Decks in bloom

When we lived in the Blue House, we had a super large deck - it was awesome. The deck was off the kitchen and we used it all the time. We were super spoiled at the Blue House; we had three eating areas in good weather: the kitchen, the dining room, and the deck.

I loved it. Okay fine, I loved the whole Blue House.

But the deck. The first summer we were in the house, I knew I had to do something with it but I had no idea where to start. My friend Chandra gave me an early birthday gift of plants and planting materials and we spent a very pleasant day making the deck look beautiful.

The deck became a central part of our life that summer. It was home to a big table with an umbrella, a bunch of solar powered lights (there was no power on the deck), an awesome park bench and our bbq. We played board games out there. We ate our meals out there.

We often had friends over for meals and of course we ate out there. We had birthday cake for breakfast out there.

We had parties out there, lots of deck parties. We had birthday parties out there, more than once.

We had an upstairs neighbour and a downstairs neighbour in the Blue House and they both had their own small-space gardens. Water our respective gardens became part of our evening rituals. After the sun had set, the crows had flown home to Burnabye and I had taken down the ugly sheets on the kitchen windows (I finally made and hung the curtains before the second summer) and opened the windows and doors in the house to cool it off, I'd head to the deck to water my plants.

Around the same time K and R would both be out doing theirs. We liked our neighbours and we saw them often and this became a time, just before bed, for the three of us to exchange pleasantries and stories. By that second summer, K was preparing to move out and R and I were on tenterhooks because we didn't know when/if the house was going to be sold and we'd be looking for another place to live. The second summer I pretty much only had volunteers and herbs. I didn't want to leave much behind if we did end up leaving. And the deck had started to rot. K probably would have replaced it for us, but she no longer owned the house and the new landlords were...difficult.

Moving into a condo was a huge adjustment for us. We downsized tremendously. Our outside space shrunk. We lived in close proximity to a whole bunch of people, not just our beloved neighbours K and R. Oh and we had a brand new baby.

But I still wished for a garden and a green space and some plants. And this year, I finally figured it out. It's not as spacious as the Blue House. There's no grass. I can barely fit a kitchen chair out there, so it's not exactly a comfortable place to eat or read or do much of anything. But it's ours. And it's pretty.

And J is so excited about it...and that makes it 100% worth it! Oh, and I'm excited to what the plants will produce...looks like lots of strawberries and herbs, a few tomatoes and some beans...which is way more than we've ever had before!

Happy Birthday Pax Lodge

I have a lot to say about Pax Lodge and what better day to say it than on the 20th birthday of that white building in Hampstead.

Well, there is going to be a better day because I need to go to bed instead of blogging.

So instead, a few thoughts and a few pictures. With promises of a few more stories and a few more pictures later. I have lots of pictures...just saying...

Thoughts:

• Pax Lodge was my home during a few of the best years of my life (so far)
• Pax Lodge introduced me to many of the people I consider my closest friends
• Pax Lodge made me happy. Or maybe more, I was happy when I lived at Pax Lodge (that sounds like I'm not happy now...but that's not true either...it's just different)
• Pax Lodge taught me more than I learned during my four year degree
• I miss Pax Lodge. I miss my Pax Lodge ladies
• Look at the happy faces in these pictures...Pax Lodge is a happy place!

Photos: (please excuse the quality or lack of quality of the pictures...our computer is still out of commission and I ended up taking pictures of pictures, not scanning them like I should have...)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY PAX LODGE!

Hits the nail on the head

Oh my, this girl, Lynnea Malley, sums up Facebook quite well...

And because of Facebook's awesome ability to time suck, three nights a week I'm aiming for no Facebook at my house. Without even trying, I'm doing really well on the weekends...I think the computer slept from Friday afternoon until about 6:00 yesterday when I decided it was time to make my grocery list.

We'll see how this exercise goes. I feel old. I remember a time when my evenings were spent reading or knitting or hanging out with friends. Friends who were in the same room as me. Friends who I wasn't communicating with via computer or smart phone or some other new-fangled technological device.

PS there are still some spots in the homemade giveaway game!...you don't *have* to do your own giveaway to participate...leave a comment and you're in!

