Saturday, May 20, 2023

Floral Notes

I took the dogs down to Beechwood cemetery a couple weeks ago. It was a little too early for the tulips to be in bloom but that daffodils were very nice.  Some tulips were up but they definitely weren't at their peak yet.






This week I went down to the tulip festival with my two of my sisters, a brother-in-law and my aunt, who is here visiting. Dogs have been allowed at the festival since 2018 but I left Teddy and Liam home for this trip as we planned to have lunch downtown while we were there. It was nice to go down during the week, every other time I had been there it was during a weekend, and it was always packed. We had a little difficulty with GPS and parking lot I wanted to go to was closed but we made it there in reasonable time despite the detours.

We started at the Experimental Farm gardens then walked through the Arboretum to get to Dow's Lake and Commissioners Park. 








Then it was a walk through the park to see the tulips. We saw most of the larger beds of tulips before we turned around to head back along the lake to the Dow's Lake Pavillion where we had lunch. It was a bit chilly if you were just sitting even in the sun but a perfect day for walking.









After viewing the tulips, we had lunch at the pavilion then headed back to the car and began the ride home. We again had GPS problems as I had set a waypoint to get downtown to avoid construction but never actually went to the waypoint so the GPS was trying to take us back there. So, we went there, just to have to turn around to go home. Now I know how a waypoint works, I thought it was more like selecting a route. 

It was a really nice afternoon. I'm not sure that the tulips were as nice as in some years as we had two very cold nights with frost warnings, but they still are quite spectacular.

Sunday, May 7, 2023

A Date with Destiny

I got up very early Saturday morning to see the coronation of King Charles III. Turned out I could have stayed in bed longer as they said programing would start at 3 am so I thought the actual coronation procession would begin sometime after 4am; so I got up at 3:30am. the procession didn't happen until around 5:30 am; but anyway, I was up so I just got comfortable with a pillow and blanket on the couch.

It seemed kind of unreal. Queen Elizabeth had always been a piece of the fabric of my life. Growing up I had kept scrapbooks about the Royal family and had numerous books on them as well. The scrapbooks are gone but I still have a good many of the books.  Although we all must pass, it just seemed like Queen Elizabeth would always be there. Now here we were waiting to see her son crowned, I wonder what he thought about it all; knowing his whole life that to fulfill this destiny his mother had to die. 

It was a wonderful ceremony, full of pomp, pageantry and history. I think those of us who watched from home had a better view than many of the invited guests who probably only saw the King and the rest of the Royal family as the entered or left Westminster Abbey, even the Royal family only really saw the back of the Coronation chair from where they were seated. 





It was nice to see the role that Prince George played in his grandfather's coronation and that of Prince William, but I especially liked that Princess Anne had a role as a member of the King's guard on the procession back to Buckingham Palace and took part in the salute to the King on the grounds of Buckingham Palace. 




The balcony scene had more members of the family than I expected but those who were not there were not unexpected. I was glad that the Queen's cousins the Duke of Kent, the Duke of Gloucester and Princess Alexandra were there. They represented Queen Elizabeth's reign. And representing the reign of the new King were his brother Edward, now the Duke of Edinburgh, and his family, Princess Anne and her husband, and Prince William, his wife and their children. 




There were those that said it was a shame Harry wasn't there. I don't feel bad for him. I've watched the interviews he's done and read his book; he's made many claims but didn't really substantiate many of them.  And just like keeping his titles, he seems to want the prestige and privilege that goes along with being Royal but not workload or the intrusions on his life. 

I wish King Charles a long life. I hope that he's able to resolve those family issues with Harry. It would be sad to think that Harry's children will miss out on getting to know their close relatives. 

I hope Canada will keep the monarch as our Head of State or, at least, that we'll stay in the Commonwealth. 


Saturday, April 22, 2023

Chris De Burgh Concert

I went to a concert this past week. It was the first really big event that I've gone where I didn't wear a mask; we'll see how that works out. 

My friend and I went out to dinner before the concert. We had a nice meal with a couple glasses of wine. Our reservations had us at the restaurant during Happy Hour so many drinks were only $6, as well on Wednesday's all of the burgers were only $14. 

We thought we had plenty of time, so we leisurely headed over to the nearby venue only to realize we were at the wrong concert location. So began the race across town; luckily, we had prepaid for parking. We were a bit late; the concert had already started but we weren't the only ones that were late, and I think we only missed the opening song. 



I'd seen Chris de Burgh in concert before many years ago; his stage show has gotten more techno than I recall. He also either had a cold or is having some difficulty reaching the high notes of some of his songs but at 74 years old he still is a good singer and storyteller. 

It was a good evening despite the road race to get to the concert. Next time I'll check to make sure I have the right venue. 

Wednesday, April 5, 2023

Teddy is Six!

We're a day early celebrating Teddy's sixth birthday but what else is there to do on a cold wet freezing rain kind of day. 

I had already made some pumpkin pupcakes earlier in the week and had taken some out of the freezer this morning to thaw for tomorrow. But since I didn't get my errands done today, I decided we'd celebrate today.  I quickly made potato buttercream icing for the pupcakes and we had our little pawty.


Teddy is not too thrilled about wearing a party hat or posing for pictures but he's a sport about it all. He waits until I'm done taking pictures to get excited about getting a pupcake and presents.

In addition to the pupcake, Teddy got a new bumper and some treats. He got more treats than I planned to buy as how could I resist buying treats called Teddy Treats. 


The boys also got new collars but really, they're for Easter. I don't know why I bother; you can never really see the collar with long Sheltie fur.



So now Teddy has had more birthdays with me than with anyone else. I hope he likes it here with me. You always wonder what they think about. 

Happy Barkday Teddy!