T makes his entrance

Well, it's been a few weeks since I last posted, and they have certainly been evenful. Little T, baby boy made his entrance a week before my scheduled c-section. It seems to be my fate to have wonderful easy pregnancies and nightmare deliveries.

It was not fun, let's leave it at that. And T ended up spending a week in the NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit) as a result of how not fun it was. I am trying to focus on not being angry at being sidelined for 10 hours when I went in expecting to be taken straight in for a section.

He is beautiful and wonderful and we have been home for a week so we are completely sleep deprived and humourless at this point. M is handling his arrival very well, although she is not thrilled with the fact that she can't play with him, and she is acting up a bit (which began when Mummy was away in the hospital for a whole week, she has never been without me for more than a couple of hours, so it's understandable) but on the whole she is quite gentle with him and loving.

In other horror stories, the "Cons" got elected again. Which is horrific, but frankly what do we deserve with the lowest voter turnout since the 50s? Makes you shake your head. Canadians complain bitterly about whatever government we get, but you have to vote or you have no right to complain.

"Happy birthday, Samantha. Make a wish. " ........"It already came true. "

I return to my blog with an ulterior motive. Backpacking Dad (http://backpackingdad.blogspot.com/) has a giveaway of 2 notebooks from John Hughes movies, Sixteen Candles and The Breakfast Club. Two of my favourite movies of all time, because I am nothing if not an 80s girl.

The challenge is to write about which character I would be. Which is a bit of a poser, because let's face it, as much as we love them, none of those characters is really how we would want to see ourselves. They all have serious flaws, and yet it's those flaws, rather exaggerated for dramatic effect, that make the characters so relatable.

In high school, I was probably most like Samantha from Sixteen Candles. Not because my family ignored me, I was essentially an only child (three much older half siblings aside) and I have nothing to complain of in that regard. But because I was neither cool kid nor uber-geek. I was a good student, with fun friends, but I didn't run with the most popular crowd (mind you, in a grad class of 21 students, 20 girls and 1 guy, there was not a huge distinction) and I didn't spend my time breeding fruit flys.

I suffered from typical teenage angst, I wanted so much to be noticed by guys, but I was really shy. There is no better example of this than my grade 11 year, when we attended the annual "Computer Dance" at a local boy's school. If you never went to one of these, you filled out a form and supposedly the computer matched you with a boy at the school. At the dance you spent some time talking and had a couple of dances with the guy in question, and this was intended to break the ice and get the party going at the first dance of the school year.

Imagine my horror and ecstasy when I was paired with my dream guy... gorgeous, popular, on the rugby team... and super nice as it turns out. He did his best to talk to me, but I was so paralyzed by shyness I could barely put a few words together. All in vain as it turns out, because he had a long term girlfriend from another girl's school. Sigh.

So I didn't get the guy, at least not that time. But in grade 12 I finally figured out what Samantha learns at the end of the movie, that guys are people too. And eventually I got a love life.
I guess what makes me like Samantha today is that although I have a great life, 2 gorgeous children and a great husband, I still sometimes see the "cool" people and wish I fit in there too.
The difference is that now I know that my few friends are really much more cool than the popular kids, and much better suited to my particular brand of nerdiness (I'm a literature / languages/ arts nerd) than those so-called cool people would be.

Many many years after I saw Sixteen Candles and The Breakfast Club for the first of many times, a wonderful man bought me all of the John Hughes movies on DVD for Christmas one year. He is the amazing sweet man I married and he is the father of my two beautiful children. Meeting him made all my wishes come true.

"Baby brother loves his stickers!"

8 weeks to go until Baby Boy makes an appearance, and of course there's still a lot to get done.
The office is basically moved downstairs to share with D, just a bit of junk still lingering that I have to deal with this week because this weekend the carpet and wallpaper come out.

Over the next couple of weekends the room should be transformed into a nice baby room.
There are still lots of things to pick up. I haven't been buying too much yet but I need to go through M's baby clothes for suitable gender-neutral wear then buy what we need from there. Since we weren't sure she was a girl, I didn't buy much girly stuff until after she was born, so there should be some reusable things.

I am still (touch wood) feeling pretty great by and large. Very pregnant, but healthy.

