Away we go again!

Matt took a holiday day on Friday giving us a four day weekend. Initially we had planned to go up and explore the North Canol road. However, going through my house I realized we were very short on groceries, diapers, cat food and a number of other things. Matt will be on call for the two weekends in a row are this one and then we leave for a two week vacation to see my parents and a week of camping and fishing with them at Francis Lake here in the Yukon.

So the plan has changed! Now we will spend Thursday and Friday going down the South Canol road. We will fish, play in puddles, spend the night somewhere along the way, and enjoy one of our favorite roads in the Yukon. Nothing like spending a Canada Day out in the Yukon wilderness with family!

Saturday and Sunday will be spent in Whitehorse. Matt wants to look around for a smaller quad trailer that we can haul down the back roads and I want to hit some garage sales. There is the usual shopping and I have packed the swimsuits in case we want to visit the pool. And the really exciting part is that I get to go to the movies with a friend and leave my men in the camper! I am so excited! So is Matt because this means he doesn't have to take me to the show (it is the Twilight movie- I know, I am a total geek but whatever! hehehe).

The North Canol will have to wait until August to be explored. At least then it will be hunting season and we can bring the guns and quads with us.

Enjoy your Canada Day and weekend everyone!

Newest Sewing Project

I was looking around on the Etsy website last night and came across a neat pouch/purse/thingymabob. Tonight I made up my own pattern and gave it a try with the scraps I have around in my sewing room. It turned out pretty good for a first attempt! I will make a couple of small changes on the next one, but I think this will be a nice way to use up the heap of scraps I have been accumulating for the last few years.

**Oh the joy of having my evenings back so I can go down into my sewing room!!

****Plus with all of the sunlight I can actually go into the basement in the evening without fear of zombies!

Seal with navy blue split cow hide

From the side.
For the next one I will shorten the leather going over the top and
figure out some kind of strap for it.

Open.
Wow. From this picture I see I was nowhere close to centre when attaching the button strap! Better fix that.

A Little Sad

On the weekend I went through the boys closets and cleaned them out. Broken toys were tossed, other toys put in a box to give away and some were put into rubbermaids to be brought out again in a few months to make them new and exciting again. Clothes too small for Cavan were put into a box for a friend to sort through for her baby girl. Clothes too small for Hunter were sorted with some going straight to Cavan since he is growing like a weed and the rest to the same friend for her little boy.

I am not the type of person who needs to hold on to a lot of mementos from my past. So far, for the boys all I have kept are their wrist bands from the hospital, sleepers that Matt bought them, and some fur booties and mittens. Everything else has been given away because I feel better about these things being put to good use instead of collecting dust in my basement.

But then I came to the baby quilts. Cavan has moved up to a large fleecy blanket that he is in love with and sleeps with every night. These quilts were handmade with love from friends and family and I just couldn't part with them. I now have an entire rubbermaid of quilts and I have no clue what I will do with them. Maybe I could find someone to somehow fashion them into two large blankets for each of the boys. I know someone out there could really use them, but I just cannot part with them and it is such an odd feeling.

Then I was brought to tears when I pulled out my infant packing shirt. Hunter was packed around in it for the first six months of his life. Cavan was as well, but not as much as Hunter. Learning how to amaaq my children was something so special I learned during my time in the arctic. To have your baby ride along on your back, snug and warm, and to feel their chest against your back as they breathe is such a beautiful experience. I realized I will never get that opportunity again since we will not be having anymore children. It is now in the rubbermaid with the quilts and I know that I will never be able to part with it. Perhaps I will be able to amaaq my grandchildren in it when I am old. Cavan still rides in my packing vest made for larger babies, but it just isn't the same as when they are tiny. I was surprised at how emotional I became over a small piece of fabric.

It is a really good thing I sent Matt to the vet to be fixed a couple of months ago, or else I would have been asking him for another baby right about now! Maybe I should start asking for a puppy instead.

Thankfully my amouti is big enough to still even carry Hunter in it if I wanted to this winter! I will be packing Cavan as much as I can, although I doubt it will be much since he is Mr. Independent and wants to walk everywhere himself.

I wonder if one day I will be kicking myself for not hanging on to more of the baby stuff. But I have pictures, videos, and am printing out this blog year by year as hard cover books that document all of the craziness of our lives with little boys. I hope that will suffice.

So parents... what baby stuff are you holding onto? Any of it bring you to tears lately?

For Tina

Check out what Cavan is wearing, Tina!! Those pj's are going another round.

Smiles

These smiles make my day completely worth while.

Sleep Sense: Two Weeks

I have spent the last weeks wishing we had done this sooner. We are sleeping! All of us!

We have stuck to our evening routine and bedtime at 7:30 for the last two weeks (and as close as possible while camping) and it has paid off in full. Cavan is now sleeping straight until 5:30 every morning and Hunter will sleep until 6 or 6:30. We have to go into Hunter's room a couple of times during the night because he gets uncovered and cold then calls in his sleep for us to cover him up. He doesn't even seem to wake up during these times. A couple of times he has called for us to take him to go pee, but then he goes right back to sleep.

Hopefully in time Cavan will make it to 6am, but for now I am pretty happy. That is ten hours straight he is sleeping. He is also napping in his crib twice a day. The morning nap is usually short at about 20 minutes and then the afternoon nap is around an hour.

I am finally feeling well-rested. That in combination with my walking and weight loss has given me a lot more energy. Amazing what a full nights sleep can do for a person!

Forty!

This morning I hopped on the scale rather excitedly to see if my walking this week had paid off. And it had!!

I have now lost 40lbs since the start of January. That 50lb goal for the end of July looks like it just might happen. And I am completely blowing my goal of 50lbs for the entire 2010 year out of the water.

Since Monday I have walked 22km all the while pushing a stroller with my little lead weights inside. I am so proud of myself for getting out there every day this week, even in the crappy weather and a bit of rain.

Another high point of the week was tonight. I made a small chocolate cake tonight for Hunter's birthday. We each had a piece and then I had Matt promptly take it over to another family for them to finish it off. Otherwise I would have eaten it all tonight. That is a huge step for me as a binge eater.

My reward for hitting 40lbs? Blowing lots of my husbands money at an awesome garage sale this evening. Fantastic day all around!