DianaEric.com

The first 2 videos are definately the best.

I read about this application on marko’s blog. It sounded fun so I tried it our with pictures from our Piper’s first birthday which we celebrated at our first Bible Study after our camping trip.  She is so ridiculously cute.

The are always a few great human interest articles about people saving lives or giving away their fortune or just just very NPV (neutral point of view) interviews with political candidates.  However my problem with the magazine is that it is littered with advertisements for prescription drugs and fast food and investment type things i feel as if i must not be feminine enough, old enough, or have poor enough eating habits.  None of the advertisements really interest me and personally i get frustrated trying to read an article in a magazine and they say “flip to page 50 to continue reading” and the ads aren’t numbered so i have a hard time trying to even find the second half.

Monday is always our “us” day, and Eric planned this past Monday out over a week in advance.  First, he brought me some beautiful irises (my other favorite flower) after work.

Then after his nap, he got up and made us a yummy picnic lunch.  He took me to Flaming Geyser Park where we had a lovely lunch by the river.  I love my husband!  Thanks Eric.

September 7 was the First Annual Live Aloha Festival in Seattle.  When we had dinner the previous Friday night at Pac Island, they told us about it.  We always in support of them and of whatever Hawaiian culture we can get here, so we were excited to go after church.

It was really fun to be surrounded by locals, to hear pidgin, see people in slippas and muu-muus, watch hula and smell the local food.  I felt like I was home!  It was also great to get some shaved ice, and Pac Island was even nice enough to give us a discount on food because we’re ohana!  Now that’s Aloha Spirit.

If you want to make some food from Hawaii, my blog’s got an EASY recipe for you.  Make yourself some somen salad.

When you geocache, there are some different acheivements people go for.  Such as how many finds you have, or the number of highest difficulty caches.  Another acheivement is “First To Find”.  This means that the instant the cache is public, it’s up for grabs, and whoever gets to it first gets that official title (and often something in reward).

We were wiped out and ready for sleep, and Eric was just checking his e-mail before we got ready for bed.  Up popped a notice that a cache was just posted only 3.5 miles from our apartment.  He said, “we’re going for it!”  I ran and grabbed our headlamps and a pen, while he plugged the coordinates into our gps.  Then we literally ran out the door and to our car!

It said it was a park and grab (meaning you can park your car and simply walk up to it) but it wasn’t quite that simple.  First we turned down the wrong street, then we went the long way behind a row of houses.  We walked .13 miles in shorts and slippers (flip-flops for you mainlanders) through rocks, and black berry bushes.  We got there only 30 seconds ahead of the next couple geocaching, but it was just enough.  Eric found it and we were first!

The couple we met go by the name Bollom and Tularoo, fun huh?  It’s always nice seeing young geocachers, a lot of them are retired with lots of free time (which is awesome too).  Here’s a picture of Eric with our prize.

If any of you reading this are geocachers, the hide was The Great Gazoo Lost His Probe 1.  If you’re not a geocacher, you should be.  Thanks for the hunt Luke505!

Are you ready for millions of pictures?  Okay maybe only twenty.  This is our third annual small group camping trip.  This is also our first time with two little ones!  We went to Ocean City State Park at Ocean Shores.

When we arrived, this dog from the camp site next to ours immediately jumped up for Eric to pet her, and did not want to get down.  He gets attention from all the ladies, I’m serious.

Eric, Heather, and I arrived a few hours before everyone else, so we walked a couple miles along the beach to a geocache.  It was windy.

So windy it was actually hard to walk in!!

This bench is right by the geocache we found.  Cool huh?

You have to walk a long ways through grass to get to and from the beach, I love this picture of Eric.

There was some different flora in that are than I’ve seen in the rest of Washington.  Eric and I spotted this on our geocaching day (we ditched the group while they played a 3 hour game of Settlers)

This picture turned out terribly but I had to put it because we found our first “Cache Across America” cache.  There’s one in each state and they each have a code.  When you find all 50 you use the code to find the final cache in DC.  We were excited to find out we’d be camping so close to one.

This is the beautiful view from where we were geocaching.

Later that second day, our whole group headed to the beach.  That’s my sister Sharon, my sister-in-law Heather, and Aaron with Piper in the background.

I told Emily a few days before the trip that her packing list was her bucket and her shovel.  She remembered! (or more likely Mommy remembered)

Eric found a whip on the beach!  Really it was some kind of sea plant, but it was cool!

Aaron and Piper.  Aaron was way excited to bring his fancy kite, which was really cool.  The best part was when it knocked him and Eric down at the same time!

Piper had a great time at the beach.

Piper and Emily love Eric so much, his name is the first both girls said of people in our group.

You can’t tell in this picture but she had so much fun riding on Eric’s back and was laughing and giggling up a storm.  He’s gonna be a great dad one day.

This is Emily’s experience with a roasted marshmallow, it squishes even better than it tastes!

This was what we made our campfire pizzas on.  Yummy, but lots of work.  Can you see the scream face?

This was right before we left on Sunday.  We’re not ready to be parents yet, but we sure love having friends with kids that we can live vicariously through!

I have a wonderful husband, the other day he told me that the bad thing about riding his bike to work is that it makes it hard for him to bring me flowers!  But Mondays I’m off, so a couple Mondays ago, he drove and came home with these beauties.

If you don’t know why yellow roses are so special to me, read it here!

Yesterday Eric and I went to Pac Island Grill for dinner.  We have been to a few Hawaiian restaurants in Washington and this one wins hands down.  We’ve been going there since we first started dating.  I brought my camera and meant to take pictures of everything and write a review, but the food’s so good you just dig in!  I saved my favorite for last so I got a picture of it.

Ahi Poke!  (Pronounce Poke-ay)  This was a staple for me in Hawaii.  In fact if I was really craving it, I’d drive all the way to the North shore for some amazing poke.  I love shoyu poke, so I just added some shoyu to this and let it soak it up.  Delicious.  Yes, it is raw tuna, and it is amazing.  The first year we were eating there, they didn’t have poke, we’re so excited they added it.  Everytime we go, I wait to hear the magic words (we have poke!).

Now the next thing I’m waiting for them to add, is chocolate haupia pie (they just have regular haupia pie).  So since I couldn’t buy it anywhere, I made my own!  This recipe is from the Star Bulletin.  I made my own pie crust from scratch this time, but you can use a frozen crust, or even those pre made graham cracker or shortbread crusts.  I also used mini chocolate chips because I didn’t have any big chocolate to shave.

Chocolate Haupia Pie

1 9-inch prepared pie crust
7 ounces semi-sweet chocolate
1-1/2 cups heavy whipping cream
1/4 cup sugar
Shaved chocolate, for garnish
>> Haupia:
1 can coconut milk
1 cup milk
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup cornstarch
1 cup water

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bake crust until golden, 15 to 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, make haupia: Whisk coconut milk, milk and sugar together in a small saucepan. In a separate bowl, dissolve cornstarch in water. Bring coconut milk mixture to a boil, then reduce to a simmer and whisk in cornstarch mixture, whisking until thickened.

Microwave chocolate pieces on high 1 minute; stir to melt completely. Pour half the haupia into a bowl. Mix remaining haupia with melted chocolate and pour over the bottom of the baked pie crust. Layer white haupia over the top. Cool pie at least 1 hour in refrigerator.

Whip cream with 1/4 cup sugar until still peaks form. Garnish pie with whipped cream and shaved chocolate. Chill another hour. Serves 6 to 8.