Six More Weeks of Winter according to the Groundhogs this year! Feb 1 - 11 2022

I hope not!

Punxsutawney Phil

Tuesday afternoon we headed up to Nanaimo as we're babysitting Amelia Wednesday morning starting from 7:30 am. With possible snow in the forecast overnight Tuesday, we decided it's better to get there the day before. Kristi is on call all day at the hospital and Jason had an appointment in Victoria so we were asked to babysit. :)

Notice the foot through the gate. Yup she'd be down those stairs in a second!

Jason made us Chicken Parmesan for dinner, delicious. Lots of great baby time. 

She loves using Kristi as her jungle gym. Certainly mommy's girl when she is home. No one else will do. lol

Amelia is really crawling now and exploring her home.

And she makes everything into a hat. lol Such a cutie.

Wednesday morning both Jason and Kristi were out of the house by 7:30am. I made Amelia and us, breakfast of scrambled eggs and toast. She is such a good little eater.

Ray took Zeus out for several walks and did a few errands in town with me on baby duty. Amelia is such a great baby and usually quite happy, smiling all the time. She sure can scoot along now crawling.

Morning snack time. "Floorios". lol

She is learning to hug and kiss you back. I was the recipient of quite a few so definitely melted my heart.

Snack after morning nap.

She is also very helpful resorting your cupboards in the kitchen. lol

Grandpa had fun with her too. When he left to take Zeus out, she crawled to the gate at the stairs and just bellowed for him. Too funny. Apparently she learned to say Grandpa the day after we left. Now she has 8 words.

Jason arrived back home just after I put Amelia down for her second nap of the day. We hit the road just before 2pm as there were snow flurries and I did not want to drive on slippery roads. We also brought Zeus home with us, as Kristi and Jason are heading over to Squamish on Saturday and coming back Sunday. They wanted to visit Kat, Garrett and Stella and of course their new 8 week old German Shepherd puppy named Charlotte. As I will go back up to Nanaimo Sunday afternoon to be ready to go to Victoria with Jason on Monday for Amelia's appointment to get her hip checked, I will bring Zeus back home.

Fortunately it just sprinkled on the way home ... no snow. At 5:30 we headed over next door to Pat and Darryl's for dinner. Darryl cooked up his mom's famous fried chicken. Dinner was delicious as was the Saskatoon Berry pie. They taught us a new card game so we spent an hour playing 7 up and 7 down.

Darryl and I did a bunch of wine tasting, surprisingly I felt ok Thursday morning. :) I did not drink for the month of January for the most part but kinda made up for it tonight. lol A great evening.

Thursday the clouds stayed low all day and sprinkled. I kept busy with laundry and in my kitchen today. Homemade pasta with short ribs. Ray's a "happy camper". 

Friday a cloudy start, but by 9:00 am the heavier rain began. Fortunately Ray got out for Zeus's walk before it started. Staying pretty close to our feet in case we leave him. :)

Saturday we were surprised with the delivery of our new foldable e-bikes around noon. They arrived crated in big boxes. Fortunately for us they are mostly together on arrival. Only a few things need to be put on, the front tire, pedals and attach the handlebar. 

Rize charged me $50 more to deliver here as they said FedEx doesn't deliver to Lake Cowichan ... I beg to differ and will be asking for my money back.

They arrive 95% assembled.

Rize Bolt X with fat tires.

Rize Bolt, Mine is a smaller one, more for city driving, also foldable.

We decided on purchasing these as Ray is having more trouble with his legs and back with walking any distance. He has been going out for short rides on his regular bike and finds it works for him. To keep him mobile and able to get down trails for pictures, we decided on a foldable mountain bike with fat tires.

We spent the afternoon putting them together. Ray's took longer as he had to go to Lordco and pick up a torque wrench ... as per instructions in the manual. Once back, we finished his bike and mine only took about 30 minutes to put together. Ray's too sore to complete the assembly by filling the tires with air, so the inaugural bike ride will have to be tomorrow.

Saturday morning, Kristi and Jason went over to Squamish to see Kat, Garrett and Amelia for an overnight. They have a new German Shepherd puppy, 8 weeks old named Charlotte. The girls, Stella and Amelia really enjoy seeing each. Kristi and Kat facetime almost daily so they are used to seeing each other via cell phones. :) Lots of hugs and kisses happening.

Stella is a tiny little thing at 20 months old compared to Amelia at 13 months.

The girls and the new puppy.

