End of January already

Hi everyone!

Just wanted to drop a note and say hello. It's hard to believe January is pretty much over, and so is my week of holidays. In my mind I had wanted to go somewhere for the week, like Mexico, and enjoy some sun. I decided to stay home and have a week at home. It's been pretty busy. I've added a few pages from my website to here since it shut down last week.

Also did a fair bit of video creation. I saw the Chiseled Ice Festival mid-week, before things started to warm up and melt the sculptures too much. As it was, some of the finer pieces of ice had already broken off. They were still lovely to look at.

Also went for a walk in the creek valley. I had been seeing what I thought were Ruffed Grouse during the week, and was hoping they would move into the creek valley and set up residence. However, I reviewed the footage I had taken of the group over at the gas plant, and realized those ones were likely Grey Partridge.

I still feel like some of the other birds I saw were Ruffed Grouse but I'm not really a partridge or a grouse expert. I went for a walk hoping to find some of their tracks in the snow, which are always cute to see as they look like little stars, or their pellets which look like All Bran (nothing against the cereal, it's delicious. That's just what they look like). But there was nothing out there. I was a little disappointed, but I had a good time anyway.

The creek is also starting to melt in spots, as you can see in the photo. I usually don't trust myself to walk on the ice but it really is amazing seeing all the trees and tall cliffs from the viewpoint of the creek.

For my last day off, hopefully we can go for a walk out at Elk Island. I will probably have to wrap my knee up in a brace to help it manage against the ice, and make sure I have my cleats with me as the melting snow wrecks havoc on my knee.

I've also been forewarned that I am heading back into a disaster zone. Two of my coworkers are off, one due to medical leave and the other to take care of their spouse who just had surgery. I feel like I'm going to need another holiday after a couple of weeks.

Grande Prairie

So I have been working for the past few days in Grande Prairie, Alberta.

A couple of evenings ago I was able to check out the Muskoseepi Creek area. The name Muskoseepi translates to "Bear Creek" in Cree. While I didn't see any bears, I saw a good variety of birds, including Mallards, Canada Geese, Red-winged Blackbirds, Herring Gulls, and other species of ducks and gulls. I also watched some people canoeing along the creek.

Yesterday I visited the Grande Prairie museum and Heritage Village, visible on the left. They have a collection of original and reconstructed historical buildings from the past century. I especially enjoyed the Mad Trapper's cabin and the taxi post. A tabby cat named Chester adopted me and served as my guide through the village, walking me from building to building. (I think he was the local tom cat.)

This evening I took a short walk around Crystal Lake, which was full of ducks and geese honking and more blackbirds singing.

I haven't had a chance to do much painting, but last night I painted a samurai kabuki actor using my Chinese ink set. It's based off a historical painting. It was actually a lot of fun to do! I like how the tree turned out in the background, too. I ended up layering the tree leaves somewhat by accident.