To Mom

The purple bushes and the pale pink one on the right are varieties of rhododendrons.

The tree on the far right is an ornamental crab apple that is just starting to pop open.

I just love the view out my front window (except for the other houses!).

Update...Facebook style

Okay, so I'm having fun on Facebook. I will admit it. But I still hate how much time I could waste on there. And I haven't even looked at games or those stupid quizzes...
Anyway, since I don't often update my status on there, here goes:

Robyn is...

- happy to have had a good coffee date with 2 other homeschool moms who love what they do but don't think that salvation comes through homeschooling.
- loving that I can walk to a fresh water lake that pours into the ocean. In silence.
- wondering if we should sell our house and rent the one that sits by that lake.
- trying to find a sitter so my man can take me out for supper Friday night (I told him he should)
- wondering why I don't go to the city more. There's sooooo much there to see and do.
- realizing the answer to the above question is sleeping in four different beds upstairs.
- happy to have found lavender sea glass today.
- thinking about how poor my posture is and trying to improve it.
- still trying to decide whether or not to homeschool next year.
- finally wearing Crocs. I pretty much only take them off to sleep. Or go to church.
- enjoying the benefit of someone else's labour in my flower beds. They are very well-planned.
- wishing I could find a hobby and stick with it.
- wishing for a vegetable garden. Actually, longing for a garden.
- stocking up on salmon pieces for all our company this summer (don't worry, I'm freezing them).
- happy to have the basement almost ready for our first set of guests in 3 weeks!
- tired and ready for a solid night of sleep. (Wishful thinking)

Adrienne's Song

Happily singing while eating her breakfast, "I don't like my sisters, they're mean to me, and they don't like me...I shouldn't be singing this song, 'cause it's not appropriate..."

I Hate Facebook.

There. I said it.
I held out for sooooo long when all my friends were joining the madness, and now I finally gave in. And I regret it already. (No offense to those of you who pushed me over the edge - ha ha)

Okay, I do like the fact that it is getting me in touch with people...sort of.
But can anyone identify with the panicky feeling of seeing people's comments, etc. and feeling like you must join in? I mean, I had friends before, and we did just fine keeping in touch with emailing and phone calling, and now it's like I feel that if I don't check my page for 3 days, I am SERIOUSLY out of the loop. And I could spend hours (literally) catching up on things.
Honestly, it is insane. I can't stand it.

But... I can't leave now, because I have to stay in touch with the reality that this is how people are communicating "these days" (man, I feel old).
But I'm just here to say, if you really want to stay in touch with me, don't stay in touch by FB. I will keep checking my wall once in awhile, so I will get your messages. But don't expect much from me in the way of postings, photos, etc.
My feeling is, if I'm important enough to you, you will jog on over here and check out my blog, or MAYBE even give me a call or jot me an email to see how I'm doing.

Call me old fashioned... you just might be right. (Wow, even my parents were on before me)

SIGH.
I feel so much better now that I've vented.
...and I know if you're reading this, you must be a true friend, since you came all the way over here, instead of just checking my FB page.

Prince Edward Island

... a trip of...

- sun and windburned faces
- ice cream (including Emilie's first cone!)
- hiking
- picnicking
- wind and more wind
- searching for shells and sea glass
- lobster, mussels, clams and chowder
- sheep at the B&B
- driving lots, but seeing diverse scenery
- the girls eating pecan tarts in bed
- sandcastles
- many memories made

(Green Gables)

(Confederation Bridge)

Happy Mother's Day to me! These are some terrific kids.

Magnificent magnolias!

New buddies...

This is what it looked like when I decided it was time to pack our bags a couple weeks ago.

an interesting conversation

A few weeks ago I was talking to our insurance company and the lady on the other end needed all our information. I was giving all our birthdates, and mine was last.

Me: And mine is September 20, seventy-eight.
Lady: ... that's nineteen seventy-eight?
Me: Uh, yeah.

(kind of threw me off, but I answered quickly before I thought to say, "Um, no, that's eighteen seventy-eight. I had my kids really late in life.")

Life...

- everything has settled down here after the fires. They are still watching the hot spots (smoldering) all week they say. Hopefully there won't be any more flare ups. 8 homes were completely destroyed and I think about 7 more were damaged.

- I just got word of a homeschooling seminar at the end of the month. I mostly want to go for the second-hand sale than anything. Even if we decide not to homeschool next year, I want to build up my resources a bit.

