November 8 2008

here are some photos from a drive to IGA this weekend.

Those are mule deer; one buck and three does.   There are usually about seven of them.  I wonder if they're the same group that comes to our lawn at night and eats the berries from our tree... 

This was quite a thing to see:  some guys were going into Tim Hortons for a coffee, and they just parked their trailer while they went in.  Looks like they were just hunting.  Funny, I thought the season was over.  The moose looks like an older one - huge, but skinny and whithered.  I felt kind of bad for him.

November 8, 2008

We're nicely settled in now, and just about finished emptying boxes.  The next step is to get the girls involved in some extra curricular activities, other than playing in the basement and watching cartoons.  They all want to go skating but I don't think there are any rinks open yet.  It's cold enough, but that type of weather has just begun.

This week I'm going to look into swimming, gymnastics and brownies as well.

The snow is here now, and it's beautiful.  The girls have really been enjoying it too.  not many new photos, but here are a couple:

A lot of my time is spent with Sadie when the girls are at school and Sherrie's at work.  Here she is, hard at work at her 'office'.  She's pretty stressed out about the economy right now.

Our Halloween display.  Notice the little African clay one?  They don't look like much in the daylight, but they looked great with the candles at night.  

Our Sadie.

This is our house from the front

November 1 2008

Well, the movers finally arrived last Wednesday.  They were a very nice couple from Newfoundland who traveled together in their big truck, moving things all across Canada.  After they were done, I insisted that they stay for lunch and made them soup and sandwiches.

Notice the dirt lawn?  Had that done a week ago.  The lawn was sloping towards the house (no good in a drainage sort of way) so we had to have it reshaped.  Unfortunately that meant having dirt until spring, because no one is selling sod at this time of year.  

Halloween was a blast, and the girls enjoyed it very much - first there was the pumpkin carving in the basement, then the halloween parade at school, then getting ready with their friends and going trick or treating (in a group of eight or nine with several parents in tow - I was kind of bummed that the girls had enough and wanted to quit after just one street - we could have had a collosal haul if they were into staying cold and tired... oh well) and then a halloween barn party the next afternoon - what a blast that was!  watching the little kids dancing to monster mash is always a treat.  Here are some more photos:

Monday October 27

I'm back after an uncomfortable absence from all things web.  Since it's been a while, I'll fill youz all in via point form - that's easier for me and negates the need for eloquent prose, so here goes:

• moved into the house - it's wonderful, but needs lots of little things like reinstalling a few fixtures and patching the odd hole here and there, but overall it's great and was ready to move into with minimal effort and/or cleaning
• for the first time I sat in my own basement and watched a hockey game on my own TV.  Wow!  what we've been missing!  I hope none of you take it for granted - this Canadian thing rocks!
• The town continues to impress us with its friendliness and hospitality.  Here's a quick example:  one of our neighbours brought us dishes, a toaster, table, chairs, cups, pots and pans for us to use while we wait for our shipment - she also brings us a pot of coffee many mornings.
• Amy and Erin play daily with a brother and sister down the street.  The boy is in Erin's class and the girl is one year older than Amy.  They're lovely.  
• We've made friends with the young couple who sold us the house and have been hanging out with them.  They've got four young kids who our girls are getting to know, and have been most helpful in helping us with the house and getting us settled here in Peace River.
• It's been pretty busy around here lately:  plumber, furnace guy, gas company, landscapers, trucks of earth, home inspector, and lots of others making our place a bustling one.
• There are deer all over the place  - they leave tracks in our lawn and apparently like the berries on the bush in front of our house.  There's also a wolf - no kidding!  I saw it today - a huge white and grey tame wolf that runs around the neighbourhood sometimes.  It's beautiful.
• Mus qua means bear in Cree
• We've been having unseasonably mild weather lately - I'm still going out in a t shirt on most days
• no movers yet - hoping they come before Halloween so the girls can use our costumes and we won't have to buy new ones.
• Sherrie's been travelling a lot - she was away on an overnight last week, is going for four more this week and then on another in a week or so... it's going to be interesting getting used to having such a jet-setting mom (or should I say Cessna setting?)
• Erin loves school, and loves french immersion.  Amy's finding it quite challenging, but doesn't want to give up and does her homework every night.  She's such a hard worker.
• Still no sign of Sasquatch, but I'm keeping my eyes on the window.

That ought to do it for now, will be putting up pictures later this week - we've just got our home internet today, so feel free to write to me!

Steve

Sunday October 12 2008

Amy and Erin are gone to see Beverly Hills Chuhuahua with Sherrie, and I'm back at the hotel while Sadie has her nap.  We went up for a lovely walk in the hills after breakfast today, and got a good look at the town and the scenery.  It's really beautiful, and not even near how cold the news was saying - not yet, anyway.  I spent a lot of the time in just a t-shirt, as it was too warm for my sweater.  

Here are some pictures:

October 2008: Peace River Diary

Amy and Erin helping the lady at the check - in

On the coolest teeter-totter we've ever seen!

