A Few of My Favourite Things

Often my house feels like its caving in on me. It's not large, and it does have an awful lot of kids and pets and things in it.

So, to remember how much I love my home, and my intense fondness for vintage and handmade Christmas, I decided to wander around and focus on the small vignettes, and effectively block out the bigger picture. Joy is often in the details.

(Table runner that I made some years ago. That tree always makes me happy)



Tacky Christmas body art that I'm going to charm my tinies with this week.

Retro gnomes and santas on my stick tree.

That sits by my dining room window.

One-eyed reindeer. I love him unconditionally.

 

My paper village. One of the many highlights of unpacking the Christmas stuff.

Old packaging.

A sweet and dorky picture of the girls at Christmas when they were little.

My childhood pop-up book.

Bowls full of baubles.

Old records and Bambi's.

Strange little reindeer and Christmas mice scattered here and there.

 

 

There are a lot of things that stay in their boxes.

 

 

 

 

Creepy santas.

Handmade stockings.

Bottle brush wreaths.

My favourite Christmas picture of all time. Sam, aka, Baby Jesus is maybe a day old.

And the mother load- Kenny Rogers albums!

 

So if you stop at my house and all you see is clutter- just slow down. Break it down, focus on bits at a time.

Works for me, every time.

 

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Why Its Not Going To Work To Live Each Day As Though It Were My Last

My husband is a bit of a foodie. While others bemoan the NHL lockout, Brian is cheering along to the Food Network, poring over issues of Saveur magazine, and shamelessly indulging himself in hours of internet porncookery.

For years now, every second friday evening, our back door opens wide and friends pour in with all manner of gastronomic delights, Brian generally being at the forefront of culinary prowess. He is likely to have spent hours poring over his shelves full of recipe books and unruly stacks of scribbled and printed recipes before deciding on that one (or three) concotions that just have to be shared.

All this grandiose cookery has bought Brian a bit of a reputation, and even morphed into a bit of a catering sideshow. Two years running, he's been asked to provide taste bud tittilations for the Christmas party of a rather large farm nearby. Now, this is kind of a big deal. And it pushes Brian well past the boundaries of what a Friday night tapas entails. Now in addition to poring over cookbooks, watching food network til the wee hours of slightly past ten PM, topping up his serving and chafing dish supplies, and coveting two hundred dollar knives, he also begins to develop heart conditions, high blood pressure, pre-traumatic stress disorders, tremors, and hot flashes.

In short, it becomes a family affair. Daughters get hired. Wives get bribed. There is cheese to be shredded, lettuce for chopping, beer batter to mix, a giant brisket to season, asparagus to wrap, beans to soak, trays to collect, pots to stack. There's camembert, proscetto, chilies, limes.

On Saturday morning, I set my alarm. It's my weekend, and I usually expect everyone to survive on nutella and frozen pizzas. I'm not one to slave over a hot stove when there's a break from the weekly grind. But this weekend will be different- not for the kids, who'll still be subjected to my survival of the fittest regime- but for me. I will be cooking, weekend or not. So, to squeeze in my own requirements for a proper weekend, I'm planning an adventure- an early morning road trip with a friend to a thrift shop not yet explored.

We headed down the snowy highway, hot coffees in hand, the hour long drive quickly passing in the warmth of our conversation. And then the treasures! Kitschy Santa ornaments, bottle brush wreaths, vintage sweaters, strings of lights, some books and stickers for the kiddies, a green pendant hanging lamp, and more. It was bliss. It was a weekend in a morning, as well it had to be.

And soon enough Brian was texting, begging me to come and help.

With my newly acquired goodies ready to be played with later, I was ready to pin on my apron and become the loving wife. The girl and I headed straight to the farm and set about chopping and stirring. The setting was sheer perfection- a stellar home, beautifully decorated. Platters upon platters of fresh fruits, veggies, chocolates, and nuts. Wine being chilled, mixes coming in by the crate.

We began in earnest. Hours just kept slipping by and there was still fish to batter and fry, tacos to assemble, portabella mushrooms to barbeque. Panic set in ever so slightly for me, and at top crazy heart racing speed for the main chef. My $2.00 boots began to pinch me, and Arianna's briad wilted in the heat of the boiling oil. People began pouring in in their festive fancy pants and earrings, high heels and expectations.

