I want a training partner

I paid too much money for a silly book for tracking workouts. Surprise surprise, I’m not exercising any more frequently because of it. it’s really hard to stick to a schedule by myself.

My friends in Alberta are not athletes, and while we have awesome playdates and barbeques, it’s just me an a Chariot full of kids on the trails. And that’s kind of lonely.

I’m planning a wedding!

There will be vows.

That’s about the only detail we have firmed up at this point because there are a number of variables we have to pin down before we make any deposits.

Things like location. I don’t mean a venue, I mean honest-to-God location. Will we be living in Alberta or Newfoundland? Where in Alberta? Will we have bought a new house? Because that will significantly inform the rest of the wedding, largely budget-wise. I don’t know about you, but I’d really rather take put a chunk of change on a down payment than rent a social hall and chair covers. And if we DO buy a house, will it have a yard nice enough to throw a party? Can a buy a dress from Sears? (Of course I can!) How will we serve the ice cream cake? (Long before Travis ever proposed, we agreed on having an ice cream wedding cake.)

I guess that makes two decided details. Vows and ice cream cake. Sounds like a wedding to me!

Oh, do you want to see my ring? Of course you do!

Engaged to be married

That’s a cherry wood ring with a Labradorite stone inlay. Labradorite is a mineral found in Labrador and Madagascar that catches brilliant blues and greens in the light. I love cherry wood and I wear Labradorite earrings almost every day, so it was a perfect choice. Travis sure knows how to pick them. Obviously.

Motherhood 2.0

Hey there!

I had a baby a few weeks ago, so things have been all eat-sleep-diaper-laundry-repeat around here. Note shower was not on that list. Baby is five and a half weeks old, and I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve showered since she was born.

Ok I exaggerate.

…or do I?

Anyway, let me tell you a few things about motherhood 2.0

1. Every baby is different.

Who knew? Not me. Sure, they look alike, but the similarities end there.

2. Every labour is different.

I know, right? Sylvia’s was comically easy (relatively-speaking). Caroline’s knocked me sideways. Whaaaaat? I’ve recovered now, although the Chiropractor is still on speed dial.

3. Sleep when the baby slee…. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

I slept hours when Sylvia was a newborn. Not consecutive hours, but a significant portion of the day. This time around? Not so much. At lease not since the grandparents left. I may get two three-hour stretches on a good night. And daytime naps are a thing of the past.

4. Placenta pills: Cannibalism or Best Thing Ever?

I’m firmly in the Best Thing Ever camp. I kept my placenta and had it dried and encapsulated. So every day I am eating a little bit of myself. It allows me to get by on less than six hours sleep, and it is amazing. Thanks to Natasha of Placenta Edmonton for doing the actual encapsulating. (She’s a Newfoundlander too!)

5. Two hands are not enough.

With every pregnancy, women should grow an additional arm too. That way you’ll always have one more hand than you have kids. And that way, you may stand a fighting chance of keeping the kids clothed, fed, entertained and out of harm’s way. May.

Meanwhile, Sylvia asked for vegetables and dip for breakfast yesterday. So 7 a.m. saw me peeling carrots into the kitchen sink. Just when you think you’ve got a handle on your kids, they go and ask for vegetables. For breakfast. Say whaaaaaat?

Oatmeal

We brought our new baby home from the hospital almost three weeks ago.

I brought a few additional hospital souvenirs – namely plastic tape goo all over my arms from the multiple (failed) IVs a team of nurses tried to stick me with post-delivery.

That goo is worse than tree sap to wash off.

Butter (not margarine) is the only cure for tree-sap covered hands, so Travis suggested I try it on the goo.

I  hopped in the shower with a palm full of butter and started to scrub.

No dice.

So I took up my Tval sugar scrub, and that didn’t to the trick either.

Then I tried my oatmeal body wash, and when THAT didn’t work I figured I had better cut my losses and go bake some oatmeal cookies.

And that’s pretty well where I’ve been the past three weeks – eating oatmeal cookies.

Which is totally acceptable because oatmeal does wonderful things for my milk supply.

Dilemma!

This baby is due Feb. 27.

Blogwest starts March 7.

