I'm still here

It has been a little busy the last few days. I haven't gotten anything done on the sewing project, but, just yesterday, I figured out how I can alter the pattern for now to accommodate my two very different sized girls. I will be drawing out a new pattern tonight and hopefully will have time to sew it over the weekend. I think once I have shed a few pounds, that I will be able to go back to the original project and adjust it to work around the hole it has. So, good news there!

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More, even better news!

My creepy upstairs neighbour has moved to a different building! *happy dance* (same complex still) I didn't realize how much better I would feel and I haven't even seen much of him since the last incident I blogged about. I will be able to enjoy going outside again next summer!

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Tomorrow is All Hallows Eve, ghosts and goblins will be trick or treating. Adults will be giving out candy to the little beggars that come to their doors. Do you make them sing for their treats? and count the number of kids? If the kids are taller than you do you still give them candy? what if they aren't in any sort of costume? Do you dress up to scare the kids?

All this stress for one night a year!

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Not only is it Halloween, it is the last day of Breast Cancer Awareness month. I would like to thank each and everyone who showed support or donated time or money to the cause. A few posts this month have brought tears to my eyes and a few have made me realize just how lucky I am. Thank you all!

Have a good weekend everyone.

WWC: Then & Now

WWC again! I thought this was going to be very difficult, but then at the last minute, I had some inspiration. The words this week are THEN & NOW. The Weekly Word Challenge is brought to us by the cold suffering, soon to be married, Tink of Pickled Beef. How do people in Florida get a cold anyway? the air conditioning too high? On to the words, remember to click to enlarge:


When I was but a mere child, mom would let us play with her old make up. This is what it looked like THEN.

This is what makeup looks like NOW. The biggest difference is in the mascara, they are both Maybelline btw.


Back THEN if you wanted ice cream, you had to make it yourself and it took quite a bit of effort.


I had to get this photo on-line because I don't own one of these new-fangled machines. If I want ice cream NOW, I just go to the store.


If you were inclined to eat back THEN, you also had a fair amount of work cut out for you.


Unlike NOW, when I just have to go to the freezer. (yes that is ice cream in the tub in back)


Of course, back THEN, if you were lucky enough to go to school, all the grades were taught in one room.


Unlike NOW, where there are many rooms, the grades are divided amongst several buildings and kids no longer consider themselves lucky to get an education.


This is how you went about building camp back THEN.



NOW, of course, there isn't as much work involved and you can take it with you.

Yes, these people are my relatives and as some of them are blog shy, I blurred their faces.


That's all folks, hope you have a good day, drop by and see Tink if you would like to join our band of shutterbugs.

MTM: Old Strathcona -Part III

Whyte Avenue or 82 Ave, is the "main drag" in the Old Strathcona area. It is four lanes of heavy traffic all of the time. On Summer evenings and weekends, you would think it was a set for "American Graffiti". It is where everyone with a tricked out or restored car comes to cruise. It is where bikers hang around in parking lots, unless they are cruising as well. You can see the most amazingly restored vehicles, hear the roar of Harley's and choke on exhaust fumes from any of the outdoor cafes, restaurants or bars along Whyte.

Click to enlarge

From the Old Strathcona website:

Princess Theatre 1914: 10337 Whyte Avenue

When it opened in 1915, the Princess Theatre was said to have the largest stage in western Canada. Early fare included high-class musical vaudeville and musical concerts. When television arrived in the 1950s, the lobby of the Princess was converted to retail use for more than 15 years.

The first commercial film shown at the Princess Theatre was The Eagle's Mate, starring Mary Pickford. Until 1940, the Princess was the only commercial theatre in south Edmonton.

click to enlarge

Periods building abound in the area. Unfortunately a few have been lost over the years to fire and bad planning.

click to enlarge

click to enlarge

If you happen to be in the neighbourhood in the spring during Stanley Cup playoffs and the Oilers have made it that far, you can be assured that the city police will be shutting the streets down to vehicle traffic and will be out in full force. During any of the playoff games, there is a huge potential for a riot, if we win, you want to be safe at home.

click to enlarge

Some of these are from the 50's through the '70's and were built to the style of the time. They are a couple of blocks to the west of the period buildings, but they represent an era of their own too.

click to enlarge

click to enlarge

Since 1974's founding of the Old Strathcona foundation, buildings only get replaced, if they have been damaged beyond repair as in the case of fire. New buildings whether replacements or not are being built to "fit" in with their older neighbours, both in style and by being clad in brick.

click to enlarge

I have so far only covered the main shopping area, there is so much more to cover, but I think next week I will take a look at a different area of my city. Strathcona will continue in the future.

