Dutch Blitz

May 17, 2012

Kids Are The Darndest Things

Yesterday morning, I was at the volunteer appreciation tea at my kids’ school (see above photo). I loved seeing the kids singing, and I loved partaking the coffee and snacks, and I loved sitting with the women I got to sit and chat with. I have a new(ish) friend, who has four children, three of whom are the same age as my three. We started sharing stories and it got to the point where I was doing the silent laugh. Parallel lives, kids are crazy, need more coffee, etc.

(In the midst of our conversation, I told her that I’m a blogger, and gave her all of the details. I hope we can still be friends.)

I love my kids, and I think that’s pretty apparent, but they are not perfect. Nor do I expect them to be. They say ridiculous things and they do ridiculous things and, oh. That makes them even more awesome.

I have a child who weighs all of sixty pounds, but he sounds like a heavy-footed elephant as he makes his way up and down the stairs. It’s not intentional, but DUDE. Be lighter on the feet already. Especially at 6 a.m. He also likes to throw himself on the ground for NO REASON WHATSOEVER. If you are on the hunt for jeans with knees blown out, I can hook you up.

I have a child who is the oldest, and who thinks that means that he gets to be the parent. My response is consistent. Stop being a weenis. He is also wired like me, in that he sat with me on the deck on Mother’s Day and talked for thirty minutes STRAIGHT (While my husband chuckled to himself in the garden). He is the kid who takes care of all of the other kids, and who hugs you just because, and who I really shouldn’t complain about. Except for those weenis moments.

I have a youngest child who will wail that she CANNOT FIND HER HOODIE. Well, yes. Standing in the middle of a room will not help you find your hoodie. MOVE YOUR FEET and look in ALL THE PLACES. Or, don’t, and just stand their with your crocodile tears and OH HEY I FOUND YOUR HOODIE, because YOU ARE THE BABY and ALL OF PLANET EARTH WILL MAKE SURE TO TAKE CARE OF YOU.

They push me and they pull me but my life sure would be boring if they didn’t do either.

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May 14, 2012

The Mother Load

This past Friday was even better than the usual end-of-week fiesta that it is, because my Dad and his wife were driving back from a trip to Alberta and stopped in for a few hours to visit and join us for dinner before heading home to Vancouver. Seeing them is always great, but they brought along a special treat. My sister Mel:

She’s the one sibling with whom I share the same Mom, and yet I haven’t seen her since all nine of us kids gathered at Dad’s house five years ago. We keep in touch, but with her in Ontario nowhere near Toronto and me in BC nowhere near Vancouver, it’s kind of hard to get the two of us together, never mind our two families. The kids don’t even remember that last visit, so they were pretty happy to get to know Auntie Mel a little bit. Especially Emily.

Between Auntie Mel and my Dad, Emily was pulling out all of her tricks. Songs and dances and skipping ropes and stories and toys and all the things. She was especially taken with Grandpa, and he obliged her by talking in the Donald Duck voice that he used to do for me when I was little. It never gets old.

After they’d left for the coast and we’d cleaned up dinner, I went to the office to check my email. She appeared in front of me a few minutes later with a big smile and watery eyes.

It was really nice to see Grandpa Al today.

Oh.

I pulled her onto my lap and told her that if Grandpa Al lived closer, we’d see him more often. She knew that, but she needed to hear it again. She sees so many of her friends at school and at church who have grandparents who are involved, and she doesn’t have that. I confirmed his love for her, and reminded her of the older couples in our church who do pour into her, but there’s just something special about a Grandpa, you know?

I knew exactly where she was coming from, because I grew up on the north coast of B.C. and all of my grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins were (are) in southern Ontario. I saw them once every few years and while I loved every minute of those visits, I sure felt that void when we returned home. I’ve always hoped that my kids would have grandparents nearby who loved on them the way most grandparents do. Trips to the park, ice cream dates, big Sunday dinners, time spent roughhousing in the yard.

They don’t have that. Between that fact and my own family history, I do everything that I can to love them as hard as I possibly can. They are the reason that I live with my heart walking outside of my body. They are the reason that I play catch even though I suck at baseball. They are the reason that I make pancakes and bacon on a Saturday morning before spending three hours at soccer. They are the reason that I’ve watched Transformers 217 times. They are the reason that I walk them to the bus stop every morning and pick them up after school even though I told them to catch the bus home as well. They are the reason that I never eat the last piece of anything, in case they want it. They are the reason that I laugh so hard, all the time.

