What’s stopping you?

September 29, 2015 / edebock / 6 Comments

Is there something you’ve always wanted to do, but never tried? Somewhere you’ve wanted to go, but never been? Why? What’s stopping you?

Did someone tell you that you couldn’t and you believed them? Maybe you’ve been wounded by a parent, a spouse or a so-called friend. Maybe you were told that you were worthless or that you’d never amount to anything. Maybe now’s the time to prove those naysayers wrong!

Be unstoppable!

I realize that sometimes there are financial constraints or physical restrictions that make it difficult to achieve our dreams, but sometimes those just become excuses.

My daughter-in-law had her second major back surgery before she graduated from university and she was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis while pregnant with her first child. Six years ago, she was almost bedridden, but on September 12th, she rode her bike 120 gruelling kilometres from Vancouver to Whistler, BC in the RBC Gran Fondo! She has endured more pain in her life than most of us will ever know, but she’s unstoppable!

Maybe it’s your age that’s holding you back. For some people, the space between “you’re too young” and “I’m too old” is far too short! Pam Lutrell, writer of over50feeling40, one of my favourite fashion blogs, is transitioning into a new career at 62 because she’s unstoppable!

Be unstoppable!

Is it fear that’s stopping you from doing something you really want to do? Perhaps you’re simply afraid to step outside your comfort zone. Michael Jordan, possibly the greatest basketball player of all time, said, “Never say never, because limits, like fears, are often just an illusion.” Yes, fears are just that, an illusion; something we create in our heads that stops us from trying something new or achieving something great. Why not stop the negative self-talk and take a chance?

What is it that you’ve always dreamed of doing?

Be unstoppable!

When my life is over, I’d be happy if my epitaph said, “She was unstoppable!”

What the heck is vegan leather?

September 22, 2015 / edebock / 10 Comments

Lately, I’ve noticed more and more ads and fashion blogs referring to garments and handbags made of vegan leather. Really? What the heck is that? As a lover of words, I was compelled to find out.

Vegans are usually defined as a strict vegetarians who omit all animal products, including dairy, from their diets, but The Vegan Society offers a much broader definition. “Veganism is a way of living which seeks to exclude, as far as possible and practicable, all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing or any other purpose.” Hence, vegan leather.

In reality, though, vegan leather is nothing more than fake or faux leather by a different name. Pleather, as it was once known, is a synthetic leather usually made out of petroleum byproducts such as polyurethane or PVC bonded to a fabric backing. A few are cork or kelp based. Though once deemed tacky, under its new and classier name, pleather is suddenly seen as eco-chic.

Make no mistake though, the production of these synthetic leathers involves excessive levels of toxic substances and since they aren’t fully biodegradable, they produce micro-particles that are ingested by animals and thus enter the food chain at all levels.

Animal-friendly or not, synthetic leather offers advantages to both fashion designers and consumers. The softer, realistic-looking material is a popular choice with designers as it offers them a flexible, versatile textile to work with; one that can be made to sparkle or shine or even be saturated with a rich or bright shade that no tanning process could mimic. Not everyone in the industry is happy to call the fabric vegan leather, however. Some would prefer to avoid the connotation that their clothing is designed exclusively for animal-cruelty advocates.

Like many consumers, I simply like the fact that faux leathers are a nicely priced alternative to the real thing. I can’t help thinking that the new term sounds overly pretentious though and I’ve also noticed that the so-called vegan leather products that I’ve seen advertised tend to be pretty pricey. Could it be that people are paying more for the sense of superiority that comes with the fancier moniker and the feeling that they’re doing something good? With apologies to William Shakespeare, a faux leather by any other name is just as fake!

One of my latest thrift store finds. The label says it’s “100% polyurethane with 100% rayon woven backing.” It doesn’t say vegan leather. It doesn’t pretend to be anything it isn’t!

Fall camping

September 13, 2015 / edebock / 3 Comments

I’ve always wanted to go camping in the fall; always hoped for just one more outing with the trailer before winter hit. As teachers, it never happened. We were back in the classroom and up to our eyeballs in work by late August or the first week of September. Then, with retirement came several years of helping our friend, Louis, with harvest. I loved being out on the combine, but it meant that there was no time for camping in the fall.

Finally, this year it happened! We packed up the trailer last Wednesday morning and headed for Miquelon Lake Provincial Park, less than an hour and a half from home. Surrounded by the spectacular colours of the season, fall camping was everything I always thought it would be! Though we got caught in the rain while out geocaching on Wednesday afternoon, the clouds soon disappeared and for the remainder of our time the weather was glorious.

Here in Alberta, we don’t get the wide variety of fall colours that are found in eastern Canada, but everywhere I turned I was surrounded by beauty and I took dozens of pictures!

We found 14 geocaches within the park boundaries, but the highlight of our trip was definitely Friday’s hike. We left the trailhead late in the morning intending to hike 7.3 kilometres, but we’d completed all but 1.5 km of that by the time we stopped to eat lunch! Digging out our trail map, we quickly decided to add what we had originally thought might be a separate hike sometime in the future. In the end, we covered 13.2 km! Considering the fact that just a few months ago, I couldn’t walk more than two km without playing out, I was pretty stoked!

Those of you who’ve been reading my blog for very long know how much we enjoy exploring old abandoned houses that give us glimpses into life in days gone by. Imagine our surprise and delight when Richard spotted an old brick chimney rising out of the bush a short distance from the trail. Of course, we had to take a closer look! Although the girl manning the park office couldn’t give us any information about the house or its original inhabitants, it was easy to see that the two storey structure and its smaller outbuilding must have been there long before the park was established in 1958.

Though we didn’t see any of the larger wildlife, including deer, moose and elk, that live within the park, there was clear evidence of their presence along the trails. Plenty of fresh hoof prints and droppings told us they weren’t far off. What we did see were squirrels, muskrat, tiny frogs, a surprising number of garter snakes and an abundance of water fowl. As Miquelon Lake and the numerous wetland areas within the park are located within two of North America’s migratory flyways, flocks of migrating geese honked their way overhead and settled on the lake each evening.

Miquelon Lake is also part of the Beaver Hills Dark Sky Preserve, an an area that has been established to reduce the glare of artificial light and increase the visibility of the night sky. Each evening, as we sat around the fire in the crisp evening air, darkness settled around us and stars filled the sky. What could be more relaxing?

Dare I hope for one more camping trip before winter arrives?