Fully Alive…Ready to Smile

That’s what Michael Buble does to a soul…makes them feel REAL good! We just got back, it’s 11:58 and I have to say, what an amazing experience. Yes, an experience. That’s the only way to describe his concert. It was so fabulous. The man is hilarious. He’s so freakin’ funny my cheeks hurt from laughing so hard. It’s been very cold here and one of the first things he said when he got on the stage was (very seriously), “I’d like us all to bow our heads for a moment of silence as we remember all those poor souls who froze to death on their way here from their parking spots!” And then he laughs. He’s so cute, he laughs all the time because he knows he’s funny.

But I’m getting ahead of myself like usual. We went to the concert with 3 other couples (who happen to be not only some of our dearest friends, but also our family), Kevin and Charmaign, Clint and Elin and Darrell and Kathy. We started out having supper together (Darrell and Kathy met us at the concert) at Moxie’s. I must interject here that I tried salmon for the first time (I didn’t order it, but tried some of Clint’s). I don’t do seafood, but I thought since my goal was to start breaking out of my mold I’d be brave and try something new. But I digress. On the way from the restaurant to the concert I said to Jer that we should take a picture of ourselves. So I proceeded to take a nice self-portrait of us. After reviewing the picture I said he looked kind of squinty, could we take another one.

This is the second result…

I don’t know your thoughts on it, but I think squinting is definitely preferable!!!

Anyway, when you go to a concert it’s always a surprise as to who’s going to open for the main act (unless you knew ahead of time who the opening act is, then it’s not a surprise, but we didn’t know, so it was) and once again we were not disappointed. Naturally 7 opened for Michael and I have to say I enjoyed them just as much as Michael. In a different sort of way. You can’t compare apples to oranges, so I feel no guilt what-so-ever in saying I liked them equally. Okay…maybe a smidge. Kind of reminiscent of the guilt that I had saying I was going to wear my “Josh Shoes” to Michael…which I didn’t by the way, it was far too cold, so I wore boots, which have now been dubbed “Bubbly Boots” by my husband. I know, I know, he’s weird…what? I am too? I know, two peas in a pod, that’s us. Anyway, where was I? Oh, yes, Naturally 7…

This bunch of boys is supremely talented. They do what is called “vocal play”. It’s similar to acapella in the way that there is no instruments, but the difference is that they ARE the instruments. They imitate all the different instruments in a band so well that you cannot tell that there are actually NO instruments accompanying them. Impressive, no? I thought so. I was completely blown away. I urge you to go look them up on YouTube…or you can just watch this, aren’t I nice? I’ve done the work for you. You must remember when watching their videos, that every single sound, I repeat EVERY single sound is made by them. It’s awesome.

On to Michael…ah, Michael…he.is.da.BOMB!!! Seriously. And he’s Canadian. 100% pure Canadian goodness. It may be cold up here, but we got some hotness going on! (besides me, of course) I don’t even know where to begin to tell you all the funny things he did. Some highlights for me were: some random girl screamed “I love you Michael” and he screamed back “I love you too, stranger in the darkness!” or when he sang 4 of my favorite songs all in a row…”Lost,” “Feelin’ Good,” “Home,” and “Everything” and then he starts ranting about how mushy it’s getting and that it’s got to stop. That he’s going to bring some manliness back to the show and he gets all the guys hyped up and yelling and then he starts singing “YMCA!” Too funny. Or when he said that Naturally 7 wanted him to be in their group because he had the right look and the right moves and then he proceeded to demonstrate why he should be in the group by putting his finger in his mouth and making a popping noise on his cheek and some random farting noises. Or when he was in the middle of one of his songs and he started beat-boxing…I just about peed my self on more than one occasion. I said I was probably going to cry at some point, I just didn’t realize it would be from laughing until my sides hurt! Ah…

And as for his singing performance. I can’t begin to tell you how good he is. He is a natural. He is the ultimate performer and entertainer. He is so freakin’ talented that even if he had no stage presence at all he’d still be fabulous (not to mention he is not hard on the eyes…I’m just sayin’)

Here was our view from row 19…moments like these when I wish my camea had a real zoom and it’s kind of fuzzy because I turned the flash off (Louise has better pictures because she was closer and has a nicer camera!).

And here’s a relatively nice picture of Jer and I (he behaved himself this time)…

And what could end the evening off better than an Iced Cappuccino from Timmy’s. Yes, even on the coldest day of the year, it’s still good.

