The thing about a food intolerence is...

... that it gets blamed for everything.

I have a feeling that most of you parents out there, will have the occasional WTF kind of night with your baby. A night where they wake up in the middle of the night howling and crying - inconsolable and unable to tell you what's wrong (right?)

When this happens to us, we immediately think we made a mistake. What did we give him? Was it the bread? Was it the cheese? No, he's been having that cheese for 2 weeks, how could it suddenly cause this drastic a reaction. What oatmeal did you use in dinner? I am going to go and read the ingredients right now! Could it be the goodstart we've been giving him, also for weeks?

So now I've decreased the amount of goodstart we're giving him, because twice this week, around 10, Kiernan wakes up howling and is inconsolable for almost an hour. We end up giving in and letting him watch tv to calm him down, only because he is so upset it is clearly not a cry about not wanting to go to sleep. He's so upset he's irrational "Do you want water?" "Water water water!" so you bring him water and he bats it away and howls "WAAATTERRR!" um. that was water. repeat. same reaction. Okkk... "do you want a bottle?" "BOTTLE BOTTLE BOTTLE" so you bring him the bottle, he bats it away and cries pathetically "boootttlllee"

So ya, frustrating, upsetting, and so mysterious. Does this just happen to some kids for no reason? Could it be nightmares? Do you think it's the food? I just don't get it and I feel so bad for the little guy!

I feel pretty oh so pretttyy

One of my goals lately has been to feel prettier so I've been trying to make more of an effort to get out of my ponytails and shlumpy clothing.
I also realized that there aren't any photos of Eric and I that I like since, well, practically our wedding but probably more accurately since I got pregnant. So with a wedding as an excuse to get all dressed up I made it a goal to try to get a good photo of the two of us this past weekend. I think it turned out pretty well!

Not going to jinx it

Because I don't want to jinx it I'm not going to tell you that:

- Kiernan has been getting 4 oz a day of goodstart (dairy) in his bottles and there hasn't been a reaction. This has been a gradual increase from 2 oz a day over a week ago.
- Kiernan has peed in the potty about 10 times now. We still aren't actively potty training, but just putting him on it every night before bed and sometimes when he first wakes up to get him used to it and hes peeing about every other time.
- Once Kiernan going to sleep he doesn't wake up again until morning. Sometimes he wakes up at 5:30 but we can usually convince him to go back to sleep until 7 or so.

The whole blog thing

Lately I've been thinking about blogging a lot, and how I can't think of anything to blog about. I used to think of a zillion things a day to blog about but couldn't find the time to blog. Now that I have the time, I don't seem to be able to find the inspiration.

I think it all stems from what I'm going through right now - which is a time of great uncertainty and attempting to re-evaluate.

I'm written here in the past about how hard a time I had going back to work. That wasn't helped by me having other commitments, including Apples'n'Oranges. I managed to get myself so stressed out and anxious by everything I was doing that I started experiencing all kinds of fun stress and anxiety symptoms - you know, like heart palpitations, daily headaches, low immunity, daily fits of tears, etc.

So I said enough and am now trying to figure out what to do instead. And it's a tough journey. It's a lot easier to try to bury your head in the sand and ignore that changes need to be made. But that won't make things better - and better is my goal.

So I hope that I start becoming inspired again, and that I feel happy and optimistic and creative again, and then I'll start blogging my heart out. I mean, I need to get in shape for the Blog Friends Fest which I have officially booked my hotel for (Some Kind of Wondermom and I are rooming together) and CAN"T WAIT TO ATTEND! :)

Proof he's not just cute to me cuz he's my kid

Kiernan has been spending one day a week with his grammie lately, and today was that day. She had to go to the store so she put him in the stroller and took him over to the mall - a mall well known for it's weekday inhabitants of, well, old people.
Kman was starting to get drowsy so Grammie pre-empted any falling asleep by taking him out and having him walk along side of her holding her hand.
An old lady, who by Grammie's description must have been about 4 feet tall, stops and says
"You keep ahold of his hand now!"
Grammie "I will"
Old lady "Cuz you know... those gays..."
Grammie "oh....?"
Old lady looking back as she walked away "and he's a cute one!"

