November

Clearly, I have got a bit of catching up to do!
Now that the kids are getting bigger and more independent we have started to branch out a bit from our regular family activities of swimming, walking, biking, and going to the park. In November we did our first ever family bowling night- just the 5 of us.  It was great fun. Kezia is not old enough to bowl yet, but she was happily amused by straightening up the balls as they came back, and playing a little "pass the bowling ball" on the floor.

We took some nice puddle jumping walks on the dyke...

My brother Scott (and Cristal) had their first baby. A beautiful girl named Mackenzie. She was born 7 weeks premature, so had to spend some time at the NICU before being greeted at home by her cousins.

The kids and I had a field trip to Granville Island to see the play The Wizard of Oz, and then had a fun filled afternoon of bird feeding/chasing, eating while listening to an amazing fiddler, topped off by a Lee's doughnut of course. I will remember this day with fondness forever. I hope they do too!

And last but not least, we ended November with Colin's moustache!

He decided to do Movember in honour of his Uncle Dick, who was going through chemotherapy at the time. He raised over $1,000 along with some other men from our church.

Epic Weekend

This fall seems to be flying by like no other. I feel like we just started back at school and now it's already Halloween! Crazy. Anyways, amidst the craziness, we try to have at least one great family day every couple of weeks. This means that "activities" sometime have to be sacrificed. So a couple weeks ago- we passed on Theo's first Floor Hockey game (he is in a local league now), and we headed out to UBC for the Apple Festival (after swimming lessons, that were early enough for us to do both). We have been several years in a row now, and have learned that if you want to buy your favorite apples, you have to go early! Thankfully, they had volunteers, walking through the line up handing out cute apple tattoos to help keep the kids occupied. It was such a beautiful day, that we didn't mind waiting in line.

There is a bit of walk through some bush and under the road until you get to the main event area, and there is always a lovely garden with lots of interesting fruits and veggies growing. Many that I had seen here for the first time, like a kiwi!

 There is a children's area with lots of activities to do. Below is a picture of my boy, having just spent about half and hour at the biodiversity museum's table. We learned lots about antlers- even tried some on!

There was free face painting...

A photo opportunity.

Yummy apple pie!

My favorite part. Apple Taste Testing.

 

Apple chips!

After the Apple Festival we had an appointment to get the van serviced, so we spent a few hours at Granville Island, feeding the birds. Oh how we miss being so close to Granville Island!

A rare moment of stillness as he listens to the music.

The following day, we had a birthday part to go to out in Surrey, so we thought we would capitalize on the fact that we were in farm country by heading to the pumpkin patch.

There was a petting zoo with sheep, goats and bunnies.

 Well, that's all for now. It was definitely weekend to remember. We were blessed with such beautiful weather, a true warm autumn day.