How did this baby get to be three months old already? Cliché as it is, it really does feel like just yesterday I was in labour and gave birth to her. Though on the other hand, she feels like she belongs with us and has always been here. She is such a delight to us and we are so in love with her. She laughed yesterday, like really laughed, for the first time, at Fiona being silly. She grabs toys and puts everything in her mouth. She is trying really hard to roll over, from both front and back, and if she could just figure out how to get her arms out of the way could probably do it, as she can get most of the way. She is super easy going and happy to just hang out and let things happen around her. Probably a good trait for a third baby.

She loves to smile and usually smiles when I bring out the camera and smile at her, but she was just waking up in this picture so is still sleepy.

1. Visit a pumpkin patch.
2. Make a pumpkin pie from scratch.
3. Paint and carve pumpkins.
4. Go on a hayride.
5. Make homemade candied apples.
6. Do a leaf-rubbing project.
7. Build a huge pile of leaves and jump in them.
8. Visit an apple orchard.
9. Bake a homemade apple pie.
10. Visit a corn maze.
11. Do some Autumn crafts
12. Make homemade apple cider.
13. Go geocaching at least once a week.
14. Make our own butter.
15. Create our own quilt squares.
16. Listen to Autumn from The Four Seasons by Vivaldi
17. Make a scarecrow.
18. Learn why leaves change colours.
19. Spend at least 30 minutes outside every day.
20. Finish sewing our Christmas advent calendar before December.
21. Pick five new things off this list to try and do them!

She asked to try again tonight, and took her shirt off saying she’d like to be skin to skin. Guinevere was still a bit fussy, but settled down as Meredith walked and bounced and sang “Hush Little Baby”, and eventually fell asleep.

My heart just melts watching the two older girls with their new little sister. They love her so much and absolutely dote on her. I think seeing Meredith walking around wearing her tonight even gave Kris baby fever. He mentioned something about how neat it would be to see her at nine doing the same thing haha. We are not planning on any more, but regardless, one baby at a time…

I thought I’d post some of my steps, though this isn’t a whole tutorial, since there are lots out there, more just how I changed it to account for the smaller size of the wearer. I didn’t find much information about making a mei tai specifically for an older sibling to wear a real baby. I used a conglomeration of several tutorials, plus my experience making previous ones, but mostly the Scandi mei tai tutorial and the Hobo Mama tutorial. Click any pictures to see them larger.

Once I had the fabric, the tricky part was deciding on dimensions. The straps were pretty easy. I knew the ones on mine were far too long. I tried on our doll mei tais. The one I recently made for Fiona had straps that were 44” long, and trying that on they worked but were a bit on the short side. The twill my mom had was 60” across, which I decided was the perfect length. I decided on three inches wide, so needed to cut them 7” wide to take into account a 1/2” seam allowance. I folded it selvage to selvage, and then over once more, and used my new rotary cutter and mat (thanks Mom!) to cut three straps. So much nicer than ripping the fabric all the way across and hoping for the best!

I decided to try Hobo Mama’s way of sewing the straps, which is to fold the seams in 1/2” and iron them, then fold the straps in half, and then just top stitch around it after tucking the padding in. I’m not sure whether I like this way or just sewing them normally and then turning them better. It’s definitely a pain to get the padding in and get them turned properly the second way, but turning down each side 1/2” took quite a while too. There are probably more efficient ways than the way I did it though.

I have to say though, that this way definitely made nice, sharp angled corners. I just folded the end corners into the middle and ironed them, and so no need to try and be poking the corners out perfectly after sewing and turning. Sorry for the blurry second picture. I did this on one end of each shoulder strap and on both ends of the waist straps.

For the padding, I cut 10”x10” squares of fleece, folded them in half, then in half the same way again, so I ended up with rectangles 2.5”x10”. I think if I were to make another, I might only do three layers of padding, or maybe make the padding slightly narrower. I tucked the padding into the shoulder straps about 4” from the straight ends, then pinned it all along and top stitched the entire strap. I started with the angled corners to make sure they stayed nice and lined up. I sewed two lines down the just padding section to keep the padding in place, plus I like how it looks. I usually like how top stitching looks and would top stitch the folded edge the whole way too, but I’d read that some people find that creates more pressure points, so I decided not to for now. I can always go back and do that if I change my mind later.

