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• Reaching the business goals I set for this month!
• Ending March on a super positive note.
• Bonding over DDR and Guitar Hero.
• Learning the end value of hard work.
• Getting back on track.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

• $1 candy at the Everything For A Dollar store.
• Filming in Starbucks and having people stop what they’re doing to watch.
• Getting our recession t-shirts printed for Life Allows!
• Spending a grand total of 15 minutes at home between appointments.
• Watching Gilles Marini dance.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

For the last two weeks, my brother has been on spring break. Having him home all day, every day, has made me realize how much I missed him since he started school in September.

Of course he’s going to be mortified that I am telling the internet that I missed him, kind of like how he’ll be mortified (most likely for me) when I tell you that I frequently trick and/or attempt to bet/bribe him for hugs. By the way? I suck at tricking, betting, AND bribing, so I just settle for telling all the old ladies at church that he ABSOLUTELY! LOVES! HUGS! And you should see the murderous looks he sends my way when that happens.

According to him, staying at home was “boring” and he was “really looking forward to school tomorrow”. I can see why he would think this, because you what sucks? Having a forced two week vacation from school where you use your sister for target practice and play video games all day. And by the way? I’ve been helping him mod his nerf guns so the ‘bullets’ hurt more when they hit me. AM I THE BEST SISTER ON THE PLANET OR WHAT.

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• Surviving Day Three of Insanity Three Day Weekend.
• Watching a plane take off with a glider plane.
• Mac & Cheese.
• Meeting new people at the Abbotsford Health Show.
• “I return calls within 24 to 72 hours!”

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace In Small Things.

• Seeing the best friend.
• Skytraining from Surrey at 10pm and not getting raped/killed.
• Dinner parties with six figure earners.
• Not having to work on Sabbath.
• (Meat-eating) people loving the (vegetarian) soup I made!

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace In Small Things.

• “You’re the girls from that website with the videos! I loved it! Very well put together. Great job you guys!” – comment from a lovely lady tonight on Life Allows.
• When people recognize you from your work on the internet. Seriously. NOTHING MORE REWARDING. That’s just reason #9327426 why being internet famous (FOR A GOOD THING) would be superliciously fabulous.
• Surviving Insane Day One of Insane Three Day Weekend ending on Sunday evening.
• Having a best friend who is one-in-a-million.
• The human angels among us.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace In Small Things.

Seriously. It’s almost the end of March. THREE WHOLE MONTHS INTO THE NEW YEAR. How did this happen? Where did the time go?

People are getting ready to graduate, losing weight for swimsuit season, considering summer plans and leaving the house without winter coats. The sky is getting bluer and bluer, the flowers are starting to come out (tulips!) and you can feel the weather changing. We’re leaving behind the season that began 2009, and entering into a new one that is completely foreign to this year.

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• The comfort that comes from knowing you have a plan.
• The responsibility of being a role model.
• Lists you can check off, that actually get checked off.
• Those restful hours before bedtime when you can surf the internet and abuse the stumble! button mercilessly.
• The interesting things life throws at you.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace In Small Things.

• Beautiful clear blue skies.
• Running at 10, 20, and 30 minute intervals. And surviving it.
• The hint of summer evenings to come.
• Being able to see my bedroom floor again.
• Moving forward with things you’ve been putting off.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace In Small Things.

• 8:15AM accountability calls to get you up early and keep you on track.
• Talking about logo designs, color pallets and typography. It makes my heart flutter.
• My Polestar Business Calendar day planner. It has more writing space, and is used in conjunction with my At-A-Glance Weekly/Monthly planner, which is smaller and is taken everywhere with me.
• Taking public transit.
• Getting to know people you’ve ‘known’ for years.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

• Getting more comfortable in front of the camera.
• Learning to get up early.
• Learning to go the bed earlier.
• Tech skills — they keep making themselves more and more useful, day after day.
• That feeling you get when you realize that you have more power than you think.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

• Taking the dog for a walk around the neighborhood on a beautiful spring evening.
• Deep conversations about relationships, marriage, and the not-so-terrifying probability of being single for the rest of your life.
• Glimpse parties! (Look out for Monday’s video blog over at Life Allows for more info.)
• Self-realization.
• Greasy but utterly delicious pizza from the hole-in-a-the-wall pizza place across from the Joyce-Collingwood skytrain station.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

