Vacation in Toronto

 One of my favourite "traditions" that David and I have started since getting married is that we try and take our vacation around our anniversary...having it land around a holiday weekend every year is certainly a plus! It's hard to believe we've been married 4 years already! I'm continually blown away by the amazing gift God made of marriage. In small group we've been learning how God's purpose in marriage is sanctification in our individual lives...but aside from the stretching and growing times (and even in those) it's not like it's a horribly, awful life that you have to endure (like some people try to portray it). Instead, when you're working together as a couple, life doesn't seem like it could get any better! Thank you God for an amazing gift!

One of the clues to enjoying marriage seems to be to HAVE FUN TOGETHER! It's so easy to get bogged down in life and forget about actually having fun. Yay for vacation anniversaries that help us remember this!

We decided to stay closer to home this year since we couldn't find any completely amazing deals anywhere else. So after a crazy weekend of teaching a kid's program, we quickly packed and set off for the world's most popular vacation destination...Toronto.

 Our first stop was "Casa Loma", which claims to be the only castle in North America. It was built by a crazy rich guy that did some amazingly creative things.

 This is us in part of the amazing garden.

 Here is one of the super fancy, cool rooms.

 What a place, eh? There's even an underground tunnel leading to the garage and garden shed.

 We got the CityPass free with our hotel so we were able to go to all the tourist places we've never been to...like the CN Tower.

 This is my very brave husband standing on the glass floor and looking down. I didn't expect to be so freaked out by standing on it. I did stand on it but could barely look down.

 We took the ferry to Toronto Island...how fun! We certainly got our walking in for the day. We basically got off on the far right and walked 5 km to the middle just in time to catch the ferry so we could get back before our parking expired. It was enough to know we want to go back someday...when we have more time.

  There were some amazing views of the CN Tower from the island. It was extra special because we had just been up it that day.

 We made it in time for the ferry!!

 Another day we went to the Toronto Zoo. This was one of the most memorable things...beavers sleeping with a snapping turtle!

This funky bird was willing for us to get really close. I was rather afraid it would choose to peck me as soon as I was looking away from it and at the camera.


All in all we had a lovely time away and saw lots of neat things. Our favourite place was definitely Snakes & Lattes: A Board Game Cafe. Thanks Ashley and Andrew for telling us about it.

It is seriously the most brilliant idea ever. You pay $5 and can play as many board games for as long as you want. It's like a coffee shop but you play games instead of sit on a computer. They need to franchise it and bring it to Muskoka!

They have over 2000 games! We even got to try out the expansion for "Pandemic".

Recent Teacher Trainings

 We had the joy of getting to know the ladies in the TCE in St. Catharines over the past couple months. We went down for the first weekend and then the 4th weekend. St. Catharines is right near Niagara Falls, so it's about 5 hours away from us. Our driving didn't let up on the in-between weekends, though. It's been nice to finally be home for a couple weeks without driving so much...and begin to get caught up on all the things you never get to when you're constantly packing and re-packing your bags.

 We worked with Vance, a co-worker, the last weekend. He's the main Teacher Trainer for the GTA.

 I love that one of the students has trained her daughter to fall asleep while on her back. So brilliant! Her daughter wasn't there most of the time, but sure is adorable...especially when she's sleeping while her mom is studying.

The lovely ladies that treated us like family the minute we met them.

This past weekend we had a teacher training in Gravenhurst...so nice to only drive 20 minutes to get there!!

Is it still trim time?

 It feels like David has been working on trim for forever and as I looked back at pictures I realized it's getting close to that, well at least several months of forever. My ambitious husband took up the challenge of making his own trim for the windows and doors since his parents gave him a bunch of good wood they didn't want when they moved.

The process began by hauling all the wood here, then hauling all the right tools, sometime around Christmas it seems.