- two girls from church (older, responsible girls :-) ) offered to take my kids to the park for the afternoon. Be my guest! It's looking like rain now and I'm really hoping they don't have to cancel!

- there are so many things coming up in my flower beds. The girls get so excited every time something new opens up. I don't know what we have right now, except for the grape hyicinths. I need to keep looking online I guess and try and find out what we have. For some reason it bothers me not to know what they're called.

- we are headed on a family vacation for the long weekend! We are so pumped. I won't say where we're going for now, but I'm really excited to see more of the area.

- I was so blessed to be so well taken care of while Daryl was away last weekend. We spent all of Sunday and most of Saturday with friends, and it was so relaxing.

- I'm getting so anxious to fill my freezer and shelves with food this summer. I hear there's wild blueberries everywhere here, and lots of people pick peaches, strawberries, raspberries, apples, pumpkins, etc. at farms. So we're planning a few trips with friends over the summer. There are so many farmer's markets around I'm hoping I can just buy the things I can't pick myself. I've still got 2 jars of hot pickled green beans on my shelf that I've been hoarding. I suppose it's time to crack them open and enjoy them.

- it's so windy here that almost every time I hang laundry out, it wraps around the line so many times that I can't pull it back in. It's such a pain, and I'm not sure how to resolve the problem. Any ideas?

Update

Just a quick update before I head to bed.
We are at home, safe and sound I do believe! We haven't seen smoke all day, and it has been pouring rain here. Thank God, and thank you all for your prayers. The fire is now classified as "under control", and people who were evacuated are returning to their homes. I still have our things by the door, in case something should go differently than expected. But at this point, I really can't imgine that the fire would turn around the opposite direction and get out of control again. We are expected to get rain all weekend, and I don't think anyone here has ever been so happy for rain and heavy fog!

Good night!

Excitement I could live without...

Here's the past 24 hours in a nutshell:

around 3 pm, yesterday - Olivia came running in telling me there was a huge cloud that "looks like a bomb". We went out to see it and it was massive black, billowing smoke. I didn't think much of it, since we had heard sirens already and we assumed it was a large building on fire.

4pm - turned on the radio, and found out there was a forest fire a few kilometres away from us

4:30 - I'm starting to get concerned when I hear that a couple houses have gone up in flames, with people escaping in cars with flames following them

5:00 - hearing of road closures and wondering if Daryl will be able to get home from work. His cell phone battery was dying and I couldn't reach him.

6:00 - Daryl's home! Later we heard the road must have closed just behind him. He could have taken a different route, but it would have taken a lot longer and by this time I was thinking about packing.

7:00 - That's it, I'm packing up. Neighborhoods are being evacuated that are very close to us. I can hear people being interviewed on the radio and they can see actual flames.

8:00 - excitement is dying down. Most of the neighborhood is out on the street, taking pictures of the smoke...people are on their roofs to get a better view.

10:00 - from the front porch we can see the smoke is now bright orange, then 15 minutes later the orange colour is gone and the smoke is diminishing. Thought we'd sleep with the door unlocked since we don't have a doorbell.

Slept mostly peacefully all night...comforted a scared child...looked out the window to make sure everyone else's vehicles are still there too and we didn't miss the evacuation call. :-)

6am this morning - hearing of new evacuations. Fire marshall is still declaring the fire as "out of control".

8:00 - packed a few more things. I was in a hurry last night, and just grabbed a few photo albums, photo cds, etc. This morning I added old notebooks (with details of the kids in them), a few more photos, my knitting, and each of the girls packed a back pack. Olivia had a nervous, crying breakdown thinking about what if our house burns and her desk won't be there when we get back.

9:00 - nothing feels normal. We have to drive Daryl to the airport later and I think we will take all the things we have packed and head to some friends' house for the weekend. We've had 2 families offer their homes to us. I don't want to risk having to pick up kids out of their beds in the middle of the night tonight, by myself.

10:15 - now what? Guess I'll keep doing laundry and tidying up in case the house burns down. Just kidding. But I am in the mode of leaving for the weekend, and that means I need to get organized since I don't want to come home to a state of disaster.
So...DON'T WORRY about us - we will be going far from the fire. And we have plenty of friends who are making sure we are well cared for.
Have a good weekend! :-)