humpty dumpty house

Moving Day

2009-12-31T21:01:00.001-05:00

Today is the day, folks. Moving day that is.

I haven't been coming to the Humpty Dumpty House of late because it no longer feels like home. Just like one can find that they've outgrown a pair of pants, not in terms of size but in terms of style, I don't feel compelled to blog here anymore.

Yes, our house is still a crap-trap falling apart and in need of repairs. We're half of the way through fixing the disaster we purchased and hope to be able to finish the repairs in 2010. Today, it's no longer overwhelming. Somehow, it has become manageable.

We've even got the kids now. They're adopted and it's finalized. Nearly three years in that's become manageable, too. Even enjoyable most days. Except when Bella is in high teenage drama mode about applying to the local arts high school and Bubaloo pulls out a toy gun that looks frighteningly real on the school bus. Those days suck. Hard.

So on the eve of a new decade, I don't think I'm done blogging, I'm just done blogging here. For now, the journey of the Humpty Dumpty House ends. It picks up somewhere new.

If you'd like to follow along at the new blog, leave a comment or drop me an email at gumshoegirl [at] gmail [dot] com.

Here's to health, happiness and being grounded in all the forthcoming years.

When Your Heart Swells and Swoons

2009-08-31T08:58:00.003-05:00

There are moments when you fall more in love with your wife and kids.
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I asked the kids to stand in the hallway closet so that I could chart their growth over the past 6 months. We discovered that they’ve each grown a respective 3 inches. Suddenly the flooding pants make sense. The dryer didn’t shrink their clothes. They’re just taller.
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Bubaloo is playing competitive football. The only reason he’s actually on the team and sees some field time is because they don’t have enough players. In a game situation, he’s required to play at least once each half. (I thought football was played in quarters, but I guess the rules for the kids stipulate halves.)

My formerly over-the-top aggressive kid who had to be pulled from team sports for being too aggressive just stands and cowers on the field. He runs away from the kids who try to tackle him. He hasn’t quite yet discovered, despite our repeated efforts, the law of physics that could turn his small stature into a huge benefit. For now, he ends up in the way or is tripped over and that in and of itself has led to a few touchdowns for his team.
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Bella has a boyfriend. Or she has two boyfriends. We’re not quite sure. She left the school year with a boyfriend, L., but she wasn’t quite sure if they were a couple anymore. They weren’t really talking, they didn’t walk home from school anymore, and by the end of July we had to ask, “So how long do you not talk to someone before you can say with certainty that they’re not your boyfriend anymore?”

L. called the very next day. They talked about stuff. Not about their relationship. So it wasn’t till she came home from camp and now called a boy named K. her boyfriend where we were really confused. Did K. know about L.? Did L. know about K.? Were they having an open relationship? Was everyone okay with this?

At times like these you have to remember not to place your adult frame of reference and relationship understandings on your kids. Simply, Bella totally forgot about L. That he was her first boyfriend. That he existed at all.

We went through a lesson on honesty and transparency and let her know she should do right by both boys and clarify her intentions.

She picked up the phone to call L. She didn’t have his phone number. She doesn’t know where he lives. He won’t be at the same school tomorrow as he is going into grade nine. I suppose you can’t officially break up with someone you can’t locate.
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Yesterday was pride and it involved our kids convincing various merchants to give them lots and lots of balloons that were attached to their booths. I was too busy enjoying my beer and hanging out with Wifey and the gay boys to be too concerned about how they were actually doing the convincing.

They had collected so many helium balloons that we knew were never going to fit into our car. That’s why when they each lost a few strands the adults were okay with it despite our kids’ devastation. Total tear fest about how unfair it was to watch their helium balloons float up to the sky.

Since we came home, Bubaloo has been entirely unwilling to relinquish his last strand of rainbow coloured balloons. They go everywhere in the house with him. Even to the bathroom.

So when he piled on to our bed last night to quietly read before bed, the balloons came too. Wifey somehow came to hold on to them.

As he quietly read cuddled at the foot of the bed with the dog, Wifey drifted into sleep. Glasses on. Book on chest. Icepack on her injured back. And holding on to the strand of pride balloons.

Dog Days of Summer

2009-07-21T08:44:00.001-05:00

Every summer I wait for it to happen. I wait for that particular feeling that comes. The one where you know it is summer. The feeling you get when you’re in the midst of the dog days of summer.

Bright sunny days. Warm dry heat that wraps your skin. Sweat that trickles from your brow. Hot black pavement that burns your feet. Sounds of crickets fill the air. Ice cream quickly melting into a drippy stream on your fingers. Endless quest for a neighbourhood pool. Kids laughing on bikes while streamers fly through the air. A pail full of frogs. Drinking cold water from a hose. Reading a book under a large shady tree in the middle of the afternoon. Tall, cool glasses of lemonade or ice tea. Smells of BBQ waft through the air. Packs of kids roam through the neighbourhood inventing new games to play. Freedom. Lazy. Leisurely. Ensuing boredom.

When I think of my childhood, this is the montage that plays in my mind. Conversely, when I look at my kids’ summers, this is the montage we’re creating for them.

Scheduled weekdays and unscheduled weekends. Family rafting trip. Endless summer day camps both general and themed. Sleep-away summer camp. Family camping trip. Hikes to Gatineau park. Room cleaning. House cleaning. Bike ride around the street. Ice cream. Rain. More rain. Gardening. Feeding spiders. BBQ. Video game playing. Absence of other kids outside scheduled programs.

I love summer and I long for the days where neighbourhood kids could run wild and roam the streets. When neighbourhoods were full of kids who knocked on each others doors and called one another out to play. I think my kids could have that, only there aren’t really any kids in our neighbourhood.

Across the street, there are two kids the same age as ours, only they aren’t full fledged residents as they visit their Dad on alternating weekends. When around, the sibling pairs are only able amuse each other for an hour or so before their interests diverge. There is another sibling group around the corner, but they’re Francophone. While they speak English, they’re not in the least bit impressed that our kids are unilingual, and have no desire to include Anglophones in their social group. There’s only one other girl on the street, and while she’s the exact same physical age as Bella, maturity wise she’s about 2-3 years ahead.

As a result of a playmate drought, our kids entertain themselves and play with one another. In and of itself, this isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Our kids have incredible imaginations that they exercise through The Game and other kid-inspired forms of entertainment. It’s just that, gulp, they never really, really, really get bored.

I was bored as a child. After a few weeks, the endless days of finding stuff to do left me unstimulated. I constructed elaborate fantasies about attending a sleep-away summer camp. But, I was never allowed to go. I imagined have the opportunity to go to day camps, but those were few and far between. Instead, my mother hired a nanny from Quebec to care for me and my two siblings in the summer. The nanny took the job to work on her English, which meant that she spent very little time being able to actually interact with us for the majority of the summer.

Inadvertently, I’ve constructed the summers of my dreams for my kids rich with summer camps and family trips and lacking elements from the nostalgic montage I constructed above.

Photo Post

2009-07-02T15:17:00.009-05:00

There's been no time for blogging lately because my life has been consumed with the spring sports season which finally came to a close last weekend.

We've never put the kids in high time investment activities at the same time before. With football being 5 weeks and softball 7, we thought we'd give it a try. All of this sporting added about 10 hours a week in additional commitments to our already busy schedule. It was exhausting, but worth it.

Can you just eat up this cuteness?

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It wasn't always cute, however. There were many memorable "you're going to football, dammit" moments.

Thankfully, football only happened on weekends. Softball, on the other hand, happened on both weekends and weeknights. Games that started at 6:00 pm. Who has time to pick up your kids, get them fed, try to squeeze in some homework and get out to a field when your own workday doesn't end until 5:00 pm? Especially, since at least one game of the week was 20 or 30 minutes from our house.

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We developed a strategy. We always made practice and one (conveniently located) game each week.

Softball with pre-teen/teen girls was an adventure unto itself. I give the coach ultimate praise for enduring. There's nothing more comical than missed catches because the girls' were too busy talking. Or, they weren't wearing their gloves.

Ever so the recreational league, the coach developed a habit of not telling them which team won the game until it was over and they had completed their regularly scheduled lecture on how they needed to support each other better as a team instead of playing or eating when they were waiting to bat or sitting off an inning. Funny thing is that score never really mattered to the girls. Not one of them ever bothered to keep score themselves. They never asked the parents, coach or ref what the score was throughout the game. They were always pleasantly surprised when they won. And, they didn't really care if they lost.

Bella and Buballo's biggest fan? My #1 pooch.

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Things That Go Thump in the Night

2009-06-05T11:33:00.000-05:00

I’m not sure what made me do it, but I’m glad that I did. I secured the hotel room door with both the lock and the bolt.

On Saturday evening after we returned from a family wedding, the kids were all tucked in their hotel beds, while I snuck in a little reading time before turning out the lights.

At 1:16 am, I was woken by a loud “guh-gunk” noise. Repeatedly. In quick succession.

It took me a moment to realize that unlike the night before when I was awoken at 2:00 am by a bunch of kids having a tailgate party outside my hotel room window that this noise was coming from inside the hotel room.

It was Bubaloo. At the hotel room door. Trying to get to the bathroom to pee. Only, he had mistaken the hotel room door for the bathroom door.

He was sleepwalking. Totally unaware of his surroundings. He had somehow managed to turn the lock on the door, but had not managed to unfasten the deadbolt.

I crawled out of bed to re-direct him to the bathroom. He did the rest of his business in the toilet after having done the first part of his business in his PJs. I wrangled him into clean-ish, non-wet PJs, and he crawled back into bed still sound asleep.

I was between extreme laughter and terror. What if he had of got out of the hotel room and peed in the hallway? How would he have got back into the room once the door had automatically locked behind him?

All I could imagine was this little sleepwalking boy wandering up and down the hallway of the Super 8 peeing on various peoples’ door (and frankly if he had of got out that wouldn’t be too far from the truth). I was simultaneously amused and horrified of how far he could have walked and what could have happened to him. How does one return a boy who is totally unconscious of his surroundings in a strange, unfamiliar place to the room where he is supposed to be?

This is the stuff that family legends are made of.

Coming Out to the Birth Family

2009-06-01T12:10:00.006-05:00

When we adopted our two children at the ages of 9 and 11, they had to come out twice. In no particular order on their first day at their new school, they came out as having lived in foster care and as being adopted into a household with two moms. They moved in on a Monday, started a new school on Wednesday, and hadn’t even had time to consider which aspects of their lives they would and would not immediately want to make public to their new classmates and teachers.

We had screened both of our potential home schools for their familiarity and experience with same-sex and adopted families. Neither of them had any. The deciding factor about which public school to send our children to was made when the principal spent an hour talking with me instead of dealing with a child who had been sent to the office for some behavioural infraction which she happily told me all about. We choose the other school.

As parents, we want to protect our children from homophobia and every discrimination they may face throughout their childhood - from being taunted in the playground to losing play dates. We strive, as much as possible, to keep their interactions with those who may not be accepting of our family to a minimum.

Since we adopted Bella and Bubaloo the biggest ‘outing’ I’ve been dreading is the one that would happen at the time of the birth parent reunion. This is the ultimate coming out that could go either way and result in acceptance or damage to our family unit.

Our kids always made it clear that when they were 18 they’d like to find their birth mom. We’ve always been supportive of that.

The files Children’s Aid had on our kids didn’t exactly make it easy for us to assess the possible tolerance and acceptance levels of the kids’ birth families.

Looking at religion alone, we were presented with a mixed bag. The grandparents’ who primarily raised the kids were Mormon. Bella herself, without any actual knowledge of the religion and how it works, identifies as Mormon. The files on their birth mom, however, revealed that at the time she handed over custody she identified her religion as Pagan.

Socioeconomic and education levels, if one were to make a sweeping judgement, were more likely to reside on the side of intolerance.

We reviewed the paperwork trying to elucidate further clues, with no success. The only thing we were sure of was that it would be a gamble to try to predict how the birth family would react to having Bella and Bubaloo being raised by two lesbian moms. With a safe seven years to pass between the adoption and the first probable contact with the birth families, we pushed it aside to reside in the deal-with-it-much-later-when-it-happens file.

One year later we were found by their birth mom. This was six years ahead of schedule.

Within moments of speaking to her on the phone, we came out. Her reaction? She was pleased. Happy, actually. She never disclosed to Children’s Aid that she was a bisexual and she thought it was great that her kids had coincidentally been placed in a household that would embrace and celebrate that part of her personal identity.

As the kids grappled with having two moms, their sometimes desire to have a dad, and how different they were from their peers in yet another dimension in addition to being adopted, we relished the moment that we were able to share that little piece of knowledge.

Knowing that their birth mom was bisexual, that they too could have been raised in a household with two moms had of they stayed with their birth mom, gave them a little injection of strength. It made the outspoken Bella a little bit more outspoken. It made Bubaloo, who was having a hard time at school with teasing, a little more proud.

This kids talked to their birth mom last month on the phone. For the first time in nearly six years.

They talked about lots of things. Activities they liked, favourite colours and foods. They reminisced about pets and family members. They shared stories of the things they do with their new forever family and adventures we have now.

It was casual the way they were able to talk about their adoptive family with two moms. It was no big deal. Nothing out of the ordinary. Just another day.

There was no big 'outing,' for which I'm grateful.

This post is in honour of the 4th Annual Blogging for LGBT Families over at www.Mombian.com.

Learning Patience Through a Garden Retrospective

2009-05-19T08:00:00.021-05:00

I'm not a very patient person. I've never pretended to be. This ongoing litany of gardening projects, however, has helped me to cultivate me a dose of patience.

Gardening grounds me. I'm learning to wait from season to season to see how plants emerge, unfold and fit together. I'm learning to embrace labours that have no finite beginning and end.

When you're in the thick of it, you think that things have to happen immediately. When you step back and reflect, you realize that 3, 6 or 12 months is often a short amount of time to have completed all of this gardening change.

In 2006, this is what the front of our house looked like. We moved in that past fall and were excited to see what the garden would hold. Thank goodness for online photosharing because I hadn't saved this anywhere, but given that the irises are up, this was taken late May/early June (two weeks later than the rest of the images in this series.

Front Garden 2006

What a mess! But, a lush mess nonetheless. What you can't see is that most of the green is a wild violet that we've spent the better of two years trying to eradicate. The pine tree in the middle was a intentional victim of the foundation waterproofing later that year.

One year later, the garden is bare. Very, very bald and naked by the foundation. We've pulled some things we didn't like. Maybe we added a plant here and there.

Front Garden 2007

Another year passes and the garden sees more change. The evil wild violet is nearly gone, so now the bottom part of the garden near the road is empty. We've put in some plantings near the foundation that really haven't grown yet so they look puny. I love Lady's Mantle, Wifey love moss, so we've planted some of that.

Front Garden 2008

We also really wanted a fence, not only as a nice little hardscaping feature, but we to let our dog out to roam freely in the backyard. I designed the fence and had it custom built. The basketball net is big and pops. It isn't supposed to be a landscaping feature, but it is. Something for me, something for the kids.

Now entering our fourth summer, more change abounds.

The foundation plants were all wrong so we ripped the three Emerald Gaiety euonymus out. In their place, we've planted three false cypresses and are plagued by "mini plants need to grow" syndrome. I finally got a Japanese Maple (see it poking out around the maple) and the mock orange that is now entering its 3rd summer is getting quite big and may actually produce some heavenly flowers this June.

Front Garden 2009

We also decided that our garden was quite lackluster in the spring. I've begun to plant tulips and daffodils to put on a show. My limit is about 30-40 bulbs per year because digging them in, and amending clay soil, while trying to obscure all activity from squirrels isn't fun.

It's looking lush and spring like. Well, that was two weeks ago when I took this picture. Now there's weeds. Lots of weeds taking over. Thank goodness I don't mind weeding, sorta.

Where All the Good Fishes Go

2009-05-11T07:36:00.013-05:00

We said good bye to Treasure this weekend. She was Bella’s easter fish. Treasure was a member of our family for less than a month because she got sepsis and died.

The fish hadn’t been doing well for about a week or so. It wasn’t swimming and had difficulty breathing. Wifey did some internet research which enabled us to make a diagnosis.

On Saturday, we knew it would be time to say goodbye to the fish. We discussed it with Bella and we decided to flush her. Well, in actual fact, Wifey would be in charge of the actual transferring the fish from one bowl to another and giving Treasure the ceremonial flush back to the ocean.

It didn’t happen quite as we intended.

Wifey and I had a quick errand to run. Treasure was looking real bad and the time was near. Since we really needed to do this errand (which I cannot now remember what it was so I guess it couldn’t have been all that important after all) and didn’t want to get into what was anticipated to be a long fish funeral, I hurried us along and said we’d deal with it when we got home.

We left, ran the unmemorable errand, and returned. Only when we got home Treasure was no longer in her bowl. She had disappeared. Gone. Vanished.

It took me a moment to connect the disappearance of the fish to my daughter. In our absence, Bella had peered into the bowl and took it upon herself to scoop up her pet and end Treasure’s suffering. Only there wasn’t any ceremony. Or a goodbye. There was just a plastic baggie and a kid who doesn’t connect her head to her heart too well. A kid who took this action solo.

As we were the crappy Mommies, in our absence, our daughter had euthanatized her fish.

My heart tugged for her. I was amazed that she had opted to take this on by herself. I didn’t even want to be part of the fish’s death and had nominated Wifey to deal with it. If I couldn’t handle it, how was Bella going to? We didn’t want Bella to feel directly responsible for Treasure’s death.

We wrapped Bella in a hug and tried to insert a little goodbye with a few kind words for Treasure. We tried to use metaphor that Bella had stopped Treasure’s suffering and she was now enjoying a swim in the great ole’ fish pond or the big wild ocean.

We were trying to distance her from the grim reality of the situation. But Bella’s a realist. She knew that her fish wasn’t going for the trip of her lifetime.

That’s when Bella took the opportunity to educate us on the water and sewage treatment process.

Clearly, Treasure was not swimming in the ocean. Treasure was floating in a pond of poopy water that we’d make clean and one day drink again. She watches “Dirty Jobs” and knows all about sewage treatment. I, on the other hand, now know more than I ever wanted to.

The Looking Glass Forgot to Tell Me About This

2009-05-01T15:14:00.001-05:00

My mother took me to see a psychic. This was years ago. The psychic spent an hour telling me about my future and wrapped it up with five minutes reading my palm. None of the things she prophesized, to my recollection, have come ever come true.

But the highlights from the palm reading stick with me.

I will have one, perhaps two, children. She oscillated on the specific quantity and finally settled on somewhere between one and two. The only certain thing is that there would definitely not be more than two.

One mark represented the intersection of my life with Wifey. A notation of soul mate met and partnered with.

The proliferation of x marks on my hand tells the story of a life to be lived with many ups and downs, highs and lows. All of those crosses enabled her to tell me that my existence is going to be hilly, rocky and not in the least bit dull.

There are moments where I crave a simple mundane existence. Where I’d love to not have checklists, projects, drama and child antics. When all of that dissipates and regulates, if only for a day, I’m not able to just be in a non-chaotic life. It’s discomforting. In the absence of full, I want nothing more than to get tossed back into the ebb and flow of the daily tide. When back in that current, I want nothing more than stillness.

This week the children’s birth mom came back into the picture.

She found us two years ago through the internet and has been in and out of my life. She calls us repeatedly a few times in a short time period, asks about the kids, we hold her off and then she disappears for months. This cycle repeats itself. This week marks cycle four.

Only, there is something different about it this time. Something more pressing. This time she asked to speak with them.

Perhaps we’re tired of lying to the kids. Perhaps we’re worried that the time we can shelter them from this is limited. Perhaps we know it’s only a matter of time before they find their entire extended birth family on facebook or twitter.

So we’ve decided to let them know we’ve been contacted and let them make the decision about what they want to do. Do they want to write a letter, talk on the phone, or see their birth mom?
I thought that when this moment came I’d feel threatened as their Mom. I’m not. In the least.

What I am concerned about is what this will do to them and the family balance that’s been created in our house. I’m worried that this could destroy them. That our kids could regress to the hurt beings they were before and we’d have to spend years undoing that - again. I’m worried that they’re going to feel conflicted. I’m worried that she’ll not be the person they constructed in their minds and will be sorely disappointed.

I’m just, well as any parent would be, anxious, concerned, protective and fearful. And yet part of me is hopeful that this could be a good thing for them.

It's Not Pretty, But It's Functional

2009-04-18T11:09:00.006-05:00

A new pea trellis. Total cost =$5.99 for the netting. Everything else was already laying around the house. I'm trying to get Wifey to ignore that it's a bit of an eyesore for now, but I suppose that's the hazard of having your veggie garden right outside your side door.

Snow peas, sugar snap peas and mammoth melting sugar peas have been planted, along with two rows of spinach and shallots, and one row of bunching onions.

Last year was my first time growing peas. I thought the package was stupid for telling me to plant in April once the ground could be worked. Last year at this time, I couldn't see the ground. All I could see was snow. This year, the package isn't so stupid.

Fish Can’t Live in Puddles

2009-04-17T11:17:00.004-05:00

After much debate, hemming and hawing, we finally made the decision to let the kids have pets. One pet per child. Pets in the form of fishes.

We have a dog who is somewhat lovely. Other than the barking, herding and jumping. But he’s our dog. I mean, he belongs to Wifey and I. We adopted two children and they’ve never really adopted our dog. They see him as part of the family, but not necessarily as their family pet.

Turtles, lizards and hamsters were quickly rejected as additions to our family because of our pooch. Aside from my frugality and fear that I didn’t want to be an active participant in the possible starvation of a living creature to help bolster the responsibility personality trait, these animal forms wouldn’t fit into our family.

The aforementioned dog doesn’t really have manners and we’d inevitably spend more time trying to rescue the new family pets from his jaws. The dog really doesn’t understand the difference between 'pet' and 'dinner.' Kinda like most typical two year olds.

The announcement of “fish are welcome here” was incorporated into our annual easter egg hunt. It was the 3rd clue given via two glass fish bowls and matching packages of fish food. One for him and one for her.

On the following day we treked to the local Petsmart so that Bella and Bubaloo could choose their new fish. Before we even arrived at the store, Bubaloo had his heart set on a beta fish. He was determined to get a really cool one.

For those who’ve never explored the world of fishes, beta fish for some reason are not kept in aquariums. They’re usually kept in small separate containers. I think this is because they’re fighting fish? I don’t know how they’re shipped or how they’re kept prior to being placed on a shelf for purchase, but they are kept in clear plastic containers around the size of a sippy cup.

Bubaloo picked out several colourful beta options, all of which Wifey vetoed. They’re all sick she said. She diagnosed some as being listless and others as having some sort of gill disorder. Over 15 fish were selected and declined before Wifey finally okayed one to bring home.

The fish is in his new digs. He’s not doing too good. He’s not very active and has refused to eat a few meals here and there. I’m not sure what his predicted survival rate is, but I’m crossing my fingers that I won’t have to deal with tears and a toilet bowl flush this weekend.

Bella has a regular ole’ goldfish that is doing just fine. But she is not okay with this fish business. Not one bit. She’s infuriated and this sense of justice has propelled her to take action.

Instead of doing her homework, she sat down at the table and wrote a letter of complaint. Completely unprompted. Quite a surprisingly brilliant letter, actually.

She’s let Petsmart know that she doesn’t think what they’re doing is okay. Fish can’t live in puddles, she wrote. Those are her exact words. In little kid writing and all.

The letter is now in a sealed envelope and should make it to the mailbox today. My daughter is a little activist. How cool is that? I just can’t wait to see how the store responds.

Adventures in Starting the Maybe Baby

2009-04-15T18:54:00.002-05:00

While we haven’t even decided whether or not we want to have another child, I like to be prepared. Just in case. So if it is a yes, we can move full steam ahead.

In the interim, I’ve donned my researcher cap.

I’ve sought out TTC blogs and have added some books to my future library reading list. I’ve found online family planning services and have began to make sense of the nitty gritty mechanics of conception. I know where we can get sperm if we choose to go the unknown donor route. I have ideas about men should we choose to go the known donor route. I even bought a basal thermometer to see if I could figure out ovulation patterns.

Ever since I bought the thermometer, my cycle has gone to crap.

I was so sure that I was in tune with my body. Before temperature taking was inserted into my daily routine, I was confident that I could pinpoint the exact moment of ovulation. My ovaries would give me a little pinch and the fluids were all aligned.

Ever since I started taking my temperature, nothing makes sense. All the old tell tale signs have disappeared. My temperature is a roller coaster. The charts look like garbly gook. I fear that going down the TTC road could just be a recipe for disaster. One of those all consuming journeys that completely consume my life.

While we were out in the garden tonight pruning the raspberry bushes – in the lingering daylight wearing flip flops (sans socks)! – Wifey made fun of me. She noted that we haven’t even officially begun this adventure yet and already it is interfering with our routines.

Instead of being woken up by the sound of the CBC each morning and then rolling over for a 9 minute snooze button cuddle, she’s now waking up to the beep-beep-beep of the thermometer followed by my typing in data on the computer. I'm not quite sure what she's going to say when it dawns on her that she might be woken up every three hours because a screaming child wants to be fed.

Laughs That Rumble Up From Your Belly

2009-04-12T10:41:00.001-05:00

I love slapstick humour. I LOVE it. There’s nothing better than the kind of misshapen accident to make me laugh. I’m also quite partial to incidents that are the result of people doing something stupid that has an unintended comical consequence.

As a kid, I still remember some of my favourite clips from America’s Funniest Home Videos. One of them involved some guys playing football in a backyard. One of them goes long for the ball, jumps up to catch it, body checks the fence and the entire fence falls over. That kind of stuff makes me laugh so hard that I nearly pee myself.

Yesterday, I was at the grocery store loading the week’s entire haul onto the conveyor belt. Everything was up there and I went to grab the last item from the cart. Wifey had selected some black grapes and set them in the top part of the cart where kids and purses usually reside.

I must have grabbed the bag funny because it got caught in the wire cart and caused grapes to go everywhere. They flew. I tried to correct it, but I fumbled. More grapes got loose. Nearly 50 grapes rolling all over the grocery store floor.

