A Lily... Slowly Blooming

My New Bible Reading Plan

2012-01-28T15:30:00.003-04:00

I have done Bible reading plans before with the goal of reading through the Bible in one year, but I always lagged behind and would feel guilty for not reading my selected reading every day and it would take me 2 years instead of one, and I would be happy I did it but also have some feelings of shame for not doing it the right way. So I gave up on Bible Reading plans because of this. Which was actually very helpful for me since I then started to read the Bible because I wanted to instead of because I felt like I had to.
Well it has been a few years since I've done a reading plan and I feel like I am ready to do it again (with the wisdom of knowing that it's okay if I lag behind, God's love doesn't sway depending on how much I read the Bible...). So I started a plan of reading the Bible chronologically using YouVersion's Bible app. I am really enjoying it so far. I'm hoping to be done by January 2013, but even if I'm not done by then, it's okay, but I will try :)
Do any of you have a favourite Bible reading plan?

Happy 2nd Birthday!

2012-01-03T16:08:00.000-04:00

Our little guy turned 2 on friday and we had a surprise visit from some good friends who were driving through town on their way home to PEI, so they stopped to have lunch with us and brought cake! Dawson loves the "happy birthday" song since he has a book that he gets us to read to him about a birthday and we always sing "happy birthday" at the end of the book. So he was quite happy :)

That evening we left town to go visit family and we had a birthday celebration at my aunt's house the next day. I was planning on making Elmo cupcakes, but my icing wasn't red enough and the more color I added, the more liquid the icing became, so I gave up and made simpler cupcakes :) And everyone got to decorate their own with whatever toppings I had (blueberries, raspberries, sprinkles, marshmallows, m&m's).

Dawson tried to blow out the candles, but it was hard...

He enjoyed his cupcake, especially the blueberries :)

The 3 of us :)

Opening presents. He especially liked the trucks that we got for him.

I think he had a good 2nd birthday :)

Christmas 2011

2011-12-29T14:50:00.000-04:00

We have had a nice break over Christmas and we got to see a lot of family. This year, we decided to stay in Halifax and family came to us :) Phil's parents were able to stay with us for a few days and then my parents and one of my brothers came to stay with us Christmas night. Dawson loved having all of his grandparents together at the same time!

Here are few pictures:

On Christmas eve, we had some new friends over (a couple from Poland) and we enjoyed a lobster dinner (this was my 1st lobster dinner on Christmas eve, but this is their tradition). We told our families to not go overboard with presents for Dawson. As you can see from the pics he got a couple outfits and only a few toys. He will be getting more gift in 2 days when we celebrate his 2nd birthday which is tomorrow!!!! I can't believe I have a 2 year old now :) I'm trying to make these cupcakes for his birthday by not using any red food coloring and using raspberry juice instead, but it is taking a lot of juice and I have pink frosting right now. I need to get some more raspberries, or I might just cave in and put some food coloring with the juice too.

If your curious to know what we did for gifts this year, my family decided (like last year) to do draw names for a gift exchange. It was great, one gift for one person and then with the $ we saved we were able to get a bunch of gifts through Gospel for Asia for those in need.

So we are not done with the celebrations yet!

How to make life easier

2011-12-08T20:53:00.001-04:00

Click here for a few tips on making life a little easier around the house :)

Enjoy!

Yay!

2011-12-08T20:34:00.001-04:00

Remember when I posted about Vision Forum giving away a bunch of gift certificates on different blogs? Well.... I won!!!! Yep, I won a $200 gift certificate from Vision Forum on Kelly's blog Generation Cedar. Thank you Vision Forum and Generation Cedar!
Since I just placed an order with Vision Forum 2 weeks ago I think I'll wait a bit before I choose what to get from their catalogue. But this is exciting! :)

Master Bedroom Makeover

2011-11-30T12:02:00.001-04:00

Jenny over at A Mother's Heritage hosted a blog series a couple weeks ago on how to give your master bedroom a little makeover and turn into a little haven for you and your husband. I participated in the series and had fun doing it. Do you want to see some before and after pics of our room?

Before

After

The only thing I bought was the headboard which we got for $10 from kijiji. We love kijiji :)

You'll notice that in the 2nd After picture I have a basket with magazines under my end table. I find it looks so much neater with the basket. And this was a basket I had in the living room that wasn't really put to good use there.

If you would like to give your bedroom a little makeover, head on over to Jenny's site and you can follow her steps and even see other before and after pictures. Plus, she is giving away a free copy of her ebook Embracing the Mess to those who get this makeover done. Have fun!

Vision Forum Giveaways

2011-11-25T19:23:00.001-04:00

Have you heard of Vision Forum before? I've known about them for a few years now and have ordered from them a couple of times (I'm actually waiting for a new order now). Vision Forum offers Christian books, DVD's, audio messages and even toys.
Now I have recently heard of a few websites that are hosting huge giveaways from Vision Forum where you could win a gift certificate to go toward your Vision Forum purchase. To enter please visit one or more of these sites:
Generation Cedar
Life in a Shoe
The Modest Mom
A Wise Woman Builds Her Home
Smockity Frocks
Raising Olives

They are each giving away $600 worth of certificates (worth $300, $200 & $100). That's $3,600 in Vision Forum gift certificates that are available to be won! I think that this is the biggest giveaway I have seen yet.

Earth's Best

2011-11-18T11:36:00.001-04:00

I enjoy entering giveaways on blogs. I don't win very often, but I have won a few in the past and I won another one this week from Renee's blog. And yesterday I received a big package in the mail full of organic baby and toddler food. And I mean it was FULL. There were 8 pouches of pureed food (nice flavour combinations!), 2 cans of rice & potato snacks (sweet potato cinnamon & veggie crisps), a bowl and a bib. I opened one of the pouches right away (apple pumpkin cranberry) and Dawson ate half of it right there, he just sucked it out of the pouch! And then he ate the other half for his dessert after supper. Thank you Earth's Best for a great prize! And thank you Renee for hosting this giveaway. I think that Dawson is going to enjoy this prize :)

20 & Counting!

2011-11-08T10:49:00.003-04:00

Wow! Have you heard the news already? The Duggars are expecting #20!
http://proverbs14verse1.blogspot.com/2011/11/blessed-news-duggars-announce-20th.html
http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20543449,00.html

How exciting!

Compassion

2011-11-07T12:56:00.000-04:00

I love Compassion Canada. Phil and I started sponsoring a little girl from Haiti in 2004 when she was about to turn 6 years old. She is now 13 and is a beautiful young lady. She writes to us about 3 to 4 times a year and we are always excited to read her letters.

We went to a Robin Mark concert last week and he is an advocate for Compassion, and while we were there we decided to take on another child. We were handed a card with a child's info on it and we thought he would be perfect for us. He's a little boy from El Salvador and he will be turning 5 a week before Dawson's 2nd birthday. We thought that having a birthday so close would be cool for Dawson as he grows up.

As missionaries, we don't make a lot of money, but we want to help others as much as we can with our giving. So we see these sponsorships as part of our giving/ tithes to God. Plus, during this time of year, Compassion has a gift guide so you can give a useful gift to a family in a poor area. We loved doing this last year. Instead of Christmas presents to each other, we gave gifts to others who are in need.

I really don't like the whole commercialism side of Christmas, I don't even like the whole "put Christ back in Christmas" because we know that Christmas is not Jesus' birthday and we know that a lot of what we celebrate about Christmas has been added to the stories surrounding his birth (ex: born in a stable, 3 wise men, etc...). I just feel uncomfortable with the whole Christmas thing. So we don't really know what Christmas will look like for us in the future, but I do want it to be a time of giving instead of receiving, a time where our children get to learn about other children who don't have the things that they do, who need their help to live. I don't want Christmas to be a time of selfishness for my children.

We are trying to figure out what we are going to do with Christmas as a family, but we do know that there will not be any Santa (I grew up knowing Santa wasn't real and I am thankful that I didn't have to deal with coming to the realisation that my parents lied to me and all that) and probably no Christmas tree. I haven't researched it much, but I know that there is a passage in Jeremiah 10 that makes me think that the "christmas tree" is not something that began as a Jewish or Christian practice. This is a hard thing to do since I've always loved Christmas and all its traditions, but as I look into the Bible and learn more about the history of Christmas I feel like something needs to change. I don't know... We haven't made concrete decisions about it all yet, we still need to research and pray about it all.

But go check out the Compassion gift guide to help out :) World Vision and Gospel for Asia are doing similar things too.

Money Saving Tip #5

2011-11-07T11:21:00.001-04:00

This week's money saving tip is something that I discovered a few years ago and I have done this off and on since then. I am back "ON" to doing it and it is great!

Tip #5: Use Powdered Milk

So you might not be ready to make a complete switch to powdered milk (we aren't either), BUT you will save $ by using powdered milk in your cooking. Whenever a recipe calls for milk, make some powdered milk and add that to the recipe instead of using real & expensive milk. Milk is more expensive here in Canada that in the US, and it is more expensive here in the city than when we lived in a smaller town. So I have made the switch again to powdered milk since we've moved. I give Dawson whole milk to drink and if we drink milk we will drink the same milk as Dawson. If we eat cereal we will use our regular milk, but for anything else, I am trying to use powdered milk instead of the real thing. We have some friends that have made the switch to powdered milk even for drinking a glass. It does taste different but if you make it in advance and keep it cold, the taste isn't that much different. Go ahead, give it a try!

Melanie Morgan

2011-10-25T20:17:00.001-04:00

Have you heard of this new show called Cover Me Canada on CBC? A girl from my hometown is one of the contestants and she is doing really well. She has a great country voice. You can check out the show's Youtube channel here and also vote for contestants.

It's always exciting to see someone you know on TV. Melanie is the same age as my brother, so they went to school together. We also had a mutual friend and I remember having a singing contest with her at our friend's birthday party. We were around 11 years old I think. Obviously, she won the singing contest. I won 2nd place lol :)

Anyway, I am voting for her. Her voice is great :)

In the valley

2011-10-01T09:00:00.001-04:00

Phil is taking a course this semester on counseling but it is an hour out of town (and only once a week) in the valley. He's been taking his motorcycle to get to class but now that it is getting colder he's going to take our van instead. So this week, D and I went with him. It was an earlier morning than usual for us having to be out of here by 7am. D hardly woke up. We just picked him up out of bed and put him in the car. We dropped Phil off and headed to a cafe to have breakfast. I had a pumpkin spiced latte and a muffin and I had packed a breakfast for Dawson. It was a very lovely morning. We went for a walk in this small town and then spent the rest of our morning at the public library. D had a blast! There were toys everywhere.

When Phil's class was over we joined him for the weekly chapel service followed by lunch. We then found a fruit stand and got huge bags of apples for close to nothing and zucchinis, turnip and parsnips.

That evening Phil's parents came over and they stayed with us for 2 nights. On Thursday D and I went to the valley again with them. We visited Grand Pre where they have a historic memorial site explaining the deportation of the Acadians. It was a beautiful day.

That evening we went to a delicious Greek restaurant where D ate tons of hummus.

I started feeling sick right before bed that night and I woke up the next day with a fever of almost 102*. So I didn't do much yesterday. I am feeling better today but I'm still not at 100%. It's a rainy day today so it looks like we'll be staying in anyway.

Love

Persecution

2011-09-27T13:16:00.000-04:00

"Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body." (Hebrews 13:3)

Persecution in India: Francis' Response from Cornerstone Church on Vimeo.

