Philistine

Does anyone out there still "print" their photos?  I have no less than 3 full photo albums of printed pics documenting the first six months of Maddie's life.  And then I stopped printing.  Because, really?  The mortgage payment was more important...

Kidding (sort of)...

I was one of those late-adopters of the digital camera.  And I still kind of like the idea of actually, you know, caring about what you are taking a picture of.  Instead of having 5 TRILLION pictures of every single angle of my baby girl in her Bumbo seat for the very first time.

But yeah, digital cameras are convenient. And maybe by taking ONE HUNDRED BILLION TRILLION pictures, I may get one or two that are actually passable...

So we have a Flickr account.  Which I think I may have mentioned a few thousand times.  Actually, we have a "pro" Flickr account.  Not because I take good pictures, but I'm OCD about organizing the photos into folders by month and other random categories - and you can do this unlimitedly with a Pro account, so there you go.

But now that we have this Flickr account, and I have the pics backed up on my desktop and onto CD (again, organized by month - because yes! Organizing and backing up is SOOOOO important - who wants to sleep when they can be up until 1am archiving!!)... but really?  Then printing and putting into a photo album?

Kind of like writing in a baby book once every few months - when you're already documenting the day-by-day minutia of your child's life on a blog.

Which I also did.  For the first six months...

So yeah - I guess I'm just wondering if I'm the only philistine out here that perhaps is not creating a hard copy, pictorial documentary of my family.  Or do you all print your pics faithfully?

Dammit - this is going to be like the juice question.  Thinking you'll all say, "Nah, don't worry about it..." when in actual fact you'll all be like, "Yes of COURSE I print and document my pictures - I also scrapbook and give out family portraits during the holidays.  You mean you DON'T do that?  What are you, some type of Philistine?!?!?!"

Awesome.  Bring it on...

xxoo.S

Our garden

How to build a vegetable garden?

Take some cedar posts (pish-shaw to the actual "garden ties", these are far more expensive and pretty, right?), some black earth (hello Rona - $2 per 50L bag - damn good price!), some sheep manure (ewwwww - haha), and some peat moss.  Hammer, nail.  Mix and mulch.

Then hit up the local nursery for some seedlings.  We got green, red and yellow peppers.  Peas (and still need to build the "climber" for them). Jalepeno peppers. Cucumbers. Zucchini. Four types of lettuce. Green and yellow beans. Tomatoes tomatoes tomatoes...

We didn't follow the spacing rules on all the little info spikes that came with the plants. Instead, planted about 8 plants per row. Spacing looks okay to me - we'll see how they fare I guess.

My next plan is to stock up on canning jars, as I know we're going to have more tomatoes than we know what to do with.  So aside from salsa and tomato butter (a chili-type sauce), I'm planning on canning a bunch of tomatoes to use for sauces and such throughout the year.

I am so green.  Next project is a clothesline.

xxoo.S

The weekend - in pics

In line, at Ontario Place, Maddie met her newest crush.  A ginormous beaver.

It wasn't planned, so possibly the most serendipitous happening thus far of 2009.  Our visit at Ontario Place coincided with a Meet & Greet with Loonette the Clown, of Big Comfy Couch.  Maddie's ALL-TIME fave show.

Playing in the only real play structure she was big enough for.  Oh well she was happy, clearly.

Waterpark.  It was cold.  The rest of us were still in our clothes.  Poor kids... the shit we put them through...

On Sunday ~ Maddie helping me plant the garden. This became my new desktop pic immediately.  Honestly?  How adorable is she?

Plenty more pics of our weekend on our Flickr page...

xxoo.S

What a weekend

Wow - I have so many pics to upload, but I'm not going to wait until I actually get around to it, so here goes...

Saturday morning saw me skipping Pilates to head down to the GO station for 8:30am. That itself was an amazing feat, considering Maddie decided to sleep until almost 8am that morning. We met up with another couple and their daughter, who's Maddie's age, and headed into the city to, "Experience...Ontario Place!".

Overall the trip was a success. The weather wasn't quite what we expected - a bit chillier than we would have liked, and the waterpark was cooooooooold. And the girls were both about 6 inches shy of almost any fun ride/playstructure/activity to participate, but we found a few things for them to do and we actually did manhandle them into their suits and tried to get them to enjoy the water after the sun showed it's face for a bit.

