Reflections of 2010...

This time last year, we were new parents of a beautiful baby boy, I was on maternity leave, and we were renting a house.

As we turn the page to 2011, we have a 15-month-old who keeps us incredibly busy and continues to bring us incredible joy, I own an online natural parenting store, and we own our first home! What a year!

Over the past 12 months, I have continued to fall more in love with Ethan and more in love with my job as a mom. I was made to be a wife and Mom – I’ve been saying this since high school, where my economics teacher would make fun of me and tell me I couldn’t live off of love….I’m proving him wrong. I have never felt so fulfilled and so at peace about where I am in life. I can’t imagine being back at work and leaving Ethan every day; I would be missing out on so much! I love that I have the privilege of watching him learn new things every single day – I’ve watched him take his first steps, learn his first words, and figure out life as a one-year-old. I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

I own a business! What the heck?! How did that happen? This time last year I wouldn’t have thought I had it in me…sometimes I still don’t know. But, with immense amounts of encouragement from my wonderful husband (and some incredible family and friends), I took the plunge and am now the very proud owner of ‘Lovable Little Tree Huggers.’ Starting my business has enabled me to share my passion for cloth diapering, baby-wearing, and natural parenting with friends and strangers alike; it has given me a sense of independence, and it has given me the opportunity to meet some great new friends and other stay-at-home-Moms. I love what I do, but most of all I love that it allows me to stay home with Ethan and savour the joys of motherhood.

Not only do we now own a business, but we bought our first home in 2010! After essentially giving up on the fact that we would ever own a home in the area we're currently living, things just about fell into our laps and we were able to buy a house that we have quickly made a home. We are excited about renovating our kitchen and powder room in 2011 and about making more family memories in our first family home!

As we say goodbye to 2010 and remember all of the excitement and memories made, I also feel a sense of loss and mourning. In 2010, a dear friend passed away very suddenly, sending my life into a cloud of sadness and many, many tears. Life didn’t seem fair. He was far too young and had so much potential…he was going to do great things. I grieved for his parents; I grieved for his brother and sister; I grieved for my parents and for other friends affected by his death; and slowly over the last couple of weeks, I think I have started to grieve for me. There are many, many memories that I look back on and am thankful for, but I feel like there were also many memories waiting to be created. As I begin 2011, I remember my friend. I remember vacations together in our childhood, I remember conversations with him that went way over my head, I remember the first time he met my son, and more than anything, I remember his laugh. I cling to the fact that he is with God and he is at ultimate peace…sometimes that gives me peace too. Until I hear his laugh again, I’ll remember his life, and in his memory I will cherish every day I am given.

I'm NOT pregnant

I realize it has been a LONG time since I've blogged...over 15 months to be exact.
Before anyone jumps to conclusions (that is, if anyone still follows this blog...), no I am NOT pregnant and that is not why I'm starting to blog again.

There are many times I have thought, "I would love to blog about that," but haven't done it. I love the idea of writing memories down so that we can look back on them, but if I don't blog about it, I'm definately not going to write it down. I have a blog on my business webpage, but don't feel comfortable blogging about life and family on that, and so, I've decided that I'm going to start writing on here again.

If you still read this, let me know...it'd be nice to know I have some loyal followers. However, at the same time, it'll just feel good for me to write things down and maybe one day my little man (and any other future children) will be able to read about their childhood and the quirky things they did that made their mother smile :)

Any day now...

Well, I'm 39 weeks today and anxiously awaiting the arrival of this baby. I'm not feeling too bad, but it seems that life is just on hold as we wait for the little one to make it's appearance. I've been trying to keep busy, but days still seem to drag a little bit. I've been tired again the last week or so, but I'm sure it's nothing to what I'll feel in the weeks after baby arrives. We are just SO excited to meet our little one...we talk about it constantly and dream of who this little person inside of me is. We have the room all ready now and I"ll post some pictures of that. The crib is supposed to come in this Saturday. This Saturday is also my very good friend Hannah's wedding. I've been excited for this wedding for years (literally...it's been a long time coming!) and I really hope I don't have to miss it.

36 weeks:

38 weeks:

I suck at this.

