My ancestors were the first to settle in Ottawa Ontario, Canada which was then called "Bytown." See link below for history of my ancestors.

I came into this world in the very cold month of January 1945. I love the winter months! I had 8 uncles, 5 aunts, 2 sets of grandparents and 2 great-grandmothers, 1 great grandfather and more cousins than I could count. Seems I was always going to school with one cousin or other. One of my uncles was in the Ottawa fire dept. and later became fire cheif. One grandfather was an RCMP officer and the other head auditor for the Metropolitan Life Insrance. Our family is a mixture of Scottish, Irish, English and some North American Indian. We all had that unique Ottawa Valley accent, combo of english, scottish, irish.

Hopewell Elementary School

This is the elementry school I attended from grade one to grade eight. It was old when I went there, having been built in the late 1800's. I even used a desk in grade six that my father had once used........his initials were carved in the old wooden desk.

Both Hopewell and Glebe are still in use today and still look the same. Hopewell is renovating this year. Glebe used to share about 1/3 of it's school with High School of Commerce, where I attended. Now Commerce is at Carlton University. My mom had attended Glebe for her high schooling. In Commerce we barely had enough boys to makeup a football team each year. They were very strict at high school, not a sound while all the students changed classes. Lockers were opened and closed ever so quietly. Being in the capitol of Canada, I entered high school on a 4 year course being done in 2 years as government office workers were going to be needed. School started at 8:00 am till 4:00 pm, with 15 minute break in both morning and afternoon and a half hour for lunch.

The Rideau Canal

I loved to skate, ski and snowshoe. Cross country skiing was my favorite sport. I did not mind the cold, preferred it to the heat of summer and how can you call Christmas as Christmas without the snow. The Northern Lights are a frequent sight in Ottawa and I loved to lie on a snowbank and stare up at them, as I said the cold did not bother me. The Rideau Canal in winter is drained before it freezes with just a bit of water left and it becomes an ice-skating rink over 11 kilometres long! It is the longest free ice skating rink in the world.

Canoe on Rideau River

The only things I liked about summers was, no school and lots of time in my canoe. I learned how to handle a canoe at age 4 as we grew up by the Rideau River. I would pack a lunch and leave early in the morning and spend the day travelling about in my canoe. I accidently came too close to the rapids one day and learned in a hurry how to 'shoot the rapids'. My father who had seen me heading too close to the rapids greeted me at the bottom and promptly took my canoe away for the summer *groan*. I shall never forget my experience with the rapids, but at the same time am proud that I did it and survived & no, I would not do it again, once was enough!

Red Maple tree

I love maple trees, especially the red maple. I also loved the fall season in Ottawa. The days were not too hot nor too cool, just right. I loved watching the birds migrate south for the winter and remember the crispness of the fallen leaves as I walked through them. We had a fair amount of fog as Ottawa is in the valley.