Chief Ten Bears: October 2006

Dave's Brithday Gift (somewhat NSFW)

Based on African fertility sculpture, I made this one just in time for Dave's Birthday last Sunday (sorry honey, I nearly forgot). Genitals and articulated arms are labour intensive and hence, you won't be seeing any of these in my 'Ten Bears Shoppe'.

He's got a new technical blog too, drop in and say hello!

Firewood Season 2006

Soo Valley 2006

We've picked a different location to base our chopping and gathering, right of the 9km mark and up Branch 5 in Soo Valley.

Tarn Lakes

A close-up of the glacier-fed tarns in the Soo Valley Basin. I'm looking down from where we are parked.

A Good Clearcut

Believe it or not, there is such as thing as a well executed clearcut. That's when the land is scraped clean of most brush (to minimize fire) and any natural streams are either left untouched or rehabilitated to maintain consistent land drainage. This one is only a hectare in size and surrounded by secondary forest and reseeded slashes.

Branch 5.2.1

In active logging country, roads are named in numerical order. This side road is marked in relation to where we are chopping firewood, Branch 5.2.

lookit my log

Gassing the chainsaw in preparation to digging into the freshly pulled 25 ft. log at his feet.

logging cable

Remnants of industry. Cable like this lie strewn all over the Soo Valley.

left behind

While I wait for Dave to finish bucking a log into sections, I'll jump into the brush and pull up what the loggers left behind when this area was harvested last year.

x-section

A close-up of the cedar in question, with some cottonwood fluff stuck to it.

flying chips

That's a three foot long blade going into that log, and it barely reaches through it.

motherlode

The fruits of the day's labour as we unloaded for the night.

Checking in on San Diego

Busy Su Lin

I haven't done a panda screen cap in a while, mostly because I tend to log into the Zoo cam too late in the day to see anything. This day was special as it occurs to me while seeing this again that it was also my fifth wedding anniversary.

Everlasting summer

This is the longest 'indian' summer I've ever seen in Whistler. My neighbours down the street even have begonias thriving in their flower beds. Hopefully it will last a little while longer. I'm just thrilled that I haven't had to sprinkle ice melt on the front walk yet.

The view behind me when I take the backyard pic above. That's our back patio barbecue station and a pair of two feet long tiki salad utensils. They're not great for tossing salad and I know because I've tried.

Below this deck is our precious winter wood pile. The credit goes to Dave who hauled and chopped four cords on his own last summer. We went up to Soo Valley yesterday (my first firewood trip of the season) and I wish I took a camera along to show you how beautiful the fall colours currently are. Next time, for sure.

A new bear

For variety's sake I worked on Circus Bear while renovating my patio deck. When the monotomy of red paint and plywood got to me, I'd take a break and work on this guy instead. The deck rail may seem like a creative thing to do, but it really is just basic home construction and a lot of repetition. He's already added to my 'shoppe' in the side bar (check it out)!

No turkeys were harmed in this meal

October 9th was thanksgiving in Canada and my roommate Mona was nice enough to include me in her vegan dinner (my first non-meat holiday). She cooked the whole shebang, I pitched in the table setting and washed dishes to even the deal.

Dessert was also vegan and I made her make a birthday wish in it. She was away from the house on her actual brithday two months ago and I didn't get my annual chance to rub it in till that evening.

Happy Accident

My new ring looked like one of these till I forgot to take it off in the bathtub one night. The frosty stuff in the detail are bath salts that dried in the recesses. It actually looks better this way now that I think about it, more like a flower and much less like a blue plastic blob. There are more great rings to be had here.

Ain't She a Beauty?

Holy cow, it's done... the deck I mean. Dave found a nice cafe table at a garage sale, something that can withstand the elements till next spring.

Those pyramid shaped things on the top rail keep water out of butt joints and screw holes, as well as making it look nice.

I had no luck finding a new finial anywhere so I made this out of a store bought drawer pull, a bun foot for a sofa, and wooden wheels. It got glued and brad nailed before being turned upside down and screwed to the top of the stairs.