Finishing up August

I took these pictures all at the end of August...

Rebecca loves to hold ("hug") Elias :)

Doesn't his expression look like he's a little concerned?? :)

Yep... definitely concerned!

I thought this looked cute with them both sound asleep facing the same direction.

Apparently Uh-Oh likes to look over the fence with an unobstructed view, so he goes walking over the roof of our shed! Justin noticed him there one morning, so we took a picture.

It's been a challenge to keep things tidy, let alone clean the house, since Elias was born. Rebecca is into everything, and thinks she's "helping" even though she's often NOT helping at ALL. So, one day I pulled out a sheet of snowman stickers and a piece of paper, sat her on a chair in the living room, and cleaned the rest of the room while she sat and did her stickers... and then stuck the stickers all over herself as well. :)

Justin was amused to find that when Elias spat his pacifier out, he had turned his head in such a way that the loop on the pacifier looked like a monocle... Justin called it a pacicle instead. :)

Pommes de Terre

Yup, that's right, apples... of the ground. A.k.a., potatoes! Rebecca has taken to removing potatoes from my little bag of highly treasured white fleshed vegetables (a rare treat because of Justin's allergy to them!), and eating them as if they were apples! She takes little bites out of them all over, and thankfully just basically takes the peeling off, because I want my potatoes! It's meaning I'm having to cook them more often, but I suppose since I've had them for 2 weeks already, I probably should be using them up sometime soon so they don't go mushy. I mentioned to my dad this evening that she was eating the potatoes like they were apples, and he told me they were great... with salt! Now I know where she gets it!!! He even went so far as to tell me that it's even better to cut them into chips (fries) and salt them, and then they're raw potato sticks!

The above picture is Rebecca's solution to the extra pair of shoes in our house! Justin was showing her how to put the shoes back on the shoe rack, and about 5 mins later he walked out to find her carefully balancing my crocs on the backs of his crocs! :-) She loves to take the shoes off and put them back on the rack now! She also loves to help me put things into containers... so she actually helped me put her toys away this evening, and pick up her bath toys... and she likes to shelve her books! If only she would actually leave them on the shelf when she was done with them, I would have about 1/2 the work! :-)

Rebecca showing me her very dirty finger!

Our neighbour realized just a few days ago just how much bigger than Rebecca her little one is (said neighbour's child is in the picture in the below post), and gave us a very large quantity of clothing. I'm pretty sure it would have filled two trash bags, seeing as it had one nearly overflowing, and then it was overflowing from a large box as well. Justin and I sorted through it, and got rid of about 50% of it already, and then some of it is kind of "wait on it" type decisions, and others are ones we just LOVE... and the sizes go from newborn all the way up to 2T! So... while it sounds like we were just given a lot of clothing for her to wear right now, we weren't, actually. Unfortunately, while a lot of it is gorgeous (and is really great brand names like Carter's), it's also a lot of summer weight stuff. If we happen to have a girl that needs summer clothing in the 6-12m range, we're VERY well equipped! But, with Rebecca I'm having to put stockings and sweaters on along with the adorable clothing. Oh well... who can complain about free clothing?? Especially when there are actually outfits that fit her, right? :-)

Trying to share a leaf with me!

Also with the clothing came a few pairs of shoes in Rebecca's size (our neighbour was thrilled that she fits a size or two smaller than her daughter, lol), and so now Rebecca seems to have two favourite pairs of shoes. One of her favourites is still the pink pair my mum and sister sent down for her, and the other is this little pair of silver and pink "Nikes". She was actually trying to get Justin to put them on her feet this morning as he was getting ready to go to his allergy appointment! However despite the fact that he did bring the two of us along with him, he failed to put any shoes on her feet! And then, the lady who gives Justin his allergy shots noticed she didn't have shoes on her feet and got excited about the size, because we commented it was hard to find people giving away the size 3 shoes, and said she had stuff she was going to bring for Rebecca (including various shoes and sweaters and outfits) as well, lol! I feel almost like I'm running a "free clothing shop", with how much clothing I bring in and send out my doors! Thankfully freecycle works well... when the people don't decide to be "no-shows"!

