Musings...

Have been having a bit of a conversation with Sharon, Gord's sister, about transcontinental communication, or, more to the point, our inter-family communication. It's made me look again at my desire to give gifts, and acknowledge that a part of it feels like necessity/compulsion, in the sense that I worry how others will feel if I don't give anything. It's highlighted by the fact that gift-giving hardly registers on Gord's radar. He calls his family a bit, perhaps emails, but pretty much, until we're in Canada, there's not much interaction. He hasn't hardly spoken to lots of the people he/we'll no doubt hang out with a lot while we're over there. And it doesn't seem to affect the relationships negatively - he just picks them up when we're in the country.

So Christmas is coming, and I've been making lists of family and friends, and thinking of gifts I can make for them, and this is an enjoyable process. But for one thing, it takes a lot of energy to make a range of gifts (even though it's fun) so I don't think my lists are entirely realistic. But more importantly, I hate how it feels like a one-woman show. It'd be cool if Gord and I chose to buy/make gifts together, but this just isn't going to happen. Just like it'd be cool if Gord and I both updated this blog.

So I have a choice here. Gord is obviously free to do whatever he likes, and I can either get pissed off at what can seem like a lack of contribution to elements of life that I value. Or, I can cut myself some slack and choose to let the blog fall behind, and not have hand-made, or any, gifts to give, without worrying how other people will feel. This makes space to ask myself what I actually want to do, as opposed to feeling like I need to make a gift or be writing here. Cos often I hate how the computer sucks so much energy. It makes space to just climb into bed, which is probably what I should be doing right now.

However, I find it really hard to switch off from how other people might feel. I don't ring that many people in Canada, so if I stop even putting stuff up on this blog, won't they think I'm not interested in them? And if I come empty-handed to Christmas lunch, because I don't necessarily want to buy stuff for the sake of it, won't everyone feel pissed off?

Just processing out loud here - still working it out...

So how do you do gift-giving in your family?

Betta but some photos up here to keep this blog interesting!

Here's Gord and Jas at Miri's 3rd birthday party at Gembrook (same as Jas and I, above).

Anna came round for tea on Monday, wanting to shave her head as an act of solidarity for a friend of her's at work who's having chemo. I did the honours, and I reckon she looks good! It's something you have to do once in your life, anyway... Love to all... And please don't take my lack of blogging personally! Chances are, I'm just nourishing myself by reading a book in bed, or something!

Painful conversations like pulling teeth!

So what's new?

Well, I'm having my wisdom teeth removed this coming Tuesday, part of getting ready to go to Canada. I don't want to have to think about my teeth while over there! They played up when I was six weeks pregnant with Jasper, so I couldn't do much about them then. I met the oral surgeon on Tuesday - seemed like a really nice guy. The thing I'm most stressed about it having to wear a hospital gown - it's such a symbolic stripping of oneself and one's autonomy. But yeah, I'm not too stressed about that, it'll just be new, my first time in hospital. I'm hoping the aftermath won't be too bad. I'm madly trying to EXPRESS myself so that Jasper doesn't dose up on my anaesthesia!

And...

I fell off my bike. So predictable. I was coming down a bit of Punt Rd (a majorly busy road), despite trying to avoid it - I was trying to get to the bike path by the river. Anyway, I had this big arse truck bearing down on me and I thought I should get out of the way. Decided to pull into a petrol station, but my bike tyre didn't handle the slight kerb very well. Slid off - could see it coming about 2 seconds before it actually happened. The damage wasn't as bad as I thought - the worst bit was a very grazed forearm. I got up straight away and didn't even feel like shedding a tear! It just added to the feeling that I was having a very bizarre day...

In the process, I scratched up my wedding ring. Showed it to Gord and he said it was symbolic of the scars we inflict on each other, which was quite meaningful, given we were kind of mid-argument. An unresolved conversation anyway. It's a bit more resolved now, but God, it's painful, when marriage functions as a mirror, as our wedding preacher said. Where the other person reflects back to you your own hurts and shortcomings. Yeah...

Other than that, I had a most lovely day yesterday. Jane, Caleb, Miri, Piper, Jas and I headed off to the Collingwood Children's Farm. Spent five hours there - talking, holding a baby, knitting, eating, drinking coffee - while the kids ran around. It's not like they totally amuse themselves, but it's so much easier when they can bounce off each other's energy. Well, easier except for when they crap on the grass! (thankfully it wasn't Piper!) I really enjoyed talking to Jane, enjoyed a woman's perspective on my unresolved conversation with my husband. I don't mean that negatively, that we bitched about Gord at all. It was just sooo nice to hear her musings on a whole range of topics, cos really, men and women think so differently about stuff. I went home feeling relieved - that was my dominant emotion - relieved that someone had understood and listened. (This is not to say that Gord hasn't been doing this!)

Dunno if I should rave on about all this, given the rather abstract nature of my ramblings, but the bottom line is, it's all good, cos this is really old stuff that I'm really glad to process, but like I said, in the moment, it's bloody painful.

