Forgotten tea party photos!

I was going through my camera the other day, trying to clean off the SD card to make room for Christmas photos and I realized I forgot to edit and post these photos!  They are from High Heeled Life's charity tea party back in November.  Each of us got to go home with little treats and some of us won prizes!

Hand made, chocolate dipped marshmallows!

Soap and hand cream from C&E - I love the ribbon!

Treats for the bath, chocolates and an eye mask!  

How cute!  The ribbon is awesome!

These are such simple but sweet ideas for prizes and favours for parties!  Thanks again HHL!


Have a fabulous day!

Monday's Random Thoughts

It has been a crazy couple of week of meetings, meals, events and work! 

- On Sunday I attended a charity tea at High Heeled Life's house...you can see the pictures here.

- On Monday I attended the annual Rural Urban dinner in our town.  The first surprise was when I found out we are the urban side.  Really?  Ok!  The rural side is verrry rural.  Farmers.  Like reallio trulio farmers.  The second surprise was when I realized that even tho we were sitting at the same table as 6 farmers, they weren't going to speak to us.  Hermes Scarf Friend and I tried forcing ourselves on them but they were having none of it!  The urbanites *ahem* are expected to mingle with the farmers and we will be called out if we don't.  It's all in fun and raises money for charity but I think I will raise some expectations of the farmers...like next year they should actually speak to us!

- On Tuesday morning I had a civic awards meeting.  I picked up the chair of the committee and we went to another member's house.  He must be retired as he is around all the time and...he baked us scones!  I want to know who the heck has time at 8am to bake and clean up before someone comes over at 9am!  I didn't know much about what this meeting was about - and I was told I was chairing it!  Ummmm.  Shoooot!  I made it up as I went along and we got through it!  The chair sent me the nicest email telling me how much she admires and respects me.  I get a bit misty just thinking about it!

- Tuesday evening I had another meeting - Rotary Christmas fundraising this time.  Last year we made it competitive and had teams assigned to each of us.  This year we are keeping the teams but not the competition...but if we sell 500 hams and 150 boxes of chocolates the chair of the fundraising committee will come to a meeting in drag...and makeup.  He is currently growing his mustache for Movember.  This will be fun.

- If you follow me on Twitter you might've been witness to my thoughts on a conversation about ribbon colours for the Christmas chocolate fundraiser.  The chair thought pink ribbon on lime green boxes would be weird (because agreeing to dress in drag and makeup isn't weird).  A lawyer on Twitter actually offered to call him and sort it all out!  Now preps, don't worry, I got my way and we will be offering the choice of pink or red ribbon on the chocolate boxes. Crisis averted.

- The basement renovation is coming along nicely.  The drywall is almost all up which means the power tools will get a break...as well as my headache.  The other day the guys were down there and a fight escalated until I thought it was going to come to blows.  The guy in charge knows one of the issues we have had is the noise level.  Not the work noise, but the stereo they play down there and the fighting that used to go on and rang through our entire house...one of them has the whiniest voice, it just makes people want to punch him in the face!  Anyhoo, the fight got louder and louder until I heard the guy in charge yelled at the top of his lungs 'We're not supposed to be yelling!!!!!!!!'.  And then silence.

- Hermes Scarf Friend and I worked for the hospital gala last week.  We set up the silent auction room and there were 85 items!  Some of them were big ticket like Pilot Friend donated a flight for 4 to Ottawa, a tour of the parliament buildings and lunch with our local MP, trips to Toronto with hockey tickets, $400 bottles of wine and so much more!  I have watched enough soaps to know getting on the hospital board will be the pinnacle of my career as a Suburban Princess...this is step one towards that goal!  It was so much fun seeing my custom ribbon on a few of the auction items!  To order your own personalized ribbon please visit Royal Ribbons!

- The other day the Little Prince was looking at photos on one of the laptops.  He came across one from the highland games in the summer and said 'Oh I do love a marching band!'.  He is definitely an old soul!

