Nesting 3.0

The kinds of things one does when overdue by more than a week, regardless of 30 degree heat:

-remove oneself from the public eye by having an awesome friend drive one's eldest child to and from Vacation Bible Camp (thanks, Jen!)
-mend a younger daughter's favourite dress
-vacuum up the sandy evidence of playground outings
-wash the front porch windows and sweep the porch in anticipation of eventual visitors; consider and reject cleaning the front door 
-scrub sinks and toilets, particularly after a potty training #2 accident... gross
-dust the ceiling(?!)
-attempt to keep up with the laundry
-attempt to keep the house tidy
-jump at anything that could be a contraction
-gear up for further appointments and ultrasounds
-knit
-remind oneself that this was to be expected, and that's it's just an extended period of calm before the storm

Garage sale mission accomplished

Our kitchen chairs have been unsightly ever since we first strapped a booster seat to one of them, about four years ago. Up until then, they had served us well, and we've had them for almost nine years now. They were the cheapest ones we could find at Ikea, and not well-finished, and they got unbelievably sticky and dirty over time. On a couple of occasions, Hubby or I took steel wool to them in an attempt to clean them up a bit, but that would last all of two or three days. Then one of them broke a few weeks ago, and as it coincided with the start of garage sale season, I determined it was time to replace them. I was prepared to be on the lookout all summer.

This picture does not adequately convey the grossness

Happily, it didn't take quite that long. This past Saturday was my second morning of solo garage saling, and after a fruitless morning, I happened upon these beauties. The price was right: 20$ for a set of four.

Now that is a properly finished chair!

On Kijiji and at most other garage sales, people want to sell you a kitchen table and chairs as a set, and I don't blame them. But I love our kitchen table, and I'm not in the market for a new one. Also, good solid wood chairs tend to be expensive, so I am quite pleased with these. I do wish there were six chairs instead of four, but we really only need four at the moment (we can keep one of the rubbish chairs for the booster seat, or use the old wooden high chair). I gave them a good scrub today, so that any food stains I find from here on in will be guaranteed to be ours. All they need now are new felt pads, as the old ones were falling off and gross-looking. Reactions from the fam: Hubby was pleased, D was disappointed that they don't match the table, and M thought we stole them from Grandma and Grandpa's house.

Potty training 2.0

The timing on this couldn't be helped. After the horrible, drawn-out process of potty training D, I always said I'd start with M when she asked me in her own words, and here we are, weeks away from my due date, and she's interested. It's going okay so far. We were up at the cottage on the weekend, and I brought along a potty because the other alternatives are a composting toilet or an outhouse, neither of which I wanted her using on her own. At home she's been using the toilet along with a step-stool to help her get up, so having something more at her level was a delight. She did pretty well, using the potty successfully two or three times each day. Poor D had more pee accidents than her sister! Most of the time M was in a bathing suit with a swim diaper, and the rest of the time she was in a disposable diaper.

Her cottage uniform: a swimsuit and a smile

Now that we're back home, it's either cloth diapers or underwear. Up until the past few days, anytime M had undies on, she would wet them without telling me. If she had a bare bum, she would remember to run to the bathroom. Yesterday we had the first big success: dry undies all morning! Today she's had two accidents, but both were in the kitchen, so it was easy to clean up. I'm finding it much less frustrating now that we have hardwood floors on the main level. I'm also trying to be more relaxed about accidents, but consistent about wearing undies (now that it's summer and we're around the house more). We are also not providing stickers or candy for successful toilet use this time, although we do sing her a little song to say good job. (If you're interested, it's "Good job Maevey/good job Maevey/good job Maevey/you've done a very good job" to the tune of Good Night Ladies. Super creative, I know.)

Winding down for summer

It's hard to believe that it's still technically the spring. Most people are probably gearing up for summer and planning vacations and such, but it's a little different around here. We've had quite a few weekends away in the late spring (Toronto, Windsor, the cottage, camping), and I've probably got about one more in me before I need to start staying close to home. I'm trying to be careful not to promise the girls anything about trips to the park or splash pad, because we don't know what life will be like once there's a newborn in the mix.

It's equally surprising to me that D's first year of school is drawing to a close. It seemed to go by really quickly, even with the long, drawn-out winter and many days of trudging to and from the bus stop. I'm amazed at how much she's learned this year; at Christmas, I was helping her write cards to her teachers with connect-the-dots, and by Valentine's Day, she could write each of her classmates' names! Her numbers are coming along, and counting and all that. I'm probably most excited about her increased use of French; that's something I was never able to enforce, but she is so pleased to be able to communicate, even minimally, in another language. She's quite looking forward to attending play group again in the summer (again, no promises post-baby!).

Most of all, I've been pleasantly surprised by how fast this pregnancy has sped by, despite how inappropriately early I found out about Sesame. Of course, by this point, I'm getting rather uncomfortable, but I'm trying to relax and enjoy the last few weeks of having two kids on the outside, as it were. As we settle into summer, I'm very excited to meet this new little person and savour what will likely be my last newborn. Consequently, I've got some knitting to finish up, because who knows where I'll find the time once we've got three little ones under the age of 4!

