When The Sun Comes Out...

Train a child up in the way they should go...

I felt lousy this week. Coughing, sneezing, and miserable.

I lathered my feet yet again with Oil of Oregano, drank my Wheatgrass Juice, popped my Vitamin C and spent time with my pillow...while on Mommy duty with one...

That meant that the little Princess spent way more time than normal in one bedroom while The Prince spent time burning off excess energy with Noe and Popops.

I think The Princess is excellent company when feeling under the weather. She is pure entertainment. I was sung too, performed for and she even played with my hair...

Little girls... awwww...

I also think my love of reading the newspaper with my coffee in the morning is rubbing off on her. (She got the newspaper but was left begging for the "copie") And my knack of finding great deals...

In the middle of playtime/destroying what once was my bedroom and now is a hurricane zone she snuggled in for a little snooze. The Princess hasn't fallen asleep like that in possibly more than a year...
And now I see why The Hubby always says she has my lips. Yep. Undeniable.
Following my PJ induced coma came a day of spontaneous fun, which in my opinion is the bestest kind of fun! Auntie Emma, the kids and I hauled off to the St. Lawrence Market in Toronto and when The Prince pleaded as to why he was being forced to go there instead of to the McDonalds Play Place I yelled:

"Because my kids are gonna grow up cultured DANGIT!!!"

I think I brought my point home.
So we cruised the cheese section and picked up (nasty) olives for Auntie Emma's Ben and then The Prince had his annual picture with the lobsters. Last year we got his first pic here... only he had a stunned/glazed look in that one...

Is it possible that he's becoming MORE of a personality?
Class Clown anyone?... I hear they are now accepted by schools as a breed all their own.
My first time having "Montreal Bagels" and I am pretty sure they're immediately addictive

- like crack.
Us ever so wise adults decided that coffee's from Tims would be ideal for this walk pushing a bus along bumpy Front St. I think people beeped for us when we tried to turn around?

Friends for almost 10 years... going strong...
Yet another reason as to why I am madly in love with Toronto and why I would brave the nippy-ness of the day to soak up the sun radiating off the stunning architecture.

You must understand.

I HATE the cold.

Way more that I hate nails scraping down a chalkboard, slightly more than I hate the feel of velvet and almost as much as I grandly DETEST the texture of peas oozing as they're chewed.

That also says how much I CRAVE the sun.

Especially when I am deprived of it for the bleak winter months that DRAG ON FOR MILLENNIUMS.
A 3/4 family portrait seemed appropriate... classic really... My kids have such poise...
Don't you wish you were there?
And now for the smile of torture people. 500 snaps later...

But seriously now.

I have to say a few solemn words.

Today we had to say goodbye to Joovy.

She had supported my loads when I was too weary to carry them.

She has been on long journeys where we have shared tears and diaper explosions.

She has followed me over the sandy beaches and through treacherous mud and run with me in lush fields.

She was a faithful helper.

And she met her fate on the door frame of the Green Parking Garage at the Jarvis St. exit.

It was quick and painless for her, though I was aching from the mass I had to drag the next 300 feet to the car.

She will be missed dearly, both in deed and for the weight my arms will have to suffer with.

She had a spot of honour... she is now indeed disabled.

And I am now without a double stroller.

Goodbye Joovy.
Crap.
The day was rich with thrill and adventure and though the loss of Joovy will be felt for a little while, The Princess picked herself up in no time to administer much needed/healing "ouchie" high fives to Uncle Ben before coming home and refusing to go to sleep.

I love my life.

When Life Takes Over.

I was at MOPS today. (Mothers of Preschoolers for those of you who have not been consumed by the world of diaper changing and teething babies)

MOPS has been my saving grace every other Wednesday through the last few years.

I've needed some saving grace these last few years. Actually "some" is too small a portion. I've needed PLENTY.

These are my living room walls.

The Prince loves to bring people into the room and show off "his" pictures. He explains each one of them: "This is me with lobsters", "this is me in my new clothes", "this is me playing froggy"...

He is proud of these moments. He is proud of the memories.

That's part of why the pictures are up in mass quantity.

Well, that's the nice part of the truth.

