Surrey to Edmonton

I have successfully completed the longest non-stop drive of my entire life. Today I drove 12.5 hours from Surrey to Edmonton. And I went alone. I know, lots of people have done it, but it was a big thing to me. I'd never driven more than 4 hours straight until today! And I feel that I've learned a few valuable things today that might be beneficial/amusing to know about long solo road trips:

There are awesome leg stretches you can do while driving.
You'll eventually talk to yourself. And it's actually kind of comforting.
You start to feel really sorry for the bugs hitting your windshield (and categorizing the sizes of the "splats" as they happen)
Calculating your average speed per hour is ridiculously addictive. And if you're anything like me, you end up working out goals to beat (ex. to average 110 km per hour by 3:oopm) or taking VERY short rest stops so as not to mess up your timings too badly...and so you don't get to far behind all those slow cars you just spent the last hour trying to pass, and who now will be in front of you again...drat.
It becomes entertaining to open the window while you're driving and try to see what kind of effect sticking different lengths of your arm out the window at different angles has on the aerodynamicy of your vehicle.

That's all, really. The day was actually quite entertaining. The Rockies are so beautiful; every time I see them, they blow me away. God truly is an artist. Seeing the sun hitting the peaks of those mountains and the beautiful lakes and trees just screams his name. So cool.
But I am very happy that my driving is done for the day.

Little thing: my dad made me breakfast for the road... at 5am

Blogging eh?

So I've begun a blog. Obviously you've figured that out by now, as you've found it. I was really just sort of reminding myself. I had always thought I wouldn't start one because a) i thought that bloggers spent too much time updating and writing and b) the blogs of people I would possibly enjoy keeping up with are never updated. Perhaps that's because they are actually out living. I know it is an overly cynical opinion. But I see a blog now as a great way to keep family and friends even if only somewhat in the loop of what's going on in my life, particularly with this moving across the country thing. That, and I'm not really one for mass email updates.

Having let my past cynicism about blogs come out already, I now feel truly hypocritical saying that I am not sure I will be much more committed to blogging than those whose bi-annually updated blogs that caused my irritation. I guess life just happens, despite our best intentions.

Tomorrow is my LAST DAY in beautiful British Columbia. Early Thursday morning, I'll hop in the van with a good amount of my earthly belongings, and begin the nearly 2 week adventure across our fair country, starting off the trip hanging out with my bestie in Edmonton for a few days :) It's like heading off to university again...just more foreign. For the first time since I was 5, September does not mean the start of school. I can't even really imagine it...

Another chapter is about to begin. Corny line, I know. But I tend to write what comes to mind, and very rarely erase it. I figure, it'd come out if I were talking to you, I might as well just let the words out as they come.

I really am so excited to see what God's got up his sleeve for me this year. I have that familiar feeling in the pit of my stomach. The one that makes me feel nauseous at what's approaching, but which I have also traced back throughout my life and noticed a pattern. This feeling surfaces when I realize I'm in over my head. And it's been in those times that God's done truly amazing things when I quit trying to pretend I know everything. At this point, what's going through my head is 'yep I'm scared, sweet, that means it's gonna be awesome.'


little thing: played frisbee in the backyard with my opa