So, we're getting the Barth ready for it's first roadtrip - putting new tires and rims on, getting the propane system checked, etc. Pretty exciting, but also pretty stressful......so much to do before we have to leave! It's great, as it is forcing us to do a mini trip two weeks before we really move onto the road, so we can see what else we really need to get done. But it's also putting us under the gun to get a lot of stuff done NOW, and it's not so much fun to be in the thick of it. Our mantra is: it will be worth it in Dec, it will be worth it in Dec, repeat, repeat, repeat.

It's kind of ironic, as from the time we talked about moving away, Kea expressed very clearly that all she really wanted was ONE LAST HALLOWEEN in her neighbourhood. She wanted to see everyone's costumes, she wanted to go trick-or-treating on our street, she wanted to show off her jack-o-lanterns and she wanted to see the neighbours' fireworks. No problem, we're leaving Nov. 20th so there should be no issue with that.
Well, then, I found a fabulous doula course that I've been wanting to do FOREVER, and it's finally at a time when Jamie can be with the kids, it's easy for them all to come along so that I can still nurse Ryland in the evenings, and it's an intensive 4 days so not spread out over many weeks. It's in Twisp, WA, which is an interesting area to explore, and we have nothing else going on from Nov. 1-4th. PERFECT. I signed up, everything was moving forward, and then one day it just sort of clicked - WAIT A SECOND. Twisp is a 6 hour drive away. Halloween is the night before. The course starts at 8 am. Ugh.
We seriously debated driving late at night, and getting up at the crack of dawn (or even earlier!) in order to make it on time AND fulfill Kea's one and only wish that means the world to her. It was the plan for a couple of days, but neither of us felt overly comfortable with it. We're talking about driving over mountain passes on our first real road test with the Barth - yes, we've had EVERYTHING checked out, including new brakes and new tires. But in the dark. And in the rain. With tired drivers. This is sounding STUPID. I tried to see if I could miss some of the workshop, but it's not really an option. There are no buses for me to go ahead. We are gone too long to leave Kea behind....finally we had to sit Kea down and break her heart.
She did have a good cry, and was rather insistant that it's not fair that SHE has to give up what she wants, I should just give up my course, but I think we've come around to the other side. She's going to a Mexican Halloween celebration tomorrow with her favourite friends, in her costume. We'll put together fun goody bags with favourite candies for them to enjoy. We will carve pumpkins tonight. And I emailed contacts in Twisp to make sure that they do indeed celebrate Halloween - apparently Trick or Treating on Burger St. at the north end of town is very fun!!!!!! So that is the plan - drive over the N. Cascade highway during the day on the 31st, arrive in time to celebrate Halloween there, take my course from the 1st-4th, then drive through Osoyoos up into Princeton, spend a few days visiting the grandparents there (in time for my grandma's birthday!) and then home again for the weekend.

Now let's hope that we can get the Barth cleaned up by then, and fix the issue with the kitchen drawer falling open every time we turn a corner!

Family photos!

Yesterday we went down to Jericho Beach for some fun family photos with Ella Pederson - a friend who also took some great photos of the kids and me shortly after Ryland's birth. She emailed us a few early copies today (the joys of digital!) so I thought I would share them with you! Happy Fall :-)

On Saturday the Mountain View Cemetary hosted an All Souls night so we decided to throw a bit of a Halloween dinner party beforehand. We decorated the house with ghosts, spider web and fun candies....


and created fun foods to eat with neighbours, like mummified apple heads in punch, puking jack-o-lantern guacemole and mini jack-o-lantern pizzas!



Then we bundled up warm and wandered over to the cemetary, which was a very magical place to be on this crisp, windy evening.

Apparently there are over 2100 houses on the market right now in Vancouver. And in the past month, 70 have sold. Thank goodness ours was one of them!!!!! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!





We're out of our house on Nov. 20th (almost exactly 7 years to the day that we took possession!) and then heading south, towards the sun. Once we purge more, pack more and fix up the Barth!!!!!!

Well, the first offer fell through. We found out this morning, and were feeling rather disappointed and discouraged. However, by tonight we were negotiating over two more offers, and have signed onto another one so our moods are much better! Subjects are set to be removed on Tue, so we continue to sit on hold for a little bit longer and hope that this one is it!!!!

And looking back at it all, it's funny to see the journey to get us here, but of course this was the family who should have bought it from the beginning, it just took us a while to meet somewhere in the middle. If it all works out, we will be ECSTATIC to have them taking over our home! Continue keeping your fingers crossed for us - this market is crazy crazy these days!!!!

xoxoxoxo

Happy Thanksgiving!

We're stuffed with pumpkin waffles. Roasting a turkey for dinner. Juggling multiple offers for the house. Feeling very hopeful that we'll be on the road before Christmas!

Life is good!

obligatory baby in pumpkin shot!
Originally uploaded by the five mckays

So, check out this shot last year of Ryland sitting amongst the huge pumpkins at the Apple Barn. And this year, we returned so of course, I had to take another shot....... He's growing up so quickly, where is the time going?!

It was a BEAUTIFUL day to be outside, picking apples, jumping on the massive bouncy bubble-trampoline thing, petting animals, visiting the pumpkin patch and just running around. We feel happy, energized and ready to prepare our house yet again for an open house tomorrow!!!! Keep sending those positive vibes.......SOMEONE has to be sticking their fingers in their ears about all this depression era talk??!!!!!

Oh, and there's more photos from our adventures on flickr if you want to check them out.....

Hello!

