Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Currently...


[list from the lovely Tina]

listening: my goodness, I hardly ever listen to music anymore...re-discovered my "the emancipation of mimi" cd by mariah carey, it's good summer driving music! 
eating: local strawberries (so much better than the ones shipped from cali!) with cool whip
drinking: home-made iced coffees (waaaay too many of them)
wearing: trouser jeans, a purple shirt with buttons at the top, a pink sports/nursing bra
feeling: a little bored and restless
weather: sunny but cool-ish, about 20c...just the way I like it :)
wanting: to go shopping for new underwear and clothes for just me
needing: a haircut. badly.
thinking: about the shoot i'm having with my sister and her hubby on friday
enjoying: watching a PBS documentary series about the origins of life with dan
wondering: how much longer i can use breastfeeding as birth control
 
Night night.

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Yeah, I'm one of those...


I'm one of those...

...a 20-something year old with a 'fancy' camera



...a stay-at-home mom who is trying to supplement her income

 
...a "scrapbooker-turned-wannabe-photographer"
 

...a beginner who is afraid to show off her work to blogland




...an amateur who doesn't know all the technical jargon and is still afraid to shoot in Manual or RAW



...a person who doubts herself and her ability more than she probably should



...a person who receives compliments from 'the real world' yet doesn't believe them




...a starting-out business owner who finds it hard to use the words 'clients', 'session fees' and 'proofs'



...a woman who is trying to pursue her real passion.

So, yes, I am all of these things, but I'm going for it anyway.

Happy Wednesday.
G.

PS-To see more of my photos, hit the "Press the Shutter" button in the sidebar.

Sunday, June 27, 2010

Progress...


Just checking in with my progress for A Week in the Life (gotta keep accountable if I'm going to get this done in the next few weeks!)

So far, I've:
-Created and ordered Collage prints
-Printed all mini prints, trimmed them to size and inserted them into the page protectors
-Printed Opener pics and created Opener pages (see below)
-Created, printed, trimmed and inserted Victor's eat/sleep schedule cards
-Printed, trimmed and inserted a few other random journaling cards


I still have A LOT to do though...
-Wait for Collages to arrive in mail, create collage pages
-Sew page protectors for Long journaling cards
-Create, print, trim and insert Long journaling cards
-Create Cover for album (I have an idea of what to do at least...)
-Print, trim and insert remaining journaling cards
-Fill in journaling cards (w/ my handwriting)
-Create 'schedule strips' and adhere to mini prints where applicable (w/ my handwriting)
-Create Intro page to album

I think that's it, there might be something I'm missing...like I said before, I'm really liking how it looks though, I'm excited to share, hopefully in the next couple of weeks!

Thanks for letting me go on about this project once again :)

Until next time,
G.

Saturday, June 26, 2010


Another month has gone by and Victor is now a social, happy and skilled 4 month old! And since I've been terrible at keeping up with his actual baby book, I've decided to use this blog more as a journal to keep track of things, and once his first year is up I'll come back and print off these monthly posts to stick in his book.

So, an update on Victor @ 4 months:

*His eating and sleeping habits have changed a bit this month, and I guess you could say it's for the better.  He can go for much longer periods without eating, and he sleeps for much longer periods of time too (up to 6 hours in both cases!)  Lately I've been having to wake him up to feed at night, I'm not sure he'd get up if it were up to him!  We're averaging waking up 1-2 times at night, so not bad!   He's also much better about being put down to sleep, most of the time he doesn't even have to be asleep for us to put him in his crib, he can go down on his own, which is so wonderful. 

*He has an approximate 'bedtime' (between 9pm and 11pm usually), and a 'wakeup time' (usually between 7:00am and 9:00am), so not a schedule by any means, but he's starting to develop a routine for sure (when doing my Week in the Life, some of his feeding schedules and sleeping schedules were nearly identical on different days).  He eats about 7 times a day and sleeps on average 3-3.5 hours at a time, unless he's doing his 'power naps' of about an hour or so, in which case he has longer stretches in the evening. 

*Breastfeeding is going well for the most part (still using the shield...oops), but in the past couple of weeks he's had a few 'feeding strikes/freakouts' where he just refuses to nurse and has a huge fit when I try to feed him.  On a few occasions I had to pump because he would just not feed from me.  And sometimes he seems like he'd rather be doing something else than eat, he likes to look around a lot while feeding, but that's normal for this age, it's just hard to get him to focus and eat enough.  He only averages about 10-15 mins a feed, it used to be 20 solid minutes, so I sometimes wonder if he's getting enough, but I have to trust that he knows how much he needs.  I'm still feeding 'on demand' so it should be ok.

