I originally started writing this post back in November. I kid you not when I say that I was 99% finished when I decided to put it away and pick it back up another day since it was getting pretty late. All I had left to do was read it over with a fresh pair of eyes to make sure everything made sense since I was almost falling asleep by the end of it. I didn’t know that ‘another day’ meant one in January. Let’s carry on….
If the busyness of August is any indication of how long this post is going to be, hold on to your seat friends because we may be in for a long one!
August was non-stop, but yet I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.
I briefly mentioned before about my mental health struggles and, while I don’t talk about it much here on this blog (I’m not sure why – maybe it’s because I often use this place as a form of distraction or an escape from the ever consuming thoughts surrounding it), it’s still ongoing, and oftentimes socializing and doing things with others tends to help ease those daily struggles.
So keeping busy was exactly what I needed!
August started off by spending the last few days with my sister and her family before they went back to Ontario. You can read all about the first half of their time in Newfoundland in the July recap.
It was my sister and her husbands anniversary on the 1st, so they wanted to go out for a nice dinner to celebrate and they asked me and Todd to join them too!
We started off the evening with drinks at the Papillion Cocktail Bar on the pedestrian mall. They had such good drinks here! It was a beautiful evening, and it was so nice to sit outside with a drink, chat, and just be immersed in the liveliness of the street.
Then we went to Portage for dinner. Portage is known for it’s upscale (but yet casual and trendy vibe) family-style dining where the food is meant to be on large serving dishes and passed around the table.
It’s a fairly new restaurant in the city that’s become extremely popular.
Here’s the thing I’m learning with this place though – while the food is good, I do find it overpriced, and I don’t know if you leave truly feeling like the meal is worth the cost. Or, at least that’s how I feel. Although I do think the atmosphere and the fun of the sharing dishes makes this a great choice if you’re looking for something a little different.
We all ended up having a really great night!
Another thing we all wanted to do while they were here was an East Coast Trail, and we ended up choosing my personal favorite – Sugarloaf Path.
Sugarloaf Path is approximately a three hour, moderately difficult trail. It’s a great one if you’re looking to get in some good hiking, but it’s no so long that you’re gone the entire day (and then too beat to get off the coach the entire night!). Plus, I think it’s one of the best for the scenic views, it’s a great combination of wooded and open areas, and the added bonus? It’s in the city which means you don’t have to drive very far to do this one. I just love everything about this trail!
We started the trail from Logy Bay so we could end in Quidi Vidi and go to the Wharf in the Quidi Vidi Village. What better way is there to do a hike than knowing there’ll be food and drinks waiting for when you’re finished?
The entire family did this one, except for my dad and miss Charley (it’s so hard not being able to take her on long walks anymore…it makes me so sad!).
Even my seven year old niece did this one! She’s such a great little hiker!! We did have to play a few games of ’20 questions’ towards the end of the hike to keep the walking momentum going, but I honestly think that helped the adults just as much as it did the kids!!!
We stopped about halfway for a quick little rest and some snacks! Another favorite part of mine with hikiing!!!!
Just look at this view….
Here we are (above) at the part of the hike where you can see Quidi Vidi. It’s also the part when my brain recognizes the finish line and automatically assumes we’re done, and then decides to tell my legs the same thing!
Unfortunately at this part, it’s probably close to another half hour before you’re officially finished. And since it’s all downhill at this point, it makes it feel even that much longer!
But, don’t those look like the smiles of people who had just finished!? I mean, I love hiking, but I love finishing even more!
Sign me up for more hiking if it ends with a cold beer and Johnny and Maes!
Before we knew it, it was time for my sister and her family to head back to Ontario. We ended their last night in Newfoundland with a night of bowling and a great dinner at the St. John’s Fish Exchange.
I ordered the lobster and shrimp pappardelle and it was SO good!
Saying goodbye to them is always hard! I get so used to having them around 24/7 and it’s hard to go back to the realization of not seeing them again for months and months (or even a year!). It’s the simple day-to-day things that I truly miss, like having dinner together, or doing a movie night, or even just sitting around and talking.
But, I am thankful all nine of us were able to spend ten full days together! We had some pretty good weather, and we definitely took advantage squeezing in as much Newfoundland summer fun as we could!
Oh!! I just remembered the downer that happened about an hour before we brought them to the airport. We had a few hours to kill before their flight so we all went for a walk at Bowring Park. I swear we weren’t there ten minutes and Charley hurt herself.
She started limping really bad in her back leg. I immediately knew that she had something serious done, and I was pretty confident I knew exactly what it was.
A few years ago Charley had a cranial cruciate ligament (CCL) tear in her back leg (similar to an ACL tear in humans), and she had to have TPLO surgery. It was quite the ordeal and the recovery time was longer than any of us expected. And we won’t even get in to the cost of this surgery!
