Wordless Wednesday

Not forgotten...

Spruce covered in moss outside our door.

As the title of the blog says, everyone hasn't been forgotten. I've been very busy, but the blog has always been in the back of my mind. As I've said in the past, I would like to write more, but it hasn't happened yet. It's not for a lack of things to write about, but rather, an overwhelming amount to write about. I think about sitting down to write, but I know that I don't have time for all the things I want to say.

Yesterday I was reading the blog of a wonderful and crafty woman here who lives in the woods and does crafts from things that she gathers there. She even gathers plants and mushrooms to dye wool with. This lady writes every day, monday to friday. Not a lot, but something, every day. Every Wednesday she has a 'Wordless Wednesday' where she posts a photo she took of something in the woods around her. I found this inspiring. I really like blogging, and this might be the answer I'm looking for.

So...a summary of the chaos:

William has been swimming still twice a week and in JFW (junior forest wardens) every Tuesday. JFW had a skills meeting near Edmonton where we learned all sorts of interesting survival skills. The kids amazed me with their knowledge. It's not often these days that you can see a 12 year old kid erect a shelter and start a fire in 5 min flat. These kids could. 

William also just finished a swimming competition in Grande Cache a few days ago. He did really well and we are very proud of him. His team took home five golds and the overall title too. Also, I have to add that the boys were very blessed on their drive to Grande Cache. They hit a moose! Blessed? You may ask...Yes! They weren't hurt and the vehicle received minimal damage. Here's a photo I found here to put things in perspective:

William and Allan were in a truck and not a car, but a collision with a moose on the highway is usually the equivalent of hitting a parked semi. Very rarely are the results ok. That is why they are so blessed and I am so grateful.

In other news, winter hit us with a vengeance. In the course of a week we received over a foot of snow. The roads were horrible and William and I stayed home most of the time. If I had to go into town, Allan drove me while I looked at my iPhone (I can't stand to look at the roads when they are that bad). The weather also turned cold and we received our first -25ºC weather. Were we warm? Yes. Were quite comfortable, but we learned a few things.

Allan's shaving cream froze in the medicine cabinet. It's not a heated cabinet, so if we had opened it a crack, the warmth from inside the trailer would have heated the cabinet. We didn't think of that, so it froze. We also learned that shaving cream doesn't recover from being frozen, and Allan had to buy more. 

The worst thing that happened was that our fridge quit. We had read that there is stuff flowing through the fridge that can gel at cold temperatures and we should take precaution. We didn't take it seriously enough though...it gelled, the fridge quit, and that was last week. We have since had warm weather and we still can't get the fridge working, so we will have the service guys come out and look at it. We are blessed enough that there are guys in town that will come to the RV instead of insisting that we bring it to them. That just wouldn't work right now.

Well, so much for a quick post, but if I post again tomorrow and the next day and the next...I should be able to keep them brief and keep everyone up to date. I may steal the 'Wordless Wednesday' idea though...so tomorrow may be only a photo. We will see.

Old Man Winter...

My car at the first snow of the year.

I can't believe it's been nearly a month since I last wrote. We've been very busy around here, but I didn't think it had been that long. I will definitely do my best to be better at posting!

Lots has changed around here, but the biggest change would have to be the season. It's no longer fall here. Winter has come and brought freezing temperatures, snow and ice. We have had cold feet, frozen water, chilly bums, and ice cold beds. It's definitely been interesting adjusting, but it's all good too.

So, the first thing is we have had to winterize the trailer, but not in your typical way. Most RVs, you drain all of the lines and then replace the water with antifreeze for the winter. Because we are staying in ours, and would like to have some water, we can't do this. We have to find a way to keep our water from freezing while not using antifreeze.

What we did was take our water line, that's hooked up to the campground water, and we wrapped it in tinfoil. Yes, the entire 30' hose is wrapped in tinfoil. We then taped heat tape to the hose. If you don't know what heat tape is...it's not tape. It looks like a long electrical cord which has a sensor on it, and when the temperature gets close to freezing, the cord warms up. This keeps pipes (or in our case, hoses) from freezing. The reason we wrapped it in tinfoil first, is that tinfoil conducts heat far better than plastic, making sure we aren't only warming one side of the hose.

