first ride!

Today I went for my first ride with my new bike! It was half an hour ago and I am already feeling sore (can't wait for tomorrow morning when I feel it!) I biked 14.2 km on the Matsqui dyke (thought i'd start small). It was great to be outside and it makes me so excited for all the biking I'm going to do in the future! Now I am off to school and then to work! Working tomorrow and Sunday as well plus a wedding tomorrow, so I am excited for that! And maybe we'll get to school work next week.. sigh.. thought i'd post some pics from my bike ride to document the moment.

It's been a while...

All right, so it's been a week since my last post and it seems like millions of things have happened! Right after that post, I left home for school and got a flat tire, therefore missing school and swallowing up my afternoon. The tire was not repairable, so my car sat on my yard with its small measly spare tire for four days with me not being able to drive it! Worked a lot this weekend and had a really rough weekend all in all. I had a really big spiritual breakthrough during the week and I think part of it was being under attack and I had not armed myself for it and therefore fell hard.

Monday I bought four new fish!! Their names are Magnolia, Dexter, Lizzy and Garfield. Photos will be posted soon! Soon after being the fish, my friend and I who had gone out for dinner realized that my trunk would not open, and so all of our stuff was stuck in the trunk!! (the fish weren't in the trunk luckily.. haha). Anyway, so it was official that my trunk was broken. Today (thursday) i finally got it fixed which was good. Today I also bought a mountain bike! Yay! I'm pretty excited to start mountain biking and for being outside. There's a mountain biking clinic starting up at work so I'm going to join that and am looking forward to it!

Lots else has been going on but that is all I feel like saying for now. So there's my update which simply gives you a sneakpeak into my week!

Crazy

I have not posted in a while so I feel the necessity to post, even if I do not have anything to say. Spring is here! And so is the rain and that is something to be excited for! means the grass will be nice and green for the summer and all the flowers will have plenty of water to help with their blooming! I am enjoying the rain, because I think if it was nice outside, I would want to be outside and I need to be inside writing papers (which is not what I am doing right now either...)

Lately I have been a bit overwhelmed thinking of everything I need to do. Why does this happen so easily? It is hard to find time for God, school, friends, working out, family, making good meals, etc. etc. etc. I am realizing there are some more things I am needing to say no to.. So I will work on that (I have a few ideas in place) and will let you know.

Right now I have three papers looming over my head! One is the one on worship, the next is a psych case study and the last one I have no idea what it is about (something about the history of Christianity). All twelve pages and all coming up! So I need to focus and get to the grind on those! The semester is coming to an end soon which is absolutely crazy! It's flown by! And my summer is almost here, and I am super excited! I am taking six classes throughout the summer as well as travelling to Alaska, Calgary, Montreal and the French Polynesian Islands. I'm excited!

I am going snowshoeing again on Sunday up to Grouse Mountain and am excited for that! I think the weather is supposed to be a bit nicer as well. So I will hopefully have some pictures from that! And I hope to find the time this weekend to take some outside pics, we will see! So here is my update on life! Hope all have a good weekend!

Perfectionism

First of all, thank you to those who have responded to the challenge put out there as part of a previous post! I encourage you to continue doing so! As I was reading Becky's, I was really encouraged. As I read about her successes and accomplishments, it encouraged me that I can also succeed and do good things and it was truly inspirational! So let yourself be an encouragement to those around you!

March 19th has finally come and is almost over!! I have been dreading this day for a couple months now as it was the day of my 75 minute presentation in my psych of religion class. phewf! it's done (except for the paper).. SO good to be done it and not have to worry about it! I also got my midterm back in that class and got way better than I thought! I got 98%!! The matching section was scaled down which was the thing that bumped my mark up! But I was just happy to have done well!

