How to date your kids

Lately I've both missed the girlies terribly and felt flustered and frustrated by them all at the same time. It's been close to two months since I finished placement but it still feels like we are trying to find our feet, the girls and I. We all coped through the crazy semester and crossed the finish line with all players still intact, yet we're all a bit different. I, for one, got used to having some new independence, even if that independence came with a nearly constant full schedule of client visits, births, and studying. 

It was the first time in a while that I was out in the world without the responsibility of the girlies and at times that was exactly what I needed after years of parenting young children full-time. I was thrown into a world where I could move about without always calculating how it would impact my children. Of course I was thinking about them throughout the day and I missed them deeply, but I wasn't answering to them in a way that I had become accustomed to. We had neighbours who walked them to school (bless them), a caregiver who picked them up and  made dinner, and of course, another parent home with them all the times that I couldn't be. But I wasn't home running the show all the time and some days it was a good feeling.

The girls too, developed new routines, new ways of moving through their world. When I was back home for bedtimes on a regular basis after my placement ended, Shira started declaring (loudly) that she wasn't used to me and my rules anymore. Papa does it different. (I bet he does, I thought.) While everyone was relieved to have the family together more often, we all had to adjust. There were big feelings all around, more tears than usual, and some ramped up competition over who got to sit in my lap (mostly from the girls, though not exclusively).

Since the first week of May I've been home during the day by myself. The girls and I worked out a new routine for the mornings, I began walking them to school again, but then the day was mine until 3:30. I would work on the course I teach online, read, putter around the house cleaning and fixing things that had been ignored for months. I would be lying if I didn't admit that the past two months have been lovely. Don't hate me. School lets out for summer this week, so this alone time I speak of will be a thing of the past.

In honour of all this time I had on my hands, I decided to spend one day alone with each girlie. To reconnect. To be silly. To eat too much ice cream. As I mentioned above, the girlies spend a good chunk of every waking hour competing for my attention, so a day alone together is a treasure. It was delightful to spend a full day with them without the constant sibling bickering. No competition, no outdoing the other, no raised voices, just the two of us. For Alyce and I it was a chance to talk about some difficult things after a rough year at school. As for Shira, we just played.

So how to do date your kids? If you can swing it, choose a school day, since there are few things better than skipping school. For those of you who gasp at my pulling the kids out of school to eat ice cream, I suggest relaxing. There is life beyond school. If not, a weekend will do, since ice cream tastes like perfection even on a Saturday.

The rest is up to you. I chose to take them out for the full days, filling our time with a mixture of treats (like french fries), crafts (watch out not to let the seven-year-old burn herself on the stove while making paste for paper mache, not that I'm speaking from experience or anything), and playing. I took Alyce to the mall to buy some new earrings and for some lunch, then we had popcorn and a movie at home. For Shira we went to the beach, collected bucketfuls of rocks, and then stopped for lunch on our way home to paint said rocks. While I chose to take each girlie out for lunch, a date day doesn't require any extra money. A picnic on the beach would have blown Shira's mind almost as much as McDonald's did.

The result? Two magical days. I still do bedtime differently than their Papa, but they'll just have to get used to that one.

Be well!

xo

This week

This week features an amazing trip to Vancouver! I flew out to surprise my stepmonster, Kate, for her 40th birthday, with the added perk of seeing my Dad and little brother and sister (who are eleven and seven, respectively). And mytheir enormous, goofy dog. We are soul mates, he and I. 

It has been three years since I visited my family in Vancouver and it was beyond overdue. This family of mine, divided by too many provinces, makes my heart happy. It was just me flying out on this trip (much to the disappointment of Alyce and Shira, and the result was some pretty incredible time spent teaching Sydney how to knit, watching Noah show off at his baseball game, and of course, celebrating one of my favouite people in the world. And since I was on Toronto time the entire weekend, I was even able to enjoy some quiet time with my Dad, an early riser, before the rest of the family crawled out of bed.  May there be more trips in my future.

Here is a snapshot of my week.

Shenanigans with Noah at Sydney's school fair. 

Sydney was a natural knitter. It is pushing me to finally teach Alyce, who has been begging to learn.

