Benjamin's Birth Story

I gave birth to Benjamin in September and had a crazy, whirlwind delivery. When I was pregnant, I obsessively read other women’s birth stories. I found them fascinating and felt like they would help me prepare for labour myself. In hindsight, they didn’t prepare me at all.. I don’t think anything can. But I still wanted to put down the events of the day in writing so I could remember it. Here goes! This this not concise in at ALL. I’m writing this more for me and future Benjamin than anyone else, so that’s why I’ve included all the details. Congratulations if you can read through this whole thing lol
P.S. My experience with midwives was amazing I would recommend midwifery care to anyone!

*****

On Thursday September 4th, I had an appointment with my midwife. I was 2 days overdue and she suggested we do a “stretch and sweep”. She had talked to me about it at my previous appointment and I had no desire to do it because I trusted my baby would come on his own when he was ready and because I have a horribly sensitive cervix and I didn’t want to put myself through unnecessary pain. We talked a bit more about the procedure and I ended up agreeing to do it. It was painful and I cried. Like ugly, red faced, huffing and puffing crying. She wasn’t even able to do it properly because I couldn’t relax at all, so it was all for NOTHING! Ultimately she was able to deduce that I was not dilated at all, 0% effaced, and my cervix wasn’t even facing the right direction. She told me I wouldn’t be going into labour in the next 24 hours and very unlikely would it be that weekend.

On Saturday September 6th I went to get a pedicure with my mom and sister. The guy doing mine said I looked HUGE (uhh thanks jackass), but he gave me a nice strong foot and leg massage that felt awesome, so I forgave him. Later that day I went grocery shopping with my sister and did an extra large shop. I forgot to get bagels so I walked back across the length of the store to get back to the bakery section. The walk back to the bakery section completely winded me, but like the aesthetician said, I was huge and the extra 35lbs was really weighing me (literally).

When I got home from grocery shopping, I ate a bunch of pineapple and hung out with Kevin. I really felt like crap (tired and achy) so I decided to take a bath. I sat in the tub for maybe 10 minutes and it wasn’t helping me at all, so I went to bed early. This was about 9pm. I woke up on 3 different occasions with splashing acid reflux. The third time I actually ran to the bathroom because I thought I was going to throw up from coughing so hard. Kevin had been watching TV at that point but came in to check on me. I gave up on sleep at this point and asked him if we could watch Hitch. It was after midnight. I felt little twinges when we settled on the couch to watch the movie, but I had been feeling twinges for weeks, so I ignored them and didn’t say anything to Kevin. At 1:30am I was having a harder time concentrating on the movie so I told Kevin I thought I was having contractions. He was excited. I kind of was too, but the anticipation scared me. I told him at this point that I wanted to wait until at least 6am before calling the midwife.

Side note:
In my previous appointments, I had said I would like to try to have a natural (drug-free) hospital birth. I had also said I would like to labour in the comfort of my home as long as possible. The midwives said that was fine and waiting up until 7cm was safe. After that point it’s hard to relocate because then you’re starting the transition phase of labour, which is the shortest, but most intense, painful part. They told me if I hadn’t asked for an epidural by that point, that I would by the time I reached the transition phase. They said that most women will react pretty strongly to the transition phase – crying, vomiting, diarrea, etc. Needless to say, I was not looking forward to it, but I really appreciated my midwife’s honesty during that conversation. While I like to be mentally prepared, NOTHING could have prepared me for labour.

So back to the story, I pulled out my big yoga ball and was rocking back and forth on that. By 2:30, I was surprised by how much pain I was in. Things got pretty crazy after that. At the beginning of each contraction, I would literally jump up and run from room to room wailing/screaming. My cat was freaking the F out. I’d jump in the tub (I hadn’t drained the water from earlier) and back out again. I felt like I couldn’t get ahead of the pain. Kevin tried timing my contractions but they were all over the place. At 4:30am, I threw up and Kevin called my midwife. My secondary midwife (Esther) was available so she said she’d make her way over. She got to our place at about 5am. I was on the bed, naked, on all fours, rocking back and forth in the middle of a contraction when she arrived. I immediately said, “I’m going to need to go to the hospital as soon as possible to get the epidural!!” She said that was fine and she’d have to check me first. She did an internal exam (which was painful… ugh damn cervix!!) and her face said it all. I didn’t even need to hear her say, “You’re barely dilated…” I was crushed. Stella, my primary midwife, had told me at an earlier appointment that women generally dilate a half centimetre every hour. Esther didn’t tell me how far dilated I was and I didn’t ask, but I knew it was less than 4 because that’s how far you need to be to be admitted to the hospital. Later on she told me I was 2cm when she checked me.

So then Esther sat on the side of the bed and told me to lay down on my side. She’d put her hand on the top of my belly when a contraction would start and would coach me to say “whoooooooooo. whooooooooooo. whooooooooo” and then would let me know when the contraction had reached its peak. I found her presence to be extremely comforting. Kevin was trying to rub my leg while Esther was there, but I didn’t want him to touch me at all lol. I can’t really explain why I found Esther to be so comforting, but she was authoritative and caring and she’d gone through labour herself before so I really felt like she could help me through it. She coached me through contractions for about an hour, then said she was leaving. She said to call her in a couple of hours or if my mucus plug came out or if my water broke.

After she left I tried to take little cat naps between contractions but it was so difficult to rest. I ended up getting up and sitting backwards on the toilet. At 7:30am I noticed I was bleeding and I was SO FREAKING EXCITED. I never thought I’d be so excited to see blood, but it meant progress and meant that we could call Esther back! Yay!! I’d barely even processed the thought before another contraction started and I heard a huge SPLASH in the toilet. It legitimately sounded like someone dropped a brick in the toilet bowl and there was splash back all over the toilet and floor. I yelled out to Kevin that my mucus plug came out and my water broke and that there was meconium in the water. Note: there wasn’t meconium in the water. It was super murky looking because I’m gross and hadn’t flushed the toilet after my mucus plug came out lol.

