Good -Bye Kandi Girl

Kandi has gone and crossed the Rainbow Bridge as of July 14th , 2008 . She was 12.5 yrs old and the most laidback dog we have ever owned . She loved everybody and everything ..... especially food and the Yorkie pups ! The past 16 months she had defied all odds and out lived more health problems then we ever thought possible . The worst was last may when her liver shut down and we thought she wouldn't make it but she pulled out of that . Since then she had fought one infection after another , small strokes and then the last being mammery gland infections . She was even senile .... though she always thought it was time to eat !

Good-bye Kandi Girl and I hope your brother Buddy was waiting at the other side of the bridge waiting for you . Today I hope you are pain free and running through green meadows !

We will miss you girl and the boys will too ! Tigger , the cat has called for you but finally just curled up in your bed and gone to sleep !

" A dog's love is unconditional ........ R.I.P. Kandi "

Thanks Heather !

I " won " a photo contest on a message board and Heather created this cute siggy for me ! These are my dogs ... Kandi , our old cocker and Tucker and Ryder the Yorkies ............


" Love the one you are with "

Oh where , oh where is the time going ?

Just a few highlights of the past month or more :-) DH & I upgraded to a little large motor home this Spring ( not even going to talk about our wonderful gas prices ! ) . We took a quick trip to the Okanagan to pick our mansion on wheels up in April , missing all the snow and crappy roads that followed soon after we got it home ! BIG BONUS ! This baby is only 5 ft longer then our " old " one but we have gone from a Class C to Class A ..... basically meaning we sit over the fron tires and have the option of using the driver and passenger seat for living area .... plus we have 2 slides .... one where the dining area and the couch ( which we didn't have before ) and the bed actually move out about 18-24" giving us more living area ! We have been on a quick one week trip to do the loop ( Valemount , Blue River , Little Fort , Fawn Lake and Lac La Hache before heading home ) and all we can say is ...... PERFECT in every way :-) I even spent 5 days by myself in our favorite getaway while DH worked ! Tucker thought maybe he would teach himself to drive ..... when you are too short , you just stand on the pillow to drive ! LOL ! This was his favorite place so I am wondering if he was trying to tell me it was time to get moving and go home !

Unfortunately DH still isn't well and has since had a change of meds that seem to be helping . He has lost another week of work and is now stressed as this is a bad time for hime to get behind as it is number crunching time for him ..... BUDGET time ! He will be glad to be able to just sit and relax after July 1st as he has that week off for holidays and we are just going to sit and do nothing at our " camp " ! Now to just get the next couple of weeks over and done with so he can relax !!!

" Always take the scenic route ! " ~ unknown

April is moving on !

April may be almost over but winter doesn't want to leave ! We have had below 0 temperatures for the past week and as DH was away , I managed to play a bit . Some of these cards were done this past week but all were April's creations . I have to start prioritizing my spending though as I buy , buy , buy for scrapbooking and find I just am not doing any ! The stamps and cards are taking over ... probably because they are a small project and I love doing them ! Don't get me wrong , I love scrapbooking too .... just not motivated to work on anything right now in that department !

Winter has taken a tole on everybody it seems as Spring is so late in arriving . The lakes are still frozen over here and the campgrounds still have snow in them . We have finally in the past day lost the last patch of snow on the front lawn but the back will be another week or so yet ! It is still cold at night to even consider going out camping ......maybe in May ! A change of pace may help DH too as he needs to relax and get the Crohn's Disease under control . He always relaxes while camping and maybe we will be able to just go find some peaceful corner to relax in this year .......

