Weekend Recap

We woke up to our first bit of snow on Friday morning.  It didn't last long but it was a sign that winter has arrived.  We bundled up and headed to school and work for some busy days.  

I ordered groceries online to pick up on my way home from work.  It worked out pretty well and I think I will do it again when I don't have time to make a big grocery store trip.  I even ordered meat and produce and it worked out. 

After supper of tacos and the boys went to bed, I picked up my new library book, Tell by Frances Itani. I grabbed the Passchendaele bookmark E got at school that day and what do you know?  the book is about a Canadian World War I veteran just returning to Ontario from the front.  I mean, I knew that when I picked the book out, but had forgotten. I thought it was a neat coincidence.

The next morning I went to my exercise class and then came home for a quick breakfast and shower before we all headed down to Old City Hall for the Remembrance Day ceremony there.  Although this is blurry, you can sort of see that E wore Papa Doug's air force pin on his jacket. 

Q was passed out on the way down there.  He woke up before the ceremony but was content to sit in his stroller (with a few bites of peanut butter sandwich to keep him occupied)

The crowd at the cenotaph. 

We ended up being front row for the parade of the band and various honour guards.

We were all tired when we got home but Dave still went for his run.  I did some cleaning, E watched a movie, and Q napped.  We decided to go to Swiss Chalet for supper because we had a gift card, but while we were there I commented that it was a fitting choice for Remembrance Day since my grandparents were fans of Swiss Chalet so it was like dining with them.

Q made friends with the various tables around us.

E thought he wanted to order the pizza, but we convinced him that the chicken and ribs are the specialties here and in the end he did enjoy that. 

We watched Stranger Things after we got home and finished off the series.   The next morning I got up early (not by choice but I couldn't sleep in).  I prepared some food for our dinner party and Q "worked at E's desk" and kept himself busy. 

We went to church where we observed Remembrance Day again.  The children's choir sang In Flanders Fields in French, and did a great job.  I had a few people come up to mea afterwards to comment on how well E did singing.  I was very proud of him for learning this difficult song.

In the afternoon E and Dave got a haircut.  I watched The Holiday while Q napped and I prepped the rest of the food.  

Dave and I broke into the beer and cheese while waiting for our guests to arrive.

The kids had a great time playing together.  We enjoyed our meal and company.  I served grilled chicken (marinated in lemon, oregano and garlic), greek salad, rice, hummus, tzatziki, and pitas.  And I made a cake for dessert.  Just a white cake mix but I added vanilla bean paste and cardamom to the mix, and then those again plus clementine zest to the icing.  Not too difficult but something a little more special than just a cake mix. 

Chaos in the living room (that was kindly cleaned up before everyone left).

A few tunes on the piano, E was having a great time!

The littles got in on it too.

We completed our night with some Saturday Night Live and Walking Dead.