Happy New Year 2009 everyone!!

Enjoy this classic New Year's movie.

More posts in 2009 :)

Merry Christmas!

Lots of snow...

A beautiful big tree...

Happy Anouk...

Liam unwrapping the Faraway Tree people...

Christmas magic

A beautiful night! Merry Christmas everyone!

Getting ready for Christmas!

The house is getting very ready for Christmas! Nisser are dancing on the cupboards and hanging out in every corner of the house...

The bell for Christkind is hanging in the doorway to the Christmas room (aka living room!).

Nisser knitting: 

...and playing with the cat: 

Decorations on the fireplace mantle:

We brought in the Christmas Tree and put in the lights, we will decorate it with Liam tomorrow morning. And then Christkind will come, and the nisser - it will be a Danish-German-Canadian Christmas collaboration to make it the best Christmas ever for Liam!!

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

...or not. I think we have enough snow. A light dusting on Christmas Eve totally qualifies for a White Christmas, no need for 30 cm!! But, there is no choice in the matter.

And as I nurse my muscle aches from shoveling snow yesterday I look out into this winter wonderland, it is beautiful, no doubt. And snow does seem to bring the neighbourhood together. The Greek family across the street lent me their snow shovel, and the next door neighbours offered their shovel as well. I guess I was a very sad sight trying to shovel through the snow with a garden shovel.

Even the upstairs neighbours dropped off a card thanking us for shoveling the path (- and our relationship hasn't been characterized by warm and fuzzy feelings in the past!). There was no way of getting out the door without shoveling, the bottom three steps were buried in snow and the backdoor stairs were covered in a sheet of ice. Yikes!

So, don't let the smile on my face while shoveling fool you, this was a lot of work. No wonder people have heart attacks when shoveling snow. Anyways, this bout of exercise really proved that I am utterly out of shape, which will have to change in the new year. 

Well, it looks like I will have plenty of opportunity to get into shape shoveling more snow; I just checked the Environment Canada website: Snowfall Warning for Metro Vancouver, 10 to 20 cm of snow expected between this afternoon and tomorrow evening.

We'd better get all of our last minute Christmas preparations done before the next Snowmageddon hits (that terms was coined by the CBC, not me!)

No soother please!

I just have to share our extensive soother collection. We have tried every soother available, in every texture, shape, size and colour. Textured silicone, like mommy's nipple - well, the marketing pitch does not convince the experts... That one got spit out just like the organic latex soother from Denmark, the regular NUK orthodontic, the extra small one, the berry shaped one... 

Nobody can say we didn't try, but Anouk prefers her two fingers. Even the little trick of putting the soother around those two fingers did not fool her:

 

All we can hope now is that she either won't suck on her fingers too much or that she'll outgrow it very quickly or maybe in a moment of luck she does discover the comforts of a soother.

But I'm not holding my breath and seriously thinking about a savings account for future orthodontist bills....

A night to remember

This weekend was a very special weekend for me, a Saturday evening I had the privilege to share with Liam. An evening at the opera with my son, a little boy completely enthralled by the music, the story, the stage, the orchestra. Hansel and Gretel was performed at the Chan Centre, Simone was singing Gretel and the fairy tale is Liam's favourite story. It has been for a long time - long before we knew that the UBC Opera Company would be performing it with our friend Simone as Gretel. It was perfect.

Liam and I got all dressed up for the Opera, Liam wore a new orange shirt and we left for the Chan Centre much too early. We sat in the foyer and Liam drank in the atmosphere, a bit intimidated by all the people coming in, enchanted by the stars on the ceiling, intrigued by the actors milling around and selling raffle tickets. And then it started to snow outside, our first real snow of the season. It was absolutely beautiful. Sitting with Liam on my lap, reading the synopsis to him and the snow coming down outside the windows behind us.

Then the bell rang and it was time to find our seats and for the opera to begin. On stage a giant storybook that would form the backdrop for all the scenes of the opera. We had perfect seats in the second row, Liam on all of our coats so that he could see the stage well. His eyes were glued to the stage, his feet tapped to the rhythm of the music. When in the final scene of the first act the Sandman came and then fourteen Angels gathered around the sleeping children, Liam was completely lost in the story.

