A Christmas Traditions Meme

I saw this on Postcards from the Mothership and felt inspired to participate!

1. Christmas Eve or Christmas morning?

Christmas morning. Although I liked the idea of one gift on Christmas Eve and the idea of Christmas PJs so much that we now do one gift - of PJs, on Christmas eve :)

2. Donner or Donder?

Donner.

3. Turkey or ham?

Turkey with my family, and you just never know what we'll have with my husband's family :) It's always yummy though.

4. Gifts opened all at once, or one at a time?

I am firmly a one at a time girl. Whenever I am in a situation where everyone is opening at one I can't figure out where to look, what's been opened, who should be doing what and it's always very confusing to me. But I'm trying to get used to it ;)

5. Christmas tree: live or artificial?

We always had an artificial tree growing up and I was fine with that. I had a few years with real trees because roommates insisted, but I'm happily back to an artificial tree now. And now that we have one we REALLY like, I know that every year the tree will look fabulous and not having to worry about finding the right sized one, or one that is full enough, or, one that falls down in the night.

6. Cards: boxed cards, family photo cards, or e-cards?

I already ranted about cards once this year. I only send out cards if I have a photo to send. Otherwise, I just don't really get the point...

7. Christmas lights: incandescent or LED?

We just have the lights that came with the tree and I don't think they're LED. If/when we eventually get lights for outside, we'll get LED.

8. Re-gift or not?

I would, but I don't find I generally have the need.

9. Gift wrap or gift bags?

I find wrapping paper such a waste but I agree with many who say kids enjoy the ripping. So for now we're doing a bit of both, and I made some cloth Xmas bags that should last for years. I also stopped buying wrapping paper (I used to go crazy after christmas but have stopped) so I'm hoping that once I run out I'll have switched over to primarily the bags...

10. Best Christmas song?

I don't know... but I love Christmas music

11. Best Christmas movie?

Sound of music probably doesn't count eh? I can't really think of Christmas movies I love, but I feel like I often watched Sound of Music on tv on Christmas day.

12. Favourite family tradition?

I'm loving growing more and more traditions. We're doing yearly photos with Santa, and Xmas pjs so far. I'm hoping we'll have many more!

Okay, your turn. Do play along!!

Christmas cards

I feel like this is really bitchy of me to feel, but,

If you aren't going to bother signing more than "love so and so" to a generic Xmas card - why do you bother sending them? It doesn't make me feel thought of or loved by you. It makes me think that you went through your address book and thought "ya, I guess they ought to get one".

I don't think that's really the sentiment. "Sure, we like them." Either write me a personal little note to at least show me you know who you were sending the card to or don't bother.

There are, however, exceptions. If you are sending me a photo of you, your family, or your kids, I am fine with a simple "love us". I like to have photos. I put them on my fridge until they're a bit too old and then I put them in a scrapbook and keep them forever. Another thing I like are Xmas newsletters.... send me a generic newsletter telling me what happened in the last year. Don't have time to do that? I TOTALLY understand. Do like me and hope the people you like and love know you like and love them and don't need me to waste paper, stamps and time sending them meaningless cards that will doubtless end up cluttering their mantle until it goes in the recycling bin.

Signed a grinchy feeling me.

Hi bungabooboo!

Kiernan LOVES making up words. It seems like half the time he comes up and says "I want to boodleemanga mommy" or "let's watch domadaba". He thinks it's hilarious! Especially if you respond with made up words too. Sometimes we read books with entirely made up words leaving him in hysterics.

His other favourite thing to do lately is to walk up to you and call you a name that isn't yours.

Kiernan "Hi Daddy!"
Me: "Hi Kiernan"
Kiernan "No. Hi Daddy!"
Me: "ok. Hi Joel"
Kiernan kills himself laughing and repeats. Sometimes calling me Grammie or Grandpapa instead.

This weekend it evolved.
Kiernan: "Hi Daddy!"
Me "Hi Joel"
Kiernan: "Ya! Kiernan is at Vicky's house" *kills himself laughing*
And I have to say, I pretty much killed myself laughing too :)

Santa - year 3

I was so sad because every time I walked by the Santa display (and I work at the mall so I do a fair amount) I never ever saw our favourite Santa. How thrilled was I when I finally took K for his photo when he was there! And Kiernan smiled! None of this looking crazy freaked out ;)

What a gorgeous kid we have!

(I took a photo of the photo again this year ;)

You know what I've been kind of obsessively worrying about? Next year, do I get one photo with each child? Do we do a group photo? Is it unfair for Kiernan to have gotten all these photos on his own and not have the twins get that too? Is 4 separate photos excessive? I think it is, but does that mean I shouldn't do it? So many decisions to make before next year! :)

How can I have 20+ weeks to go?

I'm 15 weeks pregnant with these twins, and unlike the other blog I've found following a twin pregnancy, I'm going to be a complainer.

