Christmas is coming...

It's that time of year again when I remember to update the blog and tell you everything that happened in 2018. 

Looking back if I was to put a label on this year it would be "All Change". For those of you who know me well you'll know I don't really like change so it's been a bit of a trying year in that respect.

But all in all we have lots to be very thankful for as we have our health, family, a roof over our heads, a wonderful church family and we live in a beautiful place.

Harriet graduated from Harvey High School and had lots of celebrations making May/June very busy months. She then moved to UPEI in September to study Biology. She is living in residence this year which she finds interesting. She has made lots of friends and is getting plugged into church life at Christ Central Church Charlottetown. She has found a part time job looking after 3 children for 2 afternoons per week which she enjoys too. 

Josh has had a busy year with 2 semesters at UNB and 1 semester on a work placement. He is going on an 8 month placement after Christmas as is currently set to graduate in 2020. He is very active as a volunteer firefighter and also plays war-hammer and other tactical games. He lives with Isaac and has converted a bedroom into a gym.

Isaac moved into an apartment in town with Badger his dog. He decided city living isn't all it's cracked up to be and moved back to Harvey and bought our old house. He's busy finishing the renovations on the house and Josh is his lodger. He is going back to St Andrews to do his block 4 then sit his red seal exam to complete his HVAC training.

David and I keep busy working full time, being involved in Christ Central Church Fredericton, looking after the pigs, chickens and dogs and renovating the farmhouse. We moved into the farmhouse in the spring and have made some progress since then. We now have electricity, walls, water, a shower, some flooring and a makeshift kitchen. We are currently working on our chicken hotel so we can have all our feathery friends together under one roof. 

This empty nest stage of life takes some getting used to, we miss having the kids around and having to cook much smaller meals! Maybe once we've finished all the renovating we'll have to take up some new hobby or something!!!

Winter has come very early this year, we had our first proper snowfall in October which stayed for a good week. It then hit us with full force early November and we won't see grass now till April! This certainly makes doing all the farm chores very slow going. But hey it looks lovely and snowshoeing is fun.

We have no plans to travel next year, we really aught to make our house into a home. But if anyone wants to come visit we'd love to have you stay, and if you like doing DIY even better!

8 years in Canada

Some of the grad celebrations

25 years....and counting!

On 31st July 2018, David and I will celebrate our silver wedding anniversary.
We really can’t believe it’t been so long, it seems like a blink of an eye.
We’ve been looking back at the last 25 years and we think we’ve fitted a fair amount in!

6+ houses
2 countries
3 kids
4 dogs
4 cows
Countless pigs, chickens, turkeys and ducks.

Our wedding vows have been well and truly tested as we’ve seen the best and worst of each other, had times of plenty and times we’ve found it a struggle, times of good health and some serious health concerns. But through it all we still love and cherish!

We don’t have any big plans to celebrate. We will take a day off from both work and renovations and probably go for a day out to see more of the beautiful place we live.

Things are kinda strange around here now. David and I moved into the farm house last month. I mentioned in my last blog post that I had some basic requirements for moving in, well we didn’t quite achieve them! For the first few weeks we had a bedroom, toilet, sink with cold tap, toaster oven and kettle. We now have progressed to a hot shower so you could say we are glamping! We have lots of very kind friends who come up to help out with all our renovations, hopefully soon it will be more like home. On the plus side the farm is in a beautiful location, the big windows are lovely filling the place with light, it’s much quieter and there are lots of birds and other critters.

In June Harriet graduated from high school, which makes us feel really old! She did fantastically well  coming home with many prizes and awards and finishing top of her grade over all. We are very proud of all she achieved at Harvey High School. She is going to University of Prince Edward Island to study pre veterinary science. She is counting down the days till she starts on Sept 1st.

On August 4th we celebrate 8 years in Canada, we will have our traditional ice cream cake!

David, Kathryn and family are coming to visit for a few days at the beginning of August, it will be good to spend time with them.

On the move...

Once again nearly half a year flys by and I eventually get round to writing the blog.

Winter was very long this year with us getting lots of snow we’ll into April, then spring came all at once with warm weather and lots of rain which caused flooding along the St John river valley.
For nearly 2 weeks the river has been in flood breaking lots of the more recent records. Many properties have been damaged and lots of people have been evacuated. Thankfully the river is receding now. Our church building was flooded in the basement and was cut off as the roads around were flooded. We don’t live near the river so we weren’t effected.






We had a phone call from our insurance company last week asking if we were still renovating the farmhouse. When we said we were they said they could no longer insure it as they only do it for 1 year on houses under renovation. They would if we moved in to a 95% completed house! Haha that isn’t going to happen.

No one else would insure us either except one company who specializes in renovations. Anyway to cut a long story short we have to move into the farmhouse buy June 7th! I have a short list of basic requirements before I will move in; electricity, water, toilet, sink, shower, door on bathroom, locks on doors, door on bedroom! It will be like camping with wooden walls for a bit. It has certainly motivated us to get a move on with the work.
Unfortunately it couldn’t have came at a much busier time. I’m still on the road with work and have a trip to PEI and Winnipeg before we move in. The pigs all need to be outside so there’s fencing to be done. We have to work full time and have commitments a number of evenings per week. Also Harriet is graduating in a few weeks and there are lots of events we have to attend associated with that.

Isaac is also on the move into an apartment in town, Harri is going to PEI in September so that leaves Joshua to stay in the house to look after that till we are ready to sell it. Ah it’s all change.