Wedding

Dave and I are celebrating our 11th wedding anniversary tomorrow.  I'm looking back today and sharing some details of our wedding day (with some help from our wedding book and photo album!)

Engaged - June 2008; I wrote about that story here

Married - May 23, 2009

Location - Halifax, Nova Scotia - St. Matthew's United Church for the ceremony and the Prince George Hotel for the reception 

Weather - Beautiful sunny and warm, unusual for spring in Nova Scotia, we were lucky!

Number of Guests - About 90

Colours - Green and Pink

Flowers - Pink gerbera daisies for the bridal party bouquets, corsages, and centrepieces.  My bouquet had pink and white roses and ranunculus.

Readings - 1 Corinthians 13:1-13 and Colossians 3:12-17

Hymn - God Who Blesses New Beginnings (486 in Voices United)

Other Music - Canon in D, (Pachebel), Jesu Meine Freude (Bach), Recessional in Classical Style Gordon Young)

Meal - Spinach Salad, choice of Herb Cream Cheese Stuffed Chicken with Brown Butter Mashed Potato and Vegetable or Grilled Salmon with Herb Risotto, Leek Cream Sauce and Vegetable, soft chocolate cake with Bailey's ice cream, and wedding cake

Wine - Grand Pre L'Acadie Blanc and Trapiche Pinot Noir

First Dance - The Book of Love by Peter Gabriel.  Then Dave and I danced with our parents to "How Sweet It Is" by James Taylor, and the next dance was "May I Have This Dance" by Anne Murray.  The idea there was for all of the couples to start the dance, and then the DJ asked people to remain dancing if they were married, married for 5 years, married for 10 years, etc, until the only two couples left were my grandparents and my great aunt and uncle, both married in 1947.  It was really special.  

Bridal Party - Six in total - three girls and three guys - all friends from various parts of our lives. (I'm not sharing names since this is usually a security question for logging into the bank!)

Honeymoon - Rome, Venice, Interlaken Switzerland, and Paris. 

Best memories - Dancing with everyone.  We always had a full dance floor and if people wanted to see me, they had to come and dance. 

Regrets (if any) - We did not have an open bar, which was not uncommon for Maritime weddings in 2009 and I didn't think it was strange until we started going to more weddings.  I also wish Dave and I had done speeches to each other rather than just to say thank you to everyone for coming.  Since we did traditional vows, we didn't share anything personal at the wedding and I've always enjoyed seeing other couples do that.

Book Post

This past week I participated in the Facebook challenge of posting 7 books without explanation. I usually don't do those types of things, but I enjoy reading and contributing to a reading list.  I also liked seeing the interactions with different people on books, I have lots of reader friends!

So for those of you not Facebook friends with me, here are the books I posted (but this time with a few comments).  I didn't just pick my favourite books of all time, since it is almost impossible to rank books, but ones that I think people should read and ones that have stuck with me after I read them.

This is a haunting book about the olden days of Ireland where people believe in fairies and evil spirits.  I was really pulled back and forth even though I am an otherwise modern logical person.  I wrote more about it here.

This is one book that I always recommend to people. This author wrote Bear Town and Us Against You, which became more popular in the last few years, but this one is the best.  It is an endearing story of a grumpy old man, recently widowed.  There is a Swedish movie that was on Netflix once, and now I've heard there will be a movie made starring Tom Hanks, which is perfect casting. 

This has been one of my favourite books for awhile, and I think everyone should read it.  It tackles the very serious issues of mental health and assisted suicide so it is extremely heartbreaking and it also takes place in Canada (so it checks two of my three boxes for favourite books, the other being set in wartime). I wrote more about this book here.

I just read this book last month and it will definitely be a top book for me for awhile.  I may not get around to doing a full review of this, so I'll just give you a quick synopsis. It takes place in the '70s in Alaska where a family looking for a new start moves to a small town to set up a home.  They are met with a variety of different challenges.  

I loved this book since it is different from books I usually read (about white people).  This is about a Nigerian immigrant to the United States and her life in America versus the life she would have in Nigeria.  I do try to read about different perspectives and different parts of the world, so I liked reading about a life that I know very little about. I wrote more about it here.

