time on the island part one

every year we spend a few...maybe a few more than a few...days with my mom on the island. i'm pretty sure she waits with anticipation for us to come...and then for us to go home. we make her do the impossible, but she is joins us for every adventure, in fact she plans them herself.

day by day this is what it looks like to spend ten days with my mom.

saturday

we arrived in the early afternoon with enough time to have lunch with my grandparents and great uncle frank. lunch is always my favorite at this house, cheese biscuits, pickles, and tuna buns. we sat outside and played police man, dragging my 6"4 grandfather off to jail for being bad and then ran around the backyard trying to escape said man by crawling under the fence by the potted plants around the patio...my heart soon settled and we continued playing police man.

sunday

the beach called us by name. we walked the long trail by sitting lady falls to wittys beach. that's home for me, a place with many memories and stories. we packed a lunch and after playing, some of us ate like queens while others swatted bees, made sure plates were full and everyone was happy. we built sand castles, hunted for crabs, found a massive crab, played kitty in the sand, found out that my oldest would rather live with her nana, made (a bit of) fun of my mom, laughed pretty hard about it, continued building the sand castle, later jumped on the castle and then eventually, much later, we began our journey home.

monday

my mom took the girls "back to school" shopping. i thought about it later, really it is such a blessing to have someone in your life who cares enough to offer help in a small way (huge really), like offering to help you buy your kids some new fall clothes. a blessing. we couldn't do that on our own, at least not the way my mom provides. for that i want to say thank you. thank you for taking care of my kids in a manner that seems to excite you, for providing something simple yet so necessary. i think it is a quality that i saw come out in you more than ever before. you care for others, you protect them, you offer others care in a way that is far more than deserved.

tuesday

the museum. i had this idea in my head ever since we took the preschool group to the fort langley historical museum, and i was so excited about the potential to take the girls to the royal british columbia museum. so we went. with mouths opened wide and an exclamation of "wow" at the entrance to every exhibit we explored the museum. we took the girls to the imax show of "born to be wild" and sat with eyes glued to every moment...and hands full of crackers. it was amazing and beautiful. we explored the rest of the museum and sailed with captain george vancouver, panned for gold during the gold rush, visited the old town and sat to wait for the train. we discovered sea life from a submarine and experienced the ice age with a rather scary mammoth. kinda looking forward to the next time we can go.

wednesday

fort rod hill. one of those places that the girls can run, that they can learn (i think, i hope), that we can explore. we traveled here with our steady and true fort rod hill gang. this year we were able to watch a navel ship come into port from the light house, and it seemed to make the experience even more real. we explored the underground tunnels and maybe even preformed an act or two, maybe this was my highlight. we picked up beach rocks and shells and the girls were taught to collect things from their auntie shan.

the next few days and adventures are yet to come...