Gratitude Sunday: Boldly Going Forth

Joining Taryn today at Wooly Moss Roots blog for Gratitude Sunday: a chance to look back at the week that was and reflect with gratitude.

It feels good to be back to the blog and what better way to begin again than with Gratitude Sunday.
Yesterday was your typical October day here in southern Ontario-cold, cloudy alternating between dripping and pouring rain. Today dawned all blue skies and brilliant sunshine.
Feeling grateful today for:
::sunshine and blue skies
::the wisdom to put down the work knitting and start up something just for fun-knitted pumpkins. Who doesn't need knitted pumpkins on their dining table??
::making peace with how things are right now. My mantra these days.
::the work contract that spanned 4 months instead of the anticipated 2 weeks. It allowed us to do so much this summer and helped me to know myself better. It's over now and has been for a month and I have finally settled into this new-old reality.
::my Etsy shop and the love people have for knitted chicken mittens. Who knew?!
::hoodies, flannel shirts and jeans. I love fall's wardrobe.
::that geranium up above. It just blooms and blooms and gives off that geranium smell despite cold rains and several frosts.
::the respiratory illness that has plagued both of my kids this month finally loosening it's grip.
What about you? What are you feeling grateful for this week?

Yarnalong: Be Simple Shawl & The Promise

Joining Ginny this week at Small Things blog for Yarnalong:

This week I've been working on easy things. My brain needs a break from serious reading and I wanted a simple, mind-less knit that I could pick up and put down quickly. The season for wool-chucking has begun and I'm sure my neighbours were wondering what in the heck I was doing this morning. But the light was so soft and there was green! I was going to go into the backyard but my neighbour has been standing in his sunroom for the past 15 mins in only his boxer briefs and I was pretty sure me out there with a camera and knitting was going to get awkward for one of us.

I found the Be Simple Shawl on Pinterest and began it using this soft, origin-unknown, Chinese wool. I took the little tag into work and asked my friend to translate it. She didn't have a lot to say but could tell me it was 30% animal and 70% something else. I suspect based on it's fuzziness it's something like angora but not wool. It's got that sparkle to it so I'm guessing it's 70% acrylic. It at least gives me some idea as to how to wash it (in cold, lay flat to dry, don't agitate it!)

The pattern is so easy and I am loving the nubby, simplicity of garter stitch. It gets finished off with a picot bind off that adds a bit of a fancy touch.

I finished The Nature Principle last week and quickly grabbed Robyn Carr's The Promise at the library on Saturday. It's about a small town in Oregon and a Physician's Assistant who takes a job there to recover from a broken relationship. It's an easy read with believable characters, a little romance and a happy ending. I love books like that. 

Ah, green and light. Spring has shown up here and I am doing my best to soak it up. Have a great week!

In my Garden

I thought I'd take you for a walk in my backyard tonight with pictures I took last week. It's raining cats and dogs here in Waterloo and I didn't get a chance to putter around the yard after work and I'm missing that meditative outside time right now.

This jumble is my vegetable garden. From left to right I have potatoes, red leaf lettuce, carrots (cleverly hidden by the overly-enthusiastic, self-seeding-from-last-year dillweed) and beans. In the top of the picture is my friend's plot and you can see some green cabbage, lots of hot peppers and kale. (Don't tell but I've been nipping her kale and adding it to lunch and dinner for a while now)
If I could get out there now I would try to do something with the bolting, falling-over lettuce and weed around the carrots.

A LOT of green onions. I've added them to everything I can think of and I feel like I've barely made a dent. This photo was taken last week and some of them are now the size of small cooking onions. A friend suggested I freeze them for use in the winter. I'm thinking that's what I'll do with the green tops and use the white bottoms now in cooking.

Isn't that kale beautiful? I'm feeling pretty hopeful for these green tomatoes. Just need some hot weather...

This is my herb bed. The tarragon is going crazy. I have thyme blooming in the background and hiding underneath are oregano, basil, sage, parsley and chives. At our last house I made the mistake of planting mint in a bed. After it spread everywhere I decided that here I would plant it in a planter and save myself the dirty looks from the neighbours.

