I'll Wake Up In Strawberry Fields Every Day

Happy 4th of July! What better way to celebrate the birthday of the United States than to tell you about my Canada Day. Canada Day was on a Tuesday this year, which would have been great had my boss decided to be generous and close the office on Monday. He did not decide to be generous, however, so I had to work on Monday and then had Tuesday off.

It doesn't feel like summer until the strawberries are out. The local berries were late this year because of our rainy spring but this week I managed to score myself some.

Local strawberries = strawberry jam!

First I smashed them up:

Then I added a ridiculous amount of sugar:

Then I cooked it until it got nice and bubbly:

Then I poured it into these cute little jars:

Then I boiled them so no-one at the wedding gets botulism:

(everyone knows that a wedding that includes botulism = Worst Wedding Ever!)

The end result:

I think (knock on wood) that I am finished making jam. At this point we have 121 little jars of jam for the wedding favours. We have less than 121 guests so I think we're in good shape. Unless something catastrophic happens to the jam and the seals break, I won't have to make any more jam this year (unless I want to.)

It turns out that I am not the only fan of local strawberries.

I love the staring contest she is having with the strawberry. She's totally winning.

It's mandatory to make strawberry shortcake with the first batch of local strawberries. I don't make the rules, I just follow them.

After all our strawberry fun, I took Stella to my parents' house. She loves running around in the yard with Toby. Toby is afraid of cameras but I managed to snap one picture while he was preoccupied (my Dad was on the other side of the gate, about to come into the yard.)

Toby is a black lab German Shepard cross. He is a big dog. Stella doesn't care (actually, she probably doesn't realize) that she is so much smaller than he is. She jumps all over him and tries to get him to chase her around the yard. Toby is turning 11 years old this year so there isn't much chasing going on. That doesn't prevent Stella from trying to provoke him every 30 seconds though. Poor old Toby is very patient with her and just tries to ignore her.

Stella has a giant tongue. And yes, that is dirt on it.

I couldn't stop laughing as I snapped this photo.

Stella does not appreciate being laughed at.

Right, so just to round out this completely random, photo-filled post, here is a picture of some flowers I bought yesterday. I bought them from a street-vendor for $10. Beautiful, right? This will be my back-up for when my aunt shows up with mums. Not these specific flowers, but the street-vendor. I will out-manipulate the manipulator. Hopefully.