Too Many Cooks

You have reached the end of the internet. There is nothing more to see.

2011-09-27T20:33:00.003-04:00

Perhaps it's more accurate to say, I've reached the end of my bandwidth... and I'll be damned if I'm going to mess with linking pictures here from Flickr. Nope, I'd rather create a new blogging ID and set up a new blog and continue on my merry way.

Too Many Cooks: Part Deux

In sickness and in health

2011-09-23T21:09:00.002-04:00

Hi. Long time no see. I've had pneumonia.

This goes back to a cold I had about three weeks ago, that I got over 90% of but never shook off the last 10%. Then I had a week where I spent multiple days on the road, and they were long days - days that involved regular office hours, followed by gymnastics class, followed by meet the teacher, followed by the kids' bath and bedtime and then capped off with a 3 hour drive to Niagara Falls and a hotel check-in during the wee hours of the morning.

During those days in Niagara Falls, Chad and I celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary - not together, mind you - (and hopefully, more to come on that later) - and to celebrate we decided to spend a night where it all began, at the Elm Hurst Inn. The Elm Hurst is not far from Lakeside so the plan was to have an anniversary dinner and spend the night there, then continue on to the race in the morning. I started feeling unwell on the Friday as I drove up to the Inn, and by the time I got there, Chad was all set for a steak dinner and I had a bowl of soup. Upon waking up the following morning, it was pretty clear that there was no way I could race that morning. Chad went on to race the duathlon, but I was there merely as a spectator.

(Sidebar: this means that my 2011 triathlon season produced the following results: one race only 2/3rds completed; one completed with a horrific swim; and one DNS. It was not exactly a successful season. I am only half-jokingly pondering retirement.)

After the race ended, I went home to bed and stayed there for approsximately three days, feeling worse and worse all the time. Finally, when I started having trouble breathing, I decided something must really be wrong and went to the emergency room, and six hours and two chest x-rays later, at 2 a.m., I had my diagnosis: pneumonia.

Isn't this something only old people get? And didn't people stop getting it back when the iron lung was invented? It feels all medieval-like. Apparently not.

So... yeah. Things have been a little quiet and slow around here, and have led to some questioning of what's essential and what is not, since this seems to be evidence of being spread too thin. Back with more when I am back to normal - hoping that it's one day soon.

The hay is in the barn (and other random musings)

2011-09-14T20:59:00.000-04:00

Chad and I are racing at Lakeside on Saturday, and I am starting to regret having signed up. My training for the past month has looked like this: race at Rondeau, go to Disney for two weeks and eat copious amounts of ice cream every day, come home and spend a week being miserably sick, get well right in time for Taper Week. I am a little underprepared - the work put in earlier in the summer'll have to do - and it's supposed to be cold on Saturday morning - not great weather for jumping into a spring-fed lake.

I've been asked by a few people to share more Disney pictures, and I will... I have roughly half of them edited, and working on the remaining half - but I haven't been home much lately and can't edit on the road. Here is one - the first picture of the entire trip. Taken in the garage prior to piling into the car and driving to the airport.

Ebayers suck. I wanted one Missoni bag from Target but when the merch went on sale on Tuesday, Target.com crashed and the stores sold out the same day - people grabbing carts full of merchandise solely to resell on eBay. The $35 bag I wanted is now $255 and counting. I don't want it anymore.

The other night, Mallory asked Chad if he wanted to help her sing "a love song to mom". She spent a few minutes coaching him and then they sang me the Barney theme song. She is a keeper, that one!

Liam has developed a bald patch on the back of his head. This coincided with the start of school and I wondered whether the pressure of Grade 1 was getting to him - if he was pulling his hair out in class. Then Chad found a clump of hair on the floor in the music room. I guess hanging around the house is stressing him out?? The bald spot does not seem to be growing so I am hoping this is a one-time thing and that he is not on his way to looking like Grampa Ralph by age 7.

On Wednesday we had Meet the Teacher. Mrs. Garrow says Mallory is not giving her any trouble, is polite, raises her hand before she speaks and contributes to the class. Is this MY Mallory? She said she was asking the class what they know about apples and Mallory raised her hand and shared that there are shapes inside when you cut them open. Pretty clever!

School Daze

2011-09-11T21:58:00.001-04:00

The first day of school was very underwhelming for me from a photography perspective. On Tuesday morning, I took a few quick pictures of Liam on the front porch, and on Wednesday I had my camera with me when I dropped Mallory off for the first time, but it really wasn't what I wanted it to be. This is a big year for us - Liam has gone full-time and is now in an official grade. And it's Mallory's first year, period. This deserved some documentation.

Plus, it's a good time for a photo shoot. Reason number one: it's been a number of months since Birthday Portrait Season. Reason number two: it's coming up on Halloween Costume Portrait Season and Christmas Card Portrait Season. No time like the present to keep the kids on their toes and get them all practiced up for the many fun photo ops in their futures.

So on Saturday night, I dressed the kids up in some school-appropriate outfits and we went over to the school yard. (This is when it comes in very handy to live right around the corner.) I brought gummy snacks for bribery purposes and I brought Chad for entertainment purposes.

Mallory was crying about having a sore toe before we began and I thought this photo shoot was destined for failure, but the allure of the gummy snacks won out, Chad made some stellar faces, and in less than ten minutes I had several portraits of my newest little kindergartener and big Grade 1 boy that I totally prize.

We are getting there, slowly but surely - to the point where we can have the official picture-taking be over and done with in a very short period of time, if everyone will just cooperate from the getgo. Then they get to move onto the fun stuff - in this case, making use of the playground equipment.

I still have a hard time believing we have a kindergartener and a Grade 1 student in the house. Time is flying.

As for me, I still haven't figured out this formatting thing. Why do they have to go and change a good thing??

Going to the drop-off

2011-09-07T21:48:00.000-04:00

OK, so clearly I still have Disney on the brain, because that's a Finding Nemo reference... when you're a fish you go to the drop-off on your first day of school. Yesterday was the first day of school for the vast majority of people (including Liam) but since Mallory is an A day student, today was her first day. And let it be known - she was PUMPED. Here she is, carefully packing her lunch the night before. She was so excited about school that she promised to eat all the produce we packed for her, and she made good on that promise. We should have started her in school three years ago.Last night she slept terribly - maybe on account of nerves or excitement, or maybe on account of something else entirely. She was up multiple times and each time she got up, she left her bedroom door open and Captain got in - he has a real affinity for her room - and while she loves that cat more than almost anything by day, he terrifies her when he gets into her room at night. So every time I was just getting back to sleep, she'd be up and wailing again about the purring or rustling coming from the corner of her room.

We did manage to drag ourselves out of bed this morning and make it to school by bell time. Mallory was in no mood for pictures (despite me getting these few) - I'm not convinced I would have gotten that many more even if the weather had cooperated. It was pouring rain, which put the kibosh on a lot of first day of school pictures that I wanted to take and also changed the usual classroom routine up. I didn't have the opportunity to shoot the class lining up along the fence as they normally do, because today the kids and all the families all crowded into the coat room to get out of the wet. It was crowded, it was getting hot, and it was quite chaotic.

In the midst of all the chaos, I didn't have a chance to give Mallory a proper good-bye. Mallory is usually hell-bent on getting a kiss and a hug from me in the morning, and it doesn't matter if Chad is hollering at her to get in the car - she still wants it and is willing to endure his wrath to get it. This morning, Mrs. Garrow was telling the parents to wave and leave before I knew it, and there she was on her spot on the bench way across the room from me with twenty parents separating us. I gave her my wave and lost it. I didn't expect to get so emotional; certainly not for the little girl who has been challenging me constantly these last few months, fighting every morsel of food I ask her to eat, bath I ask her to take and polite words I ask her to say... suddenly she seemed very small and helpless over on the other side of the room. I expected her day to be wonderful but the tears came just the same.We left work early today, to pick the kids up directly without having them go to the after-school program. And just as I'd expected, Mallory had a wonderful day. In fact, she told me school is the best place in the world. "More wonderful than Disney World?" I asked, and she said yes. She chattered the whole way home and then some, telling us first and most reverently about the opportunity she will have one day soon to take a show-and-tell item into the classroom and already decreeing that it will be her souvenir charm bracelet from Disney. She also told us about lunch, what she did at recess, how she made the puppet she brought home with her today, what songs they sang in music, who sits at her table with her, and otherwise giving us more information about school than we gleaned from Liam through his whole first kindergarten term.

As for Liam, he seems to be doing pretty well, too. He has a good mix of kids in his class, some from last year and some he remembers from the year before that. He likes his new teacher. He saw Mallory in the hallway today. And most importantly, he thinks he is the coolest kid ever with his new Buzz Lightyear backpack that he can not only carry as a backpack, but also roll like a piece of luggage. A last-minute purchase that is already well worth the money.(Publishing this today using Blogger's new interface, which totally sucks. Pardon the mess - I have not yet figured the formatting out.)

Disney World 2011 highlight reel

2011-09-06T06:46:00.001-04:00

One day, there will be an extended version of this movie made, with some of the clips that were too long to fit into a movie that condenses 11 days into a 3:49 song. For now... a sneak peek into our trip.

ETA: There is some sort of phantom background music from about 2:00 to about 2:30 and it's driving me crazy. I can't get rid of it and can't figure out what's causing it. I know what it's from... it's from one of the fireworks clips... and it baffles me because that clip is muted (as most clips are) and that's not the point in the movie at which you hear it. So what gives?? Any iMovie geniuses out there, please let me know!

11 days, 4 parks, 3 resorts, 5 Dole Whips, 7 spins through It's a Small World...

2011-09-04T23:19:00.000-04:00

...one magical vacation. Back with more when we're unpacked and settled, and by 'settled' I mean I have overcome the urge to stay up all night and neglect basic things like hygiene and proper nutrition in order to spend more time sifting through vacation photos and footage. Yes, really.

The one where I eat it on the swim

2011-08-21T16:40:00.000-04:00

Earlier today was the Bulldog Triathlon out at Rondeau Park. You may recall that this was the locale of my very first tri ever, the Try-a-Tri, here. This year I was back, but being an old pro at this tri thing now (said with tongue firmly in cheek), I was ready to do the full course race this morning.

Or so I thought. My back injury has been niggling all summer long, and I haven't run a 5k since early July. I have been so focused on the run - could I do it, would I re-trigger my injury, could I even last 5k now that it's been 8 weeks without any running - that to be honest, the idea of anything going wrong on the swim or bike never crossed my mind.

Oh, but it did. Approximately 15 seconds after the horn sounded to start my heat of the race, I had some sort of panic attack in the water. I couldn't breathe even though I wasn't moving, I couldn't get my heart rate down, and I couldn't reason myself back into a more sane state of mind. I kept thinking about how earlier this year I'd swum 4 times the distance - in the ocean! - no problem. I told myself to suck it up. I thought back to my final swim set last week which I'd finished in 17:19 - which may not be fast by swimming standards, but it was pretty indicative of someone who has at least trained for the distance.

Instead, I bobbed about gasping for breath, trying to decide between swimming back in to shore or latching onto the lifeguard's boat. In either case, it would be throwing in the towel.

Somehow I got moving again... sloooooowly... and somehow I did pull through and finish that leg of the race. I puttered through transition because really, I'd lost so much time on the swim that a few seconds here or there didn't matter. Transition was pretty darn empty by the time I got there. It was depressing.

But the bike leg went OK (a little slower than I expected, though it rained the whole time and I definitely took it easy on the corners because of that) and the run actually went better than I expected. So all was not lost.

But that swim leg got the best of me. It took me 23:17 but felt like an hour. I'd been thinking I could do it in 17:30. So much for that!

On the bright side, Chad signed up to do the duathlon, his first. He did really well and now we are one of those corny couples who share a hobby, which is pretty neat.

The only thing left to do is decide whether or not to go ahead and sign up for Lakeside this year. Part of me wants nothing to do with swimming again for a good long while. And part of me thinks back to Top Gun, where Tom Skerritt is telling his crew to get Maverick back up in the sky as soon as possible after his crash. If it worked for Tom Cruise, it will probably work for me.

In the blink of an eye

2011-08-19T06:17:00.000-04:00

Thursday was Liam's last official full day with Cindy. We're taking some family time for the next few weeks and when school starts in September, he'll be full time in Grade 1. Cindy was the one who really drew this to my attention on Wednesday night - she gave each of the kids a book as a wrap up to her summer reading journal project, and she told Liam that she picked the Toy Story early reader called 'Forever Friends' because she would be his friend forever. He will be back with her from time to time on PA days, and probably full time next summer, but essentially, he has graduated.

He's come a long way since this... ...but it feels like it's happened in the blink of an eye.

This could go on indefinitely

2011-08-18T06:38:00.000-04:00

Mallory's love note from the other day, while sweet and adorable, was not entirely unprecipitated. She wrote that note in response to finding out that Liam was busy making a surprise for her.

Liam's surprise started with an empty box of Kleenex that he collected from the bathroom. "I can make something out of this," he said. First, he painted the whole thing purple. Then he let me in on the secret: he was making Mallory a treasure chest. Once the painting was complete he told me that we needed to go shopping for some fake flowers and some gold-wrapped chocolate coins. I took him to the dollar store closest to our house, where he found the flowers and we subbed in some Rolos for the chocolate coins. Back at home it was bath time and the project had to wait til the next day for completion. Last night he got some adult help hot-glueing the flowers to the chest, put the candy inside, then hid it in the back yard and drew this map to help Mallory find it. (Captions added by moi to assist the general public in deciphering. He got the elements of the back yard correct, even if the layout is a little crazy.)

And in response to that, Mallory took a shoe box from Chad's recent purchase, painted it blue, put an old stuffed animal inside, hid it in the back yard, and drew a map that was essentially a copy of what Liam drew. Except that she hid her box behind the neighbour's tomato plants rather than in the pine trees.

All of this treasure-hunting makes me think that our kids may be ready to watch The Goonies now.

I don't know why it's turned sideways, but read the caption. She dictated that directly to Chad right before presenting Liam with her love note.

