Cake Decorating Calgary Style

Those of you who know Sophie will know that she has been decoratin 3D novelty cakes for almost eight years and has an amazing portfolio of fantastic cakes that she has made, and all without any training or lessons. Before we made the move she expressed the interest in taking lessons so after a friend mention a craft chain that offered evening classes in cake decorating she enrolled on the first course.

Although she has experience using fondant icing and gum paste, (not that I know that much about icing!) she has never really done and piping icing on cakes so she was keen to learn the tricks of the trade and really enjoyed the first three lessons. She has the last one next week before she enrolls on the next course, (I have never eaten so much cake), but here are here last two creations.

Winter Preparations = Queues, Queues, Queues!

After the recent traitorous drive through the mountains we decided that we needed to get our winter tires brought and put on the car so Nige went to Costco to order them. This week we had the call that they were ready and that we could either make an appointment for a few weeks time or queue up early in the morning in order to get an appointment that day.

As I was off today we decided that I would get up at 4am in order to be there at 4:30am. When I arrived I was 10th in the queue with the first person arriving at 3am!!!!! What the salesman didn't tell Nige was that I would be queueing outside until 7am unless someone arrived early!

Thankfully due to the large number of people queueing each morning someone arrived at 6:15am and handed out tickets to the first 15 inline (thank goodness I didn't arrive 15 minutes later as I wouldn't have got in that day), we then got to come back at 7am when the manager arrived in order to book our appointment, so not only had I already queued for nearly 2 hours in the cold, but we had to either wait til 7am or come back again!!! So I decided to nip home to warm up and then return again at 7am. So at 7am I arrived back, queued for another 20 minutes and managed to book the car in for midday.

So again I returned home for a quick breakfast and made my way back at 10:30 to pay and drop off the car, another hour spent queueing, (thats 3 hours 20 minutes in total so far today!)

After the car was ready Nige had finished work so we met up and headed off to get an oil and filter change on the car. Here they have drive-thru garages so we queued up (AGAIN) in order to get that sorted (another hour queueing, 4 hours and 20 minutes in total!)

Now that car was winter ready we decided that we were next. We had originally decided that this year we were going to just hire out ski/snowboarding equipment, but with the average price around £18 a day we decided that it may be better to invest in our own so we we headed for a three day new and used ski sale in calgary.

I had spoken to a few people in work about the Sale and was told to get there early as the first day is very popular, so as it was due to open at 5 we made our way early to arrive at 4pm. When we arrived however we weren't the only people that knew to arrive early and there were already about 100 people in front of us. So we got in line and eventually after queueing for about an hour and 30 minutes (5 hours 50 minutes in total now!) we entered the sale.

The sale consists of ex demo stock, used and ex-rental skiing and snowboarding equipment all arranged into sizes. The sale was at one of Calgary's ice rinks that had been covered over for the sale and was basically a bit of a free for all as everyone rushed to get the bargains in their size. There were a lot of volunteers around that could answer any questions you may have and give you some advice with your choices. After a couple of hours of selecting and trying on Nige had found a snowboard, two sets of bindings and two pairs of boots. I had found Skis, boots and poles. So now it was off to QUEUE in order to pay. After 1 hour and 10 minutes we got to the till and paid for our goodies......£340 what a bargain.

So today was a day spent queueing, 7 HOURS! worth, but at least we are all set for the cold Canadian winters!

Another step for a Canadian Nurse!

Well today was my 7 hour Canadian Registered Nurses Exam at the Calgary University. This was another stage towards becoming a fully registered nurse in Canada. It was split into two 3 1/5 hour multiple choice exams with an hours break in between. Preparation for the exam consisted of me going through the hundreds of practice questions from the CRNE prep guide many times leading up to the exam day, but although I have been a nurse for almost five years I have still found elements of Canadian nursing that I have found difficult.

The fact the the exam was multiple choice makes it sound very easy but I can honestly say that I came away having no idea if I had passed or not. The wording of the questions is very particular and there always seemed to be a couple of answers the at first glance could be correct so I was having to really think about what they were asking from me.

Anyway even though it was multiple choice, for some reason, it takes 8-10 weeks for me to get my results through so its going to be a bit of a wait until I know If I have to start cramming for the next exam in February, (which has a new format of fully written!!!)

I'll keep you posted!

The Big Secret!

Well those of you that have been following Sophie on Facebook will know that she has been keeping a little secret. Well at last the secret can be revealed.

When we arrived on Canadian soil she weighed the heaviest she had ever been, what with the stress of the move, her operation earlier in the year and all the goodbye meals and drinks. She had always said that moving to Canada would give her to opportunity to start new habits and that she has done. Just the new lifestyle change from moving here meant that she lost around 5 lb in the first month we were here without any structured weightloss plan, but when she attended a local Weight Watchers meeting to find them unsupportive, rude and very uninteresting she decided to try something different.

So on July 23rd she joined Canada's No.1 weight loss organization Herbal Magic www.herbalmagic.com and has since lost nearly 30lbs. She has done so well and although she isn't where she wants to be she hasn't got far to go with her target day as the 25th December.

Another PR update!

After a very busy few weeks the paperwork has finally been completed, signed and triple checked ready to be posted tomorrow, lets hope we won't be waiting long for some good news!

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving in Canada conveniently Sophie's parents and our friend Sonja had both her mum and brother over visiting. So we decided that it would be a great idea for the eight of us to get together to celebrate Thanksgiving together. Both Alan and Sonja moved her a similar time as us, so getting together with family was really important to us all and as we couldn't be with all our loved ones by us all getting together we could reduce any homesickness.

Cooking roasties Canada style, on the BBQ!

Bainesy just carving the turkey ready to serve....yum, yum!

Martin, Josephine, Sonja and Alan just waiting for their pumpkin pie and ice cream!

It was a wonderful day and the food was fantastic (thank you to Sonja and the Mums for all their help!) but most of all we realized how lucky we are to have such good friends!

Snow Snow Everywhere!

Well we woke up the other morning to find that the weather had been busy whilst we were sleeping and had left us a little surprise this morning.

This was the second lot of snow we have had over the last couple of weeks but this time it didn't take long for the temperature to start picking up and by the end of the day it was mostly gone, but a surprise all the same.