Tag Archives: Toronto

Follow The Yellow Brick Road

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This weekend I saw the all-Canadian new production of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Wizard of Oz presented by Mirvish Productions.

Based on the 1900 children’s novel, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz written by L. Frank Baum, this production is heavily influenced by the 1939 MGM motion picture starring Judy Garland but with a few surprises and a modern take on some of the classic songs that are instantly recognizable from the first note.

Danielle Wade, the winner of the CBC’s reality show Over the Rainbow holds her own in the spotlight with veteran Canadian performers and delivers a rendition of Over the Rainbow that will leave you with goosebumps.  Wade, voted Canada’s Dorothy, after several weeks of competition proves that she has what it takes to take top billing.

Lisa Horner who plays Miss Gulch and The Wicked Witch of the West is nothing short of captivating and when she takes the stage, your eyes will look at nothing but her.

Aside from knock-out performances given by the entire cast, The Wizard of Oz is a visual spectacle from the moment Glinda’s glittering dress graces the stage to the whirl of green shimmer and sparkle that create The Emerald City.

For more information about the show, visit Mirvish and be sure to follow, follow, follow, follow, follow the yellow brick road all the way to the Ed Mirvish Theatre at 244 Victoria St. in Toronto, Ontario.

What was your favourite part of the Wizard of Oz?  Was it Dorothy’s ruby red slippers?  Of the evil flying monkeys?  Have you see this production and if so, what was so memorable about if for you?

image courtesy of Spec.com

Danforth East Pops Up!

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I live in the east end of the city, close to the Danforth, but not the part of the Danforth known as Greektown. No, we’re further east, beyond the reach of Starbucks, in a (so the lingo goes) gentrifying part of town: Danforth East.

It’s a great place to raise a family, as it has all the community amenities that one could want: a great library, good schools, local sports facilities, and a vibrant community-run farmers’ market in East Lynn Park.  However, if you were to walk along our stretch of the Danforth, you’d probably be less than inclined to stay and find out what the neighbourhood is about, given the number of papered-over storefronts that line the street between Coxwell and Woodbine.  There are fantastic independently-run businesses in the area deserving of foot traffic, (I’m looking at you, Better Bulk, Royal Beef, and Silly Goose Kids ) but with so many For Lease signs in windows, the whole area has the appearance of being down and out:  those empty storefronts make you want to go elsewhere.

Enter the Danforth East Community Association (DECA) and their Renew East Danforth Pop-Up Stores Project. Modeled after a successful similar project in Newcastle, Australia, the Pop-Up Stores project links building owners with potential short-term tenants. DECA volunteers paint and ready the stores for the tenants, and landlords donate their empty premises for a short period to entrepreneurs looking to get their feet wet in the world of retailing. After a successful pilot this fall, DECA has organized a full-month of Pop-up stores  – nine shops in six storefronts — in anticipation of the holiday season.

The Toronto Star’s Catherine Porter, who is also one of the project’s organizers, wrote a great article recently about the project’s genesis and aims:  take a look!

It’s a great project with a smart bottom line: if you want to revitalize an area, you need to make it vital for people to come.   By creating foot traffic on the street, DECA is creating buzz  and turning the Danforth East into a destination.  Newcastle, Australia saw a complete turn-around of its downtown business district in three short years. Here’s hoping the Renew East Danforth Pop-Up Stores Project can do the same here.

For more information about the Pop-Up  Stores Project and the artists, entrepreneurs and creative minds who will be setting up shop, click here.

Buy local this holiday season, and pay us a visit out east. I think you’ll be glad you did.

Curing the Nature Deficit

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July 1, 2012: Milkman’s Lane, Yellow Creek Ravine, Mud Creek Ravine, Don Valley Brickworks.

In his book Accidental City, Robert Fulford wrote about Toronto’s ravines:

The ravines are to Toronto what canals are to Venice and hills are to San Francisco. They are the heart of the city’s emotional geography, and understanding Toronto requires an understanding of the ravines.

If you’re not familiar with Toronto’s ravine system, I recommend the blog, Toronto Ravines and Trails with Abbey. It’s the personal blog of a Toronto father who has chronicled his adventures exploring Toronto’s ravines with his five-year old daughter.  Of course, if you have a literary bent, there’s always Margaret Atwood‘s Cat’s Eye to read,  in which Toronto’s ravines figure prominently.

Walking in Toronto’s ravines has become a Canada Day ritual for us, those years when we can’t get out of the city (read: most years). There is nothing like an amble along a sun-dappled trail to get the imagination flowing. Not five steps on to Milkman’s Lane, and the boys had launched into a new game of their own devising, which continued, unabated, until they finally stopped to smell (or water) the roses at the Evergreen Brickworks, our destination of the day:

P.S.: We’re wishing our American readers, family and friends a very happy, relaxing and restorative Fourth of July.  Whether you spend the day in a ravine, at a beach, at a barbeque or just in the company of people you love, we hope today is a good one.

