Making Friends

The weirdest thing happened last Friday. I didn’t feel like doing too much when derick came home so we went swimming and were planning to go out for dinner that night. and when we got down to the pool there was already a mom in the pool with a small boy (amandas age) and a dad sitting in a chair near by. My first thought was “man I hate sharing public pools, there’s ALWAYS someone down here”. I got to go to the hot tub when Amanda quickly became friends with the boy in the pool. The dad came over to the hot tub to talk to me. we talked for a minute until he wanted to talk about details about what derick did for a living, that’s when I sick’t him on derick. they ended talking for a while and the mom came to the hot tub and she and I talked. They were just very open friendly people. And I was SOO happy that their son was playing so well with Amanda. It’s hard to find someone to match her playful character.

I found out they were staying here at the hotel for the next 2 weeks cause they’re house/condo got flooded. And as we talked more, they shared with me all the great things there are to do around here with kids and told me about the best restaurants in the area. I found out that the mom’s familys business runs the Tim Hortons restaurants. That is the biggest restaurant chain around here. It’s like the stamp of Canada. There are more of them here then there are star-bucks or McDonalds in the US. So this gal is up here to handle 2 of the stores near the area. They told us that we could get free doughnuts anytime we wanted them cause they liked us. they then asked us what were we doing for dinner, we said we were thinking about this so-so restaurant. And then they said we should go to Mortys, that they had the best hot-wings. And they said “why don’t we ALL go together?” and derick and I NEVER do anything like this, after all we DID JUST meet them. but we look at each other and sad “sure why not?”. so we left the pool got ready and then called their room to say we were ready to go, and they wanted to show their room layout to us so we went up to their room. Like I said, they’re just very open friendly people, but at the same time, I’m thinking of the best way take them out if I needed too as we’re walking up to their room. Their son was watching “backyardagains” another thing that made Amanda realize she really liked this kid.

So then we finally all leave for the restaurant. Amanda and this little boy held hands all the way to the car, and all the way into the restaurant, it was so cute. When he was in his car and we were in ours driving there, she would say “where’s _____” “he’s right there in his car” “oh, good”.

Mortys is a Pub, but we quickly are learning we ARE actually a PUB-family (here in canada anyhow). Pubs, are non-fancy, great food, great price, we sat in lawn-chairs with a plastic sheet on the table, there were soccer games being projected on the walls and TVs, and NO one even LOOKED up to give us the stick-eye cause we were there with noise little kids, you just cant hear them over all the noise there. It was just a really great place to eat for those reasons alone, but their wings are HUGE!! Their like supper colosso chicken wings! And there were pretty awesome! Voted best wings too in the news papers and stuff we found out. I got a 12 count HOT style, but I couldn’t eat them all cause they were so big. They were even better the next day I found out. We got Andrew a “pogo” which is what they call corn dogs here. Derick got wings and Amanda got a burger, but the cool thing is kids meals come with a drink, ice cream and a cookie.

I was surprised at how much we had in common with this young-couple, and how nice they were. We’re both Christians and do things like FHE, against gay marriage, and they’re what we would call “republicans”, and they’re very much about family and stuff like that. I was so surprised when we started to talk politics and religion. When he was asking how did we were Christian/against gay marriage, and did we like Oboma?, I looked at derick, and was worried about how bad this might go and said “how much do you want to know about us on the first date?” we chuckled, But it was relieving to find out where were all on the same page.

After dinner they showed where the “good” library is (apparently I went to the pathetic one earlier) and then we all went to the “old train station”, it runs 3 days a week to take you to the local farmers market. But when it’s parked, your kids are free to play around it and clime on board and stuff. We took some pictures and walked and talked for a while. But it was now getting dark so we all drove home.

We’ve made plans to do some fun stuff together, and go to a baseball game (blue jets?… I cant remember their name). I’m so shocked, and what a blessing it had been to meet these great people and how we’re quickly becoming friends.