Christmas until now: a catch-up

Once upon a time there was a blog.  And the blog was happy.

But then the person who loved the blog ignored the blog and the blog was sad.

And then the same person needed the blog to build a house and to sit on its stump.

That's when things got weird.

Christmas.  Beth's visit.  New Years.  Back to school.  Brownies and Sparks starting back up.  It's January 20 and almost a month (!) since I last posted.  I'm not sure I've had such a long hiatus since I started blogging way back in 2006 but I'm noticing this trend among some of the blogs I follow.  Maybe we all just need a break from ourselves.

However I still need to preserve our family memories since my personal memory is abysmal and getting worse with age and the less sleep I get so here goes.

Christmas was lovely.  We had Christmas morning on our own and then we bundled the herd up and headed to Pam and Jim's for a great Christmas dinner that we didn't have to cook.  And Jim made awesome Pomegranate Cosmopolitans.

Here is a selection of  photos from Christmas Eve and Christmas morning:

Christmas Eve dinner before we got dressed up and headed to the Christmas Eve service at church.  We had our usual German dinner of sausages and sauerkraut.  This year we added scalloped potatoes.  And ended with the traditional boutentelle (sp?).

Emily begins unloading her stocking

Happy Hope on Christmas morning

As expected, Henry loved his book about buses

After a breakfast of Chelsea buns and fruit salad, it is on to the main event.  Emily was happy with her Spirograph from Santa.

Hope opening her Barbie camper.  It's seen lots of play since.

John is befuddled by the way the firetruck was attached to the box.  Hey Santa, next year take stuff out of the packaging before you wrap it, okay?!

By the end of the gift unwrapping, Henry was an old pro.

On December 29, Family Reyburn descended on our house.  Beth and Kate arrived from Texas and my dad and Donna from Gravenhurst.  We crammed into our wee house and no one got maimed.  We went tobogganing (Kate's first time) and made snowmen and went to the Nature Museum and made necklaces at Savvy Bead Company (one of the favourite activities we did) and went to A Gym Tale and Beth and I went to Spa Nordik on the coldest day we'd had so far this winter.  Next time we're taking toques to wear with our bathing suits and bath robes.  We also made a huge gourmet dinner on New Years.  Beth introduced me to the wonders of St. Germain Elderberry Liqueur.  All in all, it was an awesome visit.

Beth and Kate take the GT for a run

Emily, Hope, Kate and neighbour Anna pose with one of the best snowmen we've ever produced.

Kate works on her creation at Savvy Bead

Emily lines up her beads

Hope concentrates while she strings her necklace

Back to the routine come January 9.  And since the snow fell on Christmas Day, winter has been hitting us full force in Ottawa with temperatures each morning around minus 17.  I'm ready for a thaw.  The cold temperatures are giving us perfect skating conditions however so we're going skating this Sunday for the first time this year.  I'm really looking forward to it, as are the girls.

Henry turned 20 months old yesterday and he really deserves a post (or several) all his own.  He is everything that is perfect about this age right now.  Sure, he still has the occasional grumpy day (like today and yesterday) but mostly he is crazy fun to be with.  He is cute as all get out.  His hair is soft like feathers and curly like Art Garfunkel's.  He gives us coy looks when you ask him questions looking for a laugh.  His words are coming out faster and furiouser now.  He pipes in for the "HI!" part of the Dora theme song... you know in the last part: da-da-da-da-da-Dora - HI! - da-da-da-da-da-Dora - HI!.  He shouts out the HI! all on his own.  One of his favourite parts of the day is when I play puppets with his bear and lamb that he sleeps with.  He goes to sleep giggling away.  He calls out "Mama!" over and over again through the day when he wants me to see what he's doing, what's he's built, the trouble he's getting into, or if I just haven't looked at him in a while.  He loves playing in the snow, which is surprising given his age.  Emily and Hope didn't take to it until they were over two.  He refuses to get out of his sled when I'm pulling him around in it.  He is crazy-crazy about Kindermusik and starts the next level next week.  His favourite characters are Dora, Barney and "Toot", aka Thomas the Tank Engine.  While his allegiances definitely lie with John and me, he is totally enamoured with Hope.  He calls her name throughout the day if she's home or not.  Sadly for Emily, he refuses to say her name although he loves her to bits too.  She's dealing with it well but would love for him to give in and say 'Mimi'.  For now, it remains all about Hope.  Here is Henry's cuteness at work as well as the evidence of his fondness for saying 'Hope':

There have been some great moments with Emily and Hope from the last few weeks. While Beth and Kate and my dad and Donna were here, John and I and the girls played sleepover in the master bedroom.  John and I were on air mattresses while the girls stayed in their beds.  John has been known to snore now and again (that's called "glossing over the truth") and Emily is a light sleeper like me.  Here is the list that Emily wrote one day while we were all sharing a room:

Beth and I just about popped a gasket laughing so hard when we read this.  We did our best not to let Emily know how funny we thought it was.  I think we failed.  This gem is going right into her memory box.

