Do you remember lying on your back in the grass, smelling the fragrance of the earth and searching the clouds for elephants, or angels or any of the other wonderfully imaginative figures that the clouds are wont to form.

Yesterday was such a day, and if it wasn't so hard to get up I would surely have thrown myself down amongst the dandelions and searched the heavens....











Pictures don't really do it, - you have to be there to watch the movement of the clouds as they form and reform all the while providing enchanting entertainment for those who are aware and search....and I think, if I remember correctly, you have to squint your eyes!

Come join Music Monday and share your songs with us.

Here is Louis Moreau Gottschalk's stirring Grande Tarantelle for piano and orchestra.

I love it, - it just seems to carry you along on such a marvelous wave of music.



Gottschalk was an American composer who was born in New Orleans and became a dashing and romantic virtuoso on the piano as he played his own pieces in concert.

Despite his popularity, most especially in South America, he had a tragic career and died at the age of forty. Unfortunately he has never, since his death, received the recognition and acclaim that his music deserves (IMHO). Perhaps because he is much like Chopin, but does not quite make the mark!

Listen in, - it will gladden your heart and set your toes a-tapping.

Six things that make me happy, among 106 at least.

By nature I am a happy, contented person, and so it is a pleasure to accept an invitation to list six things that make me happy.

1. Our marriage brings me deep and happy fulfillment. Despite the ups and downs of relationships this one seems to have had a lot of chemistry to keep it buoyed up!

2. Music makes me happy, - in particular playing the piano. I can lose an hour easily at the keyboard, and it is not only the music I play but the memories it rouses.

3. I love to garden, - a busy life before we retired kept the gardening to vegetables, but now getting my hands into the soil is my passion.

4. It give me a lot of happiness when I have an opportunity to chat, lightly or at depth, with our grown up children.

5. Reading, reading, reading..... All kinds of reading, - the kind you underline and make marginal notes and the kind you just enjoy for a good story well told.

6. One of the most delightful ways to spend an afternoon is to go driving with Charles and the camera. He has such a good eye for pictures, and I have a quick finger on the button, - especially when we are taking pictures out of the car window. Otherwise, I have good legs for hopping out of the car and finding the best spot from which to aim the camera. Nice companionship, too.

Now, I love the mathematics involved in weaving, and preparing a warp, and I'm always happy having lunch out with old friends. I like to knit. It makes me happy to put on some good music and spend a morning baking (tired legs, though) and tea with grandchildren is a great delight. There are a lot of things that put a smile on my face, but these will suffice for now...

What tickles your fancy?????

SkyWatch Friday

May 22, 2009

A soft April afternoon sky...





and in the evening it dons its romantic Monet colours.






April was fickle this year, but this day she was feeling generous and held out splendid promises....

ABC Wednesday

R is for Reading

And HERE is Clifton Fadiman's Lifetime Reading Plan.



It first came to my attention when I had a little more Lifetime Reading left in my future. At that time I took it quite seriously, and set myself to read at least some of Mr. Fadiman's suggested books.

Now I pass it on to anyone who loves to read, to whom books are life's blood and to whom the education obtained in a wide, wide field of writing is priceless.

Have you read the Iliad, the Odyssey,The Pillow-Book by Sei Shonagan, The Mill on the Floss, The House of Mirth, The Magic Mountain or Women in Love?

Look at Clifton Fadiman's list and make your own choices. Open the book, turn the pages, and lose yourself in other worlds......

Rodeo Days in Keremeos on the Victoria Long Weekend

Rodeoing started in the early days in the Similkameen Valley when the majority of the inhabitants were ranchers, and eager to compete and display their skills with horse and cow and lasso.



Keremeos held their first official rodeo in 1921, next to the Victory hall in what is now the centre of town, and without any fences or corrals.



In the early 1940's the Elks took over the rodeo events, and the site was relocated to a spot across the river where cowboys still gather to compete, and where the excitement of the wild horse rides, the bulldogging and the calf roping keep all the spectators on the edge of their seats, - that is the ones who haven't gone to find refreshment at the hamburger booth or the beer garden.

When the children were growing up we attended rodeos faithfully, with the movie camera (all the rage at that time) and we have faded films of small cowboys/girls chasing calves, and many an exciting moment when the clowns had to come to the rescue of riders just one step ahead of the bull that had just thrown them.

Everybody wore jeans and cowboy hats and neckerchiefs and with six children it was a night-before-the-rodeo chore to make sure everything was laid out and ready to hop into come the happy morning. When our youngest daughter reached the age where she could attend rodeo's on her own we gave up the pleasure of sitting in the dust and the hot sun, and stayed home with a cool drink! But we have exciting memories....





