Expectations and Trips To The River

It was a gorgeous Saturday in early May.  The weather was predicted to be very summer like and everyone was gearing up for an entirely fantastic weekend.  

With Kevin being away, I had a morning of school in the city while a babysitter stayed with the girls.  On the drive home from school, I could not wait to get home. 

I knew exactly what I wanted to do.  I wanted to take my girls to the river.  I wanted to just sit and watch them play in nature's playground.   I wanted to walk around and explore with them.  I wanted to relax with my girls and connect with them, and only them.  This is what I expected for our afternoon, and really, why wouldn't it happen?  My girls love it at the river!  

On the drive home from school I called home to quickly get the the girls excited about my plans.  I spoke to Kamille first.  I said something like, "Honey, I am so excited!  Get your bathing suit ready because when I come home we are going to the beach at the river!"  Unfortunately, I was met with the most deflating response, "I don't want to go to the beach!"  

What?  Um, no! 

I was caught off guard.  "Ok, well, lets think of somewhere we can go to enjoy the nice weather.  Where would you like to go?"  I asked.  

All she could tell me was that she wanted to stay home and play outside.  

Deep breath.  

Now don't get me wrong.  There is positively nothing wrong with doing this.  In fact, I think we likely have one of the best neighbourhoods to do just that, and no doubt there would be parents lining the streets sitting in lawn chairs and throwing back drinks, but really on this day, and after a few crappy days of solo-parenting I just wanted to reconnect with my girls, alone.  

I asked to speak to Karis.  Surely I would have one of the two on my team.  Karis, maybe.  She seemed indifferent and was more interested in getting back to playing with her friends.   

Well crap.  

I figured I'd give them some time to think about this.   Once I got home, I paid the babysitter and gathered my girls to discuss my great plan.  Still, no great response.  Come on girls!!! 

Before I knew it, I was bribing them with popsicles and chips, but still no takers.  They now demanded the popsicles and chips for playing out on our front lawn.  

I was slowly losing this battle.  Karis was still more on my side, but at 3 years old, she wasn't that skilled in teaming up with me to convince her sister that the beach is where we should go.  

Its seemed like only minutes into the debate that I lost it.  

Full. Mommy. Temper. Tantrum.  

No need to discuss the details (but you could probably ask my neighbours all about it because the windows were open, of course.  Shit!).   It was ugly.  I mean it.  Like, I lost it and turned into a really pissed off 13 year old yelling at her parents or something.  Saying nasty things to hopefully inspire a change of her mind.  

It was no parenting strategy that I have ever subscribed to, but it was flowing from me like an erupting volcano.  

Expectations not being met.  That's what it was.  I was pissed off and I wanted to blame my girl for having an opinion or her own ideas.   

I needed a break to collect myself.  I closed myself in in my closet and let the rest of my tantrum seep out of me.  Kamille opened the door and had a few choice words for me - fair enough - but I was still feeling like my buttons were pressed and I wasn't sure what to do so I demanded her to leave me in my closet so I could compose myself.  In this moment Kamille positively hated me, I am sure.  She was so mad herself and we were toxic together.  

I debated with myself over and over as to why this was important to me and if we should just stay home.  Why not stay home?  After all, the girls were having fun.  But it wasn't what I wanted.  And why shouldn't I, as the parent, be able to call some shots?  I know that I wanted 1:1 time with my girls and that's not a bad thing.  The thing is that I knew Kamille would love the beach when we got there.  

I knew it with 100% of me.  

After emerging from the closet with a decision as to what I was going to do, I got the girls together.  I told them that we were going to the beach.  That I would pack everything myself, including their own bodies and we would go to the beach.  I threw in the added bonus of a stop for popsicles and a bag of chips.  I left little room for negotiation because we had already tried this and it hadn't worked.    This is what we were doing.  And if it all turned sideways while we were there, then I promised that we could come back home.  

Things took another turn of disappointment before they got better.  Kamille expressed her upset with me, but somewhere between then and leaving in the care we had hugged it out.   I just promised her that Mommy makes good decisions about fun things to do and she would just have to trust me.  

And eventually, we all piled into the car with beach toys, towels, sunscreen and smiles.  

And I was right.
They, especially Kamille, were very happy to be there.

I can't recall what she said exactly, but it was something along the lines of "Mom, I forgot how much I loved it out here!"  

we picked up a box of popsicles on the way

What's not to love on a day like this?
Space to breathe, connect and appreciate.
I turned out to be exactly what I hoped for.  

And maybe the experience of this day will help to keep a lasting memory of how much they love this magical place we visit.

I got my chance to sit back and watch them happily play while I indulged in a little treat.

An amazing view...

...and happy girls,

because they got chips too!

There was a point during our afternoon where I suggested that we could leave, but this one was now too busy for that nonsense!

So we opted to go exploring for heart shaped rocks and other things that may have been washed up or trapped in the rocks.

This is what I was expecting for this afternoon.....

smiles

exploring

The stuff that tops me up after a week of solo parenting.  Its the connection I was hoping for.

This little Miss and I are bound to have our struggles.  They are already here and I can't stand the big nasty arguments that we can find ourselves tangled in.  Just the other day she said to me, "Who cares about you! Your just a dirty old stupid rat!"  Ouch. 

