…..Cee is taking a week off from blogging but she’s still encouraging everyone to continue with her challenges
I love taking photos of odd ball abandoned rusty things.
I’m not sure why you need a fire hydrant on the edge of a rugby field. There are no buildings close by.
….in the Cormier family
This is my husband’s 37th pumpkin that he’s carved and my son-in-law’s first. I think my husband has some serious competition.
Yesterday I luckily found this large beauty. In my neighbourhood they were almost completely sold out when I finally got around to purchasing one and they weren’t reduced in price. It weighed a ton and I was glad that I parked close by.
This year I had the pleasure of cleaning the guts from the inside of the pumpkin.
Now that the messy part was done, my husband could focus on the design and carving out the face of this year’s Jack O’lantern.
Here are the two finished pumpkins, side by side. You be the judge.
It was a perfect night for trick or treating. Both my husband and I sat outside with a glass of wine in hand as we greeted about 46 children. That may not seem like a lot of children to you but last year we only had 2. I leave you with a few more photos of Hallowe’en at the Cormier and Turner house. Enjoy!
….thanks Becca for hosting Sunday Trees
….plus an assortment of other interesting characters
Ah, Hallowe’en! An excuse to dress up and express our creativity.
Every year at this time I wrack my brain to come with an original idea for a costume. In the past I’ve been a gum ball machine, a jellyfish, the lion from the Wizard of Oz, and an assortment of witches. My favourite costumes, however, are those that are a play on words. For example I’ve been a chipmunk where I’ve dressed as a monk and then pinned potato chip bags all over me. I also dressed up in a bird costume and put a large clock around my neck and called myself ‘Time Flies’. Another time I hung a huge quarter around my neck and carried a large hammer and called myself a ‘Quarter Pounder’. This year I designed a costume that was an interpretation of my last name ‘Cormier’.
Three days ago my friend L called me and asked what I was going to wear on Hallowe’en. I was stumped. I felt burned out and that there were no more creative juices flowing. I told her that I would probably just recycle one of my old costumes and go as a witch. She had already decided to go as her name so she was going to be a cat with a tail announcing her love for music (she’s the music teacher). I glibly said that I’d have to be an apple ‘core’ and she got very excited. We talked for a few minutes more and when I hung up I had my costume in my head. Here’s what I came up with.
Core + Mi (as in doh, re, mi) + eh! (a Canadian interjection)
Every year I’m always amazed at the wonderful costumes that the teachers and children parade around in (literally). At the end of the day we have a big parade that the entire school participates in. We walk around the school which borders on two streets and the parents and the community are out to witness the ‘spook..tacular’ event.
Hope you enjoyed your ‘Halloween’ weekend in your part of the world as much as I did!
Cheers!
….although technically not a flower this seed pod started out as a one
….closing the cottage took place later than normal
Traditionally many people close their cottages on the Thanksgiving weekend in Canada. For us this year that date was pushed forward by two weeks.
Our first grandchild was due to arrive on October 4th and we wanted to be close to home when she made her way into the world. As a result we didn’t venture too far from home from October 1st on. One week after the due date was Thanksgiving, which we spent with our daughter and the following weekend it snowed up north. Snow in mid-October is pretty rare in this part of Canada so we weren’t prepared, physically or emotionally, to drive in 15 cm of snow this early in the year.
Earlier this week we had beautiful weather and all the snow up north had melted away. We left after rush hour and made it up to the ferry dock on time, so we thought, to catch the 11:30 boat. What we didn’t know at that moment was that the schedule had been changed in early September when the kids on the island went back to school in Midland.
A nice young man came over to the car and told us that the next boat wouldn’t be for another two hours so we decided to drive back into Midland and have some lunch. We had Frances with us which meant that we had to find a place where we could eat outside. Luckily it was warm enough to do that and one of my favourite restaurants in town still had their patio tables and chairs outside on the sidewalk.
After a delicious lunch of butternut squash soup and a couple of grilled sandwiches we drove back to the ferry dock where I got out of the car and took a few photos of the surrounding area and gave the dog a little bit of exercise while we waited for the ferry to be loaded.
When we finally got to the cottage we quickly started to do what needed to be done. I stripped all the beds and bagged and stored away all the pillows and blankets. I removed all canned and bottled foods from the cupboards so that they couldn’t freeze over the winter. I removed all paper products from the counters and put them into sealed containers so that the mice that move in couldn’t shred them for bedding materials. My husband brought all the outdoor chairs and tables inside and moved and covered the barbecue. We loaded up the car with the bedding and clothes that needed washing and all the canned food. The last thing we did was board up the door so that the snow couldn’t blow in and to keep the glass window from shattering.
We took one last walk on the beach with the dog, keeping her on the least so that she didn’t go swimming. There’s nothing worse than having to drive for two hours with a wet dog unless of course that dog has been sprayed by a skunk.
We left in good time to catch the 4:00 ferry but when we got down to the loading dock we saw that the ferry was on the other side of the lake. I guess that this scheduled time had been changed as well. When the ferry got closer I could see why the time had been changed. The ferry was loaded with high school children coming home from school.
When we finally got on the ferry we were allowed to drive on, front end first, instead of backing on. What a treat! After 20 minutes on the ferry the car ride home took just over two hours.
Another great summer at Christian Island has come to an end. Thank goodness we were able to close on such a beautiful day.
…..the other day WordPress notified me of a milestone
When I started this blog three and a half years ago I had no idea that I would still be blogging this far down the road, never mind posting 1337 articles.
Congratulations on writing 1337 posts on Mama Cormier!
My question, however, has to do with the number 1337. Why is that number a milestone in the blogging world or at least at WordPress? When I think of milestone numbers, 500, 1000 and 10 000 come to mind. Am I thinking in metric terms? Is 1337 an important number in the Imperial system?
What am I missing? If anyone can help me I’d be most appreciative. In the meantime I’ll celebrate this recognition doled out by those wiser than me at WordPress.
Upon doing further research I did find in Urban Dictionary that 1337 means ‘elite’. Is this the answer?
…debating, tea, strongest sense and a title for my autobiography
Four more great questions from Cee. I had to give two of them a bit of extra thought.
If you were on a debate team, what general subject would you relish debating?
Seeing we’ve just come through a very long election campaign, by Canadian standards, I’d have to say that I enjoy debating about politics. I’m actually pretty passionate about it and I find people who make rash statements, quote political ads as facts and make sweeping generalizations very frustrating.
What’s your strongest sense?
No question that my strongest sense is visual. I have good colour sense and I love to explore the smallest detail in my photographs. My husband thinks that I have selective hearing and my sense of smell is very weak. I love the taste of most foods but I’m not sure I could pass a sommelier test.
What would you name the autobiography of your life?
This is probably the question that stumped me the most. Here are a few titles that I might consider:
Learning to Appreciate the Small Things in Life
Being Loved, Giving Love, Loving to Learn
My Life – It’s Not What I Thought it Would Be
Happy Being Ordinary
Always Looking for the Next Adventure
List your favorite flavors or types of tea.
My favourite tea at the moment is a good strong orange pekoe tea from Ireland or Britain. I still enjoy a good cup of spicy Chai and in herbal teas I like anything with ginger and lemon.
Bonus question: What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up?
I pretty much wrote about what I was grateful for from last week on Sunday so I won’t repeat what I’ve already said but if you missed it you can check it out here. One other thing I am grateful for is being able to work with such wonderful people. As you may or may not know, teachers, here in Ontario, are going through some pretty tough negotiations and we’ve been without a contract for 14 months. Everyone is getting pretty frustrated and even though we’re still in the classroom doing our jobs and still running extra-curricular activities for the kids, the media is relentless and the rumours are frightening. Needless to say tensions are high but for the most part people are supportive and forgiving.
For the rest of this week I’m looking forward to finishing up some of the art assignments in my classrooms so that I can display them in the halls and share them with you. I’m also looking forward to Hallowe’en. I have no idea what I’ll wear this year but I may go with a traditional costume. I’m glad that the 31st is on the Saturday. The weather is suppose to improve by then and I won’t have to rush home from work to carve out the pumpkin.
Here are a few more photos of the Farmers’ Market that I visited on Saturday and photos that I took on our walk.
…although technically not a flower I just loved how this plant grew out of this old log
…at the Farmers’ Market I saw this unusually shaped sweet potato
I remembered a couple of other odd vegetable shapes that I’ve taken photos of in the past.
Have you taken any odd ball photos lately? Join in the fun and go to Cee’s Odd Ball Photo Challenge to find out the rules.
