The Best of 2019

2019 has officially come to a close. We celebrated with a dinner out with Mom and a lazy day at home. I'm sad to report that Grandpa Harry is in the hospital with a Gall Stone complications. He's waiting for an MRI to figure out a course of action. All in all it's been a good, but a tumultuous year riddled with health care concerns by many of the elderly folks in our midst. Mom has been pretty stable, but definitely slowing down. Her cognition isn't what it used to be, but at least she's baking again. Her back has been her biggest issue as of late.

Tracey got a raise this year and is going on 20+ years of service. Roger is going on year 19! The countdown to retirement is on the horizon. He's planning on a 2027 good-bye. By that time Melody would have graduated high school and will be on her way to University or some other post-secondary. Malcolm will have already had 3 years of Postsec under his belt by then. We'll have to see what transpires.

Roger and his motorcycling passion continues, he even welcomed a new addition to the family just this past December. He's patiently awaiting the onset of Spring to ride.

Here's our annual slideshow to commemorate a year gone by.

Disneyland 2019

We surprised the kids this year by planning a trip to Disneyland for their birthdays in November. With Star Wars land partially finished the timing was good. As always, Tracey researched a bunch of deals and found a great hotel and airfare for a reasonable price. Still not really sure it was a vacation cause we walked our feet off. In the 4 days at the park we (according to Malcolm's fitbit) walked 146k steps, or 111kms! That's two and a half marathons!

For Roger, Star Wars land was a highlight and for the kids it was the magic of getting on all the big rides. I'm not sure what the highlight for Tracey was. Here's a slideshow of the days at Disney and Universal.

The best of 2018

Here are the highlights in point form:

• The family tried skiing for the first time. Highs, Malcolm loved it. Lows, Tracey lost a toenail and it took almost 8 months to grow back! 
• The family had a wonderful multi-family vacation to Maui. We swam with live sea turtles! 
• It was the year for experiences over gifts, Roger and Tracey saw Lauryn Hill, Ed Sheeran (the kid's first concert), P!NK, Conan O'Brien, and Tessa/Scott on ice. 
• Roger made a bunch of new motorcycle friends and said good-bye to some of his old friends. I think Marie Kondō put it well: “The space in which we live should be for the person we are becoming now, not for the person we were in the past.” 
• Epic ride with Calvin and Keith to Vernon on the bike this past summer. Roger put close to 9k kilometres on the bike this season. It'll be interesting to see what 2019 brings:
• Malcolm got his braces off and Melody in turn got them on. 
• Tracey was connected to a new found family with some crazy twists and turns along the way. 
• Roger and Tracey's department won an award for excellence and shared a $1k prize. 
• For the kids, TKD continues with both of them advancing to blue stripe. They should be able to make it to red belt by the end of next year. 
• Academically, both kids are doing well and the extra curricular is on the upswing. Malcolm's ringette team is actually quite good, they've lost very few games so far. Melody is still excelling in gymnastics, we'll see where that goes this year. 
• Over the summer we took a trip to Oregon, just the four of us. We managed to survive an 8.5 hour car ride from Portland! You know as a photographer, I take a lot of photos and of the 20k + photographs I took in 2018, this one is by far my favourite and it was taking with my iPhone no less:

Here's a video slideshow of year gone by:

The best of 2017

2017 has had its ups and downs, but looking back on the year we have many things to be thankful for. Melody is doing great in school working hard in grade 3. Also, to no surprise Melody has fallen head over heels (literally) for gymnastics. She's moving on to the next level in the new year and will be performing more difficult moves going forward. She caught up to her brother in Tae Kwon Do, earning her green stripe in the summer. The transition to middle school was an adjustment, but Malcolm too has been doing well. He's joined the school band (alto sax), started Ringette and is diligently continuing with Tae Kwon Do as well. Daisy Rey has been the bright spot in our lives, she's been the best family dog we could ask for. Mom had surgery to remove her gall bladder in the fall and has had a new lease on life. Much of the pain that she experienced in the past is now gone. She's still dealing with her various ailments, but the chronic pain she's felt for years has been relieved due to the removal of the gallbladder. Tracey and Roger are still hard at work. Perhaps the biggest addition to the family this past year has been Roger's new motorcycle. He was able to fulfill a lifelong dream. Please see the slideshow below to see a review of 2017.

Here's our 2016 in review.

It was a tough year all the way around. In August we lost Obi which was devastating and recently we've found out that brother Glen's cancer is back, we also lost Mr. Goto in December and even Mom gave us quite a scare with a short stay at the hospital with a gall bladder attack. The bright spot has been the addition of Daisy Rey, and she's shaping up to be quite a little character. Stay tuned for what unfolds in 2017.

Pumpkin Patch

We switched things up this year and headed to the lesser known Pumpkin Patch in Delta. There was no hay ride or apple at the end, and due to the torrential rains in October it was a muddy mess. All in all the kids enjoyed it though. Here are a few pictures.









We went over the Calvin and Shannon's house to carve them:

Cranberry Harvest

Every year we see the cranberry fields mature in the fall. I always seem to miss the few days where they flood the field for the annual harvest. This year I was lucky enough to catch a dry day and take some pictures with Malcolm. I had hoped that we'd get some amazing reflections with the flooded fields, but that day happened to be clear without much cloud cover. Well anyways, it was fun to try and capture some images at sunset. Here are a few:

Apple press event at our school.

It was Apple Fest at our school on October 2nd. The kids got to see first hand how to make fresh apple cider. We even brought a big bag of apples we picked from Mr. Goto's yard. They washed them, peeled them, crushed them, and then pressed them. Some of the other volunteers pasteurized them and then distributed the cider. It was actually quite delicious.