A Dinner Out

Hello friends and fellow bloggers,

How are you doing?

You may remember that I celebrated my birthday last week. It was a hectic week due to water leaks in the building and dealing with investigators, movers, insurance adjusters and temporary lodgings but in between I managed to have a birthday lunch or two.

One of my brothers who lives far sent me some funds for a meal on him. Due to being quite busy and not in the mood for cooking, I really appreciated having a meal or two out. This was the meal I had on Friday night and it was delicious (Spicy Tuna Maki and a Bento Box meal of Beef Udon Soup, a California Roll, Mixed Tempura and salad).  This is one of my favourite 'go to' places in the neighbourhood and one of my favourite Bento Box meals. What can I say? I'm a creature of habit, lol.  When I know something is good I return to it again and again.

How about you dear reader?

Do you like Bento Box meals?

Are you a creature of habit like me?

Once again, I thank you for your time to visit my blog today. I'd be honoured if you would leave a comment and I hope you can visit again soon.

Happy Birthday to Me

Happy Birthday was sung a few times yesterday. I celebrated a birthday on Monday and though I don't generally go for big parties I do enjoy more intimate gatherings with family and friends.

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A friend made a scrumptious and diverse dinner.  There were 3 kinds of rice (plain white, brown and chicken pilau), millet ugali, chicken stew, sauteed kale/onions, roasted plantain, roasted chicken legs with a lemon sauce and chapati. Not to be outdone her son made 2 flavours of muffins in two different sizes.  We had a feast and I was stuffed.

I thought it was rather creative how this young boy made cupcakes and bought candles to spell out Happy Birthday. 

It was very sweet.

Here is the young chef lighting up the cupcakes before they sang and I blew out candles.

Not to be outdone my "baby" brother bought me a beautiful fruit cocktail cake with whipped cream frosting topped with fresh fruits. This is my favourite cake and it has now become a staple for family birthday celebrations. I will have a few more birthday luncheons as friends have invited me out later and as time allows in my schedule.

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I haven't had time to post a lot of photos of my various outing over the past few weeks so I'm sharing a few from a few weeks ago when a friend invited me on a harbour cruise.

I have a lot of photos to share.  This post will only cover the walk along the northern sea wall toward the departure point for the cruise.

I alighted near the sea wall close to the entrance of the Westin Bayshore Hotel.  This hotel is popular with tourists and is located almost at the entrance to Vancouver's Crown Jewel, Stanley Park. Stanley Park is a 405-hectare public park that borders the downtown of Vancouver in British Columbia, Canada and is almost entirely surrounded by waters of Vancouver Harbour and English Bay.  Read more about this beautiful park at this link.

I'm headed north west of the hotel so I need to go around it.  I found the hotel rather large and spread out.  It is also undergoing some redevelopment though it is still open for business.

A view west towards downtown Vancouver.

A small marshy pond located adjacent to the hotel. Too bad there were no birds splashing about

I love the riotous colour in all the blossoms.

Just as I am about to head due west, I look to the east and snap a few photos. 

The  white building with the 'sails' in the background right is the east wing of  the Vancouver Convention Center and where I was last week for Flyover Canada.  I just learned that it is still part of the Convention Center. I thought it had been replaced altogether by the new one (see photo below) but now I understand there is a west wing and an east wing which are actually two separate buildings.

See the paddle boat with tourist on the top deck.

You can see the port of Vancouver with the multi-coloured shipping containers in the background.  The float plane on the far right is part of the fleet for Harbour Air which flies to our provincial capital, Victoria and to many other points on Vancouver Island.  In late April the airline added flights to Seattle, Washington.

In the photo above you can see the structure in the middle with a green roof. That is the new 'west wing" of Vancouver Convention Centre.   It is built on stilts over the water.

 The living roof, seawater heating and cooling, on-site water treatment and fish habitat built into the foundation of the West Building make it one of the greenest convention centres in the world. The Centre recycles an average of 180,000 kilograms of materials annually, nearly half of the total volume of waste generated. It avoids canned goods, disposable utensils and dishes, and donates leftover food to local charities (source: Wikipedia)

The grey, concrete building peeking out just to the right of the lamppost in the foreground is the Vancouver Lookout Tower. At the top there is an observation deck and the only remaining revolving restaurant in the city.

I enjoyed my walk along the waterfront looking at all the activity on the water and the various boats and ships which were docked. Though the weather was overcast it was perfect for a day out.  Signage was present here and there announcing various tours and yacht rentals.

A float plane comes in for landing.

Signage announcing some water adventure tours.

 

I've now arrived at the departure point for the Harbour Cruise. Here I sit and wait on a bench for my friend to arrive. 

It isn't too long before I heard my name.

My former boss was out for a luncheon walk and recognized me in profile as I gazed out over the boats and yacts.

What a small world we live in.

In a short while afterward my friend arrives and we set off for our adventure.

Stay tuned.

Joining in with 

Our World Tuesday

Thank you for visiting. Please come again soon.

My Great Nephew

It has been awhile since I posted.

