Family Life – Page 15 – a hippie with a minivan

Wilhelmina is 1!!!

I can’t believe that a year has already passed. A year ago, I gave birth to my fourth child. My second unassisted birth, my first daughter.

Wilhelmina is so amazing. She loves to cuddle, she loves her brothers and her Daddy (and me) and she loves to smile.

After three boys I am enjoying having a little girl and though she can be tough and hold her own, she is very girly. She plays with her dolls and stuffed animals, walks around with them and cuddles them. She seems to have a different one each time as though she is making sure each one gets attention.

She loves to get dressed up and tries to put all different kinds of clothes on. The other day while I was in the sewing room she pulled out some fabric that was put together for a dress that I hadn’t completed from a while back and kept on trying to put it on. I made it into a quick skirt and tried it on her. About 15 min later I took it off her and she insisted that I put it back on and kept it on all day periodically looking down and seemingly admiring it…

She has been walking for more than 1 1/2 months now and walks as though she has been walking her whole life. She loves music and loves to dance and constantly bops her head to the beat whenever there is music…

She loves cats, real cats, stuffed animal cats, drawings of cats, books about cats… and guess what her first word was? yes… cat…

She also loves books and will bring us books to read to her and will sit down and look at books by herself. Especially if there are cats in the book… or beside the book… or both!

A few weeks ago she decided that eating was fun and insists on sitting down in her chair and eating with us at each meal. She reacted to Gluten so we are are keeping a close eye on what she eats. I am thankful that we have been getting closer with some friends that happen to also be Gluten free and have a bit of a starting point and advice for what to avoid and what substitutes are available and work. I don’t mind the allergies that we already had. Keeping clear of artificial colours and flavours and a few dairy products are a good thing and even if the allergy was no longer there, I would still do it. Gluten is another story though…

Ec is doing good… we went through a bit of a potty pause that coincided with teeth coming in and walking and holidays etc… It was not really a strike, but just a few more misses. We just went with the flow, let her do her thing and it is going back to normal now…

(she even practices EC with her cat… because cats need to potty too)

As I said before, she loves her brothers… and they love her.

The most amazing relationship I find is between Xavier and her. She looks up to him, she follows him around and he just adores her. He loves to wear her around the house and has been doing it quite often gving me an opportunity to get some things done without having to worry about her…

All in all she is just a joy to be around. She makes us laugh and smile and is so cute that it brings a tear to my eye… being our last, I am so grateful to have her and I am enjoying every minute though time seems to be flying by…

Little Dancer…

She’ll be a year next week…

Winter Unschooling gathering…

On the 2nd we left for the Winter unschooling gathering at Oka national park. It was amazing!

We were only 7 families which made the gathering the perfect size for talking and sharing and for the kids to play and have fun without being overwhelmed…

I stuck to my plan of not taking to many pictures and instead just enjoying and living the moment..

We talked and shared, the kids played and played.

The first night we got there it was more about settling in, on the second night we had a great potluck with amazing food and great conversation. After Supper the kids, and a few parents, all headed to the playground in the dark and played games under the stars, coming back in with red cheeks and noses and ready for sleep. During the day, they played Sardines (an amazing derivative to Hide-and-seek where when the hidden person is found, the group starts hiding with them until everyone is there) and board games and just hung out in other peoples rooms or outside…

On the third day the Ice slide was re-opened (it had been too mild for it) and the kids spent part of the afternoon on it and then we headed back after supper in the dark for a few night slides when the park was closed and we were the only ones there…

I feels so refreshing to be with people that share the same lifestyle, the same philosophy of learning, the same attitudes towards children.

I took the camera out when we went to the Ice slide just before heading home…

I even made a video 🙂

If you are in Montreal, Oka National Park is a great place not too far away to head for the day for a walk or sliding…

Can’t wait for the next unschooling gathering!!

It's a new year… 1-1-11

2011 already…

Here are a few things that have been happening around here…

I finally got my Xmas pics up, It was so hard to get good pics with the little daytime light that we have this time of the year especially because we don’t have great indoor lighting either…

(Xmas morning)

My uncle is feeling better and I was even able to wish him happy new year over the phone last night… It is amazing how fast the body can recover after having been so close to death. He should even be getting out in the next week… I just hope that this is a bit of a wake up call to take better care of himself…

I just found out that I became an aunt on Xmas day… I find it sad that I might never meet my nephew and that my kids may never meet their cousin… I never thought that my brother would ever settle down…

Tomorrow we are leaving for a 4 day unschooling gathering at the same place we went in the summer… It will be a smaller group which will be great. I am looking forward to hanging out with other unschoolers, talking over tea, playing outside (hopefully temps will return to normal) and just relaxing unplugged for a few days.

I hope to take lots of pics but I might not… I have been making a conscious effort to live the moment instead of trying to capture it…

Have a great New year!

Holiday stress…

I love this time of year… the lights, the snow, the decorations, the mood, the stories, the crafts…

I hate the stress. I don’t know why, but the holidays have always been a source of stress for me. Even as a young child I would retreat from parties or actually feel physically ill after an hour or two. I am not a fan of crowds, they make me quite anxious, but I can manage well when it comes to friends.

The expectations…or perceived expectations are a big problem for me now. I enjoy having friends over, but when it comes to family I always feel like there is criticism. It might not be overt, and it might not even really be there consciously, but I always feel like it is. And of course I expect it to happen so I am often defensive.

What makes it hard is that no one (family wise) is used to having a lot of kids around. One child, two maybe… but with four kids in the house, things are rarely quiet. Throw in the excitement of a holiday, and having people over who are adults then there is mayhem.

I say adults because when there are other families over it is so much easier. With families, there may be double the amount of people but the kids are off and having fun on their own, we might not even see them for periods of time, but when just adults are over, the adults talk and the kids want attention, negative or positive, and when you have a very strong willed child around it makes things even harder.. It feels like whatever their behaviour is at the time is a direct reflection on our parenting and then it almost always leads to some topic that they don’t agree with…

This year there was an added stress to the holidays.

My mom and Grandmother came over on Xmas eve an we had a great time. We were supposed to head to my grandmother’s house on Xmas day as my uncle Marc was preparing a traditional Supper. However, when my mom and grandmother got home they found my uncle unconscious. My mom took his blood sugar and it was so high that it was not registering. They called 911 and he went into Coma, his body temp was 88, and his blood sugar was 64. His kidneys stopped working and he stopped breathing and needed to be put onto a ventilator. He was in bad enough shape that we were pretty unsure if he would survive or not and I headed to the hospital to be with my family. It was a very weird atmosphere to be there on Xmas day with a Santa Clause and an accordion player visiting the emergency room and people laughing and wishing each other Merry Xmas while he lay in a Coma.It has been a rough few days but finally we had a bit of hope today and he is starting to recover though he has a long road ahead and there are still many uncertainties.

Now, Simon will be going to work for two days, then we will Welcome the new year and then head to the Winter Unschooling gathering where we will be hanging out with like minded families for 4 days.

I have a feeling that it will be a great ending to the stress of the holidays…