Me wondering if the snow will ever end. We just had another 15 centimeters dump on the last day of February when I’m typing this!
The winter carnival season is upon us and this year the Vars carnival made an appearance outside again. I can’t remember the entire history of the Vars carnival but I feel that we went once after a spaghetti dinner with Sierra as a baby (there was a bonfire and some Beavertail on a stick that Vero still talks about!) and then another year it was so cold that they just limited the carnival to a day of kids activities inside the school gym which was fun as well.
Painting snow hills! How cool.
But this year it was outdoors and an afternoon of fun was planned. Horse rides! Treasure hunts! Sliding! Snacks! Crafts! Drawing pictures! Hot chocolate! It was great. The kids really loved it and Sierra enjoyed seeing a few of her friends from class at the event. Ezra enjoyed seeing the horses and going for a ride.
“No Dad, THIS is how you paint. Let me show you.”
We also lucked out that it wasn’t OVERLY cold. The week before had temperatures around -20 and I would say this day gave us -10? -15? Whatever it was, it was manageable for a few hours with the kids outside. Vero even loved the carnival so much that she went back to pick up some pulled pork sandwiches for supper!
To whoever was involved with the carnival this year, well done!
Enjoying the horse wagon ride around Vars. We even passed by our house!
Meeting Tom and Wilson. The horse ride itself was quite hilarious as the fellow in the back had jokes to entertain us for the ride.
I’m pretty sure sharing a pogo was the highlight of the carnival. Two days later Sierra is still asking if we can have a pogo. I think I will reserve that for special events! To this day, I don’t think I’ve had a pogo yet. I’m saving it for a special day.
Chatting around the fire
This photo was on the town councillor’s Facebook page and you can see all of us in the wagon.
Another photo from the town councillor’s Facebook page. At first I thought it was just a pile of wood and then I spied Ezra sipping some hot chocolate in the background! That was the part of the day where we surrounded the hot chocolate to cool down.
This is a note to myself for future reference. Sidenote: Future you, you’re looking good today!
I wanted to capture an audio stream which I couldn’t download. It was streaming only. I encounter a lot of these through Patreon or Substack pages of artists that I support. E.g. Dan Mangan who shares one audio file of a concert he performed.
For awhile I had a complicated system involving my laptop feeding into my mixing board recording to an SD card but I figured there must be an easier way.
The easier way is a concept called loopback where it loops your stereo output from your computer BACK into your digital audio workstation (in my case Logic Pro) as an input.
I was looking into software that could do this (Loopback, Jack Connection), but then I stumbled upon a video which explained that some audio interfaces already support this feature.
Sure enough, my Focusrite Clarett 4Pre supported this. In the manual it says that Inputs 11 & 12 are designated as loopback.
Here are the steps to enable this for future reference:
Open Logic Pro and create a new audio track. Do NOT choose inputs 11/12 immediately. Choose something else.
Mute the track. At first I was creating a massive feedback loop when I selected 11/12 because I hadn’t muted the track and it just kept feedback through my speakers.
Once track is muted, selected inputs 11 & 12 as your inputs.
Go into your browser click play on the stream.
You should see the meters bouncing and you can click record.
Once done, make sure the stream has stopped.
Unmute the track. Note that if anything plays on your computer while unmuted will create a feedback loop.
We were lucky to have Poppa and Grandma drop in for the weekend on their way back from Gaspe. The kids were very excited and I suppose the big kids in the house were also excited!
Horsey rides for all!
Teaching Ezra how to play tic-tac-toe
Friday had us hitting the road in a snowstorm (seems like this is a trend every time my parents visit) to head downtown to see about Nanny’s investments after she passed away. I hadn’t realized that the World Exchange Plaza was under complete renovation so it took a few minutes to figure out how to exit the building from the parking area.
I am not overly familiar with downtown parking but I will now know that if I need to return to Meridian Financial I can park under the building we need to go to instead of trekking through a snowstorm downtown! There was an increased police presence in case of a protest to mark the anniversary of the trucker convoy. We didn’t see much action on the streets other than snowplows.
We had a few hours to kill before our next appointment at the notary so we headed to Casino Lac-Leamy where my parents haven’t been before.
Mom and Dad got remarried there.
I had a great Parisien burger (brie, mushrooms and onions) and my parents had a smoked meat sandwich. Dad was feeling extra generous as he slipped me twenty bucks to play at the slot machines!
