Weekend Rewind... on Thursday

Wow, the days are soo long lately and come evening after a workout I am done in and have no desire to blog. So I really just need to make some time for this, because I want to document this time in our life.    

 

 Noah starts swim lessons this weekend, so on Friday I took the kids swimming at the pool where Noah will have lessons with M's Mom to help get him used to the new place. Both of them loved it! I couldn't get over how well Em did with it too!! I think we are going to go as a family this Friday again, but as a family!     

 Saturday morning we decided on a last minute market trip. I got myself a new jewelry candle with the smell of peaches and cream! I don't usually love candles and am a fan of scentsy, BUT, this is my second candle purchase lately, with the other one being A Thousand Wishes by Bath and Body works! We got some fresh meat from the butcher while we were at it and Mr. Noah picked out some jelly beans! We stopped to get Em's passport picture done - poor girls pic is not soo flattering! But who's is? We grabbed lunch and came home to eat! And that is about when Noah had a complete and udder melt down over his bun being crooked on his sandwich. His emotions are soo crazy right now, and this is a whole new thing, aka the threenager coming out in full force! Wow and it made me realize that I have NO clue how to handle this yet, as every approach has failed so far. Parenthood has been pretty seamless, heck twos were a breeze, but this is a whole new ballgame and M and I need to learn the rules apparently... or reinforce ours!!

  I did order some new books to give me some strategies to pull out of my back pocket when needed! I know this is typical for his age, but for some reason it doesn't make it any easier to deal with! 

 

 That evening M's parents came over to watch the kids while M and I went to the firemans Christmas party. Noah ended up getting wind of where we were going and was then set right off for the night. He did not a great night at all, which was surprising since he loves spending time with Grandpa and Grandma. We came home around 8, Noah was in bed and Em was half asleep, but fighting it. Luckily we were able to get her right down. The rest of the evening was spent worrying on my my part on how to handle this new tantrum thing. Wow.   

If only kennels were an option eh? I mean he loves this thing and whenever we can't find him, this is where he is:  

 

 Sunday we spent the day as a family, we got some housework done, and we tried a new recipe for dinner with our active fryer. It was chicken, tomato paste and carrots, served with rice. It was pretty good and we were really impressed with how tender the chicken was and it only used two teaspoons of oil!     

After the kids went down, M mounted the new TV and I cleaned the couch with my Christmas gift, a new bissel little green machine. 

How have I lived without this thing? It is soo great!!! I got half the couch done while trying it out and will do the rest maybe tonight!! 

 

Monday morning I took both kids to the doctors and they both got a clean bill of health, no colds and no ear infections!! Music to this mans ears after 2 months of it! 

When we got home, my cousin had dropped of gifts for the kids from my aunt. Em loves her new books!!

They both love Noah's gift, it is a fabric reuseable sticker set!! 

We got our lush order in as well, soo much fun! I haven't used lush products since I was in high school. I decided to order online, because I really can't stand the smell of the store, it is just too much, so I was ordering blindly, but I am impressed with what I got and they threw in a sample of the "honey I washed the kids" soap! 

Yesterday I was brave and took both kids to the passport office in London to get Em's passport. It was super busy, the room was packed, but luckily our wait wasn't too bad. My Mom met up with us, although Noah has been super clingy lately and waited with me anyways. I seem to recall he was like this before he turned 2, as well as the bad behaviour, so hopefully this will just be a short phase to transition to 3! But he did do great yesterday with only 2 melt downs when it came to leaving the mall and lunch. But overall he did great and met a new little friend at the mall that he played with. 

Our afternoon wasn't too smooth with only a 30 minute car nap, but we survived and today is a new day!
 

Emilya 8 Months

Eating: Emilya is getting better with eating, although this past month we have slowed down on food introductions for some reason, I will blame the holidays. These posts pretty much recap the 8th month instead of the beginning of the month, but they are getting done and documented. Em is still nursing about 5 times a day. She gets a bottle of pumped milk in the morning, nurses before morning nap, then again before afternoon nap, either before or after supper and before bed. I am still pumping when I get up in the morning, so she can get a morning bottle. We were going to stop that, but in all honesty I want her to stay familiar with bottles, so it works for now. We plan to introduce homo milk in her 9th month, like we did with Noah.

