I’m so not a morning person. I haven’t been for as long as I remember. I got up earlier when I was a kid I suppose but for decades now I’ve been someone who loves to stay up late and sleep late the next day (this has been a problem for over eight years now, what with having two kids who enjoy mornings very much). However, this morning – even though I had nowhere to go for hours – I purposely got up with my alarm clock at 5 am so I could watch two people I’ve never met get married.

Yes, I got up before the sun just to see Prince William and Kate Middleton tie the knot.

Since I hadn’t gotten to bed until after 11:30 last night, I was groggy and bleary-eyed during the time that it took to boot up my laptop and head over to the live BBC stream on YouTube (God I love the Internet). As soon as I saw William and Harry in their car leaving Buckingham Palace I woke right up though and it was worth it to be a bit tired just to be able to watch their wedding.

I don’t know how to explain why I’m interested in the Royal Family. I wouldn’t want to be a part of it, I really don’t think I could handle the pressure, the scrutiny, and the whole deal of always being told how to act. William seems to handle it quite well, Harry appears to blow it off by being the unpredictable wild child, and from what I can tell so far Kate is going to deal with it with the self-confidence she has. However, despite not wanting to be a royal person myself (well, maybe when I was a little girl. Or when I’m washing dishes and wishing I had a house full of servants) I am fascinated by this family. It started with Diana and I remember hearing she had died as I sat in a bar downtown. I also remember getting up in the middle of the night to watch her funeral so of course I was going to get up to see her first born son marry his own princess-to-be.

The ceremony was wonderful and beautiful and I am a sap so I was a little teary in parts. The speeches and sermons and lessons were fantastic and I enjoyed every minute of it. I had to get Hayley ready for school but the ceremony was wrapped up before I had to usher her out the door. She missed the balcony kiss but Breanna and I watched it together (and then she re-watched it repeatedly on YouTube, I think I’m in for trouble in the future) and then I showed Hayley after school. The three of us did sit and watch the whole wedding together though, eating scones on the couch.

I also remarked on Facebook and Twitter that Harry was going to wind up single again if he didn’t put his eyeballs back in his head and stop drooling over Pippa Middleton – who looked unbelievably gorgeous.

I know not everyone is into watching the Royal Wedding and that’s okay, I don’t mind if people have no interest. However I saw a few people here and there snidely making comments about how it must be nice that we can all just forget about Libya, murders, Japan, etc etc since all news coverage was set aside to cover the wedding. I completely disagree. I don’t think it’s disrespectful to leave the tragedies for a few hours. They’ll still be there at the end of the day. Meanwhile I started my day with a big smile because for once I turned on the news channel while I prepared breakfast and instead of horror and despair I saw hope and love and joy. I think I might need to re-think my compulsion to watch the national news in the mornings because it really changed my outlook first thing out of bed. There’s something to be said about happy news for a change.

In the meantime, although Hayley enjoyed the wedding tremendously, it seems to have had a huge effect on Breanna. After the wedding was over (and once she was done staring down the balcony kiss), she changed out of her pajamas which is rare for her to do of her own free will. She pranced out of her room with a long fancy dress on, brushed her hair until it gleamed, and has been wearing a tiara for so many hours that I’m wondering if I’ll be able to convince her to take it off at bedtime. She has also been referring to herself as Princess Breanna and practiced curtsying a few times.

And in the time that it took me to type this up she watched this a few more times.

I think she fully intends to find herself a prince. Now I just need to get myself a really awesome fancy hat.

I nearly forgot about Earth Hour this year but Hayley reminded me after they discussed it at school and then it was mentioned quite a bit in my friends feed on Facebook. A lot of people like to complain about Earth Hour saying that it’s a useless observation. They say that it doesn’t make any sort of substantial change as far as energy conservation goes because as soon as the hour is over people turn their lights, computers, televisions, etc. back on and forget about it.

I disagree though. Yes, many people will go right back to their usual ways but if even a small percentage decide that it’s nice to not have everything lit up like you’re trying to land planes, well that’s a chance for a difference. It’s also about education. I can talk about energy conservation with the kids at any time but having a special day set aside (such as this one or Earth Day in April) makes it more interesting for them. Hayley liked knowing that people all around the world were shutting off their lights at a specific time.

Anyway, our Earth Hour was low-key, no big gathering or party although that would have been fun too. We simply shut everything off and lit candles in the living room, and I brought out the little candle fondue set. I put chocolate in the fondue, cut up bananas, apples, and strawberries, and we sat together as a family just enjoying ourselves.

At one point they both wanted to use their DSi and although they could have theoretically done that (since they were charged up and required no power) I told them that would sort of defeat the purpose anyway. I explained that part of Earth Hour is to conserve energy but part of it is also to remind ourselves that we don’t need electronics every second of the day (that’s a good reminder for me too, me being the person who uses my iPod Touch to check my email as soon as I wake up, often before I even roll out of bed).

We just talked and hung out, and at one point Hayley decided to do the before-bed yoga routine she’s been doing for about a month. It seemed like such a nice idea that I did a little bit of yoga myself. I think I may have to do candlelit yoga again soon.

Once 9:30 came around – actually it was almost 9:45 by the time we noticed the clock – we got the kids ready for bed and George and I did turn the TV back on for a movie. We didn’t turn all the lights back on though, just a little bit of light. We watched The Day After Tomorrow which, yes, is a ludicrous movie but it’s exciting and I thought it was kind of fitting to watch something that showed results of climate change after celebrating Earth Hour.

Next year I think it might be fun to invite some friends over for the evening; if our future home in Halifax has a fireplace (a lot of them do!) that would be nice too, to sit by the fire in the dark.

Did you celebrate Earth Hour? What did you do?

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One last thing – My sister (who has moved her blog to a new location) is 39 weeks along in her pregnancy today. She could go into labour at any moment (theoretically; she said that she doesn’t feel any signs that birth is imminent right now) and she put up a post asking for readers to guess when her baby will be born. If you could take a moment, please go take a guess and maybe you’ll be right! Breanna picked today, the 28th and Amanda’s father-in-law had a vivid dream that it would be today as well. I think Baby Guthrie will make an appearance on April 1st. What do you think?

I knew I hadn’t gotten around to updating for awhile but I hadn’t realized just how long it had been until my sister emailed me to see if I was okay. When your own family member (especially one who has a tendency to skimp on blogging herself, ahem!) notices your unplanned leave of absence you know it’s been awhile. Obviously I can’t catch you up on every single day, nor would you want to know every last detail, but I can update on some of the bigger moments since we flipped the calendar to 2011.

We celebrated New Year’s Eve at home which is nothing new for me. I’m not really into going to parties or bars on that day although I have always said I’d love to do Times Square for the ball drop just once before I die. What was different this year was getting to celebrate with George. The thing with being a musician is that it’s not unusual to be booked for a gig on a night like New Year’s Eve. Luckily for me it didn’t happen this year so for the first time since Hayley was three months old we got to ring in the new year together.

We kept it low-key. We introduced the kids to E.T. and they both loved the movie (Hayley was so enthralled that she brought home a book about him from the library this week!). We also enjoyed some appetizers, most of which were Indian, so I was very happy indeed, and the girls drank ginger ale from champagne glasses while George and I had some red wine. We hung out in the living room until Dick Clark’s Rockin’ New Year’s Eve came on. It’s a tradition of mine to watch that and even though Ryan Seacrest has taken over most of the hosting duties I still can’t help but put it on. I had a wee fangirl moment while watching New Kids on the Block, what can I say?

This was also the first year that Breanna managed to stay awake until past midnight. Last year she held on until 11:30 and then passed out cold on the couch. She was very proud to be able to celebrate fully this time.

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On January 8th we had another first; we left the girls with the first babysitter they’ve ever had that isn’t related to them. Our friend was celebrating his birthday at a nearby bar so the girls had a sleepover at their friend’s house and her cousin babysat them. He’s a really good kid and they all love him so it worked out well. It was Breanna’s first sleepover ever and she did very well.

At the bar we listened to some live music and had a few drinks, and it was fun. We stayed until a little after 1 am and then finally headed home after the band finished their second set. It was very weird to come home without any kids but I was so tired that I fell asleep five seconds after I hit my pillow.

The next morning we went over to pick up the girls and stayed for breakfast. Breakfast is probably my favorite meal ever, but I’m not a fan of actually making big breakfasts (which is why pancakes are usually supper here). Having someone else do it makes me very happy, which is why it’s awesome that George frequently makes bacon and fixes up egg and cheese “McMuffins” on weekends. At their house I enjoyed a big plate of French toast and bacon and home fries and it was a good way to start an otherwise very lazy day.

