Otherwise known as... Finter?? Wall??

It happened... we were snowed upon. On September 29th, it couldn't even wait for October! Well, it was only a little bit of snow and it all melted the next day in the SUNSHINE! Yay, sunshine! Since then I have heard more weather rumours... weather is a common topic up here but that is because it is interesting!! You never know what is coming your way (shh, don't say it too loud apparently even tornadoes happen up here... yeesh!). Anyway, back to the rumours... I have heard rumours that by the end of the week EITHER it could snow, again... or it could be 20 degrees and sunny! Hah, there you go, predictions! The actual funny thing is, they could both be right.

Fall

We are having another beautiful fall, and although it has been "officially" fall for only about a week, it has felt like fall for nearly a month. Last year fall was wonderful. It was about two full months of beautiful cool, but not cold, weather and amazingly colourful trees. I don't think we are going to be so lucky this year.

We had our first frost last night (at least I think it was the first one!) and there have been rumours floating around that next week, the first week of October... next week we may get snow. SNOW!! I am not ready for winter yet, I am still processing that fall is here, for real! There are still tomatoes on the vine for goodness sake... well there were yesterday, maybe the frost did them in...

Anyway, we have a lot to do to get ready for winter and we haven't even started. Mostly we have to winterize our vehicles and get the snow-tires back on... it feels like we just took them off! We have to finish off the shed so we can clear out the garage so that we could actually park in there. We need to finish outfitting the kids in winter gear... we have gloves and boots for them but they will need new snow pants and possibly jackets.

So we have a lot to do and potentially, very little time to do it... lets just hope it isn't such a brutal winter as last year!

The Weather Tales...

The weather up here is always interesting and it is often in the extreme category. Extremely cold mostly. But right now, as the seasons are beginning to change from summer to fall the weather seems confused. For the most part we have been having beautiful fall days, mid to high twenties during the day and cooling off at night, perfect for playing outside and enjoying the end of summer vacation.

But this morning we were socked in with fog and I thought it was going to be a cool day, a day for pants. Yet now in the afternoon it is lovely and warm, until a cloud goes in front of the sun and then the temperature drops 5 degrees! A few days ago we had a major thunder and lightning storm, it was absolutely awesome... not to mention right over top of us! The light show started in the early evening with constant lightning but completely without sound. By 11pm it was still constant but now it was HERE and loud and woke me up from a sound sleep... I swear it must have landed right beside us! The house literally shook.

Something tells me we are not in for the beautiful, prolonged fall that we had last year but whatever kind of fall it is going to be, it has started.

Next...

I haven't been posting on here at all for a while, I had come to a cross-road with this site. When I started this blog it was about moving. First the decision to move and then the preparation for the move, the move itself and then for our transition into our new home and town. But a year passed and I wasn't getting any "inspiration" to write... we had explored our area and come to accept it as home, and home wasn't what this blog was about.

However, lately I have been thinking "oh, that would be a good story" again, so perhaps this blog isn't quite done yet. I expect the posts will still be sporadic, but hopefully I will feel inspired to share them.

My push to write today is that last night, hubby was taking the dog out before we went to bed and he came in quite quickly and called for me to come out. We finally got to see the northern lights. They weren't really bright, they were quite dim actually, but we still got to see them and that was something we have been anticipating since we moved up here. So he went and woke up Maria, because I had promised her that if ever I see them I would get her up... apparently they weren't as exciting as she was expecting (they actually dimmed down even more while she was watching) because she soon asked to go back to sleep, but she saw them!

So, we have had another milestone for us up here and I expect there will be others for me to write about as well.

Where has the time gone??

I can't believe it is the end of May... I totally missed my "one year anniversary" of living up here (it was April 30th) and here we are exactly one month later! I think this is a sign of contentment... things aren't new and unusual up here anymore, urging me to write about it on my blog. Now, life just is.

We haven't been sitting around on our bums though, we have been busy, as per usual. We have had hubby's family come and stay with us, we have had a few birthday parties for Allan (my baby is FIVE!). We attended the trade fair here in FSJ, which was huge and very well put on... the kids had a lot of fun checking everything out, getting treats and seeing friends.

