Not her favourite

My niece got a fortune teller this weekend. It appears to be a magic 8 ball kind of deal - you ask a yes/no question, and you get an answer.

The first question she demonstrated for me was "is Auntie Colette my favourite auntie?"

The answer was maybe.

The second question was "is Auntie Colette NOT my favourite auntie?"

The answer was yes.

300

My Monday class at the gym is body toning - so basically strength training. I like strength training, and I try not to miss this class.

The format of the class changes every month, and when I saw the format of this month's class, I considered changing my policy.

The plan was:

25 knees to chest (like a crunch, but raising your knees as well)

25 burpees 

50 squats

50 push ups

50 ball leg curls

50 supine rows

25 knees to chest

25 burpees

I hate burpees. If I never do another burpee in my life, I will be perfectly ok with that. (I also find them really difficult with my asthma). I talked to the instructor and he gave me a substitute exercise - skipping. Except skipping is easier, so it would be 50 skips instead of 25. That's fine - I skip at boxing (except when I've hurt my foot, but my foot has been annoying for too long, so it has to get over it).

One of my colleagues did the routine a couple of days before I started, and she was ridiculously sore the next day. And the day after. And the day after that.

I was a little concerned.

I went to class the first week,  prepared for the worst, and ... it wasn't that bad. The skipping was a little too easy, so I decided the next week I'd do 100 instead of 50, and I had to do bicycles instead of knees to chest the second time, but I survived.

And I wasn't even sore the next day.

The second week, I managed the knees to chest both times.

And this week I missed class, so I went in yesterday to do the workout myself. It took 18 minutes.

I'm almost sorry next Monday is February.

Winter camp

My Pathfinders are going camping next weekend. There is a building on site, but we're planning to spend a lot of time outside.

Any other year, that would be fine, but this year ... well, let's just say that it's been a little cold.

(One day last week I told my colleague in India that it had warmed up from -25 C to -22 C. He did not think that was considerably better.)

Because it has been so cold, Wanda has been wearing my snow pants when she takes the bus. It works well ... except I'm taking the car AND the snow pants to camp.

I went and bought another pair of snow pants.

And then I realized that my winter jacket isn't really warm enough to wear outside for two days.

I went and bought another jacket.

We might sleep outside on Saturday, so I will be packing almost every blanket I own. We have to bring our own water, so I have to pack that. Then there's the food, and the crafts, and the stuff for a treasure hunt/survival activity, and my Dutch oven, and ...

It's so much easier when we camp in my back yard.

Cooling off period

In the middle of November, I got home from work and walked into the kitchen. The floor was cold - so much so that I thought "wow, I'd forgotten how cold the tile floor gets in the winter".  A half an hour later I looked at the thermostat, and noticed it was 10.5 degrees Celcisus in the house. I called the furnace company, and they came out and fixed it.

In December, I woke up one Sunday and noticed it was cold. I checked the thermostat, and the furnace had stopped again.  (Well, it was still working, it just wasn't heating).  I called the furnace company, and they got it working again.  At that point, I knew it wasn't fixed, but they couldn't figure out what part was broken, so they couldn't fix it.

I was worried about leaving it, but I warned my house sitter and got on the plane. I was lucky - it didn't stop at all when I was gone.

I got back on Wednesday, and Friday night it stopped again.  This time, it started spontaneously working as the guy from the furnace company arrived. By the time I went to bed, the house was warm again.

Saturday morning, I woke up to a house that had dropped to 9 degrees.  The guy from the furnace company came out again and had a lot of trouble getting it going. (The one thing you don't want the guy fixing the furnace to say to you at 11 am on a cold Saturday is "Do you have enough firewood to make it to Monday?") Luckily, he got it going again, and he figured out what part needed replacing.

Saturday afternoon, it stopped again. I started calling around borrowing heaters from friends, and it spontaneously started working again.

Sunday, Wanda and I bought (and carried) a lot of firewood.

Monday I stayed home so they could fix it, and they had trouble getting the part. It wouldn't be in until Thursday.

Amazingly, the furnace continued working, and Thursday they came out and fixed it.

Now I just hope they replaced the right part.

* * *

My new years resolution was to change the temperature in my car to Celcuis. I figured it out on January 2. That's two new things in a row, and January 3 I started wearing my new orthotics.  I even considered trying to do a new thing every day, until the furnace went out and I was more focused on not freezing.

* * *

Here's a picture of the many things I got from our family friends who are downsizing.

Christmas wrap up

I started my trip to Saskatchewan in a panic. I left Friday, December 20, which those of you in Ottawa might remember as the day of the snowstorm. Wanda called a couple of hours in advance to order a cab, but DJ's didn't start looking for an available driver until the cab was supposed to be here.

Since they weren't likely to get a cab here in time, we unexpectedly had to drive to the airport. We parked at the Park'n'Fly lot and made our flight without much time to spare.

***

I made a quilt for my sister for Christmas. I started it in July, and finished it in December.  Here it is:

***

The dog is still awesome, and I'm still her favourite auntie.

***

I got to see a lot of family on this trip, most of them multiple times. It was great to see everyone.

***

I went to three of my niece's ringette games. She got her first goal in one of the games, and her team won another one. I attributed it to her favourite auntie being at the game. (B: "Auntie Wanda?")

***

The trip back was in eventful, but man the 6:20 am flights kill me. The Park'n'Fly bus was just leaving the terminal when we got out of the airport, and he stopped to wait for us when he saw us coming. The car wasn't too bad, but there was a fair amount of snow behind it, so our driver came back to shovel out the back and, when we were stuck in the spot, another driver came over to help get us out. I highly recommend them.

***

First day of the year, and I figured out how to renew an ebook from the library. Yay for new things!

***

Yesterday, I went downstairs at mom's to find my cousin's three-year-old son zipped into the dog kennel. I asked if someone put him in there, and he answered (in the saddest voice you can imagine

), "no, it was me".

***

Airlines have a 50 pound limit for luggage, and I know if I can easily lift my suitcase, it's under 50 pounds, but the instructor at the gym has been working on an evil plan to make me stronger. My suitcase squeaked through at 49 pounds.

***

Some family friends moved into a senior's home from the house they lived in for almost sixty years. I helped them go through stuff for a couple of hours, and they gave me a few things, including some pans and an awesome pickle dish that survived the trip home.

***

Winnipeg airport has stores and restaurants in the secure area. This is new, and a big improvement from a few years ago, when the only store was closed and the water vending machines broken when I was there.

***

Before Christmas, I love having the tree and lights up, but as soon as I get home, they just look like work to me.

Not that I put them away today, but it won't be long.

***

And now I'm home, and I'm exhausted, and there is no food in the house, and I go back to work in the morning.

I hope everyone enjoyed the holidays.

Quilting for Lazy People

Today I thought I'd walk you through the process I go through when I make a quilt.  You can get quilt patterns in lots of places, but I usually don't. I like to start with graph paper, and work on that way what design I want to use. 

Once I have the pattern figured out, I pick out fabrics. I like colour, so I often use a bunch of colours in a single quilt.  

For this quilt, I used a pattern involving triangles.  I started with 4" squares, then cut them in half diagonally. I used 2 fabrics per block.

This pattern used 8 triangles (or 4 of the original squares) of each fabric. 

I matched one triangle of the first fabric to a triangle of the other fabric, then sewed them together along the long edge.

I move from one to the next one without cutting the thread, so they all end up in a chain rather like a sausage. (I hate cutting threads.)

Once I have the triangles sewn into squares, I arrange them to make sure I like the pattern.  Do I want to do blocks like this:

 

Or like this?

 

(Of course, there are other options as well.) Anyway, I chose the second one, and then I flipped one square over the other so that I could sew them together.  That created two strips of 4 triangles each, which I sewed together to make a square.

 When I had all the squares done, I laid them out on the fabric I'd chosen to go between them to find an arrangement I liked. (When I'm using a lot of different colours, I like to have one consistent fabric to tie them together.)

I then ripped 2" strips of the yellow fabric. I started with the middle section, because i had the big panel piece to work around.

Of course, I'm not super exact about how I cut and sew the blocks, so they're not all exactly the same size. That's OK - the yellow hides all of that.

