Forever Young

Over the years I was told many stories about the village and the folks that lived here even before I arrived.  On many occasions I caught myself holding back giggles as the story teller referred to this or that "young lad" during the telling of his tales.  I was well married and had nearly grown children, and these "young lads" were almost always old enough to have been my father.  Sometimes they were not all that much younger than the story teller.  It seemed funny to hear them described that way at the time.

This week I was setting up an outing and asked if I could invite "the girl next door" to come along.  "The girl next door" is a grown woman with a son in his twenties.  She was living in that house next door when I first moved here, and was still in high school at the time.  I've been here 36 years now but  no matter how grown up, or old she ever lives to be, if I'm still around, she will always be "the girl next door"  to me. 

I guess, as they say, age is all relative.  It's good to know that many of us will always be young in the hearts and minds of those who knew us when we were.

Free Stuff is No Bother

Some days, going to the post office is really worth the walk.  Today I got three pieces of mail with free things in them.  One was a box from Proctor & Gamble.  They send out boxes full of samples at least a couple of times a year. A lady at the post office noticed my parcel and said, "Oh, P&G" and I immediately asked if she get this too.  Her answer was, "I can't be bothered with that." 

That box had samples of Pantene shampoo and conditioner, Bounty paper towels, Tide Pods, Dawn Ultra Concentrated dish detergent and what looks to me like a full size Febreze room freshener.  It's good for 30 days anyway, and came in a lovely Mediterranean Lavender scent.

There were other things available too, but Proctor and Gamble lets you choose the things that would be useful to you. It would be no good, for instance, if I were sent something for a dishwasher, since I don't have one.

The Garnier Intensive 7 Days Body lotion was sent as a consolation as everyone who had entered a contest on Facebook was sent an e-mail to tell us we had won a full bottle, 2 full weeks before the contest was even over.  I still have a chance of winning that, as they sent the samples and a coupon for a dollar off as soon as they realized the here had been an error. 

And yes, you do see a $50 Bon Appetit gift card.   I won $25 worth of credit at Card Swap through a blog I read, and the rest of the money spent to buy this card arrived in my Pay Pal account from having done some surveys.  Card Swap has all kinds of cards available and I picked this one as my hubby is often trying to feed me, so I figured it was my turn and he won't object if it's done card I didn't actually spend my own money on.  Bon Appetit is good for all our favorites....Montana's, Swiss Chalet, Kelsey's, Harvey's, and somewhere else I'm not acquainted with. 

The very notion of someone not wanting to be bothered, when it comes to free stuff, just boggles my mind!

Sept 22 
Correction:  Apparently that little Garnier sample was something I sent for myself, on Sept. 5, not what they are sending because of the contest error. For that I will get a coupon for a free full sized bottle of Intensive 7 Days Body Lotion. I tried my sample this morning and I already know I will enjoy the full sized bottle.

Step Out of the Way

This morning there was an author being interviewed on the CTV Morning Show.  She mentioned that sometimes when the men in our lives try to help, we step in and get in their way by making suggestions on how to do the job.  I'm sure I'm guilty of that sort of thing, but I have learned to step back from certain chores when my man takes a notion to do them.

You can always tell, however, just which of us did certain things.  For instance, when I hang laundry, I hang pants by the waistband, and shirts by their bottom hem.  He hangs pants by the bottom of the legs and shirts by the shoulders.  His way may require a bit of extra ironing on my part, but I think I still come out ahead time wise, when he helps with that chore. When doing dishes, I put the dishes in the drainer facing toward the sink, starting from the front of the drainer. He does just the opposite.  I'm not sure I understand the logic of that, but hey, the dishes still manage to dry just fine, so it's easy to stay quiet about that. And of course, there is always the toilet roll.  The ones I replace roll from the top and down the front of the roll.  His roll from the back, down the wall to the bottom.  Okay, so while I can leave the other differences in how we do things alone, sometimes I really feel the need to FIX this one, but I'm working on it.

Budding Artist Goes Touring

As some of you may know, J.J. Clarke is the CTV Ottawa weatherman who often presents the art work of children from around the region.  It seems that my 7 year old grandson's Grade 2 teacher sent in one of his pictures, and it was chosen from among 50 others to appear on TV last week.  Unfortunately I didn't see that broadcast, but my brother did, and so did his other grandmother.  Thanks to social media and a little help from one of my grandson's great aunts, I was able to track down this particular art display.

Sunday was Grandparents Day, or so I learned on the internet.  So, when the above mentioned grandson phoned and wanted to come spend some time with us, it was hard to say no.  We had plans though, to go on an artist studio tour. I told him that, and he informed me, "I like art," so we picked him up on our way through his town. 

At our first stop, he took a good look at some of the watercolours, telling me which ones he liked.  I pointed out a simpler one, with just layers of land and sky and suggested he could try something like that with my watercolours sometime.  He said he didn't like that one.  Didn't "get it at all" was more like the phrase used., which once again proves art appreciation is an individual thing.

He was thrilled to be allowed to enter the draw though, and took the time to fill out the entry form himself. Everyone on the tour could fill out a form at each of the locations they visited, and have a chance for a $50 certificate to buy something from any of the artists along the way.  I think, by the end of the day, he had decided it would be nice to have one of those soft fluffy bears from the Magpie Hill Alpaca farm.  We only found where to fill the entries out at a couple of locations though.  I'm not sure if that cut down on our chances, or increased them. If others had as  much trouble finding the draw slips, there won't be much competition.