Esther told us to get to the hospital and she’d meet us there at 8am. We live just over 1km from the hospital and can see it from our condo, but it took us over half an hour to get there because my contractions were extremely intense after my water broke and I couldn’t help but push. Every time a contraction would start, I’d have to stop and press up with my hand. I’d been told that pushing before you’re 10cm can cause your cervix to tear so I was freaking out inside. In my head I thought I was 4-5cm dilated and all that kept me going was knowing that I was going to be at the hospital soon where I could get an epidural because if it hurt this much already, there was NO WAY I was going to make it through the transition phase drug-free.

When we arrived at the hospital, Kevin parked the car in the ER lot and we rushed through the doors. I had a contraction in the ER waiting room lol I seriously felt like I was being ridiculous but it was so painful. I had my dress hiked up around my waist, my hand pressed upward on my crotch, while I was on my knees screaming in pain. (I’m laughing while I’m writing this, but it was super intense at the time). A nurse came out to check out what was going on and told us how to get to Labour and Delivery. We ended up taking a wrong turn and another nurse found me  (I kid you not) shaking and trying to break through a set of locked doors like I was the Hulk. She said she’d get us a wheelchair and I said I didn’t want to wait and could we please run there if you don’t mind??? When we got up to Labour and Delivery, another nurse came up to us and immediately was like, “They didn’t give you a wheelchair?! Hold on!” She grabbed a wheely office chair, told me to sit down, then ran down the hall dragging me on the chair behind her while I was wailing and knocking into the walls and carts in the hallway. We must’ve looked ridiculous but I didn’t care.

When we got to the room (at 8:12am) I could barely keep my eyes open. I noticed a few women I didn’t recognize and I said, “I have a midwife! Where’s Esther??” She said, “I’m right in front of you. Open your eyes” lol I didn’t realize my eyes were closed. I hopped up off the chair and said, “I’m going to need that epidural right now!! What do I need to do?” She told me to get undressed and get onto the bed so she could examine me. I stripped down in about 5 seconds and while I was doing that I told Kevin to go pay for a parking pass because I didn’t want to get a ticket or have our car towed. LOLOLOL! He obediently ran out of the room. Not even 20 seconds later, Esther takes one look at me and says, shocked, “omg you’re crowning!! The baby is coming NOW! Someone get Kevin back here or he’s going to miss it!!” I couldn’t believe I’d gone from 2-10cm in 2 hours. I’d just sent Kevin to go pay for parking. They were telling me the baby was coming RIGHT NOW. And there was no time for an epidural. Esther gave one of the other midwives (who had just finished attending another birth) her phone and they called Kevin and told him to get back ASAP. Poor hubby… he told me later he ran back through the hospital as fast as he could. All I was thinking when I started pushing was, “If Kevin misses the birth of his child because I told him to pay for parking, he will never forgive me!” He got back to the room just as I started pushing. I had one midwife on each side of me and I had one foot resting on each of their hips. Pushing felt AMAZING. The relief I felt once I was able to start pushing was fantastic. Three contractions in and Benjamin was born! It was 8:22am, 10 minutes after we arrived in the room. I didn’t know it at the time, but his cord was wrapped tightly around his neck so they had to cut his cord when only his head was out. And then he did a poo-splosion all over me on the way out. Because of this, they took him away to examine him for a minute. I was overwhelmed by the amazing relief I felt when he came out and there was no more pressure - I just fell back in (no joke) complete bliss. When Benjamin let out his first cry that’s when I realized they’d taken him to the examination station a few feet away and I just lost it. I started sobbing uncontrollably. The experience was so amazing. Esther put him on my chest and he immediately found my nipple and started sucking. I was surprised at how strong his latch was. Kevin called our families at this point to tell them we had the baby. They were all so shocked. We had agreed earlier that we wanted it to just be me and him at the hospital and I’m so glad we did. As it turned out, we barely made it to the hospital ourselves so we wouldn’t have been able to have our families there even if we’d wanted them there.

When Benjamin was born, we were still deciding between two names. Naming a person is HARD! Ultimately we ended up naming him Benjamin Joseph. He weighed in at 8lbs 8oz with a head full of hair and dark grey eyes. The whole time I was in labour I kept saying to Kevin that I wouldn’t be able to have another child because it was so painful. Then literally the moment he was born I thought, “That wasn’t so bad! I could totally do that again”

And about the drug-free part… I’m happy I got to experience a drug-free birth. Even though I asked for an epidural a few times, I wasn’t able to get any kind of pain relief – not even a Tylenol! I had a difficult time getting ahead of the pain and when we were on our way to the hospital, the thought of pain relief via epidural is what kept me going. Little did I know this guy was already making his way down. If I can make a comparison, it’s like running a marathon and feeling like you can’t make it, but the finish line is just around the corner. You just can’t see it. Also, birth was so incredibly different than I thought it would be! My recovery was slow as molasses, but I felt so great immediately afterwards. Also, we packed a hospital bag and didn’t even open it lol. I thought I would be walking during the contractions and using the whirlpool tub, but as it was, I didn’t even get a hospital gown LOL I just delivered naked with the midwives holding my legs. I even packed my DSLR, but the whole thing was over with so fast that we didn’t get any labour photos at all!


Hopefully my story helps someone out there, or at least entertains a few :) If you have any questions, please feel free to leave them in the comments section down below!

Experiences of a First-Time Pregnant Lady – Part 1: Finding Out I was Pregnant

As of writing this post, I’m just starting my third trimester. Ahh! Part of me feels like time is flying and part of me feels like I’ve been pregnant forever. Sometimes when I see myself in the mirror, especially my bare belly, I think, “holy crap, I look so different!!” and other times it just feels normal. Like, “Didn’t I always have a baby bump?” lol no!! At Christmas last year I had a 25 inch waist and was 25 lbs thinner.

So anyway, I’m writing this series of posts as a kind of diary entry. Being pregnant for me has been a trippy adventure so far. I was never that girl who used to say, “When I have kids…” It was always, “If I have kids…” For some reason I just felt like I wouldn’t or couldn’t. I couldn’t picture myself being pregnant or having a family. The whole idea just seemed really foreign and I didn’t understand other women who were so certain they were going to have kids. I used to tell Kevin that if he was certain he wanted kids, I wasn’t the girl for him because I didn’t think I’d ever truly want them. But while I couldn’t picture myself pregnant or with a baby/young child, I knew I wanted to have grown kids. Does that makes sense? I wanted to have a relationship like what I have with my parents now. Weird? Maybe. But that’s how I felt.

