….this bloom lasts only one day
New Flower (Aug. 8, 2014) – Passion Flower
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Category Archives: Happiness File
Cottage Life – July 19th, 2014
I finally got up to the cottage. This is actually my second trip to the island but I was back in the city for an extended period of time. Now that I’m back I’ve settled into relax mode. On my first trip I opened up the cottage and did a lot of the cleaning and sorting one does when you first open up after a long winter break.
My fridge is run on propane and right now the only downside is that it requires two people to start it, one at the front and one behind. Unfortunately the automatic starter doesn’t work so someone has to hold a flame in front of the pilot light which is at the back of the fridge while another person pushes the buttons at the front. When I arrived last Thursday, alone, none of my immediate neighbours were around so I kept my food in my cooler. Luckily my girlfriend’s daughter arrived on the next boat so the fridge dilemma was quickly resolved.
My meals are simple. Fruit and yogurt for breakfast, soup and an open face sandwich for lunch and salad and grilled meat for dinner. I always make a thermos of coffee first thing in the morning and later in the day when it cools down I might put a few ice cubes in it and have an ice coffee. I also enjoy a cup or two of tea but I have to stop drinking by 7:00 in the evening or I’ll be up in the middle of the night. Oh, did I mention we don’t have indoor plumbing. I don’t mind the outhouse, except at 3:00 in the morning. I never have to get up in the middle of the night at home. Why is that?
Today my girlfriend and her husband arrived. They’re my immediate neighbours to the south of me. I joined them for coffee when they arrived early this morning and they invited me for lunch later in the day. I always contribute in some way when I’m invited for a meal so today I sliced and grilled sweet potatoes and onions that I prepared on the BBQ. Most of my meals are cooked outside, in fact all of them because I also don’t have electricity.
As I type this on my fully charged laptop I’m listening to the radio which runs on batteries. I love the CBC in the summer. If I stay for an extended period of time I’ll take a trip to the library in the village and use their Wifi to post my articles, catch up on my emails and recharge my laptop and iPhone. I’ve been up for three days and I’ve already finished reading one novel and am on my second. I get a lot reading done at the cottage. The weather’s been a bit cool so I’ve stayed close to the cottage. The beach isn’t warm enough for lounging right now. I need to get out and walk a bit more. I’ll probably do that after I finish this post.
Another activity I like to do while I’m up here is paint. I’ve brought my boards and canvases up with me on this trip and am planning to apply gesso to them to get them ready for painting. The next time I go home I’ll pick up the rest of my paints and bring them with me on my next trip. I also like to take photographs and I’ve taken a number of shots of my neighbour’s garden across the street from me. They come up a lot earlier than I do and when I get here in July their garden is well established. Well I’m I think I’d better finish here and get outside and move.
Till the next time. Cheers!
A Word a Week Photograph Challenge – Kitsch
Share Your World – Week 27
….thanks Cee for more great questions this week for Share Your World
If you were the architect of one existing building, which building would you select?
What an impossible question! There are so many wonderful buildings out there in the world that I’m sure my choice will probably offend a variety of people for a variety of reasons. I’ve decided to limit my choice to buildings in the city I know best and that would be Toronto. I am a huge fan of the AGO (Art Gallery of Ontario). It was recently renovated and the architect is Frank Gehry. I love that Gehry built the addition around the old building and preserved the best features of the original gallery. My favourite features of the new addition are the Galleria Italia and the Baroque Stairs.
http://www.ago.net/frank-gehry-redesigned-ago
What is one of your favorite quotes?
My favourite quote is ‘Live, love, laugh, learn’. There are many variations of these four words and I love them all.
What color do you feel most comfortable wearing?
I am most comfortable in reds and royal blues. The OA at our school says that I can wear all colours well but that is not true. I just know what colours suit me and I tend to stick to those colours.
What is something you learned in the last week?
In the last week I learned about the mystery plants that were gifted to me and how to play the chord Dm on the ukulele.
Bonus question: What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up?
I’m grateful to the temporary caretaker who helped me with my dilemma in the library. He made a few phone calls and saved me a lot of work. Hopefully when I return at the end of the summer I’ll have a new floor in the library a new caretaker who’ll be as considerate as this one was.
In the coming week I’m looking forward to returning to the cottage and hopefully seeing Germany in the finals of the World Cup on Sunday.
Mystery Plant #3
….this is the last plant I need identified
Thanks to Maggie Wilson I now know the name of my mystery plant #2. It’s a Spiderwort or Tradescantia. http://home.howstuffworks.com/spiderwort.htm
Photo courtesy of : http://www.northcreeknurseries.com/_ccLib/image/plants/DETA-315.jpg
My last mystery plant has lovely burgundy leaves. I’ve seen this before but the name escapes me. Any ideas?
Ignore the green weeds around this plant.
Done – Time to Relax
… finally finished cleaning the library
If you walked into my library right now you’d think I was off my rocker making a statement like that. There are boxes of books everywhere.
Believe it or not that’s what I had to do. Over the summer a new carpet is being put down in the library and the books on the freestanding shelves had to be taken down so that the shelves can be moved.
I also had to clean my office so that the caretakers can get in there and clean the floor and the counter. I was really stressing about not being able to get in there and get things off the floor and the counters.
I spent two extra days at school this week to get the job done. While there I started to purge and threw away a lot of paper and old outdated documents. It was a slow process but worth it in the end. I can now enjoy the rest of my summer without worrying about the state of my office.
Now I hope when I return that the carpet will be down and that my office will still be uncluttered. I suspect that many of those boxes will end up in. It’s the one area that’s not being carpeted.