This is a bit of a thriller, taking place in the UK, and has a twist you don't really see coming, and I will say no more!  It's one of those books you can't put down. I read about it here I also read another of her books called After the End, which was a crying on the subway book, if you're into that sort of thing, although with Covid, no one is reading in public anymore, so you should be safe. 

The only non-fiction book I included.  I only really discovered Anthony Bourdain after he died but then I was obsessed with him.  I went to Chicago in June of 2018 and literally at the airport on the way there, I watched his Chicago episode of Parts Unknown, the first show of his I had seen.  Then he died the next day.  After that I could not get enough of his various shows, and I loved visiting those places with him and wishing I could pull up a stool next to him to dig into to anything - if Tony was eating it, then it must be good!  I can't even really put into words what it was that I loved about him (really, I've started typing a bunch of things and keep deleting it because it's not quite right). This book was just an extension of the shows and his spirit, I could hear him reading it to me. 

I've heard the Toronto Library is going to start allowing curbside pick up soon so I am excited to get my hold books, I can hardly remember which ones I have ready for me. 

Weekend Recap

My Friday included a quick trip to the LCBO, mask in tact. 

Then after work, I took Q for a run.  He is heavy!  We made it all the way to the (Winnie the) Pooh stick bridge, as per his request, but he was asleep!

Pizza and movie night after that.  We watched Sonic the Hedgehog again.  

Saturday was supposed to be our only nice day so after our pancake breakfast, we went right outside to do some yard work.  We have to get two of our big oak trees cut down in the next week or so, so I moved the plant and the small tree that was underneath them.  It took me all morning, but it was a success. Hopefully the stay alive, but at least they have a chance now. 

Their new home.

Meanwhile the kids played around and Dave worked on the back porch posts.

After lunch I started to mow the lawn, but E asked to do it instead. 

For supper we had burgers and French fries.  I picked up this salt in San Francisco and we like to put it on our fries.

On Sunday morning we knew the rain wasn't supposed to start until mid-afternoon so we hurried down to the Lakeshore to ride our bikes, the city had closed down the East bound lanes for the weekend so people would be able to run, bike, and walk on the waterfront and stay spread out.  It was fun!

A little chilly when we stopped for our snack and Q didn't have a sweatshirt since he had been snuggled into a blanket in the bike stroller.

It was supposed to start raining in the afternoon so we had decided to watch Trolls World Tour and make popcorn. It seemed weird to do it even though the weather was still nice, but we did it anyway.  Well, the kids did, while Dave continued his work outside and I cleaned the bathrooms and made banana bread. 

Some cards before supper.

Then another movie downstairs, this time Scoob, the new Scooby Doo movie.  It was actually pretty cute. 

It was nice to have a holiday on Monday although I actually ended of working for most of the day.  One of our neighbours organized bingo for all of the kids via Zoom.  E loved it and won a few times.

I took Q for a drive in the afternoon and he fell asleep almost immediately.  And meanwhile Dave made some foccacia bread.  It's addictive!

We ordered our supper from The Friendly Thai, with enough leftovers for the next night. 

Covid Quiz

I saw this little quiz on Facebook - questions to ask your kids about the Coronavirus - so I thought I'd make it into a post. I asked E these questions, Q wasn't interested in participating.

What is the Coronavirus?

It's a sickness and people can die from it.

Who is the Prime Minister?

Donald...hahah.... Justin Trudeau

How many days have we have been in lockdown?

For a long time...7 weeks?

Do you want to go back to school?

No

Who is the first person you're going to hug when lockdown is over?

The first person I see at school

Where is the first place you want to go?

Jamaica!!

What do you think we can do to get rid of Coronavirus?

Figure out a medicine and then you drink it and then send it to a satellite and pour it over the world so no one can get sick...oh and don't eat bats.

Is mom/dad a good teacher?

Yes, yes of course, maybe.  (Laughs)

How did the Coronavirus start?

By China eating a bat with a sickness. (Me: You know that may not be right.)  Yeah, but there are bats that have Coronavirus. 

If you had to wear protective clothing to help you what would it be?