Highlights of the day? Loonette the Clown just happened to be making a showing there (if Maddie could say OMG, I think she would have all.day.long after getting to meet + hug her idol!), so yeah, that was about as serendipitous as it gets.  

And the bear and beaver dudes that were randomly walking around the park?  BIG hit with Maddie. Big. HUGE hit. If she could stuff either of them into her pocket and leave, she would have. Instantly.

Not great highlights? None of the food stalls had any milk, or juice, or any style of healthy snack. And smart mommy that I am, I only packed a few snack options and completely forgot her sippy cup.  Yeah, that made things a bit difficult.  

And the fact that there were so many cool rides and things that she probably would have had a blast on, but couldn't get on because she was too tiny. Brought back memories of a tonne of times growing up, that I had to stretch and tippy-toe my way onto rides. Poor thing - she'll be dealing with that for ages.

So bottom line - Ontario Place?  Far cooler than I remembered.  But really, only good for those 2+ I think.  The under 2's were a bit bored...

So that was Saturday for us - love being a tourist in your own city - must do it more often.

Saturday night our BFF couple came over with their baby boy, C. He slept his way through the visit, and we enjoyed a few drinkies under the stars. Got Maddie fed and put to bed, and then we all had dinner (a lovely, leisurely, relaxed, with no toddler present, dinner) and played some games. Fun. Almost how life used to be... ;)

Today was a gorgeous weather day - sunny and warm and lovely. Perfect day to plant a veggie garden.  So that's what we did.  We should now have plenty of vegetables throughout the summer - unless I'm absolutely useless and forget to water the damn thing. Which, let's face it, is entirely possible.

A few trips to the park. Some bbq'd ribs for dinner. That's a pretty fantastic Sunday in my opinion.

Hope you all enjoyed your weekends just as much.  Pics to come soon...

xxoo.S

Summertime

♫  ...and the living is easy...  ♪

I have been a great employee today.  I may work from home, and I may have stared longingly out the window at the beautiful sunshine and gentle breeze, but I did.not.crack.  I busted my ass today, and could easily work through the weekend.

However - this weekend is going to be GORG from what I hear.  Nary a cloud in the sky. In essence, the weather that we all wished for last weekend.  So I will be putting work aside, into a tight little corner of my brain, not to be dwelled upon, so I can fully relax and enjoy the weekend as much as possible.

We have a date with another couple and their 19-month-old daughter for Ontario Place tomorrow. I'm a little sad that I'll miss the awesome Mom 2 Mom sale happening in Ajax.  And I'll be missing Pilates.  And the other garage sales happening all over my 'hood.

But that's okay. It's just the start of the season, and there's plenty more sales where those came from. (PS - why WHY did I sign up for a 9:30 Sat a.m. Pilates class at the start of garage-sale-season?? Silly me.)

And dudes - Ontario Place? From the looks of their website? Is going to totally rock. I haven't been there since I was a kid - and all I remembered was the bumper-boats.  Now there's a huge waterpark and apparently all sorts of things catered to the young-uns. 

Sunday will hopefully be the day we (finally!) plant our veggie garden.  We'll see...

Have a wonderful weekend! 

xxoo.S

Who knew juice was so controversial?

Since I don't think we can really control (all that well) what happens at daycare and I think it's better to institute as the "norm" for her at home (and also, really? am I going to force her to deal with Maddie's righteous indignition when she sees the other kiddies drinking juice and she's getting water? um, not fair) - we've cut out the juice.  

Cold turkey.

Not giving in.

So it's water or milk. Milk or water. Take your pick. We'll even put in some ice cubes. But yeah - no juice for you!

She's okay with it. So far.

Meaning - we've been doing it for 2 days, during the week, and she's only whined a bit.

Oh the weekend is going to be nasty...

Thanks to all for the comments and advice - 'twas appreciated - even those judging me for still giving my daughter a bottle before bed... um, yeah...

xxoo.S

Retrobike

Okay - so I got this link from someone?  The Scoop, I think.  And holy shit, do I want this bike (so much so that I'm whoring out the side bar of my blog for it - so CLICK dammit, cliiiiiiiiiickkkkkk!).