For the body, I wanted it small enough that it would fit Meredith well, but large enough I could reinforce it properly and it would hold a small baby well. I searched around online and got some advice from the Babywearer forums online and a local Facebook group, as well as just holding up some mei tais I already had to Meredith and eye balling what might work. I decided to go with 12” across and a lightly padded waist so we could cinch it if need be. We ended up with it being about 16” tall though I hadn’t decided that until it was almost all put together (as I just made the panels that long with the plan to cut them shorter if I thought it necessary). We looked around at mei tais online, and she decided she wanted the body to be square-ish, and that she wanted the panels to be framed by the pink fabric. I made the panels first, and their finished dimensions are 13”x16.5” or so, to allow for seam allowances. I wasn’t very exact with the height since I knew I might cut them shorter, but did try to get the width right.

I then cut out a piece of heavy canvas to the same dimensions to use as a heavy inner panel. I held it up to Meredith and eye balled the angle for the straps. Many mei tai tutorials advise a 45° angle, but that seemed like it would be too wide, so I went with a 60° angle (from horizontal), which was still easy as I have markings for that on my cutting mat. They probably could have even been a little closer together than that, but it would have been harder to get them even. I made sure they were even and sewed them onto the heavy canvas with x-boxes. Sorry for the super blurry photo. There are much better photos of this on other tutorials. I purposely didn’t sew over the same lines when I needed to go across again. I have read mixed things on whether sewing in the same place more than once could weaken the fabrics (more holes poked along it), so opted for two lines a short distance apart instead to be safe.

I didn’t take any pictures of putting the whole thing together, but there are lots of great tutorials on how to do so, including the ones I linked above. I made the hood based on the Scandi hood but with smaller dimensions. I don’t actually think it needed the hood, as I doubt Meredith will ever want to carry the baby long enough for him/her to fall asleep, but she really wanted one. I haven’t put loops on the straps for the hood ties to go through as I figure I’ll wait until baby is here so I can get them in the right spot. It’s possible tucking the hood straps under the mei tai straps will be good enough anyway. I decided not to cut the body shorter, after trying out a long-ish doll in the mei tai and seeing where it’s head ended up. I know that is not perfect, but it can be rolled at the bottom if needed for smaller babies. I made the padding in the waist quite light, just two layers instead of four, so that we could cinch it if needed, since I prefer legs out carries if possible. I sewed along the waist padding every 1/2” after top stitching the strap, for looks as well as to reinforce it and make sure it could bear weight. I just moved my needle over to the left and lined up the last row of stitching with the other side of the presser foot and it made a perfect 1/2” spacing.

I will report back once the baby is born and we see how well it fits. In the meantime, she wanted to try it out carrying Fiona, who is only 10 pounds and 6-8” smaller than her, plus obviously too long for a mei tai made for a newborn. But it easily held her weight, and Meredith claimed it was comfortable and even carried her around for a short time in it.

I can’t wait to see Meredith carrying her new little sibling around in it too.

There are six in total this time.

This little guy is about half the size of the rest and has fuzzy feet, so I assume our Silkie rooster has managed to fertilize some of our eggs finally. There is one other with fuzzy feet too (though he’s bigger, so obviously got the hen’s size). The rest would be Ameraucana crosses from our other rooster.

The girls like the little yellow one the best. I think because that’s classically what they look like in their stories and such. (The classic white Leghorn hen starts out as a yellow chick.)

It will be neat to watch them grow and see how they feather out. I love baby chicks!

I’ve been finding some time to actually sit down and blog most days, and I’d really like to start keeping this one up again too. Especially since technically Meredith starts kindergarten next year. In reality, very little will change, except that she’s already starting to get asked all the time about it. I was reading back older posts and some of the funny/cute things Meredith did, as well as funny things she has said, and I wish I’d done a better job of writing these last two years. It’s as good as a diary for me. So my goal is at least once a week. That said, I don’t think I am going to go with Self Design for school (which involves weekly reporting). I called and had a chat with another school, and the reporting is way less stringent and they are still very open and unschooling friendly (we discussed it at length), so I think I will give them a try instead and see how it goes.

I have said before that I am going to try and blog more, but I think looking back through the old posts has really motivated me. As much as I don’t want to take too much time away from family to be on the computer, I think dedicating some time even just once a week to record my thoughts and what we’ve been doing will be worth it down the road.

On that note, I’m going to share a couple of cute things Meredith has said recently.

We were in the grocery store, going up and down the aisles, when she noticed the big Koolaid display in the juice aisle. She got a really confused look on her face and asked me why there was Koolaid in the drink aisle. As far as she’s concerned, Koolaid is for dying wool and cloth (and hair, though we’ve never actually done that yet).