We have also had some friends move to town from Ladysmith. They have also been affected by the demise of the forest industry on Vancouver Island and have come up here to work, so I am looking forward to having a friend who is MY friend.

We also were shown how to find the Charlie Lake Caves by the daughter of a friend. These caves have no signage to speak of and are wide open for anyone to explore, which is pretty impressive considering the following statement taken from the Virtual Museum Canada:

Charlie Lake Cave


Charlie Lake Cave is located in the Peace River area in northeastern British Columbia. The site contains evidence of a series of temporary occupations, spanning the last 11,000 years.

The lowest (earliest) level of the site contained several stone artifacts, including a fluted point, six retouched flakes and a small stone bead. This level has been dated to 10,770±120 years BP. Associated animal remains included bison, snowshoe hare, large hare, ground squirrel and fish. The bison bones exhibited cut marks that researchers believe were created by humans using stone tools. Charlie Lake Cave is the only archaeological site in Canada in which fluted point tools and associated animal remains have been found in an undisturbed context.

So we have settled in to life up here and we have started some of the habits of those who live up here (i.e. we have bought a travel trailer and a quad!). We are still exploring new things up here and enjoying finding things to see. This summer we have plans to use our travel trailer and discover whatever we can within the nearby areas. Ao I hope to keep in touch on here, but it may be sporadic!

Spring

Walking around Stump Lake in Squamish with Nana & Grandad

The last two weeks have been spring break for Maria so we took advantage of the time off to go back to Squamish and the Island to catch up on some overdue visits and for Allan's yearly check-up with the cardiologist. It turns out that two weeks is not long enough to see everyone, but we managed to see many of our much missed family and friends.

Getting in the good books with the Easter Bunny...

Having a lovely visit with Granny Green brought the unexpected surprise of more cousins!

Our trip to Squamish was wonderful, it is funny how we have come full-circle now that we have left the Island. For so long after leaving Squamish, we couldn't stand going back to town because of all of the changes and building that was never-ending. We loved seeing our families and friends, but it was hard to see the town itself, it was no longer our home-town. Now that we have left the Island and moved up North, we can see the beauty of Squamish again, it still isn't "home" but it isn't so disturbing to see the changes... maybe because it really isn't home anymore? (anyway, I side-track) We had a wonderful visit with everyone we managed to see while in Squamish and we enjoyed the lack of snow.

Maria stopped by at her old school during lunch hour to see some of her old friends, then we went to Transfer Beach after school to meet up with more friends... it is always fun to throw rocks

Our visit on Saltspring with my Sister and her family was great fun!

We left for the Island after a week and managed to see so many people and had such wonderful visits, it really was awesome on the Island too. We managed to get to Salt Spring to see my sister and her family, visit my other sister and family in Ladysmith as well as most of our friends, we visited much of our family in Duncan and managed to join in on the annual easter egg hunt which was great fun. We also spent one day in Victoria after Allan's Dr. appointment (which was excellent) and we went to the Royal BC Museum and watched an Imax movie... so it was VERY busy, but so wonderful.

We had a great time at the museum

We saw an otter on our walk out on the breakwater

The easter egg hunt was awesome... even if it was pouring rain!

Then to top off a wonderful trip, we arrived back in Fort St John to spring... the snow is almost completely gone and it is warm. Ahh spring, I have missed you!

Our trip home was good... but a little over-stuffed!

A lot has happened in a year

It occurred to me the other day that it was over a year ago when hubby and I flew up here to look at houses and look through the school - and I suppose when I started this blog. The picture at the top of this blog was taken in early March...

We hadn't moved up here yet, one year ago, but we were gearing up to it, and all the panic and depression that ensues during that kind of upheaval. I have some friends who are going through the exact same thing as we did a year ago, and I feel for them. That was the hardest part. I have been trying to help them as much as I can, but there is only so much I can do... time does the most and I must say that after almost one year up here, as much as I complain about the weather... life is so very much easier now and I am thankful for being where we are.