Meeting Auntie Shaila And Baby Zianna

After a week of talking on the phone and exchanging text messages, we finally got a chance to meet Shaila and baby Z for the first time. Thanks Dana for introducing us to each other! It's great to meet more moms in our area.

After our play date with Shaila and baby Z, we rushed home for our our Artist Group (minus Anne, plus Nat) Knit & Bitch night where Nuala teaches us how to knit. She definitely makes it look so easy... the rest of us don't make knitting look like a relaxing activity. Some of us look quite intense!

We ordered pizza, and since it was a cold night... I had the fire on and made some tea for the ladies.

Sean was a bit surprised to come home and see that all I have is a small rectangular piece... I think he expected that I'd have made a scarf or hat or something like that.

I am so glad that my relationship with my girlfriends sans children had not changed, even though the logistics of getting together may be different than before Maddi came along. Although I wasn't too worried about it, it was definitely something that has crossed my mind. Although I seem to hang out with guys more in my high school and university days, I definitely treasure the women in my life and have learned to appreciate the relationship I have with them, regardless of age, race or where and how I met them.

Discovering Thierry

I got on to Foursquare early in 2011 because L'Atelier offered a big discount to new clients for checking in on it. I don't remember to check in most times, unless I'm with my friend Sonia who's crazy over it.

However, for some reason, I've been remembering to check into places I go in the past week. And once I saw myself ranked against my Foursquare friends (you get points for checking into places, and ranked among your friends based on number of points you gather within a 7 day period), my competitive nature kicked in. All of a sudden, I am out-ranking Sonia! Woot woot!

Anyways, I've brought up Foursquare because that's how I discovered Thierry Patisserie.

I've been cooped up indoors for most of the day; so when I discovered Thierry, I sent out a spontaneous invitation to a couple of girlfriends to go check it out with me. And naturally, Sonia was one of them. In the end, she was the only one who can make it.

Tonight, I got to take a walk and check out this fabulous tea and treats place. They do have really good macarons! Also quite good coffee! And this came as a surprise to me, but they serve wine and liquor! Not that I'm a big drinker; quite the opposite, but I just thought that was a clever twist for a tea and treats place.

All in all, a wonderful night of play and simple pleasures, with a great girlfriend to share it with.

I do feel quite lucky to have girlfriends that can come hang out with me in a moment's notice. You know who you are, you are all awesome!

Maddi's First Play Date

Today, Maddi and I slept in till 9.30 this morning. We both had our breakfast, I got a chance to change out of my pjs when Maddi had a bit of a nap after a feeding. I managed to tidy up the house a little and then it was time for our first play date!

I first met Elina about two years ago, when I first started going back to school, in Accounting class. We took the next class as well and have kept in touch after, through Facebook. Coincidentally, we got pregnant around the same time. And today, Elina and baby Jacob dropped by with some cookies for a play date. It's really more of a mama date. It's nice to have friends with babies around the same age. Thanks for coming over today! Next time, when I am done with my voluntary house arrest, a walk would be nice!

After Elina and baby J left, I had my lunch then it was time for our nap. I napped till about 4, but Maddi didn't wake up till about 5.30. So I took the opportunity to have my ginger sponge bath. She really only got up to feed, then when I put her in the Moby, she continued to sleep until 7.30pm. In that time, I got busy. Tidied up the house a bit, washed dishes, put dishes away, made more of my herbal tea that I've been drinking, made dinner and had dinner. The only thing I didn't get to is laundry. I have to say it was a pretty productive day!

Serendipity

Today, I got a visit from Sue and baby Ethan for a few hours. After they left, I walked to Urban Fare to pick something up. On my way there, I felt compelled to walk into saf & benjamin, the new-ish baby store that opened up. Sommer, the wonderful woman that owns it happens to be tending the store. I don't even remember how the conversation started, but somehow we got talking about me wanting to start my photography business while I'm on maternity leave. She didn't cheap out on the support, encouragement and resource/advice for me to go for it... and even welcomed me to stop in anytime to say hello or if I had any questions.

Yesterday, I met with Ashleigh Wells, today I have this encounter with Sommer. I am super impressed with how these women are so generous and how willing they are to encourage and help another woman who is venturing to start her own business. They're not the only ones, either and it's not just women. I've been very blessed to meet a few good people that have blown me away with just how willing they are to help.

After the slew of replays on the media of Steve Job's speeches, plus this serendipitous connection today... I was compelled to do something. So, I went online and submitted a name approval request. When I get the approval in a few days, I'll register the business and get a GST/HST number. I realize I don't need to register until I'm making $30K a year, but registering just makes it more real in my head. It makes everything more professional, more legitimate and therefore requires more commitment on my part - no more one foot out. As my brother said, I need to go all out and give it my best shot.

I'm excited, and I'm so proud of myself for acting while inspired to be courageous and follow my heart... when it's so easy to simply wish and hope.

Hypnobabies!

I'm not sure when I started thinking of this, but I believe it was before I even knew I was pregnant... I wanted to explore my options with more natural birthing, i.e. midwifery, home or water birth, etc. However, when I did get pregnant... we were in the midst of looking for a new family doctor.

With a referral from a friend, we managed to find a great general practitioner who specializes in obstetrics. The only thing was, she was only accepting new patients to her practice if she provides the prenatal care and assist in the birth of the baby. It is important to me that we have a family doctor after we have our baby, so we decided to go with her and let go of our original plan to explore more natural options. I believe it was the right decision for us, although I was a bit bummed about letting go of a possibly more empowering birthing experience.

When I heard about the Hypnobabies prenatal course at my chiropractor's clinic, I got excited! I looked into it and consulted with Crystal Di Domizio, an instructor of the course... and decided that it was the perfect way in which I can incorporate the more natural aspect of birthing into my birth experience.

I want my birth experience to be empowering, not feeling like a helpless patient at the mercy of the medical professionals and drugs to treat me of my "condition."

I can imagine that many of you women who may be reading my blog have gone through giving birth to a child, and for some... it may not have been a pleasant experience, for some the medical staff had been very helpful and the medical interventions may have been desired. I want you all to know that I say everything I've said above with all due respect to every woman's individual and unique birth experience. I am simply sharing what I would like mine to be like. As part of getting to how I want my birth experience to be like, I would like to hear of only positive and empowering birthing stories, so please save the "horror" stories of birthing for at least until after I have had my own birthing experience.

Tonight, we had our first of six sessions of Hypnobabies classes. It was great to meet the other couples, although I'm still having a hard time remembering everybody's names - I think I can remember four of them. I'm sure I will eventually get everyone's names right by the end of the course. We were given great information and I love all the relaxation exercises - even Sean enjoyed them!

Thanks, Crystal... looking forward to the next session!

Playing With Light

Despite how tired I was last night, I had a hard time sleeping. However, I still had an early start today with breakfast at 7.30am and the first class starting at 8.30am... and another late night tonight with the class ending at 9.30pm. It must've been adrenaline that carried me through the day.

I have taken a one day workshop with our instructor Scott Robert Lim last Fall, so a lot of the lecture material covered in class today was a review for me. The afternoon however, was the chance to put into practice everything we learned in class and the opportunity to capture some amazing images in the school's chapel. Above is a photograph of one of our models, Kendra, to give you a taste of what we've been playing with!

As much fun as it has been, it's also been a long day. It's time to turn the lights out and get some good rest for another amazing day tomorrow!

Dresses & Bubble Teas

Today, I spent the day with girlfriends and it was fabulous!

First, I went wedding dress shopping with my bride-to-be friend Natasha, along with her mom, and her bridesmaids Jaz and Amy. Lots of pretty dresses and lots of opinions later, Natasha is left with one tough decision between two favourites.

After, I went to the mall to kill some time before meeting up with my old university friends, Anne & Sue for dinner at an old favourite restaurant... then to a bubble tea cafe to enjoy a new flavour of an old time favourite drink - Sesame Chocolate Milk Tea.

It was a great day! =)

Cracked

I went for a photo walk with a friend this evening and killed two birds with one stone; metaphorically, of course - hung out with one of my best girlfriends, Anne, and went hunting for my photo of the day.

Anne told me about this sculpture in the middle of a concrete park in Yaletown. I've been to that park a couple of times, but not recently... so haven't seen this sculpture before. It is a bit odd, a bit creepy... but it also does what a piece of good art should do - get you thinking.

It seems like a sculpture of a man, but somehow it reminded me of Lady Liberty. It made me think of having gone through some hard times, ones that leave you cracked and falling apart... but it also made me think of being held together by whatever source of support one can muster.

I read somewhere recently that as women, we have an advantage on health... that spending time with our girlfriends is like exercising. We relieve just as much stress talking to our gal pals when we talk about our frustrations, stresses and how we feel. The article also said that the best thing a man can do for his health is to have a woman in his life.

What unstitches you? What holds you together?

* I also think that sometimes, it is good to let oneself get undone... a good opportunity to put oneself back together a bit (or a lot) differently than before.

Buds

Spring is just around the corner... nature says so all around us!

Today's photo is also a tribute to all my female buddies who goes shopping, spa-ing, afternoon tea-ing with me, who understands me and meets my needs in ways no man can - Happy International Women's Day!