But no pictures this time.
I took Atticus to the race track (horses) last month. He was so good and had so much fun cheering for the horses. Since my 'boss' owns and trains horses at Marquis Downs (and all across Canada, actually) we got to go back to the barns and see her horses and pet some noses.
While we were watching one of the races a middle age lady came over to us and struck up a conversation. We ended up picking horses to cheer for together and having a rather long chat about my work. After almost an hour of talking she offered to buy us ice cream. It was then that I introduced myself and Atti and discovered she is a good friend of my Mom's that is quite involved in the Asian community. It was really neat to find out that she actually knew a lot about my life already and, she wanted me to point out, she offered to buy us ice cream BEFORE she knew who we were.
The heartbreak-of-next-door continues. Atticus chased after Tristan until he escaped into his house and left instructions with his mom to tell Atti 'he needed a break'. I watched from our yard as Atti quietly sat down on their back step with nary a toy or activity to be had. Tristan's mom kept telling him that if he came back a little later Tristan would come out and play, but Atticus would just sigh and quietly confirm that 'I'm fine. I'll just wait for him.'
It was so sweet but so pitiful and I wanted to just run over and scoop his sensitive little heart up. Instead I lured him back to our yard with the promise of a rousing game of hide-and-seek (in which he tells me where to hide and then comes looking for me) and a bike ride (in which we saw Tristan riding his bike - he'd gone out the front door - and I had to explain why he was riding bikes with another friend).
My email was hacked. It's all fine now, but the hacker asked for a $3,000 USD 'ransom' for it back. It took some work to get the passwords all sorted out (Facebook was also an issue), but who in their right mind thinks anyone would give them any money for their email account back, much less 3 grand!?! It certainly has made me more cautious about password and what sort of info I keep in my email account.
We also bought a second car. I'd been digging my heels in over this for some time, but the money we should save on gas should cover the cost of our 2007 Chevy Optra. So far it's been nice to have a little thing to drive to and from work, although I'm sure the Durango will be accompanying me to work during the snowy winter months.
We took the boys swimming to George Ward pool. Usually we go to Lathey if we go to an outdoor one, but it was closed so we headed to my old stomping ground. The lame thing about GW is that the little kids area is, well, lame, but the nice thing about GW is that it has diving boards. Atticus saw the other kids jumping off the 1 meter board and thought he'd like to give it a go. Vin waited in the water near the board and I helped him climb up the ladder. I wasn't sure if he'd jump once he got to the edge of the board but after a quick check with us that it was OK to jump he gave 'er. He was clearly the littlest kid jumping and garnered quite a lot of attention. Dillon wanted to jump as well but I thought people might question our parenting abilities if we let him (although it wouldn't have been much different than Atti jumping). He likely would've wanted me to jump with him anyways.
We also took the kids to ride my horses. Well, one of my horses. The taller 4 year old is the quiet one of the two and I knew she'd be fine with the kids on her if I led her around. I also handed the reins over to Vin and he rode her around the farm on his own. I'm pretty impressed at how level headed and calm she is. It's really too bad one of them has to go because I think with some time they could both be worth a lot more money than they are right now.
Vin and I also celebrated our 4th anniversary on August 2nd. We went to Nagoya for sushi and the theater to see Inception. Can't remember the last time I've been to the theater, but I think it was 'UP' and before that 'Bourne Supremacy' (or something like that). We even managed to go on a Tuesday so we hit the jackpot with popcorn and a drink.
A few weeks ago we decided to ride over to Carrie's house. I anticipated that Atticus would ride in the trailer with Dillon, but as it turned out he rode his own bike and Dillon rode in the bike seat. Vin gathers it's about 4 (ish) km to Carrie's (with a hill, too) and Atticus rode all the way there without any complaint (midway up the hill he did run out of steam briefly). We let him stay to play and Carrie drove him home as riding all the way back would possibly have been pushing our luck.
Took the boys to the EX on the Thursday. We got there at 2pm and didn't leave until 8pm. Carrie and the boys met us there so Atticus would have someone to do the rides with. We managed to see the SuperDogs Show during a short but heavy rain and then it was back outside for more food and fun. Vin had to leave for work at 6, and really, I can't believe the boys made it happily and without incident until then much less until 8. There was some heavy sleeping that night!
I heard of 'Cricket Creek' from someone but had never been there so we took the boys on one of my days off. It's a neat little putt n' bounce/mini golf place that has ice cream and maybe 10 different bounce houses. None of the bounce houses are simply 'bounce' houses, but obstacles courses, slides, rat races, etc. The kids had a great time except almost all of the houses had some sort of ladder that Dill wasn't able to climb so I had to go through with him. They had a HUGE pirate ship with a HUGE octopus that was a great big gigantic inflatable slide. At one point Vin was laying at the bottom with the camera and Atti came down at warp speed and crashed his right eye into the lens. There were tears and blood, but not too much damage. I'd recommend the place, just don't take pictures from the bottom of the pirate slide.
Atticus had his long awaited appointment with a child psychologist. She confirmed that he does indeed have night terrors, but to not worry too much about them a he's in a deep sleep at the time and isn't suffering in any ways and will remember nothing of them when he wakes up. She did say they could lead to sleep walking, though. She also confirmed his OCD tendencies and actual OCD tendencies. She was able to give us some tools to help ease the anxiety he feels and lessen the impact of them. He actually hasn't had too many problems with OCD as of late, but funnily enough as soon as we got home there was a shoe removal incident. But at least it was nice to know how to best handle it.
And, to wrap this review up it looks like we may be having a visitor from Taiwan within the next few weeks. And it isn't who you'd think it would (should) be...
