Choices, Clue, Canucks

It has always been my theory that as long as I am at a Canucks game, wear my jersey and get on the big screen, the Canucks win. They should probably hire me and pay for me to go to all the games just so they can win. The other night Kristen and I enjoyed the game and of course, we won.


This last week has been filled with so many wonderful things. Family and friends involved in most of it and it's been delightful. But also filled with some tough choices which hasn't been so fun.


Last night I ran a Clue Night at church with our jr. and sr. high youth. We had one last year and it was a great success so we did another one this year and it was great! We had 8 rooms and many wonderful and willing volunteers! The kids all had a great time and thankfully, the mystery was solved. :)


We had a kitchen, a bakery, a conservatory, games room, sports room, knitting room, library, and the professor's office. It was fun seeing the people in character and also to see the things that they made the youth do before they got an answer to their questions.

Some of the bakery's creations...

The fantastic ladies of the bakery

Some game challenges in the games room

Eating the pizzas that were made in the kitchen

All in all a great night and fun to be involved with the youth again. And as I alluded to choices earlier in this post, I have made the really difficult decision to not go to South Africa this Thursday. Was supposed to go for a month. And just realized for so many reasons that I wasn't supposed to go and that I need to be home right now. Very sad though because I was so looking forward to meeting my friends' families and spending time with them. But I know there will be other chances!


One of the things though that I am SO excited for in staying home right now is hanging out with this little guy lots and to meet a new little one very soon! Can't wait!!!! I got to spend the whole day playing today and it was tiring but so fun!

Beautiful flowers from my mom's garden.

Have I mentioned I LOVE this kid?

That's all for now. So you'll be hearing much more from me in the future. Maybe not about African adventures, but about the adventures I'm having around home. And tomorrow I have a big interview that I'm a little bit nervous for! We shall see how it goes! More on that to come...

Seasons, Swimming, Sr.

Yesterday a new season began, today a season of my life came to an end.

Tonight was our last official youth night for the year with me being on staff at church. My contract is up end of June. It is weird being done, but funny too because I know I will be doing some of the same stuff in the future and will still be quite involved, it will just look a bit different with not as much responsibility.

Tonight we had a BBQ and pool party and it was a lot of fun! Just great to be together and hang out and enjoy youthfulness.
I love my underwater camera. :) And so do most people! It is fun seeing what photos are on my camera at the end of the night.
Group underwater photo. Best ever. haha

Yesterday I had a wonderful time hanging out with this little guy-can't get enough of him. Even snapped a few pictures.. He snapped some as well. Only because he was mesmerized by the sound the camera made when he pushed the button.


And dinner and cake for my mom's birthday last night with family! Always great to just spend time together and enjoy being with one another. I'm generally fairly busy and have a tough time stopping and simply being.
I couldn't quite find 57 candles, but I figured 10 would do. Close enough.

And so I welcome this new season! Hooray for summer and nights of enjoying being outside in the warm night air. And hooray for a new season in life. One where in some ways I'm doing a lot of the same things I was doing before. But it feels different in oh so many ways.

Race, Rapid, Red

Although I have only ever seen the Amazing Race on TV once or twice, I really enjoyed putting on the amazing race event! I didn't really know what I was doing, but it all turned out really great!

The final clue was to build a puzzle and find the message on the back. My favorite was when teams flipped it over and it broke in the flipping so they had to rebuilt a bunch of it. :)
Counting the books in the library. These guys got dropped off at the wrong library initially and the taxi driver took off, leaving them to have to run to the church..

I LOVE that the taxis were lined up at the fence before the game started. Our parents were amazing taxi drivers! They were hilarious.. speaking other languages, going the wrong way, stopping for gas, chatting with people they knew on the streets... After one taxi ride one of the group leaders said "This taxi ride made my kids not want to take a taxi anymore.."

Before the race, we had a BBQ and it was fun to hang out and enjoy good food and company and hang out during the beautiful evening we had!
All in all a fantastic night! Now I kind of want to put on an amazing race just for my friends or something. Would be fun. :) Perhaps a midsummer's party! One more youth event for the year! Crazy that time has flown by so fast!

Friday, Finished, Floating

The Amazing Race is finished. Sigh.

I don't even want to count the hours of work that went into planning, but every single minute was worth it! There may have been some things I made a bit too hard, but overall I think the youth loved it and really enjoyed it! I was so thankful for all the volunteers who were awesome, at the different stations, and the taxi drivers as well, who added so much character!

More on that in my next post with some pictures of the event. Many smiles and laughs were had.

Afterwards, my friends Megan, Maia and I went swimming. It was so wonderful to just swim around and float there, enjoying casual chatting and stargazing. Afterwards I was SO relaxed. Exactly what I needed.

Today shall be filled with birthday parties and weddings! Stay tuned for a more detailed post! :)

Sandbar, Spelling, Sanity

Last night, I went for dinner at the Sandbar on Granville Island with my friends Dave and Adri. It was a wonderful time to hang out but also to thank them for the time they have given this year to helping out with youth. I have appreciated serving alongside of them and getting to know them better! And I am incredibly excited to travel to South Africa with them in a few months and to meet their family out there!

Anyway, after dinner, we went to see 'The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee' which is playing through July 31st at the Granville Arts Stage Theatre. It was hilarious! We enjoyed it and if you are looking for a fun musical to see this summer, go check it out! Some of my favorite singers/actors from other musicals I have seen are in it and they are absolutely fantastic.
Life this last week has been a little bit crazy and I have not been getting nearly as much sleep as needed. Four hours a night is definitely not enough! So I am trying to maintain my sanity and remember that my reactions to things are mainly a result of lack of sleep. Tomorrow I am helping run 'The Amazing Race' with our jr. and sr. youth and it's a lot of work putting it all together.. but it's coming together and it should be fun (hopefully not impossible)... but I am looking forward it to being done because then there will be less on my plate!

