The Value of a Friend

Last night was our third girls night out, and of course was a great night! We headed to our new spot, Brown's social club in Langley and than off to Traveling Sisterhood pants 2..I highly recommend getting some girls together and going, so cute:)

These girls nights have been such a blessing in my life and I know others. Old friends getting together, new friendships formed..its such a gift. SO I found these qoutes today on friendship and thought I would share. My challenge to you today is to go out of your way to bless a friend, or tell someone in your life how thankful you are for them. Friends need to encourage and uplift..carry eachothers burdens to make the load a little lighter:) have a blessed weekend...xo

"Blessed are they who have the gift of making friends, for it is one of God's best gifts. It involves many things, but above all, the power of going out of one's self, and appreciating whatever is noble and loving in another."

To have a good friend is one of the highest delights of life.-- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Truly great friends are hard to find, difficultto leave, and impossible to forget....G. Randolf

No distance of place or lapse of time can lessen the friendship of thosewho are throughout persuaded of each other's worth....Robert Southey.

The supreme happiness of life is the conviction that we areloved for ourselves. Victor Hugo

The greatest sweetener of human life is Friendship. To raise this to the highest pitch of enjoyment, is a secret which but few discover. Joseph Addison

The best things in life are never rationed. Friendship, loyalty, love, do not require coupons. G.T. HewittIf

we would build on a sure foundation in friendship, we must love our friends for their sakes rather than for our own.-- Charlotte Bronte

Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art. like love It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things that give valueto survival. C.S. Lewis friendship qoutes

Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born. Anais Nin

In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends. Martin Luther King

Friendship is love withunderstanding... Proverb

I hate goodbyes:(

So tonight we are heading over to mom and dad C's for dinner to hang out with Dave's youngest brother, Joel, before leaving tomorrow for college! We are really excited for Joel as he is heading off with his best friend to a christian acting school outside of Calgary. I know that this going to be an amazing adventure for him..and a life changing experience, and we are so proud of him:)
Coming from a family of 2, and gaining 6 sibling this last year has been quite overwhelming to me. Joel's our only baby sibling, and never having a younger sibling before, he has been quite a special addition. I have loved getting to know him, and do got overwhelmed of how different it is having a younger sibling. This whole new relm of protection I guess you can say. Mostly I am going to miss my partner in crime and gaining up on Dave..so much fun:)
I know i have said this before, but to me my in law siblings are my siblings..and I truely am blessed to have them all!

good bless ya Joel....we know you are going to do great, but man are we going to miss you!!

Another Family weekend:)

Well, another weekend has come and gone..and summer is almost over!! Even though with this rain it already feels that way:(

The last couple of weekends we have been blessed to spend them with our siblings. Last weekend was with Dave's family, and this weekend was with my brother and sister in law. We do get to see our family lots, this isn't a rare thing, but just a reminder of how lucky we are too have such a great family to spend time with!

Friday night was a low key one with our friends OB and Nicole hanging out and chatting, Richard and Nadine showed up later in the evening. After OB and Nicole left around 12am, Nadine decided she needed a snack. Well, the plan was to make cupcakes the next day, thanks to my new blog friend elysha introducing me to save and scoop:) But we decided to get a head start! So midnight cupcakes were made! I have to say we took the easy way, betty crocker style, no fancy decoration..but we did try new flavours(courtesy of save and scoop)..Vanilla cupcakes with coffee/vanilla icing, and pina colada cupcakes with vanilla icing! According to my focus group, Dave my hubby, The coffee ones were the favorite!!

Again, not the fanciest looking things, but yummy:)

Sat we sent the boys off to war...paintball war that is!

Nadine and I made our way to do some shopping and hit the scrapbooking store! The goal was to complete our wedding albums:) Well..we set up the table..with the help of my cat...but didn't make it to far. We got distracted by lunch and Step Up 2~

We made it back to the table to try again, just in time for the boys to walk in the door!haha! we were busted:)

Saturday night was a lovely evening of dinner, and a walk on Cultus Lake...

I did manage to finish my wedding album last yesterday!! Now on to the honeymoons!!!

My Shack Review!

Ok, so it took me a little longer than I said, but I am now finished reading the Shack!! So here is my personal review on it. And again, I would love to hear how it spoke, or didn't speak to you!!!!

So, first of all, I have to say that I didn't have the reaction that I know a lot of people did. I didnt cry or it didn't change my view on God. Its not that I didn't agree with the way they depicted God, I guess I just came to a lot of the conclusions on my own.
I understand though becasue I was talking to someone who read it and loved it. but that person also said they struggled with the idea of grace and unconditional love. So why this book would hit them so hard makes perfect sense.

