May 2016 – Page 3 – Just An East Coast Girl

A Spring nuisance or a medicine for the body?

We have been enjoying beautiful weather this week. I have been trying to get outside and do some gardening. This time of year flowers and green plants are starting to sprout up and it’s exciting!! However, there is one colourful flower that isn’t so welcome, especially on our new lawn that we put in last year.

Dandelions! Hmm? Yep, those pretty yellow (flowers) weeds that pop up overnight on your lawn.

When we were living in China, we ate them! They were actually quite delicious. Ladies would spend hours in the parks gathering dandelion greens. And then cook them up. Maybe like we do fiddleheads here. Or…dandelion tea? It’s supposed to have many health benefits.

But here at home, we collect them…by the bucket full… BUT more because they are a weed invading our lawns.

My husband wants them GONE!!!! So we go outside and pull them out by the root…a little bit everyday. BUT We may have to rethink this a bit… Check out this site.

https://altnature.com/gallery/dandelion.htm

What are your thoughts?

A new kind of fun

Anyone who has been reading my blog for any time knows I love adventure and I love to explore. Unfortunately time & money these days doesn’t allow as much travel as I like so I have been looking at new ways to incorporate some extra fun in our walks and hikes around here.

GEOCACHING

Have you heard of it? What is it?

I have heard about geocaching for a long time and wanted to give it a try. My youngest son had his first go at it 3 weeks ago and since then I have really been wanting to get out and do it. So last night we did. I had my first introduction to geocaching.

…so what is Geocaching? Here is the definition from Wikipedia.

Geocaching is an outdoor recreational activity, in which participants use a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver or mobile device and other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers, called “geocaches” or “caches”, anywhere in the world.

A typical cache is a small waterproof container containing a logbook (with a pen or pencil). The geocacher enters the date they found it and signs it with their established code name. After signing the log, the cache must be placed back exactly where the person found it. Larger containers such as plastic storage containers (Tupperware or similar) or ammunition boxes can also contain items for trading, such as toys or trinkets, usually of more sentimental worth than financial. Geocaching shares many aspects with benchmarking, trigpointing, orienteering, treasure-hunting, letterboxing, and waymarking.

Sounds like fun, right? That’s what I thought and so this summer I want to do more of it as we are out and about.

Last night we loaded the app on our phone and set up a user name. The app shows caches in your aerator wherever. I just have the basic version for now until I learn more. The basic version gives you quite a few spots but also shows the premium ones in grey ( A LOT MORE) You click on the one you want to find, it gives you basic clues and then you walk or hike to find it. We did some easy ones in our neighbourhood last night just to see how it worked. You log in and when you find it, you can add comments and/or a picture and it sets a marker that you found it. Pretty cool!

Here are a few pics from last night. We are really hoping to get out and do some more geocaching really soon.

Geocaching…I think it’s the perfect activity to get you out exploring!!

Dearest Mother

I am blessed beyond measure to have two wonderful Mothers. My Mother and my Mother-in-Law. Both are remarkable women and I have learned much from them. And… and as of 3 weeks ago, I am officially a Mother-in-Law. I love my new daughter very much and happy she is my son’s choice for a wife.

Today is the special day we set aside each year and we celebrate Mother’s.

Mom

Happy Mother’s Day!

Feeling Nostalgic

I had a moment today….

Typical Spring Saturday…Yard Sale time!!! and my parents were having one today so we popped in just to show our support. Also, we had a couple boxes of things left over from our yard sale last year so we thought we would stay a few hours and see if things would sell.

Dad & Mom are feeling the need to declutter and get rid of stuff. Their reason…”Who knows how long we can stay in this big home and look after things… the time will come we have to move to an apartment” Sounds good to me! They’re having fun going through old things and deciding what they want/can keep and getting rid of the rest. A great Spring project for them.

One of the things they are selling is an old 8track player and 8tracks. Do you remember these? I sure do!!! I remember listening to them all the time as a kid. I started looking through a box of 8tracks….that’s when the nostalgia hit!!! It took me right back to 1975 to when we moved from Ontario back to Nova Scotia. I was just a kid. To pass time in the car on that longggggggg drive, Dad would play the 8tracks and we would all sing to the top of our lungs! Some of my favourites…Tammy Wynette and George Jones, Charlie Pride…oh my…and truth be told, I’ll bet if I played them today I would still be able to sing right along with it!!! Haha, good times, great memories!

It was a fun morning and we made a bit of cash and are down to 1 box.

Have a great weekend!

Cinco de Mayo

What is it?

It’s an excuse to have Mexican food! Yummos!

Actually Cinco de Mayo is Spanish for May 5th. And it’s a holiday in Mexico. A celebration held to commemorate the Mexican Army’s victory over French forces at the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862. It doesn’t mean much to us since we are not Mexican but we have Mexican friends and the date is written on the calendar and…like I said before it’s a reason to enjoy Mexican food. Tonight, it was fish tacos!

Prayers for Fort McMurray

Spring and Summer season can bring wild fires in the West Coast of Canada. And unfortunately it has started this year with a devastating fire in Fort McMurray

The only bright spot in the wildfire that has caused the entire Alberta community to evacuate is that no injuries or fatalities have been reported so far. The fire raging in the Fort McMurray area forced officials to evacuate 60,000 inhabitants.

Many Maritimers have called Fort McMurray home ( or second home) for a number of years as many have gone there to work in the oil sands. There are many friends and family from Nova Scotia that are dealing with this devastation… PLEASE PRAY!!!!