Hello? Is there anybody in there?

Hello? 

Is there anybody in there?

Just nod if you can hear me

is there anyone home?
(Roger Waters, David Gilmour)

Remember me? The gal on a 5 year plan to retirement? The gal who thought life wouldn't start til I retired? The gal who met a life changing man named Michael?

The gal who is now on the final leg of her working career? With only 259 days left til retirement? 

Yup, that gal! That's me, Jane! 

Now that I'm into my final year of teaching Part 37A, Section 271B has kicked in. Basically - get rid of as much sh-t as I can so I don't have to move it when I sell the condo...and fix up the condo so someone will actually want to buy it. Ah yes, the final lap!

We are now surrounded with storage bins and boxes which are rapidly filling up with the detritus of the past 20 years that we've lived in this condo. Much has found its way to garage sales over the past 3-4 years, some has gone to second hand stores, some is listed on Kijiji and the rest we trip over constantly!

Shelves and cabinets are being emptied. Flooring is being ripped up - yes, we haven't always lived with plywood floors!

There are currently 15 gallons of paint in the basement waiting upon us to fill in nail holes in the walls.

There he is - wave to Michael! He's had the wonderful job of ripping up the carpet. And right now he's driving with the truck full of patio stones to our former trailer where the current owners are going to put them to use.  We are going to replace the patio stones with flagstone to upgrade our patio area. He sure got a good workout yesterday loading them into the truck!

So we are living in chaos but oddly it feels just fine. Actually it feels great to finally reach the final stages of divesting ourselves of one life and preparing for another. 

We feel we are going on an adventure and the waiting is finally over! The idea of having an adventure before us as we head toward our 60's is exciting and scary and magical!

Kazi's room - obviously we haven't started in there yet!!

It would be nice to get everything done by Christmas so we could enjoy our two week break but I think that's being a bit too optimistic. 

When I look at these photos I see so much STUFF still to deal with.  But we've made a great start! We've ordered new carpet for the upstairs bedrooms, new ceramic tile for the kitchen and bathrooms and new bamboo hardwood for the dining and living areas. We'll have professionals install the carpet and we are going to do the ceramic and hardwood ourselves with the help of experienced family members.

I hope I can get in the habit of keeping you updated on our progress but I think it's better not to make any promises :) I've been on a blogging break now since May so who knows if I'll be able to keep it up now that I'm working AND redecorating. 

My feeling is that I don't really want this to be a personal finance blog - that was never my intent but that was the habit I sort of fell into. So, I've eliminated my financial goals (which really don't change anyways) and want to focus on our day to day adventures...or maybe there won't really be a focus at all! 

Winter Camping in a Yurt

Life seems to be back under control. But knowing how tricksy ol' Murphy can be I'm going to tiptoe lightly around that subject. I've spent the morning getting caught up on the last little jobs to get the house shipshape - laundry continues as we speak, I screwed the shelves back onto the wall behind the basement door - I had to remove them so the workers could haul out the old hot water tank and bring in the shiny new super-quiet very efficient new one. I did my first grocery shop of 2012, but more about that tomorrow as I evaluate my first No/Low Spend week of January. 


Now, on to more interesting topics; you've heard more than enough about The Flood. Let's talk about camping in a yurt!! OMG we had every kind of weather imaginable! The first day it was +7c(45F) and poured down rain on the drive to the Pinery. For the rest of the day it was a bit misty and we were fine wearing our rain jackets & jeans. The second day it was -2c(28F)and we had flurries of snow pellets attack us off and on all day plus very strong winds. The third day it went down to -18c(-4F) with  more snow AND some sunshine. We brought winter coats, winter pants to wear over our regular pants, heavy boots, gloves, hats and scarves so we were fine no matter what Mother Nature threw at us (but man, she musta been pissed off at somebody!)


