Sign

I'm sure there is some commentary I could make on this sign, but in discussing it with others and contemplating it for a month, I'll just let you come up with your own opinion. The only extra information I should pass along is that this sign sits in front of "Cranbrook's Fire Place" Store, or some name similar to that. Hmmm...

Our room

So it's taken me this long to be confident enough that I can try to figure out how to post a video, and then to make a video so I'd have to figure out how to post it! This is our room at ELL and it was cleaned today, so I tried not to mess it up and took the video right when I walked in after housekeeping had finished! I can not say in words just how much I appreciate the housekeeping service. It's like eating a meal at someone else's place and maybe they just opened a can of soup and added water, but it tastes so much better than your own can of soup because they made it for you! Thank you Amber, Sharon, Rachel, and the other kind lady that cleans up after us! (it doesn't take all of them, just one at a time, we aren't total pigs!)

Gleek!

This was an early morning for me as Lola, our car, had 2 boo-boo's that needed to be mended, so off she went to the shop, and off I went to a coffee shop to wait. I read for 2 1/2 hours, which was heaven, and then picked up Lola, and we were off.

We rented a fabulous movie called "Away We Go" on the weekend and decided we must own it, so I went to Roger's, for the 5th time since I've been in Cranbrook, to pick up the movie. Michelle, the most wonderful and helpful clerk at Roger's, has time and time again tried to find me a copy of "Glee" Season 1 Volume 1, and has even called Blockbuster to inquire if they had it. That is service! So today, Michelle, my second most favourite person of the day (the first always is and always will be Dustin), asked if she could help me! I had found the movie, and said I was good, and I was always looking for "Glee" but had come to terms with not finding it in Cranbrook. At that she said, "Let me just check the computer again!", and I waited, and then she casually said, "It says we have ONE!". My heart jumped, but I dared not let it get too excited, for surely the ONE DVD that they did have would have been scooped up by some other fanatical Gleek by now! She searched her desk shelves, glanced at the computer again and started to stroll over to a shelf 10 feet from the main desk. I walked, well sort of skipped, over to where she stood, and watched with joy as her right hand reached out for the colourful Brady-bunchesque cover, and there in her hand was the "Glee" DVD!!!

Not being a shy person, I almost hugged her, but was able to hold back and then proceeded to verbally hug and kiss her with words, letting her know that she will be my second favourite and most lovely person in Cranbrook today, that I would be blogging about her loveliness, and that she was just wonderful! And, being that I had just had a large mug of green tea, followed by a large glass of iced black tea, the caffeine decided to hit at that point, and I just glowed all the way home!

4 years ago today I was planning my father's funeral, and today I'm just full of glee! Time helps, kindness helps, and memories of being loved no matter what help the most!

Have a Glee filled day! I sure will!

Family Bed Gone Wrong

Going against the advice of such experts as Scotty, Moofut was allowed to stay in our bed for an entire night. As per Scotty's advice, Moofut developed some bizarre attachment issues. He was flipping out and as a result required some serious time out in the corner. We hope this is as far as it will go. Should have listened to Scotty!

Happy Birthday Dad!

Today would have been my Dad's 80th Birthday, so in honour of that occasion we had a bowl of chips and some ice cream bars! I think my Dad would approve and then we said "Well my little bit was good!" which he said no matter if he had 1/2 a cake or just a small piece! Happy Birthday Dad, love you!

10 minutes ago in Cranbrook...

So we slept in! It's Saturday! All of a sudden, at 9:30 am, there is a knock at our door. We aren't dressed appropriately. Then the phone rings, it's George, "The Olympic Torch is coming in 2 minutes!!!" . Okay, great! So we look out the window, 2 minutes pass, no torch, I have to pee, should I go, I'll miss it, I go, still no torch, hmmm, should we get dressed? Ya, I guess. So we throw on some clothes, phone rings, George says, "It's coming right NOW!!!", okay so we run outside in our pj's and boots with no socks, and my Canada toque and there, beside the mini golf greens was the torch bearer!

First Quilt Complete!

After 3 group sessions and 4 hours of hand stitching, my first quilting project is complete! Flannel is apparently very hard to quilt with as it stretches and slides. Well I can attest to that as I think there is only one side that looks like all of the squares are actually square. However, it fold up completely evenly, so that is a first for me and blankets. It is my first project and I'm really pleased with it. We decided to tie it as opposed to quilting it so we could move on to our next project which involves 90% quilting. Stay tuned for more adventures in quilting...

Plans Realized

You may have been wondering if I was ever going to build anything. Here it is,

a sawhorse was my first project. the top picture shows all the pieces hand cut by yours truly and the two bottom pictures are of me next to the finished work. I changed my hairstyle a bit and remodelled my face for the second shot. It's a terminator 2 thing. It was great to complete this project and have all the pieces I designed fit together like a puzzle. Notice the beauty of the wooden pegs. No Nails or metal fasteners of any type hold this sawhorse together.

