VanderMeander

Outta here!

2005-10-10T22:48:00.000-06:00

Well kids, I've had it. I'm outta here. And if you want to know where I'll be, you better just come over here and see if I'll tell you!!

Happy Thanksgiving, from the "perfect" North American family

2005-10-09T14:47:00.000-06:00

Well, Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I am anxiously awaiting learning how to cook all of the fixings for Thanksgiving dinner with my mom this afternoon, and hope everyone has a great day. Let's all take a minute to remember how very much we have to be thankful for. Get some perspective on all the blessings you have in your life, and try this week to make someone else's life a little more blessed. Buy someone who's hungry a sandwich. Take some clothes or toys down to your local thrift shop. Send some money to Pakistan or Central America. Don't wait. Do it!

Me, I'm thankful for my family. For a great husband. For a beautiful daughter and a cute little boy who wore his first tie to church this morning! I'm also thankful for my extended family and family-in-law. For their example and love. And for friends to be open with and who help us become the people we want to be. I'm thankful for a house and a bed and for more than enough things to meet daily needs. For a beautiful country and beautiful world with so much diversity -- so many things to see and experience and people to learn from. But this year, I'm especially thankful that I'm being challenged more and more to love others. To do and give what I can to those in need, and especially to teach my children to look outside of themselves. And I'm thankful for God's grace to help me with this loving and giving when I fall short.

Unheard of...

2005-10-06T23:48:00.000-06:00

It's 11:42 pm. and there is construction going on right outside my house. And what's even more astonishing is that it's either by the City or a crown corporation (SaskTel). Something must be real important. Because, let's face it, I think those guys worked about 5 hours a day when they were repairing the bridge this summer and last, and always at the height of traffic. No way you'd catch those guys working at night (heaven forbid!) when there's no traffic! I wonder what's going on. Although, I must say, I did almost take a picture of the 5 guys and 1 girl who spent all day a few days back digging a hole where the construction is going on right now. Two guys to dig, two guys to watch, and the girl for moral support, I guess. It was so funny. Your stereotypical workmen. Although, I'm sure they were wanting to take a picture of me, in my pyjamas at 4pm. Typical housewife.

"100 Posts": Let's celebrate and have some fun!

2005-10-06T21:57:00.000-06:00

The following is a post created by taking sentence #1 from post #1, sentence #2 from post #2, and so on and so forth (Unless the post doesn't have enough sentences, then I'll just take the last sentence and continue on with sentence 9 from post 9 as before). Maybe it'll be funny, I don't know.

Well, of all my dumb luck, Blogger was down this morning when I attempted rather naively to do my first blog post ever. Which means that Ctrl S = Trouble for Dixie. However, for the past 25 minutes she's been whining and crying, and we've just let her cry. I chose that phrase because whenever I have philosophical discussions, I usually end up saying "well, it really is a fine balance", or "we just need to find that balance...". Two nights ago I had a bizarre dream in which I and some unknown person were both (male) priests and bridesmaids at a wedding between Danny Devito, Diane Keaton and some other unknown person from PA, at which there were no rings, but rather large chewable vitamins were exchanged and eaten(!!). Often before bed at night I will say, "Marc stop and think for a sec... think what's going on in the world right now. But then I think, if they brought it, they must like it, so maybe they're glad to keep it for themselves. They're usually close to a centimetre longer than the other hairs, but why don't we notice them before they hit that centimetre mark? But was the breast exam really necessary? But today I did it. In it I basically looked at whether or not we can "know" an historical event better by being an eye-witness or by being removed from the event -- either in hearing an account from an eye-witness we know or even further, by studying it in history. I wonder how long it will be before I grow up...? Does this make sense to anyone? It's how people lived in our day. I don't actually know if this even helped me find the mistake, but it did prove that I was quite the conscientious little 8 year old, with way too much time on my hands. To which granny quickly pushed me off and said "Dixie, you shouldn't kiss like that... I wonder if my mom remembers it that way?!

Well, that takes me up to about post 16. And since a lot of my posts are failing to be more than 16 sentences long, I will stop at that. Interesting. Try it for yourself.

The first time I ever played with a laptop was hanging out with friends one Thanksgiving, I believe. We were all sitting around and watching football. I love to type, so I spent the entire evening (seriously, hours... the whole time) typing our conversations out, but ending sentences a little too soon or starting the next person's phrase at just the right time so that it our conversation become completely skewed and inappropriate. Quite a bit of fun. And apparently a good party game, as it got a lot of laughs when I'd read it back to everybody. (Actually, I think we still may have the conversation saved somewhere.) That's one you really gotta try.

And beware if I ever come over to your house with my laptop...

Bride & Prejudice

2005-10-06T21:36:00.000-06:00

Marc and I had a movie night last night. Meaning, I watched a girlie movie in bed and he watched "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" in the basement. $0.99 at Shopper's Drugmart, you can't go wrong with that. I thoroughly enjoyed myself. We don't normally watch separate movies, but neither one of us had any real interest in the other one's movie. And don't feel bad that I didn't get the big screen and the stereo sound, for there is no place I would rather watch tv than in bed. Man I love my bed. I think I spent the majority of Madeline's first 3 months of life in bed. Did everything in bed. She even ate pablum for the first time propped up on a pillow in our bed. I definitely take the love of my bed too far sometimes, but I have been emerging from my bedroom a lot more this past year, so don't worry.

I had to do a quick baby food run to Walmart before Marc and I settled in for our "separate movies" date. And it was there that I learned the struggle of Paul's words in Romans where he says "what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do". I was greatly anticipating curling up in bed and watching this movie with the lights out. And snacks are pretty much mandatory to enjoying a movie. So there I was in Walmart with McDonalds but 20 steps away. However, Marc and I had just talked about how eating out was the one thing we definitely needed to cut back on, and he had told me to buy just what we needed at Walmart. (Which by the way I did, no scouring of the children's clothing sale racks this time.) So I was fully prepared to walk out of Walmart with no McDonalds. Until I got to the exit and someone was eating fries right by the door, and I got a whiff. All the way to the car I debated. "Now I'm really craving McDonalds, but it never tastes as good as you think it will. It will go straight to my hips, and will be a $5.00 withdrawal on our bank statement that is a waste... but it tastes sooo good. But I need something to eat during the movie and we don't really have any snacks at home..." I drove the long way out of the parking lot, so I could drive right by the other McDonalds (yes, we do have 2 McDonalds within the same parking lot complex in PA... sad, really). And I had self control. But I didn't like it. I even thought of going home, asking Marc, and then driving to Wendy's or something. But instead I got a glass of water and our last strawberry Fruit-to-go and went to watch my movie. Pathetic. I know. About 15 minutes into the movie I was so disgusted with having no snack that I made a bag of microwave popcorn, sprinkled chocolate chips on it (my piano student's suggestion -- quite good), took half to Marc, and enjoyed the other half in bed during the movie... though not as much as I would have enjoyed McDonalds. (So, do you think I should have just got the McDonalds instead of "depriving" myself to the point where I wasn't enjoying my movie? Did I over analyze the situation way more than any normal person would?)

Anyway, so I watched Bride and Prejudice. It was not bad. Not super. But not bad. I mean how can you even compare to the A & E 6 hour special? And as Marc said last night (Marc, not me... though I couldn't disagree), how good can it be with no Colin Firth. And it's true. Though William Darcy in B & P looks strikingly similar to my optometrist, there was not the same heart fluttering attachment that Colin Firth brings. But I must say I loved all of the Indian culture. It reminded me of why I want to be Hindu or Muslim every Saturday when I catch glimpses of their programming on Vision network. I loved all the dancing and the family interaction. The way they adapted the story was pretty good. But I couldn't stand that they broke into beyond lame songs, turning it into a musical, with the cheesy head nods, shoulder shrugs, and furrowed brows. Worth $0.99. Maybe a video store-price rental. Definitely not theatre worthy. And I'd only buy it if I saw it for $5.00 somewhere -- and just because I love Indian culture so much and not for its cinematic merit.

A Month in the Life of the Vanderkids

2005-10-04T14:27:00.000-06:00

Today I finally had the initiative to start going through our family pictures on the computer (we are currently 4 months behind on this -- so doing the kids albums is not going to be fun!!) So here some pictures of the kids from the past month. This is the life of two little kids called Madeline and Luke.

After a fun afternoon at the Forestry Farm zoo in Saskatoon last month.

The big, fat, happy goof in his high chair. It's struck me how odd it would be if we all ate the way babies do. Try tonight, and see if people look at you funny. Have your legs sticking out 90 degrees from your body, and keep your arms always in motion floating in front of you somewhere about shoulder level.

Madeline with some of the "spoils" from her first trip to the dentist: a "bib" with dinosaurs on it and 2 plastic dinosaurs. Not pictured are her bag to hold all of her treats, which also included a bracelet and a big bird sticker. (Thanks, Linea!)

Drawing pictures with chalk on our driveway one evening.

Luke wearing the Gap toque I found for myself at Value Village.

Madeline sitting in on a grade 6 class at Princess Margaret School. Did I mention the girl is obsessed with school? Every school we drive past she says "Mommy, that's my school! Someday I can go to it." "Someday I will go to school like my cousins." And on and on... So she was very excited to get ready with her piggy pencil case and go to the class. Though, she didn't last long in the desk and spent most of her time drawing on the chalk board.

Bathtime for the Vanderkids.

Luke in the front yard after church last Sunday. Can't get much cuter than that!!

Feeding Time

2005-10-04T14:03:00.000-06:00

This is Madeline feeding Luke last week:

This is what happens when a 2.5 year old feeds a 6 month old:

And this is how happy his sister makes him, mush-faced and all:

Oprah

2005-10-03T14:09:00.000-06:00

Marc made some comment last night about Oprah -- how she's become increasingly annoying and seems to be very full of herself.

My reply was, "Well, if you had 600 people screaming and wetting themselves when you walked into work everyday, plus millions of people watching from home, don't you think you'd be full of yourself too?!"

He understood.

An Observation on Society... or else Marc and I are just very, very lazy

2005-10-01T23:10:00.000-06:00

People are becoming perpetually more lazy. Let's think about how people communicated within cities before they had phones. Can you imagine? They actually had to walk to someone's house and talk. I get mad when I can't find the cordless phone and have to spend 5 minutes standing in the hallway talking instead! And a lot of the time I'm too lazy to roll over in bed to reach the phone, and I'll get Madeline to get it for me.

It's major effort to go a drop a letter in the mail box which is maybe 50 feet from our house. Actually, I think the only time I've ever done it is was when I was driving somewhere and hopped out of the car and dropped it in. The rest of the time I give my letters to Marc to put in the office mail. How did people survive when snail mail was their only form of written communication -- and even before the days of Purolator and FedEx?!

Ya, we're just lazy now. We don't want to move. And you want proof? (Besides that now people play tag while sitting on their butts in front of a computer?) Instead of going to get a phone book, I'll scroll through 60+ names on our phone to find the number from the call that person made to us last month. Or if I have the phone with me near the computer I'll look it up on Canada 411 instead of getting up.

However, we don't have Canada 411 bookmarked (and get ready, because here's where the ultimate laziness comes), so I'll will Google it (only having to type in "ca" before Canada 411 pops up) and then I'll click on it. (Though now I realize that it would pop up on address bar too!! -- which would save me a step.)

There is something seriously wrong with people these days (or maybe it's just me) when people like me will go to their own website (because it's bookmarked) and from there click on a link to another person's website because it's too much effort to move your hand 1 inch to type in the URL of that website.

Our grandparents are rolling over in their graves. The travelling encyclopedia salesmen probably only came around once every two years (and not like they could afford a set anyway) and the library was probably in the next town. And we get mad when we have a slow connection on our high speed internet which will lead us to Wikipedia and Google giving us information on everything we'd ever want to know. Or, heaven forbid, Blogger be down for an hour of scheduled maintenance!!

And then there's Marc, who will stand in our bedroom and watch tv a foot away from it and change the channels with the remote. (Now he says it's because the tv will swivel if he presses the buttons on it, but I've never really bought that.) Honestly, how spoiled and lazy are we when we're bitter that we can't scroll through 50 channels during the 30 second commercial break of our favourite show because we're too lazy to get off our chair and get the remote from across the room?

And then there were the two months that we didn't watch tv with our stereo sound because we couldn't find the remote for it, and it was a hastle to go to the stereo to turn it on, and then there was the possibility of having to get up to change the volume if one channel was louder than the other...

Why do we grumble about waiting in line at the automated teller where after a minute's wait we'll do a month's worth of banking and bill paying in 5 minutes? Actually I guess that's why we do internet banking, in the comfort of our own home, so we don't have to worry about going somewhere, at certain hours, parking, walking to the bank, standing in line, talking to the teller, showing her our bills, getting out cash, getting our bank receipt (remember the days of the bankbook?!). What a horrible ordeal that would be to live out every month?!

What would our grandparents think when we choose to wait 15 minutes in the McDonald's drive thru instead of going in and getting our food in 3 minutes, and when 1.5 minutes is too long to wait to heat up a pizza pop?

More tag

2005-10-01T22:28:00.000-06:00

I got tagged. Here's the assignment.

1. Go into your archive.
2. Find your 23rd post.
3. Find the fifth sentence (or closest to).
4. Post the text of the sentence in your blog along with these instructions.
5. Tag five other people to do the same.

So, here's the 5th line from my 23rd post entitled "Website gains acclaim" on June 3, 2005 (which was actually about when Lauralea first put me on her blogroll).

"It's a proud day for VanderMeander."

I'm going to tag:
1. Marc
2. Simon
3. Ang
4. Peggy
5. Becky

I covet your prayers (but not in the way you think)

2005-09-30T09:58:00.000-06:00

At Bible Study on Wednesday, Randall asked if someone wanted to close in prayer. No takers. And since my head was all muddled and my "m"s and "b"s where interchangeable at that point, I didn't volunteer either. So Randall prayed. And as soon as he got the first sentence out, I thought, "man that guy can pray". Nothing fancy. Really very simple. Just laying everything that's going on out before God.

So last night I told Marc that I "covet Randall's prayers", meaning I'm totally jealous of the way he prays. I don't know how he does it. I fall asleep when I pray. My mind is instantly distracted. I know this is a learned process, but I have a feeling that men are (or could be) better pray-ers because they don't have that "problem" of being able to multi-task and can shut their brains off to focus on just one thing easier than women.

I find that I can pray easier and definitely get more out of Bible reading when I do these things audibly, but I still find it difficult to both of these things by myself (in a group, I do infinitely better). I know the answer is not reading Foster's book on "Prayer" (which I really want to read and will read), but rather just sitting down and praying, etc. But I seem to be so bad at it and it seems so unfruitful that I get frustrated. So... any advice?

"Take me where the loons are calling" (a Connie Kaldor reference no one will get) and Motherly Guilt

2005-09-29T15:42:00.000-06:00

Picture yourself on a sandy beach on the shore of a beautiful Northern Saskatchewan lake in the Autumn. You are sitting on a large plaid blanket, wearing your favourite wool sweater which provides the perfect amount of warmth for this time of year. You've just put down one of your favourite novels and are sipping a hot beverage of your choice. The water is calm. The sun is slowly setting and its reflection on the lake is magnificent. Everything is still. Until you hear the gentle "whoo-ing" of a loon somewhere in the reeds. The sound is beautiful. The moment is beautiful. Life is good.

Now. Picture me. Around 2:30 this afternoon. Still in the bathrobe I have ventured to remove from my body for a total of 15 hours over the past 5 days (besides sleep). I am nursing a 24 pound 6 month old boy on my couch with the blinds wide open (luckily a large birch tree covers most of the window, so that the people getting their hair cut across the street don't get a free show along with their cut) who decides that a good way to nurse is to latch on for about 3 seconds and then fidget and look all around the room for the next 10. I am surrounded by a house that I have not been able to clean for the past 5 days because of the illness which I thought had gone away yesterday, but has now moved into my throat and chest. (This is also the reason for the bathrobe, though I must say I am known to stay in my pyjamas longer than most stay at home moms. Regular hygienic activities have remained constant throughout these days, however.) I look around a see piles of books and stacks of papers -- opened mail. Receiving blankets. Infant toys. A pile of hand-me down clothes from a friend. (BTW, thanks Ang!) Some Halloween face paint. Various piles of extremely small objects that my daughter enjoys playing with -- a Dora sticker here, a pile of rocks there, a Polly Pocket shoe, two tall candle holders fashioned to be a house for said Polly Pockets. A melange of shoes at the front door. A plastic bag.

When what noise do I hear from the stillness and serenity of this moment...? Why also the sound of a loon. Only it's not a loon. It's the whining of my 2.5 year old who has prematurely awoken from her afternoon nap -- like way too soon for a good day, let alone a day where I'm feeling like this. The noise repeats itself at intervals which themselves are annoying. (Seriously, she sounded exactly like a loon.) Finally she speaks. And various forms of "Mommy!" "Maaawwmmmmeee!" "Mommay!" emerge from behind her closed door. And I nearly, almost, was on the verge of... but didn't lose it. Praise the Lord that with just a few yells of "Go to sleep!" "Be quiet!" (not even major threats), she went back to sleep.

However, that was enough to bring on my third set of tears of the day (which was followed by a fourth set, upon recounting the situation to my mother). It's all just so tiring! And you know what's the most tiring of all? Not the housework. Not the breastfeeding. Not even the diapers or the whining. It's the motherly guilt that goes along with all of it. If I'm cleaning the house, I'm feeling guilty for not paying attention to the kids. If I'm playing with the kids and teaching them new things, I'm feeling guilty for the neglected dishes I will ask Marc to do when he gets home. If I'm feeling frustrated with the kids, I feel guilty because I know that I have good, calm kids for the most part. And if I'm feeling sad and frustrated about all of this , I'm feeling guilty because I know that all of this is just mundane, "no big deal" kind of stuff. I feel guilty that there are people I know (let alone in the rest of the world) going through major life crises right now, and I'm getting overwhelmed by the fact that there are countless toys under my bed and my bedside table is one big pile of papers, hair elastics, and a lone Barbie shoe. And right now, after venting (and doing the dishes and having both kids asleep in their beds), I feel better. My mind is cleared. I know I can do this and deal with them and the house. I know this is a time to be cherished, and that the time for going out into the world and helping others will come, when my children no longer need 24-7 watching. But I need to know how to get that perspective in the middle of the call of the afternoon loon, you know?!

The old gray mare, she ain't what she used to be

2005-09-28T14:47:00.000-06:00

Now my husband, Marc, may have string of faults and traits that annoy me (as I do for him), but the one thing he has always been good at is making me feeling good about myself -- my appearance. The other day I asked him, if he would still love me when (as it seems to be inevitable after nursing our first two children) I look like a woman out of a National Geographic article about Africa. Then the boy (sweet as he is and with full sincerity) said, "Of course! You're beautiful! You're so sexy!" and on and on he went. Needless to say, he made me feel a lot better!

So I've come to a few realizations. And all young moms/old moms/expectant moms/women who have gone through major weight fluctuations should read this.

#1. My breasts are not saggy, I just get to see more of the top of them and less (if any) of the bottom of them, than I have before. This should be seen as a new discovery of yourself. You're discovering more about that top half, and can put the underside to rest as a tired soldier who held up his own for the first 20 years of life and now deserves a rest.

#2. I won't be kicked constantly by the next babies we have, (resulting in many small bruises on my upper thighs), because when I nurse them laying down they really won't have to lay anywhere near my body.

