The second day of our family reunion was nothing but sun and blue skies, in stark contrast to the sopping mess we saw on day one. Conditions were nearly ideal for a trip to the park -- a few degrees warmer would have been welcome. Everyone had a good time playing on the playground and running up the toboggan hill at Prairie Winds park, but you had to run pretty hard to feel like getting wet much higher than your ankles in the wading pool (the water felt icy cold). Scotty has pretty short ankles, so he didn't venture out very far at all until the very end, when R showed him this cute little fountain.
Unfortunately, we didn't take very many pictures on this day; however, we think the ones that we did take turned out nicely.
Fall is here, and Calgary is aflame with bright-coloured leaves. We took Scott outside for some pictures on Wednesday afternoon because it was such a beautiful, sunny day. Just as I might have predicted, he really wanted to stick those leaves in his mouth.
When people meet our baby Scott for the first time, frequently they say that he looks "healthy". By this they mean that he's a bit on the chubby side. He's got full, rosy cheeks. He's also got dimples in his elbows and his knees, and plenty of rolls on his legs and arms. From what we can tell, he's pretty average for height and weight, so he's hardly a monster. I guess he's just healthy-looking.
If a slightly chubby baby is "healthy", what do you call a really chubby baby?
Today we decided to take a load to the dump. R's parents are moving out of their house in a few weeks so they were clearing out a bunch of junk. We had finished the bulk of our renovations, we were ready to toss out a pile of junk as well. It only took a little bit of time to load up the stuff from R's parents' place. Our place took a long time and filled the back part of the truck right to the ceiling. I had no idea we had so much junk. It was mostly stuff from tearing apart the old kitchenette and some scraps from building the new one. We also cleared all the detritus from the shed.
The dump (aka Spyhill Sanitary Landfill) charges $5 for any load under 250kg, which is a great deal. After that, they charge at the rate of $50 / tonne, which still isn't that bad. We thought that maybe we'd hit the $25 mark. No way. We came in at $48 (960 kg) -- just shy of a tonne. We just needed to find a couple bags of sand or something.
I took a few pictures of the chemical disposal area, but I missed the sign on the road that said "no littering" right near the dumping point. I couldn't tell if they were just trying to be funny.
Here's a gang of cast-off fridges, looking to make trouble.
With the work winding down, we had R's family over for a BBQ dinner. We roasted hot dogs and marshmallows over the fire. It was nice to sit and enjoy the house instead of simply being a slave thereto.
While our little niece climbed up in a tree, her little brother decided to play with the tools. Perhaps he will share his father's knack for renovations, but who knows if he'll be half as agile. You see, my brother-in-law Luke twice climbed into impossible spaces for the sake of successful plumbing. Once, when we'd already framed, drywalled and painted the kitchenette, he climbed through a tiny gap in the wall to get at a pipe that was leaking. He was INSIDE the wall, hugging the pipe, for at least a half hour while he worked. Another time, he was behind the stacking laundry machines when we put them into the new laundry room/ broom closet. It was so confined in there that he had to climb up on top of the machines to wriggle out the gap between the top of the dryer and the door jamb. Anyways, it looks like his kids are ready to climb things and work with tools.
While my other brother-in-law (Mr. M) was working on fixing the cable jack in the basement, Scott decided to help out by softening up this section of cable. After the BBQ, the family stuck around to help with some of the last details around the house. It was wonderful to see the project coming to a conclusion and things getting cleaned up.
Here's a banner to replace the one that's been on there for a month.
Last Friday I took about 70 pictures. The top ten or so are included here. Most of the day was spent on Parliament Hill, followed by an evening trip to Mooney's Bay (just down the street from our house). Because it was our neice's 3rd birthday, we finished off the day with a bit of blueberry crumble. From the pictures, the day would seem idyllic; however, we'd filled the agenda with too much scenery and not enough activity. As a result, our guests spent much of the time entertaining their young daughter, who was not particularly enthralled with neo-gothic limestone architecture. We learned some valuable lessons about planning family expeditions that day.
We started out with something new that we'd never tried before: The Changing of the Guard. It takes place each morning during the summer months, and includes a military procession along 4 or 5 blocks of downtown Ottawa to the front lawn on Parliament Hill. We set up position on Elgin Street, near the National War Memorial to wait for the procession to go by. During the summer, the Ceremonial Guard also maintains two sentries at the memorial, which provided for some good photographs.
I was surprised at the size of the contingent of uniformed guards that came marching up the street past us. I did not expect to see three divisions plus a full marching band. It was quite impressive, and we had a wonderful view.
We followed them up to the Hill, where a large crowd had already gathered to watch. From then on, our view was more obstructed, and much further away.
Once on the lawns, the guards went through a lengthy series of formations and inspections. Although it was a novel sight, there was very little movement compared to the marching, and the interest level in our group (at all age levels) began to wane. We'd already gotten our tickets for the Parliamentary tour, but those didn't start for another hour, so we had to wait. If I had it to do over again, I would get the tour tickets for 10:30, which is when the ceremony is just wrapping up. That way, you can go directly from one event to the other.
Eventually, we did make it into the Parliament Buildings for the tour. Scott was fairly happy to be there, until we got into the Senate Chamber. Then he started screaming bloody murder and I missed most of the action that followed. The ride up the elevator to the top of the Peace Tower was the big climax, but little Alli was too scared of the height to spend much time looking out the windows. It was a busy day on the hill with a lot of tourists, so everything was a little slower.
