Aloha.

Where Did September Go?

The first half we were in the kitchen, chilling at the Dekker house, watching movies, eating at restaurants a ton, hiking with Jeff's brother, jogging, reading, working, attending the 20s 30s group at church, and eating dinner with my boss, his girlfriend, and Jeff's brother. This month we were more social than usual and we did well on our budget.

The second half started out right with one of our dearest friend from Calvin and her gentleman friend staying over night at our apartment. It was great to meet her friend and catch up as we hadn't seen her since our wedding last November. The rest of the second half consisted of me shopping and packing for my trip to Hawaii while Jeff hung out with his family. And of course traveling to Hawaii and relaxing on the island of Maui with my family! We read a ton of books, relaxed and I traveled a great distance. September was a satisfying month!

A Slightly Social September!

So we are finally breaking free from our normal routine. Don't get me wrong, this routine is just fine... but when work wares on us, (which it has a little bit more than usual for both of us this month), it is fun and necessary to do something new together and not be the homebodies we are accustomed to being. That being said here is how we've spent our time lately...

On Sunday we hung out with the 20s/30s group from church and had a blast. We watched football, ate yummy tacos, and yes I even played Dance Dance Revolution against my husband in front of a bunch of people I don't know very well. We were evenly matched which made it even more fun to "compete." Unfortunately we were the first ones to leave due to my starting working at 11:00 pm but we were both very glad we decided to go and are looking forward to finally getting to know some people our age from church. They meet weekly after evening service which is great because we don't have to wait so long in between meetings if we aren't able to attend.

Last night Jeff and I had dinner at a quaint Thai Restaurant with my boss, his girlfriend, and Jeff's brother. It was bitter sweet as Om is leaving Oregon for better prospects else where, but an enjoyable evening none the less and great food... I tried the Pumpkin Curry, to help get me in an Autumn mood. And as expected it was delicious!

Speaking of Autumn, I'm putting this gloomy Portland Weather behind me one week from today when I travel to Hawaii! I am really looking forward to spending some quality time with my Griffin- Halverson family! I've missed my sister and Billy and parents a lot since moving here and feel like this will be just what we need to reconnect. :0)

Before Hawaii though- Hope, a dear college friend of both of ours is road-tripping it out to Oregon to drop off a friend at University of Oregon! They are staying at our apartment for Thursday night before heading down to Eugene. Looking forward to hosting them here but worried we won't get our place cleaned before they arrive.

So I would say this is slight progress from the homebodies we have been since I've moved up here. Compared to some people's schedules it doesn't look like much but to us every 'little bit' is helpful to kick our habit of sticking to our same old routine.

Goals for September

Some self-reflection the other day brought about the desire to better myself. So with that said here are my goals and a little blurb about how I'm going to achieve them in this new month.

1. Stay within our budget- track spending closely with MINT
2. Have fun in Hawaii- spend time with family, relax by the pool, and drink IN MODERATION.
3. Meditate daily- Before sleep and when I wake.
4. Spend less time on the computer- self explanatory.
5. Practice genuine hospitality- with Hope & Rob, and have Josh and Carolyn over more often.
6. Make a new friend. -Invite a coworker out for coffee.
7. Have patience with myself and with situations I find myself in.
8. Read daily- whether from a book or magazine, whether one page or fifty.
9. No library fines- read, return, and renew books in a timely fashion.
10. Think before speaking- don't vent unnecessarily.
11. Pray for friends and family often.
12. Show Jeff more acts of kindness- do at least 3 thoughtful things for him each day.
13. Volunteer my time- walk over to Russellville Retirement home and inquire about a volunteer program there.
14. Deep clean apartment- get ready for Hope and to make it nice for Jeff while I'm in Hawaii.
15. Keep our kitchen immaculate- no leaving the house with dirty dishes left in the sink.
16. Share with others- Give thirty items or more away this month.
17. Exercise more- Take a walk or Jog with Jeff at least 2 times per week.
18. Finish reading 4 books this month- Chopra, Kingsolver, the In-law book, and simplify your life.
19. Complain less about aches and pains.
20. Date Jeff- Do something new and different together each week.
21.Eat at healthy times- no later than one hour after I wake up.
22. Be mindful of what Jeff's and my future selves would like and act accordingly.
23. Try new recipes as long as they don't add extra expense to our budget.
24. Enjoy Jeff- talk with him and practice active listening.
25. Get enough sleep

August Happenings:

In the month of August we:
1. Said goodbye to my parents before they drove down the coast back home to California.
2. Read more than we had in our entire marriage thus far.
3. Laughed a lot together.
4. Hiked and went for walks with Jeff's brother.
5. Cleaned Jeff's family's living room and basement freezer.
6. Enjoyed each other's quiet company at the library on several dates.
7. Kept our own apartment immaculate for 9 days straight - a record for us. (Unfortunately it is overwhelmingly messy again).
8. Went to church 3 times.
9. Started seriously tracking our budget and thus learned we spent way more than we intended.
10. Attempted Yoga stretches together.
11. Tried out several new recipes.
12. Baked 2 loaf of bread.
13. Decided I should participate in the Griffin/ Halverson Family Reunion in Hawaii this September.
14. Consumed over 10 liters of soda pop- mostly for help staying awake at work.

