While January felt shorter than usual, February has felt longer. Our weather has continued to be quite mild – some cold days but no snow and not much rain. It’s lovely to see the days steadily get longer. On days when I close at work I’m now no longer doing so in complete darkness.
We celebrated Lunar New Year and this year we got to do so by attending a lunch hosted by the Mandarin-speaking congregation at our church. They combined with a bit of Valentine’s Day flair and had a spread of homemade Chinese food, as well as a few presentations. It reminded me a lot of church events when I was a kid, in a lovely and nostalgic way.
Over the February long weekend (Family Day was February 16th), we took the opportunity to spend a day in the city. We caught the first ferry (6:20am!) and after breakfast and a drive through Stanley Park, we were at the Vancouver Aquarium just as it opened. We had all last been there in 2018 so Rose didn’t remember anything. Pearl had been the previous year with her grandparents’ and we had visited the Oregon Coast Aquarium in 2023. The aquarium has changed a lot since I was a kid (no more whales) but is still world class and full of interesting things to look at. Highlights were, as always, the sea otters, but the sea lion training we got to watch was also lots of fun and we enjoyed the jungle zone with the turtles and monkeys.
We spent about 3 hours at the aquarium and it was a lot busier when we left so I definitely recommend planning a morning visit. We had lots of time to take in all the exhibits, including a 4D show about salmon (narrated by David Attenborough!)
From there we headed to East Van and met up with my entire extended family for Dim Sum. My uncle was visiting from Ontario and my niece was home from Alberta for Reading Break so it was a great opportunity to all get together and eat delicious food. We were home on a 4:45pm ferry and had all the next day to recover from our adventures.
Our big February highlight though is that Pearl turned 11! Long time readers may be as shocked as I am! Her birthday fell on a busy weekday, full of activities for her but we celebrated with homemade burgers for dinner and a chocolate cake with green icing.
Pearl is one of the most delightful kids you could ever hope to meet. She’s funny and clever and thoughtful. She’s very aware of those around her while also being remarkably comfortable in her own skin. She’s a great friend and a fantastic big sister. I’m honestly so excited to see what she’s like as a teenager and an adult.
This year for the first time ever she didn’t want to have a theme for her birthday. She chose a dinner party, just as she has for the last couple of birthdays and once again requested sushi. For dessert she decided on chocolate fondue and Pearl, 6 of her friends, and Rose had a lot of fun dipping fruit, marshmallows, and Oreos in chocolate.
We’ve found that birthday parties get simpler as the kid gets older. They don’t need as much entertaining and are content to hang out together. Our major entertainment was a scavenger hunt that took them around the neighbourhood. I wrote 11 rhyming clues and planted them around, including some of the guest’s houses and our local park. It culminated in finding their goody bags.
Karissa Reads Books 