Friday, November 27, 2015

Birthday Adventures!

Well, a lot has happened since my last post! I wish I had more time to recount it, but life always keeps me on my toes.

I am very excited to say that the tiny tomato plants in my garden the last post grew quite tall and I got to eat delicious grape tomatoes all summer! I was so proud :)  The red pepper plant I planted at the same time (in may/june) didn't grow for months, then all of the sudden (in October), grew taller, and got peppers on it! Right now (yes, right now, in NOVEMBER!) I'm waiting to see what will happen. Will they completely mature and i will get bell peppers in December? Or will they just hang out on my plant for another 2 months and then call it quits?  We shall see. . . And it is almost time to plant more rainbow chard!! Even my small endeavors in gardening are exciting to me, especially when I can grow something in the middle of winter!


I was able to back to Iowa this summer to attend the wedding of my dear friend Melissa. It was so wonderful to be there for so many reasons. It meant seeing God's faithfulness in Melissa's life to bring her a husband, something we have prayed about for probably as long as we have known each other. And it was wonderful because I got to see all my friends again, one of which I haven't seen for years because she has been living in Australia, and it was such a surprise to see her! The occasion was a grand reunion of M 'n M ladies from back in the day. :)

Also, at the end of the summer, I took a fantastic vacation with one of my favorite travel buddies, my brother. We took our second trip to Europe, visiting 4 countries on the continent this time. The Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, and Germany, visiting friends and one of our cousins and his family along the way. I have grand plans of putting some of that on here. . . I really will try, but I won't promise anything!



I suppose one other way I spend a lot of time these days is hanging out with my new(ish) boyfriend, Anthony :). You may have seen some evidence of this on facebook, but we are enjoying eating at lots of fun restaurants, getting me caught up on some good tv shows (like The Flash!) and movies I have long been missing, and just doing life while getting to know each other. And of course, having a great birthday adventure! I didn't mis-title the post!


Anthony decided that since I have never been to the Magical Kingdom on either coast, that he would take me on my first trip to Disneyland for my birthday. It was great! Better than I expected, although I'm not so sure I knew what I really expected! :)

It is Disney's 60th Diamond Celebration or something, so the castle has these pretty "diamonds" draped all over, if you can see them in the pictures. It was rather pretty at night, especially. Additionally, we were lucky to go right after Halloween, so everything had been decorated for Christmas! And they change the Haunted Mansion to a Night Before Christmas theme, which was pretty neat. We got to watch Fantasmic, the evening show, which was pretty incredible. We did have to watch the fireworks from farther away from the castle. But they were still great. They have these ones, that look like shooting stars. So beautiful.

One of the things I really liked about it was all the little details, such as having a jazz band playing on the patio we ate at in the New Orleans area! And, we had the most fantastic pumpkin cheesecake there! The rides we were able to get on were really fun, even though we didn't ride any crazy awesome rollercoasters like I got to at Six Flags two years ago :) I particularly enjoyed Pirates of the Caribbean and Thunder Mountain. And we missed some things (like Space Mountain!) so really, we kinda need to go back. . . :)

Well, that's all for now. Until next time!