Six Months in Canada!

We've now been living in Canada for six months. The time has flown, especially recently as we now live a regular life, in our own home and have a very regular routine.

At the University of Alberta it is now final assessment time, so Alec and Anita are just about finished teaching for the year! Straight after this we will have Spring term where we will both be teaching for a very short period and then we will have time for development of courses for the next year which commences in September! It's funny to think that if we were in Oz we'd be still just starting the academic year. During Summer we will be heading to Australia for a 4 week visit and we will try to catch up with as many friends and family as possible.

Anita had a lovely birthday on March 31 and celebrated with "close family" with a roast lamb and a glass of wine!

The week before this we enjoyed having the company of Desleigh and Peter de Jonge, who stayed for 4 nights. Desleigh was Anita's Master's supervisor from the University of Queensland and she was in the USA and Canada on study leave. Desleigh says that she needed to come to Alberta to find out "what the fuss was about" and why her Aussie friends had come to work here. She found out why! Really great people to work with and some great areas of OT teaching and research :-)

Over the past two weeks the snow was melting rapidly, the ground was starting to dry out and the puddles had all disappeared... we thought the Wintery weather was "done", but lo and behold, true to predictions by the local forecasters, the Spring snow started!!!
... we had 10cm of fresh snow over the past weekend, the temps have remained low so the snow has lingered on into the week. It is just so pretty and quiet!

A week ago Will played his very first Canadian footy game. He is the Punter (a la Ben Graham). He played well, took the hits well and is playing again soon... well, that is as long as the snow if off the field! Hee hee! See sidebar of the blog for the YouTube link of the very first punt!

We get Geelong's games on cable most weeks and when we can't get the game (such as last weekend), we listen to it on K-Rock via the internet. Isn't it amazing to think that we can virtually live anywhere from here. The final picture I'm including in this instalment is a cartoon from The Age that depicts the mood leading up to the Geelong v Melbourne game. Just think, it kind of came true! Geelong held back!

A quiet week...

This week was a pretty normal one with a regular school and work routine. We managed to also fit in an exciting hockey game where the Oilers won in extra time! Wow, the crowd went wild just like they do when the Cats score a goal!



We also managed to get to the kids' school to see the school production of Annie. It was wonderful! Really this school does attract some seriously talented kids! Sam is keen to audition for next year's production now.

Today we had some fresh snow, which was timely as Sam is off skiing with a friend at Rabbit Hill (about 25 km from Edmonton) and it was starting to get a bit patchy this week with the warm weather (+6!!!). We've got snow forecast for the weekend, which means that the roads will be slippery again and we'll all just slow down a bit.

The kids have Spring break coming up in conjunction with Easter, so they'll have about 10 days off school. Alec and Anita continue to teach over the break (except Easter of course), so we can't really get away anywhere special. Boo Hoo.

It's been really nice over the past few weeks to actually live in our own home, not have tenants downstairs below us and just have space and our own things. It actually feels normal!

Well, only 5 more sleeps until AFL starts! Go you Catters!

Assimilation

Will has signed up to play for the West Edmonton Raiders...

Comments from friends and family:

• "I don't believe it!" (Lynne A.);
  
• "Alec, You look ridiculous." (David B.);
  
• "I bet he has his Cats jumper underneath" (Lisa H.);
  
• "Wow, he so looks the part. Just a shame it isn't blue and white! When you come and visit you will have to give us a lesson on gridiron." (Gayle N.)
  
• "Have you told them that rugby players don't need all that padding crap? Our players are REAL men?!?!?!!!!!!!" (Pip M.)

This single picture got more comments than all postings to date! Thanks! You made Will's day :-)

Cheerleading!

Although Australians (and Canadians for that matter) are cynical about the world becoming too American there are some amazing things like "cheerleading" that are quite special. Despite the make up, the hair, the "image" etc, these girls and guys are amazing athletes! They perform incredible gymnastic feats and the teamwork is truly incredible.

Senior Team from the Victoria School where Will and Sam go to school

Middle school "Pom" team (more like a dance routine)

Elementary School development team
(Sam is at the back on the right)

New Beginnings

It has been wonderful to finally be in our own home, with our own things around us! Even though our household belongings were delivered on February 1st on a freezing -27 degree day!

we didn't move until the 18th Feb... The removalists were great and they had everything in and unpacked by 3pm... they didn't put anything away though, so over the next few days we visited and started to sort things out, and then gradually over the next 2 weeks we moved the items we brought with us in our 12 bags, and the things we have bought since arriving... skis, snowboards, loads of coats, many warm clothes and so on.

Our house has the feel of a "beach house" with the open plan design, light blue walls and light-blue and white kitchen.

Just one thing though... there's no beach, just a back yard still full of snow!

On the day we moved it was so cold outside that the plastic cubes for the esky (you know... the pre-filled ones) were frozen solid! The china was so cold it hurt to touch it and they warned us quite sternly... "DO NOT PLAY THE PIANO UNTIL IT HAS WARMED UP... THE SOUNDBOARD WILL CRACK!" Welcome to Edmonton!

So, the greatest thing about moving into our own place is having our own familiar things around us. Just as the Colletts had said before we left... it finally makes you feel more at home!

Samantha's room is again using the red "hand" chair as the source of inspiration... so off to Ikea we went! Her walls need repainting, but she's happy with the carpet colour... So are we! The blue looks great with red and white.

Will's room is of course, teenage mayhem with a dash of football passion! He has not had time, nor parental input to get sorted out... off to Ikea with him too! He doesn't mind the silver-grey carpet he has, and hey... would we ever see it? So he's going to save us some money too by leaving it down!

Will's Shrine to the Cats

The basement has loads of potential and room! So we're taking time to think about how we might improve that room.

Visitors from OZ

We've finally had some visitors from home! Bringing gifts of Tim Tams, Vegemite and Twisties! It was lovely having friends to stay... even if one person's arrival was delayed two days because he 1. forgot his passport and the 2. Air Canada cancelled the flight on the following day!!!!! Poor Craig!!!

Craig and Paul making dinner

We managed to take our visitors around Edmonton to see the beautiful old architecture of the Glenora neighbourhood...

...watch ice skating on Hawrelak Park

...and a walk over a bridge over the frozen North Saskatchewan River.

They headed off to Banff to ski and attend "a conference" and we fell back into the usual routine...

Life is becoming "routine" as we go to work and school each day, drive the kids to their extra-curricular activities and dig snow from the paths.

Alec is really enjoying working in the Ed Psych department in the Faulty of Education and just loves teaching his students (3rd years, 4th years and Masters students)
... he's been trying lots of new approaches to engaging the students and is getting fabulous results. Alec has also just applied to commence a PhD at the UofA.

Anita is also loving teaching the Masters Level occupational therapy students and has recently applied for a teaching and learning grant at the UofA to look at the use of Wikis in teaching and learning with OT, PT and Speech Path students. Fingers crossed the project is approved.

Sam is enjoying gymnastics and waxes and wanes around being in cheer-leading.

Will recently had braces put on his teeth and was rewarded by his braces-wearing-friends (as they sympathised with his aching jaw and teeth) with a "join-the-club" milkshake. Sam gets 6 baby teeth out soon to prepare her mouth for braces too! Lucky we have a great dental plan through work!!!

So, the weather improved this week and we had bright sunny days and top temperatures ranging from -18 to -6. Truly heaven after last week's cold snap... even the hardened Albertans were complaining last week!

We'll be moving to our own home in the next few weeks and look forward to seeing our things again. We'll update again after that :-)

Just a bit chilly!

Brrr, we've had our first real cold snap! The "cold" we've felt until now was nothing! From inside the house it looks great out there with constant snow falling, it's just beautiful.
The kids are loving it and have rugged up twice today to head outdoors to play. I haven't stepped outside today as it's too cold and windy for me. I stayed in and baked Anzac biscuits (Happy Australia Day) and we also played a game of Aussie Monopoly (Thanks Hutleys!).

It has snowed all day! Here's the weather situation...