I've been 'Tagged'

I have been 'tagged', actually at the beginning of June but I have only just got around to posting. Moline http://moline.typepad.com/ tagged me, along with a few of her other contacts the deal is to list 7 random things about myself.
Here goes:

1. I met my husband Craig 18 years ago on a plane! We had seats next to each other right at the back on a 10 hour KLM flight from Johannesburg to London.
NO we didn’t join the mile high club!

2. I lived in Norway for 7 years in total in my 20's and can speak Norwegian fluently (well I may be a little rusty now). I used to translate as part of my job, but I don’t think I would feel confident enough to write it anymore. I do love reading some Norwegian and Swedish blogs though just to keep in practice :D

3. My birth sign is Pisces, born February 29th so a leap year baby too. I am quite nostalgic and sentimental, more so as I get older (perhaps this is normal?) I like to keep in touch with all my friends, look through old photographs. I still have these ‘special’ pyjamas that I wore when my eldest daughter was born almost 16 years ago! I just can't bring myself to throw them away and keep them wrapped in tissue paper in a hat box along with some other bits and pieces that have happy memories.

4. I love ‘thrifting’ for special treasures. Particularly vintage items that really appeal to me and I know have potential, I usually know exactly where they will go in my home. Painting wooden furniture is a hobby of mine and I get itchy fingers just looking at something that needs some TLC!

5. I am lucky enough to have a wonderful husband, two talented teenage daughters and a dream home – my family mean everything to me.

6. A few people in my life have inspired me; firstly my Granny Mary who taught me how to sew and had a great vintage suitcase full of fabric scraps and a huge wooden box of buttons and always took the time to help with whatever craft project I wanted to start. My friend Keriann in New Zealand who has the most warm and welcoming home I have ever been lucky enough to visit, she bakes wonderful cakes and sews beautiful quilts too. My daughters’ who believe in me, give me encouragement and manage to brighten my day no matter how dull.

7. I like to be organised, I write lists all the time and can’t sit still for very long because there is always ‘something’ I need to do and if there isn’t I will find it. My energy levels are highest when I wake up, I am definitely a ‘morning’ person.

Another school year comes to an end

Hi friends and family,

This Friday was just about the end of the school year for the girls, both have to go in for awards ceremonies one day this week, but otherwise they are free for the summer! Now it's time to really plan what we are going to do for the next 8 weeks.

It has been a good year for them both academically and for Amber socially too with her group of lovely friends.

Jemma's exams are finally over and she got some great news via e-mail on the last day of school. About 2 weeks ago she was called down to the hall along with about 30 other students from grade 10 and 11 to be told about an Advanced Study Program that is being run for the first time at her High school. It's a sort of ground course in preparation for a University subject and is funded by the school board. Mostly by correspondence lessons, with one lesson a month being practical in the laboratory. Of the 30 students there would only be 5 chosen and Jemma got picked! She will be studying Biology and is very proud of herself and excited (we all are). It requires quite a bit of extra work in grade 11, but what a challenge and achievement to be chosen.

Yesterday we had planned to visit a friend for a 'surprise' birthday party, unfortunately when we arrived at her house she had just had to leave to collect her sister from the airport (a 3 hour round trip) and then we found out the flight was delayed by another 2 hours. Needless to say the party was 'off' as it seemed a little pointless without the birthday girl. We stayed a while, left her a wrapped gift and huge bowl of watermelon balls that I had brought along and we returned home, feeling disappointed. Then the phone rang and our next door neighbours invited us over. We had a lovely time instead enjoying some good wine, snacks laughter and chit chat. The kids all had fun around a small bonfire in the garden organised by the dads, toasting marshmallows and playing hide and seek in the woods.

It was a late evening so everyone else in the house is fast asleep as I write this on Sunday morning. I have to get busy soon with my sewing, as I have quite a few orders to make up and put together for my Etsy shop, which is a little sparse right now.

Ok now I feel a cup of tea is calling so I had better finish :)

I will write another mid week post as I have been 'Tagged' by a fellow flickr/blog member and this means writing a few 'things' about myself. (I will have to think about that one!)

Hazel xx

Mum's Visit

My Mum and step Dad are coming to visit us in Nova Scotia in a months time! This is hugely exciting because the girls and I haven't actually seen either of them for SEVEN years!! They live in South Africa, where they have lived for over 24 years now. My Mum also turns 60 the day after she arrives, so a special milestone birthday too, just hope she isn't too jet-lagged.

Jemma and Amber are really looking forward to seeing their Granny and Grandad, they were just 6 and 8 years old on our last visit to SA.

Craig came home yesterday after a busy week working on a renovation project down in Weymouth on the coast. It was nice to have him home again and today we enjoyed a drive to a garden centre, where we bought a cute little perennial plant with tiny white flowers with pink candy stripes,called a 'Peppermint Candy Flower' The pink stripes come a bit later I am told.

My little desk and chair found at a yard sale last weekend is now painted cream and re-covered in some cute blue 'laundry' fabric. Their new home is in my laundry for the summertime. Jemma has already ear marked it as the perfect 'study space'.

