Thank You's for Everyone

Thank you Kim for throwing me such a fun wedding shower, I had a wonderful time. It was fun to see friends I hadn’t seen in a while, I’m so glad you came Shelley.

Thanks you everyone for coming, I loved visiting with you and I loved the gifts.

The beautiful wooden bowls and yummy chocolate from Bernard. The really great lights that Brad and I love. The cozy blanket and cuddle kit. I’ve been trying to get people to play Yatzee with me all weekend, so far I’ve been unsuccessful. My plans to make muffin tops were postponed but definitely not forgotten. I’m excited to take the bathtub in my new place for a test run will my yummy soaps and lotions. Brad was so excited to see the onion soup dishes and we can’t wait to try out the awesome picnic basket. We scrounged for food yesterday and it wasn’t until we were sitting down to eat that I remembered the pasta kit... that would have been perfect. Another day for sure.

Thank you again, I hope you had as much fun as I did.
L

Move

Things I will not miss about the duplex

1. Roommates (don’t get me wrong, I love them, just ready to have one eternal one)
2. Collecting rent money
3. The clothes dryer that leaves little burn marks on my unmentionables
4. The spider problem that appears in my room every spring
5. The Really tiny bedroom
6. Paying to heat the house - we wore a lot of sweaters
7. Having specific cupboards in the kitchen for each girl... having all the cupboards will be such a dream

Things I will miss

1. Doing laundry for free, coin operated is going to be an unwelcome change
2. The storage space
3. The hard wood floor upstairs
4. The regular size oven (as opposed to the apartment size I’m about to have)
5. The summer coolness of my basement bedroom
6. Dave for a neighbor

6 Weeks and Counting

When you were a kid what kind of vacations did you go on?

We went on road trips. Long drives that didn’t just get us to our final destination, they were part of the destination. We’d drive to California, camping along the way. Staying in KOA’s with freezing swimming pools, showers and electric outlets. We’d eat eggs, sausage, bacon, pancakes for breakfast and steaks for dinner. We’d hit up all the sites along the way, the Grand Canyon, Lewis and Clark caverns. Once we got there we’d see everything there was to see, after all, you may never make it back. Disneyland, Sea World, Universal Studios, Notts Berry Farm, Cotton Fields, Great Sequoia Trees, Venice Beach... you name it, we saw it. They were world wind trips, busy and scheduled so by the time we got home we needed a vacation from our vacation.

As I’ve grown up I’ve come to realize that these aren’t my kind of vacations at all. Now I love to go to Hawaii and sit in the ocean for days. I didn’t go to Pearl Harbour, I didn’t go to the Pineapple fields, I went shopping, I went for dinner and I sat in the ocean. Perfect.

I went to London, I saw Broadway shows, I shopped, I loved it. I went to one museum. I didn’t see the crown jewels, I didn’t see much of anything else... perfect.

This weekend I went to Shushwap lake, to a cabin accessible only by boat. We sat, we lounged we dipped our feet in the water (it’s much to cold to swim this early in the season). We cooked and napped and visited. Perfect.

Here’s to a week in Puerto Vallarta in 6 weeks, here’s to lounging on the beach, swimming with the dolphins, zipping through the rainforests and loving every minute of it!
L

The Apartment that Almost Wasn't

So remember the great little place we found, the one with the ugly green carpet? Boy what a drama it’s been.

So we go see the place with the owner Brenda, she tells us it’s ours and all is good. We’re supposed to go give our damage deposit to Jennifer the resident manager on Monday.
So Monday comes and we head over to see Jennifer. She has no idea we were coming, doesn’t know who we are and has us fill out an application! Application? But we were told it was our apartment! Jennifer calls Brenda who does not clear things up and has Jennifer complete the application with us.

It’s official, we’re concerned.

So we wait the next day hoping for a phone call but not surprisingly neither of them get back to us. It’s now Wednesday, and we don’t know where we’re going to live, we’ve missed out on a week looking if we don’t get this place and the cherry on top... we put that address on 500 wedding invitations!

So Brad calls Brenda on Wednesday, she tells us that we postdated our cheque and she doesn’t want that and we need to go see Jennifer to fix that and “a few other things” whatever that means. So we go see Jennifer. Once again, she has no idea we’re coming and as it turns out doesn’t even have our cheque, Brenda still has it. So she calls Brenda... ha, Brenda thought Brad was someone else when he called... our cheque looks fine but no decision is made. She has our application. So we wasted our time going over this apartment to come up with no results! Argg!

So we go home and call Brenda... starting to feel pretty nervous and stressed at this point.Up until now we’ve felt pretty sure that Brenda hasn’t ever remembered who we were so Brad walked her through the entire encounter we had with her. Reminding her that we’d asked for the apartment number so we could put it on our wedding invitations. She finally remembered us but wasn’t at our office so she told us to call her tomorrow morning. She does tell us that it’s 99.44% sure that the apartment is ours so we’re feeling a little relieved.

