la Ghetto Booté

Still Alive and Kicking

2005-03-17T12:49:00.000-05:00

Well people, here I am, I'm still alive, I have not disappeared off the face of the earth. Hehe, I know you were all concerned.
I'm sorry for the lack of updating - lets just say, as everyone else will, busy equals my life. Can I suggest that working while going to school is not a very good method if you want to get all your work done on time, and be able to get adequate sleep, including having a normal social life. Holy crappers does it ever suck. Thankfully I only have 2 weeks left at this Zellers, which is like... SO EXCITING! I'm looking forward to not having to work, but then I remember why I gave them my notice... cuz the month of April is goign to be INSANE! Yes, everyone, you may agree.
Hehe, but I don't want to make this blog update all a bunch of complainage and whinery. Insteadf I'll.... ummm...
Well, I HAVE NEWS! It has been officially decided that moi, Claire Heather Fleetwood, will be living in B.C. next year with my vonderful dormmate Adrienne. I am going to work for at least a school year, trying to save money for either more schooling or more travelling (i.e. Hawaii). Anyway, I think its uber exciting, boy, haven't used that word in awhile, and I can't wait til September.
Banquet is coming up this weekend. Its going to be tons of fun. Quite excited. We're goign to miss those of you who won't be there - you big JERKS! hehe, jokes jokes.
Oh, and guys I only have my grandparents car for 4 more days. Sniff...sniff... so sad is that. Ugh, I'm going to miss Mona! You were so reliable on our late night Tim Hortons runs.
OHHHHHHHHHHH, just thought of more fun news. If any of you are on or near or know of Redeemer campus and more preferrably know me.. you must come visit my dorm to meet our new dormmates. THey're names are Captain Jack and Mrs. Petticoat Smith. If you want the full-length story of the acquiring of their names just ask. Captain Jack and Mrs. Petticoat Smith are two black goldfish, the cutest of them all at that! Anyway, they're living in our dorm now.. so you should come introduce yourself. Because they need to socialize. All they do now is swim, swim, and... look at our yucky messy dorm. Please, come give them some entertainment.

Happy St. Patrick's Day my friends!

Oh, and you're so right Craig. I can't complain about actually having a cart and only having to walk about 200 metres... I feel for you... really I do :)

Procastination of Semester 2 has officially begun!

2005-01-31T14:17:00.000-05:00

First things first... an announcement! My cousin has just gotten engaged! Quite exciting. Shes been dating this nice guy for a few years now, and they finally got engaged! The wedding will be small, but I hope to go to the ceremony... cousins aren't invited to the reception :(. Hehe, a little news to brighten my day.

Secondly, my sympathies to those tall Redeemer students who have to lug home the mini-shopping carts 'The Market' provides for us. Being a tall Redeemer student myself I have been blessed with short dormmates who are willing to bring the full cart back, in exchange for me carrying it there. Though I understand how frustrating it is to be slowly carrying it back and then hear it fall on the ground... eggs smashed, bread smushed, grapes rolling everywhere. Hehe, one thing I never realized though is how funny it is to watch this happen to someone else. Lol, sorry guys, but I looked out my window in time to see it drop out of your hands. Luckily only your bread fell out. Oh, and props to the intellectually superior students who tape hockey sticks or contraptions that make the handle longer. Genius!

Thirdly, I'm starving... Can someone give me an idea for some lunch?

Bon soir!

2005-01-13T23:54:00.000-05:00

Bonjour. Je m'apelle Claire. Je vais ecriver cette journale en francais parce que je suis agacant et enneyeuse. Mes apologies a toi Kimber, je sais que tu ne sais pas qu'est ce que je dit, mais si tu parles avec moi je vais deviner pour toi. Je pense que cette journale va etre utile pour apprendre le francais Kimber! Tu sais que je suis correcte!

J'accord. C'est decider. Je suis un(e) nerd. Completement. J'ai donne des 'brackets' a cette 'e' parce que je ne sais pas qui c'est feminine. Est'ce que c'est masculine? Je ne sais pas. Ci tu sais, sil vous plais ecriver ici. Merci!

Alright. Well since thats done and I've diagnosed myself as a 100% percent complete nerd in the region of french. Except I made our french teacher's day today. Hehe, she said we should look at the French board that Yolisa deJager made about her trip because theres a ticket to a theatre on her board that is in the movie we just watched. Anyway, because of my nerdity I wanted to nlook at it. So I stopped. And she walked up behind us and said " You just made our day." Hehe, oh to be teacher's pets, i.e. nerds. What fun.

By the way, if you go to Kimber's blog. Which because I don't know how to make links on this stupid blog thing it is..., www.livejournal.com/users/krimbe, Tal refers to her as the essence of cool, and as she is THE coolest. I would like to refute this. Now, Tal of course is the essence of cool. I agree with that. I mean come on, shes friends with me. Who isn't ;). But I have to say she can't be the coolest. I am in fact cool itself. If anyone was in the vicinity of coolular, that would be me. Tal only comes into that because she hangs out with me. Bahaha! And that is my refutation... if thats a word... and I know... its a horrible refutation... how horrible is the vicinity of the refutationular... but rest assured... and please believe. my words speak the truth... i am THE cool. Tal is a friend of THE cool. Therefore, from the process of deduction... she can't be THAT cool. Muwahaha.......

Alright I'm spent. Chow my friends :)... oh and Christina, I miss you!

Props to all my women out there

2005-01-08T13:10:00.000-05:00

I randomly checked my Yahoo mail this morning, or rather afternoon... I just woke up. And there was a forward from a lady I worked for over the summer entitled "Women." Anyway, it was really cool so I've decided to put it on here.
Voila:

By the time the Lord made woman, He was into his sixth day of working overtime.
An angel appeared and said, "Why are you spending so much time on this one?"
And the Lord answered, "Have you seen my spec sheet on her? She has to be completely washable, but not plastic, have over 200 movable parts, all replaceable and able to run on diet coke and leftovers, have a lap that can hold four children at one time, have a kiss that can cure anything from a scraped knee to a broken heart and she will do everything with only two hands."
The angel was astounded at the requirements. "Only two hands!? No way! And that's just on the standard model? That's too much work for one day.Wait until tomorrow to finish.
"But I won't," the Lord protested. "I am so close to finishing this creation that is so close to my own heart. She already heals herself when she is sick AND can work 18 hour days."
The angel moved closer and touched the woman. "But you have made her so soft, Lord."
"She is soft," the Lord agreed, "but I have also made her tough. You have no idea what she can endure or accomplish."
"Will she be able to think?", asked the angel.
The Lord replied, "Not only will she be able to think, she will be able to reason and negotiate."
The angel then noticed something, and reaching out, touched the woman's cheek. "Oops, it looks like you have a leak in this model. I told you that you were trying to put too much into this one."
"That's not a leak," the Lord corrected, "that's a tear!"
"What's the tear for?" the angel asked.
The Lord said, "The tear is her way of expressing her joy, her sorrow, her pain, her disappointment, her love, her loneliness, her grief and her pride."
The angel was impressed. "You are a genius, Lord. You thought of everything! Woman is truly amazing."

And she is! Women have strengths that amaze men. They bear hardships and they carry burdens, but they hold happiness, love and joy. They smile when they want to scream. They sing when they want to cry. They cry when they are happy and laugh when they are nervous. They fight for what they believe in. They stand up to injustice. They don't take "no" for an answer when they believe there is a bettersolution. They go without so their family can have. They go to the doctor with a frightened friend. They love unconditionally. They cry when their children excel and cheer when their friends get awards. They are happy when they hear about a birth or a wedding. Their hearts break when a friend dies. They grieve at the loss of a family member, yet they are strong when they think there is no strength left. They know that a hug and a kiss can heal a broken heart. Women come in all shapes, sizes and colors. They'll drive, fly, walk, run or e-mail you to show how much they care about you. The heart of a woman is what makes the world keep turning. They bring joy, hope and love. They have compassion and ideals. They give moral support to their family and friends. Women have vital things to say and everything to give.
HOWEVER, IF THERE IS ONE FLAW IN WOMEN IT IS THAT THEY FORGET THEIR WORTH!

Endquote. Wow. I just thought it was really cool, as a woman myself, to think about the way God made me. Obviously he didn't have a conversation like that with some angel dumb enough to question His craftsmanship. But.. well, anyway, it was a nice piece of encouragement. I hope it can encourage some of my fellow ladies out there.

Chow my friends :)

Apologies...

2005-01-01T21:21:00.000-05:00

So, I've just come on the internet and I was looking around at all my dormmates blogs and decided to check mine. Lol, only for the reason that I decided to finally update it. Anyway, I checked the comments and found some "anonymous" one saying "UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE..." lol, oh dorm 201. Whichever of you it was I ruv you ;). That's right. Ruv.
What was odd though is when I signed in and it shows you the little tool bar or whatnot it said my last update was December 30/2004. If I"m not correct, Dec. 30 is two days ago, and my last update was Dec. 15. Hmm. I'm confused. "Confoosed and Confuffled" as my dormmates would suggest I say.
Anyway, I'm sorry I haven't updated in awhile. There isn't much motivation too. Life hasn't been very eventful. Though I got almost all of my shifts given away at Zellers and got too come home for my last week off! So excited. It has been fun too.
One word of advice for this post: Vaughan Mills. Amazing mall; has a Tall Girl; huge parking lot; right off the 400; DON'T BRING MONEY WITH YOU. Lol, and that, is my advice. You should all take the trek to this new Vaughan Mills mall. First of all as mentioned it has a Tall GIrl shop, second of all its a huge mall! with some pretty funky stores. THe only problem is you will spend money if you go there. So if you have no money and don't want to spend it then don't bring anything with you. Period. Hehe.
Also, I have a beef. Now I'm not so good at putting these 'beefs' into words cuz I tend to just ramble. Lol, I need someone who could put it more eloquently. But you know what bugs me?! Slow drivers who purposely stay in the passing lane when they know you want to pass them. I got behind this quite slow driver. She was quite annoying. Ugh. Anyway, I was patiently awaiting this part of the road where they open up a passing lane. Its the point when all the fast drivers get giddy and scoot around all the stupid slow people, no offense to any stupid slow people I know ;). Anyway, so the passing lane earrives, and the nice little lady stays in it! Ugh! Isn't it a known rule that you stay to the right unless passing people?!?! THats right. It is. So I had to follow the chick practically all the way home. Oh man. So people, follow the rule thats there for a reason: so fast drivers like me can get home that 76 seconds quicker.
Lol, okay, theres my update. Now I have to go cuz my fam is watching some weird movie and my tapping is to loud for them. I can't help it I type fast :). Chow my friends... and Happy New Year!

Cold!

2004-12-15T16:12:00.000-05:00

So I think it's time I update my blog again. I'm at my sister's house right now so I decided I'd take advantage of the WORKING internet, rather than wait ages while the stupid pages load and I have to go back and write it over again after it all crashes. Lol.

Anyway, exam time has arrived. Woot!Woot! I got one done and I think it went alright. I knew what I was talking about... sort of. I just couldn't remember the name of the poem I was talking about. Shucks. I have one on Friday which will be great, one Saturday afternoon which will suck and one Tuesday morning, which will rock! French, oh how I lov eyou. You boost my GPA, like tons!

My birthday also came and went. I am now the big 2-0, which Caell likes to mock me for getting old. Though may I remind him that his birthday is coming up quite soon as wel. My family visited which was very nice. It was so good to see them though their stay was short and a little cold considering it was freezing outside! But I was so glad to see them. A couple friends and I also went out that night for an amazing night on the town to celebrate. Adrienne, Kimber, Caell, and I went to a club in Hamilton, lol, which royally sucked, so then ended up in Hess Village, which was actually fun.

Anyway, now everyone is just sleeping in, getting some studying done and looking forward to Christmas holidays. I wasn't originally looking forward to them because I didn't think I was going ot get ot go home but, praise the Lord, I am not working Christmas eve or the day before so I can have at least 3 days at home! SO excited. I may end up working boxing day as well, but if the sdcheduling lady goes by my availability I'm not technically available that day. Oops. Lol, definitely boosted my spirits for the next ewek or so. I thought I was going ot have to live all by myself for 2 weeks straight over the holidays. How fun would that be.

Anyway, I should probably get going so I can catch a bus home and do a bit of shopping. Hope eveyrone is either done exams or doing well at them or getting through them or looking forward to christmas! only a week and a half left people! woot! woot!

Chow :)

Oh gosh!

2004-11-19T15:39:00.000-05:00

For goodness sake it has been two weeks since my last post. I apologize profusely to the zero people who read this. Hehe, I know, no one cares. Anyway, not too much has happened in the past two weeks.

Basically my life has consisted of work, class, work, class, and so on. If I'm not in class or working I'm trying to catch up on sleep or get some work done. So let it be said that I'm stressed. That's right. Stressed.

Monday nights I've been going to Bethel Young Adults service. How much fun is it. Uber fun, thats right, uber. I really enjoy it. I don't know why it just seems to completely rejuvenate me and I feel completely refreshed afterwards. Just excellent. If any of you are near, you should definitely come out some Monday night. I think you'll like it.

Also, I don't know if I've posted about this before, but God has been shoving me in the face lately about doing soem kind of missions work. Okay... he hasn't really shoved me in the face. But he has been laying on my heart a desire to go somewhere and help some children. I believe that God wants me to go to Africa. I think this is where He is directing me. I'm just not sure when or what he wants me to do yet. But thanks God for letting me know where! And if anyone has time to pray that he'll show me when it would be mucho aprpeciated. Hehe, its kind of exciting.

Well folks, its almost Christmas time. Unfortunately I'm getting in the spirit of Christmas already because of working at Zellers. Disgustingly, we've had Christmas music playing for the past 2 weeks and a half which is exactly the same music played at the Bay in Markville. Kill me now! The third Christmas in a row that I'm listening to the same stuff. Argh! But, despite the music, I am enjoying this Chrsitmas season and all the pretty ornaments I have to wrap up. Tons of fun.