Some of the very best riders to compete in the Keremeos and Chapaka Indian Rodeo (held Easter Sunday) are First Nations Cowboys.

Here is a picture of Mr. and Mrs. Aeneas Nehumption who were Flagbearers for the 1950 Rodeo Parade



We still occasionally go to parades.....

Sometimes we even take part....

O Day of Rest and Gladness, O Day of Joy and Light

An old traditional hymn - the words written by Christopher Wordsworth, a distinguished English Bishop and a man of letters.



Christopher Wordsworth, 1807 - 1885

And a man of good sense.... This morning, because I didn't have to play the organ at church today, I was sorely tempted to stay home and 'worship' in the garden.

But then I thought of what 'worshipping' in the garden entailed. Probably another heavy battle with the coutch grass, which doesn't exactly typify a Day of Rest and Gladness. Or perhaps I would have been tempted to get the potatoes cut and planted, - or I would have been recruited as a go-fer as Charles stuck closely to his favourite maxim - 'never let a day go by without doing something useful'!

I preferred Christopher Wordsworth's advice, and so we went to church and sang some very modern 'inclusive' United Church Hymns. You must go a long way back to the 1938 edition of the Anglican Book of Common Prayer to find 'O Day of Rest and Gladness'.

Today we sang 'It Only Takes a Spark - Pass it On'.

I can't leave this subject without remarking on the inclusiveness of modern hymns. 'Dear Lord and Father of Mankind' has become 'Dear God Who loves all Humankind' - and then we have 'Dear Mother God your wings are warm'.....

My eyebrows shot skyward when instead of 'Halleluia' in an Easter response, the pew bulletin instructed us to say 'Hurrah, Hurrah'. Oh dear, how does one know when one is just too old and needs to 'hermatize'.

I have digressed from the subject of days of rest and gladness. We came home from church, with me still thinking 'days of rest', but with Charles thinking 'good opportunity to add that thing-a-ma-jig to the garden tractor'.

I had a little nap, fussed about the house a bit with a duster, read a few pages of the book I'm going to praise soon, - but Charles went out and fussed about the garage, frustrating himself because he couldn't find what he was looking for, - got down on his knees at least three times (a major endeavor getting up) and now I see him, poor darling, rubbing his paining hands, trying to ease his aching muscles, and all because nobody told him about The Bishop of Lincoln who recommends A Day of Rest and Gladness - in song.

I don't have to play the organ next Sunday, either......



(Photo borrowed from Flickr)

The Upper Similkameen

We have gone on a pictorial drive to Penticton, and one to the south east over the Richter Pass to Osoyoos, but on Wednesday Charles and I journeyed up Highway 3 to Hedley, and, as usual, were struck by the differences in the topography of this rocky part of the Similkameen.

It has a beauty all its own. The striated mountains have been a repository for gold and copper, and over the last century mining in the country around Hedley has had a varied and profitable history.

We left Keremeos and traveled through ranch land where the Black Angus grazed contentedly on the spring green meadow.



High in the distance on our left we glimpsed the snow on Crater Mountain, an area that I have not visited myself, but one which seems to hold a fascination for the men in the family. I particularly remember Charles and No. 2 son leaving a family picnic in the Ashnola region for a 'short' drive up the road to Crater Lake, and creating a small panic when they were not back by dark! But then, I probably panicked easily in those days.




Soon the ranch land narrowed into a a stony corridor with intriguing walls, created by fiery volcanoes more than thirty million years ago. A little research records small ocean creatures captured within the rocks.



A quartzy waterfall cascades down to the road.



And just down the road a beautiful, but rather threatening, tower of rocks forms a forbidding castle.



We pass St. Anne's Roman Catholic Church on the Upper Similkameen Indian Reserve, turn the corner and slide gently down into the town of Hedley.

The town, the mountain and the old abandoned Nickel Plate mine above us has memories for Charles of the few months he worked here before joining the air force. Here is a picture of the 'skip line' as it was when he rode the steep incline...



The mountain has given up its gold. The mine and the community at Nickel Plate have been abandoned. The Mascot Mine has been turned into a spectacular tourist attraction, well worth visiting. But in 1904 the Hedley mining ventures were just starting on their roller coaster endeavours, and the establishment at the base of the mountain looked like this...



Fortunes were made, and fortunes were lost. Hedley now is a small town with a bright core of community minded inhabitants. We drove around slowly, - there were memories for Charles there, and for me as well as we passed the Community Church which is part of our Parish.

We took pictures of the steep striated walls that encircle the town...





and then we drove home, and I could take pictures out of the window on the other side of the road!

Of the river, from a spot where Charles took a picture with his small Brownie camera in 1942....



