Birthday with a Bang

This week has been perfect. Dani planned a man-cation for my birthday on Wednesday! She bought me a box of bullets and we went out shooting at the range, and after that we exhausted ourselves climbing at the gym. She surprised me by preparing breakfast, lunch and dinner with all my favorite foods - bacon, raspberries, havarti cheese, and marinated steak.

I also enjoyed receiving birthday cards and calls from the Roylances, Naomi, both grandparents, and texts from several other family members and friends. Best birthday ever.

Slow-motion captured the muzzle-flash from my handgun. Sweet!

Despite my advanced age, that is not a dad-pooch around my belly.
My under-shirt was just bunched up beneath my tshirt. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Best marinated steak I've ever had!

Dani totally made this day awesome. I sure am lucky to call her mine - she's my greatest blessing!

Mendenhall Glacier Kayaking

Our friends, the Wellings, were kind enough to once again let us borrow their kayak on our day off this week. It was a shorter day on the water than the day we went sea kayaking, because we paddled the Mendenhall Lake up to the glacier--and the water was freezing! However, the frozen fingers were worth the views as we were able to get close to the face of the glacier as well as it's many icebergs. Paddling around here is a new experience for us--our inner riverguides are used to being able to set our paddles down and still float downstream on the river. Sadly, that's not how it works on a lake. But the good news is paddling on still water builds character and muscle all while letting you take in views you couldn't see any other way! The deep blue and white shades of the glacier and icebergs are stunning against the gray silty water and the low rain clouds. The trees on the banks of the lake are exploding into fiery reds and yellows indicating that fall is already upon us.

An iceberg window

Other than that it was a pretty slow week filled with lots of work (both of us), schoolwork (Chris), and playing in the kitchen (me). We've felt the need to temporarily eliminate sugar from our diet (for REAL this time - ending with a permanent and significant decrease of sugar intake for the future), and eat more whole foods as opposed to processed foods that are so conveniently sold in a price range that targets broke college kids like us. It's hard to believe how much sugar is in so many things until you read the ingredients on the labels (for clarification, we know there is natural sugars in fruit, and we are still eating fruit). As part of the change we've had to become creative with our food, because heck, it's not a doughnut so we need more than some gross kiefer to keep us satisfied!

Remember to pray and remember to play (and eat),

Mr. & Mrs. Andrew

We Got a Dog!!!

Just kidding. We did however dogsit for a full week, and took our job very seriously. The majority of our week was simply filled with going on runs and walks with Fynn. This was actually a really good experience for us as our time dogsitting made us recognize that we are not ready for the responsibility of caring for a living creature. Fynn not only needed to be walked twice a day but also needed to be fed twice a day and had to be let out to go to the bathroom. As Chris said, “How are you ever supposed to leave the house?” Not to mention neither one of us enjoyed picking up dog feces and having to carry it around until we saw a trashcan. So we probably won't be getting our own dog any time soon, but we sure had fun getting on some trails with Fynn.

This week we also spent a fair amount of time in the kitchen. After all, I had gallons on gallons of berries to deal with. So,

We made fruit leather for hiking snacks...

Only a small portion of the fruit leather we made. 

And freezer jam!

We also had the opportunity to take advantage of a sunny day and get some climbing in. We both really wanted to climb at a place called the Sea Cliffs (it's super beautiful and you can only climb it when the tide is low or there will be no place for the belayer to stand). After spending some time bushwhacking and searching for the climbs we were disappointed when they were finally found. All the bolts were completely rusted and although some rusted bolts can still be ok to fall on, it's impossible to tell which ones so we decided not to risk it. *We're more saftey cautious than most of you think - take a moment here to just be proud of us.*

There was a climb that was just off the road which we saw driving to the Sea Cliffs so we decided to do a quick climb there before heading home.

Other than all that our week was filled with lots of work, math homework, and yoga (I'm trying to get into it, and this was a good week as far as actually taking the time – Naomi should be proud). Oh, and we watched a really cool documentary called Breaking Ice with our friends Ben and Camille. Yah, we like glaciers.

Remember to pray and remember to play,

The Andrews