One year in.....

It's official. Today is one year since we landed in Canada. Time is a funny thing - on one hand it feels like we've been here for longer, on the other life back in Perth still seems close and familiar. As far as the kids are concerned though, I think Ottawa is pretty much their whole experience. The twins are now 21 months, so have spent more of their short lives here then in Australia and Miss 4 struggles to remember things from back home unless we are looking at photos, or things that we talk about all the time. She was even complaining about the heat when it was 27 and humid! This from the child who didn't complain about the cold all winter. I did warn her that Perth gets a lot hotter and if she keeps complaining when we're back in Perth we'll have to ship her back here ;) Anyway, onto what we've been up to the last few weeks.

As Spring gains momentum and the weather warms up, lots of schools and communities start having fairs and other events. We'd heard about a nursery school fundraising in an area called the Glebe, just south of the city, and thought we'd check that out. Of course the weather wasn't playing along (damp and overcast) forcing lots of activities inside which took some of the shine off the day. Luckily though, it was also the time for the annual Tulip festival which was close by, so went for a wander to check it out. Quite spectacular - just thousands of tulips in colour-coded displays. The reason behind it all is that during WWII, Princess Juliana of the Netherlands sheltered from the conflict in Canada. As a thank you after the war, she sent 100,000 tulip bulbs to Canada, and the Netherlands still sends Canada 10,000 every year. A beautiful disply of friendship between the 2 countries.

The following weekend was the Victoria Day long weekend. Saturday whizzed by with a lovely picnic lunch and play at a playground, followed by friends over for drinks and nibbles in the afternoon sunshine while 6 kids ran around in the backyard. Sunday we had more visitors for a morning coffee (and they brought delicious scones with them) before the weather turned wet again. (Note: there is an awful lot of Spring rain in these parts!) On the Monday, we went to the Aviation museum. Lots of good displays, a kids playroom, kids craft activities, the chance to sit in a couple of cockpits....it would have been all good except that the twins were in an 'escaping' mood. They became obsessed with running away into the lobby and toward the doors, which they thought was hilarious. Not so funny for poor mum and dad chasing and catching them. Of course then they didn't want to leave and come home. Twin 1 was so desperate to get out the gate when we got home, that she managed to push past me and face plant with an awful thud onto the pavers outside. Ouch! Blood and tears, but thankfully no serious damage.

Of course mid-week we had another near-miss injury. Miss 4 cracked her head on the corner of a table. There was blood, a big egg was coming up, but thankfully icing it made a world of difference. A bit harder and I think stitches would have been required. I spent the rest of the week waiting for Twin 2 to hurt herself - things do come in threes they say! That was a week and a half ago and so far so good......(touch wood!)

A wardroom dinner the next weekend sold out before we bought tickets, but as a number of hubby's work friends also missed out, we decided to have our own night out. It ended up being a great night; five couples at a riverside brewery, which had a good variety of pub food and a good variety of beers. The tasting plate of beer proved very popular I must say. A fun night. Another of hubby's colleagues came over on Saturday for a BBQ lunch. It's always nice to finally put a face to the name, and his boys did a great job playing with Miss 4 even thought they were older. In Ottawa, it was also a big weekend as it was race weekend, where there are a number of shorter fun runs, as well as a marathon. I had tried to enter a short run, but the spaces had all sold out weeks before. (I've made a note for next year.) The Ottawa marathon itself was running on Sunday, and our neighbourhood had the race run through at around the 36 km mark. A couple of locals organise a cheering station down at the local park, and it has won the best cheering station for the last 5 years and was keen to win again. (Seriously - I think it's called the best community spirit?) Anyway, we wandered down to the park on Sunday and couldn't believe a) how many people were running the marathon and b) how many people we knew who were at the park. Pretty much the whole neighbourhood turned out and it was a fantastic atmosphere. By the time we arrived, the elite runners were well and truly gone, but the crowd was still going mad for all the runners still passing. Pumping music, an announcer giving shout out to runners from the community, kids with noisemakers, people in costume - great fun. And the whole thing is right next to one of our local playgrounds so the little ones were happy. We'll go back next year for sure.

The weather over the last week has been a funny mix - warming up but also quite wet at times. Hubby and Miss 4 knew all about it on Wednesday when they went off to their weekly soccer league. The weather was overcast but fine and warm. About half an hour in, the skies opened and the field emptied. Of course by the time they had walked home, they were wet through to the skin. Miss 4 had never been that wet in the rain before and was not looking very impressed. Oh well, I thought it was funny! Nothing a towel down and a change of clothes didn't fix. It did take 2 full days for her sneakers to dry out though.

Friday was a warm sunny day and I thought it would be nice to take all the kids to the playground at the Governer-General's for a play and a picnic morning tea. I'm still trying to decide if it was worth the effort! The humidity meant that the twins little legs (in shorts for the first time) kept sticking to the slide. Miss 4 managed to graze her knee (as well complaining about the heat) so I ended up feeling cranky trying to keep everyone else happy! Thankfully I had planned a girls' trip to the movies last night which is always good to improve one's mood. We saw The Great Gatsby, ate Malteasers and popcorn and decided that the critics had been a little harsh. Today, rain threatened all day, but thankfully held off, as it was Miss 4's school fair. A great day. Everything was bought and sold on a ticket basis, so we started the day with $20 of tickets. Games (which all had prizes) were one ticket each, the bouncy castle was 2, food was mostly one ticket, there were horse and cart rides for 3 tickets. $20 provided lunch for us all, lots of entertainment (and some fairly silly prizes) for Miss 4 and some bake sale treats. Got to be happy with that!

A couple of things on the agenda for tomorrow; Miss 4 has an afternoon playdate and we're planning to go out for dinner. Next week will be exciting though - Miss 4 has her first dance recital! Now to convince her to let me put her hair into a bun....I'll let you know how it goes!