Well done Tamzin!!

Well today Tamzin got some exciting news..........
She has been asked to be in the 'recording orchastra'.
Let me explain.

When the school makes their music DVD's they don't use all the students to record the songs, They have what they call a recording orchastra to cut the sound tracks with - it is a much smaller group I believe.
Well they have asked if Tamzin will be one of the ones to play for the recordings.

When they 'film' the song (not record the sound tack), they use all the students and then mix the recording with filming - hope that makes sense.

They will spend 10 days 'practicing' prior to the Christmas California tour and then in January they record for 3 weeks - solid.
They need the recordings completed before they go to Hawaii in March to do the filming of the next series they are making which will follow on from the Steps to Christ one they did 2 years ago. I believe they will have to learn around 39 songs for it.

So she is very pleased with herself.
Well done Chick..................... we are proud of you.

To stitch or not to stitch

This morning we woke to this fog hanging over the river - it looked neat.
As you can see all the snow has melted on the top of the mountain - which is great. It has really warmed up. Yesterday was a scorcher and it looks like today will be the same.
This warm weather is great news for the harvest - they are going full steam ahead with that.

Yesterday wasn't such a good day for Alistair - he wacked his elbow on a peice of metal and got a gash on the very tip of his elbow. Very inconvienent spot really as every time he bends his arm it opens up the cut. I think it really should have been stitched, but he didn't want to get an injection! He came home with blood all down him and his clothes.
So I put some of those butterfly strip things on it (lucky we had some of them from when Tamzin sliced her finger open on a can) and bandaged it up.

Let me see where did I leave off in my last post - I think it was Sunday - yes, and I was heading out to do some gardening. Well here is the picture to prove that I actually did do some gardening.
It took me all day to weed that small piece of garden - it was hard work. But it looks much better without the overgrown weeds there. I will plant the tulip and daffidil bulbs this week. (This hill behind me is the hill Kyle goes up over to the guys dorm.)


They have asked if we can have some of the board members stay here when they come for the board meeting in 2 weeks time. (They don't have enough guest rooms for them all) So I thought I better tidy the place up. It will be a big challenge to get the spare room ready as at the moment it is full of boxes! Good incentive to sort it out though.

Kyle did a spot of riding with some of the guys on Sunday. They have made quite a good riding track close buy apparently, so they went off riding on that.
While riding they came accross a huge bear - biggest they have seen round here. He was scared of them thought and dissappeared as soon as he saw them.
Makes me bit nervous though as this was just down the hill from our house! Don't think I better leave Missey tied up at home while we are out.




Work is going well. Nearly half way through scanning the first file draw - there are over 18 draws to do, so it will be a long slow process.

I see another earthquake his New Zealand. I hope everyone is safe and well.......

Family Night (Amoung other things)

There seems to be a tradition forming after vespers on friday night - we are becoming the 'taxi' service back up to the guys dorm (we live fairly close to it and it is quite a walk up to the dorm).

After the meeting has finished the guys 'hover' round as to see when we leave to go home, then they all come begging for a ride.
So we pile in as many as we can in the back of the van and head off (this time was a bit light on it, not sure where the rest of them were).
It is Tamzin's job to have the van cleaned out so they don't stand all over everything (learned that from experience)!
This time they felt that they needed to hug us all to thank us for the lift - these are some of the more 'crazy ones' - but they are great.





We invited over a couple of the boys for sabbath lunch - I think they appreciated some 'home cooked' food (even though the cafe food is very good).
I must say at this point that I am still coming to grips with the oven in this house, and the fact that the preacher talked for 45 minutes longer than usually didn't help the colour of my meal much! - it was a bit browner than I would have liked!
Anyway it tasted good.
The blond guy at the end is Ezra - he is from Iceland and the other one is Nolan and he is from the USA. Unfortunatly, lunch was a bit rushed as Nolan had signed up to go 'canvasing' (handing out Steps to Christ books) in Lillooet, and the bus was leaving at 2pm. As church didn't end till after 1pm it turned into a 'gooble and go' meal for Nolan.




Last night was Family night.
That is when the students are divided up between the staff homes and come and spend the evening with you. You feed them tea (supper), close sabbath and then play games or do whatever you decide.
We had 5 come to our place - one from South Korea, 2 from Alaska, one from Minnisoda and one from California. We had a great evening getting to know them all - it really it a great way to get to know them.
We played the Amazing Race and Balderdah. They all seemed to have a good time eating american hot dogs, fries, pumpkin pie, caramel popcorn and ginger crunch.
When we were done Alistair gave them a lift back to their dorms.




