Catching Up from October...

It's been a while since Emily or I last posted. Even though we have been keeping busy with school and work, we are doing well and are getting very excited for the upcoming holidays! Here are a few pictures from the past couple months.

Emily coordinated a lot of the work put into the Conflict Resolution Week at the University of Oregon in October. At one of the events, we had pizza and I was super excited to get BBQ chicken pizza. I had been craving it for months...

In the middle of October we ran the Runaway Pumpkin half marathon.

Emily did great!

I did well too. We beat our best time for a half marathon by about 23 minutes. Go us!

After the race, we went up to Portland to visit with family and went out for sushi to celebrate.

These were the shirts we got from the race. If you are wondering what's up with the beard, keep scrolling down through the pictures. :D

We had some new neighbors move in below us from Saudi Arabia and they have been so sweet to make us different foods and treats. I don't remember the names of them, but they have been amazingly good!

So I grew out my facial hair for about a month in hopes of it being long enough to braid for my pirate costume. It didn't work, so we cut some hair off of the wig that I wore for part of Halloween (keep scrolling down and you'll see what I wig I'm talking about) and then hot glued it to my beard. Crazy? Yes, but it didn't hurt until I let Garrett and Aunt Tricia try to yank them out at the end of the night. Thinking back on the experience, it was silly to let anyone try and yank out hot glued in hair. For the record, Garrett was successful with his yank and Aunt Tricia was not. :P

So yes, I was a pirate and Emily was a parrot. We had fun dressing up for Halloween but had to have a picture of my parrot on my shoulder... "Polly want a cracker???"

Here is our little cousin Carter with the wig that I wore probably about 5 minutes on Halloween for my costume. After that, I gave up and didn't want to have to bother with all that crazy hair.

Earlier this week when I got to school, there were 5 turkeys out in front of the classroom. I told them they were a few weeks early, but they didn't seem to care.

Anyways, life is good. We hope to be posted more pictures up soon. Much love.

What a Great Birthday!

I feel like it's been ages since I (James) have written the blog. Well, last week we had the awesome experience of celebrating my birthday - and yes, it was awesome! So we have a few pictures to sum up most of the excitement. Funny how most of the pictures are of food.

We had so much fun  finding ways to use the peppers we have been growing in our garden. This was one of my favorites! We made some yummy crescent roll delights with cream cheese and jalapeno peppers inside. 

We went out to this Italian place called Mazzi's for dinner one night and it was pretty amazing - as you can tell from my facial expression in the picture. I enjoyed both my fettuccine alfredo as well as Emily's raviolis.

I don't remember if there was anything particularly special inside Emily's salad, but they used a pesto dressing on top that was fabulous!

I know this doesn't look as good as it was, but I asked for ice cream cake for my birthday and we decided to make it. So we made some ice cream and then put it inside the cake we baked. It turned out better than I thought it would. Although it was super delicious, it was also very very very sweet so we could only have a piece at a time.

Among the cards and gifts and what not, this was one of my favorite presents... Legos! I'm such a nerd. I felt like I should collect a few of the City ones and started with the Coast Guard ship.

Emily made my pancakes for my birthday as well. Isn't she the cutest!

After work, we went up to the LDS temple in Portland and then went out to Fuddruckers. It was my first time going there and I must say that they have great burgers! 

Another cool birthday gift, Dr. Pepper flavored bubble gum! We had a bubble blowing contest.

As you can tell from the size of Emily's bubble, she won.

Our time since coming back from Hawaii has been super busy! I started working at my new job at Bridgeway House working with autistic high school students. It has its challenges, but has been much easier than working with the elementary level like I did last year. There are still plenty of things to learn! Emily started her new GTF (Graduate Teaching Fellowship) job this past week and has been enjoying that. She starts classes this upcoming week as well. Life doesn't really seem to be slowing down a whole lot and I am already feeling like we need another vacation. :D

Summer has gone and Fall is here. Hope we will get back on a schedule and post a few more of our adventures! Much love!

4th of July Fun

Both Emily and I had a nice 4-day weekend to celebrate the 4th of July. It was pretty awesome being able to do so many fun things like BBQ, go to the movies (we saw both The Lone Ranger - which was fairly good, but a little on the violent side - and Despicable Me 2 - which was pretty funny and the movie that we enjoyed more out of the two), and hang out with friends and family.

The week before 4th of July, I got to go rafting with the youth group in our church. Some of my favorite boys!

We also went out to eat at a new Thai restaurant called Ta Ra Rin. I had some yummy BBQ chicken and Emily enjoyed some yellow Thai curry and some mango sticky rice for dessert.

We also had fun doing a Wasgij puzzle.

