Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Out with the Old

Wow, last day of 2008 already! Where does the time go?
We had a very quiet and enjoyable Christmas; just the four of us. We watched some Christmas movies and played lots of Scrabble over the holidays. It was very cold - down to the -30's (-22f) so we didn't get out much.

Christmas morning (I decided not to include the unflattering photos of me in pajamas)

On Boxing Day it snowed. And snowed and snowed and snowed some more. We did not go out to shovel - we played Scrabble instead and watched it float to earth. The next day Husband took out the tractor and blowed the snow off the driveway and I shovelled the walkways. That is when we realized we had gotten another 30cm (12 inches). I am very thankful that husband convinced me we needed to purchased the snowblower attachment for the tractor. He can get the driveway and way to the compost cleared in about half an hour! It certainly saves a lot of back breaking shovelling.

Once it warmed up a little we got the dog outside to run and play. Being a boxer he is not an outside/cold weather dog.

Kaiser and Husband walking in the woods where the snow is not deep.


Kaiser running(?) in the deep snow. It was over my knees in depth.


Nice photo of husband in his usual winter ensemble - toque, vest, and boots.

In yesterday's newspaper there was a story of a cougar attacking a dog very close to where we live. The cougar was destroyed the next day, luckily the dog survivied. Over the past few years the incident of cougar sighting has grown quite a bit around our city. I can't ever remember cougars being in this area before - they must be slowly moving in after the deer. With the kids and dog, we need to be more vigilant.



We accomplished a lot in 2008...


  • Finished the new house (still some siding, soffits and eavestroughing to put up)
  • Moved in
  • Began fencing
  • Renovated old house
  • Rented old house
  • Landscaping/levelling of yard around the house
  • Brought in sandy loam for the yard
  • Laid some sod in front of house
  • Cleared garden area for spring 2009
  • Set up green house
  • Did some container gardening
  • Did some canning
  • Son made honour roll first year of high school
  • Daughter has made a large amount of babysitting contacts/job
  • Made cheese for the first time
  • Tried to cook most things from scratch
  • Recycled most of our waste - I only take one small bag of garbage to the land fill a week
  • Poured the garage floor and have begun setting up shelving/storage areas in December (yeah! I have some closet space again)
Have a Happy New Year and all the best for 2009!

1 comments:

Ruthy said...

A Happy New Year to You and Your Family :-)

Now it is 9.48 in the morning and after 4 hours of sleep, I'm not really awake.
I hope, this year will be better than the last.
Although, last Sunday is still something very positive happen. Uncle Horst and his two daughters, both with husbands, one of them with the 2 kids, were here in munic. (Sorry, jetzt auf Deutsch weiter) Meine beiden Cousinen kannte ich ja noch nicht, und das schönste, hier in der Nähe von uns gibt es noch eine Cousine, von der ich gar keine Ahnung hatte. Da war die Freude über die doch wieder ein bisschen gewachsene Familie sehr gross. Da Onkel Horst letztes Jahr im Juli einen Herzinfarkt beinahe nicht überlebt hätte, wollte er uns noch einmal alle sehen.
So und jetzt geh ich meine Miezenzicke :-) füttern (heute darf sie ein wenig zickig sein, sie hatte gestern Nacht doch sehr Angst wegen der Silvesterknallereien) und dann gehe ich aufräumen. Unsere Feier gestern mit fast allen Nachbarn war doch recht heftig.
Neoch einmal alles Liebe und Gute für 2009.
Liebe Grüsse, Ruth