Moving Day!

I'm moving in order to blog you better. This site will still be here but I will post updates on the new one. Please update accordingly.


http://katieannab.squarespace.com/


There's more music and a contact me space.

In honour of the move True confession Number 5!!! I think my best yet. Check out the new site to see.

Can we still do that?

Yesterday I was driving and a lady illegally passed me and cut me off so I beeped at her. We pulled up to the lights, only about a half block later and I didn't do anything, I didn't really care, as she pulled away she gave me the finger. I didn't know we could still do that as grown ups? Well this changes everything!!

Dear Daddy

Yesterday we went to playland and the older kids coined Orange "Super Baby" and 6 of them followed him around for 2 hours. Today we're making muffins, going to the farmers market and then we thought we'd see if we could destroy the house and make mama's eye twitch some more. It's funny! Mama says we should be wild things, at first I thought she meant for Halloween but now I'm not so sure. She also says she misses Saturdays where sleeping in, eating fried bacon and eggs and holding your head are the only things on the menue. I don't know what she means but she says I'll learn.
Love Piggy
P.S. She also says to tell you the trash needs to be taken out and the lawn mowed. What should she do?

And so she wondered, could one thing change everything?

Every week when I go to the grocery store I put something in the food bank, and I started to wonder.... If I have just under 300 FB friends and if I could get half of them on board and if half of those shared it, and if just half of those did it too, what would happen? I've done some rough numbers, if 2 items could make a meal, did we just feed 100 families dinner?

True Confession - Number 4

Until I was in my late teens (LATE) I honest to goodness believe that there was some magical mechanism which made it impossible for the vacuum cleaner to suck up it's own cord. You could go over it all you want but it would never suck up its own cord, voila magic!! I was sorely disappointed and perhaps a bit embarrassed when I found out this was not in fact true.

PS True confession 5 or maybe 6 will probably be my best ever!! I almost can't wait but it's not time yet.(I am NOT preggo!!!! Just incase that was where you were headed with that.)

Better Things

When you start the day at 5am and by 8am are staring lustily at the bottle of wine on your counter the only thing to do at 1pm is have that glass of wine, turn on Sharon (the music) and spend a little time with Amy(Amy Butler Style Stiches-purse pattern book) while the chaos swirls around you.

P.S. I've lost my stats tracker ( I can no longer tell if anyone has visited my page) so if you're here drop me a note and let me know. I love to get comments. If you don't have an account you can select anonymous.

Sigh

On a scale of one to fed up, one being good and fed up being fed up, we're at fed up plus about six thousand and twelve.

Pink or Blue and a call out fee

Friends of ours recently told us how they have subdivided their home into pink and blue task, pretty self explanatory I think. We never labelled them before but there are very clear pink and blue tasks in our home. Blue tasks would be putting away the dishes and the laundry, mowing the lawn and barbecuing (I can barbecue, I choose not to). Pink would be everything else. Yesterday I flushed a diaper liner and some wipes (we have cloth diapers), I know I shouldn't flush wipes but I did so whatever. Last night I notice it hasn't flushed, so I flush it again without thinking and the water starts to rise and I'm like OH GOSH!!!
So I message the carnie and ask him what I should do, do I flush it again, do I plunge it, what? He asks some questions, what happened, what do you see? I see baby poop, what do you think I see?? Anyway he tells me how to plunge, I'm a chick, I've never plunged before, ew. Our plunger until now has been exclusively used for Orange 1 to suction on his face while running through the house. So I do it and come back to the computer and ask him how much a plumber call out would be. He says at least $100 and oh god what happened. I told him it worked fine and I want to paid $100 plus an extra $80 for the gross factor, this was clearly a blue task, I completed it despite being pink and I expect to be paid for it. I don't care that it was my fault, it's still not my job. He actually paid up on the spot plus gave me a nice tip! I'm going to use it to buy a new plunger. xoxo

Musical Delight!!!!!!!

I've added in music!!! I think every couple days I'll add in a new song. There will be no rhyme or reason to them, just what I feel like sharing. Eventually it will be an entire playlist.  I think it helps the ambiance. What do you think? What do you think of the new look? I'm still playing with it so you can be honest, I'll try not to cry.

True Confessions - Number 3

True confession number 3:

Orange 1's actual name comes from an old Julia Roberts movie. 

Piggy's name:  I lost a bet with a dude in a bar. I was in college, we were at a pub, we were playing playing online trivia and I was sure I was going to win. I promised to name my firstborn son after him if I lost, I was not going to lose. I lost! The big guy vetoed it for the first but I got it in there for number two. I think thats almost holding true to my word. So Mr. Percy if you're out there this one is for you.