While I’m really hoping to have this baby sooner rather than later, I can’t ignore the statistical possibility that baby may still be holed up inside on March 7.

And if baby IS still in utero then, the statistical probability of it making an appearance by March 9 is pretty well guaranteed.

I know. I looked this stuff up.

So…. Do I spring for an earlybird Blogwest ticket and hope for the best, but take the $200 loss when baby arrives en route to the event?

And what if I DO deliver before the conference? Do I bring baby with me? What then?

Too much uncertainty. I should probably just bow out this year, but I had such a great time at the inaugural event and I really want to see how it has grown!

Here, there, and everywhere

Let me tell you, it’s a lot of fun preparing for a baby on one side of the country when all your baby things are on the other side of the country.

Not.

For example:

Baby clothes – I can’t possibly justify buying new ones when there are BINS of the stuff sitting in Summerville.

Baby change table and pad – ditto.

Crib - likewise.

Bouncy Chair – I just gave in and bought a used one here.

Rocking chair or glider – Both are sitting unused in NL.

Bumbo - It’s so light it is worth getting shipped out, because that thing is GOLD.

Baby bathtub – At least that gives me an excuse to buy one of these nifty buckets.

And then there’s all the little reminders of Sylvia’s birth and early days, like her hospital bracelet and baby book and cards from friends and relatives. I know if I were in Summerville I’d be spending a lot of time going through those things and settling into nostalgia and memories of that wonderful sweet time. Oh sure, I’d be on a mad tear to get the spare room finished (and I mean finished. That’s the only room we didn’t touch when we undertook the Great Summerville Project of 2010, and there are still bare panels of drywall on one side, outright holes in the original walls, and peeling ceiling paint). But I’d be among familiar things at least.

We brought Sylvia home to a half-finished house and now we’re about to do it again for the second time.

I’m always the first to say you don’t need half the stuff on the Baby! Essentials! lists, so I don’t even know why my lack of preparation is distressing me. We’ve got diapers, and a bassinet. Everything else is a luxury, right?

I know. PERSPECTIVE. Mine must be lost in the mail.

 

 

 

Out to lunch, or perfectly reasonable? YOU DECIDE!

We have this wall hanging in our bedroom. It’s not exactly art – I stretched some IKEA printed fabric over a wooden frame, stapled down the edges and  called it done. Only the spruce boards I used to make the frame weren’t cut evenly. Instead of a nice square picture on the wall, we have an irregular quadrilateral.

The 2-foot square hanging is only out by an inch or so, and normal people may not even notice it. As a matter of fact, until yesterday it was little cause for concern for us either, because it hung on the wall adjacent to our bed. The out-of-line frame wasn’t as noticeable because we were looking at it from an angle.

However.

Yesterday I rearranged furniture in the bedroom to make room for baby things, and the trapezoid/trapezium now hangs at the foot of our bed, where we can see it face-on every morning and night. I’m considering a fun social experiment in which I track Travis’s blood pressure until he rips it off the wall and chucks it out the window.

You have to understand – when we were renovating the Summerville Project, we wired about half the upstairs outlets before we installed the flooring. Once the flooring went down, those plugs sat 11 and a half inches above the floor. When we realized there was a difference of half and inch between the early round of plugs and those that were wired in after the floor was put down, (standard height is 12 inches) well we just had to go back and move the first 14 outlets up half an inch.

(If we had spent less time on levelling up outlets and light switch plates, the Summerville Project might be closer to being done by now, but I digress…)

We both come by this neurosis honestly. Travis has a relative who will take a screw driver around the house, ensuring the tiny screw heads affixing light plates to the wall are all pointing in the same direction. (Directly up and down). You should SEE my parent’s driveway after a snowfall – a single flake wouldn’t dare settle in the driveway after my father has meticulously shovelled. And asymmetrical necklaces drive me around the bend – just ask my former coworkers. Oh I get the ones that are made from all different beads and are DELIBERATELY asymmetrical, but the one that are just slightly irregular with one bead of a repeating pattern out of place? Let me get too close and I just might grab that necklace from around your neck and restring it for you, thus restoring harmony to the world.

The wall hanging is going to have to go.