Week 2 without Daddy

Finish putting the annuals in Daddy.

Ceilidh is ever so helpful around the house. With her Dad not around she tries to do her best to lend a hand. Especially if that hand is in dirt or sand or wood chips. And even though she has gardening tools of her own she often prefers to garden without tools.

I even weeded the front flower bed and Trouble didn't help.

Play date at Case's.

More importantly played in Case's sand box.

 We got together with our old maternity buddies and had a play date. 10 kids 9 moms it was good times. Plus someone else's toys are always better then the ones at home. 

I also played in the wood chip pile. Not as fun as sand but still good.

Then went to Montreal to go play in the sand there.

She really can't get enough of the sand.
Even when we were in Montreal all she wanted to do was go to each nearby park and play in the sand. And when visiting Cedric since there was no sandbox she settled for the pool. Sand, dirt, water and one year old's best friends. 

Visiting with Cedric and Em who were down from SK

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Letters to Dad

Dear Daddy I have had to learn to dress my self after Mommy got sick.

Ceilidh has had to deal with me alone for a whole week. After I got the flu, pink eye and the toilet sprung a leak it was a rough start. Thankfully she has been a trooper and did not come down with any of the ailments that her mother suffered. We survived week one with out Matt and only two more weeks to go. We both miss him but thankfully do get to talk to him on occasion via Skype.
This is Ceilidh's week in pictures, her perspective.

The toilet leaked so I started getting the sand bags ready.

Daddy I took care of the lawn for you.

I did take a break after cutting the lawn.

But then I was back at work tending to the flower beds

I even took care of the flower pots out front

Don't worry Daddy even though I was busy I took Mommy out for breakfast on Mommy's Day.

Ceilidh's dad is away on business

For the next three weeks it is just Ceilidh and me. Today is day 4 of 20 days of us two. I will try to post a picture every day Matt is gone but I will try to post them every few days. It is a way for Matt to be with us. Here are the first few pictures, no picture on day two as I came down with a fever. Murphy's law Matt is away and I get sick.

Day 1 Look Daddy I am eating all my breakfast, yes I use a spoon to eat my hash-browns.

Still Day 1. Yummy salmon who knew Boston pizza had healthy choices

Are rocks good to eat?

Big belly button

The other day my friend's daughter asked me why Ceilidh has a big belly button. This little girl is herself four years old and was watching while I changed Ceilidh. It was the first time and probably not the last time that a little person asked about Ceilidh's scar. I am glad that this little girl thought it was at least a belly button albeit a large one. I explained to her that Ceilidh was sick when she was a baby and had to have surgery to fix her belly. I always wonder how Ceilidh herself will handle these questions as she gets older.
According to her surgeon most scars are up and down, while hers is like a purse string. This gives it more of an appearance like a belly button but only if you don't know any better and don't stare. Speaking of her surgeon we had our year after follow up appointment. It went really well. He thinks that she is growing well and is optimistic that her muscles will eventually cover her organs. Right now her tummy still puckers out but the hope is that it will all settle down. We will go back again next year.  I will try to take a picture of her belly and post it later.

A year has come and gone

The few times we have her hair down

She is trying to show you her teeth and her Easter dress

Here we are Easter 2012, and Ceilidh is now a year and a week. We have come a long way from last year when Easter was later in April and we were bringing her home after 23 days in the hospital. Well she is now walking and started at 11 months 3 weeks, which is exactly the time her dad walked (I had just finished reading his baby book so the date stuck in my mind). First day I noticed was at library group she walked from me to another mom. She does a lot of first at library group, how I will miss all those fun times. After that day Matt and I played the game where we tried to get Ceilidh to walk from me to him and from him to me. But we need not have bothered. Her true motivation is other kids. My last strollercize get together we had a potluck and there were more kids then usual. And there were a few older ones, by that I mean 3, and she was doing her best to keep up with them which meant walking. Everyday she gets more and more comfortable in her walking. I guess we are officially in trouble.

She had her own birthday cake and I also made one for everyone else

We bought her a lawn mower that blows bubbles,  fun times

On other fronts her teeth count is now at 4. The two top and the two bottom are all in. Just waiting for two others that I can see in the gums to drop. We finally confirmed that she knows I am Mamma and Matt is Dadda. After her first two hours at day care last week, when I went to go pick her up she saw me and was saying Mamma. Glad that is confirmed. With Matt it was the fact that she would point at his picture and say Dadda. We think she is figuring out the sign for milk, and all done but not a hundred percent sure yet.
Her birthday celebration was really low key. We had a birthday supper the night before with her favourite meal, which included cheese, noodles with meat sauce, and banana bread birthday cake. For her actual birthday we took her to the Experimental farm where she met all the farm animals, including a little lamb born that day. Hard to believe Ceilidh was once that small too. Her Nanna visited that weekend and spoiled her silly. This Easter her Grandpa and came down for a visit and they had a blast together. She had no chocolate but had some home made doughnuts, which I think are a millions times better then any chocolate eggs.

