Another Eventful Weekend!

This weekend I had the priviledge of being able to see ALL my nephews!! I hadn't seen Koen and Liam for probably almost 3 weeks I would have to say!! Too long!!!

Kai's pjamas were WAY too short on him!! It was quite funny!!

Koen has gotten so big since I have last seen him! He totally looks like Amy did when she was a baby! He has so much hair that it automatically styles into a mohawk as you can see!

Liam had quite an evening last night. Our family went to the rink for supper and Liam had such a good time! He got a rocket painted on his face, a balloon shaped into a dog, and a football!

As you can see below..... a party of some sort has begun!

Raquel and I decided to throw a suprise birthday party for Jared and Darcy last night! They were suprised when other people started comming but sure didn't show it! Oh well!! We tried!
Jared attempting the "crab walk limbo".

Jared recieved this game "Chicken Limbo" from Shannon and Tracy for his birthday, so we thought we would pull it out and give it a try! It seemed to be quite the entertaining game! Quite amusing to watch I really must say!!

Darcy also attempting the "crab walk limbo". I think they both made it!

Raquel and I made them a "Hot Dog and Fries" cake! We were so excited to show them our creation! It looked quite disgusting though because it looked so real!! Tasted good tho!

They didn't seem to want to share with anyone else! Does it look real?!?!

It was an eventful evening but a lot of fun!! We played Buzz Word and then we sat in the hot tub. Jon showed up also and was quite excited to sit in the hot tub. Most of us were already in and then Jon came............
He pulled up a chair and was ready to climb on in.... he had a coke in one hand as well... he already had one leg on the ledge and then all of a sudden we heard a crash and looked over at Jon. The chair had slipped away from under his one foot left on the chair. Meanwhile his other leg stayed put on the ledge! Lucky for him he has long legs.. if that would've been me I would've been all other that floor!! Oh Jon.... only you!

Dueck Family Outing

Yesturday the Dueck family and I headed out to Winnipeg to celebrate Jared's birthday. We were to meet at Dakota Bowling Lanes by 4:45 ........ at least that's what MOST of us thought. Tyler was no where to be seen. Wouldn't you know.... he had gone to Academy Bowling Lanes!!! We did start without him since he was basically at the other end of the city! lol. He did arrive eventually and the evening went on. When you are bowling with the Duecks .... be prepared for some good compeition. They pretty much all seem to be amazing bowlers ..... even you Dana!!!

We headed off to Applebees for supper and Tyler almost didn't make the turn off (at least from what we saw, lol). It almost seemed as though he wanted to go bowling and out for supper by himself!!! Jared basically just got games for his birthday. From Tracy and Shannon he got a game called "Chicken Limbo"!!! lol and yes..... it requires you to do the limbo!!! It was awesome!! I can't wait to play that game!! It actually has a chicken on it and it sings a limbo song!!! He got a few funny cards as well .. but apparently it takes me awhile to catch on to such humor! Well the time had come for the talented group of Applebees singers. Our waiter had asked what the birthday boys name was and he replied ..... "Jared." She then got everyones attention at the restaurant and announced.. "Dan is celebrating his 2oth birthday". She had told us earlier while she was serving our drinks that she had short term memory ... but this was pretty bad since he had JUST told her his name!! We corrected her and she announced his real name. I must say..... the Duecks sure are a fun group of people to hang out with!!! Never a dull moment!!!! ( in a good way)!!!

Jared and I made sure we would make it home by 10 to watch the first episode of Amazing Race: All-Stars! I guess Sunday nights will be filled television watching once again!!

Valentines / Birthday

Last night I took Jared out for his 20th birthday! I was a week late...... oh well!
First of all we headed down to the Olive Garden on Portage.... it was PACKED!!! We had to wait for 45 minutes!! When we finally got to sit down we enjoyed our salad, soup, and bread sticks. Jared ordered spaghetti and meatballs ................... HUGEST meatballs I have ever seen!!! Plain old me ordered a pepperoni pizza since I am not a fan of the place!

We managed then to make it to the Golf Dome at around 9:00. We hit the driving range for about 40 minutes only since it was $.40 per minute! I only swung and missed about 5 times so that was good!!! I am really really looking forward to golfing with Jared this summer!!! I have never ever been to a golf course so it should be interesting none the less.




We stopped at Tim Horton's on our way back home for some Ice Caps. In Jared's words ...."the worst Ice Cap I have ever had." Oh well, at least I enjoyed mine!!!

I had totally forgotten that I had a birthday present for him until he reminded me! lol. I had bought him a brown t-shirt from New Orleans.

We also gave eachother our Valentines Day gifts yesturday since we didn't have them ready on Wednesday!

Here is what we gave........