In Star Wars what Han Solo wears to protect him from poisonous gas (in the one with Rey)

Are you enjoying lockdown?

Yes. Because I have a better chance to play video games (leaps up to do a dance)

How long do you think it's going to take before we can leave lockdown?

2 years...I'll be 11!! (I sure hope not!!)

Three Things

Three things going on with us at the moment:

E

1. I wrote about E's school work on Monday.  I have noticed he really enjoys the music assignments so I wonder if I should get him into playing an instrument.  He has never really shown an interest in our piano, but he may like something else.  He did say he misses playing his recorder at school (thankfully he didn't bring it home with him before the quarantine started).

2. Dave printed off a bunch of Sodoku puzzles and E works on them throughout the week.  When he completes one, Dave tapes it up on the cupboards. 

3. We put in a swing on the treehouse a couple of years ago and E has been enjoying it so much.  He is the only one who can use it for now (it's too tipsy for Q), and that's good because I don't think he really wants to share it yet. 

Q

1. Q is all registered for Junior Kindergarten for September.  He is excited about going to E's school.  We have tried getting him to practice writing his name, he can do the Q but not much else consistently.  I told him he will have to write his name on everything when he gets to school but he doesn't believe me.

2. Q has quite the temper, which is really just a three year old who can't control or understand his emotions.  It usually comes with some biting, hitting and scratching and poor E takes the brunt since he doesn't want to fight back.  I have noticed it is happening less and less and we do have our strategies for helping him calm down.

3. He can get his own cereal now and is actually pretty good at pouring it and the milk.  It also means he eats about 3 bowls a day but Cheerios are pretty harmless. 

Dave

1. Dave is always working on the lawn and he has already done the grass seed and will probably do it again soon.  The people two doors down just got their front grass replaced with fresh sod even though it looks pretty good.  Dave felt like they were opening mocking him. 

2. Dave makes our pizza dough every week and this week he made some cinnamon buns.  I have him slated for foccaia bread next.  I am not good with yeast but he has discovered this new skill.  

3. Dave got the NBA Jam game for the Nintendo Switch and that, along with watching The Last Dance on Netflix, has brought him back to his early basketball days.

Me

1. I am not a gardener but I did do our herbs this week and we also picked up some baskets for our front.  It did not feel very summery at the garden centre, but hopefully the weather will take a turn this week. 

2. I tidied up both kids' drawers, removed the clothes that were too small, and folded everything Marie Kondo style again. It is so nice to see everything and makes it easier to put things away.  My drawers have been like that for awhile and I love it.  I also moved up my summer clothes *fingers crossed*.

3. I was mourning the loss of Jerry Stiller this week, aka Frank Costanza.  This is my favourite bit from him:

Weekend Recap

Friday night meant pizza night.  Dave tried a new method of making four individual doughs for each of us rather than dividing a bigger dough into separate servings.  We all made our own as usual and they were delicious.  

This was mine, black olives made it even better. 

Then we put on Star Wars for movie night.

On Saturday morning we went out for a hike.  We took along the Animal Bingo that Dave had put together, customized for what we could actually see in our neighbourhood.  Note the winter jackets, it was chilly!

It was pretty nice while we were in the woods, but then the flurries came down!  Crazy weather for May.

After lunch we watched a movie and some of us (ahem, the adults) fell asleep.  We ordered supper from La Cubana.  They do Cuban food really well and their restaurant is always so cozy.  I went down to pick it up and wished I could stay.  Everything was delicious. 

Some pics with my kiddos in honour of Mother's Day.

On Mother's Day I got to sleep in a little bit and had breakfast made for me when I got up.  I decided to tackle the front closet, because although we had snow the day before, I was confident we could put away the winter clothes. 

This it the before (note the plants I'd brought inside to protect from the frost)

And after.

Meanwhile the boys made donuts. 

Then Dave went outside to start his project on the back porch, the kids played and I cleaned the boys' rooms.   Then we went downstairs to watch a movie.  Q is not sleeping here but looks like it.

We had a lovely supper of steak, roasted potatoes, and kale caesar salad.  After supper I played a game of crib with E. 

We finished off our night with a bit of wine and SNL.