How Does A Baby Grow?

Little by little - in a blink!

What a great day!  Today we celebrated our little man's first birthday - what a joy he is and we are thankful for the friends and family who helped us celebrate and who sent us messages.  It really does take a village to raise a child, and we're grateful for all of you who are a part of Nolan's world.

I'll post photos of the day once I've had a chance to see what we actually have on the camera - I turned it over to Madeline while I brought the cake out and Sean had Nolan; she took quite a few throughout the party, so I'm not sure what I'll find.  It's nice to not be not be the one behind the camera sometimes, especially when you know the event will still get covered!

For now, here are a bunch of my favorites - one from every two weeks all year long.  Enjoy!

brand new

two weeks

one month

one and a half months

two months

two and a half months

three months

three and a half months

four months

four and a half months

five months

five and a half months

six months

six and a half months

seven months

seven and a half months

eight months

eight and a half months

nine months

nine and a half months

ten months

ten and a half months

eleven months

eleven and a half months

Maddy's Fundraiser

Madeline's class is going to Winnipeg in February for Festival du Voyageur, and they have asked parents to help with fundraising; planning steak nights and stuff like that.  This is my contribution.  If we raise more than what M needs, the rest will go to the class fund.

Maddy's Fundraiser

My Mom likes to sew, and she is offering the proceeds from all January sales

to go towards my class trip to Winnipeg.

Magic Bags: $12 Wheat filled microwavable bags, also great stored in the freezer.
Perfect for around the shoulders, or to throw in the foot of your bed.  18”x6” 

Coffee Cozies: $5

 

Bean Bags: $5 for set of 3.  Perfect for juggling and a million other games.

To Order:  Please email Carolyn at followandlead@gmail.com.
You can pick colors and we will make arrangements to get them to you.

Thank You!!  

Added:  These are the coffee cozies currently in stock, and the options for magic bag covers; now it's easy peasy to order by number!!  There are more coffee cozies on the way in brighter fun colors, too.

 

Matchy Matchy

Tuesday night, at the beginning of small group, we were all standing around the kitchen fixing our drinks.  Someone commented on these new mugs that we got for Christmas from Mom & Dad, and I said I liked the green one (that I was using) best.  I looked down and noticed that I was wearing a green shirt - then looked at Lori, using the purple mug - and wearing a purple shirt, and then at Byron, using the blue mug - and wearing a blue shirt.

The next morning, I was telling Madeline about the matching mugs and shirts while making myself a coffee - in the red mug - and yes, I was wearing a red shirt.

Relationship

A couple of times over the years I have chosen a word for the year, inspired originally I think by Ali Edwards and the fad that her 'One Little Word' is: (check out her post of all the words that people have chosen this year).  Picked in January, it's a word to focus on through the coming year, something that helps you stay on track to become the person you are wanting to be.  In 2010, my word was core; in 2011, abide.  Last year I didn't choose one, but I think one chose me: mothering.  There was the balance of maintaining a marriage and parenting a teenager as well, but mostly meeting with a positive attitude and love all the demands of a newborn.  It was a great year.  Yes, it was challenging at times - traveling, sleeping - but overall wonderful.  The outside myself part of the year centered largely around neighbors, and the creative side was sewing and making an album, Project Life style, for Nolan's first year.  I enjoyed all that, too.

This year?  I think it will be a lot of the same, but I also think that this year won't be just all 'eat sleep poop' and I want to make sure I know where it is I want to be going; who it is that I want to be; what it is that matters most to me.  I looked over the list of goals I have stored handy on my phone, and the word for this year that seems obvious to me is RELATIONSHIP.  I want everything I do to be contributing to building relationships; with my husband and kids, family, friends, neighbors, play date moms and book club girls...  The relationships are the point.

What is your January habit?  Do you choose a word?  Make resolutions? Set goals?

Homemade Christmas... Not This Year!

With the wee man around, I made the easy decision that I would not be making the majority of the Christmas presents this year.  I don't know that I've ever made more than I've bought, but I do like to make as many as I can.  This year, not only did I just shop, but I shopped online for a bunch of it... so easy!! 

I did, however, have a big sewing session the week before Christmas.  I posted here about the coffee cozy I made myself, and here are the 10 I whipped up for my friend Holly:

I didn't have time to quilt them all like I did with mine, but had enough fun fabric that I made them doublesided - still works and looks great.

And the second side...

I will sew up a few more when I have some time; if you'd like one (for $4) let me know your favorite color and I'll make one up special for you.  Shipping will be way more reasonable than it would be for a magic bag, too...

