Oliebollen with Oma

At the end of each year, my Oma (Dutch for Grandma) makes Oliebollen for all of her children and grandchildren. It's a tradition from Holland to have them every year on the 31st of December.

So.. What is it exactly? Well, it's like a doughnut, deep fried and topped with icing sugar.

Wikipedia puts it this way..

"An oliebol (plural oliebollen pronunciation) is a traditional Dutch food. Oliebollen (literally oil balls) are traditionally eaten on New Year's Eve and at funfairs. They are also called smoutebollen (literally lard balls) in Belgium. In English they are more commonly known as Dutch Doughnuts.
Oliebollen are a variety of dumpling made by using an ice-scooper or two spoons to scoop a certain amount of dough and dropping the dough into a deep fryer filled with hot oil. In this way, a sphere-shaped oliebol emerges.
The dough is made from flour, eggs, yeast, some salt, milk, baking powder and usually sultanas, currants, raisins and sometimes zest or succade. A notable variety is the appelbeignet, which contains a slice of apple. The dough needs time to rise for at least an hour. Oliebollen are usually served with powdered sugar."

Because it has been a New Year's Eve tradition, I always wanted to get it on camera, just because I thought it was a cool process and didn't want to take it for granted. I finally filmed her making them this past year (2011) and this is what I came up with.

Happy New Year.

2010 Olympic Torch Relay

I was lucky enough to be one of the 12,000 people, selected out of an estimated 1,000,000 applicants, to carry the Olympic Flame on its way to the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic Games.

It was an awesome experience, but so were the Olympics in general; following Team Canada on their quest to Own the Podium. Need a reminder? Check out Stephen Brunt's Video Essay at the end of this post.

Here are some pictures, videos and highlights on "Vancouver 2010".

(Today is the 2 year anniversary of the day I carried the torch. I just wanted to repost this on Blogger, as I am no longer using the site this was originally posted on. Thanks for checking it out.)

Canadian Internet

When I heard this story on CBC Radio's news program This is That, I couldn't believe what I was hearing.

Apparently there is a group out there, the Association of Canadian Content, who wants to make only Canadian sites available to people surfing the Internet in Canada. A Canadian Only Internet.

I was hoping this was a joke but I'm even more worried about this now that these previews of Canadian only sites have surfaced online.

Hill BSS Poster Boy

In the 2010 Fall Semester at the University of Regina I joined (well, I guess I was accepted or "made the cut" so to speak) the Paul J. Hill School of Business Students' Society, the Hill BSS.

My job? Poster Designer. Not the most prestigious position, heck I think I was the last name listed on the BSS Depth Chart, but it was definitely the most fun. I got to work with pretty much everyone on the BSS at least once to design posters, flyers, tickets, and web banners for various events and activities.

Looking back, it was just a lot of fun to get involved, in my second year at the U of R, with an awesome group of people who will no doubt dominate in the near future.

One of the posters that I happened to get a lot of positive feedback from, which was also one of my favourite posters to create, was for the Halloween "Moster Mash Bash." So, since it's that time of year, I thought I'd use Halloween as an excuse to showcase some of my work with the BSS.


Check them out and let me know what you think.

Google+ Album
or
Facebook Album
and
Hill BSS

Follow my Year at VanArts

On September 6th, 2011 I started the 1 year 3D Character Animation program at VanArts (Vancouver Institute of Media Arts) in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

If you want to see what my life is like in the "big city" and what I'm up to at VanArts you can keep up to date by following me on my various social media sites.

YouTube
(Videos! Check out my VanArts Vlog playlist here
and my Animation Project playlist here)

Twitter
(Tweet me! @CreelmanKid)

Tumblr
(Thoughts and pictures, mainly pictures)

Google+
(You can send me an email from here)

Facebook
(Great if you're on the Facebooks)

If you're not into that sort of thing, but still want to know what I'm up too, don't worry!
Just check out the VanArts Page here on my Blogger blog for a weekly digest.

Here's my first vlog, check out the YouTube Playlist to see all of the videos.

Shades of Pixar in Parade Floats

For me, the Creelman Fair (put on by the Creelman Agricultural Society) is the biggest event of the year and in 20 years I haven't missed one.

One of the highlights of the annual fair is the Parade that goes down the service road, adjacent to Highway 33, turns down Main Street, and then heads to the fair grounds. When I was younger, my dream was always to build a float and one day be a part of the Creelman Fair Parade.

One day, about a week before the fair in 2003, on an old flat bed trailer in my Oma's shed, my brothers, cousins, and I got to work on what would be our first of many parade floats. "Hockey Night in Creelman" was a success, it was our "Toy Story".

So what are the other connections to Pixar Animation Studios? Well...