M is being very sweet about her baby brother. Yesterday she stuck stickers all over my shirt right on my belly, for baby brother. I was not allowed to take them off all day... lol.
She still has her moments, though. I am not naive enough to suppose it will all go smoothly. Yesterday she said she wanted her crib back... I know she really doesn't, it's more her concern about the baby having things that are hers. She's been sleeping in her bed for weeks and I am quite sure if we tried to switch her back there would be even MORE wailing.

Clean sweep?

So as usual it's been a while without posting. I was never good at diaries either.
DH is off work for 2 weeks and we are busy sorting out our junk. My office will become the new baby's room so I have to clean it out and move everything downstairs, into David's office which we will now share. Hmmm. I am still not sure about it but he is clearing out the back half which will give me a place for my stuff and to set up a desk with my printer etc.

I won't use it as much as he does. My laptop is parked on the dining room table which works very well so far. Handy for sneaking online as M plays and easy to tuck away when we have company for dinner.

Today is blissfully cool. Actually yesterday my Mum took M to Gyro Park while I got my hair cut and it was nice and sunny but SO windy it was quite cold. M asked for a jacket which has to be a first. I came out of the hair salon and thought how nice it would be to have ice cream at the beach, picked us each up a frozen treat, not realizing they were already freezing!
Still Miss M enjoyed her frozen juice bar very much. It was fun cleaning her off after she plunged her sticky hands back into the sand though!

The summer is flying by, I am now into my third trimester and our son will be due before we know it.

M seems to be used to the idea now, gives her baby brother a kiss, and made the transition to a big-girl bed like a trooper. We thought we would put it up and let her get used to the idea before putting her down in it at night. First night she said she wanted to sleep in her big girl bed and she has never looked back. A few days later she said the baby could have her crib... and then started telling us we needed to get the baby's room cleared out so that we could take the crib out of her room!

Time for me to get back to work, there's a lot to do and I am not moving so fast right now! Not to mention bending is getting harder! Still I can't procrastinate any longer, time is running out!

Gone gone gone you been gone so long

Wow, such a long time since I posted here. So much has happened.
The dining room is finished and gorgeous. Just need to get the outside stuccoed now and it's done.
I am sitting in it right now with my new laptop.

I have a new laptop because my old computer died. Sad but just in time because I will be losing my office over the next month.
My dear husband has another project to work on, transforming my office into a baby's room.
Sometime in early October we will be welcoming our second child, a son!

We are very happy although I might have preferred to not be pregnant through July and August. M is getting used to the idea slowly. She went from not at all thrilled to talking about how "When my baby brother finishes growing he will play with me!"
so it's really amazing. Now she gives my belly a kiss and talks about "baby brother". I am sure she will be less than thrilled at first when he really comes home and takes a lot of the attention off her. But I am sure she will adapt. She is such a sweet and nurturing child.

In other news, it is hot and I am pregnant. So yesterday dear husband went out and bought an air conditioner. Oh so GOOD!
I just want to stand in front of it all day...

Gearing up for Christmas

So, just as I should be getting ready for Christmas, baking, decorating, making cards....
My husband is planning to tear down a wall in my dining room. To be fair, it was my idea, that he is bringing to fruition with a ton of hard work and serious man-hours.

This summer he re-roofed our house, with the help of his Dad who is absolutely amazing. It was a huge amount of work, but it saved us a lot of money, and while they were doing it they were able to roof over the sunroom. This sunroom has been a huge liability from the moment we moved into this house.

Sunrooms seem like such a great idea. Not so. They are too cold in the winter and become furnaces in the summer. They are the depository for dead plants and various odds and ends you can't find a place for in the house. Worst of all in this case, they leak. We were informed when we bought the house that there had been a leak in the past, but that it was all fixed and we had nothing to worry about. Not so much. Every single winter it has leaked. In Victoria it rains. A lot. It starts raining in earnest in November, and it doesn't stop until May. Well, it doesn't rain every day, but most of them.

So the big plan when doing the roof was to put a proper roof over this area, and build it into the house, then take down the wall to make it a part of the dining room, thus gaining me an extra 8 feet of length. It was my idea, and my father in law helped make it possible.
So now we are at the stage where the wall needs to come down, and probably the ceiling too to do the lighting. The carpet will come up and be replaced by gorgeous strand woven bamboo.

I can hardly wait to have my gorgeous huge new dining room. But here's the catch. It's nearly December. I want to start hanging garlands and stuff, not deal with a construction site in my living room/dining room area. I am very concerned that it will not get completed by Christmas.
I am worried about spending most of the festive season in chaos.
Part of me wants it done so badly, and the rest of me wants to tell them to hold off until January. Sigh.

