When it's cold outside...

We go to the museum!

The National Art Gallery:

The Canadian Museum of Nature:

A Happy Solstice to All!

Waking up to snow

Oh! Jack Frost! You came with a bang in all your glory today. SNOW DAY!!! Even though I'm done teaching for the semester (hence, I don't have to drive to work), I still get excited when I see snow in the early morning and can't get back to bed. To top off the enthusiasm, Simon worked from home. YEAH!!!

Shovelling with a rake goes twice as fast... hum...

Frosty

Hug in the snow

Lunch for the birds

Extra food for the chickadees.

Amazing socks! Stood outside taking pictures for about 3 minutes and did not feel cold at all. Truly!

 My moment: Doing a meditation practice in the early morning (before 7am) with Margot quietly sitting on my lap. Bliss!

Casse-Noisette

Went to see The Nutcracker yesterday. With Margot. It was the first time she ever attended a live performance. It was a success!!! I am just so impressed by her ability to sit and watch and be attentive and applaud. Wow! Who knew the attention span of a 2.5 year old could be so long? I certainly didn't.

Here's what we did right:
-Picked the right time: 4:30pm show (not too late)
-Chose a small theatre (instead of the "oh ever so popular NAC") with good seats, next to the aisle.
-The nature and length of the ballet (2 hours with intermission)
-Willing to leave after the intermission. We really kept that option open, but didn't need to leave.
-Brought snacks.
-Invited Noa, Jason & Eve. With company, everything is more exciting! (especially when Noa exclaimed to Margot "C'est Batman!" when some guy in a bat suit danced across the stage and gets killed a few moments later by the nutcracker. There was no rat fighting scene in the version we saw.)

The magic: watching Margot's face during the ballet. Priceless.

(unfortunately, I didn't bring the camera so I didn't capture the pre-show and intermission moments)

Tree and Pomegranates

This is our tree, decorated Margot-style. Awesome!

Wrong season, Margot!

My favourite Winter fruit. I grew up eating pomegranates (patiently peeled by my dad) at least a few times a week. Back then, it was an unpopular fruit (I was the odd kid out). And now, pomegranates have achieved celebrity status.

When we went to Granada (Spain) in 2006, we actually saw pomegranate trees. How cool is that!

J'aime Gymnastique!

Margot finished her gymnastics course yesterday.

The facts:
-A 11-week course, once a week, from 3:30 to 4:10pm on Thursdays.
-Offered through the City of Gatineau and Unigym Club.
-Her group, Les fourmis (the ants), was a parent and child group (18 to 30 months).

My thoughts:
-It's a loud activity. Do kids really need that much stimulation at the end of a day? Hum...
-The instructors were excellent. High school-aged girls who were enthusiastic and great with young kids.
-Some parents are really annoying: too involved in their child following the "circuit", not butting in line,  doing things properly,etc.   Others are relaxed and laissez-faire (I fit in the latter). Surprisingly there were as many moms than dads.
-When I signed up Margot, I naively believed that she would join in right away and follow instructions. I was wrong. I learned on the first class to go with the flow and not expect her to do everything (or even half!) of what was planned.

Margot:
-Margot loved gymnastique before and after class more than the actual time there(!) She would talk about it every day leading to class and excitedly explain what she did in gymnatsics to family members.
-Margot was really reserved and passive at first. It took her about 8 weeks to warm up. She observed a lot and was a bit distracted by all the excitement around her.

Margot's favourite activities:
-The big trampoline - she excelled in fearless jumping!
-The "poutre" (high beam) - the tallest one was the best one.

Receiving her certificate

Advent

We are starting to get into the festive season.

Decoration for our door. A wreath bought at the Carp Christmas Market:

The Gingerbread House is out:

And look what's inside: (Margot-style)

Seeing Santa Clause up-close and personal at the Aylmer Parade. A cold cold evening to be standing and waving for more than an hour!

