The Langleys Lately

Well not so much fun! Last weekend I took out the garden hose to wash my motorbike, and water the lawn. This is what we got for our trouble!

Pretty sure there is trouble behind that dry – errr… wetwall!

Well that sucks

Not sure how long the repairs will take, but the insurance company has been good about it so far.

On the positive side, my motorbike is clean.

Thanks to Dave for taking this picture from in front of my house.

I should have written about this earlier but better late than never.
Last weekend on the 24th of April I went out to the Alexander Mackenzie Trail with a number of friends, there were eight of us in total. We had a terrific time on our quads, plodding and playing in mud, water and snow. I wasn’t keeping track but I figure we probably spent about five hours on the trail though it felt like less at the time, but it felt like much more the next day! These machines are quite a lot of fun, pretty amazing where they will go. I felt pretty tentative at first but as time went on I was feeling more and more comfortable with my machine, a Honda Foreman 450 with an electric gear shift on the handle bar.

Jordan and I have spent Jordan’s spring break in Prince George and we have been having a ball. Today we had an opportunity to go with some friends an family on a hike on a great trail. Jordan and I accompanied a couple of friends (Mr. and Mrs. Gandalf), my brother in law (nameless guy for now) and his daughter Kendra and seven dogs, all part of my plan to break Jordan’s fear of dogs.

The dog therapy plan worked well, Jordan made terrific progress around the dogs.

We hiked about three kilometers up the trail then turned around to head back. Some way back the nameless brother in law spotted some over grown path that it looks like a quad had once used and decided that it must be a short cut back to our starting point. Kendra and I were the only two that saw it for what it was but we did not constitute critical mass.

Needless to say the short cut became an episode slogging through an overgrown old clear-cut block that I would not recommend for and eight year old, or pretty much anyone but certain nameless brother in law types. However we survived with the knowledge that said nameless brother in law has not learned any lessons about short cuts. We made it back, later and a little scratched up from thorns and willows, and we encountered quite a bit more mud, swamp and bog than on the way in when we stuck to the trail. Too bad I didn’t have a camera…

We had lots of fun yet again today but don’t tell the nameless brother in law or he will try and sneak another one of his short cuts over us!

Well I hope no one has high expectations for our annual letter cuz its not happening! I’m still trying to get the dishes caught up at the end of each day so there’s not much time for extras. If you care to get caught up on more details of our year, you can browse further down the page! Here are the latest pics, the twins are growing and in spite of ongoing colds, are fairly healthy. They are quite funny and very interactive, which is very rewarding! We are all having a hard time adjusting to Sean working in Prince George, its tough being apart and also tough readjusting when he is home, because he is usually trying to work and the time home is so short.

Jordan has new glasses (tinted, no prescription) which are helping him cope with the fluorescent light flicker in his classroom. He enjoyed his Christmas break despite disappointment that our Wii died as soon as school let out. My parents spent a week with us for Christmas and we shared dinner with the Dirks. The kids had fun acting out the Christmas story, and the twins enjoying ripping paper and especially all the attention from Grampa Reimer. I enjoyed a break from mixing up formula, (thanks, Mom!) –only 2.5 months to go and I will be glad to be done that chore!

Cameron is pushing in his top two teeth so is now the proud owner of 4. Erica has her 2 bottom teeth and is figuring out how to “chew,” she so excited about every spoonful that feeding her is somewhat of a challenge and quite hilarious! The babies are crawling as much as they can and taking little steps – won’t be long! They love the camera and Cam enjoys squinting for the flash. They love their big brother who plays peek-a-boo with them and light up whenever they see him. Jordan’s interests this year continue to be volcanoes, geysers, earthquakes and hurricanes/tornadoes, and of course, sharks and whales. His interests have also expanded to include learning a significant amount of Hawaiian and he did a research project this fall on Hawaii. The top of his list goes to the inner workings of the human body, specifically DIGESTION!  We now know more about digestion than we ever cared to know. Thank goodness for the library, he is a voracious reader! Jordan especially enjoys The Magic School Bus series and “Bill Nye the Science Guy” movies. He has a wonderful teacher this year in grade 2 and I am so thankful for her positive character and willingness to work with his challenges. Our time with LEAD Foundation came to an end this fall and we miss the wonderful people and their input into Jordan. His weekly activities have really taken a cut which I am sad about.  As much as I enjoy the twins I really miss the time I used to spend with Jordan, and I’m afraid he spends more time playing the WALL-E computer game than I’d like.  C’est la vie.  Jordan’s 8th birthday is next week and we are planning a swimming party. This cake should be fun.

Jordan has tinted glasses to help with the fluorescent lghts at school.

Ok, here are the latest, we even have some of the FIVE of us together, thanks Wayne!

Summer seems to now be officially over, the bite of fall is in the air! I thought I’d do a little summary of the summer! We had lots of visitors, grandparents, brothers, sisters, cousins, aunts and uncles, thank you all for coming! Sean and Jordan took a couple trips to Prince George, one to check out employment as he was laid off at Emerson in June. After a dry summer with basically no opportunities in Calgary, Sean started work with Andritz Automation, based in Prince George. He’s working with many old friends from his days at Universal Dynamics a decade ago so its nice to jump right in. I am trying to cope with single parenthood this fall as Sean is in PG 2 weeks at a time, then home 1 week and back for another 2. We are so thankful he has a job he enjoys.

My mom has come to help me for 10 days so that is one reason I am able to finally update the blog! It is great to be able to at least get some naps in and not worry about trying to find transportation to and from school for Jordan everyday. He is enjoying grade 2 and has an excellent teacher. The babies are sitting on their own, rolling around and trying to crawl, they sure can move! Right now they are fighting colds and teething which is always fun. At the end of August Val took me away to Kamloops overnight so we could attend my nephew AJ’s wedding. I am so happy for him and was thrilled to be there!

These are the 3 month portraits, courtesy of Allison Orthner who loves to photograph and is the “Queen of Scrapbooking.” She has a wonderful talent of capturing expression. Click on the thumbnail to view the uncropped photo.

Yesterdays drive from Bozeman to Spokane was long and both Jordan and I were pretty tired, especially when you consider coming after the long day at Yellowstone. The hotel in Spokane looked nice so I decided to book an extra day here so we could take it easy and get some rest. The forecast for today was pretty hot so we set out right after getting some breakfast into Jordan. We left for a walk through Riverfront Park in downtown in search of dad’s morning coffee, and found an amusement park. Our day of rest turned into another day of excitement from gondola rides to Imax, to the spinny rides that pretty much wrecked me! In truth the spinny rides came before the Imax movie and I banned Jordan from rides that required any adult accompanyment after we went on the “SIZZLER”, however I was still feeling pretty rough as the day got hotter. I needed that air conditioned theatre seat to aid in my recovery. One should also note that when you are trying to recover from vertigo, Imax is not reccomended. I am writing this post on my iPhone while lying on my bed trying to recover a little bit while I irresponsibly leave Jordan to play on his computer.

Well I did get a pretty good cup of coffee.