Artwork

Can you tell who did which piece of art? One is the cross stitch that I've been working on for what seems like ages. Jonah's baby brother was born last week, and I just finished it today. The other one is Mary's work, and is the drawback of having crayons, chalk and an easel in your 2 year olds bedroom.

Crazy

I am officially in my third trimester. Less than 12 weeks to go until there should be another member of our growing family, and I really hope they pass quickly. My centre of balance is off, I have a hard time getting up from sitting down, my back aches, my boobs leak, I waddle when I walk, and I can't sleep at night. When I do manage to sleep I have bizarre dreams, usually about kittens. Occasionally I find kittens and bring them home, sometimes I give birth to kittens, it's all very strange.

I'm also getting more and more frightened about, well, everything. I worry about the move to Saskatchewan (though my worries are a little less thanks to Ryans comment on my last post), yes, but I worry more about what comes after. I'm terrified of giving birth, which is strange, but I know what I'm getting in too now, and it is much more frightening with that knowledge. My biggest fear is probably the most irrational though. I love Mary so much, more than anything or anyone I've ever loved before. Every once in a while it amazes me, I never thought I was capable of feeling this way before. How on earth will I be able to love this next baby as much? What if I don't love it as much, will I be able to be a good mother? Will I resent the new baby for ruining my relationship with Mary? I have so much fun spending time with her, and I won't be able to do it as much with a new baby. Everything is going to change so much, and I worry that none of it will be for the better. I'm sure that I'm being crazy and obsessive, I have friends who have more than one child and they seem to love them all....but I just can't help it.

So, yesterday we spent another $250 on the piece of crap Taurus that we just spend $700 on last week. Urg. Hopefully this will be the last money we need to sink into it for a good long time, I'm getting awfully sick of throwing all our money at it. Unfortunately, because of Ians work situation over the last couple of weeks (which has resolved, thankfully), we are very short of cash and had to ask my dad for a loan. It would have been okay, but the $250 we just spent was set for groceries, and now we are back in the exact same position as we were before Dad sent us the money. Selling this house will be fantastic, especially if we get what we think we will get for it...we can pay off our debts and actually get on top of things for once.

Oh, I took Mary to the doctor yesterday, just one of the walk in medicentres in town. My timing was perfect, when we got there the place was empty, so we only waited about 15 minutes to see the doctor, but in those 15 minutes the place filled up like crazy. Mary's had a bad cough for about 2 weeks now, and while she seems okay otherwise, it was starting to worry me a little bit, and it gets bad enough at night that she can't sleep and sometimes coughs till she throws up all over herself (and us on Saturday night). I quite liked the doctor she saw, she was a non nonsense sort of lady, and while I don't usually like female doctors I'm glad we got to see her. She poked in Marys ears, looked in her mouth and throat, listened to her chest, and pronounced that there was no infection, it was probably just the viral cold that is going around, and we should expect it to continue for another week or two before it gets better. What I liked most was that she didn't toss antibiotics at us like many doctors would do. I don't know if they do it because they think that parents expect to be given some sort of prescription, but it drives me crazy. I don't want to give Mary (or take myself, for that matter) medicine that isn't necessary and isn't going to do anything to solve the problem.

Houses

For those of you who care, or are curious, here are links to the MLS listings for the two houses.

Gray : http://www.mls.ca/PropertyDetails.aspx?vd=&SearchURL=%3fMode%3d0%26Page%3d1%26vs%3d1%26rlt%3d%26cp%3d%26pt%3d20%26mp%3d100000-150000-0%26mrt%3d-1-0-0%26Beds%3d3-0%26Baths%3d0-0%26f%3d%26ft%3dall%26o%3dA%26of%3d1%26ps%3d10%26ptgid%3d1%26aid%3d1671%26MapURL%3d%253fAreaID%253d1585&Mode=0&PropertyID=5332042

Vibank: http://www.mls.ca/PropertyDetails.aspx?vd=&SearchURL=%3fMode%3d0%26Page%3d1%26vs%3d1%26rlt%3d%26cp%3d%26pt%3d20%26mp%3d100000-150000-0%26mrt%3d-1-0-0%26Beds%3d3-0%26Baths%3d0-0%26f%3d%26ft%3dall%26o%3dA%26of%3d1%26ps%3d10%26ptgid%3d1%26aid%3d1671%26MapURL%3d%253fAreaID%253d1585&Mode=0&PropertyID=5526972

I really wish I knew how to make links nicely here, but all my magic helper buttons have disappeared (if anyone can tell me why, and how to get them back, I'd appreciate it).

I'm really quite excited and anxious, I want to get this done as soon as possible now that things are moving along. A week to wait for the agents to tell us how much our house is worth seems like an unbearably long time. I want to know now! What if by time we find out how much the house is worth and arrange to sell it, both the houses we like are sold? What if we end up having to move without somewhere to move too? What if I have to stay behind with Mary while Ian goes off to work? I certainly can't pack and move on my own (or really even with help, according to the doctors...). I just can't wait to be in a house that is big enough for our little family to grow in, and the idea of being relatively debt free except for a smallish mortgage is incredibly exciting.

The hardest thing about moving will be leaving all our fantastic friends behind. The idea of that kind of makes me sick in a bad way as opposed to an excited way. I'm sure we will survive, and we will come back to Edmonton for visits, but still. I mean, I moved to Edmonton 7 years ago without knowing anyone, and now I have a huge network of friends, surely I can do it again, right? The problem is that Regina is...well, it just isn't Edmonton. I'm thinking of putting an ad in the local paper there to find people to play D&D with. How does this sound? "Thirty something couple new to the area in search of a group of like minded people to engage in weekly role playing adventures." Tee hee. I'm sure we would get some colourful responses to that one.

Choices

So, for those of you who haven't guessed it, we are moving to Saskatchewan. We considered looking inside the city, but the house prices there are so crazy because of all the albertans moving there that we just can't afford what we want. This time we are not willing to comprimise and move into a house that we hate because we can't afford any better. I've been looking online at the MLS service, and found several three bedroom houses just outside Regina, the farthest being about 30 minutes away. Yesterday Dad and Michael (his wife) spent the day with our real estate agent looking at the houses that I picked. They quickly whittled down the choice from 7 to 2 houses that they liked the best.

House # 1:

This house is in a town called Vibank. which is about 30 minutes south east of Regina on a secondary highway. Vibank has a corner store, gas station, post office, butcher and a K-12 school. The house itself is on a huge lot, but the lot is unfenced. It's been well taken care of, but it does need some work. Michael didn't like some of the colours in the house and the shower in the basement needs to be ripped out and redone. The baseent is fully finished with a rec room and basmement. There is a man floor laundry, a double attached garage, an en suite bath in the master bedroom and a covered deck off the kitchen. They said it is a very nice house in spite of needing some work, they both quite liked it. Oh, and it is 1341 sq feet. They are asking $139,900.

House # 2:

This house is in Gray, a hamlet about 20 minutes straight south of Regina. Gray has nothing....just a post office and a school, which is right next to the property that we are looking at. The house and yard are not as big as the one in Vibank, but the yard is fully fenced, and like I said, it is right next door to the school. Dad says that you walk across a gravel access road and are in the school yard. They liked this house better than the one in Vibank, they said it needs no work at all. The bedrooms are bigger, it has a fully finished basement as well, the floors have been taken care of. There is a neat little sun room connecting the house to the double garage, and it has a new furnace, windows, dish washer, central air and central vac. Michael called it immaculate. Their only concern is whether or not we would want to live in a town with absolutely no amenities, though it really is very close to Regina. This house is 960 sq feet, and they are asking $109,000 for it. The taxes in Gray are also over $1000 less a year than the taxes in Vibank.

Dad is going to check into the status of the two schools on monday for us, and then we will go from there, but I suspect we will be making an offer on one of these houses in a week or so, once we decide which one to go with, and once we hear from a couple of real estate agents here and find out how much this little dump is worth. It's all quite exciting and a little bit scary....things are moving much more quickly than we were planning when we went to Regina last weekend.

As for the rest of our lives...Mary is sick again (still). I ended up bringing her to bed with us last night because she was coughing and crying in her own room. She came and snuggled with us, and ended up coughing so hard that she puked all over the bed and herself. Poor baby girl. She eventually fell asleep with us, but she was coughing and restless all night long. She's had this cough for over a week now, and it doesn't seem to be getting any better, so I guess it's time to get her to the doctor yet again. blah.

Fainting Fun and Hospital Hijinks

What a fantastic day. I wish there was some way to show dripping sarcasm through typing.

I woke up this morning with the best intentions. We have a couple of real estate agents coming over on Sunday to tell us how much they think we can sell our wee dump for (Ian says 210 thou, I'm more conservative at 180) and we want to get the house presentable for them. I made up a "to do" list for both Ian and I, things to do every day.

