I took the kids on a walking tour of downtown Ottawa this week to look at statues and other outdoor art, with my friend Tudor and her two boys. Here in Ottawa you can’t really turn around without falling over another statue or memorial or monument, and there are some that are really interesting, and I really, really wanted to check them all out. In fact, I wish I could have gone to ALL of them, like literally every single one in the city, but in the end I had to try to restrict myself to a reasonable downtown area. And even then, it wasn’t all that reasonable as we were walking around for FOUR hours and enthusiasm, I’m sure you can imagine, waned a bit at the end there.

But overall I had a good time and although I’m not sure this will be THE event of the summer, I think the kids liked it okay, and learned quite a bit about Ottawa and history and what they would and would not consider art, so that’s definitely a summertime win. Plus, they now have a few favourites so next time we are downtown, we can be sure to revisit the best ones and spend more time there and hopefully make a lasting happy memory.

I wanted it to be a little interactive for the kids so I set up our walking tour like an Amazing Race – I had a pile of clues and I gave the kids them one at a time to lead them to the next statue. Each kid also had a map of downtown that they could mark things on, or use to trace their route. I’d say this approach had mixed success. Since we had a variety of ages, I made the clues really simple (along the lines of, “Go north a block, and look for some giant stones”) and the older boys (aged 13, 12, and 11) found that got pretty boring after a while, although the level of clues was perfect for my almost-8-year-old, so not sure I could have found clues that would work for the whole group anyway.

I’d say, if I were to do it again, I’d revamp it and do one of the following instead:

For an older tween or teen crowd, I’d reduce the number of statues, and make the clues way harder – number puzzles or word scrambles or history clues that require lookup on a smartphone.

Or, also for an older crowd, keep the simple clues but rather than handing them out one by one, give them the whole list of clues, divide them into teams, and make it into a race.

For younger kids, instead of clues, maybe lead them on the walking tour and give them a scavenger hunt list – say they need to watch out for a “bronze feather” or a “statue made of wood” or “someone wearing a three-pointed hat” or things like that. In fact, I think this is my favourite idea.

Or, also for younger kids, go totally laid back and just take them to a specific area – city hall, or Major’s Hill Park, or Parliament Hill – and have them wander freely and find what they are going to find; possibly gently guide them to a few hidden statues of particular interest.

I’ll leave those ideas as an exercise to the reader.

We ended the tour with ice cream in the market and let me say that the promise of ice cream, as well as snacks and pop and candy along the way, went a LONG way to making this event a success. Things to pack, in addition to sugar (or pocket money to purchase sugar along the way): sunscreen, hats, camera, lots of water, clipboards (OMG, there was SO MUCH love for the dollar store clipboards I brought); possibly a compass for the directionally challenged.

Below you’ll find links to the stuff I used, including the list of statues we went to, maps used, and clue sheets, if they can be of use to you. There are 37 statues on the main list, with a few bonus ones you can go see if you’re up for some side trips, but as I mentioned above it took us almost 4 hours to do this walk, which is almost 7 km long, including breaks for rests/snacks/drinks and the end walk back to the car. For smaller kids I would definitely recommend shortening this up. Either you can have a look at the full list and make your own hit list, or I would recommend just focusing on some or all of these that were favourites of my own kids:

• #3 – The Living Room, City Hall
• #7 – Ottawa Firefighters Memorial, City Hall
• #11 – Kwakiutl Totem, Confederation Park
• #12 – Animals In War/Boer War Memorial, Confederation Park
• #13 – Oscar Peterson outside the NAC
• #19 – Grizzly Bear (“Territorial Prerogative”) on Sparks Street
• #22 – Famous Five on Parliament Hill
• #23 – Lafontaine and Baldwin Statue – Whispering Wall, Parliament Hill
• #27 – Ruins of Colonel By’s home, Major’s Hill Park
• #28 – Anishinabe Scout, Major’s Hill Park
• #31 – Maman, National Gallery
• #32 – Majestic (Lampposts from Hurricane Katrina), National Gallery
• #33 – One Hundred Foot Line, National Gallery
• #37 – Dancing Bear, Jeanne D’Arc Court in the Market

Here’s a link to my full document.

