play together / again.

We're halfway done! This is both happy and sad. I'm starting to hear “I miss....” , “I can hardly wait to.........when I get home”. Before we took this trip Joseph and I asked the Lord to show us individually and as a family what He would like to teach us. We're beginning to see that He wants to grow in us a deeper love for each other. And with this love is a dying of self, patience, humbleness – this is hard stuff, especially in a van where we all have different music preferences, different tolerance of noise, different opinions. Joseph and I have also discovered that it starts from the top and works its way down the troops (we're slow learners). So that means we have to watch our tone if we want our children to have good tone and we need to share our last morsel of sweet if we want our children to and.......Keep growing us God, we want to be more like You!

-Katrina-

any time I see strawberries in the store from California, i not only think of our their carbon footprint size but also their taste....other then the ones from our garden, these were quite sweet and only one state away from where they grew 

I've never been a full serve type...but both times I had to get gas in Oregon, I had to wait while someone pumped the gas for me, when I asked they said it was to save jobs, and I could not help wonder about the job that was taken away from me in the process

thanks Jesse and Val for sending us off with some gift cards to the "green circle", you will be pleased to know that as soon as we crossed the  border into Washington, I pulled over at the first 5bucks possible.  Sometime when we are back, I'll show you how to turn a 20oz. "no room for cream" into two other drinks. 

For me yesterday was a long day and some things just tired me out. But today was different, I'm excited about seeing the Sittlers in Vancouver. Around noon we went to the Stash tea store and it was amazing to see all that tea in one building. 3:00 pm we pulled into Seattle and checked in at our hotel and started to walk to the Pikes place market. After that we started to look for somewhere to eat and noticed a Vietnamese restaurant. The minute we walked in the door a delicious smell greeted us. I ordered an Pad Thai seafood dish that I thoroughly enjoyed even though I couldn't finish it all, it will make a good cold lunch for tomorrow. Later 0n we rode the monorail through downtown Seattle. I have been enjoying Seattle and can't wait for tomorrow.

-Joshua-

I'm not trying to make this a food blog, but that Katrina's "Gaeng Gai" with steaming bamboo...

our quant meal was interrupted by siren sounds and shots firing...we know this was an urban experience but what we did not expect was a protest/public art piece happening right before our very eyes....The guy with the megaphone was announcing that everyone should "keep on spending", and that the "coast was clear of any "human rights violations" and the police like person, would keep saying that "every would be fine, and things are under control, time to open up another bank account"

I"m not sure if this is an after image of some of the occupy efforts, but at least this seemed a bit more focused then some of the usual "standing around to see whats going to happen" type of causeless  rallying we've seen at times....

things got worse as we went to the official "Pikes Place" location for the this time brown circle...It was worse then trying to get inside a record store for a free concert....there were people literally reaching over each other with cameras, lines down the street and I kept my distance

I had originally had dreams of discussion about the state of blending/blanding thats going on, and how pikes place is now at every rest stop across the country....but we'll see how tomorrow goes instead.

there were many other street performers...and this one was a true reward for us (especially Abigail) his hands say what your ears can not hear right now...but we will share our cd when we are back....

we met a number of really nice "strangers" in seatle...this one in particilur was enjoying me trying to photograph "Isaiah glad to be out of his car seat...and running/jumping" after talking with him a bit he gave me this red ring form my camera lense as a peace gesture between our rival camera systems...I bumped into him again a block or two later....and this time took this portrait, he then returned the favour with a group shot for our family...His name was Teddy....and some of my little guys thought he was sort of like a west younger Aaron in Seattle.