My Life as a Mom

Okay, so it's a little early, but just a very little! Zachary Michael Yanos is (just about) five months old! That is so crazy to me! He's getting so big so fast, and it doesn't matter how much I make the time to enjoy him, it still goes by way too fast! I am loving this little guy, and I'm loving that I feel good and am enjoying him. It's kinda crazy, I actually find that I am less stressed with five kids than I was with two, three or four. I guess I've learned a lot from the other four! Zachary has made a lot of big steps this month. He now has really good head control, so that opens up a whole world of possibilities for him. He now sits in his Bumbo - and tries to eat his toes. He plays in his play-toy-thing...I don't know what to call it, but he likes it, and he loves his jolly jumper, especially if he has the mirror out to watch himself.  (Wow, what a run on sentence!) We are having fun as he is very free with his smiles now and he recognizes our voic

Halloween 2009 - The Addams Family One of the best things about being out in BC this summer, has been that my kids have had the opportunity to get to know their Yanos grandparents better. We live in the same town as my parents, so my kids have grown up with them, and all of them have great relationships with my parents. They have been to my kids dance recitals, soccer games, skating competitions and school functions. My parents know my kids individually and have different relationships with each kid. It's been great having them around while our kids are growing up. My in-laws haven't had that same opportunity because they have always lived quite a distance away, and they don't come to visit very often. When they do come, it's always for a quick visit as they are on their way somewhere else, or coming from somewhere else. This fact has always made me a little sad. Grandparents are such an important part of a child's life. I grew up with both sets of grandparen

So, I have 8x10  pictures of each of my kids in my livingroom and they are all nicely bordering a painting (Gorgeous, done by my Dad and given to me just a couple years ago - I've been wanting it all my life!). This arrangement has worked perfectly for me, when I get new pictures taken I change out the old ones and it works great. Well, now I have a problem. I now have five children, not four. Five pictures doesn't nicely frame a painting, and I am NOT moving my painting. So. I guess I need a sixth picture. And here is the answer to my problem....a picture of Michael and I with the kids' pictures. I'm actually really happy with how the picture turned out. It was the end of the day and Michael and I had been being goofy all day having fun with the kids. I pulled my hair out of my ponytail (Notice the frizz!) and handed the camera to our eleven year old. But really, I think it may be one of my favourite pictures of us.  At first I wasn't crazy about it, 'cause I

Heather, my girl. Heather is such a delightful teenager. She is seventeen years old and really causes us very little grief. Heather has been living with us for almost three years now, and things have been fantastic. She is very pleasant and happy and likes to make people laugh. Heather is a great big sister, she is best friends with Natasha, she is finding common ground with Peter, is learning a lot from David and loves to sit in front of Zac and make him laugh and smile. She is very helpful and willingly baby-sits for me when I need her to. When I first met Heather, she was eight years old and was a little awkward with affection, but we desperately craving it. Since then Heather has become our hugger. She has no problems with throwing her arms around us and telling us how much she loves us. She is even starting to turn her Grandpa and Grandma Yanos into more affectionate people. If Grandpa Yanos doesn't get his hug from her, he starts teasing her until he gets it - and she loves e

Zachary, my baby. There is nothing that makes time fly faster than having a baby. It seems like the last four months have flown by. Yes, my baby is four months old. He is such an amazing baby! Everyone comments on how bright and alert he is, and I get several people saying that most babies aren't that alert until they are much older. From the day Zachary was born, he's been a very alert baby. When he's awake he's awake and when he's asleep he's asleep. He looks at everyone and examines faces, he loves it when people talk to him and he definitely has his favourite people (Mom, Dad and David). Zachary is so easy to put to bed, I wrap him in a blanket, give him a soother and lay him on his stomach and he goes to sleep. Even if he doesn't go to sleep immediately, he will often lay there content until he does fall asleep. Yesterday I came in to check on him about 10 minutes after I had laid him down and found him completely wiggled out of his blanket, soother gon

