An obsession is starting...

I mentioned on Twitter today that I've recently begun an obsession with the colour gray (it all started with a cute little sweater/shirt I thrifted on Saturday...I'm thinking half of my wardrobe will be gray this Fall!)  Anyway, I've also been in the mood to get back into decorating this apartment, Victor's room is really the only one I would consider 'done', so I'm thinking that either our bedroom, the bathroom or the living room will be my next project.  For our bedroom I'm envisioning a gray + yellow colour scheme (the walls being gray with yellow accents).  I'm still unsure of how dark of a gray I'd want to go, I'd worry it would be too dark in the many, many, many winter months we face (ha!), so I'm thinking a lighter/heather gray is probably a better option.  I'd also like to be bold enough to paint some of our furniture yellow, but that's a pretty big commitment, so I'm thinking of adding yellow through the bedding/wall art, etc.

Here are a few pics I've found online as inspo (sorry, no credits, I just googled!)

I like the idea of painting a big canvas like this, or covering it with fabric, a nice cheap solution to filling up big walls (which we have)

Love the dark gray and soft yellow, but like I said, not sure how lovely it would be in February...(it's always all about the weather with me! haha)

LOVE yellow furniture...perhaps I will try to thrift an old dresser to paint?

We have a blue bedspread currently, I like the look if I decided to add a third colour...I'd like to also make my own curtains, something like these would be perfect.

And just to show how much I love gray, this image caught my eye while searching, I may need to try this soon:

What colours are you into right now?

G.

The difference a year can make...

A year ago today I flew off to Italy and Croatia to reunite with my friend Jelena and return to Europe after 4 years away, to see St. Peter's and Vatican city (and nearly cry from the beauty of it), to swim in the Adriatic Sea (and the bluest, clearest, warmest water I've ever swam in), to eat delicious pasta and drink delicious cappucinos, to visit ruins and landscapes that were centuries old (beyond my North American comprehension), to nearly suffer heat stroke from the +35C weather nearly every day, to take a train through the Italian countryside, to drive through Slovenia, to see the canals of Venice, to go to what must have been a Roman paradise in Brijuni, to see 3 of the 7 coloseums in the world...I left a year ago for a trip of a lifetime.  

And today I'm doing this.

But you know, I wouldn't trade it for anything

...

(well, maybe one more swim in those waters, lol)

Happy Sunday to you!

G.

Bag for me, bag for baby...

A couple of things I'm pining over online...

1. A nice camera bag. The one I have right now is too small for my new camera, plus it's U-GLY. This super cute teal one is from Jo Totes, and from what I can tell it's just the right size for my Canon, plus my purse stuff, cell, and maybe a diaper or 2 (I mostly want it for lugging my camera around on an everyday basis, since right now I put it in my non-padded purse and it freaks me out so much!) Plus it appears to be affordable compared to a lot of other 'lady camera bags' I'm seeing out there, so I plan on using some of my session money to buy it. Lovesit.

2. Cute bibs. We fed Victor cereal for the first time today (yay, solids!), and it made me realize that we're going to need a lot more bibs around here (we already use at least 2 a day from drool alone!) This cute one is from the BabyMomo shop on Etsy, but I'll probably end up buying a set somewhere cheaper, I can't justify spending over 10$ for one bib...unless I learn how to make them myself?

3. Photography-nerd shirts. Kara posted a photo of her wearing this shirt from 40/60 Photography the other day on her blog and I looooved it immediately. It's kind of silly, but I think I might splurge with some of my session money and buy it :)

4. Smelly diaper storage. One thing I can justify buying for Victor (and for myself!) is a Wet/Ick bag.  Right now when we're on the road I just use a plastic bag to store his wet cloth diapers, but it's loud and annoying and smelly, so I think a cute wetbag like this is just what I need.  This one is from Monkeyfootdesigns on Etsy, and I think it would be just the right size, and I love the fabric (plus it would match my new camera bag/purse/diaper bag, ha!)

I haven't window-shopped online (especially on Etsy) in forever, it feels nice!  What are you oogling over on the Internets lately?

