Happy Halloween!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

To celebrate this spooky occasion, our family always gets together to carve pumpkins, and let me tell you, some get pretty fancy... You'll see...

Sandy gets very excited every year. He loves to carve pumpkins. It took him forever just to pick out a design.

Here's all of them...

Mine is supposed to be a monster from Monsters Inc. I like my pumpkin to look cute scary, not creepy scary. lol.

This is Clint's and Christopher's pumpkin. Igor. This was their first pumpkin carving ever. Did pretty good if you ask me!

Tyler has been reading the Harry Potter books all the way through for the first time this year. And well, I give you the three headed dog from Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.

This is Jordy's pumpkin. Very creepy...

And finally Sandy's pumpkin. It looks like its moving! He did such a great job. This is a character from one of the Scooby Doo movies. Like I said, he loves carving pumpkins.

And the group of them once again, just because I think they are all so great.

I hope your Halloween is spooky and fun. Safe Trick-Or-Treating to all!

An update with pictures...

Hello again. Yes, I know its been a few months since my last post, but until now I really didn't have a lot going on that was very interesting. I hope this post makes up for it. There are a few new things to report on.

Here we go:Jordy Graduates!

That's right. We are officially no longer students (either of us). Jordy was technically finished school at the end of August, but he didn't convocate until October 16, 2010. I am so proud of him and how he was able to stick with it. It can't have been the easiest and he worked hard to finish. I can't even begin to imagine what it would have been like if we had a little one running around too. Hats off you all you mums and dads out there finishing school.

Here are a few pictures from his Convocation Ceremony:

(If you want to see more pictures - go to my Facebook Album)

We renovate our bathroom:

We started this bathroom renovation at the beginning of the summer. We had Jordy's brother, Bryan, come up and help us demo, drywall, and tile the tub surround. The rest of it stayed undone until this last week and a half. In about 4 days, we mudded, sanded, primed, textured, and painted the entire bathroom.

So you get an idea of the transformation here are the before pictures:

(sorry, we didn't take any before we ripped out the old tub surround.)

The bathroom used to be this nasty yellow (from previous renters smoking). So we had to use some very heavy primer.

The difference after it was all white was amazing. I can't believe we left it yellow for so long.

We also decided that because there were so many inperfections in the walls (old house) we were going to "texture" the walls. So we bought a bucket of ceiling spackle, and Bryan painted it on the walls, I went along about 5 mins later (while it was still wet) and with a trowel flattened it all out. So we ended up with this really nice, textured look. Very easy to do, but a little messy. The spackle doesn't go onto the walls very nicely.

I believe this was after the first coat of blue. Yes, I also painted the cabinet brown. It makes such a difference and was way cheaper than buying a new cabinet. It made the counter top look like new.

Here are some after pictures:

This is not the mirror we are leaving in there, we actually used to have this huge plane glass mirror in there, we got it cut to a slightly smaller dimension for free, bought some cheap trim from Home Depot, painted the trim brown, and will frame the mirror with it. (Once we have time to.) Then that will replace the temporary mirror in this picture.

All of the pictures (3) in our bathroom I found at Walmart for pretty cheap. 2 of them were $15, and one was $30. They match the paint and scheme perfectly!

In this picture you can see the tile job we did in the bathtub surround. It is much better than the old yellowed plastic surround that used to be there.

We traded lights with Jordy's mom, as hers was too powerful for her bathroom (and melted the ceiling tiles) and it has a frosted glass on the front, so to make it match, we bought a can of spray on glass frosting and frosted the glass on that medicine cabinet on the left.

All in all it was a very cheap, do-it-yourself, but very nice bathroom reno. It has made a yucky old bathroom look almost brand new all for under $700!! I love it!

That's all for this post. I've got another one going up today too. Stay tuned!

So much new...

As the title indicates there is so much new stuff in our lives since my last post. (I KNOW, I'm terrible at keeping you all updated... in my defense, Jordy is just as capable at updating this blog and he hasn't done it either.)

