Monday, April 14, 2008

Seagull Legs


On Friday night Wendy, Janice and I had a celebration of sorts... We toasted to my new job, to Wendy's domain (wendesign.ca) and Etsy site and to Janice - because we love her.

As we sat at White Rock, eating our fish and chips, the seagulls began to surround us. They were getting closer and closer and ruffling their feathers. I was getting uncomfortable, Janice was getting irritated, both with me being uncomfortable (and subsequently getting closer to her lap) and with the birds. When all of a sudden Wendy says (in all seriousness) "Doesn't it just look like I could snap their little legs?" And then we laugh... a lot.

And that is why I love these girls. The celebrate with me, they laugh with me, they laugh at me, they know my junk, they've seen me cry, they've called me out on my crap and they still love me.

Sunday, April 13, 2008

... it's about time

I know, I know, its been a long time! Really I'm quite a hypocrite for ever bugging Darren about his blog because mine is starting to gather even more cobwebs than his! I now have 2 great reasons to post a blog though so I will write this post and then make a concerted effort to love it and pay a bit more attention to it...

Reason #1 -

I met my blogging crush. Two weeks ago Janice and I went to Summerland and I got to meet Amanda who's blog I read ... a lot. That's write, I'm a bit of a blog stalker. She's pretty great and hilarious and her daughter is just too adorable! So I met her and she checked out my blog... and then Facebooked me to get my act together, so here it is Amanda!

Reason #2 -

Something very exciting happened! I got a new job. Starting May 1st I will be the Ministry Hub Coordinator at Langley EV Free Church. I'm so excited I have basically not stopped smiling since Thursday night and sometimes I just squeal ... that's right, I said I squeal. Its a really good thing Janice doesnt read my blog cause she would smack me for being such a girl. I can't wait! I'm so stoked excited to be a part of this awesome team of people that love Jesus so much that they are giving their lives to "push back the darkness in Langley" (I have to put that in quotes because it really is taken straight from Darren's mouth :)). Maybe it sounds corny but I can hardly wait, its my idea of the perfect job.

So the whole interview/application process has been a few months and I guess I've just kept putting off posting because I wanted to have something really exciting to talk about. And, of course, another very exciting thing in our life right now - Matt graduates in 2 weeks. More about that soon...

Thursday, January 24, 2008

Frozen Wobbly Bits

So I've officially begun training again ( I can say that cause I've done the run for day 1 of the half marathon training so I am now "in training" ) and I've started running with Sarah ( of "Sarah and Shaun" or "the people with the PADS Dog" - for those of you whose life is just a little less bright because you dont know Sarah yet). I love running with Sarah cause she's a real-live grown up who owns her own house and has a dog so we talk about mortages and interests rates and sometimes I pretend that my bank account has money in it and I'm mature enough to potty train a puppy. But she really is lovely and even when she's not educating me in the ways of the world we have great conversations!

We are quite the pair running together though because Sarah runs with almost every piece of clothing she owns on her body. Ok so maybe not that much but she's got sweats, a long sleeve shirt, a short sleeve shirt, a jacket, a toque and gloves on. And I'm wearing shorts and a running shirt. Now that we've hit January I've started wearing a long sleeve shirt but we're still pretty unevenly dressed! So because of Hawaii and Christmas and colds and birthdays and some other things that have gotten in our way for 3 weeks, yesterday was the first day we've gotten to run together and it also happened to be the coldest day of the winter so far! Short of it actually snowing on us while we ran, it couldn't have been colder! The kind of cold that makes all my wobbly bits not so wobbly CAUSE THEY'RE FROZEN TO ME! The kind of cold where her neighbor had just washed his car and the water run off had made the side walk an ice rink ( Dont worry, I didn't fall! ).

But you know what, I'm gonna keep running in my short running shorts cause its about the only thing I've got going for me in the toughness department. I'm really ok with the fact that I'm the weakest person I know. I have no upper body strength, I am a WUSS, I'm afraid of heights and most other things, Im SO jumpy you'd think I just came back from the war and the other day I had to get my pregnant friend to open my travel mug that was closed to tight... BUT... I RUN IN SHORT SHORTS IN JANUARY!!!

Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Hawaii Finale

Matt & Dee on our date night in Haleava Me and the brother-in-law-in-law to be.
We were a scooter GANG!
The view from Diamond Head.
Our visit to the Breakers. My mom's childhood vacation spot - SOOO COOL!

Hawaii II

my hubby, the mermaid with voluptous boobies
Rick & Martha. We got to visit them in Kailua! They took us to 2 amazing beaches and had a little bar-b-que for us.
This is the part where I'm all "ya, I could pursue a career as a beached whale." and then another wave comes, whips me around, and exposes me to half the beach.
Matt and Carla (I dont know why the pictures are small after this, sorry!)
Andrew & Sam. Its hectic.

