London, Paris, New York, Wawa

In a motel in sault ste. marie right now, my mum is sleeping pretty much I think.. My back kind of hurts from driving a lot and my stomach is not awesome, probably from all the Chinese food we ate in wawa... 

I really wish I'd remembered to check if this motel had wifi before we'd signed in, this phone isn't the best for making blog entries on. Thank god I have any type of service now, though. From a few hours before thunder bay until now, in the sault, neither me nor my mum had any service at all. Really kind of bananas! No cellphone service?! Bananas!

Haaa, we're having a pretty fun time, we camped last night and then woke up in the rain, it's been damp all day so we're glad to be snuggled up in this motel. 
Actually this place is sweet, it's got mix-matched flower print sheets and all different towels and furniture and homey touches, it's like a motel that wants to be a b&b! Pretty cute!

I have been taking a billion photos I'm just not sure how to put them from flickr to blogger on this mobile phone guy!

Back in Toronto on Thursday, hopefully I keep phone coverage until then so I can at least update my twitter,
Man I love the Internet!

faaaaamily bonding roadtrip party

(I'm posting this the next morning as the internet connection crapped out last night while I was trying to post this.) 



Day one of the road trip COMPLETE.



I mean, except for how I'm not actually asleep yet.


I'm on the 3rd floor of a B&B which used to be a convent, my mum is sleeping in our room but no one's up here but us so I'm in the common area trying to use the wifi which is weak at best. And I do mean weak!

Awww man it's taking forever to load any webpages! Awesome! I want to go to sleep!

Pretty solid day, despite the 10 hours of driving. My one regret is missing out on the Salvation Army in Yorkton. We got super frustrated trying to find stuff and were behind schedule on account of already going down one wrong highway, so we just left. I did want to see it though..
Spent an awesome $4 at the Lanigan MCC Gift and Thrift, though.

Small town Sask is pretty much the best. Everything was half price at this store too. I was like "should I get this pot? oh it's fifty cents I guess I might as well!"

My mum's getting on my nerves only a bit and it's in a mum-way which last about 12 second and then I get over it. I don't know if I can say the same for me on her nerves... AH WELL.


Also, I did kind of want to go visit the Margaret Laurence house in Neepawa, but we didn't have time. We forgot about the time difference (of course). I love Margaret Laurence. She's dead though she wouldn't have been home anyway.


My mum did read the Neepawa newspaper, though! Exciting times.

Steve-Dave made me download the Moron Test app for iphone (which cost a whole 99cents) and I played a lot of that in the car. Super frustrating and addicting trying to prove you're not a moron!

I am pretty into the scenery. Something I never thought I'd care about. Now it's one of my favourite things.



We're staying the night in Elie, MB. There's a hot tub here! We went in it! Also, there's lots of year-round Christmas decorations around. I like it.
There's more Christmas decorations in one of the closets. I told me mum we should just put them up for them. She was not convinced.
The trains go by so close here we can feel the house shake. Pretty nice.
I wish I owned this old convent then I would decorate it  more tastefully (no offense hahaaaa no offense always means offensive) and have parties. I would also take out the chapel because who wants a chapel in their house? not me.

haha the house is shaking so much right now.


I may or may not wear the exact same outfit tomorrow. Very comfortable for traveling.

let's summer at the country house!

I've decided that instead of calling Violet's farm a farm, we should call it The Country House.
a) it's not a farm (there's no animals at all unless you count wild birds, turtles, and lightning bugs)
b) it's not a cottage as it's not on a lake
c) it's not a cabin, it's got a lawn and it's fully a house with all house amenities, including a dishwasher


Enough reasons for me!




If we were in Saskatchewan we would call it an acreage, but that's not right either, as that implies that people live in it all the time.


Aaaaaaanyway, I love it there!
I love it so much!
Pretty much equal to Dollface cottage, though I've spent way more time at DF cottage and we all know how serious I am about familiarity equalling enjoyment.





