Evening of Sunday, July 19th
The girls and I had a great weekend. They arrived around 2:00 p.m. on Thursday bearing food and drinks, ready to play cards! Bern stayed and helped unload Fran’s car and then went over to spend the weekend with Dawn and Ken at their home on Clam Lake. We immediately got down to playing cards amidst visiting and snacks.
It was a wonderful afternoon, closely followed by an equally enjoyable evening. We had a lovely supper of chicken, baked potatoes, broccoli and carrots. I know, I know - very healthy, right? Our healthy supper was followed by homemade blueberry pie and ice cream - also, healthy in that the pie was made with Splenda and the ice cream was low-fat. It was surprisingly good!!Friday dawned sunny but gradually got cloudy and windy by the afternoon, but the temperature stayed mild so we spent lots of time on the deck reading, knitting and doing Sudoku. In the afternoon, we played more cards. For supper, I BBQ’d pork chops and we had potato salad I’d made on Thursday. We finished off the blueberry pie with cups of tea and a movie - Jane Eyre. Fran hadn’t seen “Ice Age” so we watched that one, too. Such a cute movie!
Saturday we went in to Burks Falls. We needed more water, plus we had to take a bag of garbage to the dump. On the way, we stopped to admire a little herd of buffalo and tried to ignore the "Bison Meat for Sale" sign. They are so majestic!
While we were in town, the skies opened and we stood outside the hardware store waiting for the rain to stop. Fran wanted to go to the drug store, too. We were shocked to find that the drug store is closed on Saturdays and Sundays. Weird, huh? Anyway, we browsed around the flower/antique shop for a few minutes before coming back to the cottage. I suggested going to other gift shops, but Jan very wisely offered, “Why waste time wandering around gift stores for things we’re not going to buy, when we could be back at the cottage drinking tea and playing cards?” Everyone agreed - it’s nice to go away, but it’s nicer to come home. Of course, we played more cards and drank more tea! After supper, we settled down to watch “Out of Africa”. The scenery in that movie is spectacular - I’d forgotten. Robert Redford was never much of an actor, but he’s sure nice to look at - I’d forgotten that, too. I am getting old.Anyway, it sounds like we didn’t do anything really productive (besides rest & relaxation) - but, we did! Jan read a book, while Fran knitted an Aryan sweater for one of her nieces, Maggie started knitting a vest for herself, and I finished knitting a little poncho for Bella. We also made plans to take a little four-day holiday to Halifax next July. We’re going to put aside a little money each month - Fran will open a special account. Our last holiday together was our tip to Quebec City a few years ago, and we had a ball!
This morning, Bern returned to the cottage around 10:00 a.m. I made pancakes for breakfast, which we had with fresh fruit and syrup.
Bern stayed out on the deck and only came in to take pictures for us. Don’t feel too badly for him - he had pancakes, too! We played our last game of cards before the girls packed up to go home. Bern took our picture out on the dock. The sun very kindly came out for the event. All in all, it was a wonderful weekend. We all have very different personalities, and that may be one of the contributors to our very special friendship. All we know is that what we have, works - and we’re truly grateful for it!
We’re planning to go home on Tuesday. We’ll make sure the cottage is ready for James’ long weekend here with Emily and his friends. The weather forecast for the rest of this week is, of course, warm and sunny. Oh well!
Evening of Wednesday, July 15th
We had a quiet day yesterday. Bern overhauled the BBQ and attached a spare propane tank to the cottage, so we’ll have heat if we need it while the girls are here.
The way the weather has been, we probably will. Right now, we’re in the middle of yet another rain storm which has knocked out satellite reception - it had better come back on by 11:00 for “So You Think You Can Dance?” or I’ll be very upset!!!Anyway, this morning we got up, had our coffee on the deck and then packed up the laundry, camera (just in case we see something) and my laptop and went into Burks Falls. When we got to the Laundromat, there were no empty machines so we walked across the street to have breakfast. The plan was for Bern to mind the laundry while I whipped over to the library to check email and update my blog (this plan has worked many times before), but when I got to the library, I was told their internet service had been knocked out and they didn’t know when it would be fixed - they were waiting for the “guy” to come and check it out. Bern suggested we go into Huntsville to use the internet at the library there - also, to stop in to see George and Judy (our friends from Oakville who moved up here a couple of years ago). George was at work but we had a very nice visit with Judy. While there, I got to check email, saving us a trip to the library. We stopped for a few groceries (including blueberries which I will turn into a pie tomorrow) on the way back to the cottage.
