Life Happenings...

Well, although life has been pretty slow lately we thought we should at least say hello!

Some highlights of the new year so far have been:
*Brandon turned 27 years old!!!
*Carole continues to work on her application to a program to get her teacher certification. So far this has included a lot of work on an application essay, taking Math 99 at the community college, and taking the WEST-B. The WEST-B is a skills assessment for people who want to go into a teaching program. I think mine went pretty well, I feel confident! My math class has actually been fun, and has made me feel a little more confident about going back to school, so that is good! There is still a long haul left on the application process. If I pass the test and they like my application then I face a group and an individual interview. Hopefully the time passes quickly so I know soon whether I am in or not! If I do get in I'll start in June and it is a one-year intensive program that combines my schooling with several days a week in a school in Bellingham.
*Brandon has started the recruiting portion of his year, so far he has visited Concordia in Portland. This will culminate in his visit to Lake Placid, NY the end of February to trade applications with the other camps of the Lutheran association that Lutherwood is a part of. He is getting excited for this trip because he'll also spend a few days visiting his best friend John, who just joined the Secret Service and is now in New York City. Carole, unfortunately won't be able to make it as planned because of class and work commitments. =(
*Smokey's jaw has healed completely, you can't even see where it was broken on the x-rays. He's enjoying chewing things again!

I guess that sums it up for the most part. Don't forget, we are always open to having visitors!!!

Whew, a scare!

We had quite the scare last night. We thought Bandit had gone on to fish heaven. Which is easy to think when he has his head shoved under a rock on the bottom of his bowl and his tail is sticking straight up. But when Brandon gave him a nudge he seemed to be just fine. We did move him a little closer to the heater, because we are having weather that is just not supposed to happen around here and our furnace is having a little trouble keeping up!
We have about a foot of snow (which Smokey is loving, at least) and it hasn't gotten above freezing for 3 days. In a place that it rarely gets BELOW freezing we aren't sure what to do with that!!! But, the good news is...it has been sunny!!!! Yeah!!!!

=+=I'm a math genius!!+=+

So on Tuesday I started the math class, Math 99, I have to have before I can get into the teaching program I'm applying to and I left class feeling like I was a) old and b) very far behind, since everyone else in there had just finished the Math 98 class last quarter. On Wednesday we got our first homework and as I did it I thought, "hey, I remember most of this" On Thursday our professor asked if anyone had any questions and I realized "I'm a Math Genius!" (I know, I know, there are no stupid questions, but still!)

Memories of Vacation

Hi everybody! We just wanted to let you know some of what our Christmas vacation was like. This year we decided along with Carole's parents and brothers to take a trip somewhere fun. We chose Zion National Park because we could then also catch a Phoenix reunion of Dad's parents and brothers, and all their families.
Zion was amazing. Every morning we would walk out of the lodge and just look up and up and up, and go "wow" We spent our days like this: Breakfast (a yummy, yummy buffet in the Zion Lodge), followed by a 2-4 mile hike, then we'd come back to the rooms for a bit, have a snack, then go for another hike, or a drive, or to the visitor's center, then come back, have a glass of wine by the fireplace, go to dinner (delicious every night no matter where we went!) come back, go to sleep, start all over. It was fabulous. We were there from the 23rd through the 27th.

Then we drove the LONG drive to Phoenix. Mom decided to chase some non-existant =( California Condors, but Connor, Kendall, and we instead detoured to some Anasazi ruins. These were really amazing, too, just the fact that they've survived since 1100! We drove past Sunset Volcano, but didn't get out and look around because it was getting late and it was SNOWING! Luckily we soon dropped back down to the warmer part of the desert into Phoenix.

