Polly

Who is Polly? She is a little girl and she's sick. She has a condition that narrows the vessels in her brain which causes seizures and possibly strokes. She is the first little sparkly wonder love child I encountered while searching for information about DS. I read about her birth and her early struggles. I read about her family's journey from diagnosis to thriving sweetie in pre-school. Her pictures and her story gave me hope and reassurance about A's future. She's one of my heroes and an inspiration. Please put her high on your prayer list.

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is one of my favourite holidays. You get to feast and celebrate with your loved ones but there's no pressure to buy everyone their dream come true. You just show up (or host) and have a great time. If you're paying attention to the season, you also reflect on your many blessings. I am grateful for so much this year. For little A who is a sparkly sparkle, for her health and for all the people, old friends and new, who stepped in and helped us out when she was born. That was only 7 months ago and it was without a doubt the craziest, most intense time of my life so far. I'm grateful for little t who is also a sparkly sparkle star. He has embraced A with so much love and acceptance and it's inspiring. For big T being a good man in a storm. For my family who also embraced us all and some of whom camped out here until we were ok. I'm grateful for my friend S who has opened many doors of inquiry, curiousity, healing and self-knowledge. I'm grateful for every scrap of sleep. I'm grateful for the amazing trip to the big lake this summer. I'm grateful for the harvest. That's where this seasonal feasting all originated, the harvest, and I'm glad to 'subscribe' to a real harvest and feed my family with it.

We went to visit Farfar and Farmor this Thanksgiving. It was too short but still a wonderful trip. We are all grateful to them for the many many times they have hosted holidays and the huge effort they put into making it all very special. Thank you, thank you.

Here are some highlights; The picture at the top is the beautiful holiday table.

Blowing off some steam on the ferry. There was a looooonnnnnng wait to get on.


Here's t doing a dance of excitement after the long journey.



Here is a shot of FF & FM with the kids. Everyone is wearing bandanas that Tor picked out for them so they could all be cowboys.



Here are FM with A. They got along famously. A never missed a chance to smile at her FM.


It turns out the ergo carrier really can handle up to 40 lbs! Tor sometimes wants to be the baby so here he is in the carrier on the way home. We're practicing our 'Blue Steel' look for the camera.

It's been about a month since A started eating solid food. Her first meal was mashed up organic carrots from our CSA farm. I used the hand blender to mash them and they were still a little lumpy so it was a hesitant start. Since then she has tried the commercially prepared carrots and other vegetables which she likes much better. Still we persevere making our own stuff. She has also tried squash, beets, zucchini and sweet potato as well as apple, pear and both rice and oatmeal cereals. Of all these fine offerings I was expecting her to gravitate to the fruit or beets because of the sweetness but no. Her absolute gobble- it- up favourite is............. zucchini. What???!!!! Yes it's true. She can't get enough of it and luckily the harvest is just full of the stuff and it's really easy to make it smooth. So we've had lot's of fun and surprises trying new things and we continue to introduce more each week. She likes grabbing the spoon and trying to feed herself although she often wacks herself in the face. Here are a couple shots of her first meal.

Whoops

Well a few weeks turned into nearly two months. Alot has happened and changed including the season. My blogging time is severely curtailed. Little A's sleep has never been the same since we went east and I find I must follow the kids to bed or risk returning to the state of sleepless grumpy monster.

We had a great trip in July Aug (except for aforementioned sleep issues). We came home mid-Aug to have more park fun. Then we went to a fairly remote island in the Salish Sea altogether including T. This shot is from the mainland on the way home.


Now we are returning to some sort of routine. Preschool, playgroups and next month swimming lessons. A is eating solids and seems to love it. Days are busy and evenings very short. All this crunch will pass someday. Crumbs in the meantime.

Offline for a few weeks...

We'll be off-line for awhile. We're heading to a spot without internet or cell-phone access for 3 weeks! We'll be back in mid-August. It's just the kids and I for this trip so wish me luck. We'll be with my side of the family so there will be lot's of excitement. I leave you with some pictures of summer's bounty, all served outside on the deck. Thanks to our friends for cleaning it up while we were away in the spring.

Dessert


Gravlax made from the salmon which the boys caught, served with shredded beets from the farm we subscribe to. Arugula pesto on the side. (no I don't concoct this stuff, I just enjoy it immensely)


Blackberries picked by t. and I, from the alley one block over. These are early this year. I hope we don't miss the whole crop while we're away.

Summer Fun

We've been having a lovely summer here. The weather is good and since we've discovered the really big deserted beach, we've spent more time in the sand than any summer I can remember. To be fair, I can't remember much these days with the interrupted sleep but we are definitely getting our beach fix. Our local park also has a wading pool and an activity coordinator to help entertain the kids. When T. is busy, we usually manage to spend time there having fun.

When I can manage not to worry about A. and the future, which is surprisingly more often than not, things are really lovely and fun these days. She must be working her magic on me already.

So here are a few shots of some fun we've been having, in no particular order.

Beach time on Canada Day


Windy Ferry ride

A. wondering how she's going to escape this crazy family.


No running on the pool deck!


Beach Ball

Visit to Farfar and FarMor

There are many days when I'm way too tired to write anything. Other days we are way too busy. That was one of my hesitations in starting a blog but I'm still glad I started because I've felt more in touch with all of you and I've met a few nice people from around the world besides. I still haven't joined Facebook though. I can't imagine having time for that too.

So, a few weeks have passed since we visited Farfar and Farmor (father's father and father's mother in Danish) on the island but it was great fun and it's worth posting a few pictures. As usual we feasted like royalty. They always put on a huge spread of delicious food. We also visited a local beach which we had never seen before and the fisherman's wharf. Little A enjoyed being held and loved by her grandparents and t as always, enjoyed being a big ham for everyone.

Here are FF and FM on the beach


Here are t and FF showing off their belt buckles.


Cowboy t found a good horse


Cuddles with FM


Story time with FM