- Live the life you're meant to

Missing: Inspiration

January 14, 2014 by Farewell Stranger ·

The new year is normally soaked with inspiration for me, like a path laid down just waiting for me to walk it.

I never quite found that path this year.

I looked for it. I waited. I read the usual things and saw the usual references to potential and opportunity and new. But by the time the new year came it seemed like the path had been walked by everyone else already.

This time last year I was pursuing my goal of exercising for 30 days straight and looking forward to a year of adventure and exploration. This time last year, not incidentally, I was on mat leave.

Maybe the path is always well-worn and maybe it’s up to us to find our own footsteps or our own way to walk it. Or maybe my path is just filled with other things right now.

Every other year, it seems, I have felt like I can do anything. Anything! I just have to decide what to aim for. And then of course the inevitable everydayness sneaks in and turns that anything into well, maybe something and eventually it’s more like at least I can do a few things, but it has always started as a wide open space.

This year that wide open space is filled with laundry.

It’s hard to make new goals and seize opportunities when it’s all I can do to remember which day we need to put the bins out and when I’ve been carrying cheques in my wallet for weeks (months?) because I can’t figure out how to get into the bank to deposit them (because cheques in US funds need to be deposited in person and do you ever find yourself in a situation like this where you wonder if it’s really worth the 30 bucks?).

So I haven’t found my 2014 inspiration. I’ve chosen my one word for the year—or, I suppose, it chose me—but I haven’t quite managed to commit to it. I haven’t spoken it out loud.

Maybe this year, this time – maybe right now I need a different path. Maybe inspiration will only come in small doses.

Think small instead of big and a month instead of a year at a time. Chase moments instead of mountains.

It’s a different path forward, but it will be okay, I guess.

It’s an okay path.

I’m trying to believe that.

How is your new year going?

Join Greta from Gfunkified and I for #iPPP (iPhone Photo Phun), a weekly link-up that requires nothing more than a blog post with a photo from a phone camera (any phone camera, not just iPhones). We want to see your funny, your yummy, your heartfelt, your favourite phone photos of the week.

Filed Under: Hard things · Tagged With: #iPPP, One word, perspective

Explore: Life in Pictures, Vol. 6

January 7, 2014 by Farewell Stranger ·

The end of 2013 whipped by. Last time I did a photo update on my word for last year we were finishing summer and transitioning into kindergarten and I was getting ready to go back to work. And now it’s 2014. January 7 already. Before I know it May will be here again and the snow will be gone and 2013 will seem very far away. So here’s the end of the year in pictures.

I didn’t do much in the way of exploring, at least not in the traditional sense. But we hit some milestones and had some fun, and I guess that’s what it’s supposed to be about anyway.

Someone turned one.

You would think he didn’t like his birthday cake.

But you’d be wrong. He devoured that piece.

It was a good birthday. The last first.

Christmas came even though I wasn’t ready, as predicted.

It was fairly low-key – a rare thing in my family. But we did the obligatory (and enjoyable) things. Now I just need to clear the detritus from my living room. (I did mention that it’s January 7, didn’t I?)

We had a cold snap in there too. A very, very cold snap. Did you know you could get ice an inch thick on the inside of your windows? In Alberta you can.

But winter is beautiful. At least I think so.

So we took advantage of it.

We walked, and found signs of beauty and love.

Winter lasts for a long time here, but sometimes you just have to throw yourself into it and become one with the snow. (Literally, even.)

He looks like he’s not enjoying himself (or maybe he just thinks the hat is goofy) but he had a blast. Deep snow is apparently quite fun when you’re one.

We had some losses…

…but many more wins.

And so ended 2013.

#iPPP is back for 2014! Join Greta from Gfunkified and I for #iPPP (iPhone Photo Phun), a weekly link-up that requires nothing more than a blog post with a photo from a phone camera (any phone camera, not just iPhones). We want to see your funny, your yummy, your heartfelt, your favourite phone photos of the week.

Filed Under: Photos · Tagged With: #iPPP, family, favourite activities, living life, One word, photos

Tea and Quiet

December 17, 2013 by Farewell Stranger ·

‘Tis the season, as they say. Life is busy enough as it is, and now we rush around trying to get ready for Christmas. I feel as though it may whiz past me this year, whether I prepare for it or not. And yet somehow that’s okay.

