Lol, so yesterday my troop of boys was loaded into a Step 2 red wagon, and boy is that thing nice! I love it so far. . .the boys LOVE it! We made a trip to the park for a picnic lunch and then to the playground. It was . . . fun. Anyway I am really glad I finally got one, they go fast when they are in store, so I basically raced to Walmart when I found out they had three in stock. It will definitely be a life-saver for many things, but I am not sure that with the wheels on it will fit into my trunk! Can’t win em all I guess.

Well I really had nothing to say, other than that. AND my vacume cleaner broke so that will be something FUN to spend money on. Ugh. Better go and tend to my naughty boys. . .

Hugs!

Martine & the boys

 

I thought I would give out some love to my two favorite shows on the tele right now, and encourage others to watch them too. These are two shows I definitely NEVER want to see go off the air!

BREAKING BAD - Channel AMC

Wicked awesome show, starring the dad from the old Malcolm In The Middle, but don’t be fooled by his past under looked role!! He is a STUNNINGLY amazing actor and shows off all of his skills in Breaking Bad. It’s got me addicted for sure! He is basically a Science teacher in a high school who finds out that he has Cancer and not much time left.  To ensure that he leaves enough money for his family (his pregnant wife and a handicapped teen-aged son), he starts up a meth lab partnering with an old student of his. I should add that he is soon called a “king pin” because he is so talented with science and in the lab, that the meth is of course of phenomenal quality.  A twist is that his brother-in-law just happens to be the head of the drug unit with the police! It’s SO well done, the acting & writing of this show is impeccable.  Seriously if you haven’t tuned into it yet, DO! The first season has now ended and should be available on DVD soon, but the second season has now been ordered for 13 new episodes. . .I can’t wait!!

FLIGHT OF THE CONCHORDS - HBO

Man this had me laughing so hard the first time I saw it, I could hardly control it, and the sad thing is that it gets even funnier the next time! This duo is HILARIOUS, and they are SO amazingly talented it should be illegal. Two guys from New Zealand have a real band, and they incorporate their songs in with their show. If you do not have that great of a sense of humor, it will be interesting to you (there is never a dull moment), and if you do, you will need to grab onto the sides of your chair to keep from falling!! Watch it! You will NOT be disappointed!

Of course an honorable mention HAS to be said for my favorite British com, called TWO PINTS OF LAGER (and a packet of crisps). About 5 Brits who are hilarious, weird and really likeable. I wish the show hadn’t ended at season 7. . .

Anyway just thought I would share those tidbits of info with you about some really good shows to check out this year! THEY will have you addicted!

Much love!

Martine

Oh I am tired! In between doing photography shoots, trying to keep an eye on the boys, and web design, I had a dog show this last weekend. Even though I was only showing one dog for a friend of mine, I am exhausted, just not as used to it as I once was!! Not to mention the boys were all there, and very much work.

I REALLY screwed up today though. . . Vincent was SO excited and has been SO excited about going into Junior Handling for this dog show and competing in Pee Wees, and I showed up right at noon as was LATE to enter him, so he didn’t get to go! Poor Vincent, he sat there at ringside staring forlornly into the ring while the other kids showed, and he just looked so disappointed! The worst part is, I have no one to blame but myself!! I will say though. . it is hard to get three kids and a dog out the door! I just can’t believe I did that to him. . I feel terrible, and he says to me when we got home that he thought his heart was broken because he couldn’t show a dog. I wasn’t expecting that he actually would love it so much, it looks like I might have to invest in some handling classes for him! Anyway, the Juniors judge or girl in charge of Juniors told me I should have come and talked to her to get him in the ring. Really, she’s such a nice girl, I appreciated her saying that anyway.

Otherwise the weekend was good. Yesterday the judge didn’t even glance my way so I knew we didn’t have a chance, but today, I noticed the judge was REALLY looking at my bitch for breed, and she did really well so the owner and I were both happy! The boys were a bit of a challenge for everyone, I will NOT be bringing all of them to a show together until they are much older, or unless I invest in BULK leashes for the boys, lol. Vincent was telling what a great job I was doing WHILE I was in the ring and even tried running in, lol! Too cute, but it sure wasn’t the time, hard for me to ignore it, that’s for sure!

I took some pictures of the Juniors because my friends daughter was showing a fox terrier and it’s AMAZING the things, and people that it picks up in the background, stuff that I wasn’t even paying attention to . . .some pretty FUNNY stuff I must say, lol! You can just zoom right in to anything that it picks up on the wide angle. I just love my camera for action shots, it’s so much fun! I feel like the paparazzi, lol, snapping away, it’s GREAT!

Well we did some show training & photos with my friends German Shepherds, and here’s a tip: Never allow children to participate, they get in the way of the best shots, I SWEAR, lol! But so it goes.

So I am sharing some pics from the Saskatoon Show, and I stopped by the traintracks afterwards and did some pictures of the boys, but unfortunately baby Nicholas was too afraid to go anywhere near them, he just booked it right back to the car, lol! Oh, and of course a pic of my male German Shepherd Bob, he is the BIG black one!!

Let me know what you think!

Thanks to everyone for your letters & notes of support about my son. . .greatly appreciated. He is doing well, but still we have not found a diagnosis. It is highly unlikely that he is autisic, or has aspergers, because of the high level of communication/eye contact he has.  It was nice to meet someone today that had a child with exactly the same issues!! The only downside was that her son did not outgrow the bahaviours until he was 12 years old!! Eek! It’s just been such a stressful issue, and one that really is very unique, so people really have a hard time understanding. . .good thing my landlord does, or I would be out of a place to live!

Well, in the midst of all of this, we are getting excited as we have made the bookings for a camping trip this summer!! I haven’t been camping in a long time, and the kids have not been yet, so this will be such a blast!! Vincent is already asking so many questions and thinks he needs to pack already, lol. I am really excited about this, I really need a vacation too!!!!!

Haven’t had much time for anything lately! It’s been hectic here, there is so much going on right now, it’s fun, and exciting, but sometimes stressful. Sooo, I guess I will try and keep this updated more often, it’s so hard lately; I’m sorry!

Hugs and have a great week!

Martine & the trio of boys

Well I must say I am not too impressed by the changes at wordpress and I hope they get all the glitches and problems fixed soon! I am not able to upload any photos because the box pops up so low on my screen and I am not able to move it up. I have switched one of my blogs over to blogger.com because it was the second site that came up on googling “free blogs” but I hope I don’t have to!! I much prefer wordpress.

Things have been busy around here for sure! I have been doing a lot graphic design for various dog breeders, but lately my hands have been giving me a lot of problems with the long hours and my back as well. I am not sure what I will do with my web design, I LOVE it, and I love doing the Victorian designs the most, however, I am finding it hard to get a good market out there for the Victorian themed designs.  There are a LOT of amazing competition out there!! It just seems such a shame to give up something that I have been doing for many years and toss it aside, but it’s definitly not something I want to make my career.  I would like to continue doing it now and then when I am asked, as a hobby, but other than that I really don’t see how I can keep working steady full time on designs when I am incredibly busy with everything else in my life!

Other than that things have been good. . .struggling as this is the first month my rent went up by $150 and sad because I am still having problems with my soon to be 3 year old. The doctors suspect he may have a form of high functioning autusm called Aspergers. I have been doing a lot of research on it, and I am still not convinced, but he is such a young child too so we will see. . .Let’s just say I definitly have more stress then I can handle right now, so I hope that NOBODY gives me a hard time, please and thank you.

Well it was nice to check in again, but I have really been slacking off when it comes to reading my bloggy friends new posts, I am so far behind I am scared I don’t have the time now! I am so sorry! Anyway hopefully I will catch up sometime this week. My goal is to spend as much time AWAY from the computer as possible so who knows how those two goals with collide.

Sincerely,

Martine

Well here it is. The month I have been dreading. Rent goes up by $150 but nothing else does.  Somehow I know I will get through this, I have to for my children.  My boys? Well they are bratty to say the least.  Vincent got up before the break of dawn and him and his brother snuck down the stairs whilst everyone else was sleeping and took every single Easter egg in the house and ate the majority of poor baby Nicholas’s Easter basket treats.  Yes, that would be Easter in my home. I was not pleased.  Going to the church Easter service was, however, lovely. My mom and Aunt & Uncle met with us there and it was a little bit of a struggle to get all of the boys through the door and pretty much shoved into the playroom. Let me tell you, my patience has been short lately with my little terrors. There is not much that they won’t break, mess, wreck, or puke on.  My whole house looks like a tornado came through it and two out of three boys have bright red marker all over their faces that is NOT coming off. Not only that, but my vacuum cleaner is practically broken because of all of the plaster it has had to clean up from Christian’s obsessive head-banging. Oh well. . .

