What We Will Miss About the Place We've Called Home the Past 9 Months

       Well, we're getting closer to our big move. We have settled most of the details and are counting down the days! :) At least I am! I am finished work this coming Wednesday and my parents come the following Wednesday so that leaves us with one short week to get this apartment packed up! Matthew has been done school for about a week now and has been great at helping out around the house so I'm sure we'll be able to get everything done. :) So yah, my parents are coming on May 4, Matt's brother gets married out here on May 7, our moving truck comes on May 10 and I fly home with my ma & Pa later on that night. Matt is planning on probably heading out early the next morning and will arrive home by around the 15th or so. So plans are definitely falling in to place and I can't believe that I will be home in less than 3 weeks! As we get closer to leaving both Matthew and I have come to realize that there are some things we will actually really miss about living out here. When we were making the decision to move, it was easy to overlook the good things about living in Hamilton in favor of the excitement of being back in Lethbridge with family and friends... but shortly after making this decision, a list started in my head about all the things we will miss! 
       So here's the list... Not in any particular order,  just as I think of them!
1. My brothers live here!!! That is definitely tops on the list!! (not that the list is in any particular order... :P ) We have immensely enjoyed having my brothers living just 3 blocks away, coming over for dinner, haircuts, and hockey. In the excitement of going home to family in Lethbridge, I can't forget the family that we're leaving behind. :( I love my brothers and I know Matt is going to really miss having them around too!

2. BRUEKKE! My brothers band! We haven't been able to catch as many shows as I would like, because they often play pretty late... but when we go, I always LOVE IT! And always end up leaving feeling super proud of my little brother. Make sure you check them out at bruekke.com... download their E.P. and show them some support cause they? Are AWESOME!

3. Joy Johnson. My brothers Beau. We've enjoyed hanging out with and getting to know her during our time in this city! 

4. Hamiton is also known as "The City of Waterfalls". And we're trying to see as many as we can in these last couple weeks! In fact, we are heading out to see #1 on the "Top 16 Waterfalls in the City" list tomorrow. Apparently there are 126 waterfalls in the city! We will definitely miss the scenery and beauty that this area offers. 

6. Apple orchards! I went to a couple different orchards around the area in the fall and loved picking fresh apples right off the trees and then trying out different kinds of apple-y desserts. :)

7. Our wee little apartment/first home. :) We have (for the most part) loved living in this place. It definitely has it's quirks and annoyances, but it has treated us well as our first place. I will miss the character as I really don't think we will ever find a place like this again. This was our first "home" as a married couple and we have great memories here!

8. Restaurant selection! We've enjoyed having a whole bunch more food options to choose from this past year. :) We will miss having Kelseys nice and close by as well as some of the local "non-chain" restaurants. Sorry, no pictures for this one. :P


9.The Light-house! :P We are going to miss hanging out with and visiting Jeremy, Christine, and Zachary Light. Jeremy attended seminary with Matt and I know that he really appreciated Jeremy's advice, encouragment, etc. and will miss having him to talk to. We will miss going there for dinner and games. Hoping we'll have the chance to connect with them in Lethbridge again someday. :) Again, no pictures. 


10. I know that Matt would want me to say that he will miss MacDiv. We struggled with making connections there for quite a while, but I know that he made alot of friends that he was sad to say good-bye to. We both really enjoyed the banquets that we went to and the people we were able to meet! We connected with another couple from Alberta and are sad to be leaving them behind. 


I'm sure I'm missing things or will thing of more things later, but there are definitely things and people we will be sad to leave in May. 


But with this list, there are also some things that we are happy to be saying good-bye to...
-13% HST is just EVIL! :P
-Milk in bags! Worst. idea. EVER! We were able to find a little milk market that sells 4L jugs, but you can't them at any grocery stores.
-People referring to the escarpment as the "mountain". :P It's not a mountain people! It's a hill! A hill!! Actually, after 9 months of living here we've started to refer to it as the "mountain" too, just so people know what we're talking about.
-I am happy to say bye to "Fortinos", "Metro", "Food Basics", etc. These are the names of grocery stores here and I was just never as comfortable shopping at any of these places as I am at "Safeway" or "Superstore" back home. Silly, I know... But still! :P 

Ok, I'm gonna stop list making cause this is getting long... Before I sign off, here's a quick pregnancy update.

