It's October…
I can’t believe it is already October… Fall is my favourite season and I think this is my favourite Month.
The leaves change and fall, the air is crisp but not too cold and the warm meals make their return and are new again… After the summer and the first month of pregnancy that nothing appealed to me and cooking was a bit more of a chore than a hobby, I am enjoying being in the kitchen again. Over the weekend I made Hot Pepper Jelly, Raspberry-Plum Jam with a hint of vanilla (recipe to come), apple-pie jam that didn’t set but has now been named apple pie syrup which Xavier has fallen in love with and I still have many apples and plums to cook with which will most likely because other treats along with apple sauce that will be a treat during the winter…
I have also been making roasted chicken, roasts, roasted veggies, soups, stews, pot pies, crumbles, apple-cinnamon oatmeal, apple pancake along with many other meals that warm you up…No heating needed yet, our oven and stove have been keeping the house warm lately…
Another fun thing is that Xavier has been commenting on my meals more instead of just saying that he likes it or not… he is interested in what goes in and what flavours come from where and has been commenting on little parts of the meal that he likes and not just the ensemble. He has also been a lot more interested in trying new things which is fun when you love experimenting..
Thanksgiving is coming up in two weeks and I am planning on a traditional meal with all the works… and hopefully we will have a few friends over to share the meal with us… Here in Quebec, especially on the French side, thanksgiving is just a day off and there are no special meals or anything.. growing up as a child, my mom never did anything either and I loved being invited over to friends’ homes for their traditional thanksgiving suppers… so it is a tradition that I love sharing with my children and I hope that later on when they have children of their own, I will be able to kep the tradition alive and have the family gathering that as a child I dreamt of having…
The end of October will also be the end of the second trimester for me… just a few short months and we will have a new baby in the house again. It is going so fast because in a way I have still not accepted 100% that I am pregnant… not like the other times… the loss just before has made this pregnancy different then the others. I am also carrying this baby very differently, my Uterus is long and I am carrying high… though I am definitely showing when I am standing up, when I am sitting or when I lay down it is hardly noticeable… and I can still get a few pairs of pants on and zipped up though they are too tight to wear like that…
Then of course is Halloween, one of my favourite days… hopefully it won’t be raining and we will be able to go for a long walk in the neighbourhood with the kids all dressed up and trick-or-treating…. Last year we went out early and then came back, put aside the candy that we could enjoy (not much) and then opened our lights and gave out all the candy that we can’t eat… the kids loved the idea and loved giving out the candy along with the glow sticks I bought at the dollar store..
Happy October to all of you that love fall as much as I do… I hope you are able to make a few memories…
(the leaves changing on one of the maples in my yard)
A few current thoughts…
Things around here have been quiet…
The summer was busy, but not too much but it feels good to start back into a normal routine again… My aversions seem to be going away and though there are still a lot of things that don’t look appetizing, I can eat more meals that I make, which in turn gives me a little more inspiration to cook. Lately I have been going through the freezer and using the food that we have in our meal plans…
I am trying to get our food costs down but I find it hard. I can spend a lot less for a week or two but then have to spend a lot more the next week in order to replenish a lot of our staples. So basically things spending the same amount when you make the average.
But, we are using more things up which is good.
My energy is also seeming to come a back a bit… I swam a bit last week and would like to go again tonight… Swimming normally (crawl) feels great but only if I don’t use my legs much… when kick with my legs I get contractions and it doesn’t make swimming that comfortable. Having more energy also means that again, cooking is easier, making bread on a regular basis and getting some more cleaning done in the house… Simon has been working a lot on the downstairs lately. We have a bit of a mold problem, it is not in the walls or black mold but looks more like a grey dust on the walls and on a few pieces of furniture. We bought a dehumidifier and that seems to help with the humidity and Simon has been taking everything out and cleaning it, moving furniture etc and a lot of things are not going back were they were before… instead being bagged and either headed to the garbage, recycling or for donation.
Last week I made a new friend… I feel like a kid when I think about it… she just opened a little Maternity store in town where she sells motly local baby products including cloth diapers and soon wraps and slings etc… though she doesn’t homeschool we have so many other things in common and it feels great to be able to meet and talk to someone in the area…
I have also made a decision about the local group and will not be going back. A few things happened and were said at the last meeting that were the last straw for me. I might still do a few activities on the outside with the group but I won’t do much more than that… I will try though to go with the other further groups a bit more often.
So life continues… the leaves are changing and fall is arriving and soon things will start going faster as January approaches… It is still a bit of a shock to think that we will be adding another little life to our brood… scary and exciting at the same time…
little update…
What a bad blogger I have been… I haven’t been posting much lately…
Summers seem to be a hard time to post for me and in the last week or so summer has really hit here… We had a mild and rainy June, July and begining of August but now it is hot and humid and unbearable at times… I am so happy we made the switch in Janurary and now have our rooms downstairs in the basement… At least we are able to sleep pretty well…
The pregnancy is going well, I am nearing 18 weeks now and I can’t believe how fast it is going… I felt the baby move a lot at about 12-13 weeks but now in the last three weeks I haven’t almost any movement… I feel distant thumps once in a while but not as much movement as I am used to feeling at this time in the pregnancy… I am pretty sure that the placenta is in front so that would explain the lack of feeling, I am just looking forward to getting the bigger kicks soon…
I was getting a bit confused about the dates and I felt that I was measuring bigger for a while so last week I went to see a midwife friend of mine and she gave me a second opinion and everything looks to be on track now… but neither of us can explain how I was able to hear the HB so soon and why I was able to hear it where I heard it…
I haven’t felt much nausea in the last week which feels great but I am not hungry for much either… I am still eating bagels with goat cheese and hot pepper jelly everyday and craving sour and sweet things… I found some yellow plums yesterday and there are only two left from the box… I can’t get enough of that combination…
The boys went with my mom again last week for two nights and it was a lot easier with Khéna this time around… we went blueberry picking and did a bit of shopping and he was a lot more content about not having his brothers around than last time… My mom brought them back on Friday afternoon and then on Saturday we went to a party with Simon’s Family… it was gorgeous and hot outside and the boys played and had a lot of fun… we also broke the news to his family about the babe…of course everyone’s reaction was that it was time to have a girl… but they seems genuinely happy for us which nice to see… I honestly wish that we saw more of that side of the family more often…
I can’t believe that we are mid August already… soon the temps will go down and I will start cooking more and sharing more here… well… hopefully… 🙂
heartbeat…
I was able to get a little sound clip of the heartbeat last week and thought that I would share… it is the first time that I have heard the heartbeat this clear in any of my pregnancies…
At first in the clip you hear the normal heart beat sound but then you start hearing actual thumping.. hearing the thumping noise in the doppler was really a first and I have to admit it was amazing to hear… which is why I had to get the recording…
Enjoy 🙂