Sherwood Park, Alberta

We have had an interesting time out here so far. We went out to Candy Cane Lane and Maisie's House with some friends and their little girl. Doug is looking forward to a bachelor party in a Chalet in BC, and I am looking forward to a shopping trip to an outlet mall in Calgary with some friends. They have a Coach outlet and a Michael Kors Outlet there that we are excited to hit!

But lately all of our adventures and misadventures have been in the car. The snow here is intense! I used to work down to road at our head office, but now I have to drive up to Fort Saskatchewan every work day. The first few times I tried to find my way up there I was lost thanks to the snow caked over all of the road signs. Since then I have swerved off the road, fallen into snowy ditches, gotten locked out of my car, gotten frozen out of my car, run out of gas on a desolate highway... The list goes on and on. Doug and I have both been spoiled with company trucks a couple of times, and are now looking into getting one ourselves.

But much as the snow is a menace, it is beautiful!

~*~

 At the end of November Doug and I moved to Sherwood Park. Sherwood Park is a hamlet on the edge of Edmonton. Our new apartment is about 10 minutes down the road from our old one, but in a well kept building in a quiet neighbourhood. There is a plaza with a Homesense right behind me, as well as a Superstore, and a great gym walking distance from our patio. The Sherwood Park Mall is literally down the street and has a La Chateau outlet in it, that I have been enjoying. one of Doug's friends lives around the corner, so he has been enjoying some much needed guy time!

The apartment has a great deal of storage, thankfully, as we still have about 20 totes en-rout from Ontario.I miss my artwork. But I am looking forward to getting my easel and painting some new pictures for our poor white walls!

Doug was the first to be bitten by the Christmas bug this year! He reminds me of Scrooge on Christmas day sometimes!










I have two Christmas trees in the attic in Ajax, but none here. Douglas bought me a little guy to put all of the decorations that arrived on. Moo Moo has been helping me decorate in her own little way. She loves to snoop in the boxes of things, and play with whatever she can get her paws on. Today, as always, she "helped" me wrap a few gifts by pulling off the ribbon and chewing up the ends, and crumpling as much of the wrapping paper as she could. At least she leaves the tree alone, for the most part. She likes to sleep under it (I wonder if she remembers that she was a Christmas gift when she was a kitten.), and chew on the candy canes, but to my relief, she leaves all of the glass ornaments alone (one bonked her in the head once, and she's been holding a grudge), and only occasionally tail flicks the others.

Well, its time to bake cookies. I will write again soon.

Merry Christmas

This Is Why We Came Here

Most of you know about Doug's experience the first few weeks here. He has had more work than he knew what to do with! He's been ecstatic that, not only has he had to turn job offers down, but he has also gotten to choose what he wants to do here. Unlike Ontario's job market that held a thumb on his aspirations and played a part in breaking his spirit, Edmonton has done nothing but help him expand his horizons.

He is so happy! Not only was he able to land the job he wanted, but they bent over backward to have him! His training was paid for, his compensation is remarkable, and he is looking forward to every weekend off.

Edmonton has not only helped Douglas. I transferred from my Costco, in Ajax,  to one here for an easy transition. At first I was hoping to stay with Costco for a few months for some added stability, but the job was getting to me. I was bored, and agitated there. After two weeks it became clear that I would need to start looking to get back into an office. One week later, I had three job offers, one of which I accepted with gusto. It was everything I was hoping for! Challenging daily problems to solve, researching, invoicing and accounting, with plenty of multitasking, await me every weekday. Weekends were always free to live my life! But then, a day later, I was called back in to the company Doug is now working for. Apparently they had a sudden opening and I was the only person the lady in HR could think of who had had the experience to do it! Now I work at Head Office as Cost Control.

So here we are, working for the same company, making an exciting contribution to our future everyday, and looking forward to all of the quality time we will be able to spend together!

