Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day is from St. Valentine who, during the Roman Empire officiated weddings even when Claudius II banned marriages, and aiding persecuted Christians. Valentine was later beheaded when he did not renounce Christ. One legend says that before his death he restored sight to the jailer's daughter (by the power of God), and he wrote her a note and signed it "From your Valentine." He was beheaded February 14th. (Source for this was Focus on the Family's Adventures in Odyssey episode on St. Valentine, and Wikipedia states that this idea of St. Valentine was from the book Golden Legend although Claudius banning marriage is not stated. The website roman-emporers.org does say that Claudius was very strict towards his soldiers. Catholic.org mentions the letter and the jailer's daughter). It was Chaucer who is believed to popularize the romantic love associated with Valentine's day. Anyways, the purpose of this little history lesson (and it was really neat to research it), is that Valentine's day has become so hyped up by our culture it is rediculous. It is said to be the "Black Friday" for the floral business, with sales reaching $80,000. Some of my friends from Willamette use to deliver flowers and they can attest to how busy and crazy Valentine's day can be. When I went to pick up the freezer on Valentine's day (see previous posts) there were many Valentine's vendors along the street trying to make a quick buck. This year, Heather and I decided to not celebrate Valentine's day on Valentine's day but the day after. So on Friday morning, February 15th, I went to Fred Meyer before work to pick up some roses and chocolates for Heather. The roses were 75% off, and the chocolates were 50% off! After work, we had reservations at McCormick and Schmick's Harborside. We had received a $25 gift certificate from Alaska Airlines, and by splitting an appetizer and a meal we were able to only spend $10 plus $3.50 for parking. Afterwards were were going to rent a movie from Red Box (for free with coupon), but unfortunately it did not have Becoming Jane or No Reservations. We had a wonderful Valentine's day on February 15th and are really enjoying dates on a budget.

Pre-Spring Clean-up

If you read the next post, you will learn the story behind our new freezer. Today, I (Scott) was faced with the issue of making room for the freezer in the garage. I had organized the garage fairly well last fall. However, once we started to put together the nursery, everything that was in that room went out to the garage and the garage was messy again. Here are some before and after pictures of the garage.

Blessings

Recently God has blessed us in a huge way! We have been wanting an upright freezer for the garage for a while now, although we haven't had the money to buy one. Well, a few weeks ago we were going to Goodwill to find Scott a pair of jeans. As we were pulling up we saw a pickup with 2 upright freezers heading towards the donation center. We quickly pulled over and ran to the pickup as the donation person at Goodwill was telling them they don't take freezers. Unfortunately, they were trying to donate a yellow refrigerator, not a freezer, and they were keeping the upright freezer. We talked a little, and found that they go to Easthill Church (another great church similar to Good Shepherd in Gresham). We talked about FPU (they also had gone through Financial Peace University), our baby Stanely, their kids, and we gave them our number incase they ended up not needing the freezer.

Well, a couple weeks later Heather got a phone call from the lady simply stating, "Call me about a freezer." We called, and they wanted to GIVE us the freezer! Turns out, they were hoping to use it as a second refrigerator but it was too cold (it was built to freeze things which it did). What a huge blessing, God knew what we needed, and He provided. This was a big answered prayer.

That was blessing number one. Blessing number two was getting the freezer. We have a Toyota Camry, and a VW Jetta. Both are not made for transporting freezers. Once we found that we had a freezer, we had to find a way to transport it. Heather first called her dad, who was more than willing to help us, but he is up in Welches, and the freezer was out past 181st. Then we thought of our friends from Bible study. Matt works in construction and has a pick-up. The problem was that he has night classes most weekdays. Scott called him, and he was more than willing to come out and help!

He was working that day out in SW Portland, so he met Scott and the family with the freezer's house, and Matt was the right person to ask. He had all the equipment and know how. We got it into his truck, he had the straps to tie it down, and we got it back to our house no problem. When we got it home, Scott was going to plug it in, but Matt wanted to look at the wiring. The lady had mentioned that there was a problem with the wire, but she used some electrical tape, and it was working fine. Matt took one look at it and told Scott not to plug it in until it was fixed. The hot, cold, and ground wires were all cut and while some electricity could make it through when held together it was the type of problem that starts those "electrical fires" you hear about on the news. Again, what a blessing that Matt was the one we called, because we would have had no idea that the wires needed to be fixed to avoid a house fire. God is good.

