Jan 3rd to 7th

The weather has been nice, a bit of cloud, temps 54F (12C) Monday to 70 (21C) today (Friday).

Monday I delivered our card to Lenore and Mike, Lenore was not home and Mike said he wanted to wait to open the card until Lenore came home which I certainly understood and thought it was very thoughtful of Mike. Other than ordering a couple of knife blanks for Woody, and the usual daily things like walking the dogs, cleaning, etc., there is not much to report.

Tuesday I was very proud of myself, I took the dogs for a walk on the trails in the desert and managed to walk a full mile, that is a first for me in just about a year, (since I have been having issues with my hip), it sure felt good to walk without any major pain. I hope that means that my hip is slowly healing. Other than doing some major cleaning and working on the blog that is about all I accomplished. Woody keeps busy with his leather projects, he is working on a belt for himself which I urged him to do, nothing like wearing your own creation, he is also working on items for Wild TV which is presenting some challenges for him. Leather is not forgiving, one slight wrong move and the project is garbage, he at least can use the scraps of leather to practice on, so not all is lost and it is the only way to learn. I ordered another knife blank for him today so once they arrive he will be a busy boy!

Wednesday the highlight of my day was a visit from Mike and Lenore, they dropped over to thank me for the card, and they are such thoughtful sweet people. Lenore invited me to go “Street Walking” in Tombstone, I laughed saying that did not sound good, but of course what she meant is window shopping with some of the swimming gang, I thanked her but declined, walking is still an issue as I found out on my morning walk with the dogs, it would have been fun otherwise, some of the girls made themselves costumes so they will fit into the 1880’s look. Many people dress up in Tombstone so you fit right in. Woody made a trip to the gun range with his buddy Rolly to do some shooting; they left around 1:30 and got home around 5:00, almost late for “Miller time”! The weather was perfect for shooting, no wind although Woody said it was a little chilly at the range, and he had to put a jacket on. This is the first time they went to the range this winter but I am sure they will go again before the winter is over.

Thursday was a busy day, we dropped the dogs at the groomers at 10:00 am while they were getting all pretty and clean we did some shopping. After picking them up at 1:30 pm we came home took them for a walk and settled them at home then went to visit with Cheri Saunders who had invited us over for snacks, etc. Cheri is the owner of Blue Opal since her business partner and friend Mike passed away about 5 months ago. We met Mike our first year here and became friends and were very sad to hear he had passed away which we found out shortly after our arrival when Woody stopped over at Blue Opal to say “Hello”. We visited until around 5:00 pm and while there Cheri offered Woody some Mother of Pearl for Woody “to play around with to see if he could incorporate it into some of his leather pieces” (in her words). Woody was surprised and pleased with her generous offer and thanked her excitedly. After dinner Woody worked some on designing some leather projects, incorporating the Mother of Pearl, I did a little work on posts for the blog until Cookie started whining and looking so sad, she wanted to sit on my lap, she really hates it when she doesn’t get her lap time, yeah she is spoiled but how can I resist when she looks up at me with her sad brown googly eyes. When she was just a small puppy I really spoiled her by letting her sit on my lap while I worked on the computer, she is too big now to do that but of course she doesn’t know that so I shut down the computer and watched a little TV with her and Muffin in my lap, not a bad way to finish off the day!

Today our friends Dale, Janice and the boys flew back to Alberta from Tucson, hope they had a good trip, will have to email them and see how the rest of their trip went and find out what they had a chance to explore in Phoenix and Tucson.

Friday was a nice day 70F (21C), sunny with some wispy high cloud floating around and some wind. Not much to report, we did not even go to the Jam Session at the park in the evening, this is first time we have chosen to not attend since 2008 and only the second time we missed a Jam Session, we choose to go and see Johnny Bencomo at the Landmark Café a few weeks ago instead. Woody worked on a belt buckle for himself incorporating a few Mother of Pearl gems, it did not turn out as nice as we both anticipated, the design on paper looked good but somehow did not look real attractive on the leather a little disappointing but he is not deterred, will try something different with the Mother of Pearl after giving some more thought to the design. I will post a picture of the buckle after Woody completes one to his satisfaction.