They are the reason that we hiked up Giant’s Head Mountain yesterday afternoon, because they wanted to see the view again.

They are the reason that I cry whether I’m happy or sad. They are the reason that I love their Dad more that should be humanly possible, because they are flesh of both of our flesh, blood of both of our blood. They are the reason that I get to sit and cuddle on the couch, because it’s what Moms do. They are the reason that I will crank the music and have an after-dinner dance party in the great room. They are the reason that I aim for a healthier, more sustainable life, because I want to give them the best that I can. They are the reason that this introverted extrovert will talk to parents I don’t know, because my kids want to hang out with theirs. They are the reason that I make the choices I do, in almost all areas of my life.

I want them to see love in action and to have love and to know love and to feel loved. I’m sure that I fail, often, but I am giving it all that I’ve got.

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May 11, 2012

Bits and Bites

I’m sitting in my office typing this, with the peeping baby chicks for company. As I mentioned on Instagram yesterday, they are awfully cute but have developed a distinct “Eau de chicken poop” aroma. Or, as Doug commented, “Poop du poulet, from Chanel.”

Matthew should have the addition to the coop done this weekend, and it’s so beautiful here that I have the windows open, so I’ll survive. If you see me out and about this weekend and catch a whiff, well, I apologize in advance.

This is just a quick post to link to where else I’ve been this week, for all five of you who care.

Over at Work It! Mom:

(So much sex talk. Sorry, Dad.)

Over at The Bad Moms Club:

It Takes a Village To Raise A Child

I’ve got three new recipes up over at Life Made Delicious:

Homemade pizza dough, with instructions for baking it in the oven or cooking it on the barbecue (SO GOOD)

Spinach and sprout salad, with balsamic vinaigrette

Baked ham & egg cups (Tanya made these for me when I was in Alberta and they are AMAZING. It’s our new Saturday morning breakfast.)

Now I’m hungry.

In non-writing-related news, my Dad and his wife are driving through here on there way back from a trip to Alberta and stopping in to visit for a few hours this afternoon. With them is my sister Mel, whom I haven’t seen since her wedding. SEVEN YEARS AGO. (She lives in Ontario.) It will be good to have some face time and for my kids to see/meet their Auntie. I’m a little bit excited about this.

Have a great weekend, friends. I hope it’s sunny and warm where you are, too.

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May 10, 2012

Chicken Run

Almost a year ago to the day, I told you guys how Matthew and I are constantly striving to be more green/sustainable. We went from having Bantie chickens, which lay small eggs, to deciding to raise larger chickens for both eggs and meat. He placed an order for fifty baby chicks and they arrived in a cardboard box sent overnight through Canada Post.

Soon, those little bundles of yellow fur were full grown chickens and roosters (who like to live dangerously by perching on the fence that borders the dog run).

We’ve had some of their eggs, and we had a number of great roasted chicken dinners. (Matthew hunts and fishes, and has gutted a buck, a doe, and many trout and salmon.)(Is there anything he DOESN’T do?)(No.)

The chickens are now laying daily and we get about a dozen eggs each day. Matthew put it out on Facebook that he had eggs for sale and woke up in the morning to find that the demand was far greater than what the chickens are producing. Apparently there are only two people in our small town who sell eggs and they have long wait lists. Being a farmer would be his dream job if it paid the bills, but he does it anyway because he loves it. So, he placed an order for egg chickens (50) and meat chickens (25). We have a number of friends who cannot wait for this fall, when the hens start laying eggs.

(We’ve hatched baby chicks here at home in the past, and will do it again, but we changed breeds this time around.)

At 6:00 yesterday morning, the post office called to tell us that our chirping package had arrived. Seventy-five baby chicks, smooshed together in three compartments to stay warm.

The yellow ones are the meat chickens and the ones with brown markings are the egg chickens.

The kids were SUPER excited that the chicks arrived before they had to get ready for school.

