1980's me!!!

So this Halloween was the first Halloween I actually dressed up and had some fun in the last few years. It was a spur of the moment idea between myself and the girls at work but we decided to come to work dressed up in our best 80's retro gear. About two days before we went down to Value Village and browsed the racks to find the look we were going for. My costume would not have been complete if I hadn't found the sweet metallic, fuchsia, zebra print, spandex tank top!! I tried to go glam rock wearing a longer t-shirt underneath my tank and a pair of skinny black leggings, the finishing touches were my pink leg warmers, leopard flats and fake hair extensions!. One of the girls brought in a CD book FULL of 80's tunes which we enjoyed for the entire afternoon while we dipped into the customer candy bowl, to finnish off a great day my boss baked us a pizza for lunch!!!:).

It was the best Halloween I have had since Chris and I lived closer to our friends!! I'm really glad I did something this year. Next Halloween we will be a family of five, two adults, two small puppies and one baby!, I think I'm going to borrow my friends family tradition of doing a group costume and going up to Walmart each year for a family photo session. I'm already planning my 'Labyrinth' tribute photo shoot~ David Bowie eat your heart out!.

Happy Halloween!!!

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More Amy Sol

Here is anouther sweet Amy Sol print I got last month. Thought I would share the awesome with you. Im thinking I may frame the two prints and put them up in the nursery when we set things up. oh yeah btw...Im pregnant check it out!!!
http://saucymamasjourneyintotheunknown.blogspot.com/

Today's highlight!

(this is not the mouse I saved, but he was just as cute)

Today a baby mouse ran into work, one of the girls screamed and it was so scared it was paralysed with fear. I scooped him up in a little bucket gave him a chunk of muffin and took him out back to a small field that leads to a little ravine behind the store. I carefully turned the bucket on its side and let him be alone outside. when I went back out to check on him a little while later he had already scurried off somewhere. I'm glad I freed that cute little mouse before one of the men at work could kill him :). I have decided to write a short story about this little mouse who I have named Finnegan Pearson Mouse.

My vacation: Vancouver- round 2!

Now we continue my vacation saga, day two in Vancouver we go to my Aunts house to help her build some shelving units, a few hours turns into an all day event. But it was fun none the less, we were able to visit with each other and spend the day together. Late that afternoon we browsed Granville Island and bought some Granville Island beer right from the brewery and I was able to visit my favourite store in the world.....Dragon Space. That's a store that sells nothing but fantasy related items, if your in need of Gryphon's, Unicorns, Fairies or Dragons- you need look no further. After that we went back to my Mom's house to have a BBQ and celebrate my younger sisters birthday.

The following few days went by in a blur of visiting friends and family, we were able to visit a few favourite haunts but the majority of our time was spent trying to see everyone we could. I was able to catch up with everyone I had hoped to see and Im so glad it worked out that way. We were also able to do some shopping....so much so that I had to ship some of my clothes out to myself to make room for my purchases in my luggage.

On a visit to my Grandmother's house my sister rear ended a car in front of us and totalled my Mom's car. We eventually made it out to my Grandmother's house after driving the car back to mom's house and contacting the insurance company. We visited my Grandparents and had a HUGE lunch at their house. We found out that they were going to be selling their house of 25 years and moving into a condominium near the beach.

They were pretty happy about the move, although I found it was a little bit sad to know they would be leaving the only home I remember them ever being in. What really makes it tragic is my grandmothers massive floral garden and my grandfathers vegetable garden in the back will eventually be bulldozed after the house is rented out for the Olympics to put up an overpass. 15 year old grape vines, roses, fig trees and hydrangeas among other flowers and vegetables will all be lost to "progress".The visit went well though, we poured through some old photo albums for a few hours and listened to some old stories about the good old days. It was nice. Having not seen them for over two years the good-bye was a bit emotional, living on the other side of the country from your friends and family can be tough. It turns out not just for us but for them as well.

Towards the end of the week we were trying to help Mom get her wedding organised, to no real avail. Eventually we just threw our hands up in the air and had to say 'its her wedding, not ours, let her handle it how she wants to handle it'. With the relatively little amount of planning and the huge last minute venue change (three weeks before the wedding) everything really did come together rather nicely. I must give allot of credit to My Aunt Sherry and my Sister for the amount of things they brought to the table to pull it all together, including flowers and getting my Mom to the bridal shops early enough to have a dress to wear on her big day. She wanted to go dress shopping a week before the wedding.....can you imagine that potential disaster?....gah!!.

