November 2017

This trim was a little longer than most - we have had a lot of tangles recently.  The kids didn't seem to mind until the end when they realized their hair was shorter.

We don't normally get snow in November.  A usual year for us is a few days of snow sometime in January or February.  Seeing snow falling in November reminded me of just how crazy last winter was - weeks of snow on the ground and snow late into spring.  The snow today was a strange confluence of weather - it didn't have any chance to stick to the ground in Vancouver, but you did see the odd vehicle with snow on the roof.

Perhaps because of the strange weather, I found an owl with strange behaviour.  The owl was sleeping in clump of trees about four feet off the ground, right next to a large pathway.  The bird was trying hard to sleep, but the noise from walking dogs would sometimes stir it awake.  I didn't see anything wrong with the bird - it appeared fine, just making strange choices.

One of the challenges was the size of the canvas.  Every new monster you make is a potential treat in the future so a dozens of muffins (three for each kid) was all we could reasonably make.  If we had some event to give them to (bake sale?) the kids could have made much more.

We got a break in the rain and Helen wanted to go grocery shopping so the kids and I got on bikes and rode over to the Olympic Village via the seawall.  Much of the seawall turned out to be closed so we had to detour to city streets which isn't so much fun with a five year old.  We got off our bikes at the Habitat Island and the kids went to play on the rocks.

We rode into the village and had a snack at the bakery.

We got home by lunch time and the kids had a good afternoon indoors after the rain started again.

Iona beach is a great place to see migrant birds during the spring and fall season.  November is not the season - this time of the year you will only see locals.  That said, it's a still a nice part of the world with views of the ocean and river and a mix of pond and shore habitat.  I went for a walk to see what was out on a nice weekend.

One of the highlights of the year for me is the East Side Culture Crawl.  For a weekend in November, artists on East Side of Vancouver open their studios and thousands of people march through.  Some locations (1000 Parker Place) are crazy busy.  Some locations are quiet.

Many artists have policies on taking photos of their work - many are okay as long as you tag them.  I like to photograph the spaces and tools.  Perhaps next year, I'll bring a wide angle lens and actually photograph spaces.
 

 
The kids can't take more than a hour or two of crawling.  This year it was poring all weekend so we did a repeat - the MakerLabs on Cordova.  They had an interactive exhibit where you could leave positive messages on balloons.  The kids really enjoyed making their own addition to the piece and wandering through the tags.

We were a little late on carving pumpkins this year.  The pumpkins sat out on the deck, dry and cold and they were still good to carve a few weeks late.  Naras pumpkin was considerably thinner than Clairas which is why it glowed brighter.  The pumpkins lasted about 3 days before the brown fungus got yucky.