Summer – Page 2 – wee little lovelys

Our latest move…

September 1, 2016

We moved within Victoria on September 1st.

Moving is SO much work and one of my least favorite activities. The owners of our rental house were moving back from Japan so we had to find a new home during the busiest time of year for house rentals… students moving back into town. We also had a crazy house sale boom so many rental homes were being sold so owners could profit which meant there was not a very big rental supply.

A long story short…we found a nice place to move to (huge yard, heat!, a pond with goldfish, fruit trees, a view!, loads of wildlife coming and going in our yard) and with a lot of effort our move was successful.

Jimmy’s clever key organization

old house

new house

Vancouver summer trip

July 30, 2016

Last summer we traveled to Vancouver for a mini vacation. We wanted to spend time checking out all the fun tourist things and to visit old friends. We stayed downtown for two nights so we could catch the sky-train and walk around the city. We visited the Aquarium, did some shopping, visited Science World and had a blast.

After our stay downtown we drove over to North Vancouver to stay with our good friends Faye & Niels. I have known Faye since my first year at University. She was my roommate in residence! The University placed us together randomly and have been friends since. We had a great two nights spending time with Faye and her family. We also visited with our friends and the kids surrogate grandmother, Evelyn, who was our neighbor in our old condo building when we lived in North Vancouver. We spent some time with her and her boyfriend Barney. They were so sweet and it was nice to catch up on all the condo gossip 😉 We also had some time to have a picnic with our South African friends Kim, Ryan and their two sons Kye and Fin. We spent a lot of time together when Claire & Rhys were babies as Kim and I worked together and had an overlap with our maternity leaves. We used to swap child minding which I miss so much! A bonus of staying with Faye & Niels is we tagged along to another friends big BBQ so we were able to see lots of old friends and they have the best backyard that Claire & Rhys made the most of.

We had a great trip and we are excited to make it an annual summer adventure.

….

Science World:

Aquarium:

Lions Gate Bridge to West & North Vancouver:

Faye & Niels home:Faye & Nield

Evelyn & Barney:

Kim & Ryan clan:Kim & Ryan

Lisa & Sean’s BBQ…best backyard for kids:

And of course….Jimmy found a pool to skate 😉

Sooke summer visit

July 16, 2016

Every summer we like to get out to Sooke and have an overnight camping adventure at Wendy & Chris’ home. This summer Claire & Rhys had their very first sleep over without us! Exciting times. We went out on a date night in Sooke and had dinner at the most amazing restaurant right near the ocean- Wild Mountain. After walking around the harbour we headed back to the house long after Claire & Rhys went to sleep. They did not know we were coming back that night and they did great. A success.

We also had a special time on Chris’ boat… we went crabbing! We found out Rhys gets seasick and Claire enjoys boating.

Good times!

Science Venture summer camp- 2016

July 15, 2016

Claire & Rhys were in a one-week science camp this summer.

On one of the days they had to dress up like their favorite scientist. Rhys went as a geologist and Claire went as the famous primatologist Jane Goodall. Their costumes were pretty cool:

Celebrating the end of school… in Tofino!

July 1, 2016

Every Canada Day there is a skateboard contest in Tofino. Jimmy has been meaning to attend it for years. We opted to combine his desire with a family vacation as a way to celebrate the end of the school year. Additionally, we were married in Ucluelet so this area of the island remains very special to us.

We stayed at Pacific Sands Beach Resort which was amazing and very family friendly. Being right on Cox Bay beach, the kids loved the easy-access to early beach walks and exploring. In fact, we visited several times during each day. We would spot new sea creatures, hike the adjoining trails, go slug hunting (where we would count the number of slugs along the way), and even venture into the chilly waters. It was so much fun! There was even a nature camp for 1.5 hours per day the kids could attend and nightly S’mores making.

One of our best trips ever. I think we will make it an annual event.

Pedalheads Summer Camp!

August 10, 2015

We were all lucky this summer that Jimmy could stay home with the kids and they could have some fun mellow adventures together. Claire & Rhys still had plenty of summer camps lined up throughout the summer to keep them busy as they love activities. One of our favorite camps was Pedalheads!

It was a summer biking camp that was a week long camp with half days. Claire and Rhys received new bikes at the end of the school year that were a big step up from their balance bikes. Pedalheads summer camp taught them how to ride their bikes safely and with no training wheels- yahoo! It was a success and they can now ride their big kid bikes pretty well. The last day of the camp was a dress-up princess/ pirate party and bike rodeo. All the parents watched, video-taped, clapped and hooted as each kid rode through an obstacle course. Great fun! We will definitely sign up again next summer.

Summer camping in Sooke

July 15, 2015

We have never camped as a family before and the kids were eager to give it a try so as a soft run we camped out on Wendy & Chris’ property in Sooke. Obviously the kids loved it and Jimmy & I survived the night so looks like we will try a real camping trip next summer 🙂

We had a big picnic, spent time at Sooke potholes and had loads of leisure time reading in the sunshine, and visiting the chickens. Jimmy even entered a local skateboard contest where he did really well and won some skate goods.

We always enjoy our time with Wendy, Chris and Senna and this was yet another fun get-together.

The stream down from Chris & Wendy’s little hobby farm: