Another Day

Abi stayed home today because her childcare provider had a stomach flu.
So we did stuff.
First I would like to point out that Abi chose this outfit. She found the hat on the dresser and insisted on wearing it. So we added the sweater to match, much to her delight."Cheese" (please).
Abi played with the camera for a while when I was making lunch.
Abi helped me pin out this shawl to block it into shape.


When it came time to nap, she was less than happy about it. She played quietly at the door for a while...Eventually I got her to nap. And now I wait... for the day to continue.

Family Passings

Tomorrow Abi will be attending the second funeral of her lifetime. Abi's great-great-aunt Ann passed away this week. I don't imagine Abi will remember her, which is unfortunate because my great-aunt was a wonderful woman. I don't have many memories, because we've lived most of our lives far from that side of the family, but the memories I do have are of a kind, warm, compassionate woman. I am sure her passing will be mourned by many whose lives she has touched. I realized yesterday, while reading the obituary, that Ann is not a blood relative. I never thought of it that way; she is simply family in my mind. I suppose that's because, being a great-aunt, she has always been a part of my life, of my family. That's the wonderful thing about family (blood or otherwise) - loving, supportive people who are always there. (Which isn't to say all blood-relatives / family are loving and supportive, but the people I think of as family are.)

Abi's first funeral marked the passing of her great-great-great grandmother last year. I truly hope there are no more passings for a long time. I would hope Abi has more time to develop relationships with her extended family, because there are a lot of wonderful people to meet.

It is at times like these that I am reminded how precious family is and I realize that we don't create enough opportunities to interact with our families. Abi inspired a sweet little phone call earlier this week as she brought me the phone and insisted on speaking with Pa. I asked her which Pa she wanted, F or B, and she replied B. So we called Grandpa, Abi said hello and Pa and bye. We briefly caught Grandpa up on life here, but most importantly I'm sure Abi brightened his day by calling. She in turn was happy to hear his voice, although it does always confuse her to hear a voice on the phone. (Usually when she plays phone there is no one on the other end.)
We should do that more often.
And, dear family and friends, we're not the only ones who can pick up a phone or send an e-mail or leave a comment. ;)

"I DID IT!"

"I DID IT"
"ME TOO"
"I WANT TO DO IT!"
These are all common Abi phrases - little miss independent that she is and has always been.

Right now she's reveling in the air blowing through her hair. The sweet warmth of the blow dryer after a bath. I can hear her upstairs with Robin.
Robin: Do you want to brush your teeth?
Abi: YEAH!
But then she changes her mind. "I want to eat!"
Ah, delay tactics. She specializes in these. She ate plenty of dinner just before her bath.
Oh, she's decided she'd like to brush her teeth. What she really wants is the MI paste that follows.

New Video

It's been a while since I shared videos, so I hope you enjoy this little gem of Abi dancing this evening. Her favourite song is "Monkey!" - thanks to Dorion I think (it's his favourite too). Of course, who wouldn't love this fun song. She requests it, over and over, often. She particularly likes to ride on my back to this song - sheesh, I carry her there once...
Also featured is one of my/her classic Littlest Pet Shop toys - before they went with the horrid big-head style. She loves the two cats (I mean, 'owms') I have. And thus my buying of LPS toys as a teen and storing them all these years (to the point where I even moved with them) is justified. lol
I think it's adorable/hilarious when she feeds the cat from its little food dish. "Num num" she says for the cat, or "water" she indicates of the other half of the dish as the cat feeds. Then the cat is returned to its crate to be carried around.
We are fortunate that Abi is not a child who puts things in her mouth - besides her food (which she stores in her mouth. So, really, even if she did put things in her mouth, it's not as if she would actually swallow them. She'd just store them away.)

Oh, almost forgot the video

Enjoy.

Wintery Goodness

The weather seems to be warming across the country, making it a perfect time to enjoy winter's many beauties. Quick, before the cold returns.

