Randomness

I had to sneak a couple of pics on here of my newly discovered fave Christmas cookies that Ive made this year, Stained glass sugar cookies. After experimenting to see if they would actually work and having a few turn out pretty "rustic" looking I made a few more that look a little more pretty. Jo-Ben loved em, then again who wouldn't love a cookie and candy together... its a perfect marriage. :) yum. The picture quality is pretty bad because it was the middle of the night!

Before: After:
This is what I woke up to this morning. Amazing. The sunrises and sunsets out here blow me away. Pretty cool to stop and take in during my busy morning routine.

Last but not least the promised pictures of my new nephew! Welcome to the world baby Mateo Ezra Barkey. We haven't even met you and we love you already baby boy.

I love the little balled up fists. He was 10 lbs 1 oz and looks pretty long.
His little hands with his long monkey fingers. His fingers look just like his uncle Jo-Ben's!
The amazing momma Anya lovin' on her new son. We are so proud of you Anya!

Our little bundle of joy. I love his little hat.
Tired yet happy momma & baby.
heehee I love this picture... he looks like a little muscle man.
Beautiful Mateo.

The proud poppa Josh, never seen him happier.

We are flying to Abbotsford tomorrow night and we can't wait. Jo-Ben's parents and grandma flew in from North Carolina last night & his sister is flying in from Korea a couple of days after we get in. My entire family lives in the lower main land so its going to be a very special Christmas for me- both of my families in the same area, something I never thought would happen. Thanks Mateo! :) I am especially so excited to meet the little man and spoil him rotten, what kinda auntie would I be if I didn't?! I'm also so looking forward to seeing all of my friends and extended family, it's going to be great.

Brazilian Food!

My husbands boss and his wife took us and a former employee of his and his fiance (also friends of ours) out for an AMAZING dinner last night. We headed out to Calgary to a Brazilian restaurant called Bolero. This place was incredible. Bolero is a new Brazilian style steak house, where Gaucho chefs circle the dining room with a variety of meats to serve to customers, known as rodizio style dining. The dining room was BEAUTIFUL, amazing open fireplaces and a really cool assortment of seating from intimate booths to large, long family style dining tables. Lots of dark wood, amazing light fixtures and structural art pieces. They played really great, upbeat Brazilian music all night that created a really fun atmosphere. Dining is simple. Each table receives a wood dowel that is green on one end and red on the other. To eat, flip the green side up and the servers will descend; to stop, turn it to red. Bolero features a "fresco" bar of salads, cheeses, roasted peppers, pickled vegetables, sun dried tomatoes, marinated veggies and cold sea foods to get you started. There is also be a hot bar with six or eight vegetable dishes, beans and my fave coconut rice to complement the meats. Perhaps the most common food the world over is "meat-on-a-stick." From Greek souvlaki and Indian kebabs to Japanese yakitori and Guatemalan skewered iguana, I can't think of any non-vegetarian culture that doesn't spear meat and roast it over a fire. But the granddaddy of them all is the Brazilian churrasco, wherein huge roasts of whatever meat you've got are impaled on long sword like metal skewers and roasted over charcoal. In the restaurant (a.k.a. churrascaria) version of churrasco, the loaded skewers are paraded into the dining room and the meats are sliced directly onto your plate. There are 17 variates or meats that include bacon wrapped chicken and fillet minon, sausages, every cut of steak imaginable, rack of lamb and the juiciest pork tenderloin we had ever tasted. The process is non-stop, with meat following until you can't take it any longer. Definitely not a place for a vegetarian! The "gaucho chefs" (gaucho is also what Brazilians call their cowboys- I thought that was perfect for Alberta!) come around and slice you off as much or as little as you want of each selection... and they bring the selections around over and over again all night. OH! and my favorite part was that they also came around with huge, fresh rotisseried pineapple... it was all caramelized and delicious. It was amazing food and such a fun experience.

IM AN AUNTIE!

