A few days off

There's nothing like exploring your own province, where you live, when you have a few days off. We intended to visit Invermere and I wanted to gain a new perspective, which I did. Who knew we would also end up getting to know Keremeos, the Fruit Stand Capital of BC, intimately as well?

Ohh, do I have a story tell. I need at least a half an hour to get it all out. I'll have that time tomorrow night.

In the meantime, check out the photos from my Glider plane experience.

HINT: Look to the left, Sarah's Photo Gallery, the first set of links are my newest photo library links. I'll embelish them over the next few weeks.

I love this picture I took of Bubba

F@#!^& Winter!

Seriously check out this webcam, it's still snapshots but it's live. It updates every 5 or 10 minutes.
And go to Jennifer's Vancouver, a good friend of mine, Jennifer Jones, has tons of beautiful mountain photos.

What the "h" "e" double-hockey-sticks is going on?

Last week people were fighting over bottled water, this week it's snow tires. What's next? I'm not sure but I think Vancouver might fall into the ocean ane we'll be fighting over kayaks or something.

Meanwhile our backyard is filling up with snow, it's so beautiful, I love it. But no one loves it more than Bubba.

I'm worried about the new evergreen Magnolia we planted at the end of October. We checked it every hour on Sunday and we shook the snow off every 2 or 3 hours. I keep thinking the branches are getting too heavy with snow and they're going to break off. I can't believe it's holding up as well as it is.

Since I wasn't able to get out and take my own pics of the mountains today I found some photos other people have taken. Click on the links below to see them.

abnormal... but beautiful by Judy B
Winter Wonderland by mountainhiker
IMGP4058 c by tim_flickr
Snow in Vancouver by L_Barnes
43rd Ave by rinlee

The best underwater photos this side of National Geographic

Click on photo to see slideshow.
CJ has taken many beautiful photos over the last 3 or 4 years. I've saved everything she's sent me. All of these photos were taken while she was diving in our local British Columbia waters, colder than... From Part Hardy to Sechelt, she's been everywhere. I truly admire her stamina and her beautiful photos. To think she started out 4 years ago taking swimming lessons and now she's accumulated over 300 dives and even more beautiful photos. Bravo CJ, you're a star!

When will the dog ever figure it out?

This is a message to Bubba, these are not your chew toys!
Eating money is not a laughing matter, Bubba. it's bad enough we have to buy all your food and pay for babysitting. Do you really have to eat our money?

As it turns out Bubba, you did me a favour when you chomped on these puppies. Just the day before I was telling my co-workers how much I hate these boots and I don't even know why I bought them or even wore them, they're so completely ugly. I especially don't like the colour. They're seriously ugly, boring and uncomfortable. Good riddence!

Why the toe Bubba? And why only one side of one toe of one shoe? Did Kevin catch you in mid-chomp? How were you going to finish these off? I need to know!

This still works believe it or not. You're lucky, this time Bubba.

Who's in the doghouse?

This is Stellans latest thing, crawling into Bubba's crate with him and inviting Uncle Kevin to join the party.


Can you believe the nerve of this dog? Chewing on the insoles right in front of us! Yes, these are the insoles from the shoes/boots he chewed. He's been punished. Do you think he's getting the message? Aaargh!

Me in the Benz

There you go, Uncle JD!

The other thing that happened this summer.

Click on the picture to see the full slideshow.

We had a great long weekend in the middle of August on Mudge Island with Belinda and Jude, the Tkach's. The pictures tell the story better than I'm able to in words. In a nutshell, there was drinking, swimming, fishing, more drinking, eating, sleeping, more swimming.

I think it's safe to say the highlight for all of us was when I caught the 10-pound starfish at the end of my fishing line. The hook ended up embedded in my leg and Jude and a very helpful woman surgically removed it right where I sat, there on the rocks.

Yes, there are pictures. I insisted that Kevin get the camera and document this.

One and a half months of wedded bliss

Click on the picture to see the slideshow.

Ryan and Corryn were married on July 29th and it was a beautiful, well-planned event complete with 2 horse carriages, a bride and groom, family and friends, a dam, a beautiful sunny day, schnitzel and a chocolate fountain! Pics are on the way.

The highlights for me were attending the rehearsal and dinner at Corryn's family home, drinking good Scotch with Uncle JD, talking with Aunt Kathy, getting a pedicure in my pajamas with my two favourite sisters, watching Blake and Nadia dance their sweet little hearts out, getting to know Kathy's sisters and dancing with Stellan.

PS> Their anniversary will forever be shared with the more public anniversary of the Kid Rock and Pamela Anderson union. Neither of you should accept any excuses for forgetting this day!

Added some photos and comments

Click on photo to see updated photo album.

I added 5 photos I took from my standard 35mm film camera. It was all I had when Dad picked us up from the airport in St. Lucia, since Bubba chomped on our little digital camera like it was one of his chew toys and we had to send it to get it repaired again and it wasn't back from the shop by the time we went on our vacation. I had to take these spectacular photos. Take a look!

