After supper tonight the lils and I went outside to burn some energy.  I took some pics, and pondered what to do after bed, and if there was anything from the weekend that I wanted to write about.  Nothing struck my fancy, so I planned to just veg on the couch as we went inside to get ready for bed.

We always give the lils a few minutes to wind down when we get inside, and they were enjoying it when I heard the dreaded sound.  Cough, splat.  Yes splat.  I figured that one of them had vomited, and rushed to the family room in time to see Goose take two steps and vomit again.  I hurried her to the bathroom, where she vomited one more time – on my feet.

She is still a little monkey, and not really a puker, so was really confused by what was going on.  I got her naked and tried to tell her to face the toilet in case “it” happened again.  She took my telling her to get “it” in the toilet to mean that she needed to get in the toilet and started to climb in.  Once that was corrected and it was apparent that she wasn’t going to be sick again, she was happy to wash her hands really well.  She told me repeatedly that they were “yucky” and this made her feel better.

I took this opportunity to do a quick triage of the family room, cleaning up the bulk of the mess, and got them settled in bed.  When I headed downstairs and surveyed the damage, I found that her first vomit had landed both beside and in the toy box!  I wrestled with this one for a while – leave it for Willy?  Garbage the whole thing?  Seal it up and put it in the basement FOREVER?  Finally I decided to clean it up and got to work.

I speculated the entire time as to what had caused this – she is otherwise symptom free, and didn’t complain on any pain or discomfort.  I blamed the soup that we had for supper because I have a bit of an upset stomach (wasn’t the hour that I spent cleaning puke, really).  So I ditched the leftovers of my current favourite cinnamon soup.  I am convinced it was the soup because the broth I used expired YESTERDAY.  That’s rational, right?

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Despite the fact that my allergies have been insanely bad for the last two days, I cut the grass a while ago. It has increased the suffering. This means that I lost the game of chicken that I had been playing with Willy, and this is just one of the reasons why I wish he had lost. He won because he is currently on a train to visit his father, who is in hospital due to complications from his chemo. We are all a little freaked out. I spent much of the time after dropping Willy off explaining to Woo about cancer and why his grandfather is in the hospital. He still has questions and is not alarmed, but that doesn’t make it easier.

Today is our wedding anniversary. We don’t generally celebrate in any big way, but I still miss being with Willy.

I thought that having a “mother’s helper” for a couple of hours a week would be helpful this summer. Unfortunately the thirteen-year-old neighbour that I have hired has proven to be increasingly less helpful as the summer goes on. I know that she is young, and have viewed this as a trial babysitting period. I fear that she is failing the trial and now I am in a pickle, as she lives closeby. She is a really great kid, just not a great babysitter. I have tried to help her learn, but she lacks confidence, would rather stay close to me, and automatically brings the lils to me when they cry, ask for me, or do something wrong. This is not what I pictured, having three children underfoot while I try to get things done.

That would likely be enough for me to call this a crappy end to the week, but we also played our last games of the ball season last night, and lost both spectatcularly. Given that we were playing the team we are tied for last place with, I was hoping for a split. Instead we got trounced, rained on, and I managed to mangle my already pained heel when I planted my foot poorly in cleats. (I did get a nice hit, however) At some point during the first game Willy let me know that Goose had somehow knocked over her highchair while she was sitting in it and hit her head on the ground at supper. He neglected to tell the sitter about this, which made me worry for the rest of the evening.

It could be that I am just cranky from the lack of sleep that is going on, between getting the news about my FIL late last night, the allergies, the early morning visits from the little boy and the plain silliness of me going to bed too late, I am one tired girl. I am heading to the to cottage to spend the weekend with the littles and my mother. And wine, lots of wine. That might fix things, but sadly, I think not.

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I used to have a hate on for trucks and school buses in my neighbourhood.  They would always come up the street at the worst time, and would always wake Woo, who was a terrible napper.  Garbage day was the worst, between garbage, recycle and yard waste, those noisy trucks sometimes made six trips up the street, all during naptime. ALWAYS during naptime.  He would wake and fight sleep, fall back to sleep and get awakened again several times through the day. It was very frustrating.