Today (Sunday) has dawned quite sunny and bright - seems we had a fair bit of rain in the night though - and our water has decided not to work...........better sort that one out.

Alistair has rounded up 20 or so students to work today - they are trying to wash and pack carrots today to fill orders.

I am hoping to do a spot of gardening and plant some bulbs that we bought last weekend.


It seems that some of you may have missed getting this link to You Tube to see the carrot harvest in action. Just cut and paste the link into the address line and hopefully it will take you to the video.

http://www.youtube.com/user/paktnz?feature=mhsn

Testing Video's

I am doing a test to see if I can upload video's.

(UPDATE I have taken the video off since it was such terrible quality.
If you copy and paste this link to 'you tube' you can watch it there.

http://www.youtube.com/user/paktnz?feature=mhsn


I took this video on my new camera that Kyle bought back from the states for me. I am impressed with the quality of the videoing on it. I have had to reduce the quality to upload and I see it isn't very good. If you double click on the video it will come up big, but the quality gets really bad. I will work on getting this better.
Sorry about it being a bit 'bumpy' I should have used a tripod.

Try this link to You Tube - I think it might be clearer.

http://www.youtube.com/user/paktnz?feature=mhsn

Anyway, this is the carrot harvest in action! I took this video from our house - we get a great view from up here.
The big loud noise you can hear a couple of times during the clip is rocks being tipped into a dump truck - they a busy landscaping here.

Alistair has had a pretty productive week harvesting. We are watching with much 'fear' as the snow slowly gets lower down the mountain. He told me yesterday that the harvest usually take 6 weeks! I think we need a miracle for a frost to stay away that long.......... but hey, stranger things have happened.

Kyle was meant to go on a canoeing camping trip this weekend - all the grade 10's were going, but the forecast is for rain over the weekend so they have cancelled it. Unlike NZ, the weather forecasting is pretty spot on here - so one can rely on it.
He is pretty pleased to be staying home. He looks forward to his sundays when he can 'catch his breath' and have a bit of a rest. Plus he was in Oregon last weekend and next weekend they are off on another tour.

Tomorrow night is 'family night' when a group of students will be coming over to our place for supper (tea), worship and whatever you want to do with them till 9pm. So today I will clean house and cook and get ready for that. Thought I might make them some good old ginger crunch (thanks for idea Felicity- not sure that it will be as good as the 'other Mrs Smith's!). Plus american hot dogs and fries.

Work went well this week - I actually quite enjoyed it. Bit of a huge job though. I think I will be there for a month of sundays doing it! But we really are blessed though, here we are sitting out in the middle of no where in a country where there are no jobs to be had, and I get a job right here on our back door step - I can walk to work. The Lord really does bless...............

You all have a great weekend.

Snow Capped Mountains

The snow is creeping further down the mountain with each cold snap.
I took this from our lawn.
The snow usually melts by lunch time - but this time it hasn't.
It really is quite pretty.

Thanks to all those who have been praying for the rain to stop and the sun to shine here so Alistair can get on with the carrot harvest. Today dawned foggy but it has cleared to a lovely sunny day. He is out there harvesting as we speak.
He tried yesterday, but it was too wet and the tractor kept getting stuck, plus the carrots had just far to much mud on them.
I guess we just need the rain to stop in NZ now - sounds like you guys are getting a 'hammering'. We keep a watchful eye on the xtra site to see whats happening.

Yesterday I started work in the office. I will be working in the afternoons - Tamzin can either come with me or go help Alistair.
Not sure if I mentioned before that they had asked me work - they are wanting me to put all the old records (for the last 30 years) onto computer. So I have to scan thousands and thousands of papers and organize them onto the computer and then shred the paper copies.
Bit daunting really but I guess I will get into it.
I actually quite enjoyed being back in an office environment working again - wonder how long that will last! Will be a bit of a juggle with time and all, but I think we will manage.

Better go get lunch on and make some more fruit leather.........

Transportable Party

Well Kyle returned home safe and sound from Oregon yesterday.

His description of the trip was that it was a 'Transportable Party'!
I thought that was rather good description being that they were on the bus for most of the time - hence transportable.

