River Tubing

Saturday started out great, and it just continued right along that way. The rain cleared up and made way for gorgeous weather. We took advantage and with a group of other families headed out to float down a river.

One of the fun things to do in the summer here is to tube down the Gaspereau River. When the water level is high enough you can rent large inner tubes and use them to usually have a nice relaxing trip down the river. It seems like each time I go though there is a bit of a mishaps that makes it a fun adventure.

Last year a couple friends and I took a lunch break from work to go, left one car at the bottom and then drove mine to the beginning. When we arrived at the bottom there were no keys to the car we left. We thought for sure they were somewhere at the bottom of the river. Luckily after we called for a ride back to my car, the keys were sitting there on the seat. Lunch ran a little long that day.

Today we took some inflatable boats with us so that we could ride together with the kids and try to stay a bit dryer than having our butts sitting in the river through the tubes. We did rent a couple for Alexandria and her friend though. There were two kinds of boats, three larger ones, and three smaller ones. On the first trip down one of the smaller boats that Ella and her friend were in, and was tied together with our boat, ended up catching some branches on the side and tore a hole in it.

It didn’t take long before it was deflated and the kids were in the water. We were able to get them situated into other boats but not without one of our friends losing his hat to the river in the struggle.

Shortly into the second trip down another one of the smaller boats manged to get a hole and deflate. It was our friend who lost his hat and he was tied to another boat and was their navigator. But he opted to walk back up the river as the boats all left him behind pretty quick. Another took over as navigator for them and he went down the river on a tube with two boats tied to him keeping them on course.

We had a lot of sun, water, and even more laughs. It was a great way to spend the afternoon.

Wonderful start to a Saturday

This Saturday morning has started out wonderfully. First I slept in until 6:30, then headed down stairs with just my little man. While he played and watched a little Pokemon, I curled up in a chair with a nice cup of tea and started a new book. The rain falling outside was perfect background noise. 

The finer points of parenting

Tonight the topic came up which was followed by a teaching session. It started out just Noah and I but shortly after it was three kids and Jen taking instructions in my class, Armpit Farting 101. 

New nephew

It took me a few days until he was home from the hospital but I was finally able to go meet my new nephew Gavin. 

What an adorable little guy. My son Noah is pretty taken by him too, always wants to be the one holding him. Not that I can blame him for that. 

   
   

Nothing like family

After doing really well for a while after finishing my last round of meds Saturday I took a big step back. Monday I was able to get in to see my family doctor and she said it is quite common for this to come back so she immediately prescribed antibiotics again. 

To be sure it was the same thing though she also told me to send a stool sample to the hospital for testing. I was going to try running it there today but am feeling just horrible. Thankfully my sister offered to take it in for me. 

Family, always willing to do anything for you. Even deliver a bag of your poo. 

Wapuu Colouring Pages

My family has fallen in love with Wapuu, especially my son. He loves his Wapuu shirt and every time he puts it on in the morning he asks me if I’ll wear mine too.

Lately he has been drawing and painting versions of Wapuu. He came home from school excited the other day to show me what appeared to be a giraffe version with a very long neck.

In case you’re somehow not familiar with Wapuu you can find out more about him here http://wapuu.jp/

Today I had a few minutes so I decided to help him out a bit and took a couple of images and turned them into colouring pages for him to do. They aren’t a great job and the Wapuunk version was a bit tricky in spots, but printed out they will do the trick for him.

If you’re interested you can grab them here.

Reason number …

No longer can I keep track of the number of reasons I love my job. But this is up there with the very top of them.

Yesterday I received this feedback from one the people I had chatted with. It wasn’t only for me as they have chatted with a number of my team over the past while, I just happened to be the lucky one to help right before they left this:

One of the main reasons I am a great fan of WordPress is the chat line. It is especially important to me as I am deaf and trying to hear instructions over the telephone is fraught with difficulty. Anyway, I have learned to use your chat line when I get stuck and I have never been disappointed. Not only do all the people with whom I have chatted know the right answers, they come over as really nice people – the sort you would like to have as friends. I’m sure some could find a fault somewhere but I’m damned if I could.

This made my day yesterday and it carried right over today. I’m very lucky I get to talk with so many interesting and neat people. Of course some days can be stressful or you can let things get to you, but then something like this comes along and all that fades away.

Unseen Perk

Tonight I found another unseen perk of distributed work. Jen is no longer afraid to cut my hair, because really who will see me anyway.

YAY free haircut!

Gardening

For a guy who doesn’t overly enjoy gardening, and isn’t very good at it, I seem to have dedicated a fair amount of time to it this weekend.  It will be worth it though in the end. 

The waste resource management group here was giving away free compost yesterday. We took advantage and I went and shovelled a bunch into bags to bring it home. I was running short of time but luckily my sisters family was there at the same time and they helped me fill a bag or two as well. 

Today we went a picked up some tomato plants and some seeds for peas, beans, and zucchini. There are not many things I like better than eating peas right out of the garden so I’m hopefully the grow the most. 

When we arrived home I mixed all the compost into the garden where all these will go to give them a good base to start with. 

The boxwoods at the back of the yard took a beating this winter with all the snow sitting on top of them. Tried out the new trimmers and have them looking better now. 

Once we were done for the day and were watering a the existing things the peony is starting to come up. I was warned though that after being transplanted it might not bloom this year. My fingers are crossed that we at least get a few though. 

Model train show

Today was dance recital day. Jen, Caile, and Ella were busy with that all day. Caile and Ella were only in the first half of the afternoon recital, so after the intermission Noah and I took off and went to check out a model train show that was setup today. 

Noah’s favourite was the Lego train it was pretty impressive and if you look close you can see Superman flying on top of one of the buildings.