Can't I Just Peek 10 yrs Into The Future? Just Peek...

One thing that my friends and family never could understand about me is my compulsive need to find out how books end before I get to the end. I will be reading a book, be so hooked, and by the time I'm halfway done I am no longer able to enjoy the book because I stress out about how it's gonna end.

  Will he live? Does she make it? Is he guilty? Peeta won't really die, will he? WILL HE? Snape is bad? For real or is this a fake-out? Is Dan Brown REALLY pulling the whole 'it's-just-a-fake-out-not-a-real-secret-society-at-play' AGAIN?

Questions plague me and I end up just skimming SUPER fast so I can get to the end and find out the answers... I ended up having to circle back to see what I missed anyhow so now I just read half-way and when I get all stressed out, I flip to the back, read the end, relax and then return to my previous spot and continue reading. Now that I know the ending, I can sit back and enjoy the read.

Sometimes I find that I can be like that in life. I just want to know what's gonna happen so the stress of the questions is gone and I can just sit back and enjoy the ride. 

Probably not gonna happen eh?

That's why I love this song. It reminds you to enjoy your today, don't get caught up fretting about tomorrow and dreaming about 'when...' because one day you're gonna look back and miss THIS, this amazing part of your life that you are living now and you are gonna wish that you would have just sat back and enjoyed it and stopped stressing so much because it all worked out in the end.

Yes, I may stress about jobs/when-to-have-kids/living-in-house-limbo/gaining-5lbs/etc. but one day I will look back and miss today. 

Today, when Shawn got off early so we went swimming, tanning, to the temple and then out for dinner.

I could see missing that, it was a good day. 

 Maybe I will even miss the fight we had tonight too. Doubtful... Maybe when we are 20 yrs married and we sit back and laugh about how upset we got over a case of miscommunication. 

So next time you find yourself focused on 'when'. 

When you get married

When you buy a house

When you lose 5 lbs

When your husband graduates

When you travel to..

When you get a job at..

When you have kids

When they grow up

Remember to enjoy today

Carpe Diem

Because you're gonna miss this... 

... but I still am gonna peek at the end of my books. That's different.

Scratch That...

So the house is Taber is a no-go.

We put an offer in but it was rejected as the owner is hoping to get a certain amount out of the house and the house just isn't worth that anymore. Pity...

But maybe it's a blessing in disguise because now we have a new town in our sites, no house in particular, but a town. We went for a drive last night to check it out and I got pretty excited cause it was so cute. Shawn got excited because it was his idea and he loves it when I agree...

We'll see where this leads...

Working With Leeches...

Now, how many people read the title and thought I was talking about metaphorical leeches...




Wrong....

One of my patients was prescribed "Leech Therapy" mid-afternoon on Friday. Apparently the place to get leeches is Edmonton but the courier's were all out already so, 10 hrs and a $740 tab later the leeches arrived via taxi.

So, forty leeches greeted me Saturday morning when I came to work. My patient needed 2 leeches applied to their wound every two hours (promote blood circulation) and I was the lucky one who had to fish out the leeches and prick my patient to draw a drop of blood to bait the leech to bite. 

Let's just say it took a few hrs and many previous leech encounters to get me to not be squeamish for this photo. First off all, no-one warned me that leeches are such good swimmers, and creepy looking swimmers at that, but I was okay with that. It was when they got their mouth and butt suckers stuck and I had to pull them off everything... Ick.. The patient had quite a good laugh watching all us girls scream and shudder when trying to attach them to the wound. 

Then there were the times the patient would call us to let us know a leech has gone AWOL and we would have to go flip the sheets, turn the pillows, search the ground and try not to squirm too much looking for the lost little critter. 

But the WORST PART was when it came to euthanize the leeches.

Once they get full from feeding, they detach themselves and are satisfied for a few weeks, so we have euthanize them by putting them in alcohol. The leech would toss and turn and then all the blood the lil sucker had ate would come out, leaving a pretty bloody mess as he died. Lovely.

Ick..

By the end of the shift I became quite comfortable with the leeches and got a kick out of watching a new shift of nurses squirm and scream when they went to grab the leeches. But I am still gonna avoid leech-infested water like you wouldn't believe. It's one thing to apply them to a patient but it's a whole 'nother thing to find them on my legs and arms and pull them off.. shudder

Hidden Potential...

