changes

These past few months have been months of change.  Oh how I have longed to write and record everything that is happening, but in the midst of it, everything seemed too much to record. How can I put this life into words?  It seemed impossible.

The days scurry along and sometimes it seems impossible to catch a moment of quiet. Balancing homeschool preschool, doctor's appointments, playdates and mom's group, housework and errands has been tricky at times. Balancing being busy and then having that downtime, playtime at home that the girls crave and love - it's hard. Our biggest news the
                                                                                    past few months is #3...

...baby #3 is coming! Nausea, exhaustion, and just trying to figure how a pregnant mama can do all this - that has been the past few months!

The girls have been fabulous, and although we have had our struggles they are beginning to internalize everything that is happening, primarily through play.  They play birthing babies and have packages of goat's milk to play with (wipes refill packages), they carry their babies everywhere too.

They are great friends and their pretend play is amazing.

Tim's sister got married in November and we had a lovely time celebrating with family and a few of her friends that flew to Fredericton for the occasion.  Charlotte was a flower girl for the very first time!  

Lila had a matching skirt (all homemade... not by me!) and did pretty well throughout the ceremony and photos.  

She even had some flower petals to sprinkle!  It was a great time to connect with family, eat yummy food together, stay up late and celebrate together.

Christmas has come and gone, in a bit of a whirlwind. I was quite sick up to the holiday, so preparations were minimal. We had a nice celebration with family, and made it to Nova Scotia on Boxing Day to visit my family.  

New Year's Eve we spent with close friends in Moncton and had a really nice visit with them and their boys.

Now we are home, the Christmas tree has yet to be taken down and to be honest, I feel like I am grasping at  loose ends, trying to live these days with purpose and joy. What's to come in the new year?  I'm not exactly sure, but there will be love and growth and change.  I know that for sure.

strength and fitness

My fitness routine lately has been slack.  Let's be honest, it is non-existent.  I searched quickly through some photos, looking for examples of exercise and couldn't find anything that is recent. Oh, there is the odd family hike or walk on the trail or in the woods, but that is it.  I'm becoming aware of a loss of strength, endurance and health due to a lack of fitness, and I'm not sure how to fix it.

August 2012

I hope to not be depressing, just honest!  I honestly feel better when I work out. I honestly don't know how to fit it into my life in a practical, affordable way. When I reflect on the time that I felt the most in shape, it was when I was regularly attending Goodlife, a local gym within walking distance to our townhouse, lifting weights, attending the Body Flow class and also, taking a class on Nordic walking as well.  I was preparing myself to hike Mt. Katahdin and using my poles, walking all the way up Smythe Street to work and then often walking at lunch with the poles too. (I can't really believe I had the guts to do it at the time, I was the crazy pole walking girl, but I didn't really care!)

July 2007

Oh, and did I mention that was before kids?  

I am in this weird place right now, of trying to eat enough and not lose weight.  The restricted diet (no gluten/dairy) combined with breastfeeding makes for a tricky calorie balance.  I would love to learn about about nutrition and the best way to feed myself and my family.  

July 2012

I think health is a combination of many factors.  We have never had a scale and it is not about the numbers for me.  It is about food, exercise, sleep (?!), strength, outdoor pursuits and cultivating a sense of peace in life.  I have a few pieces in place, but it is always a journey.  But that fitness/exercise/strength piece is just not there at the moment.  I have experimented with working out at home before, with Leslie Sansone's Walk At Home program and the Jillian Michaels' 30 Day Shred.  Videos aren't motivating to me lately, it seems every time I sign a workout video from the library, I never even open it before it is due back.  Our living room is our business office, play room, music room, and more. There usually is no space to work out!  If there are any suggestions out there I'd love to hear them.  If I come up with a plan, I will share it, and continue to share my journey!

a message for the mama of a little one

Mama, I remember.

I wish I had thought to capture some photos. Picture memories of daily life at the time. Walking endlessly, nursing endlessly, crying and crying and pure and utter exhaustion.

Mama, I remember like it was yesterday.  Not knowing how on earth I was to get it all done. Begging Tim, please, please, please can't you stay home from work another day.  I just can't do it. One week at home, and one week working from home was a lot compared to some, I realize now.  But my confidence was buried in a pit somewhere, and no one could convince me that it would be okay.
Mothering two came as a huge shock.  I entered motherhood the first time with pure joy. I do remember walking Charlotte through the house in the middle of the night, living room to kitchen door to bedroom, watching Tim sleep wishing, wishing I could be too.  But I had become a mama, and it had been a longing of my heart for a long time.

