Where in the world?

At first I was avoiding writing this post. And then I felt ready to write it, but couldn't make the time. Now I've got about 3 posts I want to write, and I just need to get this out of the way! So, while Colm naps beside me and Aedan is quietly watching t.v., I'll fill you in.

After 2 weeks of Costa Rica, we decided it just was not the right time or place for our family to be experimenting with the ex-pat lifestyle. We made a radical change to our plans, and came back to Ontario in time for the holidays. Costa Rica is absolutely beautiful, and it is a place to which I will return. There is so much more of it to be explored, and when the kids are older, maybe we'll see it all. The beach we stayed at was wonderfully low-key, almost undiscovered really, and we've got some great memories of it. Aedan discovered that he loves to play in the waves and to devour mangoes in the sand. And Colm never showed a moments hesitation with the water! He even tried taking his first real steps in the surf. I guess he thought it would be easier to enjoy from a slightly higher vantage. 

We relaxed, we soaked up the sun, we ate our combined weight in fruit, we dispatched no less than 6 scorpions from our house (and one enormous, hairy black spider), we watched a group of 10 howler monkeys move through the trees at our back deck, we played in the waves and watched the sun set over the Pacific ocean every night.

I felt so guilty, so ungrateful, when we first made the decision to come back to Ontario so soon. But I know now it was the right one. Spending the holidays with family felt like exactly the thing we should have been doing, and the boys are loving all the time with grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. 

Without any further ado, here are some of my favourite photos from Costa Rica. Enjoy!

Variations of Home

(I wrote this post a few days ago, and was waiting until I got a photo of the door, or something, to post. But I've had a sick baby in my arms for the past couple of days. The words are more important, anyway.)

I remember visiting my parents, not long after moving to the Yukon, and referring to their house as "home". My mom told me that it made her happy to hear that I still thought of it that way.

From then on, I made a concious effort not to refer to it as home. I'd decided that the Yukon would be my new home; I could not have more than one.

I am home now, in my parents' house. It is always a comfortable feeling, as we drive from the airport through the familiar streets of the city in which I grew up. It is a deep exhale as I step through the side door and drop my bags. Everything is familiar: the smell, clean and sweet; the creak of the stairs; the way I immediately begin opening the refridgerator and the cupboards, like my teenaged self looking for something to eat; the way my sister and I fall into the rhythm of setting and clearing the table; the dinner-table conversation. All of the things I fought hard in my twenties, I embrace now. This will always be home.

But home is also a log cabin on the other side of the country, blanketed in snow. Home is the woodstove softly ticking, it is the generator humming through the dark night, it is the complete silence that accompanies a 3 am trip to the outhouse. Each time we drive the long highway between Whitehorse and Dawson, I am awed by the vastness of the territory, the wildness of it; where the only thing moving is the wind through the trees, the only sound the beat of a raven's wings. It is something I treasure but will never possess. It is a darkly beautiful jewel. It is terrifying and comforting at once.

And as we begin this journey of uprootedness, of travel, of not-knowing, home is here, in this bed where I write, my two little boys sleeping spread-eagled, arms flung across one another. Home is any bed that holds the four of us, anywhere, in any country. The familiar sounds of our shared sleep, the particular scent of our skin. 

Home is any place in which we all lay down to sleep; home is any place we all wake up, together.

Gramma and Grampa's Visit

The last 10 days have been full of time spent with my parents, and it's been simply wonderful. We're so lucky that even with the distance between us, we're able to get together several times a year. Last summer, my parents bought a camper in Whitehorse, and we parked it on our property, so they have somewhere to stay when they come visit (our home is too small to be comfortable with 4 adults!) Lots of time was spent playing with Aedan, chasing him around the yard, or taking him to the park or the river in town. P and my dad got a lot of work done on an addition we're putting on our home, which will include lots more storage for us and a big water tank, too! I was able to put in two more raised beds, both planted with a green manure crop of red clover.

