This weekend Mike and I went shopping for Jacob’s birthday presents and we’re really excited about the choices that we’ve made!  Here’s what we decided to pick up!

Both of these Imaginarium Train sets are interchangeable!  We’re a big fan of wooden train sets and Jacob of course loves “Choo Choo trains!!”.

Another thing that Jacob is really interested in right now aside from trains and books is puzzles!  We got him 4 puzzles in total but here are my favorite two!  We love sturdy wooden puzzles - especially those by Melissa and Doug.

This one also by Melissa and Doug is pretty cool!  It’s 6 puzzles in one!

We are also big fans of the leap frog learning series!  Jacob really loves his baby tad, animal farm fridge magnet, and his leap pad!  We have known for a while that for his second birthday we’d get him the alphabet fridge toy!

I think we made some pretty awesome choices!  We also got him a few new books because he just adores story time!  I can’t wait for his birthday party now!

I woke up this morning feeling sort of drab and under the weather. Despite sleeping the entire night I still felt exhausted and suddenly the cold symptoms I had experienced earlier in the week were back to haunt me. Thankfully Mike took Jacob out of the bedroom and I was able to get a bit more sleep - Imagine my surprise when i woke up to find a beautiful bouquet of flowers in a vase next to the bed and cards from both of my boys!

In my card from Jacob was a picture that he had drawn for me and his hand print which was of course so touching!  The best part was having both Jacob and Mike climb into the bed with me while I opened them.  t was a really happy togetherness kind of moment.  In Mike’s card was tickets to see Avenue Q!!!  Yes!  I just am so happy because I’ve wanted to see this musical for the past year and have waited patiently for it to come to the big T and lo and behold Mike is going to take me! It’s a date!  Truthfully while the presents were great it was not the real awesome part of the day.  In fact, we decided (I came up with the idea and Mike thought it was a good one) that we’d not do gifts the same way we’ve been doing them in the years to come.  I think we’re going to go homemade gifts for things like mother’s day and valentine’s day!  It really has so much more meaning because clearly the best part of that gift was Jacobs hand print and picture!

I feel so blessed to be a mother.  I think that’s what mother’s day is really about in the end - a lot of mother’s get caught up in the “it’s my day to rest” and “it’s my day to be thanked by my family” but that’s not really what it’s about for me.  I feel lucky and fortunate that Mike tells me constantly that I’m a good mom, that I am beautiful, that he loves me - I feel blessed to have a great partner for life and an awesome kid that brings such joy to my life.  Celebrating motherhood and the enrichment it brings to my life is really what it is all about!

We spent the day today visiting family and the day could not have been anymore perfect!  We had brunch with Mike’s mother and Sister in Law ( Colin had to work) and then we had our own family time together in the late morning/early afternoon!  Jacob went to Nanas for a quick visit while Mama and Dada went home and baked a lasagna to bring back to my mom’s house!  We all had dinner together (Mom, Danny, Jimmy, Mike, Jacob and myself) and feasted on lasagna, caesar salad, and garlic bread!  For dessert we had chocolate frozen  yogurt with strawberries on top!  Yum!  In the end we all sat around spending time together before caling it a night!  It was a truly great day!

I just finished watching the movie Pay it Forward.  I have always loved the message that this movie delivers and I’ve probably see it a half dozen times since it’s release.  The idea that people could actually “pay it forward” is revitilizing in a world that oftens leaves us feeling hopeless it will ever be “better”.  I have to admit that this was my first time watching this movie since I became a mother and let me tell you it definitely carried a whole new variety of emotions.  Previously I was very moved, cried a little and felt sad at various points but this time I found myself near sobbing and I’m pretty sure it had to do with the idea of losing a child.  I think that it will be far too difficult going forward to watch these types of movies, the same way that is hard to read about a child suffering from cancer, or hear about a student in a highschool getting shot or stabbed - somehow suddenly I have a far more rooted connection to these stories. I wonder if I’ll be equally as moved the next time I watch The Little Mermaid and King Triton lets Ariel stay a human.  What movies are safe to watch to avoid the sob fest?  Only experimentation will work!

This is such a short post but it will have to do for today becausse I am feeling so blah.  I think I’m coming down with a cold or a sinus infection!  I woke up this morning with a sore throat and I’ve been sneezing all day with a light headache!  I hope that somehow this will pass without issue!!!

As a good portion of you bloggy friends know I am a Child and Youth Counsellor and i work with teenagers and their families in a counselling capacity when the adolescents come to stay in our treatment center.  The young people that come to stay in our program are usually facing a vast array of problems that are behavioral, emotional, and psychiatric and truthfully over the years I am becoming immune to everything - meaning that really there isnt a struggle that a teenager would come to our treatment center with that would surprise me.  I think that’s a really hard place as a mother to be in, despite the fact that it makes it easier to focus on helping the youth the right way - instead of through my own emotions.  I’m not allowed to share the details about our clients, I never would but I do talk about the variety of problems we see teens facing in general to my friends and family and the response is always “wow I dont’ know how you do that everyday”….well the truth is, neither do I.  For some reason it’s just the right thing for me to do and the desire to help and guide young people to get to a better place in their life is just really engrained in me.  I guess you could say it has a lot to do with some of the struggles I had as a teenager that I overcame, but really I think it’s just that I’m a sensitive caring person by nature.

Mike and I always ride the subway/bus home from the big city after work and yesterday while on the bus we encountered a situation that I’ve been trying to figure out and it’s been a battle between my heart and my head about what the right thing to do would have been.  Sitting very close to Mike and I on the bus was a young teenaged girl no older then 16 years old I’m sure and looking very much the modern day teenager (I’m making this assumption based on seeing teenagers on a daily basis and not because I think I’m a stylin happening mama *wink*).  I observed as the young woman turned around in her seat to face the window and became slightly curious as she pulled some items out of her purse and proceeded to look around the bus to see if anyone was watching her.  Having worked in my profession for nearly 10 years now I have a very casual way of observing a situation without people really realizing that I am observing so I’m pretty sure she was unaware that I was watching her. After a short time I nudged Mike and he looked up just in time to see (as I did) the teenaged girl lean down and snort a line of cocaine - I’m not sure what happened in that moment but my heart started to bleed I’m sure because I immediately felt overcome with the need to understand what was so wrong in this little girl’s life that she was so deep into an addiction that she couldnt’ wait even to get off a bus to snort the drugs - whatever it is that brought her to that place yesterday I am sure it was not an easy road and I know it will be a very difficult road for her to get to a better place in her life.  I wanted to help her, to reach out a hand to her and point her in the direction of help, of hope for the future.  In that moment, and I’m sure it had a lot to do with the fact that we were nearly home to see our 2 year old son, I wanted to cry and I am not usually moved so much at work because it is just what comes naturally to me (the helping and listening part) but I wanted to cry because dear gosh let me be a supportive loving parent that guides her child in a direction that is not similar to drug addiction.  I confess it will be a learning game when it comes to my own child…I can only pray and hope that I have the right tools and a good portion of love and guidance to help steer Jacob and any other children we may have away from such choices.  I can’t stop thinking about this girl - I can’t stop thinking about my choice to do nothing - I wish I had reached out to offer her some kind of helping hand……I didn’t even try to offer a way out to this girl adn today I’m not okay with that because that’s not who I am.

Yesterday morning after reading Mike’s blog for a short time I realized we both struggled with keeping our blogs updated consistently!  Since the launch of www.mamamelissa.com I’ve had pretty consistent posting over here and I know think Mike is getting jealous!  Because I know we are both competitive beings I decided to deliver him a playful bloggy blog challenge!!  I challenged Mike to see who could have the most consecutive days blogging without missing a post and now……………it’s a BLOG WAR!!!!  Stay tuned as I try hard to *coughs* kick Mike’s ass!! I will not accept defeat so I suppose I have to win!!

