Saturday, December 31, 2011

Baby Update!

With the New Year fast approaching, I thought it a good time for a last posting for the year. Our little girl has been growing by leaps and bounds, and has been very active these last few weeks with lots of kicking and moving... I'm sure it's a hint of what's to come in the near future! As much as I loved the second trimester of pregnancy (no nausea and lots of energy!), this third trimester is starting to take it's toll. Exhaustion is back in full swing, and it seems I can no longer get through the day without a nap. Fortunately, we're on vacation until January 9th, so I've got plenty of time to rest up before I head back to work!

31 Weeks... only 9 weeks to go!

The nursery is coming along - we've re-purposed the bookcase from the craft room and bought the change table. We still need to buy the crib, but at least most of the main pieces are in place!



And of course the knitting has begun for our little one. Some of it has been going great and others... not so much. I started a baby blanket in August and I still have 15 or so stitches on the cast on edge that are waiting to be knit. I think the combination of the heat and first trimester exhaustion conspired against me. I also have a baby sweater on the needles. It's sized 9-12 months so I should have until the fall to get that one done before it's needed. My knitting priority at the moment is a Christening gown that will be needed this spring. 


And with that, I'd like to wish you all the very best for 2012!

Happy New Year!

Friday, December 30, 2011

Apparently I suck at this ;)

Wow! Apparently I've gotten really bad at keeping this blog up to date! I'm going to try to fix that today... unfortunately I think the easiest way to do it will be to go back and add posts to the past couple of months (otherwise I'll get everything all screwy in my head). So, if you notice blog posts showing up where there weren't any before, just bear with me until I'm all caught up!

Saturday, December 3, 2011

Tigger Goes Home

Well, today we took the grey kitten in. The co-worker who took Tux last week, has a friend who is adopting the other kitten. Last week's excitement was pretty hard on mom, but since she still had one kitten to look after it wasn't too bad. So, this morning when we got the last baby ready to go she already knew what was going to happen. Once he was in the kitty carrier, she went up to the door and smelled him, made sure he was ok, and let us go without a fuss.




Tigger (as he's now been named) spent the day with us at work until our co-worker was ready to head home with him. Although we're going to miss him terribly, I'm sure our other cats (with the exception of mom ) are happy to see him go. Talk about throwing the social balance out of whack!

Friday, November 25, 2011

Tux Goes Home

Today, we brought the black kitten to work with us so he could go to his new forever-home. One of our co-workers had decided to adopt him, so her 2-year old cat will have company. She has settled on the name Tux for this cute little guy.




We'll miss him!

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Kitten Update!

For the past few weeks, we've had 2 little energetic kittens running rampant around our bedroom. We've found homes for both of them, but have been waiting until they're litter trained, weaned and on solid food before they move to their new homes.


Last week, they learned how to climb up on the bed... that's been quite an adventure. They alternate from playful wrestling matches and sleeping on our pillows, behind our back, on our arms... we've gotten quite good at waking up before we roll over in bed to see where the kittens are first!

As you can see, mom has been taking all the rough-housing in stride...


As of today, they're both using the litter box and eating kitten kibble. Mom has still been nursing them, but it's been getting a little less frequent these days. So, they should be ready to move to their new homes sometime next week. We'll definitely miss them when they're gone!

MIA

Things have been so hectic these last few weeks! Time to make it up to you =)

I'll be updating all of our adventures from the past month (has it been so long since my last post?!?!) during the week... kittens, weddings, Halloween, baby news... all good things! =)

Monday, October 31, 2011

Masquerade Ball 2011!

After a year of planning, the night went off without a hitch! Our decorations were ready and waiting...



All that was missing were our guests!



 The costumes were all amazing, and everyone had a great time! And now the planning begins for next year...

Happy Halloween!

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Baby Update!

We went for our second ultrasound today and found out...


It's a Girl!!!

Monday, October 10, 2011

Weekend in Toronto

This past Thanksgiving weekend we went to Toronto for my cousin's wedding. We grew up together, and I wouldn't have missed his wedding for anything!

