TESTING THE LIMITS OF TECHNOLOGY

It used to be so simple. The needle on empty used to mean it was too late. Now, thanks to intelligent technology, the sweating at 3 am that I underwent driving to the gas station was unnecessary. Which was lucky for me, because the gas station, despite being lit up like Christmas, was closed! By the time I got home, I was below zero and yet, the next day, my beautiful merciful husband, who would never allow this to happen to himself, drove without event back to the now open station the next morning.
This is me freaking out at the gas station at 3 km!

MY FIRST FLOWERS OF SPRING - CROCUSES!

WHICH OPTION WOULD YOU CHOSE?

I took my daughter to the orthodontist for a second opinion. Turns out that her wearing a set of palate expanders for a year was for nothing. The good news is that we could leave everything and eventually pull teeth, she should only need braces as a teenager, like the whole rest of the world. Option #2 is appliances for 18 months costing $3500. My daughter chooses the second option. Which would you choose?

BUTTERFLIES FLY FREE

Every year that we can, we go to the Montreal Botanical Gardens to the Butterflies Go Free event. This year we went with a friend, and as always, it was a great event. Here are few pictures:

GIVE A KID AN IPHONE….WAITING FOR EASTER

HELLO KITTIES!

My daughter and I have advanced to charms! Some are more successful than others, and I had to do Hello Kitty twice because her face fell apart the first time, but my daughter made the one on the right with only a little help looming (those double and triple bands are tricky!) help, and colours completely different from the you tube video BYA. Well done, sweet heart! The next one she did was truly all by herself, looming it all! And now we have a Mimi !

FINALLY, SOMEONE MAKES GENERAL TAO TOFU!

I was in La Cite recently and found a little stir fry kitchen in the food court that was serving this. I was so happy! Just because I'm a vegetarian now doesn't mean I don't miss some things I once ate! This made it a little easier.

RED ROSE TEA FIGURINE WHIMSIES

Yesterday I was out shopping for a bathing cap that my gym requires to enter their swimming pool, and I happened upon a little auction house with these figurines. I don't know if you have ever seen these before, but my grandma kept an extensive collection  of these in her tiny apartment, and they brought back memories! I also realized that I have been remiss in teaching my daughter a lot of nursery rhymes that I know, maybe because most of them are so traumatic, ending in loss or death or fear! That being said, she's 8, and has had a taste of these realities, so I feel this may be the time to share them. The mirrored plate was the collection of sale (I bought the fiddling cat) but they are a mix of nursery rhymes and other animals (a chimp and an otter).    

  I found several collections on line, and below is the 2 dozen nursery rhyme collections.

 Here are the words, for my daughter, and to crank up my memory, for the characters in this group of "whimsies". (Don't you just love that word!?)

1.
OLD KING COLE was a merry old soul, and a merry old soul was he. He called for his pipe and he called for his ? and he called for his fiddlers three.

LITTLE JACK HORNER sat in a corner, eating his Christmas pie. He stuck in his thumb and pulled out a plum, and said, what a good boy am I!

HUMPTY DUMPTY sat on a wall. Humpty dumpty had a great fall. All the kings horses and all the kings men couldn't put Humpty together again.

JACK and JILL went up the hill to fetch a pail of water. Jack fell down and broke his crown, and Jill came tumbling after. 

TOM, tom, the piper's son, stole a pig and away did run. The pig was eat and Tom was beat, and Tom went crying down the street.

LITTLE BOY BLUE, come blow your horn. The sheep's in the meadow. The cow's in the corn. But where is the boy who looks after the sheep? He's under a haystack fast asleep!

LITTLE MISS MUFFET sat on a tuffet eating her curds and whey. A little spider sat down beside her and frightened Miss Muffet away!
2.

PETER PIPER picked a peck of pickled peppers. A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked. If Peter Piper picked a  peck of pickled peppers, where are all the pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?

DR. FOSTER went to Gloucester (yes it really rhymes!) in a shower of rain. He stepped in a puddle right up to his middle, and never went there again.

MOTHER GOOSE

There was an OLD WOMAN WHO LIVED IN A SHOE. She had so many children she didn't know what to do. She gave them all broth without any bread, and whipped them all soundly and sent them to bed.

GOOSIE GOOSIE GANDER, whither shall I wander? Upstairs and downstairs and in my lady's chamber. There I met an old man that wouldn't say his prayers, so I took him by his left leg and threw him down the stairs!

WEE WILLY WINKIE runs through the town, upstairs and downstairs in his nightgown, rapping at the windows and crying through the lock, Are the children all in bed, for now it's eight o'clock!

LITTLE BO PEEP has lost her sheep and doesn't know where to find them. Leave them alone and they'll come home, wagging their tails behind them.

THREE BEARS
3.

PUSS IN BOOTS

JACK'S HOUSE  - This is the house that Jack built.

RED RIDING HOOD

The QUEEN OF HEARTS, she made some tarts, all in a summer's day. The knave of hearts he stole her tarts, and took them clean away. The King of hearts called for the tarts, and beat the knave full sore. The knave of hearts brought back the tarts and vowed he'd steal no more.

BAA BAA BLACK SHEEP, have you any wool? Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full. One for my master and one for my dame, and one for the little boy who lives down the lane.

HICKORY DICKORY DOCK the mouse ran up the clock. The clock struck one, the mouse ran down, hickory dickory dock.

Run, run as fast as you can! You can't catch me, I'm a GINGERBREAD MAN!

Hey diddle diddle, THE CAT AND THE FIDDLE, the cow jumped over the moon. The little dog laughed to see such a sight, and the dish ran away with the spoon!

Oh yeah! I bought the cap I started talking about. Here is its twin! It makes me happy!