Oh... and... well... I'm trying to remember... but I'm pretty sure that someone's birthday is in 3 weeks. Not quite sure whose. Some really tall blond echick. Shes uber cool... I just can't remember her name. Hehe... hmmmm...

Off to do homework, Chow!

p.s. letters from friends at home rock! Thanks CHristina! Love you tons :)

Ummm....

2004-11-04T13:00:00.000-05:00

Well, I didn't know what to title this blog. Cuz I don't really have much important things to say. I just wanted to write about whats happened in the past week and a half or so since I blogged. Goodness I think it's been a week and a half.

My little sisters visited this past weekend. It was reading break and half my dorm had gone home or on road trips, the other half was here with me in our quiet boring school. Now it was only boring cuz there was like no one here. But it was very very nice to have such an empty dorm for a change. Anyway, my sister came up Friday and stayed til Sunday. I had to work Friday and Saturday, boo, but those days went quickly so it was all good. We watched a total of 6 or 7 movies the entire weekend. Actually my total went up to 8 when we watched Shrek 2 downstairs. Ugh. I was a fidgety zombie that evening I'd sat for too long staring at the TV. The list went something like this... THe Prince & Me, Finding Nemo, Sweet Home Alabama for the girls, Ever After, A Cinderella Story, Identity for me (SCARY MOVIE!!!!!!!!!!!), While You were SLeeping - cuz we missed church :(, Breakfast at TIffany's for me, and then to finish it all off... Shrek 2! Goodness, I am officially antisocial. Lol, not true. But thats all us girls could think to do the whole weekend. Anyway, it was good to see my girls again... I miss them so much out here as I do my parents and will have to get home again soon. Hopefully :(.
On Sunday Christina came and visited me as well! How fun was that. It was so nice to see her and hang out with her again, reminiscing about the summer and all our memories. Hehe, and I'm so glad she thoroughly enjoyed my dorm and my dormmates, lol, and she enjoyed the downstairs dorm as well. Oh those 101 boys.

I went to an SIM mission meeting last night. Wow... it was interesting and very scary at the same time. I didn't realize it was mainly for the India team, which I'm not sure I'm meant to be on, but it was still lots of good stuff. God is definitely still shoving this in my face. I'd completely forgotten my goal, or should I say desire to do some kind of missions work during university and now that I know I'm to do it with kids I'm trying to check out many possibilities. But hey. Tons up in the air still. And it won't happen til next year anyway so I have tons of time for God to tell me where I'm actually supposed to go. Hehe, hmm...

Anyway, I'm supposed to be in class now but its cancelled and so I'm at a loss of what I should do. I'm sure I'll just end up watching days, so I guess I'll say chow for now. Oh, and would someone kick this rain out! It royally sucks.

Chow :

when and where God

2004-10-24T13:36:00.000-04:00

Today at The Bridge Mr. Rob (his name is Rob Powell, don't ask me why I called him Mr. Rob) was talking about family. It was a really good sermon. I didn't like it at first when he said the Bible rejects family, but he made a good point about it. I think it was just the way he worded it that bugged me. Ask me about the point if you'd like. But I'm not goign to explain it cuz thats not the point of this blog. Why I'm mentioning this service is because they showed a Samaritan's Purse video about Operation Christmas Child. It was a movie showing them giving out the christmas shoeboxes to all these kids right. I'm sure most of you have already seen it. It just made me cry. That's what I want to do with my life. I want to be able to give something to children that makes them so full of joy they can't contain themselves. I don't care or how, God tell me that, I just want to make these kids happy! I don't want to be stuck in smelly Hamilton or small-town Claremont. I can't tell myself that I've been doing nothing so far towards this goal. I spent my summer on my own short term missions venture at good 'ol UAC. It felt so good to provide a place to go for these city kids where they had so much fun they didn't know what to do with themselves. Anyway, to not keep blabbing... seeing the movie this morning encouraged me on my passion in life. Now all I need is God to show me who and where and when.

On a funnier note, we went to Brampton Friday night. How fun was that. Apart from being exhausted we went to the department sized LCBO. This event involved me giving $5 bucks to the wrong thug who then walked past the right thug and acted like he never took his money. Even funnier was when Kimber and I both saw the money I yelled "hey buddy!" while Kimber yelled all innocently, "excuse me sir!" OH Kimber, how I love her. Honestly someone should have videotaped it. Hilarious.

Also, I worked at Zellers yesterday. And you know. Its crazy on a Saturday. Its like people can only shop on a Saturday. Doesn't make sense to me! But it was a good day. Apart from biking to Meadowlands at 8 in the morning in the FREEZING cold it went well. I had a nice fruit salad from the diner for 'brunch'. I even got nice compliments from customers. It makes my day when I have nice customers and I can chat with them. They renew my faith or trust in good people. Unfortunately there were a couple incidents I could do without. Like the lady who called her daughter ( a toddler) 'the Beast' to her older daughter, in front of the toddler. I wanted to smack her. How dare someone call her child a Beast just because the girls is stuck in a grocery cart and is pretty antsy. Argh! Also the three or four screaming babies throughout the day made for an exciting work environment! THank you Lord for giving me extreme patience cuz I was able to get through it. All my customers were complaining but really, did they have to work for 6 hours and sit through at least 3 chidlren screaming for a full 20 minutes while they wait in line? No, they only had to listen to one child for about 10 minutes and then they could leave. Awww, muffin. Suck it up!

Haha, okay I'm done. My family is coming up THursday or Friday to drop my sisters off to stay for a couple nights. I'm awfully excited - I miss them terribly. Also my friend Christina is hopefully coming up the Monday too to stay for a couple nights, how excited am I! You better still come :).

But I should go do work now. Enjoy the perpetual mist fellow residents of Hamilton! Chow.

Procrastinating...again.

2004-10-20T19:28:00.000-04:00

I feel terrible folks. I can't believe that I haven't written for OVER a week and a half. Its terrible. Hehe, but let it be known, I have been so busy I've been losing my mind. Out of my skull. Egads. Help!

Hehe, tons has happened in the past week and a half. Awesome concert at the Underground last week. Fun times... except for the guy jumping around in a speedo, and the other guys horking at each other, oh and that guy that told us to ahem... pull that ahem... out of our ahem... Yeah, that wasn't SO much fun. But all in all, fun fun. Lol. Saturday was work. And shopping! WOohoo! Then we had a good time at Crabby's. Except for a certain dude throwing pieces of crayon at my glasses. Hes just lucky he didn't break them ;).

Sunday was sleeping in time (sorry God), and crazy study time. This is the night I officially freaked out and was stressing out of my skull. Huh... But hey, the psych test is over now. ANd I think I did all right. Tuesday saw a pretty good French test, a grammar test I got 50% on, a paper that I wrote the night before which actually turned out awesome. I've worked Monday, and today (Wednesday) of this week and still have to work Friday and Saturday. Woohoo to that! Hehe, not so fun, except large paycheck. So I guess I'm okay with it. And I think I'm having dinner with Diana Friday night so amen to that!!

Right now I am procrastinating because I have a takehome midterm due tomorrow that, if you can believe it, I haven't started yet! Haha, oh goodness. I am officially a loser. Or I just work extremely well under pressure. I'm going to go with the latter. THat's right. My best work comes out at 2 in the morning when my assignment is due in 6 hours. Hehehe.

The most entertaining moment of this week came when I had a very unfortunate but utterly hilarious freudian slip. Patrick asked if I was hitting on him and I said... Yes, I want you Caell. endquote. Now Caell is a friend from downstairs, Patrick is a friend from offcampus. Lol, oh boy. Kind of embarassing. BUt hilarious all the same. And if you don't understand the term Freudian slip, look it up. Google it as they say. I don't have the itme to explain. Hehe.

Anyway, I hope everyone is enduring this cold wet weather. It royally sucks for riding to work in the morning and afternoon. Shiver!!!! But still gorgeous all the same. Thanks God.

Chow my friends!

Back at School...

2004-10-13T13:26:00.000-04:00

Well, we are all officially back at school and out of holiday mode. Sniff...sniff... I like holiday mode much more than school mode I'm afraid. But oh well... it'll end soon right?

The rest of my Thanksgiving weekend was incredibly fun. Monday we had all the family over and I think it was our best family visit yet. Everyone was in a good mood and we went for a hike and had tons of fun. At the same time it was depressing and sad because the only reason we had such a good time was because our Grandpa's wife didn't come. She "wasn't feeling well." Now you won't understand (you meaning whoever reads this) but just believe me. Hehe, its very depressing when we have a good time because one of our famliy members isn't there, and everyone realizes this as well. Ugh. Anyway, overall Thanksgiving was great.

On my second day back (yesterday) I had my first day at work - Zellers! I'm not sure whether to Woot!Woot! or boohoo :(. Hehe, but it went well as well, thank you Lord. I only had a few mishaps, had lots of customers. It was all really fun. What I didn't realize though was that I have to call people over the PA. I have to pick up the phone and say like... "ladies wear call 304, ladies wear call 304". Freak me out! Hehe, I was so afraid I was going to mess it up! Sheesh. Hehe, but at the end of my shift I got my Zellers shirt. Hehe, I know, wrong order. And I look ultra cool in it if you will, except that because of my monstrously long torso (grr tall genes) its a teensy weensy bit short. Which means if I ever accidentally put it in a warm wash or in the dryer I'M SCREWED! Hehe. But working at Zellers also means that I have an excuse to go buy a pair of semicasual black pants, like Dickies or something. Woohoo! Shopping trip! let's do it Adrienne :).

Anyway, work work work. Isn't that what I'm supposed to do here? Work. Right.

Chow my friends. I miss my family :(.

Ahh... St. Jacob's

2004-10-09T19:14:00.000-04:00

Well, I've only been home a day. But it has been such a fun day I just had to blog about it. First of all, the saddest part of the day was that we didn't get to sleep in. Sniff...sniff... We had to jet off to St. Jacobs to meet the g.parents for an early lunch. But its okay, there was coffee made so I was all set. We had lunch at the Stone Crock with Grandma and Grandpa. It was tons of fun, except I think I've trained my body to eat lunch at like 3 unfortunately so I wasn't in the mood for a big brunch. But it was nice to see my grandparents again. Afterwards we decided to go shopping and went to this store called "Earthwinds." As you can gather from the name it was all these Indian, Middle Eastern type clothing and really cool touristy things. Anyway, I bought a couple things :(. Smote me now! Haha, but I found this gorgeous really cool, sarong deal fancy skirt with ribbon and stuff. Its so pretty! I also found a really cool knitted hat that matches my new scarf and my winter coat so all in all that store was a jackpot. Oh and I forgot! Tal, I didn't mention this to you. The Campus Crew store in the mall had everything at like 5$ to 10$ bucks! So us girls got these really cool long sleeve Ts. And hallelujah, they are really longsleeved! How fun. Anyway, I should probably go back to hang out with the family since thats why I'm home, oh and to get some of that soup ;). Just ask 201 about this soup. Chow my friends. Hope you're enjoying your weekend.

Its Thanksgiving!

2004-10-08T13:50:00.000-04:00

Well guys, it is thanksgiving weekend! I'm so excited. Okay, sorry you Americans, but its Thanksgiving here. And I am excited. I'm about to go home for the weekend... and have lots of turkey! Haha, boy I'm a nerd. Anyway, yeah I hope everyone has a great thankgsiving, what are we all thankful for? I could go on and on so to answer that question so I just won't.

By the way, what is happening to the weather these days. This past tuesday it was freezing cold and I had to run in a sweatshirt and gloves. Today it is so gorgeous and we're all walking around in T-shirts! I'm so confused. Confwused! and Confwuffled! But hey can I complain. I guess not. The only problem now is what to pack seeing as I don't know whether it'll be cold at home or stay warm, or get cold the last day. Ugh.

Oh and more exciting news! I finally got my first shift at Zellers. How exciting. I called them up and she hadn't put me on the schedule yet but she just said to come in anyway to get started. By the way, for those of you who aren't in Expo. 201, the previous sentence is incorrect.... because you don't know who the she I'm referring to is. Aha! See, I've learned something. WOot!WOot! Now all I have to do is learn the rest of the grammar crap and I'll be set. What fun.

Well now I guess I should pack cuz I have to leave in an hour. Happy Thanksgiving!

Screens... are a wonderful thing.

2004-10-04T21:18:00.000-04:00

Well. Here I am procrastinating from finishing my English paper. I'm horrible. I've half written it. But now I just have to stick it in my computer and finish it up. Only problem = I don't want too. Soooooo, I think I'll do whatever else needs to be done BEFORE I do this stupid paper.

On another interesting Oy-Redeemer note, I just realized that my window screen hasn't actually been latched in this whole time and by randomly hitting it popped out of my window. Now both the latches aren't working and won't actually latch in to the window. What fun! So now its sitting up against my closer wall and my window is open. I could jump out of it and fall to my death at the moment. Well, okay its only the second floor. So really I could just break my neck. Hmm... that would be fun. Bahaha! totally kidding.

Well, thanksgiving is coming up this weekend. We're all pretty much going home. I'm not sure whether I'll have to come back early to work but hopefully I can stay home longer. We'll see. I get to see my grandparents too! That's exciting. I haven't seen them in forever and I got a letter from my G.ma a couple days ago and now I miss them. I'm not really close to them to begin with but they are still so cool, and adorable, and sweet, and I ruv them. So there.

Huh... what to talk about. What to do? Anything but write a paper. Please. Anything. Haha, gee. Maybe I should go do it now. Seeing as I'm trying so hard not to do it. Chow my friends

Silversmithing

2004-09-30T13:57:00.000-04:00

So, every Tuesday and Thursday at 10:50 I can be found in my Canadian Literature class, taught by Professor Cook. acouple days ago he read us a story that I absolutely loved and want to share with this blogging world. I don't know if you will like it or not but I thought it was very hmm... for the lack of a big word... good! Hopefully this isn't illegal or anything. Anyway. The story...

There was a group of women in a Bible Study on the Book of Malachi. As they were studying chapter three, they came across verse three, which says: "He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver." This verse puzzled the women and they wondered what this statement meant about the character and nature of God. One of the women offered to find out about the process of refining and get back to the group at their next Bible Study. That week the woman called a silver smith and made an appointment to watch him work. She didn't mention anything about the reason for her interest in silver beyond her curiosity about the process of refining silver.

As she watched the silver smith, he held a piece of silver over the fire and let it heat up. He explained that in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were hottest as to burn away all the impurities. The woman thought about God holding us in such a hot spot - then she thought again about the verse, "He sits as a refiner and purifier of silver." She asked the silver smith if it was true that he had to sit there in front of the fire the whole time the silver was being refined. The man answered that yes, he not only had to sit there holding the silver, but he had to keep his eyes on the silver the entire time it was in the fire. If the silver was left even a moment too long in the flames, it would be destroyed. The woman was silent for a moment. Then she asked the silver smith, how do you know when the silver is fully refined? He smiled at her and answered:

"Oh that's easy - It's finished when I can see my image in it."

Wow. When Prof. Cook read that I was just blown away by that last sentence. Some may be like... "what the deal yo." Haha, but that just reminds me again of what our ultimate goal as Christians is... to become like Christ and show God's love through our own actions and lives. I always wonder whether I am doing a proper job of showing God's love or whether I'm sucking at it. Hehe, don't worry, I know I do a good job sometimes, but man are there times when I could sure use some Jesus in my actions and words. Sheesh.

Hehe, anyway, thats my little shpeel for the day. Off to read some MORE English homework that is overdue. Whoopdeedoo!

Chow my friends :)

Oh my. Has it already been a week?

2004-09-26T21:40:00.000-04:00

Well people, I apologize profusely for not blogging in a week! I honestly have no clue how it went by already but gosh darn it the last time I blogged was 2 saturdays ago. So I guess I better eh.

Well. My week has been pretty good. I'm still having tons of fun with my dormmates and fellow neighbours and Redeemerites. I seem to have a lot to do and yet I don't have much homework. I'm not sure how it works, but hey its a good enough of system for me.

Currently, I'm at home for the weekend and boy is it nice to be back. My sister and I went with Redeemer to Wonderland for the day (yesterday) and then got picked up by my Dad to come home. We got home just in time for the last few ladies of mom's "tea" to leave. This "tea" was really just a ploy to sell these amazing cleaning products that her friend sells. Hehe, well it wasn't a ploy, those who came knew the stuff was going to be sold to them. Hehe, anyway. To make a long story short we didn't have to sit through it at all and just got the leftover goodies, and Mom got tons of free gifts for hosting and the amount that was sold. So all in all, sweet deal!

I was too exhausted to go to Saturday Night @ UA last night so stayed home with my wonderful mother instead. Unfortunately I missed some action, reportedly some man walked up on the stage while our friend Laird was starting his sermon or talk (its an outreach - they don't like to call it a sermon) and ahem, created some conflict [;) Tal]. But it was suppposedly a good night anyway. Church this morning was awesome. I got to see and visit with all everyone I've missed so much the past few weeks. Poor Karima couldn't go out for her birthday after all - don't you hate work which makes you come in on short notice when you've already had plans. Grr. Oh and good news which has officially been announced. We now have a new senior pastor, a Mr. David Wall(s). I can't remember whether its 'Walls', or 'Wall.' So don't quote me on it. He spoke during the summer and I thought he did a good job so I'm pretty excited. He comes from some church in the States and has been all over America doing some really cool stuff. As Christina would say... Rock on! Hehe, she'll understand ;).

Grandpa also visited today which was really fun. It was good to see him and chat with him. Overall this weekend has been really good to sit and chat with the fam. Get back into the old routine if you know what I mean, except this old routine is the good one!

I'm going to end this with a shoutout to Tal who was bored out of her skull when I talked dto her earlier this afternoon. What kind of conflict did you start? I want to hear all about how the meeting went, hehe, and I'm so sorry I wasn't there to make it even more exciting.
Oh... and hows the place looking? Should I prepare myself to walk into a disaster? I should shouldn't I.

Haha, anyway, off I go to watch some more TV and see how my Dad's audition went and then go to bed. Does anyone else notice that when they go home they feel their tiredness? Huhhhh. Chow :) I'll see some of you soon.

Laundry has been done!

2004-09-18T22:19:00.000-04:00

Well, it is now Saturday night. And I am sitting in my room with my fellow sick friend and dormmate, Gayle. We both have colds. Sniff...sniff... Boourns to colds. The rest of 201 are out playing ping pong at the moment. But Gayle and I were just too tired to do much of anything. Anyway, I just thought I'd complain about my filled up head and my scabby red nose that won't stop dripping and my throat and its ugly sounding cough. Hehe, what a description. Today I've actually been feeling a lot better than the past couple days htough so I am thankful for that. Sudafed is my hero for the next week.

Many apologies for that previous uber long blog. I had no idea I wrote that much. I wouldn't even want to read through that whole thing. Goodness.

My family went to Muskoka for the day today. How jealous am I. They drove up early this morning and are coming back tonight with my bike in tow. That I am excited about. I think they're hauling it up here in Diana's vee-hicle. So I won't get to see the fam but I do get a bike which is a nice thing, and probably my other blanket and maybe some other htings. Who knows. I think I only asked for my blanket.

Oh and good news. Well actually I don't know if its been announced yet so when I hear that its been announced I'll let you all know.

Oh, and even more exciting news! I did laundry. Woop!Woop! Hehe, I know I know, I'm a loser. I just love the smell of clean laundry. Hehe, except part of the purpose was to shrink my new jeans, except I didn't actually put them in the dryer so I'm hoping they either shrunk or I'm goign to have to wash them again soon cuz they probably didn't shrink as much as I needed them to.

Okay. Yeah I'm done. Going to the Bridge church tomorrow. I think its going to be a good time. Its this new church at a movie theatre in Burlington that a bus from Redeemer goes too. Sounds really cool. AND! they send you home with a bag lunch. Who could pass that up! Sweet deal.

Chow my friends :). Miss you terribly.

Trying to be smart here

2004-09-14T23:32:00.000-04:00

Okay. So this blog is pretty much going to try to be a deep blog. Deep coming from a dumb blonde though is a lot different coming from like a blonde Gayle. Just to clarify. Hehe, anyway. I was just completely bowled over last night with the conversations going on and just things that were said. Let me elaborate for those of you who weren't in dorm 201 last night. Ryan Timmy and most of us girls were just chatting away and we got to talking about our lives and our backgrounds and such, the difficulty of folding and wearing hospital gowns... shootings in schools and hometowns... things like that... you know. Hehe, anyway, the conversation eventually moved on to more interesting topics. Ryan and Tal talked about experiences they'd had and stories they'd heard about such as near-death experiences and angels, demons, things like that. I totally didn't want to go to bed, it was all so interesting to me! Over the years I have written so many events or circumstances off and not even thought about them. Last night, and other times before, made me realize how much God works in this world! For many years Satan has been a powerful force in my family and home trying to disrupt everything and cause a lot of turmoil. And he has definitely been relatively successful many times. But yet I look back and see how completely God was there... he had never left, we had just made the decision to be stupid for a matter of minutes. God has gotten my family through so many financial, emotional, and health worries and so much other stuff I can't even begin to list. Anyway, our conversations last night just reassured me and reminded me of that fact. Ryan also made this exciting point that we can know who our guardian angels are and he believes that every person has a few guardian angels. My heart burst when I heard this because it just makes me love God even more knowing I have a guardian. And I agree with Ryan! There are too many things in this world and in my life that are non-write-offable, hehe, if thats a word. I can't say I know who my guardian angels are, I can't say I've had any experiences with angels. I can say I know how powerful Satan is. I know what he can do to a person inside, how he can twist and twist at your heart. My heart has been full of fear and hesitance and... To this day I am afraid of my home in the dark, in the broad daylight especially when I am alone. It does not feel safe to me and I have a constant feeling of being watched. My parents and I agree that this shouldn't be written off either. I don't know exactly what I'm trying to say here. I just felt the need to comment about what we talked about last night and share some of why it was so effective to me. It again made my heart burst and reassured me of God's presence. He has been doing that a lot lately. I hope my sister will forgive me if she didn't want this put on the worldwideweb but she became a Christian again the week before we moved back to school! Praise God! is all I can say. I cried as she was in the other room talking to Mom and Dad and just saying how she couldn't do it by herself anymore. Some of you know of the troubles I have had with my sister in the past, the fear and resentment I've felt watching her take the wrong roads, rebel if you will, just wanting to shake her a billion times and say you know, STOP! Anyway, so many prayers have been answered by her accepting Christ again and this is just yet another example of God telling me... Hello! I am here. I am with you. You can come to me. You have no need to fear. And now this past couple days He has been telling me that He's got angels watching over me. How can I not shower him with thanks. This just reminded me of a couple statements in my devotions I've been reading the past couple of days. Statements like "The only safe place is in Jesus." "God is not capable of anything less than the best". "Jesus is the solid rock of our foundation." These constant reminders show me God's grace, love, confidence, trust in me and just encourage me in my faith and inspire me to trudge on and give more of myself to God, in hopes of allowing myself to give all of me. Anyway, this turned out to be quite a hulabaloo of a blog. Hehe, i.e. a long one. Please pray for my 1st year friend whos having a rough time adjusting to all the schoolwork and reading these profs give us. I know she can do it, and God will help her through it so... Well, time to either decorate my room... or do homework. Haven't decided yet. Chow my friends, God Bless.

1 week

2004-09-12T18:40:00.000-04:00

Well, I just realized that it has been officially one week since my last blog and since I moved in back on Redeemer's campus. And boy has it been a crazy busy week! I don't know what to talk about and yet theres so much I could write on here about. I've spent the week shopping, going to a late night luau, going to HotSpot, an amazing worship time, going to the Decade Dance in my sister's sequin dress and looking hilarious with my dormmates and fellow Redeemerites, and basically just hanging out with all ze friends that I have missed so much over the summer. Today we went to Booster Juice. Emm... If you've never had a Booster Juice you are totally missing out and I will have to take you sometime... (i.e. people from UAC ;). My room is a mess unfortunately. It is smaller than my first year room and somehow I have tons and tons of clothes so I don't know where to put it all. i have two boxes of clothes under my bed still! My most favorite thing about these apartments though is the ultra high bed! THese are IKEA beds and when I got here I switched ours around and flipped it over so now its almost at my hip height. And for those of you who know me my hips are kind of high off the ground. Hehe. So yeah its uber cool. Anyway, I'm in the middle of making KD so I should probably go check it before it lights the building on fire. CHow my friends :). I miss you all... sniff...sniff... but hope to see you soon!

2004-09-05T11:53:00.000-04:00

Well its Sunday. So far its another gorgeous day outside. This weekend slash week has been crazy busy. I haven't had much time to stop and think which is frustrating the hec out of me. Yesterday we packed up the van and trailer, to the brim I might add, and drove out to Hamilton to move Anne into her new place. It is really nice actually which we are all glad of. Goodness me she had a lot of stuff though. I've been feeling guilty for packing quite a few boxes but we almost couldn't fit all her stuff in! My, my. Its kinda sad to see her go I'm afraid. I know I'm moving out tomorrow and will be only 10mins. drive away but I loved living with her again here at home and am going to miss hanging out with her. Hopefully we can hangout more than usual this year. That does remind me that I am moving back to school tomorrow. I need someone to reassure me that its going to be great I'm afraid. At the moment I'm kind of sick thinking about it. I said goodbye to Leslie and Pat and Shannon, and I hoped to see a few others but didn't. Hmm... I am going to miss them so terribly. I think this year might actually be harder than the first. God has blessed me so much though and I'm trying to trust him with this year. Its become a bit easier with how He has helped me so far. I have the opportunity for a job at Zellers at my usual pay of just over $9/hr which is so amazing, I wasn't expecting to be able to get the same hourly wage. As well as a job He has blessed me with so many people who care about me and have hsowed it by giving me gifts of money. They are small but so appreciated, I don't know what I'd do without them. And I've already said this but throughout this summer He has just given me a sense of my future and I am more certain now than before that I am meant to work with kids in some way, shape, or form. This does make it hard though because all I want to do is skip school and find some kids work with! I know I can do that at school but I want to do it fulltime and I want to do it now! Hehe, I guess Gods giving me patience at the same time. Geez. Well, time to get back to packing slash making bread slash doing my sisters hair slash accomplishing 50 other things I have to do in time for tomorrow. See you soon my friends... and goodbye to my friends from home. I hope to visit you sooner than later. Chow.

Teacher? or Librarian?

2004-08-31T20:02:00.000-04:00

Well today was a gorgeous day. And successful! I went to the dentist, ugh, but thank the Lord had no cavities. And I got a new toothbrush which I was hoping for because I need one. Haha. I also got new glasses. Woohoo! They are so funky, yet we're having trouble deciding on what they make me look like. Ali says librarian. Lindsay says teacher. Mom and Dad just say ooohhhh...ahhhh..... Hehe, I love 'em. Anyway, I've made a dint in the stuff I've got to do. God is really looking after me this week. Hes opened up some ideas to deal with worries about school, one example being getting hooked up with a job, which sounds good to me! At least its not completely hooked up yet, but almost :). Anyway, I can't think of much else to write at ze momente. Maybe later.

Chow :)

An Ode to small towns

2004-08-29T17:18:00.000-04:00

Well, nothing much exciting has happened in my life recently. Same old same old work, rain, and no tan. Lol, just kidding on the no tan part, well tan relative to me... not my sister Lindsay who looks macedonian. Anyway, there has been some happenings around ye ol' small town of Claremont... a shooting! Hehe, how exciting! Well, I thought it was exciting, Mom and Dad were worried about the guy being shot at, as was I, but it was still so exciting! When I drove home from work Friday night there was caution tape wrapped around the General Store and immediate area with 4 police cars and plainclothes detectives and their cars around. My dad ended up finding the scoop and turns out a couple dudes came in the store around 8:30 ( in broad daylight I might add, what dimwits) and shot at the owner who was in the back storage room thank the Lord. I guess he saw them coming so closed the storage door and moved away. For some reason the two dudes were scared or something and only stole some cigarettes and a couple DVDs which they threw out their getaway car window. Anyway, the owner monsieur Daniel went chasing after them!!! The people who witnessed this whole thing watched these 2 guys with hooded masks and everything run down the street with Daniel (the Chinese guy that runs the store) running after them and they shot at him one more time! Lol, you Scarboroughtonians probably think is nothing compared to your last ocuple months... oh and the B-dot as well Tal ;), but man it was all the news in Claremont. Daniel was even giving out tours of the gunshot holes and fingerprinting stuff the next morning. Hahaha.

