movin' on up...to the east side...

well, in this case, we've technically moved DOWN the hill, but we've moved UP in style :)


I announced on Facebook back in June that Chris and I had purchased our first home. Well, we moved in on July 31st at about 3pm, so as of today, we've been officially been living here for a whole week! We're settling in nicely, despite the gong show that happened on moving day.


Short version: Was supposed to get the keys at noon, helpers arrived from out of town at eleven. Got call from lawyer at 11:30 saying there'd been a mix-up and we needed to send more money to cover the taxes already paid by previous owner. Sent money transfer at 12:20. Proceeded to sit around and W....A....I....T with helpers (some more patiently than others) who had already packed the first load into the trucks. Got call from lawyer at 2:20 saying keys could be picked up, house was ours. Arrived at new house with keys at 2:30, opened front door, discovered that previous owner was not done moving out yet. Started moving her stuff out to garage, and our stuff into house. Previous owner arrived, embarrassed, gradually got her act together and departed the premises!! It was a crazy day, but we lived to tell the tale! And, the aforementioned lovably scattered previous owner left us a LOT of stuff -- ladders, wheelbarrow, shelving, treadmill (!!) etc, etc, etc. I think she got tired of packing !!! Luckily, it's mostly stuff that will come in handy.

Anyway, we haven't taken any photos yet with OUR stuff in the house, but these are a few photos from the listing, and some we took on the day of the house inspection. I'll try to take some updated photos and post them soon :)

Our rhubarb patch.

The living room.

The guest room!

The kitchen.

The backyard!

the sound of summer

Back in May, my dear friend and cousin, Mary Simon, came to visit me in Orillia. She brought a fancy new toy with her....a funky video camera! So we decided to take advantage of the opportunity and record some songs that we love to sing together. Here are two of them:

"We Walk the Same Line" by Everything but the Girl which we originally performed together when Mary visited me in Saga, Japan... (if you watch closely you can see our kool kat Owen run down the stairs behind us right at the end of the video!)



and "Cecilia" by Simon and Garfunkel which we used to sing together as teenagers walking through the streets of Burlington, Ontario!!



We also recorded "Crazy Love" by Van Morrison and "Linger" by the Cranberries. Then Chris and I recorded "Lua" by Bright Eyes, and Mary and Chris did "Special" by Justin Rutledge. They are all available here. Lots of strumming and singing and sunshine!!

Enjoy!

the taste of summer

i offer you....



FRUIT!



Are your tastebuds tingling?

Beets, Parsnips and Pineapple: A match made in veggie heaven

I had some pineapple juice leftover from a week ago when I made the Pineapple Cashew Quinoa Stir fry from Veganomicon. I didn't post that recipe because a) I had no time and b) the recipe didn't turn out so great.... I think because I did a few substitutions that I really shouldn't have. Lessons learned! But, a fellow blogger did post about that recipe here.

Anyway, I'd been wanting to use up the pineapple juice and I found a recipe earlier in the book for "Shredded Parsnip and Beet Salad in Pineapple Vinaigrette". Sounds like a strange combo, and the authors even acknowledge this when they say "At first blush, the ingredients look a little insane, but once they come together it is out of control delicious; earthy, sweet and fragrant." They also describe the salad as "magical"....how could I resist that description? I gave it a try, and I loved it!



NOTE: The authors explicitly say that you need to use a food processor to get the beets and parsnips to their desired uniform thinness. I ignored them and made this recipe with a normal hand shredder and it was fine (sort of like a wet coleslaw but better), however, I'd be curious to try once I get a good processor.

Dressing:
2 cups pineapple juice
1/3 cup red wine vinegar
1/4 grapeseed oil (I actually have this, but I'm sure you could sub. in olive oil)
2 TBSP maple syrup (or agave or sugar if necessary)
1 clove garlic, minced
1/4 tsp salt

Whisk all of the above and set aside.

Salad:
1 pound beets (I used 3 medium sized)
1 pound parsnips (I use 2 medium sized)
1/2 cup coarsely chopped mint

Mix the beets and parsnips with the dressing and use tongs or your fingers (!) to squish the veggies down into the juice. Let sit for 15 minutes.

Add the mint and stir again. Cover and refrigerate for 30 minutes before eating.

beware of turtles

Chris took me on a nice long bike ride the other day...a much needed break from my mind-numbing research paper. The ride was a challenge for me, even though Chris does double that ride with his eyes closed several times a week! As we turned back towards Orillia, I saw this fantastic road sign and wanted to share:



Turtle crossing! As we rode along the path, we did see one baby turtle but no big ones.

