Snow day adventure...

School was cancelled today... but I didn't realize it until I was showered and finished hair and stuff... I didn't really think the snow was all that bad, but it did get a lot snowier by late morning.

I love storm days when school is cancelled because it is pure uninterrupted work time. We are coming to the end of the financial year for the school and there so many little details to be finalized and figured. All that peace and quiet it like a gift from God!! But this blog is not about me today.....

This blog is featuring a letter to Stephanie and Sean, in Korea... from Parallax, their pretty grey/beige cat.

Oh, hi Mom & Dad

So... you know how cats are curious, right. And you know how smart I am, right. And you know how I like the thoughts of being outside, right. And, you know how I have big strong paws... right. And you know how the back door sticks when it get damp... you know so it doesn't close right.

Well, here's what happen. Sometime today... I can't tell time, so I don't know when.... I noticed the back door was open just a crack. The big door. And I think, I am not sure, but I squeezed between the back door and the back screen door. And I got out... hee hee...

What I didn't bank on.. was that I couldn't get back in. I walked through the snow... my first time touching snow by the way..not impressed! Anyway.. I walked over to the ramp and slid down that thing... that sucker is slippery!

I figured I could get in the front door. I walked past the basement windows and Tonks near passed out... I was outside.... and no one is home....

The Front door... locked... I think... I don't know.. but it wasn't opened. I am not sure how long I was outside.. but Grammie and Grampie figure about 2 hours... cause my foot prints were just slightly buried with new fallen snow.

They came home 1 whole hour earlier than they usually do and you should have seen the look on their faces when they saw me sitting on the door step OUTSIDE. I wasn't even scared, really. But I was really happy to see them. Grammie picked me up and cuddled me.. while Grampie ran to the back door to see how I got out! The house was really cold... 62 degrees F, cause the back door was wide open. Pika was pretty panicked when I came in.... I think he was worried because he could see me out the screen door.. I sat on the railing for a long time cause I could see in the warm house through the screen window! I sat so long, my bum melted all the snow on the railing!

so... anyway... I am home, warm and safe, cleaned my feet already, had a bite to eat, and now I am bathing in the luxury of the kitty bed I got for Xmas.

Love Par :)

To add to Parallax's letter... you can not imagine the shock we

experienced and I actually didn't believe it was her. Like Terry said... out of context, she looked like a totally different cat. She was hiding around the corner of the house when we pulled in, and I didn't even see her. It was Terry who said, in a slightly panicked voice "What the hell is that"... as the grey ghost slinked to the door. She sat up like a weasel, and when she saw it was us.. she sat down, and calmly waited for us to get out of the car. It was shocking!!! Pika was absolutely freaked... and the house was absolutely freezing. She was very cold to touch, and I kept her snuggled in my arms for a minute but she was too interested in getting fed! Lesson learned that we have to be more careful with the big back door, since the screen door doesn't shut that well! I don't doubt she pulled that big door open since she can do it to the front door!

Oh, well...

Secret projects...

I secretly worked on little projects last spring.. some in the summer, a bit in the fall and then a mad rush in December.... because my little projects were Xmas and Birthday gifts for my family and friends.

While I was graced with my sister's fantastic sewing machine and fun threads,

I started sewing little signature blocks, and tucking them away with all my nieces, sister in law

s, mother in laws and some of my friends names on them.

I picked away at finding fun fabrics to match, and fun buttons to accent.

Then I started making my "take a long" bags in the fall, and my little H1N1 vacation set me back quite a bit but with my sister's gentle encouragement, I picked away, 20 minutes at a time.. and finished all my little bags for family and friends.

In all, I made 12, I think. They were so fun to make and even better to give. The theme of the bags I made were black on the outside, with fun zipper panels, and fun, bright fabrics on the inside. I chose to make them black so that the bright threads in the their "names" would pop. My sister is making some right now for all her little grandkids... so head to her blog to catch a peek at some really cute Take A Longs made with fun fabrics on the outside.

A blogging opportunity...LOST... or maybe not...

