~ *~November '05 Mama's & Littles~* ~Its May! - Page 3

[gingerstar]

Yikes, Helen! I hope she truly is ok, and that you are ok too! That sort of thing takes years off a mama's life, I think.

[flapjack]

She's fine But yes, I could do with a quiet life.

[MamaFern]

*hug* helen & skye.
so scary!

ngaio is extremely accident prone, but he never seems to get hurt. she must have a guardian angel.
she is learning to ride a tricycle and really loves it & wants a bike with training wheels now, so im sure she will be getting some more bigger bumps and bruises. im going to buy the kids each a bike for our moving to the new house/town gift. its the perfect place to ride bikes, well, save the giant hill that connects us from downtown, but its really just a 5 minute walk up & down (i would not be letting her ride down. she would surely die)

Melw: good luck with the house stuff. you will find the perfect place for your little family! steveston is a neet place, so that sounds really cool.. i hesitate when it comes to complicated family stuff, but maybe not all families are as...complex as mine.

QOC: happy belated anniversary : and im so sorry about the loss of your friend/teacher


Timothy & elwynn & ngaio are going away in the middle of june to a funeral. Timothie's uncle (who was a foster baby & later adopted at 16 months by his grandparents) died while we were in kaslo. His truck stalled on the train tracks while he was driving a friend home and then his friend couldn't get out of his seat belt (not sure the details) he was trying to help him and the train hit them and he died, but his friend survived. Its a tragedy for his family, especially his grandparents as he was the youngest and he spent quite a few years as the only child once all the other kids had left home. i only met him once, but i feel very sad for them. death is never easy to deal with and this is really the closest death that has affected me ever, except for when my gramas 2 sisters died, and different times and in their 70's/80's
Timothies grandfather is taking it very hard, he is in his late 80's and the sweetest man you could ever know. it makes me cry thinking about him being so sad.


on our front: im going to vancouver for a week on saturday. my BFF lives in holland and is coming "home" for a few weeks, so im taking E out of school (for another week. im the worst mama ever. he misses so much school) my mom is coming up on thursday to visit for a few days then take us back with her. i get to shop at ikea and a few places to find much needed items for our new house. i will be back the 6th or 7th of june, and then only a few weeks left of E's school and my daycare job then we move. Im soooo excited. i can hardly sleep at night.

im getting so much done house wise, yesterday ngaio and i cleaned out her room. only keeping the special, nice things..mostly what i, or my auntie annie have given/made her.. we went through her clothes and took out 2 huge bags to go to the thrift shop, a bunch of stuff that she had outgrown to be passed onto rue, and she is left with only a laundry basket each of tops and bottoms, and a few dresses hung up, socks and undies in a basket and jammies.. its still a lot, but a lot less than when we started ( i keep her clothes in clear bins with lids, so moving thyem will be a matter of snapping the lids on and throwing them into the truck!. her desk, which was mine when i was little built by my dad, needs sanding and painting, but other than that it will take me all of 10 minutes to pack her few special things up and take her bed apart..

i did the same with my room, and im not taking my bed, so im going to take it apart soon and give it to my sister. rue's clothes are decluttered, my few possessions are pared down to special things, ostly nature inspired, crystals rocks, a few books.. all toys/games/crafts stuff in the house we cleaned out to the really nice, special ones (only a very few plastic things left!)

i still have my clothes, which for the most part are stuck in a closet blocked by boxes of other stuff, so im living out of a laundry basket and kind of liking it. my new house has lots of closets and im thinking of getting rid of most of my clothes and just keeping what i really like & wear. summer is coming and you dont need much and i can rebuild my wardrobe there, they have a great thrift shop ( i found a brand new, perfectly my size dark brown MEC organic cotton hoodie for $3.00 while i was there!) and elwynn's to go, his room has been taken over by timothty till we leave so its harder to get stuff done in there..

and then my kitchen is next to be purged. im really happy that im going to be all set and ready well before moving day. i dont actually want to start packing till closer to the end of june though. i know its stressful for the kids, so i want to let us just be here a while longer, soak up the idea of leaving to go so far away from my sister & the place we have lived the last 2 years (my sister is pretty choked i think, though she hasnt said anything & was planning herself to move to kelowna in the fall..which is only about 3 hours from kaslo)

so yeah. another fern ramble.