Then he constructed a plastic shelter (aka "the greenhouse" even though it has no connection to growing things, it's just the closest thing that it reminds me of). The shelter was necessary in the winter, as he needed a place to paint the trim and let it dry outside of the house.

Next he sent the wood through the planer, then routered the edges to be all nice and curved, then sanded it all and finally did a primer coat and first coat of paint. I only know this process because he's had to tell me it about 30 times so I could remember and I know the distinction of "really loud noise", "extremely loud noise" and "rather loud noise". I'm not even sure which one is which! The painting is a bit quieter...except for the compressor.

We're finally reaching the home stretch for the doors and windows, so I'll put some of the beginning pictures on. David's done most of the work by himself but I only seem to remember to take out the camera when someone else came. He's now working on the last 1/4 of trim! He's super excited that we're getting a company to cut the baseboard. It'll take them less than a day and then all he has to do is paint it and put it on.

Oh yeah, the last part is the only part that I can actually help with...putting putty stuff in all the nail holes, sanding them and doing a final coat of paint. No wonder so many people never get trim done in their houses!

March- David's Dad came to help for a day

Window frame

Notice the difference?!!

April - the first piece header to go on!

Daniel came to help for a day

That just looks like somebody's fingers are going to hurt!

The guys collapsed after a hard day's work

A Visit and Ottawa

 12 or 13 years ago a couple began coming to our church. They had recently moved from Canada. I became friends with them and Debbie became a mentor to me. That summer their niece, Crystal came to visit and we became pen pals and friends. I was SOO excited when Crystal was able to come to visit over her Easter break. Since she'd never been to Ontario, we worked it out to go to Ottawa for a couple of days so she could see her countries' government. We had a lovely time and saw lots of fun things.

 We went walked around Rideau Hall (where the governor general, the Queen's representative, lives). Around the grounds there are lots and lots of trees with little plaques, because they've been planted by world leaders or royalty. We posed with the tree that William and Kate planted last July on their visit. So in 20 years we can come back and see how much it's grown!

We walked around Byward Market and saw the "famous" place that President Obama got shortbread cookies for his daughters. It struck me as really funny at how much publicity this place has gotten out of it. He got Canadian Maple cookies...but they are now called "Obama" cookies. It was the closest thing that I've seen at my two countries merged into one.

Here's Parliament Hill. Sadly the lighting is really bad because the sun was setting.

 Have you ever eaten a beaver tail?  It's one more Ottawa experience that we got in!

Who would guess that there's so many different ways to have a Beaver tail!

What a treat to have a friend come to visit! Thank you Crystal!!!

Trouble with Mud

 This is what our road looked like the last few days. I was simply trying to go to town to buy groceries and do errands on my day off and I got stuck in the road. I ran back barefoot (I didn't want to ruin my shoes with mud, crazy what you're mind thinks up when you freak out.) I got stuck about 1 kilometer (or 1/2 mile) from our house. I ran home and got David to get me unstuck. He did get me out...but then ended up getting really stuck.

 Stuck in the middle of the road in fact. I felt like I was in Africa, getting stuck on our own road.

 We actually had to get TOWED out of our own road, out of the middle of the road!! The snow melted so quickly and the frost came out because the weather suddenly went up to 20+*C (75-80*F). Our neighbors said that they've never seen the road get this bad. I sure hope not! I'm really hoping that this isn't an annual occasion.

 This is is my footprint. I came back in my "classy" winter boots.

 I stuck this stick down into the deep ruts and it still sunk to the lowest part where my fingers are...so it was 12-18 in. deep of mud.

I ended up eating my lunch while we waited for the tow truck.

If the earth were a golf ball...

 A few months ago David watched a teaching dvd by Louie Giglio. He was struck by the statement that "if the earth was the size of a golf ball, the sun would be the size of a 13 foot ball". Our great God just spoke this all into being! What an amazing Creator God we have!

