Victoria Day Long Weekend means Going to the Cottage!!!!

Pretty well all Ontarians know that Victoria Day weekend (which here in Canada falls on the 3rd weekend in May) is the weekend that anyone who owns a summer cottage goes up to open it up. If you are lucky enough, you get to leave work early on the Friday and miss the horrendous traffic. In our family, we are 4th generation cottagers. We have a system for long weekends. My husband works from home on the Friday. The car is fully packed with clothes, food, summer staples and tech gadgets and we make a bee line for the boy's schools to pick them up as soon as it's over. We then drive for the 3 or more hours to get to the cottage (regularly 2 1/2 hours) and unload.

A lot of people think going to the cottage is a terrible idea. Who would want a second home to clean, cook in, fix up etc...well...apparently TONS of people do! For the little inconvenience of sitting in a car for a few hours and maybe having to smell your stinky dog's breath for too long, I think it's all worth it. There is nothing like stepping out of that car and just staring at the water and breathing that first breath in of clean, crisp air. Watching the dog tear off and head to the water for a drink and a swim, stepping into the cottage and smelling the knotty pine or that familiar smell of vintage quilts, and hearing the wood screen door slam. These things are all worth every second of travel time.

This year we are tearing out old carpets and painting the knotty pine white in the bedrooms. The cottage was built in the 40s and we have been lovingly renovating it little by little. It's quirky, crooked, with sloped floors and wonky windows but I love it. I even love the fact that it's bedrooms are only 8' x 9'. Barely enough room for a queen bed and a dresser. It's cozy and cute.

And this is why I love it so much. This is my son on a wakeboard as the sun starts to set and the above photo is our view from the cottage kitchen. We have a southwest facing view so we get the most spectacular sunsets every night.

One day this will be a refuge for my sons and their families. Their children will be 5th generation cottagers. I hope we are giving them the same kind of memories I and my husband both had as children, memories that never leave you, and fill you with a sense of being part of a Canadian tradition. A sense of family, a love of nature and knowledge of how truly blessed we really are.

Ok, so blogging is a blast!

I was sitting here today trying my best to figure out how to customize my blog to best suit my audience. I quickly realized that you have to have a minor in computer tech and a major in graphic design to do that, both of which I don't have. I hope you like the change, I do.


I have been a little lax in my pinning lately and thought I'd focus on my blog instead. I have a few photos to show you. I'm in the "let re-decorate mode" so tell me what you think......

My gazebo

This is my gazebo in my backyard. We have roll down bamboo shades to have some privacy but I was thinking of getting some heavy sailcloth type material to make some curtains to give it a more homey feeling. I also discovered that a painted deck is a nightmare!! Does anyone out there have any ideas of how to keep from repainting a deck every year? We have ultra durable oil based exterior paint on it at the moment and it still chips and peels because of our Canadian winters.

via Pinterest

The above photo is almost identical in layout as my bedroom. At the moment my room is a manilla yellow colour with pale robin's egg accents. I was thinking of repainting the walls this colour because my furniture is dark too. I love that the night tables don't match. 

And finally, we are going up to the cottage on Friday for the first time since Christmas. We've done a lot of renovating (it's from the 40s) and have decided to paint a bedroom At the moment almost the whole cottage is knotty pine. It's beautiful but a little claustrophic when you're in a tiny 10 x 10 bedroom. I've found some great examples of what it could look like if we painted it white and here's one of them. Here's hoping it turns out like this!


Here's option No.!

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or Option No.2!!

via Pinterest

Sometimes you just have to dream

via Pinterest

I love the colour of the paint in this office. I'm in the process of making my office more 'official' and I think I'll go with this. What do you think?

via Pinterest

Having just brought home a new puppy, we've decided to put a runner up our stairs (that, and the fact I keep falling down them!). Our stairs look just like these. The pattern is suble and elegant.

via Pinterest

 

This photo is so inspiring to me. We are so blessed to have a cottage on the lake to escape to. It's doesn't look like this but everything else in the photo is identical. Maybe one day....

I'm so excited about my new website that will be launched in the next week. It's a big step for me because I've been plugging away as a genealogist for a long time but now I feel really official. With the blog started and my Pinterest addiction (check it out, it's under Sandra Moffatt Genealogical Research),  Facebook and LinkedIn, I feel totally "social media" updated and ready to go. I just can't seem to get into Twitter. Maybe I'm too old, or maybe I talk too much for 1 sentence tweets.

I love all aspects of history and genealogy, but on the other side of the coin, I adore interior decorating. I never studied it or worked as a decorator, but I worked in the industry for over 12 years. It was so much fun and fed the "artist" part of my personality. It's an industry full of creative, colourful, adventurous people who "paint" their masterpieces onto people's homes and into their lives through design and decor. I think if I were younger I'd try to do both but I just can't seem to see an Interior Decorator who spends hours in libraries, archives and on the net researching working out so I'll stick to sharing my loves of all that is design/decor on this blog.

Please feel free to share any ideas you have on anything you find interesting here. I'd love to hear from you.