- I went to a 'shopping extravaganza' the other night.  I was invited to bring my ribbon samples, a dish for the food table and a prize for the gift basket.  I had never been to this sort of thing so I had no idea what to expect.  I'm all for being a team player but I would struggle with asking people to bring so much to my house.  Have you been to such a thing?  The hostess invited lots of vendors from different companies to set up their displays and invited lots of guests to come and get some Christmas shopping done while holding a glass of wine and eating something one of the vendors brought.  One of the shoppers won the gift basket all the vendors donated to.

- Remembrance day brought nice weather.  I am always happy to know the people at the memorials don't have to stand in the rain or snow.  I find these events so emotional and end up having to think of other things while I am there so I don't start sobbing.

-  Does no one ask 'How are you?' back anymore?  I always lead with 'Hi so-and-so, how are you?' and almost always get 'Good thanks' back but they never ask me how I am!  It's a bit of a conversation killer isn't it?  I'm always left wondering if I am supposed to walk away, carry on with what I was going to say, stand there staring at them....

- I have been talking to the Little Prince about Santa and asked if he is going to write a letter to Santa.  'Yes'...Ok...I asked what he will say in the letter.  He replied, 'Thank you'.  Four words:  Mom. Of. The. Year.


Have a fabulous day!

Charity Tea Recap & Photos!

Last weekend I attended a charity tea at High Heeled Life's house.  It was called the Serendipity Christmas Tea and we were all asked to bring an unwrapped gift for a teen girl which would be donated to the local charity collecting for Christmas.

 

We were greeted at the door with a glass of champers.  You can see it ready and waiting on the table.  I've decided I need to be handed a glass the moment I walk into any building.

The all important branding and signage!

 

Some great items were collected for the teen girls who need some love at Christmas.

 

Every surface was beautifully decorated - I know the pain of living with a renovation!

 

Sometimes we just work with what we have!

 

Prepare to gain 10lbs just looking at the food - I lost track of how many treats I ate!

Everything was beautifully made and presented!

 

Never be afraid to ask if something you are deathly allergic to is in something you are being served.  Better safe than sorry!  I was told tho, these were amazing!  

 

More food read to be warmed up!  

These were delicious - cranberry and turkey I think!

 

Seriously...I would've forgotten to serve the tea!  

Fortunately HHL always has lots of people around to help out!

 

Three different teas with all the fixins!

 

Sugars and honey!

I had eaten so much I didn't even try to top it off with a scone, but everyone else raved about them!

 

Mmmm clotted cream.  'Nuff said!

 

After sugar and champers it's nice to have a glass of cold water

 

Uh huh.  We were expected to eat it all!

 

My favourite cupcakes!

 

Macarons.  NOT Macaroons.  Two totally different cookies. 

Don't try to tell me in America they are called Macaroons.

They aren't.

 

So about those cupcakes....if you are ever invited to HHL's house, ask for the cupcakes.

Treasures from Paris.

 

One of the tables all set for a group of ladies.

 

All the little details were perfect!

 

Every teacup was different!

 

Another table by the big comfy couches!

 

Magazines were laid out...just in case 7 women ran out of conversation!

 

Fresh flowers everywhere!

 

I sat at one of the couches to eat all of the yummy treats. My favourite was the egg salad sandwiches - apparently they contained some highly guarded, secret Italian ingredient.

 

Yes, I photographed other plates too!

 

Thanks for inviting me to your charity tea HHL!  I had a great time with the girls!

After we ate everyone gathered around the big couches and like fun loving women who are no threat to each other we laughed and screeched and cackled and had a great time!  Now we know one of the girls has her family's meals all cooked by her MIL, her husband gets the kids to school and does the ironing and the children sort the laundry.  She gets to read books and take baths (oh and work full time).  We are all a little jelly bean!

At the peak of hilarity there was a tentative knock at the door - the room went silent and one of the husbands was let in....looking terrified!  We sat there looking mostly prim and proper until we forgot he was standing there before we went back to conversations about why men cheat, how to make children say please, religion in the 1st and 3rd worlds and anything else we could come up with!