This afternoon I took Rebecca out to play in our lovely wet grass and muddy lawn and flower bed... and she had a blast. I'm sure her tummy has mud in it, because I didn't realize she was chomping down on clumps of dirt!! Anyway, she had a great time collecting white rocks and tossing them into the little puddle at the end of the driveway, and trying to see just how close she could get to the water in the ditch. :-) And, she ended up completely covered in mud because she went digging through my flower bed, while sitting on top of the dirt! She had a great time though, so I'm not complaining... until the stains won't come out!

Speaking of stains that won't come out, does anyone have ideas for how to get stains from an apple out of a top? For whatever reason, Rebecca and apples almost always end up meaning that there are little brown stains on her shirts wherever the juice touches, and I can't get it out. I've tried soaking it in OxyClean, a paste of OxyClean, Shout, and if it wasn't involving a nice orange colour, I would be tempted to try bleach... Currently I'm rather tempted to try out that new "Clorox2 Free" stuff they have out, since it's supposed to bleach stains but leave the colours alone...


Anyway, there's a little bit of what's going on around here. :-)

While Rebecca Plays

Currently, Rebecca is taking books off her little shelf... and picking them up and putting them back... incorrectly! I guess, at least she's putting them back!

I spent the morning yesterday getting out the next size of clothing for Rebecca. It's very odd... there's not a huge difference in the size of the sleepers (just a little more length in the legs), but the clothing is actually very large on her! She's starting to fill out some of the clothing in the 3-6m size range (though most still fits her well), so we decided we would get out the next stuff so it can be put to use as well. :-)

Justin has decided to keep a tiny tree frog as a pet... I'm not sure I like this idea yet. I may ask him to get rid of it. Nothing wrong with the creature, I just don't see us as having anywhere really to keep the thing, and it's existence seems a little boring in a container that is about a 1/2 gallon size, I think!

This afternoon we have knitting group, which Rebecca really enjoys. Of course, when it's a room full of grandmothers (aside from your own mother) how could you help but enjoy yourself?! They spoil her rotten, one day a week, hehe. :-) They even bring little toys, clothing, and books, for her on occasion! She spends the couple of hours chatting with them all, sitting on laps, and entertaining everyone, especially now that she is extremely mobile, because you never know where she's going to pop up next! :-)

And, last of all, I picked up a book I heard about from the library yesterday. (Oh, and Rebecca walked, holding my finger, from the car to the library, through the library, and all the way back to the car... you wouldn't believe the stares a kid that small gets when they walk, hehe!!) The book is called "The No-Cry Sleep Solution", and I have to say, it was quite reassuring! Now, it affirmed my suspicion, that Rebecca is definitely lacking in the sleep department. it said that a baby the age on the chart they give should at least come close to the number of hours given, and if they're not the baby is probably chronically over tired, which is why they don't generally tired! I'd been thinking for a while that she had to be lacking, and this book confirmed it for me-- she's about 3 hours off from their low end of the average sleep needs of a baby her age! So... I'm aiming for the "minimum" number of hours right now. We actually accomplished the night time sleep, for the most part, last night, so we'll see about day time sleep today! It also told me that all these people who tell me that by 9/10 months my baby needs to be sleeping through the night every night(!!), so I must be doing something wrong, are actually incorrect! According to the book, first of all, many babies actually need a mid-sleep feeding, even all the way up to two years old! WOW! It also said that 1-2 night time wakings, one of which requires a feeding, and one of which simply requires comfort in some other way, is perfectly normal for a baby up to age 2 (and sometimes beyond... and then it said that even a lot of parents of 2 year olds are up every night at least once with the child because they need something or other! The book states that a "through the night sleep" is actually about 5 hours... even though people try to tell you that it is 8-12! Apparently it is a social construction that babies should sleep for 8-12 hours straight, not a biological fact. I feel so much better knowing that!

