Win kids' shoes from See Kai Run!

I love See Kai Run shoes. Here are a few of their newest fall styles that I am in love with.








This pair is called MIKE. I love the colour combination of these shoes: tan with a little avocado green. Faux shoelacing detail and Velcro closure. Retails for $46.








This one is called STEPH. Orange is the hot colour this season and this adorable leather bootie is definitely hot! With scalloped detail and brown sole. Retails for $46.








This pair of BRIAN shoes are real blue suede shoes! With white contrast stitching, these shoes will have your little man stepping out in style. Retails for $40.








Don't forget the classic red shoe. YUNA is a Mary Jane with brown elastic across the toe. Retails for $40.

Wanna win a pair? Just so happens I've got 2 pairs to give away. If you've got a girl, you could win this pair of MONICA shoes (see red shoes with heart detail below) in size 6-9 months. If you've got a boy, you could win this pair of JAKE shoes (see brown and cream shoes below) in size 9-12 months. Enter by sending an email to wingreatstuff@yahoo.ca and type "See Kai Run Shoes" in the subject line. Tell me if you have a boy or girl! Don't forget to include your mailing address. (*Open to Canadian residents only.) Deadline to enter: Nov. 5, 2008, midnight.

A gift for Mommy from her little boy

"Mommy, I have a surprise for you," said my 6-year-old son Benjamin yesterday. "Come closer to me first."

I leaned in.

"No, even closer," he said, motioning for me to come within inches of his face. "And close your eyes."

I leaned in further and shut my eyes. I felt a puff of warm breath, then a light and slightly rough brush against my cheek. And then the sound, smack.

My little boy kissed me on the cheek with his lips! What's the big deal? Not a huge deal if you don't know the significance of a seemingly ordinary act of affection. You or may not know that Benjamin has Castleman's Disease and is finally getting better. But the disease has, among other things, caused lesions, bleeding, and cracking inside his mouth and on the outside of his lips since January. No one has been able to kiss him on the lips for nearly the entire year. Up until now, we had been managing by having him "kiss" us by putting his palm against our cheeks and tapping his fingers. And we kissed him on the top of his head. Lauren, Benjamin's little sister, would kiss him on his calf.

So you see, a kiss is not just a kiss. It's a gift, a very special gift, from a little boy to his Mommy.

When you give kisses to your child tonight, savour them!

Impressing a baby is a lot easier

My 6-year-old boy Benjamin and 3-year-old daughter Lauren are into tumbling. Benjamin is into it probably because of Star Wars and all those Jedi moves. And Lauren is into it because Benjamin is into it.

So the other day, Benjamin asks me, "Mommy, can you move like a Jedi?"

"Sure," I said, as I started to do a Karate Kid-type stance. "See?"

"No, that's not like a Jedi," he said. "Jedis do cartwheels and flip in the air."

"Well, I can do a cartwheel," I said.

"Mommy, I mean a COOL cartwheel," he answered.

"I used to do cartwheels a lot. In fact, I can do something even cooler than a cartwheel. I can do a one-handed cartwheel," I blurted before I could stop myself. I used to do one-handed cartwheels all the time when I was in high school, 20 years ago.

"Can you show me?!" he demanded, jumping up and down.

"Uh, okay," I stammered, as I readied myself for the cartwheel. Suddenly the floor looked really far away and my life flashed before my eyes. But I bravely put one arm up in the air and the other on my hip, and...went for it. When I hit the floor and opened my eyes, I was on my feet, but all I could see were stars and I was veeeeeerry unsteady. But I did it, and exclaimed, "See?! I can do it!"

"Your legs weren't straight and your other arm almost touched the floor," he said flatly.

So much for impressing him. I miss the days when I could dazzle him just by crossing my eyes.

Help design your dream stroller!

Stroller company Safety 1st is joining forces with Design Exchange (DX) by inviting Canadian post-secondary design students to create strollers for the next generation of parents. And they want to know what parents think. Here's a snippet from their press release from today:

Safety 1st is looking for fresh new ideas to create a trendy, functional, safe and affordable stroller for new parents. What features or styles are new parents looking for? Parents can email their thoughts and ideas to safetyfirst@dx.org. Parents' concepts could be worked into future designs!

For more details visit the website.

What are you looking for in a great stroller? Here are some of the pie-in-the-sky features that would be on my wishlist:
1. a built-in cover that shades baby from the sun or rain (it is a pain to hook make-shift covers out of receiving blankets)
2. reflective light strips so that stroller can be seen in the dark or rain
3. anti-tippability. Every parent hangs shopping bags on their stroller. Is there a way to make the stroller remain stable?
4. grows with your child. At one point, I had 4 strollers (umbrella stroller, double stroller, jogging stroller, single 3-in-1 stroller) in my garage because I had to buy a new one for every stage and age, and when I had 2 kids. Can we get a stroller that grows with baby, from infancy through to preschool age?

What about you?

How Benjamin is doing

So many of you have asked me how my son Benjamin is doing. I have not written about him lately because: 1) I just got burned out talking about it; 2) He is getting better; 3) Not everyone is interested in hearing about my little boy's illness.

But here is the scoop: Benjamin is doing great. Here is a list of some of the things that make me optimistic about his recovery from Castleman's Disease:

• As of last week, he is off prednisolone, the steroid medication that he had been taking since February 2008. Why this is good: Taking medication makes him feel like he's sick; being off of it seems to brighten his spirits -- psychologically, I think he feels healthier not taking medicine. Also it's good because the doctors obviously don't feel the steroids are needed anymore. Another reason this is good: I can expect my old boy back. Steroids caused some dark and quick-changing moods in my normally happy kid pre-Castleman's.

• He can swim again. Benjamin is an avid swimmer, but since the onset of the disease, he has been unable to swim since January 2008. Just this past week, he was given the thumbs-up to try swimming in a pool again. He did and he loved it. We didn't keep him in too long, as we thought the chlorine was affecting his lip condition, but I had tears in my eyes watching him leap into the pool, not caring that others were looking at the many scars on his body.

• He is able to participate in normal activities for the most part. He can run, he can walk, he can rollerblade. He can, he can, he can, he can!

Does this mean he's healed? No, not quite. Some things he's still faced with are:
• Hardened versions of the original lesions on his feet have destroyed all the nailbeds on his toes. He essentially has no nails and the nailbeds look like a relief map of the Rocky Mountains. The doctor said she didn't think they'd grow back -- they are too "distressed."
• His lips are still extraordinarily sensitive. They bleed when bumped lightly and they still have a couple of small lesions on them.

I didn't believe the oncologist when she said it could take two years for this to fully clear up. I scoffed at her then, believing that once they took out the tumour, everything would be back to normal in no time. Now as we're nearing the end of Year 1 with this thing, I am starting to understand.

Next week, I am going to visit a couple of my best girlfriends to have a weekend reunion. I believe I have been saving up all my feelings about this whole ordeal for that trip. I haven't really shown how I feel to anyone -- not even my husband. Not really. This little trip will really, really help. Sometimes, there is nothing like a girlfriend's shoulder to cry on.

Washroom etiquette

We've just returned from a cruise vacation and my fingers have been burning to tell this story on my blog ever since the incident occurred! Here goes:

My 6-year-old son Benjamin was swimming in the pool with my husband, myself and my daughter when he suddenly had to go to the washroom to do a "no. 2." My husband took him out of the pool to take him to the men's washroom. They came back to the pool about 5 minutes later -- my son was hunched over with cramps. The men's washroom on the floor was closed and they couldn't find another one close enough. So my husband asked me to take Benjamin to the women's washroom. No problem.

We got to the women's washroom and into a stall and everything was fine. Until this woman yelled out as she stepped out of the washroom, "Use the men's washroom, people!!" I threw my stall door open and stopped her and said, "Are you talking to me?" I hate it when people don't have the guts to tell me something to my face and yell out mean things as they exit a scene -- they want to say something insulting but don't have the courage to say to you face to face. There was another woman in the washroom with her son (who looked to be about 5 or so), who was as offended as I. Apparently, the woman who was mad at us for bringing our sons into the women's washroom was changing by the sinks and didn't appreciate little boys walking in on her. My answer to that is: If she's so modest she should have changed in a stall or her cabin. But let's get back to my point about boys using the women's washroom.

First of all, my son tried using the men's washroom with his dad and it was out of service. Second of all, it was an emergency (my son had to go!). Third of all, I'm not sending my 6-year-old boy into a public washroom, on a cruise ship filled with 3,000 strangers, by himself.

So, this is what has led to my poll question at the upper right. When is a son too old to use the women's washroom with his mom? Assuming it's not an emergency (like my particular circumstance was).

Feeling the force for these kids' Star Wars costumes!

Do you love it?! Here are my kids in their new store-bought Star Wars costumes for Halloween. Princess Leia for Lauren and Clone Trooper for Benjamin.

Now, I'm all for being creative and using your imagination to make your costumes -- in fact, I prefer that. So I was going to make Princess Leia and Clone Trooper myself. I was thinking I could make something out of white spray-painted cardboard to resemble a trooper outfit. And for Princess Leia? I would somehow twist and twirl my daughter's super-fine and slippery hair into two side buns. (Or I could just affix two bagels to the sides of a baseball cap, as someone else jokingly suggested. Truth be told, I didn't actually think it was such a bad recommendation. Rather inventive, really!) Then all I would need is a robe of some sort.

Before I embarked on making them however, I decided to search on the Internet for ready-made Star Wars costumes and found these lovely specimens! And they were relatively inexpensive! Both costumes cost about $45 US together. I found them at www.buystarwarscostumes.com. Check it out.