So we got back yesterday – that last day of driving is always a real doozy. Going up can seem like a breeze, but no matter how long the drive home is (and admittedly Thunder Bay is 15 hours away from Toronto – that’s a very long drive by anyone’s standards) it always takes way, way too long.

Sooo…More pictures!

This is Liam’s parent’s big doggie (she’s half border collie and half poodle). I think she looks exactly like Sprocket from Fraggle Rock. She doesn’t ever stop moving, and has a serious oral fixation. She’s only trying to tell us about them rascally fraggles though.

We spent much of the week helping to get things ready for a good friend’s wedding on the weekend. These were the crafty little centerpieces – button flowers – I spent a good few hours making dozens of them (they were also the brides bouquet and the grooms boutonniere)..

Besides the buttons, and a gnome theme, there was also a Finland meets Scotland thing going on at this wedding (the groom being of Scottish decent, the bride being of Finnish).

This is one of my favourite shots of the day – a group of ‘Finns’ (denoted by their Nokia boots, fur hats, and ski gear) kidnapped the ‘bride’ (or in this case, the groom, who everyone was calling the bride, since he had the much more expensive outfit on – traditional highland garb doesn’t come cheap).

Nothing to worry about though, simply an old Finnish tradition called “the stealing of the bride”. All the bride had to do was prove herself worthy of marriage to her groom – by answering a bit of trivia about him – and he was returned safe and sound.

Then we broke out a bottle of 12 year scotch and passed it around.

Yeah, it was a pretty good time.

We’re alive and well in Northern Ontario. Here’s some proof:

I think every person in Canada should drive up the spectacular Trans Canada Highway once in their life (it’s our version of Route 66 or, even California’s famous #1). We’re lucky enough to have taken the Toronto to Thunder Bay stretch multiple times at this point.

That, my friends, is a persian. Regional Canadian cuisine at it’s finest (and reason # 1 why I laugh when editorials try to claim we have no – culture here in this country).

I’m pretty sure there’s nothing better on the face of the planet than finding finely crafted brews and burgers, at a local roadhouse – after a long day spent floating down a crystal-clear, clean, northern river on a raft made of inner tubes. Did I mention there was not a cloud in the sky? No? Well, there wasn’t. Um, yeah, perfection.

More proof of us in our natural state to be found on Flickr.

One of the best things about moving into an old house, is being pleasantly surprised by what pops up come spring. The downstairs neighbor told me that there were lilies next to the sidewalk leading to the laneway – but that didn’t really prepare me for what started blooming this last couple weeks.

This is some crazy collection of multi-coloured lilies – colours I’ve never seen before like lemon yellow, and crimson red. There are at least ten different varieties of them – many even have beautifully contrasting stamens – and there’s yet more that have yet to bloom (I’m really hoping I don’t miss anything interesting when we go on vacation – but I inevitably will).

Well, we’re still pretty busy ’round here, especially since we are leaving for a bit of vacation soon (nothing too exciting, just returning to Liam’s hometown for a week to attend one of his oldest friend’s wedding).

We spent the other night on the set of a TV show, which was pretty cool. Even cooler was seeing a good friend, an old friend, take charge and kick ass like the awesome producer she is.

Sometimes it seems like just yesterday that I was just a kid, and now my friends are lawyers, and producers and doctors. It’s weird to know real, live, important grown ups. It means I must be one myself (scary).

Anyway, I might try apprenticing on set in the art department – which has always been one of my (admittedly many) dreams. I even took a course or two in set design.

Talk turned to the completely unglamorous work that goes on behind the scenes of these things, and it was mentioned that one should be prepared to get covered in all manner of messes at this particular shoot.

Of course, only I would turn that conversation into an opportunity to wear a cute outfit… But of course I did.

People are always surprised to find that I have no fear of getting messy – but you can’t do things like art or cooking or gardening without getting a little dirt under your nails, a little flour on your collar and a little paint in your hair.

You just have to prepare yourself for a mess – and that includes wearing proper attire.

So at the moment, I’m dreaming of cute kerchiefs and cuffed coveralls, worn Rosie the Riveter style. Something like this gorgeous little pic from this months Marie Claire (found via Jezebel, of course):

I’ve even found a company that makes adorable coveralls, specifically fitted for women, named after Rosie (which is pretty awesome).

