sunday meditation
If you ask me to set up a new habit, I’ll last about 2.5 weeks.
Meditation, working out, new eating plan, whatever.
I’ll give almost anything a good try for a few weeks.
And then….
Well, let’s just say things often just kind of peter out.
But I do have one practice that I am faithful to every week.
It is one that makes me feel a sense of accomplishment. It soothes the part of my brain that needs order. And in a world where so many things can feel out of control, accomplishment and order feels good.
Needed.
Soothing.
.
.
.
On Sunday nights, I turn this:
Into this:
Yes, that is right. I enjoy folding laundry. Judge me if you must, but the repetition, the uniformity, the creating of order from chaos.
This is my meditation.
My one steady habit.
Also, it gives me a good excuse to binge-watch the second season of The Good Place.
My other really established habit (the Netflix).
Oh and so we are clear, I fold, everyone puts their own laundry away!
N~
these kids are gonna be alright.
On Saturdays Ten has ballet class for an hour.
On Sundays she has 2.5 hours of Hip Hop and on Wednesdays she has another 2.5 hours of Jazz, Lyrical and Acro.
The math on that is 6 hours of dance a week.
I know. It is a lot.
This year, we felt that both our kids were old enough to make a choice (and the commitment) about how and where they wanted to spend their extracurricular time and efforts.
This is where she wants to be.
Her other close friends are in Guides and playing indoor soccer and we gave her these options as well, but she was adamant about what she wanted to do this year and how focused she wanted to be in this one area.
Having a child who is this confident and sure of herself and what she wants to do is weird for me. I was never that kid. I mean, jeezus, most days I am not that woman.
This morning on the drive to the dance studio, I asked her to tell me what makes her feel proud of herself.
Without skipping a beat she said, “My hair.”
When I asked for more details, she explained that she is proud that she has short hair, “because all the other girls have long hair. I like being different.”
Read that again.
I LIKE BEING DIFFERENT.
Can you imagine saying that when you were a ten-year-old?
Having the self-assurance and knowledge that different is GOOD.
Think of the world these kids are going to shape with that kind of conviction.
I worry about plenty of things as a parent, but raising these babies of mine to love being different and unique and to do the things that they want to do (and not what all their friends are doing), makes me believe that maybe, just maybe, we aren’t completely messing them up!
Also, I am pretty sure these next few years are gonna be all kinds of payback for my own tween/teen years. Just look at this level of sass and spirit!
Goddess help me!
N~
Ten knows I am writing every day this month for #nablopomo and #netpositiveblog and when I asked her what I should write today, she said, “Write about Me!”. Careful what you wish for my girl.
So let me ask you the same question I asked her:
What about you makes you feel proud of yourself? Share your answers in the comments.
#FridayFaves: wash your face and wear the dress
A list.
For you.
From me.
Of things and people and places I like.
Go.
Enjoy.
Be happy.
~
An oat mylk latte is my new coffee drink. It all started when I went to SweetPea Cafe for the first time, discovered they are a 100% plant-based establishment and had to choose a milk alternative for my latte. The friendly baristas kindly let me sample all four of the options, almond, soy, coconut and oat, and hands down, the oat mylk won out for its creamy smooth texture and taste. As luck would have it, my fave locally-owned cafes (Sweetpea Cafe, and Blackbird) are all carrying an oat mylk alternative these days and I can happily find a dairy-free latte anytime I want.
Milk alternative sampling. #tryplantbased
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I’ve recently added two new products to my skin care regime and I am loving both of them. The first one I’ve been using for a few months and it is by far my favourite facial cleanser EVER. The Rosehip Cleanser from Indie Lee smells good, feels good, and gets rid of makeup fast. I actually look forward to washing my face every night now. Rosehip is chock-full of Vitamin C and antioxidants and this 46-year-old skin of mine needs ALL of that. You can find the whole Indie Lee line of products at Lux Beauty Boutique.
My second addition is the Radiant Face Drops from Pura Botanicals. I’ve been using Pura moisturizers for my morning/evening routines for about a year now and can’t say enough about them. Again, these drops are full of antioxidant rich rosehip oil, evening primrose oil to help with pigmentation issues, and lavender to calm and sooth the skin. I use the drops every other night and use my Overnight Watermelon Mask on the opposite nights. Check out the whole line at the new Pura Botanicals + So Pretty Cara Cotter flagship shop on 124 St in Edmonton.