 We celebrated friendship and sangria.

No one will ever convince me of this "half-sister" business. She's mine, through and through.

A gift from Syd.

I expect Noah will play in the majors one day, said the proud sister.

The weekend-long celebration called for my favourite red lipstick, which it seems was wearing off about the time I took this photo.

How was your week?

Be well!
xo

Ten things my mother taught me

1. To peel off the stickers and price tags from everything, no matter how time intensive.

2. To always adequately salt the potatoes.

3. How to pour a glass of wine.

4. That it is okay to make mistakes. (I’m still not good at this one. I’m a slow learner.)

5.  How to apply mascara.

6. How to read.

7. That gold really never goes out of style.

8. Not to let them see you sweat.

9. How to make buttercream icing.

10. To love my children.

Happy Mother’s Day, you gorgeous woman.

I survived the semester

So I'm mostly here to tell you that I survived the grand catastrophe known as clinical skills, reproductive physiology, and pharmacology. I did it. Passed. Done. Over. Survived. It was truly the most work my brain has ever done, and I say this as someone who has been in school since the dawn of time. I learned so much about fetal heart beats, placentas, and the use of medication to control postpartum bleeding (in addition to about a billion other things) that my brain is ready to explode. And explode it shall when I begin my first clinical placement in two weeks!

That's right. In two short weeks I will begin a little less book-learning and a lot more hands-on baby catching! Can you even believe it? I know I can't. I have my stethoscope at the ready, my pager is warming up, and I'm (sort of) ready to go. Do you want to know all the feelings I have about starting placement? Here's a sampling: giddiness, panic, trepidation, delight, anxiety, and exhaustion (that's a carryover from this past semester of superwork).  I think more than anything I'm excited that I'll be able to use my hands. I remember my own midwives' hands on my body, on my baby, and I want my own hands to learn that skill and attention. My hands are always warm, so that's a start.

Life is about to get real in an entirely new way. I will be on-call 24 hours a day, with only a handful of days off each month. I will be called away for births and appointments at moment's notice. Did I mention I have a family, with two young children? How will this work? Will they miss me? Will they feel left out of my new life? Will the girls be cared for in all those times I'm working? (Of course they will be, is an answer to that last question.) To this point I've been busy and chaotic and overwhelmed, but all of that has taken place within a framework of regular schedules and flexibility. But last I heard, birth with a midwife is unscheduled. I've known about this part of my student midwifery life for years, but now, now it is here. I'm talking to my children and to Matt, explaining how I think life will be for the next 18 weeks, but who are we kidding? I have no idea. Mama will sometimes leave in the middle of the night and only time will tell how that impacts the girlies.

Can I tell you about how nervous I am about this transition? I think I'll make a good midwife one day, but am I ready for this? Will my hands learn? I am an anxious sort by nature and I'm having to work really hard to just keep breathing. Am I strong enough for this? I really do think so.

In these last two weeks before placement I plan to have the girls help me to prepare for all these big changes. We're going to make notes and drawings to carry with us, to peak at when we're missing each other. I'm going to ask them to make a sign for my bedroom door that says "Mama is sleeping!" for those days I'm catching up on sleep from the birth. I also feel the need to plan everything at home, which of course is pretty ambitious considering the next two weeks are filled with holiday dinners, marking, preparing for placement (translation: taking everyone's blood pressure). But I also want to wash my floors, sort my clothes, write up a meal plan for Matt and the girls, make food to keep in the freezer, and sleep. I'm nothing if not eager.

I also want to blog. What are the chances?

Be well!

Seven years and all I got was this awesome family

You and me, plus three cats and two children. We were married seven years ago, today. Last year we completely forgot about it, but this year the champagne is already chilling in the fridge. Almost every day I both take our family for granted and shake my head at the luck I must have to land this family of mine.

Happy anniversary, Matty. I love you to the moon and stars.

Ten things I have learned about midwifery school

1. We are an eager bunch.

Some of us applied more than once to get in (just like I did).  To say that we take things seriously doesn't even skim the surface of just how much effort we are all putting in to make this program work, and some of us will at some point even need to relocate somewhere else in the province to complete our clinical placements. But some of us have waited close to twenty years to follow this dream to be a midwife (that would be me again), so yes, we're eager. The energy in our classrooms is phenomenal because we're all want this so much. This isn't to say we don't all struggle some weeks, because I'm sure we all do. But it feels good to love what you do.

