Joy in the Journey

New Backround

2011-06-28T14:29:00.000-07:00

I like to change it up as you probably know. And I couldn't put x-large pictures on my other setup, hence the change. I grabbed this pic (one from our wedding) because it was easy to grab and I wanted to see it bigger. More posts soon. I need to download pictures from my camera.

Highcliffe

2011-06-27T11:44:00.001-07:00

Today we went to the beach for the first time since we moved here. Our home state would be ashamed of us! Well we had such a good time. After it rained for 10 min, it is England after all, the sun came out and we enjoyed the day and Kira!

Surprisingly the water was not that cold! Now don't mistake me it was cold, but not the kind of cold that makes your appendages go numb. It was definitely bearable.

We love having Kira with us so far we've gone to Blenheim palace (pictures coming) and the beach. We are hoping to go to stone henge soon :)

Stolen

2011-06-26T08:54:00.000-07:00

Yep I stole these pics off Facebook :) Here are just a couple of pics that other people took on our trip to Ca.

We Love...

2011-06-19T22:45:00.000-07:00

The Beach!!!

She's the Best

2011-06-08T21:48:00.000-07:00

Seriously my friend has been so helpful and such a blessing to me during this trip and it's only the second day. :) I love her!

On the plane :)

2011-06-07T02:59:00.001-07:00

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

On our way!

2011-06-07T02:41:00.001-07:00

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Location:The sky

Eights Week

2011-06-04T09:28:00.001-07:00

Every year Oxford holds The Eights, which is a rowing race between all of the colleges in the University. Thousands turn out and fill the river banks. Everyone from uni students to families to older alumni. People BBQ and have parties on river boats. I love seeing all the ex-rowers in their striped sports jackets. (Think Mary Poppins, when they jump into the side walk painting and Bert is wearing that White and red striped jacket.) We had fun meandering around and watching the rowers.

P.S. We are getting very excited to go to California in just a few days!

Oh just saw how this looks on the computer sorry for the graininess I'm working out how to blog from my phone.

(Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone)

Location:The Isis

Instagram

2011-05-30T16:04:00.000-07:00

Wow, long time no bloggity blog. Sorry for the long hiatus!

All these pictures were taken with my phone, I have been instagramming lately, an app where you upload pictures onto a social network. Kind of like twitter but with pictures. Instead of a little blurb about what you're doing/thinking/etc you upload a picture. So these are all some pics I have instagrammed.

I heart Him

2011-02-25T16:41:00.000-08:00

Every monday we have a Bible study, it's my favourite time of the week.

J&V

2011-02-09T07:50:00.000-08:00

J&V just got engaged and asked me to take some pictures of them. I'm not sure how they even knew I like taking pictures, but I don't care I was stoked to be asked.

I love taking pictures and can't wait for my new class to start! Sometimes, I let the business of life stop me from just snapping a few pictures. When I'm taking a class I don't have any choice but to slow down and be purposeful in my photographs.

Condensed

2010-12-18T11:03:00.000-08:00

Here is a little of what I've been up to the past few days. (pics are from my phone)

Made some ornaments

made cookies for the neighbours

Made cake bites (instead of cake pops I was just working with what I had on hand) and how is possible that no one told me how delicious these are? Like bowl licking delicious!

I didn't make the snow but I still like it ;) I did however make a few snowballs.

I make silly faces

I guess I've been in a making mood.

It is snowing...like a ton. I love it :)

We are doing well, enjoying Christmas time. It seems like it was just Christmas. How does it always sneak up on me?

Why I Love the Internet...

2010-12-12T15:57:00.000-08:00

...I get to see this face

forgiven

2010-10-12T13:17:00.000-07:00

Random London Shots

2010-10-07T13:43:00.000-07:00

I just literally looked through my latest picture folder and picked some ones that popped out. The first one might have popped out because of the cute guy :) We spent Monday in London just exploring. We found some cool spots. I loved the old wharfs. Alan likes finding place that have been movies.

Oh and then Alan made me put a picture of myself up :/

The Good Stuff

2010-10-05T13:40:00.000-07:00

That's right people! We finally went to chipotle in London, and let me tell you it was good :) Tasted just like chipotle in America. It was also good to see it really busy because hopefully that means they will stick around over here. We seriously debated going back there for dinner, but London's a big place and we weren't anywhere near it . It makes me want to go to London all the time though. Not that I ever turn down an offer to go there.

The inside was only slightly different still has the same metallic tables but not the same kind of art or exposed feel to the rest of it. Also the font was different, but whatever it tasted so delicious. I would have eaten chipotle out of a shady ice cream truck if it tasted the same!

PS the rest of London was awesome too....hopefully pictures of that will come soon.

Mr McAvoy

2010-09-30T15:48:00.000-07:00

So "they" (whoever they are) have been filming in Oxford all week. On Wednesday while we were waiting for my photography class to start (woowhoo) we ran into some filming while walking around town. Things are often shot in Oxford, but usually it's just a few scenes here and there. but they have been all over the place shooting loads and loads.

We were having fun just poking around walking in the middle of their sets etc...hey they weren't stopping us. I am convinced it's because I looked like a legit photographer. What? Ok, humour me :)

James McAvoy (I knew him from The Last King of Scotland) just standing there waiting for them to make up their minds whether to shoot the scene again or not. It's funny what they use in filming. For this scene they have transformed this door that just leads in building for student accommodations into the entrance for a pub.
We were watching a different movie earlier in the summer during which there is a chase scene (that they shot in Oxford), Alan and I couldn't help but laugh because they are running down a dead end street. Ahh the magic of movies, nothing is ever as it seems.

Mr. McAvoy again, (with an actress actress also in the movie)

Lately I have taken a lot of pictures with intent on blogging but have been super busy, and hence super tired. Hopefully as my class gets into full swing I will post more pictures, or just get around to the ones I've skipped. Can you believe it's practically October!

Wembley Stadium

2010-09-04T03:58:00.000-07:00

We got to go to our first football game (soccer). It was really fun, I always like being at live sporting events much better than watching them on TV. In the picture above is our friend from church Ken. He got us amazing tickets through his work. We were only five rows away from the field. It was awesome.

England vs. Bulgaria

Dedication

Truth 4 Youth

2010-09-03T05:33:00.000-07:00

Here are just a few pictures from the summer youth camp we took our kids too. It was an amazing weekend filled with great teaching and spiritual growth.