Shhh don't tell the big guy. I don't think I've told him. 

A Moment

He asks me to lay down with him, he doesn't normally, so I do.
He puts his head in my hand and reaches to hold the other.
I know its been a hard day.
He finally falls asleep with his hand pressed to his temple as if deep in thought.
He is warm, he is cuddly, he is mine.
I love him so.
I stay long after he has fallen asleep.

There is a moment, even in the longest and the worst of bedtimes. The trick is to notice it.

What's On your Table?

I'm always running out of inspiration for meals. I like organic and free range when possible (although I did eat a bag of chips for breakfast today so clearly it's not a deal breaker), I love things that you can make in big batches and freeze. I hate to put away dishes, the simpler the better.

So I thought I'd ask what's on your table? Jenny you should absolutely do a post on quick and delicious mom meals ( See Jenny's blog, KitchenWitch, link to the right).

Tonight we did bacon with farmers market vegetables, sun dried tomatoes and pasta.

Conversations With My Husband

Me " I'm thinking of starting an affair"

Husband "Why?"
Me " I'm pretty bored"
Husband " I wish you wouldn't"
Me" Well what should I do then?"
Husband" You could sell crack out of the back of the car"
Me " Oh! Okay"
pause
Me" But what about the affair?"
Husband " Well... I'm away enough you could just pretend to be having an affair with me"

Me" Okay, that seems like a good compromise"

Is it a bad night?

Is it a bad night because it's a bad night. Is it a bad night because things have changed? Is it a bad night because I am making it so or because it is so?
Things have been going really well, this has been our best carnie on tour trip yet, but tonight I was done, ready for a break. Did this cause the chaos or did the chaos cause this. Bedtime was a disaster on everybody's part. Was it me, was it them? Who knows.
Orange 1 and piggy share a room, Orange 1 asked for Piggy to share the room and loves it. I can't believe how much he loves Piggy. We have pictures of "the Daddy"taped to the wall and it helps. Every night before bed we say "night night daddy" and we give the picture a kiss and look at it for a while. In the day when the daddy calls we talk on speakerphone and tonight we had speakerphone chat with the daddy during bedtime. Orange 1 pretty much refuses to talk to him but he listens intently. During bedtime was a mistake. I hung up and the disaster that followed was so emotional. I found another picture of the daddy in a frame and asked if he wanted to hold it, he did. He fell asleep staring lovingly at the daddy picture and it broke my heart. I can fix a lot of things, I can be a lot of things, but I can't be the daddy, no matter how hard I try. There were some tears.

I didn't see that coming

Do you know that if you google just the right combination of beautiful and blog you get a lot of gay and lesbian porn-esk material. I have to say I didn't see that coming.

Piggy Pica

I feel like Piggy has that disorder where you can't stop eating things. I saw it once on Grey's Anatomy. Cheerios, raisins out of the heat grate, old shoes, bits of paper. Did I see this early on or has it become a self fulfilling prophesy?


NOTE: Yesterday we added bits of the shaggy carpet and pebbles to that list. 

Dear Husband

When you get home you owe me big time. I would like a never ending supply of wine, I repeat Never Ending, a day at the spa, perhaps some diamonds and maybe a pony. I shall not be getting up at 3am to play trains with the children, I shall not be taking out the trash or doing dishes. We will not watch "Deadliest Catch" or any other type of man show. We will watch "Say Yes to The Dress" and you will pretend to be interested in each and every dress. We will have girl talk. I would like to be a "lady of leisure" for at least a week.
love you
Wife

Orange 1

Today I looked at the tiny striped sock, then I touched it, then I smelled it's familiar scent. It made my heart ache and it was hard to breathe.

Dear Daddy

Dear Daddy,
Yesterday mama took us on an outing and we got new movies. Orange 1 fell asleep holding the one on trains and was very very happy. Mama was in a bad mood to start the day yesterday but then she put on the Bob Dylan Christmas album and it cheered her right up. She says if you don't come home soon she's going to break out all the Christmas stuff early this year. I think she likes Christmas. Today Orange 1 has gone to work at the baby factory, mama says he has to earn his keep.
I miss you and am getting tired of seeing this lady all the time.
Love Piggy

Sometimes it's what you have

Sometimes it's where you've been that counts

Naomi Claire Photography

True Confessions - Number 2

The carnie is still on the road so while he's away I thought I'd share some secrets involving him as well.
Last month the carnie was away for 18days in a row. While he was gone he said "go ahead and check my email so you can look at the next months work schedule" so I did.  Here is what I found:

He had emailed scheduling asking something or other and they replied. This was the first email from scheduling so I opened it (AS DIRECTED BY HIM)

Carnie " Greetings from xxxxx where the vodka is plentiful and the women are beautiful, until they turn 35 and some sort of switch flicks, blah blah blah scheduling, blah blah"

I was so M A D!! First of all he could have taken us on the road with him on an all expenses paid carnival tour, but didn't ask us to go. His response: "Uhhhh, I didn't think you'd want to go". Yeah cause I don't like hotels and restaurants, its just so taxing to not have to clean up or make meals.

So this was the kicker for me, I'm at home with 2 kids, they're loud, they're messy, he's eating at restaurants, sleeping through the night, eating freshly baked cookies, I bet the concierge fluffs his pillow for him!  PLUS he's drinking vodka and checking out all the ladies.

So I replied:
"THIS IS FROM YOUR WIFE
F Y I   Don't tell your wife she can check your email to look at the work schedule if it's going to include emails about you ogling women with your vodka goggles on. Glad to hear your enjoying the under 35 crowd. Less Than Impressed!!!!!"

I sent it to him and a few days later the carnie says to me " You know I think when you sent that to me you must have clicked reply all and also sent it to scheduling". (They thought it was so funny they forwarded it out to the entire office.)

Me (innocently)" Oh my I'm sorry about that"
True confession Number 2: I know how to send an email to a single user, I'm no dummy. I had to cut and paste that address in there. hahahahahaha. Now let that be lesson learned!

Dear Daddy

This morning I got up and woke up mama with a pat and a kiss. We're having cheerios and watching The Polar Express. The Christmas carols seem to make mama smile, she sings along, she's not very good but she tries, and I like the trains. I think one day I'd like to drive the train. Could you help me?

Yesterday I went on a date with my girlfriend K and I chased her with a stick and pushed her down to show her how much I love her. Then she had to go home and go to bed but I stayed and played a bit longer. Some new girls came, they had popsicles so I knew we were soul mates.  One of them had really curly hair and I gave her a hug and we chased each other up the slide, then I pushed her little sister down the slide to show her how much I love her. Shhh don't tell K.
Love you lots
Orange 1

Dear Daddy

Today I went on a date to the Y. I played with trains and another little curly haired boy. I jumped in a castle and got stuck in a tube. The little curly haired boy tried to help me out but mama had to come get me. I had a great time and then I came home and fell asleep in the middle of the floor while clutching my train. 2 is being good today, he liked watching me play, he got to lick some new toys and is now eating a book on tractors.
Love Orange 1

Today's post is brought to you by the letter F

F as in feeling, not as in bomb.

Last night we played another rousing game of musical beds. Piggy must be growing and is up every hour, Orange 1 is also having some trouble sleeping. We rotated from my bed, the nursing chair, O1's bed, back to my bed and so forth. But in the happy light of morning everyone is happy and frolicking, the coffee is hot and I'm grateful to have such happy little boys.

Lately when things are getting me down I have a rotating stream of words that give me a little sanity.

Kindness

Harmony

Peace

Love 

These are words that inspire me or I qualities I aspire to have. So today I say to you inspire and aspire. Try to inspire someone, your kids, a stranger, anyone  and aspire to do better. Do something wonderful with your kids, play ball in the park, go for a walk and watch the fall leaves change. It doesn't have to big big it just has to be meaningful to them. Share kindness, give something to charity, buy a cookie for someone on the street, put something in the food bank at the grocery store or share a smile with a stranger. Take it anyway you want but do something.

Today I will share kindness 

True Confessions

I'm thinking I'll try out something new, I'm calling it "True Confessions". Things you didn't know about me, probably don't need to know. I'll try to give a background story with them.

My brother-in law is getting married, so my soon to be sister in law is picking out wedding dresses (my favourite thing to do). I love wedding dress shopping, I love wedding planning, it's a once in a lifetime party. I would do it again in a heartbeat. I had the most beautiful wedding. We we're married by the ocean with 46 of our closest friends and family and I loved every minute of it. There was sand and ocean, a trio playing music, pristine white table cloths, white place settings and white covered chairs, sparkling clean glasses and tea lights glimmering along the path after dark. Everything I could have imagined. So here's my first confession:

I like to wear my veil around the house with my PJ's. I do it fairly frequently.

I have another one for later but I don't want to give away all my secrets so early in the day.

