There is no such thing ...

Hudson has never been a wonderful napper. He is a good overnight sleeper, but naps have been a struggle since he was tiny. Until he was about 1, I was lucky if I got anything more then 25 minutes out of him.

You can imagine my joy then, when yesterday he napped for 3.5 hours!

It was divine. I had not one but two cups of tea, and pretty well read half a book. Pure bliss I tell you. Bliss!

Fast forward to a couple of minutes past 11:30 PM....

I heard a creak of the floor and then a loud bang as Hudson's bedroom door slammed against the adjacent wall.

"I come mommy"

Then another crash -this time our bedroom door. Before I could open my eyes, a stuffed bear landed on my face. A tiny elbow jabbed me in the ribs. A knee in my stomach.

"Up mommy" "Up"

You've got to be kidding me.

I plucked the bear and the child out of the sea of bedsheets and pillows and carried him back across the hall. Tucked him in, and returned to my bed.

For the next 2 hours, Karl and I took turns plucking, carrying and tucking in. And each time, the creak, the bang (times two) and that darn bear.

At around 2 am I dispatched Karl to the basement. One of us needed to have our wits about us in the morning.

The creaking and banging continued until about 3 AM, until I finally gave in and let Hudson lay in our bed beside me. As a sign of gratitude, he proceeded to serenade me with hits like "twinkle, twinkle" and " itsy... spider up...down..... out....". Complete with hand gestures.

Sometime shortly after 4 AM, we both passed out.

No such thing as a free 3.5 hour nap I tell you..... no such thing.

Jaws

A couple of days ago, I noticed a small scratch on the pinkie of Hudson's left foot.

M: "What happened over here, Hudson?"
H: " Boo boo"
M " Well, I can see that it is a boo boo.  How did you get that boo boo?"
H: "Shruck" (or something like that)
M: "A TRUCK ran over your foot?"
H: "No mommy" he sighs and pauses dramatically.  "SHRUCK"

M: "Come again?!"

Hudson grunts, walks over to his Thomas the Train table and picks up the aquarium piece with a little shark inside.

M: "A shark got your foot?"
H: "Yaaaa"

Bathroom Reno

Sometime this summer, we are going to have our upstairs bathroom re-done. Well, not re-done completely, just a little face lift. I have been searching for inspiration for months. Today, I found these....

             

I think this may be a little out of our budget, and I am not sure the neigbourhood is ready to.. ehm... get to know us this well !?!?.... but WOW. A girl can dream, no?

If you like, you can see more of this bathhouse (yup, that's what they are calling it) as well as other gems here.

A completely (list) unrelated update

Hi there! Remember me? One word - Cold.

A nasty, nasty cold.

This is what we have been up to.

Two weekends ago:

Hudson celebrated his 2nd birthday in the company for his mom and dad, both sets of grandparents, uncle Mike, and not one but 2 birthday cakes!

Oh yes, and balloons and lots of presents :)

We also went skating which was a bonafide disaster. See this picture below? Notice the "I am soooo not impressed with this whole thing" look on Hudson's face? That was as good as it got. If anyone heard about about a disheveled looking woman dragging/carrying a hot chocolate soaked two year old who screamed "Daddy! Daddyyyyyyy. Daaaaaaadddyyyy!" and "No, No.... go away" the entire way home..... Yup - that sure was us!

 

Moral of the story - I think we will stick to sledding for now : )

This past weekend;

we went to the Childrens' Museum

and created some art of our own.

 

And.... that's about it :)

In list related news - I have nothing. 

No wait, I did stat re-reading a book. "Fall On Your Knees" by Ann-Marie MacDonald. I read it like a million years ago, but in 2010 it made the Canada Reads list, which made me want to re-read it. Fifty pages in, I am really glad that I dusted it off.

xo, M

 

A Makeover!

Times two, none the less.

Alright, so I know that my little header here will probably never be short listed for any awards, but it took me half an hour to make. Using....please do not laugh... Microsoft Publisher, 2004 I think. In my defense, that's all I have at my disposal. Did I mention it took half an hour? Of time that my boss technically paid for. Just saying.

I snagged that fun font off this really great blog called "How About Orange". I did not read ALL the details, but I am pretty sure it was free. Like 99% sure. I am not even sure if I am allowed to link my blog to others like this, so if one day this entire link magically disappears.....

And as for make over number 2....

This is what our office looked like last weekend.

And voila!

There are lots of things that need to be done still. For example, notice that none of those pictures are actually hung? And that frame with the four black and white photos. Ultrasound pictures. Of Hudson. We put them there "temporarily". Hudson turned 2 yesterday. I WILL replace them before I hang that frame up. I promise! I am also not 100% sure why ALL the curtain rods in our house were fastened to the window frames (by the previous owner), but will re-post once that issue has been fixed. And once the shelves are installed in the closet (to the right of the desk).


One thing about doing any sort of a project with a baby in the house is that any work does not start until about 7 PM once we are all home from work and fed, and needs to end by 8:30 before Hudson goes to bed. Frustrating? Just a bit.


Anyways, let me know what you think!


M

Happy Birthday Hudson!

My little monkey turned TWO today!

2.3%

*warning: This post is a little wordy. I promise to work on that in the future.

I am seriously excited to tell you all about the progress on my (ok fine, OUR - Karl has been awesome and is completely embracing the idea -how lucky am I?!?) "Thirty before Thirty" list! So excited in fact, that I do not even know where to start! Eeek!