There's a man-made pond with a little dock and a boat and I just floated all my time away in the pond, so lovely I wanted to just stay there forever. I did stay in until I was quite wrinkly and tired out. It's not super deep and it's nice to be able to touch the bottom from time to time.
Kind of murky but I'm sure fine with regular dirt and mud and plants and bugs. I mean, shit, I swim in Lake Ontario. I'll swim in anything! And enjoy it!



Violet read her book on the dock and we drank drinks and told stories about our lives.


We also spent a stupid amount of time just lounging on the veranda. So lovely. So, so lovely. Violet is very calm and was feeling a bit quiet and tired I think and I like that just fine sometimes, in fact I get that way myself a lot.

I did all the cooking pretty much and was totally contented slicing away in the kitchen by myself while Violet read on the porch. Seemed kind of idyllic, I like cooking by myself for other people. If that makes any sense!

Ha, that's Violet's novel, not mine. What a showboat I am!



I finished reading that book of short stories by Miranda July. Pretty effin great.


Oh can't I please just have a country house as well? With dishes?? I managed to not steal anything.










Whoaly bunkie! I don't know if you can call a structure this massive a "bunkie". Even if it were originally intended to be a bit less grand...
Yes, that's where we sat up on at night and Violet saw shooting stars and I saw lightning bugs and we talked about sad things and happy things and drank our drinks and I remember to breath deeply.
I forgot to go swing on the tire swing but win some lose some! 


I tried to make Violet let me stay there forever and just go back without but no dice!



We did see some peacocks on the way back, though. Who knows why! Apparently her neighbour also owns a helicopter, so, what the fuck?

We also stopped for ice cream, so... you know!


Quick drive there and back and pretty lovely and the roadsides are peppered with GIANT MANSIONS. We kept saying, why don't we go out here more?? Makes no sense!



What a terrible picture to end on!

I'm about to become super busy -- I think it's something like 11 shifts in 9 days (supposedly) and then cottage for 4 days again? (!!!!) And then working through (one day off?) until I go back to Saskatoon on the 26th......
SUMMERSUMMERSUMMERSUMMERDON'TLEAVEMESUMMER

I want to live on some water

I don't know why I wanted to hold off on posting my favourite picture from Owen Sound, especially since I would obviously just forget to post it but here ya go now, anyway:




uh huh.



IN OTHER NEWS:




I really should have saved that to go in Christmas cards accompanied by an earnest letter detailing my life and (lack of) accomplishments this year. Oh well, have to come up with an even better one? Hopefully!!


(I've written 5 more blog entries this evening and I'm storing them up so hopefully this week will be chock full of new material but I can't post it all at once because I want you to enjoy it all fully!!!)

lovely autumn roadtrip (part two)

We stopped at Ingalls Falls on the way back to Toronto. Holy nice out. Luckily JL had that wrecked ankle so he didn't make me hike around (just kidding, I don't mind hiking. sometimes. ugh, why am I so lazy?)





There were a lot of seniors around. Therefore we did not cause shenanigans. Seniors are not into shenanigans.



Can you spot the brooding tall fellow:






I tried to take some timer jumping shots and the camera jumped off the rail it was balanced on as it took the picture. I shouldn't be allowed to own fancy things.



It does cause me to laugh much harder when someone else is witness to how bad I am at jumping.





Hi, I'm 12:

No, but really look how little I look! No wonder no one ever takes me seriously! How silly I must look when I'm angry!


I should've gotten JL to one like that too.



Ohh, great, take your bad ankle out onto a balancing-place






We stopped in Orangeville to visit Miss Lindeman's mother's store, which is called Drangonfly Arts and is located on Broadway.
I don't know why I didn't take any photos there. Because I'm dumb?
I did get a bunch of Christmas gifts though, and we did visit with Miss Lindeman's mum. She showed us a lot of glass beads and if I really needed another crafting interest, that might be it.

Oh, good, here are some photos of the store from a couple of summers ago.



There are many more mittens in the window display this time of year.

And then we came back to Toronto and then the road trip was over.

The End.