Image of the Day

One of my favourite subject matter for photos is trees. Another of my favourite subjects is the sky.

Taken May 7, 2024

A Walk Around Lake Lafarge

 Hello friends and fellow bloggers,

How are you all doing today?

I spent much of the day at Lafarge Lake with a dear friend of mine. We spent the time walking around the lake and sitting and admiring the ducks.  I was so busy catching up with her that I didn't do a very good job of taking photos but I did manage a few.

It was a fabulous day for an outing. The sun was shining brightly even though some of my photos look like we were expecting rain.  We weren't but it's still a bit windy and chilly in the shade.

The remaining days of the week are expected to get progressively warmer.

Lafarge Lake is a 5 hectare man made lake located in Town Center Park in Coquitlam. It is very easily accessed via the Skytrain and adjacent to the Douglas College campus.  In winter there is a fabulous light display which you can partake of for free. I meant to go with dear hubby this past Christmas but he got busy with work and I didn't wish to go alone. Perhaps it will work out for Christmas 2024. 

I've read that it's a very popular and crowded event. I suppose because it's a free event and there is plenty of parking. There is also a fabulous Evergreen Cultural Centre nearby and a brand new community centre will open in a few days. This is a great place for one but I think families with children would especially appreciate the convenience factor.

First Monday in May

Hi friends and fellow bloggers,

How are you all doing today?  I'm still very busy with errands and such.  Some of you know that I've been on a mission to find Brasso (metal cleaner/polisher) and some neutral shoe polish since last Friday to no avail.

Sky around 5:30 a.m. Monday

I checked one more store in the neighbourhood today just on a lark because I had to pass by there on my way to drop off a book at the library.

Sky at 4:45 p.m.

Sky at 4:45 p.m.

Lo and behold the store had Brasso.  They didn't have any neutral shoe polish but they did have something called Dubbin.  This isn't what I need for a particular project but it will come in handy for conditioning leather items and the leather sofa so I bought it. Tomorrow I'll check some other stores for the neutral shoe polish.  I could order it on line.  But I'm on a mission to see if and where I can find it locally in case I needed or wanted to buy these items again.

Sky at 7:55 p.m.

Dinner of pork chops, tater tots and pico de gallo

I'm thinking of posting daily or almost daily for awhile just because at this time of year I love what I see in the sky and all the greenery around me. I hope you'll come and visit again soon.

The Week Ends and Starts Like This

Hello friends and fellows bloggers, 

I hope you are all fine and that you enjoyed the weekend. As I mentioned in my last post here, I was very tired from all the walking and shopping I did on Friday and Saturday.  Thankfully the weather was good for those days. In fact, it was good all week long.

Late Saturday the raindrops started falling but just sporadically. Today it rained but not so much. It will rain more tomorrow. So we ended the week in sunshine and start the new week with cloudy skies and rain. 

 

It looks like the week ahead will be mainly sunny and warmish, with a few cloudy periods.  This is good news because one of my dear friends and I are planning a walk around a lake and of course we'd prefer that it isn't raining when we do so. We've postponed a ew times already due to inclement weather but now the temperatures are much warmer than they were a few weeks ago.

I haven't been reading much this week as I've been busy with several meetings and appointments. I need to get cracking on 2 books that will come due at the library shortly.

I've been experimenting lately with eating parts of the beef that I don't normally eat. Partly it's due to lack of availability at my local grocery store. But last week I made beef tongue which I haven't had since I was a young girl. It was nice and tender. On Sunday I made beef liver with some onions and pieces of bacon. I didn't have a lot of bacon so I cut it into pieces and mixed it with the onions. It was tasty. 

Liver isn't readily available at my local grocery store either but oddly enough I found it at another grocery store owned by same billionaire. Now the parent company is converting one grocery store (Buy-Low) into the other (Save On). I don't know why they are doing this because Buy Low is not a new acquisition. It was purchased in 1995 by the Jim Pattison Group but I have noticed the soaring prices at Buy - Low over the past 3 years.  All three major grocery stores in my general neighbourhood are owned by the same company.  It's no wonder the prices are so high at all of them.

My View on a Saturday Walk

Hello friends and fellow bloggers, 

I hope you had a great Saturday.  I had a busy one. 

I spent several hours shopping on Friday night. I was able to get most of what I wanted but I was not able to buy 2 seemingly simple items:  Brasso for cleaning and shining metals and neutral coloured (clear) shoe polish. 

After doing the housework and laundry on Saturday, I decided to try again to look for these two items.  I never buy these things but how hard could it be?  I know I've seen them around in several stores on more than one occasion over the past many years. 

It turns out that the local grocer doesn't carry these items anymore and and the supervisor on duty doesn't know why. This was the 2nd place I checked in at. No worries I thought, since I was sure to find them. Hours and 4 stores later, I still hadn't found either item until I got to the very last place, a pharmacy, where I finally found shoe polish but not in the colour I needed. 