Well we are back from summer camp, and so tired. We had a wonderful trip, everything went really smoothly and the teaching was amazing! I have to say this might be my favourite camp ever. I was shocked at how sound the teaching was, it really was very edifying for our youth (and me too). The kids loved Carl Kirby from AiG, they were talking about his talks all week! Paul Wilkinson, whom I'd never heard speak before, was amazing. I think it was the clearest talk I have ever heard on Revelation. Another thing that impressed me was the amount of time we spent in the word, most of the time was spent in group or mini-group sessions, which was hard for a couple of the younger kids but worth it. I seriously could go on and on about the teaching. Well I think you get the picture....we had a really good time.

It's not that I am slacking :)

2010-08-20T04:10:00.000-07:00

Ready for a super random post? Like I said in the post title, I'm not slacking on posting it's just that I haven't been taking pictures. And Alan was ill for a little while, and now I am have caught this wonderful cold as well; and really who wants a picture taken when you feel like your head is going to blow up or deflate?

Alan spoke in church this past weekend, and did great! (Oh I love him so) He spoke on evangelism and when is that topic not convicting? He is also going to teach at our church's Christmas service as well! We're excited. Next weekend we are headed to our youth retreat, and I am really excited. I've already told parents I would post some pictures from it, so I will have to follow through, so you may not have to wait as long in-between posts. Not that you wait in high suspense for my little posts. :)

Earlier this week (pre cold) I went for lunch with a friend (which ended up consisting of ice cream :). We spotted a very cute little store called POD. It had some seriously cute random things in it. It is one of those small little boutique stores that are fun to poke around in. I found this little drawing of the store on-line, so it might disappear. But it's on the high street here, it has lots of great little things for gifts. I've already plotted how to drag Alan in there :)

I also want to say an extra Happy Birthday to my mama! I hope you had a really good day out with Tim. Love you lots and lots. Ummm can you come visit? I miss you.

I love summer

2010-08-03T05:02:00.000-07:00

I love youth trips :) It was so fun to have one again! Last summer we were still pretty new to the whole living in England thing so we weren't able to do any proper summer youth activities. Since we are now pro's at this living in a foreign land thing (not so much, but we make it work :) we were able to whip up some stuff for this summer. Here is Calvary Chapel Oxford's first summer youth trip ever! We went to Thorpe Park (kinda like a six flags) and had lots of fun. I included a couple of pictures of some youth who I know parents won't mind me putting on my blog.

Ryno (pronounced Ray-nu) and Jake getting off a ride

Leana and I in line for a ride. No we aren't burnt, we took Alan's little camera with us and the colouring is off. It was a great trip for us all to hang out and have fun. We only had one hick up the whole day. One of the other girls was carsick on the way to the park. I will spare you the details...but I am surprised it hasn't happened to us before with all the trips we've taken.

In just a couple of weeks we are going to camp :) I am really excited. This camp looks really good. It's a small camp but they have some great speakers from Answers in Genesis and New Tribes Mission.

In just 3 sundays Alan will be speaking in Big Church :) Please pray for him if you think about it. I am so weird, I get more nervous for him than he does. I think I know how nervous I would be if I had to speak in front of that many people and for some reason I get that nervous for him as well. I know he'll do great though, he is pretty amazing.

This morning I enrolled in a photography class! I am really excited. It's a twelve week class and I will definitely let you know how it goes and hopefully post some of my assignments on here.

testing...

2010-07-25T15:17:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to see what an xlarge picture would look like :) Sorry, none of this stuff is new.

changes

2010-07-21T03:03:00.000-07:00

Hi, as you can see I am changing up my blog, I got a notice that the background I was using before was not going to be available much longer. So this change is out of necessity rather than want. I will be changing it up until I find one I like and then playing around with a new header in photoshop. Then maybe I'll start posting again...maybe

Our Whirlwind Life

2010-06-02T09:59:00.001-07:00

We just got back from a rather whirlwind 4 week stay in CA. For people who didn't hear we found out on the 28th of April that we needed to get a new visa in a hurry because of a law change and we flew back on the 3rd of May. It was a little crazy but the Lord totally provided everything we needed and people to cover the ministries we were involved in.

Oh man it was so good to see everyone. So so good. I had missed my close friends and family a lot. We weren't planning on going to visit in May but maybe we should have been. We were home for Mother's Day, 3 birthdays, My sister shared her testimony in School (she did SO amazing by the way), one of the bestest families ever had a baby boy while we were back, and the LOST finale :)

It was the first time we had been back since we moved to Oxford, there are things I would do differently but all in all a good trip. Here are just a couple of pictures :)

That great family I was talking about, here they are. Alan is holding Luke in the above picture and I am with the girls below. We LOVE the Jacksons. It was so good to spend time with them.

We got to meet our nephew (below) and celebrate his first birthday with him. He is adorable! All of our nephews and nieces grew so much in that one year, it was a blessing to see them and spend a little time with them.

We spent a day in Solvang with Alan's Parents and here is a not so good picture to prove it. We really enjoyed being able to go there and spend time with them.

Alan's Birthday

2010-04-28T11:09:00.001-07:00

Alan turned 25 on Tuesday!!! Somehow he talked me into letting him open his presents the night before...well it didn't take much. I love giving people presents, so it was a treat for me to let him. Just so ya know that isn't a super flat cake, it's a birthday brownie, and yes I did put 25 dots on it ;)

On his birthday we headed off to Warwick Castle it was pretty sweet. On a side note we have heard rumors that the grocery store Morrisons carry Kraft Mac N Cheese, but it is only a select few that have in stock. It just so happens that there isn't a Morrisons in all of Oxfordshire, but knowing Alan's love of mac n cheese I did find out that there was one en route to the castle. Unfortunately it wasn't one of the privileged branches that had it, so we kicked the dust from our metaphorical sandals and are still on the hunt.

Alan always gets picked to do fun things. When we were just arriving to the castle he was approached by an employee that explained that they use volunteers to power their massive Trebuchet and of course he was asked to be said volunteer. Then as an after thought while Alan was filling out the disclaimer he said "oh you could do it too". Hmmm get in a giant mouse wheel and run to power your Trebuchet in front of lots if people? Normally that would be a big no, but I knew that Alan would really like to do it together. It's a good thing I love him so much. You will however not be seeing pictures of me in that thing. :)

But here he is in the wheel. It really wasn't hard at all and now it's fun to say we have done it.