Raskullz

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Something I am loving this spring is my son’s Raskullz bike helmet.  The boys wear their helmets pretty much all spring and summer, and Raskullz offers a fun alternative to the traditional style.

Styles range from princesses and ladybugs to sharks and gorillas.

If you see a red mohawk with a skull and crossbones emblazoned on the side, barreling down the street on a bike, chances are that he belongs to me.  Every crazy bone of him.

Ps – I received no compensation for recommending Raskullz but should they wish to, they know where to find me.

photo courtesy of: http://www.raskullz.com

Tying the Apron Strings Tightly

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My kids are over-protected. I’m over-protective. And only slightly apologetic about it.

There. I’ve said it. And I won’t lie: there’s a part of me that winces when I tell you that we often allow our kids to play outside of our house with other kids, more or less unsupervised. What if someone reads this blog post, figures out where we live, and then lies in wait for my children to walk out the door, and then goes and snatches one of them? I’ve spent my whole life practicing the memorization of licence plate numbers just in case someone I love is ever abducted in a car, and I count my complete inability – to this day – to remember a licence plate as a portend of doom.

What could I have to do that could be more important than watching over them? Some days, I wonder how I let them out the door in the morning. What if they fall down those impossibly wide old stairs at school? They’re nine and seven, and still I worry about them eating a snack at recess: what if one of them chokes? Will their friends have the presence of mind to call a teacher? Do any of their buddies know the Heimlich manoever?

It’s crazy. And I know it’s crazy. And I keep my crazy mostly under wraps, hidden from view, because I know my crazy does my children no good. In every other part of their lives, I believe in allowing them to explore, test, and ultimately, to fail.  I do try to push them out of their (my?) comfort zones, but they’re not going anywhere; my nine year old won’t even walk half a block to mail a letter without me.

I’m not entirely sad about that.

I’ve tried to figure out where this irrational over-protectiveness comes from, but the only comforting thought I have is that there’s strength in numbers. I’m not the only one locking the doors constantly. Being overprotective has become a sign of “good” parenting, like feeding your children only organic veggies and demanding copies of their grade’s curriculum so that you can monitor your child’s daily progress toward their Expected Learning Outcomes.

We monitor our children’s every move during the day, but that doesn’t stop each and every one of us from lamenting the loss of freedom that we had when we were children. We live in cities that are considerably safer than when we were little. So what in the hell are we afraid of?

Nuclear proliferation. Watergate. Distrust of institutions. Energy Crisis. Hostage takings. Hijackings. Three Mile Island. Bhopal.

Ah yes. I was a child of the 1970s and 1980s. Half of our parents were divorced (a statistic, by the way, that hasn’t held true since the early 1980s, but I digress). We were educated by ABC After-school Specials, with episodes entitled things like “My Dad Lives in a Hotel” and “Which Mother is Mine?” In public school, I had a friend who was expected to be out of the house until dinner. Not that she had anywhere to go; it was just that her mom worked all day, and she wanted some quiet time when she got home. So when I went to their house, we played outside until six or seven at night. In January.

Can you imagine that now?

I read somewhere that Generation X went through its formative years as the least-parented generation in history (which may be news to the generations of children who were sent out to work before they were ten, but you get my point).  And while I feel obliged to include here that I was not under-parented myself (just because my parents were divorced doesn’t mean I didn’t spend a lot of time with my grandparents, thank you), I knew a whole lot of kids who were. And I bet every last one of them is trying to keep their kids safe from whatever boogeyman of uncertainty and insecurity haunted them in their childhoods.

So as a card-carrying member of Generation X, you’d think I’d just get myself into therapy – like everyone else – and get on with it. Why not try and push my kids to be more independent? But then I think of Sharin Morningstar Keenan, abducted from a playground when she was nine, in 1983. She was younger than me, but familiar; I remember, when she went missing, seeing her father on television, pleading for her return, and realizing that I recognized him: Sharin had her music lesson right after me on Saturday mornings. I still think of her, remember myself lying in my orange-wallpapered bedroom, listening to the news on the radio, and being so afraid: not for my own safety — I was streetproofed beyond measure — but because such evil existed in the world and I was helpless to do anything about it. I know, now, that most abductions of children are by people they know — most abuse is perpetrated by people that children know and trust — but that’s not the evil that frightened me most.

And I think that I’ve been given no greater gift than my children. If the kids of my generation turned out to be okay, so often cut loose, then I have to hope that our children will turn out all right for having been held onto a bit tighter than may be strictly necessary.