I was exhausted by the time I got home!  It was a great day for a great cause!

Have a fabulous day!

Outfit of the day

I always mean to take photos of my outfits but usually I am busy trying to get out the door without forgetting anything and by the time I get home I cant be bothered but I managed to pull together a polyvore!  I took all of my brain cells to get this to work and once I saved it I had no idea how to get it onto my blog except as a screen shot so I have some learning to do!  I just wish I could upload my own photos to polyvore.

In the spring I was in T&Co so I could pick up the mug I wanted and, while I waited in line (in the middle of the day - what recession?), I did some people watching.  There were three girls from England being served - they were dripping in 'Return To' jewelry and denim vests.  You know the type.  I think they subscribe to the idea of keeping their money where they can see it!

I'm not one to wear more than one piece of a certain brand at one time.  I feel it makes one look like one is trying too hard.  In this case though my T&Co wrap is the only one that goes with this outfit and I only wore it on the plane when I was chilly.  Otherwise I would've chosen a different wrap - by the way, if you don't have a silk/cashmere wrap, I highly recommend putting one on your Christmas list.  They are perfection year round!


Have a fabulous day!

How a spoiled princess gets to a Rotary conference!

Last weekend my Rotary club was hosting the district's annual conference but we don't have a place to hold a conference in this town so we had to have it in Collingwood which is about 4 hours away.  I was thinking I wouldn't be going as I could only make it on the Saturday and 8 hours of driving in one day just isn't my idea of time well spent.

Enter my pilot friend.  He had offered to take a group of Rotarians up to the conference on the Friday afternoon and since I asked nicely, and make him custom ribbon and treats for his plane he agreed to take me on the Saturday morning.

In case you are wondering how I come to know people with private planes and get flown around...I make nicenice with everyone and ask for what I want.  Life is as simple as that!  I asked my pilot friend and if he had said no, well then...I wouldn't have gone.  But he is a nice man who is easily bribed so he agreed to meet me at his airport (yes, his airport) at 9am on Saturday.

Pilot friend needs a code name...Daddy Warbucks?  The Red Baron?  Any other suggestions?

Let's have a look at this plane.  The bottom arrow is the 'step' and the top arrow is at the hand grip.  I am 5'2" and had a moment when I wondered if I would need a boost or a box to stand on.  Fortunately I was wearing pants with a little stretch so I managed to get up there with minimal embarrassment.  The object is to put one foot on the step, grab the hand grip, then step up onto the wing near the door.  I should point out this turned out to be a lot easier than getting down from the plane, in high heeled boots.

The plane has all the bells and whistles including auto pilot, traffic alerts, gps and heat (which I found is important as it's chilly up there in the big blue sky!).

The screen on the left shows the horizon, altitude and speed...the one on the right shows our route and the geography around us.  Another amazing feature this plane has, which the pilot called 'The Wife Pleaser', is a parachute.  I don't mean a parachute for the passengers...the plane has it's own parachute.  My blood pressure dropped dramatically back to a normal level when he told me about this and showed me how to use it.  One never knows when the pilot flying the plane might have a problem and be unable to land safely - pulling the chute and turning off the power to the plane will let it float down to the ground safely.

Ready to take off.  Pilot friend has a hangar and runway across the road from his house.  Another benefit of living in the country...there's lots of land!  It's completely hidden from the road, easy to get to and has it's own parking lot.

 

 The moment one realizes...no one is flying the plane!  It was on autopilot so we got to chat and learn about the plane on the way to Collingwood. 

The cars are so tiny!  We were about 24,000 feet up which sounds like a lot but isn't really but the cars, houses and sheep still looked teensie!

Checkerboard farms.

