Merry Christmas!

Pure Joy

I am so thankful that they enjoy one another's company as much as they do!!

And wonder how long it will last after he is walking and talking and gets into her "stuff" for the first time!!

Separation Anxiety

So, the Buddy Boy is now eight months, which is about when one expects separation anxiety to kick in.  At he moment, it is more lonliness than separationa nxziety... he wants someone to look at and talk to.  It can be me, Daddy, or his Big Sis, as long as someone big is there.

Apparently, the four foot high Foghorn Leghorn from my High School days counts.

All hail Uncle Foghorn!!

Taking After His Mama

The Buddy Boy enjoying his books.  Mama loves to read, spends lots of time at the library, and probably more time reading than she should!!  I was noticing that he was trying to grab our books when we were reading, so instead of leaving his books on his shelf, I got out some of the board books and left them with his toys.

He especially loves these ones, they were given to him by my Cousin & his Fiancee, and have textured pages.  He loves to feel the pages!!

Rollin' rollin' rollin'

The Buddy Boy's Septemebr trick!

Happy boy

Can I feed the Baby?

How 'bout lunch then?  dinner?  Can I feed him his breakfast tomorrow?  I'll feed the baby if you want, then you can eat your breakfast?

I am so lucky to have such a willing helper!!

Hey... how come I'm not falling down??

Cause Mama was quick with the camera then the catch, so he didn't have time!!

Taken about six weeks ago.  He is now sitting on his own, with a few minor head clunks, and is attempting to move.  He looks like a harp seal, he lays on his Tummy, kicks his legs, and tries to swim with his arms!  He's now starting to get either his butt up, or his head up, but hasn't managed both at the same time!

Pulling Santa's Beard

When I took him up, I was going to warn Santa to watch the beard.  But then Little Raven took him up instead, and I forgot to mention it to her.

Luckily, none of the kids noticed that anything was amiss!

Cousins

Buddy Boy And his "little" cousin, Little Miss Sweet Pea. Little Miss Sweet Pea is three months younger. Can you tell that BB is on the low end of the weight/size percentile spectrum, and Little Miss Sweet Pea is on the high end? She's totally going to be the boss when they get older!!

And Little Raven with Little Miss Sweet Pea. No worries about Miss Sweet Pea catching up to her!!

In Conversation

With LR, her friend, and her friend's Mom:

Fr. Mom: "so, we should get going, you guys have a test tomorrow"
Mama: "pardon?"
LR: "Um, I forgot to tell you.... we have two tests this week, one of them is tomorrow."
Mama: "And where's your book for tomorrow's test?"
LR: "In my locker."

Of Course.  Because where else would it be?? 

How I Spent my Summer Vacation....

Off to the Halloween Dance

Yes I know I'm behind.

Giddy-up!

Six Months

10 Days

10 Days old, and four days before his due date, enjoying tummy time (how rare!). This is the "Tummy-time quilt" curtesy of Gretchen at Lazy Mama Designs.

Mealtimes

Did you know that you cannot levitate Rice Krispies by staring at them and opening your mouth?

The buddy boy is just discovering that. "What? I open my mouth, spoon goes in... open my mouth, n1pple goes in... what do you mean I have to do some work here!!"

He has discovered that if he licks his hands, and then presses them into the crumbled up arrowroot cookie, that the cookie will stick, and he can lick it off. Or else, he can be a hoover, lean down really close to the tray, and try to kind of suck the food up.

We obviously need to work on the pincer grip a little bit.

Even if he gets the food into the mouth, he can't get it far enough back on his tongue anyway, so I clean it all out of the folds in his baby neck after, lol!!

Six months

Uncle Stevie came to visit from out west. Oh, did we mention that we "forgot" to tell Grandma & Grandpa that he was coming? "Hi Mom, I'm here for dinner... brought someone with me, hope you don't mind!!!"

They were a smidge surprised, to say the least.


