Weekly Round-up

This week we really settled back into our routine a bit. Peter's work schedule has been absolutely bizarre since we got back and this week was no exception. He's worked a bunch of 'day' shifts, but they started anywhere between 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. I really don't like the ones where he leaves before lunch and gets back after the kids go to bed ... very tiring! He is working today but then has most of this week off. We are looking forward to lots of family time.

This week we had company for supper a few times and went out for dinner to celebrate the birthday of one of Peter's coworkers. It was really nice to get back in touch with people I hadn't seen in a while.

The last few days have finally been sunny and warm! Peter took Nathan swimming at the nearby outdoor pool on Thursday. We're contemplating putting Nathan in one of the 2-week swimming lessons this summer. It would probably be good for him to be in a structured setting like that.

We also finally gave Nathan the rest of his birthday presents this week! We gave him this Aquadoodle mural for his wall. So far it has been a big hit. We also gave him a tee ball set and a tool belt.

He's going to have fun helping Peter this week when we get back to work on renovations :)

We had our ultrasound for the baby this week as well. The technician said the baby (singular ;) ) looked good and was the right size for our dates. This was good news as I had been measuring large early in the pregnancy.

Our vegetable garden has taken off this week. Everything I've planted except watermelon and pumpkin (they were just planted last weekend) is up. Here are some pictures I took tonight.

(empty, empty, empty, cucumber)
(lettuce, empty, spinach, tomato)

(cucumber, empty, squash, empty)
(tomato, green beans, yellow beans, tomato)
(empty, pepper, dill, empty)
(carrots, green onions, garlic, empty)

(back row nothing is up yet)
(spinach, carrots, empty, empty)

I'm planning to plant another round of spinach, carrots, lettuce, and beans at some point this week. We also have to get our supports up for the squash, cucumbers, watermelon, and pumpkin.

Other than that it's been a fairly uneventful week. Nathan is doing ok with the potty training. He keeps waking up in the morning, getting out of bed, and then peeing on the floor. A bit frustrating, but the last two mornings he's made it, so hopefully it's a trend in the right direction.

Our plans for this week are to make some headway with the bathroom renovations (post on the progress so far to come later this week). I would like to see us finish grouting the floor, installing the shower, and fixing the electrical this week. Since Peter only works one shift this week I think it's reasonable. It is definitely different trying to get construction work done with two little ones running around!

Well, Nathan is crying for me to come turn on his night light so I'd better run ...

We're back!

Sorry for the lack of posts over the past few weeks, but we were too busy visiting and enjoying the time back east. We flew back here on Saturday, made trips to Costco and Superstore, then headed home. Our flight out left at 5:35 in the morning and we finally walked in the door at home at supper time (which, with the time difference, was more like 8 p.m.). Needless to say we were exhausted! It was still good to be home, though, and after a quick supper the kids headed to straight to bed and I followed shortly after.

I finally finished unpacking yesterday and got the house pretty much back to rights.

Peter's work schedule has been completely weird since we got back, so that's throwing us off a bit. He's worked the last three supper hours (usually he only works one supper hour every three weeks) and I must say I don't enjoy the new hours. Thankfully they are temporary.

Our last couple of weeks at home were much more relaxing. We still had lots of visiting time, saw a few rugby games and some figure skating, and bought some gifts to leave there to save on shipping costs later.

Here is a picture of Hannah obviously disagreeing with a rugby call:


Nathan got a play tent with a tunnel while we were home and he had a blast playing with it for an afternoon there.
I had kind of forgotten about it until I was looking at pictures for this post. I actually paused while writing this to take the kids outside to play with it (which then turned in to supper time, walk, bedtime ... and now I'm back at it). They both had a blast.

We are looking forward to settling back into our routine (I am such a routine person!!) here at home and looking forward to some visitors in the not too distant future!!

Weekly Round-up

This was another good week for our family. We continued to use our schedule, although admittedly I was not as strict with it this week.

Nathan
Nathan continued with his tracing book this week. He still loves it and is getting into more and more complicated lines. He seems to be less enamoured with puzzles lately, although we did wake up to him having finished one while we slept this morning.

His potty training took one step forward and one step back this week. He started on Wednesday telling me when he would have to pee. This saves countless trips to the bathroom every day! I still make sure he sits before his independent play time, before rest time, before bed, and before we leave the house, but other than that he tells me if he has to go. The step backward is that he will not poop on the potty anymore. He pretty much only goes in his diaper first thing in the morning. I think the best solution for that will be to switch to underwear at night. He generally wakes up dry in the morning so I think he's ready for it ... I'm just not sure I am! I think we'll wait about a week and then start with that.

Nathan sleeps during about half his rest times at the moment. I really thought he was done with naps, but I'm glad I was wrong. This week he ripped up a book during one of his rest times ... as a result all books have been removed from his room for the time being.

Hannah
Hannah completely weaned herself from the bottle this week. She is now drinking a full straw cup of milk at lunch and one at supper, so she is getting enough milk. She still has her soother and likely will for a while. She seems to rely on it quite a bit.

