A Long Weekend For Some

The first weekend of summer, now that school is out and June is drawing to a close.  Because of the Canada Day holiday tomorrow, lots of people booked today off and made it a four day weekend. Not possible for yours truly but I still managed to enjoy 2 lovely days at the cottage with family and friends. The weather was warm and muggy, too hot for some but I was soaking it in (still thawing out from that bloody polar vortex that we thought would never leave!).  The sun was shining, the birds were singing, there were lots of interesting sights to see out on the lake.

Late Sunday afternoon was our annual cottage picnic, including the hard fought tug of war - always a rivalry between the north and south ends of our cottage road, especially since the North team has won several years in a row but this year, the South was victorious - whoo hoo!!

North

South

As the picnic was drawing to a close, dark clouds threatened and thunder could be heard rumbling not too far off.  I had to drive back to the city and the clouds along my route were absolutely stupendous!

Only an extremely brief minute or two of hard rain, followed by even more glorious cloud formations and all too briefly, a rainbow (also visible in downtown Toronto, according to the radio, which seemed entirely fitting, given that the celebrations for World Pride Week were drawing to a close at that time!).

(Can you believe that I didn't do anything to enhance the colours on the above photos?!)

All in all, a great way to start the summer of 2014!

Haiku My Heart: Summer Dusk

This time of year, dusk
falls slowly, in soft pastels
that echo with dreams.

Haiku My Heart Fridays hosted by recuerda_mi_corazon.

Not My Mother's Yard Sale

Last Friday night, as I was driving to my mom's house to help with her (third) yard sale the next day, I stopped in at this yard sale along the way.  I was astounded to see all these fabulous vintage and antique items, most very reasonably priced.

I especially loved these two old stoves!

 
Wish I had room in my apartment for some of these lovelies!

A DLP Canada Swap

You might remember me telling you about The Documented Life Project earlier this year in this blog post.  The group is going strong and all sorts of magical things are happening - online courses, in person workshops, gatherings of DLP members and creativity galore being shared in the Facebook group.

A lady by the name of Katarina Adams gathered together 9 Canadian members in 3 provinces (Alberts, British Columbia and Ontario) into our own little group on FB and suggested a swap.  She divided us into groups of three and gave us our instructions:  the first person was to send a background page that we want to use in our DLP journal to person #2, who is responsible for adding paint, texture and/or layers.  The page is then mailed to person #3 for them to add quotes, embellishments and/or final design details to the page before mailing it back to the original person, who can then add it into their DLP journal.

Here's the background page I sent off to a lady named Helmi in Alberta.  I was running a bit behind schedule in getting my page in the mail, so I decided to use a gelli print page I had on hand that I didn't otherwise know what to do with.

Front

Back

Today, I was super excited to get my page back from Christine in Alberta (who also happened to be my NLWM penpal this year, as revealed in this post).

Front

Back

I can't believe how pretty it is!  Helmi and Christine did such a great job turning my rather boring piece of background into a work of art. Thank you so much, ladies!

P.S. Christine also sent me Helmi's page for me to finish but I can't show you a picture of that just yet. First I need to add my magic to it and then send it off to Helmi. I want her to be the first to see it, then I can share it here.  I can tell you, it's pretty awesome already!!

Flying the Flag

World Cup soccer is a big deal in a multi-cultural city the size of Toronto. I've lost count of how many cars I've seen flying flags this past week, and that's not counting the ones in the parking lot at work!  So far, host country Brazil

and Italy seem to be tied as far the most popular choice

but I've also seen flags for Germany (the one with the crest is a state flag, I've learned):

England

and France

(It almost looks like the Eiffel Tower in the background of that photo, doesn't it??)

I had to look this one up, it turned out to be Croatia:

Here's what it looks like unfurled:

There's even one poor soul who just doesn't seem to realize that summer has arrived and hockey season is over for this year.  I think it's time this flag was given a decent burial!

This proud Columbia wins the award for biggest flag:

Personally, I can't get excited about soccer. It just looks like a lot of running back and forth to me, a bunch of guys chasing a white ball on grass.  I can't really believe there are 3 more weeks left in this tournament.  I also can't believe Google has had soccer doodles every day for a week now, is that going to continue for the duration?  The one today was cute though - everybody in the boardroom watching a game and cheering, until the boss walked by and they quickly changed the channel to look like they were having a meeting.  Very clever!  But enough already!

Many thanks to flagdetective.com, where I was able to look up those flags above with which I was not already familiar and copy the above images for the Brazilian and Croatian flags.

Haiku My Heart: Hello Summer!

Summer arrives, full
of promise, sparkling with light,
hearts embrace the warmth.

At long last, summer arrives tomorrow at 6:51 a.m.!  The solstice is always a bittersweet time for me. In the back of my mind, I know it means the days will now start getting shorter, only by a minute or two every day, but still...every lost minute of sunlight means we're inching closer to another season of winter.

Never mind.  I'm not going to think about that right now. I'm going to just soak it in, embrace the arrival of the summer of 2014 and jump in with both feet!

You will find more Haiku My Heart gifts to enjoy at recuerda_mi_corazon.

Laundry Challenged

It's not hard getting the laundry done, it's getting it out of the basket that is the hard part!

This is my darling Matisse.  She likes snuggling into the warm clothes when they're fresh out of the dryer.  It's also hard to get a good picture of her because of her dark colouring, so I was quite delighted when I snapped this one. Isn't she pretty?

Internet Cuteness

I can't seem to get enough of these cute pet videos on the Internet.  Saw this one about the parrot with the stuffed bunny just tonight, how adorable is this?? ("peek a boo, what are you doing?"!)



So far, my favourites are the baby goats.  This video of 44 of the little critters has become an Internet sensation.  You can read all about them here.


Although I also get a good laugh out of these bouncing goats.


But this one has to be one of my favourites (you have to click here to watch it!). I love the way the goats slide to a stop, turn around and nonchalantly walk back in the other direction when they run into the dog, and then zoom back again.

Enjoy!

Scenes From The Racetrack

I went to watch my cousin Chris race his vintage Fiat Spyder 124 yesterday.

He's been coming here to race in June for a few years now but this was the first time I've been able to go.  I've watched many Nascar races on TV but had never seen an actual car race live before, it was quite exciting.

Chris and several of his friends who drive similar (Fiat) cars park together in what they call the paddock.  They share tools and parts and advice, and lend each other a hand when repairs are needed. We were introduced to his group before the race and got a chance to check out the cars up close.

Here's Chris getting ready to head out to the race track, with my mom, my cousin and my aunt to wish him luck.

I learned it's not always easy to photograph racing cars.  Sometimes you get a good shot of a bunch of them:

Sometimes a clear shot of the one you want, like this pretty turquoise car that was my personal favourite:

But sometimes you get this:

or this!

The race was at least 3/4 over when the pace car drove by.

and the yellow caution flag came out, indicating there was trouble on the track.

We knew something had happened but we didn't know what, since we could only see part of the track from our vantage point.  The guys from Chris' group of friends who weren't racing quickly realized that one of their team members hadn't driven by with the rest of the racers who were still circling the track at a much slower pace, which meant his car was probably involved in whatever accident had brought out the caution flag.  The race ended and we headed back to the paddock, arriving just as the damaged car was being brought back on the tow truck.

Luckily, the driver was okay but of course, he was quite frustrated and disappointed by what had happened to his car.

Not everyone had a bad day, this little fellow seemed to be enjoying himself!

All in all, it was a lot of fun. Many thanks to Chris for inviting me along.  It was fun to spend some quality time with the family at the racetrack!