Here is a wonderful post from Laeli at Force of Nature for Canada Day. Please click on the link below to read her family’s story. O Canada! Our home ON NATIVE LAND! Oh, those aren’t the true lyrics but those are the lyrics I sing and will continue […]
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 […]
I remember some of the names of my high school classmates. Sylvia Coulson, Jane Cripps, Janice Butler, Valerie Russell, Penny Lewis, Peter Blackwell, and many more. My memory gets worse every day, but today I remembered one person who changed my perceptions. Her name was Penny Haag and […]
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 […]
This very funny video is something we all need at this point in our Covid-19 journey. From The Adley Show: What We Should ALL Be Doing Right Now.
Thanks to Arkenaten for this link. Here is Muhammed Ali asking “Why is everything white?” https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-us-canada-52988605/muhammad-ali-why-is-everything-white
Of all the many exciting, terrifying, celebratory, confusing, and frustrating images to come out of the recent demonstrations and marches, the pictures of non-military men carrying weapons and wearing camouflage are perhaps the most upsetting. I can’t stop thinking about how their pants and shirts have been coopted […]
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 […]
Originally posted on Snowbird of Paradise:
In 2005, San Jose State University honored former students Tommie Smith and John Carlos with a 22-foot high statue titled Victory Salute, created by artist Rigo 23. It shows Smith and Carlos making a salute to human rights while the national anthem was playing during their medal…
Flags interest me. They are symbols, they are decorative, and they can be celebratory. As I walk about I see national flags, sports team flags, pride flags, association flags, and commercial advertising flags. Sometimes, I notice flags that look a little sorry for themselves. They have been abandoned […]
I interrupt this series of posts about murals to (a) apologize and (b) vent a little. The apology is necessary because I have no idea how my posts appear on your electronic device but I’m pretty sure my last couple of posts were a bit haphazard, graphically speaking. […]
Many of the murals in Legal depict people who lived heroic lives, and today I have chosen two people whose heroism has made them very significant in Canadian history. One heroic person depicted in the murals in Legal is Roméo Dallaire. He was the Force Commander for the […]
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 […]
There are so many great murals in Legal that it is hard to pick out a few to show you. Today I have chosen the portraits of two more homesteading families. This first is of Joseph St Martin and Marthe Calage. Joseph was the stepson of Jean Calage […]
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 […]
When first approaching Legal, Alberta, visitors can stop at the Ensemble-Together Monument that was created by Ernest Chauvet, welded by Louis Forcade, and painted by John Ellenberger. It has a Canadian flag at the centre and the flags of Britain and Quebec on either side. The monument affirms […]
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 […]
I am a snowbird who travels south for the winter. When I get there I have a bird of paradise plant on my patio.
