etsy envy

The sprout's new bedroom was inspired by rocket ships and robots. So right now I am envying all things space...

And cute little boy clothes! There is such little choice :)

Rocket long sleeve tee from JackandChloe


Rocket fabric by Keri Beyer from luckykaerufabric



Knee patch wool pants from FuriousKingston


Robot tee from CantaloupeCorner


Lunar landing pod art print from johnwgolden


Rocket ship flashy pants from BayBeeGee

nobody puts duckie in the corner

remember to lock your doors

The doorbell wakes you up. It's 1am. And you know, you sense that something is wrong.

It's just kids, you try to convince yourself. They are running around ringing doorbells trying to give everyone a good scare. At 1am...

And then you hear someone try the door. Your heart starts to race. You think, I locked it, didn't I? You turn to the dude who is already climbing out of bed. "What's going on?" You ask. Like he knows. Like it's not pitch dark in your house. Like he can see who's outside from the bedroom.

"I don't know," he says.

Your heart is racing. Someone is trying to get into your house. You hear the sound of someone trying to turn the lock. You feel trapped. Scared. Frozen. It's making sense, what is happening, yet it makes no sense at all.

A burglar who rings the bell?

The baby starts to stir. Will a crying baby scare him off? You realize that you can't move. Your whole body is frozen. Listening. Waiting. He's still trying to open the door. And then nothing.

The dude is back. "Get him." He says about the baby. "Get him and call 911. Somebody is trying to get in." He's holding a knife.

His words unfreeze you. They give you a purpose. You get the baby. You get the phone. You force yourself to be calm. You quiet the baby. You call.

And you hear him trying the other door. He's still trying to get the lock to turn.

It's like you see yourself, you hear yourself, saying words you hoped you'd never say. "Someone is trying to break into my house." You marvel at how even your voice is. You fight to stay calm. It's like it's happening to you but at the same time it's so bizarre that it isn't. This has to be someone else. This isn't happening to my family.

She asks questions. "I don't know," you say. "I'm with my baby."

The dude comes and takes the phone. He gives a description. Height. Hair. Backpack. Barefoot. He tells her what direction he's headed in. He asks for a cop to come by. He hasn't put the knife down.

It's quiet again. No one is outside. The dude is waiting at the door. He still hasn't dropped the knife.

Ten minutes go by.

The cop arrives.

"We've apprehended him." He says.

"He's being very cooperative." He says.

"Never been in trouble with the law before." He says

"He's really drunk. Probably just thought this was his house. We're going to take him home."

On the stoop are his shoes and socks.

"Didn't want to track mud into the house," the cop jokes.

Only, I don't feel like joking. I feel relief that it's so trivial. But I feel sick. This is my house. This is my family. I don't fall asleep again until the sun is starting to come up.

And in the light of day, I can see the humour in it. I can see the guy telling the story about the night he got so drunk he tried to get into someone else's house because he thought it was his. I can see him laughing about it over a few beers with his friends.

But now it's dark again. And I'm afraid to go to bed.

Does he understand the fear he's left us with?

we bought a house!

It is a 1960's bungalow. It still has the original kitchen with original stove, recirculating hood fan and single sink. The basement is original too. Wood paneling, orange carpet, orange bar. Oh ya, baby, there's a bar!

And it's perfect :)

Well, okay, maybe not "perfect". But I get to redecorate, which I am loving!


Since it's a mid-century home we are thinking about going (wait for it...) mid-century modern.

Aren't we original?

The best part? I get to do another nursery! And since we now know that the sprout is a boy it won't be yellow and green. I'm thinking robot, rocket ship...

Feel free to suggest your favorite mid-century modern design websites. I need ideas!

sometimes life just takes over...

Or it doesn't, actually.

Sometimes life ends.

This happened to be the case of one great grandmother recently. A lady who truly understood what it meant to live through hard times. A lady who was a survivor. A lady who fought so hard for all the things she loved.

