January 24th

Blogging is hard when everyone is sick. What would I even post? A comparison of throat lozenges (my husband pronouces it loSenges and it drives me crazy)? Pictures of the overflowing tissue trashcan, like we have a dedicated trashcan JUST for used tissues and it’s ALWAYS full? That’s so disgusting! Everything here is gross right now, but here’s a few random tidbits.

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Hanging with my favorite tween watching PLL.
Father daughter dance
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sleepytime // now that there is a tv in my room we can lounge on the bed to watch Pretty Little Liars and it’s GLORIOUS // daddy-daughter dance // baby eats: orange-ginger salmon, honey glazed carrots, and mashed potatoes // I’m in the middle of my semi-annual Moomin marathon // stickers stickers stickers // ol’ blue eyes // she’s the tallest

Gwen is super into getting dressed these days. Like I don’t mean she’s happy when I put clothes on her (unless the clothes in question are zip-up footie pajamas, but that just because she’s obsessed with zippers and being zipped into things, she just really likes the zipping), but when she finds something that is clothes, or clothes-like, she tries to put it on herself. She puts shirts on her head and wraps them around her shoulders, she sits on the floor laying leggings on her legs and shoes on her feet as if that will magically make them be on her body. She has a special hooded bath towel from Ikea and that she actually can put on herself, usually backwards, and when she has it on she parades around the house proudly, dressed in what appears to be ceremonial robes.

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One of the effects of my cool (ie NOT COOL AT ALL) disease is that my nails are a pathetic mess. Like they were never GREAT but now they are so weak and brittle they are practically non-existent. Vapourous. I can’t grow them to the tips of my fingers, let alone PAST the tips, without them breaking and splitting and cracking and peeling. I’m basically over it so I made an appointment to get acrylics put on this weekend for the first time in my life. I’m an embarrassing combination of nervous and excited about it? Someone tell me it’ll be okay.

The other week I decided enough was enough with my faded hair. Like, the purple had faded SO MUCH that my ends were starting to look like idk… toothpaste? Like weird minty green-blue, especially in the front. I took the leftover purple dye and mixed it with an entire giant bottle of Pantene conditioner to make a lighter purple to retouch it with. It’s still pretty dark; I probably shouldn’t have put all the dye in but OH WELL u live u learn igss. My plan is to keep retouching it and letting it fade, and add more and more conditioner to the dye until it’s pastel enough that it doesn’t stain my hands. Maybe by then my hair will be long enough that I can cut all the dyed ends off anyway? And then my pastel purple condyetioner (patent pending) will just be to keep my white hair from looking yellowed.

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A project I’ve been working on that has finally come to fruition is making stickers to sell in my shop. For some reason I had the HARDEST time finding printable glossy sticker paper that was water resistant/the ink wouldn’t run, like maybe that is just a thing that doesn’t exist in Canada? Like freezer paper, like how am I supposed to make stencils without freezer paper?????? Anyway I was finally able to find what I needed online for a decent price with reasonable shipping, so I put together a few sticker sets. The first one is based on these black & white mini-stickers I’ve been including in my banner orders as like a little gift with a coupon code attached, I did a larger, full-colour version with some new designs. The second set is based on my old self-portrait, how terrible is it to make stickers with my OWN FACE on them? I had a little bit of an issue getting the sizing right on these and had to reprint so now I have like… 48 stickers with my face. Terrible! I also did printed versions of my glitter stickers, and I have plans for several additional sets. You can find them all here.

January 20th

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looking sharp with a Fever Bug stuck to her face

We are all sick around here- well, not Sym, but everyone else. Taylor and I have had cruddy colds for weeks (WEEKS) and over the weekend Gwen got sick too. Is there anything more pathetic than a sick toddler? Still dressed in their rumpled jammies, trailing after you with a pale face and sad pink eyes. It must be terrible to feel so bad and not know why. I’m happy she doesn’t seem to have the cough & sore throat that Taylor and I have, but instead she has an endlessly snotty nose. At this point my house is about 90% used tissues and throat lozenge wrappers, and I think we’re all ready to be well again.

January 17th

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she has a special hat // squirrel friend, I got the cool effect on this picture by taking it through the plastic window insulation, what an excellent photography tip // what I work on when I should be working on other things // for the birds // Sally Hansen Midnight Glitz over Hard Candy The End, these were supposed to be my NYE nails but I was too lazy to do them then // a quiet room // I will never get over these curls, I’m hoping that when my hair grows out natural and undamaged I’ll have them too // baby eats: vanilla ice cream with pink sprinkles, I used a melon baller to make the tiny scoops // stacked toys // a nice moment ruined by my dog and her constant flailing // don’t you just want to hug her? // playing fetch // head in the clouds

When I have like 15-20 custom etsy orders to make my favourite thing to do is be a total bonehead and like… not do them. It’s so dumb! I mean I’m not late on any of them or anything but it would still be smarter to make them rather than doing stuff like idk, busting out my sewing machine that I barely know how to use (I realized I bought it last January and I’ve used it twice, WOW) and hacking* away at some fleece with it to try and make a cloud-shaped pillow. It was sort of a disaster but when Sym came home from school and saw what I’d made she asked if she could have it, and when I said yes she was so happy. So it was all worth it in the end.