Here is what I did get out of it! first of all, I really found that this book didn't help to me to much understand my relationship with God, but with my husband. I am on this journey right now of understanding what the role of God in my life is and the role of my husband. I do believe that sometimes we expect too much of our husbands, we almost make them into our Gods and expect them to be comforting at all times, fix things, understand all things, but that's not their role. God is suppose to be our ultimate provider and caretaker.
I also really found it made me understand the idea's of submission, and how my husband didnt have "power" sort to say over me. I always knew this but sometimes I felt pressure from other people to comform to this. Its the same way people view the trinity, almost like a pyramid with God the father on top..thats not correct. The three work together as one and submit to eachother, their roles are just different. And I see it as the same as with a husband and wife. we are suppose to submit to eachother and work as one as a team.

The other cool concept that i loved in this book was the idea that love does not grow, or knowledge grows. love is like the skin of knowledge, so as our knowledge grows/increases or love expands. I thought this was cool!

the third and final thing that I love about this book that i have been struggling with lately is the idea of forgiveness. I have encountered a couple of situations recently where i have been frustrated of other peoples views of forgiveness and their expectations on me about it. What I love about this book is that it shows their is a difference in forgiving and forgetting. This book describes forgiveness as releasing the hold around someones kneck. But that God doesn't expect us to forget or reenter a relationship. If someone hurts you deeply, we are expected to forgive so that they are released and God can redeem them. But God doesn't expect us to keep a relationship with that person, boundries are exceptable! I loved this!!

Anyways, thats my review:) Can't wait to hear yours! And again, these are just my opinions...If yours differ thats great, I still want to hear them!!

Weekend in Colbourne Land:)

This definitly was a weekend in Colbourne Land:) We are currently house sitting for my parents. Ps, so nice to have a big house:) Anyways, Friday night David's brother and his wife came over to spend the night to visit with their younger brother Joel who's off to College next week! We had a great time with the family. The six of us hung out all night and didn't get to bed till 2am:) Which is fine except that I had to get up at 7am for my day of beauty control training! Anyways, I survived and didn't feel like I missed out on much considering I came home to find that all the 4 sibilings did that day was go to Taco Bell. It is great living by so many lakes, but when its as hot as it was this weekend, everyone comes to Chilliwack! So we opted for air conditioning. Sat night we moved over to David's parents place to have dessert and spend sometime as a whole family before Joel leaves:) Sunday was a lounging day for us..but I did venture out for a couple of hours to a "purse party". if you don't know what these are they are a home party with all knock off purses, wallets, sunglasses and jewelery! I was in heaven:) So i bought myself a prada purse and wallet and the most exciting part....my new Chanel earings!! Ok, i have been searching high and low for these things..and I especially wanted them because they are my initials!(deep blog writing here, I know:)) But I am a girl and I love this crap!!

So here they are! not to bad for $20~

The greatest part about this weekend was both Dave and I felt like we were dating again:) Staying up way to late, not dealing with "Responsibility" we just had fun! It was quite a nice treat:)

The Shack!

Ok so one of the things I love to do is read! I love classics like miss Jane Austin, and I have braved myself to read Anna Karenna(spl?), tried War and Peace but that didn't work, love Sophie Kinsella and Emily Giffen, and I love books about relationship and such. I also love this Christian chick lit author, but I can't remember her name..shoot. But I don't tend to read to much christian fiction. Well, I bought my dad for his birthday back in April this book the Shack..after that I swear it was the only book I ever heard about. Ok, so I am on chapter 8 right now..so don't tell me what happens! but, I am giving the heads up to you all that if you have read it, what's your opinion..and if you haven't go get it and read it so we can talk about it:) OK, so this is my official version of a blog book club;) I have very mixed opinions and reviews..so what's yours??? ok, but wait, don't tell me till I am done..I will try and finish it this weekend..just think about it!

Latest Adventure!

Ok, so a quick background...before moving to Chilliwack 2 and a bit years ago I worked for a cosmetic company for about 5 years:) Well, after five years in retail I was done!! I couldn't wait to get out of there..However, after sometime apart I have recently realized how much a miss selling skincare and cosmetics..I just don't like the "retail" end of it! Plus I am such a product junkie..I missed it! So I have been exploring my options of different possible routes I could take, and looking at different home party options. A couple other parts to this was finding something I could do make us some extra cash and something that I could build fo the future:)

Ok, so I heard about this company Beauty Control and tried some of their body products..actually I am a sucker for some of their packaging(thats what grabbed me). Anyways, then I was reading my friend Shawna's blog one day and saw that she was starting to sell this line. So..I went to investigate..long story short I jumped on board!! I am quite excited about this and can't wait to get these parties started:) my kits on its way and I am off to training this Saturday:)

Anyways, I have to say a big thank you to Shawna for taking the time to tell me all about this great company and getting my set up, I really appreciate it!! Your awesome!(ok, so if you know Shawna, host a party for her...you won't regret it!wink wink:)

Can anyone relate.....

