Ebb and Flow

Country, Winter...Running?

2012-01-30T15:05:00.000-05:00

I'm still alive. Country living agrees with hermity old me. Last week there was a little ice storm and I spent the day in the den writing and folding laundry and drinking coffee and looking out the window at the lovely ice formations on the trees in the yard. Then the power went out and I got out some candles, picked up the baby from daycare and waited for SB to get home and light the fireplace. (while I'm sure I'm perfectly capable of lighting the fire myself, I'm not equally confident with my ability to set the flue/fan correctly to keep the smoke out of the house. So until I get a chance to practice, I will not light a fire without supervision!)

Today I ventured out for not only my first run in our new neighborhood, but my first REAL winter run. Yes I ran in slushy and snowy conditions when we were in the city, but that was....longer ago than I would like to admit. Now that winter is fully upon us, the road is full of chunky ice and snow and the air feels empty. Since I haven't run in an embarrassingly long time I dialed back my routine to a 4km run/walk. While my legs and back feel actually really really great, my lungs had a hard time with the cold air and I'm glad I didn't push it.

My biggest beef about this winter running thing? I think I have an allergy to the cold! I'm not even kidding - before the holidays we went on a lovely walk on the mountain on a very cold day. We bundled up, but I wore just jeans, no longjohns or anything. By the end of the walk my thighs felt tingly from the cold, which I think happens to most everyone. But when we got home and I began to thaw out, my legs became unbearable itchy. Like, intolerable. Like, I wanted to take a sharp object to scratch at them. Being a patient of the great Dr. Google, I looked up the symptoms and allergies to cold conditions is a real thing. So, today I felt warm enough on my run, but now that I'm home and warming up, my legs are soooo itchy again. Maybe I should put a pair of shorts over my running pants? I don't want to overdo it because too hot = sucky. Today it was -5 when I left. Anyway, a dose of Benedryl helped last time so I'll probably hit that up soon.

I should have taken some photos. I need to make a point of doing that. Tess had an amazing time - she is really loving life here, as she should, since we moved out here basically for her quality of life :P Also, this was my first run in like two years without a jogging stroller. It felt amazing.

Gonna Eat a Lot of Peaches

2012-01-21T19:03:00.000-05:00

We've moved to the country! I wish I could tell some kind of crazy ridiculous moving story, but I can't because things went pretty smoothly. We are settling in slowly - there are still boxes full of stuff waiting for their places to be assigned, and there is still stuff that hasn't been put together yet. I am the worst for this kind of thing because I'm completely indecisive. For some reason I feel like when you put something away somewhere THAT IS ITS HOME and you are never allowed to assign it a new one. SB is not bad at this at all so while I spent the week running errands and doing laundry and getting the kid to learn daycare, I did NOT get anything done in the unpacking field. So SB has been doing that today.

Our new home is so lovely. While it is gigantic compared to what we're used to, it's nice to feel like we have space to live. The kitchen is phenomenal, and I've got big plans for some baking to do this week. (although I must note that no matter how large the kitchen is, it would seem that Tess always finds it most convenient to be underfoot).

We had the not nice surprise of a non-working garage door opener. This in itself would be less annoying if we actually had a copy of the key to the outside back door. But we don't, we only have keys for the front door, and the door inside the garage. Which means that when coming home, we have to go through the garage. And also our garage can't be locked from the outside. We thought the opener may be something we could fix, but SB took a look today and the gears are totally stripped. This is a bummer, but I guess not the end of the world.

So we've made it! We haven't killed each other yet, but the little home projects haven't really started yet. I haven't taken any photos yet, but should. I guess I'm taking too much pleasure in just soaking up our new lair.

A few things

2012-01-10T21:43:00.000-05:00

We're moving to the country in three days. And while our house is in chaos, I had a few things on my mind this evening that I thought should be shared because that's why I blog.

1. I totally want to learn to crochet because over there on Pinterest there are myriads of teeny tiny little animals all made of crochet and I NEED to do that.

2. My new house will be full of deer/elk/moose. I love these, and they were hard to work into modern condo styles. Hello country, here come the deer.

3. We have our second notary meeting tomorrow morning bright and early to sign for the new house. Lately M's schedule has been ... less on the bright and early side and more on the side of "let's have a 30 minute disco party at 5am and then go back to bed until 10! Kay?" which is a routine I'm actually all for, but, alas, life beckons. Anyway, I've had some pretty sticky insomnia lately, so to avoid a comatose me signing my life away, I just took a sleeping pill. And so zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

It's a big old Happy New Year post

2012-01-01T21:13:00.000-05:00

2012 is here. Which means that for the next two months anything I have to write the date on is guaranteed to have some scratched-out numbers on it. Just warning you.

2011 was very good to us. We welcomed our little Marlowe Fiona and she seems to be fitting in with our craziness just fine. I did not suffer any postpartum depression which was a miracle in and of itself, but my body is not bouncing back at all. I am admittedly quite lazy on the food front, but I feel I've been pretty active. We bought a house and sold a condo. I was published. I started a new blog.

2011 was very bad to a lot of people I love very much. My uncle was in a terrible motorcycle accident and is still on his long and painful path of recovery. It has been 6 months now. One of my dearest friends suffered the most terrible loss I can imagine. She is also on her path to recovery. I send all of my good thoughts and energy to them daily and can only hope the universe works the way I think it does.

In 2012 we will be moving. I will be going back to work. M will start daycare. I hope to do more writing, although the outlook seems bleak. I rarely get time to myself, and when I do it feels so decadent all I want to do is sleep and/or lounge. Maybe I should be more disciplined about it, but so far I haven't been. I want to change the way we eat. As of this moment it feels impossible, but I'm hoping that the move will give us a predictable routine and it will all work out.

I don't generally make resolutions. They are impractical and generally self-defeating. But I do like to think about my intentions. And I intend to live this year with love, good energy, and patience.

And away we go

2011-12-21T09:50:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow we are leaving for New Brunswick. The last time we undertook this endeavor things went well, but Marlowe was 3 months younger and totally not active yet. Now she likes to spend the time scuttling around the living room banging toys and "dancing". And petting Simon.

We are not taking any strollers this time. We do have to bring winter coats. And the cat. I'm not sure how the whole packing of the vehicle is going to work out, but I'm hoping we'll have a little bit of extra space somehow. We are also arming ourselves with a season of Sesame Street to appease the beast with. I can only cross my fingers. And maybe drink some Maker's.

Missing the little Bed Bug

2011-12-02T15:12:00.000-05:00

When Osha first passed, I felt okay about it. He was old. He had gotten very sick. It was time. And while I still believe all of those things, the more time that passes the more I am just really missing him.

Because he rarely left our bed, we called him the Bed Bug. In the middle of the night I still wake up and expect him to be cuddled against my head, or within reach between our pillows. While it's nice that now I can roll over without worrying about squishing him, I miss his heavy purrs. He had the purr of a cat four times his size.

Tess misses him in her way - sometimes I find her squirmed up between our pillows in the middle of the day, where he used to sleep. (she will occasionally try to get up there at night as well, but there isn't really enough space. But she tries.)

Simon also misses him. He seems to sleep a lot more now, and is more cuddly. He's like "okay, the old guy has moved on, now it's time for my retirement to start."

Such a little guy, who made such a big impact on us.

Snow running

2011-11-23T14:29:00.000-05:00

Can I just say something about winter running?

It's very hard. And very discouraging.

That's not to say I'm giving up! No! But today was my first foray into running in the snow. I was armed with my new Nike Pegasus GTXs, and my feet stayed dry even though I was running in about 3 inches of snow. I was warm in two layers of wicking long-sleeves and one Gap warmest vest. I have some great thin gloves from my dogwalking days which allowed me to keep traction on my stroller handle. I have a Bernese Mountain Dog by my side who Lives. To. Play. in Snow.

The downsides?

My pants. All I have are standard yoga-y pants, and these are toooooo cold. I need something that cuts the breeze to the hoo-ha area. I have a pair of North Face ski pants which aren't super insulated so I may try those. I usually wore them with a pair of sweatpants underneath for dogwalking or snowboarding, so alone they might be perfect for sub-zero runs.

Second, I think I would like to have a different hat or maybe one of those headband ear warmer things. Because my hat kept feeling like it was popping off, probably because of my ponytail and also my ear buds.

Lastly, I kind of expected that a little more traffic would have passed on the trail we use to run. It hadn't. Therefore while my footfalls landed nicely in packed snow for the most part, pushing the Chariot through 3 inches of wet snow on either side of the existing rut was HARD. So so so hard. So in one week (granted it was a week I spent with a cold) I went from running a tough 5k/35 minutes to an excruciating 12.5 minutes (I forgot my Garmin, so not sure how far we got, but probably.... not that far). Everything hurt - my shoulders, my triceps, my quads, my butt.

So, we have a few kinks to work out, and I'm a bit discouraged that I'm basically starting my Couch to 5K program from the beginning to help myself wean into snow running, but we're gonna do it! Especially since our new house has a horse and pedestrian path right behind it that will be perfect for runs through the woods!

House news

2011-11-23T11:43:00.000-05:00

So, after 9 days on the market we have an accepted offer on our condo! Yay! They are doing the inspection today and if that goes well (no reason it shouldn't) we will be moving the first week of January. weeeeeee.

We were sort of hoping to get in there before Xmas, but 'twas not to be. So instead, we will be traveling to NB for Xmas, rushing back, packing up, moving, unpacking, hopefully getting M into daycare, and then I'm back to work! All in the span of about one month.

Does this stress me out? Some parts yes, most parts no. I'm glad that we will be starting our new daily routine in the new house. I'm stressed we don't have a daycare spot yet. I'm happy that before the holidays come we will know that our condo sale is going through and can relax and enjoy (?) M's first Xmas. By driving ten hours in the cold, possibly snowy weather, then struggling to fit in time with everyone then driving back. So relaxing and enjoyable.

But, focusing on the positive - things are looking good that we will be moving and we're very very excited. Right now the thing I'm looking forward to the most? When Tess realizes that the whole big, fenced, wooded, beautiful yard is all for HER! I don't think she will ever want to come in the house!

Sad days

2011-11-16T16:48:00.000-05:00

Sadly, today we lost our little buddy Osha. The B'Goshie. Hamburger. Goshus.

While we only had Osha for the last few of his 20 years, he fit right in with our crazy little family. He loved sleeping. He loved cuddling. He loved cookies. He purred a lot and gave headbutts which we called Kitty Knucks. I was freakishly allergic to his saliva, and broke out in a burning rash whenever he sneezed on me, but I didn't care and loved him so so so much.

Here is one of the last photos we have of Osha. In spite of being old and frail, he loved everyone, even kids. Our friends brought their oneish year old to visit after Marlowe was born, and Osha was all about trying to cuddle with that kid. He also loved Marlowe, even though she still doesn't know how to be gentle and would grab him by his kitty cheeks. When she let go he would give her Kitty Knucks. Anyway, this photo was taken one Saturday morning while they were hanging out together.

Still in a holding pattern

2011-11-03T21:15:00.000-04:00

The subtitle for this post would be "and my ulcer is angry about it."

We still may be moving. Or we may be staying put. It's been two weeks now of back and forth offer/counteroffers and to tell you the truth I don't think I can take much more. While it hasn't been affecting my sleeping habits, nor have I had any migraines, my stomach is constantly in knots and I'm also definitely eating emotionally. Or eating to kill time. Both of those.

Do we need to move? No. No one needs to move anywhere. We have a roof over our heads and our home is warm and in one piece. Do we really want to move? Yes and no. There are really good points for staying put, but there are also many great points about moving. And since we aren't just thinking of ourselves anymore, anything that benefits M counts for two points, and when you add that up moving wins this match by a landslide.

Our new place would be in a suburb which isn't much like a suburb. For some reason I just do NOT want to live in a suburb, but this burb has horse farms and duck ponds, so that's the country, right? At any rate, if it is a suburb, it's not the icky Stepford type, it's the type that I want to live in. But let's call it the country, M'kay?

This country community also boasts several great schools, English schools! English schools with great French Immersion programs which is exactly what I want for M. So while there are other suburbs that I would also deem un-Stepford, they are definitely more on the francophone side, so not ideal.

The house in this country community has a yard! With trees! Actually, most homes in this community have great yards, but if we get this one it is my favorite yard of all the yards on the MLS. And that is a lot of yards. The house is pretty great too, but really it's the yard that I love. Which is funny because one of the things I love about living in a condo is we have no yard at all. But this house and it's yard, it's got me.

For the moment I just want to KNOW, you know? It's the waiting and the imagining and the pondering that is burning a hole in my gut. And adding new girth to the spare tire around my middle. Did I mention this house also has a trail right behind it? Through the back gate, actually. Where I could run without fear of pieces of cement falling on my head?

Would I miss living in the city? Most definitely. But I'll still be working in the city. And most of the fun stuff we do in the city we do on the weekends anyway. We can always drive in on the weekend and still do the same things. Or not. Maybe we only do them because we don't have a yard. I guess we'll find that out. Or maybe not. Because who knows what's happening? Not my stomach, that's for sure.

Things I learned while fixing up the fireplace

2011-10-26T13:01:00.000-04:00

1. Don't be scared to use tools with your caulk

2. Usually less caulk is actually more, but don't be scared to get enthusiastic either

3. Getting caulk all over the place isn't the worst thing in the world

4. Try to keep a steady hand with your caulk

5. Your baby will always wake up while you're in the middle of getting your caulk on.

****This post was brought to you by Moving - you gotta fix some shit before you can do it!

Surprise for you....

2011-10-24T18:03:00.000-04:00

Another post about running! Are you tired of hearing about my running adventures yet? Do you wish I would have just kept all the baby stuff on this blog to bore you with?

We are moving into the last week of our Couch 2 5K program. The program itself is actually 9 weeks, but with our vacation and our ~ahem~ laziness I think we've been working on this for about 6 years now. But we're almost there!

The actual running is getting better. Not much easier, but bringing Tess helps give me something to fuss over to help pass the time. SB also had a great suggestion that I should be listening to audiobooks or podcasts rather than music. Normally I would buck this suggestion, but for once I listened and gave it a try. It's actually great! I have been listening to Q podcasts so far - we'll see what else I can scare up that I like.

M is still very amenable to our runs, although I have learned that I have to go pretty much as soon as she wakes up, otherwise it totally messes with her sleeping schedule. The cooler weather is presenting some challenges, mainly finding a hat that won't fall over her eyes, resulting in screams. Mittens so far are not an option at all. Ever. We've been getting by using hoodies, and thankfully it's usually over 10 degrees in the afternoons when we run... Fingers crossed she becomes more used to winter wear or it could be a LOOOOONG season!

Sewing project #2!

2011-10-22T22:49:00.000-04:00

After my exciting foray into quilting, I realized how much I love love love to sew. Why, you may ask? Because as much as I love knitting, I am extremely slow, so finishing a great knitting project takes forever. And I don't have forever. I have a kid.

So as soon as I finished the quilt I began hunting for a new project to work on. And of course the project I found was on the ever-inspiring Moda Bake Shop website. I decided to make this cathedral window pillow for my friend Stamatia.

I went out fabric hunting and found these:

Various fabrics in similar colorways from Moda Verna by Kate Spain and Fashionista fabrics.

Sewing the front piece was challenging, but actually much easier then I expected.

While I definitely could get more practice and do a better job if I ever made this cushion again, I am so very happy with the finished product, and I hope that Stamatia is too!

Things I should be up to but am too scared to start

2011-10-22T12:32:00.000-04:00

Last night I had the pleasure of viewing a documentary film called Fortunate Son at the Montreal Festival du Nouveau Cinema.

Generally, I miss out on this type of thing. I am a self-professed hermit and even though I love events like this, I'm also lazy and crowd-phobic, so I usually skip them. I know, I suck. However, this film was made by the husband of a friend, and I felt like I really really wanted to be there to support them.

The film is beautiful - I know he will do well with it, so if you happen upon a viewing of it, you have to see it. It is moving, poignant, thoughtful...just everything you want a documentary about a family to be, but that they rarely are.

Anyway, I left the theatre feeling the way I always do when I see a really great piece of art. Inspired, and also disappointed. People I know are doing beautiful, fantastic things, and I cannot seem to get it together. BUT, and this is a big BUT and revelation to me, his film made me realize one of the reasons so many of my projects stall.

I am terrified of offending anyone.

The whole time I was watching this amazing film about Tony and his relationships with the people around him, I felt my insides cringe for him - for putting it all out there, the beautiful moments and the ugly ones, even though it could hurt the feelings of the people in the film.

I know I write fiction, but I have realized that I am completely preoccupied by writing characters that are not too similar to people I know, or scenes that are not to familiar, for fear that someone will think they see themselves in it and get upset. Does this make sense? And this quasi-obsession generally ends in me abandoning the project because I don't feel invested in it anymore - it doesn't feel authentic or honest.

So I'm going to work on it. And hopefully it will help me move forward.

Switch it up

2011-10-17T14:23:00.000-04:00

Our last jog was last Friday, and we decided to switch it up a little. We brought Tess!

Pro tip: try not to run on pavement with your dog, or at least as little as possible. Think about how bad you've read it is for your knees, hips and ankles. Now think about your poor dog with no comfy cushy running shoes to help brace the impact for them. Especially if you have a large or giant breed dog like Tessy!

When you think about running with a dog, it usually seems like a better idea then it actually is in practice. Since we run on a dirt/gravelly trail, and we don't run a long distance, I decided to bring Tess along for a little exercise. I didn't really account for the fact that cyclists also use our path, and Tess hates the sound of bikes. And rollerblades. And skateboards. And humans in general.
So, while it did a good job to keep my mind off the actual distance we were running, it was very tiring staying on my game as the pack leader while trying not to wheeze myself into a coma. I'm not saying we won't bring her again (she was very tired out after and a very happy pup for the rest of the evening) but we may try to time our run to hit a lower traffic time of day!

And then, like that...

2011-10-15T12:26:00.001-04:00

...she was 8 months old.

I know!

So, here is another slideshow. I guess we'll call this one The Hair Evolution. You'll see what I mean.

The music in this one is another song we use as a lullaby - The Aspidistra Flies by Stars.

It's a special kind of torture

2011-10-11T17:13:00.000-04:00

So, being back to jogging is fun. It gets me out of the house without spending any money, it gets the kid some fresh air and some scenery, and it's exercise. We're into it. We're doing it. Yippee.

Why are we doing this again?

I guess because this past weekend was a long one, many of the running bloggers I read and my running family members were participating in some pretty big events. There were marathons, half-marathons, and a special kind of crazy, 250km 5 man relay. And the people ran, and I encouraged and cheered for them and felt great for them for what they accomplished. And I also got inspired.

So this morning I got up with one objective for the day. If these people are able to get their acts together to run these crazy distances, then I should have no problem getting myself through my silly 5k training. I only have 2 weeks of that program left, that's peanuts! And then I will train for a 10k and will sign up for an actual race. And then next year we'll be running a half marathon, or, good jeebus, and actual marathon. So let's do it. Let's go - I put together the stroller and got M in it and off we were.

And oh the agony. The leg aches. The wheezy throat with coughing. The sweating. The sore back. Is it because I'm old and out of shape, or just plain out of shape? Who cares. Aaaaaargh. Wheeeeez. Aaaaargh. Why. Whyyyyyyyy?

Even 20 minutes after arriving home I was still stiff and sore. I went through all of this a few years ago when training for a 5k race. I know it gets better. But when I look up training schedules for the 10k distance, it seems so impossible. They add mileage to their schedules like it's nothing, and it's very daunting. It gets me anxious about a goal that I'm not even training for, because each run now seems like such a huge accomplishment but in the grand scheme of things it's small potatoes.

So my question is - if you are a distance runner, was it this difficult starting out? How did you get through this crappy beginning stage? When do I stop feeling like a crazy maniac?

Thankful

2011-10-07T16:34:00.000-04:00

This summer has been a summer of realization for me. Several people very close to us had literally the worst summers of their lives. There was injury, and loss, grieving and pain. Their stories are not mine to tell, but I felt them so, so deeply.

I am an easygoing person, and often seem to approach important things in my life casually. This is just my way - I like humor, I like sarcasm, I like to go for a laugh. But for once I want to get serious and say that I don't for a moment take anything in my life for granted.