So... we're working on a bedtime routine... again. I know, I'm always working on one, lol. But, it worked last night, so we're going to try it again. Rebecca is lacking about 3 hours of night time sleep, and 1 of day time sleep. I'm not going to worry about the day time sleep, we're working on the night time sleep. So, the way to increase the sleep at night, is to make her go to bed earlier. We've been working to move her bed time back for a couple of weeks now, and my goal is to eventually have her in bed between 7 and 7:30 pm. Right now the goal is 8... which we made, and she was quieter settling down than she has been in ages, but the book says that when you find the "right" time, the baby will generally be very peaceful lying down to sleep... so I think perhaps 7:30 is the "key" time for her. We'll get there eventually.

The routine that seemed to work really well last night was this:
6:30 supper
7:00 walk
7:30 run bath
7:35 read story (which she sat still for, amazingly!)
7:40 bath
7:45 massage
7:50 nurse
8:05 bed (she quit nursing and was trying to play so I put her in bed)

Eventually, I want to have supper at 6, and basically shift everything 1/2 an hour earlier, and see how it goes, but they say in the book to go by 15 min increments every 2-3 days, so I guess next week she'll be going down (most nights) at 7:30. We have two nights a week that we are going to be out past that time... which is why I really want to have her going down at 8, but I guess she really needs somewhere in the 7:30-8 range, so we'll have to work around that.

This and That

Okay, so I was thinking, I haven't said much about what is happening in Justin's and my lives lately... I keep talking about Rebecca! So, I'm going to try to give some information about what's happening with Justin and me... as well as Rebecca. Sorry, you can't read a blog entry from me that doesn't include Rebecca... just think, when we have two or more children, the entries will be lengthened accordingly! Maybe you'll eventually have to set aside 15 minutes or more to read an entry!

So... Justin first.

Justin has been working on a number of programs that I had no idea he was working on, but he was apparently working on them for things he thought would be helpful at Canon. It turns out, not only are they helpful, but when he sent them to their tech team, the leader of the team proceeded to send them out to each supervisor with the instructions to have each team member under them load it onto their computer so they would be able to make use of it! Justin also got an email thanking him for taking initiative, being creative, and doing something that helps Canon stay in their highly competitive position with other companies. :-) He also has made what is called "A-Player" for a consecutive 6+ months, and for making it the 6 months he gets a monetary bonus, plus he gets taken out to dinner by his company! Very exciting... especially the extra bit of money, lol. :-) Too bad it isn't going to also mean an increase in wages. I don't know if I mentioned it, but Canon had to give everyone a pay cut a couple of months ago. Thankfully, Justin had just been given a raise of 6.5%, and the cut was 5% in his tier level, so he actually ended up still making more than he was, but most people did not get that much of a raise if they even got one, and the higher tiers lost 15%, 25%, 35%, and 50%! Kinda makes one thankful to be at the bottom of the pyramid!

Justin has also been looking at other job possibilities. He's somewhat qualified to take a position as a Linux systems administrator, because places will hire on experience and knowledge rather than requiring a piece of paper for that one. He's got plenty of both (it's his favourite hobby!), and we discovered that jobs with Linux range in pay from double what he earns up to 4x the amount! Whoa!! He applied for at least one position, though he never heard back, so I guess that was probably a no go. However, there are many that come up in the area on a regular basis... so while we are quite happy with Canon and their benefits and such, we are also keeping our eyes and ears open for positions that would get us similar (or better!) benefits, and a MUCH better pay range! Another thing we would like is a 40ish hour work week somewhere closer to where we live, so the commute doesn't add an extra 1.5-2 hours each day! However, as a systems admin, he would also be on call through the night and on weekends, which would be a real pain, but hey, when overtime will get you at least time and a half around here, if not more... it's not too bad! I told him that I wouldn't want him working Sunday mornings though, and if he got a job that called him in on a Sunday they would have to wait for him until at least afternoon, if not evening. Hey, we only get so many family days! :-)

Me... well...

