from one home...

From one home to another to another and we're back in the Gat. Hendrik and I rolled in yesterday afternoon, just beating crazy rush-hour traffic - ouf, I need to think about traffic again. Anyways, it's good to be home and it does feel like home here - having all three of us together, in our space, with our stuff.... but to be honest, we're still missing our home in Vela and I'm still thinking about it as if it's our home. We're constantly comparing - the traffic, the food, the grocery stores, the attitudes, the cars, the people, the weather, the landscape - and I guess this is part of getting used to being back here... right? Because it's soooo so different! I came back from a trip to the mall late last week all buggy-eyed with a bad case of culture shock (apparently Oshawa can do that to lots of people); the different shopping experience and the different people and the bad music and chain stores and all the Tim Hortons cups and teenagers with face piercings and babies... what a world apart from Trento's pedestrian streets and historic city centre. Anyways! There's good here, there's good there, and really, home is where my family is and where the people I love live - and I'm lucky to have more than one home. Lucky lucky lucky... and I hope we'll be lucky enough to head back to Vela one day to revisit memories and people and places... and to eat. :)

The week in B-ville was great! Hendrik loves his Gamma and Buppa and it was amazing for me to have some time to relax a bit, get out, organize, enjoy their company, and have help with the little one. Some pics from the week:

Steve's car was a fave - he is such a boy with his love of cars and trucks and diggers...

Bob and Marg put together this awesome table - he LOVED it! I love it too :)

artists at work

outside on a chilly day, sporting a lovely BFM jacket!

Buppa and our boy (no longer a baby!)

reading with Pam - the fire truck book was a fave :)

this kid LOVES helping out around the house: unloading the dishwasher, doing laundry, swiffering... long may it last :)

making his first pizza, yum yum!

one cute Dutchie - with his new orange soccer ball from Pam and Bob

happy after bath time

the keyboard was a huge hit too...

he knows all of his letters!

And here we are in Gatineau for a few days - we'll drive back to Bowmanville on Saturday and then fly to CA on Sunday.... it's going to be busy! But good. From one home to another to another....