Something I struggle with a lot is being a perfectionist. I used to always think it was a good thing, because then it would mean that all of the things I produce would be perfect.. hmm. not so. One of the theorists we have looked at in class talks about perfectionism being neurotic. The traits she gives to perfectionism (most of which i had fit perfectly) were
1. satisfaction-one will never be satisfied, because what will be good enough?
2. all or nothing-if you can't do it perfectly, why do it at all?
3. living under the tyranny of shoulds/oughts/musts: leads to guilt
4. mistakes: we tend to point out our mistakes first before other people have a chance to point them out
5. Procrastination: putting off doing certain things so that later on you can have an excuse as to why you did bad (you didn't put much time into it).. serves as a safety buffer
6. Sacrificing Quantity for Quality
7. The parity between satisfaction and performance: when you perform better, ironically you will most often not be more satisfied

So in looking at those I realized that shoot! I definitely live under these things and I don't want to, because it totally takes away from my enjoyment of life, because I can never live up to this unattainable standard that I have put in place for myself. The other day it kind of hit me hard in realizing that the fact that I am a perfectionist totally jades the way in which I view God. I make Him out to be a perfectionist (well He is perfect, but that's not what I mean). I think that the way He looks at me is through the perfectionist view.. if only I could be a bit better, etc. And so I never feel good enough! A huge load fell off my shoulders in suddenly realizing that God is not a perfectionist in the way He looks at me. And I don't need to be a perfectionist either! I simply need to live my life truly and give it my all within the time and energy that I have and that will be good!

This last week has been amazing as God continually takes burden after burden off of my shoulders and more and more I am feeling incredibly free! After all, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free! So why not live in it!

Successes

To understand this post, you will have to read the previous one along with the comments! Becky suggested we all put up a post listing some successes so that we can all celebrate them together! I think it is a great idea (except for the part about me starting!) So funny, because even now I'm thinking I can't possibly post good things about myself, because people will think me arrogant, etc etc.. So here I go! Yay for celebrating the good things in our lives and the things we are good at and have worked hard at! So I will encourage you if you are reading this to do the same on your blog!

Some recent successes/achievements:
-Sang on church worship team this weekend
-At work this weekend, I have known most of the people's names and been able to strike up conversations with most of them
-Got 94% on my social psych midterm
-Wrote my social psych paper a week early!
-Was bold with a "confrontation" that needed to happen in a relationship
-Said no to a new project (which is super hard for me to do)
-Worked out four times this week!
-Made someone else smile

So there's a few of mine for this weekend!! Looking forward to hearing some of yours and celebrating with you!

humanism

The other night some girls from school and I went to the Canucks game. Even though the lost, we still had a really good time! The pic above is the sad faces that the Canucks lost. :( We did get on the big screen though and danced a bit too, so that was fun! As we were leaving, we had some drunk guys bugging us, and Steph made the mistake of mentioning that she is a Leafs fan.. The guys all around us kept shouting 'We got a leafs fan. We got a leafs fan here.." I thought we were going to get beat up!! haha All in all though it was a lot of fun to just hang out and have a great time!

Today in one of my classes we have started talking about the theories of humanistic psychologists. Most of the time humanism is looked at as a negative word and I understand the connotations behind that. However, today we were talking about our tendency to look at the negative rather than the positive. However, as God's creation, we all certainly do have good within ourselves. We looked at an excerpt from Alice in Wonderland, where the Mad Hatter talks about how it's funny that we look at our negative points and our mistakes in order to improve. Instead, they look at their good points and the achievements/successes they have had, practice those and become better people. Makes sense.. Why do we focus on the mistakes and fixate our thinking on that? Seems as though it's not going to help the problem.

We filled out a chart looking at certain achievements and successes we have had and later talked about them in groups and it was tough. For some reason, we stop ourselves from sharing our successes with other people. It is thought as though we are bragging or are proud. But why can we not share these things with one another? I think it's important to celebrate those things! Anyway, those are a few of my thoughts. Good reminders for me to look for the good within myself and the good within other people and focus my thoughts on those things.

hard at work

So when it is sunday night it is slow, and when I have my camera we get creative! haha.. Today was a great day! Sang in ensemble in church this morning which is always a good time. And then went to work for my eight hour shift. Had some good socializing, some good fun, some work (of course), some good chinese food for dinner and friends come to visit! Sandy came by for a workout (and to bring Rob and I dinner) and then Jocelyn dropped in later and it was so nice just to chat! Made the shift go by faster for sure!

