December

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December started with a pretty big bang this past weekend! First, there was the Santa Pur-suit- a 5k race that’s done all in Santa suits. I signed up for it a while ago and it was a total blast. The weather was cooooold, but there was a little bit of snow, all stuck to the trees which made everything beautiful. The motorists who were waiting for the horde of Santas to pass didn’t even seem put out- they were just bemused at what was probably one of the more surreal events of their day. Everyone was a bit disheveled by the end but it was so much fun.

Later in the evening, Trevor took me to see The Nutcracker in Mississauga! It was a touring company that was performing it, and it was fun. The Living Arts Centre is a really nice venue, convenient to lots of restaurants and shopping, so we were able to wander around and amuse ourselves pretty easily waiting for the house to open.

Then, on Sunday, the Advent Carol service at church, which was really nice. It was super warm though, I was sweating buckets, but I really liked the music we did this year. Super pretty stuff.

Despite all the Christmas season kick-off stuff over the weekend, I haven’t gotten any decorations up yet. Hopefully I’ll get to that soon. 🙂

Swerving right into the oncoming holiday season

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Plowed through most of of November already! I know lots of people like to hold off on holiday celebrating as long as possible, which is fine, but I’m already getting ready. I’ve done nearly all my Christmas shopping, we’re working on Advent music at choir, and we went to the local Santa Claus parade is this weekend!

Today is foggy and the sunlight looks thin and cold, though the temperature is going to be fairly mild. No notable snows yet, but those don’t usually come until the first bit of December.

Wesley and I both picked up a bit of a cold- He’s got snot from his nose to his ankles, and mine is more of a sore throat and desperate need for extra sleep so far. Hopefully we’re both all cleared up soon.

I’m getting used to the idea that I’m heading back to work soon. Nervous about the logistics and the transition, but excited to be working again. Lots of other things to look forward to in the new year as well- my parents are coming to visit in February, and we’re likely heading to Florida in March for a vacation with Trevor’s parents (as soon as dates and details are sorted out). I’ve never been to Florida (despite having been to most of the other states) so I’m excited about that.

End of October updates

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We went to Fort Erie and Buffalo on Friday, so that Wesley could get his “interview” for his NEXUS card. Both Trevor and I have NEXUS cards, and they’re just plain awesome for crossing the border and getting through customs quickly. Traveling with Wesley though, he needed a card too.

As funny as it would have been, they didn’t ask him any questions. 🙂 They did ask us if we had any questions about the program, but since we’ve had cards for a while, we’re pretty well versed at this point. They asked me a few questions, including “Do you own a boat?” which was my favourite.

After we got the paperwork and so on sorted out, we had lunch and then crossed over to Buffalo for a little cross-border shopping. We managed to get most of our Christmas shopping for Trevor’s family done, which was nice and will hopefully make my December a little more relaxed.

Wesley continues to be a huge flirt. A number of different times he has totally derailed something someone has been doing (shopping, eating, etc) just by smiling at them and raising his eyebrows and laughing and generally flirting with them. At the grocery store, at restaurants, it happens all the time. The kid is cute, but distracting!

Hurricane Sandy is turning into a big storm, and we might get some remnants of it here. I’ve been glued to the weather because I find it all fascinating, and I’m also hoping everyone I know who lives on the coast is doing okay.

Babynaut

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So ever since I dubbed myself the Preggonaut when I was pregnant, we called the baby “Babynaut”, off and on. So his halloween costume was a foregone conclusion.

Ready for blastoff!

Pumpkin Patch!

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Trevor and Wesley and I went to the pumpkin patch on Saturday, and it was really fun! We wanted to go someplace new- we’ve been to Snyder’s Family Farm in the past, but it was a fairly long drive and it’s a really big patch, so you have to do a good bit of walking around to find a pumpkin you like.

So we tried a place in St. Clements called Naumans. Much closer to us. And it was awesome! I took Wesley in the carrier, and we didn’t have to do too much hiking to find pumpkins we liked. It didn’t cost to get in, and the pumpkins were nice and cheap (we paid like 8 dollars altogether for ours, I believe). The weather was chilly, but pretty decent pumpkin patching weather!

