Sunday Drive

Since this is probably our last weekend with our baby Honda, we thought we would take advantage of my Sunday off (probably my last for awhile) and go on one final road trip in this car. This is our car looking happy parked at Risser's Beach. I don't think he realizes yet that we're trading him in.

We went on my favourite drive - the South Shore via the Lighthouse Route. I snapped some pictures as we drove along. Here's the 3 Churches (sort of).
We stopped in Lunenburg for lunch (Big Red's of course!). So I took pictures out the window. It's already starting to get busy with tourists. One of these days I'd like to go on the horse tour.

No Bluenose today.

After lunch we went to the beach. Risser's Beach will always be remembered for the tunnel. Sometimes I still get the urge to run through it screaming really loud!
The beach was weird. It was a little overcast, but still warm. The tide was really high, higher than I've ever seen it. There were actually some people swimming, so the water couldn't have been too cold. I didn't find out, though.

The house built into the hill (it's kind of hard to see).

We also drove through Bridgewater and went to Tastee Freeze! It's still as busy as ever, and the Uber-hick in front of us in line was quite entertaining. He was like 40, and totally flirting with the 16-year-old girls working the counter. And he gave them a $1 tip and was all smarmy about it. I love Bridgewater! I still get freaked out by how much it's being built up. Just past the Exhibition grounds, right beside the call center, they have built an enormous police station! I remember when I used to cut through that way on my way to Cari's (when there was only the old deserted hospital there) and be all freaked out. I don't think it would be so scary to cut through there now that the police are right there. There are also traffic lights going in everywhere. And Lahave Street is now directly connected to Glen Allen Drive. And enough said about the Walmart business park. Craziness! Craig just doesn't understand. Cari, when are you coming to visit? We need to go explore together!

Bye Bye Braid!

Well, the tail officially came off today. And it was a huge success. Clara had a great time, the kids gave her a huge cheer, and the raffle raised over $600 for new books for the school. I am so glad I got to be a part of it. Here is a picture that the art teacher drew in honour of the event. This is Clara, the Mr. McKelvie (the principal), and the "Teacher's Pet" (I don't know the story behind this, but apparently there is one).
I jumped into the picture here. Clara's holding the braid just minutes before it comes off!
Drumroll please...
And there it is!
What a great way to celebrate a pre-retirement. The school has such an awesome feeling of community.

So excited!

My former cooperating teacher and close family friend, Clara Mitchell, is nearing retirement, and has been growing a rattail braid for the entire time she's been teaching junior high. But to celebrate the end of her second last year of teaching, she has been selling raffle tickets for the lucky person who gets to cut off her braid. The proceeds will go to the school library and the hair will go to a hair donation programs that makes wigs for children. And I won the draw!!! So this Friday I get to do some chopping. I'm pretty excited, as this is a defining moment for that school. The picture below is a picture of Miss Mitchell with a former student who is apparently a Hollywood actor (was on the show "Hang Time", among other things - I checked him out on IMDB). She's one of those teachers whose students remember her years later. So glad that I got to work with her, and that I now get to be a part of this. There was also an article in the paper about it last week. Here is the link if anyone is interested:

http://www.herald.ns.ca/Search/841080.html

Congratulations!

I just visiting Selena's blog, and was pleased to find out that she has finally had the baby!!! Congratulations Selena and Tom on your new baby boy. Noah Clifton is a great name!

Zoo!!!

In honor of a very rare Sunday off from the restaurant, Craig and I decided to spend Father's Day (Happy Father's Day Dad!) taking Griffin to the zoo in Aylesford. It was a beautiful day in Nova Scotia! Nicest day we have had in awhile. The sun was shining, and the temperature had to have reached 30 degrees in the Valley. The only downside was that the animals seemed to be feeling a little lazy. The lions in these pictures look like they're dead!
This one female lion put its head up for a second, just in time for me to snap a picture to prove they were actually living!

These goats were all chillin' in their cute little hut.

Craig and Griffin and the llama. I think Griffin was a little nervous. As soon as I took this picture, Griffin bolted over to where I was standing.
Here's Griffin glaring at some chicken.
This is for you Cari and Steve!
Craig and Griffin feeding the deer. The same ones kept coming to the front and there were a bunch in the back who were getting screwed out of food. So the boys started throwing them over the heads of the agressive ones.
These tigers were having issues. They kept jumping on each other. I think they were in a fight!

Griffin took this picture. It came out pretty good.

It's the zonkey! Half zebra half donkey. Craig likes the name "Debra" better. Zebra bum.

The monkeys were the best. They have several of them at the zoo. They have the coolest cages, and are always jumping around doing entertaining things. I swear this one was purposely putting on a show for us! Griffin loved them!The brown one in this picture was playing with another monkey, but kept returning to the black one to get a drink. I'm guessing the black one was the mother.
Biggest tortoise ever! Man this thing could move, which is surprising considering it's a tortoise.

At the end, Griffin went on a pony ride. He really liked it, even though they only went around the ring once and most definitely did not go very fast.

This little goat was adorable. I want one! Do you think Craig would notice???

All in all, it was a great day. Happy Father's Day to all the dads!