About Laurel

Woman, mother, grandmother, wife and citizen of the world. No longer young but never old. Lover of mountains and the sea, beaches and gardens, wildflowers and nature. I want to help people fulfill their dreams, record what has passed in my time and encourage serenity, good health, joy, peace and satisfaction. Oh and I am a cancer survivor; it can be done! Create something, build something, love someone. Leave the world a better place.

And Then There Were…..Twins

Posted on April 15, 2013 by Laurel

The magic of twin boy grandchildren. They are definitely not identical and that’s part of the fascination. They came into the world prematurely and they used to be very small. That’s changing.

They are 9 months old and so busy it defies description. Perpetual motion. Touch, feel, chew, spin, grab. I have a furry vest that I am likely going to have to wear all summer. They love to touch it, rubbing their little hands up and down the (fake) fur. When they wear it out we will have to cut it up and put pieces in their memory books.

Yesterday there was an I-can-make-louder-noises-than-you match as they sat opposite each other taking turns yelling out very loud happy noises. I wonder what they said?

One is very much alertly curious. He watches, turning his head slightly to the side as if saying, “what is that all about?” The other watches more studiously, carefully, as if drawing his own conclusions. They don’t stare at other babies like most kids; after all they have each other. But they both gaze at their 4 year old cousin as if he is a miracle. (He is but that’s beside the point.)

One has a grin that is accompanied by noises and chortles. The other has a smile that engages his whole face including his eyes and the almost dimple in his chin. When he smiles it’s with everything he’s got. Did I mention that I really like little kids?

One has been busy growing teeth. The other learning words. He rather likes his Dad. His dad’s name is Greg. One of his first words was “Geg”. Seriously. I told you he is curious and he listens. (Parenting 101 note: They hear everything you say. Period) I understand the other twin has made his vocal debut with “Mama”. That’s great, I approve, but we are working on “Gamma”.

They do like the same toys: Sophie and Monsieur Tsetse (luckily they have one each of these), the small red book, the singing frog (une-deux-trois-quatre-cinq-six-sept-violette-bicyclette), the stacking toys. Happily their attention span so far is shorter than a finger snap so there’s no fighting (yet). On the other hand there is no compunction about grabbing something right out of the other brother’s hand either.

They are on the same sleep schedule roughly. I understand that is Sanity 101 for parents of multiples. But when one gets tired he rubs his eyes. The other pulls on his ear exactly like his Dad did. Did you know there was a gene for that? When I tucked Monsieur Ear-puller in, he snuggled into his sleep sac and smiled, almost purring, looking very grateful that someone had realized he needed a rest from all that doing. I am waiting for “Can I have my nap now?”; there’s likely a gene for that too.

Not one of them but this is their mantra.

In line with their plan to be 6’4″ by the time they are two, they eat everything in sight. One liked the Brussels sprouts. (Go figure!) The other went along with it but was fairly unimpressed. They both ate their carrots and absolutely devoured the fruit. And when it came to dinner which was a “wonderful” melange of turkey and vegetables, they had their mouths open before the next bite was ready, following brother’s bite with covetous eyes.

One bounces with glee when you pick him up from his nap. Bounce, bounce, kick, kick….here I am, ready for what’s next! Let’s go! By the way what is next? Let’s go! The other bounces to music: bounce, bounce, dance, dance! Sing more, play more music. Don’t stop! Dance more!

Their parents came home before we could abscond with them and for some reason wanted to give them their bottles and cuddle them themselves. Oh wait, it’s okay; I am no longer 30 and I’m exhausted. Nap time for Grandma. I wonder if I could borrow a sleep sac?

You Know You’re a Grandparent When…

Posted on March 5, 2013 by Laurel

The most important news of the day is who has pooped and who hasn’t.

You love it when your grandchild nominates a pinecone as his “something beautiful” in a treasure hunt because you know he learned it from you.

You find that you require an account not only at the Lego Store but at Toys R Us.

You spend hours watching small people learn things. Like how to make miscellaneous sounds and faces and roll over or read their first word. And it isn’t boring; it’s better than Facebook.

You realize you have watched the baby giggling video about 100 times.

Every little thing in the sky and on the ground is a miracle because you are seeing through the eyes of a child.

You start showing random strangers in airports baby photos and expect them to think the babies are as beautiful as you do.

You have absolutely NO idea how to fold up the stroller. (What ever happened to those perfectly easy fold-up ones?) Or fit the car seat into the car. And your fingers just will not undo the buckles.

Your four year old grandchild explains how to …..(fill in the blank)…..(usually something with to do with technology).

