Tuesday, January 27, 2015

All dressed up, nowhere to go.

Our plans to keep busy were quashed when Eleanor got sick and our car broke down. So we spent the weekend at the dr and walking the long walk home from the mechanic. I've been saving Eleanor's birthday present from her dad and me for a rainy day, and there's nothing like being stuck inside, a little bit sick and a little bit antsy, for some dress-up. 

Some of it is old hats I stole from old roommates. 


Some of it is old hats I used to use in preschool. 


But most of it I picked up in the week after Halloween. A ferocious bee. 



A lovely wig. 


A royal crown (that's her 'royal' face). 


A triceratops head. 


A firefighter suit. 


A dragon cape. 


A monster. 


A skull. 


Fancy gloves, fancy hats, glasses, wings. 


We never do anything now unless we're holding some flowers and wearing a fascinator. 


Or a rat costume and a pink vest and a grass skirt. 


Everyone so fancy these days. 






Thursday, January 22, 2015

Update extravaganza!

Sooooo, how're things? Good, good. Hey, so it finally  happened, I finally drove away without unplugging my car first (you have to plug your car in when it gets below -20 or it'll freeze and won't start). Geneva was crying, Eleanor was talking at me, I had to get the stroller out of the trunk, my brain was busy. Anyway. Never do that again.


What else. I got a fitbit. Eleanor calls it my 'fitbitter.' I love it. I love seeing how many steps I take in a day, how many MORE steps I take on a Tuesday when we walk to the library, how many more steps I take than Josie (who is pregnant, so it isn't even that gratifying to gloat at her). I had to pick it up at the post office, which is inside the Shoppers, and I can fit my bike trailer through the first door of the Shoppers but NOT THE SECOND DOOR so I was stuck there, inside the vestibule, because those doors don't open from the inside, and I had to leave my girls there and go through the store and around to the outside, and ask a stranger to hold the door for me while I wrestled them back out. Never do THAT again, either.


I joined a mom walk stroller boot camp mall fitness thing. It's on Wednesday mornings, before Eleanor's swimming lessons, and the one ends just in time to boot it over to the rec center for the other. It's not the greatest workout of my life, but it's not NOTHING, and I get to talk to other grown-up persons. Everyone there has these eensy babies, these sleepy newborns and gummy two-month-olds, and I've got Eleanor reading books in the front, and Geneva staring at me out of her big old eight-month eyes to make sure I don't go more than three feet away from her.


Geneva is eating foodstuffs constantly, and she was never a great pooper and then we started solids and she became a TERRIBLE pooper and then a mom on my facebook mom's group was like, Hey, when do I start giving my baby water? And I was like OH RIGHT WATER IS A THING so I started giving her sips from a straw.


I love her little bird mouth so much.


And she's super keen on it, like it's this neat new trick she's learned, and also now she poops like a regular person. Win win.


Robyn and Ryan came down from Meadow Lake for a visit. That was back when it was HELLA COLD so we went to the Fun Factory and the girls ran around like mad things and Ben did toddler stuff and Geneva just sat there like a fat, happy turkey because Geneva's best thing is to be where other people are doing things and she can WATCH.


Joel had a birthday. Eleanor drew him a card. I bought him a growler of amber ale from the farmer's market, which I just remembered is still a thing in the winter. Baby is for size.


We ordered in noodle bowls and I made him some lava cookies out of a box, because BABIES ON MY BODY ALL THE TIME NOW I AM NOT A FUNCTIONING HUMAN BEING.


Have we talked about how I'm using the bike trailer as my main stroller? I still use the double decker for mall walks and things, but right after we got home from BC the last time, I tried walking the double to the library and the wheels aren't big enough and it had just snowed and I got stuck crossing every street and had to go around to grab the front of the stroller by Eleanor's feet and haul it to the next sidewalk, and an hour later we got to the library and I was like, Ok, we live here now because I cannot do that again all the way home. And then I remembered that we have a bike trailer with massive back wheels and that Geneva can sit up in it now, so I can fit both girls in, and I put heat bags in their laps and tuck them in with blankets and go for runs. I RUN OUTSIDE IN THE SNOW BECAUSE I AM FROM SASKATOON HEAR ME ROAR.


Geneva always falls asleep in there and it's so adorable I could die. Look how snuggly she is.


Today was so warm, and we were only walking the ten minutes home from Flip, so nobody bothered with mittens, and Geneva fell asleep but Eleanor kept trying to hold her hand anyway.


My mom emailed a while back asking about my sad boobs. Remember how sad breastfeeding used to make me? And how sad I was about the sads, because I love breastfeeding, the convenience, the snuggliness, the supreme awesome power of feeding a human being with your body, the ability to be like, Sorry I bonked your head on the side of the crib, here is a boob. Anyway, that's all better. It sort of wore its way out a few months ago, so even though I'm still nursing like five times a day (alllllllways eating), my hormones have leveled out or something and now I am FINE and it is AMAZING.


Also the weather is amazing. It's so melty. Our dance card is pretty full this week so that we don't go mental waiting for our trip to BC, but we'll save some time for stomping around in the yard because how can you not go outside right now.


I ask you.

Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Hanging out, hanging in there.

This picture is my life right now. 


Geneva no more than three feet from me, directly in my line of sight. Eating, if at all possible. Her only other two settings are Actually On My Body or Crying. Eleanor is in swim lessons again, so her towel is draped over the time-out chair, which I no longer bother to put away anymore. 


I've been laughing at that picture all day because I need to laugh at SOMEthing. Geneva is SO. NEEDY. She is figuratively dying every time I put her down, so Eleanor is getting inadequate attention and it's making her feisty. I feel so terrible, because she's so self-reliant and requires so little from me and I can't even give her that right now because this baby. 


We go to BC in a week, and everyone is going to get all the attention they want. I want zero attention. I'm going to lock myself in the guest room with a coffee and a book, and nobody is going to talk to me, and it's going to be amazing. I can probably put up with these two until then.

 

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

This is also how I read.

Like this.


Like this.


Like this.


Like this.


Like this. 


THIS is how *I* read. 


Sunday, January 18, 2015

EVERYBODY reaches for a lime.

Remember Eleanor and the lime? I don't see how you could have forgotten. It has been a long and lovehatey saga.

Well. Geneva eats like a hungry bear right now. I cannot keep this kid full. I gave her her first toast finger the other day and it was amazing because it took her like ten minutes to eat and she sang to it the entire time BUT the germane point to this story is that this is her toast face:


Ack! Toast! So tangy!

And then today I was chopping things for a salad and giving her soft bits as she sat in her high chair beside me because heaven forbid I should be doing a thing that is not feeding her, and after I squeezed the limes for the dressing I gave her the rinds and GIVE me that for my mouth. 


Give me BOTH of those for my mouth. 


Yassssss. 


Saturday, January 17, 2015

Skatering

Redux of last year's skatering adventure,


with the warm temperatures and the sunny day 


Only this go around, Eleanor spent zero time being frustrated, and 100% of the time laughing her fool head off.


As I was not, this time, pregnant, Joel and I took it in turns to haul Eleanor around the rink


and bite the baby's face. 


Tricky business, this. My back is (as Eleanor would say) killering me. 



And then we went for burgers. Sorry, fat hands. 


Burgers are for skaters only.