Things that make me happy

My rule for this weekend was that I was only going to do things that make me happy. And boy, when you decide to do that, moments just pile up on top of each other and overwhelm you! It was really such great weekend!!

The first thing that made me happy was getting my reports in on Thursday after school. YAAAY! I was officially free to enjoy the weekend. (I'm just going to pretend that little stack of marking isn't staring back at my from the basket on my 'dining room' floor - where I tried to hide it!) Sleeping over 12 hours on Thursday night also made me happy!

Friday morning I went to my church's Good Friday service and was really struck again by Jesus' sacrifice, and by what it meant for where I'm at in my life right now. It was nearly audible (nearly! I wasn't hearing voices or anything!), him saying, "Hillary, I died so you wouldn't have to carry all this. Lay it down. Let me take it." How freeing it was to just give it up. I'd been trying to carry way too much, and I don't need to. God is SO good.

A bunch of people went out for brunch afterwards, walking through the neighbourhood of old heritage homes - beautiful gigantic homes along tree lined streets, the warm breeze and cherry blossoms filling the air. I had a good conversation with my friend Lloyd on the way there, which really built me up and encouraged me. He is one of those people who is just generous in every way, and every time you come away from talking with him, you feel good.

Brunch was great, and after that, I went home and began shoveling out the masses of paper that had seemed to breed and were threatening to take over my desk! There's nothing better than the windows and doors open, the sweet smell of the jasmine flowers outside my door wafting in, and doing a good, hearty clean-up. It felt sooo good to be able to see my desk again! hehe! I might post before and after pictures, but then you'll know how bad it really was!!! EEK!

Oh who am I kidding? Here ya go, before and after...


Afterwards, I headed out to another friend's house for a big Easter dinner (the one that would have been way less fun that hanging out with charm-boy) and guess what? It was SO much fun! Lloyd cooked a HUGE dinner for about 10 people - turkey AND ham! - and we ate, drank, and made merry. I learned that I'm still not very good at holding my liquor. A glass of wine, a chocolatini (mental note: buy chocolate liqueur!!!) and a daiquiri, even over two hours or so and a with a large dinner, and I was NOT ready to go home for a few hours! I suppose that would definitely fall into the category of "things that make me happy," albeit in a slightly different way! Ha!

Saturday was more of the same - brunch with my grandparents, more house shovelling - you know, taking care of all those little corners that you don't usually get to but that stress you out when you see them? Ah, it felt good. Then my friend Brad called and informed me that I was going to his house for dinner with him and another friend. :D I was treated to another yummy dinner (thanks, Brad! It was scrumptious!), and then Brad and Ian came back to my house to watch a movie while I cooked and prepared Easter dinner/lunch for the next day.

With no extended family Easter dinners this year, and my mom having hurt her back a few weeks ago, I offered to have my immediate family over to MY house for something to eat after church on Sunday. I made it very clear that I was not doing EASTER DINNER, but that I would make "something to eat after church." The EASTER DINNER label was a little more than I wanted to take on at this point in time. But Sunday turned out to be great, too! My parents came to my church (which was their church when they were growing up, and all the way till I was in grade 4), and shock of all shocks, my brother and sister came too! (If you're reading this, K & B, I'm really glad you came, it was nice to have everybody there!)

Church was AWESOME - I love the way my church tries to incorporate the diversity within our congregation. The readings, the art, the decorations, the music, the sermon, the testimonies - all were triumphant declarations that Christ is risen! AND? We even sung the song that I posted yesterday morning! Yay!

Lunch went well (no-one got poisoned! ;) heehee!) and we had a nice afternoon just goofing around and talking. It was neat to have the whole fam to MY house! My mom says this officially makes me a grown-up. I say, "Noooooo! I don't WANNA!"

And then? Sunday evening? What better happy-maker than to go for a walk on the beach with a friend? I called my Vanessa up and asked her if she wanted to head out with me.

"Uhh... it's kinda rainy here."

"Eh, it's ok. It's not raining here, we should be ok."

Except.

This is Vancouver, and rain hurtles in pretty quick in these parts! By the time we got to the beach it was POURING! Well hey, that's ok! It was easy to find parking!

Vanessa and I ran around at the beach in the POURING rain, laughing at the ducks and taking goofy pictures of ourselves. In a "Oh, what the heck? I'm supposed to be doing things that make me happy, right?" moment, I took a flying leap off a grassy knoll - and then anything else I could find - and landed with both feet into a colossal, sandy, muddy, and rather deep PUDDLE!


(click any image to make it bigger:you can read the rock and see the splash of my insane puddle jumping shenanigans!)
Let me just say this: PUDDLE JUMPING MAKES ME VERY VERY HAPPY! I repeated the act a number of times, creating little sandy lakes inside my shoes and making my jeans so wet I had to cinch up my belt another notch so my pants wouldn't fall off with the weight! Vanessa was content to watch the craziness unfold, so she was the official photographer. AH! It was glorious!

Especially when it was finished off with hot chocolate, whipped cream - dry pants!! - and Amelie, the most happy-making movie ever! - back at my house afterwards.

Today I allowed myself to sleep in and just wake up when I woke up (8am! grr... I'll have to work on that!), and I'm headed off to Home Depot's garden center to buy some baby flowers to plant in all my pots on my patio. I didn't do anything with my patio last year, and I missed it. I'm going to go make a little garden. Inch by inch, and row by row, I'm gonna make my garden grow...

And those? Those are all things that make me happy. Have a great Monday!