The last stitch.

This is one youtube I love to watch. It's about knitting, but also about life and our endless quest for more, of never being able to just stop and be in this moment. Love it.

xoxo

C

This morning I got up early, before the rest of the house, as usual. Fed Mr. Bruce, made my tea, started the laundry, made salad and baked cookies. We will be out most of today so I need to have enough snax and lunch ready to take with us. I fed the birds, took my vitamins. As each child woke up I hugged them and confirmed their morning toast order. I checked my email on my way through the livingroom. Then as I stood buttering their toast I tried to process the news I had just read.

A childhood friend's mother has just died, my email told me. And I recalled lunches in their kitchen, sleepovers at their neat house in the woods, her mother's voice as she lamented my friend for not doing her chores or laughing at my friend's jokes. I can see her husband, such a great dad, and how they were always together, partners, in life, in businesss and in caring for each other and their daughters. They were one of my 'dream' families, you know, the ones you wish you belonged to when your own was driving you nuts. And now she is gone. My heart aches for my friend, whom I haven't chatted with in 15 years. For her sister, her sweet daughters, and for her father, who has lost his partner, his best friend. It's just hard, all around.

And I stood their buttering, thinking of how stressed out I can get trying to show my loved ones that I care, to honour my friends, to try to do what I can for those in my big, gregarious family of people. And how much I stress about living my life 'right'. That I want to arrive at my final days feeling that I spent my life well, I did what I hoped and did not waste a minute. When will I have that career I dreamed of, when will I travel like I planned to in high school, when will I get all those books read? Yet each day I am taken over by the minutae, the details of what, when, how now. And that focus is lost. You get lost in your life, no matter how much you try to remember the big picture. But maybe that is not such a bad thing. To live constantly trying to shift your focus, trying to be sure you remember what really matters, is hard. It can really stress a gal out. And maybe being lost in your life is the same thing. Instead of focusing on the bigger picture, the big to do list, the forever-looking-ahead-to-be-sure-you've-got-it-all-lined-up-so-when-you-look-back-it's-a-life-well-spent thing can make you miss it, your life. Can make you forget what is going on now, how much you love it, or not, but that this is it, the life you've got. It could all be over tomorrow, or in 30 years. Maybe living in these days, getting lost in the tiny details and distracted by the toast crumbs is okay. It's being present, now, when that life you keep worrying about is happening right in front of you.


It's something worth remembering.






xoxo

C

On the water . .

When you are on the ferry, life is good. The islands float by, maybe the sun is shining down on you out on the deck, or maybe the day is cloudy and grey and you watch it go by from inside the boat. Either way, it is a reminder of the awesomeness of where we live. I imagine people living in the various geographies of Canada have their own similar connections to the landscape that is the backdrop to their lives. I have ridden the ferry for as long as I can remember. As a child, on holiday with my parents, then after their divorce, traveling to Al's cabin more weekends than I could ever count. As an adult I attended many a midwifery meeting in Victoria, and Kit and I camped and road tripped around the Coast. We lived in Roberts Creek on the Sunshine Coast, and years later made a final move to Victoria. The ferry has been such a constant in my life, and I am always restored when I can make that connection to my unique landscape.

Today, I soaked up some sun.

Yes, life is good.

xoxo

C

So far . . .

It has been months since my last post and a lot has happened. Some big birthdays happened around here which must be mentioned first.
A very lovely little person turned FIVE this winter! And now she'd like to be let in on all the action thank-you very much.

And then not much later an amazing fellow strutted through his ELEVENTH birthday! Holy cow! Do you all remember when he was only ONE??

In case you're wondering, both these great days were celebrated in Hawaii, in the lovely warm, humid sunny weather we love. It was great, each day debating pool or beach, and we generally opted for both.

We checked out the familar sights (the zoo, the reefs) and added in the Foster's Historical Garden in Waikiki. We saw crazy plants and gorgeous flowers. But we were not prepared for this:

What a crazy-looking tree! Pods growing off the sides!

We have since learned that lots of tropical, pod-bearing trees grow just like this. Cocoa trees are a prime example.


We were blessed to have friends and family make the island trek to come and visit us over the winter. It is so much fun to have the house filled with good buddies. The kids are forever busy and us adults just sit back and let the mayhem reign

And on all those rainy West Coast winter days, we kept ourselves busy. If you have these supplies (duct tape, empty beer cans, empty milk cartons and some odd-shaped containers, we used tofu and BIO-K) you can make the coolest thing.

A Star Wars AT-AT walker planter. How awesome is that?!!

The plants look a little rough in that pic, but it's been sitting on the counter in a bright window for months now, being spritzed daily by its attentive creator (Hannah) and now it is a flourishing forest that currently houses a fierce battle between Darth Vader and a tough little Ewok.


Speaking of battles, another sort of battle is waged regularily in our basement, and it looks something like this:

Those Nerf guns are definitly the best family gift ever!

Leif and Hannah have created many treasure hunts and quests for Ivy this winter. They are full of intrigue and challenges, like this one. She is so lucky to have such great siblings I tell ya'.

"WHOEVER DRAWS THE SWORD CAN DEFEAT THE MONSTER" it reads.


We checked out a new burger place that opened in town, Big Wheel Burger. I know, you'd never expect us to say that, we are not burger people. The kids asked us if this was what McDonald's was like. Oh no little grasshoppers, this is nothing like that. Big Wheel is a joint collaboration between a bunch of local chefs who wanted to create the old-fashioned burger place of yesteryear, using local, organic ingredients. So they have fries and burgers hand made from local, organic beef and spuds, buns from an island bakery and gluten-free buns from the awesome Origins bakery just up the street from us. Milk shakes from Island Farms milk and ice cream and local beer from Phillips rounded out the great all-local menu. It was very tasty, we ordered far too much, and will keep it in mind if we're at the beach this summer and have that childhood burgers-at-the-beach feeling.

And now it is spring, and we have proof that the weather is warming up. The bees are out! Wahoo!

xoxo

Caelen