Here’s a link to just the “clues” if you want to print them out for the kids to use.

Here’s a link to my Google Map that lays out the whole route, and marks the exact location of each statue.

Just let me know if you have any questions – I’d be happy to chat about it!

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Oh my GOD, you GUYS. IT WORKED. I went to see Taylor Swift last night, in some sort of crazy stars-aligning miracle situation. I apologize in advance for the amount of all-caps in this post but I still just CANNOT get over it – my half-cocked plan of action actually WORKED. Crazy!

I spent all day Saturday, Sunday, and Monday on Kijiji, compulsively reloading the Taylor Swift search, looking for people posting tickets. By Monday new postings were going up at least every five minutes, either people with tickets to sell, or people looking for tickets. The going asking rate was still around $200 a ticket, and the going “willing to pay” price for people looking was around $100 a ticket, and actually things started to get kind of bitter on there as a few “looking” people started to bitch about how the “selling” people should get off their high horses and should be grateful to get something rather than nothing, while the sellers started to post snidely that NO LOWBALLERS were welcome, and eep. I emailed about 100 people letting them know I’d take a ticket (or two, my friend LuckySevens was willing to join me) off their hands for (admittedly) lowball prices but almost no one even bothered to write back.

So…Monday night rolls around. Here I also have to mention that I’d been really sick all weekend, like so sick I actually spent Sunday lying on the couch resting, which is nearly impossible for me as I have an overwhelming need to be busy at all times. But my head was pounding and I couldn’t eat anything because my throat was so sore I couldn’t swallow. It would have been so easy to just bail but Sir Monkeypants was AWESOME, he was all, “It’s an opportunity!” and “She might not be back for a while!” and “Do something crazy while you still can!”

So, having not eaten anything but yogurt for three days, I took all the Tylenol allowed by law and made myself a little sign in Word that said “SINGLE TICKET WANTED.” Then I drove down to the Canadian Tire Centre and (GULP) paid $15 for parking and figured I was committed now. I headed over with my little sign and hoped for the best.

There was a fairly big crowd milling around outside because there were stands set up where you could have your picture taken with Taylor Swift cutouts and souvenir stands and stuff, so I held my little sign and started walking around. I felt like an IDIOT, everyone staring at me, GAH. I figured I’d last maybe five minutes tops. A guy pulled me aside and pointed me in the direction of a scalper in a red hat – said scalper had a few single tickets but he wanted at least $250 for them, so I passed. I made one more circuit with my sign, ready to pack it in.

And then, A MIRACLE. A lady came over to me and said, “Oh, you need a ticket? We have an extra,” and then she GAVE IT TO ME. HERE YOU GO, WEIRD LADY. COME SIT NEXT TO ME. FOR FREE.

OH. MY. GOD. Pretty much my ideal plan, RIGHT THERE.

I mean, what are the chances of that actually happening? Like, nil, right? It was a crazy, stupid plan, right? And then IT TOTALLY WORKED.

This reminds me of a side anecdote about my Uncle Mark, who, at age 8, was caught smoking with his buddy Rob by his mother, my Nana. The hilarious part of this story is that Mark and Rob’s plan for trying smoking did not involve stealing cigarettes, but rather, sitting at the side of the road and waiting for a passing driver who was nearly done his cigarette to throw it out the window onto the road, and then they’d pick it up and smoke the last bit. And of course you would think, great plan boys, that is NEVER going to happen, and then that is EXACTLY what did happen not five minutes after they sat on the curb. The world is funny sometimes.

So, I rushed inside and the ticket was good, and I peed and ran to my seat where my new best friend was already sitting (Nicole T. of Manor Park, you are THE BOMB). She was there with her 15-year-old daughter and daughter’s friend, and there was a third friend who was unable to make it last minute, and they couldn’t find anyone else to take the ticket, so it was just available. I like to think it was fate.

And, GUYS, the ticket was also AWESOME. 300 level but really central AND I got to sit on an aisle which meant I had a great unobstructed view at all times.

