FEATURE: A Day in My Life as a Canadian Mom, Wife and Content Creator Living on Koh Phangan, Thailand

Day: Tuesday July 25, 2023

6:15 am: I wake up in my four-year-old son Hudson's bed because he came into our bed last night like he always does and then started to kick me in the ribs every so often. Sometimes I can handle it but I have a cold since I got back from Bali and I'm having trouble breathing which is affecting my sleep. Getting prodded in the ribs every 30 minutes by a tiny foot doesn't help. So I teetered into his bed at about 2am and slept until 6:15am — my normal wake up time.

I love to get up at this time. The dogs are outside, Fraser and Hudson are still sleeping (they usually sleep ‘til about 7:30 am), and even the sun is still yawning itself awake. 

My espresso machine grinds me out a latte, and I set one up for Fraser when he wakes up, and then get out my yoga mat.

When I was nursing our newborn son at the start of COVID, I wasn't able to leave the house. So I developed my own at-home yoga routine made up of all my favourite poses that I started doing every morning.

I've added to it throughout the years, and it's now evolved into a 45-minute to one-hour-long routine that wakes up and energizes every muscle in the body and centers me for my day.

I start by burning some palo santo or sage, then rub some essential oils on my feet and hands, read a poem from a poetry book, and sit in silence for a few minutes.

7:30 am: My favourite part of the routine is around three-quarters of the way through when I get to my headstand, which is usually around when Hudson and Fraser wake up. It’s not unheard of for them to be coming down the stairs while I’m upside down, my pajama top usually around my head. Must be some sight while they’re blinking their bleary eyes awake.

After morning cuddles (depending on how grumpy Hudson is but I always get one from Fraser), Hudson eats his chocolate peanut butter or cheese toast, and Fraser sips his coffee on the sofa trying to wake himself up for what is usually a busy, stressful workday.

Once he's bathed and changed for school, we load Hudson into the car and I take him into his school. It's just a four-minute drive, which is a pretty sweet commute.

Screenshot from a little video I made of Hudson and I in the car once we got to school.

We recently moved to the center of the island which is not near a beach but close to everything else (and being a tropical island, the beach is never exactly FAR).

Back in the car, I open YouTube and select Thai With New. New is the YouTube influencer who's been teaching me one new Thai word per day, along with how to use it in a variety of sentences, every weekday for the past two years. I've gotten into a routine of listening to her every day on the drive back from dropping Hudson at school. And it's improved my vocabulary massively. Not enough, so I'm thinking about starting on her paid Patreon channel, but I'm pleased to see progress in my Thai after being here for way too long without speaking more than the proverbial taxi Thai most farangs here speak.