Dear Daddy

When you come home you'll find there have been some changes. Orange 1 is dating (it's K, he is in love), they hold hands and run in the park and I am starting college. I'm very smart and have decided to skip kindergarten and go straight to college. I've been embezzling funds from mama for a while now and I seem to be very good at it. My hostile takeover of the world has been temporarily put on hold to pursue these other interest. Mama is waiting patiently for you but is starting to look very old. Come home soon.
Love 2

Trivia and Giveaways

So if I can't be funny I can at least be fun. I was thinking about ways to increase audience participation (that's you), so I was thinking about doing a giveaway. No strings attached, just for fun. I'm going to put some more thought into it. I think something handmade, maybe by me, maybe by someone else. If you have something you'd like to feature here let me know, I'm totally into it. Stay tuned!


For today lets play trivia. I think something easy and girly to start. Can you name any of the bloopers from Pretty Woman? There's a bunch so if you watched it repetitively growing up, like me, this should be easy.

Isn't she lovely

Tulips

Next year I'd love to have a beautiful garden full full full of tulips. There's something so exciting to me about tulip blooms.

The travelling circus hits the road

My husband travels for work, a lot a lot. I don't really like to share personal details so for our purposes lets just say he's a carnie in the travelling circus. From now on I shall cease referring to him as "the felon" and now refer to him as "the carnie". More on this to follow. I just wanted you to know the change of names is now in effect.

What's that smell?

I just played a rousing game of "what's that smell" in the living room. I checked the baby, counted all the sippy cups to ensure I hadn't lost one in the mix (its happened), checked under all the furniture and nothing. Finally I returned to the baby and wonder of wonders it was the baby. How can something so small make such a stink?

Open or closed?

This morning I went in the bathroom hopped on the scale and much to my delight found I was at pre-preggo weight. So I announce excitedly to my husband "I'm at pre-preggo". His reply was a faint little breathless "what?". So I came out and said it again and the look of relief on his face was overwhelming. He said "All I heard was I'm and preggo, my whole face went numb". Maybe its best to open the door when saying some things.

Lets try something new

This is an experiment, this video is soooo funny. Wait for the end, I promise, it's worth it. (Perhaps not suitable for young viewers)

Sally OMally

Not so honest

So the truth is I may have left out part of the story yesterday. After the big guy and the little guy had their heart to heart about gravity and hollywood the big guy and I then had a thorough discussion about the actual value of gravity. I thought if he was going to teach the little guy these things he should at least be accurate and teach it to 3 decimal places. We then had a super geek conversation and debated how many decimal places you need, and what those numbers actually are, this ultimately ended in us googling. FYI its 9.80665.
We're both nerds as it turns out.

The hard bite of reality at the ripe age of 2

Background: Orange 1 is watching a movie Polar Express (I'm sick, it has trains, we all win), in it a star falls and an Elf jumps after it and saves it or something along those lines, I wasn't really paying attention.

I overhear this conversation: Husband " I just want you to know that what we just witnessed isn't actually possible and can only happen in movies unless you neglect the aspect of wind resistance, I just want you to know that this couldn't happen in real life and......acceleration due to gravity....9.8m/s(squared)....elf.. theoretical......"

Me "What!?"

Husband: "Whaaat? He should know" 

Please note Orange 1 is only 2

What is happening here?!?

Our basement flooded and I lost my little sewing room so for 3 months have been hoarding fabric. As some of you may know, I like pink. Pink shoes, pink sweaters, pink watches and especially pink fabric. Today I sat down in my brand new little room ready to go but apparently in all this time it never occurred to me to buy pink thread. You should have heard the not so gently stream of words that came out of my mouth. I was  so MAD!!!

A Break?

The big says " Go on an outing, I'll take the boys" but then proceeds to leave with both sets of keys. Super, just super!

These are the people in my neighborhood

There's nothing I love more than people watching. These are some of my favorite people in my neighbourhood:

Crazy house guy: Crazy house guy has this 3 story old wooden house buried in the middle of an upper middle class neighbourhood. You might not notice it at first as it's buried among trees, there's no lawn due to the crazy foliage and weirdness everywhere, (crazy house guy has a standard or slightly smaller than standard city lot and I am unsure how he got it so wild looking). The first time I saw it I thought it was a burnt down building, it took me about a month to realize that no thats just how it looks. He's always working on it out back but it never looks any different. Crazy house guy never has less than 9 giant bags of cat littler on his "porch" (not sure it really qualifies as porch but whatever), and his latest addition is an old toilet. I once found a woman staring at it in the back alley. She stopped me and asked "Have you seen this?" I smiled and said "Yes I have". She said "What is it?" I didn't really know how to answer that. I looked back when I got to the end of the block and she was still staring at it in wonder. I really like crazy house guy. I recently learned that crazy house guy is actually a mathematics professor, go figure.

