Sunday, June 30, 2013

Unexpected Hospital Visit...

This afternoon, our Son, Shawn gave us a call with some not so good new. Seems our oldest Grand Daughter, Emmie, had to make a visit to the Hospital.

Seems she picked up a bad cold last week, and it turned into a case of pneumonia. Next problem, is the Family is travelling this weekend, and is in the Toronto/Mississauga area, so she was admitted to Hospital in the Mississauga Area. Shawn reports she is doing well, but may have to stay 2 or 3 days in Hospital. Judy and I plan a trip to the City tomorrow to visit her!

 

They started in the Emergency Ward today, but after a visit from the Resident Pediatrician, Emmie was admitted. I am sure Dad was right there helping, as he is a Pediatrician himself!

Get well soon Emmie! We love you!

 

Yes, we are flying our Canadian Flag this Canada Day Weekend. Weather here is good so far!

Today turned into a day of moving furniture. Chris and Kristina found a new couch/recliner/sofa bed on Kijiji, so I was enlisted to provide transportation via our motorcycle trailer. It was a half hour drive over to Paris, to pick up the new sofa, which of course was in an upstairs apartment, and had to come down the staircase from you know where. Chris' Brother, Kevin, came over from London to lend a needed hand.

 

As you can see, it is a bit of a monster, but sure is comfortable!

Never did get around to blogging last night... turned into a very social night. Above you see a great picture of our RV Neighbours John and Sheila. They live right beside us in our Park, and are here to the end of summer also. We met up with them last year in Florida, and had lunch with them at Disney.

Last night we went out for a night on the Town. We started out with a fantastic dinner at Charles Dickens English Pub on Dundas Street. None of us had eaten there before, and we were all pleasantly surprised. It was great food with a terrific atmosphere! Will go again!

After Dinner, we decided to carry on with the night, and headed to the local Movie Theatre to take in the new released movie, "Now you see me"...

Judy chose the Restaurant and the Show. Could not have picked better. This movie, starring Woody Harrelson is a great show. If you get a chance, go and see it! It keeps you on the edge of your seat with the plot and a lot of suspense! Won't give it all away, but we all enjoyed it! The night did not finish after the movie, as John and Sheila invited us back to their Phaeton for refreshments. What a great night!

Busy, but fun day again!

Till tomorrow...

 

Friday, June 28, 2013

Happy Canada Day Weekend!

Yikes, Canada is 146 years old this coming July 1st, so that makes this Canada Day Weekend! There will be all kinds of festivities held all over Canada this weekend, including a big fireworks display in Woodstock and at our Park. Everywhere you look around here are Canadian Flags flying!

However your flag got awefull wet here today... wow... it rained pretty well all day! Judy spent last night in with the kids tending to the needs of Charlie, so Kristina could get a good nights sleep. This morning, I spent cleaning up the RV, doing laundry, etc., to keep everything up to date!

So... how much rain fell today?

It rained so much, that Gwenny had to go outside and play in the puddles with her Grand Mother! No, Judy did not pencil sketch the pictures of Gwenny with her umbrella above... that is just me messing around still with my iPhotogene program again... here is the original picture below.

On the ground beside her, is a "paper boat" that Kristina helped her build. Gwenny wanted to try it out!

Judy reported that the boat did not fair all that well in the water, but that did not dampen Gwenny's enthusiasm for trying to make it float!

Well, sometimes when your a little girl with bright pink boots on, you just have to jump in the puddles. Judy took her around the block, and said Gwenny jumped in every puddle they came across. Why not!

So, don't forget to get out there and enjoy Canada Day on Monday! The weather looks like it is going to be great here for the big day.

Till tomorrow...

Thursday, June 27, 2013

Back to Blogging again...

Yesterday we took a road trip over to visit Tom and Cheryl in Richmond Hill. I thought, hey, no problem, I would take my iPad and post from Richmond Hill. Well, I got there, turned on my iPad, and oooppppssss.... 9% of my battery life left! Seems I forgot to charge it the night before, and did not bring my charge cord with me.... oh boy! No more needs to be said.

 

Check out this crew sitting out back on the deck last night... it was warm, errrrr no, it was HOT out! We managed though.

Here is a Woman with a happy face! Cheryl is really doing well with her new knee that was replaced about 5 weeks or so ago. She can walk around without assistance, and she is vigilant about doing her rehab work.

Yeah, Tom and I took on a few of the World's biggest problems last night, and got a couple of them solved.

This guy above flew in for a free dinner last night, I managed to catch him with our point and shoot and aided a little by iPhotogene.

This guy above, never said a word all night!

This morning Tom had a Dr. appointment down at the Toronto East General Hospital. I drove down with him, as he was having the Dr. look at a blocked tear duct, so I figured he might not be able to drive home. Turns out the Dr. put medication in the eye, but he was fine to drive... rats.... I really wanted to see if I could smoke the tires in his nice Corvette! That yellow sign you see says it all! Pay for parking here. It cost $15.00 for about 1 1/2 hours of parking in the Hospital Parking Lot. Welcome to Toronto!

 

I did take the chance while in Richmond Hill today, to drive by this building. It is called Observatory Place on Yonge St. in Richmond Hill. Back in 1987, I opened a new Branch Office on the Ground Floor of this building, for Montreal Trust. I worked here for two years before being transferred up to Sudbury. I know, you are probably wondering what I did wrong to deserve Sudbury! I actually requested the transfer, and we loved living up north for 10 years! Jenny Craig now has a shop where my Office used to be.

We made it back to the RV this afternoon, however it looks like a lot of rain on the way for the next few days!

Till tomorrow...