This morning's sermon in church reflected and expounded upon my thoughts from last night. Last night as I was reading in Romans, I was reminded again of how silly we often are in that God has given us these amazing gifts and all we do is take off the wrapping paper and walk away with it. We fail to open the box! The whole gift is Jesus and the wrapping paper is the fact that we get to go to heaven when we die. But what's in the box?!? Power!! Ressurection Power! A power that conquered all the forces of darkness against it and triumphed over death to give us life! We have this power and it has broken the power/hold that sin once had on us. Sin is dead! yet, how often we and try and claw at the coffin of sin, trying to get it open. Why do we so easily fall into the habit of going being stuck in this slave mentality that holds us in bondage to our thinking that we are bound to sin and therefore we ought to simply give into it. No! We have to say yes to God and yes to His incredible gift and walk in that victory. I need to continually remind myself of this. I'm not a slave to sin anymore! Sin is dead and now since my "marriage" to sin is broken, I have been freed to marry Christ! But why oh why do I try to open up that coffin and release the stench of death into my life?

Papers...

Well, just got home from work and every time I am there I realize how incredibly thankful I am for that job. Some things annoy me incredibly, but what job doesn't have that! I love being in a place where my job is to talk to people and make them feel welcome. What an incredible blessing! I always leave so thankful for the people that I get to interact with daily and the blessing they are in my life!

Now i am working on a presentation for my Psych of religion class. Three of us are doing a 75 minute presentation (ouch!) on looking at the psychology of worship. My portion of it that I decided to look into is: Worship: Spiritual facilitation or manipulation? Interesting to look at for sure. I am coming to the conclusion that both exist and it is a fine line. It has been interesting to look at the purpose of doing certain things in worship and it has been interesting to see how our physiology relates so closely to the experience of worship as well. We are definitely fearfully and wonderfully made! Anyway, back to my research, but just wanted to put a post up so that those who actually check the blog can read something. :) (and all you blog stalkers really should make a comment and make yourself known!)

Snorkels, Fish and Turtles!

taken of the sky from underwater!

I picked up my pics today from my underwater camera and they actually turned out pretty good! The picture below is a bunch of fish swimming over a shipwreck. It is absolutely amazing when you are swimming and a huge school of these fish surrounded you completely! The turtles were great as well! There were quite a few swimming all around us and we could touch them and it was fun to chase them a bit too! We had to wear lifejackets, because it was mandatory, but Lindie and I did not actually inflate ours, but we wore them-dont' quite see the point, but oh well! At least we were following the rules.. We just wanted to be able to dive down and lifejackets sometime block that!

The weekend is going well so far. I thought it was Wednesday today and was pleasantly surprised to see that it was Friday! I closed tonight at work and will open again tomorrow morning! And then Sunday I am a bit sad to be losing an hour of sleep (dont' forget to change your clocks!). Sunday morning ensemble is singing in church which is always a good time! And then afterwards I get to go to work again for eight hours! So lots of working, but I am glad to be able to get a lot of readings done at work!

Next week there is something called the fitness challenge starting where I work. There is one amongst the staff as well as the members. Rob is convinced he is going to win, but my goal is to join and prove him and Darryl wrong! They are pretty determined.. but I think it would be swell to be them.. so we will see how that transpires!

nothing really...

I think my jet lag has finally hit me (a few days late mind you) and now I get to lose another hour this weekend! crazy! these pictures really have nothing to do with this post, but I figured I would post them just to have some visual images for all of you. Plus I forget which ones I have already posted, so forgive me if they are doubles!

First week back at school has been good. Good to get in the swing of things and crazy to think that the semester is almost over! It's already March 8th!! AHHHH!! what worries me is the four 12-page research papers coming up.. I need to learn how to research.. and how to edit!

