soeurs du jour

thanks for waiting

i went to synagogue this morning.  i am home now, lunched and relaxing.  tomorrow i will be having 25 or more people for lunch so i am taking it easy this afternoon.  i drifted over to shutter sisters a minute ago and the talk is "light", where it is, how to find it indoors.  i took these photos just shortly after i bought my camera, it is my grandson, in my living room, in afternoon light.

they may or may not be examples of a good use of light, but i love them.  i love how soft and gentle the light is around him.

margie

Rainy Day

It is a rainy day here, Margie is already off in the car, shopping, doing, making. I am working.

Be with you soon!

xo
K&M

100

Here's a toast to us. I opened typepad and saw that this is our 100th post.  

and i opened the post and saw that kath had scored the 100th post and i thought to myself, oh no you don't missy. without even asking i have jumped in here and decided to share this momentous occasion.   

Margie wrote that while I was trying to post the champagne picture.  I got booted out of typepad and didn't know why!    You'd be surprised at how often we do the same thing at the same time or are thinking the same ideas. You'd likely not be surprised at how we can hear a bottle being opened in celebration from far away.

A few weeks ago I posted a picture of our family  which got us laughing and reminiscing a bit.  I  didn't have many memories of the time that the photo was taken, so Margie filled in the blanks.    We decided that every now and then we should have a Memory Monday.  

That's our Mom.  I don't know what kitchen that is.  Probably our farm.  We moved from there when I was five, just before kindergarten started.  It's a great photo, isn't it?  Mom is probably younger than I am now.  Her pants are unzipped there, was it thanksgiving?  Are those the turkey leftovers in the pan?

I recognize some things from the photo, the aluminum tray, the yellow can opener and the cutlery bin from the dishwasher.  Those three things ended up in the kitchen at our family cottage so they are clear in my memory.   There are a few things I wish I had from that photo, the porcelain door knob on the wooden door and the dark green pyrex bowl have caught my eye!

oh wow, i am laughing my, well you know.  there has never been any doubt in our minds how we inherited the decorating gene, it was definitely from mommy.  the sea foam/buttery yellow colour scheme, trendy!!  you don't know our mother, she is 90, she lives here in my city and frequently will call and pronounce "i need to redo my kitchen" or "i want a new vanity in the bathroom" or "i am going to repaint the apartment."  Until she was about 85 she would do the painting unassisted. when she calls me i tell her if she is well enough to want a new vanity she is well enough to find one and get it installed.  i am not mean, she is bored and tackling a reno makes her feel young. she is capable, ask the president of a rather large flooring company here in canada, he has talked to her several times on the phone because she wasn't happy with his service. he actually called me because she gave him my number so that he could promise me that he was going to fix everything she was unhappy with even though it was going to cost him money and very unprofessionally he said "your mother is something else".   poor guy.  i told her quite awhile ago that she should feel free to play the "90" card.  and when she needs to, she does.  a couple of days ago she managed a plumbing crisis.  meanwhile, now i know why my zipper is undone after dinner!!!  and kath, ahem, too.

l'shana tova!

fall, a favourite time of year for many of us for many different reasons.  school starts, schedules realign, routines resurface, NFL football returns, yeah i know i am canadian but we are an NFL family all the way, but now it is holiday time.  the jewish new year, roshashana is this week, and today, i can't talk to you, i have to cook.  lots.    

and so l'shana tova to all my jewish friends and family.

for a good year.

margie

rose coloured glasses

I loved Margie's post yesterday.   Seeing my great-nephew and Charley always puts a smile on my face.    But it was her words that really got me and I was nodding and thinking yup, yes, I hear ya.  We do get side-tracked don't we?  Best laid plans and all that.

I am writing this on Friday night, because tomorrow morning will come early and I have plans laid out for the day.   I do tend to see my plans through rose coloured glasses though, see, I know I can accomplish everything.   And sometimes all at once.   I just have to put my mind to it.   I deceive myself.

Although the 8 week challenge does not officially start until Monday, we were weighed and measured on Tuesday night.   Once the numbers were written we decided there was no point in waiting, may as well start the eating portion of the program on Wednesday morning.  