She lost this last battle to cancer. And the sprout will never know his great grandma. Sure, he's met her and spent time with her. But being only one, he will not carry these memories with him.

Instead he will hear of how she survived the war in France.

He will learn that she once hemmed pants for Picasso, who offered to pay her in art. But she was so poor that she asked for money instead.

He will hear about how she came to Canada to have a better life for daughters, only to be swindled, left penniless and alone, with her daughters back home.

He will find out that grandpa lent her the money to bring them together. The same man who sat in the front row at her funeral and could not stand because he was crying so much.

He will learn that she had trouble pronouncing names and it took her years to say daddy's name, called mummy "brawny-winny" for the longest time and never quite got your name.

She was a woman who continued to love after life took away so much, and everything indicated that she should be defeated.

But she never was.


We will miss you, grandma.

A party would have been too obvious

We decided we weren't going to throw a 1st birthday party for the sprout. I didn't feel like inviting a bunch of people over so the sprout could take a nap.

And I eat far too much cake anyways. I don't need another occasion to have more cake.

Besides, I have a hard enough time keeping my house clean. Now that we are selling I haven't gotten any better. Ugh.

So, what do you think a science major and a math major do with their first born for his first birthday?

Well, first we took a trip on a steam engine.


But the sprout decided we were going too slow, so he drove instead.


Then, he flew us up to the moon in a rocket ship.


On the way back to earth we stopped off at the space station to operate the Canadarm.


To end the day we traveled really fast down some optic wires, just like data traveling from one point to another.


And after all that, the sprout passed out.


Yes, he actually sleeps like that quite regularly. It helps amplifies the farting which is especially nice when he has his ass right next to your head.

You too can have an awesome, out-of-this-world birthday experience! Just go here!

happy birthday!

Happy birthday, little man!

uh... you missed a spot

My child loves the broom.

Okay, that sounds like a euphemism for...

Well, we aren't going to go there.

But, seriously, the sprout loves the broom. Literally.

We've all been working hard getting our place ready for sale. Which has involved giving the sprout a lot of piggy backs in the Beco. (Oh, god... that sound like a euphemism too...) If I need to get something done, like, say, sweep the floors and the sprout wants to, say, cruise the furniture and put lots of sweaty footprints all over the nice floor I am trying to clean, it is just easier to hoist him on to my back. Where he can chat and drool on mummy's head and point and tell me I am doing it all wrong.

He always giggles when I sweep. It is by far the funniest thing I've done lately. Apparently, I suck at cleaning the floor. I suck so much that it reduces my child to a giggling lunatic.

I guess the sprout thought I needed a lesson in how it's done.
Can you see the dust that he's swept up? Genius child. I wonder if I can whore him out to cleaning companies and make some extra cash have more money to put into his RESP.

Oh wait, there is something against child labour, isn't there?

No child labour laws were broken during the writing of this blog post.

so apparently we aren't too cool

For crawling, that is.

The sprout has never shown an interest in crawling. Standing and cruising is far more interesting.

Until recently.

Hello angry crawl.

You. big. meanie. You. have. put. me. on. my. ass. in. the. middle. of. the. floor. Well. screw. you. I. want. to. cruise.

So far he's only figured out how to crawl to the couch to pull himself up to stand. He hasn't figured out that cruising is a mode of transport. I haven't enlightened him to this fact.

He doesn't need to know, does he?

thump, cry, pause, WAIL

You know that saying, the one about the forest and the tree falling?

If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, will it still make a sound?

Ya, that one.

Obviously, it will. The impact of the tree hitting the ground is going to cause some vibrations and sound is just vibrations.

But I digress.

What happens when the baby falls over?

This has been happening a lot lately. Someone wants to move faster than his feet will take him. Or he changes direction mid step and trips himself. Or he decides that he doesn't need to hold on who-cares-that-he-can't-balance-on-his-own-yet.

Thump.

Usually he falls on his ass. Sometimes on his side. Frequently on his head.

Cry.

It's like he's just testing to see if you are going to come to the rescue.

Pause.

If he is just falling over for attention, there is no pause. He'll keep crying till you pick him up.

But when you look over and his mouth is open like he's trying to scream but no sound is coming out and 5 seconds go by and then another 5 and you start to think, okay, little sprout, breathe. Just breathe.

Wail.

Full on screamfest. OH MY GOD! It's the end of the freakin' world. But maybe if I point over there at that contraband non-toy you'll give it to me to make me feel better. Really, your computer would make me feel much much better, mummy. Or the camera. Or daddy's fancy chopping knife in the kitchen. It's shiny...

Or, you know, boob would be lovely too.

So, what happens if the baby falls over and no one is around to hear it?

You'll never believe it.

The baby still makes a sound.

Thump, cry, pause...

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAH

At least he hasn't figured out how to fall out of his crib yet. I dread to hear that.

happy mother's day!

Happy Mother's Day to all you mama's out there.

Let's celebrate by... playing in the snow!

The dude is making me blueberry pancakes and bacon for breakfast :) The sprout is cruising the furniture. And I am sitting here thinking I should really clean up my house relaxing.

It's mother's day AND my birthday. I don't think I should have to do anything today. In fact, I think I'll go back to bed!

Oh, wait, no. Breakfast's ready!

Enjoy your day and indulge a little :)

Image via Getty Images

do people really live like this?

We're house hunting.

You, know... that fun time where you think it's a good idea to spend too much money so that you can have a few extra square feet, a basement and a yard. And you get to go and snoop in other people's houses. Which I think is really what house hunting is about - spying ;)

We've been to see 4 houses so far. One was already sold when we saw it. One cost too much money. One was nice but we didn't like it enough to enter into a multiple offer bidding war.

And one was, how to describe it... in one word...

AWFUL

Absolutely, unequivocally, AWFUL.

The house was being sold "as is" and I was told that we could expect the house to be in very poor condition. Which we kinda figured it was from the pictures. We figured it would be dirty. We figured it would be smoky. We figured there would be peeling wallpaper, and crappy flooring and that it would be very messy.

Oh, how naive we were :(

We didn't think there would be dog poop every where, dirty dishes piled high in the kitchen, a giant hole in the ceiling, walls missing upstairs and "wall-to-wall" carpeting meaning random pieces of carpet strewn over the subfloor.

There was a toilet behind the stairs on the main floor. No door, no sink. The plunger was on the floor beside the toilet and a note on the toilet said "do not use". This was the 2nd bathroom.

We couldn't enter the master bedroom because "the guy" might be home and sleeping. But someone had cut a "doggy door" out from the bottom of his door to let the dog in and out. I assume, so that the dog wouldn't poop in the bedroom.

There was a pool in the backyard. If these were my friends, and I knew how they kept their house, I wouldn't go within 6 feet of that pool.

I left feeling a bit sick.

Do people really live like that?

Where was the pride of ownership?

I admit, I sometimes let my housekeeping lapse, but I don't think I could ever let it get to that point. This was years of dirt and neglect. Nothing was clean.

No, wait, the giant TV in the living room was spotless.

It's nice to see the owner had his priorities straight.

It still makes me feel sad when I think about it. I cling to the hope that they are moving out of here and going to a home that will be able to give them the help they need.

And for us, the search continues. But maybe we won't go to any more "as is" house sales.

feeling frumpy

Do you remember, before you had kids, how you always thought that will never be me? I will never be frumpy. I will be the yummy mummy that everyone envies. I will shower every day and wear killer heels. I will turn heads as I push my designer pram down a posh shop-lined street and drink overpriced decaffinated beverages at a trendy cafe with all the hipsters typing on their laptops and ipads.

Do you ever notice that reality is often very different?