But hey, I meant all that to sound positive. Hopefully it does! On a different positive note, I talked to Gord's sister today in Canada and was glad to touch base. And on another funny note, I've been cleaning out old memory boxes - basically the social paperwork (invitations, letters, etc) of previous years, and found some valentines some little girls wrote to my little brother ages ago. Too cute - I'm going to send them to him!

This is how the kids travel lately, if I need to take a pram and if Jasper doesn't need to sleep (in the sling). I love how their sibling relationship is developing- it's a joy to watch...

Tickets, and farewells...

Last weekend, I somehow managed to misplace my wallet, my keys and one of Jasper's blankets, all at different times/ in different places, although it wouldn't surprise me if my wallet and the blanket are snuggled up together somewhere! Needless to say, the week has felt somewhat unravelled!

On a different note, on Thursday I walked to the market, to the organic shop, to pick up some fruit for Piper's lunch and the shopping I'd left there on Tuesday! I then dropped Piper off at childcare, headed back through the market, picking up an organic fairtrade coffee on my way to the hairdressers where they're happy to cut my fringe for five bucks. And I did all this in the space of twenty minutes, and then was on my way to my favourite opshop! Sometimes I gotta love living in this area!

It's an inevitable part of packing up and heading to Canada (and of coming home again), that I start noticing all the things I'm going to miss. I'm determined to try and be in the moment, missing these things already now, farewelling them, really, and then ready to soak up all the good stuff Canada has to offer.

Which leads me on to announce that we have finalised our tickets, and will arrive in the second-largest country in the world on
Wednesday 5th December. We leave here on the same day, thanks to the quirks of the IDL. We're going to book the final leg, Vancouver to Winnipeg, ourselves, cheappo Mennonites that we are, so I will post once we know the final details, but we'll probably arrive in the early evening.

And just to be different, here's on of my favourite photos of me and my brother Simon, circa 1984.

Great weekend

Well, we just had a beeeg weekend!

On Friday, I had people over for a craft space, from 3 to 10pm ish. Enjoyed chatting with Mum and Dad at the end of the evening. When they left, Pete, our house guest got home from his job on a film set (a psychological thriller called Break In - look out for it!), so we talked for a while - I was rather hyped! That's what social spaces do to me! Then right when I was heading off to bed, Gord and Jesse got home. I hadn't seen Jesse for a while - it was great to see him... finally got to bed at 1am! With a few wake ups thoughout the night, of course, and two kids who decided 7am was a good time to get up (others would say this is a sleep in!), I didn't get much sleep.

So Saturday, we had a fantastic brunch at Choi's (our old place, actually), with Samara too. The weather was absolutely gorgeous, to welcome the first day of spring, and that house was always beautiful in sunnyweather. From there, we headed to Mum and Dad's. They looked after the two kids (Jasper for the first time) while we headed off to the movies. Saw the Bourne Ultimatum, which was satisfyingly entertaining. Said hello to my bro, Daniel, at the italian restaurant in Greensy where he works, and had a coffee a few doors up. Had tea with Mum and Dad, and then drove rather blearily to Gembrook, arriving around 9.30pm (not that you really care!).

At around 6.30am, Jasper decided he was done sleeping, after having listened to the kids stomping around upstairs for a bit. I was psyching up to get up, cos I was feeling tired but not grumpy, and I knew Gord was tired AND grumpy (having, of his own volition, slept squished next to Piper the steam engine in a single bed. Why? you ask. Well, he didn't want to be bounced around next to me while I was changing Jas's nappy in the middle of the night! He told me at one point last night he jumped out of bed absolutely fuming because Piper was snoring, the blankets weren't covering them both well enough and he was cold, and he felt like he hadn't slept yet! He paced around for a while, calmed down, and re-did the blankets, but yeah, why woulldya?? He didn't get much sympathy from me - he just made me laugh instead - in the morning when he told me!)

Anyway, what I meant to say was that I was psyching up to get up, but then Jane offered to take Jas. Later Gord got up, and between the two of them, I was able to sleep in til 10.30am, with one feed in there - that felt SOOOO pleasant! Hasn't happened in quite a while...

We were at Gembrook cos there was a stack of wood to be cut up and stacked. An arborist had come along and trimmed a whole lot of trees along one edge of the property, and we were there to do our best to clear the timber off the neighbour's land. I love hauling wood - enjoyed throwing and stacking it while Gord sawed with a chain (or is that chainsawed?). Lovely weather to be outside.

Got back home just in time to hear Samara preach at church - it was really ace to hear what she had to say. Piper was TOTALLY baked, after a whole weekend of full on play, but she got to bed okay, without cracking it.

We just watch Idol (whoo! I'm really enjoying it!) and chatted to Pete. He and Jotara just bought a one-bedroom apartment in Northcote, so that's pretty exciting. I love this sense of relationships developing - makes our life all the richer... And here I am on the couch with my laptop, enjoying having a bit of a rave here. It was a really good weekend, that's why I wanted to write about it. We don't usually plan our weekends this full, but even though it was busy and we missed our relaxed coffee space at the market on Sunday morning, it was still a really satisfying weekend.

Soayeah... betta wind it up... love to all

P.S. This is Jas this morning - check out his perfectly Canadian t-shirt, a hand-me-down from Ilsa and Liam...