Last pics from Nova Scotia, Grey Gatineau

Emma's was the toothiest, mine (in the middle) was the meanest, and Nathan's was the silliest!


Very scary witch and vampire! Halloween night was so warm that the kids wore T-shirts under their costumes and weren't even chilly!


Nathan turned 7 in Nova Scotia.


Emma and I made apple pies with apples we'd picked ourselves!



Emma on Grandma's deck. Sunny and warm in October.
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Juleta here. I haven't managed to get the kids in a blogging mood since arriving in Gatineau 3 weeks ago, and there's a lot to recount! Some things I'll remember about our time here include

• Grey skies! I suppose we did have some very warm and sunny weather earlier in November - but after days and days of grey skies this prairie girl is suffering from the seasonal blues!
• Our amazing visit to the RCMP musical ride barns. We lucked out and watched a practice session where the riders did a complete run-through of the routine for us. Magnificent horses, beautiful riding -and we were the only ones in the audience. Emma and I were in horse heaven. Nathan liked it too :)
• Walking in the famous Gatineau hills. Very nice. Though I wouldn't trade Kananaskis country, or even the Weaslehead for anything...
• Going for a weekend run past 21 Sussex Drive on a clear, warm day, with Oak and Maple leaves covering the sidewalk.
• The patriotic power of the national Remembrance Day ceremony, made perhaps more special by seeing Prince Charles and Camilla.
• The way the wind blows the Canada flag on the top of the Parliament buildings. That flag is never slack!
• My terrible French! Why is my old brain having such a hard time dredging up my University French? Was it really 10 years ago that Chris and I were in France? Nearly everyone in Ottawa and Gatineau is billingual and I wonder if they know how wonderful that is?
• Living in a city again has some conveniences (walking to a grocery store etc.), but the ugliness of the urban landscape is quite appalling. I sure miss the postcard-pretty landscapes of the Minas Basin in Nova Scotia! But even more than that I miss the wilderness of the foothills and mountains in Alberta. Eastern Canada has been so much more intensively used by humans (at least this far South). Farmed, logged, fished. Of course, we are in the process of doing the same thing to Alberta and BC, but somehow I still feel closer to 'wild' when I'm home.

More later -

Juleta