I had a GREAT Birthday :)

I had a GREAT Birthday this year, but in a way it was sad too, cuz it made me miss my family even more. I am so thankful for them, and there's nothing like being away from them to make you realize that even more... I am so lucky to have the family I have.... Anyway, I do have an Aunt out here, and Darcy, and others who know I am away from family and they do their best to make up for it, which I am also thankful for. When I got back from camping, there was a message on my phone from my family, they SANG "Happy Birthday" to me on my answering machine. It was great. I will NEVER get used to being away from my family, especially on special days... I dn't like missing family get-togethers either... My Aunt had Darcy and I over for Dinner and cake on Sunday night when we got home from camping, which was fun. I like seeing her new house. She got me a baseball glove too, a nice surprise. Now Darc & I can play catch without having to borrow one from someone... :) And I just love getting "care-packages" from my mother... Each birthday since I've been here I've gotten a "reminder of Nova" from her... and this years was just as sweet.. it is a Christmas stockng made up of the Nova Scotia Tartan, with a little card on it saying why all of the colors of the Tartan relate to Nova. It is also a reminder to know my family misses me if I have to be away during Christmas.. AWE!! My mom is SO THOUGHTFUL!!
Also, on a side note... I 've always thought it was a little "silly" when people get upset turning 30, 50 and so on... Well, (this may sound crazy to some, but...) I think I am going to be one of those people who gets depressed at turning 30. Turning 27 was NO picnic. It was almost depressing. Sometimes, even though I feel SO young, I feel SO OLD!! I feel like time is flying by and there is so much to do, so much I want to do, and so much not done that I thought would be done by this point in my life... ANYway... I hope I get a grip on things b4 I do turn 30, and maybe it won't be as depressing?? HA we'll see!
Anyway I really should get going for now. I hope all is well with everyone!! :)

I LOVE Camping

I went camping for my birthday and we had SO, so much fun. Darcy, our friends, and I haven't gotten much in this summer, so it was a nice break from work and schoolwork. I even had two whole days off from work, and I got off early on Friday so we could leave early. (Good thing I got off early tho', and instead of getting some extra schoolwork in, I spent over an hour at my bank and TRYing to track my boss down as he forgot to SIGN my paycheck... GRR... woulda been fine if I'd noticed B4 I cashed it...Anyway I got it straightened out at least, and before I was outa town...).
We went to a place called "Burnt Timber Creek", and there is a campground in the woods above the river. To get to the river you find a way down a steep "hill" (looked more like a cliff to me... ). We spent pretty much all of both days at the river or walking through the woods. The weather was beautiful, and I went in the river a couple o times, I love the water, but it wasn't much fun cuz I was the only one who went in. "Too Cold".... well, I found it cold the first day, but the nxt day wasn't bad at all. It was SO COLD at night tho'... I am so glad I brought a winter hat, etc. to sleep in :)
We did not see any bears thankfully- apparently they're on the roam right now in search of berries... but we did see quite a few other animals. Even Donkeys!! (We drove by a Donkey farm... I did not know there was such thing...at least around here).
Here are a few pics of our trip:


Those rocks are diagonal but flat, this is where we set up our blanket like we were at the beach (wishful thinking). The water side of the rock has a big, deep area of the river where ppl. g o in the water.



This pic is of the river. We walked along this to get to the "swimming spot". The campground is on the left side, back in where those trees are.



This is the mini-waterfall we found while walking in the woods. I think it's awesome. It reminded me of the Blomidon waterfall, minus the red clay. Oh, how I MISS Blomidon and would LOVE a pic of it!!


Ok, now that I am publically admitting this, even more people will make fun of me... I kind of like "burnt things"... I like my toast darker, I love pork chops when they are "crisp", etc... but not usually in a charcoal (Sp??)-like state... except when it comes to marshmallows. I LOVE my marshmallows toasted until.. they r BURNT. I find it so funny to watch ppl toast them to the point of "perfection"- where they are an even light brown color all around... but it takes them FORever. They apparently find it just as amusing to watch me- I put my marshmallow on a clotheshanger, stick it IN te fire 'til it catches on fire, pull it out, blow the fire out, and eat it. It only takes a few seconds, and.. perfection :) YUMMY!

This is me crossing the river. The current wasn't very strong n this river, in most spots anyway. Which was good, this way, no one got wet unless they wanted to. But it was a lot deeper than it looked to be in certain spots...

This is me in the water... it was a 'bit' cold, especially the first time I went in...

These shoes are the BEST investment (and a cheap one too) ever! At least for water activity! They were like 8 bucks at Can Tire, and they even have PINK in them!! (I LOVE pink... funny since there was a time I couldn't stand it at all.. my room growing up was my worst nightmare for years... ;) ). These shoes make walking in the river (very rocky) SO easy.. beats bare feet or flip-flops...

More me in the water.... it was so peaceful :)

The weekend went by waaay too fast... It was sad to leave knowing it would probably be my last camping trip for this summer anyway. Does anyone else find that summer went waay too fast? The mornings here feel like Fall all of a sudden...

Some Beautiful Scenery

These are some pictures of mine and Darcy's visit in July to the Grass and Spray Lakes, just outside of Canmore, Alberta.



This is one of the caves we found at the end of our hike.




This is the waterfall, it is beautiful!! The hike takes you pretty close to it, I haven't seen something like this in sooo long; such a refreshing day :)

This is at the Spray Lakes, we went here first. Once you pass this, the road just goes and goes... so it seems anyway. So we eventually turned around, and found the Grass Lakes.





The above two pics are of the Grass Lakes, they are absolutely gorgeous!! The caves look out onto this lake.

This was a tiny lil' waterfall we saw before the big one...

One BIIG Puddle

I love being outside in storms. This one came out of the blue, so my friend April and I decided to experience it first-hand... Hey, Jon, does this outfit happen to look familiar? ;)

This puddle was the biggest puddle I think I have ever seen... It was actually a ditch, in Caronport... One minute it was empty, the next it was sooo deep! And SO warm, like a tub. A very muddy tub tho'... What a storm, eh, April? :)

FINALLY :)

YIPEE!!! I think I finally found out how to put pics on here... :) For those who may be wondering, I Didn't find my camera cord/cable thing... I went to Future Shop, Best Buy, the Source, Japan Camera, Black's, etc... today looking for one. Go figure my usb hook-up on the camera end is WAY smaller than the smallest one any store had... I ended up buying one of those usb flash drive things that you put yer memory card in and it downloads the pictures that way. It seems to work good so far, but I still have a lot to learn once the pictures are on the computer...I can't even manage to get them in an album properly... Anyway here goes. This picture is at "The Grass Lakes" in Canmore, July/06. Once I have some time maybe I'll just go back into the blogs and fill in the missing pics... IF this works.

Oh, Man

Well, I thought I had the rest of my night planned. I was going to FINALLY download the pics from my camera onto my laptop- about time, since my camera AND memory card are full. I was going to do this while I watched the rest of "Cheaper By the Dozen 2". I LOVE that movie. I saw it in the cheapie theatre and laffed SO MUCH. My plans have changed drastically now that I have discovered that I CANNOT find my camera cord ANYwhere, and I've tore the apartment apart in the process... GRR, now I have to clean, and still won't have any pics on my blog :( Not too much to report other than that... Sad, but true. Anyway, I really am puzzled as to where my cord could be?!
Oh, and I do have yet another question for WHEN I can get some pics on here... do they automatically go on in a nice size, like yours do Erin (etc...)?? Or do I have to play with them? Someone ans. me, pls...
Oh and P.S.-There is a WICKED Thunder storm going on here right now yipee.

Thanks God!

Since I have been introduced to the world of blogging, I have been browsing around some of my friend's links. I have learned that I don't really like reading the blogs of people I don't know...with the exception of one. This one is written by a Christian mother of 3, two boys and a little baby girl... the baby girl has had health problems, and I happened upon her blog the night before the baby was scheduled to have heart surgery. Well, this baby was on my mind and in my prayers that whole night and the next day at work, and every time I checked this woman's website for updates until finally there was one... Praise the Lord, the baby came out fine and is doing well! I am SO HAPPY, and I don't even know this family, except through their blog... sweet little thing too btw. Thank-you God!!
I wish there was like a blog 411, where you could enter people's first and last names to see if they have a blog, instead of these search things only working by nickname...
One thing (of many) that I love about blogging is the randomness about it... virtually any subject or thought can be made into a blog... of course, one must remember that ANYone could end up reading what is written....
Oh, and Erin, I can see now how to change the fonts, add in a pic, etc at the top of the window I'm writing in... BUT, I am almost certain that those options were never in this window before now... the window WAS all white.. really? :)
So today Darcy and I went to the creek. It was great. I'll post some pics once I put 'em on the computer. And that will be after my papers are finished... We were planning to have a fire and cook supper there too (they have GREAT picnic and BBQ spots) but we didn't have enuf wood left in our stash, and nowhere seemed to be selling it so I got to thinking maybe there's a fire ban on, so we didn't have a fire. Anyway it was SO NICE to be around the water, the river was SO COLD, yet refreshing. But today, even though this seems like a clean river, and a lot of people go there (maybe that's the problem??) something SMELLED so bad there today... I don't think it was the water, I think it was the woods. ANYWAY... We stopped on the way for ice-cream, there is this cool little place with SO MANY flavors, ... AND... they have PEANUT BUTTER FUDGE CRUNCH!! I have not seen that kind ANYwhere since I left N.B. (the 4 C's in Riverview, VERY good ice cream..).
Anyway I am off to bed, long day of work tomorrow, and then....more paper!
Good night all!

HOT!

It is so hot here today. About 28 Degrees so far and it's not even noon (I know it gets much hotter elsewhere... but it's hot for me, especially with no ocean...) I have realized the past few days that I can never win- in the winter, I wish it was summer, in the summer when it is TOO hot, I wish it was cold... Hmm... actually, yeah, I wish I was cold for maybe 5 minutes... I don't think I'd go as far as saying I wish for winter... nope... just summer :)
I was up half the night typing a paper, and I am off today :) It was so nice to sleep in, and even though I SHOULD be working on my papers still, I am going to the creek with Darcy. We do not have many days off together and summer is flying by waaay too fast...
I talked to my mom last nite... on MSN.. it was kinda funny, I've been away from home for years, and I don't think we have EVER talked on anything but the phone...
O and I found an old friend o mine on here!!! This bloggin thing is soooo cool, I love finding out what everyone is up to, especially people I've lost touch with! I only got hooked cuz my brother's wife and her sisters all blog, and her blog addy was on her MSN name one day so I checked it out... Then I got hooked on all their blogs.. and through those ones, found some o my old friends! What a cycle eh! Anyway I hope even more ppl I know have a blog...
Tis all for now. I will write more to update tonight and IF anyone reads this and knows how to post pictures, PLEASE tell me how to post some.... CuZ I have lots...