HUGE news!

Lots of news, but the biggest piece has to do with Miia's belly, which now contains little 'Shrimpy', our baby-to-be! Miia is 13 weeks along and we're having lots of fun reading 'Birthing for Dummies' - kidding - visiting the doctor and midwife, and thinking ahead. Miia has some nausea and fatigue but is otherwise great, strong, healthy, happy, as you can see in the photos. The official due date is November 20.

Of course Miia's mom (Aiti) couldn't resist coming to see her pregnant daughter. She's had fun at garage sales, Peggy's Cove, the art gallery, and on a visit to my parents and grandma, who shares Aiti's love of gardening. Aiti is fixing up our garden real nice.

In some lesser, but still significant, news, I got into King's College journalism school but declined the spot. It would have been fun but I'm already getting a fair bit of work freelance writing, particularly my regular gig for The Coast, and I'm enjoying the balance between journalism, PR-type writing for NGOs, creative writing, and policy work on pesticides. Seemed more important, for now, to get a year of paid local work as a freelancer than a year of I-pay-them training.

Otherwise, we're settling in here in Hali, a great little capital city with a good sense of community. With the nice summer weather we bought a little barbeque and we've chucked the frisbee around some in the Commons with friends. I play basketball weekly with the youth from Miia's work, which is lots of fund.

We also just learned we'll be able to stay in our current home at least another year, which makes us really happy. We hope to do a home birth here if all goes smoothly. The cats like it here too. Bosh has of course befriended many of the neighbours and makes his rounds daily. As you may notice in the photo little Moon has just been neutered and will soon take to the streets. Fortunately Hali's absurd cat by-law has been stalled. Now Council can go back to investing in parking.

There's also a picture here of our good friends Jason and Jocelyn, who are great fun, and my friend Toast at open mic night. He came for a visit from Bristol England.



Happy Spring to all!

-Chris