 

Pilot friend asked me if I wanted to fly the plane and, since I'm not an idiot, I said YES!  He told me what to do, took it off autopilot and I took over.  I wasn't very daring as my goal for the day was staying alive (sing along with me!), so I focused on keeping the plane in the air, going straight and in the right direction.  I did learn it's easier to fly by looking out the window than at the controls and screens.  But then I've never been very good at video games!

 

We got to Collingwood, borrowed an airport car and went to the conference.  Yes, I almost forgot we were doing this for the good of Rotary.  When we got there they were between sessions and on a coffee break.  Perfect timing!  So we got cookies and warm bevvies and figured out which sessions to sit in on.  But not before making our way through the crowd of very excited Rotarians and so many friends I haven't seen for a while (who were all suitably jellybean knowing I was flown there).  My chocolate chunk cookie and I chose to go to the microfinance and microcredit session and I am so glad I did!  I am sure we have all heard of Kiva (I have countless Kiva loans out there in the 3rd world) and this session explained the Rotary system of microfinance and how loan officers on the ground, in the trenches so to speak, help people save, get loans, learn about business and get out of the dire conditions we all have seen on tv but are fortunate enough to not have to endure.  Yes, I know...run on sentence.

After that session we had lunch and got to see all kinds of awards being given out.  Because this was a district conference for 55 clubs, getting an award is a bit of a big deal.  Awards were given for literacy programs in schools designed by Rotarians, monies raised by Rotarians to help eradicate polio, awards for amount and length of service.  I saw a man I thought looked familiar then realized he is Jack Layton's son, there to accept an award given to Jack who was also a Rotarian.  Agree or disagree with his politics, he was a true Rotarian and devoted his life to 'the people'.

After lunch we saw a presentation by Jamie Fraser (not that Jamie Fraser) of Dignitas International and he spoke of his time in Africa working as a doctor.  When he came back to Canada he was so affected by his experiences (some of them were very unpleasant and spiritually damaging) he knew he needed to continue the work, so, he has devoted his life to changing how the 1st world views AIDS in the 3rd world.  He has been fighting to get governments to provide the same treatments as anyone in Canada would get.  This is so important as the 3rd world will always be the 3rd world if something doesn't change.  Eradicating AIDS in Africa means countries wouldn't be as dependent on the 1st world.  Isn't that what we all want?

 

After the presentation there was a big walk in Collingwood to promote our efforts to eradicate polio worldwide. Pilot friend/Daddy Warbucks/Red Baron and I chose that time to leave as neither of us had planned on staying for the dinner and gala.  When you know that many people in a crowd it takes a while to actually get out the door.  I was happy I got to see our friends who do so much good work in Laos before they left - we wont see them again until April at the earliest!

Pilot friend is in agriculture and used to own grain elevators in Collingwood so he asked if I wanted to see how one works.  We arrived just in time to see a truck of corn being weighed, tested then unloaded into the elevator.  The machinery is huge and everything reeks of ethanol.  We got to taste the corn, which is very dry and grainy when it's not cooked on the fire and slathered with butter and salt.

The farmer bringing the load of corn in saw my badge and said 'I see you are a Rotarian'.  I said we both are (pointing to pilot friend) and he was asking what we were doing up there and told us he is a Rotarian in another district.  We are everywhere.  My one regret is I didn't ask the farmer more questions about how they harvest the corn and get it off the cob...so unlike me!

We got back to the Collingwood airport, gave back the loaner car, inspected the plane and got on our way back home.  Lots of autopilot and chatting about pilot friend's family history in the area and maybe a teeeeeensie little bit of gossip about a mutual friend.  We did a lap of our town and it was so neat to see town hall and the park from the air!   My camera battery was dying so I didn't get any shots of town but let's hope there is another chance!

 

I managed to squeeze in one last shot before the battery died.  We were about to land at pilot friend's airport when he told me other pilots this he is crazy to land between the trees like this.  Charming.  I suggested he not tell people that until after the flight is over!  We landed safe and sound, disembarked and got the plane put away.  The Suburban Prince and Little Prince arrived about a minute after we landed so they missed the plane coming in but did get to see it in the hanger and chat with pilot friend for a few minutes. 

