Wednesday Night ...

Chris worked and I was lonely as I gardened, so Carrie sat on the screen with me as we both worked in silence. Best girl .... She's whipping together house plans on AutoCAD for the new home. Nothing she can't do. 

We got the teachers plants as a thank you. Isaac got flowers for Mme Roseveaux and Elliot chose a huge tomato plant for Mme Goble. I took a few home too ..... 

Created a little privacy screen of flowers!

Typical summer night around here; Isaac was painting and trying his hand tonight at Watercolor (or he'll be reading, playing piano or jumping on the trampoline)

While Elliot plays on the trampoline;

I have a good feeling about this summer ...

Afternoon bike ride ....

Took the 5 boys to the forest research trails this afternoon .... They were all pretty excited .... Especially the zalinko boys ... They all had their helmets on and bikes ready within minutes ....

My chain fell off halfway through so Marty helped me out ....

The gang ....

After our ride, it was time for a swim!! (With our clothes on!)

Jean shorts and all !!! Marty and I both had jean shorts ....

The Odyssey - a classic book to finish grade 7 with.

My boy has a teacher who walked by his desk last week, and casually put this book on his desk and told him he could have it.  This was her copy, with her name in it, underlined and highlighted, a loved copy.  I am beyond thrilled with this transaction, that not only did she think he could handle a classic such as this, but that he hasn't been able to put it down since he received it.

Open House 2017

1,300 people - a stark change from the 150 when we started here 16 years ago .... Such a hit! And such a smoking hot day!!!!

My sweet workmate Randi came and spent the day with me.  She had never been to camp before, and she initially wasn't going to come because she had to throw her son a birthday party.  I convinced her to bring her gaggle of boys and let them run while we hung out.....it was a successful 'birthday party' complete with cupcakes at the end on their way home.

My awesome husband, enjoying the day and all the joys that come along with people oogling over all his amazing projects!  He has milled wood from trees and used that wood to (almost completely single handedly) build the new gear shed by the canoe beach and has sided the interior of the entire gym.  See picture below of the new beautiful gear shed!!  What a guy!

The family stayed after Open House and hung out....it was nice.

Oh and while open house was starting, Laura was off on her own getting this done!:

Finally summer!! You've arrived!

Just in time for the open house .... We got a little preview of the new inflatable and a little quality time with the camp wives. 

GRADE 7 !! All done at Mount Prevost!

I was there early to get a good seat, and walked in to the band playing Canon in D, Beauty and the Beast, and a couple other songs that got me teary ....

Here are the 3 amigos ... the 3 boys who love their screens ... they play minecraft with eachother in the morning ... yesterday Elliot was at Keagans house and they made a youtube video on how to do a walkthrough on Minecraft.....it was cute ...

Pedro, or as I like to call him "The rooster in the hen house" ... has loved my boys for 8 years ... he walked me through the hallways when Isaac and I were looking at him starting kindergarten there 8 years ago!  He started his speech to the grads today and spoke on the day they came for their orientation day ... and how little they were, and I REMEMBER that day!!

  I mean, here is Isaac on his FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN:   (Also note, this was Chris's t-shirt on his first day of kindergarten too -- I mean, don't you just want to CRY and gush at all the feelings????!!!!)

And here he is on his Grade 7 grad day!!!

Even Chris made it!! 

LOL ... please note the photo-bombing brother in the background!!!

Classic Isaac!!

No idea who the kid on the left was, but he was looking awkward like he wanted to pose with Noah and Isaac too .... but NOAH AND ISAAC!!!  Since Kindergarten!!!  I love Noah ... such a great friend for Isaac ... their friendship is one of the saddest parts for me of him transferring schools next year .....

OUR BOY!!! GROWING UP!!!!!

Crunch time....

Painting some beams for Chris last night as the boys played. It's tough watching him at the moment. So alone, nobody around. Last night they were working on the new inflatable because it wasn't blown up yet. (He ordered it from China, waited months, went over to Vancouver on Monday to get it, shipping dept gave him the wrong package, he was sick about it overnight, got a hold of them the next day and was thrilled to hear they would ship it to camp since it was their error and it arrived yesterday!!). After making all new concrete anchors for it (hard!!! Heavy!!!), around 4:30, he told David and the lifeguards to finish inflating it.   He came back at 6 and the blowers were still running, the inflatable had over inflated and many of the interior supports broke and there were no staff to be seen. He's been sick about it all night. Stewed all evening while I helped paint, he fell into bed at 10 but was up at 3. 

Things are hard right now, but they are always hard at this point in the year. It's really hard to watch. I'm just trying to make sure he's fed .... The inflatable situation is brutal. (Just that cherry on top of everything else) He had a dream of kids playing on that inflatable and being able to hang out together on the top of it. And now it balloons out so kids will slip off the top and the bottom balloons out so it will rock in the water now.  He's so calm though. I admire that.  Oh, on top of all these projects, he's also planning an amazing program of games for the campers and it's going to be amazing.  I don't know how he does it. I just stay out of the way and let him do his thing.  It's 6:30am, he slept in, (lately 5:30)....but he's gone now. Off to hit the day!! Love him. 

Work is in the crapper right now ...

For some reason there has been super strain between Linda and I at work. Not sure why, it started a few months back and I asked her about it and thought we had worked it out. (Super weird reason that included her being offended that I offered to pay for something to help her)....So an increase of negative energy and quiet aggressiveness has been coming my way for awhile now.  I brought it up once and won't again.  I've been so supportive and since we were hired 5 years ago, I've had her back when others get offended by her sharp edges. But that's over, I now only offer her calm professionalism now. Sad but true. So work isn't awesome now. No more office for me either,  just a wall against the cubicle of another worker (who also has a window)...and an angry coworker..... So music is my happy place while I work lately. Upside is that it also makes me look abit unapproachable..... Right?

Oh and the red door behind me?  That's the bathroom and I can smell it every time she poops. Awesome right?  Good thing the pay is great. 

Oh, and I love who we work with when we are out in community...pretty sweet ladies. That's Catherine in the middle, looking all weird lol. Sun was in her eyes. She apologized for wrecking the pic.  But these are all service providers who love our people with disabilities. They are awesome and go above and beyond. 

"Self advocates year end picnic". So glad Catherine and I went. Good reminder to stick with it .... Though there are crappy parts .... no job is perfect and this one comes with some great benefits for people in our community with disabilities. 

Mary stays over

So we planned it for over a month. and a bunch of things tried to happen to stop it, but she made it and we played and laughed and exercised and it was so good ... For both of us.  

She's the only one who gets what I do at the job, she's the only on in my adult life that I've met and just knew she was my friend, immediately, like upon first sight!  She's an important girl and it was a really great 24 hours. 

Already missing the drive ....

It's when they are locked in the car with me for an hour a day .... I've gotten to know things about their day that I probably wouldn't have been told had they not been locked in the box with me every day for over an hour.  I'm already, genuinely, sad that these commutes are almost over now that they are going to a school just down the road in the fall. It's been (mostly) a joy to spend the start and ends of our work/school days together with nothing to do but read or talk together.