As soon as I saw her limping on her other back leg, my mind went straight to another CCL tear (we were told a few years ago by the surgeon that if a dog ruptures a CCL, there’s a 70% chance it will happen again on the other leg).
We waited a few days to see if the limping would improve, but ultimately ended up taking her to the vet. The vet said she was pretty confident it was another CCL tear, so she sent off a referral to the surgeon. I was completely devastated! How did this happen again?!!!
I won’t get in to too much details now (I’ll save that for another day! – this recap is going to be long enough!), but Charley has been doing pretty good since the incident. She still has a small limp (some days/weeks are better than others), but she’s doing much better than she was at the beginning of August. She’s on painkillers to help with any discomfort but, I have to say, we’ve been fortunate because she hasn’t been half as bad as the last experience we had with this. And this is when I knock on wood!
She’s still been able to get out for her walks, and she did so much swimming during the summer (something that she both loves and is great for her legs!).
Swimming at Octagon Pond in Paradise became one of our favourite spots! You could not beat the sunsets here!!
Okay, moving on to the better parts of August…..
We had four fun weekends left of the month and, the first one was the Nickelback concert and Todd’s St. John’s Triathlon race.
The Churchill Park Musical Festival is an outdoor festival in St. John’s that usually occurs over two weekends. The three main events this year were: Nickelback, Pitbull, and Shania Twain. My first choice was Shania Twain, and Todd’s was Nickelback, so we ended up doing both!
I spent a few days thinking about what I was going to wear to Nickelback, and ended up going with a simple jeans and t-shirt combo!
We went to the concert with friends and we all had a blast! Nickelback was so good, and way better than I expected! I am now officially a big fan!!!
We did VIP for this concert and we loved that we were able to get so close the stage. The only downside was that the lineups in the VIP section for food, drinks, and the bathroom were extremely long. Actually, they were probably even longer than the regular section, which we were really surprised of. But, being able to see Nickelback perform so close still made it totally worth it!
After the concert was over we were all so hungry, but it was late and there was barely anything open in the city. Somehow we ended up on a school bus that was taking people from the concert downtown, just so we could go to a restaurant that was still open.
At 1am, Jungle Jim’s hit the spot for us though! #worthit
Sunday was Todd’s big race day! A very big race, might I add! Since it was the 40th anniversary of the St. John’s Triathlon, it was a special race for the year. A total of 116km’s- a 2km swim, 92km bike, and 22km run. That’s even more than a half-ironman!!! He signed up for this one about six months earlier and finally the day had come!
I’d love to say he was feeling completely prepared and ready for his race, but that wasn’t the case. He wasn’t very happy with himself that he stayed out so late and consumed too much greasy food and drinks at the Nickelback concert two nights before.
In true Todd fashion though, he powered through!!
The swim portion started at 7am, so I made sure to be there in time to see him start! The weather started off so crappy! Rain, drizzle, and fog…remember Newfoundland’s specialty!
It certainly was a great morning for the ducks!
Since there was so much fog, the 2km swim ended up getting cut to 800m because of the poor visibility. Out of all the training Todd did beforehand, he was definitely the most trained and prepared for the swim portion, so he was a little disappointed that he couldn’t do the entire swim.
The weather improved as the day went on though, and it turned out to be a beautiful day.
He finished in the early afternoon with a total time of 6 hours and 18 minutes. Considering how he felt the day before (*shakes head*), he was really happy with his time. In fact, he took 35 minutes off his bike time from when he did the half ironman the year before.
I was there the entire day cheering him on, and I was so proud (and amazed!) to see him cross the finish line! If you ever want to feel completely motivated (or unmotivated, depending how you look at it!), go watch a triathlon! It’s amazing to see these people in action and what they’re capable of!
After the race we went downtown to the pedestrian mall to celebrate!! We ended up at Blue on Water again (I think that’s three months in a row we’ve went here! At least this time was for dinner though, and not brunch!).
When we got home, I wanted to take Charley for a little walk since she was stuck inside all day. Todd was the biggest trooper ever and wanted to come, so we all went to Octagan Pond so she could have a little walk and swim. Is it bad to say I think I was more exhausted after the day we had than Todd was!?
It was the most beautiful evening and it was the perfect way to end such a great day!! This was actually one of my favourite days of the summer!
The next weekend was another outdoor concert at Churchall Park. This time we had Shania Twain!! Remember the cowboy boots I bought a few months before? Well it was time to break them out again!
I went to the mall a few days before the concert and found this dress from Old Navy to wear.
Shania Twain was playing three nights – Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. We went with friends on the Friday. Although we all had to work that day, we all managed to get off a little early so we weren’t too late getting there. I believe the first opening act started at 4, but Shania Twain wasn’t coming until around 9:30.