A young employee walked by and I let him know that I had spilled the grapes and it needed to be cleaned up.

He looked at me. He looked at the grapes. And, gave me a look. Not the kind of look that said “you’re such an idiot.” The look of “who the fuck cares” tainted with “I don’t really see what the problem is” and an indigent dash of “it’s not my job to clean up the floor.”

Before I could even turn to let the cashier know, who was still caught up in a huge language barrier miscommunication with the previous customer, someone goes flying.

A poor lady. Her feet go right out from underneath her, fly up into the air, and she smashes down on her butt. With a thud she lands on the hard concrete floor.

People scuttle to help her up also sliding around on some of the now smooshed grapes. They get her to her feet and I hear threats of suing the store. She’s in shock; the crowd is disgusted at the danger of spilled grapes.

The lady is mostly embarrassed and if she’s not okay she’s not about it admit it. The small crowd surveys the grape disaster and their eyes fix on me. Standing there. Mouth open. Holding the incriminating bag of grapes.

I’m still in shock. Thank goodness. Because I’m not laughing. For the first time in my life I’ve managed to somehow maintain control.

I interrupt the cashier’s conversation with the previous customer to let her know about the grapes on the floor and the flying lady. She looks at me. And does nothing about the grapes. She does continue to scan my groceries.

I’m actually speechless for once.

As I’m formulating my next plan of action to get the grapes off the floor, another employee walks by, and says to my cashier as if she’s an idiot, “Can you please call for clean up?”

My cashier looks confused. Clean up? What needs to be cleaned up?

She doesn’t move other than continuing to scan my groceries.

The other staff person now shouts the order at her she quickly picks up the phone to call for a clean up. The cashier turns to me and says, “Well I didn’t call because that other guy knew about it and I thought he would come back. I guess not.”

All of this has taken place in less than a minute. Wifey, who was bagging the groceries, was completely oblivious to the entire incident that had taken place. As we’re rolling the buggy out of the store, I start to laugh. I’m laughing so hard that I can’t tell the story. Tears are forming in my eyes because this is so awful, but oh-so funny.

*****
Later on in the night, I need a good fix. So I explored the Cake Wrecks blog.

After having had a dinner party on Friday, where the desert provided was an utter cake wreck - the middle of the out-of-the-box cake wouldn’t cook so my friend just cut it out and then she ran out of space while trying to write “Happy Easter” in chocolate chips so it read “Happy Eastr” – I was hooked on the endorphins provided by a good belly laugh. This site provided them.

It was late and Wifey wanted to sleep. My laughter wasn’t appreciated. I didn’t want to stop reading so I picked up the laptop and carried it to the bathroom.

I couldn’t stop laughing. Out loud. At 12:30 am.

Wifey tapped on the bathroom door. She wanted to know if I was okay. Then she clued in. But was still kind of uncertain. She was in disbelief. Could I really be holed up in the bathroom, with the laptop, reading about baking disasters?

I had to inquire, “Is there something wrong with that?”

Signs of Spring

2009-04-06T17:02:00.001-05:00

It’s spring. The crocuses have bloomed. Or so Bubaloo let me know.

Bubaloo: Mom, I’ve got good news and bad news.

Me: Oh really?

Bubaloo: The good news is that it’s now spring because the crocuses have bloomed.

Me: So what’s the bad news?

Bubaloo: The bad news is that heads of the flowers are gone. A squirrel ate ‘em. I know it. Chopped the heads clean off.

Me: Yeah, I noticed that.

Bubaloo: Well this just can’t happen. I’m going to guard those flowers all day long.

He grabbed his hockey stick and headed out to the garden. He never actually got to the flower bed before he was distracted by some other element of nature.

Later on in the day I witnessed Foo-Foo, the leader of the neighbourhood wild rabbits, hopping along the backyard and snacking on grass. Something tells me that the crocus eater isn't a squirrel.

Gauging Winners and Losers in the Ultimate Power Struggle

2009-03-29T22:12:00.002-05:00

When we returned home after our first ever family-out-of-the-country vacation in January, the whole family was out of sorts. Easing back into the daily routine was challenging for all, especially given the changing nature of each day being exacerbated by snow storms and the transit strike.

On a particularly horrific morning, Bubaloo and I butted heads. He wasn’t listening, wasn’t getting ready and was going to miss his school bus. The very bus that had been giving me a daily headache due erratic pick up times which often made me very late to work.

It was the last request that led to this disaster. I asked him to do something simple like brush his teeth. I asked him again. Then I asked him again. And again. And again.

He was in a state by the time he got to the bathroom. When I came up the stairs behind him, only moments later, he had LOCKED himself in there. Normally I would have gone straight to lock picking, but that very child on the other side of the door had broken the lock by jamming it with a piece of plastic a month earlier, and we hadn’t got around to fixing it yet. The only option left in my arsenal of parenting skills was reasoning.

Things were already heated. My patience had already evaporated under the exercise of my temper. This was the power struggle of all power struggles – I wasn’t going to lose. The kid was about to miss his bus, which would result in me having to drive him to school, which would add an hour on to my commute making me even later than I was going to be initially.

I knocked on the door and asked him to open it. Silence. I asked again. Silence. I then pounded on the door and threatened him. Silence. I then pounded on the door and pleaded with him. Silence.

Quickly my mood went from pissed off to terrified. The child who had locked himself in the bathroom was the same child who had lit a toilet paper on fire in the bathroom a few months earlier. He was angry and frustrated and silent. Possibly up to no good. All I could visualize was the possibility of my burning house.

I panicked and issued an ultimatum. I told him if he wasn’t out of the bathroom by the time I counted to 5, I was coming in there. I told him I was going to kick down the door.

Slowly I began to count. 1. Silence. 2. Silence. 3. Silence. 4. Silence. 4 ½. Silence. 4 ¾. Silence. 5. The door was still closed. So I “Chuck Norris-ed” it.

With one deft, cleanly placed, martial arts inspired kick that door was open and the kid flew off the toilet and out of the bathroom. I banished the child to his room.

I was so angry by this time. Simmering. But I was also triumphant because I did not lose that power struggle. I was also pretty amazed that I kicked that door open so easily. I was slightly impressed and in awe of this untapped skills. Then, I looked at the door and felt a twinge of regret. Wifey was going to be pissed.

I called her to fill her in on the situation and she came home immediately. School and work were out of the question for both Bubaloo and myself. We needed to resolve this conflict.

Wifey came home and was angry. She was mad about the door. Mad about being called home from work. Mad about Bubaloo’s poor choices. Mine too, apparently. She admonished us both.

She called a family meeting and wasted no time in mediating a resolution to this issue. The door would need to be replaced, and Bubaloo and I would be responsible for that. We’d have to go to Home Depot to get another one and we’d have to split the cost 50/50. With a job that pays slightly more than $5 allowance per week, I got the better end of the deal, or at least I thought so until I got entangled in sorting out the ensuing complications.

It took three trips to order the door.

On the first trip we discovered that we’d need to order a custom door as our 76 inch frame was much shorter than the standard 80 inches. We went back a week later with the measurements, only to be told by a different salesperson that a custom door requires more measurement than the length and the height of the door. He sent us home with a worksheet. On the third time we went back, we finally had the information we needed to place the order, and after 45 minutes of dealing with a very nice but not so computer savvy gentleman, we had finally placed our order.

The new door arrived last weekend and today I set aside some to work with Bubaloo to install and paint it.

We went to put the hinges on the new door and they had milled it incorrectly. We grabbed a chisel from the garage and quickly chipped away at it to make it work.

When we hung the door, we noticed another issue. While we knew the frame wasn’t square, it became evident how unsquare the frame was. While the door is 5mm from the frame by the hinges, on the handle side, it’s much sorter. A ½ inch much more noticeably shorter.

Then, because the door is no longer square, it wouldn’t actually close with the handle into the lock hole. We had to chisel a new one of those, too.

Four hours later plus another five where I decided to repaint all the trim upstairs because the can of paint was already open, the door is painted and the hardware installed. It sort of closes. It just needs a little extra firm push.

When I reflect back upon this, the 3 month process to get and install the door, plus the back and forth to Home Depot, I’ve learned some pretty valuable lessons.

I will replace doorknobs with broken locks as soon as they break. It’s worth the $25 cost and 30 minutes of my time (plus another 10 minutes to find the screwdriver that no one claims to have taken from the toolbox).
Always know whether or not you have custom doors before you decide to let your alter martial arts personality loose.
Call Home Depot and let them know about the crappy mill work and numerous trips just to order the stupid door and they’ll cover the cost of the door for you.
Think about it, if only for 5 more seconds, before you ever utter the words “I’ll kick down that door if you don’t...”
When you’re in the midst of door replacement suckage, and you’re about to lose your cool in frustration, just abide by the mantra “It was so worth it to win that power struggle, because if I hadn’t I’m sure I’d have to be fixing other little disasters because my kid wouldn’t have counted on me to follow through.”
Always, always, always win a power struggle. No matter the cost. As the grown up, however, you should probably be a little bit smarter (i.e., quickly mentally evaluation the financial, time, spousal and pain-in-my-ass cost) about which situations you make into power struggles.

A Lesson in Positive Reinforcement

2009-03-25T16:55:00.005-05:00

The kids were sitting at the table tonight after dinner mowing down on cookies. The very cookies I spent most of my day dreaming about and secretly demolished two right before dinner. With this treat, Bella pulled out her homework.

Bubaloo: Whatcha workin' on?

Bella: A poster.

Bubaloo leans across the table to get a real good look at what she's working on.

Bubaloo: Is that a REAL poster for the army?

Bella: No, it's a fake poster. It's for a war a long time ago. The war of 1812.

Bella proceeded to read the copy she drafted inviting men to sign up as soldiers, "Join the Army and Come to Tom's Tavern."

Bella: I put that there because I thought 'army' rhymed with 'tavern.'

Bubaloo: Army. Tavern. Um, those don't rhyme. ...But good effort!

My Kids Love Me

2009-03-21T17:20:00.003-05:00

One perk of adopting older kids, at least when they write on the furniture they don't use marker. This made my heart melt.

Crimes of a 13-Year-Old and Her Adoptive Mother

2009-03-20T13:22:00.002-05:00

I spoke too soon. All is not well in the portion of the humpty dumpty house that is occupied by the 13-year-old. The same goes for any part of the house that I have to occupy alongside her.

This week Bella has had the luxury of attending a week-long program at a local art school. With this great freedom have come copious opportunities to make poor decisions.

Here’s a short list of her (irritating) crimes:

Getting some kid to buy her candy and then not being able to pay her back
Getting me to give her an advance on her allowance to pay back the kid
“Losing” the allowance advance money on the way to art school less than 10 minutes after getting it
Then borrowing money from the art school’s receptionist (who thankfully happens to be a good friend) to give to the other kid
Confessing to #3 & 4 when getting caught on the items below, but with no intention of paying back the receptionist
Biting into an apple (against the requirements of her recent dental surgery) and breaking one of the dental chains (for the second time in less than two weeks)
Taking an enormous box of granola bars to give to her art school “friends” leaving nothing else for anyone who resides in the household
Leaving art school at lunch to wander around the market and being late to return to class in the afternoon
Everything else she hasn’t been busted for yet

I hate lying. I hate dishonesty. I hate that I have to spend all this time dealing with this kid on stupid stuff. I hate that all this stupid stuff is totally able to get my blood boiling. And, I hate that all this stuff makes me like her less than I already do and it’s not like her likability was all that high to begin with.

This is the crux of our attachment issue. We haven’t attached to Bella and she really hasn’t attached to us. She’s nearly 14.

We spend all this time trying to make it work, and I worry that it just won’t. We spend a lot of time worrying and wondering if what’s broken can even be fixed.

I worry that we may want to begin actual work on the Maybe Baby next year and I’m terrified that we could face the same issues with another kid. I’m resentful because the Maybe Baby may never be part of the plan because we may not have the space, food, money to have another kid as what I need to have a Maybe Baby I have to spend on this kid that I’m not all that crazy about. You can’t trade up or out on kids. But this totally isn’t what I thought I was getting into.

I feel awful and guilty about this all the time which really can’t be helping whatever attempts I make at bonding with the kid I already have. I’m consumed by this day in and day out. It’s horrible.

Four Weeks Into Career #2

2009-03-19T11:39:00.004-05:00

Life is great. I can’t really complain. I guess this means I don’t have much to say as I’m not tormented or desperately searching for amusement in my kids’ antics.

I started a new job five weeks ago. I spent the first four weeks actively seeking not to pass judgement on whether or not I liked it. I may have, this past Friday, mentally muttered something to myself about this job being a great fit. The weather was balmy. My Friday afternoon consisted of a staff team lunch and then being given the rest of the afternoon off so I could pursue my shopping hobby (seriously, living in this insulated city is great because what global economic slowdown are you talking about? We’re pissing money/investing too much in our house/kids’ teeth right now).

This is the most relaxed place I have ever worked. I feel valued as a staff member. This value is manifested in both what I can contribute to shaping the growth of this start-up not-for-profit and in the size of my biweekly pay cheque. While I’m at the low end of the salary range for a fundraiser, this is the first time in years that I feel adequately paid as an employee in this sector.

We have an awesome mission, no shortage of challenges, and it’s not a daily battle with red tape. The other big occupational perk is that I get to wear jeans every day to the office. Comfortable pants make me want to work.

After the weekend, however, I returned to the office slightly deluded and cursing the productivity of my colleagues.

I think I’m the only one who has actually done something of tangible significance during the past 4 weeks that will contribute to the future success of the organization - output as known as "ensuring that we all have jobs next April."

Four grant applications, two of those being major ones. An operating budget and annual activity plan. Serious progression on Board committee development. New website in development talks. Celebrating my rockstarness, I accomplished all of the above while I had a week-long flu and I haven’t actually really had an official orientation session yet.

The thing that is the source of this irritation is that I haven’t seen any output from my boss. Well, to be fair, she did do her dishes for the first time before she left today. And it may be because her brother has been incredibly sick in the ICU and skirting a terminal diagnosis which has totally left her understandably drained, exhausted and distracted. What I’m not sure yet, and trying to hold off passing judgement on, is aside from this illness would it actually be any different? I’m either a bad person for asking this question or undeniably intuitive and realistically setting my self up for disappointment.

I think at the root of this may also be a clash in working styles of type A and type B personalities. Anal retentive, high-achiever meets organic, uber-relaxed thinker and actor. It’s good to write this because I remember again why I choose to take with job and work with this person – we’re yin and yang – and in this will create leadership balance that will hopefully thrust this organization to success.

Down With the Greenhouses

2009-03-10T21:15:00.006-05:00

Tonight at the dinner table Bubaloo was on a comedian kick. Unintentionally comedic, albeit quite funny.

"Nay with the greenhouse gases!!!" he extolled.

"Yay for those who destroy greenhouses!!!!!"

This makes you think about how we, as adults, name things and how kids use this to make sense of the world.

All I can imagine is my little boy wearing big ole rubber boots with a hammer running around the neighbourhood threatening to destroy the evil, bad, polluting greenhouses.

We clarified the metaphor for him, but he still seemed a little confused and couldn't quite comprehend how the earth's atmosphere is similar to that of a greenhouse.

Brother and Sister Love Story Meets Battlestar Galactica

2009-03-08T16:49:00.004-05:00

When Bella and Bubaloo first moved in with us, they were children who didn’t know how to self entertain.

Coming from a foster family where there were 3 bio kids in addition to the 5 other kids who frequented the home-based daycare, the house was constantly filled with people. It was a house where the TV was always blaring and there was someone always around. The family had each of their children enrolled in an uncountable number activities, topped off with regularly scheduled family outings, so Bella and Bubaloo often spent much of their time in the family van being shuttled back and forth from one thing to the next and waiting in the van for any given activity to end while being amused by a DVD entertainment system.

When they moved in with us they experienced an immediate culture shock. Saturdays weren’t planned out weeks in advance. There wasn’t a constant influx of entertainment, outings and activities. It wasn’t go, go, go. It wasn’t one thing after another. Both kids were beside themselves and didn’t know what to do. It was also quite surprising that as kids they were quite lacking in the imagination department.

Then one day they dreamed up The Game. Although, it wasn’t called the The Game at this time.

As Bella and Bubaloo began to discover one another as siblings and playmates, they did this through pretend play that can be likened to a verbal rendition of Chinese Letters. Instead of creating a story line by line on paper, they would sit for hours constructing elaborate narratives alternating weaving a shared tale. This wasn’t an action-oriented game. It was totally verbal with the kids sitting across from one another.

One munchkin starts with an idea, and the other builds on to it with their own idea. The idea can only be one sentence long. It also has to be linked to the previous idea by the phrase, “And then...”

In action, it might sound something like this. “And then, they were on a pirate ship searching for gold. And then, out at sea there was suddenly a big storm. And then, the boat was tossing in the water. And then, it began to fill up with water because the pirates had sailed too close to the shore and hit a rock.”

In the early days, this was very secretive. It was as if they were almost embarrassed about the discovery of this new imaginary world. They wouldn’t play within earshot of the grown-ups. And they liked to play behind closed doors.

Before we knew what it was they were playing, and how it was played, we inquired as to what they were talking about all the time. Bella responded, “We’re playing a game Brother and Sister Love Story.”

Before I jumped completely to conclusions, but already half-way there, I asked her to share a little bit more about what this was. “Well,” said Bella, “it’s about a brother and sister who live in a far away land and have adventures on pirate ships and slay lots of dragons.”

There’s nothing inappropriate about that, so I had to ask why it was called Brother and Sister Love Story. There was a big piece missing here.

“Because it’s about a brother and sister who love one another.” Simple. Matter of fact. Appropriate. Since we explained to the munchkins how Brother and Sister Love Story didn’t really best describe what they were playing, we suggested they come up with a different name. This is when The Game was born.

The kids love The Game and it’s become a staple of how they play together. Now that they’re 11 and 13 it hasn’t died down one bit. They don’t have marathon 4 hour sessions any more, and The Game is leading to more sibling squabbles, but they love it and play it all the time.

This morning, I came down to get a cup of coffee and they were at the kitchen table eating their breakfasts while playing The Game. Fully engrossed they didn’t even notice or acknowledge me. That’s when I my ear latched on to the phrase, “Battlestar Galactica.”

A few weeks ago, when the adults were down for the count with the flu, we actually let them watch lots of TV/movies and in a moment of delirium we allowed them to watch this show. I love Battlestar Galactica because it’s such a brilliant and intelligent show, but the sex and killing in the later seasons doesn’t really quite make it kid-friendly. They only watched the initial mini-series, but they’re completely hooked. They're fascinated by humans creating machines and space travel. They ask to watch it all the time and we keep on finding ways to distract them.

I hadn’t heard anything about Battlestar Galactica for a few weeks, so I thought interest had finally waned. Waned it has not. It’s just completely permeated their play.

Exactly What It Looks Like

2009-03-01T19:01:00.015-05:00

This is exactly what it looks like. A jar full of socks. A jar full of stinky boy socks. A jar full of hopeful Guinness Book of World Record stinky socks. Almost.

Without letting the family in on his challenge, Bubaloo decided to beat a world record for stinky socks. He made it three weeks wearing the same pair of socks before he got busted.

I don't know why it took us that long to catch on, but even three days after we kept on smelling an odd funky smell, we couldn't quite figure out where it was coming from. When we finally figured out it was coming from Bubaloo, we asked him to shower. But he came out of the shower and was still stinky.

That's when I spotted the dankness of his socks. Which compelled me to inquire if he had changed them post-shower. He let me know he had changed his socks. I then re-phrased my question to inquire if he had put on clean socks after his shower. He hadn't. He had changed back into the pair he had been wearing that day. The very pair he had been wearing for the last three weeks!!!

I finally wrestled the horrid stinky socks off his feet and was about to toss them into the laundry bin. But he pleaded and implored with me not to ruin all his efforts with a touch of detergent. He was determined to be in the Guinness Book of World Records.

Instead, we came to a compromise. He could keep the socks but he'd have to promise never to wear them again. He'd have to put them in a jar so that no one in the house would ever have to be subjected to the smell of the putrid socks again.

Since that time more socks have been added to the jar. Whenever he manages to make another pair stinky, but not quite as stinky as the initial offending pair, into the jar they go. Occasionally he walks around the house with his stinky sock collection in hand and beams. We've also caught him from time-to-time unscrewing the lid of the jar to take a whiff just to ensure that the stocks haven't lost any of their stink.

A Salt Rifle

2009-02-19T20:15:00.001-05:00

Bubaloo is fascinated with all things war. Guns, army men, blowing things up, war strategy. It horrifies me.

We’ve spent some time talking through war with him and trying to discourage him from his future ambition of being an army man. We’ve tried the gruesome approach – you could have your arm or leg blown off. We’ve tried the morbid approach – you could die. We’ve also tried the tugging heart string approach – you wouldn’t be able to have cuddles and kisses whenever you wanted if you were to be deployed far away.

Nothing has worked. He is totally fixated.

To accompany his obsession with being an army man, he is enthralled with toy guns. We don’t allow him to have toy guns. We were somewhat reluctant to even get him a water gun this past summer for fear of encouraging this fascination.

But no matter what we do, he has this incredible boy-ability to turn any inanimate object into a gun.

A wooden spoon. A stick. A ladle. A broomstick handle. And most recently, the Swiffer.

We have a Swiffer that comes apart into four metal pieces. Using elastics, he managed to tie the pieces together so that there was a longer and shorter side that he was able to refashion into a gun. This time he called it a rifle. A sniper rifle to be exact.

An out of town friend stopped by for a visit, and Bubaloo was up and down the living room with his toy making it so that no one could focus on the conversation. I asked him to play somewhere else in the house and to take his assault rifle with him.

He grabbed the Swiffer gun and muttered as he went up the stairs, “It’s not an assault rifle. It’s a sniper rifle.”

Confused I shouted after him, “Bubaloo, what’s the difference between an assault rifle and a sniper rifle?”

Indigently he retorted as if I were the most uneducated and informed person on the planet, “a salt rifle shoots salt and a sniper rifle shoots bullets.”

A salt. Assault. Those homophonic words will get you every time!

Cleaning House

2009-02-15T12:29:00.010-05:00

When one is under the influence of Mary Poppins room cleaning can get a little creative. Picking up over 100 plastic army men is not much fun. Using a slingshot to fire them into a box - while wearing your skateboarding helmet which doubles as an army helmet - is an entirely different story.

Love Me With a Cookie

2009-02-12T19:22:00.005-05:00

Bubaloo asked to mark this Valentine’s Day with a cookie. A cookie for his one true love and enduring crush: the girl who likes Golden Oreo Cakesters. Actually, he asked to take her out to dinner and a movie, but we didn’t quite feel that was a good fit for a kid in grade 5 so we put forth a counter proposal that would have him woo her with his baking skills.

Bubaloo and Golden Oreo Cakester girl have been officially boyfriend and girlfriend since early January. Funny thing though, she has two boyfriends. Both with the same name. Bubaloo goes to school with her every day and gets to play on the computer with her and share snack time treats. The other boyfriend with the exact same name apparently lives quite far away. Bubaloo doesn’t care one bit that he’s the second boyfriend. He’s totally smitten.

To mark this monumental Valentine’s Day, Wifey committed to a baking project. My Wifey is brilliant in the kitchen – only as a cook, and definitely not a baker. She can intuitively mix and meld, fold and blend, and tease out flavours in food. She lives by the dollop and the dash. She knows when a pinch of salt or a squeeze of lemon is required. She can tell by smell what each and every unlabelled spice on our counter is.

What my Wifey is not good at is being precise and following directions in the kitchen. She can’t measure. And therefore, she can’t bake (well).

To compensate for this weakness, she bought a partial pre-fab cookie mix. All that had to be done was to add an egg and butter. This should have been easy for her to do, and it should have been easy to incorporate the kids into the process.

Admittedly, baking followed a tough day and rough night with the kids. They’re all sick with that horrid two-week-kick-your-ass bug that’s going around.

It all started off well and good intentioned.

Bella got out the cooking sheets and placed the parchment paper on top. Wifey emptied the contents of the package into a bowl. Then she melted the butter. Bubaloo was called over to crack the egg. Due to a ridiculous repeated questioning that the recipe couldn’t possibly require only one egg he was swiftly relieved of his baking duties. Sidelined, he couldn’t let the one egg only go. He just kept on stating that there needed to be more than one egg.

With exasperation, Wifey took completely over. She began to mix the batter. With a whisk. She was trying to cream together the butter and egg with the flour/chocolate chip mixture with a whisk. The butter was all stuck on the inside of the whisk, she’d try to move it around faster to get the butter out, there was butter flying across the kitchen. It rivals some of the funniest baking incidents I’ve ever been privy to.

When I finally got around to clarifying that whisks were for whisking (don’t you love it when kitchen tools are aptly named!) and that other instruments were better suited for stirring, she was done. Balls of dough were quickly dropped on the cooking sheet and the trays went into the oven.

The only bit of love Bubaloo had been able to pour into his Valentine’s treat was his fear that the cookies would crumble without two more eggs. It didn't matter to Golden Oreo Cakester girl. Bubaloo was rewarded for this thoughtful efforts with a phone call.

Life Gets a Little Messy Sometimes

2009-02-10T14:42:00.002-05:00

One of the first things you do as a prospective adoptive parent is fill out a lot of paperwork. Every aspect of your life is under scrutiny as your fitness to become a parent is judged by a barrage of social workers.

While your capabilities to potentially parent are being assessed, and sometimes I hope that your abilities to parent the kinds of children who are available for public adoption are taken under consideration as well (although, I’m not entirely sure on that one), there’s very little opportunity for prospective parents to assess what kind of kids they can parent.

Very early in the process we filled out ½ of one page that defined our “range of acceptance.” Simply a behaviour, characteristic, or challenge was listed and it was your job to select yes or no. Yes, I’m willing to take a child with X. Or no, I don’t want a child with X. Nowhere on the form are any details or further information on any these yes/no items to be found.