Actually, I've been looking at buying a bike recently.  And because I'm so cool and retro and very, trés vogue I've been perusing my retro-options.  Because mountain bikes, eh.  Not all that exciting to me.  I'm not biking any mountain in the near future.

And I also have a larger-than-average bum. Not an "athletic-I'm-going-to-scale-this-crazy-mountain" bum. Which means - give me a big, cruising, bike seat please. In fact, I would totally take a banana seat if I could find one...

So with my lovely thoughts of an old fashioned bicycle with a basket on the front, cruising around my boondocks, and Maddie strapped precariously behind me, I started scouting, and searching, and googling.  

And then I found one of those seats that strap just behind the handlebars and thought, that's just super cool and interactive and tra-la-la, I'm an eco-mom who rules.

Again I digress... so I'm searching for a fancy ol' bicycle and found a very cool program founded by Kona (who are bike-gurus or something).  It's called the AfricaBike - and for every 2 they sell, they will donate a bike to home health care workers in Africa (who use the bikes to deliver ARV drugs to HIV/AIDS patients in a variety of African countries).  Anyways - this isn't a public service message - but it was a standard, classic-styled bike.  Not the prettiest, but it worked for me.

However, when all is said and done, I'm a bit of a procrastinator (I think I've talked about this before?), so I haven't ordered the bike.

And now I've fallen in love with another. I'm so fickle... 

Oh well, at least it's inspired me to start looking again.

xxoo.S

Juice monster

I think this would be top in the list of "if I could go back and do it differently". (The nice thing is that list is short, so far, which must mean we're doing something right...)

At a young age, Maddie started getting juice offered. As I was the paranoid-obsessed breast-feeding mom (I was so afraid I'd lose my supply or she wouldn't get the right nutrients, I would breastfeed after every "meal" of solids she got), I hated the thought of her drinking anything else for the first 6 months. Then six months hit, we started on solids and the Grandmas kept bugging me that juice would be fine as well. And so we did start on the juice pretty early. As in - she was drinking and asking for more - well before her 1st birthday.

And now? She refuses to drink anything but juice, all day long. Sometimes I can get her to drink some milk (read: an ounce or two) with her meal, but if you offer her milk any other time (unless it's bedtime bottle), she'll throw it right back at you. And forget water - it's like an insult.

Instead, we get the whine, and the (fake) cry, and the eventual angry scream for more JUIIIIIICE!

And most times? We give in. Because you know, we're apparently lazy like that.

But after our last doctor's appointment, where I was asked her general intake of milk and I had to reply - about 10 ounces. Well I vowed to make some changes. And that was about 2 weeks ago, so best I start to do it, right?

I've determined that I can (sometimes) get her to drink water out of a different style sippy - the Rubbermaid juice boxes - more like a straw cup than a sippy. Whatever - if it works then I figure it's fine.

But what do you do when she's whining for juice and nothing else will work? I don't know. Aside from retrospectively wishing I just offered her water as a drink alternative (especially as she eats so much fruit, we don't have to use juice as a vitamin component to her diet), I can't really think of a good idea.

Do we just go cold turkey, limit her to one sippy of juice per day and offer water or milk the rest of the time? Listen to the screams and be the evil juice-withholding parents of her worst nightmares?

Or do we just say 'eff it. Fix it with the next kid and let her become a juice monster who's teeth rot out and etc etc etc...

Should be said - we always water down her juice by at least 50%, and she's never had yeast or diarrhea issues from the juice. These are really just my concerns, based on nothing. Guilt? Reading too many child-rearing advice columns that happened to talk about juice intake recently? Who knows.

Would love some advice though. Even if the advice is "shut up and don't worry about it"...

xxoo.S

Spring cleaning

Sidenote: I have this sneaking suspicion that I've already used this as a post title before, and while it shouldn't, it's irking me to the core. But it's the end of a very long, long-weekend, and I don't have the energy to search my archives. So if my suspicion is correct, then, I'm sorry. I am clearly not as original as I fancy myself to be....

I just spent two hours this afternoon unpacking summer clothes and packing up winter clothes. Does anyone do this anymore, or have I been brainwashed by my mother and am participating in some ancient practice that is almost as de-vogue as monitoring your white-wearing to after Victoria Day and before Labour Day?

