Spring is Springing

The snow has been melting for a few days now. It is still melting, and the corresponding dirt and slush are turning it into that in-between ugly that comes after the beauty of pristine winter but before the freshness of green and spring flowers. Before it got ugly, though, we spent an hour after supper one day frolicking in the snow with our two dogs and three cats. Actually, the cats didn't frolic. Rascal kept threatening to wander away, but since he's the only one that is neutered, he is unlikely to go far. The dogs had fun though - Estrella found an deer antler and chewed on it at length on one side of a snow hill, and Sushi pounced around in the slush with the girls and jumped on me when I fell in the snow on the other side of the snow hill. It was a good thing that Estrella and Sushi were not aware of each other, because they go for the throat. The grey cat inadvertently got left outside and Jessa had a panic because technically Mini is hers but Jovani found him huddling under the back deck, hissing at Estrella, who was barking her fool head off at him. He was afraid to move, but Jovani rescued him.

During our snow play the girls lined up lying down side-by-side on the snow, and Mommy-of-the-lousy-aim did her best to use them as snowball target practice. They easily avoided my snowballs, even the big ones, but I had a heart-stopping moment when I hit Jessa right in the face. I expected a big wail. Of the three, she has the lowest tolerance for pain and discomfort. While I held my breath she dug the snow out from behind her glasses, wiped off her face and turned to me with a grin and a laugh. Phew! She's growing up, and I'm glad because she has been the one it has been most difficult to tell if she is truly in pain or if it has been much ado about nothing.

Last night was parent-teacher interviews at Aislinn's school. I've had a bit of drama with one of her teachers - her Language Arts and Religion teacher. As a by-the-by, this woman is going to Belize soon to assist in incorporating the Alberta school curriculum into the Belizean curriculum, to upgrade the level of education in Belize. Anyway, it seems that Aislinn has been underperforming in her class. We went from Aislinn's French teacher who said, "Your girl is doing FABULOUS" and "She has a real future in French", and "She's such a sweet girl" to the Language Arts and Religion teacher who is underwhelmed by Aislinn's effort. We figured out a couple of things - 1) Aislinn is intimidated by this teacher and 2.) Religion class does not equal "spiritual studies". The homework on "What do you think God's purpose for you in life is?" was NOT adequately answered by, "To love and to serve God and to be the best person I know how to be." I encouraged her in that answer - it sums it up, and all the rest is detail. However, the teacher wanted the detail. So, because it was my fault that Aislinn handed so little in, I am making her do the assignment over again over Easter so that the teacher can see what Aislinn is really capable of - and she can re-evaluate it or not. Jovani and I are both working on encouraging Aislinn to not be intimidated. She got over her fear of her phys ed teacher already, she can get over this difficulty and concentrate on doing as well as we know she is capable of doing. How very strange that Aislinn would graduate from one teacher who says, "I can tell that writing runs in the family" to one who says, "Aislinn isn't showing that she knows how to write." Sigh. Then, after that teacher, two more raved about how much improvement they've seen in Aislinn since the beginning of the year and how hard she works and how well she's participating in class. It really makes a difference how one feels about one's teacher.

Nabloclan Bookkeeping Services is now officially registered with CRA, I have a GST number and business is slowly but surely trickling in. A family whose taxes I did at H&R Block have brought me their business, which initially I thought was kind of them, and then I realized, these people have such strange lives - which is evident by their receipts - and they are just "normal" enough to know that their lives are strange that they wouldn't want to have to go through giving all that information out to another tax preparer! I thoroughly enjoy my work, and much of that is in enjoying the quirks of humanity.

Mom and Dad and much of the Fort St. John family have been in Saskatoon for the past two weeks, and depart for FSJ tomorrow. They won't be bringing Mom and Dad here because apparently my cats are a serious problem for Coral, and she can't stay in the same house overnight with them. Sigh. I didn't know how allergic Coral is until after we got Rascal for Meadow's birthday. Robin has fun with the cats while he's here. I thought the obvious answer was to put two of the three in the barn, but Jovani is protesting that because HE's attached to them in the house - but he's also attached to having Coral stay overnight here once in a while. He didn't realize until we got Meadow's cats that he prefers cats to dogs - though he loves the dogs too. It is a dilemma. Coral doesn't come so frequently that it seems a fair trade off to permanently kick the cats out, but we would like for her to come as infrequently as she does.
My husband is a big softy, and his heart is genuinely torn.

And I guess that's all she wrote for today.