Sounds like they had a great time. They have all come back rather tired but all singing better. The trip was mainly for singing lessons with Mr Blaylock (the guy who trained Charlotte Church), but they also performed 4 concerts.
Sounds like there were the normal 'hick ups' that come with concerts - mainly sound system problems - seems that is the same the world over.

We keep getting 'snipits' of 'stories' that happened on the trip from Kyle. Rather amusing really.

Last night they put on a concert for the students that didn't go, so they could hear what they had been up to. I went along - it was great. The difference in Kyle's singing confidence was really noticeable - he is singing with much more 'passion'.

Yesterday was a terrible rainy day here - they tell us rain like this never happens here. Makes us wonder how come it rains anywhere we go - mind you, we aren't in NZ and you are getting plenty of rain there!

Alistair is stressing a little about getting the carrots harvested. Last week the harvester was down all week getting 'sorted' so it didn't break and chip the carrots (Alistair isn't convinced it is right yet, but has to run with it). This week it looks like it will be too wet to harvest. It has turned quite cold too which is a worry, as if a frost comes it will kill the carrot tops and then they can't be harvested!
We will have to pray hard.............

Yesterday I got given a rather large box of plums from the orchard here. Wasn't sure what to do with them so made what they call 'freezer jam'. Hadn't heard of that before. Very simple to make, all you do is mix sugar and this powder (pectin I think - plus some other stuff) and then mix in the chopped fruit and stir for 3 minutes and it's done! No cooking. You can keep it in the fridge or freeze it. I haven't tried it yet, doesn't look that appetizing to me!
I also am making fruit leather with it (thanks for the suggestion sis!) I don't have a food dryer so am doing it in the oven on the lowest temp it goes. It has turned out rather well -even if I say so myself. I am quite impressed. Seems I am turning rather 'domestic'.

I better go pray for some sunshine.......

Check out these pumpkins!
They were amazing.

Today Alistair, Tamzin and I decided that since Kyle was away we should be too, so this morning (Saturday) we headed out on a 'road trip'.
We are doing a circle - through Hope, Princeton, Oliver, Penticton, and after 550km came to rest in Kelowna for the the night. Tomorrow (after a spot of shopping) we will head back to F/V through Merrit. ( In case any of you want to look on a map).

Somewhere along the line we came across this fruit stand with this fantastic display of pumpkins. I have never seen so many different shapes, colours and sizes of pumpkins.
It is coming up to Thanksgiving here so hence all the pumpkins.
Tamzin is dying to get a big pumpkin and carve one and put a candle in it - hopefully we will come across some more tomorrow and get a few.




This was another fruit stand and they had lots of old machinery with pumpkins all round them. It was so nice to see these 'bursts' of orange around the place.
I am not sure why we don't grow pumpkins like these in NZ.


We saw heaps of old cars and trucks in our travels today. We had to stop and take a picture of these ones, there was a whole line of them. Such a shame to see them all rotting away - Alistair would love to have one of these trucks - done up of course.





We came across this lake - it is called 'Spotted Lake'. Not sure why it is spotted, seems to have a film on top with these 'holes' in it. It looked neat.


Unfortunatly it rained the whole day today - seems to be a trend with us (it rained while we were in Whistler as well). But even so we had a great day exploring.

Carrot Harvesting

Monday was the first day of the carrot harvest.

17 students turned up there all bright eyed and bushy tailed ready to go for the morning shift. Bins were lined with plastic, loaded on the trailer and taken out into the field to follow alongside the harvester to collect all the carrots.

It is quite amazing how the harvester works.
It digs down under the carrots and lifts them up, at which time the green tops of the carrots are caught up in 2 belts and carried up to the top of the harvester. Once they reach the top there are knives which chop the tops off the carrots and the carrots drop onto a conveyor belt and are carried out the shoot.

Unfortunately, something wasn't adjusted correctly and it was chopping the carrots instead of just the green tops - therefore making them 'seconds'. Alistair spent the whole day stopping and starting trying to get it right. They weren't successful, so on Tuesday they decided to pull the harvester apart and do some work on it. By the end of the day they were worse off than at the beginning, as they had broken something on it and will now need to pull it apart again and fix what broke!
Today they are working on it again.

Kyle is off to Oregon in a couple of hours for singing lessons and to do some concerts. He will be gone for 5 days.


As a note of interest - the guy driving the tractor is called Nolan............

P.S. Remember to double click the photos to make them bigger

Whistler

What a lovely place Whistler is.