I began to order tequilas and soda and chop a little faster.

The grand marnier wings and prime rib Yorkshire puddings needed to be taken from the oven and plated. The pans would need to be chisel and pick axe cleaned. Lime marinated cabbage began to fly onto fish tacos at unprecidented speeds.

The ice began to melt on my mint leaves and there were hours to go. Better order a refill.

The soaking pans hit the floor to make room for the dishes that were piling up. People were filing by for seconds and thirds and we barely lifted our heads from the tasks at hand to see if we'd scored.... or bombed. By midnight or one or two, my boots were kicked into the corner, more ice had been found, the pans had more or less been scraped and thrown back into the van. My body made a weary drop beside a friend and I let myself relax.

It had been a long and busy day that had passed by me at breakneck speed in about three minutes. There had been much to laugh about, many ways to delight the palate, with liquid refreshment peppered throughout. We'd put in a spectacular family effort, Brian had pulled it off again, and we'd all worked together as a beautiful machine.

How the clock turned to the hour of 5 AM is way beyond me.

That the clock showed 5:45AM (the time my alarm typically goes off at in the morning) before I ever got to sleep is the second great mystery.

Now, if Saturday had been the last day of my life, I may have chosen to spend my time in similar ways. A road trip and treasure hunting. Helping Brian in his element, celebrating his success. Sharing it with our daughters. Letting hours upon hours drift by sipping on iced drinks with mint, and laughing at everything.

But it wasn't. The truth is that Sunday had already come, and it had been consumed by Saturday. Then there was Tired Monday, Draggish Tuesday, Shoot Me Wednesday, Nap Please Thursday, and TGIF Friday.

In the future, I'm simply going to have to pace myself; it just can't be done. I can't live each day as though it were my last or soon it will be. I'm embracing boring days, and Arthur days, zone-out days and shopping days. Days packed with meaning, and dull days in between; days for helping and days for doing what I want to do.

Until next year. When maybe we'll cater a party again.

 

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Oh Christmas Tree

I hear that IKEA sells Christmas trees for twenty dollars.

I bet you could walk in and out of that tree lot in under ten minutes- tree in hand, wallet still bulging.

But choosing a real Christmas tree is so much more than that. Like a crisp walk on a Friday night when everyone else in the house is distracted by their own amusements. First a detour into the local gas station- big sale on mandarine oranges and time to pick up a little something for my favorite tree vendor. The people at the till know her brand, if I don't.

And then, what's this I see? A barricade on main street? A tree lighting ceremony? There are glowing fires, and my son Sam's classmates are lifting their voices to the skies and the newly lighted pines, singing Christmas carols to the glow of ice candles. Clearly, my Sam has chosen "safety first" and refused to bare his soul to the townspeople in the middle of a highway in winter. He's snug as a bug at home on his comfy couch, controller in hand, clever boy.

Thank goodness there are good parents out there- the show-offy ones who read the town newsletters, school agendas, and flashing electronic sign on the front of the elementary school. Must be nice to be so flawless and have so much time. I'm grateful to them- their children provide a picturesque backdrop to my solitary Christmas tradition. So, with the tune of "Christmas Without You" ringing in my ears, I slip past the masses and into the tree lot, gift in hand. A waft of pine scent bathes me in hope and good will, and my senses are soon delighting in rows upon rows of spruce and pine. Long, slim, shiny ones, ittsy bitsy prickly ones, fat ones, pine-coney ones. The lot is filled with people who don't have all the time in the world like I do. I let them all go ahead of me, so content am I to sniff and finger every prickly pine in sight.

In less than a nano second, my brain is caught in the classic Christmas struggle: a big fluffy, upper class looking tree, or an affordable, perfectly Charlie Brown, space efficient teensey pine. Then I remembered that I'd thought to resolve the issue before leaving my house a few minutes earlier: This year? Selflessness. One single tree, properly spaced, fully intact, complete with needles that wouldn't fall off in the first 24. No little tree for me, that's just indulgent.