How far along are you?

We will be 17 weeks this coming Sunday. The half-way mark is getting close. :)

How have I been feeling? 

Unfortunately, the idea of morning sickness passing once you hit the second trimester hasn't been quite true for me. But as long as I remember to take my diclectin both in the morning and at night I usually manage okay with only a slight nauseous period late afternoon. 

I've been slowly getting my energy back and have seen the clock as late as 10pm a couple nights this week. :)

Are we going to find out the sex of the baby?

Well, we have an ultrasound here on Friday May 6 (while my parents are here, so my mommy gets to come along!) and we've been told that they will tell us at that ultrasound if we decide we want to know... I think we're leaning that way, but we still have a couple weeks to decide. :)

Cravings?

Well, the Pizza Pop craving has come and gone... Just one day I looked at them and decided I couldn't eat them anymore and haven't had one since. Weird! I can't say that I've had any other odd cravings since then. 

Unfortunate symptoms?

Well, my skin hasn't ever been the clearest but I had been on ProActiv since before our wedding with great results... Unfortunately, the jury is out on whether or not it is safe during pregnancy so I have steered clear of it and I am breaking out like a teenager! Oh the fun of pregnancy hormones! :P My belly also "popped" quite early so I've been dealing with mild amounts of back pain... But nothing that can't be manged with a warm bath most nights. :)

Baby belly at 16 Weeks

Well, that's about all! I'm hanging out in the lil bedroom by myself tonight while Matt has some guy friends over for poker playing and hockey watching... maybe that's why this is getting so long. :)

We hope you are all doing well and look forward to seeing alot of you soon! :)

Big Changes in Our Lil House

Well, I haven't written for a very long while... Since before Christmas. At first, the reason for my blog absence was that my dear sweet Oma passed away on Christmas Eve and I had no idea how to even begin processing that. I felt like whatever I said, whatever I wrote, could never even come close to summing up the amazing lady she was and how big of a void was left in my life. I started several blog posts talking about her battle with cancer, her faith, determination, strength, etc., but nothing just ever seemed good enough... So I just didn't post anything. How on earth could I possibly write anything that would sum up what she meant to me? I was just so incredibly grateful that my whole family could be there with my Opa to say our final good-byes.

We came back to Hamilton and after dealing with homesickness, settled back into life... We both had a bit of a hard time adjusting to life back in Hamilton as being home for Christmas really made us realize how important family was to us and how it was harder than we had expected to be so far away. We began to talk about if we wanted to stay in Hamilton for the full 3 years to complete Matthew's degree. We had both been finding the school here to be a little less friendly and family-orientated then we had hoped and weren't quite feeling settled here. Fast - forward about a month... That's when I realized I was just feeling "off" and decided to buy a pregnancy test. It was quite the surprise to both Matthew and I when it came back POSITIVE! (I may have actually taken 3 more tests before believing the results). It took a few weeks for the news to set in, but it helped us immensely to have the support of all the very excited grand-parents and aunt & uncles to be, as well as some far away friends. We have had some amazing care by one of the doctors at the walk-in-clinic here and are starting to get used to the idea of being parents!

But with this news came a realization that being far away from family was about to get a whole lot harder. We then began to pray and ponder our decision and plans for the future. Did we want to spend the first 2 years of our baby's life 36 hours away from family and friends? Of course, people are great and promise visits, but 36 hours is FAR AWAY! I had always imagined having our moms a wee bit closer when we had our first baby! It was a very hard decision to make, but Matthew and I have now decided to move back to Lethbridge for a year. Matt will be taking a year off school and working and we will be close to family while the baby is little and then we hope to move to Vancouver in the Fall of 2012 for Matt to finish off his degree. We have done some research into Regent College which is on the UBC Campus in Vancouver and have heard that it is a whole lot more family friendly so we plan to go there for Matthew to finish up his degree. Like I said, big changes in our little house!

