Tooth update

Not on Violet, on me (although Violet seems almost ready to bust another one).
I had the specialist consult on Thursday last week to find out about options for this front tooth (probably eventually both). Since the actual tooth broke while on vacation in BC, the logical next step is to completely remove it, get an implant, and new crown. Sounds expensive, right? It is. Likely over $3000 when all is said and done. For one tooth. Yup! If I had known that the crowns were not going to last 4 years, I would have opted for this from the get-go (to be clear, there's nothing wrong with the crowns I received, or how they were put in, it's the tooth that's the problem). The implant is about 70% of the cost. Apparently my current crown can't be re-used...
At this point, we're not sure if dental insurance is going to cover any of it, but I do get a "flex" benefit from work that can be used for dental, or anything else not covered by my or Marn's plan, so that will definitely help, and if I can some how get the billing split up between now and July, I will be able to submit twice (my flex renews in July).

This is basically a 3-stage process. Remove the tooth, then heal. Screw in a metal implant, then heal. Get a new crown for the implant. Sometimes, and the dental surgeon is hopeful, they can extract and insert the implant at the same time which will save me 2-3 months of (healing) time. Between extraction and crown, I will need a "flipper" denture that will also help protect the implant. Not really looking forward to that, but it's a necessary evil.

So anyway, at this point it looks like I will be going this route. We'll have to make that decision soon as I would like to get in for surgery before July. 2 months should be lots of time to get in.

That could be me soon

Our little miss

It's official, Vi has become our little miss.
For the first time last Wednesday, Violet cried when I took away something that she wanted. She looked right at the toy, right at me then started to wail. I didn't know she had it in her and truthfully I wish she wouldn't do it (I know, I know, it is a developmental milestone, yada yada yada). Now she does it all the time. Ugh.
She is progressing with her eating habits, opening her mouth now...most of the time. She does make this face (above) every time she has something with a little bit of texture (other than rice cereal) and it makes me smile, every time still. She loves baby mum mum rice crackers. Yesterday she tried them for the first time. I was nervous when she bit off a larger piece and tried to take it away, she cried, and cried until she got it back. Ugh. As much as I don't love the fussy, it is fun that she has a new way to communicate with us. She is always telling us what she likes and doesn't like through smiles and cries. She has also started a very high pitched squeal. Cute right now, but I think over time it might start to hurt the ears.
She does the face scrunchy nose breathing ALL THE TIME. I think it has to do with her nose being stuffed from being sick. At least I hope that is what it is from as you can't go 5 minutes without hearing it multiple times. She thinks it is very funny if I imitate her noises, loud nose breathing included. On a less happy note, we also had a day of thinking biting mommy during feeding was funny. Tried the pushing her head into my breast to discourage her...she thought that was the funniest, laugh out loud thing. So I tried the 'you are hurting mommy' face, still quite amusing to my little one. I went to the firm NO. Don't know if it worked or she got tired of the feeding interruptions but she has stopped (I know this might just be for now, but let me ride with it as the biting hurts so much it made me cry).
She is also a little woman on the go. She can easily roll from front to back and back to front. She turns herself in circles on the floor (time to move the crib down) and rocks back and forth when she is on her hands and knees. She has pushed herself back a few times but mostly she just gets frustrated right now and plops down on her belly to interact with all the toys. She also loves to fold in half to chew on her socks (while they are on her feet still). It is a bonus if she gets them off and can bring them to her mouth. Too cute.
Vi loves reading now. She has started to really look at all the pictures and she looks up at you when you are reading to her.

Carey brought Mya over last week and I was not fast enough with the camera to catch the initial interaction. I sat them down, far enough away from each other (or so I thought) and gave them some toys. As I was walking to get the camera I turn to see Vi yank the soother out of Mya's mouth and see Mya latch her fist on the Vi's hair. Ahhhh, her first fight! Just kidding, I think that Vi was curious and Mya likes to grab hair and is not allowed to touch her sisters!

