The odd couple.

I braved waddling into church this morning despite my large and in charge size and my personal "due date" issues. I survived. After that we went home to quickly change before heading over to my in-law's place for the 14 year tradition that is "Sunday dinner". I, being in the last few days of my glorious roundness of pregnancy...and also being comfortable with Curt's family, had "wisely" chosen baggy grey pajama pants and a tight motorcycle shirt that barely covered the last inch of my stretch-marked stomach. I slid my feet into my sandals and started going out the door. That's when Carrie announced. "There's company there mom." (My mother in law often invites friends and/or strangers for dinner.) "Who?"...i considered changing depending on the answer to that question. Curt interrupted with a smirk. "Never mind, we don't have time to change, let's go!" (He knew it was missionary friends we have known for years so was pretending to be brave.) I grabbed a blouse... yes, a see-through blouse with no sleeves and wore it OVER the too-short motorcycle shirt and pajama bottoms. Curt told me that it looked worse and smiled. He is enjoying my lack of dignity...and proper clothing. Him in his perfectly pressed dress shirt, new pants and fresh hair cut, and good looks. It's times like these that i am glad to remember that it was HIM who asked ME if i would PLEASE be his wife... makes *me* smile. SUCKER!!!

bathing suit pep talk from a seasoned husband...

We're planning a family holiday and I had to buy a bathing suit that's suitable for wearing in public. I had worn out the bottom in the last good suit i had. Plus, i needed one that will work for maternity that's fairly "decent". We hit the mall and I found a few suits in one of the shops and started trying them on. Curt kept giving the sales lady really weird "old lady" suits to pass on to me in the change room as a joke. (She thought he was serious.) I forced him to come in the change room with me to check out one of the suits. He took one look at the suit i had on. It fit strangely over my pregnanty belly and rapidly vanishing waist-line. At this stage of a pregnancy and after 6 pregnancies I "show" right away. But mostly that "show" is really my body knowing what to do hormonally and just going with the flow. It's not a tight little belly full of baby. It's a body that knows the routine. :) Anyways, Curt took one look at me and said something i didn't think i would ever hear my husband say: "Don't worry, it will look better when you get a little bigger."

Rediculous Romance

It's 9:48 pm and I'm alone at home tonight with the kids. Curt goes to "Filipino Basketball" Tuesday night. He helps organize this weekly event and does the driving as well. Many of the Filipinos in our area are new to Canada and still do not have licenses.
Anyways, the phone just rang a few minutes ago and i went to answer it. A woman's computerized voice announces with perfect diction that i have a "text to land line" message. Not knowing how this is supposed to work, i wait for instructions. I am to press a number to hear the message. I press the required number and the robotic woman announces the number from which the message is being sent--my husband's cell. Confused, i wait a couple seconds and then i hear the strangest thing. A woman's computerized voice. She relays the message in a carefully slow monotone: "I-- LOVE-- YOU."
I wait.
"If you would like to respond to this message..."
You can't be serious. That was the weirdest "I love you" that i have ever gotten. Romance with a twist of the ridiculous. My favourite kind.

Curt

I don't blog about him often although his name is sprinkled throughout most of my posts. He's asked me jokingly why I haven't written about him. I've tried...

Overnights with Sadie in the hospital.

Ice fishing at Slave Lake.

Early morning hunting with Darren.

Chickens.

Taking Carrie riding.

Snuggling a camping Robbie.

Sleepy Robin.

Piggie backing across the river to the camp.

River-side snuggle with Ellie.

He takes each of the kids camping when they turn 4. This was Robin's trip.

Happy Moo-thers' Day

For a couple years now I have been asking the relatives to phone me when one of their cows is calving. I'd never seen that before and I thought my kids might like to see it too. Tonight, on our way home from a birthday party we got a call from Curt's cousin Jeff to get over to their barn as they had a mama who needed some help birthing. The waters were stained and they were going to pull the babe. We were just passing Curt's other cousins' farm only a mile away so turned around and made a B-line for the barn. By the time we arrived, Jeff was up to his shoulder in (*ahem*) cow, and was looping a slip knot over the front hooves of the calf. My kids stood and stared. Curt started to narrate: "Now kids, this is JUST EXACTLY how mom had you guys." Yeah right. Thank goodness NOT!! Jeff started to pull. Much gore began to emerge. Sadie was a few feet away from the action on the other side of the metal fence and as soon as the hoof emerged cooed "awwwwwww! cuuuuute" (haa haa!) Then the cow let loose with what i thought was amniotic fluid.
me:"Back up kids, so you don't get splashed with amniotic fluid...Is it usually that color?"
jeff:"Umm, Yeah, that's not amniotic fluid."
me:"Oh."
kids:"What IS it??"
... you get the gist of the "details"... i won't go any further.
Jeff's dad came in and directed the kids to get right in the pen as fast as possible so they could get a front row seat for the actual "birth". We were only there about 2 minutes when the calf came catapulting out and sliding across the floor only inches away from our feet. I'm glad i didn't wear flip flops! We got out of the way for the mama and the baby to be brought out into the open pen. The mama followed Jeff who carried the babe. She was POURING milk out of her one good teat. (three of them are useless) It was like she was blind to the rest of us as she focused in on her little one to lick it clean. All the while, her milk continued to pour. I know that feeling. Sometimes just thinking about my tender babies causes "let down" Amazing to see that in an animal. Amazing. Suddenly she noticed us. She turned fierce and threatening. We went from "Awww to AAAAHHH!" and exited in a timely fashion to the opposite side of the fence. Birth, no matter how sterile or how non-sterile, human, or animal...is shockingly mysterious and miraculous. God is interesting...the way He has created *life* is interesting...Makes me wonder about Him to see that tonight.

Date Night

We went riding tonight. My first time in...forever. Either I'm pregnant so Curt won't take me, or the kids are going with Curt. Finally tonight I got to go. Curt took me to the same place we rode horse on our first date 13 years ago. After all these years he still saddles my horse for me. He adjusts the stirrups for my short legs...high enough so a leprechaun could ride if he needed to. He went to take a picture of my momentous first ride of the season. *click* He looked at the picture... (smirk on his face) "Hmm! Your mouth is wide open." It's one of his "in" jokes. He likes to tease me that I talk too much. I reminded him that one of the reasons he liked me on our first date was that he didn't have to think of anything to say. My mouth ran like a squirrel in the park and he just sat on his horse and smiled. I finished my light-hearted lecture by saying. "You liked that I always had something to say." He smiled... "You still do!" (more teasing)

Curt showed me how he can get our little Arab "Sketch" to curl his neck all the way back to the saddle and spin on a dime and how he can get him to side-step. He showed me how to get the new Tennessee Walking horse we borrowed from his dad to keep it's gait. It was almost like learning to shift gears on a standard vehicle. I miss my Arab Chenille who died this winter. It's going to be strange to break in a new horse. It was good to get out today though and just be the two of us even if it was only for an hour and a half. A little flashback to our first date and a reminder of the things we love to do together.

mellowing

13 months after our marriage:

When we brought our first child home from the hospital we were hypnotized. We couldn't sleep for staring at him in the bed between us. I remember both being propped up on one elbow in bed with little Darren sleeping in between us. I looked over at Curt staring at Darren and thought. "This little life is here because of our love for each other!" It was an overwhelming thought. When Darren would cry in the night, we would both get up to watch him nurse and have a change of pants, watch him being burped, watch him watch him watch him... and slowly Curt faded off to sleep. There was nothing *he* could do anyways. He had to get up at 5 am for work. Curt was a light sleeper and the lights being turned on, the crying and the bed jostling as I got in and out was annoying to him. On nights that Darren's colic was on 'high' he would scream for 4 hours at a time. There was no place to go in the tiny farm house we were living in and our attic bedroom was open to every sound. I tried to soothe Darren, I took him to the living room to watch the dark winter night continue on without me, all the while, jiggling Darren, singing, rocking, pacing, patting, massaging his tummy. A few nights Curt dragged his weary old self and walked out the door the 50 paces to his mother's house and slept in the basement. It was impossible for me to not take that personally. It made me feel deserted in those bleary-eyed first months of motherhood.

12 years later...

