Could it be, we’re back on track?!?

Sweet Rina,

Ever since we got back from our trip on the east coast, you have been all out of whack with your sleeping pattern. I guess at first it was thanks to the jet lag and then you got this nasty cold (which you still have!), but tonight, you fell asleep at your “usual” time and have been sleeping since I put you down. Here’s to keeping my fingers crossed that you are finally back into your old sleeping routine and will start sleeping through the night again. I’ll admit that it’s been particularly challenging for me as I really relish my “evening time” by myself. Those few hours where you are sleeping and your Dad isn’t home from work is when I can really unwind, whether it is reading all the blogs I follow, watch some TV or work on my translation project or just enjoy a nice fire in the fireplace. However, for the past 3 weeks, I haven’t had the luxury of this quiet time by myself, let alone an uninterrupted night of sleep in well over 5 weeks and it has taken its toll on me. So for tonight, I am thankful you seem to be sleeping well! 🙂

In other news, you had your 1st eye check-up today. I was getting one for myself and the ophthalmologist was asking if you’d had your 6-months check-up (for your eyes). I had no idea you were even supposed to get one at 6 months and I know our *wonderful* doctor did it. the doctor today was nice enough to throw yours in at the same time as mine! You seem to have a bit of astigmatism in your left eye (just like me), but nothing to be worried about right now and it could’ve been a fluke according to the ophthalmologist. You’ll have your next check-up around 2 years old. As for me, my astigmatism has gotten a tiny bit worse, but it’s still very minor. I ordered my contact lenses and will get new glasses when I start getting paid from work as my money from my maternity leave pay is not getting me very far lately. With your birthday, Christmas and having to renew my nursing license, I’m living on pennies right now, but don’t worry, we’re doing just fine! It just means I have to be a bit more frugal than usual! 😉

I was just taking a short break from my translation work to update the blog, but I should really get back to it seeing as I haven’t been able to do any this week. You see, I’m helping out with the French translation of Eat to Live. My name (as well as many others) will be in the contributors of the e-book when it comes out! Not bad, right?!? 🙂 I just hope it will help many other readers out there to eat healthier, I know it has helped me tremendously and I’m eating delicious foods, losing weight and not feeling deprived through it all!

Here are a few pictures I took recently of you, just because I like them!

You were all skin and bones in your Halloween pyjama!

Up to no good, making a mess of my linen closet!

Sleep well little angel!

Love,

Mom & Dad Xxo

We’re home!

Sweet Monkey!

We finally arrived home yesterday after a very long day of flying. Our first flight from Montreal to Vancouver was 5hrs long. It seemed a lot longer because you spent 3.5hrs of it either crying or whining. 😦 I guess the combination of teething, having a cold and the pressure in your ears was not a good one and you sure let me (and everyone else on the plane) know about it! The only time you were quiet was when you slept for a bit. I tried giving you Ibuprofen and Acetaminophen, but nothing was helping you, so I just let you cry (what else was I supposed to do?!?) Meh!

I was just really glad to see Jenn at the airport (she came to pick us up with her lovely Stu because your Dad couldn’t get off work in time to get us). I love them so much, they are the cutest couple I know and Stu was all concerned about his driving because he “had a baby in the car”! That made me laugh! We came home and Stu and Jenn helped me unload while your Dad was in the shower and then it was time for some family cuddles! I can assure you your Dad really missed us, he wanted to hold you and look at you, had flowers waiting for me on the table and the whole place was spotless! He helped me put you to bed and then we talked and cuddled on the couch.

We all had a good night of sleep and I woke up refreshed. We had a doctor’s appointment for you (check up your weight and height) and although you’ve gained 4.5lbs in the last month, the doctor wants to see you again next month. Ugh! Like I only have to do that with my life, going to doctors appointments to weigh and measure you. By the way, apparently you grew 6cm in the last month also… My guess it that last month’s measurement was wrong. It puts you back into the giant category at the 90th percentile, but you’re still at the 50th percentile for your weight.