We will be moving back to Lethbridge in Mid-May after Matthew's brothers wedding which is out here on May 7. My parents are flying out for the wedding as well so we will have a few days to visit with them here and show them some of our favorite places and then we will be packing up to head back to Alberta. We are going to stay with my parents initially and figure out more from there. I have already been hired on to work for the summer which is great, as that means I won't lose out on Mat-Leave, and Matthew has started the job hunt as well. We are really looking forward to a summer spent at home. Two of my very good friends are having/had babies as well, so it will be great to be close to them, and Matt's best friend and wife are coming back from Australia so we're excited to see them too! (Hi Mitchell and Julie! :) ) I am excited that we will be in town for Jolene's grad and my dad's 50th birthday, as well as some family camping! We are now counting down the days! :)

Well that brings you up to speed on things in our life! How fast things can change in just a few months time!

Now some quick answers to the many pregnancy questions we have been and continue to be asked:
When is baby due?
Well, we actually just got back from our ultrasound which showed baby to be about 12 weeks 1 day, which gives us a due date of October 2.
How have I been feeling?
Well, lets just say that at around 8 weeks, diclectin became my very good friend! I was throwing up a little too much for mine and the doctors liking so she got me set up on a low dose and it's made a huge difference! I have had the normal pregnancy fatigue which has made staying up til 9 a late night for me, but I'm just resting when I can.
Are we going to find out what we're having?
Well, that's up for debate at the moment but I think we're leaning towards yes??? Don't hate me mom! :) Otherwise, we have decided that if our child is a boy, it will likely remain nameless... So if we find out the gender, we may be able to stop arguing about names! :P Our ultrasound is actually already booked in Lethbridge for the beginning of June, so I guess we have until then to decide.
Cravings?
Oh my goodness. It's kind of disgusting, but these past 4 or 5 weeks I've been craving Pillsbury Pizza Pops! And apple sauce. And that's about it. Yuck, that sounds gross to read. But Matthew makes me a fruit and veggie smoothie that I drink every morning so at least I'm getting some decent nutrition. But my appetite is on the upswing so we'll see what I'm eating in the next couple weeks. :)

Ok, here's a quick posting of my belly at 12 weeks, and then a picture from our ultrasound today and I am off to go make something for dinner. I think we still have some pizza pops left so I'll see if I can convince Matt that's what we should have for dinner... :)

Blurry Baby Van Dyk : 12 Weeks, 1 Day

A Busy Baking Weekend!

Hi! It's me again! :)
        Matt is one week closer to being done his first seminary semester and we are both one week closer to coming home for Christmas! And I can't even tell you how excited we are about both of these matters. :P The countdown is totally on!
        Matt has spent the weekend busy studying for his two finals coming up this week. He writes his History of Christianity exam Monday morning and then his Greek exam Tuesday morning, and then he's DONE! He's heading out Tuesday night to celebrate with some of the guys from his bible study and then he won't have to think about school again until the New Year. I'm really excited for him... he really needs the break! 
        We have a pretty busy week coming up before Matt leaves for home next Sunday. Wednesday night we are having our landlord and her 2 kids over for dinner since her husband is out of town for the week... Should be kind of interesting! Some of the first people I'll cook for that aren't family. Yikes! :P Thursday night Matthew and I are going to do our own lil "family Christmas". We just decided to do some small gifts and spend some time together before he leaves. Unfortunately, he is already wearing and enjoying his slippers so I have to think quick about what else to get him! Friday we are heading over to some friends place for dinner and games. Looking forward to that! Saturday we're gonna be busy packing food for the guys trip to Alberta and packing all the gifts and clothes too. And then Saturday night we are going to a Christmas party for the Toyota dealerships here in the city. The body shop I work for is affiliated with and owned by the same family as the Toyota dealerships so we were invited to go represent the body shop with my manager and her husband. It's a pretty fancy deal so I had to head out and get a shirt and tie for my hubby and make sure i have something to wear that suits the weather. I'll try to remember to take/post pictures next week! And then Sunday morning Matt, Eric and Tim are climbing in the car to begin the trek home to Alberta. Crazy!!!!
        This weekend I was busy baking some Christmas treats. Eric's girlfriend Joy came over Friday night and we baked up a storm. Eric loves banana chocolate chip muffins so I showed Joy how to make those... and we made a ton of them! While she was busy with those, I was making Matt's favorite Christmas treat "Eggnog Cookie Cups". Here's the link if you're interested in trying them: http://www.tasteofhome.com/Recipes/Eggnog-Filled-Cookie-Cups . Soooooo good! Kind of finicky to make but so worth it! Then yesterday, I made some Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Truffles. Basically, you just make some safe to eat cookie dough (like this one for example: http://www.food.com/recipe/heathers-safe-to-eat-raw-chocolate-chip-cookie-dough-108925), then roll it into little balls and place on cookie sheets in the freezer. Let them harden for an hour or two and then melt some chocolate chips in the microwave. Then, toss the balls of cookie dough into the melted chocolate and coat it. Then put them back on the cookie sheet (with wax paper on it to make it easier) and back in the freezer so the chocolate can harden. And then eat and ENJOY! :) Yum, yum! 
Here's a couple pictures of the treats: 