But if I am looking to be brutally honest and transparent about my life, that's not the entire truth.

When the first few frames went up I was trying to make people believe that our lives were as beautiful and captivating as the pictures, all day, everyday. At the beginning it was innocent, like a bride who wears a little too much makeup on the wedding day to be extra pretty. And then one night, when crying about the misery and agony of my day it dawned on me that I was attempting to also fool

myself. I was resenting all those pictures. I hated those walls for a little while. I was angry at the life I wasn't truly living and the happiness I didn't really feel.

You see, life hasn't been the imaginary dream of marriage and parenthood I set out for. When I said "I Do" at twenty I ruled the world. I knew things that my elders were too stubborn to learn, I had an answer for everything and life was going to be brilliant. We would make lots of money off The Hubby's music and live a fabulous life and five years later we would be prepared and excited to have our ONE(two) child(ren).

My plan went perfectly until we had a tiff on our honeymoon (the horror), I didn't know how to cook anything other than sausages and rice and The Hubby was jobless. Then just after New Year's 2005 we found out we were preggers. And we were excited...

Nervous, overwhelmed and unprepared, but excited...

The Prince was born one week after our first anniversary. (Now that was a sexy first anniversary... I was so bloated I could hardly walk so we waddled around a mall, had dinner at The Keg and prayed that I wouldn't go into labour until AFTER we ate our steak).

The Prince was challenging...

Perfectly adorable and chubby and sweet, and ours... but challenging none the less (all I can say is THANK GOD FOR NOE and AUNTIES).

Fourteen months later we were decidedly pros and so planned to make sure that our precious, wonderful gifts from God would be two years apart. Because we could handle two?...

Ha.

Well, the two years apart plan worked.

But the fabulous life began to completely fall to pieces.

The Prince became abundantly bewildering.

Meltdowns, sleeping problems, fearlessness (which is dangerous in small children and something that only Sir Richard Branson has the right to have), aggression, difficulty speaking, you name it we dealt with it.

Two Years and twenty days after The Prince was born came The Princess, with her own set of complications.

We almost lost her twice. Due to breathing problems. Terror does not express the depths of what we felt.

Only hours after she was born I was travelling in an ambulance with her and chasing the transport nurses through the halls of Sick Kids Hospital as she was rushed to the NICU.

Yet through all that turmoil and panic we saw God show up in ways we never fathomed.

And The Princess is fine today.

Following all those nail biting times was the worst winter of my life so far...

The Prince became un-parentable.

Yes.

There is a word invented for what life was like with him.

And I became the worst mother in the world at times.

(Again, THANK GOD FOR GRANDPARENTS and AUNTIES)

It took four adults to raise him. Did you catch that?

I. said. FOUR.

To try and help him we learned a new way of living.

We now try to eat mostly organic. The kids have a dye-free diet.

We use homeopathy to treat illness. We even visit an amazing chiropractor weekly who has also been another one of those provisions from God I was mentioning.

IT FORCED US TO DO SOMETHING.

The Hubby and I went to parental counselling and sought advice from those wiser and more patient that we are. (And I was learning- however painfully - that I did NOT know everything. I know very little in fact.)

By November this year I was finished. I was tired and worn out. I had cried and yelled and begged God for something to change and whenever a change occurred it was gone within days.

I was Hopeless.

So we talked. Talked to teachers, talked to our family. We talked to social workers and talked to doctors.

And in December we were told the official assessment was that he had an Autism Spectrum Disorder and a diagnosis would only confirm that.

We didn't panic. We didn't fight the doctors. We didn't fight each

other. We finally had an answer. An answer as to why, out of dozens of mothers I met and talked with, was I the only one pushed so far, so much, so unendingly.

The Prince did not get easier. But our relationship and responses did. This made sense of all the chaos. This explained our struggle. And it gave us perspective.

I dreaded Christmas this year.

It meant LONG days at home. No break for school in the morning.

No peace of mind for me until Popops or Noe would intervene.

But again. As He always does, God showed up.

We were praying, we were more patient, we were eating right and adding supplements, and trying to learn all we could and somewhere in the mess of all that we met our son.