One of the biggest changes is my new job. I got a job as a Legal Assistant at North and Company LLP in Lethbridge, AB. Its a pretty good size firm with branches in lots of surrounding communities. It includes, Taber, Milk River, Claresholme, Warner, Picture Butte, Vulcan, Crowsnest Pass, Pincher Creek and possibly a few others. (I can't recall at the moment.) It's so much fun to be learning so many new things. I haven't had to apply my brain for so long now its a tad out of shape. So its nice to be using it again. On the down side, the learning curve is HUGE! I'm not sure I'll ever remember all the legal terms and documents that I use almost everyday. There's just so much. I have to constantly remind myself that I've only been working there for a few weeks and I'm not expected to instantly know it all. But its still tough. I can see the advantage of going to school for anything legal. At the very least it would've helped with the vocabulary. That's right. You try figuring out what they want when they say: "Use the precedent for the Unanimous Shareholders' Agreement found in the Corporate Matter #####.###, copy it into the submatter you've just opened, then form a resolution to update the Corporate Minute Book." HAH! It might as well be in a foreign language. BUT I am slowly learning, and I love the challenge I get everyday. :)

So because I've stumbled into this awesome job opportunity, we're staying in Lethbridge for at least a year or two, so that I can build up some experience. If at that point we have to move for Jordy's work, then I'll be able to get a job at another law firm.

Jordy is ALMOST done his degree. He has one course in July/August and he graduates in October. We are super excited for him to be finished. He's still searching for a job opportunity in Lethbridge, which has turned out to be a lot more difficult than we thought. It turns out that accounting firms aren't hiring as many people this year as they have the past few years, and most jobs are in the larger city centers. Ie: Calgary and Edmonton. But in the meantime, he'll find a job at a bank or something similar until we can move, or he finds an accounting job.

We went on our camping trip this summer the 5 days before I started at North and Co. It was lots of fun. We headed out to Salmon Arm, BC. On the way there and back we stayed with some of Jordy's family in Golden and I love their house! Its a beautiful log house that is nestled away in the woods outside of Golden, BC. It was like walking into a story book. Very charming. They make lots of their furniture themselves out of wood from the forest around them. It was just so amazing. It rained almost the whole time we were camping, but even that didn't ruin it for us. We found that we LOVE Salmon Arm. Yes there was rain, but since there was not a hint of wind, it actually fell down-wards, not sideways at you. We had a beach umbrella just stuck into the dirt at the campsite and in Alberta it would have been miles away in about 2 seconds. But we left it there like that the whole time we were camping and it didn't even fall over. It was amazing. The area is so beautiful too. The lake, and all the trees, and the mountains. Its like the Crowsnest Pass but no wind, and a warmer lake. Like I said, we loved it.

I can't think of anything else that you may have missed out on since February (yikes I'm a bad blogger) so I'm just gonna post a few pictures from our trip in the next few days and say talk to you next time.

Tagged and More

I was tagged by Rebecca. So here goes :)

The Rules:

(1) List 6 things you are a master in.

(2) Pass it on to 6 bloggers you think are masters at friendship & make blogging so awesome.

And here we go...

(1) Master Sleeper - love it, can never have enough of it.

(2) Master Procrastinator - Why do today what you can put off until tomorrow?

(3) Master Texter- I wish that on job applications instead of a wpm they could have TPM... I'd rock that one.

(4) Master Tickler - I always win.

(5) Master Budgeter - Between Jordy and me, we have it down to an exact science I think.

(6) Master of Punctuality - Christina you are not the only one. If I'm not 5 mins early, I worry that I'm late.

(I'm not going to tag anyone else... If you want to do it and share with everyone go for it :)


Life has been pretty good to us. Work is going great for me and I love the consistent schedule. Monday to Friday wake up at 5:30 work till 3:00 then whatever till bed at 10:00. It is sooo nice. I thrive on a regular schedule. So I'm feeling energized and healthy. Partly that is due to my keeping up with going to the gym a few days a week. It's all the way across town though so sometimes I feel like I'm dragging my feet but when I get home I always am glad that I went. It's finally turned nice enough out that we can spend some time outside. Thursday we went Rollarblading for the first time this year and it was beautiful. I can't wait till summer when we will spend most of our free time in the sun. Jordy is working hard at school and I think he's excited to be almost finished. He has so many assignments and exams that he works his butt off day and night sometimes. I love soo much that he works so hard to be as good as he can be.

Church callings are the same and I still enjoy working with those little spirits in the primary. We have a few autistic children in our class who definitely have their challenging moments... or days when it feels like the lesson is totally useless because we spend all our time trying to convince them to sit on their chairs... BUT it's always worth it. One of the mom's came to me before class one day and said her autistic boy was asking if he gets to go to our class that day. :) They are such sweet spirits and the lessons we teach are as much for Jordy and myself as they are for the kids. Everyone needs weekly reminders to Choose the Right. :)

We're excited to help celebrate our nephew's first birthday. We're going to have a small party with him and his parents. It's crazy that a year has flown by already... he's soo big now!