After the appointment, I went grocery shopping to buy some fresh veggies. I was surprised to step on the scale and see that I had lost weight as I was expecting to have gained a bit while away. 🙂 I am now 12lbs lighter than I was BEFORE I got pregnant with you! That means I’ve lost 37lbs in the past 10 months! Yay me!

We came home, fed you lunch and you went for a long nap while I cooked and unpacked our bags, went through my mail (bills only, I’ll read the magazines later) and tried to relax a bit. I was thinking of going for a walk with you when you got up, but you were all stuffed up and runny nose, so I thought better of it and decided to stay home with you and take it easy for the afternoon. You went to bed without any fuss and hopefully, you’ll sleep through the night again tonight. You haven’t given me many full nights of sleep while we were away and I need to catch up a bit on lost sleep.

I just finished (finally) putting pictures (of you) in the magnetic frames we had on our fridge and will look into the cd that came with my Vita-Mix! I played around a bit with it this morning and I can already tell, I’m in love! It works beautifully and is a breeze to clean! I can’t wait to use it to create more healthy and tasty recipes!

Sleep well my lovey and I hope you feel better in the morning!

Love,
Mom & Dad Xxo

Kingston wrap-up and more traveling

Sweet Rina,

We left Kingston (and your Grandma, Nonno and aunt Sandra) yesterday and made our way to Mamie and Grand-Papa. You, once again, did really well during the car ride and I was pretty excited about seeing my parents!

This morning, your Mamie and I had a bit of fun with her wigs while you were napping. Here are the pictures we took of me trying on her different wigs:

This one actually looks like one of my old haircuts!

Hello wings!

Channeling my inner Tina Tuner!

Hmmm. Maybe not!

After we were done fooling around, we went for a lovely walk on the neighbourhood trail and then I did a quick grocery run (and a bit more clothes shopping for you 🙂 ) and came back home and got cooking. I made a lovely, no pasta lasagna. It took a lot of prepping, but it smells lovely and I also made another batch of my no-meat loaf. I have food for the week and I’m good to go!

I had to go for another walk later in the evening as you wouldn’t fall asleep. It had worked, but now the stupid clock that rings every hour in this house got you all riled up again. It’s really too bad as it’s getting late and I’m about to crash into bed myself. Hopefully, you’ll fall back asleep quickly. I’ll try to go settle you now.

Love,

Mom & Dad Xxo

 

Best. Traveler. EVER!!!

Sweet Rina,

You’ve proven yourself as the best baby world traveler, yet again! After being woken up at 0345 without any complaints, you went on to falling asleep on the short plane ride from Victoria to Vancouver. You then slept for 1h30 (I slept too!) from Vancouver to Toronto. You ate like a champ at the Toronto airport and went on to sleep on the plane from Toronto to Kingston, crying only when I inadvertently woke you up as I shifted to re-buckle my seat belt. We had the entire back row of the small plane to ourselves and I had stretched my legs.

You truly are an amazing traveler and make it so easy on me when I’m dreading a long day ahead of us. Everybody was astonished at how quiet you were and how adorable you are. I am one lucky mom!

Also, when we were in Vancouver, I got the best email! I received an email telling me I was the winner of a refurbished VitaMix! As you can see, those things are quite pricey (even if re-furnished). All I had to do was to write an essay telling the people of the Eat to Live website how a VitaMix would help me keep a nutritarian lifestyle. I did so and sent my essay, not thinking anything would come out of it and today, I was informed my essay was picked for one of the VitaMix! I am ecstatic! No more fighting with the blender in the morning for my Green Monsters! That was the beginning of a great trip! Then, I was pleasantly surprised by your Grandma’s desire to help me eat nutritarian while I’m staying with her and your Nonno! I was afraid of falling off the wagon while on my trip, but it looks like the wagon will remain on the rails!

Now, I’m off to try calling your Dad before I crash into bed!

