Definition Of A Wife

Well I only have a few days left at home with my little lovekin It is hard to believe that a year has gone by so fast! For months I have been searching for a new job and going in to Staples to try and ask questions about how things are now operating. A lot of things can change in a year, which by the sound of it has happened. For the longest time no one would say anything, which is really frustrating. On Tuesday I went in to talk to them and try and get some answers. The boss tells me that I am now going to have to work at least two evenings a week, and that my salary paid position is now hourly paid. I told them that there is no way that I can work in the evening. Ella needs to be picked up from daycare by 5:30, Matt works until 5:30 or 6, sometimes later than that, so I have to be the one to go and get her. Starting work later in the day would also mess with things. Would I wake Ella up for the same time and take her to daycare and then not see her all day, she would be in bed before I got home. I will be paying $550 a month regardless of if she is there half a day or not. It doesn’t sound like I would have any say in which evenings I would be working either and they have never been great about getting the schedule done in a good enough amount of time. When I told them that this would not work they didn’t seem too impressed. Why would I think that my shifts would have been changed around? Before I left I was working Monday to Friday days.  The boss says ” Well the world changed while you were gone.” Excuse me? Its not as if I have been on a deserted island for the past 11 months I know what is going on in “the world.” Don’t make me sound like some idiot who has no idea what is going on. Then he said “don’t worry about this now, just finish your week off with your daughter and we will see you on Monday.” How can he not expect me to worry about it?! Now I need to figure out either how to make this work or what to do.

I was so mad! I drove my parents office not that far away just to vent. They really were not happy that they would have done that to me, especially that it is only a few days before I go back to work. My dad hopped on the computer and started searching. He found a full time Monday to Friday days job at Subway. So I took the lady my resume and she said that she would phone me by Friday.  I am not really looking to make a career out of where I am working at the moment.  My Mary Kay business is starting to pick up and that is great! I am hoping that it wont take long and I can just be focused on that since that is what I want in a career. The flexibility of hours, the pay, and all of the extra perks that the company throws your way. And best of all, making other women feel good about themselves!  Now I am anxiously waiting for a call from this lady at Subway to see if I have the job. It seemed like I would have it.

I really want to stay home with Ella She has been extra fun this week and I know now that summer is finally starting to appear it would only have gotten better.

Sigh

Well it is about time I wrote my entry all about our honeymoon!

We left Saturday May 2, 2009 in the afternoon on a direct flight. There seemed to be more turbulence than we are used to and the landing was a bit rough, not that we got sick, we aren’t air sick people. I am going to blame that on the fact that it was a brand new plane, and I believe that the co-pilot did most of the flying and he seemed to be a fairly new pilot too. It wasn’t terrible, just not the smoothest flight. We wound up getting there half an hour early too which was nice. We arrived at 5:35 local time. Even though it was just a short drive to our hotel, The Signature at MGM, it was still $14.10 USD. After the tip that wound up at an even $20.00 USD. Matt had forgotten that they had one dollar bills in the states so he said to the cab driver, “A five back will be good” and the driver said ” All I get is a 90 cent tip?” I handed the five back to the driver and said thanks, apparently I had forgotten too that they had smaller bills. That bothered Matt into the next day that the driver was given a $6.00 tip and he was not a good driver. He was all over the place and on his cell phone the entire time speaking a language we had no idea what he was saying. It was too bad we hadn’t been on the cab before, we’d have been riding in a Cadillac CTS (like the one I am aiming to earn with Mary Kay) and that driver seemed a lot friendlier! When we went to check in there were a few issues. My mom and dad had rented a time share on Ebay and the owner had not put our names on the room! After making a couple of calls, and 20 minutes later we were checked in to a room that made us feel absolutely rich!! We had a full living room and kitchen, a three piece bath and then the Master bedroom had a very comfortable king size bed, with a TV that comes up out of the desk. The master bathroom had separate his and her sinks. Hers equipped with a vanity with magnifying mirror, and his equipped with a TV!! There was a full size glass door shower, a jetted tub big enough for two and the toilet was even in a seperate little room with a phone!  Who needs a phone in the bathroom?!

By this point it was almost 9:00 our time(at home 7:00 Vegas time)  so we are starved!  So we set off to get some food.  Little do we know there is a fight that night at the MGM. This left us fighting through a HUGE crowd of crazy fight fans.  We walked over to the Luxor to find the food court there, we had walked right by the food court at MGM, couldn’t see it through all of those people! It was good though because it was a lot quieter there anyway. We decide to eat at this place called Nathan’s Famous. Wow! Do I wish we had one here!! I asked about the Cheese Steak,  the gentleman working tells me that it is their most popular item, not just for them but in that whole area, so I decide to get it. This was the BEST Cheese Steak I have ever eaten in my life. Now it doesn’t look like much, but I had to take a picture.  The meat on it was so good! It had a soft layer of mayo, which didn’t even taste like mayo with the rest of it on there, mushrooms, onions, green peppers and mozzarella cheese. The bread that it was made on was so soft. I ate two on the trip and now just thinking about it has me wanting another one!

We set off back to our hotel after walking around a bit more only to be fighting against the crowd of people leaving the fight! It was wall to wall people and being so short I could hardly see a thing. All I could do was trust that Matt could see where he was going so I clung to his hand and he fought through the people dragging me behind him! Eventually we made it through.

Day two we went to the Las Vegas Outlet Center to do some shopping. I really had been hoping to find a dress for my brother in law’s wedding this summer, but no such luck. I found a lot of dresses that I would have loved to have bought but they were all way too much money! We did end up with a new pair of sandals each, courtesy of the Sketchers store. I found a couple of shirts. Ella is where I could have shopped all day. We don’t have a Gymboree in Saskatoon so I made sure to get her some clothes there while I was around a Gymboree store. I could have kept shopping but Matt said, no, that’s enough clothes! lol. That night we went and saw ‘O’ by Cirque De Soleil at the Belagio. It was such an incredible show. It is one of the more expensive shows to see in Vegas but it is worth every penny of it! Check out the trailer for it here>>>>> http://www.cirquedusoleil.com/CirqueDuSoleil/en/showstickets/O/O-Las-Vegas.htm

The next morning we went for breakfast with Mark(Matt’s brother) and his girlfriend Kristy. Yes, we did end up doing something with them, despite that it was our honeymoon, but we had a lot of fun. We ate at the Luxor buffet, making sure to stay long enough to get some breakfast food and some lunch food After that they came to our hotel to enjoy our eight swimming pools, including a lazy river. It wasn’t too sunny while we were there so we didn’t get a whole lot of sun, but it was nice to be lazy on the pool side. After lazing in the river we split up for the afternoon. Matt and I wound up having a nice nap in our hotel room before meeting Mark and Kristy again for a late supper at The Rain Forest Cafe. I have seen this rainforest cafe before, and another elsewhere I think, but I had never eaten at one before so I really wanted to go there. That was our “fancy meal” of the trip. One thing about Vegas is that the food there is really expensive! (Remember the cheese steak? I had that with fries and a drink, Matt had chicken fingers and a drink and it cost us $30.00 USD!!) It was a really neat atmosphere to sit in and because we went later, 8:30, it wasn’t super busy. The food was very good! (I will add an image soon, need to get it from Mark)

Day four we spent some time walking around and seeing few sights, including my favorite, M&M World. Four floors of everything M&M!!! We came home with half a set of mugs that I really liked and when my mom and dad are there in September I have already told her she is going to bring home the other  half for me! If ever you want a nice big coffee mug that is the place to buy it! They are always really cute and fit a good two cups of tea in them. Perfect!

Later on we went to see a Titanic exhibit. This exhibit is going to be in Vegas for the next ten years so if you want to see it you shouldn’t miss it.  It takes about an hour to walk through and look at everything. When you start off they give you a card and you are now this passenger on the ship, when you get to the end you get to see if that person survived or not. They have a ton of artifacts from the real ship, stories of passengers and crew members, and the big piece of the ship that has been brought to surface. This piece is massive! Which is likely the biggest reason this exhibit is going to be at the Luxor for so long, it would take a lot of work to move that around! We finished the day off with some swimming, and  think that was our second Nathan’s meal night. We tried to eat cheaper than the first time though!

On Wednesday May 6, 2009 we spent the morning packing up, checking out, eating breakfast at the MGM buffet and then all day in airports flying home. On the way home we had to take three planes. First we flew to Vancouver, then to Calgary, then to Saskatoon. We reached home by 12:00 am local time. It was a long way home but thankfully didn’t have to wait too long at the airports. One of our flights, the one from Vancouver to Calgary, left late due to other flights during the day being canceled and other flight crew memebers finally being able to get a flight home. That made us a bit more pushed for time but not by much.