The other day, I went to get her a glass and she said “No Mama, no no! I want to be a real hippie!” I asked her what she meant, and she told me real hippies only drink out of jars.

I am so enjoying being the mama to two little girls. They are fascinating, and wonderful, and I love to be with them. I have wonderful conversations with Meredith now, and she is so amazingly sweet and thoughtful and caring. I love to watch her and Fiona play together and Meredith show Fiona all she knows.

Fiona is definitely going through the two year old’s more wanting to be independent phase, but is still so much fun. She chatters constantly and loves to do whatever her big sister is doing. She is also so sweet. She is going through a bit of a phase where she hits sometimes, but she almost always catches herself right away and then wants to give the person a big hug and a kiss. She’s incredibly gentle with the baby ducklings. She also already seems to have a great sense of humour, and can be cheeky (in a good way!).

I look forward to perhaps adding some posts about things we’ve done in the past I’ve been meaning to blog about, but if I don’t get to those, I’ll at least hopefully start keeping track of what we are doing from now on.

We went to Butchart Gardens first, which to be honest were a bit of a let down. I have been to Butchart in the late spring and summer when everything is in bloom, and it is gorgeous. The beginning of March was very bare and there was very little to see. The Japanese Garden was nice though and Fiona especially liked all the fountains.

Moss bunnies

A 78 year old Sequoia

Stopping to smell the flowers

Catching a ride

Then we went to the nearby Butterfly Gardens, which were much more what we were hoping for. The sun was out and the butterflies were very active. Two butterflies landed on Fiona, which actually kind of scared her, and upset Meredith because Meredith had been hoping so badly to have one land on her! Oh well, maybe next year.

There was a station with microscopes set up to look at various items they had arranged. The girls both took a turn. I don’t remember that from last time we had visited, so that was a neat addition!

They had little hair clips for sale that turned colour out in the sun, but you couldn’t tell what colour they were until you’d bought them and brought them out. The girls loved them, but three of the first four were a pale orange colour. So we went back and got a few more. Meredith decided she should wear them all at once (there are more at the back!).

After the Gardens, we went downtown. Everything downtown had crazy long line ups though. Meredith really wanted to do the Harbour Ferry tour and said she didn’t mind waiting in line for it, so we got into line.

The boats only take 12 people at a time and they are out for a half hour each, so we ended up waiting for just over an hour. Meredith made friends with a little boy in front of her and they were able to pass the time pretty well, even in the cold wind that started up.

Fiona had fallen asleep by then, and I decided to keep my feet on dry land and went off to see what deals Roger’s Chocolate had for the “tourists” (free chocolate!) while Kris and Meredith did the harbour tour.

Meredith had been looking forward to a bus ride (so much so, that she’d packed a backpack specifically for the bus four days ahead of time (since we first mentioned the possibility) and had been counting down the days). Originally we were going to take one of the bus tours, but decided it would make more sense to just take a city bus. We were heading out to meet some friends for dinner, so I drove while Kris and Meredith caught a bus.

Despite off and on periods of cold and wind, it turned out to be a pretty fun day. As the girls get older, there are other events that would be fun to do as well.

Click any pictures to see them bigger. These are taken with a five year old camera that we gave to the girls to use as their camera, because I have two nicer, more expensive cameras. The two that are mine, that I take extremely good care of, are both broken. The old camera that gets dropped, thrown around, and used constantly, still works (mostly) perfectly. Go figure…

If you ever take your children near water and haven’t seen this article, please click over and read it. I’ve seen it posted and reposted many places now, but it’s one of those articles I don’t think can be reposted too many times. It has a lot of important information that I didn’t know. The most eye-opening part of this article, for me, was this:

To get an idea of just how quiet and undramatic from the surface drowning can be, consider this: It is the number two cause of accidental death in children, age 15 and under (just behind vehicle accidents) – of the approximately 750 children who will drown next year, about 375 of them will do so within 25 yards of a parent or other adult. In ten percent of those drownings, the adult will actually watch them do it, having no idea it is happening (source: CDC).

A friend of mine made a comparison to labour and birth: any of us in the natural birthing community know that labour doesn’t look anything like what they try and show on TV. The same holds true, apparently, for drowning. I didn’t realize that someone who is drowning could have their head above water. I didn’t know there wouldn’t be any thrashing or yelling. In fact, he makes the point that to the untrained eye, a drowning person often looks like they are just treading water.

And parents – children playing in the water make noise. When they get quiet, you get to them and find out why.

