bathed in love

yesterday afternoon right before we headed down to the playground with "team caldwell", magnificent touched my arm and said, "i will make you a bath tonight."

this isn’t a heavily coded language. it is his love language. magnificent loves ambience and loves creating a romantic bath. he also knows that i love baths, but for a variety of reasons, i am a shower woman.

the reasons?

1) i hate the feel our bathtub’s chippy paint leaves on my bottom. my modus operandi when bathing is to begin with shampooing my hair, then dry my hands on a conveniently nearby towel, leave in a conditioner while reading a glossy mag, and only when the bathwater gets uncomfortably cool, reluctantly drain the tub while shave legs and pits, and then have a refreshing coolish shower as a final rinse.

2) baths take a long time to clean up from

3) our bathtub is too small. i like full immersion baths and hate having bent cold knees sticking out of the tub. i like all over warm.

charles knows all this, knows i have had maybe five baths in the four years we have been in our flat, yet he planned around my persnicketiness. he kept the door shut while running the bath, so that steam filled the small room. he lit candles and placed a small table he had dragged to the edge of the tub so i could dry my hands and place my magazine on the edge when it came time to rinse off. he called me in and promised he would clean up everything, handed me O magazine and waltzed off, claiming he was sweating to death and needed cold air.

what was he talking about? this was perfect? i added some ginger bath bubble.

the water was very hot. i actually read the letters to the editor while standing, to get used to the heat. finally finally, i lowered myself in, did a quick shampoo, rinsed, conditioned, (also did a quick face scrub), then dried off my hands and drank a large glass of cold cold water that mc had also thoughtfully provided, picked up the magazine and read.

vanity fair has been my favourite magazine for a long time, but o is moving right up there. i read every single article, except for the occasional fashion piece. and dr phil, who i sometimes find avoids the question.

one of the articles focused on five women who either stayed with and rejuvenated relationships or got out of them. as magnificent and i approach seven years of marriage, i do admit to wondering if he is getting the seven year itch. i don’t think i am … with the end of infertility i like to think i got rid of those unhappy feelings. it’s hard when your husband works so much to wonder what is distraction caused by work, obligations, family, church, friends and world events, and what is distraction caused by overlooking.

i don’t think he is going through the seven year itch. i think he is busy. but i know he is magnificent.

the articles continued and i kept reading until i had to face the inevitable uncomfortable truth, the water was a mere lukewarm. and what’s this..ah yes, a hair on my arm was standing up, protesting the cold. my knees, which had been so contented above the water enjoying the heated sauna like air, were also complaining.

clunk went the magazine

tzing went the shower curtain

galump went the bath plug, as i tugged the chain with my toes and removed the seal

a semi cold brisk shower, and TUBGATE2005 was over.

i climbed out and in very un-tess like behaviour, cleaned up from my tub. it took magnificent 45 minutes to create TUBGATE, and me 10 minutes to clear up from it.

then i went outside, and found my husband snoozing. i thanked him and he mumbled, "okay", and that was that. i then ate dinner, and went to sleep, all awash with love.

rainy days and sundays

today the rain started pouring just as we were leaving the flat to catch the taxi that would take us to church.

mila and i cordoned off the triumverate underneath the carpark while sebastian and charles soaked themselves trying to flag us a taxi. after a few wet minutes, they hailed the taxi, jumped in and came back to the car park to pick us all up. mila sat up front with the driver, charles held jasper, i sat in the middle with one girl in each arm, and sebastian sat beside me. traffic was bad, and the run off from the umbrellas was dripping on to my much loved shell encrusted beige sandals, but we got to church in plenty of time.

mila took an umbrella and jasper, and ran up the 20 or so steps that lead to the entrance to the church, and then across the courtyard into the blessed building. i could have waited for charles, but decided to go for it. sporting my look of one girl per arm, i dashed up the steps, noting that my sandals were submerged in water, and as luck would have it, dale arrived with an umbrella. he had seen mila arrive, figured there would be more babies arriving, and came down to help out.

soon the triplets were in the creche along with denby’s twins (no, it’s not a multiples only creche, it just seemed like it), and charles, sebastian and i were saying hello, and oh it was so good to be back. all the people i wanted to hug were there.

then the bells rang, and it was time to enter the sanctuary. this last weekend, many of the church leaders gathered for a prayerful retreat. and my goodness, were the results of their closeness, petitions and requests to and of God reflected in the sermon, which i believe veered quite from the original path.

being a person who loves music but has a not so lovely voice, music often brings me to tears. classical music reminds me of my grandad, show tunes remind me of frugal blake, and today’s praise selections reminded me of God’s grace and His gifts to us. the joy of his blessings were reflected on the praise team’s faces, and it was electric. a short excellent message, communion, more powerufl meaningful songs.

