Carla`s Mother`s Day Give Away

Carla is at it again. By holding a give away of a beautiful tote bag and whimsical wallet she is raising money for the Canadian Cancer Society and Leukemia and Lymphoma Society of Canada. Carla is hoping to raise $300 to split between the two charities. Mother`s Day is coming up in May and this is Carla`s generous- spirited way of honouring her mother, her mother-in-law, both affected by cancer.

Please consider joining Carla by making  a donation thereby entering you in a draw to win the lovely tote bag pictured above. Go to this LINK: http://halfdozendaily.typepad.com/my-half-dozen-daily/2012/04/mothers-day-tote-bag-giveaway.html and join in!!

A Number of Things

My lovely mother used to write a column for the Norwich Gazette and she called it "A Number of Things".  Like her, I don't always have just one topic on my mind to write, I often have, well, a "number of things".  So today's post title is brought to you by:

Va va voom, mother dear!
Wish I was as thin as you!

First I'm going to show you what our talented Carla made for me. I'm going to a baby shower on April 1st and look at me, I've already got the present and paid for it out of my gift fund! A blanket, ribbon blankie and burping pad.

 About a day or two after I found out that the mom-to-be was decorating the nursery in a "Peter Rabbit" theme Carla posted her new baby sets made with, what else, "Peter Rabbit" fabric backed with minky! And the predominant colour is green which is perfect as this couple isn't going to find out the gender of their baby.

Well, I mean they will eventually but not before!

 Worried about spit up Peter?? Don't worry, it'll wash out!!

Also included is a hand made card - so sweet!

That wasn't all I purchased, oh no! I had also ordered a mug rug pour moi! I loved the brown paisley materials Carla had posted recently and when I saw the mug rug she made for Makky's mom (I think!) I just had to have one for myself!  And look!

It fits on my little side table perfectly.

 And is a really nice match to my brown paisley chair where I sit to read and blog every day.

 I think this picture is upside down, not really sure, but does it matter?

It works! I love it, thanks Carla!
And I'm not done yet! Carla gave me a bonus gift! Yes she did, I know, she's so sweet!

 It's my own little whimsical wallet - isn't it so cute?? I adore it!  My favorite fabrics!

 So what am I going to use it for?

I'm going to carry it everywhere with me in my purse. It'll replace the boring white envelope I currently carry to put my receipts in. See, there's one in there already!
Thanks Carla - that was an unexpected treat!

Strange story: on Friday when I was leaving Carla's I noticed something hanging down underneath my car. I don't think that's supposed to be hanging like that - and at first I thought it was part of the car. I got down on my knees to take a closer look and saw the word "Emerson", then "play", and "record". At first I thought it was from a pile of stuff I'd taken to Talize, a second-hand store. But that didn't make any sense. I pulled and twisted and finally freed it from the car. Then I hoped and prayed that all of the car's fluids wouldn't leak out!! It was indeed the plastic front of somebody's old VCR!! One of us must have run over it and it got jammed under the car. So far the car seems to be running fine and there are no warning lights on or strange noises or odors! So far no one is admitting to running over anyone's VCR, but then Kazi drove the car last year with a flat tire and didn't notice that either...I'm not accusing anyone...just sayin'.

Tablets c1960

Definition of a tablet c1960: a number of sheets of writing paper, business forms, etc., fastened together at the edge; pad


My love affair with tablets, or pads of paper, began many decades ago (gulp) when my brilliant mother began tucking one into my Christmas stocking each year. We weren't allowed to come downstairs until 7am so my brother Kim and I would amuse ourselves with whatever we found in our stockings which somehow mysteriously appeared at the end of our bed sometime during the night. It wasn't unheard of for us to wake up at 3 or 4am and stretch out a toe to see if we could hear that longed for sound of crinkly wrapping paper and feel the firm but bumpy contours of our Christmas stocking. How thrilling it was!!


We would get together in the boys' room or the girls' room and occasionally even in the bathroom if our older siblings didn't want to wake up. I always hoped for one thing in particular - the thick pad of paper - YES, it's here!! What did I fill it with? Stories of my own, but mostly drawings - drawings of fashion designs (step aside Stella McCartney!) and houseplans...strange hobby huh? 

We look pretty posh don't we? I don't know how she did it but she raised 5 kids on the earnings of my dad's manual labour at the local co-op plus the money she made writing and selling children's stories. With two older sisters you'd think I wore a lot of their hand me downs but they were (and still are hahaha) 9 and 12 years older than me so she had passed their clothes onto others by the time I showed up. I did wear hand me downs, but they were from the daughter of the postmaster and were really good quality, lucky me! 