Money Saving Tip #4

2011-09-19T11:32:00.000-04:00

I think that this week's tip is pretty obvious, but perhaps you haven't given it much thought. I know I need to dive into this one deeper.

Tip #4: Cook with beans
If you want to cut back on that grocery bill, buy less meat and buy more beans. Brown rice and beans make a full protein, so we really don't need to eat as much meat as we do to get protein in our diet. I think that the average meat-eating north american person probably eats more protein than they need daily. One great resource for bean recipes and to get more of an awareness about the foods we eat is a cookbook called More with Less. It's a mennonite cookbook full of recipes and tips. You can find it here.

I have some beans and veggies in the crockpot right now making a soup. I hope it turns out alright. I really don't have a lot of experience with dry beans ( I did soak them overnight but they were still pretty hard this morning). But beans are inexpensive, especially if you buy them dry, and they last a long time in your pantry.

Feminine Beauty

2011-09-17T13:24:00.003-04:00

I had never heard a sermon by Eric Ludy before today. I went on the Ellerslie website and went through the different sermon titles and chose one that I thought would be the best one to listen to without my husband (he's away for the afternoon). So I chose "Feminine Beauty". Wow! This is the best sermon I have listened to that deals with those difficult verses about women. You know, those verses that make us uncomfortable because they seem to be putting down women. If you have struggled with the meaning of these verses or if you are looking for a deeper explanation of why those verses are in the Bible, listen to this sermon. It is quite long, so if you don't have an hour and 20 minutes, at least listen to the first half hour. It is worth it.

Eric Ludy - Feminine Beauty from Ellerslie Mission Society on Vimeo.

More Giveaways!

2011-09-12T13:15:00.004-04:00

Well I have found some more lovely giveaways that are happening.
First, check out Far Above Rubies to win some pretty bobby pins from Lilla Rose.

And here is a HUGE giveaway full of prizes at A Wise Woman Builds Her Home. The author of this blog is promoting her ebook "True Christian Motherhood" and celebrating it with a big giveaway. Check it out!

Oh September

2011-09-08T10:07:00.003-04:00

Things have been busy busy these past few days here. We had some guests stay with us: my lovely friend Liezl and her 5 month old cutie and Phil's parents. We managed to fit everyone in our apartment for a good night's sleep. Then as the school year kicks off we've had a few things to do as Phil works in campus ministry and we have moved to a new campus. So we are learning new things and meeting new people. We had a day of prayer and fasting on Tuesday and ended it with a shared meal for supper. It was a really neat day.

Then yesterday we had a free BBQ for students on campus here and we had more guests come by for a short visit: our friends Tim and Kathryn with their little one. She and Dawson played super well together, it was really cute. They even gave each other a kiss goodbye :)

learning how to share toys

playing together on this maze

Oh the camera is out!

So that plus all of the new tenants that have moved into our building have made these last few days very busy. Phil is on campus right now manning a table for clubs and societies day and it is pouring outside :( I'm getting some stuff done around here (and taking a logging break) and enjoying a chai latte. Hope you are all having a nice week.

Love

Money Saving Tip #3

2011-09-08T09:43:00.002-04:00

I just realised that I had already written a post this summer about saving money. So for this week's money saving tip I will send you to that post by clicking here. It's about ice cream :)

Lila Rose Giveaway

2011-09-03T18:59:00.003-04:00

Kim at Life in a Shoe is doing a giveaway for Lila Rose flexiclips for your hair. I have seen these a few times on the web and they just look so pretty. I'll have to order one sometime, but for now I will enter for a chance to win one :)
To enter and check out the post, click here!

And to Check out Lila Rose, click here :)

Set Apart Girl

2011-09-01T20:43:00.002-04:00

I have rediscovered a website that I love. Set Apart Girl is Leslie Ludy's website and it is full of great stuff. I just read their online magazine (which will be going to print in the Spring of 2012) and it's really good. It is focused on Jesus and the feminine set apart lives that we can live for Him. It is full of good stuff for younger girls but Leslie also gives good advice for moms and wives too. Check it out!

The title of this blog was taken from one of her books, Authentic Beauty which I have read a few times on my own and in small groups of girls. She and her husband have a great ministry.

Money Saving Tip #2

2011-09-01T10:53:00.000-04:00

Last Friday I shared my first frugal tip with you on how to save money at the grocery store. This week I have another tip regarding groceries.

Tip #2: Buy Cabbage

Cabbage is usually inexpensive (especially when it goes on sale!) and you can use it in many different ways. You can make coleslaw instead of salad, add it as a vegetable in a roast (very yummy), stir fry it, make sour kraut (I've actually never made sour kraut, so don't ask me for a recipe lol), make cabbage rolls, etc.

It's cheap, it's full of vitamin C and it's good :)

NEW Money Saving Tip #1

2011-08-26T15:56:00.006-04:00

I've been away for a few days visiting with family and so that is my excuse for not blogging for like a week :)

I have been preparing supper this afternoon (a little earlier than usual...but I think it's because I'm hungry...) and I had a thought of sharing some money saving tips on this blog. Our family is very intentional on being frugal and we are learning more and more tips on frugality so I thought we would share our journey with you. Never know, maybe it will become a weekly thing, but for now, I won't commit to that :-p ... This segment will mostly be about saving $ on groceries, but I'll also share about other areas of our lives where we can save $.

Money Saving Tip #1: Buy medium ground beef instead of lean or extra lean beef. And buy it when it goes on sale. You will save a lot as the leaner the meat, the more expensive it is. And truly, I don't notice much of a difference when I cook with medium ground beef. You might have a bit more fat to drain from the pan, but really I think the savings are worth that. When medium ground beef goes on sale, I stock up and then divide it all in freezer bags and put the bags in our deep freeze. Then when I use a recipe that asks for ground beef I pull out a baggy and defrost it and have the right amount for meals like spaghetti or shepherd's pie.

Hope this will be helpful in saving you $ :)

Shampoo be gone?

2011-08-18T19:49:00.004-04:00

I have to share with you my latest beauty secret... Some of you might have tried this already, if you have, tell me what you think or how your experience went.

Okay, so my new beauty secret is.... I don't use shampoo anymore. What?! You read that right. No more shampoo. Well it's not forbidden, and I might use it once every few weeks or if I am not home, but what I use now every time I wash my hair is good ol' baking soda. And I love it! I have naturally oily hair and if I don't wash it every day, it shows. But with this baking soda technique I only have to wash my hair every other day before it starts to look greasy.

When I first tried this, I brought a box of Baking Soda in the shower with me and when it was time to wash my hair, I poured a bunch in my hand and rubbed it in my hair...not an easy task. And the results weren't great, although I guess it does take about a month for your scalp to adjust to no more shampoo. So I headed over to Life In a Shoe where I knew I had read about Kim's journey of going shampoo-less and I found the trick. Use soda water! Basically what I do is pour about 1/2 a tablespoon of baking soda into a large mug and bring it in the shower. Then I fill it up with shower water and pour the water on my head and rub it in. It is much easier to handle and to rinse out. Now if you have hard water you might want to boil your water first and create your soda water in a bottle that you can keep in the shower (use an old shampoo bottle).

My hair feels different than before. The best thing is that it doesn't get greasy so soon and when it does, it's not as greasy as before. Another change is that my hair feels heavier and more manageable and my scalp feels healthier. I love this switch. Plus it is more cost effective! Which is always a great thing!

I've read that you can use vinegar (white or apple cider) as a rince, but I haven't tried that yet. I'm not a fan of vinegar smell, so I am not jumping at this opportunity.

So there you have it! My latest beauty trick! :)

Let me know if you try this out.

short update

2011-08-16T14:49:00.002-04:00

It has been a busy time around here. As August is approaching its end and people move into this apartment building, we have a lot of work to do as the superintendents. It seems like everyone wants to move in by September 1st! Phil was away for almost a whole week, so I had a lot more things to do last week. I am really glad that he is back :) Not just because of the work though... I like having him around ;)

This weekend we'll be going up to Fredericton again for a special wedding. 2 students that have been involved with the campus ministry for the last couple of years are getting married and we are the MC's at the reception. They are also getting married on our 6th wedding anniversary, so D will be staying with my parents for the weekend and we'll stay at a B&B. Then on Sunday one of my girlfriends is having a baby shower back home so I am going to try to make it in time for that. I love baby showers and I miss my girlfriends.

In other news, Dawson is now talking up a storm! He is catching on to words so well now and he repeats a lot of what we say. It is very cute. His latest words are:

D'autre - More

Amen

Bible

Minou - Cat

Oh my! (he got that from me...hehehe)

changed the look again

2011-08-11T16:18:00.002-04:00

There! My background now reflects the title of my blog :)

Is it too much pink though? lol

Missing my hubby & loving being a mom

2011-08-11T10:08:00.003-04:00

I think I just got my 1st comment from my husband on here...lol. I'm not totally sure though as I've been blogging for a few years now, but it is quite exciting. Especially since he has been away since Sunday and I will only see him again tomorrow evening when I pick him up at the airport. He had a conference to go to in Alberta for campus ministry staff.

I've had to stay here to a) take care of Dawson and b) take care of our apartment building as we are the superintendents. I've had to sweep and mop the hallways and entryways and show a few units to potential tenants while Phil has been away. I've been busier than usual with this extra work to do which makes my days go by faster and so I don't miss Phil too much when I am busy. But when I stop and sit I realise that I really miss him. Especially when Dawson looks at me and says "daddy?". It melts my heart. I've been telling him that daddy went on an airplane and then he smiles, laughs or makes a motor sound :) I'm looking forward to bringing him to the airport tomorrow and hopefully we can see some planes landing or taking off. I'm sure he'd like that.

Dawson has really been picking up on words in the last few days. He repeats a lot of what I say or he'll surprise me and remember a word that I've said before while pointing to the object in a book and then he'll just say it without me saying it 1st. This morning he did that with a butterfly ("papillon" in French) as he pointed to it in his book. He had never said it before! It is just so exciting to be able to see a child learn and develop. I absolutely love it! And I wouldn't want to miss these precious moments for anything. I would not rather be working than spending my days with my child. There is no other career that I can imagine myself being in that I would love as much as motherhood and that would have more value than motherhood. This is a big and serious job I have. I have big responsibilities to raise up this child well. And I am ever so grateful that God has given me this noble responsibility and that He helps me through it.

A sermon by Paul Washer

2011-08-08T21:46:00.003-04:00

I just listened to this sermon and thought I'd share it here. Paul Washer is a bold preacher and he's not afraid to preach truth. This is a good sermon for both men and women to listen to.

Recovering Biblical Womanhood by Paul Washer

For Many other free videos visit the website: www.sermonindex.net

D's Latest obsession

2011-08-08T10:12:00.003-04:00

Last week some of our good friends were at the children's hospital that's just 2 blocks away from our place. Their 2 week old had a twisted bowel and had to have surgery to get it fixed. They live in PEI so it was nice to be able to see them and meet their baby boy. He is doing very well now by the way. Well on one of our visits to the hospital we discovered a big playroom and Dawson went straight for the train set. He played on it for an hour! I thought he would've been too young to play with a trai set at 19 months, but he just loved it.

My husband loves to find deals on kijiji, so he looked it up and found a starter kit for $5. Dawson is in love.

It is just too cute to see him play around. He plays so quietly. He played with it for about 30 minutes today and I had to almost drag him into his room to put him down for his nap.

