Milestone Birthdays

Over the weekend my family and I traveled to Lethbridge to celebrate my brother's 40th and my dad's 60th birthdays.  With them each celebrating milestone birthdays this year we decided to mark the occasion by all staying in a nice bed and breakfast together and going out for dinner at Ric's Grill, the popular restaurant in the former water tower.

My brother and his wife, my mom, dad, and me all drove out to Lethbridge on Saturday to meet up with my sister and her boyfriend at the Galaxy Bowling Alley.  I don't think I've bowled sober since high school, which is another way of saying that my skills at the game were almost non-existent.  I still stand by the fact that I think my bowling ball was cursed, but I suppose I shouldn't have expected my professional status on Wii bowling to transfer over to the real thing.

Both my dad and brother seemed to regain their bowling skills after a few frames, although they both woke up with bowling pains the next morning so I'm not sure it was worth it.  It was a fun way to spend the afternoon, but I doubt any of us will be qualifying for a bowling league any time soon.

From there we headed to the bed and breakfast, which was a giant house with more than enough room for all of us.  In the basement there was a giant snooker table and shuffle board.  Those were a lot of fun too.

After that we headed to Ric's Grill for the evening.  The ambiance was really nice and the food was excellent.  There wasn't exactly a whole lot to see despite our great vantage point, but I suppose you'd get a better view during the day.  In any case, we closed out our meal with a request for the piano player to play Just the Way You Are by Billy Joel. It was a nice moment and my mom really enjoyed it. Oh, moms. 

Back at the B&B we played a few games, exchanged cards, and my sister surprised my dad and brother with a Scrabble themed birthday cake.  My dad is an avid Scrabble fan so it was quite fitting.  We joked around a bit more before all heading off to bed.

The short trip was a relatively low key, but all around fitting family gathering.  We created some new memories,  shared a lot of laughs, and were back home before we got too sick of each other.  That, my friends, is how you celebrate milestone birthdays with your family!

   

Twas the Month Before Christmas

If glancing at the calendar wasn't enough of a reminder, the mounting list of projects and last minute goals that I set out to complete by the end of this year has left me feeling the pressure.  That's not to say that I'm not on track to complete them, it's just about a realization of how busy I'll actually be.  

First, and perhaps most pressing, is the list of work projects that I want to wrap up by years end.  This includes  photography for the Weddingstar website, a few promo videos, a year end video for Stream Media, and lingering elements from several projects that keep bleeding into others.  At this time last year I had the same goal but an editing project for Stream kept coming back and it seemed to nix the fresh start I was hoping for when I was still busy with it in January.

As an added line of defense I'm taking the end of December off and have made it clear that I don't want any work on my plate during this time.  Fingers crossed it goes to plan.

Additionally, one of my other big goals for the end of this year is to have my new portfolio site in full swing.  Things are looking good on this front.  The site itself is designed and I've started the meticulous process of filtering and linking content that I want to feature.  At this point it's requiring more updates and refreshes on Editing Luke posts, but it's fun to back track and feel like I'm constructing a solid presentation.     

Over the weekend I also managed to design and order my brand new business cards from MOO.com and can't wait to have them by mid-December.  It's been exciting to think about how I can continue to brand myself and connect with more people in the new year and I know this portfolio project will help.

There are other things I'd love to do too, like work on my short film Searching Salvation. There are people I want to visit, there are new posts I want to make, there are a couple of books I want to finish, and even a few PS3 games that I'd love to waste a day playing.  It's been a rough year in a lot of very different ways, but I feel like if I make the most of this last month I'll been in a good place come 2012.  It'll also make Christmas that much more enjoyable and relaxing.

Here goes.  
 

Disneyland Attractions in 2004

As more time goes by travel footage like this seems to become even more exciting to watch.  Places like Disneyland are seen by so many people that when things start to change there are lots of people who are eager to remember it the way it was.

These travel edits that I shot in 2004 where never meant to be much more than home videos, but YouTube essentially gave them a second wind.  I've re-uploaded these original edits I shot of the Jungle Cruise, Pirates of the Caribbean, the Mark Twain Riverboat Ride, and Splash Mountain as the ones I first uploaded years ago looked incredibly pixelated.  Here's hoping that these bring back some memories for all of you guys too.

For more of my travel edits from this 2004 trip you can view my Disneyland post here, and check out my full  playlist of California edits here.