The best Christmas Present Ever...

So, the other night there were about seven cop cars right outside of our house for several hours complete with searchlights and everything. We peeked out the windows on and off for a while, but could never see enough to actually figure out what was going on...so we chalked it up to some kind of massive manhunt that was taking place. Slightly freaky, but Isaac was with me so I wasn't too worried.

Fastforward to the following afternoon.

I am in the kitchen preparing to bake some fantastic spicy ginger cookies for that evening's festivities and Isaac is in the back room, when we hear a knock at our door. A very loud knock. Now the thing about our house is that there are three doors to enter before you actually get into our apartment. We live in an old house, so there's the external door that leads down a very short hallway and ends with the door of our apartment and the door of the downstairs apartment. If you go through our door, it takes you up a set of stairs where you then reach the actual door into our apartment. Now, obviously the only people who know this are those who have been to our house before, so the majority of our knocks come from the door at the bottom of the stairs. Only people we know come straight to the top of the stairs, but that happens only if we know they're coming over, so they never knock, they just come right in. All that to say, something is not right if there is a loud knock coming from our top door. Isaac asked me to get it, but I was a tad alarmed being that there was a possible vagrant on the loose via last night's supposed manhunt. Not wanting to just open the door to a murderer without Isaac in the room as backup, I called out a friendly, "Who's there?" When no one answered, the churning in my stomach kicked it up a notch so I turned my gaze toward the back bedroom and called for Isaac to come. But before he came out the knock returned, even more fierce than before. I called out again, "Who's there?" and again, there was no answer. Something was definitely wrong because I was only about seven feet from the front door and there was no doubt that whoever was out there could hear me, but was refusing to answer until I opened the door. I called for Isaac again, and then eyed the deadbolt, about to run over and flip it locked, awkward as that may be since they would most assuredly hear the sound of the door locking loud and clear and would know I just locked them out. I heard the deep tones of a man's voice behind the door now and became even more panicked as I racked my brain to try to remember where we had put the phone so I could call the police if necessary. And still there was no sign of Isaac (probably because Isaac doesn't get scared of anything, so I'm sure it never even occured to him that the person at the front door was possibly waiting to shoot me at point blank range once I opened the door). Then, to my horror, I saw the front door starting to open and I knew he was coming inside. I thought my heart was going to beat straight out of my chest and the words, "Don't come in or I'm calling the police," were at the tip of my tongue...

...when two long lost faces peered around the door. It took my frazzled brain a couple seconds to register the intruders, but two seconds later I was screaming and crying as I recognized Morgan and Tommy!! THE Morgan and Tommy who have been gone since September gallivanting around the world and who weren't expected back until the end of March! I know I can't convey our excitement at seeing them, but they're two of our best friends and we have missed them so much since they've been gone. And we had absolutly no idea whatsoever that they were coming home for Christmas. They surprised everyone, even their parents! It turns out, they really had wanted me to open the door without knowing who was there so they could see my surprised face which is why they didn't want to identify themselves. Makes sense, just makes the situation a tad scarier when there are dangerous criminals on the loose. Anyway, I recovered and we got to spend an awesome evening with them...and they're here for three weeks!

As soon as we had calmed down (okay, as soon as I had calmed down) we drove over to Justin and Alex's to surprise them. Isaac and I hid behind the bushes and Tommy and Morgan rang the doorbell and waited. I wish I could have seen Lex's face because all I saw from my vantage point was smiles and waves from Mo and To, and then finally Morgan's exasperated beckoning for Alex to come open the door. Apparently she had just been standing inside staring at them in shock because she couldn't believe they were actually there. So awesome! And then we called Justin up from the basement, but like Isaac, he doesn't react with the drama of us lovely wives. Just a huge smile and hugs all around from him.

Just thinking about it all makes me tear up again. So we have three wonderful weeks to spend with our friends before they head back to Asia for the duration of their expedition. The best surprise ever.

PS, if you're interested in following their journey, you can read about it all here. And they have hundreds of awesome pictures from their travels.

The day we got married...

Better late than never. We've finally got some of our wedding pictures rifled through and relatively organized into a pseudo-chronological display.

Want to see them? Go here.

Do enjoy.

Deadly Persuasion: Why Women and Girls Must Fight the Addictive Power of Advertising by Jean Kilbourne.

So provocative. She found a way to put into words the things I've been feeling for the past decade.

A handful of wheatgrass...