Weekend update

2011-08-02T19:24:00.005-04:00

It is 8:30pm here and the sky looks like this:

There is a thunder storm outside and despite the loud noise and bright flashes, there's something peaceful about a thunderstorm. Am I crazy or do you know what I mean? Thankfully Dawson is sleeping through all of this. He'd probably just think it's a big truck going by... He LOVES trucks by the way. It's his absolute favourite thing.

My parents came down to see us this weekend (for my birthday) and we had a great time with them. we also got to see more family and spent an afternoon in a lovely park just a few blocks away from where we are.

Lovely flowers

Here D is sunbathing ;-)

Here Dawson doesn't seem impressed by having his picture taken with his 3rd cousins. They on the other hand are being super sweet :)

Here some guy dressed up as a mascot showed up and Dawson ran right up to him (but he didn't get much closer than this).

We saw a duck with her ducklings. It was really cute.

We went out to eat on Sunday and we had burgers and milkshakes. My burger was a peanut butter burger, yep, you read that right. It was delicious! And they got me a german chocolate cake (which reminds me, there are leftovers in the fridge...)

This evening I will be participating in a webinar on raising children to be leaders. I think tonight's guest speaker is Doug Phillips. It should be good.

Modest Mom Giveaway

2011-07-30T10:37:00.003-04:00

The Modest Mom is having a giveaway! Check it out here:

http://bit.ly/oezAFM

AND.... Life in a Show is also having a Giveaway from the Modest Mom's store. Enter here: http://inashoe.com/2011/07/giveaway-layering-shell-from-the-modest-mom/

Divided

2011-07-28T14:19:00.002-04:00

There's a new documentary that's out called Divided. It takes a look at why so many young people who grow up in Christian homes decide to leave the faith. Phil and I watched this documentary last night as it is available online for free for a limited time at www.dividedthemovie.com

It is a very interesting movie and I can see how it could be quite controversial too. I do recommend that you watch it. I think this movie has an important message for Christians, especially fathers.

anniversary coming up

2011-07-27T15:57:00.003-04:00

In less than a month Phil and I will celebrate our 6th wedding anniversary. Yay! And to celebrate we will be MCing at a wedding. :) Some students that were involved in the campus ministry back in Fredericton are getting married on our anniversary and we are the MC's. It should be fun! We're making a weekend out of it by leaving Dawson with the grand parents for the weekend and we'll find a B&B to stay at :) We still do own a house in Fredericton (please pray that it will sell) but it doesn't have any furniture and there is now someone living there, so spending our anniversary night on air mattresses in a house that's occupied doesn't sound very appealing...lol.

Hope you are all having a good summer. It is cold here today. It doesn't feel like summer at all.

Happy Birthday to Me!

2011-07-26T15:29:00.004-04:00

Today I turn 28! Only 2 more years in my twenties! Yikes... lol.

I've had a lovely day so far. Phil made breakfast and got Dawson ready and they wore matching outfits...too cute.

I got a present during breakfast. It's a light diffuser for my camera. Here I am testing it out:

The living room was quite dark when I took this picture, but with the diffuser you don't get that ugly flash look in the picture. Yay!

Then Phil took D out for a walk so I could have some uninterrupted Bible reading time. And they cam back with some flowers. Gerbera daisies, my favourite!

After Dawson's nap we drove out to Pizza Delight and had a free lunch buffet and free kids meal for Dawson! It was great. The restaurant had a play area for kids and D played in there for a long time while Phil and I ate. The play area was right behind our table. Then Phil gave me my 2nd present: the new Duggar book! He knows me so well lol.

And I have about a thousand facebook birthday wishes to look at :) It's funny how facebook has changed birthdays. I now expect to get a ton of emails from facebook on my birthday now...

Ice cream!

2011-07-21T14:30:00.004-04:00

We like ice cream at our home but we also don't want to spend lots of money on it. So we have discovered some tricks to make ice cream a cheap treat!

1) Instead of buying expensive fancy flavours, we buy a BIG inexpensive tub of plain vanilla ice cream and we will mix in whatever we have on hand: candy bars like reese peanut butter cups to make a homemade blizzard treat, homemade cookies, chocolate chips, sprinkles, etc.

2) When a good ice cream flavour goes on sale, we'll buy some but mix it with vanilla to make it last longer. This is a great trick!

3) Look for coupons. We bought a few cereal boxes this past spring that had a FREE ice cream coupon on them for up to a $5 value. We waited until the good stuff went on sale to use our coupons. What normally would've been $9 would go down to $4.99 and so we'd get it for FREE with our coupon.

We've definitely been having ice cream weather lately around here :)

God's Loving Discipline

2011-07-20T19:19:00.003-04:00

I was reading in Hebrews this morning during my Quiet Time and the chapter I was reading talked about God's discipline and how He disciplines those He loves just like a loving parent disciplines his children. Now that I am a mother I can relate to this passage a bit more. I was thinking of how I need to discipline Dawson now even at this young age because if we let him roam free he would go straight for a moving truck because he loves trucks, he just doesn't know the consequences of going in front of a moving vehicle yet. He would also go straight for the ocean or water in a pool, because he loves to play in water, but since he can't swim yet, he needs our guidance, our instructions and our discipline in teaching him what is okay and what isn't. This is all for his safety and his own good.

Of course the kind of discipline we give to our son will change as he grows up, but for now, this is the stage where he is at. And I think that one of the ways that God disciplines us is in this way too: Protecting us from things we want and guiding us in another direction. Towards something better and safer. Now just like a child, we can throw a fit and struggle our way through to get what we want (and reap the consequences of course) or we can accept the discipline, the instructions and know that they come from a loving Father. He doesn't discipline just to punish us, He loves us and therefore, disciplines. Just like I love Dawson and discipline him out of love.

Back in the Blogging World!

2011-07-19T20:05:00.003-04:00

I just gotta say that I am so excited that I'm blogging regularly again. My blog has a fresh look, even my recipe blog got a face lift and I have put blogging into my schedule. Not that I'm that great at keeping a schedule, but this one is pretty flexible so I should be able to stick with it pretty well :) And I designed it around things that I am already naturally doing. I think what I would do wrong before is I would put things that I wanted to do in my schedule instead of filling a time slot with something that I am already doing. For example, I would put down that I wanted to have a quiet time with God every morning before breakfast (which I almost never do, I get it done after breakfast, most often during Dawson's 1st nap) and that I wanted to exercise every other evening, clean the whole house on Mondays, etc. It just wouldn't work out and I would get discouraged that I couldn't keep a schedule and I would feel like I had no self control. So this way of going about it seems smarter and easier :)

My Menu for the Week

2011-07-19T19:49:00.004-04:00

Okay I did my menu planning a little earlier this week :)

Monday

B - Oatmeal

L - BLT's & Greek Pasta Salad

S - Shepherd's Pie

Tuesday

B - Cereal, boiled eggs

L - Tuna Melts & pasta salad

S - Leftover shepherd's pie, raw veggies and ranch

Wednesday

B - Blueberry pancakes

L - Tacos with rice

S - BBQ out

Thursday

B - Mushroom & cheese omelets

L - Pizza (I need to find a good homemade crust recipe, send it to me if you have one)

S - Roasted Chicken, potatoes, brocoli

Friday

B - Hot Rice cereal

L - Tacos or taco salad (with leftover taco meat)

S - Chicken Pot Pie

Saturday

B - French Toast

L - Black Bean Quesadillas with Guacamole & sour cream

S - Leftover Chicken Pot Pie (I'm doubling the recipe so there better be leftovers ;-) )

Sunday

B - Cereal & Toast

L - Soup - Fricot if there's chicken leftover, vegetable soup if not

S - Lasagna

There you have it! Of course it is always subject to change, but that's fine :)

to sew or not to sew

2011-07-18T20:29:00.003-04:00

So remember last year when I made my first ever blanket? If you don't remember, you can check out this post. Well since I made that one I have made 2 more and am in the process of making a 4th one for someone special. They take me no time at all, I just need to set aside the time to do them.

I am enjoying sewing and I have some projects that I would love to do, but for some reason I never seem to think of sewing. Like when D is napping, I always end up finding something else to do. Maybe I just need to make a schedule and schedule some sewing time in my week. The other day my friend Renee interviewed some seamstresses on her blog and that gave me even more of a craving to sew. Their company Marie-Madeline Studio has beautiful fabrics. Looking through their website just makes me want to have a baby girl to sew dresses and skirts for. I'd also love to try my hand at making a quilt. My grandmother loves quilting and I've always had a quilt from her on my bed growing up and even now. But I've never learned how to quilt myself. I can just imagine a beautiful quilt made from scraps of fabric from Marie-Madeline :)

Because I am so new to sewing, I am not very confident, maybe that's what's stopping me. But I have to tell myself that the more I practice, the more I'll get better at it right? I mean the last taggy blanket I made was the best one I've made so far.

I do have a couple patterns in my sewing kit, one for a dress and one for an apron from Sense and Sensibility Patterns, I think I'm just scared to try lol.

Dawson speaks

2011-07-15T14:55:00.001-04:00

Here are a few of Dawson's words. We're speaking in French so here is the translation if you need it :)

Canard: Duck

Coin Coin: Quack Quack

Bateau: Boat

Pomme: Apple

Camion: Truck

Bye: Bye :)

In Repentance and Rest

2011-07-15T09:12:00.003-04:00

I've really been enjoying my times in the Word lately. I've come to a new realisation or understanding of grace. Not in my head, but in my heart. And that has made me feel so loved and accepted by God. This is something that I've heard a lot before, but it feels like it's the first time that I have really felt and known that it's for me.

Part of this has come through me reading a book called The Book of God. It had been sitting on our bookshelf for a while but I had no idea what this book was. I thought it might be some cultish book that we had for referencing, but then we looked it up and it is basically the Bible in novel form and it is really interesting. It's kinda like watching a movie about the Bible and it goes chronologically. So this book has made me realise even more how every person that God has used is flawed and imperfect and that I don't need to try to be perfect by my own efforts; I don't have to work at being a good person for God to accept me. He does the work in my life and He has done the work of salvation already by becoming the sacrificial lamb.

There's a verse in Isaiah that says "In repentance and rest is your salvation". Rest. Not work, the work is done by God. We just need to repent and trust Him and we can rest in His Grace. Wow! Salvation does not come by works. And of course I knew that already, but I see it in a new light now. I know it in my heart as well as in my head. It's a good place to be. It is good to feel loved.

Menu Planning

2011-07-14T14:32:00.006-04:00

Since moving to Halifax I've started to do something that I've wanted to do for a while but for some reason just couldn't stick with it: Menu Planning. I've dedicated a journal to it and it is going really well. So I know that most bloggers post up their weekly menus on Mondays but today I feel like putting mine up, so here is what we have eaten and will eat for the rest of this week.

Monday (We were on the road so...)

- Breakfast - Pop Tarts and Apples

- Lunch - Sandwiches

- Supper - Spaghetti (thanks for the sauce Mom A!)

Tuesday - B - Oatmeal and Toast

- L - Macaroni & hotdogs

- S - Mussels, coucous, Greek Salad

Wednesday - B - Cold Cereal & Smoothies

- L - Egg Salad Sandwiches, Potato Patties (fried left over mashed potatoes)

- S - Tomato Macaroni (used up the left over spaghetti sauce) & Salad

Thursday - B - Pancakes with strawberries

- L - Left over macaroni

- S - Corn Chowder (cooked in Mussel juice) & Biscuits (recipe)

Friday - B - Bacon, eggs, potato patties, warm apples

- L - Greek Pasta Salad

- S - Pork chops, rice, brocoli

Saturday - B - Pancakes (recipe)

- L - Leftovers or something simple (Phil will be out)

- S - Leftovers or something simple (Phil will be out)

Sunday - B - Oatmeal

- L - Barley soup

- S - Chicken pot pie

There it is! It can always change because I don't always know if there will be leftovers for the next day. But wow, menu planning makes life so much easier, and I end up spending less at the grocery store if I plan ahead. Bonus!