#3. Kathy Bates in the hottub scene in About Schmidt is what normal women look like.

#4. I am still able to fake perkiness with the help of underwire, molded cup bras. Though I once thought they made my girls look unnatural, too perky, and akin to the bosom of "Leave it to Beaver"'s mom (and thus I deemed them the "60's mom bra"), I will now bow prostrate before the person who first molded those lycra cups and married them to the c-shaped wire.

#5. It was really very sweet and made my husband feel good when my son decided that he needed to turn his head 180 degrees while still nursing, and then latch off and smile every time my husband enters the room or makes any sort of movement near him.

#6. While watching the Seinfeld episode where Jerry and Elaine are trying to figure out if the girl at the club (played by Teri Hatcher) had fake breasts or not and in the end ditches Jerry saying "They're real and they're fantastic", my husband snickered when I referred to my pair saying "They're real and they're flat-tastic".

#7. I have merely graduated early into the elite league of motherhood. And I shouldn't feel bad that this has happened so early in life (while still in my mid 20s). Rather I should revel in the fact that I will be able to see the same sagginess make its way upon my daughter(s) and probably my granddaughters, whereas those who wait until later in life, will never be able to point and laugh at so many future generations.

Now. Doesn't that make everyone feel better?

Those Quarrelling Christians

2005-09-28T12:17:00.000-06:00

Found this quote at Simian Farmer, one of my new favourite reads:

We do not want churches because they will teach us to quarrel about God.

~Chief Joseph

My first response was, "Hey that's really funny, and really true!"

Then I thought "But hey, people always fight about everything! How many debates on politics, mercy killing, the environment, Survivor, etc. are going on right now at water coolers across the globe? Why is it okay for everyone else to quarrel, but not Christians? We are all just humans after all! Why are Christians expected to live beyond the normal standard?"

And then it hit me. Two things.

Firstly, people expect Christians to live up to higher expectations because the general Christian population these days says that they are living on a higher plane! Now, most Christians aren't, because they are constantly screwing up, but many are still claiming to have no problem ascribing to the more "noble" values & actions that Christians should have. And they're just lying. And that really bugs me. Let's be real people! Let's admit that we are in a constant struggle to do the right thing and we are constantly screwing up. Pretending that we are all high and mighty is going to do nothing but turn people away from the country club, phoney Christianity that permeates much of the Church right now. So this quote is true because (some/many) Christians pretend to have it all together when really we're just quarelling children like everybody else.

The second thing that hit me, is that it is not right to say "Why are Christians expected to live beyond the normal standard?" And the answer of course is that we (in our minds -- though many in society don't see it) know or believe that we know God and that He calls us to live a better life -- a life of love, self-sacrifice, and giving (and not one of finger wagging and posh, padded pews). I was reminded of in the Bible where it talks about teachers, etc. being judged harsher because they know more/should know better. And it's the same for those who call themselves Christians. We have an idea of what we think is right, and we need to start focusing on us living according to that and admitting we constantly fall short, rather than quarelling with our fellow Christians, and especially those outside of the churh. We judge others way more harshly than they deserve and don't bat an eye at ourselves -- when we are the ones who are going to be judged the harshest by God! It's that whole "plank in the eye" chestnut. (So I guess I better stop judging my fellow Christians in this post and work on my own issues!!)

And that's why the quotation is so funny. Because it's so frustratingly true!

(Bet you didn't think all this would come out of that little quote, eh Simon?!)

Possibly the worst day of my parenting life

2005-09-26T18:18:00.000-06:00

So I've been sick all weekend. Not getting better, but getting worse. We went to Tapestrama on Saturday night. I force Marc to go to this ethnic fair every year, but this year I think he actually liked it and didn't complain too much about the price of the food. As I was putting on my eye makeup to go out that night, I noticed that it really hurt to put even mild pressure on my eye. So I was worried I was gettting some sort of eye infection, or ear infection, as I was feeling it in my ears too.

We stayed up WAY too late on Saturday night and Madeline "helped" out by waking up scared, and as a result I didn't fall asleep until after 5am -- not what you need when you're sick. So Sunday was a total write-off. Luckily the kids were good. Luke slept in his crib and Madeline watched TV downstairs when Marc went to church, so I could sleep (and sleep I did) while he was out. I had several naps yesterday, but was stilling feeling pretty crappy. The "Martha Behind Bars" movie did cheer me up. Nothing like seeing one of your heroes getting a body cavity search on primetime television!

But Monday morning came and I was not doing well. Not at all. I was exhausted, stuffed up, groggy, fevered, lightheaded, and certainly in no condition to look after two kids all day. Luckily for me, my husband works for my father, so Marc got to take a day of "parental leave", and he stayed home to take care of his family. This went well until noon when Marc got the initiative to haul the concrete from the deck we've been in the process of tearing up for 3 months (!!) to the dump. He finally got a vehicle to move it, so I was glad to see him working on it.

Until... Madeline would not go to sleep, at all, and decided that today would be the perfect day to whine, cry and blubber for 3 hours about not wanting to sleep, and upon whining about not wanting to sleep and resultantly getting her TV watching taken away for the rest of the day, whined and blubbered and cried about wanting to watch a show. After insisting that "daddy would say yes" to the TV, even though daddy was the one who took it away in the first place, she actually spent 45 minutes crying & whining at the front window while Marc was loading concrete in the driveway (I did manage to get a short nap in during this crying spell -- cruel mother that I am), Luke also decided that he'd only sleep for 40 minutes instead of his usual 2+ hours in the afternoon, and instead spent much of the afternoon kicking me while nursing, arching his back and making his screechy "I'm uncomfortable" noises. And though it doesn't sound like much, you have to recognize that I'm sick and tired (in all of the areas those terms can apply) and had to handle 2 unbelievably whiney and irritating children by myself for 5+ hours on a day that my husband was supposed to not only be looking after the kids but me too. Plus, you guys have never heard Madeline whine. She is one persistent little girl. Marc is a very patient guy, and even he's been getting fed up quicker with her this weekend.

So too many tears were shed and too much yelling occurred between the women of the house today. Hopefully when Marc gets back from his 3rd load to the dump shortly, I can get that rest that I've been looking for since noon. At least he's bringing home supper (and even Booster Juice!), so things should start looking up soon... I hope...

A new life

2005-09-24T00:18:00.000-06:00

Tonight I had a "ladies night out" because Daddy was kind enough to watch and feed the kids on short notice. Of course "ladies night out" involves shopping at a Children's Used Clothing Sale for toys and clothes for our children and then going out for appetizers and talking about our children and children-to-be. While we were out we found out about a friend who just had her first baby yesterday morning.

I remember after Luke was born, a lady from church brought over some food and held Luke and asked how things were going and if he was healthy. Thinking it was a somewhat odd question, I told her we were a bit concerned because he was mildly jaundiced. And the lady said, "oh that's nothing! He's healthy. Praise the Lord!" (or something to that effect). It had never really occurred to me that my baby could be anything other than healthy and that I would ever really have a major ailment to worry about.

Well, this little (though once again over 9 lbs!) boy that was born yesterday is having some major issues right now. When his mom went into the hospital (after being sent home the night before) his heart rate was 60 (most babies at birth have heart rates around 130 or so). Shortly after that they lost his heart rate completely and he was taken out by a very quick emergency c-section. No heart rate at birth and it took 10 minutes, but they revived him. He was sent to Saskatoon and things seemed to be looking up, he was looking at his dad and responding to him, and then this morning he started having a few seizures.

Now, maybe it's because I've just held my own 9lb newborn only months ago, but when I think about a little new baby having seizures, it just makes me cry. You can say the word "seizure" and be flippant about it, but when you think of a little body going through that (never mind, the fear of what is causing them), it's heartbreaking.

As soon as I told Marc about this he said we needed to pray, and we did. Later, as I was doing the dishes, I started thinking about this little guy. How God made him. How God loved him. But more than that, how God could save him. You know, He's powerful enough. It wouldn't be much to fix this baby's heart, heal up a few brain cells. No big deal. Then it hit me why people get so mad at God. Because it's true. God could absolutely heal this baby. (I don't really want to get into a debate about free will and determinism here, though...) And maybe He will, and maybe He won't.

But then my thoughts went on to the idea that maybe God does not necessarily want this baby to have life (or a long life, at least). I started to think about the miscarriage that we had last year. Even though it happened very early on, it was still a hard thing to go through -- horrible, really... horribly sad. Actually the thing that made me the most sad (though it was really the happiest thing out of it all) was the hope that there was a little baby up in heaven who'd be waiting to meet its mom and dad someday. (It still makes me cry.) And I know it's a completely ludcrious thought, but sometimes I think that all of the miscarriages and stillbirths that happen are God's way of "stocking up" heaven with beautiful little babies. I know it doesn't make sense, but still there is that hope that these tragic events do not ultimately end tragically.

But for right now, that kind of philosophizing and speculation does not make a set of new parents feel any better. So, before you close my site tonight, would you say a prayer for baby Nicholas and his mom and dad? For life. For hope. For peace in all circumstances.

What translation are YOU reading?

2005-09-22T10:39:00.000-06:00

Madeline's latest obsession is David and Goliath. She's had a David & Goliath story book on her headboard for a month or two now and for about that long she's been able to tell us the story herself, saying "Israelites", "Philistines" and all. Sometimes I've thought that the story was a bit too graphic with the allusion to Goliath having his head chopped off, etc. But she seems to get more scared at the new Winnie the Pooh movie than any Bible story she's heard.

My mom lent her a David and Goliath 'Bugtime Adventures' dvd -- which tells the story and parallels it with some insects living in the dirt on the battlefied with their own set of problems. She's been watching that the past few days and it has inspired her to act out the David and Goliath with her and I taking turns as either David and Goliath. (The second time she did this I was in the shower and she came in, pullled back the curtain and asked me to be David. Luckily when she asked me to be Goliath I could use the falling down dead from the stone as an excuse to put my head back and under the water to rinse my conditioner.)

She'll use anything from a rope to a cloth belt to Luke's soother clip as her sling with stones and will whip it around and release at the appropriate time. My favourite thing is the funny, shy look she gets on her face when she thinks of something for her character to say, and the little cricked mouth she gets before she coyly says it. Such phrases include Goliath saying "Coward!! You'll never kill me!" and David saying "I'm going to shut you and all the Philistines!!"

So, I knew she knew the story and we've had fun acting out the story (several times a day). This morning she wanted to play it again, and I had Luke on my lap so I decided that he could be my character. I stood him up on my lap and held out his arms as he proclaimed "I am Goliath!!! Grrrr! Who are you little boy?" We went back and forth switching characters, and we were all having fun... until the second time she played Goliath.

Luke had his sling all ready and had just proclaimed that even though he was just a little shepherd boy, God was with him and that Goliath and the Philistines would never win. He had just begun the swinging of the sling, when Goliath began to approach at a rapid pace "air sword" in hand. David swung faster and had just released the stone when Goliath began thrusting his sword into David's chest repeatedly proclaiming "It's time for you to die!!"

Oh well... David won the next time.

Phrases I've taught my two year old in the last two days:

2005-09-21T22:53:00.000-06:00

"I ain't no foo'!"

"You wanna piece of me?!"

"Well, so's yo' mama!"

"Pull my finger."

What is it with women?

2005-09-14T12:48:00.000-06:00

Seriously. What is it with women? I just spent the past hour and a half (while watching the last Canadian Idol show only because I feel like I have to because I've watched since the Top 10 shows started, and certainly not because there are any talented singers left) looking up "birth stories" on the internet. It started at Dooce -- which just PROVES my insanity, because I've already read her birth story -- but before I had really started reading her website, so I thought I would see it in a new light (I thought it was too crude the first time I read it -- for a little baby's birth, after all) because now I know more about her. Then I went to another birth story that was linked through Dooce. Then I was at a loss and wanting more birth stories... must read about transition... crowning... episiotomies... (cue the drooling, glazed-eye Homer Simpson... and I suppose it would be appropriate for him to say "boobies" here, even).

So I Googled "labour stories". I got a bunch of sites about labour (as in work) disputes. Not quite what I was looking for. No dilating cervixes on those sites. So I figured "birth stories" would work. Jackpot! And here's where the absurdity of all women who have birthed children begins. I spent a good 45 minutes at a site that not only has birth stories written out, but has corresponding pictures! Thank goodness they had the "decency" (literally) to categorize the stories into "very modest", "modest", and "very graphic". I started with the very modest, but I couldn't be satiated and delved into the "modest". I had to squint a few times and scroll a bit quicker, because as much as I love childbirth and hearing people's stories, there's only so much I want to see (especially since I'm planning on doing it one or two more times!).

I began to think about the strange connection that all women who have given birth share -- why before I got married all I cared about on TLC daytime was "A Wedding Story", but upon being married for more than 6 months, I couldn't care less about that and was obsessed with "A Baby Story" from then until I'm done having kids and TLC finally starts to mimic Fox and ABC's "nanny" type shows and begins "A Toddler's Story", and consequently leading to "A First Day of Kindergarten Story", "My Daughter's First Period Story", and so on and so forth (feel free to make up your own). What makes us care about how bad (though "never as bad as I did, and I didn't even need pain medication!") other woman had it, how long their labour lasted, how long they had to push for, how many stitches they had, whether or not their babies latched on right away, and on it goes?

But, still more than that, after looking at these birth stories (usually only the home birth ones), I began to ask myself, why do women feel the need to give birth completely naked? Do bare "buhzies" really make the baby come out that much easier? Even with Madeline, after 18 hours of labour, I still had the presence of mind to throw on a tank top before getting into the bathtub to try and relax! I just don't get it. I imagine it's some kind of "I am woman hear me roar"-empowerment thing, that makes you feel more "in tune" with womanhood -- as if women throughout the centuries stopped to take their tops off before getting on the birthing stool or squatting in the forest to birth their children. The last picture of one of the births was a women with her husband, her new baby and her toddler son, and both of the children were nursing. Now I'm not going to judge. But really...

There were only two "very graphic" births, I did not venture into one of them (I've birthed enough Vanderheads to not want to see what major damage in the undercarriage looks like). But the other one was about a little baby born at 23 weeks who weighed only 1lb 2oz, and who died two days later. I didn't look at all of the pictures -- seeing the baby just begin to pale with approaching death was enough for me. But one picture really got to me. The moment that the mother got to kiss her little baby, just before they took the baby to the incubator where her short life would be lived out.

And then I got it. As much as the birth obsession is about the pain and the length of the pain and the medicinal relief of the pain, more than that, it's about the miracle that birth and new life is. How precious it is. How precarious it is. How fragile these new lives are. How the line between taking a baby home and taking a baby to a funeral home is so fine -- a cord too tight, a heart beat too slow, a bit of bleeding... And it's when we look at these other stories that we are reminded of this -- that it's all a miracle. It's all given and it can all be taken away in a moment.

So look at this picture of the mom and the baby that she only heard give two faint little cries. See the look on her face and the love in heart because she knows that this moment is fleeting. But really... it's all fleeting. Our lives are collections of fleeting moments, fleeting acquintances, fleeting feelings -- everything is fleeting. For as much pain as there is in that woman's face, there is so much love, so much cherishing, so much meaning, so much fulfillment. And there is so much in that tiny moment, because she knows that it's the only moment she has. I wish I could bottle up the feelings of that woman in that moment and carry it with me all the time so I would recognize and love all the good that surrounds me everyday. But I'm resigned to try my best to cherish the lives that I have around me that aren't so fleeting and to be glad for the moments of love that I've had in those moments and with those people that were fleeting. Look at it once more.

Happy Half-Birthday To You!

2005-09-11T19:51:00.000-06:00

Right now 6 months ago I pushed this little guy (well, if 9lb 9oz at birth can be considered little) into the world as we know it:

If you didn't know Marc or I then, or our blogs, you can read the account here. Great birth story! And right from the start he was a great kid. Slept through the night at 2 weeks(!!). Never cried unless he had gas. Smiles at everybody. Laughs everytime he sees even a glimpse of his big sister. The only indication that he's awake in his crib is the jingling of his little blue bear. Loves his pablum. Takes a bottle when we need him to. Has peed during a diaper change maybe 8 times in his life. Loves to cuddle and hug. Has the most squooshable cheeks. And the best smelling stinky toes on the planet. And can make you feel better with just one look of his piercing blue eyes. Luke Timothy Vandersluys today you are half way to being a year old and you've already brought us 50 years of happiness!

Have a "Funeral Moment"

2005-09-10T21:56:00.000-06:00

At the end of my second year of university my grandparents came down to stay with me in Regina, because the aunt and uncle I lived with at the time were going away on holidays for a few weeks. These are the grandparents that I had spent much of my pre-school years with and whom mean a lot to me... I mean a lot. I don't know if it's just the perception children have about grandparents and other "older" people, but I always worried about when my grandparents were going to die. They just seemed "old". And, yet, looking back at certain memories (like their 45th "ruby" anniversary where we had a picnic in our backyard and they wore "ruby"-coloured matching bunny hugs) they were really just a bit older than my parents are now -- and my parents don't seem old at all. So, even though my grandparents were not very old, in my youthful opinion they were always on the verge of death. I was convinced that they wouldn't see me get married -- but granny winked at me when I reached the altar, and grandpa actually lead us in the exchanging of our rings. Well, after that I was sure they wouldn't make it to see my children -- but Madeline does indeed know and love her "bestamore" (the Norwegian name that I called my great granny) and Luke has stolen the heart of both of them. Anyways, all of that to say that growing up I was always afraid of what my life would be like and how much I would miss my mom's parents when they were gone.

All of that came to a head on one of the nights that granny and grandpa were staying with me in Regina. Grandpa had been to a Sunday evening church service and had just come into the bedroom where granny and I were laying in bed watching tv together. Grandpa took his sport coat off and came and sat down on the bed and we chatted for a bit. I looked at their faces and was just so happy to be in that moment, to have them there all snugly and close. And then I started crying. I don't think they knew what was going on. So, I told them. I told them how much I loved them. How much they meant to me. How much I didn't want them to die. And how much -- how indescribably much -- I was going to miss them when they died. I just got it all out. They were not quite as shaken up over it all as I was, and they reassured me that they were not going to die (well... anytime soon anyways), and that they loved me very much. Then we all hugged, had a bit more of a cry, and grandpa probably lead us in a little "huddle prayer", like he always does. And that was that. We knew how we felt about each other. We knew the inevitability of death and we knew that, though it would some day separate us, we had loved while it lasted (and that someday we'd be together again).

I told Marc about this shortly after, and I don't think he really "got it" -- at least in regards to grandparents. He was never close with any of his grandparents, either because of death or proximity. And I was never really close with my dad's parents (grandpa died when I was just 5 and grandma when I was 11) -- though I do have certain clear memories of my grandpa and I did have some great times with Grandma Dynna in Weldon. In some ways it's nice that I don't have the same "pangs" about their death as I will when my mom's parents die. It's nice not to hurt, you know? But at the same time, you have the deep hurt because you've had a closer relationship and a deeper love... and that is always worth it.

So, today think of someone that you love and have a "funeral moment" with them. Tell them the things you'll want to say but won't be able to tell them when they're gone. Tell them how much you love them and how much they mean to you. Get it all out. Every time I think about my grandparents dying, I think of that moment at my aunt and uncle's house, and I have peace, because I know that we all knew (and still know) how much our relationship meant. And even more than just the funeral moment, make relationships that count -- that will bring the big hurt of separation, because it's made of the big love. After all, if that's not what life's all about, I don't know what it's for.