I am not exactly looking forward to this week, since ALL of them will be home.  It doesn’t leave me much room for any sort of productivity around the house, but I suppose I have to force myself to drudge along and spend some quality time with the boys. It always makes me feel like a spectacular mother when I am done, but just pushing myself to actually do it. . .is another story all together.

Well there. I said it. I am completely busy and not committed to it at all. Yet I love & miss my bloggy friends and my family always nags me about keeping it up better. Don’t take it personal, it’s not you. It’s me.  I have given myself a very small window of time to spend on the computer so that my kids get my full attention, my back doesn’t ache and my hands don’t have carpal tunnel attacks. Within this small window, I put my work obviously as a priority, and if getting to your e-mail doesn’t fall within that time bracket, then I am sorry, you probably won’t hear back from me for about 2-3 days tops.  So friends, stop being concerned and bugging me about my poor responce times, it’s hard!

 Anyway, I am definitely very excited about the upcoming week. I have a lot of wonderful opportunities awaiting me, and I am really anxious to get going! I have briefly put my web design to a slow down, because of my carpal tunnel and the fact that I burning out from being so busy all of the time, in between raising my three adorable yet naughty little boys.  So be patient with me. . .I will be back soon

 Miss you all, God bless!

Martine & the boys

Sorry! I have been away from blogging way too long, it’s been a madhouse over here! One thing after another, but finally everyone seems to be back to good health, and settling down. 

Odd to say, that I really have nothing to talk about, even after being gone from the blog for so long. Kelly is finally feeling better, which has been great! I took my mom out on Friday night for her birthday present and we went to go see “The Other Boelyn Girl”, awesome movie!!! We grabbed a couple of drinks afterwards at a local Irish pub, and it was actually really comfy. I’m just glad mom had fun and enjoyed herself, she deserves it! Other than that, I have been working on a couple of websites, and doing some photography. I have also decided it is time to go back to belly dancing. It has been a few weeks and I sure miss the friends and the good times, it’s also a great way to stay in shape! Or in my case, get in shape, lol.

I am so boring. . .oh well. I better go then, but thought I would pop in to say, yes I am still alive!!

Well I can’t say “yet again” I have a reminder, but for the first time, someone ripped me off with my graphic design.  I worked really hard for someone, corresponding back and forth for a long time, until she finally had a graphic that she said “I love it!” and has been using it. . .for months, without paying for it.  After several e-mails and two phone messages later, I finally told this person that if she was not going to pay, then she must remove the graphics from her website, and that if they remained there, she would have her name put on a “Failure to pay/graphic theft” client list on my public website and blog.  Well it came off her website within an hour so I know she was paying attention.  Yuck! I have certainly learned my lesson, about being so trusting for sure. I have since started watermarking all of my work as “sample” or ” property of Martine Sansoucy”, and once I receive payment I send the original work.  I guess the whole experience just made me sad. . .

Aside from that I had a pretty good day! My mom had my oldest Vincent for a sleepover and I got to spend some alone time with my youngest boys.  Then they all helped make home-made pizza’s for supper and fruit shakes, what a mess, lol! But they ate EVERYTHING! I find that it usually helps with picky eaters to let them help with making what they eat, they will almost always “try” something that they make. I was pretty productive today too.  I got some laundry done, some cleaning, and am working on three projects right now for web design so that is always something I enjoy. My Leita is such a doll, she needs to learn to take food nicer though. . .she likes to try and take your fingers off, lol.

Anyway I really have nothing to say, so until I do, take care everyone!

Hugs! Martine & the boys

We had a lovely evening spent at mom’s house, for a home cooked spagetti meal, which was delicious! I have a “feet” project involving feet (obviously) and children, so I got some shots of the boys getting tickled and it was so sweet!

As well, Bob our giant bi-color German Shepherd male lounging around, just generally always looking amused or sniffing around just “in case” one of the boys messed in their diapers.  He’s such a goof, as always doesn’t know quite how big he is, lol!

My kids were actually relatively well behaved for the shopping outing today, and that was a refreshing change for me.  Anyway, thought I would share, I know it is a LOT of pictures for a blog, but oh well. Till next time.

Bob

Mom’s Decor

Mom’s home-made lampshade

Vincent laughing

Vincent getting tickled

Christian getting tickled

Another one of mom’s home-made lampshades

Mom’s refinished corner cupboard

Mom’s new antique desk, painted and refinished by her. It’s gorgeous!

Nicholas and the spagetti supper