I am not going to overreact, but we awoke this morning to a dusting of the white stuff. LA reacted as expected: “!;?&%, it’s snowing.” Ben and Ella were enthusiastic about getting dressed in their boots and coats and hats and mitts.

I had to take the van in for an out of province inspection today – the van passed and now we have an Alberta plate (since they only have one on the back).

While I was waiting for the inspection, I walked around for a bit near the Autowest Superstore at 178th St. and 102 Ave. Not the most friendly neighbourhood for a pedestrian – and during a snow storm to boot.

Needless to say, I sought shelter in the nearest place – which just happened to be a Denny’s. So I had breakfast and read the Journal. Denny’s has sure changed. Walking into this place during a frigid, snowy morning, I was met with a warm breakfast environment. You know, breakfast has this special quality as a meal. You are greeting the day – everything has potential at breakfast. It’s hard to describe, but there are some places that just enhance this feeling at breakfast and kind of warm your cockles. The food is nothing to write home about, but I’ll be going back to this west end Denny’s again.

The day went fairly well. I had a good workout at the Y and we ended the afternoon and Ben and Ella’s first skating lesson. Ouch. That was painful – for their poor knees and for me to watch. I kept making eye contact with Benny and he would look at me and shake his head side to side. He wanted to get out of there. They came off the ice halfway through and they were both sobbing. Too much falling, no fun. Broke my heart. But I didn’t want them to quit. Skating will be a source of great fun for all of us and it’s like anything else – swimming, playing piano, riding a bike – well, they don’t do that yet either, but you get my point.

In order to get them back on the ice, I promised all manner of treats. Back home, we went straight into a bath and both their little knees were black and blue. Should I get them little knee pads?