Girls and Routines

I have a large group of friends who are artists: actors, musicians, designers, writers, painters, and dancers. It makes for a lot of fun when we all get together. In our history together we've thrown theme parties for no reason (we got to dress up!), participated in a fashion show where we designed and modeled the clothes, and wrote and practiced choreographed routines to music that we preformed for the rest of our friends. We've had a lot of fun over the years.

So last week when the following viral video was going around, I could relate to the fun these women were having. This was another fun video to watch (and sing along with). Enjoy!

Viral Video That Made Me Laugh

I'm not really here today, so here is a viral video that made me giggle and clap my hands. I have a soft spot for Tom Hanks and Tom Hanks movies. I also really love well executed live performance skits with lots of changes. This was a lot of fun to watch.

Expanding My Gaming Playlist

I recently began playing Skyrim on the Xbox 360, and I'm really, really, enjoying it. It's only been a few days, but I'm already at level eight, I've collected enough gold to buy a house (5000), and I've picked all the mountain thistle I could find. So far it's been a lot of fun.

I didn't know I was going to like Skyrim, as I've watched John play it before, and I didn't think it was the kind of game I'd be interested in. My tastes are more tuned towards cartoony action/adventure games (mainly the Lego series of games), and I was sure the detailed fantasy world just wasn't my style.

But I've been looking for a new game to play and I described what I was looking for to John:

Me: "Basically I like to run around an open world and find stuff. Collect studs (gold). Unlock cool things by collecting other cool things. Not a lot of enemies. When you die you don't have to go back to the beginning."

John: "You're basically describing Skyrim."

Me: "Am I?"

It turns out I was. There are enemies, but they aren't hard to kill (I learned to use my sword and shield no problem). And sometimes the Non-Player-Characters (NPCs) kill the enemies for you. This happened most famously for me when I was supposed to kill a dragon on the main quest. I hid in a watchtower and was going to hit it with my bow, but it never flew past the window I was aiming from. I went up to the roof to get a better shot and "Completed: Kill the dragon" came across my screen. It made me laugh and I didn't mind at all because I still got to search it's body for supplies and I got all the glory.

I am really glad I gave Skyrim a try, as I like it way more than I thought I would. Plus it's been fun to have John help me with things I cannot do very well on my own (yet). The controller is most often handed over for lock picking, swimming, and for quickly finding specific buildings while I'm running through town (I always seem to be going in the opposite direction of where I want to be).

Yoga with Friends

Inspired by Plowing Through Life's post about Cats Stealing Dog Beds, I thought I would post this video compilation of pets interrupting yoga. As someone who has done yoga with a cat on her mat (see: cat yoga), I can totally relate to this video.

Here is my version of this. Cats like yoga too!

Happy Monday!!

Cat Says: I'm Not in Your Way, Am I?

Yesterday I posted about my summer dishcloth knitting project, which needed a photo of my yarn to go with it. I wanted to photograph the yarn in natural light so it would best represent the actual colours. The spot I picked for natural light, also happened to be the best sunbeam in the house. The photo shoot was delayed a wee bit, while Gary did her best impression of 'cutest cat ever'. I love that little monkey!

Bliss.

Don't mind me. Just having a nap here.

Still in Winter Wonderland

Joanne over at Rhythm of the Needles posted this video on her blog and I just had to share it too.

We had a snowstorm yesterday that cancelled the school buses. It also covered up any green that was starting to show itself and made me have to wear my boots again (which I swore I wouldn't do). It also went down to -13°C (8°F) overnight, which is just rude for mid April. However it does make this funny video from Rick Mercer (which he posted a month ago) very much on the nose.

Pie Crust Dough - Fail

So I took the dough out of the fridge and attempted to roll it. And it crumbled like a little bitch.

I asked the internet the ultimate question: "why?"

Maybe the dough was too cold. Maybe the dough was too dry. The internet forums said I could add more water, but if I did, try not to handle it too much. How do you mix in water without handling it too much?

So I played around with ball number one and completely wrecked it. I moved on to ball number two, making an effort to handle it less.

I got it to roll out finally, but I know I handled it waaaaayyyyy too much, and when I tried to line the pie plate, the dough broke in a zillion places that I "patched" with pieces that were stuck to the rolling board.

It was at this point that I called Mom.

