Courtesy of Eric Manherz

The Experience and Service That You Deserve

E r i c MANHERZ

BROKER

Steve LANGLO I S

REALTOR ®

613-601-6404 info@ericmanherz.com www . EricManherz . com

Top 2% of 18,000 agents

2025 | ISSUE 8

Adding art to the walls of your home allows you to showcase your personality and add colour, dimension and conversation to your life. Choosing the right artwork in the right size can really help your pieces stand out and your room look complete. Experts suggest using art to fill up to two-thirds or even three-quarters of the empty wall space in your rooms. In most cases a large piece will work, but play around with different arrangements of smaller pieces as well. Smaller pieces grouped for a gallery wall should be spaced out from each other by an inch or two for a cohesive look. When hanging frames over a piece of furniture, choose art that’s narrower than what it’s sitting over and place it slightly above the top of the furniture as well; up to a foot above to allow for some visual breathing space. For art going on a wall where it will be the focal point, it’s suggested to hang the center of the piece at eye level, which is about 57” from the floor. You may want to adjust this height if you have higher ceilings though. Of course these are guidelines for art placement and sometimes breaking the rules is more appealing than following them, so do what feels right in your home. RULES FOR HANGING ART

Best Lentil Soup • ¾ cup dry green lentils, rinsed • 1 (14-oz.) can diced tomatoes • 2 tbsp white wine vinegar • 12 fresh thyme sprigs, bundled • 6 cups vegetable broth

INGREDIENTS:

• 2 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil • 1 medium onion, chopped • 4 medium carrots, chopped

• 2 celery stalks, chopped • 8 cups kale chopped (keep leaves & stems separated) • Heaping ½ teaspoon ground cumin • 4 garlic cloves, grated

• Sea salt & black pepper (to taste) • Option garnish: ½ cup chopped fresh parsley, red pepper flakes, grated Parmesan cheese

DIRECTIONS:

1. Heat the olive oil in a large pot over medium heat. Add the onion, carrots, celery, kale stems, cumin, salt and pepper, and cook, stirring occasionally, for 8 minutes, or until the vegetables begin to soften. 2. Stir in the garlic, tomatoes, lentils, vinegar, thyme, and broth. Cover and simmer for 25 to 30 minutes, or until the lentils are tender. Add the kale leaves and cook for 5 minutes, or until wilted. 3. Remove the thyme bundle and season to taste. Serve topped with the parsley, red pepper flakes and Parmesan, if desired.

NEVER REGRET A DAY IN YOUR LIFE. GOOD DAYS GIVE YOU HAPPINESS AND BAD DAYS GIVE YOU EXPERIENCE.”

UNKNOWN

WORD WHEEL How many words can you make out of the letters in the word wheel? All words must include the letter in the center of the circle. There is one nine-letter word!

2 N MATH RIDDLES What do the numbers 11, 69 and 88 all have in common? T E O R I add 5 to 9 and get 2. The answer is correct, so what am I? A clock. When it is 9 a.m., adding 5 hours would make it 2 p.m. T What three numbers give the same result when multiplied and added together? 1, 2, and 3 (1 + 2 + 3 = 6 and 1 x 2 x 3 = 6). F They all read the same way when placed upside down. O G

1

V

I

T

C

E

I

E

N

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What is 3/7 chicken, 2/3 cat and 2/4 goat?

Chicago!

The 9-letter word answer is “Incentive”

CLEANING OUT YOUR WARDROBE

Organizing your wardrobe can be fun when you find pieces you haven’t seen in a while and decide to incorporate them back into your regular rotation. However, some of those long-lost pieces were lost for a reason and are taking up unnecessary space and should really be donated. There are a few tricks you can try as you cycle through your wardrobe if devoting an extended period of time to go through your wardrobe isn’t realistic. The most popular method is to turn all your hangers backwards so the open part of the hanger is facing you. Then, as you wear and return your clothes back to the closet, put the hanger on the other way. After a few months, you will be able to visually spot the pieces you don’t wear frequently and can easily pull them from your closet. For items that aren’t hung in the closet, you can try designating a “worn” and “unworn” side of your drawers. As you wear things, move them from one side to the other and as time passes, you’ll be able to see what you keep bypassing. If space in your drawers is limited, put a piece of low-tack tape (painter’s tape or washi tape) on everything, as you wear and replace pieces in the drawer remove the tape. Again, over time you’ll see what is taking up space and what you regularly wear. Finally, organizers suggest for every new item you bring into your wardrobe, remove a piece that no longer suits you. Going through your wardrobe can be done at any point throughout the year, but is often more effective at the end of a season like when summer transitions into fall.

PAINT FINISHES EXPLAINED Walking down the paint aisle can be confusing when you look at not only all the colour choices, but the paint finishes too. Finding the paint you need will depend on where you’re painting, how many coats you want to apply and how durable you need the paint to be. Take a look at these popular finishes to help you find your perfect paint. • Flat or Matte - Non-reflective with a low sheen. Easy to touch up and hides minor wall imperfections but shows scuffs and wear and tear. Great in no or low-traffic areas like ceilings. • Eggshell - One of the most popular paint finishes with a low sheen. Washable and resistant to scuffing but more difficult to touch up. Use in low- to mid-traffic areas like living rooms, hallways, entrances, etc. • Satin - Most versatile paint finish with a soft sheen. Easy to clean and durable. Use in busy areas like bedrooms, kitchens, bathrooms, etc. • Semigloss - Durable and shiny, will show most imperfections, but easy to clean and works well in high humidity rooms like bathrooms, kitchens and laundry rooms. • High Gloss - Very reflective, durable and stain resistant. This finish is great for doors, cabinets, trim and other smaller surfaces.