Exhaustion was pure.  It was intense with two.  Two babies, two years and newborn. So many needs, only one me.    

Mama, please know that it is going to get better. It is going to be okay. Surround yourself with loving support. Accept meals, accept help. You are in a season. It will be okay. Discover what brings you peace and joy and DO those things. Even if it's every once in a while, it will make a difference. 

One day, you will turn around and your children will be playing happily for chunks of time at a time and it will take your breath away. You will realize that you have space and a second to breathe and relax. Please don't feel guilty about this! Feed your mama soul during these times. 

Mama, know that you are not alone. Reach out and lug your newborn to a coffee shop with a friend and spill your heart. Saying that it is hard out loud, like nothing you ever imagined, it will help.

Give yourself grace, mama. It's a hard season, that season of newborn to one year. And even beyond. 

Much love,

Pamela

(photo credit - Shanie Stozek)

summer fun - part 2

I figure I'd better finish up our summer fun memories!  Autumn in here, as I am reminded by our morning walks, collecting "signs of Autumn" as Charlotte puts it.  Although the weather has been deceivingly warm, we were all in shorts and t-shirts on Saturday, it felt like the high 20s out there!

The summer is always full of lots of books for us.  It's no different than the rest of the year, really.  We do love our library dearly and always come home with a bag full of books.  The challenge becomes getting through all of the books before the next trip to the library!

We love play times with friends, I even got to babysit this sweetheart this summer!

French braids with Auntie Anna... lovely!

Lila tried a whole corn on the cob, and loved it.

Daddy turned 30!  We had a lovely birthday party at the lake, swimming, supper and games.  Here we are playing pass the parcel.

"Pin the roof on the house", Charlotte's idea for a rendition of pin the tail...

Two big birthday cakes!

 A spontaneous puppet show!  (I loved their creative use of a car as a puppet theatre.)

Some lovely gifts!

A "fishing buddy": Tim's real life fishing buddy and his son made this for him.  Funny and bittersweet as they were in the process of moving to a different city at this time.

A game of dominoes before heading back into town for bed!

Lila became really confident in her swimming this summer!  The girls always wear life jackets, but Lila was attempting to swim and kick on her own.  

Happy Hollisters and "Goofy Minds the House" were two of our favourite cottage reads this summer.

I think I will have to save the girl's birthdays for a third post.  We did have many lovely photos this summer, capturing our wonderful times with family and friends!  

Our preschool homeschool rhythm

We are in our second week of homeschooling, and it has been wonderful and challenging.  I love the intentional rhythm and structure that homeschooling has brought to our days.  The summer was full of lots of park time, visiting friends and family and days full of busyness.  I love that.  I think I thrive off of social interaction with other adults too.  I also love the intentional plan to stay home three mornings a week and do fun preschool activities with the girls.  I really like not feeling guilty about just staying home, but relishing in the routine we have built in just two short weeks.  It is wonderful.

It is a huge decision about what to do for preschool for a 4 year old.  Most of Charlotte's peers are in a 2 to 5 day a week preschool.  There is only one person in our immediate play group circles that is homeschooling for this year before Kindergarten.  It is a weighty financial and educational decision.  After much discussion this summer we decided to homeschool for this year.  I plan to homeschool for preschool three mornings a week, attend a Mom's group one morning a week and then keep one free for drop-in library program, groceries/errands or just a "stay home and relax" morning.  Our afternoons are a bit more unscheduled at the moment, but I am focusing on our morning rhythm right now.

The theme for the first month of school will be getting into the routines we have set together.  In the morning, that starts with our Morning High Five.  Each of the girls have a "High Five"... five things that they do in the mornings, and then sometimes we do actual high fives when they finish everything.

Charlotte's consists of: making the bed, checking Ava's water dish and filling it, setting the table/eating breakfast, clearing her dishes/washing the morning dishes, and getting dressed/clothes in laundry & brushing teeth.

Lila's consists of: eating breakfast, clearing her dishes, wiping the table clean, getting dressed/clothes in laundry/brushing teeth and getting Ava's leash and poop bag for our short morning walk.

This is quickly becoming part of our morning routine!  I love it, and it's frustrating at times. Children doing their own chores and having responsibility in the house always takes longer. (Especially when they are two and four!) I try to remember that this is important, and they are contributing to our family unit.  I also try my very best not to clean up after they are finished!

