Xander and Clare

A snippet of video shared by Clare's teacher of the class practicing their violins.

Emily was in town for the holidays, which means she and X got to go head-to-head on 2K.

Emily always wins. :)

Em then took the kids to see the new Spider Man movie.

Em is the big sister X never had and we love when she's in town!

Clare brought plenty of reading material for our adventure...

...across the border!

Still a little kid at heart.

Lovely lunch on Granville Island.

Taking a water taxi ride to another area of Vancouver.

Teenager.

This new building is so cool!

We had one of the tiny water taxis all to ourselves on the way back. A very fun way to take in the Vancouver skyline.

Did a little eagle watching over Christmas break, too.

And we never miss the annual New Year's sale at Village Books.

Waiting for basketball practice to start at what will be her middle school in just a few quick months!

Waiting to watch Clare play in a basketball tournament down south.

Video game faces at Kate and Jessica's.

They just keep getting bigger and bigger!

Waiting to start day two of the tournament.

X has been playing basketball with these boys for years now. Excited to see them all move into high school teams.

This was the last game of the regular season, against the team that beat them in the championship last year. This year, Whatcom Middle School finished the season undefeated, though Fairhaven gave them a run for their money in this game. At one point, X hit two gorgeous three-point shots to pull the team ahead, and then they never looked back.

Suiting up for another (local) game.

The middle school basketball championship tournament -- WMS won it all!

Henry will be playing for Bellingham High School next year, and this WMS team of nearly all Squalicum High School kids will definitely miss him -- but it'll be fun to watch them play against each other.

Saturday lunch date with the Winters at Zane's.

Clare had $2.75 to spend on jawbreakers at Paper Dreams, and they weighed out exactly $2.70 worth for her.

A gorgeous day to walk down by the water with Jessica and Henry!

I don't know. Some sort of Fortnite thing, I'm sure.

And another.

Just for fine, while running errands, I took the kids into a new furniture store. They found their dream gaming chairs.

I dashed all their dreams when I said no way.