Very Seedy Whole Grain Oat Bread...

So, today I decided to make a loaf of what I'll call "Very Seedy Whole Grain Oat Bread". It has very special flax seeds (from Valley Pistachio given to me by my parents from their drive to Portland in late July) as well as poppy seeds, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds etc. Unfortunately, I didn't have the patience to soak the grain ahead of time, so the way it is will have to do. Like all my baking projects, I never really know how they will turn out as I'm always adding unmeasured amounts of various ingredients to favorite recipes... I'm all about experimental cooking. This can be a bad thing when it comes to making breads as exact measuring is a basic requirement for "getting it right". Its in the kneading stage and it looks kind of dense...(as whole wheat bread can be a lot of the time) but it hasn't risen yet so I'm hopeful it will be ok. 2 more hours to go...

Update 3:40pm... I am soo thrilled with how it turned out! I am eating a warm peanut butter and honey sandwich in the edge piece as we speak! I am most surprised how doughy the middle is and how crusty the edges are! Jeff should be getting home really soon... Hopefully I can leave some of this sandwich for him for him to try a taste of...... a bite...... a nibble...... the crumbs? This bread is as closed to perfection as I would ever hope to get. Its fluffy and flavorful. Not dense at all. If I can ever repeat the recipe I will be one enthused woman. Ok... now off to make Jeff his own sandwich.

Nature is my favorite color.

So, off we went yesterday morning... Jeff and I went on a 3 hour walk on Powell Butte. It is the most peaceful piece of land I've ever experienced. We walked the perimeter, or as much of it as we could as they are constructing a water reservoir at the tippy top. "I hope this is what heaven is like," I told Jeff. So many colors of green and brown, and yellow. Nature is my favorite color.

We are making veggie pizza for lunch today... Jeff surprised me and soaked the pizza dough while I was napping in the afternoon. Because we are going to Title Wave used bookstore this morning with his sister, I might suggest a taking the pizza for a picnic lunch at a nearby park! :0)

In the kitchen

This early morning our apartment is scented of sweet fruits and cinnamon as I eagerly await the fate of my first berry project.
(2 cups of handpicked berries from Sauvie Island).

A loaf of Blueberry, cinnamon, walnut, pecan bread! I adapted the recipe from a cinnamon raisin bread recipe I found in the little manual that came with my Breadman Pro bread maker. I sprinkled the top with cinnamon sugar to make it extra sweet :0) It is looking and smelling delicious but its only in the rising stage, so I'm hoping it'll bake up nicely and provide for a delicious breakfast toast tomorrow morning and several days to come!

Rising Blueberry Bread Dough...



For breakfast yesterday morning, we had fruit bowls (Kruger Farms sliced Peaches, Local Kiwis also purchased at the farm, and half a carton of freshly picked tiny strawberries) with tart vanilla yogurt. For dinner yesterday I made 2 medium home made Hawaiian pizzas (we'll eat the left overs fridge cold), cooked green beans with walnuts (one of my favorite side dishes), a farmer's market cucumber and green pepper salad, and our new favorite Champagne (Barefoot Moscato Spumante Champagne) to wash it all down. I had never really given hawaiian pizza a fair chance until a few weeks ago when Jeff brought some home from Winco. I tried it and loved it!! So, I bought all the ingredients and decided to try to make my own versions. They turned out deliciously. Here is a picture of a different kind of home made pizza I baked up a while ago:

Garlic, Basil, Olive, Sausage Pizza. A little heavy on the cheese... but still tasty.

Berries Galore

With dirt crusted jeans, sticky arms, and one almost-brimming-bucket of blueberries in tow, I scoured each plant I came across thoroughly in search of the biggest blueberries I could find.
(a few medium sized Blueberries from Sauvie Island)

I had heard stories from Jeff's childhood about family trips to Sauvie Island so I was excited to see it for myself. When we first arrived at the farm, I was impressed with its serenity. The sun was warm but not roasting, we were ready for hard work so we each grabbed 2 green tubs and started picking. 45 minutes later, we trucked down the hill to the stand to weigh our produce and I was amazed to find we had picked 10 pounds of blueberries between Jeff and myself! (I had picked 7 pounds, Jeff picked 3.) :0)

Susie treated us all to flavored Honey Stix and we drove on until we came to a barn-like building which happened to be Kruger Farmers Market. There we asked if there were strawberries to pick (which I later learned are best for picking in June.)