We live in a rather tiny apartment. One bedroom, one bathroom, a living room, and a kitchen. Which means no storage place. At all. No extra closets, no garage, nothing. So for the first year of our marriage, the home for all of Isaac's tools was a gigantic pile on the floor against the far wall of our bedroom. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm definitely not complaining because we LOVE our little house, but I was also very thankful when Isaac's next project created a home for all of those tools. He got the idea to incorporate old milk crates as shelves and started the hunt for a broken down cupboard he could restore to fit the crates. A few days later, his project was born. He had to extend the back of the cupboard and fix it up quite a bit as it was a sorry piece of junk to being with. Then he covered all that work with lots of sanding, paint, and varnish, fit the milk crates in and - whallah, we have a mini tool shed. It's beautiful and matches the other cupboards he did earlier this year. And best of all, we have our far wall back.

And then there's his dream (our dream, really) of living in a place where plants rule the roost. Where everywhere you look inside, there are dozens of species of plants living among us. We have tons of plants in pots, but this time Isaac wanted to fully incorporate the greenery into the piece of furniture. So he purchased some old drawers from a torn down elementary school, fixed them up (of course), and then created waterproof indents in the top to house whatever it was we wanted to grow - wheatgrass at the moment.

Next, I want a new bed. He's been drawing up designs on and off for the past year for it, but weather, space, and lack-of-garage-sized-tools has put that little dream off for possibly a couple more years. Until then...

And then we went home...

One big holiday down, one more to go. We got to have two Thanksgivings this year - one with my family a week ago and one this past weekend with Isaac's family. The first one we rode the train down for, and that was an experience in itself. An extra two hours of travel time each way tacked onto an already long journey left us not quite sure if it was worth not having the stress of driving and traffic and such. But it was fun to at least do it once. We brought our laptop and dvds, books, and cards and spent a solid six hours side by side watching the beautiful fall colors sweep by. Dad picked us up in Vancouver and brought us home to see the star of our little Thanksgiving...Ava Grace! Or Olivia, I suppose, since no one else ever uses her nickname anymore. She's my sister's little daughter and she is cuuu-uuute. Perfect little spiral curls, a smile to die for, and all the adorableness of a two year old learning to speak like an adult. Of course, it was great to see mom and dad and we spent the evenings playing games with Debbie and Mike, but there's no denying we were all most excited to ooh and ahh over the littlest member of our family. Makes me want to have one...minus all the late nights and responsiblities that would come with it, of course. Highlight of the weekend - I taught Olivia to bat her eyes while asking mommy for something. I'm such a good auntie. Okay, so maybe that wasn't really the highlight of the weekend...there was time with the family, mom's amazing dinner she made, and the snow that fell on Saturday, but it's these little life lessons that must not go overlooked. All in all, a very nice family Thanksgiving.

Fastforward three days and we packed our Kia and headed back down south for the holiday with Isaac's family, which coincidentally also made me want to have little kiddos. Still minus the late nights and unending responsibilities, of course, but the little ones romping around the Hurst home are pretty adorable as well. Unfortunately, there were no pictures to document these events, but I will narrate them for you nonetheless. There was unending game playing, Thanksgiving dinner number two, a fantastic waffle party the following day, and unfortunately no snowfall to be seen the entire weekend. I got a treat Friday morning, though, when I visited Jolie at the Beauty School she attends and recieved the most amazing scalp treatment I've ever had (also the only one I've ever had, but nevertheless so nice). Then she ringletted my hair to perfection and I finished off the weekend a very curly blonde girl. We spent the night with Ian and Savannah the next night and got to snuggle and entertain Jayden and Daelyn the next morning. So cute. Then it was home to more games with the girlies, then back in our car for the long drive home. I could eat pumpkin pie every day for the rest of my life. Mmm, mmmm.

Alas, it is back to real life now in all it's glory. Eight to fours, grocery shopping, and no little ones. There is a bright spot on the horizon, though, as this week appears to be the week in which we shall acquire the Hurst Christmas Tree Number Two, which means more pumpkin pie, hot cider, and cranberry and popcorn strings galore. Christmas season? Yes, please.

Phyllo Creations...

If you're sensitive about your birthday being forgotten, special dates passing unnoticed, and Christmas presents being bought at the last minute, then I'm not the best friend for you. For some reason I can't keep birthdates in my head for anything, no matter how long or hard I try. And by default, remembering anything like an anniversary (other than my own) is completely out of the question. But I am blessed with a couple friends who are incredible at remembering all those special days, who will pop a little card in the mail wishing good luck on an upcoming final, who will send postcards to you while you're out of town on vacation, who never forget a birthday, Christmas, or anniversary. Not that I forget Christmas, but you know what I mean. Dear Morgan is one of those people...the Morgan of the Morgan and Tommy couple who is off gallivanting around Europe and Asia for the next several months. Now if I was taking an extended vacation, especially if it was one that spanned nearly a year's length, I would gladly use that as an excuse to not have to even try remembering everyone's special days back home...but not Morgan. Her brother's birthday was a few weeks after she and Tommy left town and I was emailed specific instructions on what exactly to make for him since Mo couldn't do it herself. And then Tommy's dad had a birthday last week and, once again, Morgan remembered will in advance and asked us to help her make it special for him. Mo and To were in Turkey at the time and wanted us to create Turkish Baklava for Tommy's dad so it could be like we were all there together. Lex took it a step further and made an entire Turkish dinner and we had Rick and Sherri over to Alex and Justin's to celebrate! There was a lentil stew that was incredible (no matter what Justin says), zucchini pancakes that had some other completely foreign name I won't even try to remember, greek yogurt, hummus and pita chips. A-mazing. Then there was the baklava for dessert. The only things that were missing were Morgan and Tommy, but we'll be with them soon enough, I suppose. Happy birthday, Rick!

