Thursday, April 24, 2014

Showered with Love

When I was home for Easter last weekend, my mom hosted a surprise baby shower with my family and friends on the East Coast! It was such a wonderful surprise and so nice to see everyone.

With the help of a few family members, my mom put together a great spread of afternoon snacks. She used the bunting from our wedding and crafted a sweet mobile centerpiece. My favourite touch was the cut up vegetables in the little baby mason jars!
Little Peanut was spolied rotten with sweet blankets, clothes, books and other baby necessities. I think it is driving a few family members crazy that we're waiting to be surprised on gender, but everything itty bitty is adorable no matter what the colour! My mom made me a beautiful blanket that I will share in a future post, and my Grandmother embroidered a beautiful Peter Rabit quilt that is pictured below!


My sweet girlies were in charge of handing me gifts and made good use of the wrapping accessories. My friend Crystal is due the week after me, so we took a 1st picture of the babies together!


  
The diaper pin game was hilarious. Little Abby had managed to score 3 pins on her own, and then realized a few items were wrapped using a receiving blanket and the same pins! She swiftly took the pins from the gifts to add to her stash, so we had to let her win for creativity! The best part was that she said baby immediately following her win and was then worried she lost it all until we told her the game was over.

Chris was gifted a special shirt to help with dressing the baby!


My friend Caitlin was in on the surprise and made the drive up from Maine to be a part of our Easter weekend!

A big thank you to all my friends and family that came to celebrate and an even bigger thank you to my mom and husband for pulling off such a great surprise!

Wednesday, April 16, 2014

Sale Season

 It's quickly becoming my favourite time of year, the spring antique sale and flea market season!

Here are the dates for the big ones I am planning to attend:

May 3- Our community yard sale (I have two tables!)

On the weekend I was introduced to an entirely new kind of sale: The Mom Sale! I was invited by a friend to a sale she goes to every year hosted by an association of parents of multiples. It is basically an indoor yard sale of kids stuff. I didn't know what to expect, but the deals were great! One of the items I was after was a play gym as I heard these are great for tummy time and early engagement. I picked up the one pictured below for $3!!! After a quick spin in the washing machine and some new batteries, it's as good as new.

Wednesday, April 9, 2014

Packing Light

My sweet friend Les came to visit this weekend and we had an absolute blast. She is one of my comfortable friends, one of those friends you can do nothing with and still have a wonderful time just being together. We went on a few shopping adventures and then checked out a small town nearby for a yummy lunch and some exploring. It was perfect! One of the things I love about her is that she doesn't pack light, she doesn't really even try, which I think is awesome! She brought a few bags of stuff and in one of those bags was a ton of fun and healthy snacks and magazines (since we love reading magazines). Here is just a taste of all the snacks that came with her!


Thanks for a wonderful weekend my friend, I can't wait to see you again soon! xo


Monday, April 7, 2014

Diaper Delivery

I have been doing a lot of research when it comes to anything baby related. Although I feel I am becoming more and more decisive as we continue to purchase or add items to our registry, I know I have been driving my husband crazy with my analysis paralysis. When I learned I was pregnant, one of the first things that I spent time considering and researching was the option of cloth diapering. I had a feeling it would take some time to get my husband to buy in, so I wanted to make sure I had my facts straight and that the story was convincing. I apologize in advance for the length of this post, but I have become fairly passionate on the subject!

I first heard about what I call the new age of cloth diapering (vs. the prefolds used in the past) on John and Sherry's post here. After reviewing many many different brands and options, we decided to try the bumGenius All in Ones Elemental. This style changed in 2013, and there are a lot of posts comparing and contrasting the new to the old version. I managed to get them on sale from a company called Enfant Style Diapers in Montreal, but have since found a local retailer that sells them a few dollars cheaper than the sale price I paid which is good to know. We have bought 12 so far, but I am thinking 18 will probably be the right number for our family. They arrived this week, and I couldn't have been more excited to pick up the parcel from the post office. I am currently in the process of prepping them, which for these organic babies means washing them 6 times prior to using them to build up absorbency. We won't be using them on our baby right away, as this version doesn't typically work well for newborns. They are designed for children 7-35lbs, but I am thinking the 10lb mark is a good milestone.



Based on the research I've done, here's what I think so far about cloth diapers:

1. With everything parent and baby related, you need to do what works best for your family and your kid. Just because these are the diapers I've chosen, it doesn't mean they're going to fit my baby perfectly, and I may need to consider other options once we've tried them out. 

2. We're going to use cloth diapers when it's convenient, which means they will pretty much be used in our home. In the beginning when the baby is small and we're operating on no sleep and learning how to feed, it does not make sense (for our family) to attempt to add one more stress (and several loads of laundry) into the mix. We will transition to cloth when we're ready. If we are going on overnight trips, we will bring disposables. 

3. The up front cost of cloth can be overwhelming (we paid $300 for the lot above), but if you plan to cloth diaper your kid for at least a year (two is even better) or you plan to have another child- the savings can be significant. This was a bit surprising to me; I thought cloth would be hands down cheaper in all scenarios, but if you are planning to only have one child and your daycare will not support cloth, it may be more cost effective to go with disposables (as long as you're always buying on sale). I found these posts to be pretty helpful to breakdown the various costs: 1, 2.  

4. There are tons of ways to save money in this arena. If you're buying new, there are a few budget friendly options available on the market- these two got the best reviews from what I read: Kawaii and Glow Bug. The used cloth diaper market is HUGE, and there are tons of great deals on Kijiji if you're open to buying used. I actually found a lot of 24 of the version I bought on Kijiji for $450. Chris was not on board with buying used diapers, so we opted to buy new, but that option is definitely available and viable!

5. Both parents need to be on board to make this work. Chris was apprehensive in the beginning, but I think my passion for the subject, as well as the fact that I am the primary laundry doer in our household won him over. One of the main reasons for choosing an all in one style vs. pocket or envelope was just how easy and user friendly it is as well as its similarity to disposables. The cost savings as well as the reduced chances of diaper rash and the fact that cloth diapered toddlers tend to potty train faster were all good benefits in our books. The other thing that I had a hard time believing until I read it everywhere, was that the cuteness factor of cloth diapers can often win family members over. At first I thought that was silly, now that I have received my adorable diapers in the mail, I can see their point and I'm ready to get people on board!

Five long-winded points are probably enough for now. I will keep you posted on our adventures of cloth diapering once we actually begin! I know there are tons of resources out there, and I hope this ends up being useful for someone else. I will leave you with one last great resource: a chart detailing all the best detergents to use for cleaning cloth diapers!  I bought a can of Nellie's Laundry Soda yesterday to get started. Tip for Canadian Moms- Homesense and Winners are a great place to find this cheap!

Wednesday, April 2, 2014

Bad Boy-Cat

This is a story of Boy-Cat being bad. He has recently taken to testing our limits (we think he knows there's a little one who will consume all of our attention on the way). He has been spending too much time devising plans of getting himself on top of the cupboards no matter the obstacles we put in his way. The other night he attempted to make a jump that was just too high, luckily I was right there and able to catch him literally by the fluff. It was a very scary moment. We have since reinforced our obstacles, and now he just cried wishing that he was on his cupboard with the view!


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