I have a beautiful family and a beautiful home in a beautiful city. I have the best friends anyone could ask for who love us and are always there for us with our families so far away. I have work that I love, and have been able to pursue my passion with the full support of my amazing partner. This first summer with our beautiful, funny girl was a phenomenon, and every moment with her has been a gift all its own.

So as much as I gripe and complain and joke, they are just jokes. I am happy, and grateful, and joyful, and I feel so much myself, moreso than I have in a very long time.

My Running Must Haves

2011-10-02T12:58:00.001-04:00

As promised, a list of stuff I use every single time I run. These are not optional, because I'm a little bit superstitious about my exercising. So if I use something, and on that day I end up having a great run, then it immediately becomes a part of The Conditions and I use it until I break it or lose it. Those are just the facts. Onward.

1. Nike Pegasus running shoes.
As I mentioned in my previous list, I have been wearing this model of shoe exclusively for over five years. I've owned several versions, and have always been delighted by them. My current pair is one year old, but since I was pregnant during that year they have seen very little action.

2. Moving Comfort sports bra, model: Fiona.

This is a relatively new addition to my routine, since I bought this bra post-pregnancy, but holy man I love it. Fit is snug but not constrictive, lots of options for adjustment to get a correct fit, and no chafing or other weirdness. The model also just happens to be named after my kid (or at least her middle name) so there is that as well.

3. Garmin Forerunner 305

Not the coolest, newest, sleekest GPS watch, but serves its purpose and hasn't let me down yet. Easy to use and pretty reliable, so I really can't complain, especially for the price. For some reason it doesn't like to pick up satellites on my street, but if I walk on down the block a bit I have no troubles. I do find the watch a bit bulky, but that's just a detail. My model also has the heart-rate monitor which is useful for us slow, out of shape people to help us get the most from the workout.

4. iPod (various)

Not an original piece of equipment, but indispensable nonetheless. I have used many iPods over the course of the years. My favorite one as far as just usability on the go was my iPod Nano. However, I am currently loving using Get Running's Couch to 5K app for the iPod Touch, and I think once I finish that program I will seek out a good 10K app too, so the Touch wins as far as features. It is bigger and slightly annoying when I switch between songs while running, but the apps are well worth it to keep me motivated.

5. Goody mini claw hair clips.

They aren't cute, but they are magical. They keep all my little flyaways out of my face, which drives me pretty much bonkers while I'm running.

6. Gnarlyfish iPod Touch armband

Does the job of keeping my iPod attached to either me or to the jogging stroller, but also doesn't interfere at all with my ability to use the touch screen. Has a band extender, which makes it suitable to use on my arm, but also without it I'm able to attach it snuggly to the stroller handle.

7. Chariot Cougar Carrier.

This is the mother of all jogging strollers. It is light. It is versatile. You can use it for cycling, hiking, and cross-country skiing too. The kid is comfy in there, and also completely contained. I can pretty much fit every single toy she owns in there with her, but she doesn't even care because the giant windows keep her occupied checking out all the scenery we're passing by very fast.

Yes, this stroller/carriage is very very expensive. Believe me, we hummed and hawed for a while over it. However, we would see them on craigslist used for maybe 20% off and they would be sold in a matter of hours. So, we ponied up to get a brand new one, and when it comes time to sell it we're sure we'll get a lot of that investment back.

We brought this stroller on vacation to the beach and it was fantastic on sand. The other day I ran in a giant rainstorm and the the kid was cozy and dry. I'm excited to see what it can do in the snow, sort of.

So that's my list of must haves. I'm pretty flexible on clothing, especially since the weather is so variable and I am forced to change it up pretty often. I don't run super long distances, so I don't bring water packs or gels or anything of the like yet, but may in the future.

What are your favorite pieces of running gear? Why?

My running wishlist

2011-09-28T14:42:00.001-04:00

So, I'm officially back to *jogging* and nothing gets me motivated like new STUFF. Especially since barely any of my old STUFF fits because I'm too gigantous for it. So, if I had all the money in the world, this would be my wishlist of stuff to grab up to keep me back in the swing of things.

1. Nike Air Pegasus+ 27 GTX

I have been wearing Pegasuses (Pegasi?) for over 5 years. I love this shoe. I have owned many many pair of both the regular runners and the trail runners, and I think it's time for a new pair. Since I could only afford maximum one pair, and since fall/winter is upon us, I would opt for the trail runners which are water resistant and would be great for slush and slop.

2. Nike Anti-Blister running socks.
I like a thin sock. And I'm not gonna lie, I haven't tried these particular socks, but I have two pair of similar Nike socks that have holes all through them cause I've worn the shit out of them. And they are still my go-to socks. Never give me blisters (unlike my evil regular cotton socks) and never bunch or wriggle.

3. Lululemon Run:Swiftly Longsleeve T.

Terrible photo, but you get the idea. Again, fall is coming, so sleeves will be a must. I have one long-sleeve running T by Nike, but it's a bit thin for cool weather, and also a little ~ahem~ smallish at the moment. This one is recommended by Jenny so I'm willing to take her word for it and give it a go.

4. New Headphones.

I currently use earbuds, which are just alright. I hate the kind that you jam in your ear with the reverse-suction-cup type thingies, so those are out. I'm thinking something like these:

Although I've never tried anything like them and they may or may not suck. My very favorite headphones of all time were a pair of the old-school Sony Walkman sports ones - the kind with a headband that folded up for when you were "on the go". Ya, I loved those. I used them for probably ten years, until the wiring in one side died and I could only hear in one ear. And still I wore them for a while before giving up and switching to earbuds.

So that's my wishlist. Running is great because the amount of equipment you need is minimal, but boy when you have great stuff it can really motivate you to get out there and USE it. I will do another list of the stuff I already have and use every time I run as part of the CONDITIONS.

I smell obsession

2011-09-26T17:11:00.000-04:00

I don't know why, maybe it was the cooler weather we had last week, but something put it in my head that I need to start baking bread. All kinds of bread. Yummy, warm, tasty, buttered bread.

I have a recipe that was my grandmother's, and I've made it a few times and it was great. But I wanted something more. So I googled and found some great websites full of artisan bread recipes and holy heck now I want to make bread every single day!

Since all great ideas need to start somewhere, I decided that the best place would be something close to home, but not plain old grandma loaf. I found this great recipe for a rustic Italian bread and away I went.

The recipe seems long, but it's really not a lot of work at all. It's mostly a lot of waiting and planning, but only maybe 20 minutes of actual labor. That's a good deal!

I began my loaves last night (SB asked I one point if I was still "not making bread" while I was waiting for the Biga to rise). I finished them about two hours ago, and I have to say they are delicious. Very nice crust, and a very moist and spongy middle. I am worried I may eat all of the bread before SB gets home tonight.

And, believe it or not, they are pretty too!

I like to Yog

2011-09-23T17:41:00.000-04:00

With vacation over, the Running is back on. Well, the Jogging is back on. I can't really call it running. Because I'm slow.

I'm trying to read a lot of running blogs (I love this one) and I like to engage in conversations with people I know who are avid runners. However they all run. And I barely jog. But I still find it motivating to hear about my friends' progress and successes.

I'm on week 6 of the Couch to 5K program, which means with all the running and walking I'm traveling about 4km per workout at the moment. And it's haaaaard. I've never been so great at self-motivation, and now the kid is an extra good excuse to skip a run sometimes, but we try to run at least three times per week. Usually we don't. But we try!

Does anyone out there know of any great running blogs from anyone just starting out? Cause I would love to hear about them and read 'em!

Possibilities

2011-09-20T21:16:00.000-04:00

We made it back from vacation! So far the worst part is Double Baby Time Change, in which we changed an hour when we got there, then changed back 10 days later to come home. We could also call it Baby Subaru-Lag, since we didn't fly there but it seems to have the same results. General crankiness and sleep schedule disruptions all around, lasting approximately one day.

Before vacation, we started nosing around the real estate listings thinking about the possibility of moving our little three ringed circus to a more comfortably-sized location. The problem with this being that a more comfortably-sized location in our neighborhood would cost us approximately a kajillion dollars, and the sale of our condo plus our savings gives us about negative three dollars, approximately. Just for comparison's sake.

So we widened our search radius, excluded neighborhoods that were tooooo francais (bitches need to find good anglo schools), too suburby (bitches like diversity), too old (bitches hate renovation), too new (bitches watch Mike Holmes). And soon us bitches started having to consider things like "is it near a commuter train line" because, yup, that's how far away we ended up.

Long story short, there was a house we loved, but while we were busy hemming and hawing and calculating and re-calculating, and driving by and peeking in the windows someone else was buying that damn house. But now we love that area, and now I'm stalking Realtors.ca ten times a day, especially on Monday, cause it seems everyone lists on a Monday.

Maybe we'll move, maybe we won't. More space would be great right now. Commuting to work would be a bummer. Tess would have a yard, and we could have a pool. But no more walking down the street to the [Bilboquet/Frites Alors/Les Infideles/the grocery store/the SAQ/the toy store/the bank/etc].

The things we sacrifice for our kids, and our 100 pound dogs. (Although while on vacation we discovered that when given the option of sleeping on one of two floors, Tess will choose the one that we are NOT sleeping on. This makes me sad.)

I'm tasty

2011-09-12T18:34:00.000-04:00

Vacation is great so far. We are eating far too much in the way of deep fried seafoods (at least we're going for an array this year instead of our staple, clams). We are drinking too much, too often (last year I wasn't allowed to drink due to being knocked up, so this in itself is an improvement). We are walking on the beach and making fires and playing crib and seeing friends and family.

The kid is semi-cooperative. After her stellar performance on the ten hour drive to our destination, she has decided that she no longer tolerates car travel. This is a major suck. While the whole purpose of renting a cottage is so that we have a home base and people can come to us, we still do have to do some driving to get things like groceries and beer and emergency sweaters for the baby because we're horrible parents and only brought one.

Today we drove to Fundy National Park, and while the park itself is beautiful, the drive to get there is full of gorgeous farms, small craft shops, old barns, covered bridges etc etc. I was dying to take some photos, but on the way there she slept (we CANNOT stop the car when she's sleeping) then woke up and promptly cranked. So, there is always the way back, right? Except it followed the exact same routine. But our time in the park was fun, especially for Tess.

I will make a photo post at some point, but I mostly wanted to say that if I could sum up our trip it one word at the moment, it would be BUGS. Bugs themselves don't bother me much, however it would appear that I am a particularly tasty person for mosquitoes, even when I apply various repellents liberally. They swarm me, and either leave SB untouched totally, or else he's extremely un-allergic to them and just has zero reaction when they do bite him. And I haven't notice any bites on the kid yet, but she is rarely outside during prime mosquito feast time (ie after dark.)

So, I'm using a lot of AfterBite and trying not to scratch. It makes me want to avoid the fun things like fires and beach walks sometimes, but I try not to always be the downer and take one for the team every once in a while.

Moving Mama

2011-09-11T10:06:00.000-04:00

I've realized that a lot of the talk over here is about things the average person probably doesn't give two hoots about. Things like birth and boobs and baby caca. So, I'm moving that whole mess to another site! Just for you!

The new site can be found at Mama Urbana. Whenever I have the hankering to go into too much detail about anything parenting related, that's where it will be posted. But don't worry! Ebb and Flow will still contain lovely pics and anecdotes about little M and all of our awkward and exciting times together.

So if parenting stuff interests you, head on over there! And if not, tell your friends! And if they don't want to read it, then you can all shove it.

Some thoughts on birthing - 6 months later

2011-08-26T14:18:00.000-04:00

Before we decided to have M, I wasn't convinced kids were a great idea for us. Obviously I was willing to give it a shot, because, hey, there she is! But I am of the "One and Done" variety of parents. Kids are a difficult endeavor to undertake, and why the hell would you ever want to even the odds and be 2 against 2? Huh?

But one feeling that hasn't left me over the last six months: I want to give birth again.

right? I know. I'm totally insane.

Pregnancy was great for us. Aside from no booze and no sushi, things were easy and not only tolerable but often enjoyable! (yes, please, you can carry my 10lb bag of cat food to my car for me, even though I'm perfectly capable, I would prefer not to today.) So that would in no way discourage me. Having a kid has been exactly what I expected it would be, in that, holy eff, just once is enough, so don't worry, the odds of me carrying out this crazy thought are slim to none.

Why would I want to give birth again? Because I want to do it better. For the same reason I like running - I want to improve my personal best.

Again, yes, I realize this is insane. I had pretty much the perfect birth, based on what we wanted. No drugs, no IVs, no forceps, no vacuum, no emergencies, no problems. But I did have to have an episiotomy and, oh, ya there is the fact that I pretty much begged to die for about 5 hours.

Some of the things I had hope to do during labor to make things easier on my body, but that we didn't do:

a) warm bath. We tried this. But funny thing - we had NO HOT WATER at our house that night. I was beyond miffed. And a woman in active labor who is beyond miffed is not a pretty sight.

b) a birthing ball. For some reason, I forgot all about this. Which is weird, because I even considered purchasing one until my doula assured me she had never had a problem using the ONE they have on the floor in the hospital. But I don't remember even asking. I'm an idiot.

c) squatting. Every time my head was vertical, I felt like I would faint. I'm sure that if I had just sucked it up and told someone that instead of mumbling "please just kill me. I want to die." that they would have helped to physically support me in a squat. But, I didn't, so no squatting happened. I think the squatting may have helped get M out faster, and may have helped avoid the episiotomy.

Anyway, so I have a handful of regrets about my birthing experience, and they aren't going away. And since I can't go back and do it better, the only option is to do it again. Basically to improve my time. I know I know, I know. Just, shhhhh.

so far so good

2011-08-24T21:46:00.000-04:00

So far I'm digging the blog revamp. It feels fresher. Now on to more important matters.

Myself and my mama friends have been all in a tizzy lately about feeding these wee bairns. There are so many theories on what's "right" and so, so much information to plow through that it can be a bit overwhelming. Luckily, we are about ten moms, all with kids around the same age, all with different ideas, and all open to sharing them, so we are very efficient about pooling information and taking from it what works for our families.

The first 6 months, however frustrating they may be, are actually a no-brainer in the baby diet department. I am of a mind that there can be no argument that breast milk is best for an infant. All the studies in all the world-over agree that this is the case. Seems simple, but breast feeding may not be best for every family. And that's fine, because, wouldn't you know it, there is another choice that is pretty great and it's called formula. So if you can't/choose not to feed baby Option #1, Option #2 is still pretty fantastic and your baby will live and thrive. That's it, the end.

I miss those simple, simple days. We did a little of everything at our house - breastfed, pumped and bottlefed breastmilk, then when I lost my milk we started on formula. The transition between all stages was smooth, no nipple confusion, no digestion issues, and no concerns about seriously fucking up my kid's digestive system.

Now we're in FOOD territory. Admittedly, we started food very early. I read all kinds of books and articles and everything except the pediatrician said that after 4 months if the kid seems game, go with it slowly. So that's what we did, at almost 5 months. We chose to go the traditional route and offer purees of various fruits, veggies, and cereals, one at a time in small quantities. (I have a friend who is doing Baby Led Weaning, and am rather jealous that her baby is into whole solids - M gags at the smallest lump in her velvety purees - Priss.)

And so far it's going well. M loves to eat (most of the time) and the only things she will consistently turn her nose up at are meats and lumps in the purees. She seems to love all flavors, it's the textures that are the problem. The only digestive issue was a few weeks in: whoever the hell thought it would be a good idea to suggest rice cereal, bananas, and carrots as first foods without issuing a disclaimer that they are all BINDING should be shot. Perhaps it should have been obvious to me that she shouldn't eat all of these food within the same 24 hour period, but it wasn't, and our poor little Chicken was crying while she tried to pass one of her first solid stools which was WAY too solid. (no other instances of this since I clued in to which foods should go together and which shouldn't. And we also keep prunes on hand for such emergencies as they tend to get things going pretty quickly.)

SQUASH

Now it's time to worry about the big things, namely highly allergenic foods and when to introduce them. My major concern is actually with wheat/gluten because I know several people with Celiac's disease and it is nasty. Previous theories said you should hold off on wheat until baby is older, but there are some new studies that say introducing it earlier is actually better... And some of our mama friends from Israel have never seen peanut allergies there, where peanuts aren't withheld.

So, for any mamas I haven't already had this kind of convo with, if you can add something to the mix please do. How did you deal with allergenic foods? Any advice for stressed out parents who don't want to break their kid? (I'm pretty sure the warranty ran out a while ago....)

oops

2011-08-23T12:31:00.000-04:00

I accidentally changed my blog template. I hadn't really thought about it at all and was just playing around and now I can't get back to the old one.

While, yes, I'm ready for a change, I don't necessarily have time to fiddle around at the moment, so expect to see changes happening over the course of the next little while.

Yay for change!

100 things REDUX

2011-08-17T21:01:00.110-04:00

The old Bloggity Blog turns 6 years old this weekend! In honor of that, I'm revisiting my very first 100 things post and updating with my current 100 things. Old answers are in blue. When the item hasn't changed, I'll try my best to think of something related to share. Let the fun begin!

100 Things

1. I have two dogs and one cat who I treat like children - We currently have 2 cats and one dog. Still treat them like children.

2. I have a boyfriend of 7 years - we got engaged a few months ago. Still with SB, married two years this September.

3. I have two Bachelor of Arts degrees - one in Biology and one in Creative Writing. Don't ask. Still don't ask. Also don't ask about my student loans which I think I'll be paying until I'm 80

4. My favorite color was blue, but I think it's changing. I'll let you know. Nah, I still love blue, but am also partial to grey.

5. I have three tattoos - same. I would love to be badass and get a full sleeve, but the more I think about it, I can't imagine paying that much for a tattoo.... will most likely at least get my kid's name tattooed on me somewhere though

6. I hate my job so much I want to rip my eyes out. This was actually an alternative title for my blog, but got edged out. Now I have a job I LOVE LOVE LOVE. So much so that I can't wait to go back to work in January.

7. My grandfather has been saying I have a memory like a steel trap since I was three. I'm still not sure what that means. same. I often find myself pretending I don't remember meeting someone to avoid the moment where they don't remember meeting me. That's awkward.

8. I like to play with punctuation - the - dash - is - my - favorite. Still love punctuation play, but currently digging the ellipsis....

9. Within the next year I want to live in a house with a yard. Maybe? Been living in our condo for 4 years and it's a bit crowded. Less excited about a yard now though.

10. I want the yard so my dogs (who are 10 and 11) can retire in comfort. Those dogs have since passed. They liked condo living just fine. Tess is so lazy I think a yard would be kind of a waste for her. Or else she would love it. What do I know?

11. I can hold a grudge like nobody's business. Still true. Although now I rarely waste time starting new grudges. I just drop folks from my life and don't think of them anymore when they seriously tick me off. Still holding onto old grudges though.

12. I rarely seek vengeance. I think I could safely say I never do. It's generally not worth the effort.

13. When I do, I'm usually not as mean as I want to be. I recently got into an altercation with a sales associate at The Bay wherein I raised my voice and waved a sales sign in her face. That was the first time I lost my temper in a very long time. But I still didn't call her a cunt or anything, so I don't think I was mean at all.

14. My taste usually outweighs my budget by at least 100%. This is still true, but I am a much better bargain hunter than I used to be, so I can often get the things I want within budget. Win/Win.

15. I love buying gifts. Still true - although I have also come to really love making gifts, and this helps with the whole budget thing too.

16. When I'm upset, I usually crave potatoes in one form or another. I do less emotional eating now, but more bored eating. And I still love potatoes.

17. When I was little I used to talk to myself - my grandfather said it meant I would be rich one day. Still waiting......and still waiting.

18. I'm a slave to TV, and strive every year to cut down my TV watching schedule. I always get sucked in. DVR has changed my life. But I still watch too much TV.

19. I hate cooked peas, but love raw ones. I now like cooked peas!!! But not from a can.

20. My cat is my favorite pet. Don't tell my dog. I think I love them all equally now.

21. I have a hard time saying no. Really. Still have a hard time saying no, but much better at avoiding ever being asked in the first place!

22. I get jealous of other people's good fortune. Not so much anymore, but I do feel very guilty when I end up luckier than others.

23. I don't have a problem saying "I'm so jealous of you". Still true.

24. I was born with a hole in my ear. I thought it may be genetic, but my kid doesn't have one.

25. My grandmother is still the most influential person in my life, even though she was only part of it for 10 years. While this is probably still true, there are so many other influences that I value more now than I did before.