The had a beautiful spot - 
you can see the Niagara Escarpment in the background


Family came from far and wide to help celebrate!

Enjoying a dance...

and of course the Mother-Son dance.


Congratulations Shane & Chelsey - 
Wishing you both a lifetime of happiness!

Thursday, October 6, 2011

First Frost

We woke up this morning to the first frost of the season.

 


 
And so it begins...

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Kittens!

Of all of our cats, only one hasn't been "fixed"... our youngest female. We've been very careful to confine her to the house as soon as she goes into heat until we're sure it has passed. But, a few days after getting back from Newfoundland we were letting one of the other cats out and she ran and full speed, jumped over them, and was gone for the rest of the day.

Now here we are, 2 months later, and she has given birth to two kittens! She's a first-time (and will be only time!) mother and she's doing a great job looking after her babies. One of them is black with little white toes on all 4 paws, a white spot on it's chest, and a white belly; the other one is a tabby cat.

Pictures will have to wait until they're a little bigger... mom has them in a cozy spot in our closet and we don't want to disturb her. I'm sure they'll be up and about in no time!

Monday, September 19, 2011

Another Room Makeover: Nursery!

After finding our we were pregnant, we got to work repainting the baby's room.

When we moved in, we installed shelves one of the walls with the intention of using them for books and teddy bears and other stuffies (at our last place). However, once I started putting some books on the shelves they started to pull away from the wall. I was not impressed, especially considering that at our last place these shelves lived in the kitchen and held a couple dozen large cookbooks with no complaints. Needless to say the books came off the shelf and were replaced with yet more stuffies. 

Before the room reno could start, I wanted to remove the shelves from the wall. Unfortunately we used metal plugs (which I really don't recommend!) and when they were removed they left a 1" hole in the wall. So I had lots of patching to do to repair the damage. Once the repairs were complete, it was time for paint. 

As much as I like the colour of the "blue room", I found the blue had a lot of grey in it and looked kind of dingy. I wanted a colour that had more life in it so we went with an aqua blue (Premier's Tahoe Blue from Canadian Tire). 

Before

Cutting In - You can see the difference in colour

Finished: View from the door

View from the window opposite the door

We still have to get some furniture to go in this room. Up until now it has been used as a guest room, and had 2 single beds in it. We removed one of the bed frames and put it's mattress under the bed in case we still needed the extra bed. We're hoping to pick up a bookshelf from Ikea in the next few weeks (the same one that we used here, and then we'll need a crib, change table and glider all before the end of February!

Friday, September 16, 2011

Between being back to work and "morning" sickness (what a stupid name that is!), time has just been flying by! Today I finally had a chance to go around and take some pictures of our gardens! Our flowers that were supposed to flower in August have finally decided it was time to bloom.

Some of the dahlias we planted are blooming. The plants themselves don't look very big, but the flowers sure are!



The gladiolas started to bloom a few weeks ago. Unfortunately, we didn't plant them deep enough and the wind knocked most of them over. We've taken to cutting the flower spikes once they start to bloom so we've had some nice fresh cut flowers inside.


The gardens that we worked so hard on earlier this summer have been doing well. The first one we tackled is filled with blooms. We even discovered some yellow cone flowers that we didn't see last year (lucky they survived the rebuild!), and it seems some seeds from a ground cherry plant that was planted 30 feet away made it in there as well. David has been enjoying harvesting the surprise crop!


Our shaded rock-garden is also doing well, although it will still need some work next year. Some of the ferns I thought I moved have come back, but with the new rock placement it works well. 


Our neighbour's chicken have gotten big and she often lets them roam free...


And finally, a sure sign that summer is coming to an end: the Canadian Geese have begun their fall migration south.

Monday, September 5, 2011

New Addition!

We found out at the beginning of July that we're going to be parents! According to our calculations, our estimated date of delivery was March 12th, 2012. However, at our fist ultrasound last week, the technician told us that I'm actually a little further along than I thought. Instead of being 12 weeks, 4 days the baby was measuring 14 weeks, 4 days moving the due date to February 26th! Needless to say we're very excited! It's still too early to know if it's a boy or a girl, but we should be finding out at our next ultrasound. 

