He asked, I said *nods head vigorously*

Joel took me on a bike ride last week and asked me to marry him. Apparently, my answer was *nods head vigorously* followed by ”...yes”! I’m not sure I remember that part but he says it’s true.

The proposal was fantastic and lovely, which was no surprise, especially when the proposer was the king of orchestrating surprises.

But I was surprised by how great it was telling people the news.  I have lovely friends and family and am so glad to be with someone who they all love too.  Thank you everyone for being so happy for us, and for telling us so.

I might spend a bit of time posting some of my favourite reactions to the news. There were a couple of real winners.

Braving the clowns is totally worth it for pizza this good.

It's festival time in Edmonton and that means a delicious selection of lunch food choices for those of us lucky enough to work close to the square.  The only trouble with the most recent festival is that, well, it was the Street Performers Festival.  This festival has the ability to give me "the knot" (thanks Dietermans for coining the phrase and putting words to that awful feeling of awkward, make-it-stop, embarassment on behalf of others that plaques the pits of the stomachs of overly socially conscious people everywhere).

I was walking through the square the other day when it was on and watched an unsuspecting office worker strolling past a peformance.  The performer stopped, ran out of the circle he was performing in and chased them down so he could pummel them with some sort of fake balloon sword.  UGH.  All this to get a half-hearted chorus of chuckles from a crowd of kids and parents.

Anyways, Joel and I went back later looking for a snack that didn't involve sitting inside at any sort of restaurant and we found something that totally made it worth enduring the awkward.  Some genius ordered a wood fired pizza oven on wheels from freaking Italy and is now making awesome pizzas at festivals in Alberta. His oven is on a trailer.

We shared a BBQ chicken pizza and it was so good that I went back the next day in a thunderstorm to eat it again for lunch.

Braving the clowns is totally worth it for pizza this good, my friends.

Craft camp

Traditions are nice.  I think the best kind of traditions are the accidental ones.  Like the fact that it seems like Kaeli and I have done some sort of ski trip on all of her past few birthday weekends.  I don't know if it ranks as tradition yet, but it might be starting, and that's nice.  Another good one is going canoeing on my birthday weekend down the north saskatchewan river with a pack of my friends every year for several years now.  Another good one is eating chicken ceaser salad with natasha.  A not so great one is drinking diet coke with Natasha. ha.

Every Canada day weekend for the past 14 years, my extended family on my mom's side has gathered in Saskatoon.  This is pretty much the tradition to beat out all other traditions as far as my life goes.  We eat good food, have fun times, and craft our brains out.  My friend Rebecca has started calling it craft camp.

It started out when my sister and I spent a week with my aunt each making our own quilts.  I was 12.  The next summer we went back and made another one, this time for my parents.  And my brother tagged along and spent the time working with my uncle in his fully equipped wood working shop. And the next summer we decided to get together and make a quilt for my cousin who was getting married as a gift from all of us.  By this time we were noticing the pattern and somebody dubbed the event as QUILTFEST as a joke, but the name stuck.

Then we started doing other sorts of projects.  Making canoe paddles with the help of my patient uncle.  Making cutting boards, knitting, upholstering, gocco printing.  Anyways, here we are 14 years later still going strong and taking on even bigger projects, like my brother who put the biggest log of all time on the lathe...


Joel made a quilt and a lemon meringue pie using a blow torch...

Other projects included making dresses, drum sticks, upholstering, a huge cedar bench, a giant set of pick up sticks, a wooden bowl.

I almost feel sheepish at how great my family is when I talk about Quiltfest, but then I remember how to everyone else we just sound like a bunch of nerds, so it can't be that bad to gush a bit.

just the five of us

I usually let May long weekend pass without any major plans, but this year some sweet plans fell into my lap.  When I was visiting Kerry early this spring we spotted some serious antique cuteness in her house and asked about it.  She told us it was from Nanton, which has great antique shops and an all girls road trip was born. 

It was a great weekend.  We picked up Kerry at camp and headed straight to Nanton.  I had no idea they had all those antiques.  Being in the car for that long got a little tiresome, but over and over, there were little moments where we all felt glad to be friends.  I like those moments...the ones where you know that everyone  is thinking the same thing: how am I so lucky to have these great people as my dear friends.  There were five of us, and I've known them all between 9 and 23 years.  That's a lot of years.

Sooooo, because I am lazy, a photo collage clockwise from top left: we found letterpress blocks at the last minute, antique gates and beds, sharing a milkshake, we're not sure, grumpy family vacation photo, kerry and tash against a brick wall, best pic ever of kim wearing an aviator hat, pretending to walk down the street in nanton, grain elevator!

Chatting with my brother

I think my brother can make me laugh harder than almost anyone else.   It's all in the details.

Scott: BSS* tix on sale for oct 8 show at Winspear.  Heidi and I got tix and Sean bought 2 also!

Me:  Did you mean BSB?

Scott: Yes. The ESO covering the backstreet boys entire discography with a guest French hornist.

Me:  Call me crazy but I'd buy tickets to that too.

Scott: You know what else we should really see is all the HSM movies back to back (the acronym is a test).

Me: HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL! KABLAM!

Scott: Nothin but net

*BSS is Broken Social Scene

Seedlings

Gardening started early around our house this year.  Bri's got a flat of jiffy pots growing, and Joel and I have been working on our own seedlings too.  The first picture is of the tomato seeds in Joel's hand...we were amazed by the tiny-ness of the tomato seeds.  I've never taken the time to grow tomatoes from seeds, since it was always fun to pick them up at the farmer's market.  As an experiment, we used plastic egg cartons with holes punched in the bottom to grow our seedlings.  I'm not sure it was the best choice as they are pretty small, but the verdict is still out on that one. 

We've got basil, tomatoes, green beans, sugar peas, sweet peas, and lupin growing so far.  The rest will be planted straight into the ground.  At first I wanted to start some beets early but then I realized that if I did that, then I would have to transplant them one beet at a time into the garden, which would be ridiculous.  Glad I realized that one before I tried it!

I'm excited for my little garden this year. Yay.

Guilty (musical) pleasure

John Mayer concerts are turning into a guilty pleasure of mine.  You may recall the event of '07 when Kerry and I were transplanted from our nosebleed seats INTO THE FRONT ROW.  Because John Mayer is a lovely (if somewhat vile in magazine interviews) musician who likes to save the best seats for random fans with crappy seats. 

So, this time, NayNay and I scored 6th row tickets with help from my friend Matt.  The opener was Michael Franti and Spearhead, and I wouldn't normally bore you with details of the opener, but they were totally awesome.  Like rock-the-whole-place awesome.  Michael Franti ran off the stage and through the crowd high fiving everyone (including NayNay) as he ran past...

 
And his guitar player was the happiest little guy I ever did see.  He smiled at least this hard for almost the entire show, except for one song where he was totally rocking out too hard to smile...

And now some John Mayer, who put on  good show, except for a very, very long drum solo.  I'm talking possibly over five minutes.  The only other negative was his cargo pants.  He reallly needs to stop wearing those.  New fun fact: he is pretty good at whistling...