70. Knit a winter hat for J

So, this happened by accident.

It was freezing cold.

FREEZING...

And J's hat looked more like a beret and she really needed something to cover her ears. So I set out to make her a new toque. That covers her ears.

So, I pulled out my knitting supplies (still not unpacked from our move three years ago...) and dug through my stash and found some leftovers. I love this stuff!

I made the Stitch 'n Bitch Valentine's Hat and Mittens of out it.

See the heart? It was much easier to do that I thought it would be. Good thing...


Flaps! I think I must have swatched this...if I hadn't it would have been all wonky.

The hat. With the braid things. Its supposed to have a heart like the one on the glove in the middle of the forehead, but I decided against that.

These were great for a while. I attached an i-cord to the mittens so that I had lots of options for hot hands when I walked home from work.

Yes. This wool has been around since 2004, although these were a 2005 project.

I'm actually tempted to frog these and make something else. I haven't worn the hat much at all and I have barely worn the mittens since I stopped working somewhere easy to walk home from. Oooh, bad sentence ending with a preposition.

I also made this other hat that is probably something I adapted from a couple of patterns. I hate swatching, but this turned out all right and I wear it a lot. I think I made this in 2005, but this is 2006.


And this is the hat I made J. It's a good thing her head is so much smaller than mine or I would have been tempted to steal it and make her another one. I LOVE IT!


She spent the evening after I made it wearing it around the house. I think she may have even worn it to bed.


Of course, now it's too hot for this hat, but at least she has it for when the evil winter we're supposed to get strikes!


This was such a success and so much fun that I have three (non-baby blanket) projects on the go. Two Christmas gifts and one not Christmas gift. Yes Fiona, I'll post them on Ravelry...soon...

For Sarah - London in Vancouver

Look what's sitting beside my desk... (yes, I know it might not be entirely geographically correct)

Thanks Sarah! I still love it and now I have a toddler-safe place to keep it.

It's been seven years...

but we picked up exactly where we left off...


Nine years ago I met Rebecca (second from the left) in Switzerland and we created some havoc together. The picture of us in the bath tub (with Christy and Liz on either end of the tub) is the night before I left Switzerland we had a little party...

Anyway, two years later I went to Australia and spent a couple of weeks with Rebecca in Melbourne. She was here yesterday with her friend Dani - they had just spent nine weeks travelling together and they stopped in Vancouver for a few days. Rebecca was on her way home to Australia today and Dani headed south to Washington and California. But even though it had been seven and a half years since we saw each, Rebecca and I just picked up where we left off...it's so nice to have friends like that. I was so sad to see her leave our apartment tonight - we had such a lovely day together - we walked through Stanley Park and part of downtown, we went for Greek food, we went to MEC, we had birthday cake and we got takeout Chinese and we just had a great time. Amazing how seven years of life have passed and while many things have happened in our lives, it's still comfortable and easy and great.

How smart am I?

Apparently not very....

A few times a year I get "homesick" for London. No biggie. I usually pull out my "book" (former Pax Lodgers know what I mean) and I flip through it. Maybe I pull out my photos albums. Maybe I make a phone call, send an email, or chat with one of those Pax Lodgers and in a few days, I'm over it. London was a place I lived, oh, seven years ago, and it's a place I've visited a few times since and plan on visiting again in the future.

Yeah, so tonight, smarty pants that I am, I decided Google Earth was a good way to get my (woken up every 45 minutes to an hour last night) brain ready for bed. Why I thought Google Earth was better than pjs and brushing my teeth and actually getting into bed, I'm not sure. But it seemed like a good idea at the time. Famous last words.

Now I miss is even more. I would love to go for a walk on the Heath, eat some crepes, hang out with some friends, wander the city, visit Paperchase. You know, just be in London.

walk on the heath

eat crepes

hang out with some friends

hang out with some friends, some more

wander the city

Yeah, I miss it. And Google Earth made me miss it even more. Now, to find that bed I mentioned earlier....

What is oozing out of our ground?

I think you learn about rainbows and how they're created in elementary school...so, either this lady's brain is oozing or she skipped elementary school (oh, and the apostrophized plurals, they drive me nuts! More nuts that the misspelled words constitutional and thirst) But check her out, she's special!

