No Longer Nikki G

Hey All!
Due to the fact that I am no longer Nikki G
nor, do I live in Kamloops anymore,
I have started a new blog to chronicle my new life.

Please visit it.

http://nikkiandarrondelay.blogspot.ca/

No longer Nikki G. Photographic proof of the change.

Sisters Weekend

OH MAN OH MAN!
I'm so excited.

I mean there is lots of fun things coming down the pipe this month. Moving (in progress), getting married, (July 4 woot woot!),  honeymoon, Barkerville (next weekend), traveling with my new husband etc.

First up though : Sisters Weekend!

I don't know when it started, but I know it started when we were still living in Ontario which is going on 10 years now. Every year we go away, just the four sisters. We always do something different and we always have fun.

This weekend we are headed to Vancouver to see the musical Wicked, as well as to go to our new favourite place: The Improv Centre. Love it. Hilarious.

It's just going to be fun. Just straight up fun. I'm so excited to have a whole weekend just with my sisters doing fun things! Yay!

In celebration I made a video showing how happy I am.

An eyebrow story. (It's funny, I promise)

Last day at "work". I put it in quotation marks because although I am physically at work, there is no work to do, so I'm pretty much building up some Pinterest boards and stalking people on facebook.  I was asking my friend what I should blog about and she gave me a list of uninspiring ideas. I told her I'd think about them while I got my eyebrows waxed, "maybe there is a story in that" I jokingly texted back.

And while I was laying there painfully getting hair ripped out of my face, I realized that there WAS a story in eyebrow waxing.

Let us go back a few years. My sisters and I are in our hay-day of living together. Fun times all the time. We are shopping one day and Bethany comes across a do-it-yourself waxing kit. She decides that spending $9.99 on seemingly never ending waxings is way more cost efficient than paying someone ten bucks every time she wants her eyebrows waxed. I agreed.

Yay us for being so frugal!

This is my friend Hayley's eye. She has perfect eyebrows and
NEVER has to wax/pluck/thread them.

Luckily we didn't learn the hard way that sometimes it is worth it to pay money to have professionals do things for you. Our youngest sister Vanessa however, was the one who learned that (literally) painful lesson.

After giving Bethany a semi-not-sucky eyebrow waxing, Vanessa decided that she would trust me to wax her eyebrows as well.

Eyebrow one: Check. Beautiful. "It looks so good Vanessa! Really, I'm impressed with myself. This kit was totally worth it."

Eyebrow two: Oops. Maybe I shouldn't have been so cocky. I didn't say anything. Just sort of had that panicked look in my eye. Vanessa asked me what happened. "Oh, well the good news is that your one eyebrow still looks really great... The bad news.... well... ahem.... you might now have... uh... three eyebrows?"

My bad.

And while it was really really really hilarious, I did feel bad. But on the good side, Vanessa got bangs and learned a new way to style her hair. 

Things That Make My Fiancee Sad

This is my fiancee being happy.
Unlike the other night when he was sad.

The other night I was happily laying in my bed almost asleep when I got a text from my wonderful Fiancee.

The text was : "Sometimes E-Bay makes me sad."

This surprised me. Because I know for a fact that Arron LOVES E-bay. Loves it like I love Dr. Quinn. I mean I could live with out it, but why would I want to? Same with his love of E-Bay. Living in a small town makes shopping difficult and so we buy a lot of things we need or want online just because of the remoteness/lack-of-all-stores in this town. Plus E-bay has amazing things and amazing deals!

So I was surprised when he was so disappointed and sad about E-bay. I naturally asked why. 

Turns out Arron was looking to buy some motorcycle gear, specifically leather pants. He typed in "Leather Chaps" and was rewarded with slightly traumatizing photos of "black, bum-less (only it didn't say bum), gay, leather, chaps" 

Arron was gracious enough to send me the exact photo that came up.
I will spare you the image though, because I (unlike Arron) care what you view before bedtime.

Moral of the story: be very specific with your search words when looking for things online. 

A Lofty Goal

It all started last year when I was thinking I was fit and healthy and doing pretty good fitness-wise. And I thought to myself, "Nikki, you should join a team sport." I never actually got around to it because after I said that to myself I realized a few things.

1. I suck at sports. All of them.
2. I'm not a very good "team player" as they say.
3. I really am no good at sports.
4. I have never been on a sports team. Other than T-ball when I was 6. Seriously never.  Because I am bad at sports and I never made the cut and eventually stopped trying.

Well anyways, last summer I enjoyed watching Arron play baseball with his team and I noticed that a few of the people on the team were... well.... mediocre players. And I thought to myself, "Ok Nikki, you probably aren't any worse than those players. You could do this!"  So all winter I pumped myself up to join Arron's team.

So I joined it. And I made myself one lofty goal. "To not be the worst one on the team."

Yup. I set very high standards for myself this season. And so far I either meet them, OR if I'm completely honest, I at least tie for worst which means I'm not the actual worst all by myself.

I'm glad I can laugh at myself and still participate. And I am being hard on myself because I don't like sucking at things. I like being good/awesome/the best at whatever I try (oldest child, type-a personality right here).  And truthfully Arron says I'm not that bad. He said, and I quote, "You were surprisingly average .... for a girl." But he loves me and wants to marry me so he has to say nice romantic things like that.

Anyways, I'll keep trying and learning and hopefully get to be third worst or something. That would be exiting! 

f.o.r.e.v.e.r (I'm sorry)

Here are the things I have been busy doing. (Also known as "Why I haven't blogged in f.o.r.e.v.e.r)

1. Planning a wedding
2. Redecorating Arron/soon-to be my house. (Well to be fair, just one room right now, but it's been a process)
3. Doing taxes for everyone in the Cariboo.
4. Waitressing.
5. Crafts
6. Organizing my life (and failing)

Life has been too busy. TOO busy. I won't complain (too much) because work and activity and doing things are good, but other than this past Easter Weekend in Bella Coola with Arron's Family, there has been ZERO downtime. I keep thinking to myself "just a few more weeks, just a few more weeks," but the weeks keep coming and so does all the work. 