- My ligaments are already killing me. It's a struggle to turn over in bed and so I'm sure it wont' be long until I'll have to get out of bed to turn over like I did with k.

- The heartburn, reflux, etc is already so back some nights that I lie in bed burping for half an hour straight and last night I built a mountain of pillows on the bed to recline upon since lying down flat was too painful.

- My hips are digging in to my mattress so today I went out and bought a memory foam topper for the bed. Hopefully that will help.

It's only going to go downhill from here people. What I want to know is, WHY is being pregnant so difficult? If this is was we were built to do, shouldn't it be easier? Do animals have this much discomfort? Imagine animals who spend their lives breeding? What a horrible life!!

These babies will be worth it. But May/June is a long ways away. sigh.

The stuff you learn about twins

When I found out I was having twins a few weeks ago I knew little about twins. I knew there were fraternal twins and I knew there were identical twins. I knew that fraternal twins could run in a family - but that it has to come through the mother and I knew that identical twins are a always just flukes. Other than that - I didn't know a thing. Oh, I knew that identical twin pregnancies could be riskier than fraternal ones.

Since then I have learned quite a lot and I've decided to share my new knowledge with you all (lucky you! ;)

*Fraternal twins happen when two eggs get fertilized. They are as different from each other as two babies would have been from two separate pregnancies.

* Identical twins happen when a fertilized eggs splits into two growing organisms. Depending on when the split happens four things can happen:
- earliest split - both babies end up with their own complete environment from amniotic sac, placentas, chorions, everything. This pregnancy would look pretty much the same as a fraternal twins pregnancy
- medium split (most common) - both babies have their own sacs, but they end up with some shared stuff (ie placenta, chorion)
- later split (and the least common) - both babies end up in one amniotic sac. This is very dangerous because they can ended up twisting themselves (and their umbilical cords) all up and it can cause a lot of problems.
- latest split - Siamese twins. They split so late they didn't completely split.

So what does this mean? It means that the only way to know for sure what kind of twins you have are if you have twins that share a placenta, chorion or amniotic sac (automatically identical) or if, later on, you find out that the babies aren't of the same gender (automatically fraternal). It is possible that you could go your entire pregnancy and not know if the twins are identical or fraternal if they are the same gender. And when they are born, if they look really similar, you might even have to have dna testing to determine which kind they are (there are, after all, some very similar looking non-identical twins out there. For example the Olsen twins!)

At my latest doctor's appointment the ultrasound report the doctor had had an analysis on it from a specialist other than the technician who shared the twin news with us. It said that the twins are likely fraternal. There was no more information than that. Given what I've learned (and my research is not scientific here - it's pretty much wikipedia ;) I THINK that means that the twins have their own everything (which is very good!) and that *most* identical twins end up sharing something. Therefore, it is most likely that mine are fraternal but it's not written in stone. I am, amazingly, not really obsessing on it (I thought I would to be honest) and am instead ready to wait and find out. I am very curious on the gender of these babies though, mostly because I want to see if the remainder of my whole "prediction" comes through and that they end up both being girls. My next ultrasound is January 5 so we have a ways to go yet. Hopefully they'll both cooperate and show us the goods ;)

Oh. And I also found out this week that my mother's cousin had fraternal twins. So I guess it does run in the family... ;)

Our little monkey

This Fall we enrolled Kiernan in a gymnastics program since his favourite things to do are to climb and jump and tumble, etc. He really enjoyed it!

This past Sunday was parents' day - which was kind of chaotic and only entertaining in little bits, but it was still fun to watch. As you can see, practicing a dance once or twice with a bunch of two year olds and their dads doesn't make for the best looking dance you've ever seen ;)

A couple of K videos

One of my favourite sounds in the world is Kiernan's belly laugh. I've found that I can get him really going by fake belly laughing to him which turns into a real laugh as he really gets going. Kiernan now has a fake belly laugh/cackle that my mother in law believes is my fault. Who knows, but it CRACKS ME UP - almost as much as his real belly laugh. (please ignore the fact that it's really hard to video him because he always wants to see what we've taken)




We also got a cute video of him eating a chocolate cookie. (Please pretend his Dora addiction is not what it appears to be in this video ;)

Say what?

I swear, these twins are leeching my brain power out of me. Every day, I feel a little bit dumber than I did the day before. I can't remember things 5 minutes after I think them. For example:

- This morning I really had a craving for Tim Horton's peach drink. Remember it used to be in the those fountain drink things? Well they sell it in cans and bottles now and I get cravings for really sweet juice so off I went to Timmy's before opening the store. I got a coffee, a yogurt and a bagel. I forgot the juice. Seriously?!

- I had a headache the other day. Eric asks if I took tylenol. "yes" "no" "sigh... I don't remember" He's all "what do you mean you don't remember?". I mean I know I thought about taking some, but did I actually do it, the best I can tell you here is "maybe". Same with my other meds... I can tell you I remembered I should take them some day, but then spend a lot of time trying to decide if I actually did. I'm going to need to get one of those pill dispensers to prove whether or not I'm taking my medicine :P

- I was out for breakfast with K and Eric on the weekend when I suddenly panicked. "I forgot to tell her how I want my eggs". Eric is all "really? are you sure. She probably would have asked." "no, i didn't tell her." and I wave her down frantically. She comes over and looks at me curiously, opens her book and says "over easy?" GAH! These things disappear from my brain!!

I'm I doomed to just get dumber and dumber over the next 5-6 months???

The thrill of twins

I know and feel that this an amazingly fabulous thing that has happened to us. Twins! That's frickin' special man! And I'm excited for that. But the next year - it's going to be hard.

These are the things rushing through my head:

- I am more afraid of carrying these babies than of having them. My body didn't deal that well with one (although birth was good) and I'm afraid of my body not holding up well through this.
- There's a lot of pressure involved in eating well (especially when I feel gross a lot of the time) for TWO growing babies. The pressure makes me nervous.
- Even in the bigger of our two vehicles, two babies, a kiernan, and a stroller big enough for all three of them will not fit.
- Overall, the jump from having 2 kids to 3 kids had a fair impact on things since we have a 3 bedroom house, we don't have a van and as it was, I was hoping we wouldn't have to be in the house we're in for long with just TWO kids. We're going to be crammed in like sardines.
- I need to expect not to be able to work after my second trimester if necessary - talk about a difference in planning financially for the girl who just quit her full-time permanent job!

So again, don't get me wrong. I'm happy. But there's a whole lot of nervous and scared mixed in there. ;)

Oh, and also. Still doesn't REALLY feel real ;)

I wonder..

... will twins make me have an even odder shaped preggo belly than last time, or fill it out better making it rounder?

These are the thoughts going through my head people. eesh ;)

The not so unexpected I suppose

When I was 19 I had a dream that one of my friends from highschool was pregnant. It was such a vivid and real dream that for (I believe) the only time in my life I picked up the phone and called a person in my dream to find out if I possible dreamt the truth. She sounded surprised, informed me no, and that was that.
2 days later she called me back and was all "ummm... you kind of got me realizing I was late so we went and bought a test and I *am* pregnant". Right. then I fell off my chair because obviously I was psychic ;)
And that was the end of my career as a psychic. Um, except you know how the other day I was telling you about my twin prediction?
Introducing babies A & B:


The freaking out has been minimal so far - i'm assuming due to the fact that I'm waiting for the time when, any minute now, someone says "JUST KIDDING!"
But Eric assures me that the technician did in fact tell us we were having twins, and yes, we did actually see a shot with both of them in it and no I didn't make all of this up.
The tech said they're both right on track with one at 2.25 inches from crown to rump and the other at 2.5. And... OH MY GOD WE'RE HAVING TWINS!

Colic

This week I can really feel for those little guys with colic. Every night, around 5 or so, regardless of what I eat, don't eat, take my medicine, don't take my medicine, etc, I start to feel HORRID. It lasts a couple of hours and I walk around moaning and groaning and feeling like ass. It doesn't help that it happens every night during the two hours I get to spend with my son every day. I resent it. But alas, such is my lot in pregnancy I guess ;)
At a mere 12 weeks I'm already feeling ligament pain, getting nightly heartburn that tums won't clear up and am nowhere near being at the end of my nausea. Have I mentioned that for the last 2 years I've joked that our next baby would either be a boy (following in the Wellman curse tradition) or twin girls. Our ultrasound is on Wednesday so at least we'll be able to rule out the twin thing soon (I hope! ;)

There's a camel WHERE?

I/we like to bring up the new baby a fair amount to Kiernan and I often ask him where the baby is. This evening's conversation went something like this while lying on our bed:
"Kiernan, where's the baby?"
"In mommy's tummy"
"Want to say hi to the baby?"
"Ya. Hi baby. How are you? I'm fine" and Eric came in and lay down on the bed with us and Kiernan says
"where's the camel?"
Eric and I look at each other, look at Kiernan and we say "we don't know. where's the camel kiernan?"
"in daddy's tummy!"
Ha! A camel in daddy's tummy. This stuff kills me :)

Danger Danger!

Today I finally got my lethargic pregnant ass off the couch to do something productive while I was home and started cleaning the bathroom. I got out all my supplies and began spritzing the tiles in the tub with the vinegar and water solution we were told we should use on our new and fancy tub.

So there I am, spritzing away, when suddenly the bottle comes from the nozzle and slams down into the tub and the vinegar and water come catapulting up out the top of the bottle and hit me right in the face. Right past my glasses and into my eyes! And I lost it!