Until next time,
G.

A Week in the Life [Completed Album]

        

[Oh my friggin' word, it took me foreeeever to get these pics in order! I had to delete my post twice and start over because the pictures kept getting all mixed up...anyway, I digress...]

So here it is, after nearly 2 months, my completed A Week in the Life album!  Let me tell you, when Ali said that this project was A LOT of work, she wasn't kidding!  Not only was the documenting a huge feat, putting it together was just as big (if not bigger) of a feat as well!  Even though there was very little 'scrapping' to do, it still took a long time, there was a lot of trimming, and gluing, and repetition...but it's done now and I'm pretty happy with how it all came out! 

A few things:

-The cover was inspired by Christina Clouse's cover in a way, I basically took scraps of all the patterned paper used in the album and had my mom patchwork-stitch them together, I love the way it turned out.

-I kept the cover pages and collage pages pretty simple and the same throughout, with just a slight variation in paper width and photo placement, but it's all pretty much the same.

-Looking back now, I wish I had chosen a better cardstock colour for the journaling cards, the green looks pretty dull to me now, I think a yellow or something would have been better, but the green was neutral enough to go with all the picture colours and patterned papers.

-I LOVE the long journaling cards in the 11X6 page protectors, I will definitely do this again in another project.  I love that I wrote so much, it's very rare for me, but I know I'll appreciate it when I look back on this project.

-I HATE my handwriting and will probably do all my journaling cards on the computer next time.  I'll also try to mix up the topics next time and not do the same everyday (like what we watched, it's the same thing all week! haha)

-I didn't use any embellishments at all in the album, and it's a little 'plain' compared to how I usually do minis, but with the amount of work that it was I'm glad I kept it simple, the focus really is on the words and the photos.

-There were some empty spaces in the divided page protectors (I didn't have enough pics for some of the days), so I simply inserted some patterned paper to fill the gaps.  I thought about writing some quotes on them, but I think I'll leave it as is.

-Nothing is straight in the album.  Nothing.

Ok, onto the pics (these are the 2-page spreads, to see each individual page check the A Week in the Life 2010 set in my Flickr account).

As I said before, overall I really enjoyed this project and will definitely do it again; my plan is to do a week in each season, but I think that the earliest I would do another would be next April (for Spring), I don't have it in me to do one this Fall and I need to focus on finishing my December Daily mini this Winter, so...I'm not sure if I would use this same format, there are some elements I would want to keep (long journaling cards, divided page protectors), but I'll have to see, if I keep all the weeks in this AC album then I'll probably use the same format to keep it consistent and just change up the patterned paper.  We'll see though.

If you have any questions about the album or my process, just let me know, it's pretty close to Ali's as far as the format and ideas go, but I think I added my own little spin to it :)

Cross this off the list of projects to finish, yay!!

Now, the question is: what should I complete next?

Until next time,

G.

Vive l'Acadie!

Last week I went up to Bathurst (about 3 hours north where my family is from) to visit my French grandmother, aunts and cousins. Victor and I spent 5 days with family and it was a really nice change of pace for us (the pace being much faster that is!) My aunt from Toronto and her girls were there and it was actually the first time in a long time where all the grandchildren were together in the same place. My mom and sister also came up for a few days with the dogs, so it was a busy place! Victor, of course, was the main focus (my aunts love babies and hadn't seen him before), so he was plenty spoiled while there :)

Anyway, on the second day there my sister, grandmother, Victor and I went to the Village historique acadien, about 45 mins down the shore on the Acadian coast. It's a really interesting place where they re-create acadian homes and farms from the 1700s, 1800s and 1900s. There were people in each house, in character, ready to talk to you about life as it was back then, using the tools and actually working as if they were back in the old days. The characters speak in old acadian french (which is the french I speak mostly), there was a tavern, school, church, several different kinds of houses, farm animals everywhere, it was just a really cool place. My grandmother is acadian (she actually grew up about 10 mins away from where the village was located), so it's also part of my culture and heritage, so I was really happy to go.

