birthday boys

Andrew's birthday is only 2 days after mine and since their are so few at home these days we got only one ice-cream cake for the two of us. BTW he is 28 and I am 59.

Work and rest!

July 27 Kesten Krogsgaard and I were installing some laminate flooring at a rental unit and by noon we were ready to start putting down the laminate. We almost finished too but called it quits by 5:00 pm because of the heat. Saturday I finished it mostly and I also did some reno work on another place. Sunday was my birthday (I turned 59!) and I conked out after Sunday dinner. Ten of us went to Mano's Restaurant and the staff their sang Happy Birthday to me. I even got a free desert (a piece of cake with a sparkler on top).
I never could figure out when I was a kid why my parents always had a nap on Sunday afternoon. It was a glorious time to run about town or play a game of pickup ball, street hockey, football, anti-I-over, or kick-the-can (a version of hide-and-seek). It was only after I turned 50 or so that I started to appreciate Sunday afternoon naps.

New births

You can clearly see one of the three new chicks and I think that this is the male robin that has come to feed regurgitated worms and bugs to the chicks. I'll try to get a photo of all three new chicks when the pair of robins are both away from the nest.

Visitors

Sheena, Micheal, Victoria, Moria, and Arwyn came to visit and we had a bbq on the deck because it was so pleasant outside.

Lilies as thick as SNOW

The lilies in Ruth's flower garden were so amazing that when she looked out the window at 3:00 AM last night, Ruth mistook them for a moment for snow. I couldn't get them all in one shot so had to take several from different distances and angles. When Sandina (Alex's girlfriend) was visiting, she said that the most pleasant aspect of our whole place was the pond and she fell asleep in our hammock which is to the right of the pond that you see in the last picture.

I promised you a picture of the blue eggs and here it is. Sorry it is a little out of focus but I didn't want to disturb the robins too much and take to long. Sometimes the robins have four eggs but this one only has three. I'll get another one posted (hopefully) after they hatch.

About seven feet from our balcony door a pair of robins built a nest so now we have to go outside a different way. I'll have to take a picture of the blue eggs when they aren't watching.

The hailstones that I picked up around 3:30 AM on July 7. Over half an inch of rain in about 10 minutes with some hail thrown in to make it interesting. Fortunately the hail wasn't too damaging.

Ruth's garden

The flowers showing are only a fraction of the flowers that Ruth is growing. We have a real vegetable garden this year also as I dug a trench three feet deep and put in metal to keep out the tree roots. Also I put up a 7 foot high mesh to keep out the deer and rabbits. The peonies Ruth is holding are 7 inches in diameter and are the largest that she has grown. The last picture is the pond with four of the five goldfish that we have. They are not as pretty as Amber's.

A Joy-ous time

Canoing on Bob Parker's canoe trip this year was great. We camped at one spot and went to various lakes around. Darius Crook caught a rainbow trout (about 2 pounds) at Singh Lake [the first picture], but Joy Guidinger caught this 8 lb 11 oz 27 + 1/2 in. long pickerel (aka Walleye) in Nipekamew Lake [55 km past Heritage Lake Bible Camp] on July 1, 2007. Bill Blackmon the Katchie Kamp outfitter asked Joy for the fish so he could mount it on the wall because it was the largest pickerel that he had seen in the23 years that he had been there. I was Joy's canoe partner when she caught it so I made sure that she did the right things so she wouldn't lose it. Also I got to scoop it into the canoe with my net. It sure got my heart pounding. Just that one event of seeing Joy catch that fish made the whole trip worthwhile. She outfished all the other nine guys on the trip.