"A dream, within a dream..."

On Saturday, I went to my good friend Amy's wedding reception. She had her wedding in Calgary in the beginning of January, and had her reception at the Calgary Zoo- sweet, eh?- but had a second reception for all the London/Toronto people.

Her dress was so floaty and she looked gorgeous in it! Don't you agree?

My friend Lisa and I- can you tell she just travelled to Mexico? (okay, fine, I'm also just pasty-white)

I was bored after and taking photos of myself...laaame, I know...

I love my shoes:)

I borrowed this dress and jewelry from my sister- it's great to live with someone you can share (some) clothes with.

I'll take more photos soon so that I have better subjects, not just self-portraits! I swear I'm not that self-absorbed, at least I hope not.

This weekend I'm heading home for a friend's bridal shower. It will be fun to see the girls again, as well as my family.

My roommate from college for two years just had a baby a few weeks ago, he's a preemie and is getting open-heart surgery at the U of A hospital today- if you think of it, please pray for him, and for his parents, Nicole and Peter. His name is Timothy.

Thanks!

Liz et moi

Liz and I were bored a while ago and decided to take pictures of ourselves/each other. This is what we came up with. Isn't she pretty? :)

I love those grey days...sometimes

The other day before work, I really wanted to take some photos of my yard- well, more precisely, of the neighbour's yard:) There was a light dusting of snow everywhere and the snow shovel looked kind of cool.


The photos look kind of dingy and don't capture the grey days I love. I hate when the sky is just white with no contrast, it's too depressing.

Doesn't this look like they're having a conversation? :)

The view from our house.

I did say I would post about St. Catharines, and I totally forgot, so I'll mention it now. A couple of weeks ago, I rented a car and drove to visit some friends in St. Catharines after work on a Friday. We have been in touch over the past few years since I met them at PRBI (where I went to school), and I've been thinking of joining their organization or pursuing some short-term to longer-term missions trips with them. They've been tremendously supportive and also have faithfully kept in touch to see where I'm at. I think I'm getting closer to decision-making time, which is totally daunting but also pretty exciting, all at the same time.

I also met with a rep from another organization regarding literacy work, which I'm really interested in. It's giving me lots to think about between the two- it seems there's so much out there of interest to me, I'll never narrow it down! However, I don't believe that the events in our lives are all random, and I know that if I pursue something and the door closes, it's not the option to pursue at this time. It's really reassuring to me because it doesn't mean those doors are closed forever, but for the time being it could be a wrong choice.

Liz and I had breakfast together on Valentine's Day- waffles with strawberries, soy ice cream and whipped cream- kind of cancels out the soy haha if you're lactose intolerant- and it was so good. We rarely eat together from being on different shifts so it was a treat in more ways than one:)

Other than that, I went for my first run in about 2 months yesterday- yikes- and I'm sooo sore today! Oh well, now I'm over the hardest part- getting out the door on the first day:) So here's hoping I can run again tomorrow and not take such a long hiatus for a while. I can tell I've put on a few and I don't like that feeling but oh well, my identity is not in my weight, right, girls! I've been thinking of myself as a "lapsed runner" and I'm still probably not going to race for a while, I'm too out of shape, but I'll maybe do a 10k here and there, we'll see.

Well, that's all I've got for now, do you like my new blog background? Green for Nat, heheh.

Blogger won't save my spaces between paragraphs, grrr... so annoying. Does anyone know how to fix this?

Walking on a Sunday

On Sunday, the sun was glorious and I just had to take a walk after church. My sister was sleeping all day anyway before her night shift, and I didn't want to be cooped up indoors, so I grabbed my camera, a notebook and a novel and shoved them into my purse, and headed outside.

In a stubborn frame of mind, I decided to wear my green shoes instead of boots, because my feet would be getting wet regardless, and it was a time of slipping and sliding on ice and tiptoeing through puddles- this thaw was so sudden.

I took a gander down Victoria St, a street near the university that has a marker on the pavement showing "City Limits 1910" or some year around there. The houses are all so unique and I love to look at them and pick which one I would live in:) I used to walk down here once a week to babysit for my Australian family:) who are all growing up way too fast in their Christmas photos, by the way. Anyways, I wanted to walk down here for old time's sake, and it was kind of sad to go past their house and see no bikes and bike trailer and kid's toys. I really miss those kids and wish I had spent more time with them.

From there, I continued into Old North where the houses are larger and older. I just love the architecture and could stare at these houses all the time, I don't get tired of this.

