Dave and I are now settled in our house here on the Kemptville Creek in Oxford Mills Ontario.

When we first moved in we put a new roof on it, had wood floors fitted in lounge/ dinner, new furnace/oiltank. the usual stuff, just to make it comfy!!

The summer after we moved we fitted a wood burning fireplace in the lounge. We were lucky in that their was a rough in for a fireplace behind the drywall. Most people think we are mad having a wood fire place but we like the ambiance. We have a wood stove in the family room which gives off a lot of heat especially when we keep it well fed.

Their is a large room off a bedroom upstairs which was roughed in for a bathroom and we started to work on this in January 2010 with help from a friend who came down for 5 days and managed to get a lot of “behind the scenes” work done. Then we took off for 3 months to Thailand. On our return the garden required a lot of work just to catch up on the lack of weeding the previous year/s. Thus the bathroom took a back seat untill the fall when Dave started to work on it now and then. We had already got most of the fixtures and fittings but there was a lot work required and soemtimes Dave got a little overwhelmed. In the end it was compleated and we moved into the bedroom in the summer of 2011.

This was originally written in Dec, 2009.

In any case, I’ve opened up a new blog over at Knitravel. The word is a combination of “knitting” and “travel”, and “ravel” – for what yarn does I’ve since begun other crafts now, but I suppose the main focus will still be knitting and travel. And also, I’m not really traveling at the moment, though I suppose short weekend trips to Kemptville sort of count as travels, so I do post about that as well. I also post about stuff going on in Toronto, although really, that’s not all that interesting – you get the best updates on my Facebook page with the photos, I think.

I’m also still posting, about my client work and school studies in interactive multimedia, at the envy creative blog. So head over there if you wanna see what I’ve been up to in my career.

Anyway, hope you’ll still follow us. Cheers!

In any case, I’ve decided to start posting a photo a day. I’ve already posted the first photo. If you want to see it, you’ll have to click over, or check out the post at the new envy creative blog. BTW, I relaunched the site recently – it’s not completely ready to begin promoting yet, but a link or two here and there won’t hurt.

This is probably why I turned to design. So I can still create works to be seen, published, even more – interacted with, without having to come up against possible failure at my greater passion for writing (have no doubt, I do love design). Without having to hear words of discourging criticism of my limited, mostly squandered, once-potential for talent that just never blossomed and probably never will.

This way, I can slowly turtle on, writing in bursts, when my need to express myself genuinely becomes too great and I can no longer hold in my voice, when I can finally take my vocal croak and turn it into eloquent hieroglyphs perhaps destined to be digitally burned eternally into the minds of humankind as the Internet Archive and biotechnology evolve, morph together into some new species that will overcome all environmental disaster, oxygen depletion and animal extinction.

Well, it’s nice to have a less scary dream amidst all the constant prophecies of our self-induced, imminent doom, anyway.

And Starbucks was giving away free coffee to anyone who brought in a mug. I gotta say though, it was really watery compared to usual…

Still a good day. Being beautifully sunny as well, I rode in on my bike, saving a couple of tokens too! What a great day!

I entered the King West location in the morning, and approached the front desk. I explained to the attendant (I don’t want to step on anyone’s toes and call him a Barista) that I was here to meet the founder and CEO, Wilhelm Liebenberg. I was told he was in a meeting, and asked if I would like a coffee. Not hungry enough for a milk-based drink, and certain I didn’t wanted a full dose of drip coffee (I’ve been trying to cut back on the caffeine), I made a snap decision and asked for an espresso. This turned out to be the perfect choice… the attendant told me to go sit down and he’d bring it to me.

As I waited, I pulled out my iPod Touch and scanned for wireless connections. I saw one for Spice Safar, and when the attendant came over, I asked him for the password. I logged on, and happily checked my email (I love this wi-fi being provided for free to customers in many places downtown – right on, Toronto).

But more importantly, the attendant had brought a rectangular, white plate arranged with a small espresso mug on a little saucer, a beautifully shaped spoon, a long, thing bag of raw sugar, a shot glass filled with sparkling water and – my favourite, of course – a little bowl with the most perfect portion of chocolate cake you’ve ever seen – about 8 small bites on the spoon.

I was in heaven. The espresso had a light, frothy head, felt creamy to the tongue and tasted nutty and chocolaty with just a hint of coffee flavour. I wanted to savour it, so I took small sips and ate some of the chocolate cake in between. When I was done, the sparkling water was the perfect accompaniment to clear my mouth and throat of any stickiness. I find I always want water after espresso – Spice Safar certainly gets the whole experience right.

My partaking was complimentary, but Wilhelm mentioned the price being the same as what you pay at Starbucks. If that’s true, I think I’ll start going to Spice Safar more often!

Look out for their flagship store, launching in the next couple of months at King & Spadina.

I just stumbled across another one, too. It’s similar, but works slightly differently – you get coupons emailed to you daily. I’ve just signed up, and I’m looking forward to the deals they feature. Check it out at Groupon.