Weekend Snapshot

My friend Tara sent me some love in the mail last week. She created this wonderful piece of work, using stencil and spray paint techniques. Each page is different and it was an unexpected surprise.

Tara's a sneaky one-she kept saying she was making a book for a friend while she was working on it and it never occurred to me that she meant I was that friend. When my husband brought the mail in and handed me the package, I was so surprised.

THANK YOU TARA! It's beautiful and so sweet of you to make this for me. I will treasure it!

My best friend Lisa and I went to Seattle on Friday for a medical appointment she had and we stopped at Trader Joe's on the way home. I am a big fan of their artsy reusable shopping bags. My pals Tina and Pip each sent me one about a year ago that's green and turquoise and has a sort of nautical theme to it. It was love at first sight!

This is both side of the current one they have. Love the colours and art on this one too! The best part is they are dirt cheap-$1.99 each! Gotta love that!

We took Indy to the lake for a swim this afternoon. He loves the water and chasing his water Kongs. He's so crazy for retrieving the Kongs that we found that having two works best.We throw one, he brings it in and we throw the second as soon as he drops the first one at our feet. He just goes and goes and goes! I love watching how fast he is. He looks like a seal and you can hear him chuffing as he swims back with his prize in his mouth. Labs are all heart-they will play till you are exhausted.

Umm..anyone want to roast a marshmallow? Not long after dinner, I heard a fire engine coming and honking madly. That's not too out of the ordinary, as we live near a fire hall, but the honking was a bit unusual. There isn't alot of traffic near the fire hall, so I couldn't figure out at first why it seemed so loud. Then I realized the engine was coming down our street and it smalled to a halt right in front of our house.

I flew outside to see what was wrong and there's this car parked about 20 feet from mine with flames shooting out of it, 5 feet high! Wow! There's something you don't see every day!

Turns out our neighbour was driving home and his car started acting funny. As he pulled up near his house, he smelled something and so he pulled up on the gravel and got out right away to see what was wrong. Smoke was pouring out of his car so he ran in the house to call 911.

It ended up he had to call them twice, as at first there was just smoke and then after he hung up, the car burst into flames. It's a good thing he didn't park in his garage or the house would have caught fire! It took the firemen a good long time to get the fire under control and the smoke was heavy-they all had masks on and at one point, I couldn't even see the three guys who were dousing the car-they disappeared in the cloud of smoke that was billowing out from the hood.

Eventually, they got an axe and popped the hood open and you should have seen how burnt the top of the hood was. You could tell it was a very intense fire. They finally got the fire put out and the car is probably a write off. I am just glad my neighbour was able to get out of the car before he got hurt. He seemed to take it all in stride. He had company over for dinner and they just carried on with their evening. I suppose there was nothing he else he could do really.

Other than that *laughs* my wrist is still in the half cast and hopefully healing, though not fast enough for my liking! I am distracting myself by reading Dan Brown's new novel, The Lost Symbol. It's yummy! There's nothing I love more than a good book and this one is as delicious as The Da Vinci Code. (And yes, I bought a hardcover-I couldn't wait!)

I have to post about the special ATC swap that was filmed for a tv show that I was at on Thursday night. I got a sneak peek at the 2009 Richmond Art Gallery ATC show as well and I have photos! It will have to wait though, as it's hard to type in a half cast. Stay tuned though, it's coming up next!