My perennial bed. It stretches most of the length of my backyard and has orange lilies, sedum, peonies, irises, asters and some low green stuff that I don't know the name of but the foliage smells nice.

Our toad house. One of the kids made it at pottery camp and I thought it made such a great garden ornament. It lives underneath the grapevine behind a plant The Boy gave me for Mother's Day a few years ago. I don't know if any toads have taken shelter in it but I love the sight of it peeking out unexpectedly.
That was fun! Although the rain has stopped, night has fallen now and it's time for me to crawl into bed with a book and maybe I'll even go to sleep early tonight. G'night.

Indulge me in a little philosophy and deep thinking for a moment...

Last week when we were at the cottage His Lordship decided that we should go bush-wacking in search of a couple of tiny lakes he had found on a similar expedition. It had been a cool week and the kids were getting bored so we headed into the forest.
Not a great picture above but I was swatting mosquitos while trying to capture the depth and greenness of the forest. You get the idea-it's pretty dense, no trails and really far from well, anything.
We never did find the lakes as the mosquitos were unrelenting and the kids had had enough after not too long. I don't blame them.
We did however find these:

Two rocks balanced on a bit of outcropping of rock. You can't see it very well but there's a 3rd little rock acting as a shim to help keep the other 2, bigger rocks steady. I keep thinking about this pile of moss and lichen-covered rocks in the middle of nowhere. The forest is pretty dense around these rocks and our cottage is pretty far from anywhere and anything. And I wonder who piled these rocks like this? and when? and why? I mean we make little rock piles all over the place now for fun. You see little inukshuks all down highway 400 to cottage country. But these rocks are different somehow. I keep thinking about them and I wish I could travel back in time and see who so carefully placed these rocks in this place.
There was logging here 100 years ago so I can hypothesize that one of the loggers is responsible for this and maybe it was to mark where they'd been or something.
Imagine, this pile of rocks has been there for 100 years.
I guess it's just one of those things that I'll never know the answer to but it sits in my mind and I keep turning it over to see if I can figure it out from a different angle or understand why I keep returning to it.

We took to the woods

This past weekend my friend and I ran away from our families for a weekend of rest and relaxation at my cottage. We've both been feeling pretty run down by all the cooking, cleaning, arguing, working full-time and lack of sleep in our lives lately and booked this weekend months ago before the ice was even off the lake.
My cottage is quite remote and requires a drive to a tiny place called Ardbeg, Ontario which according to my friend's husband is the greatest place on earth. It's claim to fame is that it's a ghost town (at least until 2 more people move in then it will be whatever is smaller than a hamlet). It also has a restaurant/store/gas pump/take-out window/bar that makes some pretty great meals.
After a 4 mile hike in to where we pick up the boat complete with an almost-run-in with a bear we arrived at the cottage just as the sun dipped below the horizon and the mosquitos went from populous to blood-thirsty swarms. Why do I do this again??
The next morning after bacon, garlic toast, coffee and tea and some strawberries we sat out on the dock where we pretty much stayed all day and did absolutely nothing except talk and read and knit (that would be me only) and savoured the lack of our families. We love our children and husbands, don't misunderstand me but sometimes everyone needs a break to recharge. To look at things with a little more perspective and to gripe and complain until we're done and can say nice things again about the people we love.

I managed to finish knitting my second bigger mouse mitten. I even read some without feeling the need to jump up and "get something done". It was hard. The book I've been working on is called We Took to the Woods by Louise Dickinson Rich. It was written in 1942 and is Louise's accounts of life living in the bush with her husband and small son. I don't know where this book came from. A used book store maybe? Yard sale? Left by one of my brother's cottage guests when he/she was done reading it? The mystery is part of the charm I think.

(snackage, complete with Baileys and milk)

We cooked dinner to the sound of Grease, Bob Marley and Fleetwood Mac on the record player. There is something about records that is better than CDs and MP3 files.
I built this great one-match fire and of course there were s'mores.

