Specifically, let's talk about injuries caused by the opposing team. I ranted a bit about that during the playoffs last year, both when Rome hit Horton and when Boychuk hit Raymond, but it's up for discussion again this week. Just for the record, as a Canucks fan, I felt that Raymond's hit deserved to be penalized, although perhaps, based on the criteria applied to other hits, four games was a big much (but maybe it wasn't, I'll get to that in a second) and I was APPALLED that the league didn't even review the Boychuk hit on Raymond.
Wednesday night we were watching the Vancouver - Chicago game. I really enjoy it when Vancouver and Chicago meet because the rivalry is so intense, it brings a lot to the game. J and I listened to the first half of the first period in the car but we were in the house when Duncan Keith hit Daniel Sedin. J started yelling, "That man has to go to the penal (yes, that's the word she uses, but it's pronounce more like PEN-ll than peenal) box because we don't hit and Mommy, that other man is lying down. Now there is going to be blood on the ice. That man needs a time out." And while, there was no blood, she was right about going to the penalty box
[aside: J loves watching hockey and is just starting to grasp the concept of the opposite teams. She doesn't understand checking because at home and at daycare she has been taught that we never, ever, ever hit another person...so watching the game with her means there's a whole lot of "Why didn't that man have to go to the penal box for a time out? He hit someone."]
It wasn't until the second period intermission that they showed us the earlier hit where the roles were reversed. And I can't say that made me like Duncan Keith any more.
We've been noticing over the last few weeks that the officials aren't calling a whole lot of penalties and that seems to result in games that aren't much fun to watch for a variety of reasons. This game was a perfect example of how a bit more effort in penalty calling by the officials might have prevented a whole bunch of hullabaloo later.
Like, maybe if Daniel Sedin had been called on the initial hit and done his time in the box, Duncan Keith would not have lost his mind and hunted down Daniel Sedin. If that initial hit had been penalized maybe neither the Canucks nor the Blackhawks would be facing the indefinite loss of one of their key players.
Daniel Sedin threw a bad hit. Duncan Keith made a ridiculous decision and if the rumours of his threat of I'm going to make you pay or whatever it was are true, he made more than one dumb decision. And the officials, they lost the plot. I know it is best if the officials don't get too involved because they can kill the momentum of the game and they don't want to be seen as influencing the outcome, but their JOB is to enforce the rules and make sure the play on the ice is safe. I don't know exactly how much NHL officials are paid, but I've heard that starting salaries for linesmen run about $75K. Anyone else making that kind of money under such direct public scrutiny would be without a job at this point.
And then there are the fans. I'm not talking about the rational fans - the ones who can maintain their team loyalty but still see that a player on their team made a big mistake which goes for both sides in this case (check out the anti-Canuck vitriol spewed by a Chicago journalist who can still see that what Keith did deserves punishment). I'm talking about the ones who are saying things on twitter and forums and comment sections of newspaper articles and blogs saying stuff along the lines of Sedin deserved it, glad someone finally gave it to the Canucks etc. No one deserves to get hurt by an intentional play. No one. It's professional hockey, so yes, injury is something of a given, but being intentionally sought out should not be a worry.
Does Daniel Sedin deserve a suspension? Probably. Does Duncan Keith deserve a suspension? Definitely. Did Daniel Sedin "deserve" to get hurt? No way. Should the officials be disciplines as well? Probably, but unlikely. How do we make this go away?
The NHL keeps saying they want to crack down on head shots and prevent concussion and other dangerous hits and injuries, but all they do is hand out these 3-5 game suspensions that are obviously not having much of an effect on the players. I say change the rules. If you injure someone, intentional or not, on an illegal play, you sit until they are able to play again. And THEN you serve your suspension. One or two of those and the players might wake up and change their behaviour.
So now, we wait for Brendan Shanahan to make a decision. And there will be upset people on both sides of the situation. But maybe the attention this hit is drawing will drive some change. And maybe one day people will realize it's just a game and the players are human and cheering when one gets hurt is just not the way to go.
