Stream of whaaaat?

Winter is clearly leaving like a lion—and I gotta say, I’m bummed by it. Last week, Mother Nature taunted us with the first harbringers of spring—warm sunshine, chirping birds, melting snow, the sound of the run-off trickling into gutters, brown tufts of grass peeking out from lawns. It was heavenly. Looked like and Wiarton Willie finally had it right. An early spring and not a moment too soon. And, then, last Friday, right after she had us shedding mittens and parkas for jackets and sunglasses, she went ahead and dumped another 10 cm of the white stuff on us, followed by a week of frigid temperatures. Gawd.

Flash forward to yesterday—yup. More snow. Another 10 cm of the crap. Looks like grey, dreary skies all weekend. Utterly depressing. Truly. Mother Nature is one fickle b!tch.

I guess you could say I have cabin fever and wrong you would not be. I’m a proud Canadian, and I hate the thought of a green Christmas, but man, oh man—I was never meant for winter weather. I get to about mid-January and I’m done with it. Suivant, next.

But, we’ll get to spring eventually, I suppose—I’ll give Willie another week or so before I file an official grievance. In the meantime, I’ve got plenty to keep me busy. (When do I not?) Lots of things to cross off the To-Do list at home, of course, but I’ve also joined the Make-a-Wish team in Rockland as a volunteer, so I hope to be involved with Brooke and company in some fun events there. Looking forward to taking some wish-granting training soon, too.

Of course, I want to get started on that wish trip scrapbook, too, especially now that my sister-in-law Brenna—the star of scrapbooking superwebsite, ScrapSmith—found me some adorable mermaid/princess/fairy/Disney papers to work with. Gorgtastic! So, that’s another project that will be ever in the wings.

Must get back to the DISBoards as the folks there have been very patient with me while I have gone on blogging and trip-reporting hiatus for the last couple of months.

And, in spite of all my complaining, spring is coming, so that means time to get party-planning! Not only is there the usual Easter shenanigans to prepare for, but I’ve got a bundle of birthdays I need to celebrate. We have a lot of April birthdays in the family—my granny’s, my mother-in-law, my hubby, my brother (who will be 30 this year!) and, of course, Miss Avie, who will be two in just a few weeks. Eeek! I can’t believe it—seems like it was a couple of months ago that I began this blog to chronicle her coming into the world.

Here she is in a terribly unsteady iPhone users' hand (mine), perusing the Sears catalogue. Caught her ogling Dora tricycles. Little sister has already started catalogue shopping. Highly amusing. But, helpful, too. (One guess as to what my little sweetie will be getting for her birthday?)

She's growing up so fast. (FYI, her feet are growing at an average pace and are, in fact, quite normal-sized. In this pic, she was wearing Brooke's shoes.)

And, you know what she said to me this morning when I opened up her bedroom door to her little chattering voice? Prepare to gush....

“Oh! It’s my mommy. Love you!”

Yup. Sweetest thing ever.

Kid plucked all my heartstrings and the sound resonated all the way to work. In spite of the grey skies and bleak March terrain—which is saying something, I think.

More about her party plans forthcoming—but let’s just say, I’m very partyblog-inspired lately and have been showing my love of these awesome sites through Pinterest. Okay—can I say how much I love that website? I have found about a bazillion awesome, time-wasting websites in the last few weeks—Mod Clothes, We Heart It, Zulily—to add to my collection ol’ Flickr, Etsy, Contestgirl and Facebook standbys. But, honestly, it’s a struggle every time I sit down at the laptop because as the urge to creep along the pin boards is almost more than I can bear.... I adore it. I feel that website was created specifically with me in mind.

Seriously—I’m one of those peeps who has about 300 favourite websites stored on my browser and then saves a gazillion photos from different websites showing cool crafting, arty, entertaining or clothing ideas onto her hard drive. I’m not joking—there might just be more ‘mermaid party decoration’ photos there than there are pics of the girls. Now I can finally clear out all of those images and keep the ideas in one tidy little account somewhere in the cloud, all neatly sorted and organized and shared among like-minded friends.