Just when you think life is on the uphill swing , another thing smacks you to remind you that life isn't that easy . BIL was diagnosed with another brain tumor ( this one at the back of skull near the spinal cord ) . Not the kind of news we were hoping for . DH was in Montreal last week on business so swung by to his brother's for a few days as it worked right into his flight plans ! BIL is going in tomorrow for the gamma knife radiation treatment and the Dr is optomistic that this will kill the tumor . Everybody is praying that this will work and that he can get on with his life and live to a long and healthy old age . Dh was glad he did get to see him one way or another . Their Mother actually arrived the same day as DH did so he visited with her as well . Dh has been on new meds and is having some problems with them as his white cell count dropped so he has had more blood work ..... the good news is the blood has regulated itself to where it should be . He came home with a cold though so is under the weather tonight . Wouldn't stop him from going to work though .............................

" Life isn't like a box of chocolate ..... it's more like a jar of jalepenoes . What you do today , might burn your butt tomorrow ! " ------ unknown

Happy Easter !

WOW , where has the past 6 weeks gone ? Seems like it was just Valentine's day and already the Easter Bunny has been and gone ! Must be a sign of old age when time moves so quickly ! LOL !

Here is our Little Man , Aiden and what he thinks about turning 1 on March 12th ! It worked out well as DD and family came up on the 11th for an Avril Laveigne concert ( poor DD ended up sick though and couldn't go with her girls ) . We spoiled Aiden because we can being we are the grandparents !!! There are some really neat things out there for boys and a real novelty after shopping for 4 granddaughters ! He loved his cake we bought him too .... a perfect shade of blue icing coated his face ! DH & I didn't attend his big birthday paprty on the 15th at their home as we had taken a week of holidays to go visit my family . We also went to a RV show and drooled on all the new units out there ! Fun to look at ! We also spent a few days by ourselves on the way home and shopped and snooped . Did manage to hook up with my friend Lisa for supper one night too ! Thanks Lisa for joining us :-) Next time hopefully we can hook up at a campground and have a much longer visit !

Winter is finally starting to leave although we are still getting the odd snow flurry and still have a fair bit of snow in our yard ....but it is leaving too and we have seen some warmer temperatures and the SUN !!! Even some grass is starting to show where DH shovelled paths for the dogs and they are loving that !

Off to cook supper for a mob and it is a roast not turkey or ham as we had both while we were away !!!

Happy Easter everybody and Happy Spring !!!

Happy Valentine's Day

and it could be a day of good news too ! Pretty flowers delivered day from my Valentine and i gave him 2 Yorkie pups ! No not real ones but Sandicast figurines :-) .... we do NOT need any more dogs !

Good news has been the gift of the day though . DH saw a specialist out of town today and it was well worth the $500 to fly there and back again as he was told the Crohn's Disease has NOT progressed to the point where he will need surgery any time soon :-) Medication will be changed in the next week or so and the specialist feels this will do the trick and get things back to " normal " . We couldn't be happier ! It was a long day for him though and he was so tired when he got in . 2 days of meetings and late nights earlier this week always take there tole on him .... we always talk about him cutting back and he seems to just get busier !

DS also saw his specialist today and got the results of his throat scope . All is good for now but he will have to go back in a year for another . No cancer cells were detected so she must have done a tissue culture .... though Ds didn't ask how they determined that ! Aggggg ! He does have a spot somewhere ( he didn't ask ! ) but I am assuming it is on his esophogus that has a spot that has grown to 3 cm since the last scope a year ago . It will be a spot to monitor as cancer can form quickly and that is her biggest concern .But for now it is all good news .

BIL is in remission and a walking miracle . In 15 months he has beat two of the most deadly cancers , brain and stomach ! I hope he starts living his life to the fullest while he is able as his specialist told him it could be tomorrow , next week or not for 20 years before any of it surfaces again . They are awaiting the birth of a new granchild as well ( overdo so it it wouldn't be long ) and maybe this time they will get their girl . They have 4 boys of their own and 4 grandsons so maybe this time ..... it took us to #5 to get a boy !!! It is their turn !!!