A prospective parent who is completing their range of acceptance may have a conversation like this:

Wifey #1: What’s the difference between FASD and FAE?
Wifey #2: Let me check on the internet. Oh, these are kids that have been exposed to alcohol in the womb to varying degrees.
Wifey #1: I suppose that might be okay. What the heck is this RAD thing?
Wifey #2: The internet says that’s Reactive Attachment Disorder. I quickly skimmed the page and can sum it up as a strong opposition to authority.
Wifey #1: Well I hate authority so bring that kid on!

And the list without a lexicon or further information continues on with things like fire starting, experienced sexual or emotional trauma, stealing, anger management issues, retarded (seriously, in this day and age the form actually used that word to describe children) and so on.

As a parent who now knows a lot of other parents who have adoptive children who face a huge range of challenges, I now have more clarity as to what issues I wouldn’t be able parent. At the time, however, there were only two boxes we checked ‘no’ on. Both ‘nos’ were related to things we were familiar with.

Wifey didn’t want a fire starter and I didn’t want a child who was ‘retarded.’

While I won’t copy the entire narrative I wrote to CAS scolding them about their use of the word ‘retarded’ and how I expected more from an organization that works with children, I knew I couldn’t raise a child who was experiencing global developmental delays.

I’m not a patient person. I’ve worked with kids for years. I’m also the older sibling to a brother who has a genetic disorder that has resulted in significant global developmental delays.

When my brother was born they told my mother he would never walk and never talk. Initially his diagnosis was Down Syndrome. About six months later it because clear that that diagnosis was incorrect but they weren’t quite sure what was wrong with by brother.

It wasn’t till my brother was seven or eight that my brother got a label that fit. Our family was finally connected to a doctor and a geneticist, the only in the world, who were working with this particular chromosomal mutation.

My brother is a phenomenal human being. He’s resilient, good hearted and indefatigable. He has poor social skills, experiences depression, has had major medical complications and setbacks. He’s surpassed every limitation he was told he’d have. He walks and talks. He even drives – it took him an extra 6 years to get his license but he did it!

My brother has never really had a true friend. His friends are primarily friends of the family. People forget his birthday all the time and he spends upwards of a month picking out a birthday gift for them. He dreams of finding a girl to date and marry. My brother will never financially be able to independently support himself and the amount of money afforded to him by social assistance would barely provide enough to pay rent, let alone food or transportation.

My brother also happens to be the most irritating person in the world to me. Because he is the brother of an impatient sister and he knows exactly which buttons to push, I’ve usually hit my upper threshold of tolerance within 10 to 30 minutes of being in the same room as him.

I’ve seen how challenging and self-sacrificing it has been for my Mom to mother him. She loves him unquestionably, but he consumes her. There is no end in sight because my brother will never move out of the family home. My mother has been parenting him for 30 years and will be his primary caregiver till she dies.

The cost has been high for my mother. Two marriages . Near financial devastation. Family vacations. Numerous career opportunities. Relationships with other family members and children. Unconditional love is costly, yet my mother wouldn’t change a thing.

Having witnessed my mother’s life, feeling constantly guilty about how I relate and react to my brother, gave me firsthand knowledge that I couldn’t parent a child with global delays. I will also become the primary caregiver to my brother when/if my mother dies and I knew I couldn’t handle two kids like my brother.

It’s the truth and it’s ugly. It’s something I hate about myself. But I couldn’t in good conscience check off that box with a ‘yes’ on the range of acceptance. With each checklist item, we were asked to dig deep about what we wanted and about what we could or could not handle.

This past weekend the Globe and Mail published an article on a new test that could assess the genetic health of unborn children. I read the article from beginning to end and handed it over to Wifey.

Given our ongoing discussions about the MaybeBaby, and my deep fear that I could somehow pass along the genetic disorder my brother has even though I know it’s not how this particular disorder works, I had to again confront an ugly truth. If we were to get pregnant and we find out that our fetus is compromised, I wouldn’t want to carry it to term.

I, like all other parents, want a healthy baby. My baby doesn’t need to be, and surely won’t be, perfect. But I don’t want to be an ugly person all the time. I would be a horrific parent to this child. I would be resentful and angry. I would feel guilty and awful. I would be the kind of parent that no one deserves.

When we make these kinds of decisions, it’s less about the kind of children we bring into the world. It’s about making sure that the kids I have do have the best parent possible. I want this for my kids. They’re entitled to and deserving of this. And so this truth - my truth - is messy, ugly and complicated.

Finding a New Normal

2009-02-07T09:46:00.008-05:00

On December 10, 2008, transit went on strike. On January 30, 2009 just as the federal government was about to debate back-to-work legislation on the premise that transit was an essential service, the City and the union agreed to end the strike and put the matters into binding arbitration. The strike lasted 51 days. By the time we resume partial service on Monday we’ll have been without buses for around 61 days. But who is counting?

Over the past two months we’ve heard transit horror stories. There’s been lots of opinion about whose fault this fiasco is – the City or the union. We’ve also heard some great things about people making connections and friendships and building a sense of community.

The last two months have been incredibly rough and stressful on our family. By no means have we had it the worst, and we’re not one of the many horror stories, but I am so excited for Monday morning because I can resume pre-strike routines and will endeavor to appreciate the things I’m grateful for.

1) I will not have to write Chauffeur on my resume.
We have one car and I have free guaranteed parking at work. This means since the transit strike, I’ve been getting up to drive both Wifey and Bella to school every morning and then driving back from downtown to wait at home with Bubaloo for his bus. My morning commute will now return to being a delightful 5-10 minutes in a single car ride. No more 30 minutes to 1 hour of driving two people where they need to go followed by 1 hour of waiting for a bus or driving Bubaloo to school because his bus doesn’t show up. My family can now get where they need to go. And, they can do it on their own.

2) My moving-clock will be delayed.
Our neighbourhood is okay. It’s turning over. There are not a lot of kids, and the kids who do live here our kids have managed to alienate. The schools are kind of sucky. On the bright side we do live close to parks, a bike path, have great after school care and are 5-10 minutes from Downtown by car. Location is key and to make our house work better for us we just need to pay down debt so that we can fix up the basement and have more space and a second bathroom. Before the strike we actually contemplated moving to Orleans. Thanks but no thanks. I get a headache thinking about traffic and the possibility of having to spend 1/3 to 1/4 of my waking hours in the car each day.

3) I will be happy Mommy.
I am a morning person, or so I thought until the transit strike. It turns out I need to have one cup of coffee, a shower and thirty minutes of quiet “me time” to not be a mega bitch in the morning. I’m so glad that I perhaps will be able to avoid barking orders every morning as my blood pressure goes through the roof. I will endeavour to count to 10 a lot more and will have the will power to do so.

4) I will appreciate how others benefit from transit.
I like that we’re a one car family and that we live in a city with a town-like feel. I like that I can espouse those values because my family members are the ones making these two things happen. I don’t personally like the bus or take the bus unless I have to (I’m not patient and it’s unbearable to me to take 45 minutes to do what I can do in 10 minutes with a car), but I’m thankful that my family members do like transit and like to use it. I am happy that lots of other people use transit so there are fewer of us on the road. In return for getting use of the car each day, I’m the one who responds to all kid emergencies and makes sure that the kids get to all regularly scheduled doctor, dentist, orthodontist and school appointments.

In less than 48 hours, our city will resume to being a mobile city. While I’ve been in denial, I’m also hoping that the teachers don’t go on strike this month. My head really will explode if that happens, too.

The Maybe Baby

2009-02-04T10:38:00.004-05:00

There’s been talk in our house of late about adding a new member to our family. We call this person the MaybeBaby.

When we first looked into building our family we wanted an adoption-bio mix. Our plan initially was to adopt one child, a boy between the ages of 5 and 8, and then to have a baby girl sometime thereafter.

Instead we ended up adopting two kids, a boy and a girl, both older kids. Still, we think of adding a baby to our household…maybe.

The MaybeBaby is contingent and can only come to be once we’ve dealt with all the things that make it a maybe. Once we’ve paid off the debt from fixing our money pit house, have refinished the basement and the very near orthodontic and educational bills our children will incur. Once we’re sure Bella and Bubaloo will be okay with a new sibling. And, once we’ve figured out what is the best way for us to make a baby (known vs unknown donor).

We’re working on all of these items at once and hopefully with in the next year or so it will all come together.

Last night at the dinner table, we worked on the last two maybes. Talking more with Bella and Bubaloo about a sibling and the mechanics around how that baby would come to be. Talking about a baby inevitably leads to a great sex education opportunity.

Wifey turned to Bubaloo and asked if he had any questions about how we, as two women, would make a baby.

“Babies are made through S-E-X. Duh!” shouted Bubaloo. Not sex. Because he couldn’t say the word aloud. All he could muster were the individual letters and spell S-E-X out.

Wifey and I exchanged glances. For all our talks about sex with the kids, we weren’t sure if we were understanding him correctly. Did our son just articulate that two women having sex can make a baby?

So we inquired.

“Yes! You and Mom have S-E-X. And, that’s how babies are made.”

We backed up and went through baby making 101 with the kids again. Babies require sperm and an egg. Women have eggs. Men have sperm. You need both those things, often acquired through sex, to make a baby. We also inserted a lesson here on safer sex and STI prevention.

To ensure the kids retained our lesson we went through it one more time.

“Can two women having sex make a baby?”
“No!” choursed the kids.
“Can a man and a woman having sex make a baby?”
“Yes!” they shouted.
“Can two men having sex make a baby?”
“No…” they said. Then Bubaloo piped up, “They don’t make a baby, but they’d make a mess. Men make a lot of sperm and with two of them it would get everywhere!!!”

If I Had 10 Million Dollars

2009-01-28T20:54:00.002-05:00

Two months ago, Wifey’s colleagues did the impossible. They won the lottery. Four of them. They split one of the biggest jackpots in Canadian history.

We told the kids and began imagining what we would do if we were to win $10 million. We’d get a bigger house, pay off my mother’s mortgage, pay for Wifey’s sister’s schooling, take a huge month-long vacation, set up a trust fund for my brother, buy a Playstation and have some fun.

I’d also quit my job and finally achieve my life long career ambition to be a philanthropist. Can you imagine anything better than finding great charities to fund and making their work happen?

The flipside to all this imagining is that our kids started to have a new ambition. They wanted to win the lottery. Since it was so easy for Wifey’s colleagues to work at winning the lottery, and they did win, the kids insisted that we should be equally successful at winning. Missing from this equation was the element of chance.

Bubaloo suggested that we spend all our money on lottery tickets, while Bella extolled on the sins of gambling.

We opted to set up a little family experiment. For the next year, every week we’re each going to invest a dollar.

Bella and I will combine our dollars and place them in a savings jar. We’re 10 weeks into the experiment and our jar has $20 in it.

Wifey and Bubaloo have joined forces to win the lottery. Each week they spend their $2 on a lottery ticket. Any winnings they receive must be placed into a jar.

So far they don’t have a jar. They haven’t even won any cash to put into the non-existent jar. The only thing they’ve won with their $20 is a free ticket. One single lonely free ticket. Even with two tickets in one week, we still haven’t won the 649 or Super 7. Just imagine.

The idea is at the end of one year we’ll compare the contents of both jars and make a family decision on how to spend it.

Well we’ve already decided that it will be spent on a ‘fancy dinner.’ We just haven’t quite come to agreement on what constitutes ‘fancy.’ I do believe that the kids have nominated McDonalds, Swiss Chalet and the Lone Star as their options.

LGBTQ (Adoptive) Parents

2009-01-25T15:56:00.001-05:00

Right now, I’m sitting in the Porter lounge having just doused my pants and laptop with a latte. I think I was a little overly enthused to sip some of my free latte. I’m here catching a flight after having attended a weekend-long conference on post-adoption peer-to-peer supports.

With 28 moms and 2 dads, I was the only queer person in the room. This only reinforced my need for LGBTQ-specific post-adoption supports in my community. All of us had one major life-changing thing in common – we all had at least one adopted child. Despite this, I wasn’t able to connect with any of these people.

In part it could perhaps be because I was an average of 10-20 years younger than all the other parents. The generational gap was evident every time I didn’t get one of their cultural references. Who the heck is Davey Jones and why was running into him at a hotel such a life defining moment for you? (Apparently he was from the Monkees and had a huge teen scream-your-head-off-and-faint following).

It wasn’t a one-sided generation disconnect; it was mutual. Any time I mentioned Facebook they didn’t see the networking potential or the future challenges posed by our kids being able to search for birth parents and relatives.

I’m still flabbergasted by the number of people who assume that birth children are not a possibility for us or that we have not faced an extensive infertility challenge. As far as I know, both wombs are functioning. We just lack the sperm to allow an egg to take up residence there. No matter what Wifey and I do, any child in our home will not be the biological likeness of both our parts. So, why should adoption be any different for us in this respect?

There was even a general disgust in the room of referring to themselves as adoptive parents. Not parents who adopted children. Nor parents with 4 children - 1 adopted and 3 biological.

I love being an adoptive parent and referring to myself as such...if only because I commonly use the specific phrasing to disassociate myself from having had any role in my children’s public display of poor behaviour. Sometimes, I just want to avoid judgmental people who I clearly see thinking “how did such a smart girl get pregnant, not once but twice as a teenager.”

My family is complicated and messy. I’m out. Sometimes more than others. My kids are out and constantly out me. I just spend so much time trying to sort out how my identity puzzle fits for me and has a place in the larger world.

So yeah, I’m going to make me another adoption splinter group and bring together the queers!

Boyfriends and Girlfriends

2008-12-08T13:20:00.003-05:00

Bella had a boyfriend. He lasted all of three days.

On Friday, this boy arrived at school as a new student. Early Monday, they became boyfriend and girlfriend. On Wednesday they broke up.

For three whole days she was in boyfriend bliss and Bubaloo was horribly upset by the injustice of it all. His sister liked a boy, a person she knew nothing about, and somehow managed to call him “boyfriend.”

Since September, Bubaloo has been pining for a girl. She first dated one of the Justins in his class. When they broke up, he was too shy to make a move, so she’s now the girlfriend of one of the Austins.

Bubaloo knows everything about this girl. He knows her favourite colour. He knows what games she likes to play. He knows what she likes about school. But most of all he knows her favourite snack is Golden Oreo Cakesters.

While this girl is still entangled in a grade school relationship with one of the Austins, Bubaloo let it slip to this girl that he has a crush on her. He really likes her. A lot. And today he’s putting a plan in action to win her affection through food.

I wish I could tell you that he came up with this plan himself. I wish I could tell you that he begged and he pleaded this weekend to make it happen. But I can’t.

It was Wifey who planted the seed that Bubaloo should try to woo her with Golden Oreo Cakesters. She came back from the grocery store with this treat and promptly packed him two in his lunch today. She’s given the explicit instruction that one is for him and one for her.

Admittedly, while I’ve not been active in the hatching of this diabolical plan, I’ve been pretty complicit as I’ve chosen take the path of amusement rather than one of intervention.

We the parents are heavily involved in a scheme to break up two kids so that our little one can have a girlfriend. He’ll either come home with a phone number or a black eye tonight.

Update: Bubaloo gave her the treat. In return he got her phone number with a note that says "call me cutey," only cutey is spelled as culy. She's still dating one of the Austins. When he called her tonight he wasn't allow to speak to her. Her mother says she's grounded.

Saturday Night

2008-11-29T21:12:00.003-05:00

It's Saturday night and I'm curled up on the couch with Wifey. The kids are tucked in. I'm waiting for the chai tea to finish brewing.

In my lap, I'm reading a book on planned giving. It's less of a book and more of a tome. One that could hold a small child down in a wind storm. It's all about wills, bequests, taxation benefits and so on.

Our mutual silence is punctuated with questions like, "Who do you want to leave the dining room table to?" and "How much do you think we're going to need in life insurance to cover the kids if we die?" and "I want to leave some money to charity X, you good with that?"

As I'm learning about how to help people leave their own legacy through a charitable gift, we're getting ready to create our long overdue wills. Once we get the insurance in place, the massive paperwork we've been slowly picking through will finally be complete.

In Wifey's lap she's reading a stack of articles from the Harvard Business Review and some other magazines on human resources management. My favourite so far was the sarcastic article on the symptoms of a bad boss.

It's Saturday night. This is comfortable. I don't think I've ever felt more grown-up in my entire life.

Sticky Fingers

2008-11-19T20:15:00.006-05:00

Bubaloo has a little problem with sticky fingers. Sticky in as much as he often finds himself attracted to objects that don't belong to him. Things somehow find their way into his backpack, pockets and eventually our home.

We've moved from the inconsequential collecting of bottle caps and garbage off the street to more meaningful things that actually belong to someone and have been intentionally taken.

To keep this stealing phase under control, or in the least to preserve our sanity, we have him on pocket check. This means every time he enters and exits the house we search him.

You'd think that pocket check would become a deterrent to the thieving and the ensuing consequence, but what we're finding out is that they inspire innovation.

The first couple of times, it was easy to spot the toy, candy or DS game that wasn't his. These items were just casually tossed into his bag. He then switched up his modus operandi by sneaking non-food items into his lunch bag.

Next he embarked on the confusion tactic. This is where he'd pack so many toys to take to school every day so that we couldn't possibly keep track of what was his and what wasn't. Quickly, he was limited to a maximum of three things.

Then he decided to use the class auction that happens every Friday as a cover to bring things home that weren't his. All of his "big bucks" would be used to buy chocolate bars, pop and toys and he'd weave us an elaborate tale. We uncovered that, too, and now communicate with his teacher's through the trusty agenda to find out what he acutally won at auction.

Another time he tried to take the contraband out of the house by shoving it up his jacket sleeve. He's also tired to covertly hide a toy within a toy. And just the other day he realized that I wasn't regularly checking the side pockets of his backpack so he stashed two full handfulls of halloween candy in there. I only caught him this time because I heard the crinkling of candy wrappers.

While it's kind of exhauting having to do all of this busting, now it's starting to be a detective game for me. It's a challenge to try to think like a 10 year-old-boy. I'm consistently amazed at how clever and innovative he is. I'd be even more so impressed if he'd use his brain for good!

This morning, however, has to be the best attempt at smuggling yet.

He wanted to take his iPod to school and I said no. He tried to whine, negotiatiate, and talk me to an alternate decision. But I did not break. There was going to be no iPod leaving the house. Call my motivations self-centred. I certainly did not want to have to deal with the child who would be hysterically upset when it was lost or stolen - and I think the liklihood of that was pretty high.

Just as I was about to start his pocket check, I asked him to produce his iPod.

He couldn't. He told me it was in his room. He told me it had fallen behind his dresser. There were a couple of other tall tales woven in there. I told him that he had to put it in my hand, and warned him that he had better not make me late for work.

I sent him up to his room to find his iPod while I started to check his backpack.

Quickly he came back down the stairs to confess. He let me know that he had lied and wanted to take responsibility. Indeed, the iPod was not in his room. He had put it in a little bag that holds his shark tooth in one of the pockets of his backpack.

I pulled it out. Only the earphones weren't there.

When I inquried as to their whereabouts, he gave me a little sheepish grin.

He took off his shoe, stuck his hand all the way to the toe and pulled out the earphones. They had been squished in there with his stinky sock resting on top.

Now, I'm having to re-think pocket check. Growing and innovating alongside my child. I never imagined that SHOES would be part of my daily checklist.

My Kid Takes the City Bus to School

2008-11-12T18:13:00.008-05:00

I grew up in suburbia. In a small town north of Toronto. It wasn't until Grade 9, when I was 14 or so, that a yellow school bus was no longer provided. Well to be truthful, I lived 3 blocks from my grade school and had to walk, but that's not the point.

According to the Ottawa Carleton District School Board, when you are in grade 7 and live less than 3.0 kms from the school, transportation will no longer be provided for you. That means that this past September our daughter needed to take OC Transpo back and forth from school every day.

Now remember, this is a child who has memory challenges, regularly gets seriously disoriented in our own neighbourhood and loves to talk to strangers. The first two, we were pretty confident that we could develop strategies for. It was the "talking to strangers" that had us concerned.

This is the same child that locked herself out of the house last summer and instead of waiting for us to return in a short time, knocked on a complete stranger's door and went into his house. The only reason we knew she was there because when we were walking up the street we saw her backpack on his stoop.

On the transportation front, I can appreciate that we live in a city, and that mass transit is somewhat of a luxury. This is in the sense that my kid won't have to walk 2.7 kms to school each day and we're saving some tax dollars by not having a yellow school bus.

But, we DO live in a city and we don't exactly live in the nicest part of the city. We live in Overbook on the cusp of Vanier and she now goes to York Street Public School.

The very things we try to protect our children from, like dirty needles on front lawns and prostitution, were addressed the very first city transit trial run we took with her before school. I'm not so worried about her exposure to such issues, I just don't trust her judgment not to pick up a used needle up to throw out or to ask someone directly what they're doing standing on a street corner. No amount of street proofing has been effective with her. Social cues and street smarts just aren't her strength.

We've done what we can do, not without a hefty dose of questioning and parental guilt, but we've done that best that we can and we have to let her go, learn and make her own mistakes.

When Bella came to show me the photos on her camera, she got to a series of images of people sitting on the bus. I asked who her friends were. "I dunno. They're not my friends," she said. When I probed further, I discovered she knew nothing about these people. They were just random people on the bus.

I then proceeded to warn her about taking photos of strangers without permission and how that could get her into big trouble. She quickly cut me off.

In the belitting matter-of-fact voice that 13-year-olds use with an annoying frequency, she let me know that she wasn't stupid enough to take a photo without permission. In fact, very smartly and smugly, she let me know that she had asked for permission.

To which I replied, "Isn't one of the first rules of taking the bus that you don't talk to anyone, especially strangers?"

It only then dawned on her. She had taken random photos of... g-a-s-p ...strangers! And just because she talked to them to take their photo didn't make them any less strange!

Sometimes I just want to hit my head against a brick wall.

On the other hand, I can just picture the scene unfolding on the bus of some little kid asking randoms to take their photo. I mean, what would you say to that? How bizarre!

My kid behaves on the bus like one of the people we warn her about.

Paper Identification

2008-10-17T15:32:00.001-05:00

Last night I went to the post office to pick up the munchkin’s passports. After months of struggling with various government offices to get the adoption paperwork and birth certificates in order, and then gathering all the items and signatures for the passports, we finally submitted the applications earlier this month.

Timing is of the essence here as we’re now booked on an out of country vacation this Christmas…only the kids are not yet aware of the impending adventure. So last night when I returned from the post office I was very excited to show the kids their very official travel documents.

I handed Bubaloo his, and he got all excited about the pages and the possibilities of collecting stamps one day. I handed Bella hers. She opened it up to see the face of a young boy sporting a mod-hawk by the name of Samuel.

We’re now in the possession of a very official travel document that doesn’t belong to us. Passport Canada sent us the wrong passport and somewhere in the world a stranger is holding our daughter’s passport.

Now getting this sorted out doesn’t seem like it’s going to be a walk in the park. Calling Passport Canada only has resulted in us getting re-directed to having to show up at the office. The only result of this is more paperwork.

Like in high school, where I didn’t like science labs because lab = lab report, I’m beginning to develop this equation: children = horrid amounts of paperwork + bureaucratic headache inducing snafus. To date, we have yet to have a single piece of official documentation be issued successfully.

Not 'Yer Grandfather's Stew

2008-10-05T17:51:00.008-05:00

Since she first moved in with us, Bella has always talked about her favourite meal. Stew. Not just any stew, but the stew her Grandfather used to make her. This is the kind of food that foodies love best because it's a meal tied to memories.

The thing is I hate stew. For the same associative memories that make Bella love it, I cannot stand it. The smell, the taste and most of all the texture. It's just not a meal that I've brought myself to make for her in the past year and a half.

But on Saturday morning as I meandered over to Loblaws, there, in the meat cooler was a package of stewing beef with a bright pink label marking it 50% off. While I love the Saturday morning meat sale - there's nothing like getting more meat for your family and making that dollar spread further - this stewing beef called to me. I could take advantage of the great price and do something nice for my daughter at the same time. The generosity of a cheapskate!

I talked proudly about the stew I was going to make just for her. I searched the internet for a great recipe. I even came in early from planting bulbs so I could brown the beef for the stew. When I realized we were out of bread I even adorned the best puppy dog eyes so that Wifey would quickly run to the store to grab some.

I made the stew with love and three hours later dished it out for the dinner table.

The look on her face said it all. She wasn't impressed with my efforts. Not one bit. We probed about what the problem was couched only in the guilt of "look at all the effort I went to for you" that a parent could muster.

She then spilled all her disappointment. "The stew my Grandfather used to make was white," she said. The bowl that we'd assembled for her contained a brown stew. As she ate it, it also turned out that she didn't like the potatoes. Or the stew sauce. Or the beef.

In the end I'd venture to guess that what her Grandfather used to make her wasn't stew at all. The lesson I get from this is that frugally motivated kindness will give you a karmic kick in the ass every time.

The Edu-muh-cation of RKW

2008-10-01T20:40:00.005-05:00

Last night around the kitchen table, Wifey was telling her favourite joke. "Pass the honey...honey. Pass the sugar...sugar. Pass the tea...bag." I groan. This kids think it's hilarious. Wifey thinks she's a comedian.

After pleading courses of "tell it again, Mommy!" Wifey acquiesced and told it with a newfie twist.

At the end of the joke, Bella asked what a newfie was, and we responded that it was someone from Newfoundland.

To keep her on the toes of her geography skills, we asked her to tell us where Newfoundland is.

Bella: It's east, east of here. I'm sure.

Mommies: Good job sweetie!

Bella: I read in a book once that it's close to Australia.

Mommies: Um, no. I think you might be confusing Newfoundland with New Zealand.

And then, she tried to argue with us about the location of this Canadian province. Unless there's be some sudden tectonic plate shifts we don't know about, I'm pretty sure that when I woke up this morning Newfoundland was a couple of thousand kilometers to the east, not tens of thousands of kilometers.

