they grew!

our garden...

(yes, that's a mcflurry cup in the middle -- someone bought that from home...the kids like to make jokes about how we're growing mcflurries. oh kids...)

on tuesday morning when we got to school, most of the plants had sprouted however there were a few that hadn't. one student came up to me quite upset and told me that she thought her plant was dead. i told her not to worry and that all seeds don't grow at the same speed...then i crossed my fingers...haha. it sprouted today!

the abbotsford riots

you will not believe it if you did not see it tonight on south fraser way in abbotsford. wall to wall traffic with people hanging out the windows with canucks flags screaming and honking their horns. thousands of people, every cop in abby, and probably a lot of tim hortons coffee. WOW. it was like nothing i'd ever seen in real life. my ears are still ringing. the parking lots were full and there was NO ONE in the restaurants. everyone was on the street at the corner of gladwin and south fraser way screaming. i was there too. unbelieveable. round ONE? oh man...abbotsford is CRAZY. i would've never have guessed it...

go canucks go!

spring around our house

"our house...in the middle of our street. our house..."

today i walked around the yard looking for signs of spring to take some photos.

our neighbour's overgrown dandelions.

some tulips (umm...of our other neighbours)

tim mowing the lawn.

okay...so maybe there's not that many signs of spring in our yard, but it felt warm outside today and we were happy to be feeling a little more spring-like.

spring planting

so right now in science, we're learning about plants. today we planted marigold seeds. in peet pellets. peet pellets seemed smart when i was buying them because they're little hard round things that you add water to and they pop up and you plant seeds in them until they've sprouted. then you move them into a real container. but shoving these marigold seeds into them didn't seem like it was going to work...that would be a major disappointment. we'll see. umm...how long does it take usually for marigolds to sprout?

it was pretty funny as we were planting our marigolds, the kids were all very adament about naming their plants. and one kid's plant couldn't have the same name as another kid's. the names range from goldie to roberto luongo. i'm sure luongo would be flattered.

another thing that we did today was put a sponge in a pie plate and put birdseed on top. apparently, it should sprout. i can't imagine how that will happen but i guess that's why it's an experiment right?

ah...teachers. we look like we know what we're doing but sometimes we're just learning along with the kids.

if you guessed we bought a car -- you were...

RIGHT!

on monday, tim bought a car. on tuesday he filled out the paperwork. on wednesday, we brought it HOME! we literally just walked in the door and i'm attempting to post pics. they're not working. so i'm just filling you in so you don't explode with anticipation. haha.

a mazda 3. now, being the car buff that i am, here are some of the features that i thought were great: rain SENSING windsheild wipers, 8 cup holders for 4 seats, tiny trunk lid but huge trunk, all the tools that come with the spare tire (maybe this is every car but i just never knew it), doors that won't lock with the key in the ignition, yes, the list goes on. now, this is the first new car that i have ever in my life driven. and so far, i've only driven it around the block. so i'm posting these pics and then driving over to tim's parents' house to show them. wish i was coming to WR tonight though. :)

get ready for it...

diet coke has lost it's hold

yes, it's official. this weekend, free to drink diet coke, and it just wasn't that big a deal. WHA???? yep, it's true. it may be that diet coke has lost it's grip on me.


> there was once a time that if i forgot to bring a DC with me to school for lunch, i might go out to the corner store to get one.


> there was once a time that when i had people over who also drank DC, i knew i'd better get a few 2 litres because i could drink one 2L myself.


> there was once a time that 9am wasn't too early.


and now these times have come to an end. don't get me wrong, it's still the only pop that i'll drink...maybe just not so frequently.

the playoffs may ruin our marriage...

haha. not really but...

this is the first time the canucks have been in the playoffs since tim and i got married. we've never experienced the tension they might bring...

