tea time under the pear tree

mornings

In the morning, Liam and Dylan peek through the stair railings to see if I am awake. If I am, they come down and settle onto the couch (bed) and watch cartoons or movies on the laptop.














Usually they eat peanut butter & crackers and fruit but this morning we made PANCAKES!

influential friends

Julie brought sockmonkeys for Liam and Dylan.














These sockmonkeys do not always set a good example for the children.














I hope the glowing owls she gave to Christian and Amanda are better behaved but I think it is a good thing that Auntie Bettie is keeping a watchful eye over them.

children who eat their greens...

children who whomp too much...

layers

Tonight was an exciting night for many reasons. One reason was that it was the first time that the Schumacher cousins (Christian and Amanda) and the Vancouver cousins (Liam and Dylan) met.

Another reason was that Christian decided to dig up the Sophie Setnyk memorial onion to put on our pizza.

You can see Christian at work in these photos. The last picture shows Christian and Amanda with the onion -- Liam is standing behind them. Not pictured here is the goofiness of the first annual cousin whompfest.

dormitory

Some of the BC people are coming today! so I got the dormitory ready.











































They arrived around 7. Cousin Kellie and my Mum and Dad came over for a BBQ dinner.

Welcome to Toronto Suzanne, Liam and Dylan.

goodbye beulah marion mollins

Aunt Beulah mugging for the camera in 1961, just around the time I first met her.

Beulah died this morning at 6 a.m.

Last night, as we said good night to her, she told us that when she closed her eyes it felt as if worlds were brushing over her. It sounded nice.

Tonight, as I close my eyes, memories of this funny, feisty woman will brush over me.

Beulah Marion Mollins devoted much of her life to churchly charities and, in latter years, to serving as a volunteer helper at Toronto’s Sunnybrook Hospital.

It was at Sunnybrook, despite earnest nursing and doctoring, where Beulah passed away on July 18—just 25 days after her 85th birthday.

Beulah was born in North River, Nova Scotia, the first of four children of Vera Grace Nickerson Mollins and Rev. Harry Whitfield Mollins. She was schooled as the family moved to Ottawa, then Brantford, Ont., where she began working in banking, a career carried to Toronto, where she later switched to secretarial work.

As a pastime, Beulah, a music lover, was a pianist who often performed publicly as well as at home.

In the latter years of her later life, Beulah spent many pleasing months with fellow retirees and a caring, cheerful, helpful staff in Toronto's Annex Retirement Residence.

In that rest home, and among a sister, a brother, and six bright nieces who knew her as “Birdie,” “Ant” or “Bunny,” Beulah Mollins is much missed.

The guestbook at the Globe and Mail.

The guestbook at the Toronto Star.

audrey day 2

We watched The Maltese Falcon.
We had more scones and fruit and cheese for breakfast.


























Audrey cooked the potatoes on the BBQ and we made salad for lunch.













Georgia came by














and took some pictures of Audrey.

audrey makes scones

Audrey loves scones. For her birthday I gave her a scone-making kit and a copy of the recipes my Mum uses. We made a date for a scone fest.























I got ready for scone fest by making Audrey's bed with the special lacey sheets














and buying fruit, double cream and teeny potatoes at the market.













Audrey came over in the early evening. We set the VCR to tape So you think you can dance? and went over to Marquee Video and rented Big Deal on Madonna Street and The Maltese Falcon (Audrey has remarkable movie-knowledge). We had dinner at Il Gato Nero and ice cream at Dolce. Then we came home to make the scones.














































































We watched our tape of So you think you can dance? and Big Deal on Madonna Street and ate scones.