And it's not like I've ever been honked at by carloads full of teenage boys... more than once...

It all started off so innocently. It was a crappy day so why should I go outside? Why should I even bother to get dressed? Heck, lets go back to bed, little sprout. We can be lazy!

It has spiraled since then.

And now the poshes of mummy days is coming up - Mother's day. Only it's a double whammy in our house. It's also my birthday. And I feel anything but yummy these days.

I have a week to change that.

Motherhood is beautiful, so why shouldn't we be?

two lessons all boys should know

(1) When a girl says "no" she means "no" and you should respect that answer.

(2) Mummy is a girl.

So when mummy says, "No, you can't sleep with me tonight", you are supposed to say, "Okay, mummy. I respect that. I'll go and happily sleep in my kick ass crib."

You aren't supposed to start wailing just because we walk into your room.

And when mummy caves and say, "Okay, you can fall asleep in bed with mummy, but then you are going to sleep in your crying cage crib." It's in poor taste to promptly fall asleep snuggled up to the boobs but start screaming the minute you hit the crib mattress.

It also isn't fair that you can look up at mummy with huge puppy dog eyes, squeeze out tears, and go, "Maaaaaaammmmmaaaaaaa!"

Damn it. We never should have encouraged this talking thing.

And when mummy caves (again) and picks you up, you should keep crying like something really is wrong and you really need to be held. Don't immediately stop wailing, break out in a huge grin and say, "Mummy, you're my bitch!"

Also, when I pick you up please don't point at the boobs as if to say, "I want that one now, mummy." And then start nawing at my bra straps. I'll get it out when I'm good and ready to feed you.

Okay. Right now.

Please stop banging on my chest.

Tomorrow, little sprout. Tomorrow you are going to sleep in your crib all night. Or, you know, maybe the next night...

giving the cows a run for their money

Cows have gas.
Gas = methane
Methane + oxygen = carbon dioxide
Carbon dioxide = all bad for the environment
I get it. I do. But really? Cows? Their methane emmissions amount to 16% per annum...

Obviously, you have not been to my house lately. If you came for a visit you might change your mind. Cows aren't causing global warming. The sprout is. Or, more accurately, the fart symphony of green house gases coming out of the sprout's butt is. You've got to hear it to believe it. I should start selling tickets!

Seriously tho. He's not that big. I have no idea how he can have so much gas stuck up there. I have no idea where it all comes from.

And okay, maybe lentils isn't the best thing to serve a baby. Curried lentils, actually. But lentils are tasty. The sprout readily agrees.

I am sure his methane emmissions amount to at least 17%...

You cows ain't got nuttin' on my baby.

Except that we think you are tasty and we will eat you.

Mmm... beefy...

wanna win some wipes?

Then head on over to Huppie Mama for your chance to win one set of 5 cotton flannel/organic sherpa wipes. These have been very popular in my Etsy shop :)

And while you are there you should check out her blog about living green with her beautiful baby girl down in Florida!

Also she is sponsoring a number of giveaways right now, so you might want to enter those too. Because it's fun to win stuff!

Happy perusing!

it's earth day

What do you want to change in your life to make it greener?

I want to exchange all our plastic containers for glass or ceramic.
I want to switch to Bullfrog for our electricity.
I want to live somewhere that I can use a compost.
I want to buy less and use what I already have more.

How about you?

Image from www.dohosurf.org

my etsy shop has been featured!

How exciting! Our first feature, evah!!

You should hop on over to Raising a King to see what lovely things Kristina says about our wipes :)

And you may find something useful (wink wink) if you are looking to shop at bee sew sew!

While you are over at Raising a King you should check out all the other great Etsy sellers she's featuring this month. There are a ton a awesome discounts and coupon codes! Including one for her own shop Buy some love. Seriously, how gorgeous is that?

Happy shopping!

I *heart* Oliver Jeffers

Boog. boog. BOOG!

