Life after imac death

It's a bit of a struggle, but I know there could be worse things then not having our computer. I'm using mom's macbook in the interim. I'm not used to a laptop so everything is a little bit harder. 

I started a little photography class on Friday but of course without the comfort of my own computer, it's been hard to get into it. 

I'm documenting how we count down to Christmas, our advent. This year I decided to forgo the inexpensive licensed boxes of waxy 'chocolate' and make my own advent calendar.

 It took a lot longer than I had hoped. Cutting the boxes was a bit time consuming even with the Cricut doing the majority of the work. Adding the ribbon was piddly and Kerry helped with that.
They are full of Hershey's kisses, and Reese's Peanut Butter mini cups. 3 of each. Kerry needs his daily chocolate too.
I have them hanging from twill tape tied to bull dog clips on our Ikea shelves. I'm sure I will come home one day and find them dangling from one clip, with dog slobber on them. But then again, I have faith in my dogs. I believe they never get on that couch, but always on the other so they can look out the window. I believe they won't even notice that the boxes are within their reach.

It's Christmas time, time for believing!
I also believe the mac guy at London Drugs will find and save Emily's Disneyland pictures and videos!

Public service notice of the week: BACK IT UP, Baby! All the time. Don't wait and do it later. Do it now. No one ever said "I wish I hadn't backed up today!"

21st Century Phones

My new toy.
It's pink but it has a black protective colour so you really can't tell that it's pink. Now Kerry can use it, but he doesn't have to because, drum roll please... He has his own phone too. With his own phone number.
We've always just had a basic phone. For emergencies like calling home to ask what is on the grocery list, or to find out when someone is coming home. So that's what Kerry has now, a basic phone. And I have this one that needs a 894 page instruction manual to tell you how to answer it. Might just be me.  Now I can text (which I've done with Dad and Shaun), instant message, get messages, and access the internet. It's way more than I need. But I have to tell you that even though my scrap room is off the computer room, I'm pretty stoked about having the phone right beside me so I can see whatever it is that I'm looking at on the internet. And I can facebook while standing in line at the grocery store. That is what everyone needs!


Update: Our 8 month old iMac kicked the bucket today. I am not a happy camper.

Thanks to Michelle for helping me pick out phones!  If you need help in the camera/phone department, go see her at London Drugs.

Trip Continued.

Life is doing a very good job in interrupting with my trip blogging.

 I long for the days when we could roll up to a sign in our van and after telling that sign what we wanted to eat, a woman on roller skates would bring our food.

 It came in my favourite shape! Tot shape! And the cherry limeade chiller was so yummy.

 I long for the days when you could wear your costume to Disneyland and see people like Asian Baby Elvis. He was so cute, it's hard to tell but he was bustin' a move for us.

 I also long for the days when we cold ride Big Thunder Mountain anytime we wanted with Dorothy and the Tin Man.

A Nightmare Before Christmas wedding

I love that Amy and David went with their hearts and did their own thing when it came to picking a theme for their wedding.  Not many people do that.

I took these pictures as a guest, not as their photographer.

Every detail was planned out by Amy. She's a wedding planner.

 Every detail except the fire engine driving by at this time with sirens blaring.

 Check out the officiant. He's their friend, he's the local Jack Sparrow impersonator. He's bang on!

 First dance, awwww.....

 We had such a nice time and were so honoured to be invited to share their special day.

And speaking of special...

It was totally by accident that I caught this moment between brothers.

I'm in the process of adding a bazillion photos to my smugmug gallery, the link is on the right side, near the top of this page. There's trip photos, wedding photos and M family's photos.

A quick sneak

I'm so glad I made time to fit this cute family in for a photoshoot this weekend. The weather co-operated!  L didn't want his picture taken at first, but after awhile he kind of warmed up to the idea, it didn't really help that the sucker was peppermint but he was a good sport about it. K was having none of it but I think we did okay despite the fact he didn't want to look at me. You may remember him from his newborn shoot.
Thanks little Minck family!

