More self reliance in 2010 is the mantra …

The rain and wind were out the last night of the year and are still partying well into the morning.  Thinking back over the past few days a lot of good things have happened this year (2009).  The pace was comfortable with a few hectic moments scattered here and there to keep things interesting.  At this time last year I was beginning to rip the strips for the kayak, and now I’ve built it and have had it out on the water a good 25 times, with a 3 day trip to Cortes Island.  Tai played his first “concert” on the mandolin and is now in grade 2.  Along with everything that life throws at a mother, Norie keeps on keeping on.  Ekou started pre-school this year and I’ve had a lot of good times with him hanging out, hiking, “working” in the shop and a few trips into town.  2009 was a good year for the McGillivray’s and hope that 2010 is as bright.

Billy, Hiromi and their son, Nico, came up from Oregon to spend Christmas with us.  Great friends that I met in Japan and continues to this day.  They were here about 2.5 years ago (before Niko), and it felt like we saw each other last week.  Good things are happening in their life and are hoping to move up here in the future.  Thanks guys for coming, you are always welcome here!

Here are the pictures since I last posted some.  Lots of ground covered as it was a busy month here on Denman Island.

Norie took this picture of the food at the F.D. Xmas Party. Lots of yummy treats

Making/eating Xmas decorations

Yup

Tai and Norie’s ginger bread houses

Planing birch for the top of the dresser

Santa and the boys at the Community Hall Xmas dinner

Hiromi & Nico

Hanging out before Christmas dinner (the real one)

Can you tell we have full tummies

Tai providing a little entertainment between courses

Good memories

Albert

Hiking on the south end of Denman Island

We found a nice downhill bike run with 5 or 6 jumps. I heard that there were trails down at the south end of the island, but this was the first time I found the jumps.

Time in the forest is always good.

Looking through the pictures, I noticed we did a lot of eating the holiday season.  Can’t get enough of those homemade desserts!

I’ve been listening to Bap Kennedy and Tony Rice’s “Church Street Blues” the last few days and can’t get enough.  Check them out if you want to hear some good acoustic music. 2 great movies I’ve seen recently are Avatar and Julie and Julia.  We saw Avatar in the theatre a couple of days ago and it was a visual treat to see on the big screen.  We watched Julie and Julia last night and laughed our asses off.  It’s going to be a classic for sure, and it doesn’t hurt that Norie is also a cooking freak.  Well worth the watch if you like food and cooking.

So what’s in store for 2010 . . . ?

Canoe. I’m hoping to be able to start it around the end of January/beginning of February.  Really looking forward to this and it will be a lot of work and time spent in the shop.

First Responder Course. I’ll be taking the First Responder Course through the fire department around the beginning of February.

Snow to Surf Race. I’ll be doing the mountain bike leg again this year with a new team of younger guys on Denman Island.  The race is in April and is a good motivator for me to get out and ride.

Guitar and mandolin. I hope to learn a few more tunes on both instruments this year and try to play everyday.

More self reliant. This year I want to become more self reliant and plant a bigger garden than last year.  With just finishing touches left on the shop (other than putting up the wood for the inside ceiling), I hope to be able to spend more time in the garden this year.  We turned off the TV at the beginning of the school year in September, and without the TV on, there is time for so many other things to do.  I also want to start riding my bike more around the island for chores, cutting down on my driving time and impact.  More time for self reflection.

Get out on the water. Going to try and learn how to roll this summer and explore more of this area.  I want to get over to Deep Bay, across from Repulse point (where Albert and Rollande live) and find a hamburger stand at the marina that I keep hearing about.  With the canoe, I’m thinking of fishing on Chickadee Lake.  I’d also like to take another kayaking course this spring that will work towards my guide license some day.  Who knows, I might even finish the greenland style kayak paddle that I started and look into building a couple of canoe paddles.

That should keep me busy for a while …

All the best in the new year, and decade, and drop me a line or link to where I can hear what’s happening in your life.

Love John, Norie, Tai & Ekou

Interesting link from CBC today

Queen Charlotte Islands renamed Haida Gwaii in historic deal

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/story/2009/12/11/bc-queen-charlottle-islands-renamed-haida-gwaii.html?ref=rss

The past week on Denman Island

Photos …

Tai and Norie made Sock Monkeys to sell at the Christmas Faire

Sun coming up on East Rd.

