The Family That Plays Together Stays Together

It's become a tradition for me, my adult children, and

naturally my one sweet precious granddaughter, to all

come together at least once a month for a family meal

and to spend some quality time together. 

We did this on Saturday and the time we share together

... priceless.  

Auntie Michelle, my youngest child, bought

Elyssa a few different magic tricks and gave them

to her for Christmas.  They had to practice a bit, 

then it was showtime! 

Uncle Derek had to blow on the magic bag

which was empty in order for the magic to happen.

and ta da... boxes of flowers came out of the bag!

They performed a few other tricks as well then

 Elyssa informed us that she has magic money ears,

she got her Daddy to show us. 

It was a wonderful evening, phenomenal food, tons of

laughs, and I experienced the real magic...

the magic of love my family shares

when we all come together and play! 

The Motorcycle Show

There's a motorcycle show in my city yearly and there's

some awesome bikes on display.  I found myself back 

in the Harley area more than once and here's a few I love. 

This first photo the sales rep shot for me, he

suggested I enter this picture online where

Harley is giving away riding gear and lessons. 

Both I'd love to win! 

This Super Low Rider is something for me to consider

when I'm ready to buy, it's comfortable for me and doesn't

intimidate me as much as some of the bigger bikes. 

Ran into a friend and she asked for a few shots, 

I obliged and played with the photos and I'm

rather pleased with this one.

There's also something about the colors of the Indian motorbike... 

I love these colors! 

I also had the opportunity to chat with the author of this book, 

Motorcycle Therapy and you bet I bought his book, 

I'm interested in what he has to say.  The author is Jeremy Krocker, 

he has two books out, this one and Through Dust and Darkness. 

I'll read this one first, it's a shorter read and soon enough I'm going

to be totally immersed in reading academic readings...

Speaking of academics, today I applied for graduation in June...

mixed feelings over this one but it's time to get it done and move

forward. It's been a long haul, some years more challenging than

others, however, I know that one day this too will be a distant

memory, a positive experience for sure! 

One more course, I've got this one in the bag...

I hope! lol 

Lighting Up My Life... the saga continues

Thank goodness I have some pretty amazing friends, 

I've wanted to have new lighting in my home for some

time now and it started with the LED strip lights behind my tv...

that was a few posts ago but I'll include a few more photos to 

show what's been added now...

I had a single light (which was beautiful) off to the one

side of the tv, but it didn't put out hardly any light. 

My friend went on Kijiji and found this pot lighting for

$10, then he painted it and installed it today, 

he even added a dimmer switch to it and I'm absolutely

loving this!  But we didn't stop there. 

In my kitchen I (I bought it and my friend did the install)

 added pot lighting as well and I also used strip lighting on top 

of my cupboards, loving this too! 

And the old ceiling fan, it was huge, way too big for the small

space it was in. Today I found this smaller ceiling fan

and I absolutely love how this looks. 

It's amazing how lighting can change the look and feel

of a room, now what's next on my agenda... hmmm 

maybe finish decluttering. I'm starting to get concerned, 

I'm actually doing things I've wanted to get done for

a long time... what's up with this? lol 

Amazing Talent

I went out to listen once again to Sarah Smith, 

this lady has an amazing voice, one which often

gives me goosebumps when I hear her sing.  I didn't

take along my DSLR this time, only my P&S but

I hope to get better photos of her in the near future. 

For now, my P&S photos will have to suffice. 

Sarah Smith, from Ontario...

Shine Bright, if you click on the name of this song it'll

take you to one of my favorite songs sung by this talented lady.

Here's another name to watch for, Karen Claypool, (in this video Karen is

in the white gown... wow, I just found this rendition of Hallelujah and WOW!)

This young lady is astounding! Sarah invited her up to sing a song and

Karen obliged!  

It was a real treat to hear Karen sing, she

has an amazingly powerful voice. Karen does a solo

act and is also a part of The Dirt Road Angels Band. 

We are so blessed to be surrounded by such amazing

 talent.  As for me, well I love music, music which makes my 

heart dance and caresses my soul. 

I also enjoy music which  makes my feet dance but when I get 

goosebumps (people-bumps) like I did listening to Sarah and later 

by Karen it's been worth it to venture out in -100 and drive on icy roads... 

okay a wee bit of exaggeration on the -100 but enough of winter

already!  It was only about -30, only being the key word there! 

Lighting Up My Life

I was in Ikea the other day and noticed they had strip lighting

tucked in behind a tv in one of their displays. I went and sat on 

the couch in the display to see if the light would be distracting 

and it actually made it much easier on the eyes to watch the tv.

 I sat on another couch where there was no lighting behind the 

tv and I knew what I was going to do with some of this lighting I'd 

ordered off of eBay... it started out

a friend who is into his lighting wanted some of these and I thought I might

as well get myself some while I was at it, to do what with I wasn't sure, 

until the Ikea trip.  So today my friend comes over to install a new kitchen

lighting fixture for me, then we start to play with the strip lighting and WOW! 

See for yourself... the top left corner is no lighting, there's 16 different colors 

and I can dim or brighten each color... personally I like the clear, yellow and 

light orange the best. 

I've also ran a strip of this lighting on top of one of my

cupboards, that too looks awesome. The nice thing is these 

are LED lights, I can leave them on all the time if I choose 

to and not worry about the power bill, wasting energy or

the lights getting too hot. 

Yup, I'm enjoying lighting up my life!