mud spice: mucking about in art and motherhood

I have so many photos to post that I don’t even know where to start.

Last month was the kitchen renovations. Let’s start there.
Chris tore up the kitchen and along with the help of Shane and our plumber, Eamon, they put it all back together again. We made a little make-shift camping style kitchen in the living room and cooked downstairs with Juliet and Shane.

Then came the destruction.

And then the re-flooring.

Here’s Chris and Shane working hard on the floors.

And then came all the plumbing work.

Isabela got the stomach flu one of the days of the renovations, so she spent part of the day napping on the couch and watching TV (a rare treat in our house these days).

Diego joined her for a little bit of it.

Then Shane helped put all the IKEA cabinets together.

And finally the cabinets were placed back in the kitchen.

It took piles and piles of tools.

Ahhhh. At last the countertops are on and the precious dishwasher, which was the whole reason that these kitchen renovations got started in the first place, is installed.

And yes, now we have a wonderful new, beautiful kitchen. Still not fully finished as we’re waiting on some tiling and some last detail things, but all in all, a brand new kitchen.

Some things of beauty…

From a recent wedding we attended.

Chris and Mamadou tearing up the dance floor with some African drumming.

And some very rare snow in the middle of April.

Being sick and tired for so long I could see myself slipping into self-pity (more often than I’d like to admit). And so to combat that, I like to remember some of the things that I am thankful for.

I’m thankful…

1. That I’m starting to slowly regain my energy and the nausea is slowly disappearing.

2. That Isabela and Diego have learned to play peacefully together and more days than not spend in this wonderful stage.

3. That glimmers of summer and warmer weather are starting to appear.

4. That my husband takes my kids out every Saturday morning so I can sleep in, do art, email, blog, or just lay in my hammock.

5. That Isabela got accepted (by lottery) into the free public montessori school just two minutes away from our house.

6. That soon, oodles of family and friends will be joining us for the summer.

In other news, our kitchen is soon to be shredded and IKEA will be moving in, along with a long awaited and highly anticipated dishwasher.

It has been a very long and painful two months of nausea and utter exhaustion, but it looks like I’m starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. I actually had a whole morning yesterday where I didn’t feel nauseous and had enough energy to take the kids to the library and go grocery shopping. Wow.

The last two months my prayers have been something like this, “God, please give me short term memory right now so that I can forget all this pain when it’s over.” Along with a frequent mantra of, “I love my easy and joyful pregnancy.”

Thankfully, I am near the end.

To celebrate, I hung up my beloved hammock in our living room. A project I’ve been wanted to do for oh, 4 years or so.

Ahhh. Heavenly.

Today I am 32 and just popped my first gray hair a few weeks ago. I also thought it would be an appropriate time to share that baby number three is on its way, due in October! Diego doesn’t really get it yet, but Isabela, the day I found out I was pregnant said,

“Mama, I’m really happy we’re having another baby, but I’m worried it’s going to be a boy. We already have too many boys in our house.”

Juliet just found out she’s having a boy, so if it turns out that our baby is a boy, then yes, Isabela will be drastically outnumbered. Of course, she will make a good ring leader to the four younger ones in the house.

My grandfather has a tradition of writing birthday poems each for us, summarizing our year in a most delightful way. This is my birthday poem that I just received and wanted to share. Thank you, Grandpa!

Well, Mrs. Mudspice who likes to muck around,
Looks like you are getting hits as your blog is noticeably found.
Just wanted to alert you that Spring is here,
Oh Yes! Also Happy Birthday to our granddaughter we hold so dear.

Are people starting to notice your beautiful glow?
In that for the third time you are starting to show.
You have always been one to make things really hum,
That is why you have been a fantastic mum.

Know that your Hubby Chris is delighted to have one more,
He is a grand person you both admire and adore.
Looks like you will need two more cardboard boxes for the kids to play,
Most ingenious of you and Juliet for many a rainy day.

Isabela and Diego will be overjoyed with their new sib too,
Olee and his bro the same when their new cousin is due.
The Sun sign of Aries indicates for you a bright and happy future,
You have much going for you that is for sure.

To our ‘76er and trilingual nieta we say Feliz Cumpleaños,
Have a wonderful day celebrating your numero treinta y dos.

Thanks to Claire Garland and her book, Toys to Sew, I have created these three sweet handmade dolls for the kids for Ayyam-i-ha.

Really, the process of creating these dolls has helped me to overcome a lot of my sewing fears and perhaps prejudices as well. In fact I liked it so much that I realized I would be able to do it even more and faster with a sewing machine, so I asked Chris to buy me one as my Ayyam-i-ha present.

So here is the Isabela Doll in her pajamas and bunny slippers.

The Diego Doll with his “Meow Meow” shirt riding along in the bus.

The Olee Doll with his Winnie the Pooh pajamas.

The Isabela doll here getting ready for a dance party with her dancing clothes.

And finally, the cousins wearing their party hats at the Ayyam-i-ha party.

I used Juliet’s felt cupcake tutorial to make these delicious felt cupcake toys as gifts for the kids this week as it is now Ayyam-i-ha!

My sister is 4 months pregnant now and I was thinking about how Olee and his new brother or sister are already starting to bond. Even though they haven’t seen each other yet, the baby can hear Olee, and Olee can hear that baby’s heart beat at the midwife appointments.

Around the painting I inscribed a beautiful little prayer by Baha’u'llah. It is meant to be whispered three times into each ear of the newborn baby.

“Verily, thou hast come by the command of God! Thou hast appeared to speak of Him, and thou hast been created to serve Him who is the Dear, the Beloved!”

I’ll tell you what’s wrong with this picture. My parents and my in-laws all together on vacation in Malaysia while I’m in freezing cold Canada (poor me).

But to be perfectly serious, it’s quite remarkable that my family and my in-laws all want to vacation together and that our family has so much unity. It’s also quite remarkable that my children get to grow up seeing their grandparents every week over i-chat and watching a specially tailored puppet show just for them. It’s ‘The Jetsons’ come to real life.

And at least we have Tia Lia for a little while now.

Diego was a surprise pregnancy. In fact, we had just decided to wait a year before having another child, but I was feeling really sick and went to the doctor later that morning, only to find out that I was pregnant. We thought God must have gotten a good laugh out of our decision to wait.

Well along came Diego and for the first year of his life, he was so calm, easy going and relaxed. I called him God’s mercy on me, because I don’t think I would’ve been able to handle two stubborn, strong-willed children (Isabela was enough).

Diego was born incredibly strong. He could lift his whole upper body up on his own at two weeks old.

He learned how to walk in my parent’s swimming pool in Malaysia where he would take a few steps and then fall under water. We’d pull him up and as if nothing had happened, he’d take a few more steps.

He also started potty training himself, all on his own, at a year and a half.

Diego is adventurous and courageous and extremely confident with his body. He is a strong kinesthetic learner and fiercely devoted to his older sister, Isabela. Diego has an enthusiastic and joyful spirit and a love of being right in the middle of everything.

Happy Birthday, Diego!

According to Isabela, it’s not a party without a party hat.

Our dear Granny came all the way over here just for Diego’s birthday.

And to top it off we had snow that day too! And a whole snow family came to visit.

But some hungry little ones snacked on their noses.

Alas, the stomach flu has finally caught up with me, even though I managed to bypass it last month when everyone else in the house had it. Needless to say, I’ve been spending an ridiculous amount of time watching TV and movies, mostly on quicksilverscreen.com which is bringing me back into the realm of TV addiction, which I have worked so hard to avoid.

We learned the secret from the hospital last year on how to stop throwing up. It really helped me yesterday. Just skip this part if you’re feeling queasy, but it may help you one day. After an hour has passed with no vomiting, then take a few sips of water. If you can hold that down, continue over the next few hours with just sips of water. Then after 6 hours has passed with no vomiting, take a few bites of simple food, like crackers or rice. If that stays, then keep taking small bites slowly over the next few hours.

Then move on to the spiritual healing of the illness. Vomiting is a violent rejection of ideas or fear of the new (from You Can Heal Your Life, by Louise Hay). The affirmation is: “I digest life safely and joyously. Only good comes to me and through me.”

And, as may be obvious by my last posting about kids sharing a room, I have a lot of fear of new things right now, which I’m trying to sort out. In fact, the whole bedtime thing is actually getting better, especially now that we but a childproof lock on the door handle at night so Diego can’t run out. I’ve also spent this last week going from school to school in preparation for Isabela starting kindergarten next year. That scares me a lot. In fact my flu hit the strongest on the day when I came back from visiting a public montessori school close to our house, which I most wanted her to go to, but where I found out they only have 6 spots available (based on lottery) due to all the siblings entering. It’s all in God’s hands. Detach. Let go.

