originally published in the Waterloo Region Record, May 2010.


It seems that my tastes in wine and humour are similar: I enjoy each when mature and complex, but I am not above indulging in the unsophisticated and not entirely savoury. As the mother of a 14 and 11-year old, I occasionally partake in both.

During their early days, the type of humour that my kids engaged in consisted mostly of gut-busting laughter when a cup fell to the floor from a high chair, or a toy was tossed out of the crib.

Later, we endured countless knock knock jokes, non-stop bathroom humour, and many gags during which the parent answers a question, and the child announces, through uncontrollable fits of laughter, “Ha! It’s opposite day!”

As my kids get older, the mingling of their increasingly sophisticated thought processes with good taste has, thankfully, become more deliberate and refined. Unfortunately, though, they don’t always aim to hit the mark, opting instead for a type of humour that might be referred to as comically dysfunctional.

As the butt (haha, I said butt!) of many of their jokes, I am generally a pushover for what they dish out. Apparently, I am also a glutton for punishment, since I really do understand and (somewhat) appreciate the enjoyment the kids get out of pulling one over on the adults.

An example of my 14-year-old son’s current type of comedy is an announcement late on a Sunday night that he has homework. I’ll have been led to believe that he’d either completed said homework, or that he didn’t have any to begin with. Every time – the story always changes, but not the method of torment - he still gets me. As my eyes widen and I begin to carefully choose my words and measure my reaction, his face will slowly begin to crack a sly smile. “Just kidding!”

My daughter also thinks she’s pretty funny…which is actually a question I regularly pose to her. “You think you’re pretty funny, don’t you?” In fact, I ask this of both the children, and instead of replying, “Sorry, Mom,” with heads hung in shame, I am subjected to echoing guffaws, peppered by, “That was so funny” and, “You should have seen your face!”

This 11-year-old tyrant has a knack for jumping out from the least expected places, at the least expected times, startling me into emitting high pitched, barely- human noises, accompanied by contorted facial expressions. She lurks, ready to spring and shout, “Boo!” sending my near-resting heart rate skyrocketing. She then gleefully mimics the look on my face and, as I recover and my beats-per-minute resume normal levels, she dashes off to find her father and brother, who give her high fives as she re-enacts her ugly tale.

My son had a new teacher transfer to his class in February, and one evening she called our home, explaining that she wanted to become acquainted with her students’ parents. We briefly discussed how things were going with Nick, and I was aware that he was around the corner, straining to hear what was being said. Although there was nothing incriminating, after I hung up the phone, I told my husband that Nick had been behaving poorly in her class. Playing along, he suggested that, in Grade 8, shouldn’t a student know better, and if not, maybe this student shouldn’t be allowed to play in the upcoming hockey tournament.

I dramatically swung around to where Nick sat, stunned…and I flashed him my biggest, brightest smile.

We all laughed, and I savoured the sweet, smooth taste of victory…not at all upset that it was lacking maturity.

Life...especially when creatively documented...is good!

originally published in the Waterloo Region Record, May 2010.

Until a recent Sunday afternoon, my idea of preserving and documenting our family history involved barely lifting the lid of a Rubbermaid container, stuffing memorabilia into it, and quickly pushing it back onto a shelf in the basement. This approach ensured that I could quickly forget how overstuffed, under-organized and ineffective this method was.

For a number of reasons - among them the fact that, when placed atop the coffee table for casual perusal, this bin may not enhance the décor in our family room – I was realizing the best solution to manage our overflowing container would be to create a family scrap book.

Except for the scribbled words, “kids’ keepers,” the outside of the bin is entirely nondescript, but its contents, once considered merely semi-precious nuggets, are now emerging, for scrapbooking purposes, as absolute gold. I was thrilled to uncover forgotten items like a piece of fabric from curtains my mom made for my son’s room…this little gem provides memories of a kid’s first room, AND a sample of a grandparent’s handiwork.

It appeared that my hoarding tendencies were actually paying off. Apparently, the desire to scrapbook (Is that really a verb?) had been dormant in the back of my mind, waiting to spring forth and create beautifully embellished pages with snippets that accentuate the colours of my children’s eyes. OK…maybe not quite. I’m not artistic, but I am smart enough to enlist the help of my 11-year-old daughter whose involvement will ensure that the calibre of aesthetic creativity increases. Significantly.

Thinking that we would just spend an hour or so in the initial planning stages, I decided not to bring the entire bin up from the basement. I ran up and down the stairs, each time producing, to my daughter’s delight, more bits and pieces from my two kids’ babyhood and beyond. But her delight soon changed to bemusement and then, outright fear. My demeanour had undergone a major shift; I was no longer offering jovial explanations of items, but was obsessively gathering, sorting and muttering organizational strategies under my breath.

My neurosis, as it always does in situations like this, began to surface. What’s the best possible way to organize all of this? By year? By child? Oh my goodness, could it actually be by activity? I was tormented by countless questions, because - and this something that my husband is always quick to point out about me - nothing is ever simple.

The family room looked like a scrapbooking store…if it happened to be located in the Disaster District.

I suppose though, if a store had a table scattered with greeting cards and newspaper clippings, and a floor covered with piles of loose photos and albums, ultrasound pictures, tiny first bathing suits, and various other items reminiscent of the lives of two children, then yes, it looked quite like a scrapbooking store. But I suspect that a store would have some semblance of order…which although my goal, was so very far from my reality.

And eventually, reality interfered. My husband was otherwise occupied (taxes, he said, but I know he was just avoiding me…imagine!) and somebody in the family with a drivers’ licence had to get groceries. My obsession loosened its grip as I realized that feeding my family in the near future was more important than documenting our past.

It has become obvious that creating scrapbooks, 14 and 11 years later, isn’t easy…or particularly smart. But luckily (and astonishingly), we produced a craft-happy child who recognizes her mother’s shortcomings, and is also old enough to pick up the slack. Life (especially when nicely documented) is good!