Weekend Away & Mussels for Supper

2011-07-13T10:55:00.003-04:00

This weekend we left our apartment (overnight) for the 1st time since we moved here. We were only away for 3 nights and we got to see our families in Moncton. We got there Friday and stayed with my parents, then saturday morning we went strawberry picking (one of my favourite things to do in the summer). I put some in a smoothie this morning for breakfast.

I also got to see some old school friends who I hadn't seen in years! They got to meet Dawson and we just caught up on our lives. It was neat :)

I saw my grand-mother and then headed over to Phil's parents place for a birthday celebration for our sister-in-law. We hadn't seen Phil's parents for almost 2 months as they had been away on an Alaskan cruise and then visiting family out west.

Phil and I sang at our old church like we used to do all the time. It just ended up that his parents were supposed to sing, but because they knew we were coming, they asked if we'd like to do it instead. It was such a joy to sing at church again. After Church we picked up my brother and had some Arby's for lunch. I love Arby's & we didn't have one in fredericton, so we often go when visiting Moncton. There must be one somewhere in Halifax, I'll have to research that.

After putting Dawson down to bed at 8pm, Phil and I hit the road for Fredericton to clean our house and meet with a real estate agent. We were trying to sell privately, but since we are away we thought it'd be smart to hire a realtor to do al of that work for us. So now the house is empty of stuff and all clean and ready to sell. Please pray with us that it would sell this summer. The property is so close to campus that it would be a great investment property for someone who wants to rent out a few rooms to students. But if it doesn't sell before september it would be hard to find students to move in since they should all have a place to stay by then.

Anyway, we left before lunch monday morning, dropped off some stuff at a good will store and brought a few things back with us. We then picked up Dawson in Moncton and headed to Halifax in time for supper and a few apartment showings (part of the super job).

It was great to step back into our apartment when we got home. It really felt like home. I totally enjoy living here and love making it my home.

We went grocery shopping yesterday and ended up saving a bunch of $. I was curious to know how much everything would have cost if nothing would have been on sale and so I took out the calculator and found out that it would have cost us $175.41. But almost everything we bought was on sale plus I had a couple coupons and a $50 voucher (earned by collecting airmiles). So my total before the voucher was $95.82 and after the voucher, we paid $45.82 for $175 worth of groceries! Now that's my kind of saving :)

A special treat we got for last night's supper was mussels...mmmm. We enjoyed them dipped in melted butter, with greek salad and couscous. Dawson wasn't a fn of the mussels, so here he is enjoying veggies and coucous.

cell phone blogging

2011-07-11T16:17:00.000-04:00

I am on the road coming back from a short weekend trip to visit our parents and take care of some house stuff and I just figured out that I can update my blog from my cell phone! How exciting! this is actually Phil's phone but he passed it on to me since he got another one for work. yay! anyway, this feature is pretty cool but I'll have to check what it looks like on the computer when I get home :)

Our new place

2011-07-06T14:57:00.005-04:00

So at the end of May we moved to a new city and a new province: Halifax Nova Scotia. It is beautiful here. This is the biggest city we've lived in so far but there are trees and parks everywhere so it doesn't always feel like we are in a big city. We are also right on the ocean which is really cool. And where our apartment is, we are really close to a few parks and just a 5 minute walk to some major stores and grocery shops.

For those of you who haven't seen the facebook pics I put up, here are some pictures of our new place :)

Our balcony view

small bathroom

Kitchen

Kitchen side 2

dining room (with the table I grew up with)

Master bedroom

D's room. This was taken a few weeks ago, his room has changed a bit since.

The big living room

Living room other side

We are settling in well here and enjoying getting to know this area.

What do you do to keep cool on a hot summer day?

2011-07-06T14:45:00.004-04:00

We eat homemade popsicles :)

Well, we try to eat them:

Ummm not quite there...

Almost....

Yes! Got it :)

I usually just freeze some juice, but for Dawson, this was a blueberry banana smoothie (basically just those 2 fruit blended with milk) that I made the other day and thought it'd be good frozen. He seems to like it!

the best chocolate chip cookies

2011-05-13T21:27:00.001-04:00

I have found the best recipe for chocolate cookies. I added this recipe to recipe blog but just updated it today with pictures (I made some this week). Check it out here.

House pics

2011-05-09T10:39:00.004-04:00

I thought I'd share some pictures of our house. Some of you might remember the "before" pictures 2 years ago when Phil started doing renovations. I think I might have them on a web album. Oh yes here it is. Now for the "After" pictures :)

Our backyard

Living room (notice the books are all gone from the shelves )

J's room

Dawson's room

Our room

The office/guest bedroom

Kitchen

Upstairs bathroom

Downstairs bathroom

Other side of kitchen

Almost time for goodbyes

2011-05-09T10:19:00.003-04:00

We have about 2 weeks left before we move. I'm excited but I am just realising that there are people that I want to see before we leave. How many meetings/meals can we squeeze in before we go?

I will definitely miss living in my own house: having my own washer & dryer, a normal sized stove, a backyard and lots of space. But I am also looking forward to living in a bigger city and moving to an apartment: less stuff, walking more (everything is so close to our building), meeting the people that live in the building. Ok that last one I am definitely nervous about, but I still want to do it. Having less stuff will be nice, I just want to simplify our lives and not have clutter. I'm scared that it will be hard to do (we have done a lot already). I'm sure we will end up bringing more stuff than we need there and we'll just have to purge again once we are moved in. I guess that's not a bad thing. There's a Salvation Army store just a couple blocks from our place :)

The house isn't sold yet, but that's ok. We've had about a dozen groups come in to see the house already and it's only been on the market for 2 weeks. If it doesn't sell, we could always keep it as a rental property, but that could be hard to do from afar.

Our church is hosting a going away party for us next week with a square dance! It should be fun :) It will be hard to say our goodbyes but as we anticipate this move, I'm getting excited to embark on this new chapter in our lives. I'm not sure how long we'll last in the big city though. Last night we watched Your Love Never Fails, a movie I won from Renee's blog, and we were both yearning to go visit Texas...lol. Or at least somewhere in the country :) Maybe one day we will find ourselves moving to the country. I think we'd both like that, but for now, we will experience the city life. That's where people are & that's where unsaved people are. As missionaries that's where we are called to be.

Love

Big Changes

2011-05-04T20:17:00.002-04:00

After 1 year of being married, Phil and I set out on a new adventure and we moved to a new city. For the past 5 years now we have lived in Fredericton and have worked in campus ministry. We have loved this city and have made great friends, but I always knew that this was not our home and that this would not be where we would settle. Well, that has become a reality now as we are preparing to move to another city & province: Halifax, Nova Scotia.

We will still be doing campus ministry but on different campuses. We are moving for a few reasons. One is that we won't be on our own in ministry anymore, we will be joining a team, which will be good for us. Another is that Phil is thinking of going back to school, but he'd like to test the waters a bit first and take a couple courses while we are in Halifax.

At the moment, we are trying to sell our house, which we've lived in for 2 years and we thought we'd find an apartment sometime in the summer, but we actually found one really quickly and are moving at the end of this month! Yikes, things are happening fast! Phil also wanted to find part time work and he found both an apartment and a job in one shot. He is going to be the part time superintendent of our apartment building. It sounds like a great opportunity and it is at a perfect location for us. We are excited about this move but we are also saddened by the relationships that we are leaving behind here.

Moving from a house to an apartment means that we need to get rid of a lot of stuff (unless we want to live in a cluttered apartment...which we don't), so we have been going through everything and deciding what to keep, what to give and what to store, It feels really good to do this. I am looking forward to making this new apartment our home for the next little while. We really don't know how long we will be there. We're taking it one year at a time :)

Love

from the mouth of a babe

2011-03-31T12:36:00.004-04:00

We are back from our little getaway in New Hampshire and D did great with his grandparents. When we left he was starting to walk, but needed some coaxing to do it. When we got back he was walking everywhere and all the time! It's a whole new ballgame! He is talking a lot more now and trying to repeat words that we say. This morning he would repeat "oiseau" which is french for "bird". He also says "ball", "yes" in english, "no" and of course "wow!" to name a few. He also does animal sounds for dogs, cows and sheep. It is just too cute :)

Phil turned 29 on Monday. This is officially his last year as a 20-something year old :) Craziness....

shay what?

2011-03-10T15:04:00.003-04:00

I've been watching the Shaytards channel on Youtube lately. Have you heard of them? They're a family who've been vlogging everyday for the past 2 years. They are a really neat family and they seem to have a bunch of fun together as a family, so they are fun to watch.

I only discovered them a couple weeks ago, but they are huge on youtube. Each video gets more than a couple 100 thousand hits. It's crazy! They're just a normal family, but people like to see their videos I guess. They're my new secret obsession...lol, ok not so secret and not really an obsession, but still :)

In other news, D is being weaned :( It's sad, I know. He usually only gets nursed in the morning now and occasionally in the afternoon as well, but this morning I didn't nurse him to see how he'd react and he hasn't asked for it and has been fine, so I'm wondering if he'll want it today at all. We shall see. I actually need him to be weaned soon as Phil and I are going away for a week and have decided to leave D behind. *tear* It's going to be hard, I know, but he'll be with his grandparents the whole time (both sets actually) which he adores. I think it will be easier on him than on us, especially me. But it'll be a busy week, so hopefully the busyness will help me to not think about him too much. We're going to the states to visit a discipleship/rehab farm and taking part in a course on healing. It should be a good week for us.

Love

surprise visit

2011-03-08T11:07:00.003-04:00

Since this week is March break (or reading week as they now call it), on Sunday evening we decided to drop by for a surprise visit at our parents'. We stayed with my parents that night and they loved spending time with Dawson and then on Monday we went over to Phil's parents and gave Phil's dad a new wood splitter and he and Phil started chopping some wood.

We all met together for a great spaghetti supper with both sets of parents. I can't believe how much Dawson loves his grand parents. It is so fun to see him react so excitedly when he sees them, and now also when I mention their names :) It's very cute.

D basically only has one word in his vocabulary at the moment and it's WOW. He says wow for everything he sees. It's hilarious! This little boy is quite amazed by everything around him :)

We are now back at our place and we are dedicating this week to finishing up some house renos that we've been putting off. Phil is at the hardware store now to get some supplies. I'm excited to get everything done in this house. We bought a fixer up'er and have already done a LOT on it but there's those finishing touches that still need to be done to make it complete.

I'll have to post some before and after pictures in a few weeks when (hopefully) it will be all done :)

Oh and I forgot to wish my good friend Renee a Happy Birthday yesterday. Happy Birthday Renee!!! Miss you xoxo

Love

Long overdue update

2011-03-05T20:22:00.004-04:00

Yikes... I'm a horrible blogger. Forgive me for not keeping you up to date with my life ;)

I've been working on my blog today because after going on it I saw that my background was gone! So I decided to search for a new background and I gave my recipe site a new look too.

Things are good here. We just got back from a trip to BC to visit family and it was great. Dawson was a wonderful traveller and he is back on his normal routine now :) He is in bed now and Phil and I are about to watch a movie. We got a few movies from the library today. I love the library :) Dawson got to play with a bunch of kids there today, he doesn't get to play with other kids very often since he is an only child...for now :) We are looking forward to having another child. Nursing has been cut to only twice a day now and my cycle is back, so you never know!

