Author Archives: Sherry

Park time

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I have a love-hate relationship with the park closest to us. It’s great because it’s not far at all, it has some fairly decent if not exciting play stuff, and it backs on to what’s left of the woods around here. And of course, we all know how much I love to go walking in the woods. On the other hand, I loathe it when the summer weather hits because they stupidly stripped all the trees away when they put the park in; sure there are plenty of trees along the perimeter but not in the actual park itself. Which means there is zero shade where the swings, slides, and whatnot are located. There used to be two trees that provided a wee bit of shade but they got sick and were cut down last Spring. They’ve also recently planted some new ones along the path so there’s that at least, but they’re too young to provide any relief from the sun just yet.

Tulips

Usually we go to the park during the day so that there’s less rush to get back home. Yesterday, though, we were busy during the afternoon so I promised the kids that we’d go to the park after supper. We ate at a decent hour and since we had ordered in some Chinese food which meant few dishes I figured the world would not fall off its axis if I left the plates in the sink. I constantly struggle to keep on top of housework, but as much as I hate doing dishes I also hate when they aren’t done. There’s something incredibly discouraging about a sink that is full of dishes when you wake up in the morning (oh, to have a dishwasher…). Still, taking the kids out to play was a bigger priority so off we went.

We ended up spending almost two hours there and I can tell you right now that once school is out (just over two weeks to go), we will be doing that a lot more frequently. Not only is it more pleasant to be at the park when the sun isn’t directly overhead, and not only does it usually provide a bit of relief from the daytime humidity spikes that plague Montreal, apparently that’s when most of our neighborhood goes to the park.

Usually it’s just us at the park. It’s so rare for other kids to be there that it’s like a huge novelty to see one other kid show up. Last night there were so many people at the park all at one time. There was a family flying kites, another packing up some soccer balls to go home, some kids who were playing a land version of Marco Polo, and it was awesome. It was noisy in that really great “look at all those children having fun” kind of way and all the parents seemed to be in a good mood – myself included.

I definitely want to go back at the same time from now on. I’m sure we’ll go during the day sometimes too, especially when we have those days that are nice and sunny without being oppressively hot, but it seems evening is the time to go for our park! I was even thinking that I could pack up their before-bed snack stuff and we could have a snack picnic there, then come home and get them into bed. That would be fun to try.

I managed to get some better pictures of the kids in their glasses too. Hayley is still loving hers (but I have to remind her frequently that she doesn’t need to demonstrate this love by taking them off to clean them every five to ten minutes) and has been reading a lot more lately, just like she used to. It’s unbelievable how much her vision troubles cut into that, and reading is something she loves. Today I put Breanna to bed for her nap and then sat on the couch with my book (Eat, Pray, Love, totally awesome), and Hayley curled up beside me with Charlotte’s Web and we read quietly together for half an hour.

Breanna asks regularly if she can please take her glasses off now, but since her vision is apparently worse than Hayley’s is, it’s really even more important for her to wear them at all times. She’s still feeling under the weather (and as of this moment has been napping for an epic two and a half hours, I’m going to be screwed at bedtime but she really needs the sleep) so I know it’s annoying for her to wear them, but so far a bit of distraction has helped a lot.

And I still think they look adorable in them.

Posing

Still modeling

Getting used to the glasses

Ooooo-oooh.

Too bad today is overcast to the point that it looks like it might pour rain at any moment. Good thing we’ll soon have endless summer days for park time!

Two girls in glasses

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On Friday I called to find out what was going on with Hayley and Breanna’s glasses; it had been almost two weeks and they had told me it would take about a week and a half. The guy who checked the file said the glasses were already there and they had called on June 2nd to let us know. A quick scroll through Call Display showed this to be a total LIE but I shrugged it off because other than that their customer service had been great and the prices were reasonable.

I had to go out in the afternoon because Hayley’s school held their volunteer tea. It was way more fun this year because I knew a lot more people. I sat with some of my friends and we had such a good time laughing and just enjoying some pleasant afternoon time while our kids all ran around outside with the daycare. The drummer in most of George’s bands over the years is also a lunchroom monitor at the school so he was there as well and it was good to catch up with him after not seeing him for awhile. When it was time to leave I invited him to come drop by and see George for a bit so that was nice too.

