Life's a Beach

Since our weeks are typically full of work, working out, church assignments, and preparing to expand our little family we don't spend a lot of time just relaxing.  Realizing that this would probably have been the last weekend that we could just relax for a very long time we wanted to have a little get away.  Shawnie was kind enough to let us escape up to her beach house - we are so glad we did!  We stopped at the outlet malls on the way to Westport and did a little shopping, which is always fun!
Saturday the weather was absolutely beautiful!  We had invited a family from the ward to join us and so Oley and the boys spent the majority of Saturday crabbing.

Out crabbing on the docks

The weather was Beautiful!

Sharon taught us the art of making it less stinky when cooking crab, by cracking them apart and only cooking the legs. 

The puppies loved it as usual!  Dinky has something terribly wrong with his back paw so he wasn't as enthusiastic as usual but we still couldn't hold him back from his pure bliss!

Oley & the boys starting a fire

It was such a nice weekend we didn't want to come back to reality!  We couldn't feel more blessed, we live in the ideal location - at the beginning of the month we were on top of Mt. Rainier snow-shoeing and by the end of the month we were at the beach soaking up the sun, both a couple hours from our house.
As I reflect back on what we were doing last year on Easter we were flying to Wisconsin to evaluate whether I wanted to take an amazing job offer.  I am so glad we have the gospel in our lives, a husband who honors his priesthood and is able to provide blessings in time of need, and that even though the decision seemed stupid in the mind of many others we went with what the Spirit was telling us and declined the offer.  The blessings that have come from that decision are more than we could ever comprehend. 
Through the atonement of Jesus Christ I know that I have someone to go to when I don't know what path to take and when I feel as though I can't go any further, it is through the love of our Godhead I feel  as though my life could not be any more complete.  I hope that when the day comes they can look me in the eye and know that I did not take their sacrifice for granted.   As I reflect on the Savior and the tremendous amount of love He had for me I realize the shortcomings I have when following the first and greatest commandment - As I have loved you, Love one Another.  It is my goal this year to truly love those around me - it's easy to put up with others, but I want to truly have compassion and hope for the best for them.

Dog Park Fun

The weather is finally starting to get nice and so we wanted to get the dogs out to a park, unfortunately Oley got off work late Friday and so we didn't make it.  On Saturday morning I attended an amazing women's conference - it was exactly what I was needing and a little extra!  The little extra was in the session on the 5 Love Languages, if you haven't done this as a family I would highly recommend taking the quiz for Family Home Evening.  I will just stick it in here so you have no excuses not to check it out: Love Language Quiz.    There is also a book, but check out the survey and do it for Family Home Evening - you'll learn something new about your spouse and children.  Oley is probably the best husband ever, when I got home he had all the Saturday chores done and so we headed out to the dog park in Lakewood.  The dogs loved being at a little dog park that there were actually little dogs at to play with. 
What we didn't know was that this park was located by the old western state hospital that Oley has been wanting to go to - he heard it was haunted.  It was actually really creepy!  We walked up and there was a labyrinth that some women was walking around chanting, and there were a bunch of teenagers making a movie - you know one of those places where you can tell the Spirit does not want to be, this was the place.  We didn't spend much time there becuase we both felt a little uneasy.  But we can now say that we went and it was interesting. 

 

Snow Shoeing = Awesome

Last week while out with Oley's Aunt she told us that Rainer National Park does a guided snow shoe hike and asked if we wanted to go with her.  Since we still have yet to make it up to the mountain we were super excited to go.  Throughout the week we had invited others to join us but one by one they all chickened out, except my cousin Trae - yay! 
Saturday morning I got up and went for a quick run and as soon as Trae arrived we were on our way.  Mapquest had estimated it should take around 2 hours from our place to get to Paradise. . . in all reality it took an hour, so we were able to browse the museum a bit before the hike started (no Oley didn't speed, it's only 60 miles away max.).    Since moving from Idaho we haven't really had any real snow, so it was a nice reminder of why we moved away from the snow and cold while playing in the 13 foot snow banks.  We had a blast, and when I say "we" I really mean we this time - Oley is still talking about it today! 

We had the choice between "modern" or old fashioned snow shoes, we all went with the modern ones!

That behind me was how much snow they had. . 13 ft in fact.

We learned a lot about Mt. Rainier and the wildlife/history of the park.

This was a blast!  If you have never been snow shoeing before I highly recommend you add it to your bucket list!