Mini Vacay

Cool!  By taking just one day off work (Friday), I've given myself a 5 day mini vacation.  I'm off now until next Monday.  Woohoo!

Cindy & Karel are coming out to visit for a couple of days.  They were heading East for a 60th birthday celebration and decided to make a side trip to Calgary too.  (Yay!)  They arrive on Thursday and have to leave again on Saturday.  Naturally, the weather is supposed to turn to crap while they're here, but that's okay.  We don't see eachother very often, so sitting indoors with a bevvy and catching up won't be a hardship.  This photo was taken in March of this year.  We managed to fit in a quick visit with them in New Westminster on our way back from Mexico.

It's week #6/52 of my photography project. ("F")  This week's entry isn't terribly imaginative, but it practically fell into my lap.  This Fence is right outside my office window, so I've had it in mind since the beginning.  Next week is "G".  Now that's gonna be a tough one...

Taz has had her annual summer buzz cut and yes, she looks ridiculous! 

We never claimed to be expert dog groomers.   Actually, she'd look silly even if we did know what we were doing with a pair of clippers.  Her head is SO red and her undercoat is SO white, it looks like somebody attached the wrong head to her body when they assembled her. 

Go ahead and laugh!  She doesn't care, she's a lot cooler.  And I don't care because I'm no longer ankle-deep in dog hair in the house!

Uh oh

Like I need a new chocolate addiction! 

I had a couple of these, then a handful, then they became dinner... 

Oh well, life is short;  gotta treat yourself once in awhile.

Learning to cook

When I lived with my parents, I wasn't allowed to cook on accounta I might make a mess in the kitchen.  I guess messy is different things to different people, but my mother was one of those over-the-top neat freaks who would have a conniption fit over things like crumbs on the counters, so experimentation in the kitchen was definitely frowned upon!  When I moved out on my own, I didn't so much cook, as practice chemistry.  It wasn't easy being a macrobiotic vegetarian in the 70's.  Remember "Diet For A Small Planet"?  That was  my bible. (And only cookbook)  I pretty much lived on steamed vegetables, brown rice and homemade yoghurt. (gag!)  Of course, as a good earth-mother-hippie-chick,  I did this very stylishly while wearing long cotton skirts and peasant blouses!   In my 20's, I survived on beer and bar snacks.  Period!  In my 30's, I was single again, but by then, microwave popcorn had been invented, (Woohoo!) so I would alternate between that and toast.  (because it's important to have a balanced diet, y'know)  When Dan & I married in 1987 he was working shift work and we seldom ate meals together - and that's just the way it was for some 20+ years.  We ate a lot of frozen or packaged convenience foods - separately! 

So finally, after 23 years, we can sit down and enjoy a meal together.  We can even entertain guests because we both have weekends off now, but unfortunately, neither us ever bothered to learn how to cook.  Umm, bit of a problem.  Sure, I now own a whole shelf full of cookbooks, (I love the IDEA of cooking) but most of them are in pristine condition - and dusty!
Luckily, we live in a technologically advanced age.  I like to browse through the Flickr group called Recipes to Share.  People there post photos of good looking dishes that they've created and they include the recipes.  Quite often, these photos lead to a blog link where there are many more wonderful photos and ideas.  One of my favourites is Cookin' Canuck's blog.  She always shows step-by-step photos and has easy to follow instructions.  Perfect for an old rookie. 
Last night's delicious barbecued salmon was made from her recipe.

Because I can no longer imagine life without a blog

The last couple of blogs were pretty event specific.  Travels With Vincent was to chronicle our first winter as snowbirds, travelling around in our VW van, and Mexican Madness  was to give friends and family an idea of our life in our new winter home in Puerto Peñasco, Mexico.

Blogging became a large part of my life and I find myself a bit lost without one on the go. 

So this one is simply an ongoing, day-to-day rambling of things and stuff that interest me.  Photos, craft projects, books, recipes - whatever strikes my fancy at the moment.

F'rinstance, this is my latest knitting project:

I've been on a serious knitting kick for a couple of months now.  I've made a matching set of scarf, mittens and a hat.  A couple of pairs of socks and a pair of flip-flop socks. (over which, I took an enormous amount of flak) 

 

I expect my enthusiasm for knitting will probably run out before I finish this sweater.

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And my first photo project is in its 5th week of 52 weeks.  The first 26 weeks are the letters of the alphabet and the last 26 weeks are the numbers 1-26.  I'm really enjoying this project.  Unfortunately, the other members of the group are pretty creative, so it's gonna be a struggle to keep up.  Thanks to Monica for setting it up on Facebook.  Creative Photography Click

This is week #1 - A

Week #2 - B

Week #3 - C

Week #4 - D

And week # 5 - E

The rest of the project will be located under the tab at the top of the blog.

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And in other news:  I've just ordered a Kindle2 E-reader!  I'm so excited!  I can't wait for it to arrive!

I hope I like it after all this anticipation.  I mean, I really like BOOKS.  I like the look of them and the feel of them and the smell of a new book is wonderful!  I love caressing the cover and cracking the spine for the first time.  Yes, I do that!  I know some people consider that sacrilege, but how else do you get the book to lie flat so you can read it while eating breakfast?  And after all, reading is the POINT of a book.  Right?

I am gonna miss this, though.  I love the look of a stack of books waiting to be read.

Of course, being able to take as many books with me as I want when we travel, will make up for it!

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And finally, kitchen experiments.  Found this tasty (and easy!) dessert here:

Do these look good or what?!  And it's just mango and ice cream.  Even I can do it!