Mental Health Days

2008-09-26T13:13:00.005-05:00

When I was younger, I was good at taking a day for myself when I needed it. I can recall in high school, at least once a semester, I'd tell my Mom that I just wasn't going to go to school cause I needed just one day to do nothing before I'd jump back into the swing of things.

This is one of the things my Mom has always admired about me, according to her. I never really got that - why people have such a hard time saying time out for 24 hours.

Ten years later, I get it. Because I secretly was planning my "sick day" since the beginning of week.

So I did it. I called in sick. And, I'm not even sick. But, the guilt. Oh, the crushing guilt.

Despite the fact that I'm "sick" to my colleagues and staff, I'm still working. I've taken a couple of phone calls. I took a meeting. I talked with a client. I mean really people, I'm "sick." What if I really were sick? This really isn't helping me trying to convince myself that the world-won't-stop-without-me and dispelling the being-out-of-the-office-for-one-day-will-cause-irreparable-harm complex.

What this does for me, however, is create a nice illustrative commentary on the state of the organizational culture at my office. There really is no such thing as a holiday. We've actually all started to differentiate between a "I'm not in the office holiday, but I'll still do whatever you need me to do" and "I'm really off and you can't reach me no matter what" types of vacations.

So, I'm going to enjoy the rest of my personal mental health day. I'm going to catch up on TV I missed this week. I'm going to enjoy my new blog layout. And, I'm not going to answer the phone again.

Queer Parenting is Radical

2008-06-01T06:02:00.001-05:00

One of the things we told our adoption worker early in our process is that the kids we adopted would have to be more than okay with us being queer. They'd have to have enough comfort to be part of the queer community because we're "out-out." We're active, involved and engaged, and our kids would become part of that world.

Parenting hasn't lessened our activism, but it has been thought provoking and challenged assumptions within both the LGBTQ and straight communities.

Back in February I did an interview about the new statutory holiday - Family Day - and how the LGBTQ community should/should not embrace it for a local queer publication. When the reporter kept on pushing on the angle around how my family differed and didn't emulate heterosexual models of families, I stated, "Being a queer parent in still a radical notion - for both the queer and mainstream communities." He nearly dropped the phone.

We live in the nation's capital and this is a notoriously conservative community. It's a city dominated by public servants. It's quiet, sleepy, and still has a small town feel to it.

The LGBTQ community here is also unique. It's not a very out and visible community. We have a quasi gay village. Our queer organizations struggle, flounder, and often fail. The LGBTQ community is dominated by gay men - from bars to services. There's limited space for women and trans folk. The space for families, up until the last few years, has been even more limited.

When we became parents of two children, we knew handfuls of other families in the LGBTQ community. Most queer parents are focused on being parents. That means taking our kids to school, swim lessons or gymnastics, and coordinating family vacations. It's dealing with tempertantrums and helping our kids become responsible adults. As parents, what we do is more around what our kids need than our identities. And, more often than not, being queer becomes secondary to our identities as "mom" or "dad."

When we became parents of our two children, very few of our queer friends could understand why we wanted children. For some of them, it was because we were young. For some of them, they were concerned about how we'd change as people with kids. But for many of our friends, they just didn't get why when everything in our lives was so anti-mainstream by virtue of our identities, that by choice we emulated and embraced the values of the heterosexual world. We got married, bought a house, and had kids. Exactly in that order. Essentially, we were accused of being sell-outs. We were accused of trying to embrace this otherness, that we were attempting to 'straighten out' who we were by becoming mommies.

So when you ask me why I think queer parenting is 'radical' this is why. As a lesbian, I've stood on the outside of the straight world, and now as a lesbian parent, I'm being forced to stand on the outside of the queer community. We challenge the conventions of communities we have a stake in when we choose to have kids. By being queer, and being parents, we've challenged institutional heterosexism. By being queer, and being parents, we've challenged notions of what it means to be queer.

The thing is, as a queer parent, I'm more out than I've ever been. I'm outed daily by my kids in every single thing that I do. I'm outed by virtue of having kids.

When I have to fill out a school registration form or enroll the kids in an activity, we write both of our names as the parents. When we're at a restaurant and the server asks how we'd like the bill split, we get a confused look when we say its all together and the kids are calling each of us Mom. When a co-worker asks what the my kids' father's name is or when a coach tells my kid to practice soccer at home with his dad to only get a funny look - I'm suddenly outed. From grocery shopping to clothes shopping, you're always out when you're a queer parent. You're always visible. And, you're always visibly queer.

Being queer and being a parent is what it is. Kids don't make you less gay. If anything you're gayer because you're conscious of that gayness every single day. You're conscious of suddenly not really fitting in to any community - except for the one of other queer parents.

Counter Surfing

2008-05-31T21:03:00.003-05:00

Our dog Gus has an issue. Well, to be honest, he has multiple issues. Notably, these involve barking, jumping on people and counter surfing. The first two behaviours are a little scary for people who aren't familiar with Gus. He's a 70lb dog with made up of black lab, german shepherd and border collie. Getting greeted at the door by a dog who simulaneously barks at you like he wants to tear you apart and kiss you silly is quite an odd experience.

But, most of all, he's become more than the occasional counter surfer of late. It started off with an item here and an item there every few months. Sausages that had just been drained sitting in the collanadar in the sink. The toppings off half a pizza mysteriously disappear by the time you walk back from the dining room to set the table. A sandwich from the table is no longer there. The motto in our house is that if you leave it unattended it's your loss. (Note: I'm too busy trying to deal with my kids behaviours and be a parent to even begin to attend to the dog!)

Only now, Gus has found a new source of human food. Leftovers from Bubaloo's back pack.

See, we ask our kids to pack their own lunches for school each day. Then we do a lunch check to ensure it meets our expectations. Sometimes they just tell us that they've got a main lunch item, like a sandwich or dinner leftovers, one fruit, one veggie and something else. Sometimes they make a song about what's in their lunch, or do a little dance. We try to make it fun. Some days it's more of a struggle than others, especially with Bubaloo around the need to have some sort of veggie in his lunch.

By packing his own lunch, he gets to eat the veggie of his choosing. We've tried taking him to the grocery store and letting him pick out items of his choice so there's lots of options to pack. When we discovered he liked V8 we stocked up on that (he liked it until he realized that we also liked him to drink it). Basically, he likes baby carrots, baby carrots or more baby carrots. And, that is the veggie he chooses to pack every day.

Only, he doesn't like the baby carrots anymore. He hasn't quite outright said it as he continues to pack them all the time. But, we find with increasing frequency that they come home in his lunch box each day. Or they fall to the bottom of his backpack to be discovered weeks later. He's also put them in the drawer beside his bed and other interesting places in his room. I'd like to think that with some of his food issues that he's hording carrots, but I know that's not the case. He's hiding them because he doesn't want us to know he's not eating them. Why he just doesn't bury them in the garbage can underneath things is beyond me.

The dog increasingly is fascinated by the contents of Bubaloo's backpack. I'm getting a little bit more frightened. Gus barks at it, noses it, knocks it off its perch in the hallway all in attempt to get at its contents.

Yesterday, the dog got his victory. And yet I'm not so sure it was his first. I came home to find the dog with a saran wrap package of very dry, old baby carrots in his mouth. It was the size of a softball - a week worth of carrots I'm sure.

The dog had hit the jackpot and there was no way he was giving up his bounty. I tried to be the owner and command the dog to give them to me. Then I tried to take it out of his mouth. He growled. He then tried to run away. Finally, I just had to wrestle them away from him and ran to the garbage can keeping my gag reflex under control.

This morning when I saw the dog lying in the hallway stalking Bubaloo's sealed lunch bag, I knew better than to find out what was so tempting. I called Bubaloo to deal with it and deal with he did. Goodbye yucky stinky sandwich from Monday's lunch.

Gus 0. Mommy 1.

Green Thumb Sunday - Garden of Scent

2008-05-18T20:13:00.012-05:00

One of the things that struck me about many Green Thumb Sunday posts is that people tend to show off each of their wonderful plants, but shy away from showing off how all of the plantings work together. Our front garden is a disastrous work in progress. And, here it is.

Many of its faults are hidden from this angle. What I do enjoy is that the purple leaf sandcherry (top left) starts to bloom as the flowers fall off the forsythia (mostly cropped out of the right). I spent part of the day yesterday pruning the forsythia back. I went a little harder on one side than I had originally intended and I hope it comes back.

These green and white tulips appeared this past week. We can't remember whether they came with the house or if we planted them last year. We definitely need to plant some tulips in the back and some pink and purple ones in the front.

Wifey Wifey loves lilies and she came home with these a few weeks ago. They're fire red and light up the garden. They also have a light, lovely fragrance.

Our house was without a lilac bush and the lilac evokes spring as a child for me. This was added to the garden last spring. I brought home a Charles Joly lilac, instead of the dwarf Korean as intended. On the label, I was attracted to the deep-wine burgundy blooms. Two years in a row, I've gotten a light purple. The smell is wonderful, and I do enjoy it, but I do wonder what it is.

These are the lovely fragrant jonquil daffodils.

I read somewhere that inter-planting daffodils and blue grape hyacinths was a complimentary colour pairing. So I tried it. It does photograph well, I just don't like it all that much in the garden. Perhaps it will need to be moved to a new home.

Last, but not least, these marmalade coral bells are a thing of wonder. I love the way they catch the light and change in the light. They seem to dance.

Gardeners, plant and nature lovers can join in Green Thumb Sunday every week. Visit As the Garden Grows for more information.

Green Thumb Sunday - For Mothers

2008-05-11T06:06:00.002-05:00

It turns out one of the reasons Wifey was inclined to agree to the purchase of our sinking-money-pit house with too much garden for non-gardeners was the bird bath on the front lawn. Only when we took possession of the house and moved in, the previous owners had taken the bird bath with them.

We've now become gardeners over the past two years and Wifey has talked a lot about the missing bird bath. The stone where it sat surrounded by sedum has remained firmly planted, yet empty, in the front garden. This Mother's Day we treated ourselves to a short road trip to K & B Concrete Lawn Ornaments and came home with this.

Not much to report on the new blooming front. There's lots preparing to bloom, but not quite there yet. New this week, is the bleeding heart.

And, the trilliums. Only one of three has yet to appear in this part of the garden. Five more on the other side have just broken through the hard crust of the soil. This one has been putting on a solid show for about two weeks. I'm also happy that we inherited these trilliums with the house as the $9.99/root cost a the garden centre for this native plant gave me temporary sticker shock.

Over in the veggie garden, the peas have started to sprout.

Gardeners, plant and nature lovers can join in Green Thumb Sunday every week. Visit As the Garden Grows for more information.

Notes on Parenting

2008-05-06T20:31:00.011-05:00

Tonight, my friend called and asked how things were going with the kids. While this was one of the first undisturbed phone conversations I've ever had with anyone (you know this all too well - your family ignores you for hours on end and as soon as the phone rings and you're conversing with someone everyone suddenly desperately needs to talk to you or you become more popular than ever imagined), it wasn't quite private and I couldn't get into all of the trials and tribulations of being a Mom to Bella and Bubaloo.

Wifey is away on business. That means I'm solo parenting. She's been travelling a lot in the past few months and now I'm beginning to dread her departures because all of the intense emotions come out to play when she leaves town. It's like how the wheels on your shopping cart freeze and you get thrown backward with quite some force just as you're trying to push the cart ahead. Totally unexpected. Throws you off. And, it takes a bit of time to figure out what is wrong.

Bubaloo's has some significant meltdowns which after hours of negotiation and talking can be boiled down to one single, heart-wrenching question - "Why couldn't my birth mom get the money to keep me?"

He knows that Wifey and I both have jobs, and it seems quite easy, he just doesn't understand why if a person we claims loves him so much wasn't able to do such a simple thing as getting a job that paid enough money so he could have a warm place to sleep at night and food other than cereal and peanut butter sandwiches. Actually, given that he doesn't quite grasp accountability and responsibility, he doesn't really get why there wasn't a job that paid enough ready and waiting for his birth mom to fill, but that's a whole different issue.

Poverty and addiction are complex issues. Putting them into 10-year-old speak, what to say and not to say, isn't really the part of parenting I enjoy.

Bella's spending a lot of time not acknowledging how she really feels that her classmates don't like her. Given some of her well developed control issues, a penchant for being bossy and a love of tattle telling, it's not surprising that peer relationships aren't quite her forte.

While her brother was in meltdown mode in his bedroom, she sat at the dinner table and denied that it had any impact on her. When we finally got to the point where she could admit that it hurt, why she liked to be overly bossy and tattle tell, and perhaps other ways that could make her a better friend, we got somewhere. She spent some tearful time on my lap.

I'd been home from work for less than an hour, had somehow managed to get a meal on the table, and had yet to recover from my day at work before I have to be a full on solo parent.

These were the things I didn't get to tell my friend today.

Instead, what I got to tell her about was the 'why questions' I used to ask my children to understand, and why I've given up on asking why. I no longer ask why because I never get an answer that makes any rational sense.

The responses I get to 'why questions' don't make sense to me. It surely doesn't make sense to me as it's getting explained in the present moment. I'm not even sure it made sense at the time. But someone, at some time, must of thought it made sense because they chose to do it anyway.

I'd like to ask why, but I know better not to, how the new coffee table that's part of the backyard furniture set got caked with mud and dirt. All of the furniture is under a covered patio, so I know it didn't fall from the sky. The coffee table itself is a good 5-7 feet from the garden, and it's behind a low rock wall, so I know the wind didn't pick up some loose dirt and drop it on the table. I don't really know what kind of art one would do with mud that would involve it being caked and pressed into the wicker. I'm not sure what kind of experiment could be conducted with mud that would explode and cover a table with mud.

I'd like to ask why. But I know better not to.

I'd also like to ask why if one were to do something that would so obviously not be okay, why one wouldn't be industrious enough to try to cover their tracks - at least a little bit - in the first place. Does anyone really think I'm going to question the WHO in this situation?

I'd like to ask why, but I know better not to, what one thought would happen when slime thrown 10ft into the air hit the ceiling? What about experimenting with something easy to reach like the floor or the walls, or better yet, what about OUTSIDE on the driveway (wait, I know why outside wouldn't be good - the slime would get dirty). I'd like to know who thought mass producing slime in a can to market to children was a good idea in the first place. I'd like to know which parent (ahem, it wasn't me) bought the slime into the house to begin with. And, I'd like to know how the slime got out of the garbage can when the parent who neither brought it into the house nor wanted it in the house disposed of the toxic green goo.

I'd like to ask why. And, I'd like a better answer than, "I wanted to see what would happen." I'd also like someone to haul the ladder out of the garage, climb up it, wipe the slime off of the ceiling and then repaint it when it stains like I'm sure it has.

I was really getting into all of the wonders of the kid-brain when I was forced to end my phone conversation prematurely. I couldn't hear her over the barking dog who was sitting at the side door whining to go out. He was letting the whole house know that he had to pee.

Which led to my newest discovery that I'm the only person in my family who knows how to open a door.

Green Thumb Sunday - Spring is Possibly Here

2008-04-27T19:40:00.012-05:00

My body knows it's spring when I turn down the street heading towards home and I can see the yellow of the forsythia blooms. The forsythia, and this particular one, is perhaps my favourite spring shrub. Maybe because it's usually the only thing in bloom in my garden at this time. I love the way it seems to glow at night under street light. I love the way it looks at dusk after it rains.

Soon after the forsythia bloomed this week, the first batch of daffodils bloomed. These are my first daffodils ever. I can't even remember what kind they are, but I purchased a bunch in the fall. I'm enjoying them so much that I've made a mental note to ensure that more daffodils are on my fall purchase list.

And this is what the daffodils look like up close. Flecked with dirt.

The first tulip of the year to bloom were these lovely red ones with great foliage. I have no idea what these are as we inherited them with the house.

The biggest disappointment of the year goes to the rock garden tulip - Tulipa violacea 'Pallida' - which was supposed to look like this. I splurged on three bulbs in the fall because these were supposed to be white tulips with blue centres. Only one has come up thus far and imagine my surprise/horror when the leaves unfurled this afternoon to reveal a yellow centre. I don't imagine the yellow will turn to blue. Right now, I just feel ripped off.

In the veggie garden, I have my very first shoot. Only peas and spinach are planted outside in the side garden right now. And, here is the spinach.

You have to love that tax refund season coincides with the start of gardening season.

We were at Home Depot last weekend to purchase the hedge pruners and a new composter. On a whim, we took a rest in a outdoor furniture set. Wifey was smitten.

To make sure she was truly in love, I made the whole family drive from store to store to try out and assess the style and comfort of various patio furniture. The winner was the first set we sat in and we welcomed it home this weekend. The only draw back was my naivety that this wouldn't have to be assembled with an allen key. But, it's together now and with all the crap hanging out back there it looks as if it has been ours for many a summer.

That funny paper lantern like thing to the upper left of the photo is a faux wasp nest. We've had really bad issues the past two summers, and in Wifey's course of research, this is supposed to fool the wasps into thinking other wasps have already built a nest in that particular place. I suppose it's better then Wifey running around the yard armed with the can of raid as she chases wasps around.

Gardeners, plant and nature lovers can join in Green Thumb Sunday every week. Visit As the Garden Grows for more information.

Green Thumb Sunday

2008-04-20T07:07:00.009-05:00

I finally decided to do it. I've joined Green Thumb Sunday as my obsession with working the soil is at an all time high this year.

As the sun kicked into high gear, the snow rapidly melted. The first bloom of the year goes to a little white crocus. It appeared this past Thursday.

As a joint Christmas gift, Wifey and I had Santa Claus (who we actually call Mommy Claus in our house) put a Nikon D40 under our tree. We purchased the lens the white crocus photo from a friend - I believe it's a macro lens. It takes pictures really close. The only problem is around the fact that you have to manually focus. You actually can only use manual focus. And, I've never been able to focus a camera.

Although, I have to say when I was with a photographer on a shoot for work a month ago and I was talking her through my issue she noted that it's nearly impossible to manually focus with a digital SLR. Thank made me feel a little bit better.

On to the only other thing blooming in our garden. More crocuses. Only these ones are purple.

The unseasonably warm weather has given us a huge start on garden clean up. The front garden is raked and cut back. I purchased a hedge trimmer on Friday and cut the cedar hedges - when I wasn't looking, Wifey went and cut them again to "fix" my attempt.

We cleared out more junk left by the previous home owners.

And, my little man helped me dig in some organics to one of the raised beds and helped to install a trellis in preparation for the forthcoming sowing of peas.

You can see the butchered hedges in the background.

Today, it's off to fix the composting situation, perhaps purchase some comfy patio furniture and bikes for the kids.

Career Change #1

2008-04-14T19:56:00.010-05:00

I read somewhere, some time ago, that one can now expect to experience 7 or 8 different careers in a single lifetime.

I've been in marketing and communications for nearly 8 years. For most of those years, I've somehow managed to work at the manager/director level.

I suppose that happens when you work in small-ish non-profits where you can easily expect to post the director title on your nameplate or email signature because you're the expert in the organization. Mostly you become the expert not because of this experience you've managed to amass over a number of years in your profession, but because you are the only person with any iota of knowledge on staff. You often work on a team of one, this one does include yourself, and there's no one to challenge your self-proclaimed expertness.

All of this to say, is that I'm thinking I might be due for a career shift.

One of my longtime dreams has been to work as an executive director of a small, non-profit organization. My organization of choice would be this one or this one. I'd even consider working for this one (which just posted for an ED but with the current family situation I felt I couldn't give it what it would need, so I opted not to apply), this one or this one (but who knows what I could ever do here).

I've been thinking that I'd like to work in camping. I could work here or here, but neither of these are based in Ottawa. I don't really think I'd like to work at the direct service delivery level. But I enjoy supervising staff and ensuring that the resources and systems to run and support the organization are in place.

Given my new interest in gardening, I'd love to work somewhere where I could acquire new knowledge like a sponge. I was thinking something like a gig at a garden centre or landscape company. Only, I don't think I'd be so good at the manual labour side of things. I'm good at coordinating and planning. I'd be good at cultivating customer relationships. And, I'm good at project management.

There's just so much that I'd like to do, I just don't know what it is that I want to do. All of these decisions need to keep in mind that I can't earn less than I earn right now - and now, I'm more underpaid than I've ever been.

I'm just tired of facing the same battles wherever I go.

It's exhausting having to create an argument and buy-in about why branding is important. I work in organizations with cultures that revolve around leaving everything till the last possible minute to get done. I hate that everyone thinks that the marketing cure-all is to simply create poster or that marketing begins one week before you launch a new program. I hate that no one realizes the amount of time it takes to craft text or design a project. The amount of review and revision that has to take place for 1 page to 20 page documents. I hate that I have to write/re-write everything produced. I hate that we never get past the we-have-to-market-right-now-or-it-will-all-be-over mentality that we never get to planning, strategic initiatives or simple communications with our members or staff. I hate that if no one can figure out where responsibility should go in the organization than it must be a marketing issue - from uniforms and signage to office supplies and mail.

Work makes me grumpy.

But most of all, I don't love it anymore. And that is a sign that I should start thinking about career #2. Suggestions? What would you do if you got to choose another career?

Throwing Resolutions Out the Window

2008-04-07T20:00:00.005-05:00

Nearly three and a half months ago I made a resolution. This is a resolution I made around the same time that the majority of humankind, or at least cultural artifacts like blogs and newspapers would have you believe that this is so, make personal pledges for the forthcoming year.

The year started off promising on certain fronts. One of those fronts where I didn’t quite achieve success was on the blog resolution. I had whole-heartedly resolved to blog at least once a week. Every Sunday night. I idealized the thought of curling up in our bed with a cup of tea, the laptop and just making some mundane event of my week amusing through words.

Well, the first week passed and I missed my Sunday writing window. I probably had a good reason that I could rationalize back then. Something like the first Sunday of the first complete week of the New Year would be when this commitment would begin. Then the second Sunday went by and I still hadn’t written anything. I probably came up with a pretty good reason as to why I couldn’t keep my resolution that week either. Then the third, fourth, fifth and so on Sundays went by.

A whole lot of Sundays, with no action, just left me feeling a little disenfranchised. And guilty. I like goals, because I like to achieve them. I don’t take them lightly. And, I’ve really not done so well on this one.

But, who cares? This is a blog after all. It’s not supposed to be a chore. It’s supposed to bring pleasure. I’ve forgiven myself and will be back to writing in keeping to whatever irregular schedule I should choose not to schedule. Things are much simpler that way. Write on impulse.

Life has been a little bit overwhelming. From Bubaloo painting the principal’s office with Elmer’s glue, to having Wifey need to put on my pants because I threw my back out, to the school suspensions, the over-the-top acting out, the loss of after school care, a car accident, the adoption finalization, discovering you don’t really like your children, to the mess of work, social workers judging your parenting skills, to it all. Life hasn’t been easy. It’s been a struggle. And, I’ve spent much of the last two months wondering what the hell I’d gotten myself into by becoming the adoptive mother of two children.

I felt trapped in the obligations of being a parent. Trapped in the obligation of having to pay a mortgage. Trapped in the need to have a job to pay the mortgage and put food on the table. Trapped in a job that’s not the job I initially signed up for. Trapped in the trappings of adulthood. Trapped in the life I created for myself. Trapped in the life I created with Wifey for the two of us.

Now, in this moment, I don’t feel so trapped. A little perspective shift reveals that these aren’t my burdens. They’re my gifts. I choose not to spend my time dwelling in the “what if” hypotheticals of different choices, as these are the choices I made, and will make peace with that.

How to Make Friends

2007-12-30T14:25:00.000-05:00

Our kids have really poor social skills. Like really bad. Their skills are so bad I'm no longer surprised by the immense difficulties they experience at school and in other social settings.

Bella is a bossy, know-it-all, control freak. Bubaloo is a belligerent, belittling and downright mean dude. While we, as their parents, know where these issues come from, other children do not and do not have the patience to stick it out.

We had an inkling about what they were experiencing at school and having seen them play with the neighbours over the past few days, I'm horrified at how bad they are. I'm not even sure after yesterday if the new neighbours will even play with them again. They are no longer friends with the handful of other kids who live on our street.

Our kids just can't seem to make friends or acquaintances, and without the ability to befriend other kids, how will they ever learn how to build a friendship?

We've put them in extracurricular activities. No click. We sent them to summer camp. No click. We've arranged play dates with other kids from LGBTQ families. No click. They go to school everyday. And still, no click. How do we help these munchkins?

We repeatedly re-visit what makes a good friend. Because often the kids they choose to hang around with don't inspire the best behaviours in our children. We see our kids being used for some troublesome purpose (like stealing chocolate bars out of a cupboard at school) or engage them in unbalanced friendships (like only being a friend when everyone else is mad at you) which negatively impact our kids.

Yeah, kids can be pretty cruel. But in turn, we know our kids dish it out back. Or, dish it out first.

Neither child has ever had a single good chum. And, we're at wits end to help them develop the skills they need to help them out. How do you help your kids negotiate the intricacies of friendship?

Predicting the Future

2007-12-16T22:01:00.000-05:00

Three nights ago a friend came for a visit. As we sat around the dining room table, Bella took an interest in her necklace. After commenting that it was pretty, I encouraged Bella to ask more questions about it.

Our friend revealed that the symbol on the necklace was a pentacle - a pagan symbol.

Bella's eyes lit up and she was so excited that she momentarily lost her words. When she found them again she blurted out, "But I'm a pagan, too!" And, um, part Moron to make that an interesting combination.

Bella's birth mom was a pagan; her grandparents Mormon. Which in her mind makes her religion 50/50, despite the inherent contradiction of the two belief systems and the fact that she's never practiced either.

Sharing a little bit of her pagan roots with our friend, Bella somehow got onto the topic of Tarot cards. Our friend let us know that she used to read them for money on the streets of Toronto. Eventually, the skill was laid to rest because it was tedious to constant predict one's career path or if one's true love was to be the person met casually the night before while downing drinks at a bar.

