what year is this again?????

ok, so i received a request from a dear friend to vote for her 10yr old daughter's hockey team to win a training day with our local NHL team... so i do; i go online i click the link and i vote! i am THAT good of a friend! LoL!! well there are 7 pages of teams hoping to get enough votes to win ... i am curious to see if any of my kids teams were entered (they were not) ... then i notice there is another girls team from our town in there ... hmmm, do i know anyone?? i click the link and this is an exerpt of the intro by the FEMALE coach:

"... Soon, for an upcoming event, they will have a chance to reach out to other girls 5-10 and encourage them to come try out this sport that connects them so beautifully. As women they will one day be running things at home, keeping their house in order, which is a solo thing, whereas, this team sport gets them off to a young start at accomplishing something together. It will be a very sweet sight to see these girls demonstrating their desire for other girls like them to have this wonderful experience too..."

WTF??? "...As women they will one day be running things at home, keeping their house in order, which is a solo thing..." HUH??? so we are prepping them to be a lonely housewife? are we simply giving them something to while away the days until they meet a nice boy and settle down and manage a house and pop out babies? are we not teaching them to have partnerships with their spouses?

now, don't get your knickers all twisted, i am a stay at home mum but before i did that i worked for many years for the local school board. i went to university ... i paid my rent; i bought my groceries, i owned a car, i paid insurnace; i even travelled ... after i met my husband i worked for a few more years and once baby #2 came along, we decided it would be better for me to be at home.

i want my girls to get an education; travel the world; settle into a satisfying career; if husbands/partners and babies come along AWESOME! if they then choose to stay home - GREAT! if the decide to work fulltime - GREAT!

i want them to know that they can be lawyers or dancers or doctors or bankers ... musicians or teachers or accountants or engineers ... entrepreuneurs or fashion designers ... dentists or city clerks.

i want my girls to use their years in hockey to build relationships, to prepare them for being part of a team at home, at school, in the workforce ... WHERE EVER!!! i want them to use it as a lifelong tool for chamaradery and friendship; for activity and fitness; i DON'T want it to ba a stop-gap!

why doesn't this COACH want the same things for her daughter and her daughters friends? why is she holding them back?

WHAT YEAR IS THIS AGAIN???

ahhh, i KNOW! its been a looonnnggg while ...

i am sorry ... we have had some pretty f'ed up times at our house lately ... i know that some of you know whats been going on but i just haven't felt like writing ... i am going to skip the last 2 months and jump back into life here! i promise to write a bit about our drama but not now ... the last few months have been sad and sadness doesn't motivate me ...

xoxod

i got my SCRAP on!!!

My scrappy girls and I went to Younique Country Retreat last weekend!!! OMG! It was awesome! The food is FABULOUS and Heather and her crew could not have ben better hosts!

Younique is just outside of Guelph ... not to hard to find at all (we only got lost once!lol! but that was probably cause Cher and i were too busy chatting to pay attention to the instructions!!)

Heather has a full Crop room on the main floor with lots of natural light and a separate entrance. Each cropper has a full table and the use of a Cricut machine (1 machine for every 2 croppers!!!!! I KNOW, right!!!!).Each table has a ight, and a magnetic mat and tool bin with basics in it!

Downstairs there is a full stocked store with TONS of awesome product and her prices are FABULOUS!!!!! She has cardstock and patterned paper and embellishments and tools and adhesive and tools and EVERYTHING!!!

The accomodations are wonderful - each guset has a basket on their bed with towels and slippers and a robe and toileteries. The food is out of this world and Chef Jeff did a wonderful job of accomodating all our needs!

After all my drama of Chrsitmas and Teenager, this was a welcome weekend away! I worked on my Disney album (yes we went 3 YEARS ago - so i'm a bit behind! lol!!!) Its not finished by any stretch of the imagination, but I got a GREAT start and I dont have much left to do ... titles and journalling an about 8 pages of pictures to finish!

Here are some pages:

my teenager is trying to kill me ....

its true!! i have a 14yr old and she is working hard at being a teenager!! OY!!!

she had gotten into wee bit of trouble at school and that lead to her phone getting taken away ... and THAT lead to me finding out about a WHOLE BUNCH of other trouble she had gotten into ... OY!!