We arrived at Whistler late Saturday afternoon after a rather slow trip over from Lillooet.
The road between Lillooet and Whistler is terrible - I will never complain about Kiwi roads again! It was windy and steep - which is ok, but they sure need to do some repairs on the road. But if you weren't in a hurry (which we weren't) the slow trip gave you time to enjoy the scenery - which was very pretty. You could see the mountains changing from rugged, desert like to green forests (and rainy).

I haven't been to Whistler before so it was a nice treat. It is a very 'Swiss like' alpine village with the houses and resorts nestled in amoungst the trees, hardly even standing out.

The placed we stayed was very nice. The ski lift ran right past it so you could walk out of the hotel and head off skiing.
Of course there was no skiing at this time of the year, but what there was were hundreds of mountain bikers. In summer they use the lifts to take the riders and their bikes up the mountain, and then there are hundreds of trails for them to ride down.
Kyle thought this was fantastic as one didn't need to ride up hill - ever - it was all smooth sailing down. Actually it was far from smooth, we saw some of the jumps they had set up for the bikers and they looked down right scary!

On Sunday we did a ziptrek tour which took about 3 hours. It was great. They took us up the mountain a bit, we got to get right up close to the bobslede track they used for the olympics. Apparently next summer they plan to open the boblslede track for those adrenilin junkies to take a ride down - don't think it will be me as they average 130km /hr.

Anyway back to the ziplining. It was a rainy cold day so that put a bit of a damper on things, but it was still lots of fun. We would zip through the trees between the 2 mountains (Blackcomb and Whistler Mt) and come to rest way up in the top of the trees. It was great fun.
I was very upset that I forgot my 'little' camera which I could have taken on the tour, so I didn't get any photos. I did ask a lady to take a couple of pictures of us and she is going to email them to us when she gets home. So hopefully I will be able to show you how handsome we all looked in our yellow rain coats and fashionable hats and harnesses!

After we had dried off and warmed up we headed back to F/V.

We had a great weekend and I enjoyed my 40th birthday more than I thought I was going to.........

Happy 40th To You!

Today was my Birthday (incase you hadn't guessed that already!)
And yes, I turned 40!
Can't believe I am that old really - that snuck up on me.
But age is only a state of the mind (so they say).

I received these 2 lovely plants. The card didn't say who they were from, but after some investigation I solved the mystery - thanks Mom & Dad (and the rest of the Magee clan).
The pink plant is growing on a rock, it's not in any dirt. I hope I don't kill them!

I have to admit that I was feeling a little 'blue' - being that I wouldn't be spending such a 'milestone' with my nearest and dearest in NZ. It didn't help matters to know that a good number of them would all be together partying it up for Justin's 21st birthday (my nephew) - on my birthday (well it was my birthday here in Canada).

Well one of the ladies here - Yolanda Hall found out it was my birthday and invited us for tea on Friday night.
Unknown to me (but Alistair knew), she had invited 2 other families also for tea to help celebrate.
It was a lovely surprise.
We had a great evening of good food, good company and good fun.
It really cheered me up.




Alistair decided we should go to Whistler for my birthday.
We haven't been there before, so it will great to check it out.
I will let you know what we think of it on my next blog (we have only just arrived here).

bye for now.

P.S. Missey has improved alot. She is still doing her duck impresonation, but no where near as much - which is great.

P.S.S. Remember to double click on the photos to enlarge them.

A trip to the vet......

We all recovered from the fun and excitement of the weekend.

We thought Kyle was getting a cold from the water activities at the picnic (which wouldn't be good for his singing lessons in Oregon), but with a few prayers he seems to have managed to shake off the bugs.

Yesterday saw Tamzin and I taking an unscheduled trip to Chilliwack (a 2 hour drive each way), to take Missey to the vet. That was the closest vet.

We don't really know what is wrong with her, but it appears she has breathed something up into her nose and it is stuck in her nasal passage.
She has started doing something they call 'reverse sneezing' where she sucks wind in through her nose trying to get rid of it. It makes the most terrible nose ever - it actually sounds like a duck! Very embarressing when out and about and your dog starts making duck noises - just not cool really.
Anyway, they did suggest flushing out her nose, but this would require her to have a general anestetic and there there was the risk of the water they use to flush out her nose, going down into her lungs - not to mention the $450 charge for doing it.
They suggest we see if she can dislodge it herself, as she was seeming to be improving. But this morning she was really bad, she has gotten better this afternoon though. If it doesn't come out or improve it will probably mean surgery!