This past week at Brownies we started to teach the girls how to hand sew.  They embraced it enthusiastically and Emily came home asking me to show her how to sew on the machine.  Two days ago she sewed a hot pad and Hope played around with different stitches on the machine.  As Emily sewed her first line of stitching on the hot pad I found myself saying: "Emily, Nana would be so proud!" and felt tears welling up in my eyes.  I was surprised by how emotional I was about it.  This was a direct connection to my mum and a deep connection between my mum and my girls.  This weekend each girl is going to sew a skirt for the Barbies.  I can't wait.

Emily had her first piano lesson on Thursday, another connection straight to Mum.  For the last year, I've been teaching Emily so this was her first lesson with someone other than me.  She loved every second and I was pleased to get confirmation that I've done well with her in the last year because her teacher (the wonderful Lynn) was really impressed with how much Emily already knows.

I took the girls for haircuts over the Christmas holidays and you'll note from the video above that Hope had all her locks cut off.  She's now sporting an adorable short cut that I absolutely love.  She's really happy with it too.  Hope continues to be my even-keeled, loving, cuddling, soft-hearted, reliable, hilarious and fun-loving girl.  I can now add budding reader to that list.  I'm so impressed with how her reading is coming along and thrilled that she isn't struggling with it.  And unlike Emily she seems to have much more patience for sounding out words and working at it until she gets it.  How refreshing!

Kudos to you if you've lasted this long.  I think I can count on one hand those of you who are still with me.  But this gets me mostly caught up and hopefully back in the blogging saddle.

Heading West

I got word on Monday morning during my class at Carleton that my grandmother - my dad's mum - died on Sunday night. My grandma was 88 and not in good health. She'd had Alzheimer's Disease for about 7 years. I'm glad her suffering is over.

I lived with my grandma and grandpa for 4 months from September to December 1995. I was on a work-term from my program at the University of Waterloo. I was working at the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra. My grandparents lived in Sherwood Park, Alberta - a very short commute into Edmonton. It was a great four months. I got to know my grandparents so much better and I spent a lot of time - mainly laughing, eating pretzels and playing cards - with my uncle and aunt at their house which was a short bike ride away. I was really lucky to have had the opportunity to spend that kind of time with my grandparents. I heard a lot of stories from both of them that I hadn't heard before. I helped Grandma in the kitchen. We talked a lot. My favourite stories from Grandma were about living in Saskatchewan during the Depression. She told me about men coming to the back door asking for food after hopping off the nearby trains. She also told me about she and her brother, Uncle Bob and her dad riding bikes around all the country roads on Sunday afternoon. She told me about her very grumpy grandmother who she never saw smile. Grandma laughed a lot. She was almost always knitting something. She loved to travel. She said that maybe growing up by the railway tracks gave her "itchy feet."

She didn't always have the easiest life but she greeted each day smiling. She made the best bread. She made an amazing beef stew with dumplings. She had a killer recipe for cappuccino muffins. She was particular about how the dishwasher was loaded. (Terrible photo below but all I can dig up at short notice.)


I'm looking forward to talking about her next week with everyone and hearing other people's stories.

I have to admit, I'm not looking forward to a two-hour time change with a baby. Five a.m. is going to come very early.

As an aside, I will be the one on the WestJet flight hauling a full case of Girl Guide cookies as my carry-on. My family out west has demanded that I bring a case for them to buy, which I think is amazing, and also very very funny. We Reyburns really like our baked goods.

The March Break I'd rather forget

My last post was so full of naive optimism. Since then I have become a dark and brooding soul, ripe with cynicism, dark humour and biting sarcasm.

At least in theory. Truth is, I'm still my peppy and perky self. Now that March Break, otherwise known as The Week I'd Rather Forget, is over.

To backtrack, we decided to go to my dad's in Gravenhurst - about 4 hours from Ottawa - from Tuesday to Friday last week. We got out of town about an hour later than we would have liked... which was fully expected because we always get out of town an hour later than we would have liked.

The kids were asking to watch videos literally 2 kilometres from our driveway. I should have known then that this would become The Trip from Hell. We should have turned around at that very moment.

We stopped seven times - yes, seven - on the way there banking a 6.5 hour trip. We stopped twice to feed Henry, once for lunch, twice because Hope thought she was going to throw up, once because I drank too much tea, and another time for who knows why. Henry did not sleep ONCE during the trip. We had to completely reorganize seating because Hope's tummy was very jumbly in the back. WARNING, WARNING! Did we turn back for home? Nope. Did John say outloud "I forsee this being a total disaster" and I say "you are such a glass half-empty person!"? Yes and yes. Was that the foreshadowing that had this been a movie would have left the audience screaming DON'T GO IN THERE at the screen? Oh yes it was.

