Time Travel - Back to the Real World

Two years!

Wow, life has been happening, and changing and we've been riding the wave, but with this back to school season things seem to be craving routine more than usual, and here's a favourite place of mine to lay it out on the line.

On top of my oldest boy going back to class and into grade one, my little girl is heading off to preschool. And as if that's not enough, my partner in crime is going back to work after a ten month leave because (buh da da daaa!) we had another baby!

Life is wild right now, which has been a blast this summer, but it just won't work come September, so I have a major organizational overhaul to undertake.  The biggest catalyst (other than the fact that I am a compulsive planner and listmaker, especially when under stress) is that my kids are growing up too fast! Bugaboo is in Grade One! How did that happen?  I'm realizing that keeping my nose to the grindstone and making it from day to day is not enough. This is our life, the few years we'll all share as a family, and there are things I want to do with this precious time. I want it all, and for that, I'm going to need some planning.

I found, quite by mistake, a really concise image that encapsulated this kind of planning for me in a local outdoor living type magazine. It's a calendar-wheel that balanced gardening and skiing according to the season.  I knew I wanted that, so I penned down a few lists (see, I'm all about the lists) about what I want to do with my time now and what my long term dreams are.  Put down like that, it's easy to weigh what I want in my life with how I spend my time (ie maybe a little too much on pinterest). Anyhow, I've kept that chart in mind these last few years and realized how much I crave balance in my life. And again, like I said, this needs a plan!

So coming up on the night before school, I'm doing a brief series on my plans for organizing, well, just about everything.

Should be interesting.

Take care!

a consideration on equality

This is my boy.  He turns 4 today.  His favorite things are trampolines, kayaks and tools.  He loves trucks and lego and action figures.  But he also loves my little pony, princesses, baby dolls and baking.

A little while back I made a tutu for my daughter.  After finishing it, Bugaboo asked for one too.  I'd like to say I gave it to him right away, but I hesitated.  I could see no good reason for him to not have one, because there isn't one.  So I made him a tutu.

He loves it.  If something so simple could bring him so much happiness, how could I have not wanted him to have it?

The actual issue is on a different level entirely, because if I want to raise him to be a man who sees women as equals, how can I not let him play with 'girl things'.  If we start pointing out what is for girls and what is for boys at an early age, how can they not see themselves as suited for some things, but not others.

In school I wrote a paper on gender as a social construct.  Since having a little boy and a little girl, I know I was, to a degree, incorrect.  They really are different creatures.  They have different ways of thinking, and while all kids are unique (wildly so), there are noticeable and predictable trends of 'girl' vs 'boy'.  That doesn't mean they can't do the same things, just that they will probably find different ways to do them.

As a feminist who sometimes struggles with my decision to be a stay-at-home mother, I want my children to grow up to be happy with themselves for who they are, not because of which social gender stereotypes they are or are not conforming to.

So, while girls and boys are not the same, you can't teach them to think of each other as equals unless you treat them the same.

I was impressed by actor Dustin Hoffman's insights into inequality.  While preparing to film Tootsie, he started to ask himself how he would have been different if he had been a woman.  I ask that of myself when deciding something for my children; would my decision be different if he was a girl?  If so, than I am making a mistake.

Women, as a group, are not given equal rights as men, but at the same time, a girl who plays hockey, or builds with lego is praised, while a boy who wants to do ballet or play with baby dolls is at best tolerated.  There are scores of great children's books showing brilliant strong females, but where are the stories of sensitive, delicate boys?

My ramblings don't really have a finite point, I'm just circling around the thought that no man would think of a woman as equal when they're told they cannot do the same things as a child.

So, while the thought of nail polish on my little man goes against my grain, I'll not let that be a decision that leads him to be an adult who would hesitate letting a woman do a man's job.  Or vise versa.

Happy Birthday Bugaboo.

*This was originally meant to be a post about tutus entitled "a foray into frills", but this felt more important.  Also, please notice that I avoided saying "men treating women as equal" and instead put "thinking of women as equal".  Oh, and I highly recommend following the links.  Just a suggestion.

rip sweet hp (and hello summertime!)

So, after 5 years, my sweet sweet laptop has died.  My darling hubby is a bit of a mr-fixit, and I knew it was over when he suggested I start browsing the lappys and tablets next time I was at the store.  It's serious when even he doesn't think something's salvageable.  So I've stolen onto his system (which is much more tech-y and password protected and overwhelming than my cute little setup) for this little update, which is basically to say that while I'll try to keep things up to date, computer-type things are on tenuous ground for now.

