Tuesday we went to Orillia for a day out and went on a 2 1/4 hour cruise around Lake Couchiching
We went on the Island Princess and had a good time.
We took my brother up to Blue Mountain in Collingwood for a day out on Monday. Dh has never been before, and me and my brother hadn't been there for 30 years. It's a big ski resort, but is still busy during the summer, with people hiking, mountain biking and just enjoying the area.
I am having my first ever giveaway, pretty exciting eh!!!
For those of you who are regulars on my blog you know I have been busy with putting together a recipe book to raise funds for the church I attend. The book arrived last week and in celebration of that I am giving away two copies of the book.
This is a Pillar Clematis, that I got earlier in the year. I have it growing in and up this rusty iron obolisk. It is such an unusual clematis, for me as I normally grow the larger flower ones. However I must say this is ever so pretty.
It was a busy day, but a good busy day. The weather was gorgeous on Friday, no humidity what so ever. The temperatures were quite cool in the low 70's. Infact when I was hanging out my first load of laundry (just after 7am) I had to put a fleece jacket on over my nightie as it was chilly!!
I got some cleaning done in the house. Cleaned some windows, which was long overdue.
The kids and my brother came up around 3:30pm. Ds has bought a new to him Lexus IS250 so they had to drop off my car, which ds has been using all this week. It's a fancy dancy car; too many bells and whistles though for me.
We then went out for supper to East Side Mario's and had a lovely meal. They all then went to the casino, and the old folk's (me and dh) came home. The kids and my brother sound as though they have had a great week, busy with all sorts. My brother comes to stay with us on Sunday.
Poor dh was called out at 1:30am on Friday morning, so he worked all night, but was home by 11am, and is now off for the next three weeks. He spent part of the day doing some electrical work in the house before falling asleep in front of the tv around 2pm-ish.
I took a couple of photos of Molly.
It started to rain on Wednesday afternoon, so I went and picked some crab apples to make jelly. I used this recipe I found it was the simplest and pretty easy.
Had a busy day on Tuesday. I got a coat of paint on the trim in the bathroom closet. When dh got home we put up the closet organizers in both of the closets. I still have a couple more coats of paint to put on the trim in the bathroom closet, but the painting is done in the spare bedroom closet, so I can start and put things away in the bedroom closet.
Dh still has to put the light fixtures up in the closets, and change the sockets and switch in the bedroom. I still have some new trim to varnish. It's funny these rooms were supposed to be quick jobs but one job seems to lead to another, which leads to another.
Fooled Molly. I was upstairs painting so she followed me upstairs. I then decided to have a shower, and figured I would bath her as well at the same time. If I have my nightie on she won't come upstairs with me, as she figures she's going in the bath. She didn't click this time, as I had my painting clothes on. Needless to say she wasn't happy when she discovered I was going to bath her!!
I got the field cut, it's growing at a crazy rate!!! Roll on the cooler weather when it stops growing!!! Discovered that a couple of trees that I thought were crab apples are actually eating apples, and they are good. So have to pick them, not sure about storing them though? Will also try to fit in making apple jelly this week as well.
Make another big pan of mashed potatoes for supper on Tuesday night, using potatoes that had bad bits on them, or the skins weren't that great. So we will pick away at those for supper through the week.
My plan of action on Wednesday is:
The Church recipe book arrived on Monday. So I spent part of the afternoon sorting out the orders and calling a couple of people who are going to deliver them to their respective church. If you click on the photo you will see more detail of the churches.
More yellow flowers. These ones grow to around five feet tall. Not sure what their exact name is, but they are pretty.
Got a busy weekend ahead of me/us, so other than my Today's Flower Post tomorrow, I won't be posting until Monday.
Enjoy your weekend, and see you on Monday!
Gill
Just in case you need a laugh:
Remember it takes a college degree to fly a plane, but only a high school diploma to fix one; a reassurance to those who fly routinely in their jobs.
After every flight, UPS pilots fill out a form, called a 'gripe sheet,' which tells mechanics about problems with the aircraft. The mechanics corrects the problems, document their repairs on the form, and then pilots review the gripe sheets before the next flight.
Never let it be said that ground crews lack a sense of humor. Here are some actual maintenance complaints submitted by UPS pilots (marked with a P) and the solutions recorded (marked with an S) by maintenance engineers.
By the way,UPS is the only major airline that has never, ever, had an accident.
P: Left inside main tire almost needs replacement.
S: Almost replaced left inside main tire.
*
P: Test flight OK, except auto-land very rough.
S: Auto-land not installed on this aircraft.
*
P: Something loose in cockpit.
S: Something tightened in cockpit.
*
P: Dead bugs on windshield.
S: Live bugs on back-order.
*
P: Autopilot in altitude-hold mode produces a 200-feet-per-minute descent.
S: Cannot reproduce problem on ground.
*
P: Evidence of leak on right main landing gear.
S: Evidence removed.
*
P: DME volume unbelievably loud.
S: DME volume set to more believable level..
*
P: Friction locks cause throttle levers to stick..
S: That's what friction locks are for.
*
P: IFF inoperative in OFF mode.
S: IFF is always inoperative in OFF mode.
*
P: Suspected crack in windshield.