The Womanly Art of Misplacing Womanly Products

2005-09-10T09:40:00.000-06:00

Let's take a moment to bring to mind inappropriate feminine hygiene moments:

IFHM #1: "Okay so I have to tell this story but I will try to protect the names of the people involved. My friend's son started Kindy the other day. Unfortunately the back pack he was using that day had been used on a family field trip and a feminine product was left behind in the pack. Snack time arrived and the little guy dug out what he thought was aprt of his snack. He unwrapped it and began swing it around by the string and yelling at his teacher. "What is this? Hoe do I get it open? How do I eat it?" His teacher upon reporting this grand event to Mom said it was her best first day yet in her 20 or whatever years of teaching. I have it on good authority she also shared this with another fellow teacher to which was also added. "If he's got the tampon, where is the cheese string?" (Link - thanks for the laugh Peggy!)

IFHM #2: One of my (male) English teachers that I had in high school told us about the time, when he was a child, his mother asked him to put the napkins on the dinner table because their company would be there soon. (I think we can all guess where this is going.) He looked all over and finally remembered where his mommy kept napkins. And when his mother and the company came to the table she saw a maxi-pad laid out "just so" next to each plate. (Keeping in mind that this was probably 30 years ago, when maxi-pads were a lot more maxi than they are today.)

IFHM #3: Then there's pastor's daughter who decided that the best time to come out dancing with tampons dangling like earrings from both of her ears was when the rather serious superintendent for her daddy's denomination (aka daddy's boss) was over for supper.

IFHM #4: And finally there's Dixie -- whose entire life is one big inappropriate feminine hygiene moment (not that there's anything wrong with still not liking to buy these things when you're 26 years old).

Hope these spark some good IFHMs of your own or those you know. Write them as comments and we can all have a good laugh (at your or other people's expense).

Dixie Danza

2005-09-09T21:15:00.000-06:00

Ran across this on the Celebrity Baby Blog tonight:

GrandDanza

Tony Danza, 54, became a grandfather for the first time on August 27th when son Marc, 34, and wife Julie, also 34, welcomed baby Nicholas David into the world by c-section at 5:13 am. Of the birth of his first grandchild, Tony says, "There's a certain feeling of accomplishment that there's another generation...but the most exciting thing is watching your son be a dad."

Though I've been happily married for five years, I think this finally puts closure to the fact that I couldn't have, shouldn't have, and, looking back, really did not want to marry Tony Danza, though if you had asked me that when I was 13 years old, I would have told you the exact opposite. Even Roberto Alomar (who I also thought I should marry) would have been a little more feasible -- as Roberto is only 11 years older than me, rather than the 28 years that Danza is. (Though, in my defense, he did look quite young for his age on "Who's the Boss?") Now I guess I just need to make sure that Marc does not want to still marry Alyssa Milano.

Really big sausage

2005-09-09T20:52:00.000-06:00

Here's one just for Marc: the world's largest sausage at Mundare, Ab.
I foresee a stop at that town on our next trip out west.

Via

"I WANT TO CHANGE THE WORLD!"

2005-09-09T17:13:00.000-06:00

I got out in the garden a bit this morning -- picked the last of the beans and started digging up the bean plants. (You see, by about late July I'm usually so frustrated with the weeds and ugliness of my garden that I'm ready for fall so I can dig up all the annuals, move some perennials and have an idealized picture in my head of how much better my garden will look next year. Though, next year it never quite lives up to the picture, and I'm ready to start digging in July again!)

Yesterday, I found sidewalk chalk at Superstore for $0.94 for a big box of 40 (Crayola no less!). Madeline had drawn pictures and had got us to draw some pictures for her on the driveway last night while we were working in the front yard. She came into our bedroom just before 8am this morning announcing that she was ready "to go outside and draw more pictures". I held her off a bit so I could sleep in a bit, feed Luke, and get all of us fed and dressed. We were outside before 10am. I drew her a hopscotch game and she was quite content playing and drawing and jumping there for quite a while, until...

The heaven's opened, the wrath of God was poured down, and... one of her pieces of chalk broke. Now we've always known that Madeline is quite a particular little girl: Little People dolls must be facing a certain way, a while back she wouldn't eat burgers that we'd cut in half, even when she was just over one year old I remember VERY carefully opening a Nutrigrain bar for her in church, pleading with the Lord to help me not to break it as I was taking it out and for Madeline to hold it in the middle, not at the bottom, so that it wouldn't snap in half with the first bite and subsequently unleashing her fury. She just doesn't like things broken. I don't know how many bananas she has refused to eat because they broke in half. Now before you think we're some push-over parents who give in to our daughter's OCD tendencies, believe me when I say there has been much yelling and many tears over the broken articles and she has been forced to eat these things, and she is getting better. But what can I say, when you take after your father that much, what can we really expect of her?!

Meanwhile, back in the yard...Madeline comes to me very distressed and demanding that I fix the chalk. I explain to her that it can't be fixed. And try to make her feel better by saying, "now you have two pieces of chalk!!" Ya, that doesn't work. I was trying my best to ignore her and hope she'd get over it herself, but I seem to recall a lot of "but I really want you to fix it... but it needs to be fixed... but it wants to be fixed... can you fix it?" And then came the waterworks and the pent-up aggression. She started getting significantly more mad and I got significantly more irritated. Finally I said, "Madeline the chalk is broken. We can't fix it. That's just the way the world works." (You know, the usual lines that all two year olds understand!)

Then my daughter, who never ceases to amaze me, proceeded to say off and on for the next 10 minutes. "BUT I WANT TO CHANGE THE WORLD!!" And I thought (and here comes the "hugs and learning"), what an idealistic little girl she is. (Of course, her mother did have great plans as a teenager to fix all of the world's problem's by "simply" converting Satan...) I was trying to think of the best way to explain the chalk thing to her, and give her a good life lesson at the same time. I told her that we couldn't change the fact that the chalk was broken, but that we could change how it made us feel. We could be happy about it, by saying that now we have two pieces of chalk. We could think about how the boys and girls in the hurricane didn't have any chalk right now, and how they'd be so happy to get a piece of chalk to draw with, even if it was broken.

Well, it didn't work. She still went on and on about the world "needing to be changed", that she wanted to change it. (And good for her!! ... really.) But this still didn't solve her crankiness over the broken chalk. So I resorted to the old, "if you don't stop about the chalk, I'll put it away". Still cranky. I asked her if she'd like me to draw her some new squares with the broken chalk. That seemed to appease her. Then a few minutes later she was yelling because she couldn't get the last piece of chalk in the box (because, of course, the broken piece was now taking up two spaces). Shortly after that, the mosquitos were "too bad" and she needed to go inside. Oh well, at least no more screaming about chalk and changing the world...

UPDATE: Madeline woke up from her nap while I was proof-reading this entry. I went in to change her diaper and I (who now officially hates Eric Clapton) started singing "If I could cha-a-ange the world". (You know because I was changing Madeline. That's the reason why Madeline at 18 months old knew the words to Bob Marley's song "Get up, Stand up" -- because I would sing the first few lines as I would "stand her up" on her change table after changing her. Anyway...) And then I realized my mistake. She started saying in her usual post-nap whiney voice, "I need to change the world by fixing my crayon". Then there was some mild crying and a bit of kicking when I tried to put her pants on. Luckily the threat of taking her "Pontoffel Pock and His Magic Piano" (Dr. Seuss) video away was enough to get her in full hysterics. So ya, just a typical day at the Vandersluys home... a bit of crying... too much idealism... and rhyming cartoons to make us feel better.

Just a little Wednesday afternoon blackmail...

2005-09-07T14:28:00.000-06:00

Ran across a 4 year old email from my mom just now.
Love you, Marc! (Sorry, but I had to.)

I suppose some explanation is due...

This picture was taken of Marc in the outfit that he wore for a video we did for my grandparent's 60th wedding anniversary. They got a letter and certificate from the Queen, so Marc dressed up in that, with a wig, glasses and make-up, and pretended that my dad's law office was his (well, really her) office and gave a big greeting to them with an English accent. With some funny bits thrown in (as if that outfit isn't funny enough in itself). S/he went through her daily schedule at the end of it which included something like: tea, sign stuff, more tea, wave, sign more stuff, serious talk with Charles, just a smidgen more tea, etc. Marc was a great sport. And this picture proves it, as it was taken way after the anniversary back at our apartment in Regina. My mom never did get a still picture of him as the Queen, so she took it then. As you can see, the Queen without make-up is not very becoming!

Oh ya, and when we went to the Salvation Army to buy his get-up, Marc was quite convinced that he could fit into a size 8 dress. He wouldn't try them on at first and said, "let's just get that size 8, I'm sure it will fit." In the end I got him to try them on, and I think we came home with a size 20 at least!!

If you want to know what to do about Katrina, ask a child

2005-09-05T22:10:00.000-06:00

Last night before bed I was telling Madeline about the hurricane in the States. I told her about how there was a big storm, with lots of wind and waves and rain, and that a bunch of boys and girls didn't have houses or toys anymore because there was water everywhere. I asked her, "Do you think we should help those boys and girls? Should we get them some new toys?" And she said, "Yes. They could have my toy house because it doesn't have any water in it." She was talking about her Fisher Price Little People house which is her absolute favourite toy that she got on her first birthday and has played with almost everyday since. She also said that we should "go to Superstore tomorrow and buy them some new toys. That would be good."

Then Marc came in and she told him about what had happened to the kids. He told her that those kids didn't have any clothes or food either. He asked if we should send some money so they could get some clothes and food. She said "Yes. And we should go and build their house for them, too." Marc said that he didn't think that we could do that, but we could send money for them to buy hammers and wood, etc.

And he's right. We can't go. I don't think a nursing mother and her two year old child would do much good in Louisiana right now. But it made me stop and think of the sentiment behind what she was saying. You think, "oh she's just a kid, she doesn't know about it." But, really, she's a kid... so she knows everything about it. Her mind isn't racing with her "to do" lists for the next month. She isn't thinking about how helping these victims would inconvenience her. She isn't thinking about how if she gave them money, she wouldn't have money for her things. It is the simpleness of a child's mind that says "You need a house without water? Take mine. It doesn't have water in it." "You need to build a new house? I have two hands. I will help you build it."

I told her that we could pray that Jesus would help the kids not be afraid. I told her she could tell Jesus what she'd like to say to the kids and He would tell them for her. She started talking about how they didn't need to be afraid of the water because Jesus is always with them. That's standard Madeline-when-she's-afraid speak. But then she started talking about being afraid of monsters. I thought she was being side tracked in her little 2 year old brain. But now I think she was just relating the fears of those kids to fears that she has (like monsters and the dark). She was putting herself in their shoes. And I think we need to do that too. The hurricane survivors don't just want our money, they want our empathy. But at the same time, they don't just want us sitting here feeling sorry for them, they want us to take action to help them (and probably the best way is through money). My little two year old taught me that. Ask your kids. What do they say we should do for these people? And what would happen if we all (and our leaders!!) started doing the things they said?

The difference between him and me

2005-09-01T22:15:00.000-06:00

Two minutes after I made the milkshakes:

(That's his on the left & mine on the right.)

Not for the faint-hearted (aka Sh!t Happens 2)

2005-09-01T21:54:00.000-06:00

Yesterday, as I was having a nice soak in our newly renovated bathroom with pina colada bubble bath I was reminded of the following:

When I was pregnant with Luke I liked to have bubble baths a lot. Now, we have dimmers on almost all of the lights in our house, and I love to have the lights very, very dim when I have baths; occasionally I'll read by candlelight (nothing better than Pride and Prejudice by candlelight surrounded by pineapple/coconut flavoured bubbles). I also like to have baths with Madeline sometimes.

(I just remembered that this will have to be two stories in one, because this part is important. About 6 months into my pregnancy with Luke, I think my back had enough of carrying a 35 pound two year old around and what I thought was my hip (but turned out to be a butt muscle) would give out so that I couldn't walk. I went to my doctor and he sent me for physio. The second time I went, which is the day I speak of here, he worked the muscle so much that I could no longer walk or put any pressure on my left leg... I mean none... I was on crutches. But only for 24 hours. I, of course, was miraculously healed as I sat in my doctor's waiting room waiting for him to check me over. (Seriously, I came in on crutches because I couldn't walk, and when the nurse said to come into the office I could suddenly walk. She said that the next time something is wrong with me I should just come and sit in the office for a bit, and that should cure me.) )

Anyway, so the day before my miraculous healing, I decided that a bath might relax this ass of a butt muscle of mine. Madeline needed a bath that night too, so she hopped in with me (although I certainly didn't hop in myself). We sang some songs, she poured water on my knees and back, and we played with her bath toys, all in a nice dimly lit bathroom (Marc used to laugh at me when we were first married because when he'd go to the bathroom after I'd have a bath, there'd be a pile of rubber duckies and wind-up bath toys by the drain that I had played with while in the bath). It was very relaxing.

At one point Marc came in and talked with us for a bit, and on his way out he said, "what's all that stuff in the water?" I said, "oh, that's just all the gunk from inside her squeezie toys", and we continued playing. We had a nice long bath together, and 45 minutes later Marc comes in to dry off Madeline and help me get out of the tub, and he turned the lights back up. And when he did that, we discovered that "stuff" in the water was not gunk from in her squeeze toys, but, that's right you guessed it: gunk from inside my daughter. Madeline and I had been stewing in her feces for over 45 minutes. It was gross. It was disgusting. But worst of all, was that since I could hardly get into the tub in the first place, I couldn't get out of the tub to wash it out and then back in to shower myself off, so I had to stand there while Marc drained all of the poo and wiped off the tub and watch it all wash over my feet and legs.

Oh well... it makes for a good story.

A life less ordinary

2005-08-31T22:20:00.000-06:00

I saw a bit of the Hurricane Katrina on tv tonight. It's pretty crazy. And very sad. There was a special about tiny premature babies, some only days old, and the doctors and nurses who stayed in the hospital to save their lives. Their incubators, etc. are running on generators, and if the generators runs out someone will have to sit and manually turn a crank to keep the machine going (at least the one type of machine I saw). Those are the people I never really stop and think about when I see evacuations and natural disasters in the news.

Then there are the people looting and stealing plasma televisions...

I saw three cars piled up on top of each other, all completely wrecked. And it made me think about the power that natural forces have over the earth. I thought of that car on top of the pile (it looked like a BMW). How many hours did the people who owned that car work and work and work to pay that car off? Think for a second. That car would be at least $50,000. That's WELL over Marc's and my combined annual income (when I'm working), and that $50,000 of course would not include the considerable amount of interest paid with monthly payments. A car like that would cost Marc and I a year, year and a half of work. Every hour of every day spent to pay off that car. And as Kevin Spacey says at the end of Usual Suspects, "and like that... he's gone." One extremely heavy wind and within a few seconds that year and a half of work is a pile of rubble in the street -- completely worthless. And that's just one car.

Now I tend to be an overly (well, excessively, really) reflective person. So I'm constantly thinking of what I am doing, should be doing, wish I was doing, etc. Sometimes, though rarely, these things all correlate. Most of the time, however, I end up doing things I am doing, while wishing I was doing the things I should be doing. Things that have meaning. Things that are lasting. Things that are outside of myself.

It seems to me like we spend our time making our own little life for ourselves. Like me spending my days with my kids (albeit playing with them and teaching them) and cleaning the house. Finding a place for all of our things. Moving this to there and that to here. Trying to get rid of as much as possible -- because we really don't need so many things!!-- but still ending up in a house with too much. Giving things away. Buying a few things to make the pared down rooms just a bit cozy and cohesive. Organizing the kids clothes. Giving their clothes away. And then there's just the everyday maintenance of the necessities: washing the dishes, doing the laundry, making the food, etc.

Now some of these things really need to be done. (We do need to eat, after all.) But some of it seems like such a waste of time. What does having a very nice serene bathroom really do for me anyway? Or a nicely organized closet? Honestly, sometimes I feel like I'm so shallow for spending my days doing this. How much of what we spend our time and money actually has any sort of value whatsoever?

Marc and I are constantly trying to create for ourselves the daily life that we really want -- where we're disciplined and balanced and are able to do a good portion of the things that we feel are important. We spend a lot of time with our kids: reading to them, singing and dancing with them, playing games, being goofy and childish (oh ya, and some yelling and mild threats of corporal punishment too). We've also started spending a lot more time reading and reflecting, listening to good music, calming ourselves so we can get a better idea of what we should be doing. But then here again I have the problem of what does sitting at home in my cozy red living room, listening to Chopin and reading Brian McLaren really do for anybody?

Over the past several years I've come to realize that we need balance in life. We need time to work and rest. Time to nurture our physical bodies and time to pursue intellectual endeavours (this from the girl who convinced my high school principal that I did not need to take the required Phys. Ed. class in high school because "I'm here to learn, not waste my time running around for an hour" -- and now I have the thighs and hips to prove it!!). We need time to look after ourselves so that we can look after others. So, ya, I know that there is value in the reading and the relaxing, but I think we tend to spend too much of our time doing that.

Then I start thinking about how we have only so many hours in the day, days in the week, etc. Where can I make time for the things that help others? It comes down to logistics. I just need to pick an evening, get a sitter, and get out there. Or pick a time, open my home, and get people in here. I know that I have to just do it, and stop "should"ing all over the place. Then I will know that I have not spent the hours of my life in vain. That they will be worth more than some BMW in a heap on the side of the road. Somehow they will have the worth of that little 3 pound baby hooked up to monitors in the NICU. Because I will have touched people. And not just people. But people outside of my sphere. People that make me see beyond myself, and who, in turn, help me understand who "myself" really is.

"And these carrots?" -- "Have been murdered, yes."

2005-08-30T14:59:00.000-06:00

It's amazing the deep things you can learn in the mundane chores of daily living. For example, I was weeding the garden one morning several weeks back and had loosened the soil around a bunch of the thistles and weeds. When I came back a few hours later to pull everything up I noticed that it didn't hurt to touch the thistles anymore. I was quite excited about this new way of "pain-free" weeding. But then I thought, "that's what thistles are supposed to be -- thistley and painful -- and it only took a few hours for them to cease being thistley".

It brought to life the Parable of the Sower from Matthew 13 where the farmer is sowing his seed and... "Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root" (verses 5 & 6). I had always understood what was going on in that parable, but to see the example made it hit home a lot more. I guess I had never realized how quickly plants wilt when they are no longer in soil. It took those thistles just two or three hours to completely lose their "thistleness" -- their entire purpose and reason for being. It made me think, "how quickly do I lose my focus, my sense of purpose, my "grasp" of God, when I am not working on deepening my roots in Christ? And what could my "potential" be if I took more time to focus on the things that I know are the whole purpose of life -- loving God and others, being a person of justice and mercy in this unjust and merciless society we've created for ourselves."

She's a good kid.

2005-08-26T16:40:00.000-06:00

It's amazing the way two year olds play on your emotions. One minute there's screaming, the next smiles from ear to ear... and that's just the parents.

I've been sick most of this week. As a result I've needed to have a nap of my own after lunch while the kids sleep. Because of the sickness and the tiredness I've been a little (read: a lot) short tempered with the kids. It's like they know the exact moment that you don't want to be bothered, and then they bother you then. (Like when Marc wants to read me a portion of a book, that is Luke's cue, even if he's been quiet for a half an hour, to start making strange, screechy, raptor-like noises. Or this morning I sat for half an hour eating my breakfast and waiting for Marc to finish on the computer, and as soon as I got the computer, Luke needed to start crying, Madeline had to sit on my lap, and when she got off, she had to start bringing me five face cloths to hold for her.) So, I was ready for bed because of sickness and irritation every day after lunch this week.