 

2. We cry at the drop of a hat.

Oh, we're an emotional bunch. I remember updating my facebook status after the first day of orientation in August, declaring to my little world that I had never before joined anything where its members cry because they are so grateful to be there. I remember some really excited people in my first undergrad, those kids who had all their books and papers at the ready, all their pens lined up in a row (me), but I'll wager that not a single one of my fellow Liberal Arts majors teared up at the prospect of their first class English Poetry class.

We cry a lot. In class. Out of class. On the subway. We're learning so much about what midwifery care means, about what it takes to care for clients we'll some day have the honour of working with, and sometimes we just can't help ourselves. Seriously, this is emotional work. We're observing births and watching families come alive. And the babies!

This beautiful breast was created by my friend, Kyla Austin. She also made me a uterus and placenta. I am rich in anatomy.

3. Our teachers expect us to do a lot of work.

Our professors are midwives, social scientists, science scientists, and the whole lot of them work us pretty hard. This term was just a ton of reading, preparing, writing, and general nail biting. I am eternally grateful that I decided to take my anatomy and physiology course out of the way this summer (see above re: eager), because I would have been drowning this term with an extra science course. The midwifery program is divided into course work (1.5 years) and clinical placements (2.5 years), and while we all know this first year and a half of courses is easier than the juggle of constant learning on placement, it doesn't make things feel any easier now, or last week when I was writing what felt like the longest literature review of all time.

Here's the thing: I've been in school a few times before (ahem), so I felt like the transition to midwifery school wouldn't be so hard. I'm sure you know where this is going. Writing a master's thesis was a lot of hard work, and the PhD comprehensive exams were a killer. But this program sort of took me by surprise, what with the constant (and I mean constant) deadlines of assignments. And have I mentioned the readings? One course in particular (I'm looking at you, Nadya) has us reading piles (actual piles) of articles each week. But do you know what the amazing thing is? Everyone comes to class prepared and ready to learn (more on that below). It blows my mind just how hard everyone works. This program demands so much but it seems to have met its match in this group of future-midwives I've surrounded myself with this year.

4. We are surrounded by pictures of cervixes and vaginas pretty much all the time.

Speaking of being surrounded: they are everywhere. I'm not just talking about diagrams in our text books, but models of them at every turn. The program has one large classroom dedicated to midwifery classes, and since it's the same room most of the clinical training takes place in, all the cupboards and counters are actually overflowing with vaginas, a pelvis or two, and an entire cabinet filled with babies (dolls, that is). It's nice though, because sometimes we'll be discussing a really heavy topic that has us all thinking hard and squirming in our seats, and then I'll look over at a baby doll poking out of a life size torso on the counter next to me, and perspective returns. One day one of our professors suggested if we weren't used to everything being all-vagina-all-the-time that we should stand in front of the mirror and just say vagina over and over again to get used to it.

Say it with me: vagina, vagina, vagina, vagina. Good.

5. The program is overflowing with intelligent, thoughtful, and generous women.

I am fairly certain that in four years Ontario is going to have some amazing new midwives. (I'm sure each year there is a new crop of similarly wonderful new midwives, but this is the group I know and I'm sweet on them.) This program has introduced me to some of the most kindhearted, intelligent, compassionate women I've ever met. And they work their asses off. They make me laugh constantly and drink almost as much coffee as I do. And the support! I've heard rumours of competitive programs where students stand in each others' way. Not in this class. If one of us has spent hours looking for an article we need, we post it for others to use. Need someone to edit your paper? Done. Printer out of paper? Send it to one of us and we'll bring it to class for you. We even offer unsolicited dating advice. It seems we've already got each others' backs.

6. My children have already started asking if I'm a midwife yet.

Just three years and five months to go!

7. I am learning so, so much.

And my brain hurts. It hurts so bad sometimes, but for all the right reasons. Inferential statistics, representations of birth in literature, racism in Ontario midwifery, medical research studies on home births versus hospital births, learning to use our pagers, accessible health care, correlation graphs. And we haven't even begun to talk about the vaginas yet!

