The German is coming! The German is coming!

No, it's not another wartime invasion, but Stefanie decided to opt in for a German exchange, and part of that obviously was playing host to a German student who would in turn host Stefanie when she went to Germany.

Tina was a lovely girl from a small town near Muenster, but unfortunately Stefanie did not feel the week was successful and was on the point of backing out of the return trip. I'm not sure what ultimate reason was for her disappointment, but Stef found it difficult to be a good hostess while still having a full homework workload and not being free to do what she liked. Tina spent most of the day with her fellow German classmates touring around London while Stefanie and the English girls were stuck at school all day, and then coming home, I guess, Stef just needed her time to unwind and couldn't bring herself to entertain Tina all evening. In the end, we convinced her that her return trip would be far more fun (it being easier to play guest rather than host) and that she should honour her commitments.

Thankfully we were proven right, cuz Stefanie is now keen to do this again next year, oh my!

Spoilin' for a fight

You know how you're just about ready to take someone to task and they take the wind out of your sails by being so agreeable? Don't you just hate that?

Before we went away for the summer, I made sure to tell the school that Larysa's guitar would have to spend the school break there as I had no time to find it, let alone return it to our house. By the time we returned, the playground take on it was that it had been given to some other child in the school who had begun taking guitar lessons. I allowed the self-righteous anger build in my breast until I was ready to "beard the lion", so to speak, and confront our headteacher about their misplaced generosity.

Before I could get even one whole sentence out of my mouth, though, Mrs. Morrissey (who can scare the wits out of any human - child or adult) cheerfully jumped in with: "Oh, I think I just saw a guitar in the cafeteria, that's been there over the summer..." and proceeded to lead me to what appeared to be a snot-encrusted object.

'Ah', I thought to myself, 'at least here I have reason to vent...Someone's taken Larysa's pristine guitar in its case and left what appears to be a case with six week-old snail trails all over it.' I decided not to mention anything until I had checked to make sure it was indeed not Larysa's.
Thank God I did hesitate, because I proceeded to find her music notes inside the case.

So even though I left the school victorious, with the long-lost guitar in hand, I still felt a sense of deflation at not being able to express my worked up feelings that I'd nurtured so well.

Adriana's Birthday

I find most children's parties difficult to plan, but Adriana's is probably the most difficult. It's right at the end of summer, so either you have to let the parents know at the end of the previous school year (and they've usually forgotten by then) or you have to wait until the next school year and hope that there aren't any new kids that you aren't aware of joining the class.

This year, we decided to go for the 'after the new school year starts' scenario and it worked out fairly well considering I had less than 2 weeks to arrange having just arrived back from Canada. I decided to make the planning process a little easier by hiring an entertainer: Mr. Marvel. He's more marvellous than I could ever hope to be to a 6-year old!(Adriana had seen him before at another party and loved it.) Their website at http://www.mrmarvel.co.uk/ says they'll entertain your children for 3 hours with Punch & Judy puppets, magic tricks and a disco. And boy did they ever get entertained! I had a lot of fun too, since all I had to do was get the food ready and the pinata passed off to Orest. I would definitely recommend him to any mother who wants to keep their sanity intact while someone else deals with 20-30 over-stimulated kids.

Adriana reading

Adriana has come on strong with her reading since she's been back at school; to the point that she's now reading chapter books. I have noticed however that she tends to gloss over words that she's not so familiar with or change them into words that she thinks they may be. So the other day, "fair lady" became "fire laddie".



Then in another book, "creepy crawlies" became "crappy criers".



The funny thing is, I'm starting to like her versions better...

August 28, 2007 - a Date that will live in Infamy

Yup, this was the day that I set up my Facebook account. Since then I was wasted countless hours searching for friends who aren't there, posting up photo albums that no one sees and writing little unsatisfying snippets of information.

And this is why my blog has remained un-updated since then!

I am now in a position where I have to go back through my diary and try to recall what happened when and how funny it was at the time. The whole reason I started blogging was so that I wouldn't have to rely on my faulty brainbox to come up with memories of times past, but to record them realtime (practically) while it was still fresh in my mind.

I hereby denounce Facebook as a dilettante's website and shall focus my free time on keeping this blog up-to-date!