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And speaking of shopping on 124 Street. You may have noticed that Henry's Interiors is no longer on the corner of 102 Ave in the bottom floor of Plaza 124. Don’t worry too much though, they are literally just down the block and are now happily relocated in the brown building kiddy-corner to Remedy Cafe, and yes, they are still the best! Go see them for your all your design, furniture, and home decor needs. One of the best things about Henry’s is that every time I’ve asked them to help me find the perfect piece for our house(s), they have come through to find me great, Canadian-made products, and 90% of the time, way less expensive than anything I have seen elsewhere. Shop Local my friends!
~
I have always wondered how people had all this time to listen to podcasts. And then one day, I just started doing it. At first I would listen while I was on a walk. 45 minutes goes by super fast when you are listening to someone talk or an interview, and soon enough, the podcast is over and you don’t even realize that you just walked 5 kilometres! I’ve figured out how to get them playing on my Sonos system at home now and will put on a podcast while I am at home for a bit, making dinner or doing some other work that doesn’t require my complete undivided attention. My favourite episodes from this past week are Dax Shepard’s Armchair Expert interview with Brené Brown live from Austin, Texas, and Episode 139: Nurturing Your Friendships from Christine Koh and Asha Dornfest’s Edit Your Life podcast.
In case you are wondering, I listen to podcasts on the Overcast App on my iPhone or via Spotify when I am at home through my Sonos system.
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I bought this Onion dress by Whitney Mero in April of this year. I wore it for all of 20 minutes while I tried it on and twirled around in it in my bedroom and it has been hanging in my closet since then. I’ve been waiting for a “special occasion” to wear it out of the house. I realized this week that special occasions are what you make of them and if I wanted to wear the dress, I just had to wear the damn dress. So I wore the dress. On Monday night to dinner and the Reuben and the Dark concert with our dear friends.
Note to self: April haircut and colour > October hair.
Moral of the story: wear the damn dress people! Rock those amazing shoes you splurged on. Put on the sparkly earrings. Don’t wait for a special occasion. Make every day a special occasion and shine your freaking light bright and bold and beautiful as can be!
XOXO,
N~
This post is part of my commitment to do #NaBloPoMo this November and also to contribute to the #netpositiveblog movement. Please comment (you know, like we used to do back in the day before double taps) and let me know what other faves of mine you’d like to hear about in future posts or if you have some you’d like to share with the group! ;)
Reasons to blog.... again.
Note to self.
On this November 1, in the year 2018, the day that #NaBloPoMo starts…
DO NOT get all nostalgic about the “good ol’ days of blogging” and decide to check your archives from 9 years ago.
Or wait, maybe I mean DO.
The get nostalgic part at least. (Please DO NOT go looking for my writing from 2009, it was seriously awful!) But the reasons I was writing, those are good reasons to get nostalgic about those days.
I wrote because I wanted to share experiences, I wrote because I needed to find my voice and then give it a place to “speak” the truths that I was feeling as a new parent and a new “stay at home” mother. And to be perfectly honest, I wrote to give my brain something else to do too besides endless rounds of peekaboo and the cleaning of dirty cloth diapers (you do remember that my original blog name was Natural Urban Mamas right?).
I read a lot in those days too. I read a lot of other #mommyblogs. Blogs the likes of which some of you have never seen. Award-winning, amazing blogs like Attack of the Redneck Mommy, Phd in Parenting, Girls Gone Child, Her Bad Mother, Dooce, Up Popped a Fox, mochamomma, and many, many others.
I miss these gorgeous faces too.
And I miss those days. I miss reading the stories from these women. Knowing their struggles, their triumphs, their thoughts that seemed to have been plucked directly out of my own mama brain and published on the internet just waiting for me to read them.
At some point blogging changed. We all know this. It became more and more about “monetizing” and becoming an “influencer” and working with brands and for some people that worked and continues to work and this is fantastic. But it changed things. Or maybe the world changed and that made blogging change.
What I know is I’ve never been good at the whole monetizing part of blogging. I have always just wanted to, I still just want to write. And this is my medium. This is where I share my stories. Where I work out my thoughts about the world and how I fit in it and how I work every day to make it a better place for the people I love.
So, in an effort to find that magic again, to bring back story telling the way we used to do it, a bunch of OG bloggers (I mean, I guess, I’m not officially 2006 OG, but I am OLD, so I’m lumping myself in with everyone else) are writing on our blogs again this month for #NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month). Asha Dornfest of Parent Hacks (and co-host of my favourite podcast, Edit your Life) wrote this post as a catalyst for this conversation, and she thinks that maybe, just maybe, we might be able to heal a bit of our world by doing this.
“You know how Humans of New York is this tapestry of different peoples’ stories that somehow shines a light on what connects us? Our blogs could once again be that, writ large, distributed across geographical, political, racial, religious, ethnic and gender lines. No silos, no algorithms. Just real people sharing real stories so other people can read and comment and feel a part of those stories and be reminded about what connects us. Incubating community without a specific agenda beyond sharing of ourselves and connecting people.”
She may be right.
I really hope she is right.
So let’s connect.
Let’s do this thing, and write and comment and read again, and feel like we are part of something good and positive and hopeful.
Find the other blogs and bloggers doing this on Social Media using the hashtag #netpositiveblog.
See you tomorrow.
XOXO,
N~
the revolution: it starts when we start paying attention...
Can I tell you all a story?
I mean of course I can, this is my blog, I can do whatever I damn well please.
The other day I did something bad. I mean not BAD, bad. But if the scale is "I killed someone" on one end and "I ran over a squirrel" on the other, I would say it was somewhere in the middle. Although maybe that's not a good scale, because now you all probably think I killed something...
Let's start this again.
A few days ago, while on a lovely walk through the river valley with my little family, I did something I am not proud of. My actions and words in this instance made me realize how DEEPLY ingrained our biases are and how much work we all have to do DAILY, if not hourly, to consciously unteach all the innate {-isms} the live inside us. I unconsciously sent a message to my own children that has been sent to generations of girls and boys since time eternal: one of you matters more.
Here was the scene:
We were walking along under the changing autumn leaves, talking about regular things; who needs new snow boots, where we want to go for our next family vacation, silly memes the kid’s teacher had shown them. Somehow the conversation veered to holding hands and hugging. (Probably because their father and I like to hold hands when we are out walking - because physical touch is one of my “Love Languages” and I make sure he knows this and thus, holds my hand.) As it turns out, my son is very much like me, and physical affection is one of his love languages as well.
In the course of our discussion, Eleven asked Nine for a hug and she said no to him, as she has done many times before. He asked a few more times, and again she said no. I could see how much her continued refusal was starting to hurt his feelings and I was starting to get frustrated with them both. And that is when I said to my daughter, "Oh come on, just give him a hug, you are being mean and hurting his feelings".
Yes, I said that.
I made my son's feelings about not getting a hug, more important than my daughter's bodily autonomy and very clearly stated boundary setting. And, for an even bigger truth, it took me another few hours to realize what I had done and talk to them both about my mistake and why I was wrong.
I feel the need to share this little story for a couple of reasons.
One, no one is perfect, and as parents, we are going to mess up - OFTEN. The only way we get better at this parenting gig is admitting our mistakes, to ourselves and to our children, and learning from them. I had a talk with both my kids, individually, and then all of us together, about this incident and how I handled it. We talked about why what I said was wrong and how, going forward, we can respect everyone in these situations without compromising our own needs and boundaries, and without hurting anyone’s feelings.
Two, I'm telling you this because it is just one example of how deep our cultural and societal biases are ingrained in us, even those of us who think we are progressive and doing our best to raise a generation of feminist children. No matter how much we rail against the patriarchy and demand equality and march and vote and #timesup and #metoo, if we don't first change from within and recognize the ways we (often unconsciously) uphold the status quo, it is all for naught. Change HAS to start at home, and our children have to see us modelling the kind of behaviour we want to see in them for any of this to make a difference.
And three, because these past few weeks in the USA, we’ve seen the trajectory of what happens when boys and men’s feelings, their sense of entitlement, and their disregard for anyone but themselves and their personal and professional gratification is maintained as the preeminent bro-code of our patriarchal world.
