I write to you today from the other side of a week of solo parenting. This is small fry for lots of people, I'm sure, but it always seems like such a monumental feat from my perspective. I emerge tired, slightly strung out, and maybe a little grumpy. This is all despite the fact that, truly, everything went pretty tickety-boo. But I won't complain, or even really regale you with stories or anecdotes. Instead, I'll show a few snapshots, including some inventions that have been happening around here lately.
Juniper thought she looked so glamorous in this outfit that she wore it two days in a row (despite my best efforts to dissuade her)
We put in a lovely afternoon at Judith and Simon's on the weekend (Clark got home later that night)
It was very good sliiiiiddddding!
Inventions:
These days, any box deemed of appropriately large size will mysteriously disappear from the recycling, and rematerialize in some new and improved form. It all began with a kayak box that Clark snagged from work. It was reconstructed using zip ties and imagination, and has become any number of different things since then. Currently, it is most often a tree fort/time machine:
Door closed...
... Door opened
There is also a "monster machine", used to lure and trap monsters before they can enter anyone's room. They can then be shrunk down to a size considered acceptable by the inventors:
Annoyingly, monsters like to eat teeny tine pieces of cut up paper, and this must be kept at all times on the upstairs landing.
Finally, both Juniper and Linden have their own custom-built dream machines, meant to filter out bad dreams, and catch good ones. They have buttons and levers, various different settings and instructions, and heaven knows Juniper and Linden are the only ones who actually properly understand how to work them:
Linden's dream machine
Juniper's dream machine
And that is all for now! I suppose next week we will see what March has in store for us. From the sound of things, it will involve some more treacherous weather. But at least now I am not the only one needing to deal with all the shovelling and frozen pipes and treacherous driving. See you then!
This morning I took Theresa (Clark's sister) to the airport. When I returned, the house was eerily quiet. Her departure was the end of one crazy week and half, wherein the kids had not one, but two aunts come to visit and play -- a relatively rare occurrence in the doldrums of February.
Left: my sister, Faye. Right: Clark's sister, Theresa
The overlapping visits were not planned - my sister Faye was here on a working trip from where is currently living in Freetown, Sierra Leone, back briefly to do all the things she is unable to do in Africa. Theresa was just here visiting us, as well as one of her best friends, who also lives in Ottawa. Due to the massive, massive storm that hit Ottawa last week, Theresa was delayed by a day getting here, and the girls only actually both slept here at the same time for one evening. Nonetheless it was, as you can imagine, a jam-packed party-filled time. Some highlights:
A beautiful wintery snowshoe through the woods with Theresa
We took Theresa to the science museum, both kids armed with clipboards, paper and pencils to be "scientists"
Finding some live butterflies and caterpillars
Walking down the sidewalk, looking ridiculously cute
Theresa, Clark and I also volunteered in Linden's class -- Clark talking about the ocean, and leading some experiments, with Theresa and I as helpers:
demonstrating where the ocean is on the globe
showing some fieldwork slides to the class
Of course, we also took some mandatory group shots:
Faye on the couch....
... and Theresa on the couch (photobombed by a strip of sunlight)
And now... everyone has left me to fend for myself. The aunts are gone, and Clark left on Saturday for a week in New Orleans. From a house full to bursting, to just the three of us. Ah well. February giveth, and February taketh away, I suppose. Let's hope I survive relatively unscathed. See you next week!
This branch very handily caught Juniper on what would have undoubtedly been an unpleasant plummet to the ground
Happy Family Day! Here in Ontario, we are enjoying a nice extended long February weekend, trying our hardest to ignore the ridiculously cold temperatures. We were joined on Friday evening by my sister Faye, fresh off the plane from Freetown, Sierra Leone. As she is fond of saying, she left Freetown in 30°C weather, and descended into -30°C weather. I outfitted her in extra winter gear, and she was more than happy to embrace this extreme bit of winter while she's here:
*almost* too cold to play outside.
I took this photo from inside, because no one wanted to take their mittens off to actually snap an outside shot
Highly frosted/ice-caked windows
Nice and warm and snuggly and pyjamaed inside
Yesterday, Clark and the kids and I decided to check out a museum we'd never been to before: the Agriculture museum. It was pretty cool! Literally. It was so cold, in fact, that we had the place almost entirely to ourselves, and only took our winter gear off twice -- though the barns were warmer than the bitter outdoors, they were not what you would call "balmy". But it was very interesting, there were a bunch of animals to enjoy and learn about, and we will most certainly go back on a slightly warmer day.
There were a bunch of animals that would normally not be inside, except that all the outside water was frozen solid
Special activity: making little bird feeders
Finished product!
