Bobbie and Papa

Well a week ago was my (kirsten's) grandparents anniversary and I forgot to blog, but my parents have been graciously and mercifully reminding me so that I don't let it go by completely...

Bobbie and Papa celebrated their 69th anniversary on July 30th...a number I can't even imagine. I mean, we've been married just over two years. 67 to go...

69 years ago, for reasons I'm not exactly sure of, my grandparents got married in a courthouse. As far as I know, there's only one picture available, at least that I've seen. (So I'm sure the weddings both their grandchildren have had have seemed ridiculous...) And in that picture, Bobbie looks gorgeous and is glowing and Papa is so handsome and proud.

Their life together has included homes in several Texas cities, jobs and careers for both of them, two sons, two grandchildren, incredibly graceful aging, and so much happiness.

And some days, they seem to me just as young as they do in their wedding picture.

Bobbie and Papa- all our love, and happy anniversary!

One Year

Today was Daniel's first anniversary at Columbia Ridge...

It's hard to believe that just over a year ago we were driving to Portland, living with Matt and Kim, looking for a job, and that we didn't have any of this — our apartment, our church, this ministry and these amazing people.



It has definitely been an exciting year. An awesome school year, and an awesome summer. We've learned a lot, played a lot, done a lot and seen a lot. We'll be making some constructive changes for the upcoming school year that we're excited about...and are so excited about all that will continue to be in store for the coming years.



Honestly, I can't express how proud of Daniel I am. I wish I could show each of you how much these kids love him, and how well relationships with students have been formed. He has spent his hours planning, preparing, teaching, and investing. He pours his heart into each day, each event, each interaction and each text and facebook message. I am so, so, so glad that he is able to be doing what he loves and is made for, and also so glad that we're in the place we know without a doubt that we're supposed to be in.



We spent the day at a leadership conference with about 25 other church people, and at lunch they gave us a "happy birthday" cake, a card, and so, so, so many sweet words and prayers of thanks and encouragements. We love this church so much, and really I just hope that everyone is equally fortunate enough to one day know how appreciated they are. We are so thankful to be so appreciated, but almost moreso, we're so thankful to be a part of a team that expresses that appreciation to one another and loves and encourages each other. We honestly couldn't ask for more.

...and if these pictures don't seem to add up with what I was saying about Daniel's job, I forgot to mention that he also gets to dress up in ridiculous costume, be silly, and act crazy frequently.

Parents Visit

So about two weeks ago my (Kirsten's) parents visited us for the very first time and it was so, so exciting. We knew that Portland was right up their alley, and I think they would agree. Plus, we did much in the "country" and saw plenty of the mountains, the coast and even some orchards...

But let's start at the beginning...

We went to Por Que No?, one of our very favorite restaurants, did a general overview of portland, Powells, the Rose Garden, Council Crest, and the waterfront all within the first day and a half.

Then the next day we drove out to the hood river valley, to pick cherries. We saw some amazing "kite boarders" on the river and then cut lavender, learned about alpacas (and i got an alpaca finger puppet!), and then got tons of cherries, lots of raspberries, and some garlic...

Plus, it was an astoundingly clear day to see Mt. Hood and Mt. Adams, which we didn't even know was visible from out there.

 

But that wasn't all...we spent the rest of the day driving around the other side of Mt. Hood, with some incredible views of the peak, and stopped at Timberline to check it out.

Then the next day we began at the farmer's market


and then headed to the coast, officially one of Nickel's favorite place in the world (but a bit windy and cold for the rest of us...she didn't seem to notice...) 

Sunday after church we went out to the waterfalls...

and one of the high schoolers we know got us some free snacks

Mom and dad flew in and out of Seattle, so we got to spend their last day there!

We ate lunch at a pier

Saw the space needle

Went to the market

And took a ferry over to Bainbridge Island

All in all, we stayed incredibly busy and had lots of fun. I am SO SO SO glad we got my parents out here and SO SO SO glad that I'm pretty sure it won't be there last time.

There's someone else who was glad they came...

...really, both these guys were. Nickel and Ben (matt and kim's dog that we dogsat while they were in Hawaii) not only shared (Ben's) bed, but got more walks than either had seen in a long time, I'm sure...

(the view from dinner before mom and dad left...)

Catching up

So you already know that we're now again adless, which is certainly disappointing. And you had heard that we were hot. But I thought you might want to know what else we've been up to. 

We had lots of guests, and then that ended. 

Then it was hot, like really hot. For basically an entire week we took a huge fan, set it down in front of Nickel, and then went to anywhere where we could find air conditioning. The mall, Ikea, all sorts of spending time inside. I (kirsten) kept teetering between whether I had altogether become a wimp or if one really shouldn't have four days of "triple digit temperatures" without AC. But Reed researched and found out there were something like 21 days of 100+ temperatures in the last 20 years before last week...so that was pretty unusual...