Why you sit back and enjoy the ride. After all isn’t the old adage true that says something about how it’s not the final destination that’s the important thing but the journey that gets you to that end result? I’ve learned in the last week that there are lots of things that are out of my control…which is a very confusing thing for someone who likes to maintain a good grip on the reins. “What do you mean we can’t pour the basement on Friday? Wasn’t that the plan?” or “Is that water leaking through our drywall?” or “We can’t put our casings up until the basement is poured and now we can’t pour the basement till Tuesday so that’s going to put the painting on hold for another week which screws up the WHOLE schedule!! WHAT???!!!”

There were some tense and not so shiny moments for me this week. Finally I sat myself down (oh, yes, I said “Erin, sit, we need to have a chat”) and I said to myself, “Self, this is beyond even you. Now you can choose to sress yourself out and blame your dear husband for scheduling errors that are honest mistakes, or you can sit back and remember that you have a roof over your head and no deadline except that which you’ve chosen to set for yourself in your head. This is fun, remember? FUN with a capital F! We LIKE this. Now instead of having to rush through the painting in a week or two we can draw it out and REALLY enjoy the experience. Don’t roll your eyes at me…at yourself…whatever. What’s an extra couple weeks? In the end it still isn’t very far from being done and you knew this would happen so don’t act all surprised and annoyed. Just buck up and roll with the punches.”

Wasn’t that a great pep talk? I thought so. It worked, too, because me, myself and I are on much better terms now. No grumpy conversations going on in this here head. Back to singing and dancing and happy little bubbles of love.

Sometimes we just can’t have what we want when we want it. It doesn’t matter how much we want it or how much we think about it over and over. How many nights we lay there thinking “what if” or “If I just did this, then…” This is where faith, fortitude and patience come in. Mostly we just have to trust and obey. The rest will fall into place when the timing is right. And sometimes we just don’t get what we want. That’s when we have to trust that God’s plan is bigger and better and that he can see the future which is far brighter than the dreams and futures we build in our heads. Then you can look back and realize that hindsight really is 20/20 and that there’s that great big “AHA!” waiting for you at the end.

If nothing else, you learn how to deal with the little things life throws you with a bit of finesse and grace.

I almost forget how to do this already.  That’s a very scary thought.  I feel like I’m slowly falling off the face of the internet…so I thought I’d pop up for a quick hello and a what’s happenin’!

I’m upto my eyebrows in drywall dust and paint, literally (I’m thinking of going white, what do you all think?).  This was after I finished sweeping off all the walls in the house before I could start priming.

(click on all pictures to make bigger…if you care to)

I’m currently 2 rooms away from being finished the primer.  That is about 16 hours of painting under my belt already and I still have 2 coats left…oh, yeah.  Good thing I LOVE painting.  Very good thing.  That new mp3 player has been coming in very handy to ward off the lonliness…and every so often someone will pop in to visit for a few minutes, usually well timed.

Doesn’t that primer look nice…one step closer to being livable.

Here’s the view out our living room and dining room that was absolutely brilliant the day I was painting in there.  At times the glare was almost blinding off the very slick snow and ice.

We’ve only had one minor (which could have been major) mishap.  On Wednesday night last week we had a wicked wind storm and it blew about 3 bundles worth of shingles off our roof.  Thank goodness that’s all.  So today my brothers came and fixed it and we’re okay.

My girlies were both sick this weekend.  They are slowly recovering.  So I spent most of the weekend at home with them.  But yesterday I did go to the house for a couple of hours to help Jer with prepping our basement…shovelling gravel.  Me…shovelling gravel.  That almost deserves a “LOL,”  but I have discovered I’m quite handy and that as girly as I can be, I know how to bust my butt when needed (I also learned how to put poly up on a wall over the insulation).

(Here’s my girlies having fun at the Children’s Museum last weekend.)

A HUGE highlight for me last week was when I went to the mail when I was taking a break from painting and there was a package for me.  Now I LOVE packages.  Especially when they sent from my Val!!!  It was my Christmas/”thank you for visiting me” gift.  It was the most thoughtful gift ever.  I sat on the floor of our house in the middle of all my painting supplies opening it.  With every item I pulled out of the box and every thoughtful little note written by her I got more and more teary eyed until I was finally just all out crying.  I could tell that every thing that went into the box was put there with love and sweet thoughts and it made me feel so incredibly special.  She even put a cd in with all my pictures from the photo shoot she did with me.  There are so many lovely shots in there.  I’ve been adding pictures to the link on the sidebar of my blog as I get them emailed from her, but here are a couple that I just got and I LOVE!!!   

Hope everyone has had a good start to the new year!  I CAN’T WAIT to catch up on all my blog reading.  I feel so out of the loop and it’s rather lonely.  I miss you all terribly and I look forward to reconnecting.