test

Great Saturday

Slept in this morning until 9. It was so nice to get some extra rest. I don’t know what it is about the week of school after a long break, but it really wipes you out. After some honey nut cheerios I dropped Erin off at Jesse and Aprils house and went out for a ski. It was about 6 below when I stared skiing. The sun was shining a the snow was sparkling everywhere. The trail was snowed over from the wind and snow we had last night so I was breaking the trail again. There were lot of fresh tracks already out. I wasn’t sure but I think there were fox, wolf, and deer.

After skiing I hauled wood to fill up the “wood box” outside our house. Then I relaxed and took a sauna.

Curling instead of skiing

Thursday nights I curl in the afternoon league. We played
pretty well and ended up winning in an extra end. The excitement of
the game however was Tony having the opportunity to score 8 in one
end. He ended up missing by about an inch on his throw. Fun times.
Back to skiing tomorrow.

Skiing

Double click to play.

Back to Skiing

I went for a ski after work today.  There was a lot of snow on the trail.  at times it was above my knee.  Im guessing it averaged about a foot and a half of new snow.  This caused the skiing to be slow and more of a walk than a glide.  It was great to be out in the fresh air and watch the sun setting behind the trees.  As I was skiing along I flushed a grouse that had been bedded down underneath the snow.  There wasn’t really a trace of it being there, and as I skied up onto where it was hiding, it exploded out of the snow leaving a perfect set of wing prints in the snow.

I have a really cool app on my iPhone called RunKeeper.  It kept stats on my progress including distance traveled and average speed.  Every five minutes it would announce the duration of my ski in both time and distance and then let me know what my average speed was.  On the way out I was averaging 37 minute miles and by the time I got back to the car the average was down to 27 minute miles.  By no means was this a quick ski.  It will be interesting to see what I get to for a speed once the trail is nicely broken in.

Here”s how my fuzzy face fared from the frosty frigidness.  (like my use of appropriate f words?)

Last Day of Break

Well that went awfully fast.  I can’t believe Christmas break is already over.  Today I pretty much laid around the house watching Sawyer with Erin.  The Vikings game was on in the background which was really a waste of my time.  After the boy took off Erin was driving her Dad to Virginia I got my winter gear on and shoveled off Jim’s roof.  He was planning on doing it tomorrow, and since I had the time I figured I’d take care of it for him.  He does most of the driveway plowing so I hope it evens out a bit.

I also put in for a BWCAW permit today.  The lottery for the 2011 canoeing season has opened and will close on the 15th.  We put in for the Nina Moose entry point hoping to get into Lady Boot bay on Lac La Croix for some fishing.  We hear its pretty amazing there.

We are also planning on a Quetico trip this summer as well.  This will be my first trip into the Canadian version of the BWCA.  After doing some research on the web it looks like their permitting system is shut down right now for a revamp.  We’ll apply for the Canadian permits when they open back up for business.

Its back to school tomorrow.  Its crazy how fast the first half of the year has gone.

Let the new year begin

2010 was a great year with lots of fun and lots of work.  I’ve been working very hard on getting my masters in educational technology.  In 2010 I completed 27 credits, 9 in the spring semester, 9 in the summer session, and 9 in the fall semester.  I’ve only two classes left and will finish the program this summer.  Erin and I have some exciting news, and it doesn’t involve a baby.    In the last month of the year we officially purchased our home on lake Vermilion.  We love living on the lake and enjoy getting out in all the seasons Northern Minnesota has to offer.  School (work) is going well.  I am teamed up with a guy named Steve who works for a technology company based in Duluth.  He comes up to Virginia twice a week and we hammer out the tickets created by our staff k-12.

We’ve had a nice amount of snow this year so far.  I’ve only been out skiing once though.    I am hoping to ski at least three times a week in the coming months.  I may have blogged about this already, but I’m not sure.  Jesse and I built a sauna this summer.  We’ve been using it quite a bit and I’m really excited to use it after skiing this year.

Well.  I hope to blog more often in 2011.  We’ll see how that goes.

New pipe

We installed a new stove pipe today. We were able to install it so any creosote that drips down the pipe will go back into the stove and get burned back up. The new pipe is nice and shiny black. I’m looking forward to a nice fire once things cool off a little more.

Fall

Fall has been going by pretty quickly here on the lake.  Work has been very busy.  We are working with a company out of Duluth that will help with our schools computer network.  They are great to work with and very knowledgeable.  Steve is my main point of contact for the company.  He has been spending quite a bit of time at our building helping the year get started.  We are hoping that things begin t slow down for us, at least in the realm of hardware failure and poorly images computers.

At home Erin and I have been enjoying our time on the lake.  Weekend boat rides dubbed the “Apple Cider Tour” are taken frequently.  We have been using the suana on almost a daily basis.  It is so nice to come home from work and relax in the sauna.  We are still jumping in the lake to cool off from time to time, but those swims sure are getting shorter and shorter.  We’ll see if I am crazy enough to jump in this winter.

Here is glimpse of what our neck of the woods looks like this time of year.

Wheezer

The last few nights Erin and i have heard a wheezing sound outside our house.  At first Erin thought it was me, but we were able to narrow it down to a sound coming from the woods by our house.  Erin thought there was something big and dangerous in the woods that would devour me whole and wouldn’t let me go investigate.  So last night when we heard the sound again I armed myself with some bug spray, a headlamp with spotlight mode, a camera, and a tripod.  This is the resulting image of the scary animal.