Our three blessings.

1. The refrigerator

2. Matt helping and seeing the electrical problem

3. The day we met the people at Goodwill we also found Scott a $9 pair of brand new Levi Jeans that would cost $50 retail.

Wow.

Still growing...

Hey Everyone, It's been really busy around here lately with work, preparing for Stanley's arrival, more work, trying to stay on top of housework, juggling finances (bills), different Bible studies and classes, rehearsals and concerts, spending time with friends, and more work. I guess this is what life is like after graduation. We're so thankful for this new leg of our journey together and we are learning more every day. We're also growing in another area (mostly Heather) and that is around the middle. Stanley is often very active in his growth and development and it's fun to feel (and see) it. It is so exciting! We have less than eight weeks until his due date and we are getting more eager for his arrival every day. We hope and pray that all of you are doing well. Please drop us a line and tell us how things are going for you. P.S. What fun things are you all doing for Valentine's Day? Any ideas?

Breaking the Silence...

Hello Friends and family! Do you think it is about time for us to blog again? We sure do. It's been on the "To Do" list for almost two months now and I (Heather) am finally getting a chance to update. I finally went through our pictures on picasa and thought I would share a sampling of them with you. Find many more pictures here.

A picture from the hospital when we discovered that we were expecting a little boy named Stanley!

"Oh Christmas Tree"

Our Little Nursery-with many thanks to Ginny!

We had a wonderful family Christmas! After Good Shepherd's church service on Christmas Eve everyone came to our house for dinner and a gift card exchange. It was so fun and each person went home with something they could really use. On Christmas day we headed out to be with the Overbys, MacSwans, and Mills and had a great time. Watching snow fall outside was a real Christmas blessing!

On the afternoon of Christmas, Scott and I drove up to Welches to be with my mom and dad. We had a traditional Swiss Raclette dinner and a lot of Pinochle.

We also got "snowed in" and enjoyed a winter retreat in the snow country.

This Belly has grown!!! Oh, how I've been growing over the last few months. I really popped out over the holidays! Could it be all the marvelous food?

We had a wonderful New Years trip to Arizona to visit my sister and her family. It was so fun to spend time with them-especially my niece and nephew.

A few more pictures...

My sister Beth sent me these pictures of our family.

Here's the fun news though-she's expecting a baby two months after me.

So make note of the pregnant sister picture.

The Results are in...

We just got home from the hospital and the results are in. The visit went well. We got to see our baby's spine, head, hands, feet, heart, brain, and all those things that you want to see on a baby. We also were able to see whether the baby was a boy or a girl. The technician reminded us that nothing was guaranteed, but the results seemed pretty clear. We're going to have a BOY!!! This is contrary to most polls that we took. When we talked to family we asked them what they thought and most people said a girl. Only Gene Tilgner, and Sarah Overby said a boy. On our blog poll the vote was 7 for girl, 3 for boy. So only 30% of the people guessed correctly. We are so excited about little Stanley. We appreciate all the excitement and support from you. Stay tuned for more news regarding our little one.

Early Vacation, sort of...

Today has been an interesting day at work for me (Scott). Soon into the first class of the day an announcement was made about a power outage and that students need to stay in the classrooms. My classroom still had power, although my computer screen was doing something weird. Soon after that the fire alarm went off and we all filed outside into the parking lot, in the rain. We stood around for a long time until someone let us back in only to herd the mob into the gym. Turns out there was an electrical issue, most likely from rain seeping through the roof (it's an old school), and they eventually shut the power down to avoid a bigger problem which shut down the power in the surrounding area. Well, after standing around in the gym, going back outside after some kid pulled the fire alarm, and back to the gym, they finally told the kids who have cars to go home and the rest of the students to wait for the buses. By the time the buses came it was about 10:15. It then took an hour and a half to finally release the staff to go home. Kind of crazy. Lesson plans are shot. But now I get the afternoon off, and later we get to find out whether we're going to have a boy or a girl!!! Vote now if you haven't voted yet. That includes you mystery bloggers who never post. It is a completely anonymous poll. Hopefully we'll post later today.