The big challenge is to keep my office like this all year.
New Flower of the Day (July 3, 2014) – Lobelia
….I’ve been a fan of this pretty little flower for many years
Strike a Chord
…..Do you play an instrument? Is there a musical instrument whose sound you find particularly pleasing? Tell us a story about your experience or relationship with an instrument of your choice.
My parents wanted me to play an instrument but they couldn’t afford to buy a piano. I remember someone coming to the house with an accordion when I was about 8 years old and trying to get me to manipulate this big, heavy and awkward music box. I’m sure that the cost was too prohibitive, never mind that I had no interest in being an accordion player. In the end my Dad bought me a Hohner melodica.
Oh, how I disliked this thing. Image courtesy of https://c1.staticflickr.com/7/6014/5927778569_5a0e7458c5_z.jpg
I didn’t like this instrument either.
When I was in grade 7, our school had a school band and everyone was welcome to participate but you had to rent your instruments. Again my parents couldn’t afford the cost of the rental. Instead I took part in the class where we learned how to play the recorder. That instrument my parents could afford. In fact I was pretty good at it. Years later, when I started teaching grade 5, I took a refresher course and started teaching my students how to play. It’s not my favourite instrument but I did take some pride in knowing I could play an instrument and pass on my limited talent to my students.
In high school I was very limited as to what elective courses I could take. As much as I loved the arts I couldn’t fit any arts programs into my curriculum. I think this is one of the reasons why I was so happy that my own children had the opportunity to attend the arts high school and they all studied a musical instrument. When our son was 10 years old he expressed an interest in the piano and we started with an old clunker and then quickly moved on to a beautiful baby grand when we realized that he had a natural gift.
Once our children reached middle school they all played instruments in the school orchestra and band. Two of them played the cello and one the saxophone and they continued to play in high school.
I think one of my favourite instruments is the guitar. I can’t play it but my husband can and over the years, off and on, he had fine tuned his skills. He started playing when he was 14 and even gave lessons at this early age. I never heard him play until he was well into his 30s and in his 40s he played with our daughter at a school recital. He’s pretty much self taught but for a couple of years he did take lessons. He’s added a couple of guitars to his collection over the years and I bought him a strum stick several years ago.
Image courtesy of: http://www.baconworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/strumstick2.jpg
Recently he’s added a mandolin to his collection and every day I hear the sweet sounds of his new acquisition wafting up from his office in the basement.
I’ve tried to learn how to play a musical instrument on my own. I tried to play the piano and I started to feel somewhat comfortable with it but then the piano needed tuning and I stopped. I know it’s a pretty dumb reason to stop but our children also no longer played, mostly because they had all moved out or were away at school and I guess I felt I wasn’t worthy of spending the money to have it tuned. Hmmm? Money seems to be a reoccurring theme in this post.
An instrument that I have taken an interest in lately is the ukulele. I bought my first uke some years ago when we were considering teaching it to our students. I think the one thing that put us off was that we would spend most of our time tuning it, leaving us very little time to actually play.
My love for the ukulele, however, continues and for Mother’s Day this year my husband bought me a new concert ukulele. It’s a little bit bigger and the tone is so mellow. I love it and I keep plunking away. I bought my friend, who is also the music teacher at my school, a ukulele last Christmas. We’re hoping to spend some time this summer honing our skills together.
Maybe some day we’ll form our own ukulele orchestra. LOL!
For more ‘Strike a Chord’ entries check out
http://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/strike-a-chord/
Painting Your Garden
…..I’ve just completed another on-line painting course hosted by Carla Sonheim and taught by Diane Culhane
I loved this class. It was the first time I painted on wood and the first time I used the palette of paint from one assignment as my canvas for the next assignment. There were six lessons in all with 3 large assignments all using different techniques or a combination of techniques from one week to the next.
The process involved putting gesso on the board to prep it for painting and then creating a garden scene inspired from your memory, magazine pictures, other artists or from your own garden. Most of my inspiration came from my imagination. The idea is not to create realistic flowers (but you can if you want) but to use a variety of techniques to create a more whimsical garden. It’s almost more like folk art. I loved doing this and am looking forward to creating more gardens. Maybe in future paintings I will include some buildings and maybe I’ll scratch in some fun characters coming out from behind the flowers.
Soccer, Soccer, Soccer
…..I’ve become a huge fan of international soccer and the World Cup
I can’t believe how much soccer I’ve been watching. I chose five teams to support because of my family ties to some of these nations. My fifth choice was Iran because my future daughter-in-law is from there. In fourth place I supported Italy because my other daughter-in-law is half Italian and her other half is Argentinian so my third choice is obviously Argentina. My second favourite team is the Netherlands because that is where my son presently lives and my number one choice is Germany because that is where I was born.
Now on Canada Day you would think that I would be doing something ‘Canadian’ to celebrate our 147th birthday but I found myself with my husband at a bar watching the Belgium vs U.S.A. game. I have to admit that I was cheering for Belgium and only because of its proximity to the Netherlands. The Americans played a fantastic game and if you’re not a soccer fan after that game I’m afraid there’s no hope for you. It was very exciting, right down to the last few seconds.
On Saturday we went to my daughter’s place to watch the Germany vs Algeria game and it was a nail biter as well but in the end, in overtime, Germany won 2 to 1. Algeria surprised everyone with how well they played and the game almost went to a shoot out.
Before we went to the pub my husband watched the Argentina vs Switzerland game and Argentina also won in overtime. Now that leaves me with three teams to cheer for but if it comes down to Germany and one of my other teams I have to go with Germany. Sorry kids that’s just how it has to be.
Mama Cormier 
