A post began some time ago, and now finally culminating in this...

At the start of May my lovely cousin Amanda came to visit. We had a lot of things going on while she was here, such as hot yoga (something I will not put myself through again unless I feel an overwhelming urge to cause myself to faint), Alison's bachelorette, hiking up Mount Doug, and a trip to Seattle. The bachelorette was held on Saltspring, an absolutely gorgeous Gulf Island.

Above is the view from the veranda of our cabin at Cusheon Lake Resort... *sigh* I don't think I'm supposed to divulge exactly what went on during the weekend, but we had fun playing some games, and spent much of Saturday at Ganges Harbour at the market, which was interesting and entertaining.

Not long after that adventure, Kaitlyn, Amanda and I went forth to Seattle, in search of clothing and Relient K. We succeeded, and also found the unexpected treasure of the EMP/SFM, which was really interesting, and helped our trio fulfill our collective life-long dream of becoming rockstars!! Also, the architecture of the museum was really unique. Observe from one vantage point:

We spent Tuesday night at the City Hostel. Our room was #309, that had a somewhat creepy mural on it. I think we were all nightmare-free, however. It was sad to say good-bye to Amanda on the Thursday, but we did manage to fit a lot in and make it a very worthwhile trip.

Alison's much anticipated wedding was last weekend, and all-in-all things went as planned and everyone enjoyed themselves :D One of my favourite pics of the day:


We've had some good weather over the last while, so we (me and random other persons) have had some great nights of slo-pitch, an afternoon of skimboarding, some fun volleyball and soccer juggling times, and a sweet hike.

Other random highlight: A couple of weeks ago Dave took me out for a ride on his sport bike again; we had a nice long ride through some empty, winding trails. It was absolutely stellar!

Favourite quote of the day: "U like ... unicorn." (Joanne, while listing off her flight number, and mishearing me say, "Like uniform".) :D

Strangest thing I've seen lately: One of the girls at the out-of-school care has a pet bunny, Dusty, that she loves dearly and speaks of often. The other day she brought in pictures of it... taken during the procedure to neuter it. The gas-masked bunny was my favourite.

(Actual date of completion = June 6th, 2010)

April flowers

Well, I have not quite been meeting my goal of blogging once a month... but I am still trying. It seems like it has been a long time since that last post. I’ve fit a lot of things into that time. The tennis tournament was a good learning experience (for both me and Chris, on a couple of levels), and that’s all I have to say about that.

The last couple of months have been sort of a transitioning period for a lot my friends, either students going into exams, then into summer/graduation, or people moving around and job hunting/finding. In the midst of this, I played in a couple of hockey tournaments, kept working my three jobs, played a lot of tennis (and watched some, like Roddick winning the Sony Ericsson!), and enjoyed numerous delicious meals and conversations (sometimes over meals, sometimes in places like a pool, a hallway, or a basement) with fabulous people.

I saw How to Train Your Dragon at the start of the month. I haven’t seen many of the animated Pixar or DreamWorks movies lately, and for the most part haven’t wanted to... but this one I really enjoyed!! Slow-pitch started a few weeks ago, and it’s been a slow start for the ACF co-ed team, as we’ve forfeited 2 of our first 4 games; we’ve been having a good time, regardless.

The April 16^th weekend a group of us went up to Denman. This is my favourite group shot from the beach there:

Pictured below is Chris in his (then) newly purchased 1992 Nissan ZX300, twin-turbo, 300 horsepower beaut of a ride. I have the privilege of driving it part of the way up to Denman, and part of the way back. It's fun to drive! (And it's not a mirror image - it's a right-hand drive)

Life is good!!

The long, dark winter of the soul...

Just does not exist when you live in Victoria! How can your soul be in winter time when you can play tennis outside in a t-shirt and shorts, under the sun, in balmy 16 degree weather? February was an absolutely glorious month here in Victoria!! It's been good getting out and playing some tennis as I am planning on playing in a mixed doubles tournament next weekend. I do miss the cold and snow, there's no denying, but tennis (among a few other things) does assuage my soul somewhat...

Needless to say, with three jobs, more than occasional participation in sports, and so many little things to take up my time (e.g. friends, haha) life has been really busy since I got back to Victoria. The trip back to Ontario over Christmas was definitely a nice break from running around being continuously busy, and I could almost go for that kind of a break again. However, I am still feeling blessed in each of my jobs, and thoroughly enjoying the community God has given me here!

Three prime examples from this community are seen (with me) below:

Kaitlyn, Harrison (Chris's roommate/Kaitlyn's boyfriend), me, and Chris, at a fountain outside of the Empress in downtown Victoria. Taken on the day we survived a tsunami (taken not long after said tsunami was purposed to hit).