But Mona knows me. She knows my weakness for the stick tree, and starts in on me immediately with her shiny eyed, wide grinned wiley ways- "I know what YOU want!", even as I stand before the boring perfect trees, thinking of pleasing my family members at home. Now would the folks at Ikea know my preferences in holiday decor? I think not. Nor would they take the time for a long leisurely chat beside the tree jiggler near the back of the lot. The good folks of Ikea wouldn't likely take the time to share bits of their story with me. Their hopes and intentions, a little of their pain, the reason for their joy. I probably couldn't gift them with some holiday smokes and enjoy the scent of it mingling with the pines. (my big brother was a smoker. The faint smell of cigarettes always makes me feel cozy and safe; like I'm on the brink of an adventure.) I likely wouldn't linger until my boots got soggy and the elementary carollers had gone back home, and the street fires extinguished.

By the time I exit the lot, the street has become a highway again, and the ice candles have been put away. Mona is about to close her shop until the morning, when I promise to return with the means to bring my great big tree home. Of course, she's sold me a spidery one as well- insisting that its really only worth five dollars.

When I get in, my family asks me- Did you have to go to Altona for that tree?! Did you grow it yourself before you chopped it down? Where on earth were you all this time?

They still don't get it, after all these years, poor impoverished home bound souls.

I'm happy when I wake up on Saturday morning, knowing I can head back down main street- stopping to pick up my trees, then maybe a few minutes to check for treasure at the thrift shop. Mona has my tree all shaken down and bottom trimmed, and gives me some advice at making it last longer than four minutes. Being an Amazon woman, she offers to carry the big tree to the van while I scoop up the itty bitty one. It's not far to home- just three blocks, so no need for fancy blankets or ratchet ties. Just a slow drive down the street with the hatch a little ways open.

If I'd bought my trees at Ikea, I'd have to have some fancy ways to tie those suckers down.

And if I'd bought my trees at Ikea, I know for sure that four days later when I'm strolling down main street with my team of tinies, there wouldn't be a tree seller carreening to a stop beside me, dashing out of her car, and rushing over to say;

"You took the wrong tree! Did you notice that your little tree wasn't at all the one you'd chosen? That when you got it home it didn't have all those gnoby little pinecones that you loved so much?

You took the tree top that I cut branches off of to use in Christmas arrangements - did you notice the huge gaps in it?"

Nope.

It just wouldn't be the same

If I bought my Christmas tree from Ikea.

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The Delegates

It might have been the two dollar cowboy boots.

Or the recognition that followed standing up at that church event some weeks ago when I sprung from my pew to pay my father tribute for all the years he'd given. Maybe all the Mennonite elders and eldresses saw me in a new light that day: Wow. Kehler. Abe's girl! Maybe they saw new things in me, possibilities yet to unfold. Maybe they saw all this potential, lying fallow, awaiting a Mennonite ignition.

Maybe it was the way I handed out the programs at tonights annual meeting. I did it all without a walker, defibrillator, or seeing eye dog. I handed those papers out with a flair- I would have kissed the babies, but I think that I may have been the closest qualifier for that position, so I poured a little extra energy into shmoozing with the seniors.

It's a tricky dance, sitting on the board for my local Mennonite Central Committee thrift shop. (Well, its really not a dance at all, because that would be a sin.) But I've spent the past three years sitting. Mostly quietly, taking it all in, getting acclimatized, acculturated, laying low, staying humble, knowing my place, searching for things to apologize for. Trying to follow the right columns during the reading of the financial reports, never firstening or seconding those minutes because my severe and untreated terror of numbers caused my hands to grow numb and usually brought on a series of seizures.

But tonight- oh glorious night- my chance at fifteen more minutes of fame. A cabinet reshuffle of sorts, new delegations for old delegates. And I suppose my three years of humility bore fruit: a new title.

Secretary Of The Board.

I have a pretty firm idea its those boots.

Because I for sure don't have a spiral notebook and ballpoint pen that our now defunct secretary of ten years weilded at our monthly meetings. I used to gaze across the table from her and wonder; "What's it like to be a real writer? What's it like to get published every month?! Oh, to lose myself in such fervor- such singleness of vision, such dedication to the preservation of history!"