"Rolling pie crust never works right."

"I never put the dough in the fridge."

"It's kinda late to be making a pie anyway, isn't it?"

My Mom is amazing and I probably should have called her this afternoon for tips. But at least I have new ideas for next time, as I have now chucked this batch of dough in the green bin.

Going to have another go at it later this week.

Family Day and Roll Up The Rim

It's Family Day here in Ontario and also the first day of Tim Hortons Roll up the Rim to Win! I spent today sleeping in, reading, writing, going for a walk in the (cold) sunshine, and stopping at Timmies for some Roll up the Rim fun. Not quite sure why this ad campaign works so well on me, but I got a medium decaf and a box of 20 timbits while I was there. And a chance to win!

There are two parts of the rim to roll up this year. Here is how I did:

I won a frickin' doughnut!!!

And a "Please Play Again" on my bonus roll.

Kitchen Tips

I had some fun in the kitchen today making a pie (post to come next week) and I learned a few things I thought I would share with you.

1. When using a corded electric hand mixer to blend ingredients in a pot on the stove, be sure to keep cord away from the burner.

2. When baking a pie that is REALLY FULL of filling on a baking sheet, be sure to use a baking sheet that doesn't warp when heated. A warped baking sheet will cause filling to drip out and make your kitchen smell like burning sugar.

3. Always have fun, even if you burn the cord of your hand mixer or have a bunch of filling drip out of your pie.

My Going Outside Outfit

It's been so cold that I abandoned my desire to knit a balaclava, and went ahead and bought one at the Canadian Tire. Trying on a balaclava at a retail store is a little awkward, as every image I have in my head of people wearing them in a store is when they are about to rob the place. Luckily I didn't have to try the balaclava on very long to know I loved it - the hot pink won me over. Score! At the check out this hat rang up as "childs", so I guess it is confirmed that I have a small head because it fits perfectly.

The balaclava does what it's supposed to do too, as I was brave enough to test it on a cold day earlier this week. The uncovered space around my eyes still gets a little too cold for long walks, but at least I can go outside for little jaunts now.

The funny thing about getting your photo taken while wearing a ski mask? I'm still smiling as wide as ever. Can you tell?

Fun in the Snow

It was a beautiful sunny day today, but unfortunately it felt like -28°C (-18°F). I couldn't stay out too long, but I needed to see the sun. A little sun on my cold face was better than none at all.

I don't have snow pants but I went ahead and made a snow angel. It was quite enjoyable, actually.

I also became a scientist for a few minutes and did the experiment to see what boiling water does when thrown into cold air. There is a great summary of people trying it out here and here. Apparently some people who try it burn themselves, so if you try it, don't burn yourself!

Here is my attempt at it this morning. It was only -20°C but it still seemed to work.

Impulse Cookie Decorating

I had some leftover royal icing from my D20 cookies, so I picked up some Gingerbread men and sprinkles and decided to have a little fun.

Three dudes getting ready for sprinkles

My only goal for decorating these was to eat decorated cookies. So my inner child let loose and added all the icing and all the sprinkles (especially on the center guy).

No, these were not made by a small child.

Halfway through the third one, I realized my icing bag had sprung a leak. I wouldn't be able to keep icing leftovers from hardening, so I added what was left to my third man.  Mmmmmm.... only 35 calories...

Is he a (1) snowman? (2) mummy? (3) super delicious? (yes on 3!)

It's Still Here

We got our first real snow storm of the season late last night. I know this because we were driving home in it and I was reminded that we need to put our snow tires on. Rain can quickly turn into snow this time of year - what fun!

Checking outside this morning, the snow had yet to melt away. The air was damp and cold and it made me long for hot chocolate, Christmas lights, and festive music. I think we still have some time before there is a constant blanket of snow on the ground, but like the Stark's say, Winter is coming.

 

 

Patio table with snow

Hanging basket with snow

Halloween Joy with Spider-Man and Gum

My favourite trick-or-treater from last night was a little six-year-old Spider-Man. We were handing out candy at a friend's place and they had a giant pot (cauldron?) filled with assorted goodies. I put a handful of yummy things into Spider-Man's bag, and as he walked away he looked in his bag and gleefully exclaimed: "Oh wow! I got gum!" I don't know that kid, but he is awesome and he filled my heart with joy.

