Skating!

The big day has finally arrived, Talia hit the ice today!!

We got her all decked out with new skates & a helmet yesterday. Public skating here in town is free for an hour on Sunday afternoons, so we headed over just after lunch. Yes, that is exactly when naptime usually starts, so we thought we may be in for a not-so-fun time.

Talia was super excited and kept asking us "Mommy, you comin' skating wif me? Daddy, you comin' skating wif me? Brutter, you comin' skating wif me?" She really likes her pink helmet and can't take her eyes off her skates when she's got them on.

So since this was her first time on skates and all, she was terribly wobbly. She thought it was super cool when Daddy picked her up and zipped her around the rink. She thought it was super lame when one of us went with her on the ice, but when we each took a hand she started to get the hang of it and walked all around out on the ice.

We had a pretty good time! Declan, chill as ever, hung out in his stroller while Rainer & I had Talia out on the ice together, and we watched the action when Daddy had big sister out by himself. Talia had moments when she really liked it and moments when she was really "ALL DONE SKATING!!!" We lasted about 25 minutes, which I think is great for the first try. We're not expecting her to be jumping and spinning by the end of the season, but it's a fun family activity that Rainer and I both love, and we want to be healthy role models and expose the kids to all kinds of sports at an early age.

The only thing that wasn't great about the day was when we were leaving, I was walking out behind a woman I recognized from Run Club, and her friend said to her "Did you see that guy with the 2 year old out on the ice? That's so friggin' ridiculous!!!!" Sigh. That's a small town for you. Rainer and I were clearly the only parents on the ice that could actually skate, so Talia was in far safer hands than the 3 year olds whose parents were barely managing to not fall on top of their kids. Sheesh. Anyway, imagine their disapproval had they known that Rainer & I were both on the ice before we were 2, and that I was skating around today at 22 weeks pregnant!! Ha!!!

Random Fall Updates

DECLAN

- Declan is just a few days shy of 9 months old. He's starting on cow's milk and is only nursing once or twice a day. That makes me sad, because m'boy is really into boobs, but the fact is that the pregnancy hormones are fighting with the milk hormones, and the pregnancy is winning. I don't have much milk left, so even when I do nurse him all day long, I'm topping him up with formula anyway. And of course my little prince needs the expensive $30/can formula, not the generic $8/can formula. I will not be sad to see the end of that stuff at our house. I mean, I know formula has saved a lot of babies' lives (including Declan's, probably) and I do not care AT ALL if someone has to, or chooses to, feed their baby formula - but for some reason it has been really hard on me to give it to Declan. Probably because I feel like he's being rushed out of baby-hood since there is another on the way, and think that if it weren't for me being pregnant, he could have continued his great love affair with the boob for much longer.

- Declan had his 9 month appointment this morning. While he continues to be massive to us (in comparison to his sister at this age) he is only 17lbs (5th percentile) and just over 27 inches (10th percentile.) Our hilarious doctor was all "He must seem like a giant to you.... how does your husband feel???" Poor Rainer, he keeps holding out hope for a giant Rainer Jr., but it looks like the McQueen genes reign supreme with the first 2 babes!! Declan also has 2 teeth and no interest in crawling. He won't even roll anymore! Now that's lazy!!

- Declan is on table food and doing great with it. We went out for lunch today and he had his first meal off the kids' menu. (Kids' menus are full of garbage, by the way. I mean, really? I'm not going to order my kid a corndog and fries. I'm just not.) Anyway, he got a plain mini-hamburger, broccoli, and applesauce and he ate the entire lunch. I don't know where he puts it.

TALIA

- Talia is doing great. She talks a mile a minute and is always making us laugh with what comes out of her mouth. She insists that she wants "anutter brutter" when we talk about the new baby. Rainer thinks she is going to end up with an army of tiny brothers, who she will train to do her bidding.

- Talia is completely diaper-free during the day, including her nap. She has a bad habit of taking her diaper off in the middle of the night but can't make it until morning consistently, so that has been greeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeat. Oh well, I wash diapers almost everyday anyway, so what's one more load of laundry?

- We are 100% in the midst of the "I do it mineself" phase, which means we are late for many events and get there with clothes on backwards and shoes on the wrong feet. But hey, as long as she's wearing pants, I am not complaining. Did I mention that her favourite thing to do is take off her pants & panties and ask people "See my pee-pee?" BECAUSE IT IS.

ABACUS

- Okay, here's the thing about Abacus. I suggested Atticus as a name the other night and Rainer, accountant that he is, heard "Abacus." That's just funny, because who likes math that much? We hadn't come up with a good "on-the-inside" name for the baby yet, so Abacus has sort of stuck. But the more we use it, the more people think it's for real. IT'S NOT. So sorry, but don't get your hopes up.

- We had our 20-ish week ultrasound this morning. I had thought I was 20 weeks, 1 day along today and that's exactly what the measurements came back as. My Dr. did not believe me, as my exclusive breastfeeding of Declan at the time of conception and my morning sickness hitting really early - too early, in her opinion - made for lots of back-and-forth when it came to settling on a due date. In any case, I will take great pleasure in telling her to suck it at my next appointment. (Lovingly, of course, because she really is awesome and hilarious.)

- Abacus looks healthy as a horse and is on track to be the same size as his/her brother and sister were. Poor Rainer, looks like he's zero for three when it comes to our kids' genetics. Seriously, was he involved in this at all???

- And in our first EPIC FAIL of parenting where Abacus is concerned, we didn't get ultrasound pictures. In our defense, usually they give you a form to fill out when you first get there AND the tech asks you if you want them. This time we got no form and the tech didn't mention it, and we didn't think about it until we were at lunch afterward. Poor, poor, third baby. The neglect is beginning already.

The Boys

When we were expecting Talia, we didn't know how "the boys" would react to having a baby in the house. When we brought her home from the hospital, they were initially wild with excitement to get a good sniff, but it was sort of like they knew she was tiny, and vulnerable, and here to stay.



We spent a few days training them to stay off a blanket on the floor, so when Talia arrived and started hanging out on the floor everyday, they already knew that was a no-dog zone. That particular rule resulted in a lot of this:

The novelty eventually wore off with Ernie, but Bert took the responsibility of taking care of his baby very seriously. When I would nurse Talia, he would sit right in front of us like he was standing guard - not even Ernie could get by him. And although both pups were very good about the "no dogs on the blanket" rule, occasionally we would find Bert, snuggled up to his baby, giving us his best puppy dog eyes.

Before too long, he trained his partner in crime to use her puppy dog eyes, too.

"Aw, Mommy, can't Bert stay here with me? Just this once?"

When we brought Declan home, the boys hardly noticed there was a new baby in the house. Now that he's on solids, they've decided he's okay, and like to hang out under his highchair. But they generally can't be bothered to sneak on the blanket anymore. Unless, of course, the combination of nice cushy blankets, a firm pillow at chin-height, and the glorious sun spot combine to make the baby's blanket the most irresistable spot in the house.

Here's hoping the new baby will sleep just as peacefully in that same spot!

You Just Never Know

When I was pregnant with Talia, I used to daydream about what it would be like to be a mother. I was positive my baby would be a little girl, and I would think about all the mother-daughter moments we would share.

I did not think that someday that baby would be 2 years old, and the thing I would most often say to her would be "Stop taking your panties off and putting them on your brother's head!"

That's the kind of week it's been around this place. Hello, Friday. We're glad you're here.

Coffee Talk

Today at lunchtime Talia was delighted to drink out of her brother's new little plastic mug (part of the Noah's Ark dishes Declan got from G & G for his baptism.) She very seriously peered in at her milk and then said sternly to me "Mommy! Diss my hot coffee. You no touch diss, Mommy, diss burn you!"

Little does she know I don't touch the stuff - don't want it to stunt my growth, ha ha.

Salt & Pepper

Talia has been going to daycare with the same kids for over a year now - they started at JoJo's house, then JoJo went back to work and the whole crowd moved 2 houses down the street to Jody's house. We don't know the kids & other parents really well, but well enough to know almost everyone's names, who is connected to which child, etc.

