Kyra and I are already more than halfway through our holiday in Nova Scotia. We've had a nice time ... some amazing times. I went to my highschool reunion this past weekend and had an incredible time. So much fun! It was so great to see old friends. On the last day, I caught up with one friend who now lives in Georgia. We had lunch at a great little 'gastropub' and shared two orders of mussels and rhubarb gelato. We also shared a lot of words, thoughts, dreams, and feelings. We had a hard time saying goodbye. Tonight we were on the phone for two and a half hours ... I think I'm in trouble ...

This will be a short entry because I'm posting it from my BlackBerry. I don't have internet connection at home right now (not in our budget) and I haven't been able to steal an unsecure WiFi connection. I have been keeping up with most of you since I can read my friends page on my BlackBerry. I love today's technology. In four days, Kyra and I will board a train and head off to Nova Scotia. We'll be in Halifax for Canada Day! Yay! Anyhow, I'm not sure that I can stay for more than one night at SMU (despite the alumni rate) since my current financial state is so tapped. :( Anyhow, are there any of my Halifax lovelies available to meet up on July 2nd in case I can't stay the originally planned three days? Shelagh? Tammi? Bueler??? I'm still hoping that I'll be able to manage staying until Friday or Saturday, but if I can't, .. Anyone? Which brings me to inquire ... Does anyone have a teeny tiny corner that Daisy and I could put down an airmattress? We certainly wouldn't need any special accomodations or a personal travel guide. Just a sleeping spot so that we can spend our days wandering around Halifax. I realise that summer is a busy time and this isn't much notice, but I thought that I would throw it out there. Hope to see some of you soon! :D

I have been without an internet connection for a few weeks now. My friend halloween_666 has loaned me her portable connection for the weekend and I have been in cyber-bliss all evening! Thanks 2! Anyhow, I plan to write an update sometime over the weekend, but for now I just wanted to say hi and wish all the wonderful moms and future moms-to-be a belated Mother's Day. I hope that you all celebrated the day in your own way. Daisy and I just stayed home. She made me breakfast in bed, and gave me a beautiful hand-made Mother's Day card. A lovely day, but to me Mother's Day is every day.

Now back to reading everyone's back posts ... I am presently 260 posts behind. :p

In order to get the best deal with ViaRail, I'm planning to book our train tickets today or tomorrow. Kyra and I are planning to stay in Halifax again this year, hopefully for three nights, in order to do the tourist thing. However, I was wondering what goes on in Halifax on Canada Day? I was thinking that we might arrange to arrive on July 1st. Our train would arrive around 4:30 PM (although we were two hours late last year), and we'd like to celebrate Canada Day that evening. Are there any concerts, gatherings, festivals, etc. that night? Do any of my Haligonian friends know?

 

So I'm all moved in to my new apartment. I survived, but barely. Heh! Damn, but moving sucks! Especially when your as disorganized as I am when it comes to moving. Thankfully I have the most amazing friends who helped me move. I have absolutely no idea how I would have managed with out them. But, seriously ... I own too much crap! I am promising myself that I am going to get rid of at least 25% of my stuff. I do NOT need this much stuff. While I was packing I already got rid of a lot of things, and probably 50% of my clothes, but I'd like to lighten up some more. Plus, the new flat is really small so I'd like to not feel owned by my things. I'm afraid that that's how I felt in the apartment that we just left, and I refuse to feel that way here. New apartment = fresh start. :) Oh, and I should also mention that we did indeed get hit with a major snow storm. Nothing like moving in a blizzard! It's still snowing like mad our there. Note to self: NEVER move in the winter again. But it's done and we're here ... and I'm stealing someone's WiFi right now. *grin* I don't yet know what I'm going to do as far as internet connection is concerned. I was lucky to have free high-speed for the last nearly five years, but I'm on my own here. But right now, I'm so happy that I was able to find an unsecured signal tonight. Anyhow, got to relax. I only got a 45 minute power nap last night, so I'm sure that I'll sleep like the dead tonight ... and on a new queen mattress no less. Life is sweet!

Just checking in to say hi! I've been busy packing up my apartment for the last week or so and despite the fact that I'm moving tomorrow, I am not finished yet. I've not been online much and I'm totally out of the loop with everyone. I'm having withdrawal. :) Of course, with the constant snow that we've had here lately, it was only fair that we get hit with a big storm just in time for our move. Here's tomorrow's weather forecast:

Day: Snow at times heavy and blowing snow. Amount 15 to 25 cm. Wind north 40 km/h gusting to 60. High minus 1.Night: Snow at times heavy and local blowing snow diminishing in the evening and ending near midnight then clearing. Amount 2 to 4 cm. Wind north 40 km/h gusting to 60 becoming northwest 20 overnight. Low minus 10.

Sigh!

Daisy and I picked up the keys to our new apartment yesterday. We were able to go in to check on repairs, and to take measurements. We did discover that our couch will not be making the move ... too wide. Being there, and having the keys in my hand makes everything very real now. We are moving March 8th ... only eleven days to go. Oh, and of course we are are all packed and ready to go .. NOT! It's crunch time!

