Our Adventures

Work is slow this week so I thought I'd catch up on the happenings around here. A few weekends ago we took advantage of the spring-like weather we've been having. We went for a hike up to Mt. Slesse with our friends Ryan and Cheryl. The hike took us about 5 hours in total (but that included walking up and down a logging road for two hours) and we had an amazing view at the base of Mt. Slesse. We hit snow pretty soon in our hike but it was nice and packed down so besides having to be careful with your footing the snow didn't slow us down too much. Supposedly there was a plane crash at the mountain about 50 years ago where everyone on board died. There was a memorial but it was covered in about 5 feet of snow so we didn't get to see much of that. It was a great hike and really refreshing to get outside in some great weather.

Taking a quick breather

Intense river crossing

Mountain range along the way

Getting close to Mt.Slesse

Mt.Slesse

All of us at the base of Mt.Slesse

The boys being goofs

Chris and I

Y-M-C....(I was the A)

Chris had his last basketball game of the season last night. His team won the Fraser Valley East and last night was the beginning of all the Fraser Valley's to get into Provincials. His team didn't seem to be on their best game last night and ended up losing and getting eliminated from any hopes of getting farther. Although it will be nice to have more free time I think Chris is going to miss coaching those boys.

Not much else has been going on around here. The Olympics have started and we're starting to regret not getting tickets to an event. I had a friend who was at the freestyle skiing where Canada won its first gold and I was pretty jealous. We're planning on heading into Vancouver this weekend though to share in some of the Olympic spirit downtown and see all the different displays they have there.

It's feeling more and more like Spring around here especially since January just flew by. I worked 9 days in January which is almost as much as I worked in all of October-December. Things are starting to pick up I guess. Last week I worked 4 of those 9 days so that might have been a extreme week because this week I haven't worked any yet. We'll see, people say February is supposed to be busier. Other than working the only major things that happened to us in January was my birthday and going to Kelowna for a basketball tournament.

I turned 28 this year. For some reason that number seems old to me. I know, I know it's not that old but this year, the number 28, just made me sound old. To celebrate my oldness Chris and I went to see Avatar in 3D and even though we had to sit in the 4th row, it was still very good. We also went for supper at White Spot, one of my favorites. The next day we had the gang over for some cake and games and it was a good time had by all. The thing is, even though my age feels old, I don't, and I guess that's all that matters.

Only having two candles to light made it a little easier than 28

Officially 28

Eating some cake
The next weekend we headed to Kelowna for a basketball tournament Chris had got his team into. He was a little nervous this being the first time he had brought a team on an overnight event but it went great. There were tonnes of parents there to help out and the guys on his team are really good kids so there really was no need to worry. Friday night they won their first game and on Saturday they lost their second and won their last. So overall they came in third which I think they were pretty happy about. It was good for them to have tougher competition because they only have one other team that they regularly play out here that they don't beat by at least 30 points every game. This week they're getting ready for Fraser Valleys and then hopefully Provincials, we'll see how far they can go.

Chris giving them a pep talk

They started getting better at not swatting for the ball

Intense defense

Warm-up's

Jump Ball

The team with their third place plaque

I know I've been on another hiatus from blogging but I'll try better from now on. We've finally finished most of our renovations, just one more room that we'd like to paint (or that I'd like to paint) but we don't know when we'll get to it. We were painting and hanging pictures and cleaning up until December 23rd, just in time for all our company. But it got done and we are happy with the results. The family room was done a while ago but I put up Christmas decorations before taking pictures of what it looked like. All we did to this room was re-painted over some spots in the same color and put up a new fan and lights and my dad added new wainscoting to the back of the room where their massive TV used to be. We didn't want it to be one long room anymore so we split it up to make it a little cozier.

What it looked like the day we moved in

The completed room with our new couches

The little reading nook

One more angle
The hallway and stairway were the bane of my existence for about two weeks. What we thought would take a couple days to paint literally took almost two weeks. No matter how I painted the paint seemed to leave these shadows of where the sections overlapped and looking the other way it almost looked white in these spots. It didn't make sense since we had used this paint throughout our house and didn't have any problems until the hallway. Trying different paint and using an extension pole helped eventually and it's as good as it's going to get because I'm not going to paint it for a long time again.


