June 15,16, 2013 Father's Day Tradition continues...

Well, another Father's Day at the cottage.  The weather was great and lots of good food was consumed!!  The Kempe's brought their trailer again -- they were headed to their camp out at Cookstown after the weekend.

It was a perfect time of the year to enjoy the lilacs and I discovered so many more big lilac bushes/trees than I ever had seen up there before! The smell was delicious!

The dogs were pretty well beside themselves with joy to have 4 Grandparents there at the same time for cuddling and spoiling with treats!

After Sunday brunch, gifts were opened by the father's and everyone settled in for a picture show.

My Dad received solar lights to match his new deck at the back of his house.

Paul's Dad received strings of lights to go on the new gazebo at their trailer site in Copetown.

Mom K brought a Father's Day cake for the guys!

Later, after brunch, some of us decided to take a hike around the trails.  Rudy immediately disappeared down a different trail than the one we were on.  We called and called and finally I went to see what happened to him.  We found him at the base of a tree going crazy and barking like a mad dog. At first I though "oh no" its a skunk or a p-pine but....thank heavens it was just a baby p-pine!! Luckily it was out of reach in the tree but that didn't stop Rudy from trying to climb the tree - at one point he was actually bracing himself against one trunk while climbing the other - that is the picture below:

Here are pictures of the baby - not very good but his camouflage is pretty good and he blends in well with the tree trunk.

The poor little thing was scared to death and we were scared that its mother was going to appear and start shooting quills!
I had to grab and hold Rudy and bring him back to the cottage and every time I let him out he would right back to that spot - finally we had to put him on his leash when he went out.  Later in the afternoon when we made certain the baby was gone we were able to let him out.

I spent some time before we left for home taking some pictures of Spring flowers and here are some of the best ones:

Not sure what this one is - identity tbd!

My one hidden peony plant - I found it at the end of Woodcutter's way.

I also found a big expanse of day lily plants that I didn't know about either!

A new plant I need to identify - only flowers at the junction of the leaves and stems.

Dames Rocket

June 8th and 9th, 2013

Just a quick overnight this weekend, we wanted to come up and make sure all the new plants were surviving and get things tidied up before Fathers Day weekend, next weekend.

We did manage to get out fishing once, but the water was very high and we were not able to walk very far.

We also managed to "drop" in at the farm on Concession #2,  Glencolton Farm and buy some barley straw to combat the pond algae. Some of you may remember the algae problem and my research on the Internet for natural products that would eliminate it without harming fish. We had been guided in the direction of the farm from a helpful home hardware employee, when we realized that the small bags of barley straw pellets would not be cost effective for the size of our pond.

So we headed (Saturday) a mile or so up concession #2 from North line to the large farm with the big "government keep your hands off our land" sign. We drove into the driveway slowly - didn't quite know how to go about this...we saw a couple of youths and we asked them who we might speak to. He said we should probably speak to "Elisa" at the house.  She seemed to be just saying her goodbyes to a visitor so we waited.  When she was free we told her our story and how we had been directed there by the home hardware guy.  She had never hear about the straw solving the algae problem but thought it would make sense as it would produce nitrogen as it decomposed.  I don't think she was particularly happy about having more people sent to her to solve a problem - just a feeling we got.

Anyway, she brought us around the back of one of the barns and showed us the straw and we realized we hadn't brought anything to put it in.  She suggested that they had some empty feed bags in the main barn and we went to the entrance and were very amazed to see a whole stage setup with huge pillars and a seating area.  She explained to us that they used to hold concerts through the summer until the "authorities" told them they needed upgraded safety systems in order to have the public in the barn.  Of course they couldn't afford these changes so the concerts are a thing of the past.

We also found out that they were nearly bankrupted from a legal fight that they had waged about selling their unpasteurized milk.

As we were walking back to the straw, I noticed some little sheds and asked her if her husband was selling these sheds.  She explained to me that they would host school children, mostly grade 4 and/or 5's through the Peel District School Board for a farm experience and that these were little cabins for the kids.  She did mention that they had received some inquires from the Halton District School Board.

