Forgot my camera!

All will be explained in the video! Please forgive my lack of grammar if you know ASL.

What made last Friday exciting!

Last Friday we attended our friend Keltie's science fair here in Cranbrook. She did an experiment where she sunk a 120 feet of black plastic reinforced pipe 6 feet into the ground and pushed air through it on order to send the warm ground air up to the surface. They found that if they fed this pipe into a furnace or heat pump, the air would go in at about 2 degrees Celsius and then the heating system would only have to heat the air in the house another 18 degrees. At minus 20, this would be a real energy saver. I'm probably not explaining this exactly right, but the point is that she won best project in the show. There were at least 80 other projects and she won!


Also at the fair was a very enthusiastic gentleman offering people the oppourtunity to stand on a podium and hold the Olympic torch that came through Cranbrook. Even though we have not watched more than 30 seconds of the Olympics so far, Dustin stood on the Gold podium and I stood on the bronze. I don't need to be the best!

Pretty fun day, but it didn't end there. We went to see "Shutter Island", which was just so intriguing, and thought provoking that we went to see it again on Tuesday!

Bragging Rights!

This is our Great nephew Sebastian Elliot, and he's almost 8 weeks old. What a total sweetie! We miss him, but we will get to meet him in May. Just thought you might enjoy an update from the early January picture!

We love you sweet boy!

Quilt for Haiti!

This is my latest project, a "Streak of Sunshine" quilt to be given to Mennonite Central Committee for Haiti. They need 10000 quilts, so I thought maybe they would be happy to have my beginner attempt. I chose these fabrics for their brilliant colours and high quality fabric. I had so much fun putting this layout together on Monday that I forgot to eat lunch. By 2:30 I was pretty hungry. I'm going to try to make a similar one for us, but I don't have enough fabric, so off to Fabricland again! Life is so hard sometimes. Isn't it cool how the actual streak of sunshine followed the pattern of the quilt?

Ainsworth Hot Springs! (not a paid advertisement)

Sunday afternoon we drove the winding road to Ainsworth Hot Springs. What a beautiful place to sit and look at the mountains. The caves were just fascinating. The outside doesn't look like much, but walking through those openings felt like walking to the centre of the Earth. The walls are rough stone with icicle looking protrusions hanging from the ceiling. The water was 40 degrees in the cave, and it was running into the cave much hotter than that. It was like a natural steam room inside, so I couldn't stay in there for too long, but Dustin lived in there. The main pool was 35 degrees and was lovely to sit in and soak. I almost fell asleep at one point, so I decided to get out. We highly recommend this affordable and unique experience if you are making your way through this area. Hopefully it's sunny for you as the view is just spectacular, as you can see!

Our Motto: Why take 3 hours when you can take 6!

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Saturday was a beautifully clear and sunshiny day, a perfect day for a drive to Nelson, with a side trip to Bountiful. Google Maps assured us that the shortest most picturesque and interesting way was through Kimberley and Grey Pass to the free Ferry on Kooteney Lake. At 11 am we had our Starbucks and a full tank of gas and off we went. We found the first road we were to take, St Mary's Lake Road. It was windy, but offered beautiful views of mountains (3) unobscured by electric lines. We were enjoying the drive, feeling mildly concerned when the roads we were supposed to turn on didn't materialize. The road (1 & 2) started to look like a road laid down by the founders of this country at the time they founded it, and we started watching the woods for folks in overalls with banjos. After 2 hours of hoping that we would end up somewhere that looked like civilization, we didn't.

After reading the sign that said only vehicles with 2 way radios were allowed to drive on the road ahead we promptly ignored it and kept going. After a few minutes we started to realize that we were heading up a hill and on either side of the road were logs. There was a pile of bear poop beside a bridge with large claw scrapings along the boards, and we thought maybe we were in the wrong place. With amazing skill, Dustin backed our car up for over a mile down the hill and over the bear bridge. We decided to drive back to Kimberley and start again. At least the ride was beautiful! We found out that the Grey pass is a summer road only. If only Google Maps had that information!

The road less travelled, is less travelled for a reason!