Linen Guy: Linen guy is new to the neighbourhood. He wears khaki pants, a white linen shirt, straw sunhat and metal rimmed sunglasses EVERY TIME I see him. He is very clean, he walks about the neighbourhood at a rapid pace, never stops and NEVER speaks to anyone. I was disappointed when he ignored me when I said good morning one day but I've made my peace with it. I like to imagine that linen guy is a multimillionaire who is recently recovering from a crack/heroin/crystal meth addiction and he walks to keep himself straight.

7:17 am guy and the regular dog: When we first moved here this guy walked his dog and every morning at 7:17 am his dog crapped on my lawn. At first I was kinda grossed out but then he just became a regular part of my morning, he always picks it up so at least he's polite. He stopped a while back and I though perhaps he switched dog food but then I saw him with a foot brace on so I think he just wasn't making it over this far. I hope he comes back. I liked him.

The BMW ladies: These are the super rich ladies who live up the street. (Note: If you go up one block from our house its the ritzy neighbourhood of the city, if you go a couple blocks past that its the industrial crappy part of the city, I like to call it "eclectic" ). These ladies are not limited to but do include almost all BMW's, it's generally their car of choice. The BMW ladies have a certain social etiquette that one must learn. If they are walking get out of their way, if you are walking get out of their way and absolutely most importantly you may only speak to them when spoken to. They are not my favourite.

The F Bomb lady: I was crossing the street in my car and this lady was standing at the corner with her dog, she was late forties, well dressed, pretty golden type dog. I waited but she didn't go, I thought she was waiting for her dog to pee, so I crossed. I guess I had bad timing because half way across she decided she wanted to go but it was too late for me to stop. I gave her the "oh I'm so sorry" wave and in return she YELLED F#%& YOU!! at me. I was so shocked I kept going but then decided that was totally inappropriate so I drove back around the block and chatted with her. I politely explained that I was very sorry for not stopping but that in the end I felt her language was inappropriate as I had my kids in the car and there were about a dozen other kids on the street at the time. She didn't really like that. I was very calm and polite, she seemed to like that even less, she said a few more nice things to me, I thanked her and went on my way. I'm pretty sure she drives a BMW.

A bargain of a deal

Oh Satan and Satan's brother couldn't you peddle your wares another day? The mama is sick. I'm even willing to make a deal. If you cease the evil today you can be three times as evil tomorrow and I wont even be mad.

The chair that changes everything

Two children later I finally decided that it was time to get a chair that is comfortable. For all of the first and most of the second I've been sitting in my beautiful wooden rocking chair. I love it, its so beautiful, but only to look at, sitting in it is a different story. Every night I struggle with a squirming baby trying not to drop him off one side or shmuck his head off the other and forcing myself to stay awake so that he doesn't slide out the side. 2 Weeks ago I finally ordered a new chair and yesterday it came!!! My husband let me get it as a 2 month early birthday present. (How nice is he?!) It is so beautiful. The mini peeps and I all have colds which as many of you know means minimal sleeping. Last night I curled up with piggy and a warm blanket in my new beautiful chair and for 2 hours in the middle of thenight had a lovely sleeping cuddle nap. Its a whole new world all thanks to a chair.

Note: Dear Urban Barn,

If you would like to give me another chair or even the entire set I would happily take

those off your hands and will give them a wonderful home and speak lovingly of them as well.

xo Katie

A Change of Season

The changing months always have a profound affect on me and none more than September. I still have that little kid part of me that marks years according the start and stop of school. The first of September has far more significance for me than that of New Years. The beginning of September has a feeling of excitement yet sadness. It's saying goodbye to the hot lazy days of summer, swimming pools and spaghetti straps and in turn donning closed toe shoes, vests and thinking of mittens to come. It always leaves me with a little sense of sadness and nostalgic memories of childhood. Goodbye summer, I have loved you but move on to joyful thoughts of sharpened pencils, autumn leaves and trick or treaters.

What would I do without this guy?

Husband "Have you noticed my recent addition to the kitchen?" (Mischievous grin here)

Me "No"

Nothing appears different

Me "Will I notice it"

Husband " Oh you'll notice!"

Husband " Guess what happens when you press that button?"