Cob Building (no it's not made of corn cobs!)

Tim and I have big plans to turn our falling down firepit area into a cob structure where we can have fires to cook on and hang out at in the evening by the river.

Currently it's a cement pad with a light pole in the corner and a dangerously tilting fireplace of bricks with a iron oven on oneside. Behind that is a 3 foot cinder block wall that the top 2 rows are dissintegrating. It looks horrible.

Here is kind of what we want it to look like.

This is a cob structure that was built in 2006 in Dufferin Grove park which we lived near. The whole community pitched in with working the cob material. Cob is made up of clay, straw and mud I believe and you have to stamp on it with bare feet to work in the straw to the clay.

THey also did a gorgeous job laying in mosaics of glas, china and mirror and then grouting it all around to the outside of the cob. Anyone was allowed to come and do mosaic on it. There are some amazing designs on the structure.

I don't know when we'll do it or if it's even possible. We've been looking for a book with decent instructions besides telling us to take a weekend workshop.

Sculpting Tantilizers

OK I got permission from Tim to post some of his sculptures. So far these are only created in clay and then we will cast from these and make molds and master casts. I hope I got all that lingo correct!

These are the fairy ladies carrying off a honey pot. I guess it would have been helpful if I had thought to turn the bloody thing so you were looking at it from the right angle!! Oops, sorry!

Here is the Oak tree man or Fall guy or something like that. Tim's working on doing a plaque for each of the seasons.



This is a fingermaze that is the same pattern we used in our larger walking labyrinth. It's kind of fun to run your finger around on it.

Tim's been sculpting lots more since these photos were taken but we want to keep some of it secret until we open our doors of the gallery!

Winter Fun

It seems like it's been a long time since we've had a winter resembling normal in this country. We have been having great fun with all this pretty snow everywhere. I guess after living in the city for so many years it seems very gorgeous. In the city the snow is only ever fresh and clean looking for about a day or so. Then the dirt and and plows and salt turn it all nasty and brown.

Here it still looks fresh and white and still untouched in areas with only an occasion path of tracks from some critter running along.

We, sorry correction, Tim cleared a big area of snow off of the river and has been skating everyday since and the kids have been out there too. The hockey games have been feverish between them. I managed to get out there yesterday after school and played until the tummies were growling on everyone.

Tim also got ambitious and tracked a labyrinth in the snow and then traced all the edges with sticks so that in the spring we'll be able to add to it and make it more permanent. It's wonderful to walk under the pines and listen to the wind run through all the needles and it's actually the river at the back of the picture which is covered in snow. It should be a nice spot at anytime of year.

County Life is Great!!

6am First snowfall and a full moon. It was gorgeous!

Well I'm back in the library. We come to the library about once a week or so. Apparently the news on getting wireless is more dismal than before. The technician that works on the tower here in the County fell off his roof over the holidays and broke his leg! Sooooo... he obviously won't be climbing that silo in Waupoos anytime soon to add the extra length needed to get the signal to us. sigh...

Dialup is crazy slow. Our modem can only run at half speed because apparently the copper wire in the county is kinda lousy so the signal can't run any faster!

I do love it here, even without TV (besides the 2 channels we do get!) and cell phones and internet. The kids have their moments of wanting to go back to the city. Mostly this is because they miss their friends. Being able to see so far out on the horizon is amazing after never being able to see past the wall of houses across the street in Toronto. Even lousy weather is wonderful to look out the window at!

There was big excitement yesterday! It was officially a snow day! NO BUSES! The kids were thrilled with the icy weather keeping them home for the day. This morning though it was back to business and they got outside early enough to slide down the little hills on their crazy carpet sleds before the bus came.

Tim and I decided to give the sleds a try at the back of the house from the hill and both of us would have ended up in the river if we hadn't managed to get our feet out quickly to stop the slide. Obviously our weight carried us alot further than the kids and all the crusty ice on the surface of the lawn made from some speedy sledding. The river isn't exactly frozen solid yet so it would have been a nasty ending. Tim went first and couldn't stop for quite a distance so he was a bit paniced by the end of the trip!

Fun to be had in the simplest of ways around here!!

We Are In the County!!

This is the view from our kitchen window and the horses are usually in the green field you can see on the other side of the river.

I'm once again at the library picking up junk mail. The deal is the Wireless tower they built on a silo in Waupoos isn't tall enough to get a decent signal. So back to the engineering drawing board of figuring out how to get it taller and attach it so it doesn't blow off!! They say maybe by xmas. We aren't holding our breath.
We are in town to do some errands and one of them is to find a modem for dial up in the mean time. Of course they will only allow us to use 10 hours month until the wireless is up. Yes you heard right 10 hours a month!!! Yeah, I freaked too! Hopefully we'll have some dial up before the week is out.