So here’s my experience on the whole pregnancy thing so far. Note: There’s going to be some over-sharing in this post. You’ve been warned. Also, these are my personal feelings on the matter – if you feel like something I’m writing is offensive/upsetting/etc feel free NOT to let me know in the comments :) Positive vibes only!

Finding out I was pregnant:

Kevin and I got married in June 2013. His friends had their first baby a couple weeks after our wedding and we had gone to see them when their baby was a few months old. During our visit, the new mom told me all about her experiences of getting pregnant and delivering. I always love hearing these stories. There is literally no such thing as TMI in my world! She told me she bought cheap ovulation predictor strips online and that if I were ever trying to conceive, that’s the way to go because it’s waaaay cheaper than the ovulation kits offered at the pharmacy. Seemed like smart advice, so I kept it in my back pocket.

In the fall, I had been modifying my diet from poultry/seafood to seafood to vegetarian to vegan, and as a result, my period had been quite late in October (there’s that oversharing I was talking about lol). Even though we hadn’t been trying, we had been talking about starting to try and I had been thinking about it, and I had convinced myself I was pregnant! I went to Dollarama to get a pregnancy test (yup! I’m that girl.. no shame lol) and it was negative. I took another one a few days later, also negative. I finally got my period, which ended up being 8 days late, so I chalked the whole thing up to the changes in my diet.

In early November, I bought some pre-natal vitamins, and at the end of November, we threw caution to the wind *wink wink*. I remember saying that if nothing happened by the end of December, I wanted to be careful until at least April because I didn’t want a child born at the beginning of winter. Winter is cold and depressing and it seems less ideal to have a baby in the middle of it. At this time, I also made a trip back to Dollarama for some ovulation strips. I bought 5 of them. There wasn’t anything leading me to believe I couldn’t have kids, but like I said in the intro of this post, I just wasn’t confident that I could. A $5 investment for some ovulation strips seemed like a good place to start. The instructions are on the package, but basically you have to start using them at certain time based on your average cycle length. One lines means you’re not ovulating, 2 lines means you will be ovulating in the next 24 hours. The package says something along the lines of “do the horizontal mambo after 24 hours but before 48 hours of testing positive.”  The fourth test I took had the two lines I was looking for, but we missed the <24/> 48 hour window and I remember thinking, “we’ll try for real in the spring”. No harm, no foul.

My period ended up being late again in December, but this time I didn’t stress about it at all. It was clearly diet related, as I had committed to a vegan diet until the new year. I had also lost a few pounds so I thought the weight loss and diet were to blame. On December 30th, my friend came over to have a vegan baking/cooking day with me. We had to go to the store to get some supplies before we started. I picked up 2 pregnancy tests because was planning on drinking -to be honest, because I didn’t have to drive at all that day, I fully intended to get drunk that night. When we got back to my house, I poured her and myself a glass of red wine when she got a phone call. I took that time to excuse myself to the bathroom to take the test just in case before I started drinking. At this point I was 8 days late (same as in October) and really felt like my conscience needed to see that negative test before I started on my wine. I did my thing, 2 lines came up, that meant negative, right????, and I checked the box just to make sure…. 

Two lines meant positive! I was panicked and confused. I think at that point my eyes bulged out of my head. I was confused because when you take the ovulation tests, which look exactly the same by the way, you’re looking for 2 purple lines. So I had gotten used to thinking I was supposed to be looking for 2 lines. Also, I was so ridiculously dehydrated at this point and thought that maybe the hormone is just super concentrated in me because I’m so dehydrated lol All these thoughts passed through my head in about 3 seconds and then I burst out of the bathroom door waving around my pee stick mouthing “WHAT THE F*CK IS THIS???!!” to my friend, who was still on the phone. Her eyes bugged out of her head and she motioned for me to take the second one (I always buy 2 tests at a time). The second test came up with the same result. And I feel like I also need to say, there was no waiting 3 minutes for the lines to appear… they appeared immediately and they were dark. There was no mistaking that both tests had 2 dark lines. I grabbed my phone, went into the bedroom, and called Kevin, who was at work. The conversation went something like this:

Him: Hey

Me: Guess what the f*ck I just did??! I just took a pregnancy test and it says I’m pregnant!!!!!!!

Him: Are you serious?

Me: YES! Of course I’m serious!

Him: ….omg. We’re gonna have a baby… (although I couldn’t see him, I knew he was grinning from ear to ear. Not exactly the same response as me LOL)

My friend, who had just finished up her conversation came bursting into the room and tackle-hugged me down at this point. Kevin and I said our goodbyes and my friend and I walked back into the kitchen. I was STUNNED. I was so blasé about buying the tests, and taking the tests, and being late. We put so little effort into trying to get pregnant. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining. I know a lot of people have fertility issues; I just thought we would have had to.. you know… try a little harder. Anyways, my mind was reeling and my eyes settled on the 2 glasses of red wine on the kitchen table that I had poured no more than 5 minutes ago. I said to my friend, “Do you think I could still drink that?” She then picked up my glass and poured its contents into hers lol. I guess that answered that question.

The rest of the day was a blur. Kevin came home. We had a moment. He was SO excited. I was freaked out. I’ve never had such an introspective day in my life. I literally couldn’t think of anything else. I mean, I didn’t feel pregnant, so clearly a mistake had been made. I called my doctor and scheduled a physical and a blood test, but I couldn’t get an appointment for about 10 days. Other than not drinking, I didn’t do anything different until my appointment. I decided I didn’t want to tell anyone until I at least had the results confirmed with a blood test, but those 10 days were weird. I didn’t feel different, but everything was SO DIFFERENT!  I could barely sleep because every night I had the most crazy thoughts about pregnancy and babies,and when I did finally fall asleep I had the vivid dreams and nightmares about it too.

