Showing posts with label Family. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Family. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 12, 2022

We bought a camper!

Not only did we start camping when we arrived here three years ago, but we have been covetously looking at campers. With nighttime temperatures below freezing in the mountains even in July,a camper greatly extends the season. It also gives us air conditioning and protection from mosquitoes during the rare - but becoming less rare - hot spells. It lets the cats come camping with us (although they may hate it and only ever do it once). We didn't want to buy a new vehicle so it had to be something what we already owned could pull, i.e., something small. But we still wanted separate beds for everyone.

So, when Terry saw the camper on kijiji (aka Canada's Craigslist) and it met all our requirements we pounced on it. Even though this is the end of camping season. Most campgrounds that don't specifically do winter camping have either closed or will close after this weekend - Canadian Thanksgiving. Snow will come at any time, it's already October.



Saturday, September 24, 2022

Going home again

The kids and I spent three weeks in the US this year. Starting in MA, we spent time with mom (board games, card games, Cider Hills, and for me and Alex the first of five college tours!) then with dad (another college tour, with dad as tour guide, Duck Tours, and his annual BBQ). 

Zoltan as a volunteer for the magician who performed at dad's

We drove down to PA in time to meet Terry who had been driving from Calgary. Staying with his sister most of the time we hit the Turkey Hill Experience, laser tag (a surprising number of injuries!) another college tour, and time in and around the pool.  We even tested out our origami kayak in there.  And then again at a state park with an actual lake.  We visited folks in the Lehigh Valley and swung by the cabin on our way to the last two college tours - one being Penn State. Will Alex be blacklisted if I mention I was not too impressed with the Penn State Creamery ice cream?

Finally swinging south, we invaded my brother's house. Terry and I had some errands at Main State and I got to catch up with a few friends there, then more catching up with friends as we checked out the water park at Cameron Run. My nephew and his girlfriend also hit town that weekend so we got to have a big festive brunch before heading to the airport where we discovered there were issues with the kids being on my ArriveCAN (as in, one wasn't and one was only sort-of) which took nearly an hour to fix and we weren't allowed to check in until it was complete. Did I start panicking? Of course I did! Also of course, nobody ever asked to see the app once we were allowed to go, but every other step from the check in to the gate was super smooth so we still had plenty of time. 

Storms in our plane-change city made us nervous but I reminded myself that if storms delayed our landing, it would also delay planes departing. At touchdown our next flight still showed a departure in 20 minutes and we were 20 long gates away. I am out of shape. That it all I will say about that. The plane was in fact significantly delayed so we could have crab walked backwards - lesson learned. We once again had time to spare and then some.  Super smooth otherwise, and from landing in Calgary to being in the cab home was less than an hour. We did arrive after midnight, though, and I had work bright and early the next day! 

Thursday, July 21, 2022

Elkwood Campground (aka Peter Lougheed camping #2)


Back during our first full summer when we were camping neophytes and made lots of mistakes, we spent a couple of nights in the Peter Lougheed area. There are multiple campgrounds and one we visited was Elkwood. Elkwood had actual showers (in one location for the entire campground), an ampitheatre that held concerts and park ranger informative talks, and a ton of bike trails. We swore we'd come back one day and thankfully, Schnerp.com let us do exactly that!

[side note: schnerp is a site that alerts users to cancelled reservations to their chosen campgrounds so they can try to snag the newly opened spot. The window is only open for 10 minutes and the first 2-3 times we tried someone else got the spot before us.]

We ended up never using the showers nor did we attend the concert but the campground was as nice as we had hoped. We arrived Friday after work and a fast food dinner, the nearly eternal summer daylight allowed us to still get the tent and gear all set up before s'mores and getting ready for bed. I was also thrilled and surprised to sleep as late as 7am and only woke a little cold in the night.

After a more or less leisurely breakfast we headed out to the Blackshale Suspension Bridge, which I would not say would be worth the trip from Calgary but being about 20 minutes from camp made a ton of sense. The bridge itself is cool, as a suspension bridge, but there isn't much else to it. The loop is only about 1km long, taking us up to and over the bridge, then looping into the forest before spitting us back out by the car.