What Christmas Looked Like

Merry Christmas, everyone! I hope you all had time with family, time to relax, and time to think about the Baby who came to be Savior of the world; the Savior or you and of me.

We made it to Winnipeg for a few days and had a great time with all my family there.  Mom asked if I had any use for this old sleigh that came as a fancy gift package once upon a time.  I said no, but that we should do a little photo shoot with Nolan before she got rid of it...

I think this one was my favorite!

Have to get a cousin shot!

Fun to see the next littlest one playing with Nolan, and getting a glimpse of what he might be like in a couple of years.

Christmas morning!

Nope - didn't plan that.

Her best reaction may have been when she opened up this onesie - she's been wanting one for a while...

Here are the cousins from Sean's side - we had the Ward family Christmas yesterday out in Balgonie.  Sickness kept some away at the last minute, so we had only six of the 11 cousins.

I think he likes it!

A few family additions to announce!  This shot was taken two years ago; Lynsey found an engagement ring in the pocket of the jacket she got for Christmas, so this year, there is a new Mrs. Ward!

This is the other addition - sweet, hey?  Alexa was born November 13, and we were so disappointed to not get to meet her yesterday.  Hopefully they're all feeling better soon, and hopefully we get to meet her soon, too.

I'll leave you with this one that we used for our Christmas card this year - all the best to you and yours, and may 2013 be a great one!

Merry Christmas!

A quick catch up before I snag a nap - little man was up OFTEN last night.  Forgot that he doesn't need mom to get to sleep after days of holidaying and lots of mom putting him to sleep.  We'll get back on track... This too shall pass.  :)  (It just means that I need to nap so I don't lose it on either child!)

A few highlights:

Doing dishes with a new dishcloth from my sister and having the water turn blue.  Getting new kitchen stuff from two sisters and having them match.  That and new dishes from IKEA = mini kitchen reno!

Calling Nolan to open his gift from Auntie Carla and having him run over and use it as a stool to climb on the couch.

Nephew Zach smitten with Mad-a-den...

Silas and the ugly Christmas sweater.  You wore it so well.

Dave telling the (toy) story of Woody's missing hat on repeat.

A visit to Winnipeg's new IKEA.  (Not so great - wanting to nurse Nolan part way through and finding the awesome family care room at the end of the visit.)

Nolan wearing red & white striped jammies Christmas morning that Zach wore his first Christmas.

Madeline getting to visit with her friends at church as well as a whole day at the cousin's house.

Sean and I getting each other 'just right' tops.

A super pro reflector shield for my camera from Sean.

Madeline's reactions when she opened her footed 'onesie', her bright yellow Aero sweatshirt, and her Beauty & the Beast tickets.  Thanks, family!

Just hanging out with family made the trip to Winnipeg with an 11 month old worth it.  So glad the celebration of our Savior's birth has turned into a tradition where we spend time with those we love, enjoying and gifting each other.

The Social Media Roundup

I've noticed myself making decisions lately where to share what...  I'm not on the computer much, and rarely go on Facebook on my phone (I can't turn off all the silly game notifications and it's a pain to scroll through the junk to find stuff I actually want to see), but I know that's where the most people see stuff, so when I took this photo, that's where I shared it.  It got 46 'likes' - that's maybe the most attention anything I've posted has got other than Nolan's introduction!

Twitter is fun and actually the source of most of my news.  Yesterday Sean and I were mentioned in a tweet by my friend Lori (the one with the orange star, because I 'favorited' it):

We then tried to get Nolan to say Anna, but he's not there yet.  She is 4 1/2 months older, after all.  I showed him the picture I took in the nursery that morning to help him, but he just kissed my phone instead!  They are pretty cute together.  #littlefriends

Twitter also played a role in getting our streetlight fixed...

SaskPower tweeted a link to their site where you can report a burnt out streetlight - I retweeted it to Sean, who replied that he already had reported it... twice.  So SaskPower, seeing this negative publicity, got right on it, replying and promising results, and it did happen - about two weeks later.  I took this from the front window and tweeted that, too.

I shared this photo on facebook on Saturday and got myself a job! 

The longer story: We are often at the soccer facility to watch Madeline play, and there's a Tim Horton's there, which we sometimes make use of.  Tim's doesn't have coffee sleeves, though, and I thought I would make myself one to keep in the diaper bag so we didn't have to get a double cup each time.  I ended up using it for the first time the other day, and posted a pic on Facebook, with the caption "First time using the rad little coffee sleeve I made. It's making me happy." and a friend asked if I could make her some to give as Christmas gifts.  I had been thinking of sewing more of them, but hadn't found time yet... I will post pictures here when they are done, and add them to the shop, too.  Here's a shot from the original photoshoot:

While Facebook and Twitter get their share of attention, my favorite place to share stuff is right here... and as soon as I am done wrapping gifts and baking, I will be back, showing and telling.  I do appreciate you being interested in our lives and in the stuff I post; thanks for coming along for the ride!

