The First Long Weekend

May Two-Four Weekend

Queen Victoria would be so distraught that we have unofficially changed the name of the weekend celebrating her into just two numbers, Two - Four... or otherwise known as the May Long Weekend.  Oh well, I never knew the lady...  Plus, it's a day off work.  I'll celebrate people, names, numbers, letters, deceased pets, whatever!

Here, for your viewing and reading pleasure, I offer a brief synopsis of the weekend that was "Victoria Day Weekend, 2013".

Saturday

First up was a campfire / weenie roast out at S & K's farm.  The kids were generally racing around the place causing mayhem, scaring the chickens and cows.  The adults weren't straying too far from the snacks and fire pit.  We did get to see some recently hatched chicks.  There were a couple hundred of them.  I started to count them but they kept moving around...

Thanks to 'Special K' for finding it in her heart to share some of her pictures; she's still in the good books. Tammy on the other hand...

Here are a few more photos of the night.

AK roasting his weenie

Arson and Half-Pint chilling in their chairs

The big boys competing for cooking space around the fire.

More big boys guarding the table full of snacks

The kids were given some sparklers later in the evening.  That created a bit more excitement - especially for the young ones who were starting to get tired.  No eyes were poked out.

There were a few burn victims around the fire - thankfully they were either wieners or marshmallows!  Half-Pint is still annoyed at Auntie Marshy for not blowing out his marshmallow in a more timely manner.  Little does he know that with a mouthful of salsa and tortilla chips in her mouth she would have peppered his marshmallow with little bits of corn chips if she had tried to blow out the flame!

Half-Pint and his charred Marshy-mallow

Sunday

We were invited over by another family to enjoy some fireworks that their group of neighbours set off on Sunday night.  I didn't get many pictures, sadly.  It was a fun night of sitting around another fire, having more snacks and watching the show!

LP playing with a large stuffed toy

Brother KP flaked out waiting for the fireworks to begin

Fireworks!

More fireworks!

Monday

We had a birthday celebration for 'Bun Head' at Tammy's.  The whole family joined in - even Uncle Kevin and crew and Gramma and Grandpa came from Windsor.  Again - more food; burgers, hot dogs, birthday cake.  I got worn out just from eating all weekend!

A group of us went to Bun Head's soccer game.  She had a loud cheering section.  

Well, that was a great start to the festivities of the summer.  Special K has a bunch more events planned for us.  I can hardly wait for the next email to come out telling me where I need to be, at what time!  We have a great group of friends to spend time with.

There are also family camping trips scheduled, off-roading events, fishing trips, soccer games and who knows what else!  I'm looking forward to lots of fun activities this summer.




Oh, one more thing...

Nate and Erin and the boys will be home in a week.  Lots of us are excited to see them.  Our party group will be significantly bigger at the next event!



Oh - one more 'one more thing'...
      Our church has a group over in Togo right now working on the hospital.
      You can check out their activities and blog postings here -->  SCBC Togo Team blog

Game 7 Magic

J-Man, Half-Pint, LP and Brother KP ready to cheer on the home team.

London Kinghts vs. Barrie Colts

The series was tied 3-3.  Game seven of the Ontario Hockey League finals.  This was for everything.

The Knights were leading in the game but played too cautiously, protecting the lead in the last ten minutes.  Barrie scored (of course) to tie the game with just a couple of minutes left.  Cue the tension!

London cranked up the pressure again and managed to get what looked like a goal with .1 of a second left on the clock!  Point One of a second -  -  Really???  That's as fast as a blink.  After a lengthy video review to verify the goal and the game time, it was ruled a good goal!

There was a huge celebration in the arena.  With virtually no time left on the clock the Knights were champions.

The Joy of Victory

The home team was jubilant, the fans were raucous, it was a party atmosphere as the referee signaled a good goal...

The Heartbreak of Defeat

A dejected, exhausted Barrie Colts team showed amazing team unity despite the crushing loss.  This was a sweet indication of how hard these guys played for each other.  They have no reason to hang their heads.  They played well (despite missing two top players for the final game) and showed great sportsmanship.

The Hardware

Knights forward Bo Horvat was given the playoff MVP trophy.  Then the Knights captain Scott Harrington was presented with the big trophy.  

Bo Horvat being presented the MVP trophy by league commissioner David Branch

Congrats to the team on a great season.  Now, on the Memorial Cup in Saskatoon!

Oh, one more thing....

Thanks to a very generous boss for the great suite seats during the Final Series!  Go Knights Go!

Gobble Gobble

Beginner's Luck

Well, last post I mentioned that the oldest boy (9 years old) was going to come out on his first hunting trip.  As it turns out it was probably the best possible morning out in the field that a rookie could have.  It went kinda like this...

Wake up at 4:30am.  Meet Andy and load everything up.  Get out to the bush by 5:20am.  Have decoys set up and settle in place by 5:45am on the south side of the bush.  Where we set up was a wide gas line easement separating our bush from the next property over.  Wide open field so anything crossing over can be seen.