No problem, I thought, as I adjusted my rose coloured glasses to sit more comfortably on my nose.   I had things well in hand, I knew pretty much what we needed to do and had done some preparatory things in the kitchen, cleaning out, organizing, buying some of the foods I knew we would need. 

Wednesday night we spent two and a half (yes, two and a half) hours (yes, HOURS) in the grocery store with the nutrition coach.  Not shopping, we followed her up and down the aisles listening to her talk and read labels to us, holding up our little hands when she would ask, "Now has anyone ever had plain yogurt?"   By the end BB and I were lurking at the back of the group, like the bad kids, whispering to each other, "Grab that baguette, we'll eat it as we go along and pay for it before we leave".   "Oh, Oreos, do they make whole-grain, sugar free, red wine free Oreos?"  There may have been some gentle shoving and giggling too, you know the kind, where the boy likes the girl and he nudges her with his shoulder or gives her a little bump with his hip and she giggles. I digress because that was the only fun part of the evening. 

By the time we got home we were famished.

Again, no problem, I had planned for this and cooked the night before,  I took off my rose coloured glasses, polished them with the hem of my shirt, put them on and in a flurry of activity had dinner ready in 10 minutes.

On Thursday, I cooked.

By Friday morning, I have to admit, my rose coloured glasses felt funny, like they were sitting a bit askew, as if I had one ear higher than the other and they were smudgy with fingerprints.   I had spent 4 hours the night before shopping, slicing, dicing, whirring chick peas in the food processor, making apple sauce, boiling rice, cooking salmon.   I even boldly wrote an email dripping with false bravado to Margie where I announced, "The food is so much better when I make it myself and cheaper too!"  I lied. I was a  a quivering mess by the time I launched that missive at 10:30 p.m.

This was not working out as I had planned.  I could not spend this much time on food preparation.  How would I find the time to exercise?  Or watch tv? Or anything?  I put my rose coloured glasses back in their case and looked at things in the cool light of day.

On the way home from work tonight, I stopped at Costco and bought hummus, quacamole and bruschetta topping, then I went to the grocery store and bought things in jars that fit in with our food constraints.

I feel much better now.  I'm seeing clearly again through my rose coloured glasses.   Indeed, I looked out my kitchen window as I was loading the dishwasher tonight and saw that, once again, all was right in my little rose-coloured world.

 

The sunset reflecting on the clouds coloured things perfectly for me.

Have a great Saturday.

Kath

side tracked

photography excites me and disappoints me at the same time.  i go out each day and visit your blogs, i look at your photos, i look at mine, and i think, mmm??  why them and not me? i want to grow and progress and expand and develop and learn, you get my drift. i also want to finish reading doris lessing's the golden notebook but time interrupts my reading as well as my photography. i am enjoying this book for two reasons, the soul searching it inspires and, truthfully, the challenge of reading it. very smart that doris lessing. 

Mrs. Lessing says: 

'About five years ago I found myself thinking about that novel which most writers now are tempted to write at some time or another - about the problems of a writer, about the artistic sensibility. I saw no point in writing this again: it has been done too often; it has been one of the major themes of the novel in our time. Yet, having decided not to write it, I continued to think about it, and about the reasons why artists now have to combat various kinds of narcissism. I found that, if it were to be written at all, the subject should be, not a practising artist, but an artist with some kind of a block which prevented him or her from creating. In describing the reasons for the block, I would also be making the criticisms I wanted to make about our society. I would be describing a disgust and self-division which afflicts people now, and not only artists." 

so today, just like my friend robin, i was up early, had the two cups of coffee, did my hair, packed up the dog and the camera and set out to take the photo to end all photos.  my cell phone rang, it was charley's good friend.  "hi bubby".  

i didn't miss a beat, i said "get your shoes on, charley and i are coming to pick you up, we'll go for a walk and take pictures".  the photo shoot to end all photo shoots had certainly ended, rather abruptly and all of a sudden the day was side tracked, and i was turning down the grandmother path.  he climbed into the car, water bottle and bag of trail mix in hand, and off we went.

he and charley pretty much ignore me when we walk.  they run ahead, they run back, they fall down.  One friend throws the stick, the other brings it back; the boy laughs, the dog wags her tail.
     

the two of them have been close for a long time.  they love a little out of town time together so they can go fishing.

