15th birthday photo… 9 days left

I love this photo of myself and a good friend celebrating my 15th birthday.

Don’t ask why am I wearing a bow in my hair.  It probably came off a birthday present.  You will soon notice that in my birthday photos I often have strange things on my head.

Once again, there is the evidence of mom spoiling me with a great meal; birthdays are always deserving of the fine dinnerware.

And then there is the cake: Rum Cream Pie.  Divine.

.

.

.

.

I am trying hard not to get too hung up on the fact that there are only 9 days left to be 29.

It is still over a week away.

But less than 10 days.

I really should be okay with this.

16 days left… A past birthday

I’ve been digging out all my albums looking for old birthday photos.  There are a lot of years where I don’t have a picture, especially during the last 5 to 7 years.  I did however happen to find this beauty.

Once again, I’m not really sure what year this was taken.  It is either celebrating the year I was going into Gr.8, so my 13th birthday, or Gr. 9, my 14th.

No matter.

I love how everyone is piled on me. Sigh. I was loved.

The candle and wine glass in the foreground hint that mom made a special meal… most likely spaghetti… (and punch not wine… in case you were wondering).

Three friends over to celebrate my day.  It is interesting to see who I had picked.  Of those three, I am only in regular contact with one today.  Another, I know what is going on her life and I’m sure if we ever did manage to meet up we would have lots to talk about.  The third, I have no idea where she is or what she is doing.  I really lost touch with her while we were still in high school.  Funny how that happens in life.  But on that day, I wanted each of them there.  Sure looks like we had a great time too.

Huh.  I had another thought.  These three didn’t really know each other.  They weren’t friends with each other as much as they were friends with me.  I’m glad that wasn’t an issue in our lives at that point in time.  It is sad that it can be such a big deal in adult circles… I admit that there have been times when I have dragged my feet when considering a friend’s invitation to something where I know no one else.  I should just go and celebrate that friendship.

Friendship is worth celebrating.

31 days left… I’VE BEEN COUNTING WRONG!

Today is the ninth of August.

August 2010

There are 31 days in the month of August.

My birthday is on the ninth of September.

I’VE BEEN COUNTING WRONG!  There are only 31 days left to be a twenty year old!

This is really discouraging.  I guess my subconscious was looking for a way to give me more time so it fooled me into counting my birthday.

In an effort to cheer myself up I hunted down my old photo albums in an effort to find some pictures of one of my favourite birthday parties.  Sadly, I do not remember what year I was celebrating, I’m sure my mom knows, but I’m going to guess it was 7 or 8.

It was one of my biggest parties.  I can remember cutting out magazine pictures of boys and girls as I made each of the party invitations by hand.  We had a theme, which I took very seriously, Around the World.  I told all my guests to come dressed from a different part of the world.

Not sure what country cowboys are from...

The afternoon was full of super fun activities.

You can't tell from the picture but we were getting ready to do a 'sound' story.

Hitting a pinata is cultural... right?

The pinata was a chicken, I don’t remember why, but it was very solid.  I think it took about a week to make since we kept adding layer after layer of paper.  Paper mache is too much fun.  We just couldn’t stop ourselves.

And I’m pretty sure this was the year my parents set up one of their best treasure hunts that had us searching all over the farm for the clues, even down groundhog holes.  The best moment was when we were to count in and down the rows of corn to find the next clue under a stock.  The boys were up ahead and in their excitement decided to skip the counting part and just start pulling up stocks.  I was a little worried at that point what my dad’s reaction would be but I’m pretty sure he just laughed it off as he quickly showed the guys which stock the clue was under.

Keeping with the theme we ate some ethnic foods:  Hot dogs and taco’s.

And of course there were the presents.

I must not have liked that gift.

It was a good party and a great way to celebrate my birthday.  I wonder what I should plan for this year.  It could be fun to do Around the World again. 🙂

33 days left… Farm ideals

Friday night, after writing a post about goals in which I concluded that relational goals were of the utmost importance, we watched the movie Food, INC.

Wow, I can I sum up this film?  Shocking.  Blunt.  Hard core.  It made me feel sick to my stomach and brought me to tears.

Movie reviews are not my intended subject matter but I mention this film because Dave suggested watching it after reading my post.  He is so great at giving me a new perspective.

Even as we were starting the movie I had realized that I had in sense copped-out of really examining what our family’s goals should be.  Yes, the relationship goals are important.  In fact, I still feel that they should be at the center of our choices.  But I took the easy way out of coming to any real conclusions about money goals.  (I think I’ve already mentioned how I can be very indecisive…)

After watch Food, INC. and having a long talk on the couch has is clear that there are a few ideas that I hold very highly and that still tie in to this new “mom” outlook where Abigail impacts every choice I make.  One of the big ‘ideas’, or for tonight I’m going to call “ideal”, is that of the farm.

Food, INC. is a film that examines often hidden polices, practices, and goals of the american food industry.  It concludes that those making the choices in the industry are out to make the biggest profit regardless of the consequences to our health or the planet.  It isn’t just pointing a finger at McDonald’s but at everything you find on the supermarket shelf.  You will want to plant a garden and raise your own chickens after watching.  Interesting to me since that was number 30 on my list.

There are two factors motivating me to plant a garden, well, maybe three.  First, it will save us money.  This reason is actually the least motivating of the three since it is a lot easier to find cheap produce than it is to grow it.

Second, and this one ties in with the film, I want to know what I am feeding Abigail.  It is scary how far our food travels before it reaches us.  The other day I picked up an orange at the grocery store that was from South Africa. South Africa!  Take a minute and think about the journey of that orange.  When was it picked and by whom?  How did it get from the trees to the ship?  How long was it on the ship?  What else was on the ship?  Where and when did it get off?  How long before it reached my store?  How many hands and boxes did it pass through before I picked it up, sliced it up, and fed it to my little girl as a snack?  Yikes!

Thirdly, I am motivated by the ideal of the farm.  I grew up on a beef farm in rural Ontario and that has played a large role in shaping my viewpoint of the world. I grew up eating veggies straight from the garden.  All our beef was “our beef”.  Most of our chicken came from the neighbours.  We made our own maple syrup and apple juice.  Having tasted the difference since leaving home I now know was spoiled with excellent food from my own backyard.  I want to give that to my kids.  Yes, she may whine at pulling weeds but she will love eating peas from the pod while still standing in the garden.

My farm ideal

This doesn’t mean that I have made up my mind about building a dream green house in the country.  But it does mean that I recognize that it is an idea that deserves our thought.  It can be a goal that fits with our vision for our family.  We have lots of time to reach those goals, after all, we’re still 29.