Where's the Snow?

So last weekend, we decided to head to Waterton to play in the snow.  With nothing on the ground, we thought it would be fun to play in the white stuff and get some snowshoeing in too.
We packed up the boys and our niece and headed West.  The mountains looked like a fall day with what appeared like a dusting of snow on the peaks and upper slopes.  The townsite was mostly bare with snow hiding in the shady parts of the town.   A short drive later and we were at the Cameron trailhead. There was so little snow here, we felt we needed to head further in.  We finally decided on Rowe.

Funny how with kids, what normally takes 15 minutes, now takes 30 minutes.  As it turned out, we hiked for about a half hour and stopped to play.  I thought I would dig a snow fort, but after hitting dirt in less than 2 feet, I figured a change in plan was needed.  40 minutes later we had a cool tunnel that the kids could crawl through!  Time for a picture!  Oh wait, how come my pockets unzipped?

As you might be able to guess from the fact that I have pictures to post, I found the camera.  Much like a needle in a haystack, I found our camera in the snow.  No worse for wear, I even took a few more pictures.

It was a pretty awesome day with some fun sledding, building and snowball fighting.  We packed up and headed home with some tired kids and some tired parents.

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Parallel Time Shift.

Just finished watching an episode of Doctor Who.   Yeah, I'm a geek, I confess.  Anyway, it dealt with the same person walking in the same spot, but at different times in their life.  Then I came across this picture while looking through some old photos.

It's a picture of my Grandfather in Venice.  It's a neat shot, but the best part is this.

How far away am I?  6 steps?  20?  I had no idea how close the two of us stood, years apart, on the other side of the globe.

Neat stuff.

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Reading Club

This past year, I got myself a kobo ereader just before summer.  Then I thought I would start with a classic.  Moby Dick.  Painful!  So painful.  I'm sure there are many out there who thought it was fantastic, but for me it just about ended my reading agenda.
As luck would have it, our school instituted a 30min reading block each day.  It rescued my reading, giving me time to finish the book and a complete series, the Hunger Games.  That made 4 books this year!  I'm almost done Game of Thrones and also read a book you might have heard of.  Veracity.
If your unsure, it's Veracity by Mark Lavorato, a compelling story of a world post world wide disaster.  I should have read it sooner, but I only had a digital version and when I sat at my laptop.... well , I found other things to do.  With an ereader, your sort of limited on what you can do.

It was a great read and I highly recommend it.  I found towards the end that my heart was actually racing as I was concerned for the main character, something that I don't recall happening very often.  You can get yourself a copy of the book here.  It's a legit site and Lavorato has a link to a free copy on his website.

I also came across an interview with him about a new book that he is has published.

It's good to see him doing well and I'd love to chat with him too.  I need to see about getting a kobo version of his new book!

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Christmas Activities

After Christmas, Dora and I had to get some house stuff finalized in Kalispell.  We packed up the boys and headed south for 4 days and 3 nights.  We booked a hotel with a pool for the boys, who enjoyed the swimming and hot tub.  I finalized some appliances and our kitchen cabinets.  After that, we had a nice treat for the boys.

Often we drive to Whitefish and pass a sign for Izaak Walton.  I knew they had xc skiing there, so I thought I would check them out on the web.  Turns out, they also have trains!

For a premium and two night minimum stay, you can stay in a train engine or a caboose.  We were able to book ourselves into the little blue caboose you see here.  It's a bit of a jaunt, but you get a sweet view and some quality isolation.  Well minus the trains.  You overlook a busy train yard, that while mostly quiet, has it's fair share of train activity.  Dora's dad probably would not like it, but the kids sure did!

With shovels, sled and snowshoes in tow, we headed to our room for the night.  It wasn't the largest of suites, but the upper bunk was pretty sweet.  I'm still trying to understand some of the old sign-age from inside.

The next day we built snowman, snowshoed and read curious george a few times to many.  It was a great stay and if you can find the cash, have kids who love thomas the train, I think you would enjoy your stay.  The restaurant in the main hotel had excellent food and as a side note, their fire alarm is in excellent working condition!

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Happy New Years!

Happy New Years to all you out there, not living in LOMAH.  It's been a year of fewer postings (The count is actually 80 if you include the 24 posts on our other blog) and busy like I can't remember.

To sum up the year, there's been family stress, selling, moving, home construction, new job for Dora and numerous others.  We are hoping that the new year can bring some good news and less new.  We're actually hoping to settle into some normality this year.  The new house should be ready this spring and Dora will be finishing her first year at a new school with a new course load.

