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• Cargo bike: I love the way the Load 75 makes it easy to go to playdates and on family adventures. A+ rides in it for quick trips or when she's tired of pedaling. I can tow her bike with the Bakkie bag. Glad to bike more.

  Since playdates are now 15 minutes away instead of 60, it's much easier to bring hot chocolate or popsicles to share. I used to bring store-bought popsicles, but now that the fruits are in, we've been making our own. (We've even gone fruit-picking!)

• Crafts: I sewed a lot this year, from outdoor projects with Sunbrella fabric (covers for the awning, pizza oven, and grill) to handsewn drawstring bags and zippered pouches. I crocheted a few gifts, too.
• Code: I automated more of EmacsConf and made a presentation about it–my first in years. In consulting, I wrote some code to support events, and I've even been able to write tests.
• Curiosity: I've been slowly learning more about myself and us. I still worry, I still feel unsure, but this feels like a possible path.
• Looking ahead: In some ways, it feels like we're taking two steps forward, one step back. Some things that were hard are now easier: cooking, sewing, reading together… Some things that were easy are now harder: playing with friends… I think we might be getting better at figuring out what works for us, though, so that's good. Looking forward to more experiments!
• Topics: declarative language, co-regulation, nonviolent communication, competent/intuitive eating; testing and automation; Minecraft scripting; biking and exercise; working with what we've got

Text from sketch

40 by month

• Aug 2023: ramp, etc.; swimming; pizza party; quilt, ukulele bag, grill cover; harvest
• Sept: pizza parties; grade 2; consulting events
• Oct: EmacsConf presentation prep; automation; tried cargo bikes; Mathalon medals; synchronous exemption
• Nov: cargo bike!; skating
• Dec: EmacsConf; one cat died; skating
• Jan 2024: Tried livestreaming; lots of tweaks; Minecraft with cousins; consulting event
• Feb: P52; Star Wars party; skating; other cat died; COVID booster
• March: skirt, cloak, dress; rock-climbing; crepes; A+'s anxiety; maple syrup festival
• April: first 3x3 comp; drawstring backpack, rose, journal cover, machine cover, 5-stone, basket; more decluttering
• May: A+'s surgery; PS3 controllers & PC, PS Vita; cat carrier pad, skirt, poop emoji, vest pockets
• June: strawberry picking; crochet gifts, swim skirt, flowers; big kid bed; homemade popsicles; garden
• July: pouches; Pixel 8; swimming; blueberry & raspberry picking; bitter melon
• Overall: cargo bike, crafts, automation, figuring things out
• Next year: exploring more of our interests

Last year, I hoped to spend a lot of time playing outside with A+. Investing in a cargo bike has definitely helped with that, as we can more easily go on family bike adventures or head off to playdates. I've been learning more about playing inside with her as well, exploring Minecraft and figuring out how to work with the Minecraft Bedrock scripting API. This year A+ got into Star Wars and Harry Potter, so there's been lots and lots of reading, conversations, LEGO, Minecraft worlds, and pretend. I enjoy spending time with her. I think we're slowly starting to figure each other out.

We simplified the garden this year, and I feel like we've been able to water it more consistently. The bitter melon plants have been very productive, and the cherry tomatoes have been more than enough for our regular consumption.

If next year is much like this year (plus, of course, the things we'll experiment with and learn along the way), I think that'll be all right.

Last year, I figured that life as a 39-year-old would be about adapting to grade 1 and A-'s developing capabilities, and hoped to continue spending time outside.

We successfully navigated virtual grade 1, turning in the required homework every day. We mostly treated homework as practice in emotional regulation and figuring out how to work with our brains. A+ liked it when I took on the role of grousing about homework, broke it up into sections followed by Minecraft segments, translated the math homework into Cantonese, or set timers. Sometimes it was challenging to get through the work, but it helped to point out that homework was a way for us to stay out of in-person classes. I hope we'll be able to have a similar arrangement in virtual grade 2 next year.

Friendships were a big priority for us. We took advantage of our exemption from synchronous learning to spend most weekday afternoons playing with friends at nearby parks, even through winter. The kids loved playing dress-up, dolls, and kitchen, and they had plenty of special moments together. I like the grown-ups in the group, too, and we've been putting our heads together trying to help the kids learn about friendships and fun.

Thanks to A+'s friendships, we've been exploring lots of new interests. We let her explore Minecraft this year because many of her friends play it. She's really taken to it, and I'm slowly learning to have fun with it as well. I even set up Minecraft Realms Plus subscriptions so that we could play with A+'s cousins. Fortunately, it hasn't completely taken over our lives. Friends were also good reasons to go skating in winter and swimming in summer. (We started braving outdoor pools.)

A+ continues to be a bookworm, yay! She's watched a good number of videos and followed up with lots of book tie-ins, particularly around Minecraft and Disney Descendants. I'm learning not to worry too much about her eyesight and let her enjoy it, with the occasional reminder to check in with her body in between books.

As a result of A+'s growing independence when reading on her own and when playing with other kids, I've found a little time here and there to work on my own things. I wrote some code to recolor my Supernote sketches and extract the text, and that helped me write about more of my thoughts. I managed to figure out how to run multiple tracks for EmacsConf, which was awesome. I often bring hand-sewing projects to playdates so that I can work on them while chatting with the other grown-ups. I set up the sewing machine in the living room, and that made it easier for me to work on dresses, skirts, and even some outdoor covers.

I've been able to tend to the garden almost every day. I'm getting more comfortable starting seeds, propagating cuttings, and rescuing tomato branches. We grew lots more bitter melon and cherry tomatoes this year. The potatoes were interesting to experiment with, although that might be something I'll get from the grocery store going forward. I enjoyed eating lettuce, radishes, and beans from the garden. People have been stopping to take pictures of the zinnias, and the kids had fun making flower crowns with the marigolds.

I've been drawing daily moments on my SuperNote A5X as part of our bedtime routine. A+ likes to flip back through them, and they've made my monthly review process easier. I'm looking forward to building up a good archive of them.

It's been a good year for learning more about the world and learning more about ourselves. Thanks to all that practice dealing with homework and interactions, I've learned that I lean more towards sharing reflections and offering carrots rather than using sticks. I'm getting more comfortable with the idea that I can't just tell A+ everything. Some things she just has to experiment with for herself. I'm looking forward to getting better at keeping the long-term goal in mind without also catastrophizing and worrying too much about long-term effects. W-'s really good at thinking through things, and I'm glad I get to learn from his wisdom.

Let's see what next year is like. I hope we can work out a similar arrangement with A+'s virtual grade 2 teachers so that we can spend the afternoons outside. I'm looking forward to exploring more projects and developing more skills as she plays or reads. When she wants to spend time with me, I'd like to get better at playing with her, and Minecraft seems like a good avenue for that. Onward!

Text from sketch

Life as a 39-year-old

• Aug 2022: Recoloring sketches, connect the dots, library script
• Sept: Eye checkup ok, new scleral shell, EmacsConf sched, porch railing
• Oct: Wonder Woman, OpenAI whisper, OBS in the cloud
• Nov: Snowman, Ethernet, EmacsConf prep
• Dec: Emacs Conf tracks, skating, campfire
• Jan 2023: Twiddler, skating, forts
• Feb: Party for A+! Skating, sledding
• March: Minecraft, Mineclone, atropine, glasses, tooth extraction, taking turns
• April: Minecraft caving, laptops, garden
• May: Minecraft Realms, cavity, booster seat, loose tooth, sewing during playdates
• June: finished grade 1! biking farther, Minecraft worlds
• July: swimming, pizza, sewing covers

Compared to when I was 38:

• Stopped/reduced: LEGO Technic, house organization, cubing
• Continued: outside time, SuperNote drawing
• Started/increased: Minecraft, videos, playdates incl. 1-on-1, skating, swimming, container gardening, EmacsConf

40:

• Stopping/reducing: worrying
• Continuing: outside time, play, moments, drawing, crafts, garden, EmacsConf, consulting
• Starting/increasing: playing with A+

This might be the earliest I've written an annual review in years. Now that A- is becoming more independent, I've been slowly reclaiming time for myself. We'll see how it goes!

