Transitions! After 11 years, today will be my last day with Island Health as I begin a new adventure with Coast Capital Savings next Monday (Jan.20th). It has been an honour and a privilege to work with so many great colleagues at VIHA over the years. I am now excited to work with new colleagues, face new challenges and new opportunities. Here is to the transition points in our lives…Cheers!

It’s been a couple of years since we paid much attention to the Mercer’s website. We were working on a side project called “Tomi Dou“. Tomi is Japanese for “wealth” and Dou is Japanese for “the way of” Tomi Dou = “The Way of Wealth” which is a collection of our strategies for getting out of debt (something we accomplished in November 2014) and hopefully our journey to financial independence. Instead of releasing a whole new sub-blog we decided to that move all those articles into our main site here: http://themercers.ca/category/tomi-dou-the-way-of-wealth/. We’re hoping others will benefit from some our lessons learned.

I am happy to announce that I have finally launched my Order Out Of Chaos site (http://www.themercers.ca/OrderOutOfChaos/). It’s  a platform for project management and methodology which is what fills my work days. I love what I do and want to share it with others.

The purpose of the site is to:

• Allow me to speak candidly about my thoughts primarily on project/program/portfolio management, secondarily on benefits realization management, change management and process improvement.
• Explore how the above disciplines can be layered together and their effectiveness multiplied through systems thinking.
• Allow me to explore the nature of variation (aka waste) and what we might do about it on the macro (e.g.: project management) and micro (e.g.: process improvement) levels.
• Allow me to share tools and templates that I have either used in real life or want too but have not had the chance yet (perhaps even becoming a resource for new and veteran project managers alike?).
• Share my experiences with using Microsoft SharePoint for project delivery.

I started creating content for this site back in the summer of 2012. Can you believe it took me almost 3 years to launch it?!?! Time flies when you are having fun. 🙂

Well another year is coming to an end. 2012 was all in all a pretty good year. Grace lost her first teeth, Wyatt used the toilet for the first time, Kana kicked up the home schooling a notch where there is a teacher assigned to help Kana with lesson planning and also provides report cards for Yuki. I turned 40 this year and I changed jobs at VIHA (I left the Project Delivery Office to become the project manager on the SharePoint Services project.

Other notable events this year include my Dad (Fred mercer) getting diagnosed with cancer which prompted a mini-Mercer reunion where my Uncle Ken (whom I had never met in person before), Uncle Paul & Auntie Jenny and Auntie Debbie (whom I last saw when Mt. St. Helens erupted) came out from all over the country for a visit. Also Gav & Rhonda Joth got married, Nick and Denise had baby number two, Jeremy and Aki has baby number two, James & Hiromi had baby number one and Kinya and Mel are expecting baby number one any day now.

We are very thankful for this year of 2012 and glad it didn’t turn out the way the Mayans figured it would. From our family to you and yours we wish you a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year!

Love and Prayers,
Craig, Kana, Grace Yuki and Wyatt Haku Mercer

We’ve been unsure what to do with our site ever since we moved back from Japan in the spring of 2007 as the site was totally focused on our life in Japan. We’ve made some minor additions over the past five years but nothing substantial.

Over the past few weeks we decided it that this website is our family scrap book, a time line of important events and as much as Facebook contains a lot of our lives…it doesn’t allow us to present all of the content in the way we want to. So we are REBOOTING and RELAUNCHING our website in WordPress and will be adding content (e.g.: recipes, Kana’s thoughts on homeschooling, family events, Plarail trains etc) regularly. In fact we’ve been adding new content already!

Cheers,
Craig, Kana, Grace Yuki and Wyatt Haku Mercer

This weekend I am thankful for many things.

I’m thankful for my wife Kana who is a constant support and the love of my life. I’m thankful for our kids Yuki and Haku who fill our lives with so much fun.

I’m thankful for my Dad (Fred) who is facing the most difficult challenge of his life (he is suffering from terminal cancer). I’m thankful for my second Mom (Janice) who is supporting my Dad every step of the way. There is a line in most wedding vows “in sickness and in health”…I am pretty sure Janice can write the chapter on “in sickness”. So proud of you both…there are no words.
Continue reading →

Canada is supposed to be metric but living next door to the biggest users of the imperial system makes it a little tough to be 100% metric. When we were living in Japan though it was a totally different story. I actually got to use metric all the time…even got to the point where I could estimate length in centimetres and metres. It just so much easier. Imperial seems easier when you are estimating in in feet or inches but as soon as you are estimating in percents of an inch it falls apart…3/8ths or 2/16ths anyone? Seriously…WTH?!?

