it's been a long and eventful weekend. friday night barb and i were going for our first kayak trip of the season. i mentioned to barb that i invited elicia and heather to come (neither of which ended up coming) and so she took the liberty of inviting her friends cliff and jen, and shawn henry (all of which showed up), which was fine with me. i mean do i own the seas? no! the seas are for everyone to enjoy! so anyways the short story is that barb and cliff and jen were late because of border delays. so me and shawnhenry hung out at the cove twidling our thumbs and talking. there was a beautiful rainbow but that only lasted so long.

finally they got there by the skin of their teeth and the kayak peeps were kind and let us go even though we were officially too late to go out. they were all in the doubles and i was in my favourite--the pinta. we went up the arm to the danger bay house and then back. it was a beautiful evening. it had been raining but the rain was gone and the sky was what i like to call 'expressive'. rays through clouds type expression. i had to leave earlier than the rest to pick katie and brent up at the ferry so i booted it back and left them in my wake so to speak. after a while i couldn't even hear them after a while, so i don't know what they did or where they went. all i know is that i got back right at eight thirty when i needed to.

i love kayaking. out on the water i had all these dreams of kayaking adventures dancing in my head instead of sugar plums.

in the end katie and brent's ferry was an hour late so i had a half an hour wait. i bided my time by making stoopid videos of myself on my cell phone and looking at the funny ones i took of the twins on christmas day. those gave me a good chuckle. before i knew it brent was knocking on my window.

of course we went to casa gelato, "we're blossoming with 218 flavours". it's a tradition now and traditons cannot be broken. it's also a tradition with sarah and kyle so i go there many times throughout the year not to mention when amy is over. today the handsome son was working and we had quite the interlude. fatima reads that as interlewd but that is only because she is lewdi-two-shoes. but basically it comes down to the fact that by the time i left i think we had an 'understanding' of our mutual regard. this time i got fig and chocolate shavings and chocolate coconut. katie got chocolate coconut too aaaaaaaand something else i can't recall. we both tried mushroom and decided it tasted exactly like mushroom, but not too bad in a weird way. brent, as is his wont (ie. will not), did not do the taster's circuit. brent went straight to his choices, and got three scoops. he was done by the time katie and i had made our careful decisions. he is all about the vanilla that guy. he got another scoop of vanilla cookie dough after that. i tasted his and to give brent his due, it is the best vanilla cookie dough i've ever had. both brent and kyle are good about giving you tastes and i like this about each of them. it's a favourable brother-in-law feature. katie and sarah can pat themselves on the back about that one.

brent fell asleep in the orange chair almost as soon as we got home. that left katie and i to put up the air mattress. at first we were having troubles with elicia's battery run pump and katie was trying this other little pump that was not doing squat and she even tried to blow in it. katie has determination in spades. if a value book was written on her, determination could be her value. she could have a talking beaver as her imaginary friend. i miss those value books. anyways don't dispute my choice of value, i'm perfectly aware that many other values could be written on her, i'm just highlighting this one. after a while we figured out that it was the angle in which you held the battery pump that determined success. once a successful angle was found the bed was pumped up in no time. i got some blankies and a pillow to put on the bed and katie woke brent up so he would go to bed. then we went to bed. we like to talk in bed but we were so tired and katie kept falling asleep. "at least you can admit it, unlike jordan." i pointed out. (jordan will deny sleeping straight into head drooping and snores) at one point katie laughed and i asked her what she was laughing about. she said i didn't want to know because it wouldnt' make sense and then she said something about a lady with a desk like an ironing board. oook, i said. a lady with a desk like an ironing board. yah, she said and laughed.

temple trip: we had over two hours of border wait on the way there. it was a cut throat line up too and all these cars were driving down the truck lane and then trying to bud in front of us right when we were having to merge into one lane and so there were three lanes merging into one and i was in a legit lane but the man who became known as hard nose harry would not let me in. like i mean i really tried to force him by edging really really closely in but he would not let me in and he would not look at me either. i merged in after him, and then would not let the illigit volkswagen van in front of me and i noticed later that the illegit van would not let a silver car with an asian lady who was a budder in front of him later on. in short we were all hard nosed harrys. but really the budders are just infuriating to a line up of cars that is hardly moving at all. we were all getting so worked up about it that we had to talk about something else. we played name that tune for a while. my gas went down more than a notch and i ended up turning off the car in between times.