Raclette is a traditional Swiss dish. Raclette is also the name of the cheese that is involved with this Swiss dish.

You have this half moon of cheese on a stand, and there is an open flame, or a heat source of some kind that melts just the edge of the cheese, and then you scrap it onto your plate. The food you generally see eaten with a swiss raclette is potato and sweet pickles.. like gherkins.

When I first attended a Raclette dinner, it was nothing like this. It was with a grill, little frying pans, and tons of different foods and sauces. Like a fondue but not. That was over 20 years ago, and my french mother-in-law (I have two, one is french, and one is not), hosted it.

What a blast it was, and I always wanted to own a raclette, but they were super expensive and not in my budget. With an "Canadianized" Raclette supper you grill what ever you want on the top of this small table top grill, and then load up your little fry pan and top it with a soft melting cheese of your choice, place it under the grill and wait for the cheese to melt. You slide it off of the non stick pan, onto your plate and enjoy with whatever sauces are around the table.

My dear friend Karen was given a Raclette about 15 years ago and didn't know what to do with it. We planned a raclette supper with her family but it never transpired. Before she moved away, she left the raclette with me to use with the promise that when she comes back here, I will give it back!! I have used it only a few times, but each time, we come up with a different way to use it.

Here's the lost blogging moment... Last night, I had my two dearest friends and their hubby's for supper and I prepared a "Mexican" Raclette. Now, that isn't really possible, since Raclette is a swiss dish, but we put a Mexican twist on it.

I marinated chicken in fresh coriander and lime slices, and beef was marinated in a fajita marinade. We had onions, peppers (even some hot ones) corn, mushrooms and potatoes.

A couple of melty cheeses (I used part skim mozza-which didn't really melt that well :( and some yummy salsa's, guacamole and sour cream for sauces.

Cricket brought the turkey/spinach appetizer and Debbie brought dessert... Chocolate Peanut butter Cake...

NOT ONE PICTURE.....NOT ONE!

So, this is to tell you we had a great supper, lots of laughing, lots of stories, lots of combinations on the raclette, yummy cake and ice wine....

I did take a picture of the Mexican stir fry we made on Sunday with all the left over veggies and meat... and leftover cake too!!! (Thanks Debbie)

~Special note~

I used the word "Raclette" 12 times in this blog.. and spell check didn't like any of them!

(ok, 13 times)

Some "Ups" of the week!..

Its been a calm and somewhat passive week... but even with a "non-eventful" week.... there have been some ups and some downs... I will only talk about the ups.. I don't want to talk about my Red Saturn that is in the shop and needs a whole new engine!... I am not talking about that... I will share a couple of "ups"..........

Ups.... well.... I am working hard on "moving forward"... taking care of me... getting blood work... getting unfinished health issues resolved... exercising each day... taking my Vitamins... you know the normal January stuff...

But....

A sweet and heartwarming "up" for today took place just after lunch. We have two shifts of lunch .. Early lunch starts at 12 and ends at 12:40, while late lunch starts at 12:3o until 1:10. Around 12:45, kids are coming in from recess and dropping off borrowed mitts, while the late lunch kids have just finished eating and are coming in to borrow mitts. Its usually a pretty steady time of the day with a lot of kids coming in and out for about 10 minutes. But today... was quiet. Abnormally quiet. At the end of early lunch, Linda was getting ready to go for a walk and I was at the counter talking with a student and the phone rings... Chantal, who is working in the office today, makes a mad dash for the phone... while I send off a student with a dry pair of mitts. Along comes one of our repeat "borrowers", returning snowy wet mitts. She has a very long face, as she slowly walked up to the counter. You see, this morning, she lost her beautiful WHITE mitts she got for Xmas... well just one of them... and this is the 4th time it has gone missing. We, at the office, seem to always recognise it whenever we are in the cafeteria, hallway or gym. We have always been able to recover her mitt/or mitts... but not today. She left us with her one mitt, and had to borrowed some pink gloves.

