A Fish Tale

I can't remember if I posted about Sebastian catching his first fish or if I just thought about so hard I think I did it. Does that ever happen to anyone else? Often I have to ask Paul if I spoke to him about something I intended to share with him or if I just got to the thinking about part and stalled out.

Okay, swung a little off topic there. A while ago SeaBass and Paul went fishing and SeaBass (hehe) caught his first fish. He decided he likes catching them but is not so interested in eating them. So they decided they would go back out and catch release.

Q decided he would like to try fishing as well. (PJ and I stayed home for some girlie time, we painted our nails and did a princess puzzle together)

Below is Q with a nice sized first fish and huge smile on his face. He was totally jazzed when he came home. Paul said they had a blast.



SeaBass caught a couple as well. I think Paul caught one too, the kids were sure to let me know that they caught larger fish than their Daddy.



A Little Rant:

In BC there is a lot of government talk about the recession and the cuts that need to be made to keep the deficit from getting out of control before we start having the same problems that the US is having. We are experiencing a recession here, but not as bad as the US at this point in time.

The government feels that one of the solutions is to make cuts (surprise). It seems to be a government consensus that the school system would be a great place for cuts. Let me give you a bit of background.

There are less people in Canada than there are in the state of CA. BC is a whole lot of land, with not a huge population, which means there a whole lot of rural communities. Many of these rural have small schools so that the children don't need to bus in from far away to get an education.

The plan the BC government is coming up with means closing many of these rural community schools and having many of these children bus as for as one hour to school. Can you imagine your child spending two hours of his or her day on a bus and then getting home and trying to get homework done, or play a sport? How about getting your eight year old out of bed an hour earlier to get then to school on time? How about the danger of busing children long distances on snow covered winter roads? How about the cost of busing these children and maintaining the winter roads to get them to school safely?

Here's my beef: BC is hosting the 2010 winter Olympics in Vancouver. Wonderful for press and tourism and general exposure for all the wonderful things BC has to offer. Our government has spent millions and millions of dollars to build housing for the Olympic athletes, millions on large venues for the athletes to compete, millions on law enforcement, security, advertising and so much more that comes along with hosting an event of this magnitude.

What I want to know: I don't understand a government that can justify spending millions and millions of dollars on hosting a world event when they cant take care of their youth.

It makes me angry as a tax payer, why don't I get to choose how I want my tax dollar spent? Isn't it more important to invest in our children and future of this and any country than it is on the Olympics?

Okay rant over.

Merry Chirstmas

I think everyone out there knows that Paul has been wanting a bike for a very long time. He rode one when I first met him, I think he sold it sometime while he was in Chiropractic school, or maybe just after retuning home when he finished school.

We have talked many times about him getting one again. I told him he can get one when he finds one three car seats fit on.

Well, the kids are a bit older now and our work schedules play out in such a way that I drive them to school most of the time. We have a parking problem at the office and a bike would really help with that.



I have been watching bike prices drop since the recession and you can get a used Harley for a great a deal in the Great White North (and in the US I would imagine) I told Paul I thought he should keep an eye out and if he saw a good a deal on a bike he wanted he should buy it. (I gave him a $$ amount he had to stay with in budget)

Low and behold they had his dream bike right here at the local Harley dealership, used and his budget. He went down to give it a test drive and even had a cashiers check in his pocket to buy the bike if he liked it.

He test drove the bike and liked it so much he freaked out a bit and walked out of the store with the check still in his pocket. He even called me later to tell me he needed to call the store and apologize to the salesman for running away in a panic.

Paul is not so good at buying things for himself.



So I got off work that day and picked the kids up at school and dropped by the house to feed the kids a quick snack and grabbed the cashiers check off the dresser. The kids and I went back up to the Harley shop and found the salesman that Paul ran away from. I explained why Paul ran away and he laughed.

I called Paul and asked if he really wanted this bike or if he wanted to keep looking around. When I got his answer I said good bye and when I got of the phone I bought Paul his first Harley for Christmas, and his birthday, and our anniversary...for the next ten years.

I wish the light were a bit better in the pictures above, but she is gorgeous. Paul of course is so excited it took about a week before it really sunk in.

It feels so good to be getting a head start on my Christmas list.