Our water compartment. It's inside the 'basement' door. The white hose is our water, and it's connected directly to the campground water. The black cord is the 'heat tape' and you can see the orange sensor on it. This is before we had everything attached. Yes...there is a plug-in in our water compartment.

Water hose wrapped in tinfoil with the heat tape attached with tape.

We then wrapped the whole thing with pipe insulation tubes. They look like pool noodles.

Once everything was wrapped in the pool noodles, or pipe insulation tubes, or whatever they are called, we had a nice warm home for our water hose. It worked great! The only problem was, where the campground water comes out of the ground, in the metal pipe, it kept freezing. Our hose didn't freeze, but that doesn't help when no water gets to the hose in the first place. We learned to keep our holding tank full of fresh water, just in case. Usually by the afternoon, everything had defrosted and we could use the campground water, but there were quite a few mornings without water.

Then..yes, there's so much more...the campground shut the water off. For the winter. For real. I guess their pipes are too close to the surface and they freeze quite regularly. The owners have taken to shutting the water off for the winter and blowing out the lines, saving them the cost of repairing burst water lines. They then haul water and use a pump to fill the RVs here twice a week. They come every Monday and Thursday. Our holding tank is large enough to provide us with plenty of water...as long as we don't shower. 

Luckily, a short walk away is a shower house. In fact there are two shower houses. One where the laundry is, and one by the fish pond.  The showers are free, and in some ways, better than showering in the RV. I don't have to worry about using all the hot water, or using all the water period. I can have it as hot and as long as I would like. The problem though, we have to walk to the shower house. I also learned that if you shower on the weekend, you may...or may not...have hot water. I must share this story. Haha.

The outside of the shower house by the fish pond. Left is women's, right is men's.

Inside the women's side of the shower house. There's two toilets, two sinks, two showers, and plug ins if you need to use a blow dryer.

The shower stall.

One fine Saturday morning, I wandered over to the shower house by the fish pond, images of hot water dancing through my head. Upon arriving, I undressed, started the shower, and hopped in. Less than 30 seconds later...the water was ice cold. I jumped out as fast as I could. Shivering, I contemplated this. It happened so fast, my hair was still dry. I could just towel off and head back to the RV. Obviously all the hot water had been used up before I got there. Just as I decided to come back later, the water turned steamy again. Strange. 

Deciding someone had perhaps flushed a toilet, or ran a tap, or something in the men's side, I got back in the shower. Got my hair wet, and FREEZING WATER. Crap! Hop out again. Now my hair is wet, I'm freezing, and nothing is clean yet. Covered in goosebumps, shivering, I contemplate again. I really want a shower. It's been at least 30 seconds since I jumped out...maybe I should go home. 30 seconds is a long time when you're wet, cold and standing next to a shower. Hot steam comes from the shower. Ok, lets try this again. Hop back in the shower, warm up, put shampoo in my hair, get it nicely lathered, and FREEZING WATER. This has to be some sick joke. Now my hair is full of soap. I can't just leave. I have to rinse my hair out. Do I do it in the freezing water? This water is ice cold. It's not like it just cooled off and is merely warm. This stuff is being pumped straight from a glacier somewhere, I swear!

The goosebumps on me look like small mountains. I'm seriously debating running back to the RV with the soap in my hair and rinsing it off there. I think it's been a full minute. Yes, that's what I'll do. The hot isn't coming back this time, I can tell. I look at my towel....and heat comes from the shower. Really? I sigh, and hop in the shower. 

My hair rinsed, the water goes ice cold again. I jump out. I'm getting a little mad now. I'm plotting all of the things I will say to the campground owners about their defective shower and my horrible experience. The shower goes hot. Ok, that time it was only for a second or two. That's not bad. I'll see if I can wash before it goes cold again. Yes. I managed to finish my shower in blessed heat. Moral of the story, don't shower on Saturday. So far. I haven't had a problem during the week. We'll see if that changes.

We also discovered that the slides are about 5º cooler than the rest of the trailer. You know...the place where our beds are, and our living room couch, and our dining room table. Yeah. They are cooler. Our feet get cold on the floor. We have since skirted the trailer, and that has greatly improved the warmth of the floor, but you can still feel the cold through the walls of the slides. It's only -15ºC here. We aren't freezing by any means. I have to admit though, I'm a little concerned what the slides will feel like at -40ºC though. 

The RV with it's tinfoil, bubble wrap skirting on (I think it's called Flex Foil Insulation). The large propane tank is a new addition as well. A company comes out and fills it for us, all 380lbs. We just have to call them when it hits 30%. It's way more convenient and much cheaper than the smaller 30lb bottles.

In the meantime, we are wearing slippers, and we discovered an amazing invention. A mattress heater. No more getting into an icy cold bed. No, no! We turn the warmer on about an hour before we go to bed, and we crawl into a heated bliss. Oh my. It's heaven. The dogs love it too. Gunner never used to sleep on the bed, but he's finding his way on our bed more and more. Manny sleeps on top of the blankets now, he usually sleeps under them. I think it's too hot under them with the heater on. 

Lap blankets are our friend now too. Don't get me wrong...we aren't cold. It's just...cool, sort of. Like a slight draft, almost. It's hard to explain. We could probably turn the heat up and be just fine, but that would mean our furnace would be running more and our propane would be disappearing faster. We don't want that, so we use slippers, blankets, a space heater, and mattress warmers. With those things, we are toasty warm. The space heater is also to keep the furnace from running as often. Power is free here...propane isn't. 

So far, so good on the winter RV front. I will keep things updated more often, as we also have internet. Did I mention that? We have satellite internet now, and with being fairly careful, we can avoid going over our allotted 30 gigs a month. It may seem like a lot, but not if you consider that one HD movie from iTunes uses 4.5gigs. Or...a 5 minute youtube video can use 100mb. Thats roughly 1/10 of a gig. So 10 videos that are only 5 min long, and I've used a gig in less than an hour. We are downloading seasons of tv shows and movies once a week while I clean the apartment, and we are avoiding using the internet for things like, netflix, youtube, and facetime. We are, however, playing online games, specifically, Guild Wars 2. Before you panic...an hour of online gaming..on a pc...uses about 24 mb. I would have to play for 4 hours to use up what one 5 min video on youtube is using. BUT, it would be totally different if I was using a PS3 or an Xbox 360 to game online. The graphics are much higher, and can use as much as 100-200mb an hour.

I digress, all is well here. Until next time, take care =)

Our first visitors!

It's been two weeks since I last wrote, and it wasn't for lack of inspiration. Plenty has happened around our little abode, one of the things being that we ran out of data for our internet. We can buy more at any time, but we talked to a certain company and they assured us that they could provide us with internet, satellite internet and high speed!  Sound too good to be true? Yes, it was. We phoned them back a week later to arrange the hookup, drop off, meeting...whatever it is they had to do, and the person who answered said, "Oh, we have satellite television, but we don't have satellite internet. Besides...you're out of our internet coverage area." This may seem ridiculous, but it's about par with everything else we've experienced. We had one lady (different company) tell us that they had satellite internet, but we couldn't move the RV for 2 years because they had to hardwire it in, and only did a free move every 2 years. Huh? That makes no sense, but we couldn't convince her otherwise. So, we are continuing the search, and in the meantime, I may purchase more archaic internet from the campground. I say archaic because it's so slow it takes hours to do one blog upload.

So, what's new? Well, we spent a week back at the old house trying to get it cleaned out. We couldn't bring the RV because the transmission is gone in the truck, and as I write, we are still waiting for it to be fixed. Instead, we stayed with my Mom and had a wonderful time. The dogs love my mom. It's like they know that she's special because she's Grandma. They are as bad as the kids...Manny cries when he sees her house, he's so excited! Of course, we are excited too! She spoiled us, fed us like royalty, and wouldn't let us do a thing! I finally told her pay back was coming when she came to visit us. She wouldn't be allowed to do anything but relax.

Manny in the arms of his Na-Na....I wasn't sure he was coming home with us!

When we went home, my in-laws came out to visit us! Our very first visitors. I was a little nervous, I really wanted them to see the charm of what we were doing, and why we loved our new, strange life so  much. It's one thing to do something that you love, it's another to show it to someone else.  They brought their RV, a 33 ft bumper pull, and we managed to get them a spot in the campground. That's one thing that has amazed me, the campground is still full and it's nearly October. I'm sure in some places that might be normal, but here, it's dropping down to freezing temperatures at night, and there are still people pulling into the campground.

