Beautiful Blogger Award

I have been given a Beautiful Blogger Award by Jennifer over at Connected Mom!

The rules are really very simple: 1) link to the person who nominated you, 2) tell 7 things about yourself people might not know 3) nominate 15 more beautiful bloggers!

Before you read the 7 super-duper interesting things about me, go check out the Connected Mom Blog! Jennifer writes about many of the things I love like breastfeeding, baby wearing, and natural and attachment parenting. She is TEH awesome!

1) When I was a little girl I wanted more than anything to be a marine biologist when I grew up. I made this decision living on the bald Canadian Prairie having never even seen the ocean with my own eyes. When I finally did see the ocean I still loved it and everything in it, but realized that I was far too frightened of it to go any further than ankle deep and would probably not enjoy a career than involved actually getting IN the ocean.

2) I recently took up the Ukulele. I always thought that I could be a really musical person. Never mind that I never really learned to play an instrument, and was rarely given any choir or musical theatre solos in school, I was convinced that I possessed the hidden talent to be a rock star. As it turns out the best way to test ones musical acuity is to try tuning an instrument by ear. . . I just can't do it. I can play several simple Ukulele tunes, but I need Das Piper to tune my instrument for me every time.

4) Despite my long time Vegetarianism, when I was pregnant I craved stove-top turkey stuffing. I did my best to ignore this craving. Not only was I set in my decision to remain vegetarian throughout my pregnancy, I also knew that introducing that amount of pure sodium into my system would be asking for trouble. I finally gave in around my second trimester. I had been so sick that I simply convinced myself that it wouldn't really be eating it if I was just going to throw it up again within the hour. . . I ate the whole box, on several occasions. . . and ya know what? Not only did I develop a pretty bad case of preclampsia late in my third trimester, but IT WAS DELICIOUS!

5) I have to touch the car window every time we drive over train tracks. There are several reasons why that I have some up with in my head, but the fact is I just have to, there is no good reason.

6) FRINGE SPOILER ALERT! I don't believe that the Walternate is trying to build a machine to close the holes between our universe and the alternate universe, I think he is building a weapon to take over and occupy our universe when the alternate is destroyed.

7) When I was pregnant with Oliver, Das Piper and I had already settled on a different name for him. We were going to name him Duncan. 4 months before he was born I was at the grocery store and realized that with that name his full name would sound very similar to a brand of instant cake mix. . . I contemplated not saying anything and using our original name anyways. . . I am pretty sure just contemplating giving a kid such a ridiculous name makes me a pretty terrible person.

Ok, there you have it, 7 random things about me that you may or may not have known. I know what you're thinking, you're thinking "How does she know what I am thinking?" and after that you're thinking, "This woman is really quite boring". So here are 15 bloggers who are much more interesting than I am that I would like to pass the beautiful blogger award on to!

1)Breastfeeding Moms Unite
2)Lulusparrow
3)Bloomy Mommy
4)Beatnik’s beat on life
5)Chaotic Mama
6)Mommypotamus
7)Brisbane to Brooklyn
8)Abigail’s Road To Nowhere
9)I am the Diva
10)Accustomed to Chaos
11)Feminist Breader
12)Blacktating
13)Schmutzie
14) Tori Klassen
15)Hobo mama

Baby Haiku

Glasses
What's that on your face?
Perched so neatly on your nose.
I want to grab them.

Jumping
How I love to jump!
Jump jump jumpity jump jump!
Mom's arms are so tired.

Remote Control
These buttons taste good!
Sorry, were you watching that?
Daddy in training.

Guest Post: My Mom's Thoughts On my 24th Birthday

It's true! Today is my 24th birthday, and instead of spending the whole day singing my own praises, I thought I would invite my mom to sing them for me and share her thoughts and insights on my life thus far. My Mom normally blogs on her own site, torriklassen.com.

Each month, my oldest daughter, “Pocketbuddha” sends me (and the rest of the family) an update on Oliver’s progress, which is titled “Oliver is [x] months old.”

Well, today I get to update you all about Pocketbuddha, because it’s her birthday, and because I’m her mother, and because - damn I am proud of her.

She was born 24 years ago in Kindersley, Saskatchewan. There was still a Soviet Union then, and a divided Germany. Jello Biafra was in his last months as a member of the Dead Kennedys. A two-headed baby was flown somewhere for surgery - luckily not my baby. I didn’t want to think about such things back then. No. Wait. I still don’t.

It was hotter than hell the week she was born. The little maternity ward was full and the water pressure in that small prairie town failed from overuse - there was no running water in the hospital for a day or so. You can imagine how much I wanted to take my little girl home to Kerrobert, an even smaller town where we lived. After three days, we did just that.

Me: barely 21 years old, not much prior experience with babies or toddlers of any kind (not much babysitting experience, no small cousins, etc.). We come into our home (a two-bedroom apartment), I took my baby out of her car seat and laid her on the bed.

Baby Pocketbuddha: tiny. Black hair. Sleeping peacefully.

Me: Ye gods. This is an entirely new human being depending on me 24/7 from now until - well like 18-20 years.

What. Do. I. Do. Now???????

Like any new mother - no worse, because I was so inexperienced - I had hopes, dreams, expectations. But Pocketbuddha was from the start her very own person who didn’t feel the need to follow any path but her own.

I’ve always admired that about her, even while I was admonishing her to “Question authority, NOT your mother!”

This is what she taught me: children are their own people, they’re not little “minime” copies of their parents. Not necessarily.

So you can be horrified all you want when you carefully raise them vegetarian until age 4 when suddenly at day care they grab a sausage and wolf it down.

Yes, she did this.

Yes, I was horrified.

But look at her now: she’s the vegetarian, I’m the carnivore. Closing the circle. Nyah.

Over the years our relationship hasn’t always been close. At one point when she was a teenager I actually had serious doubts as to whether she could actually take care of herself on her own given the horrific state of her room and her generally slovenly attitude toward household chores.
I didn’t realize at the time, but it’s just a developmental phase teenagers go through. Pocketbuddha is the eldest of three; she had to train us to be good parents. She did her job well, because I felt more prepared for it with her younger siblings, much to her chagrin.

But one thing I never had any doubt about: that she would be a wonderful mother. When her best friend had a baby at 17, she pitched right in and had that little girl in her arms as much as she could. Same with another friend’s baby boy a year or two later.

One night I was driving up to her dad’s house for a visit, or to pick up something, or drop something off, I can’t remember now. It was summer, it was fairly late (9 or 10 in the evening). There was my teenaged Pocketbuddha with her friend’s baby on the front porch, on the rocking chair.

“Mom,” she said with a pitiful expression on her face. “She’s been up for hours and she won’t go to sleep! I’m exhausted!”

“Oh no!” I said, seizing the teaching moment by the horns. “Gosh, well. Babies do that sometimes. It won’t last. Eventually, she will go to sleep." I beat a hasty retreat without offering to help, figuring the lesson here would be: don’t have children before you’re damn good and ready.

So when my beautiful, smart, sassy, creative, artistic daughter called me a year ago February to tell me she was pregnant, I cried tears of joy. My little baby was going to be the best mother, EVAR. Better than me, because she knew exactly what she was in for.

And when I walked into her home that she shares with my son-in-law (a man I quite like, respect and admire) and my grandson: I saw everything in its place, neat and tidy, and a mother completely in love with her baby boy (c’mon - what’s not to love?) and I knew that, just as her namesake wrote in the 14th century:

All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.

WordFUL Wednesday: Robert Munsch

My 8 year old niece won 6 tickets to see Robert Munsch from a draw at her school, and was very thoughtful in choosing who to invite.

Her mom, her two best friends, and of coarse me, her auntie JJ, who has been buying her Munsch books nearly every birthday and Christmas for the last 8 years.

Needless to say I was ecstatic! I have loved Robert Munsch's books for as long as I can remember. Without his stories I don't think I would love books half as much as I do now.

For anyone out there who has never read on of his stories stop reading this (you can come back to it in a bit, just humor me here), get in your car, or on your bike, bus, or train and go, right this very second, to the nearest book store and get at least one, or as many as you can. You'll thank me when you do, and your children will thank you.

(If you find yourself overwhelmed by the selection, my personal favorites are "Purple, Green, and Yellow", "Millicent and the Wind", "The Mud Puddle", and "The Paper Bag Princess")

The man is quite simply a genius. His story telling speaks to not only every child, but to every person. Every character is us, our children, our brothers and sisters, our nieces and nephews.

Along with very relatable characters and plots ranging from a girl who finds a baby in a hole, a boy who won't go to sleep, a girl who makes friends with the wind, to the experiences of a young immigrant's first days of school in Canada, Robert Munsch also builds his stories with story time in mind. His stories are meant to be read out loud and interacted with.

Hearing his stories come to life through his own telling was magic.

At one point, while he was telling every mother's favorite Munsch story 'love you forever', all the babies in the audience aged 0 to 13 and beyond rested comfortably in their mother's arms without any resistance or embarrassment. It was a shared moment so peaceful and powerful that there was not a single dry maternal eye in the house. I got the feeling that many of the mothers of older children had not had the opportunity to hold their babies so closely in quite some time.

There is a funny thing that happens though, when you hear stories you remember from your childhood told by someone other than the person who told them to you in your childhood. It's not unlike listening to a cover of your favorite song in that it's often hard to stop comparing the two versions and just enjoy it, and yet it's so much more than that. There's a disappointment that sets in, and something akin to home sickness. The man who wrote the story could never tell it as well as my parents did.

So tears and laughter and nostalgia were had and at the end of the show I eagerly rushed for the autograph line. We stood there for 2 hours, despite the fact that the children were getting bored and Oliver overtired. (Thank god for those girls though, Oliver hardly fussed at all he was so busy soaking up the attention!)