This week they asked me if I would work in the office (I know, I know Andrea I can hear what you are saying!)
They have a project they want to me complete (a quite big one). So I probably will work a couple of hours in the afternoons. I am down there an hour each day while Tamzin is playing in orchastra anyway, so I might was well get paid for it.
Not sure when I will start, probably mid to end of next week maybe.
Tamzin will come with me and either help me or do her own thing.

Tamzin had her second lesson with her new cello teacher this week. We are a bit more encouraged after the second lesson. We weren't so sure about him after the first lesson, but I think he will be good for Tamzin. He is young guy, very laid back way of teaching (too layed back I thought at first), but this time he pulled her up on some things and expected things of her which she is capable of but has gotten lazy about. He plays his cello with her at each lesson which she enjoys.
Kyles new teacher is giving him a 'rev-up' too. He much prefers his old teacher Mrs Appleton! But change is good sometimes.
Kyle is having quite a lot of trouble with his violin pegs with the different weather here than at home. We can't seem to get it right - one time his pegs won't hold, so he puts a damp cloth in the case and then they swell so much he can't turn or tune it at all. Hopefully it will settle down soon.

This morning Tamzin and I have been working with one of the students who will be setting up a webpage for the carrot farm. Tamzin designed a business card for them and they want the website to be somewhat the same.

Today the senior class (grade 12's), headed out on a survival campout. Apparently they have had to be ready to go on this since school began. They didn't know when they would be going, they just had to be ready at any time to go. They got 10 minutes from being told they were going, to having to leave! Alistair said one of the students he had working for him this morning came running in all in a panic as the word had 'gone out' that they had 10 minutes to be ready to leave. The guy was in a bit of flap!
Not sure where they are going camping.

This weekend we are going to Whistler for Saturday night. It is my birthday so Alistair thought it would be nice to have a night over there. We haven't been there before.
We are taking the kids and Missey! We even found a motel that lets you take your pets, which is good as I wouldn't want to put her into a kennel the way she is right now. I sure hope she improves by then or people will think we have taken a duck with us!

Thought I would show off the bottling that Tamzin and did last week..............

This picture was taken right before the boat with the guy wearing the red shirt sunk!

But I am getting ahead of myself – let me start at the beginning of the weekend……………

We have had another great weekend.

Saturday was the quartets first performance!

They sung 2 songs for church – it was excellent. They were all quite nervous – being the first time performing, but it sounded great. Kyle even had a solo in one of the songs. I did video it and hoped to put a clip on here, but we can’t find the cord to use to get it onto the computer. I will keep looking for it.

We were invited to the Hall’s place for lunch (they were the ones we had for lunch last week).

Upon arrival we saw this bear up in the top of this pine tree – he was just sleeping there! Apparently he visits often – actually a number of bears come by often and eat the Hall’s apples from their trees. Later in the afternoon the bear came down from the tree to have a feed of apples. Missy saw him and wanted to go investigate! Kyle kept a very tight hold of her.

We had a very enjoyable time there, visiting with them and eating the great food they had prepared.

Sunday was the ‘fall’ picnic in the orchard here on campus.

It was excellent!

They had games for the students to play – some of which were quite difficult (and a few that were even a bit dangerous – that is if you are a guy and decide to jump between the ropes instead of having your team lift you through!)

They provided tea - which was scrummy! They had beans and corn bread, taco salad, baked potatoes which were done in tin foil in a big bomfire and also corn on the cob roasted in it’s husks in the fire too.

Then there was pumpkin pie and apple pie with whipped cream. We all ate way to much, but boy was it ever tasty – and it was all vegan!

The main highlight for the students was the boat race. They were divided into teams which had to construct a boat from cardboard and 1 roll of duct tape, and paddle it across the pond – all the members of their team had to go across in it.

What a hoot!

Some were utter failures and others were amazingly well built. Kyle and Tamzin were on different teams and both their teams boats sunk on the last team member crossing. – they went over 1 at a time.

Some of the boats didn’t even get half way across once! That was the case with the guy in the red shirt in the opening photo! It didn’t look very streamline!

There were a number of very wet and very cold students by the end of that event.

After they had all gotten changed and sort of warm, we had worship in the orchard. They had put up fairy lights around the trees – it was a lovely atmosphere.

I can see why the fall picnic is one of the highlights for the year……..

bye for now.

P.S. Remember if you double click on the photos they will come up bigger.