Early, Eek, Ecstatic

Good morning all! Just wanted to write a quick hello in my quest to post more on my blog. Last night I finished my Lit Review and a five-page paper, working on them until five in the morning! I think that's a new record for late nights for me. Then I woke up at eight to go to class. I look forward to midnight tonight when I can finally go to bed!!

Next week Lindie is coming to visit and I'm pretty excited!! Haven't seen her in a while so it should be fun-I love the little adventures we always go on!

Anyway, that's all for now!! Until next time!

Creative, Class, Concert, Celine

So this last little while has been a bit insane, but here's a bit of a rundown:

My friend Kristen works at the Old Spaghetti Factory, so her boyfriend, Chris and I like to go visit her while she's working. We make sure we're ultra demanding and we always end up being her favorite customers.. hehe.. always fun!
Chrystal and I wanted to watch a movie the other night, but I don't have a tv and don't really want one. So this is how we set up my laptop and speaker to have a nice pseudo-tv!! hehe.. worked well!!

Last night, a group of us girls went to the Celine Dion Concert. We met for dinner beforehand at Sammy J Peppers and then headed to GM Place. We were going to go sit at our spots on the balcony when the guy standing there asked us if we wanted a deal, and then he proceeded to trade us tickets and gave us floor seats!!! They were second row and we got to see everything-crazy!! When Celine walked out, she was right in front of me and we had some good bonding moments of good eye contact. So, although you couldn't see all the lights and jazz from afar, it was pretty cool to see everyone so close the whole time!! Here's some pics I snapped. My camera battery was going dead, otherwise I would have taken more! Oh well!









What a great concert! Loved all her outfits and just the whole show was great! What a powerhouse!! hehe..

Yesterday in one of my classes, we had a guy come as a guest speaker who just got released from prison last Friday. The class is called Prison and the Person, so it's quite fitting. Anyway, it was super interesting to hear his perspective and to see him as a person who has feelings and emotions and to hear what he had to say. It's interesting to compare the truth to what is portrayed in the media as well and it's sad that we don't uphold truth, but we like twisting facts in order to sell more papers and in order to scare people, etc. One thing he said that really stuck out to me is the fact that he will never be free. Yes, he's served his time in prison, which amounted to a total of 18 years, but he will never be free. Society does not freely accept him and he will be judged for what he did. It's an interesting thought that we put all this effort into rehabilitating people in prison and we say we love all people and want to serve and help them, yet we fail to accept them into society, even with something as simple as giving the person a place to live. Obviously there's two sides to the story, but I just found that really interesting.

Anyway, I need to get back to writing my thesis... here's a rundown of the things I have to do in the next few days: Mark midterms for three classes, write my lit review, read 150 pages and write a 5 page paper critiquing that, prepare for an hour long presentation, prepare for a midterm, write a 12 page paper.. and the list goes on. ha! but that's giving you an idea of my level of sanity.

I think my stress load has started hitting my health. Things have been really dizzy of late and I can't get up without the whole room spinning. It's kind of scary. But I guess just the factors of stuff at home with school and life is all adding up. AHHHHHH!!! hehe.. until next time friends!

Walk, Weekend, Winners!

This morning, my friends Amy, Carlee, Kristen and I did the walk for autism. Kristen works with kids who have autism and so it was good to raise some money and support those families who have children with autism and to help research the causes of autism, along with possible cures. So it was a 3km walk in a park in Burnaby by Swangard Stadium. We kept joking that we were going to win because we were so far ahead. haha.. Guess that wasn't really the point, but we had fun!

Research, Review, Ready

Greetings from a brain that no longer functions to its maximum capacity! I have been working on my literature review all day today for my thesis. Blah. Okay, i have wasted a lot of time, but I suppose that's part of the process of research. I have a stack of twenty books beside me and have sifted through about ten of them. Only ten more to go!! haha.. And about twenty articles to read as well-should be fun. For those of you who were wondering, I'm looking at moral development in children. Should be interesting-but a lot of work!

I keep thinking school will ease up, but then it gets more and more insane-so such is my life right now. At times I feel like I am drowning in school and life, but I'm working at keeping my head above the water. So that's my quick update. Until next time!

Cow, Castles, Cookies, Calgary, Carey, Cirque, Carry, Chips, Crazy

First off, my apologies for taking so long to put up a post!! Life has kind of been insane with school and everything else, so here is the longest post in the world. Okay, maybe not, but it has lots of pictures and such. And the longest title by far. haha..

Amy, Amy and I with our nacho mountion (spelled wrong as a joke...) These are two of my friends from Trinity. They both gradded last year and I miss them at school but am glad we can still hang out during other times!

