BBQ disaster

So I have told Jeff many times that I do not know how to BBQ. He keeps telling me that it is easy and if I can cook in the kitchen then certainly I can BBQ. Well on Saturday Jeff was working outside with other members from our class. They are preparing a garden that we will plant in the spring. Anyway he invited the one couple over for dinner. I had planned for us to eat hamburgers. I know what you are thinking...hamburgers, I thought you were vegan. Well we are...most of the time! Every once in a while we get the urge for a good burger. We bought a big box of them this weekend at the store figuring that it would last for quite sometime and provide our little family with 5 meals. So now that we had friends coming for dinner what would have been 5 meals got reduced to 4. No big deal.

The guys were still working so Jeff asked me to get things cooking. I immediately felt nervous about the BBQ, but I figured what the heck I can do this.

I started the BBQ and turned it on high. The flames did not look too big so I figured that was good. I placed the burgers on the rack and shut the lid. I went to put the tray back inside and figured I would go back out in a few minutes to check on the burgers.

About 2-3 minutes later I went outside and saw that the flames looked very large and seemed to be escaping out the sides. I knew something was wrong.. I opened the lid to find all of the burgers on fire! I quickly shut off the BBQ and took the burgers out. Here is what they looked like:

I was horrified. Not only were these completely inedible now I had wasted 2 of our meals and we had no dinner to eat. My friend was laughing, but I just wanted to cry at that point! When the guys came back we got a laugh out of it and then Jeff cooked us another 2 meals worth of burgers and we ended up having a good evening together.

So the moral of the story: I will NEVER BBQ again!

Sushi 101

 We had a cultural experience on Saturday at our next door neighbor's house. They had us over to learn how to make sushi and then to eat it. None of it was made with raw fish. I made a plate of veggie sushi for our family. It was really good! They also served us miso and tofu soup with seaweed (surprisingly good) and some spicy fermented cabbage (not so good!). We had a great time together and it was fun to learn how to make a new dish!

I made the ones on the white plate

We even attempted chopsticks

A conversation with Rylan

The other night at the dinner table we had a conversation with Rylan and this is how it went:

"I don't want to eat my soup," said Rylan.


"Well if you eat your soup you will get big and strong someday, " said daddy.

"You will be big and strong like daddy," said mommy.

"I gonna eat my soup aaallll gone, " said Rylan. Which he proceeded to do. When he was finished he said, "I'm still hungry."

"Do you want more soup?" Mommy asked.

Rylan replied, "No I don't want more soup. Thank you though. I want another biscuit. I'm gonna be strong. I'm gonna be daddy."

Just thought I would share a typical conversation with Rylan. His vocabulary improves everyday and he copies everything we say and do. (Which is rather scary at times!!)

Fall colors

This is near where we live. This is the Saugeen River. Thought you might like to see some of the beautiful colors!

Carsten thoroughly enjoyed our long walk around the town of Durham the other day. He especially enjoyed chewing on some leaves!

Apparently Rylan figured since flowers have a nice scent, leaves must also!

Our school took a canoe trip down the Saugeen river the other day! It was so fun. We left the boys with a fellow classmate and enjoyed the afternoon on a canoe together!

Canoeing is hard work! I am still sore from it a few days later :)

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving to those of you who are either living in Canada or are Canadian (I think this only refers to Cami in terms of our friends in the states!) So with that said Happy Thanksgiving Cami!


We celebrated yesterday and had a blast! Played like a 5 hour game of Carcassonne and ate way too much food and dessert. But it was good!!

So will we celebrate American Thanksgiving you ask? Well we will go to school as usual but we hear there may be a potluck type thing for the Americans. We shall see!

Canadian Thanksgiving

Monday is Thanksgiving here in Canada. It is super weird to be celebrating this holiday in October! But alas we are :)

We got invited to go to a few different homes for the holiday. We will go to one families house on Sunday (there will be three families there total) and then we will go to another families house on Monday. The plan for Sunday is to play at least a few rounds of Carcassonne in the midst of eating a lot or really good food! Monday will be a good time of fellowship and then another round of food!

Sounds like a great weekend to me, eh?

When American Thanksgiving comes around, we will be in classes as if it is just another day. Weird! No black Friday here either although they have something similar the day after Christmas called Boxing Day- more on that when it gets closer. (And no it has nothing to do with literally boxing)

Yes Rylan

We have set a standard for Rylan that when we ask him to do something or he is asked by others to do something (or not do something) that he needs to respond with, "Yes mommy or yes daddy or yes mam or yes sir." Well the other day Carsten was in his highchair and Rylan was sitting at the table. It was lunch time so I was feeding Carsten and Rylan was eating. Carsten decided to spit his food out so Rylan says to him, "don't spit your food out Carsten. Say 'yes Rylan.'"  Jeff and I about died laughing but then had to correct him and tell him that he is not the dad! Kids pick up on everything! We were encouraged to see that he fully understands the concept.