Good day for riding although the rain was a bit intense

Loaded up the bikes today (first time using the bike carrier) and went for a nice ride at the Dundas Valley Conservation area on the rail trail bike path. This was our first time riding there and I must say it was fantastic. Heading west from the trail centre is a nice gentle uphill on fine crushed gravel - apparently you can ride all the way to Paris Ontario.

Today though we only went to the second road crossing (sulphur spring road I think) before we turned around for 2 reasons. 1) the Sprogs were whiny after 15 minutes and 2) a thunderstorm was threatening.

So we turned around and glided downhill back to the trail centre. Young sprog (age 6) and I kept riding for another km or so before the skies really opened up and we were royally drenched. The young one managed to fly uphill though especially considering he is a fairly tall lad on a 12 inch wheeled bike with no speeds. Pretty impressive.

I think maybe it is time to step up to a better bike - he took a spin on one of these today at Brant Cycle and his birthday is coming up so maybe the time has come to fork over the dough...

Flapping in the breeze!

Doing our bit sometimes means working harder. We have a corner lot in the burbs and we cut it with a reel mower. Takes a bit longer and is more excercise but it is worth it.

In the same realm of harder work is a clothes line. Ontario recently struck the bylaw that banned outdoor dryers off the law books which means that we can all hang our skivvies in clean fresh air and sunlight. Gives a whole new meaning to a good fence makes good neighbours.

So to celebrate the spring sun, new law and fresh breeze we sunk a cedar 4x4 into the ground this weekend and strung our very own Canadian Tire deluxe clothes line.

Very exciting. We'll see how long the excitement lasts - I give it a week of lugging wet laundry from the basement before the novelty wears off.

Changing seasons: time to bulk up

I love the summer, the hot weather, the sunny long days, the camping, canoeing and cottaging. But I also love the fall. And over the last few nights and those early morning commutes, I have noticed that beautiful fall crispness is in the air.

For us this usually means the beginning of the cooking, baking, roasting, red wine drinking and bread making season. It also means a chance to try out some truly decadent recipes from the autumn issue of the LCBO's Food and Drink mag (not on their site yet but available in the stores).



I love this magazine - every shot, as you can see on the left, is perfectly taken to make readers drool and the recipes are fairly good although sometimes a little on the piggish side.

Now if we could just afford to have a wood burning fireplace installed we would be one happy cocooned family.

lead poisoning redux

We have known about the dangers of lead for decades and yet it still poses a real and present danger, just think of the recent toy recalls caused by poor manufacturing monitoring on toys made in China. So I was somewhat surprised to see that the school that my kids attend has high levels of lead in the water.

From the Burlington Post "Tom Thomson and Ryerson elementary of Burlington, the New Street site of the Gary Allan High School for adult and continuing education, W.I. Dick elementary in Milton and Montclair elementary in Oakville now all have minimum daily flushing times ranging from 20-35 minutes."

I understand that older schools can be hazardous but running the taps up-to 35 minutes when we have just come through the driest summer on record just strikes me as a give-your-head-a-shake dumbass bureaucratic moment. I love when our government officials suck and blow at the same time.

I am not downplaying the health risks associated with lead, trust me, in fact my kids have been bringing their own water since they started at the school, but is there no better way to address this issue? Is the flushed water captured and used to water the trees and plants on the property? What is the long term fix?


From the Halton website on lead in the drinking water. "Younger children are still developing and are therefore more sensitive to the neurological and blood effects of lead. As well, children less than six years of age absorb lead more easily than adults. Particular recommendations are made for formula-fed infants because the water used to make the formula can contribute 40-60 per cent of an infant's lead intake, whereas drinking water in older children and adults only contributes approximately 10 per cent of total lead intake."

This is scary stuff and is just another example that we can never really get a handle on all the pollutants out there. No matter how much monitoring or safe guards our elected officials and municipal agencies promise to put in place, we are still being poisoned every single day - even by a simple drink of water from the school fountain.

A new wooden screen door.