The toy that Buddy boy is holding is a hand me down from his second cousins, and one of his favourites, and the beautiful sweater that he is wearing was hand knit by my sister-in-law. You can't see the detail on it in the photo, but it is gorgeous.

He Shoots, He Scores!!!

Update

I am currently at the library, with Buddy Boy sound asleep on my chest.

It has been a great 6 months.  I can't belive that I am halfway through my mat leave already!!  I really am dreading going back to work.

We visit the Ontario Early Years centre weekly, for Mom & Baby time, and we go to story time at the library twice a week.  LR is active in Girl Guides twice a week, and I join her once a week.

Still no internet at home, so the photos that have been posted have been ripped off from various family members facebook sites (Thanks Guys!!).

3 Months (ish)

Snuggling

Buddy Boy, About 6 weeks old (I can't believe how big he is already) 

The Adventures of Buddy Boy

'Cause Unkie Steve-a-reno has too much time on his hands... lol

ummm..... Hi?

Wow.

I can't believe that buddy boy is two months already. He's holding his own head up already. Last week we went in for his two month innoculations. He was not a happy camper.

He has begun to form some routine, so that is good. He usually naps in the mornings from 10 - 11, and again in the afternoons from about 1:30 - 3:00. He's at his most awake and alert in the evenings. Overall, I'd say that he's a fairly happy baby.

He dosen't like to sleep in his crib at night, so that is being a bit of a challenge. He'll start off in hs crib, but going back down after a night feed is a challenge. He'll go to bed around 11, wake up two hours later for a feed, and then sleep until 4:30 or five. When he was a couple of weeks old he was giving me five hours at night in a row, but hardly any naps during the day. Now that I have daytime naps, I have to get up more at night. I think that I prefer having it spread out like this. Now that I've said that, he's going to stop napping during the day though, right?

Not much else is new. I get up, drive LR to school, come home, eat breakfast, feed the baby, put the baby down for a nap, putter, play with the baby, eat lunch, put the baby down for a nap, putter, play with the baby, go and get LR from school, come home and make dinner. The amazing thing is, I am not bored at all, and I don't miss work at all.

Update

Baby bird was born April 11, 2008. He was two weeks early, and Mama was still at work when labour began on Tursday. The next day was supposed to be my last day.

So far, he's a good sleeper (I usually get about 5 hours straight at night), and a pretty good eater. He was 7 lb 1 oz at birth.

His room is almost finished now (he's in our room right now). We've finished the drywall work, and painted the walls. We need to wait a month to hang the wallpaper, since the paint is brand new.

He'll probably stay in our room for a little longer, since his room and Little Raven's room is connected by the pocket door. I'd rather have myself up at night with him than myself and her, especially since she has to go to school!!

Its A Boy!!

Baby Bird was born by Momma Raven at close to 1AM on April 11th - it was a Most Exciting Day!!

I'm sure she will tell you more about it soon.

Bunny Jail

This is the look that greets me every morning when I feed him his breakfast:

He gives me a similar look when I am walking past his cage in the middle of the night on my way back from the loo. On the way there I must wake him up, but on the way back: "Hi! you're up! Is it breakfast time? Can I come out to play now?"

Silly bunny, it's 3:00 in the morning. Go back to sleep!

Sign of Spring

I actually saw a Robin pull a worm out of the ground the other day... and then he and his buddy had a tug of war over it!

It was too bad that the camera wasn't closer!!

The (Frozen) morning after

After the rain stopped, and the snow was mostly melted, here is what our yard looked like:

In the words of Little Raven:

"when I get home tonight, can I go skating in in our backyard?"

ummm... I think that once the sun comes out, the ice will be melted.... it might be a little soggy by then!!

Which really was too bad... especially since around the tether ball tree there was a circle of ice. I've never played tether ball on ice skates, but it would have been interesting!!