My other big project this month, to get out of my head for awhile, has been this little garden I dug beside my patio. Just a modest one since we will be living in our very own first house by August, and it has a huge yard, so next year I won't be so modest!



I've planted 6 lettuce plants and 2 tomato plants :)








Hope everyone else is getting into the swing of summer too!

The Good Food Box

As promised in my last post, I wanted to share some information about The Good Food Box program. A lot of communities have them - throughout Ontario, Canada and the world - although they don't always go by the same name.


From what I understand, the first program in Ontario started in Toronto in the 1990's and then other communities began to adapt the idea to fit their own demographics. Usually, it is run by volunteers, and they make it possible for anyone in the community to engage in monthly bulk purchasing of fresh fruits and vegetables. The goal is to make fresh, high quality fruits and vegetables available to everyone. What could be better than that?

I've been doing a student placement at the Barrie Community Health Centre, which hosts the Barrie Good Food Box, and they asked me to do an evaluation (survey) of how the program impacts those who buy it. Does it make a difference for them? In what ways? In doing this project, I've learned a lot about what a valuable program it is and how much people depend on it. I've also learned that the more people who participate, the better it is (and the more accessible it becomes). So, I wanted to spread the word to everyone.

Most programs operate on a pre-pay system, where you pay in cash during the first week of the month, and you pick up your box during the 3rd week. A small box costs around $9 and a large costs about $13 (depends where you are). Everyone gets the same veggies - you don't get to select the produce you'll receive because it's basically a bulk order. The program utilizes a local wholesaler who delivers the food to one location, and then a group of volunteers divide the produce into individual boxes for each purchaser to pick up. So, I picked up my first Orillia Good Food Box today, and for $13 this is what I got:




A photo of what it looked like when I picked it up this morning



A photo of everything that came out of the bag!!

In case you can't tell, it included potatoes, cabbage, romaine lettuce, cauliflower, carrots, onions, honeydew melon, apples, oranges, cucumber, mushrooms, and cherry tomatoes!

In my evaluation of the Barrie program, I've heard a lot of people say that it's like getting a treasure chest every month. You never know what you're going to get, but you always know it's going to be GOOD.

tuco and klompengirl to wed

I sent out an email awhile back, but since I know a lot of people who aren't on my email list (i.e. Facebook, Blogger) - I thought I could make a general announcement to the world....

Chris and I are getting married! We did a self-portrait a few moments after he popped the question - we were on showshoes in the forest behind his parent's house in Bancroft. We'd just made it up to the "lookout"...


We are having a small wedding on September 27, 2008 in Orillia Ontario. Our ceremony will take place at the Stephen Leacock Museum grounds, and our dinner at the Ossawippi Express Dining Cars (both pictured below). We're looking forward to a lovely day with close family and friends!





In other news, things are humming along with the research project and the work placement that I am doing for my Masters of Social Work degree. I am doing my work placement at the Barrie Community Health Centre where they've asked me to evaluate their Good Food Box program (I'll do a separate post about this soon).


If all goes according to plan, I should be done all my work by the end of June. After that, a full (but fun!) summer of music festivals, triathlons, wedding planning, and job hunting awaits me!

ethicle

I thought I had published this post a long time ago but I see now that I just saved it as a draft. Oops!

For those who are interested, there is a search engine called Ethicle that operates the same way Google does, but it apparently donates one cent each time you do a search. As far as I can tell, the results are the same as what you would find on Google or Yahoo.

Think about using it and/or setting it up as your home page.

The Lords Prayer

I was listening to CBC radio this morning (up here in Orillia we get "Ontario Morning Today") and there was a segment on the Lord's Prayer being read in the Ontario Legislature. I sent an email to the CBC (and to my MPP who was one of the interviewees) after hearing the segment, and thought I'd share it with the world...

What do YOU think?

********************************************************************

Hi there,

I’m emailing in response to your story this morning about the Lords Prayer in the Ontario Legislature.

Both interviewees on the program repeatedly referred to this as “Dalton McGuinty’s thing” and stated that they have better things to be doing with their time and our money….