We have our camera back now, after almost three months in Toronto while they were waiting for parts. It's a Minolta X50, cute, compact camera. Unfortunately Minolota's camera and photo business has been taken over by Sony. This happened at the same time we sent our camera in for repairs causing a long delay for the repair company in receiving parts.

The great news is, three months later, we received what looks like a brand new camera for less than $180. Bubba only chomped on the LCD screen and the viewfinder. And we've learned a valuable lesson, from now on we're paranoid about keeping it far out if his reach. I check every single day. I wish I remembered to do the same thing with my sandals at the back door. Oh well.

More good news...

I have lots of new photos to share with everyone. Bear with me while I upload them to my computer (done), add captions (still to do), and post them for everyone to see (still to do). I have a few good photos from Ryan's wedding at the end of July and more pics from our long weekend with the Tkach's on Mudge Island in August.

Keep tuning in and thanks for the comments.

The Sunshine Isle

Click on the photo to see the slideshow.

I love St. Lucia. What's not to love about the Sunshine Isle? It's the best place to do nothing, explore, meet locals, meet tourists, eat fresh fish and tandoori, scuba dive, take a catamaran and see dolphins and sperm whales, drink Piton, and lie on the beach and swim in the sea.

Kevin and I spent two weeks there at the end of May to celebrate Kevin's 40th birthday and our 4th anniversary. If you haven't heard the surprise part of the story, check my last blog post, as they say.

We had a great holiday, the best ever, if I do say so myself! We did so much and so little at the same time. The highlight was the Rainforest Cable Ride. We were high from the exhiliration of it all for hours afterwards. Amazing! I was also mesmerized by the abundant food-bearing trees everywhere, especially in my Dad's backyard. He had an avocado, an almond, a couple of coconut and two mango trees.

I'll let the pictures speak for themselves. I'm planning on adding captions to the Photo Album over the next couple of weeks so check back every once in a while to catch up. Also they seem to have uploaded in no particular order so I'll do my best to reorganize them when I add the captions.

Happy Photo Gawking!

It was bound to happen sooner or later.

Click on the photo to see the slideshow.

Lordy, lordy Kevin's fordy! And boy, was he surprised. Not that he turned forty this year, he knew that was happening, believe me, HE KNEW!

It was the gathering at the hockey rink after his game on Good Friday that surprised him. He was not expecting Murray and Cheryl, the boss and the boss's wife; his good friend Rick and his family, Fiona, Riley and Hayden; Katherine, Brian and Stellan, his sister and brother-in-law and nephew; Liz, his mother-in-law; Chris, well he was expecting Chris but not his wife Nancy; Krista, Kyle and Kylie, and Janelle, his nieces and nephews; Belinda and Jude, his good friends; and Jamie and Jewel from work. (If I've forgetten someone, I apologize.) There's photos from that night and I'll upload them as soon as I find them. Thanks to all who were able make it to surprise Kevin! He was thoroughly caught off guard and ecstatic everyone showed up.

But that's not it! In front of all those people, a slideshow was played displaying Kevin's best moments caught on film, of course, during the last 40 years. He really was the epitome of fashion, especially in the 80's! If I hadn't scanned and taken some of these photos myself I'd think "that can't be the same person" in each one. Take a look at the slideshow. I'm disappointed that I'm not able to add the music to the online slideshow. Just imagine "I want candy" from the Napolean Dynamite soundtrack playing in the background.

To continue with the short story made long by my rambling, that wasn't even the last of it. To top it all off I handed Kevin an envelope with a travel itinerary in it. He was also surprised with 2 weeks in St. Lucia with his lovely, beautiful and thoughtful wife, yours truly. We've just returned from said holiday and I can't wait to tell you all about it. Keep looking for the latest update. I promise the updates will be more frequent in the future.

Stellan is one!

Stellan's photo bloggin'! Katherine and I are helping him build it for the first few years. January 31st was the day and partying was the way. Click on the link and you'll see some photos of Stellan and the Frasers at Christmas, New Years and the BIG number one birthday.

I'm trying a new photo blog.

Shutterfly. It's pretty, it's simple, and it's free. It's everything I'm looking for in a photoblog mainly because I tend to look for the impossible.
I've started a new collection that we can all add photos to. Eventually I will migrate all my Flickr photos there.
It turns out Flickr is great for organizing and resizing on the fly but the free service only includes 3 photo albums, the bandwidth (the bytes uploaded or downloaded) is limited per month, and they only allow you to see the last 200 pictures uploaded (the older photos are still there but hidden).
Shutterfly appeals to me because it has unlimited space, with the option to organize your photos in an unlimited number of photo albums. They also have all the cool personalized products and prints you can purchase. It makes sense to me that this is what they are making their money from and not from selling disk space and bandwidth.