Once I had the top completely done, I layered it with the batting and the flannel back piece. I like to have the batting a little bigger than the top, and the backing a little bigger than the batting.

Pin, being careful to catch all three layers (and not the bedspread it's lying on):

Once it's all pinned, flip it over to make sure the flannel back is lying flat - you don't want to have any folds.

If it's flat, it's time to start quilting.

My plan was to quilt down the yellow strips.

When I was done, I flipped it over again to make sure there were no folds.  Sadly, there were, so I had to rip out that seam and sew it again.  (I rip seams while watching Downton Abbey. I'm totally hooked, but I'm late to the party so I have no one to talk about it with.I just finished season 2.)

Once it was all quilted, the only piece left was the edge  This is where the larger back came in handy.  I folded the edge over once, then again until it overlapped the top (so that the edge is finished):

When I got to the corner, I folded it as I would if I were gift-wrapping a box:

And then again:

I then sewed around the entire edge to secure it, and here's the finished product:

This was a more complicated pattern, so it took about 5 hours from start to finish. 
 

Habitually

Back in July, I hurt my foot. (I was sitting on a stool, and my foot slipped. The top of my foot slammed into the rung of the chair. It was bruised, but I could walk without any pain, so I didn't worry about it.

And then, a month later, I helped a friend put together 13 bookcases. After that, it started hurting when I walked. I got it checked out, and the verdict was that it probably wasn't broken, but even if it was, they'd just treat it with a tight shoe. I started wearing an ankle brace that supported the middle of my foot, and whenever I wore proper shoes, I used some arch supports that made it possible for me to walk without pain.

And then it snowed, and I had to move the arch supports from my boots to my shoes (and back again) every day. I decided I needed another pair of arch supports.

I have high arches, so I wasn't able to find any commercial supports, and had to look into orthotics. I made an appointment and went in for the assessment, and one of the things she said was that my left shoulder dips down when I walk.

Normally I carry everything on my right shoulder, so I decided to try carrying things on my left shoulder, 

It turns out my left shoulder is not up to the job. My purse, laptop bag, gym bag, whatever I'm carrying, is constantly dropping to my forearm.

It's comical, really. One or more bags starts dropping, and I start waving my arms around, looking, I'm sure, like I'm fighting invisible ghosts. And then one drops, and the rest follow, and I'm suddenly carrying everything on my forearm, with my laptop bag dragging on the ground.

Force of habit is a powerful thing.

Appreciation

Girl Guides of Canada asked on Facebook "Should parents buy their daughter's Guider a holiday gift or wait until the end of the year?" Obviously, neither is required or expected - and, I'd argue, neither is a particularly good way to show appreciation. If you want to show appreciation, here's what you can do.

Drop your daughter off on time. No, not ten minutes early - at that point, I'm trying to get organized, and I don't want to entertain you or your daughter. Not even if she's really excited to be there, or you have somewhere else to be. I need a few minutes to get my head together and figure out what I forgot.

Pick up on time. If you're early, wait outside - don't disrupt the entire group. And don't be late - I want to go home and eat, because I probably didn't have time after work. (Obviously, things happen, but more than once a year is too often.)

If you have something you want to talk about, either talk to me after the meeting, or call/email a day or two before the meeting. Leaving me a message at two on the day of the meeting may not even get to me until I get home.

If you owe us money, pay promptly. I don't volunteer because I like being a bill collector.

Respect the deadlines. If camp forms/cookie orders/permission slips are due on a certain date, don't show up two weeks later with them. 

Help where you can. Be the person who volunteers when we need a hand, and then follow through without needing a reminder.

Get your daughter there. When she isn't allowed to come because she's grounded or you dont feel like driving her, it's a hassle - we've bought supplies we don't need, or she won't be ready to do the next part of whatever we're working on so we have to spend extra time catching her up. She'll miss some due to illness or other commitments - don't add to it if you don't have to.

Show her that you're proud of her. I see girls achieve amazing things every year, and it's sad when their parents don't recognize that.

That's what I want for Chrjstmas. 

Why I'm not here

Back in June. I came up with a great idea for a Christmas gift I could make. I bought materials and, after my company left in July, got right to work.

I've been working on it ever since, and ... it's getting there, but it's not done yet.

