Category Archives: Family & Friends

Grade 8 graduation

Last night we went to Brandon’s grade 8 graduation (at the nearest high school due to space) and I can’t believe my little boy is so big already!  Sigh I’m totally not ready for him to go to high school but here we are…  The school gave out medals and patches to celebrate and made up enough categories that everyone got something but Brandon got honour roll, the math award (of course the Chinese kid lol), the academic achievement and some other stuff.

LOL he totally doesn’t know how to pose and I tell him all the time that he looks like a robot haha…  He was wearing my suit, a bit big on him but did the job.  School is over after next week and in Sept my little boy will start high school, myself I hated my high school years so I hope that it’s better for him.

I’m so damn lucky, Brandon is a great son and I’m very proud father.

Busy weekend!

We certainly had a busy Victoria day weekend, started with Brandon having a friend sleep over Friday into Saturday.  The kids slept in the basement and Slinky was all over them, he loves guests.  After the friend left, Brandon and took the winter pool cover off and started the process of opening the pool…  I watched the company I used last year do it and it didn’t seem too hard so I figure I’d give it a shot, to be fair opening is much easier than closing, I think I’ll still get the other guys to close it for me as I don’t have a way to blow the water out of my circulation lines.

Sunday I took the family to Bonnechere caves and it was fun!  The drive there required us take local roads so I had a good time going there and back and the caves were definitely unique.  It was pretty warm outside, around 27C but inside it was maybe 15 degrees and very wet since limestone is porous.

Some parts of the cave were very narrow and I had a difficult time moving around with my pack on.  Should have used my camera sling instead and I should have put the wide angle lens on instead of my 24-70, ahh well.  Still it was a lot of fun, I’m not sure if I’d go again as it is a 3 hour drive 1 way but it was great to experience it with the family.

Today Brandon and I continued to open the pool, the water levels are high enough for us to start the pump, add some chlorine pucks to the water (there are lots of stupid bugs grr) and we’ll do some vacuuming out of leaves a bit later when the temperatures are lower.  The pool is green right now but by this time next week it’ll be blue and we can swim woo!

Amazing experiences

The sun ejected a few CMEs the Earth’s way last week and the first hit our planet on Friday and continued throughout the weekend.  Since it was clear, I took Brandon hunting for auroras and it was an amazing experience to s hare with him, to say we were successful is an understatement!

The first photo is of the sun, the suns pots on the right side of the picture, that’s where the storm erupted from.  Friday night the Kp index which gives you a rough idea at how significant the storm was at max, Kp9 and rated as a G5 geomagnetic storm (analogues to hurricane category ratings) and the auroras were so bright, you could see the greens, reds and purple colours with the naked eye!  Each photo is either a 2 or 4 second picture, absolutely wonderful!

Unfortunately Maggie had a badminton game early Saturday morning so she didn’t come with but yeah I was able to share this wonderful experience with the boy. 🙂

Obviously the last two photos have nothing to do with the auroras, that’s actually from a few weeks ago when we went to take pictures of the solar eclipse that came through, also shared that event with Brandon.  Definitely feel very fortunate that I can share these types of things with my boy and I hope that he remembers them forever! 🙂

Quality time!

Took Brandon to Silverdale this morning to do some shooting and it was great!

Brandon got to shoot his GSG-16 rifle, he enjoys it quite a bit and even though he didn’t initially like the recoil from 9mm pistols, he enjoyed shooting the Glock 19 on the steel plates. 😉  The ting from striking steel is very satisfying and I’m glad I can share this wonderful hobby with him.

End of year vacation

We went on vacation to Myrtle Beach (yes again) the last week and while it’s not cold here in Toronto, it was much warmer and nicer down south.  My mom accompanied us down so she and Brandon shared a room.  It was a very laid back vacation, we’ve been there many times so we mainly enjoyed nature and the beach.

One of the days, Brandon and I did break off and go for a nature walk and to do some birding (more on that later), for the short hike it was interesting that it felt like walking around nature at home but I didn’t recognize the trees or leaves on the ground.  We visited WonderWorks, it’s kind of like the Ontario Science Center but a bit more fun oriented.

For birding, Brandon and I mainly walked along the Myrtle Beach and saw a bunch of brown pelicans and seagulls fishing (and fighting over food).  We also visited Huntington Beach state park where we saw the some egrets and a pink spoonbill fishing in the marsh.

