"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

Let it snow!

Sarah and I had another day off, so we headed up to Seymour for a day of snowshoeing. You've obviously heard about our weather, we're getting lots of snow, and it seems to be sticking. Most days are pretty cold, we love it. This day was pretty chilly, -15° on the mountain, not counting the wind chill (only wimps and people with lousy clothes count the wind chill).

This is actually from the day before on Cypress, but it's representative.

Maggie and I playing between the two summits. The wind packs the snow a little bit, so it's easier to go off trail, though there were lots of icy patches.

This is on the summit. The false summit, actually. The real summit is another kilometer away or so, and is somewhat dicey in the winter.

Sarah on the the way in.

Going around the back of the mountain.

BC Parks are so over-dramatic when it comes to safety. I'm not even sure what these say.
Sarah climbing the face of the 1st pump (the smallest of the three summits)
Maggie and I playing in the snow.
It's hard to coax Maggie to run through the deeper snow.
Here again. If I'd kept the camera running for a few seconds longer you would have seen Maggie careering across an icy patch to the snow below. Too bad.
Sarah and Maggie plowing through the snow on the way out. Not long after this Sarah fell into a hole and got stuck. I had to dig her out. Then I did, but was able to get out on my own after filling my snow pants with two or three pounds of snow.
A successful day on the mountain. Then home to eggnog.

Last day of school!

So yesterday morning I wrote an exam nice and early and had the rest of the day to myself. A friend (Theresa) and I decided to spend it outdoors at Stanley Park and then at Granville Island doing a little browsing and Christmas shopping! We then headed back to my place for some tree decorating and dinner with a couple of my other pharmacy friends. Here are some pictures and videos!

I wanted to name all the birds we saw for the bird nerds (Mom and Kat), but I couldn't find these guys in my Audubon Society book.

No brainer ;)

This is an oystercatcher. He was making a racket and I tried to get a video and then he shut up.

Lions Gate Bridge.

This is a common merganser.


Lots of ice! It was quite chilly and I got a bit wind/frost-bitten down by the ocean. My face still hurts today!

Yes this is indeed a large blow-dryer for your children.

After than, our tree fun began. Remi brought the tree in (it was frozen, he had to thaw it out) and then wrestled with it to get it to sit in the stand and THEN had to cut off a few of the bottom branches. The tree is huge, but it's definitely the nicest tree we've had yet.

Some friends of mine came over to help us. That's Ariel on the left and Theresa on the right.

Lots of decorating!

Remi and I topped it off.

And there's Raj! Yes, the boys are giving the finger. Not very Christmas-spirited, but this was the best picture of the five of us and Noble Fir.

Then we ate! Moroccan chicken and a zucchini and apple salad with preserved lemons that Remi made himself. Mmmm!! It was so good! Oh, and wine of course!

We're all ready for Christmas out here for the most part. A few things left to pick up present-wise for each other, but we're looking forward to some time to ourselves and some snowshoeing!! There is TONS of snow out here! Remi is thinking about heading up to the mountains tomorrow and the two of us have Friday off and it's supposed to clear up. Pictures to come!

Happy holidays everyone!

Sarah

OH! I almost forgot the videos. The first is a crow picking up a shell and breaking it open to get at what's inside. Crows are so smart! That is true - wikipedia it.

The second is us decorating the tree. It's more for my mom really because I wasn't there to help her with the tree this year.

Our province is better than your province

The sun actually shone on Thursday and Remi finished his exam early, so we decided to go for a walk on the North Shore. It was a beautiful day and Remi felt photograph-inspired so there are a few panoramics here (because everything is big in BC).




Maggie of course went swimming. Her tail seems to suck water up and so always shoots up a big stream when she shakes.

Then she wacked me in the nose with her big fat head. It hurt.

Family photo! We tried to get Maggie to sit, but she wanted to bark at us instead.

The sun came through the trees in a few locations and looked like a star-rainbow.

Another video of Maggie swimming ;)


I have one final left (Remi finished today) and then it's relax relax relax (in other words, work work work at the hospital). We haven't quite finished Christmas shopping yet, but we're close. We're getting our Christmas tree on Tuesday!

Hugs and kisses to everyone!

Sarah and Remi

Petgill Lake

There wasn't much going on at school today, so I took a professional development day and took the dog up to Petgill Lake for a quick hike. It wasn't the most incredible hike we've done, but a nice walk in the woods ending at a sub-alpine lake. Mostly it was nice to escape from the noises of the city for a short while. Here are a couple of pictures:

This is a view to the end of Howe Sound and Squamish. It's a pretty good view of the Chief.

Petgill Lake. Pretty nice, but it was windy and cold, so we couldn't stay too long.