On New Year's Eve, we decided to go Snow Shoeing on Cypress Mountain for the afternoon. It was an amazing day (look at the pics!). In the photos are IBM friends Shane/Tammy and Chris/Christine (Christine's sister was with us as well). Other than an awesome head butt move from Atreyu on Nicole, it was a fun time. We followed up with an evening of drinks and food to celebrate the arrival of '05.
We had a busy Christmas as per usual! We spent a couple of days in London visiting with family and friends (Nic's dad and grandma, Rick, Lynn and the kids, Julie and the Peever-Bain family). We then headed with Nic's mom Sandy to spend Christmas proper with Andrea, Ky, Zea and Den's mom Nicole. It was a fun family event filled with lots of food/drink, jigsaw puzzles and sitting by the fire. The most fun was watching Zea's face as she opened all her gifts!
In our 5 years living on the West Coast, we hadn't done much exploring of the Gulf Islands between Vancouver and Vancouver Island. We finally organized to spend a Saturday on Pender Island in late November with our friends Shane, Tammy and their dog Atreyu. It was a fabulous day including beautiful ferry rides, beach vistas, hikes and yummy baked goods and other tasty fare from sleepy merchants on Pender.
In mid-October Nicole headed home to London to attend a work function with her mom to celebrate her upcoming retirement at the end of the year. What Sandy didn't know was that Nicole had also planned a surprise retirement party for her on the Saturday night...and was she ever surprised! About 40 friends and family gathered at The Old City Hall Restaurant to help celebrate Sandy's 42 years at the P.U.C./London Hydro. It was a really special and well deserved night for Sandy. Way to go Mom!
Andrea, Ky and Zea came to London to help celebrate Sandy's retirement but also for a visit. It was the Pruesse's first visit to London to see Sandy's apartment so we had some fun hanging out at home. Zea was the hit of the retirement party...mingling with everyone she met. We also had a chance to take Zea to the London Regional Children's Museum which was an absolute hoot.
We headed to Kelowna for Thanksgiving to visit the Kloss/Dantzer gang. We had a fun active weekend. We hiked up Knox Mountain, went for a monster walk all the way downtown, and Rob ran the Okanagan Marathon for the 3rd year in a row. Go you Rob! At the end of the weekend we continued on to Fernie to further explore the riverfront acreage we had been interested in. As we are posting these pictures, it looks to be a done deal...At the end of November we'll own another 9 acres in Fernie, with about 170 feet of riverfront access. Let's hope a meteor doesn't hit Fernie... or we'll be in trouble!
With beautiful weather for the 2nd straight weekend we headed out early on Saturday morning for the 2.5 hour drive from Vancouver to Northern Washington State. This is probably our favourite hike in the region. It's a good length and took us just over 4 hours. There are stunning vistas the whole way along. This is a must-do for anyone visiting us here in Vancouver.
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We headed out with Java on a vacation over Labour Day weekend. We spent a few days in Fernie renting a great condo on the ski hill. Our visit to Fernie was hectic with some real estate work but we had a great time. We had 30 trees planted on our property (8' Blue Spruce). Highlights also included a hike up in Sparwood and a round of golf with Tad Kondo (Dennis' junior high friend from Calgary). There are also a few pictures of the property we are considering buying on the river.
We also traveled to Nipika Lodge near Invermere/Radium which is a beautiful remote mountain lodge on 1500 acres. We stayed in a great rustic cabin and did a nice hike there. On the way back to Fernie we stopped at gorgeous natural hot springs at White Swan Lake provincial park.
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Dana, Rob and the three girls visited with us prior to their vacation in the Gulf Islands. It was great fun and the girls are growing like weeds.
- More shots of our friends Brian, Megan and their little guy Aidan. He's now 8 months old and getting cuter every day! We've spent lots of time with these guys this summer taking turns hosting BBQs on our decks.
