Calling All Teachers!

I'm please to tell you all that I have a new venture with my sister.  We Launched the blog on Jan 24, 2011. It is designed for teachers called Teaching by the Book. It is located at www.teachingbythebook.ca The site contains a recommended read aloud book and lesson plans for teachers from grades K to 8.  Associated books are also listed on the site. We publish one recommended book and a lesson plan per week on a theme. The first blog was for Family Literacy Day and February's theme is Black History month.
Pass it on to all your teaching friends!

Gardening Tip of the Week

Dealing with ICE!: I use sawdust. While it does not melt the ice instantly, it does residually and it stays on top of the ice. After ice melts, it adds to the soil water retention. I also use the ash (potash) from my pellet burner. This combination of ash and sawdust has been working great. Any extra pellet stove ash goes on my strawberries, rhubarb and my onion beds. It works. Submitted by John Sholl

This garden tip  and photo came from a blog I subscribe to and I thought I should pass it on. 

This calls for one more

Dec.. 12, 2010

Grandma tree 1300 years old in Capilano, BC

We found a VIP lounge here that makes sitting in a airport lounge very comfortable.  We paid our $15.00 each and were enjoying the buffet and comfy chairs when the announcement system came on and said they were investigating a fire alarm in the domestic terminal and we were to stay alert.  So instead of a relaxing buffet breakfast we had to gobble our food and make sure our various assorted 'bag lady' items were ready to load at a moments' notice.

Tree top walks

Dec. 11, 2010

Capilano bridge suspended 457 metres above the river.

We took the free shuttle to the Capilano Suspension Bridge.  The guide driving the bus, asked us without prompting if we needed seniors tickets and then said, “Nice Tilley hat sir!  My wife said I could get one as soon as I get a little older.”

Other countries have a hard time trying to top us on forest walks.  The oldest tree at the Capilano canyon was 1300 years old and over 250 feet tall!  They just soared up, up. Up.  And the waterfalls were bigger than any we saw in Hawaii.  From the bridge we saw bald eagles perching in the trees, but the bridge was swaying too much to get a photo.

Real mountains, Grouse, in fact! They don't have these everywhere!

On the return trip we toured Granville Island and checked out the shops.  Afterwards we went  to Mass at  Holy Rosary Cathedral built in 1836.  Then a short walk in the rain back to the hotel finished up our adventure in beautiful British Columbia. Home again, home again, jiggity jog! And of course there might be one more blog if something happens on the way home.

Clothing Optional

Dec. 10, 2010

To Anonymous and all of our faithful readers, it's been great to read your comments and know you are out there.  Thanks for the smile every day and making us feel like we are in touch with home.  Tomorrow will be our last post about our trip, but we are going to Bahamas in March so more tales will ensue.  And there's always the garden blog to read about!

We went to the clothing optional beach today on our way to the Museum of Anthropology but protocol was followed and no one gawked or stared (must have been averting their eyes and following protocol.)   

Museum of anthropology at UBC

On the way back we stopped at the Van Dusen Garden and saw their Christmas Lights display. 

This evening we saw The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets Nest.  It was the Swedish version with English subtitles. Excellent!  You can’t beat Nooni Rapace who plays Lisbeth Salander. She conveys the reticence and vulnerability that the character demands.  Hard to image that the English version with different actors will be better than this.

Lights reflected in the still water

A fairy land

We’re been doing a lot of walking and I have the blisters to prove it! But at least it didn’t rain today.

Oh Canada

Dec.9

Lights covering St. Paul's hospital - right next door.

We arrived in Vancouver last night during a rainstorm and 7 C temperature.  Four days of rain are forecast while we are here.  What a relief from all that sunshine.  But Vancouver certainly is decked out for Christmas, with beautiful lights decorating downtown.

Pacific anemonies Vancouver Island

the Handyman with his head in an aquarium bubble.

front view

Giant Pacific Octopus

We went to the Aquarium today – what a beautiful ocean floor they have here.  I would like to go diving, and I told the Handyman we would wear dry suits, but just thinking about changing outside is enough to end that idea.  I bought gloves for my cold hands today.

artistic arrangements of 50 years of stuff

bottles, buttons, bows, bowls, boots, bags, bolts,  - you get the picture

We went to the Art Gallery, it always brings a smile to my face.  The artistic interpretations of life are so entertaining/thought provoking/amusing/startling/engaging?

There was an exhibit entitled “Waste not” It was a very intriguing look at stuff. It was like an artistic display of that television show Hoarders. (Okay, I confess to watching) The artist described how his mother began saving items because of deprivation.  She lived in China during the Cultural Revolution and started out saving useful items out of necessity, but eventually the stuff she had saved became redundant because of progress in technology or design.  The items meant to help improve their lives cluttered the family’s life so much it interfered with their life.  You can see in the photos how artistically the items were displayed in the exhibit.  It made me smile to remember collecting bits of string as a child. Or how they taught us in school to tear and fold the corner of two pieces of paper together because they didn’t supply paper clips. There were no Dollar stores to make reusing items unnecessary.

We’re easing back into the Canadian climate.

Christmas Urns

Penta urns

Well, take 5 women from the gardening club add pruners and this is what you get!  I must admit that I was a little worried about a committee creating urns, but they turned out well!  I like this one so much it was hard to take it away from my front to bring it to the raffle.

A Christmas urn that will take you through the season.  Just replace the ornaments with more pine cones or fruit.

The inspiration urn from Sheridan Nurseries

Our gardening group decided to create 2 urns for the Penta Luncheon.  We thought that someone might actually want two, one for each side of the door.  The Nurseries report that silver, red or green are the inspiration colours this year.  The urn on the right was the inspiration for our colours. The design is very stunning and modern.  Though we put silver in ours urn to be au courant, we did want a traditional looking urn because we had no idea whose house it would grace. Birch logs are still popular, so if you have one add it to the urn.
It was a lot of fun creating the urns.
The secret is to layer the colours of greenery that you add.  The B.C. cedars and pines are fuller boughs than our Ontario ones, so they are worth the price in my opinion.
Get out and create before the ground freezes and it is too hard to get the branches in the containers!