*I know “hacking” isn’t usually a term associated with sewing but I feel it accurately describes my technique & skill level, and I mean hacking like with a dull knife, not like HACKING hacking.

January 14th

I moved the little kitchen and she is way excited about it.
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Kisses
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My desk is the cleanest it's been in literally months
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Baby is doing baby stuffs
IT HAS BEGUN #minieggs #easter
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O were you lying here?

a typical mess // are bibs not cool or something? I see all these pics of bibless babies/toddlers eating really messy food while wearing fancy/expensive/handcrafted clothes and I’m like… THEY ARE GONNA STAIN THE HELL OUT OF THAT SMOCKED DRESS // little scavenger // baby eats: li’l chicken & waffles // kissy face // start your morning right with a breakfast of Synthroid & Tapazole // my desk is so nice and clean now // but my bulletin board is a stupid mess // hi little one // the first Mini Eggs of spring // this creep // seriously, it is spring now // grabby hands // this dog is very undignified & also a bedhog

Gwen is such a baby on the move these days- although at 14 months old I guess she’s technically a toddler now. AND TODDLE SHE DOES. She hardly ever crawls anymore, usually just if she’s on a soft surface (like a mattress) that is too difficult to balance on. She walks everywhere, and even runs. Her favourite is when she sees me coming with a diaper to change her, she just takes off running in the opposite direction so I have to chase her down while she shrieks with laughter. If she’s carrying any toys she’ll throw them aside as she runs, I guess to reduce her weight & drag so she can reach higher speeds.

She still falls, often because she tries to walk right through a field of toys and steps and stumbles on them instead of going around. Usually she’ll just pick herself up, dust herself off and keep going, but if she’s tired or hungry or teething or is just feeling emotionally fragile that day then she’ll sit where she fell and cry, or pick herself up, dust herself off and follow me around yelling until she gets a cuddle (it doesn’t take long).

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Some thoughts on goals & goal-setting… Obviously it’s that time of year when everyone is busting out their resolutions or goals or theme for the year. I posted mine and I think they are really doable, and also clearly stated. But I see so many people posting these weird, esoteric, intangible goals and I just have to say WHAT. Things like “in 2014 I’m going to SIMPLIFY.” Simplify what, and how are you going to simplify it? Exactly what aspect of your life requires simplification?

Some other goals (???) I’ve seen that I just Don’t Get: “focussing,” “being more present,” and “being more aware.” BEING MORE AWARE OF WHAT??????? Like it’s one thing to set yourself completely unrealistic goals that you’ll inevitably fail at (which is why one of my goals is “don’t eat potato chips during the week” and not “stop eating junk food, start working out and lose 30 pounds” because lbr, that is not going to happen) but it’s quite another to set yourself a goal that DOESN’T MEAN ANYTHING. You can’t (well you can but what is the point) just say that you are going to ~simplify~ and leave it at that.

PS As a side note my potato chip eating rule has nothing whatsoever to do with my apple pie a la mode eating rule and I will eat pie as much as I like even on a Wednesday like you can’t just compare apples and potatoes Taylor.

January 11th

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Well this can't end well.
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What the hell how did I do that???
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Saaaaaaaaaadieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee #ghosts #creepy #haunted
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Why are you not in bed asleep, baby?

stompin’ // buncha banners in progress // Monica Geller moment: “What if the baby gets in the ribbon drawer, and messes up all the ribbon? What if there’s no room for a ribbon drawer because the baby’s stuff takes up all the space? Where will all the ribbons go?” (ty to the person who made this connection on instagram) // this bear from bijoukitty is so cute // baby eats: nutella sandwich & strawberries (this was a disaster, she ate the strawberries and then screamed and cried until I took the nutella away and replaced it with vegetables) // heart in the palm of my hand // rude little stickers // sleepy friends // crazy legs // she can hold her bottle herself now (but often chooses not to) // a visit from Sadie (my haunted doll) // downward facing dino // wide awake and ready to party

Last week I got very sick and tired of Gwen constantly pulling things off the shelves on my side of the office, so I had the brilliant idea to swap out my open shelves with the bookcases in the hallway that have doors on them. DOORS. Doors that now have childlocks that are also basically adult locks because they are almost impossible to open unless you know the trick & have skinny fingers. I’m slowly moving my crafty things inside them, but not everything is going to fit and idk where I’m going to put it all.