Love,
Mom & Dad Xxo

Run (walk) for the Cure

Sweet Rina,

Today was our Run for the Cure event. You and I managed to raise $645 for the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation! Good job little one! We walked the 5km with some friends from work. It was nice to be surrounded by all these people who cared for the same cause! Your Dad dropped us off close to the start of the event and we walked to meet up with the others. Meanwhile, your Dad enjoyed a relaxing morning at a coffee shop. He wanted to come to our turnaround point to take a few pictures, but we got there before him and he missed us :(, no big deal!

I was very moved to see what some of our fellow teammates had written on their running bibs. You see, you could write the name(s) of the people you were running the race for. On our bib, I wrote “Mamie” and pinned it to your stroller. However, some of our fellow teammates had written “Val’s mom” on their bibs, along with other names and it really touched me and got me teary eyed!

When the walk was over, I texted your Dad to come get us and after dropping you with him at home, I was off to go reunite with our teammates for a lovely brunch. I was a bit disappointed to not find any vegan/vegetarian options on the menu, but I ate some SAD (Standard American Diet) food and could definitely feel it a few hours later. I was hit with a major case of the doozies and wished I could just lie down and nap for a bit, but you wouldn’t let me. Instead, I got to cleaning up the bathroom. Normally, I do this on Mondays, but seeing as I’ll be busy with laundry and packing for our trip, I decided to do it today.

I’ll need to get up at around 3am for our trip so it should make for a really long day for me and hopefully, you won’t be too affected by the change in your schedule. Here’s to hoping you handle the travels well!

Love,
Mom & Dad Xxo

Glorious fall day!

Sweet Rina,

Today was a really sunny fall day and I wanted to go for a stroll (a stroll for you, a workout for me! 🙂 ), but I had to wait until you got up from your nap. I’m not quite sure what’s happening to you lately, but you don’t nap in the mornings anymore and then you napped from 1130 to 1415 today and it’s been like this for the past few days!!! You also skip your afternoon nap. I’m not really worried about it because you’re still sleeping 11h30 every night, so I figure you get more than enough rest in a 24hrs period. You might just be outgrowing your naps, who knows?!?

Anyway… Once you finally got up, I gave you a quick bottle and then propped you in your backpack and we headed out for Swan Lake. I was a bit disappointed because the boardwalk that runs across the lake was closed for renovation 😦 so we had to go around through the streets. Not a big problem in itself, but the view was a lot less pleasant to look at.

We made our way to the top of Christmas Hill just as the clouds started rolling in (of course, they would!), but I still managed to capture a few nice pictures:

Clear view of Mt Baker

Fall day from the top of Christmas Hill

A tree wearing fall clothes, on top of Christmas Hill

You seem to think it's funny that I'm sweating so much!

You're a funny girl, you know that? Always cracking me up!

Showing your lovely toothy grin!

As we were done posing and it was getting a bit chilly since the sun was hiding away, I put you back on my back and we made our way back to the trail around Swan Lake and came back home. Of course, as soon as we settled inside the apartment, the sun came shining out again! I gathered some wood with high hopes of starting a fire once you would be in bed for the night (our fireplace isn’t baby-proof and I don’t trust you enough to light a fire during your waking hours!), but now, I’m too hot, so that won’t happen. At least, we have firewood inside now, for next time!

Overall, it was a lovely day with my lovely girl (you) and I even had time to make a packing list of what we’ll need on our upcoming trip! I’m pretty excited about it! We’ll be spending one week with your Grandma and Nonno and another week with your Grand-Papa and Mamie! I’ll really miss your Dad though, but it should be plenty of fun!

On a side note, I have to admit that I caved in tonight. I was really craving some carbs so I made a toast with some hummus on top after 3 weeks of no carbs whatsoever! Oh well, I’ll be fine!

Love,
Mom & Dad Xxo

Dancing queen!

Sweet Rina,

Here’s what you’ve been up to today: Dancing and standing up all by yourself!

You are my little champion and make my heart swell with pride!