For more My Town Mondays drop by Travis Erwins blog for links to other places around the world.

Have a good day all.

P.S. For those following the sewing saga...I had to take the bodice off yet again and this time put a hole in it. Back to the drawing board to redesign. *sigh*

Sewing - AARRRGH!

Well, it has actually gone better than I imagined. Here is the suit so far...here is what it will look like when I am done (I hope).




Unfortunately, I have to pick out all of the stitching along the bust sides and tighten it up and raise the fabric along the straps, cause the girls are falling out.


Not a very good photo of what that will entail, but I used an overlock stitch on the machine, so there are about 7 million stitches for each inch of fabric. Through four layers and the gathering.

I don't think I will be done today. Which is a real pisser as I only had one strap to add and the legs to hem. *sigh* I think I will go vacuum.

Have a good day all.

Sewing Update

I think I am a bit intimidated by this project! I have never sewn stretch fabric before, so I have been procrastinating a bit. It has taken me all weekend just to cut out the fabric! Monday, in between sessions on the computer, I spent time finding the sewing machines instruction book and reading up on what it had to say. Yesterday, I took some scraps left over from cutting out the pattern and tried the suggested settings on the machine. After several false starts, I think I found the right settings and might just be ready to give it a whirl today.

Have a good day all.

WWC: Plain and Adorned

Tuesday once again folks and that means Weekly Word Challenge. The words this week were Plain & Adorned.

This house is certainly ADORNED with decorations.


Which makes this one look rather PLAIN.


Home made fries ADORNED with ketchup just for this photo.


They are much better just PLAIN.


A lot of roof tops are ADORNED with satellite dishes.


You don't get any more PLAIN than this!


That's it! I have been trying to sew and am getting a bit frustrated, so I didn't have a lot of time for photos this week. I'll post about the sewing probably tomorrow.

If you would like to join the WWC visit Tink at Pickled Beef, she is the word master for us all.

MTM: Old Strathcona - Part II

In hindsight, I should have posted this first. Too late now, so we must just forge ahead. Click on any photo to enlarge.

In 1891, that Calgary and Edmonton Railway Company, decided to complete the line between the two cities. They decided to end the line on the South bank of the North Saskatchewan River for purely greedy reasons. They wanted to create a new commercial centre and take over Edmonton which was located on the North bank. They called the community South Edmonton and set about building the rail station, section house, engine house and an hotel.

This is the train side of the station that replaced the original station.


Unfortunately they are re-doing the roof on the street side, so it is a bit obscured by scaffolding.

From the Old Strathcona website:

Canadian Pacific Railway Station 1908: 8101 103rd Street

Separate waiting rooms for men and women and a smoking lounge were the talk of the town when the station opened in January 1908. Built for $24,000, it replaced a modest wood frame station that had been constructed in 1891.


This is the sign between the new & the old stations, they built the new station in a style similar to that of the old station. (I didn't think to get a photo of it)

From the Old Strathcona website:

Strathcona Hotel 1891: 10302 Whyte Avenue

The Calgary & Edmonton Railway Company built what was first called the Edmonton House Hotel in 1891, making it the oldest wood frame commercial building on Whyte Avenue. Originally the rectangular wood frame building had 45 guest-rooms, a dining room and beer parlour. The old gal still knows how to kick up her heels.

During Prohibition, the Strathcona Hotel served as the Westminister Ladies College.

Two additions, in 1907 and 1913, were built onto the north end of the Strathcona Hotel.

Sign with an archival photo placed by the city designating this as historical.


From Wikipedia:

In 1899, Strathcona was incorporated as a town and named after "Lord Strathcona, a pioneer fur trader and clerk whose real name was Donald A. Smith".^[1] It became a city in 1907.

In 1902, alarmed by fires that swept through many prairie communities at the time, Strathcona's town council passed an ordinance requiring that all buildings be constructed of materials like brick that are resistant to fire. This, along with municipal development moving north of the river after amalgamation, means Strathcona has one of the largest stocks of vintage buildings in western Canada.

The University of Alberta was established in the city of Strathcona in 1908.

Today, those parts of the City of Strathcona around Whyte Avenue are known as Old Strathcona.

In the 1970's many of these buildings were threatened with demolition. Fortunately there were a lot of community minded citizens that got together and created the Old Strathcona Foundation and put an end to the threat. In 2007 it was finally given recognition by the province as an historical area.

Next week I will show you some of the more interesting buildings along Whyte Avenue.