It's the sprout's first word. He holds up a book and says, "boog!" He sits on my lap and points at his pile of books and goes, "Boog!" He sits on the floor and turns the pages, banging his chubby little hands on the books. He loves his flip-the-flap books and his touchy-feely books. I have more than once caught him petting monkey's tail. But not his monkey. His monkey has a fluffy tummy.

It's cute. It's so friggin' cute.

Let's face it, tho, after the 18th million time, the twist ending of "Peekaboo! It's you!" is lost on me. I think I want to shoot myself.

But then... one day, we found a penguin at our door.

It was when I was looking for a Christmas present for the sprout that I first picked up How to catch a star, by Irishman Oliver Jeffers. I got to the part where he considered flying his rocket to space only it was out of petrol because he had flown it to the moon last week. I was completely drawn in but the simplicity of the story and the artwork. Oh. my. god. The artwork! It is phenomenal! I *heart* Oliver Jeffers! It's just... he's just... I want to marry him... Actually, no. The dude might have something to say about that...
Jeffers writes from an amazing point of view - that of a child. But he does it in such a way as to make his stories endearing to the reader. As adults we often forget the simplest way from point A to B in a child's eye can be the most ludicrous avenue available. But that's what makes children so special. They are unaffected by the world around them.


Our favorite book right now has got to be Lost and Found. Or maybe it's The great paper caper just for the artwork which tells a fantastic story all on it's own. The day I bought that book I studied it for half an hour before going to bed!

Guacaholics anonymous

Over here at chez le sprout we practice baby-led weaning.

Baby-led weaning (def.): (1) The epitome of lazy parenting, only with a fancy name.

We have discovered that the sprout is quite fond of guacamole. So when the dude said he wanted to make tacos for supper I thought, score! Not only did I not have to make supper, but it was an excuse to make guacamole.

Yes, we eat guacamole on our tacos. We also only ever eat soft shelled tacos. We also put grated carrots on our tacos. Okay, we are admittedly a bit odd.

Baby-led weaning (def.): (2) Hand baby food. Sit back. Take pictures.

In an attempt to get more guacamole in the sprout's mouth and less on the floor (or flung across the table...) we started making guacamole sushi rolls. These are really easy.

(1) Make guacamole. Take the fruit of one avocado, the juice of one lime, 1/4 of a small onion roughly chopped, salt and pepper. Combine in a food processor until well blended and smooth.


(2) Rip off a piece of tortilla and coat said piece of tortilla in guacamole.


(3) Roll up said piece of guacamole covered tortilla.



(4) Hand food to baby.
(5) Take pictures



Avocados were harmed in the making of this blog post but it was all in the name of tastiness!

An escapade

So, the other day I went in to check on my "napping" baby. Instead I found this:

Yes, that is my child, standing on the floor between the bed and the dresser, banging on the wall.

Ummm... dude! You are supposed to be sleeping. Not giving mummy a heart attack because she walked in the room and saw an empty bed.

You should have seen the look he gave me. "Hi mummy! Look what I did!" He was sooo proud of himself. And what do I do? I grab the camera, of course!

What I want to know is how he circumnavigated the pillow mounds on either side of him, dismounted the bed and landed on his feet with out a sound.

Actually, no. I don't want to know. I really might have had a heart attack if I'd witnessed that.

We no longer have that bed. The stupid thing was like 3 feet high and I practically needed a step ladder to climb into it every night. I promptly sold it 10 hours after this escapade.

We now have this bed:

Thank you ikea!

yoga pose du jour

Bhujangasana
(aka Cobra!)

replacing the elastic in a fuzzi-bunz {a step-by-step tutorial}

It happens to all of us, sometime or other. The elastic in a diaper goes. It snaps or it wears out and isn't stretchy any more. And it sucks. Diapers aren't cheap. Thankfully, the fix is. For less than $1 worth of elastic and about 35 minutes of time, you can replace all the elastic from a cloth diaper. It's really easy and only needs a basic knowledge of sewing and a sewing machine.

