Casserole attack

It is definitely a Monday. It’s a tired, dreary, rainy day. The silver lining is it's Valentines Day. Paul brought me lunch to celebrate it being love day. I got a rose and a turkey sandwich. Bootcamp is cancelled tonight due to rain, and Paul and I get to start our evening of relaxing and being in love even earlier!


BUT first, it was a great weekend! Let me tell you about it.

 We love ferry rides!

 Grandma loves to see Wedding Pictures.

She is constantly amazed by how clear the photos are...it's adorable.

 We stopped at Timmies at least twice a day while in Port. I LOVE timmies.

 Waiting for our return ferry. Cuddly..and silly.

I couldn't quite manage to get Paul in mid air - Oops.

 

Paul and I spent the weekend in Port Alberni on the Island. We had a throghouly enjoyable ferry ride and a great drive through the grove and over the hump. We spent some much needed quality time with John and Crystal (one of my bridesmaids and her boyfriend) Friday night and Saturday we enjoyed a great lunch with youth group friends. We also went out for dinner with my Grandma and my aunt…mmm pine café. I love it. After that Paul and I joined my aunt and uncle at their place for some great conversation. We got there at 7:30 and didn’t leave until 1! They are so enjoyable to talk to; insightful, wise and fun!

Sunday we joined Lisa, Tony and Gwyn for breakfast (which was so great!) and then caught the 12:30 ferry back. Paul headed straight to church to lead kids church and I did all the grocery shopping. We joined my family for a family dinner and enjoyed being with my parents and sister and her family.

We came home right after dinner and between 8:30pm and 1am I made 9 casseroles, and 5 sets of leftovers. Woo! That’s 40 minute a meal! I love it! In the next 3 weeks I will be away a lot during the time that I normally make dinner so I thought I would make a bunch of meals that can be taken out the night before eating them and then Paul can throw them in the oven and they can be ready for when I get home. It’s perfect. I went online and found 9 recipes that used somewhat similar ingredients or ingredients I readily have available or are cheap…I made a list of all the prep work to do before assembly and master list of every single item needed for all the meals.


Step 1. Dice vegetables (onions, peppers and tomatoes), cube chicken, shred cheese, etc. Paul helped me with this while we watched 30 Rock.

Step 2. Cook meat (8 chicken breasts, 1 pound of ground beef, etc), boil pasta, cook rice, etc.

Step 3. Read through master ingredient list and put everything on the kitchen table for easy access as needed.

Step 4. With Candace’s help start with recipe one and put all the recipes together. With each recipe mix the ingredients in a large mixing bowl and when done adding ingredients put mixture in large freezer ziplock bag. Put that bag inside another bag with the ingredient/recipe list and any cheese topping needed for during cooking)

This was far more work than I expected, and without Candace doing the dishes as I went a long it would have taken me twice as long! It’s still totally worth it as now we have A LOT of food. Also when doing prep I made way more spaghetti sauce, noodles, rice and chicken than needed, so on top of our planned casseroles we ended up with quite a bit of extra food for the fridge. Our fridge is full and this makes me happy.

babysitting and superbowl

What a great weekend!


Friday night my nephews, Connor (2 ½ half years old) and Austin (3 ½ months old), spent the night with Paul and I. My sister, Jenna, and her husband, Colin, were out for the night to celebrate their 4 year anniversary! They dropped the boys off with us at 6 and came back Saturday at 11. They had a great time and so did we! Connor had a lot of fun playing with Paul and I, and Austin is such a sweet, easy baby. Connor was great going to bed, and I got the joy of cuddling up with him, reading him a bedtime story and praying for him. Oh!