After supper George had to work, but his dad was nice enough to come pick us up and we drove over to get the girls’ glasses. I realize that I’m seriously biased, but they both look *ridiculously adorable* in them.

Sisters in glasses!

Breanna has a cold that’s been keeping her up at night and driving her crazy so she was less than keen to pose for me but I got a couple at least.

Sisters in glasses!

Hayley is ecstatic. She was so happy to be able to see more clearly. The optometrist told me that she would have had trouble seeing clearly beyond three or four feet, which explains why she was having trouble seeing the board at school. However, she also said she has trouble seeing right up close, and that it would affect her concentration levels. That struck a chord – she’d been having more and more trouble getting through her homework and I thought it was just a combination of being tired after seven hours of school and being too much work, and that may be part of it, but the optometrist said that it may also be from her eyes tiring out from the effort of reading and writing.

I also didn’t really realize it until last night, but she hadn’t been reading in bed much lately. She used to read books every night before falling asleep but it was too hard for her eyes. Last night she was really tired but when she hopped into bed she pulled out one of her favorite books and forced herself to stay awake long enough to read it just because she could.

Breanna is mostly ambivalent. She didn’t really want to keep them on last night but she was tired and not feeling well. This morning she refused to put them on again and I didn’t push it, but once she saw Hayley wearing hers she went back to the bedroom and brought them out for me to put on her. So far she’s had them on for about three and a half hours without any complaints or requests to take them off. I think that there’s a huge difference in how she sees now. She told me everything is bigger.

The optometrist was surprised last night because she said when kids put on glasses as strong as Breanna’s are (+5 and +6) they sometimes have trouble adjusting and walk funny but Breanna walked and ran all around the store for us so they could see how she reacted and she didn’t have any issues at all. She had never been able to tell us she had trouble seeing because she didn’t know anything different, but I’ll bet it’s a whole new world for her. She didn’t want to leave the store but then I said, “come on and you can look out the car window and see all the stuff you didn’t see on the way over” and the staff all laughed.

I think it’s really helpful that they both had to get glasses at the same time. It probably would have been harder to get Breanna to keep hers on if it was just her, but seeing her sister in glasses makes her want to do the same thing. Meanwhile, even though I hate my glasses because they’re old and need to be replaced, I’m wearing mine today just so they can see me in them too. They make me a bit woozy after too many days in a row because the anti-reflect coating is mostly worn off, but I can wear them for today at least.

Hayley is so excited to go to school on Monday now that she can see properly – she can’t wait to sit and look at the board and actually see things clearly. I’m so glad their glasses are working well for them so far!

A lack of sleep makes me ramble

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My favorite

Breanna is either going through a growth spurt or she’s turned into a tiny teenage boy. It’s unbelievable how much food she can eat in one day. Right now it’s 10:45 am and she’s been up since 6:30. She actually only started eating at about 7:30 though, so we’re talking about just over three hours of time, and this is what she has eaten so far:

– A bowl of Raisin Bran cereal (except she takes the raisins out. I have a three year old who would be thrilled with a box of Bran Flakes.)
– A bowl of strawberries
– A strawberry yogurt
– An apple
– A piece of bread with peanut butter
– A slice of cheese

That all also includes milk in her cereal and a juice box.

I’m going to need another job just to cover the amount of food she eats on a daily basis, although maybe this will push her over the weight limit and we can start using a booster seat in the car soon!

*******

Flutter

Speaking of jobs, I just started a new blogging job. It’s part of b5 media, where I already write for three other blogs, but this one is a member of the beauty & style network. (Let me pause for a second while I struggle not to laugh over the idea of ME working for a beauty & style network.)

It’s still keeping me in touch with my niche roots – celebrities – but it allows me to branch out a bit. The site is called Celeb Look and basically I detail what various celebrities were wearing while they were out and about, then I link readers to places online where they can buy the same outfit or similar knock-offs.

I only started yesterday but I’m already enjoying it. It just never fails to strike me as hilarious that I work on fashion sites (I write for this one too) and most of the time that I’m writing I’m often wearing such fabulous outfits as pajamas, track pants, or jeans. I almost feel like a fraud, but I figure it’s just my way of living vicariously through people who make enough money to afford to wear Calvin Klein and Versace.

