Last few weeks...

It's picnic season again, so we've been to Lighthouse Park for dinner. Only once so far, but it was a perfect day.

Maggie relaxing for a few seconds before stepping through our meal and being a general pain.

Looking as graceful as ever.

This was on the way home from a mediocre walk the next day in North Van. There's still snow! and it's pretty much as sea level. We were outraged.

Maggie has been swimming a lot.



This is yesterday. We were working off 7 year old instructions in a hiking "guide" book whose authors feel that implications of a route are more entertaining than actual directions. I hope that the authors are lost somewhere as I write this (the first hike we tried from the book apparently doesn't exist).

Maggie is always the first to the top of everything.

This is typical of a lot of hikes. Not a big deal though.

More trails. It was deserted for a while, then there were lots of people on the road.

One of the viewpoints.

Salmonberry.

More views. Whatever.

A panoramic shot from a spot we rested at for a few minutes.

Sarah saw a bear on the way up, so this chain I found was a reasonable proxy for the bear spray we forgot at home.

Remi

Study break

Remi and I took a couple hours off during the exam period a few days ago and headed to one of our favourite spots, Lynn Canyon. Here are a few photos and a video from our new camera!

Sarah

Dispatches from the front

There's been another shooting in our neighbourhood. The cops have completely baricaded the area around the local Boston Pizza (the food they serve is a separate crime), and there's the familiar sound of the RCMP helicopter overhead. Sarah's attempts to study in the Starbuck's were foiled by a maze of police tape, a nice officer who was trying to determine if a stain on the ground was blood had to show her the way out. Nobody is sure how much longer this gang war is going to last, but I think many of us figure the problem will solve itself.

Remi

P.S. Amusingly, Mozart's Requiem is being played on Radio 2.

My turn

I also went to Ontario a few weeks later. All in all a good trip, nothing to write home about, of course, because many of you saw me there. Here are a few pictures.
Star lake at dawn
Juniper berries
Some lichen

Remi

"Home" For Reading Break

Last week was Reading Break so I headed back to Ontario to visit my family, ESPECIALLY my nephew Keenan who is now three months old.

Mom and I started with a walk on the beach with Rosie.

Rosie loves to play. ALL THE TIME!! She'd play in her sleep if she could, I think. Kristin and Byron brought my baby out to visit on Family Day.

We did a lot of cuddling while I was home. And some walking too! I absolutely LOVED hanging around a small town for a week. I can't wait to graduate!!

I bought Keenan a toy for his carseat. Kristin tried to tell me he doesn't like toys yet, but when I pushed the button in the store, he cracked right up. Doesn't like toys my foot! The next photo shows how relaxing reading break was for me - I had to babysit and cook!! Just kidding, I loved it!

Like I said, lots of cuddling.

After a bath!

I spent my last night in Ontario at Kristin's place. She and I went out for dinner and then the whole family (Kristin, Byron AND Keenan and I) went bowling with one of Byron's friends.

Keenan even tried bowling. He seemed to love the lights and noise.

I spent Saturday in Ontario with friends from Guelph (Amanda, Nick, Dave, Jess and Tim). We went for lunch (Chinese dumplings!) and then to the art gallery. We all realized that we don't "get" art, but think we'd be great artists if we only had some conviction that what we were producing was "art".

Tim stayed for dinner at Ann and Alain's before we drove to the airport. Alain really enjoyed dinner ;)

Fionn was there too! So were Julien and Megan (thanks for coming guys, I hope you're feeling better!).

Thanks everyone for housing me and putting up with me for a week. I look forward to heading home again soon (or maybe you can visit us?).

Sarah

New year's and recent walk

This is from a walk near Lillooet, where we stayed with friends for New Year's celebrations. it was a nice relaxing trip away from Stink-Town (Vancouver). We spent our days hiking about and our nights eating: a good combo.

We've been seeing eagles everywhere recently, they spend a lot of time near the coast in the winter. It's rare to see one this close though, so this was pretty neat.

Today we went to the Reifel Bird Sanctuary, which qualifies as homework for me, which is pretty neat. It got us out of the house for a quiet walk without Maggie (she's not allowed in). This one above is an American Wigeon (I hope).

A boring woodpecker.

The birds were pretty tame.

A gull doing a civic service: eating an invasive fish.
That's it for now...

Christmas and Boxing Day

Remi and I both had to work in the morning on Christmas Day and Boxing Day, but we still made the best of the afternoons. We got a lot of snow here over the Christmas break and the first picture shows how Vancouver handles snow on side streets, which is to say, not at all.

Remi shoveled - A LOT.

Maggie enjoyed the fluffy stuff though ;)

This next photo is Christmas Eve dinner (made by Remi). Lamb with red pepper sauce on polenta.

Our tree!

Remi thought we should dress up Christmas Eve, so to justify it, I said we had to have a photo with the tree.

This last photo is Christmas dinner (made by me). The turkey was a little overcooked, but that was Remi's fault.

I guess we didn't take any pictures of Christmas morning, but we did take one video:

Happy belated holidays to everyone!

Sarah