Then, here comes the motherly guilt. I'm frustrated with Madeline for most of the morning, and what does she do, but say "Mommy, I'm going to tuck you in." So she grabs my leg (her version of "carrying me" to my bed) and takes me to my bedroom. She tells me to lay down and then pulls up the blankets so I'm nice and cozy (actually, only she could touch the blankets, which was kind of irritating, but anyway...). Then she proceeds to tell me a "story elk". (She's been obsessed with elk every since she saw one in the mountains when she was 16 months old. Since that time, we've had to tell her a "story elk"-- about "Princess Madeline" and her friend the elk -- every night before bed.) This is how the story went (I kid you not):

"One day Madeline and the elk were walking through the forest. When all of a sudden... a tree fell over! Then they picked it up and danced all around it. Then they all played a game... and it started to rain. There was a BIG storm! The thunder crashed. Dash! (eyes go big and hands flash out) Then all of a sudden there was a big fire!!! ... AND IT BURNS!!! AND IT BURNS!!! AND... IT...BUUURRRNNNSSSSSS....!!!!!! (Spoken calmly and happily) Then they walked back to the castle and Madeline told her mommy and daddy all about it. And she crawled into her bed and said 'Dear Jesus, Thank you for this day. Bless this to our bodies. In Jesus' name. Amen.' "

Then she said "good night, mommy" and walked to her bedroom and had her nap.

She's a good kid.

The World's Most Frustrating Dream Family

2005-08-26T09:19:00.000-06:00

This is what brought me to consiousness this morning. (And no, I'm not pregnant, I just have VERY vivid dreams.)

Steve Martin was my abusive boyfriend and he and his dog were in the process of attacking me at my parents' house. This went on for quite some time and it was rather scary. At some point I grabbed a knife and stabbed Steve enough times that I thought he was injured enough to not outrun me if I made a getaway. It worked. I left Steve injured and ran down the street and around the corner looking for a house where I could hide.

I knocked on the door of the first house and after much debate they let me in. It was a woman and her three daughters (all around 10 years old). I explained the situation to them some more and then asked if I could call 911. The lady said "hello?". I thought I'd somehow got the wrong number and asked "Is this 911?" And the lady laughed and said "ya" -- like saying "hello" instead "911" is some sort of great joke for people in life-threatening situations. After talking to her I felt better that the police would soon be on their way.

But by this time Steve Martin had made his to this street and was going to every house looking for me. He knocks on the door and asks if they've seen me. Now, this part is sort of fuzzy. But all I remember from my vantage point of the closet I was hiding in was that the family got really uncomfortable, said "no", but with enough unease, that I'm sure they made Steve suspicious -- that coupled with the fact that when he finally left, they had their faces smooshed up against the door and watched him go from house to house down the street.

Much time passes and I'm getting increasingly nervous. I decided to call 911 back and remind them. The 911 lady said "and where are you?" So, just to be sure I put the homeowner on. She says "Ya, we live on Dent Crescent." I got my bearings for a second and then realized that this house was not on Dent Crescent. So, I whispered to her, "no we aren't!". And the homeowner goes on, with sort of a glazed-over look on her face that yes, she does live on Dent. So I grab the phone from her and tell the 911 lady "I'm pretty sure that we're the house on the south corner of where Amos meets Sherman."

More time passes, but I'm confident that the police are going to be here soon. But, just in case, I look for a better hiding spot. (Keep in mind, that throughout this entire dream I'm extremely nervous that Steve Martin is going to show up and kill me.) And what do you know, the lady and her kids thought that the door probably doesn't need to be locked or closed. So who comes to and through the door again, but my boyfriend Steve Martin... and his dog. (At this point in the dream I somehow realize that Steve has also called 911 -- due to certain knife wounds he has incurred, and the 911 people, not putting two and two together, have answered his call first, leaving him all stitched up and ready to continue his attack on me.) However, I'm quite secure in my hiding place on the top, top floor. Eventually, though, I hear voices and steps coming closer.

Pause (for dramatic effect).

(I -- conscious of my dream state-- was getting quite scared by this time, and was hoping to either wake up or not be found by Steve.)

Still pausing...

Steve's dog comes through the door and seeing that he's going to start barking and go crazy because he's found me, I stab the dog. The dog dies. I cover up the mess on the nice white carpet with a blanket from the couch. And I pick up the dog and go and hide behind the couch (which is angled between two walls -- so that I'm basically hiding behind it in the corner of the room). I hear Steve come up the steps looking for his dog. He doesn't notice the well-hidden blood on the floor. And he comes over by the couch, and I see his silhouette as he leans over to look behind the couch where I'm curled up and hiding the dog next to me. And I know he's looking exactly where I'm hiding, and I know my grey bunnyhug is exposed and that I didn't have a blanket over top of me...

... and then I woke up.

I have a confession to make...

2005-08-25T17:45:00.000-06:00

I may as well come clean. Because there's really nothing wrong with it. In the immortal words of Michael Jackson: "before you judge me, try hard to love me"...

Okay here it is. I read the Celebrity Baby Blog. Well, not just read it, I check it multiple times a day hoping to get a glimpse of some pregnant celebrity. This week it's been Jennifer Garner at Wendy's and at the gym, Brittney Spears leaving a restaurant called Koo Koo Roo, and the news that Jerry & Jessica Seinfeld had their third child -- a boy named Shepherd Kellen. Okay, it sounds really shallow, but you've got to know that I'm the kind of girl who spends hours at pregnancy.about.com looking at pictures that women have posted of their bellies at different weeks of their pregnancy. (Some of them are pretty nasty!) So I mostly I read it to see the pictures of the pregnant celebs because I'm obsessed with being pregnant and pregnancy in general (just ask anyone who knows me).

And in a related story... I have almost met Brad Pitt two times now. Well, not really, but he and Angelina Jolie were at the Royal Tyrell Museum in Drumheller this past Saturday at about 7pm. Now, about two months ago, Marc and I and the kids left that very museum at about that time. And then when I was in high school my parents were going up the gondola at Banff and the girl in the gift shop said that the Barenaked Ladies had just been up it and that Brad Pitt was staying at the Banff Springs Hotel right then. So you see, I've missed Brad Pitt by two months and two miles. Good thing I'm more of George Clooney kind of girl...

Pukey Luke

2005-08-22T15:34:00.000-06:00

I must have done something really bad in a past life... My kids spit up when they're babies. Now, most kids spit up, but my kids spit up: every time they nurse, I get a little present given back to me.

There is something in my breastmilk that makes them spit up. And that is not good. Of course, there is something in my breastmilk that makes them sleep through the night at 4 weeks of age or earlier. And this is great: I'd rather have some spit up and a kid who sleeps through the night than the opposite... but why you Fates, oh why, must the spit up ALWAYS land every time on me?

I can have a blanket on my lap and a burp cloth completely under the chin of my child (Luke these days) and somehow he will find that one spot that does not have protection for a split second and decide that that is the place to throw up. And mommy is now covered in warm, wet, curdled regurgitant. (Did I mentioned this happened to me three times already today?!) Marc, on the other hand, can have maybe a kleenex under half of Luke's chin and Luke will spit up onto the kleenex. I've even seen Marc holding Luke facing him on his lap with nothing covering him, up comes the spit up, and Marc somehow comes out unscathed.

I don't know how he does it (Luke or Marc, for that matter), but it's extremely annoying, fascinating, and cute all at the same time. (There Becky, that ought to take the baby bug out of you for a bit!)

Marc and I are in BIG trouble...

2005-08-20T13:09:00.000-06:00

Marc and I are in BIG trouble when life starts getting harder for our kids. When we went to the exhibition a few weeks ago there was a place to get your face painted. Madeline was very excited, gave her loonie to the lady, and told her she wanted to be a clown. I think Marc mentioned this on his blog that week, but anyway, she ended up looking like Zena Warrior Clown. It made us so sad. She didn't even see herself, but we could tell she just wasn't excited because the week before she had come home from a kids day at the park where she got her face painted like a tiger and she "Grrrrrr!!!!!"ed at us that whole night. So Marc and I were both on the verge of tears because of that.

Today Marc and Madeline are going on a little adventure down to the library. We had mentioned to her that she and daddy were going to take the bus down (two adventures in one). But the morning was getting late and Marc has other things to do today, so we thought maybe they should take the bus another day. Of course 15 seconds later Madeline comes in all excited in her "library clothes" with her little Dora lunch box saying "Daddy, I'm ready to go on the bus". Well, how can you say no... So we quickly checked the PA bus system on the internet. We couldn't quite figure it out at first and then Marc realized that the bus was coming in 2 minutes. Marc rushed to get his stuff together and his shoes on and they were out the door.

Now, apparently there is no longer a bus stop right across the street from us anymore, so Marc didn't know where to go. I told him to hurry and get down to the other stop about a block down. They made it, and as they were walking I noticed the wheelchair bus that I always see in the day drive by. I thought, "Oh good, the big bus will be by in a minute", as that's what usually happens. So I'm holding Luke and standing at the end of the driveway in my pyjamas watching them down there, waiting to see Madeline jump up and down and get excited as soon as she sees the bus.

5 minutes pass... no bus. 10 minutes pass... I've since grabbed the videocamera to capture this "memory moment", and am holding Luke in one hand and the camera in the other (not an easy feat in itself). 15 minutes pass... Luke starts getting fussy so I run and put him in the exersaucer. When I get outside again he starts crying, but not too bad. 5 minutes pass... Luke is now very noisy and I remember that it is about time for him to eat. So I go back into the house, sit on the ottoman by the window, Luke nursing on one side and me still poised with the video camera in the other hand. 5 minutes pass... the camera keeps turning off every few minutes because I'm not doing anything with it, so I try to hold Luke with my elbow and turn the camera on again several times over. 3 minutes pass... Luke finishes one side and now needs to eat from the other side, which is of course the hand that I need to hold the video camera with. Now, so far it's been bad enough that he is being extremely fidgety while eating and will come off at the slightest movement (ie. me lifting up the camera every 10 seconds when I hear that a car is coming), but now I have that and a baby and a video camera to hold in the same hand, a baby that is latching off so often that I figure the whole neighbourhood has probably gotten a nice view of the "Vanderboob", and a plant that I cannot reach to move that is obscuring my camera shot if the blasted bus every actually comes.

5 minutes pass... Luke is now finished eating. I decide to run the digital cameara out to Marc and Madeline so he can get some cool pictures of them on the bus. I quickly put on a sweater, grab the stroller, put Luke in, have the video camera underneath and the digital camera over my shoulder and proceed to the street. When I get to the end of the drive way I see Marc's foot, as he gets onto the bus... the bus that drove past them as they were looking for the bus stop 35 minutes earlier!!! Ya that's right. Madeline's first "bus" adventure was on a glorified Dodge Grand Caravan. Well, not really. But it does look like a handicap bus. Not like the big buses that they had when I was a kid.

So I was choked. Mad that they had missed the bus, and sad that it wasn't really a bus at all. I took Luke for a walk to get out some of that frustration and clear my head. And as I walked I thought: my kids are in for a lot of disappointments in their lives. And if something like this is going to make me upset I need to buck up, in a real hurry. I know that every adventure isn't going to be perfect, every day isn't going to be a magical new experience, but to look into Luke and Madeline's big blue eyes and see their excitement over things, it makes me sad when things like this don't go the right way... Let alone, when we have to burst their little bubble about the world and they find out that there are rapists and kidnappers and murderers out there.

What an emotional thing it is to be a parent. The love you have for your kids makes you hurt so much for them. And there's a bittersweetness to it all -- because you share in all the highs, you know that the lows will hurt all the more. But because you feel the hurt so bad for them, you know how inexplicably deep your love and care is for them.

The Death Quiz Challenge

2005-08-18T13:13:00.000-06:00

So today I found the Death Quiz, by doing the Director's Quiz (I got Sofia Coppola) via Rilla's blog. If you read Marc's blog you know that I will outlive him by 12 years, dying by myself of old age in 2065 at the age of 86. The scary thing is that Madeline will by my dad's age when I "die". Interesting to think about all these things (and only slightly morbid).

Anyway, here's the challenge: I thought it would be fun to do the quiz with ALL of the wrong/bad/unhealthy answers. I did quite well. My made up guy will die 36.5 days from now (September 2005) of a heart attack. See if you can out-die that! Tell me if you can beat 36.5 days!! Happy dying.

My daughter is my accountability partner.

2005-08-16T22:28:00.000-06:00

Picture it Prince Albert, 2005. A young couple is watching a show called "Canadian Idol". The theme: classic rock. The young husband is...

Anyways... I've always wished that I could have theme music playing in my daily life. I would chose the music from The Golden Girls. Come on you know it. Laa LAAA laa-laa-laa-laa-laa du-de-du. Then when Dorothy goes out onto the linea it's du-de-du dee due, (up a tone) du-de-du dee due, laa-laa-laa-laa laaa laaaa laaaa... laaaaaaa......(fade to scene). When Marc and I are fighting it would be the music from "the windy night in Florida" scene. And that's the music that would have played in our house tonight.

I was nursing Luke and watching TV on the bed and Marc was cleaning out his bedside table. Luke was becoming increasingly troublesome and irritating as he was insisting on nursing still, but there was nothing left to nurse (if you get me). I asked Marc a few times to get Luke's soother, so he could go to bed. Marc did not realize that I was nursing him and figured I could do it myself. I was getting increasingly frustrated with fidgety Luke (who was doing his best to ensure that his mother has completely saggy boobs by the time he's done nursing), and Marc (who I thought could just get up, get the soother and continue what he was doing). I figured Marc was going to wait until he was done cleaning to get the soother. Finally, I had had it and I yelled (well, not really yelled, but raised my voice a bit -- but still pretty angry). "Would you just get off your butt and get it and then finish?!" Ya. Marc didn't like that.

Then I heard we heard a little voice coming from the room of our daughter who had been in bed for a good 45 minutes. "Mommy! Don't get mad at my daddy!!" Ya. I knew I shouldn't have said it while I was saying it, and my little accountability partner reminded me of the same.

Five Years Ago Today: A Wedding Retrospective

2005-08-12T15:32:00.000-06:00

On August 12, 2000, Marc and I said "I do". And we've been saying "I don't" ever since. Ba-dum chuu. Aah, that old chestnut... But really, five years ago today I married an awfully handsome 22 year-old, who wiped his nose throughout our entire wedding ceremony, and who was, undoubtedly, my best friend and the perfect fit for my lifelong companion.

So today I thought I would share with you some of the great memories from that day that made it, unquestionably, Marc and Dixie's wedding. (Apologies for the poor quality pictures. But after all, this was five years ago, and picture technology wasn't quite what it is today.)

Five years ago today... we looked something like this:

Five years ago today... the uncle who married us said "Marc, you may salute your bride"... and he did:

Five years ago today... we thought it would be a good idea to pose like this:

Five years ago today... the rear-facing third seat of my parent's '84 Caprice Classic wood-panelled station wagon was our wedding car:

Five years ago today... we got our pictures taken at PA's Court House where there are beautiful big trees, stairs and pillars, but the photographer thought that this brick wall was, perhaps, the nicest spot for family pictures:

Five years ago today... we deliberately danced like idiots to a Queen song into our reception:

Five years ago today... we asked people to pay to get us to kiss, and then gave them way more than their $10 should have got:

Five years ago today... I got a tear in my veil because of a very emotional moment in Marc's dad's speech (but it was worth it!!):

Five years ago today... we sang and played "When I'm 64" and proceeded to do an impromptu lounge singer bit, at the end of which Marc said "Thank you. We'll be here all week.":

Five years ago today... I cried so much during our "thank-yous" that all you can hear on the videotape is a series of high pitched noises and squeaks between phrases like "Mom and... squeek, squeak, squeak... dad" and "And to my sob, sob, sob bridesmaids...":

Five years ago today... we made a mockery of the cake-feeding tradition:

Five years ago today... we took off to Saskatoon, where Marc read the "how-to you know what" chapter of our Christian marriage book while I was getting ready in the bathroom in our hotel room(!!):

(But now I'll stop because that's already too much information!)

It was a wonderful day. And even though today, 5 years later, we collectively weigh at least 50 pounds more than we did then, we have 2 kids (that together weigh 50+ pounds) to love and raise together. And even though today we've had many arguments about countless things -- both reasonable and unreasonable, we know each other better and have forgiven enough to know that nothing will ever break our love. And even though today we're still as uncertain about "what we're going to do when we grow up", now we know that even when we've been married 50 years we won't be done growing up. And even though today we won't be wearing $400 outfits and saying "I do" in front of all of our family and friends, I can say right now to all of cyberspace that I love you, Marc, so much more today than I did on that day, you've made my life unmeasurably blessed, and you mean the world to me.

Pyjamas and Poked Out Eyes (and one more thing)

2005-08-12T09:40:00.000-06:00

This morning while I was trying to go back to sleep after Marc got up, Madeline came running into our bedroom yelling joyfully, as she does every morning, "Mommy! Get up! The sun is up!" (I keep telling her that it doesn't matter when the sun goes up or down -- we sleep when it is up in the summer and are awake when it goes down in the winter. She keeps saying that she doesn't want me to "put her to bed right after supper" in the winter, but she still doesn't quite get it.)

So I was half asleep when she said she wanted to take her pyjamas off and, as she was struggling to get her arm out, I asked if she wanted my help. She did. So with my eyes half closed I reached out for her arm, but instead poked her in the eye. This is what followed:

"Mommy!! You poked out my eye! (and very dramatically added) I can't SEE anymore!!!! (with a few boo hoos for good measure)

After I was sure she could indeed see, I helped her get her shirt off. Then she asked if I would help her with her pants but first added:

"Don't grab my eye, okay?!"

Oh, and one more thing:

Madeline just asked to watch a show. First it was going to be Penguins (a reward for her just acting out 5 minutes of the dialogue for me), then when I couldn't find it I asked if she wanted to watch my $2.99 special of Dr. Seuss' "The Lorax", which is from the 1960s (there's something sweet but strange about my daughter singing "Grickle grass, grickle grass, somebody lifted the Lorax away..." from this very environmentally conscious story).

Anyway, the reason why I really let her watch her show was this: I told her she couldn't watch a show. She whined and said she needed to watch a show. I said no. More whining. I told her, "you'll live". She said "I don't want to live". Now this was shocking to me, made me sad... but then I remembered, she is just 2.5 and probably doesn't know what "live" means. Until she said:

"I want to live with my show."

Why I hate Future Shop.

2005-08-11T17:35:00.000-06:00

Well, not really. But right now a little bit.

Tomorrow is Marc's and my 5th wedding anniversary. The running joke for me and anniversaries is saying "Aaah... 7 years of wedded bliss..." to my brother and sister-in-law who celebrated their 9th anniversary this year -- so for Marc and I it's about 3 years (only slightly literally -- maybe 3.5).

I told Marc I had some errands to do today. He asked if I was going shopping in quite a disgusted tone. And I said "No?!" with enough intonation that he knew I meant yes. "For what?" then followed. "Nothing." He asked again. I told him I was getting him his present. For a moment he thought I was talking about his Father's Day present that I keep mentioning to him, but have yet to give to him (it's more of a fall present -- so I'm making him wait. In the meantime I'm having great fun telling him that every ridiculously expensive thing that he sees and takes any interest in is his Father's Day present -- computers, houses, cars, anything. It's really quite fun.). Then he clued in and said "we're not getting each other presents are we?" I said nothing.

We usually just do one big purchase in the year and have that be our birthday/Christmas/anniversary present for each other. But we haven't done that for a year or two. And we never actually do a gift exchange. I usually come running into the house with his present, and even if it's a month or two before the occasion I tell him he can have his present and insist that he open it. And he usually just lets me go shopping, as my present. Well, this year I wanted it to be different. I was going to go to Future Shop, get his present, wrap it up all nice, get him a card (maybe even for the proper occasion -- will post on this later), and give it to him at Amy's as we have our nice romantic dinner out.

I wasn't quite sure what I was going to get him from Future Shop, but I had some ideas. One of which was a really good digital camera -- an almost professional one, that you could add lenses, etc. to. I hadn't thought I would buy it, but thought I'd give him something else and some money so that we could start saving for one. Well, of course they had a nice display model which has been surpassed by this year's model, so it was really cheap. I asked them if that's their best price. The guy said that he could maybe get $20 off. He does the usual call, leave the desk, talk to the manager, wait for the manager to call back, look for the manager who's taking a long time, and then finally talk to the manager at the desk. Well, it turns out they'd give me $100 off. I essentially said I would take it without actually saying those words, and he started looking for all of the stuff that goes with it.

And that's how I spent 40 minutes of my day standing at the Future Shop camera counter. Although I must say it was a great study on "women in environments completely foreign to them". About 3 women came looking at cameras or memory cards and they were all exactly the same: serious, intent look on their face, scanning from model to model, touching one, looking at another, picking one up that looks interesting, pretending they have a hot lick what any of them do, looking up desperate for someone to come and help them, but keeping that serious look on their face and keeping busy touching memory cards in plastic packaging until someone does.

So I was all ready to surprise Marc with a kick-ass anniversary present that he'd be totally surprised about, and then the guy tells me that he can't find the lens cap. He spends 20 minutes going through bins of misc. cords, discs, etc from under the counter looking for it, going into the back room, coming back, going back, etc., etc., etc. No luck. Then at some point he realizes that there's no battery pack/charger or battery. And there went the other 20 minutes. A few other employees have joined the hunt, and finally two employees and the manager come to me and tell me that they can't find the battery, though the charger has been found, "but we do sell them individually, and there is one in the attachment kit that you're also buying". So I said, "well, can I get one of those... thrown in?!"

And here we go with the standard line employees are told to tell customers at exactly 35 minutes into the haggling process. "Well, we're already giving it to you at cost", with that really icy, awkard look in their eye that says "we're not going lower!" and "it would make me fe-eal we-ally we-ally bad wif you asked me that again ". So I knew not to push it, at least with the manager. Usually I use my ease and humour to cut the bartering tension, but I could tell that wasn't going to work.

Now does this make sense to anyone? 5 minutes before I had a camera with everything I would need. Now all of a sudden I'm paying the same price for a camera that doesn't come with a battery?!

In the end, the guy who first helped me was going to give me a brand-new lense (with a cap). And I told him, I'd rather contact Canon and pay for a lens cap and have Future Shop throw in the battery for free. He of course didn't think the manager would do that. (Ya, I figured that.) I also wanted to say that "maybe if you didn't give away lenses from other cameras, you wouldn't lose so many of the pieces for your other cameras". So I told him I'd talk to my husband (there goes the surprise!) and be back. I asked if I could write down the model of the camera. And now he doesn't even have a pen for me to use! So I left. Disappointed for a number of reasons.

And when I showed Marc the camera on the internet he looked at it awe-struck and said "so you're getting me that, and I'm getting you..." "A plush toy, I know", I retorted. "$50 to spend whereever you want" was what it actually was. I told him to go to Future Shop and take a look at it, but now I don't even care. Now all the romantic notions of surprising him with the gift and having a nice meal have vanished. (Well, I guess we can still have a nice meal.) But, now the other things I had thought I'd get him seem so lame compared to the "silver tuna" of all anniversary presents. Oh well... he'll probably walk in the door in a few minutes with the camera under his arm after going to look at it at Future Shop. We'll see. I'll keep you posted.

THIS JUST IN: No camera under his arm. And apparently he feels as sad and depressed as I do. Read his version of it.

Aaah... the new image

2005-08-11T00:18:00.000-06:00

Tonight I was kicking around on the net and decided to see what (one of) my favourite blonde 60 year old woman has been up to. Ya, that's right. I went to www.marthastewart.com. I didn't go around too much on the site -- just looking for the latest dirt on her. I didn't find much, but I did find out about her new TV show which will begin on September 12th. I clicked on the link about getting tickets for the show, etc. and ran across FAQs of audience members, one of which was the following, answered in true MS fashion:

What should I wear?
Dress your best. Audience members may appear on camera, and/or may be asked to participate in the show. No tank tops, T-shirts, sunglasses, or hats. Hint: Bright colors look best on television.

Heaven forbid someone wear a lowly t-shirt in the back row of a television audience! (Now you know why Oprah's audience members always look like they've had professional hair and make-up done -- because they're told to.)

I also found a promo video for her new show. She has a new image, ladies and gentlemen. Watch these. Especially "This Fall on TV: Martha's Live" -- I think there's two of them, but the one with the cow (or is it a bull, my computer's too slow for me to be able to tell) always make me laugh. I guess she did need to soften up her image a bit, be a little more human. But this is almost too comical. You know I'm going to have to watch it once... just to see what she's really going to be like.

I will post about Martha Stewart's link to Luke's birth in a later post. For now I'll just keep you all guessing...

(Ya, and now I'll go to bed, mom. I'm just waiting for Marc to finish up book two of Harry Potter.)

Life and Times

2005-08-10T23:14:00.000-06:00

I've been thinking lately about how fast time goes. Luke will be 5 months old tomorrow, and it feels like he was just born. Half the time I think it is still March... the other day I said it was "July 5th"... and yesterday I asked my friend on the phone if her husband was going to be doing field work again this summer... um, hello, summer is almost over! I nursed Madeline until her first birthday, which means I'm almost half done nursing Luke. Plus, in the next few months he'll be starting on more solid food, so that means the nursing/feeding schedule won't be quite so demanding. Good in a way, but sad too; he won't be a baby much longer. It's made me realize how important it is to treasure the time you have with your kids.

I was visiting with my grandparents this afternoon. They always have such interesting stories from their past -- all of the jobs that they had, different towns they pastored in, all of the people they met and helped. They still get tears in their eyes about some people/stories. And even though they're both in their 80s now, I bet it seems like just yesterday that they were chasing after their own babies. On their mantle each month they put up pictures of the kids, grandkids (12 + spouses), and great-grandkids (13 & soon to be 14!) that have birthdays or anniversaries in that month. I saw a picture of my cousin and her husband and realized that in just 2 years it was going to be their 20th wedding anniversary! I couldn't believe it. I remember my parents' 25th anniversary, and even though I was in grade 9 at the time, it still feels like it just happened. So to think that my cousin has almost been married 20 years is scary. How fast do the years really go by?

My granny wrote in a memory book for me, after that cousin's wedding, that she prayed that she would see me get married some day. And I always hoped that she would. And she did. In fact, both her and my grandpa have 18 years under their belt since she wrote those words that I was scared wouldn't happen. And next year is their 65th wedding anniversary! 65 years of marriage, and yet they still talk about grandpa riding his bike all through the Okanagan to visit granny when they were dating; they still remember the "little bead of perspiration" that dripped down granny's face in the alcove at the altar at their wedding ceremony. And as long ago as it was, and as many things as have happened since that day in July in 1941, I bet it seems like yesterday.

So what can I do today to make the most of the time I have and the people I have to spend it with -- so that the days which slip into months which slip into years will be filled with a goodness and a richess that will make my memories full despite the brevity of time?

Whoops!

2005-08-08T14:34:00.000-06:00

We had Marc's best friend and his wife over last night. They're expecting their first baby in only 9 weeks! They're starting to get a bit nervous (!!) over the whole thing -- being parents, not being just the two of them anymore, the major life change, the birth, etc. You know, the usual. Marc and I were telling them that they didn't need to worry, that they'd be great parents. We also told them how inept we were when we had Madeline. I asked the nurse as I was putting Madeline in her "going home from the hospital" outfit if I was putting on her onesie right. And the nurse looked at me like I was crazy and unfit because I wasn't sure even how to get her dressed. When Madeline had her first sponge bath, I was holding her and washing her, etc. all the while flipping through a book that showed how to wash your baby and how to dry your baby. "Luckily" both of these events have been captured on video. Yes, you even hear me tell Marc that "there's a drying off baby page" in the book, and maybe he should turn to it. Our kids will know how clueless we were when we first had them, yet we made it through the baby stage quite well, if I do say so myself. We have yet to see if we're successful through the toddler years.

So, I was doing my best to tell our friends that they would be great, because Marc and I didn't have a clue when we had Madeline. And then the topic of childbirth came up. I LOVE childbirth. I LOVE being in the hospital (even with a bum full of stitches). I LOVE the first few moments and days of getting to know the newest member of the family. Even with all of the pain and tiredness and nervousness that goes along with it, being in the hospital having our kids are hands down the best times of my life. Everytime one of my friends is about 38-39 weeks pregnant, I get insanely jealous and wish I could be in their place, because they're going to get to give birth in a few weeks. I drove by the hospital in PA about a month or two after Luke was born for the first time since I had given birth and I just stared at it, got tears in my eyes, wanting to be in there, and jealous of all of the women who were giving birth at that very moment in that very hospital. People find me extremely strange for my love of childbirth. Now, I still get scared and nervous a week or two before the event, and it still hurts to get it out (obviously!), but I love it -- although I have not and probably will never say that as one of my children is crowning. But give me a day and I won't be averse to doing it again, give me a week (seriously, that's all it took after having Luke) and I'm jealous of the women in labour on A Baby Story.

So, I was regaling Marc's friends with stories of Madeline's birth. 24 hours of labour. 2.5 hours of pushing. A head with a circumference 5 inches shorter than the length of her body (ya, 15.5 inch circumference -- get a tape measure, then you'll realize why it took 2.5 hours to get it out). The hour long session in the OR getting "repaired" after pushing that Vanderhead out. And numerous other details that I love sharing, but which would be a bit too graphic for your average VanderMeander reader. I don't know what I was thinking! These people were already nervous about the whole baby thing. They will in a hospital giving birth in 9 weeks. And I felt the need to tell them about all of the unpleasantness of birth and the early days of breastfeeding! And then Marc said, "Why are you telling them this?" And I thought, "I don't know". Because I love to talk about it. Because, I was trying to say, as hard as it was and as uncomfortable as it was to hardly be able to walk for 2 weeks, it was still one of the happiest memories of my life. But... ya, I don't think it really "helped".

Bourne to be wild

2005-08-06T12:01:00.000-06:00

Yesterday Marc and I found The Bourne Identity and The Bourne Supremacy together, new on dvd for $22.99. Not bad. Good movies. And the third one will come out some time -- I can never remember what it's going to be called. So... every once and a while, I'll be driving around the city and will think of a good name for another one of the sequels to the movie. I figured I should share some of them. (It's a fun game. Add your own -- just any 4 syllable word that ends in -cy or -ty will do.)

Some of these aren't that good, but I'll work you up to the good ones. And I won't patronize you with explanations of what the movies would be about. We can all figure that out.

The Bourne Democracy
The Bourne Diplomacy
The Bourne Redundancy
The Bourne Discrepancy
The Bourne Veracity
The Bourne Audacity
The Bourne Elasticity
The Bourne Polygamy
The Bourne Viscosity (this one is probably my favourite)
The Bourne Onomatopoeia (sorry, I just like that word)

And, of course, the final Bourne movie will be:

The Bourne Lobotomy

Thoughts on Prince Albert's Annual Dief Chief's Parade

2005-08-05T16:45:00.000-06:00

On Monday Marc and I and some friends attended PA's annual parade. Pretty long and boring quite frankly. I think Madeline even got a little bored. I read in the paper the night before the parade that everyone was supposed to dress like one hundred years ago to celebrate Saskatchewan's Centennial (is anyone else ready for the year 2005 to be over in Saskatchewan?!). So, to be a good citizen (and to hopefully get my kids on the front page of the local paper), I dressed them up in gingham. That's as close to 19th century garb as I could find on a day's notice. Madeline wore an outfit my mom made?/bought? for me when I was a kid. Although my legs must have been skinnier than Madeline's. We told her to tell us if she could no longer feel her legs at any point during the parade, they were that tight. Here's how they ended up, though, sadly they did not make the front page of the Herald:

Madeline is waving a CTV flag that was being given out. And that's how it all began. The makings of a three-part blog entry on the Dief Chief's Parade.

1) Inappropriate things I got my 2.5 year old to yell out at the parade floats:
- upon being handed the CTV flag, she immediately began to chant "CBC... CBC...CBC"
- when the army reserve floats passed by, she yelled "make love, not war!" (but I made her stop before the veteran's float came by, because they're just too cute to be disrespectful to)
- at our local MP driving past in his car "float", "stop sending your propaganda!"

2) Inappropriate things I wish I would have seen at the parade:
- Our mayor on a S.A.D.D. float (just find the article about him on the link!)
- a few more people stepping in the horse poop
- a "piper down"

3) Inappropriate things to be thrown from parade floats at any municipal parade:
- condoms
- I had visions of the Booster Juice float having a hose and spraying the open mouths of the parade-goers with nutritious slush
-the street sweeper violently blowing horse excrement onto unsuspecting parade-goers as they pack up their lawnchairs to go home

Wedding Showers and Gameshow Ethics 101

2005-08-05T15:44:00.000-06:00

A few weekends ago we went to a wedding shower hosted by Becky, at which we had some real Southern iced tea (soo good!), had some good laughs, met some great people, and played a game which I have recently decided caused me to sin.

The game was "Two Truths and A Lie". You tell two truths and a lie about yourself and then everyone has to guess which is the lie. I had two goes of it. I went first, so by the time everyone else had their turns, I had thought of better ones for me.

Here, you guess, which is the lie in each of the lists (if you know me -- like you're related to me, or were at the party, maybe don't answer). Now, in the game you can ask 5 questions or something to help you guess, but you guys are smart. You can figure them out:

First list:
1. I had a boy tie my shoes for me everyday in kindergarten.
2. I've seen every episode of Seinfeld.
3. I have a slight obsession for blonde 60 year old women.

Second list:
1. When I was 3, I slapped my babysitter.
2. When I was 6, I punched my best friend in the throat.
3. When I was 14, I slapped a carnie.

Anyway, this game was really fun. But then I started to think... lying is a sin. You shouldn't lie. We're told that from the moment we first begin to bend the truth as children. So why was it okay to lie in this game? Well... that's just a part of the game, right? It's what makes it a game. You wouldn't have much of a game if it were called 3 Truths, now would you?

Then it made me think about Survivor where everyone always gets mad if they find out that somebody lied to them. Isn't that just "part of the game"? I guess, there is a difference because lying is not a condition in the game, it's not necessary, the game can still be played (though not always successfully) without lying. I guess in the Two Truths game you know everyone is telling a lie, but you could say the same thing about survivor, basically. What do you think? If lying is okay in the wedding shower game, is it okay in Survivor? Or is lying wrong even in the wedding shower game? If lying is wrong is it wrong in all circumstances?

You didn't know I was this neurotic.

2005-08-04T17:51:00.000-06:00

It occurred tonight as I was eating our family's current favourite dessert (vanilla ice cream with chocolate chips), that I have certain neurotic tendencies. Okay Marc's sister-in-law calls me obsessive-compulsive... you be the judge. Am I OC (obsessive compulsive) or MD (mildly disturbed)? Leave your two-lettered comments.

1. I noticed tonight because I have to have one chocolate chip with each bite, and try my best to have the same amount of ice cream with each bite.

2. I eat pizza by taking a bite at the end (where normal people eat from) and then a small bite, half-way into the crust. I eat enough of the crust so that when I get to the last "row" of bites before the crust, I turn the piece sideways and have the cheesy part and half of the crust with each remaining bite.

3. Same as #2, except for sandwiches and toast. Except here I eat the sandwiches at exact angles before turning it sideways.

4. Eating cake I take bits of icing from the edge with each inside bite so that (what else?!) I have the same amount of icing and cake with each bite.

5. As a child, I knew exactly how many meatballs and how many raviolis were in Chef Boyardee's Mini Bites. I would have a meatball with each ravioli, except for two bites when I would have 1.5 raviolis each per meatball.

6. I have to have the sheets on our bed exactly parallel and square to the bed. I don't know how I manage to sleep every night with Marc who doesn't care, one turn of his body and the sheets are completely off the bed, and he leaves his bathrobe and clothes from the day at the end of his side of the bed.

That's all I can think of for now. I'm sure Marc will be able to add 7 through 35. So, more may be added later. But, do 1 through 6 make me crazy?

Peace and Quiet

2005-08-04T14:32:00.000-06:00

I don't think I've spent more than 20 minutes straight in this house since last Friday, besides after 10:00 at night -- and who wants to clean their house at that time of night? So, right now both kids are settled down and I can finally begin to clean this insane mess that our house has become over the last week. Lots of outings, shopping, and trips to the pool do not make for a clean house, when you don't have anytime after each trip to clean up because you're on your way to the next outing. I'm not completely procrastinating the cleaning, but I feel entitled to sit down and catch my breath for a minute before I try to find spots in this little house for everything that "needs" to fit in it.

Strike that. The kids are not settled down. Madeline called me into her bedroom because her "head hurt" and it needed to be dried... by water from the bathroom sink. (Who can know the mind of a 2 year old?) I didn't let her leave her bed and was asked to sing "Go to sleep you little babe" from Oh Brother Where Art Thou? for about 5 minutes and then I told her to go to sleep. She is currently making an extremely annoying half whining, half crying, half coughing, half "mommmaaay!" (I guess that would be a quarter of each of those, but I don't care right now). Oh, and now she's sing "Your mama's gone away, but your daddy's gonna stay..." to herself. Oh well, she will settle down. And I will do my best not to lose it on her.

I'm finding myself very edgy lately. I think a lot of people are. I think it's the heat. I don't know how people in hotter climates survive such long increments of heat. It just makes me crabby. The messy house also does not help. I was worried I was having some post-partum hormonal issues and asked my mom about it. I told her I was mostly crabby when the kids were cranky, the house was messy and Marc was irritating me, and that the rest of the time I was fine. She suggested that it was probably the messy house and husband and the cranky kids, not the hormones.

Pondering the messy house the past few days and thinking up the title to this post, I've thought about what makes "peace". For me, it seems like I can't have peace without having calm surroundings -- a clean house. I just can't relax or settle down until things are in order. But is this a reflection of how I respond to life in general? I haven't had too much bad or traumatic happen in my life, and sometimes I wonder if it's because I just couldn't handle it. Normally I'm good at getting perspective over a lot of the situations and experiences of life -- dealing with church, people, etc. But Marc constantly tells me that I should just relax despite the mess in the house because it doesn't matter; and I know I should, but I just can't. So, I'm kind of wondering if I'd be able to have peace about something major happening in our lives in the midst of all of the "mess" of it, or if the peace wouldn't come until it was all "cleaned up". I guess it's something to work on -- to be able to have peace in the mess, while you're working to clean it up.

Well, better go sweep...

you silly goof

2005-08-04T13:40:00.000-06:00

Madeline is going through an I'm scared of everything phase at the moment. She'll be outside for 10 minutes and then will say she needs to come in "because the mosquitos are too bad". The other day she wouldn't go into her friend's paddling pool, and don't get me started about her not taking a bath without her diaper on!!

Her oma and her grandma have both told her that she doesn't need to be afraid because "Jesus is always with her." So, now that's what she says to herself when she's afraid. She's also been talking lately about how someday she's going to Jesus' house (which we've never talked about before). I'll ask her "what are you going to do at Jesus' house?" and she usually says something about eating or painting or talking to Jesus. The other morning when we were all having breakfast I asked her what she was going to do at Jesus' house someday (Marc had never heard her talk about it before). She replied, "Love Him and serve Him." We burst out laughing. Marc said she had just become a Christian and I started getting worried that my 2.5 year old had just reached the age of accountability. I joked that I was going to email Becky and tell her that Madeline had just asked "to accept Jesus into her heart as her personal Lord and Saviour."

Anyway, we were quite proud of her lingo and her little girl love of Jesus. And then a day or two later she came into our room in the morning and told us she had a scary dream about a monster. But she told us that Jesus was in her dream and made her feel better. I said, "what did Jesus say to you?" She replied, "He said, 'God loves you, you silly goof!'."

Sh!t Happens!

2005-07-29T22:30:00.000-06:00

Luke has been constipated for a "solid" (pun slightly intended) week now. He has had two small poops since last Saturday. So tonight when he was grunting on my lap while Marc and I were working on my new website I was quite excited. Until I looked down. Yes, that's right. A trail of stinky, week-old, slightly pruny smelling baby poo had slithered all the way down my shorts, part of my leg, on the leg of the chair and into a rather sizeable pool on the floor below us. (Thank goodness we have one of those "plastic" mats you put under rolling computer chairs!) Marc burst out laughing and said he wanted to take a picture -- too bad the memory card was full (although we have been known to take pictures of exceptionally funny poo incidents with Madeline), and Luke of course was completely oblivious and jabbering away happily.

I think this may actually outdo the other poo story from two weekends ago. I had just returned from the gym in my new soccer shorts that I had got at Sportchek the day before (because you have to look good to work out). Now, they're soccer shorts, and maybe they're for boys, I don't know, but they have the underwear already in them. Well, I was nursing Luke in Marc's (well, I'm the one who always sits in it...) big leather recliner when all of a sudden I felt something warm and wet when I put my hand on Luke's back. I called Marc over from the computer for a "leakage issue". Well, I did not know the of half it -- or even an eighth of it! Marc's instantaneous laugh when he got to the chair revealed that yes, there was indeed a pool of Luke's poo settled nicely between my legs, soaking through the new shorts, the underwear shorts, and my own underwear. Very nice feeling indeed!

There ends the first edition (with certainly many more to follow) of "The X-crement Files".

Oh ya, and he did barf all the way down my leg after we got he and I changed tonight! But, for more tales of tonight's whoas, read the post I just did about the monitor!

Oh the humanity! Part II (aka Monitor - Part II)

2005-07-29T19:49:00.000-06:00

Well, a week or two back I posted about leaving the monitor on, as you'll recall. Well, the plot thickens. Actually, the plot not only thickens, it hardens into an enormous brick, unstoppable, and being thrown at my head.

I walk into the house tonight, coming back from the gym, and Marc asks how long it has been since I've been in the backyard. I say, mildly embarrassed (because of the state of the weeds in my garden), that it was last Friday -- one full week. To which Marc tells me that the monitor was on when he went outside tonight. Now we normally bring it in every night or every time we're in for good from the garden -- apparently not last week, however. Although it was tipped over so the speaker was facing the deck, the volume was still quite high. And although the monitor base is in Luke's room, I've heard Madeline's shows that she watches in our bedroom and talking in the hallway and bathroom (as the door to Luke's room is usually open).

Yes, that's right. Basically every noise (day and night -- if you catch my drift) that has occurred within the south wing (not that a 900 square foot house can have "wings") of the Vandersluys household has been boldly broadcast to our neighbourhood for a full seven days!

Hmmm... I thought our back neighbours just didn't recognize us at the park the other day. Maybe they were just avoiding us?!

Needless to say, Marc has decided that we should now have the monitor by the kitchen window instead of actually outside.

Do I post like a brunette or a red head?

2005-07-29T12:15:00.000-06:00

Well, Marc and I are soon going to be starting on my own domain. Much to the chagrin of blogspot, I'm sure. I'm excited about the new site and being able to make it my own. I'm going to post pictures of the family, the kids, etc. And I think I'm even going to put a really cool family picture taken at Moraine Lake on the banner. But before I do that I need to know...

Do I post like a brunette or a red head or a blonde? I'm not sure how many of you that read this have never met or seen pictures of me, but if you haven't (like Raven, for example), from what you've read, what do you think I look like? Short? Tall? Thin? Fat? Tanned? Pale? etc. I'm curious, and want to know before I get the new site up with the pictures.

Hey, we could even do it for each other! I still think Raven is Raven Simone (Olivia from the Cosby Show), except I know she's not five. Actually, I think of her as average to tall height with medium length brown hair. I know everyone else who comments, but why don't we have fun guessing what we all look like? It could be fun, and only mildly offensive!

Random Thoughts on Life

2005-07-28T17:46:00.000-06:00

Everyone always comments about the similarities between babies and the elderly: the drooling, the diapers, the slurred/incomprehensible speech, etc., etc., etc. But with the amount of walking we did on our holidays this one really came to mind:

At what point do children learn to look where their going, instead of walking forward with their head turned to the side, and at what age to people unlearn to look behind them when their backing out of parking lots and driveways?

Crap.

2005-07-28T10:04:00.000-06:00

Madeline just ran into the kitchen moments ago saying, quite frantically:
"Mommy, I can't find my crap anywhere!!!"
Followed by "I need my crap... Have you seen my crap."
I asked her what her "crap" was, and of course she "doesn't know".
I'll keep you posted.

10:27am UPDATE:
Well, she wouldn't let me shower until I found her crap.
I asked what colour it was. "Red."
Then she said it had eyes and a nose and a mouth.
Then it dawned on me, she got a crab with her new bath toys yesterday, and the crab was underneath a Jysk flyer that I had set on the ground, after Madeline had told me she wanted to look at it.
I said "Is this your crap?" And the mystery was solved. Another crap-sis averted!

Playing Doctor and Veneral Diseases

2005-07-27T19:47:00.000-06:00

Sorry. I have a whole bunch of posts that are in the works that are taking too long to get together...

So, here are a few random funnies to appease you guys (Raven!! -- it's nice to know I'm missed).

Madeline wanted to "play doctor" today, after seeing some kids do it on a CBC cartoon. So we scoured Walmart and Superstore for a "Dr. Halyk kit" (our family doctor). After having no luck at those places, my mom found one at the Co-op. There was a stethoscope, tongue depressor, glasses, what I'm convinced is something to pee in (but I think it's meant to hold instruments!!) and a needle. I was "disappointed" that there was no instruments for a certain "feminine" procedure, but I did teach her to say "turn and cough" to cover the male end of medicine. (My mom will truly be horrified!!) At first she called the needle a "noodle", but then after a while she was going around insisting that I needed a "nipple". She was really getting quite upset that I didn't want the nipple she was wanting to administer to me!!

And I thought I'd mention the bizarre names that Madeline gives to her dolls: Gopiana, Gonina, and of course, the name she has given any princess-tinkerbell-looking girl since she was about 19 months old: Hunnaria. Say it out loud. I don't think we ever discussed STDs with her at that age, so she must have quite the imagination!!

Monitor

2005-07-22T13:33:00.000-06:00

I imagine my neighbours are having a good laugh right now.

I was in the garden this morning and have the monitor out there so I can hear when Luke wakes up. Well, I thought the phone was ringing so I went inside to get it and ended up staying inside. Because I hadn't thought I'd be staying inside, I left the monitor on out there.

So, the whole neighbourhood just heard us having lunch, me singing goofy songs to the kids, they heard a story about Thomas the Tank Engine and "Lucky the Puppy" and whatever else we've been talking about. Hopefully, they didn't overhear any incidents in the bathroom. And now they're hearing Luke fuss in his crib.

I better get out there and grab it before any other embarressing things occur!

Sweet dreams

2005-07-22T11:54:00.000-06:00

We've all had those dreams, right? Where you're eating something really good or doing something really fun and then you wake up and realize you weren't really doing that (or humans really can't fly on their own) and you don't have that food in the house.

Well, the other night I dreamt that I was getting ready for some date with a guy I didn't know (I was single in the dream). As soon as I got dressed and got to the restaurant, all of my friends grabbed me and the guy and said that we had to go to the rehearsal (wedding rehearsal). All of my friends got in their places on the stage, girls on one side, guys on the other. The guy (who had turned into a somewhat creepy guy I went to school with) and I were about to walk down the aisle, when I saw Marc standing with the guy. I got really sad because I didn't want to marry this guy and even though I didn't really know Marc in my dream, I knew if I had to marry someone the next day, I'd want it to be Marc.

Then I woke up. And then I was happy it was just a dream!

Oh the humanity!!

2005-07-20T11:46:00.000-06:00

Marc and I and the kids spent Saturday to Monday at Candle Lake with some friends. It was a very relaxing (except for the 2 two-year olds running around!!) extended weekend. Since Sunday was a bust for weather, we spent all afternoon on Monday at the beach. There were no mosquitos to worry about there, but once we got back to the campsite we noticed that they had really come out full force. Luke had slept at the beach and fell asleep in his stroller on the walk home, so we left him outside with his mosquito net around the stroller while Marc, Madeline and I went into the tent to get changed and cleaned up.

I had just finished changing when I heard Luke crying. I thought "oh good, he's up to eat." As I came out of the tent and turned my head, it was like something from a horror movie. I look and I see the mosquito net down at his feet and at least 20 mosquitos swarming all around his face, and he's all squirmy and moving his hands. Cue the dramatic classical music, and the slow-mo of me running with my arms outstretched and yelling "Nooooooo!" as I dive to the stroller, lifting my son up from the carnage, rolling onto the ground and over into the eating tent, safely away from the mosquitos.

Well... what really happened was that I went running to the stroller, yelling "Why is his mosquito net off?!" at Marc, who I was now mad at about the net, (when I had pushed Luke back to camp and left him there and Marc hadn't touched him), grabbed the net and started striking at all the mosquitos around Luke with it (probably muttering curses under my breath -- at the mosquitos, and maybe a few at Marc), and I finally pulled him out and ran to the tent to check out the damage, which was as pictured below.

He hasn't scratched them or been bothered by them too much, and, of course, it's Luke, so he just keeps smiling through it all -- red eyelid, and everything!

What a boy! What a West Nile-infected boy!!

(I guess this picture doesn't really show it that well, and yes the story is mildly exaggerated, but it makes for good entertainment. And there really are about 30 bites on his face.)

I got a (few) poll(s) up my butt (but my brothers have been telling me that for years)

2005-07-15T17:02:00.000-06:00

Carl pre-empted me when he said he'd rather describe his cds. I've been planning on doing the book thing for cds and movies for a while, to see if little old me could get something started in blogdom. So here goes:

CDs
Number owned: I'll let Marc count them, but I'd say about 400

Last cd bought: The Isaacs "Bluegrass Preserves" ... good stuff

Recent favourite/new listen: This is hard to answer -- just listened Dixie Chicks "Home" and remembered how much I love it, same with Neil Young "Unplugged". I like the new Coldplay too.

5 cds or artists that are meaningful to you:
(in no particular order)
1) Jane Siberry (Love is Everything, Maria, Teenager, Hush) -- a lot of tears shed over these albums, Teenager is an AMAZING acoustic album
2) KD Lang (Ingenue, Hymns of the 49th Parallel) -- hands down the best concert (for Hymns) I've been to. I could go see her every day.
3) The Gaither Vocal Band (all albums from 1996 to 1999) -- those of you who know me understand why.
4) Bruce Cockburn (Breakfast in New Orleans, Dinner in Timbuktu; Charity of Night) -- reminds me of pining for Marc when he was out treeplanting
5) Steve Bell (Waiting for Aidan, Sons & Daughters, Burning Ember) -- for being Christian music that Marc and I both actually like

Let's play tag:
1) Marc V.
2) Randall
3) Linea L.
4) b-1
5) Carl

Movies
Number owned: didn't count either, but I'd say 200

Last movie bought: The Corporation (excellent documentary previously-viewed at Blockbuster) -- I'm not going to count my Dora the Explorer purchase here

Last movie watched at home: Bend it Like Beckham

Last movie watched at the theatre: Mr. & Mrs. Smith

5 movies that are meaningful to you:

1) The Sound of Music -- has to be #1 b/c I'd watched a few times a day with my granny when I was a kid (not bad for a 3.5 hour movie!)
2) A & E's Pride & Prejudice -- so good (I could watch it over and over, and it's about 6 hours!!)
3) Schindler's List -- made a big impact on me in high school
4) The Christopher Guest collection: Spinal Tap, Waiting for Guffman, Best in Show, A Mighty Wind (funny, funny movies to watch again and again)
5) Dancer in the Dark (starring Bjork, good -- strange -- music, a bit of the Sound of Music, and an amazingly sad story, make this a must-see -- if you don't mind crying for an hour)

Let's play tag:
1) Becky
2) Lauralea
3) sil-1
4) Marc, again
5) b-in-law Andrew
5b) Carl

And, remember, if you don't have your own blog, do your answers in Comments.
Happy tagging.

Do you think it's more hotter or more humider?

2005-07-14T23:00:00.000-06:00

Yes. It really was that hot in our house last night.

Doesn't she look comfortable?

Potty-training advice, please

2005-07-14T22:56:00.000-06:00

+Last week Madeline announced that she was, at that very second, "going pee-pee in my diaper". That coupled with the fact that she's been waking up with a dry diaper made me think that I should get on the training bandwagon again. We've had some good days, and some not so good days with it so far.

I decided to put her "Dora" panties on her and let her roam around the house in them. She's been very good about telling me that the "pee-pee is coming" and we race off to the potty. She's had 1.5 accidents. Not bad really. And don't worry I've clorox-wiped our kitchen chairs!!

She went once on the potty at about 1pm after a morning of "mommy the pee pee is coming!". That girl can hold her urine. We immediately rushed to Walmart to buy a Hotwheels scooter (R & L, how much do you want for that one at your house, since Hotwheels appears to not make them anymore?) and a Barbie. She was very happy with her baby barbie and all the miniature toys that came with it... luckily. After all she had been chanting for 2 days on the potty "Push it out! Push it out! WAAY out! I want my scooter, so I'll push it out!" (And yes, I made up all the lame songs she sings to herself on the potty.) The next day she went twice on the potty with no fears and not too much stalling.

However, Sunday night we were having company, she needed to have a bath and as soon as she'd get in there she'd panic and say "mommy the pee pee is coming". So we'd take her out and put her on the potty, but she wouldn't go. We'd put her in the tub, but within seconds she'd say she needed her potty. Finally, she started asking for her diaper (and eventually crying for it). We kept saying, but you're on the potty, that's where you're supposed to pee pee. But after a lot of tears and a very irritated mom and dad, we quickly washed all the dirt out of her hair in the bath and threw on a diaper and sent her to bed.

I just don't know how traumatic this training thing is supposed to be. How much should we push her to pee. At some point we feel that we're being cruel for letting her sit on the potty for an hour, and for the last 20 minutes she's crying about the fact that she needs her pull-up or her diaper. Any thoughts (from those of you who have potty-trained... those of you who have no kids, don't know. You may think you do, but you don't).

However, Madeline's been quite entertaining on the potty.
- For example, she gave her own rousing rendition of The Little Engine That Could's classic "I think I can't!".
- I've learned that she doesn't understand what "why" means:
M - "Mommy, I'm scared of the potty."
D - "You don't need to be scared. Why are you scared?"
M - "Because I'm scared of the potty."
D - "Why are you scared of the potty?"
M - "Because I'm scared."
D - "Why are you scared?"
M - "Because I'm scared of the potty."
D - "Why are you scared of the potty?"
M - "Because I'm scared." ...
- That conversation is the same as the one where she asks for her diaper, and when we ask why, it's because she needs her diaper...
- In fact the picture above was taken of my mom coaching her on the phone, and I think the majority of the words out of Madeline's mouth were "well, I need my diaper", "because I need my diaper", "well, I just need my diaper".
- Mom could also tell that I'd been coaching her a bit too much on the potty when Madeline was babbling to herself in the backseat of my mom's car say "When Andrew and Ben (her cousins) go potty, they just relax and let it come..."

She's doing not bad. She announces every time she pees, which is definitely a step, and sometimes even asks if she's allowed to go in her diaper. So, we'll just take it one step at a time.

You've got a real gentle touch there, doctor.

2005-07-14T13:47:00.000-06:00

Today I finally did it. I switched dentists. I've never liked the dentist I've had since I was a kid. But when I heard Becky had a good experience with Linea, I thought I would give her a whirl. What a difference. I don't know if it's because I've given birth twice since I've had any major dental work done (and I'm pretty sure that just about anything is less painful than that), or if she really is that good, but it wasn't a bad or painful experience at all. That is until she said those dreaded words... "root canal".

I blame my own stupidity. I had a tooth that cracked and started bothering me when I was pregnant with Madeline 3 years ago. Then it stopped hurting and I totally forgot about it until about the time we started "trying" for Luke. By the time I went to the dentist again I was juat pregnant (as in, I found out the next day) and they couldn't even take any x-rays. So 3 years of having food stuck in that tooth (although I did pretty much floss after every meal because of it) just caught up with me today. But Linea assures me it's not that painful, just time consuming... oh ya, and wallet consuming, but not as bad as I thought... though still bad. Oh well, with 8 years of orthodontic work and my wisdom teeth being pulled as a result and now this root canal, I'll be able to say I've had just about every procedure known to dentists performed on me... well maybe not all, we did discuss a lovely sounding procedure called "skin grafting" -- which luckily I don't need.

Me and My Books

2005-07-13T22:54:00.000-06:00

So I got tagged a very long time ago by Becky. But we went on vacation right after that, and I insisted that I include in my book count my books that are still at my parents house to outdo Marc's number. So here's all you need to know about me and my books:

Number of books I own:
Marc and I collectively own about 800 books, 400 of which are mine.

Last book I bought:
What to Expect: The Toddler Years

Last book I Read:
The Story We Find Ourselves In -- Brian D. McLaren

5 books that mean a lot to me:

Phenomenology of Spirit -- G.W.F. Hegel
The best philosophy book ever (okay, and the hardest one to read, too) bar none.
Mere Christianity -- C.S. Lewis
One of the first "apologetic"-type books I read in high school, which unknowingly started my love of philosophy in university.
Freedom of Simplicity -- Richard Foster
A book that helps me get some perspective on life, when one minute I want to be a missionary and sell everything and the next I'm going crazy spending money at Walmart.
A Reasonable Life -- Ference Mate
A great book that I wish I would have read a LONG time ago (it would have saved a lot of fights with you, Darren & Mel :)!! ).
Heaven is Not My Home -- Paul Marshall
Amazing book that turned my whole view of life upside down.

Tag 5 more:
Well, since everyone I read has been tagged, I want to tag some of my readers. Write your answers as a comment here. So I choose to tag:
1) Carl
2) PJ
3) Ang
4) Mel
5) Raven

Mama... can I play with my toys?