By 2:30 we were back in Cranbrook, driving in the opposite way towards Creston (4), and our final destination, Nelson!!! It was 3 hours, and when we arrived we found our hotel on historic Baker Street. The website showed pictures of a cute little boutique hotel nestled in the Rockies. When we got there we realized just how amazing Photoshop can be. The rooms must have been college dorms as they were grey cinderblock rooms barely big enough to walk around the bed, and the view is the brick wall that Dustin is showcasing above. It was fine for one night, but CSI would have had a field day in the shower with all of the hair left in there.

So basically, we didn't make it to Bountiful.

Stay Out!

Moofut spotted this sign when we stopped for a washroom break.

Bound for Bountiful

We had a really exciting day today, but we are waiting for some pictures and then we will give you the low down.

Tomorrow morning we are driving to Nelson BC so we can stay overnight and go the Ainsworth Hot Springs. On the way we are going to drive through Bountiful to show Moofut where the Fundamentalist Mormon sect lives. Apparently there is a store there, so we'll buy something and take pictures. I'm not planning on joining, I like having one husband all to myself.

Stay tuned...

Moofut's other Valentine's wish..

Well after the Cranbrook Ed incident, Moofut promised to be good for the rest of the day. He asked if he could go and see the nice lady at Starbucks and have a special drink. Thanks to Jean and Martin we still had some gift card left from New Years, so we said "okay"! He picked a green tea lemonade, which we all shared! All's well that ends with special drinks for Moofut!

We also love you!

Moofut's Valentine's Wish...

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A few weeks ago, we went against the advice of Scotty and allowed Moofut to stay in the main bed. Ever since, his behaviour has been completely unpredictable and, at times, scary. It started with temper outbursts a few weeks ago and today progressed to picking fights with the locals. On a trip uptown, Moofut started by eyeing up a local elephant named Ed(1). This made Ed upset and he mounted an offence (2) that looked as if it was going to be curtains for Moofut. In a fury of fists that would make Jackie Chan proud(3), Moofut turned it around and got on top(4). Andrea and I had to intervene and lay down some ground rules and after a lengthy session of conflict resolution, it seemed Ed and Moofut became good friends(5).

Scotty, you can't leave us hanging like this. We need your advice now more than ever. What can we do to get Moofut under control? Is this adolescence or is this type of behaviour here to stay? I guess all is well that ends well!

Happy Valentines day to all! We love you Leanne!

Happy Valentine's Day so far...

These are the mint cups that I made for Dustin's Valentine's present. It takes a lot of creativity and problem solving to cook, bake and work with chocolate in our tiny kitchen. I'm used to having my electric mixer, my good chocolate melting bowl and pot, my toothpicks and piping bag. I had to make the filling for these yummy cups twice as I couldn't figure out how to cream the butter and icing sugar together with only a fork. The second batch was amazing, and I got an arm workout! I used a spoon to create the hearts on the tops of the cups instead of my piping bag. It was a really good challenge and makes me realize that I really don't NEED the fancy tools in my kitchen to create beautiful edibles, I just need my creativity. Dustin thought I bought them at the local chocolate shop. He couldn't believe that I made them in our little kitchen. He bought me chocolates from Sweet Delights, the cute little chocolate shop in downtown Cranbrook. The owners are so nice and helpful, and the chocolates are almost as good as mine :).

We wish you much love from friends and loved ones this year and always, and if you are reading this, we must love you too!!!

The Chisel

Here is the most important tool a timber framer needs, the chisel. This is one of the finest The Barr chisel. It is hand hammered and tempered and should outlast its owner. Upon receiving it and spending the whole night by its side, I made it a nice case using denim as a material. Total cost 70 cents and some money for the chisel.

Cue Cards

In my last year of University I had to fulfill my Science Credit. I was so terrified that I wouldn't pass, so I made cue cards of all of the definitions and information that I had to absorb. It worked miracles and I think I passed with a B+! I thought I'd employ the same method for my American Sign Language course, so I played a game of Match and paired up the sign with the word. The exercise itself was enough of a confidence booster as I only needed to look up 3 signs in two chapters. The third chapter was the class that I missed, so I didn't do as well, but even in not knowing the sign I learned it by looking it up. I'm going to practise with classmates this weekend and then I'll try to put some sentences together and make a video lesson for the blog here. I guess I should be teaching Moofut!