Hawaii I

PIPELINE.
the lays (spelling anyone?) smelt AMAZING!
first night on the beach in honolulu. sooooo fun!
ENGAGED!! Andrew proposed on the beach and it was beautiful. The wedding's in June!
We all got very familiar with the boogy boarding. And the sand got very familiar with my private places as IT LODGED ITSELF EVERYWHERE!!

renovations

feel free to oooo and ahhhh appropriatly at the overhaul on my blog. i like the prettieness of it and I FINALLY FIGURED OUT LINKS!! you'd think, working on a computer all day long and helping create the power to change website, i would have some knowledge of this, but i didnt. but blogger has finally made it dummy proof enough that my 10-year-old cousin could do it so i'm set. so please, check out my links, i think they're all pretty cool, hopefully you will too!
hawaii was lovely, thank you for asking. we enjoyed ourselves immensely and i will post some pictures here which will share the full story!
we hit christmas with the Juliens this year in S-land and it was ... hectic and perfect. we're now 9 cousins (including husbands) and 5 aunts & uncles/parents and when we squish into a room and rip into the stockings - its chaos. and i wouldnt trade it for the world! we're loud, we can be obnoxious and we laugh ... a lot. we played the wii and watched tons of planet earth. we went for long walks and ate WAY TOO MUCH.
and now january has come and almost gone and life is... nuts! matt's been working lots of nights and has started 7 classes (that's right, my husband is a freaking genius - you might want to get his autograph). i have filled my days with work and friends and church stuff. (if you're at our church, you should check out our cool wall!)
we've brought the term "scrimping and saving" to a whole new level and laugh at ourselves constantly. we're living for september and yet trying, day by day, to find life in to space and time God has given us. to not reach for the stone to make bread. to not just exist, but to remember we're crazy busy and poor for good reasons right now.
feburary here we come....

Wednesday, December 12, 2007

"is da beach dat way?"

I can't beleive how quickly Christmas has come! On Monday it will be 1 year since Matt and I tied the knot... WOW! It has been a year full of huge laughter and, at times, huge challenges. My wonderful hubby is amazing. I am so lucky because he treats me like a princess and keeps me giggling. Matt's done really well with school this past year, he got to drive a huge truck for the summer and got some kicks out of that and he's also landed himself a job with KPMG - Abbotsford here he comes (NO we're not moving to Abbotsford in answer to the inevitable question that everyone asks). I was telling a friend the other day about how marriage sometimes brings out the worst in you and it's true. But while it brings out the worst in me int those moments where I am irrationally flipping out about something very very lame, its also has brough out the best in us and I love that about marriage. Matt has consitently challenged me in my areas of weakness and I know I DEFINETLY wouldnt be who I am today without him. I'm looking forward now to year 2 because someone told me that's the magic number for when husbands stop leaving dirty underwear on the floor... right???



On to other news - we leave for Hawaii in 2 DAYS!!!! Holy hannah - you can bet how much excitement fills the Splinter house these days! Matt's parents are SO wonderfully taking us and the girls and Andrew to Hawaii and we CANNOT WAIT! Last night I raided Shannon's summer clothes and now I have a whole new wardrobe and am good to go! I have this continuos image in my head though of Stefan (my cousin) in Point Roberts, in front of his giant sand castle, imitating Schwarsenager - "Is da beach dat way?" (while flexing his arms all manly like) I CANT WAIT!



Speaking of the Julien clan - we also cant wait to spend Christmas with the fam in Summerland - bring on the Talent show! I will share some of our antics after!

Merry Christmas!

Tuesday, October 23, 2007

H&M

This weekend Danielle and I finally got a day together and decided to relive the memories at H&M. We braved the traffic and rain into Coquitlam and enjoyed ourselves quite a bit even if we didn't really enjoy the store. I really loved H&M in Europe - I'm pretty sure we went to one in all 21 countries we went to - it was SUPER cheap and really trendy for Europe but full of fashions that I knew hadn't hit Canada yet. I came home with all these great tops that came out here about 6 months later. But when we went to the H&M here in Canada I was very disapointed that is seemed to be just as expensive as Jacob or Old Navy. Its still a really trendy store but the problem is I just dont really like the trend right now - skinny jeans and pregnancy tops are just not doing it for me - probably because I'm not 17 years old or pregnant BUT I am holding out hope that one day, when I like what's trendy again, I will enjoy H&M with the same enthusiasm that had us traipsing in to every outlet across Europe!

Monday, October 15, 2007

why i love mark driscoll's rants...

"There is a strong drift toward the hard theological left. Some emergent types [want] to recast Jesus as a limp-wrist hippie in a dress with a lot of product in His hair, who drank decaf and made pithy Zen statements about life while shopping for the perfect pair of shoes. In Revelation, Jesus is a pride fighter with a tattoo down His leg, a sword in His hand and the commitment to make someone bleed. That is a guy I can worship. I cannot worship the hippie, diaper, halo Christ because I cannot worship a guy I can beat up. I fear some are becoming more cultural than Christian, and without a big Jesus who has authority and hates sin as revealed in the Bible, we will have less and less Christians, and more and more confused, spiritually self-righteous blogger critics of Christianity."
Mark Driscoll - on the biggest challenges facing young Christiand in the next 10 years.