Weekly Photo Challenge: Blur

Posted on April 6, 2015 by Mama Cormier

….this week’s WP photo challenge is to find beauty in the blur

Five Stories, Five Photos Challenge – Day 2

Posted on April 5, 2015 by Mama Cormier

I was invited by Elizabeth from Tea and Paper to join the Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge “Post a photo each day for five consecutive days and attach a story to the photo. It can be fiction or non-fiction, a poem or a short paragraph and each day nominate another blogger for the challenge.” Elizabeth is a fellow Canadian who lives close by but never reveals exactly where. She loves to journal, take photographs and write poetry.

Today, on day 2, I’d like to invite Woolly from Woolly Muses who resides ‘way down under’. He describes himself as a former wool chaser and after 30 years changed careers and became a teacher. He loves all kinds of photographic challenges and I hope accepts this invitation to join in on this challenge.

After yesterday’s poem I felt I had jinxed the weather. We had a beautiful, albeit cool day, and I really felt in my heart of hearts that Spring had finally arrived. I did say that more snow was still a possibility in this neck of the woods but I guess I was quietly hoping that after our long and bitterly cold winter that we might get a break from that prediction. Silly me!

Last night, after watching a movie with my husband, I decided to quickly check on my emails before heading off to bed. The dog started to whine, indicating that a quick trip outside was in order. I put my laptop aside, slipped on my shoes and without putting on a jacket I opened the door and this is what I encountered.

Arrrgghh!!!!!

You can’t really tell from the photos but the snowflakes were big and fluffy and they clung to the branches of the trees. I have to admit that it was pretty but enough is enough.

This morning when I woke up the ground was still covered. Later in the morning didn’t it start to snow again. Once more the flakes were big and fluffy but the temperature must have been hovering just above freezing because it didn’t amount to anything. Later this afternoon all traces of the snow were gone.

Is this the last of the snow? I’m not saying anything this time. I don’t need to jinx us again.

Cheers!

Sure Signs of Spring

Posted on March 22, 2015 by Mama Cormier

……March 20th marked the first day of Spring

The snow has melted in this part of the world but the east coast of Canada has been hit with more snow storms and we’re talking about a lot of snow.

I’m thrilled that Spring has finally arrived even though the signs aren’t always obvious to the naked eye or to exposed skin. This morning when I woke up I could see that it had snowed last night. Nothing significant but enough to know that winter isn’t done with us yet and if that tiny bit of snow didn’t convince you, the cold wind certainly did.

Later in the day the sun did warm things up a bit but walking into the wind did make the trek a little uncomfortable. I, however, was on a mission to find signs of spring that I could record with my camera.

Much of the plant life still harbours the brown tones of decay but the sun added a certain warmth and brought out a richness to some colourful naked branches.

One of the signs of spring was the hidden treasure that lay inside the snow all winter and now appeared everywhere. Hardly photo worthy though. On our way home we looked up and I saw my first robin of the season. I have noticed that the birds are singing more brightly in the morning when I wake up and the squirrels are more active in the backyard.

I was hoping to see signs of new growth coming up through the ground but It wasn’t immediately obvious. When I returned home I walked up to the front garden and pushed aside a few leaves and lo and behold I found my crocus starting to push up through the ground. Spring is definitely here despite the cold and gloomy forecast for April.

Well at least it’s warm inside and my husband has brought Spring indoors with his gift of fresh tulips. I’m a lucky girl.

Cheers!

Sunday Trees – 175

Posted on March 22, 2015 by Mama Cormier

….thanks to Becca Givens for introducing me to Sunday Trees

Even though we are officially into Spring I could not find a single tree that has started to bud.

Cee’s Black and White Photo Challenge – Music

Posted on March 19, 2015 by Mama Cormier

….Cee’s Black and White photo challenge this week involves anything to do with Music

Music in the Afternoon – Trumpet, Piano, Bass and Drum

Posted on March 15, 2015 by Mama Cormier

…..a great concert featuring Jens Lindemann

On Thursday of this week I had the pleasure of attending the third concert of a series, Music in the Afternoon, put on by the Women’s Musical Club of Toronto. I didn’t know what to expect. I only knew that the featured artist, Jens Lindemann, played the trumpet. It turned out to be my favourite concert to date.

The concert started with a piano and trumpet duet. Jennifer Snow (who is also Jens’ wife) appeared on the stage and began to play. From the back of the auditorium the unmistakable sound of the trumpet joined in. Slowly Mr. Lindemann made his way to the stage while he played.

