Dandelion Delight

Golden sunshine is springing up all over the back lawn, so let's make use of all those sunny dandelions. They may be considered weeds, but for me they have their own style of beauty.

I'm sure my neighbours were peeking out of their windows wondering what is that weird person doing on her hands and knees......

In French the lowly dandelion is named piss-en-lit. Rough translation.... wet the bed! So called because the leaves are diuretic. The whole plant is edible, and once I made some pretty strong dandelion wine from the blossoms.

After completing this piece of "performance art" and taking some photos, I dashed off to pick up my grandies from school as usual, and when I got home, the lawn mower had been by and my masterpiece was no more!

But there are plenty more dandelions to come.

The next day, my sweet grandie Emma was at my house for her scheduled "dinner date", and helped make this lovely dandelion sunburst.
Can you see the little violet in the centre?

Inspiration comes from the art of British artist Andy Goldsworthy. Make sure you scroll down to see some of his inspired work.

Where's Waldo?

Where's Waldo? He's playing hockey, that's where.

Grandie Emma is in her first year of ice hockey. It's hard going for her, learning to skate forwards, backwards, stopping, starting, getting up after falling in the ice, and handling a hockey stick and a slippery rubber puck at the same time.
But the coaches make it fun, especially so at Hallowe'en.
There was a special Hallowe'en hockey practice at the weekend. The players on Emma's team all turned into mini "Where's Waldo" characters thanks to the inventive coaches.
Watch out for that scaaaaary bat above your head, Emma.

Of course there had to be a team photo. An opportunity not to be missed. Can you guess which one is Emma er... I mean Waldo?

 And the opposition became "The Pirates" with lots of cries of "YoHoHo" and "Arrrrr me Hearties".

Then they were out on the ice for their regular practice. It was more lighthearted and fun than their usual hard workout practice. Games of tag using (plastic) bloodied body parts. And instead of skating figures around orange pylon markers, they were using severed arms and legs... really scary stuff.

When Waldos and Pirates meet on the ice.... it's Hallowe'en Hockey Night in Canada!

Tournament Time

Summer is on the wane, evenings are getting noticeably shorter, it's the middle of August already and that means softball season has come to an end for my grandchildren. That's too bad because the young players have just started to come together and work as a team. Another couple of weeks would have been perfect timing. They are finally thinking ahead and planning baseball strategy.... and as you know, baseball is full of strategy.

But it's not quite over. Just one last blast on the town's baseball diamonds.... the highly anticipated annual Baseball Tournament!

Our family has been ably represented since June by numbers 3 and 4 on the "5 and under' Yellow team and number 5 on the "8 and under" Red team. And now it's time to challenge for the championship!

 "5 and under" Yellows played against "5 and under" Reds at a well attended 10am game on Saturday morning. Lots of enthusiastic mums and dads, and aunts and uncles cheering them on. And at least one Nana.... me.

I have no idea if the Yellows beat the Reds or vice versa, I don't think anyone was keeping accurate score, but after the game each player got a drink, a slice of yummy pizza, and was presented with a "solid gold" trophy by the coach with a handshake and some words of praise. And you have to hand it to the coaches.... they are teaching basic baseball skills to five year old children who really don't have a clue what it's all about, and the coaches do it with kindness, loads of patience, smiles and a huge sense of fun.

"8 and under" Reds took on the Black team in an early 8:30am game, then challenged the Blues for the final at 11:15am. Skies were mostly blue with some grey clouds, so we all had fingers crossed that the rain would stay away.

It was a hard fought game. Reds led from the start with some snappy fielding and a couple of spectacular home runs, but Blues came from behind in the final innings to take the game 13-12.

 After the game, a drink, a slice of pizza and another "solid gold" trophy for each player. As the coach gave out the trophies, he gave each player an individual pep talk noting their considerable baseball achievements during the summer such as memorable home runs, double plays, spectacular base running, and how each person had improved, what they need to work on for next season, and his hopes for them in the future. Hooray for the coaches of these teams, they deserve "solid gold" medals!

 And the happy recipient of a trophy. He's going to join the rep team during the winter to hone his baseball skills ready for next season. He really really REALLY loves baseball.

Note: I was surprised to find that this is blog post number 899, just one more to go for 900! Perhaps I should have saved this comment for the next post. Thank you to all the bloggers around the world who have read my ramblings since I started this blog in November 2006 and have left me comments.... Happy Blogging to you all!

Four Towheads

What's a towhead?  According to the Oxford Dictionary; a head of tow-coloured or very blond hair, or a person with such hair.

What does tow-coloured mean? Once flax, jute or hemp fibres have been retted (soaked) and prepared for spinning into textiles or ropes, the fibres are very light in colour and are known as tow. The noun “tow” used in the fiber sense came into English in the 14th century. The word may be related to the Old Norse noun tó, which meant “uncleansed wool or flax, unworked fibre of thread.” 

Any towheads in your family?

Happy Faces

We spent a sunny day on Toronto Island and YoungerSon bought an all day pass for the kids rides at Centreville. The rides have been there for years.... YoungerSon remembers some of them from when he was a tiddler. But they are updated all the time. It was a perfect day, not crowded, not hot, nobody cried (well, not much, only when they told Emma she was too little to go on the bumper cars, and that was REALLY LOUD!), everyone had a spiffing good time.

No explanation needed for these photographs, just look at the happy faces.

