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While Sean was napping, Flora decided to do some sneaking.

Digging around.

Really digging.

Success! But I think she really wanted his iPhone.

Sean says he didn’t really wake up while this was going on, which surprised me. After all this pickpocketing, she spent time poking his face (I did stop her and tell her no every time, but she was quite intent on checking him out while she was sleeping.)

This is Sean’s new tattoo. The bull is the old logo for the Belleville Bulls, the OHL team closest to our hometown.

Here’s the story of how he ended up getting it today, and how I found out about it.

Sean and our friend Jason had made plans to go to Toronto’s Fan Expo today. They got all the way down there and discovered hordes of people in long lines that weren’t moving anywhere. They walked through various open doors to find more lines of people (many dressed up as their favourite character from whatever fandom they enjoy best). There were lines to buy tickets. There were lines to get in after those tickets were purchased. They decided that waiting in all those lines wasn’t worth their time. So they left.

What’s with all this buildup? I’ll get to that.

So apparently they wandered around downtown for awhile, visiting the Silver Snail, having a couple of beers at The Bier Markt, and buying cigars at Frank Correnti Cigars. So, it was a good guy’s day out. After a quick visit with a friend of Jason’s who works in the area they were in, they ended up in a tattoo shop. Sean has been considering getting a tattoo in commemoration of Flora’s birth. He’s been struggling with the image as I don’t think he’s keen on getting a flower (the meaning of the name Flora) tattooed on him, and wanted to make sure any tattoo he did get was the right one. (I’ve tried to veto the use of a fireflower for Super Mario Brothers with her name and birthdate underneath, but I need to remember that it’s not my body – I just have to look at it.)

So they were looking at the different designs in the shop when Jason (ever the good friend), points out the sample of the original Belleville Bulls logo. Sean has always said that if he won the lottery, he would buy the Belleville Bulls – he’s that big a Bull Booster. So he was excited to see the Bulls logo in tattoo form, and once he saw that artwork, made an appointment right away to get it put on his calf.

Keep in mind that I don’t know any of this is happening right now. I’m home with Flora thinking that these two are spending too much money on GI Joe action figures and getting their pictures taken with Star Wars characters and Transformers.

At about 6PM, Jason and Sean come in. Jason is in first and gives me a very low-key “hi”. I ask what’s going on, and he kinda points at Sean, mumbling that something happened to him. As he hobbled through the door, I see that Sean is all bandaged up. “What the hell happened to you?” I ask (it was more sympathetic than it sounds). Sean then tells me that he was hit by a cyclist while walking downtown and it scraped up his leg really bad. They flagged down a paramedic driving by and he bandaged it up. Shocked and worried, I ask if he’s all right and if he needs stitches or followup care. He says it needs to be wrapped until tomorrow, but he’s essentially okay – the pebbles have been cleaned out and the wound looks dressed enough that it won’t leak all over the couch or sheets.

The evening progresses and I put Flora to bed. Once she is down, I go on my computer in the next room to kill time while making sure that Flora is really going down for the night. I open up Facebook and I see that Sean has updated his profile picture. To the picture you see above.

I know Sean is a big Bulls fan, but I think to myself “it’s tacky to use someone else’s tattoo as your profile photo”. When I looked closer, I thought to myself “holy shit, that’s *my* couch in the background of that photo”. I go downstairs and make the following statement:

“I had to find out you got a new tattoo via Facebook?”

Big laughs all around. They wondered how long it would take me to find out. Turns out I found out about two minutes after the photo was posted. There was no teenage cyclist who ran my husband down. The two of them concocted that story on the way home.

It’s a good thing I checked Facebook tonight. I had planned to write a Twitter status, complaining about assholes on bikes who run down people and don’t even stay to apologize or help the victim get up. And that would have been posted to Facebook too.

And that would have just looked silly, given what I know now. Our friends would think we never talk to each other.

Earlier today, Sean took Flora took a spontaneous trip to visit our friends Jason and Amanda and their six month-old son Thomas. They live a couple hours away so Sean and Flora are spending the night. She and I have never been separated for this long before, and never overnight. Judging from the phone calls I’ve had with Sean, it’s been harder on me than it has been on her.

During the first phone call, I could hear her babbling with Jason and Thomas while Sean told me he packed everything she needed and that everything was just fine. Once I told him that I planned to spend some of my free evening cleaning the tub, I received a verbal honey-do list of chores to do during my evening to myself. (Which interestingly enough, almost all involved poop: litter box cleaning, emptying the diaper pail and walking the dog. No one shits in our tub yet so cleaning the tub was a poop-free zone.) The second phone call was me calling to check in. I spoke to Jason as Sean was putting Flora to bed. I was worried because I do the whole bedtime routine unless I’m out of the house as I still nurse Flora right before I put her to bed for the night. Jason reported that he didn’t hear any screaming through the monitor and that she had had lots of fun all afternoon and into the evening. Jason said he saw Sean go up with a book so that meant that Sean remembered the book I read to her at bedtime. I heard him address Mr. Bunny while on the phone with me earlier so I knew she had the soft toy she sleeps with. Like he said, he had everything they needed and everything was just fine.

I just talked to Sean a few minutes ago and after some fussing, Flora finally settled and went to sleep. Considering she is sleeping in a playpen at someone else’s house and her mummy wasn’t there to help put her to bed, it doesn’t sound like she did too badly. I’m happy that she wasn’t being cranky for Sean, but sad because it felt like I was being left out of the fun. I am proud of both of them, but am looking forward to their return home tomorrow. The house is very quiet and I miss them both terribly. I do think this trip was good for all of us, and I hope Sean does it again while he’s off. It would just be nice if he did it on a weekend so I could sleep in the next morning!

So, where did the last few weeks go? I can’t believe July is more than half-over. We’ve been busy in the Mitchell household, but not uncomfortably so. We all adjusted to my being back at work without any major issues. I was amazed at how while lots had changed at the office while I was gone, it ultimately is “same stuff, different day”. Parenthood has really put my work life into perspective. It’s a lot easier to leave the worries and petty office dramas at the office when there is a small person at home who picks up on your bad moods and reflects them back at you. I’d rather have a happy baby during the precious few hours I get to spend with her between my arrival home and her bed time. It’s a lot easier to come home happy though – I really look forward to seeing Sean and Flora on the deck playing outside when I walk up the driveway or watching the two of them interact while Flora eats her dinner, or whatever they’re doing when I come home. I think Sean is really enjoying his time at home with her, and I hope that he will gain some of the same perspective I did when I returned to work. I feel kind of bad actually that I wasn’t able to compartmentalize a little better when it was just Sean and I. It’s not like I was a work-obsessed corporate zombie before Flora was born, but I spent a lot more time worrying about work-related stuff than I do now.

In other news, Flora has moved up from her infant car seat to a (much bigger) toddler/child car seat. Not because of her weight (her weigh-in at the doctor yesterday put her at 19 pounds, 12 ounces), but because she was getting too tall for the seat and it looked like it was getting uncomfortable. So we picked up a new seat that will sit both rear-facing and forward-facing (see this link on rear facing car seats) and with some outside help, got it installed into our car. I’ve been calling her new seat “the command centre” because it is huge (since she’ll be able to use it well into her toddler years) and looks kind of like an office chair for your car, complete with cup holder. Flora looks more comfortable in this seat and the buckles are easier to work with so she gets strapped in faster.

What else has happened around here? We’ve spent several weekends and a few days around Canada Day visiting family and friends. Flora got to have her first boat ride and dip into Lake Ontario courtesy of her Grandma Faye and Grampy Doug. I don’t think she was too impressed with her lifejacket, but she did enjoy the water, sand and boat. Next up will be swimming at Auntie Kyla’s!

I cannot believe that this child is turning one in one month and two weeks time! This really was the Fastest. Year. Ever.

This upcoming Monday, after 289 days at home, I go back to work. My share of the parental leave is over and Sean will be taking over as the stay-at-home parent role. People keep asking me “How do you feel?” and “Are you ready? or “Do you think Sean is up to the task of staying home with Flora?”

Those are really big questions. And they don’t have easy, one-word answers.

I have mixed feelings about going back to work. On the whole, I’m excited to be joining the world at large again. I’m looking forward to seeing my colleagues. Back in April, I treated myself to a new work wardrobe using the money from my tax return, and I’m looking forward to putting it in action. (I watched a lot of What Not to Wear during the early days of constant nursing and I decided that I was going to try and dress a little better. I suppose I’m trying to defy the “slummy mummy” stereotype.) I’m also looking forward to going out for lunch again. I work in an area which has a great variety of restaurants offering takeout meals of varying prices and I’ve missed more than a few of my favourites. I’m even excited about the work itself, if you can believe it. For the first little while at least, it’ll probably be fun as I get back into the groove. However like most office drones, I’ll know I’ve settled in when I start complaining about stupid stuff along with everyone else.

While I’m generally happy about returning to work, I’m sad that I won’t be able to be with Flora all day. I’ve been pleasantly surprised at how much I have enjoyed being a stay-at-home mum. We have our little routines down pat, and I know I’m going to miss them when we’re separated from each other. I know that I’m now joining the world of “working parents” (in quotes because I know stay-at-home parents work too): I will now always be stretching and compromising to accommodate everything and everyone in my life, and there will never be enough time. I just hope that I can manage the challenges with grace, flexibility and humour. I also hope that I pay attention during the good times so that I can remember that they do exist, and replicate them when things get tough.

Despite the fears and anxieties that I’m sure all mums get when they’re leaving their babies to return to work, I feel ready to return. I just hope I still feel ready when I don’t have complete control over how Flora spends her day. Sometimes I have a hard time remembering that just because Sean does things differently than I do, doesn’t mean he is doing them wrong. I’m working on that. I trust Sean and I know that the two of them will enjoy their time together. I’m proud of Sean for taking parental leave. I feel thankful – and lucky – knowing that during my first couple of months back at work, Flora will be spending most of her time with her daddy. It will be so good for both of them, and they will have so much fun. I can’t wait to see the pictures and video of the tomfoolery they get into together.

So yes. A lot of big feelings. It’s a big situation – I think they’re justified.

Written content? Who does *that* anymore. It’s all about pictures of Flora now. It’s just easier to show the pictures than talk about them.*

Here are some pictures from the last couple of weeks.

We’ve been out and about – the mall, the library and more recently, a playgroup at the community centre. Soon, we’ll be trying the pool on for size. Whenever I put Flora in her snowsuit, I tend to start laughing. Not in a mean way of course, although running to get the camera probably does add insult to the injury of putting on a snowsuit. She’s so puffy and marshmallow-like in it. I’m not sure if she realizes I’m laughing at her yet.

We wished Auntie Kyla a happy birthday.

We hung out with Thomas.

Naptime for Thomas and Flora from Melissa Price-Mitchell on Vimeo.

We visited with Grandma Janet and Grandma Faye. (Leia loves Grandma Janet too.)

We took some family pictures.

We made some silly faces.

Auntie Kyla gave Flora a bath.

Flora tried on Grampy’s hat and played with his duck decoy.

And…Flora sat up on her own for the first time! She lasted about 20 seconds before she tipped back over, but it’s a start. Note the major WTF look on her face.

*Written content will hopefully return soon. And maybe it won’t even *be* about the kid.

We smiled (a little bit) for the camera:

We hung out on the couch and gossiped:

We saw a really big Christmas tree:

We had a visit from Grandma Faye and Grandma Janet:

And we showed everyone how much we like to rock:

It was a fun week.

Flora was baptized back on November 9th. She slept through most of the service, but naturally started making noise during the moment of silence, so I had to step out of the church to settle her. I felt bad changing her diaper in the front seat of the car with the door open in early November, but I suppose that got me to change it faster.

My sister is a very proud auntie and godmother.

Flora and I stayed for a couple of days to visit with family after Sean left to go home. He was supposed to work, but ended up with a nasty cold so it was a good thing we didn’t see him for a few days. If I can avoid being sick this winter, that would be great. And it would be fabulous for Flora. We took lots of pictures, particularly on my mom’s spiffy new red couch.

Sean hates it when I post pictures of him sleeping on the web. (I only did it once before, so it’s not like it’s a regular occurrence.) However, he and Flora looked so cute in these pictures, I had to share them.

When my sister saw them on my Flickr page (she checks it every day to see if I’ve posted new pictures of Flora), she told me that there was a similar picture of my dad and I. I can’t remember if I’ve seen it (I’m sure I have), but she told me that she wanted to group the two pictures together in a frame. Obviously, she is the scrapbooker of the family. I then remembered that I saw a similar picture with Sean and his dad (his dad isn’t sleeping, but the premise is right), so maybe she should group all three if we can find all the pictures.

I must have stumbled on some classic baby picture pose, if we all have a picture like this. I wonder if there is a book of classic baby picture ideas that you can apply to your baby.

Flora Faye Mitchell

Date of Birth: September 4th, 2008 at 7:17am
(Due Date: September 10th, 2008)

Weight/Height: 6 lbs, 8oz, 19.6875 inches

After a long induction, labour and birth, we are happy, healthy and home. Healing is going well, and we are all getting used to each other.

More pictures can be found on my Flickr stream: http://flickr.com/photos/mpricemitchell/sets/72157607159140943/

If I am smart, I will write more about the birthing experience later. xoxo

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