Here are a few pictures from the trip (I just love old stuff like this, so much of it I would have in my house today!)  [You can see the rest of the pics on my Flickr.]

         

On the way out I was telling my sister Daphné how that, despite the hardships these people must have gone through, in a way their lives were better than ours, because they had to work for their own survival; they made their own food, clothing, housing, everything, and because of that, they didn't have time to be bored or depressed or restless or any of the other issues people face today. They have a program at the village where kids can go and spend a day in traditional dress, working and pretending to be living in those times, I wish I had gone when I was a kid! (My cousins have gone 3 or 4 times and they love it.)  Visiting there inspired me to try and live more simply (but it's hard!)

It was also really nice because I used to spend a lot of time 'downshore' at my nanny's cottage, playing on the beach, so it made me all nostalgic to drive along the shore again, it's so beautiful there!

I'm still working on my friggin' A Week in the Life post (Blogger has been pissing me off to no end lately), so I'll try to get it up later this week, I'm about 4-5 posts behind, hopefully this week I'll be able to get them all up!

Until then,

G.

PS-If you want to know more about the Acadians and their Deportation from the Maritimes (I assume most Americans don't know much about them; they are the original  'Cajuns' from Louisiana), you can find more information here.

Ok, so it seems like not that long ago I was writing about how Victor had just turned 4 months old, and now here we are, at 5 months! Time might be speeding up a little bit (or maybe it's just me feeling too busy and less organized...) Regardless, I figured I'd better update before I forget everything that has gone on in my little bébé's life in the last month.

So here we go:

*First off, the feeding/sleeping report: He's been doing great in the sleep department, he has slept through the night about 4-5 times (meaning he slept for around 6 hours or more...he once slept from 10:00pm to 6:00am!), but usually stays down for 3-4 hours at night. During the day it's still pretty unpredictable, he'll usually go down once in the morning for a little bit (after his morning workout in the JJ), and then in the afternoon and evening he'll probably have 1-3 naps of at least an hour. It's only been very recently that he's been getting harder to put down, for awhile there it was super easy, just a bit of rocking and then putting him in his crib, still awake in many cases. As for eating, he has been doing really well too, we're pretty much set on a 3-4 hour eating schedule (longer at night sometimes or if we're busy), and he has gotten super quick, he can finish in about 10 mins. Still using the shield, but I've pretty much given up on the idea of not using it. We're still exclusively breastfeeding, but will probably consider starting solids soon. All in all no complaints!

*Of course he's still not sitting on his own, so we bought him a 2nd hand Bumbo from a friend and he loves it! It's very handy to have, it allows him to sit and watch us as we eat supper or as I fold laundry (and it's a nice break for us too). Although he can't sit on his own yet, he definitely can move! Especially when he sleeps, we put him down with his head at one end of the crib and when we go to get him, he's completely flipped around to the other side, he spins himself around with his feet without any problems. He can roll from back to side easily and from tummy to back sometimes, but still not back to tummy. He LOVES to stand; in fact, I would say that he's standing at least half of the time he's awake (on our laps or wherever). His legs are crazy strong, people say he'll walk early...I'm in no rush for him to move though! When he's on his tummy he can hold his head quite high, it's quite cute, but he doesn't like being on his tummy for more than a few minutes at a time (this will probably be the case until he can roll).

*As you can see above, he has found his feet and finds them quite yummy :)

*He still enjoys the Jolly Jumper, looking in the mirror, being tickled and held, as well as all his usual games, but most of the time he just really likes to chew on things. Everything goes straight into his mouth! His motor skills are getting quite good (especially his grabbing/grasping/hand coordination), so we have to be careful at what he's grabbing at now. He's recently gotten into grabbing our faces, which sounds cute but actually hurts a lot of the time! He has a set of plastic keys that we got from a co-worker, these are by far his favourite chewing item as of late, but he'll take anything.

