Mama-luia

We have reached another milestone in our home: we now have a nine year old in the house. So far, it's a pretty nifty age. It involves bigness -- in opinions, feelings, ideas, and even sizem. It's like I woke up one day and realized my son is quickly gaining on me, height-wise! I do not know how I will deal with it when he outgrows me. Nine means independence: biking places by himself, devouring books by himself instead of always wanting me to read aloud to him, having strong opinions that may not be replicas to that of his parents'.  I had a foretaste of all of this when he was three -- he certainly wanted to do everything "by myself!" back then, but now, he can, and does. For reference's sake, here is Noah at three. Let us pause and sigh and whisper "tempest fugit" and WOULD YOU PLEASE STOP CHOPPING ONIONS IN HERE, I'm trying to BLAAAAAHHHG. While it actually does not feel like "just yesterday" that this picture...

Lovely little Anna turned four three weeks ago. Four is such a wonderful age! Suddenly your toddler-ish child seems so grown up and capable of new things, but with the precious imaginative innocence of a little child, too. We celebrated her birthday with family in the city, and my dear sister made her a beautiful cake iced in pink and turquoise, her favourite colours.  I just love her sweet expression here, just so dear and lovable.  Our little lady is getting so wise and mature! We then had a party with a number of her friends at our house. It was another slapped-together 'theme party' (in very loose quotation marks) in honour of butterflies. To give you a sense of the lack of preparation on my part, I actually hid the prizes for the scavenger hunt while the kids were already there. And I have no photo at all to prove it happened. She didn't seem to mind my disorganized state, though. Just to have a bunch of sweet little children over for pi...

For the second time in our family's history, we celebrated a baptism on Father's Day. I was only six days postpartum, so it was a more low-key affair than previous baptisms for us. Dear Elijah was welcomed into the Church in the company of his parents and siblings, many of his cousins, aunts and uncles, 3/4 of his grandparents, and his godparents and 5/7 of their children, too. So the low-keyness wasn't for lack of people. It was for lack of effort, on my part, at least. Elijah's wonderful godparents generously offered to host the reception at their house, and it was a wonderful grace, because not only was I still very much in recovery mode, I spent the night before looking after a newborn and a sick Isaiah too. To make matters more... interesting... it was 39 degrees celsius that day. Our house is not air-conditioned. Elijah's godparents home is. It seemed like a sensible choice to move the festivities over there. *** Even though I was woozy fro...

Isaiah is five now! What a wonderful age five is. I still remember my own life at age five; it was a very happy year. We had a wonderful little gathering last week with a few of his young friends. It was a Dusty Crophopper party, at his request, and I'm certain none of the other guests even knew who that was, but that's fine. We've watched the movie "Planes" and the sequel "Planes: Fire and Rescue" so many times as a family that multiple lines have been woven into our daily lexicon. We hosted this party when I was 36 weeks along, just one day after Patrick being away for several days for a work trip. Thus, I was considerably not on my game as far as party prep work went. This Pin the Propeller on Dusty, I drew and furiously coloured in at about 1:45 PM the day of the party (and the guests were expected at 3). I was still cutting and tracing the actual propellers while the kids were being dropped off. But the kids seemed to enjoy it. ...

I saw a video pop up on my Facebook feed this week. I'm pretty sure it was titled "All we want for Mother's Day is..." It was a woman saying how we as mothers work so tirelessly 364 days a year, without hired help, without even sometimes the presence of extended family in our life, and just one day a year, we deserve the day "off." This woman said her dream was to be left alone in her room to sleep as late as she wanted, come out to eat a meal she didn't make and wouldn't have to clean up after, and then drink a mimosa by her pool. But mostly, she wanted to be alone. via GIPHY Or maybe have a get-together like this. It's hard to say I do understand this sentiment, of course. I can't remember my Myers-Briggs acronym but suffice to say, I am an introvert. I also do not have hired help, at least not regularly. (I do occasionally pay a babysitter to occupy the kids, but that's usually so I can catch up on housework, run errands by m...

"Then something Tookish woke up inside of him, and he wished to go and see the great mountains, and hear the pine-trees and the waterfalls, and explore the caves, and wear a sword instead of a walking stick." Dear little Noah has become an honorary member of the Inklings. After I read the entire Chronicles of Narnia to him and Isaiah this year, and his father read him The Hobbit this winter, he has taken his Audible credits and downloaded three Narnia books (and counting) and The Hobbit too. Every day now, after he begrudgingly gets his homework done, he unwinds by listening, and listening, and listening , to these stories. He can recite a rather shocking amount from any of these novels from playing the recordings of the books while he plays with Lego (and tells his siblings to leave him alone). I digress. It was no surprise to me or Patrick when he requested his party this weekend be a Hobbit-themed gathering. I don't think he could have made his father happier by...

Some people say that the older they get, the more they act like their mother. This may be true of me. What is even more true, though, is that the older I get, the more I want to be like my mother. Mom in her element As a mother of soon-to-be four children, I think about child-rearing a lot: what works, what doesn't, how to respond to each of my children as individuals, how to manage the collective chaos (and din) they create. Often memories from my own childhood creep up and I try to emulate the many generous ways my mom made me feel special. One of those was through celebrations. Mom and Dad have hosting down to an art. Is it because they are incredibly organized? Have a perfectly decorated or perpetually clean home? No, no, and no. What they do have, however, is a lot of warmth, a huge spread of food, and a sense of humour about themselves. That, and my Dad doesn't get off his feet until the company leaves, even if that means getting up at the crack of dawn to put...

Recently, we had a milestone in our family. Our first child came before the altar rail and received the sacrament of the Eucharist for the first time. It was a beautiful, amazing day. If you can believe it, this is the most flattering family photo we have. He was so happy. He knew it was a special day, and it was so uplifting to see him taking it all so seriously, excitedly, reverently. To add to our joy, my parents made the trip from Nova Scotia to be with him on his special day. It meant so much to me, and certainly to Noah, to have them there. Their pride was evident from the moment they arrived. We can all see how much he's grown and it's beautiful to witness. Awaiting his scapular We didn't get great seats, despite Patrick and I arriving 35 minutes early. I couldn't see any of the children processing in, as we were tucked in the north transept (thank you, Fish Eaters , for helping me learn that tidbit of church-y vocabulary). As well, the children ...

Happy belated birthday to Isaiah! Our little ray of sunshine turned three in May and we had the pleasure of celebrating the day with his grandparents and godparents in Nova Scotia. First off, cereal with his beloved Gooey. Gooey takes his cereal very seriously, and is happy to shower his grandchildren with it (figuratively, of course), because they lead dull lives, being forced to eat such mundane things as oatmeal, pancakes and scrambled eggs for breakfast. A birthday greeting from cousins back in Ontario His godparents provided the MOUTH-WATERING cake If you can believe it, it was made without gluten, dairy, cane sugar or soy. My dad, the hater of food-restricted diets, had a second slice that night and said "you would never know" that it was made with substitutions. He has a fierce love of dress-up so the fireman suit was a big hit As was the cowboy costume... He asked to wear his chaps over his jammies. Isaiah...