Anyway, as she slowly sauntered in, eyes down cast, twirling the end of a strand of her hair, I hear Chantal say, while still on the phone, with a very excited voice , "we will MAKE her available". I looked and she was putting the phone on hold. I thought someone very important must have been on the phone for our Principal, just the way she said it.... and then she turned to me, glassy eyed and excited. She said " Its a dad from Afghanistan on the phone... he wants to speak to his little girl!" And can you guess what little girl...yup, my little down trodden mitten girl!!! She just happens to be one of Chantals grade Primary students... When she saw little R standing in the doorway, Chantal asked her to come with her to Linda's desk... there was someone special on the phone. I am sure little R was worried that it might be someone upset over her yet again lost mitt, so, when she sat in Linda's chair and put the phone to her ear... she wasn't smiling. Then all of a sudden she raised her voice to the most amazing "Hi Daddy!" I have ever heard. Well... all three of the women in the room (me included) welded up with tears and we got all giggly!!! Oh... so heartwarming. They chatted for about 5 minutes and then the call ended with "I love you more, Daddy!". Bahhhhhh... more blubbering on our part and our little mitten girl skipped off to class with not a care in the world...

It was a beautiful moment!

In the midst of crazy

I know I have said this a million times but I find something hilarious every single day at my workplace...

Today... A little primary girl, dressed completely in her snowgear (snowpants, coat, hat scarf and boots) with a big and insistent voice marched into the office, wormed her way past two grown ups and stepped up on the step, looked over the counter at me.... interrupting the teacher at the counter who was discussing something not that important with me. Her big cowboy voice announced that her mitts were soaked and she needed to borrow some from my clothesline...

I acknowledged her request, told her to go and help her self, reminded her to bring them back when she was done.. and off she stepped. She took 3 steps towards the mitts, and stopped. In her big demanding voice she boomed...."oh ooo..... I have to go pee". Every adult in the room froze.... for like 10 seconds. Then, like a well rehearsed play, someone whisked her off to the bathroom, about 50 little steps away, while the rest of us held our breath. Another, followed and stood in the door of the bathroom to hear if we needed to find spare clothes, snowsuit, boots, socks, undies...... We watched through the office glass, as the grown up in the door way waited for a word from the stall... and then the thumbs up came our way.. and we all giggled, rejoicing in another accident averted.

After lunch when the mittens were returned, I noticed that when our little weak bladdered spitfire walked out of my office, her snow pants where on, completely inside out...

Not a day goes by...I don't find something funny in this place we call ~work~!!

The dawn of 2010

Well, its back into reality now that school is back in and I have put in a full week and weekend of "normal" life. The weekend before school started, I, like many of my friends, was high on renewed energy, new hopes for betterment of one sort or another. I love the whole idea of the "New Year". Its like the ultimate Monday... the start of the week, when a weekend has gone wrong. Its the ultimate "tomorrow...is a new day". I haven't really done the whole "resolution" thing for 2010... specifically, but I do feel like this is the beginning of something better.

2009 was filled with friends, family and wedding plans. It was getting together with my dearest friends, planning, crafting, and socializing. My family helped plan and create many of the best parts of Michelle's wedding and almost every member of Terry's family and some of mine were here for the wedding. Those were all the good things.....

2009 for me was more sad than I like....Although, Terry's father died just at the end of 2008, it was 2009 that this loss was felt. Also in the loss of Terry's mom's husband (sort of a step parent but not really, cause Terry was a grown man when they got married), which happened in March.. suddenly. From this there was emotional ups and downs, rash decisions and stress beyond imagination. Moves to Ontario, moves back to Nova Scotia...hurt feelings, closed doors. A marriage breakup in Terry's family filled all of our hearts with shock and sadness.. teenage woes in a family dear to me, broke my heart..... the unknown always seemed so dark. Although the wedding and all of the fun activities planned before and after were the highlight of the summer, it was quickly followed by the sudden death of our beloved Mollie, to be followed closely after that (3 weeks) with Stephanie leaving for the unknown of Korean living and teaching. The fall was filled with sadness and worry, with work and routine, with illness and exhaustion. Christmas came very quickly, and although I was stressed about it coming so quickly, I truly enjoyed the whole event. I loved having all the pets, and Michelle and Scott home. I loved having Gail visit, and I loved being able to talk to Stephanie 10 times a day... it was wonderful to have Kim and the girls, along with Corey for Christmas dinner. I felt the turning of the mood.. over Christmas. The beginning of the end of a long hard year.