Hockey Mom

No pictures today, I need to download some and my camera is at home and I am at work. I have at least three blog posts in my camera right now.

We are all doing well around here. I am trying to get into the rhythm of a new schedule and I think I might have things under control next week.

The kids are playing hockey again, the season started up about two weeks ago. This time they are playing in a minor hockey program and the kids are in 3 divisions that are divided up according to year of birth. Each division has 2 ice times a week and each year of birth gets it's own ice time.

You've done the math haven't you? Yup that adds up to six ice times a week for this family. (That does not include Paul who has two ice times a week as well, but I don't need to be there to lace up his skates quite yet)

The kids are having a great time, they seem to be enjoying this program even more than Peter Puck. Peter Puck is a great program but the kids are pretty comfortable on their skates and wanted more puck time and more game time not just practices and drills.

All three kids are hoot to watch, PJ is playing on an all girls team. It is a bit more of an age group blend. Some of the girls want to play on boys teams and some don't. There are not enough girls to put together an all girls team in each age group, so PJ's team has 6, 7, and 8 year old girls on it. They all grin from ear to ear while they play.

In SeaBass's division they divided all the kids up into three groups and have spent at least two weeks just having the kids skate and play games on the ice, like freeze tag and some drills to evaluate skills. They rate each kid on different skills on a scale of 1-5. Then they divide up the teams as evenly as they can so no team dominates the season. They are using the this week to have the teams play thier first games and decide if the teams are even. If there are teams that are to week or to strong they may juggle a few players to balance things out. Very cool.

At Q's level they are teaching more skating and puck handling skills. They teach alot by playing games, having the kids pull one another across the ice and playing a game called star wars where they have to try not to have pucks touch them, freeze tag and so much more.

So far it is stacking up to be a good program for all of them. I have the crock pot out and often have cooked breakfast, lunch and dinner by 8:00 in the morning. If anyone has a good crock pot recipe send me an email. I can only eat so much roast.

Paul has been helping out, he takes SeaBass to the early weekend games (sometimes he plays at 7:00 am) oddly enough SeaBass says the early games are his favorites.

There is an up side to sitting an arena freezing your buns off 4-6 times a week. That's a whole lot of knitting time. I actually get more sitting time than I ever have in a week, but the house is a mess. How does it get so messy when we are not even home to mess it up? It's a mystery

Finally

The kids tell me one of their favorite things about from Dad and Corrine is story time with Corinne. They are captivated books, which I think is very cool.



My pictures are a bit out of order here, this one should be somewhere further down. Some how I thought I had pictures posted that I did not and then when I posted one another disappeared. I think my computer is doing what I tell it to do not what I want it to do.



I think I have been trying for post for about a week now. Every time I fire up my computer either I get sucked into reading everyone's wonderful blog posts or I have technical difficulty, or someone tells me I have a patient waiting, or a kid needs help with homework. I think you get the idea, the blogger gods are not with me.

I took these pictures when Dad and Corinne were here for a visit, Dad came out for a dirt bike ride with us, we had a great time. My pictures are bit out of order so clearly that's one of Paul not Dad. I love the dirt bike shadow in the picture below, I don't know why.



Here's Dad on the quad. He only took for a short spin by himself. It was so funny when we started out I asked him if he wanted me to drive it or if he wanted to, he said he wanted me to drive first. So he gets on the quad in the seat in the back and as I am climbing on the front to give him a ride he said, "This is just weird." I laughed.

I started up the quad and put it into gear and dad leaned forward and and yelled through the helmet, "Kelly, if you kill me I'll haunt you forever." I laughed so hard. We did a little ride up to this small lake and a look around.



The water was the lowest we have ever seen it, there is usually an island in the middle of the lake and we could walk right out onto the island without ever getting our feet wet. The kids had a blast chasing little frogs all over the place.

Dad said he spent the first half of his time on the quad holding on for dear life and then about halfway through he realized there was a seven year old on a little quad in front of us leading the way and he began to relax and really enjoy himself. I am glad he decided to come out with us.

When we go out dirt biking for us is about having a great time and day out with family, we are not out there trying to go as fast as we can racing one another. (If I can keep the boys from racing one another as they get older and more competitive I will be doing well)

(My post seemed to jump all over this time, it took three sittings for me to write it, so it might be a bit confusing)