Bowling Buddies

Instead of our usual Thursday night intellectualizing a bunch of us Eastsiders decided to brave some new territory at Kenmore Lanes and engage in a little friendly competition. Funny, I never realized how competative a bunch of boys who spend most of their time in a cube farm could be. Actually, I guess I had some idea when I think back to their last croquet match....bowling and croquet.....hmmm........just for the record the guys have been bungee jumping.



Heidi and Aaron (some of Royden's workmates) also made it out to show off their bowling skills. Nice form Aaron!



Here's a little Adam montage for you-I've entitled it "Adam in Action". I believe he had the winning score of the evening.







Sadly we girls did not fare so well score wise...not that I even played:) but we did have fun. Better enjoy that victory dance Lautenbach-lucky for you Mrs. Millhouze was not in the house that night-'cause if she had been...she'd a smoked you all!

The Fruits of Labour

When Royden's away Ruth is at play...well...not quite. So Royden was away in California this past weekend and I was wondering how on earth I was going to spend two whole days without him. We haven't been apart much in the last three years...and last time he went away my dad came down to keep me company. This time I was on my own. Reading? Shopping? Hmmm what to do what to do? After my nice relaxing massage on Saturday I decided that it was high time to repaint the guest room. So I did. Ceiling and all. NOW I need a massage! I also managed to put a small hole in the wall while doing some detective work that now needs to be patched. There was this protruding circle in the wall and I just had to know what was making this defect. It was driving me crazy. So like a zit I picked it, and now there's a hole. Unlike skin drywall doesn't heal up after leaving it alone for a week. So then I made a patch. My patch still needs some work but I'm actually feeling pretty good about myself. Here's some pictures (minus one of the patchjob:)).

Before (during our home inspection the guest room was actually a very cute girl's room)


After



As you can see it is begging for guests...so some of you had better hurry up and come visit us!

Summer VACATION!

How do you spell vacation?



Ah yes. The cool water of the Shuswap lake. The beautiful lake that we grew up beside. The crisp refreshing waters we dove in to endure the heat of Salmon Arm summers. Well..Ruth dove in them. I never found Shuswap lake warm enough to actually get in. Our vacation last week was no different. Ruth ran into the water while I hung back and took pictures. WARNING: This post contains pictures of my glorious wife in a bikini.



We drove home on the coquihalla during the day. We make the drive in the night so often that I forget how beautiful it is.



I actually didn't take out my camera much while we were in Salmon Arm. We decided last minute to finish our week up at Nathan and Erin's ranch at Bridge Lake. It was kind of on our way home and we hadn't been there since they started managing it. It's a guest ranch out in the boonies. And when I say boonies, what I mean is free range cattle roaming the forest, dirt roads, mountain trails, secluded lakes. It was exactly what we needed.



Well you can only sit around and do absolutely nothing for so long. After that you need to find a brand new Polaris Ranger with nobby tires and four wheel drive.



Oh there's one!

Nate and Erin were kind enough to let us pack a lunch and head out to little tobe lake, using their ranch transportation. It was a short 20 minute ride in the ranger. But oh...was it a fun 20 minutes...



And that picture doesn't even show the mountain trail. It's like it was built for the ranger. Pot holes, dips, hills, rocks, roots, boulders. All we had to do was go fast!

And watch for the locals...


Watch out guys, get out of the way! We've gotta be at Tobe lake in 20 minutes! We're on vacation !!



We made it there on schedule. It was beautiful.



But I let Ruth drive the ranger home and I was afraid it would be the last beautiful lake I ever saw.



I nearly died that day. (just kidding babe)

Well in between our excursions in the woods, Nate and Erin cooked up some great meals. And we got to eat at a huge table with all the guests. Thanks guys!



Well after lunch it was back on the ranger and out into the woods again. This time we went to Montana lake where there was a rowboat tied to a dock. I asked out loud if anybody owned it and I was answered by a loon. So we took it for a spin.




That was very peaceful afternoon. I will remember it for a long time.




Well that was all anyone could ask for on vacation. But we couldn't leave without a trail ride the next morning. Nate and Erin I know you guys were busy but thanks so much for hosting us. We really had a great time and can't wait to come back.



But maybe next time we should set up a speed trap in the woods for Ruth?

Symphony of Fire

Technically it's called the "Celebration of Light". But since the sponsorship change I just haven't really adopted the new title.

So Ruth and I drove up to Vancouver for the weekend, mostly to visit with Uncle Elmer and auntie Marlene. But also to hook up with Loa on Saturday night. And we also had the pleasure of having dinner with our friends Jos and Nicola in Kitsilano.



We also spent a lot of Saturday downtown. Hanging around Granville Island, waiting for Loa's phone call and trying to decide where to eat.



Scooters have been catching my attention lately. I really want one, but my pride can't deal with the fact that I would ride a scooter to work as my little sister rides a street bike. My wife also wants a husband. Long term.



Yum. One of my favorite beers.

Well, we hit the beach at 10:00pm with Loa and her brother and some of their friends. We pulled out our cameras to capture the show.



Well, after a Sunday brunch we headed back home, taking drastic measures to avoid the 2 hour line up at the border. We took 'zero' ave which literally drives along the the 54-40 line, all the way to Aldergrove crossing. There was still a half hour wait at the border, but we had coffee...

WARNING MOM!

This is not the blog update you've been waiting for! You've been warned!

I had to go to the dump this last weekend, which meant that I had to pull all the old lumber out from under the deck. Well, you can imagine what I found...spiders. Freakin huge ones. My good buddy Bill, recently loaned me his macro lens to mess with.

Big spiders...macro lens. Mom: watch out!

I feel ducky!