Some of you may think I am making a giant leap from my son wanting a hug from my daughter, to Brett Kavanaugh assaulting Dr. Christine Blasey Ford when he was young and stupid, and regardless, assumes the US Supreme Court appointment is a God-given right he is entitled to, but I don’t believe I am.
Hear me out.
Boys don’t grow up and become entitled assholes just because. They do so because everything they are taught and exposed to from day one tells them they can be.
We tell cute little baby boys that they will have girls falling all over them for being little “heartbreakers”. From an early age, we show them via movies and TV shows the power of the mediocre white man and the women who will always be their supporting cast (Yeah, I am talking about you MAX, of Max & Ruby, and you too Caillou, you annoying little shit). We glorify violence against women and the myth of the dark, troubled superhero type. We have “blue” jobs and “pink” jobs in our homes. For fuck’s sake, some people teach boys that peeing sitting down is not MANLY, and we all know who cleans up that mess.
We use feminine words to demean men and think nothing of what it says of the value, or rather, lack thereof, that we place on women. A women who cries on the stand is emotional and irrational, a man who cries on the stand is brave and passionate. A boy who punches you, teases you, pulls your hair, snaps your bra, is just doing so because he likes you. You should feel flattered he is noticing you. Just give him a smile, a hug, a kiss, a blow job, let him grab you by the pussy, or, you know, you might hurt his feelings.
ENOUGH.
As a parent, a HUMAN BEING, I want better for my kids. I want them to FULLY understand consent and bodily autonomy, theirs and everyone else’s. I want them to see themselves as equals in all things. As parents, we’ve tried to do this from infancy. We teach proper names for body parts and they are in charge of their bodies. We have an open door/yes we can talk about this at the dinner table/#askusanything policy. Even (especially) when it’s weird, or deemed “inapporpriate” by some, or uncomfortable, and also something neither of us had growing up and yeah, we are literally flying by the seat of our pants (FBTSOOPP™️) parenting some days.
So, yes, this means that I will stop in the mall as we walk by lingerie stores with 12 foot posters of women in bras and panties and we will talk about the hyper-sexualization of women in advertising. Yes, it means that I will pause a movie, even a classic like Star Wars: the Empire Strikes Back when Han forcefully kisses Leia, and we will have a discussion about consent and why this kind of action is NOT OK. Yes, it means I don’t force my kids to kiss and hug friends and relatives at family gatherings. Yes, it means we’ve talked about Judge Kavanaugh and Dr. Blasey Ford a lot these past few weeks and what it all means. I do all of this as a parent in the year 2018, and also as a survivor of childhood sexual assault. I do so because I don’t want either my daughter or my son to be like me: a 46-year-old woman just now learning how to set boundaries for herself and enforce them unapologetically.
I also do these things because I have 46 years of systemic and intrinsic, cultural and sexual biases to deprogram from myself. It’s not an easy task, this unlearning of my own biased life lessons, while also learning/teaching new ones, but is crucial in our world today. We HAVE to do this, constantly, every day, in all that we do and say and model for our children, and all people with whom we have any kind of influence.
No one in their right mind wants to wake up thirty years from now and see either their daughter or their son in the positions that Dr. Christine Blasey Ford or Judge Brett Kavanaugh were this past week.
We have to do better for our children.
The first step to creating this brave new world, is admitting these cultural and sexual biases that exist in ourselves and actively work against them. It’s a process and it starts with the little things like the subtle messages we send our children with our words and actions in every day life.
We have to be vigilant with ourselves.
If we are not, I’ll just see you at the next round of “entitled man who thinks the world owes him everything” presidential election or supreme court confirmation or superstar athlete kid with his whole life ahead of him and god forbid we hold anyone accountable for their actions. And the girls and women affected by these actions will continue to be secondary to it all.
There have been a few more instances of personal boundary setting with my kids since our walk through the leaves and this conversation is far from over in our house. I am happy to report that they have come up with a special handshake that only they share to show their “love” for each other. I call it love, they cringe at the thought because - TWEENS, but hey, it’s a start.
For them.
We can do this people.
We have to do this.
