thanksgiving

We made our usual trip to Caribou Lake for Thanksgiving. The weather was amazing and we had a great time.

Michael also got things together for us to go geocaching, so we tried that out for the first time.

Just before we found our treasure we found this:

Me holding the canister we found.

There was all kinds of interesting things in it, of course I can't remember now what they were.

We ate well as always, got a lot of reading done and did some walking.

It was just what I needed, a well deserved rest!

canning

Our Garden did incredibly well this year! Manitoba had such a wet summer, that we really didn't have to work hard at it either (read: I can remember turning on the garden hose only a handful of times). This year, we decided to try something different with the hot peppers we grew (two years ago we dried them). We pickled them!

I wore latex gloves to do the chopping. By the end the gloves had holes in them. These were hot peppers! Habaneros, chilli, and banana peppers. We even got a few sweet bell peppers from our garden this year (first year we've had success with that).

Then according to what I read online, we blistered the bell peppers to get the skins off (apparently the skin gets really tough).

That's the completed bowl of chopped hot peppers.

The finished product!

Michael says that they are hot! The first time he ate them, his lips turned very red. I won't even try them. I've increased my tolerance of hot food quite a bit since I met Michael but I don't think I'll ever catch up to him!

farming

So last year I helped my boss Roger on the farm for harvest. I really enjoy working on the farm. It ends up being a lot of long hours because after I finish my regular duties in the office at 5 PM I change clothes and head to the field until about 10 to 11 PM on average. It depends on we are doing. We have to stop combining when the dew starts because the straw gets to tuff for the combine to thresh it efficiently. If I am doing field work, like cultivating I can go until I get tired or finish a field. So here are some pictures for you to see.

Roger mans the combine. And I or Travis run the grain cart.

We go out to meet the combine on the field when he needs to dump and travel along side the combine it dumps so the combine never has to stop. This grain cart hold approximately 1 semi load and can be off loaded in less that 3 minutes with the 16 inch auger.

Once the grain cart is close to full we unload it into the semi which takes it to the main yard where the grain is put in the bins.

  

*this is Esther: I can't handle leaving this unfinished and Michael doesn't always even remember we have a blog, never mind that I sometimes ask him to contribute to it, so I'm posting this as is. Yes that is his quad sitting precariously on farm equipment. He took it to the field that way.

VS Team Potluck

The new team has formed! Peggy and I are still there, but the other two members are new. So we had a potluck, and Peggy did a Meyers-Briggs personality assesment with us, and then we learned about each of the personalities.

The chart that maps out where we all fall.

We enjoyed an incredibly beautiful evening!

kijiji you make me happy!

so, i've been watching for ikea stuff on kijiji. (dangerous, i know). when the most perfect piece popped up. in the color that matches all the rest of our lovely furniture, a wardrobe was posted. i looked at it, and thought, i bet you with those dimensions it would fit in the corner of the kitchen!

see, since we have tenants again, i have given up my crafting space. i have to say i've not been too happy about that. my mind was thinking of the possibilities. all my crafting goodies stores right next to the table where i do them. what a fabulous idea. so, i showed it to michael, he figured it would fit and thought it was a good idea (i think it's just because it meant he could reclaim a couple of closets in our house).

so, we looked at it, bought it and michael set it up!

tada!

i still have to move in and get organized, but for now i just shoved stuff in. for such relatively small dimension 24" x 21" it feels downright cavernous!

when i buy bins and get it sorted out, i'll post it again.

Soul Men's Retreat 2010

quick BC trip

My mom wanted to come out for a visit this fall, but I talked her into flying me home instead. So, I went there for a long weekend. We went to Ikea, had some family dinners and hung out a bit. I also managed to see a couple of friends and my grandparents.

Breakfast with Dan & Jenn on my last morning.

The haul from Ikea (I also brought home salmon and berries and swiss chocolate!)

I discovered a great quilt shop in downtown Abbotsford, where I bought some fabric...which I think I find way more enticing than yarn. I think this could become a problem.

Except for the fact that I recently acquired this wardrobe to help with the need for storage (more on this in another post).

sewing project #3

I've been sewing a little again. Trying to enjoy the use of my very own sewing room while I can (the end of this luxury is looming).   This is a project that came from a book I bought myself last Christmas called One Yard Wonders. Great book. I modified it a little, since I needed it covered on all sides, unlike the one in the book which was bare on the back.

The picture in the book had these awesome giant buttons on it, and I wanted some too, but I'm too cheap to buy buttons that would look that cool. I was telling Michael about this and he volunteered to make some for me.

He was only too excited to have a reason to use his new tool, and I think the buttons turned out awesome.

Here's the finished product (well, kinda, I still have to sew 5 more buttons on)

Goodbye ugly, scratched and rusted filing cabinet. Hello kitschy & cute coffee table (which still does house my files).

and unrelated, but just in case some of you were concerned about what exactly I'd been knitting:

the frying pan cozy really was for the frying pan, see? i know some of you won't admit it, but when you saw the first picture you were thinking it looked like something else.

it's back to school time

We are once again sharing our house. We had two lovely young girls move in this past weekend. It means we've had to give up the shoe shelf that is normally for tenants, but I think I can handle it.

It's crazy how different it is to have girls living here compared to the guys from last semester.

This is another piece of art I bought with my money from Opa. If you can't remember what that's all about, you can check back on this post.

Michael also decided that it was time to stop putting off the issues we have with drainage in our backyard, so he ordered some crushed limestone and built a birm around the low spot where water creeps into the garage. It seems to have solved the problem beautifully, now we just have to work at making it look prettier.

A garden update. We have harvested a lot of beans, the peas are pretty much done and the weather has been so crummy the tomatoes won't ripen.

The dirt is spread out, because we are slowly working on filling in the low spot in the lawn, in case you are wondering.

family gathering at our house!

Mom and Dad Schultz and Stuart were in Winnipeg delivering a load on a Sunday, so we had them over for lunch. We enjoyed a delicious bud, spud & steak stew from Supper Central.

Later in the afternoon, John, Angela and Cate joined us. We celebrated Angela's birthday. We enjoyed classic summer food, hamburgers and potato salad.

I made some cake too! Bienenstich and Chocolate Spice Cake.

It was so windy that the candles blew out all by themselves, before it arrived in front of Angela.

fun on the play ground nearby:

Playing with the trains set.

We had a great time and enjoyed being outside all day, the weather was amazing!