enough is ENOUGH!

WARNING to anyone that is grossed out easily. okay, it's not THAT bad, but spence would die if he saw this When I got pregnant I noticed that my already thick hair got thicker. Some may think that is a blessing, but I beg to differ. Not only do I need much more than just the nickle-sized shampoo squirt (at least that's what my mom always told me to use) i need much more time to blow dry my hair, curl, straighten, etc. So when I was done being pregnant and i noticed my hair thinning (just barely) i was happy. until THIS

this is just after one shower. I'm lazy and usually just let my hair go down the drain, but pretty sure if I did that now, I would clog it in less than a week

this is the SAME day after blow drying, not even after straightening. seirously, one day and all that hair!

this is my weekly routine of cleaning my brush. ya, i know, gross. when does this madness end? I am sick of having loose hairs EVERYWHERE. vaccumming and sweeping is required daily but obviously doesn't happen and my bathroom floor is just a sick mess. speaking of hair, getting my hair done this week. probably going to just keep it how it is but i started looking through old pictures of hair colouse trying to see if I wanted a change. I think in the winter i will change it. which one do you like best?

left is redish (can't tell that well) i used to dye my hair for fun with my friends when we were bored. my hair was the most damaged then. remember before straight irons literally using an iron to straighten your hair? haha. good times. second is an old high school pic, dark brown. no it's not the lighting in the third picture, my hair was BLACK. i think my dad almost had a heart attack. some people thought I was gothic. but it was when christina agulera(sp?) died her hair black so it was TOTALLY COOL. haha last blonder. i love looking at older pictures. i may have to just do an oldies post or something sometime cuz it's so fun quick UPDATE

spence and I had our 5 year anniversary last month. this was after we came home from eating out. first time we left her with grandma! she did pretty good. of course we had to do the typical text about eery 5 min to make sure everything was ok. can't believe it's been 5 years. pretty sure i'm too young to be married 5 years. without getting sappy, let me just say he is AWESOME and i love him so much. i know it's lame, but i LOVE flowers...(i get it, they just die) and i got a huge one delivered with all ofmy favorites in it and it was all pink! i was ecstatic. so cute. every time I saw them in the kitchen i would just sigh and felt os loved. haha so lame

i know it's my profile picture, but I can't get enough of it. she's going to be a heartbreaker

and these gorgeous eyes! she is now 3 1/2 months. at the present moment she is hypnotized by treehouse. addicted to TV already! definately our child. i can't believe how you can love one little human so much! not kidding EVERY SINGLE thing she does i am telling spence about and sending pictures constantly throughout the day. to anyone else it would be super annoying, but since she's ours we just obsess. and she has started giggling. it just melts my heart!

last week was gorgeous weather so we went out to the pool a couple days and to the splash park. first time swimming!

i'll leave you with the collage of the three of us as babies. who do you think she looks like more? left is me, middle is blakely, and right is spence. i think she has started to look more like spence a bit. I still think she looks like some of my baby pictures more than his. i'd say it just depends on the day. but either way, she is for sure going to be better looking than either one of us. good thing ! :)

Blakely Grace

So since my baby girl is now just over one month old and I have two friends that have had babies just last week and have already posted about them, I decided I should maybe get on it and share our exciting news. (though I figure everyone knows already, but who doesn't love to see more pics right?)

So we are no longer just the 'Dorward Double' because there are Three of us! Blakely Grace Dorward arrived on may 25th at 8:10pm. she weighed 7lbs 6oz and 21 inches long. Labour wasn't TOO bad, but then again, I got the epidural :) i waited a little while, but then after being induced and having hard contractions 2 min apart for at least an hour and a half I wasnt sure how long it would take so I decided to get the edpidural. Not a fan of how swollen it made me so there won't be ANY hospital pictures haha. they are hideous.

Just a few hours old


my two little babies all swaddled up


she ALWAYS has her hands by her face so she has to wear her little oven mitts


can you tell I love pink?


first sunday at church


her new trick she learnt when she was jut 4 weeks old!


looking so grown up now



and we had a little family photoshoot with Leah. She did an awesome job and didn't even get mad when she went to the bathroom on that blanket...oops.


momy daughter picture


While this last month has been CRAZY, I don't know how we could live without her now. Spence is so cute with her and we are both just obsessed. I text him pictures of her all day and every face she does we just oo and aw at. She is getting more alert and has a little personatily already. I just can't get enough of her!

sitting, waiting, wishing

Well, it's my due date TODAY! and still no little baby. Which is okay because I have kept busy up until now. But I am getting worried if she decides to wait till I am induced or something I might get a little stir crazy. Suggestions on what to do to keep my mind off it?

I don't have a picture of me before I was pregnant standing to the side (for some reson it's not a popular pose when you aren't prego..wonder why) but here is the comparison. Look at that chubby arm! gotta LOVE pregnancy


I wanted to post this picture of our little nursery! mainly cuz I LOVE the colour PINK(i know, some people are probably gagging out there) and cuz Spence and Regan did a really good job of the wainscotting, and spence usually isn't the handy-man type, so I was proud of him.