*******

Thistle and friend

This coming Friday I get to go to Hayley’s school for a Volunteer Appreciate Tea in the afternoon. I went to one last year as well and it was a lot of fun – it was very British-style with fancy china cups, a variety of teas, some coffee, and tons of cookies, biscuits, and other baked goods. It was really nice but I’m looking forward to going this time even more because I know more of the parents this year. I’ll have to take pictures this year too, last time I was a little shy about it since I didn’t really know anyone.

Before the tea, there’s an assembly in the gym where they have the whole school come and sit down and the principal gives out an appreciation certificate to all the parents who volunteered over the year. It’s almost like an awards show where each person is called to come down and pick up their certificate and it’s fun because all the kids applaud and cheer – it makes you feel a little like a rock star. Last year I remember most of Hayley’s class was reaching out to give me high fives as I walked past. It’s the closest I’ll get to being a celebrity at this point in my life!

Hayley’s extra excited about it because the tea goes past the end of the school day so she gets to go down to the daycare with her friends to play. Every once in awhile she asks me why I can’t put her into the after-school daycare and I point out that it’s because I work from home and therefore we DON’T NEED IT, but sometimes she wishes she could play with her friends, so this will be fun for her too.

*******

All wet

I stayed up past midnight two nights in a row and got up with Hayley for school at 6:30 two mornings in a row. It’s not a good combination, I’m exhausted today and not in that good, hilarious loopy kind of way. It’s more of that “holy hell I’m going to pass out and sleep for 36 hours straight” kind of way. Perhaps tonight I could try to get to bed before the day is actually over, yes?

(Magic 8 Ball says: Don’t count on it.)

Stream of Consciousness

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For reasons that I can’t even really understand, I have been suffering from incredible writer’s block. Luckily it hasn’t gotten in the way of work. When your job requires you to write numerous things daily, a complete mental blackout is a very bad thing. However, I did find it pretty much impossible to write here for some reason. Who knows why.

I’m tired of the same old entry sitting up top here though, so I’m going to just force myself to write anyway, some sort of stream of consciousness effort. Let’s see what the past week held that I haven’t told you about.

I had a personal record last week. I got a headache on Monday and I swear it did not go away until Saturday. It wasn’t just one headache after another it was the SAME damn headache all week long. Tylenol didn’t help, all that did was dial it down a notch so I could function and then it came straight back to full force after four hours. I was starting to make jokes about brain tumors while thinking “hahaha… hmmm, maybe?” in the back of my mind, but George suggested it was weather-related. Considering it also rained all damn week and was a weird combination of humid yet damp and cold it’s entirely possible.

I do know that on Saturday George got me some Advil and two of those plus a break in the weather finally kicked my headache to the curb. Sunday was the first morning where I woke up without any pain and that was a total relief. Which is why I was so pissed off that I later smashed the side of my head into a hard, wooden chair while bending to pick something up off the floor. That was awesome. Luckily the pain went away with two more Advil.

Any more painkillers and I’ll need to check into Betty Ford.

*******

Hayley’s class has been studying the rainforest (hence their field trip to the Biodome) and they all had to do a research project on one animal that lives there. Hayley picked the iguana and she had to write up about two pages’ worth of information on iguanas (she ended up with three, detailing things like what they eat, who their enemies are, and so on) and then she had to make her own iguana and its habitat. Yeah, it was a lot of work for a SIX YEAR OLD in GRADE ONE, but she had fun at least.

She originally made an iguana out of clay – and she actually did most of it herself, I just kind of guided her and showed her how to make spikes down the back – but the more it dried the more it fell apart. I ended up having to glue three of the four limbs back on, as well as the head and the tail. I was worried it would completely fall apart in class, so I suggested that she make one out of cardboard too. She used a printout as a stencil, traced it onto construction paper, glued it to cardboard, and decorated it.

She also used a shoe box as the habitat and glued green construction paper, sticks, and some leaves that we bought at the dollar store to make a rainforest for her iguanas. All I really had to do was cover the outside of the box for her (since it was a neon pink Barbie shoe box!) and she took care of the rest herself. She’s really crafty and artsy. I think it came out really well!