Pinterest—my hard drive thanks you.

So, what’s all the point of this rambling piece? None whatsoever. Just a little stream of consciousness blurb to let you know I’m back.

Catch ya’ later.

Party mode in full swing

Valentine's Day has come and gone--and with it, so too has the Reese Peanut Butter cup chocolate hearts Hubby bought us. Yum! B was thrilled to pieces with her Valentines and treats and we were all surprised by Hubby's Valentines dinner on Saturday night. The menu wasn't fancy--but the presentation was adorable. He really is a sweetheart! Love you, Hubby.

Love Day has barely been swept under the rug and already we've moved on. The weather is freakishly warm this week (with an estimated + 12 on Friday--unheard of in February in Ottawa), so it feels like that groundhog might just be right for once. Spring may be appearing sooner rather than later. And, of course, with the spring melt, comes....party planning! Yeah!

I was thrilled to be able to put the invites to my grandmother's 80th birthday tea party into the mail this morning! Finally. For months now, I've been planning a special day for Granny's birthday. As a huge fan of tea and of dressing up, I mentioned the idea of taking afternoon tea to her and she loved it. She's sooooo looking forward to it, so I can't wait! She totally deserves a great day.

I've made reservations at the swanky Fairmont Queen Elizabeth Hotel in Montréal for a tea party in early April. Hopefully, all of Granny's immediate adult female relatives will be there--her one remaining sister, her two daughters, her five granddaughters and one granddaughter-in-law. We've decided to make it really 'Victorian' and are requesting that all the guests wear 'garden tea attire,' complete with hats and white pearls.

Luckily, since the party will be held at the hotel, there isn't much planning for me to do. I just had to make the invitations (very simple cards bought at Michaels--I then printed off the party info, inked up the edges and glued the papers to the cards) and send them out. I have a few small project ideas to help dress up the place settings in mind--tea bag favours and tiny frames of black and white photos of Granny for the guests, maybe tea roses in a tea cup for a centrepiece? Easy peasy stuff. Just requires another trip to Michaels!

The more time-consuming part of the tea party is figuring out what to wear! It has to be English garden party appropriate--and if I can use it for Avie's party and maybe Easter Day, too--all the better. So, I ordered a cute little shirt dress for this morning online (first time I've ever bought a clothing item for myself online without having already tried it on--eek!). All I need now is a huge hat, some shoes and some white gloves. Well, at least, party plans for that event seem to be on track.

As for Avie's first birthday bash--well, plans are starting to percolate! I know the theme (a cupcakery theme as sweet as she is!), have bought part of her birthday outfit and a few little things (like napkins and streamers and candles), but I still have to make the invitations and start work on some cute decoration ideas I have.

A quick glance at the calendar and I realize that I only have two more months left to get this all done. I haven't even contemplated goody bags or the cake though--and time is a ticking!--I can't put it off any longer!

Lastly, we had an outdoor skating party planned for this Friday evening. In my endless research of fun things to do in the city, I stumbled across a website where I discovered that absolutely anyone can enter their name into a lottery for a private skating party reservation at the historic outdoor rink at Rideau Hall. It was the last day of the lottery, so I decided to throw my name in without ever thinking I would actually win my reservation date. Well, I did!

Thrilled, I invited a bunch of friends and family with young kids to join us for the outdoor skating party--and we've been looking forward to the evening since before Christmas. The idea was to have a very simple cookies-and-hot-chocolate shindig on the ice on Friday. But, now that the weather is so damnably warm, it looks like the skating party might be cancelled.

Even if the rain holds off on Friday, the + temps have already done quite a number on the rink. And, it's only supposed to get warmer as the week progresses. If we don't cancel, we might as well tell our guests to bring their suits because the rink may just become a pool!

