We are about to spend two nights camping at Santa's Village in Bracebridge. My kids have been looking forward to this since I told them. Every day my daughter asks me if we are going camping today. It is sweet. I tell her how many days, and she counts it out on her fingers. The next day, though, she will ask me again. Is it today we are camping?
Currently, we are experiencing torrential, yet short, downpours as thunderstorms are passing through our neck of the woods. From the forecast, I think we might be safe during our short stay in Whispering Pines. Camping in the rain is not a fun activity. Unforunately, the lack of rain means a fire ban, so no campside smores, or fire roasted weiners. We are only going to spend one day at Santa's Village. The other day we will use to explore Bracebridge.
I am excited to see how things go. If we can handle a two day trip, maybe next summer we can expand. Yup, we are kind of newbies when it comes to camping. I used to camp a bit in university, but I was always with more experienced people, and borrowed their gear. I have done multiday canoe, and kayak trips as well, but that was 10 to 15 years ago. My husband and I have never gone camping together, on our own. We have never taken the kids camping either. I am hoping this will change.
Here's to new and exciting adventures as a family. Yeah, it just car camping, and the campsite is super close to town, and there is a pool and an amusement park next door, but it is our first time camping as a family, and I am making a big deal about it!
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
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Monday, July 30, 2012
Instagram is a photo sharing program which gained popularity so quickly Facebook had to buy it for $ 1 billion? This app has only been around for a couple of years, and almost immediately it had thousands of users. Currently, the numbers are in the millions. The irony of Instagram is that it puts a filter on your photos, and crops them to a 4 x 3 format so they look like Polaroid pictures. We use are cutting edge technologies to make something look vintage.
My family was talking about Polaroid cameras last week. They were pretty cool in their day. You were able to take a picture, and watch it develop before your eyes. Why don't we still have these cameras? Because, we can instantly see our digital pictures. No need to develop them. Our smartphones have become our Polaroid pictures. But, do we even look at our pictures anymore?
In our family, we have had digital cameras for five years. Yes, we were a little slow in embracing digital. We broke down when our daughter was about to be born. Before that, both my husband and I had film SLR cameras. We are quite avid photographers, and have plenty of albums in our home to prove it, but I have stopped printing pictures.
When I first got the digital camera, I would select the files I liked, and print my pictures. I would label the files on the computer with names and dates, so they would be easier to find. I would label the pictures I printed before putting them in the album. Now, I think it has been about two years since I printed a batch of pictures. We just have so many photo files. I can no longer choose which ones to print. I have no more room for photo ablums. There is no lack of visual documentation of our children, and the lives we now lead, but it is all stored digitally.
My kids like to flip through the physical albums we have. Luckily, I printed pictures of them as babies, so they get to see how much they have grown, and changed. How often to people sit down to their computer or, more likely, gather around their smart phone to look back at old pictures? I think this would even less fun than a slide show. There I go dating myself. Slides? No, not PowerPoint.
We say the new technologies will cut down on the amount of stuff we have, but now it's just all digital. Pictures, movies, music, games. We need more memory to store all this stuff, so more hard drives, and what happens if we lose it all. It would be like losing our stuff in a fire, but we could lose our digital legacy from the click of a mouse, a corrupted file, or the swipe of a finger.
We all have digital clutter, and it is only getting worse. Think of all those games you buy for your iPad, or phone when there is a $0.99 sale. We don't have enough time to play the games we download. Have you digitized all your music, movies, books? Will you listen, watch or read all of them? Our technologies have just enabled us to get different stuff, but there is still a lot of it in our lives, floating in the cloud, or on our hard drives. Maybe it's time to declutter.
PS tying in digital games and vintage stuff... My husband has been trying for years to find those water games where you push a button and the change in water pressure will toss rings on poles. He can't find them anywhere. So, he looked online, and there are digital versions available to play on your phone. This is me shaking my head.
PPS check out this neat project call Camera Obscura Project. There is a tie in with disposable film cameras. I heard about this from Spark on CBC. http://www.cameraobscuraproject.co.uk/.
My family was talking about Polaroid cameras last week. They were pretty cool in their day. You were able to take a picture, and watch it develop before your eyes. Why don't we still have these cameras? Because, we can instantly see our digital pictures. No need to develop them. Our smartphones have become our Polaroid pictures. But, do we even look at our pictures anymore?
In our family, we have had digital cameras for five years. Yes, we were a little slow in embracing digital. We broke down when our daughter was about to be born. Before that, both my husband and I had film SLR cameras. We are quite avid photographers, and have plenty of albums in our home to prove it, but I have stopped printing pictures.
When I first got the digital camera, I would select the files I liked, and print my pictures. I would label the files on the computer with names and dates, so they would be easier to find. I would label the pictures I printed before putting them in the album. Now, I think it has been about two years since I printed a batch of pictures. We just have so many photo files. I can no longer choose which ones to print. I have no more room for photo ablums. There is no lack of visual documentation of our children, and the lives we now lead, but it is all stored digitally.
My kids like to flip through the physical albums we have. Luckily, I printed pictures of them as babies, so they get to see how much they have grown, and changed. How often to people sit down to their computer or, more likely, gather around their smart phone to look back at old pictures? I think this would even less fun than a slide show. There I go dating myself. Slides? No, not PowerPoint.
We say the new technologies will cut down on the amount of stuff we have, but now it's just all digital. Pictures, movies, music, games. We need more memory to store all this stuff, so more hard drives, and what happens if we lose it all. It would be like losing our stuff in a fire, but we could lose our digital legacy from the click of a mouse, a corrupted file, or the swipe of a finger.
We all have digital clutter, and it is only getting worse. Think of all those games you buy for your iPad, or phone when there is a $0.99 sale. We don't have enough time to play the games we download. Have you digitized all your music, movies, books? Will you listen, watch or read all of them? Our technologies have just enabled us to get different stuff, but there is still a lot of it in our lives, floating in the cloud, or on our hard drives. Maybe it's time to declutter.
PS tying in digital games and vintage stuff... My husband has been trying for years to find those water games where you push a button and the change in water pressure will toss rings on poles. He can't find them anywhere. So, he looked online, and there are digital versions available to play on your phone. This is me shaking my head.
PPS check out this neat project call Camera Obscura Project. There is a tie in with disposable film cameras. I heard about this from Spark on CBC. http://www.cameraobscuraproject.co.uk/.
Sunday, July 29, 2012
Day three and nothing to say.
Day three, and I have nothing to write about. Seriously, all those good speeches I make in my head while drifting off to sleep, and I cannot think of anything profound, provacative or interesting to write. This "write something everyday" is going to grow old fast if I cannot find inspiration. Maybe I should sign up for a Twitter account, and just tweet something everyday. I could do 140 characters daily, maybe.
Saturday, July 28, 2012
Too much contemplation leads to absurd thoughts
Lately, I have been thinking about the insects I kill. You know, the tiny ant crawling on my clothes in the laundry basket, easily squashed by a finger. Or, the fruit fly buzzing around my compost bucket, feeding off the rotten banana peel. I can usually get those by clapping my hands together. Of course, the mosquito definintely deserved to die after it had bitten me in the middle of the night.
Then I think, what if my neighhbourhood is inside some giant's laundry basket, and a large finger could come down, and squash me just as easily? What a horrible way to die. Just minding my own business, hanging my clothes out to dry, and a giant finger comes down and squashes me into the ground.
This is a riduculous thought, equating myself to the ant. It doesn't have a brain, and certainly was not spending its time, walking along the edge of my laundry basket, asking, what does it all mean? One moment it is firing electrical impulses causing its limbs to move, its antennae to twitch, picking up environmental clues as to where it should be going, and the next, it is crushed, immobile, dead.
Maybe this is how people start to become vegans. If you are feeling remorse for killing an ant, imagine the guilt of eating something much more sentient. But, I still eat meat, without regret for the most part. My absurd thoughts on anticide have not stopped me from being an omnivore. I certainly have been spending way too much time contemplating why we are here, and what it all means.
These philosophical mind wanderings are quite a challenge for an atheist. I do not believe in God, or in an all knowing, judging creator. I have quite the pragmatic scientist mind. But, I do wonder about what will happen to our world in the future, and whether there are other worlds like ours that have existed, and will exist in the future. Makes you pause and contemplate why we spend so much time hurting each other, fighting, and being greedy. However, as I have said before, we tend to focus on our immediate wants and needs, and the big picture is so often irrelevant to our individual lives.
I would love to have a "zen" attitude all the time, but I know all to well how our own personalities, desires, and needs can come into conflict with others. Especially as a mom. How many times do I tell myself to not get frustrated with my children, only to be frustrated? Maybe what I need to do is, step back before I start to raise my voice, and think about the ant.
Then I think, what if my neighhbourhood is inside some giant's laundry basket, and a large finger could come down, and squash me just as easily? What a horrible way to die. Just minding my own business, hanging my clothes out to dry, and a giant finger comes down and squashes me into the ground.
This is a riduculous thought, equating myself to the ant. It doesn't have a brain, and certainly was not spending its time, walking along the edge of my laundry basket, asking, what does it all mean? One moment it is firing electrical impulses causing its limbs to move, its antennae to twitch, picking up environmental clues as to where it should be going, and the next, it is crushed, immobile, dead.
Maybe this is how people start to become vegans. If you are feeling remorse for killing an ant, imagine the guilt of eating something much more sentient. But, I still eat meat, without regret for the most part. My absurd thoughts on anticide have not stopped me from being an omnivore. I certainly have been spending way too much time contemplating why we are here, and what it all means.
These philosophical mind wanderings are quite a challenge for an atheist. I do not believe in God, or in an all knowing, judging creator. I have quite the pragmatic scientist mind. But, I do wonder about what will happen to our world in the future, and whether there are other worlds like ours that have existed, and will exist in the future. Makes you pause and contemplate why we spend so much time hurting each other, fighting, and being greedy. However, as I have said before, we tend to focus on our immediate wants and needs, and the big picture is so often irrelevant to our individual lives.
I would love to have a "zen" attitude all the time, but I know all to well how our own personalities, desires, and needs can come into conflict with others. Especially as a mom. How many times do I tell myself to not get frustrated with my children, only to be frustrated? Maybe what I need to do is, step back before I start to raise my voice, and think about the ant.
Friday, July 27, 2012
My New Project
It has been a while since I have posted an entry to my blog. My original intent for the blog, and website, was to talk about all things relavent to parenting young children. I suppose since my elder child is about to turn five, and the younger one will be three, I have moved on from the panic stage of parenting. Besides, I spend so much of my time participating in activities held by my local Best Start Hub, I no longer feel overwhelmed.
Back in 2007, I was desperately looking for resources and activities to help me become a good parent, and to get me out of the house. Sudbury, it seemed, had a limited number of programs in comparison to what you could find in the Greater Toronto Area. I felt I could serve a purpose by finding those few parent and baby/tot activities, and informing the general public about them. I also had dream of recipe sharing, and parents forming their own little playgroups via online connections. The website never really took off, and only my friends check out the blog, or Facebook page. I also realized I am not an extremely ambitious person.
I was hoping if I told enough of my friends they would tell enough of their friends, and eventually the website would grow from word of mouth. Things do not generally work that way. Yes, there are viral videos, and campaigns, but the majority of things get popular through actual marketing, and money invested. I was not willing to invest huge amounts of my own money into this project, especially without having any expertise in web design, PR, or marketing.
The year I launched my website, SudburyMoms.com came about. They were interviewed on CBC Morning North, and it looked like they had some money out into this project. I made business cards and had my friend interview me on Canada Day for a French radio station. I contacted a few people who may or may not have had successful parenting websites elsewhere, but the more I became informed, the more I realized this was not the business for me.
Many of the people I contacted offered to franchaise their websites to the Sudbury area. Others explained they were web designers, so the money they would have invested in someone else doing their web page was covered. Others offered to hire me to manage a branch of their own website for the Greater Sudbury Area, and then I would have been a door to door salesperson, asking for advertizing money, and working for a commission.
What had I been seeking in creating this website? I was looking for a way to connect with other parents like me. I was seeking a way to help increase the knowledge, and access to services for parents of younger children. But, as we all know, those children grow up, and our demographic interests change. If I had kept having babies, maybe I would have spent more time trying to make the website work. Parenting advice and parent/tot activities are niche activities. Your clientele is constantly changing, growing up, and moving on. It is very difficult to see the needs of other groups when we are so very focused on our own needs. And, our needs change as we grow.
In the past five years since my daughter was born, I have found a most wonderful resource in Our Children Our Future. Originally, they were fantastic because they provided resources for new and expecting moms, and a safe environment for infants to play. Since becoming a Best Start Hub provider, they have been able to offer our community many activities, and opportunites we might not have tried for lack of funds, or people to go with. I have met a lot of interesting families through my interactions with OCOF and Best Start. It has definitely made me feel more like a part of my community, and this is especially important for people who are not originally from Sudbury, or The Valley. I was able to make friends, and "network" in person at the playgroups. Although, I am sure there is probably someone out there developing the Facebook for parents, or an app to find a parent with similar interests to you, I still like the actual face to face interaction I get when I participate in activities hosted by OCOF.