Make Your Predictions Heard

We're finding that everyone wants to add their input into what gender our baby will be. At this point if someone asks "What are you having." Our only honest answer is, "A baby." That or "We're having chicken (tonight for dinner)." Anyways, let your opinion be heard. We have our ultrasound Monday to hopefully find out what gender our baby will be. Make your predictions by then (see poll in the right column), and we'll see if more people are thinking we're having a boy or a girl. I put twins in there for the fun of it, no ultrasound (of the two) showed any hint of twins, but that will be your million to one odds guess.

Hilarious Site

Tonight I (Scott) was working on my lesson plans for tomorrow, and Heather was looking at blogs. We found a link from Amy's blog of a youtube video, and that led us to a new web site. It is RhettandLink.com. Now, we cannot say that everything they do is clean and appropriate because we haven't watched all of their videos (yet), but all the videos we saw were absolutely HILARIOUS and clean! Two of our favorites were the Healthy Fast Food Rap and the Invisible Bed Fence. We had to pull ourselves away because we were laughing too much and we had to get to bed. But we thought we'd share it with you first. Tom and Dan, we thought of you two when we saw some of their videos and thought you should make some of your own "randomness videos." PS. The videos seemed to work better on youtube, but that could just be our slow computer.

Red Boot Duo Performance

The next Red Boot Duo performance featuring Heather on Oboe, Rhythm and Vocals and Cinda on Guitar and Vocals is this Friday night. The performance goes from 7-10 at the Mt. Hood Roasters in Welches. Come enjoy dinner, live music, and a fun and relaxed atmosphere. Hope to see you there!

What Pregnant Women Get Away With

Have you ever stopped to realize what pregnant women get away with? All the time they are able to excuse themselves, “Oh, I’m sorry, I’m pregnant.” Could you imagine a guy trying to get away with that, “I’m sorry I blurted out like that, I’m male.” It wouldn’t work. Take a couple of examples Heather and I dealt with recently (and I share these with Heather’s permission and we are able to laugh at these…now). Case one, we are talking on the phone and I did or said something that rightfully upset Heather. Her response, she hung up on me. Well, I called her back, and when I got a hold of her I said, “You hung up on me, how rude.” Then I returned the favor and hung up on her. Men, do not try that at home. The results were not pleasant and although I did not spend the night on the couch I had to go into a serious apology mode. While she was able to hang up on me, I was by no means justified or allowed to hang up on her. Why might you ask Heather was able to get away with that? Because she’s pregnant. Case two: we had an extremely fun and goofy night last night. It was one of those nights where everything we said or did was funny. Well, Heather was playing with a rubber band, and I told her not to shoot it at me or else I’ll have to return the gesture. (And no, it’s not quite going where you think it is). A few minutes later, I was looking in the fridge trying to make my lunch for the next day. Out of no where I get pelted with a…banana peel! That’s right; Heather threw a banana peel at me! Her excuse was she was trying to throw it away, although I was not even close to the garbage can. So I mimic a throw to the garbage can and throw the banana peel back at Heather. Fortunately we did not have the same type of blowup with the phone call incident, but I did get hit again with the banana peel, and I was close to being in the dog house. Anyways, the moral of the story is that pregnant women get away with almost anything. If they forget something, blunder their words, or even throw banana peels at their husbands it is dismissed as the hormones raging in their bodies. If I forget something or make a mistake while teaching (which unfortunately happens too often) my only excuse is that I’ve been working too much with dry erase markers. Oh well. On a serious note, we love this journey of pregnancy, although the hormones do tend to flare up, and Heather’s body is constantly sore as it grows. Take care friends, and hopefully we’ll post again soon.