Food she has has tried this past month:   

Bread
Eggs
Pear Juice

Chicken
Cantaloupe
Cheese
Cottage Cheese




I have pretty much set up a food introduction schedule for her at this point for the month of January.

Sleeping: Emilya is still a great sleeper. She is napping twice a day, but we don't quite have a consistent schedule going as for times. Emilya will often have a short 30 minute up to an hour nap and then a longer nap up to 2 hours. She is going to bed around 7:30 and waking around 7 AM. She must have her blankets and her lovey.

Clothing: Emilya is wearing 9 months in pretty much everything, with the exception of 6 month onesies. Through the middle of the month she began to outgrow the 6 month onesies and is now beginning to outgrow 9 month pants. With shirts, I have been putting her in 12 months depending on the size! Baby girl is long. Sleepers are all 9 month and a size 3 diaper. 

Features: Emilya has blue eyes and blonde hair still. Her dark hair at the back is gone and her hair is officially JUST long enough to put a clip in.

  

Weight: 7 Months:  17 lbs 12 oz
               8 Months:  18 lbs 15 oz   29 inches

                             

                    

What The Doctor Had To Say: We didn't see the doctor this month, but we did see our audiologist. Emilya's ear outgrew her first impression, so we had a new mould made! She is doing pretty good with letting us put in and take out the hearing aid often, although life with the hearing aid will be a lot simpler when she isn't nursing, as we take it out for that. We haven't been able to get anymore testing completed at this age, although we keep trying! The testing should get better around 10 months.

  

 

Nicknames: Emma, Em, Ems, Emmy Baby, Little Miss, Littlest Squish, Baby girl, Baby Bunny, Emilya Hope, Sis

   

Big Brother Update: Noah continues to do great with her. He just loves entertaining her, although sharing can be tough sometimes. He also likes to micromanage what she plays with and how she plays, which we are working on. He will often sing to her, dance for her, or help us out with her. I love how interested he is in her and how well they play together for the most part.

Likes: army crawling - she refuses to get up on her hands and knees and relies on her army crawl to get her from point A to point B and she's fast! She loves her brother, the dogs, blankets, her lovie, little people play sets, trucks and dinky cars. She enjoys baths and snuggles, patty cake, abc's, twinkle twinkle, and dancing.

   

Dislikes: her face being washed, her brother scaring her and being in the dark in the car.

  

Personality: Emilya is pretty much the happiest baby. This past month we got a new puppy, which took some quick training for Maggie to learn that Emilya is not another puppy. We celebrated her first Christmas, which was soo much fun and she didn't shed a tear! She did quite well for Christmas getting new books, new clothes, new toys, her first dolls, Santa brought her a flashlight toy to help with dark car rides. She was not afraid of Santa at all. Em said her first words, "Hi" and "Dadda". She has 6 teeth, with 2 more coming in. Emilya has learned how to sit herself up, but so far has no interest in walking or pulling up on things. We moved her out of her bucket seat and into a rear facing car seat.

2017 Goals

I will say that before having kids M and I didn't really set goals, we had ideas and projects to work on, but this year we actually made goals. Since having kids life has been great, we are the happiest we have been, sometimes it still feels unreal. 

 M made his list which stemmed around being more positive, and positive inforcement with the kids. He is also going to be more patient when it comes to pictures and actually begin to embrace them himself - he's back on Instagram and already posted a pic!! He is also going to get into shape, because we both agree, we feel our best when we are healthy.   

Moving on to mine. PATIENCE!!! Yes, I suck at it, and I'm realizing how hard having the shortage makes life, especially with kids. I need to slow down, and be patient. This is going to be hard, but I have seen a difference soo far in my practice over the last week. This should help me bear the threenager phase right? Any advice on that? 