It will such a sweet relief to have the privelege of reporting to my father, the ninety year old forefather of many things Mennonite and thrifted. To be able to tell him that his act of bringing eight children into the world was not in vain, but that finally, in his last, most ambitious exertion, a child has risen to the prestigious title of Secretary of the Board Unto The Mennonites.

I know for darned sure it wasn't the double piercing in my right nostril. Or the holes I punched into my left ear after I turned eighteen and mama wasn't looking. It can't have been that I have an ipad and can bypass the notebook, typewriter, the blacksmith and the printing press.

I'm just thinking it must be those two dollar boots.

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Weekends

I said "no" to two parties.

Two.

And I really like parties. But last Monday when I mysteriously and serendipitously got the day off, I stared the long list; the big list straight in the eye, and I took it on. I painted the back porch- the mud room- the reception area for my daily entourage of little guests. It had been painted a brown-with-tinge-of-terra- cotta around six years ago and it wasn't at all pretty. (I don't even like terra cotta) This was all confirmed recently when one of my wee ones carried on about how my house was like a "cabin" and "Joycie- what is that hole in your wall? Does a mouse live in there?" I was properly chastised and "Paint the porch" made an official entry on my long list of dreaded things. Right below: "call the physiotherapist, your daughter isn't able to move" and "call the wart lady, your other kid can't walk".

So, Monday I took on the porch and transformed it from terra cotta awful to what I thought would be "steel grey mysteriously classy". It came out more like "Old country blue are we still in the 80's" but I"m choosing to live with denial. I'm calling it grey and calling it painted, and taking it off of the list. Besides, the mouse hole and the long chiseled channel that happened somehow last Friday when I wasn't looking got mudded in and painted over, so that's got to count for something, right?

Well, when the boy came home from school, he said he liked that color and that's what his room should become.

We've done this massive shuffle, you see. With the long awaited basement reno came the new love nest for Brian and me. Which led Jane to claim and repaint our old upstairs bedroom. Which meant that Micah could move into Jane's room which had been painted nine years ago in soft pinks and greens and flower stencils. Fussy boy felt this this should be changed. Jane had also hung so many LP's, posters, mementos, etc onto her wall that it had become more of an eyelet piece than an actual partition. It was ever so overwhelming. But Monday's porch success empowered me and I promised Micah that on Thursday evening (my first available five minutes) we would begin.

By Saturday morning, we'd pretty much patched and painted and were ready to take a look at the floor. Which was a disaster, I might add. So, after swimming lessons, I steered the rust bucket towards the Steinbach thrifty store with the pretense of looking for a piece of carpet. First I sniffed my way through several other departments, landing cowboy boots..... not floral but still awesome... not on sale for $75.00 but regular priced for $2.00! Then piling up on vintage fabrics ranging in price from ten cents to three dollars. In my jubilation I nearly forgot all about flooring, but in the furniture department glancing around for a book shelf for Jane's new room my eye landed upon a roll of carpet. Grey. Just the color my son had his hopes hung on. Perfectly clean, large enough, and beautifully priced at $40.00.

I really like paying for a stack of fabric, a roll of carpet, and a pair of boots for less than what the boots at the mall that made me sleepless for a week had cost. It validates my existence.

Upon our return home, armed with an exacto knife, a gin and tonic, and a $40.00 carpet, I set straight to work. Hence the refusal of party #1. Which I know was awesome, and that I would have enjoyed a great deal. Sometimes though, its for the greater good to just keep going, looking neither left nor right. By the end of the night I had the carpet laid, the last of the painting done, the bed and dresser moved, and the boy happily hanging his Zelda poster.

It felt like a party.

I went to bed early, exhausted, reading a book about the holocaust called "Children of the Flames" that I may have also bought at my favorite store for about a dollar. I slept like a freaking brick.

Sunday morning, and another party (of sorts). The first Christmas event- the Martens family gathering. My mother is a Martens, the last of her crew. The event was to begin at one in the afternoon, so my sister and I were enlisted to arrive at 11:00 AM to set up. I didn't have the heart to break it to anyone that it doesn't actually take two hours to unfold some chairs and start up the coffee perk. They're all kind of old and I didn't think it was nice to mess with their heart medication. So, I took the opportunity to do very little, slowly, and with precision. It makes my mother happy.

