7 days until 60

My goal in starting this blog almost a year ago was to prepare myself for turning 60.  Well, that's exactly what is happening next Tuesday.

I started blogging as a kind of self-therapy, and it actually kind of worked.  I found myself working on things within myself that were no longer so comfortable to blog.  So I kept working, but kept it to myself.  That's why it's been a long time since there has been a blog entry from me.

But now it's 7 days away, so I'm going to write 7 entries in 7 days.  Starting today.  Given the narcissistic nature of the purpose of this blog, there will be 7 new blogs about me, me, big beautiful me.

Here are some things I have learned about myself this year:

1. I am really enjoying my job in public relations.  I've found that when I joined Arbonne, I received great training in network marketing that translated very well into educational marketing.  It's really just about relationships, and I love relationships.  I have so much to learn, I fight to be consistent in my efforts and I only get done half of what I plan to do; but I love talking about my school.
2. I don't handle criticism very well.  I've had more criticism this year than ever before and it was pointed and personal.  I worked very hard to keep my responses truthful and professional and it all worked out to the good in the end, but in the process I felt very vulnerable and distrustful of others.  it took me quite some time to get over it, and that's the part that surprised me because I usually have pretty good bounce-back.
3. I've learned to make myself waste time.  It's too easy to be driven and feel like every moment needs to count for all time and eternity, but pretty soon my ability to be effective is frittered away.  I have been leaving town on my days off as much at possible, relaxing after dinner on week days, and working on having people over more frequently.  I don't know if I'm more effective, but I do find I handle things better and feel more creative.

I'm doing less than I was last year in music commitments - no church choir, not on the worship schedule, not teaching any music courses.  But I have added some very satisfying activities: local chapter of the Registered Music Teachers Association, joined the Valley Festival Singers in Abbotsford with Dave, started teaching some private piano lessons again and I've trained as a barista at our church espresso cafe.

Tomorrow let's talk some more.

5 Pants in 5 Months

If you follow my blog, you have been forced to follow the story of my pants.  Lucky you.

I pledged in April to make 5 pairs in 5 days, but the pattern proved problematic.  I did finally finish all 5 pairs, and have been wearing them gleefully this month.

The truth is, I made 6 pairs, because the very first pair had to be taken apart completely and resewn from the beginning.  I changed the pattern every time so the first/last pair fit just right, then went back to all the other pairs and updated all the changes so they all fit the same.  Here they are:

5 Pants in 5 Months

HOWEVER.....there is a curve ball:  In the last 2 weeks, Dave and I started cycling some of the trails around Chilliwack.  The setting is spectacular, but my cycling skills are not so it's pretty teetery, coasting-along style cycling.  So imagine my surprise when I put some pants on this weekend and they are all too loose - like 2" too loose!  Fortunately I somewhat anticipated my size changing and designed them to  be altered along the side seams easily.

 I'll just get right on that.

The 5% Summer

Welcome to the Cottage

We bought our cottage five years ago in the summer as a fixer upper with great bones.  We moved in a flurry, got the kitchen and bedroom operational, then 3 days later I left for Japan because Sarah was about to have Japanesie #4.  Turns out she went 2 weeks late, and I did not get back until the day before school started.

Meanwhile, Dave worked like a mad man.  One of the main things he did was refinish all the bedroom and kitchen floors which he discovered were straight grain Douglas Fir.  All the kids decided to come home for Christmas that year, so during the fall we renovated the main bathroom and the kitchen mostly by ourselves.  Here is what the kitchen looked like when we bought the house:

We got the bathroom to 100%, but not the kitchen so much, and we have never touched it again until this summer. We had replaced all the lower cabinets, but kept the orginal upper cabinets.  However, the upper cabinet doors had been unsuccessful refits, so we removed them but never replaced them. We had the floor molding in the garage, but it never made it to the installation stage. Also, because we never got to renovating the heating system until this spring, it was very hard to keep clean.  Here's what it looked like until this summer:

Can you see the dark open cabinets up high?  They are cedar lined!  For 5 years Dave has pondered the construction of the cabinet doors, which have to fit inside the casements, leaving no room for error.  Stacks of magazines and a garage full of tools were accumulated in the rumination process.

