Busy Day at the Science Centre

Well, I finally took Ellis to the Science Centre. It almost looked like we weren't going as by the time I got us all out of the house I'm usually in a fowl mood and it doesn't take much for Ellis to provoke me. He was dancing and jumping all over me as we waited at the ferry terminal and I was like "that's it - we're going home!" So I wheeled us around, but decided to stop in the playground to consider what my options were. He played a bit and then I said

"ok - if you promise to be good, we can go."

"uh - ok" he said. and I wonder why our discipline doesn't work.

So we set off again - caught the ferry - got off the ferry. I should mention that Ellis is going nappy free these days - it is rather exciting. I asked him if he has to pee - "yes"

darn.

Ok - let's go in here. We were by the waterpark so they had some washrooms. The handicapped one was occupied
we waited and waited. We saw one man go into the mens, followed by another. The second man came out rather quickly. There seemed to be a rather bad smell emanating from either the handicapped/family or the mens. "Uh - Ellis -do you think can you hold it?"

"nope"

"ok" I said.

We waited some more - eventually the person came out - it was someone changing. Oh - that made me mad - at least that is not where the most foul smell was coming from. We had success - YAAAAAAAY!
We continued on past the waterpark. Rowan looked on with sad puppy dog eyes. "Sorry Rowan - we are not going there today."

We found the science centre and another exciting moment - it was half price day - hooray! It seems that the age where children start having to pay here is 3 - which sucks - so it was nice that I only had to pay $4.50 for Ellis as opposed to $9.

We went in and Ellis immediately started running around like a maniac from station to station pushing every button, flipping every tile... He could have stayed there all day I think - I started to get hungry though and Rowan started to get bored. The science centre was good - but small and one entire section was roped off -maybe that is why it was half price day. I eventually managed to pry him away - just remembering at the last minute "do you have to pee Ellis?" "Yup"

Another toilet success and I was started to feel like a pretty good mom (of course I had nothing to do with it - it's all daycare).

I had these free coffee coupons that we had gotten from someone who turns out to be our neighbour (we saw her on the ferry one day, she took a liking to the kids, we told her we were newcomers and she gave us the coupons). Anyway - she seems like a very unlikely restaurant owner - older- seems a tad dotty, but maybe she is just friendly. We had sort of walked by her restaurant before and from the back, it looks like it doesn't get much business. However, when I went in, thinking I could get my coffee and a cheap lunch, it was a rather nice restaurant on the river. I was told that they were almost fully booked, but they squished us in. So my free coffee and juice for Ellis cost $30 (I had really good lemon pepper calamari and chips and Ellis had his standard fare - chips (with a bite of chicken). I almost felt like a lady who lunches - oh, yah, except for the kids. They were well behaved though - so that is pretty good. Rowan is not yet at that impossible stage where we will not be able to leave the house.

We then took the Citycat across the river and went to the library - it was our lucky day yet again! The craft people had taken over the children's area of the library - they are doing crafts every day until Christmas from 10 am till 3 pm. They had every kind of material you would need. I asked Ellis if he wanted to do crafts

"nah." he said

"WHAT?"

Now I know he just wants to do crafts at home to torture me.

Eventually, the glittery pieces of flotsam and jetsam called to him and he went and sat down. The people running the crafts were very impressed with how prolific he was.

"he's made quite a few things" as he used everything available.

They were especially impressed with his use of straws and cupcake papers - he got me to punch holes in the sides of the cupcake papers and then he threaded the straws through. Should take a picture really - he thought of it himself. I was busy doing snowflake cutouts and paper chains for our tree - that is the limit of my imagination. He was the only boy there and clearly the youngest (but boy did Rowan want to join in - I felt like a goalie - keeping him away from the scissors, buttons, you name it) Our apartment is starting to look like an modern art gallery.

On the way home, Ellis feel asleep while sitting next to me on the ferry. Sigh - never a good thing. He slept for two hours in the stroller in the hallway until dinner at which point we attempted to get him up. He made it through about two bites of dinner before freaking out - had to put him back to bed.

I cleared out and went for a ride on my new bike. It was amazing - the city is completely different at dusk - cool, breezy, happy. I rode down one side of the river, crossed the goodwill bridge (pedestrian/bike only) rode up the other side through the botanical garden (note tree above) and the turned around and went back. When I got home, Ellis was up - acting as normal as could be.