Once I got used to that rhythm, I found that I had very little desire to go home. Home was that place that went to hell in a hand basket while I was upstairs carpeting. So, thinking of the pit of despair that I was avoiding by making coffee very slowly and methodically at a family gathering prompted me to say "no" to party #2. A very fun costume, dress-up party with friends who I really enjoy and want to enjoy more often. But the thought of Monday being just one sleep away, my boys upstairs going through nine years of toys, discarding and donating, five loads on laundry on the bathroom floor, carpet scraps strewn on the back deck, the spoils of swimming lessons, painting days, etc all over the porch, the kitchen up to my ass in alligators, and hopes to make time for the Etsy shop looking bleak, I felt that a cancellation was in order. Besides. I hadn't had five minutes to dream up a costume. Which you need for a successful costume party.

It's Sunday night now; 9:15. My work day begins in 10 short hours.

My boys are in their rooms upstairs, happily busy in their newly acquired, tidied, painted and carpeted bedrooms.

Brian is happily watching a documentary in his new bedroom.

The porch is tidy; ready for an early morning invasion.

The kitchen is clean.

The laundry has been laundered, dried, sorted, dispersed.

And I still have some time. To snuggle under the covers with my book, to get enough rest, and to not dread Monday because I'm all caught up and ready for the madness.

Until next weekend.

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Bless Me Bloggy

I have sinned, its been eleven days since my last confession.

And I probably have stuff to confess, like how people's faces have been annoying me lately.

I haven't decided who to blame for this phenomenon; pinterest for planting this image in my brain and allowing me to pin it forevermore; or Early Onset Winter and Greyness; or people's faces. It's a toss up.

Regardless, its largely the faces of people who I love which annoy me, and this complicates things. The dog keeps looking at me like I"m about to do something amazing, the husband lets words out of his face that reduce me to the emotional maturity of a gnat, and then there are the children. Lovely people, really. But yesterday one small person chiselled a groove into the drywall (how do they manage these things?!) and another smallish child urinated on a vintage chair that I quite like(d) the way it was. Without eau de yucka-pee. After that their faces pretty much annoyed me, so I had to concentrate on a tiny imaginary dot just behind their heads so that my annoyance would reamain invisible to the naked eye. I think it worked, but repressing my true feelings is clearly worthy of a full confession.

In other news, I had to call a sick day this week. I've never had to do that in the past nine or so years of doing dayhome care for tinies. I've always managed to pull myself together to some sort of degree that I fake it through my workday and not have to make those early morning phone calls that I know I wouldn't want to receive if I were the parent of the wee one. However, with absolutely no warning, I was awakened at 4 AM on Monday morning with a yak stuck in my throat. It reappeared at 5:45 when my alarm went off, and the floor kept drifting up to where the ceiling should be so I knew it wasn't going to be an awesome day for potty training. I like how kind everyone was when I phoned them at a ridiculous hour to say "no go". Really kind. I work with some of the nicest people in the world. The nicest. Not only do they trust me with their kids (a super big deal), but they pay me for being sick without me asking. That's kind of Jesus-y in my opinion.

(While I type this, the dog sits just to my left and STARES at me. Full of expectation. Do you know how annoying this is.)

I have more things to complain about, but they involve infringing on people's privacy and I'm too irritable to deal with all that. Besides, that would entail more confessions and I'm not actually Catholic. I'm sort of Mennonite, and we don't even have release of cubicle confessions. We just kind of walk around chronically feeling guilty for having been born, taking up space, emitting odours, breathing in and out.

Forgive me.

 

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Yes, I Have Been Abducted by a Band of Traveling Gypsies; Thank You For Asking

And our router quit working. MTS took a month of Sundays or so to get here, and I meanwhile fed my internet addiction through my iphone which stubbornly sucks the information highway out of the great "Out There", much to my relief and amusement.

Its pretty near impossible to blog from one's phone though.

