Still here

No pics to post as I lost the chord to my camera...must find that. I'm working on organizing our office, so I guess right now I'm procrastinating. Life is flying by as always. Soccer is taking up lots of our time as is usual for this time of year. I'm getting very excited to have my sis Heather and her family here for Christmas. I LOVE the Christmas season and our tree/decorations will be up by the 10th. I'm really feeling blessed in life right now. So thankful for my family, our friends, our house and the dreams God has put in our hearts. Pondering a lot today on God's favor and this quote, "Favor means God's heart is for you and His hand is on you, no matter what happens in your life" -Stephen Furtick
Love it!

Whew!

We had an amazing holiday in Banff! This is the only pic that I have downloaded so far and it's one of my favorites from our camping trip. I'm so thankful to God for the almost two weeks we had as a family to have fun, relax, bond, laugh, eat yummy food, visit, hike, bike ride, and camp. Every day was a new adventure and it filled my soul to overflowing.
When we arrived home, the move was on. Christian and I spent two exhausting long days moving over to our new pad, while the Stonehouse kids stayed in Chilliwack with my sister Heather and her family. On day three, Christian left for an across Canada tour with Bachman Turner and our kids came home; on day four our international student arrived from Taiwan! Here we are in October, and Christian was only home for five days for the whole month of September. It's only by the grace of God and his strength that I didn't lose my mind! Christian came home on October 2nd, which was also our 18th anniversary, and I am completely aware that parenting is meant to be a team effort! He has to go back to Winnipeg tomorrow for three days for a NHL show and then no more travel until the spring!!!
We're into soccer season now full swing with all three little Stonehouses on teams. I'm finding it's important in this stage with our family to make sure we carve out time together and not let everyone get too busy with outside activities. Otherwise I feel like we're all inside a tornado! We're loving our new place and finding it a great place to have people over. On Saturday, we pick up our second international student from the airport...a 17 year old girl from Korea. So far, we're really liking having a student as part of our family and we're all learning a lot about Taiwan.
So...there's a snipet of what been going on with us. How about you?

Crazy Summer

Well, yes, it's been a crazy summer! Too much working and packing and juggling kids, but we've managed to fit in a lot of fun as well. Summer came late to BC so we've had to fit a lot of fun in the sun into August. We've been doing lots of swimming in the local lakes and ocean beaches. These are some of my fave pics of our summer so far...

This is Brennan hanging off one of our local tree swings. It was cold that day...this was back in June. My middle child is a dare devil! I'm praying that his brain connects quickly, so that he lives. He does things sometimes without thinking much! I really hope that Christian does not teach him to cliff jump! I thought that was cool when we were teens, but the thought of my kids doing it, strikes terror into my heart!
Abby and Isaiah had so much fun on the trampoline with the sprinkler on one of the first hot days of summer around here. And it was seriously not until the end of July!
Here's some of the goodness from our garden picked yesterday. I love having a vegetable garden! Everything tastes so much better than from the store.
My sweet friend Judy had a bunch of us girls over a couple of nights ago to teach us how to nuno felt. It was so much fun and this is the scarf I created in just a few hours! I don't think of myself as being very creative, but this is something I'd like to explore more. I believe I'm made in the image of God, the ultimate creator, so I must be creative! Brennan was a good sport to model this for the picture. I only had to promise that I wouldn't show his face :)
This is our new puppy Daisy after her first hair cut. She's a real sweety, but she still pees in our house sometimes and it's been a real challenge having a puppy to train over this busy summer!
I'm just so looking forward to our holidays next week. We really need to get away as a family. When we get back, we move, and I'm really hoping for a calm, boring September.

My New House Has A Disco Ball!