My glasses flew one way, the rubber gloves I was wearing another as I rushed to the sink thinking "but I have to work, I don't have time to go to the hospital, oh what I wouldn't do for one of those eye washing thingies I remember in the labs in high school chemistry or shop class" and I splashed water into my eye as I tried to keep it open, knowing that that was what the thingy in the lab was supposed to do.

And that's when I realized... my eye didn't really hurt. So I stopped the water thing, dried my face, and realized I was... uh. fine.

I am sure though, that had I been using lysol, all the bad things that went through my head would have been warranted. Another reason to use less chemicals while cleaning! ;)

Going for a ride

Given Kiernan's love of buses and trains Eric came up with a great activity for us this weekend. We took the bus to the train, took the train its 12 minute route, came back and bused back to the car. Kiernan, backpack on the whole time, loved it and loudly insisted that mommy and daddy also say chugga chugga too too.

I dunno

When Kiernan had his two year appointment with the doctor last week she said "well it doesn't look like language is an issue", to which I chuckled and said no, and she said "and he probably gets at least one new word a week?" and I said "I would think at least that" but I realize I have no real concept because Kiernan talks so much that unless he says something unusual I'm not surprised he knows how to say it.

I have two current favourites of what he is saying. I already mentioned that he started saying things are his favourites in my last post, but now he's trying to really use the word in more complex ways. Last night at dinner he asked Eric and I very seriously "mommy. daddy. mommy daddy. who is my favourite?" Eric and I looked at each other thinking "uh oh. who does he love more?" and he proudly pounding his chest and announced "KIERNAN!" Super cute.

His other new thing is "I dunno" to most questions we ask him. He doesn't wait and think about whether or not he knows, he just says he doesn't know and then answers. So cute! I even got a video of it. He starts off a bit distracted but stay the course :)

June baby :)

You'd think that after my post all about "talking about it" I would be the kind of person who would share all my big news immediately. And yet, I'm a little more superstitious than I let on, and have a bit of a fear that if I share good news I'm just ASKING for bad things to happen.

So despite having found out over three weeks ago that I'm pregnant again (yay!) I haven't been ready to blog about it. But now - now that the nausea, the fatigue and moodiness have already begun to take over my entire existence - I'm ready to share that I'm 7.5 weeks pregnant (we think. harder to know because I didn't have a normal cycle the month before). So I can complain. ;)

Are you excited? That's right, amongst the cute stories of Kiernan you will now be overwhelmed (promises promises that suddenly I'll be reinpired to blog eh? :) with whining about how I'm going to gain 90 lbs because instead of craving vietnamese like last time, my cravings are for the much healthier poutine. Or how last night, for the second time this week, I fell asleep before Kiernan and slept for the night - who needs to do anything other than work and sleep?

Wish me luck. I'm feeling fairly positive that this pregnancy is here to stay, although I know it's still early and we never know. And despite this promise of whining, I actually think that I may be doing a bit better than I was at this stage with Kiernan. And you only need to listen to 33ish more weeks of this. Unless of course this baby decides to be late too :)

I'll leave you with a few of Kiernan's new favourite lines to keep things cute and fun :
" oh! That's my FAVOURITE!"
" I want to eat trick or trick mommy. I want to eat trick or treat"
"I do not like that song! I do not like that tv!"
"Again Dora as a kitty. Again Dora as a kitty" (because the ONLY thing Kiernan wants to watch on tv anymore EVER is the Halloween episode of Dora.)

And apparently Eric plans to blog his side of things too - so that promises to be far funnier than any of what I have to say :)

Sleeping babies are cute!

And Jenn from Life of the Roof's son Griffin is a finalist in the 5 minutes for Mom contest to win a bedroom set. Go on over and vote for #7 and help her win!!

Go! Now! Help others! It's a nice thing to do :)

No doubt about it

Fall is WAYYYY here.

Ma spider

A few weeks ago Miss Spider (or as Kiernan insists she's called, Ma Spider) came to Place d'Orleans. Kiernan was excited to see her, but was a bit nervous as the actual meeting. Daddy went with him which made it all a little more ok :)

Cloth diapers

I'm still not in the mood to blog lately... it's just not coming to me. But my fan has been complaining so I thought I'd tell you about a decision I made recently.

I've decided to attempt to switch Kiernan to cloth diapers.

Why this late in the game? A couple of reasons. One of the big ones is I've heard it's easier to toilet train a child in cloth diapers and Kiernan just seems to me like the type of kid to just decide to be toilet trained if given the right incentive (ie not feeling wet and icky). We'll see if I'm right. The other reasons are that we're selling them at the store now, and I'm all for personally trying and understanding the product so I can sell it better, and of course, the whole "it's better for the environment" thing ;)

So far we've gone through a few nights without any major mishaps. The biggest challenge will of course be the poo, but I have a feeling we'll overcome :) So wish us luck because I think this should be interesting.

Buses going to mommy's house

Kiernan loves buses. School buses. City buses. Short buses - whatever.

So every morning on the 10 minute drive to daycare we point out all the buses. "OH! ANOTHER SCHOOL BUS!" "OH, ANOTHER CITY BUS, EH MOMMY?"

This morning it expanded. Every bus that we saw that was going the opposite direction than we were going in was "SCHOOL BUS GOING TO MOMMY'S HOUSE. Eh mommy?" "OH! ANOTHER SCHOOL BUS GOING TO MOMMY'S HOUSE!"

I thought it was genius that he was making the connection about going towards our house or away from our house. Genius right? I knew it :)

Blogging

It seems like I am taking an unofficial break from blogging. I can't seem to find the motivation lately - despite having great fodder - like Kiernan turning two and being the chattiest and I think funniest kid I've ever met ;)

I'll try to get back into the swing of things I'm soon. I'm sure once I have my computer back from Future shop (is 2010 at this rate :P) then I'll post more often. Don't give up on me yet! :)

The advantages to having a blogging husband

Despite being completely uninspired to blog lately I can tell you about...

adventures in math
the toys of my husband's childhood and their fate as toys for our child
the genius that is my son

all without having to compose a word - Eric tells them better most of the time anyways ;)

Out for dinner

Last night Eric, Kiernan and I went out for dinner.

And you know what Kiernan had?

A grilled cheese sandwich, mashed potatoes and a glass of milk! And I didn't have to ask them to check the ingredients. And he slept through the night. Which (and I've been holding out on this for awhile now) makes me confident enough to say: the milk intolerance is over!!

Think the cheese will fatten him up? ;)

Next... soy. We're almost ready to try that one.

Happy happy joy joy joy! :)

Talking about it

Yesterday two things happened to me that you're not "supposed" to talk about.

1. I found out I was pregnant.
2. I had a miscarriage.

Both were hugely emotional, and both were things I wanted to talk about. Talking about things is pretty much the only way I know how to deal with emotions. If I don't talk about them, I ignore them, pretend they don't exist, until they come back one day to bite me in the ass and give me anxiety attacks, nightmares and emotion explosions.

So I shared (and am sharing further now). And I'm ok. I was very very happy, and then I was very scared, then I was sad, and now I feel ok.

I was lucky (if you can dare to call it that) that it all happened in one day and that I didn't have more time to really process the fact that I was pregnant. I struggle between feeling like I should be more sad and that I don't have the right to be sad because other people who have gone through this when they've been much further along had it so much harder.

I'm lucky that I know, and I think believe, all the things that people tell you when you have a miscarriage: it's probably for the best - these things often don't work out because there's something wrong; it's not your fault - you didn't do anything to make this happen.

And I'm lucky that I have this blog to air these thoughts on - trying to put my thoughts into words, no matter how jumbled, really helps me process the emotions I often prefer to ignore.

our store!

So I realized that I don't think I ever even announced on my blog that the STORE IS OPEN! OH MY GOD!! WE HAVE A STORE!

And it's awesome and it's great and we're exhausted because it's an awful lot of work and Vicky and I are covering off most of the shifts of a mall that is open 9:30-9pm 6 days a week and 11-5 on Sundays. But it's awesome and I'm happy. But a bit brain dead.

I'm hoping I'll soon have more time for blogging again. Thoughtful blogging. So stay tuned ;) Until then - look at our store! :) Isn't it pretty?

W is for wagon

We were at the park the other night and just as we were getting ready to go, this very cute little boy, about 18 months old, charged on over followed by his mom who had been over in the bigger park with her son, older son, and husband. She was Asian - I don't know where from, but she spoke English quite well, but with an accent (this is relevant to the story ;)

So, it's time for us to go and we'd already been prompting Kiernan to get back in the wagon for the ride home. So he runs over to the wagon and hollers over to us "Tiernan go in the wagon!"

And the woman looks at me in disbelief. "He just said a sentence! How old is he?"

So I tell her that he's almost two, and yes, he's quite advanced with his language skills.

She starts telling me how her older son only started talking at two, and how her younger son, at 18 months old only had a few words.

And so I said again "ya, he's really ahead with talking." and something like "oh kids... they're all so different aren't they?"

But she's not ready for that to be the answer. "Did you put him in some kind of training?"

"Um, no"

"He just picked it up? You didn't work with him?"

"Well... we talk to him a lot and tell him stories and sing songs...."

"But he speaks so well, I think you must have taught him with some special program"

"No..."

"He just picked it up? My son at two only said a few words. Babies only say a few words at two, they don't talk in sentences"

By now, I'm just not sure what else to say anymore so fortunately her 18 month old ran off and she had to chase after him. I'm sure that (this is where it gets relevant) that she must be teaching her kids two languages at the same time which always slows down the speed that kids start talking but it was her unwillingness to just believe that some kids naturally talk earlier that I didn't know what to do with.