It's hard not to laugh

A lovely day in the park today lead to an interesting coversation with Adriana. She was climbing a tree and her thoughts turned to the little animals which inhabited it.



"Mama...do squirrals lay eggs?"



"No they're not like chickens."



"Then how do they have babies?"



"They carry them around inside, just like humans."



"I don't see a hospital here!!"



"Sqirrels don't need hospitals, they can have them by themselves."



"You mean the babies come out of their butts?"



Because she's just 6 years old, I decided now was not the time to have a full-on decription of the birthing process, and let the butt comment go. But we will have to eventually teach Adriana that giving birth is not like having a turd, otherwise she may never go to the toilet again without worrying she'll drop a baby in the bowl.

UMPZ

The plan was simple: we drop Stefa off for the bus to camp on August 4th and then we meet up with her on August 16th in Grafton for UMPZ. (The translation of this acronym is World Ukrainian Scouts Jamboree.) You'd think that I had enough to occupy my thoughts and time, since we still had Larysa and Adriana around, and what with the travelling to Mike and Mary's cottage and preparing our cottage for the jamboree? But no, I was desperate to see her and speak to her and hug her, that when I finally saw her on the 16th, I made a right ass of myself.

I've added all the photos onto my facebook page, so you can see them there. Plus, Orest has added a few photos to http://www.plastlondon.blogspot.com/ so you can see them there too. So I won't add them here, except for the one which explains how I was feeling about Stefa at the time.

As you can see, I'm grinning like an idiot, I missed her so much. I only had a few moments to hug her as she was marching by, and then she had to stand at attention in formation for the opening ceremonies. Luckily it got dark, and I was able to sidle up behind her (she was in the back row) and greedily catch up on all her adventures without anyone seeing me.

In her 12 days away, she'd been camping south of Montreal, visiting Ottawa with over 1300 other scouts and now she was camping again for the final part of the Jamboree just 500 yards away, so there was a lot to talk about.

I know there's a time that I will have to let go of my children, but if it's as difficult as this, I might be in for some serious hand-holding in the future.

A quickie at Mike and Mary's cottage

We didn't have a lot of time this summer to visit our friends, but we just managed to eke out a shortened weekend at the Van Dusen cottage at Green Lake.

We had to drop off Stefanie to catch the bus to camp in Toronto, so we didn't get a chance to leave until after that. So upon arriving, we had to hurry and get ready for the Green Lake costume party being held at Dan and Barb's cottage. Without much planning, Larysa came in soldier's camouflage and Adriana had her bunny ears, but I wasn't sure what to do. So I scrounged around Mike's boathouse and managed to find some accoutrements to use with my white towelling robe to come as a HazMat technician. (Only those of you CSI freaks will know what that is...) But I really have to hand it to Mary, coming as the camp warden from the story Holes...she looked just like Sigourney Weaver in the movie, sans a few inches. (I'm trying to get photos from Mary or link into Dan's website, but I'll publish for now without them.)

The next day we spent just hanging around, as the Van Dusens had to attend their cottager's association meeting, but everyone gathered under the tiki lights on the porch for a great dinner.

Next day was Adriana's first go at the Tarzan swing. Although is doesn't look high up when you're looking at the rope tied to a tree sitting in a boat, but when you're looking down trying figure out how to swing out far enough not to hit the rocks, it's scary. But after a few tries riding on Orest's back, she tried it herself. She's a trooper, that one. (Sorry, forgot to take the camera out on the boat, so here's a shot of Stefa and Larysa doing last year just to get a sense of the height.)

ski trip reunion

Last night we got together at Motria and Ostap's with a group of people and discovered that the last time we had all been together in the same room was when we went skiing to Courcheval almost 10 years ago.

It was really weird that everytime someone else showed up, the conversation with me invariably took a turn towards that ski trip and how much Stefa and Larysa had grown since then.

I think it was due to the fact that Orest and Nadia from Germany were visiting and most of the people they knew in Toronto were there that night.

The banner that never was and the fish that wouldn't be caught

In preparation for our Scouting Jamboree, I was asked to see if I could create a banner for us to use in the parade to say we were representing England, so I dutifully drove back to Toronto and went to Kinko’s, promising the girls that I’d take them to Yorkdale Mall afterwards. Three hours later(!!!), the girls were still waiting in the car to be taken to the mall and the banner still wasn’t done. Why? Because in the final transatlantic phone call to Orest, he decided that the price being quoted was too high to spend. (If only he could have told me that to begin with, the girls would have had their dinner and shop at Yorkdale, instead of getting crisps from the corner store and doing no shopping at all.)
I put aside the stress of the flipping banner and went back to the cottage to relax.

On Saturday, Larysa was released from camp and we had a combined visit from Peter and Tom and Lesley as well. Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate and we were drenched at the pool waiting for it to clear up. Finally we got a bit of sun and it dried up enough that we were able to sit outside for dinner. The next day was fab, so we decided to head into Cobourg, to spend the day at the beach with Lesley and her dog Tanner. I guess I didn’t realize how unfriendly Canada is towards dogs, never having brought Jessie here before. No dogs allowed on the beach, not allowed anywhere else without a lead. At that moment I was happy that we live in England – a place which rates dogs higher than small children.

We all made the trip up to visit my step Mum Sofia at the Baptist Bible Camp at Pidgeon Lake for the day on Tuesday and spent a pleasant day at their lakeshore with Adriana convinced that I somehow should be able to catch some fish for her. I’m not sure where this fascination with fishing has come, but there I stood, bucket in hand for at least 45 minutes with no luck of the slimy variety. I had to promise that we’d catch her something when we had better tools to do it with before she let me return to my beach chair with my sunburnt shoulders.

At the cottage so far

Remember last summer with the horrific mouse carcass and subsequent cleaning of mouse poo for days afterwards? I was so afraid of what I might find this season at the cottage that Orest's Mum felt compelled to 'open' it in advance of our arrival, in order to spare my sensibilities the horror. (It also helped that I had cleared out the kitchen of all dishes and foodstuff at the end of last summer, in the hope that the cottage would be extended as Orest had planned. It didn't happen - but that's another long and painful story in itself that I cannot bear to contemplate at the moment.) And a wonderful surprise it was to be able to sleep on a bed immediately upon arrival without having to strip the sheets and fumigate the surrounding area. I guess the only place she and I both missed was the cutlery drawer, it required all silverware to be doused in boiling water immediately and cleaned vociferously of little black pellets of mouse excretion. It was only after careful examination that I realized that not only had they used the drawer as their personal toilet space, but that in their desperate search for something to eat, they had nibbled off the ends of several wooden spoons that had obviously been tainted with something edible. I felt a bit of pity, but mostly triumph that I had foiled their attempts to feast and party on anything else in our absence over the winter.

I realized also that the old Birkenstocks that I had left here were well past their prime, when after a rain shower I attempted descending the stairs at Borys' cottage, only to have my feet fly out from under me due to a lack of tread on the undersoles of said sandals. The one good thing I learned was that my husband still has some chivalrous bones in his body (after his inaction a month ago during my falling out of the car incident I feared that the romance had definitely left the relationship) when he immediately came running over to help pick up the flotsam and jetsom.

We had a fun week with visiting with Orest's brothers after the wedding, culminating in a post golf party at the cottage on Tuesday. Things quietened down until the weekend, with Larysa's coming out of camp for 6 hours to visit with her sisters, Alice, and us. The weather was great so the pool was hopping, Orest saying he hadn't seen that many people there in years. I was relaxing after seeing Larysa back to camp and Orest off to Toronto with Borys and Alice, when we had a surprise visit from the kommandantka with Larysa in tow. It was so shocking to see them, that immediately my thoughts turned to the awful possibilities that had brought them:

- Larysa had accidentally set fire to the dining hall...
- Larysa had gotten into a cat-fight with one of her tentmates
- Larysa had hurt herself gravely

The truth was actually quite mundane and embarrassing...Larysa had lice and I was asked to shampoo and comb out the offenders. After several hours work, I let her stay overnight and sent her back in the morning to resume her last week of camp. She and the other girls were happy to see her back...sans little friends of course.

Christina and Mike's wedding

Got to Canada and hit the road running….

The whole family (both brothers and their families) were waiting for us when we arrived at 7pm, and then Borys and his daughter showed up to meet and greet as well, so our first night saw us going to bed at 4 am London time.
Next morning, me and the girls did a quick shopping trip to seek out a handbag to match the shoes I was wearing to the wedding. Who new that white patent leather would be so hard to find?

Then, Christina’s wedding. Held at the Gardiner Museum of Ceramic Art, I thought for sure that it would spell certain disaster with Adriana being there. But luckily, she was either at her best behaved, or the staff secretly hid the ceramics every time she walked by, and no damage was done. The ceremony was lovely, the bride gorgeous and the groom cried; all the elements of a successful wedding. The reception was held in the same hall as the ceremony, so we spent some time either wandering around the exhibits or just taking family photographs while they changed the chair setup for dining tables.

The meal was provided by Jamie Kennedy’s kitchen, a famous Canadian chef, so it wasn’t the typical Ukrainian wedding fare of shnitzli and pyrohy. Although I loved the food, I was worried the whole time that Adriana was not getting a decent meal at all, turning up her nose at everything that arrived to the table. So the lovely salad, the pea-filled ravioli, the beef tenderloin with scalloped potatoes sat virtually untouched. Even the appetizers that had been passed around earlier didn’t pass muster (the home-made fries were apparently “too brown”). Orest even tried to convince Adriana that the ravioli would be “just like spaghetti” and even consulted with the kitchen to have them remove the sauce from her portion alone to try and have her eat something. All for naught, the sum total of her consumption that evening was:
5 peas (that had been used as decoration on the ravioli that sat untouched)
2 pinches of bread (the rest being deemed too crunchy)
And water

There was contest going that evening as to who ate the least and it looks like Adriana may have even beat out the oldest member of the family, Didush having no problem eating the brown fries, even though they were served in a paper cone. The photo of him here looks like he's afraid someone's going to scoff the only good food he'll have all night.

The kisses between the bride and groom were limited to those initiated by a song from the participants with the word ‘love’ in it. So Adriana (with lots of coaxing) managed to give them a rendition of “Love, love, Jesus is love…” You can always tell the good girls who go to Catholic school.

It was a lovely wedding and Christina and Mike deserve all the happiness in the world.

Interesting Phraseology

In tribute to my dog-walking friends, I thought I would provide a list of words and/or phrases which Bruce and Gary have found amusing. The cause for their jocularity being, of course, that my Canadian upbringing has given me a slightly different vocabulary than their own.

• nimrod - I must have pulled this one out of my childhood, because I hadn't used it in some time, but it caused much guffawing, especially from Gary, who insisted that this must be a classic Canadian word. I tried to explain that "touque" and "poutine" were the classics, but he was having none of it. So I apologize in advance should Gary approach a fellow Canadian with this "classic" Canadianism.


• ying-yang - As in "I had so much booze, it was coming out my ying-yang." I liken the word to "hoo-ha" or "wazoo", but nonetheless, neither had heard of it before, and caused much mirth.


• carnie - There was a carnival set up in the park where we walk our dogs last week, and while we were all moaning about the disruptions to our daily routines, I added: "And these carnies don't even clean up after themselves." Bruce couldn't figure it out. "Do you mean gyppos (excuse the spelling)?" I tried to explain that in North America that most carnival folk are not gypsies or pikies, so they had come up with a less racist, more generic term to describe them. He was having none of it...he's still teasing me about it a week after the "carnies" have disappeared.

I'll probably have more once I get back to London...

The next Steffi?

Make way for the Junior champion of the Finchley Lawn Tennis Club!

Stefanie quickly defeated a boy named Ashley (poor thing- what a name) in straight sets, 6-2, 6-3 to win the title. We were worried at first, having seen his wicked practise serve when we arrived, but it seems that Stefanie's steady playing won over Ashley's attempts to show off with smashes and fast serves.

I really felt sorry for the boy, he was definitely not having a good time of it, what with his mother and some other boys to groan at every mistake and witness his defeat. But Stefanie was being very gracious with her win, even trying to stick up for him when we got home, saying: "Maybe he was tired."

So we're really pleased for her and over the summer we'll have to see if she can beat her Mum as well. Then we'll know for sure that she's good and it wasn't just a fluke.

We say goodbye and we say hello

This weekend was Larysa's chance to say goodbye to her Year 6 class from her old school on Saturday and say hello to the girls in her new school on Sunday.

Josie, Katie's mum, did a great job of organizing the Year 6 leaving BBQ at the local rugby club, there were 2 bouncy castles, a DJ and everyone brought food enough for all.

Luckily we had Kos, Melanie's dad, who made sure the music was being danced to by all, parents included. I was fine when Larysa dragged me onto the dance floor for Cha-Cha Slide, but not so pleased when she insisted I shake my booty to YMCA. I mean please, why are we teaching our children moves from a disco anthem anyway?

The next day, I was responsible for helping the PA at Larysa's new school (it's Stefanie's school too) to set up for the welcoming BBQ for all the new Year 7 parents. I spent most of my time sticking labels on people, managing the music and recruiting parents to join the PA. I was hoping that Larysa would meet some of the girls she'll be going to school with in September, but it turned out that by the time we had all the girls have their labels stuck on them indicating which class they would be in, Larysa had met only girls from other classes.

"That's ok Mum, I'll have a better chance to get to know them when we all start school anyway."

Sometimes, Larysa can be very realistically optimistic.

Never trust a child with a camera

Both girls just got back from week-long trips: Larysa to Isle of Wight and Stefanie to Bayeux, France and were keen to tell me about and show me their photos.

Larysa took a disposible camera, but informed me she had used one up on the bus before she even got there and had lost the other one.

Stefanie showed me her digital photos, and again, they were all from the bus ride there.

What is wrong with these chidlren: when they look back in a few years time, will they be able to say: "Oh yeah, that's the picture of us in France (or Isle of Wight)."??

No, they'll say: "Oh yeah, that's the picture of us on a bus to....yeah, I forget where..yeah, but it was really fun!"

Left high and dry

You'd think that having gotten rid of 2 out of 3 children and a husband for most of the week I would have gotten a lot accomplished. But just as with the February half-term, I managed to fill the vacuum of their absence with stuff and inanities, instead of with real tasks and accomplishments.

On Tuesday, I spent the entire day while Adia was a school reading what I would consider to be a "chick-lit" novel, followed by finishing off the evening with another novel that Stefanie had left behind.

Getting Rid of Matthew is one of those books that are great to read on the beach, but shouldn't be used as an excuse to while away the day at the kitchen table, just getting up to make more coffee. I'd have felt more worthy if it had been War and Peace. I can't tell you why I picked up the other book, Angel when I brought Adriana home from school, but I was on a roll and thought that I should finish it because it had interested me enough to buy for Stefanie in the first place.

Wednesday, Adriana and I were in the process of getting ready for school when she pointed out that neither Stefanie or Larysa had to go to school, why did she?

Well, there was no arguing with that, so Adriana took the day off. (or snow day, as Orest put it) We took the dog for a walk, did some recycling (i.e. she came with me to the depot), returned a pair of shoes I'd bought for her that were too small and spent a few hours at Borders and Starbucks looking at and buying books. We mooched around the house the rest of the afternoon, but by 6pm she was driving me insane and I sort of wished I hadn't given in and sent her to school instead. Thankfully she was in bed early that night and I could relax with an episode of Boston Legal (I love singing along to its theme song- so did Jerry Espensen that night).

So after 2 days of doing virtually nothing, I followed it up with tennis on Thursday and Friday morning and a hair appointment on Friday afternoon, and ba-da-bing, ba-da-boom....there's the week gone.

I've got one week before I leave for Canada, so here's me knuckling down!

Stefanie diving

Finally our first free evening! But having spent the entire day away from home, it didn't feel like we had any time to just veg out, cuz we were too exhausted and I was helping Larysa pack for her week-long class trip.

I had to get Stefanie up at 6:15 am in order to drive her to the bus that was taking her to the London Games, where she was representing the borough of Barnet in the Junior Diving competition. After going to mass first, we then met her at Crystal Palace to watch her compete. Interestingly enough, we were also able to watch some ping-pong matches and basketball games, as well as keeping an eye on the kayak races in the next pool.