Bella raced up to her room and grabbed her deck of cards. These were cards that Wifey had given to her for her 12th birthday. Since the cards were gifted, they had been shuffled and gazed at, but never read. Bella didn't really take to reading the book that came with the deck to explain what the cards meant.

The Tarot cards came out and were divided into major and minor arcana. Bella was given instructions to pick up the major arcana pile, shuffle them and to ask a question. Bella asked her question in her head.

As three cards were flipped over to tell Bella her past, present and future in the context of her question, her eyes became increasingly wide. An abbreviated version of the dialogue would simply state that in the past it wasn't an option, in the present it was not so likely to happen and the future was open to possibility. The reading was punctuated with a detailed questioning of the symbols on each card.

Bella was thrilled at her reading. Bursting with excitement. She then offered to share her question with us.

I was sure her question was going to relate to adoption or to our future as a family.

Bella spoke. And, this is what she said. It was spoken in earnest seriousness. "I asked if I would ever have wings."

I looked at Bella and then looked at my friend. I was speechless and was momentarily incapacitated to deal with this unexpected curve ball. My friend, however, was not speechless and thank goodness thought on her feet.

After explaining that Tarot wasn't necessarily a literal interpretation or response to a question and that getting wings could mean one day she would be a pilot or find herself on a plane or perhaps be a genetic scientist who would engineer wings, Bella looked at us both as if we were stupid.

"I didn't mean wings as in a pilot. I meant wings, right here, on my back," as she pointed to the spot where the cards had predicted wings would grow.

She said it in a tone as if we didn't know what on earth we were talking about. She said it in that voice used by incredulous teenagers. And not willing to listen to anything further about the matter, she left the table with the whole air of how us adults know nothing and she'd show us the day she'd fly by our window with wings on her back.

Knight in Shining Armour

2007-12-06T07:08:00.000-05:00

The Swish in His Hips

2007-12-02T21:44:00.000-05:00

Our little one is a wee bit swishy. In the best possible way.

It comes out when he dances or plays imaginary games with his sister. When we engaged all of the kids at a family wedding earlier this fall in a game of charades, he was the best supermodel of the bunch. He could work a runway better than a top ranked model, but less model and more queen.

At dinner parties, we like to speculate on the outcome of his sexual orientation. He has this dash of gay, but is oh-so-not-so-gay at the same time. We can't make him. And, so we wait and watch for him to make himself.

Keeping with the ambigousness of children's sexual orientations, we talk about all relationships in hypotheticals with him - "When you bring home a girlfriend or boyfriend..." or "What kind of things do you think makes a good girlfriend or boyfriend..." He sometimes talks about cute girls at school and other times he talks about his future with a girlfriend or boyfriend.

We've tried to make it clear for both kids that it doesn't matter to us whether or not they end up gay or straight. For a while there, Bella was feeling a tortured by the fact that she likes boys.

All of this came forth in a very interesting conversation on the drive home from a marathon candy shopping trip in preparation to the holiday building of a gingerbread village.

Piping up from the backseat in a most conflicted and endearing voice, Bubaloo asked me if I would promise not to ever embarrass him in front of a girlfriend. After clarifying whether he meant "intentionally embarrass" or "embarrass him by my mere existence and breathing in the same room," I discovered that he doesn't yet have a girlfriend but lots of prospects as there are a plethora of cute girls at his school.

As with all relationship conversations, we encourage our kids to explore what would make a good partner.

After reiterating his top priority, the cuteness of the girl in question of course, he shared his second need. He wants a girlfriend who won't make fun of him because he has two moms.

I nearly slammed on the brakes to turn around and face him to gauge the seriousness of the comment. Instead, I just looked in the rear view mirror and saw that he was dead serious.

Bubaloo has been experiencing some teasing in the past few weeks and is feeling incredibly self-conscious about his family. He loves his family in the comfort of his home, and shifts uncomfortably in the playground with his peers.

After affirming that respect is an important part of any relationship, I asked him what else would make a good girlfriend.

The next important value came someone who is nice, followed by someone who would do his homework. He was pulling my leg with this last one. I then asked him to think about how it might be important to have a girlfriend who would like similar things or like things that they could do together. In the end, he decided that this wasn't too important to him.

In recapping the list of the four important attributes of a girlfriend or boyfriend, Bubaloo stopped on number two again.

"I could have a girlfriend or boyfriend," he said deep in thought. "The good thing about a boyfriend is that he wouldn't care if I have two moms."

"Um, yes, that's right Sweetie," I said. "I don't think your boyfriend would be too concerned about you having two moms. But, it's also important that any girlfriend you have not care about you having two moms, either."

Remembering Our Family

2007-11-11T20:54:00.000-05:00

A year ago today, we met our children for the first time. Only at that time, they were only our possibly-maybe-future-children.

We received a phone call late in the evening of November 10 from the foster parents. They had been given a green light from their social worker to set up a rendez-vous with us.

See, as par for the adoption course, and especially with older children, the first meeting is set up to look like a chance meeting. You may go to a park, sit on a bench, and watch the child play. This is an observation meeting. The child is never to know you're there and never know who you could possibly be to them. From this, you're supposed to get a better feel if there's going to be a fit.

Since Wifey knew the Foster Mother, we were given the option to "run into" the family and have a little interaction with the kids.

I planned and plotted on the phone with the Foster Father. We decided that since they were planning on going to Home Depot the next day to take the kids to one of the store classes, and that Wifey and I were in the middle of a kitchen renovation, that we could have a chance encounter in the hardware section. Then, we'd be invited to join in and help the family out at the kids' workshop.

The only thing we didn't account for is that the next day was Remembrance Day.

The next morning, Wifey and I showed up early for our meeting. I remember feeling nervous, my stomach dancing, simultaneously excited and terrified. What if we didn't like them? What if they didn't like us? What if they were weird about us being gay?

When we pulled into the parking lot of Home Depot, we thought it looked empty. We parked the car and then dashed through the rain to the front doors. Only, the front doors didn't open. We looked for a sign, but we didn't find one. Then we went back to the car and waited.

We didn't have the foster parent's cell phone number. We had no way to contact them. We didn't know what kind of vehicle they drove. We had no way to approach them without giving ourselves away. So we sat in the car and waited. We thought about driving away. We were both on the verge of tears with the anticipation of about to being disappointed. And, upset that we were about to have to re-schedule a meeting that we'd been waiting to have for over 4 1/2 months.

Finally the foster parents drove up. The foster dad got out and went to the front of the store to go in. The doors didn't open for him either. He looked around and went back to their van. They pulled into a spot and waited.

We waited in our car across the parking lot mentally trying to get their attention.

Nothing happened. No one moved. We sat in our respective vehicles, each unaware that the other was there, trying to figure out what to do next.

I turned on the car, pulled out of our spot, drove around the parking lot to pull up at the front door. Wifey got out and went to the entrance again. The doors still didn't open. She waited and waited. Trying to look obvious. Hoping that the Foster Mom would see her and make something happen. Wifey then returned to the car. Just as Foster Dad left his car and went to the entrance, again.

Pretending not to recognize the other, Foster Dad and Wifey conversed. Foster Dad talked while looking at the front entrance with his back turned to the parking lot and Wifey talked while looking at me in the driver's seat. Once we discussed that Home Depot wasn't open, we didn't know why, and had no idea when it would be open again, we hatched another plan.

We could go to Chapters because that was a place they took the family to read in the children's section.

Twenty minutes later, and across town, we pulled into the Chapters parking lot and went to the front doors. The doors wouldn't open.

We couldn't believe it. I almost broke down in tears of frustration. Chapters wasn't open either and it looked like we would have to re-schedule. We walked back to the car.

Sitting there, dejected, Foster Dad tapped on the window. McDonald's would have to be open, he surmised. Let's have a really early lunch.

We came up with another story to tell the kids. This time, we were meeting them at McDonald's to give some renovation advice.

The foster family pulled up to McDonalds and went in. We pulled up to McDonalds and went it. And it was there, for the first time, that we met Bella and Bubaloo. Our 30 minute chance encounter turned into a 4 hour long pit stop.

We spent some time eating all together and interacting with the kids. The kids spent time playing in the play place. We spent some time to getting to know more about the kids through the foster parents. It was such an incredible afternoon.

It was during that time that is was confirmed for us - these were to be our kids. Even though they had no clue who we were. We were just some friends of the foster parents.

Today, in celebration, we went to McDonald's and relived our first meeting.

As a family, we always go back to the final minutes of that first meeting together. When saying goodbye and walking to our respective cars, Bubaloo donned his sneaky face. Waving goodbye as he walked towards our car, he proclaimed to the foster family, "See you later. I'm going home with them!"

All the adults laughed at his joke.

Bubaloo thought he got a laugh because he made a funny. We all laughed because little did he know how true his words were. In a few months time, he would be coming home with us as his forever family.

The Dickie Bird Comes Home

2007-11-04T10:58:00.000-05:00

My gran is in her mid-eighties. She still has her licence. How, we're not quite sure.

She stopped driving on the highway in her early-seventies, at night in her late-seventies, long distances in her early-eighties and now she rarely drives anywhere at all. The car is parked in her driveway for emergency use only.

From spring to fall, all of her extracurricular activities are based out of a local seniors centre. The art classes and tai chi she takes there is a 10 minute walk from her house. For groceries or medical appointments, she calls upon her children or neighbours to take her.

My gran has only lost her independence in the last few years. Her physical health, quickly and unexpectedly, has deteriorated rapidly.

It's hard on us and harder on her. This is a woman who worked full-time until her mid-seventies.

When she got the flu last winter, my mother found her passed out on the kitchen floor. No one knew how long she had been there. A few hours, possibly. More likely overnight. See, she's a diabetic. Type 2. She needs food to regulate her blood sugar.

Last winter, she also acquired several successive viral infections in her ear. It made her dizzy. She was unable to walk up or down the stairs in her home. She couldn't stand up for long periods of time or even tolerate car trips across town. She was confined to her house.

And, with the long Canadian winters, my gran is also subject to the fear of practically every senior residing in a northern geographic region which keeps them housebound or southbound for a better part of the snowy season: falling down on a patch of ice.

She lives alone and gets lonely. As her ability to interact with the outside world decreases, her loneliness increases. She wants a companion, but would never get one for herself.

While she spends heaps of money on her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, she'd never for a moment even consider spending a dime of her money on something frivolous for herself. This is a woman who grew up in the depression.

To put it in perspective, she never calls long distance or will end a conversation with you prematurely because she thinks it's costing you too much no matter how many times you tell her you have an unlimited call package that is quite reasonably priced.

Enter the German roller canary.

My grandmother once had a singing canary that rested in the pass-through between the kitchen and living room. It would sing its sweet bird song to her all day long. It was a German roller canary that had been gifted to her by a local breeder that couldn't be sold because it had a club foot.

She loved that bird and doted on it. It was her friend. I like to think that she would spend her days puttering around the house while talking to the bird and whispering her secrets.

The details on how that bird became not to be aren't quite clear. I know it wasn't her choice or doing. I know it had something to do with my grandfather and his irritation with the bird. Whether his irritation stemmed from the noise of its song, or her re-directed adoration, is unbeknownst to me. What I do know is that one day the dickie bird was no more.

My gran speaks of that bird fondly. She could tell you stories for an entire afternoon on its song alone. It wasn't any old canary. It was a German roller canary. She's very, very, very specific.

After months of research, connecting with breeders and anticipation, we brought a dickie bird home for her. We'll give her the gift she won't give herself.

He will be her companion till she needs a companion no more.

Trick or Treat

2007-10-31T21:26:00.000-05:00

A conversation heard this evening while securing free candy.

Man at door: What are you?

Bella: A zombie pioneer!

Man at door: Well, you're the first one of those at my door tonight.

Bella: Actually, I'm the first one in Canada.

Bubaloo: No! The first was an Indian zombie.

What impact the dinner conversations on colonization and celebrating our son's aboriginal history have had.

The Haunting of Halloween

2007-10-30T21:16:00.000-05:00

The munchkins have been planning halloween since the first week of school. From selecting the perfect pumpkins to carve to the best type of candy to give out, they've been busy orchestrating every detail.

You would think that with all of this planning that the costume department would be under control.

Bella's costume ideas have evolved greatly from the first day of school. Tomorrow, she will parade as a zombie pioneer. We're planning to wake up in the morning to put flour and egg shells in her hair and get the zombie makeup just right.

Bubaloo on the other hand has been wanting to go as the bloody ~~screen~~ scream. Being that we want to indoctrinate in our children that fun stems from imagination and not the purchasing power of the almighty allowance dollar, we told him he'd have to create a costume. He could not just buy a mask to plop on his head.

So when we piled into the car to head to Value Village last weekend for the costume shopping spree, the kids were all equipped with ideas. Bella went on her way to gather what she needed.

But Bubaloo was thwarted by a wall full of bloody scream masks. He stared at the wall. He begged. He pleaded. And then he edged into temper tantrum mode.

Since when has Value Village started to stock the commercial crap you get other stores? One of the reasons we went there in the first place was to avoid the aforementioned scene.

Bubaloo left the store without a costume and an idea of what his costume could be.

We spent the rest of our Saturday trying to inspire him. No success. We were stonewalled by a nine year old who was unable to think beyond the bloody scream.

Then it happened. While waiting in line for 1.5 hours on Saturday night to go to the city's haunted house/trick or treat event, Bubaloo announced his new costume. "I'm going to be Mr. Moneybags!" he proudly announced.

Wifey and I looked at each other. Did he mean Mr. Moneybags sort of alluding to the Fudge character in Double Fudge when Fudge falls in love with money? Or did he mean our friend M., affectionately referred to as Mr. Moneybags, who also volunteers on the Board with me as Treasurer and spends a lot of time at our house doing financials?

We inquired, and Bubaloo was all grins, but didn't directly answer the question.

Wifey was sure he was mimicking M. I was sure that he was loosely imitating the name we gave M. and was playing on his personal love of money and singing the money song from Double Fudge.

It all became clear the next day when Wifey took him out to get the final pieces of his costume. He proclaimed that he needed to get some spray to colour his hair. While his preference would have been to have had red and gold hair because that would be the coolest, he could not dress up as Mr. Moneybags without having blond hair. He couldn't BE Mr. Moneybags if they didn't look the same.

Our son is now imitating the closest person in our life that could possibly be a regular male role model to him. He's going to be M. And, M. is coming over to celebrate halloween with us.

I don't know what will be cuter.

Our adorable uber-masculine boy imitating our somewhat effeminate gay male friend. Or, the look of horror that will cross M.'s face when he realizes that the clothing selections Bubaloo has chosen to wear while emulating him scream out for the attention of the fashion police.

Week in Review

2007-10-20T06:32:00.001-05:00

On Monday morning, Bubaloo re-started his school year. He was transitioned to another classroom. Goodbye evil 'command and control' man. Hello 'touchy feely, make you feel good through positive reinforcement' primary grade teacher. He already seems to be thriving in the environment in his new classroom. Thank goodness.

On Monday evening, Bubaloo went for an emergency visit at CHEO. He was angry about having to empty the dishwasher and took it out on a glass. With fists full of frustration, he crushed a wine class in his hand. Wifey provided emergency first aid and then spent the next 4 hours waiting with him at CHEO.

While the big cut warranted stitches, but the location made that medical intervention a bad fit. He's now spent his week with steri-strips over the cut and gauze to keep the whole hand closed. Like a one-handed mummy. It worked pretty well with the exception of the day he decided to play in the sandbox.

*****

And, this morning in other breaking news, Dumbledore was outed to the world. You can read about it here.

While I'm not a Harry Potter reader, I find something quite amusing about a literary world where an author creates a character with gay subtext and much, much later has to come out publicly about the character. Specifically for the 80-90% who didn't pick up on the subtext in the first place.

Apparently homophobia can consume your imagination and the imaginations you hope inspire in your young readers. Rowling was afraid how people would react and when she was met with resounding applause, wishes she had done it earlier.

There's so much to say about that, so I'm just going to say nothing at all.

Moving Towards Finalization

2007-10-08T06:53:00.000-05:00

As each day passes we're nearing adoption finalization. Our social worker did her "final" visit and is writing the report. We've been given names of lawyers to contact. We're just waiting on the government to send in the copies of the kids' birth certificates that CAS requested. When those birth certificates do finally come in, we'll move towards becoming an official family on paper.

It's surprised us the number of things we're unable to do without the birth certificates. We've been fishing illegally all summer. We can't open up RESP accounts and begin saving for their education. We cannot travel with our children, either domestically or internationally. I think the school even gave us a little hassle when we tried to register them last year.

The only legal ties we have to our children is through three sheets of paper provided to us by CAS. One giving us permission to act on behalf of their interests in the event of a medical emergency. One to let the Receiver General of Canada know that we have children for taxation purposes. And another general "to whom it may concern" letter.

It's impossible not to have our family composition and how it came to be constantly scruitinized. We're queer so people want to know how we had children. Our children are open about the fact that they're adopted so people want to know why they were in foster care in the first place. The ages of our children would have made us teenage mothers and there's always a judgemental look cast about that.

But as we near finalization, Bella and Bubaloo's feeling have been a wee bit tumultous. From a child's perspective, I'm not sure why it is more scary to move towards this thing called "adoption finalization" than to move into a house with a bunch of strangers to be adopted. But it is. And, we've been reeling from that impact for the past month.

Last Friday, Bubaloo and Bella called a secret sibling meeting. They were whispering behind closed doors. Then they came to us. They're scared to be adopted.

They're wondering if they say no if we'll be mad about all of the money we spent on them. They're wondering what it would be like to move back in with their foster parents. They're wondering how they can really like us and love us as parents when they're so fearful about being adopted. They're wondering how they can replace one mother with two others.

We backed up. And, explained the situation again. Adoption finalization is about the legal paperwork that says we're your new parents. It's not about giving up your past and erasing your first mother for two new mothers. There are many ways you can be a part of our family and it doesn't necessarily have to be through adoption. If you choose not to do the adoption finalization, you're not going back to CAS as you'll still live with us.

We talked it through. We cuddled. And, then we wrote a long awaited letter to their birth Mom. They talked while we transcribed.

They wanted to know if she remembered them, if she still had their toys, and if she thought about them a lot. They wanted to know where she was living and if she had a phone number...if she even had a phone. They wanted to tell her that they loved her and missed her.

Bubaloo had more questions to ask, but didn't at the time.

Wipe Your Bum!

2007-10-06T08:16:00.000-05:00

Ever since Bubaloo joined our family, his underwear has been a skid mark alleyway. He repeatedly proclaims that he doesn't need to wipe his bottom.

We've tried everything. I've wiped it for him, I've shown him how to wipe, I've let him know that he smells a little bit like poo every now and then and I've tried to impress upon him the importance of good hygiene. I consulted friends about intervention strategies.

Nothing has worked. Nothing. I bought dark blue and grey underwear so I wouldn't have to deal with it on laundry day. Until now.

Yesterday morning as I was getting ready for work, Bubaloo rushed into the bathroom and landed himself right on the toilet.

"I have to pee Mom," he says.

"Well, go on then. I need to get ready for work," I say.

A handful of minutes pass. He's still sitting on the toilet. "Bubaloo, I thought you said you have to pee?"

"I did. And, I have to poo too!"

"Well, go on then. I don't care if you poo in front of me. It's your other Mom who has that issue." (Wifey is absolutely horrified when the kids poo with the bathroom door open, and will not cross the barrier of being with them in the bathroom at the same time. We only have one bathroom, and if I need to get in there, I'm going to get in there!)

Bubaloo finishes up his business and grabs some toilet paper and wipes his bum. Without me asking.

"Look, Mom!" he says holding up the toilet paper.

"Oh, good for you," I say. All the while I'm thinking why on earth did I ever need to see your used toilet paper, but I'm so glad you used some!!! And, then he proceeds to count out a certain number of toilet paper squares for wipe number two!!! Another intervention strategy to keep the plumber coming from our home due to using 1/2 a roll of toilet paper at each bathroom stop.

I can't help myself, but I have to ask, "Bubaloo, whenever did you start to wipe your bum?"

"Mom, you know how I now wear more boxersthan briefs? Well, it's just yucky-blech to not wipe and wear boxers, you know?" This is said in a very serious and earnest voice.

Success at last. I have a bum wiping son. This proud parenting moment has been brought to you by the letter 'P.'

Working Mother

2007-09-24T21:35:00.000-05:00

I am a working mother. Six days into a new job in a new organization.

Each morning I wake up at 6:30 am, hop into the shower, wrestle the kids out of bed, make myself something to eat and make sure everyone else has made themself something to eat. From the main floor of our home, I coordinate when who uses our one bathroom, getting lunches into backpacks, brushing of the teeth and making sure that everyone dresses in layers. From the top level our home, Wifey coordinates the same.

The only thing that varies in our morning routine is who takes the dog out and gets the kids on the bus. And more often than not in the past six days who takes the only travel mug full of coffee to work varies. We have three mugs, only one of which ever manages to make it home at the end of a day.

I go to work and learn what I'm supposed to do.

Today I hit the wall of overwhelmed. In typical non-profit fashion, the responsibilities my one position encompasses ranges from basic office administration to senior managerial functions. I help people take out paper jams from the photocopier while simultaneously mulling over key strategic positioning for the organization.

My department consists of two and the occasional addons. Me, my one staff person, and a small rolodex of contractors.

Our regularly scheduled days are 8.0 hours with 0.5 hours scheduled for lunch. I eat my lunch at my desk and end up sticking around for another 0.5 to 1.0 hours.

I have to leave no later than 5:15 pm to pick up the kids at their after school program. Since I have the luxury of taking our one car to work everyday, I have to drive to the school. We walk through the front door close to 6:00 pm.

Dinner needs to be made and eaten, the packing of lunches coordinated and the completion of homework overseen. The munchkins head up to their rooms to quietly read at 8:00 pm and the 8:30 pm it's lights out.

I have so little time with the kids now. The distance has grown and I no longer feel like I know what's going on in their lives and in their minds. They're done with their days, talking about what happened and re-living the good and not so good parts by the time we sit down to eat. Only, I'm no longer taking part in the re-living.

Bella dumped her boyfriend. We spent a long time talking about their relationship over dinner out on Friday evening. They had been kissing at school. She was kissing him more because she had to, than she wanted to. Affection bred from expectation. She liked the idea of having a boyfriend more than who the boyfriend actually was. She came to the conclusion that he wasn't the right guy for her.

Bubaloo seems to be doing better at school. I had a long chat with the spec ed coordinator before I returned to work and her observations of what was happening in the classroom matched mine. We also shared the same feelings on the matter. We're going to try to work on the inside track before I escalate my concerns. As a first step, the classroom EA is developing a workshop on ODD. I'm shocked she asked us for resources. My more cynical side thinks she only asked as a ploy to make us aware of what they're doing. That would make her smarter than I've given her credit for.

I'm a working mother and I don't know how other working moms do it. There's never enough time, but time is all about what you choose to do with it. Different choices would mean different time allocations.

The hardest part is being one person in a household of three others and feeling like we're all living separate lives that don't overlap or intertwine.

Command and Control

2007-09-12T07:35:00.000-05:00

Last week when I picked up the munchkins from school, I was swiftly swooped upon by the Educational Assistant (EA) in Bubaloo's class. Not Bubaloo's EA mind you, the EA of another child, because Bubaloo doesn't need an EA according to his Individual Education Plan (IEP).

She was quick to talk to me in the voice she uses with the grade 4 and 5 students to explain all of Bubaloo's unacceptable behaviours. She went on and on about how inappropriate his was acting in class. The whole matter was related in a voice to convey the seriousness of the situation which could be likened to the world coming to an end.

What was Bubaloo's crime? He chose to read in class while he was supposed to be doing other school work.

It's not that he was being rude, aggressive or impulsive. He wasn't physically or verbally lashing out. He wasn't running away.

He didn't know how to do the math and was too embarrassed or frustrated to ask for help. He had completed his science cover page in black and white, and didn't want to colour it, and threw it out when that was requested of him.

We set up a meeting with his teacher to discuss.

When we arrived, his teacher knew nothing about our kid. He hadn't yet bothered to read his IEP or student record. He hadn't met with any of the special ed team to talk about supports and effective strategies in place for working with Bubaloo. He was walking into this meeting blind and expected us to fill in the blanks.

We filled in the blanks for him. Only, he didn't listen to a thing we had to say.

I can sum up his teaching strategy with these notions he repeated over and over - "I can't have one kid not following the rules or doing exactly what the other kids are doing because they'll all want exceptions, too. When we're doing math, he needs not to be reading. We need to tell him to do something once, and we expect it to be done immediately. We expect him to act in the way grade 4 students are expected to act. Are we on the same page?"

No, we as parents, are not on the same page as you.

While I understand and empathise with teachers working in our province, we chose to send our child to a school in the public education system that had an alternative program. The alternative program is supposed to be learner-centred and employ a variety of strategies to teach children. It's not supposed to deliver education as a cookie cutter one-size fits all.

Bubaloo's primary educational challenges are behavioural. The kid, as we found out in one of our last meetings with our social worker five months after the kids were placed with us for adoption which is an entirely different story, has been diagnosed with oppositional defiance disorder (ODD).

You cannot tell a kid what to do and expect him to do it right away. You cannot expect him to take accountability for all of his actions immediately. You can't expect him not to argue with adults.

The teacher knows nothing about our child. The teacher doesn't care to learn anything about our child. The teacher doesn't care to stretch his skill set to uncover effective strategies for working with our child. It's command and control. That's it, that's all.

It's going to be one very, very, very long school year.

The Countdown

2007-09-11T08:07:00.000-05:00

In less than a week from now, I'll be returning to work. Goodbye parental leave. I'm undecided as to whether it is the thought of no longer being a full-time parent or that I'm starting a new job which is more anxiety inducing.

It's been seven months now with the kids. It took us a while to get into the groove of things, but now, there is a definite groove. There's a household rhythm which I'm about to upset. And, to a certain degree, it's my reticence to have to find a new groove that has me riled.

