Camping!

July 1st - Canada Day and Grant is working today! 1st time ever DEMXX is open on a Stat, so it will be interesting to see what happens.

We were going to head off for the long weekend yesterday, but (a) I just didn't get everything ready in time, and (b) I had a splitting headache and there was no way I could have managed it! Anyhow, Grant 'got' a campsite at Englishman River Prov. Park yesterday morning, for 4 nights, so we've agreed that he will come home from work as usual and then he will drive the motorhome and I will drive the van. Had planned on taking my car, but Amanda's red car seems to be sick so I've let her use mine for work etc. We'll get her car in either on Monday or Sunday to see what the problem is and hopefully fix it.

On Tuesday night our realtor came over and we lowered the price of the house - a huge price reduction - from $487k down to $450k. We definitely should get some action at this price. If we hadn't gone away this weekend we would still have plenty to do, so we will need to work hard during the week next week.

Weather - well, definitely not very summery! Last I looked at the thermometer it was just barely 10deg! The whole weekend is forecast to be like this, BUT next week we are supposed to get HOT weather - what a change.

I've got a lot of what needs to go into the motorhome sorted out, and after my bath I'll start 'loading it'. Luckily we didn't take everything out last summer when we rented it out, but there is still a fair bit of what I consider 'basic camping stuff' that needs to go in. And some of it I need to find! Since there are just the two of us we will need less than we did last summer when we camped with students. Even tho' I'd prefer to take my car, I guess an advantage to the van is that we can throw in some wood to use for campfires. I really don't want to have to buy wood - and we do have some wood stacked on the fire, and 'leftovers' we can use. Even tho we are not supposed to a scavenge for wood too near the park, I'm sure we can find someplace that is far enough away from the park to get some firewood. Since we've done a lot of moving-things in the house I think there may be some things I will have difficulty finding for this camping trip, but I should manage the most important things.

It is a bit sad that this is July 1st and our first camping weekend - but the weather has really not been very nice - and once Grant started having both Saturday and Sunday off we also were doing a lot on the house. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we can do some more camping - with or without guests!

I'll update this with some pictures after we come back.

HOME - Work - etc

Not a very inspired posting title! Oh well, may think up a better one.

I don't usually work on Fridays but will be stopping in to the office for a bit early this afternoon - B. phoned around noon yesterday (My hours were topped out on Wednesday) and said someone from Service Canada called, saying we had been approved for a Canada Summer Job student position and she needed to speak to me asap. I had her phone me, got all the details, then spent the next few hours posting the job on Craigslist, Kijiji, JobBank, and several local websites. I'm rather surprised that I've only received 3 applictions so far! Two meet the basic qualifications (I think) and one appears too old.

I faxed the signed cancellation forms for our offer on the house in Nanaimo, since there appears to be no deal happening imminently for this house. I've emailed our Realtor with a number of possible houses - different prices- and hopefully I'll be able to see some with her next week.

The last several evenings - around dusk - a small herd of deer have wandered through the property. The night before last H. grabbed my camera and took a few pictures, but I think it was too dark by then. Last night they got closer...right around the firepit...so I took a few more. When I get a chance to upload the pictures I'll choose at least one 'good' one to put here. Which reminds me - over the past month or so I've realized how much time I (and I think the rest of the family also) spend looking out the window, and observing nature around us. Right now I have the window open in the den and am enjoying the birds - definitely something we want for the next place.

We have busy times coming up:

• a 16yr old boy from Austria will be with us for 3 weeks late July/early August for Homestay/tutoring/relaxing
• we hope to have some HelpExchange guests soon, hopefully early July
• Grant and I are planning to get away someplace for the July 1st long weekend with the motorhome - which means I must register/insure it, and we should have it serviced
• we will be meeting with our Realtor (for this house) next week and reducing our price
• our contractor Gary will be coming over in the next week or so to remove our defective master bathtub, in preparation for putting in the new one - which Home Depot phoned me this morning to say it is in BC on its way.

Well - plenty to do! And since I need to head out for some groceries etc, along with dropping into the office, I'd better get moving!!

Selling - Moving

Well, I just gave someone the link to this Blog for pictures etc and when I looked at it I realized I hadn't posted anything since December! Definitely time to catch up.