26. I have two sisters. I hate when people point out they are my half sisters. Still this. And now my sister is having a baby and if anyone ever call her my half-niece I think I'd punch them in the nuts.

27. My dad died when I was 5 months old. I think this should make me sad, but it doesn't. It just makes me curious. Less curious about him these days for some reason. More curious about my grandmother. She seemed more badass.

28. I have best friends from every stage of my life, and can't decide who my maid of honor should be. I finally chose my sister, had my other sister do a reading, and all of SB's brothers had responsibilities at the wedding too. It was perfect.

29. I will probably postpone my wedding until I can decide. I didn't - just postponed until we had the $$$.

30. I'm a clutterbug. I still have a lot of craft clutter, but keep it to my relegated corner of the living room. I dream of one day have my own crafting room where I can spread it all out and be as messy as I like.

31. I'm very sentimental about objects, which greatly contributes to my clutterbuggedness. I have a new non-sentimental value system. I am now uber-proficient at chucking shit out - I would rather keep memories in photos than in junk.

32. I usually don't care about grammar on paper, but can't stand it when people speak incorrectly. I now care about grammar everywhere.

33. I hate reading anything written before 1900. Probably more true than ever.

34. I would love to own a bookstore. I never want to own another business ever again.

35. I've had writer's block for over a year. Writer's block was broken and will have a story published this fall.

36. I have seen the movie "Whale Rider" at least ten times. I still cry at the end. I haven't seen that movie in a very long time and now I want to see it ASAP.

37. REM has been my favorite band since Out of Time. I even love New Adventures in HiFi. Although I have to say I wouldn't call them my favorite anymore. I didn't even buy their most recent album. I feel like this is significant.

38. I've seen REM in concert only twice. Saw them once more, so total of 3 times. Each time was amazing.

39. I have one Polish friend who taught me two Polish words: MAŁPA MAJTKI. It means Monkey Panties. She's the best. I have two Greek friends who taught me a fun little nursery rhyme to sing to the kid, and also the word Nikokira, (spelling?) which, loosely translated, means domestic goddess. Which is me, some days, especially on Thanksgiving.

40. I have weight issues, and usually put on weight when I'm depressed. And, as it turns out, when I'm pregnant! Haven't been depressed in a while, but the weight... it's there!

41. I've put on over ten pounds in the past month. I put on over 50 pounds in the past year, FTW.

42. I cry when I'm (mad, sad, stressed) and am forced to have a conversation. This is still true, and the older I get the more infuriating this is. Can't wait to have my first fight with M where I end up in tears. That will be a proud moment, I'm sure.

43. When I'm really mad, I just don't talk. While this is still somewhat true, I have also gotten a lot better at yelling when I'm mad too.

44. I can type at least 400 words per minute. Okay, I have never actually really measured. But it's really fast. I'm pretty sure I can type around 600 words per minute now.

45. I drive a 2000 VW Jetta, and I'm really sad that I didn't trade her in for a new one before they came out with the new model. I guess I will keep her until they make another one as cute as she is. We recently retired old JVo to the junk yard. RIP. Now I love our Subaru, mostly because it has all-wheel drive and kicks ass in the snow.

46. I love choosing new paint colors for rooms. Although I have discovered that the less time I spend choosing, the more horrible the color turns out.

47. I get tired of the painting project about halfway through. And if I can I rope SB into doing the trim work.

48. I always fall asleep in the car. I am dreading our first drive to NB with M because I feel I won't get in my required amount of sleep.

49. One of my dreams in life is to own a doggie daycare. I will never ever ever run my own business ever again.

50. I hate snow and have seriously considered giving up all of my democratic rights and moving to Cuba. (Sun, beach, rum, cigars, what's better than that?) Decided St. Lucia would be a better option, so that's the dream now, but still shooting for sunshine. And booze.

51. My tolerance for alcohol is even better than it was in university, and I only drink about 1/15th as much. I have no idea if this is true because I haven't had much to drink in over a year. Will have to test this theory when on vacation next month.

52. I love Coke, and Diet Pepsi, but hate Pepsi and Diet Coke. ooooh, but I LOOOOOOVE Coke Zero.

53. Seeing my own blood makes me feel faint. I have had 4 blood tests in the past year and didn't faint or puke once. But I did sweat a lot. Even the nurse was a bit appalled.

53. I am terrible at keeping in touch with people. Maybe the blog will help a little. I have gotten much better at this since the advent of Facebook. So while it is evil, it is also awesome.

54. I'm usually shy around strangers, and have been told that sometimes I scare people who don't know me. This is still true. Someone recently told me I'm hard to read. I don't know if that's true or not, maybe I'm just an asshole.

55. When I thought my iPod was broken, I cried in my car. Then that iPod got stolen. Then I got a new one, and lost it in the snow on the mountain. I cried in my car again.

56. When I fixed my iPod myself, I yelled "Yay, I fixed it." and my boyfriend just said "ah, yeah" and kept watching TV. Then my employee found my lost iPod and hacked it out of the ice and I brought it home and dried it out. It still worked, and yelled "Yay, I fixed it."

57. I need it to be cold in order to have a good night's sleep. Which is why I will never ever ever live without air conditioning again. Ever.

58. I just started collecting first edition books. I have some good ones now! But I rarely hit up the used bookstores like I used to :(

59. I love Starbucks, and am sad that we don't have more of them in Montreal. Now they are everywhere, and it's still my favorite.

60. I'm a world class procrastinator. Still true, although now that M is here I am more on top of a lot of stuff. And procrastinate even more on all the rest.

61. I have no discipline. This is scary now that I'm responsible for another human. Very scary.

62. I shop to cure depression. Now I medicate to cure depression.

63. Sometimes trying on clothes makes me more depressed. This is definitely more true than ever. Ugh to post-baby spare tires.

64. I love to run and would choose running over any other 1-man exercise. Still true! Although I also love yoga now, running is still my number one choice of torture.

65. I hate feet and force my boyfriend to wear socks 90-95% of the time I'm around him, especially to bed. I have gotten more lax on the foot rules, especially when on vacation, however I'm still disgusted by them.

66. Sometimes I can't sleep because I think he's trying to trick me and has taken off his socks. This is the least of my sleep issues these days.

67. I don't like children. They make me uncomfortable 80% of the time. In spite of the fact that I have my own kid now, this is still true. Even she makes me uncomfortable at least 60% of the time.

68. I'm pretty sure I've seen every single episode of all Law and Order series, including the two-hour special return of Mike Logan on the regular Law and Order that aired in the '98-99 season. I'm so glad he's coming back to Criminal Intent. I am still a L & O buff. I am so sad that they are slowly being phased out. I still watch reruns on Bravo every day.

69. I get crushes on weird celebrities. A past favorite was David Letterman. Currently crushing on Ricky Gervais. Still better than Danny Devito (who for the record is my BFF's weird crush).

70. I don't remember much about half the stuff I've studied. Probably even less now.

71. I've thought about signing up for one of those pharmaceutical company studies that pays compensatory indemnities. Although I'm definitely less broke than I used to be, I still think this would be interesting. Possibly for many, many years to come.

72. Bad driving annoys me and I often honk and/or give the finger to at least one person on my way to work. Now that we live in the city proper my road annoyances have expanded to include pedestrians and cyclists. Why can't people just follow the fucking rules? Cross on green. Stop at red. Cars must use blinkers and check their blind spots. Bikes can be either treated as pedestrians OR cars, but not both. FFS.

73. My road rage-ish tendencies have scared at least one of my friends. This same friend is also scared to cross the road with me now for fear that she will do it wrong and I'll yell at her.

74. I've never had an accident or a traffic ticket. I think now I've had two traffic tickets (one for speeding, one for going through a yellow light that turned red cause traffic ahead was too slow) and two accidents (once was rear-ended by an old man, once was my fault and I side-swiped a Brand New car that still had the white stickery stuff on it... ooops)

75. I believe in knocking on wood, and just did so to avoid getting into an accident or getting a traffic ticket this week. I kinda don't believe in knocking on wood anymore and only do it when I'm around people who do.

76. Turning 20 made me really sad, and I'm scared I'll feel the same about 30. 30 was pretty bad. For many reasons. 27 was actually the worst, I think.

77. One of my dogs scares me. He has bit me in the foot on more than one occasion. That dog croaked last year. Now I live in a fear-free zone. But I still miss him a lot and we reminisce about his crankiness often.

78. I love Italy, especially Rome, and can't wait to go back. Still this. Although now I miss Paris most.

79. I've never been to New York City. STILL NEVER BEEN TO NYC. Does this seem soooo wrong on soooo many levels to anyone else but me? However, NYC is very expensive, and I can think of a million other places I would go spend that money first so that I could travel longer. I still want to go if I could get a lot of deals. But the planning is already exhausting to me.

80. I hate golf, but if I played it, I'm sure I'd been one of the people who throws their clubs when they're mad. I can't remember if I ever told you but SB and I went to the driving range once. I sucked at golf about as much as I imagined I would, but I did not throw my club.

81. I own every issue of the last six years of Martha Stewart's Weddings magazine. Those have been given away/recycled. But I still watch a whole heck of a lot of wedding shows for someone who got married two years ago. (and they did come in handy, although not as handy as I thought they would when I started collecting them. Mostly because of the internet.)

82. I say "That's right" a lot. Not anymore. Now we say a lot of "That's what she said". I hope that never gets old because it's a fun, fun game.

83. I'm pretty sure I'm a handy person, but am usually too lazy to actually do anything handy. Turns out I am pretty handy, as proven by 4 years of dealing with keys that were copies of copies of copies that we used for client homes where the locks were at least 30 years old. I'm still pretty lazy though.

84. I love Winnie the Pooh - less than I did a couple of years ago, but still significantly. On a scale of 1-10 Winnie and I are probably at like a 4 now. I'm trying to move away from any cartoon characters in general. I don't want a kid who is addicted to ONE GUY and everything has to be THAT GUY. I don't like when kids are walking ads for Walt Disney.

85. I am obsessed with animals who have long necks - giraffes and ostriches are my favorites. Still and perhaps even more than ever. We have goose artwork in our bathroom, the kid has several giraffe toys, and I still want to ride an ostrich at some point in my life. I have no idea why I love animals with long necks, but I do.

86. I really want to pet a tiger before I die. I didn't pet a tiger, but I DID get to hold a BABY LION when we went to Las Vegas. Sometimes I forget that we did that, and then I remember and I get all giggly.

87. I only recently overcame my fear of rollercoasters - now I want to go to Disney World! Now we have a kid and an excuse to go to Disney World! Too bad we have to wait until she's "this high to ride" to go. Booooo.

88. I am terrified of deep water and almost drowned while trying to snorkel in Cuba cause I was in such a panic. Still terrified of deep water, but had a better snorkeling excursion when we went to St. Lucia thanks to a nifty life vest thing. Now we have M in swimming lessons already so that she won't end up like me.

89. I'm usually a great judge of character, and when I'm wrong about someone, I'll admit it. Due to my hermit-like existence as of late, I'm not meeting a ton of new people. So, not sure if this is still true or not....

90. I hate hypocrites. I also discovered that I hate when people get cranky at me for being friendly and social. Because I rarely am, so to be chastised for it really gets me ornery.

91. The only jewelry I wear are: one pair of earrings, my engagement ring, and the ring Eric gave me the second birthday we were together. Now I only wear rings regularly. When we go out I may wear a necklace and earrings. Bracelets don't fit on my giant man wrists.

92. I'm terrible at doing my hair. If I'm running late, I get so stressed about it I start to perspire. This makes it even worse. I've given up on hair doing - I either wear a ponytail or stick a barrette in it. No blow-drying unless it's winter and I'm running late, and definitely no curling irons.

93. I don't smoke, but don't mind when people around me do. Now I have to care more because of the kid, but I'm still getting a bit used to that so sometimes people have to remind me to get my kid out of that giant cloud of smoke right there.

94. I've partaken in very few illegal drugs and for the most part was unimpressed. Booze are still best.

95. I love when it rains really hard. I also love thunder and lightening.

96. It doesn't matter how many hours of sleep I get - if I have to get up before 10 AM I am usually cranky until noon. Now my ideal start time is more like 9AM, but I am usually always cranky until noon no matter when I get up.

97. I no longer have my tonsils, adenoids, and wisdom teeth. I also made it through birth without an IV, and without the use of drugs or any forceps/vacuums, etc. And I've never broken any bones. That's my whole medical history folks.

98. My favorite fast food is still McDonald's, even though I worked there for like five years. Wendy's is a close second, and would be first if we lived closer to one, I think.

99. My goal is to have a job I don't really care about so I can actually get some writing done when I'm at home. Oddly, I have a job I really care about while I'm there, but that I can actually leave behind when I come home. And I got some writing done. Win/Win

100. Sometimes I find very inappropriate things hilarious, and have trouble holding in my laughter. Now my biggest issue is that SB and I have so many inside jokes and have such a similar sense of humor, that we will both find random inappropriate things hilarious and then we're both trying not to laugh. We're both going straight to hell.

The quilt is done!

2011-08-15T12:48:00.000-04:00

I am pleased to report that Marlowe's First Quilt is done! I say first because this project has been amazing for me - it was creative, inspiring, challenging enough but not impossible. The quilt is at once ugly, cute, funky, playful and sweet. I am now addicted to sewing, and can't wait to work on my next project. For now, here are some photos.

A close up on one of the squares.

This is the back - the fabric is a thicker cotton, so hopefully will hold up to fun times at the park!


One of the corners.

The border fabric is It's a Hoot by MoMo. The binding and the quilt squares are Central Park by Kate Spain

Where it's at

2011-08-08T12:33:00.000-04:00

So, the kid turned six months old over the weekend. She seemed non-plussed by the whole thing, but we were feeling a little nostalgic. Like, hey, remember that ugly little monkey we brought home from the hospital who squawked all the time? Now she's cute and round and instead of squawking, she screams! Weeeeee!


Ugly Monkey Squawker

She is still not crawling and still has no teeth. But she IS a champion eater. We started "solids" early, and so far she has tried all of the appropriate first foods. This includes carrots, bananas, three kinds of cereal, squash, apple, pear, peach, beans, peas, zucchini, plums, and more. She was not so into meats, but the past few days she's been coping alright with those too. She not only loves the purees, but she has also gummed on a cooked carrot, and some baby rice wafer cookies with gusto.

With this love of solid foods, also comes the reward of solid poo. This has made our cloth diapering life much easier and more pleasant. I think that's enough on that topic for a general update post. But I'm working on a post about baby feeding, so we'll get more in depth there.

She loves Tess more than anything - the squeals and screeches of delight are often rewarded with some finger tasting on Tess's part. I am so happy that Tess is so gentle with her, and her toys, but I am not surprised. Simon is also very interested in the baby, and lets her pull and tug on his tail or face without complaining. If she bothers him, he will often get up, circle around her, and settle in on the other side of her still within grabbing distance. This also doesn't surprise me much. I think the only unknown we had going into this was how the baby would react to them, and I have to say it has been fantastic!


Sunscreen Hair

We have been spending our days visiting friends, shopping, running, yogaing and sleeping. We have yet to hit up the new wading pool at our park because I am slightly terrified she will have a meltdown and/or I'll drown her by accident but it's on our list of things to do. Summer has been quite lovely, but we are looking forward to our vacation out East next month. And by "looking forward to" I mean "still dreading a 10 hour drive with an infant and a giant dog and all our shit, so the weather better be good".

Huh

2011-07-25T14:05:00.000-04:00

I sat down (finally) and made a little slideshow of photos from M's first 4 months.

SB's reaction was "Ouff, when did she get so big"

My reaction is "Huh, when was she ever that little?"

***The music in the video is Arcade Fire - Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels) - and was quite a popular lullaby during those first few months.

Baby drunk

2011-07-18T20:54:00.000-04:00

You know how when you used to be in university, you would spend the weekend carousing and dancing and falling down hills and then on Monday morning you had a whole bunch of bruises that you weren't sure of their origins? Was this just me?

I feel like that now, except for the drunk part. And the carousing and dancing and falling.

It started when I was pregnant. I became severely clumsy, which is strange for me. I may have a semi-giant frame, but I have pretty good awareness of space, and also great balance. But when I got knocked up, I started running into things, kicking things, banging my head. One day I slipped off a step at work and bashed backwards into a wall. And almost every day I rammed my thigh into the radiator outside of our work bathroom - I started to feel like someone was moving it so that I would run into it, because my body seemed to not remember it was there.

But now I've entered a whole new realm of self-injury - mystery bruises. I don't remember getting them, but each morning I find at least one new bruise somewhere on my body (usually on my arms). And they aren't even little bruises. They're always bigger than toonies, often bigger than the circumference of a coke can.

I'm not sure if I'm getting them while carrying strollers and carseats, or while trying to maneuver said items into the car, or while playing with the kid or tussling with Tess. All I know is I'm not having as much fun getting them as I did when I was in university. Or maybe just a different kind of fun.

My baby project

2011-07-04T11:12:00.000-04:00

People who know me know I'm a hobby knitter. I've knit little sweaters and hats and vests and blankies for most of the wee ones our friends have welcomed in the last few years, and I love love love doing it. I was ready to (and actually started to) knit a little sweater dress for M too, when we did a little closet-cleanup and SB saw some of the quilts my grandmother, aunts, and great-grandmother had made for me.

"Why don't you make a quilt for the baby?" he asked innocently. It was at that moment I realized he has far higher esteem for my crafting abilities than I do, and also that I am just crazy enough to believe him and embark on my first quilting project. Just like that.

Generally, if I can find good enough instructions, I can pretty much make anything. It may have a few quirks and kinks, but for the most part I can get a project done if I have something to tell me step by step how to do it. So I did some googling.

I found the Moda Bake Shop, which is at once instructive and inspiring. There are tons and tons of sewing projects on there, and you can also find pre-cut fabric bundles through many online retailers that takes all the guess work out of choosing fabric patterns and cutting fabric pieces. I chose a baby quilt, ordered some fabric, and away I went.

My fabric arrived like this:

Isn't it beautiful? It's called a Jelly Roll, and mine was full of fabric from the Moda Central Park line by Kate Spain.

Here are some of the fabric swatches while I was trying to pair them up for the quilt blocks:

Currently, I am finishing the last part of the quilting portion of this project. This is the second to last step, people! I have been working on it since January, when I hoped to get the bulk of it done before M's arrival (only she arrived a week early instead of like most first babies, who arrive late), but now it's almost done! And while I pieced together the blocks using the sewing machine, I did the actual quilting by hand! Like my grandmother used to do!

For some reason I feel more proud of this project then any of my knitting projects. And for some reason I feel like when it is finished I am going to experience a major let-down - this project which has been so exciting and creatively invigorating will be over. And while there will be satisfaction in a work accomplished, and excitement over starting a new project, there will never be another first quilt, and it will never be close to complete ever again.

Once it's done, I'll take a photo of M playing on it. But for now I am basking in the anticipation of it being almost done.

The Poop receptacles

2011-06-15T15:40:00.000-04:00

Back in the day when I was about 10 weeks pregnant (was that really over a year ago? holy hannah) SB and I decided for a number of reasons to try cloth diapering our little terror. A great website that pretty much sums up what I found can be read here.

Fast forward to 4 months in, and I am in LOVE with cloth diapers. We chose BumGenius, so they function just like a disposable as far as putting them on and changing them, the only difference is we only buy them once, and instead of hitting the trash after use they hit the wet bag to be washed. And because they can be adjusted for size, they will fit M until she is potty trained.

Why do I love them so much? Well, they're super cute. Exhibit A:

So in the hot summer weather she can wear just a dress and a colorful diaper.

Her butt is in great shape - no rashes yet, and barely any redness. We'll see how she makes out when teething comes on, but so far, I'm crediting the diapers.

We never run out. In the few weeks we used disposables, I made at least three emergency phone calls to SB to pick up diapers on the way home - and get home quick! Now I keep a stash of emergency disposables just in case the laundry gets the best of me, but generally one load a day keeps me on top of it.

Some rumors that I have found to be false:
They are hard to use. Again, they go on just like a disposable diaper. Some people prefer cloth diapers with snaps, but I prefer the velcro tabs since they are even easier to get on and get a good fit.

They are a lot more work. Yes, they are more work, but I think saying they are a lot more is a stretch. I wash one load of them a day, maximum. And since I generally have at least one other load of laundry to do anyway, what's one more? Laundry is my favorite chore, since you are absent for 90% of the process anyway, so bring it on.