    I need to update the blog header to add in Emilya and I need to figure out a blogging schedule that I can actually complete. I'm leaning towards three times a week. I will say using this new app to blog with is making life a whole lot easier, but I still feel so very far behind on posts but just struggle with finding time or better yet making time. I do enjoy documenting our life, so I am not at a point where I am willing to let it go yet, although I will say, it is not at all what it used to be. I am following less people, trying to comment when I can and doing my best not to get too overwhelmed! Although I hardly get any comments anymore, I blog mainly for me anyways and documenting our life. 

   I need to get better with time management. By the end of the day, I'm tired and just want to veg, however, I am not getting as much done around the house with the kids, so that leaves evenings or weekends.  

 I need to get organized and have actually come up with a plan to put it into place! We are going to go room to room organizing and if it doesn't have a home, and can't find one, it is going!  

 Our house goals this year are a new closet in the mud room, along with new garden doors and a new kitchen window, both of which are ordered already. We are also going to replace the great room/kitchen/foyer floors, as they are slowly falling apart since the roof Reno. We are discussing a few decking ideas around the hot tub, but nothing is set in stone.    

Now that Em isn't an itty bitty baby anymore, I want to start getting out with the kids more. I wish we didn't have to travel so far for fun things, however I wouldn't give up our quaint village either. So we are going to plan a couple different fun activities every month to do either as a family or with the kids and I. 

   Every year I have the same goal... to be the best me I can be. This pertains to every aspect in my life. A better mom, a better wife, better health. We are back to working out, starting with 21 day fix right off the hop. I have quite a bit of dental work coming up to help me achieve the smile I want, which will also help my confidence. It's all pretty much small monthly goals that will sum up to a bigger picture. I would like to work on some self development, making sure I am still working on being the person I want to be.   

 We plan to have Maggie trained by the end of the year. We put a lot of effort and work into training our dogs and that won't change even now with kids in the picture. What M and I have both noticed is how quickly Maggie is learning. She has hardly any accidents in the house anymore at only 9 weeks she already asks to go out! She is doing better with the kennel and with Em, but we need to work on her jumping up on Noah. It is so amazing seeing the bond between Noah and Maggie and we plan to involve him in helping us train her.    I think that sums up everything!!

Here is to hoping 2017 is just as good to us as the last 4 years have been. 

New Years Weekend

The holidays were sooo much fun, but man, I am happy to have them done and over with and get back to routine. With the new year starting, M and I have been assessing some things we want to work on in the new year, both as a couple, individually and as a family.  I will likely do a whole new post on our goals for the year. But let's rewind to our weekend shall we?    We got the cutest Mommy and Me matching hats made by Christy!! She did a great job and Em just absolutely loves wearing hers and laughs when I wear mine at the same time! This is our first matching set!

 

 

Friday we decided to pack the kids up some indoor fun at the farm, so we packed up the bouncy castle, and the plasma cars and headed to the farm to play and have lunch!

 

We also decided to put away Emma's bucket seat and install the new car seat. Boy do I miss the easiness of the bucket seat!! But Em is much happier in the car now!! 

 

 

This girl loved them bouncy castle:

 

 

And Noah was torn between flying drones, racing Grandpa on the plasma cars and bouncing and sliding on his castle. 

 

 

After we got the kids down for a nap, I headed into town for groceries and well a few extras... like new towels, new boots and clothes for Em:

 

 

Saturday morning we had an item to pick up from the Ikea pick up location, so we stopped at costco too. Of course we took my car because the car seat for Em hasn't come in the mail yet. The shelving unit boxes hardly fit and then to make matters worse, my husband convinced me that we needed a 58 inch tv.... after a small domestic in the parking lot, we got it all in and if it was safe... I would have taken a picture, but a box may or may not have been over the kids seats... we drove home very carefully!! But look at these two sharing a shopping cart:

 

 

We really didn't have much planned for New Years, we went for a family walk before bed and then after the kids were down M and I tidied up and then played monopoly!! 

 

 

New Years Day Noah and I did a little baking. His new paw patrol apron I made him is a little big, but it will fit him for a long time!! 