Living on an Island

Our property is a triangle, with a ditch running along the road, a creek (usually dry) running along one side, and then our driveway and the neighbours driveway on the other side. With all the snow melting this week, and all the rain that came with it. here's what the third side (The one that isn't supposed to have water) looked like when I got home the other night:

The water was right over the driveway, you can kind of see it on the far left side of the above picture. All the ditches were full, and the creek was full.

The first picture is our backyard. In the middle of all of the water, you can see our fire pit and picnic table.... they look a little soggy.

The water was overflowing out of the ditch, into the upped wooded area (bottom pic above), through this culvert:

And then flowing across the yard.





Here's another pic, taken from the second floor window:

Lots and Lots of water.

Luckily, when the house was built, the lot was raised. The backyard is at the natural grade, but the house and front yard were built up several feet. Even though we were surrounded by so much water, the basement stayed dry (this time at least... lol).

Normally, when I get home with Little Raven, she hops out of the van at the road, gets the mail, and walks to the house. This day "I think I'll just wait for you to climb back in the van!"

More Visitors

While hubby was sick the other day, this came to visit our dead tree in the yard:

We really need to cut the tree down, before it falls on the boat, but the birds just love it, we really don't want to take away their habitat either!!

Baby Shower

Last Saturday my Cousin hosted a wonderful Baby Shower for us!! Little Raven got to go help get ready, she got to spend the whole weekend at my parents house getting spoiled rotten!

We played some cool games, including “guess how big the belly is,” where first a piece of string is placed around the mother’s waist and cut, then the roll of string is passed around the room and everyone cuts off the amount that they think is right. Congratulations to Tiffany, who was within about a half centimetre!! Tiffany used the strategy that we were the same size before I got preggo, so she put the roll around her own waist and then added a baby from there!

My mom & LR made a cool “diaper cake,” with all diaper changing essentials... very cool.





All in all, we had a great afternoon, lots of fun was had all around!

Sick House

First hubby had a cold, and spent Sunday & Monday in bed.

Then it got me. Wednesday and Thursday in bed.

And this morning LR was sniffling a little. I suspect that she will spend the weekend in bed.

So I am back to work today, which is good, because I have a to-do list a mile long before my last day NEXT FRIDAY!! Which means that I will not be posting on my lunch hour today 'cause I'm too busy, even though I have a few things to write about:
- Baby shower last weekend
- The LAKE that formed around our house the past couple of days
- The new birds that we have seen around the house.

Since we live in the boonies, we don't have Internet at home. I dunno how that's gonna affect my posting once my mat leave starts. I can post from the library, but no pictures, since I don't really want to use my flash drive on the public computers.

Since we've all been sick, there's been very little progress on the upstairs.. and only three weeks to the due date!! yikes!!

So, have a happy weekend everyone!!

April Fool's

This morning:

Daddy "So did you hear, there's no school today."
Little Raven (eyes opening wide) "Really???"
Daddy "April Fool's!!"

Spring?

Well, after Tuesday's snowstorm, it warmed right up. By the time hubby got home Tuesday night around ten, he said that all the snow had stopped.

Yesterday was a nice mild +6 Celsius, and it was warm enough when I got home that there was no need to light the fire to warm up the house.

Today seems to be heading the same direction. As long as the sun is shinning, we shouldn't need a fire tonight either. Which is a very very good thing, for two reasons:

1) Our wood pile is getting very very small, and this is our main heat source
2) It is getting awfully difficult to bend down to light the fire now!!

Dear Mother Nature

On behalf of all Southern Ontarians, I would like to apologize. I am not sure what we have done to offend you, but we have all felt your wrath this winter.

We have now received more snow so far than the last two winters combined, and have nearly broken the record of most snow in one winter that was set in the 1930's.

A little warm weather would be nice. Especially since my winter coat no longer does up.

No Easter Bunny this year....

There's no tooth fairy either.