Our Favorite Muffins

According to the date stamp on this well used recipe, this has been a staple in our family since 2002.  Originally from this recipe on allrecipes.com, I only modified to add chocolate chips.  I wanted to print out another copy of the recipe both to get a cleaner copy and to lay it out exactly the way I do it, so I thought I'd share it here with you!

Chocolate Chip Banana Crumb Muffins

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt

3 bananas, mashed
3/4 cup white sugar
1 egg, lightly beaten
1/3 cup butter, melted

1 cup chocolate chips

1/3 cup brown sugar
2 tbsp flour
1/8 tsp cinnamon
1 tbsp butter

In a medium bowl, mix together the first four ingredients.
Preheat oven to 375 and spray the muffin tin (or line with papers)
In a large bowl, mix together the second bunch of ingredients.
Mix dry and wet ingredients together and add chocolate chips.
Spoon batter into the muffin cups.
Prep topping by mixing the brown sugar, flour and cinnamon in a small bowl, then cutting in butter till crumbly.  Sprinkle topping on muffin batter.
Bake for 18 - 20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean.

Enjoy!!

Miscellany

Madeline - Soccer is keeping us going 3 times a week or more; good exercise for her and she's really enjoying being on this team.  This weekend there is a tournament - she had a game at 6 last night (a blowout loss of 8-0!) then went off to youth at the church where they decorated for Christmas.  Today's first game was at 7 am (I'm still not fully awake) and they won 3-1.

Nolan - Clapping, waving, whistling, temper showing, 10 months old.  Loves to knock down towers, carry around Dad's lunch bucket, and play with water in the sink.  Eats his veggies well and loves meat; still eats pureed stuff / applesauce / yogurt, but loves finger food he can manipulate himself.

Scrapbook - I'm keeping Nolan's album up to date & am really loving the way it's turned out.  I have to decide if I want to keep going this way (Project Life style) since my original plan was to do this for his first year.  I may scale it back and do highlights of each month rather than each week - that would still be a treasure, and not ending up needing a whole new bookshelf.

Crafty McCrafterpants - I've had the sewing machine out and have 4 different projects on the go... the back to my big denim quilt, a new I spy quilt (found the free pattern here), bean bags (to use up beans from last year's thanksgiving decorating), and tag blankies (because I saw a great deal on ribbon on this site and thought I'd pick it up for my stash...).  Then there are always more magic bags to sew.  I'm thankful for that little sideline business!

Online Shopping! - I've ordered more stuff from online lately than I ever have before.  Scrapbook paper and ribbon and Christmas presents from Steal Network, fabric and Christmas presents from Etsy, and more Christmas presents from Christianbook.com.  So good to have a few things checked off already, and without having to do any car seat wrestling!

Weather - It's a winter wonderland here.  I heard the other day that we already have more snow here than we did all of last year. 

Read it!

You can read that title as 'I read the book,' which I did, and also as 'you should read it,' because that's what I'm recommending.  I'll admit I wasn't sure where he was going with the first few chapters, but wow.  Gripping.

Thanks to Catherine Friesen for the suggestion!

Give a Book a Chance

I was in the middle of two books the other day.  One I had picked from the library because it was set in a different time and place, and we had just finished a great one like that for book club (Cutting for Stone).  It was interesting for the first couple of chapters, then got pretty tedious and strange, so I left it and started another one.  This one was recommended by a friend, so I was expecting a winner...  It, too, was a little hard to get into.  But because it was recommended, I thought I'd stick with it and see how it turns out; before I did, though, I went back to the first one, and give it a chance, too...  I finished that one, and am farther into the second - the first, while I would not highly recommend, did pull together somewhat satisfyingly.  The second is showing more promise - I'll wait till I finish it to declare it recommendable or not.

On a different level, we just got these winners from the library and I highly recommend them!

The Influence of Parents: A Spiritual Treasure

Over the long weekend, M spent a night over at her Grandpa's.  She came home the next day with a treasure:  One of my old Bibles!  I guess at one point between moves we left some books there.  She had been going through the bookshelves and brought home Little Women and Jane Eyre, too; some good classics.