And this is the crib blanket that I made. I had been wanting to make this puffy quilt I had seen for a long time and it took me a while, so I'm sort of proud of how it turned out. could have been WAY worse!


And that's what's been going on with us. Spence started his new job about 2 weeks ago and is really liking it. I just finished work last week, and I've been liking that! I almost feel bad sometimes that he's working and I"m not, until I remember that I am 9 months pregnant and about to deliever any time. right?

well hopefully next time I'll have some news and pictures to share. wish me luck!

When is it too much?

Before I get into my post, I just thought I'd put a little update of my growth. THis is actually about 25 weeks, so 4 weeks ago. I think I have grown since then, but this is the most updated picture I have. And I always Wondered why pregnant woman take their own pictures of themselves. Until I realized that at least for me, I get spence to take a pic, then I look at it, and i'm like.nope,do another one. and this process is repeated about 10 times till he refuses to take another picture, and then I'm stuck with the reflected bathroom shot of myself. so ENJOY.



this next part of my post is dedicated to spence. I am not writing this post to tease him, but to ask when is it too much?

I'll start with the gaming. Spencer's usually pretty good about gaming just when he has time. If there is studying to do, he can be pretty focused and has really surprised me this year with sometimes going weeks without gaming if he needs to. So I"m not really talking about the actual playing aspect of this. I'm talking about how serious video games are taken in our household.



When we were moving I was going through some old binders, and I was so confused. Sport stats from '98, '99 and so on all organized neatly into these little black binders. When I asked spence about them he casually was like''oh those are my video game stats' and when I then suggested maybe it was time to get rid of them, he said no. we needed to keep them. Why? i have no idea. so now we have a box of old video game stats in the basement. I'm glad that now technology has improved and his video game stat spreadsheets are now all on a flash drive and don't have to take up space

Then today I'm in the basement looking for tax info and going through our bills to find it, and I find this box full of files. So I take it out thinking it will probably have some things I need in it, and I start going through. Each file is neatly labled and there are no loose papers anywhere. I start reading the titles, 'Fantasy Football', 'Fantasy Baseball', 'Fantasy Basketball'..etc. Each file had neatly stapled documents printed out from sport sites. He even had a file that had tabs in it! TABS!

And I'm sitting there looking at this box so organized, and then over at our filing system (which is pretty much the opposite) thinking mmmm....if only I could get him to spent that much attnetion to detail in other things. haha.

I guess I just never knew that people can be so particular about video games or fantasy sports. I thought they just played a little bit, and then forgot about it. Not my husband. I actually had to laugh when I saw his fantasy stuff today. But I can see where he gets his focus from, and how when he really wants to, he can do a really good job of anything that he puts his mind to. I guess if it makes you happy, go for it, right?

Oh Baby!

So if you didn't know, we're having a baby! May 20th is the due date. I wasn't going to have a post just dedicated to this, or post an ultra sound picture (i have always found them a little bit creepy...except the one of my own, naturally) but i guess it's different when it's happening to you. And since this is what's going on with us, I'll share a little bit of it.

So first off, here is the ultra sound pic. Yes, we're having a baby girl!



I think she coudl be waving here. Spence says maybe giving us the middle finger? mmm, if she's anything like I was as a teenager, probably the middle finger. haha.
I really didn't care what the gender was. Girls are fun to dress up etc but I find that i have a harder time with girls names. Any suggestions?

It's funny being pregnant now and thinking of how I thought of pregnant women before, no offense to anyone. But I remember being like, "I don't get why they just didn't exercise." or like "well, they could have painted their nursery before the baby came" ect. woww.....idddiiiooottt. First off I guess everyone is different, but I remember the first 3 1/2 months especially I laughed at myself for saying the exercise thing cuz that was THE farthest thing from my mind. Sleeping was probably the first thing. oh how ignorance is bliss.

I usually don't really share how I feel, but when all I think about is this little baby inside me every day, I guess it's inevitable. When does it actually feel real though? Cuz I've had multiple people tell me that 'oh once you see the ultrasound' and I"M like, ya, it was really cute and exciting, but not really there yet. and then someone else said 'once you feel the baby kick' and I've felt her a lot, but still.....mm...maybe once I see her it will be real...

I'll tell you what is real, gaining weight. ANother thing before I was always like, why don't pregnant women feel pretty cuz I always thought they did, even if they felt huge ect. Oh wait....NOW I get it. who doesn't love people sahing 'whoa! you look huge' or asking family if I was gaining weight or just my dress? Or having my father-in-law say ''Hey chubbo!" mmmm...new resolution, i will try to never tell a pregnant women that they look'HUGE' or anything.

Well, this was a little borrrrinnnnggg, but that's what's going on with us! We are super excited, and I've already started gathering fabric and dreaming up ways to do the nursery!