The other thing you may have noticed is that I am now blonde. Very blonde. White blonde, in fact. And I have to say, I really love it. I won't be blonde forever...probably just a few months to get it out of my system and then I'll be a happy bruntette for the rest of my life. But until then, I shall very much enjoy the new look. You must gotta live a little every once in a while, right?

On cleaning, Little Miss Sunshine, and the wearing of the tights...

I must say, it's like a world record for me. Three and a half weeks ago I went on a cleaning binge and scoured every nook and cranny of our house. And I mean every nook and cranny. Every corner, every surface, every appliance, every wall...not an inch of the place was left untouched. Then on top of that we put everything that was lying out away, in its place. There were no more random piles of books or papers - nothing. Our house was cle-eeean. Now, it's not like we were total slobs before or anything. We just had little habits here and here that would help clutter our little house before we even realized it was happening. Like it would be two minutes before I had to walk out the door for work and I could find nothing to wear, so the bedroom would consequently be strewn with articles of clothing tossed pell-mell all over the floor as I frantically searched for the perfect outfit. Or we would have cooked an incredible dinner and then been too full and unmotivated afterwards to properly do all the dishes. Things like that. Consequently, our weeks would be littered with multiple twenty to thirty minute cleaning sessions as the mess got too much and we needed to restore peace and order for sanity's sake. So on this glorious Sunday three weeks ago, the house was sparkling like it had never sparkled before and we liked it so much that we decided to reform our messy ways. We challenged each other to see how long we could keep the house clean by putting everything away immediately after we used it, not leaving any dishes undone, just picking up as we went along instead of stopping our lives to clean and inevitably feeling like all we ever did was clean, clean, clean. Plus, we have discovered that I am much calmer when the house is clean and when Becky is calmer, life for everyone else is calmer. Trust me.

So I tell you all this just to report that our house has stayed clean for the past three weeks! I'm shocked, really I am. And my mother's probably just fallen off her chair in disbelief, but we've put our clothes away every time we've changed, done dishes even if it's just a cup or a fork, hung our coats up, put our shoes away as soon as we take them off...it's amazing! The things dear mother tried to teach me during all those years with her have finally rubbed off on me! Anyway, we're pretty happy campers about it all, as you can tell since I decided to dedicate two whole paragraphs to this success...

Halloween has come and gone once again, and I dare say we had quite the good time with Justin and Alex that night. Since they just bought a house and all, they decided it was only natural to stay home and greet the cute little trick-or-treaters from the neighborhood, so we joined them for the evening, ooohing and ahhhing at all the little butterflies and witches who stopped by. Two days previous we had carved these fantastic pumpkin faces to line their stairs with, but unfortunately we took the pictures with Lex's camera so I have nothing to show for it. They were great, though. After homemade potato chowder, pumpkin pie, and Carcassonne, we ended the night with a viewing of Little Miss Sunshine, then parted ways back to our humble abode. Happy Halloween to all.

And for the most exciting news of all...it is officially tights season! Yes, ladies and gentlemen, time for tights, skirts, and boots...my favorite time of year - fashionwise, anyway. I'm not one for the cold weather, but it does seriously help make up for the frigid temperatures that I get to wear tights anytime I want to.

Raaaawrr. Raaaaawwrrr. RAAAAWWWWRR. RRRAAAAAAAWWWWWWRRRRRRR!

LET THE WILD RUMPUS BEGIN!

Of waffles and other peaceful things...

It's Saturday morning, rainy and blustery. Perfect autumn weather, if you ask us. We just finished our weekend morning tradition of homemade waffles and now our bellies are full and we're ready for the day. Saturdays are my favorite. We can sleep as long as we want, which I'll admit isn't even that long in most people's books, but at least it's not 6am. When we do wake up, we can take as long as we want to stretch and relax and drowse, talking lazily with each other until the growl of our stomachs can no longer be ignored, at which point we get up and start breakfast together in the kitchen. It's the same routine every Saturday - two bowls, Isaac with his wheat flour, me with my assortment of teff, quinoa, and brown rice flours. I grind the flax seeds for both of us, Isaac melts our honey and butter together on the stove. I retrieve the baking powder, cinnamon, and salt from the cupboard while Isaac collects the wet ingredients from the fridge. We each take care of our respective bowls, but have done this every week for the past year that it's become so familiar, we could do it with our eyes closed and never miss a beat. I tell Isaac he can pour his waffle first, but he never does. Ever the gentleman. As my waffle cooks, I pick out the berries that sound the best so we can start their melting process. Once I'm happily preparing my perfectly toasted waffle, Isaac pours his and lets me start eating mine while it's still hot. It's the sign that the weekend has come, that today is going to be a good day, that the world is going to be alright.

I love Saturdays.

Soon...

I'll be back. Soon.

Don't worry.

Baby cakes...

Ummm, so I have to show you how the cake turned out last night. I should start with a little history first, though. I am a baker at heart. I love, love, love to bake. I love to bake like Isaac loves to cook, and that's saying something. I am also incredibly impulsive when it comes to life in general. I believe I've blogged about this before, but when I decide to cut or dye my hair, it has to be done that day if at all possible because I just can't wait another day for what I want. When I decided to pierce my nose, I made the appointment for right after work that day. So it should come as no surprise to you that when I get the urging to bake a cake, I've got to do it as soon as I get home from work. And this would be all fine and good if only Isaac was a cake-eater. Or, more specifically, a frosting eater, which he is most definitely not. So what happens is I bake this incredible cake, eat one piece, and then the rest gets wasted because Isaac doesn't want to eat the frosting I put on it (because, seriously, what's a cake without frosting?) and I don't want to eat any more sugar than the one piece I already had. So my dear husband made a little rule for my impulsive baking about a month ago limiting me to baking only tiny baby cakes if I'm going to make one. Then nothing gets wasted. We headed off to Goodwill and found the cutest little three inch springform cake pans and my baby cake baking days began.

Fastforward to last night's peanut butter chocolate cake that I was pining for. Here are the little guys right out of the oven, and then here's the final speciman. Pretty adorable, huh? The peanut butter chocolate ganache is a little thick, but it still tasted incredible. The funny thing is we brought the cake over to J and A's, all four of us (yes, even Isaac) had a piece, and there was still half the cake left. It was so rich, that's all we could handle in one setting. I can't imagine how much would have gone to waste if I had baked the entire recipe worth! Oh, and I made this perfect cake gluten free and no one would have even guessed.

So if you're looking for the perfect cake to bring to your next dinner party or birthday or something, this might just have been the best cake I've ever partaken in. Just saying...

And no, we're not pregnant...

So, life has been changing a little as of late. Okay, a lot. And no, we’re not pregnant, as that is the first question out of almost everyone’s mouths as soon as I start to say anything. Isaac and I have been doing a lot of talking and thinking and we decided a couple weeks ago that I would not be going back to school to pursue my Master’s anymore. There are a lot of factors involved in that decision with stress and quality of life for me being very near the top of the list, so the short of the story is after evaluating all the aspects involved with our life, it’s just better for us to follow our original dreams of saving, buying land in a couple years, building a house and eventually having some kiddos. Eventually. I think I was in shock for the first couple days after we made the final decision because I had set myself up to just be continually stressed out for the next four years and I didn’t know how to handle the freedom of coming home after work and getting to do whatever I wanted. But no need to worry as I quickly adjusted to the slower pace of life and have been thankful every day since that we have chosen this route. Now I can just sit and home and bake things to my heart’s content, like this chocolate peanut butter cake that’s on my hit list for this evening.

http://smittenkitchen.com/2008/08/chocolate-peanut-butter-cake/

Ah yes, the simple life is the definitely the life for me.

Because it's a competition...

Yes! We won, we won! Justin and Alex bought a new house and all, so Isaac and I helped them move into it last week and then spent all weekend covering ourselves in paint and getting permanent crooks in our backs purely to get the title of "better friends than the Lingblooms." And it worked! Eat your collective heart out, Tommy and Morgan. Hope gallavanting around Slovakia was worth it. And I hope I spelled Slovakia right.

After like a year of deliberating about potential colors, Lex finally decided on green, yellow, and blue. Green and yellow to pay homage to the great Ducks and blue just to add one more pretty color. It took everything we could do to hold Bob back from painting a huge 'O' over the front door. Isaac, Justin, and Mark got roof duties since they're the young men and all and I got to do the trim in honor of Morgan's absence. And much to my surprise, I discovered that I very much enjoy the challenge of trim work without any tape to make a straight edge. It really is one of the only positive things that has come from my slight perfectionist tendencies. And speaking of my perfectionist tendencies, please note that the light paint under the sill that I am working on is NOT yellow paint from my trim work. That was primer not yet covered up by the green, thank you very much. Jerry, Larissa, and Jackie were all there, too, so it made for a real party on Saturday...and Jerry didn't even fall off the ladder once!

