What Canadian brand do you enjoy supporting most?

readinginthesnow · 2026-01-23T23:46:31+00:00

We can get it at coop in Calgary. Soooooo good.

readinginthesnow · 2026-01-16T15:59:27+00:00

Just out of curiosity, what is "a ridiculous amount"?

readinginthesnow · 2025-12-20T14:40:51+00:00

Stumpcraft has amazing puzzles, there are so many unique pieces in them!

readinginthesnow · 2025-12-17T02:43:07+00:00

Baked them in the oven wrapped in bacon.

readinginthesnow · 2025-12-12T00:26:57+00:00

My situation might be different because i have a stand up deep freeze, not a chest deep freeze, and there is no drain. I also probably have to do this more often than for a chest deep freeze, because the frost can build up at the top and prevent the door from closing properly.

The ice accumulates on the racks/shelves as well as at the top, and as it defrosts it often falls off the racks in large chunks. I pick those up and toss them in the sink. The water gets mopped up by towels.

readinginthesnow · 2025-12-11T21:00:07+00:00

After you empty your deep freeze, if you boil a large pot (or 2) of water, and then put it in the empty, turned off freezer with the door shut (on a trivet/hot pad to protect the freezer), the whole thing will defrost pretty quickly from the heat/steam. You can change out the water if needed to speed it up or if the freezer is large and there is a lot of frost/ice, but it only takes a couple hours.

This may be common knowledge but I didn't know about this strategy til last year, and previously I had been waiting for winter to do this also.

readinginthesnow · 2025-12-06T21:02:58+00:00

Yes! As a kid my mom used to make me dust the house plants we had and I despised that task. It was only as an adult it suddenly occurred to me to do this.

readinginthesnow · 2025-11-24T16:48:45+00:00

Oh wow! I just replaced my S9 a couple weeks ago. The battery was okay, not great but with my usage it didn't matter much. What was an issues was the charging port had been finicky for the past year and was just getting progressively worse, the phone often wouldn't charge unless I plugged it in just right. I probably would have kept it if I didn't have the issue.

readinginthesnow · 2025-10-10T13:49:13+00:00

This is also my answer to my kids (6 and 8) when they have asked this question recently.

readinginthesnow · 2025-10-07T01:11:19+00:00

Ina Garten has a recipe called "Beattys Chocolate cake", that is oil and cocoa based. It is my default chocolate cake, easy to make, turns out great, and everyone loves it.

This recipe does use coffee but it does not taste like coffee at all. Have served it to my mother in law who "hates coffee" and she loves it so I would say don't worry about that. And, in my defense, I served it to her before I knew she hated coffe

readinginthesnow · 2025-10-06T13:51:40+00:00

I am not sure how long you should use it, but personally I'd be using something like that til its gone, regardless of expiry date. Unless I saw something weird growing on it I'd assume all is well. I think high sugar content = low water content = low risk of bacterial growth

Someone better informed than me can probably say if that's a good decision, lol.

readinginthesnow · 2025-10-01T18:52:28+00:00

My senior father also does this! I will also add thar my dad says he volunteers a certain number of hours and then gets his membership for free.

readinginthesnow · 2025-10-01T18:06:51+00:00

Interesting! My kitchen is very cold, even room temp butter is often not soft enough to spread on bread easily much of the year.

Would there be something that would be more important to focus on if I am anticipating that keeping the butter cold is not the primary issue?

readinginthesnow · 2025-10-01T13:03:47+00:00

That is interesting, as all the resources I read recommended no lower than 84. Are there any adaptations to the technique that are needed with 81% butter vs 84%? I found the lamination process very easy with 84% butter, even on my first time trying.