Maybe we’re just plain crazy, but I know that kids all over the world do share rooms. I know it is possible. It’s just like when I did when I was learning to drive - I was scared out of my mind, but reassuring myself by saying, “Please all over the world drive cars. I can do it too.”

Only now I’m telling myself, “Children all over the world share bedrooms. Ours can do it too.”

They’ve been both sleeping through the night for almost a year now. They both learned to go to sleep by themselves, in their own rooms, and generally pretty quickly after we put them to bed at 7pm.

All of these things I mention, though they don’t sound like much, are some of the hugest milestones a parent with young children can reach. A full night sleep brings a parent back their sanity. Which is why I’m wondering if I’m just plain crazy to now try to teach them to sleep in the same room. Help, please! We’re ready to have our room back (since we’ve been sleeping in the computer/guest room for the last year).

The issue here is that now that they’re in the same room they think it’s party time! Time to play. All the way till 10pm which caused a nervous breakdown for me last night when I was ready to go to bed at 9pm, but had to keep sending Diego back into the room. Most unfortunately he just learned how to open doors on their second night of sharing a room. Bad timing.

The last few nights episodes have bubbled up some anger in me. I just created some new affirmations for myself to help me through this phase.

“I am flexible and patient. I let go of control and trust in my children’s capacity. I love my easy joyful life.”

On the positive side, they haven’t hit each other and they have eventually settled down on their own and slept through the night (even though it’s taken an hour and a half to three hours to do it). And I am reminding myself that it takes about three weeks to create a new habit. But I’m not sure if I’ll make it through the three weeks though. Help, please. Any have any advice for this one?

Thanks for everyone’s feedback about the blog header! I’m trying out a new one right now but I’m thinking I may re-paint the image. Being a somewhat newcomer to watercolors, I bought a pad of watercolor paper from a local art store and was having a great time using it. When it ran out last week, I pulled out an older, different type/brand of watercolor paper (which I painted the blog header on) and it just wasn’t doing any of the same things that the older paper was doing. I had no idea that watercolors were so dependent on the right kind of paper.

I think it’s time to go back to the art store.

Well, in the mean time, I’ve been sewing up a storm this week, since Ayyam-i-ha (the time of gift giving and celebration for Baha’is) is just around the corner. I really haven’t ever sewn much in my life, except the occasion button or pant hem. But I’m starting to have a lot of fun creating all kinds of toys out of felt for the kids.

It’s all been a huge learning experience. I made a felt fire truck (like a stuffed animal, but not an animal, a fire truck) for Diego’s birthday last week, which I still haven’t posted photos of yet, but fortunately Juliet did! I think she’s gotten motivated on her blog since she just a a fancy new camera for her birthday.

A well, back to the felt fire truck, with barely a week of play time, Diego already managed to rip two of the tires off, which I just re-sewed back on last night.

Here is the felt “stuffed” fire truck again (only because I’m so proud of it since it was the first toy I’ve ever sewn).

It was quite serendipitous that my friend Anisa organized a trip for toddlers and preschoolers to visit a fire station the day before Diego’s birthday. We were all mesmerized by the trucks.

They let us climb into their brand new hazardous materials fire truck ($1.5 million) that expands with the push of a button and has a complete office with three computers in the front.

We all got a turn to sit in the fire truck and pretend to drive. Isabela bounced up first without a hesitation.

Diego did not feel so eager.

And Olee. Well, Olee might just become a fire fighter one day.

He was so upset when it was his turn to get off that he self initiated a whole second and third round of driving turns later on.

And shortly after that they pulled out a fire truck and raised the 110 foot ladder to show us and one of the fire fighters climbed all the way to the top. Olee was so devastated that he couldn’t climb it that he sat on the side and cried and cried saying, “Climb the ladder too, please. Climb the ladder too, please.”

Finally Anisa got all geared up with fire clothes, boots, hat, ax, rope, hose and first aid kit. The whole deal weighed close to 100lbs in the end. Go Anisa!

The fire fighters were so friendly and so eager to show the kids all of the neat things about their job. If you ever want to visit a fire station, I highly recommend the Vancouver Fire Station up at UBC (University of British Columbia). They were fantastic. Stickers and coloring books to take home in the end as well. They were fantastic (did I say that already?)

I’m trying out a new header up on the top of the blog. I’m not quite sure what I think of it. Here are a couple versions I’ve been trying out. Any feedback from anyone? Does anyone have any preferences?

It seems as though we have all finally emerged from the dark hole of the stomach flu.

Last week when we were still in the midst of it, I had to go out to buy tile for the bathroom repairs and Juliet had to go out to pick up a package, so vomiting Shane was left in charge with vomiting Diego and vomiting Olee.

Beds in the living room, beds in the kitchen. Loaded up with piles of towels for easy puke and wash. We did at least 50 loads of laundry. Well, maybe 49. We didn’t actually keep track, but the poor old washer did not get one second break.

This was a week where we dearly missed having our parents live close by (hint hint). Fortunately we all took turns being sick and somehow, despite the snotty nose, Isabela missed it completely. She fully enjoyed the picnics in the living room though.

A week of non-stop vomiting.

A new bathroom!

A birthday!

Happy Birthday, (Tia) Juliet!

Here is my question. Is it possible to live in North America and not be affected by the body image blues?

We are bombarded by images that tell us it is to beautiful and just how important it is for us to be beautiful in order to be popular, successful, famous or rich. When I was a teenager, I was obsessed with popular media, just like most teenagers are. I was fortunate, however, to have my strong, educated mother. She taught ‘gender issues’ classes at my school and helped us understand the powerful affect of the media on our self-esteem and on the way we view ourselves.

I remember her reading and talking about a book called ‘Reviving Ophelia: Saving the selves of adolescent girls’ by Mary Pipher. Now that I am a mother with a daughter as well, I came across this book and knew it was time for me to prepare myself. What an amazing book! Every parent with a daughter would benefit so much from reading it.

After living for a year in Mexico where I was away from North American popular culture, I came back home for my last year of university. I hadn’t read a fashion magazine for a long time, but saw one at a friend’s house, picked it up and flipped through it for a few minutes. The obvious plummeting effects on my self-esteem shocked me. I was no longer desensitized to the north american media. My time away from it had made me sensitive to it and aware of its effects on me in a way that I never had experienced before, even with the gender issues classes from my mom. I made the conscious choice to stop looking at fashion magazines to protect my health and self-esteem.

Well now, 10 years later, I walk into a Lululemon Athletica store - a very popular clothing store here in Vancouver with very tight stretchy clothes. I walk into the change room, try on a pair of pants, and suddenly I have the exact same feeling as I did 10 years ago looking at the fashion magazines and feeling my self-esteem drop onto the floor. I do not look like a fashion model. I look 4 months pregnant (except that I’m not pregnant). Welcome back, body image blues.

Adolescents obsess about their bodies because they are constantly changing, poking out in new places and getting lumpy, curvy and well, different. Pregnancy is the same obsession. It’s an over-awareness of the body’s changes. Post-pregnancy, though not as dramatic carries that same awareness. “Wow! I fit back into those pants again!” or “Wow! Two years post-pregnancy and I still don’t fit into those pants yet!”

So back to my question. Is it possible to live in North America and not be affected by the body image blues?

Isabela, since watching me work on sewing Diego’s stuffed fire truck (see previous post for photo), was adamant that she wanted to learn how to sew as well. I had tried teaching her a few other times, but she usually got bored quickly and wanted to sort the buttons, or look at the different colored thread instead.

This time I got a special project ready for her: a little baby blanket made out of felt with a picture of her on top. I had the purple and red pieces cut and she eagerly sewed, with minimal help from me, the red patch with the picture of the girl onto the purple blanket.

After that, she took it to a whole new level of creativity, gluing on sequence and enormous pink buttons. The final touch was a piece of blue felt which she glued on to the purple felt and then trimmed the edges.

Really, it’s something that I want to hang on the wall, I’m so amazed by what she made.

A few days ago when we were getting ready in the morning, I overheard Isabela say to Diego,

“Come! I want to show you what I made!”

And she took him into her room and explained to him all about a book that she had made of our family.

Sometime between when we said “Good night” and when we said “Good morning” to her she created an amazing 9 page booklet which she taped together and drew a pictures of the members of our family. When I saw it I was really struck at how much it reminded of something I would have made when I was her age.

Here is the book, which you can see how she taped together on the sides.

I think this has to be one of my most favorite drawing ages in children. She’s starting to draw people and things, but everything is completely magical and out of proportion. It reminds of one of my favorite literary genres, the latin american infused “magical realism”. Everything is exaggerated and nothing is quite as it seems, yet in a very realistic manner.

So here is a series of her extraordinary drawings from her very first book.

It all started last week when I woke up and Juliet suggested I look out our front window.

Our neighbour’s tree fell over on top of our fence in the middle of the night, just missing the kid’s slide, whew! Chris and Shane managed to clean it up and surprisingly were able to completely fix the fence as well. Now we have a fun leaves and branches pile for the kids to play on sitting on our yard.

The next day I decided to take Isabela ice skating for the first time, since she’d be asking me regularly for the a few weeks. When I used to teach ice skating, many many moons ago, the very first thing we would teach the kids to do was to learn how to fall down and then get back up. I spent about 40 minutes doing that with Isabela, telling her over and over it was ok to fall down, to make lots of mistakes and how courageous and confident she was.

Suddenly her confidence was boosted up from all of that and she pushed my hand away and started skating all on her own, much to my surprise. Well, walking on skates is a more accurate description, but that’s the next step after learning how to fall and get back up. She spent 20 minutes skating around by herself and desperately did not want to leave. We were a proud couple of parents standing there watching her.

Two days later Chris got all four wisdom teeth pulled. He’s been recovering a huge deal faster than I did, but needs those pain killers, nonetheless.

Two days after that our favorite contractor, Eamon, came by because we’ve had some serious leaking from our bathroom into the ceiling downstairs. And before we even knew what had happened, our bathroom looked like this:

And currently looks like this:

Ah, yes. With a little bit of me in there too.

Somewhere in between all of that I made my first ever sewn, stuffed animal for Diego’s 2nd birthday that’s soon approaching. But since Diego is 2, and most 2 year olds, regardless of gender, love cars and trucks, I made Diego a stuffed fire truck. I took all of the stitching out at one point because, being my first time, I didn’t realize that I had to do a mirror image on the two sides until I had already sewn it. A real learning experience.

Then my sister in law once removed or something like that, Courtney, came for a weekend visit from Alberta with her one and a half year old daughter, Aria.

And finally, whether it was a virus on the air, or the Vietnamese soup we ate for dinner last night, both Olee and Diego woke up this morning throwing up one after the other all morning long.

Hopefully this next week will be less eventful.

Our snowfall has been a little anticlimactic this year. A month ago we had two great days of snow. And then nothing. So we made the 20 minute trek (well, drive) up to the top of Mt. Seymour, a local ski hill with a small sledding hill. We didn’t actually make it over to the sledding hill because it was “too scary” and a little too steep for them, but we had a blast playing in the snow, sledding down the mini hills, and making snow forts.

Chris and Diego.

Juliet pulling Olee and Isabela in the sled.

“Aunty” Meghan visiting for a week.

This is a watercolor painting that I made to remind myself that I am always supported. Actually, I made if for my brother-in-law, Shane, who threw his back out a couple of times of the last few weeks. At the same time I was have a lot of intense back pain. Usually some affirmations or a chiropractor appointment is enough to get rid of the pain, but this time it was relentless, so I needed to do some deeper digging to figure out what was really going on.

The back represents “support” as it really is the whole support for our body. And spiritually my “support” comes from God. I usually just forget that basic fact: that God is always there for me, supporting me and embracing me. I am cradled in God’s gentle embrace (well, metaphorically speaking, since I don’t believe that God is a physical being). I tend to go about my life as if I am alone, forgetting to ask for help from others, and most specifically from God. It’s sort of that first child, perfectionist syndrome, the “I can do everything by myself, thank you very much”.

Since Shane is a first child as well, we tend to have a lot of traits in common. This painting is a gift for him, but it’s also a visual reminder for me that I am always supported by God.

Here is a drawing that a illustrated and “painted” using photoshop. I’m still experimenting a lot with this technique, but it’s pretty fun.

So this painting, although it just shows laundry, is really about my whole process with coming to realize that my primary focus for this next year is going to be on peacefulness. I came to it about a month ago and have been slowly putting the pieces together of what it means in my life and how to practice it.

So here’s the long story about how I figured it out.

At the end of November we went on a trip to visit some friends in Seattle. While I was there, I was talking with a friend that we were staying with, telling him how scattered I felt and how I had so many things that I was interested in and wanted to do, but felt overwhelmed by what to start or which one to work on, so I just felt like dumping it all and doing nothing.

