Spring Decorating

It looks like we finally found an arrangement that seemed to work sell with our living room and the furniture we have. The room is kind of long and narrow, so we sent out a pitiful appeal to our dear friend Bonnie, the all wise, all knowing, decorator and queen of the universe furniture arranger. She thought up this arrangement from 2000 miles away, and it works quite well.
We have a reading chair right by the window, which now boast sunlight for more than 16 hours a day. The sofa and love seat form a great place to visit, and since this photo, we have removed the TV to the boy cave down stairs.
We should have pictures arranged and hung within the week. We are looking for a small table to put a nice lamp we have, next to the fireplace.

The dining table seems to work well here, but we are looking to replace the table with one that will match the kitchen cabinets a little better. we are also having a built-in hutch made for the dining area that will frame the big window, and give us a bit more storage too. In the distance, we are having another cabinet made to go under the window (behind the wall behind the clock) and the island top is being made bigger too, for more counter top area to work on. We cannot have a small kitchen, there is not enough counter top room now, but will be in about 2-3 weeks.
Joseph and Alan skating with their skating coach (in blue). He is trying to get them to transfer their weight from one foot to the other. Alan says his balance is not there yet, and Joseph is trying to learn how to stop without using his dad or the boards. Our dentist, who is also in our bishopric, also started skating with the boys. He is in the group with Sam.
Can you just smell the testosterone? These two just will not leave one another alone. every time they get close to the other, they push and shove like two school boys. Neither one of them fell, but they both had their arm flailing moments.
After class, the skating coach is talking to Joseph and Sam. He says they both are doing well, considering neither of them has ever really skated much before last week. By the end of the class, (end of June) he thinks they will be ready for some pick-up hockey games. There are pick-up games at this rink everyday at lunch, and every Saturday night.

Last week Joseph and Alan were the only two people at the rink for the Saturday night pick-up game, so they skated and practiced a few things for 90 minutes. They had lots of fun.

We went to see 2 movies this week. The theater in town has 6 screens, but is in a yucky part of town. One of the movies, Made of Honor, was the late show, and we will not be going to the late show again. The other, Ironman, was a matinee, and that seems to be the time to go to the flick. The prices are comparable to California, but all the yahoos are still at home playing video games.

This week for YM/YW Joint Activity we helped participate in the city wide clean up program. It is incredible how much trash accumulates over the winter months, and hides under the snow. Now that all the snow has melted, the whole city cleans up block by block,and in just 3 weeks the whole place is clean.

See you all soon.

Michelle and Alan

The River Broke Up Today!! Hooray!!

We are so happy that the river broke up today. That is the unofficial start of spring here. The big storm of 2 weeks ago is now a fading memory. On the Radio today the DJ was announcing that this is the longest and coldest winter on record in over 50 years. We enrolled the boys in the CanSkate program for adults. Today was the first class. There are about 15 people in the class, and almost half of them speak Spanish. We met people tonight from Colombia, Nicaragua, and Mexico. Now if we could just get Michelle to skate...
Joseph got a little one on one time with the skating teacher after class tonight. Her name is Tania, and she is a former figure skater. Her daughter, age 12, is skating competitively now, and according to Tania, is about half as tall as Samuel, also age 12.
The sun sets on another great day in Canada for the Simpson Clan. The high temp today was 67F, and the weather prognosticator (or, if you prefer, prevaricator) says tomorrow will be 70F.
See the green grass in the background? We are starting to see more and more of this wonderful color, just not in our yard yet. The Miskanaw Golf Club is one of 3 courses here in Fort Mac. Joseph says he wants to start working at the course so he can get a little playing time in after the course closes for the evening. By the way, this shot was taken at almost 9:30 pm. (note the pretty blue sky)

Now that the winter is gone, and the earth is starting to come alive again, we are looking forward to getting out into the yard. We are in escrow on our house in Concord, and we can now focus our energies on our home here. We will keep posting as the yard starts to take shape, and we get plantings in.

See you all soon, for Amy's graduation in about 1.5 weeks.

This morning we went to the Syncrude Sport and Wellness Center. We joined so we could enjoy physical activity when the weather is too cold or nasty to anything outside. After our workouts, Alan and the boys played a little indoor soccer. You can see the running track on the mezzanine level past the field. On the other side of the wall under the track is the college basketball arena. We all had a great time playing.
After the fun in the morning, we went home and were serenaded by the boys. Samuel on his new electric guitar,and Joseph on his electric bass. Later the boys went exploring in the woods that are about 150 yards away from our back door. They found some good mountain biking trails and can hardly wait for the weather to clear up again.
To cap off the day, the boys played in the Wednesday Night Jazz Band, one of the bands at the high school, for the annual dinner dance. The dinner was very good, Prime Alberta Beef, and outstanding vegetable dishes. The music was even better. Sam has great form, and really enjoys playing with the other youth. He is one of the youngest in the band.
Joseph is playing a solo in this shot on his new trombone. He left for Edmonton this morning to play in a music festival with another of the high school bands. He plays tuba in that one. He will be home on Tuesday. We hope the band does well,and that they learn from the judges and in the workshops they will have.

We had a great time, even though it snowed almost all day long. We know spring is knocking on the door, and we hope, as does everyone else in town, that the river breaks up this week.

In the mean time, life is good, and we look forward to another day and another adventure here in the great white north.

Hello all,

Today's guest blogger is Alan:

Howdy! For those of you who are not linguists, that is Texan for Aloha. Now, let's all try again.

Howdy!

(your reply here)

The following is a small series showing our house:


Here we are in February, early or late doesn't really matter, or even late March too. All month long the house looked like this. The drift of snow by the front door looks just like the drift of snow on the roof, and the back yard, and the whole neighborhood.

