If Only We Had Been Invited....

At first, our feelings were a bit hurt because we weren't invited to Briana and Ted's big day, but then we remembered we are afraid of crates and only service animals can go on the plane without a crate. While we like to think we have lofty ambitions, even we know playing the role of a service animal is way out of our ball park.

However, had we been included, here are some things we could have helped with:

We would have waited patiently while tied to this cute doggie post while everyone was inside getting their lattes.

We could have kept the family company on the deck.

We could have fetched make-up supplies and had Janet read the hair instructions from her New iPad.

Rockers likes to think he would be trailing behind Banana and Phil with his special Ring Pup pillow on around his neck.

Can you believe it....they went with the Best Man to handle the rings....crazy!

Rockers could have shown them where to sign their names.

We could have stood on the dock with all of them.....or jumped in and made them all wet!  We think maybe Meg's face says it all - where are the guys??

And last, but most certainly not least - why were these cute guys invited and we weren't?

Rockers Was Right - How Could I Have Been so Blindsided?

Oh boy.....while I'm rolling around on the kitchen floor, Rockers who is usually as thick as a brick has discovered the suitcases.  And, dummies that we are, we fall for "let's go to the park" ploy so they can sneak them into the car.  Bastards! I mean sneaky you know whats!

While we have no clue what they are up to,  it wasn't too long before Dean showed up.  We love Dean - he's very diligent about really long walks and is alot more generous with the cookies than Mr. and Mrs. Tightwad are.

Before you know, some info starts to come to light.

This is weird because Janet and Ted are at a restaurant.

The back of a strange vehicle is packed with suitcases.

Even stranger, it appears Phil and Bronwyn are plotting out a route.  How did Bronwyn get there and where are they going?

Next thing you know, Meg is all dressed up in a fancy dress.

And then, Bronwyn in a similar pretty dress.

Don't they look beautiful?

The reason for all this brou-ha ha:  Janet is Mother Of The Bride!  She tried hard not to cry.  Check this out!

We doggies agree with Janet that Briana is a most beautiful bride.

If only Rockers had let me know about the suitcases, I would have moved doggie heaven and doggie earth to get us on board.  Sometimes, Rockers is not all that reliable.  As a result, I am going to post some more info about what happened.

Janet's Birthday! Her Last Year in the '50's!

It was Janet's birthday on Tuesday.  Phil gave her what Janet says is the Best. Birthday. Gift. Ever!

It's a New iPad!  Janet cried!  If you had seen the gifts Phil has given in previous years, you would know why.  One year, Janet really want a watch.  Come her big day, there is a wrapped gift that looks like a watch.  When she opened it up, it was a chocolate bar that Phil had eaten the middle piece out of.  He thought it was so cute that it looked like a watch!  She cried!  Another year, it was filters for a deep fry filter.  She cried!  Now you know why she was so excited about the iPad.  This year, it was tears of excitement!  Bronwyn chipped in and added the pretty grey cover.

Lolo and Steve invited them over for dinner.  See the really pretty table?

Lolo made a delicious dinner and a beautiful dessert  If we were Janet, we would choose taller, fatter friends, that way she wouldn't look like the Jolly Grey Giant!  That's Lolo's mom on the right.

Here is Noodles.  Either Noodles is all over the situation, or out in left field.  Today it's left field.

  Here is me:

 Do you know what is wrong with this picture?  I can see something that Noodles can't see.

OH NO!  Its a suitcase!  This can only mean one thing - they are going somewhere!

Janet and Phil Go Shopping

Friday, Janet and Phil had lunch with Bea, dropped her off and headed out to Costco.  Friday afternoon, first long weekend of the summer.  These two dummies were shocked that the traffic was bumper to bumper and moving at a snails pace!  Home they went.  Yesterday, they made a successful attempt, leaving home around 10AM.  Just as they are to pull away, Janet wants to know where the shopping list is.  Neither of them have it and neither of them know where it is.  Back into the house they come and search and search.  Lo and behold - in the recycle.  Wonder which anal tidier upper did that!  First they went to Costco to get some plants and then to Home Depot to get some more plants.  They filled up the entire back of the Volvo, with the seats put down.

