Beans

Dana (my sister-in-law) took some photos while she was watching Sterly Beans while I am at work. They are pretty cute so I thought I would share! The first is of Everett, Josh (Sterling's cousins) and Sterling having races on their wheels.
These are of Sterls feeding Everett. Yes, that is in fact one of his favourite things to do and not so much one of mine. He is always trying to feed me his slobbery half eaten food!

Look at them...Wow, I really think that you can tell they are cousins. They just have a similar look about them.

I just refinished the lamp that my parents got me for Christmas. I am pretty stoked on the end results. I will post when I get home! No, I didn't take before pictures because I was lazy and am now regretting it because it looks like a whole different lamp. I did however buy these tiny pine dressers from Ikea that I am going to refinish in black and silver leaf this week. I am so anxious to start this process but work just keeps getting in the way, dangit! More pictures to come this week of my projects....

-Alauna

My post on posting.

Yes, I haven't been back in weeks. I know! It isn't that I have not had anything to post because I really have. It was the evil thing called sickness that prevented me from this action. I took four days off before Christmas so that I could have 2 full weeks off of work during Christmas to visit my family that has traveled from yonder to visit for Christmas (Mog and Pog come from Utah, Colin, Stacey and family from Saskatoon and Ry and Kay from Rossland, BC). That didn't work out too well. The first day I had off I got super sick. I felt fine most of the day and then instantly I just had to throw-up. No I am not pregnant! My whole family assumed the same until they all followed in sickness within 12 hours. Yup, everyone got the super flu over Christmas (everyone being Me, Sterling, Mog, Pog, Colin, Stacey, Lucas, Chloe, Tyler, Dana, Stacy, Angus, Sean, Kelli, Cameron, Ryan, Kaylee, Scott (there would have been more people but they had already had this flu a few weeks before)). So I pretty much spent the whole first week of my time off throwing up and being really sick. The second week I got a bad cough due to my asthma. I have had this bad cough for 2 1/2 months that has made me not able to sleep or really even function properly. After I got the flu my immune system was so down that my cough started up really bad and made me cough every 5 seconds for 5 days straight. I went to several doctors that told me to come back when it was worse. I don't think a cough can get worse and I have had it for 2 1/2 months. I finally found one that told me I have cough variant asthma and gave me a couple inhalers to stop the coughing. So a week after I am finally almost back to normal. But feeling rather ripped off. I missed my whole 2 weeks of Christmas vacation being sick. I missed Christmas eve (we do tons of fun things together as a huge family like 26 people). Yup, missed that. I didn't even wrap Sterling's Christmas gifts. I didn't take any photos. Not one of Christmas! I am so sad now. This is the first Christmas that Sterling has had that he got excited over his gifts and I missed it all.

I have done a few projects and gotten a few new projects to start on when things level out and I clean my house from not doing anything for 2 weeks straight. Project that I have done:
Rad lamp (loved the shape, colour didn't match decor)
Christmas shelf
New Stockings

Projects to do:
Rockingchair $15 at Interfaith furniture store
Wooden Highchair
Captains bed

I will be posting pictures of my projects when I get a chance.

Sterling went to Meylo clinic yesterday and got a perfect bill of health for now. Yea! He has to get a kidney ultrasound and MRI before his next clinic in 6 months, but he will always have to get both of those frequently to make sure that they prevent anything from happening before it gets too serious. He was the hit around all the other kids and parents at clinic! He was just rolling around being his cute little self and all the other kids and parents couldn't stop smiling and playing with him.

How do you stop your 17 month old from throwing huge tantrums? Sterling was such a mellow easy going little baby. Most of the time he is still his charming little self but every once and a while starting about a month ago he started throwing massive tantrums where he grunts and goes red and then flails his arms wildly around hitting everything and everyone around him and pulling my hair. I don't give into his little tantrums but I also can't get them to stop. Yeah, gotta love your child screaming like you are beating them in public.

-Alauna

Ok, I have to say it...

I didn't want to be one of 'those' parents that is always saying how adorable their children are, but with Sterlings' new 'loaner' wheelchair, how could you not agree?

I went to Children's today and Sterling got fit for his new wheelchair. I have never seen a wheelchair this small. The vendor who came to fit Sterling said this was a little big but they don't make them smaller than this. Yeah, super cute!!! The top of his head now sits at about 2 feet tall when he is sitting in this chair. He gets to borrow this one until his comes in or another child needs to try it out.