My sister-in-law Anya delivered a baby boy today, his name is Mateo Ezra and he was 10lbs! We are so THRILLED! Congratulations Josh & Anya!!! We love you three! :) ( I will post pics when I get them)

My Fave Food Blogs

I love food. I love cooking, baking and eating food. I can sit down with a warm mug of whatever in front of a crackling fire and find myself completely transfixed reading a cook book as one would reading John Grisham (or whatever author enthrals you... although I never bring the cook book to bed, James Patterson is my bed time author of choice and reading about food woudl probably give me weird dreams) Anyways, since I love making, thinking and reading about food and I spend allot of time online, for work and play, its only natural for me to find myself confessing my biggest obsession to you.... food blogs. They entertain and inspire me (and frankly make me feel less crazy... I'm not the only one out there!) :) These talented people document and photograph their culinary expertise in ways I never could. Here are my top 4 favorite food blogs, please take a look!



http://cumicori.blogspot.com/

http://www.everybodylikessandwiches.blogspot.com/

http://definitelynotmartha.blogspot.com/

http://www.jasonandshawnda.com/foodiebride/

Stained Glass Cookies

Here is a picture of some of the stained glass sugar cookies that I experimented making tonight. I wasnt going to make them till tomorrow but we had a friend come over for dinner and since the dough was already chilled in the refridgerator I just pulled some out and cut out a few. I wish I would have saved the best ones to photograph but they were so good, Jo-Bend and his friend ate like 10 of them! I'll have to make some more... they were super easy to make. You basically take a regular sugar cookie recipe and make a cut out in the middle of your cookie with a knife or another mini cookie cutter, smash up a clear hard candy (I used Jolly Ranchers) and sprinkle the candy in the hole before you bake the cookies. Then just bake like you normally would till lightly golden and voila! They are so pretty... next year I want to make them with a hole at the top and string ribbon through them to hang on the tree... I think I would make them more carefully next time, these ones are a little "rustic" looking :) Also be sure to bake them on parchment and let them cool on the parchment over a wire rack... if you try to take them off of the parchment too soon the candy is too gooey and the middle wont stay together. Hope everyone had a great weekend...mine was VERY relaxing. Only a couple of more till Christmas, I can hardly wait!

My Peanut Brittle isn't Brittle...

So, here is what our house looks like today, not a very pretty picture cause its kinda grey out today but I just wanted to show everyone the snow and everything & I just put a new wreath on the door! We opted out for the Christmas lights this year because we are spending the holidays in BC with our families this year so no lights and no tree! Also its been like consistently at -20 for the past few weeks so neither of us has been so brave as to climb up on that roof in the cold! I did put up some garland and little twinkly lights on the back deck so at least we have a little Christmas cheer to share with people (even if its just the neighbors that can see our house from their kitchen windows!... we've got the best decorated deck on the alley!) So, like I said we are spending the holidays with BOTH of our families, this is very exciting since Jo-Ben's parents and grandma live in North Carolina (his brother and his wife live in Langley, sister lives in Korea, other brother in NC) and my whole family live in the lower main land. We spend every other Christmas in NC and BC... this year is different because my sister in law Anya is 9 days over due today (& its her birthday, Happy Birthday Anya!) so we will have a little tiny baby to celebrate the holidays with this year and Mom & Dad Barkey and Grandma Milligan are coming up to spend Christmas in Canada! It will be very special for me not only because we will have a new addition to the Barkey fam but also because I get to spend Christmas with ALL of the people I love, something I never thought would happen! It is sure going to be busy but its going to be tons of fun too!

Well, my Saturday Christmas baking extravaganza was quite interesting... here are a couple of "after" pictures of my kitchen!

Here (to the left) is a picture of my attempt at peanut brittle... as the title of my post states, my peanut brittle isn't brittle! I let it cool overnight and when I went to smash it to pieces this morning to found it to be a corn syrupy peanuty gooey mess. I don't quite know where I went wrong but I think Ill leave the candy making to the professionals and stick to cookies!

