Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Oh, Canada! (and a Go!Baby winner...)


The Canadian national anthem has been looping through my head since Saturday. Some of my favorite people live in Canada and I have visited several different provinces. I used to live in Seattle and we went to Vancouver several times. Beautiful city. Our minister, James, comes from Vancouver. He and his family live two doors down from our son and daughter-in-law. Aaron and Christa were redoing their front lawn during the Stanley Cup finals. James claimed no knowledge of what appeared on Aaron and Christa's lawn one morning, but he sounded a little guilty when I asked him about it.
Mark has been selling kitchen cabinets for twenty-five years and for the first part of his career all the cabinets he sold were manufactured in Winnipeg. I went there one time with him for an annual sales meeting, which was held during the weekend of American Thanksgiving. Brrrr....They never thought about the timing when they planned sales meetings each year. That weekend was no big deal in Winnipeg because Canadian Thanksgiving is in October--coming up this Monday, in fact.

But I digress.

Saturday's mail brought a fabulous quilt from Felicity. It's right over there in my sidebar. I'll pause while you take a closer look.

Today brought more amazing mail from Canada, from an equally wonderful friend, Krista of Poppyprint. I had mentioned to her my love of Rogers syrup. It tastes like no other kind of syrup. She said that her kids would not like Rogers on their pancakes. I took that to mean they aren't quite the fans of Rogers that I am... I also mentioned the other thing that I remembered were luscious cookies in the shape of maple leaves with a cream center. *sigh* Pure heaven for my tastebuds.

This package was heavy. Couldn't be fabric. It was much too heavy for that. I took off the brown paper wrapping and found...a box that appears to be Kellogg's Canadian version of cornflakes. Vector. Mega Jumbo even. Makes them sound more powerful than the Kellogg's cornflakes we get here in the States.
Inside was a bottle of Rogers syrup and, wait, hold on, a box of cookies!!! When I told Mark about the wonderful-ness of these cookies, he seemed a bit skeptical. Until he took his first bite. Worth every single Weight Watchers point that they cost. 
Of course, the other side of the cookie box has the English version, Maple Creme, but this side of the box makes me so much happier.

But wait. There's more!Krista makes the MOST amazing pincushion/thread catchers. Which is exactly what I needed. I have a wastebasket right next to my machine but in my haste to toss, I always miss. This is perfect. In fact, everything about it is perfect. It has that great grippy stuff on the bottom of the pincushion, like you find on the feet of toddler jammies. It is the perfect weight to keep from slipping off my sewing table. (Note: I'm not going to use crushed walnut shells any longer in the pincushions I make. Krista uses crushed glass, the kind used for sandblasting cars/bikes to get paint off--but I remember her saying it is getting harder to find. I'll double check on that though.), and she uses some kind of boning to make sure that the thread catcher stays open properly. And the fabric is too cute! And it has her twill tape label. I adore twill tape labels.

But wait.There's more. You have seen Riel Nason's most amazing selvage mummy quilt, right? If not, here it is:
Did you know she is also from Canada? AND a published author? Her book, which was just released, also arrived in the mail.
The little description on the cover, "weird, warm and wonderful," makes me chuckle but also makes me want to dive right in and start reading.

When I say that some of my favorite friends live in Canada, I am not kidding. I'm overwhelmed by their thoughtfulness. Truly overwhelmed.From the bottom of my heart, thank you SO very much.

***
The winner of the Go!Baby giveaway is #27:
Cristina said...
most people don't know that I consistently spell the word character wrong (I like to spell it charachter). Thanks for hosting such a fun giveaway, and thanks for the chance!
Thanks to everyone who played along. Your insightful comments were so intriguing and interesting!

Note: I was planning on posting the screen print of Random Number Generator choosing #27. I've figured it out before. But I had to google and in the midst of things, like a doofus, I lost the original page. If someone has the patience to explain such a simple thing to me, I would love it. :)

14 comments:

05 08
Brenda said... #

nice post about my fellow Canucks. btw, I live in Winnipeg where it's cold and snowy in winter and hot,hot,hot in summer.

Heather D. said... #

I'm from very near Vancouver - GO CANUCKS GO!!! Regular season starts Thursday night for our Canucks, we can hardly wait! :)

I grew up on Rogers Golden Syrup, in fact when I was kid we at it on bread with peanut butter. Mmmmm. I had a leftover pancake for lunch today with Rogers!!

The Vector cereal isn't exactly Corn Flakes. We have regular Corn Flakes too. I think the Vector cereal has some kind of soy clusters in it. Don't quote me on that though!

The thread catcher looks awesome. I need one of those. I always have a pile of threads beside my sewing machine that invariably end up on the floor or stuck to someone's socks.

felicity said... #

Wow you had quite the Canadian experience this week, Cindy! So glad I and my fellow countrywomen have conspired to make you so happy. :) Oh, Canada indeed!

p.s. growing up, we always had Rogers and maple syrup available for our pancakes.

Mrs Flying Blind... said... #

Oh Canada in deedy - that Krista is a lovely lady!

Rene' said... #

Wonderful goodies from wonderful friends!!!

Kris said... #

Those cookies are to die for! Enjoy!

JHNickodemus said... #

Press print screen, paste it in an editing software (Elements, paint) crop, and treat like any other graphic! On your phone press and hold (at the same time) your circle button on the bottom and the rectangle button on the top right corner. When your screen flashes like it took a picture it will be in your photos.

Letterpress said... #

If you have a Mac, press Shift+Command+4 and a little cursor pops up that you can use to draw a square around what you want. If not a Mac, follow JHRME's suggestion below.

I'm headed up to Montreal--I'm going to look for those cookies (the syrup will never make it home in my carryon bag. . .) Sounds like another terrific mail day!

E.

CitricSugar said... #

Canada loves you, too! :-) Glad to see the True North treating you so well.

Not a Canucks fan, though. It's the Maple Leafs and the Bruins for me. But then, you knew that.

Never had Rogers. We always had Beehive Corn Syrup or Aunt Jemima. Now, I pretty much go for the real maple syrup. Or Saskatoon Berry. Mmmmm...

Riel Nason said... #

Thanks Cindy! Those maple cookies have been a favourite of mine since childhood -- so yummy! Cheers, Riel

thequiltedmitten said... #

oh thank you thank you thank you!!!

Sincerely,

Cristina

Poppyprint said... #

uh-oh. I had forgot you were doing WW when I sent those cookies! Sorry for the temptation, Cindy. You may just have to share with your grandkids. Yeah, my kids would turn their noses up at the Rogers, because it doesn't come from maple trees. They are spoiled rotten with their million dollar real maple syrup! I never had Rogers growing up, I think because it's a B.C. product and back east we were all maple syrup purists. It is common, though for families to have the real (vrai chose, in French) thing for the grown ups, and Aunt Jemima (what the French call 'telephone pole syrup') for kids!

Oh, and the boning I use in the thread catchers is the fibre glass strapping that bundles of newspaper, or xerox paper boxes come bound with. Enjoy!!!

Archie The Wonder Dog said... #

What great post you get!! Those biscuits look delicious!

Cheryl Arkison said... #

Go Canada Go! We really are an awesome bunch of people.

As for Vector, it is SO much better than corn flakes. sweeter (but not too sweet), with some protein clusters, and all sorts of goodness.