        The banana chocolate chip muffin recipe is one I got from my mom that she's been making for years. I have a mini-muffin tin that I use to make some bite size muffins. 

        Well, that's about all for this week! Less than two weeks and we will both be home to spend time with family and friends celebrating the Christmas season! YAY!!

Much Love,

M & J

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas

Hello! And welcome to December!
        Is it just me or has 2010 FLOWN by? I can't believe that Matt is already wrapping up his first semester of seminary and that we will both hopefully be back home visiting in less than 3 weeks! We are both getting very excited for Matt to write that last exam and then to get ready for our trips. I hope to pack most of my stuff in the car with Matt and Eric (and maybe Tim!) and then just have a carry-on or two when I fly out the next week. We'll see how that goes!
        This week has been a pretty busy one. Not as much for me as for Matt! He had an entirely exhausting week and got by on very little sleep! Two nights he was up past three or four and then Thursday he pulled an all nighter to get his paper done and handed in on Friday. He was EXHAUSTED by the time Friday night rolled around, but he's catching up on sleep this weekend. He is done all of his papers now, has his last class on Wednesday and then his last exam is Dec. 14 so we're just looking forward to then. :) 
We had a really great day yesterday. We both slept in nice and late before heading out for a date day! We left equipped with Christmas shopping lists, grocery shopping lists and plans to not head back home until we were entirely successful. And we did great! We hit up the mall here in Hamilton which has a huge selection of stores and crossed item after item off of our lists. Success! Then we headed to the grocery store for the bi-weekly shopping trip. The majority of grocery shopping trips I tackle on my own... and now I know why! Men are just not efficient grocery shoppers!!! Matt gets sucked in by every sale sign, new product and food display. Throughout the trip I heard things like "Hey hon, they have Depends on sale. We should get some!" to which I replied "Dude, neither of us wear Depends! We don't need Depends! Just because somethings on sale, doesn't mean we need to buy it!" (Note: this might be a slight exaggeration... :P) We headed to the soap/body wash aisle because he was out of his body wash. I thought we would just walk down the aisle, pick out the one he's been using, and then continue on. But once he saw the great selection of men's body wash, as well as prices varying from $3.99-$5.49, we had to stop and smell them ALL! And then compare the sizes verses the prices. Finally a selection was made! :) Later on, in a different aisle, he was slowing us down again and I said "Jeepers, I should've left you at home. This would go much quicker!" An older lady overheard and laughed and then said "I just sent my husband to go sit down and have a coffee so I can get shopping done!" Turns out this isn't a new problem. :P Matthew and I actually have a great time shopping together but it was amusing to me how it took me almost twice as long! :)
        We got home in time to make some finger food for dinner and then began setting up our Christmas tree. We played Christmas music, ate some yummy food and set about making our apart ready for the season. Then I began wrapping the gifts we bought while he watched the Oilers game. It was a really nice "date day"!
        Here's some pictures from our tree decorating. Definitely doesn't look like anything from a magazine, but when you're working with a budget and dollar store decorations, you do what you can! :P

Before Photo!

