heritage station.

Today has been an extremely unproductive day. I didn't have class today, and I didn't work until 4:30 so I must have pressed my snooze button about 9 times this morning. When I finally dragged myself out of bed around 9:30 (yes that's sleeping in these days), do you think I worked on my paper due next week? No. Do you think I went into school to see a presentation that would earn me extra points for a class? No! Do you think I did any cleaning or laundry that needed to be done? NO! Heck, if it wasn't for work tonight I'd probably, no deffinately, still be sitting watching The Big Bang Theory.
But, after leaving the house, I realized today wasn't all bad. I got to the train station right around when the high schools get out, so the station was just packed full of noisy and annoying pubescent boys and girls, and it made me think for a second or two about how glad I am to be over that stage of life. True that I'm only 3 years out of high school, but those 3 years have been valuable times of growth and change! At Heritage Station today I saw some of the most ridiculous outfits, heard some of the most outrageous conversations, and smelt some of the most...creative blends of colonge scents! While I sat on a bench and watched 3 packed full trains go by (in an effort to avoid the massive crowds of all these promising individulas) I was suddenly very grateful for the time I am at in my life right now. I have worn my share of ridiculous things, said my share of outrageous things, and I'm sure I've used some pretty creative scents in my days too, but I am glad to be pretty much done with those stages of my life. It's almost like this big I need to fit in with everyone around me by matching them perfectly weight has been lifted since I broke free of high school in 2008.
I am grateful for the stages of life that we each get to hate, then get through and THEN appreciate. I'm grateful for all the things life has taught me so far, but am glad that I get to move forward, and not need to go back to any of them. There have been good times and frustrating ones, but I've learned, and continue to learn, lots and lots. I'm grateful for where I've been, I'm enjoying where I am, and I'm excited about where I'm headed. Life's a funny thing, and I'm just glad to be a part of it!

Dear Laura,

I am the proud new owner of a Macbook, as of about 5:00 this evening. I just love how new and shiny and white it is. I love having new things, and especially new, fun and expensive things!

I promise now to keep up with my blog entries, and to keep you in the loop with my life, and with every bit of adventure that is going on right now. Life is going well and I am very much enjoying it. Michelle and I are getting settled

and loving our little apartment (even though we still hardly have anything in it).

We own a coffee table (as previously mentioned), and now a dining table and four chairs.I've come to realize my need for projects. I love to be working on things and making things. Right now I am painting our table and chairs so that they match. When we got them the table was a reddish colour, and the chairs were black. Now I'm painting them all a new shade of black, and I don't really know why. It's just one of those things I got myself into, and cannot stop now.

Tonight we are over visiting The Boys. James and Dallas of unit 118 (or more commonly known as The Boys), are our main source of entertainment. This fine Tuesday night includes:

James - "I need to shave my head RIGHT NOW, it's getting too long." (and so he did)

Dallas - "what does humility mean to you? I have a stupid paper to write on it."

Michelle - "James owes me for making make his noodles for him."

Katherine - "I just love my friends (and my new computer!)"

We miss you Laura and hope you're well too. This one's for you, and many more to come!

Calgary.

I should apologize for my absence and lameness lately. I am sorry.

Putting all this on hold, and the rest of the computer world as well, demonstrates a little bit of what my life has been like. This last month has almost been frozen for me. I got back from my trip to Ontario and had nothing to look forward to until leaving for Calgary. I couldn't start to pack, because there's only so much you can pack up of your life a month before you go. I couldn't do anymore about my student loan stuff, because I had to bring it to the school for them to sign. I couldn't get or do anything for my apartment because I didn't even know what it was going to be like. So the first 3 weeks of the month were spent waiting and waiting, getting nothing done. Then the last week hit. All of a sudden I had to pack up everything, say my goodbyes, and get ready to go. The month of August almost stood completely still. It was like everything was on hold until last week when it all hit me at once.

So I spent all day Monday and Tuesday packing, saying goodbyes (except to people who didn't even realize I was leaving ugh.), and getting ready to go. I flew into Calgary Wednesday morning, and Michelle arrived that night. We got the keys to our apartment and thus began our adventure. We spent that night with our good friend James (since we have nothing yet).