This sort of disdain is a way of minimizing what is actually a very interesting issue. I want to point out that, regardless of Dalton McGuinty’s own motivation behind this (which I’m not myself convinced are purely altruistic), it’s still important to think about this issue. Just because people/constituents don’t complain about something that’s happening, doesn’t make it ok. The fact is, this province is incredibly diverse – in ethnic, linguistic, and religious terms (not to mention many other types of diversity), and I would hazard a guess that this level of diversity is not even remotely represented in the legislature. I would also hazard a guess that many Ontarians (like myself) did not even realize that the Lords Prayer was read in the Ontario Legislature.

I’m a social work student and I’m doing some research on Hospice services and how they are responding to ethno-cultural diversity in their communities. It’s not like people are out there pointing fingers at Hospices saying – you’re not serving us, you’re discriminating, etc. But just because people aren’t complaining, doesn’t mean we can ignore the fact that this type of service is primarily being utilized by people of Canadian-born, white-Euro, Christian backgrounds. Without spending the time and money, and without allowing ourselves to feel a little bit “uncomfortable” in the process, this discrepancy could continue unnoticed for decades or longer. But that doesn’t make it right. Similarly, with the reading of the Lords Prayer in the Ontario Legislature, we could continue ignoring this imbalance for many years to come, but that doesn’t make the practice of reading it “right”. In societies like ours that are primarily “governed” by one dominant ethno-cultural group, I think there is a danger of leaving something like this “as is” because it costs too much to explore the issue, to do something about it, and let’s be honest - because what we’re doing suits us fine and no one else has noticed it yet.

In my experience, when something like this has “always been done”, it requires some serious critical reflection (which often leads to discomfort) in order to actually recognize it as an issue, and then to follow that recognition with action geared towards making a change. I’m not saying that the Lords Prayer should or should not be read. I’m simply saying that I think the process of review and public consultation is a valuable one, and that those who are involved should give it some more thought before disparaging it on provincial radio.

As humans, I truly believe we need to start thinking about WHY we do what we do, rather than just blindly assuming that it’s the “right” way of doing things. Because blind belief in certain ways of being and living and doing – that is how discrimination begins...

Regards,

A.S.
Orillia, ON

Hike for Hospice

I have registered to participate in the Hike for Hospice on Sunday May 4th, with Alliance Hospice as my chosen beneficiary.


Sponsoring me in the Hike, and helping to support Alliance Hospice, is as simple as clicking on this link!

Alliance Hospice is an organization dedicated to supporting people dealing with advanced illness, death and bereavement. In the client's home and community, our volunteers and staff provide practical, emotional and spiritual support in collaboration with family caregivers, health care providers and community support agencies. Alliance Hospice is the result of the merger of Bayview Community Hospice with CommunityCARE Home Hospice. The two agencies have been serving the people of Toronto since 1990 and have provided care to almost 6000 people over the last 18 years. This year, the hospice will care for almost 500 people with a life-threatening illness or bereavement.


Alliance Hospice provides its services free of charge to the people they serve, so the hospice relies on donations from individuals, community organizations, corporations and special events like the Hike for Hospice 2008. All of the money you donate will go to support the people for whom Alliance Hospice provides care.

Thanks so much for doing what you can to help me reach my fundraising goal of $1000... just click here.

Hana-mi

I've been incredibly nostalgic for Japan this past year. In June 2007, I celebrated my ten year anniversary of flying to Japan. When I was living there (June 1997-August 1999) I filmed two videos of daily life and some special events. Those videos have provided several hours of entertainment for me over the past couple of months!

In one of the videos, I filmed myself at calligraphy class (me with a roomful of 10 year olds writing the most basic Kanji with big paint brushes) and then filmed the final results of my work that day. It was the Kanji for "Hana-mi" which means Flower Viewing....and refers to the time of year when the cherry blossoms (in Japanese they are called Sakura) bloom throughout the country. Here is a photo of my Kanji from that day (the orange circles are the stamp of approval from the teacher meaning "good job". Usually it took me 20-30 attempts before receiving that honour!):


I realized the other day, that it's Hana-mi season in Japan right now! In the part of Japan where I lived (on the island of Kyushu, in a town called Saga), the cherry blossom parties usually started towards the end of March, and continued into early April (the further north you go, the later they bloom...the most northern parts of Japan celebrate in early May I believe). The reason of the season, so to speak, is to celebrate the coming of spring by gathering with family, friends and/or co-workers in the parks, under the trees, to admire the beautiful flowers......and to drink lots of alcohol....