Now that her night sleep is back to normal, I tried her in cloth diapers at night. I had tried about a month ago, but it was in the middle of her teething / ear infection / flu bit and I couldn't be sure if she was waking from one of those things or from the diaper. So far so good with the diapers at night. I'm so excited to be using all cloth except for when we travel!

I've mentioned before that Hannah did not enjoy standing ... at all. She seems to have changed her mind this week. On Friday she just decided that she was going to start wanting to stand and will even try to walk if I hold her hands. I am so excited about this development and will probably focus lots of energy helping her learn to walk independently!

We tried sitting Hannah on a toy car she got for her birthday yesterday and to our surprise, this is what happened!



She loved pushing herself around and chasing Nathan on the car. So much fun.

Peter hired a babysitter and we went out to dinner and movie Friday night. We hadn't gone out without the kids since February, so it was very nice to have some couple time! We saw The Bounty Hunter, and it was actually much better than I expected. The theatre here in our small town is brand-new and it's so cheap compared to going in the city - it cost us $25 for two tickets, a large popcorn, and two pops!

Goals
My housekeeping skills have been pretty good for the last month. For some reason I've been able to keep the house presentable pretty much all the time. I'm not sure what the difference has been but I hope it sticks around! One thing that wasn't working is the cleaning schedule I outlined here. I tried to think about why it wasn't working and I think it's because I had to be all over the house every day for my cleaning. With the kids it's nice to be able to focus on one area so the kids can stay in one spot while I work. So, I decided to make up my own schedule that has me focus on one (or sometimes a few) room(s) per day. Once I see how well it work I'll post what I'm doing :) I did manage to follow the schedule for Thursday and Friday, though, and it seemed good.

As far as the money goal goes, we spent little except for a deal we got yesterday (post to follow in a few days). Since it will save money in the long run I'm pretty happy with that.

I'm going to work with Hannah on her walking for this week.

Happy Mother's Day!

Weekly Round-up

Since everyone was healthy, this week was much better than last week. I also implemented a new daily schedule for the kids this week. So far it is working out well. Hannah's independent play time is improving, the kids enjoy sibling playtime, and I love that I get to spend one-on-one time with Nathan during learning time. Our days have gone very smoothly so far both with Peter's day and night shifts. I haven't even had to do much tweaking yet ... although I may shorten Hannah's morning nap at some point.

Due in part to this post on a blog I read, I have been in an organizing mood for the past week or so. I bought some totes when we were in Regina on Monday and have put them to good use. I still need many more, but I was able to organize Hannah's closet and under our bathroom sink. To help with my goal of being more organized, Peter is building me over 60 feet of shelving in our laundry room. The room is large, but had no shelves in it at all! It did have an old cupboard of some sort, but it was quite useless. Today we took that out, added two 12' shelves over the washer, and Peter is in the middle of making 4 10' shelves on the other side of the room. Here is the room as it looks tonight:

Hopefully the shelves will hold our million boxes of kid clothes. I can't believe how quickly they multiply!

A few weeks ago we picked up our new living room furniture but I have neglected to take and post pictures of it. I love our new recliner sofa. It is so comfy!



(Happy, Mom? ... Pictures of the house :) )

Goals:
Still doing well keeping the kitchen clean at night. I noticed this week that the two times I didn't clean up before bed I did it first thing in the morning, while the kids ate breakfast. This is a definite improvement.

The schedule really helped me to do reading and learning time with Nathan and Hannah. It's great to have it slotted into our day so I don't get busy doing other things and forget.

I did about half of the daily tasks this week. I started out well, but got off track toward the end of the week. I will continue to work on that this week.

Hmmm ... for this week I would like to see how little money I can spend! lol. We're not planning any trips to the city this week so I have no reason to spend much. I'll probably need to pick up a few miscellaneous groceries at the co-op, but that should be it.

Weekly Round-up

I just realized my last post was my 100th on this blog! Pretty cool. I'm really enjoying keeping up with it this time around. Hopefully it lasts.

This week has been a pretty tough one in our household. It started out great. The weather has been fantastic and we have been taking full advantage of it. On Tuesday Hannah had her 12 month needles. She seemed fine after them until Wednesday afternoon when she started with a fever. Thursday afternoon she started with vomiting and diarrhea and that continued basically until now. I think she's on the mend finally. She has been able to keep down some liquids and a few Arrow Root crackers this morning. My biggest concern was dehydration. I called the health line yesterday and they told me I should give her clear liquids, but not water. The problem ... Hannah only drinks milk and water. She turns her nose up at everything else! We discovered she will eat a popsicle every once in a while, so between that and the bit of food she's getting, I've decided water will have to do it for drinks. I think since she's getting sugar and calories elsewhere that the water will be ok.

Wednesday afternoon I had my monthly doctor's appointment. Everything looks good and we heard the baby's heartbeat again. Yay! I got my ultrasound date and Peter is trying to switch his work around so he can make it.

Since Hannah's been sick we've stuck pretty close to home for most of the week. Peter and Nathan went to help a neighbour build a fence yesterday (they have a 3-year-old boy for Nathan to play with).

I planted a few things in the garden this week, which was fun, and have had quite a bit more success with my seeds indoors. Less than a month until the last frost date!

Goals:
Despite Hannah being sick, I got my kitchen cleaned up every day except last night. I feel really good about this habit - it might actually stick!

I did better with reading to Hannah and doing Nathan's workbook with him. I'm not sure I reached 5 days for each of them, but it was definitely more than before. I am currently working on making up a daily schedule for our family again. I love when we are on a schedule - just working it around Peter's shifts has been tricky. I'm planning on posting a draft schedule sometime today.

And a new goal for this week ... I want to do my weekly tasks according to the calendar I've been following this week. They are:

Monday - change sheets and bath linens, laundry (super easy day)
Tuesday - vacuum & dust (upstairs); clean bathroom
Wednesday - laundry; wipe fingerprints off appliances windows, door knobs, light switches
Thursday - vacuum & dust (downstairs and bedrooms - this is where our carpet is), kitchen prep / clean out fridge
Friday - laundry; mop kitchen, bathroom, and hallway

This is slightly different than what is shown on the link above so it fits my house and our lifestyle better.

So ... that's my plan for the week. Peter works both days and nights this week, so it will truly test any schedule we put in place.

Weekly Round-up

I put Hannah's hair in two pigtails on Friday for the first time. As I was attempting to get a picture of her hair, she gave me this one instead. I thought it was too cute!

This week we've had a few discipline issues with Nathan. The worst came on Friday when he 'played' with my seedlings for the garden, obviously not to their benefit. I'm not sure what will come of them yet, but I doubt many of them will grow. Nathan seems to be really testing his boundaries lately. Hopefully if we just keep being as consistent as possible he will realize what we expect of him and that those expectations don't change from day to day.

I forgot my Diclectin one morning this week and it proved to me that I still need to be taking it. I was soooo sick! I guess I'll stay on 3 pills per day for a little while longer.

Saturday and Sunday the weather was beautiful here. We spent most of the day on Saturday outside. We took the kids to the playground at the elementary school and they both had a blast. Hannah is going to be our little daredevil, I think. She loved going down the slide! We came home and worked in the backyard on my vegetable garden. A bit more work this week and they should be ready for some seeds / plants!

I think the good weather is supposed to hold up for most of this week. Peter works nights all week so we should have lots of fun family time. While he's working in the evenings I should have lots of stitching time.

Goals:
I did quite well (for me) with my goal of making sure my kitchen was cleaned up before bed. I did it 5 out of 7 evenings and it is clean again tonight. I will continue with that goal.

In addition, I will make sure I read with Hannah and have Nathan do his worksheet (more on this later) at least 5 days this week. I was / am so good about reading with Nathan, but for some reason do it less with Hannah. Nathan loves his worksheets but I am very inconsistent with getting him to do them every day. These are goals that will help me keep the kids' schedules a bit more consistent, since they seem to be 'off' on weeks that Peter works nights.

Weekly Round-up

There are lots of little things that happen throughout the weeks that don't warrant their own post, but I'd like to have somewhere to mention them (or post a random picture of the kids), so I think I'll try doing a weekly hodge podge post. I'll highlight some of the things we did that week (so I have a record for my own journaling) and then pick something to work on for the week ahead.

At the beginning of this week we were in Calgary, so it was not a normal start to the week. Hannah was getting over her first ear infection (Nathan's never had one!) and sleep was starting to get back to normal.

Wednesday was a recuperation day. The kids and I stayed home while Peter went to work. Thursday we bought a new truck! We needed something that would fit three car seats, and this will allow us to 'truck' stuff back from Regina and take stuff to the dump as we do our renovations.

Since we had the new vehicle, Thursday night after Peter got home from work we took the kids for a drive to a neighbouring town and got some ice cream. They both had a blast.

The wind picked up Thursday night and was crazy!! for the next two days. I hated to go out, so we did as little as possible outside the house.

Friday morning I went to get my hair cut (finally). I am very happy with how it turned out. She did a great job and going to a new hairdresser is so scary! When I got home I noticed Hannah had developed a rash all over her. I was worried it might be a reaction to the medication she was taking for her ear infection, but it's stayed the same since then so I don't think it's anything serious.

Saturday we took the kids to a book sale at the library. You could fill a bag for $3, so we got tons of books for the kids and for me. What a great way to expand our library at home!

This morning we went to church and Hannah finally spent the whole time in the nursery without crying!! Since we've arrived she's had really bad separation anxiety. I hope this is the beginning of the end of that.

Nathan continues to do really well with his potty training. We even took him out a few times this week in his 'big boy' underwear. So far no accidents in the car seat or while we're out. While we were in Calgary he also became willing to use a regular toilet. It's so much easier than constantly emptying the potty, and it gives us more flexibility to take him out.

Hannah learned to point this week! It is so cute to watch her and it's helpful as she can point instead of scream when she wants something :)

Goal: This week I will make sure my dishes are done and my kitchen cleaned up before bed each night.