While the in-laws were here we did a lot of fishing, Heather (my sister in law) and Jack (my father in law) joined us on our morning walks and brought their two dogs, Scruffy (a Shit-tzu) and Darby (a Cocker Spaniel). It was nice walking with them in the mornings, all the dogs running around having a great time.

Heather and Jack ahead of us with the dogs.

Jack, Allan, and the dogs.

Jane (my mother-in law), William, Heather and I did a little shopping in town and I showed Jane some of the stores our small town boasts. While we were in town, Allan and Jack took off fishing. We all met up that night and went to the little pond that is in the campground so that the kids could go fishing. The campground owners stock the pond with rainbow trout. Although it's a small pond, it boasts some large fish. The lighting was wonderful that evening, so I took a few pictures <giggle>.

A huge trout Jack caught. He said it was the biggest he's ever brought into shore.

Allan teaching Heather to fly fish.

Pretty.

Jack, looking to hook that big rainbow again.

Jack furthering Heather's fly fishing instruction.

William watching his Daddy fish, net in hand.

A smaller trout that Allan caught. William's ready with the net.

We had a great time with the in-laws here. We were all sad to say goodbye. I hope that means that they will be visiting us again soon. 

There are a few other things on the list of happenings lately. My mom and Sam are coming up to see us this weekend. We're all very excited about that! We are in the process of getting the RV ready for the winter as well. I think I will devote a blog entry to that and all that we have done, including what Allan has done to organize the basement. I may also make a separate blog about how I've managed to fit everything into our RV and still have room to breath, haha. I may take some videos of everything too. I've also been hired (officially now) by Allan's company to clean their office and the crew house. The crew house will sleep up to 5 guys at a time. I have to wash the bedding and clean everything. That's where I am as I write this...they have internet! The crew house is clean right now and I'm just waiting on bedding that's in the wash. It gives me a chance to blog. Until I get internet at the RV, this may be the only time I have to post. William's plugging away at his schooling and doing well, I'm still making survival bracelets to sell to send Sam to Nicaragua with H.A.N.D.S (Helping Another Nation Develop Schools) at Easter next year. I've also been knitting dish cloths. I love knitted dishcloths! They just work so well!

I'm sure there's more that I could say, but that's probably enough for one day. I wish that I could write more, but internet is such an issue. Soon enough I will be able to write more often. There's so much more that I would like to share with everyone. I find that my thoughts get jumbled if I wait too long. Everything wants to come out at once, and it doesn't all fit <gig>. I'll post again as soon as I can.

More to life than hotdogs....

Nothing quite says camping like roasting hot dogs over the fire. Every time Allan and the kids and I would go camping, that would be our first meal. We would set up camp, gather firewood, and start the fire. Once there was a good set of coals burning in the depths, out came the hotdogs. Everytime. Except...now that we live in our RV.

We are on week three of full-time RV living and we haven't had a single fire. We don't have any firewood gathered...and we haven't eaten a single hot dog. Not one marshmallow has been consumed either! I know... I think we may have committed a camping crime. I'll keep an eye out for the Fish and Wildlife officers. I'm sure eating hot dogs while camping is part of their jurisdiction right? Eating fish and deer and moose are, so that makes sense.

If we haven't been eating the normal food of camping, what have we been eating? The simple answer is, "Whatever we want." If you're looking for food ideas for camping, this may be a strange site to be at. We have eaten spaghetti, lemon and dill salmon, lasagne, couscous, etc. How do I cook these things in an extremely small kitchen? Careful planning. Lol.

For example, tonight we are having meatball chill and fresh baked bread. I did the chili in the slow cooker at 11am, and then did the bread in my toaster oven at 1:30pm. I did one at a time, and cleaned up completely after each one so that I would have the room for the next one.

Our Meatball Chili cooking

The risen bread dough, just put into the toaster oven. It just fits.

The bread fresh out of the oven, cooling off and filling the RV with mouthwatering goodness.

The RV kitchen in action.

It is a bit of a juggling act, I admit. It's not impossible though, and as far as I'm concerned, it's totally worth it! As soon as the bread is out of the oven, and the oven has cooled, it goes back into our bedroom closet, freeing up the sink space. Once the bread is cooled, it is wrapped up and put into the microwave. Yes...the microwave. I use it as a bread box, haha. Why not, really? Then I have 2/3rds of my counter space back in time for supper, when all I need do is dish up. 

