This kind of winter

I love this kind of winter.

A massive winter storm rolled in over night and hasn't let up all day.  I don't have to worry about driving to work, so I enjoyed the snowy-but-warm walk to the station and hopped on the train and made it to work early.  Then I watched the river valley turn completely white from my office window until 2:57, when they sent out an email telling us all to go home.

The train was totally running smoothly, and the driver even made announcements about the treacherous conditions on the platforms telling us to watch our step and have a great evening.  I love it when LRT drivers talk like they are flight pilots.  Makes my day every time.  The platforms have piles of snow that were almost as big as the ones I remember from my childhood.

After trudging (literally) through the deep snow, I arrived home and decided to shovel my car out, the driveway, the sidewalks, etc.  The entire time, my iPod chose songs on shuffle that were totally rocking my face off.  M. Ward, Wilco, Stars, Sufjan Stevens.  It took about an hour and when I got into the house the bottoms of my pants WEREN'T EVEN WET.  That is how fluffy this snow is, my friends.

Let's do a quick recap: snow day, fluffy snow, lrt, awesome!

Enjoy it.

My brother sewed a stuffed penguin on his own initiative.

Last weekend, my sis came to town for a crafting weekend with me, my mom, and my sister in law. it ended up with the kidlets as well as scott and my dad, and it was such a great weekend.

We busted out Amy Grant's "A Christmas Album", and ate dessert for breakfast while we worked on various projects and hung out. Kaeli sewed stuffed birds out of fabric from Italy. I worked on flags for the Royal Bison. Francis made some a gingerbread house and train set with Heidi. Geneva was adorable. Mom knit. Dad teased us and read the paper. And our brother, Scott, sewed a stuffed penguin, with a little help from us.

Ingenuity

Although I sometimes get teased for my 'methods', sometimes I just have to risk the teasing and share the genius.

My most recent stroke of brilliance came when - after weeks of hunting for wool tights so that I could extend the dress wearing season late into the fall (thus putting off the inevitable evil of winter that is wearing DRESS PANTS to work) - I wore my new tights once and busted a hole through the toes. Darn toenails.

Soooo, I pulled out my tiniest pair of ankle socks and slid them on first next time I wore my tights. Not only are my feet totally warmer when I walk to work in the morning, but you would NEVER KNOW that I have socks on under my tights. Seriously people.

And, in summary, that is how much I hate dress pants.

Rolodex Love

Growing up I often asked for very...utilitarian...Christmas and birthday gifts.  Dustbusters, rolodexes.  So, I've had (and loved) this rolodex for many years, but because I just can't leave stuff alone once I get in in my head that it might be spray-paintable I did a little rolodex makeover this weekend.  All it involved was spraying the dividers with my favourite blue paint and affixing cork letters.  Easy and so much cuter now.

Little things that make my day better

I love customizing the spaces that I occupy; however, I once read an article that said people will view you as unprofessional if you have too many personal artifacts in your work space.  These two things are butting heads.  So, I have to be sneaky in my customization.  And it is the little things that bring me tiny bits of joy throughout the day.  Some of them are obvious and some of them more clandestine.  So today I stealthily snapped some photos of them and here they are, starting from the left upperhand corner:

• A plant from my dear friend Karen (plants are innocuous enough, right?), with a card from my dear co-worker Amy stuck on a card pick.  
• Next, a totally vintage tape dispenser that I found (to my extreme joy) in the reject cupboard at work.  I quickly grabbed it and switched it with my black plastic one.  It rocks.  
• Natasha's show postcard from last year, and a red polka dot nail file that I keep on hand to prevent those pesky rough edges that send me into nail biting fits.  
• My desk phone, which I frequently use to call Amy (who, coincidentally is leaving me for another job at the end of next week.  Sadness.  Amy if you are reading this: I WILL MISS YOU and our daily chats).
  
• My many pairs of shoes.  Usually hidden in a filling cabinet, but some of them end up on the floor under my desk.
• A felt bird I made last year before Christmas and put up as a decoration.  I could never bear to take it down.  Plus it looked so cute with the typewriter key thumbtacks.
• Framed Emily Carr postcard from Lisa.  I love it.  Had it at my last job too, but I recently painted the frame.

So, there you have it.  A little tour of the things that make me smile throughout the workday.  

The mounting obsession with coconut

I decided last minute that Joel must have coconut cupcakes for his birthday, so I headed to the grocery store over my lunch break in search of some vanilla cupcake ingredients.  I planned to just buy some coconut and sprinkle it on top of them as a finishing touch, since the two of us have been egging each other on in our coconut obsessions.  In the cake section, I found a boxed 'Barefoot Contessa' coconut cupcake mix, so I took it as a sign and bought it.  It was amazing.  And the cupcakes were beautiful.  

 

And the birthday boy was happy.

Parkour!

I took a quick trip east this past week to visit my old friend and former co-editor of the Chronicle, Lisa DeMoor. I blame our shared history of ridiculously late nights spent bonding in the Chronicle office for the silliness that eventually ensued. But I'll get to that later. First I have to mention a few of the other things that I did while I was away.

Firstly, we drove straight from the airport to Toronto to see U2 play a show at the skydome. It was awesome. They had the roof rolled back, which meant that the CN Tower was visible right next to us, all lit up in (slightly tacky) coloured lights. Summary of the concert: Bono's still got it. Photo of the concert = don't have one, so you'll have to settle for one of me reading a review the next day on the train.



The next day was tickle trunk day! We went to the CBC museum and saw it. For reals. It's amazing. They had old clips of Mr. Dressup shows and other such delights. No puppets of Casey and Finnegan though. Other item of note: Mr. Dressup's glasses back in the day were essentially the same as Joel's current glasses. I feel that Freud would have something to say about that. Gotta love him.

The rest of the day was spent going up the CN Tower, shopping, wandering through Chinatown, finding the best coffee of our lives, seeing Kensington Market, and being taken out for a lovely French meal by my cousin Aaron and his fiance Karen. They took us to an art opening after dinner. We are so scene.

Next day we drove back to Ottawa. I cheated on the Lush pact* because I was seduced by a coconut scented product and then caught up on the season premiere of The Office. Well worth it, considering our activities the next day when we decided on a whim to head to Montreal (because we could) and spend the day wandering around. We managed to see a bit of the waterfront and Old Montreal before we regressed into a fit of parkour madness, inspired by The Office. In the end, we didn't actually see a whole lot of Montreal. But we sure had a great day.

Parliament the next day, where we crashed a suffragettes tea party and then I sat on Lester B. Pearson's lap. And then we headed off to eat some sandwiches. Apparently I am a big jerk for wanting swiss cheese on mine, but I suppose that was evident already with my choice of a red sports car avec spoiler for a rental. And that's the summary of my most excellent trip east.


* Lush Pact is a vow to never shop at Lush that I made with Joel some time ago. We made the pact because the store stinks and we hate it. Well, mostly hate it. Except this one product.