Thursday 28 August 2014

Cobden Fair

The boys had a great day showing their lambs at the Cobden Fair last Saturday.  They are both in the junior division this year...so they are against each other.


Grady consistently got first when he was in the ring....even winning the 'Grand Champion Showman' for the day....while Jack kept ending up with second place for many of the showings.


They came away with some really nice colossal ribbons.


Meanwhile, the girls went on the rides.



Then on Sunday the older kids returned for the beef show.

Johanna took away 'Grand Champion Showman' for the day. 


Jack won first place for showmanship in the junior division.


It was a very good weekend. 

The judges were excellent.  At least that's what I thought.

Brenda

Wednesday 27 August 2014

Danny


Yesterday we said our final goodbyes to Danny.

Danny was a very good friend. 

He was the best man in our wedding....and Terry was also his best man when he wed Stephanie.

He was a proud farmer.

He was a hockey dad....and a hockey coach.

He was living his dream life.

Danny had a special wink and a grin.

He loved children.

I will never forget Halloween night a couple of years ago.  I had taken the kids for a couple hours around to some houses and then I came home and I got Terry to take them to the rest of the houses.  Trick or treating in the country takes the entire evening because it involves lots of visiting.  Anyways, when they all finally arrived home, they dumped out their treats all over the kitchen table and in amongst the candy were soda crackers.  I asked them 'Where did the soda crackers come from?'  Sophie just laughed and said "Danny!....He's so crazy!  He was giving out soda crackers!  But Stephanie had treats!"

That was Danny.  Always ready to tease or have some fun.

He will be greatly missed.

We all loved him so much.

Brenda



Wednesday 20 August 2014

Killaloe Irish Gathering 2014

We celebrated our Irish roots this past weekend at the 2nd Annual Killaloe Irish Gathering.

There was family....and music...and dancing.

Most of my pictures are of blurry people step dancing...




and then I got smart and I took a video.  And now I can't get it to show up on this post.  It's Johanna on fiddle and Dianne (Terry's sister) on shoes.  You can see it here....

 

Unfortunately it rained on the day of the parade.  It wasn't cancelled....but we got soaked.  The local newspaper published a photo of our float and I'm sitting under the green tarp.  Hidden.  Like a total wimp.  And Johanna is step dancing in the rain......



Brenda 



Wednesday 13 August 2014

Johanna at the Bonnechere Museum

Johanna had her name in lights last week.


Actually it said 'J Dwyer' and so Jack said that it could actually be him performing...and not her.

Nice try Jack.....although I'm sure that he could put together an interesting talk on farming...especially about sheep.


She did an hour long performance on Saturday morning at our local museum...'The Bonnechere Museum'.

It was a small but appreciative audience.  They asked her lots of questions in between tunes....which was just the sort of performance that she needed.  It's easy for her to play in front of a group....but it's harder to speak to a group.  It was a great learning experience for her.


And she played and danced very well too.

Brenda

Tuesday 12 August 2014

A Few Cakes

These are a few cakes that I have made for friends this summer...


A doll cake for a sweet girl who was turning 5.


One for my friend's mom....


One for a very special couple....


These flowers are so simple....just use a tip that makes a rose.  I think it was wilton #104.


And one for a very special lady....


I used wilton tip #17 to make these swirl roses.  It was really easy....and I liked the effect.


Brenda

Wednesday 6 August 2014

Easy Rolled Fondant Roses

My parents celebrated their 45th wedding anniversary on the weekend.

I needed to make them a cake.

I had made these simple rolled roses before with felt and I figured I'd try it with rolled fondant.....I just happened to still have some leftover fondant in the cupboard from when I made the pigs in mud cake.

Here's what I did....

roll out some fondant...use icing sugar to keep it from sticking...


cut out some circles...I used my Pampered Chef cutter for the big ones...


then cut around in circles with a knife like this...




and unroll....


and roll it back up....I start rolling from the middle back to the other end.




it's easy peasy!

I did that again....several times.  And then I made some smaller ones....I just cut them out with a small drinking glass.....anything round will work.

Then I placed them on the cake.


I piped some leaves around them....


I also made some hearts.  I rolled out the fondant and cut in in strips with a pizza cutter and then rolled them up and attached them together to make a heart.  I did 5....because they had 5 children. 

I didn't get any photos of the making of the hearts because Lydia had been playing with the radio and changing the station the whole time I was working on this cake....and when I started making the hearts she just happened to come upon "Jolene".....and so we were too busy belting out the song...and no photos of the hearts were taken.  She actually bought "Jolene" off of iTunes the next day....and now we listen to it...and "Let it Go".  It's a nice change from just listening to "Let it Go" continually....


So we took the cake and headed to 'The Sands'....we were just there a couple of weeks ago with Terry's family

I sat in the lake with my dollar store hat....and enjoyed the view.


And  I watched the kids make a hole in the sand and fill it with water.  It's just so much easier than sandcastles....because sometimes sandcastles can become stressful. 



And I got my baby fix.


And  I watched a pretty princess play cards.


And we ate....pretty well the whole day.

And then we got out the cake.  with the rolled fondant roses.  and we ate some more.



Brenda


Tuesday 5 August 2014

Changing Leaves....in July?

I was driving down the road last week and I saw this...


and I screamed.

Maybe you heard me.


This is cruel and mean.  It was still July. 


Jack suggested that maybe the tree was dead.  But I don't think it's dead...it's just confused.

August will be hot....at least that's what I'm telling myself.

Because it can't be fall yet....I haven't thawed out from last winter.

Brenda