Yesterday, when preparing Jakob’s lunch to bring to work, I held out 2 cubes of meat to him – a dark cube of beef in my left hand, and a light cube of chicken in my right. I offered him the choice. He reached for my right hand, so I included the chicken with his veggies.

Today I offered him the same choice, but I switched hands. I had the chicken cube in my left hand, and the beef in my right. Jakob was sitting in Yannick’s lap, and I held both cubes an equal distance away from him. He looked up at me, looked at the cubes, and immediately reached for my left hand – the one with the chicken.

Is it possible he’s making a choice? I know he doesn’t understand that one is chicken and one is beef and he might like one taste more than the other…but could he be making a clear choice between the light cube and the dark cube?

You know…those weeks where you actually have stuff to post? But then you get busy, and more stuff happens. And you really want to blog about that, but then more stuff happens? And by the time you remember a week has gone by and you’re home with time to post on your hands and you realize that you left your camera, the one with all the relevant photos, at work?

I’m having one of those weeks.

The aforementioned camera is still at the aformentioned store, so I won’t be able to add any photos to this post. Those of you who came here only to see knitting or Jakob…well…I guess I can say anything about you that I want in this post, ‘cus you probably won’t stick around long enough to read it. 🙂 Those of you who care about the rest of my life (and knitting stuff without accompanying photos) keep reading!

Last Saturday we finally went to Ottawa. I say “finally” because for 3 weeks now, stuff has continued to come up and prevent us from going. So finally, we go. We left early Saturday morning and drove down in my car, because Yannick’s car was leaking prestone from an unidentified source. On the way down we hear my car start to make a funny noise. Yannick said it sounded like a pulley was nearing the end of its life, but he’d check it out when we got back home that night. (We were only going for the day). Can you guess where this is going?

We spent a wonderful day in Ottawa with Julie and Richard and adorable 8-week-old baby Kayla. Jakob got to play with his new friend, Yannick and Rich were able to sketch out plans for their basement and talk “guy” stuff, and Julie and I were able to go to Michael’s- a chain we don’t have here in Quebec. (Oh yeah- that was another thing I wanted to post…I bought yarn). We left much later than we’d originally planned on, but figured it was no big deal. It’s only a 2 hour drive from Montreal to Ottawa and we knew Jakob would sleep the whole way home, so the worst that could happen was that we’d be tired the next morning when we woke up with Jakob and couldn’t go back to bed after because the boys had swimming class.

Yeah. No. We left Ottawa at 11pm. First we get lost after leaving a gas station, and it took us a half hour to find the 417 highway. We were a bit annoyed, but this ended up saving our butts, big time. (You’ll see how in a minute). We start driving and make it another half hour…when we hear a loud noise followed by the sound of something falling off of my car, hitting the road and rolling away. This was immediately followed by all the lights on my dash starting to dim.

10 points to the one of you who can guess what happened. Yes? You in the back? That’s right. The pulley broke.

The reason we ended up thankful that we spent 30 minutes lost and trying to find the highway, is because my car ended up dying about 15 feet from an off ramp for a service station/motel/resto/bar area. We were able to take the exit and park my car with all the cars from the motel clients. Had we been driving home for the whole hour we would have ended up stranded on the side of the highway somewhere most likely in between rest stops with no heat and the prospect of a long walk…and Jakob with us.

I’ll try to sum up this long story by telling it in point form:
-even though it was midnight Julie and Rich were gracious enough to come back and get us and let us sleep over, and even take me to the 24hr grocery store so I could buy the supplies I’d be missing for Jakob for the next day (diapers, food, etc)
-my dad had to drive down to Ottawa the next day so he could drive us home while my car was towed
-the tow truck was called at 3:45pm. He said he’d be there in 5-60 minutes. He got there at 6pm.
-We finally made it home at 8:00pm. We only were able to come into our house at 8:20 because I’d left my house keys on my car key ring…which was in Yannick’s pocket…which was on Yannick’s coat…which was on Yannick…who was in the tow truck…which stopped for gas and was 20 minutes behind us. Thank goodness I had brought knitting with me! I did enough work on my striped scarf during the extra time away to allow me to finish it after only knitting for an hour once we got home and I put Jakob to bed.