Even though the concert started on a serious note, we quickly learned of Jens Lindemann’s fun side. Born in Germany, he introduced himself with a heavy German accent. He asked the audience if there were any other Germans amongst us and I quickly raised my hand. I had no idea that I would be the only other German born person to raise her hand and he immediately asked me, in German, where I was from. I told him Frankfurt and he told us that he came from an area close by. There were two other German speaking audience members but they were from Austria and he made a joke that with one German and two Austrians we had a party. I was nervous that he would ask me more questions in German but he moved on to talking about Tim Horton’s and all of a sudden his heavy German accent disappeared and he spoke in a natural ‘Canadian’ voice. The audience loved it.

I should have known that he was putting us on because I had read that he came to Canada as a baby. He was raised in Edmonton and studied at McGill University and The Juilliard School. He’s won numerous awards as a celebrated soloist around the world and in 2014 he received The Order of Canada.

For most of the show Lindemann was accompanied with a piano, bass and drums. Apparently it was the first time in the WMCT’s history that a drum set appeared on stage. The ensemble was made up of the celebrated and talented musicians of Kristian Alexandrov, Mike Downes and Ted Warren. We were treated to a range of musical styles from classical (Bach and Debussy) to Jazz (Duke Ellington), Tango (Piazzola) and contemporary composers (Sting, Alexandrov).

The show ended softly just like it started but Lindemann featured his pianist, Kristian Alexandrov, with a number that he composed himself. Kristian’s Prayer brought tears to my eyes. At the end Jens joined in with a lovely rendition of What a Wonderful World. I bought Prayer from iTunes and I was able to find a video on YouTube of Kristian and Jens performing What a Wonderful World at McGill, four years ago. Enjoy!

More Snow, Cuban Food, Cheese, Tarts and Jazz

Posted on February 22, 2015 by Mama Cormier

….despite the snow it was a very full and delightful day

On Saturday we woke up to more snow. Lots of snow. We had made plans earlier in the week to meet up with friends for lunch and because we had already cancelled the last get together because of illness we didn’t want to cancel again. Luckily the drive wasn’t too long.

We had lunch at a very popular restaurant on Roncesvalles in the west end of Toronto. The weather certainly didn’t keep people from going out for a meal. The place was packed but our wait was relatively short. La Cubana specializes in Cuban delights and because we were there on a Saturday the brunch menu was being served.

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The food was very tasty and the service very friendly. I would definitely go back. We hadn’t seen our friends, D & D, since New Year’s Day so we had a lot of catching up to do. They talked about their recent trip to Singapore and shared some beautiful photographs of this island country. We brought them up to date on K’s recent surgery and his even more recent accident. You can see from the photograph that he’s healing nicely.

After lunch we said our good-byes, scraped off more snow from the car and then carefully drove off. On the way home we decided to stop at one of our favourite cheese stores in town, The Cheese Boutique. It was a good day to go. We sampled some delicious organic olive oil from Turkey, were served some hot turkish tea and met a lovely lady who was promoting her homemade lemon curd tarts and butter tarts. I asked her if she lived close by and she told us about her store and bakery on the Queensway called the The Tartistry. She also told us about the live jazz band that played there every Saturday, all day long. Seeing it was on the way home we decided to stop in and check the place out. Before we left we picked up some great cheese that was on sale, a free range chicken and a nice big steak to share for dinner.

The Tartistry is a small store, crammed with beautiful antiques, jewellery, art work and of course tarts. We sat at a small table and ordered two pots of tea and because we hadn’t had dessert with lunch we also indulged in the best tarts I’ve ever eaten. The jazz band was very good. The place was pretty quiet, probably due to the bad weather, but I can see how on a nicer day the place could be very busy. I would definitely go back here again as well.

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After spending about an hour listening to jazz we finally drove home, stopped to pick up some fresh vegetable to go with the steak and quickly shovelled more snow and took the dog for a walk before preparing dinner. Actually, we were pretty full from our mid afternoon snack so we waited quite a while before making dinner. The steak was amazing and even though one steak is normally enough meat for both of us my husband did wish he had an entire steak to himself (only because it was so good). We laughed when he said that because when we have in the past eaten a steak each he usually complains that it’s too much meat.

All in all it was a wonderful day. Full of new and unexpected and spontaneous adventures.