After Connor was asleep and Austin was again fed and changed, our friends Josh and Ana came over to play Settlers of Catan. We played with 2 expansion packs (Cities & Knights and Seafarers) and the game lasted for over 2 hours. Austin was pretty much perfect the whole way through and the game was a lot of fun! We really like Josh and Ana so it was a pretty wonderful evening. After our guests left, and after we stayed up chatting with Candace (who is living with us for 4 months) Paul and I got to have a great chat, until 1:30am about life. It was so nice to have time to talk about life and ministry and kids and the future. Unfortunately we chose the one Friday that would have little kids waking us up the next day! Both boys woke up earlier than normal at 6:30 (instead of their usual 9:30!!). I got them to drift in and out of sleep for another hour and a half. I brought Connor in to bed with Paul and I, and oh man, he is so sweet when he sleeps! And since we have a King size bed not only did Paul not notice that Connor was there, but Connor kept looking and around and saying “Where’s Auntie Paul?” He’s a bit confused on the Auntie/Uncle gender thing. Before 11 when their parents came back, I hung out with Connor and Austin in the living room (while I let Auntie Paul sleep). We watched Thomas the Tank Engine and other such shows and had breakfast. It was nice to hang out with my favorite boys.

 Me and the boys

After the boys were gone and we were back on our own I spent the afternoon organizing our kitchen and fridge. As you can see our fridge is now SUPER organized.

This makes me very happy.

Saturday night we went out to Delta for David’s, Paul’s Dad, birthday. It was nice to spend time with family and eat AMAZING food. Carole, Paul’s step mom, is a phenomenal cook! We were home by 10 and I was asleep by 10:30!
Sunday I spent the day organizing some more and prepping A LOT of food for Paul’s superbowl party. I made wings, pizza, chili/cheese dip, BBQ cocktail wieners and much more! Paul graciously recorded the superbowl and waited until AFTER church to watch the game and host his party. People started showing up at 5:30 and the last were there until 10. There were 15 guys there to watch the game and 4 girls there to sit in the kitchen and talk. The men devoured the food. I love cooking for people who love to eat! I am SHOCKED by how much food they managed to consume!

As soon as the game was halfway through and the food was under control Lyndsay, Stefany, Candace & I went out for Candace’s birthday. We had drinks at a Jamaican Restaurant and then headed over to Sweet Revenge for some AMAZING deserts. It was a perfect night, filled with reminiscing about first meeting Candace and other fun memories and sharing what we love about her.

Once we got home I stayed up late with Candace and Paul to watch the post superbowl Glee episode (Dang Telus, cut off half of the episode. I’m getting so tired of their TERRIBLE TV service). I slightly regret this decision now that it’s Monday morning and I am at work, very tired..however I am always very tired and so it doesn’t really matter how little sleep I get.

Tonight is bootcamp (in the cold, eep!), Tuesday is lifegroup, Wednesday I’m visiting a friend at Metrotown, Thursday is a coworkers going away dinner followed by a hangout with my sister and Friday through Sunday Paul and I are out of town in Port Alberni. I’m slightly tired thinking about it all – though it will be a great week! Lots of fun times ahead!

Stationary

I guess it’s time for another update. You’d never believe that I go on google reader every day to read all your blogs and yet here I am, rarely updating!

Sidenote: I love stationary. I love that part of my job is ordering stationary. I love using pens. I write primarily with a blue ink Gel pen but have the same pen in black, red and pink. I use the blue and red the most. I LOVE binder clips. LOVE. and Plastic sleeves to store paper. Also love.

I am learning that in the corporate world. everything is monotonously similar and at the same time constantly changing. Every week it seems someone is being promoted, or a new project is being approved or someone is starting the relocation process. Or all three! And yet every day I come to work, put in 8 hours, and leave. I file, sort, copy, clean, assist, email, etc. Occasionally, to break up the monotony, I pack boxes for people beginning to relocate. Ooooo. Exciting right?

Updating

Written week of November 1st:

Well what an interesting day I have had. Yesterday the entire office was sent an email asking us to all meet downstairs on our other floor in the boardroom for a staff meeting. Apparently this NEVER happens so people were concerned. Turns out our entire office is being relocated to Toronto! Most people are going to have a relocation offer and only a few will not. We of course have the choice to decline, work until the end of the summer then receive severance, accept and move to Toronto, or quit anytime without severance. I assumed that I was one of the few not going to be offered a relocation package since (despite doing well at my job) I am quite replaceable. Well, I could not have been more wrong. They offered me a relocation package and in our private meeting let me know they really valued me. I was shocked. They explained the VERY generous relocation offer and the AMAZING severance option which includes working until the end of August.