I feel like we grew so much this year. We've shifted to spending a lot more time outside, trying to slow down the progression of A-'s nearsightedness. It's been easy to do that with fine weather and plenty of playdates. A- enjoyed playing with dolls and tea parties with her friends at the playground. I'm happy to keep them well-stocked with chalk and flower petals for colourful potions and soups. We had a lot of flexibility thanks to her virtual kindergarten teacher, who was all right with us pretty much spending the whole day playing outside. A- continued to have fun reading and doing math, diving into graphic novels such as the Wings of Fire series and the comic guides of Beast Academy Level 2. She also enjoyed using math to explore entrepreneurship, setting up her first lemonade stand. (CoVID-safe: she sold bottled water and powdered juice packets.) She's also starting to get interested in typing and in writing cursive. (So fancy!)

We finally gave her the go-ahead to watch movies on weekends and other special occasions. Cinderella, Tangled, and Frozen have been her favourites. She loved the floor-length gown I sewed her. We've been memorizing song lyrics, and doing a lot of pretending. It's all good.

W- has taken over most of the cooking because we're usually out playing in the afternoon. A-'s interested in helping in the kitchen, so we do some of that together. She also enthusiastically helps with W-'s house projects. We're all picking up practical life skills. She's growing so much. I need to remember to keep challenging her!

While supporting this whirlwind of learning, I've been able to squeeze in a bit of consulting. I learned more about automating things with Python, and I also enjoyed being able to hand over my Javascript prototypes to other team members who could deal with things like meetings or fiddly CSS.

I also really appreciated working with a larger team of volunteers for last year's EmacsConf. We managed to get most of the videos captioned in time for broadcast, which was neat! I'd like to try that again this year. I see all sorts of inspiring posts in the process of compiling Emacs News each week, so I'm sure there'll be plenty to talk about at EmacsConf this year.

I've been working on few other tech improvements here and there. I upgraded my Lenovo ThinkPad X220T to 16GB of memory, so it feels a little snappier. I got a SuperNote A5X mostly for drawing on, and I love it. (In fact, I wrote this on the A5X.) I included A-'s interests in the typing website I made for her. It's nice to be able to make these little improvements.

For fun, we picked up cubing last October–even A-, who can often solve a 3x3 cube faster than I can. It's a compact way to exercise memory, spatial thinking, and fine motor skills, so I'm all for it. I average about a minute for a solve. If I practise, maybe I'll get to sub-45 seconds.

Drawing is lots of fun too. I've been really enjoying exploring thoughts and doodling stuff around me. Maybe I'll end up blogging more as well!

So yeah, all in all, a pretty good year.

Last year, I wrote that I wanted to:

• support and document A-'s learning: This worked out really well. I reused the spreadsheet I made for junior kindergarten so that I could organize my journal observations according to the four frames used in Ontario's kindergarten program. Grade 1 will be more subject-oriented, and I look forward to figuring out how to keep following A-'s interests while organizing the observations in a way that would be helpful for the teachers.
• plant more flowers: A- has loved being able to pick flowers pretty much every day for giving to us or making pretend soups. Dahlias, dianthus, marigolds, mums, poppies, alyssum, bachelor's buttons… so many to choose from!
• read and draw: I've been able to draw during some of A-'s playdates and while waiting for her to wake up. Progress is being made.
• keep my priorities straight: having a bit more me time makes it easier for me to focus on A- when she wants it to be her time.

Next year will probably be all about adapting to grade 1 and A-'s developing capabilities. We'll continue to focus on spending time outside, and we'll see how that goes.

Blog posts

Aside from emacs-news and weekly reviews:

• Emacs:
  • Started learning how to interactively debug Javascript in Emacs with Indium
  • Defining generic and mode-specific Emacs Lisp functions with cl-defmethod
  • Coverage reporting in Emacs with Buttercup, Undercover, Coverage, and a Makefile
  • Using the wgrep package in Emacs to rewrite grep results from lots of files
  • EmacsConf backstage: picking timestamps from a waveform
  • EmacsConf backstage: chapter markers
  • Adding little nudges to help on the EmacsConf wiki
  • Re-encoding the EmacsConf videos with FFmpeg and GNU Parallel
  • Thinking about Emacs community maintenance
  • Why I Love Emacs - from Bob Oliver
• Other tech:
  • Putting off laptop upgrade again
  • Avoiding automatic data type conversion in Microsoft Excel and Pandas
  • Toggle screen recording with AutoKey and vokoscreenNG
  • Trying out the SuperNote A5X
• Parenting:
  • Kindergarten means I get to learn how to write, too
  • Making a menu of activities
  • Turns out the Rubik's cube is just right for this stage with A-
• Life:
  • Reflecting on wasted effort
  • Making the most of the moment
• Reviews:
  • Monthly review: June 2021
  • Monthly review: July 2021
  • Monthly review: August 2021
  • Turning 38; life as a 37-year-old
  • Monthly review: September 2021
  • Monthly review: October 2021
  • Monthly review: November 2021
  • Monthly review: December 2021

Sketches

• Parenting
  • 2021-08-17a Mama, I want to play with you #parenting #challenge #play.jpg
  • 2021-08-19b Menu of activities #parenting #play .jpg
  • 2021-09-15 I feel blah #parenting.jpg
  • 2021-10-04 Sleep challenges #parenting.jpg
  • 2021-12-27a Planning for time with A- #parenting.png
  • 2022-01-20 Playing with fractions #math.png
  • 2022-04-17 Outside #parenting #planning #outside.png
  • 2022-07-27 Things to remember during challenging behaviour #parenting #emotions.jpg
  • 2022-07-29b Learning at home and in the neighbourhood #parenting #education #homeschooling.png
  • 2022-07-29d What does A- like to cook #cooking.png
  • 2022-07-31a A- feels great when… #parenting #happiness.png
  • School:
    • 2021-09-19 Senior kindergarten #kindergarten #parenting #school.jpg
    • 2021-09-20 Figuring out virtual kindergarten #parenting #school #kindergarten.jpg
    • 2021-09-22 Senior kindergarten plan #parenting #kindergarten #school.jpg
    • 2021-10-02 Virtual kindergarten - things to try #parenting #kindergarten #school.jpg
• Drawing for fun:
  • 2021-08-05 Purrmaid #art-hub.jpg
  • 2021-08-05 Skeleton surprise.jpg
  • 2021-08-19a Playing with lettering #lettering #sketchnoting #drawing.jpg
  • 2021-08-19 Brush lettering - A a #lettering.jpg
• Life:
  • 2021-08-09 37 to 38 #yearly #review.jpg
  • 2021-08-18a What do I want to learn #planning #learning.jpg
  • 2021-08-21 Preparing for my midlife crisis #planning.jpg
  • 2021-12-12c Refocusing #planning.jpg
  • 2021-12-14b Making the most of my discretionary time #planning.jpg
  • 2021-12-19 Waste.jpg
  • 2021-12-20a Making the most of the moment #planning #kaizen.jpg
  • 2022-07-30a I feel great when #happiness.png
• Emacs:
  • 2021-12-12a EmacsConf 2020 2021 2022.jpg
  • 2021-12-12 Parts leading towards EmacsConf 2022.jpg
  • 2021-12-13b Coordinating captions.jpg
  • 2021-12-15 Emacs community maintenance #emacs.png
  • 2021-12-16a Possible video workflow.jpg
  • 2021-12-16b EmacsConf - things I dislike, things I like.jpg
  • 2021-12-18a Excavating my accumulated Org notes #organization.jpg
• Tech:
  • 2021-12-13a Revisiting laptop question.jpg
  • 2021-12-14a Writing workflow.jpg
  • 2021-12-14c Services on my VPS #tech.jpg
  • 2021-12-14d Phone, laptop, VPS #tech.jpg
  • 2022-07-25 Trying the Supernote A5X.png
  • 2022-07-26b SuperNote for now #sketching #supernote.jpg
  • 2022-07-29a Getting the hang of drawing on the Supernote A5X #sketching #supernote.jpg

Time

Category	2020-2021 %	2021-2022 %	Diff %	h/wk	Diff h/wk
Sleep	31.9	35.7	3.8	59.9	6.4
Personal	5.6	7.3	1.7	12.3	2.9
Discretionary - Play	0.3	1.0	0.7	1.8	1.2
Business	1.8	2.2	0.4	3.7	0.7
Unpaid work	4.5	4.6	0.1	7.7	0.1
Discretionary - Family	0.4	0.5	0.1	0.8	0.1
Discretionary - Social	0.1	0.1	-0.0	0.1	-0.0
A-	45.1	42.3	-2.8	71.0	-4.8
Discretionary - Productive	10.3	6.4	-3.9	10.8	-6.6

Huh, that's interesting. We shifted to being outside more often, so I haven't been bribing A- with screentime in order to have some coding time (Discretionary - Productive time down). She's happy to read more independently now (A- time down), so I've been able to set a bedtime for myself and start settling down for sleep at a reasonable time (Sleep up), and I sometimes have breakfast by myself while waiting for her to finish reading (Personal - Routines up). From time to time, I can even do a bit of reading myself (Discretionary - Play up). W-'s handling almost all the cooking since we're out on playdates, but I've shifted more chore time towards picking up, cooking, and doing errands, so the time I spend on household stuff (Unpaid work) is still about the same. This year has felt pretty good.

It would be nice to have more time for working on personal projects, but I don't know how that would fit into our current rhythms. I don't want to stay up late, and A- doesn't want me to be on my laptop while waiting for her to wake up. So I'll probably focus on writing and drawing for a little while, since I can do that early in the morning. I just have to pick coding projects that pique her interest, like when I made a typing practice website based on her favourite books. Other things can wait.

Let's see what the next year brings!

Despite the chaos and challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, this year was actually pretty good. We easily adapted to staying home with the occasional playdate or masked trip to the playground as A- became more interested in other kids.

We chose virtual learning for A-'s junior kindergarten, which turned out to be just right for A- and me. I loved seeing what the kids were up to and learning from how the teacher taught them, and A- enjoyed being able to mostly follow her own interests. I had fun incorporating A-'s obsession with Numberblocks into lots of playtime. We read hundreds of books together (both print and electronic), and I even got to read some grown-up books while waiting for her to be done reading at bedtime. I learned how to document her learning and organize my observations according to Ontario's kindergarten program. I was even able to help the class with tech support, materials, and donations. We've chosen virtual learning again for senior kindergarten. I hope it will be just as fun.

It was a good year for learning domestic skills. We enjoyed growing cherry tomatoes, bitter melon, and basil last year. This year, I added peppers, and I planted flowers in one of the boxes in front of the house. We've been enjoying a bounty of cherry tomatoes all summer, although I'm dealing with some powdery mildew. We learned more about preserving food, and we tweaked our kitchen layout to accommodate new tools and facilitate A-'s participation. I continued baking a loaf of bread every few days, trying out different recipes until we settled on a slightly modified version of this sourdough sandwich recipe. I learned how to make yogurt, too. Building on A-'s interest in Pride and Prejudice, I sewed her a bonnet, gloves, and many long dresses. I even sewed her a gown of bathing suit fabric that she wore to the splash pads. She was curious about knitting because of Numberblocks. I showed her how to knit and purl, and we worked on some hats and scarves.

I had a bit more discretionary time that mostly came from staying up late. I helped organize EmacsConf again, and I wrote some functions to help automate the things I needed to do. I also set up a calendar of Emacs events. Having developed a greater appreciation of captions and transcripts while trying to speed-read my way through more videos than I could fit in my focused time, I started editing captions for the EmacsConf recordings. That got me interested in possibly live-captioning EmacsConf and other things like it someday, so I ordered a Georgi keyboard and I've been teaching myself stenography with Plover. I mostly use it to write journal entries. I migrated my blog from Wordpress to 11ty because I wanted to use a static site generator that could be extended with Javascript, as it's a little hard to juggle different programming languages if I don't have much focused time. I ended up picking up more Python anyway, since I also wanted to extend Plover. I considered upgrading my laptop so that I could do streaming or video processing, but I'm still more constrained by time and energy than by hardware. Speaking of hardware, I've been learning more about mechanics. A- loved watching videos of Lego Great Ball Contraptions, so I learned how to build a few by following tutorials. I'm beginning to be able to figure out how to make do with Lego Technic, adapting the designs to the parts we have (and our desire to have as many modules as possible running simultaneously).

