nippy november

Happy November, friends! Gosh did October ever go by quickly. (It blows my mind.) It was definitely a busy month, to say the least. Pretty much right after my parents got back from New Brunswick one of my moms friends from forever ago came up and stayed with them for a while. Also during that time Jeff's parents came up and stayed with us! So it was busy, but still very enjoyable. It was so wonderful having Cornie and Lisa up for a visit! Much needed family time for sure. While Cornie and Lisa were up we had our first snowfall! (i'm not sure whether i should be excited about the snow or upset about it…) It didn't really stay on the ground at all, you can just see the snow on the mountains now. I suppose i'll have to accept winter eventually! OH! Right before Jeff's parents came up we got a package in the mail! …OUR WEDDING PHOTOS!! eeeek!! It was seriously so exciting! Andrea Neudorf, our photographer, posted quite a few of them on her blog so if you're interested you can go take a look! 
http://imagerow.blogspot.ca
I'm hoping to be posting some eventually as well… emphasis on eventually. 
So really, not much is new. But to be honest i'm very much ok with that. It'll be nice to kind of get back into the routine of normal everyday life.

Happy November, all!
a.mart

treasuring memories

Remember my first October post? How i said that it was going to be an "Outstanding October"? I was right, but you know its also been a pretty challenging October as well. I'll just start at the beginning. My Nannie, Grampie, & Aunty Kathy came up from New Brunswick came up and it was just so great to see them. We had so much fun!! We played cards, walked, hiked, watched the salmon run, and just hung out as a family. (i'll post some photos of our hikes below!) It was good for all of us i think. Just lots of lovely bonding time. Oh and me and Jeff both had our birthdays! (i am now 19 and Jeffry is 20!) So we were so blessed to be able to celebrate with everyone! Tiff came up and stayed at our house for a few days, so that was super great! (i love seeing that girl) So yeah, we had a fun Thanksgiving meal and all that good stuff, and now we realize how thankful we really were. I know it wasn't that long ago, but for some reason lots of October feels like a fuzzy blur so I'll just skip to the end. The family left and we were so sad to see them go, its amazing how quickly you get used to having everyone around. So they left on Sunday morning (the day before Thanksgiving) and that was that, life back to normal. However on Thanksgiving we got a call saying that on the plane Grampie had something that seemed like a stroke, they later found out that he had a huge infection in his body. As soon as their plane landed in Fredericton he was taken to the hospital where he was immediately put into ICU. Things weren't looking good, but we didn't really know what the outcome was going to be. As the days went by there wasn't much change, but then on Tuesday the 15th the doctors tried to take Grampie off some of the medication he was taking but he went into a cardiac arrest. My parents flew down to Fredericton the same day. Things were pretty much staying consistent, there would be slight improvements, but nothing was really happening then on Sunday the 20th mom called and said that news from Grampies CT scan came back and if he survived this he would pretty much be vegetable. And that all the family got together and they decided that they would be taking Grampie off of the life support. Yesterday around 5:00, New Brunswick time, Grampie passed away peacefully with both my parents in his room. Thanks to everyone who had been praying, it was so appreciated. Its a tough time, but we're all so glad that Grampie doesn't have to be in pain anymore. We're all so grateful that we had a week to spend with Grampie before all of this happened. It was definitely all done in God's timing. At least its not 'goodbye', but only 'see you soon'. 

"when someone you love becomes a memory, the memory becomes a treasure."

We'll miss you Grampie. xoxo
a.mart

i feel an outstanding october coming...

