The Man Cave

It has been a long time, so I thought I would give a quick update on what has been keeping me busy lately (apart from family, work, and life in general of course). Last year I decided I needed a workshop. I was tired of spending an hour to move cars, arrange machinery, clean up, move machinery, and move cars again, every time I wanted to cut a piece of wood. Not to mention the fact that I could never do anything that required any sort of setup as I couldn't afford to leave things in any sort of steady state (besides "put away") for more than a weekend.

So I started digging.

This is what I started with:




And many, many (*MANY*) wheelbarrow loads later, I was part-way done:



And with a lot of sweat and some help from my good friend Todd, I got even further.



In the process, I was in between many a hard place and these:



But eventually, I got it to the point where I was ready to do something with the space.




And with a lot of understanding from my wife, and a lot of help from my brother, my dad, once again Todd, and the rest of my family and friends, I finally got the beginnings of a workshop.



And with a little more blood, sweat, and swears (and a significant amount of money), and some more help from Todd and my friend John, I have my very own Man Cave.





And tonight, Todd and I used that Man Cave to finish up this little beauty:




I want to say a huge "Thank You" to everyone who helped me make this little workshop a reality. I certainly have a fair amount of work left when the weather warms up again, but having this space to work in is awesome.

All I need now is a beer fridge and a scotch dispenser!
Stay tuned for more posts in the future!

Pizza!

Here are some pictures of the pizzas we made yesterday. We have been making one fancy one (prosciutto ham, sun-dried tomatoes, black olives, pesto) and the usual "kitchen sink" pizza. They are both good. The crust turned out a little thinner than it should have, but that was because I was pushing it to fit the two large pizza stones.







I think today I am going to try to make Chelsea Buns!

Long Weekend

This weekend is a long one in Canada as Monday is Labour Day. We don't really have any plans, but personally I'd like to get the following done in no particular order:

• Bake some bread


• Play lots of guitar


• Work on the latest amplifier cabinet


• Clean out all the old computer carcasses lying around my basement

Seeing as it is freezing cold and raining, it should be a good weekend to get some indoor stuff done.

Since we didn't have our usual Friday night home-made pizza last night, we're doing it tonight. We've been making some rather nice pizzas lately. Perhaps I'll post some pictures later tonight before we eat them!

Clearing Out The Cobwebs

So it has been months since my last post. It really doesn't feel that long, but I guess time flies whether you're having fun or not. I recently saw the movie Julie and Julia, and it made me want to get back to posting on a more regular basis. I'm also thinking about actually making a webpage beyond the 'Coming Soon' that has been on my domain for years. At the very least I can point it here.

I've had some big changes personally this year, the largest being my slight change in career (again). I am still with the same company, but I have switched roles after more than 7 years of software development to more of an applications engineering position. What does that mean? Well, mostly it means I am doing 100 things at once instead of 2 or 3 - which I think fits better with my personality. It also means I'm dealing more with customers and will be travelling a bit. But the two biggest reasons I made the switch was to learn something completely new, and for a change of pace. I guess only time will tell if it was the right move or not.

Tomorrow we're heading to Mont Tremblant for March Break. I've never been there in the winter before, and I plan to do a lot of skiing, relaxing, eating and drinking. And there will probably be a few games of Settlers of Catan, Carcassonne, and Citadels in there as well with Todd and Paulina. I am really looking forward to it.

I suppose I had better start packing...

Lots of Snow!

We got an email from Michelle the other day saying it was snowing in Scotland. That's nothing compared to the mass of white stuff we've received over the past week or so. Check out these pictures I took a week ago!

From Winter 2009

This was as the snow was still falling, and we got quite a bit more overnight. We had a bit of a warm spell during the week and a bunch of snow melted, but we still have a good amount lying around. To be honest I'm pretty sick of winter right now and can't wait for spring to arrive!

Christmas Eve In Tsawwassen

It's Christmas Eve and we have been in Tsawwassen (just outside Vancouver) since very early Sunday. On Monday the women drove to Abbotsford to get the turkey and spent some time shopping so I got to spend the day with Jordan and Griffin.



This is basically what Drew and Rhiannon have been up to for the past few days:



With the unusual weather, we have been spending a lot of time indoors passing the time with games.





But the real news here is the weather. Apparently this is the most snow Vancouver has seen in such a short period of time in many many years. Lucky us! So much for coming from freezing cold Ontario to warm Vancouver! Here's a picture of Jordan and Tracy's back yard yesterday (before the latest 15cm snowfall!):



At least we're not in Saskatchewan where the temperature has not rose above -20 (Celsius) in the past 12 days or so! I'm also thankful we got here with only a minor delay. The Vancouver airport has basically been shut down for a couple days and many people won't be making it home for Christmas. Some people have been camped out in the airport for over a day with no flights in sight! While the snowfall here isn't all that much (we get stuff like this all the time in Waterloo), Vancouver is just not prepared to deal with it. There are virtually no snow plows to speak of here (we've pushed at least four cars out of the cul-de-sac here - it hasn't been plowed yet), and most people don't even own a decent snow shovel! Wow.