Rainforest project

*******

They should be getting their glasses sometime this week. Hayley can’t wait, she asks about them all the time. Breanna doesn’t think of it often unless someone mentions them, but Hayley is tired of squinting at the board in class. I can’t wait to see the difference it makes for both of them.

*******

On Friday Hayley had two milestones. One of her friends takes gymnastics and they were having a special party on Friday evening. She invited Hayley to come with her and they got to play on trampolines, do obstacle courses, and all kinds of gymnastics activities. It was the first time we had ever just had Hayley dropped off somewhere like that without one of us being there. Her friend’s parents went out for dinner and picked them up about three hours later and they had both had such a good time.

In related news, Hayley would like to sign up for gymnastics in the Fall. I totally saw that coming.

The other milestone was that Hayley had also been invited to sleep over. She’s spent the night at her grandparents’ house before, usually when George’s sister is in town, but this was the first sleepover at a friend’s house. We had told her that if she changed her mind she could come home at any time, even if it was 3 am, but she did great. They didn’t even go to sleep until 11:30 so she just slept straight through until sometime after 6 the next morning.

She was EXHAUSTED on Saturday. She actually fell asleep in the afternoon, something she normally never does unless she’s sick.

Movie night

Since Hayley had been out, Breanna and I did a movie night on Friday. She loves Sleeping Beauty but had never seen the actual movie, so we got her that, popped some popcorn, and she stayed up later than usual. Then on Saturday, since Hayley was asleep and it was the first time there had been any sun in days, Breanna and I went out for a walk for awhile. She actually spent most of the hour and a half making “soup” with a puddle of rain water in a rock, stirring in all sorts of bits of nature. I think I need to get her a water table for the summer. Or even a big tupperware container.

Making soup

On the hunt

Soup

Searching

It was a pretty decent weekend overall. And I’m just really happy to be starting this weekend off without any headaches!

Family visit

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In what would have been a comedy of errors if it hadn’t been so frustrating for all of us, my parents and I had been trying to get together for ages with no luck. You would think that we lived on opposite ends of the country. Let’s put it this way – they still had Easter stuff to give to the kids (and to George and myself, woohoo!), so it had been going on that long.

My mom called me yesterday while I was making supper and asked if it would be okay for them to come by for a few hours today. I glanced over my shoulder in minor panic. We had been out for part of the day and when I got home I was utterly lazy and hadn’t done a single thing in the way of housework beyond washing some dishes so that I could serve supper on them. Then I shrugged, realized my parents weren’t going to do a military inspection of my home, and said of course they could.

I was up at a reasonable hour today anyway, so I did some quick cleaning to cover the basics – tidying, vacuuming, mopping, dishes, bathroom – and then they arrived shortly after I was done so that was good timing. We sat and hung out on the balcony for a bit until George came home with some lunch stuff. We just had hot dogs with some potato salad and macaroni salad, but no one seemed to mind a simple lunch.

The kids were really excited to open their Easter stuff (and I am currently typing this while pausing to grab a few candy-coated dark chocolate eggs, so yay for delayed Easter goodies indeed). My parents left pretty early since they knew it was a school night for Hayley so I cleaned up the kitchen and played with the kids until supper time, then got them into a bath and ready for bed. They were obviously worn out since they both fell asleep really quickly. Pearl was a very happy Beagle and had a blast playing with my mom and dad, so she has also spent most of the afternoon and evening lazing around – tired puppy.

It was great to have them over. With our building not having an elevator and our apartment being on the top floor it’s a giant effort for my dad to visit but I’m glad they did! Maybe one day we’ll live somewhere on a ground floor so it will be easier.

Breanna had a very serious conversation, telling my dad all about her Curious George monkey.

Monkey chat

Both Hayley and Breanna were disappointed that my parents had to leave so they rushed out to the balcony to wait for them to get downstairs just so they could scream “Bye Mimi! Bye Papa!” as they made their way to the car.

Two girls waiting

Today was a good way to close off the weekend. The U.S. may be celebrating Memorial Day weekend, but we Canadians had our long weekend last week so for me tomorrow means back to the grind!