Besides, I've been busy. (aren't you sick and tired of people constantly saying that, as if that ascends them to some holy state?) I'm just so busy and exhausted that I must be super important, and the world will surely cease to exist if I sleep. Or watch re-runs of hoarders on netflix. Which it doesn't carry any more, rocking my world and compromising my quality of life.

So instead I've gotten busy watching my daughter not play volleyball with her team; instead observing her head descend lower and lower into her abdomen and me helpless on the sidelines, wishing desperately that she was three again and throwing a tantrum so that I could just wait for it to be over, gather her up in my arms, and read her a story book. Now I can't read to her, and most of the things I say are stupid, ignorant, irrelevant, acusational. And by this I mean that saying "Dinner's ready" amounts to all of the above.

They never taught about this stuff in prenatal classes. Although its fair to say that they spent a few sessions on breathing techniques, which I never caught on to. They reminded me of aerobics, which always sends me rocking straight into my happy place, hands clenched in balls covering my eyes, waiting for the badness to go away. I should have probably paid better attention because lately I've been forgetting how to breathe for brief moments and that just doesn't feel sustainable.

Thankfully, I have been taking a sort of correspondence course that's been coming in handy, no thanks to lamaze in 1994. Its me corresponding with me, and a thousand or two books and wise women that I've exposed myself to over the past lifetime or so. I'm still a slow learner, but there's barely calculable progress, making it invisible to the untrained eye.

I am learning to take my time. I always want to rush to the part where its all better, and I scramble around trying to achieve that as quickly as possible, meanwhile inadvertently shoving all my anxiety and mental trash into a deep closet that bursts open later at the most inoppurtune times. The brain had become a bit of a hoarders delight, with all those closets spilling and cluttering my life when I least expect it, and costing me hundreds of dollars in ineffective therapy. So, I'm learning to take my time. To not rush to the last page, the conclusion, the relief of the end. It hurts being stuck in the middle of a seemingly endless plot, but I'm rewarded with tiny, exhilerating epiphanies, and so I will carry on.

It is what it is. At times it feels terrible, but it will not destroy me.

What is destroying me slowly is this early onset winter. I think we've been largely stuck indoors for four weeks now, seeking shelter from rain, winds, snow, and heavy general blighted greyishness. Its a good thing my husband is brilliant and talented and I have a very pretty basement to become depressed in. My sad despondant feet can rest on soft carpet; my eyes can be soothed by pale blues and yellows, and all that indoor toy clutter can be tidily stored on shelving come quitting time. This is going to make my annual winter induced psychosis So Much More Fun!

In other happy news, the thrift shop has begun to put out Christmas decor. I may have found just a few pretty old ornaments which I shared with my sister, knowing full well that I'd lose half to the cat's paw or the childrens' sticky fingers anyway. May as well do a preemptive strike and lose half to someone who'd actually appreciate it. I've found my head bending towards the blissful thoughts of Christmas decorating, gift-buying, brandy-infused chocolate, and the return of my eldest daughter for a few weeks. I'm lucky to be one of those people who doesn't get depressed when all the normal people do- I really like Christmas. Family and all.

Speaking of family; thank goodness for my 14 year old son. The MTS guy finally arrived this morning. I badly didn't want to look like the the adult in charge, because I was pretty sure I'd look like a noob when he would tell me things about routers and bites and cables, filters, blah, blah, blah. And that's pretty much exactly what happened. He brought us a new router, and I showed him some Apple product booster thingie that Brian had bought and asked him about that, hoping he'd make it do tricks or vacuum, or whatever it is that gadget is supposed to do. He said he wasn't trained on Apple products and only handled MTS products. So he did his thing, "explained" some stuff to me (I did a lot of nodding, but not understanding the language, didn't really absorb a lick of it), then showed where I could plug my laptop in so that it could access the internet. So, I did understand that we didn't have wireless, but we did have internet. I attempted to communicate this to the husband over text, without any of the correct language.

Son comes home for lunch, walks into the computer room, plugs in Apple thingie and reattaches the cord-a-ma-bobbers that used to be attached to the old MTS router.

Voila! Wireless.

Fourteen year old sons are handy to have around. Even the ones who don't have any formal training in Apple.