I was able to make the best speech at Mom's wedding by singing a song instead welcoming my "My new Jewish Dad" to the family. The entire room was laughing and it was great. We danced we drank and we had a great night. The following day was a day for good byes as all our family from Ontario was preparing to leave and my sister left to go back up North to B.C. More tear filled goodbyes for all. Chris and I packed up and were ready to head out for our flight for the second leg of our trip...Saskatchewan. To be continued......

Halifax-Vancouver : my vacation part one

So what has happened in the last few weeks I have been silent from my blog updates?. Well Chris and I were working pretty hard the few weeks before our vacation to earn a bit more spending money for our trip. Each of us working extra hours as well as baking Gluten Free bread which has been selling as quick as we can make it. On top of that we were packing up and house cleaning to prepare for our trip.

On August 21st, At last after a nine hour shift at work I was able to come home take a shower and 20 minute nap before we packed the dogs/ the luggage/ my neighbours stolen garden gnome and ourselves in the car for our 5 hour drive up to Halifax, to take our 8 hour flight to Vancouver....looooong day and a half to say the least. A few times we had to stop at a gas station and set the alarm on the cellphone for a 20 minute rest as we were both running on fumes at this point.

Before we got to the airport we had to find my Boss' brothers house as he was kind enough to let us park PT at his place for two weeks to save the $175.00 the park-n-fly or airport would have charged us. We arrived at his house at around 5:30 in the morning and parked the car in his driveway, left a set of keys in his mailbox and a note. We phoned for a cab to the airport and began waiting. A few minutes of waiting Chris realises he has to use the bathroom...badly and its a number 2. We cant knock on their door and wake them this early, that would be rude. As much as the thought disturbs me I suggest he craps in a few plastic bags and uses some paper towel crouched in the back of the Pt which still has its back seats all pushed forward after the luggage was unpacked.

The cab company calls us back and says the driver became lost but he is on his way now. Great Chris cant wait!!! He grabs the roll of paper towel out of the car and runs down the block hoping the end of the street will yield some lot of foliage....no such luck it just opens out onto another street. At precisely the moment he runs back (in a panic at this point) the cab driver shows up. We ask him to make a stop ANYWHERE with a bathroom. We pull up to a Tim Horton's and Chris runs in. While we wait the driver casually asks a worker having a smoke out front what time they opened...it turns out they literally opened up 15 minutes before we got there. Chris comes out and were on our way again.

We make it to the airport, check our luggage right behind a cute hippie family moving. Chris teases me saying that whole family has a kid and their moving across country and they have the same amount of luggage as I do....maybe he was right?. I had two large suitcases one medium carry on, my purse and Mushu in a carrier, he had one medium suitcase, a small carry on and Foxy in her kennel. In fact he had to check one of my bags just to make sure I could bring it along. Two weeks is a long time and you never know what you may need, always be prepared- a motto for scouts and women travelers alike!.

We have a coffee and some breakfast then go through security, we get to pre-board with our little beasts and get them settled under the seats in front of us. The flight goes by pretty smoothly as myself and the dogs nap through most of it. When we do arrive in Vancouver I am greeted by my Mom, her Fiance and my Sister. I have not seen my mom in two years and my sister since she visited last summer. We hugged and my sister and I took the dogs outside to make a pee while Chris gathered our luggage up. While at the airport we decided to get pictures of 'GNORMAN' my neighbors garden gnome at some of the tourist art displays throughout the airport.

That afternoon we showered the travel stink off ourselves had a nice long nap and then woke up to get ready for an evening at our old favourite Vancouver bar 'The Blarney Stone'. Chris and I were able to bus/walk from my moms place and be there in about 20 minutes.....which turned out to be about an hour or so too late. Our friend Ryan met us in line and we waited for about 1/2 an hour in line when our other friends decided it was too loud in there and came out to see if we wanted to try another bar. We all agreed and made our way to the next closest Irish pub which just happened to be two or three doors down the road.

This place 'the Irish heather'had a nice quite table out back for the group of us to sit and catch up. Sometimes when you haven't seen people in awhile you wonder if it may feel awkward seeing them again after so long, but once we all got settled at our table it was like old times again...minus all of us agreeing that maybe our crazy Blarney Stone days may be at an end....:( damn you maturity!!!!

After a few hours of visiting we all had to get ready to leave so our pals could catch the last sky train home again. Chris and I decided to enjoy the nice summer evening and walk the whole way back home after picking up a coffee at Tim Horton's. Once we walked across the Granville street bridge my pretty girlie shoes began digging into my heel to the point of drawing of blood and I was tempted to walk home downtown Vancouver barefoot.....yes I had partaken in a few drinks and it seemed like a logical conclusion. Fortunately for me, Chris had the sound judgement to say NO!. Instead he piggy backed me from the bridge uphill on Granville street a few blocks until we were almost home....ahhhhhh that's romance :).