While all of these high-wire acts are going on, William is doing his homework at the table, and the dogs are moving from sun patch to sun patch soaking in the rays and napping. It's quite peaceful most days, and I'm really enjoying it.

William hard at work while Manny lays in the sun on the couch.

The real test for me will be next week. We are planning on possibly taking the RV back to our hometown for a week while we finish up all the details on the old house. It's currently riding on whether or not our new truck passes it's inspection, and if we can get the 5th wheel hitch into it in time. If all goes well, the RV will be moved for the first time since we brought it to this spot. It's a little scary for me because I've moved a lot of stuff into the place since we first got here. I think I have it all in such a way that we can easily pack up and go, but I don't know for sure. Perhaps I'll let you know nest week ;-P

Settling in

Gunner hanging out at the front door.

It's been two weeks since I last wrote. So much has happened, I have no idea where to begin, or what to include. I can't include it all, or I would be here all day and I barely have the time for this as it is. I guess the best place to start is at the beginning.

On Saturday, August 25th, we went and signed our lives away on our future home. It was super exciting to finally see the place after all of the waiting and the planning. Part of me was scared that it wouldn't be as wonderful as I remembered it, that I had somehow put it on a pedestal for which it didn't deserve.  I needn't have worried. It was everything I remembered and so much more!

Left: Our old RV ; Right: Our new home

That Sunday was a long day. Allan and I drove the 300km north to pick up his boss's pick up and then drove 300km back to the dealer to pick up the RV. Why would we do such a thing? Well, even though Allan's truck is a 3/4 ton, it's still not big enough to pull our RV, so we borrowed a 1 ton. It was a 6 hour drive, then we hooked up to our new home on wheels and took it to the Wal Mart near our house so that we could load it up. Between family visiting to see the new digs, and loading everything in, we were going until after midnight.

Following my 'house' at 7am on Monday

The following day, Monday, we were up at 4am. We packed what we had left into the truck, car and RV and hit the road north. We knew where we wanted to put the RV when we got there, but we still had no idea if the campground was full or not. The last time we had talked to the owners, the place was completely full. We really had no idea where we would end up, but Allan had to work still that day, so off we went.

Monday was a very strange day, and a story in and of itself. Perhaps I'll write about it later. Long story short though, the dogs locked us out of the car half way there, we ended up at a horrible campground by a golf course for 4 hours, and in that small amount of time, I nearly practiced infanticide on someone else's kids (does it still count?). We also learned the joys of RV living. Number one joy on my list....you can change your neighbourhood any time you want, and we did! By 10 o'clock that evening we were exactly where we had wanted to be. God smiled on us and a spot opened up at our campground...and we are still here as I write!

The view from my dining table tuesday morning. The building you can

just see through the trees is the laundry. I walk a dirt path through the woods to do my 

washing...it's kind of cool.

Tuesday morning I woke up totally refreshed and feeling great. Our bed was super comfortable, the temperature was perfect in the RV, it couldn't have been a better sleep. I made Allan lunch and coffee and sent him off to work, then sat at the table and thanked God for the amazing blessings He gave us. 

As you can see from the above photo, this is the view from the dining table. It's not for everyone, but I love it. I love the woods, the smell of the woods, the sounds, the animals. It's great! It's not an ocean view, or a mountain one. It's not anything real 'woohoo' that would make it on a calendar....but it's also not my neighbour's house, or an alley, or smog. I don't wake up to the sound of car alarms and vehicles running and people yelling at each other. I wake to the sound of squirrels chattering and birds singing. There are magpies, ravens, whiskey jacks, blue jays, and a million different small birds...it's perfect.

There's a cutline behind the RV that leads to a farmer's field. I checked with the campground owner and she said that we are welcome to walk there, just no atv's. I take the boys (Gunner, Manny, and Willy) on a walk down the cutline and through the field every morning. It's been great. Everyone is tired by the time we get home, and then the dogs sleep all day and Willy isn't talking my ears off (he does that when bored, lol). So for anyone who may think that my Lab or my 12 year old boy will suffer living in an RV...you may want to look at these pictures before you judge. They are all getting more exercise than they did before we moved here. I think they have more space too *wink*.