We are rooted in Vancouver. Our families are here, our friends, our church, etc…and more importantly it’s where we have felt God calling us to be. The only way we would go to Toronto is if we felt God moving….for example there could be a Seminary there for Paul that is a much better price than here, or something like that. But really our heart is to stay in Vancouver. Right now we are 90% staying…I explained, in my private meeting, to the two head guys why we would stay. Paul wants to Pastor a church at UBC. We kind of need to be here to do that. 
**we have confirmed now, as of Nov 10, that we are NOT moving to Toronto**

Surgery update

I am at work today. I was supposed to be in surgery. I spent yesterday in the hospital waiting for surgery only to have it cancelled. I begged to have it rescheduled this week, so I am back in on Friday. Therefore, I will work today, Wednesday and Thursday and head back to the hospital Friday.
While it’s frustrating to be bumped, I am choosing to look at the bright side:

Positive #1: last night there was a guest speaker from our church in Nashville. Paul and I both REALLY wanted to hear him, I love how he teaches. We were going to have to miss him but this way we got to hear him!

Positive #2: I will be having surgery on a Friday not a Monday which means I will have three weekends to recover instead of just two! I will be back at work on October 25th now.

Positive #3: I got to have a trial run in the hospital. I feel a lot less nervous and more prepared for Friday, especially now that we know I will be in overnight. I will make sure my iPod is loaded with movies in case I can’t sleep!

Positive #4: We got to have a trial run at work, with the girl who is covering reception. I forgot to give her the mail keys so it’s a very good thing I had to come in!

Positive #5: Last night I created a new recipe for my dinner repertoire. I made chicken with pesto, tomato, garlic and parmesan. Paul loved it so much he made me take a picture of it…AND told me he can’t believe he was so lucky as to marry me. Which confirms the old adage that the way to a man’s heart is most definitely through his stomach.

Heading in to surgery

Today feels long as I dreamt about work last night. I feel like I’ve already been here and done this. Except my dream was clearly not based in reality; in my dream the CEO had a group of important visitors in. They were midgets, business midgets. They made a big mess & I had to clean it up. It was terrible. They all wore suits and managed to stay spotless; they were used to making messes and not getting dirty.



Paul and I are having a lot of fun in life. A few weekends ago we drove down to the states and slept in his parents van in a walmart parking lot. It was actually so much fun. We have friends over, we go out to visit friends. We play games. We laugh. We eat. We see our families, we go to work and school. We love to have people in our home, especially when we get to feed them and really especially when we get to have good deep conversations with them…though we also like to play games with them too.


Today is a busy day at the office. A bunch of executives from other locations are here and it’s neat to put a face to different names. It means that today is hectic, and yet when they are all in meetings it’s slow.


I’ve been doing pretty well at getting to bed on time since I started working here. I am usually asleep by 10:30 on a work night. I wake up at 6 and am out of the house at 7:05. This week though I have been up to 12:00 or 12:30 each night. In reality I don’t really feel that much more tired than normal; but as I am fighting a cold this is not a great lifestyle choice for the week. However there have been things to do, and people to see. I will be off work for 2 weeks starting Monday to have lower back surgery so at least I can rest then!


