I guess it's been awhile since I last updated, and a lot has happened. I have a new job at a company called Fastenal. We sell fasteners and safety equipment and such. I also work part time at Country Style just down the road. I usually only put in a couple of short shifts a week.

My grandpa hasn't been doing very well over the past month. They found out he has a staph infection which is located in his aorta. It's caused him to be pretty sick for quite some time. The sad thing is that he was sick for five weeks before they figured out what it was. He's been in Sunnybrook for a little while and they're pumping him with antibiotics. Apparently he's having some kidney problems too which could be from these other problems, or it could be because his body is starting to shut down. No one really knows that the outcome of this situation will be. Your prayers would be greatly appreciated.

I was able to spend the last couple of weekends away. Two weekends ago Luke and I headed to the Waterloo area to visit some friends there. We got to see Crystal, Nicole, Deanna, and Gordie. This past weekend I went to Belleville which was a good time, but a sad time too. It was a lot of fun hanging out with Luke, Jay, Karen, Victoria, Sean, and Ruth, but it was sad because it was Luke's last weekend in Ontario.

That's basically my life right now. Nothing exciting. I haven't started my Christmas shopping yet...I'll have to get on that soon. :P

My adventures

So here are a couple of pics from my birthday.

Darryl decided that he was going to be funny and wrapped a pink panther (that we already owned) in one of my mom's picture boxes, and gave it to me. It ended up going back out in the toy box. :P




And this is my cake...with an elmo candle. :D It was a very delicious cake. :)




That was a good day. :) Andrew Chuckleton stopped by to visit me that afternoon on his way home from Gravenhurst. It was great to see him again!

I have this Beauty Club membership at Caryl Baker in the mall. It's this salon type place, and if you're a member you get a free birthday facial and light makeup application. So on the Wednesday after Thanksgiving I booked my appointment. It was pretty fun, but the girl who was doing it took sooo long. She did my eyebrows first, and just chatted a lot. I'm sure that part took her an hour (no...my eyebrows weren't that bad :P) then she kept trying to sell me upgrades to the facials and such so she'd just stand there and tell me all about it. I got the makeup done, which looked decent and was glad to leave!!
Luke ended up coming to Barrie that night and he took me out for a birthday dinner, which was a lot of fun. After Kelsey's we went to Starbucks then he headed back to Toronto in a crazy rainstorm.

I ended up going to the orthadontists last week. They glued a bar on the back of my teeth so I don't have to wear my retainer as much anymore. :D The not so fun part is that they made me a new retainer and it's sooo hard to get out. It was scratching the skin off of my gums when I took it out, so I attacked it with sissors so it fits better. :P It's still not the easiest thing to get out, but at least it doesn't hurt me anymore.

This past weekend was pretty busy. I worked on Friday and then Nic drove up to see me! We hung out at Webers for a bit and had some Nachos, then we left...after finding out some chick in a Cadillac hit Nic's rental car and then took off. Thankfully there weren't any noticable damages. We had a great chat and she spent the night. We went to the mall for a bit on Saturday then she left to head for Cambridge. I worked that night then Luke came late on Saturday so we chatted for a bit. The next day Luke took off for a while, then came back for the afternoon, so we hung out until he had to head back to Toronto. It was fun to have some friends around for a change. My weekends have been pretty boring. :P

I have an interview on Thursday at 11:30 at Naturalizer, a shoe store in the mall. I'm fairly excited about it! It would be nice to have some full time work. Webers has been fun but I really don't enjoy the hours. I've almost got my smartserve certificate too. I have to finish it by October 24th or it expires.

Well, I have this weekend off, so I get to go to Belleville for the weekend. :) I'm pretty excited about that! I haven't had a weekend off in a little while. It is time for me to get some sleep, so good night to you all. Here's some wisdom for you all: Watch out for undercover cops in red parkas...I hear they can find you anywhere....

My Thanksgiving Weekend

This was a really nice weekend. I guess it actually started last Wednesday, which was Dawn's birthday. She's 17 now! Goodness, that makes me feel so old. :S I had to work Thursday and Friday night, then on Saturday we had our Thanksgiving dinner with my mom's side of the family. It was good to see my cousins again. We don't see them very often and they're all growing so quickly! I had to work that day, so I went between shifts to visit, and then after work I went back and had some good turkey dinner! I booked Sunday and Monday off so I didn't have to work. My birthday was on Thanksgiving Monday, but we had my family party on Sunday. It was actually a lot of fun. There turned out to be more people there then I had expected. My brother invited Darryl over and I hadn't seen him in forever. He made things a lot of fun and kept us very entertained. On the Monday I was able to see Saba for a bit, then later was our Thanksgiving dinner with my dad's side of the family. I enjoyed it, though it was very loud. The food was amazing and there was sooo much pie. :P
So along with turning 22, I got to think about my life and wonder where on earth I'll be in a year, and even within the next few months. It can be a scary thought but it really pushes me to focus more on God. I don't like being so uncertain about things, and the only stability I'll have will come through Him. I guess it's one thing to think it, but another thing to act on it. It's amazing how easy it is for me to become unsatisfied with life when I'm not reading my Bible and praying all the time. It's time for me to spend more time focusing on God, and to actually make time for Him every day, rather than making myself busy and forgetting about Him.
I'm really trying to trust Him to provide me with the right job. I'm looking for another job because my job at Webers isn't giving me enough hours. I'm looking for something full time, but I'm not sure where that is right now. :)
My room is coming along nicely now. My parents bought me the wardrobe and the bookshelves I wanted. My dad just put them together for me, so now I just need to fill them and get rid of all the extra junk I have packed away still. I think we're having a garage sale this weekend, so long as it doesn't rain. :P That should be fun.
The time is getting late, so I am heading to bed. Lots of love <3

Hostess extraordinaire...

or NOT. So I found a new job, though it may only be a part time job, I've yet to figure that all out. Starting officially last Wednesday I began hostessing at Webers Downtowner, a diner downtown Barrie known for it's amazing burgers. It's a great place to work so far, though the shifts are only evenings and weekends and they are very short. Eventually I'll do serving, but I need to learn the flow of things first. I really like the people I'm working with. They're a lot of fun and really nice.
I think I'm going to have to look for another job to keep me busy during the day. I don't know where I'll look, but i can't live off of the hours I'm getting right now, so we'll see what happens. I'm just praying about it right now, trying to figure things out.
It seems like there's finally something so show for all the renovations we've been doing. It's been tough living in a cramped space, but by the end of this week I should have my room all painted and my flooring down. I'm very excited about it, and I'll get to set up my new desk and actually start unpacking all of my stuff from school last year. :P
This is just a short little post. And here is a verse to leave with you.
1 Corinthians 15:58 -Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.

No more Green Tree

I am very happy to say that this past Wednesday I quit my job. :D I'm rather excited to be out of that place. I'll miss some of the people, but I don't have to stress out anymore about the work ethics there and such. On Friday I went out job hunting and actually met with some success. The manager at Webers Downtowner (a diner) sat and chatted with me and made an appointment for me to go in for a working interview. I just got back from it a short while ago and it was pretty fun. I followed the hostess around for a while and she showed me the ropes and explained everything to me. It looks like it'll be a fun place to work, so we'll have to see what happens. I'm supposed to hear back from the manager this week sometime. In the meantime my dad is keeping me busy working for him at home, so I'm not completely jobless. :P It's not easy to stand up for yourself sometimes, but I've discovered that it's worth it, no matter how tough it is. It was a load off of my shoulders telling my boss that I wouldn't be coming back in. I'm just trying to leave things in God's hands and trust Him to lead me in the right direction.

So directionless

I guess a lot has happened since my trip to Nova Scotia. That was a fun week. On the way back we stopped in New Brunswick for Rachel Langton's wedding. The wedding and reception were very enjoyable and it was great to see Rachel again. Court was in the wedding party, so we got to hang out a bit. Luke, Andrew, Court, and I all stayed at Rachel's friend's house. She was a lot of fun and it turns out that she just came to Borden for a few months, so we'll hopefully get to hang out a bit.

Right now I'm kinda lost in life, if that makes any sense. It feels like I'm living each day just to get to the next. Some things have become more clear to me in the past few weeks, but other things are so much more confusing. It's hard not knowing which direction my life should be going. I have a strong desire to work with youth, yet I don't know where or howand it just doesn't seem like things are getting any clearer. I've had to deal with some unfortunate stuff at work recently, so I'm about to quit there (it's a seasonal job anyhow) and now I'm looking for a new job. I have no idea where to look. So many jobs are minimum wage and are shift work, so it'll be tough to find anything that pays fairly well. It would be amazing to find a job in which I could work with teens and such, but I have no clue where I could even start applying. Most places require you to have a degree, or some type of schooling. Everything just seems so up in the air. All I can do it trust God to provide. It's a struggle to trust Him so completely.