I am happy though.

Here's some pictures from the weekend. 

A look-out point on the Grease Trail

At this moment on the 5 hour drive home on roads like this, I turned to Arron and said, "I'm bored." He responded, "Well we could play a game, how about the license plate game?"

Go-cart master. Except I got stuck in a corner. Funny story, those things don't have reverse!

ANNNNND my ring. Because it's pretty and I love it.

YES!

 If I read between the lines properly, I am going to assume that 184 likes and 90 comments on our Facebook photo means that people are pretty excited about the fact that I recently found an amazing man (it's true, I found him), and that he decided I was pretty swell and decided I would make a good wife. 

I also know that many of you (well mostly all the women) are curious about how we met as well as the proposal.  And so I'll bring you the prequel to the story that will become Mr. and Mrs. Arron Delay this coming July.

The Meeting
It all started with Dave (freaking) Mohr. He has no idea this was actually his doing. As was a tradition, Dave and I were hanging out in his office at the church just gabbing and talking and he nonchalantly mentioned that two men in our church had found their wives online on Christian Cafe.   I had scoffed at online dating for YEARS and had actually even started my own fake dating website called singlechristianlosers.com for single Christians who were obviously losers because they were not married at the average christian marriageable  age of 20. (This is all sarcasm, don't get offended) Anyways. TOTALLY against the idea.  But later that day I went home and I was a bit angry and bitter that no one loved me. And I thought about how I love all the covered wagon romance stories about mail-order brides, so doing the online dating thing was probably just the modern version of a mail order bride? Yes? 

So I signed up for ChristianCafe.com and searched around a bit and during my free trial week found this totally studly Cariboo boy who loves Jesus and Missions and babies and having a solid family life, and was extra manly. He loves dirt and oil and grease and getting dirty and fixing things, and pumping iron (I'm getting all sweaty and blushy thinking about his totally ripped body). And I was like, "Hey, he's cute. Let's see what this guy is like." So we started e-mailing long long long e-mails. We covered all the big questions within the first weeks of talking. Arron's thinking was, "why waste time getting to know each other and have fun if we are not compatible on big make-or-break issues." So while it was quite overwhelming and scary at times we pretty much decided right off the bat that the other person was compatible with our own dreams and goals and desires.

Then we had to meet. Arron drove his totally awesome motorcycle down to Kamloops one day in the beginning of June for our first date. I was super nervous and he was worried that I would look old. We had Starbucks and Taco Del Mar and went for a hike and then it rained (which you think would be romantic, but it was mostly just wet), and we sat under a tree and talked and he put his arm around me and I pretty much melted! Then we fed Marmots from our hand, went out for dinner and he drove all the way back home through rain, hail, snow, and cold. (Well maybe not snow, but he said it was pretty cold).

Thus began our dating. And it goes on. Lots of hiking, lots of wandering around Barkerville, lots of movies, many motorcycle rides, and some adventures dirt biking.

The Ring
Well one day last December my friend Bobby and I were hanging out and she needed to go to the jewlery store to "just get some things fixed." And while we were there, hey "why don't you just look and see what you like."   So I was looking at rings, just for fun because a proposal was A LONG way off (or so I thought). Anyways without my knowledge the sales associate wrote down the serial numbers of the rings I was looking at and Bobby texted them to Arron. Within the hour he went down to the store (very worried that I would randomly go back and catch him there.)

Meanwhile I had a secret pinterest board all full of rings that I liked and my bestie Tiersa and I had many discussions. She had a file ready for Arron when I thought he was getting to the point where he might propose. That file is now null and void since he jumped the gun and totally surprised me!

The Proposal
So Arron bought the ring weeks ago. And had it in his pocket every day waiting for the right time. I have forever, all winter, constantly, been mentioning/begging/nagging that I would really like to go for a walk. And he ALWAYS whines back about how it is cold and I'm crazy, and that is a dumb idea. But finally on Friday night we were making plans for Saturday and he said, "well, it is supposed to be warm this weekend so... I guess...... we can go for a walk."  So I was super stoked. But he still kinda had his whiny-you-are-crazy-for-wanting-to-be-outside voice.

So the next day Arron was doing his 'exasperated' (although apparently fake and keeping up the facade) face before we left. So I didn't think we would actually go for a walk. But when he pulled into Scout Island (a nice park in town on the lake) I was surprised that we were actually going for a walk. So surprised that I hadn't worn warm winter boots. So we started walking. And I got cold feet. No pun intended, my feet actually got cold. So before he actually got to the spot where he wanted to propose we turned back.

Epic Fail on my part.

The following afternoon after church Arron had had enough of waiting and just wanted to seal the deal and get the ring on my finger. He had been worried all week that I would find it in his pocket and didn't want the surprise to be ruined.  We went to get Sushi after church (but wanted to take it home because the sushi place, while delicious smells super bad funky). So we were just walking around outside (on the sidewalk, safety first), waiting for our food to be made. And we were just talking and giggling and walking and enjoying each others company and then he was on one knee with a ring in front of him!

AND I WAS SHOCKED!!!!!!

SO SHOCKED!

Don't get me wrong, I was expecting a ring. E.V.E.N.T.U.A.L.L.Y.  Like in the spring. But man alive! Not this week! But I didn't care. I was happy. I was ready. I wanted Arron and the pretty shiny bling bling! 

So that my friends and family, is the story.
And I like it.