The problem with projects like this is that I get overly ambitious, and not only do I want to do the first project, but whenever I see a project that is easier, I think "oh, I could totally do that". And the. I start the second (easy) project, and the first project sits, and then the whole cycle repeats itself.

So no, I'm not done, although I did do two easy projects tonight.

I love that fabric.

Anyway, so I have tons of projects on the go, which naturally means that I've been more sociable than usual lately. In the last week, I've gone to book club, Pathfinders, boxing, lunch with old friends, lunch with current coworkers, and a trivia night that was a fundraiser for local Ranger group, who are planning a trip to Europe. (Next trivia fundraiser is Feb. 8 - I definitely recommend it.)

Oh yeah, I also should figure out if the dishwasher is fixable or whether it really is trying to become a floor washer.

And I want to put the tree up this weekend.

Yes, I work well when I have a deadline - can you tell?

Crumbling down

Yesterday, I got home from work and thought "man, I forgot how cold the tile floors get in the winter".

Then I sat around for a while, and decided to check the thermostat. It was 11.5 C. The thermostat was set at 19. I could hear the furnace working, but there was no heat coming out of the vents.

I turned the heat off and on. No luck.

I went downstairs and turned the switch on and off. No luck.

I called the furnace company, and was debating whether to have them come out after hours. I checked the thermostats again. It was 12 C. That was odd, but I attributed it to the fact that I'd just finished cooking. I decided it could wait until morning.

I went to take the garbage out, and couldn't get the back door open - the knob turned, but the door wouldn't open. I initially thought the door had swelled enough to stick, but after a few minutes, I realized that the handle was turning, but it wasn't actually doing anything. 

I went and got a screwdriver so I could take the handle off. I got the inside knob off, then walked around the house to take the outside handle off. The problem was that I couldn't get the middle of the knob - the part that holds it in the door - wasn't moving. I stuffed a rag in the open hole for insulation and went to bed.

When I got up, it was 10 C. I called right away, and was told someone would be here between 10 and noon. He got here a little after 10' and it was 9.5 C. (If the house loses heat at that rate, I figure it broke no later than Monday.)

It took him a little while to figure out that the problem was a blocked vent - it was keeping the fan from blowing air onto an sensor. He pulled out a piece of wire and got the vent open.

It still didn't work.

He went outside to check the gas meter - walking all around the house, because the back doorknob was just a rag-stuffed hole - then came in and turned the switch off and on again. This time it worked.

The house started heating up, and there was much rejoicing - especially since it was under warranty.

Tonight, I took another stab at the doorknob. It took three screwdrivers, a pliers, and a mallet, but I finally got the door open. After that, it didn't take long to get the old knob out and the new one in.

Now there just the floor-flooding dishwasher to deal with.

(The sad part is that I was fine without heat overnight, but if it had been the Internet that was broken, I wouldn't have been so calm.)

Pre-Teen Book Club

Anyone who follows me on twitter is aware that I joined a book club earlier this year. It's fun, and it's pushing me to read books I otherwise wouldn't. The only issue is that I never remember to start the books more than two days in advance.

A couple of months ago, I became aware that my niece had pretty much stopped reading. She was an early reader, but somewhere along the way, she stopped.

Since I am her bossiest auntie, I decided we should have our own book club.

I let her pick the first book (Geronimo Stilton) and we had our first meeting.

I got to pick the second one (The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe). Again she finished it before I did. (Actually, she finished it before I started - as usual, I didn't start right away. I read fast, and I wanted to remember it when we talked about it.)

It's her turn again, and we're reading Ever After High.

I wonder how long it will be before I can make her read From The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler.

Every time I have a cold, I wish I also had a recliner.

Things that are uncomfortable:

- sitting up

- lying down

- closing my eyes

- keeping my eyes open

- thinking

- sleeping

Things I have cancelled or skipped due to illness:

- lunch with the gang from the big telecom company

- book club

- boxing (probably)

- strength class

- circuit class

- work

Haunted

Today I made a ghost. I started with a roll of wire fencing, six feet long.

(FYI, real chicken wire would be easier to work with- this was harder to bend and cut because there were so many pieces of wire.)

