Thankful Thursday - 39

This week I'm thankful for...

1. Living in such a beautiful city. While the cost of living is excruciatingly high compared to what we can earn in the Lower Mainland, I think it's worth it! We have such an amazing location with the mountains, beach, farms, city, suburbs... The weather was poor most of March, but this week has made me see the light again! (Pun intended). 

2. Tulips. I do not have a green thumb. I do not typically appreciate flowers as much as others, but I'm so excited we have flowers growing in our yard that I planted! Also, tulips are my Oma's favorite flower, so they are a little extra special. 

 Naturally Sherlock always has to get in my picture... Stopping to smell the tulips.

3. Family Group Chat. My brothers, David and I are all in a group chat on Whatsapp. Most of the time it's nonsensical, or planning a get together, but I do enjoy some of the exchanges. This past week the boys had a conversation via selfies. (Sorry gents! Haha)
Look at them bonding over something they had in common at that moment! I feel like I missed out!

Easter Weekend

Since I work for the government, I was lucky enough to get Friday AND Monday off for Easter! Wow! A 4 day weekend with no plans! I'm not feeling overly inspired to write today, so this will be largely photos from the weekend. 

I am slightly embarrassed to admit this, but mostly not... David and I spent a large chunk of the weekend watching Netflix... We started watching Scandal, and flew through the first two seasons over the weekend. Typically, we watch very little TV, so this was fun. 

We haven't bought a BBQ yet, and didn't feel like bringing out the camp BBQ, so I decided to grill our chicken in the sandwich grill. GENIUS! So delicious, easy and FAST!

On Saturday Matt, Helena, Mark, Des, and baby Violet came to visit! Matt and Mark are my cousins on my mom's side, and we don't get to see them often as they live in Fernie & by Edmonton. My parents opened up their house to the family for the afternoon and we made little pizzas and enjoyed each other's company for a few hours! Sherlock loved Violet. He hasn't been around many babies, so it's always fun for us to see how he reacts. {In every picture I took that day, Sherlock was somewhere in there watching the baby. He calmed down so much around her which is odd, but great!}

Oma and Uncle Arie snuggling with Violet. Sherlock supervising from a distance.

"I'll push anything potentially hazardous out of the way."

"Are you sure you have her Dad? I will sit here and watch just to make sure she's okay..."

"I better check to make sure she doesn't fall over here too."

"I can keep a good eye on her from here!"

"Oh my goodness... These humans let her walk around with dirty hands! I must clean them for her." These two are too cute! Violet's big blue eyes just kill me <3

Sunday I played bass in church, and then we lazed around the house for a while before going to dinner at David's parents to welcome them back from their trip to Florida and the Bahamas!

On Monday we realized we hadn't done our taxes yet this weekend as we planned. We spent 3 hours on Turbo Tax working on taxes and figuring out our inevitable amount owing. With David's business, we have to pay all his taxes and CPP for the previous year. I get a small return from work to make the amount owing a little more manageable, but it's still a lot... Luckily David set some aside to pay for taxes, but not enough! We have to work on writing more things off!

We have a system down now. David pulls out the laptop and hooks it up to the TV so we can both see. I sit on the couch with all the paperwork organized (chaotically) and we go through the Turbo Tax program together. It gets easier every year, but this year was a little different with the house purchase, etc. 

Monday evening we went downtown with Mom & Dad and met up with Jeff, Adam and Aly for dinner and drinks at Mahoney & Sons. They have a beautiful location right on False Creek. We watched the sunset on the walk back to the car, and then went to Adam & Aly's for a glass of wine before heading home. 

Why do we not come down here more often?!

Jeff and David, with Jeff's signature look of course!

I drank the Stanley Park Windstorm West Coast Pale Ale. I quite enjoyed it! It has a slightly stronger flavor than some other Pale Ales I've had. 

Sunset view from our table in the back room. 

Soon to be sisters-in-law!

Looks like Jeff and David missed the "chimp-face" memo! Haha!!

This photo is rather dark on here, but I asked our waitress to take a group shot of us! Missing Scott though :( He'll be back living at home in a month!

Beautiful sunset down False Creek. Such a gorgeous night.

I feel like we're ruining the background in this photo! Such an amazing city.

Mom insisted on us having a little photo-shoot on our way back to the car before going to Adam and Aly's. We obliged.

Adam and Aly would have scrabble piece fridge magnets! Cute. 

That brings us back to work on Tuesday morning! Looking forward to another short work week.

Thankful Thursday - 38

This week I am thankful for...

1. Some days off. I don't mean off from work, I still work Monday-Friday every week, but this past week David and I have had a couple evenings where we don't have ANYTHING planned! Wow... It seems like it's been a very long time. It's been nice just to hang out together and breathe for a minute or two. I enjoy our busy life, but it can be very exhausting/draining for me. 