Sprinklers remind me of being a kid and running through the sprinkler in the back yard and drinking from the hose. Yes, random thought. Sorry. I've been up for hours...that mythical baby insomnia finally struck last night...

Smells like Pax Lodge

You know how you can smell a smell and it immediately takes you to some other place or time? I know I've written about the Pax Lodge smell before and how it's one of the things I really like. I don't think I've ever smelled Pax Lodge outside of Pax Lodge before. I have smelled London outside of London, but not Pax Lodge.

Until today. Today I was in the little coffee area at work boiling some water and washing out a mug to make hot chocolate (because it's WINTER here again...what's up with THAT?) and the dish soap fairies bought a new brand of dish soap. It's some environmentally friendly something or other. And it did a nice job of cleaning out my mug.

And then, well then, I felt like I should be running Tilly and cleaning out Oscar and ironing to Classic FM and making endless beds and hoovering at 7:00 am and putting the flag up before breakfast and after putting in an hour and a half of work already and drinking wine on the Heath and vodka and tonic in the pubs and buying huge cans of beer, 3L bottles of Strongbow or individual Archers cooler drink things at the off license after last call. Yeah, if you lived or worked with me at Pax Lodge, you'll know what I mean.

Turns out, it was all because of that new dish soap.

Crazy.

And yes, yes I am procrastinating.

Memory Lane

Alex called me a work this morning with news that he had secured two tickets for us to go back to our early teens. In November we're off to GM Place for an evening of late eighties boy band nostalgia with New Kids on the Block. I don't know if you can consider them "kids" still, but I'm sure it will be an entertaining evening.

Adventures with the crazy lady

or why the advice your mom gave you as a kid is still good advice.

This little adventure has been popping into my head lately...not sure why. Maybe I'm hoping my kid will listen to me and not hang out with the crazy lady!

A few years ago, when I still worked for the corporate office and went out after work many nights of the week, I went out one night for sushi, then a movie and then beer with some coworkers. At least that was the plan. We got the sushi, we saw the movie (the oh-so-brilliant movie ahem...sarcasm...The Grudge) and we kind of got the beer after.

The movie freaked us out, so we figured a pub was a good way to get unfreaked out. The first place we went had dramatically increased the cost of a pint so we had our one drink and decided to go somewhere else. By now our group had dwindled to three...me, TC and his roommate H. And we were by far the most freaked out of all the people we were out with. Since they only lived a block and a bit from my place, we figured we'd go back to our neighbourhood, have some less expensive beer and then they'd walk me home, make sure I was locked in and then they could go home together and both sleep in the living room with all the lights on that night.

So we hopped on the bus, only to get about two blocks down Granville street to discover the next two blocks were blocked off because of a major police incident involving lots of police cars, some ambulances and chaos. We hopped off the bus wandered past the incident, which looked like nothing and didn't make it in to the papers the next day, and decided the fastest way to get out of downtown was to catch the bus on Burrard Street. So as we waited to cross Burrard, stamping our feet and blowing on our hands, the lady standing next to us remarks on how cold it is. Something inside my head screamed IGNORE HER...something inside all our heads screamed IGNORE HER, but she was irresistable.

Not that way.

And so we proceeded to break the parental rule number #1 - Don't talk to strangers.

And in conversation with her, we discover that she is going to YukYuk's, won four tickets and her friends bailed, so did we want to use her extra three tickets. In later discussions, we concluded this lady reminded us in a gnome-like way of Bette Middler (kind of) with a super squeaky voice.

So, since we already broke parental rule number #1, why not have a go at parental rule #2 - Don't go places with strangers.

Off we traipsed to YukYuks.

At some point, the crazy lady bought us a round of drinks, but when TC and H tried to buy the next round to thank her for the tickets, she insisted she was done drinking for the evening. Her one diet Sprite was more than enough for her. Ooops, just broke rule #3 - Don't accept candy/food (alcohol also applies) from strangers.

After the show ended, we were tired and still bent on getting to the pub in our neighbourhood. So we walked out with her and were saying goodbye when some interesting people came up and started talking to her. Seems she was a party organizer with a balloon business, but she also arranged strippers so if we wanted strippers ever, call her, here's her card. At that point we just wanted to leave, but somehow she discovered we were heading her direction and on the bus so she offered us a ride.