Back after the morning run. We’ve had great weather over the last week, although chilly.

Tai sold this guy at the Christmas Faire

East Rd. in the afternoon …

Finally got a shot of the bus at school in good weather

The entrance to Denman Island Community School

The same place as the morning shot on East Rd.

I went into town on Saturday morning and picked up some Birch and Alder for the dresser top. Here it is back at the shop.

Here’s a shot of it in the shop

The boxes and most of the drawers …

An old torch made in 1921 at Albert’s shop. Old style craftsmenship

Splitting wood …

… then I turn around

Some of Rollande and Albert’s ‘friends’ that come around everyday

All the drawers put together and filled. I’m about halfway through breaking edges

A picture that Norie took that I liked.

I’ve been having trouble tonight with putting text under the photos … breath and relax …

I’ve been steadily working on the dresser and have got all the drawers put together and nail holes filled.  I’m about halfway through breaking the edges … Tomorrow I’ll be taking the birch and alder planks over to a friend’s place and run them through his jointer.  I’d love to get a jointer and is probably the last big tool I’ll buy.  I’m pretty happy with the way the shop is coming along and have gotten into a good rhythm during this build.  It’s been cold (-6C) and it’s nice and toasty in the shop working in the evenings.  What a difference from last winter!

On the weekend I did a quick run into town and was back on the 10am ferry.  The quicker I’m out of town, the better.  In the afternoon I went down to the Christmas Faire and picked up a few Christmas goodies.  Tai was at the kid’s table and sold one of his sock monkey for $15 and a few christmas cookies.  I think he had a blast hanging out with his friends while ‘taking care of business’.  Good for him.  Next year he wants to play music outside.  It was nice to watch the kids play christmas music and it added an ‘old tyme’ feel to the fair.  You have to sign up and they give you a time slot to play and one grade 4 kid made $35 playing guitar.

This coming weekend is the Fire Department Christmas Party and should be a good time.  I’ll also plug away on the dresser and hopefully get over the Rollande & Albert’s if the weather cooperates.

Alaska to Seattle movie

Paddle to Seattle … check out the trailer and I’ll be ordering this DVD when it comes out!

Fire trucks and drawers

Here a visual rundown …

Sharpening my chisel

edgebanding picture

Applying heat to melt the glue … next taping

Taped and waiting for the glue to dry

All trimmed down and ready for more sanding

Front of the workbench after trimming the edgebanding

Putting drawers together

Clamping for nice, tight joints

I’m happy with this

2 drawers clamped and drying

Now I have a total of 4 drawers together and more to follow soon

What the pictures don’t show is the Fire Department that I spent saturday at.  We had 5 exams for our “Basic Firefighter Level” that is recognized by the Justice Institute of BC.  We’ve been working on the practical end of it for the past 6 months or so, and now we just had the exams.  To be honest, I only read one or two chapters, but with the reviews and experience, most of it came pretty quickly.  On each test there were a few questions that I had to guess on, but for the most part I knew it.  Next weekend is our Christmas Party, and then start winding down for the year.  We learnt a lot this year and the practices were fun.

The dresser is coming along nicely and I’m working on the drawers.  I have 5 more to put together, but there is a piece that I’m not really happy with the cut, and might recut a new piece.  I found some nice sliders for it http://www.leevalley.com/hardware/page.aspx?c=2&cat=3,43614,43616&p=50508 that I recommending.  I hope to order them tomorrow and go into town this weekend and pick up birch and alder for the top.  For the rest of the week I’ll driving the school bus, working in the shop and hoping I’ll be in a nice place with the dresser on Friday.  I’ll see if I can update this again before the weekend … I’ll see is the key word

Weekend doings …

A lot has happened since I last posted, so I’ll show the pictures with details to follow …

This one’s for Neil.

It’s coming together …

Testing the fit …

Here’s the result of a couple of weeks work and a lot of sanding by Dad.

The river at Fillongley Park, just past the turn around. It was bone dry in August.

This picture was taken from the bridge, where the beaver dam used to be!

You can see a sign … The river is flowing high … lots of flooding in this neck of the woods this past week.

The river as you walk in from the campground, before the bridge.

