New Heights Summer Festival

With New Heights' Summer Festival going on, Jared has been home for the past two weeks. It is so nice to have my husband actually living in the same house! We have hosted little gatherings with old and new friends most evenings, or gone out to Summer Festival events. We have played Settlers more times than I can count, introducing quite a few people to the game. Jared has played it about 95% of the nights that I am at work. It is amazing that he isn't sick of it yet.

Summer Festival is one of the most intense conglomerations of church events I have ever seen. The highlight so far was the dodgeball tournament. There were some teams that dressed to impress on that occasion! My team made it to the semifinals, where having a husband for a referee did not advance us on any further. =)

For the indoor soccer tournament, we were going to be on a killer team with quite a few other MK's from Indo and beyond. Unfortunately we looked a little too intimidating so the teams were set up at random. Somehow Jonathan, Anthony, Kevin Pust, and Alex Lee all ended up on one team. I don't remember the final scores, but they were definitely one of the top teams. After playing the last game with his own team (which dominated), Jared stepped onto my team and played goalie. He was a drastic improvement to any of us that had played goalie prior, yet he let one goal in, thus we lost without scoring a point all tournament! Sad day. After the tournament ended all the MK's and a few other avid soccer players stuck around and we played a "real" game of indoor.

As a break between the nights of the tournaments, we decided to take it easy by going rock climbing. Wow, that is a work out. Jared made it up the two hardest climbs that were set up. I only tried the second to hardest one, but probably an hour after starting, I did eventually conquer the rock. What an amazing sport. Going down stairs was a little tricky and I could barely grip anything at work for the next three days.

Last night Jared was part of the evening show for Summer Festival. Rather than bobbing for apples, he and a few other brave souls bobbed for hot dogs in a trough of watered down baked beans and who knows what else. On of the guys dislike baked beans so much that he didn't actually open his mouth when he bobbed, but instead just plunged his head into the sludge as show of being a very good sport.

Summer Festival is drawing to a close, which means Jared is off on one last trip of the summer. When he comes back he will jump right into the schoolyear with a likely coaching position for Middle School volleyball starting the 23rd and his first orientation day for teaching the 27th. He is super excited, but a little nervous too. There are still a lot of things to figure out before the kids arrive. At this point he doesn't even know all the equipment that will be available. Thankfully Jared is resourceful enough to make due with however much or little equipment there is.

We will keep you posted on Jared's job and coaching news as we find out more.

More Than Just Dirt

There is finally more green than brown in our yard! The grass seed has started to pop up and the trees have been planted. Jared was home for a few days this weekend, so we took some time to rearrange the landscaped plants to make them feel like ours. I've also had the last two days off and have made some major progress on the backyard. I am wanting a lush flowerful garden, but have come to realize that to make a bare yard into one overnight would cost a fortune. In an attempt to save some money for house payments =), I have been bargain hunting for plants. It's not such an easy thing to do. Lowe's sells some plants for $1-2 when they look like they are on their last leg and I found some very health plants there, the only problem with them was that all the flowers were old... I cut them off and the plants look great! I have also been able to find quite a few plants that will attract butterflies and hummingbirds. Here are some photos of a couple plants:

One of the neighbors trees hangs over the fence into our yard and is conveniently perfect for the birdfeeder. I am yet to see any birds use it (but I did only put it up today).

Signing

Jared came home early from the High School trip to Idaho so that we could SIGN ON THE HOUSE!!! It has definitely been a long time coming with quite a few bumps along the way. In just the first month, we have managed to warrent the gas getting shut off for four days, had the "appliance hospital" come by three times (and will come once more on Thursday, after which we sincerely hope that this time our dryer will finally work!), and ordered not one, but two appraisals on the house. Thankfully, God has been faithful through it all... we are alive and well, and come Wednesday the house should be ours! Amazingly enough we are both thrilled that we are about to be several hundred thousand dollars in debt... yikes!

At work I am apparently going to move into the more acute area this week. I am a little nervous as I wasn't expecting to move till next week at the earliest, but I am feeling very comfortable with the area I am in, soI guess that means it is time to move!

Jared is off on another week of fun, this time with the Middle School group on the Oregon Coast. He gets back on Firday and then should stay back for at least a couple weeks!

Hope everyone is doing well. We miss you all! You can be praying for the closing on Wednesday and for my work with the more critically ill patients. Thanks!

Our First House Guest!

Jonathan Dukes moved down from Seattle a few weeks after we did. He will be living with us for his first couple of months here in Vancouver. We are super excited to have him in town and even more thrilled that he is in our house!

The First Few Weeks

Well, we have made the move to Vancouver! We are mostly settled into our new home, which is amazing. It is such a blessing to be living in this beautiful house. Hopefully we will be hosting some missionaries and other people needing short term lodging very soon.

The House... yard coming any day now.

Jared has been busy participating in summer events at New Heights Church since day one. White water rafting, camping, rock climbing... he has quite a nice tan going. This week and next he is working with Middle school kids at a day camp, then it is off to Idaho for a week long camp for high schoolers.

While Jared is off on all these adventures I needed some company, so before he left we payed a visit to the local Humane Society. Planning on only bringing home one kitten, we stuck to that... only one kitten... but we did bring home an adult cat as well. Ooops! Actually it has been great. Samba (the one year old) has been able to show Awas (the kitten) a thing or two. It is fun to watch them play and keep each other company when we don't have time to show them as much attention as we would like.

I started work almost two weeks ago at Southwest Washington Medical Center. Just this last week I finally had my first day on the unit where I will be working, the Emergency Department! I am starting out in the lower acuity area, so I have seen a lot of people with migraines and abdominal pain, but nothing too gory. My hours are all over the place right now as I fit my schedule to a couple of different preceptors. When I finally am off orientation and on my own (probably about three months from now), I will be working 7pm to 7:30am. yikes! Thankfully that will be after the worst of the summer heat is through.

We miss everyone up in Seattle and hope that you will all stop in for a few days whenever you can. Our house is always open!