I have this sweet baby, who is now one year and one month. His head no longer smells like newborn, but his hair is still baby-soft against my cheek. He's so much bigger than he was, in the way of very young things, but also still so little and so dependent upon his big people, also in the way of very young things. Some nights, after I get him to ( Read more... )

The Small has now been six for two weeks, and it feels necessary to capture a snapshot of who he is now. After all, Six loves the list of things we do every year, Six loves a tradition.

Six likes puzzles, riddles, games and all things that are clever. Six asks unsuspecting guests "Do you like to play games? Do you like to play strategy games?" ( Read more... )

Levi and I were never meant to be a thing. She was to be my one-year foster dog, but I have always been found by love when I was least expecting it ( Read more... )

Apparently I wrote most of this post back in August of 2015. I did not manage to finish it then. Then the school year started, and I was back to work, and The Small Person started kindergarten. I became pregnant, got sick, went to hospital, went to hospital again, went to hospital a third damn time, had surgery and began recovering. Just before I ( Read more... )

Trying to get pregnant is a giant game of waiting around for the right moment to rush. First you wait to ovulate. You count the days, you measure, you interpret, you wait. Then there is a brief moment of rushing, of inseminating (although that too involves waiting). And then you wait to see if anything happened. If hopes are growing. The waiting is ( Read more... )

In the last week the small person turned four. The Teenager made cupcakes, we all sang, and having been celebrated by his Wallace grandparents last weekend, he is spending this weekend being celebrated by his Bergman grandparents. This year, he will celebrate his birthday at school, slightly late, by bringing in 750 bouncy balls. He was inspired by ( Read more... )

We're at the Biodome in Montreal, and The Small Person and I head to the bathroom. The Small Person refuses to come into the men's with me, insisting he is a girl. I decide it's fine for him to go into the women's, although I'm not prepared to go in with him. He goes in, and I sit down on a bench outside. Not two minutes later a woman sticks her ( Read more... )

Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray, 1891Becoming a parent is for me an exercise in compassion for my parents. As a child I failed to understand how constant children are. I failed to understand how much my parents might have their own interests and desires. They were my parents, and I understood them in relation to me, not in relation to their ( Read more... )

I want to recognise people who do parenting work - whether or not they are afforded the title of parent. I want to thank the people who help us love and parent The Small Person, without deciding in a gendered way that some get honoured today, and some get honoured in May, and some don't get honoured at all. To all those who help us love and ( Read more... )

Last Tuesday evening, Stanley told me he wanted a haircut. Stanley has never had a haircut, and his beautiful long blond hair falls in gorgeous ringlets, which I was washing at the time. Stanley has always hated having his hair washed, and I though perhaps he was requesting a haircut as a way to avoid future hair washing. Anyway, it was after eight ( Read more... )