Interesting tidbits:

• I own twice the number of winter clothes as I do summer clothes. Yay to Canada.
• I own a HELLOFALOT of tweed dress pants. Was there a special on tweed a few years ago, back when I actually fit into said dress pants?
• While my winter clothing may outnumber my summer attire, my shoe collection is quite the opposite. And damn, I think in my haze of child-rearing last year, I forgot the number one important thing about summer - which is, summer sandals. Lovely, strappy, summer sandals.
• I packed 6 more tops into my "maternity clothes" bin. I think that means I have given up on myself just a little bit less? Perhaps I haven't actually lost any more weight, but I refuse to hide behind the tent shirts anymore...
• Two (TWO!) garbage bags filled with Goodwill donations. Dudes... I do NOT understand how I manage to give away (what feels like) half my wardrobe every six months and still not have enough closet space. And bye-bye Senor Frogs belly-baring halter top. I may not have given up on myself, but I have accepted the fact that it would not be acceptable to wear you again. 

So yes, I am now fully prepared for summer. And dying to wear my flippy summer skirts with my strappy summer sandals. And swing my garishly bright small summer purses, and la-la-la I'm a Coppertone commercial...

I really will post about our weekend soon. I'm sure you're all dying to hear about my gardening, golf and garage exploits. G-G-G-great!

xxoo.S

Croup

I think we've been infected...

The term croup does not refer to a single illness, but rather a group of conditions involving inflammation of the upper airway that leads to a cough that sounds like a bark, particularly when a child is crying. (KidsHealth.org)

Boo.

xxoo.S

Back to old routines

Maddie's reluctance to attend daycare has vanished. This morning there was no fighting, no screaming, no "Noooooooooooooo" as I put on her jacket.

This morning made me feel a lot less guilty. Thankgod. And I found out when I dropped her off, that they were planning on going to the zoo. Which, cool. I think Maddie will enjoy it. It's a gorgeous day, and to be honest, I'm a little jealous...

The weekend weather forecast looks to be shitty. What a shocker. Long weekend = shitty weather. Thanks Mother Nature. Love you too...

Regardless - we have a list of to-do's to get done. The in-laws will be up visiting, so we should be able to be pretty productive. And if we actually get around to planting our veggie garden I'll take pics and let you know how beauuuuuuutiful it looks.

Have a great weekend - enjoy

Preferential treatment

Maddie loves her Daddy.

This is awesome, and I love watching the close, loving relationship they are developing.

But it makes me a little sad how she now refuses (REFUSES) to let me do or help or take part in half the things that he does.

Daddy does bathtime, Daddy does storytime, Daddy does playtime. Daddy does pretty much any and all fun things that Mommy used to do. 

I know (because I am an obsessive Googler) that this is just a stage, and that it happens all the time. One parent gets preferential treatment over the other. A few months ago, nothing Daddy did was right and it was Mommy she cried for. And now it's his turn.

And that's cool, right?

It is. I swear - I'm happy with it. But without sounding like a child myself, I do feel a teeny-tiny, little itsy bit of jealousy (just a smidge, I swear!).

Maybe because it was 18 months of her crying for me. That Mommy was always the best one to chase away the tears. I got used to it. I was the one that slept with the monitor on my side of the bed. I was the one that jumped up to her cries. Iwas the one the learned to cook with a baby on my hip. I was the one who became a pro laundrer with a toddler wrapped around my ankles.

She did everything with me and I did everything with her - and as slow and difficult that made things, I figured it out.

And now (again - disclaimer - I don't want to sound like a child, but I do want to be honest) it feels a bit, I don't know... rejecting... when she could give a care if I was in the room or not.

I still do the wake ups and the daycare pick ups and the etc etc etc. But the minute Daddy walks through the door, the sun rises, or sets. Or whatever that analogy is...

Wow, I really do sound a bit like a petulant child. Huh... 

I guess you figure it out as you go along, and I could be all big and act like I don't care - but the truth is. It hurts. A little bit.

But do I envy and admire the little Daddy's Girl my Miss Button is becoming? 

And do I chuckle a little to myself every day as I see just how wrapped around her pudgy little finger she can make her Daddy?