Phoenix was not as warm as we had hoped it would be but it was a load of fun. Carole's Dad has 4 brothers, and when you add up all the aunts, cousins, grandparents, and one new grandson-in-law (Brandon) we came to a whopping 21 people. The most fun was just getting to see our family again, since we hadn't seen any of them since the wedding. Cousins Laura and Matt had to work, so we didn't get to see them all that much, but we did spend a lot of time with Cousins Livvie, Emma, and Noah. Emma and Noah didn't even remember us, so we had a good time making them think we were fun. Of course we are old, so they thought we should be aunts and uncles, not cousins....
Some of what we did in Phoenix: The Heard Museum (a museum of native cultures, mostly Native American tribes in the Arizona area. VERY cool place), PF Changs for lunch (yum!) followed by a trip to the busiest mall I've ever seen, the Phoenix zoo, and a delicious Mexican restraunt that I can't think of the name of (not Brandon's favorite part of the trip), the obligatory photos of every possible combo of people. Other than that we pretty much ate. and ate. and ate. Fudge, cookies, barbeque, smoked pork fajitas, shrimp gumbo, turkey soup, ahhhhh...I do love food =)

Brandon and I departed Phoenix around 11:00 the night of the 30th after dinner out for Mexican with everyone. We were flying of of Las Vegas so we had about a 5 1/2 hour drive. We got to drive over the Hoover Dam, which we both agree we'd like to see in the daylight. We got into Las Vegas about 4:00, dropped off the rental car and got to the airport so early they wouldn't even let us check in our luggage yet! Once we had finally done that we crashed at our gate for a few hours before getting back to Seattle via San Jose.

Seattle was unusually kind to us and allowed the sun to come out long enough to greet us! Our awesome friend Nichol picked us up and the three of us (plus Smokey and Everest) had a very nice New Year's Eve watching "The Devil Wears Prada" (not as good as the book) and "Little Miss Sunshine" (stinking hilarious, sweet, all around great movie) The next morning we tried to go have a nice breakfast but it turns out all good chefs take New Year's off, so we ended up at IHOP. Then we drove home. It is good to be home.

Pictures from our trip

We'll post more soon, but wanted to at least get a few up....

I love copy machines!!

OK, that is kind of a lie. Right now (and I'd like you to note that it is about 20 minutes after I was supposed to leave) my hero the copy repairman is tearing apart my machine because it abruptly stopped doing anything about 50 copies shy of my goal (somewhere around 700 bulletins) I think he could hear that I was about to burst into tears because there was no one else to handle getting the copier fixed so it had to happen before I leave ona plane at 6 a.m. tomorrow!!! Alleluia, he is here. Now we are just praying it is something fixable without ordering a part or something equally time-consuming. For those of you wondering why this pushed me within about an inch of meltdown....it is because the exact same thing happened last year as I was trying to leave for Christmas!!! This copier does not like Christmas (I think it is a "Happy Holidays" copier!!!) That is me, the crazy copy girl, signing off in hopes of leaving soon!

Merry Christmas!!!!

We just wanted to wish everyone (all two of you!) that visits our blog a Merry Christmas! We are heading off to Zion Nat'l Park, UT and Phoenix, AZ with Carole's family, so we are looking forward to some sun and warmth! Smokey is excited too, that he gets to go to Bowzer's B & B (we are telling him it is a spa, not a kennel) Hopefully all goes smoothly there!
In other news....
last night we got complimentary tickets to an improv comedy theatre here in Bellingham that is owned by Ryan Stiles of "Whose Line Is It" Mr. Stiles lives on the same lake the camp is on and so therefore knows our buddy Nichol who used to have Brandon's job. They went to visit and long story short he got us some free tickets. But the really exciting thing was we didn't think he would be performing, it wasn't advertised at all that he was. But he did!! We had a lot of fun and it was a good evening out, even if it did mean a short night's sleep!
We aren't sure how much chance we'll have to update while on vacation, but we will if we can!!
~Carole

We have a Neph-dog!!!

Brandon's sister Melissa just adopted this cutie-pie, Drake. He is an American Bulldog and at 60 pounds is probably about half-size! Uff-da! He'll be able to put Smokey in his place, for sure!

Just another picture

Well, I thought this was a very "Washington" picture of us, so I thought I'd post it. This was taken at a state park on the coast about 20 minutes from the camp. We just visited for the first time and it might be one of my (and Smokey's) new favorite places. I'm sure it's beautiful in the summer, too, but this time of year it is just exactly what I will always imagine when I think of Bellingham. (After I move somewhere that is dry occassionally, someday!!) This picture is a little blurry but shows you how even rain can be beautiful (sometimes)

Happy Thanksgiving

We have had a wonderful week and a half of family visiting over Thanksgiving. Here are some highlights:

A "little" electrical work...thanks Dad!

