july 2012

july 24

on fridays we've been going to the safety village - a very cute miniature village with pedal cars [one of which toby some how managed to squeeze himself into!]

we've been continuing to explore our new town. each day someone else gets a turn of choosing what we do [although toby, without fail, chooses to never leave the house!]. i've also been trying to get the children to do something vagulely educational each day [we're alternating between math games, programming [via kodu and MITs scratch], and typing/writing [for which aly and toby have both elected to work on writing a wiki for minecraft together]. zoe has suddenly decided to learn to read. she's really stubborn so i knew there was no point me trying to talk her into it, but she's always been great with language and toby was reading at 3 so i thought she might suddenly decide to give it a go. i'd forgotten how fast they pick up words once they start.

we visited one of the local libraries last week and it seems we've been spoilt by the libraries in richmond! i'm going to give the main branch a try this week to see if they have a little more choice. we also visited gyro beach. the beaches here always have so much to do: concession stand, trampoline and slides in the water, ziplines, playgrounds for all ages, waterparks etc.

next week aly's friend is coming to visit for a couple of days and then aly flies to victoria by herself for a couple of weeks. besides missing her, i will desperately miss her zoe-entertaining abilities!

it was our wedding anniversary on saturday and with a little bit of prep work on friday together, she made/served us a candlelit meal for 2 on the balcony whilst toby managed to keep zoe entertained and did the clean up.

aly and i have spent this month doing a lot of cooking together in the hope she might be able to take over some of the cooking in the future [since i hate doing it]. it'll be toby's turn next month so hopefully one of them will turn into an inspiring chef!

july 13

aly coordinating the move! - one of the movers was so impressed with her that he gave her his exacto-knife to keep [which left me wondering if that might be against company policy!]

playing angry birds with packing boxes!

we enjoyed a lovely visit from the adams family last week. they were a great help in getting us all moved in. we did manage to squeeze in a bit of fun with them, including a trip to hot sands beach [where the sand was, indeed, extremely hot]. we look forward to hopefully seeing them back here in august again.

toby and justin burying each other at hot sands

aly and jenna at hot sands beach

soccer at the park

turtle spotting along the pond

we're all settling into kelowna nicely. i picked up a leisure guide from the local community centre and suddenly felt a lot more in touch with what is going on around us. the temperature has consistently been in the mid-30s which is taking a bit of getting used to [i'm a little in love with our A/C and with our shaded balcony]. we went to 'fun in the park' which is on every wednesday evening at a local park. all of the children loved it, but after an hour or so nobody had the energy to scrape themselves off the picnic blanket and zoe was starting to look a little pink despite the vast quantities of factor 60 smoothered all over her, so we headed home.

aly has been doing a fantastic job of getting to know all the neighbours [adults and children] on our behalf. i can't tell you the number of places i've been and had to introduce myself as 'aly's mom' so that everyone will know who i am - it doesn't look like that will be any different here!

it does feel like i've had a vacation and should really be getting back to work around about now - a very strange feeling not to be going back!

july 2

happy canada day!

what a week. so many good byes. i had no idea we knew so many people until it was time to say goodbye to them all. my mom held a queen's jubilee/last playdate on the 6th, family place held a beautiful tea party for me on the 18th, i had a goodbye scrapbooking session with friends on the 16th, my friend invited us out for tea on the 17th, my friend had a leaving party for me on the 22nd with about 40 people, and aly's friend had a leaving party for her on the 28th.

zoe enjoying her afternoon tea

jubilee party food

we spent our last evening eating at pajo's fish and chips at garry point park in steveston, and then headed to the hamilton night out followed by a movie in the park. i sat on top of the playstructure at the top of the park and looked out over so many wonderful friends and neighbours. it's an amazing community and it's going to be tough to beat.

pajo's fish and chips in steveston

goodbye hamilton

aly and her beautiful hat/henna

moving day

goodbye empty house

saturday i picked sasch up from the airport, took him back to the hotel where we'd been staying for 3 nights and then waved my mom off for her flight [thank goodness for my poor mom who cooked and cleaned and played endless games of pretend with zoe]. from there we headed straight to kelowna. it's great to be at the house in kelowna again. that first night we sat on the balcony watching a spectacular thunderstorm/rainbow, and then enjoyed a 27 degree canada day yesterday; after a relaxing morning of balcony bird watching [my new hobby] we headed down to the canada day celebrations at waterfront park.

tomorrow all the furniture arrives [as does my wonderful friend, connie, who is following it up to help unpack with us for a few days]. i should also thank my friend renukha who welcomed us into her home on friday to feed us, let us use her laundry facilities and let us leave our trash with her!

i feel very fortunate that so many people are making the trip to kelowna this summer. [3 different families in the first week in fact!]. when september rolls around, my parents will be coming for a visit so i don't think we'll be too lonely until at least november!

toby in action on sports day

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