i'm not a fan of hallowe'en ...

... but he is an awfully cute engineer!

playing in leaves makes happy boys

4 weeks to go!

rainbow cake and the one month countdown

• Today marks exactly one month from our tentative Birth-Day ... as the c-section has been decided upon for the morning of November 23rd. Tomorrow I'll wake up and say "Now ... it's less than a month." I'm pretty sure that besides washing up the baby clothes and getting a few things baked and tucked away in the freezer I'll realistically only get one thing done on my before-baby list. Not sure how I feel about that. Though for the most part I'm surprisingly ok with it.
• Sam and I shook hands on both a boy and girl name this summer but about a month later we're back to square one. It's been endless discussions and serious lists since then but we still haven't decided on anything. This is my last baby (oh, yes it is!) and so I want to make sure that I love, love, love the name and it's been especially hard to pick that one girl's name. Oh my, stressful.
• Walter's stitches are out and we can see what we're dealing with now. The door hinge must have taken off a bit of skin as, though it's closed, there still is quite an abrasion. It looks like it's going to be a big scar, at least a deep thick one, which is disheartening and frustrating. I hate having to re-learn that lesson over and over ... that life is not perfect.
• Making good progress on the one project I'm sure (and determined) will get done before Baby: my 2010 blog book through Blurb. This is the third book I've done, archiving my blog into a published book form, and so far it looks fantastic. I spent some time last week reading through the previous years' entries right before and after Henry and Walter's births and I'm so thankful I have those memories and thoughts documented.
• Henry started telling me this week, out of the blue, "Mum, you're my best friend." Oh my, love.
• Henry also talks alot about the baby in his tummy these days too. Apparently he has a yellow baby, Walter has a red baby and I have a black baby. Henry's baby is also very nice and he likes me to put my hand on his belly and touch it, though usually the baby's sleeping at that time.
• One week til November and we still have some leaves on the trees throughout the city, which is lovely. For once they fall and the branches are bare everything just looks so ugly and dismal and barren. Such a long, long winter til the trees bud again in late April or May. It is during those March or April days each year that I really miss the spring season of our West Coast home.
• Oh, and that rainbow cake? I had a wee girls party here last night to celebrate friends Melissa and Carol's birthdays. A wee party but a massive cake! It was fun to pull out that first big slice and surprise everyone with it's beautiful rainbow colours ... a cake I've been wanting to make for quite a few months now. And oh my, yummm ...

one of those days

Yes, it was one of those days today. One that is just as normal and mundane and usual as the rest ... keeping up with the schedule ... making meals, getting Henry off to school, playing with Walter just one on one. And then he somehow trips ever so randomly in the upstairs hallway and falls right into the metal hinge on the closed hallway closet door. And right there ... the day changes. I hate those moments. When it's too late and you can't take it back. A big deep bleeding gash in the middle of his forehead, Mum home alone, little boy hurt and crying. And yet there's lots to be thankful for ... Sam comes home by taxi a few minutes later and knows we have to take him into the hospital. A friend takes time off his work to go pick Henry up at school and takes him home where his wife, my good friend, and their kids are waiting. 2 stitches are needed but the closure is tight and looks to heal up well. And our little big boy does great even though it's all very traumatic and exhausting and painful and strange.

One of those days. I wondered today just how I can possibly take on another child's pain and worries as even the little, mendable hurts like today are just so hard on the parents. Even these little, mendable hurts can make a Mumma cry.

two birthdays, two days apart

birthday party: the people

2 hours of fun, friends and food! Henry and Walter had seven of their 2- and 3- year old friends over for lunch along with their Moms and it certainly was a full and noisy house! We have such a close knit group of friends here in town and we are so thankful to be able to share these special events with them. Just before everyone left we took a group photo of all the kids ... a laughable adventure in itself ... but so worth it! I just kept snapping pictures while Sam and the Moms yelled and whooped and literally jumped up and down to get everyone to look in our direction and to simply stay in their seats. One of the girls said we needed to have had a mirror over top of the kids on the wall so that the photo could have captured how ridiculous we all looked as well, ha! It was a fun, fun party ... thank you to all our friends for coming and for making Henry and Walter's birthdays so special.

Now whose birthday is next, hmm??

happy 2nd birthday to our seriously sweet Walter! xoxo

birthday party: the details

It is dark and the boys are in bed. Tuckered out after an eventful, exciting day. We are very tired too but happy everything went so well ... it was a fun, fun party. And I, thankfully, really wasn't stressed at all! My day by day to-do list from this past week helped a great deal and as long as I just got busy and did it then I knew it would all come together in the end. And yet ... I am glad it's over. October has started afresh and I can finally tackle new projects. It's a good feeling.

I decided in the summer (finally! the big "theme" decision) to have a train party. Specially of course, a Thomas the Tank Engine party. For as much as we have limited the boys' awareness of most of the typical TV characters and Disney movies they are very, very much aware of Thomas and all his friends. Henry can name each and every one and Walter can point out all the right ones in his books - and they both definitely have favorites!

My grand ideas from the summer were realistically narrowed down in the recent weeks and so I never did attempt an actual train cake. Instead, my girlfriend had miniature Thomas game pieces that I simply stuck on top of the kids' cupcakes. Brilliant! Number '2' and '3' sugar cookies were given away as thank you gifts as well as a wooden train whistle ... and everyone was happy. Henry simply wanted cake and balloons all this time, which was easy enough, and apparently all Walter wanted was the icing on his cupcake. No cupcake - just the icing.

See, everyone's happy.
My Happy Birthday gift to my boys. Until next year.