Honduras...

I was sitting in our Honduran hammock today and it made me think of swinging with these precious ones, and that made me miss them. I wish I could will myself back there, swinging on the porch with one or two in my arms, watching the rest of the kids playing in the front yard. It was exhausting spending two weeks at Destino, and frustrating because of the language barrier, but our hearts were full. Our hearts were full of love for these kids and joy at seeing God's provision for them. You can read more about the ministry at www.destinodelreino.org

The rest of the story...

So after leaving our beloved Missoula, we wound our way up to Kalispell. The drive was so gorgeous with views like this abounding...

Of course, arriving in Kalispell we had an even better view waiting for us...

Our friends Tom and Cristy(hi guys!) graciously welcomed us and provided us with great conversation, wonderful entertainment from their boys,yummy burgers for dinner and a hearty breakfast in the morning, and even sent us off with a bag of their fabulous homemade soap--thanks again guys for such a wonderful time! We are so impressed with Tom and Cristy making their dream of living in Montana a reality and it was so fun to experience it in person.

We then drove about an hour to Glacier National Park. WOW!! We really just did a drive through this time...but we must go back to explore and hike in that most beautiful place!!





From Glacier we headed to...





We drove away with a glimpse of the Grand Tetons before sunset and then worked our way back to SLC. What an amazing, creative God we have! Now I must go and study a not so creative Teachers Manual titled, "Focus on Grammar: An integrated skills approach". Does that sound fun or what?!? I think Modals are on the menu for tonight:) Jen

In Missoula we found...

More music!! This time it was a "Symphony in the park" concert and it seemed the whole city decided to come. It was a beautiful day and the music was wonderful and it was fun to people watch in this town that we now call, "Our new home." :) Who knows, really, if we'll ever live in Missoula. It's just one of those places that seems like a great place to be. Anyway, here are all of the peoples listening to the symphony.

We also found a store with loads of great shoes. Mom, are you sitting down? I finally purchased some new shoes!!As you can imagine, it took about an hour to try on all of the different choices, talk them through with the poor salesgirl who had no idea what she was walking into when she asked if she could help me, talked them through with Joel, decided on the practical all brown pair and then confessed that I had always wanted a pair of shoes with a touch of red.. so here they are...

...I'm pretty much in love with them and they are sooo comfy.
We also found a great coffee shop where I wrote the first Missoula post...

We found some really yummy food at the local natural food store...

Lots of cute shops, millions of bicycles being ridden around town, the University of Montana...it was a great place. After spending Saturday and Sunday in Missoula , we visited friends in Kallispelle on Monday, drove through Glacier National Park on Tuesday, Yellowstone National Park and the Tetons on Wednesday, drove back down to SLC today where Joelie dropped me off as I was feeling a bit fluish and have sooo much to do for school on Monday, and Joel is now driving on to the wedding in Colorado. So, needless to say, I have many more pics to post. First, though, I must sleep, unpack, give this kitty laying next to me some attention, and then I'll share some more memories of this wonderful, "only Joel could make all that happen in a week and it still be relaxed and fun" roadtrip that was this past week. Jen

Bubapalooza....

Well, our days as groupies are over for now. We got to see bub and the band in Hailey, Boise, and Challis ID, and then we drove off into the sunset towards Montana. Here are some pictures from our time hanging out on the bus,the drive from Boise to Challis, the outdoor festival in Challis, and one of our campsite where we could ride our bikes back and forth to the festival.
The boys hanging out on the bus before the Boise show.
Such a classic bub photo that Joelie took...I love it.




The drive from Boise to Challis was soooo beautiful! At one point during the drive Joelie said, " I hope things get uglier soon, I don't know if my heart can take much more of this." I hope I never forget these moments when Joel feels so full of joy that he could burst. Of course not every moment is perfect (car sickness was my reason for hoping the scenery changed soon:), but overall the oohing and aahing over backwoods cabins, making each other laugh by saying the most ridiculous things when we start to get bored, stopping at a gas station to get treats right after having a serious conversation about the need to "eat more whole foods", watching my husband and my brother laughing and loving music together...it has all made for some pretty wonderful days.





After saying our goodbye's to bub and thanking him for a wonderful groupie experience, we headed out from the festival towards Missoula, Montana. We got here late last night tired and a bit sunburned only to find there was no room at the inn. No room at any inns in town, in fact. A really nice lady from Super 8 called a place 4 miles out of town and he said that he had one more room, couldn't vouch for its cleanliness, and that he would only be here for thirty more minutes and wasn't waiting around--yikes!! We zipped out of town and hoped for the best. We pulled in and a man with a hunting cap and alarmingly large belly told us that the room was still available--whew! I asked hesitantly if they had wireless internet, and he said, "Wireless internet.I think they may have hooked that up last week." I was a little dubious but you never know. We got to our room, which was in fact clean, and I pulled out the laptop and tried. What do you know?! So, I happily checked my e-mail and then we fell into bed thankful not to be sleeping in the car. We had a wonderful nights sleep and woke up to find that this little motel is surrounded by beautiful green mountains! We decided to stay here again tonight since it's clean, cheap and not far from the town we are so ready to explore. So off we go...I'll let you know what we find.Jen

On the road again...

We decided to go on a weekend road trip before the madness of school begins for Joelie in less than a week now! We left Friday morning and returned on Monday night having visited Bryce Canyon National Park, Zion National Park, Flagstaff AZ, and the Grand Canyon!!! It was a wonderful time to say the least.Here is a little pictoral journal of the weekend, and you can click on the Flickr link to see many more pictures.


Here we are...Sammy all packed up and ready to head out on his first big adventure! We took full advantage of having our first in-car CD player and were accompanied on our trip by wonderful folks like Johnny Cash, Loretta Lynn, Jack Johnson, the Dixie Chicks,Roger Miller and lots of others--we love having good tunes along for the ride!

Our first stop was Bryce Canyon. We were amazed at this beautiful national park in southern Utah. It is famous for its "Hoodoos", which are those tall rock formations you see everywhere.


We went on a great 3 mile hike down into the canyon. By the time we got back up we were starving and devoured a 2 slices/1.00 pizza special the Camper Store was having as it had been sitting there all day long and it was now 8:00! It tasted delightful and we headed back to our campsite to settle in for the night.

The weather was getting a little chilly as we set up the tent-- I think it was about 39 degrees when we got into our sleeping bags. We warmed our bodies with hot chocolate and I snuggled in to read my People magazine(hey, have I ever claimed to be a hard core outdoorsman?!). We turned out the lantern and I begged my body to stop having to use the bathroom and stop shivering. No luck. Then I heard Joel start to snore!! Amazing:) It was a long night for me, and yet still I woke up invigorated by the fresh air and was ready to get on the road to our next destination. After breakfast, finally going to the bathroom and getting warm in snuggly Sammy, I quickly passed out until we reached Zion:)


Zion was really crowded and we decided not to stay long. It was amazingly beautiful,though, the canyon was majestic. We will definitely go back, hopefully on a weekday.

We then made our way to Kanab, Utah. Joel may be doing a rotation there in his second year of school and so we were curious to see what it was like. It was a small, touristy town with a lot of potential. The employees in every place we went in the town were exceedingly grumpy,but we're hoping it was just a really bad day for everyone and not always like that. The town was having a greyhound dog parade and so greyhounds were Everywhere-- that was fun to see. We were happy for all of those dogs that they were saved from death after their racing career was over.

After spending Sat. night in Kanab we drove to Flagstaff, AZ. What a fun town! I wish I would have taken more pictures but I didn't:( Sometimes you just get so into an experience that pictures almost take away from it. That was the case in Flagstaff. We didn't have long there and wanted to soak it up. We went on a hike right outside of town and then enjoyed all of the cool, earthy shops and art galleries and then spent the night in a very clean and comfortable Super 8.

On to the Grand Canyon we flew!This was Joel's first trip and it was fun to see him see the canyon for the first time. You get to see it too...

Walking up to the edge...

Peering over...

Disbelief at the enormity:)


After our time at the Grand Canyon, we started the long trip back up to SLC. We were entertained by Aron Ralston book on CD called "Between a rock and a hard place", the story of his climbing trip to southern Utah that ended with him being trapped by a boulder and having to amputate his own arm to get out of the canyon! Thankfully, our trip to the canyons wasn't nearly as dramatic.This weekend was one of those times where all you can see in life is the sun, no darkness looming. Being a realist, I know that these times in life are pretty rare and so I'm thankful each time I experience one. This weekend I was thankful for a healthy body to enjoy the outdoors with, an adventurous soulmate to explore with, and the sun shining down on our faces. Oh, we were also thankful to get to see all of these little guys...
...so,so cute!

That's all for now guys!