My Humble Abode

Okay so I thought I'd upload some pictures of our house now that we have lived here for over half a year! weeird to think that time has gone by that fast and snow is covering the ground already.

so I worry sometimes when I post things that people will think I'm bragging or something, but i'm not. just sharing for those interested. so here is our house!

so the outside picture of our house is a couple posts down if you're interested. I wish I had taken a picture before it snowed because we got around to doing our landscaping, and now have a driveway and a proper sidewalk, thankfully (that metal grate was scarey in heels!)


okay so here is the one side of the kitchen. there is a sunken foyer for the entrance (which you can sort of see through that opening)


here is the other side of the kitchen with the appliances and boring stuff. but i am so glad to finally have a dishwasher! i am not the best house keeper so this has definately made my kitchen at least a little bit cleaner!


here is part of my living room. a family I used to teach piano to in calgary gave me this piano! i'm so happy to be able to have one in my house, even if it's not the best, i can't complain.


this is the other half of the living room. spence thinks it's unnecesary to have all the pillows. he has no idea


this is our little bonus room. yes that is wallpaper. and there are now pictures on the one bare wall. but haven't taken pictures since then. oh well


this is the three stairs that lead from the bonus room to the hallway of rooms and bathrooms. Over that edge you can look down and see the sunken foyer. kind of cool. scary though when kids grow up i think....


and finally the bedroom. the other bedroom and office are boring, and so are bathrooms, so didn't put them up. anyways, that's the house!


and some exciting news. my twin brother got married this last weekend! I can't believe that just my immediate family is growing so huge! 28 peeps (with the 29th coming in May!) It was so fun to get away for a few days, see family and see my sister who has gone away to school and my other sister and her family who we only see like twice a year. the house was nuts with everyone around, but something Im' used to. (not sure how spence feels about that since he's the baby of his family)


so these are my sister's kids. in the summer time there was this towel at the cabin that all the boys fought over. SO I decided to see if I could make them some. I have had them done for a long time, but by the time I got around to sending it, steven announced he was getting married, so I thought I'd save some money and wait till I saw them.


haha i love this one. the only this is it was a little small for her head. I forgot how fast babies grow!! it would have fit her better in the summer.

Well that's been us lately. Now on to christmas..haven't even started anything!! yikes. anyone have any good gifts for parents? I got nothing...

Creeping Neighbours

Here is a story for you, for anyone even interested.
So last weekend Reagan was over helping us build our deck. (thanks again regan and dave) spence and reagan were out before me, so I really don't know how long this was going on, but I got out there to help out, and since our backyard is just dirt, no fences, we can see straight across to our neighbors. So you can clearly see windows, the colour of their curtains ect.

so I'm standing there and I"m looking around and all of a sudden i see this guy sitting on his couch with his head just popping up over the back of it just staring. so at first i'm thinking, this guy is just taking a look, curoius, no harm. Then 20 minutes go by and he's still in the same position. Then 40 min go by, same position. WEIRD. do you really think we can't see you??? if you really want to be inconspicuous, don't you like close your curtains, and then peak through them or something. not this guy. he's sitting with the curtains open and just staring. So this goes on for at lesat an hour. so we figure he's just wanting to learn how to make the deck. fair enough.

later on in the day he comes outside into his back yard to do something. I have no idea what because literally all we have out back is DIRT, and some random pieces of wood etc. So he comes outside and like stuttin around pretending like he's doing something while blatantly watching us. I just laughed.

So I'm thinking, this is weird, but whatever, I just wish he came and asked us how we were doing it instead of trying to be sneaky when he wasn't.

So then the next day we come home and dave tells us this story. He pulled up to the house (we are next door neighbours) and dave was putting some stakes in the ground for our final grades, and he's walking in between the house and going into the back yard, when the guy from across the way (the staring guy) crawls out from UNDERNEATH OUR deck, looks around like he is doing nothing wrong, and saunters away like nothing even happened!!!!!!!

I laughed so hard. who does that? I mean clearly he wants to know how to build the deck, which is fine with me. but are we really that scarey that you can't come and talk with us? Secondly, we are your neighbours. you are going to be living right beside us for who knows how long! usually you try not to scare people, stare at people, crawl under their decks while they aren't there kind of a thing. so all I have to say is yes, we see you staring at us, and we know about you sneaking under our deck. you are not fooling anyone.


And on other notes of things going on:
-notes to self, do not buy expensive things. we never slurge on that stuff, and finally decided to go with an iphone. two days later, it fell out of my pocket and smashed on the ground. CLUTZ. i guess i've learned my lesson, I cannot handle anything breakable.
-my father-in-law David Dorward is running for mayor! crazy. if you want to read more going to www.votedorward.ca
-Just a side note, i decided the other day that the word 'bloated' is going on my dirty word list. it sounds disgusting when you say it, and when others say it.
-and the other day I was in a waiting room, and they call 'Chelsey'. I had to do a double take cuz it was this 16-year-old boy. really? poor kid. I mean I've heard of the Courtneys, Shannons, Ahsley even, and Kelly, but chelsey? that is definately a girl's name.