Saturday, November 26, 2005

One wonderful Saturday!!



Today we added some new editions to the house.
We finally got around to hanging out some of our pictures and paintings. It definitely makes our apartment feel homier with Johanie’s beautiful mirror, more sunflower stuff, a wall clock, pictures of our friends and family and Micah’s character sketch hanging over his throne!


















After a long day of watching Micah measure, measure and then measure one last time, everything was hung and it was time to get ready to head out to our friend Maria’s birthday party.


The party was just down the road within walking distance so we headed
down the road with rolls in our hands and the camera in Micah’s pocket. We arrived at a beautiful house filled with lots of friends and family of the two birthday gals, our friend Maria and our new friend Deborah. Deborah’s family is from the Congo in Africa so let’s just say that the food was.............AMAZING!!! We got to enjoying many traditional African dishes along with some Pilipino dishes that Maria’s family made. There was a really hot pepper dish that was made and, being brave, Micah decided he would try it out. When asked if it was hot Micah replied (as cool as a cucumber) “No that’s not to spicy…." Thinking: "Oh well I love hot stuff and Micah doesn’t seem to think that it’s even hot I think I will try some." So taking some of the red hot stuff on my fork and putting it to my lips and into my mouth, Micah leans over to tell me: "Katie I was only putting on a show that is the hottest stuff I have ever tasted!!” Well just as he was speaking my lips began to swell up and I was salivating like a mad dog!!! It was the hottest thing that has ever been on these lips. I guess I will have to remember the manly ego the next time Micah tries to pull a stunt like that!!!
After supper was over and birthday cake was eaten (Dairy Queen ice-cream cake at that) the table was soon being dragged out of the room and a real dancing party began! We danced the night away learning lots of new moves as we worshiped Jesus with their own music from the Congo! Micah is a really good dancer!!! He was grooving with all the other men!! In the middle of the evening the dance party turned into a fun game of musical chairs.


Toward the end of the evening Micah decided to show them a little bit of our culture. So we put on Stephanie Mainville’s “Family” CD and taught everyone at the party how to play spoons to the fiddling music. It was wonderful!!

We left the party pretty late and could not stop talking about how much fun we had had! We woke up the next morning still laughing and dancing remembering all the fun we had enjoyed.

We can seeeeee you.........


This is yet another exciting post! Our friend Google has just come out with a neat little tool that let's katie and I track information about our website! Google Analytics used to cost $199 US, but is now available for free (it is temporarily down due to high demand, but should be up again in a couple months for new signups....). Here are some exciting stats about YOU, our readers! Firstly, the map you see above, orange dots all the places in the world that people are visiting from! We would like to at this point say a special "Hi" to our Minnesota family (circled in red) and our South Korea readers (Sarah ? : ) A big hello goes out to all our worldwide readers!!


Secondly, we would like to say "Hi" to our majority Canadian readers! Hi friends and family! Here we see that most of our Canadian visitors are from New Brunswick (obviously : ), Katie's wonderful X friends (not X-Friends, but St FX University friends!!) and a large chunk also going to Quebec!! Salue Ben, Johanie, Lionel, Francine et famille (et posiblement d'autres...)!!! If there are any other Canadians we are forgetting, leave us some comments so we know who you are : )

Thirdly, this very interesting graph depicts the length of time it takes for our returning visitors to return to the site after visiting.............the large Zero pillar indicates most people are visiting the site more than once a day!!! Neato. And most others are visiting once a day. What does this mean for us? Well, it appears that people think our lives are a little more exciting than they actually are, hahaha. As time goes on, and our blogs become more monotonous and you get sick of our apartment colors, we may see this chart level out a little. Katie and I are hoping to have 1 -3 posts a week depending on how busy life is. You can use that to gage how often new stuff will be posted! We are also hoping to start a thought blog where we will put all the stuff we are learning and reading. We want to share all the stuff that we are learning about God as well as the run of the day from our lives! Look at the top on the right for links to these blogs as they appear and also links to friends blogs (Grampa Jamer's Blog and Eli's Blog are already up there!).



Lastly, we thought we would show this graph. This indicates when people are visiting the site. It appears that people are most likely to visit our site on weekdays. Weekends are a little slow. We realize that this makes sense because most people have access to computers at work and school.

So that is the end of this exciting episode of Micah and Katie. If anyone is interested in applying something like this to their website, let me know and I'll hook you up. Have a wonderful day and God Bless you all!