*Another 'game' he likes to play now is to sit in his Bumbo with a bowl of his toys next to him and pull them all out (which apparently is a skill he shouldn't have until 8-9 months, but who knows...) I try to let him play with whatever's around (as long as it's safe) so that he experiences objects other than his toys (my bead necklaces, a watter bottle, the remote control, yarn...)

*Recently we've re-discovered his little swing, which is good, it's a nice calming thing for him to do. I like the idea of not using items for awhile and then pulling them out later, I think he gets bored of using and playing with the same things all the time (like we all do).

*He drools. Oh my does he drool. No teeth yet though.

*Cloth diapering is still going really well, despite him being a bit more frequent with his 'morning surprises', ha!

*In the past couple of weeks he has found his 'skriek-ey' voice and uses it often. He squeals and screams quite loudly, even though he's not upset. He makes many noises and 'talks' with people, it's really fun (even though the screech-owl routine can get old pretty quick).

*Weight and Height: Will find out at his needles on Tuesday.

*He went through through a little 'stranger danger' phase, in which he became afraid of new people (and even people he knew like my parents), and would scream and cry if they came near him. Luckily I think it's mostly over, but at the same time I don't think he could just be held by anyone, he's wary (I guess that means he's attached to us, which isn't a bad thing.) It was kind of hard to have him scream at people like that though.

*It's sad to say, but my little rocker baby been losing his hair quite a bit in the last month, it's very very thin all around except for one strip on the top of his head, and it will probably fall out at some point too :( It makes me sad, I love his hair and am very careful not to rub his hair when he takes a bath or when we put clothing on him but he has cradle cap and it's been causing a lot of it to fall out. I just hope that it grows back soon! His skin is still so-so, he had some bad breakouts but it's mostly under control (with his parents I don't expect him to ever have good skin, honestly, ha!)

*He smiles every time he sees either me or Dan. Every single time. And I never ever get tired of it.

*Overall, July was a great month for us and for Victor, he handled the heat like a champ, learned new things, improved on skills he already had, and in a way, really seemed to go from an infant to a baby in my eyes. I looked at him often in the last few weeks and thought 'my, how he has gotten big/old'. It's the first month that I've thought that.

Sorry for the lack of good photos, I haven't done a 'proper' photoshoot with him since he was 3 months old, I really must get out and do one soon, I'm not taking enough pictures of my own baby it seems!

I can only imagine the changes that will be coming in the next month; he'll be getting more needles (boo), we might start solids, we're travelling on a plane for the first time, sitting, hopefully getting into the water more...it's going to be a busy and exciting 6th month of life for this little guy! It's been a wonderful trip to far though :)

Oh, and I need to work on his baby book. BAD.

Until next month,

G.

PS-The baby in the pics with Victor is Eli, my friend Sara's little guy, he's 7 months old...also, I made that owl blanket they are playing on :)

Summertime and the livin' is easy (and the bloggin' is lazy...)

Oh my word sometimes I hate technology...I spent 45 mins earlier this afternoon writing out this blog post and then when I hit Publish, an error came up and I lost it all!! Turns out it wasn't autosaving either. Eventually I'll smarten up and either switch to Typepad or write out my posts in notepad (like I'm doing now), and then copy it all over, that way I'll have it if something stupid happens like this again. Ugh. Anyway...

So I've been meaning to blog all week, I don't know how many times I said to myself that I needed to blog, but every time I sat down something either came up or I lost my motivation completely. I can't wait for the day when I'll be able to just talk to the computer and it will write out all my blog posts, and format them, and upload the appropriate pics to go with it, haha...but until then, here is a (somewhat) abbreviated verion of what's going on around here. Since I can't think of all the little mini posts I meant to write, I'll just go ahead and write out random points, pêle mêle style.

*Things have been going great overall around here, the summer just seems to be passing us by in some sort of blur, I seriously can't believe it's almost August! We survived the first heat wave (barely), and now we're waiting for the second. I've been enjoying any rainy and cool day I can get, but so far there haven't been too too many. There are no complaints from me this year about the summer weather, it's been good! I still can't wait for fall though...