I had heard quite a bit about renting kayaks and canoes from a nearby campground (our PL #3 if all goes well - next year) and wanted to check it out. Boulton Creek Campground has all the Elkwood does PLUS a general store, ice cream shop, and aforesaid rentals.  It's also where we buy the token to use for showers if we so indulged. We went for the ice cream and decided the watercraft rentals were a bit rich for our blood. It's a cool system though, you handle the paperwork for the rental and get the oars/lifevests at the shop, but the craft themselves are at the waterside about 10 minutes' drive away.  

Instead we decided to check out a different waterside day use area and had a great time there, although the kids would probably deny it now. We scrambled around the rocks, the kid got their feet wet (and their shoes, socks and to some extent pants/shorts) and we watched a bald eagle grab a fish out of the water, then - after its lunch - come hang out in a tree near us.  Upon return to the campground Terry and I took a little bike ride and caught some stunning mountain views as well as admiring the wildflowers beginning to poke their heads up.

Sunday morning there was rain in the forecast so after pancakes we got everything packed up in the cars and got ready to go. On the way home we stopped at several day use areas to check them out. I deeply regretted not pulling off at Grizzly Peak because the views were clear to the wall of mountains across the way.  At the Opal day use area there was an entire city of Columbian Ground Squirrels (exactly the small mammal I have been thinking are prairie dogs all these years and just learned this minute that I was wrong) scampering around worried about birds but paying us no mind. And many weren't all that concerned about the birds either, lounging fully stretched out on rocks or among the grass.  I could happily watch those adorable rodents all day but we did need to eventually get home. We discovered that there's trout fishing at Mt. Lorette Ponds and Terry happily scoped that out for future reference.  There's also a pulloff I noticed every time we were on Route 40 that has an old fashioned well and stairs beside it leading up into .... who knows what?  A couple of miles after I was sure I had just missed it Terry saw it and pulled off. It was a sweet a spot as I thought it would be, but the trail just led along the little creek and we didn't follow it very long.

Due to various logistics this is the only camping trip of summer 2022 and it was definitely one for the books!



Friday, May 20, 2022

Sisters

I am completely enamored of our most recent additions to the family. They definitely keep me on my toes, especially Kiki, who comes to me chirping and squeaking (these are not meow-ing cats) like she needs something but she does not want anything. Not food, water, a litterbox cleaning, playing nor petting. Just wants my attention.

They came to us very skittish, to be expected. Especially Ficker, who spent her first week with us in the wall. She did come out to eat and use the litterbox, after everyone had gone to bed. As they become more comfortable some real personalities are starting to shine through.  I don't know how much is becoming more comfortable with our family and how much is that they are now the only two cats in the house - they were fostered from earliest kitten-hood by a family that already had three adult cats.

Kiki is much slimmer than Flicker, and she's always on the move. I think she actually eats more. Flicker definitely prefers to "preserve her energy."

Today's cute-ness: they were intermixed on the office chair we have been meaning to trash, grooming each other, and then on a dime started fighting. One cat got pushed off the chair. Just like human siblings!

Saturday, May 7, 2022

Getting outdoor hours

I am trying the 1000 hours outside challenge this year. Given the way the first part of the year has gone, I think I will be happy to reach 500 hours by new year.  However, my mother's day present to myself and my family means that more time out of the house just may be quite a bit more feasible.


Yes, this is a new (to us) patio set. The chairs around the table are significantly more comfortable than the set we previously had so outdoor dining just became more likely. AND there are two loveseats perfect for lounging on while reading - one for me and one for Alex. PLUS two small coffee tables just right for holding nice cold drinks to stay hydrated in the summer heat.

Just need this to not be the next "most wildfires ever recorded" year so we can breathe the outdoor air.

Saturday, April 30, 2022

Catching up

 Since the last post, way back in January ... 