We're still here, just feeling completely consumed with life, and not so inspired to write these days. I was commenting to Jamie the other day, it feels like the end of a pregnancy right now - everyone we call and everyone we run into wants to know "Have you sold yet? Have you sold?!" And when the answer is no, it makes us just want to hide out and not answer the same questions over and over and over again! I think everyone's just so astounded by how quickly the market crashed, and shocked that our house hasn't sold, and I know that it's all very positive and well-wishing and all, but it's a bit of a sore spot for us so it's hard to keep talking about it all the time!!!!!!!! But, we're doing what we can - we'd LOVE to sell it as we have so many wonderful plans vested on its sale, so we've lowered our price once again and are having another open house this Sat, and we'll see if the lower price brings in a buyer.

If not, we're working on plans B,C,D, etc and we'll see how it goes. Obviously we don't want to settle in for another winter here, but we will if we have to since it's kind of out of our hands! Then we'll put it back on the market in the spring, and see what happens then. Luckily for us, no matter what we're making a decent return on our house, and Jamie's still able to work for his company, so as frustrating as this seemingly stagnant and unknown time is, we're really in a great position and very lucky.

Not only have we been dealing with the stresses of trying to sell our house, constantly cleaning it for open houses and various viewings, but Jamie has gotten this BRUTAL cold that has made him sicker than a dog for a couple of weeks now....and now I see the kids are all coughing away. I'm hoping they'll have an easier time of it, as I've been dosing them up with vitamin C and ginger teas, but it's taking a lot of energy to deal with so many sickies. And then, can you believe it, the girls got head lice from a friend of theirs in school, and so we've been doing an insane amount of laundry, treatments and combing. Ugh. With all of that, PLUS every day life with three young kids, I'm feeling spent!

Luckily the sun is shining, and we're enjoying a beautiful fall this week! Tomorrow we're off to the Apple Barn, for U-Pick apples, the pumpkin patch, bouncy trampoline and general outdoor fun! I suspect there will be a photo or two from that adventure!

For now, Jamie has taken the kids out to the park for a bike ride, and I'm going to enjoy a couple of hours to myself - I've been sorting all of our negatives and photos, putting them in order and storing them safely and with easy access. Such a satisfying project, and timely as I'm amazed by how much I've already forgotten! Perhaps by the end of this year I will have caught up with all my scrapbooking/photo albums....that's my hefty goal!!!!!

Happy Thursday to you all!

It's so funny how the world works....Jamie and I have always felt that spending lots of time in the outdoors is extremely important for a healthy childhood. We take the kids camping as much as possible throughout the summer, including many midweek trips with a friend while Jamie was working. Watching the kids just play for hours on end, exploring the amazing world around them, full of excitement over all of their discoveries, falling asleep under the stars, waking up to birdsongs above their heads - we're all much happier, more at peace and full of awe when we're in the outdoors. (which is part of the reason we're so excited to start our journey - a full year of living largely outside!!!)

So you can imagine my excitement when a couple of weeks ago, a friend mentioned this concept they'd heard of kindergartens in the outdoors - what a brilliant concept! It's really inspired us to think about ways we can get the kids outside more on a day to day basis, and also dreaming of what we're going to do to our property next year.

And then today I open my email box to find a clip from Kip - he'd heard about this new preschool opening up in Carp and thought it would be something we would be interested in! WOW! Perhaps I can convince Meg and Ian to sign up too, and Ryland, Cameron and Etta can go off to preschool together in their woolies! I can just picture it!!!!!

(As a side note, Ryland's language is completely exploding these days - today he even said "copter" as he picked up his helicopter! Always so exciting to see this process! Anyways, one word he has articulated very clearly for a while now is OUTSIDE and he often drags us over to the door, throws our shoes at us and pleads persistantly to be taken outside! We've actually had to use the deadbolt as more than once we've discovered he's impatiently escaped and is down the sidewalk!!!!!!)

So, how surreal was that?! Yesterday morning we woke up not sure how we were going to spend the day, at 10 our realtor called to say that Chris Brown (a reporter for CBC) had called asking if we would be willing to do an interview for The National about trying to sell a house in today's market, and by 2:00 they were over in our living room taping!!!! I was less enthusiastic about it than Jamie, just from the perspective that I HATE public speaking, but it was definitely a fun adventure!!! I guess Chris had come through one of our open houses, and although the house wasn't what he was looking for he really loved the space and thought that it was a great house. Nice to know people appreciate our home - now we just need to find the family who wants to buy it!!!!!!


We were kind of chuckling, as after 3 very successful open houses in terms of turnout, but not successful in terms of offers, we were starting to feel a little discouraged, but also like there was nothing we could do and we felt a bit stagnant. So, you know, we thought we'd call in Peter Mansbridge and post it on The National to see if that gets us our buyers?! What a laugh!



Check out the Barth in the background here - finally home and ready to start fixing up the inside. Oh, and please excuse the crappy photos, I must have been nervous or something, I got eyes closed and awkward angles on every one of my photos from the afternoon!!!!!

Newsflash....

If you get the chance, watch the CBC news at 6 (Pacific time) and the National at 10 tonight, as Jamie and I are supposed to be on the news! And no, Clare, we did not find a body or anything!!!!!!!!

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY Clare!

so lawyerly!
Originally uploaded by the five mckays

We were over in Victoria this weekend, celebrating the fact that my sister Clare is now officially a lawyer. She was called to the bar on Thur, in a very official if not overly disorganized ceremony - I probably would have found it much more interesting if I wasn't forced to sit in an overstuffed, stifling hot court room while they worked out their equipment glitches for FORTY-FIVE minutes. Luckily the girls were amazingly patient during the whole thing, Jamie was willing to take Ryland out for a big runaround, and we got to eat yummy food at Milestones afterwards!!!!!!! You can see more photos on my flickr account (click on the photo of Clare to get there)