Jesse and Daddy Go To Swimming Lessons

Jesse has been talking about it all week: Wednesday, the day when he and Daddy would go to swimming lessons together.

What was he looking forward to the most? You might think it would be the fun games we would play, or meeting other new friends, or actually splashing around in the water. But Jesse is no ordinary kid; he was there for the LESSONS.

"There's going to be a teacher, right?" he asked us over and over. Apparently, a strenuous swimming curriculum was at the top of his list of priorities.

So how did it go? It kind of depends on who you ask.

What does Daddy remember? Well, as we waded into the water, Jesse deployed his best stranglehold on my neck and weeped hysterically, saying, “I don’t want to do this, I want to get out, I want Mommy.” (Did I mention he’s never been big on swimming pools?)

He repeated this for about ten minutes, during which I received several concerned looks from my fellow parents, who doubtless expected me to remove my sobbing child from the pool. Instead of this, I laughed awkwardly and said, “He doesn’t like water much, I guess,” and continued to bob my child around the pool as he continued to grip my neck and face. (This didn’t really seem to allay their feelings of concern, but what can you do???)

However, when we asked Jesse how it went, he quickly said that it was fun and fired off the following list of five things that he liked:

1. He liked the toy boat
2. He liked jumping on Daddy (he even smiled briefly when he got to do this)
3. He liked getting out of the pool
4. He liked having a shower (this was a really funny process)
5. He liked getting his diaper changed

So, despite having no positive recollections of the swimming itself, he’s eager to come back next week for round two. Here are some pics of the experience (unfortunately, no good pool shots as we were too far away):

Poor Janna desperately wanted to join in. Unlike Jesse, she has a natural love for water and swimming pools and was quite incensed that she couldn't be a part of this.

Thankfully, Momma was able to pacify Janna with the camera.

 Here's a shot of me and Jesse from a distance. If you look carefully, you'll see the stranglehold.

All done! Relieved, but somehow excited to go back



















The adventures continue!

Until next time....

Dave Vance: Romantic

For the past week, I've been creating this great master plan to impress my wife by secretly organizing a night out for the two of us. 

This romantic evening would include dinner on the patio at Malone's (overlooking Dow's Lake), followed by a scenic walk along the Rideau Canal, and finishing with a stroll through the Ottawa Arboretum (huge, beautiful garden).

I enlisted the help of one of my friends (thanks Matt Pavey!) to watch the kids for the evening, made the reservations, and cleaned the house so that Chrissy wouldn't be thinking about the mess at home.

Unfortunately, I didn't plan for the weather. No sooner did I finish cleaning the house than the sky turned dark and the clouds poured out their destruction on my plans. 

However, my beautiful wife was the best of sports. She had the best attitude, and said she didn't mind the rain at all; it was kind of relaxing. Instead of taking a walk down the Canal to the Arboretum, we went on a mission to find Chrissy's childhood home, which she has not seen for twenty years (she had lived in Ottawa as a child until she was seven years old).

It was very cool! As we approached her old house, she began to remember more and more of the area around her: houses of her friends, old forts, places where her brothers were hit by cars, etc. In the end, her strongest impression was that everything seemed way smaller than it had when she was a kid. 

Altogether, a successful evening, despite the rain. Next time, though, I'll watch the weather a little more closely.

The Johnsons, a Beach Visit, and Television Obsessions

Dear blog,

Another day gone by, and I must admit that I am deeply appreciating the summer. Spare time (read: time not lesson planning/marking) is a beautiful thing, and there are so many great ways to fill it.

BEACH DAY at THE BAY

We had some great moments at Mooney's Bay today, which has quickly become our adopted beach. Here are some shots of the kiddies getting ready to take the beach by storm.

Jesse is single-handedly bringing back the muscle shirt. Clearly, he has his dad's pipes. Janna "The Diva" Vance is sporting some shades to capture all the little toddler hearts our there.


Janna went right to work creating some Kodak moments. Every ten seconds she would do something cute, look at us, and smile.

(On the other hand, her parents were much less photogenic, and even the incredibly beautiful Chrissy Vance provided no appropriate pics.)

My main goal for the visit was just to teach Jesse how to dig a respectable hole. Unfortunately, he had other goals in mind, namely filling his buck with sand.

In a great "daddy moment," I thought I'd show him how to properly pack sand into his bucket, but I must have packed it too hard because when I flipped it upside down, it cracked in half. Jesse was not impressed.

Ah, snack time. If I didn't teach him how to make a good sand castle, at least I taught him how to relax after a snack.


Although it might seem like Chrissy and I are pretty family-oriented people, we do make an effort to take some downtime away from the kids. Here are some things we've been experiencing lately....

