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Instead of giving each other “stuff” for Christmas, we decided to buy needs for a local family, some African boys, and for ourselves…do a special experience.  So we rode the snow train to Leavenworth.  It was a magical once in a lifetime experience and you get to share it with us in pictures!

A nice guy offered to take our photo before we got on the train.  We got up at 5:30 on a Saturday morning so we were tired, but way excited.

The view from our train was awesome!  It snowed the whole time and I think I left a few noseprints on the window.

We passed by several gorgeous rivers and waterfalls.  It truly felt like we were on our own special Polar Express.

Eric and I were talking about two of our favorite musicals, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, and Fiddler on the Roof.  We were singing songs from them when this trio walked into our car and played “If I Were a Rich Man”!  We did the dig-a-dig-a dance

Our breakfast and dinner were provided by Gretchen’s Catering.  We took of the bands to hold our boxes shut and declared we were Gretchen’s Ninjas!  The food was really good and we greatly appreciated it.

The was one kid in our car, a sweet girl named Madison.  This ladies quartet invited her to sing Rudolph with them.

They sold raffle tickets to raise money to build a school in Uganda.  We didn’t really care about winning (obviously since I lost my tickets and we think they called my number but I couldn’t claim it) but were happy to support a good cause.  Our car sold the most tickets so we got these hats as prizes.  We wore ours the whole day instead of our knit caps.  Everywhere we went people said they loved them.

A trio called the Cutters was really good.  Their voices were great together (maybe because they’re a family!) and we were stomping and clapping to their music.  Beautiful, folksy style, I’d really like one of their cds.

The girl playing the violin was named Arwen, which is on our list of girls’ names we like (no, we’re not ready for kids yet, just have our list started!)

We were being so silly when Santa came and pretending we were kids, it was a lot of fun.  Our car was so nice, not only did we get really spacious private seats, but we also had our own attendants who got us whatever drinks or other things we needed.

Our car had a private bathroom lounge.  It was co-ed with two individual stalls (that lock), a bench seat to wait, and not one …

… not two …

… but FOUR sinks!  We think the car is also used for long trips, the seats recline really far back so you could sleep in them and there’s enough sinks and mirrors for lots of people to get ready for bed.

Our car was so vintage, that there was still the sign in the bathroom (in German) saying to please not use the toilets at the station (because they used to just dump onto the tracks!)

When we unloaded from the train, everyone was so excited to be in the snow.  It was really beautiful and we were hopping and skipping around.

The first thing we did when we arrived was find a place to eat lunch.  I packed us a yummy spread of cheeses, homemade crackers and fresh bread.

Leavenworth is a special, beautiful town any time of year.  But Christmas is its forte!  It’s surrounded by snow covered mountains and full of everything you think Christmas should be.

All the buildings and decorations are in keeping with the Bavarian theme.  Even several shopkeepers dressed in Bavarian costumes.

The buildings were covered in icicle lights…

And REAL icicles!

If you go to Leavenworth you have to visit Bob and Donna at the Fudgehut.  They are so kind and friendly and their fudge is delicious and creamy!  We got 3 pounds (peanut butter, rocky road, and coconut almond) and they are half gone.  We need a trip to the gym (or 5 or 6!)

One of the things they do throughout the day is have everyone do the chicken dance in the middle of the road.  It was so much fun grabbing a bunch of strangers and dancing around like little kids!

It’s tough to get a good Christmas light shot when your hands are shaking from the cold, but as hundreds of us sang “Silent Night”, all the trees in the park lit up, it’s quite magical.

Then, we all turned around and counted down and all the buildings lit up!  You really feel like you’re in a magical winter wonderland.  We had an amazing day and created memories that will last a lifetime.

In an effort to save money I’ve decided it’s time to learn to sew.  First of all, repairing clothes is much cheaper than buying new clothes.  Secondly if I can sew well I can make us clothes that are Neiman Marcus fit and quality for Walmart prices.  That’s a pretty good deal.  I’ve been doing some tshirt surgeries and other things by hand, but that gets tedious.

Then my wonderful Grandma Bonnie gave me one of her two sewing machines.  These pictures were from her birthday.  She wanted to go the Sewing Guild’s Annual luncheon/fashion show for her birthday, so we made it a ladies’ day.  She brought her sewing machine and gave it to me there, I was so touched.  She loves to sew and is incredibly good, but her eyesight has made it so difficult for her.  She made her beautiful dress and suit jacket she’s wearing, and showed them in the fashion show.

We have three generations in this photo!  Maybe one day in the next couple years we can have a four generation photo!  Speaking of little ones…

This beautiful boy Daniel and his mother were at our table.  He was only 10 days old!  We all got to hold him and it was wonderful.  Such a treat!

Another treat of the day is the raffle they have.  As soon as I saw this basket I wanted it.  I am a sucker for gift baskets.  They have a theme that everything in the matches, it’s a bunch of little gifts wrapped up so prettily together.  I can’t go to Sam’s Club by myself around the holidays because I want all the gift baskets!  But I’ve been wanting some fall decorations and so knew I wanted to win this.  I entered 16 tickets ($4) and won!  I was ecstatic.

