Happy 4th of July

After the mission trip, we had a very chill 4th of July.  I am so thankful for great friends in my life!  Zack, Hollie, and Gage came over for pizza and we just hung out.

PowerPlant Mission Phoenix

June 26-July 2

We worked with PowerPlant this year and it was a great experience.  Last year we introduced the working mission trip to our students where we literally put a roof on a house and built wheelchair ramps.  This year we worked with a church planter in Phoenix, AZ and got to build some relationships, put on a vacation Bible school, and see two little girls accept Christ as their personal Lord and Savior.  It was great!

My sweet husband has a way with kids :)

This is my pal Christian.  He was too cute.

Our group eating some good pizza.

I love these girls so much.

My fingers were bleeding after making so many balloon animals.  That is a butterfly and a dog if you can’t tell.

Another “matching shirt” picture.  We have been on too many trips to count…. but I wouldn’t trade any of it.

Ain’t that a Grand Canyon

The next trip of the summer came just seven days after we got back from San Francisco.  And in that seven days we did two weeks worth of work, had a women’s ministry meeting, a parent meeting, and an outing to white water.

We loaded up on Sunday after church and headed to the dry heat in Phoenix, AZ.  On the way we took a little detour to see the Grand Canyon.  It was a sight to see and we were all really glad to be able to see it!

It was so beautiful that it looked fake.  It looked just like every picture we had ever seen.   

If You’re Going to San Francisco…

Hello Blogging world.  I am happy to be back home after all our summer adventures.  It has been the craziest schedule to date, but everything was wonderful.  It was somewhat hard for this homebody to keep going week after week, but it was all worth it. 

First things first.  From June 9-17 we went on vacation with Mom and Dad to San Francisco!  It was stinking awesome.  I’ll let the pictures tell the story…

.

We drove to Dallas and flew non stop to San Francisco, California!  We stayed in hotel #1 and then got up, rented a car…. and stayed in it for the next 2 days. Ha.

We got to see a lot of San Francisco and the central west part of California.  I was surprised at how industrial everything looked… It wasn’t really the sunny CA I was expecting.  We drove along the coast for… well ever… It was beautiful, but after a few hours going 30 mph around curve after curve in the middle of a mountain, we were happy to find a bigger road.

We made our way through miles of farmland and gorgeous vineyards to see some magnificent redwoods.  It was something everyone should see before they die.  Add the California Redwoods to your bucket list!  It was truly awe-inspiring.  Nate says it was the quietest place he has ever been with trees as high as you can see.

My Dad had always wanted to see a Redwood forest, and it was great to get to be there with him. 

Next, we stayed at hotel #2 and then made our way through more mountains to good ‘ol Yosemite National Park.

We went to the Hetch Hetchy Dam first, and it was a sight to see.  We stayed there for a while just looking at all the waterfalls and the beautiful scenery.  You can hike to all the waterfalls, but we only had a limited amount of time before the sun went down, and the park is huge…. like you could drive for hours and hours all over the place to see tons of different things.

I climbed a rock to get a good picture with my Nate.  Behind us you can see the famous half dome.

This is a great picture of Mom and Dad at the Mirror Lake.

Everything was so beautiful at Yosemite.  I loved all the huge waterfalls and being there with my family.  Someone could literally spend a whole week there looking at what we saw in a just a few hours.  I will never forget it.

Next, we stayed at hotel #3 and then journeyed back to San Fran by driving the south part of Hwy 1.  It was much better than the north part…. Nobody got car sick.  We got to see more farmland and more coast.  The ocean was freezing.

Nate and Mom were excited to get some fresh strawberries from a stand on the side of the road.  It was neat.

We got back to the city and looked around a bit before checking into hotel #4.  That night we got to go to AT&T Park for a Giants game.  Nate has joked about wanted to see every baseball park in the US, so I guess this is one more we can check off the list.

It was pretty great….  We were freezing, but loved every minute.