We got back to Mom's place and crashed on the air mattress set up for us and slept like a couple of babies...without the need for midnight feedings of course :).

this concludes part one of our vacation...stay tuned for the saga to unfold.....

Update at looong last!!!

So what the hell has been going on with me this past month or so..... where to begin......

I have been working lots trying to save up for my trip(s) to Vancouver and Saskatoon. I had to miss my Kiss concert because my car decided to be an asshole and fall apart on me.

Chris and I found a pretty neat little house online, four bedroom, living room, bath, kitchen dining room for $46,0000, seriously where can you get a house at that cost in this country???. We decided for curiosities sake to take a look at it one day, and we fell in love with it instantly. The next few weeks were spent going to bank meetings and and trying to get pre-approved for a mortgage. We were, and Chris's parents were going to front us the money for the down payment (as we hadn't really planned on buying a house and hadn't saved for said purchase). We phoned up the realtor to take a second look at the home pumped to be making this big step together and then.......APPARENTLY the f*cking home had an offer put in on it two days before we called to take a second look at it.

Being pre-approved for our mortgage we decided to continue looking at houses within our price range and same damn thing happened again and again. We would phone to view a house and it would literally have been taken out of the equation only days before our call. I was pissed to say the least!! The real estate agent said she would love to show me all her listings as it seemed all the houses we took an interest in seemed to be hot shit after that. What really ticks me off is a few of these places had been sitting idle for a few months before we noticed them. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR.

So as we were on our house hunting, our car failed its MVI and we were driving it illegally for a few weeks...oops. It would have cost us $1000.00 to get it fixed and that's if Chris did the body work himself, the repair guy said in our cars condition and at its age (98 for Taurus) we may put the money in to fix it and then find out it needs more repairs in a few months. It was pretty apparent we needed a new vehicle, especially since we have to drive up to Halifax (5 hr drive) to get to the airport for our trip and Chris will be needing to make business trips to Halifax this fall.

What really made me angry was the fact I would have to miss Crab Fest in Loisbourg because of our crappy car. Since Chris and I have been living together we haven't really made any traditions, holidays come and go and we pretty much skip them. No kids to make happy and if it comes down to cooking up too much food for two people to eat at Christmas or buying myself a present on ebay then I chose the online shopping. Having no family and a limited amount of friends out here pretty much eliminates the need for Christmas trees, Halloween decor etc... BUT since we moved out here two years ago we have gone to Crab Fest every year...it was our only maritime tradition, and as crappy as it may sound~ getting cheap crab and eating it for breakfast in overcast old Loisbourg makes me happy. So I was determined to get a NEW $1000.00 car that wouldn't fudge up our mortgage pre-approval and we could use it for 6 months until we were in our own home then we could apply for a car loan.

So we saw an add on Kijiji for a car it was $1000.00 had an MVI sticker for the next 5 months and we figured perfect it should get us to and from Halifax and around town for a few months until we get our home..... We drive out to North Sydney to see it. I have never been to North Sydney before........people told me it was the ghetto, I grew up in freakin' Surrey, B.C so when small Town Nova Scotian's tell me about the ghetto I tend to disbelieve the stories. Well~ when easy going humble small towners start talking trash about a place in the future I shall take there words a bit more seriously. We drove into the "down town" section of North Sydney, every window in the business sector was smashed in accept for the one dollar store, the well maintained historical homes were becoming more paint chipped and seedy looking. We drove up to the house to see this car, car parts laying around a dirt lawn....does not bode well. We walk up and see this purple monstrosity...when I say purple think "the Phantom" hue. "Well can we take it for a test drive around the block" Chris asks. This guy looks at us like were crazy~as if just looking at this thing should have us pulling out our wallet.... Chris offers him to come with us he says "no take it but I don't want you taking it to far". Okay fine we get in and drive her around the block, the first thing I hear in my head "bang bang chitty chitty bang bang, chitty bang bang we love you!" this car sounds like an old man in the throes of his final death cough. Chris looks at me and asks "what do you think?". I look at him and tell him "I think these people have a very different opinion of what a $1000.00 car is worth. Hell our car was $1000.00 and at the very least the interior siding isn't coming lose from the f*cking doors. The worst part was there was a baby seat in the back.

