hydetimes

Our large population of rabbits has brought more then Lynx and coyotes.  This little guy is a pine Martin and he is here for the rabbits as well.  He is in the weasel family so a nasty little scrapper.  The dogs treed this little guy in. The trees at the top of the driveway, I was having my morning tea in my chair and I heard a ruckus and then saw this brown critter scoot up the tree.  We got the dogs inside then had a photo shoot.  We got many very good shots of him before we backed off and he scooted off into a thicket that is heavily populated with bunnies.  He was super cute!!  We are saving the best photos for painting.  He was  larger then a ferret but had the long sleek body and big tail.  Later that day an ermin came out from behind the cold storage building and headed to the house… Probably mouse hunting!  Go for it little buddy!    Mini and I both saw him from the front window and off she went.  There was about 3″ of fresh snow and she went back over his trail sticking her nose right down inside every divot he made.   Big excitement, this kept the dogs busy for the next week.  

  
Then the day we were installing the Taco sign, I was walking over to the studio and just past the shop I saw one scoot across the road in front of me (on the old road on our property, not on the highway).  He was long gone by the time I got there so I took a photo of his tracks cause they were so perfect.  

When Cam and Carola visited with us this summer, Carola asked if she could do a load of laundry.  Barry, being the jokester he is dug up this laundry plunger that someone left here.  We didn’t know what it was until Barry saw one at Karen’s and she explained it.  Carola fell for it and actually thought this was how I did the wash… We all had a good laugh then we showed her the washer and dryer.  Recently we had a bit of a cold spell and the water line to the office froze, we hadn’t filled the tank and there wasn’t any snow to melt so I gave it a try and it works amazing!   I was very impressed!  So this post is for Carola!  After all the laughter, it works great.  You do have to ring everything out before putting it in the dryer so more work but a great back up.  

My dad made us 2 bat boxes a few years back and we were having a problem finding the best location for them.  This summer while working in his shop, Barry had a bat flying around and he realized they were living in the rafters.  This is on the south facing wall above the bay door.  It gets full sun all day and they have plenty of room to get in.  I was surprised they were living there, the “rules” say they want to be near water.  The small creeks down there tend to dry up each summer.  We will see if they find it and move in, hope so!  
  

We are doing a sign for Karen at the Lightning Hotel and she was there today so we dropped by to see her and take a look at her layout.  Her son was there and it turns out I was best friends with his sister Cindy Young in junior high school… Small, small world!!  Karen was forced to put him up for adoption when she was young and Cindy was adopted as well.  Gary found his mom about 20 years ago.   I remember him a bit but he recognized me right away.  

This was out her back door, thought it looked like an ad.  
  

We took the bandage off Lily’s leg today and it looks really good.  She is happy to get her foot back and doesn’t seem to be in any pain, she is putting full weight on it.  We have to be extra careful she doesn’t rip a stitch now.  She wears the cone if we can’t be watching her and we put a light sock on her to go outside.   Five days until the stitches can come out, we will take her in to have it done, I thought I’d be able to do it but after seeing it, I think best that they do it… A chance for them to make sure everything looks good as well.  We are looking forward to having her get a clean bill of health!  

She has her lime green sock on waiting to go out.

We noticed about 3 weeks ago that Lily had a wound on her ankle.  She is a licker and she had been licking it which got it infected.  We took her in and she was on meds for 2 weeks.  It turned out that this was a lump of some sort and we were warned that we should have it removed before it gets too large and becomes a bigger problem so in she went on Monday morning, once the infection had cleared up.   It was day surgery so she was back home with us that evening.  She had a reaction to the anesthesia and had a seizure so they pumped her full of Valium to counter act it.  She was super quiet the first day home but now she is doing great and getting along just fine with 3 legs.  Her bandage comes off in a few days then her stitches come out a few days after that so she will be right back to playing and chasing squirrels.  It is so hard when your pet is injured.  She is the best little patient I’ve ever had but my heart is breaking because she doesn’t understand why we are doing this to her.  She has been getting triple the love she normally gets so she’s pretty happy and aside from the bandage, her foot doesn’t seem to bother her.  See her pretty pink bandage…
  

Having the trail across the highway is so awesome for us!  Yesterday  we went for a walk over to the creek and the floor of the forest is absolutely covered in tracks.  I was amazed and had to take photos to share… The entire forest looks like this over there, tracks of all sizes.  

