Birthday Boy Breakfast

Happy Birthday Kaelen! You turn three today and Mommy, Daddy and Masyn love you so very much!!

Celebrating 3 Years

It is hard to comprehend that my little man will be celebrating his third birthday this weekend. I mean, I close my eyes and can relive those precious moments of his birth within seconds. Parents always tell you that as your child grows up, the times and experiences with them only gets more fun. This has been true for us, however we would like to savour each stage of Kaelen's growing just a little bit longer. We want to soak it all in as each day our little boy becomes all that much wiser and becomes just that much more independent.


Now that Kaelen has experienced a few birthday parties under his belt, he is wired for his party which we are hosting tomorrow. He has been practising blowing out his candles and has been singing the birthday song to himself for about a week now. Each day he reminds me that he is getting bigger and stronger because he is going to be three years old. Our excursions to the mailbox have been an exciting adventure as presents have been arriving for him every day this week from family members who don't live here. Despite his excitement, he hasn't asked to open them as he knows that he must wait until his big day. And, you can just see the wheels turning in his head and his eyes light up in anticipation when he sees those presents sitting there on that shelf.


Today we are decorating for his party and cleaning up the house. Tomorrow will be the day of chaos with seven of his friends coming over with their parents. Our small little house will be filled with screams of laughter, crumbs from cake and bits of wrapping paper as the gift open frenzy begins. Sunday is Kaelen's actual birthday so he will be spoiled and get to open even more gifts, this time from his family. And, there will be more cake, balloons, crumbs, wrapping paper ..........


This is a picture of Kaelen only 13 hours old. It was the first time that I got to hold him since birthing him and I only got to hold him for 5 minutes due to him being a preemie. And the next picture was taken last week. Oh how they grow ......

Misled

When I was pregnant with my son, I voraciously read every book that I could get my hands on about pregnancy and how to raise a baby. I wanted to be informed about everything and be armed with knowledge for any situation that may arise. I remember reading in one book about breastfeeding. It discussed that no matter the size of a boob, a woman could breastfeed. HOWEVER, the book also said that boob size would not increase nor would breastfeeding cause boobs to sag. Ha! Ha! A man must have wrote that book.

With both of my kids, my boobs went from a barely there A cup to a DD cup size and at times even larger. Now, as some of you know, having large boobs was at times an issue for me. I found that they got in the way, I hated looking in the mirror and seeing these large bowling balls hanging from my chest. There were days that I dreamt of having my nearly flat chest back again. I found after weaning my son, my boobs came back a little smaller and they definitely drooped a little. Not a lot, but enough that there was no way that I was going to get away with wearing no bra - even if it was just around the house. I kissed those perky little things goodbye and embraced my slightly saggy ones with pride in knowing that they provided excellent nutrition to my son (who was a preemie at that).

I am currently in the process of completing the weaning process with my daughter. It was a difficult internal struggle to begin the weaning with her as I truly enjoyed every moment of breastfeeding. There was however the chance that I may have had to go back to work this month and pumping was just not an option for me. Pumping over stimulated my boobs no matter how I went about it; I would never fully drain and even a partial pump to alleviate discomfort would cause my boobs to literally triple in size. And, perhaps it is selfish of me and all, but I just didn't want to deal with having to pump in a bathroom stall or behind closed office doors and dealing with all of the hassle with it. It may work for some women, but the thought of it didn't work for me. So, my daughter and I have been working on the weaning for the past month. It was a very gradual process and now she no longer feeds from my breast. And, those breasts of mine have gone from that DD cup back to my barely there A cup. HOWEVER, that book that I had originally read has lied to me again. My breasts now resemble that of dried up, empty pastry sacks. I now embody that of a flat chest with these two little bumps at the bottom of my rib cage. There is now no way that I could ever go bra less again.

In a humorous attempt to poke fun at my new body (which don't get me wrong: I am prideful of those boobs despite their new appearance as they nourished my daughter for six months) to my husband, our conversation went a little like this:

Me: Honey. Check this rack out now. You thought that my DD leaky boobs were a little scary, what do you think of these now?

Hubby: Erm. I don't want to look at your boobs.

Me: Why not?

Hubby: Well why? Why do you want me to check them out?

Me: So you can see into the future of what they will look like when we are old and geriatric. What you see now is what you will see in 30 years from now.

Hubby: Hmm ... not a pretty sight. Is that what they truly look like when you get old? Perhaps we could save up and get you a lift.

Child Care Secured

A big Yay and a big Ugh .....

I have been blessed to have totally lucked out and secured child care for both of my children come February. And, my family has hit the jackpot big time because it is back in the dayhome that Kaelen was in prior to me going on maternity leave. We truly feel that the dayhome that Kaelen was in was a godsend and Cathy ... well on more than one occasion I have told her that she is an angel that was sent to us. Cathy is incredible and as a parent, I couldn't have asked for anyone better to watch my babies while the two of us work.

Now, the ugh part means that I do have to head back to work come February and in reality it isn't that far away. That also means that I will likely have to dig out my old resume, update it and start beating the pavement soon to see what is out there. I would love to go back to my former place of employment that I was at before having Masyn but that will all depend on whether there is any openings at that time. I won't lie in admitting that there is a small part of me that continues to hope that a big dream job will open up for my husband come the end of the golf season that pays really well. Or at least well enough that it will allow for me to stay at home with my children and for us to live relatively comfortably. Kind of selfish of me isn't it?

Calling All East Coast Bloggers ....

Attention ... or should I say, Beware!

I think that we will be packing up the family and coming down to the east coast for two weeks in early December. We have very good friends whom live in Virginia and work in D.C. . Right now we are just trying to figure out our dates and which airline(s) we are going to fly with.

I have always wanted to see the east coast so we plan on doing a lot of driving and sight seeing when we are down there. Anyone game for possibly meeting up once we have our dates secured?

How far is say Florida ... or ... Chicago ... or New England ... or Philly ... Or gosh ... my mind is coming to a blank with some of the places that some of your all live. We will be staying in Alexandria, VA.

I should have our passport apps done by the end of this week but as Murphy's Law would dictate, I have erm ... slightly misplaced my marriage license so my passport renewal could be an issue. It is in the house so I am not too concerned, I just have to find what box it is hiding in ..... That and hopefully our passports will fly through the process and won't take the projected 10 week backup .....