I have interesting thoughts to post, but I woke up recently and the brain is still not yet coherant, so those will probably come tomorrow when I am avoiding doing research for my 75 minute presentation coming up!!

Now that I have produced quite a long post about absolutely nothing, I will leave you with these nice pictures...

More Pictures

Third Installment!

Bathsheba

Codrington College

St. John's Parish

On Thursday we headed out to a beach cottage to go spend the day with some of Lindie's relatives. We took the round-about way of getting there (on purpose) and stopped at a few nice sites along the way. The first was St. John's Church which had an amazingly old cemetery. One of my latest loves is walking around old cemeteries. There are so many stories to be told there and it just sets my mind to wondering and imagining what the lives of these people were like, etc. After stopping at the church, we stopped at Codrington College, which has the most amazing view!

St. John's Cemetery

Bathsheba

Finally we arrived at Bathsheba which is on the east side of the island and the waves are

quite rough, but it's beautiful to watch! We took a nice long walk on the beach and then had lunch at the beach house. Afterwards we went to the Soup Bowl to watch some of the surfers. Then we decided to go nuts with the map and just go exploring! We went a bit of everywhere and found some interesting and beautiful sites and even came across a few really nice pottery stores!

Nice mountains

He was adding some color to the picture as he liked to say :)

Friday was the last full day in Barbados and we went on a catamaran cruise called Cool Runnings. It's a four hour boat ride with three stops. The first one we went swimming with sea

turtles! Luckily they were being fed, so I did not get eaten. Their shells feel really cool and they are fun to watch swim. We tried taking some pictures on the underwater camera we had, but sometimes it was a bit difficult to see what you were taking pictures of with the goggles on your head. Once I get them developed I will post them on here! The second stop was snorkelling by a shipwreck and through some coral reef. Amazing colorful fish! At one point a whole school of fish was swimming by me and I was surrounded! It was great! The final stop was by a beach and we had a fabulous buffet lunch and then went snorkelling and swimming some more! Then we walked around Bridgetown a bit and then went and played Dutch Blitz and had some pizza with Rachel and Theresa. Good times!

View of the island from the boat

Saturday morning I went and watched Lindie surf for a while! Then we headed to the airport and well here I am today! And so ends my trip.. I will post more pictures on this site and my pictures blog for your viewing pleasure! Now I am itchy all over because my body is one big peeling monstrosity! And I am home by myself and have no one to lotion the back! Oh well! Now off to school to write my exams!!

Lindie surfing

Installment number two!

Lindie trying to hide from the wave about to pummel her!

Okay, well Tuesday morning we decided to go to Surfer's Point from where we started exploring and hiking a bit along the beach. We climbed over rocks and many other things until we ended up at a new beach. The water makes incredible formations in the rocks! Absolutely amazing! We had fun taking pictures! Once we got to the beach, we watched the guys who were kite surfing. It is incredibly amazing to watch them and they get incredible air and do flips and all sorts of fun stuff! Afterwards we headed over to the Barbados museum to catch up on some of the history of Barbados, etc. The best part was the children's section at the end, because they had dress up clothes and Lindie modelled a bunch of them and I took a bunch of pictures!! After the museum we headed to Accra beach to watch the sunset which was beautiful!

That night we went into Bridgetown which is the capital of Barbados. We had dinner at the Waterfront Cafe. It is a restaurant right on the water (harbor) and we sat outside under the stars and enjoyed the live steel band playing. It was also great to watch all the people dancing! They had a Bajan buffet so we got to enjoy some more of the local food! Our favorite dish was the pumpkin fritters-absolutely amazing! i bought a cookbook that has a recipe for them so I think I will try making them with our canned pumpkin!

Archer's Bay-this was found with a little "detour" we took and it was quite lovely! Had to offroad a bit in Ol' Betsy, but it all worked out well!

Wednesday we decided to be posh and go to the yacht club for lunch (some of Lindie's family has a membership there). Lindie and I took a really long walk on the beach and then enjoyed some flying fish for lunch! Yum! Afterwards we headed off for attempt number two to NorthPoint! And we made it!! We even found some extra little exciting spots to go explore (thanks to my amazing navigational skills!) North Point has a bunch of cliffs with waves crashing up against it. Definitely breathtaking! Had a good time walking around the edge of the cliffs and taking in the beauty of it all!