yesterday was day 22 of the cleanse. THANK GOODNESS IT'S OVER! so today i was pretty excited to go out for dinner or something as a reward. well, i get home at 6pm and say, "let's go out for dinner!" and tim says, "the game's on." oh. not to be defeated so easily, i say, "let's go to boston pizza where the game will be on!" he says, "no. i want to watch the game at home." okaaaaayy..."let's order pizza from boston pizza!" "i don't really like having pizza twice in a weekend. and then on friday when we have leftovers? we eat pizza all weekend." defeated. so if you know me at all, you'll know that I....started to cry, of course. "it's my celebration end to the cleanse! i should be able to get what i want to eat as a treat for doing so good. i wouldn't have picked pizza if we could have gone out to a restaurant but you don't want to go out so what am i supposed to get?" tim groans, "fine, order pizza." well, like i want to order it now. so i sit around moping for a few minutes before i order it but there's no fun in it anymore. (i know, there's too much emotion in food for me) the girl on the phone was such an idiot while i'm trying to explain that i want a half hawaiian and half 4-cheese pizza because they technically don't have 4-cheese on the menu anymore and then after being on hold while she figures out what i'm talking about, she comes back on to say that the stupid pizza's going to cost $30. it's not even a large! when i try to ask her if she's charging me the extra cheese toppings for a medium when the extra cheese is only on half the medium, she can't hear me because it's so loud in the background, i finally say, "forget it. cancel my order. i'm not paying $30 for a pizza." and hang up. haha. yes, i was now feeling ultra sorry for myself. i sat around moping some more until i was too hungry and i went to wendy's drive through only to get home and have the worst chicken burger, cold fries, and a watered down diet coke.

so what have i learned from this experience? umm...i don't like hockey? no...i don't like BP? no, that's not it...uhh...shoot. [insert dad-like lesson here] i guess i need a little more time to think about it.


*note: tim did apologize during this fiasco for only thinking about himself. but girls, we all know it was too late. haha. i love you, tim.*

**note: after re-reading my post, maybe my lesson learned is not to rest so much of your happiness in food. hmm...**

what's with today...today?

anyways...i don't know what was in the water today but the kids were just so rambuncious. now technically when they're this way...it's two days before Christmas or Summer. but there was really nothing special going on. we had an extra 10 min of PE. please, just run around.

today's the official last day of the cleanse. tomorrow, i'm looking forward to having a diet coke.

10 points to anyone who can tell me what movie the title quote is from.

deep fried turkey

well...this easter we had turkey dinner at our place. it was joy's 60th birthday too. the MacDs were all out and jerry deep fried this turkey. yes. deep fried. if you've never had a deep fried turkey, you don't know what you're missing. i've heard that the oil draws the fat out of the turkey...umm...so it's healthy. but really, the skin is crispy and the inside is super juicy. it's not greasy at all. it was fantastic. (yes...it was a cheat day on my cleanse.)

day 18, disc 4, easter sunday

so i'm almost to the end of my 22 day cleanse. i haven't had one diet coke and i've stuck to my one treat a day. my most difficult moment was yesterday when i was out for dinner at white spot and tim and his friend were having burgers and fries and i was eating a salad. that sucked. honestly i don't really feel much different though. i think i was expecting a more energetic, healthy feeling. oh well. i am definitely more aware of what i'm eating and that will stay once my 22 days are up. like when there are cookies, i won't eat four. haha. i'm looking forward to thursday though...i'm planning wendys. :)

tomorrow is my mother in law's 60th birthday. we're having easter dinner at our house with them and my family too. tim's parents wanted to deep-fry a turkey so that's what we're doing. "deep fry a turkey?" you ask. yep. it's true. you might think it makes for some really greasy turkey but actually it makes the skin crunchy and the inside very juicy.

we blew up a pic for her birthday of tim and i. i know -- it's what you've always wanted. here it is so you can also get it developed.

this easter weekend, tim and i tried out northview community church on good friday so we went there again today for sunday morning. it brought back memories of ppac when we had pews and the ushers keep bringing more people to your row and you keep squishing closer and closer to the strangers around you. haha. the worship was great. we might try it again for the next little while. finding a church --harder than it sounds.

as for LOST...the second season is going to be done too soon. and then what?

today's project according to tim

out comes the sun and i'm forced into hard labour. today's project is filling in the hole and planting shrubs along the side of the house. that tim...he's a pusher.

at least i wasn't here the day he ripped the stump out the ground by himself.

here comes the tube top. i need a tan.

no title necessary

LOST has overrun my life...

during spring break, i started watching LOST season 1 on dvd with liz. i was hooked after a day of doing nothing but watching episode after episode. then tim decided he should get into it too. so i re-watched all the episodes i'd just watched with liz. tim and i finally started watching episodes that i hadn't seen at the beginning of this week. oh man. we can't stop.

when school started again, i said to tim, "we should limit ourselves to only one episode a night." well one episode a night has not happened since i said that. on the cliffhangers? you just have to keep going...it's a dangerous road that we're on. uhh...it's an expensive road that we're on...renting disc after disc...there's 7 discs to one season.

then we hung out with james charbonneau. and he owns LOST. now we're watching it for free.

there's no limits.

