Hot child in the city

I have been mostly at the beach with some intermittent, annoying interruptions of working shifts. I have been burning the candle at both ends as well as the fuel gauge. Still, you just can't beat vacationing in your own back yard while still earning a pay cheque.
The boy is busy all day at day camp and then visiting campsites and friends in the evening. We are just trying to pack the most fun into the shortest season of the year as we can.
Every meal is a picnic and my latest trick is to freeze all of the juice boxes and water bottles so that they act as ice packs for the lunch. I did this in the cooler for camping. I froze a big square jug of juice as my center cooler and then the individual water bottles and juice boxes. I packed the food around it. When it thaws, you have cold beverages and no melted ice water to get the food all soggy. Why didn't I think of this before? Some people need time to figure these things out. I am one of those people.

I'm very excited!

My sister is on her way to my house this very minute! She is on vacay and I might actually get to see her for a bit before she galavants to see all other family members in the area. I think it helps that she was delayed and I am the closest relative with a ready bed for her and the kids. I use the term "kids" loosely as they are now gigantic teenagers :)

Today we went cherry picking. Well, scratch that, we tried to go cherry picking. I couldn't find the U-pick farm so we went to the fruit stand and bought some instead. No matter, they were delicious and it was, at 34 degrees celcius, too hot to go picking anyhow. Then,we went to a thrift store that I had never been into before called The Bargain Bin. This was an apt name as many items were priced at ten cents! Gotta love that! The boy, with his keen eye, found me a citrus juicer for twenty five cents. It has a strainer so that pulp and seeds are kept out of the juice. Too cool for a quarter! We had great fun squeezing all my old wrinkly oranges into fresh juice. We then took our cherries and had a lovely splash in the lake. So refreshing! Now, I am tidying and mapping out sleeping arrangements. I love having visitors!

Staycation, all I ever wanted...

Hey folks, I'm back to my blogging and my regular life, hell yeah! I had one heck of a Staycation filled with good food, family fun, local camping, two rocking concerts (Nazareth and Rhianna, oh yeah!) and a super fancy wedding to boot! It was all both exhilarating and exhausting! It was great to have a real break from the everyday but still sleep in my bed for (most of) the nights. I figured, I live in a world class vacation destination, why not take advantage for a change? It sure saved on gas and airfare! A huge thank you to my girl, friday, for steering to the ole' ship while I was away. What a fabulous treat to see what she is up to in her neck of the woods, and for you all to get to know my BFF. You did a wonderful job, my friend, hope to see your new blog debut soon. You are a natural! Now that I have spent all my hard earned pennies on concert tickets and convenience foods, I am more determined than ever to strap the old belt a little tighter as we approach fall and the coming school year. I have been preparing by scouring the thrift stores for gently used kids clothes for next year. I already have two new kid's backpacks with cost me less than $12 for both. Score. I also went to an awesome bag sale at my work thrift store. Well... I was technically working, so that entitles me to first dibs. I LOVE my job. I found some ah-may-zing deals and filled two five dollar sacks, jammed with interesting, colourful clothes, kids' books and a really cool photo silver coloured frame. When someone says "bag sale", I say "let's see how far this bag can stretch!" It really is a thrill for me. I will now have to go through and purge some older stuff. At least it is recycling, right? I'm so glad to be back and can't wait to catch up on the blog roll to see what y'all have been up to.

Ciao Bella! What? Just because I never did leave home, that doesn't mean that I can't dream...

Hi, it's me, friday, again... just hangin out today... went for a walk along some of the trails around here- checked out the local bowling alley. anyone into glow in the dark bowling? it's super fun! not sure if you guys are into camping but, if you are, you might be surprised to know that there's tons of free camping in canada (maybe everywhere? i can only speak for here) many 'recreation' or 'forestry' sites are free! they have maintained outhouses, fire pits, and lots are lake front or near hotsprings. We use Back Road Map Books to find spots and then go explore! (these books are available by region and are easy to find, not expensive, look for updated version, if buying second hand) A lot of the time we have the place to ourselves, sometimes one or two others are there... it's like having our very own lake front cottage! i've been trying out painting rocks. I figure this is a free canvas. It was fun for a while but I think I'm just doing too many tiny details and it's become less fun so I don't know if i'll keep that up or not- I need to get some new inspiration... Does anyone have any great vegetarian recipes that involve a food processor? just got a new one, it's really pretty and i need some ideas because i've never had one before, it can make dough and everything! have fun, ciao

hey folks, is it crazy hot where you live too? it's swimming in the lake season!!! hooray!... i've been helping out with dan and cathy's garden since i moved here- it's fun and relaxing and helpful, plus they feed me and send me home with produce! my grocery bill is shrinking, i love it! so i'm heading over there in a bit and then to the beach! i had a job interview a couple of days ago, just waiting for them to talk to my references- we'll see... anyone else looking for a job right now? i tried a more casual approach this time, informal cover letter, brought a cup of tea to the interview, just wanted to be more natural. i used to pretend i was all formal but that's not really me- i can be professional but i'm also creative and maybe a bit unconventional so they may as well know who they're hiring right? have fun, wear sunscreen -friday

hey folks, how are ya today? my name's friday. i'm a friend of sandy's filling in while she takes a little break from blogland... i'll just do a little guest blogging here and there. a few weeks ago, my life was turned right side up when i moved from a big city to a small town down the highway from our good friend miss hiptobecheap. i've replaced the sound of sirens and traffic for birds and frogs- lovin life in the slow lane! on wednesdays in the summer they hold a farmer's market and live music, which we checked out... it's called wednesday on the wharf. i got a potato salad recipe from the internet (all my recipes were fancy and i just wanted the ol standard) and i invented a crisp as i went... some frozen rhubarb, two apples, a few bits of frozen strawberries. for the crisp i mashed together some rolled oats, margarine, brown sugar, cinnamon, a bit of flour (not sure if it was needed but it seemed like the right thing to do) i think that was it- turned out great for our little picnic! do you guys have cool community events too? free entertainment for the whole family! yeah!