Poor Sam was starving once we got home- he has dry food and water out at all times but he’s used to getting 1/2 a can of wet food every night for supper.

The rest of the week wasn’t as hectic. I missed playgroup on Monday because I had no car to drive, and even though one of the other moms offered to pick me up, I chose to stay home and do the cleaning that I was supposed to have done on Sunday. Monday night Jakob we had a shiva to attend for my friend Debbie’s grandmother, and while it sucked that it was on those circumstances, it was nice to see Debbie’s family again. Debbie’s parents’ house and my parents’ house are literally 2 streets away from each other (about the same distance as my house and Maaike’s house…but it feels shorter ‘cus it was a straight line) and I’d spent a lot of time there in my teenage years.

Tuesday was my first day back at work. I needed a lift from my dad ‘cus my car still wasn’t ready, which was great for me because it meant I could knit on the way to work (not something you can do when you’re driving). Since my dad has bowling on Tuesdays and goes straight there from work he wouldn’t be able to drive me home, so my mom picked us up when she finished teaching at 2:15…so it was a nice, short day. We stayed at my parents’ house for supper and for the first time ever Jakob fed himself an entire meal from real people food (as opposed to purees that I’d thawed). My mom served hamburgers with a broccoli/cauliflower/carrot mix and potatoes, and Jakob had already been cleared of allergies for all those foods, so I broke them up into small pieces, put them on his high chair tray and let him feed himself. He loved it!

He is trying so hard to be independant- the only way I can get him to let me feed him a meal with a spoon is if I give him a breadstick. He gets the opportunity to self-feed and he tolerates me offering a spoon in between bites.

Wednesday I didn’t end up going in to work, because my dad was delayed in going in, and by the time he would have picked me up, I would only have had about an hour before my mom was due to pick us up, so it wouldn’t have been worth it. That evening one of Yannick’s friends fixed my car (he could have done it himself but was too tired and his buddy works at an auto-parts place and knows cars like the back of his hand) and while they took my car for a test-drive, I went outside to try and take photos of the lunar eclipse. They didn’t come out so well, but I only went out when it was about a quarter covered, and didn’t go out again to see it at full eclipse. I’d wanted to, but suddenly started getting the chills.

I went to bed early and woke up many times throughout the night. I kept taking my temperature- I had 102 F all night. I felt really achy too so I think my body was trying to fight something. In any case by the time Thursday morning rolled around it had dropped to 101 F but I wasn’t about to go in and have to work and take care of Jakob the way I felt. It was hard enough just taking care of him! I slept every time he slept, and lay next to him on the floor while he played, and by night time the fever had broken and I felt much better. A bath before bed and I was as good as new.

Today was our first full day at work…or at least it was for Jakob. I left for 2 hours in the afternoon to attend the funeral of the mother of one of Yannick’s friends. My sister came to the store to watch Jakob so I could go.

I’ve been working on the Rumple shawl all week long and am nearly finished the first mini ball of silk. I’m trying to focus on it before moving on to something else, but I might put it aside- for a good reason. Jakob will be 1 in less than 3 months, and I have a 12 month sized sweater I want to knit him, plus his birthday gift. I don’t need a silk shawl done in the next 3 months. I do need a sweater and giant dinosaur knit. 🙂

Anyways, I’ve been sitting here half-posting and half-websurfing since 8pm, and it’s nearly midnight. I’ve got work in the morning so I’m going to bed- I work Tuesday to Saturday, remember? Hopefully I’ll remember to bring the camera home so I can take some photos of the latest shawl progress (all week’s worth) and maybe a few of Jakob too.

I feel like I’ve been granted a stay of execution!

