Bustling In The Bay

I love it when I get a friendly email reminder from our Auntie Madeline stating that it's been awhile since my last blog entry.  It shows not only that she enjoys reading the blog but also that she loves us and wants to know how we are.  Sorry Auntie Madeline for such a long delay but I have been so busy this month. 

 

In my own little photography world I had been asked to do a photo shoot of our GM at Kitikmeot Foods Ltd. for Country Guide magazine as they had done a phone interview and now wanted a picture to go along with the article.  I was pleased of course but also a bit nervous but once I took the first picture of Stéphane I relaxed and had a few laughs while doing it.  Here are the pictures that I gave them.

 

 

 

Since I had my camera at work I thought of taking a few pictures of the staff to update our Facebook page.  A Nunatsiaq reporter saw the picture of Alice and then asked if she could feature her in the paper. It was a really nice gesture as Alice has been working for Kitikmeot Foods Ltd. since 2006 and is one of our long time employees. 

 

This is the picture of Alice that was in Nunatsiaq News

Donna showing off our great looking fillets

Annie, Alice, Jonathan, Ida and Jeannie

Ida, Donna, Alice, Jonathan and Jeannie

The staff produced some fine looking fillets this past week.

 

 

Another magazine from Toronto contacted me as they did a story on our local girl band, Scary Bear Soundtrack and asked permission to use one of the photographs that I did last spring.  I was promised a copy of the magazine which will be sometime in January.  It's exciting not only for the musicians but also for me. 

 

It was our Annual Christmas Bazaar on the 22nd and again my friend Kim helped me out.  Not sure what I would do without her as it gets busy and I couldn't do it on my own.  It was another successful day for Denise LeBleu Images and we will do it all again December 6th for the Last Chance Christmas Sale.

 

John traps and was selling some of his Arctic fox pelts beside me

Scary Bear Soundtrack had a table across from me

Crowd at the Bizarre

 

Yesterday was the Santa Claus Parade here in CamBay but I totally missed it as I was helping out at the Coffee House.  The day was so much fun and I love helping out our friend Angela with her charity functions.  This time it was for our local food bank and our little village of 1600 people raised $3,100.00!  People donated baked items for sale and we also serviced tea, coffee, hot chocolate, hot dogs and chili - perfect for a cold winter day.  My favorite girl band Scary Bear Soundtrack was the main entertainment and other local musicians were invited to the open mic.  It was busy and it was nice to see people stay for the afternoon to mingle, eat goodies and listen to some music. 

 

Scary Bear Soundtrack

Anthony playing guitar and singing

Spice on Ice played a few tunes also

Our local throat singers took their turn at the mic

Alice and her children were enjoying the afternoon

Eva was enjoying her son Anthony's music

My friend Amy always comes out to support events

 

In between all of this I headed out with Blitz to catch our final setting sun for the next six weeks.  It was a tradition that I started when I first moved up here and yesterday was bitter sweet as it was Hannah that went out with me to take pictures of her.  Molly and I catch the first day of 24 hour daylight and now Blitz stepped into Hannah's paw prints and do the setting sun in November.

 

 

 

 

 

Some of you receive a LeBleu picture this time of year and here are some pictures that I took but I will not let you know which one will be one the card this year.  The wind chill has been nasty lately so we haven't been out long with the dogs but when we do I make the best of it - here's some pictures from this month. 

 

Deck the Halls

Waiting for Santa to arrive

Blitz was so tired this night, I decided to decorate & photograph him.

He didn't protest or move

The Arctic skies have been beautiful 

 

A game he plays - will roll it, watch it then pounce on it

Molly wanted the chair in my office but Blitz didn't want to move

so she laid on him - no one moved.

 

I am very sad to announce that this is likely going to be the last Christmas with our Mocha, also known as Blitz's cat.  As some of you remember when the vets were up here in August Mocha went through her 3 surgery to remove a cancerous tumour.  Well this past week I found two new ones and today I could feel more.  One tumour is weeping and one looks like it was as it has a scab over it.  I usually check her belly weekly and these were not there last week, that I could feel.  She is not eating as much as we would like and basically sleeps her days away.  Blitz doesn't love her like he did in the past and will sometimes growl at her or move away from her if she comes close to him.  It's sad to watch and I think he will miss her once she is gone but for now he senses that something is terribly wrong with her.

