this stage

So, the New Year is off to a cracking start.

In between recovering from the last month of the last year (moving out of our old home, moving in to our new home, friends visiting, my father-in-law's visit, my cousin's visit, my parents' visit, Christmas celebrations, celebrating the New Year in Kelowna), there was the week I battled strep throat, and passed it on to the wife. That same week, my daughter started pre-school and the wife interviewed for a new job. The following week, my wife got the job she interviewed for, at which point, our family was plunged into an entirely new schedule, and we all suffered through the cold the girl brought back from her first week of pre-school. Shortly after recovery, we spent some time with friends, registered the boy for kindergarten, and then my cousin came for another visit.

Still with me?

We are at the tail end of second month of the year and like most families, (after overcoming yet another cold virus cycle - that makes 3 sick cycles this year so far - if you're keeping up) the spectacle production of our days feature 2 pick-ups, 2 drop-offs, 2 full-time jobs, not to mention the very serious and laughable work of parenting - which includes but is not limited to: 3 meals, 2 snack intermissions, some sort of educational or creative or active adventure (preferably outdoor), television breaks, hugs, kisses, toddler tantrums, mommy tantrums, tickle fights, actual fights, all the clean up along the way,  and then (finally) the dancing bedtime finale that ends with a final pirouette and spirit fingers when toddler eyelids drop like curtains. 

Then of course, post-production activities ensue: strike whatever the living room and kitchen ended up looking like after the toddler frat party. Pre-set for for the opening breakfast number the following morning. Discuss parenting production notes with the wife. Knit-frog-knit-surrender-to-sleep.

Everyday is a comedy of errors, I tell you. Every day is full. Every day is an opportunity to restart, redo, reflect, reconnect, and get better at the craft. 

I have vowed that every day there will be a glass of wine.

I turned 38 yesterday.

I spent 9 hours of my birthday with the wife, away from our daily performance as co-parents and worker-bees. We went to the ocean and amused ourselves with the triptych of water, sand, and snow. We visited with a friend. We ate Cambodian food (best chicken wings in the city, I think). We did a teensy bit of shopping. 

While I enjoyed every second of it, wished for more time even in the moment, I missed my forever birthday gifts and fellow cast-members all together, centre stage.

This boy has been wrapping presents for me for weeks now, in anticipation of my birthday.  Each gorgeous bundle is a meticulous wonder of tape, ribbon, and paper. Each wrapped token: a toy car, a single wooden block, a box of tea from the cupboard, his love, his intention to delight, all of his generosity, every ounce of his creativity. 

This sweet little girl that hugged me happy birthday and tells me she loves me everyday. She sings to her own tune with her own lyrics.  She, who loves to sit and be still, read to. She, who lets me hold her hand any time I want. She is everyday, her own gift. 

This wife who works so hard to give me everything I want, to make all of us happy. Even when making me happy includes making me another throw pillow (because I really believe that there can never be enough, ever). Not only is she a true partner in every respect and I basically think she is the most adorable and best person on the planet, she bought me knitting needles for my birthday. 

Today I am back to my regularly scheduled performance as myself at the job-that-pays, at home, and at heart. 

I have been focusing on working hard for the job-that-pays, tempering the temper, laughing often, loving up on my family, mixing wine with chocolate (after actual working hours), then (hopefully) knitting.

How have you been?  

fall calls

the trees are beginning to singe.

the sun's harsh beat is receding earlier now, giving way to shadows and halos at play.

the earth basks at the waning summer light in soft focus, preparing for its time to rest. 

fall is calling. 

i am actively choosing to keep one foot in what's left of this summer. my other foot, however, is tensed and ready to sprint towards my most favourite season - chomping at the bit, to answer her call.

in the forest, part 3: the hills are alive

you know how the sound of music opens with epic aerial shots from what i am assuming are the mountains between austria and switzerland? and then the music swells and there's maria von trapp, doing a slow twirl in the middle of this open meadow, arms practically flapping to embrace the gorgeousness that surrounds her?

i've always wanted to be there.

i've always wanted to do that.

on the third day of our stay in the forest, we drove up a winding mountain road to behold a sub alpine meadow.

on the way up, we stopped at cascade lookout.

zooming in on lightning lake from the lookout
photo by ms. t* 

i love this photo. i love these kids all together.

gophers everywhere

the mountains seem to go on forever. british columbia really is beautiful. 

when we got to our hiking trail, we feasted our eyes on all that the alpine meadows had to offer (the link is from the resort page - which we definitely did not stay at).

i don't think i spoke a coherent sentence while we were up there. i wanted to drop everything, twirl forever, and channeling julie andrews, just sing! only i don't think that these hills deserved such a sound. the mountain silence was enough. also, we weren't allowed to stray from the trail. and the children were hungry and tired. and we forgot to bring the baby carrier. and it would not be an exageration to say that there were so many bugs. if i'd open my mouth long enough to attempt to sing about the hills being alive, i think a few of them would have flown into my mouth with joy in their hearts (which had already happened at the lake, so i wasn't willing to risk it again).

but boy was i enamoured with the landscape.

and i had such a crush on these flowers. dr. seuss must have come to a place like this. don't they look like something out of horton hears a who? or the lorax (the inspiration for truffula flowers perhaps)?  

apparently, some of these alpine flowers take 25 years to bloom.

i petted one of them and they are super soft. 

and there was no wind. so it's a wonder that they look to be in constant blown motion.

but for the halo of insects i developed while on the trail, i would have plunked myself down in the middle of it all and sketched for hours. i don't even think i photographed the place properly, i was swat dancing so vigorously. 

