Washington Trip: photo journal

Our first morning we packed up the Harley's and we were on our way.
We stopped at the cute Maltby Cafe and were 10 minutes too late for the breakfast menu, but still was able to get one of their MEGA huge cinnamon rolls.
The ride of course had very beautiful scenery. so much green everywhere and the majority of the ride was along a stream or a river. A few of our rest stops along the way:

We spent the first night in a cute little town called Leavenworth - known for its "Bavarian" theme. i've never been to Europe, but I pretended that's where I was :)

Welcome to Leavenworth. 



The Gingerbread Factory. I got a yummy ginger snap!

We rode the trolley from the hotel to downtown. 
The weather was wonderful the entire time. It was so peaceful and I loved being outside for the majority of the trip.
Good bye Leavenworth.
on our way to the ranch...

At the ranch in Cle Ellum. This place is so pretty and quiet. Can you believe this is the view from our bedroom?
Just wanted to capture some of the simple and beautiful things at the ranch.

We cruised around in the 57 chevy to the movies in town and even had a little drag race on main street after being provoked by some teenagers in a brand new dodge charger. It was so awesome when Clyde smoked them! and we had 4 people in the car!! the kids in the other car got a kick out of it too, and they were giving us peace signs as they drove off.
getting ready to leave the ranch... :(
Back on Mercer Island - My sister Sarah and her husband Andrew came up to visit with us and eat some Pizza. Again, perfect weather. we stayed out on the deck most of the evening.
I joked around with Sarah, who is 6 1/2 months pregnant, that we needed to get some maternity shots! It made me realize that I need alot of work/practice photographing people. It's hard!

p.s. this picture below is suppose to be cheesy ;) not serious, yall
They are celebrating their 1 year anniversary next month, so I got a couple of the two of them.

bye bye Washington! It was fun! And thanks Curfews for being the hostesses with the mostest.

WA trip

We just got back from Washington, and we had the best time. We went on a 3 day Harley mini-trip and stayed in very beautiful places. And I also got to see my lil sis Sarah (who lives in Olympia) before they take off to Ohio. I will post more pics soon. It's gonna be hard going back to work tomorrow. :(

Not enough hours in the day/week

Recently i have felt as if there are not enough hours in the day OR maybe not enough minutes in each hour. My day is usually eaten up by meetings, meetings and more meetings at work, and then I some how have to find time to get the work done. 

the past week or so has also been busy with non-work related things. So - here are a few snapshots of what we've been up to (other than work).

Melissa Thornton Carlisle's Wedding:

Last Saturday my former roommate Melissa got married to Blake. They are perfect for each other. She had a lovely reception at her friends house in Villa Park- and the backyard was beautiful. 

Me and the lovely bride Melissa

Enjoying the lovely backyard. :)

Pageant of the Masters 

Wednesday evening we headed down to Laguna Beach for its annual summer showcase - Pageant of the Masters - where art is brought to life.  It was opening night for family and friends of the volunteers in the art show - which means you could bring in food/picnics. This was our second time going and we loved every second of it! We were surrounded by mountains and fresh cool summer evening air - it was a refreshing escape from the hustle and bustle of life.

We ended up sitting right next to a group of 15 who adapted us into their group. They called us "16 & 17" and shared all of their food and snacks. Since they come every year, they have the whole picnic thing down. They had the best home-made taquitos and guacamole ever!!
The outdoor theater is carved into the side of a hill in Laguna Canyon just up the road from main beach:
POM is a mind-blowing celebration of artistic work using a technique called "tableaux vivants", or living pictures. In a nutshell, famous paintings and sculptures are recreated using actual people in costume and makeup, with intricately designed backgrounds to make it look like the original work of art.

If the concept sounds hard to grasp, imagine looking at a three-dimensional version of a painting, except for the fact that the sets and lighting are done in such a way to make it look like you’re looking at a two-dimensional piece of art. I try squinting throughout the show because it looks like something painted on a canvas, rather than live-bodied people in costume.

The pictures I took were really blurry - because I couldn't use the flash. But you can get an idea... can you believe those are all real people???

Again, all real people!!! So cool!!

Here is a good photo that i found on the internet that shows "behind the scenes".

another behind the scenes image of how they prepare for the show.

Chinese Classes

I've been taking Mandarin classes at Jeremy's school on Tuesday and Thursday nights. It makes for really long days not getting home until 10pm - BUT i actually feel like I'm learning it! Just the other day at Costco, I heard a lady on her phones speaking Chinese and i was able to pick up a word or two of what she is saying! i was so excited! 

I think the most important thing I've been able to learn are the phonetics - also known as "Pinyin". Some of the sounds are REALLY hard to pronounce. 

Another important thing that i've learned are the 4 tones. Because if you don't say the tone right, you could be saying a completely wrong word.
4th of July!

Can i just say that it was so awesome having the 4th land on a Friday! And then still having the next day off too! It was delightful!

We headed down south to San Diego (Pacific Beach) for an all day BBQ at the Shelby's. We hung out at their cute little beach house and walked back and forth to the beach - just a few houses down - all day. The night before was a little crazy - got out of class at 9:30pm, still had to go grocery shopping. The Grocery was PACKED!!! I even had to go fish a buggy out of the parking lot. I made Loaded Baked Potato Salad, Rice Krispie Treats and home-made rocky-road brownies. So I didn't hit the sack until 1am. Yikes! Especially because we had to get on the road early around 7:30am. Anywho - it was all worth it. We had a great day! It was a relaxing and easy-going day.

The Shelby's (Monique & Tommy)

The Curfews :)

BBQ on the Patio

Home-made Rocky-Road Brownies (picture from the author)

My brownies before i cut into squares: 

This was the best dessert recipe I've ever found. I loved every bite of it. The key in the recipe was to use the finest ingredients of everything!! Including home-made vanilla marshmallows, fine 100% cocoa chocolate,  they even had specifics on what kind of butter to use (unsalted with 82% butterfat). I did my best to find the key ingredients and improvised when needed. 

Chillen at the Beach - there was a marine layer all day - which helped keep things cool.
Thanks Shelby's!!!!

Saturday - Balboa Island (Newport Beach)

Yesterday we got a new digital SLR and had a field day on Balboa. We even watched the little tutorial video it came with. We had the best time. It was another beautiful day. We had a lot of fun experimenting and practicing with all of the different settings. 

Here are some of my favorites from our practice day:











We ended the day with eating at a little Chinese restaurant and a movie at the Big Newport.  (We saw Get Smart. Thought it was funny.)