Of course, Bluelines loves a good coverall too, and actually did a more stylish spin on them, turning an old pair into a cute little shirt dress.

Which is probably more the route I’ll take. Particularly the scrounging thrift and surplus stores for a deal part – because I’d rather not get cement, and mud, and wood glue, and paint all over something I paid more than twenty bucks for. It’s kinda the point of wearing coveralls in the first place.

People in this town keep talking about gentrification.

The tendency is to automatically decry it as a very bad thing.

Of course it’s not exactly all that bad. It can actually be a very good thing. There are many areas that could use a little gentrifying here and there. I don’t see what could possibly be wrong with taking a dangerous, decrepit neighborhood and turning it on it’s head. What’s so bad about taking something that’s broken, and fixing it?

That was why, when we moved back to Toronto 3 years ago, we moved to the edge of Parkdale.

It was an up and comer, a place that had potential, but was still rough around the edges.

Artists lived there, it was cheap, it was cool, it was filled with young people, there was lots to see and do – there was always something interesting going on.

Unfortunately, we weren’t the only ones who noticed something interesting going on there.

In the two years we lived there, we saw that neighborhood turned on it’s head – and the problem was, it was already gentrified enough when we got there. There was already a Starbucks. There was already some fancy lofts. There was already a Drake hotel. Realtors were just beginning to snap up empty lots to develop into boutique condos.

I think the thing is, there’s a possibility for a neighborhood to go beyond just being gentrified. There’s a possibility for it to just turn into a different version of what it was in the first place – a dangerous place, where you don’t want hang around – let alone live.

Which is why I sighed when I read this article about my old digs – complete with a picture of the nice lady with the cute dog (a fox terrier, just like Asa from the Thin man movies) who ran the vintage furniture store down the street. It pretty much sums up all the reasons we moved away from Parkdale (or Queen West West or as they’re calling it now “Beaconsfield Village” – not that I ever heard it called that when I lived there 9 short months ago – which makes me pretty sure it’s solely a Realtor invention for marketing purposes, just like nearby “Liberty Village”).

We saw it happen. We saw the suburban twits drive down from the suburbs in their SUVs every weekend and turn a friendly, bohemian community into a coked-out, drunken orgy (and I do mean that literally, as there’s now a swingers club on the block). Now that it’s started, there’s pretty much no way of stopping it.

I guess the only hope is that once the condos are built and filled with people, some actual infrastructure starts being developed to prevent the place from going to blight (although I’ve seen brand new condos go to blight before, on the cusp of the last economic downturn).

But, for the moment, it’s a bad scene. The neighborhood has become, once again, a place that’s not very livable.

And even if we occasionally miss some of the vibrancy (and the Black Dog video store) we’re pretty glad we got the hell out of there.

The complete opposite side of town is seeming like a pretty nice place to be, at the moment.

A couple weeks ago we cleaned out my grandfathers house (he died earlier this spring).

I dug these two awesome vintage fans out of the dumpster because I loved their art-deco lines – and you know how I am with beautiful vintage machines (typewriters, alarm clocks, transistor radios…). We plugged them in when we got home and found: they still work! They work so well, we won’t need to get an air conditioner anytime soon. I feel pretty good about rescuing them from becoming landfill.

It’s very hot today, so me and the cats are taking full advantage of them.

The two chairs you see (one danish teak, and one velvet club) are also inheritances. Also pretty awesome.

It’s strange to have had grandparents with such good taste. Stranger still that they’re no longer around.

Well that was a pretty good weekend.

One of those spur of the moment collections of days that just comes together perfectly.

What made it so good?

1. Seeing Wall-E. So good. Soooooo good! I am actually going to go ahead and say: best Pixar film ever. Ever!

   Why so good? The characterizations, I think, mainly. The gifted animators managed to squeeze emotions out of very limited creatures (simplistic robots with incredibly small vocabularies).

   And what emotions! These simple little characters with big personalities made it easy to tell a very small, simple story – with an epic, intergalactic, post-apocalyptic scale – and that gave the movie a huge emotional impact. Don’t be fooled by the cutesy robots in the kiddie cartoon: the movie is intense.

2. Shopping! Yes, I’m a girl… But this has more to do with some rather male-like efficiency in procuring what I needed (an outfit for an upcoming summer wedding) in a minimum amount of time, for a minimum amount of money.

