Weekend in TO and visit to Ottawa

Our "vacation" time this summer was spent in Toronto for a few days, visiting with our DD, and then to Ottawa, to get my passport and visit a few museums. We had a fantastic time in both places! We stayed in Toronto in a B&B near CJ's house (first time in a B&B, it was luxurious!) CJ took us to the ROM, where we saw the Dead Sea Scrolls, and lots more. Here are a few photos from that trip:

Mr. T!

Neat chandelier embedded into a canvas

This is the new added on "Crystal" to the ROM. It was added to the outside of the building, which you can still see on the inside. The crystal has added a lot of room to the ROM.

The garden at our B&B

next - Ottawa! Here is the National Art Gallery

Right under the spider you can see the special exhibit
sign for "From Raphael to Caracci-The Art of Papal Rome"
What an incredible exhibit! If you can possibly get to this, I highly recommend it.

The next day we were off to Hull, and the Museum of Civilization, a favourite!

This dragon was at the entrance of the new exhibit "Mythic Beasts, Dragons, Unicorns and Mermaids" We love this museum and visit whenever we can!

The first floor, First People's Hall

Looking at the Parliament Buildings through a waterfall

Lunch!

Well, I guess that's it for the summer. Back to work on Monday (even though I've been there almost every day this summer!) But more art is on it's way, I have several projects up my sleeve!

More Fun with Therese!

Therese and I also wanted to make a Coptic Bound book. We tried to read the directions, but they were very confusing! Finally we looked it up on You Tube and found a great demo. I can't show you my book because I can't get my camera to co-operate with Kodak Easy-Share (anything but if you ask me! Olympus was much better) We used crochet string because that is all we had, but I think I will re-do mine with a thicker string.

We also made a tag from an idea that I got from another blog, but now I can't find it (of course!)
You take some flat plastic from an empty box (recycling!) and you cut it into a tag shape, then you run it through the cuttlebug to emboss the design (I use a pasta machine, as I don't have a cuttlebug). The you make a tag and glue it on top. Easy peasy. If anyone knows where this idea came from, please let us know! Image by Altered Pages.

We didn't get around to playing with wax, we'll have to save that for another day! I love having Therese come and play for a few days!

Most Fun Weekend of August

The most fun weekend of August was when my friend Therese from Trenton came to visit for a few days. We wanted to do many things, one of which was to make books. She brought her zutter machine, and we started to punch out lots and lots of coasters to use as book covers. We then had the wonderful idea of making little books for our guests that we were having for dinner on Monday night. So we made 9 little books, each the same but different, and we had a surprise for our friends on Monday night!




Since it was a dinner party, we had 4 quotes that had something to do with food. We left 3 pages blank, ready for mounting a photo. During the party we snapped photos, and then snuck away and printed out 3 pages of 3 different photos, each person was represented in the photos (not all at once). After dinner (we had pot-luck appetizers, then Therese and I made salad and cedar-planked Salmon) but before dessert (cheesecake!) we brought out the books, photos, and lots of fibers and charms. All of our friends but one were stampers/paper artists. They had a ball gluing in the photos and personalizing their books, even the one who claims she's not artistic! So we now all have our own little book of that wonderful time together!

I had a lot of questions about the salmon, which was incredibly good, Therese and I just looked it up on You Tube, which is where the link above takes you, you can choose which one you want to see. The one we looked at and chose, of course, I can't find! Essentially we soaked the cedar plank (Loblaws) for 24 hours, the poured on olive oil, salt and pepper, put the fillets on (nice and thick!) oiled, salted an peppered them, and put the whole thing on a hot grill (turned down to medium I think, when we put them on). The fillets were very thick, they cooked about 25 minutes I think. And boy, did the air smell wonderful!! The bottom of the board was very charred and burnt, and the salmon tasted lovely and smokey. The only sauce we used was dill cream cheese, melted in the microwave.

Bad Girl!

Here it is, end of August, and I haven't posted for a month! After a whole month of journaling everyday, you would have thought a habit had been formed - oh, I THINK about it everyday, but I don't DO it!! And I do not know why. I find that strange, don't you?

I've had a fun month of August, starting with a trip to Niagara Falls to visit friends. On the first day we went to Jordan, a neat little village with interesting shops.

This fountain was in a garden shop - I love the sound of falling water!

Another neat little fountain, but very quiet, the water just oozes out of the rock

We ate lunch at a very cute little restaurant, with old record albums all over the place and a funky atmosphere

The next day it was pouring rain (par for the course this summer!) so we went to visit Jackson Triggs winery. It was the first time I've been to a winery, and it was very interesting! Apparently they built the winery with tours in mind, so (according to others who have taken wine tours before) we got to see a lot more than other wineries.

grape fields

This was actually near the end of the tour, where they put the wine into oak barrels. More interesting than huge vats of steel.

This is the outside of the winery. It was built to resemble a modern barn. The huge doors on either end open completely, and there are vegetable gardens in the front, and a neat watering trough fountain along the left side of the walk to the entrance. The best part of the tour, was, of course, the wine tasting. We tasted white, red and ice wine. We bought the white Riesling and the Ice Wine to take home.

That was the beginning of August!