and afterwards, we stepped into the rain , with the hugs of friends still pressing into my shoulders.

i was so happy and at peace.

not two minutes later, i was screaming at sebastian. he was unhappy because his father was sitting in the front of the taxi, and burst into unreasonable sobs and tears. all the love and joy i had felt gave way to the less glorifying of God version of tess. i (probably) overreacted…i wanted to feel this happy joyful glow all day long, and real life had intervened. and i snapped and shrewed down caine road until i distracted my unreasonable child by singing songs about sebastian riding in planes that i made up as the taxi metre ticked off the miles.

i don’t know what it is about singing and fretful souls. but it worked, on me and on sebastian, and i am grateful. i’m not proud of how i reacted to sebastian’s (infuriating, i have to emphasise how infuriating he was) actions, but what counts is that i got the better of MYSELF, and stopped the crying, and my anger.

it is almost 4pm, down to the playground we go.

park & shop & put back

this morning magnificent and i were awoken at the relatively rude hour of 6.15am. jj was sporting a 20 pound nappy and needed to express his anguish. his sisters (muses?) took up the lament and soon sebastian was awake as well.

once breakfast was underway for the triumverate, mc decided to go for a run and i offered to take sebastian for a walk to the area where magchar would finish his run. it was a lovely misty morning, not oppressively humid like the last few have been, and even though he would have preferred it if his dad was taking him, seb thought the walk would be fun.

the skies looked ominous, so we took his little umbrella and were off. we had a fun walk, and stopped to look at snails and discuss how their shells protect them and are their houses as well. we splashed in puddles and discussed how water is sometimes found underneath bridges.

at one point sebastian got rather wet and afterwards decided he wanted to be carried. i declined the offer. soon we were on flat and paved terrain, and we stopped to look at a chained fence and discuss why it was locked. a light rain began and i snapped open seb’s little umbrella, but we didn’t use it for long and the drizzle ceased almost immediately.

some dogs were being walked and after asking permission and letting the doggies smell his hand, sebastian petted them. he also held a leash, which made him feel very important, apparently. then a sweaty magnificent ran to us, and we walked to look at the koi fish and turtles in the reservior. we named all the turtles then headed back home.

after a small breakfast on the terrace, we decided to get groceries. our vehicle’s radiator split last night so our activity options for the day were severely reduced. we compiled a quick grocery list, grabbed all the kids, reminded sebastian to do one last wee-wee, headed outside, hailed a taxi, and were off to our local grocers, park & shop.

it was less hassle than we would have thought, mainly because we didnt bring diaper bags. we figured any emergency supplies we needed could be purchased at park and shop, so we got lazy. once there, we greeted the ladies at the cashier, who have all been there a while and know our family, and put jj, cee cee and lu-lu (when did my family come to this?) in one cart while sebastian opted to run alongside, get ready for this, his grocery cart wielding dad. surprised?

taking the babies out can be a mixed blessing at times. one "better you than me" can irritate me. but today everyone we ran into was so pleasant, it was just a joy to be out. i didn’t have to say, "better full hands than empty ones" ONCE.

however, my hands are not the only full ones. the babies are enjoying being able to lean out of the cart and pluck at random items that take their interest. at one point when i paused to look at toothbrushes, jasper took the opportunity to grab a box of tampons (slimfit) from the shelf and start chewing on the corner of the box. thank goodness they are individually wrapped in plastic containers. carys was extra active (and refused to sit down i should add) and showed a fondness for household cleaning items, while sela started squealing when she saw the bananas and grabbed on to the bin they were displayed in.

sebastian was very good, he only asked for one thing: a book with mr incredible on the cover. i explained to him that the book was in chinese and he decided he didn’t need it anymore.

not having a car at our disposal was no worry, we had a good family saturday. hopefully our luck will last over the weekend.

yes hello, i am the girl who fell asleep last night at 6pm. who meant to blog but the mattress wouldn’t let me move.

had a small moral dilemma last night: after a three way consultation that did not involve the underpaid mummy mediator, the babies declared themselves ready for the day at 2.30am. they declared this loudly.

i KNOW in my heart of hearts that they were not hungry (having witnessed the dinners they consumed…fish pie, their favourite, followed by yoghurt, cheese and grapes), and that if left alone, they would stop crying and commence sleeping. and sebastian would not stir, of that i was also certain.

while this crying to sleep plan worked when the babies were accustimising themselves to the 15 hour time difference in canada, back in hong kong it isn’t so easy. why? because we are in a flat and we have neighbours below us.