Now it is Sunday evening, most of their house is painted (as much as we could get done in three days, anyway) Isaac's off to help at youth group and I am sitting here on the couch doing absolutely nothing, which feels incredible, by the way. And I don't even feel slightly guilty about it. I am a little sad that tomorrow is already Monday, but it keeps me in good spirits knowing that Justin and Alex now owe us something very cool in exchange for our graciously donated labor. I'll let you know when we're finally even, J and A, don't worry.

PS...Morgan, Bob tried to paint "Morgan's Door" onto one of the baby basement windows since you're so short and all, but I wouldn't let him. Rude, Bob. Rude.

PSS...I didn't put up a picture of the whole house yet because it's not quite done yet, but we'll put one up after all the trim gets done sometime in the next few weeks for those friends and family who know J and A and care about things like that.

A weekend with our friends...

We just got back from an awesome weekend at the beach with my best friend from forever ago, Hannah, and her husband Michael.

Things we learned this weekend:

1. When you cover wooden skimboards with old wetsuits, they work nearly as well as a $200 one from the store. I actually stayed up and was rather decent, for once, and both Hannah and Mike stayed up, too, even though it was their first day! Isaac and me, yes, we heart skimboarding.

2. Yurts are nice, even though it may not be classified as 'real' camping to some, because some nights it just pours and pours down rain and being in a tent in that kind of downpour could potentially make one slightly crabby.

3. Raccoons in campgrounds have absolutely no fear of mankind and will just stroll across your campsite towards your stash of food, or in Micheal's case, right into the open trunk of his car, in order to feed their hungry bellies. Could be due partially to the fact that certain unnamed campers threw the raccoons several fat marshmallows for their enjoyment, but no guarantees here. We may never know for sure.

4. They don't do small there, very well.

5. Oysterville is the cutest, quaintest, most picturesque little town ever.

6. Isaac and Michael are manly. Okay, I already knew that, but it was merely enforced when they insisted on making the fire with pure nature. And then they pulled out their plastic lighter from Target. Love it.

7. Old lighthouses are cool. So are the old men who stand in the top of them and barely even take breaths in their eagerness to spew as much knowledge about the lighthouses and anything remotely related to you as an onlooker. So are the old women who take the admission fees at the door who are positive I don't look a day over 17. As we left, she (no joke) shouted after me, "don't forget to grow up." Charming.

8. Hannah's obsessed with slugs. And snails. And large mushrooms with slugs and snails crawling on them. Apparently those things are a rarity back where she's from.

9. There is a horseshoe game manlier than the actual horseshoe game. It's called, "Throw the metal rod used for horseshoes in the air and see who can get theirs to land perfectly upright in the sand." Yes, ladies and gentlemen, it does appear that Michael is about to lacerate himself in the eyeball with his rod.

10. Waikiki is more fun than Long Beach.

11. Hannah made a great choice when she married Michael. He's a keeper, for sure.

12. Anything tastes better roasted over the open flame. Especially fire burritos. And marshmallows. And hot dogs. And chili. Although Mike's breakfast of champions on Sunday morning did give those dishes a little competition.

13. Apparently our anniversary is more important to other people than it is to Isaac and me as both of us completely forgot it was even our anniversary when we woke up Sunday morning, and Hannah was the one to remind us. But at least he did his hair for me. That was nice.

14. There are some friendships you make that come and go, and those bless your life for sure. But there are some friendships you make that will last until you're old and gray, sitting on the porch, rocking in your rocking chairs right next to each other, and that is the kind of friendship I have with Hannah. No matter the time that passes, the miles that are between us, the different lives we both lead, we will still call each other several times a day, know what the other is thinking before they even say it, and love each other 'till the day we die. Touching, I know.

Did I mention there were hills?