Tomorrow I'll be getting up early and making waffles for everyone, and then the kids can finally open presents. Drew has been counting the sleeps since we got here. Hopefully tomorrow I'll have more to talk about and some more pictures (I've barely taken any so far!).

Merry Christmas to everyone!

The Melvin Family Christmas

On the weekend of the 13th we had our Melvin family Christmas (yes, this is out of order, but I have been so busy lately - working, and now being lazy and doing nothing - I haven't been keeping up with things). Anyway, we made our way down to Wallaceburg and stayed with Grandma and Grandpa for the weekend. Sunday we all gathered in the local hall (our family is so big we need to rent a hall...) and had a really good time. My mom organized the whole thing (I think she enjoys that sort of thing); she got a few big roasts of beef and we all contributed desserts and various other items to the meal. We did a kids gift exchange, as well as an adult one. Drew has already watched Kung Fu Panda a few times, and we are all waiting until we can watch Wall-E together as only the kids have seen it. We forgot our camera in the rush to get out, so the pictures we did get are pretty crappy (taken with the cellphone).





Anyway, I think it all went well. Everyone had a good time, and there were no major fights in the process. That spells success in my books!

Chillin' Out In Vancouver

Wow - I can't believe I haven't posted since October! I've been pretty busy with work and other things; but now I am officially on holidays for the rest of the year and we are spending the next 8 or 9 days in Vancouver (Tsawwassen, actually) with relatives.

We're staying with Sharon's sister Tracy and her husband Jordan, and we are meeting our nephew Griffin for the first time. We left on Thursday after a bit of confusion due to the impending doom of snowpocalypse. Our original flight was cancelled but we were booked on another one leaving 7 hours later. After spending a fairly boring day at the airport, we finally made it here and got to sleep about 5:30am (Waterloo time) yesterday morning. Sharon's parents are due to arrive today (their flight wasn't cancelled), and Drew is already counting the sleeps until it is time to open presents. Hopefully we'll get out a bit to see the sights and I'll post some pictures.

It is freaking cold here! I thought Vancouver was supposed to be warm and wet? We are expecting a big storm tonight so the girls are going out shopping before it hits. I'm happy to stay put with a drink and a warm sweater on, and just do nothing.

Happy Hallowe'en!

From Fall 2008

A Weekend At Home

This weekend was one of the first weekends we had at home (and without something going on like a sleep-over, TaeKwonDo belt testing, etc.). We were blessed with another gorgeous weekend weather-wise, but we didn't spend a whole lot of time outside. Yesterday I had a hankering for leek and potato soup. I'd never actually had it before, and figured I would make it from scratch along with a fresh loaf of bread while I was at it. I went with one of the first recipes I could find online, dug up a recipe for a quick loaf of basic brown bread from The Bread Book and went for it. Although we didn't eat until about 7:30pm, I think the results were worth it. It was delicious (even if I do say so myself!).

From Fall 2008

Today we went to the Liddel family farm and got our pumpkins for the Hallowe'en season. The Liddel farm is a little cheezy, but the kids love it, the prices are awesome, and we like to support the small, local farm while still enjoying the bigger guys.

From Fall 2008

After that we went to the Schantzholm farm to go through the corn maze. We did this last year, and ever since Drew thinks every corn field is a corn maze. We had a long walk through the maze, saw the animals, and had a very nice drive home amongst the fall colours.

From Fall 2008

We ended the day with a nice pork roast with vegetables that Sharon managed to find the time to prepare (whilst elbow-deep making apple sauce) which gave me time to put my motorcycle away for the season. All-in-all, a very relaxing Canadian autumn weekend!

Thanks a lot, Murphy!

Well, it is our last full day here in Scotland and we have no plans for the day except trying to accomplish some more work, and packing up for our flight in the morning. And as luck would have it, it is gorgeous and sunny outside. It is probably the nicest day we've had all week!

I guess I can't complain. We had a really nice day yesterday and I managed to get in a full day of fishing on Loch Rusky. The trout were rising all over the place and while Bob and I both had many strikes each, we just couldn't seem to hook the buggers! I did end up with one small brown trout though, and I had a second one on Loch Lubnaig later in the day that got away before I got him to shore.



Sharon, Stella and the kids went to Ayr (not St. Andrews like I had originally posted!) and spent the day at the beach. They also had lots of sunshine and the kids had a blast. All-in-all, it was a very good day.

