The time has come to consolidate some older posts from when I first started blogging. I am not prepared to let them go, they are a wonderful testament to my journey as a writer and my initial impulses for starting a blog in the first place. These older posts have been tiny snippets of markers along the way to blending the worlds of mothering and blogging. You know, back when posts were ‘allowed’ to be much shorter, and personal shared stories were more commonplace?
My children were entirely my inspiration for blogging – and they remain so. As they grow and shift and change, I also grow and shift and change. Therefore, my blog grows and shifts and changes. It is inevitable. There is great potency in taking a look at where one has been, and standing in where one is now. So although I am fully in a place of preparation to make big changes to my blog at this moment, my blog would not be where it is without these initial posts.
I will take great joy in looking back on these moments for years to come! I am keeping these posts in their original form, and with their original images – unabashedly untouched. Hopefully my readers will find some joy in them as well.
Daily Gifts
I am at yet another point of thoroughly enjoying every single day with my little ones. I am exhausted mind you, as at the finish of a busy weekend of work I find myself coming home to both a toddler and a baby that wake up within thirty minutes of me walking in the Door.
So this usually leads to a late-night-party-playtime until about 3am. But after the bit of sleep that I do get, I find I am woken each morning to new words, not before heard from the mouths of both Neeno and Seesha. Awa is at a point now of wanting to make her own school lunches – and enjoying it – so who am I to argue?
All of these little things give way to a unique and semi-adventurous morning. Once Awa has left for school and we have waved out the window to her and blown kisses for the entire time that we can see her walk to the bus stop, the games begin. Presently, I am loving Neeno’s adoration for making ‘presents’ for everyone all day long.
He takes a toy – a xylophone for example, or a toy tow truck – and wraps it in one of Seesha’s baby blankets. He then gives this present to whoever it is meant for, and waits with ants-in-his-pants, hands clapping, grinning deeply from ear to ear with his cutest ever dimples showing. There is so much delight in this for him, that I cannot help but hold sheer delight in it myself.
Leave it to these little ones to continue to teach us the joy of giving … regardless of where it came from or how many times they may have previously enjoyed it themselves. I hope to keep this sentiment with me at all times, each day, and remember the giddiness that comes with baby-blanketed tonka trucks.
I am getting seriously schooled by the sages that these wee people are, and I wouldn’t have it any other way!
Three at the Window
Photo compliments of my dear friend Lua at Lua Williams Photography … a couple of years after this post was originally written.
Seesha has started to crawl. All over the place (*sniff*). She being our last, I get very sad, very easily. That age old question pops into my head regularly … where does the time go? Every single day I think, this is it, they will NEVER be this small again.
Every day, they are a little bit bigger. A new and sometimes surprising word from Neeno’s mouth, or Awa’s artwork gaining momentum, intricacy, and yes, even popularity … and Seesha’s daily new expressions and infant sentiments.
Today at the grocery store, Awa and I were looking at the frozen fish section when out of the blue, Seesha turned her sweet little head towards us, looking up from her seat at the front of the shopping cart, and said “MmmBagel”. Yep, just like that. Awa and I broke out into uncontrollable, rolling on the floor, frozen-meat-section types of laughter!
Once home again, it was time for me to begin to get ready for work. Seesha is at a stage where she knows what’s coming once mom has her hair pulled back and is getting her shiny black shoes on to head for the door. She howls. And howls, and howls.
And this breaks momma’s heart, while taking all of momma’s will power not to remove her coat and shiny black shoes and curl up with her baby on the couch murmuring in her ear, “Don’t worry baby, mommy’s right here, I’m not going anywhere.”
After one last make-me-late-for-work cuddle, I take a deep breath and head for the front door. As I somehow manage to both scurry and trudge for the car, I hear a knock at the window. I look up to see all three of my sweet precious ones smiling and waving at me, making silent words with their mouths and blowing me sweet kisses.
I grin impishly and wave back, blowing multitudes of kisses that ride on the cold frosty air with my breath. Oh, how I love them. Suddenly in this small moment, all is alright in my world again. They will never be this small again after this moment, but I will forever have this memory.
MmmBagel.
Christmas Trees & Power Shakes
I am very pleased to say, I am getting better at the whole crepe-making thing, which is most probably assisted by the simple fact that I LOVE them! Especially the fact that they are made with more eggs than flour. Still trying to wean everyone entirely off of the wheat around here.
Everyone slept so peacefully last night, and Awa even had the sweetest little sugarplums-dancing sort of smile on her face as she said, “Don’t the lights on the tree look beautiful, Mama?”, right before she fell deep into sweet slumber. Mmm.
