Carrick to Calgary

Really must get he who knows how to do such things to deal with this blog's title - Carrick to Calgary was good, but we're in Edmonton these days, and its just getting confusing...!

Anyway, its blisteringly hot - yesterday we reached the heady heights of 35 degrees C and today we're heading for somewhere around 32 - phew! Its actually really too hot to be outside during the day, and we've found that we can keep the house cooler if we don't open any windows at all. There is very little wind around at the moment, but when a bit of breeze does stir itself, it feels like being blasted by a hairdryer on its hottest setting. Thus the windows will remain closed for the time being, and if it gets much hotter, I might even relent and allow the air conditioning to be turned on. I know it seems mad having a house that is equipped with such a thing, and being reluctant to turn it on, but I kind of feel slightly bad that it uses so much energy to cool us down when most of the year, we're complaining about being too cold.... mind you, being ever so slightly environmentally conscious doesn't stop me from driving (and turning on the car's air conditioning!), and I certainly won't be worrying about excessive fossil fuel consumption in the depths of winter when you can be sure that the heating will be going as much as necessary to keep the house ticking over at a very comfortable 20 degees C.

So, maybe we should steer clear of discussions on that sort of thing and move on to a little bit more of life in Edmonton....

Before we moved in, we had the house inspected as part of our conditions (i.e. if the inspection was unsatisfactory, we were within our rights to pull out of the contract). Despite the fact that most of the property was under a foot of snow at the time the inspection was done, and a lot of the report's pages are full of statements like 'not inspected - snow covered', the inspector did note that a tree at the side of the house was perilously close to the foundations and if left alone, would start to infiltrate the basement. So, when we moved, we engaged an arborist (tree surgeon) to come round and take a look at it and the other trees on the property. He reckoned that the offending tree was of the Manitoba maple variety. His view was that it needed to come out and that the nursery of little trees developing down the side of the house as a result of the prolific seeding needed to go too. So we agreed, and also agreed to get several of the big spruce trees trimmed so that their branches were clear of the electricity wires. I have to say that I was a little shocked when I came home on Monday and saw what a difference the Manitoba maple removal had made...

Here is before...



And here it is after...



It kind of makes us look very close to next door, but that is the way it is, and looking at it now, I can see how close the tree actually was to our house, and I think another growing season would not only have had the roots getting too close to the foundation, but the siding would be under attack as well. Still, it seems a bit bare without it...

We also got round to tackling one of the beds in the garden. It was full of very spiny stemmed roses - I think they might have been wild roses that had come up from next door's garden and while they filled a space, they were pretty poor to look at and I think that, left alone, they would have just spread all over the show. So, last weekend, we took the headstaggers and dug them out. My what deep roots they had... it took two of us most of Saturday afternoon to get the bed cleared and to get some new soil dug in. The existing soil is very heavy and full of clay, so we dug in several bags of soil improver, a bag of potting compost and a bag of steer manure.

This isn't a great picture because it was very bright at the time... but I think you can see the spiky rose things and a couple of lillies that were really struggling...



This is J doing his bit for workplace health and safety - note the bare feet just inches from a sharp spade - still I suppose he doesn't operate with his feet (only kidding!)...



Phew, hard work - here we are half way through...



And here is where the workers have given up...



And this is some of the stuff that came out...



We're not quite sure what to do with the bed in the longer term, as it doesn't get a lot of sun and is very close to a large spruce tree which probably sucks up most of the moisture in the soil. So, for the meantime, we've popped in a couple of bedding plants to not make it look quite so bare and we'll have a think about what we will do with it next spring.




But what about the potatoes I hear you cry...well, they're coming on a treat. This week saw the emergence of flower buds on the tops and they're looking pretty darned healthy...



As is the courgette in a pot (which reminds me, I must go and put some plant food in there this evening)... No sign of any flowers yet on the courgette, but I think we must be in step with the growing season as nobody at the farmer's market is selling courgettes there yet. There are plenty of tomatoes and peppers and early (i.e. really skinny) carrots for sale, but no courgettes...



So, what else can I tell you...? Nothing too exciting - we finally turned up the hems on the faintly ridiculous curtains in the living room and bedroom... Something they don't tell you about this part of Canada (maybe its the same in other provinces - who knows?). You know how at home, you can go into a home furnishings shop and buy ready made curtains... you can buy them in different drops, different widths, lined or unlined, different types of top (pencil pleat tape, tab tops etc etc). Well, it turns out that in this part of the world, there's no such thing (and people look at you like you're a mad woman if you ask for them). Everywhere I've been in home furnishings shops, they have panels of material that they call curtains. Usually, these things are 3 metres long and about a metre wide. If you have big wide windows, you just buy more panels... However, I don't know anybody who has windows that need to be covered with panels that are 3m long. The people who lived here before us didn't bother to shorten their panels (or maybe having large swathes of material kicking around the carpet is stylish and I don't know about such things)... so we spend several hours yesterday with a pair of scissors, a length of wundaweb and the ironing board and finally got the job done. Now, our panels are much more respectable and they just skim the floor - some of them are even straight! You'll have to excuse the big bit of material acting as a tie-back - I promise that 's just a temporary measure until I get out and get a couple of big hooks to attach to the wall.



We also decided that, since we were in a curtain frame of mind, we should put one up at the front door. This isn't to keep out drafts, but to give a little bit of privacy (hence they're a bit sheer). Please note that these were also 3 metres long before we shortened them...



Oh, and I spent yet more money on a new rug yesterday - slightly mental colours, but we think it works...



So, that's about it for now....just one more picture - it was my birthday last week (many thanks to everyone who sent presents, cards and good wishes), and J excelled himself by purchasing a beautiful bouquet of flowers - bestest!