At the experimental farm with her bee hat at the bee exhibit

Home after some play time outside

I will try to keep updating this blog, but I think it may now be every month or two.

11 1/2 months we have a tooth

It has been a month since my last update and I feel so much has happened in the last two weeks. The most recent is we finally have a real tooth, and it isn't that nubby that I thought was a tooth. Don't know what that is but will check with the dentist in May when she goes for her first appointment. Her first real tooth is the top front tooth, which is funny because usually the bottom ones come in first. Ceilidh just keeps bucking trends. Sadly, I fear 3 other teeth are soon to follow. Sad for her because I am sure it cannot be pleasant. At least she has been on Advil for her ear infection so hopefully that helped ease the pain of the first tooth. Yes, Ceilidh has had her first ear infection. It started off as a cold (which we both had) and I thought she was getting better and then it moved to her chest. I was worried that it might be something more serious since we were going on day 10 so took her to the doctor. It turned out to be a ear infection. I hear they are the most common childhood illness, however, neither Matt nor I have ever had one. I hope these will not be common for her. It took a couple of days of antibiotics before I saw an improvement. The worst was when she would cough she would activate her gag reflex and everything would come up. Poor thing. But now the drugs are over and I think she is better, except now she has all those teeth coming in.  We did dodge a bullet though, we missed out on a play date because she was sick and it turns out all the babes and some mothers got hand foot and mouth disease. There was about 8 babes in the group. So I guess the ear infection was a blessing in disguise.

But moving on to her other progress. No she is not walking yet. She still grabs on to things and can walk with holding on to one of our fingers but doesn't want to let go. Her balance though has improved leaps and bounds. The exciting things are holding her own sippy cup and clapping. Okay exciting for us. Just remember this will be her baby book so I have to mention these things. While she has been able to drink from a sippy cup for a while she had not mastered the art of doing it well by herself. It perplexed her that the water wouldn't come out well because she couldn't tilt it back. Now she does it like a pro. She even knows how to drink from a small cup by herself. Although I don't put a lot of water in because she will drink from it and then dump the rest out. Better to give her just enough for one drink. The clapping of the hands is very cute. I kind of noticed it when I was at a play group and they were singing "If you are happy and you know it clap your hands" and she kind of did. But then didn't repeat it for another week. Now she knows if you say "clap your hands" she drops everything to clap. The other thing she has figured out is going down the stairs. The up was the easy part but teaching her to go down safely was harder. We kept putting her on her belly to go down and she kept turning around. Then about 3 weeks ago she finally got it. Now it is funny to see her do it for everything. Sometimes she starts to early and then turns around to figure out why she isn't at the drop of yet. Well at least she is safe.

Soon enough she will be one. Just over 2 weeks. Can't wait to see what she does in the mean time.

10 1/2 months and still furniture surfing

If you look closely you can see the tooth at the bottom that she has been working on since fall

Ceilidh is still furniture surfing. She will let go from time to time and just stand there but still shows no indication of wanting to walk on her won. At least not without the help of her walker or a chair or anything else that she can slide around the house or wherever she is. It's kind of interesting to see her being resourceful and using step stools, laundry baskets, and high chairs to help her walk. I feel she wants to walk but isn't ready to let go quite yet. She has also become a master at climbing the stairs, which of course means we now have to block the stairs going up as well as down. She can sure move up them very quickly, but still has no concept of how to go back down. Hence why we block them off, so she can climb them only under supervision. I have already had a heart attack where I turned around for a minute and then found her at the top of the stairs. Yikes child, I have enough grey hairs.

Helping her Dad set up the barrier for the stairs.

Skating with the kiddies on a local outdoor rink.

Play date at the Ontario Early Years Centre.

I thought winter might be the time where her social calendar slowed down since everyone would be in hibernation mode, but gladly this has not been the case. We have been blessed with milder weather, and a great group of friends who keep the activities up. We have been walking in the local forest trails, skating on outdoor rinks, keeping healthy with aerobics, being well read with our library's children programing, and just having fun with good old fashion play dates. Soon enough Ceilidh will be starting day care. It will be a big step for both of us. For now we are transitioning her off the milk and into the world of just solids. And while she has not been a big eater for a long time, something this past week has changed (growth spurt or maybe just a light bulb moment) and she is now taking to food with gusto. Some of her favourites include yogurt (good for facials and conditioning the hair according to Ceilidh), scrambled eggs, cheese, and just recently a new like for apple sauce and berries. And for her Hispanic roots she really likes creamed corn, add that to any other food especially the meats and she loves it. Grandma would be proud.

Walking in the Ferguson forest.