My Academic Blogger's Dream Come True: A Conference Blogger Meet Up!

As old-time readers will know, there are few things I like better than blogger meet ups!! (Here are some past ones). I've lost count, but I think I've met more than a dozen friends I made through the blog in "real life!"

Today's meet-up was special to me because it was completely unexpected! Every conference I've been to since I started blogging back in 2004 I've walked around looking at people and wondering if they also blog and whether any of my blogger friends may be in attendance. And I longed, really longed to be there with someone who read my blog and who really knew me. 

Today, it happened. This morning I was looking at the schedule and saw a name. I went to facebook and messaged her and then went to her panel where I introduced myself and we talked before she gave her paper. It was only a day which it passed way too quickly. We didn't have much time to talk and I hope I didn't annoy her with some of my questions, but it was truly AMAZING to finally get to meet M!!

I hope you enjoyed the conference and that we meet again in the future! I know she's not really blogging anymore and that's ok. What matters to me is that for nearly 8 years we interacted through our blogs and became friends. I hope she liked meeting me too! I'll see her tomorrow once more and then we leave. Too bad most blogger-meet ups are always so fleeting! :-( Sigh...

I still can't believe it happened, I'm so thrilled I can't even concentrate and finish my paper!

2013's Only Blogger-Meet-Up

No summer is complete without a blogger meet-up, right?

Well... It took me literally months (ok, one month!) to blog about it, but I did have a lovely-but-way-too-short meet-up with blogger (or almost former blogger) Sarah Sometimes!!!

We didn't take a photo, (we could have, but I was thinking I wouldn't have posted it anyway, so why bother! ;-) but coincidentally we were both wearing black & white skirts & black blouses (not 100% about her blouse, but I think so).

And we talked about our lives, families, and work, her move upstate, and about Jo(e) & her family and her canoeing trip. We had a simple kid-food picnic sitting at a bench in a park and I wish we'd had more time!

K said that we're not going back to that city again, but maybe we can meet again somewhere close by (together with Jo(e)? That'd be nice!).

I drove by very closely to where several other blogging (or former blogging) friends  live, but I didn't have a lot of time, so I decided not to contact them.  Oh, and of course I was where she lives and I was all... oh, I hope I could talk to her!

Blogger-meet-up wish for next year: meeting Jamie & family. Maybe we'll go to your neck of the woods, friend! Oh, and B*, I want to meet her!!

"Is Marlo My Cousin?" Or About Being the Child of a Blogger

A few years ago my youngest son approached me as I was reading Heather Armstrong's blog (Dooce) and a photo of Marlo was on the screen.

"Mama, is she my cousin?" He asked.

I know, it may sound like a strange, out of the blue question, but it does make perfect sense to me. I check the blogs I read daily and I consider many, if not most of the people whose blogs I read  as my friends, whether or not we've met these in person. (of course I'm not referring to "celebrity bloggers" like Heather here, with her it's a one way "relationship" unlike the one I have with my other blogging friends).

When we lived in Philly, the boys got used to meeting my blogger friends and their children (more notably Kateri's, Andi/Cloudscome's & Jeanette's) in person and then seeing photos of them online when I was reading their blogs. I'm sure this is what prompted my son to ask that question about little Marlo who was a beautiful baby at the time and, by the way, my sons didn't have a girl cousin then yet, so maybe he was "wishing" she was his cousin.

I actually thought that his question was awesome! He understands that these people are real and we have a "relationship" with them even though it's only through a computer screen and I like that.

As I've mentioned before, I've grown very attached to Rebecca Wolf's blog (Girl's Gone Child) and her gorgeous family in the past year and a couple of days ago my youngest son was looking at this post with me and he was really interested in the children. I told him their names and we browsed through the photos. I told him that I thought he and Archer would probably get along and I wished, as I often do when reading blogs, that we could meet their family in person.

Are your children aware of your blog writing and reading? Do you talk about blogging and blogs with them? Do they have opinions (like my youngest son)* on whether you can or cannot blog about them?

