Merry Christmas!

 

It was 2:30am on Monday December 19th and our alarms went off - it was time to start our trek home for the holidays!  We crawled out of bed and into our car and drove 2 hours to Syracuse airport in New York.  We had been told by others not to get to the airport to early as it was a small airport with nothing to do and because we were flying within the USA, it wasn't an international flight.  We got in line to check in and 20 minutes later it was our turn to check in.  We went up to the desk and were then advised that we were actually in the wrong line up (apparently when you fly with Continental, you don't check in with Continental, you check in with United Air???).  Now, everyone that was in the wrong line up behind us and heard us get re-directed, hopped into the correct line before us, making us now at the back of the line up!  We were checked in and still had thirty minutes until our flight left, we were gonna be ok...Or so we thought!  We headed towards security and saw a line up that stretched across the airport and looped around!  Apparently, for the 6 flights that were all leaving between 5:40 and 6am, there was one security check point!  Everyone in the line up was checking the time, calling loved ones to tell them they were likely going to miss their flight, and feeling the overall anxiety of each other!  Carl and I got in line and prayed that we would make our flight!  We had booked our flights online through Expedia and one of the "warnings" was that if you missed your first flight, all other flights would be cancelled as well.  We heard the final boarding call for our flight just as we reached the security check point.  Then as luck would have it, we both got selected for random bag checks!  They took my carry on which was full of Christmas presents, one in particular that was tied in a plastic bag.  The lady took her time in trying to get the knot untied to check its contents.  "Just rip the bag!"   I said to her "we are going to miss our flight!".  She replied in a non chalant, relaxed tone "oh, it's ok, I don't like to usually rip the bags"...I gave her the Leah death glare, while trying to sound nice at the same time and said again "RIP THE BAG!".  She did.  Both of us now shaking with adrenaline ran to our gate to find out that we, along with 7 others had indeed, missed our flight!  Luckily, there was about 7 seats available on the next flight to Chicago which we all got on (Thank you God!).  They were able to get us on the next flight, change our 2nd flight and get us to our third destination in order to catch our last original flight, getting us to Bellingham as planned!  To sum up our travels, we drove 2 hours to Syracuse, flew from Syracuse to Chicago, Chicago to Las Vegas and Vegas to Bellingham were my mom picked us up and drove us an hour back to m parents house!  We were up for about 22hours with minimal sleep in transit!  Let me just say that Carl and I cannot wait until we are real grown ups and can afford to buy direct flights!  Needless to say I am dreading our "adventure" home as it will look about the same (except we'll be getting to the airport welllll in advance)!

Since arriving, I've been busy visiting with family and friends while Carl spent his first few days in town visiting several "Transit Oriented" sites for his final report for school.  My brother, who moved to Smithers for work in the summer wasn't expected to come home for the holidays but he ended up cutting his knee open snowboarding!  Although this was not a good thing, it did get him a week off work!  He came down for a few days which was a nice surprise!

David and Brier

It's now Christmas eve and we're looking forward to seeing a lot of family over the next few days!  

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Love Leah and Carl 

Christmas Time is Heeere, Happiness and Cheer...

Greetings!  Yes, I know it's almost been a month since I last wrote!  It's been just over a year that we've been in Kingston and things just don't seem as exciting to write about the second time round!  Just like last year we've been to couple Christmas parties, had our first snowfall that only lasted for the day and well, I've been working and Carl has been finishing up the semester!  Carl actually had his last day of school on December 6th but has lot's to work on during his time off!  We finally booked our flights home and will be visiting December 19th to January 4th!  Half of our visit will be spent in Langley with my parents and the other half in Whistler with Carl's parents!  

This past week I have come down with an awful cold!  My glands are so swollen it feels like I have golf balls in my throat and I'm lucky if I have a voice on most days!  I should get results from the doctor on Monday as to whether it's just a cold or???  But being sick didn't stop us from going to Ottawa this weekend!  We had to go see our Vancouver Canucks beat the Ottawa Senators 4 to 1!

  

We had sold some other hockey tickets in order to buy tickets to this game but we didn't want to spend a ridiculous amount of money on good seats and we had heard that every seat in the Scotiabank Place arena was good so we found a deal on Kijiji and bought 'em!