{This is what Sherlock does when we're relaxing on the couch... Awkward guy.}

2. Wellbutrin. I don't talk much on here about my struggles with anxiety/depression, but it's something I've dealt with for years. Just recently I went back on Wellbutrin XL 150mg, which is a daily medication used for anxiety/depression. I love that it is something so simple I can do every day to make my life that much better. It brings me back to a "normal" level. Instead of daily meltdowns and panic, I can navigate life and the "little things" much more rationally. I understand medication is not for everyone, and I respect that. For me, this is something that works and has made the past few weeks so much more manageable. 
{If you ever have any questions about this please feel free to contact me! I'm always very willing to talk.}



3. Delicous, easy dinners. In case you haven't caught on yet, I love good food. I love to eat healthy meals, and usually I enjoy cooking them as well. Let's not kid ourselves, I enjoy the odd pancake or pizza for dinner too, but I try to put "good" food into our bodies whenever possible. This week I made salmon for the first time. I don't know what took me so long! I think I thought it was ridiculously expensive, but it's really not bad. 
I made salmon, boiled potatoes and beans, and it took me a grand total of 20 minutes. That's it! Put the potatoes on to boil/cook, and by the time they're done everything else is ready to go. Now THAT is simple... and deeeelicious!

Freshly broiled sockeye salmon. It turned out so great! Moist and delectable. 

Finally... A "Quiet" Weekend!

Don't get me wrong, I love being busy. I love seeing friends and visiting family. I love the hustle and bustle of life. But... It. Is. Exhausting. 

David and I have been go go go for a couple months, with not a single day "off". All great things, but this introvert needs some down time!

This weekend we hardly had any plans! Typically if we have no plans we end up inviting someone over, or visiting with people. We actually took a weekend off!

On Friday I had scheduled "Date Night" into our calendar, so we were guaranteed not to double-book ourselves. We had a lovely dinner and some drinks at Cactus Club for our date. {If you and your spouse/partner both have iPhones, you definitely need to sync your calendars! There may be another way to do it, but this way David and I don't double-book, and we are much more aware of each other's schedules and expectations!}

Happy Hour! That means $4 bellinis!

Happy Hour also means $4 beers!

Happy Hour ALSO means Happy Renee!

David's just along for the ride :)

Butternut Squash Ravioli Appetizer and mini-burgers to start!
{If you haven't had these raviolis at Cactus Club, they are a MUST!}

Finally we had the Calamari. I must admit we don't like the spider-y looking ones, so we left those. Kind of a shame, but we just couldn't do it!

Saturday was a day to do all the little things around the house I'd been meaning to do for what seems like forever. Some of these things have been on my to-do list since the day we moved in!

We finally hung my necklace hanger so that they're not all tangled on my nightstand or in my drawer anymore! 

I hung some things on the wall in our bedroom. Those framed cards are the actual cards David proposed to me with. If you look closely at the flower on the wall beside that frame it is actually my veil I wore at the wedding. The garter is hung on the cards. I love these personal little reminders/memories of our wedding.

I made cookies! Honestly. This is the best cookie recipe ever! I'll have to post it... This week sometime. 

I hung these little signs by my kitchen sink! One says, "Renee's Kitchen". The other says, "Kiss the cook, she's Dutch". Love them!

Look at this beautiful tree across the street!

The bees were in full-on pollination mode with this tree! You could hear the hum from many feet away!

A nice afternoon walk at Tynehead during the breaks in the rain!

We moved Sherlock's crate beside David's side of the bed, and moved David's night-stand to my side (you can see in necklace hanger picture). I think this looks pretty cute, and gives us much more space by the door in our bedroom since Sherlock's crate isn't taking up all the floor-space!

Oma emailed last week to ask if we'd like to join her and Aunty Sonya & Uncle Anthony for dinner at her house. Even though we intended on a quiet weekend in, we could not pass this up! I'm really glad we went. We got to visit with family we don't see all that often, eat a delicious dinner (that I didn't have to cook!), play the Crazy Dice Game, and Oma & Sonya shared some stories about the family that were new to me. I find it eye-opening to hear stories about family/family history. It gives a better perspective of where we all come from and what life was like "behind the scenes" or before we were around.  

I definitely meant to take a group photo of us since maybe not everyone likes to see pictures of peoples' food. I like when people post what they're eating! It gives me inspiration and makes me hungry. Although it is one of the top complaints about photos posted on Instagram & Facebook... Oh well!

Butternut Squash soup to start. YUM!

Spinach salad as the second course. So fresh!

M&M Lasagna for the main! I Loooooove lasagna! I forgot to take a photo of the dessert, but we had peaches that were canned by a lady in Langley, with some whipped cream and chocolate. So tasty!

This takes us to Sunday, where David and I taught Cornerstone (Sunday School) for the Grade 2 & 3 kids at church. As it is Spring Break, we only had 4 kids, which made the class much easier to manage. 

Getting set up and practicing for the first activity/game.

Ed's Drivers Ed! They had to answer our questions correctly to move to the next line. 

After church we headed to the Dublin Crossing Pub for lunch with some friends and then back home for some more R&R. We watched "The Imitation Game" in the evening on Netflix. Truly a fascinating movie that is based on a true story. I would highly recommend it!

90% on Rotten Tomatoes!

Meanwhile my parents are sending us updates and posting daily on Facebook about how amazing their time in Hawaii is! Maybe David and I will venture out that way in November. Depends how much money we can save by then. No more dinners out!! (Psssht... yea right!)

Seriously. Who wouldn't want to go here after seeing how happy they are?!

The view from their balcony. Unreal!

While it sounds like we were busy, this is about as "down-time" as we get! It felt good to get some tasks done that had been bothering me, and to get out for some walks, have a nice visit, eat tasty food, and veg out on the couch for a bit.