Parents in the Capital : Lara K

Ottawa has some wonderful bloggers and we are lucky that many of them are Kids in the Capital contributors and readers! We want to share some of our favorite Ottawa parent bloggers on a more regular basis so we have introduced a series of posts called Parents in the Capital. Say hello to Lara!

1. Tell us about yourself and your family (please include a photo if you’d like)

My name is Lara, I am a mom to a 3 year old "with heart" and a healthy 17 month old, who thinks she's 3!  Stinky Monkey has two heart conditions and has had one open-heart surgery.  After a rough first year in and out of hospital he is now stable, growing and doing things all other 3 year olds do.  Having a healthy baby, Bella Bear, was life altering and scarier than having a cardiac kid!  Before I had Bella Bear I was on a very driven career path, I've taken a step back on returning to work this time around to give myself, my knowledge base and most importantly, my family the attention they deserve.  My interests are volunteering with/for other cardiac families, shopping (helping the economy), and giving my kids the best opportunities and lives possible!

2. What is your favourite activity to do with your kid(s) in Ottawa?

The experimental farm is a family favorite for us.  Going early in the morning, packing a picnic and watching the kids explore the animals and amazing play structure ensures lots of great pictures and happy memories!  Also, Stinky Monkey is obsessed with tractors.

3. What is your favourite at home activity to do with your kid(s)?

Swimming, we put a pool in after Stinky Monkey was born, we knew travel would be limited so we invested in a heated, saltwater pool.  We can all keep cool, get exercise and are close to home!  We love to entertain and enjoy watching all the kids have a great time on hot, sticky Ottawa summer days.

4. What was the biggest surprise that parenthood has brought into your life? The source of strength and confidence I have gained. And both my kids are inspirations to me, they teach me to live more authentically, more real and more in the present.

5. What parenting tips/advice do you wish you'd known when you first became a parent?

That is a really hard question for me to answer because my experience becoming a parent was so different.  I suppose I would have like to have known before I had kids how little sleep the human body actually needs to survive and still function!

6. Tell us about your blog and how you discovered blogging.

I discovered blogging through friends (thank you Lara Wellman) that inspired me by their ability to use social media to share their stories and unique lives!

I had the best of intentions to blog regularly when I returned to work, but that hasn't happened.  www.ParentingwithHeart.blogspot.com was meant for two things;

1. To keep family/friends informed of how things were going with the kids, it gives me a space to provide status updates.
2. As a place to provide other cardiac families with our story of how we are raising a kid "with heart" because our parenting is different, our issues are sometimes different.

7. What do you love best about being a parent in Ottawa?

The number of museums and kid-friendly spaces where we can explore, learn and socialize with so many others in the community.  I am also really appreciative of having CHEO and a great medical community so close to home, I know my kids, if and when they need it, can access great care.

Thanks Lara!

Flash back : Canada Day craft

We have so many great posts that have gone up that are still relevant so we're bringing some back from time to time. Here's a great Canada Day craft from Sara. by Sara

Now that my four-year old is done preschool for the year I am in craft-planning mode.  I work from home, which means there is a 2 hour window every afternoon that I need to fill when I work and he needs to be kept busy.

We like to decorate our house for all of the holidays and celebrations so our craft yesterday was a Canada flag.  I chose it because aside from sketching out the side bars and his hand (as the maple leaf) it required minimal mom intervention.  We used red paint but it can also be done with crayons, markers, or finger paint, for the younger kids.

1.  Outline the Canada flag on a large piece of white paper.  The outline of a hand makes a great maple leaf!

2.  Cover your table or art space, especially if its new (like our table) and you don’t want red paint everywhere (which I don’t).  Our dining room table is still wearing its badge of green honour from our St. Patrick’s day craft.

3.  Fill in the red spaces with paint, glitter glue, tissue paper, markers, crayons, red stickers, red feathers, or construction paper.

4.  Hang in a place of prominence for all to admire.

Happy Canada Day!