You find yourself smiling at things that were frustrating when your own children did them. You know this, too, will pass.

You realize the truth of this Welsh proverb: Perfect love sometimes does not come until the first grandchild.

You express your frustration about something and your grandchild says, “Grandma, we have to talk. It isn’t nice to say stupid.”

Your children realize what you lived when they were small and and start smiling at the memories of things you didn’t know they’d noticed.

You find yourself on a plane flying to “help” when there is absolutely nothing you can do except be there.

You realize that never before have you experienced such unconditional acceptance. You are just fine complete with lumps and warts, grey hair and wrinkles.

There is sand trickling in the back door. There is a sticky handprint on the fridge door and some drawings on the stairs. The back of your car is filled with random sticks and stones and shells and sand buckets. And you just do not care. You might even frame the handprint.

You are secretly glad you will get to read “Goodnight Moon” another 4,000 times.

You realize that love is watching some cartoon character called Something Lightyear or Flash Something-or-other when there is a perfectly good book you could be reading.

You find it really funny instead of excruciating that your 4 year old grandson announced in a loud voice at a mall that they were looking for a place to feed their baby so people wouldn’t be able to see his Mother’s “nickels”.

When your grandson says he’s coming to have a sleepover because of the Lego, not you, it’s okay. You laugh.

Your husband, who hasn’t missed a hockey game in 6 decades, says he’d rather come and help babysit than watch the game.

The Littlest

Posted on January 4, 2013 by Laurel

Do you know someone who has changed your life so profoundly that you can scarcely imagine how life would be without that person? That’s my Littlest. Today is her 31st birthday. She was an absolute joy as a child. Which was quite fortunate as she was indeed littlest.

Littlest and Friend

All her struggles came later as she worked to create her own identity, never compromising her values and finding a path that uniquely hers. She has been instrumental in taking me back to the best parts of my roots, in clarifying what is important in the world and in challenging my adaptability. And she kept me going to the beach.

She is a person of amazing truth and integrity. She is the personification of

Shakespeare: Polonius to his son, Laertes in Hamlet

It is a struggle to live that way and the world and its human denizens tend to let you down. But the Littlest has a strong core of belief in herself and where she is going. Furthermore, she finds her own way. Never conventional, never easy, her path has taken her to a place where I hope she is achieving balance and happiness as well as getting recognition for her many talents. She is embarking on new adventures, teaching at Pacific Rim College, and risks, opening her own business, Linden Lotus Herbal Dispensary and Clinic off Oak Bay Avenue in Victoria and doing retreats with colleagues at Sol Mountain and Mount Washington to help renew people’s souls. Don’t you just know people will benefit from her skills?

We known she has grown because the label “Littlest” comes from her. There was a time when that would have caused a huge storm of protest.

So Happy Birthday! Have a fabulous year Linden Lotus, Linden Blossom or Littlest. Whatever you are called you are loved!

(There is a story behind the Len Gibbs Print above. I saw it on a card rack when Lin was much older and bought a card. I am absolutely sure that is Lin on Cadboro Bay Beach in the days before stalking and privacy. I tried many times over the years to contact him to ask him but he never responded and he is now gone. But if you look at the hands, the physique and the hair it could not be any one else, so thanks Len for the gift of a childhood image. I would still like an original.)

Serendipity

Posted on January 4, 2013 by Laurel

I love this story. My friend is nothing if she is not a survivor. She believes in herself deep inside but has had many ups and downs to contend with, abuse, loss, lots of difficulties. In December she replaced her very old microwave (I envision my faithful but rickety old white Panasonic). She and her kids were so excited by the shiny new stainless steel that she rashly stated that by the New Year she would have an all stainless kitchen. Instead of feeling hopeless she wondered where it would all come from. Four days before New Year’s a client took possession of their new home. They asked her if she knew anyone who would like the appliances, all stainless steel – they were going to do a reno. She said they were very good appliances but they were adamant and asked if she wanted them. So on the last day of the year she met her deadline. Even better she paid it forward by donating the proceeds of selling her old appliances to a deserving charity. She is all about giving back.

I Could Never Have Imagined…

Posted on December 20, 2012 by Laurel

I could never have imagined how the advent of one small child into my life would change things, permanently. I was pretty passionate about everything I tried, passionate about business, passionate about training, passionate about travel, passionate about the mountains and skiing. No one expected me to drop it all in favour of one small child.