On the drive back, we headed through Speitstown and Holetown. We stopped at a few beaches for some nice walks and then went to Cocomos for dinner which is right on the water and it was an amazing setting to watch the sunset! And so ends my second installment. Once again, more pics on the pictures blog! Sorry for the delay in posts, but I don't want to give it all at once!

Today was a great first day home!! I went to bed at 6:30am and then got up at 8am for church. Came back and studied for my social psych exam. Then I went for a walk around Mill Lake with a friend and then out for dinner to my new favorite Japanese restaurant 'Mars Bistro'. Then I went to the gym for a workout and now I think I will study a bit for my psych of religion exam tomorrow!! I do not know where my energy has come from since I got about two hours of sleep last night. Perhaps while I am writing my two exams tomorrow everything will hit me and I will crash-hopefully not though! For now I will take joy in being the energizer bunny!

i'm back!!

Well it's 4:30 in the morning and I just got home about an hour ago! And I am jet lagged and wide awake! So my latest strategy is to stay up now and study for the two exams I have tomorrow and then perhaps take a nap in the afternoon and study some more! Enough about that though! I think I will post on my trip intermittently, because i have millions of pictures to go through and want to make sure I share them all! I will post some on here and some on my pictures blogs (link on right side) so be sure to check both! So I hear there was lots of snow and drizzle while I was gone! Did not miss that! Barbados has one type of weather: hot and sunny! Every day was at least thirty degrees and even if it drizzled a little bit or had a bit of cloud it was still boiling hot!

I arrived in Barbados only to find that my luggage was lost! I guess it didn't make the connection in Toronto.. So here I was with my jeans and sweater ready to face the heat of Barbados knowing that my luggage wouldn't arrive for at least 24 more hours! One of Lindie's relatives kindly lent me some shorts and a bathing suit though so that was nice. That night we went to church which was great! There was a musician from India there who was super humble and just all around very encouraging. Aftewards we went to Rachel's house for dinner which was great as well!

me and ashleigh at cafe sol in St. Lawrence Gap

Sunday our little rental car (we named her Betsy) arrived so we could bomb around the island. Of course, it's a bit different driving on the left hand side of the road and having pot holes everywhere and people driving on your side trying to avoid potholes and other obstacles! Always an adventure! Lindie and I started the morning off at Accra beach where I got my first burn (of many more to come...) I blamed that burn on Air Canada, because my luggage hadn't arrived and I had no sunscreen. But swimming was glorious (very salty water-not recommended for drinking) as well as lying in the sun! Afterwards we went to a mexican restaurant in what is called St. Lawrence Gap which was great! Good times and great people watching!!

The next day we set out on an adventure to go to the north point of the island (we were staying in the south). The maps aren't that great, because not all the roads are labelled and not all the roads are even on the map. And the roads aren't great because most of them are not labelled either and there will be a sign pointing you somewhere but then there won't be any more signs along the way! So anyway, with my amazing navigating skills we eventually ended up halfway there. We were on the right street but thought we'd ask for directions just to double check. Well, it turns out that the person sends us back the way we came! So we drove all the way half up and then came right back where we started! hahaha! I think that was like two or three hours later (it should have just taken about an hour to get up there..) Feeling slightly defeated we decided instead to go to Miami Beach and the Oistins fish market. We saw some big sea turtles in the water from the dock so that was fun and well worth it!

That night we went to a Bajan (Barbadian) restaurant called Brown Sugar which was wonderful! We had dolphin and flying fish! Okay, I like to say dolphin for the shock value because people immediately think of Flipper, but dolphin is a type of fish there! I would never eat flipper! come on now!

All right, that is all I will give you for now because I'm going to go shower, study for a bit and then go to church! it is now five am! haha.. tune in again for some more u pdates and pictures and be sure to check out the photos blog!