What a glorious day...

Weather-wise, that is. And I would, of course, not be talking about today as it is rather dull and gloomy in the out of doors this afternoon. But a couple days ago it was glorious indeed! Glorious enough to hit up our summer stomping grounds with Mo, Tommy, and Cody. We still had to bundle up but the sky was perfectly blue and the sun was beaming down on us the whole time! It's technically a beach, I suppose, but it's more like a long stretch of rocks to climb and trees to explore around, all with the most incredible view of the sound you've ever seen. The boys started bouldering immediately while Mo and I just sat and soaked up the sunshine...until our legs about froze off and we headed back to our warm houses because, after all, it is still winter up here. Speaking of winter, we had this schizophrenic snowstorm day before yesterday completely out of the blue, dumping several inches on us and then melting all away the next day. I am officially done with snow and ready for summer. No more scarves, hats, and jackets in order to go outside and enjoy the earth.
I made something cool today...granola! Isaac and I both love granola, and we had tried to make some a couple months ago, but the batch didn't end out that well and we haven't gotten around to trying again. But I acquired that secret stash of gluten-free oats a few weeks ago and have been craving a good granola like crazy, so I searched and searched through recipes, found one that looked fairly decent, and succeeded in making the best tasting granola I've ever eaten! I suppose that could partially be affected by my monstrous granola cravings since I've been deprived of it for nearly a year, but Isaac attested to its goodness. I think the key was using a little bit of several different natural sweeteners...honey, maple syrup, molasses, and cane sugar, which gave it a full-bodied flavor instead of being overpowered by one alone.

We're off to Saturday soccer, another little reminder that spring is right around the corner!

Up, and up, and up, and up....

I married a very athletic, outdoorsy man. I also love the outdoors, and enjoy being active, but my level of athleticism doesn't even hold a candle to Isaac's. I'm fairly positive he could just pick up and run five miles easily, even though he's not a runner. I, on the other hand, take a while to work up to being in shape. It's just not fair that guys (from my observance) can take a week or two break from working out and then pick up where they left off no problem when girls (me, in particular) stop working out for three days and seem to be right back at square one. Not fair. Anyway, my point is that these days I don't get that much exercise due to the long hours of class and studying in the evening, so I'm not in the best shape I've ever been in. But we wanted to go snowshoeing on Saturday, and I figured I could man up and keep up with the boys. It was Isaac and me and our friends, Brian and Robby, and God gave us a gloriously blue-sky, sunshiney day for our adventure. Brian and I were the rookies at snowshoeing, but it's not hard to catch on to...really, it's just like hiking but with big pieces of plastic on your feet. It's actually really fun, and I came prepared to fully enjoy the day despite 20 degree weather and freezing cold snow. If you recall, I don't do well in the cold, so I had thick wool socks, spandex, snow pants, and three more layers under my coat. About 20 minutes into the hike, I realized that was about three more layers than I was going to need. I had no idea the day would ever come when I would be at the top of a mountain, covered in snow, with super low temperatures surrounding me, and I would be too hot. Never in a million years. But let me tell you, we were shredding layers quickly as the incline got steeper and steeper.

So, I thought we were going to this well-known hiking spot that seriously everyone you talk to has been hiking at, so I wasn't thinking it was going to be that difficult at all. I mean, if all these other people do it all the time, I could do it no problem. It's something I definitely have to keep in mind because I knew these guys were all three in really good shape. I thought I had my bases covered, but the trail just kept getting steeper and steeper and I began to wonder how out of shape I must really be if I am getting out of breath on a trail that everyone hikes. Little did I know...It wasn't until we reached to tippy-top of the pass that Isaac casually informed me that, no, this actually wasn't the hike I had been thinking of. It was all in the same area, but he had decided to hike this specific mountain instead. Funny man. I don't even think this hike made him that out of breath.

The end of the story is that is I didn't die, although I may or may not have felt like I was going to pass out a couple of times because my heart was beating so hard. And with any hike, once you get to the top, it's an easy trip home! And it strangely feels like it was totally worth it once you heart has a chance to regulate again. This is us at the top, although I am aware that it doesn't look very high at all from this picture. Yes, looks can be deceiving. It really was fun and we had a great time together. Happy Valentine's Day to us!

My glutenous desires...

I'm baking bread again, and it smells amazing. It's been so long, too long, since I've made a loaf and I've been in withdrawls. I'm actually making two kinds today. We got a sourdough starter from Alex who got it from an island local nearby, and it's amazing! Lex has been trying for quite some time to create a sourdough starter that produced the perfect sourness, but this is the first one that's seemed truly authentic. She was nice enough to pass it along to us, so Isaac's been 'feeding' it every day and our first loaf is rising as we speak. I can't eat it, of course, but I did sneak the tiniest bite of Lex's loaf that she made because it smelled too good to resist. There's a loaf for me presently baking in the oven, a rustic seed bread, 100% gluten free and made 100% from scratch. My mouth is watering just thinking of it. Some people say their desire for bread just diminishes after a few months of no gluten, but it couldn't be more opposite for me. I keep waiting for that day, but it's been nearly a year and I still crave almost daily a thick slice of fresh, warm, homemade bread.

Speaking of homemade, or at least homegrown, our bucket garden is flourishing! Way to go, baby! The right is lettuce, the middle are radishes, and the left are carrots, growing taller and stronger every day. We tasted a little bit of the lettuce this morning and it was so good, delicate, fresh, just like a young lettuce leaf should taste. We fear a little bit for our carrots and radishes, as they started out with not enough light, which made them grow tall and skinny really quickly, so they might end up pretty long and narrow instead of short and fat. But if that's the case, we'll just try again. You can even see one of our radishes! It's fun to see it grow more every day. And it still amazes me that our food all grows from the tiniest little seed.