The snow here is very small flakes, and very dry, because it is so cold. In Feb the temperature hovered right around -20 C. About 2 weeks ago, things started to get warm during the day, and we had 2 days last week when the temp stayed north of zero all day and all night. Spring and summer were on the way! Hooray! And the house looked like this:

Notice you can see some grass-ish growth. See how it is not white? Things are looking up! Last Sunday, after church, we stopped by the new bridge construction by the river. (see below) It is still frozen, but you can see the hills and trees are almost free of snow. As a matter of fact, it was so nice all week that Michelle started to plant some pots on the porches, and the backyard is thawed to a depth of about 14 inches. We know that because that is how deep I sunk when I went in the back yard to check on a leaky hose bib. As a matter of fact, today was the predicted day the river would break up and we would see water flow in the river again. We were so excited when we went to bed last night.

So this morning we wake up to this:

More snow. Now we think the thing to do will be to plant the whole garden is things like cauliflower, Easter lillies, and other white things. Then we can pretend that all winter the yard is in bloom. Just kidding. A guy asked me this morning if I enjoyed summer. I said yes,and I was glad i did not put away my winter clothes yet.

Actually we really enjoyed General Conference a few weeks back, and Ward Conference last week. We met the Stake Presidency, and the Pres and the 1st Councilor both know Jacob and have worked with him at service projects. (he used to serve in 2 areas in this Stake) They each told us how hard of a worker he is, in both missionary work, and in service projects. That was nice to hear. The Pres actually said he really liked how Jacob not only approached the work, but how he could get others to join the work too.

The 1st Councilor is named Van Bruggen. His son served in our Ward in Concord a few years back. We got to catch up on how the son is, (married and with one baby now), and we shared some experiences we had when his son was a missionary. Small world, eh?

Speaking of small, Did you know that Dave and Lanette have a niece that just got married? Did you know she married the son of a former missionary companion of mine? Did you know that the groom was also a missionary companion of Ricky Score?

Here is one more, One of the Bishopric here served in Mexico City East a few years back.

Work is really good. We are getting ready to work round the clock during a 2 week maintenance shut down at one of the plants. We are hiring anyone with "two feet and a heart beat". That is the Fort McMurray battle cry. We have trouble finding people to fill the positions we need to do the work. The pay is good here, but the work is hard, so many people come to town to get rich quick, find out they still have to work (and work hard at that), and then leave because they are only interested in the $$. The money alone is not enough to keep people here. In Ward Conference the Bishop said people come to Fort McMurray thinking they are here for the money. They are not. They are here because the Lord brought them here for a purpose, just like he brought Lehi and his family from Jerusalem to the promised land for a wise purpose. WOW. I had not thought about it in those terms. Now, if I just knew what it is.

The Stake President also said something very profound. The Lord asks us to do simple things, not easy things. The Lord know us and he knows what we need to do to return to him. The path is simple. The path is straight. We are the ones that keep wandering off the path and getting lost in the bushes. Just like our children wander off and get into things. hmmmm.

Well, We have to go now. Off to the next activity. We love you all, and think about you often. We remember all the great things we did there in Concord, and we look forward to seeing you again in the near future.

Hugs and Kisses,

Alan and Michelle

Here is the Simpson cooking tradition in action. Joseph loves to make crepes almost as much as he loves eating them.

This is what happens when one testosterone poisoned young man hide Easter Eggs for the other testosterone poisoned young man.

Yes, keeping tradition alive, it is the annual Simpson Family Midnight Easter Egg Hunt. Although it looks like the dead of night, this photo was taken at about 5:30 p.m. Today, April 16, sunrise was about 5:30 a.m. and sunset was about 9:15 p.m..

This is the view from our back porch, the second photo in a series. The first photo in a series of ?? will show up as soon as Alan finds it in our computer. We hope to show the regular progress in our neighborhood. Our place is so new that it does not even show up on any maps, GPS, etc.

Oh what a great day! Look, our stuff has arrived in time for my birthday!

















My kitchen is starting to look like real people live here instead of modern pioneers. After 6 weeks of camping in our house with only the barest of essentials, we are moving in.
















Candles from an excursion to civilization: $20
Art from a local artist: $45
Flowers from Alan's boss and his wife: $150
Frog: Gift from former client.

Having something to look at besides 4 bare walls: PRICELESS
















Everything tastes better when the packaging is in French. It is almost like living in a foreign country.... oh wait...














And this is the reason we are so glad to have received our household goods by my birthday. I got to have cake and eat it too!

Thank you to all my friends who remembered me on that wonderful (but cold) day.

Egg Hunt in the snow

Joseph and Sam hid Easter eggs in the snow. It was the Simpson annual dusk egg hunt which took place in Ft McMurray. We enjoyed 50 F for a few hours and can see some grass under the snow. We'll have about six more weeks of winter. May 20th is the planting day -I'm looking forward to that day. We had dinner at one of my beehive's house and I noticed that their family had their tomato seedlings on the counter - so I'm inspired to start my seeds tomorrow.

tomorrow is also the first day of Spring Break and I'll be taking Joseph and Sam and the Beehives to Vista Ridge (a ski hill in town ) to snowboard. The girls said that they only went skiing but I suggested that they try snowboarding and they could all struggle together. The girls said that the cafeteria sells the best 'poutin' (fries w/gravy and cheese) and Joseph and Sam seemed very interested in that. Wish me well on this jaunt.

I've decided that one of the big sadness' is that I have not known these people for 12 years . Having said that know that I'm cultivating relationships and see how kind people are in including us. Every house that we've been to for dinner has ended with a board game or cards - we've got to hone our game playing skills.

I miss your hands, feet, and your yards !

love from Ft Mac,
Michelle