About half way to the creek the little tracks fade out and you get into larger tracks like this cat track…
  

We were surprised that early afternoon we were already in the shadow of the mountain.  Barry had to try out his new boots that are good to -60!!  
  

We could see where larger animals, moose or deer had been traveling along the creek.  Snowshoeing over there is going to be awesome!  We need another good dump of snow before boots alone don’t cut it.   Right now we are in a cold snap.  We went for a late night walk last night with the full moon lighting up the snow so much we didn’t have to use a flash light!  Cold but clear and crisp and beautiful.  We woke up to -16.  Stay tuned… 

Once again this summer we had a stranded traveler.  This one had a flat on his travel trailer so they just dropped it and came back for it later.  Crazy how we get one every summer!  

We had our first plough on Saturday.  The snow had settled to about 6-8″ so a little deep for Mini.  We thought we should get it done before it got cold and it got cold today.  We woke up to -10 and it is supposed to be clear and cold for the next 5 days.  We also had Khloe here on Sunday so was nice to have it cleared for her to play.  
  

Stay tuned…

This tub has been here since we arrived, never used and in really good shape still.  We gave it to Len and Hildur at the ski hill, they picked it up yesterday… Awesome!  So nice to get it gone!  
   
 

We discovered by accident that Mini is a natural hurdle jumper.  We take her over to this spot every day and have her run it over and over…she loves it!  We are going to set up a bunch of other agility obsticals for her.  Fun! 
  

Barry spent 2 days trying to get that pile to burn and it ain’t gonna happen this year!   He did manage to make it smaller but it’s still pretty big.  Have to burn off the outer edges wpeach year till it’s gone. 
  

Stay tuned… 

We had planned to go to town this morning but woke up to freezing rain.  We watched the weather network and waited it out, left around 1.  3 km down the highway we find this… 
  

This guy was travelling too fast and went off the road on a straight stretch, he was travelling the opposite direction than he is facing.  Scary!  I hope it slowed some of them down, these workers fly on this highway and it is so dangerous between the weather and the wildlife. Just this side of Stanley road this summer a guy hit a moose, he came around the corner and it was standing in the middle of the highway.  He must have been moving pretty fast too.  

Also, there was a massive road block in Quesnel with CVSE, conservation and RCMP.  We got waived thru so they must have been looking for something in particular.  Never seen that combo before.  Might be poachers.  

Stay tuned….

We are trying for the big pile today, might actually go this year.  I’ll keep you posted
  

You know I love cake so this blew my mind.  Barb put this 4’x8′ cake together with the original caribou flag on it… So awesome!  Unfortunately I had to work so I didn’t get any.  This was the busiest day of the year.  Barb came in at midnight to bake everything for the days sales then she made this amazing cake.  Her daughter Mia helped with the decorations.  It took 6 guys to get it out and loaded onto the horse drawn carriage.  

Well, I must say I am happy with the results of the election to a certain degree.  It would been nice to have more liberal seats in BC but the main issue was to get Harper out, mission accomplished.  I’m happy.   I love Trudeau, I think having a fresh young person in office is what this country needs.  End to the good old boy era.  I hope he sticks with his promises, time will tell.   It was weird knowing the results across the country as they came in, I think I prefer the old way, finding out once the last polls close.  I don’t think it changed things at the polls in BC, most people still voted to get the candidate in their riding elected.  We had a power outage the night of the election, we had the generator going for the Internet and CKNW giving us play by plays of the election results as we played cards in the candle light.  It was awesome! 

Barry did this drawing in the morning when he woke up… So talented!  He is getting quicker at throwing them together.

 Dad looking great on the front page of the Western News making sure he got his vote in early.  
  

Stinky dogs had to be cleaned up.  Mini looks so small!!   And  not overly happy.  She needs it more to loosen all the hair that has shed but gets matted in and doesn’t just fall out like Shooters would.  I brush her every few days this time of year and get a pile each time but at some point washing her is the best, then it comes out easier and in clumps.  She’s got a lot of hair!  Lily goes super curly, the poodle in her shines thru.  
  

Barry got extremely ambitious one week while I was at work in the summer and punched a trail in across the street all the way over to Lightning Creek.  The bush is very thick so he had to use chain saw, loppers, bush wacker…pretty much every tool he’s got but he did it and the rewards are huge!   We have our own personal beach with a wide creek winding by.  In one spot there is a perfect swimming hole.  In August the water was low enough you could sit a lawn chair in it and keep your feet cool… Yes it actually got that hot here this summer!  It is so peaceful, you can’t hear the highway or anything else but nature.  We stashed a couple of lawn chairs in the trees so we have some comfort and we were given a dining tent that we will set it up and do some painting.  It is very inspirational.  
   