the two little friends were playing and running and i was just preparing to focus very hard, both mentally and manually with the camera when this face jumped in front of the lens, scared me and i accidentally took the picture.  i laughed, it was in focus and cute and i had no idea how or why it turned out as well as it did!

and the moral of my little story, sometimes the best photos are the ones you least expect.  i will always look at this funny little head shot and remember this day.  it was a photo to end all photos.  i will get there, i will take better and better shots all the time, i expect that in due course i will finish the golden notebook.  maybe this funny little head shot was in focus for a reason, to help me unblock my artistic sensibility and focus.   

xo

margie

Love Thursday

The heart in this photo is hidden, you can't see it.
 It is in the person who made this marker in love and remembrance.

I was on a walk with BB and this caught my eye. I stared at it for a very long time before the realization dawned on me that I was standing at the resting place of a beloved pet.

 It reminded me of my own beautiful dog who isn't with us anymore.

I shed a little tear for both the unknown dog and my Chester too.

Happy Love Thursday

Kath

bon voyage

i know you must think i spend an awful lot of time at the cottage and perhaps that's true but for those of you who do not live in our neck of the woods, well, it's part of our culture.  we talk about cottage country, we grab every chance to get out of the city, we turn down invitations because we are going to be at the lake.  there are approximately 250,000 lakes in ontario alone!  and so yes, i am up at a cottage, again.  

this time at a friend's, with friends, to say goodbye to our good friend who is moving to the bahamas.  yup, she's throwing in the towel, or snow shovel, and she and her husband have bought a small resort. this is a short post, i have coffee to drink, friends to hug, memories to make and memories to remember. there will be tears for sure. so take time to look at these photos and think about friends and goodbyes.  

margie

Barn

2008 09 12_4269, originally uploaded by kathstewart.

I don't see my sister today. She must be busy reorienting to city life and attending to all the chores that built up while she was at the cottage. Here's a photo for you to enjoy while we wait for Margie!
I'm at work and am secretly doing this.
shhhh
have a great Wednesday.

Kath

Meandering.

I spent the last weekend of the summer, meandering about.  You know the kind of weekend.   Started with BB and I heading out for breakfast at the diner, bacon and eggs, because that won't be happening again any time soon (we have five days until the Challenge begins).

I dropped him at work and parked the car thinking I would meander around town.  I hadn't done much of that this summer. Unfortunately, we've lived here long enough that unless I have company that wants to be shown about, I avoid the centre of town because (oh dear, I have really and truly become a local) I can't stand all the tourists.  All of them eating ice cream, all of them jostling about and to a one, ignoring the rules of parking and driving.  Not you though, if you come, you won't be a tourist, you will be company.

Once I got parked and joined the walking masses, it was much better, I exhaled my tourist induced anxiety away with a few deep cleansing breaths and made up my mind to enjoy myself. 

It was a perfect way to spend an end of summer weekend.  The thing is, I didn't know at the time that it was the last weekend of the summer, I feel like I should have nodded my head in a, "Hey, Summer?  Thanks, it was great", kind of way, but I did not.  I'll say it now, "Summer, I should have thanked you before I sent you on your way, it was great, truly great.  Come again next year!"

Meandering is wonderful, not only when I'm out walking, but at home, going from room to room, doing this or that, reading a book, watching a snippet of a cooking show, folding that pile of laundry, making those muffins.   It's lovely, I accomplish a lot when I let my heart take over from my head and guide me from one thing to the next thing with little thought.  I slow down because I'm not plotting and planning and fussing about the next thing on my list.  There is no list.

I would never have noticed this guy and stopped to watch him for a few minutes if I hadn't been walking slowly down one of the few quiet side streets.

I would never have looked at the brilliant colour of this single weed,
because they are nasty when there's a mass of them.

Most of all, I would not have seen this had I not been meandering.



I know!   I have absolutely no explanation either.
White, shiny (you can't see it, they were positively glistening) plastic clogs.
With knee socks.
I suppose it is entirely possible she was very fashion forward.
 Could they have been designer patent and all the rage on the runway?

I'm giving this look the Shudder Sister's Seal of Approval*
because I can't stop looking at them, yet they're making me shudder!

Kath

*TM