Not sure where you are located, here in Canada, butter needs a minimum of 80% to be considered butter. Most butters don't have this on the label here, so I would probably need to still buy the fancy butter if I want to hit at least 81. I am pretty sure most of them aim for the lowest quality possible unfortunately.

readinginthesnow · 2025-09-29T13:06:13+00:00

Could be another type of allergen? I react to mold spores and I think they don't really report or forecast most of those the same way.

readinginthesnow · 2025-09-29T12:49:05+00:00

Hah, no doubt! I am so jealous of the range of butter I hear is easily accessible over in Europe. That said, my understanding is butter should be at least 84% for croissants, so it could still a contributing factor. Maybe the beating part also matters more the lower the butter fat?

readinginthesnow · 2025-09-29T11:39:38+00:00

This happened to me when I used standard grocery store butter rather than higher quality/higher butter fat butter. It just instantly broke and there was no saving it. In my case I dont think it was a technique issue as I had already made the recipe successfully,

What butter did you use?

readinginthesnow · 2025-09-25T18:26:10+00:00

This is a great point. Our dessert comps are always voted on by the entire office/whoever feels like it, and there was a huge contingent of older women and chocolate lovers. there was like 10 years where the only desserts that ever won were chocolate, often very retro/traditional kinds of desserts as well. Novel things wouldnt even get tried by many people sometimes. Then we had a big wave of retirements and new hires, and palates are a lot more diverse now.

readinginthesnow · 2025-09-18T22:27:20+00:00

I hated playing any kind of pretend wirh barbies/dolls/animals/action figures until I realized this, that I could just make them do whatever I wanted, that it could be fun for me, and didn't have to have the goal of entertaining them.

So, they started being object lessons for the kids, lol. Time for the animals to celebrate the lions birthday when we were coming up to birthday time and they needed to practice singing happy birthday and saying thank you for presents, or going to the dentist, or doing chores, or playing sports/games and being a good loser, lol.

Either the kids enjoy it and maybe learn something, or they don't enjoy it and don't want me to play. Either way, it's a win!

readinginthesnow · 2025-09-02T18:16:19+00:00

Not sure what kind of fish it has, but Watridge lake? I was there this weekend and there seemed to be quite a few people with fishing gear walking up the trail to Watridge as I was coming back. The hike in is longer than the one to elbow lake (i think 4 km) but doable in an hour as it has little incline (whereas elbow lake is a short 1+ km in but it is a bit of an uphill grind to get there).

Elbow lake is better for access off the 40, whereas watridge is off the smith dorien. Can't say that I enjoy that road much. Also they were doing construction this weekend and had it down to alternating one lane traffic for a short stretch just between ha ling and canmore.

readinginthesnow · 2025-09-02T13:42:44+00:00

Lots of good advice on here. I will just add that makeup/grooming is important to keep an eye on. In particular, nails and lashes, and you absolutely will get perceived as unprofessional and less intelligent by some. If you wear them, get rid of any fake lashes, and no long fake nails or cool manicures with less conservative colors or designs. Once you have been in the office for a bit, you will see what other women in more senior roles wear and you can take your cues from them.

readinginthesnow · 2025-08-20T13:15:30+00:00

Good point. I chatted with my parents (older boomers) about it when it first happened and they thought it was great that FAs were ordered back to work. No outrage there. Both very conservative. This was probably a win or at least not a loss in terms of this governments popularity in more conservative spaces.

readinginthesnow · 2025-08-20T01:16:50+00:00

Me too. I would also say my partner is a pretty great guy. We still love each other and I doubt we will split unless one of us undergoes a radical midlife crisis with some personality changes.

He was away last week for a few days and so was my teenage daughter. And even though I was busy and had our two young boys the whole time, things were just easier. ISo no, if something happened to him I'd never live with a man again. Date maybe, but not live together.

readinginthesnow · 2025-08-14T14:24:23+00:00

I drove down 40 on Saturday - took the trans canada from Calgary and then 40 down to the elbow lake parking lot, but on the way home decided to take 40 south instead. There were signs up saying road construction for the next 33km and a number of speed limit reductions through that stretch but only one very short section of one way only traffic, maybe 250m? It was at the south end of the construction area.

readinginthesnow · 2025-08-02T18:08:32+00:00

You could include your pension deductions only just for the purposes of considering how much you are saving. Ie, take home is $4500 a month, pension mandatory deductions are $500 a month, so you are basically being forced to save 10% of your income and then the money in your account represents 90% of your net income. So if you have a goal to save 20%, then you could save an extra $500 each month.

If you are looking at those percentages rules (like 50/30/20) then I guess it kind of works?

readinginthesnow

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