Our Family Web Log - Announcements

Ideas for the Birthday Boy

nospam@example.com (Selena Middleton) — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 15:38:32 -0400

I thought I'd post a few birthday ideas for those who want to get Eme something that he needs:

money for Eme's RESP
outdoor, rubber soled (but flexible) shoes, size 4
rubber-soled sandals, size 4
indoor shoes/slippers, like Robeez, size 12-18 months
spring/summer/fall clothes in 12-18 months, including socks
warm pyjamas for the cottage, size 12-18 months
buckets and shovels, rakes or other sand toys
a wide-brim summer hat, size 12-18 month

Eme doesn't really need much, but most of these are things that we'll have to get for him if he isn't gifted them at his birthday get-together.

Two Weeks Till Term

nospam@example.com (Selena Middleton) — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 23:29:01 -0400

Ok, it's more like one week and three days until Emeth is full-term and can be born at home all safe-like, but I couldn't resist the alliteration in my post title.

Anyway! I post only to announce that I've come in just under the wire--the MRP is done and submitted, just one week and three days before Emeth could be born. And now I wait.

Maybe Tim has a nice picture to post here. I've heard from reputable sources that he's started taking pictures of stuffed animals in their underwear. I'm not sure if this is a wise career move.

Emeth Alessandro

nospam@example.com (Tim Middleton) — Sat, 30 Dec 2006 18:56:56 -0500

We finally made the announcement to the family Christmas afternoon: the baby's gender and name. We made them play a little game wherein we had printed each letter of the chosen name (first and middle) on a piece of paper in large, unique (sometimes confusing) fonts; all capital letters, with no space between the first and second name. We paged through these as fast as we could while everyone watched and tried to make out what it said.

Anne and Sandro weren't with us on Christmas, so it was quite lucky that it worked out, unplanned, that we met up with them a few days before Christmas. It was at their place that I actually printed out the letters for the game. We tried it on them. Sandro had a somewhat unfair advantage in that he recognised his own name immediately as it flipped by. Hilariously, it took Anne two more tries to get it; her patient husband, and now Emeth's-middle-namesake, sitting beside her the whole time waiting for her to figure it out. (It seems from the first few letters she got it into her head that it was a girl's name, so the "Alessandro" just didn't register with her.)

On Christmas afternoon, the rest of the family took about 3 tries to finally get it right as well, though many of them were very close from the start. Many of them noticed the "Sandro", but were not familiar with the full form of that name, which caused some confusion.

All in all, it was hopefully fun... or at least interesting... even if the traditional serendipity did not manage to make an explicit appearance. Actually, perhaps the serendipity was mine when Selena's mom asked what Emeth "meant" and I realised I had never even thought of this: suddenly, Selena announced that it means "Truth". I had not know that! Serendipitously, she recalled reading Lewis writing that to someone somewhere.

And, if you haven't got it yet, it's a boy!

As everyone knows, the name Istra Isabel was taken from C.S. Lewis' Till We Have Faces and Selena's Aunty Belle, respectively. In naming the one-on-the-way we decided to keep with this pattern of C.S. Lewis characters we admire joined up with a relative we admire.

We settled on a somewhat obscure (but theologically profound) character from the historically last book in the Chronicles of Narnia, The Last Battle, and we joined it up with the name of our brother-in-law. And with that we now await the birth of Emeth Alessandro.

Speaking of Selena, she wants to share the following passage from The Last Battle, to give some slight sense of the inspiration for the choice. The full story of Emeth can be found in chapter 10, and from the delightfully-wordy lips of Emeth himself taking up all of chapter 15 (and introduced in chapter 14). This is from towards the end of chapter 15:

[...] the Glorious One bent down his golden head and touched my [Emeth's] forehead with his tongue and said, Son, thou art welcome. But I said, Alas, Lord, I am no son of thine but the servant of Tash. He answered, Child, all the service thou hast done to Tash, I account as service done to me. Then by reasons of my great desire for wisdom and understanding, I overcame my fear and questioned the Glorious One and said, Lord, is it then true, as the Ape said, that thou and Tash are one? The Lion growled so that the earth shook (but his wrath was not against me) and said, It is false. Not beacause he and I are one, but because we are opposites. I take to me the services which thou hast done to him. For I and he are of such different kinds that no service which is vile can be done to me, and none which is not vile can be done to him. Therefore if any man swear by Tash and keep his oath for the oath's sake, it is by me that he has truly sworn, though he know it not, and it is I who reward him. And if any man do a cruelty in my name, then, though he says the name Aslan, it is Tash whom he serves and by Tash his deed is accepted. Dost thou understand, Child? I said, Lord, thou knowest how much I understand. But I said also (for the truth constrained me), Yet I have been seeking Tash all my days. Beloved, said the Glorious One, unless thy desire had been for me thou wouldst not have sought so long and so truly. For all find what they truly seek.

New Reflections

nospam@example.com (Tim Middleton) — Wed, 11 Oct 2006 22:09:51 -0400

I think the fact that Selena, for dinner tonight, made spaghetti with a "sauce" of frozen peas, peanut butter, onions, and apples, signals loud and clear that it can't be hidden much longer... move over Istra, number two is on the way!

"It's just something I made up out of my head," she says. Uh huh. (Actually, it was surprisingly not that bad!)

It was the occasion of Thanksgiving weekend two years ago that we dramatically (and confusingly, not to mention stutteringly) announced the impending (but far from named) Istra. We wanted to do the same this year, so we've been keeping quiet about this development for several months now. But somehow both of the anticipated Thanksgiving dinners (in Orillia, then the next day in Port Severn) just didn't work out announcement-wise. It's hard to explain; but it left us in a bit of a desperate situation. I ended up confessing to Sandro Sunday night, whilst hanging out alone with him around a small chilly camp fire. The next day Anne was informed by me blurting it through the window of their car as they drove off. Finally, fortuitously, much of Selena's closest family happened to stop by the cottage, as they were out doing a "Studio Tour" in the area... though it wasn't until they were heading to their car that Selena's mom casually reminisced that it was on Thanksgiving two years ago we announced Selena's pregnancy. With that Selena simply said: "And we we've been trying all weekend to announce I'm pregnant again, too!"

Aunty Belle didn't quite hear what she said. Gran was a bit confused by the phrasing. But soon it was clear enough to all. Except Selena had to rush to phone her sister as soon as we got home, before everyone else spilled it there.

Who knows, old hands that we are now, we may even be able to manage to name this one before it's a month old...

Weblog comments

nospam@example.com (Tim Middleton) — Fri, 03 Feb 2006 14:26:49 -0500

Last week (or the week before?) we got hit again by those painfully evil weblog comment spammers. It took some time to clean up the comments. This form of internet lice have programs that roam the net looking for web sites they can post their avertising to. They do not care what the site is, or how cute the baby pictures are on it. So for now we have turned on "comment moderation". This means that if you post a comment it will not show up immediately, but instead goes into a queue that we have to approve before it goes live. We don't seem to check the queue all that often, but rest assured if you post a comment it will come through eventually.

Istra Isabel Middleton (And family)

nospam@example.com (Tim Middleton) — Thu, 02 Jun 2005 21:26:52 -0400

"It is a good name," said the Fox, "a very good name. And you know enough now to tell me what it would be in Greek." [C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces]

11:29 pm

nospam@example.com (Tim Middleton) — Sun, 29 May 2005 02:28:13 -0400

All is good.

First Acceptance Rolls In

nospam@example.com (Selena Middleton) — Mon, 07 Mar 2005 19:42:11 -0500

Today is a joyous day!

I came home from school and went downstairs to check the mail as I often do. I was expecting some packages from recent ebay purchases, but I was not expecting the little envelope that greeted me, it's red "York U" logo emblazoned on the front.

I mention that it was a little envelope (that is, a regular sized envelope and not a manilla) purposefully. I heard somewhere that if you're expecting news from an academic institution about acceptance into some program or other, a big envelope is good, a little envelope is bad. You see, the big envelope will contain all the forms that you need to fill out in order to accept their gracious invitation into the pristine halls of academia. The little envelope will contain one sheet of paper, messily scrawled with only a few words:

Sorry. Try again!

Well, this was a little envelope. It immediately filled me with dread, but I picked it up anyway and tore it open. I couldn't even wait to get back up to the apartment. I skimmed it greedily. As you already know from the title of this entry, it was, after all, good news. I have been admitted to the English MA program at York and they are giving me money and possibly some other benefits like a teaching assistantship.

This is a joyous day! Now I know that there will be some options for me to explore next year. At least one university has admitted me! I am still waiting to hear back from the University of Toronto for two programs and then I will make my final decision. I am very pleased that York is giving me money. I wasn't expecting it at all. This definately makes them more attractive to me.

Here are some highlights from the letter they sent:

"I am very pleased to inform you that our Admissions Committee has recommended to the Faculty of Graduate Studies that you be admitted to our M.A. Programme."

"Again this year, the Graduate Programme in English received many aapplications from excellent candidates, and we are delighted to advise you that yours was among the top-ranked."

"Financial support for graduate students at York is made up from a variety of sources such as external and internal scholarships and assistantships. Taking all of these sources of funding into account, we are pleased to offer you a minimum guarenteed level of support of $8,000 for the 2005-2006 academic year."

"We trust that you will find this combined support compares favourably with other universities. However, if your experience indicates otherwise, please get in touch with me and we can talk about additional possibilities."

"We are looking forward to your being with us next year, and we hope that you will accept our offer of admission."

Oh, and the mystery of the little envelope? They are sending all the admissions forms and information in a separate package!

Vis-a-Vis Comments (Mea Culpa)

nospam@example.com (Tim Middleton) — Sat, 15 Jan 2005 21:39:11 -0500

Several of the family have asked how to log in to post comments. My reply basically has been: just post them. That is to say, comments can be posted without logging in.

Selena discovered a few days ago that indeed the site security was set up wrong, and one did have to log in to create a comment on a posting. This has been fixed.

If anyone feels like commenting on any post, simply click the "comments" link at the bottom of the posting you want to comment on. You will no longer be accosted by the login prompt when you hit the "POST" button.

Of course, this is all Selena's fault. If she'd post comments more frequently she would have discovered this much sooner! (-:

Memorial Slides

nospam@example.com (Tim Middleton) — Tue, 26 Oct 2004 08:38:46 -0400

The slide show from the memorial is now online here.

Week Loss

nospam@example.com (Tim Middleton) — Mon, 25 Oct 2004 12:46:08 -0400

We had other things to post last week, but we were interrupted and derailed by the sad sudden death of our Dad... John "Buddy" Raymond Kerr. His physical heart failed his true heart on Wednesday Morning, around 1:30 am.

I will post a link to the slide show that we exhibited at the memorial service when I get a chance to get it online; and perhaps a few other things. I just wanted to get something to update this site... even if it is redundant, as anyone looking here will already know.

He will be sorely missed.

This is it

nospam@example.com (Tim Middleton) — Wed, 13 Oct 2004 10:14:29 -0400

I've wanted to do this for some time. But time is always a problem.

So finally I've tossed this together. Who knows if it will be used. But, you must admit, it's a nice idea.

All family members will have logins and can post whatever they want. That's it. The idea is to keep everyone up to date in a central location, for anyone interested.

If you don't yet have a login, email me. If you want a personal weblog on the site, I can set that up for you too.