And yup, we were waaay up high but as you can see, we weren't the very last row....That was until we realized that we were actually in the wrong seats and our seats were in fact, the very last row!  But like everyone said, every seat in the arena had a pretty good view!

We had lots of fun watching our Canucks win and were surprised at how many Canuck fans were in the crowd!  

While in Ottawa we couldn't pass up seeing the Parliament Buildings all lit up for Christmas!

And so now the count down until we come home is on!  

1 Week to go!!!

TGIF

Ahhhhh Friday!  

I'm so glad the weekend is finally here...

...And so is Carl!

This week hasn't been to abnormal but for some reason it just feels extra good that Friday has arrived!  This weekend, I plan on taking it easy, unlike last weekend and my little adventure to Vermont (see previous post)!  

This past week we decided it was time to break out the Christmas decorations as well as the Christmas music (ok, it may have come out a little earlier than last week...).  Instead of making a night of it like last year, I had the house decorated in about 57 seconds!  I grabbed everything from out of our TV cabinet, (including our pre decorated Christmas tree) and put it on the TV cabinet!  Viola!

This past week was also our annual "Best of the Best" awards nights for work where individuals from each branch get recognized as well as the top branch in the district get recognized.  Each year is a different theme (remember Mickey Mouse outfits from last year?), this year was "Prom".  I went with my old branch and we wore grad dresses with sashes that showed the year we each graduated in! 

  

Me and Julie on the bus ride to the celebrations!

During my last 2 days at my old branch, I spent most hours working on our limo!  I made it all by myself, complete with working head and tail lights!

Unfortunately, even after all my hard work, we didn't win for best costume!  But look who did...

Becky (on the left) and her whole branch went as "zombie prom".  They deserved first place after having to wear all that stuff on their face all night!  Overall, it was a fun night!

And now, it's Friday!  Time to sit back, relax and put my feet up!

Do you like my new slippers?

Road Trip!!!

Since Carl has been spending Saturdays studying and since last weekend was a long weekend, that meant I had 2 days (Friday and Saturday) all by myself!  On Friday, I got all my Saturday things done (like grocery shopping) so that I could go on my own little adventure on Saturday!  I decided I was going to go on a little road trip by myself, I just needed a destination!  So I pulled out a map, closed my eyes and pointed...Well, sort of...Next thing I knew, I was headed to...

 

I thought maybe it was a little far to drive in one day but then again, I did have all day!  I had heard of a few places that were neat to visit in Vermont so I decided to head to Burlington.  I headed to the border and the lady at the crossing asked me "Where ya headed?"

Leah: "Vermont"

Guard: "Why are you going there?"

Leah: "Ummm, just for a drive"

Guard: "Are you meeting someone there?"

Leah: "Nope"

Guard: "Are you going shopping?"

Leah: "Ummm, no"

Guard: "How long are you staying?"

Leah: "I'm not sure, I'll be back today"

Guard: Strange look, long pause..."Have you ever been refused entry to the US?"

Leah: "No???"

After four and a half hours of driving, I finally made it!  By the time I got there, I felt brain dead from driving, felt a little displaced and wasn't sure what to do with myself once I arrived!  Burlington was a little bit bigger than the sleepy town I imagined it to be, so after driving around for a bit, I finally found parking and went to stretch my legs.

    

I found this cool pedestrian street (which I have more appreciation for, being married to an Urban Planner), walked up and down it once and then decided I better get back to Kingston!  I hopped back in the car and spent another four and half hours driving home!  I think the highlight of my drive was seeing a man walking down the street in his black and red checkered flannel jacket holding a big rifle - only in the streets of America!  Oddly enough, I saw the same guy on my drive both to and from Burlington!  Other than that, the scenery wasn't anything to write home about!  As I crossed the border, I got the same weird treatment from another border crossing guard.  Can't a girl just go for a nine hour drive?  I'm glad I got the need for a drive out of my system, I don't think I'll be craving another one for awhile now! 

Mini Adventures

Ok so I'm a little lacking on the photos for this week but not on the news (seeing how it's been 2 weeks since I last posted!).  Let's start with...