 I'll keep on sewing (and knitting, and painting, and gardening, and camping, and kayaking, and having picnics on the beach, and perhaps this forced 'summer break' is not such a bad thing) though.

Have a brilliant summer!

*my children are oddly safety conscious; it was their idea to wear their life jackets in 6 inches of water, not mine.

beach time baby!

Happy Canada Day!

And while it's officially been summer for a week or so we are finally feeling it!  I've been wanting to make some of these up for a while, so I'm happy to finally have gotten a chance to do some up and take them for a test run.

Woohoo, beach ponchos!

Actually, I was thinking more of a pool poncho.  You see, after swim class, we normally warm up by sticking our toesies in the hot tub (my guys are too little to be jumping in entirely) and then I try and wrap them up in our towel as best I can.  The towel doesn't really stay on them well and always gets wet, so I made up some towel ponchos.  Unfortunately, Bugaboo got an ear infection so we missed the last swim class, however, these work just as well at the beach or waterpark.

Bugaboo wanted a dinosaur...

(he makes a pretty good dinosaur, stomping along the beach)

And for Little Bean, I decided a jellyfish (she's pretty easy going).

Hope they get lots of chances to use them this summer!

Roar!

things are growing in the garden

I am usually impressed by how fast things grow here (out west), but this is a new record.  The garden we planted mid-May is growing hearty and already making an appearance on our dinner plates!

Now, anyone who has grown radishes before probably would have known this, but I was amazed.  These ones are a variety that can grow up to the size of baseballs, but I don't really need that much radish in my life.  I'll probably let a few get that big, but just for the photos.

My little helpers are really loving it too.  They do most of the watering and some of the weeding/thinning out (mostly the thinning out where it doesn't necessarily need it, but oh well).

Marvelous, aren't they!

Also, our gnomes (who usually live in our garden, as glimpsed here, or behind us in the first photo) have suffered an accident (at the hands of Little Bean, she may be small, but is far from delicate).  While they're awaiting repair, we have a flamingo friend taking their place watching over the garden.  I'm calling him Havelock, the Predatory Flamingo.  This is Bugaboo's impression of him:

I have an unusual love for tacky garden ornaments.

hot stuff!

Hopefully you remember my chef attire I made a few years back.  They get lots of use, even played the role of a last minute Halloween costume.  Well, they normally get used in the real kitchen, but the kiddoes also have a play kitchen, and I felt they could use a pair of these:

They're extremely simple to make, other than how bulky they are.  Making a tiny little thumb out of material that thick was annoying.  I lined it in a white towel I bought at Walmart, which was super cheap, and then sewed a diagonal checked pattern before stitching it together.

However, they are dearly loved (Bugaboo hovered over me the entire time I was taking the photos, waiting for them back).  Plus the fabric is adorable!  I may or may not have bought enough for me to make an apron for myself out of it.  Photos to follow if that ever happens.

The technique needs a bit of perfecting, but they do the job.  Now my little chefs' fingers will be safe from imaginary burns.

PS - I have just noticed that I have not actually said what those are.  They're an oven mitt and a little potholder, just in case it's not obvious.

bow-tie lepidoptery

These are what I've been sewing up for fun lately.

Cute eh?  Little shadowboxes full of bow-ties. Or just bows, I guess; the 'tie' is optional.  And since I had my very fist fancy schmancy business fair to trot them off to (very small scale, but still lovely), I got to try my hand at a little lepidoptery. 

Now, I had meant to get a nice photo or two of the display I had set up, but to be honest, I was a little frazzled that day, and it just didn't happen.  Hopefully I will remedy this next time I get to go out among people and show off my wares.

Bugaboo is the kind of kid who wears ties, often of his own volition, sometime for no reason at all.  He's really big on costumes and accessories.  He wore his tie the whole morning (of the business-fair thing).  He even snatched a cape from my display to pair with it (he's cuter than my mannequin anyways).  He looked a bit like a tiny magician; perhaps I need to look into top hats.

Bow Ties!  A whole happy pile of 'em.  Now, however, I do have some actual work to do (took the week off for visitors, now it's time to play catch-up).

Oh, one final note from the business fair; my 'Wandering Seamstress' Geocache is hidden in my display.  It was spotted by one cacher, whether or not it gets logged...  I'll give a heads up next time she's out and about, ready to be found, until then you can check her out at the geocaching website, with TB46K8T for a reference code.

Toodles!