2005-07-13T11:18:00.000-06:00

I've always been pleased with Madeline's personality. She's not one of those kids that you have to worry about taking off on you when you're in public, she's pretty calm, plays quietly (even lays on the couch for sometimes a half an hour listening to music), cautious about things that it's good to be cautious about. But I've been learning lately that there's no way to have the perfect balance of cautiousness and independence, outgoing and quiet, etc. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad I don't have a crazy, wild child, but I do get tired of the incessant questions and the excessive neediness. I'm glad she doesn't just run onto the street or somewhere else without asking, but I think she goes a bit too far when she'll ask "mama.. can I play with my toys?"

Stay tuned for more of Madeline neuroses and the neuroses of the person she inherited them from (me).

"Thank you, Father"

2005-07-13T11:09:00.000-06:00

Apologies. I have probably now officially lost the rest of the readership that was not already lost on my vacation blogging hiatus a few weeks back, but it's 30 degrees and I have a garden and a 2 year old that loves to be outside (and is potting training, but that's another post altogether), so who can blame me.

Marc suggested I post a thought that I had while telling Madeline her bedtime Bible story. We tell Madeline a Bible story (and a "story elk", someday I'll explain that one) every night -- the same story for one week. For a while we would have a saying for her to say at some point in the story (like then Samson said "Oh no! My hair!"; King Nebuchadnezzar said "Hey, there's four guys in there"; and then your run of the mill Moses said "Let my people go!"), but we've been a bit slack on the sayings lately.

I've found that telling the Bible stories in a way that Madeline will grasp the concept and the purpose has made me see the stories in a whole new way. Like the other day I told her the story again about the loaves and fishes. I had always thought that the point of the stories was the miracle that the few loaves and fishes were made into enough to feed the thousands of people there that day. But then I thought, what if the point we're supposed to get from it is that Jesus said "thank you, father" (or whatever he actually said -- that was Madeline's phrase) over the meager offering, and his thankfulness for that little bit is what made it enough. I'm sure there's all sorts of things to get out of it, but I'd never thought of that before.

How do you forget things? Let me count the ways.

2005-06-30T23:43:00.000-06:00

Read this first.

Then look at this picture taken tonight. You see that black speck to the left of the printer and above the piece of paper? Ya that's right. That's that same mosquito that Marc drew the line around on May 18!!! I don't know how many times I've told him to take that thing off the wall. But there it stands(?), lies(?), squooshes(?).

I know, I could wipe it off myself. But I won't. Because I asked him. And because he needs to learn. Because there is a piece of looseleaf with wiring notes folded four times and stuck with a thumb tack to the ceiling of our bedroom that has been there since this (oh, that's actually longer than the mosquito!). Because there are measurement lines that have been in our son's room since we put up pictures for him in about January. And last but not least, there is a 6 inch pencil line (another measurement) that has been sticking proudly up above the telephone in our bedroom since the day we moved into our house on August 23, 2002!! It is for all of these reasons that I'm not removing the dead, and really quite gross, mosquito.

I'm really not bitter. It's actually becoming quite comical. But it must stop.

Jesus: My Lord, My Guru

2005-06-30T23:20:00.000-06:00

My current read is The Story We Find Ourselves In (by none other than Brian McLaren -- I'm not obsessed, he's just an easy read and saying some things I need to hear at the moment). I'm about halfway through the book and he's talking about the "revolution of God", as a new way of describing how Jesus came to set up the "Kingdom of God" -- that it was a revolutionary way of acting, thinking, and was radical compared to 1st century Jewish culture.

Then he talked about Jesus as "Lord". "It doesn't mean so much 'master' in reference to a slave, but master in the sense of... a master of martial arts, for example, or a master crastmen or a violin master... A violin master is someone who can take an instrument of wood and wire and horsehair and play it so that it yields music more beautiful than anyone else can play. And for the disciples to call Jesus 'master' would mean... that no one else could take the raw materials of life -- skin and bone and blood and space and time and words and deeds and waking and sleeping and eating and walking -- and elicit from them a beautiful song of truth and goodness, as Jesus did." (121)

So I got to thinking about Jesus as my master, my guru. How when I look back at how Jesus spent His time on earth it is pretty different than how I spend my time. Last year I had an epiphany. There's that verse in 2 Corinthians 10 that talks about "taking every thought captive to make it obedient to Christ"", and I thought what if I (or we all) were to take every minute, every second captive, to really think about what we're doing at every moment and to "make it obedient to Christ". I guess another way of looking at it is to make every moment have "eternal significance", but that sounds like "Christianese" in some sense, though not necessarily. Carpe diem for Christ?

We all want to make the most of our time, but this is hard; it takes discipline. I guess that was what I was talking about in my It always happens on vacation post. And I get frustrated because I'm so far from where I want to be. But it's a journey right? We work at it the best we can, and maybe tomorrow I'll do better. And if I screw things up for a bit, I can try again.

The other hard thing for me to deal with is that making my time obedient to Christ, living my life as Christ lived, does not necessarily mean that I'll be downtown witnessing to the prostitutes (though, on the otherhand, it may). But if you look at Jesus' life as a whole you see a very different mindset than we Westerners have. Sure, he was a carpenter, but that didn't define entirely who he was. He didn't have a set agenda of where he was going to be or what he had to do. He let people bother him and interrupt his day. He didn't have to prove himself to anybody, but rather, in many ways, kept his (acts of) divinity quiet. And on and on I could go.

There is so much here that I'm not doing. But the first step is recognition, I guess. And it all starts at home. And about that... I realized that the commandment "Love your neighbour as yourself" presupposes that you actually know who your neighbour is... hmm... better get on that.

The Toilet Brush

2005-06-29T11:53:00.000-06:00

So yesterday I was going through our clothes to give away. I was sitting on the floor going through my pyjamas, when Madeline remembered her new favourite toy -- the toilet brush in our bedroom closet. "What?" you say. Well, my mom found a neat bathroom set (tooth brush holder, soap dispenser and toilet brush) all in a cool design, and we're going to use it when we redo our bathroom. I've been meaning to put it somewhere else for a few weeks now, and I think Madeline's antics yesterday are the catalyst to get me to put that thing away (unfortunately, I'm sure it won't be the catalyst for Marc to redo the bathroom...)

Anyway, I'm sitting on the floor for quite a while, and Madeline proceeds to brush my hair with the (thankfully, never-used) toilet brush. I kept saying "Ouch, Madeline. That hurts. Please stop that." But she kept saying "I'm getting you ready for church, mommy." I was distracted enough that she kept doing it, but finally she stopped and wanted me to brush her hair. After one gentle brushing she said "Ouch!!" and there ended our toilet-brush hair brushing experience.

It always happens on vacation

2005-06-28T11:50:00.000-06:00

Yes. I'm alive. We just got back from our 2 week holiday Sunday night. We had a great time. But it always happens on vacation that Marc and I start saying "when we get home we're going to start doing 'x'." I think this trip it was we're going to "keep the house clean" (we always say this every time the house is clean, but it only last about half a day); "take time every evening to relax, read spiritual classics, pray together and separately"; "volunteer with something in the community" (like the Foodbank or a soup kitchen); "go back to the healthy eating we started before the trip"; "exercise consistently" (I might even join Curves for 3 months to get rid of this baby fat once and for all -- until the next baby comes, and Marc has developed some bizarre new snoring habits which I'm convinced are from his excess weight); "get the kids out playing with other kids a bit more".

So, nothing too extreme, just common sense stuff. And on the drive home we felt like we could do these things, and our mind was filled with idealistic images of cozy evenings reading with the kids on our laps while we read to them, having them play at our feet while we sip tea, read and discuss theology, and of course our newly in-shape bodies are sitting on a couch in a house that is spotless.

Well, you know how it goes... The house was clean until we started to unpack, and so I spent the first two days unpacking and trying to find room for the things (though not many) that we bought on the trip. And as I do this I get bogged down with all the crap that is filling our house that I want to get rid of, and my time is spent dealing with all the stuff instead of reading, and after 2 days I'm already too tired to even want to think of going to a gym... plus my two year old is being mouthy instead of playing quietly at my feet while I type this!

But what do I expect? It takes discipline to live the life that you want to live, and you can't expect to have a radical tranformation of every area of your life in the course of a few days. It will take time and patience and the willingness to work on things one at a time. So first we'll deal with Marc's weight...

(just kidding)

(sort of)

(no, I'm really kidding)

Have you been in these situations?

2005-06-11T15:11:00.000-06:00

You're trying to open up some plastic packaging (like on a cd or something) and use every reasonably sharp object within reach (like a pen, etc) instead of getting up and walking the 5 feet to get the scissors. It will take you 5 minutes to open it instead of 30 sec, but you still don't get up to get them.

Instead of looking up someone's name in the phone book you scroll through the 60 names on your call display, and the name you're looking for is about the 50th call in.

It's the middle of the night and you wake up completely parched. You lay there for about 15 minutes deliberating about whether or not to get out of the bed to fill your glass of water, where if you'd just gotten up in the first place, you'd be back to sleep already.

We're all dumb sometimes, no?

Got any more like this? (I feel like I should say, "if you've been in these situations, pass this on to at least 10 friends, so they'll realize their folly too. If you don't expect to do more things like this...")

I wonder if anyone's ever said...

2005-06-11T15:06:00.000-06:00

boy, the kids sure are growing up slowly.

Odd/Inappropriate Childhood Memories #4

2005-06-10T22:43:00.000-06:00

Moral of the day: Cheaters never prosper, but readers often do.

In grade 3 I was in Mrs. Mossman's science class. Once we were finished our tests she told us we could read quietly and if we happened to remember any answers we couldn't remember during the test we could ask for the test back and put in our answer. Well... honestly, are you thinking what I was thinking at the age of 8? Ya, that's right. I read the textbook!! Any answers I forgot were quickly "remembered" upon that reading. Brilliant, no? Dishonest, yes? Cheating? Well, not technically...

And this leads me into grade 4 and Mr. Wendland's health class. Back in those days (I'm not sure if it's the same now... I doubt it), you had to have parental written permission in grades 4 through 6 to take Sex Ed. If you were not allowed to take the class, you were supposed to go to the libary and study and work on a little report instead. Once I found this out I went home and told my mom to "not allow" me to participate in the class. Why would I want to sit in a class when I could be doing my own thing in the library. And I was the only one in the class who figured that out!! I remember vividly sitting in the resource room off the library and "working" on my report on apartheid in South Africa. To let you know how much work I did and was required of me... I handed the report in in grade 5.

I'm sorry.

2005-06-10T16:32:00.000-06:00

Madeline just got up from her nap a few minutes ago. She was sitting on my lap on her bed and out of the blue turned to me and said to me "Don't you want to say sorry for getting mad at me?" I thought I had misunderstood her and said "Do you want to say sorry?", to which she replied "No. Do you?!"

Well, how could you say no. So I said I was sorry for getting mad at her (it had been a bit of a "struggle" to get her to go to sleep today"), but I quickly made her say "I'm sorry for not listening to you, mommy."

I'm not that much of a pushover. And we all need to recognize our mistakes sometimes in front of our kids.

Odd/Inappropriate Childhood Memories #3 (just a quick one)

2005-06-09T13:50:00.000-06:00

I just remembered the other day that I used to try to get money out of my parents when I was a kid. "What kid doesn't?" you say. Well, my mom tells me that this started at a very early age. And then I started remembering certain things. Like making elaborate, lengthy lists of things that my parents owed me money for: work I had done for them, things that I had bought for myself that I thought they should have bought for me, or if I used dad's Coop number and thought I should get the dividend for my purchase(!). I was such a brat. That's all.

New party game

2005-06-09T13:43:00.000-06:00

Marc and I tend to get giddy and talkative on the nights that we end up going to bed too late and need to get a good night's sleep for whatever we have on the next day. First you should know that one of my hobbies (one of my "bits" really, but I'm not a stand-up comedian) is to make up funny name combinations for people... like Randall and Lauralea, I hope one of your daughters marries a guy who's last name is Mabunssoff.

So, on one of those late, giddy nights when we should have been sleeping, we (well, I thought it up, and then we did it together) created the Frankly family.

This is how it works. Give it a try sometime for fun, or during one of those really awkward pauses in a conversation with someone you hardly know, or like I said, as a party game.

It started off by me imagining that "Quite Frankly" was a person's name. Then we began to imagine the members of his family.

Quit Frankly - the brother that always gives up on everything
Quip Frankly - the one who gives all the one-liners
Quick Frankly - the fast Frankly
Quiet Frankly - obvious, the quiet one in the family
Quark Frankly - the science guy
Quack Frankly - he's crazy
etc, etc, etc with most one-syllable (and some two syllable) "q" words.

Then you can extend it to "c" and "k" words if you get really giddy, you know like Crap Frankly, etc. Half of the fun is thinking of really witty descriptions of the family members too, which I haven't really bothered to do (I'm a bit too busy these days, as the lack of posts has indicated).

So give it a whirl. And if you think of some really good ones, post them under comments!!

Looking forward to meeting all of your Franklies, quite frankly.

No Equality for the Devil

2005-06-06T14:20:00.000-06:00

I have never been much for political correctness. In fact, I got in trouble from one of my Religious Studies profs in university for referring to God as "He" in a paper. Although, this should not surprise me, since Marc and I later referred to this prof as an "Nazi Eco-feminist" -- we're cruel sometimes. But I've always assumed "He" to be an easy way of saying "He/She", at least when referring to God. And I've always thought it kind of lame when people refer to God as "She" just to make a point. But then yesterday I started wondering what feminists, or whoever, would do if everyone just started referring to Satan as "she"... Think about it.

Read the fine print

2005-06-06T12:58:00.000-06:00

This morning my aunt from Victoria came over. Now, she has the most amazing yard and is an incredible gardener, so I took her around the yard hoping to get some help with a few spots in the garden that I didn't know what to do with. I showed her what plants I had left over and she told me where they'd work best.

I showed her a cell pack of 4 larkspur, and asked if those would work in a particular spot. She said, "larkspur... those are beautiful, and they get nice and tall." I said, "but these ones only go to 3 to 5 inches, see I put them in the border over here." She said, "No, no, that's 3 to 5 feet!" Amazing how one extra line next to a 5 can make such a big difference.

I will be replanting that larkspur. Can you imagine a 5 foot plant standing boldly at the front of the garden in the middle of a bunch of 8 to 10 inch plants?! Good thing you came over Auntie Marion!

Link between McLaren and Osbourne?

2005-06-03T23:24:00.000-06:00

A few weeks back I thought I would do a post on "Why Brian McLaren is full of sh*t". I finished A New Kind of Christian a few weeks back and am 15 pages shy of finishing A Generous Orthodoxy. However, through the course of reading Orthodoxy this book has almost been pooped on and vomitted on. Now, some people would see this as an appropriate response to McLaren's writing, but since it was my 2.5 month old I thought nothing of it. However, one night we heard something fall in our bedroom. We thought nothing of it, but in the morning I noticed that A Generous Orthodoxy had somehow fallen into the garbage can by my bedside table.

Now I've heard of people burning all of their "secular" cds once they become Christians, and I've heard that Ozzy Osbourne cds or tapes will not burn, or that everything else will burn but his face or something. But the opposite seems to be happening with Brian McLaren. Is this an indicator of the future of the Emergent Church? Who knows what will happen during these last 15 pages?!

Tradition!! (to be said like Topol from "Fiddler on the Roof")

2005-06-03T23:17:00.000-06:00

"The circle of tradition is not closed, for the Spirit's ecclesial Work is not done. Traditional doctrine develops as Christ and the gospel are viewed in ever-fresh perspective. Old formulations are corrected, and what is passed on is enriched. The open-endedness, however, does not overthrow the ancient landmarks. As tradition is a gift of the Spirit, its trajectory moves in the right direction, although it has not arrived at its destination."

Gabriel Fackre

"Website gains acclaim"

2005-06-03T22:55:00.000-06:00

Well, I've officially made it! I'm now linked here. Did I mention Marc isn't? So, ha!

It's a proud day for VanderMeander. Thanks Lauralea!!

(I know I'm linked here and here and here, but so is Marc...)

Odd/Inappropriate Childhood Memories #2

2005-06-03T13:38:00.000-06:00

Today's moral is:
Recognize that toddlers can be keenly aware of social injustice... at least towards themselves.

My parents (well, really my mom) took over a Christian bookstore when I was about 2 or 3 years old. As a result, they tried to put me in daycare or preschool for a few days a week so that I wouldn't be wandering all over the place during the day.

In my memory I think I only went to the daycare for a few days total. And I'm sure that by the first day I was aware of the injustice of it all. We were forced to lay on exercise mats and sleep at the will and whim of the daycare owner. Now, I think this happens in every daycare, but... at this day care the owner's son did not have to take a nap, but instead got to play Lego. (For all I know, the son may have been a few years older than me and that's why he didn't have to nap -- he was just hanging out at the daycare.)

I was enraged and told my parents that I would not be returning to that daycare unless I was treated the same way as the owner's son and would not have to take a nap. Well I must have been quite fiesty about it all, because I didn't have to go back.

So instead I spent my days either kissing my granny inappropriately, or asking the customers at my mom's store, in my 2 year old voice, "can I help you find anything?", or hiding in the closet or colouring underneath my dad's desk at his law office ease-dropping on his appointments.

That's right. I'm a daycare/preschool drop-out.

I don't mean to be disingenous, but...

2005-06-02T14:29:00.000-06:00

Do any people besides the ladies of "The View" use the word disingenuous on a daily basis?

I don't know... that's one word I did not grow up hearing and rarely hear now, except when I watch "The View".

Morning Mother Musings

2005-06-02T11:40:00.000-06:00

Marc phoned just after 11am to see how my morning was going, and if Madeline's mood had cheered up from her grumpy-whininess of 8am. I said that she was fine, and confessed that I had slept in until 10am and was still in my pyjamas, having just finished getting the kids fed, changed and dressed for the day. I sat down to read the mail and the Lung Association came by to canvas. So there I am in my pyjamas with no bra holding Luke, and Madeline rambling on to the man about the rain storm and how she had to run to her bed to get out of the storm and on and on...

I managed to give him a cheque without too much crying from Luke, although he was slowly sliding out of his chair. I could tell it was time for Luke to go down for his sleep, but when I put him in his crib he started crying like he was in a bit of pain. I told Madeline to go pick out a story from her room and we'd all read it in Luke's room. She comes back with a book of quotations on motherhood with pictures of moms with their kids. About halfway into it Luke finally barfs all over my arm and onto his shirt, but he's still not settled. Luckily one more little barf would settle him. However in the middle of this we reached the page in the book where a little girl is upside down in the grass, and Madeline always turns it upside down to look at her. However, today she decided to turn to the "next" page with it still upside down. So we went back to the page we were just on, and then she turned the book the right way up to look at that picture, but then turned to go to the next page and low and behold there's the upside down girl again! So she turns it over again, and then turns to the "next" page again. Well this went on about 6 or 7 times, all the while Luke was either fidgety-crying or barfing on me, and Madeline insisting that I "read it mommy!" those two pages over and over again...

And I'm still in my pyjamas...

Professional Cymbal Players

2005-06-01T23:06:00.000-06:00

Marc asked me the other day about whether or not there are professional cymbal players, thinking it was bizarre that a person could spend his or her life being a professional musician and banging 2 cymbals together once or twice, maybe 3 times in a song (unless it's the Nutcracker Suite). I said that usually they are percussionists, and thus could play any of the other instruments, as well.