Kruger Farmer's Market on Sauvie Island with Strawberry fields in the foreground.


The lady working at the counter seemed skeptical but said we could try finding them if we wanted to and gave us directions to the nearest field. From the car it looked like there were plenty of strawberries, but with closer examination we discovered that glimpses of red were just the reddish brown leaves being deceptive. As we walked along the rows, we would each exclaim with childlike excitement when we found a berry. We searched for a while in this field with dismal success and found a total of 7 strawberries between the four of us! Those berries were exceptionally tiny and therefore surprisingly sweet- most of them too sun-dried to keep. (not the smallest strawberry we picked)

Among the strawberry bushes, I spotted a tiny baby froggy. It was a little bigger than a quarter. It was so cute hopping quickly along the rows of deserted strawberry plants. I've decided I want a pet baby froggy... maybe even more than I want a dog. Jeff tried to take its photo with his phone but it was too quick so the picture didn't turn out so well.

After scanning the field for strawberries, we moved along to another field down the way. To our disappointment, we didn't see many at first. The bright red against the green leaves sounds like it would be hard to miss, though at top glance the plants looked barren. What I didn't realize was how deep I had to search within the plant to find the berries.

All of a sudden I saw one peaking out from under the green leaves like a bright jewel flickering in the sunlight. Then I found another...



and a few more...


and a few more...


Once we got the hang of it, there was no stopping us. An hour and a half later we drove back to the stand to weigh our collective efforts and had picked a total 5.3 pounds of fresh strawberries. Susie said I could have all the strawberries because she still had some in her freezer from last time.

So, what will I do with 15 pounds of berries, you ask?

First I washed and froze all of the strawberries because they don't keep as well as blueberries. I will make blueberry muffins, strawberry jam, blueberry scones, strawberry ice cream, blueberry pancakes, use some for Green Smoothies, eat some plain of course and freeze the rest for later!

Look for future posts on how I end up using all these berries.

Proposal Anniversary

The hotel has been unusually busy lately. This past Friday night was crazy... I worked a nine hour shift. I prepared breakfast for over 125 guests... all by myself. There are usually only 25 guests per night so it was overwhelming to attempt to do breakfast for so many people. The girl who was working the second shift had to call Expedia to get them to stop reservations from being made. Every room was booked including the jacuzzi suites, and 2 rooms where the mechanical lock is perpetually broken. At least 10 people called and more than 15 people came in asking if we had vacancies. There was no parking available in the lot... I had to park on the street for a while. This next weekend should be very busy too. I'm glad to have a 2 day break starting tonight. (Unexpected, actually). I apparently wrote the schedule down wrong in my planner- that I had Wednesday nights and Thursdays night off when I actually have Tuesday night and Wednesday night off! This is "YAY" for many reasons.

The biggest reason is tonight is Jeff's and my "proposal anniversary"- Jeff asked me to marry him a year ago today! The 20th of July is also my maternal Grandparents' wedding anniversary which makes it extra special. It was not really a surprise that he would propose because we had talked extensively about our plans for a future together. We even went so far as to buy a book together with 500 questions about marital expectations and the like... We rediscovered while reading through the book that we are very compatible... But the parts that we weren't compatible on... well we decided we liked each other well enough that the compatibility significantly out weighed the slight incompatibility and thus we agreed; rather- promised each other, we would actively work on finding ways to negotiate through those issues when we came to them. He told me awhile before this trip down to California, "Sarah, this is the trip I'm going to ask your parents blessing for your hand in marriage and you should start looking at rings." To be honest I had trouble imagining little old me with an engagement ring on my finger. But now that I am wearing it, I wouldn't not change my ring for the world. The actual ring design is meaningful to us because it is a reminder of the day we discovered that we liked each other. That is a whole other story though which I won't get into at this time.

So, July 20, 2009, at some point that day, Jeff asked my parents for their blessing. I don't really remember the details of the day leading up to proposal - it is all kind of a blur to me now that I look back. I do remember however, that in the evening we were sitting on the couch in the family room watching the movie "He's just not that into you". Now that's a romantic movie title if I've ever heard one... Let me just say it was awkward for me to sit next to Jeff and watch Ben Affleck propose to whom ever it was he was proposing to thinking that Jeff was going to ask me to marry him some time in the next few days. After the movie we were in the mood for sushi, so we walked down the street the the local sushi and frozen yogurt shop only to find that it had closed for the evening. So we decided to continue on a walk together since we both love walking. The sky was especially beautiful that night- even with the orange glow of the street lamps, the stars were visible. We stopped on the first bridge over looking the canal. And Jeff started pointing out constellations, which I'm horrible at finding, by the way. I always think every cluster of stars is the big dipper... We took our time finding constellations together. While I was on the verge of finding the big dipper yet again, Jeff told me to look down. I was confused so I turned around to ask him where to look and he had gotten down on one knee. :0)