One little girl, A, is always there in the morning before Talia gets there, so Rainer (who does the drop-0ff) has never met her parents. I am often picking Talia up at the same time as A's parents get there, so I'd met them several times. Since July, A has a new baby brother, so her mom is off on mat leave and we've gotten to know each other better at the local Playgroup.

Last week at pick-up time I told A's mom how Talia insists the little blonde girl down the street is A whenever we meet them at the park. A's mom laughed and said that A thinks the little girl on the Pampers box is Talia. We giggled away at the silliness of our 2 year olds.

Well, this morning at Playgroup A's mom brought it up again, and it led into a conversation about what a shame it is that our little town isn't very multi-cultural, and that Talia is the only black kid any of the kids in Playgroup know, and is it very hard for Talia to be the only black child in town? I was like "Yeah, we're not very multi-cultural, which is weird because Winnipeg is so multi-cultural..... wait, what? Talia's not the only black kid in town - she's not black."

I thought A's mom was going to fall over, she was so shocked. Then my friend jumped in and said "I was surprised when I met Rainer this weekend, he's totally white!" Then some of the moms I'm friends with on FB jumped in with what they had guessed Rainer's race to be, and how shocked they were when they saw him on FB. Comments varied from "I thought she was adopted but she looked so much like you.... I couldn't figure it out!" to "It's not my place to judge, but I was totally curious as to how you managed to get yourself together and find a new guy to be Declan's dad, since there wasn't much time between the two of them!" to "I just thought Declan would darken up. I thought it was weird his eyes were blue, though." I thought it was so funny that they thought we had some exciting, exotic, interesting story to our family, and they were SO disappointed to find out we were just 2 boring white people who got married and had a brown baby.

I am still laughing. Oh Talia, my little mystery baby. The conversation this morning brought me right back to Talia's birth - I shared a room with a couple of crazies over the course of our extended stay, but one mom was lovely - she was black, and the dad was white, and Talia was darker than their baby was. That led to all kinds of switched-at-birth jokes. We actually ran into them in the mall when the girls were about 13 months old, and Talia was still darker and her hair was curlier than the other little girl - her mom laughed and said "Damn! Maybe we really DID switch them!!"

In the months after Talia was born, I took a Stroller Fit class at the mall, and inevitably at least once during each class someone would stop me to comment on Talia's beautiful skin/colour/hair and would ask where her father was from. It took me a long time to realize why they seemed confused when I told them Kenora.

When Declan was born, he was so fair and red-headed that Rainer and I were like "THAT'S not what our babies look like!!" I've actually gotten used to my nothing-at-all-alike kiddos, so it really made me laugh today when 1/2 the Playgroup fessed up to assuming the kids had different fathers of different races. I wonder what # 3 is going to look like? Will he or she continue to make the tongues wag around town? I hope so!

Score Another For The Catholics

Declan was finally baptized this past weekend. My Mom is super relieved and had a good sleep on Saturday night for the first time since he was born. She believes in the old-school Catholic belief that an un-baptized baby will never get into heaven, so I'm sure she has been a nervous wreck for the past almost-8 months.

Before the baptism I was wondering who would be silently judging me more, the people who thought I was still fat from the last baby, or the people who realized I'm already pregnant with the next one. When I finally found something to wear (a non-maternity shirt that is totally maternity-styled and a pair of pants from before I got pregnant with Talia - how do those still fit???) it was pretty clear everyone would be able to tell baby # 3 is well on the way! My entire family laughed right out loud when I came out of my room, I guess until this weekend I'd been hiding the bump pretty well this time.

We were expecting our regular priest to do the baptism, so we were a little surprised when we got there and it was the parochial assistant. I mean, it was fine and all, just not who we expected. So the thank you card was addressed to Father Phil, but my glossing-over-the-details husband gave it to the other guy anyway, ha! Oh well.

We met a little boy at church whose middle names are Declan and Raine, what are the odds of that? His mom was thrilled to bring her little boy over to meet our Declan.

Declan was feverish and kind of a cranky mess until the end of the baptism. My Mom took great pleasure in claiming the baptism healed him, but I think he was just excited to get to the party afterward.