 Oh, David, my little monster. David is three years old, going on fifteen. He is super adorable and a little cheeky! He has added a lot of spice to our lives. He loves to learn about everything and asks "why" ALL the time! But he is actually trying to learn, and he remembers the answers that he's given - not that it stops him from asking again. Of all of our kids David is the one that constantly leaves us asking "He said what?!?" Because he comes up with the craziest things. Today at the dinner table he said that he wanted more water, when I told him to go ahead and get some, he looked at me with very sad and tired eyes and said "but I don't want to get off my butt..." It was so adorable that I just had to smile and get him some water (After he asked nicely!) David has absolutely loved being a big brother, which I was a little worried about because, let's face it, he's spoiled. With three older siblings, the youngest eight years his senio

Natasha is our peace maker. She is very easy going and makes friends everywhere she goes. She loves everyone to get along and makes sacrifices regularly so that others can be happy. Natasha is very tender hearted and gets her feelings hurt easily. She is an amazing big sister to both David and Zachary and finds great joy in helping with them. She was eight years old when David was born and we worried that there might be some jealousy over not being the baby anymore, but it didn't phase her at all, she was so happy to have a baby in the house and just wanted to learn about him and take care of him as much as she could. Natasha is now eleven years old and is growing up way to fast! She has started becoming interested in make up, clothes, fashion magazines, boys and jewelry. But she still has her old favourites too: Skating, art, barbies and crafts. Natasha has been learning how to crochet and wants to start knitting as well. She has also been working with her Grandma Schindler on qu

 Peter is our oldest boy. He is thirteen (Hard to believe he's so old now!)  Peter has offered us some of our biggest challenges so far in parenting, but he has also given us some of our biggest rewards. Peter has a really big heart and he easily loves, but he has a really hard time trusting people and doesn't know how to express that. He probably doesn't even fully understand that the problem is trust. He is afraid to get hurt by other people, so if he feels that it could possibly happen, he starts to make a fool of himself to cushion himself from the hurt. Peter is always eager to help and wants to make people happy, he thrives on the joy that comes from serving others and does not like to see people hurt. He is very protective of his family (especially his little sister) and finds joy in other people's joy. Peter has always been a very inquisitive child. He has a question for everyone at anytime and loves to talk to people. The neat thing about it, is that he actu

So I finally got around to getting my kids' pictures taken. I have a friend that is a photographer and she was super good to work with. We took the kids out to a canola field just north of town and she brought this amazing trunk to pose with and it turned out fabulous! Unfortunately, Heather was still in Kimberly working, so she's not in the shoot, but I got the other four done, now I just need to find a way to get hers done! I will post more pics in the following posts, 'cause I want to do a post on each of them. But here is a sneak peak. I LOVE how they turned out, and I'm totally using Andrea to do my family pics in the fall-even if I have to drive to Edmonton for them!

a bunch of the family waiting to start a get to know you game We had our Weiss family reunion mid July. I LOVE family reunions, I mean I REALLY LOVE them. I love seeing how people change and how families grow, I love watching all the grand kids and great grand kids play. I love to see people connect like it hasn't been two years since they last saw each other. I love the reminiscing and the stories that are told (This year I learned about my aunt driving the car into the house with my mom in it - my mom was like a year old and my aunt six. Then later that day, my grandma rolled the car with both kids in it -neither in a seat belt of course- and miraculously, no one was hurt more than scratches!) I also love the feelings that are there, everyone is happy and helpful and really interested in everyone else's life. Not in the "I just love gossip" kind of way, but genuinely interested. More of the line! If you don't have family reunions like this, I'

So I've decided that I need to use up some of the stuff I have all over my house. I have piles of fabric, scrapbook stuff, yarn, paint and other random craft supplies. Some of the stuff I've bought over the years, some I've "Inherited" from my mom and other neighbours, and a TONNE of the fabric is from my aunt. She loves fabric and accumulated lots over the years, now she owns a fabric store (which is pretty exciting for me!) But as she comes upon fabric she doesn't want anymore, she passes it along to me, which is pretty awesome! So anyway, with all the stuff I have, I've decided that I need to start using it instead of just accumulating it. So a while ago I got several pieces of plaid fabric from my aunt and I've been trying to think of what I wanted to do with it. So I came up with a plan! Shorts...matching shorts...for the girls...no, the boys...no...ALL the kids...although Zac doesn't need shorts....but it would be too cute not to make him s