I'm happy to report that all is now complete.  We degreased and repainted all the walls and cabinets (I love you, Benjamin Moore!) changing the wall colour from a cream white to a soft gold, lined the cabinet shelves with glass (I love you, Brock Chapman!), installed the floor molding, stripped and stained the original Douglas Fir doors to match the floor and replaced the curtain hardware.

All this was just a backdrop to those 13 brand new cabinet doors, the "pieces des resistance".  Each door was a torture to create and fit because no two openings were the same size. We wanted them to look like they had always been there.  The glass doors were fitted with a vintage look seeded glass (I love you Brock Chapman!) and the bottom 2 shelves were left open which I love, love, love.  Here is the result:

You can see we changed the nook to a loveseat area.

Dave remodeled a kitchen moveable bar into a side table on wheels for the loveseat that also doubles as an extension to the counter when I need it, or a wagon to wheel into the dining room or living room for serving, like my great grandmother's old tea wagon:

I want you to see this all, because next I'm going to write about another dilemna concerning our house, and see what you think.  I'll keep you posted.

Thanks to Dave over and over for all the work he has done this summer.  The kitchen now sparkles and works like a dream.  It has a small footprint, but is so easy to work in, with everything at the tips of my fingers.  It's cozy and comfy and complete in every detail.  Because we took our time and lived with the kitchen for a few years, we knew it well enough to make the right decisions.  It was well worth the wait.

My First Chair

Recently, one of the two matching leather armchairs in our living split right about where Dave's shoulder rests. As I dithered about what to do the split got bigger and more irreparable so they had to go.  Hannah felt sorry for me and gave me two chairs from her house; one was Dave's old oxblood leather chair and ottoman that I had made him get rid of in an earlier renovation.  He was so happy to have it back that I immediately regretted ever making him part with it.

This was the other chair she gave me:

Clearly, this is a mid-century modern chair that is in pretty rough shape, .not a chair designed for the 1930's English cottage we live in.  But this chair had one redeeming quality - it fit me!

I'm short and squat.  Buying furniture is torture for us because Dave is a foot taller than me.  When I try to sit on furniture that Dave is comfortable with, I can either reach the floor or the back of the seat, but never both.  If Dave tries to sit in a chair that fits me, he looks all scrunched up like Gulliver having tea with the Lilliputians.  We don't buy those chairs.

But this chair found me, fits me, loves me, wraps it's loving mid-century arms around me.  Now, how to fit it into the decor?

25 years ago, I slipcovered a beat up sofa and chair, so I thought I would give it another try.  At THE fabric store in Chilliwack, I found set of fabrics that would work in my livingroom for $16.00 a metre.  At the till they were $3.00 a metre! score!  Back home, I made a pattern, cut it out, sewed it together in one night - awesome!

By the light of day, I saw all my mistakes - it didn't fit around the shoulders, the seat was crooked blah, blah, blah.  But a week later, I finally had it all together and I am pretty excited that I get to sit in my pretty chair and touch the floor whenever I want to.  Wanna see it?

Mid-century modern lines are hidden under the deep skirt so it blends with the room.  It's the first time I've had my own chair.  Be happy for me!

Old Lady Feet

No kidding, I'm trying to deal with turning 60 and how it's not really a big deal, 60 is just a number, I'm a young 59, I have a future and a hope, right? right?

My feet have outed me.  I went for a walk in downtown Seattle in March and ended up with horrible pain in both legs for weeks.  Tried the meds - nothing.  Tried physio - bingo. Huge rangy cyclist mountain climber from NZ named Craig worked me over good.  Second visit Craig taped up my feet tight and said "try that!".  It was awesome.  So he sent me to the orthotics guy (Jeremy).  That's orthotics spelled "orth60tics".