I was supposed to return to work tomorrow. Maternity leave- over. Real world- commence.

Then I got a letter in the mail this morning advising me that my maternity benefits will be ending on February 16th (Friday). Which means I don’t go back to work until NEXT Tuesday.

There was much happy dancing done in this house!

Back to knitting- no news on the striped scarf or the silk Rumple shawl, as neither were touched all weekend. Instead I cast on for a hooded cardigan for Jakob with some lovely soft blue/gray Marble yarn, and am about 1/3 done with the back. I had hoped to finish more over the weekend but somehow I ended up with only about an hour to knit each day. I have photos but they are on my camera, which is downstairs. Since I’m very tired, downstairs seems really far away right now.

What a week. Tuesday night all seemed well. I’d put Jakob to bed at 7pm as usual and he was sleeping like the proverbial baby. I enjoyed a nice supper and some well-deserved knitting/tv time while Yannick was at bowling. I managed to finish the front and back of the Hickory Dickory Dot baby sweater and had taken photos so I’d be ready to blog Wednesday morning. At 1am I got into bed, all set to listen to some podcasts on my ipod, play a few games on my palm and go to bed.

That’s when Jakob started throwing up in his sleep.

I heard him heaving on the monitor and got into his room in time to get him into a sitting up position for the first wave. We got him cleaned up, changed his sheets and pjs and I brought him into our bed to sit with me for a bit. That’s when it happened again. And again. And again. Half an hour later he’d thrown up at least once every 5 minutes and we decided to call the Info-Sante 24 hour nurses hotline. He was so exhausted that after every spasm he’d collapse against me, not even having enough energy to fully close his eyes before falling into a semi-sleep.

Info-Sante suggested we bring him to the hospital to make sure it wasn’t something we couldn’t get under control, but unfortunately the short car ride to our local hospital made him fall asleep, so when we arrived at triage with what looked like a peacefully sleeping baby in his bucket they didn’t consider us a priority. Sure enough he woke up after we’d left the nurse’s room, and spent the next while in my arms alternating between sleep, semi-conscious and vomiting. FOUR HOURS later, after he’d thrown up on me at least 8 times, I carried him over to the admittance person and asked how many more times he’d have to throw up before they would see us. They took us in to the doctor right away.

Unfortunately (again) the doctor said that they had no pediatrician on staff there, and that since Jakob was STILL throwing up he wanted us to go downtown to the Montreal Childrens’ Hospital and have him seen there. Why couldn’t they have told us this at 2am when we got there??? So at 5:30am we were on our way downtown in pre-rush hour traffic with a sick baby.

Fortunately (for once) there was no wait at the Childrens’. I hear this isn’t always the case, and we were really lucky that the waiting room was empty when we got there. They took us right away and first a nurse, then a doctor saw Jakob. They started getting worried about dehydration- he still had tears and drool so he was ok but he hadn’t had anything to drink since his bottle before bed and he had thrown up over 20 times already. The resident asked me to give him his bottle, and he guzzled down 2 ounces of formula, threw it up right away, took another 2 ounces, fell asleep for 20 minutes, woke up and threw up again.

That was not good, because their next plan was to put him on an IV drip. Unfortunately (yet again) he’s little, and after being so sick and losing so many fluids, his already tiny veins were even smaller. 3 different nurses tried and stuck him with needles while another one held him down, screaming. 2 nurses managed to find veins, and both popped. After an hour they gave him a break and he just collapsed in my arms. Thankfully they decided not to try again.

I had to spend the next few hours giving him Pedialyte by syringe, one dropper every 5 minutes. Yannick had left at this point ‘cus he had to go to work, so I spent the next many hours holding him while he slept and feeding him the liquid. He threw up one more time at 10am, and at lunch time my mom showed up and helped me out with the holding/feeding. By 3pm he was still keeping in his fluids so they let us go home. Did I mention yet that I’d been awake since Tuesday morning, 9am? It was now Wednesday afternoon.