They leak. The only leaks we've had were due to poor fit. That was back when I was terrified I was putting the diapers on too tight. But now that I've learned how to check for fit and adjust them properly we have no leaks at all. We'll see how it goes when she starts motoring around, but I can't see how they could be any worse then a disposable.

So, if you are ever considering cloth diapers, I'm free to discuss. I think a lot of people picture thin pieces of fabric, origami folded and precariously pinned to the baby, leaking and oozing all over the place. But that's so not what cloth diapers are now. They are fun, friendly, effective, and cute!

Lists about pregnancy

2011-05-17T18:27:00.000-04:00

Things I miss about being pregnant:

1. Being fat for a reason: For the most part I liked the way I looked and felt while pregnant. Post-pregnancy....Ugh, let's not talk about that again for a while.

2. Having people do stuff for me. Not that I was one of those "hey, can you lift that, I'm pregnant" people, or at least I don't think I was. But the fact that people would offer. I liked that. Also, having SB be in charge of the litter box. I loved that one. Even though he always cleaned it anyway, for 10 months I didn't have to feel so bad about not doing it. Now I have to feel guilty again.

3. Eating what I wanted. Except for sushi, and rare steak, and booze. If I was hungry, I ate. Which is probably why I'm hating my post-pregnancy body, come to think of it.

4. Napping for a reason. No one ever questioned my napping. Now M is constantly harassing me that I try to nap too much. She's a stickler for that.

5. Rubbing my own belly. Whatever, I liked it, so what.

Things I don't miss:

1. Not being able to run. Yoga was great and all, but I missed running a lot. And now I'm finding it so hard on my body to get back into it. So, so hard.

2. Trying to put on my shoes. Being pregnant in the winter made this extra annoying. My winter boots have a lot of LACES. And I work we had to change our shoes when we arrived and left, so I couldn't even cheat and just wear sneakers and freeze my feet off for five minutes. At least my feet didn't swell up, I guess.

3. Sleeping on my back.

4. Not being able to drink booze or eat sushi or raw/rare steak. (in the last month or two I took some liberties on the steak and sushi, and I did occasionally drink wine, but it's still not the same)

5. Feeling movement. I found it really, really strange actually. Like I swallowed a bowl full of goldfish. The only thing I found really cool was when she would kick and I could see it. But that was more because I felt like I could star in a sci-fi movie without all the special effects.

And now the work begins

2011-05-06T16:58:00.000-04:00

Are you tired of reading about the baby yet? I'm tired of writing about her. Kind of. In the way that, boy, wouldn't it be interesting if there was more going on in my life besides this baby? kind of way.

But, alas, this is life now. We do the same thing every day, over and over and over. If the weather is bad, then we do even more of the same thing. If the weather is good we might walk to meet a friend, or take Tess on a long walk. We're wild and crazy girls without a vehicle, so it turns out we walk a lot.

Yet, with all this walking, I am not shrinking. At. All. In the first two weeks after M was born, I think I dropped 20 pounds, then slowly lost another 10. And then I just kept hovering. All in all I put on probably 50 pounds with the pregnancy, and while they say the last ten pounds stick, I'm finding it's more like the last 20.

Also, my body has changed. I don't see the weight in my face as much as I did the last time I was at this weight, however my thighs and hips are GIGANTIC. None of my pre-pregnancy jeans fit (duh!) and I'm tired of wearing maternity jeans since there is no baby in there, so I thought about buying a new pair of on-sale in-between jeans. When I tried on my "fat size" they were so tight on my hips and thighs I could barely pull them up. And I will NOT give in a buy and even bigger size than my previous fat size. So maternity jeans it is.

But, we're taking action. I'm back on Weight Watchers, which worked extremely well for me the last time I dropped a lot of weight, and I had actually been keeping most of it off until I got pregnant (I think I was up 10 pounds at that point). I also started the Couch to 5K running program this week, which I did a few years ago too. My first run was yesterday and while it went well, I'm very sore today. Lastly, I'm hoping to get back to yoga soon - waiting to get into a Mom and Baby class so that it will add a little variety into our life.

Hopefully it won't take long to get out of these maternity jeans, and while I can't wait to see what my post-baby body is going to look like, I have a feeling I'm going to miss my pre-baby body, as flawed as it was, more than I could have ever imagined.

Closing the farm

2011-04-26T12:53:00.000-04:00

When I got pregnant, I said I didn't want to breastfeed. I wanted the baby to have breastmilk, but wasn't interested in whipping out the boob in public, or when company was over. I also wasn't interested in being the ONLY source of sustenance for this child. I had a very clear objective - I would pump and pump and pump and we would feed using a bottle, and that would be that.

After discussing this with our doula, she advised that it would be smarter to start off breastfeeding so that my supply would be established, and then we could move to pumping part-time/full-time once I was producing enough milk. I read up about this, and realized it was probably the smarter, less stressful route, and so this is what we did. It wasn't long before I was pumping and building a stash, and we were also able to feed her one bottle per day. This got her used to it, and also gave me a break in the evenings.

Starting out, breastfeeding wasn't easy. In fact it was pretty terrible. M had the hang of it right away, but my boobs paid for it. While her latch was...aggressive, it wasn't perfect, and this caused a lot of destruction and pain. It took several weeks to heal, and while my plight wasn't as bad as my friend Jenn 's , it wasn't easy, wasn't pleasant, and really wasn't fun.

We persevered because I knew that breastmilk really was best. I had some ups and downs with supply levels, but eventually we got on track. Right now I am breastfeeding once a day (in the morning) and pumping the rest. I love knowing exactly how much she is eating, and I also find she spits up less while eating from the bottle (which I know sounds odd, but there you have it).

I read a lot of blogs, and visit even more parenting forums, and am overwhelmed by how many people love breastfeeding their babies. They say there is nothing like it, that they want to do it as long as they can, that the feeling of bonding is incredible. But the truth is, I don't feel this way at all. I think I may actually hate breastfeeding. The only upside to it for me is that when I do it in the morning, I don't have to get out of bed to warm a bottle. Maybe this means I am the opposite of maternal and M will grow up sorely maladjusted and psychologically stunted, but I can't help how I feel. And I have given it more than a fair shake, I think. Even now that it has become easy to breastfeed, I don't like it any more than I did when tears sprang to my eyes each time she latched. In fact, I may like it even less since at that time I still held out hope that once it became easier I would enjoy it more.

So I'm pondering when to quit completely. I have quite a freezer stash, and I get a good amount each day when I pump. However as she grows, if she isn't breastfeeding, my body may not interpret the signs of when to produce more milk, so I foresee running out at some point, or not being able to keep up. Will I just continue supplementing with formula (currently I cut each feeding with a small amount of formula just to get her system used to it, and also to keep the pressure low for me to keep up)? Will I quit pumping altogether? I don't know. For now I'm playing it by ear. I feel guilty that I have had it relatively easy and even feel a bit selfish giving up since so many people who strive to succeed at this never get to do it. But I know it will stop sooner than later - I know that if I don't like doing it, then it's not doing anything for her emotionally, and may even be harming her in that respect. Bad Vibes Man.

Science

2011-04-19T15:25:00.000-04:00

In our 10 weeks of child rearing and 38 weeks, 6 days of gestating said child, I have come to realize something.

This baby thing is basically one big science experiment.

From "Let's try to get pregnant" to "why won't she sleep" every outcome has been up in the air, and each has been dependent on so many variables it would make your head explode if you really thought about it for any length of time.

Keeping this kid alive in itself doesn't seem so hard, but trying to excel at it so that she will thrive, THAT is a challenge. I read and google and ask around, and come away with more advice than I would ever be able to execute. But how to decide how to proceed?

As you may or may not know, we are currently trying to get a handle on this whole sleep thing. We continue to be extremely lucky that M sleeps through the night for the most part. And for the most part I mean probably 1 night out of 14 is off, and the rest she goes to bed between 7 and 8, and gets up no earlier than 6 am to eat, then hits the sack again within about 45 minutes for another few hours. We love this schedule. This schedule is the bomb.

Her daytime schedule remains slightly less than ideal. Meaning we get short 30-40 minute naps throughout the day (maybe 4-5 each day) and maybe once a week she will take a great afternoon nap of between 3-4 hours. This is overkill, I would settle for 2 hours.

So, we've been working on sleep issues. We had been practicing attachment parenting, which worked for us for the first 8 weeks. When she cried, we went to her, soothed her, fed her, whatever she needed. But heading out of week 8 was when the short naps arrived on the scene, so we moved to a slightly more humane version of what people refer to as "Cry It Out". We don't let her cry indefinitely, but only 5-10 minutes. If she doesn't settle, we soothe her and put her back down. For most naps, she never cries more than 10 minutes. Maybe once a day she will go on and on, and as soon as I pick her up to soothe her she settles and then falls fast asleep when put back in her crib.

I was feeling torn about this strategy. The theory behind attachment parenting is that if you let your newborn child cry and cry until she stops, she is learning to soothe herself, but is also learning that you are not there to soothe her. This is the last thing that I want. I may not be the most competent parent, with the most sunshiny disposition and the most enthusiasm for kid-related things, but I want my kid to know that I've got her back, no matter what. However, I also don't want her to feel like we resent her in any way, and I think that is the danger of ALWAYS being there for her, especially since I don't have the most sunshiny disposition nor the most enthusiasm for kid-related things.

And you know what? For now this change is working for us. M is sleeping more during the day, albeit still in short stints, but overall there is more daysleep happening. And she is happier. Gone are the days of many many meltdowns. Now we have a real scream-it-out, nothing will satisfy her moment maybe every 2-3 days, and they are much shorter episodes than before. And when I put her in her swing or chair instead of wailing she is content for a while to watch her mobile or some other toy.

I'm also happier. I don't feel guilty to put her in her swing while I do some dishes or laundry because now she doesn't cry. Even though her naps are short, I know to expect them to be short so I really get all my shit done while she's in there instead of trying to nap myself or take a break. Break only happens if I can get all the other stuff done before she gets up, or when SB gets home to take over.

So which method is better? Neither and both. As I said, the first 8 weeks I was happy while AP worked for us. And when it didn't, when I finally let go and moved on, we became happy again with a modified Cry It Out method. And I'm sure in a few weeks we'll have to make more adjustments. And the experiment continues.....

Happy Birthday to My Girl!!

2011-04-08T20:37:00.000-04:00

Not that one - this one:

Tess turns one year old today! I can hardly believe it. When we met her, she was one of these little furballs: (this is her litter, but we aren't sure which one was Tess)

She couldn't even walk around yet at that point.

We waited and waited until we could finally bring her home. I could barely sleep the whole week before it was time to go get her. We spent quite a while with the females of the litter, and finally we came home with this:

I think she was 18 pounds when she came home, slightly smaller than Simon. It's insane to think that she now weighs 90 pounds!

I have always known I wanted a Bernese Mountain Dog. I love everything about the breed - their size, their soft fur, their sweet temperament, their laziness. But Tess has really exceeded any expectation I could have had. Her only flaw is her shyness, but I'll take that over hyperactivity any day. And besides, it's a good excuse not to stop and talk to everyone who admires her in the park or on the street. It would take us all day to get anywhere!

I am especially enjoying seeing Tess with Marlowe. She is sweet and curious, but not overbearing. She loves to smell her and lick her hands and feet. Her favorite thing is taking walks, although I'm not sure if it's because she feels like she is protecting Marlowe and the stroller, or if she feels like the stroller is protecting her. Either way, she loves it, and it makes me so happy that I can incorporate time with her and the baby, even though M is still so small.

Everyone told me that when the baby came, I would love my pets less. Either they don't know me, or it's a total myth, because not only do I not love them less, I think I may even love them more if that's possible. And Tess especially at this point. I was so worried she would feel left out or forgotten, so we make a really big effort to keep her included. But even on the days that are particularly tough and we only have time for the minimum, she is the one who keeps an even keel and only shows anxiousness when she's really gotta go.

So, after one year, one baby, one trip to the beach, her first snowfall, her first walk on Mont Royal, her work days at the clinic and about one million cuddles, Happy Birthday to my Tessy, Baby Girl #1.

Learning Curve

2011-04-03T23:01:00.000-04:00

I cannot believe that Baby M is already 8 weeks old! I feel like these two months have really zoomed by, but that may be a bit of the Groundhog Day effect. Each day seems like it may never end, but when you add them all together, boom! There go two months!

In this time, we have tried to get to know our baby. I'm sure any parents out there know, in these first months this is a futile endeavor. First of all, newborns tend to have very little personality other than hungry, sleepy, and mean (aka cranky). Secondly, when they do start to develop what one may call "traits" or "habits", they change so quickly that there is no sense in getting used to them. They will just break your heart (goodbye, napping for hours in the swing. We miss you.)

I am currently trying to get this nap situation under control. In the beginning Baby M was often cranky, and we attributed every outburst to gas, cramps, etc. I stopped drinking coffee, orange juice, cut out dairy, all in an effort to appease her suffering. But I'm starting to think that we were getting the wrong message from her - I don't think we were making her sleep enough. So far we have been extremely lucky and M sleeps through the night. Yes, she has her exceptional, awful, wailing into the wee hours nights, but for the most part we get a solid 6-8 hours, and I feel so lucky for it. (actually I feel like she senses if she doesn't allow me a proper dose of reloading, I may drop her or put her in the dryer by mistake). But daytime was a whole other beast.

So I've been really making an effort. I am trying to create a nap routine to help her wind down and be able to know it's time for resting. We were doing a bedtime routine, why didn't we clue in that she would need this in the day too? And you know what? This week I have seen a huge difference. During her awake times she is a far happier baby then before, and her naps for the most part are lasting longer. I am learning her cues and trying to be prompt reacting to them, and I'm starting to learn her likes and dislikes. For example, she loves to be cozied up in a fleecy blanket, but it's also important she be swaddled tightly because she still hits herself in the face sometimes and scares herself awake.

I'm hoping this week will bring more progress, and more happy baby time. But I also know that she'll most likely switch up her preferences about 100 times before we get it, and that terrifies me.

Life goes on

2011-03-22T16:48:00.000-04:00

Now that I have finally gotten through the epic saga that was our birth story (sorry it was so long!), what's going on with the rest of our life?

Well, I think that's why the birth story ended up so long because really, nothing else is going on. Marlowe poops, and pees, and eats, and screams, and even occasionally sleeps. As of last week we are able to take (short) walks, and we also met with the ladies from my yoga class and their babies for playgroup.

We are slowly adjusting to life with M. And by adjusting I mean grumbling reluctantly forward waiting for the good stuff. I mean, there is some good stuff, but really newborns are not very exciting or fun. In the last week or so she has actually become somewhat pleasant during some of her awake time, so that's nice, but she still refuses to play Scrabble with me.

I'm trying really hard to live in the moment and "enjoy this time, they're only little for so long" but I'm dying for her to smile. I have always been a sucker for feedback, and I find it difficult to be working so hard keeping her alive without any indication about whether I'm doing it correctly (except for the fact that she is, indeed, alive).

Right now, in spite of all the apparatuses (I super wanted that to say "appariti" but apparently that's incorrect) we have procured for her to sleep and play in, she really only wants to nap ON one of us. Night time is fabulous, she sleeps pretty great in her pack and play, but daytime is all cuddle time. And screaming time. And as awesome as it is to cuddle with her, I really have a lot of shit to do around here, Kid, ~ahem~ laundry ~ahem~ so please start sleeping elsewhere. K, thx, bye.

And then there were three

2011-03-11T17:09:00.000-05:00

***the longest and last part of the story, also, the most graphic Sam****

As they set up for delivery, everyone kept reassuring me that it was almost over. At this point, contractions were looooooong and I was getting barely any break in between. I was feeling the need to push, but also didn't want to just let go and do it. I have no idea why, because obviously to get her out there was going to have to be some pushing involved, and I wanted her out as quickly as possible, but I just didn't want to commit to the pushing.

Instead, I preferred to writhe in pain and yell out whatever came to mind. A few examples are "Please kill me, please." "I can't do this!" (which met replies each time of "are you kidding? you ARE doing this!"). To SB "Why the hell did we ever think this was a good idea?" To the nurse who wanted to check my blood pressure and baby's heart rate in the middle of a pretty nasty contraction "are you fucking kidding me? You need to do this now?"

By 9am they were all set up and ready to get me pushing. Dr. Duh had been replaced by a really great female intern, Dr. L. Dr. K started things off by saying "Ok, we're ready to push now. If you push really well, you will have your baby in one hour." His sing-songy accent was mocking me now. I took this as a challenge to get her out in half that.

Nurse P was a rock star at this point. As she was helping me get into a comfy pushing position, she was already coaching. She began her preamble with "Now, to get this baby out we have to do this methodically" and after that Nice Nurse P turned into Drill Sergeant Nurse P and that's just what I needed. With SB on one side, my doula on the other (both being super encouraging), and Nurse P barking orders from the periphery, I felt like I had a dreamteam.

Pushing was actually a relief compared to the pain of transition. In transition I felt like my entire body was trying to curl around my uterus while my uterus was trying to explode out, while already on fire. The cliche about pushing is true, it does feel like taking a number 2 the size of a turkey, so the pain is more localized, and is a sharp burning. If all had been normal, I totally would have rocked pushing that baby out.

As it were, pushing was harder than it should have been. It seemed like she crowned really quickly, and then just sat there. It's normal that you will push a little, then baby will recede back in a tiny bit, sort of a two steps forward one step back kind of thing. But I would push, and she would head right back to where she was before the push. I started to get annoyed, and the doctors started to be concerned. After half an hour of pushing, I began to demand exact numbers like "how long will this take now?" "how many more pushes until I get her out?" and things like that. Obviously they couldn't tell me exact numbers, and that annoyed me more.

I'm not sure if the length of time she was crowning had anything to do with it, but I started to tear, and they decided to cut an episiotomy. I was pretty upset, but I knew that if Dr. K thought it was needed, AND my doula thought it was a good idea, then things were probably not looking good there. Which I wouldn't know anything about, because I was NOT stealing a peek. Really. They offered a mirror several times and seemed perplexed that I had no interest. I think Dr. K thought it would give me some incentive if I could see the progress, but nope, I wanted none of it. And at that point I think he was a little scared of me since I kept yelling things like "Motherfucker".

Nurse K checked the fetal monitor, and saw that the baby's heart rate was getting a bit sketchy. This terrified me, because after all my research (ie, watching episodes of A Baby Story) I knew that low heart rate meant signs baby was in distress, which the hospital tends to interpret as "Baby's dying, quick, to the OR!" And of everything I knew I didn't want, C-section was at the top of my list. So I got serious, and finally pushed her head out.

Within the split second that her head came out, Dr. K said "Okay, no more pushing. Stop pushing." He said this because he could see that the cord was wrapped around her neck (twice!), which is why she wouldn't come out. I would push and push, and the cord would draw her back in. Upon seeing this, he wanted to try to unwrap it before trying to push the rest of her out. But baby was not having any of that. She was just annoyed as me at that point, I think, because I swear I didn't push, but hell if that baby didn't kick herself the rest of the way out. She was born at 10:04 am, an hour and 4 minutes after I started pushing.

Dr. K officially cut the cord (because of the whole double wrap thing), then SB got to trim it back. He said it was cool. Then Dr. K said "Alright, now that the Cirque du Soleil show is over, we wait for the placenta."

They put her on my chest where she wriggled for a second, but because of the craziness of getting her out and her low heart rate they took her pretty quickly to check her out. I watched them rub her skin and suction her mouth and nose. It was the nurse and a specialist from pediatrics working with her, and that had me a little concerned. So while Dr. K and L were shooting me with stuff to clot my blood because they found I was bleeding too much, I just kept watching the baby. I could see her wriggling and squirming, but there was no crying. After what seemed like forever, they concluded that she was fine, that we had produced a baby who just didn't feel like crying. Magical! (and totally not true.)

The rest is just medical non-baby related stuff. Placentas and stitches and more swearing. I found that Dr. K was a bit rough with me, and when I said so to SB after the fact he said "well, you did call him a Motherfucker quite a few times." Which I totally didn't. I was just exclaiming it. In general. To no one in particular.

