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. 

           

Easy to please

All the kids just arrived home from school so there were eleven of them in the kitchen eating snacks of homemade peanut butter chocolate chip cookies and apple slices. 

My youngest daughter Ella, who does not like peanut butter, asked this instead:

Can I just have a couple chocolate chips and a slice of bread?

Little George Costanza

Noah had been in the washroom for a little while and was being quiet, so I went to check on him. He was in there with everything but his socks off sitting on the toilet. 

When I asked him why he was naked he said, sometimes I get really hot so I take my clothes off. 

Totally reminded me of George Costanza. 

Halifax day trip

Yesterday we took a wonderful day trip into Halifax. It was a beautiful day and it had been a while since we were able to all go spend a day together. This was the first day this year I was able to wear shorts and t-shirt, the only time I was a little cold was when we were on the ferry going across the Halifax

The ferry is my favourite way to get to downtown Halifax. You get a great view of the city and the harbour and it’s pretty cheap as well. We spent a bit of time walking the waterfront and had a treat at Cows ice cream, it’s Jen’s favourite. The boardwalk along the water is so nice with the playground for the kids to play and neat shops and views.

There was some food that was smelling really good when we first walked off the ferry. Noah said that smells so good, can we follow that smell and eat what ever it is.

Backyard Wildlife

The view from my office window is great. Our backyard always has some critter running around out there it seems. There are lots of birds flying and singing. A few weeks back the big attractions was watching the squirrels sneaking around, climbing and jumping.

We have deer who are semi regular visitors. As the clover gets growing more in the yard I expect them to make more regular appearances again like they did last year. Pheasants are a pretty regular sight to see as well.

Deer visiting in the front yard.
Deer visiting in the front yard last year.

In the past few days we’ve had some new friends join us though. We’ve randomly caught glimpses of them in the past but they seem to be hanging around a lot more now. Wild rabbits. Maybe they like to come visit our pet rabbits, but they were inside when I caught this little one out there this morning.

Visiting Rabbit
Visiting Rabbit

Out of all the critters we do get out there, my favourite are watching and listening to the the kids playing back there.