Oh and just if anyone was wondering, it is not fun cloth diapering when they start eating solids. It is not fun and I can't bring myself to stick my hand in the toilet. Is that so wrong?

Easter Weekend

Well, Easter weekend flew by. We had big plans to clean the house and organize some of the basement, but barely any of that was done. We spent some time cleaning out the garage and the front room upstairs, though, collecting junk for a run to the dump -- this was probably MUCH better time spent than doing the basement.
Now, neither of us claim to be good at keeping things tidy, and we both confess that we tend to be pack-rats. It's something that we're working on, and also hate about ourselves. Take the front room, for example; We had boxes and boxes of clothes, books and notes back from University, and in some cases back from HIGH SCHOOL! Yes, I really thought I would wear that 15-year old high school CWOSSA Volleyball jacket again. Or re-read my University text books... It's just JUNK at this point. So, most of it was junked, and clothing donated to Good Will (the clothing had been sorted earlier, but sitting in that room for a while). We feel good about getting that done as it's been sitting around in various places for 4+ years!! Don't get me wrong, MUCH more needs to be done in regards to de-cluttering, but this is a good start.
So on Saturday, we loaded up the van and went to the dump... along with every other K-W resident cleaning up their junk! I think we later found out that Easter weekend is one of the busiest days of the year. People must get spring cleaning fever, and go through their house and yard, then go to the dump. It was crazy. Luckily, we knew the person working the long line-ups at the entrance and he handed us a "free pass" to bypass all of the lines and scales! This probably saved us at least 30 minutes just to get in!

As far as Easter festivities were concerned, we were invited to Marn's parent's on Friday night for dinner. Saturday night we were at my friend Louise's place for Sarah's birthday dinner. Sunday morning over to Candace's place for egg hunting and candy/brunch, then over to Mom's house for another Easter dinner. It was a jam-packed weekend with a lot of eating and visiting. I feel like I need a week off just to catch up on things around the house. Time is flying by these days, so much faster than before Violet and I'm often wondering what happened to the week gone by?

As far as Violet goes, we're still introducing a lot of different foods every couple of days. She tends not to like anything that has "rougher" texture, which I'm sure is pretty common (but even yummy apple sauce!). She prefers her pablum warm and won't eat it once it cools down. She's eaten, or tried; sweet potato, carrot, avocado, cauliflower (one bite, and won't take another!), apple sauce, oat and rice cereal, and.... I think that's it so far -- she's going to try butternut squash this week. Marn really should be the one updating on this stuff (*nudge*). We got some shots of her "dislikes it" face and it's pretty funny, so I'll have to post some of those pics.
She's still not rolling from back to front, but rolls front to back pretty easily and when we put her in a "crawling position", she sometimes rocks back and forth. So, she's getting ready to crawl but not there yet. She likes to stand up with assistance and getting pretty good at that, just holding on to fingers, etc. We're not expecting that she'll be an early walker, but crawling may just be around the corner! (yikes)

Weather

Yesterday was t-shirt weather. Everyone was outside playing, doing yard work, enjoying the sun.... today? 10-15 cm of snow by the end of the day!! WTH?! It's April, enough with the snow! Man, I hate this about Ontario. The mood swings of mother nature can be so drastic. It's no wonder everyone's sick around here.
I was in the front yard with Echo raking the lawn, trying to get all the dead grass up (Echo was tied up, otherwise he'd be running around the court like an idiot with slobber flying everywhere, terrorizing the kids). I was literally in a t-shirt and sweating. I managed to get most of the dead garden stuff cleaned up as well which was neglected last fall.
The backyard, on the other hand is still a mush-pot and will have to wait until we have at least a week of no rain/snow and lots of sun for it to dry up. I hate that about our backyard. The water doesn't drain anywhere due to the clay content. And because Echo was tied up in the front itching to run after the other dogs (off leash, but not coming near him) and kids, as soon as I let him off in the backyard, he burned around for 5-10 minutes tearing the crap out of the lawn and getting muck everywhere. uggh!!
Whoever told us that Danes are calm and gentle is a horrible liar. He's almost 3, and yet by his behaviour, you'd think he was turning 1.

