The Cabin

I found this post that I clearly typed up last summer while out at the cabin.  Not sure why I never hit "post" as I think this sums up the love I have for the cabin pretty nicely!



It's easy to see why I might declare our cabin as the greatest thing ever. The cabin is just outside of Windermere, British Columbia. My parents bought it two weeks after our oldest son was born. From the first weekend we came out here we were smitten. The cabin, occasionally referred to as "Owen's Cabin" or "SUMP", is tucked up inside a little community where there are no fences between yards and deer and the odd bear roam through our yards. It is surrounded by trees and has just enough lawn out front that the kids can run and play.

In the winter time we enjoy huge dumps of snow which facilitate lots of tobogganing, snow man making, skating, and hot chocolate drinking. In the summer we have access to the lake and the little marina in the community. We have two kayaks which are used a lot when we and our guests are out here. Of course the big hit with the kids is the beach. They spend hours building sandcastles and smashing them down, digging trenches to fill, splashing in the shallow water, and just generally running up and down.

The last two summers I have spent easily three to four weeks out here enjoying the calm and tranquility.....ok the noise and racing around on bikes is more realistic! But regardless of calm or chaos its lovely getting out here and away from the city. We all have more time to go for walks around the block and sit and watch the squirrels in the yard.

Last night, while we were sitting on the steps of the back deck, Owen looked up and noticed a squirrel running up the post of the bird house. We all had a bit of a chuckle when she ducked inside of one of the holes. The next thing we know she is popping back out with something in her mouth and scrambling down the post and heading for the woods behind the cabin. Not knowing what it was, Uncle L climbed up a ladder to see what was in there. He could hear scratching noises coming from the birdhouse but couldn't see inside. Right then Mama Squirrel came running back and scurried up the post again. This time we were standing a lot closer and could clearly see that she was picking up her babies and transporting them to a new nest.  We backed off so she could carry on without feeling threatened.  It was such a neat experience that I will never forget.  And to think my dad was going to knock that bird house down just a few weeks earlier because it was never being used!

It's way to easy to forget to notice the simple things in life that bring us great pleasure.  And sometimes it is the simplest things that can make us smile.  Like my new dish cloths.  Yep.  That's all it takes to make me smile today.  Not only are the super soft (big difference from my old crusty cloths!) but they are also bright blue.  Really bright.  Somehow they have turned in to a reminder for me to take notice of all the great things I have in my life.  I'm sure it will start to wear off the older they get and the less "shiny" they are however for now these are the things they have made me think of lately:

- the wonderful dappled sunshine in the backyard in the afternoon.  The branches from the neighbours tree are high above our yard and create a wonderful high canopy that provides us with shade and a sense of privacy and seclusion in our backyard.

- Lilacs in bloom.  I snip purple ones from my neighbours bush and white ones from ours and bring them in the house to enjoy all of their sweet, heady wonderful smell.

- Little boys on bikes.  Its so much fun watching them fly down the back alley and getting short of breath and knowing that it won't be long before we can go on family bike rides.  Yeah!

- Our new bed spread.  It's very chic and clean and looks great.  Love it!  And can't wait to decorate some more around it.

Dirty, Dirty!

For the last month we have spent much of our time getting our house ready to be listed. It has been a crazy month of painting, fixing, finishing touches, clearing out and just generally being busy around the house. One of the things that did take a back seat to all of our busyness was cleaning. Sad, I know, but somehow it seemed more important that the tile was grouted, the flower beds edged, and the lights be replaced. So needless to say there was a little more dirt and a lot more dog hair in corners and under beds.

The clean-up started in earnest on Friday when Scott came home with......wait for it.....wait for it.....a DYSON!!!! It was nearly an all out fight who was going to use it first, we were both so excited. Our previous vacuum has suffered along with a very annoying, high pitched scream for the past, oh, seven years! And it didn't do much in terms of picking up the dirt.

Scott won out in trying it first but he did satisfy me with a glimpse of the very full canister when he finished the first one square meter of carpet in the basement. Dirt, sand, dog hair and I'm sure some other nasty things were all swirling around in its see through canister. It's a lovely, lovely machine that vacuums carpet, hard floors, and even has a great dusting attachment (no more do I have an excuse for why my shutters are so filthy!). I think we would've slept with it in our room if that wasn't super weird.

So that's it......my latest "Greatest Thing Ever" is a vacuum cleaner. And I don't care if it is weird that I love it that much. It may even get a name one day.

Technology

We just introduced two new pieces of techno gear into our house and so far I am loving it! And so are Scott and the boys.

AppleTV and Netflix. They are just plain cool. I am loving getting to watch podcasts and flicking on a TV episode and watching it quickly. The little boys are finding new shows that aren't typically on TreeHouse or CBC Kids. Scott is, of course, loving the movies and we are beginning to explore the long list of documentaries.

Could this be the end of cable in our house? There is a very real possibility that it is!

Grassi Lakes

I needed something to restart my venture into blogging and what better day than Father's Day. Celebrating a wonderful father and husband!

We decided that a hike in the mountains would be a great trip for the whole family - dog included. I was picking the hike and right up until Friday afternoon I had no idea where we would be going. We haven't taken the kids on too many hikes at this point but we do know that they always take much longer than the hiking guides tell us! Before I had a chance to seriously panic about where we would be going, a girlfriend of mine, who had stopped in for an impromptu afternoon visit, suggested a quick little hike above Canmore. I ran with it and on Saturday afternoon we headed off to Canmore to hike the Grassi Lakes trail.

I had managed to do a quick bit of research before going so I knew that there were two routes. An easy route and a more difficult route. The more difficult route apparently had the better views so we decided to tackle that one. It was not an overly difficult route - the most difficult section had a somewhat steep set of rock stairs. Both boys navigated the stairs "all by my self" just fine (with a little hand holding at the really tricky parts). And lets just say that the difficult route certainly gave us spectacular views!

Owen and his Dada

In Front of The Falls

At the top of the trail there are two crystal clear little lakes and loads of rock climbers on the rock face behind it. There were also places to sit and just enjoy the view and being in the mountains....which we may have enjoyed longer had it not been for the hovering grey clouds and occasional drops of rain. We opted to take the easy route down as we were hoping to avoid getting totally drenched! The easy route didn't have the spectacular views but we also didn't have to worry about a kid falling off of a cliff :)

We deemed this as a gem of a little hike - amazing views, not too challenging for little legs, and a few great benches along the way.

The start of ...an era? or maybe just a blog!

Welcome to my blog! To everyone who has come to visit I am very excited to be starting this blog and am excited you are taking a minute to read it.

Mostly you will find me blogging about some of my favorite things. From new kids toys to cool websites I have come across all the way down to what lives in my diaper bag and recipes I love and want to share. I might add a few pieces of advice or just let you know about interesting pieces of information I have come across. I suppose it will be rather true to what a blog is about - simply putting thoughts on paper (or the Internet I suppose!).

I will update this once every few days or as the inspiration comes. If you want to be notified when I update I am sure there is a link for that....check somewhere on site and let me know if you find it!

And off to my first post!