Audience for Taylor Swift: 13 000 girls and women, about 500 men. But the girls were so cute! Many had dressed up or wore handmade concert t-shirts or had signs. Nicole’s daughter and friend had matching outfits of white tutus and sparkles and feather boas that they had made themselves, and they were so adorable. Some had even made magical glowing signs, like this one:

The opening act was Vance Joy and he was just adorable and I like his song Riptide. Still couldn’t believe I was actually there.

And THEN, OMG TAYLOR SWIFT.

She did not disappoint. Over two hours of solid music and she was onstage all the time unless she was quickly changing costumes. And she chatted up the crowd too, a combination of a) Ottawa is awesome! and b) you are all my personal friends and c) don’t let other people’s opinions weigh you down, because you are awesome!. I’m sure she says all the same things at every concert but it felt very sincere and heartfelt and honest and OMG I LOVE TAYLOR SWIFT.

(She totally loves me too. She said so.)

After the show I thanked Nicole again profusely because she is seriously, the greatest human on the planet next to TAYLOR FREAKING SWIFT, and then I dashed out – as a single you can make it out to the parking lot pretty quickly and I think I was the first one out of there, back home 15 minutes after the concert ended to nurse my ringing ears and take some more Tylenol. Today: aiming for solid food for the first time in days and sharing my pics with the girls. AWESOME.

I am a singer. I sing in the car, in the shower, when I’m making dinner. I am really not a good singer, not at all. But at least three quarters of my mental capacity is taken up with song lyrics – I can’t stop it, they just get in there like a virus – and so I figure I better put the lyric library to good use. Plus, it makes me happy.

Today we were out at the War Museum and on the way there, Little Miss Sunshine was belting out Taylor Swift’s “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” at top volume and it was lucky she was in the back seat and couldn’t see my face, because then I’d have to explain the huge grin. It’s not that I thought she was funny, it was just SO adorable. The passion involved in the belting – oh honey, I have been there. I had a moment when I thought of all the times I had sung in the car growing up, and I often wondered if I bugged my mother (my sisters made it clear that YES, IT BUGS). Maybe it will come around to bothering me someday but for now, I just had a swell of the sweetness of parenthood, the good stuff when your kid is just like you in the best possible way. Well, I think it’s the best possible way, at least. Next up: tap dancing in grocery store lines!

Speaking of Tay-Tay, she is coming to town on Monday, playing at the Canadian Tire Centre which is like, five minutes from my house. I really, really regret not getting tickets. I was considering taking the girls and then backed out because it would be too late of a night for them, but now that the date is looming I must admit that I, personally, really want to go. Sir Monkeypants bought me her album for Mother’s Day and I am properly embarrassed at my extreme soccer mom-ness, but I do love it, and I bet it’s an awesome show, and I wish I were going.

So I had a peek at Kijiji a couple of days ago (because it’s sold out) and there are like, 100 people on there selling off their tickets, which is hopeful, but they all want like $300 a ticket, which is not quite as hopeful. So I am thinking, if there are so many people with extra tickets, how about on Monday I just go over there at like, 8 p.m., with a sign around my neck that says “SINGLE TICKET WANTED” and see what happens? I mean, I’m not going to pay scalper prices, but I figure if I wait until the show actually starts, I could probably snap up a ticket at a reasonable price and get inside in time to catch Shake It Off.

Maybe I’ll even get really lucky and someone will be there with a group and someone from their group didn’t show and they’ll let me have the extra ticket for $20. Maybe I won’t get anything and all it will cost me is an evening of lurking about and $10 in parking money.

All in all it seems kind of badass and it seems to me that at my age, I could use a little more badass in my life. Hang in there, Taylor, I’m coming!

I do not understand how it is that all three of my children are incapable of sleeping with a sheet.

And by that, I don’t mean that they kick off their blankets and sleep in the open air, which might make sense – too hot maybe, or tossing and turning.

No, I mean that every night I tuck them in, heads on the pillow, a sheet and a comforter pulled up to their chin. And then, by morning, there is a balled up sheet at the bottom of the bed, while the comforter remains pulled up.