I haven’t taken many photos recently and this trip really revitalized my love of photography which was great.  I also spent some really amazing quality time with Brandon, some of the best moments I’ve had in the last little while… On another note, Brandon really liked using the Canon EOS R6, let’s see over the years he went from the Canon T4i to M50 to RP to the R to now the R6, lol what a lucky kid huh.  He did mention how he wished he could get closer to the animals and yeah his EF 70-300mm lens is a bit short, debating if I should get the new RF 100-400 as that thing looks to be a great value.

We came back yesterday afternoon and you could tell Slinky really missed us. A great way to end 2023, today we’ll just be relaxing at home as I’m tired from all the driving and enjoying the last long weekend of the year.

Lynde Shores never disappoints!

This morning Brandon and I went for a walk at Lynde Shores and man I absolutely love that place.

Hearing the wind whistle through the leaves in the trees and the smells of nature it all makes me very happy. 🙂

Maggie is coming home!

Maggie’s dad had surgery to relieve the clot in his brain last week and has been recovering well, well enough that she’ll be coming home for Saturday.  I told her that if she wanted to spend more time with her folks that’s fine but she wanted to come home.  Can’t wait for her to get back!

Birthday weekend (and more)

Since Brandon’s birthday was last Thursday we had a weekend bonanza of birthday events…  Friday we went to African Lion Safari with my mom, Estelle & Georgia.

For Brandon and I, it was seeing the elephants that was special.  They were removed from the Toronto Zoo many years ago and seeing (and smelling) these majestic animals in person is really something else.  It was a great trip and I’m glad that everyone had a great time.

Saturday we had Brandon’s party at home, a much smaller event compared to previous years and since we have a pool it’s easy to entertain lol.

It was a mix of kids from Brandon’s BJJ classes & kids from his current school and the nice thing about kids are they all play together easily.  Oh on a side note, all the kids and one of the parents that stayed loved Sinky lol…  Kept remarking what a great friendly cat he was and yeah he’s a very awesome cat for sure. 🙂

Finally yesterday we had our traditional family gathering to celebrate my mom, Estelle, Brandon, Imran & Frank (not there, had to work) birthdays in August.

It was a lunch thing and we returned home mid afternoon.  In the evening, Brandon and I went for a nice night walk, I love doing that and am glad the boy will join me on those adventures.

A pretty good weekend (especially for Brandon) and it’s back to the salt mines today lol.

Brandon is home!

Picked Brandon up from camp last night and it was great to see him. He said he had a decent week, though was frustrated at the younger kids for not listening and messing around when instructions were given lol yeah that happens.  Next year he wants to attend but as a leader in training instead, he saw a few of the older scouts doing that and thought it’d be fun.

Before I picked Brandon up though I went for a walk with Mike, he wanted to explore the trails at Edward Gardens so I arrived an hour early to take a picture of the bugs and they did not disappoint!

I was using the Canon RF 100-500mm lens and it’s macro capabilities aren’t bad at all at 0.33x magnification (though I’m not selling my Canon RF 100mm macro lol).  As for the park, when Mike arrived, we walked down the main path down to Sunnybrook park.  He wasn’t feeling super hot though so we turned back soon but it was really nice to get out and walk around at least.

With Brandon returning home, I slept much better last night.  He has a lot of experience outdoors so I was not worried something would happen but still I feel better when he’s around.  I’ll sleep the best after Maggie returns from China, right now that looks to be around middle of August but we’ll see.

Brandon’s gone too. :(

Before I get to Brandon being away, let me make a post about what Brandon did 2 weeks ago.  He did equestrian camp at Wake Robin Farms and he quite enjoyed it.  The boy loves animals and while he was the oldest (and only boy) attending he said he had a great time.

At the end of the week long camp, the kids put a show on for the parents and that’s what I took pictures of.  Brandon mainly rode a horse name Texico but he was unavailable for the last day event so the horse pictured is named JJ.  If he wants to do it again in the future I’m definitely game, I think it’s a wonderful thing to learn and I’d love to do horse back riding as well.

Today I dropped Brandon off at Scout camp, it’s Pokemon themed and he’ll be gone the whole week so it’s just Slinky and I.  I’m sure he’ll have fun and he’s very familiar with Woodland trails and I have the week off lol.  Frankly I’d prefer everyone to be home, this week I’m sure I’ll just be an introvert and stay in.