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The biggest thing that has happened since I’ve been horribly neglectful towards my blog is that on Friday (this past one, the 14th) I had an actual professional photo gig lined up. A friend of mine from the school does marketing for a local restaurant (the food is fabulous, if you live in the area you should check it out) and they needed a photographer to capture some fun moments. They had a lot of nice shots of food but no ambiance photos of people enjoying the food or just having a drink at the bar. That’s where I came in.

Let me tell you something: All work should be as much fun as that night was. I got there at about 6:30 just so I could test the lighting and figure out some good places to set up. The actual shoot started at 7 when my friend got there along with four young girls who were willing to model for me along with any clients who were okay with being photographed (only one table said no, everyone else was happy to pose). I had fully intended to shoot for one hour. At the most I thought I might extend to an hour and a half, wrapping up at 8:30. It was 9:40 when George picked me up. I was having such a blast that we just kept going and going.

I took almost 400 photos and managed to whittle them down to 165 to present to my friend for her perusal. I’ve been asked to keep my photos under wraps until they officially launch their campaign on February 1st so as hard as it is, I’m sitting on my hands (figuratively speaking, otherwise it would be difficult to type!). All I know is I’m very excited because these will be used in campaign on the restaurant’s website, their Facebook page, AskMen.com, and Elle Quebec.

Other than that, the only other news around here is of the less fun variety. Starting on Sunday, Breanna quickly developed a nasty gastro and it has since spread. I am not feeling well at all today (I even canceled going to a Governing Board meeting up at the school which I don’t like to do), and Hayley started coming down with it tonight. I’ve already called the school and left a message to say that she’s not coming in, that way we can all just sleep tomorrow morning. I know exactly what she has, there’s no point in waking her up to see if she can go in.

Hopefully it will pass quickly and we’ll all be feeling 100% by the weekend!

(Photos from New Year’s Eve can be seen here; meanwhile more photos from our night out are here.)

So apparently this year I’m sucking at the Holidailies thing. I just haven’t felt like updating. I’ve been too busy with other things during the day and then by evening I’m kind of tired and brain-dead.

On the other hand I can’t quite think of anything in particular that I did that would keep me from sitting down and typing up a quick update. Ah well.

Anyway, I haven’t dumped or edited any photos in a couple of days either so I don’t have anything pretty to share. I do have one brief story I don’t want to forget though.

On Tuesday I took Breanna up to the school with me and handled the PPO used toys sale from 8 am until 11:30. Breanna came with me last year and had fun; this year was even better. She sorted money into the cash box, I’d tell her what to give back as change, and she helped bag up purchases if someone had bought a bunch of small stuff.

The entire sale went well in general and I do love watching kids shop. It’s interesting to see what they’ll be attracted to and it’s fun to listen to them excitedly chatter over their finds.

However, there was one little boy in particular – probably grade two – who was so sweet that I just wanted to fold him up and put him in my pocket. He had bought a handful of very stereotypically boy things. He was carrying around a couple of Transformers, a Spiderman figure, and a dinosaur. He seemed pretty thrilled with his haul. He had 50 cents left and wanted to know what he could get with it. I showed him the 25 cent table and said he could get two things there or that he could get one thing from the 50 cent table next to it.

A few minutes later he hopped up to me and joyfully held up something very different from his other things. It was a little black purse, about the size that Paris Hilton uses to cart around her little dogs. On one side it had a pink silhouette of a girl and on the other side it had a pink French poodle. The entire thing was covered in sparkles.

He excitedly told me that he had picked it up at the 50 cent table and that was what he wanted. I smiled and said okay and took him two quarters. Then he grinned and bounced a little on the balls of his feet and whispered, “it’s for my mom, she likes pretty purses and this one is REALLY pretty.”

Well. I was in the throes of PMS so it took everything I had in me not to just CRY. Instead I patted him on the shoulder, told him the purse was absolutely beautiful, and sent him off to catch up to his class who had left already.

It was the sweetest thing that I saw all day and I love that a little boy would buy something like that for his mother. If it was me, I would carry that purse EVERYWHERE just because of the thought.

Sometimes my faith in the world is restored by the simplest things.