This huge tree is on the trail and had to be chopped up to give us passage.  There are many trees down everywhere making some areas completely impassable.  The forest over there is mostly covered with moss and lush and beautiful, smells like heaven.   Many moss covered stumps and fallen trees, many paintings waiting to happen.  
 

This week we have been exploring game trails that cross this trail.  We are finding a lot of them (along with other goodies) now that the leaves are falling.  We took one that lead us over to our creek… So beautiful!  The dogs love it, it’s a huge deal to be able to go over there so they cherish every moment.  Mini run it like an Indy track and Lily runs from smell to smell with her entire body wagging.  They arrive home so tired!  Mini is not allowed to walk over the highway, she has to be carried and she already understands… When we are getting close to the highway on the way home, I say “time to get picked up” and she comes over, lifts one paw readying herself.  She is a very smart little critter.  

Getting photos of Hyde Creek.
   

 Warm temperatures have been great.  Today we got rid of a huge burn pile… Always fun to have a big fire!  Even more fun to reclaim the chunk of land under it.  We still have the monster pile in the parking lot, hopefully it will burn this year.  You would think 6 years would be long enough… We will find out.  

Stay tuned…

Barry added a pony wall on the front deck for a few reasons… Keep the snow off the deck, keep Mini off the snow bank and shore up the corner of the house now that the trees are gone and more snow builds up on the roof.  Closes us in but we are already getting used to it. The dogs have been invited to go for a car ride in this photo.  Only have to ask them once!  

We are finished our wood for the season.  Instead of going out and dropping trees we brought all the wood over from the studio since the fire place is out of commission it wasn’t doing much good over there.  We also need to get those buildings emptied out before we can burn down the studio which will not be this year, hoping for next year.  

Stay tuned… 

My first attempt… 
 
  

Had a wonderful turkey feast with Darren and Khloe.  She will be 4 on Tuesday.   My second cake decorating attempt, need some practice but it was yummy!  
   
 

Barry greeting our guests… Never a dull moment!   Remember one is a 3 year old girl.  She was scared but got over it pretty fast and talked about it all day.  
    
 

This thanksgiving we are having Darren and Khloe for dinner so I spent today getting ready.  We were up at Costco this week and bought a fresh turkey… Mmmmmm.   Our trip to Prince George was great, it is so pretty this time of year.  The photo is crossing the Fraser River.  
  

My last shift for the season at the bakery was yesterday and now I have 7 months to get caught up on a lot of things… take care of some long over due chores … build a clientele for Back Alley deSign in the area … Work on some art and most importantly have some fun!   I really felt working away from home.  I work some 6 day weeks during the busy part of the summer and then was at my desk for the 7 th designing the Tongue in Cheek.  I didn’t get much of a summer!  I wasn’t prepared to be away and Barry became house husband having to do most of the cooking and all of the housework… He was an awesome sport!  I will not go back to the bakery full time next year, but the plan for now is to go back part time.

 I am hoping to get more happening with Back Alley deSign up here.  I have picked up a few design jobs and we are selling the Secret society of Dead Goldminers apparel thru the Frog on the Bog and it is all selling great!  She is currently carrying tee shirts, hoodies, bumper stickers and stickers.  She wants to add hats next year, maybe do rags so that is another project for me to research over the winter.  She wants to add a new item each year.  The design is a hit!  

 
I have a long list of things I need to blog about so stay tuned… 

I’m having so much fun working at the bakery and a lot of it is because these ladies are so awesome!  Bernice on the left is Barbs assistant, she has been working there for 6 years.  She’s really funny and pretty casual, love workin with her!  Barb, my boss is in the centre.  She is so nice and really laid back.  She also works a lot of hours!  She goes in at 5, bakes until 8:30 then goes to work at the school for the morning (her winter job), then she comes back after lunch until closing.  Love her, she is a sweetie!  And on the right is Kristina, she works for 2 hours every morning helping set up then goes to her full time job at the photo studio.  I think she also works at the Bears Paw in the evenings in the kitchen!  Hard working young lady!  They are so great and Barb keeps telling me how happy she is I’m there.  Yay!