Two girls with glasses

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On Wednesday I was really swamped covering the Cannes Film Festival for work purposes, so George took Hayley and Breanna to their eye appointments. It was really weird for me because it was the first time I had ever not gone to an appointment with them. Sitting at home (even though I was working) and waiting for a phone update was strange.

In the end it turned out that Hayley most definitely needed glasses which we had expected. She had been having trouble seeing the chalk board at school and I wasn’t surprised to find out she needed some extra help. What shocked me was that Breanna actually has terrible eyesight. It never crossed our minds because she runs around, looks at books, sees everything as far as we could tell (including things we don’t want her to see, like when we’re trying to sneak something), and watches TV. She doesn’t walk into walls or get confused, she sees planes way up in the sky, everything. Finding out her eyesight is actually worse than Hayley’s was stunning to say the least.

They got prescriptions and an appointment in July to come back and see how things were going with them. Today we went to New Look for glasses because they seemed to have the best current promotion for children’s eyewear. We don’t want to go cheap, but we also don’t want to get $300 Calvin Klein frames for kids who run around outside a lot.

Hayley was so disappointed to find out that she wasn’t going to get them today. It takes about a week to a week and a half to have them made because of their specific prescriptions. Still, they picked out their frames and were happy. *I* was happy because neither of them wanted anything obnoxious. I was worried for a second when Hayley told Breanna she had found Caillou frames. They were cute in that they had a tiny Caillou and a heart on the side, but they were a really loud primary blue and just didn’t look good on her at all. Luckily she wasn’t interested and seemed to like the oval gold-framed glasses I found in her size. Meanwhile, Hayley already knew she wanted either gold or silver since one of her teachers wears gold-framed glasses. We found some she really loved in a rectangular shape.

Even though they won’t be ready and they’re only the sample lenses, I got them to pose for pictures. Hayley is totally thrilled with hers. Because of her face shape the sales guy said we really shouldn’t go any wider than these but since she loves them they’re perfect – she has to wear them every day so being happy with them is important.

Girl with glasses

Meanwhile, Breanna is pleased with hers but she wasn’t too keen on posing so I got the standard “Breanna Silly Smile” face, but it’s close enough.

Girl with glasses

(Also I really did brush her hair before leaving home, but the windows down in the car kind of killed that effort.)

After our adventure in eyewear we stopped and had lunch at La Belle Province for some burgers and poutine, then hit the dollar store for supplies for Hayley’s rainforest project. It ended up being a pretty good day. Luckily they went to sleep easily since my parents are coming for lunch tomorrow so hopefully the kids will be rested and cheerful.

I can’t wait to get the new glasses to see what kind of difference it makes for both of them!

Eager learner

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It took Hayley a bit of time to warm up to grade one. It’s such a total difference from Kindergarten. In Kindergarten they had circle time on the floor, sang songs, did arts and crafts, had play areas with different toys, and learned simple things while sitting at tables.

In grade one everyone has their own desk, there’s no singing or dancing, and there’s a lot of sitting and listening to learn things. There’s also a shocking amount of homework, to the point that we never EVER do every single thing she’s supposed to do, because hell no, I’m not spending every moment that she’s home doing school work after she’s been sitting at a desk doing school work for hours on end.

Still, she’s finally really loving school. She liked it well enough before but we had several instances where she would play sick only for us to discover that she was just fine after we had kept her home. More than once I had to hope I wasn’t making a mistake and send her off to school despite claims of stomach aches, sore throats, and headaches.

Then she stopped. She went to school for a month straight without a single complaint. She goes to the breakfast club and she loves arriving in the cafeteria a bit early so she can have a variety of breakfast meals – they vary from day to day, things like cold cereal, hot cereal, eggs, breakfast burritos, waffles, pancakes, and English muffins. They also offer yogurt and fresh fruit every day in case some kids don’t like the meal of the day. She also loves seeing her friends and coming home to tell us all that she learned that day (right now they’re studying the rain forest and they have a project due for the end of the month where they have to pick an animal – she chose the iguana – and find out information about them, give a speech to the class (!), and make the animal out of clay).