• Ian came home after his last exam at Memorial in December - relaxed and 'caught up' til early January, then started job-hunting. He did several temp-type jobs, then once he was offered a summer camp job he really wanted he concentrated on getting his Bronze Cross Swimming certification and his Class 4 Driver's License. The Class 4 was quite the thing as he still had his N. And he worked really, really hard getting his Bronze Cross. While he was doing that he and I started going to the pool in LS with me doing the Aquafit and him taking private lessons after.
• On Easter Sunday my mom passed away - peacefully in her sleep. She would have been 87 this June. Grant and I visited her the evening before, as the Dr felt she didn't have long left - he thought she had pneumonia. She was well taken care of and we are glad she was not in pain at the end.
• We realized this is definitely the year to finish the house off and move to something smaller. Ian helped a lot, and we found a really great contractor. I advertised in Kijiji for a drywaller after not really liking the estimate we got from a regular business. One fellow was 'ok' but his estimate was still more than what Gary's was, along with wanting us to buy the materials. Gary did not only what we wanted, but a lot more. We are extremely pleased with the work he did. We now have an accepted offer on a house (surprisingly) in central Nanaimo! We had been looking north of town, for something on a small acreage, until I came across this house/property that backs on a small park. We had to have our house listed the Tuesday after we got the accepted offer - which was about April 24th. We now have to have this place unconditionally sold by June 25th to make the deal go thru. Time will tell. This is the link to our house listing: http://www.mls.ca/propertyDetails.aspx?propertyId=9459027
• Other 'event' was my/our car disaster! The station wagon had been 'acting up' back in April, and when I took it to Cdn Tire was told there might be transmission problems, but it shold last for a bit before it needed to be serviced. The following Monday we were in Victoria before taking Ian to Camp when it DIED in the intersection - downtown - in rush hour traffic. Called BCAA - and they towed it all the way up to Steve Marshall Ford that night! We rented a car - took Ian to Camp, then came home. Steve Marshal said it needed a new transmission - anywhere between 3500 and 5000, which didn't make any sense financially. So - a week of car-shopping (ugh!) and ended up buying a car privately from a friend/classmate of Heather's. Bought it for $3800 down from the $4200 she was asking for it. Definitely got took - tho we think it was unintentional on her part. She told me it was a 99 - turns out to be a 97 - VW Golf. And it was not exactly up to what we wanted. I kept it for a couple of weeks, then after a few 'family discussions' and more checking out cars at dealerships found a 2009 Nissan Versa lease at Newcastle Nissan. I dragged Grant there on a Saturday - we took it for a test drive, and ended up buying it on their payment plan. The deal is that we will pay the car off when we sell the house. It is a dream to drive - only has the 'creature comforts' I want/need and nothing more. Really easy on gas, and parks well. Very pleased with it. No more car shopping for a long time I hope!

The weather has been positively awful this past month or two - really hard to believe it is actually June! I turned the heat on this morning - and I'm still wearing layers!

Well I guess I've said enough to catch up for now - will try to be a bit more regular from now on!

title?

Yesterday - just after i got up - Grant called from work saying he'd forgotten his wallet in his 'other jacket' and didn't have enough gas to get home! After I'd done quite a bit on the Windows 7 installation I headed to DEMXX - he wasn't quite ready when i got there are 1:20, but we left around 140 or so and went to the Goats on the Roof Market for lunch. Grant had the Beef Dip and I had the Quiche Special with Salad..mine was on the good side, and his was 'better than ok'. After I took him back to work, then came back to the Market. Amanda phoned when I was there and reminded me of her requests - I also got some bread. I didn't feel like looking thru' any of the shops - but I did go to the Antique Shop and look thru that. Saw a couple of nice furniture pieces, but nothing else I'd eally like. On the way home I came back thru the Parksville, and when I saw the waves coming in to the beach I decided to go down to the oceanside park. The light was just right so I got out of the car and used my Blackberry (!!) to take a few pictures...I've discovered the easy way to take pictures when I'm not expecting to be taking pictures is to use the phone - and then email them back to myself. Right now I have several more Guiding pictures to email...plus a couple more from yesterday...unless there is a way to transfer them over when I'm plugged into the desktop.

Anyhow, the picture I'm putting on this post is one I took of a very full-of-character tree root which has been washed up on the beach for quite some time. it was very windy, making it quite cold. But oh - very beautiful!

December!!!

Wow! tomorrow is the beginning of the 2nd week of December! Busy at work, especially with Wednesday being the Annual General Meeting and Christmas Lunch - Monday I will have to confirm the Driver List, contact Drivers, etc etc!

Yesterday when Amanda and I were in Town we went to Staples and I got a single-computer Upgrade to Windows 7...had them 'match' Costco's price, which means they did $1 less...and I had a $25 Gift Card I'd ordered (2 of) from Airmiles...so the Windows 7 Upgrade which they had at $129 cost me $102 with tax..not bad. I now have it fully installed - other than the odd program which I will install if/when I need it. So far I'm very impressed, and know that I will be wanting to get a 'Family Upgrade' for 3 computers to do the other 3 computers in the family..it seems like it has solved a lot of the Vista /XP probems, plus incorporated a lot of things I (and others) have used other programmes for. I did end up downloading the newest IE7 Pro as I find it works best with Tabs. Took a bit of getting used to getting my 'favorites' as in Google, Weather etc...I had to set them manually at the top.

Anyhow...more later...

Looking forward to December 15th!!!