It really isn't easy to take care of 3 kids, stay healthy, and keep up with work. So much to juggle, hence it’s already July and I’m only my 2nd post of the year. 

F is already 9 months, and we celebrated with a long weekend trip to Salt Spring Island. 

I was excited to go back after all these years (read more about my 2017 trip at this link). Not much has changed, other than the addition of more food trucks (gentrification???).

Oh and the addition of my 3 kids, of course. 

Before the trip, I was a bit worried about what they would eat. It's always difficult to feed each of them, because they have their own preferences, likes and dislikes, which also depend on their level of fatigue. I only let myself think about it for a few minutes, because there weren’t enough neurons in my very full and tired brain to even remember to think about it (if that makes sense…). 

For dinner on the 1st day, we went to Cassette. Spoiler - we all loved it, 10/10 food and service for a group of 9 with a total of 5 kids. 

Entree for 2, with the salmon option, for me, baby F, and H: 

PERFECT fish, crispy skin, no bones. Comes with a salad that I only managed to get one bite of, because the rest of the family devoured it. Can you see the little golden edible flowers garnishing the salad? 

Fried chicken burger for S: 

Also perfectly cooked chicken!!! H is usually pretty picky with fish and chicken, but he was extremely quiet during this meal, too busy eating. 

Cassette smash burger for P: 

He left 3/4 of the burger, mostly because he didn’t nap despite waking up at 6AM to make it for the 8:50AM ferry. More of this delicious burger for me… 

Piles of fries, as you can see from the photos. None of the fried food was overly greasy. The staff remembered to keep salt levels low. I wish we had time to have dessert. Actually, I wish I had the foresight to use formula, so that I could have an alcoholic beverage at the breweries and the cider place that we visited back in 2017. 

For most of this trip, I was with the baby, either nursing or napping him, and not doing a whole lot. We did finally make it to the infamous Salt Spring Island Saturday farmers’ market and made a quick loop around before heading to the nearby playground. Honest opinion of the market is that it was a bit of a bust though, so crowded and overpriced, with a mediocre quality of goods. Who am I to judge though? Some people might like driftwood bird houses, still fresh with bird doo doo. :) 

While F napped, the other kids went for short hikes, beach time, blackberry picking, going to the goat cheese place, bakeries. Because I was mostly with the baby, I think P must have felt neglected. I forget sometimes that he’s not as independent as his older sister, who was having a blast with her cousins and making up games… Anyways, hoping the next trip will be better for him. At the end, he bonded with my cousin’s huge dog and we ended up leaving on a very high note. Guess we’ll come back again… 

Did the holiday season completely take up all my energy and focus, so that I forgot to blog about my very normal life? 

Well I'm back again! You could never get rid of my "coffee cup and pastry flat lay with hand" photos.   

I've been holed up at my desk all day, and needed a quick mental health hot chocolate at L'Atelier because it is Hot Chocolate Festival in Vancouver, from now until Feb. 14th. Chocolate and something sweet to celebrate Valentine's Day, in case you didn't notice the trend of this festival always occurring around this time of the year.... 

We wanted to try both of their very delicious and Asian inspired flavors: 

#107 - Miso and lavendar honey hot chocolate, served with matcha roll cake

#108 - Sesame hot chocolate with milk chocolate foam, served with a pressed croissant with passion fruit coating

Dip the pressed croissant into the hot chocolate, no regrets. 

Both were delicious. L'atelier never disappoints.

Will I have time to try more from this hot chocolate festival? Hope so, especially if the snow sticks around and I'm stuck inside with the kids on more snow days.   

 

Also, I do not like to be treated like chopped liver, and I have really tried very hard to set my boundaries with all the people that I must  interact with on the daily. It's difficult with kids, and especially difficult as a remote worker. Hence, I need a mental health hot chocolate. 

Is it really over? Will we have more house related problems? I'm sure we will, that's life and our house is old. The inspection was two weeks ago, and I haven't even had time to breathe a sigh of relief because kids. Everybody is once again sick (but in a manageable way, not like the last time when we visited the hospital). S is pushing boundaries more than ever and baby P is learning to voice his opinions. 