My Town Mondays are hosted by Travis Erwin, drop by his blog and read about other places from around the globe.

Edit: for info about Prohibition in Canada go here.

Haiku & photos

So, Gary over at Pottery Blog asked us to do haiku for our pets in his comments. Mine was pretty bad, but was inspired by this photo, so I figured I had to show you all:

I don't do haiku
Sibu won't look when he plays
when I'm bugging him

I think if you click to enlarge, you can just see the tip of my finger as he is trying to grab it. So, the rules of Haiku are three lines, first containing 5 syllables, second 7 syllables, third containing 5 again. I thought I should give it another try.

View world upside down
Whiskers act as antennas
Call mothership down

That works for both of those photos. That is kind of fun, as you can tell I have never done Haiku before. Give me your best Haiku about your pets, or drop over and give them direct to Gary.

Have a good day all.

WWC: Me & Them

Wow, here we are again and this week Tink was diabolical! ME & THEM! Trying to find photos for them was hard, trying to caption them is going to be even harder - if I want to keep my English clean ;) Well, here goes nothing!

Yes, this is ME, from about 100 years ago. (because I have no idea when it was taken, or how old I might have been - 12?)


The gulls gather in the field behind the apartment - just look at THEM all! (yes, I had to dig in the archive)

This is not ME! But holy decorations Batman! Look at THEM all!


There is only one in the tree but I did startle a bunch of THEM into flight.

Train cars, just look at THEM all! Yeah, getting repetitive, sorry!

ME again! I took a new picture of my hair colour & cut, I didn't like either, so I am thinking I will just let it grow again for as long as I can stand and go back to colouring myself. (Which prompted the playing in Adobe.)



So, that's it. Hope you enjoyed. If you would like to join our band of merry photogs, drop by and see Tink @ Pickled Beef, she is usually not this diabolical.

Have a good day all.

MTM: Old Strathcona

Having been a little lax for the last two weeks, I decided that I should really put out an effort for this weeks My Town Monday post. I decided that I would introduce you to one of the most interesting and diverse sections of the city "Old Strathcona". I hopped onto a bus (or two) and within moments (pfft - it's Sunday) found myself walking down the main street of the district which is called Whyte Avenue. I walked all over the place taking photos and getting smirked at and had such a good time, that in the end I spent about two hours walking and took over 100 photos! Damn I love my digital camera! Of course all of those photos means that I have enough fodder for posts for the next few weeks at least. Now all I have to do is find appropriate information to go with them all and I will be all set.

Today I am starting you off just a bit north of Whyte Avenue, we are going to see the first fire hall, the subsequent memorial park and the old bus barns which are now the Farmers market.

If you click on the photos, you can read any signs I photographed.


These five photos are of the Firefighters Memorial, fittingly erected next to Edmonton Fire Station #1. Surrounding the bell tower are the names of fallen firefighters.


More plaques dedicated to fallen heros.

These are the three sculptured gates behind the memorial above, depicting the various modes of transport used over the years.


This sculpture is called the rescue.


From the Old Strathcona website:

Fire Hall #1 1911: 10322 83rd Avenue

Built in 1910/11 when fire engines were horse drawn, this fire hall served as a stable, a garage for the engines and a dormitory for the fire-fighters. Standing 77' high, the cupola-topped tower housed the hall's alarm bell and a drying rack for the fire hoses. Today it is the only surviving fire hall from this era in Edmonton, and is the only surviving fire hall of its type in Alberta.


The front of the fire house.

The Provincial plaque designating this an historic site.


I had to go around the back to get a good shot of the tower.


The edge of the bus barns butts right up against the fire house.

The Old Strathcona Farmer's Market, formerly the bus barns, where they parked all the trolley buses overnight. You have to watch you footing inside as they never have bothered to remove the curbs. They did take out the tracks though. Serious renovations were done a few years ago to make a year round multi-purpose community arts centre now called the TransAlta Barns.

Very back (side) door to the market.

This one is not quite as far back, you get an idea of just how big the building is though.

At the very back, they have donated space to the Edmonton Radial Railway Society to store the restored street cars that run in the summer to downtown over the High Level Bridge.


And this is where you board the street car.

I will have to wait now until next year before I can do a post on riding the street car, as they shut down for the winter - on Saturday! (Yeah, yesterday!)

Well, I hope you enjoyed that, next week, I will show you ...I don't know what but more of the area. I realized that I missed a few places so have to go back and get some more photos.

My Town Monday is hosted by our fearless leader Travis Erwin, drop by his site for links to more places around the globe.

Have a good day all.