Kindness

No picture for this thought. Today was a day filled with the kindness of others, even strangers. First, at yoga class, this lady who had made some suggestions of where I could find a lighter jacket for the warmer weather, offered me a fleece that she wasn't using. She told me to follow her home and gave me this beautiful red pull over which will be perfect for running around town when it's 4 degrees or warmer. I met her husband, they invited me to lunch, and since I had some errands to run, I declined, but I felt quite moved.

I drove home to figure out what groceries I had to buy, and thought I'd quickly heat up the soup we had last night. I sat down on the love seat to eat it, and half of it spilled in my lap. I threw the bowl across the room and ran into the tub and sat in freezing cold water for 15 minutes. At that point I realized that I had thrown a whole bowl of soup across my rented living/bed room carpet and I was in too much pain to do anything about it. I called George, our friendly host, broke into tears, and told him I'd made a mess. He sent ice packs and a lovely housekeeper named Sharon who is from Scotland, and she comforted me, made me lie down and cleaned up my mess. She was so sweet and, the word of the day, kind to me. Then Rachel, the other host here, came by with gauze and cream and stories about when she was embarrassed by an injury. I do have some blistering, but after all of the ibuprofen, tylenol, and poly sporin, it doesn't hurt as much.

I'm very blessed to have such kind people around me.

Must Have Been a Party

The owners of Elizabeth Lake Lodge invited us for dinner on Friday. The gave us apple cider, port, and a rum laced fruit smoothie. After playing cranium for 3 hours Andrea and I felt quite tired and the fatigue lasted well into Saturday. Although we do not ascribe to the idea of a family bed, we had to let Moofut in so he could sleep it off as well. Might of been the 2, 4, 6 pack, I don't know but look at the mess I'm in. It was great to get some social contact!

Workin' man!

Anyone who has admired Dustin in his purple shirt, here is a different look for you. Isn't he ruggedly gorgeous? Oh yah! He also has a blue coverall. I'll try to catch him in that some day to show you.

This weekend we had a power outage for a short time. A truck hit a pole, and while the electric company replaced the pole, we were in the silence and the dim. Luckily it was between 3-5:20 pm, so we could still sit by the window and read. Our friends Wendy and Bruce made us supper because we didn't know how long the power would be out. Thanks to them for the fluffy, luscious, homemade waffles and yummy raspberry jam.

And, it's been a very social weekend, on Friday night our hosts at Elizabeth Lake Lodge, invited us over for a delicious vegetarian shepherds pie and the death by chocolate cake and ganache topping. Gabe would have been in total heaven. They had friends over that were timber framers, so I didn't get to talk to Dustin much over supper as Dustin was quite engaged in conversation with Corey. We were also treated to many different kinds of Port, Rum and Cider. Let's just say we aren't used to that kind of alcohol consumption, and we had a wonderful time, and we really felt it. My teeth were swimming. It was worth it for the fun time during a game of Cranium and watching random hilarious videos on You Tube. My social cup is filling and I really needed that.

Turning Plans into Reality

Remember those nice plans I posted, this is the beginning of making those plans reality. Here, I have made the tenon for my sawhorse. You will notice it is the same joint as in the house above. Bigger projects are to come involving these basic skills. Who knows where this will lead in the future. With a growing population and people wanting to build bigger and bigger houses there will likely be no wood left for me to work with but what I am building in my head is outstanding.

Quilting Steps 6-9

At the first weekly Tuesday night Quilting with Wendy, 3 of us continued our lessons.

Step 6: Get right to work cutting out strips to frame the middle block, always cut in 1/2 inch lengths and widths.

Step 7: Always sew 1/4 inch seams and keep the seams straight, but a good ironing job covers a multitude of mistakes.

Step 8: Lots of chatting, laughing and compliments makes time go by quickly, oh, and snacking.

Step 9: When it's 9:50pm, hustle it and get your top finished so you have something to show the folks at home.

(picture one, Andrea with her elephant top, picture 2 Keltie's peas in a pod top, picture 3 Verena's argyle top, picture 4 my first strip of sewn squares and my centre with the trim around it, picture 5 our super hero Wendy hugging her daughter Keltie while Verena works on her layout)

Moofut loves animal prints!

Growing up with vegetarians isn't always easy, but we think Moofut is catching on to our animal loving ways. He was touring around Fabricland with Andrea and all of sudden he was gone. She found him in the animal prints section stroking the sky fabric. I guess he's picked the fabric he wants for his quilt. Monkeys and skies for Moofut, stay tuned...

