Nine months in one paragraph

Well folks, making this blog just goes to show that my geekiness has reached a new level. It has only taken since last September for me to get around to doing this - so my idea of documenting our life through our first Canadian winter is now a little flawed as it is May and super sunny, all the real snow has gone and it is well into hiking, climbing and biking season (for that, also read Bear season - but I'm sure there'll be more about those critters at some other time).
For those of you who may have missed it, we did land in Alberta last August, had a super wedding in Banff, bought a house in the foothills of the Rockies and began teaching in Calgary. Well, Sabrina is teaching full time, the authorities are a little reluctant to give me full teaching status yet...
Winter was full of of ski-ing and playing in the snow and ice - the end of the season was completed with the arrival of Browny and Nic who visited for ten days and had their first taste of ski-ing (photos to follow).
I'm still waiting for my work visa extension - not quite sure when it will arrive, but hopefully it gets here before the deportation papers do. (I've already had trouble getting into the States this year - apparently I had been an illegal alien in the US for the past 244 days!!!! - I knew nothing about it, but their computers certainly did and the alarm bells rang and lights flashed when we tried to drive into Montana a few weeks back).
Having just returned from a great few days back in Blighty (seeing family and new members of the Tate family) we are picking up with summer fun now - having had a good weekend climbing at Grassi Lakes in Canmore, we're off this evening for more of the same (good old long summer nights...).
Future postings will be rather specific to keep you all up to speed with Canadian antics, this garbled posting is just to check that this blog actually works...
Cheerio for now.

S & S
Here's a quick snap of the house.
The Piccie at the top is at a crag called Wasootch where we spent a lazy afternoon last week - we did manage to climb a few routes but were more interested in testing out how bear spray works (note to all, ensure any bear spray, no matter how little, does not blow back into your face - unless you desire burning throat and streaming eyes for a good few minutes - take it from me, it's not very nice).

Just one more thing, I couldn't resist putting up a photo of Browny trapped in a tree, into which he crashed going backwards on his first ever ski run - obviously I promised never to show anyone this shot to maintain his macho ego, so publishing it online seems the only thing to do.