Last summer we ripped out the old and ugly aluminum screen door that was too short for the front door. I sanded and painted the existing wooden door and we have lived without a screen door until today.

Over the last 2 weeks or so I have been building a screen door. I used poplar, biscuits and glue for the joinery and lost-wax cast steel hardware and hinges from Lee Valley for a little extra design.

I painted the door white and the hardware black and hung the door today. The end result is nice. It transforms the inside of the house letting in a ton of light and air and hints to a time when my grandmother used to yell at me "don't slam the screen door".

This door has a more gentle bump to it then my grandmother's door did but I imagine as the hinges loosen up and the weather stripping thins it will only be a matter of time until I am yelling out "stop slamming the screen door!."


Now we will just have to wait and see how that biscuit and glue "joinery" holds up to all that slamming.

Have been too busy

We were away camping for 5 days at Grundy Lake just south of the French River. Probably one of the best camping spots for families that we have been to, bit of a long haul from Burlington but well worth the drive.

The swimming is fantastic and if you get a spot on the Red Maple campground you are easy walking distance to the secluded beach and slippery rocks.

The other cool lake is Gutt lake which you can canoe to from Grundy. There are cliffs there that are perfect for jumping off of. The kids had a blast as you can see from the shot to the left. The highest jump is maybe 18 feet or so but enough of an adrenaline rush to get your heart racing.

We are already making plans to go again next year.

Kite festival

The Kite Festival, created by The Kite Museum.com, sort of happened in Spencer Smith Park (where else?) this past Sunday.

The weather was a bit wonky and so the event was not much to look at. There were some kids attempting to fly hand-made orange garbage bag kites in the rain and humidity. There were some cool kites in the waterfront centre (left) and a really hyper guy who whipped through a PowerPoint on the history of kites - I think he was nervous. This was our first experience with this event and the kids and I were a little crestfallen at the lack of buzz. Seems to me it could be a really cool event.

Later in the evening we biked to the Music Centre bandstand in Central Park (no not that Central Park silly this one.) and listened to some old big band music as part of the Music in the Park series.The band, made up by a primarily senior membership, had lots of enthusiasm if not musical ability. Too bad it was cut short by a non-functioning sound system and looming thunder clouds - hey maybe they were related?

Staying green in a wasteful place.

This blog will always have a slight environmental bent to it. It is who I am however I must admit that it is hard to maintain a green streak when you live in the burbs.

To recap - we moved to Burlington from South Riverdale in Toronto in July of 2005. We moved because we grew out of our small and old row house. We moved to Burlington because we could not afford to buy a larger home in TO.

We did our research and looked at many communities in the GTA. We looked north, east and finally west. We are happy where we ended up and although our "new" home is smallish and older, we like the fact that we can walk to the Library, the YMCA and downtown. I love the fact that I can ride my bike or walk to the GO train.

But all is not perfect.

There are still challenges. Like my 2 hour commute, like too many malls, too many cars and too much traffic. Like narrow views and tiny worlds where a sense of entitlement means that people still drive honking SUV's and pick-up trucks. Making connections is hard, meeting like-minded people is challenging and finding a well paying job closer to home is next to impossible.

Often, when I travel on the long train ride home, I see people that I might find interesting and that might find me interesting. They might have a certain look about them that comes off as looking intelligent, educated and aware. Then I watch them get off the train and get in to their SUV and my opinion changes. Sadly I turn judgmental and pious. Not on purpose, and for no good reason - if I could afford a big SUV would I buy one? Never.

And that is a fundamental difference between my family and many of the people that I have met so far. I like to feel that my family and I think globally and act locally. We try to shop and support the smaller stores downtown, we avoid the malls as much as possible, we drive a small car, we ride and walk more often than not, we use a reel mower (on a corner lot no less). These are not hardships for us and I am not bragging about how we live. I certainly do not feel that we are better than anyone else and there are days where we throw out too much plastic or don't recycle 100% or buy too much stuff. But on the whole we are at least aware of our actions. And when we do slip up I know that I feel good and guilty.

So why can't everyone live like us?