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A Little of What I Learned This Week

• I actually CAN be friends with people who like Zumba and running.
  
• Fighting a flu while in the child care industry is a seriously flawed idea.
• I can no longer motivate myself to move faster on the night before a sale by trying to make myself afraid. I've simply stopped listening.
• Old dogs CAN learn new tricks. (the dog has begun a new practice of dashing up the stairs to sleep on Sam's bed. This is new, and the dog is not.)
• My dad once nearly drowned in the Red River.
• People are kind, and generous. (okay, so I didn't learn this for the first time this week, but I learned it again. Today, I was gifted a dress form! Something on my wish list!)

There's other stuff I learned this week, but I can't remember it because my brain sucks.

What about you- learn anything you dare to share?

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Today

I want to write.

About time.

About the ground turning soft and people sinking.

Losing the babies, and floating between the buildings on bits of debris.

About survival and loss, and maybe finding something with the appearance of stability.

About time.

Today I will make turkey sandwiches, hand out pumpkin muffins.

Put my hand to Sam's forehead, refill sippy cups.

Talk about potties, puppies, taking turns, loving and accepting each other.

I will take out the garbage, prop up the deck, drive Jane to a babysitting job.

I will count heads, wipe bottoms, dream of intense coffee with trusted friends.

I will kiss cheeks, rub backs, zip zippers.

It will be good, honest, eternal work.

And I will dream

Of writing.

 

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The Post of Random

Inspired by Karla's post of random. It reminded me how I love blog posts such as these, and that maybe I would indulge in one myself.)

In no particular order:

• I am a very patient woman, but there is only so much whining that I can actually tolerate. To protect the privacy and integrity of the very young, I'm not going to say a whole lot more about that. Suffice to say that in my career of assisting in the rearing of small children, there are certain times and certain individuals that make working on the cold floor of a sausage factory look like a lovely, whine-free alternative. (of course, I'd have to drink a lot of wine on the job because dead animals, raw meat, and casings make me want to throw up on pretty much everything.)
• Lately I've had small children ask me; "Joycie, when are you moving to a NEW house?"

Which is adorable and charming because its out of the mouths of babes....

but....

I also want to take them by the hand through the NEW, partially completed basement that they've been allowed in for exactly two weeks and ask them questions about my NEW walls which are already dirty and scuffed.

And did I mention dented?

Now, I'm genuinely not about these things, but as with the whining that I mentioned a moment ago, I do reach that critical breaking point of wanting to scream. And not into a pillow after hours.

Upstairs, my butt-ugly pressboard-stuck-together-with-sucky-glue kitchen cupboards are swelling and denting and separating away in that total bliss of the unaware. My red back door has white scratch marks from the damn dog trying to dig her way back into the house. The front roof is growing lovely moss. And the back step? About to crumble into the Manitoba clay. Probably when a mom is coming to drop off their child in my uber child-proofed, entirely safe, but slowly falling apart OLD house.

Downstairs, the kids pick at the open-ended bottoms of the NEWLY dry-walled walls and show me; "LOOK JOYCIE! I FOUND CHALK!" Trust me, the patience of Job, plus some deep-breathing techniques are pre-requisites for the job.

Do I sound gloomy? its because I am, a little. Which is the other thing that's bringing me down- the fact that I get down. Gosh, I'm bored of that already. I just want to be OVER IT already and quit with these dips into gloom and doom.

Its a weird crisis somehow connected with my first ever daughter becoming an adult. She turned out really well, so its not that I have regrets, exactly. But I do, still. And I am hovering in this super weird panic place about all the "better" ways that I should parent the other three who haven't reached grown-up status quite yet. But I don't change, I only stew. And sew. And stew. And worry. Did I mention that I"m tired of my head?

Except my hair, which I cut short.

So, at least my brain of very little bear has a cutish place to hang out beneath.

• Shipping in Canada is very expensive. I remembered this yesterday when I shipped two bags4darfur and paid out almost $34.00. It's actually less dollars to ship something from here to the U.S. than to send something just into the next province.
  
• I really like children at quiet time. Sitting and watching "George Shrinks", I study their little faces. So trusting, forgiving. And everything still ahead of them. This frightens me sometimes.
  