Woo has grown to love trucks (duh, he’s a kid), and over time I have made my peace with them.  It is, after all, awfully cute to see Goose and Woo run to the front window each time a truck goes by. Fast forward three years, add a baby who loves to sleep and sleeps through EVERYTHING and the fact that Woo does not nap anymore, my level of concern with the trucks has pretty much disappated.  I barely notice the trash trucks in the afternoons, unless the lil peeps call my attention to them.

Until today, that is.  My allergies are insanely bad this year, and one of the lils has given me a cold.  I am a mess and really needed a break during Woo’s quiet time (formerly known as naptime – and not at all quiet).  Little did I know that it was a truck – a loud, big, smelly, sewage drain clearing truck* – that  would give me the peace that I needed.  It rolled up to our across the street neighbour’s at the start of QT and got to work, loudly clearing their problem.  Woo immediately went to the window in his room to watch.  From that point on, I didn’t hear a peep out of him, except the occasional play-by-play.  When the clock stuck 3:00, he came barreling downstairs and went to the front window, where it still sits.  It’s been bliss.

*I really don’t want to know what is clogging their drain.  They have been clearing it for over two hours!

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I generally love it when you sneak into my bed at the crack of dawn to snuggle.  You curl right into me, and wiggle into a comfy spot.  We talk for just a minute, about yesterday or today, or whatever crosses your mind.  Then we drift back to sleep until it is time to wake up.

On the rare mornings that this doesn’t happen, you are really good.  You squirm for just a second, then run off to your room to play quietly until Goose wakes, when you move over visit with her.  This works really well, especially for mommy and daddy.  We love to snooze and listen to you both.

What happened really early this morning did not work so well.  It is not that you woke up sad, even if screaming in my ear is not the best way to let me know.  When you follow this with running back to your room, crying loudly, we all know that you are upset – we just don’t know why.  I am glad that we finally agreed that it was best for you to get back to bed.  You couldn’t settle, and tossed and turned and talked and yelled a bit.  I kept trying to calm you and find out what was wrong, but you didn’t know.  Finally, after many attempts to get you to just close your eyes and go back to sleep, you did.  Then the alarm went off and I left you sleeping to get up.  I missed out on my snuggles.  That is not fair!

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I have a post about my bug hunt with Woo up at Kids in the Capital today!

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Woo and I have gone on a number of little adventures lately, some one on one time, and an opportunity to do some fun things that Goose is a little bit too young for. I recently decided that she needs to have some excursions of her own, so this morning was our first “mommy and me” morning. My plans were not big, just a solo trip to the community playgroup. She loves the park and loves the playgroup, so this seemed like a good fit.

I woke several times in the night to the sound of rain. This disappointed me, as playgroup is an outdoor activity that is cancelled when it is too wet. My fears were confirmed when we woke, and I went on to finding a plan B. I settled on Playtime for Kids on merivale, and we headed off. We’ve been to Cosmic Adventures a number of times, and I hoped that this would be a Cosmic-light type of place.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t all that we had hoped for. We arrived, and we greeted by the chaos and noise that comes with this type of place. Goose was excited to be greated by three big slides, and pulled me towards them. We headed up the path that led to the slides, me following her to help her climb up. I am glad that I went in, as she wasn’t able to climb from platform to platform without me. We made it to the top and slid down once. Sadly, the effort wasn’t worth it for her and that was the end of sliding, and the end of her time in the larger play structure. She just wasn’t tall enough to move through it on her own. We wandered to the back where the little people area was and found the ball pit, a favourite. We spent the rest of our time hanging out in this area

I have a couple of complaints that will prevent us from going back anytime soon. They have a policy of “no outside food” and claim to be 100% nut free. With Woo’s nut allergy this is a nice feature in a facility. Unfortunately, it is not enforced. I saw many parents walking around with outside coffee or breakfast treats, and most families provided their own snacks for toddlers and older children. While I don’t expect everywhere we go to cater to the needs of my allergic child, I do expect that the management will make a token effort to stop outside food from coming in if they want to claim that the facility is nut free.

It is older and a small space. Everything is smaller in scale. This means that you notice it all the more when one or two larger children start to run around, or crash through the little people area. Thi shappened pretty frequently, and I had to be pretty attentive to ensure that Goose wasn’t trampled. She was pretty nervous and stuck to me like glue. The toys were also older and in need of replacement. There were rips in some of the cusions, lots of the balls were crushed, and there was not a great selection for little people who can’t climb in the bigger structure. I just got the feeling that maintenance was not what it should have been, at least in the lil peeps area.

