Canadian Culture for Beginners

BEHOLD, Americans... I bring you the wonder of Canadian Tire: www.canadiantire.ca

Canadian Tire is not just a place to get tires (though I did once get a flat tire near Kingston, Ontario and had it replaced at Canadian Tire). It's a land of plenty - from hockey helmets to milk pitchers, camping gear to ice fishing augers. They even sell TV's.

It's the store that pays you: every time you buy stuff you get Canadian Tire money: actual pieces of paper with different denominations. You can use it to buy stuff at Canadian Tire and.... AMAZING - the local video rental chain I joined last night accepts Canadian Tire money same as cash.

I've got 35 Canadian Tire cents already. Woo!!

One of these days I'll tell you all about President's Choice brand. I'm still investigating what it's all aboot. 

Speaking of video rental... We rented Dogtooth last night. Ummmm, it was kind of ummmm..... It was nominated for an Oscar last year for best foreign language film (Greek). We'd also seen Incendies (Canadian) which was also nominated. Both dark and a bit twisted. I thought they were both good, and interesting, but definitely not for everybody.

One more Canadian culture tidbit: today we visited Peggy's Cove. Home of Canada's most photographed lighthouse, according to one of the informational signs. It was SO foggy today, so I stole some photos from Wikipedia:



Not much going on there in January.

Happy New Year from Halifax!!

Cutest leggings in the universe! Thanks Barb & Ken!

 

 

 

 

 

Put your party pants on! It's 2012 in Halifax!

Notes for new-style Canadian grocery shopping: 

   1) whole milk is called "homo milk" and all types of milk are sold in bags.

      1a) make trip to Canadian Tire to purchase our very own Canadian milk bag holding pitcher.

   2) Goodbye old-fashioned Quaker oats in a canister, hello bag of "Gruau Gros Flocons." 

   3) I consider beer a "grocery." Leave the grocery store and proceed to your nearest NSLC: Nova Scotia 

       Liquor Corporation.

Weather tracker 2012: 

Friday:     -14C with the wind chill and sunny: bundle toddler in snowsuit and walk backwards around the city to do errands

Saturday:    4C and POURING rain: housebound (adventurous attempt to catch the bus goes awry)

Sunday:     2C and gray/foggy: finally a nice day to go out and play :)

Back to freeziness on Wednesday, which is supposed to bring a high temp. of -8C and snow.

We're surviving here with just the bare essentials until our movers get here. One pot, one pan, some forks, an air mattress... Lots of things to get organized before we can feel at home. It's a bit of a challenge with no car and things closed for holidays, but I guess we'll get there. 

Happy New Year!

Topless

Only in California do you wait until November to replace your roof.  I guess our landlord feels pretty confident that it's not going to rain. It's not really cold here right now, even overnight, but thanks anyway landlord, for giving us three days' notice that we'll have nothing between us and the great outdoors but some 60-year-old plaster for a few days. No, there's no insulation in the walls, roof, or under the floor in this place. Awesome.

I guess we should enjoy it since we can before we move to rainier climes. It's supposed to rain with a high of 45F tomorrow in Halifax.

zzzzz.....

Anyone else out there like to sleep with their head resting on their feet?

Little Elephant

The girl LOVES splashing in the tub. It's hard to keep her still for washing during bath time these days. MY favorite part of bath time is cuddling my little elephant bundle afterwards - even though daddy is the official baby-washer most of the time :)

Chubby Chicks

I go back to school this week - boo!! and classes start Aug. 22nd. It's like waiting for the roller coaster to leave the station. You feel like you should be doing a few things to get ready, but things will be flying along before you know it - there's nothing you can really do to be totally "prepared." So I'm taking my last few days to deliberately NOT get ready. That means - quilts!


Here's a little preview of my chubby chicks. I just worked out how I want to do the beaks since I'm avoiding fusible applique which the pattern suggests. I hand appliqued (is that how you spell it?) all the chick bodies already, and now I'm zig-zagging on the beaks which will be flapping free in the breeze :) I hope that will hold up to tugging by Bea.

They also suggest buttons for eyes, but I don't want buttons on my blanket so I have to think about what to do instead.

Speaking of Bea... She went to a little swim "lesson" this weekend and took her first ride on the big train, CalTrain. Choo choo!