Mini Adventure #1...
I mentioned in a previous blog that I had won tickets to the Ottawa Senators vs. Toronto Maple Leafs game in Ottawa for October 30th and due to the lack of pictures I'm sure you guessed it already, we sold the tickets!  It was a last minute decision (and a last minute purchase seeing how the people that bought them, literally picked up the tickets and headed straight to the game!).  We got a nice chunk of change (crazy how much people spend on hockey tickets!) and with our little profit, we have decided to splurge and get Carl a long awaited Canucks Jersey and are hoping to also get some cheap tickets to the Ottawa vs. Canucks game on December 10th in Ottawa!

Mini Adventure #2...
So one night during these past two weeks, we decided to get a little crazy and at 9pm the plan was to head to Wendy's for a frosty!  It took Carl a bit to convince me to go, but once my mouth started to water, I caved in and we ran out the door to the car!  I hopped in and noticed a note on the windshield.  Carl grabbed it and read "Hello, my wife hit your car..."  I promptly hopped out of the car ignoring the rest of the note and sure enough, someone had hit our parked car and left a nice dent above the rear tire on the passenger side.  Figuring it wasn't to bad and there wasn't much we could do about it right away, we hopped back in the car to go get our ice cream, except...The car wouldn't start!  The key wouldn't even turn in the ignition.  We tried jiggling the steering wheel to if it would unlock something but when that didn't work, we figured it was something to do with the alarm going off and the immobilizer being activated.  So much for our spontaneous act of getting ice cream!  After 2 hours of reading manuals, looking stuff up on the internet and trying random things, we figured we would have to resort to getting it towed the following morning!  Luckily I had the next morning off (to study for an exam) and was able to get the car looked after but not after my hero of a husband was finally able to get the car started!  After hours of trying to figure out what was wrong, Carl gave the steering wheel one more good jiggle and viola, the key turned!  Thank goodness we didn't call to have someone come look at it!  The car is now somewhat fixed (needs to go back for one more touch up) and we are so thankful that our neighbors who hit the car were honest and paid for repairs!

Mini Adventure #3...
As mentioned, I had a couple days off to study for an exam for another course I took through the bank.  This gets me one step closer to being a "Senior" Personal Banking Officer (basically just means a bit more money!).  I was happy to hear that I passed with 78%!  Also, I am now in my second week of work at my new branch.  I've figured out my new morning routine and how to catch a bus and am settling in!

Mini Adventure #4...
Carl is feeling the stress of the semester build up. He recently wrote an exam in statistics where he got an A+ (the teacher didn't actually give him the percent).  He figures with the bonus questions in this class, he is likey getting more than 100%, smarty pants!  He was excited today to get his proposal for his Final Report back with the "OK", meaning he can proceed with the topic he has chosen.  On top of classes this and next semester, he is required to write a 50 page report sort of like a thesis.  He is writing about parrots and their migrational patterns and how that relates to transit oriented development (thats what he said when I asked him!).  I think he is actually writing about how to improve accessibility around transit hubs.

Mini Adventure #5...
Ahhh Movember, the dreaded month for anyone that has a husband that decided to partake in the annual moustache growing competition.  Once again Carl started the month strong and I was unpleasantly surprised at the hair that actually grew on Carl's upper lip.  But once again he cut quit early and shaved this morning - he decided he'd rather be able to kiss his wife!  

Fall Scents

Ahhh the smell of fall is in the air...I love stepping out into the early morning and taking that first breath of crisp cool air.  The weather has turned cold and the beautiful leaves are falling to their final resting place.  This week I went to a friends house where she had sweet fall scented candles burning.  To add to the fall scents, we made a delicious pumpkin roll complete with a cream cheese filling!

 

 As our nostrils filled with the sweet aroma, our taste buds yearned for the first bite!  Although it's no professional looking roll, it sure tasted good!  You have to give us credit, it was our first try at making a roll!  

Later on in the week Carl and I decided to carve our pumpkins!

Carl, sticking with the "city plan" theme he started last year,
decided to throw space ships in the mix this year!

I on the other hand, went the simpler route!

 I don't know about you but I love the smell of burning candle's in pumpkins!  I think that the smells of the seasons are one of my favorite parts of the seasons, they seem to bring back familiar memories of seasons past!

Have you carved your pumpkin yet?