  • We've skied. Literally every weekend since January 8 at least one member of the family skied for at least one day. Terry ended up going for the 10 weeks of lessons, and when that ended I started the 4 week spring ski lesson course. Sadly, tomorrow is my last lesson and given how melt-y everything is getting, likely our last time on the slopes until next season. I know most slopes have been closed a month already, but it is a little sad to us. I guess we go back to hiking.
  • We have two new additions to the household: Nikita and Flicker (née Harlow, but nobody liked that name and Flicker suits her). We had been talking about getting cats since before we went to Germany and it was beyond time.
  • Alex is prepping for high school. In Canada high school starts in 10th grade. She applied to, and was accepted at, a charter school that we expect will give her the support and challenge that has been missing in middle school.
  • Terry's been prepping for gardening season. We have a bunch of little baby plants under lights waiting for the right time. Which, in Canada, is way past Mother's Day (normal planting time in PA).
  • I had a short work trip to Dushanbe, Tajikistan!  For three days! 

Tuesday, January 4, 2022

Happy birthday to me!

 ... a few days late.  This year was a pretty good one. It started with chocolate chip waffles and Alex' card. The card included a secret code I had to crack to find the batches of cookies she made just for me.

 

  We tried to make maple syrup taffy, which failed miserably. We watched a movie together, Terry made my five hour duck (delicious as always, and the source of a year's worth of duck fat), and after dinner we had a brief jaunt to Confederation Park to check out the light displays and do a little sledding. 

The kids' s'mores cake was fantastic, although the marshmallow frosting melted into the cake a bit.  The kids gave me what I always ask for (but don't always get) - a whole day without fighting. I *may* have napped between 10-11pm but did get up in time to watch the fireworks on TV. We could see a tiny bit of the highest fireworks from the front steps but that wasn't reason enough to stand outside in the -20 chill.




Wednesday, November 24, 2021

Gratitude 21-24

 #21.  In a very generalistic, vague picture of reality, I'll explain that most of my days are spent trying to teach, coach and convince colleagues that disability rights is an important topic in foreign policy, and that physical and communications accessibility is worth the effort and possible inconvenience.  That often takes form as reviewing and editing speeches that senior diplomats will make to large crowds and to intimate gatherings.  I am grateful and even joyous every time I open a document to review and either the points I would have added are already in the original remarks, or that some other ally has already added them.  Over the last two years I have seen tangible progress and I am so grateful to be in this position, doing this work.

#22.  I am thankful that we were able to score the last, frozen, free range turkey from the butcher we frequent; local Thanksgiving was 6 weeks ago and Christmas turkeys aren't full size yet.

#23.  I am so grateful that Zoltan fits so well into his new school. He's thriving. And even more grateful he gets to stay.

#24. I am grateful to Terry for building me two bird feeders during the first COVID summer, one I can see from my desk and one in the back yard. It is such a delight to lift my eyes from the computer screen and watch the chickadees grab a bunch of seed and move through the pine tree bough, caching it (for the magpies later to steal. Circle of life.The feeder is too small for them to perch so that is also entertainment when they try.)

Saturday, November 13, 2021

Gratitude 10-13

 #10:  The kids. I am not at all the same person I was before they were born – mostly for the better. They challenge me and push my out of my comfort zone all the time and I am excited to meet the adults they become.  Relatedly, I am grateful that Alex has been mostly delightful for more than six months now; she was always precocious and maybe this is a sign her teenage angst came early?

#11:  Today I am grateful for the military men and women who have volunteered to serve and protect.
 
#12:  Buy Nothing groups. Your crap is my treasure; my crap is your treasure. Everyone is happy.
 
#13:  Today Terry finished up the 2 day sourdough bread I started yesterday (no accolades for me; sourdough has been his thing since the pandemic started and I have only begun to take over).  He also had started chicken stock from a few carcasses, some aromatic veggies, and water;  today it became chicken noodle soup.  I went to the farmers market to buy our fourth box of apples (slightly smaller than a bushel); it was turned into applesauce we snacked on this afternoon.  Zoltan made chocolate chip cookies.  I am so grateful for the interest and ability of my family to put together from-scratch delicious food.