We finally get to the bumpy, curvy road going into my dad's house. (FORESHADOWING, FORESHADOWING!) We're literally 500 metres from his door when Hope's face turns white and then green and then she projectile vomits all over herself, her car seat and bits of the car. We had about 3 seconds warning which was enough time to stop the car and watch helplessly as she showered herself in Wendy's french fries and ketchup. Luckily, I thought, no one ever drives on this road so it's okay that we're completely blocking this single-lane road. Oh Sweet Jesus, will I ever learn?

That's when man-in-Oldsmobile drove up behind us.

As I'm holding vomit-covered Hope in front of me at arm's length, I'm simultaneously explaining to man-in-Oldsmobile that one of our children just upchucked all over herself.

The look on his face was a cross between disgust and pity.

I stripped Hope down to her underwear and she sat on my lap in the front seat until we got to my dad's door. Emily, always looking for the up side (her mother's daughter) said: "Hope you're so lucky!" I'm thinking Hope wasn't feeling so lucky at that moment as liquid lunch dripped off her chin. I'm all about the visuals, people.

Arriving at the house, Hope went straight into the shower, washing away all the bad mojo we'd accumulated on the drive up. Time to start fresh! Right? Right?

Wrong.

That night Henry was up SEVEN times. The next day Hope whined all day and then puked at the end of the day at which point we realized she wasn't car sick, she was just plain sick. John threw his back out. He is still walking crooked. Hope declared her bed "not comfy" (a declaration I heard way too many times that week from her) and Emily moved into bed with me, John moved to the futon, Hope moved to the bed Emily was in. I got up 6 times that night and the rest of the night I was serenaded with Emily's teeth-grinding. Henry scraped his knuckles to bloody on the sides of his playpen simply because it made a cool sound (so he tells me). On the plus side, I baked bread in the stone bake oven which was really fun and we went in the hot tub on the deck many times. Donna even served me a glass of wine while I was in there at one point (alone!). I think that was the highlight of the week for me.

The next day was the good day: tobogganing (no one puked! Hope was happy!), walk on the lake, hot tub. Bad part: visit to the Muskoka Wildlife Centre which should have been good but Hope whined the ENTIRE TIME. The rest of us thoroughly enjoyed the place though.

When we got home, Hope hurled.

Next day... time to go home. The Griswalds pulled away. Drive home, 6.5 hours. Great lunch in Bancroft. No extra stops. Drove a beautiful route on the Opeongo Road. Had tea but didn't have to stop an extra time (still can't figure out then why it took us the same amount of time to get back as it took to get up there but whatev). NO ONE PUKED.

As much as I love going up there, sitting in the hot tub, playing in the snow, visiting my dad and Donna, someone will have to SHOW ME THE MONEY to get me to leave home for March Break for many years to come.

I need a holiday. Can we get a do-over?

Yes, of course there were some fun moments. If only there was less puke, more sleep, less pain. I have put some photos below to give you some moments (mostly good) from The Week I'd Rather Forget.

Hope and Henry sharing a puke-free moment on our first day in Gravenhurst.

Emily staying under the radar lest the Universe comes to get her, too.

A really fun morning of tobogganing. This was the first smile from Hope in a while.

Another smile! Tobogganing saved our trip for a while.

At the Muskoka Wildlife Centre. Lest you think Hope is looking for a dropped contact lens, she's actually refusing to move because she feels like stink.

Pretty much the happiest look she could muster.

Happy in the hot tub on the morning we were heading home. The hot tub was the other happy place. Especially for John's back.

Thanksgiving in review

We had an amazing Thanksgiving Weekend. I won't even be able to accurately remember all the things we did, the things we laughed about, the food we ate (okay, I can probably remember the details of the food since I'm slightly food-obsessed). Also, given that I was having such a great time, my photos of the weekend are scant so you'll only get a smattering.

John's sister, Sue, her husband, Steve and their kids, Kennedy and Claire, joined us for the weekend from Cambridge. We spent A LOT of time with them last year when we were in Waterloo and we really miss them. Like, A LOT. It was great to have a full weekend with them and feel like we never left Waterloo (minus the Ottawa scenery out the door).

On Saturday morning we went to Miller's Pumpkin Farm south of the city. We had lots of fun roaming around the patch, riding the wagon, jumping on straw bales. (As an aside, I can't really see us going back there in future years - the nickel and diming was a bit much. If I'm going to buy a pumpkin out of your pumpkin patch, don't charge me a dollar to ride the wagon to get there. Just sayin'.)

On Saturday night, the whole crew (including John's brother and his family) was at our house for a supper from that great Canadian institution, Swiss Chalet. In the evening, the girls all had a sleepover in our girls' room (a sleeping arrangement that continued through the weekend) while we adults sat up and laughed until we couldn't stay awake any longer. (Had to be at least 10:00 p.m.)

On Sunday we went to Carleton, along with the rest of Ottawa, for the annual Butterfly Show in the greenhouses. We met friends Pam, Jim and kids there as well as John's brother, Mike and his family. Hope was too overwhelmed by the crowds and preferred to hang out in the lobby with me, which I didn't mind because I was feeling a bit claustrophobic anyway. Next year we're going on a weekday. From there we walked to Brewer Park and spent a good hour or two hanging out there with the entire family and Pam and Jim. The kids had a great time, didn't mind the cold air, and we adults loved just hanging out and talking. I loved seeing Sue and Steve finally get to know Pam and Jim after we've talked about each of them to each other for so long.

We spent the afternoon lounging at our house and then headed to Mike and Cibele's (John's aforementioned brother) for a Brazilian meal that Steve kept referring to as fishwater (actually call fejoada, but truly, when said, sounds like 'fishwater' if it was said with a strong Brooklyn accent). The funniest bit was at lunch that day when we adults all started simultaneously whistling the tune from Bridge on the River Kwai after Steve started talking about being served fishwater while in a Second World War work camp. It was hilarious (not the fact that people were in work camps. That kinda sucked for them.). The kids thought we were all nuts.

On Monday, Sue and I took all the girls to Starr Gymnastics, where we also met up with Mike and Cibele and their daughter Sofia, for drop-in gymnastics. The kids had the run of the place. Being a drop-in, we adults were in there on the action, too. My legs were so tired later from trampolining. I totally ROCKED the hula-hoop though. That Wii Fit is totally paying off!

The rest of the day was lounging and preparing our Thanksgiving feast. Which was AWESOME by the way. I kicked serious turkey ass. And pumpkin pie ass too.

All the other bits of the weekend involved Sue holding or entertaining or changing Henry which was such a huge break for me, she has no idea. Not that Henry is that difficult, he's really quite easy, but still, it meant I could sit and do nothing or have tea or whatever I wanted, something I often don't get to do. And Sue loved it too. Win, win!

The only thing "wrong" with the weekend was that John's mom, The Omi, wasn't able to join us. She was supposed to be here but came down with a nasty cold and had to stay home dreaming of turkey and stuffing from afar.

I guess I was able to remember a lot after all, an improvement over Mrs. Short-term Memory, my other persona. Here is the smattering of photos that I was able to capture during all that fun:

Hope and Kennedy ready for the hay ride

Emily does her ritual pumpkin dance

Cutest baby ever. Which one is the pumpkin?

Sue reveals her true persona. Just kidding!

Hope tries to make a dash for it before I make her go back in that greenhouse again.

A typical attempt at getting a photo of all the cousins together.

An aunt again!

My sister gave birth to her baby boy this morning at 9 a.m. His name is Owen and he weighed 8 lbs 3 oz. Hooray! I get to meet him in less than a week when I fly to Austin, without any children with me this time (!), and enjoy him, Kate, and the Austin weather.

A whirlwind tour of the nation's capital

I'm back after my longish weekend in Ottawa, sans kids or husband. It was fun but fast and tiring. I accomplished everything I set out to do. I also came home with an aching back after driving there and back on my own, with my pregnant belly sitting leisurely on my hips and lower back for five hours each way.

I spent most of my weekend with my good friend Meredith who, although she refused to let me eat until 10:00 pm on Friday, still gets the big kudos for letting me drag her around all weekend looking for our things in storage, in our basement and then helping me to buy a fridge.

We found almost all of the baby stuff I was looking for save for half of the baby monitor set and my Ergo baby carrier. Clearly I found these near the end of our move and just shoved them in unmarked boxes somewhere.

I'm very happy with the fridge I got. It is decidedly larger than the previous antique that is dying a slow death in our kitchen in Ottawa. The new one is 20 cubic feet, very suitable for a family of 5 (!) but still able to fit in the space we have available, standard freezer on top and Energy Star so we should see a nice drop in the hydro bill after the existing energy-sucking beast is removed.

I ate my fill of shawarma on the weekend, spent some nice time with my brother-in-law and his wife (I never know what to call her - she isn't really my sister-in-law then is she? I just call her Cibele). I had dinner with Pam and Jim and kids and sat around talking until my contact lenses were begging to be removed and I also visited the knitting store that I really like. Not to mention that I bought a new battery for the car and had Meredith's husband, Ron, and Meredith's dad install it for me. I'm good like that.

To top the weekend off, on Monday I visited the new T&T Supermarket - a monster Asian grocery store recently opened near our house - and swooned over everything. I will be shopping there frequently in the years to come. From there I went to our school and registered Hope and Emily for the fall. Emily's teacher from last year (and Hope's for the coming year) Mrs. B, gave me a big hug and told me how much she missed us all and how excited she is that we're coming back. I got a similar reception from Mme C, Emily's French teacher. Now that's a school where I want to hang my hat. It's a wonderful example of what a community school is all about.

I really love Ottawa and I'm glad we're going back at the end of the summer. I miss our house, I miss our friends, I miss the school and our neighbourhood. I miss the entirety of what Ottawa is - the people enmass, the draw people have to be outside no matter the weather, the canal, the buildings, just the placeness of it.

And yet I was so happy to pull into our Waterloo driveway yesterday and hug the three people inside the house. I missed them so much. Home is wherever they are.