As soon as we got through the gate, we made our way to the food and beer tents right away!!!
We lucked into such a beautiful evening. It was the perfect night for an outdoor concert (and those are extremely rare here in Newfoundland!).
We didn’t do VIP with this concert, so me and Todd we were going into this one thinking it wasn’t going to be as good. After all, we had been accustomed to a certain lifestyle the weekend before!! Haha! But in all seriousness, being able to see the people performing makes ALL the difference with a concert, and with an outdoor sold out concert, we were a little nervous! Trying to compete with 18,000 people to see was not going to be an easy thing!
I don’t know how but we ended up getting so close to the stage even in the regular section, and the bathroom and drink lineups were probably even quicker than the VIP section the weekend before. The only difference was that once we got settled before Shania Twain came on, we couldn’t leave (or even move a smidge!) because we knew we didn’t have a chance to ever get in the same place again.
What a night it was! A real ‘blast from the past’ and it was nostalgia at it’s finest. Shania Twain was actually my very first CD I ever owned!
We all had so much fun and our poor voices were gone from all the signing!
And just like the weekend before, we all somehow ended downtown again! This time though we went to the bar, Greensleves, on George Street to keep the night going! Thank goodness there was no race in Todds future this weekend!!!
The next morning we went to the Classic Cafe for breakfast. A perfect way to start the morning after a late night!
Later that night we had a bowling party for my friends birthday. Every year for the last five years or so, she’s done a theme for her birthday, and this year she chose a neon glow bowling party!
I left finding something to wear to the very last minute, which obviously wasn’t the smartest idea because neon clothing isn’t something that’s easy to find. Luckily Spirit Halloween just opened in the city, so after hours going from store to store in the mall, I went there and found a neon top to wear!
The next morning our friends invited us over to their house for breakfast. While we were there they asked us if we wanted to go out in their boat for the day. Now that’s an offer we couldn’t refuse!!!
We ended up going to Bell Island for dinner at Dick’s for their famous fish and chips, and we stopped lots along the way to catch some fish!
It was the perfect day! Another one of my favourites of the summer!
Next up was our friends wedding weekend outside the city, and what an eventful weekend this was! We met a lot of new people, and it was so nice having three full days of hanging out as one big group and doing things together! I find at our age (how old does that make me sound!), it’s not easy to get a big group together anymore.
By the time Sunday rolled around, we were completely beat from all the fun and late nights, but we wouldn’t have wanted it any other way!
It was a beautiful wedding, and a beautiful weekend!
My dress was from RW&Co.
Last, but not least, was Labour Day weekend, the last weekend of August. Our friends have a permanent camping spot at a campground about a half hour from the city, and they asked us to spend the weekend with them.
Every summer we always try to do one camping trip together, and it’s something we’ve been doing for many, many years. I believe the very first time we ever went camping together was in 2008! The four of us hopped in my Hyundai Elantra and drove three or four hours to go camping with only a tent, a few sleeping bags, and some hot dogs (I kid you not!!). As the years went by, our camping essentials started to increase exponentially and eventually we’d end up packing so much stuff we could barely fit it all in a truck. And although we were still tenting, air mattresses became an absolute necessity!
And here we are now in 2024, camping in a 34ft trailer! Oh how times have changed!!!
It was another great weekend for the books, and it was the perfect way to end the summer coming to an end!
Well, that pretty much summed up my weekends in August!
A few other things that I did during the month:
1) I watched ‘It Ends With Us’ with my niece, sister in law, and her mom. I read the book a couple of years ago, so I was looking forward for the movie to be officially released! I have to say, I really really liked it! More than I thought I was going to actually, and probably even more than the book (although I will say, just like with all book adaptions, there were a few parts that were either completely left out, or just skimmed over, that I wish weren’t).
Don’t get me started on all the drama that surrounded the actors in the movie though! (Edit: I had this part originally written in November. As we all know, the drama has only gotten so much worse now in January!!!).
2) I also watched Jenn Tran’s season of the Bachelorette. Did you watch? I really enjoyed her season, and I think a lot of it had to do with Jenn being the Bachelorette. I thought she did a great job and I also thought she, dare I say, had a lot more personality than a lot of other leads I’ve watched. But gosh that ending certainly came crashing down, didn’t it? That was rough!
3) I tried a new restaurant that recently opened downtown with friends – One Eared Goat. Yes, you read that name right! I love trying new restaurants (although I’m definitely not up on the ‘restaurant scene’ as much as I used to be). I thought this restaurant was pretty good and, although I wasn’t blown away with the food, I left feeling like I’d like to come back! It was a cold and damp night when we went, and the restaurant was so cozy and inviting inside, so that gave it major points!
And that is August in a nut shell. Are you still with me? If you are, bless you!!!
Until next time!
0 Comments