I took some photos of all my old Bibles with the set now complete (the one she brought was that second one) and got to thinking about what message they send... I think there's a few, but what impressed me most was about the influence parents have.  Those first three Bibles?  They all have my Mom's handwriting on the dedication page, with my name and the dates of when I was five years old, nine years old, and for my 15th birthday.  They went from the King James to the Children's Living Bible (easier to read), to the New American Standard Bible (best mix between readability and literal translation).  The fourth, the New Revised Standard Version, was new from Neil for our wedding, since the middle one saw me from 15 to 22, including four years of Bible school, and was falling apart, and the last one that I'm using now, is a TNIV (Today's New International Version), from Sean for our wedding, when we both got new ones (also because my old one was falling apart again...)

Parents and spouses - people in your life who should encourage your spiritual self; I'm so glad they did for me.  Thank you.

Madeline got a kick out of the spine that had fallen off and that was stuck as a bookmark in the text: "I will read 3 chapters and a Psalm every day and on Sunday 5 chapters and a Psalm..."  I read that Bible from when I was eight to when I was 15.  I wonder what she thought of that commitment?  I wonder if it made her think about her own commitment to read?  We try to encourage her to read first thing in the day, before she reads anything else just for fun, but you can't be legalistic about something like that.  I just hope and pray that God's Word becomes as important to her as it is to me.  As it always has been to me.

Pray with me, won't you, for our children, that they would have a love for God's Word, a desire to commit both to him and to the good habit of reading it?  I will pray for you as parents, that you would influence your children in a positive way and leave a legacy that lasts.

That's Snow Fun!

Sunday we spent a good chunk out in the back yard, all bundled up.  Nolan didn't show much expression at all - just taking in another new experience.  Madeline tried to get him to make a snow angel, but he might be a little more playful later on...

His swing was piled high with snow, so we just plopped him on top - I think he enjoyed the ride!  That's a great snowsuit - both the hands and feet have flip over ends, so you can use boots and mitts, or just pop them over and let life be easy!  That's how we did it today - I pulled out the wagon and we walked up and down the front sidewalk for a while soaking up the sun.  He thought that was pretty ok.  I sent a photo to fb from my phone if you want another peek at him.

This is from this morning - he got a little cut on his thumb, not sure from what - a paper, maybe?  But there was a little blood so we washed him up (notice the wet jammies) and stuck a bandaid on it.  It kept him entertained for a good 15 minutes before he had it just about chewed right off, and by then it had stopped bleeding anyway.

Thankful for...

Veterans and all those who have sacrificed so we can enjoy peace and freedom.
A day off with the family at home.
Hours playing and enjoying each other.
Bright fabrics.
Online shopping.
Etsy.
Quilts.
A win for M's soccer team.
Sleepovers at Grandpa's.
Brownies and cookies and desserts.
Pinterest and new ideas to try.
Small group friends.
A new niece arriving soon.
"Dada" and "Mama."

Life in the Snow

Here's what I was looking at a moment ago - this is the view from my back door after two days of snow.  There was nothing on the ground when we woke yesterday, and now it feels like Christmas.

I got some great shots of Nolan and the Snow when it snowed earlier this week - that link will take you to see them on Facebook.

I'm feeling quilty these days.  I got a quilting book from the library yesterday, snagged on my way to check out my other books (I keep a list of recommended books on my phone, and found two - looks like some good reading this week!)  This sparked my interest and I started browsing fabric online...

 I tweeted to see where my friends buy fabric online and was sent to Etsy, which I forget has supply stuff like fabric - I always think of it as a 'finished product' marketplace - and I placed an order!  Ah, shopping online.  So great to get stuff in the mail!  I've ordered a few scrapbooking things lately, too.  I ordered from the Surly Sheep shop and got an email that it shipped today.  Can't wait!

Here's another favorite book lately:

We got it from Jamie, an old friend (and blog reader!).  It's been the before sleep story of the week - he always grins at the first picture of a cat and my meow no matter how tired he is.

Madeline has a soccer tournament this weekend, and Nolan and I made it to last night's game and will make it to tomorrow's, but had to miss both of today's.  We did go for lunch with the team and all the other parents, though - it's good to get to know some new people through that.

Well, there you have a slightly scrambled snapshot of life here right now. While N is sleeping and the others are still out, I'm going to go finish sewing up some magic bags and perhaps pull out some material and the quilt pattern I'm thinking of starting...  Have a great weekend!

What is a Colon?

Mom:  "Madeline, you're not moving."  (She was supposed to be cleaning her room.)
M: "Yes I am!  My heart's beating, I'm breathing, and my colon's moving...  What is a colon?"

We made her look it up and read it out loud from the dictionary.  She had to read the word rectum, too!