A sad day

Last night was the coldest night we have experienced here, might have been a record at 13F (-10.5C) but today has turned into a very nice day, sunny 54F (+12C) with little wind. We decided to bath Muffin much to her displeasure; she behaves but does not appreciate a bath. I sit and hold her wrapped in towels for awhile after her bath, and by the time we finish bathing her we have many wet towels so after lunch Woody takes them to the laundry. While at the laundry our friend Lenore comes over to tell Woody that she and Mike had to put down their beloved dog, Danny a beautiful reddish brown dog about the size of a golden retriever, he looks like a retriever except for the colour and is taller. They have had Danny for a long time and of course Lenore and Mike were broken hearted and I cannot blame them, Danny was such a well mannered, even tempered dog that loved life. They took him to the vet today and found out he had liver cancer, and just 13 days ago he had walked 6 miles with Mike on a desert hike. This morning he was visibly sick, didn’t want to eat or drink and was just lying around, he could not jump into the truck and normally he jumps in, loves to go for a ride, by the time they got him to the vet they had to take him in on a stretcher. The vet did some tests right away and found the cancer, what liver cancer does is compact the blood vessels so Danny was hemorraging inside and there was nothing that could be done. I created a sympathy card for them with a small picture of Danny and with the card I printed out a copy of the poem “The Rainbow Bridge”. For those of you who have not heard about Rainbow Bridge I am including the poem here as I think it is very beautiful and healing to read while grieving for a beloved pet.

The Rainbow Bridge

By the edge of a woods, at the foot of a hill,

Is a lush, green meadow where time stands still.

Where the friends of man and woman do run,

When their time on earth is over and done.

For here, between this world and the next,

Is a place where each beloved creature finds rest.

On this golden land, they wait and they play,

Till the Rainbow Bridge they cross over one day.

No more do they suffer, in pain or in sadness,

For here they are whole, their lives filled with gladness.

Their limbs are restored, their health renewed,

Their bodies have healed, with strength imbued.

They romp through the grass, without even a care,

Until one day they start, and sniff at the air.

All ears prick forward, eyes dart front and back,

Then all of a sudden, one breaks from the pack.

For just at that instant, their eyes have met;

Together again, both person and pet.

So they run to each other, these friends from long past,

The time of their parting is over at last.

The sadness they felt while they were apart,

Has turned into joy once more in each heart.

They embrace with a love that will last forever,

And then, side-by-side, they cross over… together.

Author Unknown

This poem surely invokes tears but tears are a large part of the healing process, I believe one should let them flow freely while grieving the loss of a beloved pet that has become a noble, loving faithful friend as well as a wonderful pet. We have lost dogs and know it is not easy and a piece of our heart is always with the dog. I will not deliver the card and poem until tomorrow, giving them their private time today. Our prayers, thoughts and love are with you Lenore and Mike.

New Years Day

The day dawned cool with clear skies 24F (-4C), high of 42F (+5C) with a bit of a breeze, I did not sleep well last night due to overeating last night so did not rise until around 10:00 am, Woody was up much earlier and of course greeted me with “Good Afternoon”, to which I replied “Happy New Year! I love you too”, he cannot help tease me when I sleep in and if I didn’t retort back he would be disappointed. We spent the first part of day quietly doing what we do everyday and Woody cooked a great brunch then around 2:30 pm or so some friends arrived at our door unexpectedly, what a wonderful surprise, friends from our home in Alberta, Dale, Janice and the two boys Braden and Jason. They had talked about coming down over the Christmas holidays for a visit but we had not heard a word from them regarding the visit so we thought they had changed their mind, in fact we had just talked about it the day before commenting with the unusual cold weather here it was probably good they had not come this year.

Janice teased Woody right away about telling them the weather was warm, she said it was warmer in Alberta when they left than when they arrived in Tucson on Thursday. We visited for a time and then Woody took Dale, Janice and boys on a tour of the park, showing them the facilities and introducing them to a few of our friends that happened to be at the clubhouse. I stayed home, I knew walking back to the fifth wheel (a pretty good incline) would be an issue, my hip still does not like me, and I would just slow them down. Being able to share our winter home with some folks from home was such a feeling, no words can describe the feeling or how happy we were to see them. Dale and Janice wanted to take us for dinner and as they had been to Bisbee and Tombstone already we choose to go to the Texas Road House in Sierra Vista. We had not been to the Texas Road House in Sierra Vista previously but had eaten a couple of times at the Texas Road House while in Ohio, we had forgotten how noisy it was but we had a good visit in spite of the noise.