1) Awesome family concerts:

The Johnsons are, simply put, the most talented group of family musicians I’ve ever heard. No hyperbole here: from the very first, eerily dark and brooding, opening notes to the rap/piano rock hit you might hear on any radio station; to the dramatic re-enactment of a key moment in The Little Mermaid; to the closing, acapella rendition of “Amazing Grace;” this may be the most energizing and eclectic show in Ottawa.

The questions that beg to be asked are:
Why have they not released a family album? 
and 
Why are they not playing in Bluesfest?

2) Obsessive following of hit TV series:


Chrissy and I always like to have a TV show on the go that we can watch together. So far, since we first started dating, we've watched all the seasons of Friends, 24, and we're working on Friday Night Lights. 

We actually missed the last season of 24, so we're catching up on it now... It's epic.

Alright, so maybe I should be embarrassed about this, but in the spare time I've suddenly discovered, I've begun to watch a show that everyone else apparently watched 10 years ago: Smallville!


This has suddenly become affordable due to a killer deal at Jumbo video: $9.99/month for unlimited 7-night rentals. Basically, this is a video store's last stand against Netflix and internet videos, and I think it's worth keeping the video store industry alive.

Is there even any place else in Ottawa that still rents DVDs????

Canada Day in 15 Photographs

 Off we go! Look at us here. Everyone looks optimistic about Canada day before getting on the bus for a 50-minute transit experience at the Canada Day at Juliana Park. Although we had a few brief rough patches, things turned out pretty well. Katie is holding the camera in this pic.

 Here is little Janna showing off the latest in Canada-Day fashion. While we waited for the bus, Janna and Jesse literally “danced” for about five minutes, which in Janna’s case meant spinning in a circle.

 Auntie Katie was a huge help in managing the children, and she did it all with a smile on her face. Notable, this photo was taken at Lincoln Fields, right beside APARTMENT 1004!

 Jesse’s brotherly concern for his sister has really taken off in the last few months. Whenever he feels that she is “taking the wrong path,” he takes her by the hand and leads her back. It’s usually pretty sweet, except for when he’s in a hurry and drags her across the floor. Also cute is the fact that she really likes it when he pulls her along and she puts up with it way better than when WE try to direct her.

 Lately, when we ask Jesse to smile, he’s been giving us this. It’s the effort that counts, right? Note: Momma is very relieved to have found a seat together on the bus, and Janna (possibly the bravest Vance) is petrified at least at first. She warmed up to OC Transpo by the end.

 Happier!

 We finally arrived at the fair, and we balked when we found out that we couldn’t get on the rides with Jesse. I mean, Jesse still won’t let us put a quarter in the moving spaceship ride at the mall, so how would he handle a genuine ride by himself? We stuck him onto the fire truck and this is what we got…

No problem! The ride starts and we have one happy boy. His face lit up like I’ve hardly ever seen it! 

 Meanwhile, Janna discovered one of the most incredible foods known to mankind… and this occupied her for most of the rest of the trip.

 Ride #2 for Jesse. As soon as he sat in this truck, he assumed this aura of seriousness, as though he had discovered his one true calling.

 Janna and I watched the events from the sidelines. Little did I know it, but she was systematically rubbing as much cotton candy into the back of my shirt as she could. Now the back of my shirt has two giant blue splotches on it.

 Chrissy and Katie, the true heroines of this story, kept us all going. Tired, but still smiling.

 On his epic truck ride, Jesse developed this incredible practice of waving LIKE THE QUEEN as he drove by. Without exaggeration, he queen-waved every single time as he went by, so that parents to our sides began to wave back in amusement. Clearly he felt the full dramatic weight of the moment.

 After a brief traffic jam, we were on our way home. Janna had occupied herself by chewing granola bars, spitting them onto my shirt, and then rubbing them in. Katie thought this was pretty endearing….

Almost home. Jesse had a minor meltdown when he got out of his seat and was pitched against a bus pole, but Chrissy sedated him with a granola bar. Super mom! Altogether, I’d say this Canada Day was a huge success. Now we just need to add another little Vance to the mix!!!!

Summer, part 1

Here is a summary of the last hour:

1) Woke the kids up from their nap and dressed them
2) Loaded them into the van and picked up Momma from work
3) Drove to Tim's, sat the kids down at the table
4) Waited for Chrissy to pickup food while kids became increasingly irritated
5) Kids ate timbits, but we forgot drinks! Kids become irrate.
6) Waited in LONG line, bought apple juice
7) Kids are crying, sat down with them and opened apple juice
8) Spilled 3/4 of apple huice on my lap
9) Elderly people around us mock me without mercy
10) Drive home with sopping shorts and crying, thirsty children

Another exciting day in the life of the Vances!

