feeling the love

Wow.. what a day. If I knew this day would have felt like this I would have wished to turn 29 ages ago. Yesterday when I went for my run in the morning.. I was overcome when a certain song came on my ipod.. it's called.. How He loves you and it always shakes me to my core.. well yesterday I was just praying it would sink in.. I mean I'm already 29.. I just want it to sink in. Today I felt the love over and over and over again. So thanks to all of you who wished me well (who knew facebook could be such an encouragement) and those who went out of their way to make me feel loved all through out the day. I am in awe. So here are some highlights....
It all started Sunday when I was taken to dinner with some friends.. these are not just any friends. We enjoyed a fantastic meal followed by our own "Martha" making one of my fave's kit kat cheesecake with a special Crystal spin.. and it was good.. I mean it was so good. I got some special gifts and a cuddle with the most handsome little guy. Crystal ventured all the way to North Carolina for my gift and was thoughtful enough to visit Anthropologie for me.. I mean really this store was meant for me.. I LOVED the owl tea towel.. not sure if I will ever bring myself to use it.. but it looks really good in my kitchen. Thanks C!
Monday we celebrated with my family.. Steak dinner courtesy of the grill master himself. So good. Ice cream cake. A kicking Loewen family dance party. And a Magic Bullet.. oh my! Been waiting for this one for awhile now. Amoung lots of other good things.


Today has been amazing. My thoughtful husband got me the best gift this year. I will be getting a cleaning lady once a week for October and November.

Just what I need in these crazy couple months with tons of rehersals and other stuff. I can't wait for her to start next week! The above picture is the card he made me. He is just so good!!
I was surprised at work with a couple flower deliveries, pizza, chocolate, bath & body works. Amanda kept me on my toes all day with surprises every hour or so. Although at first I was a bit afraid of how much she appeared to not know me when her first gift arrived. I won't explain it all but go to her blog and read this Hey an owl is an owl right? It felt so nice to have her think of me that way. Among a couple of other things was this Recipe Box I had seen on Etsy.. loved it! It is even better in person. I almost cried when I opened it and found it FULL of hand written recipes. Old recipes.. Like some Grandma's treasured recipes. I couldn't belive it. So amazing. And then as if she isn't already the greatest my partner in crime Audrey at the office surprised me by getting Amanda to make what can only be called the most amazing cake you have ever seen. I mean the picture does not do this gorgous, delicious cake justice... my favorite Starbucks drink a carmal macciato.. and seriously guys it even tasted like it.
Thank you for all the phone calls and your generosity.. I feel like I won the jackpot and Hey Marcy my friends put a dent in your gift cards thats for sure. :)
I also received a magazine subscription to my fave magazine Domino from Audrey. Just fits me perfectly.
I had rehersal tonight and my favorite new friend Holly made sure to solidify in my mind why I seriously heart her already. She made me homemade salsa and gave me a super cute card.
I wish it could be my birthday every day.
I do have a great post on Norwex in the works with a draw for that free gift.. if you want in on it make sure to leave your comment on my last post.
I feel full. Finally full feels good!

jumbles of my brain

so now since you have gone so long without a real post by me.. i decided in my saturday afternoon laziness to bring you all into my inner circle. here is what i am thinking in no particular order (that's how circulation works... at least in my head)
-i need a new hair color.. badly
-if i were not buried under bills i would go out and get said hair color, the thought of coloring my hair from the contents in a box scares me, i have not had the guts to do that in like 15 years.. do i start now?
-my house is clean today. it always feels good to have a clean house
-i love the way ari & noah are talking these days.. they just yammer all day long. they have the cutest little voices and sometimes i just stare at their mouths because of the way they move them. it's fasinating.
-dave is gone to work for the second time today - i hate on call weekends.
-i want a cheeseburger almost everyday. i have a love affair with red meat. it makes me feel good.
-i still am trying to find the perfect fabric to make new bedding for the boys room. i think i have narrowed it down.. well who am i kidding. these are the ones i love. Etsuko Furuya's fabrics are lovely.. love this combo HERE still loving Amy Butlers dots line though and thinking that the lime & slate full moon polka dots would be adorable.
-my brain is filled with so many home ideas and i have NO time.. seriously no time.
-loving fall so i can wear my cute grey jacket and my new pewter shoes and of course loving fantastic scarves.. which i need more of. seriously.
-rehersals are going so good. i am really enjoying it and we have a fantastic cast. it's long evenings with general blocking but i love it. it's going to be an amazing show and you should all have tickets.
-selling Norwex now too for those of you who don't know... i am loving this. it's easy to get behind products that pretty much sell themselves.. i will blog more about this later.. but if anyone wants to have a party and get tons of free stuff (espcially in time for christmas) let me know!
-embarking on my 29th birthday.. feeling ok about it until i go to rehersals and this tiny blonde girl who is probably all of 17 keeps telling me how old i look. ugg...
-trying to stay afloat with this whole parenting thing.. someday s i could just throw in the towel. it's hard and it feel awful alot of the time... I love my kids but feel most days they would be better off without me and all my selfishness... i am working on it. luckily i have a partner who rocks at the parenting thing.
-still dealing with my ever growing addiction to all things ETSY it is a seriously horrible place to go.. i keep buying things and things keep getting cuter.
sorry there are no photots here.. i have not been good with snapping. next time i promise for photos.
Ok if you are still reading this then you deserve a rew ard so here it is:
Leave me a comment and you will be eligible for a free Norwex product... it'll be good i promise.

