Christmas party

We joined the parish council in Ponoka for a joint Christmas party last weekend.  It was good to meet some of our fellow parishioners as well as a new group of people from the other parish that is being served by our priest.
We had a good meal followed by a fun gift exchange where there was a lot of cheering and "stealing" in the process of distributing gifts.  A great evening.

Therese

Dad's birthday

 It was wonderful to have so many home for Dad's birthday!!  Everyone brought food and we had lunch on Saturday!!  The table was pulled to its length and we had to add another in the living room to get everyone a place to sit.
We did take family photos which are on Brian'c camera and I will get those downloaded and blog them when I can.
Mom and Dad have bought themselves new chairs for the living room.  The old ones have found their way to the landfill after having served twenty five years of butt support for our family.

Therese

A few more snowmen ornaments

Brian spent some time in the shop in the last couple of weeks between his many other projects making two sets of snowman ornaments like he made last year.
One set was donated to the school bazaar for a silent auction prize and the other was wrapped and brought for the gift exchange at the combined parish council Christmas party in Ponoka.

Therese

Parkland Singers at the Rotary Community Christmas concert

 Last week Brian participated in a Christmas concert at the LMC with his singing group - The Parkland Choir.  It is always a wonderful evening and a great way to start the Christmas season. The concert features a variety of community bands and choirs.
This is the Flatiron Band.  A well practiced band that played some contemporary pieces.  They opened the concert.

Here is Brian's group which closed the concert and lead the final song - Joy to the World.  There were quite a few children's choirs and one church choir this year.
We were joined by Dave and Alison from next door.  They really appreciate music as well so it was a fun evening for everyone.

Therese

The end of an era and a new beginning

No sooner home, we had a long list of things to do.

I worked on getting envelopes printed for the special collections we will be doing as we move ahead with the fundraising for the new church.  I also made liners for these two baskets which will facilitate the collections.  Here you can see the scene at the church on Sunday.  It was our last mass in this facility.  We are moving to the school gym until we can move into the new church which will be built in the same location.  So there will have to be demolition of the present structure over the winter and plans are already on the way for the new one!

Therese

A get together with siblings in Winnipeg

We spent our last night with the Malaks!!  Anna served up an Italian feast and it was great to be together with this bunch again.  Haley is doing part time school at U of M and part time with Todd's firm.  She is studying architectural design.  Rob and Karen are getting ready to embark on a new adventure - a resort near Kenora.  This is a place they have visited for years and are now buying to run as their retirement project.  They are looking forward to it though every move comes with its challenges.  

Therese

Trip to Manitoba!!!!

 Just a few photos of our visit with Katherine and Gil and the kids.

Gil is reading bed time stories.

The kids - especially Loic -  like playing with the train set.  There are bridges, overpasses and switches that all connect so the train can go all the way around.

Pepere was playing "Go Fish" with the kids and they thought it would be funny to hide behind their cards!!!

Amelyn just hanging out!!

Pepere always brings bagels for his breakfast when we go and they kids always look forward to him sharing with them.

Stuffy has taken a liking to Sasha's bench and can regularly be found all curled up and napping!!  I failed to get a good photo of Louis this time around.  He has been respectful of Amelyn and is very well behaved.


Therese

Trip to Manitoba!

We were driving ahead of this cloud the better part of the day on our first day on the way to Manitoba!!  It was wonderful to have the sun and to have almost traffic!!

By late afternoon we were over taken by the clouds on one side but as you can see the sun was still shining.

Saskatchewan!!!!  It is always a good trip!!

Therese

Getting ready for our trip to Manitoba!

 When I found out that Katherine had had a girl I went and bought something pink!! A cute little onsie!!  I also made some large bibs with waterproof PLU fabric with owls and monkeys.  I worked on those the week before we left and got them finished just before Halloween.
Therese

Halowe'en!!

 

We had a good Hallowe'en!!  A few less trick or treaters than we have had in the past but the evening was beautiful.  We handed out hot chocolate as we have been doing for the last ten years or so.  They are always a hit with the kids!!
We roasted our pumpkin seeds and snacked on them on our way to Winnipeg.

Therese

Suzanne's wool blanket

Suzanne finally finished the wool blanket she started on last year.  It needed a pretty serious make over after it had been washed to remove the basting spray.  It looks fabulous and it will surely be a keepsake for her cousin and his wife.  

