Tuesday, July 11/17 - Britain, here we come...

It was a nice break after our very busy catering weekend. Only had to bake 36 dozen cookies last Tuesday, no really, nothing too taxing at all! Another 36 dozen this week before I head off on holidays as well as another potential customer in the works. No rest for the wicked but it's all good!

This week I'm trying to clear up some last minute things before I leave for Toronto bright and early on Saturday morning. After spending the weekend in Guelph, James and I will be off to Manchester, England on Sunday evening.



 We'll arrive there on Sunday morning and have 4 days to tour around Liverpool area before heading up to Scotland.

James is ever such a good sport to be willing to indulge me all that time to revel in the past. But it will be his turn when we're touring ruins in the Scottish highlands and he enjoys reveling in their past. 

Posts the next two weeks will likely just be text as all I'll have with me will be my Ipad, but I'll do what I can to keep you up to date on our whereabouts. 

Some sort of sad news this week. Lloyd has made the decision to sell the goats and chickens. The amount of time required for their care each day is significant as well as the cost of keeping them. We enjoy the milk from them and the resulting cheese making but we aren't permitted to sell any of it so it's really an exercise in futility. Now that we're busy with our Wee kitchen it just makes sense. Besides, we're not getting any younger either. He really wanted to have goats when he moved here but now he's had that experience and he feels it's time to move on to explore other options.

There are numerous Amish families that have moved here from Ontario over the past couple of years.

Lloyd's gotten to know one of the farmers and they have goats already. They've made a deal with Lloyd to take all 9 of them. They will be leaving later today. I'm sad to see them go, especially Eddie and certainly little Barney. But I know they will be well looked after. Besides one branch of the family has 14 kids, so I suspect Barney may be quite the pet for them. 

The chickens have been gone now for a couple of weeks. We could have sold 100 chickens if we'd had them. Lots of folks looking for healthy laying hens. The two hours per day we spend now on animal care and milk and egg processing, will free up time for other pursuits.  I might actually get my yard cleaned up and into some kind of order. That would be really nice.

I know at least one reader who will miss the goat photos,( sorry about that Mike.)
We'll have to come up with something else to peak his interest from time to time.


Remember back a few weeks ago when I was going to try planting a garden in wooden pallets? One of the challenges has been keeping on top of the weeds between the pallets. No time lately to get to that so this week I just took the trimmer and cut down everything in between the pallets. As for the plants inside the pallets, they are doing not too badly. We badly need some rain and I haven't been very diligent about getting out there and watering (okay, I haven't gotten out there at all). But in spite of my apparent neglect, I still have a few things growing - lettuce, spinach, swiss chard, radishes, carrots, one tiny green tomato on one of the tomato plants...  but if we get rain over the next little while, it should be in great shape. It will be interesting to see it in two weeks when I get back.

Tuesday, July 4th - what a whirlwind...

The past week has been absolutely crazy. In essence we did 7 events over the course of 4 days. But I have to say right off the top that it would not have been possible without the help of Patti, Brenda and Tristen.

Brenda was here several nights till quite late cutting,chopping etc, whatever needed to be done. All in spite of the fact that she was expecting visitors of her own.

Patti and Tristen arrived on Tuesday afternoon and never stopped until Saturday night.

Lloyd and I are truly grateful for their help in getting through our first catering job which proved to be quite a challenge, but was, by all accounts, a great success.

Patti is very organized and has helped out with various events with speedskating and piping. We just referred any questions from anyone to our "project manager". She was always on top of things. Her and Brenda together are quite the dynamic duo in terms of keeping things on track.

Lunch on Wednesday gave us the opportunity to see the venue -a  large tent in Victoria park. It was a bit of a challenging set up but we all made it work.

Thursday lunch was burgers to be followed that night by fresh lobster and BBQ steaks. One of the major sponsors of the event was BIG GREEN EGG. They provided one for us to use as well as someone who was knowledgeable in how to use it. Needless to say, Lloyd is now totally sold on the product. If they weren't so very expensive I'm sure there would be one in our garage as we speak.

Our friend, a local oyster fisherman provided freshly shucked, icy cold oysters. What a treat! Those who love them took great delight in slurping down as many as they could, while a few more timid folks were willing to try their first one. All in all a great addition to the evenings events and a great way to welcome some new faces to the island for the first time.

Because this evenings dinner was all at one time, we were on our way back home before dark.  As we passed the harbour, one of the first tall ships to arrive came into view, just as the sun was going down. What an impressive sight. Sadly there was no time over the course of the weekend to investigate any further.

Friday morning was the start of total controlled chaos. Lunch was to be there for noon, till around 2:00 and them supper back in town at 5:00.  We all went in at supper but as soon as the majority of people had eaten Tristen and I came back home to continue prepping lunch and supper for Saturday. Let's just say there were a lot of very late nights and very early mornings.

Because he was appropriately dressed in his little chef's jacket and pants, everyone fell in love with Tristen. He was most helpful and everyone appreciated his coming by their tables. Because he was there for every meal, by the end of the second day, they all knew his name and were asking if he was coming back next meal.  He made quite the impression.

So much so, that on Saturday at supper, one of the Stihl people interrupted the dinner line to make a presentation to Tristen from the whole crew. The slices they take off logs are called cookies. He was given one with autographs from all the athletes on the front and all the crew on the back. He was just ever so pleased.

Saturday evening was not the best of weather. In order for people to be using axes and chain saws up on stage, it needed to be dry but Mother Nature wasn't being very cooperative. It would rain for a few minutes then clear up. Just as the stage was being dried out and they were ready to proceed, it would start to rain again. Things eventually got underway so we walked over to watch after most of the meals had been served. Some wanted to eat after competing. We were offered a place to sit in the gator tractor that was parked nearby. Nice comfy seats and a great view - VIP seating as Tristen put it.

The show had to be stopped for the fireworks at 10:15 and continued when they were finished.  Tristen's favorite competitor was the final winner so he was pretty pleased about that. It had been a long few days but know it was over made for some pretty happy people. Lloyd had taken a truck load of stuff home and we just had to pack up what was left when everyone had eaten. The stress was now all gone!

Needless to say, we all slept well on Saturday night. In fact I slept in till 10:00, when Brenda and Bernie arrived to have coffee on Sunday morning.

Sunday was a pretty relaxed kind of day. We did a bit of cleaning up and then went for a drive to get ice cream. Tristen and I went in the Miata and Patti followed in her car. We stopped for a quick walk on the beach, which was totally deserted, before getting our ice cream in Morell.

 Back home and supper before Lloyd had to go to bed. The three of us watched a movie on Netflix and then headed off to bed. It had been an exhausting few days.

Monday morning, was also a little lazy. Tristen enjoyed driving around on our old lawn tractor. Since it no longer has a deck on it, he felt like he was four wheeling, albeit at very slow speed.

They hit the road a little after 11:00 a.m. headed for Hopewell Rocks in New Brunswick before heading home. Thanks for all your help guys and safe trip back to Ontario.