Day 92 - Oakville - Friday 5th November

Whilst everyone in UK was blowing themselves up with fireworks, I took the boys skating again tonight.

This time it was a general public skate. There were loads of kids showing off, accidentally crashing into girls or tentatively holding one by the hand, perhaps even for the first time. Most of these kids here were on the ice 2 weeks after they could walk, so they were somewhat better than us. But we didn't let the side down. Julian was more cautious than Sammy, who won the prize for the most spectacular and the most, wipe outs. It's lots of fun and the boys are just so keen to go again, which we are doing on Sunday with a group of friends.

We have been enjoying having Jenny and Lucy with us. It's so great to be able to share our story so far with friends (family really) who knew us in UK. They went up to Toronto today and tomorrow we are all going to Niagara Falls for the day. It's about 1 and half hours from here and there are plenty of things to do for everyone as well as seeing the falls of course. We even managed to take the girls out on a boat ride on Thursday. We had a spectacular fall day with only a light wind so we took off up the lake to take lunch in our favourite restaurant. It were grand. Especially as the boat is usually out of the water by mid October. We pushed it as we were hoping that we could do one last trip with the girls and we did it.

For the last week and for the next 4 to 6 weeks, I am going to school everyday and teaching Julian's class to juggle. The teacher was talking to the class about juggling and Julian (bless him) blurted out that I could juggle. The teacher grabbed me and asked me if I would take it on. So every morning now I join the class and do 10 to 15 minutes of juggling with them. We started with 1 ball from hand to hand. Then moved on to 2 balls and today (they learn so quickly at this age) we started with 3 ball; throwing them but not catching. I think that within 3 weeks half the class should be able to juggle 3 balls at least 10 times. We shall see. It's great fun. The kids are sooo eager to learn how to do it. They listen to every instruction and hang on my every word. Unbelievably, Julian is also playing along and can now successfully do 2 balls with ease.

Julie is preparing for her "Apple Pie Workshop". She did another poster for it tonight and runs the class at school next Tuesday. She is also helping in Sammy's class with the quilting lessons. His class is producing a quilt for Christmas. Each child produces a design and then creates a 12" square patch which are all sewed together to produce a bed size quilt. This is a very traditional Canadian thing and quilt shops, books, events, museums and courses are all over the place. Julie is also helping produce hand made and decorated photo albums for sale at the Mistletoe Market (Christmas Fair) to be held in the local art centre.

Julian has been for a sleep over with a friend. He went last night, a school night! He was very keen so we sent him to school with his jimmies and his bunny rabbit in his rucksack. Apparently he had a good time but is unable to tell us much about it. He is enjoying his needlework (cross stitch) at school and is creating a piece of his own design. He has made a couple of friends who he looks out for and seems to enjoy playing with during recess times. He did have quite a problem during these break periods to start with Whenever there is unstructured play periods, Julian seems to find it quite difficult to join with other kids games. When he does, he starts wanting to change the rules and this of course causes a bit of an upset. Anyway, he seems to have overcome this at the moment and seems to be playing with different boys rather than getting stuck with the same group all the time.

Sammy is forever crocheting. He has the bug big time and has just finished his first hat. This week they had a lady come in and spin the wool for them to use. Next week they are going to the farm to see the sheep who donated the wool. It's really great for them to see the whole process from sheep to hat. They do about 2 hours of crocheting a week in lesson and quite often keep going over their lunch periods too. He has a waiting list of boys who want him to go over to their place for a play.