My view Wednesday

This is actually a view from more than a week ago- rare blue poppies in full bloom at the Butchart Gardens. I'll share more about our trip to these gardens next week!

Graduation postlude

Unexpected flowers to mark this event from two dear friends. I was so surprised- but they made our quiet week last week that much more enjoyable. Thanks M & S.

Graduation Part 2

The best part of graduation, for me, was getting to show my parents, parents-in-law and cousin around the Royal Roads campus where I lived for 6 weeks during on-campus terms. The star of campus is Hatley Castle, a medieval/Stuart castle house built in 1908 for a member of the wealthy Dunsmiur family (see a history here). It was eventually converted into a school, but the gardens have been kept pretty much as they were when the estate was a private residence. I had a direct view of the castle both years I was on campus and it's a pretty neat thing to see first thing in the morning.

  

  

Graduation Part I

The ten days surrounding graduation were a bustle of activity, out-of-province company and little down time. As such, I took a wee blogging break last night- I think both Jeff and I needed a few days of quiet. I promised more photos from graduation, so here they are. Note: photos here are courtesy of my dad, cousin D, or the official (and shockingly overpriced) Royal Roads photographer.

Graduation is s actually a pretty boring event.  Your name is read, you walk across the stage to share Chancellor Calhoun's hand, you get a scroll (with a congratulatory letter as diplomas had been sent out via mail the week before) and you go back to your seat. All while wearing an ugly polyester gown. That hat was even the exact same cardboard monstrosity that I had at my high school graduation (which finally hit the garbage last fall)... somehow, I thought a master's degree would get warrant me a hat made of something more than cardboard! I guess it's good to mark these accomplishments in life, but the ceremony really is a little absurd. 

The convocation ceremony is still online- just click here. You might also want to fast forward until my name is called at 1:41:13!  

proud Mama

proud cousin 

and very relieved spouse (still getting used to having his wife back)

Away in the Rain

Jeff and I are on the mainland for the weekend visiting family and getting off the island (for the first time in over a year). We've had a hard time finding internet access after a HUGE thunderstorm blew through Abbotsford tonight.... so with rainstorms on the brain, I post this as our Sunday music for this week.

Here are the words to this old hymn, Showers of Blessing. 

Gopher Tuna

It's no secret that I LOVE choral music. What I don't like, however, is choral music sung without diction. Unfortunately, this happens often. It usually drives me nuts.

O Fortuna from Carmina Burana is a fairly well known choral piece, but one easily prone to unclear diction. Jeff found this animation that has had us both in stitches... and him singing these "new" lyrics with great gusto (particularly when weeding outside in the garden).  

Here are the original Latin lyrics, if you're curious.

Quick Recap

Last week was a social whirlwind but everything surrounding graduation went wonderfully. I have a bunch of photos to sort (and a bunch of "real" work to do today) so I'll post more later this week. In the meantime, here I am with my #1 school supporter, minutes after walking across the stage.

I am happy to report that I did not trip and fall while walking across the stage... I did that 2 hours earlier over lunch. So under my gown is the biggest and yuckiest looking skinned knee I've had since childhood. Go figure. 

Father's Day

Today, we find ourselves in the unusual (but very wonderful) circumstance of seeing BOTH our fathers on Father's Day. This has never happened before and makes today a very, very good day.

My dad picked today's music- it's one of his favourite new groups, with a hymn that's particularly fitting  for this holiday. We hope you all have a happy day.

Big Day

Jeff and I are in Victoria today, along with my parents, parents-in-law and special cousin D to celebrate my graduation. I'll post highlights of our visit next week but so far, we've had a great time (with clear blue skies and the most perfect ocean breeze). Last night, the students I've shared the past two years of my life with met up and it was so great to share and reflect on all we've been through together.

We'll be here this afternoon- Hatley Castle and gardens on campus at RRU (photos taken last year).

My view Wednesday

Our California Lilac is in FULL bloom... and that means it's also buzzing, at any given minute, by swarms of happy bees.

Broadcast error

I realized yesterday that a number of my posts last week did not successfully show up here on the blog. I usually check these things but with a busy week of work and garden projects, I assumed that all was as well on the public side of this blog as it seemed in the background. My apologies! Technical glitches have been fixed and all now seems to be back to normal. Scroll down this page and check out the next page for posts from last week (and the week before) that finally, are visible.

Lemon Candies

With a flury of company here this week (before, during and after my graduation), I whipped up one of my favourite summer desserts, Panna Cotta, to serve this week. I usually serve Panna Cotta with fresh fruit and some sort of fruit sauce (this time a mix of mango and fresh local nectarines, blueberries and strawberries with lemon balm from our garden) and I like to have some sort of garnish. Candied lemons fit the bill- very pretty, and really delicious.

1 lemon, thinly and very evenly sliced
3 cups water, divided

ice water bath
1 cup sugar

Thinly slice lemon. Because I don't have a mandoline, I used two skewers to guide my knife (which was newly sharpened) and it worked great.  Discard seeds and ends of rind.