I love that kid for two reasons:

(1) He was really excited to be getting candy. I hope he looked in his bag after every house and marveled at what was just added. Getting candy is super fun and exciting; six year old's are pretty awesome at showing it.

(2) I find it adorable that he was excited about gum. I'm not sure what he was expecting to see when he opened his bag, but gum seemed to be beyond his expectations. His gum joy reminded me to appreciate the little things. Because sometimes the little things ARE. THE. BEST.

Did you get any adorable trick-or-treater's your way? Hope you had a very happy Halloween.

Happy Halloween from Gary Bear

Pedometer (and Walking) Conscious

I have completed the first week of my 28 day reboot and things are going really well. I have successfully added activity to my daily life and I've been reminded that I find both walking and biking really fun.

Over the past week I walked 37,321 steps. I'm gradually working towards 70,000 steps per week, so I am very happy to be halfway there already. I also biked 27.2km (17 miles) over the week, and all this activity and sunshine is making me really happy too. :) 

My walking goals are also having a positive impact on my behaviour. On the weekend I was laying in the backyard reading, and at the end of each chapter I got up and walked around the house for about 5 minutes (about 500 steps). I'm really starting to be conscious of being more active and I love adding little pockets of walking to my day.

I am tracking my walking using a pedometer and it has become a great little motivator for me. I have daily step goals and it is a great gauge of how much more activity I need to do before the day is done. One of the most important things about wearing a pedometer is remembering to put the damn thing on. I often forget to attach it to my belt right when I wake up and when I get out of the shower. Too many times this week I found myself puttering around the house for a few hours before I realized I wasn't wearing it.

Over the past week I also realized that my pedometer makes a jingling sound. Jingling means it's working. No jingling means steps aren't being counted. A frustrating fact I discovered after a nice long walk around the grocery store, making sure to hit every aisle, to get my steps up. It turns out the pedometer needs to be strait up and down to work, so the waistbands of certain pants are too thin to keep it oriented properly. I've figured that out, but now I'm that person at the grocery store who keeps looking at her waist to make sure the pedometer is working.

The thing I am trying to remember is that regardless of whether my pedometer is counting as it should be, I am indeed walking more. That's what really counts (groan!), right?

Waste Not, Want Not

So remember all those milk and creamers we took home from the wedding?

Well the milks were about to expire and needed to be used up. So I took one for the team and decided to have a bowl of cereal with them.

I'm obsessed with Cinnamon Bliss, which is Sally's Cereals version of Cinnamon Toast Crunch, and had some on hand to go with the milks. I didn't want to have any soggy cereal, so I opened all the little milks before I added them.

I did pretty well and only ended up with eight leftover.

And I used those up by having another half bowl of cereal. Which was easy for me to do because Cinnimon Bliss is so incredibly good. Super yummy and no milk was wasted. Double win.

Family Wedding By the Numbers

It's been almost two weeks since we had a family wedding and all the numbers in my last post reminded me of some things I could quantify from the wedding.

Date the wedding took place: July 20, 2013

Anniversary that Jena and T were celebrating on their wedding day: 10th

Number of years Canada was celebrating having nation wide equal marriage (signed into law on July 20, 2005): 8 years

Distance the brides traveled to get to their wedding: 3600km (2237 miles)

Distance T's dad and brother traveled to get to the wedding: 2268km (1409 miles)

Distance I traveled to get to the wedding: 23km (14 miles)

Number of wedding guests: 45 (approx)

Scheduled start of wedding ceremony: 7:00pm

Actual start time of wedding: 7:30pm (approx)

Number of cars that broke down in and around the wedding: 6* (*I'm counting mine twice)

Number of 5kg (11 lb) buckets of various salads purchased for wedding: 6

Number of buckets of potato salad that ended up at my house: 1/2 a bucket

Number of days in a row that I ate potato salad: 4

Amount of time before I can eat potato salad again: 3 months (approx)

Number of slices of wedding cake I ate at the wedding: 0

Number of slices of wedding cake I ate in the week following the wedding: 3

Number of slices of ice cream cake I ate in the week following the wedding: 2

Number of cucumbers we had at the house following the wedding: 5

Number of days in a row I have forced myself to eat part of a cucumber: 10

Number of days in a row I ate a fancy cucumber sandwich: 3

ALL the Food

Last week I posted about the creamers we got to take home from my sisters-in-law's wedding. We are still working through them, but it was premature of me to only tell you about that one thing. We actually brought home ALL THE THINGS from the wedding (mostly food with a few non-food items).

