Riley's Homework

Riley gets homework now from his new school, it's kinda strange because the system here says that they are too little to be at school for more than 12.5hrs a week (which in Riley's case is 2.5hrs every day) but then they are old enough for homework?? Anyways he is loving having homework. He only gets it once a week, usually on a Thursday and he does not have to turn it in until the following Monday. Today he bought home a special bag called "The Rainbow Fish Bag" each child in his class takes turns in taking it home and today it was his turn. They must read the stories that are in the bag (one of which is about a rainbow fish - hence the name of the bag) and then draw a picture of a rainbow fish and write a sentence about it. Riley was so excited going to school today as he knew it was his turn to get the bag and couldn't wait til Emily went to bed so that we could sit down and go through it (the instructions are that parents must go through it with the child). There are also a couple of games to play but we did not get time tonight so we will try to play them in the morning.

This is Riley with his Rainbow Fish homework. He is looking mighty tired but believe me he was very proud of his effort - as was his Mummy & Daddy.

This is the page that Riley did his homework on, the page opposite is the work of a boy who is almost a full year older than him, I think Riley's looks better - am I biased do you think??? LOL

A close up of the homework. It reads: The rainbow fish shared his scales and then he was very happy. Riley Crosby

Riley's new school and 'Wacky Tacky Day"....

Notice anything 'silly'????

This week Riley started school here at Mother Teresa Catholic School. I think it was a relief for both of us that he starts school as he was getting way too bored at home. So even though this is a Catholic school and not a public school there are no school fees!! How awesome is that?! Turns out the tax from our rent will be paid to the school to help fund it. The only down side so far to his schooling is that as he in in Senior Kindergarten (Which would be Prep at home) he can only attend 1/2 days so either mornings or afternoons and seeing as how we arrived just after the school year began all they had left was afternoons so he starts school at 12:20pm and I need to pick him up at 2:50pm, some days it is more of a pain in the butt than anything but I figure that next year when he is in Grade 1 it will be easier as he will be there for full days again. So he started on Tuesday and we were informed that Tuesday was also school photo day so he has already had his face in the class pic which I just think is so funny. On Wednesday he came home telling me that Friday was "Wacky Tacky" day. I didn't hear anything about it from his teacher so on Friday morning I called the school and confirmed what it was all about. Basically he had to go to school dressed 'wacky' so Riley decided that he was going to wear all his clothes back to front and then wear mis-matching shoes and socks! He had a great time dressing up silly and after I picked him up from school we went to the supermarket and he still insisted on staying dressed up silly.

And a pose just for good measure......

Our First Canadian Week.....

The view (through the mesh screen) from our Lounge Room in our hotel room.

I can't believe that we have been here over a week already. So far things have been really great for us here. We picked up a hire car at the airport when we arrived and it was a Dodge Caravan - one huge arse minivan which we duely filled with all our luggage. The next day we swapped it for a more economical car, the guy at Avis had us down for a Hyundai Sonata but when we got there we asked for something esle so that we had the opportunity to drive a car that we would not have in Australia and so we are now driving a Pontiac G6. It is quite a nice car, very close to the ground though kinda like a race car. Driving on the WRONG side of the road has taken some getting used to and I still have to have my thinking cap on, especially when I go to turn left. I have also hit the car door a couple of times looking for the gear stick or handbreak (as they are now on my right as opposed to on my left in 'normal' cars LOL) but all in all it has not been too hard. The kids and I have been out house hunting most of last week with our appointed Real Estate Broker. All of the houses here have basements which is a totally new thing for us and Riley has been having a ball discovering what the basement of each house we look at holds. The neighbourhoods here are just gorgeous too, so clean coming from Joburg, there are so many beautiful trees and I am really looking forward to seeing them change colours as we approach Fall (or Autumn as we know it) and then again in Winter being covered in snow. The hotel we are staying at is really nice and the staff here are all so friendly too, both kids seem to have made a good impression on everyone (thankfully) and so everyone knows us when we come downstairs for brekky in the mornings or dinner in the evenings which is nice.

Brad and the kids surfing the net.

Today we went and explored a little of the waterfront here, Lake Ontario, we picked up a couple of pizzas for dinner and ate our dinner overlooking the water. The feel of the place reminded me so much of Mackay Harbour about 15 years ago which was really nice. After we ate we went for a little walk along the water and found some people feeding a whole bunch of bread (about 4 big bags full - I think they own a subway type store and were getting rid of the end of day bread rolls) to the ducks, geese and of course swooping seagulls. We stood and watched for a little bit and Riley asked me if we could ask the man to share his bread with us so we could feed them also. The man heard him and came and took him down closer to the water and set him up with a massive roll. So we spent about 10 minutes feeding probably 50 ducks, geese and seagulls. It was so lovely, clean and SAFE to be out there in public and I am looking forward to getting set up in a neighbourhood and getting out more with the kids riding bikes and taking walks etc.

The park that we visited at the waterfront.

Brad and Riley scoping out a nice place to sit and eat our pizza.

Emily looking unimpressed with her lack of freedom.

Riley looking out longingly at the boats, he wanted to go and ask one of the owners if he could have a ride. Not sure how that would have gone down LOL.

Pic of the lighthouse at the end of the pier, there were so many photo ops this arvo but I did not have my memory card in the camera and the internal memory was already full, Dad & Bec you guys would have spent hours there snapping off shots at everything. I will go back again another day soon and take some pics of the gardens there for you both.

The Big Move...

One very tired little man sleeping on the plane on the second part of our journey......London to Toronto.

WE MADE IT!!! Our relocation adventure began on Friday 5 September when the removalists came and packed and moved all the stuff in our house. The next three days we spent doing last minute cleaning and tidying up loose ends. These three nights were spent in a really nice hotel near the Joburg Airport and then on Monday morning we checked out, did some more last minute tidy ups and then flew out at 9pm on Monday evening. It was a 10 hour flight into London and as it was a night flight the kids spent a good deal of that sleeping. We arrived in London at about 7:30am on Tuesday and spent 4 hours in between flights. We decided before we left to join the Qantas club and that was such a good thing too as it meant that our stay in Heathrow was in the comfort of the BA Lounge. The kids got to play in a special kids area where they both enjoyed building towers etc with the blocks and Brad and I watched some news, drank coffee and just chilled. We left London at 11:30am (London time) and arrived at Toronto at 5:30pm (Toronto time) on Tuesday afternoon. The kids were both awesome travellers. I was sure that Riley would be fine, give him his own little TV screen and remote and he is set, but Emily I thought would be the problem seeing as how she would have to sit still and wouldn't have as much freedom as she would ordinarily have/want but she was great. She slept for quite a bit of the first flight and spent the second flight either sleeping, feeding or trying out her charms on everyone around her. At the end of both flights the people around us came up to me and commented on how good my children were so that really made me feel good. So, by the time we checked into our hotel room it was after 7pm (so we were too late for dinner), we ordered ourselves a pizza to be delivered to our room and then went to bed. That's not to say we slept of course.........and by 'we' I mean Emily. The boys happily snored their way through to 8am the next morning but Emily had me up a few times during the night and then decided that 2am was a perfectly acceptable time to start the day. I guess seeing as how her body clock was still on Joburg and it was 8am in Joburg she didn't really have much choice.

Riley with the Bzz Lightyear that he earned on his star chart - took him almost 2 months but he worked hard and managed to earn it the night before we left (good timing eh?)

Emily 'helping' Daddy listen to the movie he was trying to watch on the plane.

Emily and Daddy after Daddy finally relented and just let her have the headset....Does this pic remind you of anything Father????LOL