A magical place

Daddy visited the UBC Botanical Garden on Wednesday afternoon while Gwendolyn was at school. His report of the fun he had, particularly with a particular water sculpture, gave Gwendolyn the bug to go there too. On Friday morning, D. and G. made the trek to UBC together and enjoyed a couple of hours playing and exploring.

Wandering within the Roseline Sturdy Amphitheatre, where "Hypanthium" is located

Even the manhole covers are lovely to look at here

A favourite stone

Jumping in the sun

Walking the labyrinth on the great lawn. Too bad the Minotaur and Hare sculpture has been moved from its sentry post at the labyrinth's opening. Daddy believes it now lives at Van Dusen Botanical Gardens.

And here's a short video clip of the water sculpture. You can't see the sculpture or hear the musical cascading of the water until you are within the amphitheatre's walls, so it's quite the discovery when you first visit.

Watching Canada play...

We are fortunate to have the CONCACAF Women's Olympic qualifying tournament in our neck of the woods, and with the stadium only a few minutes away, it really was a "no-brainer" to attend at least one game. So, on Friday evening, Gwendolyn and Daddy watched Canada play Cuba. What a great opportunity to see women playing sports at a high level! (In case you're not familiar with women's soccer, Canada is currently ranked #7 in the world and has arguably the best all-round player in Christine Sinclair.)

It was a real treat for Gwendolyn, who would normally be getting ready for bed at kick-off time. We nearly made it through the whole game, missing only the last five minutes due to an urgent pee break.

Waiting patiently for the game to start, wearing her Canada colours and clutching her ticket

A view of the pitch just before the players appeared and the national anthems were sung. Singing "Oh Canada" along with 12,000 fellow fans was probably the highlight of Gwendolyn's evening!

Upon returning home, Gwendolyn drew a picture of Canada's best player. Note the maple leaf on the jersey and Sinclair's number 12 (albeit backwards)

By the way, does anyone out there remember Gwendolyn's first women's soccer experience?

Busy, busy morning!

Most mornings, Gwendolyn is raring to go upon waking -- much to the chagrin of her parents, who need to ease themselves into the day (with the help of Mr. Coffee).

Yesterday morning, she was bouncing from activity to activity, and all before eating much of a breakfast:

Plenty of painting

Crushing eggshells: a favourite "work" of the first year Montessori crowd

Mixing her "batter": a bowl full of the snow she stored in the freezer overnight

After breakfast, she danced her version of "The Nutcracker":

Then it was off to Arts Umbrella for Creative Dance class. And finally, it was time for school...

Phew!

January 16th: the first snowfall of 2012...

...and Daddy and Gwendolyn were out early for a walk around the neighbourhood:

Card shark

Gwendolyn learned the good old card game of "Go Fish" over the holidays. She often likes to play a game or two with Mama, particularly on rainy Sundays like today. The rules are still a bit flexible, and she's not the best at keeping her cards hidden, but overall she's getting the hang of it quite nicely.

There is one silly variation at our house: instead of saying "go fish," we sometimes substitute the name of an actual fish:

Gwendolyn: "Mama, do you have a queen?"

Mama: "Salmon" (or "Clownfish" or "Guppy" or "Trout...")

VanDusen Festival of Lights: photo gallery

Yikes - it's Bumble!

Getting a close look at those nifty lights

A garden aglow

Santa seems to have abandoned his sleigh...

Daddy's favourites: the funky flower trees in the reflecting pond

Post Christmas round-up

A happy and peaceful new year to you all! Here is some of what Gwendolyn has been up to the past week or so:

Grandpa came to visit, and brought some modeling clay to play with

Brrrrrrr -- a brisk, late afternoon stroll along the seawall

Now this was a BIG EVENT: Gwendolyn's first trip to the ballet. Mama and G. enjoyed Alberta Ballet's production of "The Nutcracker" on the afternoon of New Year's Eve.

Some New Year's Eve painting fun with Zoey. This year, Gwendolyn managed to stay up past the stroke of midnight -- likely the result of the day's excitement (the ballet, Zoey's visit). It was also the first time Mama and Daddy made it past midnight in many a new year. We all paid for it the next day, though...

Visiting VanDusen Gardens' Festival of Lights (more photos to come in another post)

How the holidays have flown by! We have one more day away from school, then back to see Ms. Cindy, Ms. Chris and Gwendolyn's pals at Family Montessori.