When I was out for a walk yesterday, a passing police car stopped to watch what I was doing. I think I probably looked suspicious. Perhaps someone phoned in to say that there was a woman standing outside their house and taking photos of their tree. In fact, […]
Edmonton has an annual celebration of gardens in bloom, and some of my neighbours are good candidates for recognition. We have a very short season, so figuring out what will bloom within that time takes some research. Also, we are cursed with clay soil, so I know that […]
This is the look interior designers are going for when they create distressed painted furniture. These garage doors are distressed for good reasons; they are old and they haven’t been well maintained. I’d feel distressed too if that were me. These garages belong to back-alley neighbours and it […]
A recent walk took me to two parks on the south side of Edmonton, both of which include some surprisingly thoughtful details. Empire Park is at 107 Street and 47 Avenue, and it includes the building for the Sahaja Meditations Centre which has a delightful mural by Cen […]
The weather is bad, the news is worse, and I haven’t been out of my house for a few days. Honestly, I’ve been getting a bit depressed. So, today I decided that if the weather wasn’t going to improve, I would make the most of it and take […]
The mural I am showing you today sparked my curiosity. It makes reference to the famine that affected Ireland in the 1850s. I was taught that it was called the Irish Potato Famine because a fungal infestation decimated the potato crop for about seven or eight years. This […]
Following my first discovery of the town of Legal, Alberta, I decided to create a series of blog posts highlighting some of the many murals in the town and the history behind them. This is part two of that series. The mural that tells the story of George […]
Until yesterday, I didn’t know I lived forty minutes away from the Mural Capital of Canada and the French Mural Capital of the World. And, it is wonderful! The town of Legal (pronounced lé-gal, not lee-guhl) is inhabited by 1345 people living in 448 private dwellings. It was […]
Now that many of us are staying home to limit the spread of COVID-19 we have more time to be aware of the comings and goings in our neighbourhoods. In fact, because so few people are out and about, the people who do walk or cycle by our […]
This is the door to a store that once sold ceramic tiles that were made by a local artisan. I regret that I cannot remember what the store was called. The building was empty for some time and half of the tile store is now occupied by Raw […]
Concordia University (formerly Concordia College) in Edmonton, Alberta, is in an enviable location overlooking the North Saskatchewan River valley. It is a private university with some funding from the Government of Alberta. Originally, it was affiliated with the Lutheran Church and was founded in 1921 to prepare young […]
Yesterday I walked along a street in which the trees have been pruned to clear the way for the power lines. As time has gone by, the trees have grown bigger and the trees’ branches have spread further apart. It doesn’t take much of a stretch of the […]
Norwood Wesleyan Church in Edmonton is closed for the duration of the COVID-19 lockdown, but the members have chosen to send a message to the community in the meantime. In fact, they sent several messages and put them on the main doors. The first thing I noticed was […]
Ada Boulevard in Edmonton’s Highlands neighbourhood is a popular place for walking and jogging. The area was developed over a hundred years ago and has beautiful houses all along the north side of the road. It is also the location of Concordia University, the McGrath Mansion, and the […]
It is hard to say whether this giant aluminum baseball bat is a symbol of Edmonton’s optimism or its nostalgia. Either way, it is big. For a long time, it was the biggest baseball bat in Canada, but a few years ago they built a bigger one in […]
A house that had previously escaped my notice called to me today. I was actually looking for interesting doors to add to the Thursday Doors collection of Norm 2.0. When I saw this one, though, I wasn’t sure if it would be appropriate for that setting because it isn’t […]
I am a snowbird who travels south for the winter. When I get there I have a bird of paradise plant on my patio.