8. Getting two little ones ready for school and daycare each morning before I leave for midwifery school is a total zoo.

It's a gong show. Matt started a new job just a few weeks before school started and it means that he leaves the house at 6:30 every morning (Toronto traffic is awesome). Since Shira and Alyce go to different places each morning, in two different directions, and because my classes start too early for me to drop Alyce off at the school bell some mornings, we had initially hired a friend to walk them to daycare and school each morning (thank you, Seamus). About halfway through the term, however, we needed to start saving some money (pesky tuition) and I took on the task myself. We walk a bit, take a bus, walk some more, drop off Shira, then Alyce and I walk twenty more minutes to school. I like that we use our feet to get places instead of always needing a car, but lately I've been daydreaming about time travel and teleportation. Or at least of a daycare that is next to Alyce's school. Also, I was late to half my classes in the second half of term.

I'm learning this is life.

9. School/life balance is tricky.*

You guys, I'm really bad at this part. Like REALLY bad. I am good at a lot of things (fast reader, decent baker, loyal friend) but time management is at the way bottom of the list of things I can do. This always stumps me because another thing I am good at is working hard. So if I'm a hard worker, why can't I seem to find a way to get my work done in a way that doesn't completely stress my family?

I've never done this before, that is, attempt a rigorous program while raising young children. In the past I could leave my work until the two or three days before a deadline and then work straight for 3 days and get it done. Now if when I do that it means that I am shirking a ton of family responsibilities. I know, I know, part of the problem is just that there is so much to do. School, work (I still teach an online university course), and family is a lot to squeeze into 24 hours. And yes, my sleep and health have suffered. Not cool. But there has to be a way to work so that I can give some of my time to my family with less stress. I'm not looking for a perfect system, just something that works for us. I'm going to think about this one and get back to you.

10. I still can't believe I'm lucky enough to do this.

I am the luckiest overwhelmed/exhausted/ecstatic/nervous/happy midwifery student ever.

*Understatement of the decade

On returning

Returning to Nana's

 My mum welcomes these beasts with open arms every time.

What do you do when you need to collapse and step way from life for a day or two? I go to my mum's house. She no longer lives in the house I grew up in (my grandparents actually live in that house now, so I'm still able to visit some of the favourite places of my childhood, like the secret fairy garden that still grows outside what used to be my bedroom window), but because it is where my mum lives, it's home. Occasionally I feel a bit juvenile returning to mum so often, but sometimes it's just exactly what I need.

It could be that she feeds me some of my favourite foods (I'll be there briefly this coming Sunday and I'll be asking her to make this soup again) or that the red wine flows freely (which it does), or even that she loves my girls *almost* more than I do. But it isn't quite any of those things exactly. There is something about being in my mum's presence that just makes be feel strong and it's always been that way, since the beginning of us.

At mum's house there are king-size beds.

Alyce's work of art

Snail and worm, detail

Or maybe that's just what love feels like. Glorious strength, rooted in relationship with another person.That's the only possible explanation for allowing your grandchildren to draw pictures on your pantry walls, right? Only fierce love could do that. That, and drunkenness, which while I promise you there was wine, my mother only gets giggly when she drinks champagne.

Sadly, there was no champagne this weekend. Maybe the next weekend.

Whatever the feeling, whatever the reason I have for returning again and again for short visits (or long ones, but that was just once), this is what I do. When I daydream about Alyce and Shira growing older I always fantasize about those times when they return to me. They'll leave me to explore, to love, to fail, to put one foot in front of the other, but they'll return, or at least I hope they will. I wonder what kinds of food they'll want me to cook, or what special things I'll sneak into their bags as they leave again.

I was taken by this blossoming turnip in my mother's kitchen.

I asked my mum if we could visit last weekend because I told her the girls were missing her. Which they were, deeply. My mum has been written into the foundation of our family, not only because we lived with her for so long last year, but because she comes with me, as I do with her. We are a bit of a package, the two of us. I really wanted to visit because I needed a quick recharging after my interview last Friday (which was hard, but still felt good). The four of us threw ourselves together and drove to Cambridge for a quick sleepover, just time enough to enjoy my mum's home and to feel a little bit more like myself again.