To be honest, I have tried posting earlier but I've discovered that since I upgraded to Windows 8.1 a lot of things don't work (phone to computer connection, printer, scanner). Of course they still work but they all need to be reset somehow. I'm no good at that kind of thing. I usually get my brother to set everything up. He will do so but then neglect to tell me he didn't download a certain program or connect up my printer. That kind of thing.

And isn't it Murphy's Law that you always need something the most when it isn't actually working as it should? I discovered that last week when I was trying to scan some documents and help my nephew out with some on line research. The computer connection would just "spin around". I'm not sure what the technical term for it is. Later on we discovered that my wi-fi signal wasn't working. A call to the telecommunications company resulted in them changing the modem frequency remotely.  Now at least the scanner and printer are working again.

The cell phone connection to the computer isn't. I tried to figure out how to do that myself but have no patience for it so will need to wait for help. In doing some on line research I found a forum which told me that others were having similar problems.

In my last post, I mentioned that I was preparing to go out of town to celebrate my mom's birthday.

Since then I've been to her place and back but most of the photos I took didn't turn out so I don't have too much to share with you photo-wise.  I was too busy trying to set up the room and be the hostess as well as taking photos for both my niece and myself on two different cameras.  I didn't even get a photo of the cake which looked lovely.  Sadly too most of the photos on my camera were blurred. I hope they turned out better for my niece.  The main thing is we all enjoyed a good meal.  Mom enjoyed her special day and she really enjoyed seeing her 2nd great-grandson for the first time.  Of course she also enjoyed visiting with her children, grandchildren and her 1st great-grandson.  

My picture of the fruit plate is the only thing that seem to turn out fine, lol. Everyone also enjoyed this dish at lot or at least the fruit.  All the fruit on the plate was gone and I brought home the cheeses home.

Hunter, born June 14, 2014

Oodles of food was left over. We packed it up and left it for the staff and an extra plate for mom for a snack later.  The remaining cake had to go in the garbage.  The weather was so hot that the cake frosting (cream cheese) melted and the top layer slide off the bottom layer when cut. Each of us had a piece and I threw the rest away. It was a strawberry cake and looked lovely but it wasn't nearly as good as the cakes we've had in previous years.

Besides trying to ensure mom enjoyed her day, I was so happy to see  my little great nephew. He is only two and half months old and the cutest little thing (of course we all say that). He is like a miniature man and very strong. His preferences and character are already so evident and he is the spitting image of his dad. His name is Hunter. His father is a huge outdoors man (hunter, fisherman and cowboy) and will no doubt take him hunting at the first opportunity.

This is the quilt I made back in May for the baby.

While I was there I was able to take the little guy's measurements to see if I can tailor a sweater that will actually fit him.

Busy Hands

 If I could tell the world just one thing it would be we're all okay, and not to worry cause worry is wasteful and useless in times like these. I won't be made useless, won't be idle with despair, I will gather myself around my faith.  Light does the darkness most fear.

Jewel, American singer/songwriter

Hi friends,

While I've been house bound, I've been working on a few things besides my decluttering  project.

For example, I've been knitting lots of dishcloths for my Etsy shop.  All proceeds from my shop go to Kenyan missions.  I find the knitting allows me to relax and think and pray about things on my mind.  It also helps me feel like I am doing something useful and something that may yet be helpful to the missions in the country I hold dear.

I made my rug out of old pajamas which you can see here.

Another project that I've started is a Wizard of Oz quilt that I was originally planning to make for a Christmas gift.  I ran out of time so now I am making it for a summer birthday gift.

It is a simple quilt and the quilt layers are being secured by hand with yarn ties instead of machine stitching.  I'll also add a few rows of machine stitching just to make the blanket extra secure.

I still need to cut off the edges and make a binding to sew around the edges.

There are a few birthdays in February and early March so I've been working on some small gift packages.   One for a local friend and and one for an aunt who lives out of town.

My friend turned 69 years of age on February 11th.  Since she has become a senior citizen we don't get together as often as we used to and her health has been fragile for some time.  This year we were going to celebrate her birthday by going out to high tea.  But she came down with pneumonia a few days before her birthday and quarantined herself while on a course of strong antibiotics. I told her to take it easy and not push herself at this time so she can get better and I was relieved to hear her sounding much better over the phone a few days later.

This is part of the gift for my friend, Rose. I've made her two red dishcloths and thought this lovely china cup would be a nice cup from which to drink her tea.

Next month my aunt will celebrate her 67th birthday.   I made her two dishcloths in shades of green and blue and included some note paper, a nice pen with floral designs on it and some funds so she could treat herself to a meal out in a restaurant.

I hope my aunt likes her small gift.

Now and then  it is lovely to be remembered by someone else.  Do you agree? I don't think your remembrance has to be anything huge or expensive. I think my friend and my aunt will both feel remembered when they receive their gift packages.

(My apologies for the poor photos. It was late at night when I took them.)

I hope you will come back soon.  I am planning a giveaway which I haven't done for awhile. I will post all the details right here.

Enjoy your week.