Going to Larrabee State Park with the parents. We even saw a seal! It was a bit damp but all in all a beautiful view of the Puget Sound

A visit to Orcas Island in the San Juans by ferry.

Waking up to a little snow on Saturday....

And a LOT of snow (15 inches!) on Sunday!

See you next year!!!

John and Pam got Married!

Brandon's best friend John got married this weekend in St. Louis, MO,
so we were there for the occassion.

The Scheer clan with the new Mr. and Mrs. Havecker.

The wedding party headed to a nearby park for some fun pictures before the reception.

John was somewhat perturbed that
a) he had to put the veil over his head, and
b) he had to kiss Pam in public for the second time that day
but I think that this picture is so cute!!

Pam got John good when he went to take off the garter and she was wearing her long underwear. We missed the photo op but she jumped up and did a jig with her dress over her head. It was pretty stinking hilarious to see the look on his face!

All in all we had a wonderful time and the wedding was gorgeous.
Best wishes, guys!!

Our First Trip to Canada!

Well, we finally made a trip to Canada. We went up and roller bladed around Stanley Park, which is an island just off the coast in Vancouver and the whole thing is a city park with walking, biking, and rollerblading trails around the perimeter. It was about a 10 km. trip around, and the coolest part by far was that you were pretty much on top of the sea wall the entire time, and on the outer side of the island the waves were shooting straight up the sea wall and crashing on the trail! We did a good job of timing our sprints and didn't get washed out to sea =) We didn't have the camera with us for that (didn't want to fall and break it!) but we did get some amazing sunset shots after we were done roller blading.

We didn't get a picture of the welcome to Canada sign-Brandon was pretty worked up about the whole border crossing thing (he forgot where he lived when asked) and wasn't thinking about photo ops. But he was a little calmer on the way back (and we had a longer wait) so we got a Welcome to the US pic!

Happy Howl-a-ween!

Happy Howl-a-ween from Everest & Smokey!

and Brandon, and Carole, and Nichol! We had a great time at the Lutherwood Harvest Festival (we were pretty much the only ones there) and Smokey and Everest wore the Halloween costumes from Auntie Melissa. Smokey was a Fire Hydrant and we tried to turn Everest into a fire fighter, but he wasn't big on the costume thing!

Shaunda Got Hitched!

Well, she went and did it! My good friend and roomie from college got married on October 14, 2006. Congrats Wade and Shaunda, aka Mr. and Mrs. Hall!

p.s. please note that I made my own bridesmaid dress!

Sunrise in North Cascades Nat'l Park

On the way to Shaunda's wedding we drove the "long" way through North Cascades National Park. It was amazing, the mountains are possibly even a little more rugged than Glacier NP and the fall colors were in full glory.

Diving for a Tent?

So this week Brandon got to do a little scuba diving in Lake Samish, for a tent, of all things! One of the canopies blew into the lake and sank like a stone. Unfortunately the water is pretty murky with algae right now so he couldn't see a thing, the dive was unsuccessful, except he didn't die, so I guess that is a success right there!

Smokey and the Bandit

Smokey's new "Brother" Bandit the Betta was adopted last weekend! Hey it's a new grandbaby picture on the blog.

More Smokey

Happy Fall! Here are some pictures of Smokey's wired jaw. Just what you all wanted to see!

And his friend Everest is snuggling and helping him feel better.

Smokey's surgery

So, here is an x-ray taken during Smokey dog's surgery-the arrows point to the main fracture, as you can see pretty much the front half of this side of his jaw is disconnected from the rest of his head! and there is also a smaller fracture below that main fracture where another piece chipped off the opposite way. Poor baby!!!