We're presently in the middle of taking our very first little family vacation, just me and the boy. It's partially to celebrate our upcoming first anniversary but also it's just a way to learn how we best vacation together for all the years to come when we will most surely be taking lots of family vacations together. We both worked Tuesday this week, then took the rest of the week off with plans of an overnight camping/biking trip to Lummi Island as our main adventure. We awoke to lots of rain on Wednesday, unfortunately, though, so Lummi was postponed as I was rather unexcited about traversing 20 miles through a dirge and then adventuring our way around an unknown island in search of a camping spot that would surely not protect us from said dirge. Thus, we moved Lummi to Thursday and headed out for a nice hike a few miles from the house. We have found through trial and error that we definitely enjoy our vacations more if we have adventures to go on where we can get out of the house and experience/accomplish things instead of just lying around watching the minutes pass by, so a hike sounded great. And while we weren't excited about a super long bike ride with gear in the rain, we're always down for a wet hike. Well, Isaac's always down for a wet hike, and I'm always down for one as long as it's relatively warm outside. Which it was. We chose a trail I'd never been on and set out the four and a half miles to the lakes it led to. It was beautiful, dark green everywhere, glistening water droplets on all the foliage, and at times, rain just pouring down onto us. We only passed two other hiking couples the whole trip, so we enjoyed the solitude and togetherness for adventure number one of our vacation. Here's me getting some bark out of my shoe proudly displaying the ever-so-fashionable drowned rat look. So attractive, I know. We got back around 7pm or so and I basically fell asleep for the night pretty soon thereafter, like the trooper I am. We awoke Thursday with plans to ride out to the island since it was forecast to be a perfect 70 degree next couple of days, but spent the morning first redoing our skimboards to add some cush rubber for better gripping. We went out again a few days ago and met a couple guys who skimboard all the time and, of course, have the way expensive boards and can do way cooler things than we can do on our little ones. So Isaac and his little inventor mind studied the material on their boards and concocted his own much less expensive version with some old wetsuits he procured. Pretty awesome. We'll try them out next weekend and let you know how it went.

Ah, we have finally arrived to the tale of the Lummi Island vacation extravaganza. Thursday early afternoon, we pack up our bikes with all the necessary camping gear, feeling quite outdoorsy and adventurous, and set off to catch the ferry to the island. I had no idea how long the bike ride would be, but I generally enjoy bike rides, so I wasn't too worried. Of course, Isaac is invincible and could probably ride to New York if need be without getting tired or giving up, so on trips like these, my stamina is the main concern. We were fine on this ride, though, pulling into the ferry dock in a little over an hour. Not bad for a twenty mile ride. Then comes the fun part. See, we have never been to this island before. Our dear friends, Jim and Peggy, used to live out there and were kind enough to give us some tips for our travels, but other than that, we were exploring a new place really having no idea what the island held for us. Our goal was to find a place to camp for the night, which we knew would prove rather difficult as most of the land is privately owned and there are no public campgrounds to be found. But there's lots of forest covering the small island, so really, we thought, how hard could it be?

We turned off the ferry dock and headed towards a bay at the end of the island that was our first potential camping ground. It was probably about 3pm or so at this point and yes, we had just ridden twenty miles with rather heavy packs on our bikes, but we were still energized and excited for our island exploration. So we rode, ooohing and ahhhing at the gorgeous countryside that we would be oh, so fortunate to ever get to possibly live on someday in the far future. And then we came to the hill. This same hill was later referred to us as that 'big a** hill that you feel like you're going to die riding up it as soon as it comes into your view' by a local who couldn't stop laughing in utter ridiculous awe that we had planned (and at that point accomplished) to bike around the island to this bay. I wish I had gotten a picture of it. I do hills fine on a bike, but I had already been biking for quite sometime and I most definitely do not do hills like this one. It was almost straight up, I swear. But with no option left to get to the bay another way, we pressed on and walked the bikes up once I could pedal no longer. Maybe that would be the only one, we thought. After all, it can't get worse than that, could it? Ha. The hills just kept coming, like we were headed up to Everest's summit or something. A local happened upon us walking our bikes up what turned out to be only about halfway up to the top of the hill and graciously offered to give us a ride to the top where we could from there continue onto the bay. Ahh, the bay, I thought, as he dropped us at the top of a logging road that would supposedly take us to our destination. Let me interject a quick thought here...the one that was constantly running through my exhausted body as we got further and further up this hill. We had planned to have dinner at the little cafe by the ferry dock - the only eatery on the island, mind you - which meant that once we got to our camping spot and set up our tent, we would have to turn around and ride back to the ferry for a much needed dinner, and then turn back around and make this unbelievable trek back to our campsite, without the help of the kind soul who gave us a lift. And in the dark, at that. It didn't even seem physically possible to me at that point. So we head down this logging road and discover that it indeed is going down, and down, and down until after a mile or so it clicked that in order to reach a bay, we would be traveling all the way down to sea level again. Yeah right. Not happening. Although it had mostly just happened, but we turned around right then and there to salvage any elevation we still had in order to make the trek back up to the main road we had been dropped on. So we pushed our bikes laden with camping gear up another hill way too steep for me to ride until I thought I was about to die. Highlight of the trip thus far - we got to ride down the monstrous bull of a hill on our way back toward the other side of the island in search of a more palatable camping spot. But that was about the only highlight my brain could register at that point because I was so tired. The short of the story is that we rode a few miles to the other side of the island which was thankfully not quite as hilly and found a field Jim had told us about...and after all that work, it really was a perfect field. We set up camp in a grove of deciduous trees that were felling their leaves around us in the most picturesque way and finally headed back toward the ferry for some well-earned dinner. And, thank the Lord, we found a shortcut -a nearly obscured back woods trail that got us back to the ferry dock in a third of the time the main road would have. Dinner eaten, we returned for our night in our pretty little tent in the middle of the woods on a beautiful island. Resting and contented, we went to sleep and awakened to this most beautiful view of the fog rolling in over the field looking oh, so perfect and welcoming us to another brilliant blue-sky, sunshiney, fall day. The ride to the ferry docks was rather easy this time, having had the last eight hours free from being atop a bicycle, so we made it in time to catch the 11 o'clock ferry back to the mainland and then proceeded to engage our muscles one last time for the twenty mile stretch home. It was invigorating! And tiring, of course, but once we were home, I definitely settled on invigorating as the best descriptor. A very adventurous camping experience, my love! Good choice, and happy (almost) first anniversary, Isaac.

