And it started off swimmingly on Friday night with an impromptu family & friends get together at my sister in law's home for an evening of wine, music and song. My husband's family is very musical - they either all play something or sing well and I play a bit of guitar and sing as well so we all do the family song circle kind of thing. It's a blast and always a great time.

*** Saturday July 29 ***

The following evening we had a wine tasting seminar hosted by my brother in law who is down visiting from Ontario. In addition to being very accomplished on the guitar, he's currently studying to be a master sommalier (which will make him one of three in Canada). It was very interesting and informative. There were 5 whites and 4 reds, and in learning how to properly appreciate the wine I realized it was something I'd never done before - breathe in the bouquet and try to identify all the various scents. Some were earthy, some were fruity, one was even mouldy smelling - clearly a bad bottle which he said had oxidized - another first, I don't think I'd ever really smelled a bad wine before (but I've probably drank one thinking hmm... I don't like the taste of this one).

*** Monday July 31 ***

Today, we (D, myself, Aliya and her friend) spent the afternoon in St. Andrews by the Sea. A delightful seaside resort town with pretty much only a main drag of touristic boutiques and fine arts and crafts shops. The eating is awesome - if you're partial to seafood. We had supper at The Gables and it was awesome. D had the seafood platter and I had the fried whole clams, huge juicy clams maybe as big as the end of a man's thumb (not like the scrawny bits you normally get at a Deluxe or something). Aliya and her friend had a chicken caesar salad and seafood chowder respectively. All had either big pieces of chicken, or chunks of fish or assorted sea treats like shrimp and scallops - all was deeeelicious. Photos posted on my flicker site.