In the week that lead up to New Year's Eve, I began to reflect on the year, to summarize the pluses and the minus's. I seemed to dwell, on the minus's for a few days... and thought that the end of 2009 couldn't come soon enough... and when it did... as I watched the count down on TV... tears welled up in my eyes.... I felt a weight lift off of my shoulders... it was over... finally.

2010.... a new beginning for me.... A year to get fit. That's my goal. I need to take care of myself... in many ways. I am battling the "menopause" curse of sleepless nights, midsection bulge, rogue chin hairs, emotional ups and downs and HOT FLASHES.

Its all quite exciting in a sick sort of way... every day is a new challenge on what to wear to stay cool and still look like I am wearing winter clothes... I am battling the scale and although the numbers have changed only slightly, my pants are tighter and tighter each day. With emotional roller coaster syndrome comes emotional eating... and therefore I am on an uphill battle to win the battle of the bulge.

Here's the plan... I have taken up snowboarding, down hill skiing,

biking, jogging, juggling, hula hooping, skateboarding, obstacle courses, yoga, aerobics, kung Fu,

river rafting (bubble version), ski jumping and a few other sports. All without leaving my house! We have bought Wii Fit Plus. What a blast. I have never done over half of the sports I have listed above... but now I am skateboarding up ramps and doing

tricks at the top. I am ski jumping farther than 170 meters. I am pretty darn good at the segway, I can juggle three balls at a time, as well as keep 5 hula hoops going for over 400 rotations! If you

have never tried the wii fit plus... you have to come over... Not only do you sweat your butt off, but you also laugh your head off.

With all the head and butt loss... you're bound to get FIT.

With all the wii'ing going on, Terry and I talk in a new language... and so do a lot of my friends. My friends and I share private wii moments across the room, across the curling rink and over Facebook... This is not an advertisement for the Wii.... its a proclamation from me.... I am going to get fit this year.

Move more, eat less... simple.

I am not sure what 2010 will bring, but I know I am already feeling more positive, more energized, more ready to face all my challenges.... Its really nice to close a door behind you and look ahead to what is out there in the path ahead of you...

You think you have it tough......

Well, its been a very long weekend for Kelly's (visiting doggie) mom and dad... and teenaged sister Meleigha. These are the folks I mentioned who were driving from Newfoundland... to try and get home...

Does everyone know where Newfoundland is..... Its the farthest tip of Canada... somewhat north and east of Nova Scotia.

They left Fogo Island, Newfoundland on Saturday morning. In order to leave the island, they must wait in line, to catch a ferry to the mainland. Where is Fogo... well... its on the northern side of NFLD... see below.

First off, driving to Fogo, a week before Xmas... they needed to drive 7 hours from the Valley, to North Sydney... jump on the Caribou Ferry which is 6+ hours to Port Aux Basque and then drive another 8 hours to wait for the Fogo Ferry... which is about an hour long... I think. And with all our weird weather we had before Xmas... they had smooth sailing, clear driving and arrived safe and sound.. right on Schedule...

Saturday morning, after New Years, however... the first of many Meleigha Facebook status's was "Ferry ride is done.. but we can't get off the ferry, because the first car to get off, has locked their keys in the car... everyone is waiting... ". This was written at 10:00am.. This prompted my two day long facebook conversation.

Well, at first this is kind of funny...... but in retrospect...it's a sign of worse things to come..

Through the wonders of iPhone and Facebook, I was able to keep in constant communication with Meleigha as they passed from town to town, on their long 8 hour journey. Meanwhile, we are being pounded with snow, wind and more snow. Roads were horrid and some were closed. The thoughts of the "MacPayne" family traveling through this was stressful to say the least. But according to my many chats with Mee Mee (easier to spell than Meleigha), the weather was fine there... below is their route through NFLD, (marked in RED).