Janice and Dale headed back to Tombstone; we returned feeling blessed to have such good friends that provided us an opportunity to share a bit of our winter home. We tried to talk them into staying a day to visit the Kartchner Caverns but they will head to Phoenix we think, Dale really wants to see as much of the area as possible in their short trip. Safe trip home guys, thank you so much for the visit.

The gang at Texas Road House!

New Years Eve

Today is cloudy, could not see the mountains at all until late afternoon, we did not get the predicted snow but it sure did cool down, high was 39.9F (4C) and low 23.5F (-5C), which was warmer than predicted and it will start warming up tomorrow climbing back into the normal temps which are 60F to 69F (15 to 20C) next week.

We went out for dinner with a group of friends from the park to Bonanza Pizza House just outside Tombstone, AZ. A neat little restaurant that allows their patrons to bring their own liquor as they do not have a liquor license not a practice that would be allowed in Alberta as far as we know. The restaurant was aptly named, quoted off the menu “Bonanza in the 1800’s meant a rich vein of ore, whether that was gold, silver or copper. At Bonanza Pizza House you can expect that same feeling of discovering the food is rich in flavour and the portions are enough to feed any hungry miner.” The restaurant lived up to its name; the food is hand made from scratch, huge portions and very tasty. All the pizza dishes are created with their unique “Beer crust”, it is very tasty without tasting doughy, we all very much enjoyed the food, the friendly service and of course there is nothing better than enjoying fine food with good friends.

Deciding what to eat, the menu is not large but it all looks good!








The Hughes clan, Jane and Dennis (our friends from Ontario) facing the camera and Mark and Georgane Hughes, they are not related in any way and not from Canada, it just happened that Mark and Georgane are neighbors of Jane and Dennis at the park. Sorry Georgane if I have spelled your name incorrectly.






Our waitress and in the background, Gary and Carol from North Dakata and yours truly. You can get an idea as to the size of the restaurant, there are 4 tables that will seat six and 1 table that seats two.








Visiting while waiting for our food.













Jen and Mike from Ontario, Mike and Lenore from Wisconsin.












Indulging, Woody and I both ordered Pizza Calzone, pizza ingredients wrapped in the beer crust and deep fried, not greasy at all and just enough dough to hold it all together, something different we have never seen on a menu and it was very good.











The gentleman in the hat is the cook whom we asked to meet and thank personally.


Just after returning home we received a phone call from friends we had met here the first year asking where we were, they were at the clubhouse New Years Eve gathering and wondered why we were not there, this was a total surprise as they had arrived late the night before and we had no idea they were at the park. We hurried down to the clubhouse where we were warmly greeted with hugs by Mark, Annette and their son Bret, wow it was so great to see them again as the last time we saw them was in Las Cruces, NM (where they reside) on our trip home in spring of 09. What a wonderful end to 2010!

Two more sleeps until 2011

The day started out sunny but soon turned to cloud and rain around 9:00 am with temps dropping during the day which was predicted, we even had a snow shower this afternoon, big flakes and did not last long, winds pretty much same as yesterday.

Besides doing the normal daily chores, we decided it was a day to stay indoors, I spent most of the day learning to use some of the features offered on Pinnacle Movie Studio Plus that I have not used with video clips, some are pretty cool and others allow creating a more interesting video and I must say I have only scratched the surface of features that are available on the version I have.

Woody was not happy with the leather project he was working on yesterday (a gun sling) so after giving some thought to how he could create the pattern along with the braiding he wants to incorporate on the gun sling he spent some time working on other projects and started a new gun sling this afternoon. As I type this he just wrapped it up and put it in the fridge (to keep the leather moist) and told me he is not satisfied with this one either, not good enough to sell, I feel his disappointment and I feel bad for him, I know what that feels like, work so hard on a project and then it just doesn’t work out the way you think it should be. On the positive side he received an order for a knife and sheath from his website, the first order generated from the website, now that is exciting! He now has 3 knives and sheaths to make, should keep him busy for a few weeks eh! The day passed very quickly, the second last day of the year, cannot hardly believe another year has passed! Have a safe and happy New Years Eve day tomorrow!