Sunday, November 7, 2021

Gratitude 5-7

 So I guess this is how it's going to be this year.  Sigh.

Gratitude #5:  My health. Really. It’s a trope in my house that I don’t get sick except about one cold a year. I don’t take this for granted.

Gratitude #6:  My husband. Terry really is my perfect complement. 21 years! Soon our relationship will be older than he was when we met.

Gratitude #7:  Alberta healthcare. Three ER visits in our first year (thankfully none after that, although Terry did break his ankle). We paid a pittance for all that good care. I’ll take my “socialized medicine” any day thank you.

Tuesday, November 2, 2021

Halloween 2021

 Things felt relatively normal this year - fewer than half the kids wearing masks and a sense that kids weren't being kept at home due to COVID.  This was also the first year we let the kids go off alone (albeit together). We thought we had a good grasp of what the neighborhood would hold, trick or treat-wise. We bought candy like we still lived in NE Philly. I advised kids grasping at whole handfuls that they really needed to take only one so other kids could be sure to get some candy.

Oops!

We overbought by about 100.

Other interesting tidbits are the two different business cards we got from two very different businesses - one was handed out at a house and the other was actually taped to the treat. That was something new! And the candy the kids discussed not liking that we discovered were Baileys Irish Cream truffles.

Tuesday, August 24, 2021

And a-camping we go: Rampart Creek


Part of the mad scramble for campsites means taking what you can get in terms of dates, or in terms of campgrounds.  My second priority was to camp along the Icefields - there are so many cool hikes but they are too far to get to from home. So, for this week of vacation we spent 4 days at Two Jack, came home for a night of showering, laundry, and repacking the cooler, then set off for 5 days at Rampart Creek.

The two campsites could not have been more different from each other. Two Jack is thinly treed and the sites are very close to each other.  At Rampart each site is nestled among trees and there is plenty of space between them. Two Jack was so civilized - running water and flush toilets!  Rampart has one spigot of potable water at the junction of all three campsite loops. For similarities: both places were a million times warmer than any of last year's camping experiences (a full 1/4 of the clothing we brought we never used, lots of long johns and woolens), both had really bad smoke and fire bans in effect. And mosquitoes.  We ended up cutting the trip short by one day due to the smoke and running out of bug spray.

First hike: Wilcox Pass.  Supposedly beautiful views, and I can believe it.  We did spend a bit of time playing in a patch of snow we came across, and when Terry and I took a short detour to a flowing stream the kids watched a prairie dog scamper about.  There were pretty wildflowers all along the path and in the distance.

Second hike: Parker Ridge. Similarly probably beautiful, lovely wildflowers, similar extreme smoke.

Last hike: For the aforementioned reasons, we decided to cut the trip a bit short and head home. So on the fourth day we broke up the camp, packed the cars, and headed over to Wildfowl Lake where our last hike of the trip - Chephren Lake - would begin.  It was the family highlight, mostly because the kids have become allergic to elevation and this one was barely up from flat. We usually pace 20 minutes per km, and for this it was a solid 15.  The hike itself is mostly a flat walk in the woods - so meh in my book. But the lake itself is stunning.  And because the mountains rise right out of its waters, they are close enough to photograph and actually see something.  On our way down we ran into a group that was going up to swim in that water - again, Canadians made of sterner stuff than us.

Bear: There were signs up all over the campground alerting folks that there was a bear in the area.  According to the chalkboard by the water source, it had last been seen 5 days ago.  But apparently all the good berries are now ripe because between 9:30-10:30am each morning the folks camping in sites closer to the water than us has sightings. One day on our way back from a hike we passed a car with its hazards on, pulled not-quite-over enough on the shoulder a couple of km from the campsite and Terry noted there was a bear the car had pulled over to watch. I only saw a dark blur as we drove past.  It's probably the same bear.