Cutting the wood for the drawers

Lots of ripping

At the end of the day, 45 pieces

Tai played mandolin down at the Bistro Saturday night for some save the children benefit. Tai and Norie had a lot of fun

Hamming it up for the camera

Denman West dock this afternoon

This where I get my mandolin/reading time in while waiting for the high school kids to dock

Cutting the edge banding for the drawers

Working on the edge banding

All the side pieces have been edge sanded and banded. Tomorrow I hope to do the final cut on the bottoms and start edge banding the front and backs …

The pictures pretty much tell the tale, but I want to say that I am happy with the way the dresser is coming along.  I cut the pieces for the drawers on Saturday and got the sides edge sanded and banded.  Still lots to do, but it feels good to be working on the drawers now.

Dad was putting on the second coat of spar varnish this afternoon and will have it wrapped up this week.  He put a lot of time into this project and he did a good job.  I’m proud of him.

Yesterday was the first day in about 10 days that it hasn’t rained.  I took the opportunity and did some log splitting in the afternoon and brought home half a cord of nice cedar and balsa fir.  Norie, the kids and I got it stacked just as the rain started and it hasn’t stopped yet.  It looks like we’re in for another wet week, so that means shop time

A few pictures from the shop today/night

Just the pictures tonight … big storm out there

Tai’s mandolin video

Updated … it’s now linked to my facebook page http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=211125926350&ref=nf

Busy, busy, busy …

I’ll throw some pictures at ya and go from there.

Tai and Kevin Mitchell playing at the Denman Talent Show at the Community Hall.

There were at least a couple hundred people there and Tai had no problem getting up on stage.

Tai played 2 songs by himself and then played rhythm for one of Kevin’s songs

After the talent show we had cake to celebrate Grampa’s birthday and Tai’s performance.

Yep, all mine!

Got a couple of hours up in the shop this evening.

Still quite a bit of sanding to do, but I think I’ll start cutting the wood for the drawers tomorrow …

This past weekend I did an Auto Extrication Course at the Arrington Fire Department and had an amazing time.  Friday night was new car technology and how it affects us as rescuers at an accident.  Really interesting things coming our way soon.  Saturday and Sunday was all hands on tool work … spreaders, cutters, air chisels, hand tools, cribs, stabilization, come-alongs … Sunday afternoon was cold, rainy and a lot of fun doing real simulations.  We had 16 cars to smash and chop up.  What a blast!  Looking forward to this weeks fire department meeting.

This weekend was wet and windy.  We got back on the 6pm ferry from the course Saturday night and had to be at the Community Hall for the Denman Talent Show.  I was surprised that there were probably at least a couple hundred people there considering the weather.  Tai did really well and had  a “awesome” time.  We got some pictures of him playing and Norie took a short video of him playing backup for Kevin.  I guess I’ll have to create an account over at youtube.com and post it there and then link it as it doesn’t seem to be able to post directly from my computer with this platform ???

The weather has been really wet and windy the past week and yesterday they declared a state of emergency in Courtenay due to flooding.  They closed the schools early as well as most of the bridges were flooded out and it took a long time to get the kids home.  No real flooding on Denman but the ditches were flowing and the creek in Fillongley Park was moving a lot of water.

A friend I’ve been trying to track down for quite a while got ahold of me on Facebook.  We went to the same Japanese language class in Toronto that the JET Programme put on for us before we went to Japan.  We were in the same prefecture and lost contact after she came back to Canada.  Turns out she’s married and in Kamloops … not that far away.  Also heard another rumor that another friend from Japan might be coming up to visit from Oregon this Christmas… keeping my fingers crossed.

Things coming together

Tai had the camera in the shop tonight and this is what turned out.  A lot more work in the background to get to this stage, and still a lot more to do.  I got the kicks sanded and prepped, then attached to the bottom of the box creating a foundation for it to sit on.  I used glued and 1 1/4″ pin nails to hold it in place while the glue dried.  Without further adou …

No shortage of sanding …

Tai taking a break from picture taking duties …

Nudging things into place

Boxes clamped together … first view of the dresser coming together. At first I was looking at particular pieces of wood, now I am starting to see the bigger picture coming together. Lots of details that if done right, go un-noticed.

Tomorrow will be a busy day, but I hope to get a bit done on the dresser.  This weekend I am going on an auto extrication course through the fire department down near Coombs.  Should be a lot of fun and my knee is feeling stronger each day.  Still trying to take it easy on it, but it’s feeling better.