A Nice Little Saturday

"Well, um, actually a pretty nice little Saturday...we're going to go to Home Depot. Yeah, buy some wallpaper, maybe get some flooring, stuff like that. Maybe Bed, Bath, & Beyond, I don't know...I don't know if we'll have enough time." --Frank the Tank

Yesterday, Kimm and I celebrated our 17th anniversary, and although we did not spend it in any Big Box stores, we did put together a pretty nice little Saturday. Our household goods finally arrived, Friday [cue sound of deafening applause], so the house is in complete disarray as you may well imagine. Looks like a box-and-furniture bomb went off. But we let it go, Saturday, for a day of family fun. It went a little like this:

First, we had breakfast at the W. W. Boyce Farmers' Market, downtown. This is a really impressive market for a town with a pop. of only 50K. Take a typical farmers' market (like the one we were used to in Raleigh), blend in some London-style market (thinking here of Portabello Road or Covent Garden) and then scale it down, obviously, to a smaller size. In other words, a great mix of foodstuffs and artisans' goods. In the winter, it's limited to a large indoor space in two parts, with only a few hardy food vendors outside. But later in the year, as the weather warms, more and more stalls show up in the surrounding parking lots, and the market doubles in size. We love the breakfast they serve in a little cafe right in the middle of the building, on a raised platform. The Market will probably get its own entire entry later on, so more detail to come.

After breakfast, we caught a free shuttle bus to the day's main event: Winter Fest! Or, officially, "Aliant Winterfest NB 2007!" This is a winter carnival still going on (through Sunday). The organizers created a large hill for ice slides (you really rip along on those, let me tell you), two snow labyrinths (one was at least eight feet tall, the other only four feet, for smaller kids), and a number of ice sculptures. There were pony rides for kids and horse-drawn sleigh rides for all.

There were also dog sled rides for kids 13 and under, but the line was very long. Kate and I waited in it for awhile, but then the dogs got a union break, so the staff handed out cards as placeholders. By the time the dogs were back in action, we decided to pass, but they were definitely fun to watch. (And to listen to, as well. The teams were rotated, and the furry guys stuck over on the sidelines would get very worked up about having to wait. One would take up a howl, and a dozen others would join in, "We want to ru-u-u-u-nnn, arrrooooo!")

We spent around four hours at the fest, and it was very novel to be immersed in a carnival of a wintry kind--we tried our best not to gawk at things that are commonplace to lifelong northerners. Two examples: babies being pushed/pulled in "sled prams," rather than strollers or wagons; and a woman on cross-country skis who had her husky (or malamute? I can't tell) pull her along. Who says you need a sled or a whole team?

Once we were all festivated out, we shuttled back into town, stopped by a combo coffee shop and newsstand that we like, bought some groceries at the wonderfully-named Victory Meat Market (sounds very Soviet..."Meat for Victory, Comrades!") and headed home. After a little rest, the kids amazingly decided they had not yet met their snow-play quota for the day, and they set out for a quick sledding jaunt on a road around the corner (an additional motivator here was the need to test drive a wonderful runner sled given to us in NC by members of our church). They only had a short interval before it was time for youth group, but the test drive proved a success. And I ambled along to give a demonstration on how to sled and smoke a cigar at the same time (obviously not an overly steep incline, eh?)

Oh, and the backdrop of said sledding, I should add, was the "Experimental Farm" that abuts the property we're renting. This is a government research station properly called "The Potato Research Centre." But Kimm and Sheehan quickly decided that the gov't is not fooling anyone, it's really about alien investigation. We call it Area 51-and-a-half. See for yourself--here are their nefarious hatcheries. More on the Pod People Farm in future posts.

Sheehan drove himself and sister to youth group, and Kimm and I went for dinner at the Lunar Rogue pub, then strolled around town and watched the skaters at Officers' Square (are you starting to gather that winter does not much confine people to the indoors, here?)

Here's an album, via Picasa, which includes more pictures from the day (23 pics in all):

10-Feb