So I missed two entries, and I have good reason. We have had an incredibly busy and wonderful and emotional week last week. I have only now started to feel normal in energy.

Our flight was great, no trouble with immigration at either end, and Denis was even given more time that we hoped simply because we asked if we could stay for Lily’s first birthday. We now have time to relax, breathe and really enjoy ourselves. The flight itself was so much better than I anticipated, we were given seats right behind business class so we had extra leg room and no seat back (it was a wall) to bump the passenger in front of us. Lily had no trouble with take off or landing, she got to eat chocolate to help her ears equalise with the change in cabin pressure. It was a huge hit. She slept for half the flight and entertained passengers for the other half. When everyone was disembarking I asked Denis if we could wait and be last off because of the rushing and jostling that can occur. Lily sat on the back of the seat bouncing and smiling and really engaging the passengers as they got off. She was voted best baby on board and one lady said she no longer wanted to wait a ear before she had another baby! Go Lily, spread your joy!

Thursday I worked with my mom, and it was not as bad as it could have been, I was tired but it was not the really tough cleans. Next week might be a different story.

Friday was as full as we could make it. Mom, Denis, Lily and I all piled into the car and headed off to get work clothes for me (which there was a lovely second hand store having a 50% off sale) propane for the trailer, a visit with my brother and his son who calls Lily “Cousin Lily”. He is such a sweet boy, he gave Lily a few toys he had outgrown and Lily loves them! Then we went to my dad’s and my brother took us out on the boat. It is a pontoon boat and great for little people. Lily sat on the floor and her cousin held her to be ‘safe’ when we went a little faster. I was not going to get in because it was not that warm, but my brother teased me and so I got in. We had a bunch of fun and not he way home we got a little seat for Lily to join us at the table with her own tray.

Since then we have been swimming again at a contact of my mom’s, Lily and I had a big restorative nap, enjoyed good food and got all unpacked.

I am really looking forward to our time here, and now I should be back on track for work too. Lunch is called, will talk again this week.

I am working on very little sleep and a whole lot of excitement. I expect to crash this weekend.

Our flight home was easy, no trouble foreman end to the other. Lily was a star, she was curious, happy, engaged with some passengers, loved the chocolate treat I brought for her for take off and decent. She slept through the first movie, dinner and part of the second movie, and now I wish even more than I did then that I could have joined her for a nap. I did not know how she was going to handle it as she’d already had 2 long days and is cutting that first tooth. I don’t know why I worried, she always comes through like a champ.

Some exciting news is we got 6 months here in Canada. We can stay for Lily’s first birthday and Christmas! It will also give me time to start to build my practice and really enjoy my/our family here. The immigration office first looked confused when I asked for extra time, and when I pointed out that we had flag-poled a couple years ago and Denis had been given 5 months he understood what I meant and he gave us 6 months, the max the computer would let him for a walk up admittance. We said a prayer before we headed to the counter and another in thanks after being granted even more then I hoped for.

Today Lily awoke early, still in transition for the time change. She was so sweet and tried to stay quiet but at 5 am she sat up needing her potty and that was it, she was awake until 8 am when I started work with mom. IT was a short cleaning day but a long day for me, I am truly tired. Glad mom gave me some slack and helped me get my part of the clean done, I was in a bit of a daze now and then… Did I vacuum or just dust this room? Did I dust that table? Where was the spot on the floor from the cat being sick? Over all I think I did okay and mom was, as I said, kind.

Lily and Denis hung out at the second house in the garden while mom and I worked so I could nurse Lily. I am not sure what the longer term plan will look like but it was nice that they were just outside. After being so close for so long it seems weird to be apart from Denis (and Lily) for any length of time. I truly love my family, I am very blessed.

Tomorrow is another long day, but the weekend should be more relaxed. We need a day of nothing to do but rest and eat, possibly two by the time tomorrow is over. After summer school, my graduation and the party it should calm down into a routine… I hope.

Off to join my family who is already sleeping.

So, the first leg of our journey has had us doing detours around protesting farmers to get to the train station. Then a 4 hours train ride became a 7 hours train ride. They fed us to say sorry, it was a mix of good and not so good. Lily tired the tuna after the organic apple sauce and puked everything in her tummy up all over me and her. So now she is officially in her new clothes sized 9-12 months.

We only realised we were at our stop rather late as we thought we were the last stop. The train man (conductor?) helped us off. Then we tried to get a taxi and they refused us and told us to go get a shuttle. We found where to do that without much difficulty and God granted us a bit of sanity by having our shuttle show up right as we did. We got a private van to our hotel and tipped our driver well to say thanks for letting our Lily finally fall asleep in her Moby Wrap stuck to my chest.