• Feeling your actual age for once: going dancing on a Saturday night (8PM) followed by bubble tea (1AM) and sneaking into the house so you don’t wake anyone up (2:30AM).
• Overtired, post-midnight silliness that disguises itself as drunken behavior—not being able to pronounce words, not forming coherent thoughts, something about breaking into a burger shack (?)
• Funny stories that make you laugh until you cry.
• Putting into action Operation: Social Independence.
• Clicking with people you actually like.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

• Knowing that you can code & copywrite for seven hours straight on one sandwich.
• Having a restful day of not going anywhere.
• 8:15 AM accountability calls that get you up at a decent hour in the morning.
• Working with people you actually like.
• Having a best friend who is amazingly talented at drawing.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

• Dinner with friends.
• Geek talk.
• Being brave enough to sample strange flavored ice cream – like pear & blue cheese or balsamic vinegar.
• Sharing my addiction to the Stumble! toolbar with someone.
• Pros and cons lists.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

• Accidentally missing my Sun Run training group, leading me to run on the track by myself and do 12:1:20 (12 minutes running, 1 minute walking, 20 minutes running) with surprising ease!
• The two deliiiiiiicious slices of chocolate cake Douglas gave me.
• Getting a significant amount of things done in a small amount of time.
• Working from the warm, warm bed.
• Having hidden talents.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

The people edition.

• Spending time with people you actually enjoy talking to.
• The evolution of friendships.
• People who make you laugh until you cry.
• Connections in networking.
• Accepting change in yourself.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

Over the years, I have had a lot of people tell me they would love to be vegetarian except for the fact that they wouldn’t know what to eat—but the truth is, it’s really not that difficult!

To prove this, I am going start regularly featuring vegan and vegetarian meal ideas on here that are simple to prepare and guaranteed delicious to eat—stuff I make for myself (and in larger quantities for my family) on a day-to-day basis.

We start things off with a toasted bagel sandwich with Canadian bacon—my lunch for today:

What’s in it:
1 toasted bagel, halved.
1 large fresh basil leaf (I am a huge basil fan—everything tastes better with it!)
1 or 2 slice Yves Canadian “Bacon” (or equivalent, eg.)
2 tbsp Vegenaise (you can use mayonnaise, but I hate mayonnaise – thus, I use vegenaise)
1 tbsp stone ground mustard (or some other kind of mustard – yellow mustard doesn’t taste the same)
1 small tomato, sliced
1 medium lettuce leaf
1/2 medium red pepper
Freshly ground black pepper to taste

I trust you don’t need directions on how to make a sandwich, but I highly encourage you try this one out! It’s kind of like a BLT (bacon lettuce tomato) sandwich, just adapted—and very delicious.

• Meeting people who make you realize how incredibly blessed you are to have such a loving, supportive family.
• Filming your first vblog (for Life Allows) in Starbucks. With people watching.
• Dancing with the Stars.
• Expected-yet-still-happily-surprising post in the mail.
• A flower. Not flowers, but just *a* flower. Alone.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

In case you can’t tell by the title or the photo… It went well!

The rankings:

• 2nd place in Rising Star (Rumba, Quickstep)
• 2nd place in Advanced Standard (Tango, Quickstep)
• 2nd place in Viennese Waltz
• 3rd place in Foxtrot
• 3rd place in Jive
• 3rd place in Paso Doble
• 4th place in Advanced Latin (Cha Cha, Samba)

All my life, I have been the kind of person who has had to work really hard to do well at many things some people have no trouble with. I’m not super skinny, I don’t have naturally straight legs, I don’t have good balance, I don’t have good musicality, I feel awkward moving my arms and I don’t have much stamina. In order to dance and to dance even the least bit well, I’ve had to work hard on all of those things. Nothing (except perhaps hip movement) has come naturally.

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The “what equates to a lazy, unproductive day” edition.

• Guilty pleasures like The Superficial, TMZ and Celebuzz.
• A new season of Dancing With The Stars! (One of the last missing pieces of my weekly routine.)
• Being able to sleep in until 12pm because you got home at 1am—and not feeling like a semi truck ran over you, backed up, ran over you again and then body slammed you against a concrete wall just for good measure.
• Looking forward to a productive, work and school filled week. (Odd, but true.)
• Leaving the floor sweeping and the dish washing for Monday.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

The “post Gala Ball” edition.