MeeMee kept me updated all day when they would go through little towns like Corner Brook...

She informed me of a little know fact about Cornerbrook... to quote "Little fun fact for you, Corner Brook was built completely on the side of a hill. When traveling in this town in the wintertime, be sure to have snow tires. Otherwise, it gets embarrassing not being able to drive up the hills..."

That made me chuckle..... wonder who she heard that "fact" from.....

They started their trip at 7:30 am, and by 6:15pm they were going through Wreck House... and she said it was creepy...scary..... When I asked where it was... she said "google it"... BRAT... but when I did.. I understood why.

It is a region at the end of Channel Port aux Basque and it is like a freakish "Wind Tunnel" with winds 80 to 90 kms... and this happens all the time... let along during a storm. It was quite the windy drive in their car... and when they arrived at the ferry an hour later, people were talking about how some cars arrived that day with smashed windshields from the wind and debris going through Wreckhouse.....scary.

(this pic is a Google pic, not from that day.. but lets you know how powerful the winds are there).

At 7:00pm.... MeeMee reported that Mel and Jill had a problem trying to find Subway in Port aux Basque.. even after they asked for directions. Of course, directions from a Newfoundlander were.... "its right across from the Hospital".... therefore... you need to know where the hospital is...

At 7:30pm it began... the wait... I need to quote again....

News!!
Okay, so the boat isn't coming in yet. It's "bouncing around" out in the harbour. So, the lady told us that the winds right now are 108km, with 20 foot waves!!!! Holy crap!!
The vision hasn't even left Sydney yet, and isn't until 7am. But were going on the caribou. Which is a sign of relief right there.
The lady Said she thinks the wind is actually picking up, and chances are we won't be leaving until morning. That's not confirmed though.

This news began the long night... the long day...

waiting in "Hotel Tucson" as Meleigha called it.

At 9:00pm... the news was no Ferry until 11:00 tomorrow morning... and the reality hit that they would be sleeping in the car all night.. At one point on the drive MeeMee told me that she had explored every position possible for sleeping in the back seat... so now.. at least in my mind, she knew the most comfy position to sleep in on a cold and very windy night in line at the Ferry Terminal.

7:00am the next morning.. reports in... no Ferry... it was still bouncing in the harbour. Too windy for it to dock... no ferry at 11:00. Every hour after that... delay.. upon delay...

While they switched positions in the car to get comfy.. we, in the Valley were staring out the window, watching a TON of snow come down... and I was glad they weren't driving in this.. because if all had gone well at the Ferry... they would have landed and being driving home....

The rest of the afternoon was blurry reports of boredom, sadness in missing all our snow, descriptions of Dad snoring... ipod charging... chicken burgers....

Then the news changed.... 10:00pm (hour 28, sitting in line, and hour 37 of traveling), they were boarding the ferry... and planning to sail at 11:30pm... (24 hours late).... excitement and fear of the trip over reverberated throughout the facebook status's of both Meleigha and Jill. Gravol was popped and wifi was found.... and the trip was on!

In the night, during one of my sleepless moments, I was able to chat with Jill who said it was rocky, noisy and crowded on the Ferry and 4 gravol did not knock her out... ugh... but at least they were on their way home.

My second last message from Meleigha was at 6:55am on Monday morning... and they were getting off the Ferry and starting their long drive across Nova Scotia. You can see the 6 to 7 hour drive they had to end their trip...

At 4:30.... my final message was.... after 55 hours of sitting in a car.... that they were home... showered and unloaded.... and would be by these evening to pic up little Miss Kelly!

Jill and Mel arrived last evening... and scooped up Kelly who was OVER THE MOON happy to see them... and everyone was soooo looking forward to their very own bed.

Thanks Meleigha for all your great reports. It really helped me to not worry.. knowing you were safe and sound in the car, not moving, not sailing and not driving in horrid storms. And it was fun to get all your funny updates....

Welcome home....

What fun a puzzle can be....

