I've officially been in Fort McMurray for one year. Wow. Wednesday marks one year at my current job.

Seems hard to believe doesn't it.  And I am marking it on my own by going on vacation on Friday. Oh Friday how sweet you are and how I look forward to you. LOts left to do and not lots left to do. If I do too much ahead of time I get bored waiting for the day and start repacking and take too much. If I do too little ahead of time I am rushing on the last day and leaving a mess behind. It is a balancing act.

Gave the instructions to the cat sitter today. One of the gals from work is going to pop in a few times and check on them. The great part of having purries is that they can spend a few days alone.

It's Monday and I felt like jazzing things up a bit so I wore this:

They jingle as I walk and it makes me happy. The cats were not sure what to make of the noise tonight. I danced around for a bit to make them jingle more and it drove Tundra nuts.

My pinky finger has been sore for about a week now. I was having all kinds of thoughts around arthritis and left it for a week hoping it would go away. LOL. It didn't. But at the Dr office yesterday I finally asked about it and after a few minutes he said sprain. Apparently they don't do much if you break or sprain your pinky. He offered to tape it but I said no. Today though I broke down and taped it to my ring finger. It was painful to hit the a key before the taping and now I can barely hit just one key with my taped fingers. My touch typing has turned into garble. This is the pinky on my left hand--and I am left handed so it gets used a lot. And you hit or rest on your pinky a lot....which of course I never knew before. I am hoping it will get the break it needs while I am on holiday and by the time I return it will be healed. But for the next 8 days I will have crappy typing skills at work.

The latest in entertainment around my house is playing with bugs. The door to the deck is open most of the time I'm home and of course the occasional bug or fly comes in to visit. The girls love watching the flies zoom around and I'm often concerned for the household furnishings as they chase after the fly with no thought to what they are running over/through/around. The bugs slowly crawl along the carpet until the two furry hunters get bored and let it be. Each new bug and fly is given all their concentration and attention until....yeah, it doesn't last long.

The forest fire season has started and yesterday the air was rated a 7 out of 10 for poor quality. 10 being the worst. The slight smell of smoke was in the air all day and the hazy vision out the window confirmed the air quality. It doesn't affect me physically which is great but I know a lot of people who must stay indoors on days like that which makes enjoying our short summer difficult.

So....the upcoming vacation. YEAH!! I'm off to the Yukon. The only province/territory in Canada I haven't been to yet. And a short stop in Alaska. The trip is planned and not planned. We haven't booked a single camp site and the only real planning is that we are taking one highway there and another highway back. All stops in between are to be decided on a moments notice. I have a friend coming with me and I'm excited to have the company. She hasn't been this far North before and I'm sure she will enjoy. Another awesome friend gave me a charger for the truck so I can charge the camera battery when needed and not miss a shot.

I know many do not enjoy or appreciate my style of camping but I like it and really that is the most important thing. LOL. I love my tent and the open flame for cooking and at this point in my life don't need the creature comforts of a camper to hit the open road. I'm still in my less is more stage of camping.

I've been collecting twigs and sticks to help get the fires going at night and made my own fire starters out of dryer lint, egg cartons and candle wax. We used one of my homemade fire starters a couple weeks ago at the first bbq of the year and it worked like a charm.

The lint collected out of the dryer for the past few months.

The many egg cartons I have collected. I think I eat too many eggs.

Cutting up the wax from a couple of candles I bought at the Salvation Army.

Melting the wax in a can helps saves a pot. Although I did learn a trick to getting wax off a pot--vinegar.

Pouring the wax into the egg cartons to cover the lint and bits of egg carton I had.

A bit of string to hold it all together while it cooled.

Cut the cartons in half and then wrapped them in newspaper, tied up with string.

Egg cartons--free Lint--free string--already had it on hand--free newspaper--free wax--$3.99 Enjoyment at campfires--priceless.

Happiness is sitting on the deck at the end of a long day with a drink in one hand and petting a kitty cat with the other. I love my deck. It isn't very big but the three of us fit on it with room to spare. I bought a fantastic new lawn chair that I can sink into and lean back in. Very relaxing. I have my four pots of potted plants around me and am able to not only watch the traffic go by but watch tv at the same time. Ah, life is good.

15 days until I leave on my holiday. YEAH!!! Super excited not only for the time off but for everything that comes with it. A long visit with one friend who will be along for the ride, a short visit with a friend up North, great scenery and no doubt some awesome photo opportunities. And camping for 2 weeks. Whooo hooo.

I used to just pull things out of the cupboards when I needed them as I followed a recipe. This occasionally led to realizing partway through the baking experience that I didn't have a key ingredient and baking came to a stand still as I went off to the store to pick up the missing ingredient.

A couple of years ago I figured out that if I checked the recipe the night before I could eliminate some of the same day shopping. Add to that my smart plan to put all needed ingredients on the cupboard before I started mixing them. The plan evolved and I would move the ingredients from one side of the bowl to the other as I used them or if I was only baking one thing I would put them away as I used them. This almost always guarantees I never forget an ingredient.

Key words were almost always.

Today I was making Lemonade Layer Cake and managed to forget to put the buttermilk in. Whoops. It turned out pretty good actually. It is a very dense almost pound cake like consistency. The folks at work will certainly still eat it. Put enough icing on anything and it usually gets eaten.

I'm determined to try it again tomorrow and do it right this time--hopefully.

Images for early May taken on a road somewhere outside of FMM.

Taken in the house as I aired out and checked out the tent. It is kitty approved. They hung out and slept in it for most of the day.

I've been ignoring you. I don't seem to have a lot of energy at the moment and sitting on the couch watching tv after work for a couple of hours until I fall asleep is about all I can handle. Work is busy and my boss is away for a few weeks due to illness so I'm sorta running the show again...if I'm not running it I'm certainly out front pulling it.

Either way I've been neglecting you and I fell bad about that. This is a short message...I'm tired and my brain is lacking concentration skills. It should all sort itself out in the next couple of weeks. The days are getting longer I have vacation plans looming and summer is almost here. Plus the green of the grass and trees popped this past week which will no doubt bring my mood around.

Stay tuned.

The weekend is slowly drawing to a close. It's been a great weekend here in FMMA. The weather was great all weekend hitting temperatures of 15C (59F). Which for the time of year and my location is pretty darn good. The two furry purries spent most of today out on the deck enjoying the sunshine and watching the action down below.

I went for a walk down by the river this afternoon and took a few pictures. I saw some Canada Geese, a couple of mallards and a number of gulls. The walk through the woods was nice but there was no green to be seen. The pussy willows are out and were a pleasant surprise to see while I walked along. The walk was for a few reasons...fresh air, photos, etc and I wanted to collect some dead wood. No, not for a craft project but for the upcoming camping/bbq season. When camping in provincial or national parks you are not to collect dead wood from around your camp site. When camping anywhere else--good luck finding dead wood anywhere close to your site. Most people collect anything close by to help start their camp fires. I figured a bag or two of dry sticks would go a long way. And yes, I might just be a bit anxious for my first camping trip of the season.

I received a brochure in the mail a couple of weeks ago for River Break Up 2012. Apparently the river occasionally over flows the banks and floods the lower parts of town. There is an emergency plan and routes to take. The photography club is also watching for river break up. That is supposed to be our photo challenge for this month. I haven't seen break up yet. I did see a lot of open water today but still lots of very frozen spots. I don't think there will be a dramatic break up. The river ice keeps getting thinner but that's it. What it is doing though is making lots of great ice noises. The ice is turning into large groups of icicles and as they fall apart they make tinkling noises. While I made my way through brush along side the river I was accompanied by the sound of the ice falling apart, gulls flying over head and the crunch of my boots on the dead grasses. It was nice. 

The decision has been made for the June camping trip....the Yukon. I haven't been and it is the only province/territory I haven't been to in Canada so that would make it a complete set. I haven't made any official plans and I'm going to need to get a couple of extra days off--which I have but hadn't previously asked for. Then I can start making my plans. Exciting times.

Here's some photos from today....

Canada Geese. Too far away for a good shot.

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Ice close to the shore. This is what was making the tinkling sound I was enjoying.

Fresh fire and evidence of a tarp that once sheltered the area. I suspect they will be back. A couple of people entered the area shortly after I left.

My building is the one in the middle. I live on the other side.

My batch of twigs for the upcoming camping season. I'm hoping to gather more before the trip as this will not last more than a couple weekends.

Pussy willows.

Another spot that someone must have stayed at last year. Likely abandoned during the cold winter months and likely for good.