Family movie night a bust

We had planned to have a family movie night tonight. We decided to watch a favourite movie, Elf. That movies makes me laugh so hard. John, too. And last year, Emily as well.

I should have seen the signs that things weren't going to work out tonight. First, we went swimming this morning and the kids have been dragging ever since. Second, there was little enthusiasm for our choice. Third, Hope laid down, face first, on my lap right after the movie started and Emily had covered her ears with pillows.

After about 10 minutes, right when things were getting good in the movie, Emily declared, teary-eyed, that she didn't want to watch this movie. Hope agreed. And that's when John and I ended movie night for tonight and promised to try again soon another night when the kids weren't so tired, I wasn't so irritated with them after a good but long week, and after we'd gone to the video store to choose something they would we all like.

These things don't always work out. At least now John and I can watch whatever we want. It might even be the rest of Elf!

Weekend report and other news

Happy belated Easter to everyone!  Without my desktop, my blogging has ground almost to a halt.  Hopefully I'll hear from the Mac Store very soon and have my computer back in action.  

We had a great Easter weekend.  John's sister and her family stayed with us while his mom stayed at his brother's house in Riverside South.  We all congregated on Saturday afternoon for a birthday party for our niece Sofia, who turned one yesterday.  

We had a great time with everyone.  The girls LOVED running through the house non-stop with their two cousins.  The adults loved that that girls entertained each other while we relaxed (mostly).  While we mostly stayed around the house, we also went to two parks, played outside, and visited Parliament Hill.  The weekend ended with an Easter brunch at our house.

I've also been sitting on some biggish news around here.  Last week we had two of John's grad students come over to look at our house and meet with us.  Yesterday they told us that their going to rent it for the next year while John is on sabbatical.  Although we originally hoped to spend the whole year in Texas, we'll be basing ourselves in Kitchener (pretty exotic, eh?) and spending December and January in Texas.  Emily will be going to school there and we'll be spending ample time with very close friends there.  We plan on living a student-type existence for the year enabling us to afford to be in Texas for two months and also reminding us all about how little you actually need to live a good life.  It should be great.

Of course, we have to be out of our house on June 30.  Time to panic!

Best March Break ever: Day 3 (a little late)

On Day 3 at my dad's, he had the internet connection switched to the new house so my blogging ground to a halt. No matter because I was so beat. My muscles were extremely unhappy and during my "free time" I had to just lie on the couch while the girls watched t.v.

We played outside on Thursday morning for quite a while with Sue. Sue and Art Bast are friends of my parents from Sudbury. Art has a company that makes and installs really nice kitchen cabinets and he was there putting in the countertop at the house. Sue played restaurant with us and then we all went for a walk across the ice and over to the house. I brought the kids back for a snack and then we got ready to go to the Wildlife Centre with Sue and Donna.

The Centre is out on Highway 11 so a bit of a drive. Unfortunately, we were there 30 minutes before it opened so we killed some time up the highway at the Muskoka Store, a truly overpriced tourist trap. However, I did get a new pair of sunglasses at 50% off.

We finally got into the Wildlife Centre at 12:30. Luckily I had a lot of snacks packed. The Centre was amazing. There were big walking trails through the acres and acres of property. The animals were all active and the girls were able to see almost everything. The best moment was when we arrived at the cougar/bear enclosure right at feeding time. The cougar was pacing. The animal handler dude had to coax the bear out of his den for lunch. He's still sleeping a lot during the day. My highlight was how focussed Emily was on the map of the Centre rather than the animals we were seeing. She was much more concerned on making sure we were headed in the right direction than on seeing animals. It was so funny.

Back at the cottage, I lay on the couch after lunch while the girls watched some t.v. We then headed back over to the house to build the first fire in the new masonry stove (which is a really big stone enclosed woodstove sort of. I'll post photos later). And then the day ended with supper and bed.

The drive home yesterday was fine. My legs and hips were screaming but I made it without too much trouble. It is a really beautiful drive between here and there and we were treated to three fawns crossing the highway in front of the car.

We had a great week. It was really relaxing. The kids spent a huge amount of time outside and it was so nice to be in Muskoka during the winter. But, now I'm glad to be home and back to a routine as well.

I'll post some pictures.... sometime. My computer is dead again and we don't know why. Ugh.

Best March Break ever: Day 2

Today I woke up and knew that today would be different.  My body protested loudly that I didn't nap yesterday and went to bed at a normal time: 10:00 pm.  As soon as I got up I knew that today was a bad-body day.  So, after breakfast, we headed into Gravenhurst for some groceries and a stop at a new fibre arts store.  I got a new toque and Donna bought me some beautiful yarn that I plan to turn into a scarf at some point.  The store is owned by a woman who raises Alpacas and will be milling the yarn next door and selling it in the shop.  It was really cool with beautiful colour choices.