(I wish Katie would answer these, I don't comment often enough in her blog to say we have a "relationship,"  but I know she would probably be open to meeting, were I to go to TN. I love Katie! :)

* I know L wouldn't want me to share the story at the beginning of the post, but I think I'm addressing this subject very delicately and I'm not exposing him. In fact, I know that he doesn't even remember that episode, it must have been back in 2009, (I don't remember when Marlo was born). In any case, I am consciously avoiding blogging about him though I'd love to. Oh, and I've been writing this post in my head for years now, literally, so here it goes!

A New Year's Bloggy Wish Come True: Meeting Jo(e)

Last Friday we finally, after years of trying to schedule a blogger meet-up, were able to spend some time with Jo(e) at Pretty Color Lakes (meeting her was the first item in my "things that have to happen this year" post). Unfortunately we were too busy talking (and taking photos of the gorgeous lakes) that I forgot to ask to take a proper photo of the two of us (which would be awkward without faces anyway, so it's ok in the end, I guess). Here's a fuzzy photo I took of Jo(e), my sons and K:

Too bad that we didn't have much time, but we're hoping to be able to meet again on other trips up North.

I'm including a few more photos of our time there. I hope Jo(e) can email me more photos, since she took several, including of our family!

Pretty Color Lakes is really pretty!

The boys had a great time climbing up the banks of the trail/lake.

The reflex is greener than the actual trees

One is (way) Better than None! My Trip's Blogger Meet Up

This post comes to you incredibly late, but better late than never...

I had this plan, this dream, almost, of beginning and ending our road trip with blogger meet ups. The first worked out wonderfully, but the second couldn't happen. :-( Maybe someday, right, Jo(e)?

In fact, there was no need to write this, I could just tell you to go read Pithy Dithy's lovely post about our visit, but I have some more pictures to share! ;-)

My boys had lots of fun with Finn & Cullen's train table and toy kitchen, but Kelvin was really fascinated by their Magnatiles, particularly after Mr. Pithy helped him build this huge arena (all the boys posed next to it before bringing it down):Foolishly, I didn't take any pictures in the first evening, when the weather was nice, then, the next morning, it rained! But we went out in the rain anyway to see the town (you can see that our boys monopolized the umbrellas so the moms got wet):The last part of the visit was a great and thorough tour of the Fire Station led by Mr. Pithy. In the end the four boys got firefighter hats:
Thanks again, friends, it was wonderful! We hope to be able to stop by again someday on our way to Canada!

Blogger Meet Up with Scrivener!

If there's one thing that I like even better than blogging itself is blogger meet-ups! I was sad that there were so few of them last year (only this and this, both with bloggers I'd either already knew pre-blog or had met in person before), but this summer I'm really ambitious and it looks like this was just the first of three great blogger meet-ups that will happen in the upcoming weeks!

I've been reading Scrivener's blog for years now and lately we've also been in touch via Twitter. Our children are almost the same age (his daughters are one year older than each of my sons) and I had always wanted to meet him. Actually, I wish I could meet all my blogging friends in person! It almost didn't happen because of ours and his upcoming road trips, but then we were able to meet briefly for a few minutes on Sunday.
It was great meeting you and the girls, Scriv, have a great trip and hopefully we'll see you again (if we move down there). Oh, and next time you'll have to play the guitar!

Texting my way into the 21st century

Until very recently, I think I'd never sent more than one text message in my life, but things have changed dramatically in the last 24 hours since we've had our new "smart capability" phones (this one, to be exact). Edited to add: we also have unlimited texting in our new/carrier & plan, or else I wouldn't be texting.

Of course the great majority of the 100+ (counting incoming) text messages in my phone right now were sent/received by my oldest son (who jumped for joy when we showed the phone we were getting ;-), but I'm proud to say that I sent lots of them too.

Texting is just so practical! It took only a handful of text messages to "book" a haircut with this blogger whom Ï hadn't seen for around three years! YAY for another blogger meet up facilitated by technology ;-).

