New Year's Eve 2011

Happy New Years

Niu Niu and Fia drawing

Yesterday we were able to share lunch with our friends Chris and Marianne and their two daughters Niu Niu and Fia.  Before lunch the girls took a few moments to draw us their New Year's message.  We felt it was so beautiful that we just had to share it with everyone!

Happy New Year to all our family and friends, wherever you are! See you next year.

Christmas Day 2011

I never heard the reindeer!  Again.

We woke up early on Christmas morning this year, and we were pleasantly surprised that Santa had, yet again, managed to find time to drop by the Elkins' household.  He even figured out that Frank and Mary Jane would be dropping by after church for breakfast and left packages for them as well.

So we got busy and prepared our special big breakfast of eggs, bacon, home fries, blueberry/banana pancakes, freshly squeezed orange juice and famous Lavazza cappuccinos, timed just right for Frank and Mary Jane's arrival around 10 am.  While we were preparing this, we Skyped with the Snikles in AB to share in their morning opening of presents. It was almost like being there. Gotta love Skype.

Night Watchman Smoking

After breakfast we opened all the gifts under the tree and had a wonderful time.  Peter surprised me with a new Christmas decoration that he had been able to get his hands on while in Vancouver visiting with his long-time friend Andy.  It is a genuine Steinbach Night Watchman Smoker and here is a picture. I hope you can see the smoke coming out of his mouth.  This is just one of the many hand-crafted collectibles made by the Steinbach family in northern Germany.

Later in the day, Frank and Mary Jane came back to our place to share in Christmas dinner.  Instead of roasting a complete turkey this year, we decided to have a turkey roll. We made the roll with a boneless breast, a boneless leg and pork sausage sandwiched in the middle of the two.  I have to say it is much easier to prepare, carve, serve and clean up than a fully formed turkey.  Also, we were able to only cook a quantity that suited the four of us better.  I would happily do that again sometime.  Our Christmas dinner ended with Frank sharing the Christmas pudding (and hard sauce) that Santa had brought to him this Christmas.  I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and holiday time this year.

Christmas dinner 2011

Bonne année 2012

Christmas Eve

I think we have a new Christmas Eve tradition in our household - smoked tuna sashimi and scotch. Oh ya baby!

Merry Christmas everyone.

Skating at Lunchtime

The Downtown Victoria Business Association decided this year to put a small outdoor ice skating rink in Centennial Square.  So a few of us at work (2 blocks away) decided it would be fun to have a skate on our lunch hour.  We invited everyone but only 3 of us showed up, Linda brought her daughter and a colleague volunteered to take photos since he doesn't skate.  There was music, sunshine and skaters of all sizes, ages and skill levels.  All this fun for only $2!! 

It's Finally Decorated

Okay, it's a bit more of a Charlie Brown tree than anticipated ... but I like it!  It reminds me of Hornby Island. And, and it makes my decorations much easier to see :) 

Christmas Tree Hunting in Metchosin

Hunter and his weapon looking for prey!

First kill of the day!

Busy City Saturday Urban Hike

Empress Hotel Trees. This one was cool as it is a circuit board cut with a CNC machine.

DTVBA Outdoor Ice Rink is now open to public. Judith will spend her lunch hour skating till the New Year!

Peter enjoying ginger tea listening to the Tuba band at Market Square

Freeloading on the free Horse Drawn Shoppers Experience

I always enjoy getting these shots just right!

Never to late to Rock and Roll!

Crazy island thing. Industrial trucks drive around town celebrating the season.

Happy Days, Euro Bikes and Smiles

Judith riding towards the office after coming home for lunch. Yes, you heard it right. Judith comes home everyday for lunch. And yes that is a new bike she is modeling with an ear to ear grin. She sure does love her bicycles. Down right giddy I tell you!

Judith cruising the shops on her city bike adding to the local fashion scene.

Sunday Shopping, Monday Installation

$6 aerator

Last week we had a high-speed blowout of sorts.  The cheap little plastic aerator we'd installed on the kitchen faucet blew off with quite some significant force.  Luckily, it blew off into the dish water and didn't damage me or anything else. Amazing how much force the water has! Anyway, I tried to jimmy the thing back together with no luck.  Water just sprayed everywhere for a couple of days.

On our Sunday outing for grocery shopping, we drove to the famous Oak Bay Home Hardware store to check it out and purchase a new aerator.  We purchased a more expensive model this time and spent a whole $5.99 (plus taxes)! We also found out the store had recently been sold to a new owner.  Peter has been studying local hardware market so this was a bonus piece of information.

Glass door knobs

On a more esoteric note, I want you to notice the similarity between our new installation and the existing, historical theme of the apartment seen here in the wonderful 12 facet glass door knobs.  These door knobs are on every one of our interior door handles, except the front door.  Love it.