How I Know That I Am Getting Older

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A few weeks ago we went out for a fancy schmancy dinner to celebrate a friend’s birthday.  It became clear to me that regardless of how young we feel that we have all stopped checking the 25-29 box.

Tequila shooters, Broken Down Golf Carts and Cement Mixers gave way to a full-bodied chianti and the conversation centered on work, kids, and biological clocks instead of hook-ups, student loans and wedding plans.

Everyone silently cheered that dinner was over before 11 pm so that we could all be home and in bed before the stroke of midnight.  We know there is no magic in being out past the stroke of midnight just brutally long mornings with whiney kids and/or clients.

While walking out of the restaurant we had to pass through the lobby bar.  It was brimming with so many scantily clad 20- somethings that when I looked down at what I was wearing, I felt like I was channeling my inner-Amish.

It wasn’t just the sartorial differences or the gaping abyss between sobriety and inebriation that reminded me that I am older more mature, it was the commentary from my friends:

“Wow, you can smell the desperation in here”.

 

“I think that girl forgot to put on her pants.  Oh look, apparently no one wears pants anymore.”

“What’s with the weird facial hair?  That guy needs to trim his side burns.”

Just a few days later, as I was listening to 90’s on 9, XM radio, each song a nostalgic trip down memory lane, it hit me.

I have officially become my parents: I listen to music that is 20 years old, and question the fashion choices of “youth”.

When did it strike you that you are not necessarily as “young as you feel”?

 

photo credit: bookrenter.com

 

The Great Kids Stuff Sale

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It’s that time again!  The North Toronto MOMS Group is hosting their bi-annual Great Kids Stuff Sale.  This large-scale mom-to-mom consignment sale benefits several charities in the Greater Toronto Area which is just one of the reasons that make this a must-check-out event.

The Fall sale proved to be a great score!  I picked up two bikes for $20, a pair of all-leather, never worn shoes for the baby for $5, an almost new GAP coat for $8 as well as a bag of clothes for less than $50.

It’s the perfect place to pick up baby gear for a fraction of the price.  Bumbos for $10, Bjorns for $20, strollers for a less than a third of the retail value!  There are mounds of clothing, stacks of books and so many toys that it could easily take hours to sort through it all.

Here are my insider tips for you:

-        Arrive early.  The doors open at 9 am and there is always a line-up.

-        Bring a large bag to carry around your finds.

-        Have a plan of what you are looking for.  The sale can be overwhelming so it’s better to know what you’re looking for before you get lost in the piles.

-        If you can, leave babies and kids at home as the sale can get crowded

-        Become a vendor!  Clear out the outgrown clothing and never played with toys that are cluttering up your home.  It’s not uncommon for vendors to make hundreds of dollars!

The sale is at a NEW LOCATION this year.

St. Clement’s Church

70 St. Clements Avenue (at Duplex)

Conveniently located between the Eglinton and the Lawrence subway stops.

Just check out the rows and rows of clothes!  Everything is organized by gender and size so finding what fits your little ones is much easier.  Shoes, formal wear, and outer wear are also separated so make sure you know what sizes you’re looking for!

It really is a sea of clothing!  The first two rows have bedding, receiving blankets and room decor.  It’s not uncommon to find the original price tags still on sheet sets.

Need a bouncy chair?  How about an extra one for the upstairs or grandma’s house?  For $15 or less, it’s hard to say no.

And you thought your toy room had lots of stuff!  Toys run the gamut from baby to six years old.  Games, puzzles, books, DVDs, – if your kid wants it, it’s here!

The Pursuit of Happiness?

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I seem to find advice on how to be happy everywhere I turn.  Magazines have entire monthly columns dedicated to attaining it and numerous blogs tout the pursuit of it.

For me, the pressure to be happy can be crushing and there are times, more than I would care to admit, that “be happy” is just one more line item for supermom to check off.  There it looms on the list: above “nutritious short order cook” and below “sultry sexpot”.

Being a mother has proved to be my life riddle.  One that I am struggling to figure out.

How is it that I feel so utterly lonely but at the same time crave solitude?

Why do I want time apart from my kids but once I am alone, I count the hours to when they return?

At the end of the day, I beat myself up and wonder what is that I accomplished today?  What use did I make of my two university degrees?

At the end of the day, I am amazed by the magnitude of what I have contributed to our society: three small boys, who are learning to be thoughtful, compassionate members of the community.

There are days when I am deliriously happy and days that I feel as though I am clawing my way out of a black hole.

Today I didn’t feel happiness.  I felt claustrophobic, torn apart, pushed beyond the limit of exhaustion.  As I write this, the boys are tucked into bed and not a minute too soon.  My patience now sags like a hyper extended elastic band.