Abso-flippin'-lutely.

xxoo.S

Simon's adventure

Kind of a wacky story, but since our cats are part of our family, I figure they deserve some real estate on the blog too...

Our one cat (the one that is fat and loveable and as big as a racoon) loves going outside. Except he's an indoor cat. Not declawed or anything, but has been living indoors for 10 years, and I highly doubt any of his survival skills have lasted from when he was a garbage-eating street cat (before he was a year old and we adopted him). In a nutshell, while we let him roam the backyard fairly freely, we keep the gate closed and make sure he's inside when we go to bed.

Except he likes to sneak out. Behind you. When you open the front door and are distracted by a screaming toddler that wants to be 'SIDE!!!!!! with Daddy. (I think I posted about her obsession with outside just a few days ago.)

So last night, around 11:30pm, I was packing up and getting ready to go to bed. When I realized I hadn't seen Simon in forever. Like, can't remember when I saw him last. 

I searched the house.  No cat.

I searched the backyard. No cat.

I went upstairs and woke up the Hubby, because, seriously? I'm not sure I want to be wandering the streets in my pjs at midnight without anyone knowing where I am, regardless of how safe our little boondock village is. (And honestly, no damn way is he getting away with sleeping through this while I am up to all hours, right?)

So now we're both walking up and down our street. In our pj's. Softly calling for Simon (because you don't exactly want to be shouting at midnight, right?).

Finally, I hear a muffled meow.

I track it down to our neighbour's backyard. And after a bit of flashlight scoping (where I'm sure the neighbour is going to come out and see what the hell is going on), we determine that Simon is not in fact, in any of the bushes in or around the garage that the meow'ing is coming from. In fact, the cat is in the garage (which is in the backyard - boondock house-design that I'm not a fan of personally).

So great. Our cat is in our neighbour's closed garage. And it's now 12:30am.

"F-him. He's the one that got himself into the mess", offers Hubby.

And at the risk of being judged here, by any animal lovers, yeah, I kind of agreed. Although our fault for not noticing our cat was outside, he's a bit of a dumbass to find himself locked in a neighbour's garage. And no way in hell am I knocking on anyone's door at that time of night. Especially since this is the neighbour with the nice lady and weirdo husband. (Doesn't everyone have a weirdo neighbour?). 

It was a can of worms I wasn't willing to open.

And I see the lady walking her children to school every morning. So I figure yeah, I'll just get him in the morning and teach him a lesson with having to stay in a cold garage overnight.

So that's what we did.  And the next morning, when I went outside to wait for the lady, around the same time that I run into her every OTHER day of the week, I see her car gone. She left early - in her car. Not a good sign.

Fast-forward 3 hours later. It's 10am. Still no sign of her. So I risk the weirdo husband and go and knock on the door. No answer.

At this point, I can conservatively estimate that Simon has been outside for 14 hours. And as annoyed as I am, even I can't start to worry, a bit...

So I do what any other respectful neighbour would do. I look around the garage to see if there's anyway to break in and get my cat.

Wow. That sentence sounds awful. But yeah, I guess that's what I did...

Anti-climatic ending? The side door to the garage was unlocked. Something I didn't even think to try last night.

I went in to the garage, found Simon sleeping on the lawnmower under a tarp (what? why? how is that comfortable??) and dragged his ass out of there.

He's dusty and hungry. But he's home.

Stupid cat.

xxoo.S

Twitter

I just don't get it. Maybe I'm missing something. Maybe I'm (sigh) too old. Maybe I'm just not witty enough and I'm not ready to admit it.

I get Facebook. I "got" it the moment I logged on. I got how addictive and time-sucking it could be, especially at the beginning. Looking up those old primary school friends and trolling through their kids' pictures. I even added "apps", took surveys, and sent gifts. And then the novelty wore off - and I removed most of my apps (bye Sex and the City "quote of the day"!) and gave up on trying to beat anyone in a game of scrabble.

But I'm still on Facebook daily - just to check in. Review friends' statuses, check out new pics. Um, that's about it. That's all I really do. But then again, that's what I liked it for in the first place.

Twitter - well, it's like a slutty Facebook. You can follow anyone - you don't need permission. And anyone can follow you. And people apparently have conversations. Umm, yeah, maybe I'm not connected to the right "people", but I don't see conversations happening. All I see are random comments about nothing and links to videos and other articles, that to be honest? I don't have time to be reading. 