My physical with my family doctor was pretty routine, except he told me to make sure I take my multi-vitamins and don’t eat deli meat (random). He said if I took a home test and it was positive, that I was definitely pregnant. I was still skeptical. He sent me down to the lab to get my blood test done and the following week he called me with the results just as Kevin was dropping me off on his way to work. I put him on speaker phone and he let me know I was “definitely pregnant”, that my hormone levels were showing me to be at least 4 weeks along, and that I’d need to start my pre-natal care as soon as possible.

**MIND BLOWN**

There was a baby in my belly. No two ways around it.

Living Without Cable

and for a scary few weeks, without internet!

I have a confession to make: I’ve never lived in an apartment/house that didn’t include cable and internet. That includes my parents’ house growing up, residence in university, 2 university rentals, and 3 different post-university rentals. The cable and internet has always been included in my rental costs, except for an apartment that I had in university where the cable was just never disconnected so I had free cable for 2 years!! #opportunisticcriminal

As the move to this new apartment was so temporary, we decided to not get cable or internet while we were here. We figured it’d be 2 months (tops!) before our move to the condo. As it stands, the day after we moved in here, we got notification telling us to schedule our Pre-Delivery Inspection (PDI) for our unit. I was excited at the prospect of a move so soon following our move here (that meant we really wouldn’t have to unpack anything except bare essentials), but I was sceptical that this PDI would actually go through on April 16th, as planned. My pessimism was due to the facts that:

1. >90% of purchasers had their first PDIs cancelled
2. there was no permit yet for people to move in on our floor
3. we had taken our own private sneak peak at our unit and were missing things, including flooring, toilets, light switches, closet doors, door handles, etc.

Two days beforehand, we received notice that our PDI was cancelled. At this point, I had gone 2 weeks without cable and internet. If you’re thinking, “oh poor you #sarcasm #firstworldproblems”, you’re absolutely right! I never knew before how much I depended on cable and internet! In an act of desperation, I called Bell. Bell and Rogers are both offering pretty sweet deals to the purchasers of my condo so I wanted to see if I could get any kind of deal extended to this apartment for internet service. The gentleman at Bell was very nice, and offered a great deal in terms of monthly costs for internet (about $30 for a crapload of bandwidth), but the start-up cost was $50 and we’d be locked in for 2 years. Um, no thanks. I’ll stick to my DVDs and browsing internet on my iPhone for now. This whole process has made me seriously consider not going with either of the two major service providers this city offers and finding an independent that will offer a better package at a better cost!

After talking to the Bell guy, I thought about the tenants upstairs. Before we even moved in, I wondered if I would have the balls to ask them (a retiree and her daughter) if we could share their wifi (if they had it) and split the cost while we were in this apartment. They are both very very nice ladies, but I’m a wimp and couldn’t bring myself to ask them. I didn’t want them to think we were trying to take advantage, but I did see it as a win-win situation – if they had a decent amount of bandwidth, we could supplement their costs for it for a month or two and it wouldn’t affect them at all. Makes sense, right? I just had to muster up the nerve to ask. Turns out, my mom (their landlady) ended up asking them for me one day while she was here doing maintenance and they were totally fine with it! They said have unlimited bandwidth (whaaaaaaaaat? I didn’t know such a thing existed!) and they didn’t want our money. We insisted several times, but they were adamant. Since we have a car and they don’t, I’ve offered to take them to the store/grocery shopping while we live here. I have a feeling they’ll never take us up on that offer either, so we’ll probably just end up getting them something to show them our appreciation before we move out.

How’s that for a feel-good story with a happy ending!? I now have internet and am a happy lady. I’ve been streaming TV, which feels like such a luxury! And I’ve learned that internet hands down beats cable. So much so, in fact, that I think we could actually do without cable altogether and save ourselves that added monthly expense!

And then there were 3…

Shit just got real. I’m having a baby!

I’m 4 months along and feeling pretty good. The nausea and fatigue of the first trimester have given way to a wave of energy and much clearer skin, so I’ve got a lot to be happy about these days!

I have sooo much to talk about and a LOT of questions that I want to ask all of you experienced mothers out there!! Like, a lot. I don’t want to bombard you all with all the questions in this post, so I’m just going to ask my most pressing one for now:

In Ontario, our government health care system will allow pregnant ladies to have one primary care giver for normal pregnancies with no complications: an OB-GYN or a midwife. I’ve met with both, and I’ve liked them both. The OB-GYN is a doctor from the clinic where my family doctor works, which is convenient because it’s less than 2 km from the condo, which hopefully we’ll be moving into soon. The clinic also has all the labs in house so you can get your blood work and ultrasounds all done in the same place. The midwife’s practice is also located less than 2 km from the condo. I like the idea of going with a midwife because you have the same person for your pre-natal and post-partum care and the delivery. With the doctor, I have a 1/10 chance that she’ll be delivering my baby. With the midwife, I’d have to go to another location to get any tests (other than blood work) done. Both the midwife and doctor appear very well-informed and took their time with me.

So I guess the question is this: Did you go with a midwife or an OB-GYN for your pregnancy? Did you have a good experience? I’m giving myself until the end of this week to make up my mind!

Also, what is up with all the blood and urine samples you have to give while preggo???

Thanks in advance for the help!

Five Years

Today is mine and Kevin's 5 year anniversary (happy anniversary!)

Photo: Omar Hassan

We've come a long way in 5 years! A condo, a car, long distance, a few moves, a few jobs, and several vacations.... and soon, a wedding!

Photo: Maricel Salalila

I instagram-ed a photo, and tweeted our official engagement photos, but never announced it on the blog - Kevin proposed Labour Day weekend while we were camping with my family. So now this cutie is gonna be allll mine mwahahahah!!

Photo: Maricel Salalila

I always thought I'd cry when Kevin finally got around to proposing, but I had a really bad habit of always expecting it! Seriously, before every weekend that we had plans, I would tell my friend Gary, "I think this is the weekend..." And when it didn't happen, I would be mildly disappointed. I knew it was coming, I just didn't know when. Kevin likes to do things at his own pace.. Anyhow, when the moment finally came, it was private and sweet, just like I'd hoped it would be. Except I didn't cry! Not only did I not cry, I actually laughed. I think I was just kinda nervous... like nervous laughing? Not sure. In any case, after everything was said and done it was pretty late and everyone was sleeping, so I woke their asses up to share the news!