Sunsets:  It was a lot like Goldilocks' lunch. The first night we waited too long to wander over toward the creek to get a sunset photo and the sun was already behind the mountain by the time we got there.  So our second night we went extra early, but got so bug bitten we had to give up before it got the real fiery reds.  Third night was just right, and Terry was able to capture some pretty pictures.



Sunday, August 22, 2021

And a-camping we go: Two Jack Lake

 

When we were watching and refreshing the Canada Parks web site like concert tickets were about to go on sale, our strategy was clear: we wanted to camp at Two Jack Lake.  We've driven past it a million times, wandered along its shores from the Day Use Area and even ice skated across it. As Terry was 6000-something in line, we did not get our first choice of dates, or second choice, but we got dates that we could make work and we were thrilled.

Well, smoke from the wildfires. And even though it's so dry there are the aforementioned wildfires, and a fire ban so we couldn't sit by the campfire at the end of the day, nobody told the mosquitoes.  We had very recently bought a screen tent for over the picnic table and that paid for itself during the course of the trip, even if we had paid three times the amount for it.  Poor Zoltan looks like he has chicken pox from the bites and that was with the mesh doing a very good job keeping the 'skeeters out.

Our plan for Two Jack involved canoeing and swimming.  Except we didn't end up swimming because we had pretty well cooled off by the time we waded into knee-high water.  Canadians are made of hardier stuff than us (one of Terry's colleagues had camped just a week or two before and had done quite a bit of swimming).  We did get out in the canoe quite a bit though, in all kinds of 1, 2 and 3 formations - the canoe does not fit all four of us anymore.  Alex will deny this until her adulthood at least, but she enjoyed her solo adventures.  She'd be grumpy and grumbling, paddle away, and return 45 minutes latter full of smiles.  But don't tell her, she "hated every minute of camping."

There was the loon that I swear was mocking us, letting us get almost close enough to see it through the glacial-clear water when it ducked under, but then zipping away before we actually got that close ... and popping up on the other side of the canoe + 50 meters.


 


Thursday, August 19, 2021

Camp Chief Hector Part II

 

Lunch included a surprisingly delicious bean and quinoa salad, which was good as the sandwich was salami and I hadn't alerted the camp to any food issues.  After lunch we trooped over to the climbing wall.  There were two "easier" sides and two harder sides.  The harder ones were legit - even Alex didn't get all the way up them.  I regret not fully trusting the belay and thus not climbing higher than I did.

By this point the kids were mutinying for down time, so we headed back to the tipi for reading and resting.  We had originally planned to participate in the pre-dinner all-hands water fight but when it came time to go, we were cool and comfortable in the tipi. 

Dinner was a full scale BBQ feast. Pork loin and grilled chicken, mashed potatoes, green salad and cauliflower salad.  We ate too much so I didn't feel up to joining the after dinner yoga session.  We were also in the midst of Master Labyrinth, which is played very, very differently from regular Labyrinth.  Alex absolutely swept the floor with the rest of us, showing once again why it is important to not have only one person reading the rules (She who reads the rules, wins. Unless others also read the rules).  After some digestion we had the kids teach us GaGa ball.  I now understand the name - every time I miss the ball I yell "Gah!"

There was a silly singalong the counselors led "around the campfire" (imagine an atrium with a fire pit at the bottom in front of the stage). Even the moody, jaded teenager was seen to laugh.

Not pushing our luck with the kids, we dropped them off at the tipi when we wandered back to the waterfront - we had wanted to try taking some photos with the real camera as opposed to our puny phones.  The haziness was way down - winds must have been blowing the smoke some other direction - and the view was lovely.  

