Tiny Tots Parade...

In the town square taking a quick rest from all of the trick or treating at the downtown shops...

Thank goodness Mike came because it was insane...

The Oakville Beaver...

Paige was too scared to take a picture with the Marble Slab ice cream cone!

Stay tuned as Paige may have made the local paper "The Oakville Beaver"....pretty much a shoe-in.

Conversations With a 3 Year Old

Scene: Driving in the car on the way home from the mall.

Paige: Where are we going?

Mommy: Home.

Paige: I think I want to go to a friend's house.

Mommy: We can't go to a friend's house now. Which friend's house were you wanting to go to?

Paige: Clara's house!

Mommy: Clara's at daycare today.

Paige: Bummer.

Cutie Face...

Super chubby cheeks..

Rose can sit forever now. She rarely falls over, but I still put this old nursing pillow behind her since it will catch her if she falls sideways or backwards. Sometimes she'll fall slightly sideways and maneuver herself onto her tummy. She is now spending longer periods of time on her tummy, but is getting increasingly frustrated as she knows there is more to life then just lying like a lump on the floor. She desperately tries to move by kicking her legs and reaching out for toys, but only succeeds in moving backwards a bit which really frustrates her. Paige was moving around by this age, so Mike is desperate to teach her to crawl and "works with her" a little bit each day.

An Epiphany....

I have now been off work for 3.5 years. A really long time. Since then I have spent my days playing at parks, reading stories, baking cupcakes, playing with toys, watching the kids play while having coffee with friends, and more. I also can't forget those days spent wiping runny noses, spending entire nights awake with a sick child, cleaning up pee and poop from various surfaces, changing diaper blowouts, sweeping the floor 7 days a week, and never getting caught up on organizing the house. But for the most part, life is pretty sweet. I was wondering then, why I always have this feeling like I am just counting down the hours. Don't get me wrong, playing all day is fun, but it can get a bit boring sometimes and repetitive. And 3 year olds don't always listen or do the things that you want to do. And it is really hard to manage the time with 2 kids and all of the things that need to be done with a house and the things that go along with it. But all that aside, I wondered why I was wishing away this precious time of toddler and babyhood and just wanting the evening to come, to have a rest, for Mike to come home, to go to sleep, etc. I mean, of course it's a no brainer that I should want a break, but really what was the underlying issue. And then it hit me. My life up until the point that I stopped working was all about getting to the next step. Waiting for the bell to ring at 3:00. Waiting for that summer vacation. Waiting to move up to the next grade. Waiting to finish University so I could just start working. Then, when I hit the working world full time, let me tell you I was waiting for that small hand to hit the 5 every day (well...usually the 11, or 8 or some other odd hours in the jobs I worked, but you get the point). It reminds me of the Dr. Seuss book "Oh the Places You'll Go" where it says that you'll reach "The Waiting Place" where "everyone is just waiting". So here I am today, doing just that.

After this epiphany, I realized that I can still be eagerly anticipating when Mike walks in the door at 6:00, or when I can rest on the couch at 8:30 when the girls are asleep, or waiting for the weekend to come, but these moments don't need to be the focus of my day. When it's 7:30am and we have no plans, it's OK. All we have to do is try to make the most of the day ahead of us, rather than focusing on the end part when everything is easier. It makes more sense to focus on the little things all day long...a yummy lunch, a nice warm mug of tea, feeding Rose some new food, baking some muffins with Paige, and a million other possibilities. I decided I have to stop that nagging feeling of needing to wait for something, and just learn to go with the flow.

Does anyone else feel like this?

Growing up....

Sometimes I find it hard to believe that my little Paigey will be heading off to Kindergarten next year. I have to register her in just over 2 months. Other times she acts so grown up that it is easy to see how big she is getting...mentally, not physically!

She now has full on conversations with kids at the park and joins in their games. She can tell me who she played with at her class and how one boy can push her around in the car faster, but another boy is better at it. She decides exactly what she wants to wear for the day down to the underwear and hair clip. She knows how to use my iPhone. She knows how to use a computer. Crazy. She retains information about the big concepts we tell her about like gravity and what power lines do. She's just beginning to notice things about other people, like skin colour. No embarrasing moments yet, but I'm sure those will come.

Anyway, wow. I can't believe how grown up she is sometimes...

While Daddy and Grandpa were off galavanting again...