Broken rule #4 - Don't get into cars with strangers.

When we got to the car, well, we realized it wasn't a car at all, it was a big white van with no windows and a CAGE in the back. A cage. Where she put TC and H. Who didn't have a phone between them. I had to sit next to her in the front seat. With my dead phone clutched in my hand. We told her we wanted to go to Broadway and Granville, but she insisted we couldn't live there, so H told her we lived near Broadway and Macdonald. Off we go, down Broadway, all the while she is "entertaining" us with her stand up routine. Which we all said was great...just so she wouldn't keep going. But at Broadway and Macdonald, well, she doesn't stop. She turn up Macdonald. Somehow, ever so silently, without actually speaking, we manage to agree to jump out at the next light. And lucky for us, the light at Macdonald and 16th was red. And we all manage to get out. She of course was put out that she couldn't drop us on our doorsteps, which we'd already passed, but got us to promise we'd be back at YukYuks in three months time to hear her super polished routine.

TC and H walked me home as planned and we all agreed we were no longer scared of the movie, real life was certainly a bit more frightening.

And that those parental rules, well, they're all good ones and we were in no hurry to break them again anytime soon.

And that was that.

Or not.

Just over a year later, a good friend from Hawaii was staying with me and we were playing tourist. We'd taken the Hop-on Hop-off bus to the Dr. Sun Yat-Sen gardens and spent a very pleasant morning wandering through there. When it was time to go on to our next tourist stop, R needed to use the washroom and I wanted to take a peek in the gift shop. And then I heard the voice.

Her voice.

And the only way I could escape was to walk right past her out of the gardens or go back to bathroom and wait for R. Who was most surprised to find me loitering outside the men's bathroom. He'd already looked at the gift shop and was done, so he escorted me through the gift shop, away from the lady...

And now, now I keep thinking every time I go into a shop, she'll be there.

And from now on I'll listen to my mom! Because all that advice? It's good advice.

Intermittent Chaos

...punctuated by that sick-to-your-stomach feeling of panic that comes with feeling like you've taken on a project that's way over your head, that's a pretty good description of my life right now. Not that it was a project I voluntarily took on, more like it was thrust in my general direction.

I was saying to Heddy the other day, I haven't felt this way about work since we worked together at the place where we both worked very long hours and were (under) paid for only a portion of those hours.

This week's strategy has involved a number of walks up and down the steps to Wreck Beach, many cups of tea, a few panicked phone calls to supportive individuals, and constant reminders to myself that it could be worse: I could still be doing that job where I got to do fun stuff like clean up flooding messes, clean up overflowing toilets, babysit, run a lunch service (all things classified as "other duties as required" on the job description), and still stay on top of my 2,359 other daily duties, even if that meant getting leaving the house at 7:30 in the morning and getting home at 10:30 or 11:00 at night.

Somehow I have made it to Friday, which means for two days I will NOT do any work related tasks. Now I just have to stick to the pledge, because if I don't, well, by this time next week, I might just be certifiably NUTS (yeah, yeah, I know some of you think I am already...). I can do it if I keep chanting my remember when you were a glorified gopher mantra over and over in my head. And Alex will remind me that I promised not to do any work this week...right Alex?

Happy weekend everyone!

Remember When...

playing in the park was what kids did?


Big, old tires, partially buried in the dirt made fun playground equipment!!!

Remember When...(we had to go to flag every morning before we could eat breakfast)

I was talking to my friend Paula today and she was telling me that she is putting her photos from when we worked together at Pax Lodge in an album. So, that was eight years ago...anyway, that has meant a lot of remember whens for her as well as exclamations of WHAT THE HECK WERE WE DOING!

After talking to Paula and visiting with Heather and Virginia this week, my brain is totally in Remember When mode! And the three of them (and especially a conversation with Heather) made me think of...remember when we had to go to flag every morning before we could eat breakfast...

Morning Flag - October 2001
Three unknown guest Guides, Doreen, Paola, Shannon, Nadya, Suzanne, Astrid