Hubby stringing the lights!

Enjoying some yummy eats.

Taking turns with the decorations.

Some of our favourite decorations. Got this one from Matthew last year.

Reminder of our 2 favourite kids.

New ornament for this year! :)

:

Sure love me some Tim Hortons! 

Us with our first Christmas tree!

Later on with some of the gifts waiting to be brought to Alberta. :)

Every year for as long as I can remember my mom has bought us chocolate advent calendars  and this year was no different! Here they are displayed on our wall for my ma to see. :)

        Well, that's all folks! We're still waiting for the first official snow fall of the year. We've had a couple flakes fall here and there, but nothing that sticks around! We'll see what the next couple weeks have in store for us!

        Hope you are all enjoying the start to the Christmas season. 

Much Love,

M & J

It's been a really long while! / Streams of Consciousness

Hi there!
        You know it's been a while since your last blog post when your father-in-law, who is computer illiterate relatively new to computer use, comments that he's been checking for updates and there haven't been any! :) So here I am, typing a new blog post. This one's for you Al! :)
        The main reason I haven't posted is that I just haven't had too much to say! Life here in Hamilton has become very routine and I don't have too many fun or interesting stories to share. Also, I've been down and out with a nasty/cold/flu illness for the past week or so and have had zero motivation to do ANYTHING! Matt got sick a little bit on the weekend too and we had to rock-paper-scissors to decide who would go and make our eighth pot of chicken noodle soup. :) I do have to say a big thanks to my hubby for tackling the laundry though! We kind of have an agreement in our humble abode that I will take care of the laundry if he takes care of the garbages. Most would probably think he has the better end of the deal as his job consists of one trip down our 3 flights of stairs to put the garbage in the appropriate bins, while mine consists of 3 or 4 trips throughout the day... but I don't know if I've mentioned the maggots and mold and just general GROSSNESS that is the green compost recycling bin that sits under our sink... I would do 20 loads of laundry before I would touch that little green bin! :)
        Matt has been ridiculously busy with school the past week or so and the next two weeks are gonna be pretty nutso too! The end of the semester has really snuck up on both of us I think. I am having a hard time comprehending that he is already at the end of his first semester of seminary! He has two pretty big papers due and then it will be exam week before it all wraps up on Dec. 14. Then he will have a couple days to recuperate around home before him and Eric get in the car for their trek to Alberta. He's not looking forward to the drive very much but I know he's really looking forward to spending time with family! I too am very excited to be going home for Christmas! It was really up in the air for a while, trying to decide whether or not it would be feasible and I'm soooo glad we are able to make it happen. I have been feeling pretty homesick for the past month or so and it's been great to have this trip home to look forward too. I was hanging in there until my second super close friend told me about her baby on the way... Nothing like having your two besties pregnant with their first babies and being 3000 kms away to help cause homesickness. :P I knew these times and moments would come... It's part of growing up and part of the joys of being married to a pastor-to-be/pastor. But I don't think I was ready for them to come so soon! 