She is, after all, ten years old, and after Christmas we had a long discussion about the spirit of St. Nicholas versus Santa Clause.

So on Saturday night, as we're eating a (late) dinner after church, and she's dawdling through her meal, I advised her that she'd better hurry up, otherwise the Easter Bunny was going to bed, and Daddy didn't know where the Easter presents were.

So she finishes her meal and trots up to bed. I get the eggs out for Daddy and I to hide ('cause even though there's no Bunny, you can still have the hunt!!). And Daddy stands at the bottom of the stairs, lobbing the darn eggs up to the second floor, through her doorway, trying to hit her in her bed!!

(We can be a little unorthodox here....)

"Daddy!!! Daddy stop that!!! Hey, that one just hit me!! That's it, I'm hiding under my pillow now!!"

Happy late Easter everyone!!

New Furniture

On Saturday we went for a drive to pick up our new Buffet for the dinning room:

It is solid wood, made by members of a Mennonite community.

To fit it in the van, we had to take out the seats on the right hand side. Driving home, the front passenger seat was pulled up as far forward as it could go, Hubby drove, I sat in the chair behind hubby, and Little Raven sat in the chair behind me. It made me very, very glad that I had insisted that the new van had to have 50/50 or 60/40 seats in the rear, as we would have had to take two vehicles otherwise, and it is a two hour drive!!

In renovation news, we have restored power to the upstairs bathroom, hallway, and our room. Little Raven still has to use a flashlight in the mornings though. At least it is still light out until later in the evenings now!

We have walls!

Walls are good. of course, to install walls, we had to remove the door. But having walls on all four sides of the bathroom is an improvement to having walls on two sides, and a door that is next to the open wall that someone could easily walk through:

Not only do we have walls, but we also have a WORKING TAP in the bathroom... no more running a hose from the basement up two flights of stairs to fill the tub.

It's a little primitive still, but at least I can adjust the temperature of the water while in the tub now:

We have not painted the room blue, that is just the colour of the bathroom drywall. Tonight I can start the mudding if I'm feeling up to it. I was home yesterday with Little Raven who was sick, and I can feel the start of a bit of a tickle in the back of my throat today... ugh.

A child's observations....

When we were re-doing Little Raven's room, mean and cruel parents that we are, we removed the phone jack, and pushed the wire into the wall, then papered over it. She is only ten now, and really, doesn't need a phone in her room.

As we're doing this, she was in in her room with us, and we were trying to be as discreet as possible. However:

LR: "Daddy, I'm not sure if you noticed..."
Daddy "Noticed what?"
LR "Well, when you put the magnetic paint on the walls, the magnets work right on the wallpaper too!!"
Daddy: "yeah I know, I put it there so that it would do that!" (quickly finishing covering the old phone jack).

It's funny what they'll notice.

Trauma!

So when I picked Little Raven up from the daycare on Monday, she calming asked if we could drive up to another daycare in the other end of town.

Mama: "Why do you need to go there? You were there all day with the daycare, weren't you"
LR "You know that sweater that Stephen bought me, from Medicine Hat? when we were at the beach party, I took it off, and left it there."

So we drive up to the other daycare, and she looks in the lost and found, and she looks in the gym, and there is no pink Medicine Hat Tigers sweater to be found anywhere. And the tears begin.

She was so upset that she had lost this one sweater, which was a HUGE surprise, because this child will be an only child until her Dad's & my baby is born next month, (and she will still be her Mom's only child), and is an only grandchild to two sets of Grandparents, and was an only grandchild to the third set of grandparents until about a year and a half ago. She'll be eleven in the spring. In short, she's spoiled rotten.

Gifts come out of the woodwork, whether there is an occasion or not. And she knows that by the time her Christmas toys are boring, it will be her birthday anyway. We've tried cutting back on the "things" that she receives, but it was never effective.

We've tried teaching her responsibility, but that has never sunk in either. She has always known 'if I loose it / break it etc., someone will replace it.'