I wonder what it will be like to live in a building that was built in 1885?

Ack! I totally forgot to add money to my Paypal account and my Livejournal account just expired ... like one minute ago. LOL! I received the email alert at the same moment that I noticed the ads on my page. Sheesh! Oh, well ... I'm sure that I'll survive without some of my icons for a few days until I transfer some money into Paypal. I hate how it takes nearly two weeks to transfer funds from my Canadian bank account to Paypal. It comes out of my account within two days or so, but it doesn't show up at Paypal for at least another week or more. Peh! That will teach me for being scatterbrained. Heh!

It's not about life being perfect, it's about finding the perfection in reality. - Tammy L. Michaels

Daisy spent the last four months taking a dance class in choreography with a student teacher and here is a video of her final performance. She's the third dancer entering the studio.



Daisy's Ballet Performance from Poppy Bumblebee on Vimeo.

Hi everyone! I hope that you are all well. I promise a real post in the next few days, but for now I'd like to ask a tiny favour. Daisy's best friend is working on an English project for school and I was wondering if you could answer a few questions for him. It literally took me less than one minute to complete, so I hope that you can help him out. Thanks! Here's the link:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=G5JFkztDkPUTBQFX6D5g0w_3d_3d

Who knew that it was Delurker Day? Not me! If it weren't for Carrie or Ellen, the day would have just slipped by and I wouldn't have had the opportunity to post this amazingly rockin' Delurking Day button. I'm pretty sure that no one lurks around my blog, ... it's not as if I'm a cewebrity or anything. But I did want to post the button. :D Oh, and if anyone does lurk around here, please expose yourself and say hi!

I cannot express how happy I am to be back to our regular schedule. Don't get me wrong, the holidays were wonderful and I definitely got plenty of rest ... too much rest. But not working means no money, and not having a regular schedule means not enough activity. Add that to the post-Christmas letdown, and I was beginning to feel a gentle malaise slowly taking over my spirit and my energy level was so, very ... s.l.o.w ... Needless to say, here it is January 7th and I am ready to take on the new year. Happy 2008 everyone. So far, the year has been lovely, and I have a feeling that it's going to be a terrific year. In fact, I can't remember the last time that I've felt so positive about a new year beginning. I'm really excited about this feeling and the newness of it all. I have so much to say, including some of my aspirations for this year, but since I am technically working at the moment, I shall leave you with a link to the most sublime tea company that I have ever seen ... Tea Forté. The packaging for their teas are truly glamorous, and I feel inspired just looking at them. Plus the pyramid shaped silk tea bags with the tiny green leaf stem are simply a thing of beauty. It's the small things in life that give the most pleasure.

I'm wishing a Happy New Year to all my wonderful friends. Here's wishing that 2008 is the best year yet!

Seasons Greeting to all my friends who live all over the world. I hope that this season finds you well and spending time with friends or family. Merry Christmas and Joyeux Noël.

OMG ... I totally forgot to add this to my post, that I just posted, and I could have just gone back and edited the post, but it just seemed easier to to just post another post. Whatever ...

Daisy was given a huge box of chocolates from a BOY in her class who has a crush on her. I should add that she is equally smitten with him. They are entirely too young for this, but it is rather sweet!

First of all, I'd like to thank everyone who commented with well wishes and congrats, in regard to my finally finding a new apartment. It means a lot to me that you are there to support me! :)

I'm feeling mildly overwhelmed these days. I'm quite sure that it's due to the little known fact that Christmas is ONLY FOUR DAYS AWAY!!! It also doesn't help that I've just started my 'girlie business' and so I'm also feeling extremely exhausted. I have a few more gifts to buy in the next few days, and I'm trying to figure out how to squeeze in some shopping during the daytime tomorrow when the crowds and line-ups are minimal. I've been very lucky this week because I've had several free afternoons to do some shopping and thanks to that I haven't gotten overstressed dealing with the crowds. I don't like crowds in the best of times, but hanging out in crowded, overheated stores or malls while wearing a winter coat, carrying bags, dealing with irritable, stressed people a mere few days before Christmas is not my idea of JOY! This year however, I am feeling good about this holiday season. I have my housing sorted out, and just knowing that in a couple of months we'll be able to move into a cute new apartment, is the best Christmas present of all. Also, even though I had to tie up two months rent for the above mentioned new apartment, I am NOT broke this Christmas. Money is a little tight, but with a little budgeting and careful planning, I should be able to get through the holidays financially unscathed. (Fingers crossed!) It doesn't help that I will be working only a couple of days in the next two weeks so I won't have any money coming in. Ack! But, so far, so good that I'm trying not to stress over it. I'm still feeling overwhelmed, but in comparison to other years, I guess that this is a mild form of overwhelmedness (I can so make up my own words on my own blog!) Sleep is probably the best thing for me right now, but of course, try to tell my body that. It just doesn't want to shut down at night ... probably due to the current stress ... ummm, Catch-22. When you need more sleep, it doesn't happen. Sigh! Other than the stress and overwhelmedness, I'm doing ok. Probably because the apartment hunt is now over. I can now plan for the next stage of moving, ... packing. Hmmmm, ... fun what? But I'm happy these days. Overwhelmed to be sure, but I'm taking it all in stride and life is ok for the moment. I'm looking forward to Daisy having a couple of weeks off, and hanging with my girlie, without the overlying cloud of school, ballet, work, rushing around madness. It will be good to just be. Well, besides the visiting of friends etc. Anyhow, all in all, despite the stress level, despite the fact that Christmas will be here in four days, whether we like it or not, things are good. Now if only I could ask Santa to send me a maid. :D

Oh, and for everyone's viewing pleasure, here's video of a piano playing kitty. Brilliant!