Greetings, loved ones! Lucky for you, (hopefully) i've decided that i should try to blog more often then i usually do, so here we go! This week has been good; lots of fun. I worked at Carter's/Oshkosh from Monday-Wednesday so i'm officially DONE wearing a training name tag! Weeeee! However, it looks like i'm gonna start some more training because they need someone to be a part-time key holder/manager in training (MIT) and it looks like that's gonna be ME! So i'm pretty excited about that. It's neat how i was so nervous to start looking for a job and all that stuff, but now its like God knew exactly where i was needed, and what i needed as well. Its great to feel like you're in the right place at the right time. In other news, there are some really exciting things happening this month! For one, Jeff is doing MIDTERMS! (ok, so its not that exciting, but prayers would be much appreciated!) Oh i almost forgot! Jeff got a job as well! He's officially the janitor for the Prairie Coast Equipment here in Kamloops! We're pretty excited about it. Haha and another exciting thing happening soon is that my Nannie & Grampie and my Aunty Kathy are coming up to Kamloops for a nice long visit! I'm so excited! It was a bummer that lots of my Tosh side couldn't make it to the wedding, so seeing some of them now is gonna be just swell. They fly up on the 6th i believe (is that a Sunday?) anyways and they're leaving on the 14th. Which meeeaanss... THEY'LL BE HERE FOR MY AND JEFF'S BIRTHDAYS!! My birthday is on the 11th and Jeffry's is on the 12th! (so neat how that worked out, hey?) So yeah, we're gonna have some great times! I'm turning the big "19" this year! (its different from Alberta where its usually considered the big "18" or whatever) And Jeff's turning into an adult. Lame. Haha but no, its going to be so nice. Another exciting this thats happening is that while my Grandparents and aunt are up here TIFFANY THE BEST is going to come up as well! Weeee! I'm excited. It feels like its been a while since i've romped around with that girl! SO there you have it. Alana is excited to see whats going to be happening throughout this lovely crisp fall month, and is also excited to inform you along the way! 

Happy October!

a.mart

for your enjoyment

sooo... i decided to finally post those pictures i said i would. (about time, right?) things have been busy for us lately! i've started working at Carter's/Oshkosh and thats going good! i only have a few more training shifts until i'm a qualified "Sales Associate". oh yeah. Jeff bought a motorcycle the other day! so he's pretty stoked about that! (if you have any name suggestions let us know!) so now you're pretty much caught up with what happening with 'Team Martens'! ANNND as promised here are a few pictures of my and Jeff's new place and some pics of the Margret Falls (and a few other gems i decided to throw in)!

enjoy!
a.mart

making a house a home

well its official. remember all those other posts in the past where i was all like "wheres my home?" and "where do i belong?". well i've finally got my own little slice of paradise. not just mine, of course, i share my 'nest' with the best room-mate of all...MY HUSBAND! me and mr. jeffry are the proud owners of a one bedroom one bathroom basement suite! its small and cozy, but we've fallen in love with it! i don't have tons of pictures of our place yet, but i'll be sure to take some a stick them on the blog one of these days! 
life has been so good to us lately. GOD has been so good to us! we are so blessed and have so much favour on us, its ridiculous.
alright, so whats new... jeff's been going to school for a while now, and he's really enjoying it! (lots of reading but hey, thats university for ya) and yeah, i think he's liking it so far!
"what about you alana?" yeah i've gotten that a lot. i am going to be working this year (yeehaw!) i've already been hired at a cute little breakfast and lunch restaurant down our hill called Amsterdam! i only work about once a week, but i've never been a hostess before so its required lots of training and stretching! (pray for me) i also have been hired at Carters/Oshkosh B'gosh! (thats a baby/kids clothing store that has me wishing i was just a bit smaller so the clothes would fit me!) i haven't started at Oshkosh yet, but i'm looking forward to it! and that pretty much sums up what the future holds for jeffry and i for a while. school, work, repeat. we've still been finding lots of time to relax and do fun things though! its so nice that my parents are near by (like literally 4 minutes away from our place) so we can go there for supper, play games with them, watch movies with them, and exercise with them! (they are some fast moving folks, thats for sure!) last weekend we drove up to the Margaret Falls (along the Shuswap and close to Armstrong) we walked to the falls, which were super beautiful, then we hiked up and went to a lookout point! it was stunning. (i'll post some pictures next time also) so yes, we've been busy, but we're so happy. 

happy friday the 13th,

a.mart

p.s. if you donated money to me for the philippines missions trip, expect a thank you/postcard soon! xo

Jeff & Alana Martens

WAHOO!! Gosh, i can't believe that me and Jeff are married now! It feels so good. The wedding was so much fun! I cried the whole entire time, but i think it was just because there was so much love in me it just needed to seep out... through my eyes. Haha, its the truth! I don't think i had ever seen Jeff cry that much either though! It made me so happy. It was like i really got to see a little bit into his heart and i could so plainly see that he was so in love with me and it made me sob. (happy tears of course!) As soon as we get the wedding pictures i'll make sure that i put them on the blog! So yeah, the wedding was really great. We loved our wedding, thats for sure! Cuba was lots of fun too! During the first few days on our resort the weather was pretty cruddy, so that was a bummer. But as soon as the sun came out we were soaking up as much sun as we could get! We realized, while in Varadero, that we really like Canada. We have nothing against travelling, but we just want to explore Canada and then branch out yet! So, "whats next?" you may be thinking. And its totally a valid question! Come August 11th we'll be heading to Kamloops BC! Jeff's already been accepted at Thompson Rivers University to take his bachelors of business administration! (BBA) We're both pretty excited to head back to BC! We get to see my family, and enjoy the warm weather and whatnot. Gosh it'll be nice! Not like today, here in La Crete it's been pouring rain all morning. I hate to say it, but it feels like fall. Blah. Anyways, when we get our new place (we get possession of our basement suite on the 15th of August) i'll be sure to post some pictures on here! So, now that i'm not planning a wedding, i'll try to update this little blog a little more often! Happy summer and God bless!