Home Depot has a little "corral" to try out sit down mowers.  Kind of like go-carts, but free!

Janet got busy starting on the pots, but as the sunny weather has been replaced by drizzle and grey clouds her heart isn't in it.  Soldier on, sister!

A couple of the planted pots.

This is a teeny tiny sample of what they bought.  The bad news?  They only have about half of what they need.

Noodles has been on a major naughty streak.  A few days ago, Phil comes home and can't find her anywhere.  Turns out she is at the back of the garage, keeping the painter company while he re-painted the garage doors.   Bad, bad Noodles!

Here she is, trying to make it look like she is working on the blog - she's in big trouble as we are not allowed to get up by the table.  Funny - she doesn't look all that worried.

We are getting ready to go for a walk in the rain.  See how Phil puts my collar on wrong and it traps my ear?  I don't like that, so Janet always fixes it for me.

Noodles is chillin' before our walk.  You can see her ducky by her nose.  Janet told her to retrieve the ducky from her toy box, and she did.  The first time they did this little shtick, Noodles also chose the ducky, so Janet was convinced Noodles was the next dog to be on the front of Time magazine because she knew so many commands.  Janet envisioned TV appearances, movie contracts and the like.  Move over, Uggie!   She could hardly wait to show Phil, but all Noodles did was go to the toy box and take out her Nyla-Bone, many times over.  Bye Bye, Janet's retirement plan!

Karen Accidently Puts a Curse on Janet

These are Janet and Phil's good friends, Karen and Ken.  They have been friends since Meg was in Junior High School and friends with their daughter, Raeleigh.  Janet ran into them while dog walking on Sunday and Karen and Janet decided they would go for a bike ride on Tuesday.  Karen asked Janet if she knew how to change a flat tire and her response was "that's what cell phones are for".  Turns out Karen was unable to go for the bike ride, but they surprised Janet with a great gift.

A bike mirror...Janet thinks this is excellent as now she can actually see when the bus will side swipe her!

Today, Janet set off by herself to go for a bike ride.  Phil drove her down to the Galloping Goose and her plan was to bike home for a total of 30K.

She had a flat tire....boy, was she mad! Why didn't she listen to Karen?   She walked 2K and called Phil 4 times before he finally answered the phone.  Phil, still courting his death wish, wanted to know why she walked for 2K and hadn't called previously.  Lucky for everyone, Janet doesn't use her bad language in public.

They had a special treat at Janet's work yesterday - dessert!  They rarely have sweets after dinner.  It was a Rhubarb Compote with Vanilla Yoghurt and Strawberry.  Janet said it looked delicious.  At this time of the year, they receive lots of fresh veggies and fruit from local farmers.

Janet says she loves the commercial kitchen at her work.

This is Micky.  He is the new dishwasher and Janet thinks he is very cute.

Just so you don't think we are lounging around doing nothing, here we are helping Phil wash the cars. 

And, last but not least, more Wedding Sparkles:

We Had a Busy Day!

Yesterday was Mother's Day and it was really nice outside.  Janet spent the morning opening a spectacular array of gifts, pictured here:

And if that wasn't enough, there was the lavish brunch that Phil made, pictured here:

Surprisingly, she still had the energy to go for a bike ride.  She rode from home, to the Galloping Goose and home again for a total of 30Km.  Janet says she is going to stick to 30 Km for a couple of weeks and then move up to a longer distance.

This is one of the tunnels Janet doesn't like.  Actually, we heard her tell Phil that tunnels on bikes aren't too bad - it's the one cars go through that really scare her.  She always envisions a vehicle accident inside a tunnel where cars catch on fire.  She also rolls down her car window when we embark or disembark from the ferry.  Did we mention the rolled down window when the car goes over bridges?  See where I am headed with this?  I have to add she usually forgets to roll the window down on a bridge if she is driving as it takes too much concentration for her to drive on the bridge.