VITAMINS TO BOOST YOUR IMMUNE SYSTEM

Even though cold and flu season is a few months away (generally November to April), students across the country are going to be heading back to class shortly and that often brings with it a plethora of germs. To help keep your immune system functioning in top form so you can fight off colds and flus, you might want to be sure you’re consuming enough of these vitamins whether from food directly or a supplement. Vitamin C – it works as an antioxidant and is one of the most powerful immune system boosters you can ingest. Find it in citrus fruits and vegetables like broccoli and Brussels sprouts. Vitamin E – it helps strengthen your immune function and can be found in foods such as seeds, nuts, dark leafy greens and some fruits like kiwi and tomatoes. Vitamin B6 – this vitamin helps produce white blood cells and T-cells which help your body fight off viruses and bacteria. Foods high in vitamin B6 include chickpeas, beef, salmon, tuna and chicken. Other vitamins that will also help you over the next few months include zinc, selenium, vitamin D and omega-3 fatty acids. Talk to your doctor before starting any new vitamin regimen to ensure it’s right for you, but if safe to do so, incorporating foods with these vitamins into your diet should help you stay healthier as cold and flu season hits.

AUTUMN PLANTING Just because August is in full swing doesn’t mean it’s too late to plant some vegetables or flowers in your garden or container gardens. For vegetables, anything with a short-term harvest cycle like lettuce, spinach, and radishes are fair game to plant in mid-summer for a fall harvest. Some vegetables even taste better after a frost, so be sure to check the labels on the seed packets to determine what longer germinating seeds you can plant. These may include peas, carrots or kale. As for flowers, marigolds, aster, mums, snapdragons and chrysanthemums are all fall flowers which means now is a great time to plant them to see their vibrant colours for at least a couple more months.

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Eric’s Corner Top 2% of 18,000 agents in Canada

August, 2025

We are fast approaching the latter part of summer. The Bank of Canada did not change the “overnight” interest rate on July 30 (which was largely expected). Even the US Federal Reserve decided to keep their rate steady. Luckily, the changes due to the craziness started south of the border with the Tariffs. Unfortunately there’s another “deadline” for tomorrow, August 1, but that’s liable to change at any time – again.

The next date for a possible cut is September 3rd so maybe we’ll see a change then.

In the meantime, the market appears to be plodding along, although showings on listings have slowed a lot lately, especially for condos. It’s something that is fairly normal for the mid-to-late summer timeframe. (Although this year, and the last few years since covid have been less than usual!) On a better note, we recently checked out the “Tavern On The Island”! They have a huge deck, a wide variety of tables and chairs, they’re licensed, and they serve delicious burgers, salads and more along with the great water and skyline views. It’s on Bates Island, with access from about half way across the Island Park bridge .

Hope you enjoy the rest of your summer!

B eavers and the art of ecological resilience

(Abi Hayward and Katie Doreen, CanadianGeographic.ca)

It starts with the sound of running water. There’s something in a beaver’s rodent brain that draws it to the sound, compelling it to build. To dam. To slow the flow. To hold that water in its little chunk of landscape a little

longer. The beaver is following its instincts to build a home, with easy access to tasty morsels to gnaw on: aspen, willow, birch, maple. But it’s doing something more. It’s creating a more resilient watershed. During the 1940s, a bizarre project saw beavers parachuted into Baugh Creek, Idaho, because they were seen as a nuisance in cities and towns. The beavers did what they do best and created a lush mosaic of ecosystems. 7 decades later, in 2018, a wildfire swept through Baugh Creek. Satellite imagery showed a remarkable picture: that beaver engineered, verdant valley appeared unscathed amid the wildfire-charred hills.

Researchers have found that beavers contribute more to keeping water in the landscape than climate, precipitation and temperature com bined. As beaver dams slow water down, back ing it up into ponds, this not only creates habitat for a biodiverse ecosystem but better protects the landscape from the increasing droughts and fires that accompany the warming temperatures associated with climate change. Beaver dams also filter the water, which removes contaminants and moderates water temperature. When deeper beaver ponds “stratify,” separating into layers, they create cool refugia for various fish species, which can attract protein-loving predators to beaver ponds. The nutrient-rich sediment and still water also cultivate plants for grazing herbivores. Ponds eventually give way to lush meadows as, once the beavers’ journey to trees becomes too far, beavers abandon their dams to begin all over again somewhere else. The resulting landscape is a patchwork of mead ows and wetlands — with a range of ages and successional stages — that become more di verse as beavers repeatedly colonize and aban don their dam sites. With droughts, wildfires and flooding predicted to increase in Canadian landscapes, perhaps we can let beavers do what they do best: create resilient watersheds for the future.