The winds of change!

Ok, it is official! I have cried and tried all that I can to prevent it but.....we are changing


this for this

down town for down town

job for job

(maybe) but forsure...

Tuesday is Calebs last day of work at Catalyst paper (formarly known as Abibiti)

Friday morning he came home from work with a copy of the 'Mill Street News' and threw it on the bed and told me to read it, and that he was putting his 2 week notice in that day. I will share with you what I read. This comes from John McKee who is THE general manager for the Snowflake Mill.

(i'm gonna quote most of it for you, the important parts anyway :))

"Two weeks ago, One of our competitors made a drmatic change i the pricing of newsprint. Newsprint had been selling for about $550/tonne until Boise Deridder announced a price drop to $430/tonne -- delivered (fyi.....boise is a virgin fiber papermill where as snowflake is recycled fiber....virgin fiber is WAY better). That sales price is much less than it costs us toeven mae ur product. And we are certain that $430/tonne is a lot lower price than it costs to make newsprint as well. So what is going on? Boise is trying to put mills like ours out of business, and they are getting help from the federal government to do it. They are using a tax credit loophole availableto paper mills that make their pulp from digesting wood chips like we used to do. These chemical pulp millsburn a material that is made when you pulp the wood known as 'black liquor'. Pulp mills have always burned their black liquor to generate steam to run the mill, but now they are using a loophole in a transportation bill to claim that they should get a credit for relacing fossil fuels, like oil and diesel fuel, with biofuels."

Now for the numbers! This makes me sick! This credit was only expected to cost the government $61 million/year. There are currently 30 paper producing companys that are claiming this credit and it is estimated they have paid out between $6.6 billion to $10 billion! One paper company has already reported $540 million in the first quarter of 2009 and plan on collecting $1.27 billion by the end of the year!

So, what this means is, the Snowflake paper mill is going under F A S T! Already they are planing on 20 days of downtime in July! So this is the reason for our change. As much as I would LOVE to stay in Snowflake, it isn't going to happen. It has taken some time and fasting and many prayers and even more tears (mine and my moms) but I know that this is what we need to do. Caleb is a wonderful husband and father and I know it breaks his heart to take me away from my mommy :( but he is trying to take care of our family and provide for us the best he can. And if that means we have to move, then we will follow him across the world if we have to! People keep telling me that change is good, I know that it will be hard but no matter where we are we will be an eternal family and no loss of a job or crappy economy can change that! (you wouldn't believe how long it took me to open my eyes to that!)

But that is what our plans are as of now! NOW! If only we could sell our house! anyone??????