2011-08-17T06:17:00.000-04:00

Buyers' remorse

2011-08-16T21:21:00.000-04:00

Last night, Mallory woke up about an hour after we put her to bed, positively wailing. (It's possible she hadn't yet fallen asleep. Nonetheless - the wailing.) Chad went in after her to find out what was wrong and finally elicited this response: she had chosen the wrong school lunch bag. She regretted having chosen the lavender bag with horses on it. She wanted the pink bag with black cats after all.

I was like, are you freaking kidding me? I couldn't believe that she even remembered the pink bag with black cats was there, because at the time, she'd only had eyes for the lavender bag with horses. Actually, scratch that. She really only had eyes for the backpack she had been ogling all summer, and to be honest, I was a little surprised that she had chosen the one she did. The first backpack she liked was Disney princesses, and it was only partway through the summer that she started batting for team Barbie princesses (on the shelf right beside it) instead - a subtle yet tangible change that shows she is growing up. If anything, I thought she might regret not having chosen the Disney princesses. The lunch bag was merely an afterthought... or so I thought.

I debated this long and hard. I don't want her growing up spoiled and getting everything she wants. Sometimes you make a decision in life and you're stuck with the consequences. But... this would be something relatively easy to fix. If it is keeping her up at night thinking about it, maybe it's worth fixing.

I called the store and sure enough, they still had the pink bag with black cats. The gracious owner agreed to take back the horse bag in exchange for the cat bag. When I collected the kids from Cindy's house tonight, Mallory spotted the horse bag sitting on the front seat of the car and looked glum. But when I asked her if she wanted to go down to the store and ask the owner if she would please trade bags, she was thrilled. We squeaked in right before the store closed, and the owner had set the new bag aside for us. Mallory was tickled. She fell asleep on the drive home, clutching the new bag to her chest.

Another crisis averted. Now let's just hope she doesn't change her mind about the backpack. She's spent the past few weeks loading it up with her treasures and taking it to Cindy's to show off to her friends. We can no longer consider it in new condition... it's definitely not going back.

Sociable

2011-08-15T07:17:00.004-04:00

Over the past month or two, something funny has been going on with Liam. He's become sociable.
His shyness has never been that much of a surprise to us, given that we are both totally introverted people. He will usually talk to people he knows well, but we have friends who have known him since he was born who can't get more than a few words out of him.
Suddenly, though, it seems like a switch has been flipped. People have run into him out in public with Cindy and they've commented on how much he had to say to them. We were at a cottage party a few weeks ago (where these photos were taken), and he spent half the night running around with a ten-year-old boy. The funny part was that he was the instigator of most of what they got up to.
At the party he also spent a good chunk of time sword-fighting this twenty-something guy who last year probably would have given him a good scare.
We run into kids in public all the time who are like "Hey, Liam!" Kids at the grocery store, movie theatre, library, you name it. I think they all go to his school. Many of them are considerably older than he is. He still doesn't give them too much acknowledgement, but I think it's coming.
Wouldn't it be funny if Liam turned out to be the social butterfly of the family?
Well, we all know it won't be Chad or I. The smart money would be on Mallory but... you never know!!

Cousins

2011-08-13T21:50:00.003-04:00

More pictures from the 2011 Roberts Family Reunion on Flickr.

Headline news

2011-08-12T22:30:00.002-04:00

Fawn Island 2011

2011-08-08T21:56:00.000-04:00

On the weekend we sojourned out to Fawn Island for our annual trip. Since this subject has been repeated here almost annually since I first got started in weblogging, I will spare you the deets. Behold, though, The Annual Children's Picture:We always wait until it's almost time to take the boat back to the mainland before taking this shot. The kids are sunburnt and disheveled and overtired and hyped up on too many Cheetos and cookies. And yet we do it the same way every year. But, it's fun to look back on. Here's the 2009 photo, for comparison's sake...

And this is a real hoot - the first year we had a kid to toss into the kids' picture. That's Liam in the carseat.

Of course, we have to do the Friends Who Are The Reason We Are Here picture, too.

Sometimes, that picture gets crashed. Funny, he wasn't smiling that big a few minutes ago.

I really enjoy our trip out to the island each summer because this is usually the only time of year to see this group of friends all together - and we are so freaking witty and hilarious. At least, we think we are. I have been friends with these girls (can I say that now that we are closer to 40 than 30?) for 20 years now - I moved to Chatham in the summer of 1991. Usually, that feels like it was yesterday. (Then one of the kids starts hollering for something and I realize that time has passed.)

Here's a bonus shot - Renee picked up my camera and caught Liam and I strolling down the boardwalk by the canal, checking out the boats. I love it. Thanks, Renee.

More photos in a set on Flickr.

Retail therapy

2011-08-06T21:50:00.004-04:00

On Friday, the kids had dentist appointments. And the second thing we had on the agenda was to complete all of our back-to-school shopping. To Mallory, this meant the culmination of six months of watching and waiting, as she has had a backpack picked out for just about that long. She passes by it at least once a week on a regular field trip with Cindy, and possibly again if we are running errands in the same vicinty, and every single time she stops to make sure it's still there and fawn over it (and beg me to get it for her).

So I told her that Friday was the day, and she was beside herself. She could not stop talking about the dentist appointment to be followed by the shopping trip. She was totally gung ho. We walked into the dentist's office and all went back to an exam room, where Liam breezed through his appointment. I don't know what it was, but something must have spooked Mallory, because when it was her turn to get into the chair she clamped her mouth shut and refused to open it.

This was not the first time she went to the dentist's and the last time, she had no problem with it. Like I said, I have no idea what has gotten into her. I begged, pleaded, and finally threatened: you open that mouth, or there is no backpack for you.

No dice.

Having wasted enough of the office's time, I called it quits and marched her up to the front desk to pay. Liam was allowed to pick a treat out of the treat jar. The hygienist tried to sneak a treat to Mallory but I caught her and said no way. I also informed Mallory that there would be no backpack today. She was being quiet about it, but there were tears streaming down her face. (Good! I thought.)

Finally, when I was halfway through paying the bill, Mallory told me she was ready to reconsider. I marched her back down the hall to the dentist's chair. They said they still had time to look at her. They skipped the polish and fluoride and x-rays, but at least she opened her mouth and they got a visual.

Even though it wasn't a complete checkup, I decided to get her the backpack anyway. She would need it for school, after all. We went straight to the mall and up the escalator and she marched over to where the backpack was. Except that it was gone.Here she is, not quite sure what to make of the situation. Luckily they had merely moved the display inside the store. Here she is with her purchase:After that errand, we went down the street to the toy store, and got her the dual-sided lunch bag she also requires. I wasn't allowed to take a picture of that. Apparently I was embarrassing her.

And then, after being a sweet and patient saint, it was Liam's turn. I turned him loose in a department store with his Grade 1 school supply list. He read almost the whole list by himself, and had a wonderful time running back and forth in the aisles to collect everything he needed. "Twenty-four pencils!" he crowed. I think the volume of supplies delighted him. "Six erasers!" As if picking out the supplies themselves was not enough fun, Liam had to factor some decision-making into the process. "I need six erasers. And these ones have two in each pack. So I could get three of these and then I would have enough. But these erasers have five in each pack, so I would need two packs, but I wouldn't need all of the erasers, so maybe we could leave some at home." There he was, doing math in his head without even knowing it.It was a stinking hot day, and one of my last Happy Fridays of the summer. I'd given the kids three choices for the afternoon, all involving water. We could swim at home, we could go back to the new splash pad, or we could go to the beach. I thought they wouldn't be able to contain their excitement over their choices. But in the end, we stayed home, dipping into our backyard pool for only a brief time. The kids had way more fun spreading their school stashes out on the living room rug, taking stock of their goodies, arranging and re-arranging and filling pencil cases and figuring out how to stow the thermos inside the lunch bag inside the backpack. No further entertainment was required.

(According to the dentist, Liam has FOUR loose teeth! Barely-perceptibly-loose, but loose nonetheless. He's going to look like the guy from Meet the Robinsons who can't find his dentures pretty soon. It's going to be a hoot.)

The perfect summer weekend: part 2

2011-08-02T06:53:00.002-04:00

On Sunday morning we did what we have been saying we were going to do all summer long, and finally got around to doing on the last day of July. We packed up our bikes and headed out to Rondeau.We left the kids with Gramma and Grampa, who are conveniently located just a couple of minutes outside of the park gate. Chad and I headed into the park on our bikes to do a couple of loops of the Bulldog triathlon/duathlon bike course. The Bulldog race is coming up in just a few weeks. I am hoping to do it and it was originally my 'A' race for this year... but a few weeks ago, my back had a relapse, and I am not running AGAIN. So if I do the race, it will essentially be without having trained for the run leg since May. Not the best way to PR. We were kicking ourselves for not having gotten out to the park earlier. It's flat, shaded, scenic, and without the traffic stops we have to make at home - what's not to love? Aside from the need to brake for the occasional snake, it's perfect.After we finished our bike, everyone joined us in the park, and we had the picnic we had packed, toured the little museum they have out there, and then went down to the beach for a few hours. Having a pool in the back yard is lovely, but it gives little incentive to get out to the beach. And when we finally make it there, I always wonder what took us so long.Liam even made a trip back up to the museum at 1 p.m. to watch the advertised snake feeding. Good times.When we finally dragged ourselves away from the water and packed back into the car, there were lots of "let's do this agains" and "why don't we do this more oftens" exchanged. I would love to live up to those words, but every weekend between now and September is spoken for. Maybe we'll have to pencil it in for Labour Day right now.

The perfect summer weekend: part 1

2011-08-01T13:45:00.006-04:00

On Saturday morning, we made it out to the blueberry farm for our 2011 visit. I don't know why I enjoy going there so much, but I do. This time around Chad joined us, with minimal grumbling. Fruit picking is not really his thing when it's so much easier to just buy it at the grocery store. The fact that I had to wait until the seniors' home tour bus pulled away before I could take this picture might also have something to do with it.

But seriously, how awesome is it to have a series of photos like this to mark the passage of time? Here's Mallory way back in 2007 during her inaugural visit.Liam was game for another in the series too...

...and here's what we have to compare it to. Liam is always game for a trip to a fruit farm, and not just for the photo ops. He probably had thirty blueberries in his pail when we were done, and three pounds in his belly.Mallory still insists that she doesn't like blueberries, but she was very content to burrow under the bushes and set up shop - she said she was making blueberry pies under there.There are tractor rides and games to play... here Liam is grinning ear-to-ear as he beats Chad and Mallory at a rubber duck race.After we finished picking, we went in to the bakery for a snack before making the trip home. Despite having a belly full of berries, Liam still managed to fit in a blueberry muffin, and Chad had a blueberry scone and I had a blueberry oat bar. Mallory managed to find the one non-blueberry item in the bakery, a cinnamon roll.Sometimes I wonder how we can possibly be genetically related.

Here we go again, only amplified.

2011-07-28T12:28:00.001-04:00

In the past 24 hours, we have signed Mallory up for ringette and gymnastics, and also taken the kids on a tour of the new YMCA that is opening on Saturday. Ever since she quit swimming lessons last year, Mallory has maintained that she will start swimming lessons up again "when the new Y opens". This is one of those silly things that she obviously overheard us talking about and had no idea what it meant. I mean, why would she want to swim in one place but not the other? I did expect her to back out of this promise of sorts, but last night she was enthralled to see the new pool, and the last time we were in the water at home she was showing off some moves and telling us she was 'practicing' for when she starts swimming lessons.

It came down to a choice between ringette and hockey, and given her lack of experience on the ice (one year of half-hearted skating lessons aside) and the better ice time hours offered, ringette seemed to be the way to go. Well, that's how I think of it, anyway. We let Mallory decide and that's what she picked (and despite my initial concerns, I don't think the fact that her beloved Nicky plays ringette factored into her decision all that much.) When we pulled up to the arena and she saw tables set up to process the registrations outside, Mallory skipped right over to them, she was so excited. Hopefully that's a sign of good things to come.

Once the ringette ice times were confirmed I was able to call the gymnastics place this morning and book her into a timeslot that will work. Gymnastics is run as three 10-week sessions so at least if she decides she hates the first one, I will only have to bribe her to continue for a couple of months before we are done.

Liam still needs to get signed up for hockey (that's Chad's area of expertise) and both kids need to get registered for swimming lessons when that opens up at the end of August... and I am considering whether we should start Liam in piano... and then that will do. And then, if I thought getting them all registered up was bad, wait until we're living and breathing all these activities every single day. Please tell me I'm not about to lose my ever-lovin' mind.

Hot fun in the summertime

2011-07-24T22:08:00.004-04:00

The heat is making me too lazy to write anything. Pictures'll have to do.

Pretty good at getting what she wants. Including the players' treats at halftime at her brother's soccer game.

2011-07-23T17:43:00.002-04:00

Jonah's baptism

2011-07-20T21:07:00.003-04:00

So... is it hot enough for you?? In addition to the joy of melting at home (despite the air conditioning) and swimming in a pool that is no longer refreshing because it seems to have turned into a bathtub, it's so warm, work has been a paradise on account of the heat, too. There's nothing quite like half a continent of people firing up their air conditioners simultaneously to put a smile on my professional face. NOT.I digress. On the weekend we went to see baby Jonah get baptised. Liam was actually invited to his good friend's birthday party at the same time, and the sweetheart wanted to go to the baptism instead. He and Mallory certainly get a kick out of their cousins. And hey, Mallory didn't pee on the rug this time!

Plus, we got a pretty good family picture out of the deal, too. A few more photos on Flickr.

Returning to the scene of the crime

2011-07-18T10:01:00.000-04:00

I know I've been away a lot lately, and what can I say? I've just been enjoying summer. Spending long days on the computer for work purposes, I have been taking more of a break from it lately in my off time.

(Vacation planning purposes aside. Ahem.)