Quilting Step 1-5

Step 1: You should have lots of fun... (New Kids on the Block) ha, ha!

Step 2: Enjoy some lovely fruit salad and a chocolate covered Oreo cookie, and tea, always tea.

Step 3: Acquaint yourself with the equipment and terminology of Quilting, for instance everything is a straight edged, with few exceptions, so it's important to have a self-healing matt, a long transparent ruler and a rotary cutter.

Step 4: Follow the pattern and do as instructed, but if you are using store bought receiving blankets, they are not square once they are washed, so they need to be squared.

Step 5: Cut out your squares carefully...

That's what I know so far. Stay tuned for the further adventures in Quilting starring our super hero Wendy and the hero in training Me! Oh, next time I'll bring Moofut, he's so good at holding rulers.

Felt Like Home

The people of Cranbrook are very kind, helpful and courteous. This is something we aren't always used to when in retail stores, service related places or on the road in Edmonton. We have had good service in Edmonton, but we truly are more used to rather bad service and people that just want you off the road as you are not driving up to their standards. Well, until Friday at around 5:55pm, we truly believed that there was not a discourteous service individual in Cranbrook and that we would be in for a rude awakening when we arrived back in Edmonton. But our fears were allayed at the local Landmark Cinemas when we were rudely told that our movie coupons were no good there, and then the 15 year old girl neither smiled nor thanked us for our patronage. Not even an unenthusiastic "Enjoy the show". Boy did we feel better. We were way out of balance on the kindness scale

Movie Review: Avatar

As a hairstylist, I really feel that the main point put forth by the movie "Avatar" is this, whether its horses, birds, or just the trees of the field, our hair is what really connects us to the world. If only our hair could stop wars from happening, especially the unnecessarily long war in this beautiful spectacle of hair love.

STARTING SMALL

It is amazing how complicated the most simple looking things are when we try to fully describe them on a piece of paper. We all know what a sawhorse looks like, and what really do they do other than hold up objects to build even better objects? Moofut and I had a long night trying to layout a sawhorse graphically. I only hope building it will be a snap. Moofut is very good at holding rulers and he doesn't need any sleep or food of any kind. He really makes me jealous. I think of all the great things I could do if I was like him!

Bedhead

This is my just got up, do nothing, lazy week hair. When I photographed it, I didn't actually think it looked too bad. I haven't washed it in 2-3 days and I haven't brushed it for days. I know my friend Sara is going to think this is my typically posing face, but I think it's slightly angrierish, so I'm trying.

Snuggling with Moofut

Cranbrook weather has turned cold. My apologies to those in Winnipeg, Edmonton, and anywhere else it's chilly, but when we arrived it was 4 degrees out and now it's -16, with humidity, so that's more like -20 or so. It started snowing lightly just a few minutes ago. I think it snows a lot here. It's so pretty!

Moofut has moved closer to the heater as our little suite is not always very toasty, though we are used to that as our little house is downright frigid most of the time. I have my slippers, so that helps, but I should have brought the sweater my Grandma made me in high school. It's so snuggly. By Saturday it should be up to 1 degree again and then it will be back to slush. We are both getting those brown spots on the back of our pants from walking and kicking up the slush. Oh well, that's what washing machines are for.

On the plus side, Dustin's hair has been amazing since he's been here. It's curling so well because of the humidity. Mine is really waving well too. I haven't even plugged in my blow dryer since I got here. This week is all about simple and lazy. Next week I may try to do my hair, but I'm not committing to anything. Moofut doesn't have hair, so thankfully we don't have to make him brush it.

Squaring a Log the old fashioned way.

In the first three days we are learning how to turn a round log into a square log just like pioneers would have using chisels, axes and planes. It has been a lot of hard work and my hands ache a bit. But P90X is making me ripped enough to take it.

Going off topic

So we accidently added this picture, which is from the summer. It features our biggest tomato, home grown, organic, really yummy! We are just trying to figure out our iphoto, so sometimes you will be treated to our mistakes. Lucky you!

Burrowing Moofut

After the long, harrowing trip, Moofut and the Mopers were more than ready to emerge from their confinement. Moofut was more confined then we were. We told you in an earlier post that he liked to burrow in our shopping bags, but duffle bags are good too.

Timber Frame Example

This answers the question, "What is Dustin doing again?". This is the structure that the spring session built. It was auctioned off and we were surprized that it was still on the campus. When Dustin gets home from school today, we will be able to tell you a little more about what to expect from his course.

Officially Great!

Introducing Sebastian Elliot, born to our niece and nephew J and J in Kitchener at 12:12am today. He weighed 7lbs 4oz, and is just so cute. Little bit of breathing trouble, but he's much better now. We are now Great Uncle and Great Aunt, therefore making it official that we are great!