Scalloped Potatoes

Day 58

I tried a new recipe for scalloped potatoes today. It has bacon, swiss cheese and parmesan in it and is delicious. I won’t do a double batch in this size pan again – it was too much and spilled over while it was baking. I definitely have to clean the oven now! The recipe is here if any of you would like to try it: http://www.elise.com/recipes/archives/004174scalloped_potatoes.php

A Sad Day

Day 57

Near the end of the work day yesterday, we learned that Lorne Ruzicka, a coworker on our team, passed away earlier in the day. It was/is a shock to our entire team and it was an incredibly sad day at work today.

Lorne was only 54 years old and had been with the department for just over 4 years. He was fun, kind, caring and very generous; he had a great sense of humor and made the office a fun place to be! I think it’s going to take a while to absorb the full impact of our loss - Lorne will be greatly missed.

I've taken quite a few pictures around the office over the years that I've been at Justice; I took these two pictures of Lorne from my collection and taped them to the window of his office this morning.

Downtown Pigeons

Day 56

There is a large group of pigeons that seem to always be gathered in this one particular spot on Rice Howard Way (downtown). I almost think someone, perhaps the restaurant at this spot, throws bird seed or some other kind of food to them because there always seems to be something there for them to eat. Amazingly, this cold winter day (about -20C) didn’t seem to affect them any.

Happy Birthday Michael!

Day 55

Today is a special day. It was on this day, 23 years ago, that my youngest son Michael was born! A few of my kids, grandkids, Ken and I are planning a get-together on March 7th to celebrate a few things – Michael’s birthday included. Happy birthday Michael!

Please Let me In

Day 54

I thought Little Bear looked so cute covered in a fine dusting of snow as he waited for me to open the door and let him back into the warm, cozy house. I think he was puzzled – wondering why I was standing there taking pictures of him instead of letting him inside right away as I normally do.

I Collect Cookbooks

February 22, 2009 – Day 53

Every book on this shelf in our basement is a cookbook and comprises the better part of my collection. In addition to this shelf, I have a deep pantry shelf filled with many more cookbooks, including most of the Company’s Coming series which are some of my favourites. It took about 30 years of collecting (stores, gifts, book clubs, garage sales and flea markets) to accumulate this many cookbooks but I rarely buy one anymore because I really have more than enough. I sold several cookbooks in a garage sale we had in 2006 and gave away about 3 boxes full after the garage sale. I want to give more away – it’s just hard knowing which ones I can bear to part with. :-)

Spring is Coming

February 21, 2009 - Day 52

It looks like spring just might be on its way – the view from our bonus room window is so much more promising than it was last month!

Our neighbours straight across from us must either really like their outdoor Christmas decorations, or really didn’t want Christmas to be over – because their decorations (2 wreaths on their garage lights plus 2 white light-up trees decorated with balls) are still up! :-)

I plan to take a picture out this window at least once/month during P365 so this is “it” for February.

I Met Kristy Today

Day 51

Today I went for Dim Sum with my niece Cheryl, my sister Darlene, my son Michael, and Michael's new girlfriend, Kristy – who I got to meet for the first time today! We had fun and it was exciting to meet Kristy. My first impression is that she seems like a very nice girl and she suits Michael well.

A Kiss From Heaven

Day 50

One of the first times I was at Mom and Ross’s house after mom passed away and was buried, this angel caught my eye - and my heart. Most of my memories from that sad time are foggy but this one is crystal clear and I’ll never forget the feeling I felt at that moment. My heart skipped a beat because it felt exactly like mom was blowing me a kiss from heaven.

Ross let me have the angel. It’s one of my absolute favourite things because it reminds me of mom - and of that special kiss she sent me from heaven.