Sunday we woke to a very foggy morning. The sun is supposed to come out so fingers crossed. After it warmed up some, Ray went out and used the air pump in the car to fill the tires in both bikes. So now it's for a trial run down our street. Needs more adjustment. First time I pressed the throttle almost ended up in the garden ... so I lowered the seat to have a better centre of balance. Second attempt, almost did a wheely lol Ray wishes he got video on both incidents. Third time lucky going down our road. The bike certainly is spunky. More adjustments needed to the computer to limit speed to 20 km instead of 32 km. Also, I will lower the responsiveness to 1 instead of 3 so it does not take off so fast. Lots of fun to come.

At 10:30 am we both climbed on our bikes with our new Bluetooth helmets and off we went. Rode for about 30 minutes all together. Both bikes performed well and no one hit the dirt. lol I even ended up answering a phone call from Kristi while on my bike so the helmet works well. :) 

After lunch, I headed up to Nanaimo to be there for the road trip with Jason and Amelia to Victoria for her appointment with the ortho to check her hip. Great afternoon playing with her. Since she had so much fun in Squamish playing with an old "turned off" computer, Kristi dug out one of her old ones for Amelia to play with.

Monday morning Kristi was out the door by 8 am and Jason, Amelia and I headed out in my car headed for Victoria by 8:30 am. Once we got going Amelia fell asleep ... that was the plan :) Her doctor's appointment was in the Uptown Mall so Jason and I were able to walk around with her while we waited for her appointment. Found a nice warm bubble to hold up in as it was really windy there and quite cool.

Amelia's appointment is at 11:30 am so I wandered around a few of the stores before ordering our lunch at Brown's Social House for take-out. Amelia's check up went well. Her hip is settled in the socket quite well, so she only needs to wear her brace for naps and overnight now. The rest of the time she is free to move around as she wants and even helped to stand up now. Great progress and a good thing as she is starting to voice her complaints when you try to put her brace back on at diaper changes.

Once Jason came back, lunch was ready so we sat in another bubble in the sun to eat. Amelia was hungry too and ate quite a bit of my chicken sandwich and some fries.

Everyone happy to be outside.

By 1 pm we were back in the car heading home. Amelia fell back asleep about 1:30 pm and did not decide she had enough of this being "trapped" until just after Ladysmith. Jason stopped the car and I climbed into the backseat and amused her for the 20 minutes before getting home. She was hungry so I kept her busy eating "puffs" with water. :) Such a good baby ... not one tear the whole 6.5 hour excursion.

Jason filled up the car with fuel and unloaded and then sent me on my way. Back home by 3 pm. A long day for me, but so glad Amelia's results are good.

Tuesday, cloudy. The rain started sprinkling early so no bike ride today. I road my stationary one downstairs instead. The rest of the week looks good though. It will be nice to have a stretch of weather with sunshine included. :) Ray ran into Duncan for a few errands, otherwise a quiet day.

Wednesday the lake like glass. Low clouds, as I can't see the mountains on the other side of the lake. Better than rain. :) 

Thursday, Jason and Amelia came for a few hours. While I watched the baby, Jason climbed the extension ladder to caulk the drip edge of the belly band of the house where I saw the damn bats fly out again this summer. Ray held the ladder, making sure Jason did not fall. Kristi would kill me. :) So thankful for Jason's help.

Where are you going baby? No where Grandma!

She sure can crawl now. Fed her and the boys lunch. The last spot for caulking is around the garage door, where Ray noticed bat droppings too. Unfortunately. the last owner did not caulk the joints on the corner pieces where the hardy plank and corners are. Those gaps created spots for the bats to get in. Every year we caulk new spots trying to prevent entry. Hopefully this year we have it. :) Fingers crossed. Won't notice until July if we have it as they have their babies May/June before the babies start flying.

Friday, foggy again but hopefully the sun comes out later. Finally the sun came out around 9 am and it was a beautiful morning. Ray and I went for a short bike ride, getting more familiar with our e-bikes.

First time going across the pedestrian bridge from downtown to "The Duck Pond".

On the way home we decided to try and go up a steep hill to see how the bikes perform. Unfortunately for me, I thought I was pressing the button to "up the peddle assist" but instead turned the bike off! I was so flustered that when I put the brakes on to prevent rolling backwards I forgot I could just put my feet on the ground and fell over. Nothing too serious other than a bruised ego ... a scaped elbow and a big bruise on my hip (No Ray, no pictures!). Lesson learned. :) Adjust speed before you start the hill. As the bike weighs 60 pounds I must remember my feet do reach the ground to stabilize easily ....

Otherwise a great outing. Certainly has not scared me to not try again. :) Back home we were able to spend a little time sitting on the sundeck with the heaters and fireplace on. A great day.