Speaking of which, my biscotti turned out wonderfully! They are just begging to be dipped in chocolate so I have packed them up and stored them away till I'm ready to melt some chocolate and dip them... I think Ill do milk chocolate & white chocolate! I had one plain with my lattee this morning and it was so yummy. My sugar cookies are waiting to be rolled out and baked after the dough chilled overnight but I just don't have the drive to do so today (I'm a little deflated after the peanut brittle fiasco... they make it look so easy on Martha!) :) I'll probably do them tomorrow night.

I also made these muffins... they are kinda like a cross between coffee cake and a cinnamon bun, Jo-Ben loved em. I will post the recipe when I have more time. They are really delicious & pretty simple, I think I'm going to make them on Christmas morning for our big Barkey breakfast. I also substituted plain yogurt instead of sour cream as its used in classic coffee cake and it turned out just as good and is way better for you!

Last night Jo-Ben and I went to Red Deer to catch up with some good friends for bowling, dinner and a movie. Lots of fun... we went out for dinner to a restaurant called Noodle House, the decor left something to be desired but the food was awesome... we LOVE Vietnamese food and both of our meals were fantastic plus we had fresh squeezed Vietnamese lemon aid and a Vietnamese iced coffee. If you have never had Vietnamese food you really should, its allot lighter than Chinese and so refreshing. If you go make sure to get an iced coffee... SO YUMMY! They bring it out with condensed milk at the bottom of the mug and a little drip contraption where the doffee and hot water is in and it drips right into your mug, when its all "perked" you stir it up with the condensed milk and then pour it over a glass of ice. Delicious! After dinner we saw the movie Rendition. It wasn't hyped at the box office but it was really well done. Reese Witherspoon and Jake Gyllenhal are in it and it is about two story lines that are kinda tied together and touches on terrorism and how corrupt the government is, very power full. Our friends told us that they saw the movie Water recently and its another powerful one. I read the book this spring but I had completely forgotten that they had made a movie out of it so I am eager to rent it.

So, I will leave you with a pic of my breakfast this morning, I broke out my Starbucks Christmas mugs that a special friend gave me last year... wish she could have been here to share a morning coffee with me! And a shot of the sunset outside my window that I am looking at as I write this... I am truly blessed.

Oh the great smells that will fill my house...

SO, here I am, sitting at my desk on a Friday morning enjoying my gingerbread latte (gotta love our Van Haute brewer... you can put a little puck of the coffee of your choice into the machine and it brews a single cup & we have been getting some fantastic flavors like creme brulee and gingerbread, yum!) anyways, all I can think about is the upcoming weekend because I am doing Christmas baking! Tomorrow, after a well needed sleep in, I am going to bake all day. I'm trying to make at least one homemade gift for each of my family members weather its a scarf or some baking this year, I figure Ive got some time and its so much more personal. I am gathering the rest of my supplies tonight and Ive narrowed down my list & here it is:

1.Lime Melt Aways- I know Jo-Ben will LOVE these, he doesn't like chocolate (I KNOW!) so Christmas cookies are not very appealing to him since they are usually drizzled, dunked or made of chocolaty goodness. These are cute little one bite cookies almost like a lime shortbread dusted with icing sugar.

















2.Gingerbread Caramels- I love gingerbread and I love caramels so I'm so excited to make these, I have never made candy before so it will sure be interesting!

















3.Stained Glass Sugar Cookies- Basic sugar cookies that you cut a "window" out of the center and pour melted candies into (like Jolly Ranchers) to make a stained glass look, very pretty and sometimes used as eatable Christmas ornaments.

















4.Peanut Brittle- classic Christmas time treat at my house growing up... and I got a big tray of assorted peanuts as a house warming gift so should work out well!

5.Amanda's Favorite Mocha Biscotti- my personal fave any time of year to dunk into my coffee so this one is a selfish selection :)

I'm also considering making these "gingerbread" ornaments made basically out of Cinnamon, applesauce and glue! I experimented with them last year and they are really cute and make the WHOLE house smell awesome... I'll post a link to the craft recipe below...