For my birthday, my dear friend Debbie W., gave me a wonderful Jim Shore Snowpeople puzzle. Our family loves puzzles and it didn't take long, once the family got here, to break open the box. We spent a quiet Sunday afternoon, before Xmas, putting it together..

The really fun part about this puzzle is that it is a "family" puzzle, which means it has large pieces and small pieces... something for all the members of a family. As you can tell by the picture above... the larger pieces are what makes up the border.. and the smaller ones are in the middle.

After we put it together, we started talking about what we would do with it. It was too pretty to put back in the box.... so we left it under glass for a few days until the turkey dinner was getting set up. In the meantime, Debbie had suggested that we do something special with the puzzle... share it with another family. Since my sister is a huge fan of "Jim Shore" figurines, and she also has a wonderful collections of grandchildren... Debbie had suggested sending it along to her and her family. With a little twist....

I am not sure if anyone else has ever done this.. but its been a fun project in our family on more than one occasion. We find a really fun, challenging but easy too, puzzle to put together. A "Where's Waldo" or something fun and interesting like that. Build it, and then flip it over. Write a fun message on the back of it.... perhaps a couple of jokes... or a personal message ....

And then you break it up..... and mail it away... to a friend or family member...

We have sent two to Japan to families whom we have hosted their children. We have sent one to the Walker family when they moved to Ottawa, and we also received a pretty butterfly puzzle back from them with a message on the back. We even had one as a round robin sort of puzzle.. where we started it, and sent it to one set of "moved away friends" and they made it, wrote on it.. and sent it to another family. That puzzle went for 4 families before we lost track of it...

When my sister was here last week... I flipped the puzzle.. and wrote a message, a couple of jokes and a treasure hunt on the back... and we broke it up and boxed it up....

On Sunday.. two of her granddaughters were visiting for the afternoon...and the puzzle was presented... you can read all about how that went over...right here...

Thank you Debbie for the really fun puzzle, and the suggestion to "pass it on"!!

and it still snows....

Well, the night is over...and the daylight brings a new world. Our healthy Pine tree in the front yard took a beating last night. Not from the wind but the lack of wind!

The light fluffy snow got very heavy last night, with the 'above zero' temperatures which turned snow to rain. Our beautiful pine lost two big limbs. It broke my heart to see them laying there... I wonder if it hurt.

Terry and I donned our duds and headed out to shovel the driveway around 9:30.

The plow was by earlier and left us with big hard chunks at the end of the driveway an

d they were water soaked, and partly frozen.

Time was crucial to get those chunks off before they froze.

With both Terry and I working solid.... we got 75% of the driveway and cars cleaned off. We broke for lunch and heading back out at 1:00 and cleaned, shoveled and scrapped for another hour. Of course, the damn plow went by again at 2:00 and left a shorter pile of dirtier chunks, which Terry just cleaned off...

and it has just started to snow again....

Snowed In

And loving it. This snow started yesterday late in the day, and its still snowing. We are expecting tons more tonight and high winds tonight as well. I have a few friends who are traveling home this weekend from Christmas's away. Ugh... a driving family from Fogo Island, and they are currently driving across Newfoundland, with good roads, heading to the ferry to NS. ... a family coming from Florida by air.... and another couple from somewhere south USA..... I expect they will all have delays....

For me, I am happy to be snuggled in the house with 3 cats, 1 dog and Terry. Terry shoveled for an hour and then headed to the grocery store for the few little necessities we needed (Cat food, bread and yogurt!). He is home and reported that the roads are pretty bad and just about everything will be closing early, if they haven't already closed.

Suppertime, and its still snowing... and Terry has shovelled twice. The weather is frightful..

Jill, Mel and MeeMee are almost to Port Aux Basque... and will be waiting there til the 11:30pm ferry shoves off for Cape Breton.... fingers are crossed for a smooth sail!!

The pets are all snuggled in for the night.. Terry's pooped from all this snow plus 1.5 hours on Wii today... hee hee..

Pika, my cuddler cat, is just cuddling.... perhaps due to the snow... but they are both sound asleep...