So it was Thursday afternoon and I stil had not figured out what to get for Jared. I was feeling a little stressed since I knew he was hard at work making something for me and I didn't want to show up on Friday with nothing!! So I searched around for a few ideas and the idea of making hard candy came to me! I got an old jam jar up and painted it with hearts. I thought the hard candy would go perfect in it!! So in the evening I started to attempt to make hard candy....... without a candy thermometer! BIG MISTAKE!!!! Friday morning I had checked on my creation and it still was not one bit hard!! Once again I was stressed out Friday morning at work. What in the world was I going to put in my painted jar that would still make it special??? I had to think hard since I had to have something by the evening!! Thankfully Tracy and I started emailing eachother that morning..... she had asked me about if I had found something to give to Jared yet. I told her about my idea and how everything turned into a disaster. She gave me the idea of trying again during my lunch hour and she would even lend me her candy thermometer! So I quickly rushed home for lunch break and started once again............ was I ever relieved!!!! I had 10 minutes until I had to be back at work and my candy was hard!!! It even tasted AMAZING!! I never got to eat lunch yesturday but it was sooo worth it! So I put my candy in my painted jar and went from there! Jared had told me that at first he was thinking to himself...... hmmm I guess she painted the jar... so I guess that is special. But when I had told him that I had made the candy himself he was MUCH more pleased and loved it!!! So thank you Tracy for making this all possible!!!! lol


This was Jared's creation................. message in a bottle!!! I was very impressed! He had gotton an old wine bottle, stuck a picture of us in it, filled it with rose petals and then stuck a rolled up note inside. He even burnt the edges of the paper to give it an old look!! Creative I tell you! I appreciate getting something like this instead of the typical roses given on Valentines. Don't get me wrong, I love getting roses, but this was a nice change in between, a lot more thought seems to go into something like this!

...And that concludes our date!!

Some people told me they were having a hard time reading my blog because of my colors. Let me know if this color is better!

MDS Update .... part 2

Here is a pic that I forgot to put on yesturdays update. I really like this pic ..... can I say that???


..... Tuesday 4 of us ladies were assigned the job of cleaning up about a 3/4 mile stretch of road right near the church. It took us almost 6 hours since there was SO MUCH garbage everywhere. We got quite a few honks but soon realized it was from the work we were doing!!! Two guys in a van pulled up to where I was working and told me how much they appreciated what we were doing. He even gave me a bag of new work gloves that we could use! The next day we could see already that people had started throwing their garbage out their windows. It was kind of frusterating but it was expected to happen.

Wednesday my Aunt Dorothy and Uncle Menno arrived and I was assigned to the same site as them as well as Sandy Eidse. We went to Alfred Pete's house once again. My Uncle Menno installed cabinets and the countertop while Sandy, Aunt Dorothy, and myself grouted the floor for tiling the next day.

Thursday a lady by the name of Bev Claassen and I went to another site to paint a shed. The wood on the shed was not smooth so I had to use all my strength while I was rolling in order to cover up the wood. It took us almost 8 hours to paint this shed....




.....there were other distractions along the way though. There were three young boys that we met at that particular site. Their names were Lucas, Marcus, and Rene. The one boy Lucas always kept on comming to us and telling us that he was going to paint. Even though we had said no many many many many many many times he just kept comming back. We had to keep a close eye on him since he always was wanting to pick up the paintbrush. His younger brother Marcus got his hand in the paint and put a handful into his mouth. That can't be healthy can it??? By the end of the day those boys had paint around their mouths, skin, and all over their clothes. It's not like we didn't warn them, lol. They were terrbily cute none the less. I got to play a bit of baseball with Lucas that day as well just before my lunch break!

Rene and Lucas

Friday 4 of us ladies stayed back at the church to sweep and mop the floors. Everyone only had to work until lunch that day since we were wanting to be on the road by 1. Our group only had to work until 10 so then Kerry gave Sandy and I a tour of some of the other sites. One of the highlights was being able to go by boat to see Rubys site.

I think everyone that went took this same picture

Ruby picking us up to go to her house

Krystle and I had bought a little craft to work on for our journey there.

Our Home

Our group shot

Well that pretty much wraps up my MDS adventure!!! I would encourage everyone to do something like this in their lifetime!! I had an amazing time and would do it again!!

MDS Update .... part 1

The time has come to write about my MDS adventure!!!!

Our group of 12 left for Louisiana on Feb.2. The ride there was a lot of fun! Krystle and I spent half the time driving with a couple from Winnipeg, Vance and Bev Rehill and the other half we spent travelling with Merl and Evan. We spent most of our time sleeping and watching movies with Vance and Bev and by the time we got to Merl and Evans van we were ready to play games!! Evan brought a game called "RATS". For some reason it was a TOTALLY addicting game even tho there was not much to it!! Evan told us before we started playing that he always wins. We tried to prove him wrong but he actaully just kept on winning.



We spent our first night in Colombia. Once again, Evan came to our room and we spent some more time playing RATS! Evan seemed to still be winning so we added in a few more rules of our own..... and wouldn't you know it........ Krystle won!!

Evan and Krystle during an intense game of RATS!

Krystle Wins!!!

Speaking of rats, this is the cute rat that Jared bought for me to bring along on my trip.

Krystle and I comparing on how much darker I am than her

Our second night we stopped in Hammond. (not sure where that was exactly)
The next morning we headed off to New Orleans to do some touring. Here are a few pictures of what I saw.........

The famous "Bourbon Street"

Krystle, Evan, and I pose in front of some of the first real palm trees I have ever seen.

A young boy tap dancing for us

Krystle and I posing by fake palm trees

We drove up to Six Flags and it looked like nothing had been worked on since the hurricane.

Pictures of hurricane damage

The "Superdome"

The water level on one of the houses we looked into.

Sunday night we headed down to Diamond which was about 1 hour from New Orleans.

Krystle and I personalized our room door.

Our beautiful Abode

Monday we started off our work week. Sandy Eidse and I headed off to a site to paint baseboards, wash windows and putty. The man we worked for was Alfred Pete.

Alfred Pete's backyard

****I will continue to post tomorrow but right now I have to quickly get ready for my hockey game!!!