THE GOODS BLOG: Erika's Precious Little Life - March Edition

I feel like I’ve barely been at home lately and I’m starting to feel pretty burnt out about it. It’s difficult to settle into our new city when we’re never here. While January and February were both go-go-go... The rest of the year actually has no plans in it. We currently have nothing else booked (other then some weekends at the cottage) and no other major plans. I’m sure that things will come up here and there but it seems like we have nothing but free time ahead.

February began with me still being in Regina. It felt like I was there for a long time! I enjoyed the quality friend hang-outs that I got to have.

I got my heart tattoo re-coloured (the one that I have matching with my mom) because it was super faded. My mom got her’s re-coloured as well. I was annoyed initially because I felt that the tattoo guy didn’t follow the original lines properly and he changed the heart’s shape. But now that it’s healed it doesn’t look too bad.

We celebrated Sarah’s Baby Shower!! It went really well and the venue was very beautiful (Regina Floral Conservatory). Sarah was showered with gifts!

Can't wait to meet this one!!! <3

I spent a lot of time finding all of Regina’s toddler activities. It was SO cold out and we couldn’t stay stuck in the house all day.

Mama's still got it.

I got to have dinner at Regina’s hot new restaurant, Avenue! This is the place that is putting Regina on the culinary map. I really enjoyed my entire meal!! And I even got to meet Chef Nathan Guggenheimer! You might recognize him as a contestant on Top Chef Canada.

He follows me on Instagram now!

And Carrie showed up while I was in Regina as well!

To be honest, my time in Regina was very difficult and challenging. This was the longest stretch that I’ve had Archie on my own without Tim and I found it really hard being his solo parent 24/7. (Yes, my parents did try to help and I was able to escape a bit, thank goodness.) But overall, I felt exhausted. Archie didn’t sleep well in Regina and therefore neither did I. There was a lot of co-sleeping going on which usually lead to no-sleep for me. I do not intend to be away from Tim with Archie by myself ever again any time soon. I was extremely relieved to return back home!!!

It was Valentine’s Day!!! We did our usual Valentine's Day stuff!!!

Everyone loves out-takes!

And then we left for Montreal! It was super weird to go back there and to stay in our old neighbourhood. We really did love our life there. We’ve loved our life in a lot of places! We feel like we have a lot of homes. The main purpose of our visit was to EAT!! (If there’s a different reason to go to Montreal, I don’t know what it is.) Archie wasn’t eating solid food when he lived there, so it was awesome for him to get to eat all of the things this time! He was eating foie gras and everything. We went to the Au Pied de Cochon Cabane à Sucre for our 5th time and it was crazy and delicious like always.

HOME. <3

I celebrated TWELVE years of being a yogi! These yoga pictures were all taken within the last year. Find your thing and DO IT! It doesn’t need to be yoga. Do whatever speaks to you. I promise that it will keep you full of life. ♥

(And yes, laying sideways on the couch is one of my “things” too. There’s room for all of it!)

I went to my first-ever Paint Nite with Colen and Sarah at the Toronto Zoo and we had a blast! It was hilarious and fun. When are we going to Plant Nite?! Ha ha!

And then we left for Muskoka! It’s really nice that our family cottage is only a short two hour drive away from us now! The cottage in the winter is extremely snowy!! So we mainly played outside in the snow and cuddled by the fireplace.

Archie and his cousin Evelyn.

Toronto has basically been buried in snow and we keep getting huge snow storms. Over it!!!

That’s been the month! I need a break from all of the going!

In other news, I have started taking CBD oil. I take it once a day. I’m using it with the hope that it will chill me out a bit when things get challenging with Archie and will help me to have fewer “bad days.” So far I think that it’s helping but it’s hard to say! The type that I’m using contains no THC so I do not get high whatsoever. (I got it in Regina from Hemp Haven for $25, if anyone is interested!)

Lastly and most exciting, Sarah had her baby girl! Her name is Blake Leigh and she was born via C-section at 4:23pm on February 27th! 6lbs 11oz and 19” long!

This means that my Regina high school group of girlfriends are now ALL MOMS! Isn’t that amazing?!

