Online Shopping Guide

With Christmas around the corner, and a distinct lack of physical shopping at hand, we've (let's be real here, I'm the shopper in this family!) had to learn to be resourceful at using the internet to find sites that offer online shopping.

The trick is to find retailers that offer reasonable, or even better, free shipping. Some sites will do shipping for free in the South and because Nunavut is considered "remote," we may not qualify for these deals.

I thought it would be helpful to list some of the sites that I have found really useful/helpful/lucrative for our shopping needs. Mos of the Christmas shopping we've been doing for friends and family at home have come from these retailers. *I will update the list as I discover more sites I like.

Winnipeg: It's the New Buffalo!

A play by play of our spontaneous weekend trip to Winnipeg, complete with numerous pictures of  us looking ridiculously happy and some delicious food - this post is so long it may take you a whole weekend to read it! :)

Before we moved to Nunavut, we lived fairly close to the Canada/US border, and would often drive the 45 minutes to hop over and do some shopping and eat some food. This past weekend was sort of the same...only instead of driving for 45 minutes, we flew for 6 hours. Almost exactly (not really) the same thing! Either way, it was with the same intentions: buy things we can't buy here and eat food we can't eat here.

Delayed

After a whirlwind weekend, we are currently delayed (again) from getting home (I'll tell you all about it on Wednesday!), so no real post today. good news though, we were just told "the plane isn't as broken as we thought."

So...um...yay??

Back Wednesday!
-L & J

Operation: Retrieve Husband (aka Our 3rd Blizzard in 2 Weeks)

Blizzard protocol was broken on Wednesday morning when we got up to start our day - the weather looked pretty miserable (lots of blowing snow, crazy winds, low visibility) and yet there was no warning or watch on Environment Canada's site. Hrmmm...this did not bode well for us.

Blizzard 2.0: More blizzardy. More adventurey!

One of my pastimes these days is to consistently check the Environment Canada weather report for Baker Lake - I check it a few times a day, just to see. The weather conditions looked a little suspicious about a week ago and I remember declaring "we're going to get a blizzard on the 19th" but it was too far out for anyone to really take note. Sure enough, the forecast was right and by Sunday evening we went from "blizzard watch" to "blizzard warning" to "BLIZZARD IS IMMINENT AND OR OCCURRING" ...which basically translates into, "you better have your affairs in order, because you're sitting ducks! Run for the HILLS!", in meteorologist speak.

Imagine our surprise when we woke up at 6:00am on Monday morning and there was no blizzard! Oh, but Mother Nature is a fickle woman and she changed that pretty fast...

Judith Makes Everything Better

After working for 14 days straight, and coming home to frozen water pipes, and in an all-around bad mood, something needed to be done and needed to be done fast. We needed something...and that something was Judith:

Liebster Blog Award!

I admit that with work being so busy this week I've been pretty neglectful of logging into my email and twitter accounts to see what's been going on. Imagine my delight when I saw that fellow Nunavut blogger Sarah whom I've gotten to chatting with recently gave our tiny little blog a Liebster! Sarah blogs from the community of Pangnirtung and has the most amazing photos of her life there. Her shots of the Northern Lights make me green (ha, get it?) with envy!!

What's a Liebster you ask? It's an award given by bloggers to up and coming bloggers who have less than 200 followers. A German term that means "sweetest, kindest, nicest, dearest, beloved, lovely, kind, pleasant, valued, cute, endearing and welcome." Well! Isn't that the nicest compliment someone could give? :) Thank you to Sarah for brightening my day!

Rules:
1. Each person posts 11 things about themselves.
2. Answer the questions the nominator made for you and create 10 more questions for the blogs you nominated.
3. Choose nominations and link them to your post.
4. Go to their page and tell them.

List: Random Thoughts

Since it's Wednesday and a blog post should be posted, and I come to you fully unprepared, here's a list of random things on my mind today.

The Hang of Things

A new neighbour moved into the duplex next door (also a co-worker and his family) and we were sharing a few tips that we've picked up since we got here, and he said "you really seem like you've got the hang of things here." ...it surprised me, because we've only been here 3 months, but I suppose we do know a heck of a lot more than when we first got here. It feels more comfortable know, and I feel like I have a better grasp on where to get things, who to call if something goes wrong, etc. but I don't know if I feel like I'm not new to the whole experience just yet. I'm still learning things every day, but it definitely helps to share some of the things we've learned with people who just got here - being a small group we need to stick together and help each other out!

Blizzards: They Blow!

Well, we survived our very first blizzard in Nunavut. It made me realize that any "storm" we had in Ontario was small beans compared to what an actual blizzard can be...and the one we got was considered relatively mild! I can only imagine what else is in store for us the rest of the winter.

Wednesday afternoon we started getting warnings that Baker Lake was under a "winter storm watch" and by late afternoon it was officially upgraded to "blizzard watch" for Thursday. There was an air of tension and a little excitement all around, and everyone was talking about it.

A group of us piled into the truck and went to the Northern to stock up on food and supplies in case the storm was longer than the prediction of a day (apparently last year it was so volatile that the warning could say 1 day but it lasted for 3). I stocked up on fresh produce like it was Y2K prep - (plus I figured it would save me having to go later next week.) Maximum efficiency here, people!

Wednesday comes and go and it started to get pretty cold and snow started to fall...but it wasn't anything out of the ordinary. I was beginning to wonder what the next day would bring. Well, Thursday did not disappoint!

Daylight Savings

The changing of the clocks have really been messing with me - I get so confused when I look up from my desk at work and realize that the sun is starting to set around 3:30 in the afternoon now, and it's pitch black by the time we pack up to go home.

I guess it shouldn't be a huge bother because we get into work in the dark - it's been dark as the middle of the night when Jeff goes to the airport in the morning - and we leave when it's dark. At least it's usually pretty bright out when it's time to go home for lunch. Have to find the small things.

It's Beginning to (Not) Look a Lot like Christmas

With Halloween out of the way, Christmas commercials everywhere you look on TV, and snow falling and/or blowing pretty much at some point every day, it's no wonder I'm itching to prep for the holidays. Since we're not going home this year (super duper sad faces!!!) I want to try extra hard to make it feel Christmasy at our new house.

Unfortunately for me, my husband (and sister...and parents...and friends) have this weird notion that the first weekend in November is too early to decorate for Christmas. I know, right? How unreasonable! He said I should try to wait until after American Thanksgiving but that's AGES away!! Boo!! I promised there would be a plethora of pouts until our decorations are pulled from the closet and I can deck the house out. You've all been warned!

Relatively Speaking

It's funny how quickly we've adapted to some of the changes that come with living in a community so different from home in Ontario - we find ourselves saying the strangest things, bearing in mind it's all relative to our situation here. Here are some of the things we've said recently that made us stop and laugh. Hopefully you get a kick out of these too!