Introducing - Mr. and Mrs. Awesome

A real conversation I had with a child:

At the end of the school day:
Child - "Your new name is Mr. Awesome."
Me - "Oh?"
Child - "Yep, some teachers come in here and they get walked all over. But not you."
Me - "Okay... thanks."

A real conversation I had with Stephanie later that day...

Steph (seeing a letter from the church addressed to Mr. and Mrs. David J. Geertsema) - "Why do I have to be Mrs. David Geertsema?"
Me - "I don't know. It's just the way it is."
Steph - "Well, why shouldn't you be Mr. Steph Geertsema"
Me - "Because it doesn't work that way. Listen, think about this... A kid just called me Mr. Awesome at school today. So what does that make you? Mrs. Awesome."

Fall Work

Since the weather was so beautiful today we thought it was time to get some yard work done. A few weeks ago we had bought some Christmas lights, so this afternoon Dave got up on the roof to put them up. Very exciting! This is also a big step for Dave who sometimes acts like Scrooge at Christmas!!!! Then we raked up all the leaves and cleaned up the yard. It was great to take advantage of a nice day because I'm sure after the snow/hail/sleet we got the other day, there won't be too many nice days left. We'll have to take a picture of the house in the dark when it's all lit up to show you our handiwork (not that it's that creative!) We were also thinking of putting some lights in the bush to the left of the front door, but weren't sure what it would look like. Any thoughts?

One More Time Around the Calendar

So, today is my birthday. So far I've had a good day. I was asked to go to a small Christian school to watch over some children for the day - and get paid. The beauty of it was that there were only 4 children left in the class (half the class went away for the day and I was left with 4). So I read a good amount of "Hatchet" by Gary Paulson. It was nice of them to pay me for my time.

I've been asked a couple times if I feel any older today. Which, of course, everyone knows the answer is 'not really'. I mean, you're told that you're a year older. But really, for about two years I've just rounded my age up to the nearest 10. So when my birthday comes around, I can actually surprise myself, and feel a little younger.
"Your 28?" someone might ask.
To which I'd reply, " I am?" in astonishment. All this time I thought I was 30... I really should keep better track of this thing...

Anyway, Steph and I have choir practice tonight. So we won't be around for much more of the evening. If you haven't called to say "Happy Birthday" you can try later in the evening, or tomorrow.
Just don't ask if I'm 40 yet. 'cause that would be insulting.

A Fall Walk

Fall is by far my favourite season. Aside from the rain, of course! I love the fabulous colours and am most often reminded of God's amazing creativity. We like to take lots of walks during this season, to view the colours and just to get out of the house before all the snow comes! We went for a walk at a park in Innisfil and took our camera. Here's what came of it:

We hope you're enjoying this beautiful season too!

Beard Trimmer

For those of you who have seen me this past year, you know that I have been 'sporting' a grizzly-looking goatee. Well, the other day, I discovered the problem with Beard Trimmers. That is - that I should check that I have the trimmer set to the right length. Which I didn't, so this past week I managed to shave it off. Unintentionally.
But I don't think Emily will mind.
I remember her telling me - over Skype (those of you not using Skype should install it) - that the goatee made me "look like a Wookie."
Thank-you, Emily.

Update, Thanksgiving and Regrouping

Dave has been bugging me to write a blog....he doesn't know what to write about and apparently I do. Not really true, but we'll go with it anyway!

Life here has been extremely busy (hence our lack of interesting blog entries...sorry about that!). School started off with a huge rush of busyness and I'm finally just starting to catch up. Omitting all the marking I have to do, I am enjoying my kids and being back at school. I do have quite an interesting bunch this year and they exhaust me, but they also make me laugh so sometimes that makes up for all the frustration!

Dave has also been busy working, painting, and coaching. I'm thankful that he's been given the opportunity to coach because he really enjoys it and does a great job! He's also finished painting the basement, which looks awesome! So now we only need to decide on some storage options so we can get it all cleaned up.

Thanksgiving was a great weekend to relax and spend time with family. We were at my parents and did lots of chilling and eating. But mostly it was nice to get away from all the craziness. A couple of family pictures:

And now that we're back at it again, we're trying to regroup and get ready for the next round of busyness. We started choir this week for our Christmas Cantata, so if anyone wants to check that out it's on December 19 and 20 (I think...).

And we're apparently starting the weekend with no hot water....AGAIN! I think I've just about had it with our water heater.....

Hot Water

We've finally had our water heater repaired! It only took us a week, and a few days to get it repaired. Who knew that painting your basement could cause you so much stress, eh? And who knew that you could be so relieved to get to take a shower again...?

Anyways, our only other news of late is that (seeing as we bought a big 21 quart pot for heating water - for our baths...) we decided to try our hand at canning our very own homemade tomato jam. Yep, so it turned out okay. You might get some at christmas. Maybe you won't. Maybe you don't want any, seeing as we used the pot for baths and all...