On our walk back to the campsite, I was walking in front of Terry when he hissed for me to come back over to him.  I figured he saw a deer or something he wanted to show me, and I saw a dark shape move past through the trees alongside the path.  Yeah, it was a bear.  He said it was pretty small so he wasn't sure if there was a mama nearby and if we continued on we might get between them.  Of course, continuing on was the only way to get back to camp.  We waited and watched a few moments, then started backing away towards the trail.  We were basically at the corner of a wooden walkway that in wetter times crosses some kind of pond or lake but right now crosses a field.  As we started over the walkway, talking loudly about how "We're cool, mama bear, don't want anything to do with you and just going to head out now" a bear heads out into the field essentially parallel to us.  It was beautiful, Terry and I will forever argue about how big it was, and it is definitely just living its life, not concerned with us.  It was definitely the smart thing to do not to stop and take a photo (even though the camera was in Terry's hands!!) but we did regret it a tiny bit once we were out of range and no longer quietly freaking out.

We had seen two people in the frisbee golf area by the waterfront, so we went to the main lodge to tell the counselors about the bears.  Apparently other families had seen at least one of them in a similar area in the morning, so this is not a big deal.  To the Canadians.  For the rest of the trip whenever we went past the area where we saw them Terry and I would talk louder. We still haven't told the kids.

For our last day we headed back to the waterfront, this time to canoe by age-pairs - parents in one, kids in the other.  Terry turned out to be as motivated as Alex and I definitely did not rest as much as I had planned.  But it's OK because we saw the loon again, this time it was two adults and one baby, and they were farther away.  We went through a narrow area into a bay area where we watched what looked like a baby duck practice flying. It was barely above water, splashing all over the place, and going back and forth across a wide stretch.  Never seen anything like it!  Of course we failed to capture that on film as well.

After canoeing we headed toward the Adventure Challenge.  They did a great job with boards, tires, sticks, and imagination.  Our family was persisting in our last challenge after everyone else had left for lunch.

The last phase of camp was the high ropes course.  The first event was basically climbing to the top of a telephone pole that had a see-saw on top. People (kids) climbed up in pairs and were meant to stand on each side of the see-saw. If I remember correctly, there was only one pair that actually made it to the top with both standing. To get down, they lean back in the harness and trust their belayers to get them down.  This was nobody's favorite. The last event was like a vertical obstacle course.  I'm hopeful Terry posts a photo or video of this as I don't now how else to describe it. Alex was one of the few to make it to the top,  and she scrambled up it twice.

We have caught too many smiles on film to take seriously Alex's complaint that it was a horrible time and she never wants to do anything like it again. What can I say, 13's gonna 13.

Wednesday, August 18, 2021

Camp Chief Hector part I



Alex was supposed to go to overnight camp last summer.  She was supposed to go to overnight camp this summer.  COVID made a hash of all that.  However, the camp does have a "family weekend" that we decided to try.

We arrived Friday after dinner, were directed to the family's assigned tipi, got a bit unpacked and returned to the main lodge for a snack and trivia.  They are super strict and serious about NO FOOD IN THE TIPI and basically food should be either in your car or what the camp serves, eaten in or near the main lodge.  This is worth taking seriously; more on that later.

The trivia was mostly about Canada and although we would have gotten a D if it were for school, we were happy we didn't fail.  The main lodge has games, arts and crafts (appealing to the littler ones), bathrooms with flush toilets and a water refilling station.  Families are assigned their own tables, and the camp operated like a restaurant in that we wore masks as we moved about the room but took them off when hanging at the table.

We decided to take a walk in the evening and wandered over to the waterfront area where we would be canoeing the next day.  There's wildfires raging around Alberta and B.C. and pollution is very pretty.

The tipis are outfitted with five bunk beds and a fire pit in the middle.  We didn't understand that we needed to open the smoke flap at the top when building the fire so things got a bit smokey.  It was too hot to keep the fire going anyway - such a weird feeling to be in short sleeves at 10:30pm at a campsite in Alberta. 

Sleep came late - that massive fireball in the sky keeping things light until after 11pm - and was broken by the sounds of squirrels frolicking all around, inside and out.  I gladly jumped out of bed around 7:30am and got myself dressed and ready for breakfast, which doesn't start until 8am.

