Greek Easter and the Lent process!

I have been famously been noted as saying Easter is hands down my favorite holiday of them all. And the Holiday pretty much started if you are a devoted Greek Orthodox. So I thought I would explain what our lent/fasting consists of because it's not like any other fasting I have ever heard or read about.

Greek Orthodox are the only Orthodox faithful community that follows many of the similar practices to many who follow the Catholic faith. Before Easter begins we celebrate and celebrate, in Greece itself you will hear about something called Apokries which is non-stop partying with Carnival like events full of dancing and food.

Why do we party so much right before what should be a religious pilgrimage of the soul... I guess Greeks believe we sacrifice so much during the Lent season, that we start it off with a real bang. The week leading up to lent are food dedicated days...

• we start with Grilled Thursday, a meat related date. I believe Greeks version of Fat Tuesday. You are to start removing all meats in your fridge this day and Barbeque them til your hearts desire.
• We follow up with Cheese Sunday... time to take all that Feta, Haloumi, Kefalotiri cook it, use it, eat it with bread. Because Greeks can enjoy a feverishly gross amount of cheese if need be.
• Clean Monday is the start of the fasting period... either used as the date to clean out the rest of your fridge of possible foods that aren't suppose to be there or you eat clean. Depends who you ask, this has been skewed by many of Greeks.

So now you've emptied your fridge let the Fasting begin.

I had a lot of friends of many cultures fast, a Catholic girl friend who fasted Chocolate one lent, many Muslim girlfriends who fasted for various Ramadans which consists of not eating from when the sun comes up til it settles again in the West. I will gripe that ours is harder... but let me explain why?!?!

Greeks fast Meat (For SURE) for 40+ days, I remember fasting one year for 52 days because that is how lent fell on the Calendar. This means at no point in time do you get to break this fast, not when the sun goes down, or before it might come out. Meat is NOT an option... the hard core cut out meat by products. So no Milk, Yogourt, Cheese, Eggs (this includes Fish and Bacon in case you didn't get the all meat sacrifice.

So for 40+ days you watch others eat and eat and eat food that you are dying to have... Not to mention food many devout Greek Orthodox will also fast alcohol and sex. To purify themselves to the fullest. While I haven't fasted for years since having babies, I really use to enjoy it because it was really a test of will power to me, how you can convince yourself that you can do anything you put your mind to. Not sure I am willing to sacrifice food lately. But I look forward to the day when I know I have it in me to do a full fast again.

Many days during Lent are church oriented days... But Holy week trumps it all! Every night there is service after Palm Sunday. This is also when Greeks will look to get Holy communion for all their hard work and appreciation of the sacrifice Jesus also took. Holy Friday is the beginning of the end of Lent and starts non stop Church attendance and in my opinion the celebration of Christ. Thursday night many women will stay overnight dressing Jesus' grave for that in the morning we are all welcomed to come and grieve and mourn his crucifiction, in the evening we will walk his body around the church with a candle lit vigil. It really is a beautiful procession.

Most Greeks wait til Saturday morning to begin the breaking of their fast with also having Holy Communion. This being because many will have opted out eating any oils the last week, and once they have taken their communion they don't feel as strict to eat oil, but meat is highly frowned upon til Saturday night after Midnight Mass. Many religions have a midnight mass for Easter, but our priest will come out of the church declare Jesus resurrected, many Greeks have customs of launching fire crackers at this time because it is a rejoiceful moment, some don't agree... but last year are people we're chanting and the fire crackers were exploding above us it was a little surreal of a moment.

After the festivities of Church, we tend to go home for most Greeks is the beginning of the breaking of the fast. We eat soup called Magiritsa (The best explanation I have of this is like a Haggis soup... or really an innards soup, Heart, spleen, kidney and most of all Intestine soup.) Many don't enjoy this soup, but it actually is surprisingly good. We crack our first set of eggs that night, yes we dye our eggs and then break them. I would cringe if we made ours as beautiful as per se the Ukrainians make their ornate eggs, but ours are usually dyed red (symbolising the blood lost for us all) and we crack them and eat them the same night.

Next day is Easter and other than stuffing ones face in every food imaginable... and hey we live in Canada so it gets culturally blended with anything under the sun plus the most popular Easter meat which is Lamb. Greeks consume a whole lamb, put it on the spit and let it charcoal slowly but surely all day long.

I am excited about Easter a little sad I will have newborn in the house as many activities I will not be able to participate in, like extreme fasting.

It's a very family oriented holiday. We see all our immediate family, but also God parents and God children, and coumbari (those who married us) where we give people baskets of eggs, breads and easter cookies. God parents are expected to get their god children new shoes... not sure what the tradition is exactly and where it comes from, but it's a cute one. But it's mostly a lot of good times, lots of sharing and feeling loved. Greeks are very proud of Easter and many ironically will tell you it's their favorite holiday.

So happy Lent to those starting, hope it brought some clarity to you what the next few months will feel like for Greeks. And Happy Easter Season to you all!

Cheers!~

French Mom, American Mom, Canadian Mom, what?

So much has been said and published about the Mom controversy about being a better mom if you were raised in another country. If you are a Chinese Mom (Tiger Mom) you raise your child one way, if you American you are overtly lax, if you from anywhere else so on and so on.

So the book "Bringing up Bébé" by Pamela Druckerman was highly publicised this week about parenting differences between French Mothers and their American counterparts. Now I am no American (but I love me some Americans and on many days I wish I lived south of the border) Mother, I am a Canadian Mother by proxy of where I am located on the map and albeit I am a Greek Mother because I was raised in a very strict Greek household.

