The sun is out for the second day in a row. There are nice fresh nappies hanging on the line actually getting dry. My baby slept 8 hours last night and is napping again now. My life is good.

Flight center sent me a txt (because businesses don't even bother to phone any more. I like that, but it's pretty unprofessional!) and told me to come get my tickets, so we're all set to fly. Thinking of texts, the government sent me a sms this morning telling me to update my family income details, so I think my parental leave payments must have run their course. Yuck. I'll deal with that when Obi gets home because I'm crap with forms and mostly because I just want to delay the inevitable.

Anyway I've been planning hard. You know how I was all "I'm not going to Canada a fourth time and not seeing anything!" well I've been on a mission for that. I ditched the Cathedral grove idea because I got sick of my in laws being "Oh don't spend the money on the ferry, there's old growth here in Stanly park" and because it was pointed out to me that this shit is in a RAIN forest. All of a sudden I wasn't interested. And I'm sorry, but Stanly park isn't that impressive. I don't really consider it a "weekend away" when it's in the nearest city and anyone can come hassle us and the ferries are stupidly expensive, I must admit.

Anyways (Anyways is a great word LB) I found Xat'sull and instantly I'm determined to make it happen. Now it would be super slack of me to go visit his family only to take off for a couple of days and not see them, so I invited Obi's cool grandma (I call her Camping Grandma) to join us and she's stoked. Also, she has a car, and isn't a skin-flint pain in the arse like the rest of Obi's family. She's hands-down the person I like most in his family aside from him. She never makes me feel like a freak, takes an interest in me as a person not just as Obi's secretary and gets the international living thing (she has mates her age who raised their kids in two countries the way we plan to). I love this woman.

She's a bit old for sleeping on the ground but is happy to hole up in a B&B in a nearby town, which means Obi and I will have privacy I'm loving this plan. In case you couldn't be bothered clicking the link, it's a First Nation's heritage village. One of the biggest problems I have when I'm in Canada is I have no connection to the land. Which might not make any sense to most people reading this. But, it's like sensory deprivation. Like the Gods of the north speak a language I don't understand. I can't connect with anything and it freaks me out. Here, I can feel what's going on around me. I can have all the windows shut and still tell if it's sunny or a storm is brewing. I feel like I'm in communication with the earth. Going barefoot or just walking up to a tree and laying a hand on it's bark is like having coffee with an old mate. Whereas in Canada it was like picking up the phone only to realise your cat has chewed through the cable. I sound like a freak, I know. Anyway, it wasn't for lack of trying either. I want to have that spiritual link to the earth in both my homes. But all my rituals felt empty, the straight trees intimidate me, and everything just feels plain wrong...
But no one knows the land like native people! I wish our own native people were more open about their culture, but I totally get why they don't want to share it with us too. Luckily Canadians actually treat their indigenous people well so the relationship is good. I'm hoping that by taking part and witnessing their rituals, listening to their stories, I can learn something that will help me fit in while I'm in this strange cold land. Something that will help me look forward to going back there and making a life in four short years.

It's six hours out of Obi's home town, so we'll drive up the evening of my birthday, crash in the B&B with Camping Grandma, and then the next day go on their guided tour, learn how to cook salmon in a pit fire (mmmm salmon) have a go at the sweat ritual thing they do (I imagine I'll be doing this alone, which is fine because someone's got to watch the baby) listen to campfire stories and then have wild camp sex in a teepee! The next day we can catch a workshop or two (making medicine pouches or dream catchers), thank our guides and head back to civilization.

Now I've just got to see what Obi and CG are interested in participating in, book it all, and bob's my aunty.

Thinking of sex, this next story is going to be TMI so if you're vagaphobic, just pass it by.

So last night, we plopped the baby in her cot, took a shower and decided that we didn't care that we were knackered and stressed, we're having us some BIG SCHLONG frisking action. Now I knew the baby was only sleeping lightly, because we'd been talking quietly and she made the noise she makes that means "I wish my parents would shut the fuck up so I can sleep" during our "foreplay" time. Which some nights pretty much consists of the following conversation:
Obi: "Are you awake?"
Me: "No, but it's not necessary for me to be conscious for us to have sex"

Haha. Now you can decide if I'm actually serious. Back to my story - when I was knocked up and researching such things like "Am I ever going to want sex again?" and "Will it feel like throwing an uncooked noodle into a gaping chasm?" I read that most babies are programmed to wake up if they sense danger - and their parents getting to the gravy stroke is often confused with "danger" and so you shouldn't wait until your brat is in a deep sleep to have sex. It's a piece of advice that's actually worked well for us (and we've tested it )

So I'm getting a much needed serve of BIG SCHLONG and the next thing I know we're in some strange awkward position, which I'll spare you the description of, and oh NO! Suddenly I'm full of air because my vag is going through a stage where she thinks she's a vacuum. I'm hoping that this is a phase that will either pass or be resolved through lots of kegals. But anyway I wait for the next time he pulls back a bit and I give a good push in an effort to make this comfortable again without disrupting the rhythm.

Which results in the worlds loudest LONGEST most mortifying fanny fart in the history of vag. It's not one of those cute funny queefs that you get when you first start dating that you giggle nervously about because you don't know if your shy guy understands what just happened and you're afraid he'll think you're gross. No. It's the female version of: I've been married twenty years and had a can of beans for dinner because my wife wasn't home, hold my beer while I blast off the most putrid fart in the history of man!

Now that would have been mortifying enough, but it was so loud it woke the baby and startled her, so she starts screaming like the house is on fire! Of course our cracking up (and my covering my face with the pillow in shame) does nothing to soothe her and after a few "lets just test this and give her a second" thrusts I have to climb out of bed and pick her up to let her know that the house wasn't just bombed or something.

Luckily she was super tired, one hug and she was flopping on my shoulder, so I tucked her back in and went right back to what I was doing... And that's the story of how the baby nearly ruined my sex life.

Safe point!

Thinking of being tired, man, have I ever been! My gym has a charity competition on right now. You can bring a friend to the gym, 10 visits for $10. The ten bucks goes to the cancer council, and the member goes in a draw to win cool shit like an Ipad mini (don't care) a bike or 3 months membership (would like!). It's a bargain considering how much a membership costs. But the catch is that your friend only has a fortnight to use those ten visits. So, I finally got my sister to come to the gym with me, after all the time she's spent bagging me out about it, because she's poor and unfit so it's cheap entertainment. We've been for the past five days in a row, tonight we're taking the night off. We've done classes I would have never considered trying. Like cycle and step. That shit is HARD. But, I can't be the first one to pike, so I didn't admit I would have given nearly anything to stay home last night.

Honestly it's been great. We're having a lot of fun, and if this doesn't shift a last stubborn kilo or two I might even concede that this is my new weight, and I can be happy. I'm finally challenging myself a bit, which is against my nature. I come home sweaty and red-faced. I feel good.
Just five visits to go!

It's going to suck when it's over because she can't afford a membership. Maybe I can convince Chris to go halves with me to buy her three months for winter solstice... but that's still a big gift. Especially considering I need to pay my own membership and buy more creche visits for Isis. Bit if it means I'll actually go, then maybe it's worth it? I'll think about it when we get back from Canada.

I miss Obi though because it's been cutting into our evenings together, and he's been playing one of the video games I got him for summer solstice without me. Tonight I think I'll convince him to read to me while I walk the baby. It'd be nice.

Enough ramble! Hope all you funny bastards on the blogside are having a great day