/rant over
Friday, March 23, 2012
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
Champagne tastes for the apple juice kid
J has decided we need a new car.
This is not the first time she has decided this.
Last time we needed a new car that had a windshield wiper on the back window.
This time, her tastes have evolved somewhat. I'll get to that.
About a year or so ago, J developed a fascination with cars. And asking me what kind of car every car on the road was. She quickly learned to identify Vancouver's favourite car, the Honda Civic, or Figic as she called it then. Since then she has developed quite the repertoire and can rattle off a whole slew of cars, makes AND models for a lot of them. Where did she learn their names? Well, I can read...so I'd tell her when she asked. The various makes with numbers and letters for models (BMW, Lexus etc) I've avoided, but she can still identify them and she knows the difference between a sedan, a hatch back, a mini van, an SUV, and a station wagon.
Which brings us back to last night.
Last night there were tears because we aren't getting a new car and according to J, we need one (for the record, our car is perfectly fine) and someone might take the car she picked out for us. It's special. It's not flat (I'm not entirely sure what that means) and it has a roof rack. But most importantly it's a black Mercedes-Benz GL-Class (like this one) with a roof rack.
That starts at over $77K.
Yeah. We drive past the Mercedes-Benz dealership on our way to and from daycare in the morning, but she's dreaming.
I guess she's got good taste though.
This is not the first time she has decided this.
Last time we needed a new car that had a windshield wiper on the back window.
This time, her tastes have evolved somewhat. I'll get to that.
About a year or so ago, J developed a fascination with cars. And asking me what kind of car every car on the road was. She quickly learned to identify Vancouver's favourite car, the Honda Civic, or Figic as she called it then. Since then she has developed quite the repertoire and can rattle off a whole slew of cars, makes AND models for a lot of them. Where did she learn their names? Well, I can read...so I'd tell her when she asked. The various makes with numbers and letters for models (BMW, Lexus etc) I've avoided, but she can still identify them and she knows the difference between a sedan, a hatch back, a mini van, an SUV, and a station wagon.
Which brings us back to last night.
Last night there were tears because we aren't getting a new car and according to J, we need one (for the record, our car is perfectly fine) and someone might take the car she picked out for us. It's special. It's not flat (I'm not entirely sure what that means) and it has a roof rack. But most importantly it's a black Mercedes-Benz GL-Class (like this one) with a roof rack.
That starts at over $77K.
Yeah. We drive past the Mercedes-Benz dealership on our way to and from daycare in the morning, but she's dreaming.
I guess she's got good taste though.
Sunday, March 18, 2012
Lessons from squirt on husbands and wives
On our way to gymnastics this morning, I stopped to let a pedestrian cross the road. She was an older woman and she looked super cranky, which, of course, J picked up on immediately.
Voice from the backseat: Mommy, why is that lady so grumpy looking?
Me: Well, maybe she is tired or maybe -
Voice from the backseat [interrupting]: Mommy, it's probably because her husband or her wife or her son or her daughter woke her up before she had enough sleep. Or maybe her husband or her wife or her son or her daughter didn't leave any breakfast for her and she's hungry. Or maybe she has to pee.
Over a year ago, J learned the words husband and wife. And it didn't take her too long to figure out that a wife is woman and a husband is a man. And she's made the connection before with our friends that sometimes a woman has a wife and there isn't a husband, but that she just casually threw it in to her list of people who might have wronged the grumpy lady made me happy. And that the lady maybe had to pee, well that made me giggle, silently so J wouldn't think I was laughing at her.
Voice from the backseat: Mommy, why is that lady so grumpy looking?
Me: Well, maybe she is tired or maybe -
Voice from the backseat [interrupting]: Mommy, it's probably because her husband or her wife or her son or her daughter woke her up before she had enough sleep. Or maybe her husband or her wife or her son or her daughter didn't leave any breakfast for her and she's hungry. Or maybe she has to pee.