NOTE: Since someone anonymously commented about this (on the wrong post) I did *not* keep this fish. It was released immediately as keeping brown trout on Loch Rusky is forbidden.

Still Raining

We have been in Scotland almost two weeks now and it has rained every day except two. Bob and I decided to go out fishing on Loch Lubnaig on Monday, and planned to have a BBQ lunch with Stella and the rest of the family. It looked good when we left in the morning, but ended up raining pretty much all day, and poured rain while we were out on the Loch fishing in the late morning. We didn't see a fish much less catch one. We still had a small BBQ and I think everyone enjoyed themselves despite the rain.

Tuesday was the nicest day yet and we had a full day of sunshine as we visited Kelburn Castle. The scenery, gardens and countryside was amazing. There are miles of walking paths there and it would take much more than one day to see it all. It was the first nice day where I could get some more pictures and I have placed them all on the Picasa page. The gardens had some really amazing trees including a couple yews that are estimated to be over 1000 years old, and an absolutely huge tree called the Weeping Larch that covered 1/4 acre. Its branches grew into the ground and back out again in a tangled, twisted mass. They also had the outside of the castle painted up in what the call The Graffiti Project, which is quite cool to see (don't worry - it is temporary):



Today it rained pretty much all day again, but we decided to take the day off and Sharon and I both worked all day while the kids watched movies and played the Wii. I managed to get a full day's work in, most of which was spent writing Python scripts to automate a lot of grunt work that needs to be done before Friday's release which I hope to accomplish from here.

I'm hoping for a better day tomorrow as Bob and I are heading out for our last kick at the can fly fishing. It should be lots of fun if the weather holds. We are heading out on Loch Rusky, which is a private loch but we were invited out for the day by our ghillie from last week after a rather disappointing salmon outing. I'd better get some sleep!

Ah, sunny Scotland!

We are on vacation in Scotland right now for the third year in almost as many. This is a nice destination for us as we very much like the country and Sharon has relatives here so apart from the flight over it doesn't cost a whole lot. But I must admit that is what bugs me the most! I am constantly trying to devise clever schemes of paying for things before Sharon's aunt or uncle does, and it is exhausting! Especially when using a credit card instead of cash seems to be such a hassle.

Anyway, I have not had a lot of time to comment on things but I have started posting photos here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/mark.melvin/Scotland2008

We have finally got a real taste of Scottish weather. Our previous two visits have been amazing in terms of weather but we have had nothing but rain since we arrived. We have had one nice day so far (which I spent river-fishing for salmon), but the rest have involved drizzle or torrential downpours.

We are heading to the world piping championships tomorrow on Glasgow Green, so let's hope the weather holds for that. There is more fishing planned for next week, and many more visits to the pub. It should be a good vacation!

Swiss Vacation - Day 7

Day 7

The seventh day of our vacation found us getting up at 5:00am to shower and pack so we could catch a 6:20 train to Zurich. The hotel was nice enough to pack us ham and cheese sandwiches and some fruit the night before as we would miss the continental breakfast, and I snapped a photo from our room of the Lucerne waterfront at 6:00am on our way out. It looked liked they were setting up an open-air market all along the river, which would have been very nice to stroll through if we did not have a plane to catch.



We made it to the airport with plenty of time to spare, paid $4.50 each for an espresso and finished our sandwiches while we waited for our flight. There isn't a whole lot more to say as we just watched movies the whole way back (this time the Air Canada media system did not freeze or lock up on us), got home safe and sound to a couple of kids who didn't seem to miss us all that much, and went to bed early.

All-in-all, this vacation went off without a hitch; everything turned out great and there were no nasty surprises. We had amazing weather every single day, enjoyed amazing food, people, and scenery. I would like to say a final "thank you" to the people who helped us the most (and who I bugged the most with emails while researching for this trip!) - Alain, Marc, and Christophe. It was also your kindness and hospitality that made this such an awesome trip for us.

I also want to extend a big "thank you" to Sharon's mum (and dad) for watching the kids for us while we were away. I think Rhiannon is actually happy to have us back, believe it or not. But I am sure that will change tomorrow. ;-)

A Vacation Without Kids

Tomorrow Sharon and I are heading to Switzerland for our honeymoon...err, I mean our 10th wedding anniversary. We have always wanted to visit Switzerland and we had planned on going there for our honeymoon 10 years ago. Then we had kids, and well...that never happened.

We have taken a few pretty nice vacations so far with the kids. There was a trip to Wales and two trips to Scotland, as well as one trip to Disney in Florida, and really they were all quite enjoyable. The kids were not really that bad to travel with, and of course we all had fun. But this is the first time we are going away and leaving the kids behind, and it is a little frightening to be quite honest. Sharon's mom is retired now and she is here watching them (we're only gone for a week), so they are in good hands but it is always hard to leave them behind.