I could never have imagined how much time one small child took up. I think I envisioned myself getting up in the morning, dressing the small (and of course perfect) child in something becoming and sitting, sipping tea and reading mind expanding material to the said child so that he or she grew up to be something extraordinary. The reality as you can imagine, was quite different and a bit messier.

I recall saying to a friend who had just had a child that I couldn’t imagine what we would do all day. That friend and his wife had just had a child and they must have laughed uproariously behind my back. Another friend said, quite seriously, that when I got home with the wee bundle to make sure I had the carrots peeled before 10 am every day or there would be no dinner. I didn’t believe her!

The day the earth-shaking child chose to make her entrance was cold and snowy. I had marked my final papers the day before and gone for lunch with my colleagues, done for the term. I anticipated several restful days even though the next day was my due date. Everyone said first children were always late so I was going to have a nice relaxing time before Christmas and then a blissful maternity leave. Which at that time was 15 weeks. What would I do with all that time?

I had not met this child yet and was to learn that she was, from conception, organized and on time. It was Friday night. My husband played hockey on Friday night so off he went. I settled in to be cozy. I went to sleep but not for long. Things were about to start becoming uncomfortable.

When my husband came home from hockey he was upset. There was a police stand-off drama happening that night at a house in SouthEast Calgary with a guy holed up in a house with weapons. My husband is an ex-city police officer and several of his friends were involved. One of his friends suffered a serious head injury that night from a gunshot wound. We always remember the anniversary of that event.

In the meantime life intervened and we went to the hospital. Things were proceeding very slowly so he went home to sleep. Without going into boring detail it was late the following afternoon before change came into my life. While I remember thinking, “Well, I will never do this again.”, I was in for the surprise of my life. What was about to happen to me resulted in not one small child, but 4, and my life being co-opted and enriched in a way that was totally unexpected.

At 4:31 p.m. on December 21st, a child was born. She looked at me with my eyes. Then the whole world shifted.

The stocking they brought her to me in on Christmas day 1974. Yes, I’m a packrat.

Post script:

Time has passed since I originally wrote this post in response to a prompt. That event thirty-eight years ago tomorrow made a huge difference to my life, changing it entirely. The three other children who subsequently chose to light up my life were no less momentous but perhaps not as surprising. Now there are 4 grandchildren each of whom we’ve been privileged to meet in the early hours of their lives. I can’t imagine what it would have been like without any of them. I am so lucky.

The caption says it all.

The Real Canada

Posted on June 7, 2012 by Laurel

The Real Canada is in the diversity of its places and its people. It is not ice and snow and myths about snowshoes and mosquitoes, although those are in it. It is not just about the major urban centres or the social elite. Nor our exported or retained celebrities. Those too are part and parcel of our country but not the real thing. It is the people in all the cities and the small and middle sized towns that support one another in adversity and bad weather. It is farmers and fishermen and fire fighters and folk singers; it is parents and grandparents and kids and dogs. It is on the outdoor rinks and frozen lakes in the Maritimes, on the prairies, in the Rockies and in Quebec and Ontario where kids and adults gather to play the Canadian game, whether they are good at it or not. It’s pond hockey and street hockey. It’s northern lights and southern lakes.It’s the accent of Newfoundland. It’s the Celtic music of the Maritimes and the songs of the western cowboys. It’s the accent of Quebec which makes me glad my grandchildren will be able to speak more than one language. It’s the railroad running from sea to shining sea. It’s the highway running from Victoria, B.C. all the way to St. John’s, Newfoundland. It is the people who grow the real food, not in labs or on factory farms with chickens in cages or pigs in small pens, but in beloved fields under the rising sun where they run the soil through their hands hoping for a better tomorrow for themselves and their children. It is the beauty of the lakes and streams and mountains and oceans. It is the wild places where the moose and bear and wolves still roam. It is a myriad of rocks and trees and alpine flowers. It is people who save seeds and grow what their grandmothers grew. It is people who care about nature and peace. And technology that allows us to share all these things with others. It is the ocean that smells of life, the glacier that smells of eternity and the wild rose that smells of tomorrow. It is the scent of ripening grain, the taste of a tomato just picked from the vine and the aroma of a rainbow trout freshly cooked beside an unspoiled stream. It is people whose ancestry includes so many different nations that we could only be Canadian. One picture cannot do Canada justice. Nor can one person’s view. Tell me about your Real Canada.

Change-up

Posted on June 1, 2012 by Laurel

Small hands, sweet smelling from the bath,

Gently patting my face

Small fingers touching

Small soft voice whispers in my ear, “I love you.”

The touch of small sweet lips on my cheek.
Then in an instant

Small weight settling to sleep in my arms,

Eyelashes curling in sleep,

Moving in rhythm with your dreams.