Therese

Party for Kale on Halloween

 We went to spend the day with Suzanne while she was preparing for Kale's party!!  It was a fun day - mummy cupcakes!  How cool is that!!

 There were streamers and balloons and ghosts!  Mina showed us how to make the ghosts from tie up garbage bags and then they were put up inside and out.

 Kale is really loving music at school and so he and Pepere played with the floor keyboard.
Right up his alley!!

 These pumpkins were waiting to get their insides out so they could be carved with Daddy for outside decorations.   The other one had already been done and it became the source that was spewing the fruit salad for the party.  Brian emptied that one.  He thinks it is the first time since maybe childhood that he has emptied a pumpkin to make a jack o lantern.  Better late than never!!  Mina emptied her own by herself this year.  She doesn't really like the goopy feeling but voluntarily did it anyway!




It was a fun day with the kids and Suzanne.  She made roast beef for supper which was excellent as usual.  We headed home just after supper with a bit of snow falling but it did not last and we had a good drive  home.

Therese

Tomato seeds

Some of the tomatoes I received from Paula had labels so I decided to save seed from three of the ones that I particularly liked.  They are pulpy tomatoes that are quite tasty and are good for canning and drying.
Searched the internet for how to best save seed and found a process of letting the seeds sit until the gel dissolves leaving the seeds available to be dried.  It takes three days for the process to work so I will soon be able to dry my seeds.    Therese

Reduced tomato juice and seeds!

Paula has informed me that most of the flavour from tomatoes resides in the gel around  the seeds so I have taken to reducing what remains in the bowl at the end of a canning or drying session.  I makes for a very tasty reduction which I have frozen and plan on adding to tomato sauces over the winter.  Yummy!!  We used the last small batch as a tomato sauce on our homemade pizza!!  Very delicious!!

Therese

Canned the last of the tomatoes!

I received another few boxes of tomatoes from my friend Paula. They were multi coloured and ripe so I decided to can what was left upstairs along with what I culled from her boxes.  So I have more than a dozen more beautiful jars of tomatoes because I had red, burgundy, yellow and orange tomatoes!!  They look pretty!!!
I am most appreciative to Paula for her donation of garden produce!!! She certainly is a farmer at heart!!
Therese

Oktoberfest!!

 We attended Oktoberfest put on by the Knights of Columbus chapter at the parish.  We met another couple, Carmen and Chris, which we found out live down the road from us by the lake and have similarly aged children and grandchildren as we do.  Really cool people!!  Carmen reminds me of Maria a lot.  They are originally from Saskatchewan  and she is french speaking.  

This is our friends, Tom and Peggy!  It was a wonderful evening with a great meal and a live band, The Emeralds, for music.  It was great to be dancing again.  There was a great many people do so as well so it reminded me very much of dances from my childhood.   Every age group was represented and all had a good time.  

We won a silent auction prize!!  Tickets to the Cow Patti theatre for this winter and golfing tickets for next summer!!!  We also won some mugs which we gave to Chris and Carmen.  They had attended the Cow Patti theatre a couple of years ago and bought mugs for their coffee while they were there and unfortunately forgot to take them with them at the end of the evening.  We have plenty of mugs and I thought they would appreciate having the mugs so I passed them on without ever taking them home.  

Therese

The raised beds have been moved!

We have decided to move the raised beds because they seem to dry very quickly on the concrete and therefore have not been as productive as I had hoped.  So Brian dug up the sod and we turned it over and placed the frames which I had emptied over that.  We are thinking that having turned it over it should decrease the amount of grass that will grow up through the beds.  The beds still have landscape cloth on the bottoms which should also dissuade grass from growing up through it.  Having them directly on the soil should really help them retain their moisture.

So I emptied all of the mixture from the inside of the beds which allowed us to simply pick them up and move them.  I just refilled the frames once they were moved.  I expect they will get a little less sun in their new location so we will have to see how it goes next year and make adjustments as we go.

Makes quite a visual difference with the beds off the patio!!!  The fire pit will fit on there very nicely for next year.  The little plywood covers are hiding the holes from the fence posts that had to be cut off.