 

Today was also spectacular so both Phil and Janet took us to Uplands Park.  Here we are relaxing before we go on the walk:

Phil is putting his runners on, so we don't want to waste any energy standing.  Look at Noodles' crazy hair do!

It was beautiful in the park.  This particular field is usually the most interesting in terms of changing flora and fauna.

Here I am taking time to smell the......blue flowers!

Unbelievable...We Had Another Party!

This is too much fun...we had another party last night!  Well, OK, small party.  At Christmas, some of the neighbours wanted to know how to make dumplings, so Janet said she would show them how.  That was the purpose of her party.

In order to get a jump on things, Janet decided to make the dessert on Thursday night.  She clearly wasn't channeling Betty Crocker as this is what her crater cake dish looked like:

Wow!  Was she angry!  It's supposed to be Sticky Toffee Pudding, using a recipe she got from our Aunt T.  Janet has made this recipe many times with nothing but success.  We didn't want to see her cry, so we left the kitchen.

Janet made the fillings for the dumplings and had everything ready for our friends to try to fold them.  Janet was very nervous about having this little get together as everyone has been raving for years about how delicious her dumplings are.....she says the truth of the matter is they don't know how simple they are to make.

So....we had Thai Shrimp Dumplings with Coconut Basil Sauce from Hugh Carpenter.

This is Wendy and David.  Wendy lives across the street and has a really pretty yard.  Why are they relaxing and not making dumplings?

Now we remember why David is relaxing.  Janet didn't think anyone could do a worse more creative job folding Gyoza than Phil, but David proved her wrong.

Here is Mark from next door and Jack from down the street.  Do you think Jack had too much to drink?   He's  all blurry! 

In total, they had:  Vegetable Rolls with Spicy Peanut Sauce (above), the Thai Dumplings, Gyoza and rice, Chawan Mushi and a remade Sticky Toffee Pudding that didn't crater!

Well...how about us doggies?  It was really nice and warm here today so Janet took us for a big walk.  When we get home, what does my already tired brother do?  He goes to par-bake himself in the hot sun!  What's up with that?  See Janet's hand petting Rockers' head?  Both Rockers and I always put our paw over her arm when she is petting us.  Totally adorable?  You bet!  At any rate, she falls for it!

Janet's Brilliant Idea

When Janet is at work on Tuesday and Wednesdays, they often bag up bread and buns that have been  donated to put on a shelf for people so they may help themselves.  On Thursdays, when Janet goes upstairs to make sandwiches for lunch, they use many, many loaves of bread.   They throw out, or recycle the little white plastic closures that come on the bread.

Janet suggested to Mike, Nutrition Bar supervisor, that they have all sandwich making shifts keep the tags so that when they bag the bread downstairs, they can re-use the tags which would be much easier.  On Tuesday, they did and Janet said it was way better than knotting the bags.  This is the stuff legends are made of!  We're kind of thinking "Order of Canada" or something similar!  Go Janet, Go!

See the little white tags?

These are Janet's volunteer friends from Tuesdays shift - Judy and her daughter Tracey.

Remember when Janet showed you how lumpy my doggie bed was and Mr. Cheapskate Phil said it wasn't necessary to get me a new one?  Good. Call. Phil.  Here I am, nestled up on his pillows.  Very comfy!

Sometime ago, Meg told Janet older people (we assume this means people older than Janet) should do puzzles to keep their minds sharp.  Then, when she and Lolo and Simone went out on Monday night, Lolo told Janet she always does the Word Jumble puzzle in the paper.

You are probably wondering why we have a photo of this puzzle.  Turns out, Janet got stuck on the last word and sent the photo to Lolo for some much needed help.  Either Janet is way beyond the puzzles sharpening her mind or by accident, she stumbled across the Mensa Puzzle.

Here's another thing about Nut Job...she has Winter Food Rules and Summer Food Rules.  It's now almost mid May, so bye bye to Chili, Stew, Curry, Lasagna and anything else that needs to simmer or bake for a long time

Hello Summer Food:

Salmon and Asparagus with pasta in a ginger butter sauce from Hugh Carpenter.  They said it was yummy!