Now we are in the cutest little hotel room, possibly my favourite little hotel room. There is a double bed with a single bed above it now space wasted. I want a shower but may have to wait until morning… will see how Lily handles the switch from me to bed.

Going to be short tonight, got another big day tomorrow with our superhero little girl.

Going to miss the farm and especially our friend, good thing we see her in a few weeks when she comes to visit.

One word… Busy!

Today was our last chance to go to Mont St. Michel with Denis. I really wanted him to see it as I was well and truly impressed with the place when we went with mom back in February. We had a late start but had a beautiful visit, lovely lunch and then leisurely stroll back to the car. If you get the chance I think it is an incredible feat of craftsmanship the Abby and of course all the other buildings that have popped up around the centrepiece of the little island. It is nice that it was not destroyed in any of the wars that have been waged in the surrounding areas. Denis commented that to really appreciate a place like that you need to spend a lot of time there, discovering the stories it has to tell. About how it was built, why they picked that spot, where the materials were found and how they got it to the island and so much more. I think Lily is going to have a fabulous time discovering this world with her daddy (and I).

When we left the parking lot to head home a unexpected adventure started, seems the farmers were upset about prices they were getting for their products (not sure which products) but they had blocked the roads around the island and traffic was crazy. We got past the tires and tractors on our road by going up on the sidewalk and then we headed down a number of little tiny roads that our friend had never been on. Lily at some point decided it was hot and she was not impressed with the car ride and started to make a fuss. I couldn’t believe it! She has a little tiny tooth popping through her gums the bottom left. If she had not been upset with the car ride I would not have known, she had such a good day, all smiles and bright eyes. She made a lot of strangers smile and enjoy her company. Young and old are captivated by her. At one point Denis sat with her on a bench while we were getting tickets into the Abby, it was like he was offering free ice-cream, little girls came out of nowhere to play with her. They found her again later in the Abby and again wanted to play. Adults smiled and forgot they were in a long line up as Lily brought a certain joy to all. Hard to be cranky and impatient when one so small is having such a good time.

She actually had such a good time it has made for a late night, when we got home we started packing and Lily who had only caught a short nap in her daddy’s arms for part of the tour and during lunch (she woke for dessert) played and yelled and bounced and stood until 11pm! It is our last sleep here, I am a little sadder than I thought I was but it will be okay.

Running out of time.

It is late, again. My internal clock is all messed up, Denis teased me the other day that I am preparing for the time change in Canada. That would be nice, I start work with mom bright and early the day after we arrive. Only thing is, I still want to get the most out of the last few days while we are here. Today was a good day, I finished a project I wanted to do for our friend. Denis made a frame for me and I made a collage of memories from our time here. It took a long time to sort through the photos, and it made me think that this year I am going to make a memory book for Denis and I of our story so far. I can make it our Christmas gift to us and Lily will have it when she is older.

Lily played with bathtub paint today. She had such fun with the colours, it was her first time with anything like that. She has not used crayons or any other material that leaves a mark. Her paint for today was soap with cornstarch and food colouring. She started out with the three primary colours but had every colour by the time Denis rinsed her off from the fun bubbles. We will miss the bathtub here, it is huge and has a large flat area perfect for messy fun.

I might go riding in the next day or two, I finally have the urge to do that after spending over 10 months with the horses here.  At first I would not let myself want to, I did ride once while pregnant with Lily, back in Scotland on a little highland mare I had ridden almost daily in January before I fell pregnant. It was just a easy ride in the hills as I arrived on our friends doorstep rather ill from the car ride and proceeded to vomit into a cup as I was not going to make it to the bathroom in time. Thankfully she was a midwife and took it all in stride, knowing that once the nausea had passed I was fine to play with the horses. I am okay with it having taken this long for me to want to ride again, I just wonder if we will find time.

I feel like that now, like there is not enough time to do everything, my dear friend commented that the closer we get to our travel day the faster time will seem to go. She is right, I know this and I am okay with it. I had a little lull in my energy today right after my first attempt at printing our gift for our host/friend was unusable. I thought about all the time I had ‘wasted’ since the end result was so dark you could not see many of the photos. Denis came up with the solution of using different paper as the printer is so old there is no option to brighten or darken the printing. It is not perfect but it is wonderful.

Lily’s choice yesterday.

Today was hot, sticky-melty hot.

I don’t like oppressive heat, not if there are things I want to do and there is no way to stay cool while doing it. My list things I felt like doing today got a lot smaller than my original intentions were. Which seems to be a theme in my world. Making excuses for not doing what I need to do, or think I need to do, or think I should want to do or the best, think I should want to do the thing I need to do. Oh the mind, it is a tangled mess of conflicting thoughts running rampant on false beliefs fuelled by the various faces of fearful emotions.

