"He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There won't be death anymore. There won't be any grief, crying, or pain"

I am sure your having a blast in Heaven, Aidan wants to know if there are any tractors there.

We love you and miss you and can't wait to see you.

Levi Joel Harder

Born and died August 28, 2001

Two more weeks of summer........

I have been working on this post for quite a few days now, I found it hard to blog after my last post, which was so heavy.
Aidan and I had a good talk about Mrs.Klassen's baby, and heaven, and his cousin Levi, and my Auntie Martha. He was sad to hear the news, asking why and I couldn't give him the answer. I told him that sometimes God makes babies too perfect for our earth.
I knew we had been talking alot about Heaven and hell when this morning when I had the kids in superstore, Aidan pronouced loudly in the produce section that people who don't love God go to Hell. I am sure everyone around us heard, I asked him to talk quieter but then thought to myself, he is only saying the truth. Now if we could only learn from his boldness.
Last week Aidan and Cassidy enjoyed an entire week at Granny and Grandpa's farm. I had Liam here in Winnipeg. Liam and I did alot of running around that I can't do with all three kids. The kids had a blast and we headed to Brandon for the weekend to meet my parents and spend some time with Steve's parents. Steve also had some work to do on the Brandon house, and we had a realitor come through it. Which means we are hopeing to list it in September. We have a tenant in there currently and he will be there till it is sold. Steve plans on doing some touch up stuff, laying some new flooring in the kitchen and putting a new sink/vanity in the downstairs bathroom as well as some painting. With this done we hope to list it for a decent price.
As for our kitchen renos....the new countertop is in but that is about it. The whole project hasn't got much attention lately, we just have too many things on the go. Hopefully we can get the cupboard doors up and hardware on. Plus we need to decide on a backsplash.
I had a photoshoot last week at St.Boniface Basilica and here are a few shots before the family had arrived.





and.....Aidan, at the playground in Brandon.

one last thing, TWO WEEKS TILL SCHOOL STARTS!! I am SO excited!! The kids are so bored, I am sick of entertaining them and ready to get back to regular schedule. Not excited about paying for it but we are trusting that God will work out those details.

Today was just an ordinary day when I went to get the mail. I opened up the mail to find a birth announcment from Aidan's kindergarten teacher. I know Aidan would be excited to open it and find out what his teacher had.
When I read the announcment, it read born and passed away. My heart dropped to know that for some reason, they lost there little boy. I began to think about when Laura lost Levi. Why do these things happen is beyond my understanding.
God only knows.
I ask you to pray for this family. This was there first born.
I only know her as Aidan's teacher, but Aidan was rather attached to her and the fact she was going to have a little one was very exciting to him.
My heart breaks as a mother.
To view a very emotional slideshow of this little one,
http://www.jeremyhiebert.ca/jaybenjaminklassen/

BUSY! Yes, and I haven't even gone though the camping photos from the weekend. We had a good weekend camping with our family, my parents even took Aidan and Cass home for the week so it is just Liam here. I have been swamped with photoediting from photoshoots and actually was glad two shoots got cancelled from the HUGE amount of rain that is falling right now. Gives me some time to play catch up before my shoot tonight.

I will post some more pics soon, but in the meantime, I have been slowly updating my photography website with new pics, check it out!

also, did I mention our coutertops arrived? Not quite 4-6 weeks, more like 4-6 days! So hopefully by the time the kiddos arrive home it will be installed. Now if only we can come to agreement on a backsplash!

Halway done...

Summer is halfway over, can you believe it??
The kids just finished there two weeks of swimming lessons. They both did well and really enjoyed it. They were both really challenged this year and it was good for them. Aidan has some work to do on his distance front crawl and Cassidy has work to do on her roll over float. I have really noticed how much more confident they were in the water this year and not afraid to do anything. I have always thought swimming lessons are good for kids, especially if you are at the lake alot.After there swimming was done, I promised them a trip to build a bear. They have been eyeing and saving for a while now and have been counting down the days. I saved some money by getting the outfits for there animals off of ebay and they still got to get there animals at the store. I can not believe how much a person can spend at that store, highly overrated!!

Now if you were wondering where Liam was during all this, he sat patiently every morning through swimming lessons. It was just too much to put them all in at the same time. I plan on putting Liam in while the kids are in school. He also had no desire to get a Build a bear, which was a bonus for me, and just wanted a $2.99 mickey mouse from the Disney Store clearence.

I have been doing lots more photography lately and in the next few weeks, seems like everyone has family pictures on there mind! I have a shoot next week with 13 people, and am a tad nervous on the big size but excited since I already know the family with be a blast.

This past week the kids also attended Vacation Bible School at the NK mb church This church is a short walk from our place, not the one we regularly attend. They had alot of fun. Thursday evening they had a closing program, here are a few pictures of the kids singing. Can you find them in the crowd?
As for other news, Steve started ripping apart our kitchen. We ordered a new countertop last week, although it will take about 4-6 weeks since it is a custom order. We also replaced the lighting and we are refacing all of our cupboards. They will be a swiss coffee color, (just a fancy way of saying off white) and we will add some nice black hardware. I am SO excited to say goodbye to my dark and outdated kitchen. It feels good to get things accomplished on this house.