   It’s sale time, pretty much everywhere, which meant after only an hour or two that mission was accomplished, which is especially impressive given that I needed a new bra to go under a new dress. Bra shopping is probably the single most depressing regularly occurring event in a girls life (with the possible exception of swimsuit shopping), so getting it over and done with in record time was pretty satisfying.

3. Impromptu dinner party! We threw one at the last minute (we gave people like, 18 hours facebook notice) and: People! Actually! Showed! Up!

   Liam made vast quantities of sushi, we all drank plum wine and sake, hundreds of edamame were popped out of their pods, I got to make new friends and catch up with some old ones I hadn’t seen in too, too long, and a good time was had by all.

4. We finally met our neighbors. Meeting new people is always hard, especially for us (me and Liam are both kinda shy – Liam especially).

   We were the only childless couple, which was a little odd, and meeting and befriending all those hip, young Torontonian parents I’ve read so much about in Toronto Life was a little surreal, but cute toddlers and frisky dogs are the best icebreakers, as is a good cheeseburger, and friendly people. Plus, I’ve learned that a love of good food is universal, so my knowledge of the 100 mile diet, organic food boxes, and my own little organic vegetable patch came in handy.

   Really, I think we came to the realization that we had more in common with these new people (minus the many, many, babes-in-arms) than we do with many of our friends right now. We love our friends, but we’re kinda on a different life path than many of them are right now.

   We are building a home, and a life together, where most people we know are still focusing on the next concert, the next party, the next new toy. It’s kinda nice to be around people who don’t think it’s crazy to be looking inward, instead of out; to throwing dinner parties at home, instead of getting drunk at a club. It’s no judgment call on the people who like that sort of thing, but I know that I get so much more enjoyment out of sitting at home in front of a good movie, piled next to loving kitties and boy, tummy filled with a home cooked meal. I can’t imagine wanting anything else.

You’re probably wondering what my garden looks like right around now.

Pretty good, actually!

That’s my side of the garden on the right there (the other side with the big potato plants are my downstairs neighbors – and I didn’t think to plant potatoes, so I’m pretty jealous).

We’ve been getting a lot of rain, so I haven’t even had to do much work. Just the occasional weeding.

The only veggie I worry about is my heirloom carrots, as they got a little trampled, but even my heirloom tomatoes (which I was worried about, because I started them indoors a little late) seem to be getting big and healthy and growing flowers.

My deckside, container-bound cherry tomatoes are doing even better – they already have tons of fruit on them that should be edible pretty soon.

My little strawberry plants are having a bit of a struggle though. We have raccoon visitors, at night, and one of the plants has been dug up a couple times now. I’m keeping it inside during the night time, but I think some stronger measures might have to be taken for when the tomatoes ripen.

I’m already growing mint, which is supposed to deter raccoons – but it doesn’t seem to be working at all. Next up is tucking rags soaked in ammonia around the place. I don’t want to use cayenne, even though it seems the cheapest, easiest option, because it can irritate the eyes of animals – cats in addition to raccoons, – and my catnip attracts the occasional kitty visitor, so that would be no good.

My pink champagne scented geranium is blooming though, and as you can see here, the blooms are as bubbly a pink as the name implies. Gotta love a double duty plant that smells as good as it looks!

There are even more pictures of growing things on flickr, if you’re interested. Just click through any of the above photos to see more.

If your family’s been in Ontario for at least a couple generations, then chances are somebody has a cottage.

“A cottage?” you say.

Yes, a cottage.

Ok, so it’s really just a little log cabin by a lake in the woods – and some of you may know these as camps, or maybe the more pretentious term “summer home” – and some cottages really are “summer homes” – complete with satellite TV, multiple bathrooms and gourmet kitchens. Not that ours is anything more than a little log cabin with no phone line and an ancient and quirky oven.

Point is, little lakes are actually so ubiquitous here that pretty much everyone has a cottage on one. And that is a wonderful thing, because here in central Canada it gets as hot in summer as it gets cold in the winter. So if you drive a couple hours out of town into the bush, it gets colder, and there is much in the way of swimming, naturing, beering and merriment.

So at the cottage is where we spent our Canada Day long weekend. Much swimming, naturing, beering and merriment was had, indeed.

I am pretty thankful that Liam is now a real grown-up with a normal nine to five job that allows for the kinds of extravagances like extra – long weekends at the cottage.