Our little jungle is flourishing as well. We only have one good sun-window in our house (in the kitchen), so our plants tend to end up clustered around it so they can get their vitamin D, too. We affectionally call that spot our jungle. The newest addition is a pink rose bush from my dad for Valentine's day...thanks, Dad! It adds a good brightness among all the green. This afternoon the sun was streaming in through the jungle, lighting all the plants up, looking so beautiful, and making us excited for the day when we get to build our own house with as many south-facing windows as we can stuff in there. Yes! Yes!

Mmmmm, can you smell the bread yet?

So, remember all the birthdays? Yeah, I forgot one. Chris turned 18 yesterday! He's a real person, finally. We went over to Chris' to celebrate with him and partake in a Deborah-feast, which you don't ever want to miss if you get the chance. His mom is a fantastic cook and his birthday meal was a spread of different Ethiopian foods...so good! African peanut stew, rice, lentils, chicken, so many dishes. Here's Chris, by the way, with his beautiful girlfriend. We ended up playing the same game we played when my old small group was over, and it was hilarious yet again.

I'll tell you what, it's really nice to be able to find a way to balance studying time and fun with friends time. The nights out are especially nice so I don't end up spending my entire life with my nose in the books.

Ahhh, yes, the bread has come out of the oven. It is presently steaming and soaking in some butter. I am complete once again.

Our friend Brian had a birthday last week! And we had a party. Birthdays have been happening like crazy over the past month, by the way. Both Isaac's dad and my dad, Molly, Alexandra, Morgs, Tommy, Kristina (whom I never called to wish happy birthday, by the way...sorry, friend), and now Brian. Isaac made a feast of Pad Thai and the friends rolled in. Brian's the one on the left, by the way, in the picture with Isaac. This was the first time we've had that large of a crowd over to our little apartment, but it turned out to be the perfect blend of size and coziness. The first couple of hours were filled with our friends from college, old roommates, fellow youth workers, and just about the time that group was heading out, our old small group kiddos (who aren't kiddos anymore) were heading in. For those of you who don't know, I used to lead a small group with Brian and his older brother Stephen a couple years ago through our church. We took over the group when the students were sophomores and juniors and saw them through graduation, so as you can imagine, we're pretty fond of them. We lived a lot of life together and were a pretty tight knit group. Now they're almost sophomores and juniors in college, and a lot of them stayed around here to go to school so we still get to see them around. As the sappy girl leader, I can say that I'll love those kids forever, even if they have grown up to become adults now. Anyway, about 8:30 or so our old small group rolled in and we had ourselves a hilarious evening of craziness and laughter. We played this game that's a mix of Taboo and Guestures, and oh did it bring me back to Monday nights at the Conovers. Here's a little slice of our life...





Jake Carlson, ladies and gentlemen...








This is Becky, the other Becky, whom I love...








And Katy, spelled with a 'y,' whom I also love. Little known fact: Katy knows every Starbucks barista in our town. Every single one.







Dustin exists to prove that white men can dance....








Remember that one time you guys put the sardine's in Becky's car??




The photoshoot ended after this one because Jake split Dustin's lip open with this move. And Nat's the guy in between Jake and Brian, in case you were wondering.


Happy Birthday, dear Brian!

My dilemma...

I woke up today to a really cold house. This might be no big deal for some of you, but being cold is really hard for me...as in, it makes me crabby, irritable, and uncomfortable. You might even say it's physically painful for me to be cold. During our dating, Isaac quickly adopted Justin's long-time manta of, "Warm wife, happy life," and it has followed us into marriage, equaling to a house that Isaac lets me keep at 70 degrees (which, believe it or not, still feels cold to me at times). So you can see what a bit of a shock it is to my mood when I awake to a furnace that has apparently stopped working again...yes, again. This is the third time it has broken in the past month and a half. The first time was in December when we finally discovered it was leaking ridiculously high amounts of carbon monoxide into our house, so it got shut off for two weeks while they replaced it with a new one. They brought in space heaters, but let's just say space heaters are slightly more expensive than our old furnace was. As in gouge my eye out more expensive. Then a few weeks later, the new heater stopped working as well and we were without heat for a couple days while our landlords fixed it. That was a mere two weeks ago.

Fastforward to this morning. Isaac had gotten up and left early to go snowboarding, so it was just me when I woke up in the iceberg. I mentioned I hate being cold, but I really hate waking up and being freezing cold with no way to get warm. I fiddled with the heater again, but to no avail. I actually almost started crying, I was so frustrated that this was happening again to us. Or to me, more specifically, since Isaac doesn't mind the cold nearly as much.

So here I am, sitting on our bedroom floor next to the only wall heater we have, waiting for our landlord to bring us more space heaters once again, and I have a dilemma. My first inclination is to be annoyed at our landlords for not fixing the heater well enough last time and even more annoyed because it's really their heater that keeps breaking down, and we are the ones who have to pay the extra heating costs. But I also hear this small voice inside me whispering that having heat is a blessing, and the words spoiled American keep coming to my mind. What about the millions of people, both in America and around the world, who are cold constantly in the winter months because they can't afford a constant heating system like we have? Or maybe they don't even have a roof over their heads to give them shelter from the freezing temperatures. There are so many who go without basic needs, and here I am with all of my needs met and most of my wants met as well, complaining because my heater went out and I have to be colder for a few hours. Sure, we pay a little extra this month for heat, but at least we have heat, and we have landlords who immediately bring over space heaters, even if it's Sunday morning and they're not working.

I suppose the dilemma is a simple one - be thankful for what I have and how I've been blessed, or be angry because I'm spoiled, slightly inconvenienced and think I deserve better.

It's tough trying to live unselfishly and joyfully sometimes. Ooope, there's the doorbell...