I think the highlight of the day, and a big surprise,  was walking through Herman Ruhland's Enchanted Gnome Forest.  The man has gone to a lot of work clearing trails, hanging rocks and sticks from trees, setting up stone mushrooms and gnome homes and populating the forest with hundreds of little gnomes and fairies, and even fish in the "underwater garden in the shade" (which isn't  underwater, but has some mermaids and singing fish). 

Our budding artist had a good day seeing what others do.  He learned you could make statues using wire and t-shirts, that alpaca wool is very soft, and so is deer hide. He saw how moccasins are cut out and stitched together, and how a block of stone can be filed into a bear.  He declared that he'd like to paint but never gets to do that, so I promised that next time he comes to visit, he could. 

To top off the day, we stopped in North Gower at Steven's Creek Country Market and had some absolutely marvelous ice cream.  The lady said it comes from Tracy's Dairy in Renfrew.  While we frequently come to the North Gower Farmer's Market, which is just across the street from this location, we now have another reason to make a little trip out that way.

The Calm After the Storm

I see they had a terrific storm in New York. We got off a little luckier here, but our power went off for over 3 hours last night.  Actually, it didn't go off until after this photo was taken, so I'm not sure what happened.  I expected problems earlier in the day as a hydro pole was threatening to fall over onto the highway, and they were diverting traffic until they could get that replaced.  It was only after we thought we were in the clear when the power went off. 
Oh, hey, those solar powered garden stakes put off good light if you bring them in and put them in a vase.  You can take one with you when you leave the room.  They are much safer than candles.  And, if they should happen to run out of light before the power comes back on, I found out, that shining a flashlight on the sensor for a few seconds recharges them for much longer than you would expect.

Garden Adventures

I gave up trying to grow vegetables several years back because the deer were getting more of them than I was. But I have not seen any sign of deer here for over a year, so this year I decided to plant a few things.  I put in an assortment of lettuce, an assortment of tomatoes, and a few pumpkins.

The lettuce was nice and I learned I like more than just the usual iceberg and romaine that I tend to buy.  I'll likely try that again next year, but I bet something comes along and eats it. I can't be this lucky two years in a row, surely.

With this year's drought conditions, the pumpkins didn't get enough water so, while they produced lots of flowers, I don't see any actual pumpkins on the vines.  It may be just as well as I had no idea that they would climb everything in sight.  They went into my bushes, up the tomato cages, and even climbed up my rose bush.  Bright orange flowers in unusual places have amused me all summer, so I don't really feel like that idea failed. I'd try that again too, but since I already placed the plants at the edge of the garden thinking I could coax the vines out onto the grass, I'm not really sure how to keep them from climbing all over what ever other crop I choose to plant next time.

I just heard from some friends recently that they have so many tomatoes that they are busy making one thing after another out of them.  Here's where I feel that I really succeeded.  At Canadian Tire I bought a pack that contained a variety of tomatoes, including a cherry tomato. We like those so I also purchased another variety of cherry tomatoes as well. One grew upright, and the other sent vines all over the ground. I don't see the tags so I'm still not sure which one is which.   One of the other plants in the pack is also a cherry sized species, but they are yellow and pear shaped. Nice and mild.

The nice thing about this variety pack is that the various tomatoes all have different maturity dates.  So far I have had some Old Time Tasty tomatoes, some Early Girl, and some Better Boy.  The Old Time ones are indeed tasty, but more acidic and a bit bigger than the other two. They are short and squat, while the Early Girl have an almost pointed bottom.  The Better Boy may be considered better because it seems to be more prolific than the others.  If I ever do have trouble keeping up with the crop, that's the one that may produce more than one ripe tomato at a time.  Yet to come is the beefsteak.  I'm not fond of big tomatoes, but I only see a few on that plant so far, so things are working out quite well.  Every day for a while now, we have fresh tomatoes of some variety.  There is usually a little bowl full of the cherry sized ones, and there may be one or two of the others waiting to be eaten also.  They are the perfect size to be eaten at one meal, so none of them have yet landed in my fridge.  I definitely hope Canadian Tire decides to offer this variety pack again next year.

To Market, To Market

As I've mentioned before, I really like going to the Kemptville Farmers Market.  This time of year there are a lot of excellent stalls with wonderful veggies to choose from. We got there earlier than usual and found some stalls have become very popular. I really don't want to have to stand in a long line only to discover the thing that caught my eye in the first place has been sold off by the time I get to the front of that line. I did came home with a couple heads of really nice lettuce though.  I'll definitely be eating a wonderful salad for supper tonight. 

There are always several bakers there too, and one of those also had a long line up.  I peeked to see what they were selling and things really did look delicious, but once again, I opted for a less crowed booth and got some very delicious brownies. They were large enough to share, and only 50 cents each.  Beaconholme Farm.  I'll remember that name.

Speaking of names, look also for the Dippy Darlings.  Do stop and chat with them.  They are delightful.  Their maiden name was Darling and they sell dip.

Kemptville Market is open on Sundays from 2pm to 4pm, and is well worth the visit.