I'm teaching piano to my niece and nephew starting this Saturday, and trying to recruit more students. We'll see, perhaps this year it will only be the two of them, but maybe next year I'll find more!

I finally seem to have conquered the mildew staining issue we've been having, though it did result in a bit of lightening in some places on some of the garments. At least they're usable again!! We also thoroughly cleaned the washer. I took the soap dispenser apart, washed it, washed inside that area, and we poured 4 cups of bleach into the washer, ran an empty hot load, and then poured in a gallon of vinegar and ran another empty hot load! It was rather cheap, I guess, when you think about it, but the instructions I found for keeping mould out of a washing machine say that you should do that every 3-4 months, and every 6-8 weeks you should run an empty hot vinegar load. I guess a gallon of vinegar at about $2.50 every couple of months is worth it if we're going to get consistently clean clothing out of it! The clothing and diapers are coming so much cleaner since I got that done, it's been nice!

I've been really working hard at getting the house organized, because I don't want to child proof, per se (it's pretty much impossible to do in our house) but I would like *most* things that are within Rebecca's reach to be at least somewhat safe for her to get at. All I have left is my dining room table, and kitchen counter... and then my horrible mudroom/bathroom area, which will always be last on my agenda, hehe! I'm currently trying to figure out a storrage solution for all our tupperware/gladware/other containers! I'm starting to think one of those plastic tote containers under the sink might do the trick... just have to get Justin to clean out all his mouse traps so I can do it! Maybe one of the plastic drawers would be a better idea. Regardless, I think it's a potential solution. I also need to come up with some organizational strategies for our purchased cupboard, because the top shelf, wonderful as it is, needs to be split in half, and each of those spaces need to be split in half again. So, I'm thinking a wire rack organizer, and a set or two of plastic drawers might do the trick in there as well. If only those things weren't going to cost money, I'd be all set! :-)

I guess, finally, on my part, I made a new header for our blog (in case you didn't notice!). Seeing as it is rather oriented around the past year of our lives, I'll probably have to make a new one next year! I guess that's incentive to take lots of good pictures over the next year as well. :-)

Rebecca is walking somewhat well now, but is still preferring to crawl to get places. She looks at what she wants, crawls close to the place, stands up, and walks the last 3-5 steps to get close to the item!

She is not sleeping overly well through the night, though we are really working to teach her to sleep through the night at least somewhat. We're back to 1-2 wakings in a night (normally just one with a very early waking), which is so much better than it was most of the summer! She does not, however, believe that I need more sleep than I get. Often times she is up from 7:30am until 10:30 or 11pm, with maybe a 1 hour nap once or twice in the day. She actually just finished napping on me (I was holding her and typing this post at the same time), and now she's sitting beside me on the floor insisting that the frog in the picture book says "sss" even though I keep telling her it says "ribbit" not "ssss"! We're not doing so well on animal sounds, as you may have guessed, LOL!

Our big thing right now, is teaching her not to leave the house without an adult. We're trying to establish that she may not put her hand on the door except to look out. Both our screen doors do not latch properly, and with the cooler weather, we like having the breezes that come through all the screens. She makes it very difficult to get anything done, however, because every time I get occupied doing something, she heads for the nearest door (usually the back door)! So, I've been setting up training sessions for the past couple of days, in the hopes she will clue in... eventually! Any ideas on how to teach a baby not to cross the threshold of a door to the outdoors would be very appreciated!

Oh, yes, and my victory celebration of last night... we got home from sign language class and choir practise, and she was fussing at me for who knew what reason, and suddenly she just quieted right down, looked sweetly at me, and signed "milk" very clearly! She actually has been using the sign on occasion for the last couple of weeks, but it was more something we had to guess at than something she clearly knew what she was saying! She's also started telling us "finished" when she's done eating! If only we could convince her to just tell us, and not tell us and then put all the food on the floor!! :-)

First Half or so of August

So, as I mentioned, I have a couple of dozen pictures to get up here. These ones feature some of the many adventures (or misadventures?!) of Rebecca.