        Last week I had the opportunity to help Matt with his seminary homework... Go figure, me his somewhat uneducated wife, helping him with his Graduate level school work. Well, when he came home and said that he had to make a poster complete with pictures and Greek words, I knew that I should probably help him out! :) He chose to do his poster on different animals so I spent time on google looking for pictures of animals that were present in New Testament bible times while he searched for the Greek wording for them. I then cut and pasted all the pictures onto cardstock and then arranged them on the poster... So pretty much I did the majority of the poster... :P Matt's only job was to copy the Greek words from his dictionary and print them off on the computer... Well, the other day he came home from school and I asked him what mark we got! :) Imagine my surprise to find out that after all the work I did on the beautiful poster, we were only awarded an 80%! I was quite shocked and appalled! :P So I asked him why we lost marks... and he tells me that his spelling of some of the words was incorrect! I then made fun of him and said "you're only job was to copy the words directly from the dictionary! And you did it wrong!?!" It was all said in jest and we both were somewhat amused by the whole deal. I think he was more amused at the fact that I even cared what grade we got. :) I haven't been able to help him with any more of his homework, but that might just be better for our marriage as I seem to take things a little too personally. :) 
        We have been hearing tales from across the country about the snow and wind and cold and crazy winter conditions... and quite frankly, we think you all must be exaggerating. We have yet to see a single snow flake fall from the sky here... Not a single one! So my brain cannot comprehend the fact that back home, there is a deep freeze. I know our time will come, and we will be whining about the cold weather than, but right now it's nice for us to just enjoy the balmy +10 degrees we've been having. :P Yesterday, I was driving up on the "mountain" (a.k.a the escarpment that runs through Hamilton that everyone refers to as a mountain... but really is just a glorified hill) and looking out over the city and it was a beautiful fall day and I wished I had my camera to take pictures to show you all. 
         I started my Christmas shopping this past week. I was at the mall the other day and it was PACKED! Could hardly find a parking spot, and had to wait in lines at every store. It made me glad that I started now. Along with my Christmas shopping stories comes a sad story though! I have been trying to listen and pay attention to Matt to see if there's anything I could surprise him with for Christmas. Now he's always complaining about being cold (which has nothing to do with the fact that I'm a little bit of a heat nazi who won't turn the heat above 15 in our house :) ) so I figured that slippers would be a great gift! I went and bought them yesterday and had them hidden in the back of the car until I would be able to wrap them. Well, tonight, Matt is sitting in the room freezing, and looks over at me with my fuzzy red slippers and says "I know what I'll add to my Christmas list... Slippers!!" And he starts logging in to facebook to post it on the Christmas lists for our families... and I panicked! And said "Ummm.... I don't think slippers are a very good gift to ask for" and he said "Why?" and apparently I lost my ability to think on the spot and just said "Ummm... maybe you just shouldn't ask for slippers"... This led to him figuring out that I had bought him slippers for Christmas so his Christmas surprise is ruined. :( So now I think he'll get his slippers a little bit earlier than planned! :)
        Well, it turns out that when I get typing you can't really shut me up! :) But I think that's pretty much all that's new and exciting around these parts. Tomorrow night Matthew and I are headed out to a Christmas party that the Students Association at the seminary is throwing. I'm looking forward to it as I haven't really had the opportunity to meet anyone else from the school since I started working. Saturday I hope to get our Christmas tree set up and get this place feeling a little Christmas-y. Then next week I will be there to do what it takes to get Matt through his last couple assignments and ready for finals! What a fun time of year! :P


