The tummy is growing!

Well for those of you pestering me to see how big my tummy really has gotten, here you go! Now before I got pregnant, it was the boobs that were bigger, but now the tummy is really sticking out. I went to the health centre yesterday to weigh myself after being sick for those few days. Well I have lost just over 2 more pounds! So I am now 5 pounds less than what I was at my first prenatal appointment in December. These pictures are from first thing this morning.

Now I know that there is a shadow in the way, but do you see my nice foot wear in the picture below? My kamiks are all finished and I have been wearing them. I love walking with them in the snow. I have always been a big fan of barefoot as often as possible, and it feels like you are walking barefoot in the snow- but warmer! I have had lots of compliments on them. And check out that beautiful carving on the wall behind me. It is one of our favorites and it is carved out of moose.

Home Sick

Well I am home sick and miserable. It started on the weekend with Matt coming down with some sort of wicked sinus/cough mess. And yesterday it started with me. And just my luck- I cannot keep any food down. I can barely hold water in. Since I got pregnant 6 months ago, I have had one day where I did not throw up- and that was just on Friday! It is a good thing I have a lot of extra weight on me- the baby is just sucking from those reserves when I am sick.

I was in for another pre-natal appointment a week ago and all is well. I have gained one pound, but I am still down two pounds from where I was at Christmas. But my tummy is really growing! My blood pressure and hemoglobin are excellent and I passed my glucose challenge test. I had been so worried when I got pregnant. I had just lost 30lbs and was feeling great. I was very concered that I would gain an excessive amount of weight and end up with high blood pressure and diabetes. I was also worried that I wouldn't fit into my parka all winter!! But all is fine. My health is good and the baby is really growing! I get the next ultrasound in two weeks and hopefully we find out if it is a boy or a girl!

I can feel the baby moving around a lot. It seems to prefer the left hand side of my body and for the first time, I saw movement on the outside of my tummy! I was sitting with some friends and I had a pillow over my stomach and the pillow was moving! So the baby is really getting big- but still making me so sick everyday!

So today I am sitting on the couch with water, crackers, kleenex, blanket, a cat and my barf bowl for when I just can't make it. I have watched The Price is Right, Oprah and Dr. Phil. I just checked out all of the northern blogs, which I am thoroughly addicted too! A nap will soon be in my future as well! I have to get the tv turned off soon- the food commercials are driving me nuts!! I want taco bell or McDonalds like nothing else. Ah well- in two months I will be out to have the baby and I can get my fast food fix.

Hopefully I have a quick recovery and can eat again soon!

Bought a family skidoo

Down south when you have a baby you upgrade to the family vehicle. Up here isn't that much different... but instead of the dreaded mini-van, we have upgraded to a two-up skidoo!

We had two Polaris 550 Supersports. Nice machines, however not very comfy for more than one person. So one of the supersports is being bought by some friends here in town and this is what we have coming up on the barge this year:
It is a Ski-Doo GTX 550 Fan. We decided to save some money and just go with the 2007 model instead of getting the newest 2008. This one is still brand new though and it is sitting down in Hay River. The dealership we bought it from will hold it there for us and put it on the barge in the spring. We got all of the bells and whistles to go with it as well. I am looking forward to bombing this around next winter.

And in other news- spring has sort of hit! Yesterday it went up to -23C with no wind! I was outside with no mittens or toque and it felt great. Today it is back down to -29C with a windchill of -40C, but I am sure that spring will come :)

The Kitty Coup

Three and a half years ago Tweak became our first cat. Three months later we got Freak.

Tweak is grey, lean, meowes constantly, is obsessed over kitty krack (cat treats), runs around the house like a wild animal and is paranoid.

Freak is white, fat, never makes any noise, is obsessed over any food, hates to move for anyone, and couldn't give a damn about anything.

Tweak has been the dominant cat since Freak arrived on the scene. Tweak steals the better part of the food (the gravy part of the food package), shoves Freak out of the good seat in the house, and general just beats the crap out of Freak.

A couple of week ago we started to see some change in the pecking order. Freak started to kick Tweak out of the tub to get the good spot for licking the drip from the tap. Freak wouldn't move out of the good seat in the house. And she finally became brave enough to face the front loading washing machine while it was running (her arch nemesis).

Last week it all came to a head. Freak snapped. She had had enough of being the docile, lazy kitty in the house. It was a full on Kitty Coup! It started late in the evening when Tweak did a sneak attack on her. Instead of laying down and taking it, Freak fought back! She yowled! She chased Tweak around the house. She hissed! She puffed up and became three times her size!

Poor Tweak didn't know what to do. Anytime she went near Freak, an all out war ensued! Nothing like this had ever happened before in our house. This went on for 48 hours. Seriously. The first night we hardly got any sleep. Anytime Tweak went into the sight of Freak- Freak would yowl and howl with all of her might. It became so bad that I opted to get out of bed for 3 hours and squirt Freak with a water bottle every time she went into attack mode. But nothing worked. I tried petting her and calming her down- but she wouldn't have any of it. We are unsure what went on during the hours we were at work, but the Kitty Coup was still on when we got home. On the second night, Tweak hid in the bedroom with us while we slept. Anytime she tried to leave, Freak would be waiting for her in the hallway. But finally after 48 hours, things have calmed down.

The pecking order has definitely changed. Freak is now the owner of the best seat in the house and Tweak hasn't even tried to get it back. Freak is strutting around here with more confidence than we have ever seen.

Now what is going to happen when we introduce our baby into this pecking order......

Here are the cats before the Kitty Coup, sharing the best seat in the house. A rare moment that had to be captured.

My view from work....

Here is a neat picture that I took a few weeks ago. Environment Canada said we had a blizzard warning in effect. It never really got that bad, but the blowing snow with the blue sky sure did make for a great picture. This was taken from the steps at the college. You are looking towards the Coronation Gulf with the Northern Store and the old college building in the way.

Fun around town

Well the Canadian Military is in town! About 100 men and women are up here doing some Arctic training. I believe they are all stationed in Edmonton. We did learn that a lot of them just returned from Afganistan about a month ago. These poor folks, they went from +50 to -50!! They have been working with the Rangers, sharing information back and forth. Good learning for both groups I would say! They put on a really nice evening for the community. They fed everyone and put out a lot of gear for everyone to check out. My husband fell in love with the packs that the medics carry around. The whole crew of them were very friendly and we enjoyed talking with them.


Here are all of the skidoos that they brought into town for the occasion. In the background is our complex where they are staying when they aren't on the land.




We watched these guys work their butts off trying to start the skidoo. From out the back door of the college, my students and I watched laughing a lot! This one poor guy must have pulled about 50 times trying to get his skidoo started. Then another guy came over and with one pull got it going. It was a lot of fun as well watching them all pile onto a kamotik. I have been trying to get a good picture of that, but no luck.
This group here was at the community night. We chatted with them and they seemed pretty interested in how we live up here. Surprisingly, none of them wanted to move here for good!




In other news! I got ahold of some funding at the college to have some great elders come in and teach my class and I how to make caribou kamiks. It was a wonderful five weeks and I learned a lot. The elders showed us how to scrape the skins, cut them, sew them and yep, even chew them once in a while! I loved the whole experience.

Here are three finished pairs of kamiks. The elders laughed at me a lot. I have really fat calves so we kept having to add strips to make them big enough. I think everyone had a great time with this project!