A Refreshing Start to 2015

The day before our VMQG December meeting, I listened to a conversation on the radio between two DJ's trying to psych each other up to do the annual Polar Bear Swim on January 1st.  The "swim" (I use this term loosely as it is really a screaming dash into the ocean and a panicked, breathless waddle out) takes place right downtown on Vancouver's famous English Bay beach.  The first and last time I participated was with B and my father, 17 years ago, and that was only because of peer pressure at work, where we were going to have a team with T-shirts, a towel and a participant button (I'm a sucker for the free stuff).

Spectators on top of the English Bay bath house, looking down onto the beach

While listening to the radio announcement about this year's event, I had a thought: what if I could get a bunch of VMQG members to join me in the swim? We could wrap up in our gorgeous modern quilts to get warm once we got out of the water and 15,000 people could potentially take notice of our guild/quilts/work!  In my typical, somewhat irrational and impulsive way, I got excited about this idea and proposed it to the members at our December meeting.

There was nervous laughter.
There was immediate shaking of heads, exclamations of  "no way!" and "you're crazy!"
I'm sure there were a couple of people wondering how the heck I managed to get the microphone in my hand yet again.

As I looked around at around 60 faces in the crowd, I saw a few smiles and enthusiastic nods. I reminded everyone that this is a FREE event and asked for a show of hands. I think 10 or 12 went up. Yay!

In the end, 6 guild members and one niece braved the chilly dip. Kudos to our co-presidents Holly and Felicity who both took one for the team and showed up with their big smiles! Here we are all cosy in our winter outerwear, just before stripping down to our bathing suits. It was a gorgeous day of 4C sunshine - couldn't have asked for better weather! Photo cred: Happysewlucky

The event packs the beach with spectators and there are many groups that dress up as well as individuals that participate year after year for their coveted button. There is an actual race (first three swimmers to the 100m buoy receive a trophy) which all of us were happy to let someone else win.  In reality, the dash to the water is supposed to be at 2:30, but everything gets very confusing and there is lots of screaming and cheering and throwing of clothes, so I think the first toes hit the water at about 2:25.

We got all prepared in our suits and water shoes so that we only had to take off our jackets and dash!

Photo cred: Happysewlucky

Based on the advice of experienced Polar Bears, our little group stayed off to the side of the main event so that we wouldn't get trapped in the water ahead of a crowd rushing in behind us. Miss G and I had made a pact to go all the way and dunk our heads under. That hurt.

Here's G after her SECOND dip!! This girl's got spunk. Photo cred: Happysewlucky

Don't our quilts look amazing in that sunshine?! Photo cred: Happysewlucky

It didn't take long for the gasps and screams of shock (yes, the cold was much more shocking than I expected!) to give way to laughter once we were all cosy in our quilts.  It was an amazing team-building activity that I hope will continue to next year with an even bigger group.

See you on January 1, 2016! Photo cred: Happysewlucky

What did YOU do to ring in 2015? 

Happiest wishes for the new year to all of you!

Krista goes Kamakaze

Yeah, so yesterday afternoon I jumped off a mountain.

A friend runs the paragliding company on Grouse Mountain, our local mountain for skiing, hiking and many amazing tourist activities like a birds of prey and lumberjack show, grizzly bear sanctuary, zip-line trekking, fine dining and more.  I've wanted to do a tandem paraglide for a few years.  The pilots were having a slow day yesterday and an email went out looking for any last minute customers to take the last flights of the day.

Happy early birthday to me! We took off around 5:30 and it was an incredibly warm evening. The thermals were great and we had a spectacular 30 minute flight over North Vancouver. That's the Capilano Reservoir  you can see below me. It provides about a third of the drinking water for Greater Vancouver. That's B flying in the background (above). Our daughter D is super high above - she got the daredevil experience for sure. She loved it (see smile below)!

Despite a moment of panic when I saw B and his pilot's foil start to spin directly below me, with one side flapping in the breeze, it was mostly a great experience that I would happily do again anytime. I just wish I'd been warned that the spin-o-rama is an intentional part of the thrilling flight adventure (that makes for fun video footage). I immediately opted out!  

About 3000' above North Vancouver. No biggie. Directly below my left hand you can see some white dots. Those are little leagers getting ready to practice in the corner of the landing (soccer) field. Brendan and I almost took two of the boys out on our landing!  One startled 8 year old ended up surrounded by the lines that attach the wing to the harness. The look on his face was priceless.

Our pilots were super fun, Brendan was from New Zealand, Todd from Oregon and Herminio might be Chilean, but I'm not sure. I do know he's one of those crazy squirrel-suit flyers, so I'm pretty happy he piloted B and not me!

If you're ever at the Peak of Vancouver and you want to avoid tram line ups to get down, I highly recommend a flight! 

Things That Go 'Round

...and more importantly at the fair, things that are round:

Nearing the end of the elementary school era for our family means a break in my hectic volunteering schedule. I'm losing steam, but couldn't resist the end of year trip to Playland.  I don't go 'round anymore, only up and over (I LOVE rollercoasters).  I think she does, too.

Blisters and all....

