It's A...

GIRL!!!

Announcing another little baby girl Watt. We are so excited. Today I was finally able to get my 18 week ultrasound (at 23 weeks) and we were all able to see our little baby swimming around.

I've been very anxious for this ultrasound. Because we have been in Edmonton for the last few months I've been going to walk-in clinics for my pre-natal care. (If you thought that most pre-natal appointments were a general waste of time you should go to see a walk-in doctor. But I digress.)

Until today, I had never heard my baby's heartbeat and have been very nervous if I went longer than 45 minutes without feeling any movement. I've been worried that baby is not developing properly simply because I haven't had my regular doctor who has more than 5 minutes to spare.

It was wonderful to finally see baby. Grace was also able to see her baby sister. She was pleased to know that baby had a nose and a mouth just like her. Her little sister even waved at her.

Baby has all major body parts (they couldn't find Grace's right foot in the first ultrasound), has a regular heartbeat, is moving around like crazy and likes to open her mouth...a lot.

We can't wait to meet you baby. We are so excited and love you very much. All we need now is a girl's name. Good thing we still have 17 weeks.

Colouring

If there's one gene Grace got from me (and I sometimes think it's only one) it's the arts and crafts gene. If the supplies are out and you stand still long enough there is a very good chance that you will leave covered in stickers, marker, pen and/or improvements made with scissors. (She can't actually cut anything with scissors but she knows the theory behind them)



Trying to be the good parents, we got Grace a colouring book that has a life size picture of what baby will look like at the end of each month. It also has a desciption of the different things baby can do. This month it has apparently learned to suck its thumb.
At the end of each month I crack out the colouring book while trying to explain to Grace how baby is doing. She still doesn't get it. She thinks there's a baby in her tummy and then gets mortally offended when we tell her otherwise. (At this rate we're never getting into a state-of-the-art nursery home.)
But she does love to colour. Today while colouring the closest thing to a picture of her baby sibling, Grace added stickers, crayons, markers and paint. So enhtusiastic was she that she emptied her entire craft box.
Later she spent over half an hour covering herself and mommy with Disney princess stickers

Check out Grace colouring and her newest phrase.

Long Morning

Yesturday was a long day. It was a "no" day, the first one that we've ever had but still it made for a very unproductive day. After Grace went to bed last night I thought that she was in bed for good. Not so. She graced us with her presence around three am.
Me being the very tired and wonderful wife, kicked Stu out of bed to deal with her but in his tired state he just brought her into our bed and then went to sleep on the couch.
It was a long night. Grace wanted to sleep as close to me as possible and almost got me off the bed a few times. When I woke up this morning, I was not in the best of moods. Translation: a tyrannousaurs rex is probably more cheerful. That all changed however when I looked over at Grace and realized that she'd removed her diaper at some point during the night.
Thinking quickly, I forced her into a diaper and plopped her infront of Arthur. I stripped the bed and then called my Dad to ask him how best to clean pee off of a matress. I love my Dad very much and think he's the greatest Dad ever but apparently he just wasn't around all those times my brothers and I never made it to the toilet. After a quick conversation of "I don't know, I never had to deal with this, try baking soda." I got the matress cleaned. (Quick note. Baking soda does remove all bad smells from matresses.)
After quickly pouring a bath I dumped Grace in. She was confused as to why she was having a bath first thing in the morning. She then started whining because she wanted breakfast. Howlering to Stu I asked if he could watch Grace while I made breakfast. Stu reply was "No I'm so tired. Can you turn down the sun?"
Okay.
Once Grace decided that her hunger out weighed her love of the bath, I dressed her, whipped up some scrambled eggs and told her to eat. I had to run and get the laundry washed because our building was turning off the water all day and I kinda like to sleep in non-pee covered sheets.
I had almost made it to the door when Grace noticed me and barricaded the door. After much convincing, nagging and hoofing Stuart off the couch I left them reading a story together.
With only twenty mintues to spare I got the laundry in the wash and made it back in time to make juice, fill the water jug and explain to Stu that he needed to shower now if he wanted to get clean.
After he showered I informed him that all towels of any shape and size were in the wash.
Fortunately, it seems that all the major drama was over before nine this morning. The rest of the day went as quietly as it could for the Watt house.
Tonight we plan on duct taping Grace's diaper on.

The Ledge

This is possibly my favourite place in Edmonton. Before I came to Edmonton I had a list of places that I wanted to see before I left. The Alberta Legislature Building was on that list but more for a tour in air conditioning than anything else.
One sweltering Sunday evening friends of ours took us there and I feel in love with it. In front of the main building there is a giant, raised pond that is about knee deep. You can swim and wade around the pond and splash around in many of the smaller fountains that are in the gardens. There are also many walking paths, beautiful flowers, a very friendly security guard to make sure everyone stays safe and all sorts of people to look at.
I usually have to do a great deal of convincing of my other family members to get us to go but I love just sitting there in the quiet and watching all the people there.

Grace and I wading at the Ledge

The beautiful folliage. Grace thinks it's silly that I smell the flowers.

