Mama was a Cornflake Girl

How super excited am I that Tori is on tour and will be in Vancouver in December? How super sad am I that I can't afford to go? At least I've seen her in concert, luckily twice. I think I can let this one go....I think....
It'll just have to be Tori day in my house and I'll have to put on a rotation of her cds. And B sides. It'll be a looooong day for Jordy.

Class on Saturday was good. It was a 5km hike (what's that 3 miles?) around Burnaby Lake Park (burnaby has a lake? What?!) and I really enjoyed myself. Along the walk I tried to walk beside different people from my class to get to know them. I must admit everyone seems really nice. There's even one lady who's a bit of a know-it-all and can get on my nerves, but at least she's nice and tries to make conversation with you. I would have to say that the average age in my class is late 30's early 40's. So I'm not too sure if I'm going to be making any super close friends, but you never know, I will not judge.

We also had met up with the Burnaby module (the one I was suppose to be in) and there are 43 people in that class. There are 17 in mine. Such a difference. In the Burnaby module is a girl I worked with at a different elementary school 2 years ago, a girl I graduated from CYC with 3 years ago and another lady who looks like someone I should know. I hate that when someone looks so familiar to you but you don't know why. The really eeries part? Halfway through our walk she came up to me and said that I look really familiar also. SPOOKY! We tried to figure it out but NOTHING. I said maybe it's from a past life and she agrees. Funny that.

But after walking and talking with my peeps, I started to hear some of their fears and concerns and found out that I am not alone, which makes me feel so normal (a feeling I rarely have.)I never really realized how being rejected really affected me, I think I'm scarred. I'm afraid that maybe all those people are right and I won't be a good teacher or someone will stand up in class, point their finger at me and tell me I'm a fraud. But I have to beyond everything BELIEVE in myself, in what my teaching goals are. Maybe I scare them; I'm that good. I'll put other teachers to shame. I just keep repeating in my head the lyrics from 'Swan dive', "You can call me crazy if I fail/ all that chance that I need/ is one in a million you can call me brilliant if I succeed/ Gravity means nothing to me/ moving at the speed of sound/ Just going to get my feet wet/ until I drown."

Madness

This has not been a good past couple of days for me. I am beyond exhaustion. Even my bones are wiped. I am probably not a good person to talk to right now, nor am I really in the mood for conversations, which is probably for the best anyhow. Sorry, Urs, I won't be calling you tonight on your cell, because it wouldn't be fair to you to do that. We'll see how things are on Sunday. Maybe bitching here will get rid of some of my negative enegery.

I'm kinda at the "I've had it!" place. I'm REALLY hoping not to take the next train to "Explosive outburst" town, instead to "I need some quiet reflection time" place. I realize it's a choice, don't need to tell me, I just need a moment. I didn't get a single solitary moment at all yesterday. I was at home with Isabel ALL DAY, from dawn till dusk. Jordy was at work at a "thing" and wasn't able to come home until 7:35, which at that point, Isabel was bathed, changed and feeding. My house was clean. My house was organized. I had clean sheets to sleep on that night. Not like the night before when I came home from my first day of class (which I'll get into in a bit), where I had babyfood all over my kitchen table, counters and sink, along with bibs, a taken apart high chair and just other useless crap strewn about. Not the same scene I had left 4 hours prior and am still unsure of how it got like that. I made my husband take a note of how clean my house was, when he got home last night and made a point of adding the fact that I was all alone. Bitchy, yes I know, but I felt justified. I know that most of the time the task of cleaning my house is somewhat redundant, but I feel it still needs to get done. Other people in my home clearly don't feel the same way. Anyway, not even an hour after I put Isabel down she woke up and SCREAMED bloody murder. And nothing would stop her crying and she did this twice. So Yes, no moments yesterday. Which just added more grr-ness to my pile.

The night before last I had my first class. All I am going to say about it is, despite the fact that there are some very nice people in my program, I do not feel like I fit in. I tried calling some friends and talking to my husband about it, but either no one was home or in the mood. That made me a bit sad. I also have to say about my class that even though I am a Child and Youth Care Worker, it was even too touchy feely for me. At the end, we all held hands and gave each other blessings. Too much warm fuzziness for me. But anyway, BEFORE class I found out our text books were FINALLY in at the bookstore. Only to get an email from my prof 5 days prior stating that they were not going to be in on time and was recommended we purchase them online. Which I did, and found out that one will be two weeks late. I am so annoyed with this university.

I am also struggling with customer service at The Province. Jordy loves his papers and I signed us up last year to receive them in the morning and in June my visa expired so I phoned and gave them all the new info. Then suddenly last week we were no longer receiving our papers so I emailed them. I was told that my credit card info needed to be updated. I replied saying it was back in June and this makes me uneasy giving out credit card info and then having it misplaced and if there was a miscommunication perhaps I should've received a phone call or letter asking for the updated info instead of just stopping delivery. Then I received the oddest email back, which I still don't understand. "Actually your credit information was updated last June but was not turn on for automatic payment. I email you notifying to update your credit card assuming you have a new one that is why the one we have on file that was indeed updated was never put back to automatic payment. I apologize for the inconvenience this may have cause you but I just like to make sure that you did give us permission to continue taking payment from your credit card. " Grammatically that makes no sense, right? Anyway, wouldn't the updated info be from a NEW credit card to begin with? How can I update info with an old card? That is so odd. And if I update my info and give you my new number I am automatically giving you permission to use it for payment. Why would I give you my number and say no you can't use it? So I'm going to try to call someone today to straighten this out.
Anway, I'm just annoyed and stressed. Hopefully my second class tomorrow will change things around.

All I want for Christmas are my two front teeth

Isabel has teeth. Two to be exact. On the bottom. And I think that they are fangs because they are sharp as razors. Ask my nipple. Or where my nipple used to be...ouch! Well it feels like she's going to rip it off. 5 more months of this, I dunno. Is breastfeeding REALLY that much better? hmmm....

Right now the two teeth are just poking out of her gums and they are hurting her so much. Two night now she's woken up, screaming in pain. I gave her a bit of tylenol last night and that seemed to help. It was so sad, I was up with her for about an hour, had fed her twice and she still wasn't happy. At this point I definately knew it was the teeth causing this normally happy, fun loving little girl into my sad, weepy, screaming ball of sweat. I gave her to Jordy to hold as I was going to go downstairs and get the tylenol and she reached out her arms towards me and screamed louder and harder. It broke my heart. She wanted her mommy and nobody else. I will admit, it did feel nice to know that she wanted me and was choosing me to comfort her but I felt helpless. Sure I could hold her and rock her and sing to her but I couldn't make the pain go away. It really does kill you when your child is hurting and you can't do anything. Now,I know if this was happening to anyone else, I would be saying "but holding her DOES help and it DOES make her feel better" and blah blah blah but when it is actually happening to you it's hard to see that. You just feel. And we both felt sad together.

Success!

I made my first meal tonight. You're probably thinking "big whoop", but it was to me. I made a chicken bruschetta bake and asparagus with a cheese sauce. It was my first time eating asparagus and it wasn't that bad. Even Jordy ate it all up. Actually it was all quite filling and not that bad in weight watchers points. So I'm feeling pretty proud of myself, in my start to eating healthier. I was also going to puree up some asparagus for Izzy, but read that I should wait until she's a wee bit older as it's a harder veggie for her tummy to digest. But my mom gave me some cucumber fresh from her garden and I'm going to remove the seeds from them and mash it up for Izzy. It'll probably be refreshing for her on a hot day. My dad is also giving me some beets out of the garden to for her. Beets are a vegetable however that I simply cannot eat. I've been forced many times, as my parents LOVE it, but it is utterly disgusting to my palette. So instead I'll force it upon Isabel. Well, I'll let her try it and if she doesn't like it than she doesn't have to eat it. Next on the list is green and yellow beans and cheesy mashed potatoes. YUM!

eat your veggies!

Isabel has successfully made her way through all of the approved first try veggies. These would be peas, beans, squash, sweet potatoes and carrots. She has now made her way to fruit, starting with, of course, apples. She seems to be accepting the apples, but still loves her veggies, especially carrots. This, as a mother makes me happy for two reasons 1) That she's not a fussy eater making meal time a non-stressor and 2)That she will have healthy eating habits. I really started to think about this last one. Sure she eats her bowl clean now, but what about when she comes off the baby food and starts eating "real" food. I don't eat any of those above mentioned veggies (except carrots) and really I try to have a veggie at dinner time but it's the same three that keep getting rotated; frozen mixed veggies, corn and cauliflower. I have crappy eating habits. I know this. I love fruit, but they're high in sugar and I hardly eat any veggies at all. I'd say of my 7 seven servings of fruit and veggies, maybe 2 are veggies. This is not good. For me, or for role modeling for my child. I want to do better, to eat better, for her sake as well as mine. This lead me to my second problem. I don't cook. There is a big misconception about my cooking abilities that really, I am to blame. I have everyone believing that I am a horrible cook, that I can burn water. Not true. I am by no means a fabulous cook, but I can make yummy meals...when I want to. And that's just it. I ....hate....cooking. I hate the mess, the production that goes into it, trying to time everyting so it's all ready together. And I never know what goes with what when it comes to ingredients, which is why a lot of the stuff that I know how to make are pasta dishes because the one dish is the meal. Anyways, blah blah blah, the point I'm trying to make it cooking is not a fun task so to avoid it I make up lies about my deficiencies in this area. So then no one ever asks me to cook or if I do, everyone has lowered expecatations. Well today I've made a decision. No more. I want Isabel to grow up eating healthy meals so that her body can grow the way it's suppose to, have tonnes of energy (dear god) and be healthy and happy. I don't want her to become accustomed to boxed dinners as a staple. Having worked in the school system for the past three years, I see the correlation between food and a student's success. It's no surprise that every single one of my kids in my program eat sugar packed meals. They have those lunchables, or if they do have something healthy like a sandwhich or soup, they never eat it. Just the cookies and junk. It's no wonder they can't concentrate, have behavioural problems and are falling behind in their grade level. There was even a study that linked proccessed foods to behavioural problems in kids. I'm not surprised. So starting tomorrow, I am going to start making some of the dinnertime meals and I will be adding foods such as squash, green beans, asparagus and turnips to the menu. I have found some recipes that look promising, but if anyone has any others they would like to share, by all means let me know!