Shortly before nine as I was reading my blogs and eating my breakfast, I got that feeling. I knew I was going to faint. So I stood up (cause that makes sense, right?) to get to the couch. I didn't make it, and woke up on my back, hands and feet tingling, head pounding, four cats staring at me in concern and Mary ignoring me. It took some coaxing, but I managed to convince my heartless child to bring me the phone, and I phoned Ian and my Dr's office. When I was able to get up, I made my way to bed, and dozed there off and on all morning while Mary watched TV and occasionally came to cuddle with me and tell me what she was watching (Bear! roar. Duck. Quack quack! Chicken. Snake. Owl!! hoot hoot). My Dr finally called me back around noon, and told me to get in to the hospital, so I called Ian, and he came to take me there.

We got to the hospital shortly after 1. I sat there waiting, and was finally acknowledged and spoken too by a nurse at 2:30. At 3 I was given a room and hooked up to the fetal monitor. The Doctor came to see me at 5. I got home at 9. The good news is that the baby is fantastically healthy as far as they can tell. The bad news is that I wasted 8 hours of my life and dragged Ian home from work so that once again he was not making any money, and they have no idea what's going on. Not to mention that I sucked up a room in the very busy labour and delivery ward completely unnecessarily.

It sounds like Ian and Mary had a nice time together though, which is nice. They went for a long walk, well, about 6 blocks or so. Mary told him all sorts of things (Car! Bus! Truck! Owl, hoot hoot). They visited some good friends of ours who Mary did not trust, though by that point she was awfully tired. They watched her Little Bear DVD 3 times in a row, each time it ended Ian tells me she would demand "Bear again! Please." He also tells me that a little later in the day she started demanding to see me, which makes me feel awfully good, though I suspect he's making that part up.

Anyways, tomorrow I have a great deal of work around the house to do, in spite of being told to take it easy by the Doctor. I can't take it easy right now, I don't have the time, and even if I didn't have stuff to do, there is very little easy about spending my day with a wonderful and energetic 2 year old. So...wish me luck, and wish us luck with our home assessments on Sunday!

Home Again

Yikes, what a weekend. We woke up on Friday morning, and of course Mary was sick. She was pretty stuffed up and coughing quite a bit, but other than that she seemed to be in good spirits. We bundled everything into the car and headed off to Saskatchewan, and surprisingly, the trip went very well in spite of the sniffles and coughing in the back seat.

The weekend was busy, looking at houses, talking to real estate agents, looking for a job for Ian. There is news on that front, but I'm not going to get into it just yet....things are still pretty tentative at this point. Needless to say, we made some BIG decisions this weekend that are going to change our lives quite a bit.

Mary was pretty crabby at times over the weekend, I think that while she loves being spoiled by her Grandma, she still gets tired of it and she misses her own bedroom. She was awfully happy tonight when we got home, and far more affectionate to Ian and I than she had been all weekend. It was nice to get hugs and kisses from her again.

Last night Mary was having a hard time sleeping, so I went in to cuddle with her and help her settle down. She snuggled up to me, and every time I sang her a lullaby, she would sing along....no words, but she was definitely singing. Then, every time it looked like I was trying to get up to leave, she would shove me back onto the bed and say "Sleep!" Some days she is just so adorable it hurts.

So, I will keep you all posted as things develop in our lives. It's pretty exciting, and plenty scary.

Wednesday

Hello everyone!

Today is a bit better, though I'm still feeling pretty glum. Still no ironworker work for Ian today, he's back at the lube place. Tomorrow he is taking the day off from both places to help clean up the house some before we head off to Regina on Friday morning.

Yesterday didn't get much better after my last update. I went to pick Ian up from work, and Mary and I decided that the best thing to do when strapped for cash is to spend more money going out for supper. So, we decided to head off to a chain restaurant that we have a great deal of experience eating at, and is tied in to my family via my fathers brother. It was one of the worst dining experiences I've had in a while. It took a long time to get our drinks, we ordered, and waited forever for our food. Ian and mine came with Mary's nowhere in sight. I looked at mine and realized that instead of the no green peppers that I had requested, they had given me double green peppers. I finally managed to get ahold of our waiter and he apologized and said he would get it replaced right away. I also asked after Mary's meal, and he stammered that he forgot to put it in, but would get it rushed out right away. Mary's meal showed up about 10 minutes later, mine did not. Ian finished his supper, Mary finished hers and started getting grumpy and bored. The waiter showed up to let me know that they had just put in my meal, and it would be another ten minutes or so. We ended up leaving before Mary had a complete melt down, and before I had a chance to eat anything at all. I was incredibly unhappy, and while it wasn't a big thing, after the day I'd had, it sure felt like it.