It’s the first morning in our new place…
Coffee…check!
Bacon and Eggs…check!
100 boxes to unpack….check!!!

Last week was my last day at Vigil (again). Today I begin work for the Vancouver Island Health Authority (VIHA). I will be working as the Quality Assurance/Quality Control Manager for the IM/IT (Information Management/Information Technology) PMO (Project Management Office).

Going from a company of 25 to a company of 17,500 should be interesting. Wish me luck….although I know luck has got nothing to do with it. 😉

Well here we go again! I’ve been back with Vigil Health Solutions (www.vigil.com) since returning from Japan and now it is time to say good-bye again.

I have learned a lot during my time(s) at Vigil and while I will miss all of my vigilante colleagues it’s time to work closer to home.

Thanks for all of the memories!

I have been cleaning up the website over the last couple of weeks and here is the final archive version. Here is how it will stay…”The Mercers Adventures in Osaka” (until I change it again).

It was fun while it lasted but all good things must come to an end.

Well it certainly was an interesting and enlightening experience being in Japan. We really did enjoy ourselves and loved meeting so many cool people…some whom will be friends with us for the rest of our lives.

But now we are back in Victoria and our minds our set on the things we have to do here. So the website will remain as it is until we decide what to do with it next.

For those of you who would like to have our new contact information, it is:

We will leave the information up because a lot of it may still be of use for those just arriving in Japan, so enjoy and if you have any questions you can always drop us an .

Hello from Victoria.

As many of you know we had a great flight to Victoria on April 15th. Gracie slept for 7 of the 9 hour flight. Next we breezed through customs and Adam and Sophia then chauffeured us to Victoria via the BC Ferries!

Since then we have settled in at my Mom’s place in Colwood and I have started back to work at Vigil Health Solutions Inc. where I suspect I shall be very busy soon. Kana and Yuki are getting used to the new climate as well as the totally new surroundings. Also, we have found a new place to live. A two bedroom basement suite near Tillicum Mall, 3246 Admirals Rd to be precise. It is just perfect with private laundry and driveway.

Soon after we got back Kana, Grace Yuki and I went for lunch at the My Chosin Cafe in Metchosin…the portions are big even if you haven’t been in Japan for two year so we were like “WOW!”. Very good food though…you just have to eat a little…that is the secret.

We sure are missing all of our awesome friends back in Osaka and we look forward to hearing from you soon (**Craig staring across the Pacific Ocean at Daniel and James**).

It’s good to be back.

Well as is always the case in Japan, it is time to say Good-bye to a friend. David who I met while working at Royal Kids is returning to England on Tuesday (April 2nd). He plans to travel Asia for a few months before actually getting back to England, so we wish him safe and happy travels.

For David’s “sayonara” Mika planned a Hanami (flower viewing) Party at a place called Sakura no miya (sakura means cherry blossom so I think you know what kind of flowers we were viewing). I made it down too late to see much of the flowers…it was dark when I got there. Still we were able to enjoy the good smell of the blossoms, some good food, some good drinks and of course good friends.

It all started last year about this time, that Aim became interested in getting a website. It took a long time to develop the new logo, and have all the awesome events, but finally after a couple of redevelopments the Aim English Studio website has now gone live. You can visit Aim online now at www.aimenglishstudio.com.

Christmas Greetings!

Craig Says:

Well 2006 has been a great year for the Mercer family. Grace Yuki has been growing just wonderfully. Surrounded by us as well as Grandpa & Grandma Ogino and her Auntie Chie. She just loves hanging out and being a ham. She is not talking yet but making all kinds of noises and likes trying to sing. She is crawling and boy can she move fast! Yuki also has a whole bag of cute tricks…the wave goodbye, the dual eye blink and my favourite is the dance to the National Geographic Channel theme song.

I have enjoyed working at Aim English Studio this year. The kids for the most part have been great. I teach 4 year olds up to 15 year olds which offers a great variety in ability and behaviours. My co-workers have been the most enjoyable part however which enabled us to run two very big and fun events.

