The chilly season is upon us and I have six active outdoorsy kiddos to keep warm, cozy and stylin’. When they’re not hitting the slopes or playing hockey, my offspring can be found skating on our backyard ice rink or tobogganing around the neighbourhood. I don’t let a bit of cold weather keep us inside. So how do I keep them out in the winter wonderland as long as humanly possible? These are my top picks for winter gear this season:

Snowsuits:

Getting a cool photo of a big family can be challenging at best, impossible at worst. I walked out of a photo shoot once, before the camera lens cap even came off. Recently inspired by a very cool photo of blogging friend Christine Young and her children, I felt up to the photo challenge. Seeing her photo made me scream “I want one too!”

At last count, I had been asked 1023 times for my opinion on the latest Duggar family announcement. Looks like Mama Duggar is expecting baby #20, and I am happy to comment on that news—the only caveat being that I have never actually watched the show, nor have I ever read an article about them.  However, I don’t live under a rock and have certainly been exposed to the chatter on Facebook and Twitter. There are a lot of opinions flying around about this biggie-sized family, so I’m happy to contribute my $0.02 worth to the discussion.

Generally, I think of toys as clutter. They take up valuable real estate in my house but rarely get played with. However, I have to admit that I feel a little giddy when I get my hands on a good educational toy. After hearing some recent buzz about the VTech InnoTab, I was left a bit curious. When I was given the opportunity to check out this product and share my experiences with this handy little gadget, I jumped at it. The InnoTab is a multimedia educational tablet for children aged 4 – 9.

I think it’s fair to say there are a lot of toys that annoy me. Maybe it’s because I have a basement full of toys no one plays with. The train set and a few other things manage to get some love, but for the most part it all looks like junk to me. I don’t even know how it happened. My kids get very few birthday presents and I’m certain at least a couple of my kids have never stepped foot in a toy store.

I was at a party several years ago and got talking to a man whose children were school-aged. At the time, I was knee deep in babyhood – three kids, all in diapers. The man was recounting his young son’s sporting conquests. By the sounds of things, he had quite a little athlete on his hands. It was a lovely chit-chat until he said something I found very disturbing – he commented that, as the father of the most valuable player, he enjoyed watching the games more than the parents of the other players.

My two girls with Glen Bernard Camp Assistant Director, Megan

I’ve previously mentioned that I’m not a big fan of throwing birthday parties for kids. Don’t get me wrong – I like the kids to have fun and it’s a day worth celebrating, but organizing the event doesn’t really float my boat.

Clearly, when you have six kids, there is no avoiding it. At last count, I’ve thrown 41 of the stinkin’ things. Recently our friends at the Marilyn Denis Show reached out to me looking for my tips and tricks when it comes to throwing a fun summer birthday party.

My father died in December. He had spent the last several years very unwell, and my mother spent a lot of her time taking care of him. That is a difficult situation for any family, but it is even more difficult when the person you are caring for continuously makes choices that contribute to their bad health. And so, although he was a loved man, the result was a team of fairly frustrated family members.

As parents, we all have different levels of comfort when it comes to safety. I’ve spoken about how I don’t care if my kids swim in polluted waters, climb trees or go on unsupervised adventures around the neighbourhood. However, my fear of choking has meant that they have never had a hard candy in their lives. Nope, not even a Lifesaver.

I was having some fun on Twitter chatting with some other mamas about how we came up with our kids’ names.

I told my friend, Emma Waverman, about my daughter Jessamy, who shares her name with a character in a children’s novel. Wikipedia describes the book thus: “Jessamy (1967) by Barbara Sleigh is a children's book that sheds light on English life during World War I through a time slip narrative.”

Being a good neighbour is really important to me for various reasons.

When people learn that I have six kids, I first administer the smelling salts then respond to the question they always ask: did I come from a big family myself.

A couple of weeks ago we took our kids skiing. It’s a bit of a chore really. Daddy-o and I basically spent the morning bickering, snapping and barking orders – at each other and at the kids. Trying to get five kids on the slopes while juggling a toddler is no easy feat.
Once everyone was on the hills and skiing happily off into the sunset came my sigh of relief and the question I occasionally ask myself: is it worth it?

When I posted my last blog about the “meanie at the mall”, I was shocked by how many mamas had experienced the exact same thing. That encounter was a first for me – never before had I been so openly criticized by a complete stranger. I certainly get some funny looks when I’m out with my crew, but never has it been the stink eye (that I have noticed, anyway!)

I took my three youngest kids for lunch at the food court in the local mall the other day. My toddler had a meltdown and was doing the high-pitched scream. Yeah, you know the sound.