*In exactly one month from today I will be flying across the country with the bébé to British Columbia to see my friend Heather get married! It's exciting and nerve-wracking at the same time (exciting to see my friend after a year and a half apart, nerve-wracking to fly alone with a 6 month old...) To those who have travelled with infants before, what are you tips? What to bring, what to do, how to handle strangers giving your pity/disgust looks?

*I'm not sure what we are filling our days with that is making time go by so quickly, our usual routine involves staying at home most days with a few occasional outing thrown in here and there. And yet, the past month I've felt quite busy and tired...I think it's all the extra "non mama" stuff that I'm doing, mainly photography and running.

*Speaking of photography, things are going great! For the past 6-8 weeks or so, I've had at least one shoot a week, and a couple of weeks I've had 2 sessions a week (which is my self imposed maximum at this point). I've been having a lot of fun and people so far have responded positively, so it's been really good. I'm still determined to learn from each shoot and try to improve with each shoot, because I know I'm still a LOOOONG way away from being where I want to be. But I'm discovering what I like and don't like, my 'style', my strengths and weaknesses, so these early days are still quite important for me. I'll try to blog more about this soon :)

*As for my other 'hobby', running...ugh. I'm still currently training for a 4 person marathon relay in October with 3 friends, and while I do enjoy the social aspect of getting out of the house, the running itself I could totally do without! I feel good while I'm doing it, but every second before and after are just terrible it seems. I also think that it's just a lot for me to take on at this point; we train together twice a week and then have 2 homework runs that we have to do on our own, so it's 4 days a week, which is a lot once you tack on a shoot or two, I'm out almost every evening. But I said I would be a part of the team so I will continue, but I'm really not sure if running will be my main source of exercise anymore, I need something new. But what?

*Creatively, I've gotten a few things done this past month, the most important being my vacation photobook and my A Week in the Life album. That's right, I'm done the album! I finished it last night, I only have one thing left to do (if I want, the inside of the album itself could be lined with cardstock...) I took pics of the album yesterday but didn't upload them yet, I hope to blog about it soon. I'm really happy that these 2 major projects are done, now I can get back to regular scrapping, I've missed it!

*Victor is doing really well, I can't believe that in a few days he will be 5 months old! I'll do a proper post on him with his monthly update, but so far he just keeps getting better and better every month, but at the same time I'm really starting to notice how old and big he is getting, and I'm starting to miss the tiny little baby he used to be (it had to happen at some point I guess!)

*Last Saturday we went to my sister's for the afternoon to hang out in her backyard. They have such a nice set up out there; there is a river that runs along the back part of their property, and there is a little beach down off the yard, under the shade of the trees, it's the perfect spot to put a few chairs and enjoy the water. They set up a hammock and a little raft to float in, it was just perfect. Victor enjoyed swinging in the hammock and then taking a snooze down on the bank of the river (in a laundry basket no less!), Dan and Steve enjoyed playing guitar, and I enjoyed taking some pics.

Here are a few (please excuse the quality on some, I've been inspired by Kara to shoot all my at-home pics in Manual mode from now on, I really need to get the hang of it!)

      

*Daphné also got her 10 little babies last week, they are sooo cute (though we can't get too attached to them, they are Meat Kings and not egg layers, after all...) She's got her own little hobby farm out there, it's so cool!

Well that's all for now, I'm sure there's more but like I said above, there are several posts I want to write out soon, including some online lovelies I've been eyeing lately, Victor's 5 month update and my A Week in the Life album, so hopefully I get the chance...

Dan is heading off to his high school reunion tomorrow (10 years, eek!), so while he's off doing that I'll be heading to my friend's house to have a little kiddie pool party (yay!) Then next week my sister and I (and Victor of course) may be going to our grand mama's house to visit for a few days, so I may not be around for a bit, but I hope to get back soon, I really hate it when my mind piles up with back-logged blog posts (yes, sometimes I think in terms of blog posts, after nearly 4 years that's just the way it is!)

I hope you all have a great, sunny and happy weekend. Any big plans?
G.