Rebecca has taken a real interest in our bathroom. She follows us into it, watches us use the toilet (if applicable), and then she likes to try to flush the toilet after we've done so... thankfully our toilet takes a little more effort than some!

She also has a particular interest in the toilet paper. Now that is one major cleanup job when we don't realize where she is and what she's doing! She pulls pieces off, shreds them, and keeps going. Sometimes she just pulls lengths off, and leaves them on the floor, and it just a lot of work picking it all up and figuring out what is and isn't salvageable!

Rebecca's had a lot of new foods, including watermelon, as seen in these two pictures, and broccoli, which is in a picture below. She's now had Cheerios, so she's been introduced to wheat successfully as well, but she had a pretty bad reaction to cantaloupe of all things! She got a funny purplish red rash under her skin that was little lines of some sort, and she didn't nurse well for the next 24 or so hours, which Mum suggested may have been because there were potentially sores in her mouth or throat. Further research indicated that there are often cross reactions between mango and cantaloupe (they're both part of a pollen family), and seeing as we know she spits up everything for about 24 hours after eating mango, it could explain the cantaloupe thing!


Rebecca is becoming more of a copycat every day. She likes to "help" sort laundry for me... unfortunately, that currently means that it's normally clean (or already sorted) laundry that she "sorts" for me, but I figure if she's starting now, she'll eventually do it right.

When she sorts her diapers, she actually (generally) puts diapers on one side, and the wash cloths on the other side of her! So she really is sorting, just not the way I need them to be!



Rebecca watches as Daddy leaves every morning, normally standing at the door like the above picture shows.

When she sees his truck is gone, she says a string of words that ends with "dadada!" and then she leaves the door! I'm interested in knowing exactly what she thinks she's saying about Daddy!

I got a copy of The Toddler's Busy Book from the library, because I'm running out of ideas about how to keep Rebecca busy, even for five or ten minutes. She's beyond every "age appropriate" activity suggested in Dr. Sears The Baby Book, and every suggestion I've found online as well. So, I thought if she's beyond those, perhaps she's functioning more in the range of that book, and lo and behold, it worked! Now, admittedly, a lot of the ideas are just things you could come up with if you looked at what you had and what your child was potentially able to do with things, but for a quick "what do I do with her now?!" thing, it's great, because you don't have to think! So, anyway, one of the ideas was to give the child a dish of water, and some utensils to play with. I think it actually suggested that it happen at the table, but Rebecca isn't sturdy enough to play with this stuff at the table yet, so I sat her on the floor, and she had a great time! Even better... she stopped playing in the dog's dish! LOL!



When Daddy is on his way home, Rebecca likes to spend the time talking to him. I'm not actually sure if she's talking to him or just having fun with my phone though!


She just loves the fact my phone lights up, which is why I'm not sure she's actually talking to Justin!

We were given a pair of guinea pigs, as I mentioned in my last post. They were given with the promise of "food for life"... they're kind of timid, but their babies are a lot easier to hold on to! Maybe the babies will be more personable when they're older as well. In the mean time, we're thinking we need to figure out where to get a bigger cage, because that thing is only 4sq. ft, and they need at least double that! I did find plans for how to build one, so I think that's what we'll end up doing.

And, Rebecca discovered this little white box that is in her hand... it has a level in it! She just LOVES to play with the thing. Not sure why, seeing as there's not much to see, but I guess if she enjoys it, I won't argue! :-)

I'm still around

I decided to get myself organized, and clean my house from end to end (not top to bottom, because I'm not in the mood to climb into a 120+ degree attic right now, lol). So, I've spent the last week getting many things organized. I may have to make another trip to the dollar store, to get more containers to organize into (they had some wonderful cloth fold-up baskets there!).