By the time we got home I felt worse so I ate lunch and then pawned the kids off on my dad and Donna and I headed to bed for an hour.  After my nap, I went on a hunt for everyone.  They were on a hike around the trails on the property.  The property is about 105 acres.  So, I walked up to the new house and the mason's told me they were walking the long way around back to the cottage so I "mantracked" them back towards the cottage and found them not too far away.  We hiked the rest of the way home, some of it with Hope in my arms.  

Back at the cottage, we had tea, read a bit and then heard Papa firing up the chainsaw so we headed back outside to watch and help load wood.  After that was all done, the girls and I played restaurant outside for about another 30 minutes before we were called back to the new house to help unload the quartz countertops.  Let's just say that clearly my muscles aren't too badly affected by my mystery illness because they stood up to the test this afternoon.  Man, is quartz freakin' heavy!

Back through the mud once again to the cottage for supper and now I'm chillin' with some wine and soon I'll sit down with a hot back for my back and then put the kids to bed.  I'll follow soon after.

Tomorrow: the Muskoka Wildlife Centre (a.k.a animal rescue centre).

Best March Break ever: Day 1

The drive to Gravenhurst (which, for those of you who don't know the hinterland of Ontario well, is in Muskoka - close to Algonquin Park - about 2 hours north of Toronto and 4.5 hours west of Ottawa) went remarkably well.  The girls watched a couple of videos, Emily took a nap, Hope talked.  And talked.  And talked.  We had to stop three times.  Twice was for me to pee.

Went we got up here we had a tour of my Dad and Donna's new house.  They're building a timber frame house on a piece of severed property that Donna and her brother inherited from her parents.  Her family cottage is on the remaining piece of property.  That's where we're staying.  

The cottage always smells like woodfire, which is awesome.  

After our house tour yesterday, we walked across the bay on the ice to the cottage and settled in.  After supper we took another walk on the lake.

This morning the kids were outside playing by 8:30.  We made a fire outside and walked over the ice to visit the men ice-fishing a ways away.  We pulled the kids across on toboggans.  Bentley, my dad's dog, rolled in dead Pike.  So nasty.  When we got back we pulled out the roaster sticks, hot dogs and toppings and roasted our lunch by the fire.  Marshmallows followed.  Emily wanted to check out a small hole in the ice where Donna was checking the ice thickness but never actually made it to the main water level.  There was in fact water in the hole though (see where this is going).  She ended up knee deep in the hole when she decided to touch her toe to the water and lost her balance.  No joke, that's the third pair of pants today.

I'm loving it up here.  We're outside a lot so far.  I hope to catch a nap this afternoon and put a hot water bottle on my belly which is not happy at the moment.  Aside from that, this is a great first March Break for Emily.

Beth's visit, Day 1

Oh man, I can't believe my last blog post was on Wednesday of last week.  For some reason, things have been pretty busy around here.

I volunteered in Emily's class on Thursday and Friday last week so my bloggy time was done-for on those days.  On Saturday, we had morning swimming lesson and then a pot-luck lunch at a friend's and then Mike and Cibele were over for dinner.  On Sunday morning, we had church and then Beth arrived on Sunday evening.  Wow, no wonder I haven't blogged in a while.

Beth (and Kate) are here for a week.  Hooray!  It is just a smidge colder here than it is in Texas but so far Kate has handled it well and we even had her out in the sled today.  This morning we went over to the library.  Beth and I made cauliflower-sour cream souffle for dinner (so yummy).  Basically, we eased into our week.  I'm keeping Emily home from school for the next two days so we can venture a little further out (by bus, now that the strike is over!).  Tomorrow we're planning on the Nature Museum and stop at the yarn store.  

Christmas under a rock

It seems I spoke too soon. This flu is still in full swing although I feel marginally better today. Yesterday, Christmas Day, was not what I had hoped it would be. In most most wallowly moments I feel that I ruined Christmas. More for me than anyone else though I suppose.

There are a few good moments I want to share however. On Christmas Eve, the girls put out the milk and cookies and carrots for Rudolph. After they were in bed, one of the logs from the fire rolled forward and smashed one of the glass doors on the fireplace. We decided to blame it on Santa, wrote a note from the big fellow apologizing to Emily and Hope and thanking them for the cookies. Christmas morning we all came down and I put on my best actress and was shocked by the state of the fireplace door. Emily ate it up. She was amazed that Santa's fat tummy broke the door. I think we'll talk about this for years to come. It was great.

The girls loved their gifts and we had a good time opening them as usual. The girls' favourites were:

• the water colouring book from Beth
• The Leapfrog LeapPad from Santa (I actually bought it used)
• the princess wand and dress-up jewellery from Omi
• the pirate ship from Papa
• the cash register from Papa

The grown-ups did well too. In fact, I'm still wearing my new pyjamas which I love, love, love. Not only because they came with a scarf!

After lunch things turned sour for me health-wise. I was in a lot of pain. I limped through Christmas dinner but didn't even taste the turkey or stuffing which looked awesome. I was in bed by 6:30 and slept until 8:00 this morning (save for 2 wake-ups by Hope. Grrrr.).