Sara is mom to a 4-year-old firefighter and 2-year-old monkey.  You can find her at her blog, My Points of View

Canada Day with Airplanes

by Alison One of our favourite places to spend Canada Day is at the Canada Aviation and Space Museum. It's open from 9 am to 5 pm and admission is free. There's plenty of free parking and also overflow parking at the Rockcliffe Flying Club, with a free shuttle.

There are various activities and crafts inside and outside the museum, but the good thing is there's a lot of space so it doesn't feel crowded. We enjoyed touring the Museum Storage Hangar and chatting with the volunteers involved in the aircraft restoration. Some were great at explaining details in a way that everyone understood. There was also a band playing in the hangar, with a shady place to stand and listen or dance along.

When we went two years ago, there was also a Citizenship Ceremony in the morning. I found it quite moving but my daughter was more interested in the cupcakes and juice boxes, which were offered to all museum goers. This year, the Citizenship Ceremony does not appear on the events ( http://www.aviation.technomuses.ca/visit_us/at_the_museum/events/canada_day/.)

The vintage aircraft demonstrations were a nice opportunity to relax on the grounds. There's also the possibility of a Snowbirds fly-by. I'd recommend packing a picnic and blanket to fully enjoy the museum's offerings.

Alison is a mom of two energetic children, ages 5 and 1. She just started a blog, Ali’s Adventures.

Summer of Awesome: Canada Day

by Lynn

We'll be kicking off our Summer of Awesome tour this year with Canada Day festivities on Friday. Usually I like to blog about activities after we've already done them, so I can speak with some degree of authority and confidence. But since a post about Canada Day would be kind of silly to put up next week - "Thanks a lot Lynn, I'm sure this info will really come in handy in 360 days, if I can find it again" - I'm flying blind, winging it, throwing it all out there in advance of actually doing it.

If you live in the suburbs of Ottawa, you can have a really good time on Canada Day and avoid the whole crazy transportation nightmare by celebrating close to home. There's Canada Day in Kanata, Canada Day in Barrhaven, and Canada Day in Orleans to choose from. All offer super kid-friendly activities, like bouncy castles, kids' musicians, face painting, and yummy treat foods. There's even a midway (sadly, not free) in Kanata. If you have slightly older kids, you can stay for the evening concerts, featuring SLOAN (one of my most favourite bands EVAH) in Kanata, The Lincolns in Barrhaven, and The Drew Nelson Blues Band in Orleans, followed in all three places by fireworks.

But if you do want to gamble with your life, live on the edge, look death in the face AND LAUGH, there's always downtown.

Image courtesy of Canada's Snowbirds.)

This is our first year ever taking the kids downtown - my husband and I haven't been to the Hill for Canada Day ourselves in over 10 years. Here's our survival plan.

First of all, we have to get there. Driving is insane - getting in and out of downtown is bad enough, but finding parking will take you all day long. It's especially worse this year because the Royal Couple (tm) will be in town, meaning that many more roads than usual will be closed. You can check out the road closures here but basically they could just replace this map with a big flashing sign that says "DO NOT DRIVE DOWNTOWN ON CANADA DAY" and be done with it. If you have no choice but to drive, come very, very early, and try for parking at the Rideau Centre or in the market. But be prepared to walk in from a ways off (not to mention the fact that the farther you park your car, the less traffic you'll have to deal with on your way out).

We're personally planning on taking the bus. I've heard from our neighbours that the buses get full. As in, packed buses racing right by you, one after the other. So we're actually planning on driving out a bit, closer to the terminus of the major bus lines, so we can hopefully get on the bus early enough in its route to avoid the overcrowding. Since we'll be bringing a stroller, a packed lunch for TEN people, and all the usual supplies we need for a day out with the kids, I expect to get a lot of dirty looks on the bus. As long as we don't get into any knife fights, I'm up for it.