I always find comfort in chocolate chip cookies though. This one is from To Live For, a completely vegan bakery that recently opened in East Vancouver. They have been supplying coffee shops and other stores for a while now, but finally have their own cafe. 

It is unbelievable that this cookie is fully vegan. no eggs, butter, or any animal by product. How is this possible?! It's not my favourite chocolate chip cookie, but it sure comes close. The texture is crispier than I usually like, but flavor is on point. Lots of (vegan!!!!) chocolate chips. Prior to the chocolate chip cookies, I've tried the lemon loaf, and it was even better than any loaf made with real butter. I still can't believe butter is not on their ingredients list. 

We got this cookie to go, but I'd love to hang out at their beautiful cafe soon. Maybe when I return to work and have to escape the children... 

Took both the kids and their grandpa for their vaccines one morning this week. S was very quiet while waiting in line, and refused to take off her jacket and sweater ahead of time. The kind lady who took our ID recommended we strip the kids down ahead of time, so that there's no fussing when we sit down with the nurse or whoever gives us the vaccine. 

I was slightly nervous that S would have a meltdown because there were a few other children crying and screaming around us. One little girl could be heard across the entire room, and probably outside the building as well, and she hadn't even had the needle near her yet (future anti-vaxxer in the making?). 

I got my vaccines first. Then, it was S's turn. 

Amid the chaos around us, S just sat in my lap, quietly observed the lady preparing the vaccine, had the shot, and we went over to the colouring station. Baby P was cool as a cuke, as per usual. 

A few days later, unrelated to the vaccine, and probably because we exposed ourselves to other sick children, both kids are once again sick. Their symptoms are mild, only runny noses, so I'm hoping it will run its course in the next few days. It's extra tough right before mealtimes, because both of them are hungry and want to be held. I only have one pair of arms and barely enough strength to carry one of them because they're growing so fast. Somebody will always be left on the ground, screaming and kicking. Usually, somebody will be sad, and that is often me.

Thankfully, we live in a great city with lots of food options to refuel after an exhausting day of being patient with the kids. H and I decided to visit Downlow Chicken after an especially gruelling week: 

We ordered three pieces of chicken thigh by the piece, which were served with pickles over a piece of white bread. We ordered three separate flavors - the jerk, the lemon pepper, and the cool ranch. The flavors tasted the same to me, maybe the seasonings intermingled into a hot mess of spices. 

This was so so so delicious, and the best fried chicken in town. 

The skin was crispy like a potato chip, yet the insides were juicy and tender, the perfect piece of fried chicken. How do they make the skin so crispy?! What is in their oil? And how come it's not greasy at all??

On the way home from Whistler, we decided to make more pit stops, rather than zooming all the way from the sky to the sea. We stopped at Fox and Oak for donuts: 

The top one is Puppy Chow (peanut butter and chocolate), and the bottom one, chosen by S, is a gluten free Pumpkin Spice flavor. More flavors available can be found, feel free to explore their menu online.  

Can they please come to Vancouver? 

We need these fluffy bites of heaven closer to home. 

Our next stop was at Shannon Falls, and after that, everybody fell asleep except me, the driver. It was a lovely, quiet trip home. 

Took a quick overnight trip to Whistler with the fam. 

H was already there, he was by himself for 2 nights, and my lovely mum was helping me with the children. It wasn't too miserable without him, but it was not easy either, because he is another authority figure that S respects, whether she realises it or not. When he's around, she listens better. 

We left the house at 8AM, and the 1.5 hour drive went as smoothly as possible. Baby P fell asleep almost immediately. S was entertained by the extra books and snacks for about 30 minutes, until she had enough of being in her car seat. Then, she kept saying she wanted to throw away the ocean (the Sea to Sky had the most amazing ocean view that day). 

Finally, we arrived, changed everybody's diapers, and went on the prowl for food. Portobello at Whistler is right around the corner from where we were staying at the Fairmont Chateau Whistler: 

We ordered a porchetta sandwich, and a turkey noodle soup with a side of mac and cheese. The crispy pork skin tasted super fresh, while the meat just melted in your mouth, and none of it was too greasy. 

The soup was mostly for me, and the mac and cheese for S. She didn't eat much though, I think she had enough snacks. Everything was delicious. Or was I just starving from breastfeeding and travelling all day?

What else is there to do at Whistler with two kids, two years old and under, before the first snow?   

📍Coffee Park

📍The pool at the hotel

That's a full day. 

Does anybody else's kid wake up at 5am asking to eat bread? 

This past weekend, we enjoyed a packed three days of family, friends, and food.  Everyday, there was a new turkey to carve and new desserts to try. My cousin brought over fresh mochi from Car's Dessert, an Asian dessert hole in the wall in Richmond. Maybe it's not even a hole, more like a crack in the wall, based on the photos online. 

I've been seeing more about this place on social media, but haven't made a trip in person, so I was very grateful for my cousin that day (usually, he's a bit of a pain, ha ha). He brought over a whole tasting tray: 

They were out of the fresh mango flavor, so we had (from top left, going clockwise) durian, chestnut, yam, and I think the last one is taro... My babies were getting tired and it was around 7PM already, so I took one of the chestnut mochi to go.  

The filling has little chestnut bits inside for added texture (or were they just unable to grind it to a smooth paste...?) I'm indifferent about this, I'm so used to the chestnut paste used in Asian cakes. Overall, still a great fresh mochi, very chewy and enough chestnut flavor. One day, I'll try the other items on the Car's Dessert menu, but for now, I will take the moments that I can get before the kids' bedtimes. 

The day after, we had a Thanksgiving dinner party at our house. One of my friends was asking me for a tissue:

S - "Do you have a tissue? I want to wipe the floor."

Me - "Oh, why? Did something spill?"

S - "Yeah, there's drool on the floor, and I don't want to get it everywhere in case somebody steps in it."

Me - "Thanks, I don't even notice the drool anymore because the floor is almost always covered in drool."

Thanks, S. The best part was that there was no judgement on his end, and this is the reality of living in a house with two teething children. Will I ever miss having to vacuum and wipe the floors three times a day? 

No. I do miss hiking at 6AM, rather than breastfeeding. 

It's been almost two months since the last update, and my brain feels foggy from being a mom of two. The words on this post are coming out of my fingers so slowly... 

These past two months, I've felt stuck, like everything we try to do has been blocked and there has been such slow progress. Usually, I can visualise a solution to any problem that arises in our daily lives, but right now, our future still seems unclear.  The scariest part was that both the kids caught a nasty respiratory virus last month, and I probably averaged about four hours of sleep every night for that week when they were both in the thick of it.  S couldn't fall asleep or stay asleep, and one night, we took baby P to the hospital to make sure his oxygen levels were adequate because he was having a tremendously difficult time breathing. Both the kids have fully recovered now, and I'm cherishing these moments when we're all healthy. 

Now that we're all better, I can go back to ruminating about our finances. When will we catch a break from inflation and rising mortgage rates? One of the tools we use frequently to bring down our grocery bill is Too Good To Go. We recently visited Cadeaux Bakery, and picked up a bit of a sampler:

S loves pastries, so she ate two of those croissants herself. (We've also started baby P on solids! He seems very interested in eating so far, and I'm sure he'll pick it up in no time. Between him and S, I think we'll be poor from feeding them.)

I had the chocolate chip cookie, which was not the best, but still good value for the price. There was a cheese croissant, which was quite lovely. Cadeaux Bakery offers many other small pastries, cakes, and desserts, which I'll hopefully be able to splurge on once I figure out how to make more passive income.

Three more months until I am supposed to go back to work. 

Every weekend, we always say we don't want to do anything, we'll take it easy, but we end up going out all day. This weekend, we visited the Lonsdale Quay area, had Mexican from Cilantro and Jalaleno for lunch at the food court,  and S went wading in splashpark at the Shipyards.