7days

It's been a week since we got home.

I've noticed a few things.

1. There's no dog hair in Disneyland. I knew we had lots with the addition of Linus, but holy dust bunnies, Batman! I can't understand why that dog isn't bald with all the hair he drops.

2. My scheduling assistant didn't do a very good job. She scheduled back to back classes this weekend, usually if I have one Saturday, I don't have one Sunday. But there's been a huge demand for homemade Christmas card classes this year.

3. Going away for 2 weeks to a sunny location doesn't change the calendar. Time still moves, Christmas still comes at the same time, only faster because you spent 2 weeks with your head up Disney's sunny butt to notice. And now you are panicking to adjust to the fact Christmas is 4 paydays away.

4. This is from Amy. It's me on California Screamin' where I was convinced I broke my neck. My mom asked why everyone else looked happy and like they were having fun, I said because I think I'm dying. I think Andrea beside me spent most of the ride watching me and laughing at me. Glad to be amusement for someone. Andrea's a hoot! 

5. So not only did I schedule two classes, I am going to do a family shoot for Baby K's family tomorrow, weather permitting.  I'm off in a few minutes to support Heather, Mom, Kathy, Amanda and fellow crafters at the Lutheran Church craft sale. We have a UFC night tonight, a birthday party, and I'm sure some things I'm forgetting. What am I getting at?

I need a vacation!

a movie screening

We went to see my cousin's movie last night. It's about our family, being Japanese, and how everyone in my mom's generation married non-Japanese, inter-racial. I think he said it will eventually be on PBS, the Knowledge Network and something else, don't quote me on that.  The screening was the longer 80 minute version, both that and the shorter 48 minute version are on the disk we were given.
It was hard to see grandpa in the movie, mom brought him to the screening, and he's deteriorating so fast. I'm very thankful for the video some of my relatives took and for all the pictures they took. Jeff used these in his movie and it was so neat to see grandma again.  And it reminded me of why I take so many pictures (it's not just because I'm Japanese) and why I scrapbook. It also made me want a video camera.
Even though we declined to be interviewed for the movie, we were still in it. In one part, Emily is drawing our family, I took the still shots of her doing it and both of us got paid and our names are in the credits. Which is totally neat to see. Afterwards, Emily got approached by Ken, he owns the local Japanese specialty store. He wants her to come to the sister city event he plans and for her to draw at a table for a few hours. She's so shy, but I hope she does it.  Jeff gave family members a copy of the movie, and he gave Emily her own copy and she didn't want it, said she could share our copy. But we made her take it. After the movie she was very happy she had her own copy. She was also very embarrassed because so many people came up and told her how great her artwork was.
We took Kerry's mom. Part way through the movie she says "I feel so bad", she was referring to the way  the Japanese Canadians were treated during and after the war. I told her she didn't do it and shouldn't feel bad.  She knew 3 families that lost every thing during the internment.  She's going to tell her friends to go tonight to the screening, and she thanked us so much for taking her.
Overall, I was pleasantly surprised by the movie. I learned a bit, laughed at a lot, we're a strange family, and remembered a lot more.

On the way

We planned on stopping in at LA Ink to check it out and Dad watches the show so we thought it would be neat to get some pictures. Sadly the website said they opened an hour earlier than they actually do so we just took pictures out back and of the front.

It's a good thing it was closed, we'd probably have gotten new tattoos.
The fact the shop wasn't open, made us realized California works on a different time schedule than we are used to. The next 2 stores we went to weren't open on Tuesdays, the Harley stores weren't open on Mondays, most places opened after 10. When you are up at 6 this makes for a long day of disappointments. Add to that the sad state of their Michaels, Joann's and scrapbooking stores and one of us was getting a bit grumpy!

Warning...

2 weeks of no internet and no blogging makes for lots of blogging now. You've been warned. I started with 2600 photos, I took pictures of every single thing. I've whittled that amount down do about 1500. I will not blog all of those pictures but I will put them in a smugmug gallery maybe later this week.