Good Ol' KD

Day 49

Pasta is probably my favourite food and although I usually tend to favour shrimp tetrazzini, homemade lasagna, spinach stuffed manicoti, etc., once in a while I get a craving for good old Kraft Dinner. Sometimes I eat it plain but if I chose to have it with ketchup, the ketchup has to be Heinz. I have nice dishes but when I make KD, I have to eat it in this old, worn-out. blue plastic bowl. I only use this “special” bowl for KD and spaghetti. And, KD tastes best when eaten with a spoon. Don’t ask me “why” to any of these things…I’m just weird like that.

Ken doesn’t get the same craving for Kraft Dinner that I do but he’s out snowboarding tonight and he ate leftovers (or something) before he left. I’m home alone and I had a craving for KD so it worked out perfectly! I thought about my grandson, Austin, while I was eating my supper tonight because he’s a huge fan of Kraft Dinner and I’m sure he would choose it at most meals if his mom and dad let him; he would chose it over Christmas dinner, I know that for sure. :-)

I made enough to take for lunch tomorrow – hopefully my craving doesn’t wear off before then. lol

ChapStick

Day 48

I am completely and hopelessly addicted to ChapStick and have been ever since I was 15 years old. Cherry is my favourite flavour but I’ll occasionally buy vanilla. I use it several times throughout the day so I need to have one handy no matter where I am or what I’m doing. One or two ChapSticks sits on my computer desk, one in my desk drawer at work, one in a drawer in my kitchen; I carry one in my purse, one in my coat pocket, and sometimes one in a sweatshirt or sweater than I’m wearing around the house (if it has pockets). I usually have a spare one or two that haven’t been opened yet, in case one of those wears out but when I was gathering up my ChapSticks from around the house to take this picture, I realized I don’t have any unopened ones left – time to stock up! :-)

Snowboarding Guy

Day 47

Ken had the day off today (Family Day) and he went snowboarding - which he LOVES to do!

New Kit in Store

Day 46

I design and sell digital scrapbooking kits in an online store. It works on a commission basis and several other designers sell there as well.

My new Valentine’s kit is in the store today – here: http://store.scrapbook-elements.com/index.php?main_page=products_new if you want to have a better look. When you get to that page, you can click on the picture of my kit (and click again on the second little picture that comes up) and it will bring up a larger view.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Day 45

Ken bought me this beautiful bouquet of flowers and wonderful card for Valentine’s Day and the I made the cake for him. I was going to make a heart shaped cake but I guess I gave my heart shaped pans away somewhere along the way –why would I do a thing like that?! Now I have to buy new ones. lol I also printed out a bunch of vintage Valentine cards, wrote little loving things on them and hid them with heart-shaped chocolates around the house (he’s only found 2 out of 8 so far though, so…shhhh) :-)

Home Sweet Home

Day 44

So this is where I hung out today - home. I normally spend Friday mornings doing my weekly grocery shopping and today I was also planning to look for some new clothes – but Ken’s truck wouldn’t start this morning and he had to take the car to get to work. For supper, I "shopped" from my deepfreeze. We had crab and lobster ravioli topped with shrimp and chicken in an alfredo sauce.

I love being home at the best of times but really didn’t mind not going out today since we’re back in another cold spell. It’s -15C out there as I post my picture.

Taste of Home

Day 43

In the spring of 2002, I spent 5 days visiting my Aunt Gladys. It was the first time we’d really spent time together since I was a child and I had such a wonderful time getting to know my Aunt all over again. I’ve always thought of Auntie Gladys as a special person and absolutely the very best cook I’ve ever known. Even as a child, I remember that any food she prepared tasted like it had been prepared in heaven. :-) So of course, I had to ask my dear Auntie Gladys if she would share some of her favourite recipes with me - and she did! I was thrilled! She also introduced me to the Taste of Home magazine, which she had a subscription to.

Well – if Taste of Home magazine was good enough for the best cook in the world, then I wanted it too! As soon as I returned home, I sent for a subscription to the magazine and I’ve been enjoying it ever since. I get a 3 year subscription each time (the longest available) and I’ve had to renew twice now but it’s been worth every cent. In fact, I enjoy my Taste of Home magazine so much that I've subscribed to two more magazines from the same publisher. Can you guess what those magazines are before I show you (in future pictures)?