The roll was three feet wide, so I started by building the skirt. I cut an appropriate length, then joined the two edges together and crumpled the top.

I did the same for the torso, and joined the two pieces together. 

I made one arm, then found something to help me shape the head.

I attached the head and had two pieces of wire left - enough for an arm, and the piece I cut off the head. (It's the neck in the picture above.)

I added the second arm, and then used the last piece to make hair.

And there she is.

Napping

Wednesday is circuit class at the gym. In July, the instructir changed, and every single time I've gone to class since then, I have tried to convince the instructor that we needed a nap station,

Today, I walked into the gym and one of the other regulars said "you're going to like today's class". 

I walked into the group fitness room to see that five of the eight stations were:

- nap station

- breathing

- easy walk

- sit down and relax

- skip this station

We all laughed ... until we found out what they really were.

Still, it was well done.

The car is fine (but my brain is broken)

The old car had keyless entry, but at some point over the past 13 years, the remote had broken off the keyring, so I carried it separately.

Here's how every trip in the new car has gone:

1. Walk towards car, use key fob to unlock the vehicle.
2. Open the back and put bags, etc. inside, keeping keys in hand.
3. Reach into pocket to get the key fob to unlock the door.
4. Remember the key fob is in my hand, and the door is already unlocked.
5. Get into driver's seat.
6. Drive to desination.
7. Turn off lights.
8. Remember the car has automatic lights, and turn them back to "auto" position.
9. Reach down to pop the trunk.
10. Remember there is no trunk.
11. Wonder what side the gas tank is on. Decide to check immediately upon getting out of the car.
12. Get out of car.
13. Use the key fob to lock the car.
14. Go to the back to get bag out. 
15. Realize it's locked. 
16. Unlock the car.
17. Get bag.
18. Lock the car.

 I can't wait until I need to get gas, because I still have no idea where the gas tank is.

Goodbyes

Today, I got rid of my 13 year old car.

I cleared out years of poppies from above the sun visor. (Why? What do you do with them?) I took the tiles from my kitchen reno out of the trunk. I even emptied the maps out if the door pockets.

This car has made numerous trips to Montreal, and has been to Quebec City, Toronto, and Niagara Falls. And during one not-so-good year, it also went to Philadelphia, Gettysburg, and New York City (twice).

It's the car I couldn't find in the airport parking lot at midnight the first time my niece came to visit me, and the car we were in a few years later when she announced "if my mom was here, she'd say that guy is a dumbass." 

That is the car CAA came to unlock on the camping trip where I gave in to complaints about how paranoid I was about my keys and let someone else unlock the trunk.

There's a scratch on the hood, and one of my former coworkers helpfully demonstrated how it could have happened by rolling across the hood pretending he had a box in his hands. (It was actually from digging it out of the snow.)

It has a parking sticker in the window from when I worked at the formerly big telecom company, and a dent in the side from some drunk idiot at Wanda's work.

It's the car we triumphantly fit Wanda's new ikea shelf into, right before we realized there was no longer room for Wanda.

I drove home from my last day at four jobs in that car, and drove to my first day at four jobs as well.

The first time I went to boxing, it was in that car, and the last time I went to Irish dancing was in that car. (I really need to sell those shoes.)

That car has hauled camping equipment, bags of soil, bikes, and dozens of boxes of cookies. 

It was a good car.

Where I've been

Remember this? A week and a half after my car stopped in the middle of the road, the check engine light came on.

Again.

It was time to start car shopping.

I've been saying for about a year that I want a Mazda 5. No, it's not the SUV or the cute little lime green car - it's the shrunken minivan that looks kind of like a station wagon.

A couple of weeks ago - on a Tuesday night, immediately before 2 days where I worked from 3 am to noon, and three days before Pathfinder camp - I dragged Wanda out to a Mazda dealership. We both drove a Mazda 5, and the salesman ran some numbers (that came in at $6000 more than I got from going to their website to price it out). He came down to a final number that was only $2000 more, and I walked away.

And then I had no time to do anything about it, due to the crazy work hours and Pathfinder camp.

(Camp was lovely, BTW - we managed to pick the nice weekend in between 2 rainy weekends, and the wandering bear we were warned about must have moved on.)

I was off last week, and one of the things I wanted to do was go car shopping.  (Actually, the list of things I wanted to do but didn't do could fill a ... well, a list. It's on my fridge.)

On Friday, I decided I should do something so that I didn't waste the entire week, and I went to one used car dealership.

I pick up my new car on Tuesday.

Yes, it's a Mazda 5.

Zzzzz

I've mentioned before that I wear a nightguard. Even though I'm so weird about not putting it in my mouth until I'm lying down and ready to go to sleep, if I wake up in the middle of the night and it's not in my mouth (because I fell asleep before I was ready, or because I took it out in my sleep), I have to put it in in order to go back to sleep.

So when I woke up at 2 a.m. this morning and didn't know where it was, the first thing I did was reach out my arm to see if it was on the edge of the bed.

The second thing I did was knock it onto the floor. I turned on the light and didn't see it, so I got up and moved the bed slightly ... and knocked the plugs for the light and the clock radio out of the wall.

FYI, it's dark at 2 a.m.

I managed to get the light plugged in again, but the clock radio just didn't cooperate. The plug was a little bent, so I tried bending it back with my fingers.

No luck.

I got up, found a pliers, and straightened the plug.

Still no luck.

I had two choices:
1) Figure out how to plug in the alarm clock, or
2) Get my cell phone and figure out how to set an alarm on it.

I picked up the alarm clock and went into the kitchen, where at least the plug-ins are high enough to keep me from having to bend over. The plug didn't work.

That's when I figured out it was upside down. I flipped it around, and it worked in the kitchen, and in the bedroom.

I cleaned my nightguard and went back to sleep.

How was your day?

Yesterday morning, I started the car and noticed that a light was on.

A red light. Specifically the battery light.

I've mentioned before that I have underground parking at work, and I have seen tow trucks trying to get cars out of the second level (where I usually park) before. It's not a pretty sight, so I made a point of parking on the first level.

And backing in.

I called and made an appointment to bring the car in today, and then hoped for the best. 

I had boxing last night, so I left early (in case the car didn't start). It started.

It started after boxing, too. 

And this morning, it started again. I started driving to the garage.

Half way there, the radio turned itself off. (Yes, I probably should have turned it off earlier - I didn't think of it.) 

When I was a few blocks away, the speedometer started waving like crazy, and the airbag light started  flashing. The signal lights started seeming ... drowsy, too.

By this point, I was very, very close.

More specifically, I was at the red pin, and I was going to the green pin. The only thing in between was a strip mall. 

And a red light.

The car stalled. 

Luckily, two bystanders pushed me out of the turning lane, and CAA was fast.

More goats than you'd usually see in a museum

 

Several months ago - May? June? - Lynn had a contest to give away family passes to the Museum of Agriculture. She had, if I remember correctly, 10 passes, and all you had to do was leave a comment to enter.

I'd never actually been to the museum, so I left a comment, and I won! (OK, the odds were good, but it was still exciting.)

On Saturday, I went to the museum with my friend and her 2 kids.

It was the perfect day for it - nice, but not too hot, and the forecasted rain meant that it wasn't terribly busy.

We got there around 10:30, and we started by checking out the horses, which were outside. They gave us a map and schedule of demonstrations, so at 11, we made our way to the "meet the donkey" session - which was, as it turned out, right by the goats. My friends daughter loves goats, and she was thrilled to watch them as we waited for the donkey. The donkey demo was interesting, and we got to pet her after the talk. 

We walked through the Learning Center, then went to the 11:30 Amazing Worms talk. The kids didn't want to hold the worms, but they enjoyed pumping water and looking through Energy Park.

Energy Park is also next to the playground, so we spent some time there before the Butter Making demo at noon. The kitchen where the butter making demo is is right by exhibits on tractors and bees, so we looked through those before heading out to the "Artifacts in Action" demo, where we saw how they size eggs and ground wheat into flour. By this point, we were starting to get hungry, so we re-visited the places the kids wanted to spend more time in, and then left.  

It was an excellent way to spend a Saturday - and, since it's a long weekend, there were still two weekend days left!

Thanks, Lynn!