Keeping a Clean Home

How many of you find it difficult to keep a clean house? Why is that? Heather and I were talking about it the other day and were wondering if it was because of a lack of time or a lack of motivation. Well, who doesn't like a clean home? It feels good, you can find things easily, and it's less stressful. The obvious answer then is our home gets messy because we don't have the time to clean it up. The conversation started for us when the statement was said, "If only we had a week at home with nothing else to do, then we would have a clean home." But having a clean home is more than just cleaning everything once, it's keeping it clean. For us younger generation, we get going so fast that we start to take short cuts (don't put away the clothes at the end of the day, don't load that dish into the dish washer, drop the mail on the desk) and those little "short cuts" lead us "have to have" a week to clean up. Heather has really enjoyed a website called "Flylady" and it's all about routines to declutter and keep things clean one little step at a time so you don't need to do those big deep cleans as often. What we need to do is get in those habits of not taking "short cuts" and put that shirt away when you head to bed in the evening. And remember that there needs to be a place for everything and everything in its place. Any thoughts on this? ~Scott PS. Anyone know of a good system to clean the shower and not let that soapscum build up?

Oh How Time Slips Away

We apologize for the long delay between posts. We find it disappointing when you go to someone's blog time and time again and find it unchanged for a long time. Now here we are having more than a month since our last post, especially with everything that is going on.

The biggest and most exciting thing which we have not posted about is our upcoming edition to our family. For those of you who haven't heard we are expecting our first child in April! We found out the beginning of August. The day before we moved and the day of Josh and Shannon Andrews' (Edson) wedding. We didn't tell anyone (except one or two people) until our first housewarming where we told our family. Then we announced it to our friends at our second housewarming. We are really excited about it and are looking forward to the new adventures it will bring.

Other news, on the day of our first doctor's appointment Heather was in a car accident. She was rear ended and it totally mangled our bumper and the side of our car. Fortunately, Heather and the baby were not seriously hurt. Unfortunately, she has been having back pain (and sciatica) since then. Fortunately, she is able to get physical therapy, and massage therapy through the insurance. Unfortunately, we get to go through the hassel of insurance claims again. Fortunately, our car got a new bumper, it was stratched when we bought it and now we have a new bumper.

Scott has now started work at Barlow and is loving it there. He teaches Algebra, Geometry and Algebra 2. It is fun to work with some of his old teachers and he has some really great students this year. With teaching he is now super busy again and we are trying to find that balance between doing a good job at work, and not spending too much time outside of work planning lessons and grading papers.

Enjoy reading the rest of our posts. We have our trip to Portland, the Red Boot Duo, and our move from McMinnville to Gresham. Hopefully our next post won't be delayed until mid November. Enjoy.

The Red Boot Duo

Heather and her mom Cinda have combined their musical abilities and are now known as the Red Boot Duo. Cinda plays harmonica, guitar, and does vocals. Heather plays the oboe, rhythm instruments, and also does vocals. Together they are a great pair (get it pair of boots, Red Boot Duo...never mind). Anyways, they played at the Mt Hood Roasters in Welches, and while the crowd was not the size they had hoped for, it was a great evening. Enjoy the pictures and some of their music.

See more pictures of the Duo

Tourists in Portland

On Labor Day Weekend we thought it would be fun to spend a day in Portland as tourists. We set out to start at Lloyd Center, take the Max into downtown Portland, take the street car into the Pearl District and enjoy lunch at a nice cafe, and then tour the city and end up at the Portland City Grill for dinner during happy hour. Unfortunately, it was not as glamorous as we had hoped. Don't get me wrong, we had a blast and it was a neat and fun experience. But things didn't go quite as planned. First of all, we toured around the Convention Center and the Rose Garden a little, and then Scott had the fun idea to walk across the Steel Bridge (it has a cool bike/pedestrian path near the water). Well, that was a lot of walking, and by the time we actually got into downtown Portland, we were already hot, tired, and sweaty. We forgot that last summer when we were visiting different cities in Europe that you get hot, tired, and sweaty! Anyways, we still had a lot of fun with the day. We had lunch at Manzana which was absolutely amazing, and we split a meal which saved us money. Because it was a holiday, a lot of the small stores that we wanted to visit were closed, such as a ribbon and button store that Heather wanted to look at. We did get a lot of fun pictures, and did enjoy dinner at the Portland City Grill. A fun day, but we think we've had enough walking for awhile.