H ordered the burrito and the quesadilla for us. I was finding a table with S while he had baby P in the stroller, so I missed the experience of ordering from them. He mentioned the lady who took the order was not very helpful. 

H - What type of meat is in the burrito?

Cilantro and Jalapeno Lady (C&J) - *points aggresively to the menu*

H - Thanks but the menu doesn't mention what meat options there are. Is it pork or chicken or beef? (H doesn't eat beef)

C&J - What type of meat do you want?!

H - Chicken...

C&J - OK that's what we'll make it with. NEXT.

They're clearly too popular to care about customer service, and for good reason. All this food for $25, which is not bad considering recent inflation. 

S enjoyed the rice that was lying underneath the quesadilla, but did not touch the quesadilla at all. She finished most of the guacamole and salsa, which both tasted freshly prepped by the way. 

S is pickier with food these days, and I don't think we've ever introduced her to a wide variety of food from other cultures... Fingers crossed that she grows out of this phase soon and becomes more adventurous with food.

It would also be fantastic if she could pick up potty training quicker. It's been about four or five days since we've had to change a poopy diaper, but we still aren't confident enough to remove the diaper when we go out or sleep at night. The extra cleaning from accidents during the day has drained me of any energy that I reserve for taking care of the house or socializing. All I want to do is stay home and rewatch Mad Men. 

Every kid is different, and I've heard of stories where some kids learn within 3 days or less without rewards. Maybe we did it wrong by rewarding her with episodes of Cocomelon whenever she sits for a longer time on the can, because it only works half the time. The other half, I feel like she just wants to watch more Cocomelon. That show is crack for kids.

With the latest mortgage rate increase and skyrocketing inflation, my family has continued to reduce grocery bills by using Too Good To Go. One of my latest finds on the app has been Cafe Kitsune: 

Three fluffy, flaky croissants for $4.99! Two of them had pork inside, and they tasted perfect after reheating in the airfryer the next morning. Very juicy pork:

Will we have to decide between groceries and accommodation in the near future? Fingers crossed, hoping that mortgage rates stay the same or decrease now. When it jumped up by 1% last Wednesday, I think the stress that this news caused accelerated my post partum hair loss. Clumps of hair are covering my floors, and I basically vacuum every day.

On the same day, I decided that we would start seriously focusing on potty training with S. Since we were already stressed, why not experience all the stress at once? 

We went cold turkey, removed all diapers and pants (except when going out... don't need that much stress). Accidents were horrible the first day, with lots of excrement everywhere. Now, with Cocomelon as the reward for a successful pee or poop, S has not had another accident yet while we are at home. At the same time, her diapers continue to be filled when we use a diaper away from home. We also haven't pulled the trigger for removing the diapers at bedtime...

Breathe in, breathe out. 

Visited Brentwood Mall the other day and tried out both Cazba and Parsley Doner. Consider me not very cultured, but we wanted to compare them, because they both offer meat and rice dishes that to us, seem Middle Eastern. Turns out, Parsley Doner isn't - Cazba is Persian while Parsley Doner is Turkish. From my brief Google research, Turkish is not actually Middle Eastern.

This was the Baghali Polo lamb dish from Cazba, for under $15. They gave us a complimentary salad (top of photo) because they forgot our order, and I added an additional tomato because S loves eating them.

Fall off the bone, savory and so so deliciois:

The salad was questionable. I wouldn't pay for it, but I was a pretty happy customer with a free salad.

This was the Parsley Doner chicken doner platter for $20: 

Their specialty is their secret sauces and dips (small containers in the top right corner of the photo), which I guess is how they think they can charge so much for their small portions. Their salads tasted much fresher than the one from Cazba, but for twenty dollars, I can buy a week's worth of vegetables to make my own salads.

There's  a lot of competition in the Brentwood Mall food court and in this market with rising food costs, I would buy the tasty pile of meat and rice from Cazba versus the "healthy" smaller portions of Parsley Doner. Maybe I'm not that interested in Turkish food. 