Friday, November 25, 2005

TGFF : Thank God for Fridays

To top off our busy week with lots of guest for supper, Weiwei joined us on Friday night for Hot Roast Beef sandwiches. Micah and I were not sure if he would enjoy such a simple meal, but come to find out, they eat roast beef all the time in China and Weiwei had not had it since he moved to Canada (2 years ago). After supper we took a road trip down to the co-op to pick up some ice cream. There were so many choices to choose from but Micah, being 80 or something, picked vanilla…over Candy Cane (Sarah P, I know that you would appreciate that choice).

Our friend Paul soon arrived and we all enjoyed the left over apple pie with ice cream. It was our energy food before playing our favorite card game 3’s. Weiwei must have been practicing over the week because he was really good…winning almost every game. I think that he figured out some math formula to it or something.


After all being beat but Weiwei, we moved our evening into the living room to have a Bomerman show down. We played on teams, but Micah is so good that him and Weiwei won almost every time.

It was a great evening and we look forward to learning more Chinese and even how to prepare a proper Chinese meal…who would have known that Chicken Balls and red sauce don’t exist in
China!!! Now that’s crazy!!!

Thursday, November 24, 2005

Eventful Week

This week we had the privilege of having supper with many friends and even family members. For all of you who know me, you must know that I am going some what crazy being in our small, yet beautiful, apartment all day long. So this was a great week for me having people over almost every night to enjoy a meal with us!



Tuesday night our new friends, who have recently
become engaged, Stephen and Maria joined us for supper. It has been very cold here in Moncton so we enjoyed a hot bowl of chili with nachos. We toped supper off with some yummy brownies that I made just for Stephen, which Micah seemed to enjoy as wellÂ…even know they were very low fat with hardly any sugar.







Wednesday night our dear friend Kait joined us for her once a week visit. We had a great supper together before hitting the grocery stores. We got some great deals this week!



Thursday night Micah as Nan and Grampa Jamer visited our new home in Moncton. We had such a wonderful evening together. We enjoyed the warmth of our little place as we fellowshipped over a delicious roast beef dinner with all the fixings. Supper was topped off with a fantastic dessert of homemade apple pie and ice cream. It wasn'’t long after we were done eating that Micah and Dave made their way over to the computer so Micah could show Gramp how to do some blog stuff. We then spent some time looking at the scrap book that I made for Micah as a wedding present and a multimedia presentation that Micah did for school about wedding planning.

We enjoyed having each of you over this week and we look forward to hanging out with you more!!

Monday, November 21, 2005

The Traveling Salesman


This is an exciting blog! Some of you may be under the impression that the days of the traveling salesman are long gone..............well have we got news for you..............they are not! We had the privilege of hosting Graham, the vacuum salesman! When Katie answered a phone survey several days ago, she inadvertently signed us up for a vacuum demonstration, but not just any vacuum..............it was a "Majestic Queen" vacuum!!!

Let's just start by saying that this is the most incredible indoor machine we have EVER seen! Made from army, medical, and spacecraft materials, this 1.5 Horsepower tornado bucket can suck up just about anything you can fit through the wand. We watched with awe as Graham filled the whole vacuum with a weeks supply of newspaper flyers, then suck an anti-tank bullet right into the vacuum!!!! It was pure craziness. We don't have a lot of money as most of you know, so we made the best of the situation as Graham let us test this little hummer out on our sofa and bed. It is really the most incredible vacuum we have ever seen and after talking to our grandparents about how much money you can waste in a lifetime on bad vacuums, we think that we may very well be buying one of these bad boys in the near future (like when we have kids, or I randomly decide to start wearing shoes in the house just so we can get one : ). Thanks for the presentation Graham!


Saturday, November 19, 2005

Another trip to Fredericton

Micah had me up bright and early this morning. We were heading to Fredericton to celebrate with my Aunt at her pot-luck wedding. Micah really wanted me to make meat balls so that meant NO sleeping in. Within no time the meat balls were done, the car was loaded up and we were on our way to Fredericton for another weekend. We had to pick something up at Black’s in the mall…bad idea as it is Christmas season! Micah did not believe me that it would be so busy due to Christmas season. I guess that is because his idea of Christmas season is Dec 24th. Boy did he ever get a surprise when the parking lot was so filled with cars that he had to rush to the back just to get a spot. We tried our best to get in and get out of the mall as fast as we could.


We finally got out of the crazy mall and arrived at Sarah and Davey’s apartment to drop off our stuff because we were on our way to visit Ashley and Stacey. My dearest friends Ashley and Stacey celebrate there November birthdays together because they are only 4 days apart. I was blessed to be able to spend some time with them this weekend as it ended up that we were all in Fredericton. Micah and I had a lot of fun hanging out with both of them and their boyfriends as we drank coffee, tea and enjoyed their yummy birthday treats of hot sticky buns!



After a refreshing visit with my gals Micah and I were on our way to the church where my aunt Debbie was getting married. As we opened the church doors we were blown away by the loud and yet beautiful sounds of the bag pipes, played by my very own dad! It was not hard to miss him as we turned to enter the sanctuary, he was standing at the front of the church in his full bag piping uniform. It was a beautiful candle light wedding with my cousin Becky standing up beside her mother.


Becky’s new little girl Meghan also made her way down the aisle in her mommies arms as she played the flower girl roll. She was such a good baby never making any noise as she laid in her daddy's arms. When the ceremony was over, we had the good old family pictures taken before heading down stairs to join everyone in the eating celebration.

Micah and I were so tired from our long traveling day we decided to head out early to go back to Sarah and Davey’s to get into some comfy clothes. When we arrived back at their place, Davey had made it home from Duck hunting, and he didn’t come empty handed. We found 4 ducks and 2 partridges in their kitchen sink!


We had such a fun evening with the Parsons as we played Mario Party! Now let me tell you readers something about the Jamer-Peterson family, they are super competitive and intense when it comes to their games. Davey and I on the other hand are NOT competitively intense. Even though Sarah and Micah were way better then Davey and I, we still had made some great moves against them and even beat them in a couple mini games.


Micah did however come out on top and decided to even take a picture of the TV screen as it showed him “Donkey Kong” winning the SUPERSTAR award. We then decided to try our skills in Mario Kart but not before enjoying some yummy ice-cream. Once we were done our break, we starting playing Mario Kart. The ice-cream must have boosted Davey’s energy level and competitiveness right up there because the next thing I knew I was the black sheep coming in 4th for every race! I guess I am going to have to practice that game some more.


Sunday was such a fun day! Davey made us a delicious breakfast of scramble eggs, bacon and homemade toast. We ate in a hurry before rushing out the door and off to the Meeting Place Church. The service there was amazing; God showed up and ministered in powerful ways. After church, we got invited out for lunch at couple’s house. We enjoyed a yummy lunch of French Onion Soup, which was new experience for us because none of us had really had it before.

Before heading back to our little home in Moncton, Micah decided to have a photo shoot of Sarah and Davey wearing some of clothes that we wore to Debbie’s wedding. I decided on Saturday, before the wedding, that it was time for me to rock the cow boy hat that I bought out west on our honeymoon. Once Sarah put on the hat she ran to the closet to get out her fancy cowboy boots to match. While Sarah was doing that, Micah tossed Davey his brown plaid shirt that he wore to the wedding. Dave was already playing the guitar so Micah figured it would be a great photo!!

They looked so great! I think that we should do some sort of Christmas dress up theme!

Friday, November 18, 2005

Friday Night School

Friday night our friend Weiwei came over to join us for a delicious meal of sweet and sour sausages, homemade bread and burnt squash. That’s right I burnt the squash. It did however have a unique flavor to it…sort of like burnt marshmallows. I have cooked squashed many times before and thought I had become a pro at making the most delicious dry squash ever. My ego must have gotten in the way, as I did not put enough water in the bottom of the pot. The apartment went from the wonderful aroma of cooking sausages to the stench of a burning steal pot. I could hardly find my way to the stove through the heavy cloud of black smoke. It took quiet a while for me to get the 2 inches of black charcoal of the pot! Micah and Weiwei were very good about eating it though since they were late coming home from work by an hour!

After cleaning up we enjoyed a yummy dessert of homemade sticky buns. Micah said that they were better the then ones you can buy in Alma. I don’t know about that comment. I think that I will need some more opinions before I can really believe him! Micah introduced Weiwei to a Peterson tradition of putting cheese on the sticky buns. Weiwei didn’t really like it as much as Micah thought he would, but he was a good sport about trying something new.

Micah then shocked Weiwei with his ability to do card tricks. He was quiet blown away by Micah’s ability to make cards disappear and then reappear again. We then taught Weiwei how to play our favorite card game, Three’s. It didn’t take long before he figured the game out and was using strategies to beat both Micah and I.

~ As you can see from the pictures Micah has become quite good at placing the camera in weird places around the apartment to get a better shot! This week the digital made its way in the freezer to take these pictures!


After all of our fun we headed into the living room for school! Yes School on a Friday night!
Weiwei has been teaching Micah and I how to speak Chinese. It is very difficult learning the 4 different tones that are used with each word but he is very patient with both of us and is really enthusiastic about us learning his language (since Micah has been teaching him English slang). We learned how to count to 10 this week. Weiwei gave us home work for the week so Micah and I have been counting to ten daily showing our friends what we have learned! We are looking forward to our weekly teaching and hopefully will have some more words to speak by Christmas.