• Last weekend our town ran the fifth (?) annual Imagine marathon for mental health. Every year I plan to walk five or ten kilometers in support, but I always land up waving a flag and directing runner traffic instead. I like this job. I love to see how many shapes, sizes, varieties, and people groups can participate in this run. There are people all decked out in running room and Lulu Lemon stuff. Then there are the people from Crystal Springs, a nearby Hutterite colony. The women run and walk in their long dresses, head coverings and runners. The young men run in black jeans, suspenders, and dress shirts. Young girls walk with their friends. Little boys in suspendered pants hold their daddy's hands. And they all walk together.
  

It usually makes me weepy. It always floods my brain with all sorts of pleased feelings.

This year I also saw a number of "dayhome grads" from years past. Running to support mental health.

This usually throws me headlong into a full case of clinical depression and self-flagellation when I remember that I forgot about my own children and they got left at home.

Playing video games.

I'm not one of those moms who forgets to put herself "into the equation". I'm the one who forgets to factor in the kids. Woops.

Now I'm going to dredge up some really good things, just for balance.

• After just a lot too much whining this morning, a walk to the park was the only sensible remedy. Everyone was instantly happy. Well, I was at least less irritated, if not exactly happy. I said a little prayer in my head that went something like; "God, I sure could use a nice little interaction. A little pick-me-up, a teensy bit of encouragement..... like from an adult, if that's within the realm of possibility". Now I"m not exactly in a place where I treat God like this any more. I don't usually ask him for much of anything, usually choosing instead to give God credit for the good stuff, and choosing to belief Him for the un-nice stuff. I talk to God about the things he's already into, like pretty much anything that's good. But I don't beg for good weather, or instant healing, (well, I have. But I don't right now), or beg for "a good day". I just think that makes God pocket-sized, and I have plenty of buttons for that.
  

But anyway. I did say this little mental prayer about feeling discouraged, and wishing for a kind word. I did. But with my feet firmly planted in this world, I looked forward to the zip line at the park. The kids love it and Ive been so pleased that the town put it up for us. After a longish walk, we arrived at the park to discover that some rather large people had tied the zip line rope in many many knots, rendering the ride inappropriate for little bodies.

My outlook on life sunk just a little lower, but we busied ourselves with what was left untampered.

Meanwhile another mom and her kidlets wandered into the park. We introduced ourselves, as we lonely women are wont to do on these quiet daytime adventures with minions of preschoolers in tow.

She was lovely, and easy to talk to, and encouraging.

Now. I"m not going to suggest that God, who is probably busy with Israel, Syria, and the melting icecaps went out of his way to prod another woman and her children out of her house at such and such a time so that she could lift my spirits in the park. But I did meet her, and it was good. So, I say Thank God.

• Second. For all the ways that I feel utterly inadequate as a mother, there are certain things that have been done well in spite of it all. This coming weekend is our annual trek to Riding Mountain National Park to celebrate Thanksgiving; a tradition that my parents began well before I was born. So, for about the 50th time, the Kehlers will be taking a scenic drive northwest, taking in the sights and smells of a beautiful autumn, going on a lot of hikes, eating a large bird, and generally celebrating.
  

At times I do recognize my own great fortune.

Which makes me even more frustrated that I'm prone to these Eeyore-esque musings.

• In other news, carpeted basements are nice. Even though I'm not at all a fan of carpet.
  
• And did you know that a heavy duty hinge; needed to hang the ancient doors that I insisted upon, cost $46.00 a piece at Home Depot?
  

Outrage! Outrage, I say.

• Some people foster parent. Wow, just wow.

That's all I'm going to say, tell me something random about yourself; I feel like I've done all the talking again.....

 

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The Way of It

The boy is found hunched over his art homework.

I position myself to take a photo.

He hides.

I get all stealthy and sneaked a shot or two, wanting some tangible record of my son's latent brilliance.

I was careful to not photograph his face, as he'd told me he didn't like his face on photos.

After a few quick, careful snapshots, I set down the camera.

Which he promptly picks back up.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And that's life

With my brilliant boy.

 

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