Whadda’ busy week!

Geez you’d think we were movers and shakers.

Quick recap of what was a big week as we ended up Portland in a much anticipated move.

Tuesday with a little help from some from friends we packed up our belongings and skirted up to our new home in Portland. We were able to find a wonderful two bedroom apartment off of Barbur Boulevard. It’s centrally located between Portland State and PCC, right on a bus line, just in the middle of everything. Today on our last day off together (as we’ve been enjoying our one week summer vacation) we were able to go both to Portland and Tigard for breakfast, shopping, and sights with ease. In particular i'm fascinated how each of the neighborhoods bring their own flair. Mississippi Avenue is one of my favorites, next week I think we'll hit up the Portland Spelling Bee that is held every Monday night at Mississippi Pizza. Ahhh it’s so good to be back in a city I love so much.

Church was great and we’ll be seeing many changes in the coming week. Apparently the stake here has been in a real flux and this Sunday’s attendance (of around 100+) was the biggest in about a year. They’ve redrawn the ward boundaries and we don’t know where we will be by this time in two weeks so we’ll see where we will end up. Met quite a few friendly faces and for really the first time, young married couples who are our age which is really nice. A few of them ended up being old faces from my other branch at Portland State which was a neat surprise. It’s weird though starting anew as I personally am somewhat of a introvert and making new friends hasn’t always been my strong suit so there is the obvious wish to have things remain the same but if experience has taught me anything is that with change we can have something better if we are willing to sacrifice the comfort we desire.

With school starting in a week and part of the reason i'm up here is to attend PCCto become an ASL interpreter and I am amazed on how the Lord will bless us in the most amazing ways. For the first time ever I was able to sit in on a deaf branch of the church. It was located in this very classic looking church (so different looking that I passed it three times because it clearly isn't part of the church's building plan) made of stone and with sweeping steps in the back, intricate woodwork, just gorgeous. It was a very uplifting moment as I sat there and looked at the gospel being brought to people through the hands of His children. I'll be excited to go back and continue to absorb and in time serve.

Brynn got a job at the Lloyd Center Jamba Juice and has been working since Friday. We had a little fun on the bus as we practiced getting from home and work. I’d never thought twice about how the bus worked as I had for most of my life ridden the city bus. Trimet’s system is wonderful but as I saw Brynn fumble around so cutely with the money machine I wished that everyone would get the opportunity to experience what a wonder it is to be able to get around nearly at will. I won’t lie though there are the pitfalls of the transit system as it brings everyone and I mean EVERYONE into one place. Brynn had the pleasure of being hit on the MAX when she was riding alone on Saturday. Haha. I won’t lie in that he made a good choice but next time he’s a dead man.

Saturday also brought dark clouds, ten foot breakers, and a big red dog on the ocean (even for only a few minutes). Got to live the life on a boat as I spent all of Saturday with Joel and Greg Warnock out in the Yaquina Bay, fishing, eating burgers (on a boat), and fighting the ocean. I can’t describe how fantastic it was being on the ocean riding the waves. It was wild and somewhat scary looking back and seeing how big those waves were and how quickly the caught up with the back of boat and lifted it with impunity. Man if only I could retire today (yeah, yeah I know, I haven’t even begun the fight) I would plunk down some dough and get myself a fine sailing vessel. It’s of course a lush lifestyle and we didn’t actually bag any of those jumping salmon but it was exhilarating, every single minute of it.