Over a year ago, J learned the words husband and wife. And it didn't take her too long to figure out that a wife is woman and a husband is a man. And she's made the connection before with our friends that sometimes a woman has a wife and there isn't a husband, but that she just casually threw it in to her list of people who might have wronged the grumpy lady made me happy. And that the lady maybe had to pee, well that made me giggle, silently so J wouldn't think I was laughing at her.
Friday, March 09, 2012
Water, running in the kitchen
In which I describe my first world problem and marvel at how easy we really have it...
Last weekend we came to appreciate how easy our lives are because we have running water in our kitchen.
For over a year we've had a temperamental, sometimes drippy, kitchen faucet. For too long we've had a leaking kitchen faucet - a minor thing that a small buck and occasional tea towel swipe kept in check.
But then it became bad. Super drippy and an under-the-counter leak that needed attention now. But we couldn't deal with it now.
So for three whole days we had a kitchen sink that didn't give us water on demand. We had to bring water from somewhere else to use in the kitchen. Somewhere else like the bathroom, six steps from the kitchen. And we could still us the sinks and let the water drain out. And the dishwasher was fine, so we tried to limit dish usage in those three days to stuff that could go in the dishwasher. I didn't cook or bake much because I didn't have easy access to water to wipe the counters or rinse stuff or wash my hands.
And one evening, while filling the kettle from the tub and dreaming about the new faucet, I realize just how ridiculous I was being. It wasn't that long ago that there was no running water in most kitchens or bathrooms around the world. It wasn't that long ago that there wasn't even a pump. And people survived. People in other countries are still surviving without indoor plumbing (yes, I know there are those who are not...) and there I was looking forward to my new faucet. There are places where the amount of water we had to toss because of the leak might be the day's water for a village....
I have a new faucet now. It doesn't leak. And every time I turn it on, I'm reminded of how lucky I am to have it.
Last weekend we came to appreciate how easy our lives are because we have running water in our kitchen.
For over a year we've had a temperamental, sometimes drippy, kitchen faucet. For too long we've had a leaking kitchen faucet - a minor thing that a small buck and occasional tea towel swipe kept in check.
But then it became bad. Super drippy and an under-the-counter leak that needed attention now. But we couldn't deal with it now.
So for three whole days we had a kitchen sink that didn't give us water on demand. We had to bring water from somewhere else to use in the kitchen. Somewhere else like the bathroom, six steps from the kitchen. And we could still us the sinks and let the water drain out. And the dishwasher was fine, so we tried to limit dish usage in those three days to stuff that could go in the dishwasher. I didn't cook or bake much because I didn't have easy access to water to wipe the counters or rinse stuff or wash my hands.
And one evening, while filling the kettle from the tub and dreaming about the new faucet, I realize just how ridiculous I was being. It wasn't that long ago that there was no running water in most kitchens or bathrooms around the world. It wasn't that long ago that there wasn't even a pump. And people survived. People in other countries are still surviving without indoor plumbing (yes, I know there are those who are not...) and there I was looking forward to my new faucet. There are places where the amount of water we had to toss because of the leak might be the day's water for a village....
I have a new faucet now. It doesn't leak. And every time I turn it on, I'm reminded of how lucky I am to have it.
Thursday, March 08, 2012
Thursday, March 01, 2012
Banned Books
While I was writing a post for The Great Book Challenge, I was trying to find the title of a book I read when I was about 11 or 12 - I picked it up at the library from a display of "banned books". It was about a young boy who's older brother was part of the resistance movement in World War II. Except the boy and his brother were resisting the Allied forces, not the Axis powers. They maybe lived in the Netherlands or possibly in Scandinavia, but I can't remember and of course, I can't find the book. My mom read it too and then asked if I had any questions about - I remember it being a difficult book because there was discussion of suicide and war and people disappearing in the night, but my biggest question was why would anyone ban a book? Followed by a question along the lines of "War is stupid, no matter what side you're on. Is it bad that I felt bad for the family in the book (I think the kid's name started with A) even though they were on the "other" side?" [My mom's answers: Because people are scared and no, it's not bad to feel empathy for people on the "other" side of a war. It's still a war and it's still horrible no matter which side you're on]
If you happen to know what book I'm vaguely referring to, please tell me.