Or, I mean, send your kid to my house for my special learn to talk early program - only $499.99 ;)

Medic in training

Scene: Mommy getting Kiernan for bed and going to sit in rocker to read a book. Mommy stubs her toe (as she is want to do) and says "ow"
Kiernan: Mommy ok?
Mommy: Ya, mommy's ok.
Kiernan: *pause* Mommy need a bandaid?

Watch out...

Scene: Bed time. Daddy holding Kiernan and mommy leans in for a hug.
Kiernan: watch out...
Mommy: watch out for what?
Kiernan: watch out for Tiernan
Mommy and Daddy: okay....
Mommy leans in for a hug, Kiernan leans back and gives mommy a head butt.

I supposed I WAS warned.

Wordless Wednesday : yummy timbit

Twilight - a sort of book review

I bought this book from the teen section because I'd heard despite it being young adult, it was so amazing that adults everywhere were reading it - and since I haven't heard that since Harry Potter, and I love Harry Potter, I was willing to check it out.


I am now obsessed. I couldn't put it down until it was done (that's the problem with a young adult book, I got through it far too quickly) and I was so enamored with the characters that I can't stop thinking about them. (Vicky called me while I was reading and it took me almost 5 minutes to come out of the reverie of reading the book to have a coherent conversation with her, and I don't think that's ever happened to me before).

Now I'm watching the trailor to the movie that is coming out this Fall repeatedly and reading the author's web site and refusing to let myself buy the next book in the series because I'm just too busy right now. Now I just have to stop myself from reading the whole book over again!

I recommend it, but, have a lot of time ready just in case you get as obsessed as me ;)

The things he's been saying

Kiernan amazes me daily with the new things he's constantly saying - here are a few words and conversations that have stood out recently

* He likes to use the name of who he's talking to at the end of each sentence. "what's that over there mummy?" "go downstairs daddy" "go in the car mummy and daddy" but as he gets more excited words start to blend together and/or he's not paying attention as to who he's talking to and this starts to happen "go on the slide mumdy?" or my ultimate favourite "go on the slide dummy?"

*He gets in, out, under, etc pretty well. "Oh! A zebra in the 'puter!" "Oh! bubbles in the 'puter!" "Oh! My slide in the backyard" (he's always excited by what he sees like when we were driving in montreal and he exclaimed for at least 20 houses in a row. "Oh! another big house!"

* Conversation while changing a dirty diaper:
Me: Where do big boys go poo Kiernan?
Kiernan: In da potty
Me: Where does Kiernan go poo?
Kiernan:....
Me: Is Kiernan a big boy?
Kiernan: Nope
Me: boo

* He's picked up on the fact that we quiz him everywhere we go so he's taken on both roles
"What's that? a flower. What's that? a puzzle? Who's that? grandpapa. Who's that? mommy" Less work for us :)

* He's really getting possessives and it's so cute. We get a lot of "My do it" and "my go outside"
or "No! Kiernan's 'puter!" (which, um, no. get away from my 'puter child. ;)

Maybe I just don't have enough money to do it right?

I can't believe it's already been 2-3 weeks since BFF and I can't believe I never did my wrap up post (sigh) about all the fabulous people I met and how much fun I had. But since I was there I've been thinking about writing a post about hotels.

Hotels are expensive. And trust me, since I started running my own business I really do understand how expensive it is to run a business. I no longer just think about the cost to me but try to be aware of all the costs to the business - it's way harder to make a profit out there than I ever would have imagined.

But that is not the point, the point here is, why is it, that the more you spend to stay in a hotel, the less you get?

Now if I think about it for more than 1 second, I can explain it to you from a business point of view, but as a consumer, it irritates the crap out of me.

I resent that when I spend $100/night (ish) to stay in a hotel I get a nice clean room and often also get free internet and free or discounted breakfast but when I stay at the Hilton I spend $550 for two nights (at the discounted rate) and internet is $10 for 24 hours, parking is $20, there is no included or discounted breakfast and my view looks like this:



The only thing that stood out as worth a lot of money was how comfortable the beds and pillows were - and for a hotel that is obviously important. But still. The housekeeping rated thumbs down, the hotel didn't manage to make sure wireless was available for our round table despite weeks of notice. Hilton, you did not impress me. And I expected to be impressed. And this happened when I stayed at the fancy hotel in Ottawa too - the Brook Street.

Maybe the problem is that I don't have enough money to enjoy an expensive hotel. If I didn't care about the cost I would have a nice room, I would pay for all the extras without worrying about the cost, I would spend $25 on breakfast and eat $5 worth without thinking anything of it, and then the Hilton would be the best place ever to stay.