Farewell by impalement...

Our house smells like fall! I've decided my very favorite thing about summer ending is that fall comes right after it. I'll always be a sun baby, but every year I feel like autumn becomes more and more enjoyable. In fact, I think I would even go so far this year as to say it's my favorite season. The adorable sweaters get to come out of the closet, cute jackets and tights, incredible orange and red leaves falling all around you, stews, and the fragrances of pumpkin spice, cloves, hot apples, and cinnamon. Nothing beats it. Being that it's September 1st and all, we had our first fall adventure this afternoon and it got me so in the mood. We got home, made some dinner, harvested another thousand cucumbers and cherry tomatoes from our garden, visited J and A, then headed out to a park on the edge of town boasting five or six apple trees free for the picking. We got out our bags, Isaac climbed the nearest tree, and off we went collecting our bounty. There were tons - golden delicious, red delicious, and whatever the kind is that's in the middle that are both reddish and greenish. We filled a paper bag to the brim with the first two trees and then ran around to each of the others marveling at their beauty. One bag was enough for our purposes, so we frolicked a little more and then headed home and made our first batch of ginger cinnamon applesauce! I've never made applesauce before and was amazed at how simple it is...and it makes it even better since our apples were all free. The house smelled incredible and the applesauce tasted perfect. Happy fall to us.

Oh, the other fall-tastic news is that Isaac's friend from work brought his food dryer to work today to let us borrow for a couple months so we can dry the heck out of as much fruit as we can get our hands on. Last weekend Isaac set his trusty hands to making us a homemade food dryer (did I tell you this already? I can't remember) out of cardboard and foil. And it worked great, except for the fact that it's a slight fire hazard being that it's made completely out of cardboard, so we could never have it on unless we were in the house. Not too much of a hardship, except that food takes like six hours to dry, so that left using up the six hours between work and bedtime to dry food without ever leaving the house. It just wasn't that ideal, but it was pretty fun that it worked. This one's way better though, because it lets us have it on all day and all night long. We'll be drying more apples than we care to count and we've got access to a pear tree and five plum trees, one of which is right outside our front door. We're like little squirrels storing up their food for the winter. It'll be great, though, because dried fruit is a perfect snack and this way, all this great fruit won't go to waste if it doesn't get eaten in the next couple weeks. Plus, the dryer adds to the fall aromas in our house, bringing lots of joy to my heart.

Speaking of joy to my heart, here's something that does not bring joy to my heart - Morgan and Tommy left for Europe this morning...for seven whole months. Fun for them, but their dear friends in America are going to miss them. Their send-off on Sunday consisted of a couple hours spent at a fantastic rope swing out on the lake. The boys had the time of their lives while the girls spent their time trying to ignore the fact that there were monstrous sticks all around the swinging path just waiting to impale one of their husbands. In one of the jumps I thought for sure Tommy was going to get stuck by one straight through the heart, but he dropped his feet into the water just in time to slow his swing enough to avoid it. I swear I didn't stop shaking for a full ten minutes. Sounds like the perfect way to send Morgs and Tommy off, huh? It really was, the boys had a blast. Here's Tommy right before we all said goodbye. See you in April, dear friends!

RYD...

Tomorrow is Reclamation of Youth Day. RYD. It's a local holiday up here where the men of the town (or at last all of our friends who are of the male persuasion anyway) kick adulthood in the face and spend the entire day reclaiming the splendor of their youth. Isaac will be there. And Justin. And Tommy. And Jared, Mark, Jacson, Caleb, Zach, Ty...but no girls. Because when you're pretending you're six again, everyone knows you're lying if you said you actually enjoyed the company of girls.