Assuming we make it downtown, what is there to see? On the Hill itself, there will be a morning show starting at 9 a.m. (including The Changing of the Guard, which my kids declared to be the most boring thing EVER last year, so this one is definitely for the older, more appreciative crowd), another concert/show at noon (with the Snowbirds going overhead, prepare any little ears for the shock), then the evening show begins at 7 p.m. I just found out that Jian Ghomeshi will be one of the co-hosts of the evening show.

He's my radio boyfriend, so be sure to say hi for me, since we'll be giving the Hill a pass in general. With our super young kids, it's too crowded and they don't have the patience to sit and watch a show, but older kids and teens will probably love the people, the music (Great Big Sea will be playing both at noon and in the evening), and the general feeling of sharing in Canadian pride.

If you're a royal watcher, the young couple will be traveling in an open carriage from Rideau Hall to Parliament Hill between 11:30 and 12pm, then staying on the Hill to watch the midday show. I hear the Prince will be giving a little talk around 1:15 and then they'll do a bit of a walkaround and hand shake around 1:45. If you want to touch the Princess, oh man, I can't even imagine how early you'll have to get there. But how AWESOME would that be for a little girl who loves princesses? It's a toss up - if you brave this one, be sure to tell me all about it.

Most of the action for little kids is over at Major's Hill Park, and across the river at Jacques Cartier Park. Both are open from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. (when the fireworks begin) and feature plenty for your wee ones to enjoy. Major's Hill features a stage with bands and dancing performances all day, a display about the history of basketball, and lots of really good food. I read somewhere that there will also be a big screen where you can watch the noon show, featuring close-ups of the Prince and Princess, so if the Hill is just too much you might want to catch them on video. Jacques Cartier Park is where the big fun is - things like jumping castles and crafts, a kite flying demonstration (SO COOL), tons of fun and silly kids performers, and the International Village, featuring instruments and homes from around the world.

There's a free shuttle bus that travels between the two parks, stopping just outside each one. They run often, but there are line-ups, so if you're feeling spry you can also walk across the bridge. More info on the shuttles is at the bottom of this page.

If you need a break in the middle of the day, the National Art Gallery has free admission on Canada Day and might be a nice place to cool off and sit down. If you do manage to make it to the end of the evening, remember that OC Transpo buses are free after 10 p.m., so be sure to use them to get home safely. Watch out for the stroller-related glares, though.

Our plan is to get in (we're budgeting 1 1/2 hours travel time), see the parks, maybe the art gallery, eat our picnic lunch, and then get out before dinner. But if you don't hear from us, send help - preferably a nice open carriage with a Prince and Princess inside.

Lynn is mom to three tombliboos and blogs over at Turtlehead.

Reading books at Rosemount Library

by Brie My four year old and I have been making weekly visits to the Rosemount Library before her art class and it has quickly become my favorite library!

The Rosemount library is in a lovely old building, one of the Carnegi libraries. At first I was surprised by how small the library is, especially the children's section, but I have come to love that. I feel like it is much easier to search through the books when I'm not overwhelmed by choice. It is also easy to sneak around the corner from the children's section into the adult section and grab a few books for myself while still keeping an eye on the girl.

There is a small play area for younger kids with puzzles and toys. The only complaint, and I am stretching here, is that it would be great if more seating could be fit into the small space. But the girl really doesn't mind. She is happy to sit on the floor and read her books.

I don't know if it is because of the small size of the library, but I have had some great luck findig some interesting kids' books as I search through the stacks. Here are three of my favorite.

A book by Mordicai Gerstein had me laughing as I turned the pages. I loved the story about the girl that lives in a book trying to figure out what her story is and isn't.

Dust Devil is a perfect tall tale. It chronicles the advertentures of  giant Angelica in her new home of Montana. And the illustrations are captivating.

Look! Look! Look! is the story of three mice and what happens when they discover a postcard sent to the big people that live in their house. It is a great introduction to the colours and shapes found in art.

Do you have a favorite library in Ottawa?

Brie is the mom of a 4 year old daughter “the girl” and 2 old son “the boy”. You can read her blog at Capital Mom.