Ha.

But seriously, the flowers are stunning so I thought I'd share some photos from this site.

no more manicures...

...well, not for a while anyway.

Last night I got home from my Monday class at York, and I guess I was in a state of distraction (the class always makes my head explode) because when I went to close the garage door behind me, I managed to get my thumb caught in one of the hinges as it closed. Much screaming and crying ensued and poor Chris didn't even know what the problem was, besides the problem of me going berserk. It really really hurt. A lot. At first glance, I thought my thumb was actually crushed...broken...coming off my hand...but once I calmed down I realized it was just the tears blurring my vision and that yes, it was bleeding, bruised and swelling up...but no, it was not going to detach from the rest of my hand!

Needless to say, I am now working on a "9 finger" typing style (watch for patents soon) and have a short reprieve from doing the dishes :)

Here's a visual....




Note to self: Garage doors in Orillia are dangerous!

Social work at York University

Here's a link to an online article about Masters of Social Work students at York University. It's called MSW students promote social change and I'm one of the students featured!

having cats can be a nice distraction from BOREDOM

I never EVER thought I would catch myself, in the middle of my Masters degree, saying that I'm bored out of my tree.

But that's what I'm saying.

The short version of the story is: The degree is designed so that students do the majority of their coursework in the fall, and then they work more independently in the winter doing a) a research project and b) a work placement. The research project requires ethics approval from the university, which usually comes through in late January/early February. I received my ethics approval about 2 weeks ago and have begun to contact participants to schedule interviews etc. Exciting...but no great rush. As long as I'm done my interviews by the end of March all should be well.

The big frustration has been that my work placement completely fell through....twice...before I even got started. The majority of my colleagues started in the second week of January, so I am more than a month behind them in terms of getting my 400 hours done. Sigh. And, there's nothing I could have done about it. I spent the entire month of January waiting for the school and the agency where I was supposed to work to get their act together...which never happened. We officially pulled the plug on that arrangement at the end of Jan, and then I started calling around to see if anyone else would take me on (in a hurry). The good news is, I have secured another placement, but am still waiting to actually start.

So, in the absence of deadlines and stress, I am being pleasantly distracted by my 2 new cats! I'd like to introduce them to the world at large:

This is me with Clarence. He is orange (!) and these days he's sneezing a lot.


This is Owen. He is super skinny and he talks a lot - especially when he's in the litter box.


The blue sky is inviting me out to play...a rare experience this winter. I'm going for a walk before it gets dark!

klompengirl

For those who don't know what the name of my blog means, let me explain.

Klompen = wooden shoes worn by crazy Dutch folk

Girl = human of the female variety

ergo,

Klompengirl = a chick with a pair of clogs

That's me!! My dad was born in the Netherlands (note: the Netherlands does not = Holland). Which makes me, by default, a Dutchie.



Actually, he was born in a province called Friesland where they speak Frisian, not Dutch. But that's another story.

Given this heritage, I took it upon myself to get my own pair of klompen, so I asked my Uncle Bill to bring a pair over some years ago. He must have chosen the ugliest pair of klompen in all of Friesland. Wouldn't you agree? (...yes, those are horse heads...)



But, lucky for me, my lovely cousin Mary Simon Stenekes, took pity on me and bought me another pair of (way cooler) klompen for Christmas. These ones are slippers!



How cool is that?
I am stoked. I have my very own pair of klompen slippers.

For my more "cultured" readers, here's some information about an art exhibit featuring klompen, as pictured below.



And just to make you laugh, here's a video of some crazy Dutch folk dancing in their klompen (32 seconds).

ringing in the new year - in proper annalise fashion

yessssss, what year would be complete without annalise falling on her keister now and then? as luck would have it, i managed to sneak in one more classic fall on Dec 31st. chris was busy taking these pictures while I fell, rather than helping me up...and he enjoyed them so much afterwards that I thought I'd post them for the whole world to see. for those interested in details, we were snowshoeing in the "bush" behind the family house in Bancroft.

1) a bit nervous as i start down the hill. concentrating hard on not falling.



2) concentrating more. pretty confident that i'm going to make it. if i can just concentrate...a little...harder...



3) WHAM! there it is.



Sigh. This, and then I got beat by Chris' dad at cribbage just before midnight too. Let's hope I got all the bad luck out of the way and cleared a path for all the good luck to come in 2008!

for other funny showshoeing pictures, have a look at this post .