Last week she had some sort of random bug. She was fine when she got up on Monday but then she suddenly had a bad cramp right before it was time to go. She started crying and said the cramping was across her whole stomach. When I felt her head she felt a little bit warm so I decided to keep her home. She spent most of the day lying on the couch looking sad and small.

She also stayed home on Tuesday. She started crying as soon as I woke her up, so I called the school again and let her sleep. She was better by lunch time so I said she’d be okay to go back to school on Wednesday. In the past she would get nervous about that, worried that she’d be stuck at school feeling sick, but that day she said she was looking forward to going back and couldn’t wait to go to bed so she could get up and go to school.

She wasn’t kidding. On Wednesday morning I got up at 6:30 like I always do. I usually go and take the dog out to pee before I get her up. I walked into the living room, leash in hand, and found Hayley sitting on the couch, fully dressed with her teeth brushed. I was shocked.

Then she repeated that on Thursday and Friday. Each day she was up before I was and dressed, waiting for me to get up so she could have her hair done and go to school. It was nuts.

This weekend was a long weekend here in Canada, and so she had today off. All day she kept telling me how she wished it was already Tuesday so she could go to school.

I’m glad that she’s finally super pumped over school. I just wonder what she’s going to do when school wraps up for the year in just over a month!

——-

Mosey along

Speaking of Hayley, she’s still a girl on a mission to save all the snails in our neighborhood. The other morning she saw that several of them had wandered from the damp grass to the sidewalk and she was worried people would step on them, either by accident or on purpose (which seems likely since there are sometimes a ridiculous amount of smashed shells when I’m walking along). She always, ALWAYS stops to pick them up. She’ll tap them on the shell very lightly so that they slip up inside, then she picks them up and puts them back in the grass out of harm’s way.

Good samaritan

I sometimes joke with her that maybe the snails are going to get ticked off, saying, “Oh my GOD, I spent three hours getting to that damn sidewalk and she just put me back in the grass!” But really, I love that my little good Samaritan will take time out of her busy six-year-old life just to save snails.

The things I miss

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I’m a night owl and I come by it honestly, courtesy of my mother.

Tonight I watched the two hour finale of “Desperate Housewives”. I know my parents watch too and I wanted to talk about it, so despite the fact that it was 11 pm, I called my mother, knowing she’d still be up. It turned out that she was up, but she had just gotten out of the bath and into pajamas – she hadn’t see the show because my dad was watching the finale for Survivor, so they recorded the show to watch later this week. I obviously didn’t want to spoil the ending so I shut up other than telling my mother to PLEASE call me after she got to watch it since I wanted to ask her what she thought of something.

Still, we managed to talk on the phone for over 20 minutes. We talked about the weekend, the weather, the fact that her friend from work got me the autograph of the first Canadian astronaut in space, books, and other shows.

In the end we only got off the phone because my mom has to get up early for work on Monday, holiday aside (Victoria day) since she works for an American company. Otherwise, we would have kept going, because it’s only necessity that forces my mom to bed before midnight, not genetics.

When my grandmother was still alive and her house was still standing, my mother and I used to have epic late nights during the summer. With my sister being five years younger than me, she’d be in bed at a reasonable hour, but I remember that all summer when I was 14, 15, 16 years old, my mom and I would stay up late.

We would sit in the kitchen until at least 11 pm, and then we’d head upstairs (my dad would be in the city all week for work, coming up north on the weekends). I’d sprawl across the bed with a book or magazine and my mother would sit in a little wicker chair, reading too. We’d both read a bit but we’d also interrupt each other to chat. My mom and I could sit and talk to each other – easily – until 1 or so in the morning. More than once it was almost 2 am when we finally said good night and I’d finally head off to my own bed for some sleep.

I’ve always been able to talk to my mother. Sure, as a teenager there were a multitude of things I never shared with her, as will be the case when my own girls are teenagers, but overall, I never had a problem talking to my mom. I love to talk to her on the phone now, but sometimes I wish we could just go back to the house that no longer exists and just talk until the hours become ridiculous, until we’re both yawning and all but nodding off, and just relive those days.

(My mom hates that picture, taken at Christmas time, but that’s only because she has no idea how much it means to me.)