TIP: If the only tickets you can get for a Parliamentary Tour are an hour or more away, you can spend your time going up the Peace Tower beforehand. Most people wait until the end of their tour, but you can go up any time.
A long morning filled with soldiers and tours deserves a treat. We made our traditional stop in the Byward Market for a Beaver Tail, a fried dough pastry that has become a bit of a local delicacy. Apparently, The Market can claim status as Canada's oldest continuously-operating farmer's market. It's located in the oldest part of Ottawa, which was called Bytown until becoming the capital in 1857. The Beaver Tails are more of a gimmick than a historic food, but they are still kind of fun. While the girls played it safe with the cinnamon-sugar-lemon-juice variety, Luke and I went big with these monsters, loaded with chocolate, peanut butter, cream cheese and other nutritious substances.
Following a bit of recovery time (you need it after all that cream cheese), we took the group out to the beach at Mooney's Bay. Finally, we found something that appealed to the young mind. With the sun dropping low in the sky, there were plenty of opportunities for prime photographs while Alli enjoyed playing in the sand and her younger brother enjoyed eating the sand.
Scott didn't eat any sand on this day, being quite content to simply relax in his trademark camouflage boonie hat with his lovely mother.
I think I took 30 photographs like this one. I loved the effect as the shimmering sunlight turned figures into silouettes.
We staged this memorable moment, which I have preserved as a banner.
No birthday is complete without candles and some kind of cake or pie. We loaded the blueberry crumble with ice cream and strawberries (it seems we had strawberries at every meal), but the birthday girl opted to eat the toppings and leave most of the crumble. Hey, it's her party.
R's sister J arrived last night with her son, while her husband (L) is scheduled to arrive late this evening with their daughter (I will be employing my secret parking strategy to pick them up). Now the birthday week is in full swing and we will do our best to show them everything the Ottawa area has to offer in the few days they are here.
We got off to a bit of rocky start this afternoon, as we delved into unfamiliar territory in rainy conditions. We decided to save Parliament Hill for another day, and went out to see the Supreme Court building and the Currency Museum -- tourist destinations that we'd never visited before. The two were opposite extremes of the guide spectrum. They under-guided us at the courthouse, and they over-guided us at the Currency Museum.
Although the Supreme Court is a hulking mass of a building, the tour covers only two rooms: the lobby and the courtroom itself. Our law-student tour guide had us sit on benches in the back of the surprisingly small (but elegant) courtroom while he explained the workings of the court. It took him about 10 minutes, maybe 15. It took us almost that long just to get the monstrous double stroller and carseats through the security scanner.
The lobby was impressively large, rising the full height of the front of the building. We were in the lobby only briefly, because the guide offered to let us out through the back door (actually a garage door), as a way to avoid taking our caravan back down the steep stone stairs in front of the building. As it turns out, we got an exclusive look at the Supreme Garage, which opens up into the parking lot. Very few people get to see this part of the building.
The view from behind the Supreme Court building is spectacular, and usually is part of any driving tour that we conduct for visitors to Ottawa. You can pull your car right up to an observation point that looks out over the Ottawa River, and provides a striking view of the Library of Parliament -- our favourite piece of local architecture. Any visitor to the Supreme Court should not miss the view.
Since our visit took less than 30 minutes, we still had time to catch the last English tour of the day at the Currency Museum, located just across the street from the Supreme Court, in the bottom of the Bank of Canada building. The museum is quite small, composed of only 7 small gallery rooms, but the tour took most of an hour -- and we only visited 3 of the rooms! The guide was so enthusiastic about his subject material, he kept us at the front desk for the first 15 minutes before we even saw a display. He knew his stuff, but he was one long-winded dude. Once he set us free, I found these tokens from Calgary and Ottawa in one of the displays. One gets you bread, the other gets you beer. I thought they were amusing.
After the lengthy lectures about using beaver pelts and compressed tea leaves as currency, we were pretty worn out, but J managed to find this sweet interactive display about counterfeit bills. She spotted the phony $20 bill, but she totally missed the mark on the $100. Better luck next time!
The consensus of the group was this: -The Supreme Court is worth visiting, especially since it's a quick, free tour of a large and elegant building on a scenic spot. -The Currency Museum is also free.
It's Canada Day here in the capital! Despite the occasional rain, this has been a great holiday weekend. My parents flew into town on Friday night, and we took them out to see the RCMP Musical ride on Saturday night. After warming up the crowds with the light-hearted floor show, they brought out the main event: 32 riders clad in red serge performing on beautiful black horses for about 45 minutes in great precision. The performance ends with the lowering of the flag exactly at sunset while the crowd sings "O Canada". It is a great show.
That same night (Saturday), there was a Canada-Day themed YSA dance at the church which I had been involved in planning. People came in from as far as Toronto and Quebec City (each 5 hours away). My cut-out of the Parliament Centre Block turned out quite nicely as a main element of the decorations. I used up all 11 of the ceiling panels left over from a basement renovation that we did four years ago. The dance was a great success, and I think my model was the most significant factor.
My parents came into town not just for the dances and dancing horses. They were here also because today was the big day when Scott was brought before the congregation at church and officially given a name and a father's blessing. This was my first time, and it was a wonderful experience full of emotion. I also got really warm. I asked my mom if she was feeling the heat, but she said it was just me.
After the service, we got a picture with the Dustan family, in honour of whom Scott received his middle name.
