Christmas 2010

Santa brought Crystal a ballerina tutu that she asked for from every mall Santa we saw while in Kamloops. Good thing we found a Toys R Us that had them in bigger girls size. Sean worked really hard making Crystal a doll house. It wasn't quite finished, but we gave it to her anyway. That way she can decide what color the house should be painted. She is thinking of painting it yellow to match our house. I thought for sure she would have picked pink or purple. And of course Kinect arrived under our tree. Even though it was sold out all over. We were able to snap 1 up. Then only a few days before Christmas I was shopping with Kels at Walmart and they got a new shipment in. She was wondering why I wasn't buying it. Hee hee! We had a great Christmas and Sean spoiled me(:

Have A Very Merry Christmas

With love from,
Sandi, Sean, Kelsey, Mike, Crystal & Diesel

Icey Driveway

Apparantly our driveway was very slippery. I poked my head out the front door this morning to grab the newspaper and saw our truck at the bottom of the driveway. Sometime since I returned home after picking up Kelsey & Mike from their grandma's place the truck slid. It slid about 12 feet and luckily stopped at the very bottom of the driveway and was not on the road what so ever. Thankyou Lord! I certainly did not need to have to pay for damages if it slid into the neighbour's driveway or worse if it got hit by an on coming vehicle. If our truck had slid even 1 foot more it would have been on the road. That was my very first experience with slipping vehicles. Sean has now salted and sanded the driveway. I am so thankful nothing bad happened. I was the last to drive the truck and I'm sure I'd be teased about it for a long time if there was damages. When I told a co-worker this morning what happened he said it was most likely becasue the tires were warm and not to feel bad becasue it happens to lots of people every winter. Because it was in gear with the park brake on, once the slippery spot had been past it stopped. Go figure!

Kamloops Shopping Trip. Success(:

Sean and I had a lovely weekend in Kamloops with Crystal & Mike. We arrived in Kamloops around lunch time on Saturday. My first stop was to The Mac Store to find out about finally fixing the lines on Kelsey's computer. They told me roughly how much it would cost to get it fixed. I was quite happy with what they told me because I thought for sure it would be way more considering it was an older Imac. Now I need to send it to them. I'm in no rush, so it probably won't happen until after Christmas. While we were in The Mac Store, we ran into some young adults we knew from Church. We looked around Sahalli Mall and then headed down town. That was an adventure trying to get around down town Kamloops. The Christmas shoppers were not the problem. THe problem was someone called in a bomb threat at one of the banks down town and the streets were all blocked off and the police we all over. We finally managed to get around them and head to our hotel. We chose and inexpensive hotel that had a pool and hot tub. We settled into our hotel and then headed out to do some Christmas shopping. I made Mike get a hair cut and we shopped at Walmart since their store has a way better selection than our store. However, shopping with the children presented some challenges, so we decided to go back later. We stopped at Toys R s and has great success there. By this time it is almost supper time. I made a few phone calls to see if any of our Kamloops friends were around. I got to talk to Lorraine and we made plans for lunch on Sunday. For supper we ate at Mr. Mike's. It brought back memories of when I used to work at Mr. Mikes in the puddle. They were the old style Mr. Mike's with The Megalicious Salad Bar. I ordered a Super Mushroom Burger and it was fabulous! Crystal had The Little Mike Burger and Sean & Mike had The Avalanche Burger (Also known as a Super Mushroom/Bacon Burger). The food was delicious. I even layered my pop like I used to do when I was a teenager. Orange pop with diet pepsi on top. Mike thoght I was crazy, but it reminded me of some great times from my past. After supper we went and bought chips & pop to enjoy while we watched a movie back at the hotel. It started to snow and I quite enjoyed watching the snow come down while I was sitting in the hot tub back at the hotel. We decided we were too tired to do any more shopping so after the movie we went to bed. We slept in until 8am. Wow! Had breakfast and checked out of the motel. Off to Walmart again to pick up some of the things we spotted the day before. We left the kids in the truck watching a movie and that worked out great because we were able to get the shopping done. After that we headed off to Aberdeen Mall to shop some more. We found Claires there and Crystal bought Kelsey's gift. It was getting close to lunch time so we headed over to meet Lorraine & John at Arby's. We had a nice visit with them over lunch and then headed to Costco. Costco wasn't as crazy as I thought it would be. I finally bought the shag rug we've wanted for the living room and of course my basics that I love..real baacon bits, antipesto, Sean's favorite socks and more. I didn't get a chance to do any shopping for Sean, but pretty much everything else is done. I'll be able to finish shopping for him this weekend as he gave me a lot of ideas when we were shopping in Kamloops. Now to wrap everything so I am not up til 3am on Christmas Eve(:

Annual Barton Christmas Party

We had a good time, just the girls. Hot dogs, apple cider and hot chocolate were yummy and free! Yay(: The best part was the horse drawn sleigh ride.

Counting Down til Christmas

The tree is up, the baking is complete, the groceries are bought. Now to finish shopping for the Christmas gifts. Only 2 weeks until Christmas and I haven't sent out 1 Christmas card. Usually I am all done my shopping and it's usually all wrapped up by now. This year has been different. A lot different. I am about 2 weeks behind and that makes sense because for 2 weeks in November I was working 2 jobs. That took a lot out of me. But now I am settling in quite nice in my new job. Work is not stressful at all, but I do find I get stressed during the Christmas rush. So with luck and a road trip to Kamloops this weekend that problem should be solved. I am also hoping that the Christmas Cards I ordered online show up soon. We are staying home for Christmas this year. I am looking forward to 2011. I am sure it is going to be a great year. Speaking of counting down to Christmas, we have 3 advent calendars and 3 chocolate advent calendars. Kels bought the 3 chocolate advent calenders for herself and Crystal & Mike. I never did get around to buying them. Kels said that they are never too old for those chocolate advents calendars. They count down o New Years day, so that's 32 chocolates. And since she bought them yesterday. They had some catching up to do. Oh and the chocolate advent calendars were on sale to boot. We might have to do some more baking because we've been into it a lot already(:
I don't think we will get the Christmas light put up outside. Too bad..........

Happy Sandi

Most people know by now that I quit my job at the newspaper. Friday was my last day. After working there for over 9yrs it is going to be strange working some place else. I was ready for a change and an amazing opportunity presented itself. I really am happy. It was very nice for the staff to get me a cake and going away gifts. Even though I didn't really want anything from them, it was very thoughtful. I guess they really do know me well. I absolutely love the scent pods. In fact I am burning the mulled cider one right now. The Vanilla candle looks great in my living room and smells fabulous as well.


I also love Tratorria's and the gift certificate will come in handy. A separate card from the publisher was also unexpected with generous gift certificates for meat and groceries. I am very thankful. To those that I worked with and didn't get a chance to really say goodbye, I am sorry about that. I must say the last 3 days I worked at the paper were the hardest and busiest. I wanted to leave on a good note and have everything done and up to date so that the new girl would not quit after 3 days like my last trainee. Training a new person is exhausting especially when there was only 2.5 days left to train her. I am certain she will do just fine(:
Friday I worked on payroll at my new job and it was a bit different than what I was used to doing, but It made me happy. I am very happy working in an administration position again. In my new job there is an added bonus of also helping customers design countertops, cupboards, vanities, desks etc. That part I am learning as I go along. The staff are so friendly and don't mind me asking questions. I always enjoyed helping customers. That is what I liked when I worked in retail for all those years.
I feel great....no more work stress and no papers to deliver because the carriers quit or the drivers missed delivering. Life is going to be good!

The start of my Christmas Decorating

Lou's 40th Birthday Party

Finally a family photo that looks ok(:

The Kiddies in Costume

Kelsey is The Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland, Mike is Sora from Kingdom Hearts, a Disney Game the teens like to play and Crystal is Tinkerbell.

This years Jack-O-Lanterns

Pretty talented carvers in my house(:

Pictures at The Pumpkin Field

Busy Busy Busy

A parent might feel a little happiness when September rolls around and the kids are back to school. That is bitter sweet for us. After having a busy summer it seems that things are not slowing down. But then again would I survive on slo-mow? Kels is working quite a bit, so we have to drive her around. Crystal will be starting Sparks on Wed. So if anyone wants Girl Guide Cookies, let me know because we are going to be selling them. We are starting back up with our small groups and that is Tues. night. Mike has decided that he likes to stick close to home so he won't be doing any groups or sports this year. He is socializing via X-box. To his surprise, I told him I would take him to Wal-mart at 11:59 pm last Monday to but the new Halo Reach Game. That was crazy, but made his night and week. I was voted for Mom of the year(: even though I made him go to sleep when we got home at 12:35am on a school night. He still managed to get up before 7am so he would have time to play the game before school.
My camera cord is still missing, so no pictures until it is found or I can find a new one!

Pictures of our 6yr old

The countdown is on for my eye surgery

In the spring of 2003 I was painting the shed in our front yard. It was warm and sunny out. I was wearing my contacts. I had to scrape off the old paint and a flake of it got in my eye. I thought I washed it out and went back to painting. The flake of paint made its way somehow to the back of my left eye and made several scratches on the back of my eye. No big deal until the paint caused an eye disease called pic. Pressure would build up in the back of my eye and my vision would be slightly blurry. I saw specialists from Vancouver to Kelowna. I took steroids to relieve the swelling. I had to stop wearing contacts. There was nothing that could be done to fix my eye so I just lived with it. I could go sometime a year with out any swelling and sometimes only 4 months. It's something I dealt with over the last 7yrs. The optometrist keeps an eye on my eye. In February I went in to see my optometrist for one of my check ups. At the time my eye was swelling a bit, but my vision seemed to be only slightly blurry. At that time I wanted to get back into wearing my contacts and we discussed eye surgery. So I tried some newer contacts and they worked out great. They sent my chart to Pacific Eye Center in Vancouver to see if I would be able to get laser eye surgery. I heard nothing back so I called 6 weeks alter and the optometrist asked me how serious I was about getting laser eye surgery. I had saved up some money and had a decent tax return, so I could afford it. I just had to get one more exam out of the way before they could say yes. I have studied the eye chart and know the bottom line. LOL but knew that couldn't read from memory so I had to be very sure I let her know what I could actually see. Then she put the drops in my eye and really checked my vision. I passed that exam(: Then I had to wait for an appointment that was in the summer time and didn't fall on someone else's holidays. So the date was picked. July 22/10 at 11:30am is surgery, which means I need to be at Pacific Eye Center in Vancouver at 10:30am. I am getting very excited for the surgery and scared at the same time. I leave in 5 days. So wish me luck(:

Fun day at the parade & street party

What a wonderful day. The weather was so nice! Tomorrow we are going to the Stampede. The teens are going to the Midway. Hard to believe that Stampede is almost over. I'm glad Sean can come to the rodeo with us this year(: