Well it feels like an era… 11 1/2 years, that is.

That’s how long I’ve been on the payroll at Grouse Mountain. And come January, I will return to work only part time after my maternity leave to help transition someone new in to my role as Marketing Manager.

It all started as a summer job.

I had been living in Penticton, BC and working at Apex Mountain Resort as a lift operator while I went to school. I earned a Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration with a concentration in Hotel & Restaurant Management from Okanagan University College (which is now Okanagan College and UBC Okanagan Campus) and I wanted to figure out how to get one of those very coveted year-round jobs in the ski industry in BC’s interior. They are very few and far-between to say the least. So I began working as a Guest Services Representative at Grouse Mountain as a way to get my foot in the door with arguably one of the most successful year-round ski/recreation areas in the country. My plan at the beginning of summer 1999 had been to work there for the summer before going to Nelson, BC where I had been registered for the Selkirk College Ski Resort Operations & Management diploma program. Well due to a personal situation I didn’t end up going to Nelson; I stayed in North Vancouver, met Dave – the man I would later marry, and took on the position of Executive Assistant to the VP Marketing, also one of Grouse Mountain’s owners.

Over a year as her EA gave me a huge overview into the world of resort management. During that time, the owners of Grouse Mountain were heavily involved in the launching of Kicking Horse Mountain Resort in Golden BC, so I also got to play a little part in it, which gave me huge insight into what it takes to build a four-season destination resort from scratch – it afforded me the opportunity to see and hear things I never would have seen or heard otherwise and I feel very blessed to have gained that amount of knowledge in such a short period of time.

During my time as EA, however, I realized I wasn’t on the right career path for me. I remember waking up one morning thinking, “What am I doing!? I want to HAVE an EA… not BE one.” So after an oddly stressful moment and the extension of way more grace than I was deserving of from the VP Marketing, I was handed the position of Marketing Coordinator. That was early in 2001.

Since then my position within the marketing team has shifted and morphed and moved and stretched and shifted again until I found myself in the position of Marketing Manager for Vancouver’s most-visited destination and an organization that I am very proud to be a part of. I have had the opportunity to grow my career within the safety of a company that appreciates me and my efforts and gives me the freedom to try new things. I was able to go out on a limb and lead the company into new marketing channels like social networking on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Flickr before it hit the mainstream and blogging when other companies didn’t have the confidence to get in there and jump in to these then-emerging areas.

It’s strange when I think that I’ll be giving up a position I absolutely love with a company I have grown to adore filled with people I now consider some of my closest friends… but the future is before me and I’m excited to say I have no idea, really, where it will take me in the long run.

What I do know, however, is it will take me to Oliver BC, where I will become a stay-at-home mom to 5 kids when I marry Big Mack in April.

While I’m very excited to have found a partner I couldn’t possibly be more compatible with (thank you God!), I never thought I’d want to be a stay-at-home mom at all… let alone one to five children. But the last 9 months since Dave’s death have taught me just how important the people in our lives are and how we need to cherish and nurture those relationships. It’s more important to me that I raise my kids in a wholesome home environment than it is that I continue to live and work here in North Vancouver where my modest 800 square foot condo bears the same value as a 4-5 bedroom house in Oliver. Besides, I find it terribly ironic that I had always had the intention of moving back to the Okanagan all those years ago and had contemplated revisiting the idea even before I met Big Mack.

Just last year I couldn’t imagine leaving North Vancouver. Now I can’t imagine staying.

The thought of a new start in a new town with new people and a new outlook is very freeing… refreshing even. I look forward to seeing what God has in store for me. In the meantime, I will spend my final months in Vancouver working part time, recording an album of original music, snowboarding as much as I can, planning a wedding and spending time with my kids and the Macks.

I look forward to continuing to share the journey with you.