Sunday Shopping

A photo of the glamorous Judith at the green grocer stocking up on fresh beets for the juicer Scott has so generously let us borrow. You will notice in the background "Oscar the wonder car" patiently waiting for "Judith the wonder wife" to finish shopping.

Rambutan and papaya at The Rootcellar.

Today "Oscar" was very excited (not as excited as Judith mind you) to find out he will be hauling a free "Charlie Brown (CB) Christmas Tree" back from Matheson Lake in Metchosin next weekend in honour of the "Big Chin's" birthday.  Traditionally we have gone to the dump for CB trees but this year we will have to go it alone without our CB tree expert Rachelle and saw man and choker Doug.

Also, we were considering spending the holiday week on the rock, but after discovering an outdoor ice rink is being built this week downtown (with real ice), I am sure I won't be able to drag Judith away till at least New Years! Seriously folks - an outdoor ice rink on the wet coast? This I gotta see ... stand-by for photos!

Saturday morning gluten free pancakes :)

For Sarah.

Dylan on the move for the sack.

Yes, Sarah that is your son. The future BC Lions star "DMAN" Keep up the great work you guys. We look forward to seeing him on CBC in the 2022 Grey Cup, after four years at UBC!

Tower of Dishes II

Here is another installment in the stacking dishes saga.  Who knew there would be blogging potential in doing dishes???

Thursday November 18th

New Juicer to try out

Yesterday Peter scooped a Juice Factory 2000 for us to try - free of charge!  Best kind of scoop.  It has a little bigger capacity (but smaller counter space required) and definitely squeezes more juice from the veggies/fruit than our Viking attachment.  Here is a photo of Judith cleaning up after the Juice Factory overfilled her juice glass this morning.

Tuesday November 15, 2011

Guess what Judith did on her flex day this week?  First I cleaned and lightly sanded the back door and then I dug out that can of chalk board paint that I have been holding onto for a year or two ... and presto - I painted us a blackboard! 

Chalkboard @ PeJu's

The chalkboard is on our back door.

Tower of Dishes

Tonight was an interesting mix of dishes to wash/dry so I was pretty pleased after I'd finished piling them up on the dish tray.  Worth noting. Too bad the photo isn't in 3D so I could show you the full effect of the stacking skills required for this sort of thing.  Maybe I should start keeping track of the number of pieces I stack per night.  Hmmm.

11-11-11

November 11, 2011 will be remembered for several reasons this year.  First there is the obvious one - remembering all those who fought for our country.  Peter and I attended the ceremony held at the epitaph in front of the BC Legislature.  Amazing to see how many people - and how many different ages of people - also attended the ceremony.  In the rain no less!

November 11, 2011

Secondly, it is a banner year because of the 11-11-11 occurring twice in the day.  This apparently happens rarely.  There is something about the 11-11 thing in our household, although I'm not sure what.  Or why.

Thirdly,  Peter and I played squash today.  Wish there was a photo to prove it, but you'll just have to take my word for it.  And, in case you wanted to know, Peter let me win the game. :)

Fall in the City

The Empress in Red

Life in the Fast Lane

You know you're having a good day when the sun shines and you hear several people on the street whistling a tune. Not only that, but our toilet was replaced today!  Routine cleaning revealed a cracked bowl which was duly reported to the management company on Sunday and voila!

Our new ceramic throne.

October 31, 2011

From our pumpkin patch to yours - Happy Halloween!

October 16, 2011

Unknown flower on growing on the deck

View from the desk of Sooke Harbour

Squinting in the sun.

Did I mention that the weather in October was magnificent?  Start with a dollop of that, add a whiff of a seasonal offer, and throw in a gift certificate that is 4 years old and ... presto! ... we have the perfect combination for a mini-vacation at the Sooke Harbour House in Sooke BC.

Yup.  A beautiful 1-hour drive out to Sooke with all the fall colours, check-in shortly after 3 pm, tea on the patio, 3-course gourmet locally produced dinner starting at 5:30, and followed by dessert in front of the large roaring fire before retiring to our room.  We might have eaten too much, but it truly was too good to leave behind.

Sooke Harbour House - dining room on the main floor, our room above the red doors.

View from our room. Sigh.

A happy place.

After dinner, we turned out all the lights and lit the fire, and just sat there talking and watching it burn.  After a wonderful sleep, they bring breakfast to your room!  What a way to start the day .... checkout wasn't until noon.

October 15, 2011

The weather in October was pretty nice this year.  It got quite cool on many days but I was still able to ride my bicycle to work most days.  I bought fenders knowing that the rain is going to start pretty soon and I will be needing them.  One of these days, I'll actually attach them to the bike!

On Saturday the 15th, the sun was shining and it was warm outside. We knew it would be foolish NOT to take our tea to our favourite beach for one last picnic in the sun for the year.  So we made the tea and to celebrate we stopped at our favourite bakery (okay, one of them) and picked up a sweet for each of us to enjoy with tea.  Well, it was such a magnificent day, that we were obviously not the only ones with the same idea.  Not to be scared off by this, we found a different beach just a short distance away.