The first was the Aim Halloween Party which we had over 240 people attend. 129 students and the rest made up of friends and family. The cool thing about the party was that the foreign staff was in charge. Typically in Japan, at English conversation schools (Eikaiwa), the Japanese staff plan the events and the foreigners just help out. This usually results in a "Japanese" version of a western event. In our case the foreign staff was able to plan the whole event from start to finish and the Japanese staff helped out. Of course this meant we were able to put on a totally authentic western Halloween Party complete with Pinata, Pumpkin Carving, games, candy, and Tim's Trick or Treat of Horror. We had the usual array of fall fair games, bobbing for apples, shooting range (using those little guns that shoot plastic sticky arrows), bean bag toss, musical chairs, ring toss and everyone's favourite…the fish pond! It was awesome and not only did the children experience something very few people in Japan can experience without going to another country but the parents and staff learned something too. YAY!

The second event we put on was the Aim Christmas Charity Event. We had 190 students with friends and family attend this one and again it was a great success. Like the Halloween Party, the foreign staff planned an authentic western version. Our focus was Christmas and the true meaning of "giving is better than receiving". We were able to raise over $900.00 for "Save the Children" charity. We played games in the local youth hostel gym, and had a silent auction to help raise money for charity. We also had a Christmas Tree decoration demo, a Christmas Sugar Cookie demo (using my Mom's recipe), and even Santa was available for pictures with the kids. Again it was great fun to plan and execute an event exactly the way we would back home. The only difference was that for all the guests everything was brand new.

Other highlights this year included Ai and Junya's wedding in July and my best friend in Japan, Daniel's wedding to his sweetheart Miyuki. Daniel is from Ireland and when his Mom, Uncle and brother Mark came for the wedding we got on famously. Daniel's mom Pat even adopted us. YAY!

Another highlight was meeting a fellow foreigner from Victoria at the Shimomatsu train station. His name is James, grew up in the Cook Street Village area and married a girl from Kishiwada just like me. He and his wife Hiromi live just a five minute walk from our house! We've been too busy to get together a lot but when we do we can't leave.

So yeah, 2006 has been good, but also had it's sad moments as my Gandma Mercer (my Dad's Mom) passed away. Uncle George also had open heart surgery this year and is recovering well. All in all the year was super, super busy which has resulted in us being unable to keep in touch with everyone back in Canada as much as we would like. We have been getting all of your Christmas cards and putting them in our tree which has really helped us to get into the Christmas spirit.

As some of you may have heard, Kana, Gracie and I are planning on returning to Victoria this coming spring (April 2007). We want to get back and get setup before it's time for Grace to start school. We look forward to seeing you all sooner rather than later.

God has been very good to us this year and we want to wish you and yours a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

 

Kana says:
In the first place, a huge apology for us not keeping in touch with you that much. I don't want to use an excuse of "having a little one keeps us really busy" all the time but actually it is true. However, let me apologize.

Well, 2006 to me has been all about Gracie. I can't believe she is 1 year old (Dec.22nd) and how fast this year has gone. Seeing Grace's perfect growth is nothing but joy. Since she started to crawl and move around by herself we could see her change in growing every day. One day she began giggling and the next day pointing her finger towards what she wants. It is so amazing and every single joy she has brought to our family is nothing to compare with what I had experienced before Grace. Of course, she sometimes makes us crazy with her crying for no reason or trying to destroy whatever is in her way, just one little smile on her face wipes those things out completely. Now her front teeth are finally coming in and soon she will be able to walk, run and talk.

We had two big weddings with our friends. First one was Ai & Junya's. Ai was a maid of honour at our wedding and she and Junya got married on July 16th. I did a toast to the bride and we sang a song for them. It was a wonderful day we could share with everyone. Now they are expecting their first child.
The other one was Daniel and Miyuki's. They did a ceremony in a farm in Kobe and we took Grace with us. She was very well behaved during the ceremony, actually she was sleeping but much better than interrupting with her big screaming and crying.

Other highlights for us include all our cousin's babies being born, Andrea had Isaiah, Yvette had Ryder and Jeanne had Levi. We can't wait to see all the little ones in the Puritch family running around together with Gracie.

So there have been so may good things in our life and our friends' lives in 2006. I am very much looking forward to experiencing a lot of things with Craig & Grace as a family in 2007. Wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.