I'm trying to dwell on yesterday's good moments. However, the downer of today is that Omi has now contracted our illness making us all feel doubly worse. I guess misery loves company.

Let's hope for a better Boxing Day.

Signs of the end of fall

This weekend was full of busy Hallowe'en related activity. The whole weekend however seemed to point to what I know is inevitable: the end of fall. Which means the beginning of winter. Which means the start of Ottawa's longest season. A season that, this year at least, I am dreading. Dreading because of last year. The snow. Remember? New here? Well, this is what we had in Ottawa last winter:

So as November approaches I'm getting apprehensive and pining already for spring because last November the snow arrived and didn't go until late April. This weekend was filled with fun and seasonal events but also, for me, a bit of sadness knowing that Hallowe'en is the last of the fall celebrations.

On Friday night we picked out the pumpkins for Hallowe'en. We went cheap this year rather than getting the experience of pulling the orbs out of the patch ourselves. Next year I promised Emily we'll go to a farm rather than a farm market. That was fine but what wasn't fine was the fact we were only getting four. I know, I know, what a nasty piece of work I am only letting my kids have four pumpkins. Truth be told, you could hand her a fuzzy puppy and tell her it was hers for life and she'd burst into tears because it was the wrong colour or wrong smell or wrong fluffiness. That's Emily lately. She cries about the unexpected.... and the expected. The reality is that she still needs to nap. Afternoon kindergarten puts the damper on that and she flatly wills herself to stay awake on weekend afternoons. The result is tears almost on an hourly basis and that is not an exaggeration.


Her tears dried up when we decided to go out for pizza for dinner. She was stellar, snarfing down an adult-sized portion of Hawaiian pizza. Hope ate about 3 strands of spaghetti, after crying (of course) at the sight of pizza. We abandoned ship and headed home, defeated and also agreeing that we pulled a rookie move by trying to go out to dinner with two very tired kids.


Saturday, the rainiest day of the fall so far, was the Hallowe'en party at The Farm. The kids had fun in between the bouts of Emily's crying for various reasons. They decorated their pumpkins, ate some caramel apple pieces, visited the calves and pigs and sheep and enjoyed wearing their costumes a few days early.


On Sunday afternoon after both (BOTH!) refused to nap I took them to the playground and library. The ominous sky and high winds were truly the sign of the end of fall for me and probably one of the last trips to the playground for this year. At least without hats and mittens.



Goodbye fall. I do love your visits and miss you when you're gone.

Hello winter. You suck.

All done but the leftovers

Our Thanksgiving weekend was great. How was yours?

My only complaint is the freaking long drive it is to get to St. Catharines from Ottawa. I'm saying that as if I didn't know it before this weekend. Of course I did. And yet, I still complain.

Due to some unexpected circumstances - heavy traffic, broken DVD player, tantruming two-year-old, child who needed to pee, slow service at the Swiss Chalet, the drive down took about 8 hours. It should take about 6. On the way back, it took about 7.5 due to heavy traffic and a bad accident on the 403 that close two of the three lanes of traffic. Yikes.

Aside from all that, we had a great weekend. The weather was unbelievable. I actually wished I had shorts on yesterday. The colours of the leaves were gorgeous, the sun shone the whole weekend, we were outside a lot. On Saturday, John and I went to the St. Catharines Farmer's Market to get the veg for Sunday's feast. Later that day our little family went to Ridgeville to have supper with my Aunt Sharon and Uncle Dave and my cousin Janet and her husband Terry. We spent about an hour playing outside on their property that used to be an orchard. John drove the ride-on lawn mower and towed us in a trailer behind up through the fruit trees. It was really fun. After that the girls played in the old tree house.

On Sunday, the girls played with Omi, pretty much all day, and their cousins who arrived around lunch while John and I prepared the turkey and fixings. It was a great day of chats, visits, wonderful smells and laughs. The dinner turned out great with lots of veg and lots of pumpkin pie. Mmmmm.

On Monday morning we all headed to the Port Dalhousie Carousel, still 5 cents a ride and the best carousel around - so smooth and horses are lovingly maintained originals from about 1920 I think. I've talked about it here before. Hope really loved it this year. Almost as much as her Uncle Steve who rode it more than any of the kids.

As my camera is officially on its last legs (yet again - really in cameras I'm starting to think that you get what you pay for. That, or maybe don't let your kids pretend to be Karsh like I do) so I don't have many photos to show. I'm going to rely on my relatives to email me photos and then I'll post them as I get them. For now, here are some carousel shots.


I hope your weekend was as great as ours.

Beth's visit: the rest of the days

I lost track of blogging sometime after Day 3 of Beth's visit. I found it hard to get to the computer; first, we were doing so many things; second, Kate slept in the basement so I didn't get down here during nap time, my traditional blogging time.

Beth is now boarding the plane to Toronto before getting her flight to Austin so it's time to get caught up on the last few days.