Somehow Emma managed to stay on the Frog Hopper for 5 rides, she smiled nicely at the operator and just refused to get off.

Bumper bulls? That's a new one. The twins were told they were too little to ride, big disappointment.

Happenings...

I lost my blogging ambition for a couple of weeks, lots of reasons. Did you miss me? Hmmm... I thought not.
Reason One: the weather has been so cold. We even had SNOW on the ground two days ago. I thought this was spring! I know I don't have to write my blog outside, but somehow the really un-springlike weather completely brought me to a standstill.
Reason Two: I was sewing, and once I get the sewing machine warmed up I have to finish. I made a pretty summer dress for my only granddaughter, the beauteous Emma, and made a funky Tshirt for me, made from 4 recycled Tshirts from the Sally Ann Thrift Shop. Oh this is such a bad picture.

Reason Three: Some surgery. Parathyroidectomy. Sounds very impressive, doesn't it. Just one night in hospital, lots of TLC from the nurses on the 11th floor and the hospital food was surprisingly edible. Home the next day, feeling great now. I was in Toronto for a follow-up appointment at the hospital so I took my camera along.

Toronto City Hall. Designed by Finnish architect Viljo Revell and built in 1965. Home of Toronto City Council..... and former home of notorious Toronto ex-Mayor Rob Ford... remember him?

The Countdown Clock for the Pan Am Games to be held in Toronto July 10 -26 2015.

The CN Tower was completed in 1976 becoming the World's tallest tower... but lost that title in 2010. It's now the 3rd tallest. The light on top of the weather beacon on the Canada Life building glows red for rain, green for fine and white for snow, and the lights on the actual pylon scroll up or down according to the forecast temperature. Clever.

The Red Rocket ... one of Toronto's many streetcars, 248 of them in fact. 

Outside the law courts.... the lion and the lamb. Every Individual is Equal Before and Under the Law and has the Right to the Equal Protection and Equal Benefit of the Law without Discrimination.

Open Wide!

A visit to the dentist is never scary when Doctor Bob's in charge.

Attack of the Towheads!

SuperHeroes

The sewing machine came into use at Christmas. I made all three of my grandsons Superman capes for Christmas. Black with a yellow felt Superman logo.
Callum wears his to his skating lessons.
Emma got a special cape.... red with a pink felt Princess Crown on it. Max loves dashing through the house wearing the Princess cape more than his own, so Emma has to wear the Superman.
And the capes are reversible.... red on the other side with their initial and a lightning bolt. The big boys seem to like the red side best.

SuperCallum and SuperIsaac taking a break from their exhausting SuperHero activities.

Invasion of the Gingerbread Men

First you line up an assortment of sweets and candies, then you get a bowl of the stickiest, sweetest, surgariest icing that you can find, dollop some icing on your gingerbread man, and stick the candies on. And don't forget to lick your fingers.

Max has his eagle eye on whatever's going on beside him. 

He covered his gingerbread man with red liquorice, and he doesn't even like it!

Emma was very industriously decorating her gingerbread man, but it looks like part of his head is missing already! No, no, not my head! (spoken in a gingerbread man kind of voice).

Isaac made his gingerbread man into a gingerbread robot ninja. 

(He was outraged that I called it a robot.)

But gingerbread robots ninjas don't last very long, and this one was no different. 

It got eaten soon after completion.

High Fliers

What goes up must eventually come down.......

.... and Daddy's there to catch them.

Just noticed.... this is post number 600!

365 Days

Last year about this time two tiny people arrived in my life. They made their blog debut here.

One year old today!

And now they are celebrating their first birthdays! Almost walking, and definitely talking. Happy Birthday Max and Emma! And congratulations to mum and dad and big brother Isaac for surviving the first year of the Double Trouble Terror Twosome.

Warning! Slippery When Wet

Double the trouble, double the fun (and double the diapers!)

Pink to Make the Boys Wink

Auntie J gave baby Emma a sweet little yellow summer dress.
When I looked at it, I thought "that's an easy pattern. Hmmm... I wonder if....."
Out came the tissue paper, pen, scissors. and pins. I had some leftover fabric from one of my baby quilts. Pink, of course.
I found advice on the internet on how to sew a neck placket. Never tried to sew one before.
My new sewing machine sews buttonholes all by itself. Whoopee!
And I had a button with a sparkle in the middle. Perfect!

YAY for me! I did it!

Canada's next Top Model.

So we had a fashion show.

It's a Zoo Out There!

I wish Hallowe'en had been invented when I was growing up in England, it seems that it would be so much fun to get dressed into a scary costume and go knocking on doors and being given candy and chips.... but we had Guy Fawkes Night instead, where we went knocking on doors asking "Penny for the Guy" and then building an effigy of poor old Guy Fawkes using some of dad's old clothes and then burning him at the stake (Guy Fawkes not dad) on a huge bonfire on November 5. And of course, that was Fireworks Day too. My birthday is the day before Guy Fawkes Day, so I always had my fireworks a day early at my party. I thought I was so special!

For Hallowe'en Callum was a giraffe, Isaac was a green dragon, Baby Max was a beaver (how Canadian is that?) and his sister Baby Emma was the good fairy keeping an eye on the proceedings.... sorry, you can't really see her wings in this picture, but she definitely had them.

The giraffe spent a lot of time chasing the dragon round the kitchen......

.....but the dragon managed to elude capture by roaring loudly and breathing fire on the giraffe. And laughing.