Not a bad way to spend a Saturday in October!

I got home and then had to put a load of laundry in an go get some groceries.  It's a hard splat back to reality!  That's the problem with being a spoiled princess - real life is a bit hard to stomach!  To add to that, we got a call around 9pm that the town is in a state of emergency because our water station had two pumps break and we need to conserve water.  As in....odd numbered houses get to shower on odd numbered days and we have to go get cases of water from the rescue and emergency volunteers set up in town.  The good news is I have lined up for water in 3rd world country so doing this didn't seem so bad.

Have a fabulous day!

Lavender Festival

Last weekend we went to the lavender festival 20 minutes away.   I have never been to one but after seeing The Rich Life's post on the one she went to I decided to check this one out.  It was held in a big red barn and the Little Prince was so excited to be going to a real barn!  I forgot to take a photo of it!

The chefs were busy doing something...I honestly have no idea what that was tho!  4 chefs...1 barbeque!

 The menu - which really doesn't explain what 4 chefs were doing! The ice cream was made at a local creamery, the cookies were baked ahead of time, the lemonade was in big jugs...the only thing being cooked was the beef which the Suburban Prince said was amazing.  I went to get something out of the car and he had inhaled it before I had a chance to take a picture.  So handsome husband, if you read this...always photograph your food before eating it!

The view from the barn - Lake Ontario in the background and the beautiful fields of lavender.  For those who don't know...I live in Canada hence the Canadian flag flapping in the wind.

 They also grow lots of other plans and herbs...I love how the garden is laid out in a grid.

 

Inside the barn were lots of funky pieces like chandeliers....

 

An old sleigh...perhaps once driven by Santa?

I was loving this seating area...it made me miss Mad Men a lot this summer!  Don?  Roger?  Cocktails anyone?

 

I big beautiful quilt adds a splash of colour!

 

 A huge bowl of dried lavender - I could smell it for a couple of days after the festival!

 

 
A table of pretties for sale...tea sets, napkins and pottery.

 Cards made from photographs of the farm - you can see the big red barn in one of them!

 Lavender soaps all tied up and ready to gift!

The soaps are so pretty yet so rustic at the same time!

These are laundry bags with packages of lavender in the bottom to keep the shtinkies out of your hamper!

Lavender filled pillows guarantee a good night's sleep, unless of course, you are Jamie Fraser!**

My favourite part of the event...lavender cookies and lemonade!!   I have been known to make my own lavender cookies and having them at the festival reminded me to make some this summer!  I will have to figure out how to make lavender lemonade because it is just so yummy!  If I work some magic I will post the recipe.

The lavender ice cream was nice - but I was expecting the actual ice cream to be lavender flavoured...it did make me want to experiment a bit with my lavender this summer.   Book your flights as  I will need some taste testers!

The road home with Lake Ontario in the background.

All in all I liked this event...they had directions on the website (but no times), had nice lavender signs along the route to help guide us there, the staff was dressed in lavender and knew a lot about their products, the food was good and everyone we chatted with was friendly.

It would've been nice to have music there, perhaps a quartet or some other local musician would've livened up the event.

Also, we had to buy tickets for each food station which is a great way to manage that sort of thing, but we had to buy tickets from the ladies who were selling everything else like soap and linen spray which meant we had to stand waiting for all the browsers and window shoppers to move on before we could buy tickets - so, if the lavender festival people are reading this, make things simple and have a separate station for buying tickets!


I look forward to visiting again next year!


Have a fabulous day!

PS...If you are able, please leave your comments here - I love being able to go back through to years and see what people said.  Unfortunately comments left anywhere else cant be saved the same way :O(  I read them no matter how they are left for me but I would love to save as many as possible.

**Jamie Fraser is one of the main characters in the Outlander series...because of a nasty incident with someone who always for lavender cologne he cant stand the smell of it!