Saturday, May 29, 2010

For Ben

Ben's been working with some extracurricular school stuff AND preparing for his triathlon tomorrow morning (um...babe?...it's snowing outside right now...better dress like winter for this one!) so we've been missing him and he's been missing us. This post is for him.

Sam's super helpful...look at her close the dishwasher for me!
I saw this, was happy, and returned to whatever food prep I was doing yesterday and not soon after turned and saw this:
What a silly girl!

I cooked beet soup for the girls (hmm...wait, this was Thursday, not yesterday) and that's a shirtless meal in our house. (for the girls, not me!) See how smart I am? Sam insisted on feeding herself and I gave in.
Friday morning was crazy because that was when the microwave broke and I was having a sleepy morning as it was...started making steel cut oatmeal and then decided to make normal cereal once I realized we didn't want to wait another 30 minutes. Once I sat down of course, I forgot completely and the oatmeal overcooked. Didn't burn really, but not yummy to eat. I was feeling scattered all the rest of the day!
Oh, hey, Ben, remember this morning when I was running around looking for my hair elastic? I was SURE I'd put it on my wrist and then it disappeared. Found it...
...Stuck on Katie's leg from when I put on her tights. That's the mark it left on her leg. (I think it must have come off in her tights while I was reaching into the toe. Why didn't I think to look there?)

Today, while the girls were playing and I was doing...something, I can't remember what...Sam fell down and had quite a cry...I only saw her once she was down and it didn't look like a spectacular fall. Well, it appears she fell hard onto the rug we have by the front door. See the pattern of our rug?Oh, and you know how you said Sam could crawl onto Katie's bed? I saw her do it. She's fast and proud of it. Katie doesn't seem to mind...she thinks sharing a room is the best! ( I type this for 12 year old Katie when she reads this, in case she needs reminding.)
And look what else Sam (I'm sure it was Sam, but in all honesty. I didn't see her do it) did today...That's the third time this week. Really.

And for everyone else...Sweetest Moment of the Week award: It's a tie between
1) Finding Katie and Sam sleeping in Sam's bed last night or
2) Finding one of my favorite chocolate bars on the laptop wen we got home from a little friend's birthday party this afternoon, from Ben, with an "Iloveyou" note on it.

Friday, May 28, 2010

Things I Love Today

- Both girls napped again today! It's a two day in a row miracle!

- Making chili.

- Strollercize

- Making corn muffins to go with the chili.

- Finding a fun new blog/website to read.

- Eating cream cheese and cucumber sandwiches for lunch.

- Sam saying lots of new words...Tree is one (Tee!).

- Katie saying please and thank you many times without prompting.

- Ben coming home a bit early from work during his spare.

- Weekend!

(One little thing I don't like...our microwave is broken AGAIN...have you ever met anyone whose microwave breaks as often as ours does?)

Thursday, May 27, 2010

Napping!

Take a deep breath...Shh...Both girls are napping! Sam shouldn't be down too much longer (oh well) and I just got Katie down.

We went to Chapters/Starbucks with Jo Anne and her girls and capped off the morning with a visit to a playground all together. The girls all had fun running around.

A quick late lunch (sandwiches) and Sam went down for her nap. After Gram and Papa left (they were over to kindly help me install a gate for the basement since we've started using the pressure gate for the girls room) I suggested Silent Reading Time (my favorite of all the reading times!).

This is something I try most often when I'm in the middle of a good book and am desperate to read more. (Cockeyed is the book today, excellent!) Katie was quite agreeable to the Silent Reading Time and flipped through some library books. I did notice her looking tired and after she took a potty break, asked her if she wanted to nap in the big bed. She TOTALLY agreed. I laid down next to her for about 10 minutes and she's sleeping!

YAY!

I'm blissfully enjoying the silence. Have a good day!

Monday, May 24, 2010

Long Weekend!

Our long weekend was cold and sometimes rainy...but also altogether lovely.

These pictures are from when the girls played in the pool at Gram and Grandpa's LAST weekend when it was very hot. Good times!
Some things...

The good sleeping may have been a fluke. (really, I just shouldn't be looking for a pattern yet after 3 nights in a new sleeping arrangement) Last night, Ben and I stayed up REALLY late (midnight) to watch the all important series finale of LOST (we love...!) and then were both pretty wired and had trouble getting to sleep right away. Then both girls were up several times during the night and so we woke up exhausted this morning. Yay coffee (poor Ben, doesn't drink it)!

