A spelling lesson for me.

Conservative..honestly, Emma, it's fifth grade spelling. Smarten up.

Bono...bugger off for a change.

I think I have said before, in one of my very first posts, that I actually do like U2. I really do. But if I have to listen to Bono go on and on about Canada committing 0.7% of its GDP to eliminating global poverty I am going to seriously consider banning U2 CDs from my house. And yes, I do realize that would have absolutely no impact on the millions of dollars that U2 brings home every year. But it might make me happy.

Bono has said that he expects Paul Martin to suffer at the polls come January, due to this very issue. I don't know what poll he is quoting from but most Canadians I know are not as concerned with eliminating global poverty as they are with eliminating poverty in their own backyards, along with a number of other concerns from health care and education, to gun control and gay marriage. I have not seen one person on TV nor have I talked to anyone who has said they will not vote for Paul Martin because he did not meet the goal of 0.7.

This does not mean I am against eliminating poverty in African countries or anywhere else, not at all. I am completely for it, but not necessarily by this 0.7%. How about proper trade? One of Paul Martin's concerns is that the money will not find its way to the people who need it most, but to war lords and corrupt governments. I also believe that a government's first responsibility is to its own people.

Sixteen years ago, all parties in the House of Commons agreed to seek to eliminate child poverty in Canada by 2000. In 2005, 1.2 million (1 in every 6) children in Canada live in poverty. That is disgraceful. It is the government of Canada's job, be they a left or right party, to take care of Canada's children first and foremost.

That being said, I will still be voting for Paul Martin's Liberal party on January 23rd. I eagerly await the sign for my lawn. I will vote for the Liberals because I believe they are one of 2 parties who have a chance of forming a minority government (even I can't be overly optimistic and expect a majority.) This will be either the Liberals or the Conseratives..can't remember their new name..is it Progressive Conseratives? Am I even spelling conserative right? It looks all wrong. See, that's how much I avoid them, can't even spell the word. I like the NDP party but their chances are nil. I wouldn't vote Green if you paid me a million dollars (well, I would really, but not if you paid me ten) and I don't even have the option of voting for the Bloc since they are a Quebec only party.

Reality is I'll vote for them because I have voted for them every election since I became a Canadian citizen. I even voted for them while working for the National Party. Remember them, anyone? I really loved Mel Hurtig. Shame about the short existence.

December, lovely December

Here it is, finally. The best month of the entire year. Not only does December bring Christmas, but it also brings my birthday. I am about to turn 29 for the third time, but I still find the day somewhat exciting. One day the thrill will be gone I am sure, but for now I still enjoy birthday wishes and the odd gift.

I am sure I said before that Edmonton in the autumn is beautiful, but even that can not beat Edmonton in the winter when the snow is newly fallen and the world is so pure and white. Sometimes, this is a truly lovely city.

December is always a busy month, and will be more so this year with Liam at a different school. Both kids go right until December 23rd, the first time this has happened since Taylor started school. Usually they finish the week before. Liam's Christmas concert is December 14th and Taylor's is the 21st. Taylor will also be an elf at a Christmas party for inner city children, along with the rest of her girl guide unit. Although we as a family certainly don't have alot of extra money we are lucky enough to have a nice roof over our heads, we are properly dressed for the weather, there is always food in the fridge and all 3 children will have plenty of presents under the tree. These children that Taylor will be handing out Christmas bags to will quite possibly get only that bag for Christmas and what little kid wants shampoo as a Christmas gift? It will be good for Taylor, and all the other Guides, to learn that while they don't always get what they want, they always get what they need. I could swear that comes from a song!

We will spend Christmas Day at my mother's, and will be joined by my best friend from elementary school (and Taylor's godmother) and her family as well as her new boyfriend. I am quite excited about this Christmas as it will be the first one that Saoirse is aware of. And of course the best part is that William is with us this Christmas and we will not have it in the back of our heads that he is leaving in 2 days. And that will make my Christmas complete.

Bambi? What the hell?

Bambi

Which DISNEY character are you most like?
brought to you by Quizzilla

Confession Time

I have a confession to make.

I, Emma, am not at all ready for winter. I don't know if I have pointed this out before, but I live in Canada, one of the coldest countries on the face of the earth. Not only do I live in Canada, but I live in central Alberta and if you take away the three territories, Manitoba and northern Alberta, I am quite sure I live in the coldest area of Canada.

But here's the problem. Until this week we had been spoiled by our somewhat balmy, it's-a-cold-summer-day weather. I saw people in shorts for gods sakes. In NOVEMBER!! In EDMONTON!! Madness had descended and winter was somewhat forgotten. Forgotten were the winter boots and coats, the boxful of hats, mitts and scarves. Forgotten was the excitement of Christmas decorating (this is not entirely the fault of the weather, there is a dead spider right by the Christmas decorations in the basement and I am waiting for William to find it a new home in the garbage.)

And then Monday arrived and with it a blast of cold air and a wee bit of snow. The coats were around, but getting hats and all was a bit of a mess, dropped boxes and all. I have yet to buy a new pair of gloves this season for either Taylor or Liam although they are both in desperate need; Taylor because she chews holes in the fingers of hers and Liam because he is a boy. That explains it all I think. Being the bargain hunter I am I bought new coats and boots at the end of the season last year (the coats were $17 each, regular $89 and the boots were $8.99 per pair, regular $50. The baby's stuff was an even better deal. Sigh. I do love a good sale.) So it's just new mitts I need. I hate buying mitts, you pay a fortune and they are forever losing one of the pair.

As for myself, sometimes I must think it is still 1987 and I must not do up my coat, nor wear mitts or a hat. It is a wonder that any of us ever made it out of our teen years alive and well. When your skin freezes after 30 seconds and you refuse to wear a hat it feels as though your ears will snap off if someone touches them. The things we did to be considered cools. Friggin' eejits is what the lot of us were.

The Report Cards

Last Friday Taylor's first report card came home. I wasn't overly happy with it, the math marks were terrible, mostly Cs. We had her parent/teacher interviews yesterday and I met with her teacher as well as the resource teacher. Her teacher said she needed to work on her multiplication and the rest of math should come along quite easily. No worries about her English or French, and other subjects were fairly good. So off we went to see the resource teacher as I had to sign her IPP paperwork. She proceeded to inform Taylor that her teacher has said if she does not become more self motivated and pull up her marks he doesn't want her to continue in gifted programming. I thought Taylor was about to cry. She only does this program once a week, and only for an hour at that. She loves it though. I am hoping that that was the push she needed to actually make her try a wee bit harder.

And then there was Liam. Oh, Liam. I knew his English marks would not be great. I'd rather pull out my own teeth than try and get Liam to study his spelling. But I expected all excellents, or As, in his Math. And what I got was proficient ( Bs.) Liam is not proficient at math, he is brilliant. The comments were good, but I don't feel the marks reflect that. Of all his marks, there is only one excellent and that comes in Religion (and I was shocked, he hates Religion...this is the kid who refused to take First Communion)

I meet with his teacher next Thursday. And I have alot to say to her. She doesn't give them homework, other than spelling words and home reading. I want something to start coming home, even if he is just redoing sheets that were done that day. I want to see where he is. I want to know why I wasn't told before report cards that he wasn't using class time effectively, or completing in class work. We are almost 3 months into school and I had no idea.

It pisses me off that he had to change schools to do this academic support program and he got a worse report card there than he would have at the old school. At least there he was happy. I am seriously tempted to pull him and put him back into a school where all his friends are, where I am only 5 minutes away and where I know his teacher and if he's not doing what he should be doing they are going to tell me. I am pissed off at the old school for not providing him with a teacher's aide like they seem to do for every kid who's a troublemaker. We have 17 T.A.'s in that school. There is no way there are 17 children with more severe learning problems than Liam. I am pissed off at myself for not fighting for Liam's right to an education at his neighbourhood school. My mother said last year that I should have taken this issue to the media and I think she may have been right. The sad reality is that money talks, and I don't have any. (Long story about an LD child and her lawyer father and teacher mother and her TA and blah, blah, blah. Someone tell me to shutup.)

Banned!

I have, through no fault of my own (I think), been banned from commenting on United Irelander's blog. I am quite sure that this is because he has banned William and since we share a computer I just happen to be sharing in this ban.

I have a huge problem with this, because although I do not comment on his site as often as I used to, there are certainly times I have something I want to say. Like tonight with UI's list of enemies. My sort are included in this list twice...once under "anti-american lefties" and under "bleeding heart brigade." (Note to any Americans who may read this, I am not anti-American, I am anti-Iraq war and anti-Bush, and anti-stupid tourists of any nationality...sorry, I worked in retail for 10 years, most of our tourists did happen to be American, but there was a fair number of rather foolish people from other countries, I just think you should learn a bit about the country you are visiting and I should really save this discussion for another day.) So while I am a lefty, both by hand and politics, I am not aware of being left wing and anti-American necessarily going hand in hand. As for the bleeding heart brigade, well I don't see anything wrong with Polish people getting their own channel in Ireland or with two men raising a child. I just don't see what the problem is really. And I suppose when someone calls people names regularly when he doesn't agree with what they say, chances are the odd person might toss out the words "bigot" and "racist."