I might get put in the stocks for putting his picture up though ;)

If your ever in England...firstly come visit, but secondly I would totally recommend this Castle. We had a lot of fun and it was a great day.

My birthday and Easter!

2010-04-06T13:01:00.000-07:00

My birthday was a couple of weeks ago. See that cake...Alan baked it :) He is such an amazing husband, always figuring out ways to bless me. We had a fun day despite the fact he was on crutches (poor hubby) and I got to do a little shopping :) While Alan sat in the furniture section of department stores.

Our first English easter...well they don't dye eggs :( but we were determined to. That is a brown (because that's the only colour of chicken eggs they have here) egg, which is why it's so dark. Our fun neighbours spotted some white duck eggs and got them for us. Which we dyed and tasted just like a chicken egg (thanks again, we loved them). This is one of Alan's eggs. I think it is really cute just, it is of the easter bunny leaving eggs around.

Can you believe that in less than three weeks we will have been in England a YEAR!!! I know, I know....weird but totally cool.

Blenheim Palace...because the sun came out.

2010-03-14T16:25:00.000-07:00

Went to Blenheim palace on Saturday to be out in the sun. Our first English winter really hasn't been too hard, we are just ready for the sun now. Alan is almost as white as me so that should tell you something. It may be sunny but it was still cold! We did have a great time walking around and enjoying our free pass to Blenheim. We walked around the gardens, rode the train, went through the maze, through the butterfly house, and finally sat down for a nice cup of tea (We are officially English ;)

Here are some pictures from the Butterfly house. The cool thing about caterpillars/butterflies is that when they are in the cocoon everything but there heart turns into goo then they are reconstructed into butterflies. Hmmm...sounds like intelligent design to me.

The maze was fun, it is supposedly the second biggest hedge maze in the world but we did it in like 15 min. So either we were just extremely good at mazes or they just don't make hedge mazes like they used to ;)

I hope that this sunshine sticks around!

My Favorite Person

2010-02-14T16:13:00.000-08:00

He happens to be my Valentine too.

I love him so!

Our Snow Friends

2010-01-07T08:00:00.000-08:00

Our snow dog thing...haha ok it doesn't exactly look like a dog. It's hard! We did manage to support the entire body on four individual legs.

Snow penguin, his eyes are green beens and his nose is a frozen french fry.

Ok, so we didn't make one. There was a ton of snowmen all over town. If you have to come to work while everyone else got a snow day you might as well make a snowman in front of your work. This one was outside a college kitchen. The staff that made this starting waving at us while we were admiring their work.

Baby it's cold outside

2010-01-06T12:05:00.001-08:00

Downtown Oxford during a snow storm is what I imagine the setting of a Dickens novel to be like. It is so enchanting. Buildings older than the USA covered in snow.

A classic British icon.

Doesn't he look cold?

We walked downtown during a brief hiatus in the snow, it is now back to flurries :)

I love snowwwwww!!!

We had so many layers on today! Undershirts, thermals, hoodies, and our oh so warm and wonderful waterproof jackets. (a must in the UK, thanks again Gary & Judy. Those jackets have kept us very cozy!)

Snow Angels

This view of Christ Church always looks stunning, but I love it even more in the snow. I don't think I have ever walked by this spot when there wasn't at least one tourist taking pictures. Which means there is always someone there to take your picture :)

Snow and New Hair...you totally see the connection right?

2010-01-05T15:56:00.001-08:00

It is snowing!!! It has already got a good 3 or 4 inches down and is suppose to snow for the next two days!!! We had some fun building this snow man with our neighbours James and Emma. The snow flakes were enormous. They have simmered down in size now but is still coming down pretty thick.

TaDa! I cut my hair...well obviously. I was super nervous last night, but today I knew half way through the hair cut that I was going to like it. And bonus Alan likes it too. :) When did I get this brave? I can move across the world just fine but cutting my hair...yikes.

Christmas & New Year

2010-01-01T12:10:00.001-08:00

This is Christmas morning at the Berthiaume flat, squishy faced, tired eyes, hair a mess...and all smiles.

New Years Eve 2009! We went down to London to bring in the new year/new decade with thousands of people we didn't know. Needless to say it was pretty fun :)

(Below) This is our first picture of the New Year!!!

So after the fireworks and everyone singing Auld Lang Syne. We noticed some ash falling from the sky, we thought it was just from the fireworks. Then as we walked away from West Minster, and were a few blocks away the "ash" kept growing bigger and began sticking to us, then we (along with the hundreds of people walking down the street) realized that it was snowing!!! It was the perfect end to a fun night, and a fun way to start the new decade. The picture below is right after we realized it was snowing, you can sort of see some of the flakes and maybe my tonsils ;)

This is just a video of when Big Ben struck midnight. You can kind of hear the chimes of Big Ben between the fireworks.

May you know God's peace

2009-12-25T08:14:00.000-08:00

"A foggy day in London town..."

2009-12-23T15:28:00.000-08:00

On our way into London :) We had a really great day! Pretty much everything was a blessing, we found lots of things in London that we weren't even looking for and everything we were looking for as well. I wish I could describe what an awesome day this was, I am still smiling.

The ice skating rink in front of The Natural History Museum, it was so much fun. I don't have any pics of us on the ice (because you can't take camera's in) but we had a blast, especially since neither of us fell.

(Below) I love the hummingbird bakery cook book, so I was really excited when we stumbled across the actual bakery! They have some really yummy stuff.

Ok, you will need to control your excitement, I know it will be hard but you just have to wait...

Ahhhhhhh!!! We are SO excited, can you believe your eyes? We almost can't...but we do. They are opening up Chipotle's first international Chipotle in London! Oh we'll be back! It opens in April...it's almost cruel to have us wait that long, but I am willing to let it slide for that goodness. I was and still am seriously giddy, eeek our "own" Chipotle only an hour away. Hmmm April, I wonder what we'll be doing on Alan's birthday?

They are also looking for more locations in London, and they eventually want to open stores in Paris and other parts of Europe...after all no place should be deprived of this stuff.

Love you all, Happy Christmas Eve! (It is technically Christmas Eve here :)

I still can't believe where we live!