Instead, I am impressed by the ragtag mesh of smaller hotels I've stayed in in the past and will feel I best spent my money by staying in a Days Inn, Best Western, etc

This hotel in Edson had free internet and a voucher for free breakfast at the restaurant next door. (see that truck, I got to drive it for 10 days, and I kinda still miss it).

We stayed at this hotel pre laptop so I don't know if they had internet, but they had a great included buffet breakfast.

And fancy decorations!


I'd rather stay in these places and save the extra money to go do the fun stuff (wretched photo, but such fun times had with Vicky and Urban mummy and daddy!)

Yackety yack

When I was a teenager my parents couldn't pry the telephone away from me - I spent hours upon hours upon hours talking to all my friends. It was especially important for me as a teen because we lived in a rural area and I went to a regional high school so I didn't really have any friends who lived within walking distance from me.
Even when I moved to Ottawa, I would spend hours and hours on the phone. There were countless nights I spent the entire night talking away (back in the days when I could just cut class if I was too tired to get up the next day ;)
And suddenly, in the last couple of years, I realize that I don't like talking on the phone any more. Have I just grown to dependent on online chat and email? It's possibly, although in reality I've been online chatting for so long and a lot of those overlapped with the phone years. Is it just that I have so little down time compared to before that I have a hard time talking on the phone because it's just one thing, and if I'm chatting online really I can be chatting with more than one person, watching tv, reading blogs, etc?
I think the latter might be the most accurate theory and I think it's a bit sad that I rarely give anything my full attention anymore - everything is a bit diluted and that sucks. But I'm not sure I have it in me to stop doing it either. But I'm trying lately, so that's a start. ;)

Wordless Wednesday - vacation fun

Dear doctors who work at the clinic

Do you hate being a doctor, or just working at the clinic? Because every single one of you is a crusty ass when dealing with patients (I'm assuming it's not just me and my son).

Because seriously, saying "Oh it's just a light" in an annoyed voice to a 22 month old when he's not fond of a person he met 10 seconds ago sticking a strange implement in his ear is ass-like behaviour. And you getting a .25 second glimpse into my son's throat and then diagnosing strep seems slightly sketchy too - although I will give you the benefit of the doubt on that one.

Seriously annoyed mommy.

(Kiernan will get his first dose of penicillin ever (I think we've done quite well getting to 22 months without needing any antibiotics) after his nap. I'm allergic to penicillin (but just in a rashy way, not swell up and die kind of way) so I'm a bit nervous. The joys.)

Kaboom

My laptop seems to have self destructed. sigh.
It gave enough warning that all photos were backed up, but my 1000s of Apples'n'Oranges emails - not so much. I'm hoping that laptop might give us one or two more breaths to get them out and then off to the shop it goes where fortunately all should be covered by warranty.
How will I survive without my own computer for the most likely millions of weeks they will keep it away from me?
We're leaving on vacation until the weekend and then I'm back at work next week so I'm not sure how much I'll be online. Miss me lots but keep coming back - I have all kinds of BFF things to say (including a post all about the value of expensive hotels) and I may whine and complain about how Kiernan has decided to wake up in the night every night for no apparently reason and not go down for hours.

BFF - the mini update

I've driven approximately 1500 kms in the last four days and am very very sore and tired and zonked but couldn't not leave a quick post, especially after I was claiming I'd be posting the whole time I was gone. ;)

I have lots to say but it's going to have to wait. I met so many fabulously amazing bloggers and had a great time drinking too much, going on a wine tour, out for dinner and on the maid of the mist. Being hung over, not so great ;)

Coming home was great - especially when Kiernan realized I was home (almost shockingly) and gave me the best big hug ever!

I'm taking the easy way out and not doing all the linking and the storytelling now - so instead here is a taste of the weekend via photos:

Blogher pffft - BFF here I come!

Last year I spent the entire weekend of the BlogHer conference feeling horribly jealous that I wasn't taking part.

This year Blogher was even further and I really couldn't justify the trip to San Francisco... but then a couple of Ontario gals decided to have Blog Friends Fest in Niagara Falls for a bunch of us who can't make it. DOABLE!

So we're off! Vicky and I are leaving this morning and will use the opportunity to do some Apples'n'Oranges stuff on the way down and back up. I'm bringing the laptop, camera, and flip so expect to hear from me - this is a blogging thing after all - you can't expect me to go silent for 4 days. I'm going to my people, the ones who understand the never ending need to check email, blog about something and understand it's more relaxing to have your laptop with you everywhere you go than the alternative ;)

vlogger in the making?

I got what I wanted for my bday

so watch out - i may stop using words and just post all kinds of silly videos of my kid ;)




Not his best rendition - but the best I got so far

Kids' museum in photos

We had so much fun at the kids' museum (part of the museum of civilizations) today. The bob the builder exhibit was the best part!





Kiernan felt this slide was too wussy so walked down instead :)

Fun at the farm!

It was a gorgeous day to go to the farm!

Peering at the horses.

