Year 2007 review.

This year has been quite an exciting year. This fall I switched jobs and am now working for a startup company in Dunbar called Aegis mobility. I've wanted to try something more challenging in my work and have an opportunity to really grow in my field. Aegis mobility has provided that for me so far. Basically the company is working on a service that will limit cell phone use in cars and offer a platform to allow context specific behaviour for your cell phone. For instance you could be in a movie theater and the cell phone could be smart enough to know not to ring and interrupt people around you. This work will likely get busier in the new year and as a result It will impact my involvement with youth.

Speaking of youth, I've enjoyed working with the youth at Saint Albans and having the opportunity to see new connections form and youth growing in positions of leadership. I've also seen significant growth in the faith throughout the year of some of the youth. It has been a lot of work this year but It's been worth it to see some of the results of the work I've done. This year we had the opportunity to repaint the youth room which has been mostly done and pass off a lot of the leadership to others working with me. I will be taking a 5 month break from youth work in the new year so that I can focus more on my work at Aegis Mobility. However, I am hoping after I return to begin the preparations for a missions trip to Africa with some of the youth.

Something quite wonderful happened to me this year. I now have a girl in my life which many of you will be happy to know. Her name is Alison McKay. She is currently working with Orphans in the Ukrain through a missions organization called YWAM. She has a strong faith and a passion for youth as do I. Not only that she's kind and cute. I've been enjoying spending time with her during her vistit here during the month of December and I hope to spend more time with here in January as well. She'll be going back to the Ukraine at the end of January until the end of June at which point she'll be back in Coquitlam permanently where she grew up.

Other exciting events this year have included visiting my amish relatives in Indiana. Going on a spiritual retreat in Washington (Tierra Nueva) and helping out at the Fine Arts weekend at Camp Artaban. I also try to swing dance when I can but I've found that youth work has been taking up a lot of my life. One final exciting thing was that I had one of my youth stay at my place for a few months which has been both exciting and a challenge.

I haven't yet decided what my new years resolutions are (I'll post them on my blog http://gardion.blogspot.com) but I look forward to see what happens with the new company, see the youth continue to grow (spirtually and in number hopefully), spending more time with Alison when she gets back and catching up with friends. I'm sure other things will come up.

I hope all of you have a wonderful Christmas and a happy new year.

God bless you all,

Joel.