Turns out, I like being a full-time parent. I like being able to work in the garden, oversee household projects, cook great meals, and play with the kids. I like hearing about their days after school. I like the maddening homework we have every night. I like watching my kids grow into the people they're becoming.

I never got into the housework thing. Housework is too repetitive and not project-based enough. For the same reasons I'll never get into yoga, I'll never get into housework. Having all of that time to reflect and replay my day mentally gets me riled up and angry without an outlet for the anger. There's no resolution in yoga or housework, so why bother going there in the first place. At the end of the day, who cares.

A dirty house is a sign of one that's well lived in. I should make that slogan into a tshirt.

In my early university days, I always scoffed at those people who said it was challenging or impossible to have a career and a family, and to do both of those things well at the same time. Now, I'm not so sure.

A career and family are both demanding, require equal amount of attention, and need it all, always, and at the same time. When choosing between the two job offers, the deciding factor was family. I took the job that perhaps I was less interested in because I knew that a lack of all-consuming fascination would allow me to unchain myself from my desk and blackberry. It's a position that will be as taxing and challenging as I make it. I also liked that the environment was sold as being flexible to the needs of my family.

On Monday. Six days from now. I'm about to retire my housewifey role and morph back into professional career woman.

The Big Reveal

2007-09-09T07:30:00.000-05:00

It's fixed. It's lovely. Thank goodness.

Introducing the newest structure in our garden....the fence!

At the right hand side of the house.

And a close up demonstrating how the great garden fence can compliment the kids' basketball net.

A look at the fence on the left side of the house.

Zooming in on the new step at the side entrance. Disregard the roses that have been sitting in containers since the end of July waiting to be dug into their new homes. They're being moved this weekend.

The final product.

The fence was custom designed by Wifey and myself. We want to be able to build gardens that people can peek at as they pass by. We opted to have a gate on both sides of the house to allow for easy circulation.

We're planning on growing a rose up the arbour.

The poochie is loving his new digs. He can go outside and wander to his heart's content. He's been out there for over 30 minutes this morning. A large part of his new found fascination with the backyard is that he's discovered he can eat cherry tomatoes directly off of the plant.

This marks the completion of my 2007 garden projects. Whew! Next year we'll be installing more hardscaping in the side garden with some pathways.

And, just ignore the garden on the front lawn. We spent the summer focusing on getting rid of the wild violet. We're part of the way there. The garden is such a disaster, I don't know where to begin...and I won't be beginning anything else until next summer.

First Day of the New Year

2007-09-04T08:04:00.000-05:00

My poor neglected blog. I've got lots of material for fodder from the past month, only I never had the internet access, computer, pen and paper, or time to do anything with it.

*****

The kids went back to school this morning and it was rough. ROUGH. There was attitude, tears and temper tantrums. All within the span of 45 minutes.

Bubaloo doesn't like change and copes with it poorly.

Yesterday, we dismantled the old step from the side of the house. It had been sitting at the end of our driveway for over a month begging the garbage collectors to take pity on it and stash it in the back of their truck. Only they never did. Which led to us having to break it into much smaller pieces.

Bubaloo stood at the end of the driveway for five minutes this morning mourning the lost of his "step-ey."

*******

Summer camp has come, and gone. It was the roughest year we've had thus far.

We had to send five kids home for lice, had three disclosures, fired one staff and have to seriously re-consider whether or not a handful of them should be invited back next year.

We faced an assertions from two camp staff members that parents shouldn't be directors of this camp program. Mostly because we interfere with their camp counselloring. Well, if you think that when a camper doesn't get their meds three nights in a row that we're interfering because we're the parents of the kid not receiving his meds, you're dead wrong.

Wifey and I aren't sure we can invest another year of our lives into running this program. Camp is supposed to be fun. The fun was lacking this year.

******

On the job front, I applied for two and received offers from two jobs. Both wildly different and presenting different challenges.

When I found out in April that I would be laid off upon my return to work next week, I think I handled it with relatively little panic. I decided not to overly stress out over various"what if" scenarios, and waited to see what would pop up.

Today is decision day. I'm not exactly second guessing my choice. I'm just feeling mildly guilty by it because the job I'm not going to take would be working with a community I love. The organization itself is not in a good place and I'm still reeling from the last toxic work environment.

In 1-2 weeks from now, I'll be back at work. In a new job.

*****

The contractors totally messed up my fence project. The erected it the week I was at camp. Poor craftsmanship. Design not to my specs. It's an absolute disaster. And, I'm pissed. I anticipate that the fence will fall over just after the warranty expires. They also tried to rip me off on material quality (pine substituted for cedar, and I don't even believe it's pressure treated pine at that).

I'm writing the email, with photos enclosed, this morning.

The worst part of this is that I researched the company. Saw their work. Talked with clients. How on earth have I again ended up with a shoddy contractor???

Cleaning House

2007-08-10T07:13:00.001-05:00

It seems now that we have kids the cycle of house cleaning and cleaning closets is perpetual. Once we've completed a cycle, we're back at the beginning and starting over.

Yesterday, I went through the kids' clothing with them in preparation for the new school year. I know it's a bit premature, but we're at Grandma's next week, then at camp, and only home for 5 days before we have to take off on the long weekend for a wedding and then it's already back to school time.

The kids have received heaps of gifted clothing, they each came with a small box of clothing and we've bought them a few items along the way. I had to toss a bag of clothes that they've managed to demolish through the course of play and have another bag of clothes to pass on to their cousins.

The only thing after yesterday's fashion show that the kids really need is underwear and socks. They've grown a bit and are about to go up a size, so we're reluctant to drop a huge chunk of change on new clothing.

But yesterday, I did a bad adoptive parent thing. I took this opportunity of cleaning house to encourage the kids to pitch some of the clothing that they came to us with. There have been a few items that the kids initially wore with regularity, that has now petered off, and I used the "Mommy veto" to kick those clothes to the can. These are the items of clothing that have made us cringe and wince every time they are adorned.

The brown jogging pants, bleach stained, that Bella likes to wear around the house and in public. Bubaloo's yellow shirt with a flaming skull that now has brown, grey and black dirt sleves. Bella's horrendous bad-polyester pucci-like shirt, and her striped cable knit shirts, some old funky (but not in a cool way) sweaters and faded purple cotton shirts.

Clothes are one of the few possessions our kids have ever had. They provide a link to memories of the past. Clothes are the one thing that connects them to certain people and evokes memories of the life they had before us.

One of the things they ingrain in adoptive parents is not to throw out all of the clothes from the kids' previous life the moment they move into the new home. The clothes are familiar, hold familiar smells and can provide a small source of comfort.

It's hard as an adoptive parent to have two kids walk in the front door with only a single small box of clothes, many of which were long past their expiration date. Bella's size 7 bathing suit, sun-bleached and stretched out to fit her now size 12 body. Bubaloo's pants that always looked like he was preparing for a flood. Many of their clothes were mismatched, threadbare and stained.

I don't think their foster parents realized the dismal extent of the kids clothing situation until they packed for them to leave. The day before they moved Bubaloo found three new outfits in his drawer. Clothing that came to us with the tags still on.

Shamefully, I admit that I looked upon their possessions with disdain. I looked at them as reminder of a time where the kids had very little and what little they did have was of poor quality. The way they dressed put out a huge sign that I felt screamed to strangers, "no one cares for me."

Clothing for me, as an adoptive parent, was a representation of their past and the hard lives they had led. It took quite a bit of effort and the knowledge that I was putting their best interests first not to toss it all and have them start anew. Just like they were starting anew with us. But, we've always held a respect for their past so the clothing has stayed.

Slowly, as these clothes were outgrown or grew holes, I gently let the kids know that I had to throw them out.

We set up a a separate stash of "keepables" for the kids which we'll save for them. These are items that they've outgrown but cannot bear to part with.

Yesterday, the kids were a little bit more ready to part with their past. It also helped that they've developed new clothing favourites over the past six months and that it was becoming increasingly difficult to shut their drawers.

While I may have slightly overstepped my bounds, and used copious amounts of body language to show my distaste for certain pieces to encourage them to make a decision that would please me, I think we're all happy with the results today.

There are a few item left that I put expiry dates on. And in six months from now, I think we'll have a cleaner house. At which time I'll get to move on to helping the kids expunge some of the less desirable gifted clothing.

Direction North

2007-08-09T07:25:00.000-05:00

We visited the in-laws over the holiday weekend. Nine hours to drive there and nine hours to drive back. Gus, our dog, was the least cranky and best behaved of us all.

We went fishing, played croquet, saw the sights of my Wife's childhood, admired Nana's garden, feasted on heaps of food, explored Papa's junk yard, rode on an ATV with Pepere, and fed squirrels and chipmunks from our hands.

We still haven't managed to get the timing right for these visits. This time, we took two full days for travel and had a three day visit. I think we were all ready for us to head home after the second day of visiting.

The grandparent's don't know how to interact with the kids. They feel they should love them, have some bond with them. But they don't yet. That's laced with guilt. We all needed to be reminded that this was only the second time meeting Nana and Papa.

The kids are overwhelmed at discovering this whole new big family that has a history that pre-dates them. They only met four new people this weekend - an aunt, a cousin, Memere and Pepere. They both were overwhelmed and said it was too much.

Bella is phony and fake. Just as we thought we were discovering a realness in her, an essence of whomever she is, it quickly becomes shielded in a sticky, sweet fake. She crawls into strangers laps, albeit they are now relatives, for cuddles and professes her love. Tears stream down her face when we leave because she's going to miss Memere, Pepere, Nana and Papa, so much.

None of this emotion feels real. It often alienates and estranges her more from the ones she professes to love.

Worry creases the brow of all the adults in the room. We all see the danger in her actions especially in the looming teenage years. Bad boyfriends. Unhealthy relationships. Easy sex. Pregnancy possibilities. Yet, none of us know what interventions we can take to help.

Building self-confidence and self-esteem takes time. And, with our now 12-year-old daughter time is something we are lacking.

Introducting Mr. and Mrs. Yummy Mommy

2007-07-31T07:47:00.001-05:00

Gender is often discussed at our dinner table.

Bella wants affirmation that it is okay to like more so-called "boy" things, such as catching bugs, and still be a girl. She often tries to balance her masculine traits with her feminine traits in a mathematical equation so that the scales don't dip too far in favour of girl over boy or boy over girl. She's seeking equilibrium as a reassurance of some kind.

That same search for gender equilibrium also carries over to us. Even though the kids have two moms, they frequently have gendered discussions about who is more like a dad or like a mom. The way they explore gender is through activities which are easily categorized as boy or girl. To a degree, they try to uncover the essence of a father-figure in each of us so that they're not really missing out by not having a Dad.

While Wifey and I have never had a butch/femme relationship, or one that has been predominately defined by gender roles, during my parental leave how we decided to divide roles has definitely left us with a more common or stereotypical division of duties. I'm the primary homemaker and Wifey is the primary breadwinner. For now.

When discussing us over dinner one night, Bubaloo stated that I was his "Yummy Mommy." His rationale for this was that I did all of the cooking, was always working in the garden and was around during the day. Oh, and the yummy part came from agreeing with Wifey that I was cute.

Now that I was the "Yummy Mommy," Wifey inquired as to what she was.

"You're Mr. Yummy Mommy," Bubaloo said proudly. And she's, pointing at me, "Mrs. Yummy Mommy."

When asked why Wifey was Mr. Yummy Mommy, Bubaloo explained that was because she works, works and works, and fishes, too.

So there you have it. The Mom and Dad gender division in all its childlike simplicity. Moms cook and Dads work. Moms garden and Dads fish.

I do, however, wonder what the kids think when I mow the lawn or when I paint the house. I can tell you that their jaws dropped to the floor the first time that Wifey cooked them dinner. They were shocked to learn that she knew how to cook and vocalized huge disbelief when I explained that before they came to live with us Wifey did most of the cooking.

Just wait until September when I go back to work and their whole ordering of the universe is thrown on its head.

Attack of the 6ft Tomato

2007-07-27T07:37:00.000-05:00

Everyday I'm hoping that the contractors will finish off my fence project so I can finally show off my last gardening project of the summer. The new side step is built and installed, although it still needs to be stabilized. The posts for the fence are now in. I just need a fence to go between the posts. Oh, and some pictures of the project. And, I need it to stop raining so that the contractors can work on the project.

Instead, I'll share with you the tomato plant I'm in awe of.

While I haven't quite exactly yet measured it, I did have to stake it from the eavestroughs at the back of the garage. This involved standing on tiptoe and reaching above my head. I guesstimate that the tomato plant is well over 6ft in height, 5ft in width, and it's still growing.

This is a sweetie cherry tomato and it's covered in fruit. None of the fruit has ripened quite yet.

Holy compost. That's all I have to say. And my teensy regret is that I didn't put one of my heirloom plants in the former compost area. I'm sure that would have knocked my socks off.

The tomatoes in the raised beds are starting to ripen. Only the cherry tomatoes here, too. We've (kids, wife, dog and birds) been munching on some of the christmas grape variety.

Who Are the People in Your Neighbourhood?

2007-07-26T09:07:00.000-05:00

Having kids makes you out and come out all the time.

We're pretty out. We're pretty big activists within the queer community. Having children makes you out, everywhere, all of the time. It makes you out to that huge mainstream community of which we were often only peripherally a part of as a couple and are now part of daily because we have kids.

While I've never had an incident or experienced overtly hostile homophobia, I'm always a little fearful when having to disclose that I'm a big old homo to new people. Even more so now because I want to protect my kids from any possible negative reactions others may have. I recognize that this fear is mine and I have to own it.

Most often when I come out to someone new, I get to hear all about a gay aunt, uncle, sibling, distant relative, high school friend, college buddy, co-worker, neighbour or random acquaintance. For the record, telling a queer person that you know someone else who is queer as a way to show that you're okay with queers in general is really quite bizarre. Even more bizarre is when you tell me about a same-sex crush or the homosexual experience you had when you were a kid, in high school or university. I'm left wondering if you tell me because you also needed to feel a huge sense of relief in finally having disclosed this big, dark secret to the only other gay person you happen to know.

Driving the kids home from camp earlier this week, we drove past a neighbour on another street who has fabulous rose bushes edging her property. I like to drive by and ogle her garden. But this time, the roses were gone.

I commented on their absence and Bella filled us all in on all of the details.

She's a lesbian Bella told us. She also had dug up the plants and sold them.

When we asked how Bella knew she was a lesbian and how she knew about the plants, Bella let us know that she had been chatting with this neighbour and shared that she is going to a summer camp for kids with lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans parents.

The lady then shared with her that she's also lesbian and a mother and two other gay guys live down the street from her. Not the same two gay postmen who live on our street.

While it's great to know that we live in queer central, we were more than a bit flabbergasted when we had to point out to Bella that the woman she was talking to was a stranger and she's not supposed to talk with strangers, and especially not share all the details of our lives.

Bella's come out about her family, we've been outed to a neighbour, the neighbour has been outed to us through our kid and has outed some other people in the process. Apparently, by fluke, we've purchased a house in Mr. Roger's very gay neighbourhood.

I'm Back!

2007-07-14T18:33:00.000-05:00

The vacation is now over. We're back from the cottage. It was relaxing, refreshing and enjoyable. I do think that if we had a choice we'd all rather be sitting by the lake right now. Well, I'd be sitting by the lake and the rest of the crew would be fishing in it.

I did manage to "sneak" my laptop to the cottage and "sneak" in some blogging time. When I get a moment, that is, after I deal with the earwig infestation in the garden, I'll back post the entries.

Update - I've back posted 5 entries from our vacation. Missing is a video on the Bug Buffet that I want to add, but it needs to be edited first. If only for length.

Also posted is the first installment of our adoption story, which as I write it is becoming less and less of a story and more of a saga.

Scrabble is Educational and Leads to Educational Moments

2007-07-13T21:48:00.000-05:00

Over our two weeks at the cottage, Scrabble emerged as the family favourite board game. I’m not quite sure why the kids love it so much and request to play it ad nauseum. I know that Wifey loves it because she has usurped me as the household champ and regularly achieves scores over 400. As a parent I love it because it involves language arts and math!

We’re using Scrabble to build our kids’ vocabulary and explore the world of words. The kids need quite a bit of assistance still, whether it is in deciding where on the board to play, what to spell or how to become a master in using all of your tiles laying only three letter words.

During a game earlier in the week between Wifey and Bubaloo, Bubaloo thought of a 5-letter word all on his own. Only he didn’t have the letters to spell the word correctly.

On our most recent game, he begged and pleaded for help again. Wifey quickly eyed his tiles and let him know that he now had the word he had wanted to spell the other day but didn’t have the letters for.

That’s when D-I-N-K-Y came into play on our Scrabble board. I raised an eyebrow and laughed.

Later that evening D-I-N-K-Y was replayed in conversation. Bella asked what it meant. I offered that it has two definitions: 1) small or tiny; or, 2) another word for weenie.

As in all good spelling moments, a definition is useless without putting the word in context. Before Wifey and I could offer up a sentence, Bubaloo came to the rescue.

“My dinky, as in my weenie, is dinky,” he exclaimed while pointing to his groin area and then making a small gesture with his thumb and pointer finger.

We all fell to the ground the laughing. But he wasn’t finished yet. In earnestness he continued on.

“My foster dad, even though he had never seen me…you know…naked…always used to joke that my weenie was dinky. I wonder how he knew that?” Bubaloo shared with a confused expression.

More and more laughter erupted from the family. But, the dinky conversation wasn’t yet over. Somehow it morphed into an opportunity to talk about circumcision. So I explained. While they now get what it is and the why, it was really difficult to give them a good visual picture of the difference between a circumcised and uncircumcised penis.

They requested photos. I suggested that we go to the library to find a book. They rolled their eyes at me and then asked, as if it would be a huge, taxing effort to go to the library, why I didn’t opt to use the internet instead.

Gee, I Want to be Like You…Sorta

2007-07-09T09:40:00.000-05:00

Here's a snippet of conversation lifted from our day.

Bella says, turning to me, "Mom, I want to be just like you. I want to be just like both of you. Except for the lesbian part. I don’t want to be a lesbian."

I'm not even going to bother going in to detailing the lesbian processing that occured with that one - both with, and without, Bella.

Fishin' for Food

2007-07-08T10:38:00.000-05:00

I am the only non-fisherman in a house full of fisherman. (Can you guess who is not in that photo?)

While every now and then I don’t mind the thrill of a good cast and a fish to reel in, I don’t touch hooks, lures, worms or fish. I don’t use my teeth to break a line. I don’t search out the best fishing haunts or relish waking up with the sun to discover what will be the catch of the day. And least of all, I never engage in the exchange of the Great Fishing Tales.

Bella thinks her fishing skills are genetically imbued, an insight she garnered earlier this month when we shared with her an album her bio-father had sent to CAS for her. Bubaloo just really seems to enjoy fishing. Wifey lives for it.

Surrounded by three fishermen with open access to a lake full of bass, perch, trout and crappies, there has been no shortage of fish. It started out with bringing the small ones home to cook up for a snack. Each catch was precious cause it was some sort of first. And, as they began to hook the larger ones, it evolved into keeping the large ones for meals.

We’ve had countless meals of fish, and I’m fished out. I’m even eyeing the cans of tuna I foolishly bought earlier in the week with contempt.

I like fish, I really do. But I’ve gotten caught in the trap of being unable to eat what is brought from lake to plate.

From 1991 to 2001, I was a vegetarian. I really did believe, and still do believe, that you should be willing and able to be self-sufficient and sustainable with food and part of that philosophy includes a respect of the lifecycle and that we kill to feed ourselves. We rely on pretty horrid means to eat meat and are amply removed from that process because we don’t kill the animals ourselves.

I sort of like to think that if I had to raise chicken and cattle for food, that I’d be able to raise, kill and eat them as necessary.

The fish on my dinner plate this week has taught me a new lesson. I can raise animals. I could even possibly kill them if I had to. I cannot, however, bring myself to eat what we directly bring to our plates. I’m repulsed. I gag. I can’t eat it with any sense of enjoyment.

Exactly what I’m going to do with this, I don’t quite know yet.

I'll Have a Dash of Tact With That Ice Cream, Please

2007-07-05T21:32:00.000-05:00

Today it rained, and rained, and rained and rained. All of this wet was accompanied by a show of thunder and lightening.

The family was laid up in the cottage, listening to the CBC and the crackle of the fire in the woodstove. Wifey and I read while the munchkins worked on some crafts of some sort.

When the storm temporarily broke in late afternoon, we decided to take a drive into the town of Westport to explore the tourist trap and get a spot of ice cream.

After looking at boat upon boat tied to the pier, we stopped into a local ice cream shop. It was a terrific place in a fantastic old house, with art on the walls and posters advertising local happenings. It sported a variety of ice cream flavours, which included moosetracks (my favourite!).

The spot was nearly perfect. The service, however, was not.

Before the kids even had an opportunity to look in and read the labels on all 32 flavours, the server was already badgering them to make up their minds.

To take the heat off the kids, I placed my order. Bella then settled on Bubblegum which the server made her taste before she dished out because it was a special type of Bubblegum that wasn’t to everyone’s liking. It past the taste test and Bella got a dish along with explicit instructions how not to eat out of a waffle dish to avoid it breaking.

While Bella and I dug into the ice creamy goodness, Wifey was patiently helping Bubaloo make up his mind. She was reading him the various names. She was asking what he liked. He also took this as an opportunity to taste test multiple varieties.

Loosing what little patience hadn’t been there when we first walked in the door, the server barked at Wifey, “Don’tcha know what kind of ice cream your kid likes?”

When Bubaloo was at the table safely out of earshot, Wifey politely let the server know as she handed over the money to cover the tab, “We only adopted him four months ago, so ice cream is one of the many things we’re still learning.”

Mom and Other Mom

2007-07-03T09:30:00.000-05:00

Even before Bella and Bubaloo moved in, there were long and complicated discussions around what to call us. We were involved, the foster parents were involved, the adoption and foster workers were involved, as well as Bella and Bubaloo themselves. These conversations often ran parallel to one another and at no time were more than two parties engaged.

Our adoption worker asked us in early January, “Have you given any thought to what you would like to be called?”

Wifey and I shrugged no. Because it wasn’t up to us. Our soon-to-be 9 and 11-year-old children could call us whatever they would like. We couldn’t tell the kids what to call us other than the names we had been given by our parents at birth. I’d been down that road before with my serial step-parents. No way in hell would I have ever called any of them Mom or Dad.

After their second or third visit, Bella asked her foster father what she should call us. She’d wanted a Mom again for years, but having two at the same time had thrown her a loop in the naming department. He said that she could call us Mom. Bella asked which one. And, her foster father responded she should call us both Mom. But Bella couldn’t wrap her head around how she could have two “Moms,” or rather, call two people by the exact same name.

She briefly contemplated calling one of us Mom and one of us Dad. But since we’re both pretty girly, and embody differing so-called masculine traits, that didn’t stick. It did however, give Wifey and I ample material for an endless series of inside jokes.

It turns out that everyone involved had an opinion on what we should be called. It was like a huge grab bag of naming possibilities was circulating and what we were to be called, and by whom, at any given point in time was determined by a random blind draw from this little black bag.

After a time of building our family, the kids started to try on different variations of Mom to fit us. We suggested that if they wanted to give us the title of Mom, that I could be known as Mom and Wifey could be known be Mama. Sometimes that works, most often it doesn’t.

Most frequently we get called Mom, Mommy, Muuuuuum, Mother, Mama, Maman and others. Only the kids have yet to develop an individual Mom identity that distinctly refers to one or the other of us. With the exception of one (one which in academic-speak I might label a quasi-Derridan-like la difference).

Mostly frequently heard in our house is the bellow of Mom. Half of the time neither of us answers. In part, this is because we’re not quite sure which one of us the children are referring to. And in part, sometimes we both forget that we have this new name.

The other half of the time, only one of us answers to the call. And the response comes in an overly exaggerated and frustrated tone as if we should have instinctively known better, “NO! The Other Mom.”

Mom and Other Mom. That’s the moniker that has stuck most of all. It easily fits into a variety of social situations and wonderfully differentiates one of us from the other. It also clearly defines that there is more than one Mom heading this family.

For example, we took the family on a studio tour this past Sunday and stopped at a place with a wonderful rose garden. Wifey and I were admiring and smelling the various flowers, while Bella had engaged the owner in giving her a personal tour. Part of the conversation we overheard was a discussion on mulch. Matter of factly, Bella explained to the garden owner that unlike here, her Mom uses pine mulch in the garden as her Other Mom is allergic to hay and gets hives.

Mom and Other Mom. It’s fluid. Who is the primary Mom and who is the Other Mom shifts depending upon context. It’s a relational title.

It’s part humourous and part peculiar. We’ll see how its usage evolves in our household. I’m all for organic and novel uses of language. I just don’t know how thrilled I’d be to be permanently referred to as Other Mom.

Finding Bella and Bubaloo - Part 1

2007-07-01T10:06:00.000-05:00

We discovered Bella and Bubaloo quite like Wifey and I discovered one another. Through the internet.
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In September 2005, one week after our wedding to be exact, we went to an adoption information session at the Children’s Aid Society (CAS). We’d heard that only a small number of children became available for adoption each year in our city and it would take 3-4 years to be placed with a child. We were eager to have our names placed on the list for timing purposes – we would be ready to have a child when one became available for us.

The session confirmed for us that in Ottawa approximately 80 children are up for adoption each year. People wanting children under the age of three need not apply. Older children with varying needs were the hardest to place.

We approached the worker after the session and laid out our adoption scenario. Older child. Special needs were okay. Behavioural issues were also okay. She told us that we could be matched with a child and placed before Christmas, a mere four months away. Shocked and overwhelmed, we ran from the room without placing our names on the list.

Our adoption plans were temporarily shelved.
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The following spring, my biological clock began to tick furiously and I once again hopped on the family starting train. This time, Wifey and I had series of long, serious conversations about adoption.

I began to read book upon book on adopted children and the issues we could anticipate as adoptive parents. I found little published on public adoption and adoption of older children. It was then I turned to the internet to scour for blogs. The ones I liked, I read from beginning to end.

