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We’ll be taking a holiday soon!

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Chris is off work the last two weeks of August so we’re trying to plan a short vacation.

We don’t have a lot of extra cash at this time so mostly our vacation will be a staycation, however we’ve been thinking of taking a short trip to Niagara Falls for a few days … perhaps a weekend trip although it won’t matter exactly when we do it as we’ll have 14 days to chose from. Perhaps I can find a better hotel package deal for a Tuesday or Wednesday night stay rather than a weekend stay?

We haven’t been on a holiday on our own for a long time. For some reason we always end up going to visit relatives – ie trip to Vancouver or joining friends rather than being on our own. Hmmm maybe now that we’ll actually have a vacation just for the two of us perhaps I should try to find some cheap lingerie. By cheap I mean inexpensive … not truly cheap!

More than likely we’ll be bringing our dog with us soI guess we won’t truly be alone, but close enough.

Did you take a vacation this summer? What did you do?





Looks like we’re expecting guests

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Well as usual my brother in law’s done it again. Almost every year he visits us here in Toronto. He drives up from Chicago with one or all three of his kids – depending upon who’s going to hockey camp or whatever other reason the visit is about.

He just called us a few minutes ago to let us know that he’ll be arriving here sometime Friday evening. My husband just spoke to his brother a few days ago and there was no word of a visit this summer at all yet out of the blue here we go again with another unexpected visit and a house full of guests.

Yes he’s bringing all his kids. His daughter will probably arrive with a ton of Johnston and Murphy luggage like she did last year. I swear she brought enough stuff for a weeks visit to last two months! Her luggage literally filled the tiny spare bedroom we have upstairs.

It’s not that I don’t have fun when they visit it’s just that I end up with like 10 extra people milling about my house with no notice! I say 10 people because Chris’ parents, sisters and their husbands and kids usually show up all at once too.

Don’t you hate *almost* unexpected guests?

My dog is a bug eater

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My dog is fascinated with bugs.

Ever since it warmed up enough for bugs to come out (say late April, early May) my puppy has been a bug watcher and now eater.

It’s only gotten worse as the weather has become warmer as there are more and more bugs around for her to watch and chase!

The other night I was sitting on the couch working on the laptop and the next thing I knew Midnight had jumped up beside me and she was snapping at the standing lamp beside the couch. I guess a moth came in with her and Chris on her last trip outside for a pee and she was determined to catch the moth.

She eventually did get the moth and I was fine with her eating it. Since I was sitting beside the light the moth, attracted to the light, kept buzzing around and occasionally bumped into me which of course I found totally creepy … so yeah, I cheered when she got it.

The next day she caught a moth on our front porch. She’s also gone after ants, house flies and yesterday she chased a bee right out the front door.

She banged into the screen door that my husband had just used and it wasn’t fully closed yet so when she banged into it as she chased the bee or wasp the door opened and for the first time ever she was outside the front of the house without a leash on!

That was scary. I was inside the house and I heard Chris run outside calling her name. When I got to the door she was running on the sidewalk in front of our neighbors house – maybe two or three doors down. She might have been running since Chris was starting to chase her.

We live on a main street with fairly high traffic so it’s not good for her to be loose. Especially since she’s still young and doesn’t always obey our commands.

Luckily I was quick to think of a way to get her to come to me. I called out to her asking if she wanted a cookie and she turned around to come back. As she passed by Chris he swooped down and grabbed her in his arms. We then lead her back into the house holding tightly to her collar.

We did tell her that running out there was bad, but mostly we praised her for being good and for returning to us. She got her cookie too. If i make a promise I keep it … plus I lured her in with the promise of a cookie so I had to fulfill my promise and give her one.

Hopefully this never happens again … but if it does, thankfully she loves food, especially her doggy cookies so I’ll have to remember to bribe her back home with treats.

We’ll also be making sure that she’s go her leash on when she’s in the enclosed front porch – just in case the outside screen door isn’t totally closed!

Darn fascination with bugs could have got her killed or badly injured!

Tired after a busy weekend

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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?

Still haven’t made plans for our summer vacation

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Chris and I still need to plan some kind of vacation this summer. He hasn’t even booked any time off yet but at this point it looks like he’ll be off for either the first two weeks or August or the second and third week. He’s still waiting for a co-worker to decide on her vacation time … geesh!

I have a feeling that with the price of gas this year we won’t be taking a long driving trip, but you never know, maybe we’ll end up driving to Chicago again this summer. We did that two years ago when we went to visit Chris’ brother and we had a great time. I loved Chicago. Of course if we go out of the country I’ll get travel insurance at least for me since I have a chronic illness. I can’t take a risk that my Crohn’s won’t flare up while I’m away and I’d hate to end up paying huge hospital bills in the US.

Hmmm the other idea I had for a vacation was to perhaps rent a cabin somewhere near a lake. Yes I know all the good ones are probably booked by now, but I might be able to find something.

What are you doing for your summer vacation?

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