So we stuffed our ten bags full, our $30 dollars worth (suckers/city folk born every day) and said our goodbyes and headed back to the cottage.  We moved the bags out of the truck, over by the pond and called it a day and I proceeded to get dinner started and Paul went for a quick fish.

New plantings around the front deck

Sunday, I worked like crazy getting most of the rest of my perennials planted around the front deck and I think it turned out very well.  Its a tough go when the soil is very rocky.

We also wondered what to do with our Barley straw, now that we had finally got it, and I threw in a few handfuls before I decided that I better revisit the web to find out exactly how to apply it to the pond.   Read this paper on controlling Pond Algae with Barley Straw.

In a nutshell I found out that a) we were much too late to apply it, b)it should be packed loosely into net bags, and c) submerged about 3 feet from the bottom.  Well we were NOT prepared to do any of these things! 

So we packed our bags full of straw into the front shed until I found some net bags and it was the appropriate time.

Other than that we are all cleaned up for Father's Day!

June 2,3,4, and 5th - Just the Girls and the Dirt!!

Planting Days at the Cottage!  Did I say dirt? Yep lots of dirt - shoveling, screening, carrying, sifting, packing down.  

After heading up to Gravenhurst last Friday afternoon, to help Mom with her planting (which by the way was mostly done), we left Gravenhurst on Sunday the 2nd and headed to Durham.  By the way I saw a funny quote - and since its just the girls :) I thought I should share:

A recent survey discovered that a woman's "I'll be ready in five minutes" and a man's "I'll be home in five minutes" are exactly the same.

How true!

Anyway...Monday we went on our plant buying mission.  I had brought some plants that I bought in Gravenhurst and also some perennials that Mom had potted, transplants from her garden.  I wasn't sure what I wanted this year, but was hoping to follow the K.I.S.S. method.  Its just too hard to experiment with interesting new plants up there, due to the fact that the plants get sporadic care,watering, weeding, bug proofing, deer proofing, etc.  I did decide that I would keep to the shade impatiens for the boxes under the master bedroom since they did fairly well last year and made a fairly good showing.

We headed into town, and in taking a different route, we discovered a garden centre/greenhouse at one of the florists in town.  They didn't have a lot of variety but the plants (especially in the greenhouses) looked pretty healthy.  Mom pointed out a pre-planted window box, with a mix of 4 different colours that I really was taken with.  I decided to buy this exact combination of flowers for the window boxes under the front windows.  The flowers turned out to be trailing calibrachoea  and I was only able to get the partial amount and colours I needed for the planting. 

This is similar but not exactly the colours that they had.  I was fairly certain I could get the rest of the colours at the usual flower market I go to, at the L&M market in town.  I continued my shopping and picked out some really interesting varieties of coleus for planting in pots by the front door.  

When I entered the other greenhouse I again discovered an really vibrant pre-planted container with 4 different colours of impatiens (colours I would never have put together) and they were quite stunning.  So I picked out the colours for the 2 boxes under the bedroom window.

These are similar colours

We finally made our way to the L&M market flower market, where I picked up the rest of the calibrachoea colours -  I also picked up a few perennials including some bachelor's button and silver mound.  The only thing I couldn't find was enough of the pale yellow colour of the calibrachoea.  So with Mom in tow, we crossed the street to the FS co-op store to see what they had to offer.  Luckily I found 2 more pale yellow plants and also some spikes (Dracaena) that I had forgotten to get.

Whew!! That was it - I had everything I needed for the window boxes, along with the creeping jenny or Lysimachia nummularia that mom had brought from her garden.  We came home in time to have a refreshing drink and think about what we would have for dinner!!  