[MelW]

I you rambles, Fern. It's great to hear about your plans for your new adventures in Kaslo.

Helen, I'm glad that Skye is okay. How is the new house?

We're still in limbo about the house, or how the logistics will work. Not a big surprise, considering that the funeral was only last Friday and the burial was delayed until yesterday. I'm mostly just relieved to be going forward in life- Matt's grandfather's illness and death has taken a lot of energy over the past seven weeks, not to mention that we had a new baby!! Seeing the funeral and death through Neela's observations has been wonderful. She was very confused about the casket and concerned that Papa "forgot to take his body with him when he died". And her next question was whether he was wearing any clothes in there

Neela is spending the next couple of days with my MIL while Nora and I accompany Matt on a trip to Ottawa. Neela is so excited about her time with MIL and another family friend while we're gone- I think I might miss her more than she'll miss me. She seems so mature in the past little while- offering to help out with me and the baby. She loves being a big sister and is very protective of Nora, especially with strangers.

[flapjack]

Oh Mel, she sounds lovely.

Fern, rambles are nice. Don't get rid of too much though: it's cheaper to keep than replace, and just because a thrift store shows up a gem of a find once doesn't mean it'll do the same thing twice. Sooner or later, your luck will run out (it's sods law.) I'm so sorry for your loss (and to Timothy, too.)

[spughy]

Mel, I hope Neela retains her awesomeness for a good long time!!!

Fern, I hope the move goes well for you!

Helen - yikes!

Rowan discovered the bag of winter clothes in the back of our closet, and has subsequently fallen in love with her snowpants and wants to wear them everywhere. I dragged her out of them for our nature walk yesterday, but I can't think of a truly good reason (beyond mummy's embarrassed) for her not to wear them to playgroup. I only hope it is stinking hot in the room (which is not unusual on nice sunny days like today) and she gets uncomfortable quickly. Oh, and she won't wear anything underneath them either. I know letting her go out in them is the right parenting decision, but I feel silly walking around with a kid in snowpants.

[MelW]

bumping...

spughy, I can totally see the snow pants being an issue here, too. Last winter it was a pair of beaded sandals of mine (aka "the sparkly sandals") that Neela wore everywhere. Like to the community garden, and the supermarket. She convinced me that she shouldn't have to wear socks with them, "because they'll get wet in the puddles". We got some seriously dirty looks in the supermarket, but Neela insisted her feet weren't cold. And I made her stand outside in them for 10 minutes before we left to make sure.

Our trip was good. It was very hard to get simple food for the allergy diet while on the road, so I did have one horrendous fussy evening with Nora. (I think apples/apple juice are a big problem for her). But otherwise she travelled like a trooper, let me take in a couple of presentations at the conference. And she got in to both of the bars where the poetry readings were held The first was more of a pub on campus, but the second was truly a bar with a room upstairs for special events. I got a couple of funny looks, but nobody asked us to leave. The bartender even came up to say hello and ask how old she was.

[spughy]

Originally Posted by MelW

bumping...

And she got in to both of the bars where the poetry readings were held The first was more of a pub on campus, but the second was truly a bar with a room upstairs for special events. I got a couple of funny looks, but nobody asked us to leave. The bartender even came up to say hello and ask how old she was.

Really?????? Duuuuuude. Wow. NOBODY gets into the pubs here with a baby, we've all tried. Do they know they could lose their liquor license? (Stupid, yes - happens, yes. It was actually a question on the "Serving it Right" test.) An Irish friend of mine went on a spectacular rant at the doorperson at the "Irish Times" pub here when they wouldn't let her in with her 5-month-old baby - over there, you can totally take kids into pubs, as God intended. Glad your trip went well!

