DaddyJ's Birthday

For DaddyJ’s birthday this year, the kids and I headed out to Kelowna to surprise him! He was very surprised to have us arrive more than 12 hours early as the kids got to miss school. The drive started out with quite a bit of snow and ice and then became picture perfect. Remarkably, the 600km went seemingly quickly.

We all enjoyed a relaxing weekend of water sliding, stewing in the hot tub and visiting a few wineries. CubJ particularly enjoys trying to create tidal waves as big as DaddyJ when he exits the water slide. He is a keen waterslider!

As we continue to return to the same area, we are finding that the little J’s are developing their own favourite wineries to visit. The creation of tiny coinsures! Some of their favourites include Mission Hill and Quail’s Gate for their fantastic views, interesting architecture and most likely the sparkling juice they have as samples!

SparkJ was working on a project at school looking at how plants get ready for the winter and CubJ on recycling/composting. While we were visiting our favourite winery Summer Hill, we noticed that there were two workers busy with a screen over some large grape bins. We asked if we could come closer to see what they were doing, assuming that this must be an important part of the wine making process which was in full tilt. It turns out that both kids were about to see their science units in action. The two workers were separating the grape seeds from the skins after pressing. The seeds are saved for a variety of purposes including new growth, to be ground into an extremely healthy flour and for composting. The same holds true for the grape skins which help to create extraordinarily nutritious compost. SparkJ being the cutie she is managed to get bagful of organic grape seeds to show her class how grape vines prepare for the winter! It turns out that she received them from one of the owners sons, for whom our favourite sparkling wine is named! That girl, she is a lucky one .....

DaddyJ enjoyed his birthday. We all enjoyed being together and laughing a great deal all weekend. What a wonderful way to start another year with DaddyJ. Happy "saving one more second not pressing the down arrow so many times on the elliptical machine age button" 2010!