40 years Sue and Ralph

Fiona decided it was time that her parents had a proper wedding ceremony forty years after they met each other. The two of them did a brief townhall wedding after Fiona was born, but they never had a big wedding party. It had to be a surprise party Fiona decided, so secret planning went on for weeks. When Sue and Ralph arrived at the farm house where Ralph's sister Roos lives (and where they grew up with younger brother Mark and baby sister Tina), we were instructed to hide.....

The setting of the farm is very nice for wedding ceremonies, and both Tina and Roos had their weddings taking place there already. About 25-30 good friends and family were invited for the surprise party for Sue & Ralph. The ceremony master Rich had a fun short speech prepared and afterwards the guests had a nice meal together on a long table in the garden. The evening ended with dancing....

The dress Sue was made to wear after arriving at the farm was produced by Fiona under guidance of Hilary. Hilary also continues to make cute clothes for Brooks and kids of her friends. Brooks showing one of the "made by my Mom" pants (obviously aimed at his rapid growth if you look at the legs....):

Frequent flyer Brooks

Brooks is already a frequent flyer at four months old. The bush fires near Penticton kept going (and are now already burning for three weeks), so from Vancouver, Hilary flew with Brooks to Hamilton to stay with us in Fonthill again for a few weeks. Shayd drove back to Penticton and confirmed that the fires continue and the air quality continues to be poor. It is pure joy to have the little "mannetje" with us again. His smile is golden, but he can also protest loudly when having stomach cramps or when he is not in the mood to do one of his needed sleeps. Nice pics with Mary, Mark and me.....

This week we had a few campers in the "famjam": Marcy, Joe, Sue and Ralph camped in Algonquin Park and had fun cycling and canoeing together. It is a beautiful park just south-west from Ottawa.

In our neighborhood, Bill - who is in his early nineties - lets a bunch of people play at his private tennis court. It keeps him entertained, he says. Recently, Bill was also kept busy by one of the players making wasp catchers from used plastic bottles. He is always a good sport and still handles his beer ok.....

Brooks' first swim

Just three months and a bit, but Hilary & Shayd took Brooks already to their community center pool for a dip. According to the photo, he enjoyed it (sort of). This was just before the terrible wild bush fires started in the Okanagen valley between Kelowna and Penticton. Shayd & Hilary took Brooks to stay with friends in Vancouver, because the air quality was so bad in Penticton, which was also on alert for possible evacuation. The fire fighters work hard to control the fires. 

Hilary and Shayd regularly post photos of Brooks. Hereby a few. Brooks smiling, Brooks having fun with himself in the mirror and Brooks being like a movie-star with sunglasses on a beach. 

Friends in Amsterdam have a grand-daughter born two weeks before Brooks who apparently has similar cool baby sunglasses..... Her name is Luna.

In order to make the looking after Brooks a bit easier for the time being, we are having Poncho as our guest for a while. Here hanging out with Mary on the new deck....

Ralph has been cycling in Quebec last week shortly after the cycling in Holland. Below an impression of the route he cycled there one of the days last week. Quite the distance 5 or 6 days in a row, and also quite the up and down of the road. Impressive....

Beautiful region to cycle for those who have the leg muscles for it. 

In the meantime, I continue my volunteer work at the Welland Tennis Club clearing the clay courts from the weeds and wild grass along the sides of the courts. Three hours of that work was a good work-out, also clearing the patios of some of the weeds growing in between the concrete pads...

New deck ready

Yesterday Mark finished the assembly of our new pergola and it looks good at our new deck. Today I did some finishing jobs around the deck and Tom will come tomorrow to finish the new side stairs including installing a railing. Mary bought some roll-up side-screens which we fixed on the pergola to create a bit more shade for the morning and late afternoon sun which is still very strong these days. Temperatures between 25 - 30 degrees C with humidity factors making it feel sometimes close to 40 C.

It was very nice to have Brooks and Hilary here with us for two weeks, and Shayd joining for the second week. Not really a vacation for him because he worked ten days straight on our new deck.

One more pic of me with the little "mannetje" and off he is again to Penticton, BC, with his parents. We look forward to have them over again in October when Carly & Mark expect their baby girl.....

Building of a new deck

We had lots of people visiting to lend a hand during the renewal of the deck behind our house during the past weeks. Our old deck was constructed in 1996 by a colleague of Mary from the Casino Niagara, so after 30 years the wooden construction was showing its age. Mary wanted a composite deck this time, which is more durable. Shayd and Hilary came over from BC with Shayd coordinating the ordering of the required materials and then the construction activities. Joe, Marcy, Spencer and Wil came from Sarnia for a weekend and with Mark & Carly made a hard working crew.

Mark and I took down the old deck a weekend earlier leaving the frame which we felt was still in good enough shape. Shayd however decided to replace several of the old beams and then we extended the deck frame with new posts and placed black water protection materials on top of each beam.

Shayd gave young Wil some carpentry lessons by making the steps from the deck to the kitchen sliding doors. A team of eight then laid the top deck elements which is tedious work because small connection elements need to be placed in the grooves of two deck elements. 

Shayd showed his carpentry skills in making the stairs into the backyard resulting in a very professional looking end product. Ralph came over for two days of help with the stairs in between their bike trip in Holland and his next bike trip in Quebec. Afterwards came work on the closing in of the deck with siding. Tom came over to work on the railings (Tom and Karen became friends after Mary assisted them buying a house in Fonthill about 10 years ago when she was still doing her realtor work).

A first dinner on the new deck. As a last step the new pergola is being put together. Our work was interrupted today by severe thunder and rain, but we are almost there. Brooks was a little star with all out visitors including Joe & Marcy, Fiona and Macy...

A flash back photo of young Mary, Sue and Joe with their parental grandfather during one of his visits from Holland to the hobby farm where Mary & siblings grew up (Mary is holding their pony). 

Final photo of this post was sent to me by my old Fokker colleagues who had again a get-together in Zeeland where Teun, our manager from those days in the eighties, currently lives.