I haven't blogged in 2 months...I"m really no good at this. I kept up at first because it was my way of "talking" to people when I couldn't actually tell people I was pregnant. Now, people are always asking how I'm feeling, etc. etc. so I don't feel like I have to update on here.

We have had a wonderful, but extremely busy summer. We helped out with VBS, spent a week in Halifax with 12 youth on a missions trip, and finally had a week of holidays a couple of weeks ago. We went up to a cottage on an island on Woods Bay and had an incredible week. Since we've been back we've been busy trying to finish up doing stuff around the house so we're ready for the baby. However, I'm realizing that I probably won't ever feel 100% ready. I had this list of stuff I wanted to get done around the house before the wee one makes it's arrival, but of course the list is never-ending...part of living in a house and not a part of being ready for baby I"m realizing. We got our basement done after having it flood in the winter, so that's a huge load off. The baby's room is just about finished...we're just waiting for our crib to come in the mail and I still have to buy a curtain rod and some knobs for the dresser. Other than that, I'm doing things as I can (and as the nesting urge promts), but trying not to stress about it .

Andrew is busy with work trying to be all ready for youth and small groups kick off in September so that when baby does come he can take a week off. Because they've changed my due date a couple of times we're thinking that we could have our little arrival any time in the next 2 weeks to a month. I'm pushing for 2 weeks, but trying to be realistic too.

I'm getting so excited to meet this little one!! Jeff & Linds have been nice enough to lend us the basinnette that Lindsay's uncle made for them and Jeff dropped it off for us yesterday. It's set up in our room and making me even more excited. Last night I had a dream that I had the baby..it seems everytime I wake up every night (and that's fairly often), all I can think about is when am I going to go into labor. It feels a bit like life is just on hold, waiting for when this baby decides to make his or her appearance. It's both exciting and overwhelming.

Not sure if I'll get another post in before baby comes...wouldn't necessarily count on it, but who knows. Below are some pictures of what we've been up to this summer....

The ever-expanding belly

Update

I'm realizing I'm not great at the whole blog thing, BUT I'm trying because I know some people actually read this and feel like I'm ripping them off by slacking so much.

Things continue to go well as far as the pregnancy goes. I really can't complain at all. I've had a few bad back days, and some nausea lately, but other than that it's all going pretty smoothly. I think I've had it pretty good...I'm really just loving being pregnant these days. I'm sure as the summer gets warmer that might change, but right now I'm just enjoying feeling a baby move inside of me and knowing the time is getting closer to when I'll meet him or her!

We had our first prenatal class this week and we're looking forward to learning more about what this whole baby thing entails. Though, to be completely honest, sometimes I think I would rather go into labor totally ignorant than petrified. We'll see...

I had my first shower a few weeks ago too! My co-workers threw me a surprise shower and it was a lot of fun. I got lots of cute stuff and it all makes me even more excited to decorate the room and bring the baby home!

We haven't done much to the room at all. Andrew & my Dad worked on it a bit and found that there's some rotten wall because the windows were installed very poorly, so they're trying to figure out how much they have to replace of the drywall and all that. We have the color picked out though and I have a dresser that I'm going to repaint (not true...they won't let me paint...Dad or Andrew will probably do it). Andrew also had a window seat built for the baby's room as my birthday gift. I've always wanted a window seat and it looks awesome in the nook in the baby's room. I'm excited about getting that painted too and buying some cushions and stuff for it...and eventually sitting on it and cuddling with my little one :)

Life has been pretty busy on the whole...though I'm sure things will only continue that way after September. Andrew has had tons of stuff to plan for youth and I've been working on exams and report card and all that fun stuff that teaching entails. We're also planning for a missions trip we're taking some youth on to Halifax in July. We're really looking forward to it and things are starting to fall into place, so that's exciting. Other than that, our summer has already been booking up with VBS, family events, etc. We're going up to a cottage for a week in August with my family, so we're really excited about that too. It's a beautiful cottage on an island and I plan on doing a lot of reading, beaching and floating. Can't wait!

Anyways, that's all for now. Marking is calling my name!

Meet our Baby!