In other news, I’ve been sticking to the nutritarian (no animal product, very little flour, no sugar and very little salt)diet for the past 2 weeks and I’m down 5lbs and have lost 2″ around my belly! The best part, I’m not even hungry and I’ve now know how to recognize cravings vs real hunger. Hopefully, things will keep going that way as I’d like to lose another 25lbs! All good things come to people who persevere, just like you with your standing up!

Love,
Mom & Dad Xxo

Finally!

Sweet Rina,

I had been waiting to see this interview from Dr. Sanjay Gupta with former USA president Bill Clinton about his choice to become vegan for well over 3 weeks now and it is finally available to view online. The Last Heart Attack takes an in-depth look at how a plant-based diet can reverse the effects of atherosclerosis (fat deposits in arteries) and reverse heart disease (as well as diabetes and hypertension, but that’s not mentioned in the video). The special interview had been canceled twice already (1st because of a special on the uprising in Lybia and then, because of a special on hurricane Irene). and I was getting pretty desperate of ever seeing the interview and was therefore very glad that it was made available online! 🙂

I watched it last night with your Dad and I thought it was pretty informative. It all ties in with the information I’ve been reading in Eat to Live about being a Nutritarian vegan. As for how my progress are going being a nutritarian, I lost 4lbs this week and stuck with it all week long except for yesterday. I haven’t had coffee since last Sunday and I’m hoping the headaches will go away soon. The good thing is that I can now make the difference between “real and fake hunger” as well as being able to recognize a craving. Before, whenever I felt a pang, I just ate. I’ve stuck to 3 meals/day all week and never really got hungry. I know I won’t be able to keep it up this weekend as we are visiting with relatives in Vancouver (and I don’t wish to cause any inconvenience), but I,ll try my best to make the best food choices over the weekend.

We’re also planning a little trip to Ikea since there isn’t one on the island and we’ll get some new bedding for our bed and will look for a bookcase for your bedroom.;)

Finally, as promised in my last post, here is the only worthy picture I took of you at the petting zoo! It was fun to go with SuperMama and her SuperGirls and I took some great shots of the girls, which I’ll have to give to SuperMama next time we see her!

You don't look impressed by the goats and wanted to put the wood chips in your mouth. Meh!

Get ready Monkey, we’re hopping on the ferry later this morning and hanging out with relatives! I love long weekends!

Love,
Mom & Dad Xxo

1st day as a Nutritarian and a 10km walk!

Sweet Angel,

Today was my 1st day as a nutritarian. I don’t know if you remember in one of my last post, I mentioned setting new goals for my nutrition and exercise regimen. I’m still vegan and have been (about 90% of the time) since the beginning of April. However, I noticed that lately, I was resorting to a lot of vegan cop outs or helpers (fake meat, tofu, tempeh, etc) and wanted to get myself back on track and eating more fulfilling food whether calorie-wise or nutrition-wise. I’ve read the book Eat to Live by Joel Fuhrman and it rang some bells for me. So today, I’m starting to eat a diet richer in nutrients and lower in calories. So far, I’m adjusting well except for a nagging headache (either caused from soreness in my neck or caffeine withdrawal), but I’m sure it’ll pass!

In order to also get a jump-start on my fitness, I also wanted to go for a walk around Beaver/Elk Lakes. For some silly reason, I kept thinking: “We’ve done plenty of 10km hikes, I should be fine carrying Rina in the backpack.” Although it is true that we’ve done many 10km hikes, I forgot that your Dad usually carry you for half the hike! When I reached 3km, I was already getting tired and kept on wondering why. I couldn’t understand how come I was so tired so early in the 10km! Oh well, I managed to get us back to the car once we completed the loop and all I can say is “My legs are tired!”

I think you were also tired as your eyes were heavy while you were taking your nighttime bottle. I’m glad all the cleaning and dishes are done and your Dad is home early from work. I can now relax on the couch next to my hubby and watch TV!

Love,

Mom & Dad Xxo