A Short Post

It's been almost two years since my last post. Many things have happened. Let me list them briefly:

-I have taught for two years at a school where most of the students are Dutch and taller than me
-Chrissy and I had our first real vacation (summers are awesome for teachers) and we visited family out East
-Chrissy and I have moved from our cramped apartment to a cozy little townhouse (Katie also lives there, in our dungeon - I mean, basement)
-I have bought an iPad (yes, I included this in the list)
-Chrissy and I have had another baby (Janna). She actually is the cutest baby ever.
-Jesse has learned to walk, speak... and lick people. No joke, he's licked me twice in the last two hours

I plan to write a bit more often now, but I need some major ISSUES to write about. So if you have some, let me know.

Dave

Concerning Katie the Usurper, her Henchman Seth, and my Beautiful Family

Behold: The Usurper, Katie Vance

So. Everyone has been reading Katie's blog, and hearing about her phenomenal experiences in South Korea, fraternizing with Jehovah's witnesses, Koreans, and fellow North American (mis)adventurers. Innocently, you say. Even humorous and well-written. Well, everybody, I'm here to make a startling revelation - despite it's apparently innocuous nature, Katie's blog is actually a particularly vicious electronic attack against yours truly. Read on, my 4 friends, and know the truth. Fortunately, Katie is not the only one who can pose nuanced intellectual warfare over the inter-web.

Unfortunately, for several months, I have not been able to find my blog to write in it. I accidentally deleted my bookmarks, and with them any trace of the location of my beloved "Apartment 1004". But friends, friends, your long wait is over. I have since relocated my highly-intellectual musings and have returned to present Katie with direct competition to her overrated Korean escapades.

It seems to me that Katie is trying to directly challenge my established position of "teacher" within the Vance family. First, for those of you who don't know (among my 4 loyal followers), I recently secured a contract as a teacher for Redeemer Christian High School. Furthermore, I have spent the last year studying to become a teacher at a reputable university called University of Ottawa. Furthermore, I am older than Katie. Surely, of the two of us I am more established as "the" teacher of the Vance family. But the usurper, Katie, has seen fit to overshadow me by not only becoming a teacher AS WELL, but by beginning to teach IMMEDIATELY, and to teach children who DON'T EVEN SPEAK ENGLISH. How am I supposed to compete with this? She is obviously trying to ruin me.

The logo of my school.

The logo of Katie's school. Note that they are CONFIDENT of their success. There is nothing innocent about this...

Secondly, Katie has evidently decided to challenge me in my role as "childbearer" for the Vance family. That's right, dear friends. Recently I became a father to an awesome baby boy named Jesse David. He is truly a great kid. However, upon reflecting on the blessings of parenthood, I realized that even here Katie is trying to steal my thunder. I have a baby, true, but Katie has gone and gotten herself DOZENS of babies - KOREAN babies. We're trying to teach our baby how to speak, she is teaching her multitudes of babies how to speak ENGLISH. The parallels are so striking I can't believe I didn't see them at first. Once again, Katie is attacking me subtly through her blog, further incriminating herself as the usurper she is.

My baby.



Katie's babies.

On a deceptively unrelated note, my so-called friend Seth Potter has been relentlessly and subliminally trying to convert me to the quasi religion of reformed theology. On his July 27th, 2009 post, he writes on spiritual matters concerning Israel and the Church. As usual, Seth presents his opinions with zeal and intellectual precision (dangerous tools when in wrong hands!). His post, however, is not as innocent as it seems. Cast your glance to the bottom of his post, to the "Tags" section. Yes, Seth has "tagged" me in his superficially innocuous posting. What does this mean? Some might call this an "innocent mistake" or a "simple joke", but I see purposes far more sinister here. This is a direct hark back to KATIE's own experiences with the Jehovah's Witnesses in S. Korea. Katie, having learned of the dark attraction of abberational religion, decided to apply this lesson to her own life in an effort to ELIMINATE the most direct competition to her own blog - me. It seems obvious now that she recruited Seth for her own cause and persuaded him to begin a campaign of malicious propaganda against me. At best, I suppose, she and Seth believed that I might somehow believe that it was DESTINY for my blog to be overshadowed by Katie's own. A valiant effort, if only I were so naive.

Seth "Calvin" Potter

Having adequately refuted Katie (and Seth's) weak efforts to dispose of me, I'd like to end this post on a positive note. I want to give a shout out to my beautiful new family, which is now composed of my incredibly attractive and patient wife Chrissy, my mighty son Jesse, and my consistently neglected dog, Cooper. The Ottawa chapter of the Vance family is thriving, and looking forward to the coming months.

Isn't Chrissy beautiful???? Jesse was happier in the next picture, but I love this picture of Chrissy.

Until next time,
Combatatively yours,

Dave