The other night Wes, our sixth child, now two months old ended a fitful night of sleep. He has been snorkely with a cold lately and it was as if a litter of snorting, slurping, spluttering piglets were writhing in the bed between me and Curt. I got his nose cleaned out as he howled. Finally he latched on and his eyes rolled back in his head as he settled in for another little stretch of milk induced sleep. Through it all, Curt laid there like a rock. No complaints, no movement, determinedly "sleeping". It was as if he were in a locked vault. I had to burst out laughing. If he wanted to sneak over to his mom's nowadays i couldn't care less. My how times have changed. I love the mellowing that the years have produced in both of us...i hope we just keep getting softer in all things. Life and marriage is hard enough... I'm so happy for tenderness to begin spreading it's tendrils all around.

Chenille

I wondered yesterday what I should blog about... should it be the indoor baseball the kids are doing? The wedding we went to with everyone today? The christmas concert that became more commitment than i thought it would be?? And then, this morning one of our horses died. Not just any horse. Chenille. My mother in law, who keeps track of everything down to where she planted her cucumbers in the garden for the past 30 years and how many tomatos and peaches she canned from year to year, pulled out her horse photo album this afternoon when we dropped by, reading Chenille's history to Carrie, my animal lover. Chenille was born in 1985, My inlaws bought her in 92 and she was my mother in law's horse. A bay arab. Beautiful and fast...but with the typical fire of an arab as well. She liked to ride a little side-ways when she was at a "trot" but "full out", you would think you were flying. She liked to pull the reins out of your hands and itch her legs with her nose if she could and when you would take her to the mountains her arab legs would shake with anticipation and fear, but as soon as you were on the trail, she was determined and sure-footed. Boy could she neck-rein. The first time Curt and I went out it was for a ride through Chickakoo with our parents, Chenille came. Most of our dates involved taking Chenille and one of the other horses out for a ride. One day we found out she couldn't swim as we tried to cross a pond in one of the surrounding fields. Such a terrible feeling filled us as she panicked and refused to lift her head out of the water after a fit of terror. Curt stood knee deep in the muck and held her head up until she had calmed down enough to stand again. We rode home in silence. Poor Chenille. As soon as we were married Curt bought her for me from his mother. Later, we bought her filly off of them too and Curt trained and rode her. I loved riding Chenille. I loved her fire and Curt liked to say that the horse was just like the rider. :) When we had children, Chenille was the horse they learned to ride on and she seemed to know they were precious and she would ride so slowly and carefully. She had a colt we named Snoopy that died soon after birth of a heart defect. My 4 year old son and I talked a lot about death and heaven and the resurection after Snoopy. I caught him playing with his plastic horse and make believing that it had died. He carefully laid a dish cloth on it "Snoopy DIED!!!" he announced to the empty room... paused for silence. I felt for him... Suddenly he snatched the dish cloth and threw it in the air and yelled "He ROSE AGAIN!!!!!!!!" :) Funny how some moments we never forget. This summer, Darren, Carrie, Robin and Ellie each rode on Chenille. Sadie rode while being led around. It's been 12 years since we were married and bought Chenille and this morning, after doing chores with Sadie, Curt found her at the fence between our farm and my in-law's farm. Gone. Some horses come and go and we forget we rode them or we only remember one particular ride. Sugar was so annoying she had to be at the front of the pack wherever you rode, Paula Too ganted up so much on one mountain ride that the saddle fell off and Curt just about went down the mountain with her, Silver Cloud was sold to a friend so that Curt could buy me an engagement ring, Freckles doubled me and Curt up to old Alfred's field the night Curt proposed to me...Chenille was there for 12 years anytime we wanted to ride, anytime the kids wanted to ride, or friends and family. Today as my mother in law took out the book, she also carefully noted today's date at the bottom of Chenille's page. It might strike a person funny... that maybe we're remembering horses... but it's more than just the horse we're remembering, it's the time we spent together riding with her. She represents a big part of the "recreation" part of our marriage and family life. She was there the morning we woke up to a drooping tent under thick snow in the mountains of Cadomin. My mother in law fried eggs and bacon. The snow caused HUGE snaps as it fell into her pan. She made me coffee that morning even though she would never touch the stuff, and we saw a huge moose on the mountain only a few meters away. One ride... there were hundreds more... i could go on. Hard to imagine going for a ride without her.