Bluesfest - Thurs, July 9

I brought my camera along on my first night of Bluesfest.
The first show we saw was Shiloh; she's a bit of an Avril wannabe (in my humble opinion) but she has a strong voice and really played to the crowd.

Sista Monica - your typical southern female blues singer. She can really sing!
Emily Haines of Metric, they're my favourite band right now and I LOVED this show. I hope they'll be back in Ottawa (or somewhere nearby) again soon so I can see more!

This was as close to Ben Harper and the Relentless 7 as I could get (so ya, not close at all - haha). They were good, but not as good as I was expecting.
I didn't bring my camera with me last night but I saw The Stills, Okkervil River, Sam Roberts (who was much better than I had anticipated, I'm not much of a fan normally), and Jackson Browne. I found JB to be a bit too 'adult contemporary' for my liking but Brannon thoroughly enjoyed it, dancing the whole time (to my dismay - hehe). We were right next to the stage so that was pretty great.

Anniversary Fruit

Our anniversary was June 23 so I'm more than a bit late in making this post but I've finally gotten around to it so I hope Mom will forgive me :)
Not only did we receive many email/phone/facebook/snail mail congratulatory messages, but just as I was arriving home from the lab that day, I was greeted by a delivery guy who was dropping off a lovely edible arrangement from my family - Mom, Dad, Stacie, Barnie, and Flower. In other words, it was from my mom :) :) :)
Those in-the-know will understand the small size of Flower's (Luci-Fleur) name *wink wink* - there is no way she'd ever send a good thought my way!!

Life on the dock

I'm sure my parents were wondering what the eff I was doing down on the dock on Sunday (seriously though....what else?)! I was crouched right down at the level of the boards and this is what came from it.

Doors Open Ottawa - Carleton County Gaol

We're getting near the end of this series of photos - I promise!

I've wanted to visit this place for as long as I can remember but I've never had the opportunity before. These photos were taken at the former Carleton County Gaol. It was functional from 1842 until 1972 and today it's a hostel and a museum.

I probably would have missed this little herb garden had C.P. not pointed it out. I guess nothing's ever garbage at a hostel!
The gaol was the site of what is thought to be Canada's last public execution. Prisoners were hanged right here at the front of the building. There is a platform behind the wooden doors that would have been open for public viewing. Then the trap door would be opened and the person would be hanged for everyone to see :(
I couldn't get a better shot because the courtyard is enclosed by a stone wall so I couldn't get any farther away!

So dramatic :)

These are the night-time cells; they're literally just wide enough for a person to fit in. It would be hard to even turn around. Luckily the rooms where travelers stay have been reno'd :)

Hehe - and just for fun, this is a goofed-up shot but I couldn't resist. The building is thought to be haunted by Patrick James Whelan (the last prisoner to be executed) and this looks rather ghostly so I thought I'd post it :)

Ponies and Pigtails

We went to Pickering to celebrate Liz's 30th birthday this past weekend. Most of their friends have children so the party was geared towards both the kids and the adults. Her awesome husband threw a great party - compete with pony rides, a clown, a keg and tonne of food!
I had great aspirations to take photos but that didn't really happen :(

Alex and Miss Dani on one of the ponies. This was a very quick moment, she started to scream a minute later :)

I wish my eyelashes were as long!
Miss Jenna was sporting pigtails, I thought they were cute :)

Temple's Sugar Camp

So, as I said yesterday, we went to Temple's Sugar Camp with Brannon's family. His cousin Todd, his wife Allison and their son, Charlie, were visiting from the GTA so it was a nice excuse for a trip! I would highly recommend this establishment; the food was nothing short of amazing. They have a lot of variety and have pancakes/waffles/breads made with everything from buttermilk and buckwheat to cornmeal and pumpkin (with lots of choices for sides)! It's also fully licensed for those of you who like a beer with your brunch!! lol
Anyway, I didn't have a lot of time for taking photos as we preferred to visit but here are few nonetheless :)


Lines that the sap runs through.
Charlie *trying* to enjoy his taffy. Unfortunately, it kept dripping on him and eventually led to a bit of a freak-out :)
Sap dripping into a pail :)
I'm not sure what it stored in these, I'd like to think it's syrup :)
The sap POURS into gigantic vats!
Steamy :)

Dirty Thirty

Brigitte's 30th birthday came and went this week and we celebrated last night with a surprise dinner at the Absinthe Cafe, followed by a party afterwards at Tracy and Chris's place.
We decided on a 'polka dot' theme.
We had flowers (as 'round' as possible, athough I'm not sure that party really worked out)...

...balloons....
...favours that included smarties (keeping with the theme of course)...
...oysters to keep it 'dirty'...lol....
...surprise dessert at the restaurant....
...and some absinthe of course (my photos of the drink on fire didn't work out)!!We arranged to have polka dots on the cupcakes (with matching polka dot napkins) and mini eggs too!

Since our dearest birthday girl LOVES games, we played a game of Twister! It all goes downhill from here so this is where the photos end! :)
We finished off the night with a dip in the hot tub!
We hope you had a great night (and end to a great birthday week!)!
Love you lots!

Angel Baby

Like so many others, I've lit a candle for Baby Ali, in hopes that by way of a miracle this little girl will pull through. I've had this candle for at least a decade (a gift from my mom, of course, and I just realized that it's moved with me to at least 6 different homes) but never found a good enough reason to actually light it.
I found one today.

In case you can't make out the passage on the candle, here's what it says:

A gentle hand,
a guiding touch
barely felt,
the sign of an
angel's
presence.

Symbolic

I know this isn't a new trick for the photo-bloggers but I'd never tried it before until this evening. I like! I opened up the book I'm currently trying to finish to a page somewhere around the middle but didn't pay any attention to the words...notice the 'puppy love' comment on the left?!?!

Gifties :)

I know I've been terribly delinquent with my blog lately; the truth is I've been delinquent with taking photos as well - just haven't had anything worthy to shoot lately, nor the energy to do so. Anyway, I received a wonderful package today from Miss Lizzy and made the effort to actually photograph the items. THANK YOU so much!

If you don't know what Post Secret is, check out the highlighted text. I very easily get 'sucked in' to these stories; it's very reassuring some days to know that others have problems too :)
Not only is it a great read, I'm sure it'll make for a very interesting conversation piece too!

I'll end this post by noting that I will try harder to post more often again :)

Three Guesses

Both photos are of somewhat random objects; any thoughts as to what they are? The second one actually hurts my eyes a little :(

Stems

Just a random shot (to say I actually posted something) of my beloved Vera Wangs.....

Sunday brunch

I know, today I am scraping the bottom of the barrel with this photo. I came home after a lovely brunch with Janny et al., and after tidying the house a bit (hubby is returning from his trip late Monday night) I just didn't have the energy to go outside to take some photos. I am learning very quickly that I don't like photographing anything inside because of the terrible lighting but I'm glad I took this one anyway. It's an old old old, and apparently dusty, typewriter that was sitting above and behind our table at eggspectations this morning; hence the poor angle. Anyway, what I do like about it is that the shadow clearly shows us from which direction the sun is rising!