No Title: I Can't Think Of One

What a week...It started just like any other week and then Thursday rolled around.  I  knew my community manager was coming to visit our branch that day, what I didn't know was that he was specifically coming to see me!  When he came and sat in my office, I didn't think anything of it, until he closed the door, looked at me and asked, "So Leah, are you up for a challenge?"  In my head I was screaming "Nooooooooooooooooo!" (I have issues with change) but out of my mouth came "absolutely"...Stupid mouth!  Not that it would have mattered what I said, the decision was made, I am being transferred.  The news came as somewhat of a shock as I was told about a month ago that I wouldn't be transferred.  But, as of October 31st I will be working at a branch in downtown Kingston.  I have mixed feelings about the move...I'm sure it will be a fun place to work being right downtown and all but it means that my routine of going to the gym in the morning is going to have to change and instead of a 15 minute walk to work, it will be a 45 minute walk.  If I decide to drive, we'll have to factor parking into our budget and I don't think my raise (if I even get one) will cover the cost of the parking fees!  So needless to say, there are some pro's and con's to this new adventure!  The day after I got this news, and at that point was feeling a tad blue about the decision, something happened that cheered my mood, I won hockey tickets!  We had a raffle at work and I am the lucky winner of 2 tickets to an NHL game in Ottawa where the Ottawa Senators play the Toronto Maple Leafs!  We haven't decided yet as to whether we should go to the game or sell the tickets and use the money to buy Canucks Jerseys!

On Saturday, my work had planned a garage sale to raise funds for United Way.  Although the weather had been nice, on Saturday it decided to turn evil!  We were awake at 5:30am and by 7:30am we had the tents up outside and most of our items out for sale...And getting wet.  By about 9:30am the wind had picked up and was not only tossing our tents around but a lot of our items that we had for sale as well!  By 10:30am everything was back in the branch and we had our garage sale in the lobby!  It was quite the day but it was fun and we raised over $700!  

That evening Carl and I went and saw one of our favorite Vancouver singers at a small venue here in Kingston.  We got there early so we could get good seats and see Dan Mangan up close but as soon as he started playing, all the crazy teenagers ran to the front of the stage, standing right in front of our hand picked seats.  Carl looked at me with a frustrated look, I shook my head in disappointment and thought to myself "you know you're getting old when..."  Although we couldn't see much of the concert, we still enjoyed it! 

At the concert, sporting my new haircut (I got bangs...And now Carl finally understands what bangs are!)

 

Happy Thanksgiving!

Greetings, on this beautiful Thanksgiving day!  In fact, for us Kingstonians, it's not just been a beautiful day but a beautiful weekend with temperatures reaching to the mid twenties!  After the few cold days we've had, this weather has been re-freshing (although it's really throwing off my wardrobe!).  Carl and I could not let a sunny weekend go by without catching some rays so we headed out on Saturday morning for some exploration!  We drove about 30 minutes out of town to a place called Jones Falls, the location of one of the lock systems along the Rideau Canal.  This location was built over 170 years ago and is home to what used to be North America's highest Dam (see picture on right).  Although we've been to several lock stations I never really knew what the lock system was for or how it worked so I found these fun facts interesting...

• The Rideau Canal is North America's oldest operating 19th-century canal. Most of the locks are still cranked open by old-fashioned muscle power.
• The original purpose of the Rideau Canal was to provide a safe supply route between Montreal and the Great Lakes in case of attack by the United States.
• The canal was one of the greatest engineering feats of the 19th century requiring the construction of 24 dams and 46 locks.
• The area was a wilderness when the Canal was built -- despite the northern climate, many of the workers died from malaria in the mosquito-infested swamps.
• At the Ottawa River end of the Canal, head engineer, Lieutenant Colonel John By, founded a community called Bytown. It later changed its name to Ottawa and became the Capital of Canada.
• In the winter, the Ottawa portion of the Canal is made into a gigantic skating rink, the longest in the world.

For more history on the locks, check out http://www.rideau-info.com/canal/history/hist-canal.html

 Originally I wanted to try and go away this weekend, to explore a new area and have a quite relaxing weekend hopefully staying in a B&B or hotel with TV!  We've been without TV for a year now and I must say I do actually kind of miss it.  Unfortunately, we couldn't find a place that was out of town and within our budget so we found a place in town that we could afford!  My friend Julie lives right across the street from us and was away this weekend so I proposed to Carl that we break in to her house, use the BBQ to cook up some steaks and watch a little TV!  He was all for it!  Breaking in wasn't to hard as Julie gave me a key and we got to spend our Saturday night with some TLC...And HGTV and the Discovery Channel... 