So, yeah, I'll be an avid "texter" from now on. Anyone wants to "text with me" (this sounds really weird, doesn't it?).

Oh, and I may be twittering more too, now that I can do it through texting, on the go (gotta figure out how to set that up). Too bad -- mostly for my son who would love to spend countless hours online on the go too -- we have a very limited data plan. Better something than nothing (wait a minute, that's not how the saying go, right? I think this is a saying in Portuguese, not in English. Oh well... whatevah... ! ;-)

The Sweet & Long Awaited Blogger Meet Up

The sweet part first, if you're wondering what it's about:Now that you're there drooling over those most amazingly delicious and gorgeous macarons from the suggestively named "boutique" Point G that the friendly blogger bought for us to share, I'll share the background story.

Many years ago (more precisely 15-13) K had a student (math in 7th, 8th and physics in the first half of 9th grade) named Keiko (her late dad was Japanese, thus the beautiful Japanese name, which is actually her middle name, but the one she was known for). Keiko -- who a few years earlier also happened to have been one of the lead singers in a children musical group from the institution where we worked -- I say that just to embarrass her ;-) -- is obviously well over 10 years younger than K and I, but little did we know that 10 years after we left Brazil to the U.S. she would be making the same trajectory and becoming one more rare kindred spirit in our circle of friends.

It is very rare and precious indeed to find people who understand K and I in all aspects of life: expatriate from Brazil in North America, doctoral student/researcher, parent of young kids, not to mention having grown up in the same place where I lived from 13-25 years old (in her case from 0-25, I guess). And to top it off, she and I have one more thing in common, which makes the connection even greater: she blogs!!! Unfortunately she does so in Portuguese or I'd recommend that you read her humorous, witty and well written posts about her life as an expatriate-doctoral-student-mother-of-young-children (not that she's having a lot of time to blog lately -- sadly). (A few more words about her blog. It's titled Tirando o Sapato-- Taking off the Shoe, which is a reference to the fact that in Canada everyone takes off their shoes when going into other people's houses. If you go visit over there, make sure to refresh the site a few times to see the several cute shoe pictures!!)

A meeting had been in our plans since she started blogging (and us interacting via blogs and email) back in 2006 and the idea of my brother-in-law and his wife emigrating to Canada was only that, a very abstract idea, almost a dream really for them. Three years later, BIL has been in Montreal for six months and we have visited him twice already. It so happens that during the first visit, Keiko had gone to Brazil for a few days with the, thus frustrating our plans of meeting. We even went to her house (with a bunch of other people) and her absence, as well as that of her children, was keenly felt.

Until last Friday, that is, when we finally managed to meet (albeit later than we had intended -- see lack of time mentioned above)!! Our children played together -- well, the baby girl mostly watched her brother and these two big boys play and be really noisy (particularly Linton and Zack, 5 and 3, who hit it right off). Here they are playing trains:
Oh, and last but not least, my friend lives in an awesome place, here (July photo):She lives in one of the buildings shaped like a triangle at the back of the photo which were part of the former Olympic Village from the Montreal 1976 Olympics. The buildings have a view to this place (which is were the photo above was taken -- from the inclined elevator):

The Olympic Stadium and the Biodome.

What about the macarons, you must be asking yourself? Well, there is an explanation. A while back, more precisely six months ago, Keiko posted about them here (scroll down for cute photos of her daughter). And ever since I saw those pictures I've been dying to eat them! So Keiko was kind enough to purchase some (the plan was to meet at Point G, but that didn't work out) so I could try them. Yummmm! We had to cut them all in four so the kids, and Keiko's sister-in-law (visiting from Brazil) could also have a taste! OK, here's Zack, ready to dive in (let me know if you're OK with the photo, Keiko, 'cause it shows both of your kids):Of course this post is missing something... a photo of the two bloggers. We forgot to take photos, though, because we were too busy talking away! Maybe next time. :-)

Trains, Boys & Blogger Meet Up (Belated Post)

It's been almost a month now, but my motto regarding photo sharing is "better late than never!" so here you go. My apologies to Jeannette for the delay!