Link to Christmas Ornament Recipe:
http://www.cooks.com/rec/view/0,1722,155175-241203,00.html

I'm also interested in making a Spice Rub recipe I found (the bbqers in my fam would probably appreciate this) but I still need to find some cute jars to put them in that I like. I found a really great looking Spiced Dark Hot Cocoa recipe maybe even just for me to enjoy... I'm going to post the link for that below because it looks so delicious and there is an article with allot of info on all of the good stuff in this beverage (ie: antioxidants, flavanoids, etc) and apparently the cayenne in it boosts energy too, something I am sure lacking lately.

Link to Spiced Hot Dark Chocolate Recipe:
http://www.marthastewart.com/portal/site/mslo/menuitem.fc77a0dbc44dd1611e3bf410b5900aa0/?xsc=stf_MSLO-RECIPE&vgnextoid=ca1af96910ff3110VgnVCM1000003d370a0aRCRD

ooo As I am thinking of cookie cutters I am reminded that I bought a dog bone shaped cookie cutter last year when I was making those homemade ornaments because I made one for my brother and sister in laws beloved pooch Edgar so I was thinking if I had time I would make some homemade doggie treats for him. I found a few recipes online and I think its a cute idea... my bosses have pups who are brother and sister (Chica & Rico, equally as cute and equally as yappy... they are cute little cross something or others that come and visit us at the office every once couple of days) I might have to make a big batch to have here at the office for when they come and visit.

ALSO- I have always made my own scented bath salts and sugar rubs for exfoliation since I learned to make them at an all natrual spa that I once worked at so Ive been toying with the idea of making some up for the ladies in my life too and packaging them all up nicely for Christmas gifts. Here is a link to an artical on Martha Stewart.com for a bath salt. http://www.marthastewart.com/portal/site/mslo/menuitem.0e0eb51a2e6b5ad593598e10d373a0a0/?vgnextoid=6d23d0f19132f010VgnVCM1000003d370a0aRCRD&autonomy_kw=home%20made%20bath%20salt&rsc=image_5 Sugar scrubs are pretty much the same idea except you mix the sugar with an oil ( I prefer grapeseed but you could use baby oil or olive oil too) and make it into a consistancy of a paste. Store in an air tight jar in your shower (with a good lid so water doesnt mix in) I use this on my legs and elbows expecially when they get really dry in the winter out here in Alberta, the sugar sloughs off the dry, dead skin and the oil leaves my skin so soft.

Well, I hope I inspired someone out there or at least gave someone some good ideas! Wish me luck! I will post pics of the finished product in another post. Till then...

Enchanted Melody

A friend of a friend of mine has a new Christmas CD out & is on her Christmas tour and I would HIGHLY recommend making an effort to go and see her preform if you can. She has one of the most beautiful voices I have ever heard and her CD (which you can preview on MySpace and buy on her website which I have conveniently provided a link for) is enchanting. It features 8 song that include 5 originals and 3 classic Christmas cover tunes. The link below shows all of her tour dates and cities so try to make it out to a show- it will surely be worth your while! Support some local talent by going to an amazing show and buying a fantastic CD :)

website link!: http://www.shereeplett.com./news.html

MySpace link!: http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=75987557

Let it snow! & Christmas baking...

One of my favorite things about Christmas is Christmas baking. There is just something about the waft of gingerbread in the air that makes everyone happy and nice to each other :) Gives ya the warm fuzzies. So, since my family (especially my father in law) loves my baking I have decided to bake allot of gifts this year and package them up all cute. I'm really excited to try to make my own homemade Gingerbread Caramels and Peanut Brittle. Yum! I think every one will really appreciate it. (I've also found some really cool Christmas crafts that I'm going to try out as gifts but I'll have to post about them another time in case my family snoops on here!

Last week I was in Michael's and I found, much to my uncontrollable glee (your should have seen me, I was like a kid in a candy store), that they sell Martha Stewart brand craft supplies. This was a milestone moment in m y life let me tell you! I love pretty much anything Martha Stewart, she has the greatest team of people working for her who come up with AWESOME ideas from crafts to recipes. I love it. Anyways, I found these really cute gift boxes made for baked gifts that are going to be perfect for my homemade biscotti... I could have spent hours looking at everything and ALLOT of money buying allot of stuff... but I just bought the gift boxes... and they were on clearance, gotta love that!

