A lot of repairs and great times with the neighbours. - July 14 - 20

 My gardens have new flowers blooming every day. Hydranga now blooming, as well as some gladiolas. With the plants growing so tall, our irrigation is not reaching the back of the garden in some places. As June next door, has an irrigation company doing their's right now, he suggested extending our sprinkler heads to 1 foot instead of 6 inches and that should fix it. Should happen next week.

The week turned out to be a busy. Wednesday night, Pat and Darryl accompanied us for dinner and the show Footloose at the Chemainus Theatre. Another great performance.

Home by 10:30. I woke up at 2 in the morning cooking .... checked heat pump and it's 23C in the house and the heat is blasting out of the vents. Turned system off and opened up window, fortunately it's 16C outside, so tolerable. Called Exchange Energy in the morning and they sent someone out. (Levi) We just had our system serviced 5 days ago by Mike.....

Turns out the thermostat installed 2 years ago March, has a short in it and keeps calling for heat. It's warrantied for 5 years, with their professional installation, so it shouldn't cost much for replacement. Meanwhile, they've disconnected the heating part, so at least we still have A/C until the new one is installed and they deal with the warranty with Honeywell.

We are still waiting on a date when Exchange Energy will come back to fix the ductwork for the powder room fan and kitchen fan. We've known that they share the same vent!!!! You can imagine when someone uses the bathroom and turns the fan on, the smell comes into the kitchen! There's definitely been some weird things done in this house during construction.

Also, this week, our main water valve in the basement started screeching everytime you turn on the water. It's not reducing the PSI  pressure from 100 down to 75 psi to protect household appliances, so needed replacement. JS Plumbing are great and someone came the next day. While Will's here, I asked him to check out the toilet in the powder room. Sometimes there seemed to be a little water on the floor. 

Turned out that the toilet doesn't have a big enough wax seal, and it's not even touching the toilet. The toilet isn't screwed down to the floor tightly. We could have had a much bigger mess .... that problem now fixed. He checked the 2 toilets upstairs and apparently the bolts have been glued to the toilet so you cannot get the toilet off to check the seals..... Wow! If we ever have a problem, the toilet will have to be broken to change it out. Fortunately, they seem solid with no movement. 

Our neighbour is using a tiler, so we asked to come over and check our ensuite shower, as we noticed some black coming through the grout.  Apparently the concrete pad was poured for the shower and instead of a waterproof membrane put on top, it's painted black. It's the same material used to paint the concrete on the outside of a house to prevent moisture coming into your basement!  So we need the floor of the shower redone, which won't be until the fall. Fortunately we have 20 of the 12x12 tiles left so the floor will look the same when replaced. Always something! He also showed us the drain pipe is loose and this play caused the grout to break off. So when Will came, we asked him to strap it tighter to the basement ceiling.  Ray sealed it with clear silicone.

Our neighbour Todd came in the helicopter for a visit to his house this week. Pretty cool. He constructed a landing pad made on the empty lot he owns beside his house.

Smallest houseboat on the lake.

There's been a couple of cloudy days, so I played in my kitchen. I baked a fresh blueberry tart and have a brisket going on the Traeger.

Ray went into town on Friday afternoon to pick up a gallon of stain for our bench Jason gave as Ray's Christmas present. Ray noticed the Rock and Gem Show is on, so did a quick visit to look around. Certainly not the size of the event in Quartzsite, Arizona.

Saturday night, Pat and Darryl hosted a Tapas Party with all the neighbours. What a great night. I made a Spanish Seafood Paella. (Chorizo, Chicken, Mussels and Prawns) Think I have enough ingredients??? I prepped in the morning, and Ray went into Duncan to get me the fresh mussels. It takes about an hour to make the dish, but it certainly helps having all the ingredients ready to go.

Our hostess, Pat.

Pat's grandson Ashton, helping serve. Her granddaughter, Emily, also helped serve and she baked various desserts. Great kids.

Sara, Karsen and Ashton

Ashton, Pat, Darryl and Todd

Sara, Karson, Tyler, Debra, Joe and June

June, Roy and Mike

Pat made some delicious tapas, ginger beef, bruschetta, desserts and more. June made prawn skewers. The party lasted until 10:30 and moved to Mike and Debra's with their kids. I came home to bed. :) Ray left at 10 as did June and Roy. Darryl snuck away earlier in the evening too, so just Pat's left to tell everyone to go home. lol

Sunday and the sun's back out. We decided to take a boat ride and cruise down the lake. There sure are some beautiful houses. We putted along for 1.5 hours, enjoying the views. Got back home just as the wind came up and became quite choppy. 

Houses along Point Ideal Road we pass on our way home

Houseboats for rent at the marina.

More housing along Point Ideal

One of the best houses along the lakeshore at Honeymoon Bay

We thought troubles come in threes, not with us! Along with all the repairs mentioned earlier, the next repair this week, our dishwasher. It's struggling ... with the pump is showing error codes. I cleaned all the filters, and it chugged along some more. After doing more research, to have the pump fixed is around a $500 bill According to the model and serial number, it turns out the dishwasher is 14 years old ..... not worth it. I ordered a new one from Home Depot and they will install it in about 10 days and take the old one away. Hopefully I can convince the dishwasher to hang on a few more days. :)

That's our week!

Off to Visit Squamish Family - July 11th - 13th

Friday morning we headed for Nanaimo to pick up Jason, Kristi, Amelia and Olaf for our family trip to Squamish to see Garrett, Kat and Stella for a great family get together. Garrett invited us, as he knows his dad likes looking at classic cars. We were early getting to Jason and Kristi's as I didn't know how we were going to fit everyone in including luggage, so made sure we had lots of time. That meant, arrival at the ferry is early too, but that's ok as Jason had only 1/2 a cup of coffee so far, and we all know that Jason needs at least 2 cups to be functional lol.