Katie has taken to calling me "mum-a-jum" kind of like how we call Sam "Sam-a-jam"...it's kind of silly but I kind of like it. Part of it's the way she says it...this casual, like it's my real name, "come watch me mum-a-jum!". I'll probably get tired of it in a few days.

We had a really nice lunch today at Gram and Papa's to celebrate Papa's Birthday (tomorrow) and their wedding anniversary (today). It was just cool enough to want to eat inside but warm enough to visit by the pond afterward.

I made a great banana bread this weekend too. Starts out like a normal banana bread and then you add a 1/2 cup of coconut...really lovely.

There was something else I was thinking of sharing but I've completely forgotten...I'll try and remember for next time. See you soon!

Sunday, May 23, 2010

She sleeps!

Hello!
So far a lovely weekend...cool weather though, it was sleeting/snowing this morning.

We've now had two nights with Sam sleeping on a mattress on the floor...and we were preparing to be up all night putting her back in bed. She has pleasantly surprised us and slept through the night (after about a half hour of chit chat and maybe crawling out of bed once or twice...we stand guard by the door for the first half hour). We're actually up more with Katie. (Bees keep getting in her bed somehow!)(nightmares) Sam looks so small lying on that big mattress. We do keep a gate up by the door so that if Sam was to wake up at night she can't escape. So far so good.

The other day I found Sam chewing on this:
And I swear I wasn't trying to wash her mouth out with soap...she isn't saying bad words just yet! I don't think she actually swallowed much, I found most of the bits on the floor.

When we went to IKEA last week to buy Katie's new bed (the old one has a crack in the frame and we kind of want matching ones for the girls down the road anyway) we had lunch. Yum!Wishing a very happy first birthday to Baby W, Russ and Steph's little guy. He turned one yesterday and they had a lovely party. Such an adorable little family and awesome friends.

Also, Ben and I had a little lunch date (though more like a work meeting..."we need to do this, this needs to get done..." than a romantic date, but it was nice) on Friday and we stopped in at LUSH on Whyte Ave and picked up a sample cream and soap that might be good for Sam's excema prone skin. However, I may have to go back and buy the cream all for myself because I absolutely love it. My hands have seemed really dry for ages now, what with all the dishes and washing hands going potty all day (Katie's and mine, ha ha) and this cream is doing some miraculous things to my hands. Not cheap but may be worth it. It's Dream Cream.

Thursday, May 20, 2010

Skating

It may be warm and spring-y, but that doesn't mean we can't "pretend skate"! (notice Sam's "cheese" at the end...she does that all the time now when there's a camera around)

Untitled from BabyLuch on Vimeo.


It's funny, a lot of times when Katie plays pretend "something" she actually says "Pretend whatever-it-is" so that we know it's not real. Like "pretend eat the cupcake" or pretend throw the blank". We started this because we didn't want her really eating plastic play food in the house and always said "pretend eat the banana" and now she uses it all the time. It's good so that we don't get mad when she's pretending something we actually don't want her doing. Whoa, that was actually kind of hard to explain.

Auntie Gail cam over this morning and we had coffee and scones ( same scones as yesterday, no time to bake today!). Lovely visit and she helped me with a sewing question which was a bonus.

Sam fell on a coffee can in the playroom earlier (remember the drum?) and now has a curved red line going through her lip. She's doing fine now.

Not sure what we're up to for the rest of the day...nothing big planned, we'll see what happens. Hope you enjoy your day!

Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Monster Hands

Katie says "Look at my Monster Hands!"
We've had a great day...My friend Steph and her little boy W. came over for a playdate and stayed for lunch...such a wonderful visit. We're sad to see her returning to work from her mat leave. Now Katie and I are waiting for Sam to wake up (not too soon please!) from her nap so we can go out and run some errands. It's a much nicer 20C ish day today...pleasantly warm with a refreshing breeze.

I'd write more, but yesterday was lots and for some reason ("Which one of you girls did it!?") I can't see my cursor on the screen as I type and it's making editing visually difficult. =)

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

No Reason

Hello!

No reason for the recent blog silence but the loss of blogging mojo. I've been tired (lots of 3rd birthday fun will do that to a mom) and reading more (Before Green Gables...anyone? You MUST read this if you love Anne.)