Shawn's and my idea for our first home purchase don't exactly line up... My hope was to find a house that is move-in-ready. My expectations weren't too high, I am keeping our budget in mind. But I want enough space that if we have a surprise arrival (please, oh please, no), we won't be overcrowded.

Shawn's idea of a ideal home to buy is a cheap, fixer-upper. He loves the HGTV channel and all things building with your hands so he is quite keen on the idea of flipping a house. Me? Not so keen. The closest thing I have done to home reno's is painting rooms and buying new furniture. Not the best reno resume. Good thing I married a handy-man. 

Despite my misgivings of doing our own renovations, I was open to changing my mind. It was just up to Shawn to find a house and sell me on it. 

He did it. We found a house in Taber that has hidden potential. So hidden that my first impression was to stop, turn around and not go inside. But it surprised me. The house has an updated main floor, perfect for me, and the basement needs to be completely gutted, concrete and all, so Shawn can go nuts fixing it up. Perfect, right? Add in the fact that the backyard is HUGE and he sold me.

The only downside (besides the obvious commute, which may or may not make me hate life during winter) is that it is slightly overpriced for the amount of work/money we will need to put into it... We are pretty firm in what we want to pay for it but they say it's a buyer's market right now so whether we buy it is all up to how low the owners are willing to go.

How low will they go? How low will they go??

Stay tuned... 

How We Started the Day with No Plans and Ended Up Seeing Kenny Chesney For Free

We had no plans to go to the Stampede at all.

Shawn and I were sitting on the front step, eating breakfast when my mom stopped by to pick up Chelsey to go to the Stampede (did I mention that we are staying with my sister this summer?? Yep, it's been pretty awesome so far) Next thing we know we are in the car, on our way to Calgary.

The Stampede is awesome. $15 gets you in and there is so many free, amazing things to see/do. And there are alot of EXPENSIVE, amazing things to eat/do but we'll focus on the free things...

Watching high divers jump from 80 ft in the air into a blow-up pool. Awesome.

Witnessing three crazy gymnasts blow our mind by doing trampoline stunts. Thrilling (and slightly terrifying.. I was worried for their safety)

Seeing Olympic Gold medalist Jamie Salé and David Pelletie figure skate to rock music with stunts and tricks that would never be done in the Olympics. Love it.

Window shopping amongst hundreds of booths pitching the next best thing. Tempting.

But the BEST free thing had to be......

KENNY CHESNEY TICKETS!!!!!!

We were walking to the next free spectacle when I heard some guy on a stage ask for a male volunteer. Without thinking I volunteered Shawn and next thing I know they guy was saying that if Shawn could do 20 push-ups with me on his back we would get free Kenny Chesney tickets!!!! Um, yes please.

Thank goodness he didn't ask me to do any number of push-ups cuz we would have been doomed. Luckily Shawn is quite a bit more athletic than me... I bet he wished I hadn't just ate so much fair food though... 

Getting ready to do some double-duty push-ups

Our prize... I think I got the better end of
the deal... No work, all reward.
Good thing my husband is so strong to make up
for my weakness..

So that's how we started the day, with no great plans and ended up going to Stampede and seeing Kenny Chesney for free... (and his opening act Doc Walker, a little Canadian country group whom I loooove.)

Reason I love Shawn #389

    Turns out he HATES Kenny Chesney... Ridiculous I know, right? Who likes Country music and hates Kenny Chesney?? But, despite hating Kenny Chesney, he still came to the concert with me, even sang along a bit and sacrificed hours of sleep when he had to work the next morning at 6 am... 

    But seriously, how can you hate Kenny Chesney??? Especially FREE Kenny Chesney.

An End To An Era

One year in Jr. High, my sisters and I weren't sure what to get our mom for Mother's Day.

When we were shopping we came across a black & white photobooth

$12 later we had four strips of photos and with a $2 frame we had our present.

And I was hooked.

I love Photo-booths... LOVE

But really, who doesn't???? It's a cheap way to have instant fun PLUS you get photographic evidence... Yes please. Even the most uptight person can't help but get a little silly once they are in the booth.

Throughout the past 8 yrs I have plugged hundreds of loonies and toonies and drug countless friends, boyfriends, and family into the photo-booth at Park Place Mall. Looking at all my collected photos, each part of my life for the last chunk of my life has been documented by that photo-booth.

When I met Shawn, I knew that I had been neglecting my obsession for the last year and I quickly introduced him to the world of instant, strip photos. For a guy who doesn't like photos, he was quite the good sport.

