I've Returned

Well it seems I've been very absent from the blogging world but I'm back. I guess the allure of facebook with all of its speed pulled me away for a week months. Or rather, seasons. But the need to journal always come back eventually and here we are. I won't even bother to document everything that has happened since the last entry but will instead highlight a few great events.

There were weddings, babies, camps and parties!

The lovely Elise Michalski got married to Fred in the Spring in a lovely service at Glad Tidings followed by a reception at the Faculty Club at UVIC. I was fortunate to be asked to make their wedding cake; a Red Velvet Cake as it was the same cake Elise and her Dad would get every year on their shared birthdays.

Then in August Chelsea McQuade, a friend of several years thanks to teen camp - and a fantastic young, vibrant woman of God, married her prince, Johnny Sugrue. The wedding was beautiful at a quaint church in Brentwood Bay, followed by a vintage-themed reception at the Fireside Grill. I don't think I have ever had a friend who thought and planned any more for her wedding than this girl. She was organized! Every detail was taken care of including the vintage themed table at the reception with the vintage scrapbook she created for her guest book, and the gorgeous small wooden chest used to hold all of those precious money envelopes! The name place-cards were even little birds nests! I made this wedding cake too - a four-tiered ivory chocolate raspberry cake with Callebaut Chocolate Ganache and matching cupcakes that were presented in these gorgeous cupcake liners she bought online.

July each year brings camp and this year we had one at kids camp and one at pre-teen. PRE-TEEN???? SERIOUSLY??? But yes, at Nanoose Bay Camp if you're ten you go to pre-teen. Fortunately Zachary loved it and Brooklyn equally had a blast at kids camp where the speaker was none other than our last kids pastor, Caroline Bergeron. Teen Camp this year was a huge success, very few issues and overall extremely smooth. If you haven't yet seen our Katy Perry Hot 'n Cold video go to youtube.com and type in Nanoose Bay Camp hot n cold. I don't think you will be disappointed ;)
Then August brought possibly the funniest reason for a party we have ever had. One morning Darrell woke up to tell me about the dream he had. He dreamt we had a massive BBQ in our backyard, that he rented tents and tables and a huge industrial grill from his work and with a live band playing on our sundeck. So guess what? That's exactly what we did ! The band consisted of 3 of my friends who used to play in the old blues band I was in, Soul Commotion, along with my friends Luke & Park who I play with at church.
It was AWESOME~ they did two sets of about a half an hour each, maybe even 40 minute and everyone loved it! Brooklyn and I counted - we had exactly EIGHTY PEOPLE ! Which included 20 children who I have to say were behaved amazingly well. They all just looked after each other and the whole thing went like a dream. Darrell made homemade hamburgers and then everyone just brought something to share. So we had lots of food - and we even invited the neighbours - partly as a gesture of friendly neighbourness, and partly to prevent any noise complaints. We had six neighbours come and they had a great time! I was really happy about that because I remember as a kid our neighbourhood being much more of a community than I have experienced in Canada and I feel like sometimes people miss that sense of local community when they don't know the people who live on their own street. So yes, big success.
Well that will mostly catch you up. Throw in a couple of long weekends in Kelowna at Anna's house - one for baseball and one for a family sibling reunion along with my Mum - and that is pretty much our summer in a nutshell. And we're still enjoying summer as the weather has been gorgeous. Fall has started off well :)