I ended up by King's College, which has a huge fenced-in green area, the kind of black wrought-iron fence that looks so classy, and through it you can see the huge castle-like building that's part of the college. The road here is ridged by towering pines, and I so badly wanted to take some photos. The sun made their bark glow reddish, and it reminded me of the pines on Pine Grove Hill back home. It turned out my camera batteries were dead, so it's only a picture in my mind now, but hopefully I can return soon.

By the time I was back home, my feet were drenched and dyed green from my wet shoes, but it was so refreshing to actually spend some time outside. Since I've taken the winter off from running this year, I have been going more stir-crazy and the fresh air was a welcome change. I'm hoping to sign up for a gym membership through my company- I just wish I didn't hate treadmills and those machines so much- I'll have to get over that at some point or I'll be so lazy in the winter.

Have a great day, everyone, Happy Wednesday!

The Art of Making Macarons

Recently, I've taken up baking again, just for fun. I used to do this more last year, and bring goodies to work since Liz and I can't eat them all:) It's fun to just mess about in the kitchen, sometimes changing up the recipes.


While I was in Zurich (for a day only!) on my trip, my friends and I found a chocolate shop (which you may remember from a previous entry) called Sprüngli, where they make small macarons called Luxemburgherli. They're meringue cookies made with ground almonds, with a filling between two halves.


I was craving these one day and tried to see if they have them in London, but the closest place is Toronto. On a whim, I also checked out the Sprüngli website to see if they deliver (yeah right!) but they only do in Switzerland, haha.


This all prompted me to attempt to make these myself. I knew I had seen some recipes for macarons (not macaroons, mind you!) on a favourite dessert recipe blog of mine, http://www.tartelette.blogspot.com/. So I checked it out, and the first batch failed miserably due to the fact that I had some measurement issues. This one, with the right proportions, turned out the best so far, even better than ones I've made since.


I give you macarons with a bittersweet chocolate ganache:









The pictures are a little larger than necessary, I know, but I forgot to shrink them. Anyways, these are so fun to make that I decided to expand my repertoire, and also made orange-flavoured macarons with a chocolate ganache, and pink macarons with a white chocolate ganache. Unfortunately, I have no photos of these as they got eaten by my book club, my bible study, and my friends from work. Okay, fine, I had some too:)


That's what I've been up to. I'll post again soon about my road trip to St. Catharines. Now that I finally have some photos, I'm back on the blogging bandwagon.


Have a great day, my friends!

Il y a longtemps que je t'aime

Lately, I am enamored of a certain foreign film that I went to see with Shona and Adele, two friends of mine who teach at a French high school here in town. This film, called Il y a longtemps que je t'aime (hence the blog title) :) , was showing in a small, independent theatre and I have to tell you, it really grabbed me. The title is from the song "La Claire Fontaine," a French folk song.

I took Liz with me last night to watch it again, because she hadn't seen it. The movie was showing later on in the evening and it's closing on Wednesday, so I really wanted her to see it before it was gone. If you haven't seen it or heard of it, you should look into it- it's so well done, and very poignant and cut me to the heart. In a good way though. It must have been quite a sight to see about 5 people in this dim theatre all bawling at the end. That's some kind of sisterly bonding:)

As movies go, I tend to go for the light-hearted movies with storylines about the complexities of humanity, and I have a weakness for certain musicals, while Liz is more of a psychological thriller girl, so sometimes it's hard to pick something we both like. This one is a keeper, go see it:)

Now I have the song in my head, "A la claire fontaine, m'en aller promener... il y a longtemps que je t'aime, jamais je ne t'oublierai..."

Chinese dumplings & tea

Last Monday, Candy, a friend of mine from the young adults at another church that we know, invited Liz and me to her apartment to make Chinese dumplings. We picked up a friend of mine on the way, who lives in the same building as her, after grabbing some Chinese veggies and such for the meal.

We had a lot of fun chopping up some different kinds of bok choy for the veggie ones, and they also made ground turkey dumplings. Afterward we tried different kinds of tea Candy had from China, and there is a certain way you drink it- always pour out the first pot of tea, and the second and third are always the best. It was delicious- we told Candy she should have tea-tastings here, she would definitely be in business!

Some chopping fun

Candy and I at New Years' Eve

These days, I'm trying to contemplate future career/education plans...it all gets a little tangled up so easily though. Where to study? When? How? ... :) All those kinds of questions. For now I'll stay in London but who knows what the next step will be? I'm kind of scared to start all over again somewhere else when I've gotten to know so many great people in London, but I'm just glad that God knows and He'll tell me when it's time ... hopefully when I'm more ready too! I feel pulled in so many directions that aren't wrong, but maybe are not the best choices, know what I mean?