Where to start?  Let's start 3 years ago. We took our first family vacation and went for 1 week to Disneyland. We were bitten by the bug. We loved every minute of it, except the walking back to our hotel at the end of the day. When we got back, I somehow stumbled on to Amy's Disney blog. She loved Disneyland, and she scrapbooked. David has a Subaru, Kerry wants one. We began emailing and chatting on-line. One thing led to another and we decided we were going back to Disneyland and we were going to meet Amy, David and Trevor. They invited us to their wedding. We were going to fly, but then in my great wisdom, I said "why don't we just drive all the way there?" Kerry's always wanted to drive the Oregon coast so that's what we planned on doing.

Oh, but wait! We watch a disgusting amount of the Food Network's Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives, why not make a list of the ones on the way and hit them.  So the plans were made, the maps printed out, the tickets purchased, half the hotels booked (we decided to play it loose on the way home), and we headed out on Sunday, Oct. 24th, bright and early. Really, it was dark, pitch black and early.

 There was no line-up at the border, we did get a bit of a hassle about taking Emily out of school for 2 weeks. We drove to Portland. It's beautiful there. We ate at the first of 3 triple D recommendations. Podnah's, as in 'partner's'. We had brisket, it was good, but mine is better. T-shirts were purchased and some very full Williamses hit the road again.
We took the I-5 down, this is the fastest, most boringest road in the history of roads I have been on. 13 naps a day because I was dying of boredom. We took turns driving, I drove for about 1 hour when we entered California, I needed a nap about 45 min. after I started driving. Kerry drove for 99,999 km.

 We stayed in Eugene, and then again in Bakersfield.
We stopped in Sacramento at the Squeeze Inn for their famous 'cheese skirt burgers'.

I had a beef taco. This place was worth the drive! Deliciously clogged arteries!

No t-shirts were purchased, they only had Kerry's size in pink. 

We made it to our hotel in Anaheim, strategically chosen for it's close proximity to Disneyland. Definitely worth the extra cost. Amy, David, and Trevor met us there. It was so awesome to meet them in  person. We don't make a habit of meeting strangers from the internet, but we felt like we'd known them for years. Oh, did I mention Mickey's Halloween party was a costume party?  Kerry went as Waldo, from Where's Waldo and was a huge hit with other party goers. Emily and I made her Pikachu costume. Amy was Dorothy and David was the tin man, and Trevor was a SWAT guy. I was a witch.

Not only did we find Waldo but we saw Baby Elvis too!

The park had the best decorations, as always!

 The park is decorated especially for Halloween and for the party. Dry ice made it eery and trick or treating at the park was a special 'treat'.

 The parade was neat to see, but the best part...

The special Halloween fireworks!  I think that's Amy taping them with her phone.

That sums up our first few days of our trip.  Things to come...Universal Studios, Seaworld, brave people on scary rides, a wedding, a drive on the beach, and much more.

HOME!!!

We had the best time ever on our trip. I will blog with pictures for a long time to come. As much fun as we had, it's nice to be home.
I have 2600 photos to sort through. I took pictures of everything.
Highlights...
-meeting Amy, David and Trevor in real life after almost 3 yrs. of on-line chatting and going to Amy and David's wedding.
-eating at a few Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives.
-going on rides I was too scared to go on last time.

Lows...
-driving in LA.
-finding out Guy Fierri doesn't have standards as high as ours.
-going on rides I was too scared to go on last time and realizing I had every right to be too scared.


Here we are, un-edited, leaving the park on the last day.

I must get back to unpacking. Apparently we nickelled and dimed ourselves into spending over $1500 on who knows what. And we didn't think it was that bad until the border crossing lady asked what the most expensive item we bought was and Kerry said his DC hoodie at about $70. The lady asked if we bought a tv, a computer or any electronics and we hadn't. She looked at us like we were crazy. But she let us through without any hassle after she declared we'd spent too much on alcohol.