The abundance of leftovers was due to family + friends catering the wedding and buying way more than enough. There were also leftovers from the cottage the brides rented, as it had a full kitchen and they lived there for two weeks. They had multiple friends/family staying with them for a week around the wedding, so the fridge was kept pretty full. They couldn't really take it back on the plane to Vancouver, so all the food came here. It is one of those 'best of times/worst of times' situations. So. Much. Food.

So here is a #ListPost about all the amazing things we've been working our way through since the wedding.

Food - Fruits & Veggies

9 assorted peppers (red, green, orange, yellow)

4 cucumbers

2 bags of mini carrots

1 head of celery

2 giant onions (Vidalia and purple)

Package of sliced fresh mushrooms

A bag of mini potatoes

A container of pre-washed spinach

Head of broccoli

An avocado

A pineapple

2 lbs of strawberries

1 pint of blueberries

3 nectarines

Green and Purple grapes

A mango

Foods - Assorted

2.5kg (5.5 lb) bucket of potato salad

2.55kg (5.5 lb) bucket of coleslaw

A bag of deli style ham

18 pack of eggs

A bag of brown sugar

A bag of garlic salt

2 bags of fusilli pasta

A bucket of Feta cheese

A brick of old cheddar cheese

Various salad dressings and BBQ sauces

Full ketchup, mustard, and relish

2 giant jars of dill pickles

4 small jars of bread and butter pickles

A giant jar of olives

Cakes (assorted)

1/2 an ice cream cake

Bottom tier of Black Forest wedding cake

Drinks

2 jugs of Arizona ice tea

2 boxes of orange pekoe tea

Non-Food Practical Items

A multi-purpose 20'x10'x13' canopy

A giant tarp

1 box of Nag Champa

4 vegetable serving trays

6 assorted serving trays

1/3 bottle of sunscreen

Number Nerd Odometer

Numbers are pretty cool. I like when they line up in fun ways, like when the time is 12:34pm or the date is 11/12/13. It's fun. I knew I had a string of numbers coming up on my odometer, and with a trip to Barrie yesterday, I knew it was going to happen. I was ready with my camera and a mental note of how many KM I had left before I hit it.

I had about 19 km to go when I left Mom's last night. I Google mapped where that would put me on my drive home, and kept my eye on the odometer. About 2 km from the number string, I turned down a side road and drove out of the way for a klick, feeling far more comfortable taking pictures on a lightly traveled side road than on the main highway. If you were driving around Fergusonvale last night, I was the one on the side of the road taking photos of her dashboard.

Here it my Number Nerd string in all it's glory:

I learned about Number Nerd being a thing from Anne Wheaton, so obviously I had to tweet her my photo. The following is her response, which I love forever.

Isn't life fun?

Confessions of a Tempted Baker

Before I made the Reese's fudge, I had 24 peanut butter cups just sitting on my baking shelf waiting to be used. Social plans were changed, so I had to delay making the fudge and I also had to keep myself from snacking on the peanut butter cups. When I went to make the fudge, somehow there were only 18 of the 24 peanut butter cups left. To be fair, I'm rather proud that I only ate 6, as they were sitting in my house for a few weeks.

I have a few recipes I want to make this summer, and already have a lot of the ingredients on hand, which is becoming a daily test for me. The Oreos and marshmallow fluff like to call my name periodically, and it gets me thinking about how delicious they are, and how we could always just pick up another bag of Oreos if they got eaten. I have to force myself to remember that I love baking and pretty soon there will be some sort of reason to bake something awesome. And tell myself to just leave the ingredients alone.

One day soon I might have to put a drape over the baking shelf so I forget what's on it.

This is my (almost) current stash of baking supplies. Since this photo was taken, the Reese cups have vanished (why are they so good?). Not pictured in this pile of awesome are my candy melts (which are temptingly bite sized), my four cans of sweetened condensed milk, a giant thing of cream cheese (for icing purposes), and a few more cake mixes that wouldn't fit in the photo.

Wish me luck friends! Or invite me over so I can make something awesome out of this stuff! :)