For resolution this year, I decided to jump out with 3, hoping that I stick to at least one.

1.  More exercise.  This is primarily supported by Judo I hope, with some weightlifting too.  Also number 2 should help.

2.  Waterton.  We live so close, yet this fall, we failed to deliver.  I want to make it a goal to get to Waterton at least once a month this spring.

3.  Friends.  Have'm.  Don't see'em.  Want to make a concious effort to visit with our local friends.  I was thinking dinner invites to be handed out once a month to refresh on news and kinship.

Well, you can judge the results I guess as the posts should show if I'm being successful or not this year.

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Time Lapse

This Christmas we did the usual, which involves driving up to champion for "doughgods" bun dough fried in lard, served with butter, sugar and sour cream.  They are very addictive and very tasty.

This is followed with a drive back to Coalhurst for an evening of family fun and eating.  This year I had the schools camera.  I recently purchased a remote trigger for the camera with interval settings.  I thought I would try it out to see if I could do some time lapse photography.  It seemed to work, but I think my time intervals were a bit too long, at 10 seconds, the motion was a bit too jerky.  I think I'll try it again with a shorter interval next time.

Anyways, here it is.

 

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Crafty...

My wife... she's so crafty.  You should see what she can do with Whipping cream and a chainsaw!

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Whitefish Trip

We headed south to do some shopping for Christmas and the house two weekends ago.  It was a fun trip as the in-laws were willing and happy to watch the boys for us.  While we love them dearly, you can't shop worth a darn with them.  With the boys in good hands we were in power shop mode.

We did make a quick drive up the mountain to see how much snow there was as Whitefish Mountain was open, but from the pictures, you can see it needs a few more weeks at least.

If you look at the run behind the tree by the stairs, you can see what the runs look like with no snow machines going.  The run to the right has artificial snow making up the majority of the coverage.

We also drove past the point of origin for those fires a few weeks ago.  It was crazy to see how far it spread from where it started.

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Our Movember

While I decided to grow a full beard and didn't participate in the moustache movement, that doesn't mean we didn't participate in our own way here.

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House Progress

We're 3 months into our build and things are looking great.  The house has a shingled roof and last week the builder wrapped the house.  It's nice to see that it's looking weather tight and this makes me very happy.  I'm excited to see what the new year brings as far as construction.

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House Update

Well the house is coming along, with the roof getting finished and shingles now getting nailed down.  Window are in and most of the framing is done.

It's nice to see some of the plumbing going in and things getting done in a way where upgrading will be easier.  I'd mention more, but you can check out more pictures and better descriptions on this site.

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Tourtiere

Well, if you follow along on Liminal Me's Blog, your sure to know that she is a wonderful cook.  I sometimes attempt to cook to, often with good food, less plating/presentation.  However, this time I may have succeeded in both!

While perusing the Walrus magazine, I came across a picture that looked divine, a peasant dish from Quebec called a Tourtiere. It looked good!  Now while Liminal Me often prepares lovely vegetarian dishes, I do not.  I make meat... lot's and lot's of meat.  As it turns out, this was no exception, being a meat pie.

I found a few recipes, but of course, I never really follow a recipe, rather use it as a general guideline.

For starters, I had a green pepper in the fridge and a few other veggies that I figured needed cooking.

1 small onion, 3/4 of a green pepper, 1 potato, 8 small carrots from one of those ready eat bags and I was off to the races.  I simmered this on the stove in some butter, well, a lot of butter and then threw in some of the spices.

The neat thing about this dish was the spices.  I rarely cook with savory, cloves and cinnamon.  They were a neat combination and provided some good flavor.  I'd like to say I know how much I put in... but I don't.  All I can say is that it needed more.

I took out the veggies and then cooked up a couple pounds of beef.  I could have used pork, but beef is what we had.  Also, it seems that game meat was popular back in the day.  Personally, this looked like it would work.  I threw the veggies back in and added more spices to taste.  Again, I could have used some more spice.

I tossed the mixture into a tenderflake pie crust and threw a second one one top.  Cut a few slits in the top and tossed it in the oven at 350 for about 35 minutes.  I think I put some more butter on and broiled it for a few minutes just to brown the top.

As you can see, it turned out to be a nice hearty meal!  I think everyone enjoyed it and with a few modifications (like adding some maple syrup to the top and mixture) I think this might be a new favorite of mine.

Bon Appetit!

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