This all happened on October 1st, exactly 32 days after we arrived in Edmonton. After struggling for decades in Ontario's miserly job market, we have never felt so valued, or charmed or as grateful as we do now!


Doug told me yesterday, "Every day, when I wake up, I feel like I'm on the first day of a vacation! You know that anticipation you can hardly contain? The other days are great, but nothing beats the anticipation of that first day!"

A Stunned Silence

Please excuse us while we experience our stunned silence. 

I am sure there will be much to say when reality returnes and we are numbed by the pinching.

Thank you

Our New Place

I have been getting pestered to tell you more about the new apartment so here goes...

We are close to two shopping malls and the Old Strathcona area which is where I can find all of my specialty butcher shops, markets, antiques and boutiques.  The coolest thing about Old Strathcona, though, is that it has the old train station, the public library and centers for the preforming arts. Although downtown has the big theaters and attractions, Old Strathcona is where you can find the stuff that is not yet mainstream. In fact, we had just missed The Fringe Festival when we arrived. Old Strathcona Hosts the oldest and largest Fringe Theater Festival in North America.

Obviously, we don't have a car yet.  Until we do, we have to use Edmonton's Transit System that takes me past several great places to shop on my way to and from work. I also pass through the down town core via train and bus. I do think that I would miss the spectacular views from the river valley at first light and dusk if we were to get a car. 

Our new apartment is in an older neighbourhood with mature trees, although most places in Edmonton have streets full of trees to be honest. Although Doug and I have only enjoyed a few evening walks together, I am sure it will become a common thing for us again, as it used to be.

Old School Heat

Our new apartment is small and vintage. Although, I was counting on small, the vintage part was a fun surprise during viewings. Unfortunately, they did do a minor reno on it before we moved in, so my ancient bird wallpaper is gone, but then again, so is the carpet!! Hardwood and tile makes this place easier for my cat and my allergies to get along.

Furnishing the new place is going to be a fun process, but I expect it will also take some time. There are a few antique markets near by that I want to go to to get a nice mix of old with the new stuff. Unfortunately I had to work through one of the biggest antique sales of the year, but I'm sure I can sniff out some deals regardless.

Our closet is a little small, so I will need to have more bedroom furniture than I had originally planned on. Not that I mind shopping, but I like an empty room to dream in.

 Each room has a large east-facing window that the cat has been enjoying.
We have been enjoying bright and sunny days and dark nights.

The Creeper!

We also have, what I call, a water closet! Oddly enough, the bathroom is a tub and shower with a sink, a generous window, and a tall rad that sits just below the towel rack to warm and dry the draped towels. The toilet is in a separate, windowless room that vents out to the bathroom. Unfortunately, just like the house, Moo moo must always be a part of what you're doing in there!

Although the building is still being renovated, I am liking it quite a bit. It is in such an ideal spot that I doubt we will move far from this area, if and when we do move.

I will have to end here, as I have a run to do. Today I think I will pick a new path. Any suggestions?

Our New Area

So, when we arrived in Edmonton we had expected to find an aparent in three days. Three days would have been enough time had we come after the civic holiday, but as we forgot about it, we ended up having to wait out the long weekend before we could even begin viewings. That ended up working to our favour, as we got to explore different areas of our beautiful new city and aquatint ourselves with them. My favourite area was Southgate, for the awesome upscale mall and pretty houses and condos. Unfortunately, out of the 20 apartments available to us, none of them were cat friendly. Although a friend tells me she knows people with cats who live in Southgate, school just started and a lot of the apartments recently available we're taken by the students who lost their homes when a local boarding school closed its doors.

 Old Strathcona was an exciting urben oasis, full of little boutiques, dellicitessons, patisiaries, theaters and pubs. Much as I enjoyed two days there, I think that the atmosphere was a little too young and happening for us to live in. I will be back to visit the awesome vegan markets and boutiques though.

