I’m happy to say that our bellydancing performance went well yesterday! The entire theatre sold out, and seven of the seats were filled with my loved ones and friends. It was pretty special for me to look out and see my mother-in-law, two nieces, husband, sister-in-law and two friends. The entire evening was three hours long. Below is a video of two of the dances my class performed. I’m in the green outfit in the front. Enjoy. -Laura- Grande Prairie Regional Bellydancing Performace Night, June 4, 2011 from Chris Beauchamp on Vimeo. The first dance is a Fan Veil dance followed by a Drum dance. Dancers: Laura Beauchamp, Macia Bell, Linda, Shirene, Deidre, Carrie, Julie, Christina, Shauna and Oksana.  
When I got the invitation to the Purple Party, I asked the same question you’re probably thinking, “What the hell is a purple party?” It’s quite simply actually. The name is telling you exactly what it is. It’s a party where everyone wears as much purple as they can.  Then of course all the decorations, drinks and food will be purple as well. In this case, Abby, the host loves purple so the decor of the appartment is actually what inspired the theme of the party. Unfortunately this evening I was more interested in talking and drinking then documenting the decor. However, I did manage to catch a couple shots of some of the lovely purple people that attended.  
People have told Chris and I that we look a like.  Do you think it’s possible for two people to start looking alike just because they’re together all the time? Take a look at an old couple. Do you think so? Here’s a photo of my parents. Um? Well, at least my mother doesn’t have a beard. Earlier in November, with the help of a volunteer and my mother (who sent the blue ribbon) I designed ideas for decorating a “Dinosaur Christmas Tree” for a festival called “Festival of Trees” in Grande Prairie. I decided to do the tree to help raise awareness about the new dinosaur museum we are trying to raise the funds to build in Wembley, Alberta. Check out the future museums website! Our little 3-foot tree was sold for $100. It made me so happy to see “SOLD” on it, and even happier to see how…Continue Reading
Here are some still photographs for you to enjoy of the belly dance I performed with my class at a festival here in Grande Prairie. Below this post you can watch a video of our dance. Enjoy.  
On Sunday, November 21, 2010, I performed belly dance in public for the very first time. My friend Marcia and I signed up to take a belly dance class together here in Grande Prairie from Oksana at Moondance Shimmy. The class started in September. We met every Tuesday for 1-hour and our teacher taught us one dance. It was quite the experience making the costume (thank you Robin) and the papermache jug (which my mom greatly helped me with). Our next class starts in March and in May we’ll have a final dance recital where we’ll be doing the dance we performed this past Sunday, as well as two more dances we have yet to learn. While traveling the world one of the things I promised myself was to take dance classes and perform for people. I have accomplished that goal! Here is a video of our dance. My teacher…Continue Reading
Laura slaps the plate onto our new (to us) 2002 Nissan Sentra. This is a first for her: she's never owned a car.
Hi all! We’ve now been in Grande Prairie for about 10 days, and in that time we’ve managed to check several things off of our ever growing list of things to get done. Who would have thought that moving back to Canada and starting a new life in a completely different city would be so much work (okay, we knew it would). But still, we’ve done a lot, and most of it occurred yesterday, on our second wedding anniversary. Let’s see: yesterday we managed to register our new car (a Nissan Sentra), sign the paper work on our new home (a beautiful condo half-house), and we still had time to enjoy a wonderful meal at the local Italian restaurant to celebrate our happy marriage. It was bit hectic for me, juggling the car insurance and phone calls from what were essentially competing landlords. I guess we come off as desirable…Continue Reading
Chris and I have reached our new home, Grande Prairie. Today the sun was shining on the fluffy cumulus clouds and the air smelt of the end of summer as I looked upon the solid yellow trees. It was our first full day in Grande Prairie. Chris and I visited the local TELUS store to find out the plans and information regarding purchasing an iPhone. My mind felt jumbled and confused. The over manicured, over made-up woman provided us with the worst customer service possible, but that was really no surprise since it was TELUS. Chris and I then roamed many aisles in a nearby store looking for toothpaste, hairspray, razors and shaving cream. The prices made us both overwhelmed, depressed and stressed out. We had to stick together just help support one another through the aisles. Canada is expensive compared to S.E. Asia. I knew that. I just didn’t…Continue Reading
Here's a picture of Mimoun the Camel!!!!
Hey gang, Chris and Laura here again. Well, we’ve been teasing all of you with subtle mentions of our big news. If you’ve been following along for the past several months, you’ll know that our plans have already changed more than once, so one more big change shouldn’t be too much of a surprise. Our original plan was to wrap up our travels in Thailand, where we would settle down for a year and teach English. But life has a way of surprising you. In mid-May, Laura got a message on Facebook and it changed the course of our life. Instead of magical Thailand, the “Land of Smiles,” we had a new option: a place with a strange and unique local culture; with extreme weather that some people only dream about. This place just sounded so interesting and challenging from a traveller’s perspective we simply couldn’t say no. Fresh air,…Continue Reading
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Today is our last day in the North. Around lunch time (in about 3 hours), we’ll be taking a bus to a place called Dawson Creek, where we’ll catch another one to Kamloops, B.C. This’ll be the longest Greyhound ride of our Canadian leg, and all told we’ll be in Greyhound’s nasty clutches for about 18 hours. It makes me shudder, but we have no choice. At least we’ll be leaving this snowy tundra behind. Luckily, we’ve also had the pleasure of spending the last week or so visiting with my sister Kelli and her family. It’s always nice to see the kids, even though they seem to be giving her a bit more grief than usual by not always doing what they’re told. We did a lot with them, including getting to attend Kindergarten for Delaney’s Special Helper Day. That was pretty cool. We also brought a late haul…Continue Reading