It definitely is a "full load" with Olaf in the very back. lol

Our ferry was about 15 minutes late leaving, but overall a good trip over. Views from the ferry.

Kristi and Amelia had Olaf out of the car into the pet area for a bit. On the drive down the Sea to Sky Highway we decided to pull in to Porteau Cove for a walk about. Poor Olaf gets car sick and he had just started to heave as I turned into the parking lot. Fortunately we have a towel to mop it up. As he hadn't been fed earlier, it wasn't much to deal with. Glad we have rubber mats.

Kristi said she hadn't been to Porteau Cove since we took her when she was little. Beautiful views.

Managed to snag someone to take a picture of us all.

Back in the car to the hotel. We checked in at 2 pm, managing to get adjoining rooms. Then after walking Olaf, it's pool time. Kat is working today and Stella is in Day camp until 4:30.

Off to the pool

Definitely not a slide for kids. Kristi did it only twice and Jason twice and that's enough. lol

Back to the room for some warm up time.

We headed over to Garrett's at 4:30 and ordered pizza for dinner. Jason beat Ray paying for it! The girls had a great time together and Amelia really enjoyed playing with "new to her" toys.

Auntie Kat getting some loving from Olaf.

At 7 we left back to the hotel as it's Amelia's bedtime by 7:30. Kristi was tired after working on call the night before and had been up since 4 am, so she went to bed with Amelia. Jason stayed in our room until 9, when we all went to bed. Jason was stuck reading his phone for a couple of hours before he was ready to sleep. lol

Saturday morning we were all up by 6:30 am and had our continental breakfast and coffee. By 8am we left for Feather Park and met up with Kat so the girls could play and Olaf could get a walk. A great place downtown Squamish. From here you see the Sea to Sky Gondola and Shannon Falls.

Shannon Falls coming down the rock face.

We then left to leave Olaf back at the hotel and headed to the rail museum's opening for 9:30. Kat and Stella met us there. Garrett had prior commitments to lead a mountain bike ride with some overseas visitors and would meet up with us later in the day.

We all decided to ride the miniature rail and bud car before it got too busy. Then visit the other parts of the museum including seeing the car show display.

A 20 minute ride around the site ... a little hard on old bums. :) They have lots of small animals for the kids to point out along the way.

The rail yard:

Ray worked for Western Forest Products

A Roundhouse, one of Ray;s favourites

Outside displays.

The old train station where the "Bud Car" comes to pick you up.

Hiding in the shade until the bud car arrives.

All Aboard!

We bought lunch for everyone there, supporting the Lions Club. Staying in the shade. We didn't realize there are picnic tables under cover close to the main exhibit hall. lol

Not the biggest classic car display ....

Next up, the inside displays. The girls are really interested in what Papa Ray had to tell them. It's fun to watch.

Interesting controls for a sink

Their model train display.

Here is Ray's short video.

Amelia is more interested in playing with the trains than seeing inside the big ones. lol

Stella's nervous going down these stairs so Amelia went up and got her :) So sweet.

By 1:30 we were all hot, so it's time to go back to the hotel to swim. Kat and Stella went home to pick up Garrett.

Garrett really liked the slide. lol Boy does it shoot you out.

Daddy piggyback races.

After 1.5 hours playing, time to change in our rooms. 

On the way back to Garrett's, we stopped at a Brewery for Jason and I and the girls and Garrett went to the Cidery, next door to pick up some beverages to take back to their house.

We dropped Olaf off at our hotel which has A/C and met up with Garrett and family at the restaurant which is walking distance from his house.

The girls are pretty tired, as were we all, with all the heat today. The restaurant isn't airconditioned, but as we were some of the first diners and there's a fan pointing at us, it wasn't too bad. Poor little Stella's wilting though, she takes after me I suspect. I hate being too hot! I had the girls stand in front of the fan to cool off.

After dinner we went straight back to the hotel to put Amelia to bed.

Sunday morning we were all up and out again, for 8 am, after packing up first. Off to the Fox and Oak Bakery, downtown Squamish for fresh donuts. The donuts were still warm. Yumm. Met up with the rest of the bunch at Feather Park again for playtime.

After an hour or so, it started to get hot. So we went back to the hotel and checked out and back to Garrett's until it's time to leave for the ferry.

Garrett and Kat cautioned us that the Sunday traffic from Whistler could be brutal. We decided to leave early at 11:30, even though our ferry wasn't until 4 pm. The ticket booth guy told us to go into the village and not to come back until 2 pm for the lineup. I managed to get a parking spot after driving around a bit. I put our name on the wait list for lunch at Trolls and we took Olaf and Amelia to the park across the road while we waited for our table.

We did not want to eat on the ferry, the food is not very good. Lunch at Trolls was really good. 

Olaf was able to lay on the sidewalk just beside our table. Our timing's good and by the time we got back to the car it's 2 pm so off to the ferry lineup. Boy it's hot on the pavement. Car said 28C but it felt hotter. We opened all the windows and doors. Kristi got water to get Olaf and the towel he's laying on really wet. Kristi, Amelia and I got our hair wet and poured some water down our tops. lol We managed to not melt for the 1.5 hour wait before we could turn the car and a/c on.

On the ferry, Kristi took Olaf up to the pet area on the upper deck as the car deck from all the hot cars. The rest of us sat in an area with the coolest a/c. Papa spent most of his time being a "jumping gym" for Amelia lol.

Dropped the kids off shortly after 6 pm and we headed home. Nice and cool at 22C inside, but outside was 30C. Hot, hot, hot! Good to be home.