So, I also LOVE Real Simple Magazine. I can't wait for the new issue every month. It offers sensible, practical solutions to every day problems to simplify your house AND I never fail to find AMAZING recipes in every single issue... and they are SO simple. I was browsing their web site this morning and I found this really cool idea. They have a basic freezer friendly cookie dough recipe and they have made 6 variations to make 6 completely different cookies. I'm doing Christmas cookie baking this weekend and I was so pleased to find this as I would like to make lots of different cookies and this kind of seems like a short cut way of doing so! Anyways, I haven't tried out the recipes yet but I plan to this weekend. I especially like the Pine Nut Drops and the White Chocolate Snowballs! Not sure what I think about the Fruit Cake Bars... think I'll skip that one! :) I also found another recipe for Pinwheel cookies and I'm very excited to make pink & brown chocolate pinwheels and white & pink peppermint pinwheels! I will post pics of the finish product this weekend.

Here is a link to the 1 dough, 6 cookies article:

http://www.realsimple.com/realsimple/package/0,21861,1679014-1564728,00.html

So, every morning I wake up all bleary eyed, throw on my housecoat and a pair of my husbands running shoes and trudge down our front walk to my car to start it so its all nice and toasty for my drive to work. This morning I get out onto our front porch and I notice that something is different.... I couldn't quite put my finger on it though. Then all of a sudden it hits me that I am not as miserably, painfully cold as I usually am running out to start the car. It actually feels warm! I could have gone out here without the housecoat!... ok, ok that's pushing it. But I was seriously confused (& pleasantly surprised)... I mean if its this warm why isn't the snow melting away?! Lately we have had HORRIBLE weather, AT LEAST minus 20 every day for the past couple of weeks and there is always snow. Don't get me wrong, I love snow... while I'm sitting inside by my fire with a hot cocoa watching it fall gracefully outside... but when you are trudging through it and driving in it day in and day out it gets a little worse for wear (I'm almost wishing for a good dose of BC rain to wash it all away! almost) Anyways, I got ready, had my cheerios and when I got to work I asked my boss Ken if he noticed if it was any warmer out this morning, he told me yeah, it was warmer... it was -12! ahhhhhh I can't believe warm to me is -12!!! that's the WORST! So I guess if there is a moral to this story its that this west coast girl on the prairies is starting to get a little TOO acclimatized because -12 is NOT warm and it never will be.

Well, those are my thoughts for today. Oh yeah! For those of you readers who don't know, Jo-Ben and I moved into a new house about two and a half weeks ago... Its our first home and we are very excited. We are pretty much all settled in except for a few minor things like hanging art and shelves on the wall. Well, today my bosses wife offered to give us their "old" desk... its from Ikea and its really cute and practically new & since our computer is on a Rubber Maid at the moment I'm more than happy to take it off of their hands! Anyways, I will post pics of the new desk and the new house very soon.

Have a good day! (whats left of it!) :)

Baby Cakes

http://www.babycakesnyc.com/press/tv/martha1.html link to clip on Martha Stewart

http://www.babycakesnyc.com/press/tv/martha2.html link to clip on Marth Steart

http://www.babycakes.com/ Baby Cakes Website

http://www.marthastewart.com/page.jhtml?type=content&id=recipe5560064&layout=martha
link to recipe of brownie cupcakes

http://www.marthastewart.com/page.jhtml?type=content&id=recipe5560066&layout=martha
link to recipe of cinnamon loaf

I decided to post on a post that I found on my old Blog! I was watching Martha Stewart late last night and I remeberd that I had posted on this bakery called Baby Cakes last year and I thought I would revisit that since I know how many people out there have allergies and how expecially during this time of year we all love the sweets. So on this episode she featured this lady who owns a bakery on the lower east side in Manhattan called Baby Cakes. Apperantly this place is geared toward people who have all kinds of food allergies. On the show they made the most delicious lookng chocholate cupcakes and a cinnamon loaf. The desserts seriously looked absolutly scrumptious and they were made from things like hummous flour insted of ap flour and zyanthane gum insted of sugar & canola oil insted of butter oh and my favorite applesauce insted of eggs. All of their stuff is gluten free, sugar free, wheat free and vegan... I dont have food alergies but i do have lots of friends and friends of friends who do so I thought that this would be an AWESOME site for those of you to check out! I dont think that they have recipies online yet althogh I havent browsed the entire site yet but I do know you can order from them and she did mention on Martha that a cook book was in the works. ALSO, if you look on Martha Stewart online there is a link to the two recipies that they made so you could copy them from there. anyways, hope I was of come help passing this info along! Ive posted the links above... have a good day everyone!!!

photos of our life

Here I am... random picture of me at Cultas Lake, I think its in 2005

Us in Costa Rica at a zip line trek in Jan. 2005 a few days after we got engaged

My beloved Jo-Ben

Me on our wedding day!

~ Mr. & Mrs. Barkey~

This is what we look like when we are treeplanting! oh boy.

This is me in the bell tower in Notre Dame in Paris, France on our honeymoon in 2005

This was taken at an amazing thai resteraunt on the island of Ibiza, Spain

St. Marcos square, Venice, Italy

Dancing away on our wedding night Aug. 20, 2005 (this pic slipped out of order :))

London, England

Jo-Ben and I at my cousins wedding June 2007

My family at my cousins wedding in Jan. 2007

Amanda all bundled up against the elements, my first winter in Alberta, 2006

Our first wedding anniversary, Whistler, BC. 2006

My hunky surfer boy, Costa Rica. 2006

Us in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico 2007

Mexico

Me with a bunch of bananas at our resort in Mexico, 2007
On the beach in Mexico, 2007

And finally here I am up in a plane over Vancouver in the summer of 2007

New Blog

Well, I decided to rejoin the blogger world with a new blog. (now I'm not just a stalker, im a contributor!) I am constantly on Facebook loading new photos and wishing I could write more about them & our adventures and I'm always fininding great recipes and things to post about but don't have anywhere to do so, so here it is! I am dedicating this blog to my photos, my adventures, my recipes and my general thoughts and I hope you enjoy reading about them.

So, I guess I will use this first post as a background post.

Where to start?

Well... August 20, 2005 I got married which was pretty momentous so I'll start with my husband since hes the most importiant person in my life :). Jo-Ben (Joseph Benjamin, but he has always and will forever go by Jo-Ben) grew up in Peru, S.A. on a missionary base, playing with exotic animals and swinging off of vines into a river, untill he was 18 when he came to Canada to attend and graduate from Trinity Western and in between graduating and meeting me he travelled pretty much the entire world and did various jobs that provide hours of stories (hes good at telling stories & has so many already at 29 that I think he should write a book!) Anyways, he has worked on cruise ships and all over western Canada treeplanting and running treeplanting crews and has travelled to aprox. 40 countries chasing his passion for surfing... then he met me.

We met in August of 2004 in my hometown of Abbotsford at my parents house... I always joke that he was deliverd to my doorstep! When I met him my life TOTALY changed... he has opened up my eyes and opened new doors for me & since I have met him I have experience things I never thought I could or would. He swept me off of my feet and two weeks later we were officially a couple and 4 months later he popped the question on a beach in Nicaragua (on a two month surf trip all throughout Central America (Costa Rica, Nicaragua, ElSalvedor, Honduras) that we were on with 8 friends. That summer I was faced with a decision to either let him go out into the bush for another season of treeplanting and stay behind to be an Aesthitician (what I had just gone school for for a year and half straight and 12K later) or forgo that dream and go plant. I couldn't bear to think of being apart from my fiance for the three months before our wedding so I planted. I have to say (after trecking out into the bush to do the grueling work of treeplanting for the last three summers in a row that it is one of the hardest jobs in Canada and has pushed me to my limits but I wouldnt trade the experience for the world, definetly life changing) So after my rookie season of planting (Jo-Ben's 9th) we got married! August 20, 2005, three days shy of knowing each other for a year.