Immediately we heard gobbling at the far end of the bush and we felt good about our set-up.  Turkeys are gobbling in our bush, in a bush 500 yards or so away directly south, and in another bush about the same distance west of us.  Surrounded by them!

The juvenile bird hanging out near us

Around 6:20am we spotted a lone juvenile bird wandering our direction.  It got shy a bit out of range so we let it be.  I could still hear other birds gobbling so I thought we might still have a chance.  A few minutes later I heard the noisy turkeys in our bush come down from their roost and begin their day.  After not hearing any gobbles for a short time, three birds appeared in the easement, probably 100 yards away.  They were coming right towards our decoys.

All the way to us they would stop and strut, gobble and show off how handsome they were.  They were nice looking - three big toms.  With two tags between us I knew we could only take two birds, so we'd have to maximize our chances.  When they passed by us around 25 yards away, I took down what looked to be the biggest one with a loud boom.  Then Andy took one.  His tag was filled, too.  So much action for the rookie turkey hunter to take in...  He was pumped!  So was I.  It was so cool to hear all of that gobbling, have a single bird come around and then have three big toms come 'strolling down main street' right in front of us.  And we got two of them.  Awesome.

Two down, and a lucky bird leaving the scene

 

Our hunting blind.  Thumbs up from the rookie!

A father and son photo

Big birds

Andy took a few pictures and then set to work plucking and field dressing them.  Two hours, and two big piles of feathers later, we were walking back to the truck and loading everything up.

Plucking feathers, the 'not so glamourous' part of hunting.

He's done this before.

A beautiful morning with great weather, sharing a spectacular hunting experience with a great friend and my boy couldn't have gone any better.


Oh, one more thing...

                                  Sunday dinner will be turkey!

Turkey Time!

Open Season

The end of this week marks the opening of wild turkey spring hunting season in Ontario.  I am so looking forward to getting out and nestling down against a big tree far too early in the morning. There is nothing like watching the sun come up over open fields, slivers of light breaking between stands of trees.  The cold morning air giving way to the warm rays of spring sunrise... or more often, morning just being 'less dark, more grey' and drizzling rain.
Regardless of the weather, the sound of a big tom gobbling in the distance gets my heart racing and peaks my senses!   

Sunrise on some swampy hunting land

 

The Rookie 

This year I'm taking the oldest of our 3 boys out with me for the first time.  He just turned nine so maybe this is a bit of his passing from little boy to young man.  He's pumped about going hunting!  I'm excited by his enthusiasm.  I hope we see something while he's out with me - a turkey, a deer, a rabbit, raccoon, squirrels... anything!  I don't know if he'll be able to sit quietly for an hour or two but we shall find out soon enough.  I don't know if I'll be able to sit quietly!!

Tree stand in the bush.  

Deer footprint in the mud

I've always enjoyed getting out and spending quiet time in the woods.  Some of my best naps have been while 'hunting'.  I've seen some really cool things with animals and birds:  a blue jay sitting just out of arm's reach, squawking at me, alerting the rest of the forest of my presence; a squirrel running across my leg while sitting in a tree stand, then turning back in alarm because I didn't feel like bark; baby coons wrestling just a few feet from where I was sitting...  I've had lots of fun getting out with AK and NW for some fun hunting adventures.  I look forward to more adventures this year, too!

Half-Pint shot by one of his brothers.  He's the best at playing  'dead'.

I look forward to putting food on the table and adding another chapter to the stories I have to tell from the time spent out in the field.  It's pretty cool to be able to take part in the hunting heritage we have been blessed with in this country.

Food Chain poster in an elementary school

Oh, one more thing...

Anyone have any good recipes for wild turkey??

photo by Fred Boylen - fbimagery.com, a London area photographer.

Keeping Up With Ethan

The Back Story

My nephew Ethan just recently broke his femur and had surgery to install a rod in his leg.  He was bragging about how many stitches he had received, especially because he trumped Jack's 25 stitches in his scalp from just a few days earlier.  Ethan has had more stitches than most of us - me included - but his all came at one time.  He's a tough kid.  He'll end up with more before he's done.  Jack, too!

You can see Jack's scar here, as well as more pictures of Ethan's surgery  -->   Erin's Blog

Ethan's incision marks.  He said there were stitches under there...

4 Stitches

Well Ethan, I've got four more stitches to add to my total, bringing me up to 70.  

I got hit on the bridge of the nose with a puck while playing in Woodstock last night.  A defenseman on the other team attempted to get rid of the puck as I was pressuring him.  His clearing attempt hit me square in the beak.  Other than hurting a whole bunch, it bled like crazy.  Since it was early in the game I figured I would try to get the bleeding to stop and see how it was.  The area behind our bench looked like a grisly crime scene, blood everywhere.

Random hockey picture inserted here

I was able to get the bleeding stopped after a few minutes, and with the help of a couple of teammates, got some gauze and a band-aid on it to keep it from leaking anymore.  Of course I finished the game - with a goal and a couple of assists to boot!