2009-12-17T15:21:00.000-08:00

Just after taking this picture it started snowing! It didn't stick, but it was pretty while it was falling. We are suppose to get more snow this week!!! :-)

A few pictures from today

Just Fun

2009-12-11T09:00:00.000-08:00

These are just some funny pictures we took recently. Man do you see my hair! I may like England but my hair is taking a while to come around. It get so fluffy on rainy days, which apparently is quite often :)

"over the fields we go, laughing all the way!"

2009-12-10T05:48:00.000-08:00

We put up our Christmas tree on December 1st, these are just a couple pics from that night. I think I just have one more thing to buy and I will be all done! I will try to get some pics of downtown Oxford up soon, the lights down there look great and the street performers are out in full force. Hope everyone is enjoying their December, we sure are :)

Bye Buddy

2009-11-30T16:47:00.000-08:00

My mom and sister should be landing right about now at LAX. Here are just a couple of pics from their trip.

I hope you guys had a decent flight home and recoup quickly! Love ya.

(And just so everyone knows 25 days until Christmas!!!)

Just Thankful

2009-11-27T00:07:00.000-08:00

Thanksgiving was a lot of fun! I think the food tastes better when you actually do the cooking. This was my first year cooking and hosting for thanksgiving. I made that sweet pie from scratch! I am not a huge pie fan but that was freaking good ;) Alan said it was the best pie he had ever had...but he may be biased. The fact that I served it to him warm and with a scoop of ice cream may have swayed him as well. The little things on top are suppose to be Christmas trees. It was also my first time cooking a turkey, and that turned out yummy too. (See pictures below)
My sister is thankful for PJ's. She wore them all day! We watched Christmas movies all day and cooked, so she just stayed comfortable. Funny how different we are, I would rather look all cute and she is just chill and like pshhh I'll stay in my pajama's. This time last year she was sick on Thanksgiving and little did we know that she was getting very very sick. I am thankful that she isn't sick anymore! I love this girl.

I think it may be a problem! I obviously know how to spell thanksgiving...but for some reason I rush ahead on holidays. We made "our first Christmas" ornament a couple of years ago and I spelled Christmas wrong on it too (No "t"). My family especially a 16 year old who shall remain unnamed thinks it hilarious.

Meet Frank...my first turkey. He was a yummy turkey! I usually don't like thanksgiving food that much, but this year was fun. I like cooking, I think this made me like the food better. I brined this turkey! I did some turkey research and made up my own recipe for the brine. Oh the wonders of wiki how. It actually made a huge difference though. There wasn't a dry piece on him. (Oh yeah I know you like my morning hair, ehhh?)

This is him all cooked and ready to go. Of course my first thanksgiving couldn't be without a hiccup. So.... do you see it? behind the orange bowl? It is the sweet potatoes, you know the kind with marshmallows on top? Well apparently marshmallows don't like fan ovens (do you have those in the US?) or something because the marshmallows exploded all over my oven! Luckily they were the last thing I was heating up so I didn't need to cook anything else in my marshmallow oven.

OK here's the Thankful list!

I am thankful for being saved!!! First and foremost.
I really am thankful for this sanctification process even though it really hurts sometimes.
I am so thankful for Alan, that I have a wonderful husband who loves the Lord and it shows.
I am thankful for our families
I am thankful for my friends new ones in Oxford, and old ones in America. I miss you guys so much!
I am thankful for our phone! So I can talk to those old friends! (also facebook, skype, and email)
I am thankful it's Christmas time!!!
....and I am thankful that I have to die to myself in order to live for Him!

It's the little things

2009-11-25T06:04:00.001-08:00

It seems like they have a lot more kinds of cheese here, but one thing I hadn't seen was monterey jack cheese, which I think is oh so yummy! Today they had one bag of it at our grocery store so I snatched it up and am trying to decide how to use it best.

...stay tuned for pictures of Frank, my first turkey :)

The Rideout girls have come to town!

2009-11-23T08:00:00.000-08:00

We had a really fun day of walking around Oxford and trying to give them as much history as we know. We shared our favorite place to eat with them for lunch. Can you guess why we like it so much? It reminds us of some other place we know of.

It is SO yummy!

I have missed her so!

My mom is Santa, or at least one of his helpers.

2009-11-22T08:00:00.000-08:00

My mom brought a whole suitcase full of fun presents!!! We felt so loved and were very blessed! Alan got hooked up with the mac n cheese and he's already had a batch.

Hallie used chipotle bags to wrap our presents :)

Look at this bag of Swedish Fish!!! I will be set for a while! This is our suitcase o' presents. Thanks so much everyone for all the gifts it was such a blessing, I can't thank you enough!

Christmas in a cup!

2009-11-21T08:00:00.000-08:00

The suspense is over!!! English Starbucks have red cups and my favorite holiday drink :) I had to explain how to make it, but it was delicious! Ahhh the holidays can begin now.

It has to be chronological!!!

2009-11-20T09:54:00.000-08:00

I am sorry I know you must be expecting pictures of my mum and sister visiting and don't get me wrong I have got them, but I have to keep it chronological. Stay tuned for future blogs soon about their visit. I won't let it be so long in between posts.

I started my new job about 3 weeks ago and on my first day this was waiting for me when I got home :) My oh so wonderful husband made a yummy dinner for us. I am so blessed to be his wife!

I am working at an after school program. One day I made pretzels with the kids and of course we needed to make sure they worked!!! ;) This is the result, I think Alan kinda showed me up! That is an XBOX controller. These were pretty yummy as well and super easy to make.

Oh my precious....(jk)

2009-09-27T10:13:00.000-07:00

We got our things from America last week too! I am so happy. It is so great to have some things around that make our apt feel even more like home. They also had my precious crate and barrel things :) :) :) None of it broke either I was really excited. Oh all the boxes are opened because we had to look through them while the delivery guys were still there to report anything missing or broken. Well I just wanted you all to share my excitement!!!

Stonehenge

2009-09-27T09:54:00.000-07:00

Turns out these little babies are only like an hour away from us...who knew. We had a fun little excursion last week. There is nothing around them though, they are in the middle of fields and hills. They are pretty impressive to see though.

