Inadequate Materials

Well, I've already started to backslide on my blog. But what can I say? Those last couple of weeks of school are CRAZY! I have an iron or two in the fire that I'm hoping to share in the coming weeks. In the meantime, Canada celebrates its 150th birthday today! We contemplated celebrating our first Canada Day in the area by going downtown and checking out the festivities, but as it's such a big one, and as we'd be dragging along an autistic tween with crowd and noise issues, and a surly teenager with embarrassing parent issues, it seemed like more of a punishment for us than a celebration. So we decided to stick to the activities available to us in the immediate vicinity, which are actually plentiful and impressive. You know what else is plentiful and impressive? The RAIN we're getting this grey, miserable Canada Day! Here's a look at an hour-by-hour forecast of what we're in for today: Universe, strike me down now! It's Canada's 150th birt...

After we had to let Finnegan go (and I swear I'll stop talking about this soon. Every time I start a new blog post, it seems to come out again. This is cheaper than therapy.), I must have been suffering from some residual guilt or something, because I got into this mode where I was obsessed with making life more luxurious for my remaining two pets. So, off to the sewing machine I went and made new beds for them. Then I went a step further and decided that the cat needed me to convert an old IKEA table into an activity station for him, with his new bed underneath. Here is what that looked like: Note that there is no sign of the cat anywhere in this picture. That is the normal state of his activity station/bed. Instead, this is where the cat can generally be found at any given time of the day or night: On someone else's bed. Under a completely different table, surrounded by clutter. On the floor, in Finnegan's old spot. In the la...

With a big cross-country move comes some big changes. I spent my last three years in Manitoba substitute teaching at the kids' school. Returning to work on a part-time basis was literally the best thing I could have done for my mental health, and I miss it a great deal. Unfortunately, there are factors that make getting onto a sub list here difficult. We'd need a second car, I'd need some kind of backup child care plan for my youngest, and not being bilingual here really limits me, to name just a few. So it looks like that goal will have to wait a while. But fear not! You know me. I roll with the punches! To keep myself busy, I have been working VERY slowly on getting our boring newly-build house looking like humans actually live in it (the kids and pets have been doing their part by systematically demolishing the finish on the hardwood floors). And what I've lost in hireability here, I've gained tenfold in thrifting opportunities. This area of the country is an a...

This blog is like the abandoned amusement park at the edge of town. Most of the time it sits around collecting dust and looking sad, leaving passers-by to wonder if anyone has died there. And then, just when you think someone's going to come along, bulldoze the whole thing and build a new cookie-cutter neighbourhood, the old ferris wheel slowly lurches back to life in the middle of the night. Maybe if I had a van load of teenagers and a talking dog to sort things out, I'd have a working operation on my hands. So, I left you more than a year ago in buggy Manitoba. We are now back in good old Upper Canada, where life is rather different. I like to start with the bad news and then finish up on a high note, so here's the update: The title of my blog is no longer entirely accurate. Back in March, we had to have our 16 year-old dog Finnegan put down. Despite having the blood work of a puppy right to the bitter end, he'd been suffering with increasingly severe arthritis si...

Maybe if I make it sound all official and business-like, I'll be more inclined not to neglect my blog. So here is my update for the first quarter of 2016! First up, have a look at  this awesome project spearheaded by my sister in-law, who is a 6th grade math teacher in Tennessee. I love this project for so many reasons. I am old enough to remember a time when every child in class was expected to sit still and shut up for hours on end, and got the strap and a reputation for being a troublemaker if they couldn't comply. We've come a long way in education since then, thank goodness. At our school here in rural MB, it is not unusual to see kids (my own included) sitting on yoga balls and squishy cushions right at their desks, and in some cases it is literally all they need to go from mentally scattered to focused and ready to learn. Research shows over and over that implementing sensory strategies to regulate a child's nervous system for learning is significantly more ef...

Look, it's my second post of 2015! Pathetic. My blog is officially all but abandoned. If it was a dog, the SPCA would have seized it by now. I've changed how I make resolutions. Saying hippie-dippy things like "I will simplify my life!" while staring into space and raising my right hand ever-so-slightly like I'm Hamlet doing a soliloquy is all very dramatic, but there's no point to it if I'm crying into my massive pile of clutter and lamenting the futility of my existence by the first week of February. Nope, daily goals. Daily goals are the new fad. If there's anything I'm really good at, it's jumping on the latest fad! So, here it is: I will spend 15 minutes decluttering every day. I suppose I will also spend 30 minutes a day exercising. I'm not so enthusiastic about that second one, but I guess I can set aside 30 minutes a day to work towards something that (like it or not) is kind of necessary. So, that's 45 minutes a day spe...

As I'm about 50 posts behind, having not blogged since last JULY (Yeesh!), I imagine there's no one left out there who is still checking in to read this. But I am a former student of journalism, so when I find myself privy to a scoop, my journalistic instinct kicks in and I simply must put it out there. So, if anyone stumbles across this post, just remember, you read it here first! Today, my little sister Mel was the only Canadian to run the Chicago Lakefront Ultra Marathon . For those not familiar, that is FIFTY FREAKING KILOMETERS! I complain if I have to drive that far! So, while she has shamelessly shirked the proud family tradition of sitting in front of the TV eating chips and complaining about being fat, she's made up for it in other ways. But that's not all. She finished this feat of madness in the ridiculous time of 4:19, and was the 4 th female finisher, missing third place by less than 20 seconds! And she placed 13 th overall! That's not just...