Photo: Margaret Diotalevi

The next day I went into full planning mode and had a huge chunk of the wedding planning wrapped up by mid-October. The people who know me in real life were not at all surprised by this lol.

I'm not sure how specific to get on the blog, but pretty much all the big things are covered. We're getting married June 2013 at a beautiful heritage house. We've got the venue, caterer, photographer, officiant, florist, dress, MC, and wedding party picked.


Here are some GIFs to sum up the mostly noteworthy proposal reactions:

Me, for a solid week after the proposal

Shannon

Michelle and Deric

Gary

Did you or anyone you know have a funny reaction to a proposal? Also, is everyone down to hear wedding details? Because that's pretty much all I have to write about these days!

The Perils of Living Alone

I’ve been living on my own since April of this year and it’s been awesome so far. A lot of people were/are shocked to hear Kevin and I aren’t living together*.
Honestly, I’ve found very few downsides to living alone. It’s so freeing!! But there are some downsides…here are my biggest issues:

1. Dishes. UGHHHHHHHHHHH. It takes the same amount of dishes to cook food for 4 people as it does for 1, so I have to constantly do dishes. The catch here is I hate doing dishes and let them pile up for way too long and then I just feel like giving up… I miss the days when Kevin did all the dishes!
   
2. Cooking for one person sucks. What’s the point? It’s crazy how low my standards have dropped for dinner. I used to always make nice dinners!.. everything homemade and from scratch with a glass of wine on the side. Now I live off chicken fingers.. (but I still have the glass of wine! Obviously)
   
3. Grocery shopping for one person also sucks. I pretty much can’t finish anything before it goes bad, so now my fridge looks like this:

That’s right. Empty… Or pretty close to it. At least I have some fresh-ish produce in there. So now I pride myself on the contents of my freezer:
Kevin and I are leaving soon for Boston, so I’m not bothering with grocery shopping until I get back. I have way too much to get done before we leave!

• laundry
  
• packing
  
• drop Riley off at my parents’ house
  
• dishes! ARGH!
  
• sweep floors
  
• change bed sheets (nothing beats coming home to fresh sheets after a trip!)
  
• get some USD from the bank
  
• tidy up living room
  
• mani/pedi

That’s what I really really want to get done before I leave, but I crack under pressure. Hence why I’m procrastinating by writing this post and watching Wheel of Fortune.. while eating an English muffin and some chicken fingers   Jam counts as a serving of fruit, right?
Anyone have any fun plans for the long weekend?? It’s coming soon! Also, is anyone else as shocked as me that it’s already August! Summer is slipping away so fast!
*We had been living together a bit over 2 years when our landlord decided to put our house on the market. Since we had (or so we thought!) less than a year until our condo was done, we moved in respective parents’ houses. I wasn’t such a big fan, so I decided to move out after a few months. I really wanted to try living on my own because I knew once the condo was done, I’d never again have the opportunity.

Weekend Instagrams and the Like

I haven’t done much blogging lately… been enjoying summer too much to get on the computer!

I think I’ve got to start setting a blogging schedule to get back into the swing of things! I’ve got plenty to write about but haven’t sat down to write it.

Here’s what I was up to this weekend:
1. I’ve made it a habit to go to my parents’ house on Friday nights for BBQ, beer, and the card game Phase 10. We’re all obsessed with it!
2. My parents’ cat, Angel, was lying on his back and using the door threshold as a pillow. Crazy cat.
3. Kev and I enjoying patio season on Saturday afternoon. We sat under an umbrella and it started raining seconds after we got there, but we stayed out and the rain soon passed. It ended up really hot out there!
4. I passed out on Saturday night and woke up feeling overheated – one look down explained why! This little fuzzball is like a radiator and was cozied into my side.
5. On our drive through Milton, we passed this sign and obviously stopped to take a picture!… and maybe pose like a zombie hahah
6. This pretty waterfall was the highlight of our hike through Hilton Falls
7. We started off with the Hilton Falls Trail (4km) then walked the Beaver Meadow Trail (9.5km), which unbeknownst to us, was swarming with mosquitos… might explain why we didn’t see anyone else on that trail!

I hope you’ve all been enjoying this summer as much as I have! I’d love to hear what you’ve been up to
Emily-Jane

Exterminated

The new apartment I moved to a few months ago is a basement. If anyone is even somewhat familiar with basements, they know that insects are a regular occurrence. I, for one, am not a fan of bugs inside. My thought (to bugs) is, “do what you want when you’re outside. Live your life, be free! But the second you step foot over the threshold, you’re toast!!” Once they’re inside, I kill ALL bugs, no regret, no mercy.

In my almost 3 months here, I’ve found a couple spiders, a couple silverfish (they give me the shivers)… and more than my fair share of carpenter ants.

Just to clarify, my bug tolerance is super low. Every time I enter a room I scan it for bugs. It sounds pathetic, but I can’t help myself. I don’t even realize I’m doing it. Any fleck of anything black or brown and I have to investigate to make sure it’s not a bug. In university, I once found 2 spiders in my dorm room on the same day and I woke up screaming, “SPIDERS! SPIDERS!” from a nightmare so loudly, I woke up my neighbour. (Sorry Jen Ma!)


So when a silverfish scurried out from under one of my moving boxes in the first couple weeks, I was scared, but I didn’t completely freak out.

Then when I was making juice for my brother and found a dead silverfish in my mother f-in Brita filter, I was scared, but I didn’t completely freak out. And I made him flush it down the toilet, just in case it was playing dead and jumped out at me.

Then a few weeks later when I was on the computer and felt a tickle on my shoulder, only to realize it was an ant on me, I freaked out… but just a bit.

The final straw was when I went to bed on Thursday night. I was exhausted. I turned on the light. Guess what I saw? A freaking ant crawling on my freaking bed.

I. LOST. IT. 

I went ape $hit bananas. Seriously, coo coo for cocoa puffs crazy.

It was almost 11pm and I didn’t hesitate in the slightest to call my landlord. I basically told her in no uncertain terms would I continue living in a place where I had to check my bed (my bed!!) for bugs. Nah-uh. No way. NOT happening. She very sweetly invited me (and Kevin) to sleep upstairs for the night, which I fully appreciate, but I know she has ants up there too, so I declined. And she said she would call an exterminator to come to the house ASAP. Boy oh boy did she hold up her end of the bargain. By 4:30pm on Friday (if you’re still reading this far, I called her on Thursday at almost 11pm) an exterminator was at the house fumigating. Me and Riley went to my parents house for the night, and I put my plants on the front porch.


I came back on Saturday afternoon to find about 10-12 dead ants around the baseboards. Yuck. But they were dead, so yay! The exterminator said we’ll continue to find dead ants for about 8 more days. He wasn’t lying. Every day since I have walked in to find a few writhing around dying.  I know it’s evil to just let them suffer so I squash them all and end it quickly.

In case any of you were wondering (and miraculously read to the end of this post), the exterminator sprayed the basement, upstairs, and the perimeter of the house. And he gave my landlord a 6 month guarantee, so she can call him to re-spray if we find the fumigation loses its effectiveness.

BLAGHHHHH!! Let’s just all hope that day doesn’t ever come.

Resolution Check-in: May

How many of you are still working on your new year’s resolutions? No one? Yeah, that’s what I thought. Me neither! My resolutions have fallen woefully to the wayside.


MY 2012 NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTIONS

1. Stop swearing
You know what? While I haven’t been actively working on this one, I have really curbed my habit here! In my new position at work I work with a guy who non-jokingly says things like, “Gee Whiz” “Hokey Dinah” “Bass Ackwards”… what do these words mean? I have no idea lol but it’s hilarious. And makes me want to clean out my mouth with a bar of soap
Goal achieved? It's coming along


2. Improve my photography skills
Eeek, still off the bandwagon with my photography challenge. When I moved I misplaced my camera and its accessories (charger, tripod, SD card). I have since found everything, but something is up with my SD card and I can’t take photos off of it… Anywho, my photo challenge will be up and running again very soon!
Goal acheived? Fail... womp womp


3. Learn Photoshop
I’ve been playing around with GIMP, a freeware photo editing program. I learned how to add washi tape to photos, which makes me a very happy girl. I’ve learned that watching YouTube videos for specific issues is much more helpful than reading any user guide.
Goal achieved? Coming along nicely


4. Read more news
I’m still doing well with my Twitter apps (CP24, Toronto Star and CBC News). But the news is so depressing! I don’t want to hear about drugs (bath salts??) that pretty much turn people into cannibalistic face-eating zombies… Sounds like patient zero to me. Time to start preparing for the zombie apocalypse!!

Goal achieved? Check!!


5. Do more DIYs on my blog
A big fat zip going on here. I haven’t done any projects in the last 2 months. Booo. But in preparation to start more DIYs I have been pinning like crazy! Check out my craft/diy folder on Pinterest!
Goal achieved? Room for improvement



6. Declutter each season
Nothing helps me declutter like moving and move I did! Packing helps me prioritize what’s important, which is seriously only about 30% of what I own. I still have 3 totes that I haven’t unpacked… and I moved 2 months ago lol. I’m slowly chipping away at it.
Goal achieved? Yes-siree!


7. Spend more quality time with the ones I love
Check! Kevin and I are still doing weekly dates. I’ve also caught up on my emails with friends.
Goal achieved? Yes indeed-y!

Overall I can say I'm still happy with my progress. I think I’ll focus this next month on doing some DIYs. I’ve fallen off the blogging bandwagon hard so I’ve really gotta pick myself up and get back into it! My walls are bare and they’re just crying out for some art or something…
How have your resolutions been going? If you made any, have you been sticking to them, or did some of them fall off the bandwagon like mine?
Image: zombie apocalypse

Weekend Getaway

Kevin and I left work a bit early on Friday to head to Niagara Falls for the weekend – it’s about 1.5-2hrs southwest of Toronto. We got a Teambuy deal for a hotel for 2 nights for $69 (sah-weeeeet!) and then an R-Deals deal for wine tastings for 2 at 4 different wineries (and a chocolate factory) for $39! Great deals all around.

The first night we took a stroll around the Falls. I’d never seen them at night before. This is the only shot I managed to get that was overpowered by the crazy mist.

The next day we did our tours. The four wineries were Joseph’s Estate Wines, Caroline Cellars, Riverview Cellars, and Reif Estate Winery. We also visited Chocolate F/X and a Peanut store. The way the tour was set up was pretty awesome – a mini bus picked us up from our hotel, then drove us to each of the locations, and then dropped us back off at the hotel. Kevin’s not a wine fan (except ice wine because it’s super sweet) so I drank most of his reds and whites and he drank most of my ice wines.


In terms of decor, I liked Reif Estate Winery the best. It was definitely the most luxe among the group. I’d been looking forward to going there for a few months because I had some red wine at a friend’s house in the winter that came from this winery and they don’t sell it in the LCBO (pretty much the only store where people from Ontario can buy wine) so I wanted to buy a couple bottles. The wine was Gamay Cabernet if anyone’s interested – it’s delicious! Reif also had the best ice wine out of the wineries we visited. I think the Niagara Region produces most of the world’s ice wine. It’s definitely the wine I associate most with that area. The grapes for ice wine are harvested in the winter, creating an incredibly sweet wine – a dessert wine. Reif’s ice wine was the most mellow (I didn’t give that sample to Kevin lol) so I bought a bottle of that too.


In terms of the actual tastings, Caroline Cellars had it going on! They give each person a list of their wines and let you choose 4 from the list. I’ve done wine tastings at several wineries and this was the first place that let me choose my samples. So Kevin and I (mostly me lol) went down the list and chose 2 samples each of reds, whites, Rieslings, and ice wines. 