Anyway. In the course of my internet searching I did find this great list of the top 110 banned books - with instructions to bold books you've read, colour books you'd like to read and italicize books you've read part of.Except there are only 109 books on this list because #58 disappeared.
And we all know I like lists.
So here it goes. It looks like I've read 15, read part of 4, which leaves 89 that I've never picked up. And that reminds me that even though I have a degree in English, I have read pathetically few of the books that most people consider the "classics" and I'm not really sure how I managed to get my degree without reading them...oh well...something to work on I guess! I didn't colour any because I recognized most of the titles and there are some I definitely want to read and some that I feel like I should read...and so then pretty much all of the 89 that are left would be coloured...
If you happen to know what book I'm vaguely referring to, please tell me.
Anyway. In the course of my internet searching I did find this great list of the top 110 banned books - with instructions to bold books you've read, colour books you'd like to read and italicize books you've read part of.Except there are only 109 books on this list because #58 disappeared.
And we all know I like lists.
So here it goes. It looks like I've read 15, read part of 4, which leaves 89 that I've never picked up. And that reminds me that even though I have a degree in English, I have read pathetically few of the books that most people consider the "classics" and I'm not really sure how I managed to get my degree without reading them...oh well...something to work on I guess! I didn't colour any because I recognized most of the titles and there are some I definitely want to read and some that I feel like I should read...and so then pretty much all of the 89 that are left would be coloured...
- The Bible
- Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
- Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes
- The Koran
- Arabian Nights
- Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
- Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift
- Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer
- The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
- Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
- The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli
- Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe
- Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank
- Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
- Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
- Les Miserables by Victor Hugo
- Dracula by Bram Stoker
- Autobiography by Benjamin Franklin
- Tom Jones by Henry Fielding
- Essays by Michel de Montaigne
- Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
- History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon
- Tess of the D’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
- Origin of Species by Charles Darwin
- Ulysses by James Joyce
- Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio
- Animal Farm by George Orwell
- Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell
- Candide by Voltaire
- To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
- Analects by Confucius
- Dubliners by James Joyce
- Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
- Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway
- Red and the Black by Stendhal
- Das Capital by Karl Marx
- Flowers of Evil by Charles Baudelaire
- The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
- Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D. H. Lawrence
- Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
- Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser
- Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
- The Jungle by Upton Sinclair
- All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque
- Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx
- Lord of the Flies by William Golding
- The Diary of Samuel Pepys by Samuel Pepys
- Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway
- Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy
- Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
- Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak
- Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant
- One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey
- Praise of Folly by Desiderius Erasmus
- Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
- Autobiography of Malcolm X by Malcolm X
- The Color Purple by Alice Walker
- Essay Concerning Human Understanding by John Locke
- The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
- Moll Flanders by Daniel Defoe
- One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
- East of Eden by John Steinbeck
- Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
- I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
- Confessions by Jean Jacques Rousseau
- Gargantua and Pantagruel by Francois Rabelais
- Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes
- The Talmud
- Social Contract by Jean Jacques Rousseau
- Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
- Women in Love by D. H. Lawrence
- American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser
- Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler
- A Separate Peace by John Knowles
- The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath
- The Red Pony by John Steinbeck
- Popol Vuh
- Affluent Society by John Kenneth Galbraith
- Satyricon by Petronius
- James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
- Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
- Black Boy by Richard Wright
- Spirit of the Laws by Charles de Secondat Baron de Montesquieu
- Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut
- Julie of the Wolves by Jean Craighead George
- Metaphysics by Aristotle
- Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder
- Institutes of the Christian Religion by Jean Calvin
- Steppenwolf by Hermann Hesse
- The Power and the Glory by Graham Greene
- Sanctuary by William Faulkner
- As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
- Black Like Me by John Howard Griffin
- Sylvester and the Magic Pebble by William Steig
- Sorrows of Young Werther by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
- General Introduction to Psychoanalysis by Sigmund Freud
- The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
- Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee by Dee Alexander Brown
- Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
- Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman by Ernest J. Gaines
- Emile Jean by Jacques Rousseau
- Nana by Emile Zola
- The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
- Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin
- Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
- Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein
- The Day No Pigs Would Die by Robert Peck
- Ox-Bow Incident by Walter Van Tilburg Clark
- Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Oscar, from a preschooler's perspective
Like many other people, on Sunday night we turned the TV on and watched the Academy Awards. I wasn't so entertained, but that's how it is. J doesn't understand what the Academy Awards are. As far as she's concerned, the only movie out there worth watching is the "Car Kids' Show" aka Cars 2.
