Mountain Climbed, Ticket Booked, Bags Packed....

Last weekend I went to Colorado for a girls weekend with two friends from Albion, Meredith and Janna. It was such a breath of fresh air (quite literally) to be back with friends from college. Janna summed it up well when she pondered about how we all have ended up in such different circumstances -- we are in different places in the country (we've all been different places in the world at some point), doing varied jobs, and we all married men who are doing different things from each other too, but there are a few core things that will always tie us together: friendship, love of nature, being physically active, and of course the love of food. This year's adventure consisted of camping out in Leadville and climbing Mt. Elbert, the highest peak in The Rocky Mountain Range: 14,433 feet. Meredith was kind to us un-acclimated ones, and let us take a nice pace...it took us about 5 hours up, and 3 hours down.

Here's Janna and Meredith at our FREE campsite near the trail head! :)


Chopping wood for our fire...


Trying to get that fire going...


Cooking dinner...


The start of our hike at 5am with our head lights...


Just before tree line (12,000ft)...


Lots of beautiful wildflowers along the way...


Views of the trail...




The Summit!


The trip down...



After our 3 hour hike down, we stopped for ice cream, and then drove back to Winter Park for a feast! Thanks girls for such a great weekend!

Ryan and I just booked our tickets to Uganda! Our friend Liz's baby is being baptized in January, and we've been invited to be Godparents! I met Liz in Boston when she moved there from Uganda 4 years ago and became my roommate! It has been a huge dream of ours to go to Africa, and to be able to go and be part of a ceremony like this and stay with her family makes it all the more special! We'll be going for 2 weeks this winter, with a 2 day layover in London.

Here is a picture of Liz and Charlene, our God-child-to-be! (The photo is from their visit to Tucson last summer.)


And, for those who are wondering where exactly Uganda is...


As for the bags being packed, that's a little outdated now...I started this post about a week ago. We packed our bags for Michigan to attend our family's annual Brown's Clearing Survivor Games...pictures to come soon!

Running into wildlife...

On the 4th of July, we went and hung out with our neighbors, Jose and Maria. They both work for the prison, Maria is a doctor there, and to be honest I can't remember what Jose's role is. They shared a lot of stories about working there and the stresses of it, not to mention the horrible stories of things that they actually encounter on regular basis. People making alcohol with fermented fruits and becoming really violent when they are drunk, people making weapons by sharpening toothbrush handles, etc. Pretty scary stuff. After chatting away for a few hours, we said we needed to head home because I needed to wake up early to go running. At that note, Jose perked up and said he likes to run and could he join me?

Fast forward now to July 5th at 6:30am... Jose and I meet outside to go for our run. About 1/2 way in, we turn onto Old Spanish Trail, a beautiful road with great mountain views and a pedestrian path. We decide whether or not to actually cross the street to run on the path, or just stay on the side we were on going against traffic...we decide to stay where we are since we wouldn't be on the road for too long. About 15 seconds later, we hear what sounds like a herd of elephants on the path...and look up to see...a herd of javelinas! I didn't have my camera with me, but here is a google image of what a javelina looks like...


They are basically wild pigs. I'm not too sure how safe or dangerous they are in general toward humans. A friend of ours got in between a mother and her young one time and got totally mobbed over, but that happens a lot in wildlife when a mother is trying to protect her kiddos. Needless to say I'm glad we stayed on the side we were on where we could enjoy watching them moving about.

This past Monday night we pulled into our driveway after our salsa lesson, and spotted a HUGE tarantula next to our garage! I've only seen one tarantula before, but Ryan has seen many and claims this to be the largest one he's ever seen. Despite how they are often depicted in the movies and whatnot, they are very slow and gentle creatures. Ryan's family has some well-circulated photos of his dad putting them on his face, shirt, etc...we weren't feeling quite that brave in our observations on Monday night though.

The Art of Eating

This summer we have made it our goal to not go out to eat. I say "goal" because there are exceptions to which we have gone out to eat...but still it is our goal to eat homemade food in a home at a table where we can relax. The reason for setting this goal was largely financial, but also so that we'd be eating healthier. I have to say that I think I have also learned in the process that there is just something really good about eating food that you have poured love into preparing.

Not going out to eat has certainly taught us to be more systematic in planning our meals so that we don't have to go to the grocery store 3 times a day (once for each meal as we decide what we want to eat throughout the day)...as tended to be the pattern of the past. I try to sit down and come up with a menu and a grocery list and hit the store on Wednesday, which seems to be the day that the ads change here in Tucson...and it just so happens that our favorite grocery store (Sunflower Market) does double ad day on Wednesdays where they honor the bargains for the week prior as well as the current week!

We've also been forced to expand our repertoire of meals...(although cheese crisp with salad is still our favorite lunch! :). I've decided to start an online recipe collection so that I can have access to the recipes I like while we are on the road...and so I can share them with all of you!

To access my recipes, go to www.recipezaar.com. There will be a bar with a search option near the top of the page. Click "members" button and then type in absarunnin, and click to search. All of my recipes should come up...I believe in order of when they were posted...with most recent recipes at the top. You'll likely notice that we've been a little addicted to ice cream this summer! We inherited an ice cream maker from Chris and Melissa, and needless to say we have pretty much enjoyed eating ice cream most nights...including tonight. :) If anyone has a recipe for Mackinac Island Fudge ice cream...could you send it my way?? I've been searching online, but nothing is coming up...

Happy Eating!

ESL Camp

Last weekend Ryan and I went up to Mt. Lemmon to be apart of an ESL camp for refugees in Tucson. There were 120 refugees who attended, about 100 were from Iraq, and then a handful from each of the following countries: Congo, Somalia, and Russia. Some had been in the US for 9 months, others for 1 week. It is absolutely unbelievable and humbling to be in the midst of their company and joy. In order for them to be here and have refugee status, it means that they had to flee their own country of political unrest and seek asylum in another country (many that we met were in Egypt, Syria, Rwanda, etc as their asylum country). It could've been for one year or 15 years that were in their asylum country. While there, they apply for refugee status, if they are granted the status, they are then given funds to fly to the US, with 6 months to pay back their airfare. If they don't receive refugee status, they are forced to move back to their original country. Fleeing their own country involves leaving behind family, friends, their home, their cultural surroundings, their possessions, etc...all because they want to have a better life for themselves and their family. If you want to see a great documentary that gives you a glimpse of this, check out, "God Grew Tired of Us", it's about the Lost Boys of Sudan and the transition that some of them make to the US.

The weekend had a large emphasis on English classes, as well as making friends with other refugees and Americans. I worked and played with the kids while the adults took English classes, and Ryan played music during the large group time. But, during downtime we got to just go around and socialize and get to know the families. A friend we met named Munir brought an Oud with him. An Oud is a traditional Iraqi instrument, similar to a guitar though it is double-strung, has no frets, a large curved body, and a bent neck. For almost two hours, he played and sang traditional Iraqi songs while everyone around danced and sang along...no one seemed shy at all...they just wanted in on the fun of music...such a great lesson to learn.

Here are some photos from the camp:

Ryan playing foosball with a group of guys from Iraq...


Munir playing the Oud while everyone is watching Ashrf dance (he's not in the photo)...


Hanging out during free time...


Just this past weekend Ryan's cousin Nathan got married. Going to weddings as a married couple is so refreshing. I love watching new couples embark on this wonderful journey of a life together. Honestly, I usually cry about something during the wedding...it could be the vows, or the way they look at each other, the flowergirls, etc...this time it was the groom's grandfather playing the piano...cute ol' lil' man. :)

Ryan and I went over to the groom's sister's house earlier in the week to help make cupcakes for the rehearsal dinner...


And then on Saturday, the wedding...

God is big(ger) than our new van!

A couple of weeks ago Ryan and Chris were hanging out, and the discussion of touring in a van came up. Ever since that discussion, Ryan has spent countless hours online looking for a conversion van for us to tour more comfortably in this fall. Now, when Ryan wants to buy something, he is very thorough to make sure he's getting the best of it's kind. No impulse buying for him. He signed up for an online subscription to Consumer Reports to be sure he was looking at the best makes and models. He read owner reviews. Searched vans' histories to know if they had ever been in an accident and if they had been well-maintained before even looking at the van, etc. He found vans of interest all the way from here to Illinois. One van with high reviews, that came to the surface, happened to only be about 5 miles from our house. A 2000 Ford Econoline Mark III with a brand new green paint job. It was parked at a used RV lot, and their website said they were a "hassle-free" dealership...which sounded suspicious, but great! Sure enough, they were the most hands-off used car salesmen that we had ever met. We had to go inside to get their attention that we were even there (as opposed to them being at our car door the second we pulled up, as our other experiences have been)...and then they just told us to "walk around, all the cars were unlocked, and to let them know if we needed anything...oh, and cold water was in the fridge". When we told them we were interested in the conversion van, they were quick to be honest and tell us that it needed some repair work. This set us back a little and we weren't totally sure if we should move forward or not. After a couple of days of doing more online research, taking the van to our mechanic to see what exactly was wrong with it (not that much), and lots of pondering...Ryan decided to move forward and make an offer. The van was listed as $7995 as is. We only wanted to pay $7000 since we would have to put some money into it at the mechanic. Gina advised him to offer $6500 if he wanted to pay $7000 since negotiating is unavoidable in these sorts of situations. Like me, Ryan hates these sort of negotiating situations. I won't even negotiate at garage sales! The whole way to the dealership he prayed and just asked God to make it an easy process and that the salesman would just had the van over to him without any hassle. He got to the dealership and talked with the guy in charge and told him he'd like to make an offer of $6500. The guy quickly responded with, "I can do better than that for you, I'll give it to you for $6000." What?? Have you ever even heard of that sort of thing happening at a used car dealership? Thanks God. Welcome to the family Green Machine. :)