Jill's World: The Weekend Rewind

Tuesday, October 20, 2015

The Weekend Rewind

I don’t have my pictures uploaded from the weekend yet, but it was such a fun weekend, I just have to re-cap!

Friday night was one of my favourite kind of Friday nights. They let us go early from work, and it wasn’t raining yet, so I got my grass cut! WOO HOO!! I’m praying it will be the last time for the year!! Man, I hate cutting the grass. Once that was done, I moved inside and got working in the kitchen. I made spicy roasted butternut squash soup, pumpkin bread, and pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. The soup was delicious and the bread was delicious, but the cookies were a bit of a flop. I didn’t like the “cakey” texture of them, and after doing some research, I discovered this is a common problem with pumpkin cookies – they turn out more like muffin tops than cookies. In any case, I have found a few new recipes that proclaim to have fixed that problem – no egg is key, so they say - and I’m also going on a recommendation from my friend Sara who told me to go with butterscotch chips instead - so I’ll be checking them out very soon!

Once the cooking/baking frenzy was over and I was feeling so happy to have spent such quality time in the kitchen (quickly becoming one of my favourite things to do!) – I settled down on the couch to watch the Blue Jays game. Things didn’t pan out so well for the Jays that night, but with the gentle patter of rain against my window and my house smelling so wonderfully of “autumn foods”, I was just about as content as a cat can get. :)

Saturday morning I was up bright & early to work out and get myself ready for one of my favourite days of the year: CAR RALLY!!! It is always such a fun day, and after having organized the Rally the year before and dealing with the stress of it all, I was extra-appreciative of being able to just be a regular old participant this year. My teammates and I had a dilemma on our hands, though – we wanted to do well, but we didn’t want to win (especially not again so soon) – and we struggled to walk that fine line of “trying hard” but “we don’t care”.

Thanks to Stacy for coming up with the idea and dressing us up as “Guess Who” (the theme was “Let The Games Begin”)

It was one of the toughest Rallies I’ve ever been on, and we took the longest we ever have to complete it. Our departure time was 11:10 AM, and we didn’t get back to the hall until 5:45 PM. (the deadline for returning was 6 PM). The efficient ladies who organized this year’s Rally were up at the front before we knew it, and started revealing the answers. That’s when I started getting really panicky. We had too many right answers. My stomach was in knots and my face was on fire. I honestly thought I might throw up. When they started running down the car #’s, starting with last place and working their way up, things got really intense. We waited and waited for them to call our number, all while my mind raced with the possibility of what would happen if we won again… Needless to say, it was a HUGE relief when they finally called our car #, and we were tied for 3rd place! PHEWF!!!

Now I can look back on it and be happy. We did exactly what we wanted to do. We had fun, we did really well, and we didn’t win. The IDEAL Car Rally day! YAY!!! Sue, Adam, Brenda and Cowan came up to my place afterwards for a few drinks, and we had fun re-hashing the day and how it had gone. It was a great way to unwind!

Oh, and also, it snowed on Saturday. !!!!!!!!!! Just little flurries that didn’t amount to anything, of course – it is only mid-October, after all - but snow makes my heart sing!!!!!!!

Sunday I was flying solo at church, which was a weird feeling – not one other member of my immediate family in attendance! – but it was a lovely service and I was happy to be reppin’ my fam in the pews. ;) After church, I grabbed my camera and headed across the road to take some photos for my friend Caryl and her family. This is the second opportunity I’ve had to do family photos for friends, and I really, really enjoy it. If I ever did decide to take on photography as more than just a hobby, I definitely think doing photos of families and children will be my niche.

After the quick photo session, I was off to my sister and BIL’s for my nephew Caden’s birthday party. He had a bunch of his friends over for hot dogs, snacks, and cupcakes, then they split up into teams and played Minute to Win It games. Talk about entertaining to watch! haha! I snagged some good pictures there as well. Sunday was a big day for me and my camera!

I was sad to see the weekend go. It was a good one!

Yesterday was Election Day here in Canada, so it was an exciting day. I had never felt so confused or unsure of who to vote for going in to any election, and I honestly think I changed my mind 3 times just driving to the polling station. In the end, the country decided it wanted change after 11 years under Conservative Stephen Harper, and that’s what they got. I’ll be quite interested to see how Justin Trudeau and his Liberal party do at the helm of this country now that they have a majority government.