I don't get hash tags (#), I don't get re-tweeting (RT), and I don't get why the hell I should give a shit about Ashton Kutcher (@aplusk).

I dunno. At the risk of sounding 90, "I don't get what all the fuss is about." Maybe I don't know the "interesting" strangers that I should be following. Maybe I don't give a shit.

Yup - that's probably it.

So I've removed my "twitter update" from this blog. If you read this, you probably know me. And if you probably know me, then we're probably friends on Facebook. And if you don't, or we aren't. Well that's okay - you're not missing much. My status updates aren't that interesting. I promise...

xxoo.S

Gardening hell with a little shopping thrown in

I like owning a house. It's fun to sleep on a different floor from where I eat. And it's awesome to have an outside space to call my own. Other than a 6 foot by 2 foot balcony hovering somewhere at smog level.

But oh, how much harder this gardening is. Because when I lived in my little smog-level apt, I could throw a few begonias in a box, sprinkle some dirt and call it a day. They lived (sort of) throughout the summer, and the 5 minutes a day that I sat on that crowded little balcony, I enjoyed them.

Now that we have Miss 'SIIIIIIIIIIIIIDE (did that convey the essence of the whine in her voice when she wants to go outside?) we're outside all the time. And that's cool. Because that was one of the selling points Hubby used in his sales speech to get me up to the boondocks. Cue sales speak:

"You're always saying we never go outside and just enjoy ourselves. Now we'll be able to go outside every.single.day if you want to!"

And I did. I do. I like living outside in the warmer months, it's what I've always done and I get a little stir crazy if I'm stuck inside when the weather is gorgeous outside.

Except when you own a house, being outside and enjoying it means you have to make it look pretty. Otherwise you're just outside with constant reminders everywhere you look about how lazy you are, and damn, how nice is that neighbour's lawn?

And so, these past 5 days, while I was on holidays and Maddie was home and my mom was down visiting, that's what I did. I gardened. And I planted flowers. And I dug up flowers. And planted rhubarb. And mulched. And weeded. And and and...

My side garden with the new perennials is still looking pretty sad and forlorn. But the front and back gardens (which really? are just weird bushes that I don't know the names of and some wood chip - how can so little be so much work?) are looking pretty bloody fantastic. 

Oh, and the tip to mulching? Stamp it down after you put it down. So it sticks. Because otherwise it blows all over the neighbour's yard and you look like a jackass trying to clean it up. Just saying...

In other news, Mom and I bought out the Please Mum store during our shopping excursion. And then bought out Old Navy. And then went to Once Upon a Child to buy more - because you know, she needed more.

Hilariously, Maddie's name for my Mom is "Bucky". Where she got this from, I have no idea. But it makes me chuckle a little bit each time she says it. Because it's said in this loud (I-know-no-volume-control) child's voice that screeches the end into a question - like BUCK-YYYYYY????Fairly hilarious, must get it on video before that fades.

I love when family (or friends) visit and become amazed at how much Maddie has progressed since they last saw her. Even if it was only a week ago. 

Of course I'm like, I KNOW right, she's a flipping genius! But it is pretty amazing how much stuff they learn in such a short period of time. Like sentences. Last week she was just saying Mommy's car-car. Now she says, "all done", "no milk, Maddie juuuuuuiiiiceee - yesh yesh, please Maddie juice", and "snuggle-buggle". 

Okay, I realize the last one doesn't qualify as a sentence, but this is pretty much the cutest thing she says. We've been giving her snuggle-buggles at at bedtime for months and she now says it when she wants a cuddle. You could die from the cuteness of it all. DIE I tell you.

And lastly, she reads along with her books now. "Moo Baa La la la" to be specific. She makes all the sounds the animals make. Another must for that video machine that I let gather dust far too much. You'll see this and your heart will melt.

Um - okay, a gardening/weekend update post has morphed into proud-mommy-dearest-hell. And we're through here...

xxoo.S

Vacay over

Don't you hate that melancholy feeling that you get when vacation is over? I took the last 3 days of the week off and spent it with my mom and Miss Maddie, and while it was relaxing, invigorating, productive and all that fun-stuff, like any vacay, it was far too short. 

