Archive for August, 2009

My husband and I go for long car rides when we are stressed out. When life gets hard sometimes there is nothing easier then loading everybody up in the car and just driving. There is a sense of freedom and abandonment, like your driving away from all your problems. We have no great destination in mind; we just fill up on gas and go.

This week has been one of those weeks, when you wake up with the overwhelming feeling that you need to run away from everything, if only for a few hours.

This time, after driving down familiar back roads and through old childhood neighborhoods we stopped at a favorite Italian restaurant.  If carbs can’t fix you, nothing will, needless to say I ordered extra bread.

I also ordered a latte. 

There is nothing like the comfort of a great latte – and Italians – good Italians – make a great latte.  Instantly, I was transported to an easier time, when my then boyfriend (now husband) and I camped out for a few months on my best girlfriend’s kitchen floor in her tiny downtown apartment. Everyday I would walk down Commercial drive and get a great Italian latte.

At night, we would lie on our air mattress; kitchen table pushed 2 feet away into the living room and wonder what the future would be like. We thought those days, being homeless, living off student loans and coffee would be the hard days.

I look back, over a latte, and remember them as great days. I can only hope my girls get to be homeless, living with their boyfriend, in their girlfriend’s apartment, with her boyfriend, on an old air mattress, in the kitchen, drinking coffee.

Note to self

*It is worth driving far for great coffee

With children it is hard to live clutter free.

And nothing can make you feel more inadequate then the day the new issue of the IKEA catalogue lands on your doorstep.

Sure, there is nothing more exciting then the initial reaction that something came to your house by post that wasn’t a bill.

The IKEA catalogue stands alone as a holy illustrated critique on how easily a family can live in a small modern space- clutter free. Pictures of tidy little rooms, packed with furniture, kids at play quietly in the background, these are my equivalent to those gold Russian icons.

I’m half way to the little perfectly designed living room… mine’s little, what more do I need? I’ve got the storage boxes, I’ve got the cute kid tubs, I’ve got a SAMLA… in fact I’ve got 6.

I’ve got the LIATORP, 2 BILLY’s, and a bedroom full of MALM, what can I be missing? Probably one of those under the bed storage boxes… will that hold a Little Tikes kitchen?

Maybe I’ve gone about it the wrong way, I probably needed an INREDA. It comes with drawers, and doors and lights… does it vacuum?

Perhaps I’m just not clean enough?

So in my vain attempts to rid myself the clutter, I decided to start with Olivia’s SVALA as it was covered in drawings, crayons and stickers. I grabbed the papers, rolled them up and threw them in the recycling bags; put the crayons away in their GRUNDTAL and the stickers in the DRONA. A few minutes later, after teaching clutter a lesson, I was feeling good about myself again and sat down to peruse the rest of the catalogue.

Not a second later did I hear a “HEYYY, that’s mine” followed by a rustling and a little pouty faced Olivia walking in with her rolled up (okay, crumpled) art. She immediatly spread it back out onto her table, poured out the crayons and, for flare, dumped the sticker box back out. Forgive me for not spotting a Picasso.

How are you going to solve that one IKEA?

*Note to self

DO THE SWEDISH SPELL EVERYTHING IN CAPITALS?

Fact

*I have a case of the sads.

Sorry for the delay in posting, my apologies…

My Grandpa passed away last week and between both my grandfathers, he was by far my favourite – yes, I said it – I picked a favourite. We all say we love everyone equally, but we don’t. We have favourites and he was mine. (And just for the record, I won’t tell you which kid I like best… because I love them both equally of course…)

Grandpa didn’t talk much – which was very scary when you are little- but as I grew older it became comforting. You could sit with him looking out onto the lake and not feel as though you needed to say a word, words didn’t matter.

He was a good man, hardworking and strong – and every Johnny Cash song reminds me of him. (Possibly because they both had a certain country air about them – or because they both had round faces…either way…) I love him and that will never become a past tense feeling.

I love him because he was kind, whistled through his teeth, and hugged you like he meant it.

When Russell Morley passed away on August 6^th, he did not leave me, but I will miss seeing his crooked teeth when he smiled.

Note to self  

*Sometimes shit sucks