The girls and I headed out to Nordegg for the Family Day long weekend. I left the city on Saturday morning and arrived in the afternoon. The girls drove separately, and left a little later, arriving in the early evening. The water pump had been repaired by my plumber a couple of weeks prior and was working flawlessly when I arrived.
It was a pretty laid back weekend and I didn't do much of anything. I put some oats out for the deer, tended the fire in the wood stove, and read the newspaper. They girls bombed around a little on the old snowmobile that I had brought out a few weeks back. I drained the old gas out of it and put fresh in, but it still seems to want to stall sometimes. I think mostly the rebuilt motor is still kind of tight and maybe the idle speed is set a bit low. It always restarts, but the girls don't have enough strength to pull start it on their own. On one occasion they had to walk almost a mile back to the cottage to get me to come out and restart it for them.
There were a few people around the subdivision on the long weekend but as the weekend came to an end, most of them went home. Our girls had Tuesday off from school as the public school board in the city conveniently scheduled a PD day right after the long weekend. I had planned on staying until Tuesday as well, as the contractor that is making our granite counter tops was scheduled to come out and install.
I went out for a walk around the subdivision on Monday morning. By late afternoon Helena wanted to go, so I did it again. It was great to get out in the fresh air. Out at the cottage is stayed around -5 to -10 for most of the weekend and only dropped off a little at night. We got a couple inches of fresh snow on Monday, but no significant accumulation. I understand that back in the city it was much colder and they got quite a bit more snow.
On Tuesday around lunch time, Margarit and the two younger girls decided to head for home. I stayed behind with Hailey and we waited for the counter top crew to arrive. They phoned and said they were running a bit late, and eventually showed up around 4:00. I called in to the office and told them that I didn't want to drive home in the dark and would be staying Tuesday night and heading home on Wednesday.
It was about 7:30 when the installation of the counter tops was completed and the installation crew headed back for Edmonton. I then installed the kitchen sink into the permanent counter top and properly hooked up the water supply and the drain. Hailey and I then made a supper of tacos. It was close to 10:00 by the time we got everything finished up and we decided to head out for a walk around the subdivision. It was clear, with a billion stars and no moon. With almost no one around there was very little artificial light and the Milky Way was highly visible as it swept across the winter sky. We stumbled around a bit but eventually finished the 3km walk around. It was brisk at about -12, but there was no wind and we were quite comfortable during the walk. After that we stayed up late and watched a movie on the DVD.
Pretty much all of the temporary "stuff" in the cottage has now been replaced by permanent installations. The girls mostly have their mattresses off the floor and the two older ones are set up in the bunk bed that I built. We still have to bring a mates bed out for Helena to get her mattress off the floor. I have to make headboards for the beds in our guest room and master bedroom. Still need a rolling door to close off the space under the stairs which is our access to the trap door to the basement. I have a medicine cabinet under construction for the bathroom, but its not finished yet. With the kitchen cabinets and counter top now in, and the sink installed, we got rid of our temporary plywood counter tops and the bucket that the sink temporarily drained into. Still working on the upper cabinets, but those are well underway. I think the only other thing left is the wood slab that will become the lunch counter in our bay window. Once that is done the temporary plywood counter will go. After these items it will just be finishing touches of decorating, pictures, shelves, etc. The end is near...!
On Wednesday morning we slept in a bit and eventually tidied up, did the dishes and packed up to go home. We finally left the cottage at about 11:30 and with a brief stop for lunch in Rimbey, made it back to the city about 3:00. We saw the herd of wild horses at Misty Valley but other than that there wasn't really any wildlife out. After I dropped off Hailey at home and off-loaded our gear I headed into the office for a couple hours to catch up on what I had missed. There was not a lot of activity given the time of year and my replacement Doug managed just fine in my absence.
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