Maybe it's because we only see Stephen once a year, maybe because this sweater was from the west, and therefore we can't purchase one here, or maybe it's because she doesn't receive gifts from Stephen the way she receives things from other people, but this one darn sweater meant a lot to her.

She was also afraid to tell Stephen that she'd lost his gift to her, but she was trying to figure out how she was going to tell him. So she wasn't planning on not saying anything to him, and she didn't try to tell us that it had been stolen or anything else, she admitted what had happened. usually if she looses something, we tell her that we're disappointed, we may take away privileges, etc. for discipline. In this case, there was no need, she punished herself more than enough.

So, while I wanted to find the sweater, it WAS a good time to hope that SOME responsibility would sink in. So I did what I could to help her, but made it her job to do the work. She called the other daycare on Tuesday, and they still hadn't seen it. On Wednesday, they called back, and said that all the lost and found from the beach party had been sent to a third daycare. So she called there.

She was lucky, the third daycare had it!!

So we picked up her very pink Medicine Hat Tigers sweatshirt yesterday. She was so happy to see it that she hugged it, and then managed, in the car, to put it on over top of the sweatshirt she was already wearing, without removing her seat belt and with removing her jacket.

So Uncle Stevie, it looks like she really appreciated this Christmas gift!!

More Progress

Last night, hubby got the drain line installed. whoo hoo!!

Still no proper supply line though, as the taps can't be installed until the tile backsplash is installed, and we haven't even LOOKED at tiles yet, yet alone picked out a pattern or purchased any.

It makes filling the tub an interesting challenge. Hubby had a meeting last night, but said we could go ahead and use it, just hook up the garden hose to the laundry room taps to fill it. Ok fine. So I hooked the hose up to the cold water in the old laundry room, sent Little Raven upstairs to make sure that the water was going in the tub, and filled the tub slightly. Then switched the hose to the hot tap. Turned it on, annnnnd... nothing. huh. Oh wait, the shut off valve is still off. Then looked more carefully. The shut off valve on the cold tap was ABOVE the tap. On the hot tap it was BELOW the tap. So if I turn that valve on, water is going to go straight up those pipes to... the open end behind the brand new drywall. Right. Ok, I think I will wait until hubby gets home.

Hubby comes in, says no, I meant the NEW laundry room tap.... ohhhhhh.......

So we hook up the hose to the new tap, run it across the basement up through the hole in the floor to the old laundry room, up through the hole in the floor into the bathroom. Now one person has to stand downstairs (there's only one tap in the new laundry room, seeing as it has a proper faucet, unlike the old) and work the temperature knobs, while the other person stands upstairs and yells "More Hot!!" "Add some Cold!" down to them.

Ah the joys of a home renovation. I just think it's a good thing that we are all campers. I mean really, if we can rough it in the bush for a week, with the nearest civilization at least a days paddle out, we can definitely live like this in our own home!

Progress

It may not have a supply or a drain line yet, but at least it is in place.

Hubby informed me last night that if I really wanted to have a bath, he could run the hose from the old supply line, but then to drain it, someone would have to stand in the main floor hallway with a bucket, and the tub would have to drain into that, then be dumped.

I washed my hair in the kitchen sink, then went into the little bathroom to bathe. Then sent Little Raven to do the same. We could have used the laundry tub, but it's in the basement, and it's cold down there!!

Hopefully, we will have a drain line this evening.

And the Construction Continues….

Well, hubby has been busy all week this week. We now have no walls between the upstairs loo and the baby’s room. I mean nothing, not even framework.

The drywall has been ripped off of the remaining two bathroom walls. The only drywall left is behind the shower.

So last night I went to have a bath (showers are no longer an option, as the tub is open on three sides now, with nowhere to hang a shower curtain….). I never thought that I’d have to sweep the construction debris out of the tub and wash it out before use. Hubby kindly did most of the clean up work, put a bathmat down on the floor (did I mention that there are now no tiles? So the floor is bare floorboards, with bits of tile glue stuck on it?), and left the bathroom closing the door behind him.

