2 weeks ago I wrote about a local boy - Kade McBurney. Kade has been fighting cancer since 2010 when he was only 4 years old. I had an email today from a local business offering their help after reading my blog. Our local Hillcrest Chinese food restaurant Ming and Sing contacted me to see if I could get a message to the family offering them a free meal for their family. Another small gesture that in my mind leaves a big impact on my heart and theirs.

I don't know the family, but he's a student at the elementary school where both of our girls went to before high school, which is where I first heard about the family. I wasn't sure at 1st who to contact. That's when I found the family blog diarizing the events over the last couple years. I encourage you to read it, but suggest sitting down with a box of kleenex and start to read from 2010 on. 
 
http://mcburneys.blogspot.com/

Again I must say children are supposed to outlive us as parents and I cannot even imagine the pain the McBurney family has gone through and will continue to endure.

What I can say is that I know they are in good hands at Canuck Place Vancouver, as this has become the charity that our office and many other Homelife offices in the lower mainland will be supporting for the 2nd time in our 11annual Homelife Charity Golf Classic this May 25, 2012. I was lucky enough to have had the opportunity to tour the mansion last year and look forward to seeing the funds we raised and will continue to raise to help the Vancouver location as well as the new location to be built in Abbotsford.

If there is any way you can help the McBurney family or would like to donate to our golf classic to help other families like the McBurney family by supporting Canuck Place, let us know.

I mentioned a few weeks ago about Dine out Vancouver...and just realized we have local restaurants here in the Valley offering specials in honour of Dine out Vancouver. The Vault in Cloverdale is also offering a 3 course for $25 Sunday - Thursday and $30 on Friday and Saturday. Check out their menu at the following link and make a reservation as this promotion ends on February 9th.

http://vaultrestaurant.com/dine-out-cloverdale/

As well White Rock is also hosting their Bite of White Rock offering 3 course meals from $15 - $45 depending on the restaurant. For a list of the restaurants to choose from in White Rock make sure to visit their website and make a reservation soon as it ends on February 7th.

http://www.inwhiterock.com/BiteoftheRock.tsp

We highly recommend the Vault so much so we hold our monthly womens networking group there for lunch! In White Rock Onyx and Five Doors Down are 2 of many great restaurants to choose from. Make your reservations today before these great deals are gone for another year. 

You've sold your home and found the new home of your dreams....now it's time to start the dreaded job of packing. Shopping for that new home is generally an exciting experience, but there is nothing fun about packing...

I moved my family across the country almost 7 years ago and even before we listed our home in Brampton Ontario, I started packing. I often tell clients to pack away as much as they can when they ask for suggetions on how to get their home ready to sell. You know you are moving why not get things started, it makes things a lot smoother once your home sells and your moving date becomes a reality.

For my family with such a big move from Ontario to BC, I wanted to purge as much as I could. If you haven't used it or even looked at it in the last year...do you really need it? So that's what we did. I had my house packed and organized by room and with such a big move I documented everything. It really did make the move go smoothly and I knew exactly where everything was to go and where to find everything we needed.

The power of facebook to connect people from far and wide. Strangers and acquaintances, old friends and new ones. I thought today's entry might be worth chatting about since my day was filled with chatter on and about facebook.

This morning I attended a seminar about how to improve your business presence on facebook and do it effectively. I came away with some great tips from Tod Maffin - fellow Canadian, social media and technology guru.

Then there's the personal aspect that has transformed the world as we know it and continues to do so on a daily basis. So much so that Facebook filed to go public on Wednesday.