The view from the top of the cutline looking into the field.

The view from the field looking up into the campground. You can just

see Willy's bedroom window. He has the best view!

Gunner, tired and covered in morning dew from the grass in the trees.

Willy and Gunner, looking handsome and rugged.

Gunner and Manny. Manny had troubles keeping up the first few days. He's nearly 7 years old, 

but he's leading the way some mornings now.

We are heading into week three soon of RV living. There is still much to do. We need to finish cleaning out and fixing up the old house so that we can put it up for rent, we have to skirt the RV before winter hits, organize the RV basement, and...and...and a million other things. We are loving our new life though. So far...no regrets.

Starting to panic....1 week to go.

I meant to post this yesterday, but it was my daughters 17th birthday, and well, I had better things to do, hahaha. Presents and dinner at the Keg were wonderful, and my mom was there as well, so it was a nice family moment. A bitter sweet one though, as we are leaving in a week, and Sam is staying behind.

Packing for something like this is so difficult! I have to think about so much, what we need, what we can store, what we can sell, and what to give away. There are so many details that I have to figure out, it's crazy. I just realized the other day that I hadn't even thought of what the heck I'm doing with our 60 gallon fish tank, complete with fish! I can't exactly take 300lb of water and fish into our RV. Luckily, I figured something out for them....it flushes. I'm KIDDING!!! Don't worry, they are going to a good home, *giggle*. I couldn't resist.

Now, normally when I move, I throw everything into boxes (yes I go through it), then we move, and whatever we haven't unpacked after a year (yes, I have that stuff), I go through again, and sell or donate. I don't have the room for that stuff this time. I have to make sure that we are only taking what we need because we don't have the room for all the extra stuff that I won't use for a year. I also have to think about our VERY limited storage capabilities, as well as weight limits. I'm so glad our 5th wheel has a large basement though.

I'm pretty sure this is the one that we will get.

Then there is the kitchen stuff. OH MY WORD. How to decide what to bring and what not to? I need it all I swear! I have to weed a well stocked kitchen down quite far. I need to find what is dual purpose and what I simply can't use in an RV...like our large pizza stone. That won't fit in an RV oven! I love our home made pizza though...sigh. I will have to figure out some other way. I'm thinking of getting a convection toaster oven. I should be able to bake bread and buns still, cookies, a cake maybe...and do small personal sized pizzas in one. Maybe small casseroles? There is only the three of us now. I will also save on propane that way if I use a toaster oven instead of the propane stove in the RV. I have never owned a toaster oven, but I'm thinking it will be a life saver in all of this. Besides, if it's hot out, I can take the oven outside and bake out there! Save on the A/C!

I also bought a silicone bakeware set from Canadian Tire. Reason? I can mash them up and shove them in a drawer if needed. I don't need all the room I would with regular muffin, bread, cake and bundt pan, or cookie sheet. It also says on the package that they can be folded and stored and won't lose their shape. I'm counting on it!

I also bought the above collapsable measuring spoon set, and the set below.

Those are some of my space saving ideas and solutions so far. I'm also bringing my crock pot. That's another amazing device that I think will save on propane as well as make life easier. I'm leaving in storage my Kitchenaide Classic countertop mixer and all of it's amazing attachments. I'll be sad to leave it behind, but my toaster oven and my crock pot are the only large kitchen items I'm allowing myself. I can make do with a hand blender. I did for years and years.

So, that's some of what we are going through right now. I'm trying to downsize and plan and organize, and in a few days we should have the RV. Then we will be moving into the RV, out of our house, and putting our stuff into storage. Then we need to fix a few things in the house and put it up for rent. Hopefully I will be able to post again next Monday, but if you don't hear from me in for a while, it will be because we are very busy. I will post as soon as I can.

Cowboys and Indians, 2 weeks and counting.

An awful picture of the three of us, but there aren't many, so I thought I would post it, haha.

On Friday morning, Willy and I got up bright and early and headed 3 hours north to see Allan. If you look closely in the above photo, on the left hand side, you can see our current RV. It's a little Springdale tow behind. That's where we stayed while visiting Allan. In case you haven't guessed, it's in the yard of his shop, you know, where all the big trucks are running and driving, and starting at 6am. It's great. (Yes, that was sarcasm) The shop is also wedged between Highway 16 (a major highway) and a railroad. The railroad isn't just a set of tracks either, it's the rail yard. Where the trains stop and load and unload cars. So...it's a nice spot if you don't like quiet. Ever.

Despite our less than ideal spot (it is free, and handy for Allan who had to work), we had an amazing time. Friday, we set up Willy's archery target and shot arrows in the shop's yard. The yard is quite large, so there's lots of room to shoot. We had a great time, even if Willy's bow is too small for either of us.

Once it got too dark to shoot, I went into the trailer and the boys...I wasn't sure what they were doing, until I heard a lot of noise, engines, beeping, gravel grinding, etc. I went out to look and saw this:

Allan and Willy playing in the skid steer.

Really, what more could a boy want in one day? Besides, the next day promised even more fun.

Saturday, we headed out to Hinton's Fish and Wildlife Shooting Range. It's about 45 minutes away from where we were 'camped', but they were hosting a shooting event that we didn't want to miss. It's called 'Funday'. They have it every year, and the public can go and try their hand at archery, rifles, trap shooting, and big game shooting. Not having parents who hunt, Allan and I have very little experience shooting anything. We both have shot gophers for farmers with a .22 at some point in our childhood, and that's about it for our firearms experience.

The view on the way to Hinton.

When we arrived, the members of the club were amazing. They came over and introduced themselves, and took Willy off to go shoot trap. If you are ignorant like we were...trap shooting is shooting clay pigeons that are fired from a 'house' buried in the ground. You then shoot the clay pigeons with a 20 or 12 gauge shotgun. (20 gauge is smaller)

Bob, from the club, showing Willy how to hold a 20 gauge shotgun. Willy found it to be quite heavy.

The cement 'house' on the left is where the clay pigeons are shot from. In the photo, Willy was shooting at a stationary target first, to get the feel of things. Willy hit the stationary target, but didn't hit any of the moving ones. I think it was because the gun was so heavy for him, he had problems moving it. My son isn't exactly muscular, to put it mildly. Lol. 

After Willy shot, it was my turn.

Long story short on me shooting...they created a monster. I LOVED it! Who would have thought shooting a chunk of clay flying through the air could be so exciting! I hit 4 of the 5 pigeons Bob sent out in the air. We were on a modified house, so the birds only went straight. Apparently 4/5 is pretty good for a beginner, so they took me to the 'real' area where the birds are shot in one of three directions...and you don't know which one. I hit 5/5 on that. 

Well...people were flocking to me. I heard things like, compete, try international, join, member, etc among the members. I wasn't sure what I had done, but everyone was very excited. Turns out...most beginners can't shoot that well, and I was a natural. Who'd of thought? So, I was invited to shoot with the members the next day, and get a couple of free rounds. It was exciting. 

After I peeled myself away from the trap shooters, we moved on to the rifles. Allan didn't try trap because his phone kept ringing, and he told me he really had no interest in shotguns. Fair enough. Compared to trap shooting, hitting a paper target with .22 was quite anticlimactic, but we still had fun, and Willy did very well. He hinted that he may like to have a .22 of his own one day. His groupings were wonderful, and one of the hunters offered to take him rabbit hunting some time.

Then we were off to do some archery. William was obviously quite excited, this is his thing now! He's always loved archery, and even though he likes the .22, I'm sure he would far rather rabbit hunt with his bow than with a rifle. 

Willy waiting for Allan to finish shooting so he can retrieve his arrows.

Allan and Willy had a great time shooting the bows. The club had compound bows available for the public, so Willy set aside his long bow and played with compounds. He had a lot of fun and hinted VERY strongly that he had perhaps outgrown his longbow and his next bow should maybe be a compound. <grin>

In the photo above, on the right hand side, you can see a man in a white shirt taking pictures of Allan shooting. He took pictures of William too. Was he a stalker? No. A reporter. Allan and Willy made it into the local newspaper! Willy thought that was quite awesome!

After a long day of shooting stuff, we said goodbye to all the wonderful people we had met and headed back to the trailer. Was our fun day over though? Not quite.

At 11pm, we headed out of town to a pipe yard Allan's company has. We parked the truck in the middle of the dark yard, laid blankets out in the box of his truck, and watched the Perseid meteor shower. What a cool ending to our day.

Photo was taken from here.