i actually really like my blog page. i spent a fair amount of time on it (ok, quite awhile ago now, but still...) getting the links up of my favorite reading, and links to pages i find interesting. it is like a little part of me out there but now it is so lonely. i spend most of my very tiny amount of free time on FB and not even really posting too much there either. although this is much better that being limited to 140 characters. and every now and again i bop over to ravelry, but even there i haven't posted a new project in ages and i should....i actually have several finished or nearly finished things to post! of course, i would have to take pictures and load them up here and (yawn) all that.

i wish there was a way i could put all my favorite buttons and links on FB and then i would only have one stop shopping (so to speak). gee, how lazy am i? i can't even click over to another (already bookmarked!) website. pathetic....

anyway, the kids are growing like weeds and life up in the intermountain west of BC is falling into a routine of sorts (despite the absolute dearth of good organic food and any type of decent retail establishments...thank God for the internet). mom is up here visiting and i wish again we didn't live so far apart...i miss her already and she hasn't even left yet!

getting ready to snuggle up inside for a long, chilly winter. lots of christmas knitting to do and then after that nothing but socks for me. i haven't knit myself any socks in a long time and all my old ones are worn through in various places. of course, the kids always seem to need new hats and mittens and whatever (damn growth spurts!).

i also keep telling myself i am going to finish my daughter's quilt and pull that loom out and finally put the damn thing together and figure out how to use it! all, of course, while studying for the canadian royal college boards in em coming this may. ugh!

it has been so long since i posted that typepad interfae has been totally re-vamped and looks completely different. i don't even know how to do anything on it anymore or where any of the tabs and buttons are!

oh well, until next time....otherwise find me on facebook or ravelry (puck)

whew!
so it has been, like, forever. i know, i know, i suck at this whole blog thing. but here goes again.

we are settling in, sort of, in BC. i have started work and it has been pertty good so far. busy, the people i work with are nice. some frustrations with community medicine in a much smaller hospital/city than i am used to. being able to get a CT or ultrasound between 11pm and 8 am takes an act of God, and learning all the names for the canadian meds (same meds as in the us, just different names) i can't tell you how many calls i've gotten from pharmacies asking what the hell i'm writing for. i feel a bit like a med student again in that respect, just fumbling through a new system. everyone has been patient and helpful but i am quite sure they hear my voice in their head at night asking where to find something or how to order something, etc. some days i am sure they just think i am an idiot, which hopefully after doing this job for 9 years i'm not. (at least i didn't feel like one when i was in the states)

anyway, the kids are doing well. finn is nearly walking. mostly cruising around the furniture and taking a few unassisted steps on her own. sam is great, adjusted well to montessori here, although i don't think it is as good as the school he was in back in omaha. it seems like more simple play here rather than the more educational play he got back in nebraska. anyway, he is doing fine and it happy so i guess that is all that matters. 

our house is a fair bit smaller than what we had in omaha so we are still living in a cardboard jungle. much of our stuff will stay in boxes, i think untill we move again-probably next spring. but i can't find anything!! knitting needles, summer shoes, kitchen utensils. some things i have bought again, so i'll have double once i do dig out of the boxes. 

we just recently went up to a sheep farm about 1:45 north of here. sam and finn got to meet the new lambs, and sam collected fresh eggs from the henhouse. a hayride and scones and lemonde and everyone slept on the way home. so a good day in all. and i bought a big bag of fiber, :) greyish brown and very soft, with alot of lanolin still on the fiber, but certainly not greasy. i have no idea what i will do with it but perhaps in the next 5-10 yrs i'll find time to spin it :>
speaking of which, i did order a new spinning wheel. a 'martha' double wheel from watson wheels right here in BC (out on victoria, i believe) it will be done in about 6-8 months or so.
after i get ahead of some of the bills i left in the US, i'll start saving for my sock knitting machine. (woo-hoo) so maybe next summer/fall.

i have to take the canadian EM boards next spring, so that is not something i am looking forward to, but they have just instituted some reciprocity with american trained docs so i don't have to take all the prelim exams anymore. that would have been an expensive, time-consuming and useless endeavor. 

my niece is due in a few weeks and i just finished a few baby hats for her and am about 1/2way through a sweater for sam  (for fall obviously, it is canada but we still have summer-haha). and have some yarn for one for finn. there hasn't been much time to knit with the little ones. by the time we get them into bed it is about 8pm and we both collapse on the couch and stare mindlessly into space for about an hour or so and then go to bed. occassionally i can muster up the energy for a few rows, but sometimes it is just zoning out in front of the tv.
oh well, all part of the job, huh :) and even though i am fairly tired all the time and don't get to do any of my hobbies as much as i would like to i actually would never trade it for all the gold in the world.

some pics. a

and lastly, i just wanted to note that it, unbelievably, has been a year today that my dearest brother, John, passed away far too soon. not a day goes by that he doesn't enter my thoughts at least once. i can still hear his laugh, his brotherly advice (i don't think i ever aged past 13 in his mind) and see his smile. i miss him constantly and eternally. love you john.

