Our House in the Middle of Our Street

checking out my new amazon treat!  Last month and this month were good to me in the book department. My time of watching TV voraciously (catching up with my 3 favorite shows once they're on netflix, and watching all of Parenthood in one summer) is over and I am back turning to books in every spare moment. Surprisingly, this month went to a lot of history all across Canada. Funny how one can find the right books at the right time. Lukka will be learning all about BC history this year in (home)school, so reading a few of these books were so helpful even from a homeschooling perspective, let alone enjoyable to read on their own. Here's my September reads: *V ancouver Island Scoundrels, Eccentrics, and Originals by Stephen Ruttan - This quirky little book was one I had seen while on vacation on Vancouver Island and it seemed like a fun little history lesson, complete with photos, odd stories, and few pages (170+). I picked it up at our library and I thought it was so int...

 snapped out front of Rook & Rose , in Victoria Early every year I love to make a goal list that I can slowly work through as opportunities present themselves. Sometimes they're big, sometimes small, and this one was home-centered: get more greenery in for our small basement suite. My sister-in-law does plants so well , and that has inspired me to get a few more plants to spruce up the place {see what I did there?}.  Stefan has liked this goal because he would have a house full of green if our budget allowed it!  My ZZ plant and broad leaf succulent from R&R When I went to Victoria with my friend Emily, we found this beautiful plant boutique (is that even a thing?!) and I bought two beautiful plants that were extremely well priced, and had a healthy gloss to them. The two plants above are from Rook & Rose , and if you're ever in Victoria and you have plant goals, go see them. They had an air plant that was nearly $100 (it was huge, most are ...

When we moved to Ft. Langley about 18 months ago, we notified the owners of our rental suite that we were interested in-at some point- getting a mid-sized dog. Thankfully (hallelujah!) they were okay with that, since the previous tenants had a large-breed dog.  Another one of our 16 in 2016 goal list was to get a dog. This has been a looooong time in the making, and our kids are absolutely over the moon with their new pet dog, Copper. When we were ready to get a dog, we had a few stipulations: we wanted to get a dog from a shelter (the pure-breds in this area are outrageously expensive, even for very common breeds), the kids had to show us they were responsible enough to help out with the chores like picking up poop, feeding, running around/exercise, and spending time training. The last thing we were waiting for was to get back from vacation, so we could have a solid 6 weeks of assimilating the dog into our home until we were back 'in the thick' of things with home...

This was something brand new we did early in the Spring (yikes! I've neglected this blog for a long time...) around our town, Ft. Langley, BC . There was a 2-3 week period where nearly every house in Ft. Langley, which is home to so many beautifully landscaped properties, had a 'blooming bush' in their yard. The kids and I made up an activity--go on a "blooming bush bike tour" and take photos of all the gorgeous blooms.  Most of these photos were snapped by the kids, and people, we didn't even get farther than 4 city blocks before we were done because we had taken over 50+ photos! Here are a few of our favorites, and I tried to get a good array of colors presented.  If you know which flower/bush it is, leave it for me in the comments (and describe the photo/color of flower so we can know which is which).