Anyways, I've been in touch with my Rideau Hall contact and she said she would confirm with me on Friday as to the condition of the ice. Everything hinges on that last-minute phone call. We'll keep our fingers crossed, but I think the party is off.

Speaking of party planning, did I mention I won a contest on Great-Happy-Birthday-Ideas.com? The contest was for best 'winter birthday party idea' and I won with my 'Winter ONEderland' theme for a first birthday party. Sweet! I received an Amazon.com gift certificate as a prize and the site author, Sophie, wrote up a little feature on me. Check it out here. If you're looking for some neat birthday ideas, definitely check out this website--plus, there is always a contest underway to enter!

Last week was definitely a good week for this contest junkie. I also won a Meaghan Smith giveaway on FaceBook! In honour of her recent Juno nomination, she was giving away a package of three CDs (her Juno-nominated 'Cricket's Orchestra,' the 'Cricket's Quartet' sampler and her earlier album 'Lost with Directions' ), as well as a t-shirt she designed herself to one lucky fan. I was that fan!!

If you don't know who Meaghan Smith is, crawl out from under your rock already! She's an amazing Canadian musician and artist, who's star is shining brighter every day! (And, yes, you have heard her music before because her now-famous 'It Snowed' played EVERYWHERE at Christmastime. Love that tune!) And she sent me a personal FB message! Egads!! It's about as close as I have ever gotten to a celebrity--or near-celebrity, so yeah--very friggin' exciting! Hope she wins. Just love her music. )

Anyways, here's to wishing you all a great long Family Day weekend! Let's hope the weather keeps up...I can almost taste spring in the air....

Status quo maintained

So, quick post. CT scan and MRI results are in: the status quo is maintained. No change in the lesion on her kidney (which they have believed to be a physical anatomical anomaly since June) and no further evidence of pulmonary lesions. Her remaining kidney has grown in size, which is great since that's what it is supposed to do, now that she is down to one. So, all in all, she's in the clear once again.

Cardio- and echograms next week, then just monthly returns to the MDU to flush out her port-a-cath until they schedule a surgery to remove it. To me, it won't really be over until the surgery, which likely won't take place until May. B will still have to take weekly doses of Septra (the preventative antibiotic) until the end of June, but so far, it looks like the mists are clearing and some sunshine is appearing in the distance. The road before us is opening up and the surroundings are becoming more and more familiar to us. An end to our journey come early summer? Definitely a cause for celebration!

Anyways, Hubby just returned from a week in Vancouver and is jetlaggedly napping in the next room. He'll need his rest for tonight, as we have dinner with friends and a Sens game to attend tonight. Meanwhile, B is busy making Valentines (yeah, we start crafting and decorating early in this house. As Hubby explained it to his brother--''decorating is more of a marathon sport for Ginger. She starts early and takes her time because there's a lot of it.'') and Avie has conked out for her own much-deserved nap. I guess I'll go do some laundry.

BTW: Avie's photo did appear in the Baby Beautiful issue of The Review! She looked great. Unfortunately, she wasn't one of the winners of the $50 gift certificates, which is fine because the town is a little far for me to go to get her a haircut. As her grandparents have noted, either the winners were randomly selected or the contest was rigged. My kid is certainly more adorable than some of the winning children featured. Yeah, must've been rigged....

And, speaking of Avie, plans have commenced for her first b-day bash. Have I ever mentioned how much I LOVE party planning? I am obsessed with theme parties and papercrafts and unique ways to entertain or present food or favours or cakes....

My latest obsession? Checking out the Real Parties section of Hostess with the Mostest. The photos--all of the colours and textures and details--are just scrumptious! Each entry is a visual feast for the eyes. And, the site has some wicked do-it-yourself decorating and entertaining ideas. Definitely a site to check out if you are craving some inspiration.

Have a great weekend, readers!