when we finally got through we stopped at the first gas station we saw because i was on red line empty and stocked up on the junk food. we'd been through a lot and needed to do some emotional eating.

the rest of the drive was uneventful. we got to the temple at ten after two and our session wasn't until three. but it was nice, as it always is and a respite that we needed. peace light and quiet. you dont' realize how hectic dark and noisy regular life is until you get a little break from it. katie and i were fighting the snoozemobile until i remembered a little trick i did last month. i started signing, as in spelling all the words i could of what was being said and it totally did the trick. so i whispered that to katie and we both did it. and it worked and it saved me from having to pinch myself over and over which is painful and not that effective.

katie and brent took me out to eat for supper. we were on our way to azteca's when brent saw red robin and veered off there. i hadn't been to red robin's in a while, since elicia had a bad experience there, but i had a good one yesterday. i had the whiskey river chicken burger. i liked the crispy onion straws in it. yumma yumma. katie and i shared a mile high mud pie afterwards which was a little too much but a little too good too, if you know what i'm saying to you with my eyes but not my lips. brent drove on the way home and katie and i hung out in the back seat. we had some good talks and we enjoyed brent being the chauffeur.

the border on the way back was one hour. the border guard thought we were weird. he wanted to know why we went to the temple. like was it a holiday? that left brent kind of speechless. he kind of laughed, stammered and said sure with a shrug. meanwhile me and katie were in the back seat. kickin it.

katie and brent had to catch the last duke point ferry and i don't envy them that, but i'm glad they came, it's fun to go to the temple with them.

this morning i lagged in getting ready for church. i was in open rebellion against all my regular church outfits. B-O-R-E-D with all of them. i mean how much can you beat a dead horse?? and because i also had a little case of cabin fever i started pulling out all these outfits that didn't match and that were a little on the 'far out' side and showing them to elicia. but that's how i came upon the blue paisley shirt that i'd say i haven't worn since 2004. i remember that steve didn't like it( not comfortable with the paisleys, but it wasnt' the first time his ultra conservatisism clashed with my free expression) and it fell out of favour with me for some reason that i didn't remember (but now after wearing it all day i think it may be the way it bumps out between buttons. i had to be ultra vigilent about that all day, making sure i wasn't flashing the girls at the church goers). anyways i wore it and enjoyed it except for the afore mentioned problem. i wore my dark blue polka dotted bracelet with it too. a little mix of the patternes never hurt nobody.

we went early because i had an interview with bro. wolfgram. i had a fear as to what my calling would be and sure enough it was gospel doctine teacher. randy is one and i'm the other. leif was the other but he left. bro. wolfgram didn't seem sure if he was coming back and of course we don't know either because everything was so weird when he came back and we hardly talked. i wish things weren't so awkward. it's hard to understand. anyways i'm the other teacher and i teach next week and randy is away for five weeks actually. so wow. me and the ward. this will be a big change. scary to me but scary can be good. i know heavenly father will help me and on the bright side this will force me to immerse myself in the scriptures and maybe that's what i'm looking for and maybe this is actually an answer to my prayers in a totally scary way that i wasn't expecting.

after church heather and i went to a single adult fireside in langley. it was nice to see our friends there, like SARITA (who was a hot mamma) scott and randy, and mehgan, and sarah b, and even pete. saint john (pronounced sin jin) was there too and sat with us. pot luck was good. sarah brought a cake from rene's reception. it was lemon chiffon and soooo good. heather was in seventh heaven.

the fireside was done by this couple who went on two missions to nigeria and it was all about that. they were cute and it was really interesting to me. it did go long though. but i liked it.

on the way home from church and just before leaving for the fireside there was a cool thunder and lightning storm. it was such a treat because we never get them and i love them. elicia thought the kitties would be totally freaked out but they were totally unconcerned. on the way to the fireside it was raining hard on and off between sunny periods. crazy weather. the sky was totally orange on the way home. gorgeous.

Comments