My friend Jenn came to visit from Calgary last week. It was last minute but definitely a great surprise and we had a lot of fun. Jenn just moved back to Alberta from Quebec (where we met) and her dad is a truck driver so she caught a ride with him to BC. I met them both for breakfast on the Monday and then Jenn went over to the island and on Wednesday I picked her up and we hung out for a few days. On the Wednesday, Jenn came to class with me and then we went and watched Canucks cream the Flames, 6-1. Jenn's a Calgary fan so I had fun with that, and with Vancouver's win against them on Thursday, so we're all good. :) We went to Bridal Falls which was really fun and then we headed to Harrisson to see the international sandsculpture competition which was amazing as per usual! On the way we stopped at the BC Hazelnut Store to pick up some tasty treats. Mmmm.. here are some photos from our day together:


I kept looking for the bear but sadly did not see it. I had my camera ready! After taking a picture, I don't know what I would have done however!



I love all the moss on the trees up there. They have about 125 different varieties of moss in this one forest alone. Pretty cool.



Jenn and I by Bridal Falls


here are some of my favorite sculptures from this year



Baby being born
All of the feelings and emotions that are inside someone- the psychology student in me loved this one. :)





My new favorite motto :)

Friend Cow (Jenn's friend) came along for the trip too


I got hungry for steak.. poor Friend Cow



Last weekend, my mom, Bobbi and I headed to Las Vegas for the weekend which was a lot of fun. Didn't take a lot of pictures, but we went to a bunch of shows and did a lot of shopping! Right before going to Cirque de Soleil, we were getting somethign to eat and noticed people with large cameras. Bobbi asked them who they were waiting for and they said Mariah Carey.. so I pulled out my big camera and stood and waited with them. The photographers got ushered off and I was still waiting for my mom and Bobbi when a guy came up to me and said "Since you're taking photos for us tonight, you can come to our special section over here.." haha.. Here I was being deemed a press photographer! I opted out and went to Cirque instead which was amazing!! Before that we saw Danny Gans, a comedian/impressionist-very entertaining!

We bought a few shoes...

Night lights. had i been by myself and had a tripod i think i could have had a lot of fun with the lights

Inside the mall

Dinner at the Cheesecake Factory-mmmm!

The Eiffel Tower- we stayed in the Paris Hotel so enjoyed the view




Me with some shopping bags... on the way back we only had one checked suitcase for the three of us and 7 carry ons plus 3 purses!! hahaha..

We all bought matching shopping shoes!
The view from our hotel window
Friend Cow trying to help close the suitcase. Didn't help much..



This week, Kristen, Jocelyn, Krista and I had a three hour presentation in our human sexuality class. We did a presentation on trans-sexualism and it was super interesting. Generally people bring a snack and it can be related to your topic.. so we made sugar transgendered people. We thought we were pretty clever. Jocelyn did an amazing job of rolling them out and cutting them into their shapes.

I did an amazing job of decorating them. Later ones actually had hair and stuff too.


Matt saved the people from the fire... Actually they are dismembered, so I guess he just saved them from being burned?

Kristen was in charge of putting the cookies in and out of the oven.. Little did she realize that parchment paper slips off pans quite easily.. She got excited pulling a batch out and the parchment paper slid, plunging the little people to their deaths at the bottom of the oven. They broke into pieces and one lit on fire upon contact with the burner. Kristen stood there with her oven mitt yelling at the top of her lungs "FIRE, FIRE, FIRE!!!" By the sounds of it, you'd think there were huge flames engulfing us all. Thankfully it was just a little fire and I turned the oven off and it ended and Matt saved the rest by pulling them out of the oven. After a quick vacuum of the oven, we were ready to go once more! Sadly, the little people did not make it. Some had pretty bad burn marks. Sad day.

Our presentation thankfully went better than that one batch of cookies... We had two guest speakers come who are both trans-sexuals. So, the man was originally born with a female body and the woman was born with a male body. Super interesting to hear their stories and their experience with it. They answered any questions we had and it was really a good experience.

And now it's Thanksgiving long weekend and that is something I am thankful for! This past week, every night was up until 3am finishing a paper or a presentation due for the next day. never have i ever been in this situation before.. ahh.. I have been stressed and overloaded and kind of reached my breaking point this week where I couldn't go on and couldn't do anything more. Thankfully I'm on the up and up and have stepped back from everything and can view it from a better position. Extra sleep this weekend has probably helped as well!!
Friday night, Chrystal and I went to Cats the musical and it was fantastic! Great songs, great costumes and incredible choreography!! We both love musicals and are determined to see all the ones we can!!

Tomorrow I have two family gatherings. Brunch at ten with my dad's side of the fam and dinner at 5 with my mom's side! Should be a full day (ha-no pun intended...) Then back to the grind with school!!!

That's all for now! Congratulations if you actually made it to the end! :)