 

 

We have been having issues with my PVR, and suprisingly they sent out a tech on New Years Day. I ended up getting a new one, but of course they say they are coming between 8-12 and didn't come until 11:30. I really wanted to get the kids to the farm again to play in shop, but the morning obviously didn't go as planned. So we packed a picnic lunch and went anyways.

 

 

Grandma and Grandpa showed up just as we were finishing lunch and had a little play too!! 

 

The boys flying drones:

 

 After nap we got the kids ready to goto a little New Years Party with friends. We kept it simple with just pizza, but the kids had fun! 

 

 

We have started a new earlier bedtime for the kids, so we put that in place as well. So far it's going good and Noah is not waking any earlier, so he is gaining a little extra sleep. Soo crazy how kids have a magic bedtime hour. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All About Maggie

Deciding to get a dog was not an easy decision by any means. I know I have mentioned it in the past but I had a lot of fears in getting another dog and overall I wasn't sure that my heart was ready for another dog. It's been the topic of many conversations back and forth between Mike and I and we had pretty much decided we would wait until after vacation in the new year. We discussed getting a rescue dog, but we decided with having the kids now, it just isn't the right time, as you never know what they have been exposed to or how they react with children - just too unpredictable for this life stage. 

 So you are probably wondering how we ended up with one now? Well Miss Gracie was just down right depressed. She has lost weight, mopes, eats very little and just has no will in her. We were actually concerned that had we waited a few more months AND gone away on vacation that she may not make it. It was only getting harder and harder to watch her daily.  

   It started out with just looking for litters being born and then it quickly came into okay what breed are we going with? Obviously we love golden retrievers, but they require quite a bit of maintenance. We were leaning towards a lab, as they don't quite have the same hair maintenance. Then we had to decide how far we willing to travel for a pup. We couldn't get over the price of dogs now! It blows my mind how much people ask for cross breeds, yet alone pure bred. Clearly we haven't bought a dog in quite some time. I spoke to a couple different breeders of both labs and golden retriever/lab cross, but ultimately we came across the lab shepherd ad. I was a little hesitant, as I am not a shepherd fan, but agreed to consider them. We ended up setting up an appointment to go see them that same day, as they were only 20 minutes away.   

 I was happy to hear that the mother is mostly lab herself and the dad is pure bred lab. The Mom had a litter of 12!! We had 4 girls to choose from. We did want a boy, but weren't against a girl if we liked them. We took both kids with us and saw all 4 of the remaining pups, all black little fur balls at 4 weeks old!

Picking a puppy is not an easy task, especially with children. I felt like we were there forever. Miss Maggie stood out to us, because she didn't just come running out at as, she stayed back and assessed, then she approached Noah first and then came running to Mike and I and was already trying to play with Noah, where as the other pups aside from one other were already uninterested. Maggie picked us, just as much as we picked her. Maggie was also the only girl with white on her chest out of the 4 as well.   

 So we picked Maggie and then had a few weeks left before we could get her. Noah didn't quite understand why we went to see them and was sad that we didn't bring one home. For the next few weeks he kept bringing up the puppy, asking Daddy if we could get one and then Santa. The breeder was sending weekly pictures of our pup, which was great to see her grow!!

We decided that we didn't want to give Maggie to the kids on Christmas, because we wanted the excitement of Christmas to be just on Christmas, so we picked up Maggie on the 23rd and surprised the kids with her then. Noah wasn't to sure of her until we took her out of the box and then he was soo excited and the playing began. Gracie was taken back, but interested. She didn't growl or get upset, but rather undecided on the new addition. Well that didn't take long to change.

They are the best of friends already today. Our Gracie has that twinkle in her eye again, is playing and is just soo much happier. Maggie is pretty good with the kids, although we have some work to do with nipping and jumping, but overall, she is great. She is already walking great on a leash and asking to outside! She sleeps all night in bed with us and we are crate training for when we leave the house and even that is getting better.

Maggie has been a great addition to our family and yes it can be stressful at times, but it was stressful before her at times too. As far as training her, we will have more time to dedicate to her training over these slow months for M, rather than in the spring when he is busy.

Welcome to the family Mags!