Our weather has been so February ! Cold , snowy and the thought that Spring will never make an appearence .......... we saw the sun and some warmer temperatures for the first part of the week just to give us a taste of Spring ! Today we got hit with that wet , fast accumulating snow to add to the already huge pile ! It is warming up though and the weatherman is calling for RAIN !!! That aught to make everything a skating rink as the storm drains are plugged or frozen over with ice so the melting snow is creating a few huge puddles which will turn to skating rinks if we get another super cold spell !

Happy Valentine's Day and remember to say I Love You all year long and not just today :-)

Will this ever .... MELT !

Views from the backyard and I am beginning to wonder if it will ever melt and if we will ever see green grass again ...and so are the dogs ! DH is talking about having to start shoveling off the roofs if this stuff gets much deeper and hope we don't get a quick melt or a heavy rain that will add to much stress on the roof ( which could collapse under too much weight ) . I am sure this is the most snow we have ever had in this yard since moving into this house 11 years ago .... I dread to see the lake we will have coming when it does melt ! So today is the last day of January so we have at least 2 months maybe 3 of this stuff !!! Oi Yeah !

i never get good photos of my boys

So when I do , I have to scrap them ! This was a layout that just fell into place ( thanks Jenn for the progressive challenge ! LOL ) ...... the subject isn't one I would usual consider scrapping but look at those boys faces ! They are both in there element and the happiess when they are in touch with nature . This was the annual hunting trip / male bonding in November with their dad ...who didn't get his deer but not for lack of trying !

" You can take the boy out of the country , but you can't take the country out of the boy ! "

A weekend to scrap .......

This is Tucker and he was mad because I wouldn't pick him up ! Nothing but attitude ! LOL !

This was the start of our winter .............

Call us crazy .... and cold !

Are we crazy ? Probably ! The owners of our favorite quick get-away campground invited a bunch of us summer campers down for a hot dog roast and campfire last Sunday afternoon . After a week of -20+ weather and snow , none of us were too sure what Sunday would bring . Well Sunday brought SUN and warmer temperatures ( -8 C 17 F when we drove into the campground ! ) ..... and NO WIND ! A BIG bonus !!!

It was a beautiful crisp day and everybody seemed to enjoy themselves . More curious was the fact that campfire seemed to stink and cling far worse then any summer campfire we had ever had ! LOL ! Great company and other then the fact the wieners took forever to cook over the fire and the hot dog buns froze ( can't imagine why ! LOL ) it was FUN ! Merv even put a heater in the outhouse and dug a path to it so we didn't have to trudge through waist deep snow to get there ! As my feet were freezing , it wasn't a bad place to warm up ..............

Only 3 more months ( some are saying or wishing 2 ) before the camping season starts again but I sure hope the snow and cold weather leave before then as I have definitely had my fill of winter and I can't see the picnic tables so I am not camping until I can ! I don't think I am that CRAZY !!!!!

" Find fun in everything and make do with what you have ! "

Later with more snow !

The dogs don't seem to mind the snow ...as long as they have paths dug ...would hate to lose one of the little devils in a snow drift though !

The temperature is hovering around 0 so it is actually quite pleasant outside ...cooler temperatures by next week though ! YUCK !

Even the birds need to be fed ! Have to keep the snow off their hangers !

I was just playing with the "SNOW " setting on my Canon ELPH and I am quite impressed ! Sure never got these photos with the Sony Cybershot !!!

ENOUGH !!!

It seems that Mother nature has decided we need just a bit more snow ! It started early this morning and just kept coming down and down . It has stopped for now but we are supposed to get more by morning !!! I just want it to stop as winter has been far to long already and it is only the middle of January ........................................... guess we will see more of the white stuff before it ends though :-(

ICE JAM on the Nachako River

I didn't get many photos of our ice jam on the river on Sunday ( well I did but had the camera on the wrong setting ! DUH ) ...but these are the ones I did get . This is looking across the river to the businesses on the other side of it . That field of snow is the ice buildup on the river that keeps building up more and mopre because it has nowhere else to go .
Not great photos as they were taken through the truck windshield !
The old Cameron Street Bridge with the ice building up under it .

