mama monday: the tension

Last week I spent 30 minutes in the "family planning" aisle of Shoppers staring at ovulation predicting options.  Do I want my luteinizing hormone to be represented by a "+" symbol?  A double blue line?  A straight forward "yes"?  A digital smiley face?

A DIGITAL SMILEY FACE.

I began to wonder how the human race ever multiplied without the use of digital luteinizing hormone predictor kits.  

And there I saw it, the symbol of the past year, all it's struggles, and all it's tension: I feel like my life is metaphorically sitting on the shelf sandwiched between KamaSutra's Weekend Travel Kits and Canesten.

"Life ought to be a struggle of desire toward
adventures whose nobility will fertilize the soul."

- Rebecca West (1892-1983)

foto friday: table of contents

I am privileged (and brainwashed) enough to own an iPhone.  In fact, my iPhone is a FrankeniPhone my brother pieced together from the body of my first iPhone (which I dropped on the sidewalk) and the screen of my second iPhone (which I dropped in the toilet).  Scientists are searching for the relation between me, iPhones, and gravity.

My FrankeniPhone works marvelously now and is a beautiful tribute to my previous iPhones that have gone on to a better life...as a third iPhone.  If Apple is out there reading this: yes, yes I would consider being sponsored.  Please ignore the part about dismembering your product(s).

I love to take pictures with my FrankeniPhone of things that tickle my fancy.  Most of the time I post these images on Twitter but since use wireless instead of the 3G capability of my phone (again, Apple, please omit), and rarely pick up wireless when I see these things, they stockpile until I delete them.

BUT NO LONGER.

Welcome to my world, via my FrankeniPhone (click on image to enlarge):

Which came first: the chicken or the drunk? 

This is a store front in the Junction that has been teasing me and Andrew for weeks now.  It had better be freaking awesome.

Tiger.  Lily.

At least Value Village should have the decency to clothe them.

When you want to feel scared, circa 1983.

I love old people using new technology. 

This is our church's neighbourhood, Roncesvalles. 
It's going through a tough time right now due to construction and restructuring.  I want to meet whoever wrote/designed these posters.

wifercize wednesday: editor-in-chief

Andrew and I both graduated from University of Toronto and majored in English and, although he doesn't think that Erindale campus "counts", Andrew is one of the only people I know who can match me in a battle of vocabulary.  We whisper sweet grammar in each other's ears.

The only possible downside to this situation (other than driving our friends crazy and making them nervous to write us emails, lest we send them back with a failing grade) is that we take our editors into everyday life with each other.  Clichés are out of the question, social memes are allowable only ironically, and sources must be quoted verbatim.

Over the years, Andrew has drawn the line with a few of my favourites.  He recently canned verbal usage of "O.M.G."  and refers to my punctuation as suffering from Commaitis.  I have parried with forbidding "praiselluia" and "B.T.dubs" (which is a horrendous short-form of "B.T.W." which is already a short-form of "by the way"...atrocious).  We hold each other to account each time we use the popular fillers such as "like", "whatnot", "what have you", and have almost eradicated any usage of the verb "to get", which I deem the Lazy Man's Verb (LMV for short) since you can almost always use another verb to explain yourself more clearly:

"I got this on sale." = "I bought this on sale." (better: "I purchased this on sale.")
"I got a cold." = "I caught a cold." (better: "I acquired a cold.")
"Did you get that?" = "Did you understand that?" (better: "Did you comprehend that?")

I hear the practice isn't uncommon to most relationships, including friends, siblings, and co-workers.  I'm curious: what colloquialisms will you not stand for?

welcome to mama mondays...

Blogging is a fickle thing.  It's not quite a journal and it's not quite a Twitter feed.  It's both personal and public.  I worry that it's being read and then I worry that it's not being read.  I like my privacy and I like my honesty.

I started this blog in 2005 (happy 5th year anniversary, me!) to update people about my year spent teaching English in Korea.  From there, it chronicled my travels in the UK, moving house six times, becoming a girlfriend, becoming a wife, and becoming a pastor.  It has served me well.

What better way to keep the blog honest and current than dive into the topic of parenting?  Anticlimactically, this August marks a year of "trying" (translation: a fabulous year of sex-having!) and this isn't the highly anticipated here's a picture of our positive pee test! post.  Nope, not yet.

Still, there are lots of thoughts on parenting that I've been mulling over, and I keep accumulating more, so I'd like to post some of them here.  To begin, some on pre-conception:

• Prenatal pills have made my hair grow an inch a month. 
• There are acronyms for everything to do with fertility on the internet.  "TTC", for example, once meant only public transportation in the city of Toronto.  Evidentally also means "trying to conceive" by lots of cybermoms.
• Said cybermoms, or cybermoms-to-be, are an opinionated bunch.  You can find advice online that contradicts every other piece of advice you find online.
• When I was single and naïve, I told a friend who was trying to conceive: "It's easy.  Just have sex, like, ALL THE TIME."  Graciously, she shook her head and said nothing.  As many of you are doing now.

Welcome to the journey and feel free to post your anecdotes (really...I love stories).  We'd love to hear from those of you who are thinking of trying, those of you trying, those of you who have tried, and those of you who are now parents either by birth, adoption, or fostering.