And it bothers me to see her so angry with me...

...I do know that I am part of contributing to that anger.

And I use these lessons to learn better ways of communicating with her.
To take notice of how I can change the way I relate to her.

But I also know that a change of scenery is so good for reconnecting, forgiving, and moving forward.

xo

I love my connection with this little one.  We seem to ride out the bumps fairly well and I can only hope that with practice in maintaining our connections, we'll ride out the bigger bumps that seem inevitable in our future.

We ended our afternoon at the beach with a giggle over the riddles we discovered on our popsicle sticks!

I just love these two girls.  

Expectations and Fairy Gardens

It was some time last year during a trip to one of our local garden centres that I was introduced to the idea of a Fairy Garden.  These fairy gardens were intricate and gorgeous - a display of miniature houses and outdoor living, perfect for the size of a fairy.  I was intrigued.

Later in October when my girls and I returned for pumpkins, I came across more fairy gardens.  The trend was catching and now these gardens were themed for fall and halloween.  Wow.  They were so neat to look at.  

I thought to myself that it would be a fun thing to do when I had lots of money to spend on the hobby.  ; )  In February when my mom was here we purchased a few Fairy Garden items for my niece who was turing 7 years old.  I was excited for Rachel and I look forward to seeing the garden that she creates with the little gourd shaped house, slide, chair, watering can and bird feeder accessories that we had sent her.  

I figured there was a way I could do this.  Maybe I could create a frugal fairy garden.  And as soon as I thought frugal, it all started to come together.  A trip to Michaels yielded us $1.50 houses and I knew that a walk through our big backyard would allow us to collect more items that my glue gun could magically transform!  

It was a gorgeous early April afternoon.  

There were signs of spring everywhere and the sun was warm.  

I had great expectations for this walk with my girls.  And when there are expectations, my ability to negotiate, and infuse excitement like a damn high school pep rally go into overdrive.  Mama wants to do this!

She wanted to ride in the wagon.  Check.

She wanted to bring her fairy.  Check.  And by the way Karis, great idea!  Rah! Rah!

Oh, and you too?  Loooovely!  You just bring her right along now!  

Big sister wanted to pull.  Check.  All the better to photograph you, my loves!

A smile.  Alright, we're off to a gooooooooood start!  Lets keep this going girls!  

And there we went.  Off to collect the pieces for our fairy garden!

While little sister basked in the warmth of the sun,

Big sister and I were happily selecting items and discusing all the ideas that were running through our heads!
Could we dye rocks blue and make it into a pond?  Ooffff cooourse we can!  What a great idea Kamille!

Just look at those happy fairy garden collectors!  

What's that girls?  You say you want to have a love fest and you want me to photograph you?  Well, um?......BRING IT!

They just went on and on. Collecting, sharing with each other, sharing with me, being excited about any ideas that we came up with......

a canoe for her fairy

a cape for her fairy

 It was awesome to watch it all happen.

I think it would be fair to say that my expectations of making a fairy garden with my girls were being met and I was super excited to be this creative and crafty with them.

Just look at all the treasures we have for this creative project!

It was easy to convince them to move on to the next step right after we got in that day.  With a change into our paint-worthy rags, the girls got straight to painting their fairy houses and I got creative with my glue gun.

And this is where things slllooooooowwwww down.  After this day, the momentum wore off some.  We had stashed our collection under the front deck and allowed our houses to dry before we Modge Podge them.  But one day turned into two weeks and there was no movement on my big plans for a fairy garden.

By Easter weekend, the Easter Bunny had left a couple flat woodchip fairies that begged to be painted or coloured.  Surely that Bunny was assuming this might inspire creative energy for this project, but today they are still bare....

My house (with the red roof) is fully painted brown with white spots.  It looks awesome!  I also created a twig table to go along with my two chairs.

....and everything is still outside and not in a fairy garden-like setting.

Hmmmm....such deflated expectations.

I know there have been days when I would try to get the girls excited about making our fairy garden, and I would almost be angry that we hadn't done this, completed it.  But who cares?  Why must we do this?

I've started to ask myself how much my expectations of having a complete fairy garden this year deserve of my time and attention.  Why get frustrated with my girls when they say they would rather do something different?  Why am I just not doing it on my own?

Somewhere in the past couple weeks I have found a way to let go of this expectation.  I have let go of the idea that I am not seeing it through to the end or that I let my kids lose interest, or that I am some failure for not having this envisioned fairy garden of mine come to life.

When really, what I did have was an incredible afternoon of connecting with my girls while they were excited about their idea of what a fairy garden was.  They weren't working with my vision, they were living in the present moment of that gorgeous April afternoon.  They are 6 and 3 years old!  Of course I can't expect them to envision such a huge task, as it was in my head.   They had all their creativity flowing in the moment of that day and I got to witness, and photograph it.

Who knows if we will ever get around to creating a magical fairy garden.  All the stuff is there and its is still early in the season.  I think it would be fun to do with my girls, but I am no longer going to hold on to the expectation of this.  

It will happen, if it happens.
Today I am grateful for the time spent with my girls that afternoon as we explored nature and used our creative minds together.