St Giles Fair

2009-09-10T14:15:00.001-07:00

It is a really fun week to be in Oxford first we have the St Giles fair. The city closes one of the main streets downtown for this fair. It was fun to just go and walk around and get some cotton candy (which they call candy floss here). Alan got a hot dog and was so excited for it! They don't really have hot dogs.

Then this up coming weekend is Oxford Open Doors. It is a two day event where the city "opens it's doors" for free (free being the reason I am excited). We have our whole weekend planned out, going around visiting all the oxford sites that we have yet to see. We are most excited to go into some of the university buildings that aren't usually even open to the public. I am sure I will have more pictures from that.

On another note, please be praying for the youth outreach coming up. We have to get approved by the police to have it. One of the steps in this process is a british background check but the company that does them is saying that we haven't been in the UK long enough to have one. So we are trying to work all of that out. Pray that it all gets sorted and that we can get this out reach going :) Also we have a praise that we have a venue to have it in, which is an answered prayer.

Getting Lost...Priceless

2009-08-10T15:10:00.000-07:00

From the adventures of the Berthiaume's...

Can you tell?

2009-07-30T07:41:00.000-07:00

Could you tell that this is me! I looked so different as a baby. I just spent like two hours scanning old pictures into our computer. We had to stay up really late because we were skyping with one of the Wednesday night classes at Grace Chapel. It didn't start until 3am our time. So I had some time to kill and had been wanting to scan them.

Maybe I thought Princesses put their hands up like this??? I also downloaded some pictures we have of Alan I will post them another time, I am not sure you can take cuteness of that magnitude yet.

BBQ

2009-07-29T17:14:00.000-07:00

Here is a quick little pic from our church BBQ (photo credit Dave Baxter)

Our Church

2009-07-29T12:11:00.000-07:00

Ok so this picture might be a little ghetto. I have been carrying around our little point and shoot to try and remember to take pictures of our everyday lives. (See how dedicated I am to you guys?) This is our church...well most of the time it's our local primary school. But on Sunday mornings it's Calvary Chapel Oxford :) We meet in the left side, where the auditorium is, and then the youth meet in a double classroom.

For the love of cheese!

2009-07-27T02:00:00.000-07:00

The Clarks brought Alan over some Kraft Mac N Cheese, we can get mostly everything here except this. The English Mac N Cheese is canned, not so edible. (Not that I like any synthetic mac n cheese). Alan is so thankful for this Cathy. A little bit of "home" in a pouch. We loved visiting with you guys!

The food here is different but not bad at all. I can mostly find things here that are the same or compatible with what I cook the most. I have been branching out, usually a good thing. They measure their food a little differently. They use ml instead of tsp and they weigh their food instead of using cups. We have been pretty pleased with the food here, now all we need is a Chipotle. Do you think that can be fed ex'ed?

Meet Odysseus

2009-07-25T16:35:00.000-07:00

This is Odysseus our car :) I like naming our cars. My first car was named Henry, after we got married I named Alan's car Marco (after Marco polo...he was a little car and sometimes we lost him in the sea of SUV's). This is Odysseus we call him Odie. I was going for an adventurous name. We like him a lot, and it is a blessing to have him. We were unsure if we would be able to get a car, we are so thankful to have him!

British driving, hasn't been to bad at all. Mostly Alan drives, I have actually only practiced a couple of times and "really" driven once. Alan is doing great, the first time he drove in England is when we drove this car off the lot! Roundabout's were a little weird to get use to but he conquered them pretty quickly. Alan says it's still weird to back up looking over his left shoulder but he feels pretty comfortable otherwise. I did fine that one time :) We just don't drive that often. We can walk to the majority of places we need to go. That is something I really enjoy about living here, it's much more of a walking culture, mostly everyone walks. I know I have said this but seriously this week, I will try to post more of our every day lives. :)

Conference in York

2009-07-04T10:12:00.000-07:00

This a peek of the Abbey in the downtown area.
This is the front of Calvary Chapel York where the conference was. We had a good time meeting other missionaries and pastors. It was also great to hang out with Phil and Hannah our senior pastor and his wife. I know we need to get some pictures of our church, I will try to be better about capturing the everyday things we do and see. If you would like to go to our church website here it is :) http://www.calvarychapeloxford.org.uk/

Can't stay the same!

2009-06-19T15:49:00.000-07:00

Sorry just got tired of the grey...I think I will be tweaking my blog over the ext few days. Not sure if I'll keep this layout. What do you think?

Bath

2009-06-19T15:12:00.001-07:00

We had a really fun day in Bath with Duane & Cathy. Don't judge to harshly these are all taken from a moving bus. It was a pretty cold blustery day, but it didn't rain on us, thankfully. It looked threatening all day long and then as we were about to leave the sun came out...ha. Bath is a charming city. It feels very set apart even though it's not far away from a number of other biggish cities. It is surrounded by hills which give it an isolated feel. I have started giving adjectives to places we go. Bath is charming, Oxford is enchanting, London is bustling...I am sure as we visit more of this country I will have plenty more adjectives to tell you ;) Well I am sleepy and should go to bed. So I hope you are having a blessed week and are enjoying our Lord's goodness. He never ceases to amaze me...I am so thankful for what God has done in our lives and am excited for whatever He's got planned, but content now to go to sleep ;) Love you all!

6 Cedar Court

2009-06-19T15:01:00.000-07:00

OK, it's hard to take pictures of rooms, they never turn out. I think we are going to try to do a video walk through soon. This can jut be a sneak peak. But for now here are a couple of pics to satisfy some blog stalkers..."cough...mom...cough" :) I don't mind you stalking me as long as you leave a message. Hope you all are having a good week. We are right now enjoying the company of some of the Clark's. It has been fun and adventurous going about England with them. We are blessed to have them here.

Two Years <3

2009-06-07T14:45:00.000-07:00

We just celebrated two years of marriage at... Euro Disney! Yep, that's right Disneyland (Paris). We had such a good time and loved seeing all the differences between Disneyland CA and Disneyland Paris. So how did this Disneyland measure up? Pretty good. There were a lot of improvements in this park probably because it's quite a bit newer. There were some things they had changed that they shouldn't have like the Indiana Jones ride.

Two years!!! Man how the time flies. It has been a whirlwind two years too! But they have really been two of the best years of my life, I absolutely love being married to Alan. Over the past two years I am in awe of how much God has done in our lives. I have learned a ton!

...pics of Oxford coming...

Let me explain

2009-05-17T12:11:00.000-07:00

Ok, Let me explain, why I have severely lagged in my blogging. We don’t have internet! I have even tried to steal the internet of people who live near me…they all have a password secured connection. Don’t they know that I NEED to blog! Geesh ;) Well, we have moved into our own place and we love it! It is so great to have our own place, now if only we had furniture…hmmm. (Does anyone want to open a crate and barrel up over hear and then give me 75% off of everything?)
God has been blessing us so much and still sometimes my heart yearns to be back in Lancaster? Dumb heart. Not that I miss the windy, hot desert. I miss my family, the Rideout girls and the Berthiaume clan. I miss grace Chapel (though I cannot tell you how much we really do love this new church, it is an awesome fellowship), I miss my close friends, I miss Hallie. But God’s word is so good and more than enough for me. It has helped me so much this past week, versus like Isaiah 41:13 and Psalm 25:4-5 have been speaking to my heart. I am so glad that I have an Abba father who will take my right hand and lead me.
Now to make me officially girly and totally confusing to my husband, I am also SO stinkin excited! Walking around here makes me call out praises to God for all that He has done, is doing, and will do. God has done a beautiful job, England is breath takingly beautiful. My heart also reaches out to a people that have turned away from God and have willingly given the enemy a stronghold. Learning about the church in Britain breaks my heart. The church is in constant decline and what little people there are coming to the Lord they are not English. It is mostly people who have immigrated to England. I wish I could make them understand that their problems aren’t economical, educational, or ecological. Their problem is one of the heart. Why has the Lord called us to a place that might be lush and green outside but so spiritually dead? What can I do? The answer…nothing; I can do nothing but be faithful to the Lord. So… “Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try me, and know my anxieties; And see if there be any wicked way in me; and lead me in the way of everlasting.”
We have no idea what we are doing but thankfully we serve a King who has already won. Thank you all for praying for us, we feel them. We love you.

The key to our apt...I like that they have keys like this. More pictures coming soon...well when we get our internet :)

Summer is coming!

2009-05-03T13:29:00.000-07:00

Ducklings always remind me that summer is on it's way :) I am not sure if you can see it but one of the ducklings is under it mom's wing (so cute). You also can't see it from these pictures but these ducks are huge! At least twice as big as the ducks at Apollo park maybe more.

Crew

2009-05-02T12:46:00.000-07:00

Another British Tradition...Crew. It is huge in Oxford particularly, because of the Thames and the colleges are very competitive with each other. It is really fun to watch and I think Alan wishes he could do it.

It's May day...

2009-05-01T17:03:00.000-07:00

Today is May 1st! Known here as May Day! I am not sure what goes on in other parts of the country but in Oxford there are folk Irish dancers, and the choir from one of the colleges sings on their roof at dawn and then go and jump off of a famous bridge (we hear that almost every year someone breaks their legs from doing this). Why you might ask...TRADITION! (pretend I sang that last part like Tevia from Fiddler...k) Tradition is huge here. I have a number of times (already) gotten the answer of tradition when asking a question about why something is done.

We had fun taking pictures around town today.

This is Corn Market street, the main street with plenty of shops and arcades (an arcade is an alley way lined with more shops and cafes).

This is a recreation of the Bridge of Sighs, it connects class rooms to the dormitories, I have actually been up there, thanks to an inside connection. I think it is either at Hartford College or University College, I can't quite remember.

These pictures were all taken in down town Oxford. I don't want to mislead (or disappoint you if you ever come visit), this is not the area we live in, we will be living in the Botley area of Oxford. It is no where near this impressive, it's a residential area. I will try to post again soon, but now it's late and I'm tired.

Anti-climactic

2009-04-20T23:16:00.001-07:00

I know...you all thought it would be a post about Oxford. Sorry to disappoint. I am sure there will be plenty of posts in the future about Oxford. A little bit of ocd may be coming out but I need to blog in chronological order :)

We got to go to the beach with some of our favorite people the week before we left. (Gardners & Jacksons) We had a super fun day and Alan loved surfing. David and him stayed out there pretty much the whole time.

40 Years

2009-03-31T14:27:00.000-07:00

All the Berthiaume's (except for one much missed brother) got together this weekend to celebrate Gary and Judy (Alan's Parents) 40th anniversary! We had a really great time together and I think the boys did a great job of honoring their parents. Can you imagine 40 years! They have been married to eachother for most of their lives! The boys put together some cute/funny saying for or about their parents and then had a time of thanking them for specific thing about their marriage and parenting. Andrew & Carolyn even had their wedding cake remade for te party. Now they are off to the UK to celebrate!

What's My Age Again?

2009-03-31T14:13:00.001-07:00

I had a great Birthday last friday, we celebrated in Santa Barbra.

It is always fun to spend the night in a beautiful hotel (especially overlooking the beach), go my favorite zoo, and going shopping down town. (I heart Santa Barbra!!!)

2009-03-21T15:11:00.000-07:00

Some things you don't see everyday!

2009-03-18T22:00:00.000-07:00

Blenheim Palace

2009-03-18T14:53:00.000-07:00

This is the backside of Blenheim Palace, which as you can see is beautiful. This is a Duke's estate just outside of Oxford in a town called Woodstock. It is open to the public, we went inside and had a tour, but unfortunately you can't take pictures on the inside. This is where Winston Churchill was born here and this is also where he proposed to his wife. His uncle was the 8th Duke of Blenheim.
The estate is something like 3 miles miles. This waterfall is on the grounds.

These are some wild daffodils, they are springing everywhere we look. Some of the first signs of spring in England. There are a lot of different kinds of wild flowers around here, but these are so bright and tall, they stand out the most.

This sculpture caught my eye, it is very interesting...and kind of creepy.

Us in the inner courtyard.

A Few More

2009-03-17T10:54:00.000-07:00

This is the Jubilee bridge, it has a very nice view of the London eye and parliament

These are some bobbies

So this picture doesn't look like much but has a fun little history. This is the entrance into the Ritz, Julia Roberts and Hugh Grant have a seen in this hallway in Notting Hill. I saw this and recognized and thought it was just fun.

London...need I say more?

2009-03-16T20:06:00.001-07:00

In Green ParkWestminster abbey Parliament with ben himself.

