2010 vacation?

I get 3 weeks vacation (as does Lair). However, my vacation is 'accrued', so I can't just take 3 weeks in July. In fact I would be unable to take a full 3 weeks until Dec 31.... So this changes my ideas for summer vacation...


Originally I was hoping to do Motion Notion (Quinn-less) followed by a week of camping (with Quinn and hopefully friends)...

Guess that's out the window! :( I can not commit to MoNo. If I do make it up it won't be for the whole event :(


As for Camping, if it happens, it will be close to home and on the weekend. (Is it really worth the hassle for 30ish hours?).


2010 is the year of Financial freedom; well at least from Consumer debt, the truck and school is an acceptable debt.

So, if this is the year of financial Independence; trying to use only cash, no credit, no overdraft. The last year before we are starving students....

So then I had one more thought. We NEED to go to Disneyland/world THIS YEAR... If we don't do it before Lair is in University it may not be a hope until Quinn is much older.

So, I do believe we will go on one last major trip. I've ran the idea past Lair and he agrees. We have 9,000 airmiles, so hopefully this will alleviate some of the cost. I am thinking of going in October over Thanksgiving. Waiting this long will give me 11+ vacation days plus a stat holiday.

Kerri (Lair's sister) is getting married october 16, so I want to see if we can tie this in with the vacation time (i.e. go to Disney, come home for a day, then head to the wedding).

It all looks good on paper. But cost will be a factor to how long we are actually gone. In a perfect world, we will have 2 travel days and 10 days to relax and have fun. This trip will be all about Quinn. It won' be 10 solid days of craziness, hopefully every other day around the pool. If this is too expensive, we may have to do a short trip with go-go-go every day... guess beggars can't be choosers.

Lair is NOT a 'rides' guy (where as I LOVE em)... I will ask him to wear motion bands and eat graval and go on most 'little' rides. As long as they are not spinney or crazy roller coasters I think he can handle them. An experience he won't regret (this I promise him!). I do hope I can steal away for some fantastic big rides, but not a big deal if I can't.

We do not need to go to all the parks and attractions, just the ones most appealing for Quinn.

I am super excited for this trip. Even if it means giving up MoNo and camping. I can always escape to Edmonton for a weekend!!


I am not going to re-read or edit this so I hope it makes sense!

Math

Lair has made an important decision regarding his math upgrading.

Since September, on his own and with the help of Dwayne , Lawrence has been tying get himself up to speed learning Math 10 so he could take Math 20 in February.

... Well, it's down to the wire and he has decided, although he is understanding most chapters, he's still lost on some... He feels his Math 10 platform is not strong enough to stand on for Math 20. With Math being a constant in his future education he wants to ensure he has a solid base now instead of flailing or faking it like he did in high school.

It was a hard decision because it throws him back a semester to starting at Mount Royal... BUT, in the grand scheme of things, really, what is one semester?

I fully support him and am proud that he has the foresight to see his limitations.

Fun Filled Weekend.

I had a very nice weekend. It all started when Quinn woke crawled into bed with me and slept for an hour. Then he put my sleep mask on me so he could turn on my lamp and read in bed while I slept. So Sweet!

Saturday afternoon, we bundled up, picked up Brenna, Chris and his 12 year old sister and went to the zoo! We were there for a few hours and had a great time. The bay Giraffe is so cute! Her name is Sophie. We watched the video of her birth. Holy Crap what a sucky way to come into this world! Not only did she have a 6 foot drop on her head, but kept doing a header right into the ground while trying to stand up. However, persistence prevails and she was up and feeding within minutes! And now she's gallivanting all about!

Another interesting this was the gigantic python in the same building as the giraffes; normally this fellow is curled up and not moving, but this time he was all over! He slithered for a drink of water then just kinda moseyed around. Both Quinn and I were intrigued. I told Quinn this snake could eat him; He didn't believe me. Then I told him this snake could possibly eat me! Should have seen the look in his eyes! lol


Afterwards, we headed over to the Calgary Tower. I have free passes for the tower (good for up to 8 people). I sign them out to employees at work, so signed them out for me. I haven't been to the Tower since I was a teenager. I am glad I had free passes because that is not a $14/adult, $6/kids view. However, being free, was pretty cool. =)


On sunday, Quinn did the sleep mask thing again. Then he went and quietly played. Every now and then he would come in to see me or snuggle, or I would call to see what he was up to; it was 10:40am when he finally came in and asked for breakfast! That's the latest I've ever gotten to sleep without Lair being home! It felt so good to not spring out of bed at 8am!

We headed over for lunch and a visit with Katie and Kevin. They ordered pizza! MMMMmmm Delicious! We had a great visit. They have 4 fire bellied frogs. It was cool to see them and Kevin fed them live crickets. Pretty cool!

They got a new sectional and it fits perfect in that space! As if it were made for it! And so comfortable! Their couch is exactly what we desire in Both our living and rumpus rooms! ... One day, no time soon, that what we hope to see :)


Last night we started watching Transformers II. I downloaded it. About 15 minutes into it, it switched to Spanish! LOL Ya... so, we got it on Shaw-on-demand... Crap, what a waste of money! We felt it was horribly done. Very juvenile, many unnecessary scenes and some of the characters... The JarJar Binks of the Autobots, so sad.


I will leave you with this. BEST Giraffe pic ever:

This is Dee, In Thailand I believe, on a bus. And yes, this is a real giraffe!

Flames Game!

So a perk at work is, I get to wear my Flames jersey when we have a home game.

Now, I must admit, I am a bit of a poser, as I don't actually watch the games. Wearing the jersey is comfortable, almost like wearing pajamas to work! So heck ya, I will take full advantage of this perk.

The VP of Water Resources came down 2 Friday's ago and gave ,e tickets to that nights game; well on such short notice we were unable to go so I gave them back. So he asked when would be better for me and gave me tickets to last Thursdays game. Calgary Flames vs. Chicago Blackhawks.

It was a fun game for me! I've only been to one game and that was in grade 10, Flames vs the NY Rangers. A boy named Rob took me.

Vanessa and Mike baby sat for us; Quinn was uber excited to hang out with them. We had dinner first with them, then left.

I had 3 beers, shared nachos and a pretzel. Man oh man is everything there expensive! $7.50 for a beer! A Crappy Canadian non-the less LOL Oh well, it added to the fun (and my headache the next morning).

The first period was slow, the 2nd period they started warming up and the third period I was almost drunk;... I mean, they played a decent game - but lost.

I will happily accept free tickets again but don't foresee me ever paying for them. Oh ya, and the seats where pretty good; Just off the left shoulder of the Goalie, 8 rows off the ice!

Avatar

Last monday, I went to the gym after work, had a great work out, came home to dinner on the table, then Lair told me to hop in the shower because He got a sitter (Thanks Kelly Red!) and he was taking me to Avatar!

It was such a nice surprise and so nice to go out :)

The movie was spectacular (mom I promise I will see it with you in the IMAX!!!), I do want to see it again!

It had great messages with deep meanings and I hope others appreciate it as much I did; perhaps even get other to start thinking a bit different.

=) Anyone who knows me well and has seen this, seriously, the beauty and wonder of the land in Pandora is like the little world in my mind! As well the principles and ideologies rang so true with me!

Registration for Kindergarten

Monday was Registration day for kindergarten ... We do not have a school in Copperfield, we knew this when we bought, so I can't really complain. There is a new school that just opened in Sept 2009 in McKenzie Towne, but we are a fraction of a hair out of bounds.... :( DOH! This does upset me quite a bit. We could try to get him into that school, but it would be a year to year registration and there would be no transportation provided... So just not worth it. His zoned school (Maple Ridge) is a 15 minutes (pending traffic) bus ride away.... down the Deerfoot just off Southland. I'm not to happy with the idea of him going down the deerfoot....

Lair was the one who took him to the school to do this, which is a good thing because I was quite emotional over it... Geez, if this is how I feel over registration, how will the first day be!? LOL

Lair is being schooled....

Lawrence does not have his English 30 and it is a pre-requisite for the courses he wants to take at M.R.U. As an 'mature' student (adult), he is able to Challenge the exam - write the final without taking the full course.

To prepare, this past weekend he enrolled in an 'English 30 Power Course'.

Fri 5-9, Sat 10-4, Sun 10-4

This course is designed to help students properly prepare for the English 30 departmental exam. The class was filled with 17 and 18 year olds. Most who stared off into space, slept, or were texting... Lair was the only 'adult' and apparently, the only one who cared about what the instructor had to say.

Mon & Tue is his weekend, so he prepared and studied, today he took the day off work to continue his studies and tomorrow (Jan 14) he'll endure the writing portion, and next Tuesday (Jan 19) he writes the exam.

His confidence level is high. I have faith in him that he will successfully pass this exam (with flying colors even!). When he does pass, this will be one less road block towards MRU.


This 10 day period of English is minute in time and energy compared to his main focus of MATH. Starting in September he bought the Math 10 text book, and with the help of our good friend Dwayne who is tutoring him, he is teaching himself Math 10.

He has registered in night school in February (Tue/Thurs) to take Math 20. Hopefully all his hours of nightly homework and dedication to learning the dreaded math will allow him to easily slide into that level.