Dress for thing 1, finished in May

Dress for thing 2, finished in June

Some of my favourite people

Stains begone!

M wore her current favourite dress to play group today, and in the thirty seconds that it took me to sign us in, she had managed to get blue paint on it. Just after spinning around and proudly announcing to Madame Cathy that her papa got her the dress for Christmas. D's had a few instances of getting paint on her clothes, usually just t-shirts, and I've never been able to get it out. M probably wouldn't care if her pink dress kept its new blue abstract design (the orange is from her mac and cheese lunch), but I wanted to see if I could make it look as good as new.

After a brief search, I decided to try out simple household items as stain removers, and if necessary I'd move on to some kind of bleach. My search results turned up encouraging phrases like "since tempera paints are dye-based, stains are notoriously difficult to remove", and brand names like Tide, Oxy-clean, and Shout, so I didn't have high hopes for my first efforts. I'm not the best at removing stains, and my general policy is to throw it in the wash right away and hang it in the sun to dry. This works well enough, and the girls aren't too bothered by the odd mark.

 I filled the sink with cold water and a generous splash of vinegar, then wet the stain with a bit of plain water and rubbed some baking soda in, making a paste. Into the sink it went, and it soaked there for an hour or two. I went in to check on it and was delighted to see this:

The paint actually came off! And with minimal effort.

In these years of having small children, I suspect there will be an ongoing theme of stain removal from clothing and other fabrics. I've been experimenting with this ever since I learned that bananas, avocados, cherries, and sweet potato can cause irreversible damage to cherished outfits. And in the event that I can't remove a given stain from an article of clothing, I'll have to learn not to get attached to material things, no pun intended. For today, I count this a small victory and one more idea to add to my bag of tricks.

Inclement weather two-in-one activity

How disappointed we were with the weather today! Cold, gray, threatening to rain. Even yesterday was a bit cold for the park, although we went anyway. Today, that was not an option. Hubby did have to work, but not until late in the morning, so I had a long, lovely bath before my day really got started. He got the girls a fancy breakfast of crepes, which they top only with granulated sugar. Weirdos.

I had just over an hour til lunch, so I set the girls up with two of their favourite activities, which go rather nicely together. First, painting:

 I dole out a small amount of paint (keeping dark colours minimal for M; as you can see, she goes straight to mixing), and give them giant colouring pages or white paper, sponges and paintbrushes, smocks. This will keep them happy for up to half an hour, depending on how many papers they get.

While they are painting, I clear the countertop areas around the sink, and fill each sink with warm soapy water. When the girls finish, we pop all the sponges and paintbrushes (and plates, if I don't use paper ones) in the sink, along with some measuring cups and spoons. If I have enough presence of mind, I put a big towel on the floor under their chairs, and hang a dishtowel on the back of one chair. This will occupy them for quite a length of time, and takes care of the worst of the clean-up.

Whether it's super hot or cool and rainy this summer following Sesame's arrival, this is likely a combination of activities I'll use often. I could see it working best for times when I need to sit and nurse, and the girls need something to keep them from going stir-crazy. Poor kids, there probably won't be as many park outings as they'd like. We'll do what we can.

So simple, a child can do it!

I've been thinking about the kinds of life-changing events that are based on choices we make, and how different those events can look. Take a marriage, for instance; typically, you take several months (or weeks, or years, depending on the engagement) ironing out the details of the wedding day, choosing what you're going to wear, how you're going to celebrate, etc. After the wedding, there is so much to get used to: moving in and setting up a house or apartment, living with this new spouse, figuring out how to mesh what each of you considers normal, deciding who will take on what responsibilities, and so on. For a baby, planned or not, it's quite different. You get as prepared as you can, but unless you're having a C-section, you don't actually know the day your child will arrive. And afterwards, it's even more of an adjustment than marriage, because you are entirely responsible for a tiny helpless creature, and if you're the one who gave birth to it, your body is also recovering.

Our darling girl D made a life-changing decision last night. It's something we've been praying for ever since she was born. Unlike a wedding or a birth, there aren't any material gifts that come along with it, but the intangible reward is eternal. On her own, she asked how she could put her trust in Jesus. I talked with her about it, to make sure she understood what she was doing. She knows that she is a sinner, and that her wrong actions, words, attitudes, separate her from God who is so holy that he can't be around sin. She understands that God's people used to sacrifice animals to say sorry for their sins, but that Jesus was the perfect and final sacrifice, because he came and lived a perfect, sinless life and died a sacrificial death to pay the penalty for our sins. And now, anyone who believes that he died and rose again, can live to please God on earth, and go to heaven when they die. So it was that last night, she prayed and asked Jesus to be her Saviour.

Hubby and I are overjoyed that she has made this decision at such a young age. Appropriately, it was on Palm Sunday, when the crowds shouted Hosanna (save us now) to Jesus as he entered Jerusalem for the Passover. It was also a child dedication Sunday at church, when families present their children and the church pledges with them to bring them up in the knowledge of the Lord, praying that they will accept Christ as soon as they are able to understand. D's own dedication was almost exactly four years ago. Praise God for providing salvation for sinners, and for making it simple enough for a child to grasp!

D's dedication day, May 2010