D&D last night was great fun though, for which I was thankful. Our friend T, with the kewlest character eh-VAR! kept me in stitches all night long, and when he wasn't making me giggle, Rico took over.

Mary was sick in the car again on the way home last night, so I think we need to alter our lifestyle. Up too this point she has been very portable, and if we want to do stuff, we just pack her up and get her settled in her playpen at bedtime. Waking her up to go home was never really a problem before, but it seems to be getting harder and harder on her, and really, it just isn't fair to do to her anymore. This is the 3rd time she has reacted to the late night wake-up this way in just over a week, and I don't want to do it too her anymore. So, we are going to cut out the majority of our late night outings pretty shortly, and we are likely going to have our next Tuesday game here in our teeny tiny house.

For those of you who have sent best wishes after yesterday, thank you very much. There really isn't much need to start a fundraising drive for the crappy taurus just yet though. We are heading to Regina on Friday, and we were planning on begging a few thousand dollars off my dad to fix up the house so as to make it more saleable anyways....so, we will just beg for a little bit more to fix the piece of crap. Ian spoke with his boss over at the lube place, and he is okay with the car staying there for a week or so till we can get things organized.

Oh, and I just peeked in on Mary having a nap, she's fast asleep on her bed and stark naked once again. It's time to start duct-taping the diapers on, I think.

Updatish

It seems that the Ford Taurus is well known for the exact problem we had with ours this morning. In fact, there is a recall because of this problem on several Taurus models, 2001 models and older to be exact. We are completely and utterly out of luck, as our car is a 2002 model. I looked online and was amazed by the number of people complaining of this problem in their 2002 models. I phoned Taurus, and spoke to a friendly fellow named Joe, who after a lot of typing in his computer and a phone call to our dealership (which Ian had already called) told me that there is nothing at all to be done, we are stuck to fix the problem without any help. I called Transport Canada to lodge a complaint, but they're closed right now because of time differences. I'll call again tomorrow. Even if we don't get any assistance fixing our car, I want to make sure that a lot of people know that I'm very unhappy.

Mary stripped during her "nap time" today. Shirt, pants, socks and diaper. Then she pissed all over her bedroom floor, chair, stuffed animals and bed. Yippee. Good thing she's so cute.

When It Rains, It Pours.

We were getting ahead, really, we were. We had cut down on the majority of our frivolous spending, we hardly eat out anymore (compared to how we used to eat). We were careful to keep up on our bills and we still managed to buy groceries. Yes, it was tight, but we were doing it. Then Ian froze his fingers and missed a bit of work. Then the guys he works for discovered that although they had lots of work to do, for some reason they couldn't get the bits and pieces they needed to do the work, in spite of having ordered those bits and pieces weeks ago. A couple of short days last week, one day not worked at all, yesterday Ian was told that if we wanted, we could leave for Regina today, as there was likely no work for him for the rest of the week. We can't afford this. To make matters worse, on his way to the Lube place to put in some (all be it lower paid) hours, something happened to the Taurus. It started driving funny halfway there, and when he got there he realized that the front suspension had broken, and sent a spring shooting through the brand new front tire. He phoned around, of course our expensive warranty doesn't cover suspension work, and it looks to be around $1000. He spoke to a guy at the Ford dealer where we bought the car, and he said that this is a very common problem in older Tauruses. Um. Well gee, guy, thanks for telling us that now, and older?? The car is only 5 years old, for crying out loud. We still owe around fifteen thousand on it, last I checked. Thankfully we still have the van, but that leaves us with a fifteen thousand dollar heap of metal that we simply cannot afford to fix, and me without a vehicle yet again. The weather is getting nicer, but taking Mary on the bus is a chore at the best of times. I have to walk for about 30 minutes after or before a 2 hour bus ride just to get to my Dr.'s office, which is a drive that takes about 10 minutes if the traffic is bad. Going anywhere south of the river is just a nightmare, even getting to the closest mall takes about an hour on the bus.

