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Today was our last day for our internship at church were glad that it’s over but it doesn’t really feel that we are done.  This year had a lot of ups and downs but overall we learned a lot through training as well as through osmosis and observation.  Today was our final meeting and our only task was to clean out our office which was no problem because we didn’t really have that much personal stuff moved into our office.

WE are so thankful for all of the people that supported our ministry this year through encouraging notes, money, and prayer we have felt so loved by the volunteer youth staff that it really made the year much better.

Yesterday Eric and I went up to his parents’ house to pick some of their luscious blueberries.  We got a few Raspberries from them, and then saw a ton of blackberries we stopped to pick on our way home

If you want to know the recipes for the delicious meal, it’s all here!

Hooray!  Another free date activity!  Well, free now that we have the discs (which we got at discount).  Disc Golf is a lot of fun, I especially enjoyed it because after 18 holes I could tell I was getting better.  I don’t have to be good at everything, I just want to feel like I have the ability to get good at it.

By the way, that picture once again reminded us we need one of these, so we finally got it!  No more trying to find that perfect rock, stump, branch to take the picture from.

It is pretty likely that mccain cheated however

Obama/McCain at Saddleback Civil Forum

So day 3 is upon us and Diana and I are feeling very encouraged and equipped to be Life Hurts God Heals leaders this next january the woman diana is standing with is Megan Hutchinson the woman who is the lead writer of the curriculum and the leader of LHGH at Saddleback.  We are very excited for this coming year and know that god will provide the resources and leaders not that we are hurting for resources or anything but we are sure that this is gods will for us.

The conference is HUGE i am definately struggling with the crowds hear i don’t think that i could ever go to a church as large as saddleback the amount of people crowding around and while nice i just feel suffocated.  I took some establishing shots so you guys could know what kindof view that we have from our seats.

For those that don’t know Diana and i are in California for the clebrate recovery summit for Life Hurts God Heals today has been mostly travel which has been stressful but fun.  We had no problems arriving at the airport on time nor checking in or getting to California.  However when we made it to budget rent a car to pickup our SUV’s that we rented in advance we had to wait for probably 40+ minutes while they borrowed our 2nd one from avis because they didn’t have it which was quite frustrating.

After arriving at our hotel we dropped off our luggage and headed out to dinner at Miguels where i had a giant plate of Nachos which i thought was just going to be a side nacho but i was obviously wrong about that!  The nachos were good but i wasn’t hungry enough to eat all of them.

Poo in our hotel roomPoo in our hotel room

But the real reason i wrote this post is that we found poo in our bed!  It was so gross i was in bed and i kept thinking that there was water in the bed and finally i lifted the sheets and found was looks like mouse poo in the sheet.  It was so gross that i ran to the restroom and cleaned my leg that was touching it while Diana called for service to come and replace our sheets.  It was definitely disguisting but they sent up a nice cleaning lady that asked where the dodo was and took care of it for us.

We have lots more pictures from our anniversary geocaching trip, Middle School camp, High School camp, and more!  But it’s time to do housework.  We also go out of town again Tuesday for the Celebrate Recovery Summit where we’ll hopefully get some great training for Life Hurts God Heals.  Pray for safe travels and that we learn a lot.

So we had these grand plans of doing multiple hikes on mt Rainier everyday of our anniversary trip.  There were two problems with that.  First of all, we’ve had freakishly cold weather so there’s still tons of snow on Rainier and we didn’t want to end up a news story.  Secondly, we were exhausted from the current craziness of our life (hopefully slowing down in September when our internship is over), and needed a lot of just hanging out and relaxing time.

But we did manage to get a 5 or 6 mile hike in one day.  Eric’s done way more hiking than me this summer, doing hikes with some of his youth group guys.  The first couple of miles were tough for me, but once we had lunch and I got used to it, I had so much fun.  Oh yeah, and my knee was starting to really hurt, so Eric prayed for it and it completely stopped hurting!  God is awesome.

Our hike started by longmire, and one of the first things we saw was this little tree growing out of a giant stump.

There was also this cool trunk, I don’t even know how that happens.

We had lunch here at the lookout.  It was beautiful and the sun was warm (it was a cool day).  Some other hikers came along while we were eating (we didn’t see very many people that day which was nice) and pointed out a grouse that had been sneaking toward us.

They thought it might be a turkey, but I looked it up to make sure, it really is a grouse.

We saw a lot of beauty that day.  Thanks God for the great weather.

Hooray for anniversaries!  It’s one thing you stand up for and say “I AM taking the time off for my anniversary.”  So Eric and I did that and found a rustic little cabin two minutes from the entrance to Mt. Rainier (my favorite mountain in the world).  This is jasper cabin and I loved it.  It was really only a couple steps up from camping.  You get a roof (and heater if you need it), a very comfortable bed, and a minifridge and fireplace.  It’s a lot cheaper than other cabins in the area because it’s a little more run down (and the water smelled like sulfur, but tasted fine).  But it was completely secluded which was perfect, and there’s a…

Hot Tub!  My three requirement for where we stayed were hot tub, fireplace, and grill.  Normally you get every other hour for the hot tub, but no one was staying in the other cabin so we could use it whenever we wanted.  Woo-hoo!