But I digress...


I want to show you one final gift from my Secret Santa - how did she know  of my long love affair with paper? (and lists!)

I. love. this. tablet!! A nice sized box for each day of the week and a shopping list on the side - perfection! A week at a glance! It goes everywhere with me tucked in a side pocket of my purse. Whatever did I do without it? When I get to the last page I plan to photocopy it and make my own tablet!


Now I must confess to a purchase...what??...but it's NO/LOW Spend January you say?!! HAHAHAHAH, fooled you!! A certain someone paid me back $25.00 so I spent $23 and change on these:

Everything was on sale at Chapters. The KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON daily calendar of British "stiff upper lip" humorous sayings helps keep me sane at work:) The Money Spent tablet has a brilliant setup for recording purchases, and the Great Ideas tablet is so I can record all of those super-de-duper ideas I have no matter where and when I have them!! The two monogrammed notebooks were $1.00 each and I just bought them because. They were cute and I wanted them.


So that is how you can SPEND and still have a NO SPEND day!........
technically.......no? Ah c'mon, it didn't change my balance one little bit AND I put the change into my Sealed Pot! 


The 2012 definition of a tablet: A general-purpose computer contained in a single panel. Its distinguishing characteristic is the use of a touch screen as the input device. Modern tablets are operated by fingers, whereas earlier tablets required a stylus.  (I have one of these too but shhhhhhhhh, don't tell Canadian Saver!! Oh crap, I let the cat out of the bag....)


Which type of tablet do I prefer?? Well, I could exist without my iPad, but I could never ever get through a day without a pad of paper! Sorry Apple!

Secret Santa came to Town!

I am truly enjoying my Secret Bloggy Santa gifts from my mysteriously anonymous Santa! There is a wee bit of dark chocolate left (and no I didn't share! - get your own Secret Santa I say!!) and now I am enjoying two more parts of my gift - LOOK LOOK!!

 I finished "Edge" by Jeffrey Deaver a couple of days ago and since I always have at least one book on the go, even during the busiest times of the year (especially then!) I dove into "Plum Island" from my Secret Santa.  All puns aside it is a "plum" of a book - only 30 pages in and already a DOUBLE MURDER!! Yippee!


What's that you ask? What am I wearing on my feet?? Why, only the coziest pair of hand knitted slippers complete with pink bows! Here, take a closer look...

My gramma always gave me crocheted slippers every Christmas but she died in l986 so that's how long it's been since my toes were this cozy! How did you know Secret Santa??  Not only are my toes warmer but you've taken me back to a simpler time when opening my gramma's lumpy Christmas packages were the highlight of the day. 


My gramma never put gifts into a box...no, she let the lumps and bumps transform the wrapping paper into a lunar landscape that my siblings and I would grapple with trying to figure out the contents. Along with crocheted slippers we would find other little treasures: homemade fudge, a card with a $5.00 bill tucked inside, socks, mittens, the Christmas Lifesavers "book box" (with a whole lot more rolls of lifesavers than you get these days!) and other "homely" items. 


While I'm thinking of my beloved gramma I want to share with you how she managed her money. She lived on the Old Age Pension (OAS) and also a small veteran's pension she received because her husband fought in WWI. Every month she'd cash her cheques and keep the money hidden under a pillow in her bedroom. She'd take out a bit to live on week by week until the end of the month. Whatever was left got transferred into an old purse which was also kept hidden in her bedroom and became her "savings". Then she started over from scratch the next month.


That old purse was her "bank" - like a lot of people of her generation she didn't trust banks and preferred to keep her money close by. When she died in l986 she left instructions for each of her four children to receive a certain amount from that savings purse, in the neighbourhood of $1000 each and left each of her almost 20 grandchildren $100. She also prepaid her funeral expenses. How she managed to save that amount of $$ while living on next to nothing would probably make the most frugal of us look like wastrels! 


I used the money she left me to buy a silver locket at Birk's jewelers in which I keep her picture.

 Ida Belle Catton (nee Gordon) 1891 - 1986

Ida Belle with three of her four children: she's holding the crying face of her youngest, Arthur, while seated in front of her are my Uncle Verne, and my mother - Edith Jane Eileen Harrison (nee Catton).  My gramma's three sons are still living but my mom died from complications of Parkinson's disease in 2000. I looked just like her at that age!


Wow, what a trip down memory lane! I really enjoyed that Secret Santa - thank you!  I guess I do believe in Santa after all!