If I could bottle the peace and quiet and rejuvenation of this past weekend I would sell it and become a millionaire.

Tell me, where do you go to find yourself again?

Of knitted mice and the real thing.

I mentioned last week that we were off to open up the cottage on the May 24th long weekend. It was a great weekend but it took me a week to recover from my weekend and get back into things again. There's always the lack of sleep to contend with. I've been sleeping at our cottage since I was a baby but it's still a strange place and a strange bed (that bed! why are cottage beds so awful??). Then the computer announced it's memory was full up and it refused to upload another picture no matter how much I talked nicely to it (or swore). Fast-forward a week later and I think I'm all sorted out as is the computer and here are some nice pictures for you to feast your eyes on.

We crammed 2 kids, 5 adults, including a pregnant lady and all the associated groceries into our very small cottage during a cold weekend. This works so long as the kids are able to dash around outside most of the time but not so great when we're all sardined inside trying to stay warm. But we persevered and I managed to escape for some solo canoeing time.

(sort of an odd selfie. Difficult to accomplish while swatting flies and 

trying to keep the canoe out of the weeds)

 I knit 1.5 little grey mouse mittens.

 It complemented the little gifts left behind over the winter by some real life mice who apparently had a party inside while the cold winds blew outside. I don't mind sharing but I draw the line at vermin. I stitched up some more of the ill-fated Jackaroo. I do love that thing. Maybe I mentioned that before...

Maybe ADHD Part 2, Plus Some Daydreaming

Today I met with our family doctor to discuss the Em-ster's symptoms and see what the next steps would be. To be absolutely honest my assumption was she would refer me to a pediatrician or some specialist and the Em-ster would sit on a waiting list for awhile. Instead my doctor asked about major changes in our lives (none), bullying at school (none), does she hate going to school and resist homework (yes!). Then she told me to remove all simple sugars from her diet. I hadn't thought of that although we don't generally have a lot of simple sugars in our house and diet anyway. The Em-ster and I do like to bake together however so that's going to require some creativity as I think we need to do things that are positive and bolster our relationship. I know honey is a problem for her. Maple syrup seems to be fine. I haven't really experimented with other options. She does have a problem with sugar and tends to binge on it whenever she can get her hands on it which is something I'm trying to figure out how to deal with in a healthy way.
Next my doctor asked if we have any health coverage and I said not a lot. She sighed and said there is such a long wait list for children to be assessed for ADHD. Not good. So before I see her next I need to get the Em-ster's eyes and hearing checked to rule those possibilities out then get a blood test done to rule out a thyroid problem. So many things I hadn't thought of. Well, to be honest I had but I tend to think of so many things all at once that I only really listen to the ones yelling in my ear. I sometimes miss the small, quiet, really important things. Sigh.
So that's my update. I'm grateful that we're moving forward but I also feel slightly overwhelmed at all the things I need to get done that require time and energy of which I feel are in short supply. Our lives are far too busy and I crave simplicity right now.
Every summer we spend a week at our cottage in the middle of nowhere. It really is in the middle of nowhere and takes 8 hours to get there from our home in Southern Ontario. Once we're there though it's quiet and unpopulated and blissful. There's no running water except that which we pump from a hand pump. The electricity comes from a few solar panels we have but mostly we use oil lamps and headlamps for light at night. The toilet is a composting one in the woodshed. We spend our days outside puttering and simple things like cooking and cleaning take longer and are actually a pleasure. At night we all sit on the couch in front of the picture windows and watch the sun go down over the lake and watch night come in. It is so relaxing and peaceful and....simple. I wish I could bottle it and sell it. I would make a fortune.
It is at this time of the year when winter has become unwelcome and spring is slow in coming and I am feeling overwhelmed by everything that needs to be done in a day that I miss our week at the cottage the most.

