Happy Birthday Dawn!!

Have a great day!

How can this be comfy? She can't even see the tv from here! 

Happy Sweet Sixteenth, Katie

Happy Birthday to one of our favourite teenagers!!! What have you planned for this very special day, Katie? Or have the plans been made by someone else?? Hmm?? How neat that it falls on a weekend day, too! Enjoy every minute of it. We love you lots, kiddo!

Happy Birthday Katie!!

Many happy returns of the day! :)

Andrew the Tuba Man

Andrew had his Spring Concert last week. He did a great job on tuba and trumpet.

What a handsome guy!!

Thanks for the Photos!

To echo Dawn, thanks for the photos Steve and Jessica! We sometimes feel very much "out of the loop" being on the other side of the country and not in the email chain. Regular updates here and the occassional photo do make a big difference. We're looking to seeing the place up close in August. We had originally not planned anything about heading north but I think we might take a quick run up to Red Deer to nose about at the new Ironside homestead either on the way to Blairmore or on the way back home. It'll all depend on the times we arrive and leave I think.

Canada Day Weekend and the Tesarowski Visit

First the good news: July 1st falls on a Friday this year so the long weekend is truly going to be a long weekend. Now the bad news: There is a good chance that both Rebeca and I will be working all day Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. I'm not sure what arrangements you have made already and if they can be altered, or if you want to alter them, but there you have it. Rebeca, unfortunately, works those three days as her normal shifts (Friday, Saturday, Sunday from 10am - 10pm) and I have been "volunteered" to aid in the transition of a new client (Scott Paper) on those same days. I'm not sure what the plan is regarding how many hours I will have to work or if all three days are necessary but as it works out there isn't much choice in the matter. Our team is too small for one person to handle the work and even with much advanced warning I was still told I would be needed. Hopefully as the month progresses I'll have an idea of what will be required so I can plan around the work to spend some time with you guys, hear about your adventures and performances in New York, and maybe catch some fireworks.

So much grass and so many Weeds! You should see the blisters! 

Sort of a bad shot from the living room to the kitchen, through another cool arch 

I just had to sneek in a picture of my sweet little doggie! We are such proud parents! 

A neglected flower bed turning a new leaf. 

This is looking out the kitchen window at my sweet wife working soooo hard. 

Just a shot of the cool architecture in the master bedroom. 

This is the little bed nook in the master bedroom upstairs. Looks out onto the back yard and garage. 

This is the sweet little number in the Master bathroom at the top of the stairs! Pretty nice! 

Archway from living room hallway and stairs 

Living room with another cool arch into the Kitchen, nice hardwood eh? 

This is one of the cool arch ways from the back door to the front door, the arch on the left goes into the living room. 

This is a shot of the small back bedroom to the right as you walk in the back door 

The longest grass I've ever seen! Also the first grass I've mowed in at least 10 years! 

Still In Michigan

I'm still in Michigan. Funny, so is Rebeca! She's off with her Mom who is getting some tests done at the hospital and I'm sitting at home with the dogs (one bitey and one not) and her GrandMom (who is watching the soaps....save me Jeebuz!). The weather has been really crappy, rain and cold. The birds, colourful and plentiful, don't seem to mind the rain much and last night a possum wandered up the driveway and helped himself to the seed and feed fallen from the bird feeders. We spent a large part of yesterday and again today trying to get the wireless rig here to work. It is working now but without security so that's a bit of a problem. I'm not sure how much since we're out in the country and the only people who might use the connection appear to already have one of their own. We did the rounds of the stores in search of hard to find (and cheap) Star Wars crap. I managed to find a few figures but none of the big stuff. I'm on my way back to Ottawa on Thursday, hopefully my new laptop will arrive on Friday (bless employee purchase plans!). Cross your fingers for nice weather for the Memorial Day weekend.

Visiting Michigan

Here we are sitting in Michigan. We took the train to Windsor and Rebeca's Mom came across the border and picked us up. the dude at the border asked us where we were and waved us on, it took us about a minute, we must be the right shade of beige. The traffic is still insane and fast, still lots of roadkill. We visited with a dozen or more of the family yesterday and it's out for dinner tonight. The weather sucks, both here and in Ottawa, rain and cool. I'm back in Ottawa on Thursday and Rebeca comes home a week later. Hopefully the cat is behaving. How did everyone spend their Victoria Day?

Jenn, You Still Out There?

I noticed the other day that one of our "members" had disappeared, or at least turned into XXXXXX. I think that's Jenn. Did something happen to your account? I can resend the invite if you'd like to rejoin.

We're home

Hi, All,
We got home late tonight. I just down-loaded the e-mails...24 and it took quite some time.
I'll go into more detail about what we did out in Blairmore tomorrow!!

I'll read the e-mails tomorrow.

Happy Anniversary, Jennifer and Blaine.

Good night!!

Skype

I'm not sure if any of you have heard anything about VoIP (voice over IP) but I figured I would drop a quick note to give you an idea of what it's all about. Think of it as free voice chat. Simple and smooth. How it works is this: if you have a broadband internet connection (sorry Mom, that's not you) you download and install Skype, add a user (that would be Rebeca or me) and you have the voice equivelant of internet chat using your pc. You speak through your pc microphone and listen through the pc speakers. We've tested it and it works like a charm. If you'd like to try it and need some help setting it up give a holler. :)

Last, but not least, a photo of the island just off the Cummings Bridge on my way home from work. Right at the corner two Canada Geese have set up a nest. This is the second year they've been there but there didn't seem to be any baby geese last year. Today on my way home I saw six or seven of the little blighters poking around while ma and pa kept an eye out for them. I'll take the big lens tomorrow and see if I can get a better shot. 

Here's a photo I took the other day of Maman. It's pretty cool up close. I took this one on my way to work last week, it was terribly cold so I snapped a few quick then went back up the street past the US Embassy (Fortress America as the locals call it). 

A shot of the War Memorial a few days after the VE-Day ceremonies. That's the Chateau Laurier to the right and the East Block of Parliament Hill on the left. Directly behind the Memorial and across the street is the locks leading down to the Ottawa River. 

Congratulations to Blaine

This is Nursing Week and Blaine was voted by his colleagues on Unit 22 as their "Hero Among Us". At the Annual Nursing Tea he was presented with a flower, a certificate and a Tim Horton's coffee mug. After he came home he said "Hmm, this makes me wonder what the people I work with think of me". I'd say it's mighty good. He was chosen by the two dozen, or so, staff that work on Unit 22.

I thought I would leech this from another blog because I think it's a good photo of Steve and we haven't had any photos posted in a while. 

Xeriscaping

Hold the sod/grass seed, Jessica and Steve!!!! The front yard sounds like a good candidate for xeriscaping.
We'll get some stepping stones, perennials (with some annuals for all-summer colour), maybe a garden bench and some little ceramic animals....none of those cement frogs and such.....and we'll turn the scruffed up part of the front yard into a mass of flowers. We'll bring some of the perennials we have here...irises and daisies (not Shastas which will invade the yard and lawn and neighbour's lawn on the other side of the hedge when nobody is looking) and we'll see what we can do.
Tesarowskis, how does that sound? A lot of yards in Regina are redoing the front yard so there's no grass at all. I've been very slowly doing that here. Our yard has waited while I worked in public garden spots for Communities in Bloom so things I'd like to do are still only on paper.
The Ironside girls have given me some books that I will now be able to follow up in garden designs.

Money in the Mail

I got an email a few weeks ago from some marketing firm representing Adobe (the folks that make Acrobat Reader and assorted graphic and photo software) and Macromedia (people who make really groovy web design software). They wanted me to take five minutes of my time and fill out a questionnaire. Sure, why not? I filled it out, put my addy at the end and today in the mail was a new, crisp, American $5.00 bank note! That's $6.18 CDN! Score!!

the new neighbours

Well, Steve and I met a bunch of the new neighbours, and they seem like a really friendly bunch! We went over yesterday afternoon to do some yardwork. The front yard was completely dug up last summer due to a line break 15' under ground. The whole lawn is covered in weeds; old dead ones from last year and new green ones! Ugh. We picked weeds for about 3 hours and at hour 2 one of the neighbours came across and introduced himself. He knew who we were though, Graham the bank manager has all of them prepared!

So he offered his rake, then he went and brought us extra garbage bags. Then he suggested we roto-till the lawn. (he came in today just before lunch to say that he's found a roto-tiller from another neighbour that we can trade use for with a couple of sandwiches!)

After he came across another guy showed up who owns three houses on the street. He seems nice too! They are both named Dave. (that'll be easy to remember!)

Anyways, there are tulips and raspberries and some other bulb flower that's coming up but we don't know what it is. Maybe irises? And we found a tennis ball and golf ball that Mook had fun with while we worked away on the weeds.

Happy Mother's Day!!

Happy [early] Mother's Day to Grandma, Mom, and Aunt Jennifer!!! I hope everyone has a great, relaxing day.

A New Bike!!

Ok, so it's not nearly as exciting as a new set of teeth or a new house but it's cool just the same. I got a call from Phil, the dude at my LBS, who says my new bike has finally arrived from Vancouver, they've assembled it, and I should come and pick it up. Technically, I'm supposed to be studying this week but I think I might be able to squeeze in a few kilometers on the new ride and perhaps take a look at the new war museum.