Other than that we're making plans for some summer fun and can't wait until it's warm enough to do some camping.

Til next time. :)

How the New Years starts.

Hi everyone! I know I have been terrible at keeping up with this blog. But on my defense the Holidays were CRAZY! I can tell you that I'm sure getting tired of booking time off work to be spent driving between Taber and the Crowsnest Pass. It doesn't feel like a break at all. But enough of my complaining. We had a wonderful Christmas together this year, we spent Christmas Eve at home together, got up in the middle of the night to play Santa, and spent Christmas morning opening our gifts together, at home. Ahh... that was the nice relaxing part. :) Then we both went off to work TOGETHER from 3-11 on Christmas Day. Hurray for time and a half!

We then drove of towards Taber to spend the weekend with Jordy's family (or some of it at least) and had a yummy Christmas dinner on Saturday. Had a lot of fun watching our nephew open his first Christmas gifts, enjoyed opening our own gifts from family, and giving our gifts to family. (Pictures of August will be on Facebook.) Then we headed off to the Crowsnest Pass after picking my brother up from the Calgary Airport. (I said there was lots of driving!) We spent New Years in the Pass with my family and then headed home on Saturday evening. It felt super busy.

Anyways. Now that we have spent some time in 2010 more fun things have happened. Jordy started his last semester of school at the U of L and decided he should spend more time focusing on that and so today he put in his two weeks notice at work. Boy am I JEALOUS! I would love to not work for Quest anymore. But that's another story. So he'll not be working for the majority of the semester which hopefully will help raise his GPA a bit. Another fun thing about our work schedules... We are looking into the possibility of selling alarm systems this summer. Jordy's friend is coming down this Saturday to talk to us about it and he told us they were looking at selling in either Halifax, Ontario, or somewhere in BC. I'm personally hoping for Halifax. I would love to go there for the summer and take in the ocean and the sites and maybe look for a job for Jordy there... haha. Yes, I still want to move to the East coast. All the pictures look beautiful, and Jordy spent a day there and said he liked it. AND I'm soo tired of Southern Alberta. :) So I'll just keep my fingers crossed.

Other than that we're just hoping Jordy will do well in all his classes this semester so he can be done (he may have to take an extra class) and so he will be DONE! :) I'm almost more excited for that than he is. Anyways, here are some pictures from over the last few weeks, till next time.

Making cookies.

The CUTE stockings I found at Walmart!

Our pretty tree.

Jordy on Christmas Eve.

Me on Christmas Eve.

Santa was good to us this year.

The box is always more fun than the toy inside.

August looking so cute.

New Years Eve in the Pass. (New Year's Toast)

Let it snow...

Let it snow...

Let it snow!

Wow. Friday morning I looked out the window and what did I see? Brown grass, brown trees, plus degree temperature and not a flake of snow in sight.

This morning I look out the window and what do I see? About a foot or more of snow, - 26 degrees celsius. FREEZING! I have to go out and clean off my van, warm it up for like 30 mins, and drive super slow because the roads are awful.

BUT...

What does all this mean?

Christmas,
Snowboarding,
New Years,
Cuddling under a blanket with some hot chocolate,
and fun in the snow!

We've got all our Christmas decorations up and it feels like the count down is on. The stockings are hung above the TV with care and a wonderful Christmas season atmosphere has taken hold. Christmas parties have started and gift buying.

We weren't sure what or where we were going to be doing for Christmas this year, but due to work, we'll be having a small Christmas at home, and visiting family the week after. (Sorry, only our southern Alberta family... :(

Hopefully pictures to come, and...

Happy Holidays to All!

Ol' Hallow's Eve ie... HALLOWEEN!!!

Alright, so this year for Halloween Jordy and I were invited to a costume party and we decided (after many disagreements) that we would be pirates. It was very exciting. We found both of our costumes at Value Village and at first we were not so sure they would turn out great. And well after much time and care here is the result.

I didn't really have a model for how my costume was supposed to look... but it turned out ok.

We were pretty impressed with how Jordy's costume turned out. Very Johnny Depp. And together we thought we looked pretty good. Sorry this one is all blurry. My sister took it and didn't let it focus I guess.

The party was tons of fun, towards the end though Jordy started to not feel very good and by the time we got home he really wasn't feeling good. He had chills and a temp of over 38 degrees celsius. He's still ill but hopefully with lots of bed rest and relaxation he will get better. Hopefully this isn't H1N1. Other than that though we had a good weekend.

Till next time.