I’m on the computer less, reading more. I’m writing less, playing more.

I’m finding quiet when I need it and where I can.

Are you?

This will be our last #iPPP link-up of the year. Happy holidays! We’ll see you again in the new year.

Filed Under: Hello, Inspiration · Tagged With: #iPPP, family, favourite activities, moments

This One Doesn’t Eat Books

December 10, 2013 by Farewell Stranger ·

You know that Friends episode where Monica fills in for a food critic and gives the restaurant a scathing review? Then when the owner challenges her description of the food she backs up her opinion with this line:

“I couldn’t eat it. I have five friends who couldn’t eat it. And one of them eats books.”

I think of that line every time I’m reading to Ethan and I pick up one of the books I read to Connor when he was a baby. They’re all missing pieces around the edges, particularly at the corners, and in some cases sections of the covers are completely eaten away. Yes, eaten away.

I could barely get through a book with Connor when he was small. Before he was even six months old he had devoured some of the classics – Goodnight Moon, The Going to Bed Book by Sandra Boynton, The Very Hungry Caterpillar. (He always has been quite literal, if not literary.)

These days Connor loves stories at bedtime, and occasionally at other times too. But he has never been a kid who will sit quietly and look at books. One night when he was about 3 1/2 we realized he was still awake after bedtime. We peeked in his room and he had taken most of the books off his bookshelf and had made tents with them – open and upside down, each one formed an inverse V on his bed. He had systematically lined them up, row upon row of books turned into a tent city, completely covering his double bed. It was hilarious and perfect and so very him.

Ethan, on the other hand, loves to read. He will sit and flip through books for ages. He’s mostly quite gentle, and the other night when I saw him reading some paperback Christmas stories I’ve had since I was little I wasn’t terribly worried that he would tear them apart. He just flipped through, looking at all the pictures in one book before putting it down and picking up the next.

I love that he already has a love of reading. And I love that he doesn’t eat books.

At least not yet.

Filed Under: Happy things · Tagged With: #iPPP, family, favourite activities, moments

Finding Magic

December 3, 2013 by Farewell Stranger ·

You won’t often find me blogging about work—I try to keep some space between work and blogging, and there’s not much I could (or would) say that would be of much interest to anyone else—but yesterday was a pretty cool day.

For months now we’ve been working towards a big announcement and one that I knew would be pretty cool. But I really didn’t imagine how cool. You see, I work for an airline and we’ve done something as part of our partnership with Disney. It looks like this:

I knew what the design entailed but I hadn’t actually seen it, because I wanted to keep something a surprise. So when I went into our hangar this morning in time to catch the last rehearsal of the big reveal I was pretty excited. We ran through speeches and introduced Mickey Mouse and played the video…and then the curtain dropped. It just… I mean, it looks SO cool.

The team responsible for the event did a really good job. The lighting and music made for a really fun atmosphere, and Disney provided the crowd with Mickey ears that light up in sync with elements of the show. When they changed from random colours on the heads around the room to coordinated colours I was reminded of why Disney has the market on magic firmly in their corner.

There was a huge curtain covering half the hangar and at the end of the presentation it dropped. It was totally a goosebumpy moment.

So why am I sharing this with you? Because this working-mom-of-two gig is hard – way harder than I imagined it would be. I’m struggling with it – the hours, the commute, the normal, corporate-job frustrations. We all have them, and I don’t know what the answer is. Maybe there isn’t one. Maybe this is just how it is when our kids are small.

But I had a moment of magic at work yesterday, and it was nice, and needed.

I know not everyone has Mickey Mouse visit them at work, but I bet we all have a source of magic in our lives if only we take the time to look for it.

What’s yours?

I’ve joined Greta from Gfunkified as co-host of #iPPP (iPhone Photo Phun), a weekly link-up that requires nothing more than a blog post with a photo from a phone camera (any phone camera, not just iPhones). We want to see your funny, your yummy, your heartfelt, your favourite phone photos of the week.

Filed Under: Hello, Inspiration · Tagged With: #iPPP, photos