My Bus Stop

Day 42

I took this picture at 6:56 as I waited for my bus to pick me up this morning. It’s still dark when I leave for work but it was a beautiful frosty morning.

Public Transportation

Day 41

When I get on the bus downtown at the end of the day, it’s packed so full that several riders have to stand, but since I get off on the last stop on the route the bus is pretty much empty by the time I get home. Sometimes I’m the only one to get off at our stop; sometimes there up to 3 or 4 others. I get on the bus at 4:15 and arrive home right around 5:00.

But since we’re the first stop in the morning I get my choice of seats (I have a favourite one though and always choose it). I also move to it as soon as it’s available when people begin to get off at their stops along the ride home. It’s the seat I’m sitting in here when I took the picture – the first one on the upper level (to the right as you’re getting on, to the left if you’re seated and facing the front of the bus).

A New Kit

I’ve been very busy designing a new Valentine’s Day kit for the store where I sell my digital scrapbook designs - and I finished it today…whew! I’m a day late for it to be in the store for the Valentine’s Day weekend but I sent a message to the store owner and asked if she would be able to make an exception and pull my kit from the ftp provider for this weekend. I hope she’ll be able to but I know she’s incredibly busy and if she isn’t able to, it won’t be released until February 22nd. I’m pretty sure people will still be scrapbooking Valentine’s Day layouts the following week though so that'll be okay.

The color isn't the greatest in this picture. I'll post a link when the kit in the store and whoever is interested can see the true (brigher, prettier) colours.

The Chalkboard

February 8, 2009

I paid $5.00 for this old chalkboard at a garage sale many years ago and I love it. When my grandkids come to visit, they update the chalkboard with new messages and/or pictures. Once in a while my kids or I will leave a message or draw a picture as well. Sometimes, when the grandkids don’t come to visit for a while, the message gets a little outdated. Christine, Ian and the kids were here for Christmas and before they left for home on December 27th, Ashley and/or Hope left this message, “Happy early new years” - and that’s what’s on the chalkboard today, February 8th.

Fun

Adam and Michael came for coffee this morning; actually, it was almost noon by the time they arrived today. We ate lunch together (they stopped to pick up take out), caught up on the new stuff happening in each of our lives this week, watched the family Christmas video Ken recently finished editing and then played SingStar. I got this picture of the boys when they were goofing around and having fun singing along to the game.

Grocery Shopping with Company

Michael came grocery shopping with me today. It was nice to have that little visit with him and also nice to have his help to push the cart through the heavy, messy, freshly-fallen/still-falling snow - and to load my groceries in the car.

DOJ

This sign hangs on the wall in the hallway near the elevators at work. In Edmonton, the federal Deparment of Justice has offices on 2 floors in the TD tower, 1 floor in Manulife and 2 floors in the Bank of Montreal building. They’ve been trying for years to rent enough office space in one building to accommodate all of us and it sounds like it may finally happen when our current lease expires in 2011.

When I started working for the Department on June 3, 2002, we were located on the 3rd floor of the Bank of Montreal building. Our team moved to the 20th floor of the TD tower in March 2003 and we’ve been there since.

Walk

One of the lawyers asked if I’d mind walking over to Canada Place to pick up a package for him this morning. It’s only about a ten minute walk - got me out of the office and gave me a little fresh air so I didn’t mind at all. I took my camera along and took this shot along the way.

Laundry

I had a few loads of laundry to catch up on and spent time doing that yesterday and today. This is my last load…hooray!

Jasmine Tea

I took this picture especially for my nephew Shayne. He asked me to let him know if the Jasmine tea I bought at Lucky 97 yesterday tastes at all like the tea they serve at Dim Sum. I drank two cups of this tea today and I'd say it tastes exactly like the stuff they serve at Dim Sum - it’s delicious! The brand name, “Sunflower” is printed in red on the top of the tin.