last night i forced myself to go to bed at 10pm because i'd been so tired getting back into full workdays. but tim stayed up. finished the season finale of season 1 and then watched the first episode of season 2. i watched them just now and i'm waiting for tim to get home so we can watch the next one.

it's out of control.

how am i expected to go to work with a series like this sitting at home all together on dvd waiting for me? we haven't watched any other tv for the last 2 weeks. old tv is dead to us. how will we ever watch anything else again?

the worrisome thing is really not, tim and rebecca are watching waaaaaay too much tv...no...the worrisome thing is, what if someone tells me something about LOST that i shouldn't know yet?

yeah...it's seriously out of control.

at least it's not christina ricci...

so this past week, i was at my inlaws and my father in law asked me if i knew who liza minelli was. i said that i did. he just couldn't believe that i knew who she was. "how do you know her?" he asks. well...i don't know. I just do. he thought that my haircut made me look like her. hmm...

so then he says, "if you can tell me who her mother is, i'll give you $5." so i guess in the dark, "debbie reynolds?" he laughs and says no. then he says, "she had that song." and i guess in the dark again, thinking of old people, "judy garland?" "HOW DID YOU KNOW THAT?" he's shocked.


so i got $5...essentially for getting my haircut. ha.

tea time

Despite being a tea-themed shower this weekend, i failed to take any photos of the spread complete with little signs labelling the teas and treats. at least we took pics of the important things! (thanks mom for grabbing the camera!)

Let's open some presents!

A family affair.

can it GET any cuter? what a cute mom too.

the WR girls moms (missed you Lenore!)

Alyssa, we're so excited for you getting married. Happy Shower.

day 8 of the cleanse

well, i've managed not to bore you with the details of my every meal on here for the last 8 days but if you've spent any facetime with me, you'll know that it's all i want to talk about. haha. it's actually going great considering i used to think of myself as lacking any amount of self-control in the area of food. i no longer have that excuse - i DO have self-control. last night at some friends' house, i sat beside a plate of cookies all night and ate only one. what what? it's true. i've probably never eaten this many vegetables in my life so that's feeling good. i used to hate celery but now i'll eat it for a snack. i don't leave home without being armed with a waterbottle, scads of lipton iced tea 0cal. powder packets, a baggie of cheerios, and usually a container of yogurt or cantaloupe. i've found that i get the most snacky feeling at night so i usually save my one 100cal. treat for evenings. i've been measuring things more - a half cup is not as much as you thought and it's more than you thought. it depends on what's in the half cup. haha. something that's been getting me through the afternoon cravings is my tall sugar free cinnamon dolce non-fat lattes but that's adding up. :)

there has not been ANY diet coke in 8 days. it's not a record yet. once in my first year university, raquel said that if i could give up diet coke for 2 weeks, she'd write me a letter a week over summer break. i got a lot of letters that summer. so 2 weeks is the record we're aiming to break. and no one is even promising me letters. haha.

so that's the update.

who doesn't like clean cotton?

i was once in a car of a friends from san jose who had thi air freshener. i loved it. i figured you could only get them in the states. then more recently, i saw this air freshener hanging from the mirror of a car next to me in a parking lot. i thought to myself, "self, you must investigate where you could find these." i went to the most knowledgable source i have. no, not the internet search. rachel synchyshyn. i said, "rachel? there's this air freshener that i love. clean cotton. yankee candle." with no hesitation, she said, "you can get them at linen's n things or hallmark."

i bought three.

spring break is ending...but not for me...

this post is in honor of kara and james who go back to school today since their spring break is over...aww...but look how tanned they are from being in arizona all week. they just love when i break out the camera in the middle of a game of euchre because they know these pics will end up on the blog. haha.

Korea!

notice the editing above, kara...?

my fingers look strangley long here...

happy back to school days bisschops. hope you had a good first day!

when the sun comes out, tim works outside...

and the rain breaks...

visit to edmonton

the pictures are here! i had some difficulty uploading them when i finally did find the cord and i thought i was in trouble but it's all good. you can now catch a glimpse of my trip.

these are the nikkel cousins - can you see the resemblance?

from left to right: dan, rachel, me, joel.

this is my second cousin (rachel's son) Nevin! Hi Nevin! what a great baby to meet in person. he was very happy and personable. jamie and i loved meeting him.

my dad, his sister bonnie and nevin.
after numerous hours of good conversation, we went for the trivial pursuit on evening #2 which was great. why don't people play more trivial pursuit? i think it's because we think we don't know the answers but as it turns out, age does bring some knowledge and we were suprised at some of the answers we did know! playing in teams, joel and i won -- i obviously wasn't going to let that go by unmentioned!