They’ll sit out on the porch to keep fresh, and we’ll probably carve them the day before Halloween. I’ll post pictures of our costumes soon! 😀

Thanksgiving

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The weekend before this past weekend was Thanksgiving (here in Canada). We went to Trevor’s parents house for Thanksgiving dinner, on Sunday, and it was really nice! Wesley handled the trip better this time than he did the last time we went up, so that was nice. Also, he was able to eat thanksgiving dinner with us. He had potatoes and turnip and some bread and some turkey and all kinds of stuff.

Chris, my brother-in-law, has a great camera, so he has been taking photos when we visit, which is nice. Sometimes he lets me take a picture or two as well. For example, here’s Chris and Wesley!

I’m pretty terrible at photo taking, but it’s still fun to get to use something a bit more high-end than I’m used to. Plus, my kid is a pretty ready subject (when he can keep his tongue in his mouth).

October updates

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I can’t believe it’s already October! The leaves are all changed on the trees, the weather has cooled off and is beautiful, and we’re firmly in the season of pumpkin-flavoured-everything. The summer was nice, hot and fun but not too eventful for once. Here’s some updates about what has been going on over the past little while.

Photographer: Angela Clayfield

Theatre

The Horribly Horrifying Fun House of Death has closed, and it went super well! I was totally hands-off once the show opened, so I don’t know all the details, but everything I heard was that the show went awesome. It was so nice to be able to work on a show without basically giving up my whole life for 2 months, especially since I have a little dude and other obligations to take care of. I didn’t want to just stop doing theatre altogether, especially when it meant working with people who are super awesome.

And don’t they all look so nice in their costumes, and the set was awesome as well! Thanks to Ange for the lovely photo- I wanted to make sure I had a shot of everyone in costume. 🙂

Choir

I went to the Grand Philharmonic Choir’s Sing-in on September 29th, and it was pretty fun. They’re doing the Mozart Requiem this fall, which I haven’t done in quite a while, actually- so it was really fun to sing some bits from it again. It was fun to see all my GPC friends again as well! Their concert is October 20, and will no doubt be awesome.

Church choir has started up again, and that has been nice. We had our first Evensong service last week, and are already hurtling madly toward Advent.

Traveling

No, we’re not planning a big trip or anything, though we are going to the states in a couple weeks, because Wesley needs to have his NEXUS interview! Trevor and I both have NEXUS cards, because we cross the border enough that it was a good idea, but if we want to bring Wesley along, he needs to have one too. Next time we take a trip to or through the US (we often fly from there as it’s much cheaper), our border crossing will be faster!

So we’re planning to take him for his interview then, and do a little cross-border shopping as well (a good time to get Christmas shopping done!) I’m looking forward to it!

Running

I signed up for yet another 5k race- this one is called the Santa Pur-suit, and requires that runners wear SANTA SUITS. This is AWESOME, and I am totally excited about it. It’s December 1st, so a little while away yet, but I can hardly wait. The race is close to my neighborhood, and requires dorkiness, so it’s like it was created just for me. 😀

Baby… or rather, big boy!

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Wesley is 9 months old now. He went to the doctor last week, and he’s now 20 lbs and 13 oz, which is a nice size for a baby his age. He’s nearly 30 inches tall, so he’s above average in that regard for sure. Tall and lean like his dad maybe? We’ll have to see!

He’s definitely starting to look more like a little boy, and less like a baby. For example:

That’s not a baby, that’s totally a big kid! People mistake him as being a year old, because he’s so big.

He likes riding in the grocery cart now, and he loves loves loves to play with the springy doorstop in the office. He likes to make it broing and he’s also managed to twist it off the wall a bunch of times- I find him halfway across the floor carrying it. We like to say that he’s playing us the song of his people, ha.