So my friend say, “Erika, you can’t do it all. But you can do one or two. So just choose one or two to focus on.”

I knew he was right, but I just didn’t know what to focus on and I had a day or two where I felt like I was going through a mid-life crisis, trying to figure out what to do with my life. Chris helped talk me through it and suggested that it was an an incredible opportunity because I could do anything I wanted to do. The problem was I just didn’t know what to choose.

One night I ended up talking with my brother in law, Shane, and he told me the whole detailed story about how and why he chose to stop working as an actor and become a personal trainer instead. He looked back at his last 5 years and reflected on what he had learned and where the holes in his learning were - in other words, what he needed to learn next. He decided that ‘excellence’ was the quality that he needed to pursue and chose three areas of his life to focus on in order to pursue excellence.

His process really inspired me and I thought for a while that excellence was the quality that I needed to focus on as well. But when I sat down and reflected on my last 5 -10 years to see what I’ve learned, I realized that I already know how to pursue excellence. But it was very clear that what I really need to learn at this stage in my life with small children at home and limited time to myself is peacefulness.

So with peacefulness as my overall focus, I sat down to meditate on what few things I should focus on in order to help me achieve this goal. And then it became very clear.

Number one: journaling. Journaling helps me to sort out all of my issues. To reflect on my day, my life, my health, my children, my relationships and my dreams (night dreams). Journaling is the first step to bringing me peacefulness.

Number two: art. I wasn’t sure about how or why art was going to bring me peacefulness. Sometimes when I meditate, I receive an answer to something, but it takes me while to figure out exactly how all the pieces fit together.

When I think about art, I often have a surge of my negative issues: I feel self-conscious that other’s will judge or criticize me, I have way too high expectations of myself, I feel perfectionistic, controlling, judgmental and critical. I shy away from those emotions by avoiding art.

But when I actually do art, I let go of control, my self-consciousness disappears, I am fully present in the moment, and I feel connected to the invisible, spiritual reality. I feel at peace.

Art, therefore, brings me peacefulness because it forces me to confront all of my negative issues and to let them go.

Ah. Turkey and family. A good mix.

Check out this amazing turkey!

And the amazing woman who made it! My grandmother-in-law, Joyce.

And here’s Bill setting the table. Oops! Caught by surprise!

Great uncle Jack reading a book to Isabela.

Cousin-in-law Alex, Diego and Chris. When I first met Alex at the University of Victoria photo club 12 years ago, I never would have guessed that one day I’d be having family dinners with him!

And finally Diego and I. Since I’m usually holding the camera, in order for me to be a picture, I usually end up taking one of myself. Nice stretched out arm.

I wish someone would have told me 6 months ago when I was up to my armpits deep in sibling rivalry that one day it would get better.

There is nothing sweeter in the world than seeing your children giggle and play together.

Here is the watercolor painting that I finished of the three of us during nap time/ quiet time/ tranquility-alone time.

My focus for this coming year is on bringing peacefulness to all aspects of my life. More about that journey on another post….

I’ve been really struggling recently to figure out how to make peace with Christmas. It is such a hugely sensorial experience that absolutely can not be avoided and excites the visual senses. Everywhere we go now, we see all the lights on the houses, the decorations in stores and the trees decorated.   

I am trying to acknowledge the beauty around us without creating a feeling of materialistic desire or feeling left out (since we’re Baha’is so we celebrate Ayyam-i-ha in February instead of Christmas in December). But I always grew up feeling left out as a child, particularly at school when we had to write little essays about what we received for Christmas presents. And I always lied about the gifts I (didn’t really) received.

And so when Christmas is literally EVERYWHERE on houses, in stores, inside homes, everywhere I go, well, it’s time for me to make some peace with Christmas. My first tendency was to lie to Isabela (”They’re Ayyam-i-ha lights!”) My second approach was to describe all of the different religions and how we all celebrate our own special holy days. This lead her to say: “Let’s go ask the people in that house if their lights are for Christmas, Hannukah, Divali, or Ayyam-i-ha!” Ok, I guess this one is not so bad, except that I see the flashing Christmas tree decorations and assume that they are Christians. So in way this is a lie as well.

