More Books

Here are a few more books I've finished.

The Hollow by Nora Roberts

This is the second book in the Sign of Seven Trilogy. The first, Blood Brothers, came out last year. The third , Pagan Stone,is coming out in December. I am loving these books. I think they are the best Nora Roberts books I have read. It starts out in the first book where 3 boys stand around the Pagan Stone and become blood brothers. This seems to unleash something very weird and scary. Then things start happening every 7 years. You just have to get these book to read. I can't wait for the third one.

An Absolute Scandal by Penny Vincenzi

I think I've read all her books. I've enjoyed them all. I love a really thick book to read (881 pages) but I do find them hard to hold when laying down reading in bed! It took me a while to get into this book as I had a hard time keeping the characters straight. Who went with who etc. Once I got into it I really enjoyed it. All about what can happen when people put all there money in a sure thing and then it turns out its not a sure thing after all and the dire consequences

With You Beside Me by Catherine Anderson

The first two Coulter Family Novels: Phantom Waltz and Sweet Nothings. I'm going to have to see if I can find any more books about the Coulter Family. The first one is about a barrel racer that has an accident and becomes a paraplegic. The second one is about her brother who helps a women who has stolen a horse. Both stories are quite predictable but I did enjoy them.

All three are a pretty good read. Definitely nothing heavy-good summer reading.

Bye for now

Hail

Every morning I go out to my back yard and spent about half an hour dead heading my flowers and pulling the odd weed. I was just thinking how nice the flowers were. The pots were so full and overflowing with blooms. I should have taken some pictures but I got busy with other stuff.

We went out shopping this afternoon. While we were out the sky became very black and the rain came down. As we were driving home we were listening to the radio and they were saying there had been a lot of hail not far from where we live. Well, I guess it was a lot closer to where we live because this is what I found when we arrived home.

You couldn't see any green in the pots this morning because there were so many blooms. I guess I shouldn't feel so bad because we just heard on the TV that some houses have flooded basements in areas only a few blocks from our house.
I do love my flowers though and I sure hope they come back.
Bye for now.

Summer Time

My goodness, 2 weeks of the summer holidays have gone already! Time flies...and all that jazz.

It was Stampede time in our city last week. We went down to the grounds for the day and saw everything that was on offer. Well, almost everything. We spent far more time in the barns than I usually like. The smells didn't seem to be too bad this year. I'm most definitely a city girl and don't particularly like all the animal smells.

This is one of the horses that helps to pull the Budweiser wagon. He doesn't look that big, but these horses are huge.

This big boy was hanging out in one of the stalls.There were lots of miniature horses there.

Watched some sheep sheering. We went to see the finals of the marching band competition. This is a highlight . The competition goes on all day. They are some of the bands that took part in the Parade at the beginning of the stampede. This, the stampede, is a 10 day event. It was a band from California that won.This is a beautiful quilt that was on display.I love this quilt, it's all boxer shorts!!
I've been spending time in my yard just about every day. It's looking pretty good. We've been having quite a bit of rain though. Not a whole lot of hot weather.
Bye for now.

Books,Books, Books

I Heard That Song Before by Mary Higgins Clark

This is by the 'Queen of Suspense' so the cover claims. I think it was very predictable actually. It wasn't a bad story but you new what was going to happen right from the getgo. It's a very easy read though, so great for the summer. Certainly makes you think about sleep walkers though.

In the Dark of the Night by John Saul

I've read every John Saul book there is and I still enjoy them. This one was definitely different. It's all about weird things happening in an old lakeside house. Seems a doctor that lived there, years ago was up to more than dispensing perscriptions.

Bones to Ashes by Kathy Reichs

Another Temperance Brennan mystery. If you haven't read her books before Reich creates stories about a forensic anthropologist (which is what she is in real life). This one is about trying to find out what happened to a childhood friend, and whether some bones that were found are her. I enjoyed this one.

I'm shocked. The power just went off, right in the middle of me writing this post. I thought for sure I would have lost it but it got saved as a draft. Blogger came through, you don't hear that very often.

I think I'll quit while I'm ahead.

By for now.

Schools Out for Summer!!!