Poor Smokey

Well, here is the latest excitement in our lives.
Smokey was drooling a lot and his breath smelled awful so we took him in to get checked. He had a broken tooth, and they couldn't get it out, so he had surgery today to get it removed. As a part of the surgery they did an x-ray and found that his jaw was fractured along that side as well, and inside the fracture had developed an infection. So he now has one side of his jaw wired. For the next 3-4 weeks he'll be eating only mush, and he isn't allowed to chew anything! We've been advised to keep him confined to the house unless he is on a leash and may need to muzzle him if we can't keep him from chewing. This is going to be interesting!!! Hopefully we can get the infection under control and keep the wire stable enough for the fracture to heal. Keep us all 3 in your prayers as we are probably going to go stark raving mad over the next 4 weeks!!

Vacation has come, and gone...

Ahh, well, we are home again. We got in this morning about 6 a.m. Washington time after a REALLY fun drive across 3 states in the middle of the night. That is the problem when one of you is a night person and the other is a morning person, you have trouble deciding when to stop and sleep! But we made it and both are back at work for partial days today. We'll try and get some pictures of our vacation on here before too much longer.

Master Wedding Photographers

Hello all! I know it has been a while, but we are now on vacation and actually have something to say! We spent the 31st - 2nd in Couer d'Alene, Idaho to photograph the wedding of some friends Sarah & Nate. It was a lot of fun and we got a few good ones!! on Saturday we drove home to Carole's parents' in Montana, and we've been catching up on our sleep and county fairs since then. Yesterday we went to the Sanders County Fair with Mom, and almost bought a horse. Lucky for Dad we stopped ourselves! We plan to do a little camping this week and then head to Butte, Montana to visit with Shaunda and go to her wedding shower!
Here is a pic of the beautiful bride, Sarah, and super-groom, Nate. Best wishes, guys!

Wow, we are in the final week of summer camp. Looking back it has kind of flown by, but I think we are both ready for it to be over for a little while!
We had a pretty good weekend. The Lutherwood alumni Reunion was on Saturday, so we both worked at that some, then Nichol, who used to be the program director at Lutherwood, came to visit. We babysat her lab, Everest, all last summer so it was fun for he and Smokey to play again. They have really been wearing each other out!
Brandon did some wakeboarding and Nichol and I did a little tubing. My arm-pit muscles now hurt, and believe me, Yes, there is such a thing as arm-pit muscles!

It's been a while...

Hello! OK, so I guess it has been a while so I figured I would just do a posting for the heck of it and so you don't stop coming to look!
Things were pretty quiet at camp this week, it was family camp which is always a little more mellow because, hey, the parents worry about what the kids are doing!
Next week is a HUGE camp, so we will go out with a bang. And that is that for summer '06.
Brandon and I will regroup here in Washington for a few days and then we are off to Montana, via a friend's wedding in Idaho. We will have 10 days off!!! Unheard of, and we'll be hoarding vacation time for the rest of the year so we have some time off at Christmas, but this is definitely going to be a needed break for us.
When we get back things will be rolling for me at my job, and for both of us the Middle School youth group at my work will get going. We'll be sure and put up some pictures of our vacation!

Our Baby: Smokey

Brandon's newest past-time is wakeboarding, a good one since we have job "perks" of lakefront property, boats, and gear! Consequently Carole has learned to drive the boats, which, by the way, she is awesome at!!

OK, so here is a typical night of a program director. 5 hours in the ER with a counselor who stepped on a kick ball and then threw himself on the ground...we did get some good reading in, though, and an ER at midnight makes for some great, if disturbing, people-watching. The best part of the night was a kid that came in with his parents and sat by us, and you could see where his arm was broken because it was pushing the skin way out, not through the skin, but definitely gross. He had gone last week to our "rival" Bellingham camp so we picked their brains while trying to keep his mind off the fact that his bones were no longer connected!

Greetings from Washington State!
We decided to give this blog thing a try to keep some folks updated on what we are up to, what is going on in our lives, and all that stuff that is REALLY exciting to all of you. Ok, maybe it will be super boring, but I bet once there are baby postings at least our parents and Mel will check it out! No, Carole is not pregnant, just planning ahead!!!

Brandon's sister, Mel, came to visit us for a week. It was great! Most of the time she just hung out at camp and relaxed, but on Saturday we all rode the ferry over to San Juan Island and walked around, bought touristy stuff, and went to the Arts Fair. It was a gorgeous day to be out on the water!

Whale Watching in the San Juan Islands