Today I have huge blisters on my thumbs from the raking and my shoulders are sore. That will learn me for doing manual labour... I'm an IT guy, in front of the screen all day - hands aren't ready for this kind of abuse! ;-)
ok, ok, it's just a reminder that I need to start getting back into shape - Marn and I are going to attempt to do this P90X workout (minus the eating plan). It's like a 90-day boot camp (but they don't use that term). It's made up of 12 DVD's, each it's own type of workout. It's big on what they call "muscle confusion". So when your body gets comfortable with an excersize, they switch it up, keeping your body on it's toes, so to speak. It looks very, very hard, and I'm not sure how we're going to do it yet - you need an hour every day for it, as well as a few items that we don't have, like chin-up bar. Anyway, it should be good once we get into it.

House Cleaning

It's a full time job, and never stops. Both Marn and I hate doing it. With a (male) Dane, the cleaning becomes more frequent, or should...
Yesterday it felt like I was cleaning all day. Well, I was, but spread throughout the morning and early afternoon. Between playing with and entertaining Violet when Marn was out, or watching Echo for any signs of puke/diarrhea emergencies (Why does my spell check want to spell that, diarrhoea? OH! Canada/UK spelling Vs. USA) Yes, he's still not feeling well and is back on the Med's he was on when we were gone.
I felt like I was cleaning all day, and hardly getting anywhere. Our house needs a really good cleaning. Partly because it's getting to be spring, and the house always needs it after a long winter, and partly because we both hate cleaning/laundry and it doesn't get done as often as it should. I didn't get beyond the downstairs, but I did manage to mop all of the floors and vacuum the rugs, kitchen, clean/condition the leather couches and do the dishes/load/unload the dishwasher.... and that's about it. I had to stop to start getting ready for dinner -- Mom, Tony, Lisa and the kids came over for dinner. It doesn't sound like much, and there are a LOT more tasks to do (the window sills are really irking me right now, they're so filthy).
I didn't get to, what we affectionately call, "Slobber Patrol", which is needed badly, especially after yesterday. Echo sometimes drives us crazy with the amount of drool, and frequent head shaking sending it everywhere. He was in fine form last night with all the excitement around him. The worst part of that is his slobber dries to a nice black splat on the walls and, yes, sometimes even ceilings, which is very hard to get off (it takes the "California" stucco off with it when wet)! As much as we love him, we'll never get a male Dane again... Marn was going to try and do Slobber Patrol today if she had time.

Now with Violet becoming more and more active, it's going to be a harder and more important job to keep on top of all the cleaning. I think our problem is, we'll clean and then not keep on top of it to make the task less daunting. It's a problem that we both concede to and need to change!

Why are cleaning ladies so expensive? Because no one else wants to do it!

She can roll!

Finally! Almost 6 weeks after her first roll (that I didn't even get to witness) Violet can roll from her front to back all by herself. Last week in BC, Adreinne and I worked with her on it, but no real changes. Yesterday, I took quite a bit of video because I really thought she was going to do it, but it was today when I was looking after Sadie that she finally figured it out (maybe it was the constant demonstration from Sadie that helped - LOL). Then she rolled like a champ and tried to stop me from putting her back on her belly!
Ahhhhhh, the little things.
We also started solids this past weekend (6 months exactly - ugh, where does the time go already!). Such fun. She is not really motivated for them but seems to enjoy slurping the rice cereal up.


Her second tooth broke today so soon she will be a cutie pie with two bottom teeth. She has been having trouble settling in at night since we got home from BC and as a result often ends up in our bed in the morning. I snapped this shot of A cuddling Vi after I got up to have a shower, sometimes A hears the flash click out and gets mad that I am snapping a shot as evidenced by the scowl (side note: just minutes before this, A had his back to us and was not snuggling with us, then I got up and told him she was there...I come back out and she is sneaking all my cuddles)