No joke, I'm limping in to Jeremy's office wearing the only shoes I have that fit around all the tape, which of course look like orthopedic shoes.  He has an orthopedic student from the university, a sweet young thing in her 20s who seems to never have seen a foot before.  So he reads out my chart to her "Mrs. Shinness is 59, almost 60, with leg pain very typical for her age." Great start.  Then he gives her the tour of every corner of each of my feet top and bottom telling her all the things that are wrong due to stress and aging.  While it is interesting for me to hear all the details, all I can hear him say is "OLD LADY FEET, OLD LADY FEET, OLD LADY FEET, and right here we see MORE OLD LADY FEET".  AGHHHHH!!!!

Now it is weeks later, I have the pricey orthotic inserts in my shoes, I'm finished physio, and I can walk without pain.  I still have to find shoes that can hold these inserts that don't look like old lady shoes.  I did learn that feet problems are highly related to your family members' feet, and I put together that my mom's feet problems started right when she was my age.  She never followed up because she wanted to be young and not an old lady, but within a handful of years she lost her mobility.

Lesson learned.  I still have a future and a hope (I do, right?) but in that future, I'll be wearing orthotics!

21st century education - what is that?

End of May, Dave and I went to a symposium on 21st century Christian Education - preparing students for 2025.  Take a look at www.21stcenturyeducators.com for some reading links if you are at all curious.


People from many different countries and education streams gathered for 3 days of discussion in this great venue called the Morris J.Wosk Centre for Dialogue in downtown Vancouver - I felt like I was in the U.N.  I attend a lot of conferences each year, but I came away from this stunned and buzzed at the same time.  We met this gang of rabble rousers from the Sydney Center for Innovation in Learning that challenged almost everything we do in our regular everyday classrooms. Sir Ken Robinson has a Youtube (RSA Animate Changing Education Paradigms) with an animation that blew my mind - really, I will never look at a school the same way again.  The embedding of technology into every classroom was a big part of the discussion, but I came away with the conviction that what needs to change is the pedogagy, not just the technology. Your probable response is "whatever that means" and you're right, I still can't put it into words myself.


Now, I have heard some of these ideas presented here and there over the years.  I've seen kids get turned off education (I believe I turned off a few myself, actually) and felt quite powerless to reverse that.  I've seen my creative, artistic, intuitive son-in-law change his concept of himself because he was assigned to go to the "dumb" high school.  But these dudes in at the Sydney Center for Innovation in Australia are actually doing this 21st century stuff, at a small (well, not so small anymore) Christian school attached to a local church.  They have been at it for 8 years, taking chances, making mistakes, being relentless in their pursuit of innovation (which I think should be spelled inovation but I'm wrong) and they have 7th grade boys breathless to get to school in the morning.


Now I want to get me some of that.

My Friend Maria Shriver

I was reading today about the unraveling of the marriage of Maria Shriver and Arnold Schwarzenegger.   They separated several weeks ago shortly after Arnold finished being governor of California.  Now we know that at that time he told Maria that he had fathered a child with a worker in the family home 10 years previously who he has been supporting since birth.  This is after many years of complaints in the media of Arnold's sexual misbehaviours.  They have four children aged 13-21 who must be very aware of the implications of this situation and it's effect on the public.  In addition, both of Maria's parents have died in recent months.

I find myself grieving for this lady.  She comes from the Kennedy family on her mother's side, a family that has known such high degrees of fame and infamy, of influence both wholesome and unwholesome for America.  She gave up a career in broadcasting to serve and support her husband in his political endeavours, and has made her husband and children her focus in the last decade.  She has in short order lost her parents, her home, her marriage, and her good name.  She must now shepherd her children and her own wounded soul through these next stages in public and private.

One of my life values I learned from Maria Shriver. At a crucial moment in my life I heard her say that a woman can do everything, but she can't do it all at the same time.  Sometimes she has to let go of one thing that she cares for very deeply to be able to do the next thing that she cares for very deeply.  I took this to heart, and it has saved me from spreading myself too thin, or hanging on to something after it's time has past.  Thank you for your wisdom, Maria.

At the same time, I wonder how a strong, wise, powerful woman like Maria chose to commit herself to a man who obviously did not demonstrate a faithful spirit and lifestyle before she even met him.  Could she not find someone to match her personal and spiritual values?  Did she think this was the best she could do?  Did she think that she was strong enough to change him into what he should be?

I shake my head, but I grieve for her all the same.