Of Timelines, Tonsils and Triumphs...

It’s a bitterly cold Friday with another night of -30° C with the wind chill. I’m pretty sure that’s close to zero °F. It’s been another hectic week with little time to blog and I somehow feel more out of touch with myself for not having anchored my thoughts in entries.

Erin had to do a timeline project of her life thus far for French class. It was amazing how many things she found as highlights in her vast almost 12 years of life... from first steps and words to finding out this week that she won the Legion’s Remembrance Day essay contest for School District 2 again this year.

One of the primary sources for Erin’s timeline project was digging through some of my journals to double-check dates and facts. One of the reasons that I love to keep a journal is because my thoughts and experiences are anchored to those pages in time and far less subjective that memories. It was quite amazing to look back at the wide variety of freelance things that I did before cross stitch really took off and how I am moving back to many of them once again a dozen years later. Maybe there is something to the 12 year cycle of the Chinese Zodiac!

I’ve really enjoyed speaking at the schools this month about being an illustrator. My last scheduled appearance is this Monday at Havelock Elementary about 20 minutes from Moncton. My only worry is that I seem to be coming down with another throat or sinus infection because I’ve been losing my voice all afternoon. I’m actually wondering if maybe the last sinus infection that Bethany and I had over the Christmas holidays didn’t quite clear up with the antibiotic... because we’ve both been sniffling again for about a week and then yesterday I started to feel awful again. At least one of the best things about working from home is that I can put on my big fuzzy sweater, sit a box of kleenex beside the computer with a mug of something hot and just honk or hack my way through the day. It also guarantees that no one else will want to touch the germy keyboard of my Mac!!

Erin’s Guide Camp this weekend was canceled because of the cold and the fact that one of her leaders has an elderly mother who is in the hospital, so she’ll have time to finish off her other project. Her week ended on a very high note today as a letter arrived in the mail from the Provincial headquarters for the Legion congratulating her on winning the essay contest for the entire province of New Brunswick again this year. The local branch forwarded the winning essays on to Fredericton and now her essay will now go on to the National level! The cheque that came with the certificate and letter is safely deposited in her savings account towards University and she is hoping again that this time her essay will win for the entire country. Ah, the confidence of youth... or maybe she inherited the ability to dream big!?!

I think an early night and a bit of dreaming is just what this dragon needs!