Babies

In the past 4 days we've had two close friends give birth and a third who is about to deliver any day now. Obviously we can't but become involved in the hype of having that tiny, new, wrinkly, precious miracle. These couples are so lucky to expand their family and welcome their newest into their home. Babies are just so darn cute!

It's also interesting to note that (as of 4 days ago), we know 23 couples currently expecting. Can you believe that?! 23!! It's absolutely wild! But, as I explained to some friends before, when we were getting married we were extra observant of who else was getting hitched. Naturally, because we are in those child-bearing years, we seem to notice whomever is expecting. No, we are not pregnant (who would announce that on a blog, anyway?!) I'm only saying that as we approach the 2 year mark of marriage most people think we are taking too long to hop on the baby-making bandwagon.

It also doesn't help that being in Early Childhood Education and having an occupation as a caregiver/nanny, I see children EVERYDAY, literally. I am surrounded by children between the ages of 1 day and 10 years old. Between the 5 families I work for, the kindergarten classroom I volunteer in, friends and their kids....I am surrounded by children on a constant basis. Some believe this is the best type of birth control, but to me I just love children so much that I thrive in their presence. It's also great practice for when we DO take that step into parenthood.

We can't wait to become parents ourselves. I'm pretty sure we've already named our children in full and we're not even trying to get pregnant right now! We are looking forward to that next priority in our life, however, it is not necessarily the next step for us. We will get there...when we are ready. In the meantime we will continue to live vicariously through our 46 friends in celebrating the new budding life of their newborns. :)

Thanks on Thanksgiving

We have many things to be grateful for on this wonderful Canadian Thanksgiving weekend. Although my list could go on and on and on, I'll try to narrow it down to the most important ones.

Family. We are both so blessed to have been brought up and loved by such tremendous family members. Our parents are the most kind, charitable, generous, giving, thoughtful, and pleasant people to be around. Our many siblings bring us happiness and laughter the more we spend with them and make memories together. Truly it's ironic that we BOTH lucked out with great families, and now as we have created our own family we hope to inherit some of those remarkable qualities.

Friends. Even though we may not be the most social people around, we are grateful for the few token friends we do have. We cherish the friendships we have made both as single adults and as married ones. We love that we can get together with our friends for an evening of fun, great food, laughter and conversation. We feel so blessed to have them in our lives, in fact, that we are celebrating this holiday with some friends tomorrow with a great feast (plus, our one friend is very pregnant, and she needs some serious King pumpkin pie!)

Health. We are certainly blessed to have, on a whole, a very healthy family. I am grateful that Andrew heeds my annoying nags about washing our hands constantly...but fortunately it has paid off thus far. We may have our minor issues to deal with here and there, but as we look around at our friends and neighbours around the world, we are definitely privileged to have the health we do.

Education. I know, I know, we complain quite often about school and the work that comes with it, but deep down we are eternally grateful for this knowledge we are receiving. We both are passionate about our career choices and although the means of getting there may be time-consuming, difficult, and VERY expensive, we feel blessed that we are able to overcome these trials and get some excellent education. This is the stage that we are in currently and we will continue to enjoy each step as we learn together.

One Another. Yes, a little cheesy, but I feel that the greatest blessing that we have is each other. I believe that we are such a great match and we compliment one another in so many ways. We try to be supportive, helpful, generous, compassionate, selfless, and most of all, loving. We certainly do not have a perfect marriage and we are definitely continuing to learn and grow together, but we are beginning to understand the process and how to effectively make this marriage work. I love Andrew and he is by far my best ally.

Six Word Saturday

Celebrating a friends' birthday equals PARTAAAAAYYYY!

Tonight Andrew and I are taking a break from our serious studying and essay writing (read that as watching movies and sleeping in) to celebrate my girlfriend's birthday. What's better than some munchies, fun people, great music, and a little dancing?! Not much...

Happy Birthday Sandy!

Moving Ahead

We are back in our little apartment in Toronto and settling into a new, back-to-school routine. Our trip out west was definitely worth it and we loved every minute there. The weddings, birthdays, and baptisms turned out beautifully with so many new memories to lock away in our hearts.

My brother and his new bride looked wonderful on their special wedding day. It is exciting to have a new sister-in-law (a first on my side!) and for my brother to have found someone so fantastic. They are really fun together and their wedding celebrations echoed their personalities.

My sister and her new man also tied the knot while we were visiting (great planning, eh? :P) They had such a FUN and "Debbi" wedding which turned out to be on a perfect day. The colours, the people, the music, the food--everything was amazing. I am thrilled for them and the new chapter they are making in their lives.

Being with my whole family is always so exciting and exhausting (in a good way!). Having to coordinate where everyone will sleep, who is showering when, what's for dinner for these 30-something people...it's craziness!! But I truly love it all. I love being around them all and being goofy and silly together--that's the BEST! They are such incredible men and women and I feel privileged to call them my siblings.

And my amazing husband is definitely my angel. He is always so grounded and supportive when I need him to be and is my constant companion in every sense of the word. He was a fantastic date for the many occasions we had to celebrate and I am so grateful for this wonderful man I married almost 2 years ago (can you believe it?!)

We are excited to be back in school (Andrew more so than I, mind you) and are anticipating what this next school year will have for us. It may be difficult at times to coordinate computer time usage, editing hours, grocery shopping and laundry duties, and school applications, but we manage it and have fun with it.

Here's to a fun summer, and a promising school year ahead!

Weddings, Weddings, Weddings!

Our time in the west has proved to be eventful and exciting. We love being around my family, no matter how crazy or insane we all are when put together. This last weekend, we celebrated with everyone in the marriage of my sister to my new fantastic brother-in-law. It was a gorgeous day for a wedding and most things went off without a hitch. My sister looked STUNNING in her dress and the couple couldn't stop smiling all day. It was so exciting for everyone to see my sister finally find her dream man and marry him for time and all eternity in the temple.

We also celebrated two baptisms and a birthday this week, while also driving down to see Andrew's older sister and her new (giant!) home in Montana. It was a nice, yet short, visit filled with yummy food, a trip to the dinosaur park, driving through the mountains, watching butterflies, walking kids to school, playing Twister, watching movies, sitting in the hot tub, and making many memories. We're not sure when we'll see them again, so this visit was well needed and we are happy to have made the trip.

Now we are back at my parents house prepping for the next wedding which will take place tomorrow. My brother is marrying a beautiful girl in the temple tomorrow and tonight there is a calling reception, and tomorrow an open house at my parent's place: read that as "we have a lot of cleaning/cooking/baking/decorating/WORK to do"! I'm sure they will love every minute and enjoy the celebrations with them as the centre of attention.

Not long after my brother gets married, my other sister will tie the knot to her fun and friendly new love. They are super cute together and I am so happy she has found a man to make her happy and to love her unconditionally. Their wedding will be beautiful and I'm really looking forward to being a part of it by providing some music for everyone and the couple.

There's lots of people coming and going, lots of tasks to complete and several things to look after. It's a busy home, but it'll all be worth it with the memories that are being made.

Woah, Tomato

Last week, my dear mother-in-law taught me a new life skill and I'm thrilled to say now that I can preserve my own food. Andrew was out of town at the conference, but MIL and FIL drove down to my place and we traded expertise on a few things: they taught me how to can tomatoes, and I taught them how to change their Facebook profile picture.

Canning tomatoes is much easier than I imagined! Sure, I don't have any of the necessary equipment, but I learned how to do it and actually completed half of all the preservatives. I remember my mom canning all sorts of things when I lived at home; tomatoes, peaches, pears, crab apples, and even salmon. I'm just starting with the easiest but maybe one day I'll have a little factory working for me.


I had an AMAZING teacher who was patient, knowledgeable, and forgiving of our little apartment-sized kitchen. I loved getting down and dirty with tomato skins all between my fingers. It feels like a great accomplishment to have 20 new jars of canned tomatoes to add to our little (but growing!) food storage. Thanks for all your help and knowledge, Mama S.

I Hope This Week Goes By Quickly...Like the Last 3 Years Have

It's only been 13.5 hours and I am missing my husband like I've never missed him before! (But who's counting the hours, right?) Andrew is off at a youth conference as a workshop leader and house leader this week and I can't stop thinking about him. All day, I imagined him at the university, whether eating lunch, doing a presentation, or hamming it up with the youth that he loves so much. I know he'll be an exceptional presenter this week as he has put in several hours on end preparing for this special occasion. He's been looking forward to it for months and without a doubt he's going to knock 'em dead. He's doing his workshop on dating, which holds high expectations for youth ages 16-18, for obvious reasons. He'll be amazing...I just wish I could be there to see it and cheer him on.

This conference also marks three years since we first laid eyes on each other. (Everyone together: "Awwwww!") He plans to begin his workshop with that, given that it's so relevant to his workshop topic (but he'll leave out the part that explains that 3 years ago I was a youth and he was a leader at the event!) I never imagined 3 years ago that I would married by this point, but that's the way it's worked out and it couldn't be any better.

So for this week, I'll gorge on bad food, take up all the covers, sleep with the window open for once, immerse myself in loads of hours at work while counting down the hours and days until his return on Saturday evening.

I miss you, Andrew!

**Edit: Andrew phoned me tonight and I could feel him BEAMING on the phone. He said that on a scale of 1-10 on how great his workshops went, he gives them a solid 9.5!!! I am soooooooo proud of him and so glad he called. He is having an amazing time at the conference and can't wait to continue teaching the youth. He makes me so happy and even made me cry tonight (yes, I miss him THAT much).

Six Word Saturday

Caribana Festival has turned Toronto WILD!

This festival is absolutely huge -- the biggest Carribean festival in all of North America, and today's final parade has transformed Toronto into a wild, crazy, skin-bearing city! Women are all over the place dressed like this:


Our neighbours all around, who are from the Caribbean, are having Happy Hours after Happy Hours and living life to the fullest on this beautiful Saturday. So we've decided to join in the fun and blare some Haitian music in our little apartment!

An nou fete!
("Let's Party" in Haitian Creole)

Good Work, Andrew!

It's another proud wife moment;

Andrew got a promotion!!!

Yesterday was a great day as Andrew's boss officially promoted him to Coach/Supervisor and gave him a pay raise! We have been waiting for this for a while and I couldn't be more excited for him. He has been working very hard all summer and deserves this increase.

Way to go, Andrew!

Jumping on the Band Wagon

We've decided to join the club and participate in Six Word Saturdays started by Cate at ShowMyFace.com. Basically, you describe your life in six words on Saturdays.

Today we say:

Got free tickets to Canadian Open!

My employer gave us some tickets to check out some serious golf here in the GTA and we are thrilled to get cultured with something that we've never done before. My boss's brother is a professional caddy so we will be cheering him and his player on during the tournament. (And maybe Mike Weir, too.) Let's just hope the weather cooperates with us so that we don't become ducks in the water hazards.

Bring on the visors, runners, polo shirts, and the famous "Golf clap"!