A few last days in White Rock included a couple parties at our place. The boys came up with some game ideas for the kids, including taste-challenges with various Pringles chips, Jelly-Bellies and Ben&Jerry Ice cream flavours. It was fun times.
After the parties, it was mostly a lot of hanging out, packing and getting in last dentist appointments. Jeff and I went to Whistler for my birthday weekend, (unfortunately I lost all my photos when my phone decided to crash before I backed them up), so we got in a few nice hikes.
We took a Saturday to check out Terra Nova park, in Richmond, after a baby shower for old Dalhousie friends. The boys liked the zip-line the best (though Jeff and I got a work out pushing them on it!).
Finally, the big day came. September 1st was our moving day, so my Mom picked up the boys in the morning and we all said 'Goodbye' to that chapter of our lives, the last 5 years that were spent at 13805 Blackburn Ave, White Rock, BC. (Simon was too grumpy to join us in the picture).
We moved into a townhouse in an area called Princess Park, and luckily there is actually a park with trails and a playground just down the street.
We had a week before school started, and we even managed to get some White Rock friends to visit us for a hike - we met up with the Sherwins in Deep Cove for the Quarry Rock hike. Simon was super happy that the shaved-ice store was still open for business at the end of the hike.
We caught the last night of the Night-Market/Food Truck Fest at the Shipyards in North Van, where we got Malaysian food, fish&chips, and mini donuts. We can't say we were big fans of the band playing on stage, but the balloon guy made all the kids balloon swords and belts, so there was plenty of dancing around.
And then, just like that, summer was over.
Callum and Max started at their new school, Cleveland Elementary. Sigh. I can't remember if I mentioned what a pain it was, trying to get the boys into a french immersion school in North Van, so after many deliberations with the NV School District, Cleveland ended up being the only school with a French spot for both of them. So here they are!
More catching up to do here...
Jeff went on a Scout camp for almost a week in July and was away for another few days to climb Mt.Baker again, so the Skinners needed some serious family-time. We took the August long weekend to hang out with the boys and first headed south to the Seattle zoo, but it was quite hot that day and they seemed to prefer hanging it out in the shade with statues of animals to looking at the real thing. Or eating cold snacks, like Dippin'Dots.
We met up with our Seattle buddies, Dave & Alyce Elton and their kids, to visit Seattle center, where there was an awesome water-play park and the playground next to the EMP.
We also went to a park with the Elton's, to have a picnic to eat our ultimate favourite Thai food including "Crack" chicken (it's actually Chili-basil chicken, or something, but we call it "crack" because it tastes so good you get addicted to it like crazy!!). Then we spent the night in an inconvenient hotel in Bellevue. We had a yummy crepe breakfast before heading to the Cascade mountains.
We drove to Baker Lake, a new destination for us, chosen for the fact that there is a lake you could swim in and it actually had vacant camp sites on a long weekend. It turned out to be exactly what we needed - chillin' out for 3 days with some relaxing on the beach, a lot of swimming and evening card games in the tent.
It was a great time.
Back in White Rock, Callum and Max did a skateboard camp. Again, I tried to put Simon in a Sports camp, but he refused to join in (apparently, playing soccer with his 2 older brothers has trained him to hate soccer, since soccer to Simon is more like rugby with a lot of yelling and getting hurt because that's how Callum and Max play it together!).
Meanwhile, I was busy planning a party - Jeff and I decided a last "Hurrah" would be a good idea to say goodbye to all our White Rock friends. A Saturday party for school and work friends, then a Sunday party for family and church friends... More on that later.