On second thoughts I wanted to warn my trusty females that love the Old Navy flip flops as much as I do. They have no traction!!! Haha, hopefully some of you haven't found this out the hard way but I sure did! I have fallen once and slipped 4 times so far today in the rain while wearing 2 pairs of the flops.

And Adrienne! I have exciting news for you. Hehe, you won't think it exciting at all, but I am so excited about it. And eventually my whole dorm will hear about it I'm sure, but this news is for you Adrienne. Lol, just for you.

Well, chow for now my friends. School is in a week. I'll see most of you soon. Time to chillax!

Back in ze GTA ... oh so sad

2004-08-27T21:53:00.000-04:00

Well here I am. Back in the immediate GTA. I was going to say city but if you've seen Claremont you would absolutely not call that a city. A lot has happened since I last updated. To start off I worked every day last weekend and it was long and boring and horrible. Then I drove 2 hours north to stay in our family trailer. What fun was that. We canoed til we collapsed, played Dutch Blitz and Speed my two favorite card games, I finally got a ball of hemp wed. night which satisfied my urge to make some necklaces or bracelets. The food was good, weather mediocre, speaker awesome. There was a special group there called Answers in Genesis that did all the mroning and evening chapels. There sermons were so interesting! We went to Fossils and the Flood, Is There Really a God? and the something about the real Scopes Trial. Boy did I learn a lot. Okay not that much, but I feel like I did. Some very intersting points to look at. I missed the one about Dinosaurs which I was really hoping to hear but oh well. Last night right after we got home us girls went and got our haircuts. Excitement!!!!! We both got layers done, I finally got my ends trimmed, ugh they were so dead. So now my hair is kinda layered and I can use my straightener to make it even better. So exciting. Today I went up to trusty 'ol Keswick and helped my aunt tidy and organize her house somewhat. That was exhausting! And then unfortunately I had to take a girl's shift tonight so I just got back from work. The one thing I am looking forward to though is my last day of work. Everyone seems to be rude and it is getting non my nerves. For instance Mark from jewellery, I used to work with him in shoes, is set on coming to my school and corrupting it with making a Girls Gone Wild movie. Oh brother, lol, I can't seem to convince him it won't work, oh well. Gibson from shoes has ruined my idea about buying these cools boxers... but I think I'll spite him anyway. But hey... a week left right? Hmm, I can't htink of anything else to say, and I need to get some food in me cuz I'm feeling faint. Have a great weekend everyone! Oh and some excitement is that my dormmates are flying in from BC on Sunday! Pray for safety, and woohoo!

Chow

Shout out to Kid's Kapers !!!

2004-08-19T21:36:00.000-04:00

Well today was officially my last day working for Kid's Kapers at Unionville Alliance Church. Some of my fellow coworkers seemed pretty excited about this... but I on the other hand am kind of upset. I mean... It is nice to have the camps over, the kids gone, the stress over and done with. I didn't exactly enjoy getting up so early to get to work relativley on time. But despite all my complaining... I have had one of the best summers in a long time. Did I write that right? Not sure. I just enjoyed working with the SSWs and Leslie and Verna soooo much. They are so great! So I was trying to think of a title to this blog. But I decided to call make it a shoutout to my Kid's Kapers buds. To Leslie... my tall blonde twin, you are so fun and I loved visiting/working with you. Don't shrink my Tall Girl Shop buddy... I dont' know what I'd do without you. To David... you are hilarious and I think you're so brave for going to TW in B.C. I apologize for all our girl talk you had to endure, hehe, but can I make a suggestion? Stop trying to make conflict... pleeeeeeease...... I dont' like it. But seriously you are an awesome guy... and don't lose your Hulk backpack Mr. I-wear-SpongeBobSquarePants-sandals ;), oh, and keep hunting down those Forky Tails! To Christina... my short morning pick-up buddy... I love your "rock-ons!" You are hilarious! Hehe, I will never forget your invitation to the g-hetto! Come visit me anytime girl, but only if you've started growing hair on your arms and legs. Deal? And p.s. you WILL design my house when I get one :). To Will... oh Will, what can I say to you. You are an uber cool guy... and I mean UBER. Don't underestimate yourself... and try not to break all those little girls hearts that are going to be falling for you minute by minute. And you ROCK at stories buddy... keep up the drama! To Kristen... You're gorgeous. I love your style and all your knowledge about everything. Psst... I won't tell anyone about our toes ;) I'm so sad you're not planning on coming back next summer, but if you change your mind... you know you want too! Hehe, good luck at school! To Rebekah... uber UBER cool Rebekah. You Shermans are so much fun. You ooze a confidence and strength in God that I strive for. In case you don't know already but you are such a brilliant woman... I can't wait to see what God has in store for you! Well... thats the Kid's kapers team. A bunch of brilliant people who are so good with kids and overall good at everything. I will miss you all so much this next year... please keep in touch! And if you ever want to come visit I might be able to hook you up with some tall dutch guys!... or some short brown guys (hehe, for you Jehan). I will be praying for you all.

And to finish this long thing off. I am looking forward to my week at the trailer next week. I plan on playing tennis, doing some running, making hemp everything, braiding my siss' hair... etc. Tons of fun! Oh and relaxing... I forgot the most important thing. Can anyone believe theres only 2 weeks til school? Goodness me. Hmm....

Chow my friends :)

Forced by my sister to add this...

2004-08-17T19:33:00.000-04:00

Well... on behalf of my sister I had to add this little comment to today's blog. When asked by her where the book of Titus was in the Bible I proceeded to say.. there is no book named Titus in the Bible. Oh goodness where did I come from! Lol and I'm the one goign to a Bible College/University. Uh-oh. Smote me now God :).

So...tired...want...chocolate...

2004-08-17T18:50:00.000-04:00

Well. It's been almost a week since my last post. Not sure why. Just not had the urge to write anything I guess. I know how Jehan and others feel now when they don't think they have anything to say. I do have some things to put on here though. Like our exciting trip to a Blue Jays game at the SkyDome. Oh, what a day. Let me tell you ;). It started off with a pretty crazy morning in Sunday School. Just ask David about Jayden and his dinosaur. Umm... yeah, just ask. Then the rest of the kids started coming around eleven and we left on the bus around 11:30. It was a surprisingly quick trip! Anyway to cut this story short though its incredibly exciting, my group to look after was originally these two boys that were in my group last week. The one kid was the Topher guy who almost drove me to a mental institution. Anyway, I was a bit worried about that but it turned out to be a good day........ except... for this cute little girl who decided to hang off me that particular day rather than Rebekah or Leslie. Well, she maybe stopped touching me for about five minutes. My little group also spilled their drinks 3 times. Thats right... I had to run and get napkins 3 TIMES!!!!!!!! Who needs a Stairmaster... just take a bunch of kids to the skydome! Oh and I have one complaint. Just one for this blog. Whichever dimwit approved the plan to keep the lids off pop bottles is a complete loser. Unless they want to provide packs of napkins to go with each bottle they should definitely start giving us back our lids. I'm done with running to mop up spills cuz my kids are too young to not kick them. Anyway... afterwards Karima... an incredibly cool chick I HAVE to tell you about, Christina, and our boss Verna and her fam went to get our free pizza slice from Pizza Pizza cuz the Jays got 7 strike outs. Excellent! And that was my day.

Oh... so about Karima. She is this uber cool chick that I worked with at Kid's Kapers last week. She is the 5th child of 9. WOW! And the last four are still with her parents who are missionaries in Jordan. Sounds so awesome. But the coolest htink yet I think is that she reads from an Arabaic Bible!!! She showed me her Bible on Sunday and it reads from back to front... well in my language, and shes got vreses underlined, notes in the margin... all like a regular Bible just in a completely different language! So awesome in my opinion. She rocks.

Thats all I can think about thats uber exciting. I'm going to the trailer this Sunday for almost a week. So looking forward to the long overdue vacation. I think I'm burning myself out unfortunately. Sorry Tal, I disobeyed the dictator. Haha, give me a few days at the trailer. I'll be my normal self again. Oh, and I'm looking forward to an upcoming trip to ze Tall Girl Shop with none other than Leslie, my fellow tall blonde friend. Haha, who else to go to a store for tall women with?!

Well Chow my friends :)

Whoever picked the movie this time rocks!?!

2004-08-11T21:44:00.000-04:00

Alright. Just got back from seeing the Notebook with my older sister, Anne. OH MY GOODNESS!!!! That movie is awesome! Its so good! But its also incredibly sad... We had to fight from crying for like the whole movie. Lol, the end was the best though... well the end was like uber sad actually, but it was hilarious cuz almost everyone in the theatre, which was only a few, was wanting to cry, lol, Anne and I finally started laughing... so the rest of the crew started laughign too! During the credits almost all of us were laughing /sobbing... you know how that goes right girls? Lol, horrible. None of us wanted to leave cuz we looked so horrible! I did have a pair of sunglasses to rescue me though. But those theatre guys must be used to it by now! the movies been out for like 2 months.

By the way, I'm confused. My sister said that Alzheimer's is the disease that just affects the memory, but every thing else is all good. But I was sure that it affects everything else too. Can any of you geniuses tell me whos right? And I won't hunt you down if you tell me I'm wrong ;).

Oh. And suggestion. If you ever need to find an address for someone... reverse phone searches work wonders! I've used it twice now and been right both times. Rock on!

Chow :)

Yeah for new shoes!

2004-08-09T20:39:00.000-04:00

Alright world. I'm ashamed to say that my biggest most exciting news for this weekend/past week was that I bought a pair of shoes. Yep, thats right, ANOTHER pair of shoes. But these shoes rock I have to say. They are the Adidas sandals that have the massaging ball things. They are so cool! And I waited for them to go down to only $16 bucks. They were regular 40. Who loves savings?!

Well, today was the first day of the last week of camp. Oh my, what can I say. I was assured last week that my group was good. Turns out Leslie our fearless team leader put the four most rowdiest rambunctious boys in my group... and later added another nonstoptalker boy that was in an all girl group. Oh my. One wants me to call him Agent Lazy Lard, one will punch me and yell "scandalous" every time I call him Topher, one keeps ripping off scabs that I have to do first aid on, and the other 2 are just torture. And to top it all off tomorrow we have to do the mosaic mirror craft. Save me! I can't complain too much though, everything else is still fun, my Bible story went great this morning and the boys are rather entertaining. God is good.

I would like to ask you guys for some prayer though. I've got something weighing on my heart at the moment. I'm trying so hard to listen to what Gods telling me.

Chow :)

Who suggested Harold & Kumar?!

2004-08-06T21:49:00.000-04:00

Well, its a Friday night. Just went and saw Harold and Kumar go to White Castle with my friend Diana, her little sis and a couple of her friends. It was tons of fun... except the movie was not worth wasting a cheap $6 bucks on. I mean, it was hilarious in parts... and others I was sitting watching the American Pie movies again... i.e. a waste of your time. If they scrapped the stupid comments and nudity parts the movie would be great! To top off the evening we went to MacDonalds where I almost fell flat on my face cuz they'd just washed the floor... and when I got home I had the blondest moment yet. We got happy meals. Woohoo too university students buying happy meals! Anyway, the little toy are the Ty teenie bears. The tag said Shake the Bear. So guess what Claire, the 50% natural blonde did... thats right.... she shook the bear. Haha, oh. boy. It honestly went through my head that maybe the color got darker or something. Lol. Then I thought about it. Wait... wait! Shake... the Bear! His name! Hence the picture of a milkshake on his chest. Ah man. If only there was a camera around. Hmm...
Well... off to get some zzsss, yes I know its early, I'm exhausted, but I don't have to get up at 6:30 next week! Woohoo! Yet I do have to work tomorrow and Sunday, hence commencing the continuous day sof work with no time off... AGAIN. Grr.

Chow :)

Butter yellow, Peach, and Booger brown

2004-08-05T18:40:00.000-04:00

Well, we are officially about to start our last camp of the summer. This is a special camp because it is in correlation (sorry Tal, I don't think I used the right meaning of this word... I just love it so much!) with this company Kids Games. They do sports and stuff with the kids at a different spot and it is still a Christian organization which rocks. So anyway, half the outings are to this place to play sports. So to explain the title of this blog, we finally had our T-shirts delivered. I don't know if I've already written here but all summer we've had to wear our Kid's Kapers bright yellow T-shirts. Now these are a gorgeous bright yellow. I love 'em. Anyway, we have diff't shirts for this special Kids Games camp. Which as I already said... we got today.... and found out they are a pale butter yellow golf shirt! They are a nice golf polo type deal... but butter yellow! Hehe, ah man. And to top it off the kids get these soccer jerseys with the Kids Games logo on them, which we thought normally a camp gets all the same style of jerseys, they all look the same, blah blah blah. Nope. Not this Kids games crew. We had two garbage bags full of over a 100 jerseys that were basically leftovers. Completely different colors and patterns ranging from hot pink to booger brown as my twin likes to call it ( I call it gold) and they are all diff't brands which results in diff't sizes. ARE THEY TRYING TO MAKE ZE PARENTS ANGRY AND GIVE US A DIFFICULT TIME!!! Anyway, we asked a favour of the snarkiest lady that works at the church who doesn't like me for some reason to come and hand out the T-shirts cuz we needed a tough cookie to deal with the angry parents who don't like the booger-brown-too-big jersey their kid gets. As most of you can guess, I am not exactly cut out for that tough cookie position. I would just wimper in fear. Lol. So thats whats new around the church this week. I haven't injured myself in quite awhile. Hallejulah! I am getting tired fomr getting up at 6:30 every morning though I can't compare to those who get up by 5 for work at 6. Oh... and my fam is up at the trailer again for a week and a half... which leaves me and my older sis home by ourselvevs with one car between us for a week and a half. Please pray. Haha, oh my, it won't be that bad but we haven't seemed to get along the past few days so it could get quite difficult. We'll get thorugh it. Don't you worry Claire. Well, I'm goign to stop talking to myself on my own blog and go do something productive.

Chow :)

Sat down and can't get up Disease

2004-08-01T20:12:00.000-04:00

So I just finished my 14th day straight of working. Kinda tired... hence the title of this blog. I decided yesterday that I have the 'I-sat-down-and-now-can't-get-up Syndrome'. I sit down somewhere to do something and find I don't have the neergy to get up. It's horrible. It means nothing gets accomplished at home. But hec, it doesn't bother me that much.

I got to talk to Adrienne yesterday! What fun! I decided to call her after work and she was home! So that was the excitement of the day. It was good to talk to her again and see how shes doing. And I saw Char at the Bay today. I haven't seen her in forever so that was nice. But thats all the excitement for this weekend.

Does anyone have any plans for the holiday? Mine might include just making bread and going to the beach. But hey, sounds fun. Hope everyone has a fun day planned.. unless of course you have to work. Then that stinks.

I had to run sunday school this morning. I feel like I'm just getting confirmation more and more that I'm meant to work with kids, especially young ones. Thanks God for speaking to me about this. The only problem now is that I hate working at the Bay and my other jobs cuz I just want to work at the camp with the kids. Ah well, its called patience and time right? Right.

Chow :)

minigolfing & bikinis - never do that again

2004-07-28T19:43:00.000-04:00

Well. I'm halfway done the 2nd last week of camp today. This 2-4 camp has been an interesting one. Lots of stories to tell. But too many to write on here. I'll give you a few interesting ones.

Lol, on Monday we went to Timber Creek for our afternoon outings... its an outdoor mini golf place. Went relatively well excxept for one of the student assistants getting her head thwacked by a putter and bleeding profusely. It was even more interesting when once we got back to the church two mischievous boys asked if I had balls. Ahem, I knew what they were referring to but I said I left my balls at Timber Creek. Bahaha.
Today was a very interesting day. I started the morning by straining my back muscles doing the tango with the 2 girls in my room who are very clingy and by clingy I mean won't get off me. So I've been in pain the whole day. To top it off we were in our swimsuits ready for our outing to the pool. To explain, when we go to the pool the kids are only allowed to bring their bathing suits, towels, and shoes. To make it fair us counsellors usually do the same. Well, some random kid had pooped in the pool. What a dork. So it was closed. So what was the plan B? Glow-in-the-dark minigolfing at the Putting Edge. Only problem was we were all in bathing suits. Yet Kristen assured us we'd have the place to ourselves. She even told us we could leave our towels on the bus. Well... turns out the place was full of people. And of course the kids didn't care but I happen to stand out in a crowd especially with my glowing bikini, so it was a tidbit embarassing. Halfway through Will gave me a towel he was holding for a kid in his group. But it kept falling off. So I had to supervise a full round of minigolf in my bikini, with people laughing at me the whole time. And to top it off I got smacked in the head with a golf ball that bounced off the wall behind me. Grr. The amusement apparent in the managers faces when I waited to sign the invoice though was rather hilarious. I doubt I'll ever do that again.

I have the possibility of a fourth job for a couple weeks. This one involves getting up to watch my neighbors kid from 6:45 am to 8:15 each morning while he drives his other kid to a camp. I'm so excited! (please tell me you hear the hint of sarcasm). We'll see how that goes. Thankfully its only for 2 weeks though. And don't get me wrong, I am so grateful God is providing all these opportunities to make money. It just seems to be going down a drain though. Hmm.

To top this day off I just had an agrument with my mother. Arguments are not fun. Especially from my perspective cuz I've been struggling a lot with the fact that I've made my family miserable this summer. Have I already written this on here? Not too sure. Oh well, I'll have two stories of this. Anyway, I was asking her what to do about a check that I wanted to throw away cuz it was ripped and she didn't understand what I was asking but I thought she just wasn't listening to me cuz I've told her before that she often doesn't listen to what I say and I have to tell her like 5 times and then the next day she still doesn't remember. This is in a way awfully selfish of me I guess cuz she has all her clients at work on her mind a lot and a whole family to look after. I guess it just bothers me cuz I take so much care in listening to every word most people to say to me and remembering it so they feel listened to later on. Every kid at camp that wants to tell me something gets their turn and it makes me feel so good when I see how happy they are that they could tell someone something really cool. I try to do that at home too. So I guess I don't understand why my mom can't do it back. Maybe her brain doesn't work the way mine does. I don't know. Anyway, then it came up that "i think i'm always right" which bothers me so much cuz I try so hard to admit when I'm wrong and stop if i know i'm being stupid. Try is the key word unfortunately. Anyway, I've been feeling so guilty lately cuz I've just caused so much crap around our house the past summer mainly from missing certain people and being frustrated about other certain people and not feeling i can talk to them about it. Huh... and yet I don't have the courage to actually tell my 'rents about it. Though I have my reasons for that. But huh... it makes me so angry that I can't just do something about myself being such a jerk. Frustration to the max [ah Rebekah :) ] Well, that feels really good to vent even though people i know are goign to read this. Ah well, please comment any suggestions or something if you want to. I don't think I mind if someone I know does read this. Go for it!

Ciao :)

Can someone lend me their sleep?

2004-07-25T20:59:00.000-04:00

Well. Its now Sunday. I don't have much news to tell you. Just a few things to vent and celebrate about.

First of all, you're all getting sick of my complaining by now but I am incredibly exhausted. Whichever loser suggested I take 3 jobs on is a complete dimwit. Oh wait, that was me. Lol.
I guess it serves me right. Anyway, I worked Monday to Friday then Friday night at my 3rd job, then I got called in earlier to the Bay ( my 2nd job) on saturday so worked 7 hours instead of 4 and lost my only day to sleep in, then had to go babysit for another 4 hours. And then I had to wake up early this morning to run Sunday school and set up for camp tomorrow. And then I come home to hear that the Bay wants me to come in again, which I knew was going to happen... but I just couldn't make my body go. Lol, so it had to stay home and sleep. Too bad. Then again I did have to spend the lunch hour with my Grandpa and Mildred. (ahem, talk to my dormmates).

Anyway, I do have one thing to vent about. Though I readily admit my blondeness, and I am quite blonde... it angers me when people take advantage of my blondeness! For goodness sake. Grr. Hehe, to explain, I went to B-Buster to rent a couple DVDs friday night after work. And I'm go to the desk and hes like you have $11.50 in late fees. All I can say is the B-buster completely overcharges. But so hes like have you renewed your rewards thing? Cuz I could wipe out the late fees. I'm like sweet! It'll only cost me 10 instead of 20bucks! Well... turns out it still cost $20. He used my 2 extra night things from my rewards book and the july $2off coupon which took the 11.50 away but still charged me the $9.99 for the rewards thing. So in reality I only saved $1.50. what a jerk. and to top it off he forgot to take those yellow locks off. you know how they keep the DVD case closed? So I called him up when I got home and he said I could pop them out. Which I did. I sure wasn't going to drive an additional hour just to get them out. Grr.

And then I also have a praise. Or prop to God. Whatever you want to call it. I know I keep saying things like this too. But I just gotta give props to the G.O.D. man. I've said before how I wonder where God is or if I'm doign the right things to honour him and show his love. But I mean, I just gotta look around and its like.. how can I not see his good work! My family has been pretty much safe all summer. We haven't had any drastic accidents with power tools (ahem father) or sick trips to the hospital (ladies) or car accidents! (ahem Anne). Camp at my church is completely a blessing from God. I am amazed each day at the little boys and girls who are just so innocent and pure and even those on fire for God. Some have no clue who he is but they hear about his love and are so interested! And the older kids that have grown up in the church make me proud. At the same time those kids who didn't grow up in the church make me tear up cuz I just want to show them this amazing relationship they could have rather than some of the sucky ones they do have with their 'rents but it seems I dont' get many chances. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that you guys who are wondering how hes worknig with or in you or if God is actually there, look around. You might just see things you've never noticed before. I did. Try it!

Haha, did you understand any of that. Sorry if you didn't. I find I have these urgings to write things like that but it all comes out conffufled. "Conffufled and Confuused." Anyway, starting the grades 2-4 camp tomorrow. Second last camp of the summer. Sniff..sniff.. I'm goign to miss these people. But not too soon I'll see 'em again. God Bless.

Chow :)

Rinse & Spit

2004-07-21T17:24:00.000-04:00

Well. Turns out I wrote this huge blog last night about Tal and I's road trip and tried to post it. But of course my internet has been screwy lately and so it went to "page cannot be displayed" Grr! Double Grr! So now you're probably going to get a shorter version cuz I'm extremely tired and have to leave for another Kid's Kapers meeting soon... even though I just got home (sorry... venting)

So. To sum our most exciting trip into a few simple words I'll say duct tape, rain, rifle, 4-wheeler, ambush, tattoo, chocolate, no sleep, and last but not least... "whats my citizenship?"
Hehe, ahhh the memories. Anyway, I picked Tal up by 5:30 on Friday and we were at Kimber's by 1:30 that night, or next morning. Let's just say that the last couple hours of driving were spent pumping chocolate to keep us awake and EVERYTHING became a deer. Hehe, I mean everything... we did see two on the side of the road though. Beautiful creatures. Saturday was spent being crazy busy doing everything we could possibly cram in. We were up for family breakfast at 8 in the morning and off to tour the deer farm soon after that. Seeing a bunch of deer semi-close up was uber cool. It was a bit shocking though when we found a dead fawn in the field. Tal and I's heart stopped too when Kimber's uncle was trying to see whether it was male or female and he raised his machete for some odd reason though I'm sure Tal will confirm that he was going to chop his leg off. We're both sure of it. We got a tour of the Ebels store, the dam, visited her grandma, a very nice lady, sampled some northern Michigan jerky. Emmm. Anyway, not to tell you every little thing we did it was just a bunch of fun and so good to see Kimber again. We were served dinner by her at the restaurant/bar where she works, hehe, and tipped in Canadian. We shot a couple big rifles and a handgun that I never thought I'd see or hold in my hands in my lifetime. I experienced a traditional CRC church for the first time. Tons of fun.
The trip home I have to say made the trip as well. Hehe, to explain, the whole weekend I had troubles with my power windows not working. So the left drivers side had been down about 2 inches the whole time. Anyway, as we reached Lansing Michigan, about 2 hours into the trip home it started to pour. Whaddya know! So we had to stop at the Meijer and find some duct tape. Then we proceeded to tape up the window so the sheets of rain wouldn't go through. Hehe, HINT: duct tape doesn't stick to anything wet. Anyway, it was a damp ride for a couple of hours and an embarassing trip to the border where we had to open the door to talk to the border officers. Oh my.
But I want to give a profuse thank you toKimber and her family cuz they were so awesome to let Tal and I stay there and for entertaining us. And Tal, I'm so glad you came along, you rock, and our weekend was the most fun ever!

So yeah, I think that retelling of the story was a lot shorter than my edition last night. If any of you reading this will see me anytime in the near future I can show you the pictures we took out there. Lol, aww digital cams. They are one of the greatest inventions. So now I'm off to try and relax for about 40 mins before I have to leave again. Sorry, but grr, i'm in a venting mood.

Chow!

Hand = Ouch

2004-07-14T21:50:00.000-04:00

Well, its the middle of our second week of camp. I am actually having an awesome time with this group. The girls are all attached to me unfortunately, but otherwise they are all pretty self-sufficient and there is less sneakiness so I don't have to watch their every move. Unfortunately I injured myself in our craft time today. Well, okay not injured. I sliced up my right hand pretty good. No one told me the tiles on our mosaic mirrors were sharp! Go figure! So I have 6 bandaids on my hand right now with spots for about 3 more. Lol, but hopefully it'll heal soon.

You won't hear back from me on here til next week. Tal and I's road trip is this weekend. Woohoo! Pray for safety and keeping us awake. Hehe, and hopefully I can get off work early so I can function on the way there. But have a great weekend guys!

Chow :)

I just broke a nail :(

2004-07-10T16:49:00.000-04:00

Alright. Well its now Saturday, and what a gorgeous Saturday this is. I'm at home, with the entire house to myself, except for the Budlet... what fun. I'm enjoying myself. Anyway, this is kinda the blog to talk about my first week of camp. And what a first week of camp it was. I happened to get stuck in the room with the oldest most rambunctious, accompanied by the worst youth leaders/assistants ever. We went bowling, to Woodie Woodchucks, Vivian Forest, and Kid's Town Waterpark. All of which are horrible events with 50 something screaming kids running around. Anyway, I really enjoyed myself and love watching the kids learn new things about God and all these different bible stories. 3 children gave their lives to the Lord... Praise God! That was unbelievably exciting. And overall it went well. To sum the week into a few sentences we did a lot of discipling, we got 3 hours sleep on the sleepover night, the place was a mess, and by the last day I was snapping on my leaders. But anyway, next week if the 4-6 camp. I am thoroughly enjoying working with my fellow student summer workers. They are awesome! I'm am going to miss them so much over the next year.

I also would like to praise God again here. Well this is a praise the lord... and an "oh my what am I going to do." I got two replies from my work wanted add in the church! But even though I'm thanking God I'm also going crazy cuz I have so much on my mind and can't think straight. It basically means I work 8:30-5 monday to friday and some sunday mornings at the church, then 6-9 a couple evenings a week and at least 6 hours saturday and sunday at the bay, and whatever i have left i go to help this lady in markham. I am telling everyone that I have complaining rights so suck it up if you think I'm complaining too much. Lol, I think I might do more damage to my back in this couple months then I've ever done before though.

Anyway, I'm off to go peel some more skin. Lol, if you've read my blog from last week, I had just gotten a severe burn. Like a bubbly and itchy burn. Anyway, it's been a week and has finally settled down. But now it is peeling off in inch-squared sheets. kinda frightening pulling at a little flap of skin and coming away with a huge piece. Kinda gross too. Lol, I just thought I'd share that little tidbit of info with the world.