We celebrated our 10 year anniversary (of the first date) by going out for sushi (mmm Niko Niko's), followed by ice skating (which I love), and topped off with hot chocolate and brownie cheesecake (delightful treats from Matter of Taste). All without me having to carry a baby. It was a good evening :)

What else have we been up to? Taking down Yule decorations. Sled rides for Abi. Geocaching for Robin. Knitting for me.
See:

Abi loves ducks, so I knit this up overnight at her request. We honestly went online and chose a pattern together. This is the most rubber-duck-ish one we found.

I have also made this swatch

The full project will be a wedding shawl for my sister this summer. I'm going to send this sampler to her. She told me her wedding colour is that of purple shamrocks, which we both have. I took a leaf to the yarn shop, not actually expecting to find what I needed. I assumed I'd have to get something custom-dyed to match. Even the shop owner was hesitant - knowing how difficult it can be to colour match. Lo and behold, there in the Berroco fingering weight alpaca-blend yarns was a colour that perfectly matched my leaf, it is even heathered with the darker shade in the leaf.

I've got my own shawl on the needles - my first shawl for me.

(It's further along than this now.)

Abi's been trying to help with my other major project. This is my crochet-while-nursing project:

"I want to knit!" she tells me often.

And I sewed together this cutie as a last-minute gift last weekend. I had crocheted all the pieces a year ago.


When do I find time to knit? Have you met my computer? Well, while it loads or saves or searches - I knit. It may only be a few stitches, but it adds up quickly with my computer. It also keeps me from throwing my computer in frustration...
When Abi's nursing, I knit. When Robin's driving us somewhere, I knit. Taking a little time to relax with Robin and watch our favourite TV shows? Yep, I knit.

No time wasted here!

10 Years

Today marks the ten year anniversary of our first date. Granted, we'd actually been seeing each other since mid-December of 2009, but before this date we were at group parties and talking on the phone (with me sick in bed most of the holidays, even when I went out for New Years just so I could see Robin). Yep, ten years. That's a long time. 10 wonderful years I should add.

Today also started well. Robin made a pot of coffee, and that's always a good start :)
Abi woke up happy (another good start) and had fun playing in the snow as I scraped the car windows. (I took this picture just for you!)

On the drive to daycare, I had the distinct pleasure of honking at the moron who kept creeping into the intersection at a red light. Oh how I hate when people do that (far too common!). I'm not sure why they bother. "Dude, the light is RED. It's still GREEN for the other direction. This is a major intersection and your creeping into it will not cause the light to change sooner." That's what my horn said today. When I'm behind such people (which I wasn't, I was beside them) I find it even more annoying because, despite seeming as if they really want to go, these people are always the slowest to actually go when the light changes. I'm sure it has to do with the fact that, while two seconds ago they were creeping forward, they now have stopped their momentum and are in "stop" mode (finally - half-way into the intersection!) and have to mentally switch back to "go" mode - and, well, these clearly are not very mentally-intelligent people. Meanwhile, everyone else who simply waited is already through the intersection.
I'm sure you share my frustration with these morons.
I was also pleased to see some guy getting a ticket, presumably for speeding through the school zone. It was the hour when kids are arriving, many families are crossing the street, cars are parked/stopped along the road. In short, it's not a good time to go speeding by! I've often seen police parked, waiting to catch morons here (on Keats). I confess, I do exceed the speed limit at times, but certainly not in front of a (well marked) school zone during school hours. And, inevitably, even when I'm (moderately) exceeding the limit (ie, moving with traffic in Ontario), there's always someone blowing past me. I like to think of them as "bait" - because if there are police officers set up to catch speeders, they're certainly going to catch those other drivers before I arrive. And really, I'd rather such drivers not be directly in front of me, or riding my butt, causing an accident.

Hmm, that was a lot of writing about bad drivers.