Well the suburbs have been built around the car and as anyone who has spent anytime north of the QEW can tell you - walking around up there is not much fun. Cycling is downright dangerous and despite the best intentions of the City of Burlington, transit is inconvenient and time consuming. Conspicuous consumption is, well, conspicuous and the mall is a hang out.

There are bright lights to be sure, like the better recycling of garbage and waste that will come to the Halton region next year. Like the heightened awareness about pesticides, plastic bags, and pollution. Like the high price of gas that might force drivers to rethink their mode of transportation. Things will change and I know that Burlington will, over time, become a slightly greener town.

Do we regret the move?

Some days yes. We lament the change of pace, from fast and furious, to slow and steady. We sometimes feel like outsiders. We miss our friends, who knew 40 minutes down the road would be so far to travel?

Other days we are thankful for the space, the tranquil sense of piece that we get when sitting in our backyard next to the fish pond, the friendly people we meet at our children's school, the older well-meaning steady neighbours who willingly (some might say eagerly) share the history of the street we live on. We love the waterfront, downtown the Library and the clean well maintained community centres.

On the balance it was the right move at the right time for right now.

Sound of Music Festival

The Sound of Music Festival wrapped up this past weekend and Spencer Smith appears to have survived another festival onslaught.

The weather was glorious, hot and sunny with only a mild sprinkling. On Saturday my family and I rode our bikes down and parked at Caroline and Brant and then meandered through the downtown. Oddly enough during the time we were there, 1- 5 pm, there was very little music being played. About 15 minutes in to our visit my daughter ended up having a little asthma attack and decided to go home with my wife but my young son and I stayed and played.

I reluctantly forked over the outrageous sum of $20 for some amusement ride tickets. Turns out it was well worth it as the young one gleefully and enthusiastically rode the rides. It was great fun to see him grinning ear-to-ear on the slide, mini-roller coaster and merry-go-round. Ahh to have such joy.

After tearing through the rides we sat down at the east end of the park in front of the Bell stage and watched exactly one song from a totally forgettable Canadian Idol finalist Then my son declared the music too loud and we proceeded back to Brant street to do some beading at beadworks. Jacob made a cool looking choker for himself and then we took one more listen tothe music and headed home for cookout.

Soccer Dad.

Signed my 5 year old up lad up for soccer this past winter.

Stood in line on a cold winter day for about 90 minutes or so while the line for the sign-up snaked it's way around the building and up the stairs of the Burlington Youth Soccer Club. The building was butt ugly and the view encompassed a parking lot and the QEW. Not much to keep 2 squirming, bored children interested or engaged, but I kept telling myself that this would be a good thing for him.

Plunked my cash down and we, or rather I, gleefully waited for the start of J 's first season as a bona-fide player of the classic suburban sport - soccer. The whole experience felt like a right of passage and I could hardly wait for the Wednesday after Victoria day when it would all begin,

Things did not go well.

And to understand why you have to understand my son. J is a stubborn and willful lad. When he digs his five-year-old heels in there is no moving him until he is ready. When we first moved to Burlington from the Big Smoke he was set to start JK in September. He started in May. And it was not for lack of trying on our part (or the teacher's, principal, special ed teacher etc..). He simply decided there was no way in hell he was going to school and that was that.

So my wife and I approached soccer with levity and enthusiasm and joy and support and love. The big day came. I took an early GO train home so I could get him fed and to the game on time. It was at Optimist park and even I felt overwhelmed with the mayhem and noise of 10 teams of small boys running around and kicking yellow balls in every direction. So I can only imagine how he felt.

We found the coach, got the uniform and ball and off he went to show-off his skills. So far, so good. I grinned like a Cheshire cat, I was so happy. The team finished up the 20 minute practice and then gathered round the coach for the pre-game pep talk. And then it happened. Someone stepped on his hand and he started crying and that, my dear readers, was that. We tried the next week but he would not even come out of the house. He yelled and cried and kicked and screamed and no matter what form of persuasion or bribe we tried he had decided that he would not play soccer.

At least we got a refund.