But now I'm off to spend a little time in ze hot tub, or maybe the pool, both our neighbors, and then maybe some sleep. I can barely think straight i'm so tired.

Chow :)

screaming

2004-07-09T18:10:00.000-04:00

Alright, well not that anyone is wondering, but I am still alive. But I am also in a horribly bad mood. I just spent 30 straight hours at the church, only 4 of which were passed sleeping without a pillow on the church floor... which, do I need to mention, is rock hard, no exaggeration. Grr! So anyway, if anyone is interested about hearing about the first week of camp, check back this evening or tomorrow. Lol, depending on when I get home this evening... I may or may not be able to update this. Anyway, heres a little attempt to keep in touch with the blogging world. Talk to you soon.

Chow :(

Boo to tetracyclene...

2004-07-03T21:12:00.000-04:00

Well, its been 3 days since I've written a blog. Why does that feel like such a long time? No idea why. Anyway, today was spent on the beach with my wonderful friend Shannon. It was fun just lying on the sand in mini lawn chairs and I am glad to say I finally relaxed. Only one disadvantage... the right side of me is now at least 3 shades brighter than the left. Because of the tetracyclene in my system that I take for my face my skin is more susceptible to burning. I.E. I turn red. And I'm red. Haha, boo.

On another note... camp starts Monday. I want to say woohoo! but I also want to say Egads! The church looks great... the spy theme rules. But at the same time camp starts on monday. Will everything be ready? But I'm praying... we all are, and trusty Matt just promised it would. Hehe, so I guess it will ;). Oh wait.. and God did do. So you're right Matt... it will.

Happy Canada Day all you Canadians out there! Did everyone have a good time? I had the pleasure of working. That's right... working on ze statutory holiday. But what fun it was. I hung decorations... and vacuumed rooms, haha, and organized learning centres. Anyway, that evening I got a personal show of fireworks from the hoodlums in my backyard. I could sit on my couch and see them out my front door. how kind they were, to light fireworks, 10 feet from my house.

And to end of this blog with a note of jubilee, my neighbors have gone on vacation to the Caribean for 2 1/2 weeks. Now the jubilee is not from them goign to the Caribbean, but the fact that they told us to use their pool and hot tub the whole time. Who could resist?

Chow!

Need....sleep....

2004-06-30T17:51:00.000-04:00

Well. It's Wednesday. I've just finished working 3 days straight at UAC getting ready for Kid's Kapers 2004. It has been lots of fun so far, though I'm afraid, I'm completely exhausted. I don't know why my body isn't used to all this but I just feel unusually fatigued. It might be due to the lack of sleep I'm getting. Oh well.

My days have been spent doing lots of stuff and staying busy. One day I spent the morning testing markedrs and pencil crayons and glue sticks and refilling glue bottles. Ugh. Yesterday was spent making huge posters of spy stuff like top secret file folders, magnifying glasses and life size detectives out of really colorful paper. loads of fun. And today was spent folding workbooks, cleaning out rooms, decorating walls (grrr to fun tack), shopping, etc. Anyway, to sum it up I'm having a great time working with everyone and getting stuff done. Its getting down to crunch time cuz camp starts this monday and we still aren't done everything. But we have to work tomorrow (the holiday) and so we should get it finished.

On other things, I bought 2 new shirts yesterday. So much fun. And I realized I have to memorize a bible story for Monday.

And the most exciting news of all is that a road trip has been planned! That's right. I get to drive approximately 6-8 hours with the oh-so-fabulous Tal on a trip to visit her roommate/my dormmate. What fun! I am already stoked... that's right... stoked :). My roommate declined to come... so disappointed about that... but you never know, we could just ambush her in her sleep and take her along with us. Hehe, I do know where she lives. Hmmmm...... But Tal, I'm pumped, and Kimber, we're ready to cause some ruckus in little 'ol Falmouth.

Chow :)

Whats with the Ks everywhere?

2004-06-27T21:08:00.000-04:00

Well, its Sunday evening and I've just spent another non-stop Sunday working at both the church and the Bay.

First of all, I'm really starting to develop a grudge against the Bay. Boo to grudges... but ze Bay needs to get an attitude check. My only shift for this entire week is the grand total of 4 hours today from 2 to 6. Now, normally, there is an associate on the floor from opening to closing. Last week since they cut the hours no one was on the floor until 1 in the afternoon, which is absurd. But on this gorgeous Sunday in particular I was the first person in. And yes that was at 2 o'clock. 2! On a summer Sunday which for some reaseon was incredibly busy no one was in until I came, and then I was the only one... all by myself. I usually don't mind this until I have to help someone in accessories, someone in infants furniture, someone at the fitting rooms, someone upstairs in luggage, and take a few calls from the pods... ALL AT THE SAME TIME! Hehe, now I don't mean to souund like I'm complaining... okay, I am. But I only complain when it is like a hazard to my health. I get more cardio activity in one hsift then I have in the past month.

Second of all, this Kid's Kapers thing is goign to make my summer. It seeems like thats all I write about on this blog. But today was the Summer Kickoff Karnival. And as a student summer worker I was enlisted to help, without my knowledge at first. Grr. Hehe, anyway, I started out by helping around the prize table. Then I set up the snow cone machine. At least helped set it up. That was fun... yet sticky. The rest of the afternoon was spent at the prize table coaxing kids into spending their tickets, lol, so we could get rid of all the toys and candy we had. Oh, and selling wristbands. Some of those kids are just so adorable. Gosh. To top it all off, I start fulltime at the church tomorrow! Woohoo! [hey, I didn't use the word whoopdeedoo that time ;) ] I'm so excited. I'm a bit hesitant cuz I'm either going to be bored out of my skull with nothing to do, or I'll get to do all the creative fun stuff that I could do for hours and be crazy busy. I'd rather go with the latter.

Anyhoo. Though it's only 9:17 at this point I feel like collapsing into bed. I just might do that. Boy do I feel like an eighty year old at this point. Hmm.

Chow :)

God is good - and bonding rocks!

2004-06-25T18:45:00.000-04:00

Well. Here I am back in 'ol Claremont after an amazing few days. My retreat was amazing. I am working with the most fun people I have met in a long time. 5 of us met at the church and drove up to this little cottage on Lake Simcoe. Lol, to start off... we got lost. Leslie, our fearless team leader, and David, oh so hilarious David, were "chatting" and so missed the place we were supposed to turn off. So they took us all the way into Beaverton. I realized this wrong, so we turned around, but then I, oops, took us down the wrong road. I was ahead of myself, lol, thats my excuse. anyway, while Kristen the girl driving the car I was in and Christina, our ultra cool resident of the back seat spent a few minutes trying to find this little blue cottage that was supposed to be right after you cross the train tracks. Hehe, needless to say there was no little blue cottage right after the train tracks. Meanwhile Leslie and David in their little red honda had disappeared. Finally I noticed what road we were on. So we got back on the main road and found the right turn off and were at the right cottage in a matter of minutes. Anyway, if I gave you all the details we'd be here forever. Let's just say the mid-week retreat was spent playing hilarious games of Cranium (through which I've discovered I'm really good at spelling things backwards, haha, beat that!), Taboo (everyone needs to play Taboo once in awhile), and mafia (thats right Redeemerites, mafia. And I'm glad to say I've found a newfound enjoyment of this way too complex game. I may even be tempted to play it next year.) We worked a lot on our Bible stories, wrote the scripts kinda thing, read the Scriptures, learnt how to make a Bible story good. We also spent a lot of time in devotion and prayer. The first night one of our workers gave her testimony and we had a huge prayer time cuz she had to go home early cuz her mom was having surgery the next morning. The next morning we had another good devotion time. And today we spent the morning sharing our testimonies and all praying for each summer worker. Took awhile but it was well worth it! It was so amazing being there to witness God's work in each one of us, how he'd been working in the past, how hes working now. It is such an encouragement to hear others' struggles and hardships too! Oh my, that sounds horrible. I just mean, well, personally I always feel like I'm the only one who isn't extremely close to God or who doesn't know exactly what I'm supposed to do and I feel so ashamed cuz I don't understand why I don't have this perfect relationships with my Lord. But hearing others speak of God's work in their lives, but also of how they struggled or how they are struggling now. It just touched my heart.

I wanted to share something that was said on this retreat as well. Our most amazing other leader, Harriet, who led the retreat was talking to us about following God and stuff yesterday morning. Anyway, she was talking about temptation and how everyone always has the impression that we shouldn't talk about it cuz we think that if we are tempted it means we aren't close to God and we really shouldnt' be tempted at all if we are walking with Him. But she made the point that that impression is wrong! And I believe her! I've always felt so discouraged when I'm tempted about whatever that jerk Satan decides and I think, you know if I was close to God I wouldn't get tempted. But really God uses the temptation to develop us into better Christians. If we weren't tempted we'd never grow cuz we would never be challenged! Huh. Hehe, sorry, that was just really comforting to know that I'm not being tempted cuz I'm some bad person.

Wow. this is extremely long. I apologize for whoever has to read it. I'm just still in shock at how great these people are. So much fun! And I've also had a revelation in that I've been missing everyone from Redeemer so much. I figured out why! I was so used to having this amazing groups of girls, and guys ;) around me to lean on and they were such nice people who stayed close to God. I'm afraid I got to used to that. Spending such close quality time with this small groups of people made me realize how important that is for a person, especially a Christian. If you don't have a group of whoever people around you that you can rely on for strength, accountability, comfort and closeness with God I urge you to find at least something like that. You wont' regret it!

Unfortunately, I left the retreat with my same old stomach trouble that hadn't shown itself in a couple months. Since I left the stresses of school actually. Ironic huh! [Dorm 15 girls, I hope you sense the sarcasm ;) ] Anyway, it showed up again. I think this time it was cuz in a way I wanted to go home, but I didn't want to leave the little community we had started. Hmm...

Okay. I think I'm done for now. I'll give whoever reads this eyes a break. You should be thankful! Hehe, I could go on for hours!

Chow

The Servant Song

2004-06-22T21:35:00.000-04:00

Well, I'm off the rest of this week to a retreat for the Kid's Kapers student workers. I'm looking forward to it! Its only 3 days too so if it turns out horrible I can be rest assured it'll be over soon. Haha, optimistic eh! I have to come back on Thursday for Lindsay's graduation. Should be loads of fun too... I just have to make sure I don't look hotter than my little sis. Hehe, and thats going to be difficult. ;)

Anyway, before I skidaddle... I wanted to leave you with lyrics to this praise song I was playing this afternoon. The most amazing words. 'Tis called The Servant Song:

Brother let me be your servant
Let me be as Christ to you
Pray that I might have the grace to
let you be my servant, too

We are pilgrims on a journey
We are brothers on the road
We are here to help each other
Walk the mile and bear the load

I will hold the Christ-light for you
In the night time of your fear
I will hold my hand out to you
Speak the peace you long to hear

I will weep when you are weeping
When you laugh I'll laugh with you
I will share your joy and sorrow
Till we've seen this journey through

When we sing to God in heaven
We shall find such harmony
Born of all we've known together
Of Christ's love and agony

Brother let me be your servant
Let me be as Christ to you
Pray that I might have the grace
To let you be my servant too

Kind of long. I know. Hehe, but I just found the words to be so true and something we should all strive to be. So many times I find myself being so self-centered and it bothers me incredibly. God calls us to be servants of each other and servants of others, and thats all I really want to be. I pray that we can all develop servant's hearts to serve God better.

Chow :)

Albie

2004-06-21T20:55:00.000-04:00

Well, I've just gotten back from yet another Kid's Kapers meeting, this time for the Preschool Kamp, July 19-23. This was a short one... which I admit was nice. But entertaining... we watched a sample video of one of the recreation games... the case of the sock bandit, aka "Stinky Pete" Hehe, all I can say is you had to be there, and you have to know David. Hilarious. I just wanted to ask for prayer though for this ministry. It is such an awesome opportunity for God to touch these kids lives. The total today was 473 registered, and if you can believe it 273 of those kids are from non-churched homes!!! Praise the Lord!!! It is just so amazing... we have such an awesome program being run with so many great leaders ready to help out. So if you had time and wouldn't mind praying a) for more adult leadership in all the camps, b) safety for all the kids and workers, c) that all the volunteers would get along and be able to work together, d) that God would be able to work through us and touch these kids. Wow. Hehe, sorry, thats a long list. But I guess its nothing to God right? I'm just so excited to be a part of this summer's excursion.

Anyway, enough about Kid's Kapers. Well, more to it actually. I've got a weekend, rather middle of the week retreat this wednesday with my fellow "student summer workers." I'm really glad for the chance to get away with these guys who are so much fun. Its just a time to get to know each other, share our stories, etc. But hopefully it will be fun! And in the middle of it I have to come back to do my sis's hair and go to her grade 8 graduation! Sniff...sniff... Thank the Lord, I am finally busy!

So to explain the title of this blog, my sister Lindsay has decided to make fun of my whiteness. Lol, I have to say I am developing a tan... but that tan mine as well be white compared to my sister! Grr! She looks like those ladies who live in Florida for 9 months of the year and sit on the beach 8 hours a day at the resort and then too dark for their own good. And its disgustingly natural! Double Grr!!!! Anyway, today she was chasing after me to rub dirty floor-washing water on my face and she started calling me an albino... shortened to Albie. So, I don't want to offend any albinos out there. Cuz I'm sure not one. But it was rather entertaining.

Well, not sure what else to talk about. I wish I had some interesting topic to debate on here other than recap my days, cuz who really wants to hear about my days day after day! But sorry, my life is dull and uninteresting, so you're just going to have to suck it up. Si? Si!