Some swelling, some stitches. Black eyes are coming!

 I went to the hospital and was actually quite surprised by how quick everything went.  An x-ray, 4 stitches and sent on my way in 31/2  hours.  I have a fracture of a nasal bone, some swelling - and it hurts when I squint.

I'll take the stitches out in a few days and see how much scarring there is when it's healed up.  Certainly won't help my looks much, that's for sure!  I'll post another picture if I get good black eyes from this.
Strangely enough, it was this time last year that I received 4 stitches in my lip in another hockey game...  This is a bad time of year for me to be playing!!

Photo of last year's cut.  Happened 03/01/2012.   Coincidence???

All in all it's just another hockey story to tell.

Oh, one more thing...  

Ethan, you can win this little "contest".  I'm getting too old for this stuff!

Togo - A Last Look?

What I Learned

I learned that the people of West Africa are very warm and inviting.  Nate says it has something to do with 'warm climate, warm hearts'.  I'd buy that.  People would wave and shake hands just like I was a friend they hadn't met yet!  Or maybe because I was a rare white person?

Here is Georgina.  She made yummy chocolate chip cookies.

This chatty guy was selling beads, shells and necklaces on the beach in Lome.  He wanted 6,000CFA for a necklace.  I got it for 2500CFA.  He smiled as we shook on the deal!

The food was different but very good.  I suffered no adverse gastro-intestinal affect because of it.  That was a bonus.  Suffering from 'Togo Tummy' is not pleasant.

This is spicy Pima chicken with rice and a side order of two kinds of fresh pineapple - my second helping.  SO GOOD!  The white pineapple tastes better.  Erin can tell the difference with her eyes shut!

Here is the wood container that the women pound their grains and corn in.  They also create fu-fu in these things.

I learned that common sense is still alive and well.  Not necessarily in Canada, but definitely in Africa.  They won't try something unless it makes sense to them.  And, if it works for one generation they will likely keep doing it that way until someone shows them a better - and more reliable - way.

Women pounding the fu-fu with big wooden sticks.  I wouldn't mess with these girls!

Fishing boats pulled up out of the ocean in the Bay of Benin, just outside Lome.

I discovered how the Togolese love to celebrate a good result of a soccer match by the national team, the Eperviers - translated 'the Sparrow Hawks' - in the African Cup tournament.  We were caught in an all-out mob as we were driving home from supper on my last night in Lome.  We had jubilant fans hanging off the side and back of our van!  We were barely able to keep driving forward as the throbbing mass of loud, boisterous celebrators were crowding the evening streets.  They were dancing and singing, banging empty buckets or water jugs, blowing whistles, running all over and generally having a huge street party!  Thousands of them!  No, really - THOUSANDS!!  They were streaming past us on the street and sidewalk, all heading for downtown! This was just for advancing to the semi-finals.  The whole city entire country would shut down in a championship victory!

I posted a picture of this guy before.  You can see two of the Togo national soccer team jerseys in the picture.

The baobab tree.  

A village cemetary.  They have a totally different perspective on death there.  

I learned that sitting in the hall for French class in high school was not the best way to learn the language.  I enjoyed the experience and challenge of speaking with the locals, but it would have been more enjoyable with the language barrier being a little less of an obstacle.  Learning Ewe' or Anufo would have been even better.  Alas, my skill with languages are such that a couple of words in each was all I could manage.  

School kids heading to class in the morning in a beautiful small village near Kpalime.

Flowers blooming on a tree in the yard at the hospital in Tsiko

Would I Go Back?

I would.  It was such an interesting and bizarre place to visit.  There was always something different to see even going down a familiar path or road.  The people were fun to be around.  I enjoyed spending time with the Westons, too.  It was so good to see them in person and hang out with them all.  I hope they know they are fortunate to have this experience.  I might be jealous.  I have so many stories to tell from 2 weeks in the country.  You know they have so many more to tell already!

An 11-passenger Land Rover Series IIa, carrying 15 people plus the load on the roof.  This guy had to ride hanging onto the roof rack!

Sunrise in Tsiko

I would have liked to spend more time in Mango working on the new hospital project.  It was really good to see an existing project up and running for so many years in Tsiko, seeing how it impacted the local area, both medically and spiritually.  Maybe 3 weeks over there would have been better?  (Okay, I'd have to have Christine and the boys join me for a trip that long.  That's a long time for me to be away from them all!  And Erin and Nate would likely be tired of me!)

The hospital project in Mango

I think I will have to start saving up, just in case the itch gets a little stronger...

The view from the top of the mountain, looking down on the hospital in Tsiko.

These little guys are everywhere.  I had one running around in my bedroom.  Never did catch him...

Fishermen pulling in for the day, with the Lome port far in the distance.

 Oh, one more thing...

Today, I'd trade the -10C temperatures for the +45C temperatures in Mango.  I've had enough of winter.