Us inside the London eye, which was wonderful! It was such a clear day that we could see almost all of London.

The view from the Jubilee bridge, the eye on the left and big ben on the right.

Oxford...day one

2009-03-14T13:59:00.000-07:00

I think I am going to try (the operative word is "try") to post a picture from our trip everyday we are here. So we'll see if I can do it :D I haven't gotten to take to many pictures yet, hopefully I will have some more opportunities soon. This picture is one of the libraries for the University. Do you see the blue sky! It hasn't rained since we have been here and it is suppose to be a very nice few days. It will be conducive to walking around and seeing the sights... Yay

Catching up...

2009-03-14T12:43:00.001-07:00

So I needed to catch up before I can get to the Oxford pictures :) We have been staying at casa de Gardner and it was so fun. Their boys are so so cute! These are some random pictures from the past couple of weeks.

I went to the beach with some friends and we saw some pretty star fish on the rocks.

This house is really fun! It's an old vacant house that has a fun interior. Polaroids, there are polaroids everywhere. They also have polaroid camera's inside so you can take a picture and add it to the collage on the wall.

This is the wall when you first walk in the front door. This place is off of ave D and just past 300th st west.

That's Right!

2009-03-02T20:13:00.001-08:00

That's right...two blogs in one night! These pics are from when Noel & I went to The Grove on Friday. It was a super fun day, we went shopping at The Grove and then went and got some cupcakes at sprinkles and finally had some fun taking pictures with a fish eye lens in Beverly Hills. It was super super fun so don't be surprised if there are a few more pictures from are adventures.

I Can't Believe It!!!

2009-03-02T19:38:00.001-08:00

I can't believe she's 16! I can't believe how cute she is! I can't believe she got to go to Disneyland for free! I can't believe how long it's been since I blogged!!!

Impromptu photo session

2009-02-21T00:52:00.000-08:00

Today we had a planned impromptu photo session, what I mean is we weren't planning it, but I did bring my camera along ;) Emmie is too cute! She has A LOT of really cute hats so we had a little hat fashion show. I like her, and her blue eyes, and her adorable smile...

Thanks Rach for letting me "borrow" Emmie to take pictures of her.

Tagged

2009-02-15T16:09:00.000-08:00

Well, I was tagged. I probably could have out run Hallie because my legs are much longer :) Tehehe I think how it works is you pic your fourth folder and the fourth picture in the folder. Mine is kinda random :)

Yep, I think I took this from inside a car, I am not sure why.

I will tag, Missy, Heather, and Noel :)

I have the cutest sister in the world!

2009-02-08T18:50:00.000-08:00

See I told you!

I can't beleive she's turning 16 in two weeks!

In 15 years she'll appreciate that youthful face.

I love you Kira!!!

Why yes I am random :-)

2009-02-03T22:24:00.000-08:00

I got some new glasses!

One for Emmie
& one for my niece Kaelyn. (she loves giraffes)

Oh my goodness I haven't been on the internet for a week! That's like a decade in blogging time! Our internet company was being weird, but everything is fixed now and I can get back to reading every one's oh so cute blogs. During my free time this past week I painted...random right? I actually really enjoyed it :-) Don't judge me to harshly I'm a beginner and the pics aren't that good. The coloring in the pictures is a little off. Making these makes me want to take some art classes.

What do you think?

2009-01-22T15:31:00.000-08:00

OK I have spent some time making a new header, what do you think? Do you like? Do you have any suggestions? Seriously I don't know, I have a ton of versions of this thing. Please let me know what you think!

Can I really have only been to San Diego once?

2009-01-21T20:42:00.001-08:00

I know right! I have only been to San Diego once! Weird huh? I went down to San Diego wit my friend Rachel. Her family lives down there. It was really fun. I am glad I finally got to go!

Under the pier.

Rachel (right) and I (left). It's funny it was weird to me just put our names in order because I am sure someone would have commented on the grammatical error of "me and Rachel" (Cough..husband, hehe cough cough)

I couldn't believe how close this pelican let me get. I know there is some zoom to a 50mm but not that much. I also couldn't get over how ugly these things were up close, yuck! It was all greasy looking and it had these gross claws on the end of it's beak. Pelicans always look so graceful in flight over the ocean. Oh well :-)

PS I just want to make sure everyone knows that lost is on tonight!!! Woowhoo!

Sad Day Friend...Not Really

2009-01-20T01:31:00.000-08:00

Ok, Ok, Ok, it's not wasn't such a bad day. I have definitely had worse. Sunday was my day of teaching the 2 &3 year old Sunday school class. It was really fun, and they were really cute. This week they were all so good, and such good listeners. Last week was insane!!! Fire Alarms and toddlers don't mix :-D. Then later that day our car broke down! I hate car problems. But luckily I have an amazing husband who knows how to look at a car and call our road side assistance ;) he he. Isn't he cute! We "just" had to have our starter replaced. (It could have been much worse). It wasn't really a bad day though. I really love my sweet kids (sniff, sniff), I got to have lunch with one of my bestest friends, my husband is soo cute, and I went to San Diego that night. (Not in our car). So my day was sad but not really, God still blesses me when things are going wrong and I don't deserve it!

Girls, Girls, Girls

2009-01-20T00:36:00.001-08:00

These are some of my adorable friends! They are really great to talk too and hangout with :-) We try to meet every other week, try being the operative word, usually we do pretty good. This was taken about two weeks ago, haha. I think it's a really good picture of them...I have definitely had better, that is not the greatest angle in the world for me apparently. It was funny, and slightly annoying (for them, I'm sure!) I was trying to do this with a self timer, and it was being D.U.M.B. I seriously took like 7 pics before I got one that none of were getting our heads chopped off. It did however inspire me two figure out how to use my remote control for my camera. This is going to be an exciting camera week! I get two things! A new lens (fish eye) and a new bag...wooowhoo no more green lunch bag :) I will have to show you the before and after pics. Oh yeah, I got my 50mm lens back from the factory. I wrote about how it just fell apart, well I sent it in to the cannon factory thank goodness it was still under warranty! And they just sent it back last Thursday. I love it :D I can't wait to have a pic with my new lens...so stay tuned!

Pro 27:17 "As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another."

I love this verse! It's so true, good friends sharpen each other. And these girls really do it, they are purposeful and a BIG encouragement to me! I love you guys!!!

