Family Updates

While S is out at a meeting and LM is asleep (yay!) I have a little time to start sharing how we are doing lately.
LM and I went on a grand adventure to Ontario last month.  We were gone for 9 days and met most of S's mom's family as well as his dad's parents and sister.  LM was a trooper.  It was an hour flight to Alberta, a sleep-over with Oma, Opa, Auntie B, Auntie BL and Mom... then a 7am flight to Ontario, which lasted four hours, and a week in Ontario.  Then we flew the four hour flight back to Alberta where we stayed the night before returning home.  It was a long time to be out of routine and letting strangers hold her, but she was great.  She even stayed on her schedule... we had a three hour time change.  So, her bedtime would normally be at 9:30ish pm, and she went to bed right around 12:30 pm most nights in Ontario.  Her body just had a good internal clock, I guess.  I was so thankful to know she would be back on schedule once we got home.  It was worth the lack of sleep in Ontario.
While we were gone, S managed to get a lot of work done around the house and for his music job at the church.  He had so much free time that he got extra stuff done as a surprise to me.  Things like adding night lights around the house, getting LM's diapers organized in a rubbermaid chest of drawers so I'm not constantly digging for the different pieces, organizing our clothes in a chest of drawers he got at a garage sale, tons of "spring cleaning" that needed to be done-I know, I know, it's not spring... whatever, and he made dinner for us the night we got home.  Fair trade roses and all.  I'm a fan.  Anyway, we are glad to be home with him and making everyday household chores more complicated again.  :-P
We wrote a song for LM's baptism, which is happening this coming weekend, on Saturday.  Well, I should say that we started writing a song... and it isn't completely finished yet.  If you want to know why we are doing a baby baptism instead of a dedication or instead of nothing at all, we'd love to talk about it... I just don't want to get into it on my blog.
I went back to work at the beginning of October, teaching music lessons and working with SH, my little friend with autism who I get to hang out with.  We have a blast doing homework, swimming, music lessons, hiking, playing board games, rock climbing, watching Garfield movies, and all kinds of good stuff together.  It is a nice addition to mother-hood because it is a small time commitment instead of full-time work which would take me away from LM more than I would like.  Our friend A is baby sitting one of the times during the week that I'm with SH.  She comes and snuggles with LM... and I think it does A almost as much good as it does for LM.  :-P  Dad is home with her the other day each week that I work.
S has been trying to take some time each week for photography, as well as some creative writing.  He recently started a children's book and I think it's amazing.  You can ask him about it some time.

Our little family is changing and growing so fast.  LM is 3 months old and already in 6-9 month clothing... and she is almost too long for it too.  She is still skinnier than I was at her age though.  Such a cutie.  Her friend, who happens to be 2 1/2 months older (I think), is the same height or shorter than LM now.  There is a picture below so you can see what I mean when I say she is long.

I recently attended a Breastfeeding Challenge that was put on by the local nurses and La Leche League leader in the area.  I breast fed LM with lots of other women in the public library to raise awareness of the importance of breast feeding and see how many women we could get breast feeding in one place at once.  They had door prizes and I won a 3 month membership to a local women's gym.  So, I signed up the other day and I'm enjoying it so far.  It is nice to know I can work out indoors for part of the winter, at least, since it is so cold here in the winter.
Here we are, breast feeding at the library: