….sorry for those coming to the blog to read about the new iPad….we were referring to our new house.  We flew to Kelowna for what was supposed to the day on Jan. 23 (has it really been that long since we last blogged???). We attempted to fly in the morning, but it was too foggy to land, so they flew us back to Calgary. Air Canada pleasantly surprised me and arranged a second flight that afternoon. Once we arrived in Kelowna and got all of our work done with the home inspector and walk through with the builder, it was too late to fly back so we stayed the night. I wasn’t disappointed that I had to stay in Kelowna as obviously I love it there. I was disappointed that I didn’t get to fly somewhere just for the day as I’ve never done that before.

It was a fruitful trip as we were able to remove all the conditions. Alas, here are pictures of our new place, now that it’s official: http://www.caseydarke.com/Kelowna/British_Columbia/Homes/9221826/Upper_Mission/Agent/Listing_2224353.html

We can hardly wait to move. Time is flying by though as we’ve both been really busy at work as well as prepping for the move. Picking out appliances consumed a ton of our time. After way too many hours of reading consumer reports and talking to salesmen, we chose a Miele dishwasher (only uses 4 gallons of water / load), a Kenmore Elite fridge (with ice and water for Jeff), an Electrolux stove (gas! also for Jeff), and Samsung steam washer and dryer. Out of all the appliances I’m most impressed with how far dishwashers have come. We might be able to actually be in the same room as the dishwasher and have a conversation without yelling.

We bought from Sears and Coast Wholesale Appliances as they had the best prices. Coast was about 10% cheaper than anywhere else. Since we are having them all shipped to BC we had to pay PST, except on energy star washers or fridges…they are PST exempt, which is a good little factoid to anyone planning to move to join us in Kelowna!

Good news to all of our friends here in Calgary – we’ve decided to hire movers so we no longer need your muscles. Thanks anyways if you’ve offered! They are coming for everything on the 14th and delivering it to Kelowna on the 17th. I have a few work obligations so we will be driving out on the 19th. It is quickly becoming a reality and we will miss everyone! If you didn’t hear already (sorry), Jill and Mark have graciously offered to host a going away party for us tonight so give me a shout and I’ll give you their address. We’d love to see you. Or we’re around for the next 2 weeks and will most likely be coming back to Calgary often for work and to visit my sister’s baby. She is due any day and is huge! Feel free to comment if you have any tips on inducing labour as I’d love for her to have it while I’m still living here and I know she’s ready.

We had a nice visit with my dad and Susan this weekend. We went for Chinese food at the Silver Inn. The good news was that we didn’t discover an amazing restaurant right before moving. We got a few games of uker in (of which Susan and Jeff managed to survive and beat the two most competitive people ever. Next time me and my dad should be on separate teams to make it more enjoyable for everyone).

Ok. Enough blogging. Time to get on with some packing and put our party shoes on.

Given that our house is in shambles, we decided not to get a tree this year. I wanted one since it was the very first time in 12 years that I didn’t travel anywhere for Christmas (interestingly enough it’s the first time since I can remember that I also haven’t been sick over the holidays). We have enough lights and ornaments for a tree since I’ve been collecting them over the years and Jeff has gotten an ornament every Christmas from his Gramma so now he has 31! As a compromise, we decorated one of our plants. Looks kind of sad. Might have to get a tree next year since I’ve been doing some reading and it’s actually really good for the environment to get a Christmas tree. I was surprised to hear that. Here’s our Christmas plant:

I definitely got spoiled. I got a squash bag, a spa gift certificate to River’s bend in Calgary, some clothes and lovely charger plates and napkin rings to go with our China:

It was the year of the bag. I asked for 3 types of bags and got all 3: a Lug bag from my parents that work work perfectly as a laptop bag, a disc golf bag and the squash bag.

We had my sister and boyfriend Matt over on Christmas day. We visited and exchanged gifts then were later joined by Mark (from ultimate) and Rob (co-worker). Jeff did a great job on dinner and everything was cooked to perfection:

Jeff about to put the bird in the oven

We were both a bit nervous since it’s been a while since we cooked turkey and we bought a 17lb bird (afterall, my sister is eating for two) but it worked out. At least I wasn’t sick the next day…not sure about the others We spent the evening playing Jenga Max and Croquignole….well maybe everyone else was playing Croquignole as I’m not sure what you’d call the game that Mark and I played. It certainly wasn’t Croquignole since the object of our game was clearly to hit the wooden posts as many times as possible….we’ll have to quite playing Bridge so much and practice up our Croquignole skills for next time.  The truth is that Mark was pretty good and he got the short straw when he landed me as a partner –I’ve never had “good luck” at Croquignole. A little factoid…Jeff and I have played over 100 games each of crib and Croquignole. My record is 0-100 for Croquignole and 99-1 for cribbage. Must be different parts of the brain used for each game.

Mark and I learning from the experts

Over the course of the evening Matt taught us more than we ever wanted to know about boa constrictors (still having nightmares, thanks Matt) and Rob taught us about Pigeon Racing and showed us that my guitar actually isn’t broken and has the potential to sound very nice.

All in all a very nice Christmas. I’m glad we stayed in Calgary although we missed our families. Nice that we got to have Xmas with my sis though and didn’t have to travel. Here’s Willow enjoying her Christmas present since a Christmas blog wouldn’t be complete without a picture of our most spoiled family member and arguably the cutest member:

We haven’t had much time lately for blogging since we are in the midst of painting our entire house. In the last few weeks we have painted everything. All we have left is the kitchen and the office. Then we will be ready to put it on the market and move…..

We have lived in Calgary for 7 years, and although it has been a good city for us, it is time for a change. Over the past year we’ve tossed around a few ideas: Europe, Australia, Ottawa, Victoria, Kelowna. In the end, we decided on the closest and least complicated city: Kelowna. We spent some time there this fall (as well as having both grown up near Kelowna) and loved it. The weather is so much nicer (pretty sure it’s not -30 degrees there right now) and gets nice and hot in the summer. The biggest selling features for Kelowna is that we both get to keep our jobs and work remotely, we can have a huge garden and grow more than just peas and zucchini and we can swim in fresh water every day! The plan is to move in the Spring (maybe just a coincidence but we should be there in time for the first tourney of the year Sunflicker

We will dearly miss our friends and family in Calgary but we will be back often for work and ultimate.

Willow is very confused by all of the painting but she was born in BC so she’s pretty excited to be moving back home. Here are a few pictures of her supervising. She has only managed to get into the paint once (that we know of)…and painted her tail red.

Supervising with taping

Supervising while Jeff pulls off a sketchy move

Helping paint the trim

Ever so helpful

Apart from painting, didn’t get up to much this weekend since it was way too cold to go anywhere. Went to my sister’s baby shower. She got so many cute pink things. She’s really getting big and the doctors have given her a window of January to February, so it’s hard to say when it will come since if it’s late it may be born in March. I’m hoping it comes early so I have more time to spend with the little girl before we move.

We were able to catch a bit of the Olympic trail’s speed skating at the Oval on Monday. We saw the men’s and ladies’ 1000m short track. It got me very excited for the Olympics. Go Canada!

Has been ages since my last post. That is probably a good thing and means we’ve been busy.

