Wrapping up 2020 ( Oct - Dec 2020)

2021 has arrived and it's time to put 2020 to rest. No trips since we visited Cape Breton in October however outside of work at Kent's we've still made progress on the house and had some fun.

PEI has a lot of blueberry fields and they turn a totally stunning red in the fall - who knew? It was raining the day I took this shot even though I saw plenty gleaming in the sun. Hopefully next year I'll make a point of trying to show off these fields better.

We had started to wonder if the farmer was ever going to come and harvest the carrots in our front yard. They dropped off the machinery October 21st and started October 26th. Seemed very late in the year to us but it turns out longer equals bigger and sweeter. They wait as late as possible.

Our front yard is only about 8 acres however it is also their access to the neighbours field. The farmer harvests several acreages along our road. It took 2 weeks in all. What a pile of carrots.

A couple of tractor with trailer/bins trade off following along beside the harvester. Trading off when they are full, they go up to the road where another machine with the conveyor transfers the carrots into semi trailers. They kept coming, sometimes with as many as three waiting to be loaded at a time. Hard to know how many semi loads in all - A LOT.

The carrots are driven directly to the factory and chopped up for frozen veggies.

The harvester scoops the carrots up by their tops and conveys them into the waiting tractor bins.

Semi's waiting their turn to be loaded.

Conveyor putting loading the semi's parked off the side of the road.

Both the harvester and the conveyor leaves hundreds of carrots behind. There was a big pile all along the front where they were loading the conveyors as well as pretty much anywhere in the field. People came from to collect the extras at the roadside for personal use or to feed their animals. There is no way we could ever have used them all so it was no problem. It is commonplace here with potatoes as well. That said, it was strange and felt a bit invasive when one woman drove through the yard to the neighbours field, collected a few bags of carrots, had a pee at the side of the field then drove back into our yard, stopped and collected a few more. Very odd feeling. We can't use them but it seems a bit much without asking permission since we were clearly at home. I'm definitely not going to have any qualms about collecting potatoes in fields next year, close to the road at least :-)

We did get out ourselves and collect a few which we chopped and froze.

Used some at Christmas - they were deliciously sweet.

I get to see some beautiful sunrises and sunsets driving to and from work at this time of year.

The house is sided and although it was getting colder, Scott got the siding on in the screen room as well. He made frames for the windows for screens but sadly with the winds here a couple have blown out. The frames were pretty big so he'll be fixing that next year.

Inside he is getting to more fun things or at least jobs which don't take as long and the results are easy to see and enjoy. First up - Shiplap the living room and front wall of the kitchen.

The shiplap went up quickly and we love it. Many of you know we normally go for stronger darker colours. Being in a coastal area and being in what started off as an old farmhouse, we decided on white (Simply White, a Benjamin Moore colour in case you'd like to know, mixed at work in SICO paint). We are not keen on the kitchen walls without the shiplap in white as it is the texture of the shiplap giving the colours life however we have plans to add shelving to those walls which should make the difference.

Brother and sister in-law, Trevor and Pam, own Tattrie Evergreens so we headed out earlier than usual this year to tag the tree we liked. 

Scott ended up helping Trevor for the better part of a day and chopped ours for us too. 

It was a beautiful tree with lots of branches for ornaments.

Stunning colours that night.

We've had pretty mild weather some days as you can see. Scott's wearing a t-shirt mid-November putting the Christmas lights up. We find it's best to put them up in advance and avoid doing it in the cold and snow. Not a problem this year.

Scott left the scaffolding he used for the shingles up to do some finish work next year which worked well for putting the lights up.

Inside, with the shiplap up, the next job was the ceilings. We had toyed with leaving them as is but the floor joists above just had too many nail holes from the lath and plaster. Not very nice looking so we went with tongue and groove. All of it painted before it went up same as the shiplap.

View from living room in the kitchen

View from kitchen into the living room - we were really looking forward to getting the kitchen and some storage in as most of what we use regularly was sitting on the table and it's been almost a year since we moved in to the house.

Last year I bought some paint yourself Christmas decor to paint with Emily but we never got to it. I was determined this year and had a great afternoon painting with Emily, Pam and Veda at Pam's house. 

They are all very good painters so I stuck to the basics ... backgrounds and let them fix up what I did afterwards.

Emily showed me her chickens and eggs...not sure which came first....