Oy vey!

20 months old

Today Kiernan turned 20 months old - and for some reason that strikes me a bit more than a lot of the last bunch of months - maybe because it's TWENTY! 2 - 0! He's going to be five soon if I don't watch out ;)

It's so hard to imagine that it was only 20 months ago that he was born, less than 20 months ago when I was so excited that he had followed me with his eyes (HE COULD SEE ME!) that I called Eric at work to tell him. And the first thing Eric did when he got home was have Kiernan follow him with his eyes.

And now we have this little man who runs and jumps and climbs and talks... boy does he talk! :)

He's so aware of us now it's incredible. If K hears either one of us while the other is getting him up in the morning, he exclaims "MOMMY!" (or daddy) in the most thrilled voice you can imagine - it's really heart warming. And if we start to go somewhere with him without the other parent "daddy comin'?" Or if one of us leaves "mommy goin'?"

His favourite food at moment seems to be dried cranberries followed up by instant oatmeal. If I take my glasses off he insists they be put back on. He wants to be outside as much as possible, and most of all he wants to be at the park. He can tell if we're not taking the right route the the "slide!!" and will throw himself to the ground in a fit of despair.

And I have no photos because I can't find the camera battery charger and the battery in my camera is dead I'm going to go and buy a new charger tomorrow ;)

Happy mother's day!

To me, Mother's day honours the day you get to meet your brand new baby - and all the joy and love that comes after it.




I wish all mommies a fabulously wonderful day, and with a particularly special one to my mommy ;)

Jewellery by Erin

My friend Erin makes gorgeous jewellery. She's running a contest on her blog - so go win some of it! :)

The mouth on that one!

Our chatty cathy's vocabulary is ever expanding, but there are still a few sounds and words that are a bit confusing - much to our amusement:

(s)ock - s sounds like c
(tr)uck (or big truck :) - tr sounds like f
f(or)k - or sounds like u
tick (t)ock - tick sounds like big, and and c replaces the t
and sometimes down (or is it ham) sounds like "Daaaaaaaaaaamn!"

He's also learning please, thank you and you're welcome. Although he seems to think the last two are one phrase.

If you give him something he says (in his sing songy way) "thank you! welcome!"

The amusement is almost endless :)

Relaxing stuff

I made another tote bag! I think it's really nice - simple and nice. It has another flaw (pucker on top right corner you could probably see if you click on the photo) but it also has a funky lining with a pocket and everything.



I'm working hard on relaxing, but it's not as easy as it looks. After 4 work days off I barely feel like I've rested at all - how is that possible?! ;) Any good relaxation tips?

Blog Friends Fest

Who wants to come with me? :)

Rest and relaxation

As of 5pm yesterday I am officially off work until June 3 (more on that later). I started with a bang by going straight to a 'learn to sew' class at Workshop Boutique- a fabulous store in the ByWard Market (and home to some lovely necklaces that I would love to own by my new favourite designer Marmalade ;)

We made a tote bag and I think it turned out pretty well! It's lined and everything. And embellished... although that may be where it started to fall apart.

This was totally down my alley in terms of sewing - she gave us a general template, which we could follow or change if we wanted it bigger or smaller or the straps longer or shorter.


It began to fall apart when I had to be creative and embellish the bag though - I didn't listen to the instructions for making the fabric sticky and ended up cutting my bird's nose off (which I was lucky to get because it happens to be a scrap of the owner's silkscreening which is what she sells for lots of money) and then tried to figure out a way to attach the beak back on. I think it turned out ok (you'll really see the error if you click on the photo below to get to full size) but really, you should see my friend Jen's bag - much more cleverly embellished.

And for a good time, go here (not spam ;)