Stuart posing on the steps. Notice a certain nudist escaping behind him.



The Legislature Building at sunset.

Things I've Learned While Parenting

Nobody likes to burn their tongue. It's a fact of life. If you're a toddler you really don't like to burn your tongue because you think everything you eat after that will have the same affect. Or at least that's how my toddler operates.
Since we don't have a microwave out here everything must be heated up in the oven or on the stove which usually means its too hot for her highness to eat right away. We try very hard to tell her this whenever it happens (which is about every meal) and rejoiced when she learned to say "hot". Because of this, Grace now thinks anything that is hot must be bad.
This is what I've learned. Don't ever teach your child something that they can use as an excuse later on in life.
This evening at the supper table while Grace was enjoying her grilled cheese, I held up her broccoli and asked her if she would eat it.
She held her hand a centimeter away from it, looked me in the eye and said "hot". The broccoli was raw.
Does anyone know what to say to that? Because I certainly don't. I just stared at her and said it wasn't hot. Grace repeated that, yes, it was in fact "hot" therefore she couldn't eat it. She then went to sit on the couch where she could finish her sandwich in peace.
I honestly thought that I would always be able to explain things to her in a way that would make her respect and love me even more than before IF she ever talked back to me. Mom has many surprises yet to learn.

Nursery!

Attention! Attention! Grace Mae Watt is now offically a nursery cutie! On Sunday, now that she is offically 18 months old, she got to join all the other 18 month to three year olds at church for Nursery. She got to colour, play with all sorts of toys, have a snack and a little lesson. Mommy and Daddy got to sit through their lessons without having to wander the halls for the first time in 18 months.

Saturday night was rather stressful. Grace was full of anxiety about going to Nursery but was greatly comforted when we reassured her that Mommy and Daddy would be there with her for as long as she wanted. In the end that was about 3 minutes.

When it was over she was bursting with stories to tell us, pictures that she had drawn and was rather sad to leave. She then went home and collapsed to have a giant nap.

We hope Grace continues to have this much success in her Nursery endevours.

Three Years

I still can't believe that I'm this old, but on July 29 Stu and I celebrated our third anniversary together. In some ways it feels like a long time but in other ways I wonder what I've been doing with all that time.

We decided to splurge (sp?) and bought some sword fish to dine on. Stu came home early, Grace went to bed early and we were all set for a lovely night when (a) we realized that the lady at the store did not give us sword fish but some other less enjoyable kind and (b) Grace decided to wake up and keep us company for most of the night. Even so it did end up being a very lovely evening.

So I would just like to say thank you to Stuart for the past three, most wonderful years of my life. Thanks for loving me and taking care of me. Thank you for putting up with sinks full of dirty dishes, with late night discussions about our feelings when you're trying to sleep and with wearing wrinkled shirts to church because I do not know how to iron your shirts properly.

Thanks for all the late night freezie binges, camping in the back yard and living room. Thanks for making me laugh after a bad day and eating the cinnamon rolls even though they didn't rise. Thanks for being such a great Dad to Grace and for being my best friend.

Happy Third Anniversary Sweetie. I'm so happy you chose me.

Go Karts

Stuart's office was given the incentive to make 15 sales in a day. If they did this they would get to go Go Karting. Having never been I can't say I saw the motivation in this. However, the guys were so excited, worked their tails off and made it. They were on their way.

Because we have nothing better to do during the day, the wives came along and brought the kids to see. All the wives were told they could also go on the track (after the boys were done for their own safety) except for me since go karting is a no-no when you're pregnant.

It was a two toddler effort to get that kart moving.



I just think they look so cute together.

Just one of the boys.

Stu was the leader of the pack for almost all of his two races until he was side swiped and sent into the dirt. Tall men were not made to fit into these things.

Blueberries

On Friday blueberries were on sale; or at least as cheap as they get in Edmonton. We'd bought them before and Grace refused to eat them, preferring to push them around in her stroller. We offered her some this time as we were waiting in line to check out thinking that she'd call it a ball and throw it across the room.




She absolutely LOVED them. We manages to get her outside by feeding her one at a time but while I was loading the bags into the trunk she attacked the container, refused to let it go and pitched everything she could reach out of the cart in protest. This lead to a mini picnic in the Superstore parking lot.


She now opens the fridge, takes out the container of blueberries and talks to them while eating them.

Fort Edmonton

On Saturday Stuart finally took a day off. This is a big deal if you know my husband and his working habits. We decided to go to the local fort. Grace and I went there during the week and greatly enjoyed so we dragged Daddy along. However it probably wasn't the best choice in family day trips since the temperature reached a whopping 35 . We lasted 3 three hours before we admitted defeat and went search of some air conditioning.

They were making banack for all the visitors to eat. Stuart who has obviously never been to a girls' camp in his life thought it was the greatest.

Grace just sat down part way through the fort and decided to collect some rocks.

Checking out the Native American tee pees.

On the street car.

The beautiful view of the North Saskatchewan river.

There really isn't a point to this video other than Grace saying a few words and being cute.