It worked.

Update: This was the post I had intended to publish last Monday, but couldn't. This week's Sunday visit I mentioned above turned into two days, and yes, this time there was champagne, and yes, my mum did get the giggles.

How to visit the ROM with young children

Behind the Scenes

I should tell you it took two hours to get us there. Yes, we live in the middle of Toronto, but don't let that deceive you. Going anywhere with children adds years to most outings. First it took me a full hour to Prepare All The Things. What does a family of four need for a trip the Royal Ontario Museum? I'd be happy to tell you: diapers, wipes, a full change of clothes for two children, three, filled water bottles, tea, snacks, dinner, more snacks, two umbrellas, a stroller, an extra stroller seat in case I get Alyce gets tired on the way home, change for the subway, an extra sweater, and mittens and hats in case the weather changes later that night. Once that was done I just had to get two young children ready to get out of the house. Easy! (Matt was meeting us there from work, lucky duck.)

That took one hour. Next up was a 40 minute walk to the subway that takes me 15 when I walk by myself. Shira was bundled in the stroller, but then we have to account for Alyce's dawdling, because there are puddles! And things that look like worms! And a pile of melting snow! And an airplane! We finally arrived, wet from the rain, but motivated by our collective excitement to see dinosaur bones.

10 minutes later we found ourselves still excited about bones, but less excited by the fact that we were on a subway platform, a mere block away from the museum, but in front of a sign alerting us that the elevators at St. George station were down for maintenance. Awesome. Fortunately I only had one level to ascend and found an escalator on which to awkwardly balance the front wheel of my enormous stroller. (I was traveling on the north-south line; had I been coming from the dreaded east or west I would have had to unpack Shira from the stroller, help her up the stairs, and then carry the double stroller by myself, reassembling the entire package at the top.)

We made, two hours later but relatively unharmed. It's March Break in Ontario, so Alyce is off school all week. Matt and I are dividing up the week in terms of work and being home with the girls, but we wanted to do something special as a family. We have a membership at the Ontario Science Centre, but we visit the ROM much less frequently. (Note to self: living in Toronto is a good, good thing.) There has been a special dinosaur exhibit on for months with some new-to-North American-museums dinosaur bones from South America, Africa, and Asia. I've been meaning to take Alyce for some time, but like most things I waited until its last week in Toronto. However, the plus side to my procrastination this time around is that admission to the Ultimate Dinosaurs exhibit during March Break, after 4:30 pm, is 35% off. Finally, waiting until the last minute pays off.

What to expect while visiting the Royal Ontario Museum with young children

Excitement
Silliness
Chaos
Interest
Fear of bats (re: bat cave)
Stickers
Bouncing
Running
A meltdown or two, especially if you're there in late afternoon or evening.

All of the above, plus:

You'll learn things: If you have a child in kindergarten who just finished a unit on dinosaurs, she will probably tell you things like, That dinosaur must have been a herbivore because its teeth are flat, or, That's a fossilized skull. I do, and mine did. Next she'll tell me that when I travel in space I'll need to wear an oxygen tank because there isn't any oxygen in space, which we need to breathe. No wait, she already told me that last week.

They'll dress up like a dinosaur: The dress-up clothes in the kids section will probably be their favourite part and you'll remember that you've been meaning to find some non-princess, non-fairy, non-ballerina clothes for their dress-up bins at home. I can't really roll my eyes over their daily need to dress up like princesses when all of their dress-up clothes are, wait for it, princess dresses. I'm not always the smartest parent.

The bees are always winners: At the ROM you'll find bees--real live, buzzing, honey-making bees. They can buzz back and forth between their hive and the outside world through a plastic pipe running through a nearby window (to taunt the nearby university students, Matt declared). The best part is that the bee keeper kindly painted a white dot on the Queen Bee so that she's easy to find amidst all the other manic honey bees. Once your child spots the Queen he'll receive a sticker that declares his Queen Bee finding mission a success. Success!

