A Wonderful Weekend

My weekend was the best I have had in a long time. You know those weekends that just make you feel like you've fallen into another time zone? It's not that they last forever, really, nor that they are perfect every moment, but more like they flow so perfectly that it feels like you've entered another reality...it feels surreal.

That was my weekend. It started out rather bad actually. I get really neurotic about having the house clean before we go away. My mother is like this. I ALWAYS swore I wouldn't be. I used to remember thinking "Who cares? We aren't going to be here to see how messy it is!" But of course I now see her wisdom. It isn't the leaving of the messy home, it's the returning to. Not only do you get a rude wake up call by having to leave the soft, dreamy world of sleeping in, people cooking your food for you, housekeeping cleaning up after you and experiencing fun and renewing activities, but THEN you have to shock your system even further by a return to a dreary, dirty and smelly house. Ok, in reality I wouldn't say my house is any of those things on a normal basis, but it still felt good to return to a home that was in order and smelled nice. Anway, this is a rather long-winded way of saying that I was very snappish and irritated in the morning before we left because I was rushing from one cleaning chore to another and my very patient husband finally asked me if I was planning to spend the entire weekend in this mood. Well, that in itself was irritating...but I could see that he had a point. I took a hot shower while he finished up my cleaning "To Do" list, and felt much, much better.

Anyway, back to the weekend fun...we had a lovely room with a sunken jacuzzi bathtub (I smuggled in candles to heighten the romance factor!), that was filled with gorgeous paintings. The entire inn was absolutely lovely. I loved the brightly painted walls, the artwork, the feel of it...incredible! We took the subway to the Museum of Fine Arts. It was wonderful! We didn't realize but Montreal was having it's own "Nuit Lumiere" or Light Night and a lot of museums and other cultural events were open all night long. We heard a beautiful Russian tenor accompanied by a violinist and pianist and then later an incredible, magical Russian violinist no older than me! It was a night to remember.

Sunday we feasted on a luscious breakfast of waffles with lemon creme, pastries, hot eggs (and bacon for my carnivore hubby!), fresh fruit, cappucino, fresh squeezed orange juice and more. You'd think we wouldn't have eaten the rest of the day, but we did manage to nibble a few glazed donuts at Krispie Kreme(!) which is unheard of in these northern-most parts. Of course, we spent some time hiking around IKEA which helped us work up an appetite! I bought my first "real" piece of artwork (though it's not REALLY real because I got it at Ikea, but it looks real!). This will start our collection, which I'm hoping will grow over the years with paintings and more from REAL artists whom I can meet or at least get acquainted with online. I love hearing about what inspired artistic and getting to know them, even if it's only through a short bio.

Well, I must get to my To Do list tonight! I've been adding things to it all day but haven't started checking anything off yet! I'm posting some pictures of the B&B and the lovely artwork by Benoit A. Cote (he's the owner's brother). His website is www.benoitacote.com

Bon Nuit!