Cooler today

We are losing our nice warm weather for a few days, it started out sunny today but clouded up and the wind is blowing, gusting to 50 MPH (80 KPH) and is now raining, high today was 59F (15C). Snow is predicted for tomorrow and it will stay cool until after New Year’s in fact New Years Eve the low is supposed to be 18F (-7C) and that is cold for this area, the record low for tonight in this area is 19F in 1988 maybe there will a new record. No frost for tonight but we prepared just in case filling our water tank and unhooking the water hose, you never know as we are at 4000 ft here. Should start warming up again Tuesday so this cold snap will be short lived and it is not a big deal except for the higher elevations, they are expecting about 7 inches of snow accumulation. We had snow here last year three times and it melted by 1l:00 am, the first on December 23^rd so we expect a little snow from now until maybe mid January or early February.

I updated Woody’s website today did some cleaning and did not do much else. Woody worked on a leather project plus did some needed shopping and not much else; yeah you could say we are being lazy!

Here are a couple of items he completed before Christmas, the belt buckle and a picture, both created for gift s. H e neglected to take pictures of the other items he completed and sold. BAD BOY! LOL

The Maple Leaf is hand cut and is mounted on a hand stamped leather piece surrounded by a mat and framed in a Shadow Box frame. The picture does not due this creation justice, it really is beautiful.

Hope you had a great day!

A Challenge with Blogger

Oh man I am frustrated with the Google blogger that I use to create this blog. I have spent days trying to post our Christmas Eve blog post. As you can see the post is still not correct, the fonts are two different sizes. After trying to fix the post I deleted the whole post, pictures and all, recreated the post and still the font blogger insists on using for the beginning of the post is too large. I changed the font size several times, saved the post and then published it and no difference, so I am giving up and leaving it just the way you see it and basically I am doing this post to see what font size will appear when I publish this post. Oh yeah, I tried the new editor that Google offers and the old editor, no difference except for the picture uploading. Blah!!!!

Okay this post published, no issues, now I will add a picture just for fun to see what happens!

No problem, looks okay, hmmmmm. I don't know what is going on with the Christmas Eve post. Maybe I will get brave and try publishing the Christmas Day post.

Well I just deleted the Christmas Day post, same problem cannot get the format to work properly, the first sentence I typed was underlined, there is no option for underlining, so I tried to remove all formatting, did not work. I uploaded the pictures first and then tried to write the post, not happening! Not sure what I will try next. Hope you have had a great day!

Christmas Day

As mentioned in our Dec 24^th post, we attended the Christmas Day Pot Luck and Gift Exchange today as always it was fun and the food was fantastic. We spent time visiting before dinner was served, after dinner participated in Carol singing and last but surely not least the gift exchange.



The best dressed man at the dinner!







































Right is Pooch and wife Donna, Pooch led the Christmas Carolling after dinner.

















Right is Wayne and Robin, Wayne is the gentlemen who introduced Woody to leather craft.























Right - Martha (Santa's Elf) and Anne (Mrs. Santa) directed the gift exchange.










Lenore and Mike enjoying the gift exchange shenanigans.














Right, Roger and Judy, new friends this year, we were so happy to see them as they have down and out with the flu for weeks.







Left Jane opening her gift, a very good adult beverage, which she later lost when someone stole it but at the end of the exchange she ended up with it.









The gift I opened was a cookie can filled with various sizes of batteries, what a clever gift, I lost it before Woody could get a picture!












Woody opened this awesome screw driver set which no one stole, we were surprised but happy to take it home!










Right, Bonnie has a gel seat cover for a bike, which has circulated for 2 years now. She traded it off and eventually the seat ended up with Jen who really wanted it, so guess it won't reappear next year!


After the gift exchange came the "Awards", the park has a contest for decorated sites and some winter residents do a fantastic job decorating their sites. We do put up a few outdoor lights, some bows and garland and received along with other folks in the park a "Participation Award" which we thought was awesome.

Below park Managers are recognizing and thanking the Camp Workers, Volunteers and our Activity Directors, these folks deserve thanks for sure, they all do an awesome job!



