A little background info:
In 2009/10 we (and by that I mean mostly Karl, his dad and my dad) did a lot of boring but necessary upgrades to the house. Insulation and such. In the attic in the basement. This was a) quite costly b) a huge time suck c) very very messy. As much as we hated that, we do enjoy the impact it has had on our hydro bills.  Not to mention how much we love having a guestroom and an awesome playroom for Hudson. Oh and then there were all the govn't rebates, which actually paid for about  60% of it all. So really, I think we did OK! :)

But now... back to the future:

As you can probably tell from my list, 2011 is going to be the year of "prettyfying" (Karl's word - not mine) the house.

2011 - I love you already!

Thus far, we:

- Emptied out the office closet, sorted all the various bits and pieces of paperwork that's been piling up and got rid of one of the desks (the blue one).

- In order to empty out the office closet, we needed to find alternate storage for winter coats, sleeping bags and our formal wear. The coats and sleeping bags will now live in the laundry room closet. It used to have some pretty dilapidated shelves, so we took them out, installed a hanging bar. The coats and sleeping bags will stay there, the formal stuff will be moved into the bedroom closet once that is finished. For those of you who are familiar with the peculiarities of our home - I am speaking about the smaller closet - the one that used to have a chimney.

(For those of you who have no idea what I am talking about... When we bought the house the basement had this awful 4' x 7' fake stone covered, wood burning fireplace. If you looked up the chimney, you could see the skeleton of what once upon a time used to be a bird. And judging by the size - I am thinking a crow or something equally large. It was fantastic. When we (again, I mean mostly Karl) took it down we found that the wall in behind it was completely scorched. So was the part of the chimney flue that was IN our bedroom. Oh ... and... did I mention that in order to have a chimney, they geniuses who constructed it took simple sawed through a floor joist, causing my living room and bedroom to sag towards one another? I digress...sorry)

- Since we were already in the basement, Karl also managed to get all the post reno junk and tools out of the cold cellar, build a work bench for his shop and we are currently working on getting that back into working order.

It's amazing. We now have tons of "new" storage space and I can not wait to claim it all!

But wait... I am soo not done yet!

We also started installing some new shelving in the office...

That's right, my goodness... I completely forgot to mention my trip to IKEA this Sunday. The one where I spent the equivalent of the GDP of Somalia (go ahead, google it ... I was shocked) in under an hour. Yup, sure did! My poor little car was so weighted down on my way home I did not think I would ever make it up the escarpment!

So yes, new shelving! I will be posting pictures soon, I promise.

For now, here is the inspiration shot.



I think I am supposed to give credit to all my photos. You can find this item here


AND ... here are our brand new (to us) RECOVERED! CHAIRS! Fresh from the upholster ...

I am smitten.

Also, in other list related news - Karl and I had a date on Friday night! We went skating at the outdoor rink in front of Waterloo square and then out for dinner - and those are all the details you will get!

Oh yes, and I baked something new(ish) on Saturday. I may just need do a separate post about this later.

By my calculations, that means I am now 2.3% done with my list. But you know what? I am really looking forward to tackling the remaining 97.7%.

Hoping everyone's new year is off to a great start,

M

Looney Bin

After about two hours of trying to put Hudson down for a nap, Karl walks into the kitchen shaking his head...

K: "Someone really needs to invent a toddler swaddler"

M: "You mean like a straitjacket?"

K: "Ya"

K: "Something like that"

The universe has conspired against me!

My local swimming pool (Kitchener) - closed for renovations.

My other local swimming pool (Waterloo) - closed "due to unforeseen circumstances".

Blood clinic - does not open until 3:30 on Thursdays - the only day this week when I sort of had the time to go there (I was hoping to do this one during my lunch break).

:(

Oh by the way, can anyone recommend a good book for me to read? NOT "American Psycho". That one gave me nightmares. Twice now, the staff in my office have stared in a very special, made for my brain only, dream version of the book. Not cool.

The (not) shopping challenge update.

It kind of makes me want to cry laugh, but of all the things on my list, the (not) shopping challenge seems to have generated the most feedback. While my husband especially loved the idea of me handing over my visa, my co-workers all laughed when they heard about it. Most of my nearest and dearest simply do not believe that I am capable of such restraint.

And while it is true, that I am on first name basis with some of the retailers here in KW, I am pretty sure I am not alone. And, in my defense, I am also pretty sure that the shopping gene comes attached to the X chromosome as I have never met a woman who does not like to buy new stuff. Even my mom, who claims not to be much of a shopper seems in recent years to have succumbed to this guilty pleasure. (Over the holidays I had the pleasure of touring my parents walk in jacket and coats closet. Oh yes. You did read that correctly. Nothing. But. Jackets. And. Coats. A Walk. In. Closet. Full. It's awesome!).

Since posting this as one of my 30, I have spent far too much time devising a plan to make the most of this challenge. And to be perfectly honest, it is not so much the act of shopping itself, but the joy in my heart (and if you have ever busted out into an impromptu fashion show for your spouse, or sat on the couch and watched a movie sporting your brand new winter boots - you know what I am talking about) that comes from integrating some NEW into my closet. Inevitably however, that awesome feeling wears off and, when it does, last months coveted item inspires merely a yawn. And as soon as this occurs, inevitably back to the mall I go. Sound familiar? The worst part is that probably 3/4 of what I buy I could certainly do without. Which is exactly why I have included the (no) shopping challenge as a part of my thirty before thirty.

I used random.org to generate the month (just to make it as unbiased as possible) - it will be July. And, just as a little twist, I will be keeping track of my spending in the coming months (considering making the figure public - but I am not sure I am prepared to face that kind of reality. We'll see about that one). Once July comes around, I will make a donation of my average monthly spending to .....  I do not 100% know whom yet. Most likely it will be a non profit organization that will probably make much better use of that money than I seem to.

Any suggestions?

Mira

P.S. Sorry mom, for having outed you. Secretly, I am jealous of your collection!

Oh.. and my new boots....check out these babies

Happy Birthday...

... to my DAD!