*Weight: about 15lbs  Height: 25 inches


*For the most part (probably 85% of the time), this boy is happy, smiling with his mouth wide open, big eyes, happy cheeks, but occasionally we do get this face:

Luckily we know what to do when he makes it and he's usually quite easy to soothe.

*He does not like being on his back or reclined for the most part, unless he's on his mat swinging at things (even though he only puts up with this for a few minutes).  He still really enjoys the Jolly Jumper and is it in at least once a day, usually early in the morning when Dan has him (and mama's getting a few extra minutes of sleep).  He also likes his chair for short periods of time, and is just starting to be big enough for the Exisaucer (?), so I'm hoping he'll enjoy that.  He likes to sit propped up on the couch or bed, looking around or playing with a toy, and of course, he likes being in our arms the most.


*He's getting much better with his hands, can grasp toys, and reaches for things all the time (including my hair!)  He wants to have everything in his mouth lately, and has been drooling like a madman.  So of course he's been wearing a lot of bibs, and I recently bought this hazelwood teething necklace to help with the possibility of those little chompers coming out soon.  Not sure if it works/will work, but we will find out in the next couple of months (if not, then it's still a cute accessory!)

Sitting in his high chair, reaching for his Nuby

*He's getting better with bathtime, I think the warm temperatures are making it easier, less of a shock to the skin when getting out (it was terrible in the winter!)  We also got a new baby bath that he seems to like more than the one he had before.  We still don't give him a bath more than a couple of times a week, but I'm hoping to work it into a nighttime routine every other night soon.  I also recently took him to the splash pad at the local park and he wasn't too fond of it, so I'm not sure if a visit to the pool is in our future this summer or not, maybe if the water were a bit warmer, the splash pad was freezing!


*Other activities he is currently enjoying include playing "rocket baby" with Papa (see pic below), reading and looking at books (just started this week), rocking in the glider with Mama to fall asleep (sitting facing out in my lap with a blanket), being tickled while being changed (he giggles and laughs, it's so cute!), being naked (ha!), looking around while going for walks, laying in my lap and 'talking' to me (he makes all kinds of sounds now),  listening to Papa play guitar (he really does, it's so nice to have a musical father!), looking at puppets, gnawing on whatever he can, and just looking around at the bright new world that surrounds him :)


(All pictures taken during "A Week in the Life", except the one at the splash pad and the 2 wearing the baseball cap.)

It's a wonderful age, I'm really enjoying it and can't wait to see what he will be able to do in another month.  It's kind of sad that our journey is 1/3 of the way over already (before Mat Leave is up I mean), but it's been a fun and amazing journey so far, and being a  Mama has been everything I've wanted it to be.

Je t'aime mon beau garçon.

Until next time,
G.

Tuesday, June 22, 2010


So, ever since I stopped blogging daily for my A Week in the Life project (still working on it!), I feel like something is missing, like I should be blogging more (instead of doing the million other little things I should be doing, ha!), so I've decided to include the ultimate in Blog Fodder (besides Weheartit crap), the "things about me!" post.  I actually saw it on another blog that I follow in my Google Reader and I thought, hey, why not, it would be interesting to see if I could come up with 101 things.  So here we go, #1 through #25 (A lot of this won't be new information to my family or friends, but it may be to my 'online blog buddies').
  1. I grew up with a French-Canadian mother and an English-Canadian father (both from northern New Brunswick), so I spoke both languages at home.
  2. I now speak only French with my son, even though my husband doesn't understand French all that well (neither did my dad when we were little but he understands everything now).
  3. I broke my arm the summer going into 5th Grade and ended up playing a lot of Nintendo because I couldn't really go swimming or ride my bike (though I did a little).
  4. I have a Bacherlor of Arts degree (double honours in French and Spanish), but I haven't really ever used it and consider it a huge waste of money.
  5. I've been to Europe twice but have never been West of Toronto (in Canada).
  6. I really dislike people who complain all the time, and people who brag all the time.
  7. My favourite food is probably chips with Dill Pickle dip.
  8. I have 1 tattoo that I got before my 1st Dave Matthews concert in 2003 (it's not Dave-related, just a flower 'tramp stamp', which I don't regret one bit).  I'd like to get another one someday.
  9. It took us 20 'official' months of trying to get pregnant with Victor.
  10. My favourite types of movies are historical dramas/epics, fantasy/sci-fi movies, or thrillers.
  11. I think paying to see a comedy in the theater is a waste of money.
  12. I like to make lists (obviously!)
  13. I met Dan through his cousin, Sue, who was a good friend of mine in high school (we actually have the same birthday).
  14. I'm a flake and ditch social situations often.
  15. I hardly ever cook, but I do enjoy making big turkey dinners for the holidays.
  16. I used to read a lot as a kid, but once I got to University and was forced to read, I stopped and am now lucky to read 1-2 books a year.
  17. I never used to like dogs until my parents got their Cairn terrier, Félix, in 2002.  Since then I've wanted a Daschund, Pomeranian and currently would like a Greyhound.
  18. I judge people in my head.  A lot.
  19. Fall is my favourite season by far (I'm actually wishing it were Fall right now!)
  20. I probably only have 3-4 really close friends, and don't really wish for more.
  21. I have very crooked bottom teeth and used to want braces but now I'm ok with it.
  22. I get super sentimental when watching Disney movies from my childhood and have to choke back tears about 10 times while watching them.
  23. I'm terrible at confrontation and criticism and usually cry when it happens, something I HATE about myself.
  24. I have a huge fear of heights; even watching movies where people are high up causes my palms to sweat (the last 30 mins of King Kong were a nightmare for me).
  25. I'm starting to slowly work on my dream of having a photography business, and even though I've gotten lots of compliments, I feel like a big, fat, no-talent phoney.
There we go...it was kind of tough to think of all that, this might be hard!