So once it cooled down we finally got outside and took Nickel to the park. 

and cupcakes accompanied

we collected the bounty from our garden

See that round thing there on the right that looks like a lime? that's a cucumber...yeah. but we braved it and cut it up and let me tell you, it was the best darn cucumber i've ever eaten...

and this week we've been recuperating. cooling down and catching up on sleep.

So that's it! it's that exciting!!! That's all!!

So up next: my parents!!!

technical difficulties...

Just in case you are one of the few people wondering what the heck is going on with us these days, know that posts are coming...hopefully very soon. We are having some problems with Flickr, our online picture storage thingy. And we all know that me typing 1000 words describing our house or the Douglas' visit or Vanessa's visit without any pictures would be pretty boring.

So bear with us and hopefully tonight we will be posting again.

You may also notice that our ads are gone.... apparently you guys clicked on so many ads trying to get us money that Google assumed we were running some sort of a scam and shut us down! On the one hand its kinda crappy because we had close to $50 already in that account (none of which we will now ever see) but I like to look at it this way...Google noticed us! Not only noticed us, but thought we were a threat!!! Yea. That's right Google. You should be scared.

So thank you all for trying to support us with your mice, but sadly our blog will no longer be a money making scheme. Now it's back to just our blog. But that's not so bad!

The end of an era

Or at least a year...So we are going to quit birthday posting. I know many of you are cheering right now (tired of birthday post after birthday post) but that most of you are truly deeply depressed.

The truth is that we have loved, loved, loved doing birthday posts this past year—we really appreciate getting to celebrate each person individually, and we really feel like it's something that's not done enough. But then there were days when it was a bit of a chore to birthday post, and the shame and regret with each late one, the constant fear of forgetting someone, and of course knowing that we're not even beginning to cover all of our readers. So it's time to put it away—plus, we can't repeat all of our wedding pictures. Hopefully this means that we can celebrate your birthday with you in person or over the phone, though, and more than that hopefully this has helped us, if not some of you, think about, appreciate, and sometimes verbalize the fantastic characteristics of the people we love.

So consider this your one big birthday post for 2009-2010, and know that we haven't missed you :) and we'll keep blogging about the house and life and all sorts of other things.

Happy (late) Birthday Mat

Well, somewhat fitting that our last birthday post is a day late, right? We are officially done with birthday posts, but last year, we didn't have all of the birthdays yet, including our (my, Kirsten's) cousin Mat. I have no idea really why I'm posting two days late on this one...I knew Monday, and then I remembered yesterday. Maybe it's the back-to-back guests we had (will post soon) or the heat combined with no air conditioning. Oh well.


Mat (Beth, Jackson and Luke) live in Austin. Mat used to pretty seriously act in plays, loves Star Wars (he even looks like Luke Skywalker), has seen basically every movie ever, and I beat him at Risk once (had to throw that in, I'm still pretty proud of it...). And now Mat directs. He (and Beth) are ridiculously successful, as far as I can tell, I'm pretty sure much more so than I realize. Their company does documentaries, include Lance Armstrong's and several that are on TV. Mat's also a knight. Right—a knight. He was knighted in Belguim for some work he did on a documentary (I could have basically all these facts wrong, so you probably don't want to take them at face-value. I'm too hot right now to cross-check).

these are some of Mat and Beth's (or I guess Alpheus Media's?) Emmys...Emmys!!!

Plus, on top of that, Mat's an incredibly passionate person, sweet, a fantastic father, and great to have a conversation with.


So HAPPY BIRTHDAY MAT, hope it was great!

all the pictures are from Mat and Beth's blog, except the blurry, Emmy, one, which is from my dad :)

House!!!

Lots of exciting things have been happening at our soon to be home in Gresham these days!

They put in the subfloor (I guess that's what you call this maybe?) and covered up our crawlspace...

That was on Sunday afternoon.

Then we went back on Thursday and this is what we saw...

A HOUSE!! Whoa. So get ready for the first (of many I'm sure) internet tour of our new home!

This is our front door. There will be a front porch area here...

Then you come inside. The stairs will be immediately on your right as you come in. There is a hallway that goes into the living room with a little nook on the right for coats etc.

This is the closet under the stairs (that don't exist yet)

This is the only real picture we have of the living room. This is the wall on the back side of the house in the living room that will have our fireplace and two big windows looking out into the back yard.

This is the kitchen. See the window over the sink!? The kitchen will actually eventually be closed in so this picture doesn't really show what it looks like...

This is the dining room! HUGE window on the side of the house and then a sliding glass door out into the back yard!

Here is the back of the house. 

And the left side (garage in the front, kitchen window, and then dining room window)

Here is the view for now from the inside of the garage. 

Pretty amazing huh? We were absolutely blown away. It was amazing to walk into rooms for the first time! It's pretty crazy to watch the process. We are scheduled to move in the middle of October which puts us at around 2 and a half months away which feels super close and so far away at the same time. 

We are enjoying our summer in Portland for now though! More restaurants and the Douglas visit posts to come!!