hart-lea grange

from nanaimo we made our way down to victoria.  first stop was a visit to hart-lea grange to visit our very good friends cathy and gary, and their neighbours.  

first we fed the neighbours some apples.  this is one of the teenage cows, namely mini-me - he has the same markings as his mom - thus the name :)

and here's ruby....

gary, getting some lovin from mini-me....

and here is a photo of gary and mason going into the field to meet cath, and percy and peter (the six week old calves that their neighbour peg rescued from being veal).......i found out this weekend that calves are taken away from their mother as soon as they have been safely birthed... no mama's milk for them.. heaven forbid if they cut into the profits.  cathy no longer eats beef and she tells me that learning this has also made her not want to drink milk or eat cheese ever again - i'm the same after i heard this. sometimes ignorance is bliss!

cows are luckier than us... they can stick their tongue up their nostrils, as demonstrated in the photo below!

gary and mason checking out the chicken coop....

and did i mention that hart-lea grange is also home to a bunch of neurotic cats... here is one of them...ninja...... 

nanaimo

we had a great night in nanaimo.... went to visit my nana (she is 95!), watched josie play hockey and then had dinner at mom and dad's... dad's fresh prawns.. mmm mmm good.

mason got to enjoy a ride on his papa's ride em mower.... funny how dad has a ride em now that there are no kids at home to cut the lawn. ha!

and some photos of my sister's gals josie and keira....

to visit family and friends we go

mason LOVES to catch the ferry. and even more, he loves to visit his nana and papa and his cousins. often, as he wakes up, he asks if we can catch the ferry to go and visit nana and papa and riley and josie and keira.  we made the mistake of telling him several days ago that we were heading to nanaimo on the weekend, so the past four days, he's been asking if we could go and visit nana and papa..... NOW..

here are some photos of the ferry ride over..

my #1 assistant

on sunday i did a photo shoot with jason, andrea and murdoch (more photos of them on my other blog - vickigannonphotography.blogspot.com) . mason was my #1 assistant, (or so he thought) trying to get murdoch to smell flowers, smile, etc.....

here he is showing murdoch how to smell the flowers.....

and making murdoch laugh while he was on the swing....

mason and the train

we often head down to ambleside to play at the beach and the park. almost always mason asks me if i would "go get the train". oh if only i had SOME of the power that he seems to think i have! one day he was in luck and the train came by as he was playing ... he ran as fast as his little legs would take him...

a typical weekend morning at the gannon-levin household

first, simon always lays in after we are up and out of bed. and typically, pele joins him for the sleep-in.  pele's look in the second photo says it all "get the hell out of here, we're sleeping"....  and no, its never shared. i never get to stay in bed.  mason wants his mommy when he wakes up and no one else will do.  and not only that, i'm usually the first one up!  have never been one to sleep in.....

here's a typical mason on the couch shot....with his morning milk close at hand....

and once simon crawls out of bed, he gets some love and attention... yes from me too!

..... here are some shots of simon trying to stretch out his back that causes him so much pain and discomfort. by the look of these photos i'm beginning to see the root of some of his discomfort!!!

and last but not least, a shot of pele and i don't know who (someone in their underwear!!), having a look out the window....

eating popcorn with pals

mason loves his neighbours kai and natalia.... they came over the other day and together they watched a movie and ate popcorn....