excuse me

i am living in a land of chaos.. you will have to excuse me in my absence.. just way to much going on to be able to manage it all.. yet. please have patience.. i will be back.

etsy loving..

this seriously is killing me. with wanting to redo the boys room.. make them new quilts. i am so all over this.. now if only i wasn't buried in bills and light enough to just buy buy buy!! happy friday!

http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5206901

trudging through

like with everything there is a transition period.. our last few weeks have been just that. life is alot busier for me then it was this summer. i know i mentioned that we were having difficulties with adjusting to our new "routine" well happy to say i think for the most part transition is over (or at least at the tail end) dropping the boys off in the morning has become easy and today i even had to scold myself for feeling badly that they don't seem to want me anymore when i drop them off.. it was a short moment. they have been waking up a bit earlier which makes our morning routine much easier and dropping them off involves a few hugs for me and a wave goodbye. so happy to have found somewhere for my kids to go that they love. it's evident that they are having fun.. they talk about their little friends from time to time. this morning when i said it was time to get dressed they both made mention of Shirly and Ty (he is a boy that goes there as well).
picking them up has been harder only because they don't want to leave :)
our afternoons have their ups and downs but we make the most of it. this afternoon we went to the park.. i concentrated on really enjoying our time together. we did lots of fun stuff. the problems only came when it was time to leave... noah makes life difficult when it comes time to leave anywhere he is having fun. i'll take the bad for the time i had with them their this afternoon.
i am happy i made the choice to go back to work part time. i love my job and the time away.. i know its been so good for all of us.
off to rehersals tonight which is going well.. getting nervous about all the memorizing.. but i am excited about the process.
as per emily's (one and only request from my last blog) you will get an earful on Norwex in a few days... oh and big congrats to Steph over at Adventures in Babywearing. She gave birth to Ivy LaRue in the early morning.

the real truth

well it appears i am completely at a loss... i have no ideas to put down here. maybe its the million things screaming around in my head.. i just can't silence them long enough to blog anything. so unless you have things you want me to blog about..questions, things you are dying to know about me? i am going to have to just take some time to sort my thoughts. coming up with ideas at this stage in the game is killing me. so leave your comments and i will answer your questions... and if not well then i'll be back when it flows more naturally...

is it just this mom?

what the heck??!! it's like i am a monster or something... my kids literally cried for their dad for 30 minutes last night when he wasn't here to say good night to them and then this afternoon we started a repeat of last week... every time something would go wrong they were crying for their dad.. or when they didn't have my total attention they would cry for dad.. and seriously what is that?? it makes me so mad.. it's not like i wouldn't love to give them 100% of my attention all the time but then who would do massive amounts of laundry, sweep and mop, clean bathrooms, fold and put away piles of laundry.. and sure i would love to go through the drive through every day if it meant i could spend more time with my kids instead of cutting up healthy vegetables so they have good wholesome time consuming food to eat.. then i would love to play play play instead of putting all the dishes in the dishwasher so we have clean plates to eat on. i thought i was doing good at balancing but according to my kids i just suck at it all......

you can't live on coffee alone...