Hard days come with the mothering territory and when I feel less than sure, it’s not to the experts that I turn.  I seek solace from those elbow to elbow with me in the trenches and Glennon Melton’s Don’t Carpe Diem tops my list.

Am I happy every day?  No.  Am I happy most days?  Yes, and that’s good enough for me.

Life’s not a glossy magazine, folks.  If it were, I’d have better hair.

 

photo credit: http://www.symbolset.org

The Eternal Optimism of the Backyard Gardener.

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In my mind, I am many things, most of which I won’t share. Because I won’t, so don’t ask.

Of all of those things, I can tell you that one of them is “gardener”. The appellation of “gardener” rests most uneasily, because it really not very true. In fact, it’s not true at all.  As much as I might want it to be the case, I’m really all sweet talk, no action when it comes to putting in a garden, maintaining it, weeding it and watering it. I want all the benefits but none of the work. I want to grow prize-winning tomatoes, but I’m too lazy to stake them. I weed sporadically, usually when I’m on the phone. The only remotely successful thing I’ve (correction: We’ve) ever grown were some green bean plants last summer, which provided us with more green beans than we knew that to do with (I lie: they got turned into pickled green beans and all was right with the world, but I digress). I’m still half-convinced that was a fluke.

Here’s what I do every spring: I always, ALWAYS start every growing season by making a grand plan for the garden. After I’ve decided what I’m going to grow, I fantasize about working in the garden with my boys, teaching them about varietals of flowers, showing them how to pick off the runners on tomato plants. We’ll plant three different types of peppers, twelve herbs, four types of tomatoes, some asparagus, and a full butterfly garden full of indigenous wild flowers. And of course,  it will all fit and grow under the branches of the very large tree in my backyard, whose canopy shades all but a three-by-two foot patch of clay-like soil right at the back of the yard beside where my neighbour keeps her garbage cans.  Won’t it?

Some time in June I’ll buy the best of what’s left at the local garden centre and haphazardly throw it into the soil. By August every year, I have to again face the fact that I’m not really any good at this gardening stuff. I mean, I like it. I know what I’m supposed to do to get the green shoots to keep growing and the pretty things to smell good. I’m just unrealistic about what I can achieve, underwhelmed by how much work I need to do to get even half-way there, and just a bit annoyed that gardening is actually, you know, work, and not just a way to get free tomatoes every night. But that hasn’t stopped me from starting to peruse the seed displays at our local Canadian Tire on my way to work and wondering whether we have enough room to grow watermelons.

A Spoon Full of Sugar

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Mary Poppins was one of my favourite movies when I was a child.  My mother had taped it onto a VHS cassette from the tv and I would watch it over and over, rewinding all of the commercials using the clunky remote that was tethered to the VCR with a chewed up black cord.

I watched it so many times that I knew which commercial was the final one in the 3 minute line-up and could release the fast forward button and cease the whirring of the tape with such finesse it begs the question why I wasn’t any good with Nintendo games.

When my older boys reached 3 and 4 years old, I showed them my beloved Mary Poppins –  the high-tech DVD, commercial-free version – and I eagerly anticipated the end of the movie so we could break out in a Von Trapp-esque rendition of A Spoon Full of Sugar.

Admittedly, the boys’ reaction to the movie was a little lackluster.  They didn’t really understand how Mary had all of this magic power and the tuppence lady sort of scared them.

However, when Mirvish announced that the Broadway show, Mary Poppins was coming to Toronto, I immediately ordered tickets.

I love live theatre and sit in awe of the talent that goes into producing such spectacles.

Everything from the detailed costumes to the eye-catching sets and the lighting was phenomenal.  Not to mention that the actors performed each high-energy musical number with such gusto is was nearly impossible to keep from tapping my toes.

The play deviates somewhat from the original story.   The transformation of Mr. Banks and the push for good-old fashion family values is even more lauded than the original movie but works nonetheless.

Of course, Mary Poppins lived up to every expectation that I had.  Her quick wit, and dazzling personality were just as I remembered.

But perhaps the best part of the performance was when Mary opened her black umbrella, clutched her carpetbag in one hand and flew up to the balcony an arm’s length from the boys.  The look on their faces was well worth the price of the ticket.

They were finally enchanted by Mary’s magic.

If you’re wanting to see Mary Poppins in Toronto, you’d better do so soon!  Mary Poppins leaves town January 8, 2012.  If you live in the U.S.A., Australia or Mexico City be sure to check the official website for when Mary will be visiting your city.

Do you like the image?  It’s available as a sticker or a t-shirt at www.redbubble.com.  Check them out -lots of great gift ideas.