i have dreams of camping out there someday, just to buy myself the time to really take it all in.

until then, i'll be over here. doing slow mountain twirls amid fields of fuzzy flowers, in costume, as maria von trapp. all in my head. 

i know, in yesterday's post i was 12. today, i think i'm 16 going on 17 (ahem). but tomorrow, i'll be back for the final instalment of the in the forest series, "in the forest, part 4: knitting in the wild."

in the forest, part 2: deer papparazzi

in the forest, i made friends with a doe and a deer. 

i couldn't sleep our first night there. i had to pee really badly. but i had no intention of walking in the utter darkness of the forest by myself. there were bear warning signs everywhere. so i held my pee and woke myself up at first light to make my gravel-crunching journey to the bathroom, the quiet echoing through the trees. 

that's when i saw, my friend the doe. she was just there, in the middle of the camp site throughway, munching on some leaves. she stopped eating as i approached and looked into the forest. i thought she was going to bolt. and like a giddy groupie, i waved hello. and gave a high-pitched whisper only moths could hear, "it's okay. go ahead, and eat. i'm fine right here." (i think i even tee-heed.)

the doe munched on some leaves, made eye-contact with me (oh-mah-gosh), crossed the gravel path, took a sip from some water that collected on the ditch, and silently walked back in the forest. all this happened in about 30 seconds, though i could swear to you, it was at least an hour because time stands still on moments as still and magical as this. i don't think i took a breath until she left, sweet thing.

i have no photo to prove that any of this happened. but i know it did. and that's all that matters. 

the next day, my friend the doe (i'm calling her lily) brought her boyfriend, the deer (james) came to visit me. 

i am only including this shot to illustrate that there were 2 deer in my vicinity.
and that national geographic will never hire me for my wildlife photography skills. 

they happened to saunter rather nonchalantly through the woods behind our camp. so my friend christine and i, stalked them for as long as we could stand - my hands too shaky to take more than 2 clean shots of such forest patronuses celebrities.

i am aware that this is not a clean shot. but lily was feeling shy with me at that moment. 

the clean shots i took were of james, the stag.

i know. i am all sillyness. i enter the forest and suddenly i'm 12 again. 

next time, on "in the forest, part 3: the hills are alive".

rainbow of colours: favourite things

white: the sunlight in my bedroom on those sheets, that blanket, that cat

red: japanese maples, a boy in a tree, that boy in that tree.

orange: tulips on the wife's bedside table

yellow: yellow bowl next to a note from the wife with specific instructions on how to prepare my pre-set morning latte just the way i like it

green: this canopy of trees at the river beach

blue: yarn mail from a friend in new haven with padding from her stash,  bird silhouettes on pretty much anything, and those chubby little fingers.

indigo and violet: these and many of its purple-y kinds greet us everyday in the gardens around

black: the sweater i'm test knitting, the wife who has recently proclaimed herself a knitter (be still my beating heart). that's her figuring out a sweater pattern for herself! i know right? 

the last few weeks have been rough. not terrible. not harder than most. just rough... there were extenuating circumstances, you see. much of which will be revealed anon. 

but i like to think that grief (not so much the act of grieving but more in the spirit of annoyances) - and graces, go hand in hand. and these here are only some of the graces i've been hanging on to when i feel i'm at the brink of a breaking point: when there's no tea to be had for some reason or the we run out of propane when we're about to host a bbq, or when you just happen to be in hurry-up-and-wait mode.

the colours of spring and this rainbow of favourite things: yes. 

it's a new month. happy fresh start to us all.

favourite things: on valentine's day

:unexpected treats (thank you, thank you, thank you my darling wife. you know just how much you've outdone yourself.)

:handcrafted valentines from us to the kids

:handcrafted valentines from the boy. 

:valentines for the boy's preschool class; potato-stamped hearts by me, typewritten words by the wife and the girl, and the boy glued on the hearts himself.

favourite things: pumpkins

it was rare that my parents came to school events. of course, they did all my school plays and graduations, etc. but they generally didn't do things like parent-teacher interviews or multi-cultural events. and i really didn't require them to. i was a good kid, a good student. and they were busy and tired from long days commuting and working. 

once though, i made my mom come to a mother-daughter event. i don't remember much about the event itself but i do remember that there was a little contest or interview of sorts where the question, "if your daughter was a vegetable, what would she be?" was asked.

on the transit ride home, i remember being curious enough to ask my mom what vegetable she thought i was. she answered, "a squash." and i distinctly recall a suppressed laugh. 

i was mortified. 

i was in my teens. and although i generally had nothing against squash in general, i didn't want to see myself in such tough, round, seedy, stringy, and well... squat-ish light. 

i don't know if i have the squash guts to ask my mom now what she was actually thinking then.  

in my late thirties, i have no quarrel with the notion of being seen as a gourd of any kind. i think gourds are beautiful and delicious. instead, these days, i celebrate the pumpkin!

in fact, pumpkin season at our house is now in full swing.

we didn't get to the pumpkin patch this year. but the boy didn't mind. extra large buckets of pumpkins are more than enough to set our babes' sense of wonder and occasion alight.

pumpkins at rest on my dining table are so beautiful to me. we'll be carving those tonight, in time for halloween.

i made pumpkin muffins using cynthia lair's recipe from feeding the whole family. (i omitted the cloves and cardamom and instead swirled in a mixture of cream cheese and egg. so good! and it gets better every day!)

and i made a pumpkin-coloured hat for an 8-year old friend at our co-op. he's a fan of the percy jackson series. i hope he likes it.

now, it's time to get to work. and then some last-minute halloween prep. which really means a lot more work than i think i signed up for.

happy tuesday!