In the tractor exhibit. This was actually a bit of a "ride", but it was too cold to work.
a social little calf
A little calf born just a few hours before we got there, and here tired mama
I would say that tomorrow we'll be returning to life as usual, but that is, in fact, not true at all. The kids will be going back to school, and Clark back to work, but Faye will still be here, and we'll be joined in the evening by Clark's sister Theresa, who is also coming for a visit! It will be a very full house. Then, on the weekend, everyone will leave me all at once: Faye is taking off for Toronto (before heading back to Africa), Theresa will go back home, and Clark is off to New Orleans for a conference. So. Not a typical week at all. In the meantime, Juniper will study up and make sure she's got things under control:
"Don't cut things with scissors that you are not supposed to cut"
I have a bunch to share today. A bit of thematic art, some squirrel saga updates, and a load of pictures from the week's activities and adventures. So without further ado:
1. The "Stop!/Permission" Series
Now that Linden has his own desk, he'll often go off to work on projects. Almost exclusively, these projects involve a series of pictures depicting a circle with a line through it, and some scene in the middle, letting everyone know what they should not be doing. It is perhaps inspired by these lovely signs that Juniper made for their doors:
Sigh. Anyway, Linden has his own versions -- so many that I could only choose a select few:
"Don't wake up before the sun is up on your clock!"
"No being mean to people or yelling at anyone"
"Stop being crazy"
2. Squirrel updates
You may remember the trouble we've been having with the squirrels eating all the birdseed from our feeder, and scaring off the wee birdies in the process. For awhile, the slippery squirrel shield worked (ie, the one from the video I posted), but they eventually found means of thwarting it. Clark has come up with various other solutions since then, including the most recent one, where he bought a remote control car, attached the inner mechanisms to a chopstick, and hooked it up it so that you could make the chopstick spin by using the remote. Ingenious though it was, the squirrels just thought it was amusing/annoying, and kept on munching away while the chopstick thumped at their bodies and tails. I have thrown snowballs at these things, trying to get them to go away, and they've just assumed I was throwing them food, and bounded up on the deck to see what I'm trying to give them, while I simultaneously squealed and slammed the deck door shut before they could venture inside.
In the meantime, however, they have upped their game. Not only have they been stealing our food, they have started stealing our Tibetan prayer flags (which, incidentally, Theresa brought us back from Bhutan years ago). I kid you not! Little jerks. So far, the squirrels are definitely winning this war.
3. Feed the birds....
Erin called me up on one particularly gorgeous day last week, and invited me on a walk through a marsh and forest trail, which boasted (among other things), a whole lot of chickadees who would happily land on your hand for a bit of seeds and nuts. It was thrilling! Check out the magic:
Erin and a friendly chickadee
A closeup of one on my hand
4. Museum Day
On Saturday, we went to Erin's monthly family yoga workshop, and sandwiched it between two different museums. The first was the Children's museum, where there was a special Thomas the Train Engine exhibit, and the second was the good ole' Nature Museum. The Thomas exhibit was a bit of bust - the line up to get in was ridiculous (Clark waited for at least 45 minutes with a bunch of screaming kids, dubbing it the "line-up of despair"), and then it was so crowded that you could hardly get a turn with any of the stuff. As one mother grumbled to her husband, "I'm really glad we just paid $40 so that he could play with trains here instead of at home". But the kids did have fun at the exhibit (Linden, in particular, was very serious about the huge train table), and the kids and I got to do a bunch of other fun stuff while Clark was waiting in line. In particular, we spent a good long time at the theatre exhibit, where Juniper took the stage in various different costumes, while Linden joyfully worked the light and sound booth. They even had some coded signs and symbols so that Juniper could indicate which lights and sounds should happen when.
A very dramatic queen
The blowing wind, I believe
Working the sound and light booth
One of the museum highlights - you get to stamp your passport at all the different areas or exhibits
In a driverless tuk-tuk
Front and centre at Linden's favourite part of the Thomas exhibit. Linden had to crawl under the table to claim that spot, with enough speed and dexterity to not lose his train to someone else in the process. He had it down to an art by the end.
I love this picture, because of the looming (and very creepy) Sir Tophan Hatt, staring at you from the background
The Nature museum was a hit as always. This time around, Linden and I went to a 3-D movie while Juniper and Clark went off to explore. When we found them some time later, they were enjoying the bug exhibit, having just preserved some beetles on pins ("for the museum's official collection!" Juniper excitedly informed me), and sketching some mounted butterflies.
Carefully pinning a beetle
The museum's "official collection". See if you can find Juniper, Clark and Linden's beetles!
5. Winterlude
We finally made it down to winterlude on Sunday. This is an awesome, big event that Ottawa puts on every year. There are loads of different activities, spread over both Ottawa and Hull (ie, across the river in Québec). Normally one of the main features is skating on the canal, but so far this year it has been too warm for the canal to remain open. Nonetheless, there was much to see and do - we chose to head to the area with the ice sculptures, and spent many hours enjoying the festivities.
As we were walking there, we found this amazing display of icicles. "How did that happen?", Juniper asked, then pondered: "I guess life is just a miracle". Not sure where that philosophical thought came from, but it was pretty cute!
Official winterlude picture
Helping to create a group ice sculpture with coloured ice blocks
First Beaver Tail ever. Linden looks very self-satisfied.
Beaver Tail action shot.
Building towers with coloured ice blocks
We also stumbled upon a little science experiment area at city hall on our way back!:
Creating straw shapes
Crazy hair, compliments of the van der Graff generator
OK, I think that is plenty for one week. See you next Monday!