It was during my travels on the virtual highway that I stumbled upon an adoption website that actually allowed you to view children and read profiles of those waiting to be placed. With a single click, AdoptOntario quickly became my favourite site and I checked on it with feverish frequency. I could tell from the counter indicating the number of posted profiles when more children were added and when ones finally found a home.

I celebrated for a child when their profile was taken down and it saddened me when more children were placed for adoption.

AdoptOntario was a last resort for many of these kids because they were hard to place and efforts in their own communities hadn’t been successful. Sibling groups. Global delays. Severe disabilities. Fetal Alcohol Syndrome/Effect. Non-white children (as agencies often were holding out for a racial/cultural match).

Then one day “Rachel” and “Brad” appeared. Call it a gut feeling. Call it intuition. Call it mother’s instinct. I knew we had found our children.
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In that moment of finding “Rachel” and “Brad” our lives changed. The mentally mapped life we had envisioned instantaneously changed from one child to two. Everything that we had imagined was turned on its head. Our plans of adopting a boy and birthing a girl flew out the window. Suddenly, we were compelled to adopt two and we had to redesign the blueprints of our architected life maps.
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We expressed our interest in adopting “Rachel” and “Brad” through AdoptOntario. The children featured on the AdoptOntario website could be living anywhere in the province.

My phone conversation with the coordinator was quite enlightening. She requested the name of our social worker. I responded, “We don’t have a social worker at this time.” She asked if we could forward our homestudy. I asked, “What homestudy?”

It turns out that Ottawa was piloting a new intake model. Instead of sending all prospective adoptive parents through the intensive screening and homestudy process, they’d pre-screen prospective parents and send them through a training about fostering/adoption before determining their eligibility and putting them forth to complete a homestudy.

Adoption agencies across the province were apparently holing an abundance of parents they were unable to match with children. They were the wrong kind of parents for the kinds of children with varying needs that would be in the care of the CAS. Unrealistic expectations. Wanting babies or very young children. Not wanting children with special needs. Not understanding or wanting to erase the myriad of issues that adopted children face.

In lieu of having none of the prerequisites prospective parents normally came with, we were mailed a huge package of forms to complete. We completed the paperwork after an abundance of lesbian processing and really had to ask hard questions of ourselves that revealed some not-so-great things that we had to come to terms with.

Why would we be willing to adopt a child who was HIV-positive or deaf, but not a child who suffered from fetal alcohol syndrome or was blind? Why did we not want a child affected by global delays or of significantly impacted intelligence?
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In choosing adoption we encountered ugly truths that we needed to reconcile within ourselves. Unlike biological parents, we did have a choice in the basic make up of our children. We got to pick and choose from a checklist of traits and issues that would be used to help match our family with children. It’s like genetic screening from a pool of children. Pick a desired age. Pick a desired personality. Weed out all that is not desirable to you.
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We received a call from AdoptOntario shortly after submitting our paperwork to pass along the name and contact information of the children’s adoption social worker. We had passed our first test.

The social worker’s name was P. She worked with the Ottawa CAS. From anywhere in the province, we had chosen children living right in our own backyard. Coincidence #1.

We called P. and requested a meeting. Two weeks later, we met with her for the first time.
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As spring had turned into early summer, we still noticed water seeping into our basement from the western side of the house. Having been apprised of the minor issue during the house inspection the previous fall, we’d already attempted the first level fix. Worst case scenario, we were told, we’d have to tear up the driveway near the house and pay around $4,000 to have the exterior wall waterproofed. We opted to explore the second level fix – to locate where the water was coming in and have only that section waterproofed.

Now that we were getting serious on the child front, we didn’t want to have the possibility of any environmental issues in the basement as a potential threat to their health.

I set up a series of consultations with foundation companies. The first one was scheduled to take place the day after our meeting with P.
-
In the two weeks before the meeting took place with P. we cautiously spoke about the adoption with random people. Namely, those of our acquaintances who were current and former foster or adoptive parents. We spoke in hypotheticals. We didn’t dare utter any of these hypotheticals with our families or closest friends.

It was during one of these aforementioned conversations, that Coincidence #2 was revealed. It only served to further solidify my belief that these were our children.

Wifey was chatting with colleague N., a current foster parent and decided to disclose that we were looking at a child-specific adoption. Wifey related the events to date and the colleague asked for more information on the kids.

As Wifey racked her brain to recall details from their profiles, N. began to prompt her on these details. N. knew as much about these kids as Wifey did. That’s because N.’s foster kids were the ones we were interested in adopting.

TO BE CONTINUED…

Goodbye, P.

2007-06-26T07:52:00.000-05:00

Yesterday we said goodbye to our social worker. It was harder than I had anticipated.

I spent snippets of the afternoon getting teary eyed as I selected a few photos, chose a card, and thought about what we should write on the inside.

Losing our social worker, for me, has been akin to losing a family member. She's been such an active part of my daily life for the past year, such a fantastic support, and it's going to be hard not to pick up the phone on a whim to connect with her.

She's been my confidante and somehow made the whole process of adoption seem much less invasive than it actually was. This woman knows everything about Wifey and I. And, yes, I do mean everything from our familial histories and financial situation to our sex life and values. That's how thorough the volumes of paperwork that Children's Aid had us complete in order for us to be considered as adoptive parents.

We've just said good bye to the woman who helped us create our family, who picked us out of over 50 applicants to parent Bella and Bubaloo. I'm thankful for her and the role she's had in our lives.

Our social worker is leaving the Ottawa CAS to be closer to her daughter who has a high risk pregnancy, and to do so, needs to move to another city.

Her departure doesn't mark the end our connection to the rest of our social work team at CAS. We're a minimum of two months away from adoption finalization and more likely a year from having all of the necessary paperwork in hand. Once the adoption is finalized, we'll actually get to see and hold our children's birth certificates for the first time!

I never expected to have a relationship with our social worker. It's been organic. I've learned so much from her. She's learned so much from us. It really was a great pairing and I only wish other adoptive parents would be so lucky to have the experience we had.

That's not to say it was perfect. Because it was far from that. There were often too many players at the table. Significant negotiation, mediation and intervention was also often required.

Though, I think it says a lot at the end of the day where we're able to recognize CAS for all of its faults - and there are many in both the organization and the system - and that Wifey and I are still willing to stand behind and to support CAS and the work that it does.

I thank my social worker for our adoption experience. I thank my social worker for helping to make us a family. And, I thank my social worker for have a role and an impact on my life in so many other ways that I don't think I'll ever be able to articulate.

Countdown

2007-06-25T07:46:00.000-05:00

In five, count 'em five, days we will be leaving for a much needed vacation. We've rented a cottage for two weeks.

I'm imagining long, lazy days of summer. Lying on the dock, taking leisurely swims, canoe trips at dusk, fishing in the early morning, scattered naps, long dinners and plenty of naps. Something tells me that the adventure might not pan out as originally imagined once the kids and our barking dog are inserted into the picture.

Before I go though, there is a huge week with an even huger to do list to get through. Here's the top five.

#5 - Eat more strawberries. Find more things to do with strawberries.

We went to the Avonmore Berry Farm yesterday and came home with 12 litres of strawberries that we picked in less than 30 minutes. This is the first time I've been berry picking since I was a kid. I loved it. So did the kids, and my Wife (only, she wishes that they wouldn't use hay as mulch because she's horribly allergic to it and didn't take any allergy medicine beforehand).

So far, we've eaten warm sun ripened strawberries off the vine and fresh into our picking basket. I've made a strawberry rhubarb pie, and strawberry rhubarb tarts for teachers. We've eaten strawberries wrapped in basil. I've thrown together a strawberry, basil and cucumber salad. I've frozen a bag of berries. We've still got 4 litres to find something to do with!

#4 - Cart Bubaloo around to various doctors appointments.

Today, we're doing the ultrasound on his kidneys. I'm about to pump a boy full of a litre and a half of water. This is the same kid who cannot hold his pee more than 30 seconds after the urge hits. This is the same kid who doesn't even drink that much in an entire day.

We've made a plan. He's packed two extra pairs of undies and shorts. I'm imagining the worst and hoping for the best. I'm just wondering how many accidents a kid has to have in a clinic before they will call off this whole thing.

#3 - Garden, garden, garden.

Now that I've found someone to check-in as per my planned schedule to water my plants, I've not got to commit to writing out detailed instructions. This person is not yet a gardener, but it is my hope to turn him into one!

I know this may be anal, but I'm so fearful of going away because of the recurring nightmare that I'll come home to dead tomato plants. It doesn't even help that I asked Wifey if she'd be okay if I were to sneak back into town during our vacation to check on the garden. We're also going to miss our first crop of the season's tomatoes and that is making me oh so sad!

I've also have a slew of tonnes of miscellaneous gardening chores to complete. I want to be in a good position when we return from vacation as the contractors are supposed to arrive on the Monday to install our new fence and step.

#2 - Strategic planning, Board retreat, summer camp.

I don't blog about it much, but I'm heavily involved in an non-profit, volunteer-driven organization. I've been thankful for my parental leave over the last few months because I've been able to give an excess of time to growing the organization. In part, my ability to do what I love each day has made my parental leave all that more enjoyable.

Suffice it to say, there's a lot that needs to be done, transitioned over, moved forward before I can leave on vacation. Some of it is great. Some of it is not so great.

#1 - Make a tetris master plan for packing the car.

When we rented a cottage, we failed to take into consideration the size of the vehicle we have. Not only do we need to fit four people and a dog into one Honda Civic, we also need to fit all of the stuff we're going to need for the vacation. Everything from clothing to toys.

I need to start writing the mental list I've compiled onto paper and then make a plan of how it's all going to fit into the car. We're going to need a roof rack for the kids, er, I mean all of the crap we have to bring.

Five days. Five days. Five days. Gotta love it.

Gone Fishin'

2007-06-21T07:54:00.000-05:00

We live in a city, only 10 minutes from the downtown core, and yet two blocks from our house is a huge park that runs along the river. This is one of the many things I love about Ottawa.

Last night, we piled into the car in search of a bait shop as learning how to fish was one of the top three things our kids wrote on their "I have to do this summer or I will die" lists. We got to the bait shop fifteen minutes after it closed.

I turned the car around and headed to Loblaws. Armed with two fishing rods, some hooks and a package of hot dogs, we went to the park where we ate our picnic dinner and Wifey gave her first fishing lesson.

The munchkins had only been fishing once before in their lifetime and that was with their foster family. On this trip, they caught Bubay (their toddler foster brother) twice which quickly ended the adventure before a hook even had grazed the water.

The kids stood out in the river for about an hour learning to cast and while I watched bits of pseudo fish bait, the hot dogs, fly everywhere. Hot dog, it turns out, is quite tricky to hook for adults and kids alike.

Once the dog figured out that the bait was hot dog, he was the only animal in the whole entire river interested in what was on the end of the fishing rod. A few times, he almost forgot his manners, and tried to bite the hot dog right off of the fish hook.

The sun was starting to set. Bella had long ago tangled her line beyond repair and was catching minnows in the shallow weeds, and Bubaloo was hooking his final piece of hot dog. Wifey and I were taking self portraits on the shore and had given the munchkins their five minute pre-departure warning.

Bubaloo threw out his last cast, and moments later yelled to us, "I got a fish."

Thinking he'd caught another bunch of weeds, Wifey and I were slow to react. I then looked at the line and saw it moving in the water. Wifey dashed into the river, Bubaloo reeled the fish in, and they placed it in the net.

There stood my beaming son with his rod in one hand looking into the net at the first fish he'd ever caught. And, are you ready for this? He somehow had managed to catch a foot-long bass.

The whole way home he kept on telling me how proud he was of himself.

The whole way home I thought my heart was going to burst with happiness and joy for him. I was so proud. And, so fiercely protectively proud of him and his fish. This was the first moment of parenting like this for me. The "ah ha" of watching your kids succeed and grow by leaps and bounds in a single moment.

Ode to Compost

2007-06-17T20:02:00.000-05:00

A picture is worth a thousand words and can extol the greatness of compost.

This plant, a sweetie cherry tomato, was started from seed in late-March and was planted outside on the May long weekend - about one month ago. While it wasn't planted in soil amended with compost per say, it was planted where the old compost bin used to rest. We had to get rid of the bin this spring because it was cracked, split open and no longer composting well.

The tomato plant sits there and soaks up the compost goodness day after day. It has outgrown all the other tomato plants in my garden.

See the brandywine tomato in the background that looks paltry in comparison? It's not that small. Nor, is it not a sight to see. But, whoa. Look at that tomato plant.

Why My Kids Crack Me Up, or, Money in My Pocket

2007-06-13T07:39:00.001-05:00

Over the past few weeks, we've been giving our kids more money management tools and lessons on consumerism.

Since they moved in, they have received $10.00 in allowance each Friday. The first $5.00 must be split up however they like between a jar for their bank accounts and a jar for charity. The second $5.00 is for them to spend however they would like.

Letting two children with a deficit in impulse control have $5.00 a week to do with whatever they would please has been a lesson in letting go for us as parents. Sometimes we're better at it than others. We've ended up with lots of non-working dollar store purchases, hideous accessories and other miscellaneous crap like gum, chips and an untold number of items from .25$ machines.

Our families have both asked what our kids have to do to earn money. Nothing is our reply.

Our kids get an allowance to learn how to manage their money. Their allowance is to be used to buy things they want that we're not willing to buy for them. They're learning to save and learning about giving back to the community through charitable donations. Many times they have had to go without something they really wanted because they had already spent all their money.

The kids, however, do have weekly chores that they're expected to do because we're a family and it takes all of us to run a household. They clean their rooms, set the table, clear the table and empty the dishwasher. Over the summer, they'll be picking up a few more family chores. And, when they want to earn more money, they will ask if we need help with something around the house that they can be paid for.

All in all, the system works quite well.

The tool I've been specifically working with them on is delay in gratification. I'd like to teach them to delay instant gratification. I'd like to see them buy something they really want or need, opposed to buying the first thing they see that they have enough money to buy.

I've put some limits around their spending now. Last night, for example, I ran out of sour cream while making potato salad and had to run to the grocery store.

Before the kids piled into the car, they scrambled for their wallets and started to have a discussion on the things they could buy at the grocery store. They were talking about spending their money like they'd never been to a store before.

I then let them know that they were free to spend their money at the store, but they couldn't buy food. I was then reminded of the toy section at said grocery store. This is the scene that unravelled.

Me: Okay kids, it's time to go. If you've got something you're going to buy, come to the check out now.

Bubaloo: I've got these hot wheel helicopters. I want them real bad. I've had my eye on them for weeks.

Me: Do you have enough money for those?

Bubaloo: I DO! (He scans item at self-check out and a price tag of $7.28 flashes on the screen). Mom, it's $7.28.

Me: How much money do you have?

Bubaloo: I have $5.00.

Me: Is that enough to buy the hot wheels?

Bubaloo: No. (Shakes his head in great disappointment).

Me: Well you need to go tell the cashier that you don't have enough money to buy those so that she can clear the scanner.

Bubaloo: (Walks over to the cashier, alone. He mumbles). I don't have enough money to buy this.

Cashier: Oh. (Looks up, and around, and doesn't see the parent. The look crosses her face as to why is this kid telling her this. Is it because he wants her to buy it for him? Is it because he's just sharing the news with her? It's a very clear WTF look.)

Me: (Trying not to laugh.) He's letting you know that he doesn't have enough allowance money to buy it today and would like you to clear the scanner over there.

As we leave the store Bubaloo starts in on a monologue about how he will have enough money at the end of the week to buy the hot wheels, or for that matter, perhaps he'd even have enough money to buy a water gun....or this Nintendo game he wanted...or something from the dollar store....

My learning opportunities are perhaps not going quite the way I had planned.

Medicating Children

2007-06-11T07:40:00.001-05:00

When you look through the profiles of children waiting for adoption, almost all make a reference to the child needing a parent who is able to advocate for their needs. The more "challenging" the child, or as the number of disabilities or behavioural issues increase, the emphasis on being a parent turned advocate increases, too.

By being a parent, I've become an advocate by default and have to negotiate systems and institutions with which I have zero familiarity. We're still working with Bella's school to resolve the bullying she faces. And, Wifey and I have had an ongoing struggle with Bubaloo's medical needs.

I'm a born activist. I like to think I'm pretty good at it. As an advocate for my children, I barely think I'm getting a passing grade. Mostly, I'm too overwhelmed and paralysed to the point of inaction by the sheer number of issues our kids face.

This article from Saturday's Globe and Mail on the disproportionate number of crown wards that are medicated reminded me of an outstanding issue we have yet to deal with regarding Bubaloo.

One month before we officially met Bella and Bubaloo as their adoptive parents, his foster parents placed him on an antipsychotic drug called risperidone. This is a drug that is prescribed to people living with schizophrenia, people trying to cope with the manic states of bipolar disorder, children and adolescents with autism and a variety of other anxiety disorders such as OCD, depression and Tourette's.

My son has been diagnosed with none of the above, nor are any of the above conditions being explored as possibilities for him.

Bubaloo is an angry child with poor impulse control. He often cannot articulate what he is feeling, so he shows it. He uses his body to get emotions out and often does so in highly inappropriate ways. He often is anxious and stressed when his basic emotional needs aren't being met.

In that month before we met Bella and Bubaloo as their adoptive parents, we had a conversation with our social workers and their foster parents and shared our opinion on medicating children. We don't agree that medication should be used to suppress behaviour that is emotionally driven.

Kids need to work their stuff out. And, medicating Bubaloo wouldn't give him that opportunity. As his new parents, we'd only ever know the child on medication and how were we to establish a baseline for who his is and what his normal behaviours are? We were clear that we didn't want Bubaloo to be put on any new medications prior to our adoption.

Two weeks later, the foster parents let us know that Bubaloo was on a new medication and it was working wonders for him. At his most recent pediatrician visit, Bubaloo actually articulated that he was anxious a lot and felt so angry at times that he couldn't control his rage. With both the foster parents and pediatrician delighted with this emotional sharing, a prescription was written for risperidone.

Practically overnight, Bubaloo's behaviour changed according to his foster parents. He wasn't hitting, kicking or lashing out at other kids at school when he got frustrated. He wasn't angry as much. He was a more tame and more manageable kid.

This rapid transformation brought into question whether or not it was actually the meds or the thought of the meds that was causing the behavioural transformation. Perhaps for Bubaloo, it was the idea that a little pill would fix everything and make it better that gave him the power of control over himself.

A little bit of research on this drug, thanks to my mother-in-law who is a nurse and has access to medical journals, revealed a body of literature that this drug is overprescribed to kids in foster care. There's no time and a lack of support in foster care to help the kids work through their experiences that lead to behavioural issues, so this drug is often prescribed to tame the behaviour and make kids manageable. It's an ingrained philosophy of "let's deal with the immediate behavioural issue instead of dealing with the root of the behaviour, or rather, lets deal with the effect and hope that the cause with work itself out."

Today, Bubaloo is still taking the risperidone and we haven't taken him off of it yet. There were so many battles for us to fight on his behalf when he moved in with us, so much change going on in his life, that we were advised not to wean him off of it just yet. It's an issue I've broached at the last two pediatrician appointments, but we often run out of time to discuss and plot a course of action because I walk into the doctor's office with a laundry list of issues.

Bubaloo's anxiety ebbs and flows. The past two weeks have been anxiety riddled. But, the 1-2 months before that were relatively anxiety free.

At one pediatrician appointment during a high anxiety time, the doctor suggested upping his dosage to two pills a day. We put our feet down and refused to medicate his issues away.

Bubaloo takes his little yellow pill each night before bed. By doing so, we've become complicit in what we would call an unnecessary, systemic medicating of our child.

Weeding Weeds from Weeds

2007-06-07T11:11:00.000-05:00

I'm wondering if anyone thinks it is as comical as I do that I have to devote a significant chunk of my gardening time this week to pulling weeds from our new grass patch. Perhaps it's even funnier that I'm writing about weeding grass.

We started out at the beginning of April by freecycling the stones from this patio and deciding to grow grass.

I've never really been a fan of grass, never have devoted any of my time to caring for or maintaining a lawn. My philosophy has been one of it's grass, it's a weed, so who cares? Mind you, I've never lived in a place where we've experienced "grass issues."

Prior to this experiment, the only experience I've had with growing grass was at my parents' home. And, I was purely a bystander and not a participant.

I was still in the early years of grade school and I cannot remember exactly why, but my mother wanted to build up a berm around the perimeter of our lawn. I think she might have gotten fed up with all of the neighbourhood dogs using our lawn as a bathroom. She had my step-father truck in a load of dirt and build a mini-mountain barrier to separate our lawn from the street.

It was then seeded. Only, my parents opted to use fast growing grass so that we wouldn't have to look at the pile of dirt on our lawn for a long period of time. I believe the new dirt seeded easily and we had a thick carpet of grass relatively soon.

But we had one problem. And, a pretty big one at that.

The new grass grew twice as fast as the other grass on the lawn. By midweek, the mini-mountain of grass would need to be cut. By the weekend, it would be 2-3 inches tall and look wild, uncared for and offensive to the suburban landscape.

As much as my mother tried to not be those people, in that house, with that lawn, I don't think she ever did with much success.

When it came to growing our own patch of grass, we opted to start it from seed and knew not to buy fast growing grass. I didn't do any research. I didn't ask any questions. I just purchased some seed and tossed it out there.

A little over a month later, and with a second seeding, this is what we now have growing in our backyard. What I never thought to calculate in my plans was the presence weeds. A whole, big whack of them squarely planted in my patch of grass.

Now I have patches of grass, patches of weeds, and patches of dirt. I'm spending more time trying to get the grass to grow and weeding it than I am on growing my veggies and fixing up the other gardens. It's because as I pull out the weeds, I have to be careful not to pull up a handful of the weed I'm actually trying to grow.

This is what a 1 foot x 10 foot pass of weeding looks like. Sigh. Thank goodness I find weeding relaxing.

But in more exciting news, the munchkins spotted the first tomato blossom of the season. It's on one of my non-heirloom plants, a Christmas grape. With a frost watch earlier this week, and the plants entering their third week in the ground, I'm wondering if it's too early.

Home Alone

2007-06-06T07:53:00.000-05:00

This weekend we left Bella and Bubaloo at home and took a weekend away. We left them with their Grandma, a woman they had only previously met for a total of no more than four hours, who we flew into Ottawa from Toronto for the occasion.

I'd like to say that Wifey and I went for a romantic and much needed/desired solo getaway. But I cannot. We went up to camp to meet our new and returning camp staff to lead them through an orientation weekend.

Grandma was thrilled to have this time with the kids and created a weekend crammed full of activities. There was monopoly before breakfast, skateboarding lessons, swimming at the public pool, a movie, walking the dog at the park, and lots and lots and lots of junk food.

I came home to bags of cookies in my cupboard. Chocolate bars. A half-eaten lemon meringue pie and pineapple upsidedown cake. I even came home to a confession from my mother that she'd had a solo chocolate eating mission and had raided our cupboard to eat a bunny or two, or possibly three, left over from Easter. The kids ate more junk food with Grandma than they'd normally eat in a weekend of meals and snacks. Only they ate all of the junk food and meals loaded with veggies, too.

Grandma also got the kids to drink water. And lots of it. But the water they drunk and now are in love with is that flavoured bottled water. I detest bottled water for a number of reasons, and I don't want to hear from the munchkins one more time about how the water is "naturally flavoured." Since when is splenda a natural sugar?

All of this to say, is that I fell even more in love with my mother this weekend. The kindness and generosity she shared with our kids. The bond she built with them. Her intense focus on fun that wore the kids out. She's more laid back as a grandmother and has a better perspective on the world. It was great to sit back and admire her parenting around the dinner table after coming home from camp.

Kids of Lesbian Parents Go To School Too

2007-06-01T09:49:00.000-05:00

On Bella’s first day in her new school, she came out. She came out as a foster kid. She came out as an adoptee. And, she came out as a kid with two lesbian moms.

While her history with the care system seems to be long forgotten by her peers, she has been permanently labeled as child of queer parents. With this singular tidbit of information subject to 10-year-old imagination and logic, Bella is now the grade 5 “lez.” This is because we all know that gay parents breed gay children or turn the children gay that we care for even if we don’t breed them. Right.

Everyday Bella comes home from school with a new story of homophobic bullying and harassment. Within the first week of being at her new school, the school’s administration was made aware of the homo-taunts and sent a letter home with nearly half of the sixth grade class. At first, she didn’t even understand the words her peers were using against her.

Bella gets stopped in the hallways and questioned about her family. She’s told that she’s weird and is a “lez.” She gets vilified and alienated.

We tell Bella that words can only have the power over you that you give them. We explain how bullying works, we explain how to deflect it, and we give her tips and tools to survive her school days.

Her teacher tells her that sometimes a little information is too much and can be a dangerous thing. The result of this is that Bella is shamed for having the family that she does and is told that she disclosed too much to her peers.

For the first three months of school we knew nothing of this. We had our suspicions, but Bella denied it. Finally, two weeks ago, all of this came to a head and Bella asked if we’d be willing to come to her class to speak about families and our family in particular.

We set up an appointment with her teacher and principal to address the bullying and to implement concrete steps to get this to stop. While giving lip service to the values of diversity, equality and religious freedom, it seems the school has forgot their commitment to creating a safe school with an inclusive learning environment for all children. Diversity does include sexual orientation and gender identity.

After all of discussion on various approaches, and feeling that we as parents were on the same page as the school, we were just informed by the teacher that when a lesson on puberty is delivered in the next week or so that they will plant a question of LGBTTQ issues. This is the same teacher who was clear in our preliminary discussions that she didn’t have the expertise to speak on LGBTTQ issues, even had to ask us what LGBTTQ meant, and was relying on us as both parents and community activists to be of assistance.