We got a new couch, yay! Our old one was suffering from cat and child abuse (cat had scratched front side of both arms to shreds, child had exploited a tiny rip and pulled most of the upholstery off the top of one arm.) It was a bit of an embarrassment. I'm not house-proud or a snob or anything - most of our furniture is from Ikea and I'm just fine with that - but furniture that's actually falling apart is a bit much. So I went out yesterday and got a new one. Yup, just like that. I shopped around but the one I settled on was in stock, so the old one is out in the yard right now, being broken up by DH into firewood & stuff, and the new one is relaxing into its new home

[MelW]

Originally Posted by spughy

Really?????? Duuuuuude. Wow. NOBODY gets into the pubs here with a baby, we've all tried. Do they know they could lose their liquor license? (Stupid, yes - happens, yes. It was actually a question on the "Serving it Right" test.) An Irish friend of mine went on a spectacular rant at the doorperson at the "Irish Times" pub here when they wouldn't let her in with her 5-month-old baby - over there, you can totally take kids into pubs, as God intended. Glad your trip went well!

Perhaps it's because we were with some Irish folks, and the readings were to promote an anthology of Irish and Canadian poetry. When I had asked about this issue before the trip, the (Irish) man who edited the book was a bit puzzled. I just went in with the group and never asked, and was never asked to leave. Perhaps Ottawa is more relaxed than the west coast, though that seems unlikely given the number of bureaucrats around. I think we just got lucky

Congrats on the new couch! We have lived with loveseats and futons forever, but have talked about getting a "real" couch for years. It's become a joke about buying a couch being an adult rite of passage- one day we will buy a couch and know we are truly grown up. But then we find other things to spend our money on.

Neela is dancing right now around the house naked singing about being "a so punk ballerina"

[MamaFern]

ug. im in vancouver with the stomach flu. rue puked half the way here in the car and all of last night.. and i was so sick by about 8:00 that i couldnt really take care of her and it was horrible. we were just two puking girls. and we both ended up falling asleep in a dirty pukey bed at 5am because i was just way too out of it to find clean sheets in a house where i hardly know anymore. not a great way to start a visit.. she seems to be feeling muich better and im just mildly queezy and weak feeling..probably pass on our bug to the family which sucks. im such a bad house guest.

will write more later.

[MelW]

I hope you're feeling better, Fern.

It's looking like we might move in the fall, but to rent the house instead of buy into it. I think we're going to get a bigger space for less money than our current rent, and be able to save more towards a down-payment for our own place in a couple of years. They're still slooowly working out the details, but it looks more likely.

[Gunter]

hey mamas,

just checking in to say that i have baby fever something horrible. it's consuming me to the point that i am browsing baby names on the latest DDC. What is wrong with me? I have NEVER wanted to be preggo or have another child this bad.

In other news, ez is clingy right now (snuggling me as i write before going to bed) and awesome. Growing up and all that jazz.

bux is walking and said, "cracker" today when she wanted one.

i love being a mom right now. it's kinda amazing this past month, actually how much i have enjoyed them and been capable of patience.

i'm still a doula and working for a HB midwife. i got my hair cut short today by my friend's mom.

off to read and catch up on you all. helen- did i see you are preggers? yay!

if anyone wants to move to my neighborhood in NC, there are some great little houses for sale. and, lots of other great MDC mamas and neighbors around here! come on over!

[flapjack]

Gunter, the Feb 08 DDC is having a pregnancy epidemic. (Me, Dea, SmokeyLo, CicelyM and MommytoAustin are all up the duff, and a few more are trying. Oh, and Dea has twins.) You're not alone, you're just part of a wider trend. And yes, I am 12 weeks and 1 day pregnant, and I feel like total CRAP! How can I make it through the first trimester with barely a quease, and then hit 12 weeks and just want to die? (That's exaggerating. It started at 11, but still...)

Oh, and when I told my DH I wanted to eat something and didn't know what, he made a, erm, adult proposition that would get me banned if I went into more detail And then laughed hilariously when I threw up at the very idea. He's having the next one, I swear it. Seriously, part of my transfer birth plan is going to involve the words no c-section unless you do a tubal while you're at it.

Good to hear life is good Buxton and Ez sound adorable.

[MelW]

Originally Posted by flapjack

Oh, and when I told my DH I wanted to eat something and didn't know what, he made a, erm, adult proposition that would get me banned if I went into more detail And then laughed hilariously when I threw up at the very idea.

