Bonne Fête Romi!!!!!

One year old today. I'm not as sad as I thought I would be, maybe the daycare integration took care of the separation angst. I'm still super sad though, just not *as sad* as I thought I'd be. But I'll miss her like crazy. And now that I'm writing this out, I'm feeling soooo nostalgic and broken. Cause no one will ever love her as much as I do.

On with the show.

Here's a retrospective look at what we went through one year ago today. It started off rough with a fractured femur 2 weeks before I gave birth to Miss coconut... And Liam came home with a spica cast 3 days after I gave birth.

Our stay in the hospital:

And even though I was saddened due to my induction (pre-eclampsia), and I was stuck in the nastiest of all hospitals (Royal-Victoria), and that we had an injured boy at home, it was still the best day of my life. I can speak for Nico as well as myself when I say that our 2 kids are the best thing that ever happened to us. I won't go into the cheesiness, but it is what it is. And we are, finally, a family.

Spring time

Can you hear the birds chirping? The sound of water dripping from meting snow? Yes, spring is here!!! It came so suddenly that I never saw it coming. And now it's here. And I'm happy.

See the crocuses?? Proof!! Proof of spring!!! And my tulips were growing beneath the snow. I'm always amazed that plants know when spring has arrived and grow under snow. 

Miss coconut started daycare last week, and along with my broken heart, this has resulted in a cold and a stomach virus. I've never seen so much vomit. Ever. Out her nose, everywhere. 4 hours straight, non stop. It was an experience.  She's adapted fairly well to daycare but is nursing like crazy at home, so I suspect she's dealing with attachment issues. As I am. I feel terrible every time I leave her there. And I hate putting her in paper diapers instead of cloth. But the daycare doesn't do cloth diapers. 

But here she is, on a glorious spring day, getting the hang of walking outside (weird how she walks better inside than outside). 

And for some spring inspired knitting: market shawl. I like the easy pattern and love the Noro Cashmere Island yarn. Shades of fuschia, teal, black and navy. Yum. This was my "before knitting a Clapotis" project. 

Mittens galore!!

Could this be an obsession in the making?
I'm on my 3rd pair of Noro mittens. Scary, no? It seems that I'm the type of knitter that wants to do something over and over before moving on. It's kind of pathetic. I need to get hooked on socks quickly, at least before summer comes, to obsess over something a tad more useful.




And Liam's obsession du jour (he loves cow udders - nursing nostalgia perhaps?):


Easter was a blast even if I didn't knit the little bunnies I had planned to... Busy doing mittens will do that to a gal.




We did not give miss Coconut any chocolate (yeah, I know, I'm an evil mother) yet I found remnants of green foil in her diapers the next day. Go figure.

Here she is with her new accomplishment - sticking out her tongue. All.day.long. If she wasn't so darn cute, it might be weird, but she's so yummy that we're enamored with this new "milestone"!!

March is cruel

I wish I had something witty and fun to say, but I have to admit that the snow is really getting to me. I feel like winter is dragging on and on and on. And now the latest 35cm of snow actually covered a third of my living room window. Cruel.
Liam and Nico came back from playing in the snow last night with a new friend. He had been abandoned and nearly destroyed, so the two of them decided to take him home and put him back together. Doesn't he look happy?





So today I decided to bow down to the gods of winter. I accept that there will be snow till June. I will not think about flip flops and tank tops for another 6 months, and in so doing, decided to make Nico a pair of his very own Noro mittens. Woo-hoo him. I am amazed that I remembered how to c/o 2 mittens on one magic loop. Kate must be a much better teacher than she gives herself credit for. Cause I have a serious case of the mama-boob-brain, meaning my smarts are on hiatus while miss Coconut is draining me of all my liquids and, well, sleep.

Felicity

I admit it. I used to watch the show. And when I'd visit NYC, I'd go to Dean & DeLuca just, well, cause. I bought a few souvenirs for Zelia as well. Cause she was even more hardcore Felicity than I was.
So here's my Felicity. I'm going to make an amended version for Nico... It's such a fun, fast knit. Doncha love hats?



Here's Nico's finished version. Notice how there's hardly any slouch, well Nico vetoed the slouch on his hat. Big baby.
I really like the Berroco Ultra Alpaca, it drapes really nicely and makes a warm (but not too thick) hat.