Yesterday morning Daisy and headed out around 11:30 AM to go to Daisy's ballet class and we did not return home until 10:30 PM tonight. It was a busy weekend. Daisy's ballet class was an open class and so we invited our friends Jay and his daughter J2. After the ballet class we all headed over to the Whippersnapper Gallery to see Jay's partner Rannie who had a photo exhibit there with a few other photographers. After a few hours and a bite to eat we headed back to the ballet school since Daisy had a choreography class at 5:00 PM. Once that class was finished we headed to our babysitting gig. However, Daisy and I did not make it home last night. We only arrived home this evening after 10:30 PM after spending the night and entire day today with the family that we babysat for. We planned to make it home last night, but a snow storm hit Toronto last night and the idea of venturing out into the storm at 1:00 AM with Daisy to take the transit home didn't appeal to me, and since we were offered the spare bedroom, we decided to stay. Then, this morning we were invited to hang out for the day, ... have brunch, decorate the tree, nap, and have a movie night with them. We had such a great time and Daisy really enjoyed hanging out with the one year old and also decorating the tree. The storm really brought a tonne of snow and we picked up Greek food for dinner (our friends live in Greektown), and we rented the movie Stardust. I don't know how Daisy and I managed to miss this movie, but it's right up Daisy's alley and she really loved it. I have to admit that I enjoyed it as well. I'm glad to be home though ... and the cats were very glad to see us come in the door. They were very lucky that I left extra food and their water bowl is always full, or they might have missed us more.

Anyhow, I know that I've kept several of you hanging after announcing that we got the apartment that we wanted, but I haven't been on the computer except for a few minutes yesterday morning. So, the apartment is in an ideal location for us since we only have to cross the street to catch the bus that will take us to Daisy's school in under half an hour. As for September, when Daisy will start grade seven in middle school, it will only be a five minute walk to her new school. In fact the main reason that we chose this particular neighbourhood is because Daisy really wanted to attend this particular school since they have a great music program ... strings and choir. If we had moved to a location in our present neighbourhood, Daisy would have gone on a waiting list for this school since we live outside it's catchment area. So, since we had to move anyway, we chose the area around the school that Daisy was keen on. We will be on a major streetcar and bus route, there is a large grocery store across the street, and we will be living in another Italian neighbourhood. As for the apartment itself, it is in a walk-up character apartment building with only four floors. There are three buildings beside each other that are over one hundred years old. There are no elevators, but the staircases are huge wide ones with large wooden railings and banisters. There are leaded windows, high ceilings, hardwood floors (that squeak), radiators, and other things that give the building so much character. However, the bathrooms are renovated, the appliances are new, laundry is in the basement, and there is a security system with cameras at the front door. The apartment is not as large as the one I had looked at last month (but lost to another person), but the layout is good and I think that it will suit Daisy and I just fine. It is technically a bachelor apartment, but there is a small dining room that we'll use as a sitting room, with a small couch and a small two place dining table. The bedroom/livingroom we'll make the bedroom, with a library/study area. I desperately need to get my books all out in bookshelves, and have a comfy chair nearby. Unlike most bachelor apartments that are open concept, this apartment has a door on the bedroom which is what we need so that I can continue to read or watch television after Daisy goes to bed. Plus, I won't feel like I'm being held hostage when she needs to work on homework. I can stay in the sitting room while Daisy works on her school work. It will be a challenge to make things fit in the small space, but all that means is that we really have to purge a lot of stuff, and to only take what we really need and what we really love. I'm rather looking forward to 'dumping' some stuff that I've held onto for entirely too many years. Daisy and I won't be moving until March 1st, but we're going to start getting things organized right away because there is a slight chance that the apartment might be available February 1st. Apparently the building manager thinks that the current residents might be leaving early. Either February or March it doesn't matter because Daisy and I are really excited about the move and I am particularly thrilled because it means that I don't have to keep searching for a new place. What a relief that is to not feel that monkey on my back any more. Plus I've been feeling so guilty because my current landlords have been so patient. Now Daisy and I can start planning for the move and start getting some ideas for decorating the new apartment. So exciting! Anyhow, I've posted a couple of images ... one of the front of the apartment building, and one of the layout of the apartment itself. You can see how tiny it is but we'll make it work. Plus, once we're in the building, we can always move into a one bedroom once one becomes available if the bachelor really is too small.