Nikki and The Leap of Faith

I'm not exactly sure what led to my niece Nikki bungee jumping at West Edmonton Mall.

• Did her boyfriend Luke really want to bungee jump and convinced her that she wanted to as well?
• Did Nikki have a few too many 'pops' one night and started talking brave and then eventually had to back it up?
• Did her brother Matt arrange it all as some form of shaming, thinking that she wouldn't go through with it?
• Did Nikki not get the coward of heights gene that her Uncle Stuart has?

Whatever the reasoning, it was something that my sister Monica and I had to witness.

Nikki and Luke getting ready for their tandem jump.

 View of the platform over the wave pool at West Edmonton Mall.

 Looking out over the wave pool.

The jump (sorry on the poor quality footage).

One thing I always wondered was how they got the jumpers off the cord. It turns out that once the jump is done they give them slack at the top and the jumper has a rope that they pull themselves to the ledge with. Luke did all the work. Good man!

Nice work Nikki - You're way ahead of me on the non coward list.

Christina's First Day of School

Christina scared of stagnation decided to take a University of Alberta course this semester for personal development (insert puberty joke here).  As the class is downtown I thought it would be nice to make her supper in between work and her first day back at school.

After supper, in honor of Monica's tradition I took a picture of her outside my apartment building near my address sign. She's getting so tall...

Here is little Christina on her first day of school.

If you click on the picture you should be able to see the lunch/snack I made for her. I made sure to give her some veggies and some cookies to trade with to make friends.

Saskatoon Christmas - Part 3

Christmas for me is all about hanging out and having fun with the family over the holidays.

Liam is addicted to playing mini-foosball. I take the opportunity to beat him now before he inevitably destroys me when he's older.

 My fashion statement outfit for winter sledding.

 A whole gang of us went out sledding by Forest Grove school.

 We tried to make Ren and Claire walk back up the hill every once in awhile. That was our plan to tire them out so we wouldn't have to stay on the hill all day.

 Of course, it wasn't just the small kids having fun. All the big kids got into the action as well.

 Liam was really ripping and I caught him catching a little bit of air off a jump.

 Liam talked a big game but Christina crushed him in a race down the hill.

On boxing day Randy got back from the lake and we all went bowling. Liam had some difficulty with 10 pin bowling but excelled at 5 pin.

Amelia was a remarkably good bowler. The first game of the night she broke 100 points in 10 pin and got about 2 or 3 strikes. I'm still amazed at how she could huck that heavy ball down the lane.

 Lawrence the only lefty of the group never disappoints.

 As you can see, Amelia gets her fine form from her father Randy.

 I really like this "Something About Mary" hair gel picture of Christina as she gets windswept by the blower.

And in case you were wondering, I had the high score in both 5 and 10 pin bowling. As the great philosopher Bryan Possberg once said "You don't bowl to lose".

And that was Christmas 2010.

Saskatoon Christmas - Part 2

I spent Christmas 2010 in Saskatoon this year and had a blast hanging out with family and friends. Thankfully the weather was excellent so I got some quality time outside.

Skateshack at the Bez! Free skate borrowing services on site!

Skating at the Bez is a Saskatoon classic and is easily my favorite outdoor rink.

Walking in the Meewasin Valley. Note: Christina forgot her tuque and was forced to wear my Roughriders headgear. She has never looked better.

Christina wanted to check out the bridge the the cross country skiers use. I captured her running back towards me and converted the pictures into a GIF.

Another great Christmas activity in Saskatoon is visiting the Western Development Museum. They dress up the main area to look old timey Christmas like. 

A cool attraction is the old department store window displays. My sister Monica describes them; "They were originally built for Eaton's in Winnipeg in 1946 and I first saw them probably in the early 1980s when they were displayed in Saskatoon's Midtown Plaza." (She has tons more really great pictures on her website Through a Lucky Mama's Viewfinder

On it's own the museum is quite fun - and a good photo op place.

Here's Monica "working the streets".

 A haircut and shave for 2 bits is a hell of a deal.

 Christina driving the steam train.

 Dare I say - the place is so fun it's criminal. Insert rimshot.

 More Saskatoon pictures to come.

Also: This marks my 100th post. To all the people who doubted I would actually keep blogging after a month: Suck It.

Saskatoon Christmas - Part 1

Family pictures on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

Preparing for the big feast on Christmas Eve.

 The kids table

 Living room and Mom's new mini fibre-optic Christmas Tree.

 Ren getting excited to open presents.

 Cousins hanging out.

Abridged Family portraits

Lawrence and Matt.

 Steph's Family

 Monica's family

 Christina, myself and Mom

 Ren and Claire must have been good last year as Santa left them some presents on Christmas morning.

 I got a sweet Riders jersey and my traditional gift from Christina of a calendar.

Ren was a little jealous of my calendar.

That night Lawrence and Betty were kind enough to invite Christina, myself and Mom over to their place for Christmas Day.  Christina made a friend of Betty's mom's dog.

Blog Catch-up

I have been either completely away from the internet or to busy sleeping off turkey hangovers to post anything in awhile. Look for a ton of activity in the next week or two. Meanwhile enjoy the following picture.

Note: This is not a critique of the commercialism of Christmas; I just really like my nephews toys and Spiderman.