Anyway, I got Rebecca's toys all sorted into three containers and put onto a shelf of a book case we picked up from the trash. The thing was missing one shelf, but that's perfect, because the bottom shelf holds all her toys in their baskets perfectly, and then the top shelf will have a purpose in about 6-9 months beyond just holding books/toys. Of course, I'm guessing that we're going to end up with more books and toys in a few months for her birthday and Christmas, so maybe that shelf won't serve the purpose I'm planning for it! The three baskets of toys were because I wanted to be able to limit the number of toys she has to play with so she doesn't get bored with all of them at once. So right now we're on basket number one, which has a book of pictures, a rattle thing, her drum and drumstick, the ONLY battery operated little toy we have (a butterfly), and a pull 'n' play musical dog thing. We also have a ball wandering around the house at the moment, which will be shelved along with those five items. The next basket has cloth blocks, plastic links, and a few other things, and we'll get her Fisher Price books back out with those. The final basket has a cloth book, a rattle bear thingy, a few other things, and we'll get the alphabet blocks out again with that one. It's really helped to cut down on the amount of mess she is able to make, and she plays with one item much longer than she was when they were all available to her!

Rebecca has recently started doing a lot more standing on her own. I was actually sitting on the floor with her a couple of days ago, and she stood up holding on to me, and then all of a sudden I realized she'd let go and was still standing there beside me! What a proud look she had on her face! She got all excited when I got excited though, and sat down since she lost her balance, lol. :-) She's done it at least a few times since then as well, so I'm just waiting for her to figure out how to take that first step. She doesn't like to walk holding on to anyone's hands, so I suspect she's going to be a rather independent little one. She prefers to be held or carried if you're going to touch her, but if she's going places she's constantly on her feet, stretching "just one more inch" to reach that next sturdy piece of furniture.

We have thus far gotten two pumpkins off our pumpkin plant that decided to grow out of the compost. The vine is nearly half the length of our fence and is still growing and flowering!! There is at least one more pumpkin almost ready to come off it, and I don't know if there are going to be anymore, as Justin and I haven't checked recently! I'll have to make a pumpkin pie... or maybe just mash the pumpkin and we'll eat it like squash. :-) Rebecca's been thoroughly enjoying a large variety of new foods in the last few weeks, her favourites being watermelon and cucumber. I normally don't peel food for her, but I think the cucumber skins are just a little too thick and stiff for her to do much with. Anyway, she's also tried broccoli (which she loves, so long as it is whole, not mashed up!), chicken, oatmeal, and peaches. I have still yet to find something she really will not eat, though she wasn't too thrilled by the idea of actually eating green beans... she seemed to think they were more interesting to squeeze and make the little beans pop out of the pods!

We've been having a lot of thunderstorms here lately, Justin says it's approximately every other day (though it's a lot more often than that this week) we've been having them! We lost power to one last week for about 1/2 an hour in all... and I'm currently listening to the rain and thunder of another one. *sigh* It wouldn't be so bad if the storms would just kind of skirt around us, so all we got was the thunder and rain, but most times it's right over top of us, and going out in that is not particularly safe at all. Of course, I suppose I should find Rebecca a rain suit of some sort before taking her out in the rain as well, but I figure we have enough clothing that we can always change her when we get back home! :-)

And, I believe that's about all that's happening. It's been a rather quiet couple of weeks. :-)

Around the House

Poor Cinders can hardly get any peace or rest with Rebecca around now. If she's in her kennel, Rebecca will often follow her there, and open and close the door to it... or just poke her whole self inside in an attempt to get the dog to come out!





As has been mentioned, Rebecca is starting to stand quite well alone. She hasn't begun walking yet (I think it's mental more than anything now), but here she is, holding onto something "sturdy" and standing alone, LOL.