This book focuses on key points that pretty much Children are to be seen, not heard. That adult time is reserved to the evening and patience is something taught because it's the french thing to do. You can further read a few excerpts that were post on The Wall Street Journal. As you'll see it's a highly flammable article with a ton of comments.

But when did parenting become something that has to do with your Geographic location. Without asking them, my mom friends from my Mom Board that I was on when trying to conceive are all uniquely different, some are raising their kids more religious, some have agents for their kids, others are in school still... how on earth can their parenting techniques be remotely the same. Some in Idaho, Rhodes Island, W. Virginia and California... such different physical environments how can the way I child is raised in either of those conditions be the same.

I live in downtown Toronto, love my city... but I know I don't raise my daughters the same as anyone else I know pretty much. Do my daughters run a free-for-all in my house? YES! Do they listen to every word I say with presence and awareness? NO! Do I hit them as a punishment? NO! Do I get mad at them and they get scorned with some sort of punishment? Of course!

Does this have anything to do with where I live, not at all! My father was far more heavy handed than the kids parents I went to school with. I was very much alone as a child so I was often silent. My daughter are a year apart so they are liking having a permanent friend in the house at all times. Don't you hate play dates? I have one every night.

But last year I went to Church over Easter Communion (I am not overtly religious, but religion is important to me and my daughters will be raised in this belief system) and there was a large line-up for communion. I was told Children don't have to wait in line. Now with newborns or very fidgety toddlers I have used this privilege as I have many times taken my daughter with my disabled mother and felt it would be easier for me to handle them. But my girls are fully capable of standing in a line for a while so this year I opted to well stand in line with them... at some point they'll have to learn to wait their turn. Why not today? What bothered me most and here was my judgemental self coming out was watching mothers take up their 10 year old or so... now it really is none of my business but these kids who are being taught they don't have to wait in line, when they hit the teenage years are not going to be so willing to wait; and where else won't they be willing to stay in line?

I think we need to raise our children in ways that will make our kids good adults! Yes adults! I know they are kids now, but soon they won't be and I am positive the tasks and behaviours we teach them now is only to set them up to continue to do those same responsibilities. There world we live in can be very Black & White... others might not like this reality (May I mention the British parents who raised their child sexless til it attended school) but it is what it is. People are raised to educate themselves (this is not archaic while I am sure I could debate what formal education is and how it could encroach in the personal freedom of our child but I digress), they are taught that at some point they'll need to make a living (albeit this is a choice of their own fruition), and then they will continue the process of life (become part of a relationship, live like a civilised person out of jail and chose to continue the family process).

But does any Group or Country do a better job? I say heck NO! Every day mothers across the world are praying they are doing a good job, that they are providing a nutritious meal, hoping they are allowing for their child to be and do all they can in the world. Do some parents allow for things to slide over others, yes.... I would rather my child get filthy from a meal so they can teach themselves to eat on their own instead of hovering over them til the age of 6 with a spoon. I would rather move my child out of my bed at 6 months from co-sleeping because I felt it was a good time to transition them to sleep on their own, while I am sure someone reading this would cringe that baby shouldn't be in my bed in the first place while someone else would say co-sleeping can go on and on without infringing on the child.

We all make decisions for our households that work for us, instead of saying I am doing a better job than you, or thinking ohhh her kids look put together why are mine terrors, just go over to your fellow mom and discuss. Maybe she does something far more interesting in her household, maybe we could be each other's support systems instead of each others enemies on raising one's child.

So French-smench... raise your kids to be good Adults I say, keep that in mind. When you see a behavioural pattern that your child has look within yourself and say, would I like them if they were an adult acting like this? If not nip it in the bud, if you like it and think it's cute than enjoy it.

~Cheers!

Ohhh and Baby is coming!

I've been so busy...

But aren't we all you might be thinking. But in all my stuff that I have been wrapping myself around realising that this baby is stewing away slowly to make it self a healthy happy to come out. But woah.... when did I get to the point where I only have 5 weeks left and the baby should be here.

I have been trying really hard to find myself for the last few years and one of the biggest obstacles I have struggled with is starting a business that is my own and in the vain of the industry I am so mentally attached and absorbed with Fashion. Some of you might now but if not I have been working on launching my Canadian Made Costume Jewelry line. http://www.nikiandlola.com/

I have been busy with the girls crazy schedule since going back to school since the Winter holidays, they both are fully scheduled from Monday to Thursday, and because of that it adds more to my plate. Right in the middle of my afternoon I am dressing up daughters in tutus, making sure they have sneakers in snow pant weather for Hip Hop, get a snack into them before dancing even though I only have an hour from the time the bus does the drop off til the class starts.

We also got a puppy at Christmas too... a few more things to do like make sure he has gone to the bathroom before we sleep, before I need to head out with the girls, before I need to grocery shop just to avoid any accidents in the house.

All and all totally forgetting that ohhh yeah I need to get on planning for this baby's arrival. It really hit me at the 33 week mark. I was just going with the flow, until I realised that 7 weeks doesn't really equate 2 months, I don't have anything no diapers, no outfits, no baby room planned. Perhaps I would have been more prepared if there was some sort of shower planned around this baby. But it's been so blasé of a pregnancy, just taking everyday as they come. But woah... I didn't expect it'd be here so soon. So anyday now this baby could arrive without any fair warning.

How have you been enjoying this New Year thus far?