Of the cut to the Ashnola River valley which leads to the magnificent Cathedral Lake country....



Eventually the Cawston hills appeared in the distance,



and we continued through the familiar countryside west of Keremeos, and the red covered bridge that crosses into Ashnola country.





The weather was chilly and miserable, but the company was great and it was a pleasant drive and a happy day.

ABC Wednesday

Q is for Quivering Aspen

Quivering - it gives me a nice shivery feeling. I don't think of quivering with fear, - I think of quivering with delight!

And what nicer tree to give you that feeling of delight than the Quivering Aspen, with its delicate leaves turning in the breeze, reflecting the sunlight, and just, well, all a-quiver!

Here are three baby Quivering aspen we found in a little grove of trees at a coffee break on our way from Princeton to Merritt.

Come join Music Monday and share your songs with us.

Albinoni's Adagio

Here from Wikipedia is the tale of what appears to be a beautiful musical hoax. Supposedly a piece of music written by Giazzotto, based on a fragment of a composition by Albinoni, Sonata in G. Minor found in the ruins of a fire bombed building during World War 11, it now appears to be an original composition by Giazzotto.

Shall we disregard its history and enjoy the lovely melody as interpreted by Laura Sullivan on the Synthesizer.....

Albinonis Secret Smile: Albinoni Adagio - Laura Sullivan

Mothers' Day

I listened in church this morning to the usual kind words spoken about mothers, but none of them were as dramatic as the Mothers' Day sermon I heard the second Sunday of each May, growing up in the Anglican Church. The Reverend Canon Charles Frederick Arthur Clough was the shepherd who saw us through those depression years, caring with tenderness and kindness and a great generosity, both spiritual and material.

He was never known as anything but "The Canon" in our house.




He came to Canada as a young English Curate to serve in the Canadian West, early in the last century.

He was a Judge in Juvenile Court; he was for many years the President of the Red Cross; he was a great proponent of the Boy Scouts, and at St. Faiths he and Henry White provided one of the best Scouting organizations in the West.

With all of these great attributes he was prone on special occasions to preach the same sermon, and his Mothers' Day sermon always ended with great flair as he quoted this poem by Rudyard Kipling.

Mother o' Mine

If I were hanged on the highest hill,
Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!
I know whose love would follow me still,
Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!

If I were drowned in the deepest sea,
Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!
I know whose tears would come down to me,
Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!

If I were damned of body and soul,
I know whose prayers would make me whole,
Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!

Rudyard Kipling

In the back row of the junior choir some of the more irreverent girls said it softly along with him!!!

Sky Watch Friday




A somewhat elegant sky, I think.

Not too flamboyant, - a little understated.

Lovely smudged clouds reminiscent of

a child's crayoning.

ABC Wednesday

P is for Pearly Everlasting and the Painted Butterfly




The Pearly Everlasting, a wildflower which does well on poor soils, but is somewhat toxic to cattle and shunned by them. In addition to the natural aversion to a plant that might have dire consequences, I can imagine the woolly covering on the stems of the Pearly Everlasting would make it somewhat akin to trying to eat cotton batting, and not something a cow would prefer to graze on. The plant has few juices, and hoards what it does have with the help of the soft woolly covering. Not a successful grazing plant....

But adopted as a perennial in borders or cutting gardens it is a gem.

The Pearly Everlasting grows about two feet tall, and spreads liberally. I can attest to that, having enjoyed it in the garden, but found it required constant vigilance to keep it in its place.

The silvery grey leaves lend a quietness to the garden border, and the clusters of
small papery white flowers with egg yolk yellow centres make a welcome addition to a dried bouquet. They should be picked for drying before the yellow centres are visible, to prevent them from fluffing out later.

If the cow disdains the Pearl the Painted Butterfly adores it, and makes it her host plant for laying eggs in the early summer. As the larvae emerge they feed on the foliage, but as the summer advances the foliage renews itself and there is little damage.





And it has such a romantic name......

Come join Music Monday and share your songs with us.

Django Reinhardt Plays Dark Eyes



I listened to all the modern versions of Django's Dark Eyes, and only Django has the lightness, the rhythm and the lilt. (IMHO)

Sunday Morning and a Summery Sky

When I came home from church Charles called to look at the cloud formation in the north-east, - funny bars of cloud that gradually expanded and divided.





I looked around at a sweet blue sky full of woolly clouds, and they made me smile. So soft and inviting, I felt they could be carded and spun into the most delicious wool.

Already there were spots where the wispy skeins could be stretched into rolags and guided through the spindle....





It was a momentary pleasure, - by mid afternoon they have darkened and look heavy with rain. But then, most pleasures are transitory and more precious because of their fleeting nature.