Downtown was just far too big and busy to live in! The buildings towering and business people dominating the sidewalks and streets gave my head a buzz just driving through it! But the areas just on the outskirts were lovely, surrounded by the lush river valley and backdropped with the beautiful Edmonton skyline.
 We ended up taking an unlikely apartment in the beautiful older neighbourhoods of Forest Heights. This area boasts safety, being south of the river, and was close to a lot of stores I felt were essential.

 Even more important is that the river valley trail is a five minute walk from my house, making my morning run a scenic one. Older trees tower over the streets here, and the down town core is close enough to access when I need to. Below are some pictures of the trail, and the bridge that takes me to the downtown core. 

 

Our apartment is not ready yet, so we are staying in the two bedroom managers suite for ten days while the floors are being redone. We got a one bedroom apartment with carpet only in the bedroom, which was a must for us that was hard to find. The kitchen area is retro, but in a sweet way, the bedroom has a rather unique built in that I thought was artistic, I'm just hoping they don't paint over the retro bird wall paper that would be so in right now!

As for right now, we have the bare necessities, a new bed (on order), new dishes and a few things to put in them. Mitsy Moo-Moo hid in some open vents, in the managers suite, on day one, then woke Doug up that night fighting to get a ziplock bag off her face! She had tried to steel treats in the night again!!! She's been having a harder transition here. 

Tim Hortons Where Are You?

Edmonton is very different from the G.T.A. If you look at how we lived in Ajax, which ran into Pickering, which ran into Scarborough, which ran into..... you get my drift. The G.T.A. is very concentrated. Edmonton is very spacious. Each area is spread out with green spaces giving people room to breath. Much as I love and appreciate this, poor Douglas has a small problem with it. He is constantly asking, "So... where's Tim Hortons?"

There are 26 Tim Hortons in Edmonton which is the same amount as Toronto's core. But since Edmonton is 42.88 sq km larger and most of the Tim Hortons are downtown or north, here in the south end they are few and far between.

So for any of you "Tim's" addicts out there who plan on visiting us... be prepared to make your coffees at home.

"Everything Costs More In Alberta" - False.

So out first few days in Edmonton did not go as planned. We were expecting to view a few of the apartments on our list, and move on to one in the first three days. What we forgot was that there was a long weekend coming, and now we have to wait till the following Tuesday to  view anything. That was a bit of a shock, but we used the time to explore our area. 

Our motel was  at the best location! I had picked it to be close to my work, but it turned out that the Southgate area was exactly where I wanted to be for shopping, as well as quiet and safe neighborhoods.  Doug and I spent a lot of time just walking around, getting aquatinted with the area. One rainy day we decided to go to the West Edmonton Mall so Doug could see it for the first time and we could get a sense of the different things we could do there.

 

Usually malls are more exciting for me, but this time it was Doug's turn to be a kid in a candy store. The yellow Ferrari in the picture was his first bit of candy. That's him putting his ballot in. I think the next was the dolphin and sea lion show. I really don't think he believed me, a while back, when I told him there was a real dolphin there! Like a trail of breadcrumbs, the surprises just kept coming: water park, casino, amusement park, mini put, shooting range, I lost count!

Today we went to Southgate Mall.It is a pretty and stylish place that I am hoping will be in walking distance of the apartment we end up getting. We wandered around the neighbourhoods surrounding it, just enjoying the day. Few people seem to walk around in these neighbourhoods; the transit system is stellar. We ended up in a section of Southgate called Pleasant View that was lovely! Beautiful homes and nice cars were everywhere. We stopped to chat for a good 45 min with a resident. So far South end has been very exciting.

One thing we were pleasantly surprised to find on our wandering through the south end, is that the prices for things were lower. We knew that the taxes on them would be lower, but with all of the talk about it being more expensive to live out here, we were expecting higher prices!  Groceries were primarily the same, although they did have a few cheaper items. Electronic parts and repairs were cheaper by quite a bit. Gas, of course, is cheaper, along with preforming arts and entertainment. Clothing and DVD's were on the lower end of the spectrum. And the list just continues! Doug was not surprised to find that cigarettes were more expensive by $2 but, as he hopes to quit, I'm sure it won't effect him for long.

Quick Update

So there were some people I did not get to say goodbye to after all, thanks to us renting the car a day earlier and having to return it Thursday morning. It was a bit sad that I didn't get to say goodbye to some people who are important to me, but I suppose Thursday needed to see us a lot closer to ready to leave anyway.

After a mad rush at the house last night, Doug and I left at 9:00am with Mitsy. Both of us sleep deprived, and poor little Mitsy devoid of food and water for our travels, we headed toward Pearson Airport with Glenn and my mom. I did not want to leave that early, as our flight was at noon, but as it turned out we just made it (after my very first completely embarrassing boarding call!).

Our little Mitsy Moo-Moo was such a trouper! She whined all the way to the airport, but stayed quietly tucked up in her bag without incident. As the plane descended her breathing increased dramatically, but after about an hour in the air, she was a seasoned traveler. Oddly enough, upon our arrival to Edmonton Airport I was the only one uncomfortable, as the pressure caused some pain in my ears that didn't end for several hours post landing! Doug and Mitsy were unphased.

This flight was one for our memory books as this is, not Doug's first flight, but his first to the west coast! He and I are very excited to arrive and are in the process of planning out our apartment viewings for tomorrow.

Please be patient with us as we settle in and find our place. We may not be as socially active until we are properly settled in, but we will do our best to keep you posted on how we are and what it's like in our new home, Edmonton.

The Grand Good Bye!

So saying good bye to my friends and family proved harder than I thought. The people I know seem to be spread out all over the place. Everyone works hard and has a full life and can't always make it happen.

Fortunately, I was still able to see my father, who I haven't seen in a year at least! My brother came down from Northbay along with my cousins I have not seen in a while. It was great to see them and hear how they have been and what was new in their lives.

The 24th was my last day of work and I enjoyed the well wishes of my co workers and bosses, along with a slew of complements that inflated my ego enough to last me a few months! The 24th was also the day Doug and I drove up to see more family and friends. Stopping in Orillia to see Darren and Carrie and their kids before pressing on to Espanola for Doug's mom's 65th birthday bash!

Driving up was fun and beautiful! There is so much mountainous rock there, and his parents live up a steep "mountain" that has a winding road up to their house on the lake. It was a great opportunity to see his sisters and brother-in-laws, nieces, nephews, Uncle Bill, and some family friends. It's sad to think of how old the kids will be when we see them next, but we enjoyed their company. The day was hot and beautiful! And after spending the night, we went to a folk festival in Massey the next day to watch Uncle Bill's band play.

On our way back we stopped in North Bay to Visit my brother's family and see my new baby niece! It was nice to stop and chat with Mellissah and play with my little nephew.
Then we stopped in Gravenhurst to see the mother of one of Doug's childhood friends. It was nice to finally meet her and her family and listen to some of Doug's antics.

Now that we are back, I have a few of my friends I would like to see before I go, some of which just can't make it. I hope to see my cousin today though, as well as take some friends out to dinner in celebration of their marriage.

Time will soon tell us who we will get to see from who we won't, but right now our focus has to be in clearing out the last of our things from this house, and finding our new home in Edmonton.

Update

I know I've taken a long time to update you guys, but there has been a lot going on.

Trying to find renters turned out to be a bit of a drama. We were recommended to a family we didn't like and had to fight them off. Found the perfect Saturday night double date couple, but they found another place. Then we found a sweet lady and her boys, but they fell off the face of the planet, only to resurface expecting a lease after we found our current tenants.