S is not interested in leafy green vegetables. P is definitely not interested in milk from a bottle. After 4 months of breastfeeding, he doesn't know what to do with a plastic bottle. I hope he learns to drink from the bottle soon, because we have a few dinners and weddings that we'd like to attend and if he gets hungry at night, I might not be around... Mama has to have a social life too!

Lack of sleep while traveling wasn't as dreadful as I thought it would be.  We stayed one night in a cabin on a campsite with H's scout group, and the rest of the nights in downtown Sechelt. Not to say it wasn't stressful at all, because there was that moment at 4AM that first night, when S kept rolling around, crawling all over my face, and I thought we should hop on the ferry to go back home immediately. 

At both locations that we stayed at, I slept with S, while H kept an eye on baby P in his bassinet that we brought from home.  Whenever baby P woke up for a feeding, H would come to get me. This was S's first time sleeping in a big bed, so she was naturally over excited to have the freedom to crawl out of bed whenever she desired, which was ALL NIGHT LONG. We skipped all of her naps, and she woke up at 4AM every morning. 

We slept so poorly over this entire week in Sechelt, it felt like we had about the same amount of sleep as the newborn days with S, but I still woke up more energized than sleeping at home. Must be that fresh coastal air. 

A few highlights:

•  S made friends with the other kids at the scout camp, while baby P enjoyed all of the attention that little babies get wherever they go. Her language seems to have exploded out of nowhere after camp, and she's stringing together 5 to 6 words now. 

• S figured out her own boredom while we stayed at the AirBNB. Because we didn't bring many toys for her to play with, she entertained herself with "working" and doing laundry. Once she got home, she was so excited to play with all of her toys and put together all of her puzzles. 

• PKLS Burgers

It's hard to make a half eaten burger look good. I ordered the beyond meat burger, with added fried onions and cheese. Of course, gotta get a strawberry milkshake to cut the grease. If they can make a vegetarian burger taste this good, I can only imagine their burgers with real meat... 

Why did I get the vegetarian option? Because H doesn't eat beef and I didn't want chicken.

I came back to Vancouver ready to get back into our regular routine. S has been sleeping 12 hours at night and taking her usual afternoon nap. Being away gave me a new perspective to our reliable routines, and being home with the kids didn't seem so mundane anymore. 

I have found a new way to survive toddlerhood with S. So far, it has been a time of nap refusals, becoming overtired, followed by tantrums due to exhaustion. Regardless of time or mood, she constantly demands to be picked up so that she can look in the fridge and pantry for snacks. 

I have started to imagine her as an aloof teenager, who will be too busy to be home for meals, so I don't have to cook or clean up after them. 

Me - "You coming home for dinner?"
S - "No, I have plans, bye. Taking the car e-bike."   
Me - "Did you need lunch?"
S - "No, I'll buy it, can I have $20?"
Me - "Do you want breakfast?"
S - "No, going back to sleep."

HA. I laugh because I bet she still won't sleep in past 7AM when she's a teenager, because I sure didn't. 

I'm sure there will be other things to be concerned about, as there always is with offspring. It's never easy, but anything worth having in life is worth working for. 

My usual coping method for stress continues to be chocolate chip cookies. I guess my post partum hormones are still influencing my food cravings. We finally had time to stop by Nemesis Coffee, and I could not resist a $5 chocolate chip cookie:  

They call this their chocolate cashew cookie, baked in their Dope Bakehouse. Crispy, yet soft, with a hint of salt to kick up the sweet, as well as pools of melted chocolate. This is the best chocolate chip cookie in Vancouver, the GOAT of chocolate chip cookies, followed closely by JJ Bean (that one is a bit too sweet for my liking). 

Yum.

This has been one of the slowest weeks of 2022 after a beautiful long weekend. 

We had a blast over the long weekend, meeting friends, basking in the glorious sunshine. We spent a full day at Trout Lake on Saturday with C. The Le Tigre food truck was also there for the Trout Lake Farmers Market, and we ordered a few rice bowls. All of them come with a perfect poached egg, which goes superbly with the rice.

Crispy chicken, not sure how they get it so crispy... 

They had enough pulled pork to do a half portion, mixed with half fried chicken. You can see the supremely soft pork in the bottom right corner:

They ran out of meat so we were forced to order the Brussel sprouts option. Glad this happened because it was almost better than the meat choices:

About $16 per rice bowl, which is not too bad in this day and age. 

Then, after this fantastic lunch in the sun, we were thrown back into the reality of sick kids and endless chores. S has been recovering from whatever illness she has, and has been so difficult to work with. P received his 2 month vaccines, and then spent a full evening wailing. Nursing him did not help. He refused to latch and just wanted to complain about his wounds - I imagine he will be the type that cannot bear any small amount of pain. 

I also got my blood pressure checked, and it came back low, as usual. The doctor was quite funny. 

"This is good. If you have high blood pressure, you live a shorter life. If you have regular blood pressure, you will eventually develop high blood pressure as you work and age, but if you start with low blood pressure, and they work you hard, you will only go up to regular blood pressure."

Paragon Tea Room opened a second location along the busy Cambie corridor, and we dropped by on the way to visit B and her fam. They were serving up some strongly caffeinated matcha, and soft chewy cookies:

 

Continuing with my obsession to bake a cookie that spreads with beautiful cracks and the perfect level of chewy, I had to try one of their cookie options for research purposes. The different flavors included matcha white chocolate, chocolate chip, and earl grey cereal. I wanted to get the chocolate chip for inspiration but could not resist the fancy Earl grey option. The cookie's tea flavor was strong, texture of cookie was soft, and balanced out with some crispy cereal toppings.

Can I please take a two day break to live on a remote island to perfect my cookie baking skills, sleep in, and completely be by myself?

On a day like today, days are long, nap times are too short, and I need the years to fly by. S is sick and extra picky about food. While I was out and my parents took care of the kids, S took full advantage of her grandparents. She refused to eat her lunch, asked for fruits, and her grandparents gave in to her tantrums. That normally would be fine, but when I was discussing this and making other general childcare and nutrition related comments to my mom later on, my mom didn't take it too well and started arguing with me. 

It was exhausting.

At times like this, it's easier on my mental health for H and I to parent on our own without extra opinions from our community. More physically tiring, but I'm sure we'll manage, like we did in Victoria. Something has to change before I go completely nuts. 

This is what two months post partum looks like. 

For Mothers Day last week, we went low key, and simply visited JJ Bean in the morning. I've been obsessed with chocolate chip cookies, and JJ Bean bakes one of the most reliably delicious cookies I've had around Vancouver:

What type of chocolate do they use, I wonder? What is their flour to butter ratio to get the cookie to ooze like that? What temperature do they set their oven?

Their oat milk latte never fails to lift my mood too. Iced oat milk latte and chocolate chip cookie, irresistible.

With all of this energy from our morning coffee, we proceeded to run errands and do house things. Visited home depot for charcoal so that we could take advantage of the sun and H smoked a rack of ribs. While the kids napped, we went to cut the grass and pull out the weeds in the yard. Dinner at 6PM, and we were all in bed by 10... Could our lives be any more mundane?

I recently had an enlightening conversation with a friend about her health. She was so nonchalant about having to take medication daily and so accepting of her situation. She says these things come with age, and we (our friends) all have our problems, whether it's blood pressure, varicose veins, joint pain, back pain, pain in all body parts, etc. No longer in our 20's, heading to our 40's.

 "If it isn't happening to me, then it will happen to one of us."

On Thursday, I had a weak instant coffee, because I "slept in" until 6:30AM, and did not have time to make a real coffee. This was a mistake. Waking up earlier for coffee and a few minutes alone helps so much with my mindset and mood. 

Instead of coffee, I tried to brighten up the day with some fresh banh mi's from Kim Chau. These are their #1 menu item, the special:

One of these was spicy, and had a few peppers in them, but they didn't actually taste spicy, which was a little disappointing. I'm not complaining though - check out all the meat and veggies packed in between the freshest bread: 

I haven't had these in a while, so maybe my memory is off, but I feel their prices have increased recently... Didn't these cost about $3 just a few months ago in 2021?! Now, the special costs $5.50 each. Everything is more expensive these days, and it's adding to my sadness. I have to remind myself that I'm far from poor. Unlimited hot water comes out of my tap on demand, and I can afford it! 

After the banh mi, the day dragged on, and all I wanted to do was eat chocolate chip cookies. I had no patience for S, and snapped at my dad when he told her not to yell because speaking loudly isn't pretty. This really irritated me. I want her to express herself however she wants, yell if she needs to, and not be suppressed by something as superficial as being pretty. He comes over to help with the kids almost every day, which I am so grateful for, but he doesn't always have the most modern take on raising children.

Looking back, the day wasn't so awful, and it was mostly me feeling sluggish and unmotivated. I didn't end up in tears, unlike the first few days post-partum when I was so tired, and it took massive efforts to force myself out of bed even at 10AM.  It's only been a month and a half with baby P, I shouldn't try to be too productive.

A bit late with the Easter post, but we actually got these treats from Faubourg a few days after the holiday. I originally wasn't going to post about them, because it was late, but they were so good. 

This one was a coconut mousse on top, with a "pomegranate hibiscus gelée interior, on a sablé breton base", as per their website. The sakura inspired bits on top were a nibble of chocolate that enhanced the coconut flavors:

S had their bunny dessert and she wouldn't give me a bite, so I'm sure it was good, even though I can't tell you about it.

Pastries, cookies, and sugar in general have been helping with my anxiety and post partum hormones. Baby P is great to take care of, super chill, but I get so anxious when I breastfeed. It feels harder to breathe and my chest tightens a little. He's feeding well, and I have no pain, so I'm not sure why. Does anybody else have this experience? 

Other things that are causing anxiety:

• Taxes
• Clutter
• Fridge looking too packed or too empty
• Grandparents acting like children
• S refusing to nap or taking short naps

Breathe in, breathe out.

Last week, we took both kids out to the mall to run some errands. We were at the mall for one hour, and during this time, we were able to complete two returns, browse for H's glasses, buy a new toothbrush holder, nurse baby P, and change S's diaper. It was a smashing success - P slept through the whole thing, S didn't throw any tantrums, and we even managed to pick up lunch on the way home. 

The mall trip feels like such a distant glowing memory, even though it was barely a week ago. So many diapers have been changed,  and we are exhausted every day. 

Today, we took both kids to Matchstick, then we visited IKEA, all before noon. While S took a nap, H went to trim some of our trees and bushes, while I took care of P, who is going through his first leap. We are really truly exhausted today.

Thankfully, H picked up some chocolate chip cookies from Flourist the other day so that I could stress eat after the kids fell asleep:

Flourist has two locations now, and they're both fabulous. They have their own flour mill at their bakery, and they grind their own super nutritious, clean flour. It does taste better. Their cookies are the chewy type that I crave, and they use big chunks of real chocolate (not the crappy sugary chocolate chips). 

Must keep more chocolate chip cookies at home for my mental health.

1. Organising - I've watched and rewatched The Home Edit a few times now... 

2. Postpartum hair loss - how has this already started?! As I am typing this now, another strand of my hair is floating down onto the pile that is building up on the floor by the side of my bed.

3. Travelling to warm locations with beach, sunshine, blue sky. Mexico? Hawaii? Australia - would we survive the 20 hour flight with the kids?

4. Visiting coffee shops, iced lattes, espresso tonics, green smoothies, donuts:

Today, H picked up Lee's Donuts, a strawberry and a chocolate, from Sorry Coffee at Brentwood. They're not the best donuts in the world, but they're reliable. They have that thicker, cake-y consistency, nothing fancy, just a simple layer of frosting on top. I was seriously craving some sugar when I woke up this morning around 10AM, so H really saved me. 

Waking at 10AM with a newborn and a toddler, how do you swing that miracle, you ask? 

My lovely husband takes care of the toddler when he's home on the weekends, and keeps her away from our room while I snooze. Of course, it's interrupted sleep because I am breastfeeding on demand, so when I slept for a 3 hour stretch last night, I woke up ready to take on the world again.