Hope you're all having a blessed weekend!

Love

Modesty Solutions

2010-12-17T11:32:00.002-04:00

I dressed immodestly for years, even after becoming a believer. I didn't realise the importance of modesty and didn't think that the way I dressed was a big deal. Especially since I'd hear all over the place "If you've got it, flaunt it!" and since I was a dancer in good shape, I didn't think I had any reason to hide much.

But about 6 years ago, around the same time that Phil and I started seeing each other, God started to change my heart and made me see that the way I dress is important. I saw that I could make people feel uncomfortable or distracted which I did not want to do. And I didn't want my fiance to be distracted by me either.

I'm still learning, but my days of low cut shirts are definitely over. So when I stumbled upon this website, I thought this girl had a good idea. She has a section on her site for Modesty Solutions where you can buy lace to add to a shirt or dress that might be too low cut. I've been wearing tank tops underneath any low cut shirts or dresses that I wear, but it can be a little too warm in the summer time to be wearing 2 layers of clothing. So adding some lace right where I need it could definitely be ideal. She also sells an ebook to show you how you can fix immodest clothing.

Check out Edelweiss Patterns if you want to learn more.

Blessings

Rachel and Leah

2010-12-13T13:26:00.003-04:00

I've been reflecting on the story of Rachel and Leah lately. I'm not sure why, I hadn't even read this story in a long time, but one day I was thinking about their situation and how Jacob wanted to marry Rachel but he got Leah instead. And, I'm not sure if you are like me, but whenever I have read this story I would always take Rachel's side thinking that Leah was deceptive and thinking "how dare she go in the way of true love". I would see Rachel as the good girl and Leah as the bad girl.

But as I was thinking about it more, I don't think that it was Leah's idea to deceive Jacob, but her father's, as it was not well seen for a younger daughter to marry before the eldest daughter. Rachel was pretty so she would have no problem getting married, but the Bible says that Leah had weak eyes, which might have played a factor in her not being desired for marriage. So Jacob and Leah get married and when Jacob realises that he married the wrong girl, he goes to his father in law clearly upset. But his father in law pleads with him to give Leah her marriage week and then he could marry Rachel. And that's what he does.

One thing that just hit me the other day is that, we might be cheering for Rachel in this story, but we see that God loved Leah. Not that He didn't love Rachel, but because He knew that Leah was not loved by her husband He enabled her to conceive and gave her many children, many blessings. But Rachel He left barren for a long time. Plus it was Leah who gave birth to Judah, the line Jesus came from. I thought that was interesting.

For me this was just another realisation that we do not always see people as God sees them.

Marie Madeline Giveaway

2010-11-26T14:11:00.002-04:00

Life in a Shoe is hosting a Giveaway for $50 at Marie Madeline Studio. They sell lovely fabrics as well as their own projects like skirts and aprons. Really nice stuff. If you'd like a chance to win, head over here to enter the draw.

Blessings.

mat leave is over

2010-11-26T12:56:00.003-04:00

I've really been bad at blogging lately... sorry readers :(

Well Dawson will be a year old in a month. I can't believe how fast time has gone by. And with that, the end of my mat leave is here. I definitely did not want to go back to work, but did feel like we needed some extra income to keep paying off our student loan debts, so I talked with my old manager and we came to an agreement that I could work from home on a part time basis as a contractor. So I'm not an employee, but basically have my own business and sell my services. I'm going to try to commit to 10 hours a week which I will break down to 2 hours a day on weekdays. D easily sleeps for 1 to 2 hours during his naps and takes 2 naps per day right now.We'll see how this will go and hopefully I can keep doing this until the next baby comes :) No news, just hoping... ;-) I think this is doable, 10 hours a week shouldn't disrupt my house and family duties.

D had his first fever yesterday. Poor baby. He slept a ton, a 3 hour nap in the morning and a 2 1/2 hour nap in the afternoon. When he was awake after his meal, we cuddled on the couch. He went to bed later than usual because he had slept so much during the day. He wasn't really fussy, a little whimpery at times, but he was still himself, just calmer. He woke up a few times in the night, which is still normal for him, but he wouldn't nurse. He would take the breast but wouldn't eat, he'd just calm down a fall asleep again. I thought it was a little odd but didn't think much of it. Then this morning, his fever had left him but he still wouldn't nurse. I then noticed that he hadn't been sucking on his soother, but just keeping it in his mouth.

He ate his cereal no problem, and then I pumped hoping he would take a bottle. And he did! So hopefully he'll want to nurse later.

That's it for now. I'll post a giveaway next.

Love

Halloween: do you celebrate it?

2010-10-27T14:46:00.003-04:00

As halloween approaches I wonder how many of you believers celebrate this day and how many of you don't. And for those who don't, do you have a fall festival or some other kind of celebration or don't do anything at all? If you choose to not celebrate, do you still give out candy to the neighborhood kids?

These are questions I've been thinking of and reading up on. As a child, my family didn't celebrate halloween, but my parents would still give out candy. They would usually get us some candy, rent some movies or video games and move the tv in my room and we'd stay there all evening. I never felt like I missed out by not trick or treating. I think my husband's parents would give out candy that had "Jesus loves you" stickers on them.

Anyway, what are your thoughts on this subject?

Getting some work done

2010-10-22T12:13:00.006-04:00

My husband and a gang of helpers redid our roof a couple of weekends ago. They worked hard and I provided them with lunch and snacks. They were able to finish most of the roof, but there is this one part that they didn't have time to do and it's just a small piece that goes over our back steps outside. So Phil took advantage of the nice weather on Wednesday to work on it.

The picture is taken from our bedroom window, I was not on the roof with him, although I did have to go up there once to help with a small task :)

I've really been enjoying staying home with my baby these last few months (he's almost 10 months!!!) and taking advantage of the time that I have to make things. I've never made before. One of them, like I mentionned in the post below, is a taggy blanket. I got the instructions here. Here is a picture of the final product.

The other side is made of a light blue flannel, the polka dot side is cotton.

I've also just finished a wall decoration for D's room on top of his bed:

I have my sewing machine and craft supplies in D's room so when I am working on these projects he is either sleeping (the sound of the sewing machine seems to soothe him) or playing like in this picture:

Yes, that is Bugs Bunny on his behind :-p

I also made a batch of some homemade deodorant. That's right... Let me just say: It is amazing! I just love it. I had switched over to a natural deodorant a few months back, but had noticed that by the end of the day it had worn off. So I fhad gone back to using a Dove Antipersperant to feel fresh all day long. But then I found a recipe here and thought I'd give it a try. The recipe on this site makes unscented deodorant, but I added a few drops of lavender oil to add a nice scent to it and I think it's great. Give it a try.

Oh and we just got D a convertible carseat, the Graco MyRide 65! I heard about this one when I was pregnant and was sold on it, but it was not yet available in Canada. But now it is and we saw it on sale last week :)

Isn't he just adorable? He doesn't look too excited about the new carseat, but I am :)

Anyway, hope you are all having a good week and let me know of any projects you've been working on as well :)

Win a taggy blanket

2010-10-14T14:06:00.002-04:00

Our friends Warren and Shanie are raising funds to adopt a child from South Africa. Shanie is a very creative person and has been making taggy blankets to help with the fundraising. She is now doing a giveaway on her blog to win one of these taggy blankets. They are really nice and babies love them. You can enter here.

I made a taggy blanket for Dawson a few weeks ago. I'll have to upload pictures to share.

Baby sleeping woes

2010-10-07T14:58:00.004-04:00

Woah... Where have I been on the social media scene? Well, mostly on facebook, sorry blog... I've neglected you for a while. Being a mom is a busy job and I don't know how you mom bloggers blog every day with numerous kids. When D was younger I would just nurse with the laptop in front of me, but now he nurses way too fast and if he sees the screen in the corner of his eye, he is totally distracted, so I don't do that anymore.

Dawson is 9 months old now and he is going through an "I want to be with mommy all the time" phase or something. He's usually ok if he doesn't see me, but when I walk out of a room, he'll either cry or follow me out (he's got the crawling thing down for sure). This has been fine except for nap time and bedtime. I am still nursing him right before bed, but he doesn't fall asleep nursing anymore (only once in a while will he do that) so once he is relaxed after his last feeding, I put him down and he instantly wakes up and gets up in his bed. ugh. I used to try to just rock him back to sleep with his soother but that would take forever. And since we often have evening events at our house I like to be available to the people we have home, but I also want to be available firstly to my baby... so I sorta have a dilemma.

So, I have started to train him to fall asleep without being in my arms. When he goes to get up in his bed, I put him back down. I'll do this twice and if he gets up again, I walk out of the room. He cries for me, but I only stay out for a couple minutes. I come back and lay him down and repeat this process until he stays down. I stay in the rocking chair so he knows I am still there. Once I see that he is fine and ready to fall asleep, I leave the room and he falls asleep.

I am on day 2 and he just went down for a nap by himself. Yes! It wasn't without some fighting back, but he didn't cry, just lamented a bit. Then he gave in and laid there playing with a stuffed toy. I left the room for a few minutes. When I came back in he was asleep with the tag from his blanket in his hand :) He loves tags. He had fallen asleep practically sitting down with his head forward on the bed. I wanted to take a picture.

It was hard for me yesterday since he cried quite a bit and I didn't want to let him just cry it out. So I researched controlled crying a bit and this is the system that I came up with for us. They say it takes about 3 days for a baby to get used to something and 1 day to ruin it. So I am being persistent and we'll see how it goes tomorrow.

Have any of you other moms tried different things to help your babies to sleep?

Love

Old Fashioned Giveaway

2010-08-13T09:54:00.004-04:00

If you like to sew and enjoy feminine things here is a giveaway for you. Johanna at An Old-Fashioned Girl is celebrating her 200th post with a giveaway. Enter by clicking on the button below:

Here are the prizes:

Roses and Teacups are giving away a cute nightlight (perfect for a girl's room)

Sense & Sensibility Patterns are giving away an e-pattern of your choice.

Marie-Madeline Studio are giving away a pattern for their summer shade jumper plus the fabric to make it!

And The Joy of Jewelry are giving away a lovely pair of earings.

Have fun entering! :)

A New Hobby?... And link to Giveaway!

2010-08-09T20:59:00.004-04:00

I have been in the mood to take up sewing. I'm not very comfortable with a sewing machine yet, but we have a good machine and my mother in law has taught me the basics (actually I made a paair of lounging pants for Phil a couple years ago with her help) and I now have a good friend here who is also interested in sewing. She made a taggy blanket last week and it looks awesome! Dawson loves tags on blankets and toys so I'd love to make one for him. So we are planning on getting together for "sewing parties" so that we can learn how to sew together and have special projects. We also have a friedn who sews who is willing to teach us.

I picked up a book called Quick Quilts for Kids the other day and it is full of great ideas for quilts that are almost all at a beginner level. My grandmother makes quilts and has for years and years. I've often received quilts from her as gifts and I would love for my kids to have quilts too.

So I have set up our sewing machine (it used to be stored away, hence why I never used it), and I am hoping to get my creative juices flowing. Pray that I have patience with this and that I don't give up easily... I know that I can be tempted to do that with learning new skills.

Since I've been thinking about this and getting ready to sew, I was super excited to find this giveaway on Lydia's blog. You can enter to win an apron from the Marie Madeline Store. Check out their site if you are into sewing or homemade goodies :)

Love

Happy Birthday to ME!