I should probably go through everything and get rid of stuff I don’t use or need BUT I did that last year and since then there have been MULTIPLE occasions where I’ve been like “ooh I have a great idea for a craft project lemme just get out all the supplies I need… OH WAIT I THREW THEM AWAY.” Not cool. What I really need is more efficient storage solutions! And also to maybe clean out my desk and utilize the drawers to their fullest potential. Because that is a thing that will TOTALLY happen. Totally. For sure.

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I’ve been thinking a lot recently about this blog and the direction I want to take it in. Sometimes I get caught up in thinking that I HAVE to blog a certain way if I want to become successful at this. Post on a schedule! Make my images pinnable! Care about stats and bounce rate! But like…. I don’t care about those things, and I think getting hung up on them is stupid. And I don’t like or use pinterest, so why should I give a shit if my images are pinnable? Sometimes I need to remind myself that I blog for FUN, because I like it, not because I want to turn it into something else, something to make money from (I’ve already don’t that with enough hobbies).

January 6th

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Sym & Georgie // little photobomber // the queen on her throne // playing blocks // little ponies // serious bird // her pajamas match my hair // so do my nails (Sally Hansen Fa-la-la Lavender over OPI Planks a Lot) // undecorating // penguin massacre

The other morning Taylor and I took the baby and dogs for a walk. A red winged blackbird flew across the path and I was like “oh look, a red winged blackbird!” This turned into a discussion about what birds we could name, which turned into talking about hummingbirds.

At my parents house where I grew up we had a hummingbird feeder that hung outside the living room window in the front yard. My parents’ property is actually sort of hilly, like there’s the road and then what we called the bottom garden and then a slope up to the front yard, and it was great for the hummingbirds because the males do these crazy dives for their mating displays. The lady birds would all be hanging out on the feeder and the males would fly high up above and then dive straight down, but instead of having to pull up when they reached the front yard they could dive straight down to the garden, and when they flew back up by the time they passed by the feeder they’d be going super fast already. This made them look pretty badass and impressed the heck out of the lady birds.

The other thing about the hummingbird feeder is it was a great way to see science in action. You see, the living room had floor to ceiling windows, and as everyone knows birds often get confused by reflections in windows and fly into them. This would happen with hummingbirds all the time when I was a kid. They’d fly into the window at top speed and SNAP, break their little necks. My sisters and I would find them and bury their little floppy-headed corpses in old jewelry boxes. HOWEVER by the time I was in high school this didn’t happen anymore. Sure, hummingbirds would still smack into the windows, but instead of falling dead with a broken neck, they’d just hover there for a second, shake it off, and fly away. I think what happened is all the weak-necked hummingbirds were killed off, leaving only the birds with sturdier necks to breed with other sturdy-necked hummingbirds, eventually creating a race of SUPER-necked hummingbirds. Evolution, you guys.

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Taylor is back at work and Sym is back at school so I guess the holidays are officially over now. Welcome to the January blahs, everyone! Over the weekend I finally got around to taking down (most of) the decorations; it seems to be taking almost as long as putting them up. I do feel like I’ve cracked the code on how to make holiday undecorating not as depressing: just leave everything up until it starts to look like shit and you are sick to death of it all. I have everything done except for taking down the actual tree and some globe lights I put up in the dining room. Those aren’t STRICTLY a Christmas decoration though, so they might have to stay.

I also thought of a couple more goals (~resolutions~) for this year that I’d like to work on (in addition to putting my laundry away and growing out my hair, way to dream big): stop eating potato chips during the week (BABY STEPS) and actually be consistent with wearing sunscreen so I don’t end up with a weird, uneven tan before it’s even summer. Especially on my feet! I always end up with some weird flip-flops/Vans hybrid tan on my feet and it makes them look grubby and gross (grubbier and grosser? I mean I AM wearing flipflops in the city). Not this year though. This year is gonna be different.

Leftover Panettone French Toast

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Panettone is a sweet Italian loaf cake that is pretty easy to find in stores during the holiday season. You could bake your own but I’ve read that to make it properly takes LITERALLY DAYS so I think it’s much easier to use a store bought one for this, especially if you buy it after Christmas on clearance for half price.

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ingredients
1/2 of a 750gram/1.65lb panettone, any variety, preferably a little old & stale
2 eggs
1/2 cup whole milk
1/4 tsp vanilla

Slice the rounded top couple inches of the panettone off and set aside to eat later. You’ll be left with a half-cylinder shape. Slice it horizontally into three layers of equal height (like a layer cake would have) and then slice the layers vertically into three wedges (like regular layer cake slices). This will give you nine wedges of panettone.
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Preheat the oven to 200°F and place an oven-safe dish inside. Spray a non-stick 10.5″ square griddle pan with cooking spray and place over medium heat .

