CCP: Chaotic Composter Plan

Last we left off I had entered my fourth and last time being house manager. This was by far the most difficult of the house managing dates, obviously we can't deny the time is running out so we have begun shutdown. Shutdown is the process of closing the Katimavik house (or in our case 'houses') in case there are no groups coming, or in case the house(s) is(are) sold. For me and Andrew this meant a total inventory of the two houses. Everything, everything, everything, must be listed and counted. This took about three days for the two houses, it really consumed our week. Of course it didn't stop us from making some amazing food, namely:
Monday: Andrew is an Italian from Toronto, so we made so Torontilinis
Tuesday: Niki is a resident of Lynn Valley, home of four Japanese restaurants within a kilometer of each other, so we made sushi.
Wednesday: We talked about it, we hadn't eaten it, we finally made ...Pad Thai
Thursday: Anne, our guardian angel, came over for dinner so we could thank her for helping us with the drive to Winnipeg. We didn't want to scare her off with anything too weird so we did a variety mini burger night, beef, chicken, shrimp, and veggie.
Friday: Relay for Life supplied dinner.
Saturday: Niki is always hungry for curry.
Sunday: Soups!

I did, however, have a meeting with Sarah on Wednesday night: which changed everything. She asked me one pivotal question "Is there anything that you wanted to do in Katimavik that we haven't done yet?" I told her "Sarah, when we started Katimavik there was one thing I figured we do almost every day that we haven't done once. That is of course, themed dinners." Sarah was taken aback by this and the two of us immediately got to scheming. With the collective community project, shutdown, and the final presentation coming up our group was in not state to allocate anytime to fun things. So how do we get them to do a themed dinner without asking them? That's where Sarah comes in. Her and I planned a disability dinner for Tuesday night. The underside of everyones plate had instructions of what their disability is and .... ah well let me quote myself in our Katimavik blog:

"Today I had a little meeting with Sarah which ended with her question “Is there anything you feel you haven’t done in Katimavik so far, that you’d like to do?” I sighed and replied “There’s one thing i was really excited to do on Katimavik, that we haven’t done once. We have never had a themed dinner. Ever.” Sarah was shocked. Needless to say the two of us got to scheming and being house manager for the week I helped to arrange three themed dinners.
Tonight was the first of the three. It was a challenge dinner, after everyone had sat down Sarah and I explained that on the underside of everyone’s plate was their challenge. I was deaf, to recreate this I listened to Iron Butterfly’s “In the Gada da Vida” at maximum volume. Sarah to the right of me was blind folded. Talkative Andrew was silenced. Kyle had the use of one arm which helped to feed himself along with Jessica who had no mobility. Helpful Cody had no thumbs but still managed to assist in feeding Landen. Landen couldn’t move or speak, he sat there like a fish, mouth open, not moving. Tiffany abandoned her “no hands” to help feed Landen. While poor Francois had a neck injury and could turn his head. This may seem simple but tonights dinner was assemble your own sushi. CHAOS. Sarah got wasabi everywhere.
-Niki “Blue” Andresen"

The night of Pad Thai we had a wacky utensil dinner.

The night of the burgers, we had a toga dinner, even Anne joined in.

Friday night was particularly cool, it was Relay for Life. Which is one of those big events in Sioux Lookout. I was amazed by the turn out, but Sharon tells me there were more people last year. The idea of the event is a consistent walk throughout the night, each walking team get sponsors and proceeds go towards cancer research. To keep people entertained and awake is where the fun stuff comes in. Before the walk starts there's a dinner for all cancer survivors, and the Katimavikians got too be waiters and waitresses.

 The gang is positioned with the giant cake.

Afterwards we got to indulge in the leftovers of an amazingly cheesy lasagna, salad, and garlic bread.

Volunteering for me that night started with the design and construction of the plans for the Sioux Lookout Tower, the kids were game to help although I suspect we'll never see the full construction of the 2km high skyscraper. After this I got into the face painting with such a success after the Teddy Bear's Picnic, how could we not? The highlight had to be the little girl who wanted a Canucks logo on each cheek. Then we assisted in lighting the luminaries that kept the track alive. We assisted the high school students in their volunteer jobs. Helping with the Olympics which are a series of games for the kids in the middle of the night. Cody and I went around to relight the luminaries that had lost their fire. Then Sharon scooped me up to help make some smoothies for the  healthy bingo. I don't know what happened after because it was 3:30am when we decided to crawl to the Prince house and pass out on the floor. Sarah had adjusted our curfew for the night so we could actually help out. Typically, we should be at our respectful houses by 2:00am, but how could we volunteer at an all night event? Thank you, Sarah. However the biggest thank you, goes out to those who stayed all night, thank you, and wow.


Collective Community Project, or CCP had become the dark cloud looming over our fun. Deadlines, approval, paperwork, construction, meetings, supplies, and time, the words we feared.  In fact even squeezing in an information session on aboriginal med cine was difficult. Thursday was D-day, we met at Sioux Mountain School at 8:30am, today was gonna be hard work. We introduced ourselves to the grade one class and got down to safety rules. Measuring, sawing, games, piggy backs, measuring, drilling, playing soccer, and finally a finished product.

It was hard work for most of the day.

Then there she was, one of the two composters we built with the kids. This is only part on of our CCP. The composters will remain at Sioux Mountain School as a more environmentally friendly way to dispose of waste.



 The next day was part 2. This is the construction of a three bin composter for the community garden.

 Landen demonstrates his skills with the drill.

 Our supplies were donated from Home Hardware and McDiarmid. The power tools were courtesy of The Queen Elizabeth District Highschool.

Niki and Tiffany (Nikany) sit in the finished composter.

 

To the shock and surprise of the group, the composter actually fit in the Katimavan.

The week has been histerically fun, thanks in part to Chelsea! Sarah is planning on continueing on as a PL in Sioux Lookout and thus has to attend trraining. To fill in as PL in this difficuklt time we had the experience, wisdom, and generosity of Chelsea! She we be leaving us on Sunday. We salute you, Chelsea!

Awesome.