Graham told me that this chick was going to be his, and that her name is ‘Emma.’ I pointed out that she is a meat chicken and that he might not want to get too attached. He put her down and picked up an egg chicken. Also named ‘Emma.’

The chicks are in bins in my home office for the next week or so to keep them warm until Matthew finishes the addition to the current chicken coop and run.

That one looks like I do when the warm sun emerges after a cold winter.

It’s a good thing that I’m the kind of person who blocks out the world when she works/reads and doesn’t hear A THING, because seventy-five chirping chicks is REALLY LOUD. The chicks are pretty hilarious, too (chickens are funny), so it all balances out.

If you’re a local and want farm eggs in the fall, let me know. I’ll get you in touch with Farmer Matt. And if you’re local but don’t need eggs, I’ll be more than happy to have you over for a roasted chicken dinner.

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May 7, 2012

Extreme Makeover: Home Office Edition

Those of you who either know us in real life, or have been reading for a long time, know that we bought our house out here in the sticks eleven years ago and have been renovating it ever since. We refinished the exterior of our house (More here). We gutted our master bedroom and made an en suite that I love. We made a craft room for me that has been sadly neglected as of late, but that’s a story for another day. We’ve renovated our Great Room twice and apart from the never ending cleaning up after meals and snacks, it’s my favorite room in the house. We have a laundry room that may be in the basement but is pretty darn cozy, even if I do say so myself. We created a little girl’s room that my daughter loves (for now), and our entire house is about 95% done.

One room in our house that was completed many years ago, but that I’ve never posted photos of, is our home office. Once upon a time, Matthew and his Dad were self-employed lumber brokers and they worked out of our home office, which our neighbors tell us was a garage when the house was first built. As such, it’s pretty large, and soundproof, and kind of perfect to use as an office that held three people (I did the books). Over the past few years, it became more of a holding area/storage room and it was the place where we would dump everything and then close the door.

With me back to working from home, the first thing I needed to do was purge the office of all of the stuff. I’ve spent at least ten hours this past week clearing it out. Let me show you why. We’ll start at the doorway and move left to right.

Ah, the corner of terror, complete with CD’s from 2004 and ink cartridges from two printers ago. The desk on the right housed two years of unfiled bills and paperwork, and the boxes below it are records from six years ago.

Where to begin? Bookshelf overflowing with books and paystubs, desk so covered with crap that there was maybe two inches of clear space. The Man Corner behind the desk is where Matthew stores all of his hunting/fishing/gardening/outdoorsy stuff.

Our ski gear, a box of photos from seven years ago, a pressure washer. Matthew’s “shop” is a three-car garage, so I’m not quite sure how that piece of machinery ended up in the house.

Blue bags (Yay, recycling!), counter top holding my workout gear and other random junk.

While I was at it, I decided that the space outside of the office’s sliding doors should be tackled. When you drive up our driveway, you round the bend and the first thing you see is THIS:

Have I mentioned that we live in redneck country? Apparently we were trying to blend in with the neighbors. We had everything from deer horns to the chicken boiler (we have meat chickens) to a dog crate we haven’t used in two years.

Cleaning the outside was quite simple, as the majority of the items belonged in the shed across the circular driveway.

Much better. And once we fill our planters and hanging baskets next week, it will be even homier.

Back to the office!

The frames are for the hallway, which falls into the 5% of unfinished parts of the house. The wainscoting just needs trim…

Emily wanted to help and hung up her painting for me.

I spent a solid three hours opening all of the envelopes and filing all of the papers that were on that one desk.

I decided to make the desk into an L-shape to make it more functional.

I can’t do anything about the Man Corner, but that’s OK as it’s out of my line of sight while sitting at the desk. Besides, I might borrow his crossbow and be Katniss for Halloween.

Look at all of that SPACE. SO MUCH clean floor space.

And last, but not least, contained recycling. I’m glad we recycle, but I don’t need to stare at garbage all day. That counter is where I place my laptop when I do an exercise DVD (the office is our only room with carpet), so I turned it into my workout corner.

The only thing missing from this photo is the new PC I’m picking up this afternoon. I’ll have dueling laptops – the MacBook for writing and photography, the PC for accounting work. It really is just like the commercials.

I’m sitting in my new space as I type this out and it feels good. I feel good. For the first time in over two years, I don’t hate Mondays.