Da dum da dum!

Well you have it folks, we have officially tied the knot! I would be lying if I said that we were too busy getting married to post for this last year, but the truth of the matter is we have been on a whirlwind of many changes and growing that have stopped me from keeping everyone in the loop. So here we are...this is our loop!

Nate and I tied the knot on Saturday, July 11, 2009. It was a fabulously hot day...bright, sunny and just gorgeous on the property we got married on. We were married as if in a fairytale: in front of a pond, with a waterfall on a property that sits on a cliff overlooking the ocean. We could not have asked for more beautiful scenery.

We had all of our immediate friends and family there (aside from those who could not attend of course. We truly had so much fun and appreciated being home again that it was a day never to forget. I think that since we had not been home in a bit and have no idea when we can be home again, it made it a very emotional and truly blessed trip for both of us.

Love & Hugs,

~N & B

So here we are, less than 2 months until Nate comes home!!! I can't believe it is finally more than half over. UGH! I can't wait for him to come home and we all really missed him at his grandparents' 60th wedding anniversary in Sunderland, Ontario a couple of weeks ago. It was so amazing to see all of Nathan's family and I have missed you all so much! Next time we visit, it will most certainly be with Nathan there, safe and sound. Home from Afghanistan! Here is a picture of me (Auntie Brice) with the most beautiful little baby girl in the world: Denay Catherine McClelland, Trevor and Christy's bundle of joy and the newest addition to our family :)

GREECE!

Nate at what was known to Greeks as the centre of the Universe. It is called the Navel stone (navel of the universe). The story is that Zeus let two birds go in opposite directions around the earth and this is where they met.

One of my favourite pictures of Nathan :)
THIS is the bug that was on my foot! LOOK AT IT! I couldn't believe it! I felt something weird on my foot, looked down, screamed, kicked wildly and then made Nate take a picture of the bug that attacked my foot.....what? I'm soooo not dramatic! It's HUGE!
Theatre at Delphi.
Some remains found in ancient Korinth.
This is Nate with the view of Delphi below him.

Our first Greece tourist picture in front of the temple of Zeus in Ancient Korinth.
Us posing on our day cruise to the islands of Aegina and Agistri

Here we are with the view of one of the most famous churches on top of Meteora

Us at our first hotel, not getting a handle on which pictures are to be silly and which pictures are to be cute :)
A view of from the Acropolis, behind us is all of Athens.

This is us at our very first hotel at Kalamaki Beach.

Our sincerest apologies for not keeping up to date with our blog, and of course by us, I mean me as Nate is away and would leave it up to me even if he were home :) So here it is. I met Nathan in Afghanistan on May 26, 2008 for 3 weeks of fun in the sun, learning all we could and trying to spend some time together before he returned to Afghanistan on June 14, 2008.

So here are just a few of the pictures as a certain someone bought a new video camera before we left for our trip. So there are over 2000 pictures and over 200 minutes of video that we have. We are uploading them all slowly onto our photobucket website so you are more than welcome to browse through them at any time, so here it is http://s298.photobucket.com/albums/mm278/NathanandBrice/

Gone

Well Nathan got on the bus, heading for the plane to Afghanistan today. I am very sad, but I am happy to say that I kept it together for him at the going away ceremony. Thankfully the press did not show up as the timing was moved from 8 am to 6:30am this morning instead. I am very sad to see him go, but I know that he is doing this for the right reasons so I am happy for him in that respect. He truly does seem happiest doing what he was doing for training here and he was very excited to go. It was however, odd to see him without hair!

I will be thinking of him constantly and worrying about not only him, but the hundreds of soldiers we are sending out. I have met many of them during my stay here and truly love and respect all of them for what they are trying to accomplish. My hopes and thoughts are with them over the next 8 months and I believe that there will be a little piece of me always looking out for those that are going now and even when our boy is home safe and sound.

I hope that all of you will be sending out warm thoughts to them all during this time. I know that I will. Love you all and I am so proud of you babe!

My 24th Birthday!

My 24th birthday would have to have been one of my favourite birthdays so far. Nathan planned a surprise party for me on the friday night before my birthday because he was going to be in Edmonton on my birthday. He is taking an Islamic language course in Edmonton. 1 of only 8 people that got to go.

So for the party he planned, a bunch of friends came over, we drank, talked and then they dragged me out dancing and I had a really good time. Yesterday, on my actual birthdaymy friend Megan invited Julia and Katie over to her house, we had wine, food (lots of cheese and you know how I feel about cheese!) and watched Good Luck Chuck! Hillarious movie by the way. I had MANY friends call and many MORE send me happy wishes through facebook.

I had a wonderful day although I wish I could have merged my BC family/friends with my MB friends. That would have been perfect. There's always the wedding :)

We set a date!

Ohy my am I sorry for my tardiness, I know that everyone has been patiently waiting to see some more pictures of everything and hear from us for those of you that we did not get to see on our trip home. We set a date for the wedding. As for now, it is July 11, 2009. We still have to double check when we decide where we are having it but that is the date that works the best for us.

Okay, for those who did not get to see us:
We rolled out truck on the Connector just outside of Kelowna. We hit black ice, tipped into the ditch onto our roof and rolled right back over onto the wheels again. Both Nathan and I were okay and we had 2 dogs and 2 cats in the truck as well and everyone was miraculously fine. There was $18,000 worth of damage done to the truck and unfortunately they will not write it off unless it is 60% of the value and our truck was worth a little more than double that. But it is all fixed up and seems to be fine for now.

Now for everyone:
We are back home now and getting back into daily life. I found a job at the local pub bartending and although I don't have very many shifts yet, I really like the job. Low stress, good tips, nice people. I really like it. I may need to find something else on top of that if shifts don't pick up eventually, but for right now it is good.

Unfortunately we still do not know when Nathan is leaving for Afghanistan. They are throwing all sorts of dates around and there is so much turmoil between the generals in this army that no one seems to want to make a decision. The airforce doesn't want to comply and it's just a big mess, so unfortunately we had a little farewell ceremony the other day but it does not mean much because at this rate he may be leaving in March and not home until October so we have no idea.

Little news that everyone seems to know already but I cut my hair!! It is short and cute and I really like it for now. It is back to being healthy. I think I will still grow it out for the wedding but it suits me for now, so we will see.

Well, as I am now mostly a house wife I should probably get going with the cleaning and whatnot :p I hope to see you all or speak to you all soon. I have added some more pictures below for you!
Hugs from afar!

WE'RE ENGAGED!!!!!

Well, it happened!!! Nathan proposed to me last night in the most romantic and private way I could have ever imagined! It was perfect. I posted a picture of the ring on the page, it is the white gold version. It needs to be sized so I will post real pictures of it after we have done that. We plan to mary in the Spring of 2009, maybe late May or early June. Don't worry all you lovely people back home, we will be getting married on the Island so rest assured...you will be invited! :) I will write more soon. Love you all!