Since her initial diagnosis, my beautiful wife has been writing in a personal journal on her computer. During the wedding, the honeymoon and the numerous back-and-forth tests at the Ottawa Breast Cancer center (on the Civic Hospital campus), she kept a brave face.

But after the dust settled from the wedding and cruise, and now with the official diagnosis and the impending surgery, reality has hit her hard.

However, Sylvie is upbeat about her upcoming mastectomy on Monday, September 11. She jokingly refers to it as “when one of her twin towers will be falling.”

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The wedding is around the corner! The wedding is around the corner! The wedding is around the corner! (Can you feel how excited we are?)

And just to make sure, for people who need directions you could simply visit the Orchard View Reception Center — it has directions on the wedding site.

However, here’s a little more help.

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Only a week left and counting! And we’re soooo excited, it’s unbelievable. The air is buzzing at the Fortin-Charrier household. We are all looking forward to the big day as things are quickly falling into place.

For example, we picked up the marriage license from City Hall. Our wedding planner has set the details for the decorations. The karoake DJ is getting his gear ready. Our seamstress finished the custom-tailored wedding dress.

(Sylvie just picked it up tonight. Apparently, it’s absolutely beautiful. I’m a little old-fashioned, so I don’t want to see it until the wedding day. But Sylvie is totally amazed.)

Nevertheless, now that final preparations are underway and the day is drawing closer, we have one more thing to ask.

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The day is fast approaching, and we’re excited! We decided on one small change, though.

You see, Sylvie and I have been speaking all over the place lately. We just came back from Los Angeles and Las Vegas, and we’re leaving next week for London, UK (we’re speaking at Wembley).

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Sylvie and I decided that, in one year from now, we’re moving to beautiful Vancouver, British-Columbia. For a variety of reasons, the most important of which is that we hate the cold. No more winters! No more snow! (Well, Vancouver does have mountains with snow. But the beauty is that we can rollerblade down the streets and go to Whistler to ski, all in the same January day.)

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Here are a few pictures of us with friends taken at the last Big Seminar. We were, er, busy. And we freaked out the kids when we came back we these photos!. (Yes, there were so many babies and pregnant couples at the last event, we got the "itch." So here's the good news: in a year or so, we're planning on having a baby! Yup.) Click on the thumbnails to enlarge.

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Since we were both married before, we thought that a "bachelor" or "bachelorette" party would be a bit odd, although we're not totally against the idea. So we’re doing something special.

We decided to combine both, at the same time, and have a "prewedding party." Call it a "bachelordom" or "bachelorhood" party. Either way, it's going to be a lot of fun!

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Sylvie and I have decided to go to Italy for our honeymoon. This works well for several reasons. First of all, I love Italy. It’s where a part of my ancestry comes from. I particularly love Firenze (Florence), and Venice.

Part of that is the renaissance flavor. Our wedding will have a medieval feel to it, where there won’t be any tuxes or flowery dresses. The wedding will have a Celtic theme, and the dresses as well as the men’s apparel will be renaissance-like, with a touch of modern flair and romance.

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