 

 

Our power has been going off a lot this month, I actually lost track of how many times.  First it was a fire at the plant so we were on a rotation of about 45 minutes on to 45 minutes off.  This was happening a few days.  On Friday it went off again, this time our house was out of power for about 4 hours before the rotation began.  A little too long when the temperatures were freezing and heard it was due to dirty fuel.  I know the guys work hard to keep us safe and it's not their fault as our station is about 47 years old but it's getting a bit crazy with all these outages this year.  Here are some more pictures of the sun sets and one when we had a power outage.

 

Sometimes you need to look behind you when you are

photographing the sunset

I fell into this ice crack while not paying attention

to where I was going - no worries I'm ok

Hand-held camera during a power-outage

Northern Lights over our house.

Talk soon!

Storm Day November 7, 2014

There is no work for me and most of the town today due to the blizzard that rolled in yesterday afternoon.  The town shut down about 2pm yesterday but we stayed at work a couple more hours, had to finish packaging the char jerky and candy.  We knew it was going to get worse before it got better and most likely we weren't going to work today.  Luck has it the town is shut down and it's a Friday! 

 

I have experienced blizzards before, a good ole prairie blizzard is so different than the ones up here.  I guess it is mostly due to the lack of trees, no protection or shelter from the winds.  We don't need a lot of snow just high winds and that's what we have today.  At times this afternoon I could only see the outside lights from the house across the road and never mind the house two doors down.  It was supposed to let up this afternoon but no luck so Craig is staying at work for the second night in a row. 

 

There are certain things that you have to be aware of when living in Cambridge Bay in a blizzard, besides the obvious of staying put, you also have to watch your water intake/output.  For those of you who do not know we have water delivery at our home on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays and at the same time we get our sewer pumped out.  Unfortunately today is a water day so I have to watch my water usage as our next delivery is on Sunday.  I have 1/2 tank left.  

 

The dogs hate the winds also and it took Molly 4 times this morning to have her poo.  Poor Princess Warrior.  This morning when the light was a bit better I headed out to shoot some video and of course Blitz needed to come along.  Here's some video from today.

 

  

 

Hope these wires stay attached to the house

 

 

 Poor Blitzy Boy

  

Blizzard Window Art

View from my office - or lack of view

He was so not impressed with the storm this morning

Lucky for her you can't see the snow because of her powder face

Someone is looking after me today

 

Earlier this week I headed out to photograph some of the old Hudson Bay Company buildings.  There are around half a dozen around town and I wish these buildings could speak as I am sure they would have many stories to tell.  Cambridge Bay is actually a young town compared to others in Canada so we do not have many old buildings to photograph or explore.  I find it difficult to come up with new things to take pictures of when the snow falls, mind you the land is beautiful covered in white. 

 

This was my view heading to work one morning this week

Calm before the storm?

This is the same building as above just a close look

Did a colour select on this one as I like the red door

Looks like a old school house but I was told it was

Hudson's Bay Company building

Closer look at the window

The Anglican church just up the street from us

 

I wish this boat was still here - The RCMP St. Roch

This large painting is on a building across from the RCMP detachment

 

She was the second sailing vessel to complete a voyage through the Northwest Passage in 1940 - 1942 and she was the first ship to complete the Northwest Passage in the direction west to east.  She can now be found in at the Vancouver Maritime Museum in Vancouver, BC. 

 

I am working with our head office to supply them with photographs for our airport sign in Cambridge Bay and hopefully one in Yellowknife.  It's pretty cool to be asked and can't wait to see the end product.  I am also getting ready to show my stuff off at our Annual Christmas Bizarre in a couple of weeks. 

 

The days are becoming shorter, we are getting about 5 hours and 45 minutes of daylight and on November 29th it will set for about 6 weeks. 

 

Talk soon!