My grandma

I don't know if I mentioned this in another post, but I am living in the basement of my parents home.  Attached to the house is a granny suite and it holds just that, my granny. :) Some may go crazy from living with their parents with there little family of three and somedays it is crazy.  Other days it is a house full of love.  Raphaela and I often come up in the morning to Mom and Dad sitting at the kitchen table eating breakfast and reading the paper.  Both my parents and my daughters faces light up when they see each other.  That makes up for the shared kitchen, 5 times the mess and bumping into each other here and there.

 

My grandma who is 95 just recently had surgery on her eye.  She is supposed to sleep with her face down for 2 weeks.  She also needs to put eye drops in 4 times a day.  Seeing as she is 95 and couldn't tell you what day it is, she needs a bit of help.  Don't get me wrong, she still has her wits about her, does the crossword everyday and gives cheeky replies followed by chuckles but when life has the same routine everyday (similar to feeding baby, changing baby, playing with baby, bathing baby and putting baby to sleep) you often don't remember what day it is.  The reason I'm bringing this up is while my Mom and Dad are at the lake for a few days, I am helping Grandma.  The drops are to be put in 4 x a day.  How bizarre it must be to her to have her granddaughter help her.  I think of Raphaela, my baby and how HER baby would be helping me.  So crazy!  But it makes me feel really good to help her.  Of all the years she fed us, played cards with us, entertained us in many ways, this is the least I can do.  She promised me she would live to be 100 and I hope that does happen as I will sure miss the day she goes to grandparent heaven to be with my grandpa.

 

Thought I'd throw in something 'Mommyish' #1. Cloth diapers

Cloth diapers.  I love my cloth diapers.  We have 42 in total.  12 bum genius, 6 swaddlebees and 24 pic a pecs which makes NO sense if you don't know anything about cloth diapers.  The best part?  I was given the bum genius and swaddlebees as a baby shower gift and purchased the 24 brand new off of kijiji for 100 bones.  A bum genius alone costs like 28!  Score.

Now what I have learned nay MASTERED about cloth diapers.

1. Washing them:  We do a presoak followed by a wash and a 2nd rinse.  My diapers ALWAYS come out white as snow and no rinse necessary before hand.  We use Nellies natural detergent as well as Rockin Green and when they start to get stinky, Funk rock.

2. Travelling with them: We have a large bummies zip bag that even went to Hawaii with us.  There we had to dry the diapers but I didn't use one disposable on that trip.

3.  Your friend may recommend a certain type of cloth diaper but you and your babies bum will pick their favourite.  Ours? Swaddlebees.  Come in the cutest prints as well.  Raphaela has both monkey and monster printed ones.  

 We bought disposables for the first 5 weeks as the cloth diapers seemed intimidating.  Kid number two will jump right into those bad boys after the meconium passes.  Since we started using our cloth diapers we haven't bought one diaper. No excess waste, no running out for diapers, no diaper rash and saving lots of moola.  Yes it adds to more laundry but with baby you are doing more laundry anyhow.  We also use cloth wipes at home that stay nice and toasty in our wipe warmer.  Would baby like a bum facial? :)

German Cultural Center with Gramma, Grampa and Dougie happened, Rusty MacDonald...no dice.  I was to meet two other mommies and babies from prenatal and not one of us made it.  Que Sera.  Which I used to think was a song about my sister Sarah and I was jealous she had a song.

Thursday November 21st.

We had the first good sleep in a long time and were able to function by 9:30. Raphaela needed a bit of extra love today which I learned at the end of the night, she's getting her can opener tooth. (one of her front two that I always thought when flying solo those teeth look like they could open a can) We did in fact get out of the house today to attend Movies for Mommies for the first time ever. Runner Runner was the feature.  Kind of nice to cuddle up in a theatre with my baby. We were joined by prenatal pal Kara with her little baby Ayres.  I had purchased popcorn and glossette raisins which Raphaela knocked both out of my hands. Message sent.  Guess she would rather her mom eat healthy.  I had an apple in my bag and she seemed to approve of that. Next week if you go early you can get a free Christmas picture with your baby.  Oh how the things you look forward to change drastically once baby comes.

Following the movie I lugged Raphaela in her carseat all the way down to the Rider store to purchase a green sleeper for her.  Tomorrow is now officially "Green day"and we also need to prep for Grey Cup Sunday.  Grampa Fisher and I both agreed that watching important games like this are stressful and even if your team wins you still feel badly for the losing team.  Life is hard especially when it comes to football games.  I cried when my high school football team lost City's.  Actually cried.  Go Riders Go!  I will cry less if they win.

Tomorrow is clean the house day, take baby for a walk and figure out something awesome to make for supper.  Hopefully heading to the lake this weekend for some much needed quality time with my little family.  Pratt lake, my happy place.

4 generations of women at the lake.