Even though there is so much uncertainty I have been enjoying my life. I have been much happier over the past few weeks then I've been in a long time. I'm still struggling with my health, though I have a bunch of doctors appointments coming up with specialists and such, and I've been trying to redo the Maker's Diet and clean my system out. I was doing really well until about a week ago. I need to spend this week getting myself back on track.

I was able to spend this past weekend in Belleville with a bunch of friends. It was Matty's birthday on the 31st and Saba's is on the 7th, so we had some birthday fun. It was great to hang out with everyone. At one point there was Matty, Luke, Jay, Nicola, Saba, Court, Sean, Ruth, Nicole and myself. It was a lot of fun. On Sunday we took Saba to Kingston and hung out with Justin for a bit. Aside from being so exhausted from all the late nights, it was an awesome weekend.

I just found out that it is Victoria's birthday tomorrow (6th) so Happy Birthday Victoria!! I love you lots and hope you have a great day! :D

It is time for me to finish my resume and print it off, so good bye for now. I hope everyone had an enjoyable summer, and God bless as you go your way this fall, whether to school, work, or elsewhere. :) love you all!

Vacation time

This summer has continued to be very busy. I have this week off of work for a bit of vacation time and I'm excited to say that I get to spend it out east. Rachel Langton is getting married on August 5th so Luke and I drove out to Nova Scotia this past weekend to spend a week here, then we'll head to Fredericton on Friday so we can be there for Rachel's wedding.
I just love it out here. Yesterday Luke, his mom, and I went for hike along Duncan's Cove. The ocean was just absolutely amazing! Last night I was able to participate in a crazy fun time of eel fishing. :P I didn't catch anything, I mostly just took pictures, but it was pretty fun to watch. Unfortunately we caught more catfish than eels, but it was an adventure nonetheless. This week will probably be pretty busy and I hope we can get another trip or two into Frenchy's before the week is over. I'll have to give a better update when I have more time. I can say that I'm not looking forward to going to work after this week of fun. :P

My mom's birthday was this past week so my brother, sister's and I went together and bought her a rottweiler puppy! He's super cute and a lot of fun, but he loves to chew, so we're going to have to keep an eye on him. His name is Orlando.
This was my mom's reaction when andrew gave her the pup. lol You can get any better than that. :P He was very timid and afraid at first, but he's really making himself at home now. He likes to bark at 5:30 in the morning too. :P I guess it's not too bad cuz I get up shortly after that to get ready for work, but I do lose some sleep because of it. Oh well...he'll get over it...I hope. :)

So a lot has happend over the past month. Luke's sister Rachel came and spent a week here. We had a lot of fun. Luke's birthday was that week, so we took him out for dinner. Before she went home a group of us went to Wonderland for Christian Day. If you want the whole scoop on that weekend, read Dave's blog...he's got some great pics. :)

I'm excited to say that my room has expanded by about 44 square feet. :P I no longer have a little bedroom. I'm happy it's bigger, but now I need to figure out how I want to paint it and organize it. The house is looking so different. It's like trying to find your way through a maze almost. I've taken the wrong turn a few different times. lol

For the Canada Day weekend Nic, Crystal and I went to Belleville to hang out with Luke and Matty. We got to hang out with Karen, Victoria, Nicole and Chantal as well. It was good to hang out with Drew a little bit too. He's now gone to West Virginia, so who knows when I'll get to see him again. I'm glad he's able to get his papers and such to go live in the states and finally get married! Congrats Rebecca and Drew! I'm happy for the two of you!

I would like to say that I learned how to change the oil in my car this weekend and I'm very happy about that. I was a mess by the time I was finished (an '02 Sunfire is not a fun car to try and change the oil filter in :S) but it was pretty fun! Saba came on Saturday night and we went to see Pirates of the Carribbean 2. I really enjoyed it, but I didn't like the fact that it leaves you hanging...I didn't realize there was a number three coming out soon. :P

It's been a good summer so far and it continues to stay busy. I haven't been to the beach yet...I should put that on my list of things to do. :) I'm enjoying work, and I'm getting a pretty decent tan too! It's nice to be out in the sun all day. God bless, I hope you are all enjoying your summer so far.