As all you bloggy readers know Mike and I are both working parents and as its worked out we both each watch Jacob one day a week and Mike’s mother watches Jacob on the other three days. The past few weeks have been a bit different as I adjust back to my “old” schedule at work and Mike and his mother have picked up the day that I would usually stay home. Being a WOOTHM (Work Outta The Home Mama) has it’s pluses and minuses no doubt but we’ve really managed to make it work for our family. My job provides little flexibility around the schedule and going forward I will have to work 3 weekends out of a 6 week cycle. This is how my schedule use to look before I went on maternity leave so I am no stranger to it, what I’m slightly concerned about is how we will visit the various grandparents spilled all across the city. I guess Mike is going to have to be responsible for doing this while I am at work. We’ve never seemed to have enough time to fit everyone and everything that we want to do as a family into a weekend when we are both off… I have no idea how we will do it when I’m working on the weekends!

Oh well! I dont’ want to waste my time getting my panties in a wad over it! I truly believe that life turns out how it’s supposed to be in the end so I just lift my chin up into the sunlight and press forward with curiosity about how the new schedule will look! The bonus is that I will have some weeks where I am home on two weekdays and another more favourable option is the off Monday/Tuesday and Saturday/Sunday part of the rotation! I’d like to say we’ve made pretty good child care choices so far - Jacob has never been watched by anyone other then his grandparents - this was really important to us in his first two years of life because we wanted him to feel secure and close to his family. In his first year of life we were really apprehensive and probably a bit too uptight about leaving him without us - I can definitely see how we might be a bit different with another child. I think we did a-ok if you ask me! Jacob is perfectly adjusted and has never experienced a drop of seperation anxiety. My transition back to work was smooth and almost effortless (definitely harder on Mama then on Jacob!) and Jacob is a very well adjusted, happy, easy to manage toddler. No complaints.

I love this kid so much! Just the other day he said something that just sent a spark to my heart! We’ve been telling Jacob that Mama and Dada go to work to “bring home the bacon” and after Mike dropped me off at scrapbooking this weekend he stopped by my mom’s house for a visit (see this is how we manage fitting in the grandparents sometimes) and my mom asked Jacob where his Mama was - Jacob responded by saying “at work” and Mike asked him “Jacob what does Mama do at work?” to which Jacob replied “make bacon!”

Do you see how impossible it is NOT to love this little fella?

Jacob’s most recent fascination has been that kid who comes around at certain times of the day and appears on sidewalks and walls.  He finds it hilarious that his “shadow” follows him around and will point it out very frequently.  I find it so amazing to watch him explore the world and learn new things and its astounding how interested in things that we take for granted these days. There is of course only one downside is that our walks are much slower these days as Jacob MUST point out every single person’s shadow while loudly proclaiming “Mamas shadow!” or “Dada’s shadow!”.  What a kid!  I love every moment of it.

Today Mike celebrates his thirty first twenty first birthday! I was thinking back to the first birthday of his that we celebrated together and how it seems so long ago now. I remember that on that birthday we had only been together a short time and I wanted to get him a gift but I didn’t want to go crazy I love you over the top! It’s so funny to recall it now. Anyways, Happy Birthday My Love! Here’s to many more! Check us out from when we were early on in our dating….I was in a wedding party and he was at a wedding where he basically knew nobody, had to sit at a table full of my family members, and I was very busy at another table fulfilling my maid of honour duties! Gosh I love this dude!

Yesterday was national scrapbooking day so I celebrated the day by doing some scrapbooking of course. I hauled all my scrapbooking paraphenalia (is that even spelled correctly?) over to Suzanne’s and spent the day at her place cropping a way. I had such a good time and its always so much fun to scrapbook with friends even if you don’t get as much done as you would when you are alone. It’s so much fun to scraplift other friends ideas and get their point of view about color selections, title ideas, and picture layouts. I’m just giving out a huge thank you to Suzanne for the great company! We spent the day listening to music, chatting and treated ourselves to a swiss chalet lunch! Delicious! Thought I’d share two of my pages I did yesterday! Enjoy bloggy people!