Brad calls her this morning, after numerous phone calls she finally makes time for him and tells us that she wants Jennifer to redo our application... What?! Why!At this point Brad’s slightly frustrated and asks why were weren’t told that last night when we were there?!

She got a bit defensive saying she wasn't in her office last night and they already have another application for that suite. Then she realized that Jennifer and herself are to blame for our situation, not ourselves and she's "putting it through". Brad asked when we'd find out if we have place to live, and she replied "I just said I'm putting it through, you have it."

So finally, after some stress and ridiculous management we have a place to live!
L

I made up a really simple floor plan so you have an idea of what our apartment is like, the area I left plain is filled with the awesome carpet :)

Wii

This weekend Brad and I had a chance to play the Nintendo Wii.

I’ve heard from a bunch of people that it’s fun but as a faithful Gamecube player I had my doubts. I’m happy with my console and had no desire to upgrade.

Well it’s official... we’re hooked on the Wii.We played tennis and racquetball, bowling, boxing (I laughed so hard I cried as I knocked out brad :), Cow racing (yeah, your ride a cow), baseball and a few others. There’s pretty much nothing we’d like more than to have our very own but just can’t quite justify it.

Thanks Jace and Vicky for sponsoring our Wii weekend, let’s do it again :)
L

Favorite Sister-in-Law of the Month

So last night was that special day all engaged couples get to look forward to. The invitation stuffing day!

Due to some unforeseen complications we ended up only having one night to stuff our invitations, we'd been hoping to be able to do it all week but it just didn't happen.So when we knew last night was the night I tried to call a couple friends and get us help... unfortunately for us the ones I called happened to have plans. My favorite roommate of the week was there and was a wonderful helper but Rosie, my future sister-in-law was such a trooper. She was there the whole time with us, staying late to help stuff.
She's easily secured the prestigious position for the whole month :)
(To give the others some credit Rosie was the only sister-in-law that we called)
L

Celebration

We officially have a place to live!

Brad and I have been becoming more and more concerned. I gave my notice to move out of my place so come the end of the month I was going to be homeless.

Brad has been so good about finding us listings to look at so we’ve gone to see a bunch of places and called about even more.

Here are a few highlights

1. The all inclusive $600 basement suite
   For $600 dollars you got:
   - Utilities
   - Satellite tv
   - Internet connection
   - A bathroom practically in the kitchen
   - A “kitchen” with no cupboards or counters
   - The all in one, space saving unit... picture it, 2 small burners, a sink directly attached to that and below... any guesses? An oven you say? No silly, it’s obviously a mini fridge. (I tried to find a picture, I wanted you to see it but I couldn't find anything close)
   
   
2. In the basement suite that smelled like live animals, upon noticing the hot plate and the toaster oven the landlady says, “A toaster oven and a hotplate, the same functionality as a oven. Right, cause I can make a cake in a toaster oven :)
   
   
3. The tiny, tiny apartment. We walk into the bathroom... wait, there’s no sink? Don’t worry, it’s sunk behind the door, completely invisible when the door’s open, but it’s there.
   
   
4. The Landlord who refused to let us move in because he wanted a single person. He didn’t want complains about hot water running out, and you know, one single guy is much quieter than a married couple.
   
   
5. The basement that made me cry. Not quite crappy enough to dismiss immediately.
   
   
6. The super ugly green shag carpet in our new place that’s getting us a $50 discount
   

So here’s to our new to us, small but cozy, 1 bedroom, perfectly located, ugly carpet possessing, 4th floor, balcony off the living room apartment.

We’ll have to have you over for dinner (in small groups, I mentioned it’s small right?)
L

I'll Miss Someone

I have this fear... I’ll plan a party, invite everyone I love but in the end discover that I missed someone. Or I’ll want to serve really good food at said party but I don’t want to make a ton so I try to limit the amount of people I invite. I’m not very good at that.
What if they hear I had a party and weren’t’ invited, then they’ll feel bad. And I love them, I want them to come. So in the end I normally just make lots of food instead. I prefer it to the other option.

Normally this problem affects no one but myself, if I want to throw a big party then it’s fine, I can provide for them. No big deal, I’m prepared to deal with the masses.

It’s coming time to have some wedding showers. I’ve had some wonderful people graciously offer to host and I so appreciate it. I’ve made up guest lists for them. Uh, they’re kind of big. I’m really trying, I swear... I just don’t like leaving people out.

I’ve cut a few people here and there but how do you decide to cut someone? There are people that I want there... I’m doing my best, I’m sorry if it’s inconvenient.
L

Blogging

Remember the good old days when I would blog nearly every day... yeah, those days are gone.

Reasons why I'm not loving today

1. It's raining
2. I lost one of the buds for my earphones
3. I'm SO exhuasted and I feel a cold coming on
4. I have a headache
5. I'm tired of huddling at my desk in the cold

Reasons why today's maybe not so bad

1. Betty's not in today
2. Breakfast was provided by my work this morning
3. I get to wear jeans today
4. Brad may have found us a place to live

Okay, so the bad outweighs the good today but only by 1 point... that's saying something
L