Between the 11 of us we have 22 kids. (With one more on the way!) That’s double the amount of us! There are 8 girls and 14 boys. The youngest is 2 days old and the oldest is 15 years old. (The rest are pretty much every age in between!)

It would be REALLY incredible if we could take a photo of all of them together some day!

Life with Archie:

He uses about 13 words now and knows pretty much every letter of the alphabet. He’s still not using tons of speech but is getting better all the time. He’s extremely communicative in other ways and impresses us with how smart and adventurous he is all the time. He has actually gotten pretty “easy.” (Or maybe that’s just the CBD talking, ha ha!) He’s down to one big nap in the middle of the day for 2-3 hours and the two of us go out and do things the rest of the time. It’s SO awesome that we can go to the mall (or wherever) and Archie will just hold my hand and walk alongside me. I love the option of not having to pull out the stroller.

He still sleeps in his crib and we have no intention of changing this. He doesn’t climb out so he’ll stay in the crib until he starts escaping. However, when we went to Montreal we discovered that our playpen is broken, so Archie slept on a regular mattress for the first time! He was totally fine with it and he didn’t roll off or try to get out of the room. So that was great! It was a fun experiment.

Lots of bed. Small boy.

He has been on 19 flights!

Archie is very creative and imaginative. He loves pretending to feed his toys food (he makes the sound of them eating). He created this pine cone art in our backyard without me showing him how to do it! He just started running around and collecting pine cones and lining them up. We love his little ideas!!

He is VERY into cars and trucks... Even though we never did anything to influence him toward liking cars and trucks. He also really enjoys following along and copies my yoga poses. He does a really adorable tree pose!

Lots of you guys have been asking me about where we’re at on deciding to have a second child or not. Our plan was that once Archie turned two, that we would make a firm decision. I didn’t want to be wishy-washy about it and I didn’t want to drag it out. But I think what it all comes down to is that we aren’t ready to make this choice yet. We don’t know what to do yet and we don’t know what we want. The thought of not having another child is pretty disappointing to me. I like the idea of Archie having a sibling. On the other hand, the thought of having another baby sounds like a total nightmare to me. Starting from scratch when things are finally becoming “okay” seems like an insane thing to do and I have no interest in doing it. So I don’t know. Tim doesn’t feel strongly in either direction. I also don’t like the idea of a second child “trapping us” even more. With one kid we can still manage to travel and eat in restaurants and do the things that we enjoy. A second one would really bring the costs up.

So maybe we won’t have a second one?? Some days I really do want another one though. One thing is for certain; I am NOT going to drag this out and spend years and years with babies (or contemplating babies). So I’ll likely get pregnant within the year or not at all. And then it’s a swift vasectomy for Tim. I’ll obviously update you if anything gets decided.

I am more than ready for March to bring spring weather. I miss Vancouver’s non-winter SO MUCH.

We’re heading to London tomorrow for our niece Laura’s 2nd birthday party.

I’m going to see Royston Langdon in concert on Monday. He’s the lead singer of the band Spacehog and they were my absolute favourite band during my pre-teen and teenage years. They still are! I’ve never seen them at all before and I’m so excited to even just see Royston solo!! (Apparently he plays all of the Spacehog stuff!)

At the end of the month I’m going to the Toronto Yoga Show and attending a special class called “Arm Balances, Hip Openers and Inversions” that is being lead by Colleen Saidman & Rodney Yee (they’re yoga celebrities).

Generally a more chill month ahead, that’s for sure!

THIS MONTH’S SHOUT-OUTS!:

March 7th is Susan Murphy’s 37th birthday!

I hope that you have a fabulous Susu day and that the kids let you relax! Looking through all of our photos together, we have had such a wonderful friendship full of hilarious adventures! I hope that Matt makes your day extra special. Love you!! ♥

March 12th is Kristen Smith’s 35th birthday!

You my friend are a magical unicorn. I have so much love in my heart for our friendship and the life journey that we have shared. I hope that the kids spoil you and that Dallas does something awesome - mostly that he fills the kitchen gas pump with wine for you. Love you!! ♥

March 19th is Sarah Swalm’s 8th wedding anniversary!

Wishing you and Adam a wonderful day of romance! I hope that you get to do something special to celebrate!