- We've been on 3 significant hikes this summer. Two long day hikes and one overnight hike. The two day hikes were to Lindeman Lake/Greendrop Lake and St. Mark's Summit. Both were local hikes around Vancouver and we were joined by our friend and Den's colleague Chris and his dog Toby. The overnight hike was at Golden Ears Provincial Park and it was a true test of our stamina. Even Java was exhausted after this one!
During a district meeting here in Vancouver, Nicole had a chance to do some team building with her colleagues in the form of boating on Howe Sound. After a quick lunch in a park in Horseshoe Bay, the group rented 3 boats and toured around Howe Sound for a few hours before heading out to dinner.
Our friends Ted and Tina and their little girl Genevieve came for a visit in July. It was a fun week of catching up as they used to live out here up until 6 months ago when they moved back to Ottawa. We had a chance to host a couple of BBQ's as well as hook up with a bunch of friends/IBM folks over at Chris and Chrstine's. Genevieve is one very happy kid as you can tell from all the smiley pictures. She had a chance to meet a potential future suitor in Aidan...
We headed into the Southern Okanagan for the 3rd Annual Canada Day weekend golf trip. Since our friends Ted and Tina have moved back to Ottawa, our friends Shane and Tammy joined us for a fun weekend of golf, swimming, wineries and as usual, LOTS of fresh Okanagan fruit (especially cherries). We stayed at the same amazing B&B we had discovered last year, Morbrook Farms, and had a fantastic weekend. We took a detour on the Saturday and met up with Nicole's colleague Deb and her husband Michael (who we spent time with in Arizona) for a round of golf and a drink at their gorgeous house overlooking Skaha Lake. A definite highlight of the weekend was an amazing meal at Burrowing Owl winery, sitting outside on their deck overlooking the vineyard.
On the last weekend in May, we went to Trois-Rivieres Quebec to celebrate the 65th Wedding Anniversary of Dennis' grandparents Paul and Yvette. The entire family was on hand to celebrate this amazing event. Everyone had a chance to talk about some of their favourite family memories and the great-grandkids put on a little show in honour of Paul and Yvette. The following day we had a chance to go and see Paul and Yvette's new home in Cap-de-la-Madelaine. Can't wait until the 70th wedding anniversary!
Nicole won an incentive trip through work so we were treated to an amazing trip to Sedona Arizona. We decided to extend the trip and go down early for a visit to Tucson Arizona. We stayed at the Hilton El Conquistador in Tucson which had 45 holes of golf, tennis facilities, as well as pools, hot tubs and a water slide. After 3 1/2 rounds of golf and lots of Mexican food in Tucson, we headed up to Sedona to meet up with Nicole's colleagues for an unbelievable 5 days at the Enchantment Resort. Highlights of the trip included an amazing hot air balloon ride, two more rounds of golf, more tennis, seriously yummy food, and a chance to spend time with a lot of really great people. We were also treated to a facial and couple's massage at the world class Mii Amo Spa, located on the same property as the resort. Dennis and I had our massages outside in a tent right beside the red rocks. It was seriously amazing (except Dennis was bitter he had a male massage therapist!). Overall, it was a once in a lifetime experience.
Andréa, Ky and Zéa came for a visit for their March Break. They spent a few days with us and then headed to Vancouver Island so Zéa could meet her Great Grandma Jean for the first time. Highlights of the visit included watching Zéa make best friends with Java (Zéa especially liked feeding Java from her high chair), a visit to Granville Island and lots of long walks. Zéa was also right on the verge of walking so we had lots of fun helping her try to take her first steps. We continue to be amazed at how fast she's growing and turning into a little girl.
- A few shots of another snowshoe adventure on Cypress Mountain
- Our friends down the street, Megan and Brian had a little baby boy,
Aidan Rhys on December 4, 2003. Included here are a couple of shots of Aidan in his first couple of months.
- Nicole's friend and colleague Nadine married her honey Dave Pavan on April 23. The wedding was held at the Brock house here in Vancouver and provided a spectacular setting for the ceremony, on the beach with a view of the mountains!