• Having “downtime”.
  This is one thing I absolutely need, but don’t always appreciate as much as I should. Having just gotten through a pretty crazy week, being able to finally sit back, relax and do absolutely nothing for a bit feels so good.
• Faux judging!
  Because I competed Friday and not Saturday, I got to sit back, relax and watch the full slate of competition from 6pm to midnight today! During that time, I thought I’d make it interesting by trying out my judging skills—I would watch, make notes, mark which dancers I thought would make it to the final 4 or 5 and which ones would place (top 3). I ended up being fairly accurate!
• Getting dressed up…
  To go somewhere that didn’t involve hair-sprayed, slicked-back hair (my poor bangs!) or tranny makeup. It was refreshing; I’m not particularly used to having to put that much time and effort into
• Toblerone.
  Possibly my most favorite chocolate ever. My mom bought a box of it for me before my competition because she said she knew I’d do well. Awww. <3
• The return of my appetite.
  It had disappeared for a bit, but no worries—it’s back in full force! ;)

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

The “Gala Ball” edition.

• Not being at all nervous.
  Last year, the idea of dancing in a dance competition with everyone watching terrified me. This year, I can honestly say that on the day of competition, I was not at all nervous. No dry throat. No racing heart. No shaky knees. I’m still astounded by this fact! I felt at ease and ready to dance the entire time—it felt like just another practice, just with my friends, family, and instructors watching me and a panel of judges judging me!
• Feeling “showy”.
  As an extension to the previous point—not only did I not feel nervous, but I was ready to preform. This is so so so unlike me; it was like the minute I stepped on the floor, I had gained some newfound attitude that made me want to put on a show.
• No disasters.
  This was actually a somewhat legitimate (albeit distant) worry of mine, as I have recently fallen and pulled down my skirt (two separate occasions, the skirt thing happened in the jive – I tend to kick up my heels and sometimes they catch on to things.) Luckily, the skirts didn’t fall off, the shoes stayed on, no skin was broken, no tripping occurred, and I didn’t fall. No disasters!
• Looking back to see how far you’ve come.
  I have only really been dancing competitively for a year. Last year at Gala Ball, we only did Latin (4 dances). This year, we did Latin and Standard (9 dances) and more than doubled the winnings. More importantly, we’ve gained a better sense of musicality, a bit more technique, learned more steps and polished off more dances. A lot has happened in the last year!
• Oh yeah, and bringing home SIX TROPHIES!
  Three third places and three second places. We did surprisingly well in the Standard division, especially considering we had only seriously focused on it in the last two weeks preceding the competition!

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

• Spring-loaded hoops (for those who don’t want to get their ears pierced – aka, me.)
• The feeling of preparedness.
• The launch of LA Blogs!
• The pretty tulips that have been popping up all over in the most unexpected of places
• Cubed cheddar cheese. I’m not sure why, but it always tastes better this way!

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

• The value of hard work and sacrifice.
• MOAR DAYLIGHT HOURS.
• The prospect of having a life outside of dancing after this weekend is over.
• The feeling of utter rest you get when you crawl into bed under your warm comfy sheets after a hard day on your feet.
• My favorite pair of Keds.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

• Brilliant ideas.
• The feeling you get after finally doing things you’ve been putting off for ages.
• The rare moments these days that have nothing to do with dancing.
• Genuine socializing.
• Bagel pizza at 11:30pm.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in 365 days of Grace in Small Things

• Things that give your bun the smooth, sleek look—aka, invisible hairnets!
• Photobooths that give you that old-fashioned vintage look. On FILM.
• Guilt. I can be such a little self-centered, heart-stabbing biatch sometimes.
• Being admired and brought down a notch by different people for the same thing.
• Doing arts and crafts in the middle of the mall food court.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in 365 days of Grace in Small Things.

• Watching Elvis on CMT in Girls! Girls! Girls! and Blue Hawaii.
• Baking organic chocolate cake (and making the icing for it) while watching Elvis on TV.
• Mother nature on drugs: I left the house this afternoon in shorts and sunglasses, and five hours later, returned home to 2 inches of snow. You can’t make this stuff up.
• Doing absolutely no work all day. It was so refreshing. Bring it on, Monday!
• The super speed healing of the blister-induced wound on the back of my foot (blister 1 of 3). Blisters-induced wounds are very common when breaking in new dance shoes, and with less than a week to my competition, I can’t afford to have foot wounds. All I did to this particular blister-gone-bad was put Glimpse serum on it. Normally these kinds take forever to stop hurting and heal up. This took all of TWO DAYS to heal up (!!! – Insert Chanel doing a happy dance here.)