On warm, beautiful Thursday (Sept. 23) I sent a last minute invitation over gmail chat for Jeannette to come over with her boys and she did!! Ellis had a blast playing with the boys' largest train layout yet (it's still there a month later)......and the mamas had a good (if too brief) time chatting while running after Marlowe so he wouldn't fall down the stairs too many times or bite all the apples in the fruit stand... ;-)

Look at that cute boy's smile!

Happiest of all for me was the fact that I finally had my first blogger meet up since 2007... I can't believe I didn't get to meet any other blogger (not in my family) in person all of last year :-(. The first time I actually met Jeannette was back in 2007 at the Arboretum*. (I just remember that in 2008 I did go see Jo once).

Here's slideshow of the Picasa Album that I made with all photos of the trains and boys so I could share them with my guest and her family (and my readers):

Trains and Blogger Meet-up/ Visit!

*Reading the 2007 post reminds me that I have to try and get together again with another local dear blogger-friend and her sons -- Andi/Cloudscome.

P.S. I think Dawn won!

Wonderful Blogger Meet Up!

My apologies for not posting the promised recipe just yet. I cannot do it because I received an annotated chapter from my "co-advisor" and I'd feel really guilty if I wrote a time-consuming blog post (because of the photos) instead of working on my dissertation (although I have to confess that I just spent over 40 minutes reading blogs...). So, I had to settle for a shorter post instead.

Today I had the delightful opportunity to meet yet another blogger in person (I'm to tired right now to count how many I've met, it's probably close to ten) as well as her beautiful children. Thanks for coming over, Elrena! She even blogged about it already! It's always wonderful to meet another mother who understands exactly what I'm going through, particularly the struggle between the academic/intellectual life and how busy we are being mothers. I hope to have time to come back to this subject. Meanwhile, you can check what M, at Separation of Spheres has been writing about this.

More guests coming tomorrow (BIL and family). I don't know if I'll have time for blogging much, but I'll try. I hope you had a nice Valentine's Day... I didn't grow up in this country, so it's not a big deal for me, but I did bring a cake to my son's school and he enjoyed making some themed crafts and getting valentines and candy from his teacher.

Five Boys and a Railway

Yesterday I invited two bloggers I know (one of them I was meeting in person for the first time) so we could take our boys to a local arboretum's famous garden railway since it was the night for members to bring guests. I had already met Cloudscome last summer and she actually wrote a lovely post about yesterday's meeting. I'm "borrowing" two photos form her to illustrate this one (thanks my friend! I hope you don't mind :)

L to R: "Punkin," "Buddy Boy," Kelvin and Linton
Taken by Cloudscome.

The fifth boy of the title is Ellis, Jeannette's son, who is pictured below on the right with Cloudscome's boys. I met them for the first time yesterday and I hope we can get together many other times in the future. Kelvin and I loved to learn the signs for train, tree, and water, and we want to learn many more! :)

Taken by Cloudscome.

And here you can see Ellis, Buddy Boy, and Linton, watching for the train (I took this one and the remaining photos in the post):The five boys were moving constantly, it was getting dark, and my camera had about 20 minutes of battery left, so the few photos I managed to take are all blurry, but they convey really well how excited the boys were, running up and down looking at the trains:

Ellis was so thrilled!

And so were Kelvin...
(you can see Jeannette in the background wearing the fabulous first skirt sewn by her)

...and Linton:

(For some reason I looked at him running around last night and felt that he was so tall and "grown up" already. I definintely don't have my baby anymore :-( )

We had a great time, especially my boys, who don't get to hang out with other children much. Kelvin told me he wants to play with Buddy Boy (they're the same age) again and I hope we can get together before summer's over. I really really really wanted to invite all the Philly Mama Bloggers I know (see side bar) over to our house before we move much farther away from the city, but I don't know if that'll be possible since we have to spend all of next week packing for the move.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Blogger Meet Up Squared

Last Saturday night, I had the great pleasure of meeting Lauren, the sixth "Philly Mama" blogger from my blogroll that I've met in person (there are two I am yet to meet: Jeannette and Miriam Peskowitz).