Donna surprised us and other friends of she and Pooch with wine glasses that she hand painted with a hand made dish cloth tucked inside, what an awesome gift. Donna and Pooch's daughter (Shannon) and family came down to the park from Illinois this year to spend Christmas here and became part of our swim group, Shanon gave every one in the swim group a hand made little Christmas towel, so very thoughtful, thank you both!




Last I thought I would add a couple of pics of our humble Christmas Tree. We so enjoyed our Christmas Day with friends at our Winter home!
Happy New Year all!

Christmas Eve

During the day we prepared our contribution to the Christmas Pot Luck at the clubhouse tomorrow. The park provides coffee, water, juice, a ham, potatoes and other trimmings, everyone who attends brings their favourite dish and whatever they wish to drink (other than the above mentioned beverages) nothing better and we usually overeat which is a tradition at Christmas eh! After dinner there will be carol singing and a gift exchange, everyone who wishes to participate in the gift exchange brings a wrapped gift for the exchange, then we pick a card from the deck of cards, the activity director at the park then picks a card from another deck and when you card is called you can pick a gift from under the tree or steal someone else’s gift. The gifts can only change hands twice as otherwise the gift exchange could go on all night. The whole evening is a lot of fun, especially the gift exchange, there are always the favourite gifts and the comedy type gifts, and we love it!

In the evening we attended our friend’s (Jane and Dennis from Ontario) Christmas Eve Buffet along with other friends Mike and Lenore from Wisconsin and Mike and Jen from Ontario. The buffet and company were awesome, we had a wonderful evening and we could not have wished for a better Christmas Eve. Jane baked a Tourtiere Meat Pie which is a tradition for their family and is a traditional Quebec dish which many Ontario residents have adopted.

The girls, Lenore, Jane, Patsy and Jen!

The buffet was complete with a delicious French bread, veggies and of course dessert. Before the buffet we were treated to snacks and home baked Christmas cookies along with some adult beverages.

Dennis and Mike

Mike and Mike, Mike on the left is Jen's husband and Mike on the right is Lenore's husband, just so you don't think I made a mistake eh!

Thank you Jane and Dennis for inviting us and hosting a wonderful evening.

Enjoying our winter

As I type this, my beloved husband is working on a leather project (I am hearing some frustration on his part, muttering and such) but I know he will figure out a way to solve the issues he is encountering, he always does. He has completed and sold a few belt buckles and a cell phone case since we arrived, he is now working on creating a matching set consisting of a belt buckle, belt, knife, knife sheath and gun sling.

I have been keeping busy, creating cards, doing water exercise with some ladies at the park, decorating our little home for Christmas, cleaning out our files, keeping up our daily expense record (blah) and other mundane chores LOL. We both are enjoying our winter of relaxation, visiting, attending park functions and just doing whatever we feel like when the mood hits us. One thing I have not done at all is work on our blog, just cannot seem to get my mind into, not sure why, I know I will be kicking myself later if I don’t get myself in gear. I have checked the blog often for bits and pieces of information, dates etc., from our previous trips. Our idea when I began the blog was to keep our family and friends updated on our activities and for us to enjoy when we are unable to continue living this lifestyle and settle down in a Seniors Apartment.

The puppies are healthy and mischievous at times, the other day while we were shopping they got into the candy dish that was on the table, there were several candy wrappers on the floor and small bits of candy stuck in their face fur, so last night when we went to the Landmark Café, we placed the candy dish on the counter, when we returned they had snagged the beautiful hand embroidered, with tatted edging (hand done by my Great Grandmother) off the table and chewed up the tatting, totally wrecking it, this is the worst thing they have ever done! We had pushed the chairs under the table and thought this would keep them from snagging anything on the table, WRONG! We will tip the chairs over the table after this as we don’t want them snagging our little Christmas tree that sits on the table, decorated with new and some very old decorations that were my Dad’s. Oh yeah and then to add insult to injury they upchucked the lace tatting, the little devils! They do have toys to play with but guess that was too boring!