Habitation

marriage is not
a house or even a tent

it is before that, and colder

the edge of the forest, the edge
of the desert
the unpainted stairs
at the back where we squat
outside, eating popcorn

where painfully and with wonder
at having survived even
this far

we are learning to make fire

Margaret Atwood

poem for the 4th annual Brigid poetry reading

wow, i can't believe i haven't posted anything since october, i am such a lazy loser! things have been crazy...so i'll just sum-up. we are out of our house here in 3 weeks, sort-of homeless for about 8 days (staying with a friend), then up to the great white north the 1st of march, i only stay for 4 days, then i'm back by myself to finish out my shifts here for 2 more weeks. i am glad we sold the house, and without taking too much of a loss,  but this whole moving-out-early is making me a little nuts.
i have moved many (many) times but this is by far the most stressful...think it is a bunch of reasons- distance, whole new country, moving with 2 small children, and 2 dogs, mom going back to NY to live (the kids have never been without her, she truly is a third parent), new medical system, different medicine, blah, blah, blah. anyway, i am excited too. i know it will be great to have more time off to be with the kids, and patients are patients, i just hope that i'm not a "soft" academic and can survive in a busy community ED. i am a bit worried since the last time i worked in a community ED  i was in fellowship and moonlighting and i was practically suicidal on my way to my shifts. i do think that had much more to do with that particular hospital and the terrible situations we had to work in (long story/ies) so i am sure i'll be fine. and i have many friends who do community medicine and love it. they may all just be crazy, but we'll see.
i have been doing virtually no knitting except to finally make myself a hat (my head was cold!) and knit about 6 pathetic inches of a scarf for myself. everything i make is for someone else so i figured i could take a little time for something for me. now that Finn is occassionally going to bed at a reasonable time i have a little time to knit. most of the yarn has been packed away but i did leave myself a little bag of semi-finished projects.
anyway, with more time i am hoping to keep this up a bit better. i've said that before but whatever, i don't have anyone to answer too and i am fairly sure no one bothers to wander over here anymore to look again at some silly 4 month old post
well off to knit a bit on my scarf (i did at least get myself some cashmere yarn...shhh)

so i did the early voting thing today. it was crazy busy- i waited in line outside the building for 2 1/2 hours, then another 40 min or so inside. i am glad i did it and i am sure the lines will be much worse on election day.
it was great to see everyone out to vote and waiting so long despite the cold drizzle (it was about 40F, a bit breezy and very, very damp). i am just now starting to feel warm (i've been home 2 hours)
poor W to know that one of the legacies he will leave is to be the president that rallied a previously apathetic nation (at least when it came to elections) into a virtual voting frenzy- just to see a change.
i have voted in every election since i was legally allowed, and it always surprised me when people didn't take the time to vote. i know, the whole electoral college argument, and 'does my vote really count', etc but i think it is not only a right but a privilage. i remember seeing on TV many, many years ago news footage of people who had walked to the poling site in their country, some for many miles, to wait in line for several hours to vote in their country's first ever election. they were thrilled and proud and i was at least a little ashamed at the apathy our people showed toward the same process.
i am not a terribly politically minded person, i am not even a terribly patriotic person. i do know i am privilaged to have been born in a developed country, with many freedoms and without many of the hardships so much of the world endures.
i am excited for a change, i know we are in a terrible slump but i am very hopeful that a new administration will be able to restore confidence so desperately needed to start to turn things around.
so, if anyone still bothers to read this pathetic, seldom-posted-to little blog of mine, please take the time to get out there and vote. i dont even care who you vote for, as long as it happens. plus if you do, you can rightfully complain about the outcome later :)
VOTE!!!!

so my sweet infant daughter has been diagnosed with erb's palsy, a brachial plexus injury that occurred during her delivery, which has caused her left arm to be partially paralyzed. many children do recover partial function so we are hopeful. she will need intensive physical therapy and if she still has significant deficits at 3-4 months, then surgery to try and re-attach or graft onto the damaged nerves.
she is otherwise healthy and alert and gaining weight normally so i know we should still be grateful for her overall health but it is hard not to grieve a little for her injury.
i just hope and pray that she can recover enough function to do what she wants in life.