The nice pinkish tone that was in most of the house before

Painting a stairwell is very tricky

The finished result with new bench, mirror, coat hooks and light

The last room we did before everyone got here was our living/dining room. Thankfully we didn't have paint issues so it was a matter of moving around all the junk that was piled in that room to get to the ceilings, trim and walls. I think that the color we chose for this room is one of my favorites in the whole house. We need a few more "home decor" pieces in this room but it's pretty much complete and how we want it. We kept my parents old massive coffee tables but my dad just re-stained them a darker color to match our furniture. They help fill the room and will be great for playing games on with a big group of people.


The pink room the day we moved in

The piles of stuff we had to maneuver around

The finished living room

The finished dining room (minus a tablecloth and picture on the far wall)

Turning yellow into white

Last day of painting

After all our cleaning and fixing things up we were ready for the Christmas festivities to begin. On Christmas Eve my parents and brother and his girlfriend came over for some gift openings. My mom spoiled us like crazy once again but I was surprised how she held back on getting clothes, this year it was all about Wii games. The next day Chris and I had our own Christmas in the morning and made sure all the beds and air mattresses were ready to go for the family when they got here. We went and picked up all the Falks at the airport in the afternoon and came home to a turkey feast at our place. We fit 12 people around our table, probably the most we'll ever have but it worked and it was delicious. The next day we were crazy enough to go into Vancouver for the day. Why I say we were crazy is because it was Boxing Day and we went to Metrotown, one of the biggest malls near Vancouver, and let's just say it was nuts. I did find some snowboarding boots (which I got refunded $40 more just a week ago) so it wasn't all for nothing, except that they were cheaper last week than on Boxing Day. Anyways, we wanted to go to Stanley Park and see the horizon of Vancouver from across the bay but it was way to foggy to see anything across the water so we headed to Metrotown earlier than expected. We all went out for supper to Red Robin and then the boys left us and went to the Canucks game as us girl drove home and watched a movie. The next morning we went to Cultus Lake and did some family pictures in the sunshine. The whole time everyone was here it was beautiful and sunny so now they can never say it always rains in B.C. That afternoon we had a mini Braun gathering at our place as the Williamson's and Colin and his girlfriend Amanda all came over. We ate food, played games and had a good time. The last day everyone was here we just relaxed at home. We stopped by Chris' school for everyone to see and of course the guys had to play some basketball. We ended the night by playing a murder mystery and Kevin ended up being the murderer, of all people it had to be Kevin. The next morning we were already driving them to the airport and that was that. It was a quick visit but a good one and we were really happy for them all to see our new place and fill up all the extra space we have.


Our Christmas and New Year

Once the family had left we had one day of doing laundry and relaxing before we headed down to The Glen for New Years with Eric, Carmen, Mike and Sarah. The first day was filled with games, movies and relaxing and the second day we headed to Baker and snowboarded in some nice fresh powder. My new boots worked great and I remembered how to snowboard really quickly. Carmen and I spent most of the day together so the boys could go off and do their fast between trees and whatnot stuff they do. When we all got back we were welcomed by Sarah who had made us some good but very very very spicy chili. It was pretty funny because we were all sitting there with red faces, blowing our noses and taking off layers of clothes as Sarah kept apologizing for how hot it was. It definitely gave us a memory to remember. After the spice cooled off we headed down to the hot tub for a little bit and then came back and played some games as we waited for the New Year to roll in. We celebrated the New Year with Christmas cracker explosions and sparkling apple juice and at about 12:20 we were all in bed.

Christmas and New Years flew by and now it's already the second week of school. I've only worked three days so far but am expecting much more in the next couple weeks as people start getting sick again. The days that I don't work I spend making my 2009 yearbook and a book for our Europe trip so that keeps me busy. I'll be happy once I get more work though. Chris is back at school, coaching basketball and really enjoying the group of guys he has to coach. We're heading to Kelowna next weekend with his team for a tournament so that should be fun. I turn 28 tomorrow, when did that happen? 28 sounds old to me. Hopefully this year will bring new adventures and not too many trials, we're looking forward to it.