There was a "bonus," though! Besides meeting Lauren, John and their sons, I met some other people there, including Anjali, who is also a blogger, and her lovely family. So now there's a ninth "Philly Mama" blogger in my blogroll! And I love your blog and your writing, Anjali! It's been a delight for me to read your archives and other publications online (you can check them out -- they're in her blog's sidebar - "Deep Thought by Anjali").

Lauren described the evening in a fun post in which we were dubbed "The Very Irishest Family from Brazil, Ever" :) because we the three of us (Kelvin took an extra long nap and didn't come) were wearing green. Lauren, I decided to wear green just because I didn't have anything comparable to your very Irish green beer mug earrings (I thought they were very cute, you shouldn't donate them to Goodwill :) and I wanted to go to a St. Patty's day party in style.

Oh, and I'm glad you liked the food I brought, Lauren. If you want to taste more of it, we can plan to get together again sometime ;) . Really, I love cooking and/or baking for friends and I don't get to do it as often as I'd like. The blog-post-famous cheese bourek was delicious, I'm glad I got to taste it, because that post made really curious about it.

Can you tell that I just love blogger meet ups? I hope to meet many of the other bloggers I read in the future.

~~~ ~~~

Coming up: a dissertation writing update, photos of the boys' new bedroom, and a slide show of a house being built in Brazil (but first I have to figure out which site to use to make a nice slide show, any suggestions?)

Lovely "Bloggy" Meet Ups!

Yesterday and today have been two good days... in spite of the fact that my husband is traveling (he went to Brazil for the weekend - I'm so jealous, except I would have hated to have gone only for three days - I can't stay less than a month there and even then I never do all I want to do :)

I went to the LLL meeting yesterday and we ended up having an informal conversation between mothers, which was great, because I got to talk a bit more with Jo, who's a brilliant blogger and a really cool and lovely person -- she even mentioned me and my boys in her latest post, I'm so delighted!! We love you too! Her daughter Sophia has the most beautiful blue eyes you've ever seen and the cutest smile :)

Today I met another blogger in person, in addition to Jo, Kateri, Marta, and Andi Buchanan, I now know Cloudscome (from a wrung sponge) and her lovely boys. I think this could officially classify as our first "play-date" ever -- have I been completely out of the American "mother's culture" or what? Yeah, it's not easy to be an expatriate mom, that's why I love blogging so much, it filled a void in my life in more ways that I could have ever imagined! As Cloudscome said, it is definitely cool to meet someone who blogs too, so we can talk about blogs we read and blogging, since she says all her other friends know nothing about it.

I'm so glad blogging has given me the opportunity of not only learning from other people's life experience and knowing people "virtually," but getting to meet some of these awesome people "in real life"!

Mother Talk - It's a Girl

Last night I was finally able to attend my very first Mother Talk here in Philly and meet Andi Buchanan , writer and also blogger, in person! I was looking forward to meeting Miriam Peskowitz as well, but she wasn't able to make it.

I felt a little lost at first, because I didn't know anyone there and most people seemed to know each other, but I was able to talk with a few mothers. I had read the essays beforehand, but the readings were fantastic!!

Yvonne Latty made everyone burst out laughing many times with hilarious anecdotes about her family, particularly about their participation in the Rosie O'Donnel cruise (that she and her family - two Black gay women from Philly, one Hispanic, another Jewish, with two daughters conceived through IUI - were utterly "boring" suburbanites as compared to most of the other GLBT families' stories of hardship to conceive, etc in the cruise) and the Disney World Breakfast with the Princesses (she and her oldest daughter were criticising/questioning the princesses, particularly Snow White - as to why she would take an apple from such an ugly witch - they actually asked the "princess" that! :)

Kim Fisher was shy and cute, and read her great essay titled "Shining, Shimmering, Splendid" about her triplet girls' identification with the Disney Princesses - which became a central theme of the evening discussions. Many women, I 'd even say most of those who were there, shared their experiences and their opinions about raising girls, there was also quite a bit of discussion about how girls are/aren't different from boys that I learned quite a bit from, since I have only boys and not girls.