We put Sterling in this midget wheelchair so he could take it for a test drive. He was all over the place. It was incredible and seriously made me so happy because Sterling was having so much fun. He has never been able to get anywhere real fast and he was cruising up down and all around the halls at the hospital. The vendor (Al) told me that he has seen children that have had their wheelchairs for three months not be as good as Sterling is now and that he would love to see him in a month to see how crazy good he is with his wheelchair. Oh yeah, my son is a natural at the wheelchair. SO FUN!!! Now that I am done bragging I will conclude with a video of Sterling a couple minutes after getting his first wheelchair!

What the ...

So I leave the house this morning in my little sweater for work because at 6am in the morning it is 0 Degrees Celsius out, and of course I am way too lazy to watch the news because that means that it is 5 minutes earlier I have to wake up and I am pushing it as it is. I am soooooo not a morning person. I am grouchy and unpleasant to be around. At 2pm the head honchos at work decided it is pretty crappy so they let everyone go home early. Yeah...got on train. Train sardine packed. Barely fit on train. Train goes 10 feet and then stops for 20 minutes. "What the heck?" Train starts again and more people just keeping piling on in downtown. "How many more people can fit on already full train?" Apparently more can. So now the train is so full that no one can move to get out on their stops. Haha.....That part was kinda funny actually (but only because I am the last train stop in the NW at crowfoot). So I get to crowfoot at 3:15pm. That should have only taken 30 minutes not over an hour, wow! So, yeah it is really snowing out there. Barely make it up the Crestmont hill to get Sterly beans and then slide right back down after he has been picked up. I finally make it home at 5pm. "Is it really 5pm, I left work at 2pm?" It really is 5pm. I park in the 3 foot snow drift behind our house because I have no other options. Get Sterling out of the car. Walk to the door. "Oh Crap!" There is a snowdrift on our porch that goes almost all the way up the door. If I open the door, I will have a huge pile of snow in my kitchen. Instead of doing the smart thing and walking around to the front door. Grab and shovel and shovel porch. Get in house. Home at last! And it is supposed to keep right on snowing all night and day tomorrow. Sounds fun, really excited to have the corner house as all the snow creates a huge drift right at my house entrance.

On other news: Sterling is getting fit for a wheelchair on Tuesday! I am pretty excited for him to own his own little moving mobile. But I do believe that I am only going to get stopped 'that much more' when I am out with him (which isn't a good thing because I am pretty anti-social).

Lastly: I really need to think of some way to earn money from home or my own business. I am not made to be an accountant and sit at a desk all day. Plus I super miss my Sterly. I am trying to think of a way to take what I love, refinishing furniture, painting, interior design and photography in order to make some fundage but not getting anywhere. I wish I was one of those people that wasn't so responsible and have enough nerve to just go out and start a business. Maybe one day! Anyone have any ideas for me? Probably not, but worth a try!

-Alauna

It was good and then it was over...

Sterling being a wierdo....Look at his shunt tube on his neck, looks like he is a muscle man!

Wow, I don't remember that whole weekend happening! It happened so fast that I didn't really get to enjoy it, maybe next year. Sterling had a blast at the Banff Springs Hotel. We let him roll around in his wheelchair the whole weekend and he jsut had a really good time. Bad thing about doing this is that it took us about 1 hour to get from our room to the ballroom downstairs. He got distracted so easily and never wanted to go where Trevor and I wanted to go. He usually wanted to go and torture whatever Christmas Tree was nearest him (which seemed to be endless Christmas trees all over the hotel).

Sterls favourite part about the whole trip seems to be the outdoor heated pool. He absolutely loved it! We had to go everyday to the 'bath', (which was what he called it).

This is Sterls outside being grumpy because he was forced into his winter wear. He hates wearing winter clothes and tries like a maniac to get them off the whole time he wears them. He will sit there with a grumpy expression for hours and wont even smile (that is a rarity for Sterling to not smile if you are being silly) until you get his winter clothes off. He instantly is happy again, wierdo baby! He WILL NOT wear mittens. I am not sure what I am going to do when it really gets cold here. It was pretty nice in Banff being 5 degress Celcius but pretty windy so it made it cold....At least there wasn't any snow there.

"I dunno"

He loves his lights!

So all in all a good trip. Sterling had a really good time with the sitter the hotel hired to watch him while we were at the party. She drew with him and played all sorts of games. That was the first time family hasn't watched him, so we were a little nervous but of course he wasn't. No tears and he had tons of fun!

-Alauna