Chow :)

The Coolest Daddio

2004-06-19T20:33:00.000-04:00

Well. I'm writing this in the middle of the first of presumably many UAC gatherings at the Fleetwood homestead. [And for Jehan, to "claire"ify, homestead means our house/property in ol' Claremont ;)] Because we happen to have five acres of lush, gorgeous green lawns and landscape, lol, note the sarcasm, though I have to add it is beautiful, my dad tends to volunteer our property for the summer BBQs of most of the service teams at church, especially the ones my father heads up, which seems to be many. And by service teams I mean like the ushers/greeters that are here tonight, the small group leaders and coaches which will be here eventually, the staff BBQ, etc. To add to these never ending gatherings, it seems prerequisite to have myself be the organizer slash server slash preparer of the food, beverages, etc. Lol, now even though I am getting paid for this evening in particular, boy does it get tiring. I sliced 70 buns, 8 tomatoes, 3 grotesquely large onions, 3 heads of lettuce, made about 10 pots of coffee which i had to funnel into an urn. Oh boy! Haha, I shouldn't be complaining though. Despite the hard work I like being in charge of all that stuff and I really do enjoy these evenings. Except for when you have these little old ladies who like to join you in the kitchen and make suggestions, which you obviously have to take, and they know this "only from experience." Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. Hehe, ah little Mabel. Little Mabel who picked the one spot that didn't have a railing to kerplunk onto her lawn chair and dive backwards off the porch, hehe, oh poor little Mabel. But shes all in one piece ladies and gentlemen!!! Little Mabel is one tough cookie. That she is.

At this point I feel the need to apologize because I've realized that I have many run-on sentences in the previous paragraph and big words. Lol, I guess sometimes I have the urge to not seem blonde, though at heart I am, lol, and use big words, you know, to show off my supposedly large vocabulary. ;)

Well, tomorrow is Father's Day everyone... in case you'd forgotten. Have you all gotten gifts for your favorite dads??? We have. I can't mention my family's gift here just per chance that my most wonderful father reads my blog this evening before we can give it to him. But I do need to give a shoutout to my most wonderful father... cuz hey, its Fathers day. So suck it up. Lol, I have to say it, but my Dad is the best dad in the world, apart from God that is. I mean, he is the ultimate cool. He manages to work fulltime at the church as well as about 3 or 4 evenings a week where he is doing something for the church, keeping our property mowed and beautiful, and is an amazing dad and husband all at the same time. I don't know how he doesn't drop in sheer exhaustion. I'm so sorry for all the grief my sisters and I have caused him in the past and the grief we will cause him in the future... as well as the worry. I wish I could take it all back, but I'm afraid I can't. So Daddio... I just wanted to say that I love you soooooooo much and will miss you soooooooooo much this coming year and thankyou soooooooooo much for all the sacrifices and things you have done for you girls. You rock!

Okay, this blog is getting long now. So have a great weekend everyone... and I hope all those fathers out there can have a great day tomorrow too.

Chow

Boycott le Hudson's Bay Company

2004-06-17T22:01:00.000-04:00

Ugh. So I've just spent the longest four hour shift of every four hour shift I've ever worked at the Bay this evening. And I am steaming. Okay, well angry. No! I was right the first time. I'm steaming! Joanne, my sales manager, called me up yesterday and said they'd cut everyones hours and took 8 hours off my schedule for this week. To add to this misery, I have a total of one 5-hour shift next week. Preposterous! Apparently, for some odd reason every fullservice department, well every department except for the PODs (aka central cash desks) has had their hours smashed, cut, trashed, whatever verb you want to use. So now I am going to have to find some other job or something, cuz I cannot keep getting measly little shifts when I am already thousands of dollars in debt and I am goign to be more next year and I don't have the resources to return next year! Help! I decided I think we should boycott. Anyone interested? Hehe, after much thought though I realize that if we boycotted, they would have to cut mor ehours cuz they wouldn't be able to pay people. Its unsolveable isn't it. Argh!

By the way, a piece of advice to all you cellphone users. Its not exactly entertaining for the driver of a car to have to listen to your passengers cellphone conversation the ENTIRE 25min. drive home. ugh. Lol, it wasn't that bad, I admit, I got to practice some french with whoever the dude was my older sister was talking to. But still. How boring. The rest of the ride finished with a rather intriguing conversation about that race that God created, hehe, males. Ah, was that a thought provoking, memory building conversation. Thanks for that Anne.

So Buddy is in trouble this evening. Buddy being my incredibly adorable but trying to maintain his manlihood like his dad in a household full of girls who like to dress him up. Anyway, for the second time in 24 hours he tore up our neighbors lawn in an effort to get after some rodents. Did I mention Buddy is part beagle? Yeah, he has the hunting instinct bred him. It is rather adorable watching him pounce and sneak up on stupid squirrels. Sorry to anyone who likes squirrels, but I think its kinda fun to watch Buddy chase after him. Until you find a tail and hind legs in the front lawn. *shudder*

Chow Everybody :)

New appreciation for vegetarians

2004-06-16T16:49:00.000-04:00

I just had the most disturbing experience of my life, at least up to this point. I will never EVER forgive my mother for making me cook this interesting soup for dinner tonight. It involves all these veggies and beans and sausage and stuff. But then it involves browning and boiling these pork hocks. For those of us who aren't butchers! I did a little research and a hock is part of the leg on a pig, its kinda like his heel almost. So I had to skin two of these little heels! It was so sad, my tears were dripping on the bones! Hehe, but listen, I am completely comfortable with removing fat from chicken breasts or something you know, thats normal. But this skin was incredibly thick and almost hairy, like it had a shaven skin texture to it! *shudder*shudder*shudder. yuck! hmm, i think i've dealt with this experience and gotten over it, lol, but I will never do it again! Never in my married or single life will I cook with pork hocks. Unless my man is doing the skinning.

On another note... I desperately need a road trip. I'm going stir-crazy. My hours at work have just been cut, so I have more time off, which in a way I like, but in a way I don't cuz I'm just made to clean and cook and stuff. I have only 2 1/2 weeks before camp starts. Aaaaaargggghhhhhh! Hehe, sorry, this blog is good at venting some frustrations. Sometimes I wish it wasn't public. But then I guess thats what God and a journal is for isn't it. Hmm.

The Fleetwood family went to get family pictures done for our church directory last night. That was uber fun. Us girls were hyper, mom and dad were in a "loveydovey" mood cuz its there anniversary in two days, so the ride there, back, and the actual picturetaking was extremely fun. It reminded me why I was glad to be home. Anyway, its always a fun thing getting pictures taken cuz the photographer is always overwhelmed by this huge family walking in. We tend to fill a room, mainly its our height. Then I always get assumed to be the oldest cuz I'm the tallest, which is not the case, but I still get to be in the middle back of the picture. Which is my favorite spot. And then it takes us forever to decide which pictures we want cuz in every one either Anne looked like a deer had just crossed her path, Dad looked half asleep, or Ali looked like she was laughing over something. But not a good laughing, well you know, it was kinda a weird smile. Lol, hard to explain. It was also fun because since Dad is staff he had to take his own single picture. His selection was one of half-closed eyes, or this amused look, or the final choice, a very nice smile. We tried to get him to pick the goofy one. But he wouldn't. Nuts.

Anyway, thats whats been happening the past few days. Hope all is well with everyone. My dormmate Gayle is officially in Europe for the next couple months. I think we're all goign to miss her, in fact I know we all already do. It sucks not to be able to visit her when I go to Michigan this July, but shes following God and we are so proud of her. So if we can all pray her for her safety and her team, and that the people of Hungary are blessed!

Gee, I need to figure out how to get these blogs shorter. What I thought was nothing much to tell the blogging world about, turns out to be a huge posts! Oh well, hope you can bear with me.

Chow :)

Sniff...sniff...She's all grown up!

2004-06-14T21:49:00.000-04:00

This blog is a shoutout to my younger sis, Lindsay. This most wonderful Fleetwood girl is graduating next week. Shes almost in high school! Sniff...sniff... when did she get all grown up?! I've gotten closer to Lindsay the past couple of years going to youth services every Sunday night and now going to Kid's Kapers meetings every Monday night for the rest of our summer. She is one cool chickie. Hehe, we happen to be almost identical in personality and appearance, though 6 years apart. Anyway, I just wanted to say that she is growing up into the coolest young woman who has huge things in the future for her as she follows God in every way. Graduation day is going to be so exciting, yet so sentimental! I've missed her and my other little sis (Allison) terribly this past year and will again next year. Love you both so much!

So we had another meeting this Monday evening. It was fun, yet the same thing for the 3rd night in a row. We keep hearing the same things over and over again. But tonight we also went to our separate camps to plan who was going to do what for learning centres and activities and stuff. Here's the problem. I am at every camp. All 6 weeks. But there were 4 camps meeting this one night. So I was like, how am I supposed to be in 4 rooms at one time?! Anyway, I ended up organizing the planning for one camp and was left to hope that I got assigned to something fun for the rest of the camps. Oh well.

Hope everyone is enjoying the storms, unless you don't have any in your area, then I hope you enjoy your sunny weather. Hehe :)

Chow

Is there such thing as sleeptyping?

2004-06-13T20:48:00.000-04:00

Well, its Sunday evening. I am so tired I felt like I was working in a coma all day today and have to stay awake til a bit later so I don't wake up at like 5 am tomorrow. But the Mask of Zorro is on televisione so I guess that will serve its purpose.

I went out with a girl from my dorm last night. Talitha "bruTAL" Dykstra = super cool fun. Hehe, Tal, you rock! It was a fun evening of protecting the laptop from french-speaking younguns, watching the crazy twisted Stepford Wives, hehe, oh, and thinking I was supposed to go north on the 410 when the whole time I was supposed to go south to go home. It was rather entertaining watching the little French girls sneak around the Tim Hortons partition to see Tal's pictures, lol, wouldn't you agree Tal?

I'm beginning to get tired of the same old Sunday week after week. This is supposed to be God's day. But for me it involves going to the early service, then straight to work where I am bored out of my skull and in pain, and then coming home too tired to want to do anything. And I'm afraid because I am one of only 2 people available to work Sundays its going to be like that til the end of August. I really shouldn't be complaining. I have a tendency to do that, hehe, but add to it the Sundays I have to run sunday school during Kid's kapers and oh my. Help!

By the way, sidenote. Is there such thing as non-drowsy Midol? Much needed. Oh, and I found the most beautiful scarf at the Bay that matches perfectly with my coat! For $5!!! Sweet deal.

Chow

Lunch dates rock :)

2004-06-11T22:15:00.000-04:00

Well, not too much to comment on this evening. I had an uneventful day and went to work for 3 hours this evening. That was uneventful as well! Though I did have an interesting but nice conversation with this little Indian man who started telling me about his Auntie and her 5 miscarriages and 4 sons. Hehe, I like little old men from India who start conversations with you. Especially when they aren't trying to scam you or get away with something. Anyway, I'm having lunch with my friend Andrea tomorrow! Something to look forward too! Andrea left us at Redeemer in second semester so I haven't seen her for like 5 months! Sniff..sniff.., so terrible. But hey, lunch will be great! Otherwise I think I'm just going to veg in front of ze televisione tonight with some leftover pizza and get increasingly jealous at my friends Jehan, Timmy and others who are visiting Redeemer people this weekend. Hehe, well can I complain.. I'm visiting with 2 R. people myself. Whoopdeedoo! C

Chow :)

Ahhh... Big Garbage Night

2004-06-10T22:31:00.000-04:00

Alright. Do I have a story to tell you. Bear with me. It might take awhile.
So it was big garbage night in Markham this evening. My dad happens to be an avid shopper on these once every few month events. Usually he hooks up our trailer behind the van. Well tonight, he was at church for a meeting and Anne, my older sister, and I were at work. So they picked me up at 9, and we went cruising through rural Markham. Unfortunately he forgot to put hitch the trailer... which leads to the rest of this story. We found a ping pong table being thrown out. well it was the two separate halves with some of the legs. so we pull over and hop out. lol, by the way its getting dusk now. So I in my Bay uniform, my lanky 6'6 father, and my sis run across the road and bring one half over to the van. but it doesn't fit! We try and shove it in the back, then we try it through the side door. But it won't fit! So dad takes it back over. BUt then anne says, why don't we put them on the roof and drive over to the Wests and we can hold it with our hands out the window? Great question Anne ;)! So hes like, thats a good idea. The Wests are a family from church my little sister is homeschooling with. THey lived just a couple streets away. SO we hop back across the road for a second time and bring both halves over. At the same time this van pulls up. Lol, this certain shopper happened to bring a huge trailer with him. He offered us help with taking it somewhere. Why we turned him down I'm not quite sure. BUt we did. SO instead we stacked both halves of the table on the roof. Dad put his hand out the driver's window, anne put like her head and hands out her passenger side window. And I put my hand out the van door window. Now, this is the kind of window that only pops like 2 or 3 inches open at the back. And I managed to squish my hand through it. Anyway, we head off to get to the Wests. SO Dad goes to make a right turn at this 4-way stop. As hes turning Anne goes, isn't the Wests straight. We all think about it and I go... Uh, Dad, the wests are straight. Lol, so literally about 2 minutes go by before Dad goes "shoot! the Wests are straight!" Now, you can't exactly do a U-turn very easily with two huge pieces of plywood on the roof of your van! So we turned off the first available road which happened to be a crescent and continued back on the regular path. Anyway, we get to the WEsts house. And as dad goes up to the door to ask if we can drop it off to pick it up tomorrow with the trailer Anne and I get out to get it off the roof. But... being the blonde that I am, lol, I forget to pull my hand out of the window before opening the van door! So my arm is being shoved behind me as the door opens! Bahaha, at that point I was laughing so hard I couldn't get my hand out of the window and Anne had to help me. Oh goodness. Anyway, I'm done yet. So we drop the pingpong table off and continue cruising around looking for stuff. On one street we see these three hoodlums walking on the side of the road. We passed them but then we had to stop and inspect a pile just ahead of them. But we knew they were coming, so all three of us are cracking up cuz they were goign to walk by between the van and the side of the road. Anne has her window half open so she goes to close. But she puts it further down instead! So Dad goes, uh.. Anne, you're putting the window down... not up. Anyway, we're silentn as they walk by but then all three of us crack up! It was absolutely hilarious... I know, I know you totally had to be there. But they kept looking back at us like we were stalking them or something. We passed them again afterwards and thought it was so funny. ANyway, the gist of the story is picture watching a van driving down the road with random hands sticking out the window holding this large piece of wood sitting on the roof. Oh my.