Today has been a bit less peaceful as the end of the weekend is drawing near, and after Awa missing a week and a half of school followed by another long weekend … well let’s just say she and Neeno are not sharing space so well. Two strong personalities collide! Raised voices, loud reminders echoing about how to “SHARE YOUR THINGS!”, and cries of false boo-boos float through the house right now.
So I decided to remedy this situation promptly by getting us all involved in the preparation of a Power Shake! They loved it. Here is what we put in it today:
- 1 banana
- 3 scoops chocolate hemp protein powder
- 2 capsules digestive enzyme blend
- 2 capsules acidophilus
- 2 tbsp blueberry flavored calcium liquid
- 1/2 cup vanilla greek yogurt
- 1 cup eggnog
- 1/2 cup purified water
I loved this one too. Instant chocolate power in a cup!
Heavenly Hummingbirds
Awa and I have been going through templates for this new blog of ours, and we chose one that has a hummingbird. It has been a very interesting string of events with said hummingbirds.
There has been one or two continually perching for a flutter above Awa’s head before twitting off to play… while doing a radio interview, my interviewer had a hummingbird come to visit at her window which delighted her.
Two ladies who regularly come to visit had a hummingbird buzz behind their heads for a few moments while standing at the door.I finally saw this bird myself the other day, out the living room window.
It was beautiful and sweet. And then I was told by an intuitive medium, this same radio interviewer, that she felt it was my grandmother paying a visit.
Ahhhh, I thought with misty eyes. I hadn’t felt my grandma very much since her passing, and now I finally got it. She did love hummingbirds, and what an endearing playful way to keep up with us!
Thank you Grandma.
Hummingbirds welcome, anytime.
Lock the Damn Fridge!
Yesterday, I finally did what had been at the back of my mind to do for a number of months now. After piling the trunk of the car to the hilt with grocery bags, I gathered up all three munchkins and marched into Canadian Tire in search of a lock for the fridge door.
Yes, a fridge lock.
Never did I anticipate that I might utter those words in my lifetime. Seriously.
Hubby mentioned it to me a while back, “We should get a lock for the oven door”, he said.
Blink. “They have those?” I replied, knowing full well I’d seen them on the department store shelves at some point in the not-too-distant past.
“Yeah”, he said, “And for the toilet, and the fridge, too”.
Well now, ain’t that a honky tonk! (as my beloved cattle rancher uncle would say).
Mental note taken and stored for said fridge lock.
Here is why I decided that this had gone beyond a honky-tonk style of idea, and into a full blown must-have sort of thing:
I wake one morning to the sound of the bedroom door creaking open. Tiny padded footsteps ensue, from doorway to bedside. Sure enough, like 7am clockwork, it is Neeno.
I hear a whisper, “Mama?”
I rub my eyes, moan, and smile. “Good Morning, Neeno. How are you?”
“Good, Mama. What doing?”
“I doing sleep, Neeno. What doing for you?”
“Cheese!” He yelps, as there is a loud THUNK followed quickly by a headache.
I have just been lobbed in the head with a thick brick of white medium cheese.
…Good Morning!
A few mornings later, I wake again to the sounds of a creaking door and padded toddler steps.
“Mama?”
“Hi Neeno, good morning!” I reach my arms out in the early morning darkness, grappling to find him for a cuddle.
“Morning, Mama! What doing?” he giggles.
“Trying to get you for a schnuggle”, I reply.
“Oh, maaaamaaa!” he giggles again. I giggle back.
Suddenly I am winded as something heavy hits me in the abdomen. THUD.
“Milk, mama!” screeches Neeno. It dawns on me – I have just been assaulted by a four-litre, full-to- the-brim milk carton.
My thoughts were as follows – damn, that hurt! Geez, Neeno is so strong for a two and a half year old! What a way to wake up!
… FRIDGE LOCK. Pronto.
Sweet Tunes for Baby
I just had to share this lovely lullaby video. Tonight was the usual, Awa came home from school and she and Neeno went to town on giggle fests, wrestling matches, tickle wars and hide-and-seek. This is usually served up with a side of Seesha-follows-in-awe. So as it happens, I have very little baby time at the end of the night as by the time the other two are tucked into bed and falling asleep, Seesha is already in sweet slumber or very nearly there. Tonight though, for some reason, she was full of beans, raring to go. No problem! We ‘chatted’, cooed, had tickle fests, and finally I decided to search up some animated lullabies.
The above is what I found, and WOW. I thought to myself, where have these guys BEEN? Nevermind, where have I been? Have I really not heard of these amazing children songs performers, Renee and Jeremy? They are amazing. This song in particular had both Seesha and I singing along, numerous times I might add, and Seesha clapping at the the end with glee squealing YAY!
Look them up! Hope you enjoy this as much as we did.
Lovely, Mind Stimulating Summer Days
This summer, the baby has discovered a whole new world with walking, the newly graduated toddler-to-three-year-old now understands some of the concerns mommy holds around him running and why they ring true, and my newly graduated second-grader is in love with the fine art of READING.
