Long Overdue Post

Now, seeing as it's been nearly two months without a blog post, I think I will use the sub-headings technique to avoid rambling on incoherently. This is gonna be a pretty huge post--who knows I'll have time to write another one--so feel free to skip through for anything interesting.

April Showers Bring May Flowers
I feel like only people's aunts still use this saying but it's been stuck in my head lately. To be honest, I really haven't minded the rain because it's meant that I get to wear my new Hunters. They are yellow and they make me happy. Since I still had pounds in my UK bank account, I got them online from www.countryattire.com (free international shipping!) and for once the shitty exchange rate worked in my favour as they cost me less than $100! (I know that's still quite a lot, but they would've cost me $170 if I'd bought them here!). So yeah, I've been strutting around all over town in these and loving it. Still, can't wait til the "May Flowers" part.

Blue Jays Opening Game

Baseball is boring. It was pretty fun to be there for the Jays opening game at the Skydome (Rogers Centre, whatever) with a few cool new friends and I did feel rather excited at one point in that great big stadium packed with people. But baseball is so boring. The highlight for me was the awesome little red-headed boy singing "O Canada" at the beginning (5:15 in the video clip here). Apparently he plays Billy in the Billy Elliot musical. He was pretty great and I did enjoy the red & white & mounties scene a little bit too:

Bullet for Adolf
My friend Melanie is the set/costume/props designer for a show Woody Harrelson has written and directed called "Bullet for Adolf". I think it's awesome that Mel does what she absolutely loves to do for a living: make puppets, paint scenes, shop for costumes, etc. and so I offered to help her out with the play to get a peek into her world. It was pretty fun and the show is fantastic. Go see it before it finishes its three-week run!

Pretty Flowers & Woolly Pockets
This was a bouquet I'd made for Mike's Dad when we went back to Kingston one weekend and it had all sorts of gorgeous tulips in it along with some amazing dogwood blossoms. I do love that this is what I get to do at work everyday, make pretty things.

It's been pretty busy lately with all the back-to-back holidays: Passover, Easter, Admin Week (it's when you buy flowers to give to your admin staff to say thanks for doing all the things you can't be bothered to do yourself) and next Sunday is Mother's Day already.

In the meantime to celebrate Earth Month we have installed an awesome living wall in the store with the help of Woolly Pockets. These felt pockets are made out of 100% recycled plastic bottles and plants thrive in them. The company is based out of California and they've got some pretty cool photos in their gallery of how people have set up their own living walls so check them out!

The List that Keeps Carrying Over
Having gotten used to the three-day work week for a little while, it's been surprisingly draining to have something to do every day for the past couple of months. I know I should just stop whingeing and get on with it like everyone else, but I feel like I have so much stuff to do and zero time to do them! I guess I self-assign a lot of tasks but I do have things that have to get done... like our tax returns which I've been dreading because we still have an outstanding tax audit (it's only because we had foreign income so they wanted a lot of paperwork to make sure we were paying our taxes properly...). And I also owe a bunch of people emails and our budget spreadsheet needs a serious updating and so on...

The TTC Sucks

People who live in Toronto can identify with this. I can't take the subway anymore (not physically cannot walk myself to the subway and get on it anymore, but mentally it is slowly making me crazy). I am having a hard time remembering the number of times in the past few months when there wasn't a delay of some sort, whether it's a passenger-activated alarm, smoke at track level, or signalling errors... If you're going to charge people $3 to get from A to B, then do whatever you need to do to get them there. And what the F is the point of the PA system if no one can hear what you're saying? Anyway, I know there's no use in complaining and I'm not usually the type, but I'm just a bit worked up about it right now (like that lady on the subway who decided to say it all out loud, quite loud, during rush hour the other day).

After the Gold Rush
I always liked this song but a couple of weeks ago when I heard it again, I fell in love with it. I can't stop listening to it and it calms me down and makes me feel peaceful. I always thought it was so amazing that we all associate different music with different parts of our lives and the people we met at that time and the people that we ourselves were. This is how I feel now. (On a side note, I also absolutely love "Only Love Can Break Your Heart" which is on the same album.)

Baby Alex is Growing Bigger
Alex is now 4 months old and growing bigger everyday! He's a lot more smiley and babbly now and sleeps a bit longer too. He's also just got to meet his Mexican grandparents for the first time which was great! Here he is outside in the sun with the cutest little toque ever, then in my new favourite "like father, like son" photo with his Dad, and finally having some milk with his Grandpa Wagar:

Rupert the Rabbit

Mike spent this week in Kingston to help out around the house: do some gardening, set up mousetraps, spring cleaning and repairs, that sort of stuff. Today he spotted this guy in the backyard and this is a frame-by-frame depiction of Rupert the Rabbit as he crawled underneath the shed. Mike's Dad has long suspected that he lived under there, and now we have proof. Look at that little puff of a tail! And I just love the head-on shot. Too cute.

Fairy Tale Wedding
I didn't know I was such a suck for the whole "and the prince and his princess lived happily ever after" scene but it's now clear to me that I am. I hadn't planned on watching the wedding live but having unexpectedly got the day off work, I thought I'd get up at 5am and see what all the fuss was about. The fuss, let me tell you, was about a real life fairy tale.

It's so crazy when you think about it: that there are still Kings & Queens and Princes & Princesses... and not in some faraway land either, but right across the ocean, in the land where they also have Sainsbury's and football and cream tea and pub quizzes and the best curry ever.

I was absolutely gushing over the bride & groom. Kate looked so gorgeous in that dress and the way they smiled at each other was soooo sweet. And those two little kisses simply made my day (okay, I might have YouTubed them several more times throughout the day, but what's the internet for if not make your heart fill with instant flutter as you pause and replay that balcony moment?). *SIGH*. Love. How wonderful. Next time I get married--Mike's not so fond of throwing another wedding for some reason--I'm gonna have lilies of the valley everywhere (though I also rather like the idea of a garden roses tea party).

Europe-Bound in Three Weeks!
Watching the BBC coverage of the royal wedding seriously made me miss England. Good thing we're going back to Oxford in three weeks' time! Absolutely cannot wait! We've booked most of our 10-day trip already but I've yet to book my flight over. Gonna do that this weekend though and write up an itinerary, then I'll fill you in on all the details! So psyched! :) :) :)

In closing, I leave you with this picture of the biggest strawberry I've ever seen and eaten. That is an almond beside it. It was from H-Mart (we live in Koreatown) and it was delicious.