To help the school get it, I wrote an email that contained the following analogy. “If one of your Muslim students was being teased for fasting during Ramadan, you wouldn't deliver a lesson on world religions, ask one question about Ramadan in a sea of questions about other religious faiths and expect that your students would be equipped with enough information to have curiosity alleviated and stop the harassment.”

I haven't received a response....yet.

I live in Canada. We have benefits and law that recognizes both us and our family. I’m married to my Wife.

While I never doubt that we are so much further along with human rights than the majority of people in the world, it is situations like this that we and other LGBTQ and/or non-traditional families face daily that remind me of how far we still have to go.

************************************************************************************

This post has been written in honour of Blogging for LGBT Families Day. You can find out more here.

The Poppies Have Popped

2007-05-31T07:42:00.000-05:00

The first poppy has peeked its head and has popped for the 2007 season. I was so excited that it chose to make its appearance this morning that I called the kids and Wifey to abandon their breakfasts and come to the window to admire it.

Sigh. I love poppies.

None of the poppies I winter sowed survived. Not because they didn't germinate, but um, because I failed to take off the top of the container when it got unusually hot one day early in the spring and I cooked 'em good. Real good. Totally to a burnt crisp.

In other garden news, my tomatoes are thriving. They survived the frost and are loving their digs in my new lasagna garden. I can almost taste the warm tomato sandwiches and pots of tomato sauce.

I also tried my hand yesterday at an annual flower arrangement. It actually took me nearly an hour to put this arrangement together. Once I saw the ornamental kale which I've always wanted to work with but never had, the rest of the arrangement was put together to compliment it. I like it. And, that's what matters.

Finding Bella and Bubaloo - Prelude

2007-05-30T08:00:00.001-05:00

It was around this time last year that we found Bella and Bubaloo. I knew the moment that I saw their photos that these were our kids. Call it gut instinct, mother's intuition, a feeling or whatever you like, but I knew that these kids would be our kids.

What I wasn't prepared for was the journey to become the adoptive parent of these two children. From the time we first found out about them, to the time we first met them, it took nine months. The same amount of time that it takes to carry a baby to term was the same amount of time it took to make us moms to these two children.

I started this blog a year ago and didn't make a post until this winter. The purpose of this blog was to originally chronicle our adoption process. It never served that purpose and has now morphed into something entirely different. Instead of chronicling this adventure in real-time, I'm going to write a handful of posts to recap it.

Splish Splash Gardening

2007-05-28T07:32:00.000-05:00

After months of hemming and hawing - reality check, it was at most two months - plants for the front garden have been selected, placed and planted. It was a cloudy, raining morning which was perfect for transplanting.

After facilitating the munchkins cooking the entire family a breakfast of champions, which was pancakes of course, Wifey and I headed out to the garden. This is where what we started with at 9am.

And here, just behind the iris and day lillies you can spy upon the mock orange that was planted earlier this month.

We placed out the plants and got to work. We had five shrubs to plant - 3 emerald gaiety euonymus, 1 blue danube juniper and 1 royal purple smokebush.

Wifey took the lead on digging the holes, while I took the lead on transplanting the shrubs and weeding elsewhere in the garden. It was running quickly and efficiently, until we hit hole number three. This hole has been termed the hole from hell. We've got rocky, clay soil, and the compaction near the foundation from the fall waterproofing isn't joyous to work in.

I think it took Wifey about 10-15 minutes to dig this much out. Note how she's standing with her full weight on the shovel and nothing is moving.

When we got to the fifth, and final hole, Wifey smelled gas. Well, in actuality, we'd been smelling gas upon occasion at the side of the house since last November. That's when the yahoos who were waterproofing the foundation broke the gas line (and they'd even had a locate done) and we came home to a house with no heat since no one bothered to call us to let us know about the snafu. Because of the rain, we were able to see the air bubbles escaping from the tiny gas leak at the connection joint.

I'm thankful that no one was ever hurt. I'm also thankful that the leak was before the meter and we haven't been paying for all that wasted gas!

The lady with the gas company was quite comical. She asked Wifey how long she'd been smelling gas for. When Wifey told her since last fall, the customer service representative responded, "Um, Ma'am, next time you smell gas you should call us RIGHT AWAY."

So we kept on planting until the gas company showed up.

Here I am measuring up the purple smokebush. I also noticed that you can see my underwear in this photo. I've always been a bit disdainful of people who bend over and reveal their underwear. Who knew that all of this time, I had been one of those people.

Relationships are about compromise, and apparently, gardens are too. Wifey had really wanted a juniper, and so I worked a blue danube juniper into the mix. I had really wanted a smokebush, and Wifey wanted to get rid of a tree that had been knocked by the bobcat during fall construction.

You can see it was a win-win situation.

And finally, the planting was done.

I really enjoy the pairing of the blues and burgundy colours. During the plant selection process, the golden barberry lost out to the euonymus. There's still a touch of the golden yellow tones through the mock orange. I cannot wait to see what it looks like next year when it fills out and I can place some more plantings in front.

Next, we laid down some newspaper and a couple inches of mulch. This should hopefully keep some of the weeds down and assist in our wild violet eradication project.

Coffee Grinds in the Raised Bed

2007-05-24T07:35:00.000-05:00

Last weekend, I started putting some compostables in the second raised bed. After spending part of my morning driving around collecting coffee grinds from two local establishments, this is what found its way into the first layer.

For a little close up.

Sample #1.

Sample #2

I'm not going to provide commentary, as the photos provide food for your own narrative imagination.

Mirror, Mirror on the Wall, Who's the Coolest Dude of All?

2007-05-23T07:08:00.000-05:00

Hair makes a man. Or rather, it's just been discovered that a mod hawk can turn a 9-year-old into the coolest dude on the playground.

It was time for a haircut this past weekend, and Wifey and I convinced Bubaloo that a little something more, something a little spikey in the middle that would deviate from the regular sheep-shearing of his head would be a little bit better. And, cooler. He agreed to let us try out a tiny faux hawk.

While I recognize that the mod hawk is a little dated, and that I pined after a girl with a mod hawk during grad school which was over 3 years ago now, this is a fun and manageable haircut for a kid.

In Bubaloo's own words, his hair has transformed his life. This kid, Landon, who is apparently awesome cause he knows how to do a back flip, played with Bubaloo at school and actually thinks he's cool (and now, not just cause of the hair). The hair was an 'in' to building a friendship that he had started in the winter.

When he was playing by himself earlier this week at the play structure, I caught him entertaining himself in the mirror. He was moving and grooving while checking out his do. He was making googly eyes like a love bird to himself.

Hair, whether it's for girls or boys, plays a big role in self-esteem and concept. Hair is social capital.

Bubaloo has been walking with his head higher, his shoulders straighter and has been strutting around more comfortable in his own skin since his haircut. He hasn't got in a single fight, has been controlling his temper, working better with his peers and actually is looking forward to school. He's not being teased.

I don't know how long the mod hawk infused confidence will last. My only complaint is that ever since the hair transformation, Bubaloo has ceased to blow me kisses from the school bus in the morning.

Brothers & Sisters

2007-05-22T08:26:00.000-05:00

It was noted by social workers when Bella and Bubaloo went into care that they had an unusual sibling relationship. What they noted was unusual was that there didn't appear to be a relationship. Nothing. Nada. Zilch. Other than acknowledging in a matter of fact way that they were indeed related, there didn't seem to be any other strong bond or connection to one another.

Literature on adoption and sibling groups, notes that siblings who have been raised together in circumstances that would cause them to come into care typically have tight bonds and closeness. The eldest child often becomes parentified as the caregiver for the younger siblings. The children learn to rely on each other, have an acute understanding of the other that comes from shared experiences. They are each other's family. And most often, the one thing siblings request when they come into care is that they be placed together.

Since Bella and Bubaloo have become our children, we've watched this sibling relationship develop and grow. We saw snips of sister and brother interaction from the beginning, at least in terms of knowing the other, triggers to set the other one off, being wary of the other's behaviour which would have got them in trouble in the past.

In part, we think that this sibling relationship has had time to grow because for the first time in their lives they are the only two kids in the house. With their foster parents, they were two of five children living in the house in addition to daycare kids. When they were shuffled from relative to relative, there were always cousins and other family members to contend with.

Instead of playing by themselves, or asking us to entertain them individually, Bella and Bubaloo now spend much of their free time playing fantastical, imaginary games together. Or, they ride bikes, go exploring, play nintendo or webkins. They've become playmates and friends. And, even when other friends are over, they tend to all play together.

As part of this blossoming sibling relationship, Bella and Bubaloo decided to have a "camp out" this weekend. This "camp out" took place in Bella's room. She refused to share her double bed with her brother, and instead opted to have him create a sleeping area on the floor beside her.

Bubaloo, wanting so badly to not sleep alone, was delighted with this option and bounced up and down with excitement.

Finally after the chatter died away, they both fell asleep.

As Wifey and I retired for the night, we peeked in on the sibling duo. Somehow Bubaloo had managed to work his way off the floor and into his sister's bed. He must have batted his eyelashes and played a sympathy card.

But, Bella still managed to retain the upper hand. Sleeping perpendicular to her, and about halfway down the bed, Bubaloo was dead asleep and Bella's leg was firmly planted across his face.

This Year Meets Last Year

2007-05-17T10:42:00.000-05:00

While I've been spending a lot of time working on the side garden/veggie garden project, I haven't much discussed the reclaiming of the front garden.

Past - May 2006

Present - May 2007

This one-year-later photo is taken about two weeks earlier in the gardening season and the front lawn hasn't filled out quite as much.

We've gotten rid of the pine tree through an "accident" with a bobcat. The foundation planting of evergreens and an unknown shrub was also a casualty of the foundation waterproofing, as were many of the plants in the mid-section of the garden. Slowly, but surely, we're going to be filling this garden back in and coming up with some sort of plan.

I've planted a mock orange to the left of the front stairway and a lilac to the left near the fence. It's going to take several years for them to grow and fill out.

I'm contemplating a dwarf burning bush for the left front of the house, and some other small shrubbery or large perennials for the centre underneath the window.

Rain Reprieve

2007-05-17T09:57:00.000-05:00

The rain rolled in on Tuesday and I've been able to temporarily turn my attention from outdoor to indoor projects - primarily cleaning a house that hasn't properly been cleaned in a few weeks.

The garden project is looking to be in pretty good shape and we've made lots of progress.

First off, I purchased 1x8 western red cedar from Home Depot, where they also kindly cut the pieces to length. I had tried to find a local lumber yard in search of a lower price, but where I stumbled was in actually locating a lumber yard. Home Depot sold the wood at $10 a board and when I found out that Rona was selling the same wood at $15 a board, I thought I had a deal.

Using these brackets from Lee Valley, I built the first level of each of the three raised beds. Frankly, this was the easiest wood construction project I've ever completed. Simply pre-drill your holes and screw in the brackets.

Our initial plan had been to build 3 beds, with three levels each. Once we had the second level stacked on, it gave us a raised bed depth of 16 inches, over top of another 4-5 inches of topsoil , which is covers the old gravel driveway. We tested what a two level high would look like versus the three level, and were sold with the two level.

The two level bed should give our veggies sufficient root depth. And, we always have the option in the future to add the third level.

This turned out to be an excellent decision as I decided to fill the first bed full of lasagna garden goodness, to give it 2-3 weeks to cook, and managed to deplete all of my organic materials reserve. What we have in this bed is a layer of newspaper, covered with alternating layers of leaves, composted manure, coffee grounds, sphagnum moss, half finished compost, some grass clippings and topsoil.

The other two beds were built up to a second level, and this weekend, I will be working on digging them in, leveling them off, and scraping up some more organic materials. I had hoped to have the second bed filled by now as I've got a bunch of veggies to start from seed.

We also purchased this fabulous rain barrel and have it installed, albeit incorrectly. I wanted to get in in before the week of rain so it could fill up. There's about 1/2 a barrel full now and the water is dirty, dirty, dirty. I think it's time we clean out our gutters. This weekend will also be a great time to fix the downspout and have the barrel installed properly.

This is what the side yard looks like right now. I've contacted two contractors so far about building the new step for the house and a fence and neither have bothered to show up at our arranged meeting times.

I've been itching to plant my tomatoes out for the past week and have held off. I also made a tentative mental plan to get them into their bed this weekend. But my gut tells me not to. It tells me I should wait even longer. And, this week Weather Canada has, too.

It's been very, very chilly here, near the freezing mark, and tonight we have a definite frost warning in effect. May 6 is the supposed "frost free" mark for our fair city. The gardeners' rule of thumb in our zone, or so I'm told, is the Victoria Day weekend. I think I'm not going to risk my two month growing from seed project and give it one more weekend.

Parented Out

2007-05-15T21:22:00.000-05:00

The last week has been the most challenging, trying, exhausting and difficult week in parenting Bella and Bubaloo thus far. We're tired. We're frustrated. We're losing our wits. And, we're on the verge of feeling defeated.

In the last 24 hours, we've become caught in a tunnel of endless consequences. There doesn't seem to be an end and it seems that more bad behaviour and poor choices only net the same bad behaviour and poor choices.

Bubaloo was caught stealing snacks from his classmates lunches last week at school. His teacher indicated that she though it had been going on for about a week. As we began to untangle the web of stories with him, it turns out he had been stealing for much, much longer. About a month and a half.

It all started when he lost his full lunch and lunch bag at school. Instead of telling a teacher, or asking to call home to get a new lunch, he decided to steal to feed himself. This started him on a bandwagon of thievery that only escalated with time. By the time he was caught, he had found a partner in crime and was up to two snacks a day.

The consequence we handed out was that he needed to use his allowance to replace all of the snacks he had stolen from his classmates and apologize to his class for stealing from them. He said to Wifey at the grocery store when purchasing the snacks, "Boy, do I look foolish."

Bella verbally threatened a classmate last week as well by telling him that she would "cut his body up into a whole bunch of pieces and squish them like ladybugs." When called upon by a teacher for this behaviour, she red-faced denied that she ever said that. By the time she got home, her memory had returned, and she admitted the threat.

We discussed how words of anger can be threatening because people are fearful of the action. We talked about better ways to deal with anger and frustration. And, Bella felt that an appropriate consequence would be to write an apology letter.

The apology letter was written and delivered on Monday. Only, she didn't really apologize for what she said. And, that got the other kid more upset and the teacher was called in to mediate the conflict.

This was the tip of the iceberg that began last week. Since then, the pile of offenses has been racking up at an exponential rate.

Bubaloo was sent home from school yesterday for swearing in the classroom - and don't get us started on this for sending a kid home for uttering motherfucker while playing an army game with a friend during indoor recess in the classroom.

Bella missed gymnastics last night because she got distracted by a comic while getting ready to leave for the activity.

Bubaloo ran through the house with muddy shoes after I had spent the whole day cleaning the house and had asked them to take them off.

Bella wasn't ready to go to school this morning because again she was reading a comic.

Ugh, I can't even remember what else has been testing my patience and anger threshold.

Schools are hypervigilant today. Kids' programs are hypervigilant. In turn, I feel like I'm becoming this hypervigilant parent.

Generally, we don't have major behavioural issues with our kids at home. They listen, they're respectful for the most part, and they don't act out in the home the way they do at school.

Writing all this down is cathartic. This looks ridiculous on paper. It's the small, silly, minutiae that's gotten me so riled.

Quashing Santa

2007-05-10T07:32:00.000-05:00

Yesterday in the car, Bella asked me if Santa was real.

It’s May. She truly believes that dragons, faeries and witches are real. Who would have thought that the existence of our mythological holiday friends would questioned in the off season?

She’s also 11. Which is a little old to still unquestioningly believe in the Tooth Fairy, Easter Bunny and the like. But fantasy has always been her escape, a place she inhabits because the world hasn’t been good to her, and I didn’t want to be the one to have to crush that alternate plane of mental imagining.

Her 9 year-old brother doesn’t really believe in Santa. But what he does believe in is the relationship between Santa and presents. He knows about the causal relationship that if he outwardly shows or says he believes in Santa, there will still be presents for him under the tree on Christmas morning. He’s too afraid to say it’s not real, which might make it cease to exist. It’s a big gamble he’s not quite yet willing to take.

Bella asked me if Santa was real. I asked her what she thought (aka, brilliant parental strategy of deflection). She again asked if Santa were real and told me I had to tell her the truth. So I did.

She got really mad it me. Like it was all my fault. Like I had somehow been keeping this big, dark secret that every other kid in her class knew for an eternity. Like the first thing I should have told her when we adopted her three months ago was that Santa wasn’t real.

Apparently, she wants me to start a mental notebook of all the things adults should tell kids between the ages of 0-11 and lay it on her all at once. I'm sure that will go smashingly well.

(Addendum: On Sunday night we got to the second last chapter of Superfudge by Judy Blume. This chapter is all about how Peter pretends to write letters to Santa because his younger brother still believes in Santa. And by the end, it turns out that neither Peter nor Fudge believe in Santa and the parents also verify that Santa isn't real. Why isn't there any warning labels on the book!!! Funny thing was that Bella sat with her fingers plugging her ears repeating I'm not listening cause Santa's real.)

R.I.P Black Prince

2007-05-08T16:05:00.000-05:00

Thanks to my stupidity, and a little help from the poochie, this summer's crop of Black Prince tomatoes have been rendered nearly extinct.

Left on the lower landing for some sun and wind to start the hardening off process, the dog saw us outside through the window, wanted to play and proceeded to dance on top of the tomatoes in excitement.

I knew that was not a good place to leave the tomatoes. But it was the easiest, and in the moment, easy prevailed.

Now nearly two months of work has gone down the tubes. I think only one of the four plants is salvageable.

Oh me, oh my. This sucks. Big time.

Operation Move Dirt Continues

2007-05-08T08:28:00.000-05:00

Operation "move dirt" continued this weekend and into the week. Eleven cubic yards of dirt and two cubic yards of pine mulch later, the new garden space is primed.

Today was supposed to be my day of rest as the forecast called for rain. It was only supposed to be a day of rest from outdoor projects, as the fridge is looking bare and heaps of shedded dog fur are threatening to over take the furniture. My upper body is begging for rest. It's sunny outside, however, and I'm torn.

This picture was taken on Sunday when operation "move dirt" was 3/4 of the way complete.

The dirt pile also was transformed into an army base by Bubaloo, complete with lots of tunnels and little army people. We've never actually encourged him to play army or any other sort of war game. He's just got this inclination for it and has constructed a whole elaborate fantasy world around it.

Each weekend he dons his skateboarding helmet, Wifey's rubber boots, and keeps his PJs on to run around and play. We just clued in that the reason he loves his skateboarding helmet so much is because he pretends it's an army helmet. He's an army man on his bike; he's an army man while playing basketball.

For a kid who isn't even allowed to have a play gun, a water gun or toys with guns, we find it a bit bizarre how every inanimate object gets transformed into a gun - anything from a stick, pole or branch to the leg of a barbie doll. The hose becomes a flame thrower. A big ball of dirt becomes a bomb.

We've given up trying to make army "bad," outlawing and re-directing him to other activities. In part, I think the fascination with army play comes from the fact that the last school he attended while living with his foster parents was located on an army base, where the majority of kids had army parents, and army play was part of daily school yard behaviour.

Instead, we set parameters of safety and separating how we play army in pretend-land from how we act in real life.

To break up army play, Wifey wheeled Bubaloo around in the wheelbarrow as she moved dirt.

(Note: I put that wheelbarrow together all by myself on Friday).

He'd climb in, get covered with dirt, get dumped out and covered with dirt, and spent the whole time doubled over in giggles and begging for more...and to go faster...and to be buried under more dirt.

Wifey was happy to comply. I was the killjoy who had to keep asking them both to stop jumping and compressing the dirt. All day long.

And, yesterday marked the day of finishing touches. I hauled out more of the compacted dirt, did some more grading and then heaped mulch on top of it all.

All that's left to do now is to mulch the front garden and back bed, purchase and install the rain barrel, hire a contractor to build the fence and new steps, purchase wood and build new veggie beds....

Dirt!

2007-05-04T08:04:00.000-05:00

The marathon gardening project of 2007 has begun with the arrival of dirt.

Here's where we last saw the old driveway. One final photo before the arrival of dirt.

Bella and Bubaloo were at school when the dump truck of dirt arrived. Being that I was pretty amazed by the process of dumping 12 cubic yards of dirt, I really do wish the kids could have been home to see it.

This is what 12 cubic yards of dirt looks like. I measured and calculated. The person at the dirt place calculated with my measurements, but I'm not quite sure that we have enough dirt to achieve a 5 inch depth.

Then, it was time to get the much. I opted for shredded pine mulch and now our driveway smells like a christmas tree forest.

I rented a truck and unloaded not one, but two loads of mulch all by myself! This is what a truck full of mulch looks like.

I'm pretty proud of that. Although, my body doth protest this morning. And it protests even more when I tell it we have to go purchase a wheel barrow to start moving the dirt and mulch.

Big Gardening Project(s)

2007-04-30T10:36:00.000-05:00

The big gardening project for 2007 is currently underway. Did I say project? I think I really mean projects. Add a big old 's' to pluralize that 'cause there is definitely more than one underway.

Since the waterproofing of the house, in reality, the whole landscaping around the house has become one big project. And, the garden is a largest part of it.

The tomatoes are under a grow light in the basement and they're doing pretty well. I'm looking forward to eating them, as are my kids. Wifey, on the other hand, is determined to give them all away. I had to tell her yesterday to stop offering up my black tomatoes. If I were to give away all the plants she'd promised, we'd be in a trade deficit.

It's not that we don't have plenty to share. We do. It's just that it's my job to give them away. Not hers.

Some are flourishing more than others. This just popped up today. I'm going to have to find out what the markings on the tomato leaves mean. Any thoughts?

I've also got a compare and contrast growing note. Here is the basil under the grow lights. I don't think it's actually grown at all in the past two weeks (unlike the tomatoes).

This is the basil that I left in the kitchen window sill. It's flourishing, other than it is a wee bit leggy, in the southern sunlight.

Where is the home to all of these plants? It's here! Our former driveway turned future raised bed veggie garden.

Now that I've got rid of the railing, some patio stones and the washing machine stored in the garage over winter is about to depart, a big truck of dirt will soon be visiting our home. Our plan is to put about 6 inches of top soil over the gravel and to build 5 raised veggie beds along the cedar hedge border. We're also going to build a small fence to block off the yard, purchase a rain barrel, and make a container garden alongside the house.

Last week I discovered Freecycle and promptly joined the Ottawa group. Someone responded to my post about the garden railing and picked it up on Sunday. When someone posted a need for patio stones, Wifey and I jumped at the opportunity to help someone out and dispose of one of our back patios.

I spent a few hours on Thursday lifting and stacking the old stone. Yesterday, the stones were picked up and the screening will be going this afternoon. This is going to leave us an excellent space for....grass. I know, I can't believe I actually am going to make lawn.

A few years down the road, we'd love to knock out the windows (see ledge at top of photo), put in french doors and build a big 'ole deck in this space. In the interim, I've rationalized that more grass can be a good thing because it will provide clippings for the compost bins and materials for the lasagna garden in the raised beds.

I spent the other part of my Sunday afternoon weeding the back garden bed, or rather, taking calculated guesses at which ones were weeds and which ones were plants. I really wish I had a before and after photo.

Since re-claiming the over grown bed last summer - the bed where the phlox took over bee balm and everything else - we've been deciding what is and what is not a keeper. It's going to take a few more summers, but we're slowly getting there.

And, while I weeded, Wifey decided to fix the rock wall that was half knocked over during construction last fall. She opted to have less wall and more bed. I'm not complaining as I now get to plant and try out some new flowers.

Yesterday, I was also pleasantly surprised to discover that some of the trilliums survived the pre-construction transplant. I'm not quite sure how these two got here, as I had moved over ten of them under a tree on the opposite side of the front garden. But, I sure was pleased to see them.

April Showers Bring May Flowers

2007-04-29T19:55:00.000-05:00

Wifey had to work all day Saturday. The kids spent all of Saturday asking when she'd be home.

Wifey went into work on Sunday morning, too. I called at 10:00 am and kindly requested that she return home as the kids were asking for her again in 5 minute intervals.

Laden with parental guilt about her absence, Wifey wanted to make sure her return was marked with the memory of the weekend.

After much coaxing and convincing, on went the bathing suits and sandals. Out into the pouring rain they went. And, together they ran around the house three times screaming with laughter, "April showers bring May flowers."

Talent Show

2007-04-26T13:53:00.000-05:00

Last night Bella performed at her school’s talent show.

Wifey and I prepared for days to be supportive like Olive’s parents in Little Miss Sunshine (you know, the scene at the end when it turns out that Olive’s dance talent as choreographed by her Grandfather is really a stripper routine that leaves the audience in shocked, open-mouthed awe at a beauty pageant. Comically hilarious, yet mortifying if it’s your child).

When Bella first decided to audition for the talent show it wasn’t her singing weakness that concerned us, but her choice of songs. See, her song of choice is what she calls her evening lullaby. For us, it just happens to be the only song that Wifey could remember the lyrics to when Bella first called out for a bedtime song in her first few nights here. Now, Wifey serenades the kids to sleep each night with Both Hands by Ani DiFranco.

Both Hands is a song about a relationship dying. Or, according to my Wifey, it’s a song about sex. All in all, not normally the song you hear at a talent show performed by kids in grades 1-6. The poetic beauty of the lyrics “And your bones have been my bedframe / Your flesh has been my pillow” make adults shift uncomfortably in their chairs when they come through lips of an off-key 11 year-old.

At first, we tried to encourage her to make a different song selection for the audition. She wouldn’t.

Then, we expected that the teacher’s would ask her to choose a different song. They didn’t.

And last night, we were there, ready to sing our hearts out alongside her if she morphed into Olive. Thankfully, she didn’t.

We have the whole performance on tape.

What we don’t have on tape is footage of two red-faced parents, shifting awkwardly in their seats, visibly made uncomfortable by the eyes of a packed auditorium boring into the backs of their heads. I do believe that the accompanying unspoken mental narrative would have been, “Who the hell taught their kid a lesbian sex song? Thank god that’s not my kid! That was awkward.”