As an example of the bouncing images and thoughts in her beautiful young mind, tonight she has posed to me these random questions:
- “Mom, what are those men called that bounce around with their big bellies, with darker skin?”
“They’re called Sumo wrestlers, honey.”
“And where are they from again?”
“Japan. What made you think of this?”
“Don’t know. I just did.”
- “Mom, what is Global Warming again?”
“It’s the planet warming up sweetheart, due to emissions from cars and other things humans are pumping into the atmosphere that is not good for it.”
“Ohhh, yeah. So why have we not all started using electric cars?”
“That’s precisely what I wonder too…”
- “Mom, instead of trying to kill a whole bunch of mosquitoes with poisons, why don’t we just kill off all the larvae?”
“That’s what they tried to do with all the DDT. But then they discovered it was getting into the food supply and harming people, so they stopped.”
“Well I knooooow… what I mean is, why don’t they capture all the larvae in a net, and then leave the nets in the sun, and then… (she drops her head dramatically to one side and lolls out her tongue).”
“Umm. (that’s me. perplexed.) I think that might actually be a good, working idea…”
My children, my teachers.
Things People Said When They Learned I Was Expecting (#3)
Just the other day I was thinking back to some of the comments I received when I was pregnant with Seesha, and had just begun to share the news. Now I can laugh about it… yep. Admittedly, I also found them to be funny at the time.
But I can laugh harder now.
Here are some of the top comments, on my “memory list”:
- Say Goodbye to keeping up with laundry.
- Um, I just wanted to say, you know, one plus one equals two. But, two plus one doesn’t equal three. It equals, like, five.
- Wow. That’s great. Did you want another one? I mean, this soon?
- Oh my … three is alot of work! I’m surprised you’re doing it.
- Haha! Oh yeah, suuuuure you won’t have a fourth … I’ll talk to you in a year!
- Oh wow, really? Well … two hands, two parents, two kids, you know, that works.
- That’s great! Remember though, once the kids have outnumbered the parents …
- (blink. blink. blink blink.) You’ll be fine.
September Sillies
Awa’s first day of second grade began on this past Tuesday. It started out all right, I was very amazed at how ‘on time’ I thought we might actually be! And as it is, and has been, it was not to be. As usual, Neeno served as my personal alarm clock and entered the bedroom at 7:30am sharp. Up we got, dressed, fed, hair and teeth brushed, backpack ready, new white-soled shoes signed-sealed-and delivered, bus pass retrieved from mailbox. Phewph. Most excellent, we are going to make it for the school bus on the very first day! Shoes upon the feet of Awa and Neeno, baby gate moved out of the way for full stampede clearance. I scoop to pick Seesha up from the floor and run out the door with her in tow of the other two.
Wait – why does my arm feel wet? Oh no, Seesha must have leaked from her fresh diaper… already! No worries, it’s just pee, I can throw this sweater straight into the wash once we return from the bus stop. Hold on, my arm feels REALLY wet. Oh, dammmnnn… it’s not just pee. It’s a royal mess, entailing the removal of all of Seesha’s clothes, and mine, a thorough washdown and a changing. So there we were. School was set to begin at 8:25am, and I’m sure it did so quite nicely. Although I will never know, because we didn’t get to school until 8:55am.
A blessing in disguise, perhaps, as we did in fact miss the mad, mad rush of children, parents, dogs and vehicles that accompanies the first morning stress of school. We got there, we met her teacher and the teacher’s assistant, and off Awa sailed into the world of second grade wonderment!
What did I learn from this?
That I will quite probably always be anywhere, just when I get there. It was that way for me, even before the inclusion of babies, schedules, and messy diapers.
Relief, and acceptance of…
I am really, truly okay with this
Hunkin’ Hoween
This past Halloween was seriously fantastic…it was so cold, and still it was enjoyable. Neeno dressed up as Robin, Batman’s sidekick; Awa dressed up as a Mexican fan girl, and Seesha was a baby witch complete with purple braids on her headband. We first attended a dance party at the dance studio where we learned choreography to “Ghostbusters” and then choreography to “Thriller”. Lots of candy. We then went trick-or-treating, only doing the rounds in our crescent and the one across from us, so amazed at how much effort the majority of houses around here put into decorating! We carved our very first pumpkin – and yes, believe it or not, it was my first pumpkin carved too! – with which we later roasted the seeds and thoroughly enjoyed. It felt so good to really dive into the festivities of Halloween this year, as I never went trick-or-treating as a child myself, and we certainly never carved pumpkins!