So these pictures date back ten days or so, to my last Friday off. It was hot and muggy and we wanted to do something fun. So we threw together a picnic and headed off to Mitchell's Bay. Yes, this was the site of Mallory's Big Accident, and Mallory has been upset ever since that day that she missed out on the Mitchell's Bay adventure that the rest of the kids got to enjoy. I'd told her I would make it up to her, and I did. But first I made her point out the offending piece of playground equipment. Yup, there it is. That matches the shape of the scar on her forehead alright.Then, we had our picnic...And horsed around in the water. This bay is lovely because it's clean, warm, and shallow as heck for as far as the eye can see. The kids can roam far and wide without me worrying too much.

I *ADORE* this picture of Liam. Even though it's hard to tell it's him. I might print it really big.Mallory came to the conclusion that she really does like splash pads, after all. (Good thing: next weekend involves another one!)There was never any doubt that Liam likes them.Finally, an ice cream cone before we piled into the car and went back home. From this angle you almost can't even see the scar. (Now that the wound has healed, I break open a Vitamin E capsule twice a day and smear the oil over the scar. For some crazy reason, Mallory LOVES this ritual. "Is it time for my oil yet?" she starts asking every night after dinner. It cracks me up.)I'd hoped to get out to Mitchell's Bay again this summer, but I feel it slipping away from us. Weekends are booked, flex Fridays are spoken for... I don't know if we can make it happen. Hoping perhaps for an Indian Summer that extends the warm weather past Labour Day - that might be our only chance.

Look who got lucky

2011-07-11T22:06:00.002-04:00

While we were at the Fife Animal Hospital the other day, we filled out a ballot to win one of two themed gift baskets, one for cats and one for dogs. It figures that we got a call two days later saying Captain's name had been pulled from the jar of ballots. I've never won anything... Captain enters one draw and he wins!

The kids were so excited when I told them. We had just enough time to drop by the office to pick up the prize on our way home that night. The gift basket is huge - many many toys, food, a bed, a blanket... a cat toothbrush that may or may not get used... the list goes on.

Here's one instance where you can say "Winner winner chicken dinner!" and mean it - two cans of chicken-flavoured cat food were included.

And here's another picture, just for fun. Captain was shaking his head and the result looks like he's possessed. Some days I'm sure my head spins like this, too. Only for me, I can't say the catnip's to blame.

The lizard tattoo

2011-07-10T21:17:00.003-04:00

We've had another busy weekend, which included, among other things, a trip to the beach, swimming, a community service project, Ribfest, and a visit to the open house of a new veterinary clinic in town where we will probably start taking our disease-riddled cat. The open house was pretty awesome, with stuffed animals demonstrating how the operating table works, cat and dog-shaped cupcakes, raffles, treats for the pets, etc. The part the kids probably liked the most was the glitter tattoo artist working in the back corner. Mallory went first and got herself a pretty little pink and purple butterfly tattoo. Then it was Liam's turn. As he was browsing the sheets of stencils to select what he wanted, I think I got a little distracted by the meatballs on the oh-so-close catering table. It wasn't until I heard the tattoo artist say, "Excuse me, is he with you?" that I turned back. She wanted to show me the tattoo stencil that Liam had selected to make sure it was OK with me before proceeding.

It was the Playboy bunny logo.

I kid you not! There among the butterflies and dinosaurs and even skulls and crossbones... the little rabbit with a bow tie... and that's the one Liam picked.

I had to explain to him that the Playboy bunny means something different to grown-ups than it does to kids, and that it probably wasn't the best choice. I think he thought I was crazy, but he did go on to select this lizard instead.

Another crisis averted.

Summer literacy

2011-07-03T12:50:00.004-04:00

Liam's report card came home last week and he got outstanding reviews on his reading skills. This still amazes me. We read books together at bedtime but we've never done deliberate 'reading lessons' - we are not really flashcard-type parents - so the fact that he's picked it up still surprises me sometimes. Last night he was reading a Richard Scarry book we got at the library and he read the word 'mistakes' without hesitating. I couldn't believe it.

Today he was digging through some old toys and started playing 'restaurant' with his old play food and cash register. He cooked up this menu, entirely on his own. It cracks me up. I know exactly what he's written:As for Mallory, her drawing skills are really picking up now. This is her latest creation:It's a self-portrait of her on stage at her dance recital, which she says should be obvious because she is dressed all in pink (as if that never happens outside of dance!) and also because the stage floor was black. I love the little pink ribbon she added to her hair, just like she wore it for the show. I made the mistake, however, of asking whether she is wearing her tap shoes in this picture. She was quite offended and pointed out that all of her toes are visible - she is pirouetting on tippy-toe, which should have been obvious not only from the toes but also from the arm over her head and other curved out to the side. She is pretty sure that the Grammas and Grampas won't make the same mistake I did when she shows them this picture, since they were all at the dance recital, too. Be forewarned. :)

(And at the top, that says "To Mom and Dad". She is one for addressing her artwork like you would a letter.)

The most wonderful time of the year

2011-07-02T11:01:00.002-04:00

Canada Day is one of my favourite holidays, especially when it falls over a weekend. We kicked things off with an incredibly busy day yesterday on the holiday itself. In one day we managed to fit in a trip to the local festivities in the park; a party; a parade; a soccer game; a swim; and then the fireworks, which were at 10 p.m. This was the second year we went to see them with the kids, and the first year that Mallory actually stayed awake to watch them. She was just about as enthralled as you'd expect a four-year-old little girl who adores anything that sparkles to be. In fact, after the fireworks ended she was so high on life that she ran to the top of the riverbank and started log rolling down it. Which might normally be fine, except that this was a very short, very steep riverbank, and it was after dark. Luckily we caught her before she started swimming with the fishes.

Our plans for the rest of the weekend never change from year to year. Our TV flips constantly back and forth between the Wimbledon finals and the opening stage of the Tour de France, and tomorrow morning we'll have waffles on Championship Sunday. The rest of the day we will swim, barbecue, and otherwise enjoy our lazy selves. It's a great way to kick off the summer.

Just when I think I've come to the end of the internet... there is more to be read.

2011-06-30T23:11:00.000-04:00

Knock knock.

Look out!

2011-06-29T20:38:00.001-04:00

Someone dug out his rollerblades yesterday. He is much better on them this year than last - I guess we have 26 weeks of hockey practice to thank for that! - but still a little unsteady on his feet:As for this one, I asked her numerous times to stay out of his way. She is healing quite nicely now and I don't want to mess with that.

Weekend fun

2011-06-27T20:51:00.006-04:00

This weekend it finally felt a little bit like summer. We made the most of it.
On Friday, to get out of the rain, we went to see 'Mr. Popper's Penguins' at the theatre in Lakeshore. It's not like me to drive to get to a movie, but our local theatre wasn't running any matinees. It was a good excuse to go to Cora's for lunch, too. Of course the kids loved it - you know as soon as we saw that trailer for the first time that we were taking Mallory to see it! (And Liam too.)
On Saturday Chad and I had an adults-only event to attend out of town, so the kids went to the trailer a bit to visit Gramma and Grampa. It was a lot of driving in one day but the kids seemed to enjoy themselves.On Sunday morning I took Mallory back to the ER to have her stitches removed. Same doctor but a better experience. Mallory cried, but I could tell it was more out of fear than terrible pain. And it was all over with pretty quickly. The next time someone has stitches I will probably just take them out myself at home.

As a reward for her good behaviour in the hospital, we went strawberry picking on Sunday afternoon. Our old haunt, Boley's, seems to have gone out of the berry business. So we went to Pardo's instead. The experience was made all the better by these cool old berry trugs they give you to carry your pick around in. I really wanted to steal one.

Back at home we baked up a fresh strawberry shortcake and whipped some cream to go with it. Liam was in heaven. He ate another giant helping after dinner tonight. I think I might have to make another one of these before berry season is over.

Finally, Father's Day.

2011-06-23T21:36:00.015-04:00

Last weekend, Father's Day to be precise, was the first triathlon of the (my) season: TomatoMan. This race is held in Leamington which is the greenhouse capital of Ontario. The race kit included a bag of peppers, tomatoes and cucumbers, which I suppose is partly why the race is called TomatoMan, and I swear they were the best peppers and tomatoes and cucumbers I've ever eaten. In the past I hear this has been a small local race, but this year it was an Ontario Sprint Championship and a world qualifier, which brought in some elite athletes and made the field (including relay and duathletes) hit around 400 people. Racking my bike next to some of these musclemen in their little singlets was a little unnerving. However, I was not at TomatoMan to compete. A few weeks before the race, but after having signed up and paid for it, I bent over the dishwasher one day and then could not walk for a week. I pinched some nerves in my back which made the slightest movement excruciating. After a few days I could walk, and biking was not a problem once I got my leg over the frame. Swimming was painful unless I didn't kick and running was unbearable. It was time to call in a pro.
I went for my first visit to a chiropractor, and over the course of a couple of weeks saw him maybe 4 times. Each adjustment made me feel better but didn't eliminate the problem completely. He did a couple of treatments and then told me to go for a test run, which I wound up walking most of. After that he dropped the hammer and said no more running.(I look ridiculous when I swim, don't I? I'm sighting my way into the finish here. I think I need to get some slightly-less-dorky-looking tinted goggles, which are a little more badass.) I was pretty bummed for a few days, having (a) trained for the race (well, at least somewhat -it's been a cold and wet spring which has had me biking less than I had by this time last year), (b) paid for the race, and (c) talked about the race with several friends who were also racing. It felt like I was going to miss the social event of the season.Then it occurred to me that I should do the swim and the bike anyway, and just not complete the run portion of the event. I never get out to swim in open water unless it's during a race because I am too chicken to head out without a lifeguard, so why let the opportunity pass me by?So I swam with a near-normal kick, having recovered enough by the time of the race to give it a little flutter. Then walked up the ramp from the harbour and into transition. Sauntered through transition, jumped on my bike and completed the bike course, then rolled to a stop and again slowed to a walk coming back in to rack it. After racking I crossed the timing mat onto the run course, then cut into the crowd to find Chad:Definitely the best time I will ever have for a triathlon! So my result is out there for all the world to see with a big fat DNF next to it, which kind of sucks, but the swim and bike were a lot of fun and I will definitely go back and hope to finish the entire course next year.It was super-awesome of Chad to spend his Father's Day getting up at 5 a.m. and hitting the road with me. The kids spent the night with Gramm and Grampa to allow us to get away early, and by the time we went to fetch them and got home with them they were bursting with excitement to hand out the gifts they'd spent the past several weeks creating.Liam's cooking tools tin was a big hit, particularly because it was accompanied by this summary of Chad's cooking prowess:Mallory made Chad no fewer than a half-dozen cards and gifts, but my favourite of them all was this portrait she drew of him. She made sure to let us know that the spots are his freckles.After the gifts were handed out, Chad and Liam went for a bike ride and Mallory and I decided to get the cars washed as another gift for daddy. We spent an hour out on the driveway with the hose and buckets and sponges:(Mallory actually prefers watering the garden to washing the cars.) And after all that, 24 hours later, I went out to the parking lot after work to retrieve the truck, and found it looking like this:That's the first time I've washed the vehicle in the ~6 years we've had it, and after this experience... will probably be the last.

Mallory's boo-boo

2011-06-22T21:31:00.003-04:00

Yesterday I got the dreaded call from Cindy saying that Mallory had an accident. At first I thought this meant she wet her pants. Nope... Cindy said she fell off a piece of playground equipment at Mitchell's Bay and had a head wound. She was hustling Mallory into the car to bring her back to town because I needed to get her to the ER. Not the kind of call you want to get!

Mallory was doing OK when I first saw her and I think she was greatly comforted to have me there. It looks like she landed on a piece of metal (part of the equipment) sticking out of the ground - her wound was a star-shaped puncture about as big as a quarter. We went to the hospital and went through triage OK. No sign of concussion. They gave her a topical anaesthetic and I don't think it did a great job of relieving the pain when they started to sew her up, so they stopped and gave her something injectable before putting in the next two stitches. Mallory was beside herself for the first one but somewhat better after that. I thought the bedside manner of the doctor was severely lacking but I'll leave it at that. The nurses were wonderful and did not try to shame me out of being upset for Mallory like the doctor did (because by the time she was screaming through her stitches, I was pretty upset too. I know people go through much worse every day, but that does not make it all that much easier when you are in the moment.)

After the stitches, she was quite upset to learn that I didn't plan to take her straight back out to Mitchell's Bay. Then she fell asleep in the car on the drive home - and slept the rest of the afternoon. After the day's events I think she needed it.

Today she is kind of proud of her stitches. It was Meet the Teacher day at school and Mallory thought she would get some special attention from Mrs. Garrow on account of them. Unfortunately, she did not behave all that well at the meeting. I tried to be patient and cut her some slack because I think she's still feeling a little off. Tonight she started screaming bloody murder again when I even mentioned the idea of sponging off the wound and applying some ointment to it, so I think it's fair to say that she is a little traumatized by the idea of anyone going near her head. Wish me luck with getting the stitches removed, because that is supposed to happen on Sunday and as luck would have it, the same doctor will be working the ER again.

I hope your day was better than hers.

2011-06-21T21:51:00.001-04:00

And... I'm spent.

2011-06-20T07:08:00.001-04:00

Friday night was Liam's soccer game...And then I photographed the Luminary Ceremony at Relay for Life for the Cancer Society...
Saturday we had a BBQ/pool party - lots of people in the water despite it still being chilly (come on summer, where are you??)...
And then on Sunday I did another one of these. Well, most of it, anyway.
Now I'm off to work. I need some rest.

One week ago

2011-06-17T07:21:00.001-04:00

Last weekend was a whirlwind and this weekend promises to be no different. Here's one of my favourite pictures from last weekend - we headed to the zoo, and even though we were rained out and crowded out by 5500 kids from the Detroit public school system, we still had fun. This was the first time we've ever been in the polar bear exhibit when they have been swimming. We could have watched them all day. (But then those pesky school kids showed up...)

California Adventure: Day 7

2011-06-14T20:39:00.000-04:00

My conference ended a little before noon on Friday. We checked out of the Silverado and left Napa Valley, headed back to the coast. Our first destination was Sausalito. It's a little hamlet across the bay from San Francisco. In fact, it has some real estate pricier than that in San Francisco proper since it's the place with the views of the city's skyline. It also has some pretty cool houseboats. And, it has the destination we had in mind for lunch: Fish.. And no, I did not mistype that - the restaurant is called Fish. with a period.They don't take credit cards and you sit at picnic tables to eat your cafeteria-style food but that doesn't mean it's cheap. All the fish is local, sustainable, humanely caught, etc. We both ordered up a big plate of fish tacos.The restaurant is under the blue awning. After filling up at Fish. we left Sausalito and headed back out of the city again. Just a few miles away is the entrance to the Muir Woods National Monument. I wanted to see some coastal redwoods, the tallest living things in the world, and this is one of the best places to do that. We skirted through Muir Woods on the Dipsea trail, but the part of the park surrounding the official visitors entrance has the oldest-growth (and thus largest) trees.
Muir Woods is one of those places that are breathtakingly beautiful and you look at your pictures when you get home and they really just don't do justice to how it felt to be there and see things in person. Plus, all that dappled light and shadow just doesn't translate well to a photo.I like this picture a lot... look at the teeny tiny people on the bottom right.A kind couple offered to take this picture of us, and I am glad they did, but limb chops are a photographic pet peeve of mine. I really wish the picture included our feet!It was very quiet and damp in the woods. We hiked a few miles around a paved path.This cross-section of tree is 1,000 years old. Pretty cool!We made a quick stop in the Muir Woods gift shop before we headed out. They had some pretty redwood salad bowls. I picked one up and considered it and then saw that it cost $487. It did not come home with me. I made do with two postcards instead.After we left Muir Woods, we headed back south to a finger of land that juts out - Point Bonita. There is a very cool lighthouse on Point Bonita and getting there involves crossing a suspension bridge. Unfortunately, the suspension bridge is closed until next year for repairs, and there is a tunnel you have to pass through to get to the start of the suspension bridge that is only open Sat/Sun/Mon. We were there on Friday and knew we wouldn't get through, nor could we cross the suspension bridge, but there were nice views of the ocean and city from there so it was still a worthwhile stop. The Point is a popular spot for seals to haul out of the ocean to sun themselves and we saw dozens.

Driving back, we were still ahead of schedule, so we pulled over at a beach to take a walk. Finally saw some California surf dudes in action up close.
And then we called the kids to say goodnight one last time, and crossed the Golden Gate Bridge for the last time.
Since it was the Friday of a long weekend we figured we'd better get through the city and close to the airport well in advance of our flight. We made it through in record time and then had some time to kill in a very suburban type area with no tourist attractions... so we went to see Hangover 2. We got out of the movie right in time to head to the airport. So off we went, to refuel, drop off the rental car, check in, grab a bite to eat, and then board our red-eye home. We were home by 9 a.m. the following morning... bleary eyed and exhausted, and so glad to see the kids again, but having had a wonderful trip.

California Adventure: Days 5, 6, and half of 7

2011-06-13T22:10:00.001-04:00

This was the actual purpose of our trip to California. I was attending a conference at the Silverado Resort in Napa Valley. Funny, when they took a vote at the conference last year (in Florida) to select the location for 2011, I voted for Santa Fe, along with three other people, and the remaining 146 or so attendees all voted for Napa Valley. Had I known at the time how close San Francisco and Napa Valley were to each other, I definitely would have voted for Napa, too. This was definitely the best work trip I've ever been on!The conference ran from a reception on Tuesday night til noon on Friday. Chad puttered around the grounds, used the pool and the running paths, slept in, explored some of the surrounding countryside by car, and otherwise fit in a little well-deserved R&R. I spent my days attending the conference but we had a few hours each night to spend as we pleased. Truth be told... Napa was my least favourite part of the trip. I don't drink wine, I'm not interested in visiting wineries, etc. The countryside was very pretty - we rented some bikes and rode up and down the valley one evening - but I much preferred our time in San Francisco and Marin County.One thing that Napa did have going for it was the FOOD! There are no plain-Jane restaurants in Napa. Everything is upscale, run by proper chefs, and delicious. I think we ate our way through Napa Valley. We found a great BBQ place in Napa itself, called Bounty Hunter - we both loved that. I also made advance reservations for a place called Mustard's that was wonderful. There is a culinary school in Napa and I suppose it's just a natural pairing with the wine. So yes, the highlight of Napa for me was the food.That, and the outlet mall. Gap dresses for Mallory for $4? Come ON!We had one last 12-hour stint to spend as we pleased in California after the conference ended. That's coming up next.

(And in case you're wondering... Liam is very pleased with the outcome of the hockey game last night. He has said all along that he wants Vancouver to win in Vancouver. I think he would have been a little disappointed to see the series end with Game 6.)

Tiny dancer

2011-06-11T22:35:00.003-04:00

Today was Mallory's long-awaited dance recital. Preparations began early, with a morning shower and a bun-making process that could possibly have been more painful for me than it was for her. After getting her hair done, she requested the lunch of champions: grilled cheese. She looked like a starlet wandering the house in her robe with her hair done. No way was she eating ketchup for lunch in her white costume! We waited until after the ketchup was done and her face was washed before applying her make-up.I had to get her to the theatre early, and am glad I wasn't any later than I was. Parking was hard to find and it took a long time to find our way to the dressing room, tucked away in a warren of backstage tunnels underneath the auditorium. I left her settled in with three other classes in a single dressing room. It seemed cramped but others who've been in the dance biz for much longer actually lauded the roominess. Who am I to know?

She did very well onstage. She danced. She didn't stand there like a deer in the headlights. She took a lot of visual cues from her teacher who demo'd from the wings, but then again, so did all of her classmates. She looked adorable. I, of course, was not allowed to photograph at all... we'll have to wait and see how the pro shots turned out. I have a funny feeling they will all feature just the side of her head, but if any turn out well I may shell out for a copy. They also got me for $5 for the flower for my little starlet. My wallet continues to empty.

Just as fun as seeing Mallory onstage was picking out all the other kids we knew, like daycare friends and school friends and work colleagues' kids... this is a pretty major dance studio in town, from the numbers I saw today.

After the final curtain call, and collecting her from backstage along with 1500 other parents in the warren of tunnels, I wanted to get a couple more shots of her. She wasn't really buying it. She was clearly exhausted. I did bribe her with a promise of a popsicle at home:

The other parents were giving me disapproving looks, like, don't you realize that by letting your kid wear her tap shoes out on the street, she's going to ruin them? Yes, I realize that. I also realize that had the dance season gone two weeks longer, she would no longer fit into them, and my kid is going to be tumbling and trampolining next year rather than tapping. So I really don't care. They will sell on Kijiji regardless.
One more photo at home, while we were both cleaned up. I had to tickle her to elicit a smile here. Even though both sets of grandparents joined us for dinner back at the house (thank you!), and normally she'd be a little social butterfly, she instead retired to her room for some alone playtime while we got dinner on the table. It's not like her to need alone time, but she deserved it today. She went to bed complaining of a tummy ache, which didn't seem right because she actually ate very well today. I think it might have been the stress. I laid beside her and rubbed her back until she fell asleep. Today that did not take very long at all.

It's crunch time.

2011-06-10T21:03:00.001-04:00

And Liam couldn't be more intrigued. If he were a nail biter, they'd be down to the quick. Rooting for Vancouver all the way.

California Adventure Day 4: Double Dipsea

2011-06-09T06:23:00.001-04:00

On the morning of our fourth day, we got up, checked out, picked up a rental car and crossed the Golden Gate en route to the Marin County Headlands. We stopped for breakfast at the Dipsea Cafe - a very planned, very apropos choice.
We stuffed ourselves with stacks of pancakes (mine were blueberry-apricot-poppy seed with strawberry butter; YUM) and fresh squeezed orange juice. We would need all the strength we could muster. We were off to do the Dipsea.The Dipsea is the second oldest race in the United States, second only to the Boston Marathon. It's a quirky trail run that happens the second Sunday in June (so the 101st running will be this weekend!) and there's a lottery to get in because it's so popular. The reason it's popular, aside from the gorgeous scenery, is that there is a crazy handicapping system that sets runners off in waves. The very oldest and youngest runners go first; then the next oldest and next youngest batch; and so on, such that there is a lot of leapfrogging going on and it's possible for almost anyone to win.

Last year the race came down to a matter of seconds, and in the end an 8 year old girl became the youngest winner ever, edging out a 68 year old woman.

The trail is 7.5 miles long and runs from downtown Mill Valley to Stinson Beach. It starts with almost 700 steps up 3 staircases, the equivalent of climbing a 50 storey building within the first half mile.

And from there, it continues in pretty much the same way. Sections of the course have names like "Cardiac" and "Suicide" which pretty much indicate how intense the climbs are.

What better way to spend your vacation, huh?

Off we set... we were going to do the Dipsea. The trail is well marked in some spots... in others, not so well marked, but local residents do their part to help the hikers and runners out:

The trail climbs from Mill Valley, up through the golden hills of Marin County, down through a ravine to the edge of Muir Woods, back up through some open hills, into a redwood grove, and then finally starts to edge down toward the ocean. Kind of like this:

It was pretty, and once again we really lucked out with the weather.

Self-timer on a rock. This was at the top of "Cardiac", the highest point of the course. I like how you can scarcely tell where the ocean ends and the sky begins.

Each mile of the race is marked, though we missed a few of them along the way. I'm guessing they may have been overgrown since it had almost been a year since the last running of the race.

Finally, Stinson Beach is visible below, and we start logging more downhill than uphill.
Woot! I was pretty happy to finally stumble into Stinson Beach. It took us 3 hours and 2 minutes. The 8 year old girl who won the race last year did it in 1 hour, 12 minutes. It boggled our minds.

We bought a chicken sandwich from a shack on the beach. Quite possibly the best chicken sandwich on the face of the earth. We hung out on the beach for a little. I was rooting for the shuttle bus for the return trip... was hoping if Chad rested enough, it would be hard to get going again, and he'd go along with the idea. No such luck. Chad wanted to make it a Double Dipsea and hike back. And because he'd been such a good sport about getting up at 4:30 a.m. to watch me swim a few days earlier, I felt like I owed him one. So we did the Double Dipsea.

I put the camera in the backpack for the return trip - we were no longer sightseeing. It was all business. About halfway through the return hike, I think Chad regretted not taking the shuttle. I know I did. We were very lucky to find a water fountain at the outskirt of Muir Woods - we'd run out of water by that point and were parched. We finally made it back to Mill Valley and the car, drove to the nearest gas station, and bought the first cold drink we could find. It was heaven!

That pretty much wrapped up Day 4. We left Mill Valley, hot, sweaty and exhausted, en route to our next destination. Here is a hint for days 5, 6 and part of 7:

BFFs

2011-06-08T06:21:00.000-04:00

Yesterday was the girls' dress rehearsal for their dance recital, which is coming up this weekend. Lately, dance has left a bit of a bad taste in my mouth. I was just billed $51 for the month of June. She doesn't get a lesson in the month of June - just a dress rehearsal and a performance (for which I am required to buy a $25 ticket to see my own child - but that's another issue). Why am I paying for 4 lessons that don't exist? Plus, the last week of May, a professional photographer came in to take pictures. They spent 40 of the 45 class minutes on pictures and 5 minutes on the lesson. So I paid roughly $12 to line the pockets of a photographer. No, I did not buy any pictures. Instead, we took them outside between dress rehearsal numbers, and we did our own.I hope these girls are still friends 20 years from now and that they look back on these pictures and fawn over how cute and tiny they were. I hope they can say their BFF is one they have had essentially since birth. In reality I know this is not likely to happen... maybe they don't have to be BFFs... just Fs would be nice. FFs, even.I might be grumpy about the dance thing now, but maybe I will miss it this time next year, when we aren't partaking in the costumes and makeup and wee buns topped with pink ribbons and talking incessantly about the Sleeping Beauty dance (her ballet number is set to "Once Upon a Dream").
I am planning to print a new series of pictures to line the stairs down to the basement playroom. I think one of these dance portraits may make the cut.

Spring fling

2011-06-07T12:13:00.000-04:00

Here's one more sequence of photos, from several weeks ago - in fact, from one of the first bike rides we took this spring. (The grass was just greening up and my hydrangea was just starting to leaf out - I'm guessing early May?) Liam was scooting here rather than riding his bike, since otherwise, he's too fast of a rider for Mallory to keep up. Mallory is newly discovering the joy of riding - she did not 'get it' last year as much as she does now, when she needs very little help from us.

The cyclist in me loves that the kids enjoy riding their bikes as much as I do.

Sleepers

2011-06-07T12:08:00.000-04:00

This photo is from several weeks ago. I was going through Blogger and clearing out some old entries that were never published when I found this one. It still makes me smile.

California Adventure: Day 3

2011-06-06T19:17:00.002-04:00

Before we left for San Francisco I was (a) very excited about seeing the Golden Gate Bridge (it's the engineer in me) and (b) worried that, on account of the legendary fog of San Francisco, we wouldn't actually see anything at all. We had our itinerary planned out and the Monday morning of our trip was earmarked for the bridge. We actually had a lot on our plates for the day, so to be efficient we decided to rent some bikes.We started by following the water over to the bridge, and we were very lucky to have a crystal clear day, and also to have chosen to do this in the morning. In the afternoon the sun moves right behind the bridge and you don't get that same impression of orange bridge versus blue sky that is so attractive.Luckily this part of the city is overrun with tourists so there were plenty of passersby that I could stop to ask to take our picture. I think this is my favourite of the entire trip:After seeing it from below, it was time to cross it. We climbed up some steep switchbacks and rode across the east access lane. Usually there is one lane for cyclists and one for pedestrians but on this morning, one was closed, and we were all in one lane. Kind of harrowing! The bridge is two miles across and is actually known as one of the safest places to be in the city during an earthquake.On a sad note, there was a news story we followed the week we were away. A fifteen year old girl went missing and apparently had left behind a note. As the story developed we learned that she was recorded on the bridge's security camera entering it about 20 minutes after we left, and she was never recorded coming off. It sounds like the note she left behind was a suicide note. The bridge has an average of one suicide jumper per week but it was so crowded with people the day we were on it, it's hard to imagine this girl could have jumped without a witness. For the next few days there were helicopters circling the area waters... we presume they were looking for her.After admiring the city skyline from the other side of the Bay, we crossed back and then rode on. We went throgh the Presidio, Baker Beach...and Ocean Beach (where the shark was spotted)... on our way to Golden Gate Park. It was starting to dawn on us that riding bikes in San Francisco is not for the faint of heart. You are either gutting it out climbing up some incredibly steep hill, or riding your brakes down the other side. There are no flat sections of San Francisco once you get away from the waterfront!