Tuesday, June 25, 2013

New Tires for RVlifeonwheels!

With 2 problem tires out of four in the past couple weeks, it was obvious it was time for some new rubber on the MH. We had blown one of the tires on the QEW, although it was caused by road debris, and another tire developed a leak which could not be identified. So, with these tires entering their 9th year of service, it was time for them to go. Thankfully we had replaced both our front tires about 3 years ago, so we got away light today.

Honeywood Tire up in Stratford was the chosen location to replace these tires. They are fully equipped to handle just about anything there. George from Our Awesome Travels had recommended them to us.

They were just jacking up the rig in this picture, getting ready to take the tires off. It was overcast, but they wanted to do it outside, as it was getting hot at 8:30 this morning.

These two jacks you see are holding up the back end of the RV. You can see the spare tire, already placed back into it's holder, hopefully, never to come down off there again!!!

Above is the inner tire getting ready to come off. We were able to inspect the rear brakes, and with 39,000 miles on them, they still looked new, and good to go!

Back home in an hour and a half, with four new skins on the back! Well, ready to hit the road again for more adventures! Ohhh, if you are wondering, we use Michelin Tires... they are one of the few Companies that actually make the tire to fit our rig. They come with a 6 year Mfg. Warranty. (Not road hazard.)

After I got the rig back and hooked up, I spent the rest of the day cleaning it up, and cutting grass. It was really hot, so a nice swim in our 85 deg. F. pool felt real good!

Judy went into Town to spend the day helping Kristina with the kids.... says she was baking cookies again, but I did not see any...

 

Gwenny looked like she was ready to go on a cruise boat today...

 

Looks like they had a lot of play time.... Kristina had to visit her Doctor this afternoon, so Judy stayed in to look after the kids. Check out the box in the background of the picture marked "CAR". This is where Gwenny keeps her stash of dinky cars... she loves them! (Do they still call them Dinky Cars???)

Till tomorrow...

 

Monday, June 24, 2013

iPhotogene for iPad

Back about a week ago, I had a big time iPad problem when I got a message from Blogsy saying, "hey buddy, you have exceeded your Picasa space limit"... I said... "What???"

Problem was I was downloading pictures off our camera onto our iPad direct, and then posting them through Blogsy. Good Blogger Friend Rick from out West, (ya, you all know him...) set me straight a couple emails later, and I decided I had to reduce the size of these pictures. I also use a Flicker Account to post pictures from our LG Smart Phone which works good.

So, the next problem was how to reduce the pictures coming into the iPad! Hmmmmmm... lets go to the App Store and do some shopping! Turns out, iPhotogene fits the bill! I purchased the app today for $3.00 and it works as advertised... check it out.

I needed a subject for my experiments so what better one than Gwenny. They were out to our park last night for a swim, and our weather has been super hot! This is a picture of Gwenny learning how to kick in the pool... it is the original. With one touch of iPhotogene you can do this...

This is called Purple Haze.... maybe I should look up my old Jimmy Hendrick photos! It is very easy to do anything to a photo in this app, and you can access any photo you have stored on your iPad.

 

 

As you can see, you can practically do anything with a photo... change colours, add thought bubbles, or frames, do anything with the lighting, it is amazing.

However best of all, I can instantly resize my photos and export them to Picasa where they are ready to be grabbed by Blogsy and posted to the web.

 

Original photo above. ( blur spots are water drops on the lens of our underwater camera...)

One touch button fix called "Warm". You can see the difference to enhance your pictures.

All the changes you make are visible instantly on the iPad screen as you work with them... very easy to use, and I am a beginner at this app.

So, get ready for some fancy dancy pictures coming to this blog near you. I will try different things as I go forward improving my knowledge of this program. First glance though at this App says it is a winner!

Till tomorrow.

Photogene test

 

Sunday, June 23, 2013

Family Reunion Time!

Yesterday Judy and I left Deb and Gerard in Orillia, and headed down to Seagrave, Ontario, for a Family Reunion of the Payne Clan. Turned out to be a great day for the big party, and we were able to hold it all outside and enjoy the great weather.

Starting on the left is Bob, then Howard, Judy and of course Garry. All siblings were present and accounted for! Judy is the baby of the Family, and I guess by the picture, the shortest! Howard and Teri offered up their lovely home in Seagrave, which has an enormous lot. Lots of shade was needed when the sun came out!

There was a total of 29 people at the party... Gwenny was sleeping when we took the official group shot, and I hope I counted right. There should be 28 people above... don't forget Charlie being held by Chris in the car seat with bug screen! It was great to have so many of the Family here.

Lots of time to talk to everyone, and Gwenny enjoyed the food!

Gwenny met a cousin, Persia... ( I hope I spelled it right...???....) and both were being entertained by April.

They even had a dance party!

We had a big volley ball tournament, and other games.

 

There is our Host and Hostess cooking up a storm in the kitchen! They put on a big pot luck dinner, and they supplied a great turkey and ham! No one went away hungry! Strawberry shortcake and lemon pie and a bunch of chocolate baked items to fill the desert hole in everyone!

 

The girls took Howard's 1915 Model T for a drive around the back yard!

Howard started up the fire pit full of dead limbs etc....

He saved his Christmas Tree to throw on the fire! Can you tell it was bit dry! We had flames 50 feet in the air... but only for about 20 seconds! AWESOME!

Got all the kids to pile into the Model T... might need some work on the shocks now... not sure.

Sure was a great time... I only have about 200 more pictures!

Must send our heartfelt thanks to Howard and Teri for taking this on, and being the Hostess with the most! Everyone had a great time, and enjoyed the great weather and food! Thanks again Howard and Teri!

Till tomorrow...