Faith Restored?

It snowed again last night in Portland... maybe 2-3 inches even. But then in the middle of the night, it warmed up and everything was gone in time for the kids to go back to school this morning--after a very long three week break. Yay! My faith in the Portland weather is nearly restored.

Unfortunately, our power went out this time from approx. 9:45pm to 4:30am. That was not so great. The worst part is the power goes out when everything is in full swing, and then it comes back on in the middle of the night, TV's come on, lights come on, things start beeping.... and there goes a peaceful night's rest.

Do you believe in Karma?

On New Year's Day Michael, Sammy and I decided to go see a movie: Apple - Movie Trailers - Slumdog Millionaire. It was an amazingly good feeling that we could just drive out of our driveway with almost no snow in sight. We headed on down to Fox Tower Cinemas which is pretty close to our house and since we work in the Fox Tower, we pay for parking anyway, so we might as well take advantage of it on the weekend too. For some reason the excruciatingly expensive Fox Tower Cinemas was swamped (who knew everyone in Portland went downtown to a movie at 5pm on New Years Day?). At about 4:55pm we arrive for a 5:20pm show. For the first time in my experience, there is a LINE at this theater, and for our movie. Now, this movie came out well over a month ago and its not like its Harry Potter or anything. We got in line, but the theaters are super small at the Fox Tower so I knew it was going to be tough to find three seats together with as far back in the line as we were. We entered the theater and as people were scurrying to their seats I saw a row towards the back that had four seats left. We graciously made our way up to the top, patiently waiting behind, hmm, hmm older folks trying to get seated. We politely make our way past a couple at the end of the aisle and just as I am about to sit down, a guy and his girlfriend jump the seats and hurriedly sit down in two of the four seats. I say, excuse me, but we have three people and we were here first and we came in the proper way--and he looks me in the face and says: "since we are actually sitting in the seats, obviously we got here first" and then he looks away. His girlfriend actually did look mortified, but he looked rather pleased with himself. By the time this altercation ended, there were only single seats left throughout the theater--and the front row, of course. So, we exited the row and the theater and did not see the movie. We did not end up seeing a movie that day.

So, I have to be honest, a little piece of me is hoping some bad will come to that "guy"-- I actually wished some bad Karma his way... is that wrong?

A Year in Review

We have already said good-bye to 2008 and here's

a little recap of why it was a pretty great year:

In January, we spent a long weekend in Los Angeles with Michael's Parents

In February, Michael and I spent Valentine's Day in London. Michael is window shopping at the Portobello Road Street Market

In March, Sammy's baseball season officially started. During spring break we took it easy and spent a few days at the Oregon Coast.

In April, Sammy's 8th grade class spent two weeks in Japan. Sammy is looking upside down at the Amanohashidate bridge. If you look at it upside down, it looks like it is a bridge to the heavens. Michael was also in Japan at the same time as Sammy, for business.

In May, Joey attended his first prom with his girlfriend Julia. The boys also made their annual trek to the Sasquatch Music Festival over Memorial Day weekend at the Gorge Amphitheater in Washington State.

In June, Joey did back to back outdoor trips with his school. The first a biking trip through the Redwoods which returned to school at approx. 7pm on a Sunday night and then he turned around and left at 7am the next morning for a grueling five day backpacking trip to Hell's Canyon. Sammy also graduated from the 8th grade in June.

For 4th of July weekend, we visited with the Lubitz & Bloch families in Bellevue, WA. This picture is taken at Snoqualmie Falls Lodge where we had brunch on Sunday. Michael is not in the picture because he had already left for a business trip to London and Paris.

August was dedicated to mourning for the passage of our Golden Retriever Kelsey and then celebration of the new addition to our family: Lily. Sammy and I also took a road trip to Salt Lake City to visit Uncle Andy and Lindsay and drop off some furniture to the new GTT-SLC office (no pictures for some reason).

In September, we celebrated a bountiful harvest from our garden. Sammy started high school and both boys are back at the same school again, yippee!

In October, Joey and Sammy went on a school rafting trip and Michael and I celebrated Michael's 45th birthday in San Diego, CA. We also harvested the pumpkins from our garden and had a party.

In November we took an extended Thanksgiving Break vacation to London and Scotland.

And in December, we got snowed in!

Cheers to a fantastic 2009 for everyone!