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| Doing my bookwork | Organising the cupboards | On a picnic |
Doing my stackycups
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| With my grandma | “What’s in here?” | “Oh, wow! Ducks!” |
Pink pajamas
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| Wade and mom | In our wedding finery | Bridal accessories | Drew and Landyn Soprano |
| July 31, 2002 Dave W came round for dinner yesterday and stayed the night. He’s been living in the Midlands, but has just got a job in Hackney so he’ll be moving back down again, which is great news. He’s such a close friend as well as Nova’s godfather. I’d done a bunch of cooking on the weekend so I wouldn’t have to worry about meals on the days I was working — a few salads, a Spanish tortilla, minestrone, poached trout — and we just tucked into that. I try to have Nova’s meals for those three days organised as well (she had cauliflower-cheese with a side of peas and a mixed berry salad for dessert). Nova was really happy to see Dave — she spent quite a bit of time with him last autumn, and seemed to remember who he was. He’d brought her some funky little outfits he’d picked up at Womad — leopard print trousers, a pink sunsuit covered with tropical fish, and pair of deep blue shorty pajamas. Drank a bit too much… at least it was too much for someone who has to leave the house suited and booted by 7:30am… |
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| July 28, 2002 Beautiful sunny weather. Usually we’d be at Womad this weekend, but it just didn’t pan out this year. It’s the first time we’ve not gone in five years… I find it hard to believe now that we went when Nova was three weeks old, not to mention attempting something like that only three weeks after a C-section. There was a free Indian music festival in Regent’s Park this weekend, so we went along to that instead. They had a stand set up for bands, and were showing the India vs England test match on a big screen between acts. Many of the people picnicking on the grass were Asian, and a huge cheer would go up whenever England lost a wicket. While Adam was off getting a curry and bread from the food stand I was amused to notice that the group of young Indians next to us were eating Doritos, mini-muffins, pasta salad and cucumber sandwiches. Nova enjoyed the crowd, and ate a healthy serving of grass with her Cheerio-and-raisin mix — as long as she’s eating her greens I guess…;-) |
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| July 27, 2002 Spent the morning with Tracey and Sam. We met for coffee after breakfast, then spent a couple of hours in Waterlow Park, before going back to their flat for a cup of tea (and lunch for the babies). Tracey’s got a bit of a phobia about flying ants, and apparently they come out in the afternoons, so she likes to be indoors by then. Nova and Sam get on pretty well together, although they always seemed to want the same toy at the same time, and there was the inevitable ruckus about wanting each other’s beaker… |
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| July 25, 2002 Well, that’s my first week of work over with. I’m still easing back in, but even so I was more than ready for my four-day weekend… Actually I think working three days a week is just about right. Monday was a bit of a grind, but by lunchtime Tuesday you’re already half way there, and Wednesday just sailed past. I am feeling very enthusiastic about my day at home with Nova, and it’s been a long time since I’ve appreciated how lucky I am to have such a super little girl and to be able to spend so much time with her. We’ve got a busy morning planned, then Adam is coming home mid-afternoon to cover for me while I go to the doctor. |
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| July 22, 2002 First day back in the office today, which was pretty strange after more than a year’s maternity leave. I felt like an imposter sitting at my desk in my work clothes. I must say it’s a pretty relaxed way to spend a day compared to looking after an energetic baby. All that freedom to do what you want, when you want. All that adult conversaton. All that quiet… I did find the lunchtime bustle of High Holborn a bit overwhelming after the sedate streets of Highgate. I made it back by 5pm and picked Nova up. She was relatively pleased to see me, but after a few cuddles she wriggled off my lap and returned to playing with Sid’s truly impressive collection of plastic dinosaurs. I’m pretty sure I missed her more than she missed me today… |
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| July 20, 2002 Happy birthday, Wendy! Weekends are such a nice break after five days of looking after the girl on my own. I haven’t been feeling very sociable, so it’s pretty much been just Nova and me. Antonia and Oliver dropped by for a visit, and I had tea with Pascale yesterday afternoon, but it’s great to have Adam around again. We’ve been having family meals at the table, which Nova really enjoys. I made french toast and blueberry smoothies this morning, and since we were using a knife and fork, I gave Nova her own set. She didn’t get the hang of the knife at all, although she enjoyed clashing the two together, but she did manage to spear a few squares of french toast on her fork. She’s getting better at drinking from a glass as well, and downed a creditable amount of smoothie. She didn’t fare quite as well with the stirfried veggies we had for dinner, and I had to resort to my old trick of pulsing them up in the blender, so I could feed them to her with a spoon. |
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| July 15, 2002 Happy birthday, Landyn! Nova seems glad to be back. She wasted no time getting the shelves and cupboards arranged to her liking, and reacquainting herself with toys she hadn’t seen in three weeks. Her favourite toy at the moment is definitely her stacky cups. She’s getting pretty good at stacking the eight of them in the right order, although there is still a certain element of trial and error. I’ve seen her try to force the largest cup into the smallest one, and when that doesn’t work, move onto the next one. She’s definitely getting faster though, and this morning she put them all together in about 10 seconds flat. |
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| July 13/14, 2002 Well the journey home was no picnic, but we made it. It took almost 24 hours from leaving the cabin in Jasper to walking in our front door in London. Quite amazing when you think about it… We set off about 7:30am, having spent a couple of hours packing and getting everything ready the night before. “Seven bags, one pushchair, one baby” — our mantra… We made really good time to Calgary, in spite of stopping pretty much every half hour for something Nova related. We had a picnic lunch at a little lake just east of Banff, which would have been lovely except for the ferocity of the mosquitos. We had hours to kill at Calgary Airport, and actually started queuing for check-in before the clerks had even showed up. The flight was an hour late in the end, but the airport has play areas for kids, even in the waiting lounge, and Nova had a great time. Her high pitched shrieking turned a few heads — Adam spotted a woman evil-eyeing us from the far side of the lounge. Needless to say, the person sitting next to us on the plane was that very woman. She was extremely frosty, wouldn’t make eye contact, put on her headphones before the entertainment had even started etc. Nova fussed for an hour or so — it was past her bed time, she hadn’t had a proper meal all day, we had to constrain her with one of those ridiculous kiddy safety belts some airlines use, etc. — but we eventually got her settled across our laps, and she slept for the next five hours. Unfortunately, I didn’t. I couldn’t move my legs without disturbing her, and they were having problems with the electrics on the plane (very reassuring) and couldn’t dim the lights. (I think I dozed for about 20 minutes — the little TV screen was showing the progress of our plane across the Arctic, altitude, time to landing and so on, and I didn’t see the bit where we passed Godthab in Greenland, otherwise I kept a pretty close eye on our progress…) Evil-eye was a woman transformed after her five-hour nap, and offered Nova her milk, let her play with her sun hat, held her, and backed off the plane when we landed, koochikooing and waving byebye. I can see why people might be disappointed to be sitting next to a baby on a flight if they were hoping to work or sleep, but what’s the point of being so rude? The baggage handlers didn’t return our pushchair to us at the door of the plane. Instead we had to go about a mile to the luggage carousel (one of those buggy drivers took pity on us fortunately), then wait for thirty minutes after we’d collected our bags before it finally appeared. It defeats the purpose of taking the pushchair if you don’t have it to move the baby through the airport, keep her somewhere while you collect your bags etc. But that’s Britain for you… The taxi with car seat we’d booked didn’t show up either, so we ended up taking the train to Victoria and getting a black cab there. I just held Nova on my lap for the journey home. |
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| July 12, 2002 Nova pulled off some impressive moves today. She started at breakfast, when she distracted me by flicking porridge on the cedar walls with her spoon, then swept her half full bowl of porridge to the floor. She managed to dispose of her sun hat twice — first in a parking lot in town, where I spotted it as we were pulling out, and yelled “Hat!”, causing Adam to slam on the breaks in fear he was running over a cat; the second time we noticed she was hatless as we paused to catch our breath after climbing up from the bottom of Athabaska Falls (yes, the hat was at the very bottom of the path…) At dinner she sent a plate crashing to the floor in the pizza restaurant spraying glass in a ten foot radius around our table. And for her grand finale, she dropped her tube of toothpaste she’d been clutching by the edge of her cot where Adam stepped on it, forcing most of the paste out of the tube and leaving a large pink stain on the carpet. (I actually managed to stuff most of the toothpaste back into the tube again, disproving that old truism…) We actually had a really good day today, visiting Athabasca Falls, which was every bit as impressive as it was in my childhood (how often does that happen?), especially the cauldron bit where whole trees are being tossed about like matchsticks. We had a picnic lunch next to the river, which was really pleasant although Nova squirmed on my lap like an orangutang the whole time (shades of the return flight to come…) When she dozed off in the car we took the opportunity to drive the 14km switchback road up Edith Cavell mountain, where we popped her in the backpack again, and went for a 2km circular walk to the foot of the glacier. The weather was beautiful, the scenery was stunning, the baby was in good humour, for once all our ducks were in a row… |
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July 11, 2002 Went for a tour round Maligne Canyon and Maligne Lake yesterday. We put Nova in the backpack for our hike down the canyon. She fell asleep on the climb back up, and we just propped the pack up in a chair where she dozed away while we ate our lunch. I must say she truly outdid herself in the pooping department, requiring three poopy-nappy changes during the outing — at Maligne Canyon before the hike, at Maligne Lake before our walk, and at the IGA, five minutes from home. Used up all our wipes and the emergency nappy we’d stashed in the car… Cooked a truly wretched pasta for dinner. We thought Creamo would be equivalent to single cream, and we ended up with our pasta, smoked fish and peas floating in a puddle of milk. I find the milk/cream thing very confusing. Until recently, I thought 2% milk had only 2% the fat of whole milk, when in fact whole milk is 3.25% (I guess of fat by volume?) It turns out that Creamo is about 10%, while I think British single cream is more like 18%, and double cream has more than that. I don’t know where whipping cream fits in, or even if it is the same in Britain and Canada. Canadians just aren’t into cream the way the British are. I’ve been asked in all seriousness if I want cream poured over a cream cake in a British restaurant. |
| July 10, 2002 Got a later start than planned, what with Nova’s middle-of-the-night antics, and finally set off about noon. What a marathon journey it turned out to be… We’d hoped to time our stops with local beauty spots and rest stops, but of course Nova had her own schedule. On a journey through scenic Banff and Jasper national parks, our stops occurred at an RV park/amusement park off Highway 1, a rest stop where we ate lunch on a broiling hot stone wall, and a gas station that told us only after we’d passed it that there wasn’t any more gas available for a 150km. (Took us 10 minutes to find somewhere to turn around…) Nova slept only one of the six hours we were travelling, and wasn’t best pleased when she was awake. Here we were surrounded by mountains and glacial lakes, and I was spending most of my time looking over my shoulder, trying to read “Where’s Rusty” upside down or recite Dr Seuss’s ABC from memory. The log cabin we’ve rented is really nice, with a little living/dining area, a kitchenette, beautiful bathroom, and separate bedroom we just managed to squeeze the cot into and a great view of the Athabasca River rushing past. The bed is unbelievably comfortable — once we’ve paid off our holiday we are definitely going to invest in a new mattress. |
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| July 9, 2002 Caught our flight to Calgary this afternoon. Renting a car was as unecessarily time consuming as ever, given that we’d confirmed all the details in London. When we got to the car, there was no car seat, and we had to stand around for another 15 minutes while they went and got one from some warehouse. We finally set off for Roman and Hana’s an hour after we’d landed, following the cryptic instructions I’d scribbled on a tiny scrap of paper. Calgary’s traffic lights are maddeningly unsynchronised — it didn’t matter if I went the speed limit, faster, or slower, I managed to miss nearly every light. And although I know it’s a stereotype, the Alberta drivers were a force to be reckoned with as well. I felt like I was back in London the way people were carving each other up, riding their horns, veering across lanes without signalling… It didn’t help that Nova was howling in the back seat, or that we lost the scrap of paper with the instructions, or that we discovered we were heading east when we should have been heading south. We finally pulled into a Coop Plaza a couple of blocks from Roman’s to discover