Sorry you're feeling so cruddy, Helen. I hope it eases up soon!

gunter, it's great to hear from you. I'm glad the family is so wonderful

[Queen of Cups]

Okay, mamas, I just took a huge step... I had a consultation today and I now have an appointment to have an IUD inserted one week from today. Its a big step, but its nice to know that I won't ever have to be on hormonal birth control again. The paragard (copper) IUD is good for up to 12 years, so I won't have to think about birth control again till I'm 41 years old! DH is very sure he doesn't want more kids... I'm not as sure, but I am enjoying moving on to the stage of mothering school-age kids and not sure I'm really up for starting the whole cycle again, you know? But, its still a tough decision to do something so... permanent, even though it is fairly easily reversible. It still feels pretty permanent!

So, that's my big news. I think I'll celebrate with a margarita or two tonight!

[spughy]

Margaritas are always a good idea, Jen. Congrats on the IUD, I hope it works out for you! I had one for a long time, pre-Rowan and post-Rowan, and it was great.

We had a big day yesterday - Rowan got a REAL haircut. She was inspired by Brynn - I was looking at Amy's blog and Rowan wanted to see pictures and she was completely enraptured by Brynn's new haircut and she wanted one just like it. Unfortunately the hairdresser was a bit too tentative and didn't take enough off - Rowan's hair is really fine and it needed to be shorter to have some body, but it's still really, really cute. She did really well in the chair too, only saying "I'm tired, mummy" at the end and not squirming or anything.

[MelW]

So strange...I replied to this thread earlier, but it disappeared. Or I imagined writing a reply (probably more likely, since I've started to need to check my e-mail outbox to see what was answered and what was only "mentally replied to").

Brynn and Rowan both have such cute haircuts!! Neela has still only had a little trim of split ends, and is planning to grow it "down to my bum". We've settled on braids for the summer to keep it out of her face and stay cool.

Jen, I'm considering a copper IUD, too. Let me know how you like it!

Life is good here. The girls are so sweet together- check out my bedtime success from Sunday!

[MamaFern]

mel: that is SO sweet. moments like that make life so beautiful. thanks for sharing.:

sarah: rowan looks adorable. i love the short pixie hair.
amy: likewise. she looks totally different! but really sweet.

ive been planning to cut ngaio's hair again but just below her ears.its getting long, but i keep her bangs short. with the bump on her head i hesitate to cut it too short..not sure if it would show more or not.

anypne elses 3 year olds being terrible horrible? Ngaio is having a rough time of it. i think its likely the moving and we had a good snuggle and talk about it this evening.. i hope that it helps her. she has been soooo whiney and emanding and sour.

im just busy packing and playing at the local lake as much as possible. i loove swimming and i feel so lucky to have such nice places to splash around.
ngaio is swimming too! she loves the water like i do.

[flapjack]

Good luck with the IUD, Jen. It didn't work for me, but I had high hopes for it- and therefore, I will have high hopes for yours, too.

Fern, yeah, Skye is being a handful. Screaming, mostly. The lake sounds lovely

Spughy, I love Rowan's hair (and Amy, if you're reading, I love Brynn's too) It's funny, Skye has been asking for short hair recently, too.

[barcelona]

i've been reading along, as always, but have been too exhausted to reply.
just swamped with a bunch of yoga stuff to finish up my teaching certification, which will be over this weekend! : and the pregnancy thing, of course is probably making me more tired than normal.

but anyway, i wanted to chime in and say that, yes, my three year old has been pretty difficult lately. he is either melting my heart with his sweetness and loveliness or he is just doing a lot of screaming and demanding and crying, etc. i'm not sure what it is about, but i am glad to know i am not the only one. i keep thinking it might have to do with the baby coming?, although when we talk about it, he seems very excited and happy about it.

and spughy and amy, i adore those sweet little pixie haircuts so so sweet!

mel, that pic of your girls is precious!!! do you all share a family bed? or, i think i remember that neela sleeps in her own bed, in her own room. anyway, if you do a family bed part time, how is that going? we are planning to do that.

how are all those babies doing?

jen, congrats on the IUD, and margaritas sound good to me. sounds like things are going really well for you and your sweet family right now.

fern, i am so so excited for you and the upcoming move! kaslo sounds wonderful.

helen, how are you feeling??
who else is pregnant right now?

i am 5.5 months and measuring pretty big. not to worry, right?


sorry to be so sporadic on here
checking in always, though, and here in spirit , if not in words.