I also am not going to push it, I try to enforce our High Five on school mornings, if it happens other mornings, then great!  If we have a morning like this morning.... I just let go and let the girls play, play, play.  That's what they really wanted to do this morning, and so I changed gears, and decided to write instead.  That is the joy of what we are doing.  It's a flexible structure!  I am trying to take on the "usually not always" mentality, I am challenged by Renee's writing and I'm realizing that it is freeing to think this way!  Yes, we have a schedule, and no, we don't always stick to it.  And that is okay.

I keep everything organized using a Weekly Homeschool Planner.

After our "High Five" we go for a morning walk.  We take Ava, and we are working on taking better care of our pet, giving her more walks and exercise.  Usually the walk turns into running and the girls get some wiggles out before our circle time.

  This was a family hike we went on. I still need to capture a photo of our morning walks in our neighbourhood!

After our walk we come in, get a drink of water and sometimes a piece of fruit and start our circle time.  Our rhythm for circle consists of prayer (we all take turns thanking God), songs and rhymes (two or three), memory verse, calendar time, weather, stretching and balancing (to get moving again) and stories.

During calendar we sing about the days of the week, talk about yesterday, today and tomorrow, count the numbers for the days and talk about the colour pattern (blue, blue, red this month).  We count the days to learn which number is the day for today.  We review our birthdays and special days and sometimes read the names of the months too.  We talk about our season and decide what the weather is like today.  Then Charlotte fills in our weather graph!  It sounds like a lot, but it goes really quickly.  If the girls are restless I move along quickly.


Our stories (and memory verses) follow Sonlight curriculum, the pre-Kindergarten package. I love the books in Sonlight, and we were very blessed this year to be able to borrow all the books from a friend! There are a few activities in the curriculum and I will pick and choose these as we go. We read our Bible Story during breakfast. Our favorites so far are "Uncle Wiggly's Storybook" and "The Berenstain Bears' Big Book of Nature and Science".

photo by Charlotte

After our circle time, we do activities together. For now, I am taking ideas from a Letter of the Week Curriculum and we have worked on the letter S and T so far. We do literacy, fine motor activities (including writing), movement activities, math, art, science experiments and baking during this time.  I will share more on this at another time!  I think we will start a fall unit next week.

Then it's lunch, more stories and quiet time.  (I'm still working on implementing a quiet time, it is turning out to be a challenge!) I will share more as we go!  We are getting our rhythm, and allowing lots of time for free play. The magical stage in which the girls play together has begun, and I absolutely love it!

“It is paradoxical that many educators and parents still differentiate between a time for learning and a time for play without seeing the vital connection between them.” Leo F. Buscaglia

I am still on a learning curve through all of this but truthfully, I love it.  I love the planning and I love the teaching.  I am challenged by being mom and teacher.  

there's a new restaurant in town!

I was so pleased to be contacted by a representative of St. Hubert regarding an opportunity to review their new restaurant in town!  I am excited to be entering a new area of blogging I have never touched before... food and restaurant reviews!

In return for a review of their restaurant, we were given a discounted meal at the restaurant.  All of the opinions written below are my own.

                                                                              

St. Hubert Express is located at 22 Trinity Ave. in Fredericton New Brunswick.  St. Hubert has a 60 year history and its first restaurant was opened in 1951 in Montreal.  They now employ 10,000 people at 116 restaurants and service points in Québec, New Brunswick and Ontario.  It is truly a Canadian company!      St. Hubert is very well known in Québec, and the owner we spoke to indicated that many francophones have been visiting the Fredericton location.  The St. Hubert Express in Fredericton opened August 8th, 2012.  The owners are Dennie and Barry Pope, they are co-owners of the franchise and brothers who grew up near Sussex, NB.  The restaurant manager is David Smith.  I met with Barry Pope and he was very willing to answer all of my questions, serve us great food and even take me behind the scenes in the kitchen.

The parking lot was packed when we arrived which is always a great sign!  We met Barry right away (an employee led us to the kitchen area) and we were offered to sit and order food first.  This was great, as the girls were hungry and the restaurant was busy!  I brought up our gluten and dairy allergy and this issue was dealt with in a very professional manner.  (Rather than, "I'm so sorry for you, here is the one thing on the menu you can have."  I have come across this almost every time we go out to eat.)  

