With the shipment away, M and the kids are off to visit the in-laws at the cottage. There is still lots to do so I will return to oversee the pack-up of long-term storage. In the meantime they get 10 days of lake time.

For the past 8 years, every summer, we have packed up four kids and a dog in the back of a mini-van and driven 3000km from our home to the cottage. It takes about 40 hours of driving which we usually did in three days going there, with a day or two added coming home for back-to-school outlet shopping.

The boys would say our annual sojourn helped them to understand the true worth of noise cancelling headphones when their sisters get crazy, but overall these trips — though dreaded prior to departure — have been full of good memories.

This year, almost at the last minute, we decided to fly. The means of departure didn’t change the reality that we were going. It still meant we had to say goodbye to everyone (and why don’t we have a photo of all our wonderful family and friends that came to the airport to see us off?).

After the stress of packing and saying good-bye we were pretty tired when we arrived in Ottawa Sunday evening. Instead of undertaking the four hour drive to the cottage that night, we decided on a hotel instead. As we were checking in the clerk reminded us of the Parliament light show that would start shortly (every night in the summer at 10pm). It was so nice to watch as a family and be reminded, as we head off, that representing Canada abroad is a pretty cool responsibility.