life | hello world // love, the watsons

Made you look. Watson number 3 is not on the way. But, this past Saturday marks 9 months that we’ve been here in Vancouver.

9 months ago Theo was 8 months old, and Ev was still in diapers. We knew no one, and spent many of those first few weeks out and about in the mist by ourselves, exploring our new neighborhood. And although it looks as if the rain is beginning to come and settle in once more, we were lucky enough to have experienced a gorgeous, humidity-free Vancouver summer.

If you’ve seen any of my Instagrams or Facebook posts or tweets, you would know that, for the vast majority of our time spent here, we have loved it. We have missed our family and friends and familiarity, and the rain in the earlier part of the year made me want to scratch my eyeballs, but we have come to love this place. You’re probably actually sick of hearing it by now.

Speaking of rain, about a week and a half ago it started up again. Although it is something to get used to, a second time around, as long as we have our boots, umbrellas and rain cover for the stroller, it’s not too bad. I’ll confess it’s not my favorite. I love being outside. I even love grey skies and boots over skinny jeans and seeing my breathe all wispy in the air, I can deal with the overcast skies…but the rain puts a damper on all of that. Everything just seems harder and more laborious with the rain. But, despite all that, the rain is familiar.

It’s probably one of the more familiar things about Vancouver at this point. A lot of things, up until now, have been new. It’s been a season of firsts. Of course, after 9 months we’ve been to the same park more than once and things like that, but in a way the rain is bringing us around full circle. We started 2012 and our time here in Van City in the rain, and we’re ending this year in it again. It’s almost a sense of solidarity with the city, a feeling of, ‘we’ve made it.’ 9 months in one place is the longest we’ve stayed put in the last 3 years I think. It feels nice to feel somewhat settled.

Who knows what the next 9 months will bring. I pray joy and contentment and health and all good things. But who knows. I’ll still miss my family and wish I was there for all the birthdays and dinners and day to day life that I’m sad to miss out on, but for now I’m just happy that a little familiarity is starting to settle in. And I’m even more happy I don’t have to pack a moving truck.

Finally getting back to my blog! I wrote this post while Matt was gone last week, about our little adventure in Charleson Park, a quick 3 block walk from our building…

The days have been quietly slipping away as Matt has been gone since Tuesday now. We still have a large chunk of time before he gets back, but so far it’s not been so bad. We’ve been exploring the city a bit, but ironically so I’m already finding myself comfortable within “our” spots, stores and sidewalks. I don’t plan on it staying like this though, there is too much to see. I just laugh a little as I see myself fall into the patterns I’ve always fallen into: veering away from things that are different, new, scary. We truly are creatures of habit (at least I am!). At the same time I realize I need to give myself a little bit of time to just get acclimated. I think I’ve had a good amount of change the last few weeks…

I hate not blogging and recording more consistently when a lot is going on, there’s so much to remember and record—but that’s exactly why I haven’t, because a lot is going on! But as I have at least the next foreseeable moments ahead of me to just sit and think about the last two weeks or so, I’m sure it will come back…

One thing in particular I’ve been so impacted by is the friendliness of strangers. I’ve mentioned it before, but numerous times I’ve been pleasantly surprised to find that people don’t mind just talking with me, even as they don’t know me. Every time they’ve been interested that I’m here only a few weeks, from the US with my family because of Matt’s signing. They are eager to help and point out local things I need to check out and do with the kids. It honestly and truly brightens my day, as recently I’ve not had much adult interaction other than gritting my teeth at the checkout person as the kids squirm to be free.

Which I feel like the kids are doing a lot of lately. I’m not sure if it’s the size of our apartment or our lack of toys as we left everything in MD, but they just seem couped up. I really don’t know why since we walk literally everywhere (except for Ikea where I have gone a bit crazy). Maybe it’s the adjustment for them too. Although they are kids, I’m sure they know things are different.

On a particularly long day this past Monday, after a particularly rainy weekend, as the kids were about to drive me insane, the skies stopped spitting on us and I knew I had to do something with them. So off we went to Charleson Park. Or I went in general direction of the park. I didn’t actually know where the entrance was. So I found myself with my double stroller, one kid strapped in and one roaming free as the traffic whizzed by us on 6^th Avenue. In hindsight, 7^th Avenue would’ve been a much better choice.

The steeply inclined dirt hill without a stroller would’ve been barely doable, but for some reason I decided to try it out anyways. I honestly don’t know what I was thinking, especially since I was in visible view of the road and people in their cars would clearly be able to witness my error in judgment by pushing my kid up a mountain while my two year old braved it on her own. So up we went…and about halfway there I knew I had made a really bad decision as the stroller started nosing back down. Evelyn had veered off to my left and was panicking as she attempted to scale some rocks. Luckily she pulled herself together and made it to the top unscathed. I on the other hand was still stuck. I refused to look down at the cars as I knew they were wondering what nut job would do such a thing. Instead of fighting gravity, I went with her and hoped Theo would survive the bumpy ride down…jokes, jokes. I did, however, go with gravity and turn the stroller so that it was facing down the hill. I put it in the locked position, and got Theo out so I could just walk him up the rest of the way. I then faced the dilemma of leaving my 2 year old to watch my 9 month old so I could get the stroller. Luckily the stroller was not far, but still, we were at the top of a hill. I plopped Theo down, planted Evelyn next to him, and told her to squeeze him and DON’T LET HIM CRAWL AWAY FROM YOU. Knowing how she loves to be in control of her little brother, I knew she’d take this task very seriously. She didn’t disappoint as she proceeded to grab his neck in a headlock hold, that booger wasn’t getting away from her.

So, we made it out unscathed. We went on to discover a beautiful and large park complete with trees and trails that eventually led to the water and lots of open space to run around. There is even a great playground for Evelyn, and swings for Theo, which make him giggle. What’s best though, is the view. The view across the water is spectacular. Bridges and loads of sailboats in one direction with high rises in the background, and to another direction is BC Stadium with the mountains behind it. I think it’ll be best if I just show you. And, on our way out, we made sure to take the bridge on 7^th Ave. Hindsight’s a bitch sometimes, ain’t it? At least it made for a good story.

Enjoy…

She loves the elevator in our building. It’s like the highlight of her day to push the buttons and guess which door is going to open.