Chinese Numbers 1-10

Say /Write/ Pronounce

1. yī (eeeeee)

2. èr 二 (rrrrrrrrrr)

3. sān 三 (san)

4. sì 四 (bumble bee sound)

5. wǔ (wuuu down then up)

6. liù 六 (layo, like what I call lionel in french)

7. qī (chiiiiiiiii)

8. bā 八 (baaaaaa, like a sheep)

9. jiǔ 九 (geo down and then up)

10. shí 十 (sher up)

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

Tec Weekend


Well, the big weekend is finally here! We get to see if all the preparing pays off! Well, it did. We all ate like kings and queens the entire weekend! All the teams worked VERY hard.......but as you can see, a little fun may have slipped in (what is mom wearing??). Yes armed with her tin-foil chef's hat, mom joined our kitchen ranks and pops helped me get a dish doing strategy down. It was a blast! Cheryl, mom and Katie were the kitchen think tanks. Our Youth leader, Carolyn, worked very hard to keep things tidy and keep us on track.

Sarah kept us laughing! She is one funny cat! She also brought her massive worship tunes collection with her (thanks for the rap Sarah!), and she often led us in a little kitchen worship with her wonderful voice! She is a hard worker!



Cheyenne is a work horse! This servant never quits and it was a pleasure to work with her! She doesn't like pictures that much though






Jen was always smiling as she peeled and cut and sharpened and served. Keep smiling Jen, your face is a light to the world!







Dad was our faithful Pots man! You would cook, throw the pots into the little room and they would come flying back out with sanitized steam coming off them!! Thanks pops!






Sussie Q was our kitchen mom and brought her experience and her wonderful laugh to our team. We love you Sue! (Sue loved to show off her false teeth tricks :)







The shop team (the bronze biceps) worked closely with us and we loved having their help as well! Thanks Jon and the Gang!



The weekend was filled with friend making, teaching, eating, worship and to put it in the words of one of the candidates..... "It was like one huge weekend God party!!!". I couldn't agree more! It is wonderful to see God move in everyone's lives. As we learn about the bible, God's love through Jesus, how to live for him and how to relate to God. When you spend time with God's people, there are challenges, but it is a miracle of God how we grow together and become the body of christ (how a body works all together). It takes me back to the kings kids days....... It makes me think that these lonely little houses that spend so much time in are just not right. Yes, it may sound a little granola (hippish), but does anyone know of any good communes ? :^ )
Whoa, we are way off topic, ok. So yah, Tec rocks!

Our kitchen theme was sound of music (yes Shiloh, yes it was!). It was a glorious kitchen song as people all shouted along the familiar "favorite things" tune!! We often sang it so loud that my bad drum ear would start crackling!! And for our skit, we did the sound of music in 5 minutes! And guess who Maria was, yup, yours truly, hahaha. It was very, very fun!! It was a great weekend, we recommend!


Tec Preparations


Lots of preparing goes into TEC. We don't want to spoil any suprises for our young anclican readers, so we won't say too much, but check out all the food in our little apartment kitchen!! The neighbors must think we are nuts. We came home with a car load of groceries almost every night!! Katie is a bargain ranger! She hunts down deals that are so good they must be illegal......(yes ben, you can punch me)! Katie left early to get stuff ready in Saint John and I had to work at the office on the holiday.



Thursday, November 10, 2005

A Doughy Downtown Center
















As a continuation of our coverage of Bread Towers, this week.....monday infact........Katie created an entire downtown center!! I'm expecting to see some urban cinnamon bun sprawl as a result of this growth! It tastes amazing and I am a very lucky man!! Posted by Picasa

Sunday, November 06, 2005

X Girls Continue Winning Streak


The X BBall Girls are on a 4 game winning streak and we were at the Moncton Colisium to watch them crush Acadia 74 to 56. Leah is the team encorager! She keeps the heads high and backs slapped. Emily is a bulldog and she was dominating both sides of the court. Tara was untouchable under the net and made sure they were always up 20. Booya girls. My loyalty is torn, they went on to play UNB in the Finals, so we'll see this week how it went! It was great to see the girls reunited and all smiles. Keep up the W streak X girls!

A 3's Showdown



Well, after Paul and I checked out the Boys BBall game (SMU vs. UNB), (UNB crushed them of course, boo...boo boo boo boo...... what? Yah) we headed home to the crib to see what kate n kate were up to. We made some delicious popcorn with Nacho flavoring and had a 3's tournament! We all won except Paul and he buried his sorrows in the popcorn bowl (shown below). We're making good use of the stir-crazy mom and dad!!