Perfection

Happy New Year Everyone!

The last few days have been great, the apartment is so clean, tidy and organized. Chuck decided to get one of those robot vacuums. I laughed, but it actually keeps the floor nice and clean for Skyler. It's so much easier to let it go once a day to pick up all the crumbs and other bits that he might otherwise be putting in his mouth. Not that we're extremely messy people, but Skyler does like to fling food off of his highchair, and sweeping doesn't always get everything.

Aside from it looking so nice in here and us being able to keep up with everything, I'm spending so much more time with Skyler. I've been able to feed him everyday, work on baby signs (he actually signed "all done" for the first time in the tub the other day!) and read him stories, sing him songs, dance with him. We've been doing so much, he's been learning so much! How to clap, how to sign for things, how to stand by himself (still very shaky, but getting better with tons of enthusiastic encouragement), how to use a spoon to feed himself. I honestly never want to go back to work. Sigh.

Yesterday I gave the monster his first haircut! No more baby mullet! Haha, he looks much cuter as you can see in the picture. His hair was driving me nuts, but daddy didn't want to part with it. Next to get a haircut is mommy I hope. Yesterday we went shopping and I finally got something for myself. I needed new shoes so badly, the ones I have are completely worn out in the heel, so I used my gift card from Christmas to buy some cute black and purple ones. I also installed Windo.ws 7, which so far is alright. It looks pretty neat, and I like some of the new apps like the snipping tool and the sticky notes.

I'm excited for church on Sunday, we went last Sunday too of course. The sermon was all about yoga and spirituality, we had a yoga instructor come in and he even had us doing a bunch of different positions and meditations, I really enjoyed it. This Sunday is a sermon about poetry, entitled "How should we live our lives?" because it really is an open ended question. I think everyone has a slightly different take on it honestly.

The other day I sat Skyler down on the kitchen floor with a piece of paper and I dabbed on some finger paint, he used to just sit there and I would put his fingers in it, but this time he saw me put down the paint and he leaned in immediately and started spreading it all over the paper. It was so much fun to watch him enjoying finger painting so much, and doing it all by himself.

Today the most exciting thing happened, after feeding him breakfast (a whole banana and some vanilla yogurt) I sat down with him in his living room and I moved back so that I was pretty far away (in terms of how close we usually are) and as a test I made eye contact with him and moved my hand silently from side to side and up and down. He tracked my every movement! We've been noticing that it seems like he is seeing further, but I am a hundred percent sure of it now.

I actually marked my place with a diaper and went and grabbed my measuring tape. He can see and track objects that are 42-45 inches away from him! This is honestly amazing to me. He blows my mind everyday. For the longest time he could only see us if we were about 24 inches away. Yesterday Chuck went to give him a bottle and as he walked into the room Skyler was looking at the bottle and showing signs that he saw it. He was at least 4 feet away.

I know I'll have to go back to work soon, but right now, life is just perfect..

Skyler Living It Up

Skyler taking his first ride in the sled grandma and grandpa gave him.

Checking out his new chair in his little living room area.

Skyler watching tv.

Trying to grab Winn.ie the Po.oh.



I love those moments. Watching him reach out to touch the bear on tv reconfirms for me just how much he can actually see. It might not be much, but it's better than nothing. And yes I let my kid watch tv that close to the screen. Haha.

Fighting For Our Children's Rights

I've been following this story on the CBC for a while and if you read through the comments (many as they are) you may be able to pick out which ones are mine. This woman is fighting to put in place the supports her daughter will need when she enters school. As always there are people who are opposed to this idea. The "innocent taxpayers" who abhor the idea of paying for someone else's special needs child to have the interventions to save her life made available to her in the public school system. Sometimes I just don't understand people...

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Sky guy made out like a bandit at his grandma and grandpa's christmas dinner last night (they celebrate it on Christmas Eve). He got a new sled, a stuffed dog which he is terrified of, a set of 3 ducks on a string that waddle and quack when you pull them, a xylophone which admittedly is mommy's favourite of the night, and a new sleeper. I also got a package in the mail yesterday from my aunt in B.C. She sent him a lot of really adorable clothes, which he will grow into by next winter, and a box of chocolate chip cookies, which he will enjoy this winter, possibly with some help from mom.

Today is my side of the family's Christmas celebrations. It's my first year with my parents separated so this should prove interesting. I have to go to my mom's for dinner, and my dad wants me at my nana's afterwards. I've got my fingers crossed that it all works out without too many problems..