But we're on our way, we're making it work! As of right now:

• both our clothes are shoved into our closets without any shelves or hangers
• Michelle sleeps on an air mattress, with no pillow
• I sleep on a borrowed foutton, in the living room
• we spend our spare time watching only VHS movies on a 13" TV sitting on the floor in the living room
• and we eat our limited selection of food out of Tupperware containers, and the 2 forks and knives we borrowed from the boys

It's not as bad as it sounds though. We make it work, and we make it fun. Someday we'll own beds, and dressers, and dishes of our very own and it will be grand.

There is one thing I should leave you with though, something that will make you very proud of me, and to keep you from worrying about us. Saturday I bought, AND PUT TOGETHER, my very own coffee table. It is from Ikea, and although I do not personally own tools, I got ahold of some and made this beautiful masterpiece.

(and I tried to upload a picture of it, and it just isn't working out!)

Then I felt a little to tough for my own good so I finished off the day with a smoothie, doing my nails and watching How To Marry A Millionaire!

I am feeling so much better being here. This summer was hard, but now that's it's over (as always happens) I realize all that I learned from it, and I am just grateful to take it all to a new place, for another adventure!

While in the USA :

We stopped near Boston, MA to camp for a couple of nights with Trevor's parents, and dog. We had a real nice day or so with them. We went shopping (lots of shopping) and we also went to 6 Flags. It was lots and lots of fun! I am absolutely fearless (and proud of it) when it comes to rides. I just love them. There were about 6 or 7 really good roller coasters there, and I took Trevor on every one of them; including the rickety wooden one that freaked him RIGHT OUT while we were waiting in line. It was great!

Now back to my home land !

We came back into Canada on Thursday evening. The wait at the border was a big huge pain in the butt (since EVERYONE wanted to get into Canada for the long weekend)! But we made it to the YSA Conference just in time for registration and it was a pretty good drive. That night I got really sick though and just sat it out in the hallway while the dance was happening. BUT while sitting in the hallway exciting event #1 of the weekend took place:

Nirvana came up and sat with me! Nirvana was one of my roommates while I was living in Calgary! It was nice to see her again, and she is looking beautiful and cheery as ever. She is doing well and I loved visiting with her this weekend.

The rest of the conference was full of cute little reunions with good old friends from the Toronto area. I found Heather and Bethany and Haley, who I grew up with in Burlington ward. I saw Vicky, who I knew from the maritimes and who lives here now. I saw Alex and Jon, who I knew while I was in the youth program living in Ontario. And I saw lots of friends who also came from the east. But today I got to see Mandi! Mandi was my best friend growing up in Burlington and I also lived with her in Calgary. I just love this girl. She is the cheeriest, happiest person I know and today she was even cheerier than normal, due to exciting event #2:

Mandi got ENGAGED last night. A fine man named Jordan made a real smart move and secured her, as his own. I am so excited for these two, I love them together. They're the cutest. Girls, her ring is so gorgeous and she's planning a fall wedding. LOVE IT!

So tonight I'm staying at Mandi's house and her sister (the maid of honour) and I just spent like over an hour already looking at her wedding stuff. hehehe I think she's probably just off upstairs somewhere completely in love and rolling her eyes at us lonely single girls, living vicariously through this happy moment!

This was a really good weekend, I'm really glad I came when I did, and that I did all that I did. Tomorrow I return home to my normal, everyday life in the Scosh. I actually can't wait to get home though, I must say I'm not enjoying being on the road much! Back to work and such will actually be nice.

(on a side note) Today is August 1st. Which means: only one month from today, Michelle and I get our apartment in calgary! I can't wait to get back to Calgary. There I have order, structure and routine in my life, and I miss that. I can't believe it's August already, but I'm so ready for it!

the United States.