So in saying this, I still enjoy UI's site. I do recommend people give it a read, if they haven't already, for he certainly has some interesting posts. It's just that you won't see me commenting for a wee while. Which is quite sad, don't you think? Yes, I thought you would. Perhaps the 3 or 4 readers I have could start a bring Emma back campaign. Or not.

Another Day, Another Fight

I have discovered the reason I choose not to get up in the morning. It is due to the fact that I am bound to fight with my daughter.

Got up just before 7 with the baby. Woke up Liam who complained of feeling ill. He was sick this weekend so I was suckered in and sent him back to bed. Had a very pleasant half hour watching Sesame Street with Saoirse- there are certainly some joys to early morning rising.

7.30- go to the top of the stairs and call to Taylor. "Tay, it's 7.30 time to get up." I was extremely pleasant.

7.45- back up to the top of the stairs. "Taylor, sweetie, it's quarter to 8. You need to get up." Still very pleasant. "I am up." she says. She must not have realized I was standing right outside her room and could see her lying under her blnkets. "Really? It doesn't look like you are up." Still very pleasant, but turn on her light something she can't stand. Doesn't have a fit, which she normally does. I put this down to my extremely pleasant attitude.

8.00- Taylor appears and sits at the bottom of the stairs. "You do realize it's 8 right?" Goes to make herself breakfast. Has breakfast, goes to get dressed. Calls from her room "Mummy, I have no pants!" Remembering Thursday, I tell her there is a laundry basket full of clean clothes in the linen closet. (Why is there a laundry basket in the linen closet? I suppose William got tired of it sitting in the hallway awaiting it's dispersal into the childrens' rooms) She comes down looking all right, but I wonder should I be concerned that my 10 year old is dressed completely in black? Didn't look at her feet, but I can almost guarantee she is wearing white sweat socks so I'm alright...no future goths in sight. So far so good, Taylor has been awake for 15 minutes and we have yet to fight. I have the hair brush and the taming spray ready. "Here, Tay, let me brush your hair."
"I can brush it myself."
"I know, but you always miss the back"
"OW OW OW!!!!!"
"Taylor for gods sakes, you don't complain when anyone else brushes your hair"
"I know but I want to. OW OW OW"
"I'm not even pulling hard. Here, this is pulling hard." I know, I know, a terrible thing to do. but honestly, I was not pulling hard!
"Here, let me put this in your hair."
"I don't want my hair styled."
"Too bad, I'd like you to occassionally look like someone loves you."

Anyway, I got my way with the hair, though I'm sure the clip was pulled out the moment she closed the door behind her. She kept up the attitude and I got mad. "I'll tell you something, miss, you're grounded tonight! You can home and clean your room and stay in it tonight. And if it's not clean you aren't going to Guides tomorrow!"
"Blah, blah, blah, you are so mean to me. Why am I grounded?"
"Because I am sick to death of your bad attitude."
And off she went to school, crying, and slamming the door behind her.
I just don't know what it is with the two of us. We don't get along at all, at all.

Christmas Trees (or the lack of)

I'm starting to get a bit antsy. The mall is full of Christmas trees, the hospital has one up in the front lobby and now my neighbour has gone and put hers up. I am not liking that one bit. I used to be the first person in the neighbourhood to put the tree up. It used to go up the first weekend in November but as my livingroom seems to be getting smaller as the years go by, I started putting it up the last weekend in November. However, William has informed me that it is bad luck to put a tree up before December 1, and he would like to wait! Although I certainly do not believe in the bad luck theory I suppose I can wait a bit longer. I'm somewhat fearful that Saoirse may try and pull the tree down on her anyway. Still, I don't really like waiting. However, it's better than when I was a child and we had to wait until December 15 to put up the tree. If my mum had had her way the tree would have went up Christmas Eve and come down on Boxing Day. Such a grinch. But because I always wanted it up in time for my birthday she'd grumpily relent. I have fond memories of having the tree up back then, my friend Janine would sleep over and we would leave the tree lights on and sleep underneath it. Life was easy when you were 10. I had no worries that I wouldn't get at least some of the things on my Christmas list. (Quite easy to achieve when your list is 2 pages long, full of stuff from the Sears Wish book.)