Where there's a will...

One more fun little memory from our friend's visit! Blayke is only allowed to have her soother at certain times of day and night. Waiting to go in the car is not one of those times. She has become resourceful and creative and turned her turtle into her soother to sooth her while she is sootherless! Brilliant!

What I did today!

Our quilting class was cancelled last night, but Wendy, being so dedicated and organized, called me Monday night and said there was a package of squares for me to pick up and work on this week. I arrived Tuesday at 6pm, and there was a Ziploc bag with my name on it, full of colourful squares in 3 different patterns and coordinating colours. The bag also contained about 10 pages of quilting tips and patterns to put in my binder that Wendy started for me. I was to look at the quilt she did for Keltie (her daughter) and then lay out my squares in whatever pattern I liked and sew the strips together. So last night I laid it all out (picture 1), and then this morning I changed it around a bit, and then started sewing the strips together, and now I have 9 strips hanging in my "closet" and I am done my homework for the week! Isn't is beautiful? I get to keep it too! Stay tuned for how it turns out! I'll be on the edge of my seat...

Quilt #2

This is the quilt panel on which I learned to machine quilt. I used 2 different techniques, a swirly free stitching technique and a straight stitch. I'm sure those are not the technical names for what I achieved here. I still have to put on the binding, which I have cut into strips but not sewn together, and then this quilt will either go to Haiti, if we can find somewhere to send it, or it will go to the Mennonite Central Committee sale this summer.

I really enjoyed the transformative power of machine quilting to take a flat piece of fabric and give it texture, depth and puffiness! Wendy is the most amazing teacher and wait until you see the next project she has for us!

Late apologies!

I remember a time in high school when I used to wonder why some of my classmates would misbehave and skip class. Jeff, Brian, Steve and Jamie, it has taken me 15 years to say my apologies.

As a class, we were allotted 3 days to learn CAD, a computer design program for our Timber framing. I started out okay but then the teacher decided to get 20 steps ahead of where the class was and I could not keep up. That was day one. Today the teacher went 20 more steps ahead and I really began to understand what frustration feels like. I grabbed my belongings packed up and left. I wish I could blame this on drugs but honestly, I have been stone cold sober my entire life.

Jeff, Brian, Steve, Jamie, may the force be with you!

Visitors from Edmonton!

Five weeks into our stay our good friends Rob, Gabrielle and Blayke showed up to visit with us. Since Gabe's Birthday had just passed we had a birthday supper for her Friday night and then they all rested in their gorgeous room here at the ELL. Saturday we all piled into the Enclave and drove to Creston and then to Kimberley. The sun had decided to stay hidden for the trip, but the view was still remarkably beautiful with frost covered trees and hovering clouds. Really good food in Creston and then we visited a book store, a store called The Chocolate Orchard (yum) and checked out a fruit store. There is nothing like homemade apple juice! In Kimberley we walked through the Plaztl, which looked just like a Swiss town, or what I believe a Swiss would look like, and we all enjoyed a baked good from the Bavarian bakery. We ended our eating for the day at East Side Mario's in Cranbrook, that's where I picked up some food poisoning, rendering me incapacitated and disgusting for our last day together. Dustin went swimming and bowling with our friends. In the evening, Gabe was able to visit with me for a few hours, as I felt a little bit better by then. Each morning we had a real treat, Blayke all to ourselves. Dustin would go and get her and bring her to our room and we would play with her and feed her banana pieces. She's such a great eater. And now she crawls, waves and claps on command. They all gave her "high fives" at bowling last night, so this morning I tried to work with that skill and was very successful! A few tears were shed when they left, but we will see them again soon, well in April, which will come pretty soon.

Dustin learned a new game!

We had very special visitors this weekend! One of them was Blayke, and she is learning that if she grabs at people's noses, they may honk. I've been working on teaching Dustin this game since we found out she was on her way. He just nailed it and here is the evidence. This game went on for at least five minutes, and eventually she was honking both of our noses at the same time. Quite a nice little schnoz symphony!