Throughout my trip, i was also hanging out with these girls which was lots of fun. alyssa, we didn't exactly take as many pics as we had planned, hey? i have 4...2 of them are crappy. oh well...the memories will have to suffice. haha. here's alyssa, jenny, and rachel as we waited for our name to be called at spaghetti factory and then another of us 4 with our spumoni. thanks for the good times ladies. now, i spent some time at rachel and dallas' house however i failed to take any photos of dallas at all which i realized when i got home. dallas, i just want you to know that it wasn't on purpose. :) hope you're continuing to recover well and enjoying your flowers. haha.

the pics are finally downloaded!

mr. clean is slipping...

now if you know me, you know that i am easily sucked into consumerism - i want all the "as seen on tv" products. as a child i was enthralled with the super slicer. i don't know where i inherited this gene from because it was definitely not from my parents. they're always amazed at the products that i want to buy after seeing only a couple minutes of an infomercial. man, i love infomercials.

so it's safe to say that all "easy-to-use" cleaning products suck me in. the latest is the mr. clean magic reach. you've seen it -- clean hard to reach places in the bathroom like the tile walls of your shower or behind the toilet without working hard. i bought in this week. i am now the owner of the mr. clean magic reach. and mr. clean will be recieving an unhappy email from me monday morning.

it's not all it's cracked up to be. it works so well in the commercials! you're really just strapping a wet paper towel onto a smartly-shaped blue thing on the end of a broomstick. you push it around and gunks of wet dust are left in it's wake. after pushing it around unsuccessfully for awhile, i went and got the roll of paper towel and had to clean up after it on my hands and knees. it actually made more work for me. but that didn't stop me. i thought maybe it was just because it was my first attempt. i ripped open another $2 pad and moved onto the next bathroom. equally as frustrating. again i had to clean up after it. my advice? don't buy.

now i'm not always totally disappointed with these cleaning products that i buy. i do own a scotch-brite toilet scrubber which i like. the disposable brushes are worth every penny because who wants a dirty toilet brush or cloth sitting around in your bathroom? not me.

so that's all for consumer tips with rebecca.

22 day cleanse - day one

i'm back from edmonton. i have pics to upload but i can't find my camera cord at the moment so those will be a little delayed. i had a great time connecting with my extended family as well as alyssa, rach, and dallas. my four days went off without any problems...i ate out a lot, a spent some money, and drank my body weight in tea.

now in regards to the "i ate out a lot", today begins a 22 day no desserts/bad snacks/diet coke cleanse. it takes 22 times of doing something to create a habit SO if i go with health foods and no DC for 22 days, hopefully i can ease back into having some treats here and there after 22 days but not go crazy. i've really gotten into some bad habits this month of always needing sweets after meals and snacking all the time. my new years resolutions were trickling away so this is my spring break resolution. get back on track. i went out this morning and did some grocery shopping. bought lots of veggies and chopped them all up for easy access.

get ready for the countdown...it's going to be too many posts about what i'm eating. haha.

edmonton, here i come

last year at this time, i was also in edmonton. it snowed and alyssa forced me to shovel the driveway and the sidewalk. i didn't even bring a winter coat. this year, i'm hoping for better weather. ha.

this year, my plans are three-fold. to do alyssa's chores. to visit nevin, his parents and his extended family. to bring dallas flowers after his surgery (oh and see his wife). the next 4 days are going to be packed. i can't wait to see you guys.

as for you other blog readers...this year i have my own camera...get ready for photo montage when i return. i know you can barely contain your excitement. :)

hi dad! see you on the plane.

from a teacher's point of view

so i think the longer that you are a teacher, the more intensely you feel about your students' learning. like when a student misses more than a day, i'm very concerned as to what they're missing. i agonized for hours over my report card comments to try and balance positive comments with getting the message of how this kid is really doing. when a student who is struggling or is behind misses school, i think "this is going to affect their learning". meanwhile, in the grand scheme of things, if you missed a week of school in grade 3 and now you're 25, i don't think it really matters, right? it's tough to know. when i was in grade 4 and my brother was in kindergarten, we were out of school for the month of september. it was great. i remember it being the greatest trip ever. however, now as a teacher, i cannot imagine one of my students leaving for a month. i'd be shocked and concerned that they would fall behind. i'd be stressed about getting them the right amount of homework. when really...did that month of grade four scar my learning? no. (maybe it scarred matt's...haha) i need to relax a little here. i think it's time for spring break. all i'm saying is to parents out there - if the teacher of your child seems a little stressed that you want to take your child out of school for something, don't take personal offense. we can't help it. that's why we're teachers. :)

it's tuesday...