Matt’s mom and dad had brought Ella back to our house and put her to bed. She woke up at 3:30 in the morning ( I had hardly even gotten to sleep yet!) She was so happy to see me! I got this big hug and then she wanted to play. I did get her back to sleep and she was really happy to have us home in the morning. Matt spent the next two days at home and I was thrown right back into my Mary Kay work, which is why it has taken me so long to write this!  We could have used one more day to go to the pool again and see something things that we had wanted to see and missed but it was so nice to come home toElla! I sure missed her! Next time we fly somewhere, this coming Christmas by the sound of it, she will be coming with us. Won’t that be an adventure to write about!

Matt and I decided to make the extra effort to get up, get ready and go to church this morning for Palm Sunday. While this service is generally an upsetting service I find it is one of my more favourite services to go to, especially when you follow it up with Easter Sunday the next week. The service starts off where everyone gets a palm leaf and we sing, walking around the church to our seats rather than the ordinary go sit down before it starts. The end of the service does not end in song the way it usually does but ends in darkness and quiet. For anyone who does not know, on Palm Sunday we discuss the last supper and how Jesus died.

WELL…. we never made it to the time of darkness and quiet. Just as communion was to start a woman two rows in front of us stopped breathing. Another member of the church wound up doing CPR on her and got her breathing again, while others crowed around her and someone called the ambulance.

Now I have been thinking about this poor woman all day while I wait for a friend of mine to be able to tell me if she is alright or if she knows what happened to cause this. I don’t even know this woman but I can’t stop thinking about her.

I guess you just never really know when your time will be.

Yesterday afternoon a great friend of mine came over for a visit. I love to visit this friend. We can talk for hours it seems. I have only known her a couple of years but I feel like I have known her all my life.  She is very important to my family, she was my baptismal sponsor and also Ella’s sponsor. My friend recently quit her job. I have never seen her more happy! She had some banked time and holidays to the point where she is now able to take two months time to figure out what she is going to do for the time being and try to get into seminary for the fall. I am so proud of her! For such a long time I was worried about her because she has always been so busy and so stressed. She hasn’t been taking good care of herself and always seems to put the needs of others ahead of her own, while this is admirable, it is also one of her faults. She had expressed to me that she was at a point in her life where she did not care if she saw the next day. She thought who would really care if I was gone. I told her that I would care. Her response was that I would make new friends. I then told her ” A new friend, never replaces an old friend.” If something were to happen to her I would be beyond words for how upset I would be. Since quitting her job she has decided to start taking better care of herself again, which makes me so happy to hear! She said that she sat down and thought about how she is now and how she wants to be and that she knew she needed to make changes. She said ” I know I don’t have any of my own kids, but I don’t want Ella to grow up and say, my Godmother died when I was ten. I want to have a lap for her to sit on (She is a small, but overweight woman) and when she starts to play around I want to be able to chase after her and hear her laugh.” This brought tears to my eyes! She cares so much for Ella and every time she says something like this it just reaffirms that Matt and I made the right choice in choosing her to be that part of our daughters life.  This past weekend she was asked to give a sermon at two churches that currently do not have pastors. I wound up missing her sermon and I just felt terrible. She invited me to the Bible study group at our church for this morning saying that she was going to be reading her sermon again because everyone wanted to hear it. I made sure to be there this time. There was no way I was going to miss that sermon again. It was so beautiful, touching and well written. She had me crying! I just think that she is one of the most beautiful people that I have ever met and my life would not be the same without her.

Love you my friend!

I have a had a busy last two weeks! It is about time I wrote about it! I keep thinking “I need to write about what is going on” and then I just get busy. So time to sit down and do it!

I am now a Mary Kay Independant Beauty Consultant! YAY! This has been something that I have been considering for months! Too long!!  This past week and last week I have been working really hard to get myself ready and organized for my debut party this Friday. I am really excited about this oportuntiy and I really hope to make the best of it!

For a long time now I have been looking for something that I can be happy about doing that was an option. I have wanted to go back to school, but at the moment that is not an option because of other things in my life. I really want to feel good about what I am doing. Before people would ask me where I work and I would almost feel ashamed to tell them where I work because I am unhappy with it myself. June will come and unless I find something else I will go back to Staples for now, all the while working at my Mary Kay business so that I can hopefully in the future just to do that and spend time with Ella and any other kids that we may have in the future. This is something that I feel good to say that I do.

