RAINWATER RAMBLING

I finally made it up to Alert this week. Follow the journey on the work blog.

Today we went to Stam's 40th birthday party, it was a surprise party at his parents place. He had no idea and was surprised to see everyone there. Almost everyone there we hadn't seen since their wedding 16 years ago. His Mom loved the girls and as Angela said "she kept hugging me". Hard to believe we've known each other for 22 years, we met in first year university and were room mates for a couple years while living off-campus.

Updated status reports of whether I have left for Alert, Nu are on the work blog.

It is amazing how the Taliban can have such an impact on my day to day routine. As a result of the senseless killing of four Canadian soldiers today in Kandahar, Afgahnistan, my scheduled flight to Alert this week was canceled due to plane availability. The plane that was scheduled to take us is now being sent to repatriate the bodies. Although the flight has been canceled, we still have to call everyday in the event that they find a plane. When I called tonight they said there was the possibility of a Thursday flight. All we can do is wait.

Angela, Claudia and I went to the Toronto Zoo for the Hospital For Sick Kids/Canadian Liver Foundation fundraiser event "Super Heroes: Journey Through The Jungle Scavenger Hunt"

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Susan and Gillian couldn't make it, due to Gillian's altar server training session. Grandma, Alex and Emi were able to go in their place. It has been a couple of years since we have been to the zoo. It was so busy the main lot was full and we had to park in the overflow lot.

First up was the kids zoo area. This prairie dog looks like he is smelling the clover.

Angela sitting on a turtle shell.

Claudia sitting inside a turtle shell.

The kids climbing in the spiders web.

We managed to hook up with Stam, but missed Brenda and Kira. Stam was one of the sponsorship co-chairs for the the event. Next it was over to the African Savannah. The baby giraffe was just sitting in the grass.

The lions doing what the lions do best, laying around soaking up the sun.

No, there aren't this many zebras at the zoo, it is a picture they have near the zebra exhibit, it looks pretty cool.

This was a Marabou Stork (Leptoptilos crumeniferus).

Can you guess what this is?

This elephant kept picking up the log and scraping pieces off with his tusk and then he would eat the wood.

A female mandrill deciding whether to stick that piece in her mouth or not.

Going for a ride down the river.

Angela and Claudia trying to see the orangutan's, but there were only a couple of them out and they were hanging out in the back corner.

The tiger pacing back and forth.

It was a good visit to the zoo.

Week two of school started off where week one ended, Claudia has had a few meltdowns about going to school. She has been complaining it's too long, or in the morning that her stomach hurts, etc. Susan has ended up driving her to school a couple of times, but is getting fed up with it. We'll see how the next two mornings go, friday is a P.D. Day (already?).

Gillian has started Guides already, last weekend she went to a cottage with the other 5 third year guides and their two leaders. She had a good time, and one of the other girls even made her a peanut butter sandwich for the car ride up.

Angela has a new leader this year and is hoping she can go camping at the end of the month (Gillian's group is also going to the same place).

Claudia has registration tomorrow night and her meetings start next week.

We changed Claudia and Angela's room around. Moved the bunk beds into the middle of the room with only one end touching the wall. It kind of divides their room in half, we'll see how it goes. Anyone want a wood unit I made many moons ago for when Gillian moved into a double bed. I made this piece to act as a headboard, but we have now outgrown it's usefulness. It is quite big as you can tell from the picture below.

Just to be sure of it's size, the girls tried it out head first.

The traditional first day of school photo of the girls. See last years post on the 1st Day of School. Gillian will have to walk home from school for the first month probably, until they determine the amount of students on the bus. We asked her to wait until her sisters (i.e. Claudia) are on the bus before she starts walking home the first day.

We had a fire and roasted marshmellows after dinner tonight. We had bought a little chiminea, so this was the first chance to use it.

Nothing like the smell of a campfire in your own backyard.

Here are the girls roasting marshmellows.

The little yellow bike has served its purpose and will now be passed down the line. Gillian first got this bike when she was around 4 years old, it was a hand me down from Bradley. It is on it's third set of tires. All three of the girls used this bike to learn how to ride a two wheeler. It will now be passed on to Emi.

I am now into the second year of Rainwater Rambling and still going strong. I changed web hosting providers since I was getting close to my space allocation. I am now paying for space with a lot more options, but fear not there will not be any ad banners, pop-up windows or PayPal donation buttons showing up on the blog.

As part of the archiving process, I have come up with a way in which to archive the website to a cd so that it can be viewed off-line (i.e. no internet connection). Some of the stuff shows up blank, such as the weather forecast boxes and the videos as they are hosted on-line, but all the pictures and text are there for Rainwater Rambling, From Here To There, Are We There Yet? (our trip out west) and the old tanabe.ca website. If you want a copy, let me know.

Actually the girls are looking forward to going back to school. More so to see their friends than to learn. It will be Grade 6, 3 and 1 for the girls and EQAO for Gillian and Angela.

Updates have been sparse over the last week, the girls were at Grandma and G-pa's for the week and had a great time while they were there.

This week I'm heading up to the North Bay area for a couple of days. We are still trying to get a new site up and running in the Marten River area. I'll be meeting with land surveyors and our contractor who will oversee the installation. Any updates will be on the From Here To There blog.