Also, our first night there the hydro went out....for four hours! We were lucky that a camper that was leaving gave us a large bag of wood so once Michael got the fire going - no mean feat with wet kindling and heavy winds but he persevered (what a man!) - we were able to stay fairly toasty by the fire. With no heat due to the power failure it was much colder in the yurt! By about 10pm the hydro came back on, the yurt warmed up and we called it a night!


On the second day we bought TWO bags of wood...just in case! Snow pellets aside it was a glorious day. We had a long hike which ended up on the shores of Lake Huron facing winds so strong it was a challenge remaining upright. The wind was howling, the waves were HUGE - it was an awe inspiring experience. In the evening we had a campfire for several hours and toasted in the New Year with a bottle of bubbly and made plans to come back next year! 


The third day we hiked again and met up with a family who were patiently holding out their hands filled with birdseed trying to get the chickadees to land & eat. Both Michael and I joined in with great success. Although -18c we kept warm and braved the beach once again. This time however, the frigid temperatures had worked their special magic and everything - logs, driftwood, long grasses - was encased in ice! 


Here are a few pictures from Day One of our Yurt adventure:

Stopped at a lookout point along the way - as you can see the river has overflowed its banks from all of the rain.

Men like Michael (sensitive, sweet, thoughtful, loving, in touch with his feelings:) really are a rare breed!

There - you can see a couple of yurts through the trees - no snow at all at this point. Just rain.

Each yurt is equipped with a gas BBQ. We used it to heat up our mulled wine and to cook our sausages the 2nd night. 

We also had a picnic table (wet!) and firepit...also wet!

Here, let me show you around inside the yurt:  there are two sets of bunkbeds, singles on top and double on the bottom. Add to that a table and several plastic deck chairs plus one wall-mounted electric heater. The peak of the yurt is open to the elements with just a raised cover over the opening to keep out some of the rain, snow pellets and snow.
It was actually quite magical to live so close to the elements: the wind and waves created a constant roar and it was funny to see the snow pellets drifting down from the hole in the peak of the yurt!
We had to bring our own food, drinks, dishes, pots, towels and sleeping bags. I made a huge crockpot full of chili which we kept on low, brought muesli breakfast pitas, homemade scones with raisins and chocolate chips (YUM) because as you know you have to EAT MORE when you're winter camping to help keep you WARM! 

There's our free bag of wood:) And our outdoor cooler! Anything we needed to keep chilled we just left outside our door which, by the way, had about a half-inch gap around three sides - no need to worry about a lack of fresh air!!

The food, beverage, flashlight, music and everything else centre!

I have no recall of what I was pointing at but at this point we were collecting kindling to make our first fire.

Michael and the kindling box - at this point he's still smiling because he doesn't yet know how hard it's going to be to get that first fire going!

Working away at getting the fire going with a mug of mulled wine at the ready. Did you know that glossy magazine pages don't burn very well?

SUCCESS!! Thank goodness as it became our only source of heat for many hours.

I'm having a great time!! At this point I didn't know I'd be huddled by the fire for hours to come due to an electrical outage...and the mulled wine really helps to lift one's spirits!  Note my new Blundstone Boots in a colour called "Crazy Horse Brown" - a Christmas present from Michael!

He was a little worried I was going to melt the rubber on the bottom of my new boots, but I DIDN'T, OK??

Note to self - next year remember to bring a corkscrew!
I want you to look beyond my silliness to the couple in the background...see the woman in the blue coat and the man in the red hat and green coat?
They provided us with some unwanted X-rated entertainment during the electrical outage. I'll leave the details to your ever fertile imaginations.
I yelled at them but that only seemed to spur them on...stupid people.

Here I am inside the yurt in our cozy little bed looking for images and words for my 2012 vision board - that pink fuzzy PJ top is the warmest thing I've ever worn...ever!

Opening the yurt door on Day Two - it SNOWED!!!
About 1/2 an inch, but it SNOWED!!!
Stay tuned, more to come...