Snowshoeing in Rosseau

This past weekend we went up to my parents' house in Rosseau to drop The Boy off for the week. It's March Break in our neck of the woods and he had arranged months ago to spend the week with them. The weather was beautiful-bright and sunny and not stupid cold. I borrowed some snowshoes from work so we could do some bush-wacking.
The Em-ster was all excited to try them out but the timing of our first attempt was bad. She had just gotten into trouble with her Dad for bothering her brother. We call it "poking the bear" or instigating. If she doesn't have anything else to do she'll find him and do whatever she can to get a response. All the better if it's a full-on losing of his cool. Having just arrived after almost 4 long hours in the car I was not paying attention to what was going on and when I clued in was really just hoping it would stop on it's own. I'm an optimist you see and tired. Fat chance. Anyway, by the time she'd gotten an earful from her dad she was pretty upset. Not a good time to try new things. Lesson learned. It was one of those times where I could see it coming a mile away but was hoping the distraction of these snowshoes would be enough to set her to rights again but I should've known better. Distractions do not work with this child of mine when she is in an oppositional mood. IF she has ADHD, which I strongly suspect she does then Oppositional Defiant Disorder would be her co-morbid. This of course is my extremely unprofessional opinion!
Needless to say the first attempt resulted in a melt down and everyone giving up and going inside. Sometimes you just have to know when to give up.
The next morning after a sleep and some breakfast she said to me "Can we try the snowshoeing again? I think I understand now how they work and I want to try." That's my girl. And try again we did. Just her and I and it was lovely to be there together.

Sometimes that's what we all need-the chance to try again after some sleep and bacon.

In my heart at least it is summer

I apologize for my silence this week. It has been so hard to find my voice and inspiration to post here with the unending cold and snow and blowing winds. It has been winter in these parts for 3 solid months and according to the long range forecast, will continue to be cold and snowy for the next 2 weeks. I am tired of chapped lips, cracked hands and bundling up against this weather. I am tired of fighting to get kids to play outside when I remember fighting to get them to come inside from April to November. Sigh.
In my heart it is summer. In my heart the sun shines warm on the green grass. In my heart the sound of birds wake me up each morning through my open window. In my heart I am lakeside, coffee in hand, watching little fish zip around under the water and there is bacon frying for breakfast (bacon and coffee feature alarmingly often in my dreamlife).

 If I just hold onto this place then maybe, just maybe I might be able to get through these last weeks of winter. Here's hoping anyway.

Adventures in Executive Functioning with Aspergians

So we took the kids up to my parents this weekend for an extended long weekend visit. We never do this but we let them have a day off school so we could actually do things when we got there. My parents live on the border of Muskoka and Parry Sound districts so imagine lots of trees, lots of rocks, lots of lakes and not many people. Beautiful and quiet and very different from our Southern Ontario home.

The Boy imagines himself as an Outdoorsman and being Aspergian this is his passion and what he lives and breathes. The trouble with him being 12 AND an Aspergian is that he thinks he knows everything there is to know about the outdoors. Granted he has a lot of knowledge gained from reading as many books as he can get his hands on and watching Youtube's collection of videos. The trouble is he's a little short on practical experience.
When we finally fell out of the car after 3 1/2 long hours he was raring to go and spend some time in the great outdoors. After strapping on 25 lbs of survival gear and struggling into snowshoes (because of the 25lbs of gear meant to save him weighing him down) he set off into the great white north. He left with orders from us to please just stay on the pile of snow on the side of the road and to please not go bush-wacking and please not get lost. I went inside, His Lordship set to work clearing the 4 feet of snow off my parents' roof and the Em-ster wandered off to play on a tree.
45 minutes later The Boy comes huffing and puffing back into the yard, covered in snow demanding to know why no one came to his whistles of SOS and did no one hear him and WHAT was the point of whistling SOS when NO ONE came to his rescue! Most of us said we hadn't heard him and then His Lordship says he heard him but decided there wasn't really that much trouble he could get into if he could be heard whistling. You'll notice this "relaxed" method of parenting from His Lordship as a bit of theme here.
It seems The Boy did do a bit of bushwacking and managed to end up up to his waist in snow and couldn't get out. You have to understand that he is not a great problem solver and often calls on us to fix things that he should be able to figure out. Things such as sorting out his blankets at night when he's gotten up to pee, getting his gloves from the other side of the room after he's put on his boots etc. Executive Functioning is not his strong suit and when he was first diagnosed I didn't quite understand what it meant and how it could be part of his diagnosis but as he gets older I am beginning to understand. It puts a name to his difficulty figuring out what comes first in solving a problem or how to get out of a sticky situation.
The point of my story is that while the exercise of snowshoeing and getting out to see and be in nature is important he probably learned more from being waist deep in snow and having to figure out for himself how to get out (without help) than anything else we did this weekend. I'm hoping it also showed him that being an Outdoorsman is about more than having 25lbs of survival gear on your back and involves common sense, problem-solving skills and a bit of experience. But I digress...