Ella had me in tears the other day as she was playing. Quite often throughout the day we will play together and then there is time where she plays on her own. I have always thought that it was good for her to learn how to play on her own as well as with other people. She has become quite good at entertaining herself, which has been great for me. Recently though she has gone on a nursing strike. There hasn’t seemed to be a thing I could do to change her mind. Nursing her has been this great struggle from the time she was born. So after a long struggle with her she is no longer nursing. The next thing I know she no longer wants to cuddle. She just wants to play on her own. I would come over to her and she would even push my face away. This is when the tears rolled in. I was not ready for this. What happened to my cuddly little girl? In the blink of an eye it was as if she grew up and said “I don’t need you anymore Mom.” Ridiculous, I know. She still needs me to get her dressed, help feed her, change her and carry her; but somewhere along the way she just didn’t want me for those other things. I just wasn’t ready for this change, for her to grow up and start becoming independent. Now I understand why I have baby fever and cannot wait to have another one. I also understand why some people have more than one or two kids. A mother just has enough love for them all.

I just packed up yet another box of clothes that no longer fit Ella. Since she is our first I am keeping them all for the next baby. I have one box of clothes that either a boy or girl can wear and then a couple of big boxes of girl clothes. She is already wearing 12mos for size so there are even some things that she has never worn that she may not get the chance to wear unless it is just around the house. Today I put her in a cute little sundress just because once summer comes it wont fit. I figure she should at least get one wear out of it!

 Oh! And she now has a second tooth come through on the bottom! Going to miss the toothless grin, but I’m sure her toothy-smile is going to be great!

The hunt for daycare is still in progress. Before having Ella I had been wanting to go to school and get my ECE (early childhood education) the lack of daycare in this town is really just more motivation do so. Matt and I were discussing it and I told him that it has nothing to do with Ella and being home with her. I’d love to just open my own daycare so that other parents can have somewhere for their children to go.  Though this is not something that will work right now, but I am hoping to do it after baby number two. So that means that I have to find someone.

As of now we have met with 4 providers and I have called a number of others who do not have openings. Of the list of 27 providers on the list that the town gave to me I have called at least half of that list. Well the plan is to call the other half of this list and the first lady that we met with and set up a second meeting, during the day while she has some kids there with her.  The one provider that I thought sounded great, there would be no way that I would leave Ella there after meeting with her. Ella did not like this woman. I have never seen her act like that with anyone before. She didn’t even like her kids and Ella loves other kids. Hopefully we will be able to figure something out soon, and maybe the first lady that we met with will be better on a second meeting.

Well last week Ella decided to hit multiple different milestones!!

-She can now say “Dad”

-She is not quite crawling but can certainly make her way around. Not too fast but fast enough that my eyes need to be on her and we are trying to make sure that our home is baby proofed!

-She has been doing this cute “dancing” thing whenever I play music. She can’t stand up on her own two feet yet so she does it while she is on her tummy. She will do a mini push-up and rock from side to side. I don’t think I have ever seen anything cuter!

-When you say “Yay!” She will throw her arms up in the air all excited.

-She can wave “hello” and “bye” This was really cute! I was feeding her some breakfast and sometimes she will look off and lose track of what was going on (too much to look at out the window in the kitchen!) so I said “Hi” and waved at her and she started to do it back! Later on that day I got the weekly email from Babycenter.com saying that my 8 month old might soon learn to wave. I had to laugh!

She is also starting understand the word no. I had her playing on the floor of our upstairs office. She squirmed her way over to the bookshelf and reached for the books. I had to tell her “No” a couple of times but I think she is starting to get the idea that she is not supposed to play with those. It is so cute how much she is wanting to explore everything around her. I just love to watch her learn new things! She is also getting a second tooth. When that tooth officially pops its way through she will have her two bottom front teeth. Her teeth have been slow moving so I’m actually hoping that they pick up and that she cuts a few more.

Needless to say the video camera had a lot of use this week!

For the last two weeks I have been on the hunt for a daycare for Ella when I go back to work. I already have two appointments to meet people. Today I went to the town office and picked up a list of daycare providers. There’s 25 providers on this list! I think I’m going to have my work cut out for me tonight.

Last week I was looking on Kijiji for a daycare provider. I found a couple and sent out some emails. It’s hard to know the best time of day to call a daycare?! Though I think that after supper is not bad. Well I emailed this one woman and waited two days. On Saturday I decided to give her a call. When I spoke to her she said “Oh, I’m actually not going to be doing that anymore. I didn’t get any responses and I needed to know right away.” Her add was only three days old! I know that it was the first add that she has posted because I have been looking for a couple of months. I thought ” Well, if she changes her mind that quick I really wouldn’t want my daughter to be going there!”

I’ll post again to tell how it goes

Edit:  Well we now have three appointments set up. They will all be finished by the end of next Monday and we will see how they go.