We went to my mom’s house ‘cus they offered to help out by watching Jakob so I could get some sleep. Well…by the time we got there I knew I’d caught it from him. I fell asleep right away, woke up at 7pm and started throwing up myself.

Ugh. I won’t get into all the details, but I had it all day Thursday while trying to take care of Jakob, it’s now Saturday evening, my mom who is spending the weekend in New York with her sisters celebrating my aunt Mimi’s birthday…she got it the night they got there. My sister got it this morning. Yannick got it last night and is still asleep…which is why this post has no photos- he’s sleeping in the spare bedroom where the main computer is. I’m typing this on the photo-free laptop.

On top of everything else, Jakob has been congested since Monday, either from a cold or from teething, I’m not sure. All I know is that he’s got so much snot pouring out of his little head (sorry!) that I’ve been calling him my little Booger Boy.

The end result of all this is that we couldn’t go to Ottawa today like we were supposed to, since I didn’t want to take a chance on getting little month old Kayla sick. I also cancelled dinner plans we were supposed to have Sunday night. Luckily every one is reschedulable, since I didn’t want to take a chance on getting anyone ELSE sick.

Jakob did not want to sleep today and I had him in my arms for the better part of 12 hours, but he’s finally down for the night so after I make myself a light supper I think I’m going to get some knitting done. I have managed to finish the two sleeves of the Hickory Dickory Dot sweater and hope to get as much more done tonight as I can. I want to get it off the needles and in the mail as soon as I can so I can start a Noro ribbed scarfalong with Maaike.

When I was little I did some modeling for catalogues and flyers, like Sears and Zellers. I discussed it with Yannick after Jakob was born, and we thought it might be fun to do the same with him, if it was something he seemed to enjoy. Well, Jakob is nothing if not personable and gives big grins and flirts with everyone we meet. So back in October we signed him up with a local modeling agency.

It was a long wait in coming but…

See my little cutie in there?

How cool is it to see my boy in print?!?! I’m going to see if I can get my mom to find one of my old print ads and I’ll post a side-by-side of them.

According to What to Expect the First Year:
By eight months, your baby

…should be able to:

-bear some weight on legs when held upright CHECK- oh my- He’s been standing with support since he was about 3 months old!
-feed self a cracker WE STILL HAVEN’T TRIED

-rake with fingers an object and pick it up in fist CHECK
-turn in the direction of a voice CHECK

-look for a dropped object CHECK

…will probably be able to:

-pass a cube or other object from one hand to another CHECK
-stand holding on to someone or something CHECK
-object if you try to take a toy away NO- he’ll tighten his grip but he’s not possessive yet
-play peekaboo CHECK
-get into a sitting position from stomach NO

…may possibly be able to:

-creep or crawl I’M NOT SURE does it count when he can get anywhere he wants to go by rolling and “scootching” his body?
-pull up to standing position from sitting WITH HELP
-pick up tiny objects with any part of thumb and finger CHECK
-say “mama” or “dada” indiscriminately CHECK He says “dadadada” and “babababa” all the time

…may even be able to:

-play patty-cake (clap hands) or wave bye bye KINDA- he claps his hands against other things to make noise
-walk holding on to furniture (cruise) NO
-stand alone momentarily CHECK but I don’t think it is real “standing”
-understand “no” (but not always obey it) NOT SURE- we’re trying to save saying “no” for important times so he doesn’t end up ignoring the word from hearing it all the time.

Mommy with Jakob at 35 weeks (also exactly 8 months old)

Did I mention yet that I’m in love with this kid? We went to the movies yesterday and I kept losing focus on the movie because he was asleep in my arms and I had to keep looking at him and how adorable he was asleep and how much I loved having him in my arms. Addictive, these kids are. 🙂 (Remind me to tell you another time how pissed I am at the movie theater though).