I was changing the sheets on the bed, and tossed all the pillows into the playpen to keep them off the floor. Rebecca fit just perfectly into the corner of the playpen. :-)

And... here's a full view of this very cute little playpen. We got it from someone with Freecycle, because we needed a small playpen that might fit in our room, since Rebecca learned how to climb out (and fall out) of her bassinet. So, this one has walls about 20 inches tall, is close to the same length as a normal one, but half the width! And, it fits perfectly beside our bed!

And... Rebecca LOVES books. Seriously, loves them.

^^ This is what she is not supposed to do with the books... vv

...she is starting, however, to sit nicely with even normal books with paper pages, and look at them one page at a time! This is quite exciting, since she used to try to rip the book as soon as her hands grabbed it!

I actually was in the library with her on Monday, and people were floored that such a little baby would like to look at books so much, and even look at them on her own! We checked out 13 or so books, and have read them all... I guess we'll have to go back on Monday to get some new ones!

These are the Fisher Price Little People books Rebecca's Grandma gave her a couple of months ago now. Every morning she pulls out the whole box, opens it up, and looks at every single book. :-) She loves them, for whatever reason... I find them to be extremely simple, and not overly engaging, but I guess a book is better than no book...

Things are busy around here

I didn't quite accomplish my goal of getting all three rooms presentable, but one out of three isn't too bad, right? 1 1/2 is even better... I'm working on the kitchen today, and the dining room as well. Perhaps by the end of this weekend I'll finally have a livable house...

Rebecca enjoys laying on her tummy and looking around now. It used to be that she would fuss about being on her belly, but not because she couldn't hold her head up. I guess she just didn't like it. Anyway, I took a few pictures of her on the floor on her belly... just haven't had time to get them on my computer yet. I'll do that sometime soon!

We went to our church's Valentine's dinner last Sunday evening, and had a really nice time. Rebecca was good enough to sleep through it! At least, the time when we were eating. She's quite social though, so any time there are a lot of people moving around, she's generally wide awake watching them instead, as evidenced by our activity last night. We went to the "intergenerational games night" thing at the church which was a part of the sr. youth group lock-in they were doing. I'm really starting to wonder if anyone else is going to go to these games nights, but anyway... Rebecca stayed awake for nearly the entire time with only like a five minute "nap" somewhere in there! Oh, and while we were there, I'm not sure if I was given a compliment or an insult... one of the teens asked me my name, I told him Melissa, and he asked if I wanted him to call me "Miss Melissa" or if Melissa was fine. *sigh* I didn't think I was that old! I told him Melissa was fine. I mean, seriously, I'm not even ten years his senior! It's one thing if it was a six year old, but a 16/17 year old? Apparently as soon as you have a baby you're old enough in a teen's books here to be a "Miss ____"...

Cinders made a trip to the veterinarian on Thursday because of a giant oozing sore on her back. it turns out that one of the cysts she has had for ages sprang a leak and abcessed and got infected. She's on antibiotics and painkillers now, in the hopes that her body will heal itself properly. If it doesn't, we are probably going to be looking at having her put down rather than the surgery that would be required to fix this problem. She's nearly nine, so I suppose she's lived a pretty good life, plus, the only reason half the breeds out there have a life expectancy of like 12 years is because a lot of them are medicated for the last 3-5 years of their lives. Somehow I doubt people used to "help" an animal in such a way. They probably just took it out and shot it when it started to seem unable to survive much longer.

We are trying to figure out where would be best to place a couple of closets in our home, because we have almost literally no easily accessible storage, and I need a place to put things like hats and coats, sheets and towels, my vacuum, and my mop... and I guess general cleaning supplies. Justin's made a suggestion, but I'm not a big fan of it, so I'm still thinking on where I want them. I need them, but I want to place them in good locations that I won't regret down the road.

Anyway, I need to make the most of this nap period that Rebecca is being so good as to take, and perhaps get ALL the dishes done, and maybe my kitchen cleaned! I'll try to post some pictures in the next few days...