Only 3 days I know. That's what makes it kinda funny to me. That I could get so sad about such a short vacay being over.

And doing the drop off to daycare was a bit heartbreaking. Not that she made a fuss, but Maddie was definitely feeling a little melancholy about returning to the routine as well. 

I don't feel guilty, I know she'll have a fun day. But I know exactly how she was feeling. We were both feeling it. We'd rather be home, with each other, right now...

Aaaaannnnndddddd...... back to work...

xxoo.S

PS - update post from the week off to come soon, just needed to get that out of my system first.

Maddie stats - revised

**After reading the comments, I had to go back to the little paper that the nurse gave me with Miss Button's stats, as I was starting to question it myself.  Turns out I did put the wrong stats in, she isn't 28 inches, she's 30.5 inches long.  Whew, feel a bit better now.  Entered 71.5cm in the conversion chart instead of 77.5cm.

==========================================

Maddie had a doctor's appointment today.  You know, the one where she was getting her 15 month shots (at 19 months)?

That was fun - explaining why we were so "tardy" to the doctor (her words, not mine).

Anyways - the fun stuff was checking all the "yes's" on the 18 month developmental checklist - because you know, my daughter, she's a GENIUS!!! 

• Does she follow simple instructions?  I'm like, hell yes!  She'll even follow mildly difficult instructions, send random emails from my blackberry, crank call relatives long distance and erase PVR'd programs.  GENIUS I tell you.
  
• Can she run?  I actually asked for clarification on this one - like, does it count if she falls a lot, but tries to run?  Because that's my girl - she may not have a lot of coordination, but she's a TRIER.
  
• Can she speak 5 words or more (words may not be easily understood).  Dude?!?  She can speak HUNDREDS of not-easily-understood words.  We were calling it gibberish, but if you will call it vocabulary - well, that's cool too...
  
• Does she give affection to people, pets or objects?  Does herself, in the mirror, count?  Because I don't think I've met a person who loves themselves more.  Narcissus, Madeleine.  You say po-tay-toe, I say po-tah-toe...

In all seriousness, she passed it all, she got weighed (on the BIG GIRL SCALE - I was like, dude, you won't be so excited about stepping on a scale in 20 years, but for now, yay!), and she got measured.  She's 23 pounds and 28+ inches.  25% percentile.  My tiny little Miss Button...

xxoo.S

World's Worst Parents

A bit dramatic, but I'm still mortified about this...

And because who DOESN'T want to memorialize mortifying parenting moments, let's just post it here, shall we?

Tuesday afternoon - I'm still at work, at the office, downtown Toronto.  It's 5:27pm.  There is no way I am leaving for at least another hour.  So I call the hubby to let him know I won't be home in time for dinner - go ahead and eat without me.

Because he's doing the pick up, right?

"Ummm - I'm at Martin Grove (that's Etobicoke hood for you non-GTA-ers - REALLY far away from where we live).  Where are you?" he asks.

My answer was a whole lot of @$%#&* because I realized in that split second that it took him to utter those words, we were both really, really, REALLY far away from our daughter, in daycare, in Brooklin.

So yeah, we screwed up.  He thought I was doing the pickup.  I thought he was.  Maddie's sitting at daycare (in my guilty imagination), lonely and wondering where her deadbeat parents are.

It's now 5:33pm.  We're already 3 minutes late.

"You need to FIGURE THIS OUT." and I hang up.  Because you know, I'm calm, cool and collected like that.

As I'm calling the daycare to out myself as possibly the worst parent on the planet...and throw myself at their feet to beg their forgiveness...Hubby calls me back.  

"BFF is going to do the pick up.  Maddie can fit in their infant car seat for the ride home."

Side note: this actually wasn't as illegal it sounds - she's REALLY tiny, and they have one of those massive infant seats that is made for Swedish people (haha - that's my own private joke, as Ikea makes some oversized furniture and I always think it must be because Swedes are larger... and not so funny as I type it out...).

So I call the daycare and let them know the plans.  And still beg their forgiveness.  In case they want to judge me.  Or think badly of me.  Or just wonder what kind of airhead parents we are, anyways, that we forget our kid at daycare.