On Sunday, we continued our agricultural theme by going to the Central Experimental Farm (The Farm as we refer to it). We checked out all the cows and sheep and pigs and had a ride on the horse drawn wagon that took us through all the fields, most of which have been harvested now.

From The Farm we went to Dim Sum, a must when Beth is here. It was really busy but we managed to get a table and then went to town on the shu mei, pork buns, calamari, pickled cucumber, thai chicken, etc etc etc. It was awesome.


On Monday, we stayed close to home and went to the playground. In the afternoon the girls were all playing in the backyard having a great time. Hope was, typically, not listening as I corralled her from wandering too far on her little car. She kept disappearing down the path. As she headed out of sight once again, I ran after her and as I reached for the back of the car, she stepped on the gas Flintstone-style causing her to go over the front of the car and land, mouth first, on the bumpy asphalt path. I grabbed her immediately, started hugging her, blood was spreading across her bottom lip and inside her mouth. Her teeth were all still there but some of them had punctured her bottom lip on the inside, and later I discovered, on the outside too. There was a lot of blood and a lot of crying for at least an hour. And a lot, A LOT, of mummy-guilt. The swelling was formidable and she looked just like Jamie Oliver after the blood was cleaned up. Her pouty bottom lip was a replica of his. Kind of cute although gruesome. The photo evidence, from the next day, is below.

On Tuesday we got on the bus again, then the train and then went to something I've been waiting for for a long time: the Carleton Butterfly Exhibit. I love this one week a year. The biologists at Carleton release gorgeous butterflies into the greenhouses and offer entrance for free (!) for the week. I have no idea what happens to the butterflies after this week. I meant to ask but forgot.


It is hot in those greenhouses and we were all sweating after a few minutes which resulted in three kids complaining but before the complaining started we were able to watch (and even hold) the butterflies for a while. This year was the best yet, I think. There were tons, they were really active and it was a beautiful, sunny day for a visit.


That night we walked over to Emily's school for the Meet the Teacher BBQ. Emily was thrilled (that should be THRILLED) to show us around her class, show us her cubby hole, and generally be the centre of attention for a couple of hours. I really liked having more time to get to know and talk to Mrs. B. Beth and Kate came too of course and Emily loved showing Aunt Beth her class. I loved being able to walk there and home again. It was a beautiful evening and reminded me how nice it is to live close enough to walk to school (at least occasionally).

Yesterday we walked over to Chapters for what we thought would be a relaxing, chai-drinking morning while the kids played with the train set. It didn't turn out that way. A slightly wayward child pushed over my chai, the caregiver didn't offer to replace it, Hope and Emily were a bit out of control and then we had to rush home to get Emily to school. After that I had to rush to my class. But the day ended really well with some more great backyard playing (and no face plants), leaf-jumping and an awesome cheese fondue that Beth and I made. Knitting together in the evening finished up the visit.

I'll miss you, Beth. I wish we lived so much closer.

Love you!

Beth's visit: Day 2 and 3

Whew, finally a quiet (sort of) moment to catch up on everything we've been doing.

We had plans, as you heard, to go to the Butterfly Exhibit at Carleton until I realized that the exhibit didn't start until today (Saturday). Instead, we jumped on the bus and rode it down to the Byward Market area. Our first shop, as it often is when Beth is in town, was The Tea Store. We both love that place. Their range of loose-leaf teas is incomparable. We also love their Tea for Two. The scones they served us with that were about as big as Kate's head, or so it seemed. My girls had hot chocolate and ate buttertarts and brownies. Or wore them anyway.


From there we perused the amazing vegetable displays for sale in the market right now. The colours were beautiful and we bought gorgeous broccoli and cauliflower and brussels sprouts. I would have bought even more if we didn't have to carry it all on the bus.


Kate took a giant three-hour nap yesterday while the rest of us chilled out. My dad and Donna arrived in the afternoon. With all those adults around, John and I took the opportunity to go out for a late dinner of Indian food. It was, simply, great.

Today was a big day. A really fun day. This morning we all headed out to the Metcalfe Fair. Metcalfe is a small farming town just south of us. This year was the 157th year of the fair. It is very agricultural. There were countless cows being preened, primped and hairsprayed (no joke) getting ready for show. We watched sheep being shown by their 4H members. We surveyed the winners of all the homecraft categories (I plan to sweep them next year). The kids went on a couple of kiddie rides. We watched the steam powered machines. Emily sat in a fire truck. We had tea and squares at the Women's Institute tent. All in all, it was a perfect morning doing something I've wanted to do for a very long time: revisit a fall fair in a rural setting. It totally takes me back to growing up in Niagara and going to the Niagara Regional Exhibition every fall. Metcalfe will be our new fall family tradition.


The rest of the day was lazy. Tomorrow we plan to go to the Agricultural Museum (what we simpy call The Farm) and then out for Dim Sum at lunch.

Seems that farming and all things agricultural is quickly becoming a theme of the week.