i had to get the wailing triumverate out of bed because i knew my neighbours (who sleep in the room directly below jj, sela, carys and sebastian) were sleeping. or trying to. as one does at 2.30am on a thursday morning. it would shut them up in the short term, but not in the long run. however, i had to, so i did.

the babies played around for what seemed to be forever and i didn’t feed them. while travelling we got into the habit of throwing  biscuits at them whenever they began whinging, and they definitely are in need of more variety in their diets. but i refrained from cheese cubes, grapes, carrots, and all the other finger foods.

i have often wondered why sela sucks her thumb. carys did for a bit, but no longer does. she rests her thumb outside her mouth when going to sleep, but the thumb doesn’t touch the mouth. whereas sela, with her voraciousness, consumes the thumb. but last night i learned again that God is the fine tuner of details. at 4am sela was walking around, and she put her thumb in her mouth.

sela only puts her thumb in her mouth when she is tired.

it was 4am but even i could apply the nearly forgotten philosophy 205 class..

sela only puts her thumb in her mouth when she is tired

her thumb is in her mouth

she must be tired.

so i picked her up and threw her into bed.

she did not cry.

i followed with carys and jasper.

they cried.

but only for two minutes.

sebastian slept through the night and woke up this morning declaring that he wasn’t tired and hadn’t had breakfast. he ate cheerios on the terrace with his mummy and daddy, then we prayed for the new school year and he got dressed in his uniform. unforunately, the bus company gave us the wrong information, and we arrived downstairs camera in hand to find the bus had been waiting for five minutes. not a great start to the year? who cares. sebastian had a wonderful first day and that is what counts.

i didn’t cry, but i did have to swallow a few times when i went downstairs to pick him up and saw him mouthing the words "hi mummy!" as our eyes met. the great big smile on his face. i am a far second in his affections to daddy, but he is showing his love for me. little man.

finally…a few months ago we occasionally were calling carys "blue blue" because of her eyes. that was shortened to lulu, which we still occasionally call her. we stopped because two ladies told me that it wasn’t a great nickname because lulu has no resemblance to carys’ name.

did the duke resemble john wayne’s name?

home again home again jiggedy jig

here i am, back at 122 pokfulam road.

a few hours and many time zones ago i was going through my annual, oh i wish i wasn’t so far away from family and my long term friends…i love it here and am i denying my kids the opportunity to learn to play ice hockey and ski by living so far away and what about their grandparents and their relationships with them…bla bla bla.

forget stella, tess has to get her groove back, and to help my re-integration into hong kong be not so severe, while the kids were sleeping (yes, you read that correctly), i made a list of new school year resolutions. some of them are pretty good, some are long term, and some i have crossed off my list already. (nothing like those small tasks to make you smile when you see you have checkmarks on the page already).

one of the most difficult things i have to do is suck it up. don’twanttodon’twanttodon’twantto.

but will do, i hope. at least it is on th e list.

the year before i got pregnant with sebastian and while pregnant with sebastian i was boxing. loving it. non contact. i found boxing such an efficient way to tone and work out aggression and focus. loved boxing. the owner of the place and i didn’t see eye to eye, he would comment unfavourably on my pre boxing arms, and then after i delivered sebastian, the first week i went back he commented on how fat and unattractive i was. when my instructor quit, i didn’t go back because the owner took over his classes.

but i miss boxing. and so, i am going to suck it up, risk the probable snide comments that will come my way (friends who have been have just about all quit because they say he isn’t getting any nicer or tolerant of anything that is not body beautiful) and head back. my canadian accent will also come under fire. "the only thing more unattractive than a canadian accent is an american accent."

he’s not my favourite, but i want to be boxing again, and he’s just about the only game in town.

the other item i have to take care of just about right now, is to fill out sebastian’s primary one application form. i have to post it tomorrow, so given that it is 10.20pm, i should do that now. tomorrow, unpacking.

i have missed blogging, and reading blogs, and will catch up. it’s on the list, and therefore, it will be done.

Fintry Update – New Pictures

Chuck here… very briefly everyone is doing well. Sela’s cold is cycling through the kids and it looks like hopefully Jasper will be the last to succumb and recover. But as you can tell from the pictures below, no one is hurting!

Meanwhile, hop on over to see The New Charles.

Report from Fintry: Float Buses & Tricks

Charles here, writing on Tess behalf to give an update on the latest events at Fintry.

As you know, Sebastian loves float planes. Apparently, reports Sebastian to everyone at Fintry, he is about to commence building of an actual float plane. The outside will be black and the inside will be red. The crew will serve passengers chicken noodle soup and chocolate. (Not necessarily mixed together.)