Long time no post!

Wow has it ever been a long time since I posted on here. I am so bad at keeping journals.

So much has happened, M is 20 months old and the most amazing little person ever. She is talking up a storm, learning her numbers and letters, she can recite from her books and sing songs.
I am loving being home with her, so hard to imagine returning to the salt mines.

That said, I am working on some jewellery for a craft show this weekend, and it has been consuming my life. I am using my old business name, although of course I don't expect to make huge amounts of money, this is just to bring in some extra spending money. Plus it will give me a creative outlet. I have really enjoyed getting back into the swing of things.

Hopefully it will be worth all the effort.

Long time

Wow, I have not posted in forever! This is what happens every time I try to start a journal!
I start off all enthusiastic, and it soon fizzles out!

M is more amazing every day! She is now saying a few words besides Mama and Dada: Mum!,
daisy, hello, there, once she said "there they are!", also Nana, and nanananana (banana), bye-bye, okay, uh-oh!

Hmm, husband just came upstairs and says it's bedtime! He's right. More later...

Kisses and Tigers and Waves, oh my!

What a week! I have had that nasty cold all week and the babe almost came down with it but thankfully she seems to be ok now. My husband is still successfully fighting it off, although he could use some extra sleep to help with that.

Not much new in our world as a consequence. There has been napping, thanks to my Mum coming and watching the little one. We are still watching eagerly for the walking to begin, although a couple of steps here and there are all she's done as yet.

She now blows kisses and waves bye-bye and it's amazing how such little things thrill me! I keep asking for kisses and what the tiger says so I can hear her little roar. Sometimes I think she gets a bit fed up but she humours me anyway.

First Birthday (and first steps!)

We had her party on Sunday, it was a fairly quiet one, just family this time. Her cousin came over from Vancouver for the occasion, he is 9 months older than M and I think found her a bit boring because she can't walk yet. She had a little cake all to herself which she thoroughly enjoyed!
The shine was slightly taken off the moment because she was rubbing icing all over her face and into her eyes and she came up in a little rash which freaked Mummy out. She was back to normal before long though.

Today is the big day itself, and I am near-comatose with a nasty cold. So we are eating spaghetti with sauce I had in the freezer and trying not to hack up a lung! Daddy and I will have a smidgen of leftover cake, but no icing for M this time!

To celebrate the day, M took 3 steps by herself one time when I was reading a book, and 5 steps when I was in the loo... She sure knows how to pick her moments! Nana (my Mum) witnessed both times. Grandma (Daddy's Mum) came by for a birthday hug and a little visit so she had more than her share of attention today (as always).

Must get a couple of photos up here and get the pasta made before my dear husband gets too hungry. Myself, everything tastes like cardboard right now so I'm not very enthusiastic. If only I could keep that up!

In other baby news, M can now find several of her toys when asked, as well as the flashcard of the tiger, which she accompanies with a very lifelike imitation. Tiny roar, SO cute!
Interestingly, the little plastic monkey is the only thing identified as monkey, not the flashcard or the stuffed monkey. So she's assigned the name "monkey" to that one toy rather than being able to identify a monkey in other forms. Still, I think she's amazing and watching her develop every day is a joy.

Lucky Mummy, in spite of green slime and antisocial dripping nose!

First word (and a monkey)

Exciting news this week, the little one said "Up!" to Grandma on Wednesday! And when asked "Where's your Monkey?" she looks around and finds her little plastic monkey that goes with the Amazing Animals train. She's so amazing and she makes my heart sing just to watch her learning and growing each day.

It's that time of year again... flowers are beginning to bloom all over our beautiful city. It's still a bit chilly, but nice enough that we can congratulate ourselves for not living in other parts of the country, where friends and relatives are still dealing with (shudder) snow!

We are really so spoiled here. There is always a downside to anything, depending on your perspective, and mine is allergies. So the beautiful flowers have me using up tissues so fast I wish I had shares in Kleenex. Still, a dripping nose and uncontrollable sneezing is a small price to pay for living in such a paradise. I'll take it over snow and ice any day!

Another trip to the pool today with Nana and Grandma. Little Bun made friends with a nice lady and her 3 children, who were very good at sharing the pool toys. Although as my angel is still teething we had to take them away from her. Chewing on toys that have been in the pool is really not nice... I KNOW what kids do in there...