Fruit tart with custard

Thanksgiving

We were lucky enough to be invited out to our friends pub for Thanksgiving dinner today, so I had the opportunity to take my sweet old time doing whatever I wanted.  We slept in and had a late breakfast with our Sunday latte.  It was the Victoria Marathon today so we also spent some time looking out the window at the runners and their families coming back from their run.  Some had medals around their necks, some were limping a little bit, but almost everyone was enjoying the sunny Fall day.

After breakfast I started to clean up by washing the dishes.  I do this 'chore' almost daily, usually in the evening before bed as we have no automatic dishwasher in our little kitchen.  This is not an unusual situation for a rental apartment, especially in an older building like ours.  I don't mind as it reminds me on a regular basis how to be careful about how many dishes we use, how much soap we use to clean our plates, and besides, we only have so much counter space!  Because the dishes need to be done daily, I like to do them once only and leave them to air dry.  In the morning I put them away and start the whole process over again.  One of the things I enjoy the most about 'doing the dishes' is finding a way to put all, or at least as many as I possibly can, on the dish rack.  I treat it as a 3D spatial puzzle.  First I have to plan the order in which to wash the various pieces that require cleaning so they can be appropriately layered on the drying rack.  Since the best laid plans do not always work, I have to find a way to actually make them fit. I try use every available inch of the rack but still provide enough room for the air to actually dry the dish.  Included here is a photo of today's creation.  Can I really call it a creation? I'd like to think so.

Another of today's creations was we made our first batch of almond milk.  Yup.  Grind your own almonds, add water and little something to sweeten and/or flavour it and strain it through a nut bag .... ta da!  So no more hunting around for the best price on Almond Milk.  We make our own.  No extra packaging either.  Probably fewer calories, too!  However, I will have to find room on the drying rack for one more bottle, won't I? You can see the gauze nut bag hanging to dry beside the rack of dishes above.

Well that's it for today - a glimpse of some of my life's small things.  I have so much to be thankful for.  Happy Thanksgiving to all Canadians!

Pie Confessions (or is it Concessions?)

Blackberry/strawberry pie

Seems I have a confession to make about this past week.  It is almost embarrassing to admit it, but hey, that's how it goes with confessions, isn't it?  Well, here goes .... it was 2 pie week!  Yup, I first felt the urge last weekend and because I had Monday off from work, I took the time to make gluten-free pastry and fill the cake with the last of the frozen blackberries we had hiding in the freezer.  I considered making it a bumbleberry pie as we didn't have quite enough blackberries for one pie filling, but ended up just adding some strawberries that were crying out to be included.  Since I wanted to make a pie with the lattice top, I doubled the recipe.  To roll out the pastry, I cut the ball in half and started rolling.  It became obvious that I had enough pastry for both the bottom shell and the lattice.  (Now, you know where this is going, right?)  Result:  One delicious blackberry/strawberry pie!  Plus the added bonus of one ball of pastry in the freezer ready for an impromptu pie baking at some later date.  I was very happy with this result and Peter agreed, although he didn't know about the frozen supply. Yet.

Well, maybe it was because I was generally pretty happy having a Monday off AND having some lovely pie that we easily consumed on our own in just 2 days, or maybe it was because Peter felt the same way, but I must have let it slip at some point that there was the 'backup' pastry in the freezer.  Maybe it was because Peter loves blueberry pie and he knew we had filled the freezer with this years bounty of frozen blueberries.  I don't know how it happened, but on Thursday I came home from work and Peter had made dinner including the best potatoes I have ever had, and had pulled the frozen pastry out of the freezer to thaw.  So, of course, we had blueberry pie that night before we went to bed.  All in all, a good time was had by all.

Blueberry pie

Peter's Dream Home

I knew it the minute I saw it - this is Peter's dream home.  It's got everything!

Saturday September 24th

Last week PeJu were smart and purchased a case each of Campari tomatoes and freestone peaches.  All BC grown.  Naturally, our meal choices this week have been influenced by these purchases.  Friday night Judith realized the box of frozen puff pastry in the freezer might make a nice companion ingredient for some of the peaches.  Besides, it really had been in the freezer too long anyway!  It HAD to be used up.  So, Judith did her best to make some peach strudel.  Needless to say, it was heavenly.  Unfortunately, we neglected to take a photo of it and it was gone by 10 am Saturday morning.  But we wanted you to know that these kind of good things happen and brighten up our lives.  May you all be blessed with strudel too!

Monday September 19th - Flex day

Every second Monday is Judith's scheduled flex day at work.  Theoretically, this means a 3-day weekend every other week.  We think this is a great idea!  On September 19th, it was a gorgeous day so PeJu headed down to one of their favourite spots (Clover Point), folding chairs and picnic in hand for a wonderful gourmet lunch (quinoa salad with fresh salsa).