We are happy that the constant house showings are now at an end, as there were up to five in one day and they took place all week long! But we are also happy to have found this family because they are very handy, down to earth and responsible. They have several children who are adult, well-mannered and personable. And best of all, they love our house almost as much as we do!

I was able to get my transfer at last! I will be relocating to the Southern location meaning that I get to look for an apartment in the beautiful and quiet South Side! My co worker who is also relocating has an apartment on the south side, so it should be fun!

I had to leave the travel plans to the last minute because we were waiting to get the lease signed, but now that everyone is in place, I have been able to book our flight and hotel. Not to toot my own horn or anything, but I did score getting us a cheap room at a southern hotel that allows pets! Total score considering the $8 a day difference in pricing I got for a pet friendly room!

Family On The French Side

Since we are moving so far away, Doug and I have been trying to visit our families and friends before we are gone. This week I went to a baby shower for my French-speaking second cousin. It was wonderful to be in my aunt's house again, with all of the wonderful art, hospitality and scrumtiouse rice that  remember from my childhood.

My aunt looked the same, as did most of my ageless relatives. A lot of that side of the family are vegetarians and very natural in their lifestyles, which I am sure contributes to their youth. The fun part was finally getting to meet some of the relatives I don't remember or have only "met" on facebook and seeing the wonderful blend of Island elders blending down into the mixed younger generation Canadians.

It was encouraging to see the older women from my Grandfather's side of the family that are from Trinidad. They were beautiful women who have aged gracefully and were as chatty and down to earth as the 20 and 30 somethings that were at the gathering. One of them lives in Calgary and I am hoping to meet up with her there when we get settled out west.

With a month left, I am excited to see who else we will get to see before we leave. It is interesting to see how deep our roots are here, but with scatterings of family members out west, perhaps deep roots will be established in Alberta as well.

Highway 12

Since announcing our departure we have received many invitations to go visit friends and family before we leave, however there was one large event scheduled months and months ago that we both have been very excited for. July finally brought us to the month of our brother-in-law's surprise 40th and our nephew's 15th birthday party in Orillia.

For years when we have been on our way to Orillia or North Bay, we have passed an interesting Antique Shop on the right hand side of Highway 12 and have been meaning to stop in and look around. On this drive up Doug made the time to stop so I could get a chance to explore it before we leave for Edmonton.

They had some chickens who liked to escape into the antiques area so I snapped a few pictures of them as well. I would have liked to buy a few items but, as we are moving, I took pictures instead. Hopefully I will find some nifty antique shops in and around Edmonton when we get there.

We spent a lot of the weekend in the water, thanks to some great weather, and spent some memorable time with friends. Not only did we take home some great pictures, thanks to mom lending us her awesome camera for the weekend, but after a little shopping, Doug and I came home Monday morning two video games and two novels richer.

Welcome

 

Mmmmm.... Edmonton the green city!

So right now we are selling off our furniture. We will be buying new items when we hit Edmonton, as it's not worth it to cart it across the country. We had a nice couple buy our bar fridge off of Kijiji and when they came to pick it up and noticed our house packed up they came for a walk around and picked out a few more things they wanted. I am happy that the TV sold, but I am not looking forward to watching my movies on Doug's TV in his computer room. There is more furniture to be sold and a lot more discomfort to endure before September when we leave.

We have been so excited about the move to Edmonton. I am hoping to do something active in the community to help us get acquainted with different areas and new people. I have a few social clubs in mind, but I will see what my friends on that side are into, if anything, before I decide. I have a work colleague who is relocating around the same time and is looking at moving to the South Edmonton area. Another friend who lives there says south and central aren't bad so, although I wouldn't mind being south to be close to my colleague, central has a lot of the amenities Doug and I are looking for.

For now I am keeping an open mind and looking for any apartments in a neighbourhood deemed "good" that have, no carpet, in suite laundry, and enough sunlight. I would prefer an apartment building with a pool and gym facility, and a balcony. Doug is far more open minded! Keep your eye out for us.