Non-Beach Time

The beach was actually only one day squeezed into a busy week.  Our real reason for going to Florida was for a nephew (once removed)’s bar mitzvah.  Mazel tov, Zach!

Shana and Kenan were good sports through the long services Friday evening and Saturday morning, but they really loved dressing up for the fancy dinner Saturday night at a newly renovated historical house.

We spent lots of time with family–Helen’s cousins and aunts and uncles–but also enjoyed sharing our rented bungalow with her sister Susan, Joseph…

…and their son Ishi.

Look, a camera! I'd better act up!

Sometimes we’d all just zone out watching TV…

… or reading our books …

Of course we saved time for ice cream!

And did I mention we spent a day at the beach?

Before we knew it, it was time to pack everything back up and go home.

 

More Beach Pictures

Here are some more pictures from our day at Cocoa Beach in early November.

 

Let’s Go to the Beach!

 

Happy Canada Day!

Well, up here in the frozen north it does sometimes get really nice, and today, the celebration of Canada’s Birthday, as most people call it, was a gorgeous day to go out to Heritage Park  and have some good ole’ family fun. 

Waving their train engineer hats (leftover from Kenan’s train birthday party, yes Mom, they finally came!)  at the real steam engine train that goes through. 

She rode a real rollercoaster ride that has a black cover go over it halfway through.  She said it wasn’t scary at all! 

All ready for his Bar Mitzvah!  They have a new building at Heritage Park, an old synagogue that they really picked up from the Alberta Prairies (near Sibbald, Alberta) and the people working inside actually knew what they were talking about!  The kids asked lots of good questions.  They had a matzah cover with some words on it in Hebrew, and I was surprised that I couldn’t read it… so I asked, and the lady said it was in Yiddish!  Well no wonder…

And now we are all ready to look forward to the Fourth of July coming up this weekend!!

 

Williamsburg Pics again

I don’t understand Picasa Web Album permissions.  Try this link, I think it should work:http://picasaweb.google.ca/nhekman/WilliamsburgVA#5332060807048190146

 

24-hour flu

It’s my turn today.  :-(

-NH

 

Williamsburg, VA

It’s 1775 and we’re not sure if we’re on the side of the British, the French, or the Colonists.

Click here for our Picasa Web Album.

 

Passover Seder

Here are a few snapshots of our seder.  We had a wonderful time with old and new friends.  It was our latest seder ever; the kids were excited they got to stay up until midnight!  

Hover over the pictures for the captions.

Happy Passover!

 

 

 

 

La Tire

We just got back from a maple festival, the annual Festival des Sucres.  French all around us, crafts and face painting and balloons and jumping tents for the kids, and of course “la tire”, though I have no clue how they got snow in the 7 degree weather.  It was a lot of fun, and the kids even practiced the bit of French they know, saying whispering “merci” when prompted.

The timing was perfect, because the kids have been interested in French ever since my Quebec trip, and we’ve gotten a couple of books out of the library recently about such festivals in Quebec.  So we were all pretty excited when we saw the ads around town.

Our camera crapped out a few minutes into the day–it just shows black with occasionaly streaks of random colour–so we missed some of the best parts.

Kenan’s balloon sword and pirate face: 

Shana got some pantouffles and is wearing them proudly around the house, commenting every few minutes that “I remember Grandma has some, and they look really comfy and soft.”

 

Two of a Kind