So, my final word of advice to new and expecting parents is to find you local Best Start Hub, and see what they have to offer your community. Also, check out the libraries, and local schools often have playgroups as a means of attracting students. We are very lucky to live in Sudbury because there are many French activities available as well.
Oh, and my New Project? I have decided I am going to try to write something on my blog at least once a day. I am not promising I will be able to post what I write every day, but I am going to try and write something every day. I have my ipad, so as long as it is charged up, I should be able to spend half an hour typing something up. I am not guaranteeing any of what I write is going to be interesting to read, but as it stands, I have very few followers, so I am essentially doing this for myself. This will be like an online journal, probably.
I keep listening to Spark, on CBC, and getting inspired, only to get bogged down by my daily routine later on in the day. Plus, I spend a lot of time goofing off, playing solitaire, or watching Netflix. Probably not the most productive use of my time. I am looking for a sense of purpose, and maybe writing daily will help me with this. Until tomorrow.
Back in 2007, I was desperately looking for resources and activities to help me become a good parent, and to get me out of the house. Sudbury, it seemed, had a limited number of programs in comparison to what you could find in the Greater Toronto Area. I felt I could serve a purpose by finding those few parent and baby/tot activities, and informing the general public about them. I also had dream of recipe sharing, and parents forming their own little playgroups via online connections. The website never really took off, and only my friends check out the blog, or Facebook page. I also realized I am not an extremely ambitious person.
I was hoping if I told enough of my friends they would tell enough of their friends, and eventually the website would grow from word of mouth. Things do not generally work that way. Yes, there are viral videos, and campaigns, but the majority of things get popular through actual marketing, and money invested. I was not willing to invest huge amounts of my own money into this project, especially without having any expertise in web design, PR, or marketing.
The year I launched my website, SudburyMoms.com came about. They were interviewed on CBC Morning North, and it looked like they had some money out into this project. I made business cards and had my friend interview me on Canada Day for a French radio station. I contacted a few people who may or may not have had successful parenting websites elsewhere, but the more I became informed, the more I realized this was not the business for me.
Many of the people I contacted offered to franchaise their websites to the Sudbury area. Others explained they were web designers, so the money they would have invested in someone else doing their web page was covered. Others offered to hire me to manage a branch of their own website for the Greater Sudbury Area, and then I would have been a door to door salesperson, asking for advertizing money, and working for a commission.
What had I been seeking in creating this website? I was looking for a way to connect with other parents like me. I was seeking a way to help increase the knowledge, and access to services for parents of younger children. But, as we all know, those children grow up, and our demographic interests change. If I had kept having babies, maybe I would have spent more time trying to make the website work. Parenting advice and parent/tot activities are niche activities. Your clientele is constantly changing, growing up, and moving on. It is very difficult to see the needs of other groups when we are so very focused on our own needs. And, our needs change as we grow.
In the past five years since my daughter was born, I have found a most wonderful resource in Our Children Our Future. Originally, they were fantastic because they provided resources for new and expecting moms, and a safe environment for infants to play. Since becoming a Best Start Hub provider, they have been able to offer our community many activities, and opportunites we might not have tried for lack of funds, or people to go with. I have met a lot of interesting families through my interactions with OCOF and Best Start. It has definitely made me feel more like a part of my community, and this is especially important for people who are not originally from Sudbury, or The Valley. I was able to make friends, and "network" in person at the playgroups. Although, I am sure there is probably someone out there developing the Facebook for parents, or an app to find a parent with similar interests to you, I still like the actual face to face interaction I get when I participate in activities hosted by OCOF.
So, my final word of advice to new and expecting parents is to find you local Best Start Hub, and see what they have to offer your community. Also, check out the libraries, and local schools often have playgroups as a means of attracting students. We are very lucky to live in Sudbury because there are many French activities available as well.
Oh, and my New Project? I have decided I am going to try to write something on my blog at least once a day. I am not promising I will be able to post what I write every day, but I am going to try and write something every day. I have my ipad, so as long as it is charged up, I should be able to spend half an hour typing something up. I am not guaranteeing any of what I write is going to be interesting to read, but as it stands, I have very few followers, so I am essentially doing this for myself. This will be like an online journal, probably.
I keep listening to Spark, on CBC, and getting inspired, only to get bogged down by my daily routine later on in the day. Plus, I spend a lot of time goofing off, playing solitaire, or watching Netflix. Probably not the most productive use of my time. I am looking for a sense of purpose, and maybe writing daily will help me with this. Until tomorrow.
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