This is the view from the back deck.  It was living in the woods and I absolutely loved it.  One day while Eric took a nap, I sat out there the whole time and decided I could definitely live in the woods.  It was so peaceful, and yet so much was going on.  It was fun trying to identify if the noises are birds, wind, bugs or…

…deer!  That’s right, this beauty wandered through our backyard while I was out there.  Unfortunately I was afraid to reach for my camera and startle her, but she was waiting for us down the street at our dinner restaraunt!  We went to Alexander’s for dinner.  Yummy food, rather pricey but worth it if you can afford it (thanks mom and dad for your anniversary gift, that’s how we afforded it!).

Eric got a buffalo burger.  I got this beautiful and yummy chicken alfredo with peppers.  We actually went there because they’re supposed to have the best pie, but the dinner was so filling we didn’t have room! It was great.

That was the only meal we ate out.  For our others, we went grill crazy!

Seriously, who says you can’t eat great while camping.  Everything we made used just their little grill, and our camp stove.  Eric discovered he loves to grill, which I’m happy to hear because I love to eat things that are grilled!

We had Indonesian Beef Satay, Hawaiian Salted Veggie Skewers, sliced cucumber with peanut sauce, and grilled apricots with a basalmic glaze for this meal.  It was so amazing, here’s all that was left afterwards…

The next day for breakfast we had an egg and spam scramble.

For dessert that night we made these delicious chocolate, coconut, pineapple skewers.  Oh wow, we’ve made them again since because they’re so amazing.

I made the sauce in a pot, toasted the coconut in a pan

Eric grilled the pineapple skewers.

The finished result, a warm, juicy, gooey, chocolately, coconutty, bite of goodness.  Serve with napkins!

I haven’t always felt great about Seattle. I usually think of it as a rainy, dreary place. Most of what I’ve seen of Seattle is jam packed Pike’s Place Market, or scary Capitol Hill. Today, Eric and I knew we’d be picking his parents up at the airport in the evening, so we decided to tour some areas of Seattle. It was an incredible adventure and I have a new attitude about the city.

First we went to the Olympic Sculpture Park. What a great place. It’s free, and street parking is only a couple bucks. Here’s a few of the cool sights to see there.

I love how the park mixes beautiful northwest flora with the impressive sculptures. The iris is my second favorite flower, and they had them in several shades.

This cool sculpture was so reflective (polished stainless steel) it seemed almost non existent!

I absolutely love this sculpture of a typewriter eraser that looks like it’s about to take out several cars!

There are lots of paths lined with plants and sculptures, it’s a really beautiful walk.

This was a fun bridge. The guy looking through it was pretty hot

This fountain was cool, at about 20 minute intervals it alternates between showing the son, the dad, and both at the same time. Fortunately I took the pictures from far away, when we got closer we realized they’re naked!

This was my favorite sculpture. It actually spells out Love & Loss using normal things like benches, tables, trees, street signs, etc. I really liked it.

So next we went to dinner (at 5pm, we’re early eaters). I’d found an Ethiopian restaurant called Addis Cafe online and plugged it into the gps.

We ordered one dish, because Muna (the owner I believe) told us it’s very big. We got the Lamb Tibbes, which is lamb and veggies in a sauce dumped on a large spongy crepe like pancake called injera. Then you use more injera to scoop it up and eat with your hands. We loved it! It was so delicious and made us miss Africa. We heaped compliments on Muna (who made it herself fresh when we ordered it), and promised to bring people there one day.

Next we went to Uwajimaya. It’s an Asian marketplace, and I felt right at home! They had so many ingredients I’ve been desperately wanting for making Hawaiian food as well as some more exotic Sri Lankan dishes. I could have gone crazy but settled for a few spices, Aloha Shoyu (the only soy sauce for Hawaiian cooking), Hawaiian Alaea salt, a mango, sweet chili sauce, and rice vinegar. The prices were much better than a regular grocery store too. Now that I know what’s there, I’ll have a shopping list next time I go. Banana blossom here I come!

Then we went and found the Fremont troll, I’d seen pictures but never actually been. It was really cool.

Our last stop was Volunteer Park. It is a beautiful park with lots of dog walkers, kids, and crazies. I’d recommend not going by yourself maybe. But it’s gorgeous. There was a cool water tower we climbed to the top of.

It has lots of history on Seattle Parks inside the top.

This camel’s sign says “please climb on me”.  Eric was happy to oblige.

This was a fun sculpture there by the water reservoir that you can see the Space Needle through.

All in all, it was an exciting day of adventure, and I have a new appreciation for Seattle and its beauty. Thanks Eric for an amazing date day. I love you!