Happy Canada Day!!!

Monday, Canada Day, we were up early, fed, and off to camp!  What a day!  There are six of us in our wire sculpture class, all women, and we’re going to make three different sizes of herons – the first two to familiarize ourselves with the technique and tools in preparation for the “real” reason why we’re there, to end up with a garden heron that stands approx 5’-6’ tall.  Chuck, our instructor, had samples set out – so exciting.

By 9:05, we were cutting wire and getting started with our first project.  I brought close-fitting leather gloves, which were recommended, but after 10 minutes I had to take them off – I really do need to feel what I’m doing and gloves just get in the way.  The only problem with that was, my hands got really, really dirty, really, really quickly. Oh well…

We moved along at quite a brisk speed, a little too quickly for me and a few others, but by the end of the day, we had not only finished our first heron – about 15” tall – we had started on our second one.  I left feeling accomplished, exhausted, and filthy.  As much as I tried, I couldn’t get my hands clean!

   

I named this one Bunky, in honour of our accommodations, and because it’s the smallest of what I’ll produce.

Day 2, more of the same, culminating in the completion of our second project!  Moving a bit too quickly for my comfort and the more I tried to keep up, the more mistakes I made. So, this is turning out to be a bit more frustrating than relaxing, and also much more physical than expected.  Despite using the pumice soap I bought last night and shared with the class, my hands are still filthy, plus they’re getting quite sore.  I do love my second heron, though.  I got to practice my spray painting technique on this one!

   

I named this one Hali, in honour of our location – Haliburton – and because she will be smaller than the third one.

We are really enjoying our bunky. It’s so comfy and cooking our own dinners is a bonus as we gaze out over the lake.  Tonight, while relaxing on the deck, we were serenaded by the loons – what a beautiful sound!

Day 3, we started on ‘big bird”, aka Burton (I’m sure you saw that one coming).  My hands were so sore, and so dirty, I finally caved and put my gloves back on.  Surprisingly, it wasn’t as difficult to manoeuvre the wire, probably because it’s a much larger scale and I don’t have to get my fingers into tiny spaces.

By noon, I was so stressed and anxious over the TWO mistakes I made and had to undo/redo, in trying to keep up, I finally allowed myself to work at my own speed.  The afternoon passed much more stress-free but I was three steps behind by the end of the day.  Seems it’s only my problem.  Chuck is very accommodating, though, and patiently repeats what’s required as I move forward.  It’s not that I can’t do it – I’m very happy with my results – it’s just that I can’t seem to work as quickly as everyone else.

It was mid-week, so we decided to eat dinner out tonight – chose McKeck’s pub that we’ve eaten at in the past.  I had the most delicious Thai Shrimp Wrap with mangoes, Asian slaw, and peanuts.  It was huge and cut in half – enough for dinner and lunch the next day.  But 15 minutes into dinner, I started to feel very ill, very quickly, to the point of alarm.  I was obviously having an immediate reaction to what I ate, which made me quite nervous.  I’m not allergic to shrimp or peanuts, so couldn’t understand what was happening.  The more nervous I got, the less communicative I became and, of course, was concentrating really hard on whether my breathing was becoming shallow because I was nervous or because my throat was closing (I was nervous).  Then both of my arms and hands started to tingle. Steve was very calm, thank goodness, asked me several relevant questions, and had the foresight to ask a server for a bucket.  Her timing was perfect, as I was violently sick at the table – twice!  Long story short, I ended up in emerg for two hours while they kept a close eye on me, then released me to go home and wait the digestive process out.  I was able to sleep but at 3:00am woke up with extremely itchy hands and feet – that’s never happened before!  Took a Benadryl, sat up for about an hour until it passed, then went back to bed.

While in hospital, Steve called back to the restaurant and found out it was likely the kitchen had substituted cashews for the peanuts, which would definitely explain the reaction.  I have an allergy to cashews, which I don’t knowingly eat.  In the past, any ingestion of these nuts has kicked in after about 30-60 minutes, and never so violently, but I’ve never eaten so many of them at one time, which probably is the reason why this was so swift and ugly.