reader statistics

so i thought to myself, i should start using that counter at the bottom of my blog and see how many people are really checking this page.

count on Monday Mar. 5 @ 8:30pm: 10, 742

count on Monday Mar. 12 @ 8:00pm: 11, 012

and no, they're not all me. when you check from one computer and keep going "back" to this page, the counter doesn't go up.

WOAH!

so even though there's not this many comments, it's nice to know you're reading. :) and a sincere thanks to rachels., alyssa, and ang for not letting me ever have 0 comments. you guys are the best.

oh facebook...

so i've been sucked into facebook. hey, i have myspace, xanga, blogspot, and now facebook. but i'm suprised at how addicting facebook is AND how easy it is to find people from long ago. so if you have facebook, look me up.

i'm into report card mode today and tomorrow. they're due wednesday. i probably won't be posting...but maybe it'll get my creativity (procrastination) flowing... ha.

a few reviews

review #1 - arrested development season 1.

now i know that rachelj. has spoken of this cancelled tv series before and recommended it but i had just never gone out and rented it. THEN i watched the pilot at a friend's house and was hooked. the humour is so random. and the characters are so different then anything you've ever seen before. watch a few episodes.

review #2 - arcade fire's new cd: neon bible.

being such huge fans of "funeral", tim and i had high hopes for af's next cd. plus it was super-leaked all over and we already had a couple songs downloaded which are fantastic. AND i read some reviews this week that were very positive. we went out and bought the cd tonight and while we've only listened to the cd once through...i was a little disappointed. there are a couple songs that are tedious to listen to. there ARE some great ones but it's one of those cds that you put in but have to have a remote to skip the ones you never listen to. SO FAR...i need to listen a little more. the first cd took me a little while too...

review #3 - music and lyrics.

though i had high expectations for "neon bible", i had absolutely no expectations for music and lyrics which tim and i went and saw tonight. maybe that helped because i really liked it. as domi puts it, "it was cute." domi -- you're so good with words -- i have to totally agree. it wasn't bad. drew wasn't totally annoying. hugh was funny. the songs that you hear numerous times are pretty catchy. overall, a good light-hearted romantic comedy. there are some nights that you just want some light-heatedness, right?

so there you go. my opinions on a few things. that's why you read this blog right? haha.

sharelle was totally correct in "america" by simon and garfunkel -- if you're a true "almost famous" fan, you'd know it. tune in next week for another "where's that from?" wednesday. ha.

"where's that from?" wednesdays

here are some lyrics - now name this song. if no one gets it, there will be a clue tomorrow. answer to be posted on friday.

She said the man in the gabardine suit was a spy

I said "Be careful his bowtie is really a camera"

6 weird things about me

this is one of those "tag" survey type things that people do. no, i have not been tagged however, i am doing this anyways. you know me...

6 weird things about me:

1) i love love love a sandwich with leftover turkey, dill pickle, cheddar, and ketchup. i can't wait for thanksgivings and christmases just for this sandwich. (umm...i guess i could cook myself a turkey not on these days but hey -- makes it special)

2) i'm a homebody. i'd say most often, if i've made plans to go out, when the day actually comes, everything in me just wants to not go. it doesn't matter if it's my bestfriends and i know i'll have a fantastic time...my first reaction is that i'd rather not go. thankfully, i can most often get myself out the door and if not, i have a husband who gives me a nudge and the "you'll have a great time once you get there" speech. and thankfully i have friends who understand if i cancel once in awhile. :)

3) you know books that have been made into movies? i refuse to buy books whose covers have the movie actors on the front. i hate that.

4) i love "people's court" with judge marilyn milian. if i had tivo, this is what i'd be taping. they're not all white trash.

5) whenever i see those ads on tv for diet pills -- like "hydroxy cut" -- i'm super tempted to buy them. i know i shouldn't want them but i do.

6) i play online yahtzee sometimes. haha.

now if you're here reading this and you don't usually comment, maybe you could comment today with something that is weird about you. or not weird. just let me know that there is someone out there reading my blog.

ANTM inspired

alyssa in town for the premiere. nice claw alyssa

how could i not include this crazy cat pic? he was also inspired.