that Nova had had a major pants blow out, which Adam dealt with while I bought a few things for her supper. It was great to see Roman, who’s one of my oldest friends. It’s been at least twelve years since we’ve seen each other, and I hadn’t met his wife Hana, or his 10-year-old daughter who is soccer mad, and had Adam down the park for a kick about after supper. (Apparently she was faster, more skillful, and fitter than he was, but he did have a more powerful shot — not surprising given he’s a grown man…) Nova went down as easily as ever, but unfortunately she woke up about 1am, and was very difficult to settle. It’s always a drag when your baby wakes in the night, but it’s worse when you’re at someone else’s house. We could hear people moving around upstairs, and even the dogs seemed to have been disturbed. We were sleeping in a basement room with one tiny little window, and it was pitch black. We stumbled around getting Nova out of her cot, and tried unsuccessfully to rock her back to sleep. Eventually Adam went upstairs for a bottle, which made her drowsy, but she couldn’t seem to fall asleep. I thought a nappy change might help, and somehow managed to locate the supplies and change her in the dark. She gave such a sigh of relief when I removed her wet nappy that I knew that was the problem. She settled down between us and went straight to sleep. I guess that nappy rash is really bothering her… |
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| July 8, 2002 Last day in Prince George. We took Greg and Wendy out to Earl’s to thank them for putting us up for the past two weeks. Nova really enjoyed it, especially the mirrored ceiling. She kept looking up and waving to herself. She ate an enormous amount of food: a large slice of garlic bread, a piece of pizza, any number of strawberries and raspberries, a few chips… I finally pried the pizza crust from her fist, worried that she’d do herself an injury if she carried on this way… |
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| July 7, 2002 Fern and Ed set off for Kelowna after breakfast — they should be home by dinner time. We mooched around in the morning, watching Lleyton Hewitt demolish Nalbandian in the Wimbledon mens’ final. Joined Wade and Gale at Fort George Park for a lunchtime picnic of leftovers from the barbeque. Nova really enjoyed being outdoors, flinging food on the picnic blanket, eating grass, and playing with Ernie, Wade and Gale’s little Pomeranian. The mosquitoes, which were vicious, didn’t seem to bother her that much. (Or maybe her bites don’t come up because she doesn’t scratch them?) Adam had a huge lump in the middle of his head that made him look like a cyclops. You do get a sort of immunity to mosquitoes after a while, and I guess I’ve had so many thousands of bites by now that my skin doesn’t react that much. It doesn’t make them any less annoying though… Had a wander through the park afterwards. We’ve had so many birthday parties, barbeques, and swim club parties here over the years. The old fire engine we used to climb on is gone — I guess it was considered a death trap in these safety conscious times — but they had a smaller, safer version that was crawling with kids. The merry-go-round David cracked his head on and the teeter-totters were gone as well, but there were lots of other things for kids to play on. They’ve got a terrific new water park we would have loved, and a little steam train kids can ride on, as well as a museum with a dinosaur skeleton. All very impressive… |
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| July 6, 2002 Went over to Wade and Gale’s this afternoon for a barbeque. It was the first proper summer day we’ve had since arriving in Prince George. David flew down to Kamloops yesterday to rejoin Lynette and Ceinwen, but the rest of our family were there, as well as Gale’s British relations and some of her family so there was a good crowd. We pulled up a bar stool at the kitchen island for Nova, and she polished off a plate of mixed salads. Everyone is most impressed with her eating capacity… The visitors were finding the mosquitoes pretty unbearable in spite of bug dope, citronella candles, mosquito coils etc. You don’t encounter many mosquitoes in the British Isles. Scotland is supposed to be bad for midges, but in my several visits I’ve never had much of a problem with them. I could have been lucky, or perhaps it’s just looking at the situation from a Canadian perspective, land of the moose and mosquito. Wade actually threw his back out killing a mosquito — “…it was a really big one!” Took Nova home and put her to bed about 8pm. I stayed in with her, while Adam headed back to the barbeque armed with Ed’s electric mosquito zapper, a little battery-operated tennis racquet with electrified strings that you charge by pressing a button on the handle. Any mosquito you swat with it explodes in a little spark of light. (Apparently it packs a nasty shock, as Ed, Greg, Wade and Gale can all attest…) |
