want!" It's almost like I planned it. Saoirse means "freedom" and even though it esentially an Irish Republican name, I do think it suits her birthdate of November 11th very well. My most asked question is of the pronunciation and for those of you who are not in the know we pronounce it as "Soar-sha" (which is how my Irish speaking father says it), not the more common "Seer-sha". I've also heard it as "Sayr-sha." Those Irish, they are a confusing bunch.

9. MAEVE. Another Irish name, meaning "the cause of great joy" or "she who intoxicates." I love that! It is so Saoirse. She is the only one of my children with one middle name, I just thought Saoirse Maeve was a very powerful name and didn't want to take away from it by adding to it, if that makes any sense at all.

10. SOPHIE. My poor Sophie. I wanted to call her something Irish- Niamh, Aisling, Caoimhe were my top 3. All shot down by William. He said he would agree to Siobhan, I said no as it is quite common here. My mother and Taylor pushed for Sophie, a name they had both pushed for with Saoirse. For most of my last months of pregnancy she was going to be Sophie Niamh Lily, but that all fell apart 2 days before her birth. After she was born William was holding her and he said "How about Sarah?" Now I think Sarah is a beautiful name, but I just couldn't use it. And my grandfather refuses to call my children by their Irish names so to him Liam is Billy and Saoirse is Sarah. So I said let's just call her Sophie. Biggest regret? Using another S name. I confuse those 2 girls all the time and have been known to say "Soarsh-ophie". Second biggest regret? Not insisting on Aisling, which means "a vision, a dream." Though Sophie does mean wisdom, and the girl is super smart.

11. VICTORIA. Chosen by William. He wanted to use either Samantha, after his step daughter, or Victoria, after his niece. I'm not a fan of Samantha so I agreed to Victoria. What happened to Niamh??? I don't know! I was on a lot of drugs!

12. LILIAN. LILY. I've just drawn a blank on if we spell her name with one l or 2. Crap. How shitty a mother am I? Um...really shitty since it is actually Lily! And I know that, I do, I swear, I am just really tired. Or something. I may as well as take this moment to admit I often forget her time of birth. Was it 11.19 or 11.29? 11.29. Thank God for that pregnancy blog! So...her name was going to be Sophie Niamh Lilian, and ended up as Sophie Victoria Lily. Now, I do remember how Lilian changed to Lily. Lilian was my Nanny's middle name and she had passed away when I was only a few weeks pregnant. I called my mother 2 days before the birth to confirm that there was only on l in the name. She calls my aunt Jacki in England and calls me back to say that Jacki had looked at Nanny's birth certificate and her name was actually Irene Lily. Seriously? Everyone thought that it was Lilian. So Lily it became. It's very English her name, and the Irish part of me despises it. However, my very English mother? She was thrilled.

13. S......N. The girls' last name. Irish. Should we ever get married I'm still keeping my name, though I'd be willing to hyphenate.

I do realize that I could have just deleted all that Lily/Lilian confusion. But why not just share with you all what a complete eejit I am.

Wordless Wednesday- Like Father, Like Daughter

I think the title says it all.