Today we spent a nice day at home. It’s really starting to hit me how soon I’m going back to work (in Feb!!!) and I’m trying to spend as much quality time with Jakob as I can. We play together, we read books together, even just lying in bed together and tickling each others’ faces…I’m SO going to miss our days alone together! I know he will be coming to work with me, but it won’t be the same.

Do you know how many times over the last week I have sat down at the computer to post? I’ve lost count. I check my email, then click over to Blogger and…something happens. Baby crying, phone ringing, kettle whistling, etc…etc…

But right now no phone is ringing, the baby is playing with his toys and there is nothing in the kettle so I’m giving this a shot! In the 6 days since I posted last a strange rash was broken out, a doctor was visited, a medicinal allergy was discovered, antihistamines were taken and the rash disappeared. We’re still working on the itching. Friends were spoken to and caught up with, friends were visited with, a new baby was met and cuddled, an old friend was seen again and new friends were hung out with and a good time was had by all. Swimming lessons were started, splashing occurred, a first shower was taken and pool-time was greatly enjoyed. Unpacking was done, laundry was done, more laundry was done, cleaning was done, another suitcase was found with (crap) more laundry to do and some stuff has been folded. Playgroup was held and visiting with other moms (and a dad) was done and discussions on breasts, bottles, periods, sex after baby and oh so much more were held. Laughter ensued. MUCH laughter ensued. (I think we scared the dad).

All in all it’s been a pretty busy week for our first week home. I was the one with the medicinal allergy- turns out that I’m allergic to the penicillin derivative I took for the mastitis. Symptoms appeared a full 2 weeks after I stopped the meds– crazy, huh?

But enough of this boring stuff- I know why you’re here. It’s for the photos, huh? Something quick you can skim your eyes over and race on to the next blog. Well here you go. I’ll put some trip photos in another post. This post is dedicated to my weekly Jakob photos and knitting.

Mommy with Jakob at 29 weeks.

Mommy with Jakob at 30 weeks.

I’m not putting a photo at 31 weeks. I forgot to take one of the two of us, and for Jakob alone it would be the holiday photo I posted just before I left so you’ve seen it already.

Mommy with Jakob at 32 weeks.

No photo for 33 weeks as we were away from each other, and no photo for 34 weeks either ‘cus apparently an 11 day break in schedule is enough for me to forget I took weekly photos, and I never took one last week. Sorry!

Now then. I have a confession to make. I don’t want to make it, and as you can tell by the title of this post, I’m not thrilled about making it, but I will make it anyways.

Maaike was right.

Arrfrghrhghrhrhgbhgbhgh that hurt! 🙂

Let me explain. Ever since our move my ball winder and meter counter have been missing, packed up somewhere amidst the 100 boxes we have left to unpack. Yes I moved almost 7 months ago. Shhh.

A few days before I left on my trip Maaike came over with her ball winder and we set upon my sock yarn stash. I knew I wanted to bring some sock yarn with. Socks were the perfect project- small enough to stow in my purse so I could have them with me at all times, and depending on the pattern, mindless enough for me to knit for a few minutes here and there while saving seats for the show or even in the dark during a show. Hell, I think a few times I even knit while walking around the boat, waiting in line at Passenger Services or for Bingo cards, or while waiting for my family to show up at dinner.

I couldn’t decide which to bring so in my over-eager innocence I might have decided to bring with a tad too much yarn. Maaike laughed. Yannick (when he found out what was going on) agreed with Maaike and laughed. I didn’t think it was so funny. Of course I brought with too much sock yarn! Some days I’d be relaxing by the pool for a few hours so I could work on something with a chart or three. Other days my knitting would be stuffed in and pulled out of my bag so often that I would need stockinette or ribbing or something that didn’t require frequent looking at a pattern. What’s that old motto- “be prepared”?

Apparently I didn’t realize that I’d brought with enough yarn to knit 7.5 pairs. That’s 15 socks. I went on an 11 day cruise. This really didn’t seem odd to me.