An interlude of peace and then awake,

In case I’d missed that you were still,
Above all else

A small boy.

You bring a gift

A slug, with grass and sticks and water in a plastic cup

You leave and catch a plane

While he, forgotten, leaves a trail of slime across the table.

Trust Your Gut: Your Kids are Worth A Million Complications

Posted on February 21, 2012 by Laurel

This morning’s paper says that a notorious local pedophile has managed to get off his 5 year jail sentence. It makes me sick. He has ruined lives. It was bad enough that he only got 5 years. Nothing could make up for the damage that he has done. He was a hockey coach, coaching young boys. The association, the kids and their parents trusted that he was doing it out of a spirit of community service or a love of the game. He wasn’t.

So this is a letter to my son: I want you to know that you are one of the most important things in my world. Now that you are about to have kids of your own you need to remember to slow down and listen to your instincts about situations your kids are in. You were a boy who loved hockey, just like you do now. You probably weren’t aware at the time why you suddenly switched minor hockey associations as an atom player. It was that very man. That man gave me the creeps. He was pleasant and very much involved in the association of the day. He wasn’t a real hockey guy but he had taken all the coaching clinics and he was going to be your coach. There was nothing specific that I could report. It is problematic to make unfounded accusations of a serious nature. But I just could not let you play on a team that he coached. Your Dad agreed. No doubt his ex-cop antennae were quivering too. So you moved. And you were fine but some of the ones left behind were not. Sometimes a road not taken is a good thing but I’ve always wondered if we could have done something to prevent lives being ruined.

I got some withering scorn and a bit of ostracizing but I am so glad. Individuals can weather many storms but it is very hard to fix a broken life. I like to think that today’s kids won’t have experiences like that but that is likely naïve. So listen to your gut feelings. If something is nagging at you, listen. Nothing is worth more than your kids, nothing at all, ever.

Fleeting Memories

Posted on January 19, 2012 by Laurel

A post by a friend of this same daughter took me back to this crystallized moment: Driving through the winter rain to Kindergarten with my oldest daughter and her friend. The friend knew we were expecting a new baby but we had not seen her family over the Christmas holiday as we had gone to Maui. Due to many factors I lost the baby. Miscarried. In Maui.

They are belted in the back seat and we are making our way to the local school. The friend is told we “lost” our baby in Maui. Horrified, she literally screams, “Aren’t you going to try and find her?”. I can still feel the leather of the steering wheel and the feeling that I had. I had to pull over and wipe the tears and have a bit of recovery as I tried to find the words to explain to a 5 year old what losing a baby meant. I always wondered if my daughter and her little brother thought the same thing, that we had misplaced the baby and not looked for her. And what did they tell the Kindergarten class?

Until then I had not understood the trauma of miscarriage. It wasn’t until I attended a candlelight ceremony years and years later with people who had lost a child or miscarried that I was able to put it to rest. They understood the aching emptiness.

Grandma, Can We Have a Mouth Story?

Posted on January 17, 2012 by Laurel

I don’t know where he got the term but it’s perfect. He is, after all, the son of the quintessential word woman. Have you already figured it out? It’s a story that originates in Grandma’s mouth (or maybe some region behind). It is not a “real” story; it is not a “book” story. It requires imagination and visualization, so it is told slowly to allow adequate time. It always ends well so no nightmares are generated. It also allows us to turn out the light and cuddle in the almost dark so that usually halfway through the first mouth story he subsides into deep breathing and total relaxation. Sometimes it’s the second and the joy is prolonged. Occasionally he is not ready to sleep and we have to set a limit: one more and then he has to do his sleep breathing and close his eyes. Cuddles are allowed.

So we have had the caterpillar story, the Bob and Tom digger story, the giraffe
who couldn’t reach. We’ve had Clifford, the big green dog (yes, green, mustn’t limit imagination). Quests and treks and adventures; animals and small boys, trucks and diggers. Sometimes we don’t even read books first. I love it! At first it was challenging but now some mysterious process has totted up an internal gristmill that spills out a story at need. Some of them are really good. And of course some are not. I am as capable as the next person of being boring. But he doesn’t seem to care.

My grandson is going on four so as you can imagine there is an ongoing discussion about potty mouth. One of my favourite mouth stories was the one about “Stinky.” I’ll leave that to your imagination but remember the rules, no one gets hurt and there is a good if not happy ending.

Time and Chance

Laurel Hounslow | Turning points in life, musings on human behaviour and most of all the effect of time & chance.

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