Dad went off on his own and I went along with Mom as she told me she was having trouble reading and I didn’t want her to end up at the $1 machines instead of the 1 cent machines! We had some fun and I ended up at a machine that gave me some bonus games where I won $10. As many adventures to the slot machines ends, we came out there as losers. However, it should be noted that Mom won $1,500 (or close to that?) years ago so I think she’s ahead of us all in terms of slot machines.
It didn’t take too long to drive to the notary and I found out interesting things like how an original will is sent from lawyer’s office to another and then kept there for life (whose life? The lawyer’s life?) in a fireproof box/vault. I also think that the notary was talking about it was a huge issue when the trains exploded in Lac Megantic and lawyers’ offices lost original wills. Fascinating stuff.
I managed to convince everyone to watch a new show called The Last of Us that night. I always laugh when Dad says “That was different” which is code for “That was silly. I won’t be watching the next episode.”
Saturday morning was pretty nice so we decided to head to Larose Forest to take in their trails.
Good day for hot chocolate and a snack!
I couldn’t figure out if the first photo or the second photo was a true reflection of how they feel about each other!
Always fun to have others around to snap a family photo of us
Dad and I managed to fix a few things around the house in the afternoon. My speed selector cable on the snowblower stretched so all we had to do was adjust a hex nut on one end and it reset the speed selector switch. Good to know for next time as I had bought a spare cable thinking I would have to replace it.
We also fixed up the heating system and I will update the other post about it. It went extremely well and I am comfortable doing this change in the future and saving a few bucks.
Troy, eat your heart out
We also had a great porketta that my parents had brought up last time. For future reference, we did it in the Instant Pot but Mom and Dad pointed out that if you want the crispy outside we will need to bake it next time. Thanks to the Tarzini brothers for this!
Sunday we decided to head over to Jacques Cartier Park to see the Snowflake Kingdom. It was 4 degrees out and the final weekend of Winterlude. It was very warm over the past three weeks – the Canal never opened the entire Winterlude and ice sculptures quickly melted. But it was great to go to Snowflake Kingdom in warm temperatures as the kids could be there for hours and not be cold.
We parked near the McDonald’s in Hull and I didn’t realize that we had to walk to the NORTH end of Jacques Cartier park this year as the south end was under construction and Snowflake Kingdom had moved. It was a one kilometer walk with the kids but we had a sled and it wasn’t that bad. I suppose we wouldn’t have been able to find parking closeby anyhow as they had streets blocked off.
Sierra really loved the labyrinth they had set up. She went through four or five times. I had a minor moment of shock when I found Sierra wandering the labyrinth with a group of twenty people and no adult I recognized in sight! It was a good reminder that we all need to communicate better with each other and make sure each adult is assigned to a kid!
We wisely packed some porketta sandwiches for lunch instead of waiting in lineups.
I always laugh when we go out of our way to do something fun and new with the kids but every kid loves regular playground equipment!
Ezra and Sierra had a fun time trying to jump onto a moving sled
We asked Sierra if she wanted to line up for any activities (it was an hour wait for the sliding hill!!) but all she wanted to try out was the tug of war. It was a fun event. People could join in whenever they saw a side needed help. Sierra won 4 out of 5 times! She was so happy. She would have stayed there all day.
Grandma and I were wondering why we were so sore the next day…it was from tug of war! What a workout!
Sharing some hot chocolate
A ride on a dinosaur while waiting for Grandma in the washroom. SPEAKING OF her in the washroom supposedly she came out of the washroom and was wondering why it was so hard to walk. Was there a trip wire across her ankles? Nope, she had forgotten that she had pulled down her snowpants around her ankles and they were still there! I wonder what the poor fellow thought waiting outside of that porta-potty when Grandma emerged with snowpants around her ankles! We all had a great laugh. As Nanny Ruth had wrote: “Remember me kindly but the stupid things I have done make the best stories!”
A photo of Mom laughing after her misfortune
We ended the day with a snowball fight when we returned home. It was such a nice day that Sierra and I stayed out there for another hour or two.
The rest of the weekend was spent playing Jamaica with Mom (who at one point was half a board away from me and I managed to catch up!) and watching movies and relaxing. Well, as much relaxing that we can manage with two kids running around the house! Lots of laughs were had. I did feel bad when I smacked Grandma in the eye with a snowball though. She said the worst part was when it slid down her shirt! Nothing much else was happening on the Family Day Monday other than picking up some wood from Tommy and Monica’s garage and taking an afternoon nap.