We are looking to fill those with LED lights which will be covered with plexi which will provide soft lighting for the  patio.  The compost bins will live there for the winter and we shall see about moving them in the spring.  Brian would like to acquire an IBC for gathering rain water off the garage so everything will be rearranged in the utility area to accommodate all the pieces.  More projects than we can get done in a year but there is a plan which will eventually be executed.

Therese

Shrubs have been moved

 A few weeks ago Brian went out to cut the grass and I had mentioned that he should be careful not to run over the evans cherry.  He came right back in and asked me to come outside.

The evans cherry had been pruned by a hungry hare!!!!!!!!!!!! All that is left is two little sticks coming out of the ground.  I expect he will grow next year but it was disappointing to have it be so much shorter now.  You can check it out here.

Brian also moved the sand cherry from next to the entrance of the patio to between the fence and the neighbour's cotoneaster hedge.  It should fill in that space very nicely and its burgundy leaves will add a bit of colour in the perenial bed but as you can see from the photo that it has already lost most of its leaves.   As you can see in the foreground the black currant is doing nicely.

Brian moved the potentilla from the spot next to the patio to the hole that he took the sand cherry out of.  We are planning to put a walk way from the front garage to the patio so the potentilla had to be moved to make room for that.  They are both doing well.

Therese

Our Thanksgiving!!

Suzanne and Sal arrived for Thanksgiving and the kids immediately found themselves something to do!  Mina brought her sketch book and was drawing.  Kale found the cars and the garage.  They played quietly for almost an hour before lunch.
I cooked my turkey on Saturday so I could better control when my Thanksgiving meal would be ready.  It worked out well because Richard cooked his bread earlier in the morning which left the oven free for turkey and stuffing when the time came.

Here is our feast - turkey and all the trimmings.  We had potatoes from the garden, fresh garden carrots and Suzanne brought broccoli and maple glazed acorn squash.  I made carrot and pineapple jellied salad which I have not made in YEARS!  It was a nice change.

It was great to have family for the holiday!!  The kids are growing up!!  Suzanne and I took the kids to the park after lunch and the guys took care of cleaning up the dishes and putting the food away.

There was time to just hang out after the park and I made sourdough pancakes for the kids and anyone else who was hungry before everyone left at supper time.

I am grateful for all of my children and their families!!!  I am grateful for my siblings and my parents!!  I am grateful that we can regularly see each other!!!

Katherine and her family visited with Gil's family on Saturday and the kids enjoyed a fun day with their cousins!!

Therese

Thanksgiving weekend - canoe

Richard came on Friday for the Thanksgiving weekend because he had those days off.  We went to see "The Martian" on Friday night. It was excellent and quite true to the book which we have all read.  Saturday, Richard helped Brian put up the canoe support system which has been temporarily installed in the back garage.

It looks good hanging there and now allows enough room in the garage to put the car.  

While they were at it they hung my bike as well. with a lift system we bought at a garage sale earlier this year.  Nice to have these items off the floor!!

Therese

Oktoberfest silent auction prize

I have packaged one of Dad's rosaries which he donated to me for use in fundraising in a 6" x 6" plastic box which Sylvia bought for me at Classic Packaging.  It worked out perfectly!!  I created an insert to put between the cross and the rest of the rosary which just fit in the box.  All the credits and contact information has been included on the sides of the insert which are perfectly visible through the sides of the box.
I think next time, I will add some tissue paper over the rosary before I add the insert just to tone down the rattling when the box is turned over.  The Kof C are putting on Oktoberfest here on Saturday evening so I am looking forward to seeing how much the rosary goes for.

Therese

Finisihed the harvesting at the garden plot

The garden plot is empty!!  We technically had until Thanksgiving Monday to have it all out.  I went one night almost two weeks ago and pulled everything when they were predicting killing frost.  As it turned out, we got rain instead but I will still very happy to have removed everything in ideal ground conditions.  The carrots, beets and parsnips came out easily and were not too caked with dirt.  It did take a few days to get them all cleaned but I have four bags of carrots, one bucket of beets ( Neighbours got a few and I put the extra on Kijiji for free and they were gone within an hour) and two bags of parsnips.  I have a full bucket of potatoes as well.  The weather has been really nice for drying the vegetables!!!  You can see in the photo that it was quite late by the time I was done but that is the way it goes when you are a "farmer".  

Therese