And, like the past two years on the same date, the little Advent elf dropped off a calendar (without chocolate - we know who that is for!) Thank you lil' elf! ;)

It's Starting to Feel a Lot Like Winter

As I am writing, it is snowing. Big, slow, fluffy flakes descending from the sky. Ah! Winter has arrived!
I really like winter. It's a fresh season which forces us to go inwards and reflect, drink hot beverages and stay cozy. It's also an invigorating season: the cold air, the rosey cheeks. Nothing is more deserving than coming indoors after spending time outdoors. "Wasting an afternoon" reading or watching a movie is totally acceptable after an hour on the trails.

November was gorgeous this year! As most of you know, November is my least favourite month. But this year it was sunny, mild, and friendly. No rain or the typical greyness I usually associate with that month.


Father and daughter Saturday yardwork while I drink tea and read:

Ready for a "hike" with those turbo red mitts:

How to achieve Margot's look: headband as a belt, topless, my handknitted leg warmers on legs (good spot) and shoes in the house (!)

Lil' Yogini

p.s. I swear I don't have anything to do with it ;)

This is Halloween!

Margot surprised us all by being quite the lil' trick or treat trooper!

pre-Halloween snack

Roaming the streets of Marcel-Chaput

That pumpkin is getting heavy...

Our door

Sunday Morning Yoga

I experienced a delicious Sunday morning while Margot and Simon went to church. 90 minutes of yoga. A live-filmed class at San Francisco's Yoga Tree studio (where I went to follow a Jason Crandell class in August 2009), led by Janet Stone. It was amazing! There was mantra chanting, a meditation in motion, a focus on obstacles, creative flow, ending with a seated meditation. I smiled. I sweated. I opened. I moved.  On a rainy October morning, this was the perfect remedy!

My yoga practice has been floppy since September (coincidentally since I started teaching). It's been inconsistent and my practices have been short. I know that the length of a class doesn't really matter: it is better to do 20 minutes daily than 90 minutes weekly. But... there's something so rewarding and more powerful in a longer class! You get so much more out of it. It brings you to another level.

And great news: Margot loves yoga! I didn't have anything to do with it. She begs me to watch "yoga kids" - YouTube videos of children's yoga. Sometimes she joins in, other times she just quietly observes. ;)

Time for Tea

"One drinks tea to forget the world's noise; it is not for those who eat rich food and dress in silk pyjamas." - T'ien Yiheng  c.1570

I wish to share with you the following (based on the entertaining book How to be Idle by Tom Hodgkinson):

Four o'clock tea. It makes sense. It marks the point in the day at which your energy is at its lowest. It's a time for reflection, to slow down, to pause and breathe and contemplate life.

Tea should be a daily ritual.
The legendary fisherman, Chris Yates (Who???) explains that "Tea making, like tea drinking, must be a leisurely, contemplative affair, the mind calming as the loose leaves are given ample time to swirl, separate and glow in your teapot". Quite poetic, mr. fisherman.

The enemy of tea is coffee. Joyless coffee. Hodgkinson bashes coffee drinking by controversially declaring that "Coffee is for winners, go-getters, early-risers, guilt-ridden strivers, money obsessives and status-drivem spiritually empty lunatics. It is an enervating force. We should resist it and embrace tea, the ancient drink of poets, philosophers and meditators."  Ouf! That's quite an opinion!

Here's how I like my tea:

morning: a pot of earl grey or orange pekoe in my big mug:

afternoon: a pot of loose leaf jasmine with honey.

Les feuilles virvolent*

Beautiful October day! We had fun in the Gatineau Park leaves:

Stuffing the purple bag ("sac à dos" as Margot names it) with leaves

Hiding Spot

Finding the perfect leaf (or not)

Yoga in the leaves

Picking up leaves

Flying leaves

* leaves flying/dancing/skipping in the air ;)

Freshness and Zoo

FRESHNESS:

Sometimes re-arranging furniture is the remedy for a stale room. This afternoon, we moved our living room around. Fresh!

Also, the weather is getting fresh these days.

THE ZOO:

We visited the Toronto Zoo last Sunday. We took tons of pictures. Here are just a selected few:

A butterfly in the Indo-Malaysian Pavillon.

Margot really wanted to see the elephants. But once we got to them, she wasn't too impressed...

Exotic fish.

Giraffes were also on Margot's Wish List...

The White Lions were beautiful. Margot actually liked them.