I've been such a bad blogger this month, mostly due to the insane amount of Christmas parties I have attended. I hosted 3 at my house and attended the RCMP banquet last night, as well as a small RCMP dinner with Mike's staff Seargent, a church banquet dinner and a friend's Christmas get-together. In all it's been a lot of fun, but also a lot of cleaning my house, wrapping gifts, baking food or appies for the parties and a ton of socializing. Of course, these are all my favourite things, so I can hardly complain.

In addition, I started my new job as the teacher in charge of distance ed PE. It takes quite a bit of time on the internet and BCesis marking journals, but it's not too bad and it gives me more hours.

Today I've been rushing around trying to get everything together for my trip home. Mike and I are flying out of Fort St John tonight at 6:25 to head home for an early Christmas. It's a very short trip as Mike starts work again Christmas morning at 6am but since he has 5 days off before Christmas and there was a great seat sale a few days ago, we decided to both go home. I have an airmiles flight, but we weren't sure until last week about Mike joining me. I'm excited as I get to see my sister who lives in Ottawa. It's been a year and a half since they moved and I've missed her every time they've been back on the island for a visit.

So, I better finish shoving my presents into the suitcases!

But, I'll leave you with a picture of my lovely REAL Christmas tree. It was a delight to find a beautiful real tree this year after so many years of fake appartment sized trees. The other ones are of Mike's work dinner last night. He was on shift but I got to get dressed up...I also got my hair chopped off the day before so that was fun.

Sunday, November 30, 2008

Finished!

Okay, so maybe I only made 28 posts in 30 days, but I think that was quite a task for me, who only blogs once a week or so normally. It was a lesson on what it takes to set aside time for myself to write, and I learned that I can do it. I missed the second post the other night because I was so tired I just decided to go to bed, and since I technically disqualified myself the first week into posting, I wasn't too worried. But, now it's over and I can say that at least I tried. Hopefully next year I'll be better at it.

And, tomorrow is the first day of December! My Christmas lights were put up over the weekend and my tree and decorations are all out as well. I've still got to finish my shopping and cards but it definitely feels like the season up here. I'm really excited to go home and see my mom and sisters. Still praying that Mike can come with me, but we aren't sure yet.

It's also incredibly warm here for December. It was RAINING today, in November! And the snow in my yard melted already. I can't believe this, but I'm actually hoping for snow and colder weather. It's really easier to drive in light snow than slush and I like it when the town is all covered by the snow. So, here's to snow, and no more Nablopomo! (until next year)

So this is Christmas?

I just read this article about a man being trampled to death at Wal-Mart when the store opened for Christmas sales. I can't believe that this is what we've turned Christmas into. This is why I never go boxing day shopping.

Trend?

I've just noticed that all my posts for Nablo seem to be late at night, as I am on my way to bed. Hmm...I guess that just shows how busy I've been lately. But, I do have some interesting good news. Today my contract was increased from .429 to .571! I'm excited because it's more money but I don't actually have to teach another class; I am just marking a course that students in Electric Ed (home schooled) take by correspondence on-line. This means I can do it at whatever time of day I choose.

In other news, Mike and I have formed a band. We have completed one tour and begun another. So far, we've played Aerosmith, Weezer, Garbage, Nirvana and several others. I play guitar and sometimes bass and he plays the drums. They're a little too complicated for me so far...

Of course, I'm talking about our new wii, which has turned out to be a lot of fun! It's much more interactive than most video games. We have raced with actual stearing wheels, boxed against each other (I knocked him out in round 2!) and formed a band. And now, I am off to bed as I have to get up early tomorrow for a French Foundation meeting all day.

Good night.

One month till Christmas!

I am just on my way to bed after my One month till Christmas! party. I had a great turn-out and a full living room. Unfortunately I have tons of baking left over and I will probably end up eating it all, so I've already stuck it in the freezer in hopes that I will save it until Christmas. The hit of the evening though was the very last dessert I made, which was delicious--cookie dough truffles. You make a semi-cookie dough recipe but with no eggs and condensed milk and then you dip them in chocolate. They were all gone by the end of the night and I was handing out the recipe. I wasn't surprised though, as who doesn't love to eat cookie dough?

In the end, I earned about 70$ worth of free stuff so I'm excited to buy some more candles. They have such yummy smells, like cobbler on the porch, and Mrs Clause's Kitchen and my favourite Cranberry orange. They make me a little hungry, to tell you the truth. I also got some of their enviromentally friendly cleaners. They smell like eucalyptus and mint and rosemary.

Tis the month of parties in Dawson Creek!

Happy one month till Christmas!

Happy Birthday!

Today was my sister Megan's 23rd birthday. Happy Birthday sister!!

In other news, Mike came home on Saturday night from Chilliwack with a Nintendo wii. I looked everywhere for one while he was gone with no luck, and he found one easily! So, today we bought Mario Kart for me and Rock band for Mike. It's pretty sweet. Mike plays the drums while I rock out on the guitar. Neither of us does the singing, cause that's just not what we do.

Good night.

Baking

I spent my Sunday night baking for the Christmas candle party I'm having on tuesday night. So far I've made cranberry shortbread hearts and butterscotch blondies. I'm also planning some fudge, sugar cookies with my new Christmas cutters and lemon squares. I love lemon squares at Christmas time. Sigh. Only one more month!

Christmas Tree light-up

Last night was Dawson Creek's annual Christmas Tree light-up. After witnessing last year's, I knew that I had to take a camera along this time to proove that Santa Clause does indeed arrive on a crane to light the tree.

I met my friend Jessica after dinner and we walked downtown to get our free Starbuck's steamed eggnog (very yummy) and candy canes. We listened to the 5 poor children who were singing carols out in the cold (it was about -18 I would guess), and waited for Santa to arrive.






My friends and I dressed in our dorky hats. When it's that cold out, you just can't find a really cool hat, you know?



Here's Santa waving goodbye from his crane. Note that the light is red. We were in the middle of an intersection--they actually remove the mile O post and replace it with a tree.



Ah, the lovely, lopsided tree, with no star. Beautiful.

Disappointment

I'm so angry and disappointed right now that I just had to vent in another post. I was just talking to my mom on the phone and she was telling me about some of my sister's teachers this year. She has the same french teacher I had, our same physics teacher and my same P.E. teacher, all of whom I enjoyed and got A's with. My sister is very smart--she's always been a straight A student and enjoys school. And, as I am now a teacher, I'm always curious to compare my old teachers with what I now know to be proper teaching practices. So, when I found out that my sister has my group of high school friend's favourite, beloved teacher, Mr. Dupperon, I was really excited to hear what she thought about him. His wife was my favourite teacher, and Mike's favourite class was Mr. Duperron's. They taught Chemistry and Physics and we always loved having them as teachers.

This is all to explain how appalled I was to hear that when she went in early for extra help one day and asked him to explain a question to him, his reply to her (not jokingly, although it doesn't make for a good joke anyway) was

"What, are you stupid?"

If I could scream via my blog I would. As a teacher, the idea that another teacher would say something like that to their student who is a good kid, and was asking for help, just disgusts me. In fact, it makes me lose faith completely with teachers in general. So many teachers are completely cynical and outdated in their teaching practice and knowledge. Why are they still teaching? To call a student stupid is just plain wrong. I think it also especially bothers me because I had a little visit with this particular teacher in the summertime when I was home, and Mike and I went and visited him and his wife over spring break. We loved them as teachers and he knows that he is teaching my sister, and yet he treated her like crap.

If I was in Port Alberni, I would march over there and talk to him, but alas I am not, and so my blog comes in very handy. Maybe he will read it one day and feel bad. I hope so. Many of you who read my blog are fellow teachers....what do you think?

Book Club

Last night we had our book club meeting. We rated the 13th Tale a 7.5/10 and enjoyed our chat about it while drinking cocoa. More about it tomorrow!

How many Sabrina's?

HowManyOfMe.com

There are 2 people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

Apparently, there are two people with my exact name in the U.S, but 87, 126 people with the name Sabrina and 6359 people with my last name in the U.S. My name is the 574th most popular name. However, before I got married, there wasn't anyone in the U.S. with my name!

Major geek

I decided I'd make this the week of meme's cause they're fun and I still don't know how to pronounce the word.

So, I took this quiz "How big of a geek are you?" but I'm not as geeky as I thought because most of it was computer related. I think I used to be geekier, and was reminded of that when I taught Chem 12 today and was sad that I couldn't remember how to do Moles. I scored just below a major geek, at 22% geek.



Here is the site if you want to try it. http://www.innergeek.us/index.html
(Jenn, you should take it with Matthew, I'm curious to know how high he scores! :)

Top 100 movies meme

Take this list of the top 100 movies from the IMDB and bold the movies you have seen. (I'm not sure where this is originally from). This list is from May 2004.

Apparently, I've only seen 27 of the top 100 movies...I guess I should go and rent some of them!


Godfather, The (1972)

Shawshank Redemption, The (1994)

Godfather: Part II, The (1974)

Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, The (2003)

Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, The (2002)

Schindler's List (1993)

Shichinin no samurai (1954)

Casablanca (1942)

Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, The (2001)

Star Wars (1977)

Citizen Kane (1941)

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975)

Dr. Strangelove (1964)

Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

Rear Window (1954)

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Pulp Fiction (1994)

Usual Suspects, The (1995)

Memento (2000)

North by Northwest (1959)

12 Angry Men (1957)

Buono, il brutto, il cattivo, Il (1966)

Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

Psycho (1960)

Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain, Le (2001) (I just watched this with my french class...)

Silence of the Lambs, The (1991)

It's a Wonderful Life (1946)

Goodfellas (1990)

American Beauty (1999)

Sunset Blvd. (1950)

Vertigo (1958)

Matrix, The (1999)

Cidade de Deus (2002)

To Kill a Mockingbird (1962)

C'era una volta il West (1968)

Apocalypse Now (1979)

Pianist, The (2002)

Third Man, The (1949)

Paths of Glory (1957)

Taxi Driver (1976)

Fight Club (1999)

Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi (2001)

Some Like It Hot (1959)

Double Indemnity (1944)

Boot, Das (1981)

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

Singin' in the Rain (1952)

Chinatown (1974)

L.A. Confidential (1997)

Maltese Falcon, The (1941)

Requiem for a Dream (2000)

All About Eve (1950)

M (1931)

Bridge on the River Kwai, The (1957)

Se7en (1995)

Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)

Saving Private Ryan (1998)

Rashômon (1950)

Raging Bull (1980)

Wizard of Oz, The (1939)

Alien (1979)

American History X (1998)

Sting, The (1973)

Léon (1994)

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)

Manchurian Candidate, The (1962)

Vita è bella, La (1997)

Touch of Evil (1958)

Treasure of the Sierra Madre, The (1948)

Finding Nemo (2003)

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

Reservoir Dogs (1992)

Great Escape, The (1963)

Modern Times (1936)

Clockwork Orange, A (1971)

Amadeus (1984)

On the Waterfront (1954)

Ran (1985)

Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003)

Annie Hall (1977)

Wo hu cang long (2000)

Jaws (1975)

Apartment, The (1960)

Braveheart (1995)

High Noon (1952)

Aliens (1986)

Fargo (1996)

Strangers on a Train (1951)

Shining, The (1980)

Metropolis (1927)

Blade Runner (1982)

Sixth Sense, The (1999)

City Lights (1931)

Donnie Darko (2001)

Duck Soup (1933)

Great Dictator, The (1940)

General, The (1927)

Sjunde inseglet, Det (1957)

Princess Bride, The (1987)

Dogville (2003)

Meme from Ciboulette

Choose the 6th picture from the 6th folder in your pictures files. Here's mine:

My friends Kim and Nathan. Kim is an amazing singer. She gave me her Christmas CD last year and it is my absolute favourite. Her husband Nathan makes me think of one of Ponyboy's greaser friends. They also have the most adorable baby girl.

Sabrina wants

I am quickly running out of time and ideas for my daily blogging, so I was trying to think of something interesting that I could do. I remember doing this a while back, and thought it would be fun to do again. You google "your name, wants" and write the first 5 interesting things that come up. Here's what I got.

Sabrina wants...

1)to restore the city to its rightful place on the planet
2)it this way
3)to break up the wedding in order to finally catch the man of her dreams
4)to change her mind
5)all of her students to perform

I think the last two are the only ones with a bit of truth to them. The others are from the movie or tv show Sabrina. But then I did it for Mike and the first one was scarily accurate.

Mike wants...

1)A Game Job. The chronicle of one young man's quest to get a job in the videogame industry. (ah!..does my husband have a secret?)
2)You (this post was related to Ireland, which is where I want to go this summer...strange)
3)to bite your face with pictures (how does one do this?)
4)to bag another fight
5)to play

Isn't it strange tbe difference in what comes up when you compare a guys name to a girls? Mine was all movies and tv shows, and his was all nintendo and fights and games. What does your name say?

Shop till you drop

Today I shopped.

And shopped.

And finished off in Costco shopping some more.

It was fun! My friend Sandy and I went to Grand Prairie, where real civilization and store await.

Here's what I bought:

Frames for the art work sitting on my floor

Fake lululemons to replace mine for 17$ at Costco...they're awesome!

A really big box of spanakopita

A snowman Christmas cookie tin/jar...it's hat opens into a cookie tin!

a set of 7 Christmas movies

underwear

One of my next book club selections: The story of Edgar Sawtelle

Christmas stamps

Christmas wrapping paper

Blank cards to make Christmas cards with

The book: Olive the other reindeer

Curtains and pillows

Toys to fill two Christmas shoe boxes for Operation Christmas child

3 baby shower gifts

What I didn't buy:

A nintendo wii (sigh--it wasn't without trying, they're hard to get up here)

stuck to you

Today I toc'd at the elementary school from my last job. As I was leaving at the start of lunch, one of my grade one girls from last year was following me down the hall and outside. I felt bad for having to rush off and as I said "Au Revoir" she looked up at me and said: "Madame, I don't know why, but I'm just stuck to you like glue today". How sweet is that?

The flood

Today something exciting actually happened in my house!

I came home from work and heard the sound of water rushing loudly from the sink. I thought: "yeah! Mike's doing the dishes I've been procrastinating on" and stepped into the kitchen. The counters were so shiny and clean and dish free that I took a minute to notice the fact that the sink was running water but no one was there and that my socks were very wet and cold...

That was when I noticed the large pool of water leaking out of the kitchen into the dining room. I rushed through nearly ankle deep water to turn off the tap. I guess the noise I was making got Mike's attention away from his computer game and he came rushing in. It turns out that while defrosting our dinner he was also doing laundry, which caused the tap to run very slowly to fill up the sink. So, he thought he'd come back in a minute and turn it off once it was full, which turned into 20 minutes.

But, the sound of the washing machine running drowned out the sound of our kitchen flooding!

Needless to say, we had a lot of fun mopping it up. We dumped our entire basket of towels onto the floor and began to wring them out one by one...

I used a measuring cup to scoop water off the lino one litre at a time. By the end of it, though, we were laughing. I lost count after about 15 litres. At least we still hadn't replaced the flooring; this gives us an excuse to do it sooner than later. Plus, the floor is really clean now!

It also got me thinking to all the times in our lives where we forget about things or make dumb mistakes. What silly things have you done that have made you feel stupid later? I've got a good one that I will save for tomorrow!

laundry

The warmth of lint
peeled from the trap;
life's fibers
held in the palm
of the hand.

Le jour du Souvenir

Today is Remembrance day, which unfortunately for us in BC is sometimes just a day off work. But, Today Mike and I attended the Dawson Creek remembrance service. He wore his Red Serge along with a few other members. It was neat to see him all dressed up again. I'm always surprised to remember that my husband is a mountie. The service was very well done and well attended, and afterwards we went out for lunch with some friends who we met at the service. It was too cold out to go to the cenotaph for long, and we didn't want my pregnant friend standing out in the snow.

So, now I'm procrastinating on cleaning up the house and getting ready for work again tomorrow. I'm also trying to plan out some home renovations. I'm dying to tear out the carpet in my living room and the kitchen lino. It's old and stained and I can't wait to get rid of it. Mike's agreed to give me a few hundred dollars for some paint and other decorations too, so I'm excited. Hopefully it will actually feel like home soon!

The Perfect Afternoon

This afternoon, after finishing my Pro-D day at work, I headed over to my friend Jessica's house. She lives above the garage in the prettiest house. It looks like you could just pick it up and plunk it down in the middle of a snowy wood and it would fit in perfectly. Dormer windows and a wrap around porch, and old fashioned lamp posts in the drive. We met in the early afternoon as we had planned a walk down town to go look in all the shops. We browsed through Christmas ornaments and decorations, and I bought myself an old-fahioned star for the top of my tree and a wooden Christmas tree painted green with a red star for the top of my fireplace. We then walked over to Hug a Mug. I drank a London fog and we shared a sugar cookie. The only thing that we were hoping for to make it a perfect winter afternoon was that the snow would start again. But, sure enough, as we finished our drinks and began the walk home, tiny snowflakes began to fall. It was so perfect that we continued our walk through a trail, ending near the library.

Jessica and I have been friends for a year now, but we only recently started hanging out more often. We've discovered that we have TONS in common, including our obsessions with Ireland, books, Christmas and writing. She and her sister went to Ireland two summers ago, and she's also going to school to be a teacher in January. She's three years younger than and I but it doesn't seem to matter. I swear sometimes I should be one of the siblings in her family. Her older brother is a writer and teacher too, and her younger sister loves Tolkien and the Lord of the Rings movies. Last year I spent Christmas Eve with their family at her mom's house. I seem to fit right in with them.

This has been a great four day weekend so far, and I've still got one more day of relaxing. Mike will be in his Serge at the Remembrance ceremony tomorrow, so I will be attending that as well. Then, it's back to work on wednesday to finish report cards.

Sunday passage (James 1:17-18)

"Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created."

This was the passage that struck me this morning at church. Nothing evil comes from God. When people say something terrible was an "act of God" it's not true. God does not tempt us ever. He allows us to go through trials, but it is only when we give in to temptation that we sin. Nothing bad can come from God, as James points out--everything good and perfect comes from Him. If we chose to set our sight on Jesus, we will not give in to our temptations. Unlike us, God does not change. He is always perfect and good, and He wants to give us those good gifts. He began a work in us when we were created, and he will continue to work on us. It is up to us to accept His gifts, and sometimes I wonder why more people don't. Who wouldn't want a Father who only gives good and perfect gifts?

Snow town

Do you ever notice how the whole world changes when it snows? Even when you are inside the light from the window is grayer, whiter, and it changes your mood completely. Even in my classroom, the light is different, and I feel like Christmas. That's when I start to drink my favourite Candy Cane Lane tea, and listen to carols, and go for walks in the snow. The sky is amazing when it snows here. It gets cold enough that the snow actually falls in lacey flakes. One day last winter, I went out to my car and found perfectly shaped flakes lying on my windshield. You know the ones you used to cut out of paper? They actually look like that when it snows up north. On the island, the snowflakes were always fat wet blobs that melted in your hand. When it snows, the sky feels closer somehow, as though you are trapped in your town. Kind of claustrophobic in a way, but also cosy. I love putting on my white boots, down jacket and my ear-flap tuque. And then, the coloured lights go on and it gets dark and I sit by my fireplace and read a good book.

99 Red Balloons

Well, I thought I'd last longer than a week on NaBloPoMo, but alas, I was done in by quite a few drunken po's and their wives. Tonight was my friend's surprise birthday party, and also the day I needed to do report cards. So, I worked until just after four, than quickly ran home for her card, picked up the present and headed to the surprise. It was a lot of fun, but unfortunately I was the only sober one, and didn't make it home before midnight to post on November the 7th. In my defence, I did drive 5 intoxicated individuals to their beds, so I think I deserve some credit. Oh well, at least I had fun...

We danced to old music from when we were teens and lots of early 90s and 80s songs we'd all forgotten about. Chantal and I put our hair in sideways ponytails and danced, the only two sober but still having fun, to 99 Red Balloons. And now, it's
3am and I am heading to bed. At least I'll be the only one to wake up happy in the morning!

Mundane excitement

Today I bought gas for under $1 a litre! How exciting is that? My good ole Tercel was only 37$ to fill. She has gotten us around on many trips over the last 5 years or so since we bought her. She made it through a winter in Dawson Creek, driving back and forth from DC to Port Alberni, and all the way to Saskatoon. We often complain about the cost of gas and vehicles, but I sure can't. This little car was definitely one of our best investments. She was less than 5 grand. We drove to Vancouver this summer, when gas prices were high, for $95. And, we've never had to change anything major since we bought it. I think I will be forever hooked on Toyotas. I'll be sad when I have kids and Tercel can no longer fit the family, but hopefully I'll be able to pass her along again!

Goblin Market

Have you ever tried turning a poem into a story? I tried to do this a few years ago with Christina Rosseti's poem "Goblin Market". Here is an excerpt from the story:

The moon’s light glanced off the faces of the merchants in the open glen. One had long whiskers, and pointed grey ears that twitched away above a cat’s face. Matted fur covered its back, and below, a white tail swung beneath tattered shorts. Another whisked between carts like a rat, his hands spread thick with brown fur, nails pricking plums like a thorny bush. Still another wobbled, a wombat-man, round and with a pig’s snout. Laura held her breath as one goblin man stopped, sniffed the air. He turned towards her, a red apple like a jewel in his hand.

“Laura, come quick.” Lizzie pulled at her sleeve again, her head bowed away from the market.

“Come buy,” the goblin men called. “Come see our orchard fruits. Apples and quinces, lemons and oranges. Come buy, come buy.”


From the poem "Goblin Market"

"Down the glen tramp little men.
One hauls a basket,
One bears a plate,
One lugs a golden dish
Of many pounds' weight.
How fair the vine must grow
Whose grapes are so luscious;
How warm the wind must blow
Through those fruit bushes."




Laurence Housman, illustration from the 1893 London edition of "Goblin Market" published by Macmillan.

http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/crossetti/gobmarket.html (for a full copy of the poem and illustrations)

Waiting for snow

Rootless

Rigid at the edge of this field,
the white trees wait,
curved arms open,
a line of wishbones
waiting for the wind to crack,
unfence.

Christmas cards

Lately I've been addicted to making Christmas cards and stamping paper, envelopes and anything I can get my hands on. I joined a stampin' up scrapbooking group over a year ago, and have since accumulated lots of lovely stamps and paper (and ideas!).

Since Christmas fever comes early up here, what with the extreme cold and early snows, I find myself starting to prepare early as well. Hence, the fact that I've already bought most of my gifts and made about half of my cards.

Here are a few that I made at my friend's all day Christmas card-making session, as well as the cover of "Through the Looking Glass". Sorry to ruin the surprise if you happen to get one of the ones pictured!

Sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.

I almost forgot today about Nablopomo!

It's 11:39 and I was about to fall asleep when I realized I never posted!!

So, here is something cool that I did this weekend.

On Saturday, I discovered "The Olde Creek Store" in Dawson Creek. It has the coolest old stuff, antiques, old books, and handmade items from around the world. You can buy old glass doorknobs and handles for cupboards and wrought iron key rings. My great find was a 1947 early reader copy of Alice's Adventures through the Looking Glass. It's colour illustrated and I stood it up in my guest room on the dresser. I will post a picture of it later.

My favourite Through the Looking Glass quote:
"Sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast"--said by the Queen of Hearts.

Bonsoir!

Happy Halloween from Holly Golightly

Well, my Halloween costume turned out pretty good, I think. It was more costumey than Audrey's look, but I think the sunglasses, dress and makeup were pretty close. The tiara and fake pearls weren't exactly like hers, obvisouly, but they were needed to make the connection to the movie. I was quite pleased when people recognized who I was, or when I showed them the movie cover and they said I looked just like her. So, the mission was a success. Here are a few snapshots of the evening:

Long time, no blog

The last two weeks:

1) a terrible cold and cough just in time for thanksgiving
2) providing turkey dinner for 10 RCMP and friends
3) throwing a pre-baby arrival shower for a friend (which involved blowing up 72 orange balloons)
4) an all day Christmas Card making extravaganza (i'll save the pics for another post)
5) 2 bombs going off in Dawson Creek= no see husband
6) hosting my book club meeting
7) planning a halloween party
8) getting my costume together
9) the first early morning snow (the grass is still green though)

In more detail:

Needless to say, the past two weeks have been busy. It started out with a nasty cold that hit a hight point during thanksgiving dinner. I couldn't stop coughing for about a week, but still managed to enjoy the dinner with friends. I was complemented on my decor, which was very Martha Stuart, I must say. Here are a few photos. I made cranberry/pear pie, chocolate fudge and pumpkin cheesecake squares, and Mike took care of the turkey etc. It was good food all around.






My friends little girl, Arianna.



Table decor.




Then, Mike's schedule finally got around to having days off over the weekends, and someone decided to set some bombs off on the oil pipeline and put Dawson Creek on the news! (We had a whole 5 minutes on Global National one night). But, bombs equals extra overtime for husband, so we didn't see much of each other for a few days or nights, as he slept all day and worked all night. On the bright side, the 36 hours of double time and 18 hours of time and a half means we can afford to come home before Christmas. There's always a bright side to everything.

Then, it's babies galore as 2 more of my friends delivered their babies, and two more are soon to be due, so I've been buying tons of baby gifts lately. Who knew there were so many gadgets for moms and babies? But, I'm learning lots of the mom/baby lingo so I figure I'll be prepared when we finally have kids!

Lately I've found myself playing hostess quite frequently. I'm not sure if I'm good at it, or if it's just that my living room is 27 by 19 feet (that's huge if you can't picture it--I can easily fit a piano, fireplace, two couches, two loveseats, entertainment center, chair, and tons of people). I love entertaining though so it's okay. This month alone, I've hosted a dinner, thanksgiving, a baby shower, a bible study and my book club meeting.

For this month, we read "The book thief" which was a young adult novel about a German girl during WWII. It's an amazing read and I highly recommend it. My book club gave it 8.5/10. Now, we're reading "The thirteenth Tale" by Diane Setterfield, which is supposed to be really good. I'm only one chapter in but it's very well written so far, and I think I'm going to enjoy it. It has a ghost in it, so it's appropriate for Halloween. But, Inkdeath, the third book in the Cornelia Funke series just came out, and I'm dying to read it, but thinking about saving it for a really good time, like Christmas holidays.

So, here I am now, two days to Halloween, and I just finished putting together my costume. I will post pictures of the different parts of it tomorrow, but I'll tell you a bit about it now. For years I've been wanting to go as Holly Golightly, (Audrey Hepburn, in Breakfast at Tiffany's) but haven't got the pieces together in time. About a week ago, I found the perfect dress at Sears, fake pearls at Wal-mart, a tiara which I craftily transformed by removing the purple sequins and glueing on the pearls from my scrapbooking kit, as well as black gloves, fake eyelashes, and black flats. My classes are having a party and costume contest, so I told them I'd dress up. I'm very excited. Now I just need to buy a good bottle of hairspray and tons of bobby pins to get my hair that high on friday!

I'm also excited to hand out candy in my house for the first time. Afterwards, myself and a few friends are going to the haunted house at the Pioneer Village.

Here is the dress

Happy Halloween!

Who to vote for?

Voting will take place in just over a week, and I find I've seen more about the American election that the Canadian. Being new to Dawson Creek, I was having a hard time deciding what party to vote for. I voted for the NDP last time, but I don't really think I want to vote for them again. Basically, I'm hoping that the Conservatives don't win, but unfortunately, I just discovered what a Conservative stronghold I live in. According to the Vote for the Environment website, the Conservatives won with over 21 000 votes last election, with the CLOSEST being the NDP, with only 7000 votes, and surprisingly, the Green Party came third with just over 6000. Apparently the Conservative member in the Peace River has won the last three elections in the Northern riding, and he just switches parties to whoever happens to be winning.

So, I'm pretty torn now. I know I won't vote conservative, but there is virtually no way any other party will win in the Peace, so does it even matter? I put my postal code into the Vote for Environment site and it even said "You choose", do whatever you can for the environment because no party can beat the conservatives up here. Arg. Well, that wasn't very helpful, was it?

So, now I'm wondering, what do you think? Any insights into politics?

If you haven't seen the site, (I found it on Ciboulette's blog--thanks!) here it is:

Just when I'd put away the summer sandals...

How nice is it to have summer weather with fall leaves? Very nice. Especially when at this time last year, it had already snowed once and I was sporting my fall coat + gloves + scarf ensemble.

This week has been beautiful up north. We had 26 degree weather today, which is warm even for July or August. And it's October! I layed out in my backyard with shortsleaves and read a book and ate chips. And gazed at the lovely yellow of my backyard tree. Dawson Creek is so yellow in October and it happens so quickly too. A few days and my tree goes from green to bright sunny yellow.

I've been going for walks and drives to see the lovely leaves. There is nothing prettier than blue sky against yellow leaves. And I also know that soon it will be white against white so I am getting my fill while I can.

It is strange though, as the last week of September was cold. I know there must have been at least one frost. Not because I was up early enough to see it, but because my flowers in the backyard turned black one day. And my sweet peas--which took until September to bloom--started to shrivel up too.

But, we had one last mow of the lawn, and now it is time to wait. Wait for snow and minus 40 degrees. Fall is definitely the time of waiting up north. Of getting your furnace working, your boots out, the extension cord ready to plug in the car, and your spring bulbs pulled out of the ground.

A tour of fall from my backyard:

Books

I'm super busy with school, but I've still got time to read. I'm working on the second book of the Outlander series, but I thought I'd blog about my latest book club books as we are looking for new suggestions.

Over the summer, we read "An audience of chairs" by Joan Clark. It was a strange book, but good. I couldn't decide if I liked the main character or not, as she was very odd and eccentric but it was still a good read.

We then read "Divisadero" by Michael Ondaatje, which I didn't enjoy all that much. It was the first novel I'd ever read by him and I gave it a 7/10. It certainly kept to the theme of its title; the book was really like two books, but neither came together in the end and I like endings that wrap themselves up a little more than that.

Now we are reading a really good book. I completely adore YA novels, and this one is called "The book thief". It takes place just before and during WWII in Germany and is about a little girl who steals books from the Nazis and other places. It's amazing so far.

However, we've decided we need to branch out in the type of book we read, so I've been trying to come up with some new suggestions before our next meeting, which will be at my house. All of our books lately seem to have the same theme of separated families due to a traumatic experiece; a father gives a daughter up for adoption without telling the mother in one, a father takes a mother's children away because of her mental disability in another, and then a daughter runs away from her father in our last one.

Here are the future possibilities on our list:

Late nights on air, Elizabeth Hay
The Thirteenth Tale, Diane Setterfield
The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls
and
The Red Tent, Anita Diamant

Have you read any of them? What would you recommend?

Northern Lights

I saw the northern lights for the first time since moving up north the night before last. Mike was working night shift and he came home early, at around 4am because they were having a slow night. He woke me up to say that you could sort of see the northern lights in our backyard, so I threw a housecoat over my pj's and went out into the night. It was surprisingly warm and lovely. I looked east and could see a vibrant green streak of light that started like a flare at the horizon and spread out across the sky of my backyard. While watching it slowly fade away I caught a glimpse of a shooting star. It was a small glimpse, but beautiful nonetheless. I felt like a true northerner.

Apparently the best time of the year to view them is around the 22nd of September, so I will be looking at the sky again next week and hoping for a clear night.

THE trip Part two

Wow, this last week and a half has been super busy. School and planning is taking up all of my time...so I'm just finally getting around to posting about the rest of my trip. For the last day of Disneyland, on monday, and then all the way until Saturday, we had the pleasure of visiting with Jenn, Matthew and Bronson. We stayed at Disney's Paradise Pier hotel and had a lot of fun watching the parade, going with Bronson on the Winnie the Pooh ride, and the big Pirate ship in the river. We also finally went on the California Screamin' roller coaster and Soarin' California, which was like a giant Imax where you were in a seat that felt like a plane ride. We finished off our last night at Disneyland by watching the fireworks one last time. They are really cool fireworks, especially the part where Tink flies over the castle. Here are some photos from our last day, including Bronson with Pluto, me with Prince Charming, the boys on the pirate ship and the four of them waiting for the parade to start. On tuesday morning we spent a few hours wandering around downtown Disney buying some souvenirs. I got a tinker bell t-shirt and Jenn snuck in and bought be a Disneyland picture frame for my birthday. We also went into the only Anne Geddes store in the world, where I bought a couple of baby shower gifts. We then headed in to Pasadena. Over the next few days we played board games, read a lot of stories to Bronson, toured Caltech, swam in the pool, went to the LA zoo with Matthew and Bronson and finally to the beach on the last day before heading to the airport. Beach photos: It was nice to have a few days of relaxing after the business of Disneyland. When we arrived in Vancouver, we had a visit with Mike's parents, and then had a looong drive home...it took us about 14 hours. Then it was back to work! Oh, and one more thing. Here is a short clip of the very end of the fireworks display. If you look carefully you can just see Tink flying from the right side of the castle to the left. It's so magical....

THE trip...Vancouver, Disneyland, Pasadena

Mike and I recently had the most fun of our lives...we went to the happiest place on earth...Disneyland, of course! It was an amazing holiday, with many highlights, including a couple of busy days in Vancouver with my Dad and a few friends I had the chance to meet up with, 4 days in Disneyland, and 5 days in Pasadena, visiting Jenn, Matthew and Bronson.

Our first day, we left bright and early at 5:45am and drove the 1200km's to the west end of Vancouver, where we stayed with my Dad for three nights. On wednesday we went to the beach, and I met up with a few friends who were able to drive over and visit with us. Then, on thursday we went over to Nanaimo on the ferry to meet family for lunch at Moxie's. It was fun, but I was suffering from a very sore neck, so managed to get an emergency chiropractic visit and was fine from then on (thankfully so, otherwise I don't think I could have managed all the rides at Disneyland!).



Me, Pamela, and Ravinder.



The three of us HAD to stop at the cupcake store.


Me and my mommy.



Granny.


The real fun began on friday morning. We caught the earliest flight available to LAX, to maximize the amount of time we would have at Disneyland. Unfortunately, the shuttle system was confusing and slow, so by the time we got to our notel it was already nearly 1pm. I was slightly grumpy and tired, but the hotel cheared me up completely. It was truly amazing. We got great service and warm cookies upon arrival. Mike and I rushed to our room, jumped onto the bed (there were two, so we each collapsed onto our own) and ate our cookies while watching the olympics. Once we had relaxed and eaten lunch, we took the shuttle to Disneyland! Fortunately for us, 2:45pm is a great time to arrive at Disneyland, as most people are heading back to their rooms for a nap and a swim, so we basically had no waits at all on the rides! It was Mike's first time, so I let hime be the little kid and choose everywhere we went. We started out with the fabulous Pirates of The Caribbean, which I'd never been on before, followed by a train ride, and finished at 11pm having enjoyed 10 different rides, a yummy mexican dinner and the fireworks. Pretty good for the first day, and we were grateful to collapse into the comfy beds and sleep in the next morning.






The famous giant turkey leg...you gotta try all the crazy food at Disneyland (Churro, frozen chocolate covered bananas, frozen lemonade...etc)


On Saturday, needing the rest, we slept until 9am, ordered breakfast in, and took our time getting ready. Mike went to the gym and I enjoyed the pool and "Outlander" for an hour. We arrived at Disneyland at around noon and stayed until closing, going over to California adventure park for a few rides too. We were fortunate to be there at the same time as my sister, Felicia and her two kids, so we met up with them at 6 for dinner and some rides, before heading over to watch Fantasmic. The best part of the evening was when we rode Splash mountain continuously from about 11pm until midnight when the park closed. We took up all 6 seats in the boat and alternated spots each run. I don't think I've ever laughed so much...our faces in the photos they take are priceless.









Me, Mike an Jess...very wet after splash mountain.




How could you resist chili in a Mickey shaped bread bowl? And yes, we did eat all this food, while watching Billy and the Hills.



Sunday was hard to get up, but we really wanted to take advantage of our early morning admission day...you can get in up to one hour before the park opens. We made it there by 7:30 and by 8am when the gates opened we had already been on all the Fantasy land rides...usually they have huge waits. After breakfast, we made our way to Frontier land to ride all the boats that go around the Pirate's Lair island. We rode the Mark Twain steamboat and took the raft to the island, where we met Captain Jack Sparrow, who, taking a liking to me, asked Mike to move over so that we could get a picture together. We also saw the Indiana Jones show and ate at two amazing restaurants. For lunch, we ate at the Blue Bayoo, which is this New Orleans style restaurant situated on the Pirate's of the Carribean ride. From the ride, you can see these ghostly waiters serving people at dimly lit tables. You feel sort of like you are eating outside at night time with a dark sky and glowing lanterns all around.




They had a fairy tale arts booth, where I was dying to get my face painted the whole weekend. It was so much fun! It's the one place where adults can be fairy princesses too :)





And, of course, Captain Jack.




I tried to take a pic that would show how cool the Blue Bayoo was; this was as close as I could get, but doesn't really give you the same feel.


Once we had officially seen pretty much all the rides at Disneyland,(some several times) we headed over to California's Adventure park. This park is cool, but there are about 8 really popular attractions that EVERYONE wants to see, so we managed by doing about 2 or 3 rides each day. On Sunday, though, Mike took me on the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror and I just about died. If you know me well, you know that I'm claustrophobic and afraid of elevators, so you can imagine how well I enjoyed being in an elevator with 21 people while being dropped 13 floors up and down! Well, I survived anyways.

That evening, we took a nap in our hotel before heading over to the dinner reservations I had made at Downtown Disney's Catal restaurant. It is the only fine dining restaurant in Disneyland, and we had a beautiful seat on the balcony reserved for us. Just as our dinner was served the fireworks began...how romantic.

Our final day of Disneyland was spent with Jenn, Matthew and Bronson. I will save it for another post as this one is getting long and tomorrow is the first day of school...