Though now I have to wonder, living in Vancouver where the majority of the population is either asian or east indian. Many of them “celebrate” Christmas, though it has no religious conotation or meaning at all. It is just a commercial and cultural holiday that they have adopted, just like we celebrate Canada Day (or Fourth of July) without really knowing why. We just know that it’s the time of year you can set off a lot of firecrackers without calls to the police.

So making peace with not celebrating Christmas, I guess means making peace with my own commercial or materialistic desires AND making peace with not following along with the culture. Which I’ve just learned from reading my Dad’s blog today that this is usually especially hard for the oldest child in the family to do.

I always felt left out and different than others when I was growing up and so I have a strong desire to want to protect my children from that. But the fact is, feeling different and left out are my issues, not theirs. When I get over my issues, then I will not pass them on to my children.

This is my first attempt at “painting” on photoshop, using an illustration that I first drew out, photographed (since I don’t have a scanner) and then opened up on photoshop to “paint”. The really fun part about it is that you can change the colors as often as you like. Not so easy with watercolors.

Yesterday morning we woke up to our first snow of the season and despite how much I dislike the cold, there is something so magical about the first snow. It’s especially exciting with young children. Their enthusiasm is contagious. So we spent yesterday and today sledding down the hill in our back alley and making snowmen and snow forts with a neighbor and her children.

Isabela’s sudden interest in volcanoes and fire sparked a library search of volcano books. And I found one, in particular, that has some great science experiments to do at home. Janice VanCleave’s Volcanoes: Mind-boggling experiments you can turn into science fair projects. It’s wonderful.

So here is her recipe for creating an erupting volcano:

1 large bottle
large baking pan
1 TB flour
1 TB baking soda
20 drops red food coloring

Put the bottle in the pan. Pour the flour, baking soda and food coloring inside the bottle.

1 cup vinegar

Pour 1/2 cup of vinegar into the bottle. Watch it explode! When the bubbles die down, pour the rest of the vinegar in to make it erupt again.

And then you can talk a little bit about science…
“The baking soda reacts with the vinegar, producing carbon dioxide gas. As the gas forms, it expands quickly, pushing the liquid and the flour particles out the top of the bottle. The mixture of the gas, flour, red food coloring, and liquid produces the foam, which simulates the foamy magma in an active volcanic eruption.” p.21

(Ah. Pink lava. Oops! Ran out of food coloring.)

Going in for a closer look.

Ah ha! A real volcano. 12 years ago in Guatemala. A real volcano, and me in front of it! Wearing a garbage bag raincoat, nonetheless.

Well, ok, my dad (aka my therapist) suggested that I need a little more creativity in my life. I’m wondering if creativity is the opposite of control? In other words, to let go of control, do I just need to be more creative?

Well, here is something creative that I’ve been working on. A new watercolor/drawing that is moving forward ever so slowly. It’s not finished yet (I’m sure that pretty obvious), but here it is.

This one is called “Naptime Bliss”. Me lounging in the pool with a book, Diego napping on the hammock, and Isa playing on a boat. And we’re all on the 4 star private resort island that my parents treated us to last year (Rebak Marina, off of Langkawi Island in Malaysia). This is what naptime/quiet time is for me. Kind of like a 4 star resort.

I seriously don’t know how parents get through the day without a mid afternoon rest. Kind of like how latin cutures take siestas. They are refreshing and healing. I know it’s hard to get the kids into the habit of playing by themselves and staying in their room alone. New habits are hard to make. (See this posting for tips on how to create this habit). I think I’d go insane without this one.

I was trying to imagine carving pumpkins with toddlers and preschoolers - all that goo being flung everywhere and sharp knives. Not a good mix. So I opted for decorated mini pumpkins which we did at Laika’s house with her sons, Eshan and Avy.

Next came our usual, one hour before Halloween, costume making madness. We decided to be a butterfly/fairy family since we have a whole lot of fairy outfits kicking around our house lately. So we made some wings out of cereal boxes and taped purple tissue over them.

And voila! Butterfly family number one.

Butterfly family number two.

We made it around two whole blocks, and a ton of stairs with all of them. The main commentary by Diego was, “Dark!” “Dark!” reminding us that he doesn’t get out at night too often. Fortunately at home, when they were looking through their loot bag, Diego thought the candy was toys (”marbles”) and both kids completely forgot about the candy the next day.

Really a rather odd holiday all-in-all. I will dress up, then yell something at you and you will reward me for yelling at you with treats. Nevertheless, it was fun to see neighbors that we sometimes only see once a year.