Here's a sneak peak from a couple years ago. Do enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EXK1W_yoi1A

*OFFICIAL RECLAMATION OF YOUTH DAY ITINERARY*

6:00am - Ride bikes from _______ (house TBD) up to Arboretum for Poetry, Monologue, Sunrise.
7:15am - Breakfast at Ranch Room. Flying 'V' w/ Roman Candles on Holly St.
9:00am - Ride to Westside Beaches for Tree Fort, Pipe Throw, Bomb Shelter Challenge, Dam Building.
10:45am - Arrive at Broadway Park for Wiffle Ball (8 teams of 4 - tournament) and Ultimate Frisbee.
12:45pm - Drop bikes off at _______ (house TBD) and get into cars.
1:00pm - Boulevard Park for Amazing Catches, Bike Jumps.
2:30pm - 7-11 for Slurpees, Snacks.
2:45pm - Whatcom Falls Park for all sorts of Buffoonery.
4:15pm - Tommy's House for Biggun, Kayak Stands, Flyer's Up.
6:00pm - All-Access BBQ. Kites, Calvin & Hobbes, Volleyball, Buck-Buck.
8:15pm - Dairy Queen for Dilly Bars
8:45pm - Dodgeball Tournament at Northwest Baptist Church
11:45pm - Charge Up Hill of Youthful Tranquility
12:00am - Plant Flag, Drink from Chalice, Declaration of Youth. Huzzahs all around!

I'll bet right about now you're wishing you were a boy (ahem...man) in the 'ham, aren't you?

It was only three poles...

I am FREE from the clutches of the deep, dark chemistry that has sucked away practically my entire existence these past four weeks! Ha! I actually thought it would never end, but Friday was my lucky day. 10am final...check. Work the rest of my day...check. Come home, pack my bags, drive off into the sunset with my love, Justin, and Alex...check. And no, my love is not Justin and Alex. There were four people in the car. Do the math. We rode off to a campground up by Baker and spent the weekend doing what Bellingham couples do - camping in the great out of doors. Isaac and I were rather excited because this weekend marked the debut of two recently purchased incredible items. First was our orange beauty of a tent that we purchased earlier this year. Jealous? We pulled into the campsite that Morgan and Tommy had so selflessly been holding for us all the livelong day since they don't have to work anymore and immediately the boys took off again to go russel us girlies up some firewood so we wouldn't freeze, so it was left to Alexandra and me to put up our new tent. Easy enough since it only has three poles and Isaac and I had put it up in our living room right away when we first bought it. However, despite all my incredible skills at life, I still managed to put it up wrong and my knight in shining armor had to redo it all in the dark once they got back with the firewood. It was fine, though, because that just means I need my man to help me survive in the big woods, right? A mere three hours later I was debuting the second (and arguably more incredible) item on our trip. My fleece insert for my sleeping bag. I have never ever been warm when we've camped outside and with the new fleecie, as I affectionately refer to it, I slept like a cat in the sun all night long. The peak of comfort. Isaac had gone out and bought it for me with my birthday money right before we left and, I'll tell you what, I couldn't have picked anything more amazing (thanks, mom and dad!). And don't even think I won't bring it inside once the weather starts turning and our house gets cold, because I will.

Morgs and Tommy are leaving in a week to travel Europe/Asia/Africa for the next nine months, so this trip was our last hurrah for our little group because we will miss them oh, so much. Aren't they cute? Also cute were the boys being manly and chopping up ridiculously huge pieces of tree. We were very impressed. Also cute was how the boys insisted on cooking their food on this sheet of steel that Justin had procured from his work and scoured 'clean.' They actually refused to eat Lex's bread unless they could cook it on the metal like true men. Also cute was the fire that Alex and I built by ourselves! Morgan's been building fires ever since she was a girlscout, but Lex and I haven't necessarily, so you can imagine our pride when we got it flaming on only the second try, just in time for the boys to return and be very impressed with us.

Speaking of impressed, can we please talk about how much we harvested from our garden yesterday? Yes, this was just from yesterday. One day! I mean, it's not like it's been this much fruit since day one, but the last few weeks have been bringing in the bounty. Our poor little cucumbers didn't take the first two times we planted them, so the third time, Isaac laid a ton of them down just to make sure at least a few would come up and, of course, every single last one of them decided to come up. We have cucumbers coming out of our ears, as you can see. Not to mention we'd just given away a dozen cucumbers earlier that day. But we're not complaining, don't worry. We just happen to have a ton of cucumbers growing fatter every day.

Umm, did you notice that our blog looks a little different? Yeah, I was tiring of the same old blog background, so I spent hours searching for a new one that was the perfect blend of artsy without being too girly, but had no luck. Then my artsy husband reminded me that he could easily just make us a background (it's amazing how quickly I forget these types of things), so I contracted his skills and he designed and drew this one up (by hand!) last week. I LOVE it! Simple, but very Isaac and Becky. Thanks, love!