Crossing the John Hart Bridge from North to south ...that is the frozen river stretching from bank to bank !

Apparently there may be some ice movement in the next day or so as they are trying to cut the ice with a machine ( large boat I do believe ) and forcing it towards the Fraser River which the Nechako joins with ... I have no idea how they expect this to work but they say it should help ...............

The start of 2008 creations

A couple layouts with Taylor ( granddauther #3 )





And a couple of cards . The first is hand-stitched and not my favorite idea of a fun time !
These are from a kit I bought from CTMH and were fun and easy to do though I still like making my own creations and not following directs !

I just don't follow directions well !! LOL !

Take a deep breath ......

now exhale ! LOL ! I can't believe how time is moving so quickly ! Hard to believe we are already into the second half of the first month of a New Year ! Where did it go ? Life has been busy here with a few things happening and so far only good news :-) Makes you wonder when the second shoe will drop but I am hoping it stays on that foot for a LONG time !

The biggest and most fun thing happened last week when DH & I went to see BIG & RICH with some good Canadian talent , Emerson Drive and Terri Clark as they came to our town :-) It was a totally amazing concert ( though the accoustics could have been better but we were in an arena and I guess that has to do with the crappy sound ! ) , the talent was second to none and the light show was something that this town will probably never see again ! Our Canadian talent was worth seeing just by themselves and we would have gone to see them ! Terri Clark is an amazing performer and she well deserves all the awards she has won . Emerson Drive is just starting to be recognised for the group they are .... simple wonderful ! They have been nominated for a grammy this year . We are proud to clain these guys and Terri as Canadian born and raised and they make no bones about it ! BIG & RICH were something to see as they really are spectacular . They had 2 surprize guests with them , Cowboy Troy and his hic-hop kind of country music ( rap with a country flair ! ) and 2 Ft .......... Totally a fun packed concert that went on for over 3 hrs ! No photos though as the ticket said no cameras or video equipment ...only to get there and they announce cameras are okay just not audio ..... and I had left my phone at home too so I couldn't get any pictures with it ( though they would have been 1" square regardless ! ) .

Other then the excitement of the concert , there isn't much to report . I have managed to do a bit of scrapping which is great as I miss not creating . The Cricut that DH bought me is getting a workout and I am still waiting for the company to get back to me and help solve a problem with the Design Studio so I can get to play with that too ! You have to lovew these companies that don't respond to their EMs ....maybe I will try phoning there and finding out if they even answer their phones !

Winter is still making it's regular appearence here and the snow just gets deeper and deeper . Today we hit 7 C though so that was fantastic as the sun shone ! Ice jams on our rivers are creating a lot of problems for some of businesses along the river and a fire at one of our mills a couple nights ago .... We are safe though as we live up " the mountain " and not down in the bowl area . If we flood then there are a lot of people in serious trouble ! DH & I drove down the River road to see the ice jams last Sunday and they really were something to see . I had my camera and took mega photos only to find out after I had it set wrong and every photo was super blurry ! Think I have learned my lesson on that one ! LOL !

Until the next time " Don't forget to inhale , exhale and enjoy the beauty around you as life is too short to sit in the dark "

New Years Resolution

My aunt sent me this via E-mail !

A Wonderful Resolution for the New Year!
What amazing gifts the new year brings! An entireyear's worth of wonderful opportunities, given to usone sunrise at a time. Many of the moments ahead willbe marvelously disguised as ordinary days, but each oneof us has the chance to make something extraordinaryout of them.
Each new day is a blank page in the diary of your life.The secret of success is in turning that diary into thebest story you possibly can. Have pages on understandingand tales of overcoming hardships. Fill your story withenthusiasm, adventure, learning, and laughter. And make each chapter reflect time doing these things:
Follow your dreams. Work hard. Be kind. Do what you can to make the door open on a day that is filled with inspiration in some special way. Remember: Goodness will be rewarded. Smiles will pay you back. Have fun.Find strength. Be truthful. Have faith. Don't focus on anything you lack.
Realize that people are the treasures in life, andhappiness is the real wealth. Have a diary thatdescribes how you're doing your best, and... the rest will take care of itself. - by Douglas Pagels
Have a Wonderful Year!!

