Nuit Blanche

Nuit Blanche -Gladstone Hotel, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

I must admit I found this years Nuit Blanche a little underwhelming.

I don't know if it was the poor use of space or the weariness of traveling across town to get to most of the main exhibits.
Still it is nice to see the streets filled with so many people wandering about at 1 am appreciating art and the city.

Nuit Blanche - Later That Night At The Drive-In - Daniel Lanois, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

Cottage Weekend

Cottage Weekend, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

I didn't travel much this summer (actually I have only been out of the country for a day and a half this year!) so it was really lovely to be invited to my pal Katie's family's cottage on the Ottawa River (Quebec side).
It was a wonderful, relaxing girls weekend away.

Birthday Macarons

My pal Ayalah has her birthday in the summer which was the perfect timing for a picnic!
Because she has a serious sweet tooth and also loves France I made her some macarons.

I picked up the cutest book (I heart macarons) at a cooking store in St. Johns and was itching to use it.
I made yellow with chocolate ganache filling and a cinnamon with cardamon milk tea filling. TASTY!

Trinity and back to St. John's - Newfoundland

Trinity, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

We took a slightly more lazy route back to St. John's. We headed across the bulk of the island and spent a night at a B&B before heading to Trinity for a day and a half.
Trinity was awesome. We stayed in a little cabin that Mary and I imagined what vacationing was probably like in the 50's.. really cute!

Trinity Cabins - Vintage Awesomeness, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

Trinity Cabins - Vintage Awesomeness, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

It was really quiet in Trinity (we couldn't find a place to eat that was open) but we walked around the town taking in all the lovely buildings. The Shipping News was filmed in Trinity and nearby a whole fake fishing village was recreated for the filming of Remote Passage for the CBC. Mary and I, after finally finding somewhere to eat decided to check out the Maritime Museum in Bonavista.

Root cellar capital of the world?, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

On the way there I forced Mary to drive through Elliston, the root cellar captital of the world, which seemed a little unfriendly. Also we didn't see a lot of root cellars.

Bonavista - Harbour, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

Bonavista was great though. While signing into the museum we noticed that another group of yukoners were in the museum (they had gone to the same conference as Mary and were really nice). So after a little hunting we found them and ended the evening with a lovely lobster and toutons with molasses (my favorite  newfie food .. hard bread and salt cod - I recommend you pass on them).

Bonavista - Maritime Museum, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

Back to St. John's for the last bit of shopping and wandering around (the Rooms! Viking demonstrations! Joe Fresh!).
Conclusion:
Newfoundland - highly recommended.

Western Brook Pond - Newfoundland

Newfoundland - Western Brook Pond, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

The last day in Gros Morne National Park we went for a hike to Western Brook Pond. Another of the guided walks It was really cool to learn so much about the area.
The geography was really influenced by glaciation (it was carved out by glaciers and then, when they receeded the land rebounded cutting off the pond from the ocean). Also - the part I found really cool was the rippling of the bedrock which caused alternating bogs (pictured above) and limestone ridges which are forrested (below)
The guides from the park were really into showing off different parts of the bog and forrest, even to the extent of reaching into the bog to pull out peat. We also spotted an arctic hare and pitcher plants (the provincial flower). Very cool.

Trails, Tales and Tunes - Newfoundland

Lighthouse near Rocky Harbour Newfoundland, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

Norris Point and the nearby (slightly larger) town of Rocky Harbour were amazing. t was like being home but with a different forrest.
We decided to go there for 2 reasons. The first was because Mary's friend from the conference was going to be there, and the second was because of the park. What sealed the deal though was the trails tales and tunes festival that was going on that weekend.
The festival is mostly for the locals - kind of a kick off to the tourist season. Almost all of the activities we participated in were outdoors. There were guided hikes every day - almost all of them ending in homemade pie and treats. So nice!
There were also live performances that we took in and listened to on the radio. It was really fun and we had a fantastic time.

We ended up renting a cabin and were amazed at how big it was (a bedroom each!).. We also discovered there wasn't really a proper grocery store in town. What we did find though was hard tack (which we attempted to cook), salted cod (that stunk up our cabin), and local jams (which we started a collection of).

Our time in Norris Point was really a highlight of our stay in Newfoundland and I would encourage anyone to go.

Travel - Newfoundland

After the conference was complete Mary and I rented a car and headed across the island.

Our original plan was to go over to St. Pierre and Miquelon but that proved to be too difficult due to the time we were traveling (May is not high season).

So when I said we headed across the island I really do mean that literally. From St. John's it took two days of almost solid driving (by Mary - bless her) to get to Gros Morne National Park and the little cabin we rented in Norris Point.

View Larger Map

I seem to be missing a few pictures so I'll update this later if I can find a good shot of the highway - I remember taking a few :)

Around St. John's - Newfoundland

Signal Hill - St. John's Nfld, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

The first few days we were in St. John's Mary was at her conference and I got to explore a little bit of the city.

Signal Hill - St. John's Nfld, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

I walked up and around signal hill - a little dangerous.

And Mary and I went on a few trips - to Ferryland an active archeological site which was very cool and whale watching in a huge windy storm (which resulted in the boat turning around and no wildlife being seen.

Newfoundland!

