part 1 - some tears, mud, wind and a whole lot of sun..

as i sit here on thursday morning and think of the adventures the first half of our team (namely scott, darlene, hayley, caleb, rosie and i) has first had, i can hardly believe that we're at this place already!

after our most amazing farewell our church home had for us in estevan, we continue packing up the moving van for our 530 am departure on monday.

(i'm going to include some texts i sent along the way in smaller italics thru out this blog, fyi!)

sunday - bittersweetness at its finest
sunday had lots of tears and much excitement and anticipation for what lies ahead..
i was overwhelmed with how many and who all came to our farewell; some of our most closest church family and some of our community friends who are priceless to our hearts. it was amazing.

11:55 pm - well layin in my bed about to sleept til 445. thanks for tonight..i love you guys tons... i'm so glad our friendship doesn't end tomoro :) will text en route!

monday - boy does 4:30 am come stinkin early!
went to bed just before midnight, so functioning on a limited amount of sleep seemed to be the running theme for me this week! (little did i realize that i think its drinking the casi cielo-which means almost heaven, which it stinking is!!-coffee from starbucks in the evenings that has been keeping my brain buzzing thru the night!)

so we said our departing goodbyes to our house, the kids and i did. then we had to leave daddy/lover.. boy did that all of a sudden hit us all hard - no daddy for 2 weeks.. WHAT ON EARTH WERE WE THINKING?!? for a moment i wanted to just say, no either you come or we'll stay. but we departed and we were off.

5:05 am - k i'm messed up - they're packing up rest of our stuff and i'm sitting in my first house we bought, and the reality of leaving has just hit me.

the travelling arrangements were very german, i'd say: caleb and scott in the uHaul and dar, hayley and rosie & i in my car. their car was also being towed on the back of the uHaul on a trailer. we were PACKED full! so westward we began!

7: 32 am - we're 2 hours in..the girls have jus woken up..will stop in moose jaw for a breakie..can't quite believe this is happening!

8: 01 am - just gassed up in moose jaw. got food and changing all the kids. wind is really bad.

all was going well up until the little town of herbert, where we stopped to see gramma wall, scott's gramma. you see it's startin to get warm out in sask, so all the snow is melting and it's what is called "spring breakup" for the oil field peeps - road bans, cuz the roads are too soft.
who'd have thought we'd need to be aware of the innocent little road in front of sweet grama wall's! so yes, the van and trailer got stuck, and thankfully, a backhoe was there and pulled us out of that predicament!

so scott got us stuck in mud in front of gramma's house!

a back hoe has arrived.

the truck is out! woo woo!

so onward we went.. and it started getting really windy..and it was coming AGAINST us. makes for AMAZING gas mileage... NOT! :) thankfully we still have litres on our 20cents off a litre at petro canada!

just left swift about 1.2 hour ago.. gorgeous day for driving, just nasty wind - great for the mileage :s

we stopped and had some eats and starbucks in medicine hat - you know we need our starbucks fix!!

officially in alberta!

4:06 pm - 254 km to calgary..wind's rough..will take more time than norm...

from about brooks to strathmore, the wind was so mighty strong the van was actually on a slant! but the redeeming factor was that it got up to 22 degrees at one point!!! we were NOT complaining..just praying for strength for scott's arms!!

4:20 pm - we're driving 90 km/hr and we're watching the uHaul drive sideways almost like it's dogtracking..it's so bad, the wind. prayers for scott and caleb and truck would be most helpful and appreciated!

so we pretty much have the airconditioning on in the car!

5:42 pm - we can see calgary buildings in the distance.. we're actually at chestermere... woohoo we made it!!

just before calgary, the temperature suddenly started to drop, and fast. in no time it was at a cool 9 degrees and the sky was looking a little bleak. we made it to the zondervan's home (dar's parents) in one piece and got our clothes out of the van and packed our little car full and was headed off to meet J's sister, mel, and her family at IKEA. hugs were exchanged and we planned to be back at the zondervan's the next afternoon for the celebration of hayley's 1st birthday!!

then the snow/sleet started.. and its dark.. and i'm tired.. and very emotional. all great ingredients to a cry for me! so we made our way to IKEA, and had supper with themthere (its amazing that 3 adults and 4 kids can eat salmon and meatballs and salads and veggies for under $33 bucks!)

then the beginning of a dumb evening began for me: i dropped my camera , and luckily caught the majority of the fall with my foot, and cracked my lens up real good...