After our beautiful wedding in Abbotsford we went on a two month surprise honeymoon that my husband pretty much entirely planned himself without my knowing to... Europe! It was nothing short of incredable. We toured London, Barcelona, Ibiza, the south of France (Monaco, Niece, Provance), Switzerland, Paris, Belgium, Amsterdam, Prauge, Berlin, Austria, Venice and finally a stop off in Denmark. It was an unforgettable honeymoon and I highly recomend it!

Since we were doing seasonal work (treeplanting) we took our first year of marraige "off". We lived in Maple Ridge for about 5 months spending time with our friends and family and learning how to be married :) Then we hopped onto a plane and headed back to Costa Rica and lived there for just over two months. That is when we truley fell in love with that country (my second trip and Jo-Ben's third) and started to look for property... we have found an area that we absolutly adore but that dream is on hold for now but one day I WILL be blogging from C.R.!

So that summer we went back out planting, Jo-Ben was a foreman and in his 10th season and I was a quality checker in my 2nd... it was a very stressfull summer with a new company and after visiting an old friend of Jo-Ben's (his planting supervisor for the most part of the last 9 years) we were presented an oppertunity for Jo-Ben to get out of planting and get into Radioactive X-Raying on pipelines out here in Alberta & to once again work with his old friend. We took the opertunity and Jo-Ben started schooling and training that fall which brought us out to Medicine Hat Alberta....

Oh Alberta. We technically moved out here in September of 2006. Lived in Medicine Hat for about 6 months, Jo-Ben went out of town (about 10 hours North of Medicine Hat) and worked the winter up there pretty much for three months straight... ok, ok he had one day off. I saw him about 6 days out of those three months. It was horrible but its part of the job and its only for three months out of the year... needless to say Jan- April isnt my most favorite time of year!

Insted of sitting around Medicine Hat where I hardly knew anyone I came back out to B.C. in March to spend some time with fam and friends and Jo-Ben joined me when he was done working up North in April... we stayed out there at my brother and sister in laws till May when we went up to P.G. for our last season of planting (tear, hahaha just kidding) It was once again with a new company but it was an off shoot of a company Jo-Ben had worked with for many years and the best planting experience of both of our lives.... we actually had alot of fun and for somereason somthing "clicked" and I suprised myself that I was all of a sudden a pretty good planter! We did half a season handing over Jo-Ben's crew to one of his capable guys and after ELEVEN years of planting Jo-Ben said officialy said goodbye to the resorestation industry. (YAY!)

So, now we find ourselves in Three Hills, Alberta. We moved here in July of this year. We bought our first house which we started building in July when we moved here and we moved in two weeks ago. According to Jo-Ben its in the wrong part of the world because it isnt in Costa Rica but we are enjoying it none the less (even if we don't enjoy the weather!) I feel blessed to finally have a home for us to settle into after over two years of being married and bouncing around. We both also have great jobs... Jo-Ben is inspecting pipe and is over half way to running his own X-Ray truck and I am working for the construction co. that built our house! I am wearing many hats right now as the company is expanding but I basicly do PR work, dealing with clients that we build houses for & keeping them happy (hopefully!) and purchasing all of the things needed to build a house from electrical permits & truses to light fixtures and baseboards. We are building 6 houses right now so I am a very busy girl. Its been quite an adjustement moving to a very small town in the middle of Alberta but we are both learning how to adjust... Jo-Ben also keeps busy with coaching the mens soccer (futsol) team at the bible school here in Three Hills and he also plays for a team in Red Deer and I keep busy with our new house (its alota work getting settled!) Im also planning on taking a cake decorating course in Jan so I'll keep you posted on that! We have made alot of friends out here too so we are actually adjusting quite well... but itll never measure up to BC! :)

So here we are.

I am officially a west coast girl on the prairies... living life to the fullest, loving my husband and feeling very blessed.

Jo-Ben and I still have all kinds of asperations as far as travells, life goals, etc. so hopefully this will be a good way to keep everyone informed on the Barkey's adventures! I'll post some pics when I figure out how :) & have some time!

Caio for now!