This was all enroute to our lunchtime destination: The Haight. After an active morning like that I was totally starving. Our planned stop was the Magnolia Brewpub. Lots of homebrews and all the food was organic/free range/environmentally friendly. My club sandwich with avocado and home-brewed root beer were delish. We snickered all through our meal because, being in the Haight, the pub was filled with hippies, deadbeats and people in search of the meaning of life. The guy at the table next to us was telling his lunch date about his aspirations to open his own brew pub, and he repeatedly asserted that he knows if he just keeps brewing and just keeps drinking then he will be successful. Every beer he downed was in the name of research and nothing more, I am sure. :)

After lunch we had to see the sights in the Haight. We stopped at the Ben & Jerry's that now stands on the corner of Haight/Ashbury. Across the street is the international Bong Clock, which always reads 4:20.

Before leaving, we had to stop back in at Golden Gate Park to see Hippie Hill. It's not noted on park maps but it's right where you'd expect it to be... in the first hidden nook when you enter the park from Haight St. Being early on a Monday afternoon, there were not too many people hanging out there, but sure enough we were offered some pot, and that somehow felt validating. Like we had been accepted into hippie culture.

Moving on (ahem).

We were pretty freaking exhausted by then, and had no intention of retracing the long and winding path we'd taken that morning. We mapped out a direct course back to the hotel, which would mean traveling down some major city streets rather than following waterfront bike paths. But, San Fran is a very bike-friendly city. Motorists yield to cyclists and respect them. I felt a lot safer biking there than I do at home. We planned one stop along this route, to see the fabled Painted Ladies of Alamo Square. But aside from that... it was a straight cruise home.

Back to our hotel to take a break from our kamikaze touring style, and then down to the waterfront again to catch a ferry. It was back to Alcatraz, baby! This time on the night tour of the prison itself.The tour was very cool. I am glad that we recorded 'Escape from Alcatraz' when it was on TV several months ago and even though it dragged in the beginning, we watched the whole thing. Without having seen that movie it would not have been nearly so neat to see Frank Morris's actual cell, with the hole he chipped in the cement wall and the paper mache head still tucked into his bed to fool the night guard.From the front of the building, I had to take a shot looking back to the main land, so that I could map out my swim for posterity.We got back to shore slightly after 9 p.m. and were ready for dinner by then. Not much was open so we wound up (underdressed) in San Francisco's restaurant of the moment, Slanted Door. I may have been underdressed but the cellophane noodles with green onions and crab made me really not care very much!The end of another very full day. Next up: we get out of the city.

We interrupt this trip report to bring you this special milestone:

2011-06-05T21:42:00.006-04:00

Look ma, no training wheels!

If you are looking for us at 7 p.m. on a weeknight, I can almost guarantee you that we will be out for a family bike ride around the path. Lately we have noticed that Liam is a much quieter biker. His training wheels make a racket and we noticed that he has been relying on them very little lately, able to keep his center balance all on his own. So today the wheels came off. He biked up and down the part of the path behind our house about forty times without falling, then we had dinner and he wanted to go out and do the whole 3 km loop. And he did.

California Adventure: Day 2

2011-06-02T21:18:00.000-04:00

This day started off with the Alcatraz Challenge, which I think I have pretty much exhausted. After the race I collected my finishers touque (a funny giveaway for a race in a city that so rarely sees temperatures below 50 degrees, but hey, I'll use it!) and noshed on some post-race snacks. We strolled back to our hotel and I had a long hot shower to wash the salt and Fukushima Daiichi radioactivity off.

After that, we set out again on foot, this time heading away from the water. We meandered past some famous city sights, such as Lombard Street...

And we knew we were in Giants territory... And again, the occasional San Fran oddity passed us by...But our destination for the afternoon was the world's largest Chinatown. We were determined to try dim sum for lunch. I am not a very adventurous eater, but it seemed the appropriate thing to do in the world's largest Chinatown. And I very much enjoyed mimicking Bill Paxton in Sleepless in Seattle singing the dim sum song.We chose a place called "New Asia Dim Sum" because it was supposed to be dim sum-newcomer-friendly. It was also early Sunday afternoon which seems to be a popular time for dim sum. So we grabbed a ticket to hold a place in line, and wandered the neighbourhood some more, hitting the City Lights bookshop - here Chad is pretending to be interested in all things literary......and then made our way back to the restaurant.

You order dim sum by pointing to things on carts passing you by that look like they could be tasty. But you really don't know what they are. We were able to figure out that these had shrimp in them, which sounded good in theory. But when you bit into them it became apparent that the shrimp had been pulverized in a blender and mixed with something spongey. I did not like. I didn't even try the white stuff they came with, no idea what that might have been!The veggies were OK though, and we got some spring roll type things and BBQ pork and other stuff that were all OK, though I wouldn't call it a fantastic meal. The people at the table next to us were eating chicken feet and that was enough to make me call it a day on adventure and long to get back to some more familiar food.The other thing was, we had no idea how much any of this cost. They stamp your bill every time you order off the cart but you have no idea what those stamps mean. Something cost us $8 from the looks of things. I think the total came to something in the low 30s...Anyway, enough about dim sum. Back out onto the street to stroll around Chinatown.This is what it looks like inside the Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Factory. Very un-factory like! Tasty cookies, though.Finally, after all that walking, and the early morning start, we were exhausted and several miles from our hotel. So rather than turning around and walking back down to the water, we ventured further inland, past Union Square, to the end of the cable car line, and waited for a cable car to take us home. I have to say, the cable car ride was a lot of fun. You don't get any choice about where you sit/stand on the car and we were put on the running boards. It wouldn't have been my first choice but it was pretty cool, careening up and down hills and holding on for dear life. The gripman was also very entertaining. We had a few belligerent passengers on board (one lunatic raving,"I am 66 years old, was born and raised in this city, and I will not wait in line behind any tourists!!") and he did a good job of straightening them out. We had a great view coming down the hill (Russian Hill, I think?) - the waterfront, Bay and Alcatraz all at once.
Chad and I agree, the cable cars can't last that much longer. They are an accident waiting to happen.

We finally made it back to our hotel, crashed for a bit, then headed out for a very fancy dinner at In-n-Out Burger. Hey, it's a west coast favourite... we had to give it a try!! After that, it was a very early night. The jet lag was starting to sink in.

California Adventure: Day 1

2011-06-01T12:56:00.000-04:00

We arrived in San Francisco around 4 p.m. on Saturday, which made it a long day already, given the time change. Got to our hotel and freshened up before heading out for our first look at the waterfront. We stayed in the Fisherman's Wharf area which, while touristy, was also centrally located to everything we wanted to see and do. A big plus.The water was just a couple of blocks away so we headed down for our first look at Alcatraz! Hmmm... that doesn't look so far... (Of course, the race course was not a straight line back to shore!)We stayed along the waterfront as we headed to Sports Basement, which we had to hit prior to 7 p.m. when race check-in closed. It was about three miles so we didn't get there til close to the end. But, we were taking our time, checking things out... like the famous hills......and the random oddities that you see in a liberal city like San Francisco......and our first views of the Golden Gate Bridge. Not very visible against the setting sun, but exciting to spot nonetheless.We checked in at the Sports Basement and then... headed back. Only inland a little, for a change of scenery. Up and down some hills that seemed large but would prove to be nothing, relatively speaking, in the days to come! Back to the Wharf...... where we bypassed the whole boiled crabs being sold on the street - how do you eat that kind of thing when you are standing up?...... and instead slurped down some clam chowder and sourdough bread bowls. Not exactly the dinner of champions on the night before my swim, but again - I wasn't anticipating the possibility of leading the race!By that point the time change was really starting to catch up with us, so after a brief detour along the waterfront to Pier 39 and the infamous sea lions, we went back to the hotel and hit the sack. The 4:30 a.m. wakeup call would come all too soon.

The Alcatraz Challenge

2011-05-29T13:34:00.014-04:00

This time, I will try to add some context to my photos!

So, yes, back in January or so, when I found out that I would be in the Bay area last week for work purposes, I started trolling the internet to find out what events would be taking place in and around the city while I was there. Lo and behold, I happened upon the Alcatraz Challenge, a 1.5 mile swim from a ferry docked just off the famous island's shores back to the mainland. I went back and forth over registering many, many times, though I started hitting the pool three times per week so I was definitely interested. Finally, the night before the registration fee was due to increase, I bit the bullet and signed up.

There are three reasons why swimming from Alcatraz was once thought to be impossible. One, the cold. The water was 54 F the day we swam. Two, the current. The Bay fills and empties once every 25 hours and the water runs pretty fast. They time the swim so that it begins just as the fill tide switches to an ebb, and the current does push you in the direction you want to go. But even though we swam at slack tide, the water was still moving at 4.9 knots and you could really feel it trying to tug you out to sea. They say if you jump off the ferry at Alcatraz and do nothing but float you will be swept under the Golden Gate bridge within 45 minutes. I believe it! Three, the sharks. There are sharks in the Bay, and this was the thing that made me hesitate most about signing up for the swim. Despite the fact that great white sharks generally don't come into the Bay (because the water is brackish) and the last time one was sighted in the Bay was in the 1960s, I still hesitated, because it isn't all that far to the open ocean and who wants to be eaten by a shark? In fact, there used to be a rumour at Alcatraz that the prison system had bred a one-finned great white shark named Bruce who swam in circles around the island. There are other shark species in the Bay, though they are bottom dwellers and generally don't bug people too much. Once I finally discovered that great white sharks tend to hang out in Hawaii rather than off the California coast at this time of year, I finally felt OK about the shark thing. Luckily my swim was on Sunday, because on Tuesday there was a great white shark spotted at Ocean Beach, just a couple of miles past the bridge. That might have been enough for me to throw in the towel had it happened a few days earlier!

Anyway, I signed up, and I swam several times a week until I could comfortably swim a mile and a half. Sloooooowly, mind you, but I could do it. I knew I was not about to break any records but was hopeful I would at least not finish last. A couple of weeks before the event I got my trolley assignment. I had to be ready to leave Crissy Field at 5:15 a.m. on the day of the swim.We got into town around 4 p.m. on Saturday afternoon, caught a cab to our hotel, checked in, tried on the rental wetsuit I had shipped to the hotel to make sure it fit, and then headed out to pick up my race kit at a sporting goods store about three miles away from our hotel, close to the swim finish. En route we hit the waterfront and took our first look at Alcatraz. It didn't look too far from shore, though the swim finish was not directly across from the island but rather quite a ways west of it:Anyway, I kept humming the "Just keep swimming" song from Finding Nemo under my breath and was still pretty sure I could do it, guessing my finish time would be around an hour or so.

Sunday morning brought a 4:30 a.m. wakeup call which thankfully wasn't too bad, since we were still on East coast time. We caught a cab to the beach, got checked in, and I was ready to board the trolley to the pier at 5:15. (Trolley assignments were done by lottery and I had the misfortune of getting a very early slot - the ferry didn't leave until 7 a.m.)

At least I was on my way to do something. Poor Chad was then left to sightsee alone in the dark for several hours!We boarded the ferry and had to wait an hour or so until it left. It circled the island, docked, and then the support boats moved into position. When they were ready, at 8 a.m., they threw open the doors to the ferry and attempted to push all 271 of us off within 3 minutes. The current was moving so fast that they had to do this quickly since the kayakers etc. were fighting to stay in position.The water was not as cold as I expected, but it took about 10 minutes before I could put my face in the water. Up until then I was not doing much more than dog paddling. No wonder that one of the kayakers started to tail me to make sure I was not in over my head! I took my time swimming and tried to enjoy myself. It was a pretty scenic swim and I knew I wouldn't get another view from that vantage point again. Just when I started to get lost in my own private moment with San Francisco though, I started thinking of the sea creatures, and that got me moving again. I was originally sighting way to the left when one of the kayakers told me I was being too conservative and to take more of a direct line to the finish. I followed his advice and then totally overshot it. The current was moving too fast and I was in the water too long to have been able to come ashore at the right spot.

Chad waited patiently on shore. The water was starting to clear of swimmers when finally I hit the beach at about 51:30, quite downstream of the finish line but at least on dry land. I had to run a few hundred meters back up to the finish chute and timing mat.

And, there were at least a few people still in the water after I got out. Phew. Trying to get a swimming pool stroke down in the Bay is no easy task.

More running. Who wants to run when they are freaking exhausted? Note the boaters packing it in for the day. Like I said, I was close to the end. However, there are always a few people fished from the water who cannot finish... I was just relieved not to be among them.

When I finished I had some kind of sludge on my face. Chad was like, dude, you swam through some mud. I think it was probably radioactive fallout from Japan, but whatevs.

So there you have it... I swam the Alcatraz Challenge! Definitely one of the crazier things I have done in my life, but totally worth it. It just goes to show that if you put your mind to something, you can pull it off.

I did it!

2011-05-25T15:56:00.001-04:00

I'm not featured in this video per se, but I'm in there somewhere, and I made it back to shore without any shark encounters. More to come...

I'm off to swim with the fishes.

2011-05-21T06:08:00.002-04:00

I hope I mean this literally and not metaphorically.