Pierogies for breakfast was unusual but worked. The kids gobbled down the blueberry pancakes. There was actually a whole raft of food but I forget what else we ate.  First activity: waterfront/canoeing.  We were first told there needed to be an adult in each boat, so Alex and I paired up, Zoltan and Terry in a different canoe.  Alex had goals and was not impressed with my performance. When we paddled over to the menfolk they were watching a loon and her baby, so we hung around and watched them too.  And listened to their unusual call.

But we had other plans so we soon headed back to the dock where we shed the lifevests and canoes and trekked over to the archery range.  They didn't get a lot of families who owned their own bows so were more impressed than they should have been at the family performance (except me. I haven't shot a bow since my camping days about a million years ago).  After a few rounds we tried our hands at the javelins.  They had atlatls too, which Alex was excited to see as she had done a report on Aztec weapons last year and had learned about them. We were not particularly skilled here; I am pretty sure it's the kind of thing one must practice to get right.


 

 

Friday, July 2, 2021

Fridge battles

Alex likes having a particular place in the fridge to put her things for the next day's lunch, so she can just grab the stuff, pack it up and go.  She put a little note at one small corner but the sanctity of the space was often violated. So she put up the fridge equivalent of an orange cone.



Tuesday, June 29, 2021

Vermillion, er, I mean Sylvan Lake

 Super heat wave in Alberta, so what outdoor adventure makes the most sense? Taking the canoe out, of course!  We had been by Vermillion Lakes once before and realized the only way to really experience its beauty is being on the water.

We plan to leave at 10am. I run an errand that has me home around 9:15am and Terry informs me he can't find the essential strap for ensuring the car holds the canoe securely.  We split up and continue searching.  Still no dice. I let my fingers do the walking and go online to see if a store nearby has it. The closest Canadian Tire does not but a different one across town has five in stock. We decide it's also time to get the kids life vests that fit (last year they were under 90lb, if only barely) so I grab Alex for trying them on if there are different sizes and we set off. To make a painful story shorter, there were zero of this strap in stock. How?  I dunno. It's still tender when I think about it. With Alex in the car I wasn't doing anything other than heading home and regrouping.

We decide on the next best thing - find a beach! Many of the lakes and rivers around here are glacial or otherwise deadly to try to swim in so we find one that's 1.5 hours away, and should be tolerable to immerse in.  We re-pack for swimming rather than canoeing, and off we go!

Ninety minutes later it's the worst, most crowded beach "strip" area and zero parking within the ZIP code. We can see the beach and it is wall-to-wall people there too.  It's also past lunch.  Grumpiness all around.  We drive past all that, find a place to pull over and figure out our options. There's a Provincial Park up the road with a campground! At the very least we can expect a day use area with picnic tables. Off we go!

After lunch we're all feeling a bit better. Checking the map, there is definitely water nearby - the only question is whether there is a way down to it. After a couple of fits and starts, heading the wrong direction and righting ourselves, we find the water!  There's no beach, the hill basically ends a couple of feet before the water begins, but there's a bit of dry space for our stuff and a few other groups of people along this "shoreline" to proclaim that this is a legitimate access point.

Unfortunate for our late start, we could only stay a couple of hours.  The water was pretty chilly despite being probably the warmest beach around - Zoltan kept getting blue lips and we had to make him get out and warm up.  But we splashed around, swam a bit, and looked for rocks in every color of the rainbow.  And although she'll deny ever saying this, even Alex had fun.


Monday, June 7, 2021

Back to Dinosaur


We enjoyed the fall trip to Dinosaur so much we decided we wanted to spend a night or two by the hoodoos. Through determination and perseverance normally only seen when scoring concert tickets, we were able to secure the very last campsite for the dates we wanted.

When Friday rolled around, the weather promised to be erratic. Chances of rain and thunderstorms. We were going to be using our new, amazing, enormous tent and have definitely not gotten down the "set tent up in 5 minutes flat" routine we worked our way towards last summer. So, we decided to postpone until Saturday morning.