We're no professionals, but check out our Pictures of Portland.

The Move

Well, we are going back a ways and we wanted to give you some insight into our move from McMinnville to Portland. On the McMinnville side of the move we were blessed to have Tim Suddeth, Eric and Melanie Lindquist, and Jeremy and Claudette Stevenson. With all of us the work to load the truck only took 3 hours. The most stressful part of it was wondering if we would have enough room in the van. Fortunately, with Tim's packing knowledge, and Scott's puzzle skills we were able to fill the van to the very brim, and were able to fit the remaining items in our car, Jeremy and Claudette's car, and our arm chair in the passenger seat of the van with Scott. Wow!

Our old home in boxes.

Fortunately it didn't rain so we were able to stack everything outside of the van.

Will it all fit?

Yep, it fits!!!

On the Gresham side of the move we had Gene Tilgner, Steve, Sue and Seth Overby, and Dave McCarthy. Jeremy and Claudette deserve a special thanks for helping on the Gresham side as well as the McMinnville side. With the help, we had the entire van unpacked in 30 minutes. It was incredible! We had a few bonked heads as the van was really close the the garage door, and we had several people comment how incredibly well the van was packed. Thanks Tim and everyone who helped!

Crazy August

Wow, August is almost gone and September is almost here. This month has just flown by! Scott is busy with new teacher stuff at Barlow, and Heather is trying to get a few more music therapy jobs. Things have been crazy. We're adjusting to our new home and trying to find our new home routines, like taking out the garbage, keeping clutter down, watering the lawn, etc. Scott's freshman start school next week Tuesday and the rest of his students start Wednesday. He still has a lot of things to finish before then, and is working hard at them. We're sorry that we haven't posted any pictures recently. We just downloaded a bunch off of our camera, but haven't gotten them into Picasa yet. We promise to have them up soon. For those of you who missed our housewarming, it was a lot of fun! We had 25 people show up, and ended up having a neat "Jam Session" at the end of the night. It was amazing how many musically talented friends we have. Those without musical gifts like Scott were able to enjoy the music and help pass out instruments. Come to think of it, Scott was the only non-musical person there! Wow. Anyways, have a wonderful week and blessed Labor Day Weekend! We're thinking of having a "tourist in your own town" day this weekend...

Loving our New Home

Sorry it has been so long since our last update. One of the problems with moving into a new home is changing your address a million and two times. Also with that is getting Internet up and running which we have not been able to do yet (Comcast couldn't come until the 23rd). Therefore, we are at Scott's parents and updating our blog on their computer. That means no pictures for you today. But we will say that things are going really well for us, and we are absolutely loving our new house. As for the housewarming gathering, the date for that will be (drum roll please....) Saturday August 25th. We know that wasn't one of the original dates, but with the lack of votes on our poll, and wanting to give people time to put it on their calendars, that is the chosen date. So tell your friends, spread the word, and give us a call or email for directions or if you have any questions. That's all for now, have a wonderful day and hopefully we'll be posting again soon.

Moving Day Fast Approaching

We are only 2 days away from our move from McMinnville to Gresham. We went camping for the first part of the week with our friends Matt and Holly Smucker. They have been in Taiwan for the last year, and we had this camping trip planned months before we knew when we were going to move. We went to Camp Sherman, which is about 10 miles west of Sisters. It was a great time to get away and just relax. Now, however, we are scrambling to finish up packing, changing addresses, and preparing for the move. We pick up the keys to our new place today (Thursday) and we move this Saturday. If anyone out there is available to help us moving we would love the help. We start packing the truck in McMinnville at 9am, and we plan to be in Gresham by 2pm. If you are interested you can call us or just show up! Enjoy the sun, and we'd love to hear from you.