Part way through the show, after a particular couple had been shown a few times this conversation happened:
J: Mommy, why is that sick lady on the TV?
Me: What sick lady?
J: The one on the TV.
Me: (looking at the screen and seeing some presenter who is a man and doesn't look sick) Which lady?
J: The one with the man who needs a bath.
Guess who J was referring to...she was pretty accurate in her description!
Part way through the show, after a particular couple had been shown a few times this conversation happened:
J: Mommy, why is that sick lady on the TV?
Me: What sick lady?
J: The one on the TV.
Me: (looking at the screen and seeing some presenter who is a man and doesn't look sick) Which lady?
J: The one with the man who needs a bath.
Guess who J was referring to...she was pretty accurate in her description!
Friday, February 10, 2012
The half-way point: 101 in 1001
Time for a 101 in 1001 update...I figured I'd write this post back at day 501, also known as January 28, 2012, but somehow that didn't happen.
Today is day 513. Not too far off.
At this point I've managed to complete 41 of my 101 things and there are 22 (I think) in progress. Which is pretty good I think. Some of the in progress items are big and some are almost complete, so I think I might be on track to get to 101. It might be close though. Thankfully I have over a year, so even some of the tough ones should be within reach.
I am a bit surprised that I have made over 50 new recipes already - some have made it into regular rotation and some will never be consumed at our house again. It was choosing recipes and I am still trying new stuff all the time - I may or may not blog about them, we'll see.
Our home is more home-like than it was 513 days ago. I've crossed off a few things and have made a lot of progress on others. There is a pretty good chance we'll be moving before all of the 1001 days have passed, so some of those goals might have to change. Like, if we do sell before we get a back splash installed in the kitchen, that goal will have to change. I can't imagine the new owners will want me to randomly show up and put tile up in their kitchen so I can cross something off a list on my blog. But you never know...
I'm enjoying this challenge immensely! It was a great way to motivate myself to do some of those things I've been putting off for a while and pushing myself a little harder...
Not sure if any of you are still out there, but if you are and you're doing a 101 in 1001 list, how is your list going?
Today is day 513. Not too far off.
At this point I've managed to complete 41 of my 101 things and there are 22 (I think) in progress. Which is pretty good I think. Some of the in progress items are big and some are almost complete, so I think I might be on track to get to 101. It might be close though. Thankfully I have over a year, so even some of the tough ones should be within reach.
I am a bit surprised that I have made over 50 new recipes already - some have made it into regular rotation and some will never be consumed at our house again. It was choosing recipes and I am still trying new stuff all the time - I may or may not blog about them, we'll see.
Our home is more home-like than it was 513 days ago. I've crossed off a few things and have made a lot of progress on others. There is a pretty good chance we'll be moving before all of the 1001 days have passed, so some of those goals might have to change. Like, if we do sell before we get a back splash installed in the kitchen, that goal will have to change. I can't imagine the new owners will want me to randomly show up and put tile up in their kitchen so I can cross something off a list on my blog. But you never know...