We've been here four nights now and are enjoying Peace River immensley.  What a nice place!  One of our bags was misdirected to Halifax, but other than that it was a very enjoyable trip.  The drive was a great experience too - The first things we noticed driving up from Edmonton were:

• The huge amount of bugs hitting our windshield
• The size and deluxeness of the farms and barns
• The number of pickup trucks on the road - big ones too
• (happily) how Canadian it all was!  It's the least alien place we've ever moved to!  Lovely.  

Peace River itself is in a valley, and so there's this thick fog every morning which takes getting used to.  It's quite spectacualr when it's rising.

We're staying in a hotel with two bedrooms, but it's still not much space and it's costing a lot.  We spent days two and three looking at houses (Sherrie set up the appointments before we arrived) and after seeing ten or so houses, there were no more to look at in our price range.  The good news is that we've found one that we really love and are excited about.  The outside is kind of boring looking and the yard needs some landscaping, but the inside is deluxe and spacious, with newly made kitchen and renovated throughout.  I don't have a photo yet, but will get one up soon.  The owners accepted our second offer so it's just up to the inspection and stuff and then we'll be moving in after a week or two.  

It's a short walk from a nice playground and it's in a nice neighbourhood with friendly people all around.   It's about a ten to twelve minute drive to work and school (actually about as far as possible in this town from there!)

Amy's first day of school was yesterday, and Erin's is today.  They're both in French immersion at Sprinfield Elementary School.  It's very nice!  

Well, I've got to go get the girls ready for school now.  Will write more soon

A New Chapter...

Well, we've done it.  We've moved back to Canada.  Sherrie's got a good job as an It director for a school board in northern Alberta and after a long summer holiday we're moving to Peace River.  We're flying in nine days!  So much to do, so much to do... we still haven't finalized movers, let alone packed.  

It's been a great summer at the cottage.  The girls had many adventures.  A high point for me was finally getting to the Shelter Valley Folk Festival, the baby from birth to maturity of a good friend of mine, Aengus.  

So now that our Ghana adventure has come to a close we're off on another.  I thought Ghana was the polar opposite of Hong Kong, and now it seems like we've found another polar opposite to Ghana!

This is teh kids with Dan and Kim's kids, Sully and Sierra, and Bradley's daughter Kori.  

28 May 2007

This Sunday Amy and I made a picture on the driveway with our sidewalk chalk. It was as much Amy as it was me making it, as at first I didnt want to colour the shapes in, but she insisted that it wouldn't take too long. She was right, and the result was this masterpiece. Bummer is that it rained that afternoon and so our beautiful art was washed away. Oh well...

Hi again

May 18 2007

Wow I'm not good at updating this thing often enough. By the time I get here, there's too much that has happened and I don't remember half of it to report it to you! I'll just put in a bunch of photos again:


Erin with our new bunny, Scruffy. He's a good rabbit. He likes apples and lettuce and spagetti
Sadie in a makeshift car - she loves getting pulled around in it. She's walking well now and has 5 (I think) teeth
The girls in Togo, outside of a supermarket. We were picking up some things after swimming at the club pool. Hence the wet hair.



Some village boys at the beach where I (ahem) surf. That's my board, no, not the plank - the white one. The plank is what many of them use for bodyboarding with. I let one of the older ones try my board.


Usif helping Sadie on the tricycle. He's so good with her - She just loves him too.
That's Amy waving at the camera, I'm sure much to the chagrin of her teacher, who is trying to read them a story. Sorry.

Hello again

Hi there! lots and lots has happened (of course) since my last installment.
Rather than type too much, I'll try and show you with that miracle of photography:
These are various photos from the Christmas Holidays. We stayed in Ghana and my mom and Sherrie's brother Paul came over to spend the holidays with us. We rented an SUV and took it north to Mole (Mow-Lay) National park to see the elephants, and then we went to our favourite beach, Anomabo, for a few days. All in all it was a lovely holiday. Sadly, our little puppy, Zi Zi, died on the first day of the holidays. She had been ill for months. We think she may have eaten some poison.
Oh yeah... did I mention that our own car broke down like four times on that trip to Anomabo? Good thing we rented when we went up north.
As you can see, Sadie's getting bigger. She's such a happy little thing - always smiling. It's nice.
Want some more? Have a look:


The pictures below and left are from Champs, a pub we go to from time to time. Thursday quiz night is a riot.






















Sherrie' s brother Paul.










Here's Erin's Christmas concert performance

The Kos Blog

The Kos Blog
Hi again
We're back from the summer and hopefully I'll devote more effort to making this blog thing work. The weather's unseasonably cool and dry; so much so, in fact, that they've called for a series of blackouts to happen regularly to make up for the low water levels at the hydro electric dams in Volta. sigh.
Oh yeah - the baby
Sadie was born on April 17th 2006. she was almost six pounds, and scored a 10/10 on that test they do at birth. Sherrie gave birth with no complications (she laughs when I tell her how easy it was) and our family of five is now doing quite well. Sadie seems to be enjoying her stay in Africa.
Family of six! We got a new puppy - her name's ZiZi (the name came from a book of Amy's and the fact that the dog's mom is named ZaZa) she's half lab half sheppard, but looks like a lab. very cool.