2010-07-26T13:38:00.002-04:00

I turn 27 today... yikes. I loved being 26, it is still considered mid twenties... now I think I am officially in my late twenties... oh dear :)

Phil is out working today so I am spending the day home with my little love. We went for a walk this morning. When I got up this morning I woke up to a present on the kitchen table and a note of 27 reasons why I love Genieve :) It was sweet and full of Phil's wacky sense of humour :) We are going out on a date tonight (not sure where, it's supposed to be a surprise) and Dawson will be dropped off at our friends' place to be babysat...aaaahhh! He'll be fine, he'll be fine... :)

Hope you all have a great day!

Pics From Our Trip

2010-07-13T14:04:00.006-04:00

EDIT: So only the last picture was showing up for this post (I have a Love/Hate relationship with Picasa...) So I added the other pics again, hopefully you can see them all now. This has happened in the past too, so I should know better by now to not upload my blog pics from Picasa and just use the picture uploading feature right on Blogger.

Here are some Pictures from our trip to see my brother in Ottawa.

Dawson did really great on the road. It took about 9 hours to get from Fredericton to Ottawa and he was content the whole way.

Here we are in front of Parliament on Canada Day. They had live entertainment, Fireworks and tons of vendors.

My parents celebrating Canada Day

One popular vendor was selling soft ice cream and I kept seeing people walk by with these yummy looking treats, so Phil went off to find some. He came back with this and Dawson was just mesmerized by it. It was the funniest thing.

The next day we got to visit the city. We went to an Arts museum and went out to eat at a great buffet place called Tucker's. Here's a family pic that my brother's room mate took.

Dawson loved meeting his uncle :)

quick note

2010-07-11T22:06:00.002-04:00

We have been so busy this summer. We went to Ottawa to see my brother for Canada day and then headed to Montreal to see my aunt and check out the jazz festival. My parents came with us and it was a nice family trip. I'll have to update with pictures. Then we got back here and I headed to my parents place a couple days later to visit my aunt who was home from Arizona... so lots of traveling and the baby has been so good being in a carseat for long stretches.

I'm off to bed now...so goodnight for now and I'll update with pics later.

The Past Month

2010-06-14T12:23:00.007-04:00

Woah, it's been a while. I'm not sure why I haven't been blogging lately. I guess I've been reading blog posts instead of writing my own. So what have we been up to lately? Lots. I'll do a picture post :)

In the past month, we went back home for my first mother's day and we all got to meet Dawson's cousin Charlie from BC. They are a little less than 4 months apart.

They even got to take a bath together.

Here is Phil's sister with her son and nephew.

And while we were there Dawson got his first potty! So EC has been a little different this past month. It's still going pretty well.

Then I organised my first baby shower. My friend Leesa came up with this game...

We had a really warm day in May, so we brought Dawson to the beach. Here we are on our way to the beach.

Then we stopped to get an ice cappuccino for the road and while we were waiting for daddy to come back, this little man had an explosion in his diaper. So I get him out of his carseat to change him and it had leaked all over him. And of course, I didn't bring a change of clothes except for his bathing suit. So in the bathing suit he went.

Dawson enjoyed the beach

But the water... not so much. It was VERY cold.

He has learned how to use the bumbo in a different way...

And he has started to eat solids

Hope you feel caught up :)

Love

Sun protection

2010-05-13T14:34:00.003-04:00

I have been looking into extra sun protection lately. Having very fair skin, I get a sunburn every summer, especially if I spend a day at the beach, even if I put sunscreen on. So in my search for sun protection and extra modesty at the beach, I have discovered UV Skinz. I am seriously looking into buying a shirt for myself, for Phil and for Dawson. The cool thing about this month is that if you purchase something from their site, you can get a free baby uv skinz swim shirt. Check them out here. CoolCanuck is also having a giveaway this month to win something from the UV Skinz site. You can enter here.

This month is also skin cancer awareness month. Protect yourself from the sun this summer :)

Start Your Family

2010-05-06T15:45:00.002-04:00

Jennie over at Ladies Against Feminisn has reviewed a book called Start your Family by Steve and Candice Watters. Check it out here.

LAF is also hosting a giveaway for one of their readers to win a copy of this book. Interested? Enter here.

Baby Lotion

2010-04-22T21:05:00.006-04:00

When Dawson's skin got a bit dry after baths I started to put some baby lotion on his skin after bath time. I had some Johnson & Johnson (baby powder scented & cucumber melon) lotion as well as some generic version of the stuff too. I felt that they both had quite a strong scent and I didn't like the fact that the lotion is pink... I mean what do they put in there? I'm sure it's not natural. So I was on the lookout for a natural baby lotion to use on his sensitive skin. I couldn't find anything! I saw that Aveeno makes baby lotion as well, but I am not sure how natural it is plus it is much more expensive. If it was less expensive, I might have bought some to try it out at least, but it wasn't worth it for me.

Then some friends who just had a baby told us that they got some baby lotion as a gift that was all natural from President's Choice. Hmmm... I'll have to check that out. We don't normally shop at SuperStore since it's not the closest grocery store to where we live, but we made a special trip (plus we had some giftcards to shop there). It took a while to find the stuff since I didn't know what it looked like and there were so many other brands to look at, but we found this interesting looking bottle at the top of the shelf and there was only one left. I didn't think this was the stuff our friends were talking about because it just looked so different AND it was cheap, really cheap. I read the labels and was quite impressed, plus the smell was so yummy. The scent is lime and mint, a very different, but very nice smell. Since it was so inexpensive, we got it.

I love it! It is a very nice and smooth lotion and it doesn't smell strong. Some might not enjoy the scent, especially since lime and mint aren't really smells we associate with babies, but I love the combination of the citrus smell with mint. I actually like to use it for myself too :) Dawson has had a bit of exzema on his forehead and I've used this lotion on it and it is really helping.

I rarely promote products on this blog, but I just had to share this one , especially since I didn't know about it I figured other moms probably didn't know about it either. Try it out, it is natural and inexpensive.

Answer: Where's My Baby?

2010-04-19T16:58:00.003-04:00

So would you like to know the results?

A couple people got the right answer. It is....

Yellow!

hehe...

New and improved JJ video

2010-04-15T17:44:00.002-04:00

Since our first Jolly Jumping video was a bit dark we decided to post a new one, and Dawson sure wanted to perform for you all.

Where's My Baby?

2010-04-15T11:10:00.002-04:00

So Phil woke up one morning to this unusual sight.

We were pretty sure we had left Dawson in his playpen the night before, though by the look of his blankets you wouldn't know it. After unveiling his blanket, we were pleasantly surprised that he was safe and sound though not in the position we thought. So we thought we'd make a game out of it for my wonderful readers. Below we have three options: Red, Green, or Yellow. Make a pick in the comment box and we'll let you know in a couple of days who was right (and show you the proof).

Have fun guessing!

Dawson's latest toy :)

2010-04-14T14:51:00.004-04:00

Phil went on kijiji the other day and found a Jolly Jumper for Dawson. So he picked it up yesterday. At first Dawson didn't really know what to do with it, but I think he is getting the hang of it now. It is so funny and neat to see him learn. Here are some pics of his first day on the Jolly Jumper.

His very first time

A second try (he was having more fun the second time around)

When we took him out, I put him on the bed, turned around for a minute and then found him like this:
All tuckered out :)

EDIT: Here's a little video of him testing it out. It's quite dark, so you might not be able to see it very well.

Love

My Recipes

2010-04-13T15:01:00.002-04:00

To keep better track of my favourite recipes and new recipes that I want to try out, I have created a new blog. This way I can have easy access to these wherever I am, plus you guys get to check them out too :)

Here is the link if you want to check it out:

http://genievesrecipes.blogspot.com/

Love

LAF is back!

2010-04-01T08:30:00.002-04:00

I have been reading articles on Ladies Against Feminism for a couple of years now and over the past few months, they have been remodeling the site and the new site is now up and running! Check out the new and improved site here and see the giveaways that they are having.

Love

Happy Birthday Love

2010-03-28T19:07:00.002-04:00

Happy 28th Birthday to my wonderful husband!

Picture taken on his birthday last year at a maple sugar cabin :-p

All he wanted this year was his own sugar pie so that he could eat it from the center out... boys.

EC & GAD Diapers

2010-03-16T14:05:00.006-04:00

When Dawson was about 3 weeks old we decided to try out EC (Elimination Communication). We researched it online and decided to give it a shot, besides what could we lose by doing this? The very first time we put him over the toilet and made the "psht psht" sound, he went! We just couldn't stop laughing. It was the cutest thing ever to see a tiny baby peeing in a toilet. Ever since that day, we have kept up with EC and he has been going numerous times a day. We don't catch all of his messes in the toilet, we're still working on the communication part :)

Here Phil is holding him over the toilet by holding his legs up.

I have even brought him in public washrooms and he'll go there as well. I think it's good to get him used to other washrooms besides just our own, so potty training will be much easier (hopefully).

We have some friends who gave us a potty, so we tried it out last week.

Dawson doesn't like it as much as the toilet but he has used it a couple times. I think it's the funniest thing I've ever seen. He is 2 months old here.

Here I am holding him over the toilet at about 5 or 6 weeks old.

We have been using disposable diapers as well as G Diapers. G Diapers are basically a middle ground between disposables and cloth. They have a cloth cover and a plastic liner, then you put a biodegradable insert. these inserts are flushable or you can just toss them. We have really liked these, but for big messes, they aren't the greatest since the covers would often get leaks on them and then we have to wash these covers often. So we always put Dawson in a disposable diaper at bedtime when he's wearing a diaper for a long time.

But we've read that for EC to work best, cloth diapers are the way to go, since they are not as absorbent as disposables, the baby will feel wet immediately after going, therefore he will try to avoid going in his diaper and hold it in to go in the toilet. So we do need to put him over the toilet often, basically every hour or so, or every time he wakes up from a nap and every time he's been in the same position for a long time (ex: in the car seat or snugli), which may seem like a lot, but I think it will be well worth it in the end when he is potty trained early. And I think it's fun. It doesn't feel like it takes a lot of time.

So, he is growing out of his G diapers, so since our local baby store was having a huge anniversary sale this past weekend, we thought we'd look for some cloth diapers. We bought one GAD Diaper to try it out since it was 40% off.

These are really cute and I wish I would've bought more since they look and feel so comfy. They have a very soft bamboo velour inside and are made of waterproof PUL on the outside.

This is a pocket diaper, which means that you can put inserts inside of this cover, but then that means you can't reuse the cover once the baby has used it. So what I do is I put a chinese prefold in the diaper (a friend5 gave us a bunch of these) and I also put one folded flushable sheet on the back of the diaper so I can just flush or throw out the big messes.

Use the snappies to keep the diaper in place and voila! I like how there are 3 different snappies on the sides so that the diaper is adjustable to the bay's size. Very convenient.

I haven't had one leak yet using these. I am liking our transition to cloth diapering. Daddy doesn't mind it either :) He actually installed a diaper sprayer in our bathroom so that we can wash off the really big messes on the prefolds in the toilet. It's very cool (another find from our Stylin' Mama store sale).

I might look into buying some more cloth diaper covers. Do any of you have a favourite kind that you would recommend?