I'm enjoying this challenge immensely! It was a great way to motivate myself to do some of those things I've been putting off for a while and pushing myself a little harder...
Not sure if any of you are still out there, but if you are and you're doing a 101 in 1001 list, how is your list going?
Thursday, February 09, 2012
The Tiniest Girl Guide
19.3 Go on a 10 "adventures"
66. Take J camping, preferably in a tent
68. Take a holiday with J only
Okay, so technically she's not a Girl Guide...she's too young to even be a Spark, but J got to come with me to Guide camp this past weekend and she loved it!
The camp is up on the Sunshine Coast, so we had to take two buses from our place to the ferry where we met the group. Then on the other side we took a bus to camp. J loves riding the bus. Waiting in line? Not so much. She was a bit hungry, so she got to have a treat...rice krispie squares are great!
On Saturday, the girls tried a new way of making lunch - milk carton grilled cheese! I vaguely remember this from when I was a Guide - you make your sandwich, wrap it in three layers of foil, stuff it into a milk carton and either light the milk carton (which is what we did) or drop it into the fire. J wasn't too sure about this, but in the end she had a very nice grilled cheese. I'm pretty sure when we did it, it was a layer of foil, a layer of damp newspaper and another layer of foil. We cooked a lot in the fire when I was a kid - the first night of camp we usually all brought tinfoil dinners - frozen veggies, a piece of chicken, and some potatoes and a bit of butter in a foil packet with newspaper and more foil wrapped around it...We also did s'mores and banana boats in the fire.
Saturday night the girls decorated their own t-shirt. J figured she had died and gone to heaven. Not only was she allowed to use permanent markers, she was encouraged to draw all over a piece of clothing and no one was going to ask her to stop!
Plus she got to sit with the big kids and pretend to be one too! When you're three, this is a very big deal - many smiles for small faces!
Sunday morning, J took her massive bag of Cheerios and came for a walk with some of the girls. We don't buy dry cereal very often - we eat a lot of oatmeal in the winter and smoothies when it's warmer - so J figured this was a pretty special treat!
One of the advantages of being little is that the big kids take really good care of you. J didn't even had to ask for a ride in the wagon, the girls suggested it. (Check out the J-designed shirt from the night before)
J walked up to the highway from the camp site (she walked in under her own steam on Friday too) and didn't complain once about the long walk - I think it's under 1 km. I was quite proud of her as some of the girls complained the whole way.
On the bus back to the ferry terminal, J got to sit in her favourite seat ever - the window seat at the very back of the bus!
We waited for Alex and had a warm drink and a snack (more rice krispie squares!) and J chatted almost non-stop about all the fun stuff she did this weekend and the big-girl kids and the other leaders and the ocean. I'm pretty sure she had a great time! I can't wait to do it again (maybe next time we can sleep in a tent...)
66. Take J camping, preferably in a tent
68. Take a holiday with J only
Okay, so technically she's not a Girl Guide...she's too young to even be a Spark, but J got to come with me to Guide camp this past weekend and she loved it!
The camp is up on the Sunshine Coast, so we had to take two buses from our place to the ferry where we met the group. Then on the other side we took a bus to camp. J loves riding the bus. Waiting in line? Not so much. She was a bit hungry, so she got to have a treat...rice krispie squares are great!
what are you doing to my sandwich?
lighting it on fire?
On Saturday, the girls tried a new way of making lunch - milk carton grilled cheese! I vaguely remember this from when I was a Guide - you make your sandwich, wrap it in three layers of foil, stuff it into a milk carton and either light the milk carton (which is what we did) or drop it into the fire. J wasn't too sure about this, but in the end she had a very nice grilled cheese. I'm pretty sure when we did it, it was a layer of foil, a layer of damp newspaper and another layer of foil. We cooked a lot in the fire when I was a kid - the first night of camp we usually all brought tinfoil dinners - frozen veggies, a piece of chicken, and some potatoes and a bit of butter in a foil packet with newspaper and more foil wrapped around it...We also did s'mores and banana boats in the fire.
