valley to sea to sky

last week on a sunny wednesday i drove up the newly improved sea to sky highway to squamish to have our subaru's suspension serviced and also to do some biking.


it was a beautiful day and i pedaled from the shop through the woods and out to alice lake, up a hill and down a trail called "hidden squirrel, flying monkey"; it sent this monkey flying more than once.
it was so fun i went back and did a second loop down "midlife crisis", impervious to the irony as i am only 32... even though the purpose of the trip was to work on my sports car.

i made it home in time to go for a walk with kylie, ty and niko at sunset. kylie used to fret about me being on the highway all day, but not anymore now that lowell has introduced our family to mobile me. kylie can just press a few buttons on her phone and locate me on google maps at any time.

the next day i was wondering where kylie was in the process of picking up her dad, so i checked. here she is parked in the handicapped spot right in front of the airport doors. crazy eh?

we are catching up in our lives, but still way behind in our posting. i know that the citizens have been agitating for pictures of our new house, but that is still a ways off. we are not done renos yet and we still have yet to chronicle kylie's dad's visit. however our bedroom is mostly together, so i will put up a picture of that to get the ball rolling.

november sunshine

there is sunshine in chilliwack and we are finally feeling settled and a bit more peaceful in our new place. currently we have no kitchen sink and our backsplash and fireplace are ugly, but otherwise our house is fully functional. niko has been getting gypped in his walks recently so yesterday kylie and ty and i had a picnic on a beach by the fraser.
there were lots of dead salmon scattered about, but niko didnt roll in ANY of them. good boy.

this morning after my night shift i took niko mountain biking for the first time in months. replacing biking, my recent hobbies have included renovating, unpacking boxes and yardcare.

today was a gorgeously sunny day and the moist earth and newly fallen leaves made for great (albeit slightly unpredictable) riding.

on the way home i had a bizarre craving for mcdonalds fries and stopped in (covered in mud) just after school let out. it was an interesting cultural experience, akin to spying on a junior high cafeteria i suppose, but feeling like i was in a different country observing a foreign people (none of THEM were covered in mud).

finally, watching the sun set on the valley from our new deck was spectacular. we are really digging this new house, and the view from our kitchen and living room is one of the best parts.

Craziness

It has been a bit insane around here lately between moving, renovations and cursing every piece of technology that has been installed or purchased for this house. (This includes 3 iphones, Bell Cable, Shaw Cable, a landline, a lawn mower, 2 computer chargers and a mastercard machine.) **No we didn't purchase a mastercard machine, mine just rendered one absolutely useless. After a week of having TV, phones and computers stop working on us, I told the clerk that it was me and I should probably not touch anything else in the store - especially since it was a phone store!!)

There is currently an oven, sink and gas range on our porch. (If you are my facebook friend you already know that!) We will hopefully done major renos to our new house next week and I will post some pictures. We are loving our new place and are enjoying settling in. In between the craziness my mom came for a visit and we headed back to Lethbridge while Marc went to Alaska. (I apologize to those of you I did not see in Lethbridge, I kept this to a family only visit.) :)

Grandma feeding Ty in our new kitchen

Mr. Blue Eyes

We still have to go for walks (poor us) because of Niko Bear. The weather was beautiful when my mom was here.

My mom and I headed to Lethbridge. Here we are waiting at the Abbotsford airport. Ty wanted to share my apple.
We spent Thanksgiving with my family and Raquel's family. Here is my lovely niece Maria.

And my papa.
Julie, Lowell and I got out for a walk one day and went to Broxburn Restaurant to celebrate Julie's birthday. Afterwards we picked strawberries and posed Ty in the pumpkin patch.


Here's to less craziness and more posting this coming month. Happy Halloween everyone!

great white north

last week fraser, arie and myself met up in whitehorse, rented a sweet RV and drove up over the pass and down to the coast. ostensibly we were fishing for coho salmon on the rivers of haines, alaska, but really we were just hanging around outside watching the eagles and the bears.

chilkoot lake, where we camped for the majority of our trip.

it's a good thing that the fishing was more of an excuse than a reason, b/c the coho declined to show up this year, or at least not in numbers that made them easy to yank out of the water. there were a few fish in the river, as the bears can attest.

grizzlies came down to the river every day to fish for salmon. we were privileged to watch a mamma bear fishing while her cubs gambolled on the river's edge. she did a bit of teaching, but mostly the cubs played while she trolled the river.

there's mamma on the right, with one of the cubs sitting on a stump on the left bank.

here is arie and i fishing the chilkoot river just downstream from the bears. i neglected to take a picture of the bald eagles, but they were continually swooping up and down the valley fishing and irritating the resident gulls.

arie got fed up with not catching anything and tried the bear's method to no avail.


after striking out on the chilkoot, we drove to the other side of haines and tried our luck on the wide and shallow chilkat. nothing there either, but the views were great.

after returning across the mountains and camping illicitly in kluane national park we dropped arie off at the airport and proceeded to lake laberge, where we didnt fish at all.

finally fraser and i returned to whitehorse to prowl the antique shops, visit some of his old friends and explore the nearby canyon.

so, no fish, but still a great fishing trip... as fraser and arie kept repeating, "a bad day fishing is still better than a good day at work!" amen.

Bathroom Reno

Marc and I just took possession of a new house. We CANNOT wait to do our bathroom like this!!

My Summer Vacation by Tyrn James

This is Ty weighing in for the first time on mom and dad's blog. It is almost my six month birthday and mom has spent the past six months teaching me to read and write. Here is my debut essay, fitting for the first week of school . . . I cannot believe that my first summer has already gone by. It was a busy one! Mom and Dad took me many places - Idaho, Yellowstone and now Lethbridge and Edmonton. I saw lots of my favourite relatives this vacation. **

Like Grandma!

And Grandpa!


And Nana and Grandpa.

And Auntie Julie.
I love men with beards. They make me giggle. Uncle Brad's beard gave me a laughing fit, so did cousin Nevin's!


I met my namesake Tyrn. He saw in me the potential to become a drum superstar and gave me my first drum lesson. First lesson: How to suck the sticks.


I also met Ty's mom - Grandma Deb. She LOVES me! What's not to love though!
This vacation involved many firsts for me . . .

I tried rice cereal for the first time.

Had my inaugaural trip to Jasper.
Saw mommy and daddy's old house.

Visited LOTS of people. Mom and Dad know too many people. I obliged them and was very cooperative and acted cute and cooed for them all.

Mom and Dad played Outburst with their friend. Take a look at this card, it made them all laugh. I don't really get it - Who the heck is Warren Beatty?

Oh I almost forgot! In the middle of our family vacation we had family pictures with the big G's! (That is how I refer to daddy's side of the family.) It was rainy and cold - 6 freakin' degrees! (Oh sorry, mommy doesn't like it when I talk like that) I was freezing but I cooperated to the best of my ability - I am only six months you know!
You can look at Auntie Julie and Uncle Lowell's blog if you want to see more pictures.

The next few months will be busy for mom and dad - they are moving into a new house!! I refuse to pack any boxes but I might help them out by learning how to crawl and mess up some cupboards for them!

**I have become THAT mother!!! The one who narrates for my children and makes it sound so cheesy. No more I vow, no more! This will be my one and only Ty narration. ;)