If Math 20 comes easy, we have some Big decisions to make. He has the opportunity to take Math30 over the summer; this solidify his pre-requisites and he could enroll at MRU for September classes. The Math 30 class offered is Full time days in July & Aug... He would have to quit his full time job and possibly get a part time job evening/weekends.

In a perfect world, come September, he will attend class 5 days a week full time days and not work. We'll see if we can float the household expenses on my income. Not sure how much student loans he can get. I honestly believe we will be able to live as 'students' on an extremely reduced income ~ we've done it for years by being in extreme debt!! Now we are currently almost debt free, only bearing a itty bit from the new vehicle. So if we can survive and only incur student loan debt, we just might make it.

Zoom Zoom!

Did you hear the news? We finally found a vehicle!! We've been shopping for weeks and were starting to get frustrated. We test drove quite a few SUV/crossovers but weren't falling in love with anything.

Tue Jan 5: Lair spotted one at a car lot on autotrader.ca. We called to see if it was available and headed straight over. It's a 2002 Mazda Tribute. Leather interior, power everything, moon roof, V6 AWD plus push button 4X4! We both fell in love with it as soon as we sat in it. We both test drove it, came back and made an offer. We spent $700 over our budget, but the extra money was a 1 year unlimited KM warranty (which I am so thankful we got... to explain in a bit).

Wed Jan 6: We arranged the insurance and registration and picked it up!

Thur Jan 7: I drove it to work. It felt like complete freedom as I've been car-pooling with a girl at work, and she was on vacation all week so Lair was driving me to work. I loved it! As soon as I dropped Quinn off I cranked the stereo - WAY better than the one in the van! I was a happy girl. I took 52nd Street as Deerfoot was backed up.

I forgot my lunch so went home on my lunch break. I took the Deerfoot. Let's see what this baby can do...... um... come on baby..... long skinny peddle on the right? Yikes! I could not get it to go over 80km!! Holy crap! I was pissed. Thinking maybe it just needed to warm up longer, went home, had lunch, came back. it got up to 100km, but not any faster. Something is wrong =(

I called the car lot and he told me to bring it in after dinner. He gave me a loaner (a crappy explorer which made me fall in love even more with my Mazda).

Fri Jan 8: Got the call to come pick up my truck. He said the Catalytic Converter was clogged and it's fixed now. I picked it up and yup, it goes really fast! LOL

Sat Jan 9: Quinn and I did a whole bunch of running around (Costco, superstore, Wal-Mart) and everything fit in there back of the truck. It's so awesome!!! Washed it, had the moon roof open. Loving it!

Saturday night, heading out to Brenna and Chris's housewarming, Lair was going to drive. We get in and there is a 'trouble light' on. =( Grrrrr..... Still trying to figure out what the issue is. I think it has something to do with the omissions sensor. The manual gives a few steps to do to clear the light. I won't know until tomorrow if it's a success. If the light is still on tomorrow - I will be calling the car lot. I really love this vehicle and hope this is the last of the problems :(

I poked around on the internet about Catalytic Converters. It said if one is clogged the correct thing to do is to replace it. But you can 'clean' it. My guess is they 'cleaned' it and now my omissions sensor is sensing something wrong. So I'm thinking I will have to ask them to replace it. (I sure hope this is covered in the warranty and that they give me a loaner and they just deal with the problem instead of putting a band aid on it.

I'm know wondering if we should have got the 3 year warranty!? I am also wondering if we should take it in for an inspection to Certigaurd or Canadian Tire to see if there are any issues we should attend to while under warranty.

So there you have it, we now own a Mazda : Zoom Zoom! I just pray it's not a Lemon!!

New Years Eve

Our New years ended up being a lot more fun than we had anticipated. There were no parties that we wanted to attend, and if even if we did we didn't want the hassle and expense of a New Years babysitter. So we decided we would just stay home for new years eve and celebrate quietly.

We were talking to Dwayne and Marcie about NYE and they thought a quiet night at the Ashmeads sounded like a great idea.

Eventually, after Christmas and before NYE, it seemed many people had their plans up in the air or staying home, so we opened our door for people to come and go through the night.

All in all from 7pm until 5am we had about 22 people come for a visit. It worked out quite well as they came in groups and at different times. Some on their way to a party, some for the countdown and a few who stayed most of the night.

Lair was kind enough to take one for the team and went to bed fairly early so he could get up with Quinn and I could chill with our friends.

New Years day was a total right off, however, a fun one none the less. I got up a 1pm and we spent the afternoon watching movies. We ordered Pizza and went to be early!