maybe life is getting to busy and to full of stuff.. making it harder to blog because there is just too much. this last week was challenging... ok it was hard and it beat me up. i love my job it's perfect.. i have way to much fun there and love the people i work with. being at work is excellent. it's the before work and the after work that have been really hard. as most of you know this year i am taking the boys somewhere (this might change yet) but for now we have been going to a home day care. it's amazing.. they boys love it (when they are there), they talk about their new little friends and i know that they have the best time. but the morning consists of me fighting them to get out the door. poor little guys just want to hang in their pj's. they did really good at first with me leaving them there and each day it got worse.. till friday they were screaming for me to stay.. chasing after me as i ran out the door. uggg worse feeling in the world. of course when i would pick them up they would rather stay there. at home things were not so good either.. after they woke up from their nap it was never much fun.. i am sure they are just paying me back. it hurts though.. i don't want them to hate me or be unhappy with the situation.. i know it all takes time. so by the end of the day i have been so exhausted.. emotionally.
praying for a better week.
i had my first read through at the concert hall for the play... rewind to my announcement that i got a part in our community theatre's production of Little Women... a reminder that you can buy tickets at the City Office or online. Whew this is going to be intense.. the read through was so fun and I remember why I love this story so much. I do realize that it's going to require lots of work.. but I am ready.. or at least hopefully by November I will be...
to make the abandonment of my children even worse i left Friday for the city to stay for night to take in the Multiple Sale on saturday morning. We were selling stuff this year so it had to be dropped off Friday afternoon. i had the best time with M & K friday night.. she made yummy food and we drank Grandpa's killer wine and chatted the night away. felt so good. no one makes you feel more at home then when you stay at Chez Penner. the sale I must say was a major disappointment.. in the 4 or 5 that we have been too this one was the worst. i don't know if it was a lack in stuff or what but i came away with only 6 things!!! I ran some errands in the city and came home to my family. the rest of the day was great.. we played in the sand box with our new neighbours and had good friends for dinner... seriously if the rumor of Superstore not carrying Korean BBQ meat anymore is true.. at the Difran house some tears may be shed.
so now you are all caught up. i have not been taking a ton of pics lately. i will try to post more next time.
oh wait... i wanted to fill you in on my Norwex news. i have done two parties so far and have two possibly three booked for September.. it's going really well. i love it. i am happy to have taken the plunge and can't wait to keep making people happier one chemical free product at a time.

let's play catch up

What a weekend! What a crazy last couple of weeks. I know there has not been much "meaty" conversation coming from Our Life Voyage.. I hope to change all that soon. Now that life is going to get back to "normal" at least with some sort of consistency.
We celebrated our anniversary on Friday with a trip to the city (just the two of us). I had a successful shopping day and found some great pieces that fit nice. I needed a few more work wear clothes.. It was great to feel good about myself. We just had a great time being together.. we even held hands a lot. Something we don't do anymore. We laughed lots and just enjoyed time together. We ate at an All you can eat Japanese restaurant downtown which was AMAZING. not sure if it was just cause we have missed Sushi so much or what but man did we eat. I was so full when we left. Just like old times. Of course no ride home is complete without a stop at Starbucks. I feel content with my accomplishment of 4 years with such an amazing man. Marriage is not without it's difficulties but just like in anything the good usually surpasses the bad and whats bad only makes you grow more and adds strength to life.
I had been preparing for camping all week... not only in getting stuff ready but also my mind. See, I am not a camper. I am adventurous to some degree and not a princess but really who are we kidding.. living in a tent when I have a nice bed at home? Why? But I thought hey lets give it a try. We left Saturday afternoon for Spruce Woods with some friends of ours. We had fun moments... I did enjoy myself but when it came time for bed and all that involved yeesh... the boys did finally settle just in time for the wind/thunder/rain storm of my life... we all cuddled together and just waited for it to be over. I don't think I ever slept... with it being so hot in that tent (my kids were dripping wet) to the fact that by 3am the air in our mattress was gone and I was sleeping on rocks. It was challenging and made me grumpy. I sucked it up and we had a good day. It was on the cooler side and the threat of rain all day. So we decided to stay the day and head home after supper. I am so glad we stayed as long as we did and even happier to have come home a day early. This last night in my bed was one of the best of my life. We even all managed to sleep in till 9 this morning.
So all that to say I am happy I went and glad the kids had fun but so happy to be home. I have officially joined Crystal in saying that I am not sure I ever want to live beneath my means like that again. Although having a camper would make me try it again ;)