Sounds very dear, but before you rush out to place your order, you might want to wait to learn about Sebastian’s most recent design, also in the throws of production set-up.

The Float Bus – this little darling, it sounds like, can hold more passengers. Black on the outside and brown on the inside, the crew serves sausages. (Coincidentally, Sebastian’s favourite.) Passengers will enjoy a selection of Sponge Bob, Veggie Tales or the Aristocats to view as they enjoy their sausages. Considering that Airbus is now frantically manufacturing their new Super Jumbo, Sebastian may not be far off with his vision of big planes. His creativity is in full bloom, too. If Richard Branson doesn’t put us lay people on the moon, Sebastian just might. Fasten your seatbelts.

Looks like Sela is teething. The poor girl is running an off and on temperature and little pearlies are budding through next to her two front teeth. Not surprisingly, Sela is not a happy camper. She was grumpy for her first teeth and that will probably continue. (At left, Sela cuddles her new baby doll.)

Meanwhile, Jasper loves to swim. The little olympian-in-training will waltz over to the kiddies pool (on all fours, he is yet to walk so I have been told, and has no interest – he’d rather swim now) and diving in head first, clothes and all. Reportedly, Jasper spends the most amount of time in the pool. He loves the water. (Jasper left, but wow… watch Sela walking in the background!)

Finally, Carys our little midnight marauder in training. I keep hearing stories that the "walking six steps" little miss innocent is not so innocent! Carys regularly drums up trouble and eggs on her siblings to no end. Coy Carys won’t let anyone see her new teeth coming in but they don’t seem to be causing her too much discomfort. Carys is probably the one who put Sela up to new teeth. I can just see it now, "Hey, Sela, I am going to grow a few new teeth. You want to, too?"

"Okay!" Sela would reply cheerily.

"Great, because mine are going to come in easily but yours always hurt like heck."

And later as Sela wails away: "Oh, I am so sorry, Sela, that your teeth hurt!"

"Yeah, but I’m walking and YOU’RE not," Sela would snap back. We’ve learned that both these girls have wicked tempers and strong wills.

All three have grown lots in body and hair, increased their barely distinguishable vocabularies, and spoiled rotten on custom made, fresh, gourmet meals. They dont like the plain stuff anymore and made that very clear the other night when someone tried to feed The Terrific Trio something out of a can.

I am drumming my fingers waiting for them to be teenagers, but I’m in no hurry. Doh!

very quickly for it is late…

i wanted to post about my day with kathryn, and some of the special times i spent with yellowknife girlfriends as well. there isn’t time, but there is the NEED to say how blessed i am to have such friends.

cyber friends, long term friends, short term friends. i am going to write about you all. but for now, i will sleep.

quick baby update:

sela is walking. very proud of herself thankyouverymuch. she is also big into "babies". we bought triplet dolls for the babies, and sela loves picking up baby (and even calls her bay-bee) and patting her on the back. she also loves mobile phones and has been sighted "burping" them as well. best comment about sela…jennifer’s 9 year old daughter hannah is wonderful with kids, and informed her mother:

"mummy, sela is my favourite triplet because i like her style."

sela is also SINGING. lita and i first noticed this fact the night we arrived in vancouver. it was 3am and all the kids were awake and lita and i were staring at each other stupidly our eyes tired and mouths open when we heard sela singing TWINKLE TWINKLE LITTLE STAR. lita said,

sela is singing

i know i replied dumbly.

she also sings sleeping bunnies, ba ba black sheep and incy wincy spider. it is amazing. her words are non existent, except she is trying hard to say "diamond" "star" "dame" "like" etc. it is so odd to hear this and she is growing so quickly.

carys is wishing mightily that she were walking. she grips on to your fingers and tries to walk, except for steps, they are more like stamps…like the marching band walk if you get the image. she is a clever little girl, and is really playing up the "oh i am so fragile" card. if i am cuddling her and someone else comes to me for a cuddle, even if they are barely touching carys, she will burst into tears, as if she is being crushed, which of course causes me to push the other child off me, allowing carys complete mummy time. of course, carys has no problem trying to muscle in some lap time when one of the others is adorning mummy’s lap. she also is humming to some words. she shows NO Interest in playing sleeping bunnies like her brother and sister do, but she enjoys the HOP HOP HOP at the end, which is great exercise for her little legs.

jasper has figured out his winning formula. you know that slightly helpless look he sports in all those pictures? he knows that by being good humoured, dancing and singing that he gets lifted up, attention and food. so he is goodhumoured, and there is no need to walk because visitors scoop him up so quickly. he is singing a bit, plays sleeping bunnies, and loves clapping and drumming tables and pots with his hands. when he does this he will also say ba ba ba ba ba to the rhythm. my dad has discovered that jasper likes cheesies.