Ok, so I promised myself that if I started a blog that it wouldn't just be the sunshine and lolipop side of my life, but the whole picture. Now obviously there are certain details and things that just don't need to be broadcasted over the internet, but if you are going to read my blog(and I hope you do:)) than I want you to get to know all of me:) Some of you I see on a regular basis..other's I have never met and may never get the opportunity, so I want you to know the real me as much as possible.

So, I would love to post on here how I had a wonderful weekend...blah blah blah..and apart of me did. we had friends over on Friday night, and Friends over for a bbq on Saturday afternoon, and it was great! However, come Sunday I was exhausted. See my battle in life is finding balance. I go go go till I crash, and its not so healthy. Being a newly wed and in the nesting zone I really have enjoyed being able to have people over and bless them, and entertain. It's a joy for me, but I do feel its been a little bit much this year. And like I said, I go till I crash. I am starting to listen to my body more of when its time to slow down but its hard for me. Because that usually involves saying "no" to people. Something that I am not very good at.
The other thing that I struggle with some days is this blessed role of being a wife. First of all, let me start out by saying I love being a wife and I love my husband. God has truly blessed me abundantly with an awesome husband and life...this is for sure. But sometimes the "pressure" of this role overwhelmes me. I guess because I take it very seriously. I have recently read this book by Gary Thomas called "sacred Influence", and to any wives, to be wives, I highly highly recommend reading it. Before reading this book I struggled with the way God created men and women. Sometimes, and I wonder if any of you can relate, I feel like I get the short end of the stick because of my ability to multi task. Cook, clean, plan, organize, balance the check book, go to work, entertain, and still look cute at the end of day...this is a full load!!! But what I am slowly starting to learn and some weekends, like this one, I have a hicup on my road of growth, and don't want to learn anymore, is that God has blessed me with these abilities(sometimes I don't want to use them though). What this book Sacred influence talks about is how us as wives were created to shape our husbands...what???? You want me to what?? that's right, not only did God create us as a companion but we are to be a helper(this would be the part I am struggling with:) ) So, I am on this journey right now of learning my role of uplifting, encouraging and helping my husband grow into the man of God he is called to be. What an awesome and sacred task God has asked of me that some days I feel so unworthy, and other days i feel so overwhelmed when I am also trying to get dinner on the table!
So heres what I am learning...and am open to any input into my life in this area, as I hope you all are as well:) Finding that balance of taking care of "me" and my relationship with my father, so that I can better bless my husband. I know that this is not a quick solution thing, or that the answer is in a formula, but that its going to be a life long journey....one that I am so excited to take!

So why do I write all this..I don't know. I guess I felt it on my heart to share, that if anyone else out there is feeling the same way, your not alone:) But also be encourage of how good God is, and that as we bless our husbands, God will bless us.
And again, get that book! Seriously, it has shaped and changed my perspective on so many things in a positive way. I don't want to just be married or be a wife, I want my life to be filled with purpose, and my marriage to be one that is purpose driven as well:)

And also, if you read this, please say hi, I would love to hear your comments and know who you are!!

Its Gone:)!!

So I did it! After having basically the same color, hair style since before my wedding, and now that I am done being in weddings it was time to chop it off! So here it is:) I am slowly making my way back to blond land as well..its been a while:)

Blueberry Pudding Cake

As promised!!!

Ingredients:

3 cups of blueberries
2/3 Cup Granulated sugar
3/4 cup water
1/4 cup lemon juice

Cake topping:
1/4 Cup butter, softened
3/4 cup of granulated sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp of grated lemon rind
1/2 tsp of vanilla
1_1/4 cup of all purpose flour
1-1/2 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
1/2 cup of milk

Preparation:

In greased 8 inch glass baking dish, toss blueberries with 1/3 cup of the sugar; set aside.

Cake topping: in large bowl, beat butter with sugar until light. beat in eggs, 1 at a time. Beat in lemon rind and vanilla.

In separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt. Add to butter mixture alternately with milk. making 3 additions of flour mixture and 2 of milk. scrape over blueberries, smoothing top. Set aside.

