We are closed Monday, May 19th for the Stat Holiday. See you back on Tuesday! 

Take a few minutes and think about the last time you made a new friend. Where did you meet? What happened? How did you know you wanted to be friends? Who followed up? When did you start feeling like you were moving from good acquaintance to good friend?

If you're in a place of needing to made new friends or wanting to deepen some acquaintances, what can you take from your previous experiences to guide you?

We are looking for a warm, welcoming person to host our summer playgroup from June to August. Playgroup will be from 9:00-12:00 Monday to Thursday. While generally intended to serve children 0-5 years old, older siblings are welcome along. Parents are expected to stay on site and supervise their children. 

Key Responsibilities:

Host playgroup every morning.

Set up and clean up the Children’s Area for playgroup every day.

Welcome families and help orient them to the activities.

Design and implement a playgroup format with a variety of activities.

Hours:

Monday-Thursday: 8:45am-12:15pm

14 hours a week at $20/hour

Desired Start & End Dates (we are flexible):

June 23rd, 2025- August 21st, 2025

Closed for Stat holidays: July 1st and August 4th.

Skills:

Organized and tidy

Patient, warm and friendly with children and parents

Enjoy preparing creative activities/leading circle or storytime

Welcoming and kind presence

Good at gently setting boundaries and reminding children of guidelines

Confident interacting with children of all ages

Qualifications:

High school diploma

Experience working with children (babysitting, volunteering with children, being a camp

counsellor, teaching assistant, etc.)

Further education in childhood development an asset

Required:

Police Check

For more information, or to apply please send a cover letter and resume to myinnerharbour@gmail.com.

The good news is there are lots of practical strategies out there for making friends! The bad news is that often we've overlooked the first step: our own inner work. Are we ready to make friends? 

Making friends takes time, effort, risk and vulnerability. If we aren't prepared we run the risk of burning out, being disappointed and getting hurt. 

Practicing self-compassion is the first step. Not everyone you reach out to will be interested in being friends. Not everyone you connect with will be the kind of friend you actually need. It's easy to turn these experiences into self-judgment. "I wonder what's wrong with me" or "I'm not fun enough". Self-compassion says: "I am both lovable and flawed and the people that can't accept and support all of me aren't for me." 

Knowing your core values and what kind of friendship you're looking for makes a difference, too. When you know what qualities you value, it's easier to discern whether a new acquaintance is someone you'd like to build a friendship with or not. Knowing that right now you need an activity friend who wants to hike, swim and go to the gym with you, also helps narrow down where you'll look for friends and who you'll reach out to. 

After that the practical strategies come into play! Google "how to make friends" and you'll find all kinds of awesome suggestions. With intentionality, patience and consistency these strategies really pay off! 

Lastly, communication is critical. Let your new acquaintance know you had a great time chatting. Ask if an art class buddy wants to regularly get together to create together when the class ends. Be clear about what you're hoping for and then circle back to self-compassion if the response isn't what you wanted. 

Want to chat further about the how to's of making friends? RSVP on our website for our Community Conversation: Friendship 101 on the 28th from 7:00-8:30pm! 

Identifying what gets in the way of the things we want is the first step toward making changes. 

Want to pursue connections, spend more time with friends and feel like you're involved in your community? We know friendship is vitally important to our overall well-being and yet it often is the last thing we prioritize. 

What makes it hard to invest in connecting with others? Maybe it's the season of life you're in with small children and no real village. Maybe it's people-pleasing and overcommitment in areas that don't actually feed you. Maybe you struggle with social anxiety or self-esteem. Maybe it's overwhelm from the constant exposure to a world engulfed in tragedy and injustice. 

When you can pinpoint what keeps you from the connections you want, you can look for resources and support to help you reduce the barriers little by little. Join an activity based group that shares your interests. Ask a friend to support you through saying "no" to a few things. Find a therapist or coach to work on self-compassion and socials skills. Turn down the volume of information you're taking in everyday with screen time limits. 

Friendship and connection take time. Every small step counts! 

Friendship. It's critical! And yet, it's also so easy to let friendships sit on the back burner and allow the "to-do" list to take over, whether it's work or household upkeep. 