Last year, I wrote that I wanted to focus on:

• Managing energy:
  • Sleep and managing my own plans: I slept less this year because I stayed up to do more consulting and personal projects. Fortunately, A- has learned to let me sleep in a little.
  • Enthusiasm: I like gardening and cooking, and A- often joins in. I like working on Lego Great Ball Contraptions while A- helps or reads, and she loves to watch the results. Learning stenography also makes it easier for me to patienty read lots of books since I can practise steno-ing parts of words while I read. Now that A-'s a good reader, we can take turns reading too.
  • Low-energy times: We have some screentime in our afternoon routine so that I can do household chores and get dinner together. That helps us get through some of the low-energy times.
• Taking small steps: I did a pretty good job of learning about things in the small chunks of time I have, although I've been falling prey to revenge bedtime procrastination. If I get better at taking notes, it might be easier to convince myself to alternate days when I stay up with days when I go to bed early.
• Making learning visible: My journal helped me capture lots of observations. I organized my notes and shared them with the teachers, who found them helpful when writing report cards. It was fun being able to review A-'s progress, too.

We're continuing with virtual learning until at least February, so next year will probably look somewhat like this year. We're figuring out quick dinners and other sanity-savers in case W- returns to working in the office a few days a week.

Over the next year, I want to:

• Follow A-'s interests, document her learning, and learn how to support A-'s learning in key areas: Virtual kindergarten seems to mostly focus on literacy and math. A- is pretty comfortable with reading and math, but she's less keen on writing and drawing based on the teacher's prompts. I'll look for more ways to incorporate writing into the sorts of things she likes to do. We'll probably also need to focus on outdoor playdates for social interaction, since it's hard to connect on-screen. I'm learning more about helping her develop emotional self-regulation. She's pretty level-headed, but sometimes she's definitely five years old. That's okay! I'm learning too.
• Plant more flowers in another front yard planter box: A- enjoyed picking flowers to put into a small pitcher on the table, so it might be fun to grow more flowers for cutting.
• Take advantage of A-'s independent reading time to read and draw: A- usually likes to stay up another 15-20 minutes, so that's been a good time for me to read. If I take sketchnotes or I draw my thoughts, that will also help me feel like I've had some time to think. I can also get back to drawing moments. Those were fun.
• Keep my priorities straight: It's tough having limited time to focus. I get tempted to stay up late because I don't have much time to myself during the day, and because it's easier to keep going when I have some code in my head than to figure it all out again the next time I get a chance. I'm less patient when I'm sleepy, though, so the price of feeling a little brilliant is feeling less than awesome as a parent. Reframing it might help. I'm choosing to be able to model self-regulation. I also want to have the energy and enthusiasm to learn from A-'s pretend play. Sure, it's fun geeking out and coding, but I can do that later on. A-'s availability and interest in helping me learn how to play is time-limited.

This year looked nothing like last year. COVID-19 had a huge impact, of course, and then there's life with A- (now 4.5 years old) and all her growing capabilities.

With our day settling into reasonable routines, I'm slowly getting to work on personal projects again. Our babysitting experiments pre-COVID sometimes gave me 2-7 hours of focused time. What luxury! A-‘s pretty attached to me, though, so it was the rare babysitter who could keep her interest for a long time. When the pandemic curtailed babysitting sessions, I settled into a routine of snuggling A- into bed and then staying up for 2-3 more hours. I'm still figuring out the trade-off between getting sleep and doing stuff. I learned how to use ReactJS to add all sorts of things to my journal system (dark mode, pictures, sketches). I made a font based on my handwriting. With W-‘s help, I was able to co-organize a virtual Emacs conference. I checked out resources on early childhood education. I started drawing again. Whee! I still have a lot of technical debt from things like using an old version of Rails, but I've shoved a few services into Docker containers and tried to limit their access. I hope things will hold for another year.