I/we hope you are all doing well and look forward to seeing some of you soon! 


Much Love,


M & J

Goodbye October!

Hi Everyone!
        Well, it's been a couple weeks again. I am finding it's hard to find things to keep talking about since life has settled into such a routine. Now that I'm busy working 40+ hours a week, I am not finding as much time to get out and about and experience Hamilton. Life has been pretty quiet these past 2 weeks. Matt has been fairly busy with school which doesn't leave a whole lot of time for the two of us to explore. :) Today I did manage to get him out of the house for a bit and we headed out to an orchard to pick some apples! Matt loved the apple pies I was busy making last month so we went out there together so I will be able to make some more. Heres some pictures from our outing:

 Sooo many yummy apples!

 Hokey Posed Picture. :P

 Lots and lots of pumpkins! :)

 Yummy apples that will be turned into delicious pie!

 I think Matt was excited to come along only because it gave him the chance to actually drive our new car! :) I've been taking it to work and back every day and today was only his second time driving it. 

        Work has been going pretty well for me! I'm still enjoying it and I'm learning LOTS about cars and people. This week was pretty crazy for me because my boss/the manager was off sick for 3 days leaving me to fend for myself. The guys from the shop would come and have me go look at a car and then ask me "So, do you think we need to order this part here? Or what do you want us to do?" Ummmm... I don't really know ANYTHING! I'm just supposed to answer the phone and be friendly... not actually do anything regarding the vehicles! :P But using a whole lot of team work, we were able to make it through! 

        We've been really enjoying our new little car! We get crazy great gas mileage and it's so fun to have a nice little car to drive around in. Matt and I have been a little stressed out trying to figure out what to do about insuring and registering the car though! When we moved here we found out that it cost quite a bit more to register a vehicle here then it does back home! We got a quote here for our car and in order to have Ontario insurance, it will cost us $260 a month! CRAZY! We got a quote from our insurance company back home in Alberta and she said that they can insure the car for $120 a month. That's a BIG difference! So right now we are toying with the idea of Matt driving the car home at Christmas and having an out of province inspection done in Alberta so we can insure and register it there. We have looked into it and as long as Matt maintains his student status, we are able to have our car insured and registered there. So we are working on the logistics! I won't have enough time off work at Christmas to drive with him so Eric and him might be sharing a road trip. And then hopefully I will be able to fly home for a few days as well. Hopefully we can figure something out!

        Well, I can't think of too much else new that's going on. Pretty boring hey? Well, here's a picture of the latest "decor" addition I did on one of our walls, and then I'm off to have a date night with my hubby. 

        One last thing... I think Matt's best friend Mitchell reads this blog... And we both just want to wish you a very happy 24th birthday way out in Australia!!! Hope you and Julie both have a great day!

Much Love,

Matt & Jacquie

It's been a while!

Hi there!


It's been a while since my last update and we've been keeping BUSY! I'm slowly settling in to the routine of work and housekeeping and wife being and all that. Not quite there... but we're working on it! I am loving my job and keeping pretty busy there. I've been doing quite a bit of shuttling customers to and from home as well as picking up cars from dealerships all around the city. I've gotten to drive some pretty cool cars (ie. a Lexus, a BMW, a VW Bug, etc.) and it's been a great way to learn the city even better. It's a part of my job that I really enjoy! I also keep busy in the office and shop with paperwork, answering the phone, running info back and forth to the guys in the shop, etc. All in all, I'm very happy with it and I have a GREAT boss. The lady I work for is kind of turning into my "work mom". She takes super good care of me and is just so sweet. She texts me at night and offers to bring me lunch for the next day. Chicken alfredo is on the menu for us tomorrow! :) So I sure can't complain!


Matt's parents have come and gone. They were here over the weekend for a very quick visit. They arrived Friday and spent the afternoon with Matt before coming to get me from work. We hung out at our place for the evening and then headed out car shopping first thing on Saturday morning. If you follow me on facebook, then you already know the exciting news that Matthew and I bought a car this weekend! With much help and advice from Matt's mom and dad, we made the decision to buy a 2007 Toyota Matrix XR. It's a fully-loaded 5-speed with a little over 100,000 kms on it. We are really hoping to be able to drive it for the next 5-10 years and are blessed that we are able to have such a great car to drive around here. It is more than we could have ever hoped for! We go tomorrow to the dealership to pick it up and I'm pretty excited! :) We spent the rest of Saturday afternoon shopping with the in-laws as well as Jason and his fiance at Costco. Matt's parents spoiled us with some groceries and then we all headed out for dinner. From there we went to watch Tim's band at their concert. It was super fantastic and I wish you all could have been there! Check out my facebook page for some short video clips. :) Sunday we all drove up to Bowmanville to hang out with Jason's fiances family and then it was back home Sunday night. I worked a short day on Monday so that we could all go out for dinner one more time before Al & Aneta had to get on a flight back home. It was much to short of a visit and it was nice to have them here!


Now we're back into the swing of things for another week. Matt's got a pretty average week at school, just trying to stay on top of things and I'm keeping busy too. Homesick sometimes... but it usually passes pretty quickly. Sorry there isn't any more exciting to share. We hope you are all doing well. And thanks for checking in!


Much Love,


Matt & Jacquie