We've had no illness, all is well, things are sometimes fun sometimes frustrating and usually funny. I'll keep this post relatively brief so that I am motivated to post again in much less than a month. =)

Sam, playing peek a boo at breakfast time (and just yesterday she said "Break Fast" with both syllables! A little mumbled, but two syllables definitely).
A picture of the daisy cake my mom made for Katie's grown up birthday party.
And blowing out candles on the cake GG Mary made for her. She had a great party. Likes to wear her birthday had on the front of her head like a unicorn. No idea where she got that idea but it was definitely done on purpose as she refused suggestions of normal hat wearing.
Katie was spoiled with gifts and I don't really like playing Show N Tell with her presents, but I will show this one, from Auntie Alli. She calls it "Purple Buddy" and bounces around like a maniac. Loves it.
That Sunday was also the day that Ben and I ran our half marathon. It was excellent. A little cool which was good running weather. Our time was about 2 hours and 6 minutes. About 30 minutes faster than our last one together 4 years ago. There were a few big hills that we handled well but the last kilometer was a tease that ran us right past the finish line with no real concept of how far we had to run before turning back toward the finish line. Should have read the map more thoroughly. =) Overall, we were a bit sore but happy, the perfect way to feel after a half.

The day after, on Katie's actual birthday (which was a bit anti-climactic given the two other parties etc) was gave her our gift, a sand and water table. We didn't put water in since it was freezing that evening. (It's a steamy 30 degrees here today, so things have changed a bit...and in between we had a huge spring snowfall with snow that stuck around for almost a week!)
Lately it seems like I've been doing a lot of driving in the afternoon, where the girls will fall asleep and I"ll get a drive through coffee and drive for about an hour. Sherwood Park one time, MillWoods the next...waste of gas and bad for the environment, I know, but for a while it just seems as if Katie needed the afternoon nap and wouldn't get it any other way. And I'm talking maybe once a week I do this. Not every day. Anyway...this was in the Superstore parking lot:Sam hanging out with me in the front seat while we waited for Katie to wake up. This was Katie sleeping:The day after this, we changed Katie's car seat to a booster seat as we had her weighed recently and she's 42-44 pounds (depending on the scale), definitely over the 40 pounds limit for her car seat. We just had to take out the 5 point harness, un-latch the seat from the and now we just use a regular seat belt. Katie was pretty excited, but I think Ben and I were even happier to not have to deal with the 5 point harness...those things, though safe and good I'm sure, are a pain. I've also been spending a bit of time sewing (rather, learning to sew)...with the basement done, the extra room has become a sewing/craft/storing grown up books room. This is the dress that I made for Katie from an old men's shirt. The tutorial's on line at Craftster here. I think she does actually like it, but the toddler in her resists wearing it much. She's definitely a wear what she wants to wear girl. And one last picture of our new "princess tent", a birthday gift from Auntie Andrea. Both girls love it and usually part of every daily basement visit involves chasing each other in and out of the tent. Often with screaming and giggling. And...otherwise...things are good. Katie's 3 yr check up went well...she's healthy as can be. Dr. recommended a new parenting book to try for discipline stuff, 1-2-3-Magic. I'm still reading it, but we may try it when Ben and I are both in the know with the procedures. Let you know how it works. Sometimes lately, Katie's been really great...most times perhaps...it's just dealing with common toddler behaviours that I sometimes struggle with...whining etc. We're dealing with it. Her imagination has been in full gear lately too...lots of pretend play...I guess this isn't new, but I think I've been more aware of it lately. Trying to get myself more involved in it with her, to play with her more. It's fun that she's able to create anything anywhere, but can be brain taxing for me.

Sam...wow, this girl is growing. She actually runs a bit now. Got another tooth (that's 13 now). Is getting some more excema now that the weather's warming up ( I think that's why...just like last summer) and I'm using the same prescription cream to spot treat that we used last year. Definitely helping. She also had a weird reaction on her face (May 3rd, for the record)...swelling around her eyes and a red bumpy mask-like rash on her face and near her eyes. Gave her an oral antihistamine and went to the Dr and he said isn't just a contact dermatitis thing. Something she touched may have caused the reaction...she haven't changed any soap or anything so who knows what it was. It's better now and we're not really worried but keeping an eye out for things. She's talking more...Please, breakfast, and a million other things it seems...I've heard her try to say cucumber even. It doesn't sound like cucumber, but it's 3 syllables in a way that mimics the word. She'll get there. She's also, we've just noticed that she's tall enough in her crib that we should be moving her to a bed on the floor (chest height apparently is the time to move them). We'll be tackling this this weekend...you may hear about that.

Anyway...that's plenty more than I intended to write but it's been fun. Hopefully not to boring or rambling for you. Will try and post again soon.
PS...Oh yes, I've been cooking/baking too lately. Really, you HAVE to make this. And this. And this.