So I’ve come into a bit of money and been doing some shopping. I’m trying not to get too carried away and am putting a good chunk of it on my credit card, some aside for Christmas shopping, and money towards a possible road trip in October. Meighen doesn’t really need anything – she’s got lots of clothes and doesn’t play with toys just yet. That somehow hasn’t stopped me from dropping $150 on baby stuff. Toys-R-Us has a big “baby days” sale on right now. If you buy two can Nestle formula you get a $10 gift card for the store. On specially marked tins you also get a coupon for Blockbuster for two free new release rentals and a package of popcorn. So, I bought four tins and got $20 in gift cards. When I went back this weekend to get the third and fourth tin they had a mega two-day sale on diapers! Ka-ching! A 112 pack of diapers for $15 (marked down from $25) so I bought four packages, haha. Hopefully she doesn’t outgrow them before we can use them all. I also picked up six large bottles since she sometimes drinks more than five ounces at a time and that’s all our current bottles hold. I kind of cheaped out on the large bottles (plastic Gerber) so I may exchange some for the glass ones. Hopefully we have enough formula to do her a month and diapers for two months! Since I’m on mat leave I now pay attention to the flyers we get in the community paper and shop around for all the sales.
Today we did dim-sum with my sister (yum yum dim sum). It was Meighen’s first time, but not her last. When I was pregnant and we were checking out Sears last fall, I saw a pair of training chopsticks for kids – how sweet is that! Since then I haven’t been able to find them anywhere (no Wal-mart, Toys-R-Us or Sears!). We were heading up to the Vaughan Mills mega mall to hit Bass Pro so we stopped in at Baby-Land. It was a fantastic store full of everything you could imagine for babies. Thing is, everything was WAY overpriced. I saw a package, a single package of wipes, for $25! What the hell! They were also selling a single glass Evenflo bottle for $15 when you can get the same thing at Wal-Mart for $4. Crazy! Anyways, they did have the chopsticks so I grabbed them to put away till she’s old enough to use them. When I was cashing out I noticed they also had little two ounce food containers that you can freeze and microwave. I bought a few packages of those. They’ll come in super handy when Meg starts on big girl food in a few months. I’ve heard that ice cube trays do the same thing but they seem better off for mushy fruit and veggies. These containers come with lids so I think it’d hold up a bit better than uncovered cube trays – we’ll have to wait and see.
Yesterday we went to Kelsey’s with Pere (Ben’s dad) for lunch. Our waiter was a newbee. He was trying his best but really lacked in personality. It was funny though, he gave us a card with our bill that was handwritten. “You win the Kelsey’s award for the most well behaved and quietest baby.” It’s true! Meg’s awesome when we go out. We were out and about for six hours today and she didn’t fuss till we were almost home. She’s always been good as gold in restaurants and stores. Hopefully that trait will continue though her toddler years. Wishful thinking I know.
2008-09-12 (baby has arrived)
Keeping baby feet warm
The last few weeks I’ve been trying to get Meighen to wear things on her feet since Fall is coming up quick. She seems to be ok with socks meaning she doesn’t freak when wearing them BUT she kicks them off in no time. We don’t have any shoes for newborn, they’re all quite large for her. There’s one pair of bunny slippers that fit her but they too don’t stay on long. We were given a few pairs of Robeez baby shoes as gifts. At first I thought they were a bit unusual looking but I thought I’d try them on today. They’re awesome! She hasn’t been able to kick them off all day! Genius idea. I’m lucky to have three different colours: pink with lambs, purple with butterflies and white with ladybugs - a pair for every outfit, tee hee. I can’t wait till she fits into the moccasins Grammy bought her. That’ll be cute (and comfy for Meg!).
It’s been a good week - we finally got out of the house! We’ve been staying in mostly out of my laziness but times are changing. Early this week we walked over to Wal-mart, did some shopping and stopped at McDonald’s for lunch – a two hour trip. Wednesday Ben had the boys over for D&D so I took Meg shopping for a few hours. Yesterday we went downtown to my company to have lunch with a couple of the girls. After we went back to the office and hung out for a bit catching up on all the recent changes. We then went to Ben’s office and hung there for an hour or so. When we got back we walked over to the grocery store to get some things for tonight’s dinner – that was an hour trip. Tomorrow we’re seeing Pere (Ben’s dad) and Sunday we’re dim summing with Auntie Julie and visiting with Ben’s friend afterwards. Our weekends are pretty full till after Thanksgiving. Now if only I can get motivated to start sorting the basement.