She did fairly well, placing 14th out of 22, but the bigger disappointment was that she was meant to do her first competitive dive off the 5 metre board, but declined at the last moment. I guess the trampoline we have at home hasn't helped as much as we thought.

Hopefully she'll gain more confidence on the board at the cottage pool over the summer...
(Sorry about the crap photo, by the way, being that far away, I couldn't seem to time the click correctly. It was either this photo or the one of just a splash of water.)

Canada Day, London-style & Wine Tasting

5th evening out in a row (4th one was boring - meeting at the school, but out nonetheless) and we took the kids to Trafalgar Square to see what was on offer for Canada Day.

I suspect we missed most of the best stuff which happened earlier in the afternoon- like the aerialist skiing demo (on trampolines I understand) and the street hockey, because when we got there all that was left to do for the kids was go on the simulator, which after having done all the "Cadillac" of simulation rides in DisneyWorld, was like being in a Model T Ford; and try the hockey shoot-out (line was too long and they shut it early).

I was also expecting a bit more in the way of culinary delights, but all they had were bison burgers, and once I told the girls that a bison is another name for a buffalo, somehow their appetites for 'traditional' Canadian food diminished. So we collected our freebies (pins, balloons, tattoos) and walked over to the Texas Embassy for some Mexican food.

6th evening out was a Wine Tasting event sponsored by Stefanie's school. As I'm on the Parent's Association, we felt obliged to attend, but the obligation was rewarded with what turned out to be a worthwhile event. One of the Year 7 parents is an experienced sommelier from the Stratford Hotel in St. James, and offered his services for the night. We tried some wonderful (and inexpensive) wines and cheeses, all provided by Waitrose, and now have a new favourite wine wine for the summer: Villa Maria's Reisling from New Zealand. Try it if you get the chance, the aroma and taste is very fruity and fresh, without being too sweet.

I just hope I can get it in Canada this summer...

Wimbledon & Hagbane's Doom

3rd busy night (and day) this week and we're at Wimbledon.

We signed up for the lottery in November and managed to win 2 tickets for the first Wednesday of the tournament. Having received these tickets in mid May, we had no idea who we'd be seeing or what the weather would be like during the traditional last week of June and first week of July time set aside.

Who knew it would be "Britain's wettest June since records began"? We got there just before the first match began in the middle of light rain shower, so decided to immediately go for lunch with the traditional Pimms to drink while play was suspended. Andy Roddick and his opponent (a little Thai guy whose name escapes me) were well into their second set by the time we finished our strawberries (not very tasty this year - also due to the massive rainfall) and we watched the rest of the match. It being my first time to Wimbledon, I was actually focused on more than just the play; like the ball boys and girls - how their movements are like a ballet in itself (excellently spoofed in a little British movie called "Confetti", see it if you can); like how narrow the seats are and you are rubbing hips with your neighbour all the time; and the umpires and judges not seemingly being distracted by anything while making their calls - I don't think I could do that job.

Next up was the ladies with Henin beating a tall, willowy blonde Russian (aren't they all tall, blonde and willowy?) whose name was being shouted out by the crowd in encouragement. It was a bit odd to hear "Come on Vera!" in those cockney accents though...

Tim Henman and Lopez then started their match, but after just 2 games the heavens opened. At that point it was going on 5pm and I knew that I'd have to leave by 6pm to make the hour's journey home to catch Larysa performing in her school play. So lucky for me, I didn't miss anything else, because play never got re-started after that. Orest sat there with my friend Oonagh until about 8pm when they called play off for the day.

Larysa was fabulous in her performance as a wizard in her play called "Hagbane's Doom" . She didn't have a lead role (something which really caused her great grief when the roles were first divvied out) but somehow she always manages to shine when on stage. Maybe it's just me being her mother and being ultra proud of her, but when she used the simple of act of her hat continually falling off to turn it into a comedic little turn, it shows that she's got some real acting chops. It really stayed with the audience as well, because all the parents I spoke to, it was the thing that really stood out for them as well. For a kid of 11 to be able to improvise like that...wow, it amazes me.