Getting started

Next day, Tuesday, we set about getting dirt prepared and plants planted. Since my mother is an amazing gardener, I do let her give me directions for anything to do with flowers, and she said we should sift/screen the dirt from last year’s containers with the bagged dirt we got at the garden centre and some humus from the compost pile here.  This actually took a lot longer than I had ever imagined, simply because we didn't have a sieve for dirt - so (take heart friends that eat salad at our cottage) we use the salad spinner basket.  So we did a really good job but it took forever!!   It was a pretty beautiful day – sunny – not too hot.  We accomplished a lot but we were exhausted.

Sifting and Smiling!

Unfortunately when we went to start the bbq for dinner - it was a no go.  I even had Paul on the phone with suggestions but to no avail.  We ended up having to do our dinner on the stove so we were a pretty hungry pair when we finally got to eat.  We were so tired we didn't even watch one of the videos that we had rented.

Wednesday morning, it was still a pretty nice day when we woke up.  We still had more planting to do, but definitely the end was in site.  We realized that we had come away from Gravenhurst without the pots of seedlings that mom had started for me, which was just a well since we had our hands full with finishing what we had.

We managed to take the dogs around for a little walk before she headed out for home late in the afternoon.  I have decided to wait for a few weeks to take a picture of our plantings, in order to let them take hold.

Paul and I will head up again this coming weekend just to make sure that all these plants are watered and to try and finish more planting before the Father's Day weekend.

May 25/26th - A Nice weekend to get some fishing in - NOT

Yes spring is here - the gnome is out!!!  

It was time to spend getting the garden ready for planting. That means weeding, raking, trimming...well, you know the routine I'm sure!  I hung up another couple of birdhouses that I had found at Homesense, as well as a little bird bath.  I learned how to use the riding lawn mower while Paul got into whipper snipping mode.  Saturday, the sky was sort of threatening and sure enough late in the day we ended up getting some showers.  We made a short trip into town to get a few groceries, movies and look at barley straw for the pond.  We had been told that it is a remedy for the algae problem we have in the pond beside the cottage.  

We found out that a bag of barley straw pellets was about $24.99, and was appropriate for a small ornamental 'city' pond.  There was also another product there that was approximately $28.00 for the amount for an application for a pond of our size.  It is not harmful to fish, but it turns the water blue!  Apparently, the coloring filters the rays of the sun (which help algae to grow).  The store clerk cautioned us though, that if the water is running/flowing, the product would just wash out down the creek.  We agreed with him that this product might be better for a later summer application when the water is a lot more still.

When we asked the Home Hardware clerk about where to purchase barley straw - his only thought was a farm on Concession 2, north of the turn off for North Line.  He said "just drop in and ask the farmer".  I said "will he come out with his shotgun?" The background to my remark is of course that this is the farm that has all the big painted signs proclaiming "government get off our land" and other such sayings!! 

When we left the store it was pretty close to dinner time so Paul decided that we couldn't just drop in at the farm that evening, and Sunday wouldn't be appropriate either. So...no solution again.

We went for a walk with the dogs when we got back and were amazed again at the vegetation that had just grown so much because of all of the cool, wet weather.

We found 2 comparison pictures, the first is the walkway to the fishing put in, probably in February/March:
 

This next one is the pathway now (just a little to the right):
 

I think this is why fiddle heads are such a delicacy.  One week there is no sign of them and within the next 2 weeks the ferns are unfurled!

That evening we had delicious steaks (not premium beef) that I had from our freezer at home.

The next day, we were planning to go fishing.  Paul got up with the dogs as usual, but by the time I got up he was going back to bed complaining of a headache and bad stomach.  I though maybe it was just that he had been drinking coffee on an empty stomach and tried to get him to eat some toast - but he was having none of that!

Well whatever he had, it really knocked him for a loop.  He was in bed for the whole day, kept trying to get up but every time after a few minutes would end up in bed again.  He slept a lot of the time.  Not sure where he picked up the bug, he thought it was something he ate but I had exactly the same things (but a different steak).

So the dogs and I had a pretty quiet day - lots of reading, a bit more clean up outside and a couple of walks, mostly taking more flower pictures!!  I found a couple of interesting flowers but I had no idea what they were. I have since discovered the name of the flower below is a "Wood Betony".  As far as  the other picture below - I have no idea - if you know, let me know!  It looked sort of like a dandelion going to seed but the stem is much different.