HA! Can you tell Denis and I spent a good few hours today and tonight discussing philosophy and other like topics? It is a passion of mine, diving into the self to find the bits that hold me back from a life of abundance. I want to know what it is that keeps me from really thriving, each step I take to remove a false belief makes my life so much more enjoyable. I have a great life as anyone who has been reading for very long knows, or you know because you know me outside my blog as well. However, I know there is more. I know this because I can see and feel the things that are holding me back. I know that the root of their power is some belief I have deep inside and so I want that out.

Somewhere in my day today I stumbled across the work of a woman who has made a map of how to deal with these feelings. How to find the truth behind the pain, anger, hurt, fear… and you know what? It is good. It is a tool that I will carry forward with me for awhile to help me with the trickier false beliefs that just kinda sit outside my full understanding. The ones that I get but a part is missing, the part that will make it true and easy to let go.

Money issues, I have them. I am working on them, I can intellectualise my issues but I don’t get it enough that ‘the truth shall set you free’. I can talk my way around the whole thing, but I don’t feel it in my core. I am hoping this new tool can help me. The lady’s name is Byron Katie and she has a work sheet she hands out for free to anyone who goes to her website, of how to break down false beliefs to find the truth behind them. I am going to try them because all medicine has its jurisdiction and right now this resonates with me.

I forgot to say that yesterday my business cards came. I am so excited for them, Denis helped me with the design and I am really pleased with the outcome. Time to start a new chapter in my life.

I am ready.

It was supposed to be a full day of school.

Some plans are made simply so you can change them and thats what today seemed to be about. It just was not meant to be. I fought for it though, I kept trying to focus but first it was an early morning for Lily and I and then it just seemed like every time I’d try and get stuck in to the work, I needed to do something would pull me away from it, something outside my control. So I gave up and started doing farm chores until it was time for lunch. Thinking the afternoon was going to be much the same I asked Denis if he wanted to go to Fougeres to get a postcard or two from Lily’s birth town for her baby book. We were gone as fast as we could get out the door.

We took photos of the hospital and then went to the town centre and parked so we could walk around. It is a beautiful old city with a castle complete with a moat. Lily was in a fabulous mood, she really enjoyed the playful mood her daddy and I were in taking it up a notch herself. We got the postcards I wanted at the Tourist Info Centre and we carried on to the castle. We wondered the streets, played in the park, got Lily two little souvenirs for when she is older and shared ice cream outside the castle walls. It was absolutely perfect. Lily giggled and made many strangers turn and look and smile at her big grin. Lily’s knack for making eye contact and smiling really engages people. A few even came up and spoke to her, which she loved. They did not seem to care that we could not have a chat with them, Lily held the space herself.

Just before leaving we popped into the shop that we’d parked beside, and I got a dress for €15.00. It is a great little all purpose dress. I think it will be my grad dress, my party dress and my summer dress this year. We got Lily a dress in the same shop for €4.00 but she will have to grow into hers a bit. Both dresses are cotton and from Nepal. I think it has been five years since I last bought a dress, not kidding. Denis has got me two since then, one he designed and had made specifically for me and one he got for me while I was away at summer school the first year. It was time to get a new one.

One last stop before heading home and we had our groceries and one little bouncy ball the perfect size for Lily. Our evening carried the energy of our afternoon forward and we did chores side by side, literally relying on each others strength when moving a round bale to the barn for the horses to feed. It felt good and it feels good to be such a close little family.

We got a really good start on the packing today.

The only stuff left, is things we will be using up to the day we leave. It took a long time, I was being really careful with everything. Not even a piece of paper has thoughtlessly been packed. There will be a box of stuff left behind for charity. At first I thought it would have been nice if Denis and I each got two bags for under the plane but now I am happy we don’t. Our first leg of the journey is a 4 hours train ride to Paris on Tuesday, then over night at a hotel and right after lunch the next day we fly. I realise before we even get started that four big bags, plus carryons and Lily’s car seat would have been too much to manage with Lily. I am not even using the full carryon allowance. The nappy bag, my stuff and the laptop are all one bag, not three.

While our girl was having a nap at some point today I decided to see what fellow travellers had to say about ‘baby’s first flight’. Everything, that’s what they had to say, and it was great to read. Basically almost every bit of advice will be countered with the exact opposite advise by the next post. Examples; tire baby out as much as you can so they sleep on the plane vs. make sure baby is rested so they don’t get overtired. Take an aisle seat so you can move about vs. take a window seat so baby is not disturbed by others getting in and out and privacy for nursing. Check the car seat with your luggage to avoid the awkwardness of it in the terminal vs. never check your car seat, it can be damaged as badly as if it were in an accident. Write notes, bring ear plugs and little gifts (candies or gift cards) for those closest to you vs. don’t make a show of your situation by handing out notes, everyone will see the baby just keep it quiet and realise it is not all about you. Some even funnier advice was the warnings, be prepared to drink/eat whatever you are bringing for your baby to eat onboard including breast milk. Order a wheelchair if you have to change planes. Suffice to say, this could be a whole lot of fun, silly fun where even Lily might have to laugh out loud before we meet grandma in Toronto.