And yay for it being Friday! I can't believe time is flying by so fast. I realized yesterday that I need to get a new passport so I will be doing that today or Monday in hopes of getting it back in a week because I need it by July 4th!

Enjoy the weekend!

Playing, Progressive, Perspective

Yesterday was a day full of unexpected treasures. Moments of enjoying friendship and seeing life anew through the eyes of a child.

A friend of mine needed a last minute person to help watch her and her friends' kids, so I said I was available and since i had planned to hang out with S that day, she came along too on our adventures with five children.

The day was beautiful and sunny and so we had a lot of fun playing outside. The best moments were "Go chase the bunny" and "Go chase the butterfly" and all five kids would run around chasing the bunnies and the butterfly and it was truly a delight to watch.

I love this photo. :) They have a large hill in their hard which the kids had a great time playing on and running up and down. Their clothes may have gotten quite filthy, but I figure those dirt stains were evidence of great fun that was had. :)

Rolling down the hill. When was the last time I rolled down a hill? And why not? And have I mentioned that these kids are incredibly cute? :)
Then we got down to the serious business and built a spaceship in order to go to the moon. Once we arrived on the moon, we hunted for moon cheese (which the kids decided was swiss cheese) in order to bring it back home to give away as gifts. All in all a delightful day of enjoying being outside and just playing carefree. Gives me a taste of what summer will be like.
Then S and I headed back to church before our youth event which was going to be a Progressive Dinner. I love that there is a playground right next door, because it is also a lot of fun to play on. :)
I love the youth at my church. I know I have said this before, but I really enjoy spending time with them and have been so blessed to get to know them better over the last few months. I'm excited to go to Mexico with a few of them and for other fun summer events and youth in the fall. The fun and adventure shall continue! I love how they show me a different perspective/way of looking at life.
We went to the first house for appies, then for salad and garlic bread at the second stop.

We enjoyed a mini-sermon about how to hold ten nails on one nail-good practical application. :)

At the third stop we enjoyed some tacos

And at the fourth, we had mud pie and pavlova-so tasty!

What a wonderful night to go to four different houses and get to know different people from the church. We were so blessed to have them welcome us into their homes and I am truly thankful for all of them! And I think everyone had a great time and we were all quite full afterwards.
And here is a photo of everyone jumping in order to burn off a bit of the four courses we enjoyed!

A fabulous Friday indeed. I even came home to a banana with a special note with it on my kitchen counter. How sweet.

Enjoy your weekend! Saturday is Seattle day and Sunday is pool party day! :)

Sarah, Sandbar, Shantini

I'm back! Hence the lack of posting! I figured I would post the last week in smaller segments to make it more reader friendly. :)

Last week Sarah and I hung out before youth and it was a lot of fun. We took bottles to the bottle depot and then went for dinner. One thing I have loved about my job is the opportunity to connect with the youth from church and I'm excited to continue those relationships even though I won't officially be working at the church.

On Wednesday, I joined Chris and Kristen for dinner on Granville Island. We went to the Sandbar which has a beautiful view of the water and a heated deck so we were able to eat outside on the patio which was wonderful!

Aren't they a cute couple? :)

Then Kristen and I went to go see the musical "Nine" at Performance Works Theatre. Someone I know was the producer so I wanted to go in support and because I wanted to see it. They made a movie about it recently and I had seen it as well in prep to see the musical. I liked the musical better. It's funny, because while we were in the theatre, suddenly Kristen piped up "Hey, that's my friend's wife." And I said, "That's Shantini, who I went on a missions trip to Mexico with 12 years ago!" Haha.. I knew she was in it but was fun to discover that we both knew her.

Anyway, I'd recommend you go see it, but I didn't have a chance to post about it last week and it's done.. but maybe if it ever comes around again! :)

Stench, Strawberries, Snack

Today I noticed that my house smells like puppy. Gross. Febreeze has become my new best friend.

{Here's a creative picture I took while playing with my camera.. the muffins are growing!}

Tonight for youth, I had the youth over to my house to hang out. I really love that about having a smaller youth group. To be able to be flexible and to build a tight-knit community with a smaller group. It's fun and also exciting. :)
Tonight I felt slightly home-makerish as I made snack for my staff meeting tomorrow. I made blueberry bran muffins and chocolate covered strawberries!
Chocolate covered strawberries always look so incredibly fancy and done up, but they are SO easy to make! What a fun treat to bring somewhere.
What I did was melted some milk chocolate and white chocolate, and I dipped the strawberries in the milk chocolate and then drizzled them with white chocolate. I put them on parchment paper for easy removal and then put them in the fridge to firm up. And voila! A fancy snack that looks like I took hours to make!
Today some new opportunities for some future traveling have come up that I am SUPER excited for! More on that later when I have booked flights and such (which will hopefully be tomorrow..)
I just realized today that next week is June (crazy!) and that the next 2 months are going to be a whirlwind. But an exciting one to be sure!!
And so I will leave you for now. Hopefully these treats haven't made your mouth water too much ;) You just have to join my staff meeting tomorrow! Or come grab the leftovers!

Off to Seattle and the Island for a couple days so posting might be slim but I will make up for it when I return!