We went up to Portland for most of the weekend and enjoyed a day on the river boating. Here is our cousin Candace drying off with a shammy. She tried to do some knee boarding and the beginner skies. Most of the time she was outside of the boat was spent on the tube.

Our cousin, Kellie, did an awesome job on the wakeboard and also spent a bit of the time on the tube.

I thought this was going to be a nice picture of me because when Emily took it, she said that I was such a hunk. However, I just look like I'm bored... which I wasn't. Emily and I had a fun time wakeboarding, slalom skiing, and riding on the tube. 

Here is Kayla in the water. She thoroughly enjoyed her time boating both skiing and tubing.

Carter also had a blast on the tube and helping pull the rope in whenever it needed to be pulled in. 

This is what one of our walls looks like in our apartment now instead of just a blank white wall. Emily finished one of her projects for the summer in helping our place feel a little more homey.

A little random, but we had tacos rice this past week and took a picture because that there on top is lettuce from our garden. Go us! Our garden is doing wonderfully. We hope to be eating some of our tomatoes and peppers soon as well.

I hope that everyone else enjoyed their nice little weekend as much as we did. We send our love!

The Aunts Go Marching Three By Three

This is a catch-up post from a few weeks ago. I tried to start it a couple weeks back and for some reason, all of the pictures were stretched horizontally - I didn't think all of the aunties pictured below would appreciate the stretchage, so I held off on it for a while :)

A few weeks ago, I ditched out mid-week on school and work stuff to take the Greyhound bus (scary experience!) up to Portland for a mini family reunion. Aunt Tricia, who lives in Portland, was hosting Aunt Siri-Anne, who was was visiting from Norway, and Aunt Julie, who was visiting from Utah. I haven't seen them all together for probably about 10 years. That is a big chunk of my life! But it felt like we just picked right up where we had left off.

I spent a lot of time with my aunts when I was young and I have always loved them dearly, but it wasn't until a few weeks ago that I felt like I really got to know them as an adult. I still have that natural familial love for them, but I have also realized how remarkable they really are. They are strong, in every way, and I was touched as I spent time with them that THIS is my family culture - a culture of strong women who lead and love with courage and faith.

They have strong minds. They are highly educated and learning is a life-long pursuit for them. Their children will grow up understanding that knowledge is power and it is a cause worth sacrificing for.

They have strong bodies. Between the three of them, they have 20 kids. That fact alone should attest to their physical endurance and strength. But these women also find time to play, to work, to exercise, to enjoy nature, and to be there for their families.

They have strong spirits. They are the bedrock of faith in their families and through thick and thin, miscarriages and family tragedy, sending kids off to kindergarten and college, these women believe with all their hearts in a Savior who understands their pain and joy. 

We had an amazing time together. I took a ton of pictures - these are the highlights. I was reminded again how much I love my family and how crazy we all are for not living all on the same street. It would be a party...all the time :) 

We spent a day on the beach. Don't be deceived by the bright sunshine - it was not warm.

This is a typical Tricia pose. I love it.

Tricia, the Oregonian, came prepared with blankets, a giant umbrella (that almost got away from us!), and a tent. We all laughed at her until we got there and realized that we would have wanted to leave after 10 minutes without all of our gear.

The cold did not stop the kiddos from enjoying the sand and water.

For some reason, Carter could not comprehend the concept of sand blowing in the wind.  Poor guy had sand in his eyes for hours.

Julie and the kiddos were the only ones brave enough to make it all the way to the water. 

How adorable is this baby?

We took a detour on the way home...well worth the visit.

Carter Cow.

I love factories like this - it makes me feel like I am on Mister Rogers' Neighborhood.

Cheese sampling. Yum!

And ice cream!

We went for a hike early the next morning. Julie has the absolute best morning hair of anyone I have ever known.

I may get in trouble for posting this picture, but I love it. I want it framed and on my desk.

Beautiful hike

Slug friend. Yuck.

Saying goodbye to Aunt Julie at the airport. Our visit was WAY too short.

Hangin in the car with this adorable babe. 

Courtney's last track meet of the season. So fun to watch her run.

I don't know why Kellie has such a confused look on her face because she was really determined in what she was doing. She talked James into letting her paint his toenails (something I have never achieved).

The finished product. I can't get over the hair and the painted nails together.

The kids' patriotic choir concert.

This was a weekend to remember. We also got some really exciting news while we were there. I got a fellowship for next year in the Conflict Resolution Services department! This is a HUGE blessing for us and makes a lot of things possible for this upcoming year. 

And I got a job at the place where I have been interning since January...

And I just finished all of my classes/school work for this year...

And we are going to Disneyland this week...

Life is good. 

:)