So somehow, they are kicking the sheet alone down to the bottom of the bed, while keeping the blanket. I cannot imagine the kind of sleep gymnastics that must be required to make this happen. The contortion required. And if one kid did it, I’d think, okay, they sleep weird, but all three do it, like it’s some kind of genetic quirk that Sir Monkeypants and I have cursed upon all our descendents.

I used to think they’d figure it out eventually, but the Captain is now twelve and still the sheet bunching is going on, so lately I’ve started a solid campaign to teach the three of them what a sheet is for, and why I would like them to use one, and how to use one. Repeat: I am teaching my children HOW TO USE A SHEET.

When the kids were little, my friend Izabela once commented on how the most surprising thing about parenthood is the way you have to teach them every little thing, and even stuff that you’d think would be blatantly obvious, or easily picked up by imitation, or just native to the human race, turns out to be taught. She was so right. “Hey kids – here’s how your bed works. Next week we’ll talk about how to sit in chairs without squirming around or tilting them so far you fall over, and how to work a washcloth.”

SIGH.

I’ve been watching Pushing Daisies with the older two kids. I admit it: I forced them into it. Pushing Daisies is, like, my nirvana of TV shows, considering it features everything I love about life, the universe, and everything, including:

• Pie
• Musical numbers
• Clever puns and witty banter
• 50s fashions (gloves! hats! pumps dyed to match the dress!)
• Magical realism
• Bright colours
• Murder mysteries
• Omniscient narration
• Gentle, quiet romance involving a lot of longing looks and flirty comments

All this, plus synchronized swimming, a vast variety of cheeses, eye patches, AND Ellen Greene. SWOON.

I’m happy to report the kids are properly sucked in. The Captain (age: 12 and a bit) thinks it’s silly but just loves it. Gal Smiley (age: nearly 11) was a little freaked out by the dead bodies at first, and still does sometimes find it scary, but won’t hear of us watching it without her. Isn’t it just the best part of parenting, when you can take something you love love love, and show it to your kids, and they’re young enough to love it too, instead of sneering about how everything you touch is LAME and GOD MOM, LEAVE ME ALONE?

These are the golden years, for sure.

Pushing Daisies, I admit, has been a bit of a stalling tactic because I told Gal Smiley she can watch Glee with me when she turns 11, and she is literally counting down the days to her birthday, when she plans on kicking off Episode 1 on Netflix and watching non-stop until her eyes bleed. I’m not sure she and I are ready for the teen years quite yet, but there’s massive peer pressure (“EVERYONE at school has seen it, MOM!”) and she’s already spent hours and hours watching the videos of the musical numbers online so I think the slippery slope has been slipped. It’s happening, starting September 21, so a delivery of hard liquor on that day would be appreciated.

So until the Glee thing starts up, I was looking for some other show to watch with them, and the others on my hit list – Buffy, Veronica Mars, and Serenity – are definitely for an older audience. What beloved series would you show to your kids, or have shown to your kids, given the chance?

I find, as I get older, that I get more and more sentimental about things. It runs in the family – my grandfather was well known for getting teary-eyed at every emotional moment, and several of his grandchildren are the same way. Today is the last day of school and I’m a little misty, mostly because next year the Captain will be in grade seven (SEVEN!) and Gal Smiley will be in grade six (SIX!) next year, and that just seems so big.

The Captain’s class made a yearbook this year – everyone made their own page about themselves, listing their favourite memories of the year and their predictions for the future – and then the teacher copied them into a book for each kid. I heard about it on Monday and immediately got a little teary, because yearbooks! So grown up! and then, it was even worse, because he mentioned he couldn’t bring it home yet because he was still getting everyone to sign it. They were SIGNING YEARBOOKS. Are they trying to kill me with tears, here?

Speaking of tears, here’s a word of advice: do not go see Inside Out with your 11-year-old daughter. DO NOT DO IT. The main character is an 11-year-old girl and she’s just feeling all these crazy emotions and the world is so hard and she’s letting go of childish things but not quite ready for grown up things and SNIFF. I was sitting next to Gal Smiley and at the end of it, I looked at her all mushy-eyed and grabbed her for a hug, while she rolled her eyes in true Disgust fashion. MY BABY. Damn you, Pixar.

