February 2016

Teaching your kids to ski at Cypress isn't easy.  There isn't a bunny hill really - the easy rider run is quite steep and in the dust over ice conditions we got, quite challenging.  Cypress does have a smaller hill and a magic carpet but it's only available to kids in classes which were booked up months ago.  Don't get me started on how much effort is involved with getting a three and a five year old from the car to the bottom of something ski-able.  It's isn't easy for the kids either - getting started generally means a slog stepping up a small hill followed by very brief slide down the slope where they try in vain to not fall down.

For Nara I found some success with her doing pizza down the slop holding onto a pole that I was also holding while I skied backwards in front of here (reverse pizza).  It's not super easy to do, but it did give Nara a sense of balance and the sensation of turning.  Considering she only skied for a few hours, she did make some good progress.   Claira was harder - I tied skiing with her between my legs (again sharing a pole) but she often went limp noodle when things were hard.  The difference in skill between a three year old and a five year old is night and day. 

My sister organized a birthday party for James just down the street from where she used to Live in Surrey.  The gym was pretty good, but the staff were amazing - in very short order they had all the kids names memorized and had no problem holding the kids attention for structured activities.  The layout naturally lent itself to parents on one side (chatting) and kids on the other side playing.
 

The last 15 minutes was reserved for birthday songs, blowing out the candles and eating cake. 
 

Nara has Chinese class on Sunday mornings so we often try to fill in the time with a walk outside.  I like the Richmond Nature Park so we stopped in.  I was hoping to see a hummingbird up close or a bird I haven't seen before, but no luck.  Still, it's nice to see the wide variety of birds their feeders attract.
 

So as we left the park and passed the empty lot next door I was surprised to see Coyotes walking by.  I have seen Coyotes before in Richmond but that was at dusk and fairly deep grass - not at 10am in a very exposed field.  I pulled over and took a few photos as the animal slowly walked away.

I looked it up when I got home a few pieces fell into place.  First, this Coyote has mange.  You can see his tail is nearly bald and his coat is pretty splotchy.  Apparently, if you see an animal walking around during the day, it is most likely sick.  The combination of increased heat loss from a poor coat and poor overall health means it has probably been push off of prime locations and has to eat in "sub-prime" conditions.

At the start of Febuary Bob asked if anyone wanted to do a photoclub meeting.  No one had work to show so we thought of doing a photo walk instead.  Product deadlines and weather didn't really agree so we (Galo and I) wound up going on a rainy Friday night at the end of February: