Monday, June 29, 2009

Still no internet at the appt., but I have a new job!

Hello friends and family!

So, yes, there is still no internet at our appt. AT&T really has it out for us... It's been a test to our patience; I am still making an A-, but I think Scott is approaching a B. We are supposed to have the internet on Thursday (fingers crossed) but, to be honest, neither one of us are optimistic.

Enough on that! I got a new job and I started today! It is called Taft Street Coffee and it is run by our church, Ecclesia. It was started as a ministry to the community and I believe that it has succeeded. Several people from the church come and go, but there are definitely some students and a handful of homeless people that drop in. Taft has a series of tabs that they leave open for regulars, church staff, employees, etc., but they also have one called "benevolence", which I learned today is for the occasions when homeless people come in wanting a drink. Really neat. We actually had a guy come in today for a Coke that we put on the "benevolence" tab. It just feels good to have a job where I can get to know the members of my church, the local community, and the homeless around the neighborhood. My boss is great and the girl that I will be working with most often is the asst. manager; she is a young woman named Chantal with PLENTY of sarcasm and spunk, but I really enjoy working with her. She is easy to talk to and really encouraged me today.

Scott is doing well, too. He likes his job, but he works such long hours. He leaves the house at 5:45am and comes home around 6:15pm. He says that his co-workers are really helpful and fun, but none of them are Christians, so that is difficult. Scott says that most of their leisure talk is about sex, boobs, and racist jokes. He doesn't participate, of coarse, but right now he is trying to figure out the best way to handle these conversations.

We hosted our first block party at our apartment complex last night and it was a success! We are taking the advice of my Mema and Scott's parents and going to the people instead of waiting for them to come to us. We had a great turn out, lots of good conversation, and plenty of food :-) Our landlord even came! His name is Sam and he is just the sweetest man. He is always available when we need him and I am not sure what we did, but he really likes Scott and I.

Scott's parents came over the weekend and we had a great time with them! We took them to Discovery Green and watched a competition called "Dock Dogs". Yeah, I had never heard of it either until Saturday, haha. Basically, local citizens from the surrounding Houston area bring their dogs in and have them participate in a long-jump competition for dogs. There is a 40 foot dock with a 35 foot pool extending from it; the dogs run down the dock and jump out into the pool as far as they can, have the distance measured, and go again. They take the best of 4 jumps. It was really cool to watch, but so bazar. Most of the dogs had on "dog bathing suits", which.... lets just say it was a brightly colored vest that only covered the front half of the dog. Still, we all found ourselves rooting for our favorite dog, if you can have a favorite after only seeing the dog from a distance for a total of 3 minutes? Good fun, though, and a great way to spend a Saturday afternoon :-) Especially since we are all dog lovers.

Well, that is all for now.

Love you all!

Blessings and peace.

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Married!

So, I must apologize that it has been a month since Scott and I tied the knot and I have not posted!! But-- we still don't have the internet in our apartment because AT&T apparently has a strong desire to test our patience. They are taking quite a lot of pleasure in it, I believe. But! I have found a wonderful coffee shop with free Wi-Fi that I am taking advantage of to update all of you on what has happened in these last 30 days :-)

We had a great honeymoon that started in the Texas hill country. Beautiful. We stayed at a friend of the family's 100 acre ranch in Pipe Creek, Texas in a small, un-airconditioned cabin that is primarily inhabited by come-and-go hunters. All of which are men, I am assuming, based on the quirky details of the place. It was a wonderful week! My grandfather told us that there was a Jeep on the property, gave us they keys, told us where it was, and said "have fun!" We did. We opened the rusty garage door to reveal a 1940s military Jeep with no top, no seatbelts, and yes, it was actually plugged into the wall charging! I felt like I was hopping into an adult-size version of those little red battery-operated Jeeps that we all toted around our driveways in as kids; it was AWESOME! Took us a while to figure out exactly how to get the thing started because, in lou of the fact that is was created in the 1940s, it was not an automatic start. Thankfully Scott can drive standard because, ha, I sure can't. My first and ONLY attempt was in the Temple Bible Church parking lot in a 1996 Ford Ranger when I was 17. I was with Scott, actually. And embarrassing myself in front of the entire 100-person youth group. Anyway, we got it started and we bumped and bumped and jumped and hopped over the very rocky terrain to find an awesome and beautiful river that we swam around in for several hours. We went to a Brandi Carlile concert in Gruene, TX at Gruene Hall, ate at the Greistmill, went to Fredericksburg, and slept in a lot.

The next week was in the Dominican Republic!! A total surprise to me. I didn't have any idea where we were going until the ticket was in my hand the day we took flight. It was stunningly beautiful there. The people were so fun and life there just seemed simple. We did a lot of nothing, but it was the every bit of something that I wanted to do. We stayed at a gorgeous resort on the beach, played some sand volleyball, made some friends, and took advantage of the "all-inclusive" aspects of the trip. All day, all you can eat food, free water sport activities, free alcohol (we did not take advantage of this perk as much as others...) and free tennis! We played tennis everyday for at least an hour and usually more. We went kayaking, which was scary for me, but fun! I came away with only a minor scrape on my ankle from when my kayak flipped over and dumped me onto a pile of coral. That stuff is deceivingly sharp!! Perhaps the neatest and most beautiful part of our week was our day trip to Paradise Island, a small raised sand bar in the middle of the Caribbean surrounded by a most colorful and exquisite coral reef. We snorkeled for probably 3 hours, diving and weaving amongst waving rainbows of coral and swimming amongst an actual school of fish! There was at least 100 in this group of black fish that we followed for several minutes! Now, if you know me, you also know that I am terrified of anything that is deep, wide, dark, huge, vast, etc. The ocean so happens to be all of these so snorkeling was quite an accomplishment for me, but so worth it! The only time I got nervous, aside from looking to my right and realizing there was miles of endless depth and breadth of ocean, was when I saw an eel. Yes, an eel. He was about 1 foot below me. He had absolutely no intrest in me, but who is thinking that?? I quickly popped my head out of the water, choking on a bit of salt water, and dog paddled my way out of that area.

Well, since then, Scott and I have moved into the concrete jungle that is Houston. But fortunately, we have found our quirky and quaint patch of ground in the Montrose area of Downtown. It feels a lot like Austin, TX, which is what we wanted, and we could not be happier with where we live. We have found a wonderful church that is small and so welcoming. It is less than a mile from our apartment so we have been walking/riding our bike to church. We have hooked up with a small group (a.k.a. Bible study/community group) that meets on Tuesdays about 3 blocks from our apartment. So, despite the monstrosity of Houston, we have found our niche that has everything we need within a 1 mile radious. The grocery store is 2 blocks from our house, along with a Starbucks, Einstein Bros. Bagels, Houston Public Library, and several spunky shopping places (yay!)

That is all for now. My fingers are tired :-)

We love you all and hopefully my next post will be from my own apartment with our own internet!

Blessings.