Saturday promised to be a beautiful day, but first we had to get out the door!  Camp-car-packing Tetris plus grouchy teens and tweens who would have preferred a weekend on the couch meant tempers ran medium-high. But on the road we got, and after a relatively uneventful drive (although we did see a fox sauntering across a field, as well as many examples of future delicious Alberta steaks enjoying their best lives on pasture) made our way to the camp site.  We all went into default mode with the kids getting their tent up then inflating everyone's mattresses, pitching pillows and sleeping bags into the right places while Terry and I figured out the new tent. The hammer went back and forth as everyone worked to pound the stakes in.  By the time everything was up and staked it was lunch time!

After lunch the kids had the commandment to do some hiking then they can read, play, or whatever else. Alex took off like a rocket, Zoltan decided he'd rather stay with the adults. And exploring we went.  Our goals were to climb hoodoos, take pictures, and - for Terry and me - get enough steps for our different step challenge teams to not be embarrassments.  We each ended the day around 18,000 so I guess we succeeded.  We also played a heated game of animal, vegetable, mineral where each of us managed the stump the other two. Zoltan's mineral was molybdenum, which just goes to show you that there is real education to be found in childrens' literature. 

Over dinner the first night, we were discussing the major exciting features of the new tent and Alex mentioned the large entryway so I supplied the correct word "vestibule" but she didn't hear me correctly and though I said "vegetable" so now there is a "vegetable" half open to the world just outside the sleeping part of our tent.

The second day we were all sleep-deprived because camping is loud and light. We checked out a different section of hoodoos as well as the canoe launch in case we ever wanted to come back for a float.  We cooked hot dogs for lunch and with the value of hindsight cooked food was probably not the best idea for the hottest day ever (around 75 degrees Fahrenheit).  In the afternoon we could barely stay comfortable laying in the shade.  Then Terry had a brilliant idea: the concession stand. Dinosaur Park actually has a concession stand, cafe, and in non-COVID times a whole little museum.  

We wandered over and everyone got various ice creams but I got a Slushie. Totally refreshing!

Feeling much better we lazed about until dinner and s'mores time. Having noticed the night sky the night before, we set the alarm to get up around midnight and spent some time stargazing (at least, those of us who awoke did so).

We saw numerous mule deer - a couple coming close to our campsite. We saw a robin's nest relatively low in a tree, low enough I could see the robin sitting on the eggs - the little head poking just above the edge of the nest. We saw a parent bird make many trips in and out of a hole in the tree by our camp site and when we got close we could hear the "cheep" of baby birds. No prairie dogs, which we have consistently seen in the mountains and never in the prairie.  

 


Thursday, May 27, 2021

Cake for dinner

 One of the birthday coupons the kids got last year was dessert for dinner.  Zoltan used his on something relatively mundane. Alex, on the other hand, came up with this gem.

She and Zoltan each made cakes.  

 She made the chocolate and graham cracker cakes. Zoltan made a plain white cake.  He made chocolate chiffon frosting. She made marshmallow frosting. It consumed 2 containers of Fluff and still the "marshmallow" flavor got lost in "frosting" flavor. Next time it needs less butter and powdered sugar.

She stacked and frosted the layers.  She decorated the top and sides (Zoltan helped made some of the design decisions).

This thing is both amazing and terrifying. Our slices were about 1/16 each and it was too much. I was impressed how it all came together.  The graham cracker cake is the same recipe our chef friend had used when making Alex's birthday cake 3 years ago in Frankfurt and I doubted that Alex could pull off something as moist and flavorful. I was wrong.


* Note: Terry had nothing to do with these photos

Thursday, May 20, 2021

Raising children

 This is what it is like to raise children. 


The Scene: just after lunch, at Zoltan's room

Me:  Zoltan, go downstairs and put away the mac and cheese.

Zoltan: I didn't leave it out.

 Me: Then who did? Nobody else had any.

Zoltan: It's not out.