www.bitsandpeaces.com: Epoch

In the fields of chronology and periodization, an epoch (from Greek Εποχή epohi meaning "era") means an instance in time chosen as the origin of a particular era. The "epoch" then serves as a reference point from which time is measured.

Over the last few months, my wife and I have been preparing for the arrival of our son. One of the tasks that Joanne gave to me was filling this empty wall, in the baby’s room, with a nice wall mural.

My first idea was to create a fun image with rolling hills and silly dinosaurs. I thought that it would tew kewt to have a dinosaur head poking through the clouds, with the dino’s head bent down while he took a bite of a rainbow!

Jo’ wanted me to paint a mural design filled with lions, hippos and banana trees with monkeys.

After a few weeks of chit-chat, we were no further ahead with an agreement. One day, I was working on a different art project and I found myself ‘googling’ for images of turtles… and then I became inspired!

http://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/turtlebookink/

I found a great image and after I had used my computer to flip it around, change colours and do a few other things that I do, I had the beginnings of a plan. Jo’ thought that my ideas were great and soon the paint started flying around the room.

While all of this was going on, Joanne was preparing to have her baby shower. What a wonderful event that was! The family, friends and neighbours that filled our house that day made us realize that we would never be alone when facing the challenges that parenthood will bring.

The atmosphere reminded me of ‘the days of old’ where people and communities busied themselves with making gifts with splendid decorations. Hand knitted blankets, booties, toques and sweaters were unwrapped with a smile. My sister, knowing how passionate Jo’ and I are about recycling and reusing, presented us with many educational children’s storybooks and DVD’s that she had purchased second-hand!

Of course, some items were new purchases, but the environment was always the inspiration behind them. We received books about how to raise a ‘green’ baby, with helpful hints about healthy eating, safe cleaning products and more.

One day, I was surprised to find a large package that had been delivered to our door. It was from my best friend and his wife. They have recently had two sons and so this box was filled with many hand-me-down clothes. Ken’s wife Laura, is now a stay at home mom and she is building a business creating baby products using recycled fabrics. Many samples of her creations filled this box, as well.

Ken and I have a history of sharing music. One of his contributions to this package were a few music CD’s that he had organized, with songs ‘not just for kids’ by Johnny Cash, Jerry Garcia and John Grisham.

Even the students from my Peacebus have surprised me with fun gifts for our child. Jo’ had to put up an extra shelf (and yes – I did tell her that she should have left that task to me… but Joanne loves doing stuff like this) above the baby’s crib, to hold the toy dogs and blue bears, decorated with scarves filled with peace symbols.