Then came the intermission. And to Liam's delight and great astonishment, some angels were in the foyer. Liam was mesmerized. He tugged at my hand and walked over to the angels with me and stared at them. The he told them: "I know all about you, I saw a movie with you." (We had watched a movie of the opera with him the week before.) Then he gave one of the angels a hug. After the hug he was anxious to get back to our seats so that we wouldn't miss any part of the story. So we went back, I gave Liam some chocolate so that he would make it through the second act. I read to him that the second act begins with Hansel and Gretel telling each other of their dreams: that fourteen angels had stood around them to protect them. Liam looks at me with a knowing smile and says: "But it wasn't a dream, it was real."

The man beside us asks Liam if he knows what happens next and Liam explains that the children now come to the candy house, the witch will put Hansel in  a cage and Hansel will poke out a stick or a bone instead of his finger, depending on what they had here.

Then the second act began and Liam was once again engulfed in the story. Absolutely beautiful, both the performance and watching Liam enjoy the performance. I was so proud of my son, my little boy (big boy!) sitting through the entire opera, without fidgeting, without as much as blinking as he entered the magical world of an opera performance. He loved all the effects, the stars on the ceiling over the sleeping children and the morning clouds - nothing escaped him. It is now two days later and he still can't talk about it; he is still processing everything he took in.

After the final scene and the applause we rushed to the lobby (and the bathroom!) to meet our friend Simone who was Gretel. Liam was amazed to see her there and gave her a big hug. Simone later told me that he didn't want to let go again. I think his hug expressed the relief that Gretel had managed to overpower the witch, that Hansel had been freed from his cage and that all the gingerbread children were transformed into children again. His hug expressed his love for Gretel, his love for the story and his love for that evening.

We walked to our car through the snow that was still coming down, definitely more than a dusting at this point. We drove home, very slowly and carefully and Liam closed his eyes as we crept down the hill and he prayed for the fourteen angels to surround us and protect us on our way. It helped, my heart was pounding like crazy and we slid a couple of times, but we made it down safely.

Liam then asked me whether I had ever seen the fourteen angels around him while he's asleep at night...

It is so beautiful to see the world through his eyes, to see the magic in the world around us and to truly enjoy every moment.

I will never forget this night and I hope that this night will be one of Liam's earliest memories.

Faraway Tree Portrait Gallery

Liam has drawn pictures of some of his favourite Faraway Tree friends: Silky with her beautiful, silky yellow hair; Saucepan Man with his pots and pans and kettles; and Moonface with his big head and even bigger smile. And all around them the branches and leaves of the Tree. We hung them up in his room, it's his own little Faraway Tree!

Enjoy the artwork!

It's the Saturday before the first Sunday of Advent, Christmas time is now beginning. And even though this time of Advent does not have the same meaning here, it does for me. Growing up Advent was a beautiful time with candles, the first Christmas cookies, Nikolaus coming to fill our boots with goodies in the night from December 5th to the 6th... And of course the Advent wreath with its four candles, lit week after week until Christmas. All of these traditions are so important for me and I want my children to grow up with them, even though they are not necessarily the traditions around them. I mean how do you reconcile Nikolaus coming at the beginning of December filling a boot with Santa Claus coming Christmas filling stockings and putting toys under the tree??? The other day Liam said he had many names: "Liam, and Nikolaus and Santa". Now Nikolaus really is his second name, but Santa???

I'll play it by ear, see what happens and in the meantime create the traditions I want for my family. I made the Advent wreath today with four enormous red candles, ribbons and pine cones. And I baked the first Christmas cookies: Vanillekipferl. I always think of my Oma when I make these cookies, who made the best and most delicious Vanillekipferl, I try to make the cookies like she used to, but I am still learning... I think they get better every year...

So here's to the beginning of the Christmas Season, to traditions, to family, especially to family that I miss so much this time of year!

The beauty of something handmade

I was just sitting in the living room looking out into the rain and working on one of the Christmas presents I'm making this year (no details of presents will be disclosed until AFTER Christmas!!). So, I was sitting there thinking about the blog entry form Sweet Juniper about saving the auto industry because there is something worth saving in an industry that actually produces something. And then I was thinking about myself sitting there actually making something for someone. There is a lot of beauty in making something for someone, in sitting down and working on a craft, it's soothing, it's rewarding. It fills you with pride to have the finished product in front of you , knowing that you made this yourself. 

There seems to be a surge in craft fairs and markets as well. I love the Portobello West market here in Vancouver, I wanted to go to the Circle Craft Fair, but life was too busy those days... I love the etsy website. I enjoy looking at other people's work and admiring it. I like reading the story surrounding the work: "Today the first frost came over Newfoundland and all the leaves started falling from the trees without any wind. I spun this yarn to celebrate this moment." What a beautiful description of how that particular yarn was made. It connects the person who will use the yarn with the person who made the yarn. I think the beauty of that is particularly important in our world where we are continuously disconnected from the products we use. Who knows where the meat or the produce in the supermarket comes from? The sweater in the store? Made in some sweatshop in Asia? Who knows and most of the time - who really is concerned about it? Who is confused about stuff traveling the world to make it to a sale close to your home?

That's where the beauty of making something yourself comes in. You sit, take your time and create something. It's no longer so disconnected, so anonymous. So maybe in a world where we are so disconnected from the things around us and sometimes from the people we love, a handmade item connects us again.

Late autumn in the forest

I guess I should be writing more often in my blog, and believe me, it's not for a lack of ideas... It's more a shyness on my part - I mean, how meaningful and interesting are my thoughts going to be? After countless articles and blog entries on Obama's win of the US election, what was there to add but my own personal experience of the moment... But maybe that's what this blog is about.... 

So, until I loose my shyness of blogging about whatever is on my mind, I'll stick to more domestic issues, like a walk in the forest on a gray November day...

Here we go:

Liam with "My-friend-the-bear" on his way to look for red goblins and of course to find the Faraway Tree. This time I was Moonface and Mark was Silky :)

It was really nice with the mist hanging in the trees and the luscious undergrowth even this late in the year. We discovered lots of mushrooms. 

Here's Liam looking at one mushroom just breaking through the soil. 

It's so nice to have this big forest so close, it's like a little getaway from urban life in the middle of the city. 

And somehow we are drawn more to the forest than to the beach in this weather, maybe because the beach is usually very windy and playing in the cold soggy sand is just no fun at all... And there just hasn't been as much magic on the beach, we'll have to introduce some beach fairies into our lives. :) Although Liam will be the first to tell you that the fairies and goblins are just pretend, not real, just like monsters are not real. Although he was pretty convinced last night that Nils Holgersson is real, on the back of Martin, the goose... I guess there is a fine line between real and pretend in his world and that line can be crossed in either direction whenever he wants to.

Booklover!

At Liam's daycare after the morning pit time, kids can choose to either stay for more stories or go outside to play. Their names are called and they can say either "stay" for more stories or "go" for going outside. When Liam's teacher was telling us about his, there wasn't a doubt in our minds that he would be in the "stay" group for more stories, because he will tell you: "You know, I really love stories!" and his favourite place in the neighbourhood is definitely the library and he will pretty much throw a tantrum if you don't read two chapters with him at bedtime ("Mama, we always read TWO chapters!"). So, we knew he would be in the "stay" group, but were not expecting the cuteness of him saying: "booklover" :)

We are now reading the "Faraway Tree" again for the fourth (!) time. It is his (and my) favourite bedtime book. When we got the book, we read it three consecutive times, then we went on adventures on the "Wishing Chair" and visited the "Land of Og" and had a brief excursion to the "Magic Treehouse" ("Mama, that was a very short book"), but now we are happily back to the Faraway Tree. I already look forward to the Angry Pixie, Mister Whatshisname, Dame Washalot and of course Silky, Moonface and the Saucepan Man (or Sauceman Pan as Liam calls him). 

In the morning when Liam crawls in our bed, he pretends that it is the Faraway Tree, Mama is Silky, Daddy is Moonface, Anouk is either the angry pixie or the red squirrel depending on whether she's crying or not, and Liam is Joe, coming to visit. He slips down under the covers to the foot of the bed, down the Slippery Slip, and then it's breakfast time.

It's really wonderful that Liam has all this magic in his life. Last night he was playing with his animals in bed and T-Rex ate up all the animals, except for the little bunny, so the two of them got married, and luckily his old fried Abu is magical and can get everybody who's been eaten by T-Rex out again - safe and sound. Then everybody get tucked in and with Balu the Dragon and Abu tightly in his arms, it's time to got to sleep...

My first blog entry...

So I've decided to start a blog... There are days, events, photos, moments in life that I would like to share - so, let's get started on this adventure!

Today is a typical late fall day here in Vancouver, some rain, some sun. We went for a beautiful walk in the Endowment Lands this morning. Liam was pretending to be in the Land of Og and we spent most of the walk running away from the Snake People and scaring off Ogs. The forest was beautiful, lots of mushrooms everywhere and the fall colours at their brightest. Some mist hanging in the treetops made the autumn atmosphere perfect.