I think I could find one or two items at a pharmacy called London Drugs but they have been non-operational for 7 days due to a cyber hacking incident of major proportions. I heard on Saturday's late news that they will now start reopening but I am not sure when they'll be fully up and running. I think I might also find these items at Canadian Tire and Wal-Mart but I don't get to these places often. I can either make a plan to go to these places or I can simply order them from Amazon which has better prices on both items and the convenience of having the items shipped to me at no additional cost.

When I was out at a small mall several days ago I saw a lovely jade plant for $10.00 (Canadian) and thought of buying it. When I was out last night I found a jade plant and an aloe vera plant for $10.00 total so I bought those instead.  They have been transplanted and I hope they'll do well. I think they'll need new, larger pots before the summer is over.  I love plants.

I did so much walking on Friday and Saturday and now I'm exhausted. I plan to take it easy for the rest of the weekend. 

Thanks for stopping by!

Early Skywatch

This is an early post for Skywatch Friday. It seems I'm sometimes late but never early until today, lol. We've had a spectacular few days of sunshine though rain was forecast for this week, the forecast was amended. 

I had a busy week. It was tax deadline yesterday. I managed to get it done for DH and I about 24 hours before deadline though we did have an issue or two.

I went out for a walk yesterday and I came across these notices for tax help. There was a line up of people needing to file so the sole tax preparer had to stay late to help everyone.

Look at the pricelist (below) for tax preparation.  I saved DH and I several hundreds of dollars.  Not only that, I know they would have charged us more than the posted prices because of the number of receipts we have. I've had that experience filing as a single person when I used to go to tax preparers.

Cost is the main reason I started doing tax returns myself because the pricing became ridiculous and that was many years ago already!  Thank goodness for tax software though some are better than others. 

Do you have any software you would recommend? I've been using Turbo Tax for the past 2 years and I'm ready to change.  I found it more expensive than other software and also far more complicated than necessary with various quirks as regards the tax considerations for DH and I and the constant 'push' for paying for various of their services is super annoying considering we have to pay to use the software to begin with.  DH and I have a bit of a complicated tax scenario for the last few years and going forward at least a few years. It's not so very complicated but more involved than a simple return.

Anyway, I have another busy few days ahead so I'll stop here and wish you all a fabulous few days ahead.

The Last Weekend in April

 This is what it looks like here on Sunday early evening.

I'm keeping busy on this rainy weekend with a bit of cooking, decluttering and cleaning. 

Roast beef, mashed potatoes, gravy and vegetables

Chicken and rice stew

Roasted, seasoned chicken

Roast beef stew

I don't buy many books and magazines these days however I noticed that lately I've been buying a magazine or two each year. I just let go of 18 magazines, some of them are as old as 2009 and 2012 with a few in the last 3 years. The books are old. I think I inherited one and I bought one many years ago. I never look at them so out they go.

I snapped these next photos while out for a few errands on Friday. It had been raining heavily but stopped for a few hours. The blue in the sky looked so lovely.

I also went thrifting on Friday. I'm careful what I bring into the house these days since I'm decluttering. Adding more than I really need would be counter productive.

This Omega juicer is like new but needs a good cleaning.

These cute stamps were a bargain.

I've been wanting a tray with an old map on it for ages.

During these times of heavy rain and cloudy skies before summer arrives I've been turning up the hygge.

Some lovely, fresh tulips.

A lemon scented candle.

Some faux flowers with twinkling bulbs at night.

Instead of reading this weekend, I ended up binge watching this tv series on Netflix. I still have one episode to go and it's quite thrilling.  If you haven't seen it, I recommend it.

That's how I've spent a satisfying weekend. I hope you enjoyed yours.

A Perfect Gift

 Hi friends and fellow bloggers,

I hope you are all doing well on this last weekend of April. I'm doing well. I'm trying to make the most of the time by doing small task around the house to tidy, organize and declutter. I'm also aware that the last day of the month is fast approaching and I haven't completed the tax returns yet. 

I actually started way back in January but we were waiting for 2 T4 slips (they didn't appear on line in the CRA account) so they eventually arrived but I got busy with other things. Now I think I will simply start all over again and use different software.  The one I like is Ufile but for a few years I used a few others like Turbo Tax and Simple. I can't remember why I did that.

I was watching a YouTube of a young friend of mine in Botswana on Thursday. It was storming and raining heavily in her town and after the rain a beautiful rainbow appeared and beautiful blue skies. I said to myself that I wished I could see a beautiful rainbow too and that I hadn't seen one in quite some time. Lo and behold I was out for a walk on Friday and I was gifted with a rainbow.