We got A- used to mostly sleeping in her own room, so I sleep a bit better now. A- got her own library card and proudly checked out her own books. We started giving her an allowance too, which she saves up for snacks and subsidized LEGO sets. I share some of my earnings from consulting with her if I work on client requests during the day. Sometimes she asks me if I can go and work some more so that I can give her more money.

A- still prefers to play with me, but she's starting to figure out things that she can do independently while waiting: usually LEGO, Khan Academy Kids, RelationShapes, or reading. That gives us a little more time to do stuff around the house. W- shifted to working from home because of the pandemic, and he does most of the cooking. For my part, I learned a better technique for making pizza (broil in a cast iron skillet and then finish on the stove), and I've been making sourdough bread every other day or so. (Nothing too fancy, just a basic recipe.) We've been making do with our toaster oven, as the regular oven is out of commission. Homemade popsicles have become a household staple, too.

We started regularly spending time outside: sledding in winter, biking in summer, and afternoon snack time when the weather is good. It took a week or so of holding A- by the armpits or the bicycle seat, but she figured out how to ride a pedal bike without training wheels.

We had plenty of fun at home. A- can read now! We like to take turns. We experimented with starting plants from seed, and we added more plants from home improvement stores and from friends. Tomatoes and basil flourished in the garden, and the bitter melon did okay too. We bought balloon-twisting supplies and learned how to make various animals. We picked up a Snaptricity kit that the neighbours had left out, and we played with circuits. We moved from building with cardboard to building with LEGO. In particular, the LEGO Heroica board game fired up A-‘s imagination. In addition to her usual pretending to be a baby, she pretended to be a wizard, a golem, a goblin, a barbarian, a ranger… She pretended to be lots of other people (complete with names) and things too (she was a little baby prosciutto at some point).

A- grew more social. Before COVID-19, we regularly had playdates. A- also happily played with her cousins and her Lola when we visited the Philippines last year. Of course, COVID-19 has thrown a wrench in the works. We've settled into a daily ritual of video-calling my mom, and I occasionally make PDF slideshows or mini-books to share during our chat. While playing, A- often mentions her Lola or her friends. I'm her main play partner these days, and we're figuring out more about playing together and playing separately.

A- still has tantrums, naturally. She stomps around like the fiercest baby golem there could be. But the tantrums pass more quickly now. She's better at communicating what she wants, we have more ideas for ways to help her cool down, and she's very slowly learning how to manage her own emotions.

On the surface, this year looked much like last year did: drop-in centres, playgrounds and field trips, trips to visit family, and a little bit of consulting and Emacs. It felt so different, though. Of course, A-‘s a whole lot different at 3.5 years instead of 2.5. But since this is my yearly update instead of hers, I’m going to think about how I’ve been growing and what changed.

Last year, I said, “Bring on the ‘why?’ stage!”, and it turned out to be amazing. I’ve learned more about science thanks to her questions, and I’ve learned more about engineering thanks to watching How It’s Made videos and building cardboard machines.

There were many moments when I found myself thinking, “Wow, I like spending time with A-.” It’s great watching her grow. We can talk about so many things. She’s slowly becoming more independent. Sure, there were also times when I thought, “Darn, she has to learn about this the tough way,” but I’m getting better at setting my own boundaries and taking care of myself, and I’m getting pretty good at embracing the tantrums.

I’ve also gotten better at accepting the limits of this phase. I add more things to my list than I can cross off, even with focused time from the babysitting experiment that we restarted on A-‘s request. I often pick sleep instead of working on my computer, because I get grumpy if I’m tired. It’s okay. There’s next year (kindergarten is just around the corner!), and there are other people who can do things too. For now, I’m learning how to be here.

Or there–we squeezed in a trip to the Netherlands to visit my sister and her family, and another trip to the Philippines to see everyone. A-‘s becoming quite a seasoned traveller, although she still doesn’t sleep much on airplanes. It was good to spend time with people. A- had lots of fun playing with her cousins and with Lola, hooray!

Last year, I wrote:

I’m also looking forward to learning more about pedagogical documentation, drawing, taking pictures/videos, and other ways I can share things with her and with other people. Making books for A- is fun, so I’d like to do more of that too.

I really like the way my journaling workflow makes it possible to capture lots of little moments. I’m still not good at taking a step back and seeing trends over time, and my weekly review often falls by the wayside. It was nice remembering little moments in the process of doing this yearly review. Hardly any drawing, but I came to terms with that being a low priority for now. I started categorizing photos using albums in Google Photos, but it’s not quite as smooth or as regular as I’d like.

I made a few more children’s books for A-. “I Am Turning 3” organized highlights from her first three years. “Let’s Make Popcorn” was the sequel to “Let’s Make a Smoothie.” “Going on an Airplane” helped us get ready for the trip, and she loved that I illustrated it with her favourite stuffed toy. For my sister, I drafted a book called “Magic Books”, but I haven’t illustrated it yet. I improved my workflow, so now I can theoretically make longer books with better layouts. I look forward to trying that out as we move into more complex stories.

We’ve been using some babysitting time to work on household projects and useful skills. W- taught me how to use the sliding compound mitre saw and the table saw. We repainted and trimmed the insides of the upper kitchen cabinets, replaced the drawers, and built organizers and shelves. We decluttered and organized, and we even donated old bicycles. In terms of cooking, we’ve been shifting more towards fresh food instead of cooking in bulk, more towards vegetables and other recommendations of the new food guide, and more towards higher-quality groceries. We’ve been learning how to work with a sourdough starter that we brought home from my sister’s neighbour in the Netherlands.

Babysitting freed up some time to work on some personal coding projects for continuous improvement, too. I wrote functions to make it easier to prepare Emacs News by getting feed items, checking for duplicates, and assigning categories with a few keystrokes. I started hosting planet.emacslife.com after the server at planet.emacsen.org went down. I finally got around to setting up SSL. I moved my sketches from Flickr to my own sketches.sachachua.com, and I wrote a tool that rewrote most of the links in my old posts. I started using Docker to contain some of my services, including a new version of my library renewal script. I contributed patches to Org Mode and to Termux.

I got into sewing again. I experimented with a custom-printed headband that had letters, numbers, days of the week, and other useful things for preschool education on the go. I found out that W-‘s old jeans fit me quite comfortably, so I hemmed and patched them. I serged cabinet liners and washcloths. I made fuzzy hats in winter, and shorts and underwear in summer. I started to feel more comfortable sewing. It was even fun.

So yeah… A- grew a lot, and so did I.

This year was less about dealing with uncertainty, and more about discovery and delight. As a confident talker, A- is quite an active participant in her own learning and growth, and I'm enjoying learning how to collaborate with her. It's great to see the results of the things we experimented with last year, and I'm looking forward to seeing how we continue to grow.

It helped that lots of medical uncertainties got resolved. The pediatrician said we could stop going for ultrasounds for A-‘s liver hemangioma. The hospital cardiology department said it was okay for A- to go to the community cardiologist for routine monitoring, instead of coming to the hospital for exams under sedation. Dental surgery took care of the cavities that were possibly due to either breastfeeding or enamel hypoplasia. We'll continue to see the Eye Clinic twice a year, and the ocularist a bit more frequently than that. With most of the those concerns out of the way, though, I felt comfortable wrapping up with the Healthy Babies Healthy Children program and heading out into the wild world of parenting without training wheels.

We signed up for music classes and made it to about half of them, skipping a number of classes due to trips to the Philippines and jet lag recovery time. Even though A- continued to be mostly reserved during music classes, she talked about them positively, singing the songs at home and imitating the teacher. For my part, I picked up a few more nursery rhymes. We tried nature classes, too, although A- seems to prefer music classes at the moment.

I've been making an effort to make friends and help A- connect with people. That seems to be working out wonderfully. I liked building friendships with other parents and their kids, and A- enjoyed interacting with them too.

My dad's health declined rapidly, so we made three trips to the Philippines during the year. A- and I got the hang of travelling by ourselves. A- enjoyed spending time with my family, although she was a little anxious around the medical equipment supporting my dad at home. When my dad died, W- was in the Philippines with us, which was very helpful. The celebration of my dad's life was inspiring. I can only hope to live so well, in my own way.