It is this decade-long obsession that inspired the photo-booth at our wedding. 

So, imagine my surprise horror when we were leaving a movie on Friday night and saw my beloved photobooth kidnapped and this digital impostor in its place... 

Words cannot even begin to describe the loss the teenager in me feels. Heck, who am I kidding? I still always carry $4 in my purse, just in case we hit the mall. I miss the old-fashioned photo-booth already, . 

Midnight Rain Storm

As I got off at 11 pm from my eighth and last shift in a row, I was slightly excited to go home, cuddle up to Shawn and watch some so-bad-it's-good reality t.v. 

When I got down stairs to Emerg I found myself faced with the most torrential downpour I have seen outside of the Amazon. Seriously, since when does it rain like that here??? 

Not the night to be parked two blocks away. 

Slowly the group of nurses (all without jackets) trying to leave the hospital got bigger as we all wrestled with the options

a) wait out the storm

b) make a run for it and get soaked to the bone within 6 steps

c) call our husbands to come pick us up (I seriously considered waking Shawn up to play door-service taxi-man for me)

Finally after waiting 10 minutes with no let-up in sight, I went in search for another option.

Meet option d)

One bag for my purse, one for my shoulders down and one for a hood...

I hustled to my car and arrived completely drenched thighs down as I had to wade through a literal river in the road but my 'rain jacket' had done it's job by keeping my upper half, bone dry. 

Once I was in my car I was able to sit back and enjoy the lightning and thunderstorm as I drove home. When I was coming to the underpass and saw a truck drive through the 'puddle' and the water level go up to it's doors I knew my little car wouldn't stand a chance so I reversed out of there and tried two more underpasses till I found my way home on Stafford. 

It took so long to drive home that by the time I got there, the rain had finally run out... 

I love Alberta's schizo weather... Keeps you on your toes.

The Best Parade EVER...

What makes a parade fantastic you say?


Amazing bands?

Stupendous floats?

Hilarious clowns?

Convertibles with beauty queens/politicians/celebrities riding on the back?


I say, you've seen one, you've seen them all... The best parade is

A CANDY PARADE!!!

Come on, what fun is sitting in the hot sun watching cars/occasional floats slowly creep by you unless they are tossing candy, suckers, chocolate bars or freezies your way???

Last weekend was the Coaldale Candy Parade and Shawn and I decided to test their claim that a thousand pounds of candy gets tossed each year.

I don't know why we get so excited over free candy. It's not like we can't go to the store and spend $5 and walk away with a mitt full of candy but it's something about FREE candy. FREE candy that you have to fight young kids for. 

This candy isn't bought. It's earned...

Maybe that's why it tastes extra sweet.

We staked a claim in the rare patch of sidewalk that wasn't swarming with kids and there we sat, as candy just got tossed our way, without even trying... It was awesome... Some parades they are stingy but here they were walking down the street, literally dumping buckets out on kids. 

We figure if we had a kid with us we could have tripled or even quadrupled our candy parade returns... 

Hmmm maybe we will have kids sooner that we thought. 

The Brave Little Toaster affects me still!

I don't know if anyone remembers a movie called, "The Brave Little Toaster".

I do.

But unlike other Disney movies which I remember and love, this one I remember for a whole 'nother reason.
It tramatized me.

Kirby accidently vacuums up his own cord and almost chokes to death on it. That's quite a vivid, horrific thing for a little girl to see and it has stuck with me.

 To this day every time I take out my vacuum, plug it in, turn it on and start vacuuming I am always so extra careful to avoid the cord because all I can think of is the horror I felt seeing Kirby choking on the cord... There is no way I wanna be responsible for this poor vacuum to go through the same thing.

 I know it was just a cartoon but I still can't bring myself to go near the cord when vacuuming.  

Funny how I can't remember what I did last week but a 60 second scene in a movie I saw when I was 3? Yep, still burned into my brain.

Summer Days are Here Again

Well, looks like the rain has finally left us.

Adios.

So, I had to change my blog template to reflect the heavenly state we will be in for the next two months. Natch.

I just wanna go lay outside and tan all day...

Snapshots of July 4th at Echo

The amount of cars and trailers were staggering

One day I will break Shawn from his dislike of photos.
Heck. I'd settle for figuring out how to make him smile in
 one every now and then.

The up and coming generation of Bevans girls..
Gorgeous eh?