Anyhow, I'm off to shower and get ready for teaching. Then go pick up the film to show in class, grab some food, more coffee perhaps, and greet 200 still-eager students.
Then home again, do more work, get dressed for our date tonight, pick up Abi for some cuddle/play time, drop her at the babysitter's, pick up Robin, then go out. Whoa - busy day! When will I fit in knitting???!! LOL

Curtains

After 4+ years, we finally put up curtains in the kitchen. I had bought the fabric long ago, then we weren't sure we liked it and I didn't want to sew. Later we bought curtain rods, thinking that would help move things along - it didn't and we later decided those rods wouldn't work in our bay window. This Winter, when I pulled out the sewing machine to stitch baby-clothes dolls as a gift, I resolved to finally just sew the f'n curtains and be done with it. We pulled out the rods again, but they really weren't going to work, so last week Robin picked up an alternative.
Et voila, we have curtains!

teethes

The most recent visit to the dentist revealed that Abi has a cavity beginning in one of her molars. Damn you baby-tooth-decay! *grumble grumble* We're still practicing delay tactics - using the MI paste and fluoride gel, silica (homeopathy), brushing teeth, etc. She's been added to the 6 month waiting list for general anaesthesia in case she needs teeth pulled in 6 months. If not, she'll be removed from the list. We're hoping we can delay for longer, but I don't imagine we'll be able to delay tooth extraction until they're ready to fall out in several years. I can't imagine my little one, who so recently cut all her teeth, losing any :(
We learned over the holidays that my dad had 8 baby teeth removed. Here I was blaming Robin's British genes when it was mine all along.

It's frustrating to me because she's not a sugar-eating kid. She doesn't even drink juice. But, of course, all foods have sugars, and can be broken down into sugars. And, breastmilk has sugar too - and my baby loves her breastmilk. She's actually BFing more now that she was a couple months ago (when she's at home). It seems she's reached a point where she needs more mommy-comfort, and BFing is her favourite comfort.

Oh, and yes, I'm now Mommy.
Darn. I really liked being Mum - that one syllable. There was no transition period of Mum-my. Just straight to Mommy. Mommy and Daddy. Occasionally Momma even - although I'm sure she has picked that up from when I refer to myself as such in conversation with her.

Actually, a lot of words have inherited a "y" at the end (maybe a silent zed too...). I'm disappointed by that and I do avoid adding Ys, but I know many other people (adult and child) add the Y to words when talking to kids. Horse-y. Ducky. Doggy. You know the list. I purposefully prefer to use the real words (Horse, Duck, Dog) - but I'm funny that way and never used baby-talk either.

Dad-Dy!

True story from this afternoon.
Robin put Abi down for a nap.
Abi was playing in the room, I could hear here talking to herself as she sometimes does before she falls asleep.
Then I heard her calling out (I was reading in the living room, Robin was gaming in the basement), so Robin went back up to:
"Dad-dy! I went pee!" says Abi, accusingly, as Robin opens the door and she tosses her diaper and pants at him. Sure enough, she had removed her pants and nap-time diaper, peed in the potty, and now wanted Dad-dy to put her diaper back on. She threw herself back on the bed and waited for her diaper. Then Robin laid her back, took the potty out of the room to clean, and she went to sleep (I assume. Haven't heard a peep).
I thought it was cute.

Why am I spelling it "Dad-dy"? Because that is how Abi pronounces it. We were simply Mum and Dad until about two days ago when she started emphasizing the "dy" after "dad". I'm still mum.

Happy New Year

From our family to yours - we wish you a wonderful new year. May it be full of joy and laughter and discoveries.

Abi's downstairs enjoying music as usual. Currently she's dancing to "No More Monkeys Jumping on the Bed" from her Putumayo Kids CD Animal Playground. She loves these CDs and we do too because it's GOOD music (Be Good Tanyas on now). She's also playing with her fridge farm (leapfrog toy). She likes making it play music so she can dance along. When she's not playing with those she's playing her new "boombox/beatbox" or wooden xylophone or toy piano. She loves music, which shouldn't be surprising in our household. She's even tried playing my recorder and isn't half bad - for a one year old. She's got good rhythm too. She impressed pa-pere when playing his snare drum and when she plays a piano (toy or real) she actually seems to try and play it rather than bang keys. So many musical instruments to choose from around the house - (toy) piano, xylophone, recorder, drum, guitar, and harp. I think we'll try a small keyboard in the next year (upgrade from the toy piano).

That's pretty much our day in a nutshell. Stories, dancing, drawing cats and horses on the magnadoodle (as per Abi's request), rolling playdough into a ball, puzzles, dolls... I'm looking forward to playing in the fresh snow this afternoon.

Hope you're all having fun too!