Die Princess

I wish more mothers of young daughters these days would read and agree with these 2 articles.

Click em!

Princess culture producing overspending narcissists

Harms of commercialized childhood - Princess edition

One of the many industries I would love to see go bankrupt.

Snuggly Cement

City Mouse failed to say anything about her first trip home in 7 1/2 years.

It was nuts. It was soooo good. It was therapy.

I couldn't believe how it made me cry like crazy, even taking the highway exit that led to my childhood home, seeing all the landmarks, parks, businesses that I remember, familiar signs, familiar homes, fences, schools, cracks in the road that I remember from 20 yrs ago.

Every thing is familiar.

I fit in! A trippy experience after 12 years of being a Martian. (total years in Canada - 4 in Toronto, 8 in Nova Scotia) I was driving on the highway, with this strange sensation in my chest, thinking, "I feel like me again." I forgot what this felt like. I loved it. It was like going back in time. I felt lighter, freer, smilier, bouncier, at peace.

I realize now, all these images form the backdrop for all my childhood memories. For all the people, interactions, and happenings I remember, this was the background. They are so inextricably linked with the comforts, the things nearest and dearest to me, simple pleasures of that time of innocence and foundation for all that I am now. A crumbling brick wall that hasn't been fixed since I was 10 brought tears to my eyes, it and so many million other little things like it just brought back a flood of memories and feelings.

It was intense. I loved it. I miss it very much. I am a fish out of water here, but hey.

I took Anna with me, left Niamh at home with Daddy. She was Daddy's girl anyway, but this 10 day one-on-one sealed the deal! They bonded over their common passion, tractors.

But oh my, I think I have a city girl on my hands in the eldest! Anna LOVED it. She loved the Plaza. Loved the fountains, stores, sidewalks. She was like an aboriginal taken from the middle of the Serengeti or something and dropped in downtown Hong Kong. A little culture shock. She looked down at the sidewalk and exclaimed with big eyes, "WOW! What is that?!? It's so cool! You don't get muddy!"

I know. Amazing, eh? It was the invention of the wheel as far as she was concerned.

Anna took this beauty, capturing the lilies and mint my mom cultivated outside the house in which I grew up. Still there and giving joy to the observer! I hope the people of the house and neighborhood weren't too freaked out by my photos and videotaping. I'm fairly confident the police must have gotten a phone call or 2 about this strange entourage spending a little too much time walking back and forth on the street, staring at random houses for no apparent reason.

My little fashionista loving a Plaza fountain.

I think my dad took this one of me in the antique district by my old neighbourhood. I spent many's the day riding my bike and taking walks with mom up and down these streets.

Think the sweater and boots look too warm? It was a couple months ago, don't worry. We were still chilly. Of course Anna wasn't, because she is a Canadian polar bear. One chilly evening at a public playground, another family had bulging eyes seeing Anna running and playing in pure bliss wearing a tank top while their son had on a puffy winter coat. Anna kept insisting, "I'm fine! I don't want my jacket!" Hilarious.

"She's Canadian," I leaned over and assured them.

Knowing nods followed.

There were many tears as we boarded the plane to come home, and they weren't mine.

Anna didn't want to leave. She sobbed on my lap saying, "I wish this was the first day we got here again and we were just getting here!"

I know Baby, believe me.

Don't Judge a Weed by Its Leaf

Say hello to my Million Bloom Plant.

That is actually what it's called, and the name is pretty accurate.

It was a gift from a sweet friend at church.

I love it, it's beautiful, except that at first I spent so much time dead-heading it, my family went hungry. It behaves more or less like a petunia, so I thought it required dead-heading to re-bloom, but reading up a little to do this blog post I found out it doesn't. Oh well. Forgo the housekeeper I guess. Back to the kitchen with me.

However, it doesn't seem to be rooted deeply. Get a little overzealous in your dead-heading and you'll unintentionally yank out the whole stem. It's quite easy actually.

I was thinking about what a show this plant puts on. It blooms constantly for months, from May til hard frost. In a warm climate it can even be perennial.

Then I thought about some of my experiences weeding in the garden. Talk about roots! Anyone who has ever gotten their hands even a little dirty in a garden knows of what I speak. I have been baffled and amazed at how a little leafy scruff can have a root that seems to burrow under the ground a mile like the Toronto PATH or something. You pull... and pull... and pull some more, and a root you never imagined judging by the look of it comes out, certainly a lot more than there had been leafy display.

It's the flora equivalent of an iceberg.

And I think about how so many Christians are like that. There is a big display, loud Amens, big Bible, membership in all the right groups, participation in all the meetings, a presentation of enthusiasm, but no hidden life in Christ: no deep roots, no grounding, no prayer life when nobody is watching, no hunger that drives us into the Word even when distractions try to draw us away, no loving the unlovely.

Everything is above ground and pretty.

But a flood and a strong wind will uproot the one that doesn't go deep.

A little minor pruning could prove to be the ruination of the shallow-rooted one. He can't bear up under it. Instead of bettering, it destroys him. He spends all his energy and nutrients he gathers on constantly producing more shows.

The weed was spending his energy on cultivating those long roots, and propagating. His appearance may be humble (yet still beautiful in my estimation), but that wasn't his priority. Therefore he has a poor reputation among those who cultivate showy gardens.

He is shunned and cast out.

While he may not have the colors or the flashy display of the other, he is sturdy, he does have his own grace, he'll be back next year, and he will spread. Those expansive roots will make more plants, also sturdy and deep rooted. In winter, he will rest and endure, he will do without and survive, and as soon as there is an inkling of sun and heat again, he will be back. He didn't die in the season of difficulty, though he mightn't have liked it. He quietly waited for the Spring. He stored up and was rarin' to go as soon as the opportunity presented itself, as soon as conditions were conducive.

As the song says, "Ya gotta go down, if you wanna go up.

You gotta go lower, if you want to go higher and higher.

You gotta hide and do it in secret, if you want to be seen by God.

Cause it's the inside outside upside down kingdom,

where you lose to gain,

and you die to live."