4 things that make the newborn stage easier

1. Breastfeeding: I know not everyone wants to, or is able to, but I love nursing for the bonding, convenience, and health benefits it affords. I'll nurse G in the carrier, on the couch, out in public, anytime he wants. Nothing to pack for going out, or sterilize when we're home. I've never worried about over- or under-feeding, and G is gaining weight like a champion.

2. Co-sleeping: we did this with D after fruitless attempts to have her sleep in her crib early on. M disliked cuddling, and showed a clear preference for her crib. I'm very glad that G is comfy in bed with us, because that means a much more restful night for everyone. I barely have to wake to nurse him, and we both fall back asleep immediately. This way, unless he needs a burp, he doesn't cry much in the night at all. He's also happy to sleep almost anywhere during the day, whether it's on the couch, in the swing, or in someone's arms.

3. Having a great support network: this has been absolutely indispensable. For the past month, the girls have spent about every weekend at my parents' house (in anticipation of labour, and immediately thereafter). My mom has been over almost every day since G was born, mostly to take the girls out to play in the morning, rain or shine. She looks after them whenever G has an appointment, and encourages me to stay out as long as I like. She'll read to them, colour with them, remind M to go to the bathroom/clean up accidents, and when she's here in the evenings (often with my dad), she gives them baths and does their bedtime routine. In the first couple of weeks, she made or bought dinner for us. It's made a world of difference, allowing me to settle in to our new life gradually, bond with G, get breastfeeding established, and take care of our home. We are also blessed with wonderful friends and neighbours who bring us meals and have play dates with the girls.

4. Nursing tank tops: we didn't have Target here last time I had a newborn, and I've never had a tiny baby in the summer anyway, so I hadn't yet encountered nursing tank tops. They had them at maternity stores and other purveyors of all things baby, but they were so expensive that I didn't really care to try any out. I had my nursing bras, and with those, any top can be a nursing top. My sister has used the Target nursing tanks almost exclusively, and she loves them and they're only 20$, so I bought a few to try, and now I have six and they're all I wear, lined with nursing pads. Even with the recent cold weather, I'm still hot most of the time, given how often I'm nursing/cuddling G.

As his sisters like to say, "isn't he the cutest thing?"

This kid gained a pound in a week, mostly in the cheeks, I believe

Welcome, Sesame!

My boy; am I ever thankful for gender-neutral clothes!

The "Welcome to the Flock" hat and sweater set I was able to knit for him

And we have a son! Gavin Ferguson was born almost two weeks ago now, and he was my tiniest baby at 9 lbs 5 oz. Labour was relatively short, maybe four hours altogether, but as painful as ever. He was what they call "direct OP", meaning he was head down but facing the wrong way, which meant back labour for me. When it was time to push, he came out so quickly that no one caught him and he just landed on the bed, poor thing! He was none the worse for wear, though. Present at Gavin's birth were Hubby, my friend Sarah, my sister Hannah, my mom (!), and our three midwives, and everyone was wonderfully helpful, encouraging, and supportive.

Gavin and his enormous cousin, on a gorgeous blanket the ladies from knit night put together for me

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.