Oh, and I have good news! Well, exciting news for me. No one else in this blogging world will really care. But anyway, I've been wanting to get a laptop for awhile now cuz I can type as fast as profs speak so it would be so much easier for me to take notes. But involves coming up with another $500 bucks at least that I don't have. So instead I got a wireless keyboard to accompany my PDA!!!!! So now I have this really cool looking silver Belkin keyboard that works with my Palm Zire. I just set it up in less than a minute and can type large memos. All I have to do is HotSync it into my computer after each class. Excellent deal I'm telling you.

Okay, I meant to blog this yesterday but was too tired. I had a short but fun conversation with a very cool guy last night. I'm sure you all know who I'm talking about. Anyway, this correlates with the list from Tuesday's blog. The conversation went something like this:

Claire: hey... do you have mosquitos in BC?
Matt: are you blonde?!

Haha, yes... yes, I happen to be blonde. Surprising eh!
Oh boy. My older sister is really getting a kick out of my surprisingly frequent blonde moments. I think its this Ontario air. Most definitely. ;)

Chow!

BLACK

2004-06-08T16:52:00.000-04:00

Alright, I just finished this most amazing book I just have to tell the blogging world about. It's called Black, hence the title, by Ted Dekker. Wow. I highly recommend EVERYONE read this book. And I'd like to try and give you a little plot summary but it is a complex book so bear with me. Lol, do you remember the Chronicles of Narnia? It is a series by C.S. Lewis where these children step into another world. A world where there is distinct evil and distinct good. Anyway, the story is an analogy for God and the Christian faith. The Lion is really God and the evil white witch, I forget her real name, is meant to play Satan. I'm pretty sure I have that right. Lol, I know for sure that the lion is God. Anyway, my point is this book is kind of the same thing. This guy somehow starts dreaming of this other world where the people worship this unseen character, Elyon. But at the same time the other side of the world is pure evil and the result of choice. There is a leader of this evil and he is the master of deception and lies. Anyway, the whole book consists of this guy going back between both worlds and never knowing which one is the real one, and the whole time he is trying to save the world from terrorists... and to top it off hes falling in love with a different girl from each world. Lol, boy, I've made it sound kinda typical. Well, all I can say is that you HAVE to at least try reading it. With my extremely logical brain I found it a bit odd at first but it was just so good I couldn't ignore it.
The only thing I'll warn you is that it doesn't end! Its a trilogy. And usually all the trilogies I've read theres been an ending to the certain story line and you aren't left hanging. Well goodness no, not in this book! It made me so mad! Haha, I get to the end, the last page, don't worry I won't give it away, and nothing is solved! Grr! Double Grrr!
So thats my recommendation. Black by Ted Dekker. And you can check out a bit of it at www.Teddekker.com if you'd like.

So my older sister Anne and I have decided I should start a list of all the stupid, blonde moments I have throughout this summer or life, whatever. Haha, just to inform you... I'm blonde. Haha, and I'm sure everyone knows about the typical blonde jokes and stereotype toward blondes. And you know, I am perfectly okay with saying that its all true! Lol, now, I'm very intelligent and logical and completely sane, but sometimes the blondeness just seeps through.
For instance, a couple days ago Anne was telling my family and I about a friend who couldn't figure out if Canada was a country or not and she thought it so funny! So I in my stupidness I asked... Canada is a country though right? Bahaha, oh boy. I was a little confuffled at that point.
Similarly, last night we were watching TV. We saw a preview for some show that was having Jennifer Love Hewitt on to talk about her new movie, Garfield. I say to Anne, Has Jennifer Love Hewitt ever done any other movies? Haha, now I can explain myself for this one! Really. Id just seen a special on her and her new CD cuz now shes making music. So I momentarily forgot all the other movies I'd seen with her and only remembered her being a singer. :( I'm sorry!
Lol, I know I know, you totally had to be there but my family and I have had some good laughs over my blonde moments. As have my dorm I think. My girls ( fellow first yrs I lived with last year) and I have cracked up over plenty of stuff, most of which I can't mention on a worldwide internet. ;)
Anyway, just thought I'd start the list on here, and publicly make a fool of myself. Lol. Enjoy the humidity!

The Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End

2004-06-07T21:56:00.000-04:00

I just wanted to share something I read this morning in my devotional. The author wrote a little paragraph entitled "From the Father's Heart" and its just something we know God says to us each day. I found it so comforting and hope it brings some hope or comfort to someone else!

My child, you are often confused about who I am and where you are going. When you arise in the morning, I am there with you. When you work through the day, you will find Me close by. From the time you open your eyes until I close them in sleep at night, I am always with you, ready to guide you. Do not worry about knowing how you fit into My plans. Be concerned only with knowing Me and spending time together. Your future is in My hands.

Isn't that an amazing thought?! Being a university student with absolutely ZERO money I am constantly wondering about what I am supposed to do in my life and how I'm going to get the funds to do it. Am I in the right school? Am I at the right job? This passage confirms exactly what I've always known. God is right there the moment I wake up and I have no need to worry. So what am I doing worrying! Lol. Anyway, I just wanted to encourage anyone who is reading this whose having the same thoughts I am. Hopefully I'm not alone :). But I want to encourage you to remember HE IS THERE. And as my youth pastor says... God loves you. God does not make junk. You are bootilicious in the eyes of God. Yeah baby, I'm bootlicious ;).

On a more confusing note, I've just adopted the Haloscan system for my comments. But when I put it into the template page, which is incredibly incredibly confusing the comment/trackback symbol appears in big letters at the top of this blog. I'm sure you've already seen it. How grotesque! Lol, in no way does it compliment the appearance of this blog. Anyway, the point of this complaint is to ask if anyone knows how the hec you change it?! Any help? I'd love to hear from you.

So I just got back from a meeting for the preschool camp at Kid's kapers this summer. For July and August I am a "student summer worker" aka a camp counsellor at the vacation bible school type camp at my church, Unionville Alliance Church. Anyway, its this huge event each week with detailed crafts and all kinds of stuff to do. So for the month of June theres a meeting each monday night. And because i'm a "student summer worker" i'm like the one who knows all and is one of the main leaders. Whoopdeedoo. Anyway, we had an excellent meeting where we went over the crafts, learning centres, bible stories etc for the preschool kamp. Really exciting. But then we had to do this Plan to Protect program. It is a program of two videos and a booklet about sexual abuse in the church and how to prevent avoid it etc. Wow. Depressing. Sexual abuse saddens me to the core and I just can't understand how someone could violate and disrespect someone else, especially a child in such a way. Why I'm mentioning this is because it was a depressing way to end our meeting. I was so excited about crafts preschool and then I had to watch a video about how I have to be careful in the ways I show love to kids. I mean, I understand I have to be careful, but I just want to show them God's love! Hmm. :(

Okay. Off to watch the last of the most depressing hockey game. At this point its 2-0. Boo to Tampa!

Sunshine - WOW

2004-06-05T15:12:00.000-04:00

You know, its days like today when I just can't help but be in awe of God's creation. I don't know how you can look around you and not be like, how did He create all of this?! I just went for a jog down one of our nice little country roads. I live out in the boonies of central Ontario, and we've got about five acres of land around here, on my property at least. Anyway, the sun is shining in its full power, everything is green and pink and red and yellow, the trees are blowing in the breeze. And then as I jog slash walk, grr to Matt ;), down the nice little country road all I can hear is the toads croaking in the nearby swamp, and it smells like a cottage. Emmmmmm, I love that smell. Well I'm going to stop my inadequate description. But it was beautiful! I just wanted to keep jogging slash walking forever! (unfortunately my body wouldn't allow that) These are the times I am just so awestruck by God and his beautiful work and the care he takes to make our surroundings gorgeous. I mean he could've decided to make this earth treeless, plantless, just a bunch of black molten rock or something. But no, He loved us enough to give us something gorgeous to live on. I will be eternally grateful.
Well, I have to babysit this evening. I'm not sure whether I like that fact or not. I think tonight of all nights I'm leaning more towards liking that fact mainly because they have a pool and new hot tub and I was told to bring my bathing suit. Whoopdeedoo! How excellent is that! Every year my sisters and I beg and beg and beg for a hot tub or pool cuz we have the perfect spot for it, but no, we have to resort to waiting til we get asked over to our neighbors. Lol, oh well. Its fine with me :)

Please... avoid PDOAs

2004-06-04T21:59:00.000-04:00

Alright, this evening I have a little beef to vent about in this ever-growing blogging world. Public displays of affection. They seem to gross me out. Haha. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for holding hands with your hubbie, or putting your arm around each other. I love seeing two people who look perfect for each other and look in love. But ya know... I can really do without the groping and saliva, and all that jazz. Puh-lease. Now I don't mean to sound like some stupid person ranting about nothing. A couple of days ago, at work, I stepped onto the UP escalator and as I looked up to the second floor there is a man grabbing his woman's butt! To make matters worse this couple were at least in their 70s. Yuck! I mean, it was sweet, this old couple is obviously still in love, but save it for the bedroom people! Haha, they were slightly embarassed when they realized I'd witnessed their little menage-a-deux, it was classic. Anyway! I think I'm done my beef.
Oh, one more thing. Can I make another suggestion? If you ever work in retail, more specifically in the hosiery department, never EVER volunteer to clean out the drawers underneath. Because of inventory starting next week where this pack of dudes in blue shirts come in and count every single item we have in the store practically we have to organize everything and get it ready for them. Well, I open the first drawer. BMPH! (Tal... you understand :)) It was literally full to the brim and smushed down to fit with loose tights, kneehighs, girdles, and whatnot. Stuff that didn't have prices tags or anything so we had no clue what went where and what was garbage. I almost had a heartache. Thankfull half of the drawers weren't that bad, but at least 2 or 3 more were so bad I just couldn't do anything with them. And to top it off everything is dirty, musty, dusty. Ugh, I felt sick. Anyway, I am happy to say I accomplished a lot and its more than half done. The inventory dudes should be happy.
My little sister is watching Veggie Tales at the moment. Sniff..sniff.. I miss watching the veggie tales. They were my favorite part of sunday school. Ahhhh, Junior Asparagus. Don't you sometimes wish you could go back a few years to when you were in elementary school?!
Going to start another dull, monotous weekend of work and home. Chow! :)

Who invented work?

2004-06-03T20:14:00.000-04:00

My question today is... who in heavens invented work?! Lol, now, its not that I don't like work. Most of the time I love going to work. Selling strollers and car seats can actually be fun! I'm still debating whether its funner than selling shoes, but we'll see. Anyway, some days I want to be at work. But then there are days like today. A day where the sun is shining. It is so beautiful outside and all I want to do is enjoy this God-given day! But no... I have to go and spend my day under flourescent lighting, dig through old boxes of musty baby stuff, and pretty much do absolutely nothing! I accomplished one thing today and that was making 2 display tables look pretty. Whoopdeedoo. When I go in tomorrow I'm going to have to redo them. It's inevitable! So back to my original question. I can't figure out why someone would actually invent work. Lol, how many times have I asked myself and others this. Oh boy.
Also, another piece of advice. Everyone knows that when you buy new shoes you're supposed to work them in first. Well I got new shoes yesterday, exciting!, and cuz I only worked 6 hours today I thought I'd break them in at work. Oh my. My feet look horrible right now, I have open wounds all along where the shoe comes in contact with my foot. Ouch! Thankfully I brought a spare pair just in case so I changed halfway through. But not before the damage was done. Mercy me, my feet are hurting. Lol, but enough complaining. Out to enjoy this marvelous evening. Chow!

Coffee...late at night...Bad idea.

2004-06-02T23:11:00.000-04:00

Alright. Well, here I am. My first official post. How exciting. Whoopdeedoo! Well it is exciting. I can thank Jehan for the peer pressure to start this. Ha! Anyway, for whoever reads this... I'd like to give you a piece of advice. Its profound. Really! Don't have a coffee late at night. Especially not a grande Caramel Macchiato at 9:30 at night... if you expect to sleep that night. I had a Chocolate Chip and Cream Frappucino at about 10:30 a couple of nights ago. It was a lovely coffee trip with my friend Char, but I was up until almost 3 in the morning! And I can tell I'm going to be up late tonight too. Also, because of that coffee this first blog is going to be quite a babble. Thats right babble!Oh boy. Anyway, I hope everyone is having a great summer. I miss all of you from Redeemer! But I think I'm finally adjusted to home again. You know, I can relate to all of you who aren't working or have no job at the moment. Ugh. I think I've watched more TV in the past three days then I did in my last semester at Redeemer! I feel like a zombie. But I'm doing some little things in between. To warn my favorite dormmates, you know who you are, I've made this cool set of mini canvases that have Faith, Hope, and Love in chinese lettering on them. My family likes them so I think they look good :). And I've been playing a lot of piano lately too. Oh my, I bought the sheet music for My Immortal by Evanesnce. It is my new favorite song. So beautiful. And I have A Thousand Miles by Vanessa Carlton memorized. So beautiful again. My little sis is taking her grade 9 exam this Monday. Wo. Almost 3 hours of practice a night. I remember why I quit before that!
Sniff...sniff... so the reason I had coffee this evening was cuz I went out with my Deeper Group from last year. Also the reason for those sniff..sniffs. To explain... my church, Unionville Alliance Church, is centered around small groups like little Bible studies so you have a group of people you know at church cuz its kinda huge. Anyway, they do it in the youth group too and so I was part of one the year before I came to Redeemer. They are the best bunch of girls I've ever met. So fun but also so honest and innocent. And the leaders, Karen and Julie, two ultra cool chicks are just so great. Anyway, this evening was their last meeting for this year. I've only met with them a couple times since coming home but they invited me out for this last evening. It was so sad, I love just hanging out with them, and now I will only see them on the rare Sunday mornings that I can catch them! Hmmm... Anyway, maybe I should save some of this chattering for other days so I have something to update this thing with. Alright, I'm done