Transition

2011-03-02T16:07:00.000-05:00

***warning, Sam, it's still the labor story***

Dr. Duh came back, along with the attending on duty. Luckily the attending, Dr. K, took control of the situation, because Dr. Duh still looked like he was half asleep. Dr. K was a very funny man - he pretended to be offended that I still had my undies on (I put them back on after my first check because of the gown/heat issues. I wasn't quite ready to walk around with my butt hanging out.) I liked him right away. After some discussion of what the problem was (I didn't want to stay in bed, but so long as my waters were intact, they didn't want me walking around) he suggested that we break the waters and make the whole point moot. We mulled it over, and decided it was the best plan. Note here that I did NOT enjoy the sensation of my water breaking. Ugh.

Once we were okay'd to move around, I got up and wandered a little, but quickly made my way back to the bed and hunched over it. This is where the contractions got suddenly a lot stronger and a lot closer, and this is where I suddenly started to check out. I suddenly didn't want to walk around at all. I just wanted to curl up in the fetal position and die, actually. I tried some water therapy in the shower, and while it helped I had no strength to stand and kneeling on the tile was uncomfortable. I tried to continue hunching, but again my legs felt weak. I don't think I ever got to the point to try squatting, for fear I wouldn't be able to get back up. So I collapsed in a ball on the bed while our doula rubbed my back and SB held my hands. Every once in a while I would roll over. I almost broke one of SB's fingers squeezing his hand. And while, yes, it's true that you do forget what the pain feels like exactly once it's all over, I will never, ever, ever forget screaming out for someone to please kill me. So that is some indication that I probably won't be too excited to go there again.

I really have no concept of time for this transition stage. I'm sure they broke my waters maybe around 4 or 5 am? I don't think it could have been before 4. And within half an hour, the pain went from 3 to maybe 100. Again, labor mind-eraser is in effect. At some point, Nurse #2 left (we hardly knew ya!) and Nurse P came on shift. Nurse P was amazing! She had had 3 natural births of her own, and seemed to totally know the right things to do and say. And she had a good sense of humor, which I appreciated. Probably around 6am, I heard Dr. K come in while I was in the middle of a contraction. As I screamed he said in his funny sing-songy accent "Sounds like we're making some progress in here". (some people would find his humor annoying, but I totally dug it, especially since his accent was so great) They checked and I was at 7cm and totally effaced. By 8am I was totally dilated, and they started setting up for delivery.

It's on

2011-02-25T21:41:00.001-05:00

***please note, the following posts are no-holds barred accounts of Marlowe's birth. If you are at all squeamish about that kind of thing, you may want to skip them. This means you, Stamatia.

When we arrived at the hospital, the ER was surprisingly quiet. The Obstetrics Check-In desk was closed, because it was the middle of the night on Saturday, and because SB and I had done our hospital tour such a long time ago (because we're keen like that) we couldn't remember what we were supposed to do then. We tapped on the regular Check-In desk's glass, and the gentleman who came waved us through to the elevators. Meanwhile, an ambulance crew was waiting to deposit a patient, and during this 2 minute interval they asked me approximately 8 times if I would like a wheelchair. Even though I told them no 8 times.

Once upstairs, we got all set up for the routine pre-admission fetal monitoring and check of progress. Our doula arrived, and SB went back down to park the car. (Because it was the middle of the night, he got a great spot!)

I became preoccupied by how hot the room was. I am hyper-sensitive to temperature in normal times, but my entire pregnancy I felt like a self-contained rotisserie. And my gown wouldn't snap. So we did the whole one gown the right way, one gown backwards trick so my ass wasn't hanging out everywhere, but this solution compounded the sauna-like state of the birth centre triage. We waited for what seemed like hours for the resident on duty to arrive, and when he did he looked like he had just rolled out of bed, into his hoodie, and walked from his dorm to the hospital. Which is totally possible, and maybe even probable. I don't remember his name, nor would I post it here, but let's call him Dr. Duh.

His check showed that I was 4 cm dilated, 80% effaced, but that baby was at -3 station, which means very high up there. Also, my membranes were still intact, so I guess I just had a slow leak all day long. I was a bit disappointed to hear how high up she was sitting, since I had assumed she was low and engaged given all the pelvic discomfort I'd been feeling. I was glad to hear how far I'd progressed, though, because if these pains were just practice pains, then grrrr. At this point Dr. Duh said "so, we'll get you admitted, and then you can get your epidural." When I said no, he was kind of like "what do you mean?" This did not bode well, but I just ignored him.

Once we were settled into our delivery room, our first nurse arrived. She seemed like a nice enough lady, and looking back, I feel like she was probably new. The first thing she wanted to do was get me hooked up on a fetal monitor. Since I had just spent five hours (actual time was probably 45 minutes, but it felt like five hours) laying on my back attached to a monitor, all I wanted to do was walk around the room a little. We asked why this was necessary since we had just been hooked up, and they had plenty of data for the moment. She then proceeded to explain that since the baby was so high up, and my waters weren't broken, I would have to remain in the bed on a monitor, since if my waters broke and I was walking around the cord could get washed out first and compressed.

Plausible? Maybe. However, I had been leaking fluid all day and walking around laboring at home, and if I'm willing to take the risk to have a better labor experience, then dude, don't argue with a woman squeezing out a baby. She then began her spiel about how I would also have to stay in bed so that the IV would be stable and safe, and oh, by the way, watch out, I need to put the bed rail up so you don't fall out of bed. (behind me I heard my doula whisper to me "when was the last time you fell out of bed?")

(Because I have a pretty major phobia of needles, and because I didn't intend on needing an IV for anything except an emergency circumstance, and because I know that if I needed one, it would be easy enough to install when it was necessary anyway, I was adamant about not being hooked up to an IV, nor a Hep Lock.)

She then asked us where our birthplan was if we wanted all these "special" instructions followed (don't get me started on how not wanting any interventions at all when laboring could be considered "special") - I had specifically asked my doctor about it at my appointment the Monday before and she said "it's totally not necessary, just tell the nurses what you are okay with and what you aren't, and they'll respect it. They are very supportive of whatever you choose." So I was not please with this nurse demanding to see one. Our doula quickly jotted one down, which I signed and gave to the nurse, who then said she still couldn't let me up to walk around without a monitor on.

I started to lose my shit about then, and thus began the argument that resulted in me yelling at the nurse "why are you still here arguing with me?" and "would you just go get the doctor already?" While my doula tried to politely say "I think we understand what you are saying, but she would just like the doctor to come check and see if maybe the baby has engaged?" Then the nurse fired us. FIRED US like it would hurt our feelings. I will never forget the tone of her voice when she said "Well, maybe I should just get you another nurse, then..." and I wish I could have seen her face (I was busy with my head buried in a pillow during a contraction) when we all three said "Yes, please, I think that would be a good idea."

Then she had her boss come back in with. I don't know why. She was back to trying to explain why I had to stay in the bed and why I would need an IV. At this point I turned off my ears. My head was about to explode off my body, and I felt I may leap off the bed and tackle that nurse. Eventually between SB and the doula they worked it out - the nurse left, we got a new one, and they sent for the doctor to check me.

Early Labor

2011-02-18T23:15:00.000-05:00

***please note, the following posts are no-holds barred accounts of Marlowe's birth. If you are at all squeamish about that kind of thing, you may want to skip them. This means you, Stamatia.

On Saturday, February 5th, I woke up at around 7:30am to find I had developed a slow leak in the night. Dr. Google thought it was most likely my waters, and a quick phone call to my doula later that morning confirmed that was probably the case. I had spent pretty much the entire week walking around like a cowboy because I felt like I got kicked in the kooka, and was pretty sure I had passed my bloody show on Thursday. So I kind of had a feeling things were going to get started soon.

With the intuition that birth was probably imminent, SB and I realized that we had some serious last minute shit to get done. Armed with a list of baby supplies we headed out. My walking pace was considerably slower than normal, however I had feelings of only mild cramping throughout the morning. As we finished up our errands, these cramps became more pinchy, and by the time we got home I was describing them as "contractiony cramps" instead of just cramps. We finished packing the hospital bags. I included the toothbrushes.

Then I realized that I hadn't prepared any of the Houla Houla Hop T4s for our ex-employees. It was on my list of stuff to do and I just hadn't gotten to it yet. So, as the contractiony cramps got pinchier and pinchier, I was cursing and swearing trying to find all the information for eighty seven different forms and also trying to remember how I had done it last year. Finally finished those up around 4pm, however they are still here waiting to be mailed. Incidentally, this is also the point where I would say the contractiony cramps became contractions, and this is where we really start counting the hours when talking about how long my labor was.

We had pizza for dinner, and we watched The Prince of Persia (it was a terrible, terrible movie). I tried to rest a bit, as suggested by the doula, but had no luck with that. We started timing the contractions, you know, for fun, and found they came every 6-7 minutes. I think at that point we both kinda didn't want to believe that this was it. We went to bed to watch TV. We talked to the doula several times by phone. She has a policy that she doesn't want to come too early, in case it's false labor and also in case early labor is just very very long. It's a waste of time for her to be hanging out for nothing, and it's easier to be comfortable and rest when you are just yourselves at home. I think she thought that I may make it through the night laboring as I was, based on how I described the pains, and also by how relaxed I sounded on the phone.

But then, something happened, and the contractions not only sped up, but intensified. Breathing didn't work. Walking around definitely didn't work. Somewhere between Auction Kings and Idiot Abroad (thank you, Discovery, for providing entertaining TV for laboring women at 1-2am on a Saturday) we figured it was probably time to get to the hospital. Our doula, by phone, was a bit surprised, I think, by how I went from relaxed to not quite so relaxed - rather then come to our house first, we decided to just meet at the hospital.

And away we went, in a snowstorm (thank you for the peace of mind, Subaru) at almost 3am. The bars were closing up soon, so through the snowstorm we had to maneuver around many many crazy taxis (I've been in a 3am cab before - they drive like they're playing MarioKart) and many many drunk people wandering into the street. We decided our kid was a partygirl, arriving as the bars close, just in time for the afterparties.

4 days, 11 hours

2011-02-10T21:30:00.000-05:00

The baby came!

She was born on Sunday, February 6th, 2011 at 10:04am. Her name is Marlowe Fiona, and she was 6lbs 15oz and 19.5" long.

The last four days have been sort of a blur as we try to work out some strategies to organize this crazy new life we have. I have been thinking a lot about how I want to tell her birth story, but I'm not sure I'm ready to write it out yet. So for now, I leave you with this and a promise to be back soon.

38 weeks, 2 days

2011-02-02T13:03:00.000-05:00

I've been on maternity leave for two weeks now, and I have learned a few things in this time:

1. Tess doesn't actually like spending time with me, she was just using me. She knew that I was the one with the cool job where she had lots of doggie pals to hang out with so she was nice to me, ensuring I would bring her along. Now that we don't go to work, she spends her days ignoring me and sighing, and her evenings tormenting SB because she knows HE can still at least take her to the dogpark.

2. Daytime TV sucks. As I putter around the house doing various tasks, I realize how much I hate a lot of TV that airs during the day. Especially Barbara Walters. I love the View, but I despise Barbara Walters. I feel like she has completely irrelevant opinions and it seems like she is half senile based on the comments she makes on "Hot Topics" and also the way she interrupts everyone else on the show to make said comments. Is it sad that the fate of my days lately hinge on whether she is on that day or not? Sheesh.

3. Even with all the time in the world, I am still an exceptional procrastinator. I would even go so far as dubbing myself a Master Procrastinator. And I know for a fact it's not just laziness, because I am very selective about which tasks routinely get ignored. For example, I've kept up on laundry, my crafting is in turbo mode, but I still haven't packed my hospital bag. Even after the nurse at my appointment on Monday chastised me for not having it prepared.

37 weeks, 3 days

2011-01-27T10:06:00.000-05:00

Once again, another boring report. Everything is great and normal.

I finished work last Wednesday, and I think this is depressing Tess. She finds me 100% boring since a) I can't take her to the park and b) I am not a dog. At least I'm forcing her to get to plenty of cuddle time in before the Insider comes.

I have been procrastinating getting my hospital bags packed. I have no idea why. My list has been made for weeks, I picked up a bunch of stuff that I needed, everything should be ready, but it seems like other things keep popping up that have to be done first.

In other random news, I decided to make a quilt for the Insider, at SB's urging. I have been knitting all kinds of little projects, but I think he was inspired by all the quilts I have that have been handed down through my family. Anyway, I ordered fabric to make it two weeks ago and it still hasn't arrived. UGH. Two weeks I have been waiting - I hate the US postal service.

Lastly, SB took some belly photos this weekend. Nothing fancy, mostly so The Insider will see what we looked like together. Anyway, this is my favorite, taken at 36 weeks 5 days:

36 weeks, 6 days

2011-01-23T22:34:00.003-05:00

Seeing as how our life is about to be given over to a tiny alien, I decided that this weekend I would plan a relaxing getaway weekend. However, obviously without the option of actually leaving the city just in case the alien decided to actually land, I had to be slightly creative.

So I booked a surprise two night stay at the Hotel Place D'Armes, the hotel where we got married. I picked him up from work on Friday at 5, after I had already checked in and deposited our luggage in the room (which I packed after he left in the morning). I took him to dinner at The Keg, then made him hide is eyes while I drove around the block and gave the valet at the hotel our keys. We spent the two nights ordering movies, ordering room service, reading, napping, walking around the Old Port, and just generally relaxing. Tess was in the more than capable hands of one of my co-workers for the weekend, so I was able to rest easy knowing that not only is she totally enamored by Liz and would be totally comfortable with her, but also that Liz has her own puppy at home and welcomed the play date/in-house energy burner.

The funniest thing was that at dinner on Friday night, before he knew my whole master plan for the weekend, SB said "I think that after this meal, if the rest of the weekend included nothing but lounging in pjs and not having to take Tess out, I would be in heaven." And that's exactly what it was.

***sidenote: I won't even get into the part about how my co-workers planned a surprise brunch/shower for today, Sunday, at 10:30, and SB had to covertly rearrange their plans to accommodate my surprise for him. The brunch ended up being so sweet and fantastic, and I am so, so sad I'm not joining them all at the work tomorrow. I will have to visit the clinic often throughout the year because I'm already missing it and those ladies!

36 weeks, 1 day

2011-01-18T19:27:00.002-05:00

I missed another week! With this kind of track record, I'm pretty sure I'm going to forget feeding The Insider at least once in the first week of her life.

Still doing relatively great, although yesterday I had my first day of feeling really, actually, honestly pregnant. My legs felt heavy. I had random achyness in my abdomen, back, pelvis, etc. I was tired. I was snappish. I didn't feel like walking to my car after work. SB made me go to bed at 9:30, and after some reading and heating pad I was asleep before 10:30. This morning I felt 200% better, so it seems that rest really IS the solution to most pregnancy discomfort.

Tomorrow is my last day of work. I'm pretty sad, because I love it there and love the people and will miss them tons. I had originally planned on staying on as long as possible, but I was worried about going into labor early and leaving the clinic in the lurch. However, after feeling so terrible yesterday, I'm actually a little glad to be done. I have some crafting plans to get to and lots of reading to do (my Kindle arrived and I think I'm in LOVE!) so I think these weeks will fly by.

Still no name for The Insider either. Her name will be Bobo

34 weeks, 3 days

2011-01-06T12:27:00.002-05:00

Whoops, I missed a week! SB and I were both off last week and spent our time alternating between lazing around and finishing up some decorating projects. (mostly I did the lazing, and he did the projects).

Things are humming along. We still have zero progress on choosing a name. The Insider is still getting bigger and feels more and more like a cat trapped in my belly rather than a trout. We haven't had a doctor's appointment in quite a while (because of the holidays, the clinic wasn't open) but I've been healthy and things seem great so not worried. We go on Monday for a checkup.

I had a fall at work this week which was painful and hilarious, but not worrisome. Basically I missed a small half-step while backing up and fell backwards. My fall was broken by the corner of a door frame, which caught me on my shoulder blade and my butt, then I sort of slid to the floor. I thought it was pretty slap-stick style funny, but my co-workers didn't. Long story short, aside from bruising, everything is great. As if bruising is ever really that great when you're pregnant - as if my body isn't gargantuan enough and hauling it around isn't hard enough, but then add hauling it around trying to avoid aggravating painful bruises. But, it's been three days and it's slowly getting better.

I've started doing baby laundry today (bedding is first!) and am also compiling my list so I can pack a hospital bag. Obviously it's early, however 5 weeks seems like it's going to fly by and this would be one of those things I can see myself putting off. But it's kinda important. Considering the hospital doesn't supply any diapers. Could get messy if I forget the bag.

32 weeks 4 days

2010-12-24T13:45:00.006-05:00

Yay it's Christmas Eve! I'm making sweet and hot almonds, SB is out getting supplies for our dinners tonight and tomorrow, and the puppy and kitties are snoozing away. Oh, and I'm watching a Criminal Minds marathon. Holiday perfection!

Thought I would update on the nursery, which has been "done" for a few weeks now. I'm really pleased - it has come out exactly as I wanted. Not cutesy, not frilly, not overrun by commercial cartoon characters or ugly cartoon monkeys. It's fresh, clean, cozy, and will be easy enough to update into a toddler/kid room as The Insider grows up. Here are some photos of the progress:The empty room, with butter color walls and no window treatments. I'm annoyed by the electrical panel in the corner, and trying to think of ideas to cover it. It's placed in a very awkward spot, that a canvas/painting would look weird filling the whole space.... a bit stumped.

This is a photo of all the crap that used to be jammed in the nursery, now jammed into the dining room. The room used to also contain a treadmill, a giant wardrobe and a giant corner desk, but those were sold/donated long before this stage. Thank goodness.

"Finished" - seating and storage area. Walls are now beige/tan. The giant box of picture frames will be gone (unfinished project #376 for other parts of the house) and the lamp has to go (cause it's ugly). Also, on the back of the door you can note my wedding gown, which I have yet to bring to be cleaned. (unfinished project #253). We may also get another block of 3x3 storage to stack on top of this one. The closet in this room will be used for regular storage, so The Insider needs as much space as possible for clothes and toys to be put away, otherwise her dad may put her to the street.
"Finished" the rest of the room: one option for the ugly electrical box is to pull the curtains over a bit on that side. But then I feel the room may look lopsided.... We will also have a changing pad on top of the dresser, and maybe a rug. The last big thing to do is to choose some wall art, but I have a long list of etsy prints that I want, so I can't see this being a problem.

31 weeks 4 days

2010-12-17T18:00:00.003-05:00

So, the decision has been made, and I feel soooooooo much better. We've decided to stay put for the holiday. The final straw for me was thinking about what WOULD happen if we delivered while home. The Insider would be 8 weeks early, so chances are she would end up in the NICU for x amount of time while we would be scrambling around, living out of suitcases, worrying about the cats back here and our condo, and THEN once she was finally discharged we would be traveling back to Montreal with not just an infant, but a teeny tiny 3/4 baked infant.

So we're keeping our butts here. And I feel really good about it. I think SB is just happy that even though we are staying, Christmas is NOT dead this year, and we will be able to have a tree, and hot chocolate, and lots of food and holiday movies etc. I'm also envisioning lots of walking in the snow with Miss Beastly (Tess) and taking lots of photos of her frolicking about.

Our nursery is 98% done - just need wall hangings. I'll post photos soon. It's pretty sweet.

And that's all the baby news. She's still rockin' and rollin' in there. Actually, I'll go one day thinking "wow, she isn't really moving around much" and then the next day she'll be almost knocking me over from kicking me. She's already torturing me.

30 weeks

2010-12-06T22:43:00.002-05:00

Week 30 is bringing us into the middle of a slight conundrum. To travel or not to travel?

Both of our families are in New Brunswick. We haven't been home for the holidays for 4 years due to the old dog and cat business. We were both very much looking forward to a holiday at home.

Then we became pregnant people.

At first I was gung-ho. It's no problem. No worries. I'll only be 32-34 weeks during holiday time. It'll be fine. It'll be better than fine, it'll be great!

But the closer I get to holiday time, the less sure I am that it's such a great idea. Things that do not concern me: driving in a car for 10 hours. However, for some reason, everyone thinks that this is the part of the trip that worries me the most. I have no qualms about being in a car for 10 hours. In fact, I would probably love it being that I would nap all day if I could, and being in a car for 10 hours, what's a better way to pass the time then to nap?

Things that do concern me: Going into pre-term labor 10 hours away from home. I realize there are very few things that you can plan and rely on when it comes to labor and delivery, but if I gave birth 10 hours away from home, I think I would lose it. Not in the birthing centre we've visited and wrapped our heads around, not in the hospital 10 minutes from home, not with our chart handy, not with our doula, not with our little baby nest 10 minutes from the hospital to bring The Insider home to, not with our carseat, not with our baby clothing, not with our tub to labor in at home, not with our few weeks of settling in after filled with personal chaos, but in our house at our pace with our cats. I would lose. My. Shit. And right now the only solution I can think of that guarantees avoiding this situation is staying my ass right here at home.

