PRBI trip

About 1400 kms later, I am back from a quick weekend trip up to see Ralph at PRBI, in northern Alberta. February 1 was his birthday and about halfway through the 7 weeks until his spring reading break. So I took that Friday off work & drove up there (now that I have a car! :)) with a girlfriend. The weather had been horrible earlier in the week, but thankfully by Friday things had warmed & cleared up some.

I had been planning a surprise birthday party for Friday, because I wanted to take up a cake, but then on Thursday Ralph wrote me to say he wanted to do what he had planned that night instead of Saturday! Aaaah! I wrote the girl I was going to be staying with and let her know we had to change the party to Saturday or later on Friday.

In the end it all worked out well. We got to the campus at 4:30 (it was about 7 hours of driving, plus our stops) and found Ralph. After meeting a few people and getting our stuff unloaded, Ralph took me over to some friends' house. There I was greeted by the sight of Brazilian food, candles, chocolate, and a pink rose! I could've cried. :)
The couple whose house we went to are from Brazil! Ralph had wanted them to teach him how to make Brazilian food, but then getting ingredients, kitchen space, etc. would've been difficult in the dorm, so they ended up offering to not only let us use their house, but also to make supper for us! So the couple took their 4 kids out for the night and let us use their dining room for the evening. It was so amazing of them. It was also very sweet of Ralph, since this was the first real thing he'd planned for me! :)It felt a bit weird having a special meal for me on Ralph's birthday, but I did give him his presents! There was some food for the dorm and a calendar I made on iPhoto, with pictures of us and our families, and special dates such as our families' birthdays, our anniversaries, etc. :) He loved it.

Saturday morning we had brunch with several of Ralph's friends (we played Jenga).
Thankfully, the surprise party worked out for Saturday night. Ralph was beginning to think none of his friends wanted to hang out with us! ;) He was a little unsuspecting... even when we got to the classroom and everyone yelled "Surprise!", Ralph's first thought was that he was crashing another person's surprise party that was happening that night. LOL.Ralph tried to leave one candle (for me) but left three, and then blew all those out when he tried the second time. ;)
Rockin' out in party hats...
Karina, a good friend of Ralph's (the one who led him to the Lord, actually!) and the girl I stayed with. (We're playing a game here, but I didn't have a better picture of her! :P)

Here's us with Jen (she went up with me) and Ralph's good friend John.


Instead of posting a bunch of pictures of the PRBI campus, here's a little video! Unfortunately, I forgot to show one building because it was behind the main ones - kind of behind Watt and to the right of the men's dorm - a building called Ruark, which has dorms and classrooms. Ralph gave me the tour.

And last but not least, pictures of the little town of Sexsmith. The main business street is right by the school, and looks like something out of history. :) There are old-fashioned-looking stores on only one side of the wide street.



I got to see a bit of GP too, so that was fun. It's so great now to be able to picture where Ralph is for his classes, church, ministry, etc. and to meet a bunch of the people I've heard about! We went to his home church on Sunday too - lunch and a message.

Sunday afternoon Jen & I left for Edmonton. That was sad. :( We spent the night with my siblings and left (too early!) Monday morning to come back home for work!

Ralph has his break in 2 more weeks. He'll probably work that week, and I unfortunately have to be on a work trip that same Monday-Friday! :(( But we plan to hang out lots on the two weekends around that week! Crazy that February is almost half done already!

Happy Valentine's Day, everyone! :)