 

Wood Betony

Mystery Flower

 

So, that was about it for the weekend. It was touch and go whether Paul could make the drive home but by the time I got everything cleaned up (OMG lots of work) he was well enough to be a passenger.  Needless to say I was very tired when I got home that night!!

May Two Four! - Well OK really 17, 18, 19, 2013

How nice that our usual May long weekend cohorts were able to head to the cottage this weekend!!!  They have been navigating a lot of family health trials, so it was touch and go!  

Tammy and Don arrived Saturday afternoon - without children!! and we were without children!! Wow - that's a first!  It was a beautiful day, so we paid homage by sitting on the front deck and enjoying some cocktails....just getting updated.

Tammy and I headed into Varney to Premium beef, we wanted to get some fresh steaks for the evening's meal.  We also picked up some nice, thick sliced pea-meal Bacon for the morning.

That evening we played Euchre, partners Don and I and Paul and Tammy, and Don and I were pretty hot.  Which is saying a lot since last time we played we had a dismal showing!!  We finished in a tie but we were all too tired to continue so we called it a night!

Sunday morning started off as all good cottage mornings start off - sunshine, coffee, reading!

Luckily for me, Tammy remembered to bring some "gossip rags" pseudo celebrity magazines, another must have for cottage long weekends!

 After snacking on fruit to hold us over, Paul and I decided to take advantage of the beautiful weather and go fishing.  We didn't have much time to fish as we had plans to go out to a late lunch.  We asked Tammy to walk  the dogs down to the put in point with us - we had never seen Sadie go into the water as deep as she did trying to follow us into the river.  Tammy eventually manged to persuade the dogs that they had to come back to the porch with her and we made our way down the river.

First fish of the season for me!

I think the net's just really big!! Speckled/Brown Trout

Paul was unfortunately unsuccessful that day but I actually caught a small catfish as well - which Paul said is quite unusual in the river.  Of course we practice "catch and release"!

We headed back to the cottage and got ready to head to our lunch at Munshaw's Bistro, in Flesherton http://www.munshawsbistro.com/.  This was the restaurant recommended to us by Emily's boyfriend's dad.

 

Happily, the restaurant was everything that we had heard, small menu but fabulous food!!  Of course, the selection from the dinner menu is larger and it looked to be a really great wine list.  It's quite small inside so reservations are recommended (as I was also told by the chef, Paul Lavender, when I spoke to him via email).  

Don had a jerk pork dish, Paul had trout, Tammy had grilled chicken salad and I had trout cakes - Paul and I also split a beet, walnut and goat cheese salad.  Tammy, Paul and I had craft beers from Neustadt brewery and Don had wine.  Everything was delicious!!

We were able to have quite a conversation with our waitress, who turned out to be the owners daughter, and a show jumper.  This brought the owner into the conversation, Paul Lavender (the chef), who told us that he and his wife hailed from Windsor.  This in turn started a side bar between him and Don about all the "hotspots" in Windsor, since Tammy and Don lived outside of Detroit at one time.  Another interesting thing that we found out was that they are part owners of a sustainable trout farm in the area, which explains why there is so much fresh trout on the menu!

As we were finishing off our tea's, we overheard Chef Paul talking to another table (regulars we assumed) about going to the east coast and a Chowder House there.  On our way out I asked him, where he was talking about going on the East coast and he admitted that he and his wife had bought a chowder house in PEI, which had been a lifelong dream of his!  He would be closing the Flesherton restaurant for the month of July and August and will be going out to get the other restaurant going in Belfast, PEI.

The website is http://www.chowderhousepei.com/ it looks amazing!! I swear it will make you want to head East!!

Since our visit there we had passed on this info to some friends who have a vacation property around Lake Eugenia and they were shocked and disappointed that Munshaw's would be closing for the summer months!!  We will definitely go back there in September!