Yes, in New Brunswick there is a great hospital where my mom knows most of the doctors, more of the nurses, they have a great NICU and comfy facilities. But, oh my hell, our doula, our house, our nest, our cats.... Plus a 10 hour drive back with an infant. After giving birth.

We have polled several councils. 1st being our doctor, who was only able to give a medical opinion, which was basically "sure, there's no reason you can't sit in a car for 10 hours." As stated, OBVS. This is not really the question.

2nd council consulted: My yoga class. 6 out of 6 polled there say they would never make the trip in a million years.

3rd council: A caucus of nurses at my mom's work training this week. I'm not sure how many were there, but they all seemed to think it was a bad idea too.

So, I'm at a loss. My heart and my doctor say we should go. But, my intuition, my sanity, and my councils say we should stay put. So, the jury is still out on this one.

A post NOT related to the Insider

2010-12-01T21:36:00.002-05:00

So, aside from all the baby building brouhaha, there is some more pretty big news around these parts. I submitted a story to the CBC/QWF Quebec Writing Competition way back in ....mmmm, maybe April or May? In August, I found out that out of a field of about 300 entries, I had made it into the top 30.

Last month I found out that I actually made it to the top 13, which means my story will be officially published in an anthology coming out next fall! My first publication! They told me a month ago, but I wasn't supposed to make any announcements or anything until after the gala that they held last week.

I can't really explain how happy and excited I am. When we sold the business our intention was that I would work part time for a year, and see how far I could go in this writing thing. I got out this submission, and one or two others before we found out I was pregnant, and then writing sort of got put on the backburner again while I wrapped my head around everything. I started to feel...not resentful, but definitely anxious that my one chance to give this a shot was lost, and now with a baby coming, and the subsequent child-rearing that is generally associated with birthing, I would never work up the steam and nerve again.

But this, this is a great start. It gives me a little confidence, and definitely some motivation. Like crack, I think, knowing your words will be in print is a bit addictive.

28 weeks, 4 days

2010-11-26T12:04:00.005-05:00

Here is the latest belly photo:
Taken this morning. To me, looks exactly like the LAST belly photo I posted. Although my pants would beg to differ. Maybe because I'm wearing black?

I have begun the prep work to The Insider's Lair. Yesterday I filled all the holes in the walls (the previous owner was a BIG fan of drywall anchors, which makes for very heavy patching), and today I will give the walls and baseboards a wash. I may even paint the trim today....although after dragging the contents of the room into our dining room, I'm already pretty exhausted. We'll see. Nesting fail.

We have yet to have even one conversation about possible name choices. I have been slowly building a list (I've gotten through A-M so far!) but I don't think SB has been working on his yet. In this respect, it would have been much easier if the Insider were a boy, since I have had a boy's name picked for years.

Tess says she is compiling some name selections, but will only tell them if we are really stuck.

27 weeks 3 days - Doula Doula Doula

2010-11-18T15:01:00.002-05:00

Week 27 and the Insider is on the move in there. Lots of kicking, pushing, headbutting, flipping - I swear she is going to join Cirque du Soleil. It doesn't wake me up in the night or anything, but it can be quite alarming when I'm typing away and she almost kicks the laptop off my lap.

I also had a cold this week, which started last Friday and which is still lingering. Ugh. When we owned the business, I didn't get a lot of bad colds, because I was rarely interacting with people in the public. Now that I work as a receptionist, I have had two bad colds this year, and I'm assuming I'm catching them from clients at the clinic, or from touching money...Or maybe I caught it at the hospital last week when I was stuck there for 4 hours for appointments!!! Anyway, I'm almost past it, and hopefully it's the last one for a while.

As a follow up to my post about birthing naturally, just wanted to say thanks to those who posted comments and who messaged me privately. I love hearing all about different birth experiences - both about what your intentions were vs what you ended up with, and how you would plan differently next time. It is all extremely helpful in the planning process.

To help us achieve our goal of a natural delivery, we decided to hire a doula to help us out. A doula, or at least a doula the way that we plan on using one, is basically a birth coach who is with you from the moment you are in labor until the baby makes its entrance. She is also helping us prepare for labor with several prenatal information sessions (like a private prenatal class, I think these will be much more useful to us than group ones), and will have a visit with us a week or two after the baby is home to follow up and help us out in any way she can for a few hours.

We found our doula at www.motherwit.ca - they have great information sessions once a month where all the doulas are present to explain what they do, how they work, and where you can ask any questions you may have about their services. It was also a great opportunity to see which of the doulas we felt most comfortable with, like a group interview really.

What do we hope the doula can do for us? Well, since we want to stay home as long as we can, she will join us here and help us decide when it's really time to go to the hospital. I would much rather be hanging out in my own house, on my own bed/couch/floor or in my own tub or shower as long as we possibly can. I never had any interest in birthing at home, and would prefer the main event to happen in the hospital just in case, but from what I understand labor is a pretty uncomfortable experience, and I'd rather be in a comfortable environment while I'm working through it.

We're also going to rely on our doula to help make suggestions about labor positions, to give some helpful massages to relieve some tensions, and to remind us to eat and drink when appropriate. Once we do get to the hospital, her role may be even more important. While the doula won't take on the role as arbitrator between us and the hospital staff, she can help to counsel us in our decisions. I think that if it came to a point where I had to decide whether to have or not have one of the interventions I'm trying to avoid, I would feel a lot better about whatever I decided if I was able to take 5 minutes with her to discuss the situation and get her opinion as someone outside of the medical team who actually knows how a regular birth should go.

Hopefully this strategy will work for us. And if not, at least if SB faints or something I won't be stuck alone :P

26 weeks 4 days - au naturel

2010-11-12T18:04:00.003-05:00

Before becoming pregnant, I did not want to hear anything about birthing, labor, waters breaking, c-sections, etc etc etc. It grossed me out. It creeped me out. And it was something I never thought I would ever have to worry about.

Cut to us deciding to have a baby, and obviously the birthing process is part of that. But for some reason it went from giving me major skeeves to being completely obvious how I wanted it all to play out.

I preface this post by saying that I am not a judgy person. I totally understand why other people make different choices about their births, and believe that everyone needs to make their birth experience exactly what they need it to be. Before becoming pregnant I probably would have said "Give me the Twilight Sleep birth - knock me out and I'll worry about the kid when it's out and I wake up." But it's like a switch flipped in me.

I'm sure I'm jinxing myself by saying this, but this pregnancy has been very, very easy. Aside from fatigue and some muscles cramps and achiness, I barely feel pregnant at all. It really has helped me wrap my head around the fact that my body was built to do this. It is working like it's supposed to, and building The Insider all on its own with barely any conscious effort on my part except for being sure not to poison her. So why can't labor be the same? If my body is being so efficient at putting this baby together, why can't I trust it to get it out of there just as efficiently?

So we decided to do a natural birth. What does that mean? Ultimately, my ideal situation would be laboring at home as long as we can, then heading to the hospital to fight with them about not interfering. I don't want Pitocin, I don't want laughing gas, I don't want an epidural. I don't want an episiotomy. I definitely definitely definitely do not want a CSection. There are a lot of factors that made me decide this, but basically I want my body to be in full control of the situation, and I trust it to work the way it should. I also care more about bouncing back after the labor than getting labor over as quickly as I can. And from the reading and researching and googling I've done, I feel like a natural birth is going to give me the best outcome with regards to those goals.

I feel it's important to also say that, yes, I realize this is my first birth experience and that I really have no idea what it is REALLY like. And I realize that in the moment I may change the way I feel about the wonders of the human body and gladly welcome some interventions. But I'm hopeful that I can power through it, because chances are I won't be up for doing this again. And I would hate to have any regrets at all about this experience, especially since so far it has been very positive.

If you feel like sharing, tell me about your birth. Tell me what you loved/hated. Tell me how you felt about nurses/doctors in the moment, and tell me things you wish your partner had done and things you're glad they did do.

25 weeks 6 days

2010-11-07T21:21:00.002-05:00

Appointments on Thursday were great! Our doctor couldn't figure out why the ultrasound department was so concerned about the baby's size. She thinks that 6-7 lbs at birth is great, and I happen to agree with her on that one. Anyway, so instead of sending us back up to ultrasound, she did one herself (saved us time AND aggravation!) and announced that everything looked normal to her, that The Insider will probably just be petite. Considering neither of us are giants, that seems pretty acceptable.

She also agrees that The Insider is most likely a girl, so we are going with girl. I think it's harder to get them to guarantee it's a girl than to get them to place bets on "boy" - it's easier for a boy's penis to be hiding than for a girl's vajayjay to spontaneously expand for the sake of the ultrasound. But 3 out of 3 doctors have agreed she's a girl, so my money is on girl too.

The last big part of my appointment was my glucose challenge test, wherein they make you drink a bottle of orange-flavored drink, wait an hour, then take a blood test to be sure you aren't developing gestational diabetes. I really don't want to get that. I have not looked into the different treatments for it because I'm too terrified and don't want to know about them until I get it, but I have a feeling it would at the very least involve a very restricted diet, to which I say BLAH! So fingers crossed I'll pass this test and not have to worry about it again. The tech said I should know by Tuesday.

And that's it! I promise this week I'm working on some more interesting posts about some of the plans we have for AFTER the Insider comes out, but this week we were just concerned with making sure she's not going to come out Smurf-sized.

25 weeks 1 day

2010-11-02T22:10:00.003-04:00

This pregnancy has really been uneventful. I apologize that it hasn't given me much fodder for the old bloggity blog. But I guess I'm pleased - eventful doesn't always mean pleasant!

Lots of movement happening now - Insider aerobics and circus classes happen daily. I think my doing yoga is really inspiring her (still going with "her" until we're told otherwise - we have another ultrasound this Thursday so hopefully we can get a little confirmation).

Although I find my belly is still growing gradually enough that I don't really notice it, I am starting to feel that my body isn't really my own. While I'm still very flexible in yoga class, and okay to climb stairs and walk the dog without actually getting winded, there are a few things that bother me.

If I walk too fast (with the dog, without the dog, carrying something, not carrying something) I get some pretty wicked round ligament pain. These pull at your sides, just under the belly, and pretty much feel like runners' stitches. Ya, except I'm not running, I'm just trying to get my fat ass from A to B.

My sciatica is back, only on one side, thank heavens. It bothers me most when I have been sitting too long in a chair that is the wrong height. Anyone who has ever worked in an office environment with me knows that I like my chair seat height to be about 3 inches off the floor. Okay, maybe not that low, but low. My theory is that I have short legs - when I'm seated at a comfortable height, my legs bend at 90 degrees. And it just so happens that the right height is usually the lowest one. Anyhoo, if the chair is too tall, and my legs are not at 90 degrees, my sciatica acts up and I turn into a 97 year old who just happens to be growing a fetus.

Lastly, I have been chronically running into everything. It's like all my joints and appendages have Tourettes and jump out at random objects. I just got rid of a bruise on my knee (printer stand under our desk at work), and currently have a giant blue welt on my elbow (piece of hospital equipment while on our tour of the birthing center) one on my hip (run into the radiator outside the bathroom at work at least once a day), and I'm pretty sure there will be a new one on my knee tomorrow because I bashed into the printer stand again today. Between this and the acne, I feel like I'm going through puberty again.

And I'm 97.

And growing a baby.

It's the entire life cycle rolled into a 9 and a half month period.

23 weeks 6 days

2010-10-24T18:34:00.002-04:00

A bit slack on the posting this week. But, don't worry, you're not missing anything pregnancy-wise because nothing is changing. Still weird spastic movements, still getting fatter, still feeling great, but tired. Old news.

I am very interested to see how the pets will react when the Insider comes along. They cats are very sensitive and are often the first to tell that a mom is pregnant, but our guys seem completely oblivious. Or, at least, if they ARE onto me, they don't really care either way. They haven't adopted any weird behaviors, which is great because those behaviors usually include peeing in places they shouldn't. Sometimes we catch Simon sleeping in the baby carseat, but that's harmless and pretty hilarious, actually, because he barely fits in the seat part.

I'm curious about how Tess will react. I have no qualms at all about how she will be towards the baby, but she has never known me NOT pregnant, so she may feel differently about me once all these weird hormones quit emitting their vibes. I hope she still likes me. I have a feeling we will be spending a lot of time together with the Insider in the middle of the night.

22 Weeks 4 days

2010-10-15T20:18:00.003-04:00

The Insider is moving around a bit in there. For a while I was feeling it mostly in the morning around 10/10:30, but this week it's been completely unreliable and all over the place. Once I was able to feel it from the outside by pressing down pretty firmly on my belly, but the movements are so random and spastic that it is next to impossible to predict when SB should give it a shot. Soon, hopefully.

Decided to post a "Belly Photo". It would be awesome if I didn't have that extra back and arm fat, but what are you gonna do, right? Actually, I was on a message board the other day and one of the posts was called "No one told me my arms would get pregnant too" - I laughed out loud.

Yoga should help, though. Or at least I hope so. I've been to four classes so far, and am loving it. Going to shoot for at least two classes per week. Not only is the class itself fun, but most of the women there are pretty cool, too.

I still feel great, which is a bonus. Most of the women in my class have loads of back pain, carpal tunnel, lots of acid reflux, but I've been off the hook so far. I'm sure it will come, but each week that passes that I feel good, I'm thankful.

The only annoyance this week has been a weird sleep pattern. I get exhausted around 4pm, and stay that way until bedtime, then I can't fall asleep. And when I finally do fall asleep, I wake up every hour or two for no reason - don't have to pee, no pains, nothing, just wide awake. Very aggravating, especially since I'm trying to store up my rest reserves until the Insider makes an appearance.

21 Weeks, 4 days - Girl"ish"

2010-10-08T11:36:00.002-04:00

Big week here, big big week.

First of all, finally got to my prenatal yoga class. Last Saturday's attempt was a disaster wherein I forgot to bring the exact address of the studio with me, walked right past it, continued on for 20 minutes, then upon doubling back I realized I had parked about 1 minute away from it.

However, I got my act together and made it to class last night and it was awesome. We did some postures that we relaxing and then some other flows and postures that were actually pretty challenging fitness-wise. I was sweating and out of breath a few points, so was all in all impressed. They have class three times a week, with three different teachers, but I'm only available regularly for two of them. We'll see if the other teachers measure up!

Also, we had our ultrasound yesterday. The technician was very helpful when she said "Looks like it could be a girl." Duh. It could be for sure. but IS IT???? She left the room for a few minutes and we asked her to look again. At first she seemed offended that we didn't believe her, but when we said it was more the way she stated it than anything she assured us that if she had any doubts she wouldn't have said anything at all. I'm still not 100% convinced, but am going with "girl" for now...tentatively.

20 weeks, 4 days

2010-10-01T13:49:00.008-04:00

Vacation was great! Little did we know that our wee mountain dog is actually a water dog at heart:
Her very favorite thing was running along the beach and exploring the giant piles of seaweed. And while she did hop in the water regularly, I think that she would enjoy it even more if it was a bit warmer!

While on vacation, I passed the 19 week and 20 week mark. Allegedly The Insider is the size of a small cantaloupe now. Also, within one day, my belly went from looking fat to looking round, as per my mother who said "Wow, you really popped overnight!".

The last few days I've been feeling a few what they call "flutters" - basically feels like gas bubbles without the gas. In one week, we have our anatomy scan ultrasound, which means we will know if we're having a boy or girl baby.

Tomorrow, I'm going to try my hand at a prenatal yoga class. I feel blobby and gross since I can't go running, and walking just doesn't do it for me. So I figured at least if I get some stretching and muscle strengthening happening it may help me feel better. Plus I'm sure a little flexibility won't hurt to help during labor. I'm going to check out Studio Bliss since one of our ex-clients is an instructor there. She won't be the teacher tomorrow, but I figure she is a very sweet woman, and if she works there it must be a pretty okay place. I'll let you know how it goes, so long as the exertion doesn't kill me.

18 weeks 1 day

2010-09-14T20:06:00.004-04:00

Less than a week until vacation! Actually, tomorrow is my last workday before vacation, but we don't leave until Saturday. I can't wait for Tess to see the ocean. I'm pretty certain she is going to be terrified, but I'm hoping it will be a little fun for her at least. Especially since the week we get back she goes in for her spay. Poor Tessy.

It's pretty amazing how fast Tess is growing. Right now she is 55 pounds. I can remember having to carry her up and down the stairs because she was too small to negotiate them herself. She also used to refuse to come to the door so we could go on her walk - we had to clip the leash to her and practically drag her to the door. Then when we got outside, she would refuse to walk anywhere, terrified of everything she saw. And while she's still pretty much traumatized by anyone on two legs, I can remember a time when I thought she would stay petrified forever. That I would be spending the next ten years trying to drag a 100 pound dog around. But she loves her walks, and even moreso she loves the dogpark. And I can't even begin to gush about how smart she is and how obedient with all the commands she learned in her training class. Every day I tell her I can't believe how much I love her. Because I really can't believe it. She is awesome.

On the pregnancy front, still no baby movement. However my legs have been in overdrive. For three out of the last five nights I haven't been able to fall asleep because of restless legs. I've had this happen to me before in normal times but apparently it's a pretty common pregnancy problem too. And a super annoying one. At 12:45 am last night I was ready to go run around the block a few times to get my legs to quit feeling creepy crawly.

17 weeks 2 days

2010-09-08T19:13:00.003-04:00

Still no movement in there. But belly is reaching critical mass, I would say. Any moment now the stretch marks will start to appear.

One of the first things you do when you find out you're pregnant is start googling. I can't get enough information. I read online for hours and hours and hours, sign up for newsletter after newsletter. And I cannot deny, this information is so helpful and sometimes reassuring. It often helps me form my opinions and wishes for this pregnancy, for how I want to eat, how I want to exercise, how I want to deliver, where I want to deliver, etc.

By now, I feel like I've googled my google off and read the whole internet with regards to pregnancy. I keep coming across the same info, phrased in all different ways, but basically the same old stuff I already know.

However sometimes the information that's out there is quite alarmist. Often on message boards what you will find are the happiest moments ("Yay, tomorrow we find out the sex!") or the very worst stories ("we went to find out the sex, and found out the baby has no heartbeat"). And because I still don't feel any movement, it sends my mind through all sorts of dark tunnels of "What if that's happening to me and I have no clue?"

Nothing I can do for now except assume that no news is good news. Hopefully The Insider will start wiggling around a little closer to the walls in there so I can tell what's going on!

16 weeks 5 days

2010-09-05T21:39:00.002-04:00

Still nothing eventful. I feel like I'm failing at this science experiment as my results have been fairly lackluster. Sorry it's so boring.

Before preparing the nursery, we decided to pull up our pants on decorating our own bedroom. This hasn't been touched since we moved in. Two years ago we bought a new mattress with the intentions of buying a new bedframe to go with it, but we never got around to it. Well, we've bought a new dresser, ordered our bedframe, and this weekend is the big re-paint project. We did the ceiling yesterday, and Eric and I got a start on the priming this morning. After lunch his friend Bjorn came over and helped him finish the rest as I had gotten a bit sleepy (normal) and also a headache (also normal, but was a bit worried about the paint fumes too).

One month until we find out what kind of baby this is, and until we're halfway done this adventure.

15 Weeks 3 days

2010-08-26T10:19:00.002-04:00

Another uneventful week. I must say I am quite impressed with the way my body is dealing with being pregnant. I have had zero sickness, no swelling, no weird veins on my legs. The only inconvenience has been extreme fatigue, which is not so far off from how I feel on a regular day, so I've been coping alright. Napping is a regular activity now, but there are definitely worse things. This week I've also been experiencing some pretty bad headaches, but I think those have more to do with sinus pain and allergy issues than baby-building.

I am also not finding myself having more food cravings than I normally do. And I'm not craving anything weird. I definitely miss sushi A LOT - more than I would have thought. I've tried some vegetarian sushi and while it's okay, it's not the same as some fantastic spicy tuna sashimi.

I do however have one food aversion, which is weird. I can't even stand the thought of a mixed green salad. It makes me want to barf. Caesar salad is okay, though. So weird.

