The Harvest

This post is about My Dad: The Gardener. He loves to grow things - well, edible things. I'm pretty sure this comes from the face that both my grandma and grandpa were superb gardeners. My grandma grew the most stupendous garden I've ever seen and I have vivid memories of picking corn and raspberries at my grandpa's house. Anyways, one adventure he has been working on for awhile is growing grapes. To be honest, I thought this would fail. The picture above proves I should have more confidence in the man. We harvested the first grapes the other night for dinner. They were about 1/3 the size of regular grapes but tasted exactly the same as store-bought grapes (which, for some reason was quite a shock, but that's beside the point). It was phenom.

Why I love Donald Miller

This book is all about living a good story. It's filled with inspiring bits about families that interview foreign dignitaries and jump into lakes, climbing Machu Pichu, raising money to build a Mexican orphanage. In it he says this,

"What I'm saying is I think life is staggering and we're just used to it."

In other words, amazing things (like the simple fact that our bodies keep us alive on a daily basis) are happening all around us every day and we often miss it. Which, when it comes down to it is a simple message and is said a lot, but is good to be reminded of. Donald Miller does just that in his usual train-of-thought style in this book. Refreshing and a good book to read on vacation.

Happy (Belated) Birthday To Me!

Twenty-two. 22. Ventidos. Not the most exciting age no matter how you write it, but it was a good day never the less. Spent a lot of relaxing time with my family and eating Jello Box Cheesecake. Horrifyingly enough, I prefer the Jello Box variety to the real thing and it's been a tradition for awhile now.

21 was a big year - probably the biggest yet. I finished up a life affirming summer in Vancouver, celebrated 2 years with my man, had a pretty rocking Christmas/New Years and learned a lot about myself, got engaged, graduated and got my official nursing license. See, it was big.

I think 22 may be bigger. Some goals:
1) Get married (this will happen in hopefully 325 days)
2) Get a real job

As you can see I haven't really thought many things through, but that is what I'm starting with. Like usual, God will probably surprise me with some pretty crazy things anyways, so I don't want to plan too much. Anywho - cheers to a big next year!

New Toy

This gorgeous picture taken from Siyeh Pass in Glacier National Park was taken with my new toy. My very expensive new toy. After a lot of saving and some generous graduation gifts I bought a Canon Digital Rebel. 18 megapixels of glory. I've had a blast playing with it and figuring out how to not use manual!

I'm sure you readers, all 2 of you (hi mom!), will enjoy better quality pictures from now on.