Canada — Page 18 — You are in My World Now

Houses are selling like hotcakes in my neighborhood

July 17, 2008 by Tricia

I wrote a post on one of my other blogs about a week ago about the number of houses close to us that have gone up for sale lately. They’re selling like hotcakes it seems!

I’m pretty sure that there was a news story a few days ago where some real estate companies were saying that house sales were slower than normal this past spring and so far this summer here in Toronto, but the way houses are going up for sale and being sold within a week or two I don’t think there’s a problem in this particular neighborhood.

I’m glad our housing market is doing so well. I keep hearing about people losing their homes in the US or requesting foreclosure help. I think it’s particularly bad in California if I’m not mistaken. I hope it doesn’t get that way here in Canada. Our economy has been doing better than the US economy since 2001. It’s starting to have some trouble, but as I said hopefully things don’t get that bad here.

One neighbor just a few houses down sold her house in just under two weeks and to the best of my knowledge it went for about $350,000. Her house is pretty much the same as ours so I guess if we put ours up for sale we’d get somewhere around that price too. Good to know but we aren’t planning on selling anytime soon.

I just hope that all of our new neighbors are nice people. We have a great neighborhood and we are all fairly friendly – at least to say hi or wave at each other when we see one an other if not actually visiting each others homes.

Midnight and Molly – tug of war

July 16, 2008 by Tricia

Wordless Wednesday

The other weekend we took our Lab puppy to the beach for her first swim in Lake Ontario.

While we were there we met a lot of other dog owners and their dogs. We also ran into the couple that we had first met in April when we brought Midnight to Cherry Beach for the first time.

When we first met this couple and their puppy Molly both dogs were a lot smaller – yet close to the same size. As you can see from the photo above they look quite a bit a like (Midnight is on the left in the red harness) and they are almost the same size.

Trouble is … Midnight is almost four months older!

Midnight is slightly taller than Molly and she’s a little wider but otherwise it would be hard to tell the two dogs apart if it weren’t for their different colored collars.

Molly is going to be a lot bigger than Midnight soon!

Ontario Native Plants at The Brick Works

July 13, 2008 by Tricia

Join

Rather than posting photos of my own flowers for this weekends Green Thumb Sunday post I thought I’d post some pictures of the lovely flowers that were growing at the Brick Works last weekend when we went for a visit to this nature preserve in the heart of Toronto.

I’m thankful everyday that I live in this great city with so many things to do – there’s nightlife, movies, film festivals, street festivals, great parks, a bird sanctuary by the lake, great beaches and so many things to do or learn from thanks to Toronto’s diverse cultural population. I just love it.

Who would expect such a beautiful Oasis in the center of the city?

Along with hiking trails, woods, small water falls, ponds and marshes visitors to the Brick Works can go to plays held in the old buildings or visit the Farmers Market each weekend where they can buy fresh produce, baked goods, plants for the garden or home and arts and craft type items like pottery – my fav!

There are all kinds of native plants growing in the old quarry and around the ponds and marshes, but the Brick Works also has a garden at it’s entrance displaying what I believe are also all native plants.

I’m not sure what this plant is … perhaps a native phlox?

And these I believe are daisies – please correct me if I’m wrong or if you know the proper name for this flower:

This is Butterfly Milkweed. It appears that not only does it attract butterflies and moths but also bees and wasps!

If you are visiting Toronto or if you live in the area I highly recommend a visit to The Brick Works. It’s around the Don Valley and Bayview Avenue area. You won’t be disappointed! Oh and if you want to read a little more about our hiking tour and see some more native plants visit my gardening blog to read todays GTS post.

Gardeners, Plant and Nature lovers can join in every Sunday, visit As the Garden Grows for more information. GTS participants remember to check in at As the Garden Grows each week so that we’ll know you made a new post!

Tired after a busy weekend

July 6, 2008 by Tricia

We had a very busy weekend and now I’m wiped out. I can barely keep my eyes open right now.

Yesterday we did a number of things. I cleaned up the house – swept all the floors (are house is all hardwood flooring). While I was doing that Chris went to the store to buy mulch for the garden as we were planning to add mulch to the garden beds later in the day.

However, when he got home he told me there was a tour at The Brickworks about the lost rivers of Toronto and he wanted to go on the tour.

The Brickworks is where one of Toronto’s largest brick making factories used to be in the early 1900’s and onward. The site is no longer a brick making facility, instead it’s a nature reserve with ponds, walking paths and protective native flora that barely grows anywhere else these days. So we brought our Lab puppy Midnight along with us and spent several hours on the tour and walking around on our own. I have several great photos but I haven’t moved them to my computer yet.

When we got home we noticed our neighbor that had had a stroke back in February was back visiting her home so I spent 2.5 hours on her porch visiting with her before her family took her back to their home where she’s now living.

After that we spent four hours working in the garden – until 10 pm!

Think yesterday was a busy enough day? Today was just as busy. We decided to take Midnight to Cherry Beach as it’s an off leash park for dogs. We don’t normally let Midnight off leash as she’s pretty rambunctious, but we did once she started playing in the water.

Midnight swam in the lake for the first time and she spent literally hours fetching a nice driftwood stick that we found. She’s a good swimmer – especially considering that today was her first time swimming!

We brought so much stuff for our little trip – a 30 foot leash for Midnight, a shorter leash, her harness, two water bottles, my camera, a bag of treats for the dog and a few other things. Next time we might as well buy a bus when we go! I have no idea why Chris brought water. He was bringing it for the dog but um we knew she was going to be playing in the water which means she’d probably drink the lake water so why bring extra water?

Midnight played with several dogs in the water. It’s funny … once another Lab was nearby fetching things in the water along with Midnight all the other Lab owners seemed to converge in the general area that we were standing so all of a sudden there were 6 or more labs swimming in the water and running around chasing each other.

Needless to say Midnight had a ball and we had a lot of fun watching her and taking with all the other dog owners.

I took lots of pictures. I’m sure many are pretty much of the same scene – Midnight swimming back to shore with a big piece of driftwood in her mouth, Midnight running along the shore in the waves and so on … but I think they’ll be great shots once I get them on the computer. I’ll try to post some in the next few days.

So I guess we spent most of the weekend outdoors hiking and playing by the water. It was great fun but I’m soooo tired!

I hope that you had a great weekend too. What did you do?

Everything that can flower is flowering

June 29, 2008 by Tricia

Join

I love this time of year.

Summer is here and it’s warm and sunny outside – well most of the time, it’s been story here the last week or so, and of course the flowers are pretty much all in bloom. Just about perfect if you ask me.

It’s at this time of year that I really try to enjoy my garden. I still have a bit of work to do in the garden (add mulch to back flower beds), but for the most part the hard work is done. Now it’s the plants turn to pay me back for all the care of given them, and oh how they are paying it back this year!

Look at these lovely Heuchera flowers …

Isn’t that a gorgeous color?

On my two other Green Thumb Sunday blogs (Tricia’s Musings and As the Garden Grows) I showed my visitors rose and peony blooms, but there are so many other lovely flowers that are blooming in my garden right now.

Take the Lavender for example – it’s at it’s prime and it’s lovely.

Then there are my many clematis plants, most of which have blooms right now. This one is Arctic … something:

Last but definitely not least is the Malva. It produces such pretty flowers.

I could go on, but I’m sure you get the picture – my garden is alive with blooms and their lovely scent and I’m just loving it.