It's really beginning to come together at this point. Next step was the flooring. 

We decided on a durable vinyl flooring with a wood grain look.

Action shot - the flooring went down pretty quickly

Continued the same flooring into the hallway. The temporary table in the kitchen is a folding picnic table my Dad made in the 70's. It's come in very handy.

With the flooring down it was time to unpack and assemble the IKEA kitchen cabinets we bought November 2019 - they have been moved around the house a couple of times and it's so great to be able to finally use them.

The lower cabinets are are in and we're using a makeshift counter top until the counters are built. Scott is making them out of some maple tables we bought last year. You can see the original in the corner of the picture above. The tables were used in motel rooms for years and the owner was selling them off. I bought one for a planned project and when Scott saw it he and found out the guy had another 10 to sell, we bought them all with the idea of using them for the countertop. They had a light varnish on them which I sanded off fairly easily last year. 

The cardboard cutouts on the wall in the picture above are my way of planning the shelving / open cabinets to come. Originally I was thinking just shelving but we need a bit more interest on that plain wall so we'll (I'm hoping to help) build open wall units with a rustic feel.

Completed counter top between stove and fridge.

December 1st - Christmas lights are on. I find LED's don't photograph well but you get the idea.

Dominic's 7th birthday party was full of rambunctious boys - they had a blast. Luckily it happened before stricter Covid rules came into play. 

Dom pretending to chop the cake - He was pretty excited.

With the tree up, we had Veda over for dinner and a puzzle.

Murray Harbour fishers (new name for fishermen and women) got together to create this lobster trap tree. People hung buoys on the tree in memory of loved ones, particularly those lost at sea. Early this year a local man was lost at sea which was the catalyst for the tree.

Scott also used the maple to make a countertop for the 2 piece bathroom on the main floor.

Also finally got to use a copper sink we bought 15 years ago and have never found a place for.

With the tree up and decorated I found time to do a little crafting. Saw this wool hat garland on Facebook and love the way it turned out.

Many good things happened this year but in honour of 2020 I did buy a snowflake ornament. Fingers crossed I don't need one for 2021.

When designing the main floor we planned an alcove to accommodate 3 IKEA Billy bookshelves / storage units. You can buy them with or without doors and with or without glass. The closest IKEA is in Halifax and with the Atlantic Bubble closed we couldn't go over at the moment. We had the cabinets shipped here. They went up in about an hour and we are so happy with the storage they offer not to mention some life in the hallway. 

Scott will likely trim the edges sometime to make them look like built-ins.

Matt, Chasity, Dom and Kayla came over so we could give the kids their gifts and bake some cookies with the cookie cutters we gave them (Dom got a truck and Kayla a unicorn). 

The kids also got puzzles which Matt and Scott mostly worked on. LOL!!

They are both a bit ticklish.

Scott in his basement workshop working on our kitchen table (made of 2 x 8's). It'll be a while yet as he'll move to working on the countertop but it looks good so far. He's got to work with his head between the joists but it's warmer and drier than working in the screenroom.

My days have been pretty much working but we did have an ugly sweater day. Nicole looked great in her "Resting Grinch  Face" T-shirt, antlers and Christmas vest.

I couldn't find a sweater and ended up making an ugly Christmas poncho which was fun.

Thank you Karen for our Christmas hats.

Christmas Eve we hung out at Matt and Chas' for a while.

Picked up Veda Christmas Day and hosted a turkey dinner on Boxing Day.

At this point PEI allows 10 people in addition to your household so the numbers worked. We know we were lucky to be able to celebrate together which was not the case in alot of other places.

Cousins - Dominic and Emily

A rare sighting of Emily's brother Jacob LOL!!

Last time I saw him was at work and I didn't totally recognize him with glasses he didn't have before and a mask. Realized it was him when I heard his truck leaving the parking lot. Bad Auntie.

It's January 3rd already and yesterday we went for a walk on the Confederation Trail in Murray River. Not a spec of snow, just these beautiful birches. As soon as we got back from the walk, snow began to fall and this morning it's a winter wonderland out there.

2021 has arrived and we are hopeful that Covid will be somewhat more controlled as we adjust to living with it. We have Jello plans as RV'ers call them but will definitely be in Ontario for Sarah's wedding in June. Beyond that we hope to be able to host visitors here. Fingers Crossed for a Happy New Year.

Love you all.