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| July 4, 2002 Happy birthday, Nova, our precious little one-year-old! Hard to believe that a whole year has gone by already, but impossible to imagine life without her… We had a little dinner party in Nova’s honour. She wore her pretty blue flowered dress with the lace collar from mom and dad (double bibbed for safety). Greg made barbequed ribs for the adults, while Nova had a salmon burger, baked sweet potatoes, roast potatoes and barbequed asparagus. (She had a rib bone to gnaw on as well, as Greg insisted that all babies love chewing on bones — and she did seem to enjoy it, making growling noises like a little puppy.) Fern had bought and decorated an angel food cake, and Nova was pretty pleased with that, as well as the peach jello and whipped cream on the side (she’s still not too keen on ice cream and wasn’t sure what to make of our chorus of “Happy Birthday” either). She got some lovely presents, and she tactfully spent time with each one: a new fleece blanket, a book of Van Gogh paintings for babies, a matchbox car, a little wooden puzzle, some duckies for her bath. (She got a lovely pink outfit from Wade and Gale as well.) Morse was pretty interested in the bath ducks, their squeaks convincing him they must be dog toys, and I had a job wrestling them away from him. Party over, it was pajamas, bottle and bed for a very sleepy birthday girl. |
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| July 3, 2002 Happy birthday, David! Went for a hike with the McGhees at Forests for the World this morning. We put Nova in her packsack, which she always enjoys. Ten feet into the woods the mosquitoes were ferocious — we were wearing shorts, and the backs of Adam’s legs were just covered, and I had five of the little buggers biting my hand at the same time. Fortunately Carolyn had bug dope, so we slathered ourselves with that, and put a little on Nova’s ankles and hairline, and that largely kept them at bay. (I was wearing a ribbed shirt, and they were still managing to bite me between the ribs where the fabric was thinnest…) Mosquitoes aside, it was great to get out in the woods. Prince George is surrounded by miles of forest, but until recently there wasn’t anywhere to actually walk in the woods. There were parks, or logging roads you could drive down, but there weren’t any trails you could actually walk on. David chose the local tandoori house for his birthday dinner, so we all met up there at 6pm. I had Nova in her pyjamas, and she ate her dinner along with us. She had some naan bread and rice, but the rest of the food was a bit spicy for her. The earlier dinner time in Canada works out really well when you have a baby. Nova has eaten dinner with us nearly every evening, and she really enjoys the company. She drank her bottle on the drive home, and we popped her straight in her cot when we got in. |
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| July 2, 2002 Lynette and Ceinwen were heading off to Kamloops for a visit with her parents today, so we all met for breakfast at Ricky’s Pancake House to say goodbye. She had a birthday present for Nova — a hot pink vest and a copy of Goodnight Moon. David is going to stick around for a few days before flying down to join them. Adam and I cooked New Mexican enchiladas for dinner this evening, and Wendy made a huge spinach salad, but with ten of us we made short work of everything. We settled down to watch K-Pax after dinner, but I fell asleep during the opening scene and didn’t wake up until the closing credits. |
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| July 1, 2002 Happy Canada Day everyone! When it became obvious that Nova had no intention of arriving on her due date of June 21st, it was a bit disorienting. I knew that only five percent of babies arrive on the projected day, but we’d been focussed on that date for so long it felt strange to have passed it with no baby — and no new date to aim for. I looked at the days ahead, wondering which one would turn out to be our baby’s birthday. The calendar’s pretty crowded with family birthdays at that time of year, and I was hoping the baby would have a day all to itself. I thought July 1st would be good — it was a Sunday, and “the child that is born on the sabbath day is bonny and blithe and good and gay”, plus it’s always a holiday in Canada. Instead, she came on America Day, and a Wednesday to boot, but far from being “full of woe”, she’s as cheerful a baby as you could wish for. Went out to the Millar’s in the afternoon for the wedding gift opening. Wade and Gale got some nice presents, mostly from their wedding list they had at the Bay. We bought them a bar set — shaker, jigger, and various implements like strainer, knife, tongs etc, as well as a book on mixing drinks. Back to Greg and Wendy’s in the evening, where we ordered Chinese food and watched ‘The Shipping News.’ |
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