World Traveller

Okay, okay, I guess you couldn't call Isabel a world traveller (yet) but going to Machete and East Barriere is pretty good thus far. Last month Jordy, Izzy, myself and my parents went up to the cabin at East Barriere Lake. This was Izzy's first vacation and she really enjoyed herself. So much so, she refused to sleep. She felt it was necessary to stay up and see EVERYTHING! I'm surprised she didn't strain her neck looking around so much. I think she's going to be an outdoorsy person. She loves it when we go for walks and especially when we stop in the park to play on the swings and chillax under the trees. She was the same at the cabin. I think her favourite part was going in the lake and trying to catch all of her rubber duckies with dad. Her least favourite part was putting on the life jacket. Her body went stiff as a board and she howled.

This past weekend our family went up to Machete Lake. Lots of mosquitos but oddly enough they weren't pestering me as much as they usually do. They were loving mom and Jordy. We did lots of fun things like go for a walk in the forest and look at wild flowers and trees, went for a barge ride along the lake and we saw a doe and eagles. We also had a baby chipmunk come visit us from time to time and we kept feeding it peanuts. Max wanted to prove his worthiness by barking at it and chasing it all around the woodpile. Later on the chipmunk came back and gave Max a piece of its mind. I think Isabel's favourite part of this trip was sitting with grandpa on the porch and watching the whiskeyjacks swoop down and pick up the pieces of bread we left out on the balcony. Her least favourite part was the same as last trip. Except this time she didn't scream the entire time she had it on. She just sat on mom's lap, stiff as a board. I think she thought she couldn't move her body. Her arms and legs were sticking straight out and she only moved her eyes back and forth, it was as if she was paralyzed. Whenever she saw myself or Jordy she let out a scream to let us know how she felt about being in that life jacket.

I have to say, I really enjoyed spending time with my family and had a good time but travelling with a 6 and a half month old is very tiring. It's also a long way to go for her too, which isn't easy. In two and a half weeks we are going to Penticton and back up to East Barriere, so maybe by then I'll be better organized or something. All I hope is that Izzy has a good time.

**Editor's Note: Pictures are still waiting development due to finacial issues. They will be posted on facebook shortly**

Mickey Mouse

I am so fed up with SFU I must vent or I will burst. The students in my program have been divided into two campuses. One is Burnaby, one is Surrey. I work for Burnaby but live in Surrey. I was really hoping that I would go to the Surrey campus because being on mat leave, it is closer for me and because I am still breastfeeding this will be easier for my daughter as well. At the orientation in June it was revealed who would be at which campus. I found out I was to be at Burnaby. The teachers said that if where we were placed was a problem they would do their best to switch us. I was the first to ask and gave my reason why. They said they would do their best. That's fine. If I'm at Burnaby so be it, if I'm at Surrey, super! I've made my preference and it's out of my hands.

Fast forward to a month later. I am suppose to register for my classes at the end of July. There is a diferent registration number for the two campuses. I am a bit worried because I have not heard yet from my teacher whether my request was granted or not. So I email and explain my situation again. I'm thinking this will be better for all those involved if this is taken care of BEFORE I register, so things don't become confusing and messy. A week later I receive an email from the Admissions office saying that she has gone ahead and registered everyone into their class. I double check this and my account says Surrey campus. So I'm thinking my teacher gave the okay for the campus switch. Nothing more to worry about.

WRONG.

I received an email back yesterday from the teacher I emailed a month prior to say that I am not on her list for the Surrey campus, I should double check with the other teacher. I emailed her back saying I will and explained the email that I received from Admissions. I then emailed the other teacher, whom I heard from today stating that he is away at the moment but when he returns will be contacting me to discuss the situation and then informed me that EVERYONE in the program was registered for the Surrey campus.

WHAT-THE-FUCK?!

I am so fed up with this disorganization. What if I never emailed anyone in the first place. I would've gone to the wrong campus for the first class and looked like a total dork! Not only that why haven't they made a decision yet about me changing campuses? How hard is it to look and see, "Oh yes there's room" or "Oh sorry, we can't". Seriously! I kind of would like to know where my class is when I go to school in the next 4 weeks. This seems to be the theme for SFU:disorganized. Nobody seems to know what the hell is going on, everyone you talk to has a different answer and I feel like they just don't give a rat's ass. I paid my $100 deposit April 30 and it still says that I owe $100 on my account. I phoned twice about it in May and June and was told it takes awhile for the computer to adjust. 3 months? Come on. I know I should be grateful and thankful and blah blah blah that I'm getting to go to school for my so-called dream job but at the cost of my sanity? It had better not be 16 months of this crap!