Andi read her piece last, and had to stop before the end before she got too emotional. Her essay is about her daughter learning to write, and "daring" to write "I don't like you mommy," even though she can't yet spell "don't" and how Andi had to figure out that she had to allow her daughter to express herself even though it might hurt her feelings -- a really beautiful essay, and the discussion that followed was very meaningful.

I'm delighted I was able to finally make it to Mother Talk and will probably be able to go to others, now that my husband is successfully putting both boys to bed every night!! Well, in two weeks I'll be back with my very own review of It's a Girl, since I'm participating of the Blog Tour - Yay! Watch this space then.

Lovely Day and Bloggers Meet up!!

I shouldn't be writing because I need to sleep, but I really want to share this.

Yesterday [actually, Thursday] was a lovely day all around. My parents had to renew their passports in the itinerant Brazilian consulate and since I would need to stay with the boys I decided to go to my second La Leche League meeting this month. The meeting was great, especially because I finally got to meet Jo and Sophia, my third blogger meet up (this time with a "famous" blogger :) !! I had not mentioned it before, but I had my second blogger "meet up" with Mama Marta at last month's LLL. Since I also met Kateri at a LLL meeting, I guess it's time I issue a formal statement:

I heartily thank the La Leche League for giving me the opportunity of meeting these great bloggers in real life :)

All right, back to my lovely day... It was also sunny and very warm (almost hot) and there were flowers and new green leaves everywhere. After the meeting, I went to the Jenks playground (too bad the site doesn't have a picture - I didn't have my camera with me) with the boys, and we also spent over an hour at a lovely toy store, since I parked right in front of it. We had lunch at the Farmer's market and the boys enjoyed the playground before and after lunch, when they were finally allowed to use the "big kids" part, since school was over. Then we went to pick up my parents (who actually had to wait for a bit because the boys just didn't want to leave).

Mt. Airy/ Chestnut Hill is such a great place, and I felt kind of sorry for the place we live. When we were moving here, there was a woman from Philly who told us that we would definitely enjoy living in Mt. Airy, and I realized yesterday that she was absolutely right. We just couldn't possibly afford it, though. There were basically no houses at all in our price range in that area when we were looking. I like our house, it's only 4 years old, and the neighborhood is not bad, but in that area I feel we could have real friends (here we barely know any neighbors, we don't really "fit in" with the neighborhood). I mean, just to give an example, one of the moms at the LLL meeting is also writing her dissertation, and of course there would be Jo and Marta and many other lovely people we could meet... Mt. Airy reminded me a lot of the Pioneer valley - except it's in a city, not in the countryside. I have been sorely missing the valley lately (sigh)...

It was a really simple day, but since I haven't spent much time with my boys since my parents got here it was really special for me to enjoy this day with them. I work on the dissertation at home, so I do see them a lot, but my parents are the ones who bring them regularly to the playground and other places. I long for the day when I can spend the whole day with my sons again, but I do need to take advantage of my parents' help while I can, right?

Just in case you're wondering, I'm at a better place regarding the dissertation. I'll write about it soon.

A couple of firsts

Just a quick note to say I just attended my first LLL (La Leche League) meeting. I enjoyed it very much, it feels great to be in a room full of mothers, babies and toddlers, several of whom are nursing right there and then. I actually missed my sons, who were napping in the car with my parents outside (they did come in at the end, though). I will certainly be an assiduous participant from now on, and will become a member as well.

The second "first" was meeting a blogger I read and enjoy a lot in person for the first time. It was really nice to meet you Kate, and Naomi too!! I hope to see more of you in the future :)

Well, that's it for now... I NEED to work, since I already missed the whole morning (I say this as if I worked the whole morning, I usually don't start until 11 am, because I always stay up REALLY late, and sleep in until 9:30-10. So, I missed some 3 hours, that's it).