Over the past few days I have been commenting and enjoying the dialogue with people I went to school with as they prepare for a French Immersion reunion. It's not your typical high school reunion where many people going would be the ones that graduated together. In fact only a small group of those attending will have graduated together. What's different for us is that we were the 1st French Immersion class in Brampton, Ontario. We were essentially the guinea pigs to see if French Immersion would work in our community. We started in kindergarten and most of us went to school together as you would in a small town all growing up together. It wasn't until high school that we all started to go our separate ways as some continued in French Immersion, others went mainstream. Since we came from all over our community to go to the only French Immersion elementary then senior public school (as they call Middle school in Ontario), once you switched out of French you had to go to each of your perspective high schools within your own boundaries. That's where many of us parted ways. It wasn't until facebook caught on and slowly over the years a few of us have re-connected and over the last few days it has been fun to see everyone go down memory lane. I don't feel old but it is funny to go back to kindergarten and start to remember things from a lifetime ago.

What kind of facebook experiences have you had, feel free to share your stories with us. Have you re-connected with old friends, gained a new client or maybe even found a long lost family member?

Here I go again plugging another local business...but we do like to partner with great businesses and be able to offer our clients services they can trust!

Today Kara and I met with the Sales Manager - PJ Juneja with Maple Leaf Storage here in Langley. We were very impressed with his manager and assistant manager as we were greeted when we entered their store front. After sitting down with PJ we were impressed with the services they provide to their clients as well as the cleanliness of their facilities. They gave us a tour of their location and showed us one of their self storage units all monitored by video surveillance. Controlled access in and out of their location and peace of mind knowing there is a manager on site at all times living in residence above the facility.

A Canadian owned and operated self storage company serving BC residents and businesses for over 25 years. We are proud to be partnering with Maple Leaf Storage and look forward to be able to offer our clients top notch storage solutions with a company they can trust. 

For more information and locations near you visit their website:

http://www.mapleleafstorage.com/

Give us a call today to receive a discount on your storage services when you work with the Bettina Reid Group.

I know I wrote a blog last week with sellers tips but thought this one was worth posting as well.

I was going through old blog posts and came across this article on preparing your home for sale. With SPRING just around the corner, people are starting to consider listing their home for sale in time for the spring market. Everyone looking to sell always wants to know what they should do to get their home ready.

The #1 improvement that is recommended is "cleaning and de-cluttering" of your home. Should you do nothing else, at least prepare your home so that its shown at its best! To get some more ideas on improvements you should do before selling your home, please read the following article:

http://blog.homegain.com/homegain/homegain-2011-home-improvement-national-survey-results/

For other great tips check out our Sellers tab on our website or give us a call today to book your free home evaluation!

As I have mentioned before I do like to promote local businesses in the Fraser Valley. So I want to use today's blog to promote my Aunt and Uncle's hockey program - Pacific Titans Hockey. 

They have helped many kids from pre-school to adult by training and helping them to develop their hockey skills.

Craig Sherbaty (proud to call him my Uncle) is the Director of Player Development for the Pacific Titans Hockey Program. He has been coaching for 20 years. Some of his many accomplishments and endeavours include: working with Hockey Canada, to running his own successful teams and heading up the hockey academies at various local highschools in the area. Presently he is the lead instructor for Lord Tweedsmuir's hockey academy and has been since 2006. To see more of his impressive resume and that of the rest of his staff, as well as learn how your child can have an opportunity to learn from a phenomenal coach visit their Pacific TitansHockey website at the following link:

 http://www.pacifictitanshockey.com/

If you or your child has had the opportunity to train with Craig and or his staff, we would love for you to share with us and our readers!

If you are a parent you know once you have kids they seem to get all the cool new stuff. :)

For Christmas my eldest really didn't ask for anything...which of course as parents we were very proud of her for that. (Looks like we did something right! LOL)

But she was saving up to buy herself a camera to take with her on her trip to Europe later this year. So we thought we would go out and get her a new Canon EOS Rebel T3. We managed to get it for a really great price and couldn't pass it up. We'd done our research and it was one of 2 highly recommended for beginner photographers. She's not planning on becoming a photographer. But we knew she would learn all the details on how to use it and at least now she would be able to take some really great shots.