It's not always going to work out the way you planned

I had settled down yesterday night after a pretty successful day having crossed off everything on my to do list, minus the homemade granola bars which I made today, when Raphaela cried out for her mommy.  I went and settled her down and about 10 minutes later, she cried a bit harder.  Needless to say, yesterdays post didn't go up.  I was HOPING to do this nightly but I foresee it going a different direction. I can relate this to having a child. I PLANNED to do things a certain way like not give my child a soother in fear of braces later on in life but now we don't leave the house without it.  Luckily she has one attached to her body..her thumb.  And that has been the greatest gift she could have ever given me.  She can self sooth!  That little baby has put herself to sleep! Might need to save up for the braces now but WHO CARES!

After a horrible sleep last night or lack of sleep, we got up around 7 am, back to sleep at 10 and up at noon.  So the day started off late.  We got a trip into Superstore making our way out with everything but the chia seeds.  (Small rant: At Safeway, if you ask for something they will not only tell you where it is, but take you right to it.  At Superstore I asked for chia seeds and the guy said "Ya we have them somewhere"  I don't know about all the superstores but the one on the West side of Saskatoon is MASSIVE! I blame my early labour on Doug and I spending an hour walking up and down the isles looking for some fancy sugar he needed.  Thanks, but I will take my business back to Safeway....most of the time)

After returning from our adventure into the abyss of Superstore,  I made a No Pasta Zucchini Lasagna.  Tasty but quite watery.  I am obsessed with my new cook book "Eat to Live" by Dr. Fuhrman.  The homemade granola bar recipe came from there as well. I'll let you tomorrow (or the next day, no pressure) how they turn out.  I whipped them up in my new toy!

I added to my collection and obsession of kitchen appliances.  We now have a food processor to go along with our vitamix and solo star juicer.  Yesterday alone I used the vitamix to make a smoothie, almond milk and a roasted garlic salad dressing.  Can't wait to build our house (in 10 years) and have a kitchen that looks like the pantry on Masterchef.  Speaking of which, since watching Masterchef Junior I have been even more inspired to cook.  If an 9 year old can whip up something that's tasty and beautiful, I can to!

Homemade Almond Milk= Deliciousness

Yesterday as I said, was very productive and one of the best parts was getting out for a walk with cousin Kelsey and her baby Nash.  So great to get all of us some fresh air.  I hope to get out for a walk again tomorrow even if it's just to mail a letter at Greg's grocery on the corner.  

Raphaela bundled in the Mai Tei wrap then in two coats.  Kept us both toasty warm.

Tomorrow's agenda (if baby choses sleep tonight) Head to the Rusty Mcdonald Library tomorrow morning for baby songs and stories, get in a walk outside and dinner at the German Cultural Center with my grandma and grandpa Fisher.  Throw in some cleaning, more almond milk making and we have ourselves a good day. Time to wind down and climb in JUST incase we are in for another wild ride.

My life as I know it has drastically changed....and I love it.

I have decided to start up my blog again to keep in touch with the outside world.  As of May 17 of this year my life as I knew it, changed.  I was blessed with a beautiful baby girl.  Now my days are filled with breastfeeding, diaper changing, baby toys, laundry, making food for my family and my favourite, cuddles.  Before I got pregnant I was teaching close to 13 fitness classes a day and working at lululemon athletica Saskatoon where I eventually became the Assistant manager.  I am currently on mat leave.  How life has changed.  I now understand when people say that motherhood is the hardest job but the most rewarding.  I need to mention that I was especially blessed with a gem of a baby.  She rarely cries and if she does its because she's hungry or tired.  I then proceed to feed or put her to bed.  The rest of the time she is giving the world love.  So full of smiles.  Her middle name is Sunny and she is just that.

One thing that I didn't realize that would happen when I became a mother is my obession with being a supermom.  I want to make sure to not only love her unconditionally but educate her, stimulate her though play, song and reading, be a fantastic role model and also be a good wife.  Doug and I are not yet married but we call each other WTB and HTB. (wife to be and hubby to be) This is also something that I didn't think about when it came to my maternity leave.  With being at home and Doug working I also cook and clean as well as take care of baby.  I was fortune to have Doug home with us full time for the first 4 months so cooking and cleaning was done together while we got the hang of this new little human in our care but now its up to me and it has been an experience.  I went from having a 9 to 5ish job with a side of teaching to a 24/7 around the clock mommy and WTB.  Slowly getting the hang of it.  It has forced me to become more organized that's for sure! My schedule for tomorrow includes: vacuuming the downstairs and playfloor (especially now that baby is moving about) load up baby to go to the bank, make veggie burgers, homemade almond milk and granola bars (supermom to the rescue) get baby outside for a walk to enjoy the cold but fresh air, read to baby and it always seems that the day flies by, Doug is home and its time for supper.  Going to look up some salad dressing recipes in my new favourite cookbook Eat to Live and hit the hay with my angels.