Flakes

I would love to be clever today. I have no quirky stories, no anecdotes. I'm not going to be witty or funny or retrospective in any way. I have not been sleeping well, and were it not for the fact that I work in a, scratch that, THE medical centre I would still not be sleeping well. But I know when my doctor has an opening, and I can pretty much walk into his office and request to be medicated. Which I did. And I am.

I'm also not able to upload pictures for some reason. Grrr.

The big news of this week, besides Xander learning the word "serious" (I'm serious) is that we had our first real snowfall. Tuesday around 11:00 we were in a meeting learning all sorts of new fun stuff. When the bigwig who was visiting asked us if we had any questions or comments, the pharmacist piped up with "it's snowing! Dave won the pool!!". Now, I don't think that's what our visiting bigwig had in mind, and I certainly don't think she expected that topic to consume five minutes of our meeting. The pool was a snow pool, in which each person put in five or ten bucks and said what day they thought it was going to snow. Now, it flurried a few weeks ago, but apparently the parameters were that it had to really snow and stick. And stick it did. It's still here, plus a few more centimetres that came yesterday. It is quite something to sit at your desk and watch the snow drift down all day. It sort of makes working a bit more bearable, and even these wizened snow professionals that have survived years and years of dark, bitterly cold winters wax quite eloquently when the heavens first open and blanket our town in white.

Needless to say, my first thought was of my children. More specifically, of their snow gear. Was it warm enough, did their boots have enough traction, were their fingers going to fall off because I'd cheaped out and bought their mittens at Wal-Mart. Those kinds of thoughts. Xander wasn't quite sure what to think of the stuff, and after about five minutes he'd had quite enough and was ready to come inside and watch The Incredibles for the fourth time that day. Felicity, on the other hand, just can't believe her good fortune. Snow! All the time! The first day it snowed she was so excited we had to beg her to stop licking it off of the rocks in our driveway. When we head down the stairs of our porch to the car in the morning, she licks it off the hand rail. It's made out of wood, so although she might get splinters in her tongue, at least we won't have to spend 20 minutes trying to get it unstuck. This is my daughter, red-cheeked, a mouth full of snow, and so excited she can't wait to get out there and do it all over again.

The other big news this week is that it was my sister's birthday. There is so much I could say about my sister Sarah, but if I start I'll be cleaning tears and snot off my keyboard for weeks, so I'll just say this: I would not be who I am were it not for Sarah. Not the wife I am, and especially not the mother I am. I would not have nearly the confidence and determination I have had she not led by her incredible example. In my mind we all live down the street from each other still, and go to each other's houses for coffee on Saturday mornings while our kids play in the backyard. I don't know if we'll ever have that moment, but I'm hoping when we get to heaven God puts our mansions all side by side. I miss you Sarah, and I love you.

Weekend Update

Well, it's another beautiful day in Dease Lake. We had about two hours of gorgeous snow that mostly resulted in mush on the ground, but for those hours our house was filled with excitement and a sense of what's to come. After surprising my mom with a visit to Chilliwack that proved my skills in lying to my mother and then causing her to burst into tears still more than adequate, I was exhausted. I came back from that amazing and restful visit to a cold house and two children desperately in need of their father. When I'm away from them, they miss me, but when David's away, they turn into freaker-outers because he is this family's compass. Our true north. Sounds cheesy, but it's a pretty accurate description, and the only one that explains how lost we all are in his absence.

I also started working this Thursday, which was honestly not something I was looking forward to. I love being home with my children, and especially since Felicity started school I have so enjoyed my mornings with Xander. That kid is freakin' hilarious, and not nearly as cranky as he gets when Felicity, his self-appointed "other mommy", is around. However, I promised I would work when we lived here because we have free, trustworthy childcare in the form of David's mom. Truthfully, she's much better at it than I am because she's not their mom, so they do crafts and eat properly and come home begging to go back. The other reason I promised to work is because you can get paid a ridiculous amount of money to do pretty much anything in this town. Gotta love Northern life. So now I'm the "new girl" at the clinic. People are so used to knowing who's answering the phones here, so the first day I got a lot of confused people trying to figure out who the heck I was. It was kind of fun. But soon they'll all know me, and when they only give me their first names and expect me to know exactly who they are and which doctor they see I'll actually be able to fulfill their expectations. Good times.

Okay, back to the snow. We woke up to a slight dusting of it on Friday morning, and being the newbie that I am I had the kids totally geared up. Snowsuits, boots, mittens, toques, the works. The funniest part is that even though they knew we had all this equipment, they'd never actually worn it all together, so they kept looking at me like I'd lost my mind. Like, "Mom, we don't actually wear this stuff, we just play with it. Sheesh". I was also freaked out I'd be late to work, so my hands wouldn't stop shaking long enough for me to properly zip and tie and button everything up so it actually took me longer than if I'd been able to settle down. I was late.

We'd heard last night that we were going to wake up to 10 cms of snow, so I was a little disappointed when there was none this morning. But by the time we actually got out of bed and ventured out into the rest of the house, it had started to snow and continued to do so until almost noon. It was gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous. We ate brunch and watched it fall through the trees and onto our deck. It even made our barbecue look pretty. And all the things I had pictured about living here, all the things I had seen in my mind's eye and hoped for were revived. My children playing in the snow, the Christmas tree in the corner of the living room, the reflection of the moon on the blanket of white...all things I have been wishing to see. Who knows, someday I might even see all of this as home.