After we returned to the cottage, everyone felt pretty sleepy!  After more sitting on the front porch, Tammy and I decided we would go on a little walk with the dogs to see some burgundy coloured flowers she had spotted on an earlier walk.

Red Trilliums

Sure enough, when we finally found them again, they were red Trilliums which are actually quite rare.  If was funny - we found about 3 of them but that was it, compared to regular  Trillium which as you can see below, usually are found in a group.

Tammy and I also found a couple of other interesting spring flowers - 

Nodding Trilliums

Jack-In-the-Pulpit

Sunday evening we got into the cards once again and had a really tight game, I think Paul and Tammy really thought they could outplay us but May 2013 turned out to be our year!

Monday morning was another lovely morning.  We had a filling late breakfast of scrambled eggs, toast and pea-meal bacon. 

OK maybe not exactly like this - but just as tasty!

It is so nice to be able to eat outside again! 


Just before noon, our guests headed out.  We started doing some yard maintenance and cleaning up but decided that we should go around to Baseline Rd. and hike through to the big pond.  We wanted to mount the game camera over by the pond and also take a look at what had happened over there from the flood in March.  We had not been over since before then.

I think we were both a little anxious - since its nice to keep an eye on our property.  It seemed that everything looked pretty good, although more of my "No Trespassing or Hunting" signs had gone missing.  We were pretty sure that there were tire marks from an ATV heading down the shared lane - but luckily none that we could see on the property.
We were happy to see that the pond was quite full and we could see some nice size fish swimming in the water.  It was quite obvious though that the dock was in sad need of some major repair - add it to the list!!

We got the camera mounted facing out to the pond so we are hoping for some great wildlife shots.  We headed back when the mosquito's decided to come out.  It was a good workout for both man and beast.  We remember to take a picture of a funny structure that we found in a clearing about half way to the pond.  This structure has been there for as long as we owned the property.




















It seems to be the crude foundation of a building.  Not sure if it is from the previous owners or their kids - interesting though - it has never changed since we have been there.

Before we headed home we enjoying another delicious meal - premium beef had a new sausage - pork with cranberry - we tried.

Check out Premium Beef - the best meat around!

Well another successful May Long Weekend with the Williamson's! 

Mother's Day - May 10,11,12, 2013 Noah's Ark - I mean Inn!

In a bit of a different twist this weekend, Paul went up to the property on Friday afternoon.  He was supposed to be canoeing with a friend, but unfortunately, the friends' daughter ended up in the hospital with some health problems so the canoeing didn't happen.

Paul ended up spending a cold and rainy evening doing not much of anything.

Gordon and I drove up on Saturday, late in the morning.  Gord had attended his Grad party the night before but still managed to be ready about 11:30am.  Both sets of parents, Kempe's and Ward's, were supposed to meet us at the property at about 4:00pm.  Emily was working...ahhh the life of a waitress!

Not surprisingly...Gord and I arrived "just" before everyone else.  It was a little cool and cloudy - not exactly nice weather for the meal that I had planned which was Potato salad, Bean salad, Coleslaw and BBQ chicken.  Mom K brought the appetizers which we ate not too long after everyone arrived.  We went on a walk to check out the sights, lots of spring flowers up and lots of muddy spots.

After dinner - which was more suited to a nice hot sunny day - we settled down for a friendly game of Rummoli - in which I sneaked out a win over my dad.  We all settled down fairly early (before midnight anyway!).  Mom & Dad K in the guest bedroom, Mom & Dad W in Gord's bedroom on the futon.

The next morning was cool and rainy.  Brunch was scheduled in Neustadt at 11:30  so we snacked on a plate of cut up fruit to ward off any pre-brunch hunger pains.

More about Neustadt - Grey county

We set off in 2 vehicles, Mom and Dad K and Paul and I in one, and Gordon driving Mom and Dad W's truck.  We drove and drove - it seemed like a much longer time than previously when we visited the Neustadt brewery.  The weather was not too good - cold rainy, some flurries, then rain again.  Finally we made it to our destination Noah's Inn.

