If you take a trip down to City Hall, you will find a photography display in the Rotundra that features three of my photographs. They are three of the five photos I entered in the "Picture the City" photography contest, and my work "Lower Mulcaster" received honourable mention in the "Heritage and Architecture" category.

Oddly, the whole contest turned out to not be about what I thought it was supposed to be about, which was "picture the city." I took that quite literally, but half of the 16 winning photographs could have been shot almost anywhere and one of them is clearly not even in Barrie. There are some nice photographs, though.

On Saturday, Jennifer and I went for a nice kayak trip in the bay. After returning, we were carrying the first boat to the car when tragedy struck. The darn handle slipped out of my hand, and I dropped my end of the boat.

Unfortunately, the keel landed a direct hit on the nail of the big toe on my left foot, and I never saw my toe nail again.

Jen and Kristin arrived back safe and sound this evening!

Jakob is finished with elementary school, and ready to move on to high school! That's both our babies in high school, proving the saying that time flies when you're having fun.

Jakob graduated with honours from Codrington Public School, which he has attended since grade four. He will be attending Central Collegiate in downtown Barrie this September (the same school as his big sister, who'll be in grade 11).

It was exactly four years and eight months in the making: ONE THOUSAND geocaches found!

Geocache find #1,000 came on the last weekend of summer, as Danoshimano and Kritter! headed out for a two-day excursion to Huntsville and ultimately Burk's Falls, where they found some really interesting things and cleared the entire village of caches.

Kristin went BIG at the Barrie Fair this year, entering items into eleven different categories. She came away with four first place ribbons, plus a second, a third, two fifths, and three merit awards.

She scored first place ribbons in the 'Banana Muffins', 'Flying Critter Made From a Clothespin', 'Photography - Nature Closeup' (shown at right), and 'Christmas Decoration Using a Snowman' categories. And the last one -- the snowman -- is the best story, but more on that later.