Doe, Rey, Me, Fa, So, La, Te, Doe

Yes, I'm singing once again. I've joined our church choir, and I really am enjoying using my musical side once again. This Sunday was the first Sunday I was actually not working and could make it to church and sing in the choir. We sang "God Shall Wipe Away All Tears." It went pretty well, I hope. =) So I'll be practicing with them every Wednesday evening. We're really practicing for Easter Sunday, right now, so that's a lot of fun. Anyways, it's nice for me to kind of plug in and meet a few people, and enjoy the gift of music God has given me (though I definitely still would never be a soloist, I can contribute to the choir as a whole)! No photos, but I sport a very stylish blue robe....well, I may not be in it for the attire, I am in it for the worship and praise we give to God with our voice. And that's what the choir is called, "With One Voice."

A few more photos from backpacking

Brian took these photos from the weekend, so I thought I'd share those too!

Backpacking with a great end in the rain!

We started out the weekend on Saturday, using a beautiful three day weekend to GET OUTDOORS!! Our trip guide was Chris (Jeannine's fiance-sorry if I spell any names wrong).
The destination was San Mateo Wilderness (north of San Diego).
Weather reports were: rain, rain, and more rain.

God really blessed us because Saturday and Sunday could not have been more beautiful backpacking weather: Not too Hot; Not too Cold.

Here's Day One when we are still clean and not stinky!

The hills were beautiful, and we didn't have to fight any crowds (in fact I think we saw about a total of approx 15 people the entire trip)!

Here's where we were searching the hills for the first campsite. We decided to go back a bit to a better location we had already passed.
If you can find her, Jeanine found a great spot to rest...Chris was high above looking for a spot.

Tobin coming back after giving up.

Water was a bit sparse on the trip...don't go in the summer, you won't have anything! But we made do when we had it...Despite the cow manure pasture!

Here's the site we decided on. It was the maiden voyage for our Mountain Hardware tent...

it was great!

This is how I felt in the morning...a little blurry!

Chris and Jeannine

A couple that loves the outdoors...even with crazy conditions,

a few blisters, and sore joints...it's all part of the adventure!

Brian and Tobin enjoying lunch on the second day. I ate this packaged halibut, it was not too bad...but everything smelled a bit fishy the rest of the trip. Wouldn't recommend that in the future!

Teneja Falls, a bit small, but pretty in it's own way none the less (mostly because we were getting closer to our second night's campsite).

We don't have any photos of our campsite the second night. It was a bit of an adventure because we kept looking for water. The map showed several springs, but unfortunately, they were all dried up! So by the time we realized that much of the trail was just going to keep heading up hill and not provide much of a place to camp, it was dark! We actually turned around and went back to a junction in the trail, and literally pitched our tents in an off-shoot of the trail. It started raining sometime in the middle of the night, and both our tents weathered the storm well! We packed up camp quickly and slogged our way through the mud back to the car. Thankfully it was a short 5 miles because we had done more mileage on the second day. Thankfully, all of us stayed fairly dry (underneath our rain gear), and made it back to the trail head! It was a great weekend!

The five of us with our gear in the rain!

So...what do you think?

Don't know if I should ask this, but I want your opinion on our new pillow accents in our room. We've had a Pottery Barn gift card since our wedding (because it was a wedding gift), well because we move so much I really don't feel like we've decorated much. So I wanted to brighten up the room an try to add some color to our bedset (I really would just like to get a new duvet cover), but thought this was a great start. Let me know what you think. I bought the green and orange embroidered pillow along with the orange striped rug on the floor.

The Couch

I really didn't give the new couch justice. After living nearly 3 years without one, and strongly hinting at the fact that we needed a couch, we are now enjoying it! I like being able to actually snuggle with my husband while watching a movie rather than sitting on camping chairs or laying on the floor. It's great! I also just got the pillows to go with the couch...so I thought it deserved it's own post!

My exciting purchase!

Well, the other day, I had the joy to go shopping with a nice gift card to Nordstrom's. My sister informed me that I could use it at Nordstrom Rack..so me being the bargain hunter that I am; I did just that! Two of my purchases, I was stoked about because I got two pairs of designer jeans for about $20 each!!!! Since the jeans now are made to only fit women who are 6'6", they needed to be hemmed! So I braved the task myself, so that these jeans would truly be a great deal! So on my "day off" (I got called off from work on Monday), I hemmed both pairs! Here is the finished product, of which I'm very excited and proud about! I even saved the original hem and it was actually easier to do it that way than reado the hem (less pressing). If you want to see how I did it, I used this "tutorial." I personally think they look great...no more paying for tailoring for me!

The Box

It's finished (well there are a couple very minor details, but only the builders could really tell this part). If you'll remember Tobin and his Dad faithfully worked on this project over Christmas. We got here, and I stained it. Tobin assembled it just last week, and it looks great!