- "Breakerball" on blackberry is really frustrating. It took me months of mind-numbing time-wasting to pass all 34 levels only to, instead of congratulating me on completing the game, send me back to level 1 to start over again. I felt like slamming my head in the car door.

- speaking of the car...it got broken into on Friday. Pretty bizarre...they broke the back window and went through my bag, but left my jackets, gloves, ipod, and a brand new guitar that was in the trunk. It cost $350 to fix, but at least I didn't have to replace anything else.

- It's going to get coooold here very soon. uggh. The bright side is that it means that Christmas is coming soon - which also means that we get to go away for the first weekend in December to Mont Tremblant for work. Always a good time.

- Mo has been destroying her university courses after having not taken classes for 5 years. She just had the top mark on the midterm for her toughest class

- work is crazy frustrating lately. The high Canadian dollar has put so much pressure on the manufacturing and paper sectors out here in Eastern Canada and it is mind-boggling to see how fast industries turn around.

- at the same time...we need to get a couple days off to go shopping on the US side!

Anyway - not much to add, not that much interesting has happened lately, but once the kid comes I'm sure I'll be wishing for less excitement :-)

Posted by David at 11:25 AM

October 14, 2007

The last 6 months...and we're having a baby.

October 13th, 2007. Today I recommit myself to blogging. While it has been fun to reconnect with people via facebook that I have not seen in years, there are many other family members and friends who are not currently using facebook, and I want to be able to share our journey with you as well.

And what a journey the last several months have been. It has been 6 months since I last wrote a blog entry. Little did I know when I wrote that entry that about one week later Maureen and I would have a major "OOPS"...in fact, it wasn't until May 20th that we found out that we were expecting our first child (due date Jan 25) - and it has taken the better part of the last six months for us to come to terms with it. Not that starting a family is a bad thing at all...it's just that it was not expected and the timing didn't/doesn't quite fit with what we had "planned". We were hoping to start with a puppy, but hey, things happen, and I'm just hoping our kid is really cute so that nobody has to lie when they tell us that he/she is (you know what I'm talking about...you've all done it)

Maureen had been enrolled in a hairdressing program that was supposed to start in August - but due to the due date falling right in the middle of the 9 month program she was unable to do it. Instead, she has been going to school - studying Geography at Concordia University. While it has definitely been an adjustment for her to be back in school again, she has been doing an amazing job so far - even knocking out a 96% on a technical "Air/Water" midterm.

Aside from that, I've been putting on sympathy pregnancy weight and slugging away at bringing in new business for C.H. Robinson here in Montreal. It has been a tough few months in that regard, but our office has continued to expand and we have now hired another person and shuffled the deck a bit so that there are now two of us working in the Business Development group. The rising Canadian $$ has hit hard at manufacturing out here in eastern Canada, but at least it has made shopping trips to the US cheaper.

Speaking of trips...we had an absolutely amazing summer here in Montreal. While the weather took a little while to warm up, we've had a great time visiting family, having family visit us out here, camping, driving...etc.

Where to begin? Well...here's a few pics from the last several months. Click on the PHOTO GALLERY link at the top of the webpage to see the rest of the "best" photos.

Julia's grade 12 grad (Jeremy and Erin, Mom and Dad, Julia, Stephen and Melissa, David and Maureen)

A Cattle Drive while visiting the Esau side of the family in June

on the boardwalk at Virginia Beach - August

Canoing in September

Hiking at Lac Munroe - October

So yeah - it's been a bit busy!!! :-)

In June we went to BC to celebrate my sister Julia's graduation from high school. As of two weeks ago she is now going to school at YWAM in Lausanne, Switzerland. I can't tell you how jealous Mo and I are of her traveling.

Following her grad we went up to BC.....

Continue reading "The last 6 months...and we're having a baby."

Posted by David at 7:04 AM

April 9, 2007

Broken Record

does anybody even read this anymore? The last time I wrote anything was back in February - back then I couldn't believe that so much time had passed since my previous entry. So to follow that up I didn't write anything for over 6 weeks. Oh well. Anyway, we posted a few pics from the last couple months...and I think I'm due for a bit of a ramble...