Mom and Dad Bevans
aka Todd and Jenny

I was blown away by how "American"ized everything was.
Canada Day just doesn't compare to how decked out they get down south..

Even their pancake breakfasts are patriotic

Awaiting the parade.... and the candy..

Shawn claimed the front spot, just the place to grab any
candy he desired... See that focused determination?
That's what won him the box of Cracker Jacks over the
kids' outstretched hands. 

Saying goodbye as we rushed out to try and make the
border before it closed at 11 p.m.

We barely made it with 50 seconds to spare. Shawn could hear
their footsteps coming to close the gates and we inched in

Good thing Shawn drove 150 km/hr the whole way there...

Two minutes later and we would have been spending
the night in the parking lot.

Echo Lake and Fireworks = Heaven

In the Bevan's family, July 4th weekend means being at grandma's cabin at Echo Lake with all your extended family. This is a tradition that I was not opposed to, in the least. 

Heaven.

I think the max number we got to was 62 people, but was usually only 43 people... Only a fraction of all the aunts, uncles, and cousins. You should have seen all the tents, trailers and cars crammed in the yard.

Have you ever seen such a gorgeous, STILL lake? 

They hadn't either... 

This trip was slightly different than all the other years due to one big ting. No boating.

Apparently Echo Lake has had it's fair share of rain and flooding and due to the fear of even more flooding two days before we all got there, they initiated a "No White Water" order, so basically no boats.

Tragic.

Luckily, I still had this to look forward to:

 I have always wanted to be in the states for July 4th for one reason... Fireworks... 

The one and only time I have ever played with fireworks was 15 years ago while Shawn has been doing this every year of his life so to him this was nothing super exciting. 

I was stoked.

 Part of me understands why they aren't legal in Canada... Kids without supervision could cause havoc with them quite easily... But they are sooooo fun!!! I love that every cabin was having their own mini firework show that equaled one, gorgeous out-of-sync show. I was only partly terrified that they would blow up in Shawn's face and I would be an early widow. 

I wanted to smuggle a carload of fireworks back into Canada so we could continue playing with them but Shawn wouldn't indulge my obsession that much. 

Anyone else wanna smuggle me up some??

A Fantastic App and A Very Stinky Passenger....

I love Instagram. I am sure you all know what Instagram is; usually by the time I get around to finding things out, I am about 2 months behind the times but just in case; Instagram is a iPod/iPhone app that allows you to set your pictures to different 'filters'. With it, I can change a normal, boring photo to one with a more striking, vintage feel.

Shawn hates it because he feels it takes a sharp, clear photo and makes it somewhat blurry or what have you... He's hoping I will get sick of it soon. But it makes me love even a simple photo of the Montana border sign, and playing around with photos helped the time pass as we sat at the border for 70 minutes. Apparently, the idea of going south for July 4th is a popular one. 

We set off for Echo Lake at noon on Canada Day. We had different plans originally but we couldn't wait to get down to the lake and see some family that we ended up leaving 10 hrs ahead of schedule. We made the decision as we were sitting in Raymond, waiting for the parade to start. Shawn and I came to the decision at the same time so we got up before a single float went by, packed and were gone by noon. 

The trip down was marred most spectacularly by a simple thing. BO stench. We had just got in the truck and buckled in when I got a whiff of something quite nasty.

 I glanced suspiciously at Shawn and gave him a quick peck on the cheek as I simultaneously sniffed him. Not him. I looked down at Shawn's work sweater and took a quick sniff. Not that. I hadn't had a shower that day, but I was sure that it wasn't me. No way could something THAT foul be me. Just in case tho.... I took a quick, inconspicuous smell of my armpit. Thank goodness, not me.

 By now Shawn had caught on and was enjoying me go quite insane sniffing randomly every minute or so, trying to find the source of the smell that only I could smell. After awhile I started to think that:

A) maybe I was pregnant and had developed super smell

B) The smell was in my nose (can that happen)

But than as I was sniffing, I discovered the culprit. 

The seatbelt!

Apparently Shawn picked up a hitchhiker and gave him a short ride and five days later the seatbelt still reeks of him. I don't know how bad a person must smell to make a seatbelt stink that badly that quickly but whoa, man did it ever reek and it was conveniently located right under my nose for the whole trip. We tried to air it out the window, cover the smell by drowning it in cologne, wash it in water but finally, I had to settle by smothering it with a sweater. 

That man was one stinky fellow, but I will say this about him. Smelly as he is, at least he had good sense to buckle up.