A Spoonful of Cinnamon

Have you ever tried a food challenge before? Drinking a whole gallon of milk in one sitting, eating a whole watermelon, eating a whole box of saltine crackers...or maybe eating a spoonful of cinnamon? Well, here is what happens when you try the cinnamon challenge. Watch the video below to see how Brian did. 

Brian and I were in Juneau for this particular challenge. We had a great vacation over New Year's and got to be there a little over a week. We had a ton of fun. We attending a wedding, a NYE party, hung out with tons of friends and had some good times with Brian's family. 

I didn't take a ton of pictures, because I really have many pictures of Juneau already, but here is a few of the beautiful snow and a snowshoeing walk we went on. 

DOWNTOWN JUNEAU IN THE SNOW

ONE OF OUR FAITHFUL HIKING COMPANION, MO

HERE IS GINGER, THE OTHER DOG THAT CAME ALONG AND ARAN, BRIAN'S STEPMOM. SNOW CAUGHT ON BOTH THE DOGS FUR AND REALLY BALLED UP AS YOU CAN SEE. THEY MUST HAVE BEEN CARRYING A TON MORE WEIGHT!

ME IN THE LAND OF SNOW. LOVELY!

Finishing Fall and Beginning Winter

We decided to do a quick update. It has been over a month since we last posted. Whoops!!  Anyway, fall is an awesome time of year. I love the fall colors and have tried hard not to put too many pictures up of the colors. 

Found this tree leaf, was amazed by the size. 

Here is the traditional Halloween picture. A great tradition.

This was a great birthday party for our friend, Troy. Mini golf under black lights!!

Sarah and Darla and I, once again, decided to frost way too many cookies and make some fudge for our holiday season. Those two are excellent cookie decorators!

More pictures coming later!

Wendy's B-Day Party

Back in early November, Wendy turned the big 30. I know it is hard to believe, we all remember when she was just a little girl running around in diapers. Now she is all grown up, and we are all so proud of the woman she has become at age 30. Did I mention... Oh hold on....

I just had to take a break from writing because Wendy tried to cut her finger off with a kitchen knife (it wasn't a horrible cut, but a bad one) and I had to use my Nursing Assistant skills. I assessed the situation, made sure the scene was safe, identified the victim, and treated the wound to the best of my abilities. Fortunately, Wendy did not need further medical help. 

So anyway as I was saying... Wendy's 30th birthday celebration. I tried to throw a surprise party for her, however details aren't my strong suit (getting 15 people to come to the same place at the same time is harder than it sounds) so I had to pull of a different type of surprise. 

 SOME OF THE GANG GETTING READY FOR TACOS AND BURRITOS AT OUR PLACE.

 So the plan B I had to avert to was telling Wendy " Well I wanted to throw a surprise party for you but you would have found out anyway, so I hope you have a good time anyway." But what I didn't tell her was that eating at our house was only Part 1 of the nightly festivities. She had no idea what was in store for our night. She was expecting a nice relaxing night of hanging out at our house playing a game or two and talking with friends. She did not know it, but she was in for quite a different night...

 JUST WANT TO POINT OUT THAT THERE ARE REALLY COOL PEOPLE IN OUR LIVING ROOM TOO. KEVIN, JASON,TRISHA,STEPHANIE,TROY, AND MYSELF.

The pictures below are of Sky High Trampoline World in Tigard, Oregon. Wendy and I had been wanting to go there for some time. It is basically a warehouse full of trampolines!!! How can you beat this? About a football field sized area completely filled with trampolines, and really bouncy ones too!!! By 15 minutes into our hour of jumping most of our group was already tired. You can't go out too fast and bounce like a maniac for a whole hour, it's just not humanly possible. 

 OUR FACELESS FRIENDS... TROY AND TRISHA WELSTAD

If you want to go there you can find their website online, and I believe other places like it exist around America. It was most definitely a birthday party for the ages. We all left tired, we all left sweaty, but most importantly we all left with smiles on our faces.  

   

Turkey Time!

Just in time for Thanksgiving!! Brian and I wanted to post these pictures before the turkey day since we'll be consuming one of these lovely birds for our dinner. Thanks to Brian and Nathaniel Ewing my mom's two turkeys were butchered and placed in the freezer. 

First up: Brian's killing. 

This is one of the best post-butcher pictures ever!!

Next, Nathaniel gets his turn at a bird! He did a great job, I was glad I didn't have to do any of the killing. 

