Gut-busting laughter

Katie the scrapbook lady today had a Memory Monday - laughing so hard your face hurts - and it made me think of some of those laughing times in my life. The memory that comes to mind goes back to grade nine with Kristy. We were in geography class and one of the other students in front of us used to stand with his bottom sticking out a bit. There were some mornings while we sang the national anthem or were quiet for the Lord's Prayer that we were just struck by it. Nice? Probably not - although I don't think anyone actually knew why we were laughing. I can recall it happening on several occasions though - that gut busting, I can't stop laughing time. Man that seems like such a long time ago!

Thanks for the memories Kristy and I'm so glad we're still friends!

Marlee learned to ride her two wheeler today! Just before our first snow in the fall I realized that she was pretty much balanced on her bike and the training wheels were air born. We talked about taking off her training wheels and then we got snow. With the sidewalks finally fairly dry this week we gave it a go. She took maybe two walks with me beside her and then she was off. And so calm about it! She hasn't wanted to go up the hill which is understandable but even the last bit you could tell she was getting tired and I just said - "What do you think - should we finish up now - are you tired?" She agreed and that was it. Man she's growing up fast!

Diaper discussion

I met today with a woman who I plan on signing up for a cloth diaper service with. She came to the house to show me her product and tell me about her washing service. I am totally excited! I had been debating about how to go about this whole issue since we found out about the baby. I really felt that cloth would be the way to go this time - especially since we can't recycle or compost the diapers through Small Planet anymore. I read some really good posts about cloth diapering on Simple Mom but have honestly left things till the last minute. I then came across an article in the paper about Munchkin Bums and put it on the back burner - still thinking I'd just do it myself. This week I went around to the used clothing stores and realized that there really aren't a lot of used diapers to get out there. Enter the service again - and when I asked Drew, he was totally on board with using a service and not doing anything ourselves. Works for me!


So anyway, I met with Lisa today, who apparently MAKES all of the diapers herself! They looked to be of great quality and the price is comparable to buying disposables. I am still totally on board with trying to go as diaper free (using elimination communication) as much as possible but I realize that I still have to have something around. I can't wait to see how this works out.

2 more weeks!!!

I had my last appointment with my Ob/Gyn today before DDay. He is gone next week on March Break. All in all everything has gone really well. I' was thinking today of how I had really wanted to use this blog as a way of recording my pregnancy and it's progression. So much for that. I find by the end of the day, I'm just pooched and this is really one of the last things on my mind. Oh don't get me wrong, during the day I think of all sorts of marvelous things to say - but they are out the window after 6pm. But enough of that.

My doctor was impressed with my weight gain (25lbs in total) and that it has been stabilized over the time period he has seen me. My only complaints right now are numbness in my hands when I eat or write (carpal tunnel syndrome which should disappear after birth), general fatigue and numbness in my upper chest. He attributed that to the fact that the skin by your belly button is the thinnest in the body and as it gets stretched out over the belly, the pressure causes more numbness there as well. There IS a lot of pressure. The vericose veins and associated itching are a lot less then they were a few months ago. Now it's just lower body pressure. I really need to sit down and do a comparison of all three pregancies. I have such poor recall it would be geat to see it in front of me. Do I see a scrapbook page coming on?

A lot of people are just beginning to notice that I am pregnant at all. It has been such a warm week that I've worn a vest outside and well, you can't hide it anymore. Daily, I am having someone ask if I am indeed pregnant and are shocked that I only have 2 weeks to go. I'm shocked too.

As for the actual DDAy - our doctor is actually on call so we are to go to the hospital for 8am and wait until we are called in. Matt and Cierra will still go to school and Marlee will stay home with YaYa and the other kids normally here on Thursdays. From there we will see. Still no idea on the gender and still not conclusive on the names. But time is ticking!

Tremblant getaway

Our trip to Tremblant was great! When I can join the kids skiing again I think I will be in for a big surprise. They will have long outdone me. They did mostly blue squares and some black diamonds - areas I'm sure I would not have had the courage to try. Marlee had a few wipe outs but thankfully kept persevering. She did opt out of Sunday's ski as her ankle hurt so we had a nice quiet time at the condo together.