The restaurant sends out a red alert when they have an allergy indicated at the cash.  In fact, Barry was going to take our orders personally, but he led Tim to the cash to do this in order to put the red alert through the system, so that the chefs were aware of the allergies.  Each chef changes their gloves in case they have come in contact with bread.  The allergy alert shows up on the receipts.  Barry advised me not to have any of the special sauces (served at the condiment station, not automatically with the meal) and he advised me that the chicken, fries, potato, rice and dairy-free coleslaw (!!) were safe.  Yes, they make two kinds of delicious coleslaw (with local veggies!), one with dairy products (which Tim really loved) and one without (which I loved).  It was great to have a choice to order from as most of their dishes are chicken!  

Did you know that the St. Hubert chicken mascot was originally designed by Disney animator Jack Dunham?

Tim ordered the chicken and ribs, I ordered the chicken breast and baked potato, Lila has the chicken thigh kid's meal and Charlotte had the chicken nuggets. I would order Charlotte the real chicken next time instead of the processed nuggets.  She isn't used to processed chicken anymore and the real stuff is so much better.

We all loved our food. The chicken portions were big, and although the pricing may be slightly more expensive than fast food, it was so much better.  It was filling and the homemade coleslaw added the perfect meal addition.  The chicken was moist and full of flavour.  The girls received apple sauce with their kid's meal, which was a nice touch.  The Express version of St. Hubert is set up like a fast food restaurant in format, but it has a nice quality atmosphere inside the restaurant.  When I asked Barry why he chose the Express version as opposed to the sit down restaurant he explained that it was more affordable to set up and run the Express version.  (It is one third of the cost of the traditional St. Hubert restaurant.) Also, it allows for people who work in the Knowledge Park area to have a quick lunch option.  Moncton has a full restaurant option, and the Express option is going to (hopefully) become more popular in the Maritimes.

I asked Barry why he decided to open a restaurant in Fredericton.  He was living in Halifax at the time and his brother, Dennie was living here in Fredericton.  The two choices they had were Fredericton or Halifax and they had accountants look at the numbers.  The cost of operations were lower in Fredericton so it made more sense to open a restaurant here.  

I asked if they had any practices in place to promote environmental sustainability in the food industry.  They have an eco station in the restaurant.  The customers bring their trays to the station and the employees organize and separate the waste into recyclables, plastic, compost and garbage.  It is a system that is working well for now, but Barry indicated that it might not be an easy thing to continue with forever.  Their napkins are made from 100% recycled paper, which was a good thing as we went through a lot that evening!  A huge milk spill... need I say more?

I asked Barry if they take any action to source their products locally.  I really was not expecting a positive answer for this question.  I was pleasantly surprised!  They currently buy their produce from Fresh Choice in Fredericton area.  Their produce is not strictly local, but understood that their cabbage and carrots are.  They receive 50 lbs of fresh cabbage and carrots every morning and process and make their coleslaw on site.  Barry and Dennie's father is actually a cabbage farmer in Belleisle!  They are hoping to switch and use his cabbage for their restaurant.  It surprised me how local and family based this restaurant is.

Their raw chicken comes from Nadeau Poultry near Edmundston.  It is air cooled in the processing plant, not cooled using water.  Barry explained that at Swiss Chalet, the chicken is water cooled, which causes it to look more white, but less flavourful and moist.  The chicken goes through a double cooking process at the restaurant, they have two huge ovens that cook over 100 chickens at once. They are hoping to give back to the community in many ways but they are still deciding strategically how to go about doing this.

In conclusion, I was pleased with the restaurant.  I loved the food, the atmosphere, and the precautions took to ensure that Lila and I had a safe meal to eat.  I didn't like that we had to pay 50% under the presumption that our meal would be provided for!  We are on a very tight budget and would not have otherwise spent money on food at a restaurant.  (We also choose the expensive options, before realizing we had to pay.)  I didn't like that the floors were slippery, I saw one lady slip in heels and then Charlotte fell coming out of the bathroom.  Also, there is not a change table in the women's bathroom, only in the wheelchair bathroom.  That could be inconvenient at times.  We were served by the owner, so I'm sure a regular experience would be a bit different.  But I was really pleased with all that I observed.  I am very thankful for Thomas Ledwell for setting up this experience for my family, it was a great opportunity!

Now... go try it out for yourself!  Tell me what you think in the comments.  Have you eaten at a St. Hubert Express before?  Did you have a positive experience?