Water Balloons

Water balloons have been a popular activity this summer. It's only the 9th of July and we have already gone through packs and packs of them. Thank goodness for dollar stores.

Spartan Race

After our friend Daniela had done the Tough Mudder Race last year, Hudson became really interested in doing it as well. But you have to be 19 to do that race. Then we found out about the Spartan Race which is a shorter version and also somewhat easier. You only have to be 14 to do the Spartan so Hudson was in. Daniela, Cooper and Cooper's friend Stuart formed their team.
It was a cold, wet, misty morning up on Seymour Mountain but the boys were ready to go.


 Tony and I watched from where we could which was nothing really until the last few obstacles. Most of the 5km course and 17 obstacles were not in our view. Cooper and his friend finished in just over an hour and Hudson and Daniela were not too far behind. And despite being freezing cold and Hudson fighting a bad cough they all said they want to do it again next year.






Hudson told us he was going to stop and warm his hands on the fiery finish line before jumping over it and hedid. Love it!

At the finish with their medals.

On the way home. Exhausted.

Can't wait to watch you guys do it again next year.

Happy Birthday Dad!

Reagan and I spent a few minutes this morning scrolling through old blog posts. The kids used to do this every so often and it was always fun to see them reliving memories. Anyways, it again inspired me and made me wonder why my blogging habits dwindled.
So again with no promises of any future posts here's a quick one of our birthday dinner with Dad this week. Happy 84 Dad!

Big win for Hudson

Yesterday's game was for the division championship. Even though the rain held out until the 4th quarter it was still freezing out there watching Hudson play. But the cold was worth it to watch his team win the division championship. Final score 48 - 21.
This means our trip to Kelowna for next week's semi-final game is a go. We just need the weather on the highway up there to be kind to us. Only two more games and two more wins until they can call themselves provincial champs. Go Hudson Go!

Getting pumpkins

That time again.




Managed to get a family shot. Cooper wasn't really in the mood but he obliged for this one anyway. No individual one though.

My fave.

Carving post to follow. (I hope)

Thanksgiving in Whistler...again

We headed back to Whistler again this year for Thanksgiving. We all enjoy this weekend so much that we see no reason to change it up.
Weather cooperated and we spent the three days wandering around the village, eating, relaxing in the pool and hot tub and more eating.
One of our favourite places to be is the farmers market. There are always so many treats and we end up eating our way through from one end to the other. This year was no exception. The list of goodies we consumed included:
crepes, hand fruit pies; apple and cherry, maple candy, homemade marshmallow smores, real fruit juice snow cones, wood-fired pizza
 ....and that was probably all before lunch.
 
 
 
 
For lunch Cooper and I never miss the Annual Harvest Soup Contest. We discovered this the first year we came and have done it every year since. I look forward to sharing this with him. (Can't help but notice in this photo how much taller than me Cooper has gotten.)

Kids ask every year to go up the gondola and do the peak to peak from Whistler to Blackcomb. The large price tag for all of us to do that has always stopped us from going. But this year was the year. The weather was gorgeous so up we went.


 Feeling on top of the world!

Tag and his little snowman.

He absolutely loved the snow. He ran/rolled down this hill a few times. Hiking back up starting getting tiring.

A few shots in the village. Lily loved it! So many other dogs and the big field behind Reagan was the perfect place to chase a ball. She whined every time the kids got too far out of her reach.



I tried to spend as much time as I could right here. In the big adirondack chairs that are set up for those that want to sit back, enjoy their Starbucks and watch their family play. Perfection!

Lastly, the one and only family shot I got all weekend.

The season of cross country has started again.
 
Taggart's first race proved to bring successful in terms of joy, but as he later realized not as successful in terms of his place.
 
His gym teacher coached them not to use up all their energy at the beginning. This is a race of endurance, not speed. Taggart took all of this seriously, obviously, as he placed 39th out of 46 runners.
I was surprised by this as we've always thought Tag was a good runner and pretty fast. He clearly used up none of his energy at the beginning, maybe not even that much in the middle, and at the end he seemed to have energy to spare. But he smiled the whole time. So even though I was surprised by his finish I was laughing as well. He clearly enjoyed himself and I don't think he even realized his place until a little later.

Later we talked about the fact that he had a little room for improvement and maybe using up a little more energy in the next race would help him finish faster. We talked about the fact that he should be pretty exhausted after a race. All that talking seemed to exhaust him more than the race.

We'll see what happens this week.