In small saucepan bring water, lemon juice and remaining sugar to a boil; pour over batter. bake in center of 350 degree oven until bubbly around edges and cake is firm to touch, 50-55 min. Let cool slightly before serving with whip cream on top!

Hope you enjoy...it was a big hit with my family!!!

Learning Curves:)

Why do long weekends fly so fast??!! It so hard coming back to work after three great days off! We had a wonderful weekend around our area which involved a great time with friends, family, golfing and of course the lake!! we celbrated my mom's birthday two weeks early on Sunday, as they will be away on vacation next week! So I had the honor of making mom's birthday dessert...her request, a blueberry pudding cake, it was delicious:) I will post the recipe tomorrow!! So, through all our fun activites this weekend..I learned some new interesting things about my crazy husband. fact number one..after lunch on Sunday for mom's b-day, the six of us(mom, dad, my brother Richard and SIL Nadine, david and I) headed to Tap ins putting course at Cultus Lake. Well, the owner their has befriended the cutest duck who he has named daisy. he even has a food and water dish which she follows him into the club house to make sure he fills it up enough:) Well, after meeting Daisy, David informs me that he want's a pet duck. hmmm. I think we need a farm:) He didn't just mention this once, but frequently this weekend. I wonder if that's in the strata rules?? I told him we could be like chandler and joey off of friends!
Ok, fact two, and reality check, David will not be naming our kids!! So over dessert our family got into a little discussion about baby names for future, way in the future!!, grandkids:) It was quite an interesting and fun converstaion that my husband managed to turn into quite the comedy hour..ok so ready for the two names he's decided on.....Cracker and Sun, thats right:) ok, so he's joking but seriously, creativity taken to a new level!! Cracker, I think he had to much "Sun" that day. And Sun, well he got that from our addiction Lost:)
Oh, how I love my hubby and all his quirks:)

Hope everyone had a fabulous weekend!! Oh, and I love everyone posting recipes on their blogs...great way to share new ideas..Oh, and I promise I will work on taking more pics, so you don't have to always read my ramblings:)!!

Two years Today!!

Its hard to believe, but two years ago today I met the love of my life!! Some days it shocks me that I have been with the same person almost every day for the past two years and I am not sick of him yet...acutally, I love him more than ever!!

So how did this union begin?? Well, let me tell you.....

So it all began one Sunday afternoon when I went for lunch with my parents(my dads the pastor of our church) and your guest speaker and his wife. I loved to tag along for lunches because I had just recently moved home to Chilliwack and basically at that point my parents were my closest friends..kind of sad, yet fabulous..cause they are pretty cool:)
Anyways, I sat next to the speakers wife and we got chattin about this "single" son of hers who was 24, a carpenter, who wanted to do missions, and loved spicy food..hmm...lets just say I was intrigued!! So I talked to my dear friend Nicole and put her to work! Nicole knew who this guy was, David colbourne was his name, and raved about how fabulous he was, and why didn't she ever think about him for me before! So, Nicole planned a "BBQ" for friends to get together on this Friday two years ago..and invited this David person who brought his little brother Joel with him. David had no idea of course that the purpose of this bbq was for me to check him out:) David happened to be in Chilliwack at the time because that's where his job site was, so he was staying with his parents. Very convenient for me!!
I was really nervous waiting for this mystery guy to arrive, and just praying he wasn't scary looking:) So shortly after I arrived, ok actually he was quite late(something that I have learned to get use too) in walked this guy with his little side kick brother. My first reaction was oh, he's kind of cute:) Well, after dinner, the ten of us started an intense game of croquette. Of course ob and nicole matched david and I up as a team:) We did play the game and lost because, well, we were flirting the whole time. We had an instant connection with our ridiculous humor and the fact that we both cheated the whole game!! That Sunday we got together again with Ob and Nicole, and Joel(yeh, Joel basically was dating me and Dave as well for the first year) and spent a wonderful Sunday afternoon at bridal falls and the mini golf course at Cultus Lake. That night I hung out with the two Colbourne boys and then Dave drove me home. He told me he liked me and asked for my number:) so cheesy and precious. Ok, so the best part of the story is that the whole night at the bbq Ob and Nicole were bugging me about flirting with him and how it was going...what I didn't know at the time was that Joel, David's brother, was doing the same to him!!
Apparently, after that Sunday with his parents his mom went home and told Dave that she met a great girl for him...apparently Dave rolled his eyes. Well, when the arrived at the bbq, the realized that the girl was me! Anyways, that's the story of how we met and the rest is history!!

Have a fabulous long weekend every one!!!!