Our Little Jumping Bean

Saturday, August 27, 2011

And we're back!

I was hoping to start posting earlier than this, but my body demanded that I take some time to rest and relax as best I could before starting back to work. Just to warn you, this post is a little long... photos will be added a little later.

David and I left for Newfoundland a couple of days after my last post. It was my grandparent's 70th wedding anniversary and family traveled from all over to be there to help them celebrate. Unfortunately, my grandfather fell ill just a few days before the big party and was taken to hospital (he's doing very good now, and is back home), so my grandparents ended up spending their anniversary in the hospital. The party went ahead as scheduled and we made a video for them with all their well-wishers. For the rest of the week, my grandparents had a never ending line of visitors as everyone stopped by to visit.

As for the rest of our vacation, David finally achieved his goal of climbing Gros Morne Mountain (the mountain the National Park is named for).

On our way back, we decided to stop over in PEI for one night. David had never been there before, and there was a mini mill on our way that we could visit (it's David's dream that in addition to an alpaca farm, we also process and spin our own fiber). We had a beautiful campsite at Lord Selkirk Provincial Park, and spent a couple of hours touring and learning about the Belfast Mini Mill. We met some wonderful people and had a great time!

We timed everything perfectly - we made it back home just in time to celebrate our 1st wedding anniversary!

That week was quite hectic as I raced to finish putting together a show book for the Navan Fair Alpaca show the following week. Once it was all done and sent off to the printers I had a couple of days to relax before the Alpaca show started. Once again, we volunteered as Alpaca Security and camped in the alpaca tent with the animals. It was kind of noisy, and I'll admit I didn't get as much sleep as I was hoping for, but it was much quieter than last year! We had a great time at the show; I even had some family come by to see what it was all about.

A couple days later and I was back to work. Looking back our summer passed in a whirlwind. Now I'm looking forward to our labs starting up and getting back into the swing of things!

And for those that may be curious: planning for our next Halloween party is well under way...

Thursday, July 14, 2011

Tiny break

With summer finally in full swing, we're going to take a couple of weeks off to recharge our batteries. We'll be back in August with some new adventures!

Monday, July 11, 2011

New Pony!

Our neighbours bought a new pony a few months back, and she finally arrived last Saturday morning. Her name is Kate, and she is 8 years old. They got her to teach their young daughter how to ride. (The still have Zara, the grey mare. She is in the shelter... you can kind of see her legs in this picture.)


Silver, the pony they had last year, was too nervous and they were worried that he might throw their daughter if something happened to startle him. He was sold to an equestrian centre, where they will work with him to get him more used to being around people. Eventually, he will also be able to teach new young riders how to ride.

Cats go Free!

After unsuccessfully trying to keep our cats within our "enclosure" (i.e., our deck) David decided it was time to let them run free in our yard. So far, we'd only had 2 cats who came and went as they pleased. Today, that number is up to seven!

Cleo exploring

 What's really cute about it, is that several of them like to stay together as they explore the yard.

Kali, Cleo, and Pepper, intrigued by the garage...

If either one of us goes out with them, they have a tendency to lay down near us and, usually, roll around.

Caesar and Cleo, taking a break

Thursday, July 7, 2011

Holiday Weekend Recovery

I have been spending the last few days finally enjoying my vacation. After the craziness of garden work leading up to our Canada Day BBQ on the weekend (my "deadline" to have the gardens done), I felt I needed a few days to truly recuperate.

We did have a pretty busy weekend... on Friday we went to Ottawa to see the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. We only got to see Kate on the big screen as they arrived at Parliament Hill, but did manage a glimpse of Prince William as they sped by in their car, leaving Parliament Hill. We had a great time!

Saturday morning came early as we started to prep for our BBQ that afternoon. It was an afternoon & evening affair, ending with a bonfire and marshmallow roasting. We had a great turn out, 24 for of us in all!


Since then, we've been relaxing, watching some movies, and enjoying the sun!


For those of you in the States, I wish you a, albeit late, Happy 4th of July!