My mother despised the day so much that she would lock the doors down and draw the curtains while the knocks at the door persisted and we watched a movie inside with bowls of popcorn and candied apples. I guess it’s true what they say… as parents, we determine not to replicate those parts of our own childhoods that we didn’t enjoy. Don’t get me wrong, the candied apples and popcorn I was quite contented with. I did however sometimes wonder what it would be like to dress up in costume, and wander door to door at night with my friends and a pillow case just waiting to be filled with sugary goodness. I did escape the sugar hangovers that most of my classmates seemed to have the day following Halloween, and for this I remember feeling very grateful. And I did still get to partake in some of the candy craziness, as it always found its way into a solid majority of grade school backpacks.
Anyway… upon settling the pumpkin carving excitement and lighting a candle inside of it, we began to explain the story of “Jack-o-lantern” to Neeno. This word was quite impossible for his sweet little toddler tongue to formulate, so we changed it to “Halloween Pumpkin”. This, for him, became “Hunkin Howween”. I like it. So I’m keeping it. (Yes, I have at times chastised my husband for correcting Neeno’s words. I am definitely one of those mama’s that has some resistance to her babies growing up more quickly than they need to!)
I think this is because I am at a point where I truly, finally understand how fast the time goes and that soon enough, he will be speaking clean pronounced English and I will be left wondering how that happened and grasping to recall the cute words he used to say. But maybe that’s just me…
So then, with the pumpkin placed outside, we piled all five of us into the car and drove off to the home of some friends where mommy and daddy got to finally sit down for a moment and enjoy a tasty beverage while the kidlets enjoyed answering someone else’s doorbell for a change. This was a great tie-up to a full and crazy day. Now I get it… I finally get the hubbub around this day, and the energy spent on it, all for the pleasure of the wee ones.
Hunkin Howween, one and all!
Oh, Neeno…
Oh Neeno. Indeed, last Halloween was a bit traumatic. You really did not quite understand what was happening.
Why are all these other people dressing funny?
Why are we walking down the middle of Main Street with a million bazillion people waving and smiling at us?
Why do I have to be in this sweaty suit with a long tail that squashes my bum out of my stroller?
What is that bucket?…
Ohhh… caaannnndy… (slurp, chomp, chew chew, slurp)
Please, somebody, put my sucky in my mouth before I drown myself in candy land oblivion!
Oh Neeno. This year, yes, this year… let’s try to lay off the sauce.
Just a little. xoxoxo
New Words and Nose Nuggets
Our little Seesha is growing up so quickly, and spouting many new words at what I feel to be such a young age for sentences such as she is putting together. Some of her new sentences are “Come on!” (spoken with sheer glee and excitement), “Oops, I pee…” (meaning, I have just peed in my diaper – could this signal a readiness for potty training at the tender age of 17 months?), and “Hmmm… I know!” (with a finger pressed to her lips at ‘hmmm’ and the finger raised to the air at ‘I know!’). Perhaps this signals a wee mad scientist in the making…
Along with the above, one of her favorite phrases is “Here you go!”, which is usually accompanied by a crumby plate all over my lap, a sticky plastic toy in my hand, or a chewed up and dog eared book that I had completely forgotten about and not even made it to reading halfway through – about nine months prior.
Tonight however, as I was busy at the sink, she was a very tired little Seesha. She began to whimper, and then to cry softly, and then to cry much louder. After I dried my hands on the tea towel and reached down to scoop her up, she stopped me and reached her hand out saying “Here you go!”
I flashed her a big loving mommy smile, thinking, how cute, she has picked up some of her rice grains from the floor. Not so lucky, was I … as I looked down into the palm of my hand, there was a long, stringy, colorful nose nugget she had saved especially for me.
Touche, little one. Touche.
Birthday FUNdraising
So tomorrow (actually, to be very precise, in about five minutes from now), my oldest will be turning seven. Of course all birthdays feel like a neon road marker, but there is just something special about this magic number seven. She has been such a wonderful big sister to her two younger siblings, and took everything in stride as our family grew larger.
She is the first to make sure that absolutely everyone else is feeling okay, and it is the simple things that keep her happiest. For her birthday she has asked simply to be taken out for breakfast, and then to be taken shopping with her allowance savings so that she can choose a gift for herself.
To surprise and delight me further, she has also chosen to celebrate with a few friends at the kids’ concert for the Folk Festival … while having no one bring gifts, rather, she has asked that they bring a toonie. Half of this toonie collection will go towards another birthday gift and the other half will be donated to charity.
The charity of her choice is The Girl Effect. We spent the evening researching this charity and while watching Awa’s reaction to the information and the videos, I became a bit emotional as she was so involved in what she was learning. Go girl, GO! I am so proud of you. Thank you for gifting us with the beautiful being that you are.
For anyone interested in looking further into the Girl Effect, go here: www.girleffect.org
Seize the Day, Weave Stars, & Eat Chocolate...
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