I was almost inspired to take a photo of the belly this morning. I find it has really popped this week, which I kind of like since before I just looked like I was carrying a spare tire. But I'm still not happy about all the extra flab I see (which a lot of people are saying indicates I've a got a girl in there) so didn't go through with it. Maybe next week.

14 weeks and 4 days

2010-08-20T09:48:00.003-04:00

One of the major issues I'm having with being pregnant is getting fat again. Rationally, I know that this is what happens when you are growing a human in you, but psychologically I'm finding it very, very difficult.

Two years ago I started the process of shedding excess weight that I was unhappy with. I was very successful, and very happy with the results, ultimately losing over 30 pounds. I was more active, had more energy, and actually enjoyed shopping again.

Now I find myself only 15 pounds away from where I started.

Yes, it's true that after the wedding I put on about 5-7 lbs from my lowest point, but I think this is normal, and it brought me to a point where I didn't have to constantly worry about what I was eating to maintain the weight I was at.

At the beginning of the pregnancy I stopped eating/drinking things with aspertame and started drinking more milk and juice - this small thing added on another 5-7 pounds within a month or so, but I felt I didn't want to chance the chemical effects on the baby (even though they say they are relatively safe).

I also had to quit running, not because running is bad for you to do in a normal pregnancy, but because we had a horrible heat wave and I barely wanted to chance walking the dog let alone running 5Km since they say overheating is very dangerous for a pregnant lady. By the time heat let up, I felt like my body wasn't ready to start back up again without it being dangerous.

Then, I started to get HUNGRY. All the time. And I was so worried that I would suddenly be stricken by morning sickness and not be able to keep anything down, that I figured "better get while the getting is good" so I ate. Whatever I felt like it, whenever it struck me.

But morning sickness never came and by 12 weeks I was already within 15 lbs of my starting fat weight.

But, by week 10 I also realized that I probably wouldn't be getting morning sickness after all and reined in my "feeding" habits and I'm holding steady at the same weight in the meantime.

Hopefully it will all balance in the end, but for now I feel fat, gross, and fat. And no matter how many times I tell myself that it's not fat, it's baby, and no matter how many times SB tells me "But that's where the baby goes!" when I look disgustedly at my gut, I think I won't feel comfortable until the "real" baby bump appears.

2010-08-11T18:55:00.003-04:00

I have been wondering for a while how I would approach this. And now the time is here and I am no closer to having a clue how I should say it. So I guess I should just come out with it already.

I'm knocked up.

The baby is due on Valentine's Day. I am 13 weeks along right now, and haven't had a stitch of morning sickness however have taken to going to bed at approximately 7pm since I'm exhausted.

Also, before you ask:
1) yes we planned it
2) yes we're pretty excited
3) yes we're very terrified
4) yes we will find out if it's a boy/girl
5) No, we won't name the baby after you
6) No, I won't suddenly start feeling comfortable around other people's babies
7) yes, I'm considering a nanny until that baby can hold its head up alone
8) yes, I'm already fat
9) no, you can't touch my belly.
10) NO REALLY - GET YOUR HANDS OFF MY BELLY

I'm not sure what else to say at this point.

Going by too quickly

2010-07-01T11:16:00.002-04:00

Monday was a sad day here. Not only had Tess grown out of her baby puppy collar and had to move up to another one, she had also outgrown the loaner crate and we had to buy the big one already. And her puppy fur is starting to come out.

She is still exceeding all expectations I ever could have had. She is so quiet, and sweet, but twice a day has her playful times when she is fun and energetic. Simon still wants little-to-nothing to do with her, but Osha likes to check her out once in a while, which is adorable.

Milestone-wise, she now does "sit" on command (still working on "come" - she understands it, but I think she just doesn't feel like doing it sometimes). She comes to the vet clinic with me, and while the first few days she was a bit quiet and anxious, she is slowly coming out of her shell. Today we had our first trip to the dog park, and she loved it. She doesn't quite get the concept of play yet, and isn't sure if the other dogs are trying to kill her or not. But that will come. She only has enough energy to hang out there for 15-20 minutes at a time, though.

I'm sure next week she will bypass some other monumental stage and my heart will break a little more. But I do love her so much, and I love seeing SB getting to experience a puppy for the first time. He loved Charlie and Gabby very much, but there is nothing quite like raising a puppy - so far I think he's totally loving it.

The puppy has landed.

2010-06-14T17:55:00.002-04:00

So, she's here, and all I can say is she is amazing. That is basically the only line that even comes close to describing her.

We decided to name her Tess. We had a friend whose dog's name was Tess, and we always loved it. Then she moved away and took Tess with her, so we felt it was up for grabs. My first choice name was not Tess, but in thinking about her personality during the first 24 hours, and also the physical presence she will have when full grown, Tess seemed to fit better.

So far, she has learned her name, "NO", and "come" (albeit she will only usually come to us when we are kneeling down. We're working on it.) She has also mastered going up the first and third flights of stairs. Because our stairs have open risers, I think it freaks her out that on the second flight she is looking out into the street when climbing.
Potty wise, today is the first day she hasn't had an accident, but I have been pretty diligent with taking her out at key times. She is pretty lazy, so doesn't get excited to go out like most dogs do when you pick up the leash. This makes me think it may take her a while to actually ASK to go out.

Simon is becoming more and more tolerant. He hasn't hissed at her today, which is a start, and he always positions himself in such a way that he can observe her. Each day he observes from closer and closer. I hope they will be playing soon.

That's the update - she is the smartest, sweetest puppy we probably could have chosen. I feel so in love with her it's crazy, and the only way to describe her is amazing.

Puppy preparations Fail

2010-06-05T16:00:00.003-04:00

The puppy is coming home on Thursday. Aside from getting a crate for her (we have borrowed a small one for now, then will buy a bigger one when she needs it) and deciding on our feeding plan (the breeder feeds them RAW, which we weren't altogether convinced would work for us), we haven't really prepared ourselves. It's slightly terrifying, but mostly exciting.

Today I am busying myself making a training treat pouch, because I have about 800 yards of damask fabric from our wedding decorations and figured the pouch will come in handy. Hopefully it works out. We haven't bought any new toys. We still have tons of toys, and I figure not all dogs like the same stuff and I don't feel like wasting money on things she won't play with, right?

We have decided not to continue feeding her RAW food, but we will be very paying very close attention to her diet, feeding her very specific calories/fat/protein/calcium foods, and watching her growth. The issue with giant breed dogs is that they tend to have joint and skeletal issues, sometimes caused by genetics (both her parents rate very well!) and sometimes caused by a too rapid growth rate as a puppy. If they put on too much bulk before their bones have fully developed, it causes major stress on the bones and joints, leading to big problems. We don't want any big problems, so we'll keep a close eye.

I have been trying to mentally prepare Simon - I think he's going to love having a puppy around, once he gets used to the fact that he has to share space with another fuzzy creature. He is constantly trying to playfight with Osha, who is far too old for those kinds of shinanigans, and I think it causes a certain level of frustration for Simon. A playful puppy may be just what the doctor ordered!

Some sad, and then some happy

2010-05-18T20:26:00.003-04:00

The week that Charlie died, we had been making plans to visit a dog breeder to get a puppy. It has been just over a year since Gabby passed away, and I really felt like Charlie was not my dog. It's not that I didn't love him; I did, no matter how much I maligned his presence in our home and talked about when he was going to finally croak. It's the fact that he was SB's dog. Much like Gabby was more mine, Charlie loved SB fiercely. But me, not so much. I was okay playing second fiddle when I had my Gabby girl around, but when she was gone it wasn't the same - and my heart ached to have that back.

Then Charlie died, and I thought SB might not be able to handle a new puppy. It made me sad. It was like a double loss for me. But we talked it over, and since we had been so ready to move ahead anyway, we decided that now is the time.

So on Saturday we met with a breeder, and also got to meet four fuzzy little nuggets of amazing goodness, one of which is going to be ours. We met the mom and dad dog (I think they call them the "bitch" and the "ho" or something like that) and they are both beautiful and healthy well into their fourth years, which is great.

Here is a little photo of one of the pups. I'm sorry I don't have any really good ones, but I was so entranced by the puppy breath that I forgot to take any photos at all - this is one the breeder sent to me.

We haven't picked a name for our puppy yet, but she will be a girl. And she will be coming home around June 10th, I think. I will keep you updated, and am warning you right now to brace yourselves for WAY more puppy pictures and stories than you ever thought imaginable.

I am a jinx

2010-05-13T15:31:00.005-04:00

So, I guess I spoke too soon about the whole health situation.

Unfortunately last Friday we had to make the decision to let our dear Woodgie go. It was tough, and of course happened on Friday night, when I returned from the CLOSED vet clinic. SB had found the Woodge in extreme respiratory distress for the second time in a week, and the meds were not kicking in. He was working so hard to get air into his lungs, which were crowded and swollen with fluid. We waited over an hour and nothing happened with the meds, which usually kick in within 20 minutes.

I called our wonderfully fabulous vet on her cell phone, and she talked me through all the stuff I was struggling with. In turn I discussed everything objectively with SB and we decided it was time. Our vet met us at the clinic, which was dark and quiet, and the whole thing was very peaceful and serene. I can't express how thankful I am to have our vet, and I also feel very settled about the whole situation. When he finally passed it was obvious to us that it was time. I will spare you all the details that showed me we had made the right choice, but even just seeing him so still, finally done struggling and fighting to keep his heart pumping at all, I just knew it was right.

Our house feels very empty without a dog in it. The cats are great, but they aren't dogs (okay, so Simon is almost a dog, but not quite). And surprisingly Simon has been acting very, very strangely, almost as though he misses the dog that tried to eat him on at least 10 separate occasions that we know of.

I share with you what I think is my very favorite photo of The Woodge. I didn't go through all the photos we have of him, and I'm sure it's not even the best one. But when I think of him fondly, this is what I see.

Week #2-ish

2010-05-03T18:27:00.003-04:00

We got back from NB last week, and have been go-go-go ever since. This week I'm doing walks for three days, then in the clinic to days, but by the end of this week I should be officially detached from the old business and moving on. It feels slightly surreal, especially since I continually find myself looking for my blackberry.

In the past two weeks we have had two separate first meetings with two different babies, and I am proud to say that my title as Baby Whisperer stands. Those babies dig me. At one point our friend said "see, you like babies!" and I said "I like quiet, and if I can make them quiet, then I win." I think I may have a bumper sticker made.

For those of you keeping track of pet health in our house, The Woodge is not dead yet, and his condition seems pretty stable. He will eat/not eat randomly, and seem distressed/totally fine as well.

Week #1

2010-04-22T14:07:00.002-04:00

So, it's nearly the end of the first week post-business. I will be in a car for the better part of this weekend for another fantastic whirlwind trip to NB. Goodness I hate car trips more than I thought possible. Anyhoo, thought I should give you an update on how life is going so far.

It's great. I've been doing some work at home, and doing a few more hours at my vet clinic job. I really am loving that so far, and I feel really lucky that the timing worked out for that. Last night the most adorable puppy came in and we got to play with him. I had to resist the urge to grab him and hightail it outta there.

The new business owner seems to be settling in nicely. I have barely heard from her, which I take to mean she is getting along just fine. At least I hope so. I hope she isn't just scared to ask me questions.

We're going to NB for Eric's niece's christening. I have no idea what this entails exactly, but I do know that I will have to enter a church, so if you don't hear from me, it's possible I spontaneously burst into flames when I walked through the door. It will be our first time meeting her, so that's pretty exciting, and extra exciting that she is 7 months old now, so I'm pretty sure she can hold up her head and stuff. Yay.

The Big Thing

2010-04-16T15:53:00.003-04:00

Alright, so everything is official now, which means I can safely spill the beans without putting any bad karma out into the universe and jinxing everything.

We have officially sold our business. It took us a while to decide, then took a while longer to get organized, and actually took barely any time at all to find our perfect buyer. She's great, and is much more business-minded than I am, so I think she will be much better suited to growing the business than I was.

I am actually having a lot of mixed feelings. I feel happy - we are gaining so much freedom to travel, or hang out, or whatever without worrying and planning and organizing.

I also feel sad. I would have 100 pets if I could, and owning this business kind of allowed me to do that. I took a lot of joy from the dogs and cats I saw every day. They helped me through some pretty tough moments, brought my blood pressure down when I was stressed. So that will be hard, leaving them. I know they don't care who walks them, or visits them, as long as someone shows up but I always like to think they love me as much as I love them. I will helping out during a transitional period, but will be outta there by the end of May. And who knows how much helping she will actually need me for.

And then begins a very big year for me. I'll be working part time at a vet's clinic and getting started on what will hopefully be my permanent vocation, writing. Finally. It's exciting and terrifying all at once. I have some goals, and have taken a workshop to get me back into it. I may take another one in the fall, we'll see. I am feeling inspired, and also a bit overwhelmed. There are so many possibilities to succeed, but also so many to fail. I guess all I can do is get to work and see where it takes me.

Babies

2010-04-14T11:34:00.002-04:00

And of course the day after I posted about Big A we received a card from our friends in Winnipeg with their baby Chloe on it. And holy eff if she isn't the cutest thing too. So I guess there really CAN be more than one baby that I find quite darling. And in real life she has actually liked me reasonably well also. Maybe I am not just a cat whisperer, but a baby whisperer also! I think I may make a fantastic Auntie after all.

I can't think of anything else to say right now because my mind is a little too full, but I'll be back on the weekend with some big announcements!

The End is Nigh

2010-04-13T11:12:00.002-04:00

So, not to jinx the BIG THING, but it should be happening this Friday. I am all at once terrified, elated, anxious, ecstatic, nervous and certain. As soon as the paperwork is done I will post an official announcement, but for now, I'm just trying to keep on truckin', as they say, and my hands have been totally mangled by my nervous gnawing.

Last weekend we visited our friends and their baby, Big A. I have to say, if ever I decided to abduct a baby I think it would be him. He really is the sweetest little one I've ever met. And we all know what a big fan of babies that I am. When we visit, he appears to be completely obsessed with both of us (SB's glasses, my hair, I think) and will just stare at us. Plus I can always make him laugh, and you know what a ham I am.

So, still nothing official for you, but a quick update, and I will be back, hopefully with good news, on the weekend!

sort of an update

2010-03-18T11:11:00.004-04:00

Wow, okay, so it's been a while. Quick roundup.

It's been a pretty rough month for me. Due to many many external factors combined with the perfect storm of chemical imbalances in my head, I had a minor mental breakdown about three weeks ago. As much as I kid about my craziness, this wasn't funny, and it wasn't pleasant for anyone here at our house, and it was exacerbated by the fact that our shitty healthcare system in Quebec makes it next to impossible to seek urgent care for psychological issues.

Long story short, I'm feeling quite a bit better. I'm still not sleeping properly, but the days are better, so there's that.

We still don't have a puppy, and the next Big Thing has still not happened yet.

So I guess it's not much of an update, but we're doing okay and just thought everyone should know that.

The Thoughts. How do you control them? *****

2010-02-17T01:33:00.006-05:00

I can't sleep. I can't pinpoint a specific problem, there just seems to be a whole mess of stuff clunking around in there lately. I spend the whole day with the thoughts, and work myself into a lather, then I spend the whole evening trying to keep myself from blurting them out willynilly to SB and driving him batshit crazy too. Because do we really need that? So for the last few weeks my sleep patterns have been sporadic at best.

Sleepytime is the worst. The thoughts are racing. And I know, I know "make a list before you go to sleep, so you can forget about them and move on". But the problem isn't that I think I will forget about these issues. It's that they won't go away!

It doesn't seem to be bothering anyone else in the house - all my boys, furry and not-so furry are snoring away happily. However I'm sure I'm much moodier than normal during daytime hours. My usual insomnia routine has me hopping out of bed after a good 90 minute try, watching some TV or reading then heading back in 30 minutes or so. For the past two weeks I've been just lying there until I fall asleep, which hasn't been such a hot idea, so tonight I gave in and got up to read some blogs and write a post here for myself.

It's really a crying shame because sleeping is one of the very few things in life that I know I generally excel at and which I also shamelessly enjoy.

****title of the post is one of my very favorite Karl Pilkington lines from the Ricky Gervais Podcasts.

Oh, ya....

2010-02-12T18:18:00.002-05:00

I know, I know, two posts in one day - I'm such an attention whore. But I was running and thought of something that I had been meaning to blog about.

I cannot for the life of me figure out who the hell is in charge of choosing theme music for sporting events. It was something that I realized really bothered me last week while watching the Super Bowl, and then we went to a hockey game on Wednesday and it came up again. SB doesn't seem to understand my outrage, but let me set the scene for you.

Super Bowl. A commercial comes on for the NFL draft - they ran several throughout the night. I don't know any of the players, but they were apparently showing pretty key guys during their moment of their NFL draft year. Putting on the jersey for the first time, shaking hands with the owners, blah blah blah. And what song are they playing?

Wake Up, by the Arcade Fire.

Think about it for a second.

Does it seem strange to you that they are celebrating and promoting a very pivotal moment in an athlete's career, the moment where all the hard work and dedication and all that jazz culminates in earning them that shot at the dream, that they are celebrating all this with a song about being emotionally beaten down as a child and growing up mal-adjusted. Huh.

Next scene:

Habs game.

The visiting team skates out to boos and the like. Then to bring the Habs players out two young kids (maybe 10-13 yrs old, I can't be sure because, kids, who needs 'em?) take the ice (which has been darkened and there are swirling spotlights) and what song are they playing to get everyone pumped up?

Fix You, by Coldplay.

Yes, let's get this party started with a song about dealing with a loved one trapped in the clutches of a dangerous depression.

Does it really take so much effort to LISTEN to the lyrics, to see what the song actually says? Stop being so lazy sports marketing people!!!!

Because, seriously, at the hockey game I got goosebumps, but not for the right reasons.

Still waiting

2010-02-12T17:13:00.003-05:00

Still nothing happening on the next Big Thing. I know it's very tedious that I keep mentioning it and then not going into details, but I just really dislike fielding questions about stuff when I can't control when they happen. So, you'll get to know when it happens, and until then, I get to whine about how it's not happening fast enough.

In other news, I was ecstatic to find out that Wolf Parade is doing a mini-tour in April, so we scooped up some tickets to the show in Quebec City on April 1st (we better not show up to a fake concert - I am not a big fan of April Fool's day). I'm not super stoked that we have to go to Quebec City to see them (they are from Montreal, so the only thing I can imagine is that all the good venues were already booked on the dates they needed....otherwise it's just annoying). But we're going to take the opportunity to spend the night, then check out Old Quebec the following day, which I think we've only done together once, and only for like half an afternoon.

I think it will be a fun little mini-trip, and I could never express how excited I am to see them live again. I feel like one new album every two years is just NOT enough!!! I'm hoping that since the new CD is not out yet that this means this tour is a test run of new stuff, and that they will do a big tour in the late summer/fall. Fingers crossed! Two shows in a year would be amazing!

Waiting for the next big thing

2010-02-03T17:48:00.003-05:00

Back from vacation means we're back down to business. There are big things happening here, big things. Big things I can't talk about yet. Or won't allow myself to talk about, at least until it's confirmed. It may or may not be what you think it is. If you know me at all, you know it's not that thing, but the other thing.

So, just waiting. Feels like a lot of time wasting, and lately I have been pretty preoccupied with time, and how quickly it passes. And the things I take for granted, and the things I don't take advantage of. And the things that fill up my time that have no value to me - things I can't control, obligations I wish I could shake off.

We both want to make the most of our time, doing things we love. For a long time our life has been about what we HAVE to do, but we are realizing that living life that way, it's not a life. So, we have some goals, and we have some deadlines, and we're on our way.

More to come soon, hopefully.

Back to reality.

2010-02-01T14:53:00.004-05:00

So, we're back from vacation. Been back for about a week now. It's sad. So, so, so sad.

I wasn't able to let go of thinking about work while we were there. I cheated a few times and checked the emails just to be sure things seemed to be going smoothly. I can't wait until I don't have to do that anymore. Because aside from that, I was able to completely disconnect from everything else in life (even FARMVILLE!!!!) and just spend time with SB.

The resort was fantastic, we couldn't have asked or hoped for more. We were ridiculously spoiled, and had nice surprises from the staff. SB got to do some active watersports stuff - I tried to get into the Hobie Cat thing for his sake, but was way too nervous. He didn't mind taking it out alone, and also did some waterskiing too. We went snorkeling together, which was amazing. So many cute fish to see!