sebastian has fallen in love with franklin the turtle books. there have been a few books that sebbie has loved, the ever wonderful "the tiger who came to tea" being one of them, but he loves talking about franklin the turtle and his sister harriet. he is talking more…still shy around adults he doesn’t know, but he is warming up faster. sebastian grew to love nathan very quickly, and when we were saying goodbye to nathan, sebastian said something i had never heard him say before:

i will miss you very much, nafan.

he also said, i wuff you very much, nafan.

this made me cry, little sebbie, opening his heart. and being so richly blessed with this bravery.

tomorrow to the cottage…..i probably won’t be posting for a few weeks….but charles will give updates!

three weeks of sun, family, feuds, love and laughter and no television. yay!

northern transportation

i am in edmonton now. carys had a great trip down with grandad and mo, and the reason she drove down that fearful mackenzie highway (cracker of windshields, imprinter of black flies and wasps on vehicles) is because there weren’t enough adults to accompany three under threes. my mum had flown down to kelowna to collect us, so she had used her round trip ticket already. she could have flown down, but she doesn’t like my dad driving the dreaded mackenzie highway alone. true love indeed. the mackenzie highway is gravelly, dusty, pot holey and not aesthetically pleasing.

another aspect to the mackenzie highway…not alot of places to stop. my parents needed gas, and stopped in a place called enterprise to get it. enterprise is close to the alberta/nt border. and not for the first time this summer…the gas station had no gas. this does happen a lot. there wasn’t a gas station for another 200 kilometres, so my parents had to stop at houses and ask if the residents would be willing to sell them gas. it took three hours of knocking on doors and driving to locations people who had no gas for sale recommended them to, but eventually they got some and went on their merry way. carys was apparently an angel for the drive.

we had a fairly uneventful flight to edmonton, except we were sitting beside my former eighth grade teacher (kelly, you can guess which one..have fun), and that was, well, odd.

upon arriving in edmonton, we met up with the limo driver who would transport us to pammie’s house, but wait! we were short a car seat. the airline had lost one of our carseats. luggage we could leave without, but not carseats. it was 6.30pm, everyone was hungry, babies were tired and whinging, sebastian kept asking

why can’t we leave the airport mummy? which gave me the best reason to repeatedly snap in not my quietest tone

because the airline lost our carseat.

we were a cranky little tag team.

over one hour later, the car seat was found, and we were off. 20 minutes into the journey, sebastian announces,

i need to do a wee wee

how badly?

wight now mummy.

there is no use in asking him to "hold it". but i am so tired and upset i cannot fathom pulling over into some place, unsnapping him out of the carseat, walking to a store, begging to use the loo, doing the wee wee and then reversing the above steps. so i rummage around in my bag, and pull out a water bottle.

zip goes the zipper

aside goes his bobs

out pops his willie

ahh sighs my son

as wee wee fills the bottle. he was right, he really did need to go. afterwards, he looked at the bottle and informed me,

i don’t want to dwink that.

but kevin costner did in that terrible movie he directed…but sebastian is no kevin costner. (good).

oh, and we got charged an extra 100 dollars because the limo driver had to wait an extra 90 minutes for us. can you imagine.

the next day i got an incredible gift…the entire day to myself. and i spent it with my girlfriend kathryn, but more on that later. i will post again tonight.

75 per cent

my parents left today: they will arrive in edmonton late tomorrow afternoon.

they did not depart alone…oh no. they took carys with them. (grandad blake with carys, left)

even though it has been only a few hours, i cannot believe how easy it is with only three children.

seriously.

meals are finished faster, the noise level is reduced by more than 25 per cent (it seems), there is one less moving shape to track.

when sebastian was an infant, on saturdays charles would take him out of the house and give me a few hours to be sane again. and i remember thinking, everything is so easy when there is no baby. well the same apparently applies when you go down from four to three. it is amazing. surprisingly, none of the remaining three have stepped up to bat and been more difficult.

however, my ease and enjoyment of increased relaxation is marred by this little awareness that we are not complete. the triumverate have not been separated for one night since carys arrived home from the hospital. but tonight, jasper and sela will rest their heads and carys will be hundreds of kilometres away. i hope my parents remember that carys likes to sleep on her tummy and hates having a blanket tucked around her.

i love the extra quiet, but i also like (forgive me for going all jerry mcguire) the feeling of being complete that i get when i know my family is safe, nearby, and happy. it was bad enough with mc being gone, and now these forlorn feelings are increasing.