Anyway, all in fun. Most of us will be eating turkey's on Thanksgiving; lets not forget to be thankful for these wonderful (slightly dumb) animals that God has created.  Have a great Thanksgiving everyone! I am truly thankful for the life God has given me, family, friends, health, job, home... and I am thankful for the challenges and bumps along that way, because they challenge me to love Him more and to live a life more focused on the Lord. 

Ephesians 6:10 "Finally be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms."

Trip to the State Fair

This is a little out of date, however it will still be a good newsworthy post anyway. Last month Wendy, her mother and I all went to the Oregon State Fair. I absolutely love fairs because of all the fun things to do. Having not really grown up with them in Alaska, I find myself getting super excited for the great Oregon State Fair. 

 WE CAME UPON A POLICE DOG DEMONSTRATION. THE MAN IN THE MIDDLE IS WEARING A PADDED SUIT AND ABOUT READY TO TAKE OFF RUNNING FOR THE TRUCK.

GUESS HOW MANY STEPS HE WILL GET BEFORE THE DOG GETS HIM... P.S. NOTE THE TRUCK IN THE BACKGROUND.

 YEAH ABOUT 4 STEPS.

I don't have a picture but Wendy won us some tickets to a Kaizer Volcanoes baseball game by being the fastest throwing girl. She threw into a pitching radar: 64 mph. Oh yeah my wife can throw!!!!

 THIS WAS POSSIBLY THE COOLEST THING WE SAW... HORSES PLAYING A GAME OF SOCCER. I KNOW IT SOUNDS CRAZY BUT IT WAS REALLY HAPPENING.

 THEY GOT MOVING REALLY FAST.

 ALSO A CIVIL WAR RE-ENACTMENT. THEY WERE FIRING  THEIR RATHER LOUD MUSKETS.

THIS WAS IN THE ARTS AND CRAFTS ROOM. YOU MIGHT HAVE A HARD TIME GUESSING WHAT THIS IS... WELL I WILL JUST TELL YOU. IT IS A CAKE.

Fall Fun

Fall time is a fun season. I (Wendy) have had the tradition of carving pumpkins with my family for as long as I can remember. Last Friday, we all got together, and carved all the pumpkins my mom and my nephew had grown in the garden. Sadly there were no Atlantic Giants this year, so the pumpkins were all moderate to small size. But it was a lot of fun!  

JEREMIAH AND KEIRA

THE NIGHT PICTURE OF OUR PUMPKINS ALL FIRED UP!

DAY TIME PICTURE!

And last but not least: Trisha Welstad and I decided to cook a pumpkin. And with that pumpkin puree make all sorts of foods! We made some delicious Pumpkin Curry Soup, Pumpkin Cookies and Pumpkin Pie. We also had a ton of pumpkin puree left over to freeze for our next crazy pumpkin day! A fun day cooking!! I need to get out and take some nice fall colors pictures! I love the color of the trees right now. I feel for my huby who is color blind...what must he see?? Can anyone really explain what the eyes of a color-blind person can actually see?? 

Well folks, I know we aren't winning any awards for most up to date bloggers as of late. I gotta tell you guys it was much easier to blog out in Russia than back here in America. Today's post is about our other camping trip with our nephews up to a lake. We had a ton of fun. Of course they tried to kill fish (without succeeding) and we hiked around our campsite for a little while. 

 OUR BUDDY NOAH SHOWING US HOW TOUGH HE WAS TO JUMP INTO THE FREEZING COLD WATER.

 THE MEN OF THE TRIP WITH ALL OF OUR MANLY GEAR HIKING UP A MANLY TRAIL

 WE HAD SO MUCH FUN WATCHING THIS FROG SWIM. THEY MOVE THEIR LEGS SO GRACEFULLY YET SO FUNNY ALSO.

OKAY... I KNOW WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE AND WELL... OKAY WE WERE MAKING THE LAKE A LITTLE WARMER. IF YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN. IT WAS A DESPERATE ATTEMPT TO ATTRACT FISH.

Unfourtunatey we had to bail early because the wild fires were totally out of control. The air was really smokey and you couldn't see the sky really well. We climbed up on the top of one hill to look, and it seemed as though the fire was coming our way. So we did the wise thing and took off and found a local camp site to stay in the next night and cooked mac and cheese. Monty (golden retreiver) stole the hot dogs right off my stick. I just turned around and they were gone. We had a great time with the boys.