We stayed for a little over an hour, and she was happy to leave when I broached the subject. I feel bad that she had a sad first date with me, ever though we got to stop at Loblaws to see the lobsters on our way home. I’ll make it up to her next time!

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Willy and I are fortunate in that we are able to make time for activities that we enjoy without our kids, and manage to do so with relative frequency.  We have always been of the belief that time away from the kids (and each other!) is important and necessary.  We have a good network of sitters that lets us play ball or go to hockey games, so we even get to do some of this stuff together, generally at least one night a week.

This is a great way for us to get a break, but I must admit that I am more than a little giddy at the prospect of a night out with Willy tomorrow night.  Between a busy summer filled with travel, the cottage, and baseball, and a decrease in the amount of family (ie FREE) babysitting we have been using, we haven’t been out together for no good reason in months!!  I have never been a big fan of scheduled date nights, but I think this qualifies.  It has been a long week, and I cannot wait for some time with just my hubby.

The problem?  I have no freaking idea what we should do!  How lame is that?  The best that I can come up with is to go shopping for the new freezer and kitchen sink that we need, then head to the Black Tomato for some of their nummie goodness and then swing by Chapters to buy some of the ridiculously cheap bargain books. That is what we do every time we go out, so I am thinking that won’t do.  Neither does Willy,  and we are both wracking our brains trying to come up with any good idea.  I need to find some inspiration, because it is starting to sound like we are in a rut here…

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Willy dropped the lils at daycare this AM and had a chat with N*, our daycare provider. He was telling her how great it was that Woo got himself changed and brushed his teeth while Goose was being put down. He did it without being asked, we were both pretty proud! She gave him a funny look and told him that Woo was responsible for solo dressing/changing at her place, and had been FOR MONTHS! It got me wondering just how many things he has been doing at her place that he refuses to do here.

I think that the list will be pretty long actually. Off the top of my head:

• He NAPS at N’s house, EVERY day. We only get naps if we run him to the point of exhaustion, completely over stimulate him, and have him in the car with music on.
• He eats mushrooms at her house. Mushrooms are the one and only food that we will let him pick out of what ever we are eat, as he has consistently refused to eat them, for pretty much his entire life. As he picked them out of his pasta one night recently, he casually told me that he “likes mushrooms, just not at home”.
• He listens to N, all the time, and answers properly and politely. We are lucky if we get an occasional acknowledgment that we exist some days. He remembers his pleases and thank yous most days, but there are some days that they “sleep in” and we have to go looking for them.
• On the very rare times that he misbehaves (and it is generally for beating on his sister – some things don’t change), he just goes and serves his time out. No fuss or muss or tantrum to end the world.
• “Clean-up, clean-up, everybody clean-up…” not only does he sing the song, he does the actions too. We consider it a victory if Woo doesn’t add to the mess while we are cleaning, and occasionally tosses a toy or two in the bins.

I could go on, but it is pretty clear that we have been duped by the three year old. Now we have to fix it. I don’t think it is going to be easy.

UPDATE – he freakin’ listens at gymnastics too, for the record.

*I’ll have to come up with a clever nickname for her, but all I can come up with right now is the super awesome wonderful woman who loves our lil peeps three days a week, and that is just too long.

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So I decided to FINALLY write the guest post that I promised the folks @ Kids in the Capital. It only took me a month, largely because I wanted it to be perfect. It’s not, but I think that it is still pretty good. I am somewhat sad that I didn’t include pictures, but I don’t have any that don’t have oodles of other children in them, so I passed this time.

Hopefully they will let me write some others for them in the future – I have some adventures planned for us in the coming months! The post is available here.

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Now that we are home and the laundry is done and a week has passed, I have a few minutes to recap vacation.  It was a great trip for the most part.  We started off late in the day on July 30, and the timing seemed to work out really well for all of us – driving was split, the lils got to run around for an hour at a park in Kingston over supper, and arrived at my in-laws around nine.  Woo was sleeping and Goose fading, we were settled quickly.

We took off early Saturday, headed for the ROM via subway (a treat in itself).  Woo has been wanting to go the “dinosaur museum” at home for a while, and we have been having trouble trying getting there, so this was a great substitute.  It actually blew the lils minds! It was so much more than the fishies, that were Goose’s favourites, and the dinosaur bones that awed Woo.  Their children’s area is really great, so a good time was had by all.