Season opener

2011-05-20T23:03:00.001-04:00

Soccer season already? It's hard to believe. This year Liam is playing on Friday nights. This is what my social life has been reduced to - spending Friday nights on the sidelines of a field behind the courthouse. Yee-haw!

Liam played really, really well tonight. Whereas last year he hardly touched the ball, this year he was on it quite a bit more. He even took a couple of shots at the net, though neither went in.I think this is going to be an exciting season.And because it's soccer season, that means Chad is back at work coaching. His hands were getting mighty itchy to hold that clipboard again.

The day that Mallory decided to quit dancing

2011-05-19T21:54:00.003-04:00

(Also known as - there's GOT to be a better way to post than this!)

Last weekend we went up to Toronto for Henry's 5th birthday party, which was held at a gymnastics studio called Kidnasium. Despite bad weather and bad traffic we made it there for (most of) the party and it's a good thing. Liam enjoyed running around the kiddie gym, but Mallory LOVED it. Loved it.

This is significant because it's time to sign up for next year's dance classes. We've been wracking our brains trying to decide on ballet, tap or both, since the ballet/tap combo class she is taking this year is not offered for the next age group up. Do I really want to sign up for/commit to/shuttle her to/pay for multiple classes? How to decide what to do?

(Actually, when we got her report card a few weeks ago, it was suggested that she enroll in Shooting Stars next year. Shooting Stars is a creative movement class and Mal is the only one I know who got this recommendation. Reading between the lines I think this means, "Your daughter goofs off a lot between movements and is a little out of control. Please put her in an environment in which this is welcome.")

But, since even before Mallory even started dancing, Chad has been suggesting that she take gymnastics instead. (I don't think we have the time to do it all.) And seeing her at Kidnasium really made it click for me that this is something she might really enjoy. She may not be dainty and graceful like a ballerina, but I'd bet you she could tumble with the best of them.

So... that's the decision. We asked Mallory what she would like to do and she answered with gymnastics without missing a beat. Despite the fact that she is really looking forward to getting her dance recital costume and is extra excited about the chance to wear stage makeup... she is willing to give it all up in order to take gymnastics next year.

I bet the gymnastics people don't charge $25 a seat to watch your own kid, either.

More photos on the Flickr set.

edit 5-14-16, a photo by carriecook on Flickr.

edit 5-14-14

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edit 5-14-14, a photo by carriecook on Flickr.

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edit 5-14-13, a photo by carriecook on Flickr.

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edit 5-14-11, a photo by carriecook on Flickr.

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edit 5-14-8, a photo by carriecook on Flickr.

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edit 5-14-6, a photo by carriecook on Flickr.

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edit 5-14-5, a photo by carriecook on Flickr.

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edit 5-14-4, a photo by carriecook on Flickr.

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edit 5-14-3, a photo by carriecook on Flickr.

Liam's hockey playoff art

2011-05-17T22:18:00.000-04:00

Weekend wrapup

2011-05-16T06:19:00.000-04:00

This weekend broke down as follows:

Friday - we took the kids to the movies to see Rio. How this started was that, as part of its centennial celebration, our company rented out the Capitol theatre and was supposed to do a free screening of Wall-E for employees and their families. Except that two days before the show we were notified that there were copyright issues with Wall-E or some such mess, and that the movie was being changed to Back to the Future. Which is on my all-time favourite movies list, but which isn't really appropriate for 4- and 6-year-olds. Rio it was.

On Saturday we went to Henry's birthday party, and I have only got one photo from that so far (it's the old 'too few hours in the day' excuse again). Don't worry though, I am sure more will be showing up later.On Sunday, Jonah came over to have some pictures done. I have not weeded through them all yet but I did get through the first few, including a few 'Cook Cousins' shots. Coordinating 4 kids was a bit chaotic but we done good!(Poor little Jonah. It's a good thing he's so bendy!!)

Tonight, on account of having just finished a big project that has occupied my every waking hour for the past three weeks, I am going to indulge in some photo editing time and go to bed early. And I am really looking forward to it.

Looking like she well remembers her time as a flower girl

2011-05-13T21:13:00.003-04:00

Today, as we passed a yarn display in a store, this one asked me if we could buy some so she can learn how to knit. I have not knitted anything since I was pregnant with Liam (a hat that he never did end up wearing) so I asked her where she learned about knitting. She said it was from the PBS cartoon 'Arthur', which Cindy sometimes lets the kids watch while she makes lunch. I let Mallory down gently and told her she is probably too young to learn how to knit right now. What I really wanted to say was, I don't have time. I don't have time to do most of the things I want to do. Right now I have photo shoots with the kid planned but unshot, a sewing project unfinished a year later, half a dozen books and movies to make my way through. Trying to find more time for triathlon with the season almost underway. Gardening that is so far all in my head. Wanting to at least have some time at the end of each day to catch up with Chad.

It's been a tough few weeks at work, the kind of time when you go to work, work, come home from work, think about work, keep getting after-hours emails about work, work some more when the kids go to bed, and then do it all again the next day. I don't think my lack of downtime has been this bad before but the effects are clearly showing.

Thankfully, I only have one more week of work and then I'm out of the office for a bit... still officially 'working', but offsite. I am looking forward to the mental clarity that it will bring. The timing seems perfect.

I know I will have a chance to teach Mallory how to knit someday... and of course, I'm tickled that she asked. Knitting is not so much my thing but it's in the artsy/craftsy vein, and I am plenty happy about that.

(Blogger unpublished and then republished a bunch of posts due to a technical glitch this week... and it erased all the comments. Just an FYI. I didn't zap them myself!)

Royal wedding similarities

2011-05-12T13:05:00.000-04:00

Related content, since we are a family of Disneyphiles:(Though if memory serves me right, I am pretty sure that someone desaturated Anastasia's dress in Photoshop to get it to match!)

Close encounters of the heron kind

2011-05-11T21:37:00.000-04:00

I've been working crazy hours lately. Haven't even had a chance to upload my Mother's Day photos yet (I made out well in the gift department, but spent the morning cleaning up vomit as Liam had an upset stomach which required us to cancel brunch reservations and consequently made him cry his eyes out.) Getting by on 6 hours of sleep per night is just not feasible for me for the long haul - so I'm off to bed now, and will save the update for when I can get to it.

I could escape this feeling, with my China girl...

2011-05-09T20:44:00.000-04:00

These pictures make me want to sing David Bowie. Sorry about that.

On the weekend, Mallory found a picture of a little Asian girl in her princess magazine. On the Mulan page, of course. She brought it to me and asked me to do her hair the same way the girl in the picture was wearing hers. This was miraculous for two reasons: number one, Mallory hates it when I do her hair - probably because I am not very good at it. And number two, this was an easy enough hairstyle for me to pull off.

Mallory does not think I got it 'high' enough compared to the girl in the picture... but that girl's hair was a lot longer. More material to make the buns with. I think I did OK.

Oh, fer cute!!

2011-05-06T23:15:00.001-04:00

Normally I do my own portraits but I am falling for these cheesy little shots hook, line and sinker. How to pick just one? Should it be the double-thumbs-up or the shot with the official kindergarten graduation scroll? Decisions, decisions...

The next Don Cherry

2011-05-03T07:17:00.000-04:00

"Hey Liam, who's playing tonight?"
"Boston and Philadelphia."
"What's the series at?"
"1-nothing for Boston."
"What's the name of the goalie for Boston?"
"Tim Thomas."
"What's his number?"
"30."
"What's the name of the goalie for Philadelphia?"
"Brian Boucher. He's number 33, but last game he let in 5 goals and it was 5-1 for Philadelphia so he went out and number 35 went in and he let in 2 goals and Philadelphia could only score 3 on Tim Thomas so it was 7-3 for Boston and I hope Boston wins again tonight so they will be winning 2-0. These two games are in Philadelphia but the next two will be in Boston and I hope Boston wins them because then they will win the series 4-0 in Boston."

(All said in about one breath.)

A new cousin

2011-05-02T12:58:00.003-04:00

Jonah Lucas Ryan Cook - born on Friday. I don't think big brother Ethan realizes yet that this new kid is not going anywhere... but he also doesn't seem to be the type that will mind.

All of the Cook cousins. One day - one day - we will get a picture with everyone looking the same way and not being goofy.

The shirt says it all.

(I have just about run out of photo upload space on Blogger, so these photos are linked from Flickr. Which is a pain, and also explains why the formatting is all messed up. This could be the beginning of the end of Too Many Cooks.)

Sixth birthday portraits

2011-04-30T22:20:00.001-04:00

A royal affair

2011-04-29T16:29:00.004-04:00

Not everyone is into royal-watching. I get that. I am not into it all that much myself on a regular basis, but I do get caught up in big events... and if I were on the other side of the pond, I admit it: I could very well be camped out somewhere along the Mall.
As it was, we had to watch the wedding from this side of the pond. We did it up though and made it an event. Mallory wore her Cinderella dress and a tiara, and Liam wore the colours of the Union Jack and a crown. (Yes, his Jaws shirt is supposed to be trumpeting his support of the British empire.) We also invited Mallory's little friend over, thinking the girls would be very into the whole common-girl-turns-into-a-princess theme. They watched Kate emerge and checked out her dress, but then they disappeared upstairs to play dollhouse. It wound up being the moms on the couch, discussing everything from Kate's dress to the processional music to how quickly William has started balding to the craziness of all the fascinators, and Liam watching alongside. He definitely saw more than Mallory did.
We turned breakfast into a tea party. On the menu: chocolate croissants and scones with lemon curd. Tasty! I pulled out as many red and blue dishes as I could find to make things festive.Special cups for the kids' OJ...I did not design these - I found a free printable online, and they were too cute not to print out, punch out, and stick in our food.The full spread, complete with Mallory diving into her strawberries.Mallory is unlikely to marry a prince one day but... you never know, right?? :)Too much fun. I'm glad we celebrated today.

Don't worry, girls...

2011-04-28T19:18:00.002-04:00

This is something I use to console myself when my thoughts start going like this:Just kidding, Chad! Smooches!

Back to Easter

2011-04-27T22:02:00.001-04:00

Can't wait til Friday!

2011-04-26T06:21:00.000-04:00

I'm interrupting the Easter stream of thought to comment on the royal wedding this Friday. Can I just say how happy I am that my Fridays off line up with the wedding? Because if I'd had to work on Friday, well, I think I might have had to take a vacation day.

Mallory is getting excited too. She is planning to wear her Cinderella dress for the event. Even though I hardly think the Middletons are hurting - I'm sure Kate's story does not have a 'rags' chapter to it...

I remember watching Prince Charles and Princess Diana get married in 1981, and I think it's very cool that now Mallory and I can watch this wedding together (along with Liam, who is only somewhat less excited, and some friends) at roughly the same age. Thank goodness for modern technology, though. We will not be getting up in the wee hours to do it - we will DVR the event and watch at a more reasonable hour!

Coloured eggs

2011-04-25T07:09:00.003-04:00

I like crafty things and my kids like crafty things... and one of our very favourite crafty things is colouring eggs. We don't do dozens and dozens, like some do, mostly because I hate eggs and don't eat them and really dislike the way that cooking them makes the house smell. But if those things weren't an issue... you bet I would.
We are pretty plain with our egg-colouring. We don't do the shrink-wraps (well, we did last year, but this year we were back to plain old colouring) or stickers or fancy treatments. Though as a kid I remember making marbled eggs using vegetable oil, and they turned out really well - maybe we'll try that sometime. But for this year, a plain colour wash was enough.
I think, for next year, I will collect some mason jars to do the dyeing in. It was hard to see what colour was what when we used these mugs.
Still, they turned out very pretty. Liam has eaten several of these eggs since then but sadly, I think there will be many that find their way to the garbage. It feels like a waste, but I don't feel bad enough to eat any of them myself.
Thank you Megan for finding me the perfect egg plate! This is exactly what I had in mind but was unable to find for myself. It looks pretty propped up in the china cabinet for the other 364 days of the year, and did the job of holding our eggs on Easter.After we finished colouring the eggs, we made some of these guys. Two successful Easter crafts in a row! The third craft, some crepe paper carrots stuffed with Easter treats, did not turn out at all. I should have known, since that one was from the Martha Stewart website.

Liam's big day

2011-04-21T12:58:00.000-04:00

I would be remiss if I didn't give a tribute to Liam's big day last Wednesday. The recap got away from me last week, when we were in the thick of party prep, but we did what we could to make his day fun and I got some photos along the way. As I mentioned, Liam had school on his birthday, so we weren't able to make it a day-long celebration the same way we did with Mallory. He seemed pretty excited to go to school on his birthday, though, and I remembered from the previous year why. Sure enough, he came home that afternoon wearing a birthday crown, showing off a little gift from Mrs. Garrow and telling me about the 'little chocolate cake' she gave him at lunch. (I think she hands out Wagon Wheels. Remember those? No wonder he was excited!)I slipped away from the office early and picked Liam up directly from his classroom, rather than sending him down to the after school program. We went home together and whipped up some chocolate cupcakes for dessert. I asked him a few times if there was anything special he wanted to do on his big day, but I think hanging out in the kitchen with mom, mid-afternoon on a weekday, doing some baking, was out of the ordinary enough to make it special.We had dinner at his request: hot dogs, corn on the cob, and cheesies. Again, not the healthiest week of meal planning I've ever done, but getting to choose your own dinner on your birthday seems only fair. After dinner, Gramma and Grampa dropped by to give him his present and to join us for some cupcakes.We gave him a Morphibian for his birthday, a remote-control car that can go from land to water. We thought it would be fun for him to play with in the pool, though on closer inspection, it says it's not suitable for salt water. Oh well. He can still have fun driving it through puddles and maybe even down in the creek if it ever warms up.He definitely got a big kick out of it, which was good, because we asked him several times what he might like for his birthday and he never came up with anything. He wanted us to pick something for him. Mallory gave him a puzzle - and it's a nice coincidence that that is something she can enjoy, too.I hope this little guy grows up to fully understand one day just how crazy I am about him. Happy birthday, dear sweet Liam. The past six years have been the best ones of my life.