My new stroller came in to the store, but not until after the pool. Fortunately my mother in law had one we could use for the day, it definitely made the trip a lot easier although it didn't fold as small as the Zooper, I managed to stuff it in the locker, though.

Still so much to do for the baby's first birthday party, although I'm keeping it fairly simple with
trays of meat, cheese, veg, fruit and some buns... And of course CAKE!

Parties and Dresses and Zoopers, Oh my!

Why do things seem to sneak up on you sometimes? It's nearly my little one's first birthday, and I honestly have no idea what has happened to the past year! Oh yes I do, diaper changes, late-night feedings, watching her become the most amazing little person in the world...

So much to do for her birthday party. The most important thing to get done is her cake, I want to make that really special as it will be her first taste of cake! Something tells me she'll like it. The little monkey eats anything, especially if it comes from Mummy or Daddy's plate!
Nana bought her a beautiful dress to wear. She was going to make one, but then time has been evaporating on us lately and we found a beautiful one so that's one less thing to fret about this week. Less stress is good.

Today was much warmer than it has been in a while although still overcast. My Mum (Nana) and I took the little Bun for a walk. She had a great time, loves to be out in the fresh air. Then after a little nap (for her) we went to TJ's the Kiddies store in search of a decent umbrella style stroller. I want one for short trips as she's getting a bit heavy to carry very far and although she's well on her way she's still not walking. It has to be small enough to fit in a locker at the pool, but durable and comfortable for the baby. They are getting in a Zooper Stomp which I'm pretty sure I'm going to get unless it has some major problem when I see it. They didn't have one in stock so it's coming from Vancouver on Thursday.
(great kids store in BC: http://www.tjskids.com/)

Back to my planning and lists...

Playing catch-up

Well, I just started and already I'm getting behind!

I took my daughter swimming for the first time this week! We went on Thursday morning because my Mum and her other Grandma and Grandpa go then. (Seniors Day!)
I was afraid that she would be scared of the water and scream the place down, but she was amazing. And she loved it! She floated with her head against me, she went on a little boogie board with Grandpa pushing her through the water, she played with the toys. It was a great experience and now I have no excuse for not going back...
Regardless of how I feel about me in a bathing suit... : (
The Commonwealth Pool is really great for kids, there's a baby pool and a kid's pool with a pirate ship that's also a wave pool. Then there's two other full size pools for adults.
There were a lot of other Mums and babies there.

On Friday we met the Mummies and Babies for breakfast again, my little one was great, enjoyed sharing Mummy's breakfast but she was ready to be out of that high chair long before it
was time to go.

Today Grandma came over to hang out with the Bun while my husband and I went to the Times Colonist Book Sale. It's a HUGE sale of donated books with profits to the "Raise a Reader" fund. We had to wait about an hour to get in because we got there around 9:20 am.
There were actually people lining up at 1am which is just nuts!
We got 99 books, some for each of us and some for our girly girl. $111 dollars all to charity!

I am seriously considering going back tomorrow.... is that wrong?

Tonight we had friends over for dinner, got the BBQ going for the first time in months. It was chilly out but you've got to love a place where you can BBQ at this time of year!

Today my Mum and I took my daughter to Oak Bay Village. We had a coffee (mmmm java!) and wandered along Oak Bay Avenue and back. Oak Bay is what Canadians think England is like. I can say that because I used to live in England. It has the nice village feel that you find in England but it never quite convinces. I suppose because I know the difference. It is full of shops which cater to the elderly inhabitants of the area, but over the past few years it has been changing and new, cool shops are moving in. Check out Tourism Oak Bay: http://www.oakbaytourism.com/

I am looking for toys because it's my little Bun's first birthday coming up in March and I have been everywhere trying to find something interesting that is not too old for her. (no fiddly parts she can eat!) So we went into Timeless Toys, a lovely tiny little toy shop in Oak bay Village. Unfortunately the same problem as everywhere else... all the toys I liked were for ages 3 and up!
I'll have to ask some of the Mums I know what their kids liked at this age.

The Beginning

Well, I can't quite believe that I am doing this. It's 11:45 on a Sunday night and I am joining the millions of bloggers out there... for no better reason than idle curiosity to see how this works and if I can find some outlet for my creativity in this medium.

Much more to say but morning comes far too soon, I must get to bed before I turn into a Zombie!