It's hard to describe to someone who hasn't lived it but until this past Christmas The Prince was lovable when he was sleeping. Or when he was having a gentle moment. Or when we'd been apart for a little while. We love The Prince, don't get me wrong, we would do anything for him but it is exhausting to show love when there is fear over everything... Fear of the kids being alone for a second, fear of The Prince doing something outrageously dangerous (like cutting an orange with a butcher knife- true story, scar to prove it), fear of another fight where biting and kicking would end up with me

frustrated in tears calling Noe and Popops to drive the 4km to help me. No these words cannot really express last year and all the years that led up to it.

But...

Christmas was a treat.

We laughed and played and The Prince was different.

He was calm and settled.

And we soaked in the moments fully expecting it to be like our wall of photos. Just a snapshot in time, and then back to reality.

So when we met with more doctors we would tell of the change but it had only been a week, and they warned, and we knew, he could go backwards again.

But then it became two and three and by four weeks the developmental pediatrician was thinking that it may not be ASD and that we need to look at other options because this improvement was so drastic and wonderful that it could not be ignored in a diagnosis.

The Prince is charming and precious and a gift from God. (This time not said with sarcasm.)

I now understand the joys of being a stay-at-home mother.

I had resented it terribly and wished to be anywhere but at home, but now... well now I have the privilege of watching my kids play nicely and grow together. They are best friends. I love to see them figure out how to complete that puzzle that had eluded them, to build castles and play hide and seek, or to read them bedtime stories till my throat is raw from talking in different voices.

I LOVE being a mother.

Though I wish I could claim that my attitude changed my son, that's not true.

The Prince changing, changed me.

During the last five years it has often been impossible to see life morph into what has become, impossible to see who I was becoming, but now I see, in the midst of the pain, character was being built... in all of us.

At MOPS today a very special lady was talking about fashion, but first explained about how we can often be playing dress up and hiding what is really going on, who we really are...

My living room wall was a part of my dress up.

It was all a part of the illusion.

Yes there were some spectacularly beautiful times we had as a family over the last few years, (Thanksgiving day at Whittamore Farms, or sledding down our snow covered steps in the backyard, Canada day at the lake)

and yes I have felt the passionate love a mother has for her children but instead of facing the harsh reality of my own unhappiness I was taking pictures to mask the disappointment when I should have been trying to capture a memory.

Let's just say that's no longer the case. I'm now capturing life.

And you NEED to read the book A Million Miles In a Thousand Years by Donald Miller. Seriously. Read it.

THANK YOU SANDRA!!!

Welcome to the beautified new layout with BIGGER pictures, courtesy of a talented friend!

ENJOY!

Mr. Grumpy...

Today we awoke to Mr. Grumpy sitting on our shoulders.

The kids needed picking up from Noe's house.

The Prince needed to be dropped to school and errands had to be run.

Mr. Grumpy got in the way... Never a welcome guest. He usually shows up when sleepless nights and runny noses are interrupting the fun of daily life. That was not the case today.

The Hubby and I had a fine sleep. Followed by silence while getting ready the in the morning (a pleasant change).

The Prince and Princess had a superb time at Noe's even with Popops away. They played till they conked out! They woke up cheerful and well rested.

Problem is Mr. Grumpy spreads like a nasty antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

What followed was a tantrum over snowpants needing to go on... (Anyone would rather race cars on the train track but responsible parents that we are, we drag The Prince and his cute little bum to school) Then came the adult's tantrum over the frustration of sticking wriggly feet into boots, along with the other adult's (my) tantrum over why as adults would we act in such a childish way(Ugh).

In my ideal world I would like to claim that our home is a tantrum-free zone. That we all have total and complete control over our emotions and our reactions to them.

This is not so.

Which isn't terrible. Through those moments of misery and irritation and mean words, we show we are human... and see how much we need Jesus and His loving mercy.

Boy Oh Boy did we need his loving mercy today.

Because the only thing that truly sends Mr. Grumpy off into oblivion is love. Often we could spend hours visiting with and entertaining Mr. Grumpy, indulging in his attitudes and thoughts, and though

sometimes a determination to change a mood can snap us out of his ugly company, SOMETIMES what we really deeply need to soak in, is that Loving Tender Mercy.

