Mama-luia

Hello there, readers. Long time, no blog. There's plenty to say about back-to-school happenings, life in general, but I thought I'd start instead with a pop quiz: What do  James van der Beek... (aka "Dawson") Chip Gaines... and my husband have in common? If you guessed, "occasionally unruly grooming styles,"  you would in fact be correct,  but the answer we were looking for is... They all have five children. Yes, you read that correctly.  Coming the end of March 2019, another little bouncing baby will join our clan. (Not actually Isaiah's reaction when we told him. Ha! Actually, he and his siblings danced on the front porch with joy  while eating a fudgesicle after we shared our news with them.  {I'm never one to let an important announcement or milestone pass without dessert of some sort...}) We are very happy and excited, but also deeply humbled by being given the ...

Here we are in the Octave of Christmas, otherwise known as "I have more free time on my hands with Patrick off work this week AND not using the computer and thus I blog." It's an annual tradition. Advent has come and gone, and Christmas is here to stay for a goodly long time (if you count it until Candlemas, we have Christmas straight until 12 days before Ash Wednesday this year). I'm currently wearing my most festive apron over my boring mom uniform of leggings + tunic top, after having just made shortbreads for the clan for an afternoon snack. Amazon boxes and duct tape to create... something. There is a pleasant holiday feeling in the air, and it is oh-so-welcome. But let's recap the Advent-y-ness first and foremost before getting to Christmas. *** The feast of Martinmas involved our traditional lantern walk. We modpodged some Mason jars the day before and walked around the wooded area by our church singing. It was very touching because one of my ch...

I found this in my draft folder, composed in 2013 when I had "only" two kids and one more on the way. It still very much expresses my feelings about motherhood and my decision to be at home with my children, not to mention my frustration with having opinionated people state their assumptions and judgments (mothering in a public setting is a very humbling experience). Our finances have improved somewhat since then, but the spirit of what I wrote is still very much true. The only change I made was to add a token photo of His Royal Cuteness at the end. To the woman at the Tim Horton's, I know you see me on a Tuesday morning with my boys enjoying a cup of tea while they get the splurge-of-a-lifetime: three whole Timbits each . You see us chatting and giggling with each other, and you can't help but come over and admire them. Please, pull up a chair if you wish. Come and meet my adorable children. Just please, please, don't say it to me. When you ask what I do ...

7:20 AM. (The clock says so in the picture.) Taking last night's leftover broccoli (I had purposely cooked extra) and making it into a quick cream of broccoli soup for the boys' lunch boxes. Meanwhile, the gang enjoys their breakfast. 8:25 AM. The boys are off to school, Anna is looking at books, and I sit down to my breakfast. It hurts a little to swallow, so a grapefruit and a cup of Throat Coat tea as per Anne's recommendation will do. 9:30 AM-ish. Elijah naps and Anna helps me make Carrot Oatmeal muffins . (I only use quick oats, no all-purpose flour and no xanthum gum, and they turn out great, albeit quite sweet.) 10:45 AM or so. Playing fairies and princesses. Wings, a must. Tangled hair, optional. 11:10. Cute babies playing together. 12:00 noon. Anna and I have lunch. She has protested "lunch" for some time now. She only wants a "snack" but always right around lunch hour; she gets livid if I call it "l...

I feel like I have spent a lot of my "career" as a mom putting out fires, so to speak. I have grown accustomed to living in a state of reaction -- from broken glass, to spilled drinks (or an entire bottle of canola oil on my kitchen floor once), to sibling fights -- I feel like I am two steps behind the next mini-meltdown; I can't begin to say how exhausting this is, because there's never any "progress" made when I am simply responding to the next problem. The other day, I was thinking about hospitality, and how it's something I want to grow in. There are countless times when I'll have a guest over and the work-from-home husband will quietly slip out of his office to put the kettle on, and he'll politely ask me whether I've offered my company something to drink. Sadly, the answer is regularly "oops, I forgot." My desire for my guests is to anticipate their needs. How embarrassing -- to wait until they are parched and opening cup...

I spent one very memorable Easter with my Ukrainian Catholic friend and her family. Her father is a priest and her family, not surprisingly, are all very involved in their church. During a tour of the church, this friend's mother attempted to explain the theological significance of icons to me. She said that an icon 'reads' us in a way, and that the gaze of an icon helps us to know about our own spiritual state. Sometimes the gaze of Christ or the saint depicted is one of warm affirmation, sometimes it is of gentle rebuke. They reflect back to us what we need to know about our interior state. Although I am a decidedly Latin Rite Catholic, I have experienced this while staring at an icon. We have some icons in our Little Oratory in our living room, and one of my favourites is Our Lady of Tenderness, given to us as a wedding gift from Noah's godparents. Several night ago, I was struggling with my still-not-potty-trained daughter to get her into a new diaper and jamm...

These are the days... of random things collecting on the floor and us not even noticing.* We're too busy baby-gazing. These are the days... of doing head counts at the beach, when I brave taking all the children by myself**, and say, 1, 2, 3 as I scan the sand. Then I look down and see #4 in my arms, and find myself repeating "four?!" somewhat breathlessly. How amazingly fast, it seems, that we arrived here. These are the days... of Elijah. (You knew I'd have to throw that reference out at some point.) Of extra servings of Paw Patrol. Of saying "yes": to requests for Nestle Drumsticks for afternoon snacks, to later bedtimes, to one more chapter of Pippi Longstocking, to wearing a Cheetah costume all day. Of beautiful flowers growing up so well with no effort on my part. Of little boys blossoming. The transforming power that sibling love has on a child is a wonder to behold. Of joining the adult...