Mild winter

It has been a very mild winter this year with only a few snow and ice days. Sitting in the sun at the porch in March does not happen often.... However, Mary always loves her heating blanket...

I completed another jigsaw puzzle; a challenging one in black and white (a photo of the first Canadian Tire store in downtown Toronto).

Nice dinner (with a view over the Niagara Falls) in The Keg celebrating Tom's 70th...

Opa Vandenboom birthday

Jos Van den Boom (Mary's Dad) turned 94 today (my Dad would have turned 104 if he were still alive yesterday). Brought him a coffee this morning during my walk along the local hills. Mary had bought the balloons for the lunch we had last Saturday at Sue & Ralph. She asked me to put them on his chair in the dining room.

Oops...., the 4 turned on me when I got ready for this photo... In the afternoon we had some cake with Opa at Sue & Ralph's place. Karen - Mary's friend who takes Opa every Thursday afternoon for an ice cream - brought Opa a funny hat + an ice cream cake.

The two sisters who look so amazingly well after their father every day of every week. Opa regularly comes over to our house to spend some time. He either does a sleep in one of our comfortable chairs, watches some TV or we play some rummikub together. He loves getting some "haring" (herring) and then his smile is great....

On that same table I put out every now and then a 1,000 piece jigsaw puzzle; doing a black and white one at the moment. Because of the mild winter so far, I walk almost every day. To the local community center (to play pickle ball, play bridge or watch some hockey games) and along several of my favorite walks in the area.

Christmas 2023

This year we had our family Christmas dinner together again at the home of Susan and Ralph. Mary and Hilary also contributed with a few delicious dishes. Shayd and Parker were missing because of their jobs this time, and we celebrated early because Hilary also had an ER work shift on Christmas Day. We all had a full plate of wonderful food in good company...

After dinner we had fun with poems and gifted Christmas ornament gifts. Spencer outdid us all again with a very smart poem. This year he had my name, but he managed to roast everybody. Parker and Shayd were present on-line. The ornaments gifted to Joe (creative handiwork from Ralph) and to Opa (his favorite bacon) were just a few examples of everybody's creative spirits.

The next day Opa spotted a Christmas car (fundraising activity for local foodbank). All of us spend two hours in the morning being active in the gym of our local community center playing pickle ball).

And after the family sports event, soup and sandwiches at our place, everybody went home again, including Hilary and Poncho back to Vancouver. A few very nice days together!

People in places

Marcy did send us this photo of Joe having a haircut near their resort in Belize; outdoor service. They spent ten days in the sun at a place which did not appear to have many other guests. From one of the Caribbean islands I received a photo of a former Seneca colleague (Shalini on the left) and a NC graduate and now member of the international team at NC (Derek on the right). They were both at work promoting studying in Canada.

And my group of university friends celebrated last week that it has been 49 years ago we all started our study programs in Delft. Next year a reunion is planned in the south of France....

The NC international team has built further on initiatives started some 15 years ago in the spirit of global education. Earlier this week I attended a celebration for three groups of NC students who made a short trip to Ireland and Costa Rica accompanied by two faculty members. Before and after those trips they completed a for-credit course called "Be World Ready". Vice President Sean spoke to them and it was so good to see the positivism of everybody about their experiences.

It was rainy, snowy and cold weather the past two weeks, so I decided to start a challenging jigsaw puzzle of a winter landscape. Took me ten days of patient brain practice. Just completed it tonight.

Being entertained

A few weekends ago I was invited for an event at Niagara College's culinary arts training restaurant where a musician from India entertained us. It was nice to see a few former colleagues and enjoy a Indian fusion meal. Vice President Sean was the MC of the evening...

Our son Mark installed some software on our TV which allows access to watch soccer games from around the world. Entertainment for special tournaments or a good game on a Saturday or Sunday morning. Watched a game between Manchester City and Liverpool. Also a Euro 2024 qualification team of the men in orange against Ireland.

This weekend Fonthill hosted the annual regional Silver Stick tournament. It was fun to watch U11, U13, U15 and U18 games again. And it has been a few years since I considered watching a Zamboni clean the ice in between games.....

The new arena has nice displays up from former Pelham youth hockey teams. We remember well this team coached by one of our friends. That team offered us nice entertainment for a winter season.

November updates

As always, the natural colors during the Fall in Canada were beautiful again. These two pics were taken along one of my favorite walks in our area (the one with the hills).

Colorful was also Marcy's Haloween outfit at her work this year. Susan discovered the use of a power drill to make a unique pumpkin at her door for the trick or treat kids evening...

And Mary put this creature out for the trick or treaters.....

My Dutch niece Monique had an adventurous vacation with her husband in the mountains of South Africa. Marco runs a travel business in nearby Botswana and he used one of their trucks to make this trip with some overnights in one of these camper trucks.

And other nights they would stay in traveler's lodges like this. During the day they made hikes in spectacular settings like the pics below...

Meanwhile Ralph and Susan spent a few days in a yurt in one of the many Ontario provincial parks getting together with several friends. And Opa keeps it at a coffee place across the street....

Finally on this post a FB page photo of a presentation in Brazil of a large social inclusion program I was part of about 20 years ago. It was about access to short training programs for women living in the very poor favela areas of large cities in Brazil. That pilot project became a large national program. Proud to see how sustainable that program proved to be....