Look what a friend made for me !

I just LOVE it ....thank you Heather and you really should do digi-scrapping !

Hang on tight.......

to your friends ........
and bring in a New Year together !

Happy New Year everybody and the best for 2008 !!!

Winter 2007

This is today ! More snow ( though only an inch or two today ).....................................................................................................................


Even the animals are tired of it and it is only the end of December !!!

Bring on SPRING !!!

A reflection of 2007

Christmas has come and gone for another year ! Was a special one this year as we have a 9 month old grandson to spoil and make memories with . The girls were all so cute as well . My family is my life and each year they help me get through . Sad that each year seems to go faster and faster though !

2007 was a very roller coaster year for us but the shining light through all of it was the birth of a healthy grandson to DD ! What a cutie he is and he is so smart ! LOL ! Wouldn't be long before he is graduating school .... okay maybe a few years but with how fast the years are going it wouldn't be that long !

Health issues seemed to have played a major roll in the year . DH has been fighting UC right through the year with one bout after another . He has been referred to a specialist out-of-town so hopefully we will get some answers and he some much needed relief , in 2008 . I sure hope that call comes soon ......... Dh still spends far too much time at his job but has managed to take another week off during the holiday season . He is rested ( I hope ) and I hope it stays that way for him as he has a busy January planned ( which is usually a trigger for another bout ! It is the nature of the beast ! )

As for me , well , it has been one silly thing after another and enough is enough ! Between rotator cuff problems , carpel tunnel and then pneumonia , 2007 hasn't been the best ! I just hope the shoulder is going to heal as I plan on making a major attack on a stack of photos in 2008 that have to be scrapped ! With all the supplies I have here , I should be good to go for the next year or so without any new purchases ! LOL ! Like that is going to happen ! DH bought me a cricut machine so I have to get something done after all he spent on it and the toys that go with it ! A Cricut is a computerized die-cutting machine ..... no more trying to use the handle of the Sizzix machine that just killed my arm ! Now I just have to figure out HOW to use it ! LOL !

Youngest DS hasn't worked in close to a year so I sure hope that 2008 finds him working and supporting himself ! At the moment , he has his foot in a cast as he tangled with a vacuum cleaner and the vacuum won !! He breaks far too easy !!!! This week he also goes in for a throat scope ......... and the stomach problems are getting worse instead of better which means he may have to have surgery this year ........THAT doesn't help with the job situation any either ! Just seems to be one bump in the road after another with him ........

Oldest Ds and family seem to being doing fine . They were here for Christmas and we gave Granddaughter #1 Avril Laveigne tickets for her tour in March ! I have a sneaking suspicion somebody told her she was getting them ans she didn't seem too excited about them ! Oh it is so fun trying to please a 12 year old !

Good news about BIL though . His cancer is " gone " in his brain after major radiation and a few more bouts of chemo should find the stomach cancer in recession ................ or we can always hope ! He is one very LUCKY man and he just doesn't realise how many people were pulling for him ! Miracles do happen when you least expect them ! His life has changed dramatically this year though and who knows what 2008 will bring to their household . hopefully only good things ( one being a small bundle in February in the form of a new grand baby - which is enough to make one get better ! They are hoping for a girl as they have 3 grandson's and 4 sons ! Definitely time for a girl in that family ! )

This year has been one of reconnecting with friends from the past and family that we haven't seen in years . Life really does come full circle . Hope to be able to stay in contact with all of them . Nice to share stories and memories and hear new ones !

As 2007 comes to a close and the optimism of a new year looming , I wish each and every one a safe , healthy and wonderful New Year .......

" Each day comes bearing it's own gifts . Untie the ribbons " ~ Ruth Ann Schabaker