I've started making a list of all the stuff we need to get once the mad holiday rush is over. Which I suppose I should explain to my non-Canadian friends. I just learned last year actually that you guys don't have Boxing Day. The day after Christmas all the stores put everything on sale really really cheap and it's like a crazy mad rush/stampede for people to buy things. The malls are absolutely insane for pretty much a week surrounding Christmas, before and after. I'm hoping I'll be able to go shopping Sunday or Monday without getting trampled as I have a few things I need to get and now I have some Christmas money to spend. I also sold my dining room table yesterday since we've decided to use a smaller one for now. So that was an extra hundred bucks in my pocket.

I must admit being home with Skyler is hard, not because I don't love every second of being home, but because he is calling for me all day everyday, he wants to be snuggled and held and have his mommy and no one else. Which is not the hard part. The hard part for me is knowing that I have to go back to work in a few days and I won't be able to be with him every day anymore. I'm starting to want to stay home with him. I want to be the one holding him every time he falls or needs hugs and kisses. I love watching him play and grow and learn. I don't see him enough when I work these stupid 11 hour days, not to mention I don't get paid for 2 and a half hours of it. When I go back in January I think there are some serious questions I need to ask, and if I don't get the answer I need then things may have to change a bit.

Merry Christmas everyone, I hope you are all well and enjoying your families.

Best Christmas Gift!

He gained an entire pound since December 1st!! (he weighed in at 14 pounds at his endocrine appt.) Ladies and Gentlemen, the baby who has weighed 14 pounds for the last 4 months is finally a hefty 15 pounds 6 ounces at 13 months old!

That is all.

Neat & Tidy

It's a good thing we rearranged his stuff when we did because he woke up early the next morning and decided he was completely ready to crawl and pull up on furniture and walk around it. Yesterday for the first time, I plopped him in the middle of the room not near any toys, he crawled over to the living room table and pulled himself up, (laughing triumphantly of course) and walked around it, trying to eat the table frame the entire time. I guess that's it, he's mobile now. We're screwed.

As for his zebra, he was standing at the end table next to the zebra last night, he let go momentarily and bumped his head on Mr. Zebra. He then got back up, pulled himself to stand at the table, reached over and gave Mr. Zebra a good shaking. He went at it for a solid 10 minutes. I pity anyone who crosses my child's path. Poor zebra, he must have head trauma after all that shaking. I think Sky got him back pretty good. And we got a video of it. We were both cracking up, it was pretty funny.

After tackling his area yesterday I went tornado on the apartment with Chuck's help. We purged a lot of crap, reorganized so much stuff, and now our living room is as nice as his. Our bookshelf is just as pretty as his, and our storage closet is no longer throwing things at us as soon as we open the door. Everything is put away neat and orderly. Some things went to the consignment shop, others to charity. I'm quite happy with the way my apartment looks now I must say. The bedroom however.. Let's just not go there. I suppose that should be the next project.

Today we're going to try and get Skyler weighed and measured. I'm hoping, hoping, hoping (fingers crossed) that he's grown at least a teeny tiny little bit. I've got my fingers crossed that now that he's not on such a high dose of steroids, that he'll begin to grow like he should.

Midnight Decluttering

So it is 1:40am and we just returned from W.alm.ar.t which is conveniently open 24 hours for the Christmas insanity. In case you are wondering we were most definitely not Christmas shopping at all. As I was sitting in my living room I realized I was tired of looking at a giant mountain of toys. I remembered my former plans to create a toddler living room for Skyler and decided perhaps since he's now becoming mobile I should start putting that plan into action.

As you may remember from previous pictures my living room looked something like this:

(ignore adorable baby playing with plastic bottle if you will)

$32 later it now looks like this:


The zebra and the blue car will soon be leaving us (put into storage for the time being until Skyler is ready to use them), the red one and the musical table will be moved and I will be placing a toddler couch along the wall that the zebra is currently against. The musical table will likely be in front of that as sort of a baby coffee table, except without any coffee.

Anyway now his part of the living room is making the adult part of the living room look bad. However, I am still in love with it, I'm thinking of moving to his side of the room since it looks so much neater. Honestly I love the shelf unit idea. The top box has his stuffed animals and the bottom is all his plastic and heavier toys. And I can finally have his books accessible to him. Before they were up on our bookshelf which is much too high for him to reach. I used to have to take them down one at a time just to read him a story.

There you have it. My midnight decluttering project. Oh I also managed to crochet an entire scarf which is as long as I am tall. All this is in one day. Sadly this is probably the most productive I've been in a while.