We get in our car and go to drive back home, As we are not accustomed to driving around North Sydney Chris somehow misses our turn back home and we find ourselves on some weird back road. Houses are becoming spaced out about a three minute drive apart. The gas light dings on...were driving in the middle of nowhere, At this point Chris notices he doesn't have his wallet on him and I left my purse at home as we just brought the check book in case the car worked out. Did I mention the cell phone is dead..... So essentially were screwed we have to make the car home or walk if it dies. The only thing I can think to do at a time like this~look at Chris and say "You got a perty mouth" and begin humming some hill-Billie banjo tune as I braced myself for the inevitable hill-Billie death rape that would surely ensue should the car decide to die out here. Chris was not impressed. Eventually we did in fact make it home to my relief, but Crab Fest was looming near and my only crap-tastic tradition was in danger of being ruined.....having already missed the KISS concert it made my mood even worse.

Essentially I had a choice to make... keep house hunting and rent a car to Halifax missing Crab Fest or get a new car. So we decided to put our house hunt on hold and get a vehicle instead have I mentioned how much I LOVE cheap crab for breakfast???. So we drove around a few car lots after hours to check out a few vehicles without the commission vultures circling us like a pair of dying baby Gazelles. We narrowed it down to the Golf, Matrix and Yaris as we figured a small little car would be perfect for our lifestyle and good on gas too!

So we go back to the few lots we found a decent vehicle at and decide to test drive a few cars. On our first car lot (Toyota) we checked out the matrix and the golf, they were nice, but nothing to write home about. The sales guy seemed so defeated, like his plans on making commission this month had been bludgeoned to death like a baby seal. He just gave us the keys to some cars and went back into the building telling us to come see him if we found anything we liked. As we were leaving to check out the next lot he made a point of letting us know he could drop the price on a few cars if we wanted. He didn't even try to play hard to get. The next two lots were crap so we didn't even bother test driving anything.

Then we made it to the Chevrolet dealership, we wanted to test their used Yaris, as we reinspected it during the daylight we realised it was a standard and lets face it I can barely drive an automatic, so it was a no go. They did however have a 2007 Ford Taurus in our price range that Chris wanted to investigate and that's when I noticed a PT Cruiser sitting there on the lot. "LOOK CHRIS A 2008 PT CRUISER!!!" I squealed.

"Absolutely not those are the ugliest cars I have ever seen" he replied. "Well come on it cant hurt to just look inside" he looks at me and shrugs "fine but were just looking".

We walk up to the dealership when a guy comes out and asks if he can help, he gets some keys and we sit inside the PT. "Hey Its kind of nice in here, huh Chris?" he looks at me and says "yeah it is kind of nice, I guess its not on my NEVER category anymore". We go check out the Taurus its just a newer sedan style of our current car so there is nothing new or exciting to report. The sales guy gives us the facts about each car we ask about then tells us to come back if were interested in taking any of them out for a test run.

We decide to head back towards home and wing past the Volkswagen dealership on our way. The second we hit the lot a slick commission buzzard is on us like a fly on shit, this guy is absolutely EVERYTHING I HATE about commission sales people. I look to Chris the second he walks off to get some keys and tell him " I don't like this guy, he would sell an Eskimo a refrigerator to make a buck". Chris looks at me and says "really I don't see that?" I smile and say "watch".

He has his schmooze button on max and hes telling us "unlike allot of sales people Michelle, I listen to what people tell me they want" he tells us a car in our price range is just on another one of his lots and invites us into his car for a ride up. This car that we get into is apparently the car he has just purchased for his daughter, Chris tries to open the back seat and the door is jammed shut. I just smirk~ if this piece of crap is what hes giving to his own flesh and blood I don't want to see the cars hes trying to pawn off on the unsuspecting public. The car he takes us to is not at all what we were looking for and before we know it hes throwing Chris a set of keys and telling us to take it back to the other lot. We cant refuse, were on the other side of town and have no way back to our car. He has successfully pushed us into his forced test drive sales tactic, at this point Chris can see what I was trying to tell him. I tell Chris I wouldn't buy a car from this guy if we found our dream car on his lot, so we have decided to kindly say thanks but no and go home.

We get back to the dealership and the guy somehow worms us into his office where he eventually tries to sell us ANY car on his lot (our budget was 15,000 at the most for a used car) hes trying to sell me 30,000 suv's by the end of our conversation. So much for "listening to what the customer wants". Gah I swear this guy was so greasy my face broke out from the 20 minutes spent in his presence. To make matters worse the very next day whose number shows up on my call display~ Jim Sampson, Volkswagen dealership.

The following afternoon we went back and test drove the Taurus and PT cruiser and eventually we came home with.........

The 'never in a million years PT Cruiser' a.k.a "PETEY"...TA DA!!!!

The next day I call from work to get a ride home and Mr. "I-hate-pt-cruisers" is out joy riding in the middle of nowhere, when he eventually comes to get me, I open the door and the first thing I hear from his mouth is "Man I love this car".

So that has been the highlights of the more exciting portions of July for you stay tuned for menial day to day nonsense in the near future :).