Ok, fine, she looks like him...

I have to face the facts. Miss Coconut is Nico's spitting image. I've got proof. No matter how many people that tell me she looks "just like you!" I can no longer deny the resemblance.





And I just finished a Noro hat for Liam. As a bonus, here he is actually *gasp* smiling!!

sourire!

As soon as the camera turns on and we tell him to smile, this is the face he makes!!
He looks so serious, doesn't he? And don't you just love his choice of footwear? We should move to the suburbs, the shame.
Yes, Nico is checking the floorboards in this picture. The man is obsessed with his handywork.

J'adore Liam le soir à l'heure du dodo. Dès que c'est le temps de partir, il exige une calin, un bec et un bisou. Par la suite il met ses petit bras à l'entour de mon cou et me dit : c'est une clôture! T'es pris. Tu peux pas sortir.
Pis ça veut dire que je peux vraiment pas partir. Pas le droit de briser sa clôture, oh non. Ça serait le drame assuré!
Il est le petit garçon le plus affectueux du monde entier!!

the pool...

Went to the pool this week with miss Coconut with a dear friend and her lovely daughter Sofia.

She seemed to like the water well enough but was on me like velcro! She loved the shallow area and was crawling around in it, she was such a doll! I think the chlorine water is not the best for her eczema though, so I think I'll have to limit the pool with her :(
We have another pooldate this weekend with Liam (aka dafeist) and Sofia's older sister. I think I'll keep miss coconut home.

10 months old today!

Noooooooooooo!!!
Stay small!! Don't grow. I'm just.so.depressed. She is my last and she won't stop growing. I never thought having children was such a bittersweet experience. That every milestone brings some joy and some sadness. That seeing them grow makes me want to hang on for a little bit longer than I should. I wish I could stop time. I wish I could go back and re-experience liam as a baby. To give him what I didn't know he needed at the time. Why am I so darn nostalgic?

This is miss coconut 1 year ago (I blatantly copied Kris's idea, hope she doesn't mind!) :

varia

Merci matante. Pour le méga beau chapeau.
Looking dazed and confused like a Britney Spears wannabe, here's miss Coconut sporting her wonderful faux-fur-white-trash hat. She's such a star!



French toast for supper? Sure hon. Am I not the most glorious mom that ever lived!?!



Can you feel the love? This is the extent of sibling interaction we get at this house. I am soooo envious of people posting pictures of their kids sleeping together or playing together, or just plain not hurting one another. Not me. My son pinches, scratches, pushes miss coconut every chance he gets. All under the veil of over excitement and not from outright aggression, but it still breaks my heart.

In her new car seat...

I jumped through hoops to get a silly print for her new carseat!! We realllly wanted the cowmooflage but it wasn't available in Canada for the Britax Roundabout. So I ordered it from the states. After going through hell to get the seat from UPS without having to pay their brokerage fee, we have our seat!!! So soft and lovely and comfy. We love it!!

Here she is babbling in her car seat. Sorry, the camera motion might make you nauseous!





2 mittens on magic loop. Didn't think I'd get through, but I'm nearing the end!! I love knitting with Noro, the colors are just so much fun! Not the softest yarn, but for mittens I don't care. I just like the bright, non-matchy effect it has. Hopefully they won't be weirdly mismatched. Considering on side has 4 more stitches than the other. Don't ask.

My first pair of (successful) mittens!!

This is Kate Gilbert's Gifted pattern, super duper easy and QUICK!! Love it. And best of all, Nico loves them too! I used chunky alpaca and some black Galway to get gauge. Mitts are a tad big, but warm and fuzzy. I think I'll make myself a pair next. Yum.

Here are a few more pictures of miss coconut:

Standing 

Falling

And for fun...

Après les problèmes avec notre téléphone/boîte vocale qui ne fonctionne pas, maintenant j'ai des problèmes avec l'internet. Je devrais retourner avec un vieux téléphone avec un cadran et une connection internet téléphonique! On se rappelle du bon vieux temps quand on ne pouvait pas recevoir des appels pendant qu'on était sur le web, et la belle musqique que notre ordi faisait en se connectant! Ahhh les beaux souvenirs :o)

Mon projet d'hiver (Seaweed) se continue lentement... C'est comme un peu plate comme project, ribbing, ribbing, ribbing. Beurk. Mais une fois complété, Nico va être capable d'utiliser le porte-bébé sans mettre le manteau sur miss coconut. 