or if you're in La Crete...
(Happy Fall!)
 A.Mart

i can hear wedding bells in the distance...

17 DAYS TILL I'M A MARTENS!! Oh my gosh, I so cannot believe that. I'm so excited! Many people have been asking and i'm very glad and relieved to say that "YES, wedding plans are coming along nicely!". I'm hoping that the whole week before the wedding will be a fun 'stress-free' relax time with friends and family! I'm looking forward to it! Pretty much all thats left to do are the little details. Details that you don't realize you have to think about someone asks you about them! (haha, its happened so often) So... (just a quick re-cap incase some of you don't know what's going on) the wedding is on June 29th, 2013. Oh! And for our honeymoon we're going to CUBA! Yippee! It'll be so wonderful! Not that i'm not relaxed now, but it will be so lovely to just veg on a beach for a week! 

Anyways, feel free to check out our wedding website!

http://www.weddingchannel.com/wedding/Alana-and-Jeffry


Hugs and Blessings!
Al. 

my first missions trip!

WOW WOW WOW! I really don't know where to begin! God is so good. When you step out, He's going to show up. I got to experience that first-hand while we were out in the Philippines! It was a totally new experience for me! Not only that crazy God things were happening, but even the culture, temperature, and food were new to me as well! Alright, so I think I just really want to share some testimonies of what happened while we were out there! As you may know, we went down to Manila and General Santos to do mini supernatural school's. First we went to General Santos, and none of us really knew what to expect when we went and conference started. After the service on Sunday the Bishop who came to meet us there, Chito Sanchez, asked if anyone in the congregation wanted to be baptized in the Holy Spirit so he got the "Canadians" to pray for people. I hadn't ever done this before. But i stepped out in faith, trusting that God was gonna do His thing. So we went up to people and put our hands on them and everyone we prayed for fell down! Holy Spirit definitely showed up, i'll put it that way! 
Ok so instead of going into all the trip details, i'll just share some short, brief, and powerful testimonies!

-during one of the conference days in General Santos Jeff shared a testimony of someone once being healed of flat feet. (they had no arch on the bottom of their feet) so Graeme, our directer/leader of the trip, wanted to activate the testimony! So if people had foot injuries they were suppose to raise their hand so we could go pray for God to heal them! I was sitting close to a lady named, Nenita, and she explained to me that it wasn't her feet that were bothering her, but it was the muscles in her legs! They were very painful for her when she walked. So i prayed for her legs and before she told me if her legs were healed or not she said that the muscles in her neck were also very painful and messed up so i prayed for her neck as well. After i prayed she tested it out by moving her neck around, stretching it and whatnot and it was TOTALLY HEALED!! After we both finished freaking out i asked how her legs were doing and she said they felt totally better!!
-while we were still in General Santos one of the ladies from our school, Mae, had a really had headache so i prayed that Holy Spirit would come blow on her and blow the headache away. After i finished praying she said that as i had been praying she felt some wind on her and the headache was totally gone!
-at the church in Manila a lady name Josephine came up to me and Clarke (a guy from our school) and she said that she had really bad back pain. Clarke explained to her that sometimes people get bad back pain when one of their legs are shorter then the other. So she sat back all the way in a chair and i took her legs to see if they were even, and one was shorter. So i grew out her leg! After she said her back felt so much better!!

i could go on for such a long time; there were so many more little testimonies!

A BIG thanks to everyone who helped by supporting me with prayers and with finances! Both were very much appreciated!

3...2...1...PHILIPPINES!

Eeek! Alright, so as most of you know in... 2 days, 10 hours, and 6 minutes me and a bunch of people from my school are going down to the Philippines for a missions trip! This is going to be my very first missions trip! (but hopefully it will NOT be my last!) 

"Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age." (Matthew 28:19-20)

This trip is going to be such a good experience for me! I'm excited to get stretched and pulled in new ways! I don't totally know what our schedule is going to be looking like, but from what i do know we'll be busy! I'll let you all know the details, fun times, adventures, and testimonies upon my arrival! I just wanted to let everyone know that me and Jeff really appreciated your support financially! You guys made this trip happen for us! And a huge thanks for everyone who will be praying for us! (it's much needed and very valued!)

Some ways you can be praying:

• that everyone on our team will remain completely  healthy!
• that the people in the communities will be totally open to what we have to say and offer to them
• luggage arrives safe and sound
• that God would show up and show off however He wants!

God is going to be doing some awesome things!

"And whoever gives one of these little ones even a cup of cold water because he is a disciple, truly, I say to you, he will by no means lose his reward." (Matthew 10:42)

Blessings!
Al.

busy (and exciting) times...

Where to begin?! Ok so i suppose i'll start with 2013! I've already explained how awesome Christmas was in my past blog post, but i'll blow your mind with how awesome, busy, and adventure-filled 2013 has really been for Alana Tosh! Ok so when we got back to Kelowna, Jeff got a job like the next day! He currently works at "Canadian 2 For 1 Pizza"!! (which was a total answer to prayer) Then on the weekend of the 18th i was "kidnapped", by Jeff and our good friend Dan! We started driving and i didn't get to know where we were going until we were sitting on the ferry that was heading towards Vancouver Island! We were going to VICTORIA!! And gosh, was it ever fun! We went to a beach, walked around downtown, and we got to see Lindsey Fehr! It was so sweet seeing where she's going to school down on the Island. You might be thinking "wow, this sounds like an awesome January! what more exciting things could possibly happen?" And folks, that's what i thought too. Until 2 days later. Me and Jeff had decided early afternoon on January 23rd that later on in the evening we would go for a walk! So it was no surprise when he suggested we head down to the waterfront for a walk! We bundled up and head out. As we were walking there were ducks and canadian geese everywhere! It was really cute. We continued walking down along the boardwalk beside the water. We were going to start heading back and i was looking out at the water, when i looked back i saw that Jeff was on one knee!!! WE'RE ENGAGED!!! YIPPEE! After we calmed down (and after i cried a bit) Jeff also told me that he signed us up for a bridal fair that was happening that coming weekend in Kamloops! So when Friday came we headed down to Kamloops, surprised my dad (who didn't know we were coming), and went to the bridal fair!! Needless to say, January was a crazy exciting month! So the end of January was pretty crazy cause we figured out a ton of things regarding the wedding (location, date, etc), but it got crazier. Beginning of February we decided to head down to Kamloops on the weekend because there was this crazy wedding dress sale where wedding dresses were as low as $99!! After enduring the bizarre line up at 10am, pushing and shoving of brides hunting down their dress, and 4 dresses later... i have my WEDDING DRESS! I love it!! It was the first dress i grabbed from the rack, and i held onto it the rest of the time. Love at first sight i guess you would call it! The rest of February hasn't been super crazy bizarre exciting, but it has been fun! However, this last week was Global Awareness week so on the weekend my church had "Global Children's Village"! We recreated a slum and had that set up in the church! Complete with smelly garbage, slum houses, and actors! I had the privilege of being and actor in the slum! It was pretty intense! Anyways, now you are currently up-to-date with Alana's life! It's been an amazing few months! I'll be sure to write again soon!

spring is coming!
Al.

Oh, and remember our friend Dan? Yeah, he's a photographer! So he was hiding in the bushes when this happened haha

the best year ever...2013

2013! Gosh, how the time flies! I remember holding up 10 hands, screaming "2010". I can't recall the years ever going by this quickly. But, oh well! I won't complain. Not that 2012 wasn't any good... but for some reason i have really big expectations for 2013! This past Christmas went really great! Me & Jeff drove ALL the way down to LaCrete for Christmas, which was kind of a big step for me because i had never been away from my parents over Christmas before! It turned out super good. We got to spend lots of quality time with Jeff's parents and family and of course we had a blast with all our friends! After 10 days of hanging out and have Christmas & New Years in LaCrete it was time to return 'home' to BC! Me, Lindsey & Jeff drove up to Kamloops together! After Lindsey left Tiffany came up and Jeff & I got to have our "2nd Christmas"! So it was super nice to relax with my family and still keep some of the traditions, even though we weren't there over Christmas Day. But enough about my holidays! Lets look back at some of 2012...

Happy 2013 all! 
Al