maternity leave diaries

so far, so good. it takes me a billion years longer to do everything, but i'm finding the days are FLYING past, which wasn't what i was expecting at all. i think it's because the non stop schedule of the boob show (every 3 hours, on the hour) and the duration of the feedings (anywhere from 10-30 minutes if he's being a greedy goompa) means that you do one task and then it's time to feed. it's like, put on the laundry, feed. do the dishes, feed. answer emails, feed. and then before you know it, the dotytron is home from work and it's dinner time and since we go to bed at like, 9:30pm now, the day is done. the one thing i'm having trouble fitting in is my readings for school - i basically front-loaded all my public admin readings so that i'm caught up through to the midterm on november 3rd, but i haven't done a lick of my constitutional law readings. whoops. i'm tempted to take this week off. anyway, i'm slowly finding a schedule that's working for me and the little chicken.

all that being said, two nights ago he was up from 11-3pm every 40 minutes wanting to feed for 7 or 10 minutes at a time. i broke down into tears and totally understood why sometimes people shake babies. I'M NOT GONNA, i'm just SAYIN', aight? no need to call CAS just yet.

our first outing yesterday was exciting (not). library and then ceili cottage for the CSA. whooooooo. today we're going to extend our scope and try to hit shopper's. we basically LIVE at shopper's now. although my friends G and Mhui hepped me to this online drugstore, well.ca which is an online drugstore with FREE DELIVERY, NO MINIMUM. wtf?!? talk about BEST! apparently it's Mhui's hubby's cousin's company and the kid is a real go-getter. he made brickbreaker - the one that's on the blackberry. these kinds of "celebrity" sightings seriously make my day. it's like when i met the guy whose cousin made the popeye's biscuit recipe. it's like standing in the shadow of giants, for me. lol!

i've been doing a little bit of cooking here and there, even though people have been amazing about bringing us delicious food - this is what we've had lately:

the dotytron made us turkey noodle casserole - total old skool styles. we're talking cream of mushroom soup in there, egg noodles, mayonnaise, celery, mushrooms. so good!

i made cornbread to go with a chili i made (not pictured) so the next morning we had a real french canadian breakfast - toasted corn bread with butter and maple syrup and peameal bacon.

dr. rei was a true bff and made us a delicious borscht with chunks of beef. it was soo good!

to go with we had a mesclun salad with gorgonzola-stuffed, pancetta wrapped figs

this is an awesome breakfast. you take leftover stuffing, pat it into cakes, brown the cakes on both sides in olive oil and butter, and topped with a (preferably) runny fried egg. so so so good.

fall/winter = prime time cookie baking time for me. i made us snickerdoodles.

this is almond frangipane stuffed, challah french toast with maple syrup poached apples. it's based on something i saw popping up on food blogs just before thanksgiving weekend, which was brioche smeared with frangipane and baked in the oven. the sandwiching method didn't work out so well, truth be told. i think this will work better as a baked french toast - next time.

sunday was a goosetang dinner. we had takeout from bamiyan kabob which is fast becoming one of my favorite restos. i had the sultani combo, which features kofta (ground beef kabob) and a skewer of barg (filet mignon kabob) and we also got this potato-herb stuffed flatbread which was divine.

for dessert on sunday i made us fried apple fritters. i used macintosh apples in the filling which was a mistake - they cook down to mush and made the batter overly wet. next time i'll know better. i slathered the thing in toffee bourbon sauce and ice cream, so at that point, you'd eat a dirty diaper and think it was delicious.

here's your chicken photo of the day:

he's starting to smile!

the dotytron is making my heart explode every day. last night, i left him with a crying chicken while i heated up my dinner. i come back, and the dotytron announces to me proudly, "my new technique for quieting him down is to assault him with kisses." me: "does it work?" the dotytron, "not really, but it definitely confuses him for a little bit." *demonstrates by showering the boobla with kisses all over his face and torso* *rainbow daggers in my heart*

fin.