Dadou

Was Liam's favorite word when he was a baby (he even named his fave toy elephant mr. dadou) and now it's Romi's!!
After much prompting, here she is, saying it for the camera :o)

les shakes

Je vais tenter de mon mieux de réduire ma consommation de café au minimum. Est-que mes 3 cafés par jour sont la cause du sommeil fragile de Romi? On va s'mettre le coeur net!

Jour 1: Incapable d'arrêter ma consommation de caféine à 100%. 1 café le matin. Cause perdue? Ben non, on fait donc un premier tests de quelques jours avec seulement un café par jour. 

crack baby

I drank 3 coffees in a few hours. This is Romi.

Sad

You know it's a sad day when you have to sell 2 of your beloved diapers. A gnome Muttaqin and a Goodmama. Why? Cause I went overboard with purchases. And these were the least painful of the lot that I could part with. The Mutt isn't a knit print, so didn't stretch as well as my others and the Goodmama faded after the first wash so I was scared to use it in case it faded anymore. 

Oh how I loved the Gnome print. I stalked for it, felt the thrill of the hunt, hands shaking, blood pressure going sky high while I refreshed my computer screen at 7:59:59pm. I got it. But I never realized it was a woven print. Until it came to live with me :(

Those of you who share my love of diapers can surely empathise. Lets all take a moment to wish these 2 diapers farewell, and hope they will land in a loving new home. 

OMG!!!

He peed!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Liam the boy-who-will-not-potty-train peed 3 times in his potty today!!! Could it be the beginning of the end? We went diaperless today and while I had to prompt him to use the potty and bribe him with raisins so he'd stay on it, it worked! Not one accident and 3 sweet victories. I know it won't mean much to most of you and you might be snickering that the boy should've been potty-trained a long time ago, but he would just refuse to use the potty. Ok, potties.  But he did today. And I am the happiest mama in the world!!!

Bonne Année Grand Nez!

Une nouvelle année qui débute... Je peux pas croire, déjà 2008? 

Lazy. That's what I am. Lazy. Lazy. Or is it tired?
I haven't written anything in ages and I'm kinda feeling bad about that. Kinda. 

But Liam has been home for the holidays, which means, no computer time unless it's during naps... Speaking of which:

Isn't eat the yummiest when he's sleeping? *sigh*

Let's see. I am presently bouncing Romi on the exercise ball in my Kozy MeiTai trying to get her to fall asleep so I can type this. She is pulling my hair in protest. Why won't she go to sleep?? Doesn't she realise that if she won't sleep now, then the whole day is going to be a mess? I'm about to give up but I have to go to the market but if she hasn't slept she will be so cranky that I'm fearing a total meltdown. Not a fun prospect in below zero weather with a baby stuck to my chest in a baby carrier. Where's summer? Oh how I miss thee.

Wait a minute! Her eyes just closed for a millisecond longer than before... Could she be on her way to sleeping? Nope, false alarm. 

I'm a bit late with this, but we had a great christmas. Decided to forgo the conventional christmas supper and replaced it with a  christmas brunch. It was soooo much more enjoyable than last year! Lets face it, kids past 5pm are no fun. So why torture myself? 

Morning is where it's at. 

Here's a picture of the 4 siblings together. A rare occurrence.... I think it's been years since I've been photographed with my brothers and sister, and yep, you guessed it, every picture is blurry. I need to give Nico a crash course on how to use the manual settings on my camera... 

And the rest of the gang (minus my 2 kiddos since they were, by that time, finally napping.)

La neige!!

I'm scared the snow will end up covering our windows!! Darnit, the stuff did not melt. I guess I can deal with it. Until January. Then that stuff needs to GO!!

beets -yum!

tricot...

Bon, je suis rendu la pro des tuques, ok, juste certaines tuques, mais quand même. Et là je tente ma chance avec des bas... Mais c'est l'enfer. Car je les recommences toujours. Je les fais trop grands, trop petits, trop bizarre... Bref, à date, pas génial mon affaire. 

Je suis dans la réorganisation de  mes photos de projets... Alors en voici quelques-un...