Working hard or hardly working....

...a week ago it was the latter, but not anymore! I got a job! :D I started working on Monday with Green Tree Landscape Contractors. It's a pretty sweet job, aside from all the politics involved between my boss and those who hire him. The people I work with are awesome too. God provided this job for a reason, and I'm not completely sure what it was. Perhaps it was so I could witness to those I'm working with and for, or maybe he has a few things he wants to teach me...probably both. He's been trying to teach me a lot recently, and I've been doing a great job of ignoring him. I get really down when I'm not reading my Bible and praying, yet I still don't do it. It doesn't make much sense. I saw Saba tonight and we had a great chat about this. It's just so easy to fall away from that relationship God has for us. You have a few days, or weeks even, when everything is just grand, things with you and God are great, then boom...it's gone just like that. Why is it so easy to slip away?

One day at a time

Thank you to all who were praying for my grandpa. He's been home for over a week now, and he's healing up quite nicely. He's still in quite a bit of pain though. On Monday he went back to Toronto for a couple of tests, and he has to go back again to get a biopsy done on a section of his bladder. There's a thickness on his bladder, and they aren't sure what it is...they say it could possibly be cancer. We won't know for a week or so what it is.

So I've been home from school for almost a month now, and I'm still not working. I thought I had a job lined up, but this guy I was supposed to work for basically stood me up. So I've been out and about handing out a million resumes! I guess looking for a job takes time, but it's super frustrating because I had all these plans for when I started working, but now I can't do most of them because they require money and I am broke. I've been trying to keep myself busy at home. I've been helping my mom do some landscaping out back. We're building a retaining wall and a patio. It's a lot of heavy work, but I'm enjoying the exercise. I actually made a new fire pit too, and I would say it's probably the sweetest fire pit I've ever seen! It's about 8' x 4'.

From up on the deck by the house, it looks like a glowing eye. :P So yeah...I'm pretty excited about it. You should all come over for a campfire sometime! :D

May has been a busy month. I've been to Belleville a few times, and to Peterborough a couple of times. The three Nic's hung out on the Saturday of the May 2-4 weekend. We had a lot of fun!

After Nicole left on Saturday, Nic and I went to the movies and saw Mission Impossible 3. The next day we met Dave at the movies and saw The DaVinci Code. I think we watched 4 movies within three days. :P Two at the theatre and two at Nic's trailer. It was a great weekend, a little cold though. (Snow in May...that's just ridiculous.)

My weekdays have been mostly boring. It'll be nice to get a job and get on with my life. Right now I'm just taking it one day at a time. I guess that's all I can really do anyhow. God is in control. It's been really hard to leave this job thing in His hands, but I'm trying, and I'm trying not to get very discouraged about it. It would probably be a little easier if I had a life here in Barrie, but I don't really. Luke comes to visit every so often, so that's been fun. Other than that I don't do much socializing. There really aren't many people around Barrie that I'm good friends with anymore.

I hope you are all enjoying your spring/summer so far. This humidity hasn't been fun, but the thunderstorms that follow it are quite enjoyable. It was thundering pretty good this morning when my mom and I were working outside. We also discovered that we have a snake living on our patio. How lovely...

Update

Thank you for all of your prayers! My grandpa isn't out of the woods yet, but he's doing fairly well. The surgery went well, and he was awake and talking for a little while. His colour is good, and the nurses are quite surprised at how relaxed he is. They said he may be moved to his own room tomorrow. The fear right now is of blood clots and hemorrhaging that could cause him to have a heart attack or stroke. It's been hard on my grandma, but she seems to be holding up well. She's saying she wouldn't have felt as much peace today if it hadn't of been for everyone who was praying for her. Considering the severity of this surgery it's amazing that he made it through so well. Once again thank you for praying, and please continue to do so as there could still be complications. :)

Prayer Request...

I guess I'm probably writing this a little late, but my grandpa is going in for surgery tomorrow (Monday) morning. He was born with Marfan's Syndrome, which makes him more susceptible to other problems, such as aneurysms. A few years ago he had triple by-pass heart surgery. He survived that well, coming out with a defibulator (pacemaker) to keep his heart beating at the proper rate. They kept an eye on him and found a few more aneurysms that need to be dealt with. The most severe one is on his thigh. Apparently this surgery will be more critical than the heart surgery he had previously. He basically has a 50-50 chance of surviving. If they don't do the surgery the aneuryism will basically burst (tear the vein) and he'll die. That could happen at any given time. He's at peace with whatever the outcome will be. He just had his 73rd birthday, so he's not that old and we'd like to have him around a bit longer. :) We would appreciate all your prayers! We know that whatever the outcome is, it is all in God's hands. Thank you!

