Red Hats Outing

On a beautiful Autumn day  my Red Hats group  dined at The Manse Restaurant.

As the name  indicated the house built in 1870, a Manse for at that time the Methodist  church later  the home for the United Church minister until  the  1990's. Then became a private home for   15 years . For the last  7 years  a  casual fine dining  restaurant......
The  main floor interior has been divided into  3 dining rooms, 2 rooms had fireplaces , all  rooms retaining Victorian  touches. Art   showing local   areas...... Tables set  with  crisp linen.......
In the  turret is a small dining room  for  2 or 4, very romantic  setting.
We had a small room to ourselves on the main floor with large bay window..

Needless to say the   food and wine  was delicious ,   I  enjoyed a pasta dish, others had fish and some chicken  wraps.. ... but what I really wanted to show was the  desserts..
 Vanilla Bean Cream Brulee


Love the touches of   fruit, mint and chocolate

 Swiss  cheesecake  crepes


I want to try making these crepes filled with cheesecake.

 It was a relaxed,  elegant  luncheon ....... wonderful way to spend a sunny  Autumn afternoon..

LRW # 152 - Inspiration Photo

At Little Red Wagon  blog  this  week is a gorgeous Autumn  entryway photo.

 Based on this photo  we are challenged to make a card........ I  loved all the leaves.

Based on that, this is the card I made at card making class just this week.  Using French Foliage stamp set ( this is a favourite stamp set) stamped leaves with    Cajun craze, Always artichoke and Summer starfruit colours, triple layer technique. Back ground card is  Cajun craze paper, layers Very Vanilla paper. The vanilla layers  were  dry embossed with square lattice folder... Cut out  2  extra leaves for accent to go with button and organza ribbon. Words from Itty Bitty Banners.

Bloomin Tuesday-Fall Has Arrived

Autumn has  arrived on Saturday morning  after our very hot dry summer.
I welcome  the sunny  cool , crisp days with the bright blue skies.  The heat this summer was too much for me...........
This area has also  had some good rains  over the past few weeks. 
Toadstools  are appearing in the grass that is finally green again after many weeks of brown.

 White Mums and Pink   Hydrangea are   a compliment to each other.

bright burgundy  coleus in  corner, sage  plant hiding beside too

Butterflies are    still  finding food on the buddleia...

bright blue sky and warm sun,   weather the butterflies love

 The  buds of the Stella D'oro  daylily have opened with the promise of more blooms to come.

Love the bright yellow colour.

 This is some of the bright spots in my garden this week.

Happy Birthday Grandson Brock

Eldest Grandson Brock is now 19!

Handsome young man!

We celebrated his birthday at Elmhurst  ......it is  a lovely spot.

Pretty   gardens there!

Big smile !

Brock's Aunt Rosanne  not only gave him  several $19    gift cards  but  19  toonies   stuck together to pull out of gift box.........
Wrapped 19 bottles of beer( he is now legal age to drink)  and more money  was also gifted....

My grandchildren  are growing up ! How quickly the time goes!

Happy 21st Birthday !

Today Grand daughter Brianne is  celebrating a  milestone birthday. 21!
Proud to say she is a lovely  young woman.

The family  celebrated at Elmhurst on Sunday with a  fantastic brunch , Brianne's favourite mealtime..

Lovely Victorian  Home

We dined in a private room which made it easier for the present opening and laughs that came with that...

 Brianne  searching thru her Aunt Sherry's gift of a wire basket filled with candy to find   the one special  item.

found a charm for her Pandora  bracelet

The biggest smile came from opening the  gift her Mom made of  dollars  and dollars  strung and folded together in a  box so fed out in a long string..

 I wrapped  21   blue themed  gifts  in a blue bag,blue being Brianne's favourite colour.
  20 fun gifts , 1 good one; blue pearl Pandora  charm!.   Blue candle holder , blue  martini glass, blue sleep mask, blue bath mitt , just some of the items I found ...........Thank goodness for  Dollarama!

21  blue themed  gifts in one large blue bag with blue tissue paper

Fun  day!




Last Open Screen Door Days -Bloomin Tuesday

Have we seen the last of the open screen door days?
Rainy, cool days forecast all week.

Grey and rainy

Will this be the last of the roses?

so many petals

Graham Thomas  rose

Betty Boop

Will this daylily open before the first frosty  day?

Stella D'oro

 Do the berries appearing on  the
 Holly

Yew 





and Dogwood tree   mean a  hard winter?

never seen  a berry on Dogwood tree  before

No I will not be  worrying  about winter yet!
 Autumn , my favourite season, is  arriving this weekend  ; lots of wonderful   warm sunny days yet to come.
Joining Jean  at Bloomin Tuesday to see what other Fall gardens are   showing!

Disappointed

One of the few shows I watch during the day is The Chew.  Enjoy the  banter between the hosts and  find inspiration   for  meal prep  from the  dishes they prepare.....
On Julia Child's birthday   one dish  made was  Cauliflower in a Swiss cheese sauce. They raved about this dish.
I    decided to try it.. thought it would make a nice dish to have at Thanksgiving in October.

 Used a recipe  that Julia and Jacques Pepin  made together. Found  at Food.com..Check out the link if you want to try it.
So glad I tried making this dish ahead of time. I found it lacking in   flavour..... just not enough of either the Swiss cheese or cauliflower .... more taste in the bread crumb topping.
Darn!
So this is one dish I won't be making  for Thanksgiving..now I have to search for a veggie dish  to make.
Any suggestions?

War of 1812 Bicentennial

It has come to be an annual outing to  watch  re-enactments at Backus Heritage Conservation  Area .
This year celebrating the bicentennial of the War of 1812.
There will be celebrations  continuing  in 2013 and 2014.
This year I attended the twilight   event at 7PM on an overcast  rainy day. 

Camp site of the Royal Navy.

dusk 


 Red Coats on the march.

women following behind

Elaborate  costumes .

 The fog of war  , all the smoke from the  muskets and artillery.



Americans and British fighting for control of the bridge.

Over 200 hundred visitors  for the afternoon   show and the  same  for the trilight  re-enactment.
Interesting  historical  evening.

Bloomin Tuesday- A bit of rain

We've had a sprinkle this morning. So grateful for the rain . There has been more rain in the last  4 weeks than we had in June and July.
Still the garden is showing signs   of the dryness we had.

The Autumn Joy sedum and Molina grass are  not happy. Sedum instead of being  pretty pink  is brown  and the grass  is sparse .
 The   Japanese Anemone is  showing more flowers but not nearly the  usual amount.

Fall flowering clematis is starting to show  . I  combined it with  morning glories and the cherry tomatoes entwined  all by  itself.... a fine mess I will have to clean up this fall .

will have a challenge to  untwine    these 3 plants

This clematis  has very small  flowers  but is   a nice fall garden addition

Lastly more pictures of the morning glory. One from inside on a bright sunny day , like the flowers peeking in the window......



Pretty to see from inside.

 One this grey morning......

So full of blooms

 It helps to  journal about the garden  it shows mistakes and  where  adjustments need to be made ..note to self ... more colour for the fall......