It's not feeling very Christmasy outside. Normally we have snow and it is below zero out. Right now, it is plus 12. We were warmer than Mexico City and Rome on Saturday. I'm sorry, but that's just not natural. It is plain wrong actually. Eventually we will get our winter weather I guess. Might as well as enjoy this while it lasts.

The Fashion Crisis

We are in the midst of a clothing crisis in my house. It revolves around Taylor and there are a few reasons in particular for this:
1)She does not have the body type to fit pants properly. She is tall and skinny (physical traits not passed on by her mother, sadly.) She is a size 10 waist and a size 14 length. The invention of adjustables waists was a fantastic thing, but quite often she ends up looking all bumpy in her middle because it pulls the jeans funny when you have to tighten it as much as possible.
2)She is literally growing overnight. She is now 5' tall, only 3" shorter than me. Since she was about 5 she has being saying she would be taller than me by Grade 6 and with a year to go, she may be right.
3)She has absloutely no fashion sense. Colours don't need to match, dress shirts and trackies would be perfectly acceptable in Taylor's world.
4)She could care less what she looks like. Not one iota.

This post comes about because the way Taylor dresses is a constant sore spot. Take Thursday for example. In the mornings I am usually at work or in bed (lazy I know, but William is fantastic about getting up with the kids.) I did not see Taylor that morning, but when she came home at noon I almost died at what she was wearing. Pants that were so short you could see her calves over her socks! I am not normally a calm person and I certainly wasn't at this moment in time.

Me: Jesus Christ Taylor! What are you wearing!!!???

Taylor: I had no pants.

Me: If you'd put away your bloody laundry you'd have pants!

Taylor (crying): I didn't have time to look, William woke me up late.
(A classic Taylor maneouvre...cry and blame someone else.)

Me: Honestly, one day you are going to be so embarrassed when you look back at how you dressed. Those pants are way too short! You are never to wear them again!!! I mean it!! Do you not care how you look?

Taylor (crying): NO!!!!! (Runs up the stairs, still crying.)

The conversation was longer than this, mostly me demonstrating my poor mothering skills. I have no patience with that poor girl. She has also taken to cutting the legs of her pants in class (2 pairs so far) and to drawing on them with ink. This leads to another tirade on my part, about how I am not made of money, yada yada yada. Does she have no respect for the things she owns, yada yada yada. And on it goes.

I admit that when it comes to my kids I am a bit of a clothing snob. I want them to look nice, I refuse to buy second hand clothes and I won't shop at places like Zellers. This doesn't mean I am going high end(much to poor for that), and I will usually only buy clothes at places like the Gap or Old Navy if they are on sale. Hmmm, I should rephrase that. I almost never buy anything, anywhere if it is not on sale. So here is a kid with a closet full of nice clothes, not to mention 6 drawers full, so why does she look like she just walked out of a homeless shelter? I can't figure it out.

While at work on Wednesday, I stopped in at my mum's department to pick up some charts. She told me that she would be leaving for England on Friday, and my brother would come with her. My nan is dying. I cried, like I haven't cried in ages. I left my mum's office and cried my way throughout emergency. Telling someone that her grandmother is dying in a hospital setting is probably not the best choice to make. The hospital is full of elderly women, and that made me think of my nan. Which set off the water works everytime. My boss is fantastic, she let me go home. I have had 30 some hours to process this news and it still makes me cry.
Almost 4 years ago my nan had a stroke. My grandad had just come into some money and they took an extended trip to Portugal. They hadn't been home very long when my nan started complaining of headaches. She had gone into town one day with one of her friends (as she did everyday) and came home early due to a bad headache. She complained to my grandad about feeling very dizzy and he went to phone an ambulance. When he came back into the room she was lying on the floor.
She was left paralyzed on the left side, which was devastating to her as she had always been extremely active. She had a holiday to Scotland planned for the next week and was supposed to be coming to Canada that summer. But she was alive, and for that we were all grateful. My grandad decided to move down to the south of England, where my aunt lives, as he wanted to be near family and there's no one left in Birmingham.
There have been ups and downs in the last few years. My nan has been lucky enough to have all three of her daughters with her at times (something that had not happened since 1984) as my other aunt moved back to England and my mother would go over 2 times a year. She was very ill just before this summer and they had thought that she might not make it, but she did and Taylor got to see her. I am happy for Taylor that she had a chance to be with her great nan again. It had been too long.
As for me, I saw my nan 5 months before the stroke, when I spent a week in England. Part of me is glad that I am not the one going with my mum on this trip, as I will only remember her as the way she was prior to the stroke. She is very different now. I remember her as very tiny but because she is permanantly in a wheelchair she has put on a lot of weight. She was always very outgoing and happy. She no longer shows emotion, she can hardly even smile. The other part of me is devastated that I am not going. I would like a chance to say goodbye, to tell her how much I love her and how sorry I am for my selfish teenage years. She was (and still is) a beautiful, wonderful lady and I will miss her more than I can say.