Anyway, it's very, very hot here today and even hotter in our old, upstairs flat, so we're keeping cool with lots of homemade iced coffees and lying under the ceiling fans.  Overall I can't complain much about the weather this June, we haven't really had any long, rainy streaks like last year.  I can't believe it's almost July though!  And that Victor is almost 4 months old, geesh...

Ok, well have a good evening, thanks for listening to me ramble, as always!

Until next time,
G.

(PS-I keep meaning to borrow my mom's camera to take pics of Victor's room, I'll try to remember this week and get those pics up!)

Friday, June 18, 2010

For Steph :)

Hope this helps you visualize it better! (I start my days on the left hand side, not the right, and then start my new day on the backside of the collage page.)

Thursday, June 17, 2010

A Week in the Life-The Photos


Alright, now that I have been done documenting our lives for a few days now, I decided to come back and show the progress I've been making on the album.  So far I have created the photo collages and ordered them through scrapbookpictures.com (even with shipping it was half the price as printing them at Walmart), bought the carstock and patterned paper for the pages and journaling blocks, printed all the mini prints for the page protectors and the 5X7 'opener' shots, and also bought a few more page protectors for my journaling (I thought I would have room to include the journaling on the collage page, but I have no room at all, so I'm going to make some 6X11 page protectors and do some "long journaling" cards with my random thoughts, like Ali did in her project.  It will go after the divided page protector page.  So each day will go like this: Opener page + divided page protector page w/ minis/journaling cards + divided page protector page (backside) w/ minis + long journaling card page + long journaling card page (backside-not sure if I'll include anything or not) + collage page.  That might only make sense to Stephie C, but oh well! haha

First though, here are the opener and collage pages for each day (I didn't include the minis, basically if you don't see the shots here and they were in my weekly collage, they are going to be mini prints).

As I said, the opener shot will stand alone on the intro page as a 5X7, and the collages will go on the last page for each day, as an 8X10.

(The shot of our feet at the top of this post is going to be the intro shot to the entire album, it's also 5X7.)

Monday:
Tuesday:
          
Wednesday:
Thursday:
Friday:
 
Saturday:
 
Sunday:
It looks really cool and I'm happy with how it's all coming together so far!  I won't bore anyone with the details of my plan, but I will say this:

-This project is expensive!  I'm sure I could have done it for cheaper, but basically it's costing me close to 80$ when it's all said and done.

-I'm probably going to do 3 more Weeks in the Life, one for every season.  When exactly I'm not sure, but that's the long term plan for now, and I'm hoping that they'll all fit inside one album (It's not very thick right now so I don't think it will be a problem.)  I think it will be neat to see how our lives change during different seasons (the winter one would be insanely boring I think!), and also to see Victor at different ages (along with any other changes to the family...)

Once I get the album done, I'll be sure to share!  (Probably not for a couple of weeks though, I'm slow at things like this...)

In the meantime, back to regularly scheduled blogging!  First up, a tour of Victor's nursery, which is finally done :)

Ok, I'm off to clean up, be back soon!

Until then,
G.