A full moon summer solstice passed while they were here, and it brought with it a week of very hot, dry weather. The still air was heavy with the scent of distant forest fires, and the hills were hazed over with the smoke. The highest I noted the thermometer hit was 38 C mid-afternoon. That is just craziness! I was quite ill one day, I'm not sure why (my best guess is a sudden food sensitivity, brought on by pregnancy), and was SO thankful to have 3 other adults here to mind Aedan. I spent an afternoon on the sofa, reading and napping and drinking lots of water and chamomile tea! It was strange to be still like that, but a nice reminder of how important it is to take care of oneself when it's needed.

My parents left on a rainy day, and we were all left a little at odds without them around. Life is getting back to normal now, though. We are finding our rhythm once again (slightly shifted, as I've finally got Aedan onto an afternoon-nap schedule!) I'm looking forward to our visit to Ontario in August. It's such a delight to see Aedan with his grandparents!

Home

Phew! We've just returned from 3 weeks of visiting family in Ontario, with a side trip to Vancouver, British Columbia, to visit with Aedan's doctors. I love love living in the Yukon, but getting in and out of this territory is a real ordeal!

But I will never complain about a chance to visit family.

It does my heart good to see Aedan playing with his grandparents, his aunties and uncles and cousins.
It does my body good to have a break from my own housework.
And it does my tummy good to savour the variety of foods we lack here in the North.

But it is always so good to finally come home! My feet were tired of walking on pavement, my eyes were tired of looking at endless tall buildings, and my ears were tired of the constant hum of a busy city.

It's lovely to look out the window and see only trees! Granted, the trees are now bare of leaves and covered in snow (whereas in Ontario, they were just beginning to burst into radiant autumn colour).

I missed the steady warmth of the wood stove, and the smell of baking bread. I missed the mountains and the quiet and even the cold!

And of course, I missed this blog, too! It's good to be back. I have lots of catching up to do!

Potpourri

It's a grey day today, with a few fluffy snowflakes drifting down from the sky all morning. It's started to pick up just now. I didn't realize until we went to town on Monday that it's only snowed out on the Dempster! As soon as we turn at the bridge: no snow.

Monday we went to a Thanksgiving dinner with 20-some odd other guests! It was a bit intense, but I'm so glad we went. P and I are both a bit anti-social (okay...more than a bit) but I dragged us both there, Aedan in tow, and we all did great, if I may say so myself! Aedan got passed around a little, he was a very calm and curious little guy, checking out all the new faces. There were other kids and moms and soon-to-be-moms there, so when I realized that I had nothing to talk about besides childbirth and nursing and baby-poo and the cute little sounds he sometimes makes, I gave up trying to converse with the non-parents...thank goodness there were other women there who were equally as interested in these topics! Anyway, our hostess put on an amazing meal (so impressive that she put all of that together for all of those people!) including a huge chocolate birthday cake layered with Grand Marnier whipped cream for a friend's birthday. Yum!

In light of this dinner, and my inability to discuss anything other than Aedan, I've decided that I'm finally going to drag my butt (and my baby's butt) to Healthy Moms Healthy Babies on Friday during their drop-in hours. Time to meet the other new moms in town, see who Aedan will be buddies with once he's a bit older. Also, I think if I don't start to appear more in town, people will think I'm becoming a crazy hermit-mom.

In EC news, today I caught two pees and a poo! The poo was unexpected and very exciting. We'd been hanging out, having a little diaper-free time, where I lay him down on a big water-proof pad for just this purpose, with a piece of absorbent cloth under his bum and folded over his crotch. I'd caught a pee just before we started this time...after awhile he was looking hungry, so I nursed him for a bit, still with just the pad in my lap and the cloth wrapped around him, and gave him a "potty-tunity" every time he unlatched. Towards the end of the nursing, when he was starting to drift off, I figured I'd give him one more chance, then diaper him to go out for our walk...he was very relaxed, gazing out the window. I was expecting him to pee but instead...he pooed! And then, right after, peed, too. I signal him when he starts to go, "pss pss" for peeing and I imitate his grunts when he poos. I've also started to hold him in position and signal him when I know he's pooping in his diaper but I can't get him undressed and on the potty in time, so he'll at least start to associate the signal with the action.

Pretty exciting times out here on the Dempster, eh?

Now, to make some bran muffins!