Sometimes when we know why something benefits us, it's easier to prioritize. Instead of seeing friendship as a bonus, what if we were to view it as essential to our health? What would that change?

As we move into May and our focus shifts to friendship and connection, I thought this was a good question to wrap up April's creativity theme. 

Is there someone in your life who inspires you to engage your creativity? Or invites you into creative practice? 

Maybe you're that person for someone else! As a species, we love to be invited and included. Don't hesitate to ask friends over to crochet, or collage or make cards! 

Creativity is such a powerful tool for well-being. It helps us manage stress, improves mood, boosts confidence and problem-solving skills, deepens self-awareness and is often just plain fun! Being creative in community amplifies these effects because of the support and validation we receive from those around us. So if you're looking for a more meaningful hang with friends consider getting creative together!

Feeling connected is critical to our well-being and yet we often don't prioritize our social needs. What if we just need to bring a little more creativity to how we get together? 

What do you love to do? Who might be willing to join you? 

One of the core concepts from @priyaparker's book "The Art of Gathering" is to be clear with yourself about what your hopes and goals are for any get together, no matter how big or small. Having clarity on what you want helps you shape an event that will actually meet your objective and lets your guests know what to expect. 

For example, I really enjoy creating opportunities for meaningful conversation and I really love poetry. Plus, I have a beautiful backyard, so last summer I thought it would be fun to host a garden party with a twist. I decided to ask my guests to bring a poem along, with the idea that everyone would read the poem they brought and share why they liked it. 

When everyone arrived, we settled in and helped ourselves to food and then I thanked everyone for being a good sport and bringing a poem and explained what we were going to do. We went around the table one at a time, reading our poem aloud and then briefly describing why we chose what we did. It was so fun to see what poems were chosen and deeply satisfying to hear the stories behind them. 

Did all of my guests love poetry? Absolutely not, but they were all willing to join in and see where it would take us. That willingness to be creative together and do something out of our ordinary created a wonderful sense of connection.

What kind of gathering are you interested in hosting? It doesn't have to be big or elaborate, it just needs clarity and intentionality. Love puzzles? Host a puzzle afternoon. Love baking? Invite some friends for a taste-test party of some new recipes you're trying. 

Need more inspiration? Check out @priyaparker's work and @jessjanz's Dinner with Strangers series! 

Thanks to everyone who came to our Community Conversation around screen time yesterday! We had a great conversation and really appreciated the insight provided by Kathryn and Cady from @islandclinicalcounselling. 

Kathryn and Cady emphasized that, as with many habits in life, awareness is always the first step toward any kind of change. Do we actually have an accurate understanding of how much we're on our screens? If we were to write down all our phone use (or check our screen time settings more regularly), what would we learn? 

We can also start to pay attention to what we're feeling or noticing in our bodies when we use our phones or when our phones are not accessible. 

Based on what we discover about ourselves and our habits we can make more informed decisions about the ways we want to use our phones. If we're looking to reduce our scrolling, starting with bite-sized changes can help us get there. 

A comment I really appreciated from our participants, was the reminder that you're not alone! Even though its almost impossible to function in our society without a screen, you're not alone in thinking through your habits and wanting to make healthy choices! There's no one-size-fits-all approach to screen time, so don't hesitate to make the choices that work best for you and your family, even if it looks like no one else is making them. 

And this is where compassion becomes critical. Compassion for ourselves and for others. Let's work hard to be gentle with ourselves as we seek to make changes and gentle with our assumptions about others and their choices. 

If you're concerned about your phone use or need help getting started with building new habits, working with a compassionate and skilled therapist can help! Reach out to @islandclinicalcounselling.

    

Engaging our creativity is a practice. Our minds like practices, because routine and rhythm are attractive. The creative part might not come as easily for brains more used to to-do lists and checking off tasks, but our brains are endlessly creative. Sometimes they just need a little push to get started. Prompts are perfect for this. 

In our Mind Room we have a number of different prompt options: there are journalling questions, a core values exercise and a number of different worksheets related to self-compassion and getting to know yourself better. 

We also have a number of self-help books and memoirs that can be a good jumping off point for reframing or thinking differently about challenges and experiences. 

As with any new practice, commitment is the biggest hurdle. When you can designate a time and a place to practice and put it in your calendar, it becomes that much easier to follow through.