The bedroom from hell (aka the preteen's room, so much the same)

The idea was to take before and after pictures of my daughter's room to see just how clean she could get it. I had pulled everything out of the closet and left it in the middle of the room for her to deal with it. This was back in late September I think. Her idea of cleaning it was to shove everything back into the closet (so much so that I can not reach the clothes on the back rod) and to change the room around. Some cleaning was required for that effort. I am waiting to paint it, as she is a bit old for pink, but it is never clean enough. So there are no after pictures to join these before ones. If I were to take pictures right now, the room would actually be even messier than it is here.

Remembrance Day

Today Taylor will be taking part with her Girl Guide unit, and other Guides in our division, in the Remembrance Day celebration at the mall. I think it is so important for our children to know the sacrifices that were made for them by these brave men and women. It's important that we attend these ceremonies since there are so few veterans left. It is the year of the veteran in Canada, and today I will remember two in particular.

My maternal grandfather was a member of the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire regiment and spent 3 years in Burma, the forgotten war. He doesn't really like to talk about those days. The only thing I know is that a Japanese soldier was about to shoot him when he himself was shot and killed. My grandad left the army in 1946, married my nan and had 3 girls. He is now living in the south of England, taking care of my nan who had a stroke 3 years ago. Taylor had the opportunity to meet him this summer and got on very well with him. They are very similar personalities, both very stubborn, opinionated and intelligent. I don't think Liam will be lucky enough to see him. Sad, that.

My paternal grandfather was in the RAF and was stationed in England. He managed to get home to Belfast quite often as my granny gave birth 4 times between 1940 and 1945. My mother often says that the only action my granda saw was a fight with a Canadian soldier. I don't know how true this is.I only knew my granda for just over a year. They moved to Canada when I was 7 and he died when I was 8, unfortunately I was too young to be interested in what I would have considered old war stories. A couple of years ago, I found out that he was actually jailed during the war for stealing arms and selling them to the IRA. Selling them, not giving them. He wasn't much of a nationalist. Strangely enough, he wasn't dishonourably discharged for this.

I will think of both my grandfathers today, even though one of them was far from the perfect soldier.

My baby's officially not a baby

Saoirse has just turned one. A year ago at this very moment, I was pushing and pushing and no Saoirse was appearing. She was stuck the poor thing. She'd come down and go right back up. Stubborn more than stuck perhaps. I ended up having a c-section and she was born at 1.49 in the morning. She was a screamer. They took her away to the Intensive Care Unit pretty quickly after I had a quick peek at her. I didn't see her again until 9 that morning. She was on oxygen and they said she had a terrible headache. So they assumed anyway. She was screaming so much (a solid 2 hours) that they gave her a dummy, which was something I was not going to use for her. They weren't supposed to, it is actually against the health region's agreement with the World Health Organization, but as my friend who works in that unit said when a baby is that upset they will do anything they can that might calm them down. And it did, I suppose. She still loves the dummy to this day. Not that particlar dummy, of course. We have loved and lost at least a dozen since then.

So happy birthday to my wee Saoirse Maeve. I hope today is a lovely day for you.

Finish my sentences, why don't you

This totally requires blogger particpation. I'll even go first....

I could really use a new.... pair of jeans. Or two or three. All the ones I have are either too loose or too tight. There's no happy medium with me.

The strangest thing about my family is.... that we are not very close. William finds that very strange for a Northern Ireland family. Obviously, I am talking about my dad's side here, as my mum's side are all in England. My aunt has disowned both my dad and my uncle. Odd.

When I was a kid I thought that all adults were... crazy. See above. I'll never forget those Christmas dinners that always ended in someone getting very drunk (my dad) and how about the New Years Eve my mum tried to stab my dad. Ah, childhood memories.

I'd love to be.... content.

The most beautiful sound in the world is... a baby's laugh.

My favourite board game is... Taboo. I am AMAZING at it. Especially celebrity taboo.

I'm not embarassed to admit that my CD collection has... every Corey Hart album, plus his greatest hits.

There we go...easy as pie. You have no excuses. Finish those sentences.