If you're looking for something to do this week, the Ultimate Dinosaurs are only there until March 17th. If you want to avoid large crowds of people, you might want to skip the fancy dinosaurs and just go next week. Not that they're not awesome, but there is an entire museum to see, and your kids will probably just want to play dress-up anyway.

How is your March Break going?

Be well.

When did this Monday become a Tuesday? And an invitation to dinner.

Last week was a really good one, for more reasons than I can list. Alyce made me her usual 2397 drawings (do you like my new bookmark?), I attended my first crazy intense parent council meeting at her new school, and waited (and am still waiting) with a good friend as she enters the final week(s) of her pregnancy. I'm extra excited because I have a special invitation to attend her birth as her doula. We ate mac and cheese and cookies, because isn't that what one does in preparation for labour? That's what I do, anyway, and I will encourage you to, as well. I might tell you that preparing for my friend's birth is also the reason behind all the muffins I've been baking, but that would be stretching the truth a bit, because we all know that I'll use any and all excuses to make muffins. This week I made these apple muffins from Smitten Kitchen (I grated the apples instead of dicing on account of not wanting to offend Alyce's fine sensibilities) and these lemon millet muffins from 101 Cookbooks (you can leave out the lemon and add chocolate chips if you like, which I often do, but the lemon is almost as delicious). Both were hits and both are gone.

 
My weeks are always filled with so much and trying to balance it all can be a bit overwhelming. The days have been so busy that I started this post eagerly on a Monday morning and am finishing it now on a Tuesday close to lunch. Where did yesterday go? Can I tell you a quick story that might let you in on the status of a mind pulled in a few one hundred different directions? I drove the girls across town yesterday for Alyce's medical appointment, and then rushed them back home to spend the afternoon with a friend so that I could drive all the way back across town for my own appointment . As I stood in front of the nurse at the front desk, panting and not a little bit sweaty from all the rushing, she informed me, kindly, that my appointment was for the 22nd of November. Yesterday was the 22nd of October. Not the same month, it turns out. I handled the disappointment quite well and made the most of the rest of my afternoon. While an overwhelmed mind sometimes leads to crying at the first sign of a struggle, it can also jump to the next task without too much concern. Appointment doesn't exist? No matter, I can do those other twelve things I need to finish today.

What I'm trying to tell you is that I'm busy but happy. All the projects I'm finally getting to are helping me to feel more and more settled. I've mentioned a few times here that adjusting to living in Toronto again hasn't always been easy. I am grateful to be back, but I'm learning that nothing is simple. It isn't as easy as dropping back into a former life. We have new habits, new routines, new obligations, new children. Our friends, at least the ones who are still here, have welcomed us back, but they have busy lives, too. Something that I've been giving a lot of thought to since returning to Toronto is how difficult it can be to maintain community as we grow older. My entire life has been marked by relationships with exceptional friends and I'm learning that growing older means more and more work to maintain these friendships. It isn't for lack of caring or love that we see our friends less, but the way in which our own families drive our busy days, weeks, and months. Most of us have partners and families and careers and projects and it's a wonder that we ever just find the time to sit together, with friends, to enjoy it all happening. But I think we should fight the good fight against this tendency to collapse into our own families. I think we should all take little steps to stay connected with the people we are lucky enough to have in our lives. And maybe we should meet a few more.

We celebrate Shabbat every week beginning Friday night. Shabbat means different things to different people, but one of my most favourite things in the world is knowing that every Friday night, no matter what is going on in the rest of our chaos, Matt and I have a chance to sit down for a dinner, some wine, and hopefully some excellent company. As the day comes to a close at the end of week I can feel my entire body calming down, in spite of my rushing around the kitchen preparing dinner. Sometimes we include the girls in a big dinner; other times Alyce and Shira help me light the candles but Matt and I save dinner for later in the (quieter) evening. Some of my favourite nights are those when friends join us for dinner. And so here comes my challenge: why aren't we sharing meals friends more often? Why aren't we inviting new friends to our tables? I am going to invite friends (both old and new) to our table for dinner or lunch three weekends out of four. I can't promise they'll say yes, but I am going to send out my invitations nonetheless. I hope we can make it an offer they won't refuse. Busy weeks be damned.

I'm looking forward to dinner already.