Mike and my dad have been going hunting and clay bird shooting a lot. This is a new sport for Mike, and a far-from-new sport for my Dad. I wasn't ok with this growing up, but now I have a "don't ask and don't tell" attitude concerning the whole thing. They recently went on a weekend away at a place near Ottawa. Grandma joined Paige and Rose and I for the Harvest festival at Springridge. Luckily we already had pumpkins because the pumpkin area was a zoo. The rest of the place was busy but very tolerable, especially with the nice warm weather. We took in a puppet show, went through the "tricky trail" and the Boo barn, and took Paige for a pony ride. I also stocked up on a Shephards pie for dinner with a tart for dessert. Yum!

Congratulations!

My step-sister Amanda and her boyfriend James got engaged last month! Congratulations to them! The day is most likely going to be January 7th 2012 in Oakville. Paige is going to be a flower girl, and I'll be a bridesmaid! Can't wait to see all of the wedding preparations coming together. So fun to have a wedding on the Horizon. It seems so far away when I think that Paige will be turning 5 that year, and Rose will be almost 2.

We're really happy for them and they are a fantastic and fun couple!

Thanksgiving Weekend...

Sipping hot chocolate by the fire...

Trying to reach the top of the flagpole with a long stick...

The mommy dinosaur...

Mike had a wedding to attend on Saturday night, so we packed up early on Sunday morning to head up to the cottage to join Grandma and Grandpa and Aunt Mary Jo. We stayed until Tuesday to make up for the late start. It was actually a really relaxing weekend, as the weather was nice enough to go for a long walk, have a fire outside, and spend a bit of time on the porch. Also Rose is suddenly into playing with toys, which made entertaining her a lot easier in the small space. We had 2 yummy Thanksgiving dinners...on the Sunday night, and then the leftovers on the Monday night. This was most likely our last cottage trip until the warm weather comes again. As we were leaving the air was crisp, but the sky was clear and the sun was beaming in. It would have been perfect to sit on the dock with a jacket and a hot tea. Can't wait for the spring.

The Pumpkin Patch...

Parenting...

I remember reading in a Today's Parent, or the newspaper, or somewhere about how the new trend is to be the crappy parent rather than the really great parent. By this they mean that rather than try to one-up other parents in the "look what a great involved and hands on parent I am" department, parents try to one up each other in the opposite manner. I witnessed this first hand the other day. It was a rainy and horrible day when Paige was at Jack and Jill. The weather was so horrible when I picked her up that there was no way we were rushing back to the car and instead decided to go to the library and treehouse play structure in the building to kill time. A couple of other parents and kids from the class had the same idea and were sitting in the play area. One of the moms says, "On a day like today the tv will literally be on all day". The other mom says back to her, "I am the worst at crafts. I don't like doing them at all so we just don't do them. I am so not creative".


In a way this nothing to hide attitude is refreshing. I don't think the tv being on all day is the best for anybody involved in that household, but I would prefer to hear another mom be honestly lazy then blab on about how many great rainy day activities she has planned for her kids. Every time I hear one of these similar parental shortcomings I breath a little sigh of relief. On a rainy day I may have the tv on a little more than the maximum "allowed" limit, but I will play with Paige a bit, make a little craft, listen to a little kids music. And sometimes I feel guilty. I think sometimes parents would prefer to start at the bottom and work their way up, rather than bragging about being the best parent and not being able to live up to their self-set expectations. There's nothing wrong with this attitude I say. It's not as if anyone is out there bragging about how their kid has not showered in a week, or brushed their teeth for 2 days, because that would be wrong.


And is it wrong to just let your kid work out their own problems with other kids? I decided to take a step back in the whole problem resolution area. Far too many times was I jumping in and trying to solve a problem. If Paige is blatantly mean to someone, pushing or hitting them etc. I will make sure to step in. But as we were at the park the other week Paige growled at another kid startling them. I said sorry to the kid and then to the Grandma, who proceeded to shrug and say, "they're just kids". You're right, I thought. Enough is enough. We can't constantly apologize for kids being kids. Of course Paige's problem solving and sharing skills are not top notch and I will need to help her sort through some things with some apologies on the way, but if she is just being a kid in a reasonable sort of manner and occasionally buds in front of someone to get up the slide, or takes a toy that a kid put down for a second, I'm not rushing in. Sometimes she needs to learn what is right and wrong from the other kids' reaction, rather than my own. This kind of helicopter parenting is getting way out of hand, at least in my area. And I, on the other side of the equation, don't need to wait for 5 minutes as you try to force your 13 month old to apologise to paige for accidentally sliding into her, or bouncing your ball into her. It's OK. I don't think you're any less of a parent. Accidents happen and "they're just kids".