The move to Regina is looking likelier and likelier, and looks to be happening sooner and sooner, if things keep up like this. I'm thinking that instead of the somewhat major work we had been thinking of doing to make the house more sellable, we will do some minor touch ups, scrub the place down (and boy does it need a scrub) and hope for the best. My dad told me yesterday that he would happily help with moving expenses and a down payment on a place in Saskatchewan, and we just recently found some new 3 bedroom townhouses that are being built in the city for relatively cheap. I just don't know, it seems like every time I/we manage to dig ourselves out, be it financially or emotionally, the world winds up and gives us a good hard kick in the junk to keep us down.

A Morning Conversation (and some rambling)

Mary: Hello! Hello Mummy! Hello! Hi! (Incredibly cheerfully, in spite of having been up till 3 AM jumping on her bed)

Me: Good morning Mary. (Incredibly grumpy. Sleep did not come easily last night due to a multitude of reasons, Mary's late night shenanigans being the least of them)

Mary: Morning! Hi Mummy! Where Daddy?

Me: Daddy's at work.

Mary: Oh. Daddy work. Bum? Bum! (at this point she charges to the diapers and selects one to hand to me)

Me: Yes, let's change your diaper.

Mary, upon being lifted up to have her diaper changed: Bum. Yucky bum. Whee! Diaper! Mummy glasses? Where glasses? Yucky bum. Pants! Up Pants! Breakfast?

Me: Yes, that's a dirty diaper, now you have a nice clean one on your bum. I'm not wearing my glasses yet.

Mary: Oh. eyes. Yoghurt?

Me: Okay, let's get you breakfast.

Mary: Yay! Yoghurt! Breakfast! Fridge! Highchair! Yoghurt! Spoon! UP highchair!

Me: (quietly following her orders, I get her breakfast and get her into her highchair.)

Mary: All Done! Down! Mummy? Down! Glasses! TV. TV. TV OFF! (gets increasingly whiney) OOOOOFFFFF. TV OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOFFFFFFFF!

Me: The TV is off. Do you want it on now?

Mary: TV on now. ON. Blanket please.



So, I turned it on, and other than the occasional comment on what pops up on the screen she's been pretty quiet. Anyways...can you believe that I was concerned about her speech development only 2 weeks ago? I certainly cannot.

I think it's been a long while since I posted here last, mostly just because I've been bored. Not a lot is going on lately other than the usual, and both Mary and I have been feeling just a wee bit under the weather. I'll be glad when this very long cold season is finally over, hopefully it will end.

The weather has been wonderful lately, all the snow is melting which Mary just LOVES. We've gone out the last couple of days just to walk around the block and stomp in as many puddles as we can. Pretty soon we can take out the trike that her Nana Cookie gave her for her birthday, I'm certain she'll be thrilled.

Yesterday I had yet another ultrasound. It was just a follow up from the last time I was bleeding, and things are looking good. It seems that this baby will be a giant too (really, it already is) unless it decides to come early. Even if it does come quite early though, I suspect it will be as big as most average sized babies out there. Sigh. Anyways, it was nice to see the baby again, it's growing like crazy and currently in a breech position, with its feet up by its head. The U/S tech actually watched her kick her own face for a while before moving on. Oh, and he also confirmed that this baby is definately a girl, so it looks like I am following the family tradition. All my cousins who have had children have had the first two girls, and then a boy after that. Only 14 weeks left of this miserable pregnancy! Yay!

Perfectly Average

Mary had her speech and language assessment this morning, and it went very well. It was a one on one with a S&L pathologist, and Mary was incredibly cute and charming, and used just about every word in her vocabulary. She even strung a couple words together once or twice! After talking to me, obeserving and playing with Mary, our SLP declared Mary to be mostly average. She is a tad bit above average for her receptive language (understanding) and a bit below average for her expressive language. It's pretty much exactly what I expeted her to say, and I'm quite glad with how things went. She gave me some suggestions on how to help Marys language, but everything she suggested I have already been doing. Raven gave me the same suggestions a while back, and they seem to be working quite well. The only thing I haven't been doing enough of is waiting long enough for Mary to repeat what I say. She was a little concerned when I mentioned how much Mary hates other children her own age and smaller, so she is going to talk to some other people about that issue and get back to me. I'm mostly concerned about it because of the baby coming in June. Mary is terrified of babies right now, and I really would like to deal with that issue before she becomes a big sister.

Not much else going on since yesterday. Oh, and for those of you who have asked, yes, I was dead serious when I mentioned news shows discussing grief councelling about the trade of Ryan Smyth to the New York Islanders. I couldn't make that up.