Hello from Canada

As many of you know Jeremy and I have moved to Ontario. I'm going to attempt to keep in touch and have this be a way for you to see and hear what we've been up to since we're so far away now. I'll back up just a little bit...

Jeremy interviewed with 3 companies (4 locations) in April and finally in June, the offers started coming in. Whew...it took long enough, especially since our Oregon lease ended in May. We were trying to figure out what, when, where we were going to go and do. Thankfully, a friend of mine was out of her Fitchburg apartment but was still tied in her lease thru July, so we took it over for two months to buy us almost enough time. In the meantime, we had to make a decision as to what job offer Jeremy was going to take. After much consideration and research into each job, each location and all the recreational activities each place offered, we decided he would accept the job in Chalk River, Ontario. This is a town of ~1,000 on the edge of civilization in the south/central part of Ontario right along the Ottawa River and just outside the Algonquin Provincial Park, about 2 -2 1/2 hrs outside of Ottawa.

We flew up at the end of July to try to find a place to live. It's amazing how life works sometimes. We managed to find the one available spot in four towns that took both dogs and cats. It's a huge 3-bdrm house in the town of Petawawa with a yard just big enough for Hayde, our dog, to run in and a large driveway for a car, boat and visitors. I'd have to admit, without knowing what I was getting into, it was quite the awakening once we got here in July and started driving around looking for somewhere to live. I've never lived in such a small town at the edge of civilization, but thankfully, I had experienced living in a smaller town going to school in River Falls and I like the outdoors and can handle some ruggidness. By the time we left to fly back, after getting some well needed sleep, these towns were starting to grow on me and I was trying to imagine living here.

But, it turns out we couldn't move into this 3-bdrm house until the end of Aug. and like I said earlier, we had to be out of our Fitchburg place at the end of July. So, Jeremy called up his mother and asked if it'd be okay if we moved in with her for a month. So, at the end of July, we packed up again (well, we spent June and July living out of boxes) and moved to New Richmond, WI. Once we got there, I was thankful of this side trip as it gave me practice driving the 26' long Uhaul we were going to be packing up to make our move to Ontario. (oh, in the meantime, we learned my car was one of only a few that did not meet Canadian standards and was not allowed to be imported so my parents came down to Madison, picked it up and sold it back in Sheboygan for me.) Again, how life works as this vehicle was not always my friend and had left me stranded more than I felt comfortable with. So, although I was sad to see it go, I won't have to deal with it breaking down on me anymore and I didn't have to worry about trying to tow it behind the giant Uhual either.

At the end of August, we loaded up the Uhaul once again (we were getting quite good at this by this point), made sure we had all our documents for immigrating and took off. We stopped close to my parent's cabin (as they were there for a little bit before they made their way to visit us in ON) for a stretch the 1st day and then stayed overnight in Sault Ste. Marie, MI. The next morning, we immediately crossed into Ontario and to my amazement, got thru customs with all our belongings, Jeremy's truck and boat, his firearms and of course our animals, in one hour! After much more driving we made it safe and sound to our new house in Petawawa, Ontario. It took us two 11-hr days, but we made it and yes, Jeremy's truck made it pulling his boat without any major problems! Also, the animals did a great job traveling too. Hayde (our dog) rode in her kennel in the back of Jeremy's truck (thankfully it wasn't too warm out as his air conditioning doesn't work) and Stewart and Kitty(our two cats) rode on the seat next to me, occasionally serenading me from time to time with their meows.

I'm going to attempt to post a few pictures of our house and call it a day as this posting is much longer than I expected. I'll fill in more details about what we've explored and about some of our struggles getting ourselves legalized and settled in Canada later.