This is Kiernan's "I'm having fun face" I swear ;)




Look at the baby cow! No, I don't want it to lick me. Mommy, you do it.

Cows mommy! Cows!

Cow too close! Cow too close!

Petting the goat while it is behind a fence and mommy is holding my hand is ok....

Slides - they win every time ;)

Tomorrow - maybe the children's museum... maybe cosmic... who knows ;)

On vacation!

I'm on vacation until the 28th - YAY! We've got tons of activities planned and I have my camera ready! So unlike all those other people who are all "I'm on vacation so I have no time to blog" I'm all "you're gonna get sick of all the photos I'm going to publish because that may be all I post, but there will be lots of those!" ;)

Stay tuned for tales (aka as photos) of the experimental farm, blog friends fest, parc safari, and lots and lots of Kiernan :)

Matching socks - who would have thought?

My birthday is this Thursday and it kind of crept up on me... crept up as in I only realized my birthday was coming up a few weeks ago, and trust me, in the past, I had WAY more than a few weeks to dwell on my upcoming festivities :)

I always plan/planned my own birthday party - basically because I figure I know what I want best, why let someone else try to figure it out, and very possibly get it all wrong? Same with birthday presents... may as well let people know what I want (and in return I like to be told what people want)

So this year I realized I'm growing up. It's been years since the annual Larapalooza cottage party that invites were sent out for in January. With these parties went the tendency to drink copious amounts of alcohol in honour of my birthday. Instead we started going out for dinner somewhere nice with friends, and having cake afterwards. This year, not even that is going to happen... and I'm totally fine with that.

I'd always heard that as you get older your birthday gets less and less important and I'm seeing just how true that is. I don't feel the need to do anything particularly special - there isn't really a lot of time and it's too difficult to try to figure it out. And I don't need gifts, just for the sake of getting gifts. Unless there is something that screams "LARA" to you, feel free to just wish me happy birthday, or maybe we can go out for dinner some time.

So I started thinking about how I'm growing up - I will after all be 32 in a few days...
Gone are the days when I had no responsibilities, I cut classes and slept all day, and was a rather good partier. Gone are the days when I made an effort to be a quirky dresser - I now feel kind of silly when my socks look like this (although it does still happen on occasion ;)

(not my socks... random online photo that looks like something I would do. I do not own a cat)

I'm looking forward to dinner out with Eric at my favourite Chinese food restaurant this Thursday night. And to heading to Niagara Falls for Blog Friends Fest this weekend (SO EXCITED) and I'm not disappointed at all that there isn't any big happenings for my birthday - and that's kinda weird ;)

car seat stuff

Before Kiernan was born I spent a lot of time agonizing about not having the inclination to do real research on what the best everything I should get was. So, I took the easy way out and went to the specialty shop in town and had a 1.5 hour conversation with a very knowledgeable staff person about the pros and cons of a LOT of different car seats and strollers. In the end I felt very comfortable with our choices.

We chose the Graco 30 lb bucket, since most kids outgrow the 20lb bucket before they turn one and are allowed to be turned front facing. This, we thought, would avoid us having to have one of the mondo car seats facing backwards and leaving the person in the front seat with little to no room. I highly recommend this car seat for all of those reasons btw - being able to transport the bucket with sleeping baby is FAR more convenient than having to get them in and out of the bigger seat - hear that pregnant friends? ;)


What we didn't bank on was Kman being such a tiny guy... by one he hadn't hit 20 lbs, in fact I believe it took him until almost 17 months to hit it. We only switched him out of the bucket when his big pouffy snowsuit wouldn't fit into the straps anymore and now that it's summer he could probably fit back into it again if we wanted him to :)

But all of this is just an introduction to what I really want to talk about - which is that Kiernan, at 22 months, and in his big car seat, still sits rear facing (so ha ha on us since we're still sitting squished in the front seat in front of a big car seat ;). And I feel like I spend a lot of time justifying/defending that decision...

When K was about 13 months old we did a baby show for Apples'n'Oranges and they were doing car seat clinics. I sent Eric over to take part and he came back with enormous amounts of information - most importantly that your child should stay rear facing as long as possible - ideally up to 30 lbs. And they really convinced him that this was what you should be doing, because until a kid weighs 30 lbs they don't have the same strength in their body to withstand the impact of a collision facing forward - facing backwards the seat takes on most of the impact. They also told him that it didn't matter if their feet touched the back seat - it was still much safer that way.

Kiernan is somewhere in the 23-24lb range now - so he's big enough to legally be facing forward. But for his safety, we've chosen to have him continue to sit backwards - although we've agreed that by 2 we'll probably turn him around. What did you do? What would you do? Do you think people question me to justify why they turned their kid around as opposed to thinking we're weird? Do you think I'm being overly sensitive and they're probably just being curious? ;)

Wordless Wednesday - crocodile huntin'