No pictures to share right now, as I'm having trouble uploading. These are times when I really need Christian's help and we've been in a bit of a whirlwind lately (what's new!)
Just wanted to share and write what we've been up to. This is the first summer that I've worked since having Brennan (10 years!), and I'm really not jazzing on it. I work three days a week waitressing at a restaurant here on SSI that has a gorgeous view on the ocean, but gets crazy busy. I'm soooooo tired by the time I'm home late at night! We were going to work Christian's studio schedule with my hours, but as it turns out, he's been busier than expected and had some unexpected road trips, so we've been juggling the kids a lot and we're generally worn out already. I only work about one more month and then we go on a holiday :)
We're going to Banff to camp with close friends and their family and I can hardly wait!!! I love Banff, and I love hiking and biking, and camping so it should be a great adventure.
When we get home, we're moving...yes, moving again. The house we're renting is up for sale and the kids have been longing to have a yard to play in as this house is ocean front and has no real yard space to speak of, so we found a much better house for our family. It has five bedrooms, and the rent is higher so our big plan for now is to be a host family for international students. So far, we have a 17 yr. old girl from Taiwan joining us September 2nd, and we're hoping to have a second student by October. I've started putting our stuff in boxes and fighting the urge to feel depressed about it as I really loathe moving! I think it's just that we've done it so much... And yes, our new place has a disco ball in the living room, so you can bet your boots there'll be many Stonehouse family dance parties in there!
I have a new job that I started in June as well and will resume in September and that is as an on call education assistant for the school district. I'll be working in about eight different schools on our island providing one on one help for students with special needs, and behaviour challenges. This is right up my alley and I'm really looking forward to getting more into the groove of it in the fall.
Life is never boring around here and I can't believe I haven't blogged anything since January! Isaiah, Brennan and Abby are all doing well. They had a great school year and were busy in many activities...soccer, basketball, youth group, Brownies, gymnastics etc. We really work hard to not let them get too busy. It's so important for us to have most dinners together and time as a family.
Some big family news for us is that we've applied to adopt a child through the Ministry of Children and Families. So, if all goes well, we may have a new family member by this time next year. This has been a slow process for us as we feel God calling us to do this, but were pretty freaked when we heard some bad financial news early this year. We feel like we're just supposed to keep walking ahead in obedience and leave the details up to God. We're excited, but it does feel a bit like we're "stepping out of the boat."
Well, that's enough random blabbing for now... Who knows if anyone will read this long saga, but I like writing things down on the blog so I can look back on it. I'm going to see now if I can keep up with this blog a bit better. Because what a better time when I'm working like crazy and about to move!

Mantracker Party

We wanted to do something really adventurous for Brennan's 10th birthday party and decided to do a "Mantracker Party". Christian and the boys had so much fun planning it trying to base it on a show they like to watch called "Mantracker". We decided to use a local forested park, make a map with a start, 10 check points, and a finish. The boys would get points for making it to the checkpoints and loose points for getting caught by the "mantrackers". We started out by face painting for better camouflage.

Then the boys were divided into four teams of two and given laminated maps of the park, which included the check points and finish line. The "mantrackers" did not know where the check points or finish line were, only that the boys would be within the boundaries. We gave them 90 seconds to start before they would be followed and "hunted". If I could have bottled the excitement and energy the boys had before the game started I would have enough get up and go for the rest of 2011!
This is Christian resting for a few seconds over a log after a hard run. The "mantrackers" quickly discovered that these little guys were fast and hard to catch!
Before too long the three "mantrackers" had a strategy. They worked as a team, hiding and ambushing boys.
Soon, there was a lots of catching going on :) Abby and I patrolled the park making sure everyone kept safe and taking lots of pictures. I had so much fun seeing the glee on the boys faces and seeing the mantrackers having a blast. It took about an hour and a half before the first team reached the finish line with all the tokens collected from the checkpoints.
This party turned out so great, I think it could become a yearly tradition! The only mistake I made was having all the boys back to our house for pizza, cake, and a movie after for over two hours. I thought they'd be tired and just want to sit and watch the movie, but I forgot that groups of nine/ten year old boys become crazy when they're together and can't be still and quiet for more than 15 minutes!