The more of that sweet presence and the less Mr. Grumpy feels welcome and the less he rears his smug face.

Though this day began with scowling and growling and snipping...

Remembering that all the crud I do is forgiven, changes this grey day and turns it into sunshine... (even if the weather isn't cooperating with the change.)

Mr. Grumpy has been booted off these shoulders... and a little bit of God's grace is now resting there.

Thank God for that... More contagious then misery is JOY... so today at 1:47pm...

I'm choosing JOY.

(Just took a little while today but we are all catching up.)

Listen...

Healthy???

Today I began my healthy eating detox.

I ate wonderfully well until 12:15pm

Then Amanda and I stopped by Cosco on our way to work.

Cosco has soft ice cream.

Soft ice cream is my kryptonite.

So I asked for a small.

But I should have known.

Cosco doesn't do small.

Cosco does BIG ASS EVERYTHING!

So this is halfway through my ice cream cone.

It took me over 10 minutes to eat.

4 hours later I am still suffering for it.

The banana and tea and almonds that I had for snack could not subdue the pain.

So now that I am home I am indulging in a my own stomach-pain-fixing remedy.

It's called Betty Crocker Instant Mashed Potatoes.

And tomorrow I'll begin again.

Provided my stomach is ready to cooperate.

(It is a good thing I don't own a Cosco card... I could very easily get out of control there!)

Now if only I could find the stinkin remote...

Winter Wonderland...

It must be said,

I HATE WINTER.

But even through the grumbly, grouchy freezing months I have such fun that spring blossoms are here in no time.

(At least that's what I'm telling myself!)

These are some of the best ways to fill those cold, dark days...

Play twister. In the kitchen.

(Because where else would you play twister?)

Have "Claw Attacks" while waiting for your meal to arrive at

Lone Star.

Make a Colouring Masterpiece as everyone inhales tortilla chips and salsa.

(And bedtime as soon as you get home!)

Winter walks by the waterfront.

(Don't let this fool you... it happened ONCE!)

Can you FEEL the blistery wind? The view is worth it.

Make faces when confronted with blasting air that turns your nose into an icicle.

Discover things in your own community that you've never seen before.

(Seriously, I've lived here MOST of my life and didn't know this existed.)

Spend time with incredible friends on a refreshing day-long getaway OUT of the city.

Love this home, but most especially the people IN it!

Fireside story time. A roaring fire is one of the perks in the bitterness winter brings.

Play with a dog as lovely as Daphne.

Cherry now wants a dog.

(Josh said we can get one. The day we own more than one acre.)

Apply these well learned rules to enjoying the dank unending days and you just might survive this winter.

We're hoping we do.

:)

A New Decade...

Yesterday my Mum turned 60...

And she was excited!

Boy was she excited!

The Prince and Princess had a sleepover the night before and she awoke to a charming, very age appropriate birthday gift....

A Learn Your Letters and Numbers Puzzle.

(The Prince broke the secret during the sleepover but we'll let that slide, he is only four.)

You can see my Gran in the picture...

She's 90.

And damn proud of it.

I am truly blessed to have strong, stubborn, intelligent woman with whom I share my gene pool.

And I hope that a little smudge of them rubs off on me.

Because at 60 and 90 they are still as determined and willful as ever!

We have this amazing attitude in our family that not everyone has....

We CELEBRATE AGING!!!

Yes, I said it!

AGING!

Another decade? AWESOME!

Obviously 40 is better than 30,

and 50 is better than 40,

so 60 MUST be better than 50!

Now as a woman mid-twenties, I look forward to the 30's.

Because they're going to be stupendous.

Along with this attitude about aging they also do not fret over waist size, poke at their faces looking for imperfections and they haven't wept over bad haircuts (At least that I know of)...

They KNOW WHO THEY ARE.

They are SECURE.

In my eyes, my Mum- and Gran- are the BEST!

Hopefully a little bit more than a smudge of their wonderfulness will also rub off on The Princess...

Because THAT would be perfect.

Happy Birthday Noe!!!

xo