Muffin above and Cookie below,
can't you just see how sorry they are! LOL

Glad to be settling down

Spent the day getting things set up which entails digging out the items that we pack up while travelling, setting up my computer desk, emptying tanks and filling water tank, setting up the dish and requesting a satellite change via phone, we cannot use the same satellite that we use in Alberta, some cleaning (travelling is a dirty business) the windows on the road side of the rig are so dirty we can hardly see through them from driving on wet roads but will wait until another day, we do not have that much ambition today, dusting and vacuuming will suffice for today. The dogs are great, it will take them a few days to realize that we are staying here, they let me know when I take them for walks that are thinking it is another travel day as they keep an eye on the truck if Woody is not with us, as I always walk them just before we leave a campground while Woody hooks up the rig, so when I start walking they keep looking back to see if the truck is going to move. The campground is not in as good shape as previous years and there are many stickers and such around, the poor puppies get them stuck in their feet and face. The one type of sticker is easy to pull out but the other one is sticky and has to be cut out; these get stuck in their fur. We spoke to Charlie (work camper and friend here) he said they just couldn’t keep up this summer due to the many monsoon rains here and Charlie says if they unable to keep the wild grasses and weeds cut they go to seed and then the only way to rid the ground of these pesky items is to burn them with a torch, raking does not help much. I try to keep the dogs on the road which is clean but of course the dogs seem to find any sticker that found its way onto the road. It is a beautiful warm day and we spent a good part of it just relaxing, well I spent the day mostly at home and Woody ventured out for some visiting, big surprise there eh! LOL. Some of our friends arrived earlier and of course Jim and Anne (Activity Coordinators here) stay the year around. Life is good!

The rest of the trip

I am going to fast forward the rest of the trip, did not take any pictures as we have many pictures along the way from previous trips. From Lewistown we travelled to Hardin, Mt. the shortest day of our trip, from there to Wheatland, WY, seeing snow on the hills and sometimes right up to the highway but lucky we have not had to drive in any snow. There was snow on the ground in the campground at Wheatland and it is very cool but roads are good. From Wheatland we drove to Pueblo West, CO and happy not to see snow in this area as we had hit some snow driving over Monument Pass, lucky it was cold enough so the snow was blowing around and not sticking to the road, we are still wearing our heavy fall coats. We were happy to leave the snow behind and drop into the desert. We planned to stay a couple of nights in Pueblo West to visit Charlie and Dawn, but ended up staying 4 days, had to replace the tires on our fifth wheel. Woody noticed a bulge on one tire so changed all four. The tires had to be ordered and then the Mobile Service came to the campground and took tires off the tire shop to make the change. We have used this Mobile Service previously and know they are reliable and good so not a bad place to have the tires changed. Also gave us more of a chance for visiting and we do love visiting Charlie and Dawn, you just don’t find friends like them everywhere. From Pueblo West we trekked over Raton Pass (no snow at all) to Santé Fe, NM spending the night, dropping into Albuquerque (Santa Fe is at 7000 ft.) on our way to Deming, NM we are seeing trees with some fall colours but still many trees are sporting their summer green leaves, what a beautiful sight, we take the shortcut (Hatch Hwy #26) and arrive at Deming, NM which lies in the wide open desert with the always present mountains in the background, it is warm and windy, we only spend one night, arriving at Tombstone Territories Park November 21^st our 2200+ mile (3600 km) trip at an end. We actually did not require any jacket at Deming and it was beautiful drive albeit quite windy the last 3 days of our trip and I so love travelling through Texas Canyon on I-10, it is such a unique area, awesome formations of rock along with some mountains rising up out of the desert. We are tired but elated and feel so blessed to have arrived safely.

Trekking South, Day Two

A good day of travel, crossing the border took a little more time than usual (they were very busy) but no issues at all. After travelling through some fairly flat grassland in northern Montana the landscape changes to small mountain ranges, which we know continues for the remainder of the trip. The whole trip is really beautiful driving up, down around the mountains and hills, dropping into valleys with mountains of various sizes, some covered with various vegetation from grasses, bushes and dotted with trees to bare volcanic rock and some are major outcroppings with very interesting rock formations. We travel through Great Falls where we change to Hwy 87 to travel east to Lewistown, MT, finding our way to the Hwy 87 interchange, this has always been a challenge, our GPS wants to take us on the wrong exit and the route is not well marked at all, but we made it, I was smart this trip and I marked on our road map the correct exit number to take or easiest route through Great Falls. We always use a road map as well as the GPS because you cannot always trust the GPS directions. We arrived at Lewistown late afternoon with plenty of time to set up, relax and enjoy our evening.