He’s not walking or really standing up yet or anything, but I don’t really want to speed up his mobility too much either. 🙂 I’m sure I’ll be chasing after him soon enough! He likes to make noise and laugh and wave and give high fives, and while he says hi and mama and dada I don’t think he really knows what any of those mean yet. He has a super ticklish neck (like me!).

He’s branched out a lot in terms of foods he likes- he likes a lot more fruits than he used to, which is nice. He also likes yogurt quite a bit, and meat! He doesn’t eat a ton of meat, mostly fruit/veg/grains, but we do give him tastes of whatever we’re having.

He’s still a pretty easy baby- sleeps well, eats pretty well, plays with toys independently, not a huge crier (though I think he’s working on his next couple of teeth, because he’s crying a bit more the past couple of days). Definitely easygoing though, so I can’t complain. Changing his diaper has gotten to be a struggle though- he hates lying on his back long enough for me to change it. I have to basically distract him with a full-on-broadway-musical of song and dance to keep him there long enough to get a clean diaper on him. I hope that phase ends at some point.

New bed and other hedonism

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Since we moved in together nearly 8 years ago, Trevor and I have not had the most awesome of beds. Our first bed was a futon (which we still have), but it was fairly low, and not super comfortable.

Then, we bought ourselves a proper bed, which we’ve had ever since. It’s quite comfortable, medium firmness and euro-topped and all, but it’s double size. Our apartment at the time was a decent sized one-bedroom, but we didn’t have quite enough space to go for a bigger size.

So we’ve been sleeping in that double bed for quite a while. Staying in hotels while traveling though, we’d gotten some tastes of the king size, and quite enjoyed it. Tons of space to move around. We could hang out with Wesley in the mornings for a morning bed cuddle! With us and the cats in the double, it was starting to look a bit like a clown car compared to the hotel beds.

So we went for it and bought a king size. It’s memory foamy and non-motion transfery and such. We also got some hardcore gel pillows that feel like down pillows without the annoyingness of down.

For the full hotel-like experience, I bought all white linens, too. It was all delivered yesterday. We slept in it last night and it was pretty comfortable! It’ll take a little getting used to though. The pillows are pretty blissful. And the linens. I had a cup of Calming tea in bed last night and it was pure hedonism. After a long bath in my sweet soaker tub. Yeaaaaah. Highly recommended.

bed in bedroom
BAM.

It’s SO huge compared to our old bed. Like, we can barely reach each other. But it’s awesome. Our double bed has been relegated to guest room use:

guest room
Come on over!

And the futon now lives in the office:

office with futon
Seating!

I feel like a dork going on and on about it, but sleeping is a third of our lives and all. Anyone else done a huge bed upgrade like that? How long does it take to really get used to it?

The Horribly Horrifying Fun House of Death

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I just realized that I hadn’t had a chance to post about this much, but I’ve been working on another KWLT show over the past little while. I worked on costumes for The Horribly Horrifying Fun House of Death. The show opened last night! It’s incredibly funny, written by Mat Kelly, an artist/playwright I’ve worked with on a few shows before. The director is one of my favourite people to work with (Carrie McNabb), and the cast are a super awesome group who really do the play justice and then some. They’re amazing.

Because the show is set in the current time period, I was able to do costume sketches using images of modern clothing, which was really fun and a new experience for me- before, I’d sketch in a sketchbook or do renderings in watercolor to illustrate ideas. I used Polyvore, which is a super fun site for creating quick fashion sketches based on existing pieces. I definitely recommend it to costumers- it made idea gathering and sketching fun and fast.

For example- Morrigan, the goth character, had this as the initial costume sketch:

The final costumes ended up being really similar to the initial ideas, which is awesome and doesn’t happen all the time. I blame it on working with a great cast and director, and having good luck McGuyvering what I needed/wanted. I also enjoyed doing something for a show where I didn’t have to come to every single rehearsal- I was able to fit the work much better into a baby-friendly schedule.

I got to watch the dress rehearsal on Monday, and it was amazing. I nearly peed I laughed so hard. So much fun. The costumes, set and props all look great and it has come together to be a really fun show. I’ve been so pleased to work on it.