The certificate says that he was duly called to the Bar of the Province of British Columbia and admitted as a Solicitor of the Supreme Court of British Columbia on the 21st day of May, 2010. For the past couple of days, we’ve been celebrating this momentous accomplishment in the life of our oldest son!

The celebration began with a Thursday afternoon reception at the downtown Vancouver offices of McCarthy Tetrault, one of Canada’s biggest law firms. Matt’s relationship with McCarthy Tetrault began when he was hired as a summer intern in 2008. After graduating from law school last spring, he returned to the firm as an articling student and was delighted when he was recently invited to join the firm as an associate in the litigation department. At the reception, family and friends sipped champagne, snacked on hors d’oeuvres and listened as Matthew and seven other young lawyers were welcomed to the firm. It was indeed a proud moment for us!

At 9:30 yesterday morning, we gathered at the courthouse for the call ceremony during which Matthew and 67 others donned their robes for the first time, took the Barristers and Solicitors’ Oath and were officially called to the bar. Definitely another very proud moment! In fact, the simple act of carrying his robe to the car brought a lump to my throat and a tear to my eye! It truly is a blessing to see one’s child meet such a challenge and achieve his dream.

Throughout his years of preparing for this moment, Matt had the wonderful support of his wife, Robin. We enjoyed sharing the highlights of the past couple of days with her as well as her parents and were delighted that my father was also able to join us for the call ceremony. Matt and Robin’s wee son, Sam, was also very much a part of the celebrations. After the call ceremony, Sam was dropped off at the home of a dear friend and the rest of us went out for a lovely lunch in Matt’s honour. As he sat at the head of the table, he mentioned several times that the whole thing felt quite surreal. I suspect that it will take a few days for the fact that he has in fact accomplished his goal and reached this milestone to completely sink in.

We are indeed proud to have a lawyer in the family! In actual fact, there are two of them. Though they had only met once prior to finding themselves in the same class, Matt shared his law school experience with my cousin’s daughter-in-law and she was also called to the bar during yesterday’s ceremony!

After a busy week of seeding, we left Louis with about 3 hours of field work to do and hit the road early this morning. Thirteen hours later, we’re nicely settled into our hotel room in Kamloops, BC. When I made the reservation, I didn’t realize that the hotel is located right next to the gas station that we always stop at on our way through Kamloops!

Several of our relatives live along today’s route and we would usually choose to stay with one of them but, of course, we’d also want to spend time visiting with them which would delay our arrival in Vancouver. Since we need to be there for a very special event tomorrow afternoon, we decided that it would be better to take a hotel room tonight and get another early start tomorrow. We’ll save the visiting for the way home.

Though today was mostly about covering distance, we did enjoy a picnic lunch at a rest stop just west of Obed Summit, the highest point on the Yellowhead highway. A few hours later, we also made an unscheduled stop when we discovered that Mount Robson, the highest peak in the Canadian Rockies was almost completely cloud free. Time after time, as we’ve made this trip, we’ve hoped for a glimpse of this majestic giant only to find it shrouded in cloud. Today, we stood on the deck of the visitors centre and watched in awe as only a few small clouds drifted over the mountaintop.

The blog has been oddly silent lately but, as many of you know, it’s seeding time in farm country and we are busy trying to get a crop in the ground before we have to leave for Vancouver on Wednesday.

When I first started filling in all the various things we hoped to accomplish and places we hoped to be during April and May on the calendar, I wondered how we’d possibly manage it all especially when so many things depended on a baby being born at the right time or the weather cooperating! Way back in early January, I began to pray that God would work out the timing as I knew that these things were way beyond my control. April came and went and everything fit together perfectly but I must admit that I was beginning to panic when the first week of May brought rain and snow that  left our previously thirsty land too wet for seeding. My faith may have been small but He who knows the number of our days (Psalm 39:4) was faithful. This week perfect weather has allowed us to put in several long, uninterrupted days and we have made excellent progress.

Things didn’t go quite as smoothly today but still much was accomplished. First, replacing the air conditioner motor on Richard’s tractor delayed him for an hour or so. Air conditioning may sound like a luxury but when you’re working in an enclosed cab, completely surrounded by windows with the sun streaming in, it’s essential. Without it, he would soon have been roasted Richard!

Then the fuel pump in the old half ton that serves as a multi purpose chore truck and carries the tank used to refuel the tractors sprung a leak. I love that old red and white Dodge and am glad that it’s only temporarily out of commission but in the meantime, until it’s repaired we needed another way to get gas to the tractors. Fortunately, Louis’ stepson had a spare tank that was soon loaded on the back of one of his trucks for us to use.

Regardless of the circumstances, Louis’ equipment never runs on Sundays and I respect him for that. This means that we have just three days left before our departure. Commitments in Vancouver (more about that later) mean that we cannot delay but if the weather continues to be favourable and we don’t have any major breakdowns, we could be finished. If not, we should be close enough for Louis to be able to finish without us.