Category Archives: Celebrations

Celebrations, Rants and reflections

C-Squared get married!

Last weekend, on Mar 21, I had the honour and pleasure of attending my dear friend Cristine’s wedding. We have known each other since the first week of University, when she sat next to me at a Frosh week orientation activity. Over 18 years later I still consider her one of my closest friends.

Unfortunately, for the last decade I no longer have the pleasure of living in the same city (or country for that matter) as her. We rarely have the opportunity now to spend selfish time physically together to just talk about nothing in particular, or share the minor tribulations and triumphs of daily life. It is in this other city that she met and fell in love with her now-husband Chris. (which of course generated the cute couple nickname, C-Squared) Continue reading C-Squared get married! →

Celebrations, Rants and reflections

Thank you to my friend F, the Social Glue of our group

This past weekend, we went on a trip to Great Wolf Lodge at Niagara Falls. It’s a big indoor waterpark resort that has lots of different water features, slides and pools to keep us entertained for a couple of hours each day. The place also has an arcade, craft room, and Magic Quest, that my daughter E1 absolutely loves. But it wasn’t just any regular family weekend to this resort. We went as part of a large group of 20 rooms, all organized by our friend F, so that we could take advantage of a great group rate.

Not content with this organizational feat, F also went on to plan a group kids’ birthday party gathering in one of the resort meeting rooms. This pizza and cake party not only celebrated her two children’s birthdays, but all the kids who had birthdays in January and February. She made and brought in decorations for the room, and arts and crafts activities for the kids. F even made up loot bags for each child who was going to attend the birthday party, the thoughtful contents individualized by age and interests. And of course, there is the cleanup afterwards, the unsexy part of any party. It is readily apparent to me (and everyone else) how much planning and work went into this party, while the rest of us just had to show up to enjoy.

So why on earth would F volunteer her time, energy and mental space to do all this work for other people? Continue reading Thank you to my friend F, the Social Glue of our group →

Best of, Celebrations, Storytime

I did the 2015 Toronto Polar bear dip, and lived to tell this tale

I had missed hearing the countdown. The people in front of me just started charging into the waters of Lake Ontario. In the chaos of excited participants, wind, bare skin, and a belated realization that we should move closer to where T would be trying to take photographs, the countdown didn’t even register with me. My buddy A and I exchanged a look, and followed on in. The Toronto polar bear dip of 2015 was on. Continue reading I did the 2015 Toronto Polar bear dip, and lived to tell this tale →

Celebrations

DIY Snowy Owl costume – success!

[su_heading size=”14″ align=”left” margin=”10″]The Backstory[/su_heading]

[su_expand more_text=”Show more (i.e. I want to read the rest of the backstory!)” less_text=”Show less (i.e. just get me to the How-to portion!)”]At the start of October, we had a conversation to start planning what costumes the girls wanted for Halloween. E2 wanted to be a mermaid again, reusing our homemade costume from last year. (sweet!). E1 at first wanted to be a fairy princess. *sigh* I’ll bet 80% of the girls in her grade will be a variation of a princess, with a significant portion being Elsa from Frozen. I begged her to reconsider being something else and threw out some random ideas, to all of which she said no.

After a few days passed, however, she came to me and said, “I want to be a baby snowy owl for Halloween.” Aha! I think I can work with this! It will can be puffy enough to allow for both mistakes in sewing AND to fit the jacket needed to go trick-or-treating outside in Toronto.

I am not an experienced seamstress by any means. I was originally considering using a glue gun to attach the feathers, but realized sewing would probably be faster, neater and more durable. So off we go to borrow a sewing machine. Prior to this, the last time I sewed with a sewing machine was back in high school home ec class where I made things like pin cushions and shopping bags. But I remembered the techniques, and had the time to plan and figure it out. I did have to spend a couple of hours reading the sewing machine instruction manual to figure out how to thread the machine and fill a bobbin.

The girls and I searched Google images for a couple of hours for ideas on how others have DIY made their owl costumes. I have to give credit to several sources of inspiration for how I ended up with my own design. I decided on making the body of the costume to have a bubble dress shape as it’s base to give a cute roundness. Thanks Google for landing me on this tutorial for sewing a bubble dress that I followed nearly exactly.

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[su_heading size=”14″ align=”left” margin=”10″]How to DIY Sew my Snowy Owl Costume[/su_heading]

Continue reading DIY Snowy Owl costume – success! →