The radio ads for the Weekend To End Cancer last year featured a breast cancer survivor, who at the end of the spot stated: "Cancer is hard, walking is easy."

Many times throughout our stroll through the beautiful streets, beaches and forests of Vancouver last weekend, I thought about that statement. Because I have to admit, at times walking was a little bit hard.

Lovely little scenes like a decorated neighbourhood traffic circle made it easier....

So did the amazing volunteers who fed and hydrated us, and who stopped traffic so we could safely cross the street.

The scenery wasn't bad, either. It is so easy to take Vancouver for granted, or to whine about the 2 months of rain we had this spring/summer (and 4 months of rain we have every winter), but an hour strolling the sunny beaches, bridges and boulevards of this city quickly erases those memories and has one feeling rather thankful to live here.

What really made this event for me -- what really got me to the finish line after 35 km on Saturday and another 25 km on Sunday, however, was my TEAM.

Walking, talking, listening, laughing, LAUGHING, sharing, comparing blisters, waiting in line for the Starbucks (flush) toilet, stretching, snacking, encouraging, sighing, smiling (okay, and I did a little bit of whining, too). We did it for ourselves, for each other, for our two amazing survivors and for all women.

My movie-star boyfriend even showed up. It was an incredible weekend. If ever you've thought about participating in something like this, I can't encourage you enough to dive in and just do it. The sixteen of us worked together to raise over $41,577 and it wasn't even that much work, honest. As we walked together holding hands, towards the finish line on Sunday, the announcer said "and here comes the team that was always together, at every pit stop, encouraging each other...it's Team Kicking Cancer with Creativity!!!" I felt no pain in my knees, my blisters had momentarily disappeared and I had the biggest smile on my face. We all felt amazing.

Unfortunately, this will be the last year for the Weekend event in 5 cities across Canada. Participation is down (last year 1100 walkers in Vancouver, this year 800). The great news is that Ride To Conquer Cancer, an event benefiting all cancers has really taken off and is raising millions. Good thing I bought a new road bike this spring......

Winter Wonderland

This will be the last of my holiday holdover posts, but I just had to share these shots taken on a recent snowshoe hike with 3 girlfriends.

Vancouverites are lucky to have 3 'local' mountains that are developed for recreation: Seymour, Grouse and Cypress. If you were following the 2010 Olympics, then you would have seen Cypress for the snowboarding, moguls and freestyle skiing events. There are many more undeveloped peaks, but these three offer alpine skiing, snowshoeing and two of them have commercial tubing operations and cross country ski trails.

Over the holidays I headed up to a favourite trail on Mt. Seymour to take in this glorious view.

This is looking north west, across the north shore to the other mountains, Grouse and Cypress.

This is our city. I heart Vancouver. The green 'island' in the middle is Stanley Park, linked to the north shore by the Lions Gate Bridge. I hope the crews on all of those tankers got someone to cook them a turkey dinner!

This is the wonderland component.

My smiley mug. What can I say...I'm not much of a hat girl.

I have yet to ski, but hopefully I'll get up onto the runs soon - the weatherman is expecting snow this week (which means anything could happen)! Fingers crossed for the white stuff!

Stars of the Pacific Coast

At this time of year, it's hard to see any in the sky due to the ever-present cloud cover here in the Pacific Northwest, so for this post we're going under. Deep under the sea, that is. These are some of the beautiful creatures on display at the amazing Vancouver Aquarium. I love everything about this place and whenever we have out of town guests, as we did this weekend, this is our 'go to' spot. My little Canon Powershot SD750 has an aquarium setting, so I thought I'd give it a go....herewith the results:

Incredible anemone colour

Luminous jellies

Super-sized calamari (Pacific Giant Octopus, to be exact)

Everyone's favourite little fishy

What do you think these guys are staring at?

maybe they can't take their eyes off of the cutest creatures ever seen,

the elusive Pink Octopi-Noggins

(from L-R) bestest friend, D, visiting cousin

I've got a very busy stitching schedule this week so hopefully I'll have something creative to show you soon! It's not too late to get in on the GET LUCKY giveaway....click here to enter before Monday evening.

It's a bird...it's a plane....it's

ELVIS!!!

No wait...it's a little oinker!

or Clifford, the big Red Dog!

Rrrrmmm, Rrrrmmm, the Monster Trucks have arrived!

What's all this about, you ask? Vancouver's Pacific National Exhibition is celebrating 100 years of cotton candy, sicky rides, pig races, mini-donuts and FUN! See, here's the cake:

But what we've really come for is this little star of the parade.

I'm off to the fair today with 4 kids and a wallet full of cash. I am going to try really hard not to eat too many mini donuts...but it's only once a year, right?

On another note...have you notice all of the GO! cutters popping up in blogland recently? The Accuquilt people are incredibly generous. They've sent their new home-use cutters to lots of great bloggers for review and tutorials, PLUS they've sent a second one for them to giveaway! Check out Paulette's blog for your chance to win your very own GO!

We've got 2 more weeks of summer packed with school supply shopping, a long weekend on a sweet island, exciting sewing deadlines and play dates. I probably won't make it back here until school starts up and I can get my bearings again.....so until then, sew on!