7:09 pm - i'm going to burst into tears..i just dropped my camera on a cement floor..i broke the lens, which caught the fall..

then later trudging thru snow, by myself to get the stuff from our car up into mel's place (they were gone to a church service that evening) and reefing my monster HUGE bag out of the car and busting off hayley's arm rest on her carseat in car...

love, i just broken off one of the arm rests of hayley's chair when getting the bag out. what else can go wrong? i can't do this without you..sigh..

then ripping open her gift bag as it caught on something, and her gift falling out everywhere... it was then, while blowing up the airmattress, that i began to cry and fall apart, and both my amazing little kids came around me and consoled me. it was a sight to see, i tell ya. but we prayed that jesus would help us get thru and hit the hay at 9:15.

8:44 pm the night has only gotten worse. i'm a wreck. i can't stop crying and my poor kids must think i'm a mess.

tuesday - a day in calgary
we woke up and the kids played with their cousins, madison and malachi, for the morning. it was so cute to see them hanging out and caleb is madison's new hero apparently.. :)
i spent the morning on the phone calling around for a new lens, which i intended to get in alberta to beat one of the taxes! i found what i wanted, downtown.. oh the infamous downtown! my old stomping grounds..

so after lunch i left the kids to continue playing ("do we HAVE to come with you, can't we stay and stay with our cousins????") and i went on my way.

i decided to go by our old church downtown, the very place J and i met.. and lo and behold it looked like there was someone there! so i decided to stop in. and sure enough, pastor john greets me at the door with "tracey, how are you?" funny... i guess you dont really change much after the age of 23..heheheh.. and they his wife and another friend were there, so we had a nice little time reminicing! it was great! talk about blast to the past.

after that, i had to rush to get the lens then go get the kids to go visit grama hunter, my dad's mom. found my lens, and headed back. said our goodbye's to the cousins and off to grammy's.
it was nice to see grammy.. we visited with her for a bit and then headed out to hayley's birthday event.

we decided that it'd be easiest for us to stay at zondervan's that evening for packing up purposes the following morning - so all the stuff back in the car and off to the party we went.

dar's mom, grama pauline, had planned a huge party.. i wasn't aware!! it was awesome! dar's family from her mom's side (aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents) and then scott's family - parents, bro and girlfriend, aunt from montana and grandparents... it was a huge event!

birthday girl had a great time, i had lovely visits with long time friend and scott's mom, carol.. and the kids played with all the other kids there! after the feast of pizza of almost every choice, the fruit and veggie platters, the pooh bear birthday cake and opening gifts, we were bushed! and it was only 820 pm!!

after all the goodbyes said and done, we started getting our stuff ready for loading and darlene hermitted to her dad's (grampy h) office and studied for her test she was to take the thursday morning after they arrived in vancouver.

we were a little stressed-well me for sure!- about the road situation..wasn't looking forward to driving thru ice and snow, with the big truck and all. i was pretty much worrying about that..

we kept checking the roads, not sure which way we were gonna travel, cuz of all the road advisories.. it was slightly disheartening and finally we said we'd look again in the morning.
i think i saw bed around 11 pm, not sure of scott, and darlene said she saw bed at 2...then hayley woke at 3! oh dear! i was up every hour cuz of calebs LOUD blow up sleeping bag making a ruckus! we were all in the lack of sleep department.

before i went to sleep, i got a text from my dear sweet little nai in australia..and it was so timely and so the voice of god to me right where i was at:

10:24 pm "lay down your burden, i will carry you, i will carry you, my child, my child. i can walk on water, calm a restless sea, i've done a thousand things you've never done. i'm weary watching as you struggle on your own, just call my name, i'll come." xx nai

ok i dont know about you, but that stopped me right in my tracks and i wept..it was so god, to use my friend on the other side of the world who had not a HOT clue what was going on, to talk to me JUST then.. sigh.. my jesus so rocks my world!


10:56 pm - also please pray for me..i haven't been able to sleep wel in two weeks, so am getting physically and emotionally exhausted. thanks bunches. night.

wednesday morning...a new day
4:55 am my alarm went off and we started organizing the cars, etc.
we looked again on the map and decided we'd try the #1 and see how far we could go. the thing was darlene HAD to be down in vancouver that following thurs am for her course.. so that was a concern, we didn't want to get stranded and not be able to not get her on a plane if we had to.

at 6:42 am we started our journey to the big mountains.

