A New Blog!

Hey guys, just wanted to let you know I will no longer be posting here (apparently there's limits on photos...and I just can't bear the thought of only posting walls of text from now on!)

So from now on you can find me at http://algenina.wordpress.com/

Hope to see you all there!

A Day with the Boys

It's no secret that I love my nephews! I spend the whole day with them to give grandma and dad a break and we had a blast! Just had to share:

 

Seymour

Paul has been bugging me for a cat for years now, and it never made sence to get one with moving and being away and busy etc etc. Well now that we are more settled into married life and our house...the time had come. We went for a walk to the local SPCA and to Paul's delight found him an early christmas present!

Meet Seymour!

He is 4 months old and loves to play with his toys and LOVES people.

On the way home in the car he purred the entire way!

 

Halloween 2012

Halloween

The Holiday of Pumpkins and Candy.

 

This was our first halloween with the nephews. It was so much fun!

 

 

The local mall puts on a "trick or treating" event for kids....

With the little ones it was nice to not have to go walking around in the rain to get candy in a neighborhood with the houses so far apart.

 

A little bit of trouble getting in...

 

Made it!

 

Trick or treating

 

Daddy's boy

 

Chilling in the stroller

 

 

Thanks for carrying me Auntie.

 

 

 

 

lil stinker indeed! Not an easy child to get a good picture of!

 

Oh and this was my costume:

 

Basement Reno's

Finishing a basement is a lot of work...finishing a basement to turn into a rental suite is even more work! But its done (minus the closet doors and the blinds still need to be put in)! Here it is:

Before (when framing was finished):

 After:

Family

Family:

a. a basic social unit consisting of parents and their children, considered as a group, whether dwelling together or not: the traditional family.

b. a social unit consisting of one or more adults together with the children they care for

 

What is a family? This question seems so straight forward at first, but as I become older and think about starting a family, I become more and more amazed at how many different types of families there are, and what exactally do I want my family to look like. Being adopted automatically changes the makeup of my family from the 'traditional family'. I have a Mom and a Dad, a brother and sister...but I also have a Birth-mom, and  sister who doesnt share my brother and sister with me. Now I also have a new family having married my husband. But wait...I don't just have our new family, I have in-laws...and I have 'birth-in-laws'.

 

I volunteer with an organization that supports adoptive families and a youth group made up of teens in fostercare, aged out of foster care and have been adopted. This too has played a part in my understanding of what a family is.

 

Family is so much more then parents and thier children.

 

I have friends who are currently adopting kids out of foster care, kids with special needs, kids in other countries that don't have the resources to care for them. Again, my idea of family is enlarged.

 

I am reminded of what the bible explains as family over and over again:

 

In Ruth 1, we learn about permenence. Naomi tells Ruth to go back to her mother, but Ruth pleads to stay saying “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God.  Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.”

 

In James 1:27 we are commaded "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress"

 

These stories make me ask myself, what do I want my family to look like? I pray that it is a family that loves relentlesly, that is made up through more then mere bloodline, that I can be a home to orphans. And I pray that I can encourage others to look at families differently too, that they may see a home for orphans in thier own families, that more children would find peremency, that more teenagers would be adopted, that more Christians would be empowered by the power and grace of God to carry out his good works and take care of the orphans and the widows.

 

 Here are some of the links to some of the stories mentioned that have inspired me:http://carlaburlando.blogspot.ca/
http://nataliekeller.blogspot.ca/
And if you want more information on Adoption please check out the Adoptive Families Association:
http://www.bcadoption.com/default.asp

 

Autumn Projects

So with an unexpected day off (second in a row) and a lot more to come, I decided that if I am going to stay home, then I need to be doing/working on something (as theres only so much you can do to try and find a job in a specific field).

So I went to Pinterest to find something to make my house feel more festive for fall and I found Pumpkins!

Paper Pumkin Number 1

I don't love how this one turned out..the paper seems like its a bit too heavy and doesn't stay where its supposed to very well...if I make another one I will probably glue or tape each piece of paper instead of using a ribbon to hold them together.
 
Paper Pumpin Number 2:

 

This one I love, and it was soooo easy! Just paper and a TP roll!

Here is where I got this one from:

http://athriftymom.com/thrifty-halloween-tip-toilet-paper-pumpkins/

BC Getaway

Day One: Maple Ridge to Penticton
Because we were kind of in a rush, and have done this drive a zillion times, we didn't take any pictures this time!

Day Two: Penticton to Invermere

Our day started by going south to Osoyoos

 

From there we headed east on HWY 3...through many small towns, stopping at Christina Lake to make some quesadillas for lunch on the beach!

 

 

After lunch we hopped back in the car and headed to Creston. In creston we took a tour of the Columbia Brewery (where Kokanee is made) It was actually more interesting then I had though...and I found a beer I can actually drink without gaggin!

 

Even the best of us need a pit stop and an Iced Capp to make it through the day!

 

Our Next stop was: Kimberly.

Who knew Kimberly was imported from the german alps!!! This was an unplanned stop but I am so glad we took the detour, it was an incredible little marketplace tucked away in the middle of BC.

 

Apparently the worlds largest coo coo clock.

Paul eating Schnitzel

 

 







That night we stayed in Invermere.

 

Day 3: Invermere to Banff to Golden

The day of the Parks...early in the day we entered Kootney National Park. It was gorgeous!

"The Beer out Here"

Numa Falls

Marble Canyon

Continental Divide (where the rivers run to the west on one side and the east on the other)

 



From there we headed to Alberta...to check out Banff and Lake Louise

 

The Fairmont Banff Springs

 

Returning from Alberta, we stopped to see Canada's tallest waterfall in Yoho National Park.

 

After such a long day...we needed a good night sleep...check out the super cute hotel we stayed at in Golden...we got our own cabin!

 

 





 

Day Four: Godlen - Maple Ridge

Our 'drive home day'...still consisted of two more national parks! We stopped in Glacier National Park to view the ruins of what USED to be BC's most prestigeous mountain hotel in the early 1900's. known as Glacier Lodge..its a pile of rocks today.

 

 

Our Last National Park stop was the "Summit" in Mount Revelstoke National Park.

 



 

From there...I mostly slept as it was the end of a long trip and I was still recouvering from a cold. It was a fantastic weekend and I am so trilled to live in such a beautiful part of the world!