The Castle is Rolling

Started our trek south today, weather is nice, cool but sunny with little wind.  We drove straight through to Milk River, AB (about 650 Km or 403 mi) and for us with stops for puppy walks and a quick fuel stop about an 8 hour trek.  We purchased a small extra fuel tank this summer so we could make this leg of our trip without having to fuel up at a regular gas station as there are not many options to get a big rig like ours into a gas station along this route which means we have to stop unhook the rig then fuel up and hook up again. Pulling the rig on a good day 500 km is about our limit.  We also wanted the extra tank so we didn’t have to sweat bullets about fuel as we have done on previous trips wondering if we will be able to make our next stop if we run into windy conditions as there are areas we drive through on the trek south that do not have any services for miles.  Milk River is about 20 km (12 miles) from the border so it puts us a good position to cross the border and reach our next destination in good time.  We are never sure how much time we might have to spend at the border, depends on how busy they are and if they decide to check the rig, etc.  We always like to leave lots of time for border crossing either direction we travel.  The campground at Milk River (Under Eight Flags) is a nice clean small campground and reasonably priced.  Wi-Fi and cable are not available at this campground so we hope the weather is good tomorrow, it did look good when we checked before we left this morning so if the sun is shinning when we get up we will be on the road early. 

Halloween

The only visitors we had were Chris, Michelle, Caitlin and her friend which is usual for us since being at Imrie Park, it is in a rural area and most people that know we are still here do not have kids that would be out for trick or treats! We always buy some treats in case we have visitors we would not want to be embarrassed besides we can always enjoy the leftovers and/or share them with whomever drops in the next few days, they won’t last long as Woody has a huge sweet tooth eh! The weather was pretty nice for here, no snow, high today was 52F (11C) but it cools off big time at night with a couple of degrees below freezing predicted for tonight.








Caitlin (right) and her friend.















Michelle, you can tell it is a little cool everyone is wearing heavy jackets.













Chris is hiding out behind the girls.



We are very happy that Chris and Michelle make the effort to bring Caitlin over, this will probably be the last year for her to trick and treat, she is getting to that age when she will be considered too old to go out trick and treating!

Hello friends

Just a quick update to say I am sorry I have not been faithful regarding posting news on our blog. I have several excuses, yeah I know there is not an excuse in the world that is good enough eh! We are enjoying our time here in Alberta for sure visiting family and friends, looking after the park, etc. A couple of major projects have been eating up my time that I would usually spend working on the blog. The first one was my website, the host I am using lost everything even the back up of my website, so I had to start over building it all again, still not finished with that. The second project is building Woody a website to display his knife and leather craft items; that is still an ongoing project and I have made his website a priority as people are asking if he has a website. If you want a sneak peek at the unfinished website check it out here: http://woodysknifeandleathercraft.com. Not sure how much time I will be able to spend over the next month as our friend Dave Rice from Pennsylvania is here for a month visiting, he and Woody will do some bow hunting starting Sept. 8th (season opening day) so wish them Good Luck! Dave arrived August 28th and we are having an awesome visit! I cannot believe how fast the time is flying by, it will be no time until we are heading south.
Hope you are all having a great summer and living each day to the fullest!

Woody is busy

The last post I ended with the question “Why is Woody so busy?” so better answer the question. After the Huntfest ended he had a lot of catching up to do around the park, is working on some leather projects one being a knife sheath for our daughter Deb, she left the knife here while visiting earlier and is waiting patiently for Woody to complete a new sheath and another knife sheath which was ordered via email from a person who saw his work at the Huntfest.

Deb's knife sheath.




















Old sheathe with knife and accessories

















Front view, old and new.













Back view, note the pockets for the accessories.

I think the finished product is awesome!

Storm

Couple of weeks ago we had a horrendous thunder storm with strong winds, some hail, heavy rain, loud claps of thunder, and a gorgeous display of lightening, the park had water laying in every low spot and took a couple of days to dissipate. Besides knocking our internet dish off kilter, the park was without power for 4 hours, we were happy we had a generator and felt bad for all the folks in tents, it was the worst storm we have witnessed at the park. The campers in RV's that did not have generators at least had their 12 volt lights, water, etc. There is a hand pump that campers can use if they require water during power outages as our main water system requires power to run the pump as in all rural water system applications. No damage occurred at the park other than some trees falling in the bush and on the hiking trails and all campers were safe. During the next few days the weather was unsettled, with rain showers and because the dish is sensitive to the weather I did not think much of it when I was unable to download email at times, or while trying to access some websites they would time out before successfully loading, this is normal as our signal is not good here at the park, we are on the cusp of the satellite footprint. I decided after a few days that something was not right as I was experiencing these issues on clear days. I restarted the modem as this is always the first thing to try when issues arise with our setup, seemed to help some, but then the next day while trying to download email I watched the modem transmit lights, they were completely blanking out, not normal! Okay dish must be out of whack, we will have to retune. I was also wondering if the trees were causing grief as we had to mount our TV dish higher to get a decent signal earlier this summer due to tree interference. Woody had noticed also that he was having trouble downloading email, etc., and said he could raise the dish about 6 inches and retune it, well it took awhile before he had the time to accomplish the task, in fact we finally got it tuned properly today after trying a couple of days ago but got interrupted before we really had it tuned properly. Why is Woody so busy? Well you will see in another post! EH

Awesome Weekend

The Huntfest was a success, not just for Wild TV but also for Woody, he received awesome feedback, promising contacts and generally the whole experience was grand. There were some other leather smiths at the Huntfest, one was a saddle maker, and a couple of others with various items, he received very positive feedback from them and receiving positive comments from others in the business is awesome, means a little more than wife and friends telling him he does a great job. He was totally worn out after the three days but very, very happy and excited.

Woody's table at the Huntfest, left you can see 2 of his trophies from Africa. The hides and skull mounts attracted attention plus decorated the table nicely.

Woody did not have many items to display, most items he has created are already in the hands of the person he created it for most were his own items.

Above and right are pictures of the booth beside Woody, these folks had no problem looking after his table when he needed to leave his table.

He hopes to have a table here again next year as well as one at the Cowboy Gathering in Stony Plain and will create some show pieces to display!

Opportunity knocks!

Today is a beautiful day, sunny, warm and a special day it would have been my parents 70th Anniversary, I remember my parents daily, they were both such good people and on this day I remember all the celebrations and special times we were lucky enough to enjoy together.
This weekend Woody is at the Huntfest in Edmonton, a very large trade show sponsored by Wild TV and other companies, (e.g. Cabela’s Canada, Toyota, Alberta Outdoorsmen, Western Sportsmen Magazine to name a few) for hunters, fishers, archers, ATV enthusiasts etc. This show is the biggest one in Canada with shows in Winnipeg, Saskatoon and Edmonton. Check out http//:www.huntfest.ca for more information, there is so much going on at the show with speakers from some popular hunting shows, target areas set up for archers, an ATV track, and more! Woody is displaying his leather crafts at the show and is receiving very positive comments regarding the leather projects on display which does not surprise me at all; his work is unique and very well done. The great thing is the feedback gives him confirmation that it is not just me, his friends, etc., think his work is good but total strangers are impressed, too cool! I created a DVD (which he will run on his computer) of all the items he has created as he only does custom orders so did not have stock items to display, most were his personal items except for a couple that he has yet to deliver, I also created business cards and order forms using the logo we created, he choose the name, I created the logo with the computer, printed it out then he tooled the letters onto leather, it turned out awesome. Woody took pictures of the logo then it was easy to transfer and size for the business card and order form. I love doing that kind of work and Woody loves doing the leather, so together I think we make a good team. Woody took his hides and skull mounts from Africa to decorate his table and create interest. Lucky for me the park is not full this weekend, one group here for a birthday party and Woody made sure everything was set up for them. He had to be there early yesterday, left at 7:00 AM to get set up, returned around 7:30 pm, long day but he was pleased and excited to be part of the show and had some time to talk to other exhibitors, even a couple of outfitters there from Africa who were impressed with his trophies from Africa. Today he left at 9:00 and will return about the same time as last night; tomorrow the show closes at 5:00 pm so will be home a little earlier. Huntfest is a great opportunity for Woody to gain some exposure and feedback for his knife and leather crafts, maybe even some orders, which would be a huge bonus eh. All in all it has been an exciting time for both of us!