Calling all party animals, part 2

2011-04-19T20:36:00.000-04:00

So... party day arrived. Liam was feeling a little under the weather - a low fever, loss of appetite, just not feeling himself. But there was no vomit involved and we had friends coming over, so we decided to go ahead with the party. Besides, we were expecting a special visitor.
Unbeknownst to Liam and Mallory, we had booked a guy who runs a business called Zoo2You to come entertain us. Back when we were throwing around party theme ideas, I was pushing for a western party at the local stables and Chad wanted to hire the snake and lizard guy. My first instinct was, no way! Guess who won out?
As our guests arrived, we sent them down to the playroom in the basement to amuse themselves. When everyone was here, and when the animal guy showed up - he was a few minutes late, and those were a few sweat-inducing minutes, because we had no other party entertainment to speak of - Chad handed out the safari hats and binoculars and led the kids on a hunt around the basement for animals. Liam and Mallory knew about and expected this, and they had arranged a bunch of their stuffed animals in the basement as part of the show. Chad led them past the stuffed animals, wondering whether they might be able to find the real thing...
...and they came up to the living room to find Zoo Guy and his critters.
I would totally recommend this guy - he was great with the kids and they loved it. He also did a good job of singling out the birthday boy and girl for some special attention (e.g. letting them pet/hold each animal first)... even if he did keep calling Mallory 'Marilyn'.This is a honey bear... so cute! The kids were able to feed him some banana. They also fed the chinchilla below marshmallows... not sure how many wild chinchillas eat marshmallows as part of their diet, but ooooookay...And then, the big moment, the grand finale - the full-size red kangaroo! I loved this guy - he was definitely my favourite. Here are Liam and Mallory feeding him Tostitos. (I'm really hoping that he only got to eat chips because he was at a party, and that his typical diet is much healthier than this.) Funny side note: I hadn't planned to buy the kids 'theme' clothes for the party, but the t shirt Liam is wearing caught my eye at the grocery store, and for $6 I tossed it into the cart and thought, why not? But then I had to get something for Mallory. I found the dress on eBay - new with tags from the 2010 Gymboree line. I told Mallory there was a giraffe dress coming for her in the mail. She was so excited - she loved going to the mailbox every day to check for nearly two weeks. Finally it came and we opened it... and she burst into tears. She had expected a dress with a picture of a giraffe on it, not a giraffe-print dress.

So I promptly got back on eBay and ordered ANOTHER dress from the same Gymboree collection. Pink, with a picture of a giraffe on it. But not really my taste, and not coordinating with the rest of the party.

Luckily, Mallory didn't take long to decide that this giraffe dress is actually pretty cool, and it's what she wound up wearing. But now I have another 4T giraffe dress... to relist on eBay, I suppose.After all those animals, we had 13 kids wash their hands, and then it was time to eat. A couple of the kids didn't eat a thing and one refused to sit in the dining room with all the other kids - he sat on a stool at the kitchen counter. Ooooooookay.

The reason I wanted to call the party theme 'zoo' rather than 'safari' was that Mallory had her heart set on penguin cupcakes, and penguins do not really fit into the 'safari' theme. Thanks to the book Hello, Cupcake!, here are her cupcakes:And, Liam had his heart set on 'Old Swampy'. I guess you could pass him off as a crocodile and call it 'safari' but really, that's splitting hairs.We had about five minutes left to open presents before all the parents came to pick their kids up. Never before have so many parents just dropped their kids. Knowing they'd be lined up at precisely 2 p.m. for pick-up, I didn't mind that the kids tore through the gifts their very generous friends had brought.And with that... Birthday Party 2011 was over. I felt like taking a nap, but instead I went out for a night on the town. Then I collapsed in a heap. Not sure how we're going to pull off two of these next year instead of just one, but already looking forward to it. Don't tell Mallory, but I already have her theme all picked out, and an entire board at Pinterest devoted to it!

Calling all party animals

2011-04-18T19:29:00.000-04:00

It's that time of year... Birthday Week. I know we said last year was the last year we were going to do a joint party, but when the time came to ask Liam who he wanted to invite to his party, he didn't want any school kids. So we decided to invite our usual crowd, a mix of daycare friends and my friends' kids, boys and girls, and then right before the invitations went in the mail, Liam came home one day and said he wanted to invite four kids from school. We definitely want to encourage these friendships, but that meant we had to scramble at the last minute to figure out the max number we could accommodate and shift the guest list accordingly. So, I really mean it this time: next year we are doing separate, smaller parties. I mean it!Then came the job of coming up with a gender-neutral party theme that would entertain our guests and make both Liam and Mallory happy. After some back and forth, this is what we came up with. Chad calls it 'safari' and I call it 'zoo/generic animals'. (Mostly because, as you will see, the cakes didn't wind up being safari-themed.) The good news is, animal-themed stuff is pretty easy to come by! Hats courtesy of eBay, binoculars courtesy of the dollar store, and loot bags courtesy of Oriental Trading but ordered from eBay to save on the outrageous shipping fee.The colour theme was set by the napkins I found at Winners. (Modified slightly for the invitations... the pea green changed to more of a sage green, to match the green envelopes they went out in.)Luckily, the Superstore had a whole line of tableware in the same colours... the tablecloth, plates and cutlery are from there. Right next door to Winners - I picked it all up immediately after buying the napkins! Liam used his mad paper chain-making skillz to help me turn a stack of animal-print scrapbook paper into some festive swag for the dining room. They are still hanging there. I am kind of reluctant to take them down.Then, a few potted plants from the grocery store to be the 'jungle' and some plastic animals to set the scene...Finally, some fun animal-print balloons. I learned my lesson last year and elected not to buy any giant mylar balloons... our balloon bill was half as much this year as last!That was it... the stage was set. I was glad to have taken these pictures the day before the party, because on the day OF the party, it poured rain and it was dark as a cave inside the house. Anyway, I assume the presence of the kangaroo makes more sense now?? Up next: party day.

Anne Murray may have had a hippo in her bathtub, but yesterday, I had a kangaroo in my kitchen

2011-04-17T19:23:00.002-04:00

No, really - I did.More to come. We are recovering from birthday overload, one of our semiannual big nights out, work being nuts and three of us being sick. Needing to catch up a bit and then will be back.

Now we are six.

2011-04-13T22:29:00.003-04:00

Time for Round 2

2011-04-12T21:21:00.003-04:00

Otherwise known as, The Last Known Picture Of My Five-Year-Old. We are going to have a lot of fun doing Liam's official birthday portraits this year... if shots like this are any indication, he is going to be a little ham.

You must have known it was coming!...

2011-04-11T21:38:00.000-04:00

I can relate

2011-04-11T13:58:00.001-04:00

I got a call from the secretary at Liam's school with a Code Ralph. So now we are parked at home on the couch.

Mallory's 4th

2011-04-10T16:43:00.000-04:00

Mallory was lucky to have her birthday fall on a weekend this year, which meant we could spend the whole day together and spoil her with some fun. First up: when she came downstairs for breakfast, she found some presents waiting for her. Chad and I got her a little Rapunzel's tower (modeled after the one in 'Tangled'). This is not the three-foot-tall version they were hawking before Christmas... but having said that, it's still about two feet tall. She loves it. The stupid thing is that there are pictures of a little girl playing with both Rapunzel and Flynn all over the box, and in very fine print it says that Flynn is not included. So Liam gave her this other Rapunzel playset that does include a Flynn, so that she can re-enact the movie. There was a LOT of re-enacting happening, all day long. Chad assembled the tower while I got started on breakfast.Mallory requested pancakes for breakfast. What she didn't know was that I'd already found a new recipe to try... Cake Batter Pancakes... with a secret ingredient:They were a big hit with the kids. The pancakes themselves are not overly sweet. They are served with a vanilla-sugar glaze in lieu of maple syrup. Not the healthiest breakfast going, but probably not a far cry from the nutritional value of regular pancakes, either.After breakfast there was more re-enacting and it took us a long time to get out of our pajamas because of it. There was no rushing the birthday girl! Finally: clothes! We suggested going out for lunch - nothing fancy, just something like Subway. But Mallory wanted a grilled cheese sandwich, so we stayed home and granted her wish. (If only all wishes were so easy!) After that, we took her out to see the new Easter movie, Hop. Of course, Liam came too. We tried to hype up that it was a birthday movie for both of them. (Poor Liam has school on his birthday again this year. It's going to be a lot harder to make his day special, too.) That was enough excitement for a while - Mallory came home from the movie and crashed on the couch. I'd thought she would help me with her birthday cupcakes, but instead I had to make those on my own! Dinner was at her request: chicken nuggets, rice, and broccoli. Of course, she didn't request the broccoli, and because it was her birthday, I decided not to fight to get her to eat some. I gave her a bowl of strawberries instead and called it good!Gramma and Grampa joined us after dinner for cupcakes. I love, love, love pictures of the kids with birthday candles aglow. That scene makes even spirited little kids like Mal calm down with wonderment, if only for a few seconds. I think this is the first year that we have put multiple candles on her cake, rather than a single big 'number' candle. It took some work for her to get them all blown out. In the end, big brother stepped in to wrap up the job! Then she opened her presents from Gramma and Grampa: a princess suitcase (for overnight trips to their place!) and a new pair of Crocs for summer. They are pretty little yellow Crocs with pink flowers, and they are perfect - I have been buying Mal a lot of yellow clothes for spring and summer. Happy, happy birthday to my dear little girl. We love you more with every passing year.

She's still awake.

2011-04-09T22:09:00.002-04:00

And I shouldn't be surprised, because a few of the things out of her mouth today were, "This is the best day, ever ever ever ever EVER!" and, "I never want this day to end!" (Funny, we didn't do anything THAT outrageous. Still... nice to know she enjoyed herself!)

Four years have passed in the blink of an eye. I remember this like it was yesterday:

Last moments of 3

2011-04-08T21:47:00.003-04:00

Guess who asked last night when she can start wearing makeup?

2011-04-06T07:03:00.000-04:00

Can't say I saw it coming this soon!

Second pass

2011-04-05T07:26:00.004-04:00

It never fails that, after I take pictures of the kids and pick out immediate favourites, and then put them away for a few days, I come back to them with fresh eyes and something catches my attention that didn't before. I rather like this shot of Mallory sitting on the floor. Not crazy about how she has her hands bunched up in her dress, but it's a sweet expression.This one would be just about perfect if she were sitting up just a little straighter... the forward lean is throwing me off a bit. I don't like the bit of chair sticking up above her head. Also, I can't quite decide: does she look serene... or intense?? (The latter is very 'her'; the former, not so much.)This one really makes me smile. She kept doing these fake laughs to make herself smile. But it looks pretty authentic!Of course, if I want something truly representative of how our session went, this is probably the one I should choose! I am really looking forward to doing pictures with Liam sometime over the next few weeks. He is a little harder to come up with ideas for, in terms of props, but I think this year he will really shine and we'll get some great images. Which is a good thing, because we've had a giant canvas of Mallory in our living room for more than a year now, and I've been waiting to get the perfect shot of Liam to go with it.

Day of Champs

2011-04-04T12:41:00.001-04:00

The first year of Liam's hockey career wrapped up on Saturday with the 'Day of Champs'. For a hockey league that does not officially keep score of the kids' games, I think this just involved a random draw to determine who played who for the final game of the season. We drew the Rangers, and they creamed us... but nobody's counting. Liam seems to have really disliked goaltending, much like his mother. Too much pressure. (This explains why I no longer participate in any sports that involve goaltending - is it any wonder that I like to swim, bike and run?) But for the past several weeks he's showed some real improvement. Rather than just standing there and hoping that the puck bounces off his stick - oh, I remember that feeling so well - he's been more active in blocking shots. At the end of the game, the large crowd that had assembled cheered and the sound system blared The Ramones' 'Blitzkrieg Bop' as the kids shook/slapped hands. Then it was time for the on-ice awards presentation... This totally made me laugh - they give the kids medals and Tim Hortons commemorative hockey sticks, then expect them to be able to skate back to their spots, while still juggling their own stick. Liam looked like he was going to tip over more than once. At the end, all the parents crowded onto the ice for an impromptu team photo. I'd brought my zoom lens to catch the game action, so I wasn't far back enough to get the whole team in. But I still think I like this shot more than the professional team photo we got earlier in the year. And that, as they say, is a wrap. Poor Liam... he is really going to miss playing hockey. He's one year shy of being able to play in the spring ball hockey league. Maybe next year.

Birthday month

2011-04-01T19:19:00.007-04:00

It's birthday month at our house, and that means it's time for the kids Annual Portraits. This is at once both one of my favourite times of year, and most frustrating.

Today I was home alone with Mallory, because Liam's school calendar has flipped so that his Fridays off no longer line up with mine. At least for a bit. So we planned to do Mallory's pictures today. She was just as excited about this as I was up until about 9:30 a.m. this morning. I had a couple of outfit changes planned, some hair accessories, a few props... a list of ideas to work through. Mallory had a list of her own and kept lobbing in more ponytail holders, more shirts she wanted to wear, more dolls she wanted to pose with. I was thinking we were really going to get somewhere. (I was also thrilled with last year's photos, thinking things could only get better.)

Then, of course, we actually started taking photos, and she turned into a total clown, striking insane poses and insisting that she was only going to do it once and then my chance to take the picture would be up. "Look into the camera," I would say. "I AM," she insisted, even though her entire head was turned toward the far corner of the room.

What can I say? We made it through a teeny tiny fraction of what had been planned. Not a single hair accessory used and most of the props were untouched as well. I have many, many photos shot over a very short time frame, and about 95% of them are currently in my trash folder. A couple of outtakes are funny but not even worth editing. A few of them show her sassiness, which I suppose is very typical of Mallory at this point in her life:After the frustration of the 'formal' setting, I took her upstairs and let her jump on her bed to try to capture a few candids. At least some of these make me smile:I also really like this one I caught of her reading to some of her dolls and stuffed animals after the jumping wore her out:
Anyway, I think this is the Official Portrait of a Four Year Old Mallory. This is as good as it got. Not what I had in mind starting out, but it'll do:And, I clearly remember a four-year-old Liam acting like a turkey, too. It must be the age. Here's hoping that next year's session runs much more smoothly.