We headed to the in-laws farm after a quick lunch.  The littles napped on the road, so there was an abundance of energy upon arrival.  Woo was so excited to re-discover all that the farm offered and the chance to share it with Goose.  Gramma and Granddad were really happy to see us, and it was many hours of playing and cuddling before the littles settled in to bed.

Sunday was a beautiful day, and the littles spent much of the morning exploring the farm and out buildings, and generally wearing their grandparents out.  After nap we headed to some friends for a swim in their pool.  Both kids really impressed us with their comfort in the pool, each in their own way.  Goose was her usual fearless self, repeatedly jumping in with no qualms.  She is way more confident than we imagined she could be.  Woo started really slowly, tentatively going in to the pool, but was freely jumping in by the end of the day.  They were both swimming for over an hour, and would have kept going if we hadn’t dragged them out.

I had some work to do on Monday, so Willy and Gramma took Woo and Goose to the beach for the morning.  They were pretty shy about the lake water, a surprise after the pool, but were keen to play in the sand and on the playground. Their uncle joined them for a bit too, which was a nice treat.   They headed home for the first of many corn focused lunches.  We ate VERY well, lots of fresh goodness on vacation…

Goose woke from nap with a fever, which meant that she and I stayed in while the others went off visiting more friends.  I was pretty sure that she was teething, but you never know. It freaked me out a little, as I didn’t want her to get her grandparents sick – especially granddad.  I was REALLY relieved when she started telling us that her teeth hurt.  Yay for early talkers!!  The grumpiness lasted the week.

Tuesday was somewhat unremarkable.  We had a visit from another friend, and went on a shopping excursion for provisions, but otherwise stayed home and played.  Willy set up the slide and pool – and made it a slide into the pool – so much fun was had their.  It provided a great kid friendly activity, and kept them from under the feet and out of the hair of their grandparents.

Tuesday night was great, as we got to see the Aurora Borealis, and I got to take some pictures of it!!  I was pleased with the results, but figured out some more ways to improve.

Wednesday morning we headed off to the local miniputt to see how it would go.  Woo was quite into it, even though he holds the club with a hockey grip, and Goose was more interested in throwing her three balls down the hole.  I think that it was a success, as the lils went through the entire course with much glee, and were happy enough when we left.  Filed away for future excursions!  Poor Goosie fell a few times at the outset, which didn’t help with her general crabbiness, but she pushed through it.

Willy golfed with his mom on Thursday.  I was REALLY happy to have him go with her, but stressed too.  I was in a place that I am not entirely comfortable, and looking after two monkeys who were getting on each others nerves, and tired of hearing about the things that they couldn’t do/touch.  Granddad wasn’t feeling well and stayed in bed for the day, so we tried to stay outside and quiet.  It didn’t quite work out, but we survived.

I realized today that we were starting to wear out our welcome.  I talked to Willy about it, and he talked to his folks, but they decided that we should stay til Saturday, as planned. In hindsight, we should have known that seven days were too long with them, but we also all wanted to be together. (have I mentioned that I hate cancer?)

We headed out for more beach and miniputt on Friday and were again pleased with the reaction from the lils. They were both more into it, and had a great time hitting (and sometimes throwing) the ball. We finished off the morning with a trip to the wharf, where woo and I walked out almost to the lighthouse on a scary rocky path, and Goose fell off a bench onto her head. Good times. No on was harmed on the morning, at least not permanently… Much of the rest of Friday, and the morning on Saturday were spent gathering and packing. After some tearful goodbyes, we headed to Toronto.

Sunday morning we decided to try a trip to the Ontario Sciences Centre. I had never been, but the lils had on a previous trip to Toronto. It was good that we arrived early, as it gave us a chance to check out a good portion of the kids area (although we somehow missed the water area the first time!). We hung out with Uncle J and his new girlfriend, and got to play with lots of cool stuff. Goose and Woo were appropriately exhausted by the morning, so we pack up the car and headed home after lunch.

I’d add pictures, but this post is long enough as it is!  The vacation was really great. There were some tough times, and a couple of uncomfortable times for me, but I think that we all did really well. I know that the lils and Willy LOVED it, and, in the end, that makes it great for me too.

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