Life is awesome and we are loving it here. The kids are loving it and very happy and relaxed. Quinn is bringing home love notes every day this week from all these different girls so he is feeling pretty good! Leah loves the less homework and therefore less stress and has 2 very good friends in her class.

We've had a great snow that is now gone, plus a day with double rainbows and lots of sunshine and warm weather too. It feels like we have, in three weeks, managed to have every season pass through!

The Crystal Ball

Wow! What a night Tim and I had last night!! My boss Sharin got for all the Knobart.com Crew tickets to go to the Crystal Ball at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. It's a huge fundraiser for Reach for the Rainbow, which is a children's charity. The tickets were $700 each!! Our table was given to us because of the large donation Sharin gave of a completely decorated bedroom with furniture and everything!

Sharin is in the green jacket with Mary Jane (MJ) beside her, then Adrianne, then me. Lorrainne in red and Evelyn on the rocker. This was early in the evening and once Bacardi opened up the cocktail bars it all got a bit sillier! Those mojitos went down smoothly didn't they ladies!

Yes and so did those Bacardi Razz and lemonade cocktails too!

We had to test out the comfort level of the BMW car and motorcycles that were up for auction too!

I couldn't resist hiking up my long dress and trying it out. I know, I know not exactly lady-like, but when will I ever get another chance like that!! The bike was so nice and all the foot pegs, brakes and clutche were perfect sized for me to ride. It was a wee bit tall, I had to be on the balls of my feet, even with heels on!!







Here is a shot of my hubby and me in our fancy dress up clothes. This will have to be a keeper of a picture since the chances of going anywhere this glamourous in the future is probably fairly slim!


What a way to end our 4 years in Toronto. Did I mention that the Beach Boys were there and we got to dance for a couple of hours to their music. Sweet!!

Thank you Sharin for an absolutely great time! You are an Awesome boss!! That was so much fun!

Website Building

My smart hubby is working hard on creating our Galloping Goat Gallery website. It's looking great so far. We've even managed to agree on a business card design without any major arguments! Just a tweek here and there and one back and forth of each of us having a go at the design and we came up with one that we like.

Cute goat isn't he?

I got all excited this afternoon in the middle of packing because I came across a knitting pattern for a winter hat that had a goat on it. I kept thinking how cool it would be to make Tim one for Yule and try to somehow tweek the design so it looks more like our goat. I have only recently begun knitting but have managed pretty well and even messed with some patterns midway so that they would fit better. I guess I could always just knitt the hat and then stitch the goat on after.

Tim just realized we have inadvertantly picked christmas colours. Well yes, kind of, but red and green are split complimentary and go together really well. We picked the red because the barn is red and green to go with the garden theme of our items that we will be selling. We should probably pick a third colour to compliment the design that doesn't say christmas so much!

Limbo Anyone?

Well here we sit in Limbo Land...sigh. Too soon to pack all of it and nothing much to do since the work is waiting on the other side of the move.

Having Tim home has been nice and he even cooked dinner tonight! Nothing beats sitting down to a meal I didn't have to think about, plan or prepare!

Here is the stuff I have been working on and is now on the website. Soon the grow charts will be there as well, they just need to be photographed.

www.knobart.com has most of my stuff under "New Projects" and there is even a page with my picture in the Knobart crew link. Our dog Belle has her picture and info page under the dogs since she comes to work with me on occasion when I dodn't drive in on my motorcycle. Though she would probably love that if I had a side car for her!

3 Beautiful Things

Thanks to Clare and her blog for this idea!

1. Full moon last night was gorgeous and had me up late and creative until way past my normal bedtime. Then I got up early in the morning to continue working on my fun painting. I rarely give myself permission to just paint a picture on canvas and I did last night and it turned out very cool. It sort has the look of what could be a great fabric design.

2. Hot chai tea with frothy milk made for me by my hubby who found me in my pj's playing with my paint this morning. It looks like even my pj's aren't safe from me getting paint on them. Oh well they are fuzzy purple flannel with sheep on them so it's not like I'm really going to care if I get paint on them. Love that chai and it always wakes me up with a zing of caffeine.

3. Going to the movies with the kids and actually enjoying the kid flick!

3 Beautiful Things

Thanks to Clare and her blog for this idea!