(see the gallery for more pics of snowboarding and Mo's trip to BC)

- Maureen went to BC last week to see her family so I was flying solo for a little while. I spent a day snowboarding at Tremblant which was pretty fun, but it's definitely more fun when someone else is there as well. I'm not actually sure what I did with the rest of the week but it went by relatively quickly. We also got out to Bromont to go snowboarding back in Feb and in March we spent a weekend at Jay Peak. There are a couple pics from that weekend - it snowed over 20 inches in one night and it took 2.5 hours to drive 100km to the hill, but the conditions were unbelievable. Definitely worth the trip.

-Congrats to my brother Jeremy for winning his second Juno award (Canadian music award) with his band "Downhere".

...click below to keep reading...

Continue reading "Broken Record"

Posted by David at 8:59 AM | Comments (1)

February 24, 2007

Ok, the photos are really posted now. Valentine's day, our new place and some of Chad and Bud's visit.

Posted by Maureen at 12:59 AM

February 16, 2007

february what???

has it really been this long since our last blog entry? for that matter, has it really been that long since I've had anything to add?....sigh....

the problem for me isn't that there is no shortage of things (and people) to write about - the problem is that such people may in fact read this blog at some point and so I have to be diplomatic in my story telling to the point where I don't write as much as I once did. It was much easier to write about Indian men or a guide in Nepal or a crazy karaoke character on a bus in Thailand than about my coworkers or Mo's coworkers (who all believed for a while that I had no social skills - not too far from the truth I guess)......anyway...

...if you're wondering why Mo is wearing 4.3 lbs of makeup you'll have to keep reading.

Continue reading "february what???"

Posted by David at 8:06 AM

January 25, 2007

My head hurts...

So, I'm officially through my first week of French classes. Since the focus of the course is to learn "conversational" french, the teacher only speaks in French and we are not really allowed to speak any English either. And I know it's the best way to do it, but two hours straight of constant translating in my head leaves my brain a little fried. I am encouraged though as I am able to understand most everything...or at least the general idea of what she's saying. I figure it can only get better from here right?

I'm also doing some independant studying on the side...just for my own knowledge. David has dug out some of his favourite articles and studies, etc from his BA for me to read and write little summaries on. I just finished reading one yesterday on the outbreak of World War I...how and why it happened.
It was very interesting but frustrating too as I realized that so many people died for the pride and/or disillusionment of a few men and their main advisors. So much of it doesn't make sense to my standards. It seems like leaders then believed almost that there was no choice but to go to war...the wheels had been set in motion and it was inevitable...however I believe it was just one miscommunication after another. I wonder if things would have been different if there had been telephones and they could at least hear eachother's voice...as it is impossible to hear the intended tone in a telegram.
It's hard to believe that it's almost been 100 years.

Those are my thoughts for the day.

Posted by Maureen at 1:28 AM

January 16, 2007

Back into the swing...

Well, as usual, our Christmas break went super fast, but we had a really great time with both families. After we got back, it was really busy right away cause we were moving into our new place. David had the first week off so he spent alot of time painting and setting up, and I helped too between shifts. Unfortunately, I was a bit useless in the moving department. as my rib is still pretty sore. Danny and Kerri were very hospitable in letting us crash at their place a few more days until we had the curtains up in our place.
Now we've been sleeping there for four nights now and it's great. We absolutely love how it turned out. I actually have a decent sized kitchen for the first time in our married life, complete with an island. I'm very excited about cooking in there. We will post pictures of it once we have it all finished. We still have some pictures and paintings to hang as well as a few other finishing touches.

Speaking of pictures, we have now posted the photos from our Christmas holidays so make sure to check those out.

We watched the season premiere of 24, season 6 last night...2 hours jammed pack full of stress. I don't know why I do it to myself...or encourage David in his desire to be Jack Bauer...but nonetheless, we're hooked:o)

I've started one of my courses now. I have French on Monday and Wednesday mornings and Cross Cultural Development on Fridays mornings. I haven't started French yet but I've one of the CCM classes and it seems really awesome. I'm really excited about it...so far I'm the only Canadian in the class so it makes for very interesting discussion and input.

David is back at work today and it is our first day of real snow this winter. Maybe we'll get to use our snowboards yet. The snow plows haven't been able to keep up at all so the sidewalks are covered in about 6-8 inches of snow. I'm not complaining though, I have been waiting for this!

Posted by Maureen at 3:55 AM