Signal Hill - St. John's Nfld, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

I know this is a little late but I'd still like to share some pics and stories from Mary and my trip to Newfoundland. Every year Mary attends a museums conference somewhere in Canada and I am lucky enough to often tag along. Trips to Ottawa, Victoria and err.. Toronto (we ended up going to Iceland after that one) have sprouted from these meetings and I love that every year we get to meet up and spend 2 weeks together.

Signal Hill - St. John's Nfld), originally uploaded by girl from finito.

Newfoundland was the last maritime province that I needed to visit, we didn't make it there with the family and I wish we had. Dad, I think, will love Newfoundland.. This trip also means that I only have one more province (Saskatchewan) to go and then I've been to them all (not including territories). I must say I wish I had gone to Newfoundland sooner. I really loved it there - lots of culture and energy - plus the whole province felt like a bigger east coast version of the Vancouver Island in my head (ie/ the 80's). I loved all the small towns and crazy food.

Chinese New Year cupcakes

Chinese New Year cupcakes, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

Wow - old pictures!
I made these the day I left for the west coast. Awesome Chinese New Years cupcakes for my friend Fran and her family (note for reading the story below.. this friend is Chinese)

Fran: thanks for coming by and dropping off some awesome cupcakes.
cats, eh?...or tigers?...damn! whatever!...they were awesome and cute...geez...i thought just icing was fancy...but noooooo...you had to go ALL out and put characters on mine...

i'm sure xavier will be like, "look! it's a cat...a cat...see...a cat...do you see the cat?"...
me: "yes xavier. it's a cat. it's very nice"...
x: "do you see it?...look right here! it's a cat...see A CAT!...seeeeee!"...
me: "yes...yes...i see it"...
x: "i'm going to eat the cat!...the cat, right here. see this cat!...on the cupcake there's a cat!"...
me: [shoots herself].

Me: They were tigers

Fran: yes...yes...i realized that now...

"happy lunar new year"....yes...yes...the asian got it wrong.

Chinese New Year cupcakes, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

Birthday Flowers (2 months late in posting)

Birthday Flowers, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

mom - did I ever send you pictures of what the flowers you sent looked like? They were beautiful!

5 x July a full circle (almost)

It's funny to see things come back around.

little italy, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

MYSTERY GIFT!

MYSTERY GIFT!, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

well not really a mystery for me... but can you guess what's in the box?... I can lie down on my couch with room to spare for a size reference.

Mary Mitchell in Mackenzie

Mitch, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

Right after the big Olympics trip I decided that enough time had passed and it was finally my turn to visit my best friend. She moved to Mackenzie BC while I was still living in Vancouver - so that has to be 6 or more years ago. I've seen her many times since then - but never up there.
As can be imagined it was the best ending to the trip possible. Mackenzie was a winter wonderland and any time I get to hang out with Mary is never long enough (yes, my best friend and my middle sister have the same name). We went for walks across frozen lakes, cross-country skiing (though the cross-country skiing was a TERRIBLE idea or well skiing on the hills was a terrible idea) and fixed things.. McGuiver style. The photo below is a terrible picture of our repair of the dishwasher, with a zip tie (the black one). It worked wonderfully!

Olympics - Hockey!

Hockey - Vancouver 2010, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

Oh man! this was exciting - a round robin match between underdogs Latvia and the Czechs. Somehow we got amazing seats .. just to the side of the goal in the 6th row. The atmosphere in the arena was amazing an it was so cool to see the crowd erupt when Latvia finally scored.

Hockey - Vancouver 2010, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

Though Latvia lost the game there was lots to celebrate.. That day they had won their first Olympic Medal ever! and later in the games they would come back to defeat the Czechs. Below is a little slide show of some of the pictures I took that day.

Practice Lines

Vancouver Olympics - Curling practice lines
Originally uploaded by girl from finito

One of my favorite things that I didn't expect.. before the games start they run practice lines!
The men tended to do them more than the women -
very cool.

this video unfortunately is pretty shoddy - I shot it with my phone.

Olympics - curling

Curling - Vancouver 2010, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

So I've finally gotten around to uploading my pictures from the Olympics. There will be more in the coming week now that things with the freelance work is becoming more relaxed.
This is one of my favorite shots that I've come across (so far I've only looked at a third of the photos I took).
This was the first day of curling we saw (round robin #4 for the men). The Canada v. Sweden game ended before the others that's why there is a page empty.

Jónsi

Tomorrow night, as an early birthday present Jodi is taking me to see Jónsi (the side project of the lead singer of Sigur Ros)
From what I've heard so far I think It'll be fantastic!

Olympics - Outfits and fans

Holy cow Vancouver was full of people. Mostly it was candians wandering around in toques and red mapleleaf mitts but there were people who stuck out in the sea of red and white.


Probably the most recognizable were the Dutch fans in their bright orange. Though there were a lot downtown you found most of the fans were at the Richmond speedskating oval. (these people were waiting for the skytrain)


The other really popular uniform was team Russia - and I must admit they looked really good.

Olympics - Curling

Curling! I love curling!


This is a shot from the first of 3 curling games my family attended during the olympics... The 2nd page is Team Canada (Martin's rink) playing Team Sweden. (Norway is right beside them).
Later I will upload some video of the practice runs from this game.

Also congratulations to Team Martin and Team Bernard for excellent showings at the games (gold and silver respectivly).