S: Suspect you're right.
*
P: Number 3 engine missing.
S: Engine found on right wing after brief search..
*
P: Aircraft handles funny. (I love this one!)
S: Aircraft warned to straighten up, fly right and be serious.
*
P: Target radar hums.
S: Reprogrammed target radar with lyrics.
*
P: Mouse in cockpit.
S: Cat installed.
*
And the best one for last
*
P: Noise coming from under instrument panel. Sounds like a midget pounding on something with a hammer.
S: Took hammer away from the midget.
(Sorry I haven't been around to your blogs I hope to pop by on the weekend, just crazy busy, as always!)
Wednesday was a super busy day in the garden. Got a lot of grass cut including the field and Kamikaze Hill. Ds popped by and helped me move a limb off a tree that had half fallen off. Had a bonfire. Dug up some potatoes, still a million more plants to dig up.
Talked to my neighbour above us, who is trying to sell their house; it's a bungalow with 39 acres; was $699,000, now $649,000. They haven't had much luck, not helped by a real estate agent who is useless!!!
Made a couple of Egg Pie's for supper. I didn't take a photo sorry, but all it is, is hard boiled eggs topped with cheese sauce and mashed potatoes on the top of it. Super simple and I made two one for supper and one for the freezer.
Thursday will be another busy day for me, as ds is popping by again to do some whipper snipping for me. I have all the nail holes in the trim to fill in, and hopefully I may get the first coat of paint on the trim in the closet. I also have laundry to do, plus I had hoped to get some more potatoes dug up.
After lunch I have to go to the "big" city to run some errands, and then up to my dad's as he is picking my brother up from the airport. He's visiting from Britain for a couple of weeks, so looking forward to seeing him. It's been a couple of years since I last saw him, although we do talk on a regular basis. So busy, busy again on Thursday!!
Just got an email with my latest $5 e-card for Amazon, from Swagbucks. That's $110 I have deposited in that account, and as of 5pm on Tuesday I only need another 45 swagbucks before I get my next one, so that should happen probably late Wednesday early Thursday. I average between $10 and $15 a month getting Amazon e-cards. I am saving them up, not sure for what yet though.
I have mentioned before we live reasonably close to a cattle operation, I think they have up to 3,000 cattle there. Well on Tuesday I must say the smell was worse than normal. So as they collect the manure in tanks, I am guessing they were cleaning them out, gosh it stunk.
I went out Tuesday afternoon to town. I had some books to donate to the library. Wanted to pick up some trim for the closet, yes dh is finally making a start on it, poor thing has been working crazy hours recently. It was my quilt club, after this month only one more block to go. Picked up this pattern from Fig Tree Quilts.
Had fish sticks/fingers, hash browns and Heinz Baked Beans for supper on Tuesday night. I haven't bought fish sticks in ages. It's one of those things we ate frequently when the kids were at home, but since they left home we never buy them. Anyhow, I thoroughly enjoyed them.
Had a cheese and tomato sandwich for my lunch on Tuesday with a tomato from the garden. Funny thing is I am not a fan of ground pepper, but I adore it on tomatoes? Not sure why?
So there you go a bit of this and a bit of that.
I saw that container of gravy in the freezer on Sunday, when I was pulling out the raspberries out of the freezer for my jam. Made a mental note to use that container when I next made shepherd's pie.
Monday lunchtime, I remembered about the gravy, so pulled it out of the freezer, along with a pound of ground beef/mince. Figured I would make mince and mashed potatoes, as I had left over mashed potato from the day before.
Started to cook the mince and thought I'd add plenty of veggies to it. So popped out to the garden to see what was going on with the zucchini, only to discover that there were three mammoth ones and a smaller one. So cut one of the large ones up to put into the mince. However there was too much, so ended up shredding the rest of it to freeze. Still have two more mammoth ones and the smaller one to deal with another day!!
After adding all the veggies, it was a big pot of mince and gravy; and when I looked at how many mashed potatoes I had, I knew there wasn't enough. So went outside and got the rest of the potatoes I dug up the other day and peeled and cooked them.
I ended up with a meal of mince and potatoes for supper, plus there was enough left over for two shepherd's pie's for the freezer. Not bad from a container of gravy and a pound of ground beef/mince.
On Sunday I was determined to make grape jelly and raspberry jam. I followed the recipe from here for the grape jelly and although I was concerned that the jelly wasn't going to set, it has set. I had 5 cups of grape juice, and added 4 cups of sugar, as I prefer a sweeter jelly; it made 6, 1/2 pints (250ml), plus the small glass dish. It tastes fine, and I will try some on toast for my breakfast.
I don't know the name of this flower but it is pretty. It didn't flower last year, so maybe its a biennial? Does anyone know it's name?
This is an excellent recipe if you have extra zucchini/courgettes and it cooks in the microwave in the one pot.
Sausage Risotto:
1lb Sausage (I use English Bangers)
8 slices bacon
1 onion, chopped
2 sticks celery, thinly sliced
2 zucchini, sliced
12 oz (350g) long-grain rice
2 tbsp. tomato puree
2 cups (600 ml) boiling chicken stock
1/2 tsp dried oregano
salt
freshly ground pepper
1 tbsp. chopped fresh parsley
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