2008-09-08 (baby has arrived)
10 weeks...
Meighen is 10 weeks old now. This past week she’s started drooling. Now that there’s excess liquid she’s making bubbles. It’s kinda cute but I’m always wiping her mouth, heh. Another new thing for Meg is watching TV and computers. Before she ignored them but now that her sight is better and her little mind is developing she’s quite taken by them. It could also be the light, she loves lights and bright things. Meggy also loves to sit up. She’s no where near ready to do so on her own but she loves it when we sit her up and she seems to accept being in her Bumbo for short periods of time. She’s taking shorter naps during the day and going down around 10:30 – 11:30 pm for at least 7-9 solid hours. She must have Mommy’s sleep gene.
I’ve been trying to get a video of her smiling. We play a little more each day and she’s all smiles, till I pull the camera out. Then she’s more interested in the little black box and not what Mom is doing. One day I will get it!
2008-09-01 (baby has arrived)
Meighen is two months old!
My little girl is two months old now (9 weeks). We had our monthly check up last Friday and she’s doing great. She’s up to 10 lbs 12 oz and is 23.5” tall. I question the height since she was 23” last month. Surely she’s grown more than that! She also had her first round of immunizations. It was harder on me and Ben than it was her. She only cried for a few minutes and was easily calmed after snuggling with Mom. She slept most of it off on the ride to Grammy’s but I think it upset her tummy for a couple days as there was more spit up than normal. While we were at the doctor I had my post-partum check up. Everything’s ok. My blood pressure is still slightly elevated but on a good note I’ve lost ALL the baby weight already!! I’m back down to my pre-pregnancy weight. I’m hoping to keep it up and hopefully lose another 50 lbs. I’d like to lose more but 50 is a good start.
Grammy's was good. We got to take in a movie (Death Race), sleep without worrying about Meg, chill in the pool with alcoholic beverages and swing by the amazing second hand baby store to pick up a stroller. While we love the Graco Snap-and-Go stroller frame for the carseat I wanted something more robust that she can lay down in while we walk around the neighbourhood. They had an amazing Graco super duper stroller for cheap but it didn’t collapse easily, wasn’t compact when collapsed, Meighen couldn’t lay all the way down in it, and the handle didn’t flip from front to back – all features I really wanted. It’s important I can handle collapsing it and getting it in the car when I’m on my own. We settled on an older Peg Prego model that’s not as snazzy and pretty as the newer ones but it has everything I wanted and was really clean - for $75 we can’t go wrong.
Last week we swung by Ben’s brothers for a visit and to check out some baby clothes. Out of four boxes we took two. I don’t think Meggy needs any more clothes till she’s at least a year old (maybe older). We’ve got a number of boxes cleaned, folded and ready for her to grow into. They’ve also got a play saucer (not sure of that’s what it’s called) and a crib aquarium that we can have. Oh, and we got a box of toys too! Meg is certainly well taken care of through our families.
I started looking into daycare the other week (not sure if I already mentioned). Can you believe that daycare in downtown
Toronto is $1400 a month!?! That’s for an infant to attend full time. Good god. It gets cheaper as she gets older (18 months +) We can sort of afford that, it’s about what I’m losing each month being on mat leave but it wouldn’t leave us with very much to put away in savings. We can’t do daycare closer to the house since we’re gone almost 12 hours a day between work and the commute. Our best option is to bring her with us downtown each day to avoid paying the hefty fees if we’re late getting her. This way she’s only in daycare from 7:45 am – 5:30 pm vs 6:45 am – 6:30 pm. Our neighbour (who we adore) mentioned she might consider taking in a kid or two to bring in some extra cash (her husband is the sole salary in the household and they don’t have kids). This is the perfect solution for us. I’ll be sure to ask her about it next time we do tea. Another option we’re considering is moving and getting out of the city. Our money will go so much further anywhere outside of
Toronto . If we relocate closer to my folks I can probably get away with working part-time (if Ben get’s a great job) and Grammy would look after Meg on those days. This way I’d be able to mostly raise her myself and when I do have to work at least she’s with family. We’re totally considering it – we’d get a bigger and better house, taxes are cheaper, automobile fees are cheaper, the air is cleaner, smaller class sizes when Meg’s in school, and we’d be able to have more “extra” money for adult toys and family vacations (something we do without right now).
That's about it for this week (if it wasn't long enough already). Lots to do around the house this week to get ready for our annual BBQ. We've got 12 people coming next weekend to squeeze in one last hurrah before fall arrives.
