home stretch

weird feeling. i'm on the home stretch at work, with no more repeated last days. today is my last friday. tomorrow my last saturday. monday my last monday. all the way to valentine's day. the past 24 hours have been filled with weird emotions, naturally i suppose. it makes sense to feel kind of attacked toward the end. i start wondering, am i going to get the closure i desire? is God's big enough to get me into school? has my time there been truly valuable?
yes, it was carefully appointed. God is definitely big enough.

Watchman Nee was encouraging as I laid awake at 6 am this morning (early for ME!):

"gradually we learn increasingly to look to Him, having recognized that
everything depends upon Christ, and not upon us. ..
After we learn bit, we receive some understanding as to the necessity of trusting Him:

not in the sense of believing Him to grant us item after item,
but in the sense of trusting Him to do
what we are unable to do by ourselves."

amen.

jjjjaaaaaaannnnnnnnnuuuuuuaaaaaarrrrrryyyy

The past month has flown by and has been filled with exciting, weird, and some normal happenings. We are finally ready to share them with you!!

First, Tim and I went to Urinetown. What kind of horrible place could that be? Well, Urinetown is actually the name of a Broadway musical that spoofs all the other Broadway musicals. You say there must be a mistake! Certainly, it's called "You're in town." That's what we thought too, until we saw the cast marching and singing their triumphant anthem about the right we have to "pee for free." It was a revolution with Les Miserables significance.
Powerful, emotional... urinal?
Anyway, we laughed until we peed our pants.

Then I had the Colorado Blues. Mostly missing family, and the snow that just falls on your house and you wake up to it (more than 1/4 inch!) and you get stranded home and then go outside and build snowmen in the sun which comes out all the time, even the same day as storms. And the quiet, soft sound of a blanketed landscape. mmmm. Makes me want to eat something yummy and warm.

Then, we finally strapped on our sunglasses and got some Sunshine. I thought we'd be elated, when in actuality we were horrified: OK, Sunshine is a movie in which a team of scientists from the year 2050 are trying to save humanity from freezing (the sun is dying and earth is covered completely in snow - would that be so bad??), so they travel toward the sun with the mission of sending a bomb into its center to make it blow up and give more warmth... It turns into a horror film when a 'sunman' gets onto the ship and starts killing everyone! (Sorry if I ruined it for you.) NOT the kind of sunshine I needed!

With some of our weekly organic vegetable share, I made cabbage pie with a mashed potato crust. I forgot to capture the finished product, darn...

Still in recovery mode, we went shopping in downtown Seattle with fam - Mike, Hills, baby-in-utero "I" who is now apparently kicking, and Joanie. We had a great time, and while I was disappointed not to find the Patagonia store OR my much longed-for dim sum (they were closed!!!), I did find joy in 2 new pairs of shoes (don't worry, I'm getting rid of old ones). That helped the recovery process.

And to cap the month off well, we hit the SNOWY slopes at Crystal Mountain today for a ton of fun. This was the biggest impact in turning the CO Blues to another day. I forget to we do live pretty close to tons of snow. Although it may not land regularly on my house, it's within reach:)
We definitely enjoyed the snow - here we are in the jeep window.

oooh! Icicles on the car!

Tim pretending to do a wipe-out in the snow
(since we didn't have the camera on the slopes, this is the parking lot!)

January was the last 'normal' month of our marriage, most likely. What I mean is, we've had the same sort of schedule and life since we were married. From here on out, I finish training my job replacement at REACH after 4 years of working there, start a new job taking care of babies in February, and await the graduate school acceptance letter I'm hoping for from Seattle. Then we look at moving...The year of transition has begun. Stay posted!

break-de-blog

we'll be back in action in february! stay tuned...

happy new year!

This is our last full day in Naples. Tim just put down his book and curled up on the couch, still in his swimsuit from the pool this morning, already asleep. The water still laps the boat dock below us, and the looming clouds across the entire sky have brought colder weather today. Still a great start to a new year, relaxing with family. Yet we feel ready to head back to Starbucks and to finish at REACH and for richness and newness.

We are blessed and strive to keep centered on our Source, who is Christ, our life.

jump, jump!

today we took our kayaks into the gulf and the dolphins played with us.

then we rented a boat and a jet ski for a couple hours right before sunset and the dolphins came to play with us again.


in a soon-to-be seen video, i was yelling at them, 'Jump, jump!!" that got them going.

ps you can now post COMMENTS for free,
you don't have to be anybody special (especially not a googler anymore),
sorry about that inconvenience before. we'd love to hear from you!

....to Coast

We finally made it...back to the East Coast- or, should I say, the Gulf (of Mexico)! For many a day we will be repeating our routine of waking up to the sound of water lapping the boats on the dock, have a lazy breakfast, head to the beach for a few hours, watch some dolphins jump and play, bring the kayak over to try and chase them, eat lunch, take a nap, read at the pool, play Settlers of Catan, eat dinner, watch a movie, and watch the moonlight dance on the ceiling as we fall asleep. No, this isn't the norm, and we can't complain. We'll check in later when we wake up from the dream!

Merry Lights

Merry Christmas tomorrow! Tim's working today until 4 and then we will celebrate Christmas at his family's house before heading to Florida at 8am tomorrow! A full Christmas day of flying...oh well. We each have our books of choice, Kite Runner for me since I haven't read it, and The Idiot for Tim (not intentionally!).

Saturday night we took Joanie and Josh (who is in town from Canada) to Zoo Lights, a Christmas tradition. Here are some shots:The glowing pink treeeeeee! (with an improved, non-cardboard Josh)

The new narrows bridge with Mt Rainier behind.

A preview of Florida beauty!!

It's a girl!

Tim's brother Mike and his wife Hillary announced they will be having a baby GIRL in May! This is a semi-rarity and we are very excited to have a niece!

Rudy???

This one's for you, Roxie! (And maybe all those Rudolph fans out there??) Check out those awesome 7up earrings!

Season's Sleepings

Has anyone else not been able to sleep, like, at ALL lately? This is what happens when I get mega projects running through my mind, and lists in my head, never-ending. Camp usually does this to me, and in a minor way for the first time, now does Christmas.

Could it be because I decided to make over 100 Christmas cards this year, or stamp my own wrapping paper, make fudge and cookies and loaves of holiday eggnog-cranberry bread for fun? Or could it be the coordination of getting 100 family members, 10 dozen home-made sugar cookies to frost, and 250+ sorted gifts to tomorrow's REACH Christmas party? Maybe the fact that my sister KATE GOT ENGAGED this week!! Or that I have just today begun to dent the whole shopping affair, or that we join my family in Florida in a week!!!

Probably one of those things is keeping me awake at night.

One last note: I have officially begun to loathe pumpkin anything. I do love those organic vegetables that keep coming, but I have had enough pumpkin. I keep trying to cook different things with it, and nothing satisfactory comes of it in my opinion. Definitely enough.

Good thing I'm sticking to gingerbread cookies for tomorrow's party. Let's hope I get them all baked tonight!