On Sunday we headed to Tweed after church to meet up with Great Great Aunt Joanie and Fred.  From there, just like last year we headed to Joanie's kid's cottages.  On our way there last year we had no idea where we were headed.  This year, from all of our explorations we could actually figure out where in Ontario we were!  We saw a lot of familiar faces from last year and a whole bunch of new faces!  There ended up being about 45 people over for dinner!  And just before the feast, we all gathered inside the little cottage to say grace, holding hands to pray, we encircled the entire cottage!  

And lastly, I will leave you with some colorful fall photos!

These are the trees right outside our window!

A view at Jones Falls

Leah and Carl

 

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!

Food For Thought (too cliche?)

So lately Carl and I have been doing really well with meal planning.  Usually one of us will sit down on the weekend and try and plan out at least four meals that we will have during the following week and then write out the grocery list.  It saves us the stress of thinking everyday "what are we gonna make for dinner?" and it usually ends up saving us a few extra little trips to the grocery store!  Since I learned on Dr.Oz last week that Yam's (aka. Sweet Potatoes) are really good for you, we've incorporated them into our diet by having hamburgers...With yam fries!  Who knew that making yam fries could be so easy?!  We've also managed to concoct our own chiptole aioli, yum!  This has happened to be such a hit with our stomachs that we may have had it twice in the past week...
In other food news, Carl went out with the guys on Saturday night so I decided to make good use of my time and some fruit!  I baked some scrumptious banana muffins and used some of our apple's from last week's apple picking adventure to make an apple crisp!  So yummy when warmed and served with ice cream!  I think I may have to spend some extra time at the gym this week! 
And while we're on the topic of food...On Sunday morning we went to church as per usual.  For most of you church goers you'll know that a lot of churches encourage you to say hello to people haven't met before or haven't seen in church before.  I always find this a little uncomfortable and have to admit that I normally stick to talking to my usual group of friends.  This Sunday, when church had just ended, the girl sitting in front of us turned around and introduced herself and we some small talk.  Then she just invited us over lunch!  I was a little surprised and to be honest my gut reaction was to say the usual "oh that sounds nice but..." and then make up an excuse as to why we couldn't go.  But Carl was quicker than me to reply and the next thing I knew we were walking with 2 complete strangers over to one of their houses for lunch!  The girl that invited us over had never met any of the 3 of us that she had over until that morning.  It actually ended up being really fun and made me kind of think twice about being able to reach out and talk to strangers.  I wonder if I can break out of my shell and invite someone new over to my house for lunch one Sunday...

Garden of Eattin'

Ahhhhh, a weekend at home in Kingston!  Got up early on Saturday morning, wrote my little blog with coffee in hand and then spent the morning baking lemon squares and ginger snaps for a bake sale at work!  At three, it was off to the orchard for our first apple picking experience!  We met up with a few friends from church and headed about twenty minutes out of town to Waddell's Orchard Farm!  We checked out some McIntosh, Macoun, Cortland and Empire apples!  I was completely unaware of what the difference between the apples were so I said, "Carl, let's just take a small bite of each apple and see which one we like!"  Carl thought for a second and then reached for the perfect looking apple...

Just as he was about to take his first bite of the tasty apple, a look of fear flashed across his face!  He dropped the apple at once, shaking his head and then he looked up at me and said"It's your instinct isn't it?  It's ingrained in you?!"  At first I had no idea what he was talking about it and then I remembered!  I just had to remind Carl that we weren't Adam and Eve!...He still wouldn't eat the apple!

The Apple of my Eye

Just having a great ol' time!

 After our apple picking adventure, we went home and spent a quiet evening at home!  The following morning we headed to church and afterwards received a phone call from our friends Kris and Kellie!  They were wondering if we would like to...Go Apple Picking!!!  Seeing how half of a Starbucks bag full of apples cost us $2, we figured we could afford a few more!  So, off to the apple orchard we went again!