The other cool sewing thing I’ve done is take a pattern fitting class taught by Connie Crawford.  My mom was kind enough to pay for me to take it with her and Heather came too!  It was really good, although a little over Heather and my heads.  Connie was a lot of fun and very talented.  I’m excited to put her teaching to good use.

So far the only thing I’ve sewn on my machine is the apron I wore for Halloween.

That’s right, this Halloween my family hung out with the McCains.  Eric and I thought that since my parents are so into politics (dad especially) it would be fun to dress up as John and Cindy McCain.

The funniest part was that Eric’s mask was so scary!  The first time he put it on I wasn’t looking at him, then looked up and screamed because of the scary old man standing in my living room.  A lot of kids had the same reaction.  One little boy screamed bloody murder, turned and ran down the driveway to his parents!

Another boy (about 10 years old) started screaming and backing up with arms spread and almost clotheslined his little sister down the steps!  We had so much fun at my parents house scaring the kids and interacting with them.  Some kids asked if he was George Bush or Biden.  That was pretty funny.  Parents really loved it.

Jason also took a turn at playing McCain.  Then a little while later cracked us up by proclaiming that his spleen hurt!  No, he doesn’t know where his spleen is.

We took a nice picture too because Eric looks so handsome in his suit, I couldn’t resist!  And the two things you need to have a great Halloween get together with family?…..

A Cheese Mummy

and Coke!

Thanks mom and dad for a super fun evening!

Eric and I had part two of his awesome surprise date this Monday.  We carved our pumpkin!

Eric looked very intense as he cut the top off, it was rather intimidating

Yay!  The first of the yummy pulp and seeds that can make us delicious treats.

This pumpkin was pretty easy to clean out, the skin was a lot thicker than previous ones we’ve carved.

I found a leaf pattern to print off the internet, and drew a pattern for “Johnson”.  Then came the tedious hole poking.  After a while, I decided to make fewer leaves.  It’s a lot of work!

It turned out really great.  The carving goes half way around so you can’t see it all in one photo.

But here’s the John…

…and the son.

Of course we used the guts too, we hate wasting food.  For the recipes to make these delicious treats, check here.

Toasted Pumpkin Seeds

Pumpkin Bread (ridiculously delicious!)

So this post really spans 2 years.  In the first week of October 2006, Eric took me to my very first corn maze.  Here’s the fun we had.

That was absolutely one of my favorite dates ever!  It was my first time carving a pumpkin since I was a kid (and couldn’t actually carve it myself).  We had a really great time and I will always remember it.

Eric has learned over the past couple years that I love surprises (happy ones!) and love it when he plans something for our us day or us time.  So last weekend he told me had a surprise planned for our Monday us day.  I was so excited as he turned into the lot for the corn maze and pumpkin patch!  He even had his cowboy hat in the car to really recreate the date for me!  We had a great time, when we came out of the maze our shoes were so covered in mud it took him an hour to clean them.  We got a beautiful pumpkin, but the funny thing was we were so tired that we decided to carve it another day.

P.S. the key to having a great time at the corn maze (if you’re married or engaged!) is to go on a weekday when no one else is there.  Every time you hit a dead end, reward yourselves with a kiss!

Eric and I love Netflix, we end up getting to see a lot of things we wouldn’t otherwise, like documentaries, foreign films and tv shows.  Our latest pick is the documentary “Young At Heart”.  If you haven’t seen this, you have to!  I laughed the entire movie, except when I was trying not to cry.

It’s about a singing group of elderly people (the average age is 80).  Although their favorite kind of music is classical, opera and broadway, they sing rock and roll!  There is something so much more to the words of songs like “I Wanna Be Sedated”, “Stayin’ Alive”, and “Should I Stay or Should I Go” when they are sung by these beautiful, lively, energetic people who every day face a myriad of health problems and the loss of dear friends.

We really enjoyed it and were so moved by their stories.  I hope I can be that cool when I’m that old!  Be prepared to fall in love with these people, you will feel like they’re your grandparents by the end of it.

WARNING: (There are a few objectionable words, very few, but be forewarned)

I’d like to go to a Mariner’s Game once a year.  Even if they’re not doing well, I’ve seen them win a couple games, and I always have fun.  Hawaii doesn’t have a baseball team so the Mariners are basically Hawaii’s team too.  Eric doesn’t really like it, he’s not a big sports fan.  But I grew up watching baseball movies and dreaming of going to a major league game, so once a year or so he takes me because he loves me.

He also loves teens, and a couple Thursdays ago we got to take a group of them to a game.  It was a lot of fun, even though we lost.  Eric also brought his DS and we got to do a lot of cool games and watch the play by play and stuff on it.  We even ordered dinner on it to be delivered to our seats!  That was way cool.  We were out ridiculously late (after midnight) especially since he had to be up for work at 3am.  But we love those students so it was worth it!

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.