8:10 am - just at canmore.. didn't sleep hardly last night, up every hour. darlene up til 2am studying.. pray for us all, for strength.

after we got thru canmore, scott walkie talkie'd me that the sign said that the #1 was closed. great. now what? we would have to detour. should we have taken the 22x from the beginning of our trip to save time? will we even get thru if we take the detour thru radium hot springs? we decided to do it, and it was like we were going in blind thru the next several hours..

so..highway #1 is closed from field to golden - landslides. soi we have to reroute thru the #93 and get up past golden.

so off we went... and about half way up the pass, scott decided it would be easier driving for him down the hills if the car was off the back trailer. darlene got in their car and the 3 vehicle carvan began..the sun was out and it was a dream!

we got to radium.. heading upward to golden now!

the driving conditions to radium were fairly great..there was some slushy sections there..but for the most part, great winter driving..then i had talked to my dad and he had said there was snow up to golden. and as we began to drive there was..but only for a bit, and it wasn't really sticking, which was great! then more sun, like the rest of the day had begun..

then the unexpected happened.

we approached a 3 car accident that apparently just happened. no ambulances were there yet.

10:52 am - major accident on highway to golden from radium. dar's helpin til the ambulance gets there. maybe this is the reason we were to come this way.

11:00 am - still waiting. dar still not here. no sign of paramedics yet.

12:12 pm - still waiting...

at this point in the game, caleb and scott were on the side of the road hucking snowballs, the girls in the back chattering and laughing..hayley was so amazing - she'd been without her momma in our car for hours, and rosie was in "charge of her" and was doing an exceptional job! :)

12:18 pm - just left accident now. fairly serious, but they will be ok. onward to golden.

12:39 pm - about 10 minutes to golden. the snow has started.. sigh. i hate driving in this.

1:29 pm - at golden, getting lunch then getting thru rogers pass.

it was amazing...the sun shone the ENTIRE time we went thru the pass..the roads were clear as though it were summer. i drove amazed and thanking the lord.

3:57 pm - we made it thru rogers pass! it was absolutely clear roads. and scott drove awesome in the truck. the sun was in front of us most of the way. we believe it was the SON.. our light in seemingly darkness of not knowing how road conditions are. every step of this journey to burnaby, starting over a year and a half ago, has been faith... why should this part be any different!

Isn't it amazing how the lord is ALWAYS in control?? seems like we have continued to learn and glean so much from this trip so far!!

we got to sicamous, and we repacked and got what we needed.. we were going onward to mom and dad's in kelowna, where the kids wills tay while i unpack the house, and the wall's thru kamloops on to vancouver so darlene could make it to her course at 830 in the morning on thurs.

at 5:40 ish we left scott and dar and hayley.. it felt weird parting ways.. we had been together thru this thus far.. with hugs and blessings we drove off into the sunset to get to our destination before dark...which we did.

542 pm - ok i'm choking up cuz we just left you... sigh. - this is what community is all about. :)

545 pm - well, we have parted ways..us to my folks and wall's to van for tonight thank you for your prayers thus far. walls have a bit more mountains left..keep them in mind still. love you and will update the blog!

we got to my parent's place around 730pm, and with open arms and lots of hugs. of course i broke down and cried, from exhaustion, glad the trip was over and glad to be able to rest for a day til i went back on the road friday to meet up with the rest of our "family" (namely the wall's) and get our house on halifax street!

we got several updates from s&d en route to vancouver..

6:32 pm - we're cruising..will stop briefly in kamloops.

7:23 pm - you're almost there. . wish we could chill with you tonight. getting close to kamloops. sigh..still a ways to go.

9:10 pm - in merritt!

1:32 am just driving into van..got to park the truck somewhere and get to our hotel. thanks for your prayers. please pray i get throu my certification (darlene) class tomoro. wont be getting much sleep tonight.

so that is the saga thus far...

i know its a novel..but it's an adventurous novel! i will try and put photos up on the missionburnaby.com site tonight.

again, thank you so much for your prayers and check back soon!

trace, on behalf of the crazy team, phase #1
xxooxxoo