What a great long weekend! As unfortunate as it was that I had to miss Jenna's wedding, my parent's anniversary, and spending a birthday with Lanette, we had a pretty great few days.
Scott took Saturday off so that we could go to
Lloydminster for the day (1200
kms later) and get him all geared up for a winter in the North, we spent Sunday night at the Ross residence for Thanksgiving dinner and shenanigans, and a recovery day at home on Monday.
Myself, Scott, and Rocky packed into the car at 6am on Saturday morning and made the 5 1/2 hour drive to
Lloydminster. We could have done it in 5 hours but we hit some bad weather and road conditions early on that caused a bit of delay. We made it to Lloyd early, took Rocky for a walk and did some driving around the city to see the Alberta and Saskatchewan sides. We wondered how a person would decide to live in
Lloydminster, Alberta or in
Lloydminster, Saskatchewan? Saskatchewan has a provincial sales tax, but there is no way it applies in
Lloydminster. Why would anyone ever choose to live on that side of town? As Scott said, it would be a ghost town!
We met Rae's friend Neil at his store in the early afternoon and managed to get Scott all geared up for the upcoming chilly months. We grabbed a quick bite to eat at the local Kelsey's and were back on the road by 4pm.
We arrived in Fort
McMurray just before 9 pm with only a slight delay thanks to the wonderful RCMP. I got pulled over for speeding and received a hefty ticket of $57 for doing 101 in a 100 zone. Technically I was doing 123 (Scott and I both thought it was 110 and I had the cruise control set around 120 to be safe) but the bugger still got me. He was nice enough to give me the lowest ticket possible and we were back on our way.
Sunday I made a batch of yummy mashed potatoes as our dinner contribution and were on our way to the Ross residence. About 10 of us gathered for dinner, ate a good portion of the ginormous turkey, and people were coming and going for other dinners and work all night. I taught the girls how to play Bullshit Pyramid while the boys watched football, and the night took off from there. We had plans to go out to the bar afterwards but never actually made it. A great big thanks to Mark and Krystal for inviting us to share in their Thanksgiving and for providing such a delicious meal.
Scott and I missed spending the holiday with our families, but all of the great friends we have up here made it an easier pill to swallow. A very Happy Anniversary wish to my parents, a Happy Birthday to Lanette, and a big congratulations on her first 10k race completed on October 12th. She finished in an hour and 5 minutes and we're all very proud of her for beating her target of 1 hour 10 minutes.
This week has been an interesting one. I need to be as focused on my future and our lives as I can, and hopefully everything works out for the best. Everything does happen for a reason and the power of positive thinking will prevail at some point in my life :)
Today we woke up to this, and it's still coming down....

Happy Winter everyone!