Father's Day - Sunday

I woke up this morning and looked out of the window to be greeted by these two visitors: Grazing in the meadow between our garden and our neighbours were two deer! I have never seen them so close before in the two years we have been here, it was so peaceful, with a morning mist in the air, I zoomed in as much as possible but the pic is still a little blurred. Archie was 'stunned' as he watched them, unable to move a muscle.

The girls were woken up by my frantic search for the camera before the deer disappeared. They russled up a breakfast in bed for Daddy on his special day, and presented him with home made cards complete with sweet words. His present was a vintage strawberry sign, which we knew he really wanted from a local antique shop. It was the original sign for an old strawberry farm in the area and now looks great nailed up on the side of our barn pointing to our own little strawberry patch.

We took a lunchtime drive in the sunshine, stopping to eat a picnic lunch in a local park and then relaxing by the hammock in the garden, reading, revising and chatting. A lovely Fathers day.

Early Bird!

I am awake at a ridiculously early hour of 5.30am this morning and on a Saturday too! I should probably dispense with an alarm clock as I always wake up before it goes off. I have been a 'morning' person for as long as I can remember (take after my Grandad). Today promises to be a warm and sunny, so I want to make the most of every hour.
This week my hubby has been working in Weymouth, about a 2 hour drive south, helping on a building project. He came home yesterday feeling exhausted but enjoyed the lakeside cottage renovation. He is going back again during week days for the coming few weeks ahead. He has certainly left behind his corporate accountant image in England and is much more of a 'hands on' guy now, preferring manual labour to sitting at a computer all day processing numbers.
I have been holding the fort back home, tending to the veggies (heaven forbid they should die whilst Craig is away!) The strawberries, lettuce, tomatoes and cucumber plants are all thriving, sadly the courgette plants do look a bit sick :( Also watering the newly planted grass and all the pansies and lobelie in pots and baskets. The bed of white and pink peonies will soon be in bloom (one of my favourite flowers), I look forward to having them displayed in a jug on the dining room table. Oh and the lilac bush is happy too :D
Amber had 3 friends come home with her on the school bus yesterday, so I had 4 'Giggling Gerties' to feed and keep an eye on. They were very happy as they had just found out that they will all be in the same class at school in September for grade 8, their final year at middle school, before going on to high school. They had lots of fun running up in the orchard, dancing barefoot in the empty barn and demolishing a huge dish of macaroni cheese and a bowl of salad, followed by walnut and maple ice cream.

The new lawnmower tractor arrives today! Believe it or not this is actually an 'exciting' prospect. Our old one came with the property and was a bit tired, sluggish and beige. We managed to get a good second hand price for it and have ordered a new model in fire engine red with a wider cutting width. As I will be doing most of the mowing this year I am looking forward to it's arrival and driving it up and down the field whilst listening to my i-pod sounds :D
I am a regular reader of Posy's blog. She mentioned a book called 'The Magic Apple Tree' by Susan Hill in one of her recent posts. My friend Keriann in New Zealand told me that it is also one of her favourite books. Curiosity led me to order a copy on e-bay and I have started reading it already. Yesterday I read aloud to Jemma as we sat under a Maple tree in the garden. So beautifully written, just hope it doesn't make me too homesick for England. So far much of it applies to the seasons here in Nova Scotia also. Saving this to 'draft' for a few hours...
It's now 8pm and the computer is free! My yard sale jaunt this morning was fruitfull, Jemma came along too. We found an old wooden desk for $3, in need of painting, a world globe (for the study), another chair for just $1, also in need of a coat of paint and some blue striped cotton ticking fabric. I am usually lucky when I have Jemma with me :)
Hazelx

First weekend in June

Why does this time of year go so fast? It's the end of a lovely weekend. Yesterday Craig and I got up early, leaving our two teenage daughters' in bed having a 'lie-in' after a busy week at school and a later than normal Friday evening. They had been to watch a school play, put on by the seniors in high school. They both enjoyed it and were in a very good mood when we picked them up at 9pm and not in the slightest bit tired. Craig and I spent the two hours in the local shopping mall nearby and I treated them to some new summer PJ's on sale at La Senza, which look super cute, Jemma in powder blue and Amber's in a coffee colour.

Anyway, Saturday morning Craig and I drove over to the North mountain on the other side of the Annapolis valley and stopped by some yard sales and a nursery, where we found a very pretty white lilac bush for our garden, which smells heavenly. The rest of the day was spent doing our own thing, mainly in the garden. Jemma and Amber went off into the orchard for a 'photo shoot' (see below) and we just enjoyed the warm June weather.

Today, Sunday we drove 10 minutes up to the lake to visit some friends before lunchtime, they have a house in the most wonderful lakeside setting, with their own little beach! The pedelo was out before we knew it and J & A were off across the lake wearing their life jackets of course!

Craig is off on a work contract tomorrow down in Weymouth, about 2 hours drive away, he is helping a local carpenter to convert a double garage into a cottage and will be staying down there all week coming home at the weekends only, until the job is finished, which may take a few weeks.

Hazel x