Well, I have wanted a camera like that for a very long time and have come to the understanding that I will get to use it at least for a few years until she goes off to college. The things we do for our children. :)

Looks like I might be able to at least share her lenses and turn my iPhone into a DSLR. You have to check it out, it's a mount that you attach to your phone so you can then attach a lense.

http://photojojo.com/store/awesomeness/iphone-slr-mount/

Very cool! Share with us your experience if you've tried this with your iPhone.

We are a big FOOTBALL family! Real football!

Our eldest decided when she was 4 years old that she wanted to play soccer and even though we missed out on it that year she started her 1st season the year she turned 6. Ever since, it's been nothing but soccer in our house. Dad played when he was in school but nothing really serious.

Our daughter started off loving Canadian women's soccer and only women's soccer. I used to laugh as Dad wished she would enjoy men’s soccer even just a little bit.

We took her to her 1st Concacaf game in Ottawa where she got to meet her favourite player Kara Lang along with a number of other women's players. From that moment on she wanted #15 to be her number on her teams, just like Kara Lang. She continued to love women's soccer. So much so Dad would let her stay up or even wake her to watch games played in other countries around the world. Then we moved here to BC where she could see her women's national team players on a regular basis as they train here year round in Vancouver. It was pretty amazing at 9 years old she could tell you everything there was to know about women's soccer and the players involved including the best players from other countries.

Not sure if the novelty wore off getting a chance to see our country's top women's players on a regular basis as she did. So much so many of the players knew her by name or would recognize that flaming red hair of hers. But sometime in high school she discovered men's soccer...(I know you're probably thinking it was when she discovered the opposite sex...LOL) Yes, she does admire the good looking male players out there, but she truly is not only a fan of the game but also a high level player herself.  She developed a love for FC Barcelona and lost interest in women's soccer altogether. She can still appreciate the game but if given the choice she would choose watching her Barcelona team over our Canadian women anyday.

Dad on the other hand became a huge fan of our Canadian women's team and has followed them with our daughter over the years and even continued to follow them when she stopped. She was given the honour of being a flag bearer with some of her team mates for a few of the games in the CONCACAF tournament being held here over the last week. She has watched the games with her Dad more for the love of the game and because her Dad asked her to. :) This weekend the 2 of them will go to the finals, but still Dad is more excited than she is. :( They will go together and she will have fun watching the game because she knows it so well and because she's with her Dad.

Perhaps if she has a daughter one day she will return to love the women's game!

Tonight as I write we watch and cheer on our Canadian Women's National Team as they compete in the semi-final game vs. Mexico. Go CANADA GO!!!

Spring is just around the corner! As you are considering making a move and trying to decide what you need to do to get your home ready to sell. Take a look at our 1st issue of 2012 for tips on what to do to get your home ready to sell.

The Informed Home Buyer/Seller Tips Issue 1 2012

For more great tips you can also visit our "Sellers" tab on our home page...or even better give us a call and we would be happy to visit you in your home for a free home evaluation where we can make suggestions to help you get your home ready to sell. Sometimes it's the little things that make the difference!

Take a peak at our January Cloverdale market update on myreatlytv.ca. January seems to be getting off to a good start, plenty of buyers out there and more and more new properties coming onto the market daily.

http://www.myrealtytv.ca/cloverdale

It just goes to show that there truly is a Buyer for every home no matter how odd, small or eclectic it is. Take a peak at the house that just recently sold for over $50,000 over asking in Toronto. It's definitely a one of a kind!

As we say to all of our clients you have to have a vision for the home, looking past the flaws and decor. It looks like this Toronto family did! :)

Check out this 800 square foot house that just sold for $400,000 in Toronto, Ontario.

http://www.thestar.com/business/article/1114219--toronto-s-tiny-cube-house-gets-six-offers-and-a-buyer-with-two-children?bn=1

Tell us what you think of this house and feel free to share any other odd houses you have come across.