So we are officially on the road now! Our first stop is somewhere in Maine, called Bangor, I think. (Don't quote me on that though) We are driving through the US to get to Ontario.
Today we plan to make it to Boston, to visit my favourite uncle, David, and to meet up with Trevor's parents. I just love the border. I love that they ask you the silliest questions, and I love being able to cross, completely innocently, into their country. It's the same thing when I go to the airport, I LOVE going through security and all that stuff. I don't know why, it's just nice to know I'm innocent in a situation where they always assume you're not. I've got nothing to hide, so check it all you want!
I love my Canadian passport. I am Canadian, through and through, and (even though they stretched out my face and made me look sick in my photo) I love showing that off!
So after a long, hot line up, and some question from a pleasant man named Farley, I thank you USA for a warm welcome and am excited for my visit!
(but Telus charges me lots of money to use my phone and the internet on my phone in your fine country, so I will talk to you in a couple of days when I'm back in Canada!)

Dartmouth - Moncton - St John

This morning was a big mess (as it always is the day I go anywhere big) and I was lucky to even get everything done. I searched the whole town for a dress to buy, because we figured that would be faster than my mom making the one we started. It was ridiculous trying to find something that didn't almost show my bum. I'm gonna sound like an old woman here but, why do they keep charging more and more for clothes, while they're making them with less and less material. It is so frustrating! But finally in the very last store we had time for I found a dress and a pair of shorts too. I asked my mom why it's always the very last store you go into that has what you want, and she so smartly replied, in a mocking tone:
"because once you find what you're looking for, you don't go into anymore stores."
I suppose that's true, but sometimes I wish I could find what I'm looking for in store #1.
So we finished shopping and getting money and all the last minute errands and got home with 15 minutes for me to pack. It was ridiculous. I was throwing things everywhere looking for stuff. It was crazy. But I got it done and got on the bus for 1:10PM, on my way to Trevor's place in St John, New Brunswick.

While on the bus I had two things I needed to do right away. Check my list to make sure I didn't forget anything, and get some sleep! I managed to make it out of the house forgetting only 2 things: my body lotion, and a towel, both of which are quite replacable, thank goodness. Then I rested and read all the way to Moncton.
In Moncton:
I have a lay over here in Moncton for an hour. I'm sitting here trying to tell Trevor that and I've somehow managed to turn off the connection for my phone. I can't make calls or send messages or use any internet things. So I finally call Telus (which I hate doing, I always feel stupid for these kinds of things), after playing with it for the whole hour, and turns out I had switched it to line 2, which is actually for my old Calgary number, and not activated on my handset. What a freaking mess. But finally, as we're getting back on the road, my phone is back in action and I am able to entertain myself with it all the way to St. John.
Stay tuned for more crazy adventurous travel stories (for now I sleep).

Beautiful Day

I had a million things to do today (for my trip I leave on TOMORROW) and I got none of them done. Ordinarily this would be a very disappointing thing; a frustration I've been all too familiar with lately. But not today; today was good.
I spent most of the day with my good friend MEGAN. I just love this girl, she's fantastic. She's lots of fun and always good for a laugh. Her and I ventured to the great city of Halifax today, to see what we could find. We did a little shopping, looking at some cute dresses and things. Then we ate some lunch at My Father's Moustache, a cute little restaurant downtown Halifax. We finished off our day with a nice long walk, and picture fest, in the Public Gardens. The Public Gardens are great, I just love them. In the middle of the hustle and bustle of Spring Garden road, there is a lovely little place, tucked away in a little gate, where it is very beautiful and quite peaceful.
For me, Megan is a lot like these gardens I love so much. (Oh yes, I'm going somewhere with this!) She is beautiful, inside and out, for one thing, and she is just such a breath of fresh air. Megan and I met in high school and I think she's one of the only girls I still keep in good contact with. It's nice to still have her as a great friend; great to know we made through the drama and mess of our high school years. In the middle of our crazy busy lives, that are always changing, I always have Megan, and I'm sure I always will. I just love those friends that you can escape the world with. When you just have simple, fun and beautiful memories with, no matter what is messy around you.
So while, in our lives, there are so many awful messes and so many cranky people, who make so many of our days lousy and stressful, here's to the wonderful little things and those beautiful people , who help to make those lovely and enjoyable days we all need to get us through the week!