1. Full moon last night was gorgeous and had me up late and creative until way past my normal bedtime. Then I got up early in the morning to continue working on my fun painting. I rarely give myself permission to just paint a picture on canvas and I did last night and it turned out very cool. It sort has the look of what could be a great fabric design.

2. Hot chai tea with frothy milk made for me by my hubby who found me in my pj's playing with my paint this morning. It looks like even my pj's aren't safe from me getting paint on them. Oh well they are fuzzy purple flannel with sheep on them so it's not like I'm really going to care if I get paint on them. Love that chai and it always wakes me up with a zing of caffeine.

3. Going to the movies with the kids and actually enjoying the kid flick!

Galloping Goat Gallery

Here is the location of the Galloping Goat Gallery barn. Or at least in 19 days it will be ours. This barn used to be the original Black River Cheese Factory but it moved across the road in, I believe 1901. It's going to be quite a job getting this barn up to snuff to be a store. I'll load photos of what it looks like inside when we get there and hopefully before spring there will be "after" pictures when we are ready to open the store. Too bad I can't paint it until the temperatures are above 10 celcius...sigh. That will be fun, at least painting the inside and picking colours since the outside is staying red. I want to paint the trim around the windows a sage green colour but Tim wants to keep it white since it's traditional. Any opinions? It isn't registered as a heritage building but and everyone that visits the county takes pictures of the barn since it is so picturesque with it being beside the river. Which should we do? Or do we even need to worry about it?(The river is just to the left of the picture here.)

Only 19 days left! Eeek! My stomach lurches when I see the calendar these days knowing it's soooo close.

Tim's last day of work was yesterday and for fun he decided to a jacket, shirt and tie. The kids even asked why he was dressed like that. I told the kids "Daddy is playing dressup today." The kids of course understood that explanation completely and just said "oh" and went on with getting ready for school. Tim and I had a bit of a giggle since he wouldn't normally ever wear those kind of clothes to work, only weddings and funerals warrent it.

The Handyman Gene

Apparently the handyman gene has been passed from father to son. This is Tim and Quinn building the mecano dinosaur set that Quinn won at the costume party. It was very intricate to put together but they both stayed at it the whole weekend!

Quinn is now looking online for more mecano sets to get for christmas! Tim is already planning the next build they will do with the dino set, apparently there is a car that can be adapted from the set.

Halloween Treats!

Here is Quinn, Leah and my version of ye olde witch finger cookie. We went with a sugar cookie dough that we added green food colouring to and a chocolate chip for the nail (no nuts in the schools allowed). We call them Monster Toes! Too bad most of them got a little over cooked but these guys turned out OK and it made enough for both class parties tomorrow!

Gotta love a simple fun and a wee bit gorey treat that makes 73 cookies!

and so begins... Halloween!

So Quinn managed to not scare himself too much and decided that he did want the scars, stitches and blood for his pirate outfit for the Boys and Girls Club costume party last night. 2 nights ago he had changed his mind and only wanted to be a guy with a boat that was blue with a white strip and sail. He was worried if he looked in a mirror he would be too scary as his original idea of Franken-pirate!

The evening turned out great considering how the day started out with Quinn disappearing at his school and no one knowing where he was. I found him hiding in the basement almost 20 mins after I had dropped him off at the school and watched him walk into the building. It's pretty scary to ask his teacher where your child is and she tells you that he hasn't arrived yet when you were the one that dropped him off into the building!

Anyways, letting that stress go, or trying too!

Leah's Grammie made her Raggedy Ann costume and I made the wig and painted the lines on her tights and she was thrilled with how she looked. Quinn loved his look as well and had a long list of pirate lingo that he was practicing all night.

The competition was a bit tougher this year at the club but these 2 again won two of the six best costume prizes so they were pretty pleased with themselves. Leah won Best Dressed Girl and Quinn won Best Homemade Boy.

Baxter of the Golden Eyes

Here is our boy Baxter. It seems his name is staying. He was a good boy his first night but I'm definitely going to have to learn to sleep through all the purring! He even managed to wiggle under the blankets in the early morning for better snuggling. He slept the entire day on my pile of bills beside my computer monitor while I was typing away and Belle was at my feet keeping them toasty on this chilly day.

County School Visit

Tim and I along with Leah and Quinn left early Friday morning for the County from Toronto. We arrived under a deluge of rain and gray skys at Quinn's soon-to-be school. We walk into the small school and turn into the office where we see the big white board with the important news and up coming events on it. There right in the middle in Bright orange marker is "Friday Oct 20th - Quinn's visit". The secretary and principal and Quinn's soon-to-be teacher rush to greet us and tell us all about the school.