The weather was so gorgeous on Sunday that we decided to head downtown after apple picking!  We grabbed a gelato on the waterfront and ended up running into some other friends Matt and Andy.  They just happened to be heading out onto the water on their sailboat and asked if we'd like to go for a spin!  We of course said yes!  It was beautiful!!!  That night Carl and I made hamburgers for dinner and experimented with making homemade yam fries!  Yum!  Now I just need to figure out what to do with all these apples!!!

Falling Off the Blog Wagon

I think my routine has been disturbed. I used to try and get my blog done by Tuesday or Wednesday of each week but lately I've been missing all my deadlines! Carl keeps telling me that in order to be a successful blogger I need to write often or my readers will lose interest (he's been reading to many leadership books)! But I do apologize to all my followers :) Speaking of routine, it has indeed changed around the Funk house. We have both finally gotten into a work-out routine again (it only took a year!). We are both up at 6am and I am off to the the YMCA (which I walk or ride my bike to on my way to work) and Carl either goes for a run or heads to the school gym. I am already wondering how this is going to work in the winter...Wake up 30 min earlier, bundle up in long underwear, wool socks, sweats, snow boots, a sweater, a scarf, a toque, mitts, walk 7 minutes to the YMCA, unbundle, work out, shower, re-bundle and walk another 7 minutes to work, unbundle, put on work clothes...I might need a bigger backpack...Guess we'll see what happens!

Although I am dreading the cold weather and shudder inside when I see another leaf fall off the tree in front of our place, we are still getting to enjoy some warmer weather, just with a slightly cool breeze.

As for adventures, last weekend was the annual Kingston fair so for the second year in a row I called up my girl friends and we headed to the Demolition Derby! What a better way to spend a Sunday afternoon than watching cars smash into each other until they look like this!

It Feels Like Fall!

Not only is the weather getting cooler and the trees starting to turn colour but Carl and I are sitting in Starbucks on a Friday night instead of preparing for another weekend away - Summer must be over! It's our first weekend home together in what feels like a long time! This past week concluded all of our summer plans! As you read in the last couple blogs, my parents were here visiting for a few weeks. My Dad flew out on a Saturday and my mom and I flew home the following Thursday. I had planned to come home for a friends wedding and actually ended up getting to see a lot more people than I thought (which was awesome)! It actually felt weird to be home! On my first night home I went to meet up with some family and friends and actually had to think of how to get to where I was going (which is not normal for me in Langley!). I must say, and I know I'll get a lot of flack for saying this but I do prefer Kingston over the lower mainland...In Kingston, it takes us no more than 15 minutes to get to downtown, to get to all of our friends, to get to the grocery store, to get to the water and that's on a bike! At home, I was driving from Aldergrove, to Surrey to Vancouver to Langley - ugggggh! So this is what I propose- all of you need to move to Kingston! Family and friends is the only reason we're coming back (in less than a year, I might add!) so why don't you guys just move here?! Carl's only request is that you also bring the mountains with you. I think it's a good idea...Anyways, my visit at home though short, was sweet. I, for some strange reason didn't take too many pictures so here are a select few...

At Diem's wedding: Ben, Christine, Reuben, Tiffany, Melanie and Markus

All of us with the bride and groom, Diem and Joe. Next time I won't get the drunk girl to take the picture...

And us again, missing the bride and groom but taken by a sober person!

One of the highlights of the beautiful wedding, the Photo Booth!

During my visit, I got to spend time with both friends...

Me and Laura

...And family!

...And of course, my pups :)

Bart, Bailey and Brier

And while I was out socializing, Carl was back at home working hard! He was headed off to Ottawa with 2 other couples to compete in his first Olympic triathlon!

I asked Carl what he would like me to say about the triathlon and he said "write that I was happy to finish, despite losing to people twice my size and twice my age!"....Yeeeeah, he said it was a lot tougher than he expected! But he finished and is motivated to keep on training!

Meg, Kellie and Carl

Carl picked me up from the airport on Tuesday and it was back to work Wednesday! Carl finished his internship on his birthday, August 26th and has had a couple weeks to relax before school starts on Monday! Like I mentioned, it's already starting to get cooler here which is making me a little nervous for the winter! We actually just got our car prepped for winter with rust protection! Summer just went by way to quickly! Hard to believe we have been here for a year already and have less than that until we are home for good!