What real parenting looks like

So while my kids were tubing tonight:

(that blur in the middle ground may or may not be one of my children)
My mitten and I hung out in the "chalet" while His Lordship talked to all the other fathers who were also waiting.

(can you see the emptied Advil wrapper?? have you ever tried to wash down 2 Advil liqui-gels with a scalding cup of mint tea? Not easy, let me tell you!)

It's a school night and it's now 9:30pm and both kids are still up trying to wind down from an exciting day. I am nursing a pounding headache, wondering what on earth I am going to pack in lunches tomorrow when our cupboards are almost empty and payday isn't until tomorrow. Have you been there? I bet you have. This is what real parenting looks like. I would like to show you a picture of the fabulous healthy lunch I am going to pull out of some mysterious corner of my pantry all ready for times like these. I would like to be that person but I am  not (at least not today ;)). I'm ok with that though because I just took my kids tubing on a school night and they had a great time.

Family Day

It was Family Day yesterday in our neck of the woods. A long weekend in the middle of a long winter meant to break up the stretch from Christmas to Easter that seems to last forever and what you really need is a day off. Many thanks to Dalton McGuinty our former premier who made this happen. I could however do without the pressure of trying to make it a happy, memorable day full of family togetherness. I don't know about you but I find by Sunday evening I'm filled up with family togetherness

and would like a day of family separateness. Throw into the mix a child or children with disabilities or differing ablilities and you're into the realm of holding on for dear life! You are not alone if you met this third day of the weekend with a bit of trepidation wondering what to do and what everyone is expecting of this day.
Let go your preconcieved notions and listen to your gut parents! Family Day like Valentine's Day and Mother's Day is just another day in the week and don't let the world tell you that on this day of days you need to be achieving Family togetherness and harmony. Go with what your family needs. By Day 3 we all needed to be in different places. His Lordship went to his parents' house with our daughter who DID want to spend time with The Great Oma and I was at home with our son who DID NOT want to go and instead went sledding by himself and had a glorious time. And that's ok because everyone was happy and calm.
Our day began with our daughter calling names and making a fuss because she was hungry and breakfast was not cooking fast enough (keep in mind that she is 9). It was pretty unpleasant and did not make me want to spend any day, much less Family Day with her. The boy did feel the pressure to celebrate Family Day and was quite upset by how the day was going and how we were not gathered around the aforementioned table playing Settler's of Catan. I called a family meeting of sorts and we discussed how it's important to gauge the needs and moods of everyone and make a plan that will help everyone to have a good day despite what the calendar says. The Asperger inflexibility reared it's head and there was much gnashing of teeth. Once everyone expressed how they were feeling and he could see that it would not be fun we made a new plan. We gathered around the table a few hours later and enjoyed the beans and ham that had been baking all day in the oven, filling our house with such a fantastic, mouth-watering scent and he and I played game after game of Uno.
I did however, find time to knit on a sweater...

and a pair of mittens...

and a Holden Shawlette

Well actually I just looked at the Holden Shawlette and sighed because it needs to be frogged and the beautiful lace pattern started again :(