Noah's Inn - Neustadt, Ontario

Due to the fact that I had scheduled our Brunch late in the week (I was actually waiting to hear from another spot in Flesherton called Munshaw's Bistro - more on that later...)  we were shown to a large table in the bar area NOT in the main dining room.  I wasn't actually too happy with the situation because we were right beside the front hall where people were entering the building.  Every time the door opened, the cold wind came right into the room and chilled everyone.  We asked them to turn up the gas fireplace, which they did, and that helped the overall chill of the room but not the door opening breeze.
I was also surprised that the brunch was a la carte, I was expecting a long brunch buffet table.
I ordered Eggs Florentine, Paul's mom ordered Quiche, my mom ordered Salmon, Gord ordered French Toast, and all three "big" guys (dad's and Paul) ordered "Rosti" which is a traditional Swiss dish of shredded potatoes and spices.   Some of us also ordered the sweet potato and ginger soup to start and it was very thick and gingery - almost a meal in itself.
It took a very, very long time for our meals to come - they had a new cook and he was making sure everything was good, but it took a long(!!!) time.

During the long interlude of waiting for our meal, we had a nice conversation with the owner (I think Michael?) regarding the history of the Inn and his family.  He also has a very informative booklet made up which we perused, including old bills of sale and delivery notices for the Inn dating many years back.

Everyone was very pleased with their meals, everything was certainly filling and when it came time for dessert we could only order 2 items and pass them around!  One was a pear 
and chocolate tart, and the other was chocolate raspberry cheesecake.  Both very, very rich and sweet. Thank heavens those sharing only got a few bites of each.

Here is our group after brunch, note the terrible weather and winter coats!!

  

We then headed back to the cottage, to continue the Mother's Day celebrations.
Luckily we had all arrived back when the wet snow started, and continued and continued... and got heavier and heavier...

We were quite fascinated with the birds that seemed to realize that winter was upon us again - they were lined up at the feeder!

Gold Finches

Rose Breasted Grosbeaks

Blue Jays

Grosbeak Couple

Rose Breasted Grosbeaks

We actually saw 8 gold finches around the feeder at once.  Paul's mom and I actually went out with a tin pan of seed, so that they would have 2 feeders, but they never went near the pan of seed.

We presented the mothers with cards and gifts.  I had made another trip to Eckhardts Floral Treasures in Durham Check it out - they have the most beautiful things!  Just before we got to the cottage, Gordon took me to the store on Main street as I knew what I wanted to pick out.  I got them both beautiful hand blown glass bird feeders/baths that are on a stand that stick into the ground - about 3 to 4 feet high.  Mother and I had admired them last year when we were in the store, and I kept them in my mind for future gift giving!

After the presentation, Paul insisted that he was going fishing and donned all his gear, even though by this time it was snowing quite a bit.  He was gone for about 1 1/2 hours and he did admit that when he got back he just about was too cold to do anything - here are some pictures he managed to snap on the way back - note the glove fingertips on the side!!

Starting to fish - note the line between the snowflake

The path on the way back

As it got more snow covered we started getting worried about getting home - especially about the parents getting home!!  We decided to start our dinner right away - I had planned a meal of lasagna (see recipe on the Recipe pages), garlic bread and Ceasar salad with a blueberry pie.  Yes way too much food as usual!!!

Dinner was delicious (Donna's lasagna is always a winner!) and everybody got busy getting cleaned up and ready to head for home.  Both sets of parents left at about 6:00pm and Kempe's got home with no problems.  It was pretty precarious for us driving (we of course left later) till about Fergus - then it was just wet.

My mom and dad encountered a big problem on Hwy 11.  A van flipped over onto its roof right in front of them.  Visibility was really bad as were the slippery road conditions!  They pulled over and waited until the first responders got there as there was no way they could get out and cross the highway in the blinding snow.

My mother texted me when they got home and I guess they were pretty shaken up.

Thank heavens we all got home safely on Mother's Day!!