Um

The baby’s room has no door

The baby’s room is open to the bathroom

The bathtub is currently located smack between the door to the baby’s room, and the door to the bathroom.

Closing the bathroom door did not so much provide any privacy.

Thanks hun.

I feel like I am back in my University dorm… I have to get my little bag with soap and shampoo etc. to take into the bathroom, find my towels, find somewhere to hang them up (last night, the vacuum cleaner made for a handy stand), then carry it all back out with me at the end.

I leave you with pictures of our latest de-construction:


(Just) Before the walls & tiles were removed

Possibly a reason why we have needed to do the amount of renovation that we have

One wall missing

Bathroom window (left), and Baby’s window (right)

The last wall being removed

The only working bathtub or shower in our house

You can see the two doors, on the left, the Baby’s door, and on the right, the bathroom door.

32 1/2 weeks

I feel huge. This photo was taken a couple of days ago, I am 33 weeks tomorrow.

I Think I Have A Headache....

So Saturday, after finishing Little Raven's room, hubby is looking at the Baby's room and says "I wonder why that bump out is there. It just doesn't make sense. Maybe I'll take out the ceiling in the old laundry room to see what is up there..."

Uh Oh.

We moved the laundry to the basement when we first moved in, and the plans for the old laundry room are eventually a three piece bathroom. Notice the use of the word eventually. As in, not quite yet. Aye yi yi.

I should backtrack a little at this point to explain that the tiles in the old laundry room, kitchen, and each of the two bathrooms are all a different style, and were all poorly installed. Especially the old laundry room, where the grout had been smeared across the tiles, and looked like dirt, until one tried to clean it. It doesn't clean.

So, to take down the ceiling, he got a Great.Big.Mallet out of the garage. I'm talking huge. And proceeded to drop it on the laundry room floor. Oops. Like I be lived that THAT was an accident!!

So by the time we went to bed, there was no longer any tile on that floor. And by the time LR and I returned from church the next day, there was no ceiling, and two of the walls were missing. Also, in the Baby's room, one wall was missing. Again I say, Aye yi yi.

But Wait!! It Gets Better!!

By the time we went to bed that night, one of the bathroom walls upstairs was also gone!! the wall that backs onto the Baby's room that was taken down. The wall beside the toilet that backs onto the Baby's room. Did I meant ion that at the moment, there is not a door to the baby's room yet??

JUST so that I wouldn't be concerned about using the upstairs loo with no walls, on Monday night, when hubby got home, he removed the tile from the bathroom floor, and the sink from the bathroom, and the toilet.

We now have a working toilet on the main floor (Did I mention that I am pregnant?? and peeing three times a night??) and a working bathtub on the second floor. I stopped and bought lots of night lights on the way home from the office the other night.

So, here are pictures of the Baby's room, upstairs loo, and old laundry:

Baby's room. That is the back of the bathtub that you can see to the left of the photo. Where the black pipe is, is where the wall is open to the bathroom, and the toilet is just to the right of that.

Upstairs loo. The wall is missing on the right side of this picture.

This is the view sitting on the toilet. The square of light in the middle of the photo is the living room windows, as you can see into the baby's room, out into the hall since there's no door, and over the balcony, to outside. It's like camping, and having a site with a Thunderbox that has a great view...

The floor in the old Laundry room. The dirt that you can see on it is not dirt, it is grout. Yes, it really was that bad.

Hubby removing the old floor. I think that the MOL would have a problem with his choice of footwear.... lol

Laundry room ceiling. There are pipes everywhere. And most of them are unnecessary.

Laundry room walls, with more useless pipes.

Did I mention that this baby is due in EIGHT WEEKS!! I fear that this will not be done on time....