The Choir Baby

Rebecca is referred to by most of our church as "the choir baby". She comes to choir practises with me, and she sits with us in the choir on Sundays. I have to say, she's probably the most popular member of the choir (lol). Anyway, I took my camera with me to choir practise last week, and got some pictures of her, and of the choir in general.

Hanging out with Mrs. Poynter

Again with Mrs. Poynter. This is how Rebecca has started to spend every practise.

Getting music and signing someone's birthday card.

Signing said birthday card some more. :)

See what I mean about her being the most popular member of the choir?? Seriously, it takes an additional 5-10 minutes for people to sit down for practise now, and we (Rebecca and I) leave nearly 1/2 an hour late every week!

These are Dave and Cecil... I'm pretty sure they even sit in these exact chairs pretty well every week.

Becky and Pete. Pete is DeAnna's fiance, and these two are often caught in this position, even in the middle of practises. ;)

DeAnna, the music/choir director for our church! She says her hair was a disaster on this particular evening, but I really don't think it looks that bad, hehe... :)

DeAnna with Rebecca

And, again. :)

The candy jar! I think it's DeAnna's method of bribing the kids choir to behave ;) , but I'm not really sure. There's almost always some sort of candy around on Wednesday evenings.

Speaking of choir, I get to sing a solo in one of the songs the choir is singing on March 22, and I think that's the day that DeAnna and I are supposed to be playing a duet as well. I've got to get that piece practised at some point! Oh, and then sometime after that I'm playing the music for one of the songs while the children's and adult's choirs sing. Lots happening in the music department, I guess!

And, that's all the choir pictures I have. The rest are from around the house.

We were given a bunch of clothes, and it happened that most of the newborn sized stuff actually fits Rebecca. I think she looks really cute in this outfit, but she'll probably have outgrown it in another couple of weeks. Of course, I keep saying that and after a couple of weeks she still fits things, so who knows!

I just thought this smile was adorable! We were chatting one morning, and she was just getting a kick out of SOMETHING! I have no clue what it was though! :)

And, though it is blury, this is a picture of Rebecca and me, taken by me. (that's why it's blurry) You should be very impressed that she is looking at the camera, considering there's no one behind it to attract attention. ;)

Anyway...

I did laundry yesterday and threw the detergent measuring cup thing into the machine because it was getting so caked in soap, and spent the next three hours trying to figure out where in the world it had gone, because when I pulled the laundry out, I didn't find it, I hung the laundry to dry, and still didn't find it. Finally, three hours later, I went outside, and found it on the lawn, in a location nowhere near where the line is. Don't ask me how it got there since there wasn't any wind really, but I'm glad it didn't break in the machine and disappear permanently!!

Today I am going to be trying to get more laundry done, as my laundering got stalled yesterday. Probably just Justin's and my stuff, and a load of diapers (which are currently running right now), as it is too windy today to hang little things out. I'm not even going to be hanging diapers outside, as I hung a cover and it tried to blow away on me!

Rebecca's sleeping habits seem to have changed again. I think I would prefer to go back to the "waking four to five times in the night" thing. She's apparently decided that it is time to get up at 4am. Not something I'm too thrilled by. She goes down, whether I want her to or not, by 8:00, whether she is nursing, being held, lying on the floor, whatever. She goes to sleep. She'll wake again between 11:30 and midnight, and then again at 1:30 or 2... and then she wakes up and is ready to go at 4am! And, this is regardless of how much time she slept through the day. She could take a three hour nap and do that, or take two ten minute "naps" and still do that. I'm going to go crazy, lol! Anyway, hopefully her little internal clock will tell her it is time to sleep from 4 until at least 6 sometime soon, as she was doing wonderfully, waking between 7 and 7:30 for the longest time.

And, with that, I must be off, because I need to get laundry, dishes, cleaning, etc done... I'm hoping that at least my kitchen, diningroom, and living room will look halfway decent by the end of tomorrow...