Tuesday November 11th: thoughts

I'm sitting in my bedroom, where my new bed will be tomorrow morning. I'm so tired after working late, and then taking apart our old bed, and then packaging up our old mattress to send off to be recycled. I would put myself right to bed right now, except....well my bed is currently in pieces beside me. 

Parting with our current bed is pretty bittersweet, if you go for that nostalgic stuff; we won our bed 13 years ago at Ikea during a crazy contest!

During the contest we had to stay in our pajamas all day and lie in a bed in the Ikea bedroom section. We spent the day participating in random events (Build a size table blindfolded! Put a duvet cover on as fast as you can! Quick,switch  clothes with your partner under the covers!) and we came down to three finalists, where we won our mattress. It was an epic day, where I stood on a table in the cafeteria and sang my little heart out to try and win votes, Chris was told by a 6 year old girl that they had the same pajamas (he was wearing mine at this point), and it was such a great day of teamwork for Chris and I, who usually butt heads at every turn. 

So, goodbye little mattress. You served us well. You will be missed. 

Happy Tuesday!

Date nights these days

This is what date night looks like these days around my house: funny hats in the baby section of Target. Yup. These faces are the happy faces of parents that can wander through a store without chasing a toddler. Oh how times have changed. 

One of the major differences of having a baby is missing out on nights out alone with your partner. For the first year and a bit of being a new mom, I didn't miss going out as a couple much at all. I was tired, and breastfeeding, and all I wanted to do after Cillian went to bed was immerse myself in the Mindy Project, and read blogs about organization and food prep. I know, super glamorous, right?

Now that we are almost two years in, we are now at the point where we are trying to figure out what our life looks like with a toddler who thankfully finally sleeps 12 uninterrupted hours at night, which means we have all this time on or hands now, but no money for babysitters. 

So does anyone have a secret for how they are able to peel themselves away from stupid chores, and off the couch to "unwind" (which for me basically means putting on the West Wing and falling asleep at 8pm). Any tried and true tips on finding time to have "date nights" in your own home?

Happy Monday!

A Cillian minute

So this little dude is turning two in less than a month. It's craziness. So in honour of his 23 month here on earth, here are a few of my favourite details about my little man. 

Weight: teeny tiny little guy, at 23 months he's probably only 24 pounds. This is likely because he doesn't stop moving. Ever. He eats more than any kid in his daycare, I'm told every day they are amazed at how much he eats. This makes a mama proud. 

Favourite foods: pasta, hands down, is his favourite food. Sadly my pasta doesn't compare to his daycare cook Rosa's pasta. Is anyone surprised? That being said, he will still polish off at least two bowls of pasta at home, but at least three at daycare. He still adores avocados, strawberries, and apples, which is usually what I count towards his fruit and veggie intake every day. Any other fruit or veggie can usually be found on the floor beside his highchair, where he's likely tossed it when he didn't like it. Again, at daycare he apparently has eaten lettuce and broccoli (one of his former favourites!!) but at home he's all meat and carbs. Hotdogs and sausages are also favourites around here, and he delightfully refers to all of them as "hot diggities". Hee hee. 

Favourite toys: Cillian still doesn't stray far from Dolly the dog. He adores her and carries her around for most of the day at home, and she usually comes to and from daycare with him. These days she cuddles, reads books with us, and sometimes gets to enjoy some of Cillian's snacks and meals. It's pretty adorable watching him pretend to feed her. Second in toy line are trucks, mostly his faithful garbage truck and cement mixer which we got at a consignment store for a combined $5. They are big and easy to push around, and the garbage truck has a giant opening in the top and back to store things, where we can usually find a train or leftover plastic Easter egg inside.  Thomas the train and all his friends come in third for favourites, and they are usually found on adventures with his trucks. Lastly, his new favourite toy is Play-doh! This is a new one, and basically involves him shouting out things he wants me to make for him (Ball! Snake! Doggy! Banana!) as fast as I can make it. 

Daycare: He started at the beginning of July, and it's been a pretty long, painful transition. He still cries every single day I leave him, but he doesn't cry when I pick him up anymore, so I'm taking it as a good sign. We are hoping that we can transition him from fulltime to parttime daycare if a spot becomes available. His teachers are awesome, but I'm just so jealous that they get to spend all day with him and I have to go to work. We will see what the next few months brings. 

Every day when I pick him up I am told he is a comedian and it must be so fun to have him at home, since he makes them laugh every day. He is also obsessed with a little girl names Annie, likely because it's the only name he can say. He talks about her constantly, and apparently he does it at school too so they are calling her his girlfriend. It's pretty adorable. 

Bedtime and sleeping: Cillian FINALLY started sleeping through the night from 7-7 at 17 months. It was as if he was finally ready, nothing changed on our end. It's amazing. Our current bedtime routine is bath, four books, and then he helps daddy turn off the lights and put on his white noise. After daddy leaves he has a short snuggle with mummy on the couch and then into bed with a million of his stuffed friends, two Star Wars pillows and a muslin blanket. When you look at the monitor you can barely see what is baby in amongst it all. 

Mummy and Daddy's lives: this summer has been difficult transitioning from two days at work, to five days at work. At first the transit was killing me, but now we seem to have a bit of a rhythm happening, and it doesn't seem as bad. We still really want to move Cillian into two or three days at daycare instead of five, but if it takes a while for that to happen it wouldn't be the end of the world. 

So that's our 23 month old in a nutshell! 

Happy Sunday!

The waiting game

So blogging, huh?

 I remember it was almost exactly 12 months ago that I write my last post. I was just about to go back to work, pushing a trolley in the sky, and I was pretty miserable thinking about it. The thought of leaving my little boy, the idea of trying to coordinate childcare with Chris and a crazy flying schedule: it all seemed like too much. I didn't want my maternity leave to end, I couldn't figure out how to be a mom, a wife, a friend, and also go back into the workforce, and I definitely didn't want to blog about my inner misery. 

So now here I am, a year later, sitting in the waiting room of a children's hospital waiting for my darling nephew to come out of open heart surgery, and despite my current location, I'm ready to blog again. 

So, here goes nothing. Feel free to join me on this funny journey on this internet thing. 

Happy Thursday.