Here’s the wine I added to my collection:

1. Caroline Cellars Riesling Late Harvest 2008 – 500mL
2. Joseph’s Estate Wines Late Harvest Vidal 2008 – 375mL
3. Riverview Cellars Fontana Dolce 2010 Vintage – 750mL
4. Reif Estate Winery Gamay Cabernet 2011 – 750mL x 2 bottles
5. Reif Estate Winery Vidal Ice Wine 2010 – 200mL

I haven’t bought this much sweet wine at one time since my university days when I’d buy 1.5L of strawberry Zinfandel for my Friday nights out… so classy!

The tour bus also stopped at Chocolate F/X. A guide explained to us how the chocolate is made and the shipping processes. Most of the chocolate gets sent to third party retailers who wrap the chocolate in their own brand’s labels. The sample set up here was awesome. It was basically Bulk Barn, but free... And ALL CHOCOLATE!!!



It got pretty crazy up in the sample section for a good 5-10 minutes. There were about 20 of us on the tour and there was no lining up whatsoever…everyone just rushed the chocolate. It was hilarious.

That night we went downtown for dinner and stopped by for some photos

On Sunday we did a bit of shopping at an outlet mall near our hotel. I bought a new pair of running shoes, which I have been needing for way too long. My old pair had no more cushioning and a hole in the right shoe!

Have you been to the Falls lately? Maybe for a little cross-border shopping…

I’m Moving!!

This has been a long time coming. Over the past 7 months I have been living like a transient bum…mostly at Kevin’s parents’ house, somewhat in my car, and infrequently at my parents’ house (it’s mostly just the place I stored my things). The last 7 months have been rough, to say the least. When I posted about our landlord selling our house, leaving us strapped, and causing us to temporarily move back to our parents house, the comments spoke volumes lol.

But did I listen?.. well yeaaah, but I was kind of in a jam and I was stupidly naive that the condo completion date wasn’t going to be crazy delayed… which it HAS

The last 7 months have honestly been the most stressful in my life! There’s no break from the stress. I like stability and control, and my desire for those things grew exponentially in the time that Kevin and I lived together…control for things like food, noises, temperature. Basically I’ve just realized that in the almost 10 years that I’ve been away from home (summer breaks from university excluded), I’ve become a person who really doesn’t play well with others (cohabitation-wise) because I have LOW TOLERANCE for things that annoy me, which is mostly noises…

• loud talking
• TVs and radios on ALL THE TIME
• chewing noises… oh dear gawd, the chewing noises!! AHHHH!!!!!
• and temperature control was a big issue. It was regularly 14C in my room in the winter, hence my desire to spend almost all my time at Kevin’s parents’ house.

So, the point is I found a place to live. It’s close to my work, the rent is very close to what we paid before, the lease is flexible, it includes digital cable, hi-speed internet, and parking, and I can have my cat there! The landlord full-on wrote NO PETS in capital letters on her ad for the apartment, but I still went to check it out. I got a feeling my future landlord liked me so I spilled the beans and said I could only live there if I could bring my cat. She made a face and was like, “sigh…. fine”. Yippee!!

Unfortunately I’ve been pretty sick over the last couple weeks with intense abdominal pain – my doctor thinks I have kidney stones, which has led to several nightmares – so moving is gonna SUCK… I didn’t think it could really suck less, as evidenced here, but I was wrong.. so wrong.

So if you got this far in my rambling post, the moral of the story is DON’T MOVE BACK HOME!! The strain on my relationship with my parents was not worth it. I didn’t save any more money than I did when we were at our apartment because I had to get a car and it ain’t cheap. And I felt like a loser for living at home in my twenties.

Liebster Award

In the last week, I was lucky enough to be the recipient of two Liebster Awards. The award was passed on to me first by Beatrice from The Crafty Bee and secondly by Krista from Nook of Wellington. Thanks ladies! I love when these awards get passed around because I learn about my blogger buddies and I also get the chance to find out about new blogs.

Some background: the Liebster is awarded by bloggers to other, newer bloggers, who have fewer than 200 followers, to spread the word and help the new(er)bies gain wider recognition. The award comes with four conditions that each recipient must satisfy when accepting:

1. Choose five up-and-coming blogs (with fewer than 200 followers) to award the Liebster to.
2. Show your thanks to the blogger who gave you the award by linking back to them.
3. Post the award on your blog. List the bloggers you are giving the award to with links to their sites. Leave comments on their blogs so they know about the award.
4. Share 5 random facts about yourself.

And here are 5 random things about me.

1. I'm a middle child. 

My brother, Daniel is 30 years old today(!) and my sister, Michelle will be 26 years old in less than 2 weeks, which makes me a middle child... Some of you may have heard of the dreaded "Middle Child Syndrome". Well let me tell you, it's true! I have noticed that I more closely relate to people who are also middle children, specifically when the middle sibling has one same-sex sibling i.e. Boy-girl-girl (my family), girl-girl-boy, boy-boy-girl, girl-boy-boy OR boy-boy-boy/girl-girl-girl.

I read this on Urban Dictionary (not a credible source, I know!) and burst out laughing! So true!!

Oldest: Hey I just turned 16!
Mom: Lets go pick you out a car!
Oldest: Yay!

-1 1/2 yrs later-

Middle: Hey I just turned 16!
Mom: Oh.. er.. well we're still paying for your sib's car, so you'll have to just borrow from her when you can..
Middle: >.>

-2 yrs later-

Youngest: Hey! I just turned 16!
Mom: Yay! And I just finished paying for the other car! Lets go get you a car!
Middle: Hey! I should be the next one to get a new car!
Youngest: but its MY birthday
middle: Thats stupid
youngest: MOMMY SHE JUST CALLED ME STUPID!!
mom: Be nice to your little sister on her birthday!! Come on, birthday-girl! Lets go get that car!
Youngest: WOO!