But, for the most part being a percussionist is a pretty sweet deal. I was always the timpani player, so I had a bit more work to do, as I was quite the expressive little drummer. (I would roll up the sleeves on my band sweater, bend really close to the timpani, always double checking my tuning, and stepping back and forth waiting to "pounce", if you will, and play my roll or whatever with great expression and gusto -- my body rising the louder I played. My band teacher would get even more excited in his conducting when he saw me get really into it, but sometimes he'd look at me in the middle of a song like I was a whack job.)

But even then I would say that the hardest part of being a percussionist in a band is not losing your count of the bars between the times you have to play. It really is hard!! (Especially when you spend that time talking to the tuba, trumpet, and trombone players -- right Carl?)

Mittens in Summer: On Faith

2005-06-01T12:44:00.000-06:00

Yesterday was a beautiful, hot day. As I was getting Madeline ready, putting on a summer dress and a hat, she noticed a pair of mittens in her drawer and said "Mommy, can I wear these mittens today?" I said "Yes". She proceeded to put them on and said "Then I will wear them, and then it will snow!"

It made me think is part of the "faith of a child" that Jesus talked about? As adults we wait for it to snow (metaphorically speaking) before we get bundled up, but maybe we should have the faith to put on our winter gear knowing that "then it will snow".

Of course, it didn't snow yesterday... but you get my point.

Family Trips

2005-05-30T22:18:00.000-06:00

We're going on our first family road trip in a few weeks. Driving to the Okanagan and maybe Vancouver and taking our time getting there. I'm excited about it, though with a crying 3 month old and 2.5 year old who somewhere learned the phrase "are we there yet?", I'm sure it won't all be fun.

But I'm still excited about it. And tonight I went out and bought Madeline some things to give her on the trip. We're going to buy one of those car dvd players, so I bought her the new Winnie the Pooh "Heffalump" movie (we rented it for 3 days last week and she already has it memorized -- accents and all!), a new Dora dvd, and "The Tigger Movie" because it was cheap. I also got her a couple of activity books and a few little toys. I have these romantic notions of how she's going to play with all of these toys and be so excited about the movies, and how we'll stop and have a picnic at some nice roadside stop while I nurse Luke, and we'll arrive at the hotel really late and she'll sleep on Marc's shoulder as he carries her into the hotel room, and she'll be SO excited when she sees all of the animals at the Calgary Zoo, and we'll buy her a little stuffed animal there that will be her favourite toy for the rest of the year...

I'm sure this won't happen, but I'd like to think it will, and Madeline will probably remember it something like that. I remember taking a big trip to BC once when I was about 7 years old. I remember going to Sears with my mom and buying an outfit for the trip -- dark blue jeans and a yellow shirt (that was size 3! -- as I remember it, anyway). I remember being woken up in the morning and being very sleepy and wearing that outfit as we started driving in the dark to Kamloops (I think we did it in one day too -- my dad was quite the man!). And that's pretty much all I remember about the trip. I think I remember something about the Enchanted Forest, but that's about it. But just the image in my head of that outfit from Sears makes me happy.

I wonder if my mom remembers it that way?!

Odd/Inappropriate Childhood Memories #1

2005-05-30T14:18:00.000-06:00

Announcing a new feature at VanderMeander: Odd/Inappropriate Childhood Memories. My childhood is filled with (too) many odd or inappropriate actions mostly done by myself (just ask b-1), and some which I experienced, but had the good fortune to not have caused. So, I've decided to start this feature, which will make for easy posting, when I'm too busy to think of something deep or original. Perhaps I could have a moral to go along with each memory.

Odd/Inappropriate Childhood Memory Moral #1:
Do not daily expose your children to soap operas.

When I was a kid I dropped out of preschool/daycare (see story in O/I CM #2 to come), and so the days that were not spent at my mom's bookstore and dad's law office were spent at my grandparent's house -- a cute old home with green trim and the most amazing garden. My granny and I did a lot of snuggling in the big beige chair that was half broken and would squeak everytime we'd rock in it. We watched The Price is Right, Mr. Dress-up. I'd try to quickly skip past channel 8 when 100 Huntley Street would come on, lest I be subjected to an hour of that... And like clockwork my granny would watch The Young and the Restless everyday. I was always quite bored during this time and would play and roam around, but sometimes I'd watch with her and always wondered why she would, out of the blue, change the channel at certain times during the show.

However, it seems that she did not always change the channel in time, because one day while we were watching TV (I was probably about 5 or 6) I said, very innocently and sincerely, "Granny I love you" and then proceeded to start "necking" my granny like they did on the soaps. To which granny quickly pushed me off and said "Dixie, you shouldn't kiss like that..."

I don't know how many years it was until I realized what I had done. Probably around the same time I realized why she'd change the channel during The Young and the Restless!

Am I just wierd, or...

2005-05-28T11:26:00.000-06:00

... did anyone else take notes during "Astroboy"?

You remember Astroboy, right? And at the end of the show Astroboy would give his report to the computer, but there would be an "error in the report" and you'd have to guess what mistake he made. Well, I could never figure it out, so at some point I started taking notes during the show to help me. I don't actually know if this even helped me find the mistake, but it did prove that I was quite the conscientious little 8 year old, with way too much time on my hands.

More McLaren -- On the Bible as Narrative

2005-05-26T15:38:00.000-06:00

"The Bible is a story, and just because it recounts (by standards of accuracy acceptable to its original audience) what happened that doesn't mean it tells what should always happen or even what should have happened." (167, A Generous Orthodoxy)

Sometimes it's easy to see God in the Old Testament as doing some pretty scary things. But McLaren says "if God is going to enter into a relationship with people, then God has to work with them as they are in their individual and cultural moral development." (167)

He provides to good analogies that need to be considered before we write off the Hebrew God:

The first describes the origin of America -- land theft, broken treaties, ethnic cleansing, etc. And he asks the question whether God should forsake generations of Americans because of "the original American holocaust?... Wouldn't God's blessing of a nation so conceived imply an endorsement of the atrocities that were and are committed?" (168)

Now think about his second analogy for a minute:

"Consider our civilization today. Imagine (it's not hard) that a thousand years from now, in a world ravaged by side effects of the industrial revolution (global warming from fossil fuels, extinction of species, destruction of rain forests, pollution of water and air, nuclear contamination or catastrophe, etc.), our descendents look back on our era as the most destructive in human history. "How could God ever have blessed people who drove automobile, who heated their homes with energy derived from fossil fuels or nuclear energy, who through their taxes funded the creation of horrific weapons?" they'll ask. "Wasn't God's blessing of them a sign of approval of their destructive ways?" We would protest: But we didn't know! We didn't know how much damage we were doing. We were just trying to survive. It's how people lived in our day. And perhaps God would protest as well, "I didn't approve of all they did, but I loved them, and I wanted them to survive so that you could survive now, a thousand years later." (169)

My ever-wise brother-in-law, Andrew, said something in my May 20th post that somewhat links to what I'm talking about here:

"As far as "ideal" Christianity, I'm not sure "Christianity" as an ideal or an intellectual system is of any value at all. Apart from embodied and lived reality of the Church, Christianity is just another ideology among many. Christians have traditionally held after all that real truth is not an intellectual event or ethereal platonic ideal, but the person of Jesus--really, quite a profound notion."

McLaren says at the end of the chapter, "And it challenges us: to be truly biblical does not mean being preoccupied with some golden age in the ancient world and God's word to people back then. It means learning from the past to let God's story, God's will, and God's dream continue to come true in us and our children."

If you look at the Bible as narrative, you can see the grace (Jesus) aspect of God working the whole way through, blessing us in spite of ourselves, and trying to help us get to where we should be -- like Andrew said, not to some platonic ideal but to the living out of Jesus in this world.

Who decides?

2005-05-26T10:53:00.000-06:00

Watching Madeline's little TV shows with her sometimes, I've begun to notice a strange phenomenon in children's television: animals that not only speak the same language, but whose language of choice is English.

However, I've been wondering lately who decides which animals get to speak. Sometimes animals lower in the food chain cannot speak -- like insects, etc. Sometimes animals higher on the food chain cannot speak -- like the lion just roars instead of saying "I'm going to try to eat you now", etc. This makes a marginal amount of sense, though I think if you're going to let the animals speak, you should really let them all speak.

There are a few shows, however, that just have no rhyme or reason to who can speak. For example in "Little Bear" (this has also happened in the "Berenstein Bears" & "Franklin"), Little Bear was begging his parents to get him a pet puppy. This strikes me as totally bizarre, since Little Bear's friends are a duck, a cat, an owl, and various other animals. It's not like his going to ask his friend "Cat" to become his household pet, so why can he have a puppy? Does this make sense to anyone?

Growing up

2005-05-22T20:09:00.000-06:00

Madeline came walking out completely naked after watching a post-bath Dora the Explorer episode. We put a diaper on her and she milled about the living room for a bit, while Marc and I were having a sandwich on the couch. At some point she picked up a bit of exercise chord (the kind you get from the physiotherapist, etc) and started swaying back and forth and hitting the mirrored closet door over and over again. She did this for quite some time, and once we noticed her, I said to Marc, "oh to be a kid again..." And we laughed and watched her hit the door and look in the mirror over and over and over...

It doesn't seem that long ago really. I still remember laying on the couch watching TV with my arm "relaxed" and sticking straight up in the air; and I remember when crawling under the table at Bonanza was not only a viable exit, but was perfectly acceptable. But then I realized that I'm not quite grown up yet. The marker for me for being "grown up" for the past few years has been when I am able to sit straight up in the pew for an entire church service without slouching down or putting my elbows on my knees and my head in my hands.

I wonder how long it will be before I grow up...?

Subjectivity in the Church

2005-05-20T17:10:00.000-06:00

I just finished reading Brian McLaren's "A New Kind of Christian". I really enjoyed it.

One of my degrees is basically a Medieval (Church and Social) History degree, and one of the main things that I got out of that degree is that the church goes through cycles (quite Hegelian as a matter of fact). There have been times (too many, unfortunately) when the church has pursued affluence and political power. Then once that gets out of hand, it goes back to its roots in the New Testament, namely the "Vita Apostolica", the apostolic life: the lifestyle of the apostles.

I was telling Marc that I really appreciated McLaren's suggestions because he seems to be aware of his perspective/limitations, and is trying to draw from the best of all Christian traditions. I said I liked the idea of something "brand new" happening in the church because I'm getting tired of the self-interest and self-concern of the church today. Marc reminded me that Andrew (his brother) generally tends towards the Catholic and Orthodox churches because they have a long history and tradition. Now this is not the point of this post, and I know I'm oversimplifying McLaren and my dear brother-in-law.

But it got me to thinking... I wrote a paper for one of my philosophy classes in university about the "subjectivity of history". In it I basically looked at whether or not we can "know" an historical event better by being an eye-witness or by being removed from the event -- either in hearing an account from an eye-witness we know or even further, by studying it in history.

I'm not exactly sure what my final thesis was in that paper, but a major part of it was our natural inclination to say that the eye-witness would have the best account. And I disagreed that an eye-witness necessarily has the best account. There are a number of factors that influence his or her account -- proximity to the event (ie. in a large stadium, you may not hear what someone was doing or saying), distractions around the person (ie. a crying baby or having to go to the bathroom), and they do not know the long-term outcome of the event they witnessed.

I went on to say that as historians we may not have seen the event, but we can look at it through the eyes of many different people who did (if there are multiple eye-witness accounts). There are obvious setbacks (we may not have certainty about the cultural values, etc of the people) that a historian must, but we have advantages which an eyewitness does not. We can see the outcome of an even on individuals, society and the world in general, how it lead to other events, and on and on.

So last night, I thought, just because the Catholic and Orthodox churches' beginnings were in close proximity to the beginning of Christianity (at least relatively speaking), it does not necessarily mean that they have a better grasp of what Christianity in its "ideal" or even "first" form is to be like.

Just some things to think about. I'm not saying that the Catholic and the Orthodox churches don't have a grasp on these things, just that we need to recognize that other traditions may have an equal grasp as well, through reflection on those groups, even though they've come into existence later in history. And, of course, this is not to say that the Catholic and Orthodox churches are not reflective, either.

I guess what my real point is that we constantly need to be reflective and aware of our own perspectives and looking at ourselves in the context of others, society, and history.

Today I was brave

2005-05-19T20:08:00.000-06:00

Today I got brave.

I did some yardwork. I moved a bunch of rocks in the yard with my bare hands, and didn't flinch to much at all of the little creatures underneath them (though there was some cringing). Crawled almost underneath the steps to reach a rock. I even weeded part of the garden without screaming every time I saw a worm. (Though I must say I stopped that last year -- but I still did it!!)

Then while supper was cooking, I did the dishes and poured a pot full of old soup and water into the toilet all by myself. I did not look at it, but I did dump it and flush it. Normally this is Marc's job, and he always says "come look!", and even the thought of just looking grosses me out. But today I did it.

I did all those things. Maybe tomorrow I'll be brave enough to buy "feminine products" in public.

... I doubt it.

Optometrist

2005-05-18T09:32:00.000-06:00

Yesterday I went to the optometrist...
got a great new pair of glasses...
but was the breast exam really necessary?

Abortion and Eyebrows

2005-05-17T14:28:00.000-06:00

Not that I wasn't paying attention to what Marc was saying last night when he was describing some different views on the abortion issue that we'd never thought of before (although it was 11:30 and I was trying to fall asleep), but the thing that I really took away from that conversation was this:

Why do those really long, stray hairs on men's eyebrows just appear one day, as if out of nowhere? They're usually close to a centimetre longer than the other hairs, but why don't we notice them before they hit that centimetre mark?

Good people

2005-05-16T22:10:00.000-06:00

I just got home from a very nice baby shower for Luke, and with a whole lot of loot to boot!! It was a good evening.

I generally find showers kind of awkward, especially when I'm the one opening the presents. What if I get a double? How excited should one really be over an underwear shirt, etc.? Plus if it's a potluck shower (this wasn't -- just a whole lot of good brie!) then I feel bad for the people who brought the foods that don't get touched or very little is taken. But then I think, if they brought it, they must like it, so maybe they're glad to keep it for themselves. Or you could be like me and make something with the stuff that's been in your freezer the longest and that your family doesn't like anyway, so you already have negative feelings toward the food and don't care if others share your sentiments!

Anyway, back to the good people. It was nice to know that there are a group of people who have known me a long time and (still!) care about me and my family. And lately we've been meeting new people that, even though we've really just met, we click with and can engage in great and lingering conversations (over some fine home cookin' on both ends!). And there are even some people who we've only spoken with a few times and yet you can tell that they care about you... even enough to push your jam-packed grocery cart out to the car and load it for you! (Thanks Janet!!)

It's nice to be surrounded by good people.

"Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens... Huge, rising death tolls and toxic emissions"

2005-05-16T15:53:00.000-06:00

One of my favourite things to do once the weather starts getting warmer in spring, is to have my afternoon nap (I am a new mom after all) with my bedroom window open and the blinds up and curtains back. I just love listening to the wind in the birch tree out front, the birds, even the cars going by. It's very calming and to me the whole world seems to be at peace, just because I'm cozy in my bed with the sun shining in.

Don't worry I'm not that naive... As Marc will attest to, I have a pretty strange morbid side to me. Often before bed at night I will say, "Marc stop and think for a sec... think what's going on in the world right now. How many people do you think are being mugged in New York city right now? I bet there's some woman walking down a dark street who's about to be attacked and raped. Think about all of the underaged prostitutes in Asia... about all the kids who've died of starvation in the past 5 minutes. Right now. Somebody probably died right now, and now... and now."

I do this in less depressing ways too. Elisabeth Hasselback (the co-host from the View who was on Survivor Australia) had her baby 2 weeks after Luke was born, so I felt like I had gone through my whole pregnancy with her, watching her belly grow, etc. I even cried when they announced that she had had her baby (post-natal hormones, I'm assuming. That and I missed being pregnant.) Sometimes I'd be up at night nursing Luke and I'd think, I wonder if Elisabeth is nursing her baby right now. Or in the evenings when Luke gets fussy, I think about all of the other people with newborns who are trying to keep them happy right then. Or I think about all the women who are in labour and I'm jealous because I love the whole labour, delivery, being in the hospital with the new baby experience.

I don't know, I guess I may think about things too much sometimes, but I think far too often we get caught up in our own little worlds and schedules and don't think enough about the things in the world going on right at that moment. Maybe this will explain it: After Marc and I watched Hotel Rwanda, I was especially moved because I remember hearing about it on the news when I was in high school. And now I think, I probably could have done something, maybe not much, but something! It's one thing to look back 5 years from now and say "oh wasn't that sad when such and such happened" and not be able to do anything about it because it's over.

We need to start thinking about right now and what we can do right now, instead of waiting for the situations to pass and our feelings of obligation to pass with it!

Happy Birthday, Dory... glad you're not a crack addict!

2005-05-15T09:33:00.000-06:00

Today is my brother Dory's 31st birthday. Happy Birthday! I love you. And, yes, I'm glad you're not a crack addict...

Two nights ago I had a bizarre dream in which I and some unknown person were both (male) priests and bridesmaids at a wedding between Danny Devito, Diane Keaton and some other unknown person from PA, at which there were no rings, but rather large chewable vitamins were exchanged and eaten(!!). During the ceremony my brother Dory walked right up on stage and into a back room (all of this took place at my mom's bookstore) to put some sort of box away. When my brother came out the other priest referred to my brother's addiction to cocaine, Pepsi and meth. I remember thinking that this referrence did not seem appropriate in the middle of a wedding ceremony. However, upon further reflection (when I woke up) not much in the ceremony was appropiate at all...

I wonder what a dream analyst could do with that?!

Marc hates the "fine balance"

2005-05-14T23:03:00.000-06:00

So, I've stopped plagiarizing Becky, and changed my banner's subtitle. I feel the need to have a more serious post before I go on with more of the goofy things that are going on in my head and the daily life stories that make for quick, easy, and comical posts. This blog will not be just a bunch of "today Junior did X" -- do not fear.

I chose that phrase because whenever I have philosophical discussions, I usually end up saying "well, it really is a fine balance", or "we just need to find that balance...". Marc hates it when I say that. I'm not completely sure why, maybe it's the cheesy nod and slow, condescending blink that (jokingly) goes along with the phrase.

But I am a Hegelian (anyone out there heard of the philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel -- shall I do my first ever poll, to find out?), so I tend to recognize that in each side of an issue there are bits of truth, and we just need to pull those bits out and come to a new understanding in the light of other perspectives. Shall I get deep and use words like "dialectic" and "being-in-itself"? Maybe not today... that could turn readers off as much as poopy diaper stories!

We do need one Hegel quote to start things off right, though:
"The True is the whole. But the whole is nothing other than essence consummating itself through its development. Of the Absolute it must be said that it is essentially a result, that only in the end is it what it truly is; and that precisely in this consists its natures, viz. to be actual, subject, the spontaneous becoming of itself." (p 11, The Phenomenology of Spirit)

I may not be a hard-core Hegelian, but something in his writing has always been intuitive with me. The idea that we need to recognize our perspectives, see our errors and our truths, draw from the experiences and perspectives of others in order to transcend our own viewpoint and slowly work to a (hopefully) better understanding of ourselves and existence.

That's why I added the thing about changing diapers: because each experience we have, no matter how mundane, can help us to have a better grasp of life if we allow ourselves to reflect upon it. Even, and often especially, kids can make us see truths that are around us everyday because of their completely fresh perspectives.