This photo shows the knitting I actually got done on the cruise. Remember the Fibonacci socks? I’d knit the first one during the holidays about 2 years ago, then put them aside. I brought with the remaining pink and cream Regia 4-ply and cast on for the toe on the plane to Fort Lauderdale. I clearly didn’t knit as fast as I could have, nor as often. I must have spent way too much lazy time taking the sun, going on excursions or enjoying the ship’s facilities as it took me just over a week to knit the second sock. I got speedier after that. The project to the right is the beginning of a Sidewinder Sock using black/red/white Regia Winter Color from my LYS. I would have had the first sock finished before leaving the boat but I was afraid to lose my addi turbo needle at the airport with US customs so I packed it up. I brought some bamboo dpns with for airport knitting (thanks Robyn!) and I cast on for Mona’s Barcelona Socks (the November Mystery Socks) while waiting in line at the Air Canada counter. The yarn is Trekking hand art and the color is Karibik, also from my LYS. I got 4 rows done before putting it away and I could have had more done had I not chosen to sleep the entire plane ride home. THAT was a flight well wasted!

This, uh, next photo shows the rest of the yarn that I brought and didn’t knit. I can explain, I swear! Ok, starting from the left is the Socks That Rock mediumweight in Gingerbread Dude. I brought that to knit the Rock and Weave sock pattern. I started/swatched on the bus in Puerto Limon while driving past banana and pineapple plantations. I got as far as you can see above when I realized my gauge was off. I needed bigger needles- which were at home. I’d brought every size from 3.75mm down. Now I needed 4mm. That project got thrown aside in favor of the Sidewinders. Next along the top is some brown/black/white Regia Winter Color which was destined to be Jaywalkers but now that Yannick has seen my Sidewinders he wants a pair for himself so I might give the brown ones to him. The blue ball in the middle is Colinette Jitterbug in Jewel, which, unless I find a pattern that isn’t obscured by all the flecks of color, will be knit into plain stockinette socks. Moving up again to the black ball, that’s Socks That Rock lightweight in Obsidian, a black/brown subtle color that will be gorgeous as a pair of Boyfriend Socks for Yannick. The last ball, the orange/turquoise one, is Time To Go by Lotus Yarns, and was the October (and first) yarn in the Robyn’s Nest Sock Club. I am going to be knitting a plain sock with an eyelet pattern out of one of Barbara Walker’s books, but silly me, I forgot the pattern at home.

I probably shouldn’t mention this…but these two balls? The purple The Flirting Kind by Yarn Oddity (Robyn’s Nest’s November Sock Club) and the Socks That Rock lightweight in Fire on the Mountain that Yannick had bought for me? These were balls wound in anticipation of coming on the trip but I pulled them out of my bag at the last minute. I thought that two more balls of sock yarn would be, honestly, too much to bring.

Stop laughing.

Hi everyone! I’m back!

I wanted to post tonight with some photos but the wind is going crazy here and our lights have flickered so I’m going to turn off the computer. If things clear up later tonight I’ll hop back on, otherwise look here tomorrow SOON for a new post.

Hope everyone had a great New Year’s Eve and holiday season!

I have photos. I have completed stuff. I have stuff to post.

I also have inlaws staying over for the weekend in the room with the computer.

As if that wasn’t enough to keep me from posting all the stuff I should have posted over the week, I also have mastitis.

The antibiotics are kicking in, so I no longer feel like throwing up from the pain. However I still can’t really do much with my left arm/side…including holding Jakob.

Ugh. I don’t wish this on my worst enemy. Luckily, of all the weekends I could end up with mastitis, I got it on the weekend the inlaws are over, and my MIL has been a huge help, feeding, playing with and generally watching Jakob for me so I didn’t have to bring him to the walk-in clinic I spent all day at today, where I provided amusement to the locals by alternately knitting a few stitches on the Sept Robyn’s Nest sock club kit, and clutching my left breast in agony, knitting, clutching, knitting, clutching.

I hope to return to normal, both posting and otherwise, by Monday.