One other point not discussed in the article but that I think bears mentioning is snorkel or scuba equipment and kids. While many kids love to don scuba masks and play around in the water with them, they can be dangerous. From what I’ve read, many of the snorkels made for kids don’t allow much oxygen to make it into the mask, so the CO2 alone can be dangerous. A mask that doesn’t fit quite right can let water in and a child who is not getting a lot of oxygen could take a deep breath and get a mouthful of water, or if they let the tube go under water momentarily the same thing could happen. Dry drowning is another potential risk. This isn’t to say children should never be allowed to use this equipment, but parents should be very aware when they are using it. After all, many children will put their heads under water face down so just the tube is sticking out above the water, and now that I’ve read the article above I can see how it would be very easy to miss that a child doing this was actually in trouble. In fact, a young girl drowned in a lake nearby last year while wearing a snorkel mask. There were life guards and many other people around her at the time. Children should also be informed about what to do if any water does get in the mask.

Living as close to a lake as we do now, I appreciate having this information, and hope it helps someone else out there as well.

That being said, I’ve decided to split my blog into two after all. It will be easier anyway if I can choose tags for the homesteading one that are specifically to do with homesteading rather than lump it all into one category. Anyone interested can subscribe to both, or just one or the other, and then when I feel like sitting down to write (and actually have a moment), I can write whatever I want without wondering if it’s “on-topic”. Which I really shouldn’t worry about anyway, since I write mostly for myself, but according to my stats I have a surprising number of people visiting my blog each day even when I don’t write and do hope that some people will get something out of what I’m writing.

I haven’t got the new site set up yet, and won’t have time to do anything fancy. Likely I’ll just copy exactly how this blog looks but change the picture and categories and leave it at that for now. In the fall when/if I have a bit more time I can fancy it up. I’ll make sure to post a link when it’s set up for those who are interested.

to this:

It was really cool to watch the progress. I can’t wait until it’s done and we can stick the chickens out there. We are shingling it with extra shingles from when our roof was done, and I’ll paint it inside and out with mistinted paint.

The chickens are doing well. Here they are all lined up when they saw me coming. They were ranged all over the brooder and just came to see what I was up to when I walked up.

Yes, there are eight now. We actually lost one early on, so of course I had to replace her with two more. And then we got another two from a different breeder. And later this week I still have more day-old babies to go get… Kris says his one consolation is that our coop maxes out around twenty, so he knows I have a limit. The nice people on the Backyard Chickens forums call it “chicken math”. They warn anyone new to chickens to build their coops twice as big as they think they’ll need, and joke most people will have the coop full before it’s done anyway. (Which is pretty much holding true for us, ha!) They are absolutely fascinating. I really can’t get over how neat they are to watch, and how fun. And some of them are so sweet too.

We were out in the garden all afternoon today. We brought the chickens out and let them go to town in the little fenced-in garden area near the house. We got lots of stuff planted. Hopefully we don’t get another frost. (Technically I don’t think we are considered frost free here until mid-April.)

There is still so much to do. I have planted our fruit trees (besides one mulberry that will end up near the chicken run), but still have some berries to plant. I planted the peas and lettuces in the raised beds that are already here, but I’d really like to get at least one raised bed dug this year on the other side of the house. I have a ton of potatoes (more than I remember ordering!) on the windowsill right now and need to think of where to plant them. I want to just use two long trunks from the trees that we had felled and plant the potatoes between them. Kris thinks it will look messy and they’ll be in the way. I think no matter what I decide to do with them, they’ll take up a lot of space. There are a lot of potatoes! Maybe next year they will last longer than barely into October.

We also need to finish the chicken coop and make them a run plus figure out some sort of pasture system for them, since we don’t want to let them completely free range. (Stories of poo on decks and cars, plus there is a road fairly nearby.) I’m thinking portable electric fencing, but we may just make three different pastures right near the coop and rotate them between those. We also need to finish clearing all the wood from the trees we had felled. Most of the downstairs is finally painted, though the room the chickens are in still needs to be done and most of upstairs still needs to be done.

We won’t be bored any time soon, that’s for sure.

As a side note, PhD in Parenting and HoboMama are both great blogs that I have subscribed to through my Google Reader (though I don’t know if I have them up on my blog list, I haven’t updated that in ages). They write about breastfeeding, natural parenting, etc, and are both pretty well known. Imagine my surprise when I got a pingback notice that Fiona’s birth video was linked to from PhD in Parenting, on a guest post by Lauren! I’m honoured that she likes the video so much that she wants to share it with others.