The Lighthouse Country Fall Fair – Saturday Sept 5 in Bowser/Deep Bay.  Features plenty of activities for the kids, including pony rides, a petting zoo, and bouncy castles (how did we manage before bouncy castles came along?), and the theme this year is home gardening, with lots of tips and displays,  as well as fresh produce.  The fair is at the Lighthouse Community Centre from 10am until 4pm.  Adults are $5.00 and kids under 12 are free.

Port Alberni Salmon Festival – Fri Sept 4 – Mon Sept 7.  Grace will be too busy ripping out fence posts to be able to take part in the fishing – there’s a $10,000 prize for the largest salmon caught during the Festival and hundreds of other prizes.  Fireworks will be on Friday night, and there’s a dunk tank, lots of great food and entertainment all weekend long.  There’ s a free bullhead derby early Sunday morning.  All takes place at the Clutesi Haven Marina.

Labour Day Swim – Mon Sept 7, Nanaimo – With the Aquatic Centre closed for maintenance and the ocean losing its “make you think you’re living in Hawaii” temperatures, you can grab a good long swim between 12 noon and 5pm at the Beban Park pool.

Hike to Labour Day Lake – Ok, you’re really celebrating the weekend if you make the trek to this lake – yes, that really is its name – which is literally half way between Port Alberni and Nanaimo (as the crow flies – see the map below).  It’s a pretty hefty hike for a family, but what are days of labour for, as George would say.

Or you could just relax at home and have a nice barbeque – maybe do a New Year’s Eve kind of countdown to the kids going back to school.  Oh wait, that’s for later at night when they’re in bed.

Of course I use “grab a handful” very metaphorically.  We’ve been perfecting our technique the last few years to minimize tears from prickles and the stains from handling.  You have to grip those berries enough to pull them off, but not too hard that they instantly become jam in the hand (known as ‘mushers’ in Ella lingo).  As for prickle protection, our trick is to use a glove on one hand to grip the branch and then angle it in such a way that your bare hand can easily get at the berries.  Result?  Less tears, more berries!

Another tip is to use your shortest child as the spotter.  Quite often, the nicest berries are the ones hanging underneath leaves – they’re hard to spot unless you get right underneath.  Ella has become quite good at her scouting job, though she gets a bit tyrannical when she spots a batch:  “There it is, get it!” or “I see some, pick them now!”

Being the taller of the two, Grace is more focused on the highest berries possible.  When she saw at tip on Shaw TV about using a step ladder to compete with the birds, she was all for it; when she had to carry the ladder, the enthusiasm waned.  I suggested to her that Daddy would make a very good step ladder.  Grace thought that was great, George not so much, until I told him it was kind of like a free massage.

Now it’s a frenzied race to do something with all these berries.  Jam is the old stand-by (good for Christmas prsents!) and then there are the pies, and the crumbles, and the syrups.  But this year, a little something for mummy and daddy, which is fermenting as I write.  Gotta love those blackberries!

And it wasn’t just the Saturday morning farmer’s market, or the great kids stores – they had a blast touring the art galleries (obeying the no running, no touching rules as they went!), finding their way through one of the most unusual hardware stores you’ll ever see and sipping a cool drink under the branches (literally) of the Tree House Cafe.

Then we discovered a very special way of seeing Salt Spring and the surrounding islands – a sight-seeing excursion with Salt Spring Air.  Now the kids love it when we occasionally take a seaplane over to Vancouver, but that’s mostly water-seeing.  On this tour of Salt Spring, you circle the island at low enough altitude to really take in the magnificent scenery, homes, and some of the surrounding islands.  The take-off and landing from the harbour at Ganges is great fun in itself!  Our pilot Harold Kirkpatrick was really helpful (you’re wearing headsets so you can easily hear) in describing what we were seeing.  The cost is quite reasonable when you can get a group of 4 to 6 people, and they have lots of other tours available as well.

Will Stroet is the MC and provides muscial entertainment between acts, which include Rick Scott, Friends Forever Puppets, Tickles the clown, and a production of Grimm’s Fairy Tales.  Lots of displays from local businesses and organizations, and of course, lots of food.  Things get underway at 10am right through to 4pm.

We’ve been discovering the variety of kids’ activities they offer, from day camps to building stuffed bears to beading to movie nights, and tennis or swimming lessons.  Grace and Ella have been having a blast and there’s always some artwork or project they’re bringing home with them.  The day camp in particular is great fun and unless things get really rainy, it’s all held outdoors under the shade of trees, so the kids get a full day of fresh air and sunshine without the burn.  And that means – thankfully – they usually get to sleep nice and early at night (my concern here is for the children’s health and well-being, of course).  Most activities are available for a fee to non-residents of the resort, but always check ahead and book for activities, as they fill up fast.

Then it was my turn with the teacher.  No more holding Ella in my arms in the water.  Under more questioning I had to admit that we give Ella a cloth to wipe her eyes every few moments in the bathtub.  That explains why she won’t get her face wet in the pool, says the teacher.  Another lesson learned.  Once the parents are trained, the child will be swimming in no time, it seems.  Ella’s teacher has been marvellous – we went the private lessons route through Nanaimo Parks and Rec because Ella’s too shy around groups right now.  There may be another lesson in there somewhere for us.

The heart of the street market is being able to browse over 120 vendors selling everything from artichokes to artworks, bread to beads, clocks to candles, and from every other letter of the alphabet.  The kids bought a very fun puppet here and they’ve also found unique gifts for friends’ birthdays.  If they can sample something – like honey or fresh bread – they’re extra happy campers.  And they’ve made lots of new friends there too because plenty of families come to the market.

The kids always have a fabulous time dancing to the top quality musicians featured each week.  We’ve tried in the past to have the kids stay in their shoes, but it’s a losing battle and blackened feet are a small price to pay for all the fun.  Face painting is another favourite and the ice cream wagon gets a regular visit as well.  And since the beach is so close, we often come up there first for a picnic and then show up for the market starting at 6pm (which is crucial if you want some of the fresh bread and other goodies!). The market is every Tuesday night through to August 18 from 6pm to 9pm.

We love Transfer Beach as you probably know, and that’s a great place to have Canada Day, which is why the clever folks at Parks and Rec are having it there from 1 to 5pm.  There’s going to be music and lots of family activities.  And of course they have the water park there and one of the best concession booths around – great burgers!

Nanaimo’s Maffeo Sutton park boasts one of the best playgrounds around with a wonderful view of the Harbour, plus it’s getting all polished up for the opening of the new Spirit Square, so what better place to hold Nanaimo’s Canada Day celebrations.  Our kids love the Kerplunks and guess who’s going to be there!!  A multi-cultural food fair promises lots of good eating and there’ll be plenty of fun activities as well.  It all starts at 11am and runs until 3:15pm.

If you like your celebrations to start early, then Parksville’s Canada Day celebrations will get you going at 8am with the popular Shriner’s pancake breakfast.  What could more Canadian than piling on the butter and the maple syrup!  Then it’s the annual Canada Day parade down the Island Highway starting at 10am.  Get your seats early because this is always well attended and this year everything about the Parksville celebration is supposed to be even bigger!  Then it’s off to the Community Park for a full day of fun starting at noon.

No matter where you spend the day on July 1st, though, you’ll want to end up in Parksville around dusk because it’s time for fireworks!  Our littlest one has turned out to be the biggest fireworks fan after a couple of years of ear-covering, so she’ll be there.  With her family of course – can’t have the 5 year old driving by herself to Parksville.

We have a great sprinkler toy that fills with water and then waits… waits… and then sends a blast of water way up in the air when you least expect it.  George calls it the scream machine because of its effect on the kids.  But even the scream machine can’t hold a candle to some of our favourite watering holes.

The water park at Transfer Beach in Ladysmith is one of the best around.  George wanted Ella to try out the bucket dump;  the bucket fills with water and then wait… wait… down it pours on unsuspecting children.  Yep, more screams.  But George didn’t properly calculate the water-to-Ella weight ratio; she was no fool and left the deluge to her big sister.

Nanaimo has several city parks with water equipment, but our favourite is the Harewood Mining Community Park on Howard Ave in the south end of the city.  A lot of the water features are built around a painted train track and the kids love to race around it and get sprayed as they go.

Parksville community beach has a classic old water park with some particularly tricky sprays built into the ground, which unsuspecting parents can get caught it while they’re keeping an eye on the kids.  Ok, only George, who keeps forgetting that the nozzles are there.

While up in Parksville the kids also can’t resist going on the bumper boats at Paradise Fun Park – the place with the giant mini-golf courses.  Tip for parents and older kids – the taller you are, the more you’ll get sprayed.  Hmm, I guess that’s kind of a tip for the younger kids too, isn’t it…

After the girls went gah-gah over Emilee’s goo-goo’s it was time to explore.  That meant the concession stand first because a morning of marketing requires fueling up on popsicles and giant cookies.  I went for one of the cinammon buns that every other person seemed to be eating (now I know why!)  David – who’s two – tested the 10 second rule a couple of times with his popsicle, and Ella was happy to pick it up and brush it off for him (for a child who’s very particular, she’s never been very particular about food on the ground).

Errington has plenty of space in the field next to the market, so you can lay down a couple of blankets (I chose to lay down with them) and enjoy the great music from their fab new bandshell while the kids run around and burn off their treats.  I suggested a bandshell for our backyard, but before George could suggest anything back, Grace pointed out that we didn’t need one because it’s easy to drive to Errington.  Bless her young, irony-free heart.

Then it was off to the market stalls.  I suspect there may be some magpie somewhere in George’s family tree because our girls flitted from shiny object to shiny object at the jewellery tables.  There was a wide range of styles and one table in particular featured some amazing pieces by two young girls.  Then there were the hats, and of course the baking.  None of this was impressing David, until he pointed to the brightly-coloured hoola-hoops.  We’re not talking about the plastic kind the girls have had in the past, but properly weighted, hand-made hoola-hoops.  The moment she tried one, Grace could tell she’d never really been hoola-hooping before.  We’ll take two, I said.

A few plants, vegetables, and another cinammon bun later and we were ready to head home, but we’ll be sure to head back to Errington the next chance we get.  It’s not very far, as Grace says.