I am excited to go home. All that is waiting to happen there is good for my heart but there is another part of me that wants to go to the kitchen and eat all manner of comfort foods. The new jar of Nutella, ice cream, cookies, they are all on the top of my wish list tonight. I am going to try for a glass of water and some cuddles to see if that will sort the cravings as we get closer to saying goodbye to Lily’s birth home.

Is it still unexpected if you expect the unexpected?

Dougal (the young 2 year old colt) has been ridden and he was a star. He never once thought about bucking or spooking, he simply stopped moving when he was nervous. I got Denis to get up on him so I could continue to work with him on the ground. Denis is a fabulously balanced and ‘sticky’ rider if things had not gone so well.

On Sunday we had an adventure with a wild bunny. A kitty brought the bunny home, alive, in the middle of the afternoon, right past the wolfhounds. The female wolfhound thought she’d take the bunny off the kitty, and he really didn’t have much choice in the matter. The bunny was then carried off to the middle of the yard by the wolfhound when I realised it was not a rat (what I expected) and that it was indeed a little cottontail bunny. Young but old enough to be on its own. Since I was holding two half saddled horses I yelled out to anyone who could help, “don’t let them kill it, it’s a bunny!” And ACTION! After a rather comical chase our friend ended up with the bunny, unharmed but terrified. Into a box it went, to chill out, in our locked bedroom for two hours. When bunny was more relaxed and it was just Denis, Lily and myself left, we snuck the little soul off to the forrest to set it free. The poor wee thing didn’t know that it was being released, so Denis and Lily had a visit while I snapped some photos. When it finally did decide to go, it disappeared pretty quick.

Another highlight of the weekend was a friend popped by with photos he had been taking of Lily since she was born. What a special gift, seeing Lily in beautiful photographs from one of her biggest fans. The gentleman who took them was so supportive while I was in my last trimester, even came rushing over after being on holidays to see what was up when he’d had missed calls from us. He was so positive about babies and how he loved when his kids were little but because of his work, often, they would already be in bed when he got home. He said more than once his wife gave him trouble for waking them up because he just wanted to see them.

Monday has got off to a good start productivity wise, I had a little bump when I got offended by something Denis said and I retaliated by pointing out in a rather harsh way what I thought of his words. Two wrongs don’t make a right… please oh please God let me learn that this time! We said sorry and have moved on, which is good, but it took me a bit to get over my disappointment in myself. A little team work and love and understanding went a long way to get me past that.

I didn’t eat one, and I don’t even want to.

I made cookies today, it’s been a couple months I think since I made some. I have made lots of other baked goods but not cookies, not for awhile. Normally, when I bake something that is small and portion sized like that, unless there is a certain amount needed I try one, just to make sure they taste the way they are supposed to taste. It seems silly yes, but when I was young I entered into a local Country Fair’s baking competition. I come from a family of wonderful women who know how to find their way around a kitchen, my grandma used to clean up at the fair she entered each year so I had my sights set high. I almost lost the battle even before I entered because I had mistakenly used cornstarch in the place of icing sugar for my brownie frosting. Both products were bought in bulk and in the same kind of bag, they have a very similar consistency too, so if I had not ‘tasted’ my frosting before I put it on my brownies I would have surely given the judges a taste they would not have enjoyed. I have no worries about todays cookies, I know they will last good and it was nice not to crave the sweetness of them.

Maybe because I was showered in other sweetness today. Lily is always a joy, we love being with her, we love watching her discover her world, we are amazed by her. Today she had a snuggly day which is not rare but is not an everyday thing either. She holds us and gives cuddles but a snuggly day is different. She initiates full body cuddles burying her head into our necks or she holds our faces with her hands or presses her cheeks to ours. There is something so sweet about her spontaneous snuggles and to have a day filled with them is simply precious. Maybe thats why I did not want a cookie. 🙂

Time is ticking fast, we decided not to go to Lily’s birth town today to see the Tour de France roll through. We thought about it but decided that it was not worth the long day to us. I would like to make one last trip to Fougeres next week though, to get a couple postcards of the area for Lily’s baby book but today would have been chaos. I also want Denis to see Mont Saint-Michel before we go. I went with our friend and my mom back when she visited in February but Denis didn’t make the trip. Funny, we have another friend who is doing exactly what we are doing right now but in South Africa. She is packing up her family and preparing to move to Canada. For her it has been many years and she now has 4 beautiful kids. For us it is just under a year and we are only picking up our travels again rather than moving permanently to Canada.