Bring a medium saucepan of water (2 cups) to a rolling boil. Remove from heat, and add lemon slices; stir until softened, about 2 minutes. Drain, and immediately plunge slices into ice-water bath. Drain.  

Bring sugar and remaining 1 cup of water to a boil and stir until the sugar dissolves. When liquid is clear and bubbling, reduce heat to medium-low. Add lemon slices, arranging them in one layer. Simmer (do not let boil) until rinds are translucent, about 1 hour.

Transfer to a cooling rack (sprayed with cooking spray so the lemons do not stick). Let stand about 24 hours to set. They will still be a little sticky, but firm. Store between layers of wax paper in an airtight container. I also saved the syrup to use in homemade iced tea and it was delicious! 

Still gardening

I haven't written much about our garden... maybe because we've been working weekends and evenings like crazy to tame it. We've also completed the final stage of landscaping for our front step remodel... I'll post before and after shots next week, but here's a sneak peak.

Simple

Two favourite African-American spirituals. 

Two great American choirs. 

Not much more needs to be said. 

Deep River, sung by the Dale Warland Singers

Balm In Gilead, sung by Chanticleer and gospel great Yvette Flunder

Big Adventure

After several weeks of posting about the Queen's Diamond Jubilee, I'm going to return to regular blog posting... and this post will go off in a completely different direction!

Yesterday, I went to Vancouver for an appointment and a bit of shopping.  This, in itself, is a pretty big adventure for me.  Living two blocks from the ferry terminal makes these sorts of excursions pretty easy, and now that school is finished, maybe I'll do it more often.

Yesterday, however, I had a bigger adventure than I anticipated. When I arrived in Horseshoe Bay on the ferry, there was a LONG line at the bus stop. Rather than try to fit on the packed 257 Express bus to Vancouver, I took the slower (by about 15 minutes) 250 bus (with only 4 people on it) and rambled through West Vancouver. On one street, we were stopped by more than a dozen police, fire and other important looking trucks parked on the side of the road. The reason? THIS:

I'll admit- I used the zoom on my camera to get this shot (through a momentarily open bus window), but this guy was still too close for my comfort.

He wandered out of sight and we took an alternate route, but later news reports confirmed he was succesfully tranquilized and "relocated" back to the wilderness. Phew.

And finally... the Jubilee Celebration

Here are some highlights of this weekend's official Jubilee Celebration. Prince Philip unfortunately, missed the final two days due to illness; despite his unfortunate absence, the party continued.

Prince Charles' speech at the end of the concert

Jubilee Blessing written to conclude the Service of Thanksgiving

Balcony appearance and military fly by on the last day of celebration (with a wonderfully rousing version of the national anthem sung by the crowd at 7:45 and three cheers for the Queen 9:25)

And finally,  a word from the Jubilee girl herself. 

Celebrating Jubilee: Happy and Glorious

With today being the final day of Diamond Jubilee Celebrations, I've come to my second last photo montage. Tomorrow, we'll look at highlights of this weekend's celebrations, but today we'll finish our look at the Queen's past 60 years. Enjoy!

Gospel Jubilee

If you haven't heard (!!), this weekend marks the official celebration of the Queen's Diamond Jubilee. This afternoon, the celebration will get underway with a massive floating parade of boats (including several with the Royal Family) down the Thames River in London.

For music today, I am going back 10 years to the Queen's Golden Jubilee. To celebrate her 50th anniversary on the throne, she hosted a  concert in the back garden of Buckingham Palace. One of the performers was the London Adventist Chorale; their versions of two gospel classics were just fantastic. 

Skip ahead to in the video to 18:40 for the first song, Great Getting-up Morning. The second piece, Jubilee (Great Day) follows immediately afterward at 22:30.

Celebrating Jubilee: Documentaries

There have been some wonderful documentaries produced for the Queen's Jubilee this year. Here are some of my favourites:

The Diamond Queen Episode 1: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 and Part 4

The Diamond Queen Episode 2: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 and Part 4

The Diamond Queen Episode 3

The Queen's Palaces: Buckingham Palace

The Queen's Palaces: Hollyrood House Part 1 and Part 2

The Queen's Palaces: Windsor Castle Part 1 and Part 2

And finally, this tribute from The Prince of  Wales. He shared home movies taken by his parents that have never before been seen by the public- it's just great. 

Celebrating Jubilee: Artwork

While I wasn't initially that impressed with the official logo chosen for the Queen's Jubilee (the graphic here on the left), it grew on me substantially after I found out it was one of hundreds of pieces of children's artwork requested by Buckingham Palace to commemorate this event. The Queen specifically asked for children's artwork to be part of the celebration, and a number of images have been released to the public. For several weeks last month, some of this artwork decorated Buckingham Palace as well (see the bottom two photographs). The artwork, as you see here, really is wonderful.

Photos are courtesy of The Daily Mail and Geoff Robinson Photography