Please.
N~
Willow
My dog died.
It sucks.
I am so sad.
And lonely.
And I know that may sound silly to some, but I work from home. When my kids and husband are gone for the day, it has always been Willow and me.
Me and Willow.
Now it will be just me.
I miss her begging for a bite of my breakfast bagel.
I miss her big doggie sighs as she finally settled onto her bed for her morning nap.
I miss her "dog sleep-barking and walking" while she slept and dreamt.
I miss how excited she would get the minute I picked up her leash and her silly dancing paws thing that she would do to show her enthusiasm for a walk with her mama.
I miss how she used to wake me up with her disgusting doggie breath in my face and then jump up with her front paws on the bed and try to snuggle her head all the way under me.
I miss how she loved popcorn almost as much as I do.
I miss her beautiful mutt face.
I miss my Willow.
You get so used to this presence in your life. This soul that doesn't ask much from you other than love and who gives you so much of it in return, often more than you deserve.
I hope we made the right choice for her. I hope she is walking and running and playing with all her doggie frens who passed over the bridge before her. I hope she has an unending supply of pizza crusts and apples.
I hope she knows how loved she was and how much she meant to me.
Long have our shadows walked side by side in this life.
Forever will she be in my heart.
Commissioned Artwork by JC Little.
N~
contemplation
When was the last time you took a "long loving look" at the things around you.
The people around you.
The place you are in.
Not focusing on what needs to be done, or improved, or cleaned, or put away, or changed in any way.
Just what is.
And found and then savoured the beauty of it all.
Through the eyes and fingers of an 8 year old: "Auntie, this is the BEST PLANT EVER!"
N~
Pep Talk
What if one day you did all the things you keep putting off "until the time is right"? What if you stopped making excuses about all the stuff that you keep insisting is more important than doing what would really make your heart sing?
What do you have to lose?
No, really. What do you think will happen if you said NO to everything you do out of obligation or loyalty or a "well, if I don't do it, no one else will" martyr-mentality?
Will some people be disappointed or perhaps feel betrayed if you say no to them? Maybe. But so what? The people who truly know you and love you will support you and find a way to muddle through whatever it is without you. Trust me, people will find their resilience if we give them the opportunity to look for it! The only place YOU are truly irreplaceable is in your own life.
I WILL SAY THAT AGAIN FOR EVERYONE IN THE BACK: THE ONLY PLACE YOU ARE TRULY IRREPLACEABLE IS IN YOUR OWN LIFE.
Be present in that life. Put forth your efforts and talents to work for you there - to fulfill your dreams, to work towards YOUR goals. Use them to get out of this stuck place that feels like it never goes away. Because the truth is, STUCK is not going anywhere, YOU have to leave stuck. Get out of town. Pack up all your shit and just GO!
Stuck-ville is a convenient excuse/place to stay. It's a safe haven. A risk-averse community, where nothing changes and you can just keep doing what you are doing, but never really venturing outside the gates to face what and who you truly are outside of those self-imposedwalls.
Find the courage to let go of all the things you think you should be or should be doing according to other people and their expectations and be ADVENTUROUS!
Actually, it's not even about being adventurous, it's about being fearless. It's about saying no to the things that feed those, "I am not good enough/Imposter syndrome/it's not the right time" kind of irrational fears in all of us and saying yes to things that may seem scary. But really - are they THAT scary?
Don't let 5, 10, 15 years go by of being afraid to do and be who you really want to be. Of justifying your existence in your spaces and doing the things you think you should be doing instead of DOING WHAT YOU REALLY WANT TO DO. It is easy to make excuses for why we aren't being true to ourselves. To tell ourselves that we are not ready/not there yet/not 100%, but we REALLY have to stop doing that.
A few years ago, after Eleven's stroke, my husband had to convince me to stop looking at my child from the lens of what he couldn't do and start approaching him from a place of strength, to assume that, yes indeed, he could do all the things. I was holding him back with my fear.
I think it's time we applied that lens to ourselves more.
Find your place of strength.
ASSUME THAT YOU CAN.
And then do it.
Pep Talk Over.
XOXO,
N~
This post brought to you by Nine and her tenacity to keep on practicing until she could finally do a full cartwheel!