Now, back to reality, it doesn't seem fair that just over a week ago I was eating dinner with my feet in the sand and the ocean just a few yards away in the moonlight. It's like it never even happened, like it was just a dream. At least we have photographic proof!

vacation countdown and organizational madness

2010-01-13T09:43:00.002-05:00

5 days until vacation. Which means I am now obsessively checking weather reports (it's not looking great, folks) while alternating with obsessively making lists. And it seems like these lists never get shorter.

The most stressful thing, as it is on any given day of my life, is the work situation. Trying to be sure everything is in place and ready for the girls so they have a stress-free week (or as stress-free as possible), which involves heavily coaching our clients to get their acts together and make things as uncomplicated as possible.

But this time, we have the added fun factor that The Woodge is basically half croaked, so SB's brother may come home to a dead dog at any moment. What's happening is that he is in congestive heart failure. This is surprising to me because I didn't think he had a heart, then come to find out it's about three times regulation size. He's taking three different drugs which seemed to have regulated his breathing a bit, and he's back to eating his normal meal, so that's good, but the vet gives him 4-8 months. Now, I'm not sure if we're doing the right thing by medicating him, or if it would be better to put him down, but we both have a whole lot on our plates at the moment, and medicine is easy to administer (albeit not CHEAP, by any means) so that's what we've decided to do for now. Hopefully he will be okay while we're gone, because I would feel horrible if Ren had to go through that. Even though we're expecting it to happen, I know he would feel pretty poopy about it.

And as if all that weren't enough to worry about, today I have to go for a wax. Ugh. Vacation is killing me.

an unresolved resolution?

2010-01-04T15:00:00.004-05:00

I have been avoiding the requisite "It's a new year, and this year will be different" post. I rarely make resolutions, and this year is no exception. I just can't. It seems so artificial.

That being said, one of our clients has given me an idea that I quite like. She makes lists, on Post-It notes, and sticks them to her fridge. Lists of things she wants to have. Things she wants to do. Places she wants to see. And because they are on her fridge, she sees them every day (I'm assuming. Unless she doesn't eat or drink.) And as she gets things, or sees things, or does things she crosses them off her lists. Some items are completely materialistic and frivolous, and some are really meaningful experiences - a whole mishmash.

It seems so simple. I have tons of lists of stuff that I want to have or do that are knocking around in my mushy brain. But I love the idea of having that visual every day, and I also love the idea of crossing stuff off, and seeing all the things I've achieved, and also all the items I have been lucky enough to receive. I think it would not only help me feel a sense of worth, but also increase the gratitude I feel to others for sharing their worth with me.

So I want to get on that. But it's not a resolution, really.

Back. Now with less anger.

2009-12-28T20:50:00.003-05:00

The holiday is officially over. Yes, New Year's is this week, but that is the holiday that SB and I actually get to celebrate since all the girls are back in town and there are less cats to be visited anyway. So, now we get a few days of repose after a few days of craziness and several weeks of anxiety-laden planning.

As usual, SB and I thoroughly spoiled each other. For him: a new Ultra-Zoom compact digital camera that also shoots HD video. This is because every single time he uses our Canon Elph (nothing against Canon, the new camera is a Canon too) he curses and swears and curses some more so I did some research and I think the replacement is fabulous. A very nice compliment to our DSLR, which is not the handiest thing to bring to concerts and such.

For me: a Kitchenaid stand mixer. I have wanted one of these for many many many years, and when SB witnessed the near meltdown of our wee handmixer at Thanksgiving (literally, I'm pretty sure I smelled some smoke coming off of it) when I made cheesecake, he was inspired to procure me one of these bad boys. I am excited to use it, but at the moment the pantry is a bit bare so I'll pick up some ingredients tomorrow to make some treats.

We also got many many many games for the Wii, which is fun! Except that SB has been playing Call of Duty all day, and while I *think* he's having fun, he seems to swear at the TV a lot more than I do when I'm having fun.

And finally, we used some of our gift cards from the wedding, along with Xmas money from my mom and grandfather to hitch ourselves to the HD bandwagon. We are now the proud owners of a gigantical HD TV which fits absolutely perfectly in the nook of our TV stand/bookshelf unit, so I know it was meant to be. So far the TV itself is pretty great, but what is really blowing my mind is the HD PVR that we sprung for to go along with it.

It's really an embarrassment of riches - we are so very, very lucky. And aside from all the material things we indulge in at this time of year, while we don't get to celebrate the holiday with our family and friends, they all love us very much, and we love them.

venting. apology in advance.

2009-12-15T16:55:00.002-05:00

I am a people pleaser. I feel bad when I can't make someone happy. I love to give gifts.

This is one of the many reasons why my particular line of work is sooooo bad for me. Almost daily I receive comments via phone message, email, and text about how amazing I am, my employees are. How thankful people are to have us there for them, to relieve their stress of having to be away from their pets, either because they are working in the case of the dogs we walk, or have to be out of town in the case of the cats. I love these emails - they make me feel good. (and they also make me feel like leaving this business would cause serious strife for a lot of people, but that is a whole other matter entirely).

However, a few times a year I get the "I am absolutely infuriated" email. Some people are legitimately infuriated - we did something wrong. I feel bad, whoever did it feels bad (could be me, or one of the girls, we all make errors sometimes), we do what we can to make it right. Some people are just complaining because they like to complain, or because they're cheap and they know we'll offer them some kind of compensation. Whatever, I usually play along, make it better, and they get happy again and love us again, and it's all okay.

But then about once a year, oddly enough usually close to the holiday season (hmmm, correlation here), they are not only "absolutely infuriated" but they are impossible to please. I feel like if no one has maliciously lashed out at them, human error is human error - we made a mistake, we for sure didn't do it on purpose, we're sorry, and we want to make up for it. But these people take it as some sort of personal offense that we made a mistake. And it's never over anything big. We have never killed a cat by accident. No one's home has ever been broken into because we did something dumb.

My personal favorite thing is when they fall just short of calling me a liar. That is my very favorite thing ever. Yes, I have nothing better to do with my life than to make up stories to try to cover up something that is NO BIG DEAL. AT ALL. (yes, I am yelling these things to myself.)

I don't want to give too many details about specifics, because, well, it's the internet after all. All I will say is that one of my girls made an error, and I take it as a personal offense when someone can't accept her apology, AND my apology, and a gesture to work it out, and be happy with it. Because, just let it be known that when we do something wrong, we own up to it, we apologize, we try to make it right. But we are human, and things do go wrong sometimes. And not realizing that makes you a moron, and I predict a very lonely and very unhappy life ahead of you.

And also, thank you so much for ruining my day, a day in which I was told three times how fantastic I am and how lucky my clients are to have me and my team. Huh.

**the previous post was brought to you by the fact that I need to vent, and that while I would totally love to argue with this now ex-client (because I will never accept her business again) until she realizes she is an idiot, it is not worth my energy. But I am still stewing over it, so had to get it out. sorry.

Osha goes to the vet

2009-12-01T21:09:00.005-05:00

Hahahahaha - bet you thought you wouldn't see me for a while, didn't you?!

I thought I owed an update to anyone who is still paying attention as to B'Goshie's* health.

Brought him to the vet tonight - he was NOT pleased to go in the car. He was yowling and yowling and yowling in his little carrier. But when I put on some Killers and starting singing along, he quit it (he actually loves a little Dustland Fairytale).

They put us in the exam room to wait for the vet and Osha was allowed to roam freely. He got on his Goshy Big Eyes and was really into checking everything out. I was a little worried because he was barely sniffling at all, so I thought the vet wouldn't get a real sense of his symptoms.

SB arrived for some moral support, then the vet came in shortly after. She commented on how soft Osha is (duh!), how young he seems compared to how old we were told he is (16-19, we aren't really exactly sure), how great his teeth look for any kitty age (we epically fail at taking care of dog teeth, but kitties seem to be no problem for us), how hard it was to hear his heart because of all the purring. We chatted about his symptoms while she felt him over, all the while he's purring and staring at her adoringly. Then she pulled out the thermometer.

Simon is NOT a fan of the thermometer - the last time he was at the vet (which was an obscenely long time ago, and we'll bring him for a checkup in the New Year, I think, since he's ten now and we should start paying attention so we can keep him around FOREVER) I thought he was going to rip the vet's arm off when she poked him with that thing. So, when the vet pulled the thermometer out tonight, I was preparing myself to grab Osha, who bites me when I brush him.

This is not what happened. Not at all. He started purring EVEN LOUDER. It was ridiculous. He is a ridiculous cat. I will not be surprised if someone tries to steal him from us at some point because he is just toooooo much.

Anyway, so she does all of this, and we tell her his symptoms, and we decide to try an antibiotic. She isn't sure it's an infection, but from what we describe it sounds like it could be. We're wrapping up the visit, and she puts Osha on the floor so she can see the raccoon walk he does because he has some arthritis. I could hear the rattle in his nose/throat as soon as his feet hit the floor. He had for sure been holding it all in trying to impress the vet. Within about two seconds he sneezed out two giant loogies (seriously, they were the size of quarters, and his nostrils are NOT that big). He sneezed a bit more on his face which he promptly licked up (gross) and the vet determined that, yes, indeed, this must be an infection and the antibiotics should be fine.

Now comes the fun part: pilling him twice a day for two weeks. Ugh.

* Osha, as he is commonly known, has about 100 nicknames. Among them: Oshie. Big Osha. B'Goshie (pronounce b'GO-shee), Oshalicious, Go-sha, B'Goshus, Oshus, Cookie Monster, The Wee One.

Finale

2009-11-30T23:56:00.002-05:00

So, that's it then. NaBloPoMo is done. Have we learned anything people? Anyone? Anyone?

I have not been completely forthcoming this month - I have a lot of stuff going on right now, but not the time nor the energy to get into it. Some big things, some little things. Not the least of which is the health of our wee one, Osha, who periodically becomes congested and gets kitty boogers but who tonight was feeling so rotten that he wouldn't even partake in Cookie Time, which has me quite quite concerned. Luckily he has a vet appointment tomorrow evening, so I'm just hoping he can not die until then. Ok, thanks, bye.

Obviously there is more on my mind then that, but sometimes we hold onto the little things to make the big things seem not quite so bad.

NaBloPoMo has been a nice diversion - trying to think of some kind of tidbit to share each day, and putting at least a little thought and effort into trying to make it even a little funny or witty. Some days are easier than others, but thus is life, I guess.

This week I am covering for one of our vacationing employees - I thought it would be a fun week, but after the first day I'm already exhausted. I remember when we first took over this business I had a conversation with the owner of another, similar company to ours. At one point she said to me "do you ever feel if you ever saw another dog you might just kick it?". I remember being a little shocked, and thinking that I couldn't imagine ever feeling that way. And even though I don't feel like kicking anything, I now think I know what she meant by it.

Sunday mish-mash - only one day to go!

2009-11-29T20:41:00.002-05:00

Big big week coming up.

1. The last day of NaBloPoMo is TOMORROW!!! Gaaack - I know you'll miss me!

2. doing a lot of walking this week since one of our girls is on vacation. I had been kinda looking forward to it, and then Friday was my first day of it and it did NOT go well. It wasn't a disaster or anything, but it was just really exhausting and I'm over it.

3. taking Osha to the vet on Tuesday - he periodically gets congested and sneezy, and we usually give him some baby Benedryl and it clears up in a couple of days, but this time there appears to be no end in sight. Not to gross you out, but tonight he sneezed out a booger/snot mass bigger than I've ever seen come out of a human. So, we'll head to the vet and see what she can do for us.

4. Countdown to vacation is at 50 days!

5. Tonight is Amazing Race and Dexter. When did Sunday become my favorite TV night? I'm not sure, but it is! Dexter was so friggin' good last week I can't wait to see what happens tonight.

I'm glad NaBloPoMo is done tomorrow - not because I haven't enjoyed writing. It's actually been much easier and more enjoyable than the last time I did it. But this week is going to busy and exhausting and I know odds are I would have forgotten to post at some point. That would suck, so I'm glad tomorrow is my last official posting day. But I think I will be around a lot more than I used to be.

Death by exercise

2009-11-28T21:52:00.002-05:00

SB tried to kill me today. It was a kindhearted kind of murder plot, though, in which all he really wanted to do was spend time with me doing something that is good for us. We went for a run.

This is itself would not be unusual. I have been known to run a few times a week pretty regularly. Sure for the last month or so I have been concentrating less on running and more on not throwing myself off the Champlain bridge, but before that I was getting out there pretty regularly.

SB wanted to go for a run, and I didn't really want to, but I did want to spend time with him, so thought it would be a good thing that we should do. Then he said "let's go run on the mountain". Which made me even less excited because when I run, I'm pretty particular about The Conditions, and The Conditions do not include severe inclines. Nope. The Conditions also don't include 5 degree temperature, but this is something I've been wanting to conquer, so that was less of an issue.

So, he corrals me into the car and we drive to the mountain. Stretching is required as part of The Conditions and I'm really glad that I stuck to my guns on that one. So, we got going.

The incline was not fun. Not as bad as I had imagined, but not fun.

The Conditions also mandate that I run between 20-30 minutes, depending on my pace. Running slower, I'll stretch it out to 30. Running at "race pace" (who am I kidding, I have never been in a race, but I know what pace I would like to run if I were in one) then I stick to less time, especially since I haven't been running at all lately. We were running well below race pace, so at around the 15 minute mark I started asking when SB expected we would turn this boat around and hightail it back to the bottom.

SB seemed to be in denial of The Conditions. He said "we'll just go to the top". Then when we got to the top, he wanted to keep going, probably to frolic around the lake that's up there. I had to put my foot down. I said "No, I'm turning around." "Oh, are you tired?" "I was ready to turn around ten minutes ago when I clearly said 'let's turn around.'"

So, we turned around.

We ran 6km in 45 minutes - not a great pace, but good for a long slow run. My hips are killing me. My lungs did not fail me at all, which I'm pretty pleased about. And even better, SB did not succeed in killing me off.

This time.

Meh

2009-11-27T20:01:00.002-05:00

Phoning it in slightly today because I'm exhausted and can barely keep my eyes open. I spent the day in the rain with puppies, and it was pretty miserable for everyone. Especially when I got a parking ticket while dropping some of the dogs off. Grrrr.

SB helped brighten my day by bringing home beer and Frites Alors, so we're tucking in to watch Benjamin Button. I'm not excited that next week one of our employees is on vacation, so I will be walking all day every day. I will be spending my weekend mentally preparing for that, so tonight I need to just rest up.

The Woodge avoids The Badness

2009-11-26T22:06:00.003-05:00

When I got up this morning it was evident that Woodgie's camel hump probably wouldn't make it the weekend without exploding. I called our vet's office, and they couldn't take us today, then I called their associated vet's office - the conversation:

"I would like an appointment today for my dog"

"sorry we don't have any openings today, is it an emergency?"

"He has a sebaceous cyst that I'm pretty sure is fixing to explode.."

"oh dear, hold on one second"

So they fit us in, and when the vet initially felt the lump, he was sure it wasn't a cyst, but a mass, because a cyst is liquidy, not hard. But he poked it with a needle to check what was in there exactly and all I have to say is ew. Ew ew ew ew ew. Ew a million times. It was a cyst, but just really really really full.

Woodgie was a VERY good boy, barely noticed the guy poking FIVE needles into him to drain out all the fluid. We had the vet check out a bunch of other stuff, obviously, since we were there and Woodgie isn't exactly what you would call a late model. He has a heart murmur, and also a cyst in his eye that partially covers his pupil - this was, in fact, so interesting that the vet had to pull out a textbook to compare it to, and had another vet come in and take a look just for kicks.

Since Woodgie is about 800 years old, there isn't much we can do about all these problems. Or, rather, there aren't many things we are willing to do. Surgeries and weird medications and weird therapies, that's not us, especially not at this age. But we'll keep an eye on him for some of the symptoms the vet has mentioned to us. He's calling it a palliative approach. Knowing Woodgie he'll be fine for another 6 years.

Late night excitement (not what you are thinking)

2009-11-25T22:31:00.003-05:00

Last night, right after I posted my blog post and made a cup of tea, we started hearing a bunch of sirens outside. Whatever. But after about ten minutes and a few more intervals of sirens, we were getting a little annoyed. SB got ready to walk the Woodge and said he would investigate. As they were leaving out the front door I peeked out our back patio and could see over the top of the buildings a glow, and also drifting ash from a fire.

A FIRE!!! In our very own little neighborhood!

It was crazy! As soon as I saw this I threw on my coat and went out too to check out the action. There were a whole bunch of fire trucks, and also police cars "controlling traffic" (major fail there, for some reason they would park their cars to block the road, but people would still drive right up to them thinking they could get around, and for some other reason they wouldn't get out of the cop cars to direct the traffic so it was getting a bit nuts).

The fire was the equivalent of 3-4 blocks away, and in a building that is the newest part of the development, and which isn't finished being built yet (fishy!).

My timeline of thought:

1) that sucks for the people who have bought units in that building! Now they will have to wait for them to start almost all over when they were almost done building!

2) Maybe they didn't sell enough units so the building "accidentally" caught on fire.

3) Holy heck we have a client that lives in the building that backs onto this one - I hope she was home and got her cat out.

So as we walk along to see if we can check out what's going on (couldn't get a good view since obviously you couldn't get too close and the location of the building didn't allow good viewing angles) I am calling our client to see if she was home (she had been!) if she got her cat out (she had him with her!) and if she needed a cat carrier to bring him wherever she had to go for the night (she had one!). Their building wasn't damaged at all though, but they were evacuated as a precaution.

No one was hurt in the fire, but apparently someone heard an explosion and then the fire flared up. SKETCHY!!! I'm glad that everyone was safe, and I can't wait to hear the whole story about what happened. It was a very exciting pre-bedtime!

Stuff

2009-11-24T22:30:00.004-05:00

I almost forgot to post! Because I'm exhausted! And I'm watching Hoarders!

There are two shows on A&E that terrify me. Hoarders and Obsessed. They don't terrify me because they are showing crazy depictions of extreme behaviors. They terrify me because I see some of those tendencies in myself. Since I'm watching Hoarders right now, we'll go with that one.

I am not sure when I started to "save" and "collect" things, but I know I did it throughout my childhood and adolescence. Not to the point of not being able to walk through my room due to 8 foot tall piles of newspapers, but my mother can attest to the fact that she and my grandfather have been dealing with the aftermath of my hoarding for the almost 13 years since I moved away from home. There are boxes upon boxes of toys, books, collectibles, etc etc etc. I have no idea what is even in there. And looking back I'm pretty much 85% sure that about 90% of the stuff in there can be tossed. But I won't allow it to be thrown away until I get time to go through it. And I still think, even knowing that most of it is trash, if anyone threw it all away one day that it would hurt my heart.

Luckily I have SB - he keeps me in check where we live now. And in my old age I have become much, much, much less sentimental, and so I don't tend to keep all the weird things I used to (for about a year I made a "scrapbook" of my favorite hockey teams wherein I cut out the standings, game highlights, and any articles about them and pasted them in a hilroy. I am 99% sure those are in some of those boxes at Papa's house). And the only thing I collect now are first edition books - there could be far worse things than that!

I still have this insatiable need for stuff. Shopping, buying things, getting free things - all kinds of stuff. But I am better at realizing when all the stuff that is around me isn't useful and needs to go. It doesn't stop me from surrounding myself with different stuff, but at least it doesn't build up.

And I know for effin' sure that if SB wasn't around I would DEFINITELY have 20 cats. And a baby Bernese Mountain Dog.

Honeymoon

2009-11-23T22:36:00.002-05:00

I'm exhausted and out of ideas for today. I had a fantastic dinner out with friends, and after a pretty busy work day I'm out of ideas.

I don't think I've talked about our official honeymoon, which is coming up very very soon. Because our wedding was in September, and we really really really wanted a beach relax honeymoon, which isn't really a good idea in September because of hurricanes, we booked our honeymoon for January. Little did I know that the waiting time of FOUR MONTHS in between would be tortuous, but it makes me even more glad that we headed to Vegas for our Mini Moon because holy heck can you imagine if we hadn't?

So, we're going to St. Lucia, and staying at a Sandals. I'm pretty stoked to check out an all-inclusive that has a great menu, beautiful rooms, and 24 hour room service. And I'm also super excited about the fact that I'm pretty sure our Blackberries won't work there, so we won't have a choice but to turn them off. For the first time in....4 years. Oh, yes, it will be fantastic.