Yeah! No school for 2 months. I'm really ready for this break.
In the last weeks of school we went to the zoo and had a great time. The kids really love seeing all the animals. It's amazing how protective the adult elephants were towards the baby.Many peacocks wander freely throughout the zoo.There was a baby giraffe as well, but I couldn't get a good picture.It's hard to see but there is a baby gorilla that is only 2 weeks old.

It was a very special end of year for us this year. We had a student graduate and go on to Junior High and one boy move up to a higher level class. A great accomplishment for autistic kids.
The flowers in my yard are finally starting to look pretty good. We had so much rain and very little sunshine in the last month or so that everything was late. Finally we have some really nice weather (high 20's, low 30's C so far). With all that rain our hedge was so overgrown, it took a couple of hours to trim it this morning. It looks really nice when trimmed but it doesn't take long before it needs trimming again. I'm now at the point of thinking about having it taken out. It serves no real purpose, it's just along the side of our driveway.
My BFF gave me some lilies last fall from her yard and this is the first that came up this year.This is a blueberry bush I bought. I would love to have blueberries every year. Hopefully it will survive the winter.

Bye for now.

Procrastinating!!

I think if I procrastinate much longer I'll forget I have a blog!! I can't believe it's been a month since I posted. I think my main problem is that I spend so much time reading other people's blogs I never have time to post anything on my own blog. Plus it has been raining so much that I don't have any pictures either.

We've had a few nice days and I did manage to get some yard work done. Managed to dig out a bunch of tiger lilies. They are worse than weeds for spreading. I took a chance and planted a blueberry bush. It said it was zone 3 so hopefully it will survive. Finally got all my tomato plants put in, forgot to put one in my upside down planter though. All my pots are planted but everything seems to be at a stand still because it's been so wet with little sun. Got to work this morning and half the parking lot was flooded from the rain on the weekend!!!

I had a beautiful big bunch of red tulips at the side of my driveway but we had an early morning visit from a couple of deer who decided they should eat half of them for breakfast. Not impressed. Eat my grass, eat my weeds, but leave my flowers alone!!! Actually it's really unusual to have deer on our street. We live in the burbs but we are a few kilometers from deer country.

I work for the school board and am part of support staff. Well, we are having rotating strikes. We walked out for 2 days last week and we will be out for the next 2 days this week. I don't know how much good this is doing but I hope something happens soon. We will have lost 4 days pay after this week which is not easy especially with the summer break coming up. We don't get paid over the summer so this strike on top of that is not good.

I've read a few books since my last post but I'll save that for another day.

Bye for now.

Time Flies!

Where does the time go? It's been ages since I posted anything. We have had the weirdest Spring ever. One day it is snowing the next it is really nice. Last night we were supposed to get 10-20cm of snow but we only got about 5cm. Most of it was gone by this afternoon and once again it was really nice. We are supposed to be at about 20 degrees C by the middle of next week. I hope we have seen the last of the snow.

We went to see GD#1 in her baton twirling competition on the weekend. It was the provincials so it was quite important. She did really well. She got 3 firsts, 2 seconds and 1 fourth. This is all leading up to going to the world championships in Ireland in August. We are all very excited for her.

We really haven't been doing much around here. I think it's about 7 more weeks of school left before summer break. I know I'm really looking forward to that. Nothing major planned as of yet, just looking forward to the break.

Son #4's kids came over on Sunday for a sleepover. GD is 7 and GS is 4. They were so good, had lots of fun playing and went to bed with no fuss. DH had them all day the next day while I went to work. They had lots of fun at the park.

This is what they brought me when they came over. Two little vases of beautiful crocuses that they had picked on a hill near their house.

I've been playing around with the macro setting on my camera. Some pictures turned out really well, but others were very blurred. I need a lot more practice.
We got a lovely bunch of tulips at work last week for support staff day.
The knitting I had on the needles last post is finished. It's been finished for a couple of weeks but it has been sitting in my laundry room waiting to be blocked since then. So it will probably be a while before it is camera ready. I hate the blocking and sewing together part. I love the knitting part though.
Hopefully I will get my act together and post again fairly soon. I have read a few more books I want to post about.
Bye for now.