Cybermoms welcome!

foto friday: midsummer night's dream

A few weekends ago, a bunch of friends gathered together to celebrate the birthday of Miss Jess.  Instead of booking a reservation at a restaurant (how 2009!) or crowding someone's living room we took the festivities outside - and the result was magic!

People took turns climbing benches, tables and trees (including Melissa B., who is in her third trimester) to set the backdrop.  Guests supplied wine and food, we started a few games of cards, and the party lasted well into the night. 

Afterwards, Jess mused that the decor, tone and characters of the evening were such a perfect representation of her and what she loves.  As if the curtains of her heart had been drawn and there we all were.  Celebrating her, surrounded by decorative beauty, having fun.

If the curtains of your heart were drawn, what would you see?

wifersize wednesday: gentle people of san fran

More pictures here.

Andrew and I went to California for vacation last week and fell in love.  With California and with each other.  There was a lot of love going on.  California seems to have that affect.

During the week we were attending a school at Bethel Church in Redding, but on Saturday we opted for a road trip to San Fransisco.  Prior to the trip we joked about being as touristy as possible: wearing flowers in our hair, riding the cable car, and dancing like children of the night.  Unfortunately, we forgot to pick flowers, I rode the cable car for 30 seconds while Andrew took pictures from the rental car, and we danced-like-children-of-the-night in the car as we drove past the Palace of Fine Arts Theater because we couldn't find the entrance.

Despite the items that we didn't check off of our list, we spent the afternoon doing pretty much everything else.  Golden Gate Bridge, shopping at Haight/Ashbury (double rainbow!), and lurching down Lombard Street were all part of the day's adventures.  Everyone was right: we needed our cardigans.

By my favourite part of the journey was the six hours (three hours each way) spent in the car listening to satellite radio (Tchaikovsky on the way there, comedy on the way back), driving through the Central Valley of California (the birthplace of valley girls), distinguishing almond trees from olive trees, and daydreaming together.

A friend of mine recently went on a canoeing expedition with her husband in Temagami for over a week.  She told me that they canoed for eight to nine hours every day with hardly anything said between them.

I've always loved the idea of shared silence between spouses.  So much of marriage is based on communication (...talk about the future, talk about your fears, talk about your feelings...) that it's a treat to say nothing and let all the thoughts and love hang in the air like wisps of smoke.

And that's what I'll remember of our trip to San Fransisco.

wifercize wednesdays: la fiancée

Other than having a fancy French title to call each other by, many couples discover that engagement has few frills.  While congratulations, gifts, and parties are plentiful they usually find themselves overwhelmed and under-rested; at some point at least one of them will grab their beloved and, with a look of crazed enthusiasm in their eyes, whisper: "LET'S JUST ELOPE."

The list of duties cascade like endless confetti, celebratory and chaotic, all while the betrothed are required to juggle family traditions, budgeting, premarital counseling, sleep deprivation, and losing (or gaining) a dress size or two.  Sadly, romance threatens be squeezed out of what should otherwise be a very romantic season.

Andrew and I survived engagement fairly well, thanks to the best family and bridal party two people could have, but it was not without its hiccups.  If you or someone you know have recently shed a tear over reception seating arrangements, here are a few guidelines to help you keep perspective:

1. Learn to delegate.  Even the Martha Stewarts of us need to learn to give jobs away to those who are eager to help.  Moms, sisters, aunts, cousins, bridesmaids, friends...they might be hesitant to inquire (remember when you gave them a seven page printout of detailed instructions regarding the last time they asked?) but, trust me, they want to support and help you.  Let them.
   
   
2. Don't sweat (literally) the small stuff.  Almost every blushing bride is nervous about their appearance in one way or another.  I must grow my hair longer, I must lose pounds, I must stop losing pounds, I must tone my arms/butt/stomach, I must be more tanned, I must whiten my teeth, I must improve my complexion...  Think about it: by now (hopefully), your fiancé has seen you weeping mascara all over your face, lying on a couch with the flu, red in the face during a fight, and after a PMS induced ice cream binge.  He has still thought it wise to invest a lot of thought and money into purchasing a ring to adorn your untanned finger.  To him, you are beauty.
   
   
3. Keep perspective.  Your wedding might be the biggest event of your life so far, but what lies just beyond it is far superior to it in terms of importance, enjoyment, and length.  Make sure your hopes for a special day don't land you with a mountain of arguments and debt to sort out in your first year of marriage.  In the wise words of my mother: "This too shall pass."
   
   
4. Take a look at him.  This crazy man has begun a process that will end in him promising to love, protect, protect, challenge, encourage, support, and sex you up for as long as you both shall live.  Don't let him get lost in the yards of tulle.  Make time to have a regular, weekly date night where wedding details are off the agenda (this will have to be your initiative, since it's usually us who casually bring them up...all...the...time) and you can spend time remembering why you're doing this in the first place.  Because you've found your man.

It's only a blip in the spectrum of your life but engagement is loaded with lots of opportunities to enjoy yourself, your future husband, and your prenatal marriage. 

Freddy was at his wittiest, referring to Cecil as the "Fiasco"--family honoured pun on fiance.

- A Room With a View (E.M. Forester)