Saturday night the girls decorated their own t-shirt. J figured she had died and gone to heaven. Not only was she allowed to use permanent markers, she was encouraged to draw all over a piece of clothing and no one was going to ask her to stop!
Plus she got to sit with the big kids and pretend to be one too! When you're three, this is a very big deal - many smiles for small faces!
Sunday morning, J took her massive bag of Cheerios and came for a walk with some of the girls. We don't buy dry cereal very often - we eat a lot of oatmeal in the winter and smoothies when it's warmer - so J figured this was a pretty special treat!
can we stay longer?
I love this camp - it's such a peaceful and beautiful place and I really didn't want to go home on Sunday. J had a great time, but she was ready to see her dad. We had a few tears because there were "no boys allowed" at camp and she wanted her dad to be there. We're talking about going back again for a longer stay (without Alex), but she wants to go to the Sunshine Coast with him too (maybe a little vacation this summer?)
One of the advantages of being little is that the big kids take really good care of you. J didn't even had to ask for a ride in the wagon, the girls suggested it. (Check out the J-designed shirt from the night before)
J walked up to the highway from the camp site (she walked in under her own steam on Friday too) and didn't complain once about the long walk - I think it's under 1 km. I was quite proud of her as some of the girls complained the whole way.
going to see Daddy soon!
On the bus back to the ferry terminal, J got to sit in her favourite seat ever - the window seat at the very back of the bus!
We waited for Alex and had a warm drink and a snack (more rice krispie squares!) and J chatted almost non-stop about all the fun stuff she did this weekend and the big-girl kids and the other leaders and the ocean. I'm pretty sure she had a great time! I can't wait to do it again (maybe next time we can sleep in a tent...)
Wednesday, February 08, 2012
Cousin date
A long time ago, before Christmas, Alex and I took some time off work to do pre-Christmas stuff like shop and bake and decorate, but we also figured we'd do some fun stuff. J and her cousin Baby C love playing together and since it was kind of wintery (which means wet) in Vancouver, we decided we'd go to the aquarium together.
This bubble windows are in what used to be the hands on section for kids. I think they had made the area into a waiting area for the theatre (the hands on stuff had moved...check out the kid on the phone below!), but the windows were still there. The girls had a great time watching them - the windows change colour too!
Baby C (who isn't really a baby anymore and will actually be a big sister in a few weeks) has never been to the aquarium before. She loved the wide open spaces and basically followed J around and did whatever J did.
J loved this phone the very first time we brought her to the aquarium and apparently she still loves it. We had a hard time convincing her to put it down so we could check out some more of the animals.
J sat on Alex's shoulders and was totally mesmerized by the dolphin show. C ran away from her mom as fast as she could. I think she took in all of the outdoor exhibits in less than four minute!
And of course a visit to the aquarium would not be complete if we didn't visit the belugas! J wears her beluga shirt every time we go...I don't know what we'll do when she outgrows it!
This bubble windows are in what used to be the hands on section for kids. I think they had made the area into a waiting area for the theatre (the hands on stuff had moved...check out the kid on the phone below!), but the windows were still there. The girls had a great time watching them - the windows change colour too!
Baby C (who isn't really a baby anymore and will actually be a big sister in a few weeks) has never been to the aquarium before. She loved the wide open spaces and basically followed J around and did whatever J did.
J loved this phone the very first time we brought her to the aquarium and apparently she still loves it. We had a hard time convincing her to put it down so we could check out some more of the animals.
J sat on Alex's shoulders and was totally mesmerized by the dolphin show. C ran away from her mom as fast as she could. I think she took in all of the outdoor exhibits in less than four minute!
And of course a visit to the aquarium would not be complete if we didn't visit the belugas! J wears her beluga shirt every time we go...I don't know what we'll do when she outgrows it!
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