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in 365 days of Grace in Small Things.

• The first signs of Spring.
• Partaking in a delicious variety of foods I didn’t cook—aka, potluck lunches!
• Siestas.
• Having a hand (and sometimes, a whole arm) to write reminders on.
• Developing friendships with genuine people.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in 365 days of Grace in Small Things.

• VOSS Sparkling Water from Norway. It comes in the nicest bottle ever.
• Kona Mocha Frappacino mix + ice + soymilk + The Magic Bullet.
• Typography that inspires you to go out and create something.
• The prospect of a relaxing weekend.
• It could always been worse.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in 365 days of Grace in Small Things.

You know what really sucks for someone who’s life is 50% spent on the computer?

HAVING EYE STRAIN.

I have never once before this experienced this strange sensation, even after years of reading on my laptop in the dark or hours upon hours of working at the computer. Even worse, it comes at the tail end of a series of physical events I can only describe as Chanel’s Under Twenty Body Breaking Down Fifty Years Too Soon in which I:

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• Diversity in routine.
• Popping blisters and having them heal completely overnight.
• Not having to make dinner because dinner has already been made by someone else.
• Pound cake with tea.
• Doing (nearly) everything on my iPhone that I normally do on my laptop when my laptop isn’t available.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in 365 days of Grace in Small Things.

• Photographs that have been taken in perfect lighting.
• Minor, minor injuries. They’re like war scars!
• Reading into the lives of fascinating (and often, scandalous) people.
• Being over you.
• The ‘Stumble!’ button on the Stumble Upon toolbar.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in 365 days of Grace in Small Things.

Some of you, especially those somewhat familiar with photography, may be aware of the fisheye effect. It is normally created with an ultra wide angle lens (or a fisheye lens); the end product is a somewhat barrel distorted photograph. This fisheye effect, when desired, is ultra cool—the price tag attached to such fisheye lenses, not so much.

Here is the fisheye effect in action:

Photographer: Jesus Arellanes (via Flickr)

Here is the fisheye faked:

Faking the fisheye effect is surprisingly easy; all it takes is three simple steps in Photoshop and you’re done. Here’s how you do it.

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The “unusual foods that make my day” edition.

• Prunes
• Tofu
• Basil
• Broccoli
• Saurkraut

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in 365 days of Grace in Small Things.

• Family who saves you dinner when you have to miss it.
  It was a (veggie) chicken sandwich. WITH BASIL. Love love love.
• Deciding against going for a run today.
  If had, I definitely wouldn’t have made it through Gala prep (Jive, jive and more jive technique) and probably would have collapsed instead.
• Monday meetings with Merissa.
  I am so very excited for our plans with LA! (More on this later.)
• THE TOILET IS FIXED!
  One of the main toilets in our house has been blocked for almost a month because nobody could figure out what was blocking it. Today it was fixed. This, of course, is a cause for celebration.
• A good start to March (in terms of business).
  It’s only the second day, but we’ve already gotten a head start on business activity for this month. Looks like it’s going to be a good one!

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in 365 days of Grace in Small Things.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Vancouver, B.C.—The Winkey dog has struck again.

Despite his baby-faced attempts to worm his way out of trouble, Winkey (born Sir Winkey Tiggles the Third) Wood was officially charged and sentenced for identity theft and destruction of public property on March 1st, 2009. However, shortly after serving the first half of his sentence, Wood escaped.

Residents and regular readers are warned to be careful: In 2007, he was publicly charged with grand theft of a vegetable item. Previous to that, he was trialled for murder (“THE CROW HAD IT COMING!”, Wood claimed) and following the 2007 incident, vandalism, battery and destruction of public property.

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• The view of the Pacific Ocean from the mountainous West Vancouver Horseshoe Bay area.
• Vanilla chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream.
• My first ballroom fall! (Short story: tripped on his shoe coming out of a figure, fell backwards, squealed, hit the floor, laughed, couldn’t stop talking talking about it all night: “I FELL! I fell dancing! I’M OFFICIALLY A DANCER NOW!!!”)
• Getting hit with The Semi-Truck of Motivation.
• Remembering to put my ever-dying iPhone on charge last night so it didn’t die on me today when I needed it.

Wage a battle against embitterment and take part in 365 days of Grace in Small Things.