Love

EDIT: Of course, right when I was done writing this blog post, I got my first leak in the GAD Diaper...lol. But it did not leak out of the diaper, only inside the cover itself, so I'm gonna have to wash it. But Dawson's sleeper was spared! :)

Sleepy Dawson

2010-03-10T14:04:00.003-04:00

So in the last few days, we have been putting Dawson to bed in his cradle and then when we check on him, we find him in funny positions. Here are a few...

In this one, he slid down on his wedge and ended up going underneath the side cushion that's velcro'ed on to the wedge... not sure how he pulled that one off.

He often kicks the blanket off of himself and it gets all bunched up at his feet:

He started sliding down his bed and waking up in the morning like this:

I took off the wedge he's been sleeping on last night, so hopefully this won't happen anymore.

And his favourite position... arms up in the air! And the blanket is kicked off again...lol. What a cutie :)

Love

Carseat to be won

2010-03-10T11:30:00.004-04:00

Go to My Organised Chaos and you could win a Britax Advocate CS Convertible Car Seat worth $399.99. How cool is that? Enter here.

Canadian Contest

2010-02-23T15:06:00.001-04:00

3 Canadians are going to win the newly released Purex Complete 3-in-1™ Laundry Sheets from My Organized Chaos Blog. Check it out and enter here.

Honey Butter

2010-02-22T20:15:00.001-04:00

Happy Monday! I may have posted this recipe on here in the past, but I couldn't remember if I did, so since I made a batch of honey butter today I thought I would share it with you. I first discovered this delicious spread a couple years ago when my mother in law gave us some. I then asked her for the recipe and had only made it once since getting the recipe. Well yesterday I got all of the ingredients and made a batch today. It turned out really well :)

You can find the recipe on my Recipezaar page here.

After making the honey butter, I really wanted some, but wasn't in the mood for toast so I made some biscuits.

Wonderful!

It was a hit with everyone in the house (hubby and room mates). Dawson was good and took a nap the whole time I was making these :) Here he is all strapped in yesterday after getting back from the Canada USA hockey game that we watched on the big screen on campus.

Hoping you're having a good week :)

Love

Win an Ergo Baby Carrier

2010-02-11T15:14:00.001-04:00

Lydia is having a giveaway on her blog. Check it out here.

A Month Already?

2010-02-08T22:23:00.000-04:00

Over a month has gone by since Dawson was born. Time is going by so quickly, but at the same time, it feels like he has been part of our lives for so long. And the birth seems like it happened a while ago. He is growing and changing so much already.

His usual bedtime is midnight but then he sleeps in until about 9am, so we are getting plenty of sleep. We are enjoying him a lot. He is just too cute :) See for yourself below:

We'll be visiting my parents this coming weekend and showing him off to family and friends who haven't met him yet or who only saw him when we were in the hospital. It should be a good trip home. My parents are so excited to see him again.

On another note, I've been getting some spam commenters lately, so I have made some changes to the commenting section. Hope it won't be a bother.

Love

Hospital story and pics

2010-01-19T12:43:00.005-04:00

Some recent pics of Dawson:

This morning

In the baby wrap
He's not a huge fan of the bath

Sleeping on mommy while she reads

Being a mom is really cool. Dawson is great and he is such a cutie. I can't stop marvelling at the fact that I gave birth to him; that he is a part of both Phil and I and that he gets to be a part of our family. It is simply amazing to me.

So I shared my birth story, but I haven't shared the rest of the story... the hospital story.

A lot of babies were born the same day and the day before Dawson, and all of the semi-private rooms were taken, so we were put in a private room. It was great to have our own room, with our privacy and space for visitors. Dawson stayed in the nursery the first night since he was throwing up quite a bit of mucus, so a nurse (my father's cousin) kept an eye on him that night. We slept really well that night :)

The next day, I stayed in bed pretty much all day. I only got up to try to go to the bathroom (and in the end I couldn't so, like one commenter mentionned the other day, I had to have a catheter, which was actually kinda nice since I could stay in bed...lol) and I got up to take a shower. The recovery was harder than I thought it would be, but Phil was a huge help and he became an expert at changing diapers :)

After a bit over 24 hours of having him in our room with us, a nurse came to tell us that he had jaundice and that he would need to go under the lights for the next 24 hours. I had suspected that he had jaundice and so wasn't surprised at this, but Phil didn't expect it at all. It was quite hard on him to see him in the incubator.

It was so warm in there, that Dawson just slept the whole time. At first we thought that I wouldn't be able to go feed him myself, so I was pumping what I had and then they would feed him. But when it came time for the first feeding, they let me feed him (via a small tube around my finger). Then a Doctor came in and said that I was able to breastfeed him if I wanted to and that we could put the tube in at the same time so he could get a bit of formula until my milk came in. So then the staff brought him in our room every 3 hours so I could feed him :) I didn't like the thought of giving him formula, but at the same time, I knew that becasue he had jaundice he needed more fluids than I could provide. My milk only came in on sunday and he was born on wednesday. He did great and they let him out of the incubator earlier than expected so that was really nice for us to have him back in our room.

I can't believe all of the different advice I got from all of the nurses and Dr's, especially on feeding him. It got quite frustrating. And 4 different staff came in to talk to me about birth control options. Okay, I know it has to be brought up, but 4 times? Come on. Phil said that he thinks they are trying to do population control at this hospital...

The happy family

They wanted to keep an eye on his jaundice, so he only got dismissed on Sunday, while I got dismissed on Saturday, but they let us stay there so I could feed him. They did have to move us to a semi-private room though which was tiny. I then realised what a blessing that private room was. I think that our stay would not have been as pleasant if we would have had a semi-private the whole time. My advice: get the private room if you can.

Looking better after being under the lights

It felt really good to be home after spending 5 nights at the hospital.

Birth Story

2010-01-12T16:06:00.005-04:00

I am thoroughly enjoying being a mother. Dawson is so precious. He is doing really well at night...sleeping for about 4 hours and waking to eat, then he falls asleep for another 3 to 4 hours and wakes to eat, then falls asleep again. It's great for us getting our sleep. He has been crying a lot especially in the late afternoons/evenings... he has a lot of gas and I can just tell that it hurts him by the little faces he makes... poor little guy.

I am recovering really well. I was kind of expecting to feel some baby blues, but I haven't. There was just one day at the hospital where I was over tired and had had tons of people come and visit for the past 2 days and I couldn't handle anymore... so I cried and cried. But after that, I haven't felt depressed in any way. I think it really helped to have my mom around for a week. She just left this morning. So now comes real life as a parent! 8-\

So now for my birth story... I'll try to keep this short:

Tuesday at 3:30am, we were at my parents' place for the holidays and I wake up to go to the bathroom where I realise that my mucus plug has come out. I feel excited, but try not to get too excited as I know that it doesn't mean that labor will happen today. So I go back to bed. I am awaken at 6am by something trickling down my leg... Has my water broken? No way! I never thought my water would break since it happens so rarely. I move around a bit and more comes out. I get up and nothing comes out... a sign that it is indeed my water that has broken. So I go back to bed without saying anything to Phil until he wakes up later on. He's excited and we try to figure out if there is anything we can do to get contractions to start. No luck with the ruptured membranes... So I just walked around for a bit (which I later found out isn't the smartest thing to do) outside in a storm...lol. Phil wasn't feeling great and so I was praying that he would feel better when I needed him in labor. I called the hospital in Moncton and they told me to come in. So a half hour drive turned into an almost 1 hour drive because of the storm and we went to Phil's parents' place to grab my hospital bag and eat lunch. Still no contractions.

We get to the hospital around 4pm and they put me in a labor room to check if my membranes are indeed ruptured...and yes they are. I wait around and do a Sudoku :)

At 9pm, I am still not having any contractions and so they start me on Pitocin... which I really didn't want, but I knew that labor had to be progressing 24 hours after the waters broke. So I went with it. At 11pm, they take me off the Pit since there are a ton of women in labor and they are short staffed. So they put me in a postpartum room for the night. Phil goes home to get some sleep and my mom stays with me. Phil had been gone for about an hour when I start getting contractions naturally. My mom massaged my back through each contraction since I was having a bit of back labor, but the contractions were irregular. So they started me on Pit again early the next morning. Phil came back by my side and my mom went home to sleep for a bit since she was up all night helping me through contractions. They forgot to give me breakfast, so at like 10:30am they brought me a bowl of cereal... I was starving. They told me to eat something that would be good to throw up...lol.

They kept augmenting the pit every half hour or so and contractions were getting strong and long. I was in bed for most of labor or walking the hallways and then decided to try the labor ball which was good. Then I wanted to be on my knees in bed hugging the top of the elevated section of the bed. This was my favourite position to take, but after a while I got really claustrophobic with pillows in my face, so I had to go back to lying in bed which was fine except that I felt the contractions more in my back. They didn't check me often, but when they did, I was not dilating very fast at all. I stayed at 1 1/2 for the longest time.

I got my membranes stripped at one point then reached 3cm late in the afternoon. I needed something to help the pain. So I asked for nitrous oxide. They brought it in and whenever I put the mask on, I couldn't breathe. They told me that there was oxygen flowing through so I should be able to breathe. After about 20 minutes of trying this method and not feeling any kind of relief, the nurse stepped out and Phil grabbed the mask to try it for himself. The mask imploded and he said "This thing doesn't work! We're suffocating her." The nurse came back in and Phil told her that he had tried it. She said "Do it again"...lol. And she realised that the tank was broken...sheesh. I still needed something, but I didn't feel like I needed the epidural since I knew that I could handle some pain, just not to this extent. So they gave me fentanyl which wears off after 20 minutes, but all it did was make me really drowsy and sleepy in between contractions, but the contractions were just as intense and getting more intense. So I went through 40 minutes with that and then my loved ones started to say that I might need to consider the epidural. I was stubborn and didn't want to consider it. What else could I get to numb some of the pain? There was nothing else... So after a while of Phil, my mother in law and my mother telling me why I should at least consider it, I gave in and asked for the epidural. And am I ever glad I did! I was at almost 6cm dilated when I got it and within an hour I was at 9.5cm. Because the pain was so intense, I was totally tensing up my body at each contraction and losing the rhythm in my breathing, not allowing my body to relax and dilate. Once the epidural came, I was able to relax and dilated really quickly.

Phil says that the atmosphere in the room changed immensely after that. There was a shift change, so I got a new nurse and she dimmed the lights and said I'd be pushing in a couple minutes. I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to feel where I was pushing with the lower half of my body being numb and all. So when they told me to push I was surprised how encouraging they were and how they kept saying I was doing a good job. I just tried to remember what my muscles felt like and it worked. I did get the urge to push half way through which definitely helped all the more. After an hour and 45 minutes of pushing, Dawson was born at 10:53pm and I only got 1 stitch! Pushing was my favourite part, it went by super fast.

I was very very swollen the next day and had to have a catheter put in for like a day. It was quite the experience. But as I hold my baby Dawson and he looks up at me with those big dark eyes, I am reminded that it was all worth it.

Love

It's a boy!!!

2010-01-04T20:07:00.002-04:00

He is finally here!!! Dawson Blair Anderson was born on wednesday december 30th at 10:53pm weighing 7lbs 5 oz. He is a joy! I will update with more pictures soon and share my birth story... let's just say for now that it was a long and hard labor but oh so worth it :)

Love

Still Waiting for baby...

2009-12-26T16:29:00.002-04:00

Merry Christmas everyone! I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and are still enjoying the Holidays. We have been viditing with our families for almost a week now. It is nice to be away. We're not sure exactly when we'll be going back to Freddy but if baby doesn't come before the 31st, I have a Dr's appointment to go to. I had high blood pressure a few days before leaving Freddy, but I got it checked right before leaving and it was fine. I've also had the chance to check it almost every day since we got here since my sister in law is a doctor, so she's been keeping an eye on me :)

I haven't had any signs that baby will be coming out soon, so I am taking it easy and just enjoying our last few days as a family of 2. My body is getting much achier and more tired now so I am anxious to not be pregnant anymore and, of course, I can't wait to meet our baby :)

Hopefully will be updating soon with baby news :)

Love

36 weeks shot

2009-12-07T20:59:00.004-04:00

Here is my 36 week picture and you get to see my new haircut :) It's a bit shorter than what I would have gone for, since I still wanted to be able to pull it up in a ponytail, but it works for me. I like it.

Heartburn is getting quite intense and I am feeling BH contractions every day now. I am looking forward to the end of this pregnancy and meeting this wee one :)

Pregnancy Photo Shoot

2009-11-30T14:53:00.002-04:00

Here are a few pictures that one of my colleagues took of us when I was 33 weeks pregnant:

I am Officially a House Wife! :-D

2009-11-30T14:43:00.004-04:00

This is my first Monday off of work and it feels great. I finished my at home work project on Saturday and yesterday was a busy day. So today I slept in (because I could) and made waffles with Phil for breakfast. We hadn't had a nice breakfast like that in a long time. He cooked up some apples to go with the waffles and I made a berry sauce. It was great!

Then, we put on some Christmas music (Sufjan Stevens' and Josh Groban's Christmas albums) and I cleaned up and decorated the house!!! Phil was working on a shelf in the basement. We don't have a Christmas tree, so I decorated our palm tree with little red and white bulbs :) It's pretty cute. I just need to finish putting up the Christmas lights around some windows.

:) Love

35 weeks

2009-11-27T14:52:00.002-04:00

Picture:

How far along? 35 weeks

Total weight gain/loss: 30 lbs!!!!!

Maternity clothes? Yup

Stretch marks? No, still none yet

Sleep: Quite uncomfortable. Lots of hip pain.

Best moment this week: Finding out that the baby's head is down :)

Movement: lots

Food cravings: Chocolate milk

Gender: Keep thinking it's a boy

Labor Signs: no

Belly Button in or out? It is out now

What I miss: Not having heartburn

What I am looking forward to: Meeting this little one

Weekly Wisdom: Read and educate yourself on labor (see post below)

Milestones: I am now on mat leave

Dr's appointment

2009-11-27T12:40:00.006-04:00

It's great to have my hubby back :)

We had a tour of the maternity ward yesterday. It went well and it looks like this will be a good hospital to have my baby. The one thing I didn't like was that the delivery rooms look so much like a hospital room... not cozy at all. It was good to get familiar with what the floor looks like and what they have to offer (birthing balls, jacuzzi tub, etc.) Knowing that I don't have to be on my back to push is reassuring. They are open to other positions and even have a squatting bar if I want to use it.

Then this morning I had a Dr's appointment and we discussed the fact that I might not be in Fredericton when I go into labor since my due date is so close to Christmas. He was cool with that and said that they would just make a photocopy of my portfolio and send it with me in case I have to deliver in Moncton instead. In the end, I don't think it would bother me which hospital I will deliver in, but I don't know if the hospital in Moncton offers all of the same things as this one. I do have some friends who have delivered there, so I could always check with them or maybe even try to book a tour for the mat ward there. And I can skip out on my Christmas eve appointment if all looks well the week before :)

I did get some good news from my Dr this morning: the baby's head is down! I am so happy to hear that since I really thought that the baby was transverse. I've been having lots of side and hip kicking, no rib kicking at all. So the baby must have the feet sorta close to the head or something. I was getting worried that I would need a C-Section automatically, but nope :)

I do have carpel tunnel in my arms, especially my right arm. So yesterday I got a splint from the pharmacy and am wearing it now. It feels like my hand is asleep all the time. My fingers are always numb. I guess it can happen in pregnancy because we retain more fluid or something. I hadn't heard of it though. It is not fun, but if this is the worst of my pregnancy symptoms, I'll take it! I really can't complain about this pregnancy, I have had a good pregnancy. No complications yet, no being sick (nausea, yes, throwing up, no) and I have enough energy. I was quite tired for the 1st trimester, then totally fine energy wise for the 2nd, and now I am tired again, not as much as the first trimester, but I think now it's mainly because I can't get a good night's sleep very often. My hips are really starting to hurt at night and the carpel tunnel is especially bad at night...lol. Oh the joys of pregnancy :) But it is such a privilege to be carrying this little one and I just can't wait to meet him or her :)

I have found some good books on labor at the library, so I have been doing my reading to be ready for labor. I do not want to go in there blind and unprepared for what may happen, so it has been good. Up to now I finished reading The Official Lamaze Guide (not about breathing techniques) and I am almost done reading Easy Labor which I am really appreciating since it goes over almost all of the different pain reducing techniques/medications out there, so that I can understand them all. Next on the list is The Thinking Woman's Guide to a Better Birth. A few girls have recommended this one, so I am looking forward to it.

Love

Mat Leave

2009-11-25T14:55:00.003-04:00

Phil has been away for a little over a week now. He went to visit a couple other campuses in Canada that have Navigator ministries as well. He was sick when he went to Calgary, but then felt much better when he got to Hamilton. He flies in here in about an hour and a bit. I can't wait to see him again!
I had my last day at work on Friday and then drove down to my parents' place to spend a few days here while I wait for Phil to get back. I had a good last day. We went out for lunch at a pizza buffet and I got this big gift package from Discovery Toys from the company. I got a bunch of toys for the babe that are cool and educational.
I do have a week of working from home, so technically I am only on mat leave this friday, but since I am not going into the office at all this week, it does feel like my mat leave has begun. We are really blessed here in Canada to have a yearlong maternity leave. I have a year off of work to spend with my baby :) It sure feels good to be off. Now I have a month or so to nest and rest.

Sunday, my mom and I went to my old Church. I thought that everyone knew that I was pregnant, but I gues some didn't. It was good to see the folks that I met when I first became a believer. After Church, we went out for lunch at a lovely café that I love called the Café Archibald. They sell these crèpe meals that are superb. Then we went to see New Moon! I liked it. It was very true to the book, so no surprises or anything. It was packed full of people. I can't believe how big of a hit this is.

I am at 35 weeks today. I'll have to get a belly shot tonight :) The due date is really getting close!

Anyway, I am all packed and ready to head back to Fredericton tonight with the hubby :) I should leave to get him soon. Have a great rest of the week.

Baby Shower

2009-11-09T19:37:00.005-04:00

So 2 weekends ago my mom threw me a baby shower back home. She had been planning this for a while and a bunch of women came to play games and shower me with gifts :)

Here Katie and I are sitting at the head table. We opened gifts as the women played games.

My grandmother made a cute quilt for the baby

Grandma (my dad's mom) , me and my mom

Katie gave us the Christmas outfit that Eben came home in 2 years ago :)

Some of the ladies playing a game

Playing games and chatting

My mom's cousin and my aunt

We got a lot of gifts for baby and since I had taken Monday off work, I spent the day organising all of the stuff. Baby's closet is all organised now and it feels great to be ready for the arrival of this little one. I just love looking at the clothes (mostly greens and yellows) and the soft blankets all clean and folded up nicely.... We'll see if it stays that way once baby comes :-p

And my 32 week belly shot

I am definitely getting big...and feeling big!

On Saturday Phil and I went to a prenatal course. It was mostly a guys guide to helping your wife through labor. It was very informative, especially for Phil. He learned some massage techniques to help through the labor and just learned the general process of what happens in labor. It was really good. I feel ready now to give birth (well, more ready than I was before...).

Love

30 Weeks

2009-10-22T10:35:00.004-04:00

I saw this on Renee's site and thought I'd give it a try too :)

Picture:

How far along? 30 weeks

Total weight gain/loss: I have gained 21 1/2 lbs so far from my normal weight. Although I had lost 1 1/2 lbs at the beginning of my pregnancy, so really I have gained 23 lbs.

Maternity clothes? Yes and yoga pants are my best friend right now.

Stretch marks? No and hoping it'll stay that way... :)

Sleep: Having a harder time sleeping now. I wake up in the middle of the night a lot, either because I am thirsty or the baby is moving, but most of the time it's because I am uncomfortable. Last night was the worst yet, my hips were killing me. I think it's time to call the chiropractor.

Best moment this week: Last Friday we went for a 2nd ultrasound and we were able to see how much the little one has grown. Baby was moving his or her lips a lot and moving around. This baby is sooo cute already :)

Movement: A LOT of movement. Baby is moving right now actually :)

Food cravings: Not anymore. But I do still love cheese every day :)

Gender: Don't know, don't want to know until the baby is out. Phil thinks it's a boy, I keep changing my mind. Right now I think it's a boy.

Labor Signs: Nope

Belly Button in or out? Can it be both at the same time? lol. It's a teensy bit in, and not popped out yet.

What I miss: Not having hip and back pain

What I am looking forward to: Meeting this little one

Weekly Wisdom: Listen to your body, if you need to sleep, sleep, if you need to get up and move around then do so.

Milestones: I have less than a month left of work and 2 months before my due date!!!

New Belly Shots

2009-10-15T18:23:00.004-04:00

EDIT - I don't know what happened to my pictures... but hopefully they will stay here this time :)

Here's a belly shot update. I am really feeling big and this belly weighs quite a bit...lol. Baby is still very active, especially at night so it keeps mommy up at times.

27 weeks

28 weeks

This morning at 29 weeks

Phil and I are off on a date tonight.... it's a surprise for him... an early Christmas present.

Love

Belly Shots

2009-09-28T17:45:00.003-04:00

So these are coming in a bit late, but here are my latest belly shots. If you're on my Facebook you might have seen these already.

24 weeks

25 weeks

26 weeks

My friend Katie lent me a bunch of maternity tops that I have been enjoying. The one I am wearing above is one of them.

I only have 8 weeks left of work... and I am quite excited to be coming home. I have been yearning for this for a while now and it is finally happening :)

We chose a crib/playpen this past week. Here it is all assembled in the living room by my wonderful husband:

We couldn't wait to take it out of the box! He assembled it as I was finishing up supper. I think the colors will be lovely for a boy or a girl. We can just pick bedding that is appropriate for a girl or boy once baby is born. I have been able to see my belly move these past few days... it is too funny and amazing! If I put my hand on my belly I can even feel parts of baby's body for a few seconds instead of just a quick kick. It is really cool.

I am entering my 3rd trimester this week...yikes! I am feeling quite large already...lol. I've gained 16 pounds up to now, which is quite a bit for me. But it's really pretty much all in the belly. Today my belly actually felt heavy, I'm sure it's going to get heavier ...lol. I have a baby shower coming up in a month. My mother and grandmother have been planning away.

This whole pregnancy thing is quite amazing! I really feel honored to be carrying this baby who is making my body a home before he or she enters this world.

Love

Less than 100 days?!?

2009-09-23T09:38:00.003-04:00

Woah! Less than 100 days to go in this pregnancy! Very exciting.... Never know though, this little bugger might show up late.... But it is exciting to see a number lower than 100 on my ticker :)

This is my last week in the 2nd trimester and baby is kicking up a storm! These past 3 days, baby has been moving a TON! It is pretty neat to be able to feel the baby's movements. I just can't wait to meet this little one. We chose a crib/playpen yesterday. Reality is really starting to settle in. We're going to be parents!

Love

A Lily... Slowly Blooming

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