An Adventurous Weekend

I'm so very happy to be done school now! I really don't miss the stress at all. I've been home for a few days just getting stuff done around the house. I spent a couple of days cutting and stacking wood, I cut the grass, cleaned up the yard, and just kinda did some random stuff around the yard. I've still got a lot more to do, but it'll take time.
I'm actually waiting to hear from my boss to know when I'm supposed to start work. I figured I'd be starting by the beginning of next week, but he hasn't called me yet. I got a landscaping job, mostly doing gardening and such, and the guy is even giving me a truck to drive around in! That's definitely handy seeing as the jobs will be all over southern Ontario. Until I start I guess I'll just have to keep myself busy at home. It shouldn't be too difficult with all the renovations we're doing. I brought so much stuff home from school and I have nowhere to put it right now. My bedroom is full of stuff my mom is temporarily storing, and it'll have to stay there for a few more weeks. Once it gets moved out my bedroom will be expanding and then I can reorganize and move all my stuff in.
I'm beginning to miss some people now. Last weekend, after grad, a bunch of us hung out and it was a lot of fun. We went to the zoo, grabbed a bite to eat, then headed to the Salman's to watch a movie with Chris and Amy. Crystal, Danielle, and Maria all came for grad and spent the whole evening hanging out with us.

Nicola, Matty, Lucas and I decided to hit Timmy's after we left Chris' house...it was getting a little late and we were definitely overtired! I spent the the night with Nic and her parents at a nearby hotel. Sadly she had to head home the next morning. Here are some pictures that we took at Timmy's...we were a little nuts. :P

We had a lot of fun, and I miss them like crazy!

I was lucky to be able to spend a few days in Belleville with Matty and Lucas before I had to head home. We had some fun adventures, including mini-golf (Luke won), a trip to Kingston to pick up Luke's car, exploding bottles of diet coke, and even a visit to the carwash to wash our cars. (duh, what else do you do at a carwash...:P) It was a blast!

It is good to be home now, enjoying some time with my family. I think this is the first time I'll be home for an extended period of time since two years ago. I'm sure this summer will probably be packed full of fun seeing as there are so many people that I want to visit! For now I need to start work so I can afford to do some travelling around. I plan on blogging a lot more now that I'm done school. We'll see if that actually happens. :P For now I'm off to watch some Best of Chris Farley. Buhbye! :)

Quick update

So this is just going to be a quick update. There are only three weeks of school left. :S I'm praying I'll survive them. We just got back from our Northern PAG trip. We went all the way up to Timmins and just got back today. It was a long weekend, but definitely enjoyable. I got to see Nancy again which was really exciting. I haven't seen her since grad last year. She's engaged and getting married in September. She'll be moving to the States and probably won't come back to Canada for a couple of years, so that's sad, but I'm really excited for her and it was awesome to see her again.
Tomorrow morning, which is really today, the second years are heading out for Practicum. I'm quite excited about it. I'm sure it'll be one of the highlights of the year. I'll try and post some pictures when I get back.
I haven't heard back about that job yet. It would be nice to hear something by the end of this week, but for now I'm just trying to leave it in God's hands. He knows where He wants me this summer, I've just got to wait and see.
Things for the Nicaragua trip in the fall are getting interesting. We just met this week and got more info about it. I'm getting excited about it. I hope it all works out, but once again, only God knows what will happen and I'm trusting Him to lead me in the right direction over the summer and fall.
I guess I didn't have anything very interesting to say, but things are super busy here with the end of school coming. It'll be nice to be done and get into a routine at home. I'm off to bed now. God bless and good night. :)

So close, yet so far...