So here is my (hopefully) easy tutorial on replacing the elastic in a Fuzzi-bunz pocket diaper.

What you will need for this project:
(1) a FB diaper with elastic that needs replacing (I bought 5 for $5!)
(2) elastic. I like to use 1/4" swimwear elastic because it stands up well to washing, but you can use elastin (the clear elastic) or any other type in 1/4"-3/8" width
(3) a seam ripper (very important!)
(4) measuring tape or ruler
(5) scissors
(6) a small safety pin
(7) your trusty sewing machine with polyester thread (to prevent wicking). Your thread can match the diaper or you can use white thread (like me)

As you can see, the elastics in the legs and back of this diaper are all stretched out.

I started with the back elastic, since it's the easiest.

You want to turn the diaper inside out and start unstitching the casing at one end. Be careful not to put any holes in your PUL. You only need to unstitch enough to be able to access the elastic.

See how the elastic is sewn into the seam between the PUL and the fleece of the diaper? There is no need to unstitch all off that.

Instead just trim the elastic close to the seam.

Repeat this to the other side and then pull the elastic out. Usually there isn't much life left in the elastic so you can just throw in away.

Cut a new piece of elastic. For a medium FB I made the back elastic 7".

On one side of the opening anchor the elastic by stitching back and forth a few times. I sewed the elastic in on a slight angle so that when I restitched the casing I sewed over the elastic again.

Attach a safety pin to the loose end of the elastic and thread it through the casing.


Pull it through to the other side and sew it down in place by stitching back and forth a few times. I also attached it on a slight angle here.

Turn your diaper right side out and restitch the casing, sewing back and forth at the start and the end. Pull the diaper taut when stitching. When you release the diaper is should gather nicely. This is really easy to do because you just follow the holes left from the stitching that you unpicked.

I restitch the entire casing even though I didn't need to. It was just easier. I also made sure to sew over the ends of the elastic again to give extra strength to the attachment points. Hopefully this will prevent the elastic from snapping later on!

Much better!

On to the legs.

Turn your diaper inside out again and look for the attachment point of the elastic for one of the legs. You should be able to see the end of the elastic on the PUL side of the diaper.

Unstitch the casing.

This is where you can do like you did for the back of the diaper. Unstitch just the ends of the casing. Leave the old elastic in the diaper (it is sewn in so you can't take it out unless you open up the whole casing) and thread a new elastic through. Stitch the other end down and then restitch the casing. This works just fine but it does make the legs a bit bulkier.

That's why I like to unstitch the whole casing. As you can see the elastic is sewn in very well. You need to unpick the stitching and remove the old elastic.

To sew the new elastic down, select the three-step zigzag or elastic stitch. A regular zigzag will work too but won't provide the same degree of stretchiness.

Cut your elastic. For a medium FB I chose to make the leg elastics 6.25" but I tend to like a more snug fit! If you are only replacing one leg then take the measurement from the "good" leg so that they match.

Anchor your elastic at one end by zigzagging back and forth.

Pull your elastic taut while you stitch. I hold the end of the elastic where I want it to end and use the other hand to help pull the diaper through the machine as I sew.

The diaper should be gathered after it is stitched.

Here is the new elastic sewn in. If you are doing the other leg as well, do it now. Or, turn the diaper right side out again.

The casing for the elastic needs to be restitched. You can see where the previous stitching was so you just want to follow this.

Start at one end and with a straight stitch sew the casing, pulling the diaper taut while you sew and making sure to sew back and forth at both ends.

Et voila!

I recommend that you wash and dry (yes, dry, in the dryer) the diaper before use. This will help to seal up any small holes in the PUL left from the sewing.

I hope that you've found this tutorial helpful!

Please use and share this tutorial, but don't claim it as your own. A simple link back to us will suffice, and a comment to let me know. Thanks!