Highs and Lows of 2008 In No Particular Order

July 2008 - Steve & I went to Hawaii for Ned & Lauren's wedding. It was the perfect reunion location after being apart for the first 6 weeks of 6 months.

June 2008 - Reuniting in Banff amongst many pints with my beloved work spouse, Lisa.

November 2008 - Bonding with new colleagues and feeling lucky to have met such great people in Saskatchewan.

Feb 2008 - Bonding with the beloved TSO colleagues at possibly the wildest tsoundcheck party in history.

March 2008 - Joleney & Ian reunion in Toronto on their way back from Cuba. I wish I had any photos whatsoever of the weekend that Kim spent with me in Toronto in February!

November 2008 - Reuniting with more Luther College buddies and being a bridesmaid for Beler's wedding!

April 2008 - Making wine with our favourite winos Nicole & Eric - miss you guys!!

September 2008 - A photo of my first concert duty as an Executive Director with a great new friend, Maestro Sawa.

May 2008 - Me & Lucas at an awesome goodbye Toronto party the likes of which I will never forget with some of the best friends a girl could have!

March 2008 - BON JOVI CONCERT - Fantastic reunion evening with Lisa while she was on maternity leave. An evening of delicious food, Scotch, wine, beer, wackiness, and JON BON!

May 2008 - Sad Times - Saying goodbye to Karen and leaving her with a bag of my hair.

May 2008 - An action shot of the most awesome goodbye party EVER. Big Karaoke songs and dance moves the likes of which have never been seen before or since.

May 2008 - Another goodbye Toronto party shot....

April 2008 - It was a big day when Karen, Jessica, and I found these masks at the local costume store...possibly one of the weirdest/creepiest days at the TSO (although there were many...)

December 2008 - My new RSO colleagues at the Centennial Gala.

November 2008 - A FINISHED HOUSE! Almost three years of work and we've completed the masterpiece. Sweet sweet relief!!

August 2008 - Mozart in the Meadow - my first big outdoor show with the RSO.

August 2008 - A trip back to Toronto led to this meaty reunion in my backyard with Karen & Katie.

July 2008 - Stephen feeds a rooster some pizza crust with his mouth on the North Shore of Oahu, Hawaii.

May 2008 - Loading a big yellow truck with all of our stuff and driving across the country. Stephen leaving me in Saskatchewan for six months while he finishes the house.

May 2008 - Another Goodbye Party - Karen wears a paper bag. Best outfit of 2008.

May 2008 - My Work Goodbye Part AT HOOTERS!!

March 2008 - Karen & I attend the ROM PROM and spend the night in the photo booth with Canadian celebrities. One of whom threw my business card at my face.

January 2008 - Adopting Tesla

January 2008 - Celebrating my birthday at the Rhino with old friends and new after a night of outdoor skating at the Harbourfront Centre.

May 2008 - A karaoke number to be remembered forever....

May 2008 - Saying goodbye to Stephen's family in Caledon East.

New friends, old friends, reunions...it's been a year of ups and downs and a huge amount of change! See you next year....

Lazy Day

After an epic Fall of new job, concerts, galas, and other life altering events I've been so happy to have 4 days off in a row. After spending most of those days down in Carlyle, it was nice to have one here at home just to relax.

I slept in, played with the cats, did some grocery shopping, went for a latte with an old music buddy, and made a delicious spinach salad for supper.

Tomorrow it's back to work for a couple of days of quiet work while the rest of my staff is on holiday...and THEN Stephen and I head to the Dominican for a week of all-inclusive gluttony, sun, snorkelling, trashy novel reading good times! Best Christmas present ever.

I decided that after such a lazy day it would be nice to get out to see a band play at a pub tonight so I started looking online to find some live music listings. I could only find a couple of out-of-date sites and managed to get pretty nostalgic for the live music options in Toronto. I shouldn't compare because there are so many great things about Saskatchewan and I'm trying to not get bogged down by how much I loved living in Toronto. And honestly I'm usually too busy with my job to even have to think of something to do in my spare time so I really shouldn't complain...but alas...here I sit complaining!

Merry Christmas

My car dressed as a reindeer.

Rusty greeting us enthusiastically.

Rusty supervising the family entering the farm.

The Hume Boxing Day Curling team.

Nothing says Christmas like antlers on the dashboard

Keith and Tesla do some yoga.

RSO Chamber Players perform at Bushwakkers Pub.

Yay, holidays! On Christmas Eve we packed up the car and headed down to the Cornerstone of Saskatchewan, glorious Carlyle. Supper was had with the grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and then had an evening of wine and bananagrams at Mom's place.

On Christmas day we drove out to the farm to check out the fancy new addition to the farmhouse. It's amazingly about twice the size that it once was and we had a lovely supper and evening which culminated in the entire family watching National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. My favourite part of the day was seeing Uncle Chase open his 1kg salami...I think he liked it more than last year's jar of old socks.

On Boxing Day, my gramps entered our family team in the curling bonspiel. I was a spectator this year, but the Californians and the Ontarian were excited to take part on Grandpa's team.

Today we drove back to Regina with Marshall...and soon it's back to work!

Frigid Sask Days

It seemed like a good idea to get out of the house and go for a walk. ...look what happened to Steve's van.

Life Without Renos

I haven't hung out with Stephen for the last almost three years without having a huge list of renovations to work on...our collective second job. It's a Sunday afternoon and we just got home from an SSYO concert and the coffee at Starbucks. There is honestly nothing to do. The house is clean. The laundry is done. There is nothing to run to Home Depot to get. What do normal people do on a Sunday afternoon? I think we need to get a new hobby. This is weird.

Natasha

Stephen

Nigel

Tonight we celebrated Nigel's birthday in style. I asked around and found out that Montana's is the most embarrassing restaurant for birthday singing so obviously we went there.

After drawing on the table cloths and exhibiting our artistic abilities, we headed to the movies and saw "Australia". Hugh Jackman is a god.

RSO Gong Show

Last night was the RSO Holiday Concert Special. It was a gong show of epic proportions and involved a bunch of guest artists, local celebrities, mascots, and of course I had to dress up as a reindeer. We had a huge snowstorm last night and it was a very festive and fun show. Especiall when Gainer conducted "Sleigh Ride" and then ran of with a poinsettia.

In other news, Nigel & Steve & Keith Richards arrived from Toronto on Friday night at about 1am. They were driving into the city and about a block away from my place when the cops pulled them over for having their high beams on.

I've been getting alot of stuff fixed and it's nice to have two non-working men cooking my food and washing dishes as I run in and out to different meetings, rehearsals, concerts, and whatnot. It's great to have two personal man-servants. It's a bit of a shock to have my place filled with 2 boys and 2 cats and me, but good times.

Centennial Gala

A couple of fuzzy shots from my phone - more to come!

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