E- Welcome to the machine

We've now officially entered the "school years". In all likelihood, for the next 17 years our lives will now revolve around the calendar set by our school system. For many families, this isn't much of a change. They live pretty scheduled lives with the kids getting up and going to bed at the same time each day. Dad and/or Mom work Monday to Friday, so there is already a built in concept of the week versus the weekend. Our family is definitely not such a family! Or should I say, wasn't. We went with whatever schedule suited us. Weekends and holidays meant nothing to our kids. Neither did early mornings. But the system has caught up to us and the Labour Day weekend has taken on a whole new ominous meaning. Rather than fight it we decided to celebrate it. On Friday the five of us went to the PNE. It was better than either Les or I remember from years past, with the highlight definitely being the human freak show called the Peking Acrobats. They were as good as the Cirque De Soleil without the $100 price tag. We also saw high diving, the Flying Canucks aerial show, Toontown parade, motor bike jumping and all the farm animals. Topping off the entertainment with some cotton candy made for a pretty fun day.

On Saturday we had 2 little boys from our Co-op, Evan and Miller, throw a joint birthday party in the court yard. We were sent home from the party with half a cake covered in a ridiculous amount of icing. Yummmmmm. I took all 3 kids to the UBC basketball game vs. Oklahoma in the evening while Les perfected her description of Stripper Poles. The atmosphere there has really changed since I played, as there seemed to be no problem with the kids hanging out in the beer garden. We tried for years, without luck, to get permission to serve alcohol and we certainly weren't proposing to let toddlers in. On Sunday we hit a matinee of Shrek the Third. It was the first movie we've seen as a family. Finny crawled on my lap half way through and fell asleep. Later in the day I told someone that Finny had fallen asleep in the movie and she got very upset. Apparently embarrassed that only really little people would do that, Finny explained that "me wasn't sleeping....me just resting me eyes a bit". Later on that day we went to Shannon and James one year wedding anniversary party.

Monday was mostly spent preparing for school. We had a few conversations, as well as moments of sadness, doubt, excitement and fear. Overall though, Molly has been great and we think she'll love her school. It is in one of the most beautiful locations imaginable (see my poorly orchestrated panorama photo at the top), is pretty small, has a good mix of students from a nice neighbourhood and apparently a well liked staff. We couldn't ask for much more. Oh, well...maybe a basketball hoop that is a little closer to horizontal would be nice.


After Molly was dismissed from school today, our whole family came in for a meet-the-teacher 15 minute interview. Afterwards I took the girls for a swim while Les reserved us a table at the back to school/work Arbutus Club buffet. After scarfing down some burgers, salad and corn, the girls decided to cut some rug to the classic rock the band was playing. They had a ton of fun dancing all evening long. This cellphone video may not sound great but it clearly shows that I have passed along my "gift" of rhythm.