Most people would hear this statement and think about it, imagine it for a few seconds and then forget about it. Not my creative husband. Instead he began to ponder..."could I make a 13 foot ball?" I'll admit I was rather doubtful when he decided to try it with just house wrap and tuck tape. He modeled it after a baseball and got our friend Dwane to come over for two days and they worked away to cut and tape and form a giant ball. I remember talking to my mom while they were working on it and telling her what they were up to. "Do you think it will work?" she asked me."I don't know, but somehow David always figures out a way to make his inventions work," I told her.

The time came that they could finally try it out. They started out in the basement just to see if the air would hold. They were like two little boys grinning from ear to ear as they watched the thing inflate with the shopvac. It reached the 8 ft. ceiling, so they decided to take it outside.

 I had no idea how big 13 feet around actually is!!

 David made it because he wanted to use it as an object lesson at March Break Camp to share how great our Creator God is, the same God that wants to be our Heavenly Father.

David is holding a golf ball in his hand to compare how big our earth is next to the sun. During Senior Camp we were able to let the kids actually go inside the ball. It is a pretty amazing experience. What a marvelous God we have!

March Break

We're still praying for 3 more guy counselors for March Break Camp. We have a lot of kids signing up, so we're trusting that the Lord will send us the rest of the counselors we need.

Fun with Food

I recently discovered that my camera has a really neat feature for taking pictures of food. I will dedicate this blog to random food pictures I have from the past few weeks.

 I was drafted to help with my sister-in-law's shower a few weeks ago and thought it would be a good chance to try out the cake decorating kit that my amazing sister gave me for my birthday/Christmas. Since it would have been a long commute for her to show me how to use them, I had to try them out.

 David enjoyed being the guinea pig and having the freedom to eat as many as he wanted.

It took me a long time but I had a lot of fun playing around. The ones for the shower turned out too. I didn't get any pictures of them though.

 Moving on we arrive at snack sample pictures for the Treasure Seekers theme. Can you tell what this is supposed to be? (A treasure chest.)

 Have you ever had a "sandy banana"? Simply dip a banana in Jell-o powder. It sounds strange, but somehow tasted sandy...but a good kind of sandy taste. 

 That night while washing potatoes for me to make mashed potatoes, David discovered a heart shaped potato. Isn't that sweet? At least it was until it got all mashed to bits.

This is the masterpiece of them all...the Valentine's dinner that David made for me: lobster tail with garlic butter, twice basked potato, shrimp appetizers and sugar snap peas! I sure am spoiled!

Snow Tunnel

 This past Sunday was our first "quiet Sunday afternoon at home after church" to spend together in 2 months so we wanted to do something together outside. The only problem was that I have cross-country skis and David doesn't...the snow shoes decided they wanted to retire after 40 some years of being on this earth... yet the snow was 3 feet deep. We walked in our snow boots down our road to a trail but discovered there was 3-4 feet of snow instead of a trail. As we walked back into our driveway somewhat disheartened at our lack of options, we both had the same idea. "How long has it been since you made a snow fort?!"

David then chose the biggest snow pile we have (thanks to our kind neighbor that plows part of our driveway once in a while...since the snowblower doesn't make good snow piles.) As I dug away at my little side with a shovel I realized what strength and perseverance David has! I started to think a snow cave would be just as good as a tunnel. =] I was also struck by the fact that I was living a kid's dream, digging a tunnel with someone that actually has the strength, knowledge, tools and perseverance to DIG the tunnel. My sister and I always wanted to make tunnels but I don't think we ever made it all the way through with our little kid hands in soggy, cold mittens.

A few days later as I was driving some kids home that we'd had over at our house and they noticed our tunnel. "Who made the tunnel?" they wanted to know. "David and I did", I replied. "Why?!" they wondered. "Just because we wanted to," I answered. They didn't seem to know what to think of that...two adults making a snow fort...just because.

Our tunnel that's at least 10 feet long

David climbing through

It's big enough for both of us!