I'm home right now, but only for the rest of the afternoon. I came back for an interview, which went well. It sounds like a job that I'd enjoy, and the guy who interviewed me was very friendly and said he was "pleasantly surprised." I take that as a good sign that I could get the job, and he told me if it didn't work out, then he knows of another place that's hiring and he'd try and get me the job there. My sister works next door to this place, and it was because of her that I got the interview, so thanks Dawn. :D
Only 5 weeks of classes left. :S I'm torn between being excited and depressed. I'll be glad to be done, but I've got a truckload of work to get done by that time...actually probably more like 5 truckloads. :P The only way I'll survive it is with God's help. It'll be a lot of late nights I'm sure.
It's been a difficult semester, but God's really been teaching me a lot. One of the big things has been contentment. I need to be content where He has me right now, even though I don't know why or where I'm going from here. He's shown me that unless I'm making Him my priority nothing will be clear. I hadn't been spending much time with Him, and I was getting frustrated and discouraged all the time. I decided to push aside the other things that were on my mind and try and just focus on my relationship with Jesus Christ. It was very refreshing, especially for the first week. After that it got a lot harder. This past week I really struggled with the frustration and discouragement again. It's so difficult to completely trust God with things and to know that He has a plan for my life. I've been reading in Matthew recently, and the Sermon on the Mount (5-7) was very encouraging. I learned a lot from it and was challenged to work on areas of my life that weren't very Christ-like, such as being loving to everyone. :S There are a few people that I just have a hard time appreciating, so I don't always respond very kindly. I know that it's not right, and I shouldn't judge them, so I'm trying to love them more and I'm learning to appreciate them and treat them as Christ would. It's a good jolt to the pride, but much needed.
There's an opportunity for me to go to Nicaragua in the fall as well, so I'm praying about that right now. I'd love to go, and I think it'll be good for me. We'll see what happens over the next little while.
The past few weeks have been busy and mostly enjoyable...Brooksy was up for the Carpenter's Box conference during the break and we had a blast. We just had Focus this past week, so that kept us busy. The Performing Arts Group had been travelling around a fair bit. It's about to get really busy. Our schedule is pretty full for the next few weeks.
I'm off to do something productive. God bless :)

Spring Break

It is time for another break...a much needed one at that! It's hard to believe, but there aren't many weeks left of school, maybe around 7 or 8. It's pretty crazy when you think about it. I've survived so far...now comes the real challenge. It's getting a lot harder to be at the school now. I find it's a lot more difficult to deal with people and some of the silly issues there. At times I'd just like to be done! But once it's done that leaves the question of "what comes next?" I wish I knew. :P
I've only got one more day at home before I head back to Peterborough. I'll be helping there with the Carpenter's Box leadership conference. In no time at all classes will start up again and it will be crazy busy again until school is finished.
I've really enjoyed this semester so far. The school work has been a lot more intense, but I've enjoyed the friendships a lot more. I guess it takes most of the first semester to get to know people, then by the second semester you grow a lot closer. We've had a lot of fun crazy times. :) Well, I'd like to write more, but I'm super tired. Sarah, Luke, and Jordan are coming to visit me tomorrow, so it'll be a busy day. I hope all is going well with everyone! If you haven't read through Philippians in a while, I would suggest it. :) I've been learning a lot from it lately! Bye for now!

I'm alive...

I should have posted earlier, but I kept putting if off. So yes, I am alive, and keeping very busy! It's been great to have Luke back at KLBC again. Nicole, Gordie, and I picked him up at the airport the Friday after classes started. It was pretty fun, and we got to be on tv too, because one of the guys from Team Canada was flying in right after Luke's flight. There were 5 or 6 tv cameras there, so that was exciting, especially because it looked like we were waiting for this hockey guy, and we weren't. Nicole manage to get his autograph too. lol Fun times. :)

So the following night we had a party for Luke. It was pretty fun, and it was great to see a bunch of KLBCers from last year. The game of snow soccer was awesome! Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. It was sad when they all had to leave. I really miss the group from last year.

Most weekends have been busy. We went to Crystal's house for one of them. ("We" being Deanna, Luke, Gordie, and myself) I think we were only there for 27 hours or something, but it was a lot of fun. Ever heard of the game "Hit and Run"? It's a PS2 game with the Simpsons...let's just say that Luke really enjoyed it...one of those games where you can just randomly beat up civilians. Here he is...beating up an old woman.

We played some games, made some pie, visited the General Store, the West Montrose covered bridge, and went to the St. Jacobs Farmer's Market. Unfortunately we missed the cow auctions. Not that we planned on buying a cow, but they're supposed to be fun to watch. It was a great weekend.

There were some issues at home for a while. Just over two weeks ago my little sister ran away from home. I'm glad to say she came back on Saturday, though things will be tough at home for a little while. If you think about it, then she can use your prayers right now. Just that she would be content with what she has, and that she would open her eyes to see how focused she is on herself. I really hope things get worked out soon.

I was able to go home this weekend because we had our first Performing Arts Group performance in Orillia on Sunday evening. Luke came with me, and aside from boring him to death on a shopping trip, the weekend was good. Played some nintendo, watched a couple of movies, had Melanie's birthday party, then went to Orillia. The performance went very well, especially after the way the practices had gone. Oh! Dennis and Val had their baby!! So congratualtions to them! :D Dennis had to miss our first two full-out practices because of it, but things went well considering. Now we just need to do some fine tuning...a lot of fine tuning actually.

Well, that's basically been my past month. I'm still struggling with my school work and motivating myself to get work done. Things should get better after this week. I just have a little bit to get caught up on. We have a bunch of modular courses coming up in the next couple of months. It's going to be a lot of work, but I'm looking forward to some of them. I hope I'm able to keep up with everything. I'll have drama, the Performing Arts Group, yearbook, Bible reading, and all my class readings and assignments, PLUS socializing time. :P It's just going to get busier and busier. Anyhow, I'm off to get some reading done. God bless!

I would just like to expand on what Sarah and I are doing in the pictures...because I'm sure some of you may be slightly confused. That lovely person we created represented the old year. So, basically we were burning the old year away! byebye 2005! It was quite fun, with gasoline, sparklers, and fireworks...can't get much better than that! Thank you Ecuador for introducing such a fun way of celebrating the new year!! And you too, Luke, for suggesting it. :) Happy New Year to all of you! I love you all. :) God bless.

Yo-ho-ho... part deux

So after the T-ree shirts we listened to some BEAUTIFUL MUSIC. It was really something.

It WAS really something.
I am tired.
But.... moving on. After that we had to make our man.
We sewed and sewed and sewed.

It was very challenging...especially when we started at different ends to meet in the middle, good times let me tell ya. After we sewed him up we took him outside and then...well you can see the rest for yourself. I don't like to talk about it. You get really attached to these guys ya know.


we had fireworks and and and sparklers and and and then we drank some lovely ginger beer (yuck) and and and he burned up big and fast like a choo-choo train on a full tank of gas... on the choo-choo train... if it was burning ... it was a late night. I almost couldn't finish my puzzle. Which will remain in the closed and hidden files because it is too beautiful for you to see like those princesses who people couldn't look at or they would be beheaded. Obviously metaphors aren't working for me today. After that we watched a movie and didn't get to bed until after 3. We woke up and went to church like good little girls and that is all. We had beans for lunch.... they were yummy. Nicki's mom is a good cooker.

Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of Jamaican Ginger Beer

It is the new year and we (Nicki and I.... no Nicki does not have multiple personalities... it is I, Sarah - or Captain Sarah as some call me ;) ) brought in the new year with firecrackers, sparklers, trail-mix, large burning objects dosed in gasoline, t-ree shirts, hot boys lipsinking to oldies, amazing records, and of course a BRAND SPANKIN' NEW PIRATE SHIP for yours truly.

So.... the night started with candy, and candy, and more candy. We ate it all before the camera was busted out... our apologies. But everyone knows what candy looks like.

Then we did our T-ree shirts. What are t-ree shirts you might ask? Well my dear friends THESE are T-ree shirts.

As you can see (if you look closely) they are trees... or are they-dun dun dunnn.
After emersing the trees in water they begin to transform (AHHH!!!) into t-shirts.
Since some of you are visual learners we put together a little something-something for you.
It is a play-by-play of our night avec commentary for all of ye.
So if you cannot read then you can still know all about our wonderful life. Remember boys and girls discrimination is bad.



As you can see it was a long grueling process but in the end we were victorious!!

You can see we started by unwrapping the t-ree shirts and then turning on the sink to get water into a bucket. We then placed the t-ree shirt into the bucket of water. Then we splashed in the water because that is what mermaids do. Following that we proceeded to unravel the shirts and dewrinklify them. We then wrung them dry.... almost dry.... wrung them damp? Anyways. We posed with our wet t-ree shirts and laid them flat to dry because that is what the package said. Of course it took FOREVER for them to dry so.... ya skip that part. Then we put them on. As you can see we were very excited about them. Only we have to remember to wear undershirts with them or batman will show. That was the first section of our night. We do have pictures for the rest of it as well but they can wait for a minute or two.