Lynn and Al are back up, so we walked over to see them and have a cup of tea. They are the sweetest couple! When I told her we may be selling the cottage, I thought she was going to cry! I told her not to get upset until we know for sure. They both turned 80 last September and we’ve become very attached to them. Al knows everything there is to know about guns, and that impresses Bern, no end. And, Lynn is just fun and sweet.
The girls arrived tomorrow - hurray!
Evening of Monday, July 13th
The weather turned really cold, cloudy and windy. We decided to go into Burks Falls to pick up another bottle of water - we were out of milk and we also had to take garbage to the dump. There were two big (let me say that again) BIG black bears at the dump. They were both males and one kept charging the other one. They were magnificent! We stayed and watched them for awhile, until some other cars came along. Sorry, but we didn’t bring a camera along! On the way back, we decided to get lunch at the chip wagon - french fries and gravy - so good! Anyway, before we came back to the cottage, we went over to John and Maureen Lanois’ cottage - we hadn’t seen them since last year. Maureen wasn’t home, but we had a good visit with John. Their grandson is getting married the end of August - boy, I’m getting old. It doesn’t seem that long ago he was born!!
Evening of Sunday, July 12th
On Wednesday morning, we left for the cottage. We stopped in Oakville to see James and to give him the keys and a map to the cottage. He, Emily, Ash (who works with James) and his girlfriend will be going up for the August long weekend. We had a nice drive up and had two stunningly beautiful days of sunshine. Thursday, we went into town to get groceries in preparation for our weekend guests. Lonny and Karen called on Friday to say that Karen had got off work at 11:00 a.m. and Lon was getting off at noon. They were hoping to leave Mississauga by 1:30 which would put them here by 4:00 or 4:30 at the latest.
That was the plan. They called at 4:30 to say they were stopped in bumper-to-bumper traffic - they were only at Weber’s! In normal traffic that would be still an hour and a half from the cottage. The highway was closed north and southbound due to a bad car accident and they were detoured through parts of the country we’d never heard of! Needless to say, they were pretty tired by the time they arrived at 6:30 p.m. We put chicken on the BBQ and had potato salad that I’d made earlier in the day with cherry pie for dessert. As tired as they were, we stayed up until midnight while Lonny played his guitar and we sang our little hearts out - well, singing might be a stretch. We had a good time reminiscing abou
t all the sing-alongs we used to have with John and Brenda (Lon’s parents), Bert and Blanche (Bern’s parents), Pen and all the other friends and family who used to get together on a somewhat regular basis. It was fun trying to remember the words to all those old songs.On Saturday, after breakfast, Bern took Lon and Karen out fishing. I stayed ashore to hold down the fort. Poor Karen (the one who really wanted to catch a fish) decided there were no fish in our lake with her name on them! Uncle Bern put his special lure on her line - and a funny-looking frog thing on Lon’s line. Lon had barely cast his line in the water, when he landed a nice bass. So, when they went out again later in the day, Bern put the special lure on Lonny’s line and the frog on Karen’s line. And, guess what? Lonny caught another bass!!! Not fair, huh? Well, she was a very good sport about it.
We had a wonderful dinner: steak, corn on the cob, Caesar salad, baked potatoes - and, strawberry shortcake for dessert. Judy and Herman came over for coffee and we enjoyed an hour of cottage stories that can only be told well by Judy. She could do stand-up, that girl!
This morning, the fishing crew went out again, but nobody caught anything. The wind had turned cool, and the fish weren’t biting at all. We decided to walk over to Herman and Judy’s and then over to Al and Lynn’s (who haven’t been up for a few weeks). At 4:30, we had an early dinner and they packed up - and after a few pictures and hugs - they were on their way home. Hopefully, it won’t take as long to get home as it did to get here! We had such a nice time and will look forward to visiting them at their trailer at Sherkston Beach in a week or so. Oh, they really seemed to like the cottage!!
Bern and I will have a few quiet days until Thursday when the “girls” arrive for the weekend. Bern has been invited to stay with Ken and Dawn. He and Ken will travel around to some of the lakes in the area to do some fishing. They’ve been talking about doing that for some time, so it’s the perfect opportunity.
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