Firsts in the new province

So I am slowly getting use to my new home.  The interesting winter weather two weeks ago  was a good test to my driving skills.  I love 4WD now and can totally appreciate why so many people drive huge trucks with even huger tires,  my sense of "thats a waist of gas/diesel" looking down my nose at people who drive them has now gone out the window to " were can I get tires like that?  with studs and a ski doo in the back too"  after  learning how to drive on an iced highway with no salt trucks in sight since 'well ya know salt does nothing at minus 40' ... the temp was minus 3 when we were hit with freezing rain ... and salt WILL do something at that temp which will help with having LESS accidents on the road  DA's...  I'm thinking of starting a lobbying group for at least some salt with the sand which by the way  makes great muddy  ice  at  minus 3...  At least the icky weather was gone in a few days and driving was back to normal.  Still looking into studded tires for the winter though.

 One other intersting thing I have noticed is that I am very close to both major cities in alberta, calgary and edmonton.  This has allowed me to see family more often and on a last minute schedule too.  Visiting family in ontario could sometimes be a scheduling night mare.  Bracebridge for example is over 8 hours away from were I was living.  With prices of gas in Ontario and having to book off extra days, it tended to cause for alot less visiting time of family and distant friends.  My local family saw me more often of course but even then it wasn't as often as I had wanted. Working seven day weeks tends to cut in on the social life.  Since I have moved here I have visited family in both major cities at least twice each,  its great connecting with them and catching up on life. But I still have to get to medicine hat someday soon too.

Now I have to say not having an Ikea in the same town has taken alot to get use to, I now have to plan when we go shopping and theres no quick stops into Ikea for a little wander and a meal after work any more,sigh,but it makes it more worth while having to plan when and why we are going.  We have our new bed frame and its awesome, sleek simple and it has drawers to boot.
The other bane of my wallet is however that I am way closer to a Bass Pro Shop( an hour and a half away)....  We spent the after noon yesterday wandering happily around Bass Pro, they sell ice cream there if you didn't know.  I now have a list a mile long of cool camping gadgets and wondering were we can put a smoker or a jerky maker in our apt...this trip filled my inner red neck needs for sure and the impulse buy for the day was two red neck martini glasses and a cookbook on jerky...we decided to hold off on the dehydrator till we do a bit more  research on that :)

what can I say ...they called to us...

 For those of you who do not have snow yet ...this pics for you.....all the white stuff is snow by the way and the lake is almost frozen  over too, mind you some of the snow has melted in the last few days but its here to stay it seems . This is my view from my window, not too bad eh?

Oh and our local shire along with several of the fencers have bought new swords, there was a great sale from Cas Hanwei and we decided to go for it, me and kenny included.  Once the new additions are in I'll be taking pics of our first practice with the new blades .
 

My Viking Necklace


I finally had the time to sit down and finish my necklace.  This is a project that I've been wanting to finish now for several years and while I have a few days off till I start my new job I thought I'd finish it before life gets too busy again.  That and I've started going squirrelly  not having any big projects to do, nor a blacksmith shop easily available and not knowing the area really well to go exploring either.

 This necklace is one of my memories and good times in Ealdormere.  Lets  see if I can give you a run down of the beads shall I :

-all of the lite amber is from Maunus' old necklace that had broken a few years back,  I was originally going to just fix it but thought I would "take" a few in good old viking fashion for my necklace( with his permission of course) .
- the two big black round beads supposedly based on a norse design on either end right after the amber were bought at my first crown event with Maunus in Kingston(Greyfells)
- from the left the next bead which is dark blue and cylindrical is also bought at a crown event.
- the norse head in (pewter)silver is an example of hack silver made by Wareham Forge (Sylar) and bought at the Althing three years ago, all Norse all the time, it was a super fun day and I hope it stays a constant in Ealdormere too.
- the next brown bead was given to me by a my friend Gerhard.
- the next blue bead was bought at the Althing, a great example of a traditional norse bead.
- (I'm skipping the amber since they are all from the same necklace)
-the next bead was  one that i had given to an armoured combatant( Lord James) as a thank you for helping out during my first crown that I had autocrated; he then turned around a gave me the bead back as a thank you for all that I had done during theday, such a sweet man.
-the next was a coin made by Sylar, here is the link to the coins info, very cool: http://warehamforge.ca/NORSE-REPRO/npenny.html

-the next green bead is one that was won by my lord at an event and given to him by Baronness Lucia then given to me as a favour for my necklace

-the two shells are from a necklace that was my mothers from the seventies, I remember her wearing it and I am glad to be able to have a piece of her memories on my necklace
- the next to blue and orange beads are another representation of a traditional bead pattern from the norse ear
- the thors hammer is a replicat that I made in my forge,
-then on down the line there is an Ealdormere bead that I bought at the Ealdormere Althing,
- the next coin is a repica of a roman coin,  it is my first coin that i  had ever collected,I bought it in Petawawa at a mall there from a coin seller.
- the next is a wooden bead from an old necklace of mine from SiouxLookout
-the next bead is broken but is one that I had made at a Trillium War when there was a bead forge there, that was totally fun
-the next two green beads are green jade, they are from a necklace that my father had given my mother
- the large black bead in the middle of the green beads is a replica of the byzanitne era( I still have to confirm this one)
-the bunny bead was given to me as an autocrat gift for my first event ,given to me by Baron Menken and Baroness Elanor
- the next brown marble bead was given to me by Baroness Lucia for passing my fencing authorization
-the lite blue bead was bought at a crown tournament, and is based on a norse pattern( still checking on this one too)
I may add a few more as time goes on but only if they are ones from my time in Ealdormere.
 However I can always add other lines of beads to my necklace too.

Ok one quick blog for the night... maunus's quote of the week:


" Who da man??  YODA man!" 

guess what we were watching tonight, star wars clone wars...


 

Had a great night at the fight practice for Bitters End in  Red Deer,  My gear is still in transit so I sat and chatted with the local senechael , rhyannon and her lord and two other lords that were there, their names being  Rob,Ron and Ross( dont ask me which one was which, that may take a few more intros) . Maunus had a fun time crossing swords with two of the fencers and also doing an  impromptu class too. I think we may have started the armoured combat  bug here too, hehe.     Theres going to be a regional practice in a few weeks and I cant wait to get my gear here so I can play too.  We are even going to check out a store in the west edmonton mall that sells SCA legal swords...yay!!!!!.  I might  have a new sword before christmas :)


Tomorrow we are off for a family dinner in Edmonton  and I think its been over twenty years since I was last at Aunt Robbies place .  Its going to be fun seeing everyone and introducing them to Maunus(kenny) for the first time for some.

Happy Thanksgiving every one, chat with you next week.

The tuesday flight was interesting, to say the least.  Only had a little bit of turbulence and  the lay over in Winnipeg went pretty quick.I even got to have a salsbury cheese nib, which brought back lots of fun memories from Winnipeg.And my last leg of the flight was on a jazz plane, which is way too small for my taste.    Now if i can get over this jet lag... you`d think 2 hours wouldn`t affect you that much, but this time it did.  Maybe because when I landed the temperature was ten degrees colder and the next day it snowed off and on.... sigh, so much for a warm fall ;)

Its been hard trying to take a few days off, who knew that I was a workaholic....

Tomorrow, if all works out, we should be going to my first fight practice in Red Deer, sans my gear, which is still in transit.  heh. 

I plan on writting about my misadventures out in the west, keeping my friends and family informed of what it is I`m doing. This may start out mainly with SCA things or it may not, we shall see were that tumble weed goes shall we.
First odd thing...the light switch for the bathroom is on the outside, which you`d think I would be use to since I lived in Manitoba for many years, but no, I still go into the bathroom, close the door and realize the light switch is out side...this may take a bit of getting use to.

Oh, one thing is for sure; quotes of Maunus will most definately be added on at least a weekly basis

So lets begin shall we :  Make sure to WARREN them if the blog gets too boring.... warren...hare...get it...

And on that note, have a great day everyone.