Maddie was home and happy and all was safe and sound within 15 minutes.

Thanks BFF!  And um, sorry Maddie.  We won't forget you again...

xxoo.S

T-minus 8 hours...

...until I am officially on vacay.  Which is making these past two days a complete nightmare for work (cramming 5 days into 2 is tough, regardless).  And I know that while I'm off, I will still be working.  But isn't it delicious to know you don't have to.  You don't have to be answering emails.  You don't have to be checking things off your "list".

I'm not doing anything exciting - some errands, getting Maddie's shots, gardening.  You know - vacation-y stuff that you do when you don't actually go anywhere.

My mom is coming to visit and I hope we get lucky with weather, so we can spend as much time outside as possible.  Have a good week my bloggy peeps!

xxoo.S

Maddie milestone

This weekend Maddie and I were on our own, as Seth was off to a friend's cottage for opening of Pickerel season. Which meant... girls weekend! Woo hoo!  

We kicked it off Saturday morning by going to the mall. Because who better to shop for a bathing suit with, than your 19-month-old daughter? I think I tried on, like, 10,000 suits. And finally found one that would a) not ride up my bum crack constantly and b) fight Maddie's advances to publicly flash me again.  

After buying the dreaded bathing suit (ps, Sears?  I haven't shopped you in a while, and now I remember why...) we headed into the actual mall to pick up some CDs for Mommy and a frozen yogurt for Maddie. All was going well - Maddie was SUPER AWESOME the whole time. I love how well-behaved she is when shopping, and part of me believes the whole reason she is so awesome at the mall is because of all the times I took her out when she was only a millisecond old, as I was going stir-crazy in the house, and decided she needed to learn what the outdoors (and by outdoors, I mean inside the mall) looked like.

However, this weekend, I learned, by teaching her a love of the shops, I've created a monster.

Picture this - it's 11:30 and we need to head home to do the lunch thing, so she can do the nap thing, so I can do the housework thing. We stroll back to Sears, where I had parked initially. Take the elevator down to the bottom floor, and get out right next to the garden section. Decor for your garden, to be specific.

All of a sudden Maddie is twisting and reaching and squirming and repeating, "Pwetty, pwetty, pwetty, PWETTTTTYYYYYYY!!!!!!"

I look in the direction of all her kerfuffle, and see the ugliest ornamental crane/bird/creature made out of hammered tin. Um.....kay.

"You like the birdie, Maddie?" I ask, trying to stifle my urge to be like, DUDE, this is the ugliest godawful thing in the entire world and whatthehelliswrongwithyourtaste???

"YESH! Yesh. Pwetty. Tweet-tweet."

Right. So over we stroll. To the ugly bird-creature. Which I then see, costs $45. FORTY FIVE DOLLARS. Seriously? Um......kay. Time to do some redirection...

"Well that is an interesting looking bird, Maddie. And look at this - pretty butterfly, with all the crystals, and legitimate-prettiness..."

That worked. It got her mind off the bird. And she admired the butterfly (one of those cast-iron dealios that sit on a stick and bounce in your garden). It was pretty. It had crystals. She touched those a bit.

And then I decided it was time to leave.

"NOOOOOOOOOO. Pwetty! Maddie's pwetty. Maddie's. Maddie's. Mineminemineminemine PWWEEEETTTTTYYYYYYYYY!"

Redirection turns into a monster.  

I pick up the butterfly. It's only $12. Game. Check. Match.

And that is how Maddie hit her "Manipulate Mommy into buying me something at the store" milestone this weekend.

xxoo.S  

Waiting for the delivery

Check out my first Etsy purchase!  

They are crayon figurines.  In adorable kitty shapes!  I first saw them posted on babygadget, and my train of thought went something like this...

Maddie loves kitties...

Maddie loves crayons...

Maddie would love these!

So I linked through to KittyBabyLove's Etsy Shop and purchased a set of my own.  I'm quite excited about them.  

We had bought those Crayola ones that are specifically for toddlers - for the "palm grasp".  Except they still have a tip on them, and so when she just smashes the crayon around, she barely makes a mark.  These seem to apply the same concept, but since it's ALL crayon, it will make much more of a mark (let's just hope they're washable).

They should be here soon.  I'll let you know how they work...

xxoo.S