There was plenty to do - from the skiing to hot tubbing to just hanging out at the condo. If we'd had time we could have done dog sledding, free snow tubing, ice skating or just wandering around the village. Most of the time the kids just wanted to go hut tubbing when they weren't out skiing - that or play Trouble. They all got along amazingly well - especially for it being the first time away together. The condo had lots of room and was certainly fine for me to just hang out. They didn't seem to be away skiing for too long periods anyway so I never had time to get lonely (not that I do anyway) - I had books and scrapbooking - which I never got around to - and Drew got the wireless Internet running by Saturday.

Anyway - all in all a fun trip and surprisingly I'm not feeling any ill effects from the long car ride yet. Hopefully it will stay that way. Most people when they found out I was going at 9 months just said that they could tell it was our third. I guess they are right!

Another LOAD recap and a new direction

Another LOAD has been completed! Again, this one worked out wonderfully for me - very little stress, easy layouts and lots of geat inspiration and comments.

Here are my accomplishments!

28 days

34 pages/ items uploaded

15 digital layouts

3-8.5x11 pages

4 mini album pages

5- 8x8 pages

7-12x12 paper layouts

185 photos scrapped!!!

Since I didn't upload my layouts every day I'll give a brief summary of my top 5 favourites!

#5 I finally got my Israel Top 10 photos layout done - that felt good! It was only a year late but my only regret is not having more space to journal.

#4 I really like how this one turned out of Cierra. I want to do the paper version that is similar to Matt and Marlee's but I'm almost wishing I'd done this version instead - it just suits her (it also received 11 comments!)

#3 I do so few layouts of Drew - so I like this one. He needs more pages - and what can say - all that is on it is true.

#2 I really like how this one turned out. The colours, the simple story, the overall layout.

#1 These photos just speak to me. I love the look on Marlee's face and I'd been wanting to do a layout with these photos ever since they were taken. I'm glad it is finally done.

This was a great LOAD for finishing up a few stories that had been on the back burner. I loved playing around more with the digital layouts - some were so fast yet got the look and story I wanted to tell.

I am really finding that the digital layouts are helping with these stories. I find that I haven't been developing a lot of photos lately - more of them tend to be for Project 365 and I briefly tell the daily journalling. In the past I have developed photos for layouts that I then found to be the wrong size so I have slowed down until I knew what I really wanted. I'm finding digital to be the answer. I can plug them in - adjust the size - add background photos... It's actually encouraging me to do some layouts I probably never would have done. The development at Costco isn't bad either - $2.49 each! Well worth the savings of the aggrivation. Oh don't get me wrong. I can't completely give up paper scrapbooking - I have way too many supplies to do that. Plus there certainly is an allure to that type of crafting.

I have my theme albums I still want to pursue like Halloween, Christmas, year-end month-to-month, birthdays, Christmas cards received, and School of Life. There is also the flexibility that using Drew's laptop is now bringing. I found a 16GB flash drive to store all of the digital supplies on. I hoping this will allow me to do more in front of the tv or away. I recently looked back at the last several years of photos and made a new list of some layouts to make. I'm getting my mojo back! Actually I've already signed up for May's LOAD - and then realized yesterday that we will be in Ottawa for the last few days for Drew's run. I'll be trying to upload from a hotel - hope I can do it!

BTW - check out the picassa album at the side to see other layouts.

February 2010 Recap

Time for my monthly recap! I find these posts so helpful for my organizational style. I recently went back through my notes all the way to when we were married (12 years ago) and did yearly recaps in a similar format. I have no memory recall so this helps so much!

Exercise – I’m still did my weekly 52 card pick up with Rina and I’m definitely counting my daily walks to and from school (Although I have driven more lately =()

Books/ Magazines Read – scrapbooks etc magazine; CK magazine; reading Diaper Free

Entertainment - TV/ Movies Seen – Masada, LOST, Horton Hears a Who; Olympics; Survival Special;

Special Events – kids skiing lessons on Sundays; parent council (2nd), Church hiring committee; church storage meetings; Winterfest (6th); Superbowl Party (7th); Family Day (15th); Dinner out with friends; Marlee – birthday parties to Grace (20th) and Isabella (27th); Matt to John’s birthday party (28th);

Travel – n/a

Significant Purchases/ changes – garage loft done;

Health – Cierra – eye appointment (8th); kids sick (14-15th); 32-35 weeks pregnant – general fatigue (not bad); itchy; swollen hands developing (Carpal tunnel); heartburn in last week; some sciatica

Accomplishments – LOAD Feb2010 (See LOAD post)