It's Dilovely

I’m sheepish to say that I haven’t put much effort into Halloween since I’ve been an adult. Even more shamefully, there have been two years out of the last three where I didn’t even manage to get a real pumpkin for jack-o-lantern purposes (I left it so late that there were none left – seriously!). [...]

I thought y’all might enjoy this video of (some of) our dance troupe, Invoketress, dancing our interpretation of the story of Lillith to Apocalyptica’s cover of Metallica’s “One”. We performed last weekend at the Bellydance Bizarre, hosted by DownHips of Cambridge. What a fantastic show: all the dancers bring their most funny/weird/creepy numbers to the [...]

E the Toddler has sent his first text messages. He sent Sean “Zkqbb”, “Dearer set” (the iPhone even translates baby typing sometimes), “Mnnnnjjjmm Mmllel”, and “HalzxErZzkqwqatmb”. Then he sent my friend “U W c. Ymmjolllpl”. He is really trying to give kisses to the cats. They don’t want them, but it’s still cute to see [...]

I’ve been helped to understand a significant truth. I’ve noticed the craze of “silly bands” – as a teacher, I can’t avoid them. For those of you who are not between the ages of six and twelve, they’re stretchy bracelets that form different shapes when relaxed, in all different colours. (Like the 2010 version of [...]

Sean and I are giving our digestive systems a break this week. Sean has been reading the famous book Skinny Bastard, guy version (complete with swearing and other locker-room lingo) of the even-more-famous book Skinny Bitch. It’s all about how you have to shape up and eat right if you want to be fit, so [...]

It was a busy weekend, in which I had considerable reason to think about the way people’s minds work. I think we all have those times when we are bitter about something, and we’ve all hung on to things longer than we should have. Like, for example, I still get righteously angry when I think [...]

The staff at our school is working on making kids better mathematicians by teaching them to reflect on their processes. In one Grade 1 class, the teacher gave the children a simple exercise: you have 8 goldfish to distribute into 3 bowls. Draw them in the bowls. The children had to say how they knew [...]

Last week I talked with my Grade 2 class about Thanksgiving and the things we’re grateful for. I was rather disappointed. My school is populated mostly with children who are well-fed, well-dressed, and very well looked after. These kids were like, “Um, je dis merci pour mon Nintendo DSI…” So I told them about how [...]

It was actually Friday that my baby boy turned sixteen months old… and he’s getting less like a baby every day. Sorry for the wait – I know it’s been a long time since the last Toddler Tracks. It’s been a busy weekend, including the lovely wedding of my sister-in-law, coinciding with our first true [...]

This month’s GGG book, chosen by the oft-mentioned Skye ( ) was The Year of Living Biblically, by A.J. Jacobs. Skye picked it because she had read The Know-It-All by the same author and loved it. Not all the gals who made it to the meeting had finished the book, but we were all able [...]