SOOOoo... now she is offline and under house arrest ... its like having an infant all over again; she has NO priviledges like staying home alone or going out with friends (she IS allowed to have friends in but she's stubborn and hasn't yet - you're loss, kiddo!)...she's constantly with me - all sullen and cranky ... fun times

remember, peeps, there is a reason why some animals eat their young! i have started carrying a picture of her when she was a baby to avoid this

call me if you have extra wine ... or tequila

Post Vacay BLAHsss

so we're home ... BLAH! we all decided that we should have stayed but well, you know, life goes on ... the good news is that we are gooing for christmas next year for 2 weeks! YAY!!!!! (the bad news, its more that 365 days away ... BLAH!!!)

lets go back a bit ... out last few days were wonderful! Some of us went Zip Lining and some of us Surfed (more) ... we had our Last Supper at our favourite restuarant, Barba Roja. We even got to have a quick drink with Todd the Surf God! And our Last Breakfast was at the beach watching the tide come in ...ahhhh!!

Some thank yous are in order - one to my DAH for "making us go on vacation"!! My kids and my parents for making it nothing but fun and interesting. Kimberly Barron from BuentaVista / Tulemar (Property Manage Plus) who MADE our trip ...all the emails and phone calls and last minute changes that she managed so well! Todd Pequeen of Manuel Antonio (aka Todd the Surf God) (but who's real calling is as an RMT) who handled our kids amazingly well and really taught them to be better surfers and swimmers. Bless your heart for making them sing Christmas Carols while surfing!! ALL the people we have grown to love who cook for us and make our meals AWESOME and fun!!(most of all Eliott, HappyHappy's "muchacho"!!)

i need to hobble off to my regular life now ... back to the hockey rink tonight!!

(unfortunately i had a "pinky toe meets wooden bed" incident while collecting all the girls stuff off their deck so i am hobbling ALOT but as Happy Happy pointed out, its a good thing it happen at the END of out trip! (i know, she's right!) but holy hanah, am i ever in some pain!!!)

Costa Ricaaaahhhhhh!!!

So, we are in PARADISE!

I wasn't infavour of a second holiday to CR this year but the kids schedules and DH's schedule dictated that December was the time to go instead of March ... so here we are!

DAH is a fisherman at heart so all holidays must include some sort of over-the-top fishing ... Costa Rica definitly has that! this is our 3rd trip in 2 years ... the kids can surf and DAH can fish; its hot and casual so we are ALL happy ... (well excpet for DLU but i am pretty sure its just a ruse ... way deep down she still likes us! lol!!!)

The kids have been surfing lots! Our local friend Todd the Surf God is awesome with them and a great instructor! Its always one of my favourite things to watch them surf! DLU chose to observe (read: lay-out on a chair) but at least she was with us one of the mornings!

One of the things i love so much about this country is how laid back everyone is! Dogs are fairly popular as pets down here and everyone takes their dogs to the beach and out for walks. Don't think there aren't strays here too, but even they seem to be looked after! The first day the kids surfed i spent about an hour enjoying this dog at play in the surf - she really truely ENJOYED her morning romp! She had a collar so she is a pet, but her people were either still in bed or much further down the beach ... she didn't bother anyone and no-one bothered her....

This morning Buddah and i are hanging together with "Abuela y Abuelo" while the men folk spend some time with their daughters horseback riding! woo hoo!! so Adios for now and we're off to the beach ... (i am going to MAKE that boy hang with his mama!!! xoxo)

xod

Who gets YOUR kids??

so this is a bit of a touchy subject but here it goes ... who gets YOUR kids?

i dont mean, in case of death, who gets your kids? i mean who gets to determine who gets access to your kids? how do YOU decide who gets your kids?

or do you?

What happens if you are assigned a teacher or principal who you don't connect with? or who you feel is not a positive influence to your child? how do you deal with that?

Please dont think i am teacher bashing because i am not! i know first hand what a demanding job it is to be in the classroom. i am simply looking for some insight as to what to do if you don't think your child has the right educational guidance...