Got out for a round of real (ball) golf on Canada day. Weather cooperated, which was nice since the greens sure weren’t. The good news is that thanks to some really great chipping lessons and tips, and a night of practicing chipping at the park, my chipping game is really coming along. I think eating lots of chips has also helped

The Monday after Canada day, we took off up to Edmonton to see Green Day. **spoiler alert**.The Green day concert was absolutely wicked. They play for 2 hrs and 15 minutes and I loved every minute of it and was sad when it was over. Billie Joe was so full energy spraying the crowd with water, faking orgasms, bringing people up on stage to sing-you can read the full review of the Vancouver show (same as Edmonton) here. Not sure if it was the acoustics or the band or both, but their pitch was spot the entire show of singing and screaming. They started by playing their entire new album, 21st Century Breakdown. We bought that album a while back and I just couldn’t get into it. Then I saw it live and loved it! Actually, I’m listening to it right now. After playing the whole album they went old school and played songs from Dookie and Good Riddance. As with Offspring, I expected them to be out of their prime and I was so wrong. I’d say that they are completely in their prime and if you get the chance to see them on this tour you should definitely go . I’m so glad we went with the floor tickets. Jeff and I are venturing to say that was one of our favorite concerts ever. Edmonton is a bit of a dive downtown but we stayed at the Westin (which nice and we used Hotwire for the first time), caught dinner at a pub before the show and then spent the next day at West Edmonton mall.

Upon our return from Edmonton we were in full swing of Stampede here in Calgary. Managed to catch a few pancake breakfasts (probably an unhealthy amount), take in our favorite event of Cattle penning, saw sheep herding for the first time,  and took in the chuckwagon races and grandstand show. They were advertising an “all new” grandstand show this year and I’d agree that it was new and way better than past years. They have cut down the amount the singing and dancing from the Young Canadians and have added an edgy comedian and way more action. It’s more like a cirque de soleil now instead of a bad Vegas musical. And they definitely did not cheap out on the fireworks this year. As I was watching them I was wishing I had an extra eye  like the Simpson’s fish.

….not sure why this didn’t post on Friday like planned….arg.
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Kind of a random collection of blogs in one since we haven’t blogged in a while. My dad refers to many random thoughts grouped together as a “blogette”, so maybe that’s what we’ll call this (although dorks everywhere will probably disagree as they call a small blog a blogette, and now that I’ve been rambling already about this, this blog will probably be anything but small.

Biked home on Friday and flew to Vancouver. On my way biking home two little girls were walking by and shouted to me “thanks for saving our Earth”…very cute and also ironic as they walked along drinking from their disposable slurppy cups. We went to Vancouver for Jeff’s cousin Lynette and Arjuna’s wedding (congrats newlyweds). Jeff’s parents picked us up at the airport and we went to Steveston for dinner to Dave’s Place. It’s a little hole in the wall but the best fish and chips I have ever had (sorry fishies). You can read all about the lovely wedding and see pictures on the sillylog.com. One thing Larry and Brenda didn’t mention about the wedding was that Jeff’s cousin Val was there . Val won the UPA College tournament with UBC last year, which is a big deal. She was nice enough to trade us frisbees for one of her winning discs. Not sure it’s a trade if one person doesn’t take theirs…but we have a really sweet UPA winner’s frisbee. It was fun to play cups (or fricket) with her and the rest of Jeff’s family. Since it was an afternoon wedding, we were able to hit up all you can eat sushi at Shabusan (sorry again fishies…) and left completely satisfied and disgustingly full. As were walking along the street my friend Spud (Eric) spotted Jeff and I and he happened to be going to the same place we were, to our buddy Biller’s (Ryan) place. Eric took us there and back on the bus and even paid our bus fare since we seemed to be completely useless. Dylan came over to Ryan’s to visit as well. Ryan and Alyssa just had the cutest little girl, Olivia who is 8 months old. Luckily we got there early enough to visit with Olivia before bedtime. I think my arms are still sore from being a human jungle gym. We had a great visit with everyone (even Beettle who popped by for a little bit). Had a few beers and a lot of laughs! Was sad to leave as we don’t get to visit them very often when we go to Van since it’s normally for a hectic ultimate tournament or something.

We were staying right downtown on Robson at the Blue Horizon, so on Sunday we went for brunch with Jeff’s aunt and uncle and then walked along English Bay. The weather was sunny and perfect. Great weekend in Van.

On Monday we held a zone ultimate clinic for calgary ultimate association. The weather was not so nice so although 35 people RSVP’d only 9 showed up. Luckily when you play zone it is better if it is windy, so that worked out for the purposes of teaching. Very keen group and apart from the low attendance, it went well.

Tuesday was my soccer league’s wind up party. Sad that the season is over (Thursday was my last official soccer game) but it was super fun. As it turns out, there is women’s pickup soccer from now until October on Tuesday nights so I’m pumped that I can keep playing. Women of all levels from around the city are welcome, so come out to Scenic Acres fields (behind the community centre, intersection of Scenic Acres Blvd. and Scurfield Way, NW) on Tuesday’s at 7pm. Just bring a light and dark shirt and shin pads.

Wednesday was a sad day as we had to say “see ya later” to our dearest friend Heather who moved to Toronto on Thursday. We had league so we made her some goodbye pies (being on pi it was only suitable) and had a mini party afterwards with beer, spitz and hack. We will miss her tons, but it’s a good move on her part! Plus, playing frisbee is great since you get to see all your friends at tournaments often.

On Thursday was my last soccer game and we ended up playing 5 on 5 so it was ton of running but super casual and fun.

That brings us to today….we are getting ready for our first ultimate tournament of the season. We’ve decided to cut back and only play two this year (as opposed to one summer where we played about 15 tournaments). The tournament is in Calgary (Ho Down) and we play at Glenmore Athletic park on Saturday (10-5) and at the Calgary Rugby Union on Sunday (11:30-?). If you want to see some high caliber ultimate (maybe not personally, but in general), come check it out. Our team name is Ridgemont High and it’s a fun mix of people from Calgary, Winnipeg and Edmonton.

Should probably hit the hay as tomorrow will be rough…..

Were fortunate to check out The Offspring in concert on Friday. This has been a dream of mine to see this band for years! They have never put out an album I didn’t love. Some might argue that they had a few flops (Splinter for one), but I’ve loved it all. They have been putting albums out since 1990, so I wouldn’t exactly say they are in their ‘prime’ but that’s where expectations come into play (or should I say come out and play

I went in expecting to see a great band with wicked songs that are just beyond their prime, so I LOVED it. If we went in expecting it to be 1994 and hearing Self Esteem for the first time, we would have been very disappointed. In retrospect we should have gone in expecting it to be a horrible show, much like Jeff did with the Killers. He expected to be bored and was blown away. Having said that, I’d say the Killers are in their prime.

The crowd did not disappoint. Our seats were perfect for watching the mosh pit and the punk characters that the show drew. The crowd was full of energy from start to finish. As we were emptying the stadium the crowd was still yelling, singing, high-fiving and super energetic – I felt like we had just won the Stanley cup (WAY TO GO PENS!).

How flattering when a band gets drown out by the crowd of thousands screaming their lyrics? That’s the highlight of live music for sure. We got to sing the key part of “Bad Habit”. Another highlight of seeing Offspring is the Intermission. They played their song intermission and brought out beachballs – brilliant! During the show the lead singer Dexter brought out a piano and played “Gone Away” and that was pretty sweet.
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Got us pumped up to see Green Day next month- another band on the list.

Remember back in March when I announced the great race of 2009? Well, we finally have a winner!   Congrats to Curbside Recycling for beating the Crowfoot C-train.  It was a very close race and are only a few days apart.

Thursday was our very first curbside pick-up.   Unfortunately we were only able to put about 1/4 of all our plastics in the first load.  Which means we still have a garage full of plastics. At this rate we’ll have a plastic free garage by July!  The C-train grand opening is happening on Saturday morning with full service commencing Monday morning.  As you can see only 2 days separated the two events.  I wonder if they knew the race was happening and tried to make it close on purpose?   Sure was exciting!

Let’s all congratulate the city of Calgary for coming into the year 2000.  Curbside recycling and a public transportation system that is actually becoming more useful to the 100K+ people who live in the NW.

If, hypothetically speaking, your bike broke down (chain fell off) 10 km from your house, what would you do?

a) call your husband, who is 40 km away playing disc golf and force him to come pick you up
b) walk your bike home
c) call a cab
d) take public transit
e) phone a friend

If you are as stubborn as me, you probably chose ‘b’ like I did. I just left work yesterday and I’m trying to bike all week as part of the University of Calgary’s commuter challenge. Turned one corner and the chain just snapped. I called Jeff but I didn’t have a chain tool, so there wasn’t much I could do. Next thing I know, a dude pulls over and pulls a sign out of his car “bike race in progress”. I ask him if he knows of a bike shop around and he tells me he’s a bike mechanic, but unfortunately doesn’t have his chain tool. He tells me ther are 70 bikers showing up for a race sot he chances are that somebody will have one. I head down the street to the race and another very friendly guy spends about 20 minutes trying to fix my chain but now dice. it is screwed. I weigh my options and decide to start walking and come up with a plan en route. Finally I just decide it’s easiest to just walk my bike home. Took me about an hour but I managed to get home just in time for my soccer game (no goals scored as I was pretty whipped form my 10km walk). It was a really nice walk actually as the weather was amazing and I stopped along the way for a Gatorade and a chocolate bar. My only complaint was there wasn’t enough downhill sections to coast along. Also, would have been nice to have my orthodics as my bike shoes aren’t the best for long distance walking.

After travelling for 15 hours yesterday, we finally made it to Raleigh. The trip so far:

-we got our bags! Nice teamwork Air Canada and United. That is twice in a row that Air Canada has impressed me (lost our luggage on way to Quebec City in February but they made up for it with a $200 cheque after writing them a nasty letter).

-Got to see Phoenix and Chicago by plane. Layovers in both cities. Chicago makes sense. Phoenix did not make sense: why travel west when you want to go east? Started off in mountain time zone, then to pacific, central and finally eastern. We covered them all yesterday.

-Tyler Hansbrough from the UNC Tar Heels was on our flight. He is tall!

-Was in the air for 8 hours. Left a bit of a larger carbon footprint than expected.

Just had a breakfast meeting and now Jeff and I are off to enjoy our day in Raleigh. Going to hit up the UNC disc golf course this morning in Chapel Hill. Might have to bring along a sweater as it’s a chilly day here 22 degrees and overcast

Spent the entire long weekend digging trenches. It was definitely worth it. We now have very shwanky underground sprinklers installed. I huge thanks to the entire Kowalchuk-Dron family for the advise, and hours upon hours of manual labour.

The layout and engineering that goes into sprinklers is pretty cool and Jeff and I learned a lot. Especially with 5 different zones installed.

Luckily the weather held out. We got gorgeous weather on Saturday and Sunday. The weather was freakishly hot for the weekend (crap before and crap after). We have had a combo of freezing rain/ice/snow/wind/rain since. This (winter) weather is making putting the yard back together difficult. I’m sure our neighbours love what we’ve done to the place. It doesn’t quite this bad, but here are some pictures of the work in progress:

Foreman Paul

Trench along side of house

We were afraid that the pipes might freeze, so we have lightly laid sod over the pipes but still have to some of the trenches with dirt and sod. We hope to get it done before heading off to North Carolina next week. We are off to NC for a work conference and then heading to SC to Myrtle Beach for a weekend of sun and surf. The absolute highlight is that we managed to get hockey playoff tickets so are seeing game 4 of Pens (Sidney Crosby!) vs. Hurricanes!

Busy week coming up with a 30th bday party planned for Friday and the arrival of my mom and grandma on Saturday.

In other news, scored 2 goals last night in soccer. Then played goal for the second half and let in 4, so had a deficit of 2 goals at the end of the night.