It's in the middle of lunch hour with an indoor recess because of the rain so it was a bit noisy and the principal (we got to call her Pooky!) kept appologizing since they've had 4 days straight of indoor recess because of the lousy weather. It really wasn't that noisy, I've heard way worse at Dovercourt in a lunchroom with the kids.

Quinn got a book from his teacher with all the pictures of all the kids in his class with their favourite things listed and a bit about how many people are in their families. Then his teacher introduced him to the class and showed him where he will sit and had a girl stand up and tell Quinn that she had moved here also from Toronto. Then she had a girl named Lucy stand up and say hi because her grandma and Quinn's grandma are friends and know each other.

We then left for Leah's school 5 minutes further down the road. Quinn was clutching his book and looking for Lucy's picture and asked for a pen or pencil, or anything quick! He quietly wrote his name and put a heart with a happy face and an arrow pointing to Lucy in the picture. He showed us and told Leah not to tease him but he loved Lucy.

Leah's teacher was away but she got to see her class and check out the kids and see the HUGE computer lab. There is one brand new computer for each kid when a class goes in to use the lab.

Quinn's class is SK grade 1 split with 22 kids and every other day when the SK's aren't there, there are only 18 kids. Leah's class is a grade 4 and 5 split with 22 kids in it. Nice class size or what!

In the 20 minutes that we spent at each school the secretaries and principal and even the special needs teacher had double checked on the special FM system and phonic ear that Leah needs for her Auditory Processing Disorder. They are hoping to maybe even have the classroom wired and set up for when Leah arrives. This is completely shocking for us! Toronto school board told me it would take a couple of years probably to get this system for Leah. Too expensive, not a strong enough need, she isn't hearing impaired, blah blah blah.

Pooky kept saying we will do our best but no promises but the secretary Brenda just laughed and rolled her eyes and said don't worry we'll get it all set up. Pooky said the school board would of course have to approve the expensive of the system so that's why they can't promise anything.

We shall see what happens but I'm certainly more hopeful at this school then I ever was in the Toronto Board. Like I told Pooky and Brenda "you've done more for us in the last 20 minutes than the Toronto School Board has in 6 yrs".

Wahoo! I love the County!! The kids seem like they are happy with what is to come now and Quinn seems less frantic about what the new school will be like so all in all a good trip.

I'm always a sucker for a sad story and after looking online at all the poor kitties that need homes we (as in myself and Leah and Quinn) ended up at the Toronto Humane Society on Saturday.

It was very busy but we looked around read all the cats charts and any info found one, two and three and even a fourth that we liked. Next we got a number and an adoption form and kept poking around looking. After an hour and a half the number on the lighted screen was still "3" and we had "15" in hand. Quinn was grumpy, hungry and the smell was making him a bit nuts so we decided to be smart go home and think about this whole thing.

Sunday we woke up and couldn't get all the kitties out of our heads so this time with Tim in tow we headed back to the Humane Society. We decided in the ride over we wanted a girl and a tabby as first preference. We threw around a bunch names of what we were going to call our new cat. We also decided we wanted to get one at least 2 or 3 yrs old.

Well after a short time showing Tim our favourites from the day before we found Pixie. I think Quinn found him first. He was talking to Quinn when I saw him first. He has huge golden eyes and black and white patches on the softest fur ever. He is a big boy and I assumed he was at least 2 yrs. Turns out he is only 6 months!! We discovered this while doing paperwork, so much for all our plans.

As you can see he made himself very comfortable by climbing in beside Leah on the couch for a nap. The kids are completely in love with him, we'll see how long that lasts after the inevitable kitty litter scooping begins. Oh and we have changed his name to Baxter, at least it seems to fit so far!

Making Plans

Well Quinn is still stressing so after chatting with another mom in the school yard I've scheduled a visit to the new school and thank you to Denise for her brilliant suggestion!

I spoke to the principal of the school where the kids will attend and she was very helpful although extremely curious about us. She asked straight out why are we moving to the County, what are we planning to do there? She then said she isn't supposed to ask but that she was asking anyway. I couldn't help but laugh at that. I almost forgot how small towns work. Who every has the most up-todate gossip wins!

Apparently all the County folk have already heard that it's "Toronto people comin' and bought that Black Crick property"(note to self; to sound like a local it's Black Crick not Black River). So I guess it's understandable that Ms Pooky Scott the principal of the small public school wouldn't want to miss this opportunity to grill me. I couldn't resist putting in her full name, isn't it great!