The next day, we took a double decked bus tour of the city.  We got to see almost everything in the two days we spent listening to tour guides and hoping on and off.  By the end of the second day our favorite guide, Ed, knew us by name.  (He had been to OKC earlier in the year and thought Braum’s was the greatest restaurant he had ever been to. Ha)

This is one of my favorite pictures from the trip.  This is the famous “Painted Ladies” on “Postcard Row” in Alamo Square.  They call the yellow one the Full House house and the Victorian on the end just sold for $2 million.

Me at Pier 39 in the Wharf looking at all the Sea Lions.  I could have watched them all day.

Nate’s first time on a submarine.  We took a tour of the USS Pampanito.

Nate is trying to show how big the cables are on the Golden Gate bridge.  What you can’t see in the picture are all the tiny little cables in the middle…. I forget how many Ed said were in there, but if you took the bridge apart the cables would wrap around the earth three times or something.

        

Best spaghetti I have ever eaten award goes to: The Original Restaurant in Little Italy.  Mmmmm.

We went a ton more places, but there is only so many pictures that should be allowed in one blog post… I think this is my max.

On our last couple days in San Fran we moved to hotel #5 at the wharf.  Nate ate lots of clam chowder and I ate lots of Boudin bread.  On our last day there, we went to Alcatraz.

Nate taking the tour.

Great view from Alcatraz…. They said that is one thing that made this prison so tough… The prisoners would be able to hear people laughing and living their life just a swim away, but they couldn’t get there.

First In-N-Out burger.  It was pretty good.

Riding the famous cable car.

And, one more baseball game.  We took the subway over to Oakland and watched the A’s.

This is us on our last day at the wharf.  I love this picture because you can see the city behind us.

           

Ah, Vacation… You’re a Breath of Fresh Air!

See ya in 1.5 weeks!

Nate and I are beyond excited to get away for a while.  We are also so thankful for my parents always inviting us to tag along when my dad is sent somewhere with REC.  We are constantly thinking about things at church (it’s exhausting), so we are really glad to just get away and do one of our favorite things…. travel!

San Francisco here we come! 

On the list of things to do:

• See the Golden Gate Bridge (and go to the Park)
• See the “painted ladies” on “postcard row”
• See the Full House house
• See the giant Redwood trees (like drive through one)
• Go to Yosemite and see some of the tallest waterfalls in the world
• Go to Alcatraz
• Eat clam chowder at Fisherman’s Warf
• Take a picture of a seal
• Ride the cable cars
• Take a tour on a double-decker bus (I love those things)
• Go to Pier 39 open air market
• Spend some good quality time with Nate, Mom, and Dad

Can’t wait!

Big 12 Baseball

It has been a once-a-year thing in my life for like…. 15 years now.  Phillip’s 66 is one of the Big 12 Baseball sponsors, and my parents happen to own one, so we get tickets to go watch hours of baseball.  And I married a man that lives and breaths baseball so it is exciting to watch him enjoy it.

When we lived in Arkansas, we would take our vacation time around Christmas and around the Big 12 Baseball tournament. Ha.  We look forward to it every year.  I enjoy getting to see my parents for a while and Nate enjoys watching every pitch.

View Full Album

This year we watched about 24 hours of baseball in three days.  Usually I get a little bored, but this year it was great to just sit and relax with Nate.  We needed to give our minds a rest.

Last year, we went to a couple games with my good friends Cassie and Kaylie.  This year we went to a few games with Mom and Dad and one with Zack, Hollie, and Gage.

Here’s to baseball and many more years of going to the Big 12 Tournie.

A Little Color…

We all need a little color in our lives.  This Memorial Day Nate and I set out to add some life to our front porch.  We were excited to see if anything new popped up in our flower bed, but nope… nothing.  It looks very nice, but it is all green.  If we had money to spare we would put in a whole new flowerbed on the other side, but for now we just filled the pots we already had… and I think it did wonders for the front of our house.

Enjoy the colors of summer!