In a medium bowl whisk together the eggs, milk and vanilla. Dip each side of each panettone wedge into the egg mixture and set on a cooling rack over over a baking sheet to allow the excess mixture to drip off. Place 4-5 panettone wedges in the griddle pan and cook on each side until golden brown, about 2 minutes. Put the first batch of finished wedges in the dish in the oven to keep warm while you cook the second batch.

Serve immediately with maple syrup, fresh berries, or whatever toppings you prefer. Makes nine pieces; serves two adults, one baby and a surly tween who just wants to eat strawberries with maple syrup.

January 3rd

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blackberries & blood oranges for baby’s breakfast // up high // blue skies // last year’s wild roses // bargain-priced panettone that is going to be reborn as french toast // after her nap Gwen makes bold fashion choices// new leggings from auntie // snack time

A couple of months ago Taylor had the brilliant idea of trading in all his old videos games to Future Shop for store credit, and then applying that credit to his Xbox One pre-order. It was a great idea and he ended up with many hundreds of dollars in credit. Unfortunately he wasn’t able to apply the credit to the preorder, so he decided to cancel it, but then he couldn’t do that either? idk, the whole thing was online and even though I was like TWEET AT THEM YOU WILL GET IMMEDIATE RESULTS he elected to email them, and they didn’t reply until the preorder had become an order order. He was going to return the Xbox One and possibly rebuy it in the future with the credit but I was like OH JUST KEEP IT IT’S FINE. Anyway this week he decided to use the credit to buy a new tv, I mean with the credit plus the sales it was PRACTICALLY free.

Of course like everything in our lives it turned into a comedy of errors. He went to pick it up yesterday and OF COURSE it was the only rainy day this week. The sales associate was busy so OF COURSE he had to wait forever, and once he got it home OF COURSE we had to wait until I finished work to install it. We took down the old tv (and moved it into the bedroom, so basically I’M NEVER GETTING OUT OF BED AGAIN) and went to install the wall mount brackets on the new tv and OF COURSE the bolts are the wrong length and OF COURSE none of the other bolts in my massive collection of random bolts are the right length and OF COURSE we didn’t discover this until after the local hardware store closed for the day. OF COURSE OF COURSE OF COURSE. Taylor ended up having to take the train to Home Depot just to buy four bolts at 35 cents each (plus ten cents each for four washers). HOW FRIGGING IDIOTIC.

Eventually we got everything done and this afternoon Taylor set up the bedroom tv properly so we can use it to watch stuff. It’s currently on a stand on my dresser beside the bed (annoying) but we plan on mounting it on the wall opposite the foot of the bed, which will be better. Now I have a big rearranging/cleaning bug so this weekend I am forcing Taylor into tackling his desk with me, which IN SPITE of pretty much years of constant pestering on my part is still surrounded by a giant rat king of cables and wires. WHAT. IS. IT. WITH. DUDES. AND. CABLES. AND. WIRES. EVERYWHERE. It’s like they’ve never heard of cable management, geez.

Also on the agenda for the weekend: taken down the Christmas decorations. IT’S TIME.

Sleepy New Year (January 2nd)

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Idk, my bff baby.
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Portland is happening
On a  special shopping trip to buy more baby proofing equipment because of this monster.
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Sneepy nose
Not a good day to be Gwen's face.
Look at these curls
assorted pics from December 23rd-January 2nd

At midnight on New Year’s Eve Taylor and I snuck into Gwen’s bedroom to make goo-goo faces at her. I’m always so worried about waking her up that I rarely get a chance to see her sleeping anymore, and it’s so sweet. Sleeping kids in general, all curled up in their blankets clutching their teddy bears (or elks, in Gwen’s case), or sprawled across the bed with limbs everywhere (in Sym’s case).

Afterwards I made Taylor stay up really late with me drinking glass after glass of water so we wouldn’t be hungover parents the next day. It worked, we weren’t hungover, but we were the world’s most tired parents instead. I woke up to the sounds of Gwen sweetly babbling in her crib, but that soon escalated to yelling, and I found her standing at the railing, with her elk and soother and other toys flung onto the floor. We think she’s sending them to get help.

Taylor gave her breakfast while I showered, and when I got out I found him lying on the living room floor. I joined him and in no time at all we’d both fallen asleep. At some point I made us both move the couch. Gwen bobbled around us benevolently, giving us hugs and toys and the contents of the recycling bin. At one point she very delicately placed a receipt on a slumbering Taylor’s ear.

How lucky to have such a kind baby, who let us relax and recover? She shared her snacks with us (hand-feeding me Cheerios off the floor) and was perfectly content to have the laziest day possible.