So we are leaving this Friday morning early, early and probably crawling out of the city stuck in rush hour traffic, grrr. Which should add on an hour or so to the drive. So I've got to pack snacks, a lunch and the (thank Goddess for this) portable DVD player. Hopefully all this rain we are getting will be gone by Friday so it's not a wet sloppy drive. I want to take the kids to Little Bluff to see the beach where they will be able to swim in the summer and to few other points of interest. Hopefully this will help give them a sense of anticipation rather anxiety about where we are going to be living.

It's funny it still doesn't feel that real yet sitting here in my kitchen with the constant hum of traffic and sirens from the fire station down the street. Will the silence be too quiet? Will the dark feel scary and suffocating without street lights? I don't think it will, I'm feeling too much the draw of quiet solitude and hearing nature at this point. We'll see if that is still true after some time living there. I'm looking forward to Friday and a chance to be able to take a few deep breaths before we head back to the city to finish up our time here. I am going to try and do some of the fun things in the city with the kids before we go but time is starting to sneak by me so I better get my butt in gear with some plans. Not to mention everyone here that wants to get together with us before we go. Maybe I should just have a big, last-blow-out party with all our friends and the kids friends too. Hmm... that sounds like a plan!

October's Chill

Well it sure was chilly this morning as we walked to school. Lucky for me I managed to find the box of winter hats, scarves and mitts in the attic so we all suited up nice and cozy.

Every morning lately Quinn finds a leaf and asks me to press it. Invaritably I loose it as I follow my routine of dropping of the kids and backpacks and taking the dog to the park for a run. So I end up having to spend some time hunting for a similar one to replace the one he found and it is wet. Now I have it drying which you know I'm going to forget about and it will go all crunchy and boy will he be ticked at me! THis is assuming he will even remember, you never know with Quinn, he's a tricky one!

With the move coming I am letting the kids have friends over more often and tonight they are each having a friend for a sleepover. Which means I'll have 4 kids running rampant in the house right after school and through dinner (thank goddess for mac and cheese!) until the late hours. How insane am I? Pretty insane but the guilt of knowing I'm pulling up their roots to move them is playing pretty strongly here.

Hmm... I just realized that when I saw the kids' parents this morning we never discussed a pickup time for Saturday, eeks! That can be dangerous but I have phone numbers and I will use them if it gets to ruckus on Saturday!

The Number Three

This has been a hell of a week. Why do we always assume that death comes in three's? When did someone come up with that calculation?

Saturday evening my husband answered the phone at 10pm and was obviously upset by the news he was receiving. I was in a panic wanting him to get off the bloody phone and tell me want was going on because my imagination was going crazy!

It turned out it was bad news a very good girlfriend of mine from college had died. She was the same age as me which certainly brings about a reality check. Judy was 38 and was found in her apartment dead from Menningitus, the worse strain of the virus.

Judy was the one that kicked my husband and myself in the pants near the end of college enough to admit we had feelings more than just friendship. 13 years later and 2 kids and we are still very much in love and having a great life. That Judy was a smart woman, or possibly sick to death of listening to her two friend yakking her ear off about the other person. Either way we got the nudge we needed and Judy was toted as the matchmaker for us.

The day before we got that call I was poking through my wedding pictures and found one of Judy with her boyfriend partying with us. I promised myself to call her after the weekend to catch up and tell her all about our new adventure we were launching with our lives. I got to go to her memorial service instead.

Why don't people cry? I couldn't help crying but I seemed to be the odd person out in doing it. She was only 38 and there were at least a hundred plus people there that she had been a part of their lives. Was it just too fast and shocking that people haven't let the news really sink in or have we just become too desensitized from reality thanks to all that TV and movies we see. We only know how we are supposed to act not how we actually feel and to follow that instead of the proticol that we've seen in some damn movie.

As for the number three... well I learned the day before yesterday my Great Aunt May passed in her 92nd year which is still sad but understandable. The number three death was our pet Rachel who was a very sweet rat.
Do we get to count small rodent pets as a death in our morbid death count? Rachel hasn't had her ceremonial burial or good-bye service yet with the kids. I am going in 5 mins to pick them up from school and have the talk.

Unfortunately we had to send Rachel's body out with the trash this morning but we have a box we created last night which the kids will think holds the body of Rachel. Personally I prefer the truth since we all have stories as children about pets that go off to a farm to live to only find out years later it's completely bogus! Tim wants the fake burial service, I want to hand them a gentle truth. I'm going to see how they first take the news of Rachel's passing before I make the final decision about what I want to say about her body.