I got to meet one of my childhood heroes, got to thank him for his contribution to my childhood, and to Oliver’s. And even though my camera suffered a sudden and mysterious crap out at that exact moment causing me to miss a great photo opportunity (Robert Munsch holding my son). I couldn't have asked for anything more.

Thou Shalt Not Put Baby In A Corner

As I am sure you’ve already heard, Better Homes and Gardens is currently under fire for letting THIS ARTICLE go to print. In the article, BH&G writer, Heather (who obviously does not have any children of her own), shares with us her “commandments” for eating out with your small children while making “helpful” suggestions for keeping your children at home and out of public where the rest of society won’t have to look at your whiney snot-nose crotch droppling.

Note: Better Homes & Gardens has since apologized for this article on their Face Book page siting a lack of editor impute and vetting procedures for online articles. Now that this problem has been brought to their attention I certainly hope that steps will be taken to make sure it doesn't happen again.

While I appreciate the apology, my grievances with the article still stand. The opinions expressed in this article, and many of the comments from those who agree with those opinions are a symptom of the misogyny that is ingrained in our society. When you perpetuate social taboos and set limits on breastfeeding and other forms of mothering you are marginalizing women. The hurt that was caused by Better Homes and Gardens providing an unwitting platform for these opinions can not be mended by a simple apology, but I appreciate it none-the-less.

Well Heather, I am sorry that we parents of the world have inconvenienced you, but you know what? Single childless people aren’t exactly the model of acceptable behaviour themselves. So I’ll make you a deal; I will take your incredibly offensive commandments under consideration if you consider my commandments for eating out with your lonely bitter self:

Thou shalt not park your car in the specially reserved parking spaces for parents of young children.

Yes it’s true that those parking spots are purely convenience, and are not protected by any sort of by-law. You will not be fined for parking there without children, but it forces parents of small children to find parking elsewhere and then navigate their small children across a possibly busy and dangerous parking lot. What's more, it makes you look like a total dooche bag.

Thou shalt not use the folding bathroom change table as a convenient place to set your purse.

It may look convenient, but if you had children, you would know that the festering microscopic germ farm growing on that public change table is not a place you would want to set anything without a quick wipe down and a change pad underneath. Not only that but it’s also really irritating for the woman standing there with a stinky baby in her arms waiting for you to get out of the way, especially even if you flash a cheesy smile and say ‘oh sorry, just a second’ in a laughing tone.

Thou shalt not swear loudly enough for my children to hear you at the next table.

Regardless of whether or not there are children at the next table, it is just polite to keep your voice down if you feel the need to be crude. I totally get that it is often necessary, I certainly do not have the cleanest mouth in the world, but I have enough trouble trying to watch my own mouth, I don’t have the time or energy to shield my children from other people’s bad language as well.

Thou shall not smoke your cigarettes right beside the entrance of any establishment.

I didn’t work so hard to kick the smoking habit when I got pregnant just to have insensitive jerks blowing smoke in my baby’s face when I am coming or going from a restaurant, or any other building. If you must slip out for a cigarette in the middle of your meal please make sure to step around to the side of the building.

Thou shalt not stare/glare at me while I am nursing my child.
Yes I breastfeed at the dinner table. No, I do not cover when I do. Some babies just won't eat with a blanket over their head, my son is one of those babies, but that doesn't mean that I should have to go somewhere as unsanitary as a bathroom (no matter how nice it may be) to feed him. In fact, it is my legal right to breastfeed wherever I happen to be. I do, however, have that blanket handy if you would like to eat with it over YOUR head.

Thou shalt not sit around gossiping with your friends in the designated nursing area.

It is my right to breastfeed my child wherever I want, covered or not, but if I choose to use one of the few designated nursing rooms provided by some businesses the last thing I want to deal with is a giggling gaggle of obnoxious women distracting my baby while he’s trying to latch, or just taking up the space I need to care for my child.

Thou shalt not drink too much during your quiet adult dinner and then drive home.

It’s happened too many times for me to count. My family and I go out to eat and while we are enjoying our meal (despite the dirty looks and holier than thou attitudes of the childless patronage.) someone at the next table starts to get a little louder, and little sloppier, and well, just a little bit drunk. I have no problem with that; enjoy yourself while you can, if you do ever have kids you will look back on these days fondly. However, when you then get in your car you are putting my children, yourself, and the general public in harms way.

Thou shalt not bother your wait staff with complaints about other patrons.

Maybe I am crazy, but someone could walk into an establishment totally naked and I probably wouldn't say anything to the wait staff. It is their job to take your order and bus your table, not be your social babysitter. Deciding what behaviour is or is not acceptable, or who is and who is not welcome in the establishment is up to the management, human rights legislation and local licensing laws. By complaining about other patrons to your wait staff you are putting them in a really uncomfortable and sometimes impossible position.

If any of these commandments cannot be met for whatever reason, there are plenty of great recipes out there to recreate the dining out experience in your own home where you do not have to interact with anyone you find annoying, inappropriate, or distracting.