Keeping score

2011-03-30T22:02:00.001-04:00

Entirely his own doing. Now running multiple pages. Requires that he check in with Sports Center each morning for the results. And he's loving every minute of it.

Having another tool in my kit now

2011-03-28T06:28:00.000-04:00

Last Saturday night, Chad had some friends and family over. I'd told Mallory we could do a craft but instead she chose to hang out in the basement at the ping-pong table with the guys. At 8 o' clock I went downstairs to fetch her for bedtime, and she informed me that she was ready to do her craft now. I informed her back that she'd traded the craft for her playtime with the guys, that we could do the craft in the morning, and that we were now on our way to bed. She did not take this news well so I wound up scooping her up to carry upstairs, and in a fit of frustration she started slapping me to try to get me to put her down.

That SO didn't go over well.

In the past, when she has lashed out like this (which luckily doesn't happen often, but it has definitely happened), I have yelled, begged, reasoned, threatened, etc. And it's pretty much all been to no avail. This time, I tried something different. I waited for her to calm down a bit, and then I told her in a very sombre voice that she really hurt my feelings when she hit me. Mallory has picked this 'hurt your feelings' bit up somewhere. A couple of times, she has told me that something I have said (normally something like not letting her have more dessert or refusing to read another bedtime story) has hurt her feelings. This time, I turned the tables on her, and judging by her quivery lip, I know I got to her.

The extent of my victory wasn't fully driven home until after I'd put her to bed. A few minutes later, she was back in my bedroom. "I need to tell you something," she said. I beckoned her over to me and she whispered in my ear, in a sombre voice of her own, "I want to tell you that I really, really love you and I am really, really sorry that I hurt your feelings," she said.

I was so proud of her. The thing about Mallory is, she has a mind of her own. It takes a lot to get through to her sometimes, and it's frustrating as hell. At the same time, I am not interested in squashing her spirit. Her pluckiness is part of what I love the most about her, and I know it will serve her well in the future if she can channel it the right way. It was a breakthrough because I think I finally succeeded in getting through to her on her own terms, without falling back on my authority position to make it happen.

It remains to be seen whether this eureka moment will persist - time will tell...

Guilty

2011-03-25T22:57:00.004-04:00

I was away from home for a few days earlier this week, for work. Missed the kiddos like crazy. Came home only to remember that I had a hair appointment that night - a long, long overdue appointment. It was at 6:30 and I told the kids I thought I'd be home in time to tuck them into bed. Instead, I got home at 9:30. (All I can say is, there was a lot of highlighting going on, and it took forever.) The kids had tried to wait up for me. They were both in their beds. Mallory, of course, was still wide awake, jabbering to herself, and happy to see me come home. This was Liam, trying so hard to wait up with his desk lamp on... but too tired to make it. I felt so guilty. I gave him lots of kisses and tucked him under his duvet and whispered good night into his ear, despite the fact that he wasn't listening. I'm pretty sure that he heard me anyway.

March Break wrap-up

2011-03-20T20:47:00.003-04:00

A few double-page spreads from our March Break adventures, to go in the yearly family chronicles.

Monday - the Children's Museum in London:
Thursday - the Detroit Zoo:

And, the rest of the week. I also did a spread from the sugar bush, though those pictures have already been posted, so no sense in repeating.

It wouldn't be St. Patrick's Day without...

2011-03-17T20:12:00.002-04:00

...our annual End-of-the-Rainbow parfaits.

It also wouldn't be a normal day for Mallory if I didn't spend the time to make her one and then have her refuse to eat a single bite of it.

Don't worry though... I drowned my sorrows in a Shamrock Shake, and I feel much better now.

It also wouldn't be St. Patrick's Day without a trip to the zoo, but that will have to wait for another time. I'm exhausted. I need a break from March Break.

Sugar bush

2011-03-16T21:26:00.007-04:00

We're in the thick of March Break here, and have been busy cramming as much action-packed fun into each day as possible. I did want to take a break to post about what we did today though, because it's something you can only do for a few weeks each year and I'd really urge anyone looking for some fun family entertainment to consider this.Today I took the kids to the McLachlan Family Maple Syrup Camp and Pancake House in Komoka, a little bit west of north London. How have I hit the age of thirty-five, having spent my whole life in Canada, and never visited a sugar bush before? It seemed like an appropriate March Break activity and the weather man promised that today would be ideal. It rained all morning and in fact, as we drove up to Komoka, we were driving back into the storm. But after stopping in London to run a few errands - (tangent time. Today I took the kids into Memory Lane. Is that nuts or what? Would you take a 4-year-old and a 6-year-old into an antiques mall? How many times did I say don't-touch-stop-running-look-OUT!!?? But it was actually a lot of fun. They really enjoy looking around places like that, places that are so crammed full of stuff, and they love spotting things that tickle their fancy like the vintage Mickey Mouse phone and the clock shaped like an apple. We didn't break anything so we didn't have to buy anything, though unfortunately, I also didn't find the devilled egg plate that I would like to have in my possession before Easter - I thought those things are everywhere, and perhaps they are. Just not when you are looking for them.) - ANYWAY - the sun was shining brightly by the time we came out of Old Navy with a few getting-ready-for-warmer-weather items in hand, and it turned into a glorious spring day to go watch the sap run.
I did a lot of internet research before we went, comparing the various sugar bushes in our neck of the woods and trying to pick out the one with the most to see and do. But let me tell you - sugar bushes really do not have much of an internet presence. Most of them have a small write up that says something like "Fun for the whole family!" without spelling out what that fun is. If I'm going to drive for an hour for some pancakes, I want to know what else I'm getting.In this case, the gamble paid off. We arrived with empty tummies and immediately headed into the pancake house for brunch. Liam ate more than Mallory and I combined. (I just don't understand how he functions sometimes.) We had a full spread of pancakes, sausage, ham, maple baked beans, hash browns, and fruit, washed down by McDonald's Orange Drink, which felt a little incongruous but who am I to complain? $10 for adults and $6 for kids. Liam ate his own; Mallory and I split the adult plate.

I love pancakes but never order them when we go out because the vast majority of places don't serve them with real maple syrup, and I hate table syrup. I'll be accusatory here: I am not 100% convinced that the McLachlan Family Maple Syrup Camp and Pancake House serves 100% real maple syrup with their pancakes. It didn't taste like the stuff I am accustomed to. I suppose I should give them the benefit of the doubt, but with the weird aftertaste lingering in my mouth, I didn't buy a souvenir bottle to bring home.Bellies comfortably full, we headed back outside to partake in the fun stuff. The kids could not keep their eyes off the Clydesdales so we immediately boarded the horse-drawn wagon for a ride. $1 for adults, 50 cents for the kids.After that, my favourite part of the day. There are 3km of wood-chip trails through the bush where you can get up close and personal with the tapping process. The taps close to the pancake house all drip into sap buckets, the old-fashioned way. Those further back in the bush are connected with clear vacuum-powered lines that let you see the sap running through them. You can hear the sap whooshing. It's pretty cool.The small lines connect into larger-diameter lines to bring the sap back to the boiler room at the front of the property. This is where my knowledge of pipeline operations came in super handy. I was talking to the kids about the sap laterals and how they loop from the distribution network into the high-pressure transmission line. I don't think they really got it though.It was one of those days when it finally hits fifty degrees and you can actually allow yourself to believe that winter might end sometime soon. There were little streams of meltwater forming across the trails and the kids had a fabulous time splashing about in their new rainboots. The sky was blue and Liam came home with a noticeable uptick in the number of freckles on his nose. I think my Vitamin D levels may have finally been restored to normal, and I just might survive this winter after all.Following the trail led us up to the boiler room where the sap actually gets condensed into maple syrup.If I'd been thinking straight, I would have stuck my camera on a tree stump, set the self-timer and gotten a shot of us in the bush. But it didn't occur to me until we were well on our way home. Our own driveway would have to suffice for the self-portrait.Chad just looked over my shoulder and asked why I'm writing about the sugar bush when I haven't written about anything else we've done this week. It's been a busy week, and part of it was even featured on TV! I've guess I've chosen to spend my time living it instead of writing it, but more will be coming soon.

Budding sports photographer (subtitle: giving me a run for my money)

2011-03-14T17:09:00.001-04:00

On Saturday, Liam had a hockey game, which is not all that different from any other Saturday since last September. Mallory has been going to the arena week after week for almost seven months now, almost always behaving well and almost always being gracious about the fact that for this hour of the week, the focus is not on her.

This week, I brought my camera, and she suddenly asked if she could bring a camera and take pictures of Liam too. Liam was none too pleased about Mallory using his camera, but this time I overruled him. Mallory deserved it after spending so many hours in that rink.

By the time we got home, she had taken 183 pictures, beating out even ME in sheer numbers. I loved all the little glimpses into her mind and thought process. First of all, she set the stage before the game even started, getting some shots of her environs:
Empty ice:Spectators filing in:Bleachers waiting to be filled:The Zamboni being put away:Sometimes, she managed to catch Liam in action:Sometimes, she went for the wide-angle, scene-setting shot:Sometimes, she missed all the action:Sometimes, her shot was full of action:

She caught the mundane aspects of our immediate surroundings - my camera bag and purse at my feet:

The back of my coat:Us spectating:The dude sitting beside her:
And even the classic photographer's self-portrait. The fact that there were at least a dozen of these on the camera convince me that it was no mere accident.I wonder where she gets all of this from???

An art project we think you should try

2011-03-11T06:14:00.000-05:00

A while ago I heard about a new Crayola product (and what mom doesn't love some Crayola?): window markers. I searched all over for these babies and finally found them a couple of months after I first saw ads for them (and in one of the first stores that I'd originally checked). I guess it takes longer for us to get things in than it does in most places??The kids thought it was hilarious when I told them we were going to colour on the windows. We divvied up the windows in the breakfast nook, from which we'd removed the screens last fall when we were battening down the hatches for winter. (The kitchen seems a lot brighter that way.) Since his newfound reading and writing skills are playing such a major role in his life right now, I love love love this photo of Liam's window. Before he drew anything else on it, he staked his claim to it in the bottom corner. His spelling is not perfect but I love that he is trying to do it himself, without running everything past me first. Then he climbed up on a chair and got to work: his name (again), a goldfish, a tulip, and an Easter bunny.
I definitely recommend these markers. They dry with a chalky kind of finish and wipe off easily with a damp cloth. They are sort of fluorescent, like the markers you see written on a restaurant's menu board. Our pink marker seems a bit tempermental, and of course that is somewhat upsetting to Mallory, but the rest of them write really nicely. For $5 they will buy you a few hours of entertainment - totally worth it in my book!

I bet the parents of real Olympic athletes don't make the same mistake I did

2011-03-10T21:52:00.004-05:00

From mid-January to mid-February, Mallory missed a lot of skating lessons. She was sick one week. There was a blizzard one week. There was one week that there was legitimately no ice time, and another week when we were all tired and just didn't feel like going. By the time we got her back on the ice, she had decided she didn't like skating lessons any more. She started crying each night as we headed for the rink. "Just a few more weeks," I promised her each time, feeling terribly guilty for dragging her out there when she clearly didn't want to go. She was usually OK once she got on the ice, but the whole thing was really an ordeal.And then last night, it was the Skating Olympics. We told Mallory there would be races and for the first time in probably months, she was genuinely excited to go. "I'm going to win!" she kept telling us. It made me smile to think she was looking forward to it.And then, one hundred percent on account of my own ineptitude, we got her there for her usual 6:30 ice time... but the Olympics had started at 6 and were already half over. I couldn't believe it. I felt awful. Thankfully, Mallory didn't notice that everyone else there seemed to have already settled in. (And, luckily, there were a few other families in the same boat as us.) Still, I would probably count this among my Top Ten Worst Parenting Moments. I just felt really, really stupid, and really incompetent. The skating club had handed out flyers the week before, for crying out loud. I just didn't read far down enough to see that the ice time was different. It's kind of a silly thing to let bother me so much, but on account of how much Mallory was looking forward to it... it really did get to me.
Maybe too it's because I'm almost done reading Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, the controversial new book about how the Chinese method of parenting is superior to Western parenting. I picked this book up expecting to dislike it immensely, and I disagree with about 95% of what the author says and does. But, it's a hilarious read, and it does make you question your own approach to things. (In a nutshell, the author advocates being extremely harsh on your kids, criticizing them constantly, badgering them to spend hours a day doing math drills and practicing classical music, and never allowing them to have a sleepover. There is one part of the book, where the author describes receiving handmade birthday cards from her two young daughters, that had me howling. She knows that her husband had the kids make the cards at the last minute and that little effort went into them. "I reject this card!" she tells her daughter, and orders her to go back and do it again but this time put more thought and effort into it. I mean - can you imagine??)

But I bet the Tiger Mother would never, ever have missed the first half of the Skating Olympics. As much as I heckle her, that adds to my guilt.Regardless of my own shortcomings, Mallory adored the Olympics. She took to the ice and won the first race she was in. When she puts her mind to something, she does it. I like that about her... even though it's the root cause of many an argument around here.

Unfortunately, I think the standings for the Skating Olympics are calculated on a cumulative basis. The fact that Mallory won one race out of ten matters little when she gets a DNF for five of them. She was skating so hard, she had a few tumbles. In each case she was back on her feet in - literally - seconds. Her determination amazed me.OK... there was some waiting around between races, too.
She is starting to master the gliding aspect of skating. She takes a running start and then lets the momentum push her across the ice. She just needs to stop being so fascinated by her feet, and watch where she is going.

She was crowing about that victory in her first race as she came off the ice, and I think we should be able to get her to the rink for the next three weeks with far fewer tears than we've had recently. Unfortunately, we are going to have to shield her from the awards ceremony that is being held after her lesson next week. She is not going to qualify for anything, and will have an awfully hard time understanding that after she just got finished kicking her classmates' butts.