2. My favourite show is 1 Girl 5 Gays. 

I love love love that show. I could watch it all day. Vish, David Roberts, Dean, JP, Thomas, Michael Yerxa, Dylan, Juan, Jonathan S, Jonathan N., Gerry... those guys are all awesome!

via

via

3. My Myer-Briggs personality type is ISTJ. 

According to Wikipedia:

The MBTI tool consists of multiple choice questions that sort respondents on the basis of the four "dichotomies" (pairs of psychological opposites). Sixteen different outcomes are possible, each identified by its own four-letter code, referred to by initial letters. (N is used for iNtuition, since I is used for Introversion). The MBTI is approximately 75% accurate according to its own manual.

• I – Introversion preferred to extraversion: ISTJs tend to be quiet and reserved. They generally prefer interacting with a few close friends rather than a wide circle of acquaintances, and they expend energy in social situations (whereas extraverts gain energy)
• S – Sensing preferred to intuition: ISTJs tend to be more concrete than abstract. They focus their attention on the details rather than the big picture, and on immediate realities rather than future possibilities.
• T – Thinking preferred to feeling: ISTJs tend to value objective criteria above personal preference. When making decisions, they generally give more weight to logic than to social considerations.
• J – Judgment preferred to perception: ISTJs tend to plan their activities and make decisions early. They derive a sense of control through predictability.

Yup... that's me to a T!

4. I signed up for a half marathon. 

On May 27th, I'll be doing the Toronto Women's Run Half Marathon. I did the 5mile/8km in October and I loved the experience. In all honesty, my training has taken a severe nose dive in the last 2 weeks, so I really need to get back to training! The longest distance I've run so far is 6 miles/10km.

5.  I once met Mariah Carey. 

My friend Sara's mom won second row tickets and backstage passes to Mariah Carey's Charmbracelet concert. Don't judge! Sara and I are both biracial (half-black half-white) like Mariah, so obviously we thought she was awesome lol! When we got to the backstage waiting area, the security people told us that we were not to ask for autographs, even though we told specifically to bring her latest CD so she could sign it. Oh well. They had a "professional" photographer there who took this photo of all of us, then mailed everyone a copy. Right after this shot was taken, everyone was standing around awkwardly.. I guess no one had told Mariah that they'd told us we couldn't ask for autographs, so she turned to me (me!) and said, "Do you want me to sign your CD?" I said, "Yeah ok!" Then I whipped out my CD while frantically motioning for Sara to get hers. Sara got her CD signed then security kicked the whole group out of the backstage room, which conveniently opened up to the road in front of the main entrance to the Air Canada Centre. Once outside Sara and I jumped up and down with joy for about 10 seconds before thinking better of things because everyone was giving us death stares and we were worried someone would try to steal our signed CDs from us. Yes we were geeks. At least I'm not an overweight geek anymore :)

I would like to pass this award to:

1. Sarah from {rad: Renovations Are Dirty}
2. Kerry from This Tinder
3. Amanda from Amanda Cromwell Designs
4. Lauren from The Wee Lass
5. Shannon from EightFootSix

Resolution Check-in: January

January came and went in a whirlwind, so I thought I would take some time at the end of this month (and each month) to see how my resolutions are coming along. I've done okay so far, but it'll definitely help to do a once-a-month check in. Feel free to share your progress with me too!

MY 2012 NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTIONS

1. Stop swearing
This has been an epic fail. I'm definitely more aware of my cursing and inwardly wince when I hear myself cursing, so that's an improvement, right? Even if my actual swear count hasn't gone down...
Goal achieved? EPIC #%$&-ING FAIL!!

2. Improve my photography skills
Eeek, still off the bandwagon with my photography challenge. But not all is lost! I'm adding photography to my editorial calendar! I have hope that having it on my calendar will make me more accountable!

Goal acheived? Fail... womp womp

3. Learn Photoshop  

This one isn't a cop-out, I swear. I decided Photoshop is not for me because I found Picnik and had an amazing few weeks with it. I even spent the $20-something to upgrade to the Premium package. Then disaster hit. They're closing April 2012. *Sad face* What gives Picnik??! How can you decide to close when I've only just discovered you??? 

So now I'm on the hunt for something else that is equally user friendly. Apparently there isn't anything else, but I've been tinkering around with Pixlr and I like it so far. I've also been told that Photoshop Elements is a lot easier than regular ol' Photoshop, but it's not free, which is a huge deterrent for me. 
Goal achieved? Still out for review...

4. Read more news
PASS WITH FLYING COLOURS!!! Seriously, I have been so good with this resolution. I'm really quite proud of myself. My brother told me he keeps up with news through Twitter. In the beginning of this year I got the iPhone4S and got my first data plan - it has turned me into a twittering fiend...well at least what I define as fiend-ish behaviour, so of course it made sense to me to follow some news feeds. They're great! I also added a few news apps. 

Did I mention how much I love this phone? I can barely part with it. It comes with me everywhere. It's a serious addiction. I have a feeling 2013's new year's resolutions will include "putting down the iPhone"... 
Goal achieved? Check!!


5. Do more DIYs on my blog
I achieved my monthly goal (so far) to do one quality DIY or tutorial. In January I posted a tutorial for an iPhone charging station. I was really happy with the way it came out and got some good feedback on it. 

Goal achieved? Check!


6. Declutter each season
I did a deep declutter of my closet and brought a garbage bag full of clothes to G to the Dub (Goodwill) in mid-January. I also managed not to pick up any new items while there, so double-score!
Goal achieved? Yes-siree!

 7. Spend more quality time with the ones I love 
This was the most important resolution to me and I'm proud of how I've fared so far. I've had quality conversations with all of my girlfriends in January. They all live out of town/province/abroad so I'm very happy I got a chance to talk to them all. I've also been responding to emails and text messages more promptly. Before January, I used to read emails/texts and mentally respond, then put my phone down and forget to actually respond. Silly, right? Now I just respond immediately to make sure I don't leave people hanging. Kevin and I have also had some quality dates (yay!) and even managed two (yes, TWO!) double dates last month. I think that deserves a pat on the back!
Goal achieved? Yes indeed-y!


Overall I can say I'm happy with my progress. There's obviously still room for improvement cough*swearingandphotography*cough, but I still have 11 more months ahead of me. 


How have your resolutions been going? If you made any, have you been sticking to them, or did some of them fall off the bandwagon like mine?