Ah well, I guess it is only a week and I'm sure they won't miss us one bit. Perhaps once we all get a taste of what it is like to be away from one another for a few days, it will make us want to do it more often! At any rate, what I am looking forward to the most is the week of dinners without the usual 3 hour marathon of whining, bribery, and threats to get kids - who want to do every *but* eat - to finish their dinner. That's worth the price of admission alone in my book!

So, I am going to attempt to post regularly (internet connection permitting) while we are traveling. It should be fun. The rough itinerary will be:

- Fly into Zurich and head to Grindelwald for 2 nights where we will see the Schilthorn (we are big Bond fans), and hopefully Jungfraujoch.
- One night in Neuchatel to take advantage of the legendary hospitality of some colleagues from our Swiss office
- Two nights in Montreux where we will meet up with another former Swiss colleague and see Chillon castle, as well as take a Panoramic Train to Gstaad and back
- Spend a final night in Lucerne, where we will get up early and grab a train to Zurich to fly home on the 10th.

It is going to be a full week, but I think I have kept it loose enough so that it is relaxing rather than stressful. I guess we'll find out tomorrow. Now I need to pack! As usual, I have all of my electronic gadgets sorted out (laptop, portable printer, cellphones, digital camera, chargers, etc.) and no clothes packed. Ah well, if I'm poorly dressed and totally unprepared at least I'll be connected!

Happy Birthday, Dear

Today was a milestone birthday for Sharon (I won't say how old she is), so I figured since she didn't want a big party (at least that's what she said) I would spend the day baking and cooking instead. For breakfast, I made my signature waffles. Then I went grocery shopping and for dinner I made steak and risotto (OK, the risotto was from a box) with caesar salad. But for dessert I wanted to make a chocolate cake from scratch (icing and all!). I found this recipe online, and decided to go for it.

The recipe itself was fairly easy, the only problem was that the icing takes one whole pound of finely chopped chocolate! Chopping sixteen, one ounce squares of chocolate was not so much fun.



But all-in-all, the end result was much better than I figured I could have managed on my own. Well, I say "on my own" with a couple caveats. Rhiannon did help quite a bit, and I did ask Sharon a lot of questions...but I am fairly impressed with myself anyway, and the end result was quite passable as a birthday cake!



And it tasted quite good too!

Hello, Griffin!

Say 'Hello' to Griffin Hart Hood!



While little Griffin was (a little scarily) premature and had to be delivered early via c-section, everyone appears to be doing well. Congratulations to Sharon's sister Tracy and her husband Jordan.

An Empty House

Well, we got Michelle off to the airport and back home last night and she managed to make it home to Glasgow with only one minor injury. Turns out she took a nasty fall one morning last week and dislocated her knee-cap! I've updated the photos in the gallery, so you can see her stylish knee brace there. So not only did she get to see real Canadian snow, she also got to experience our health care system first-hand with a three-hour stint in the emergency room. Welcome to Canada!

Thanks for visiting and staying with us Michelle, we had a great time and we hope you did too (despite your Canadian ice-induced injury)!

Winter Fun

Sharon's cousin is here from Glasgow, Scotland to experience a bit of our Canadian winters. So far she hasn't been disappointed by the weather.



We've had almost constant snow since she got here a week ago, and we went for a quick night-time toboggan run during the week.



Today we had a chance to go back during daylight hours and had a fun day in much warmer weather (although a little less snow).

Happy 80th Birthday, Grandpa!

This past Saturday was my grandfather's 80th birthday and we celebrated with a bit of a family get-together in Mitchell's Bay, Ontario. Everything went quite smoothly as family get-togethers go and apart from a few logistical snafus, it was a relatively good weekend. Unfortunately, in all the pictures I took I never got one shot of the birthday boy!

We decided to stay the night at the local campground in the tent-trailer. It rained the entire drive down but the day turned out to be not so bad, and by nightfall the weather was simply amazing. I took the kids fishing, although it was more like 2 hours of dad untangling 4 different fishing lines from one another, followed by Drew falling into the water and getting soaked and muddy. I also had a chance to have a few beers and visit with family I hadn't seen in quite awhile, and the kids got to roast marshmallows. I was even able to start a fire with no paper out of the scrap wood from the last tube amp cabinet I brought (thanks again, Boy Scouts).

Everyone else went to bed before midnight (although not to sleep) and I just sat outside in the dark by the dying fire for over an hour. The sky was perfectly clear and full of stars and it was absolutely peaceful. I just wished I'd had a few more pieces of scrap wood so I could have enjoyed it a bit longer. ;)