Our Home and Native Land…

Today Grandpa (my dad) and Beth (Grandpa’s girlfriend) arrived!  The kids woke up early and kept asking me over and over again “When will Grandpa be here?”, even though we knew they were arriving around 12:30pm.  When they pulled up to the house, the kids went crazy jumping  and running around.  They were so happy too see their Grandpa.  We don’t get to see him very often because he lives in Canada, so a visit is always super exciting for us!  We love it when Grandpa comes to visit!

One of the side benefits of having Grandpa visit is that he comes bearing gifts.  He restocks my Canadian treats stash…my naughty stash!  

My fridge and cupboards are now filled with May Wests, Smarties, Shreddies and Coffee Crisps!  We have Gravol for our long trip to Disney in case someones tummy becomes ill.  There will be Dare cookies to go with the English Breakfast Tea from the English Shoppe and Cheez Whiz that is tangy in taste and not bland.

Oh Canada…my home and native land….

Not only does Grandpa bring gifts from himself but he also delivers care packages from other family members like my mum and my nanny.  It ends up being a very nice sized collection of Canadian goodies!  It’s not all for me, some of it is for the kids and some of it I have to share with my darling hubby.

The things I do for love.

Even though it seems like a lot, everything will be carefully rationed out in order to make it stretch for the next 6 months to a year.  Since we don’t have a set date for our next trip to Canada it’ll be even more cherished with restricted consumption.  Not knowing when we’ll get to stock up again makes each item more valuable.

Part of having the stash is just plain ol’ nostalgia.  Just knowing I have access to Canadian treats fights off the homesickness that tries to sneak in even after the past 8 years.  It takes comfort food to a whole new level!

So thank you Dad, thank you Nanny and thank you Mum!  To everyone else it may look like a big pile of junk food, but to me it’s a piece of Canada – my home.