Tonight is the last night of soccer for the big kids (the Captain’s last game ever, as he’s aged out of this league and unlikely to move on to the next level), tomorrow is the last one for the Little Miss, and after that, there’s going to be a lot of sleeping in, lazing around, and eating of fresh fruit and freezies. Please don’t disillusion me by bringing up the bickering that’s always a hallmark of the first week – it’s enough to make me cry. Happy last day!

I sent a kid to school today with a lunch of chips, cookies, two pepperoni sticks, and a banana. When does school end, again?

——————–

The kids have discovered a croquet set that has been languishing in the basement, unloved, lo these twenty years. Suddenly it’s croquet in the backyard all day, every day. I feel like I’m living in the English countryside. Or possibly the movie Heathers.

The Captain insists on always being red. Should I book him some therapy? Shiver.

——————–

We’re off to see a FIFA game this Saturday. We just thought it would be kind of cool, since it’s a world event and everything, right in our home city. Little did we realize that our city has done everything possible to prevent us from attending, including a) only scheduling matches in the evening, b) not allowing ANY cars to park at the stadium, but instead bringing in people by transit only, and c) scheduling the girls’ end of year piano concert at exactly the same time as this ONE game we were able to attend. Kay, maybe the city didn’t have much to do with that last one, but it does feel like fate is against us.

However, after dithering and possibly giving up several times, we have been saved by my sister FameThrowa and her delightful husband, Mr. Chatty, who will be a) taking the one cranky child who refused to attend off our hands (eleven – it’s a CHALLENGING year), b) dropping us off at the stadium after we drop off our kid, and c) generally being awesome and supportive. We’ve also made arrangements to steal parking from MyFriendAgi, who lives in the neighbourhood, because we have to take two cars due to piano concert issues.

You can’t foil us, FIFA! We’re coming for you, no matter what hell you may throw our way. Prediction: sunburns, boredom, possible starvation as the game is over the dinner hour. FUN!

Dear Mom,

It will probably amuse you to hear that I now have children who:

• Take FOREVER to eat a meal;
• Dance their way to and from school when you just need them to get there already;
• Have been caught reading when they are supposed to be getting dressed/eating breakfast/doing homework;
• Cannot find their way to the park despite having being there 1000 times, and it being three streets from our house;
• Leave their shoes and coat wherever they feel like it upon entering the house;
• Hate the feel of grass on their bare feet, and avoid the outdoors in general;
• and make me listen to top 40 crap in the car.

So now I say to you: sorry about all that.

Lynn

The other day I caught an episode of Fresh Prince of Bel-Air on Much Music, because I was looking for something family-friendly to put on while I made dinner. The kids wandered in halfway through and actually recognized Alfonzo Ribeiro, who played Carlton on that show. In fact, in their world, Alfonso is a pretty big star, because he won Dancing With The Stars last year, and made a couple of guest appearances on the show this season as the returning champ. Plus, he’s the host of a cheesy game show called Catch 21 which I have been known to watch, because I am the hugest game show slut in the world, AND he was recently announced (on DWTS no less) as the new host of Gal Smiley’s favourite show, America’s Funniest Videos.

So yeah, they knew who Alfonso was.

This particular episode featured the aunt and uncle returning to the set of Soul Train, a dance show, where they got engaged 25 years ago, and as a result of the parents angle and the dancing angle, Carlton had a huge storyline and a 10 minute dance solo at the end. I tried to explain that Alfonso was not, in fact, the star of this show, but rather that other guy in the too-big pants and backwards ball cap, but they did not actually believe me.

Then, yesterday, they were watching a Disney teen show – A.N.T. Farm – and the girl on there mentioned how she’d love to meet Will Smith, and the Captain said, “Who the heck is Will Smith, anyway?”

Who would have guessed back in 1992 that the Fresh Prince would have to step aside for Carlton in the next generation? It’s like I don’t know the world AT ALL.