Yes, I am having back surgery! Since March I have been experiencing pain in my lower back/right hip. Really the pain feel like it centers in my butt on the upper right side. For the first 3 months they told me it was just a stress induced pinched nerve. Then when it persisted past my wedding and honeymoon they told me it was Siatica. Then when I couldn’t sleep next to my husband because the it hurt to lay in bed (though it hurt to stand and sit as well) they told me it “wasn’t that bad.” Finally I went to Emerg and got pills which actually helped relieve the pain for the first time in 4 months. When my GP saw that those pills were making a difference he realized it had to be worse than Siatica or stress. He finally had me sent for a CT scan in early July. This scan showed that I had a protruding disc that had fragmented and that the only way to clean out the fragmented pieces and keep the disc from protruding was surgery. This was discovered the day before I started a new job! The surgeon told me I needed surgery and that he would book me in for that night, as it was a fairly urgent surgery. However after 2 and a half months of not working I couldn’t afford to lose the job I had finally gotten! I asked the DR if I could do the surgery in the fall and still be ok on pills until then, which he said was fine. Then I went to visit my new workplace to explain what was going on. They very generously agreed to let me have 2 weeks off for the surgery and recovery sometime in the fall. Well that time is this coming Monday. I cannot wait! I have been in pain 6 months; through all the wedding prep, through the wedding, through the honeymoon, through job hunting, etc. Everyone said that the pain would be gone by the wedding/honeymoon. They said, “God is good, he will remove this pain.” Well God is still good but he did not remove the pain. Instead he used it to teach me. I have learned to slow down. I have learned to be patient and gracious with people in pain (especially when you can’t see the problem obviously). I have learned my husband is very kind to me when I am not feeling well. I have learned to be grateful for what is good, instead of complaining about what’s wrong.


Lessons aside, I am glad to be rid of the pain though 


So for the next two weeks I will mostly be at home. I have been prepping meals and PVR’ing TV. The recovery will not be bed rest. I will be moving around my home AND resting in it. My goal is to spend some time with God each day, to connect via phone or email with a long distance friend each day, and do every piece of physical therapy they give me to help heal. I will rest as long as they recommend and to my best ability follow everything they say to optimize healing.


Today I had lunch with a friend. I don’t know her very well yet but we have a lot of things and people in common. We go to the same church. We dress similarly. Heck, she was Paul’s only other girlfriend! In my head I think of her as a “dear friend” even though we are new friends. I look forward to getting to know her better. I love the start of friendships that you just know will be good. I look forward to figuring out how to make time for her in my life (on top of all the other people and friendships that are already a priority!).






Alright, I have a mountain of booklets to put tabs in, then bind in a binding machine. Woo!

Fall again

I am a strange sort of blogger; I rarely write (except in spurts) but I check every blog I follow every day. I only learned 9 months ago how to follow these and before would actually go through and click on every link to see if they had been updated. I love to read what my friends and acquaintances have to say and think about life. AND in THEORY I love to write. Something just makes it so hard though. My mind rejects the idea of writing being easy; despite the fact that it really is easy.

I am at work. I like my job. If I have to have a job and have to work somewhere; this is the place to be. People always ask me if I am happy here; and I am. They ask if I like my job; I do. They ask if it’s a dream job; and no, it’s not. A dream job for me would involve much higher pay, travel with Paul and full time availability to rest and build in to people. This dream job does not exist. That’s why it’s a “dream”. However, this job is definitely a gift from God – I love the hours, I love the pay, I find enjoyment in my work here and my co workers are nice. God has provided yet again.

I just looked back and realized that I never posted about my job. I got a job as a receptionist at a Uranium mining company. U1. It’s very exciting. I do administration and answer phones. I like the work. It’s right downtown overlooking Stanley Park. It pays what I needed it to pay and I get to dress up for work every day.

Biggest surprise in marriage? How awesome it is. I thought being married to the man I love and enjoy (Paul) would be really really great. It’s even better. Now I know it’s only been 5 months but whatever. I love my husband.

Speaking of Paul; my husband talks and reacts in his sleep. So for example one day he thought I was me about to turn in to an alien so he tried to get me to stop by pushing me off the bed and shouting at me not to do it. Thankfully I realized what was happening and managed to hop off the bed just before I was pushed off. This past weekend was my favorite though; I was awoken in the middle of the night to Paul doing pushups in bed in his sleep. He was giving it hardcore. It was hilarious to watch. Later he tried to save me from being sucked in to a vortex by pulling me across the bed. It is certainly adventurous to sleep in the same bed as Paul!

I love our home. We are 90% unpacked and settled. I still have some final things to go through but OH it feels like home. Our pantry is stocked to brimming. Our freezer has everything I need to cook the things I love to make.

I love our wedding pictures

Also I love my new family:

Life is pretty awesome

  

Now if only the courier I am waiting for would come I would be very happy. I need to send something to England in half an hour and I haven't yet received it!