A few more...

2009-01-11T15:36:00.000-08:00

Here are just a couple more from Mary's wedding. Mary your are beautiful :D

Some of my favorite everyday memories from 2008

2009-01-05T23:02:00.000-08:00

So ok there are a zillion pictures! What can I say we had a busy year :) Hope you enjoy

This is Bethel Baptist Church in Tredegar (Tre-dee-ga) Alan and I are going to do youth ministry here :) Very soon!

This is when I first got my camera, oh happy day.

My nieces above and below

This is Alan and his grandpa earlier this year before he passed away.

Alan and I went to Catalina for our one year anniversary, it was sooo much fun!

Morro Bay for 4th of July/ Gary's 60th Birthday

He is so much fun to be with

These are some great friends :)

The Bean!

And how could any group of favorites be complete without my sister! I love this pic of her, she's pretty cute :)

2008 was a year of change for us which is always hard...good but hard. As I look at all the pictures from this year I am thankful that during this somewhat year of making big decisions and not knowing exactly what was going to happen God blessed us with great friends, family and a lot of really fun memories that I will cherish for a long time. We love all of you and are excited about 2009 to see what God is going to do in all of your lives. Once again I think we'll have some big changes this year, as of yesterday International Teams told us to go ahead and buy our one way plane tickets to Wales. So we have a tentative date for January 29th. We are soooo excited and a little sacred, but honestly I would rather be scared out of my mind and be in God's will than live out side of what He wants for our lives.

Micah 6:8 "He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love Kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?"

So what do I want in 2009...to many things. What do I need? To walk humbly with my LORD.

Fa La La-ing with a little bahumbug

2008-12-28T16:07:00.000-08:00

We had a great Christmas! It was really relaxed and fun. Alan and I woke up in the morning and read God's word, opened presents, made breakfast, it was all very leisurely. It was nice for it to be just us in the morning. Then we went to my mom's and opened more presents, went to see a movie, and had Christmas dinner with the Bartletts. (which they do every year, it's a tradition) We finished off the evening with what might be the longest game of beyond balderdash ever! All in all it was a great Christmas :)

Mother & Daughters

Sisters

Do you like the shirt we got Kira?

Seriously if you have never been around Mrs Bartlet & my mom at the same time you have too! They are totally silly together! They laugh a ton and make others laugh a ton too.

My bebe playing with his new video camera.

OK, now for the Ba humbug...my new camera lens that I got for Christmas broke! :( sigh

I was really shocked, I had only had it for two days! We are going to see if we can return it, because it must have been defective to break that quickly with me doing anything to it! So that's my little Ba humbug. I'll let you know if we can get it replaced.

A little tiny sneak peek :)

2008-12-27T10:59:00.000-08:00

The Best Snow Day Ever!!!

2008-12-17T19:23:00.001-08:00

My mom and sister both got snow days today, so we were able to hang out together and play in the snow. It was so so fun :)
She is too cute, my little eskimo sister.

Snowball fight **chuckles** I think it was funner watching them then getting pelted by snowballs.

Sisters

Snow Angels. I love the snow, this might be the most I've ever seen it snow in Lancaster. It's so fun :) I was looking at the weather forecast, it is of course suppose to be sunny tomorrow, but on sunday night it might snow again..yay. If the snowstorm happened a week from now we would have had a white Christmas eve, but hey I'll take what I can get :)

Once Upon A Time...

2008-12-17T00:44:00.000-08:00

There was a couple who loved Disneyland, with all of it's beautiful colors, and fun rides it was one of their most favorite places. They went rain or shine, sleet or snow :)

We went to Disneyland again on Monday. It was our last time going, our passes run out and it would be silly to renew them right before we go to Wales, so we headed down there even though it was raining. It turned out not to be too bad, it only sprinkled when we first got there and right before we left. It was a great last hurrah. We got to do a few extra fun things.

The Hartley's were there as well, we had a blast with them. I'm glad that we finally got to go with them. Alan & Jeremy were on a hidden mickey kick and we found quite a few with the help of the hidden mickey book. We found some in Indiana Jones, Behind the R, Buzz lightyear, space mountain, by the sun, soaring over CA, Pinocchio, snow white and lots more random hidden mickeys. The one I liked the most is actually a hidden Eeyore on Indiana Jones...that's right people, good luck finding these things. It made it just a little extra fun, partly because Noel and I were laughing at Alan and Jeremy, but also it was fun when we found ones we were searching for.

It was really fun, a family was leaving the park and they hadn't used there Dream passes very much so they just gave them to us. That was pretty sweet. The dream pass is like the ultimate fast pass. Usually you can only have one fast pass at a time but this is like an automatic fast pass.

Alan and I went to Goofey's Kitchen...I loved it! I had been back in the day with the fam, but Alan had never been. I always love when the characters come and visit, and when they dance around with all of the kiddos. The food is yummy too :)
Did I mention we rode Toy Story Mania 4 times!!! That's right, once it was even after the park was technically closed. We got off of the ride right after 8pm (which is when ca adventures was closing) it was like 8:05 or something, they weren't letting anymore people on, and Alan and Jeremy begged the Disney peeps to go on once more. Alan totally pulled the I'm moving to another country card! But they let us go again :) It is a pretty awesome ride. Alan's highest score of the day was 220,400!

I was sad I didn't get to ride the tea cups one last time, but really I couldn't have asked for a better "last" day. Maybe someday in a few years when we are back visiting we'll get to go back...or just maybe the next blog about Disneyland will be from Eurodisney, that would be fun :)

...And They Lived Happily Ever After

One crazzzy week!

2008-12-06T23:21:00.000-08:00

We had a really random crazy week. I'll give it to ya day by day!

Monday: Disneyland, we had a blast with Kevin, Jodi and kids. It was great to get to do that with them. Disneyland is always fun, but there is just something extra special about Disneyland when it's all decorated for Christmas :)

Tuesday-Friday afternoon: Sadly we went from the happiest place on earth to a very scary. I know this pic is kinda sad, but it doesn't seem that bad to me. Maybe it's because there were scarier moments then this one.

This is my adorable lil sister. She was hospitalized on Tuesday evening. We just thought she had the flu until Tuesday, when we took her to Kaiser urgent care. Let me give you the very quick version. Kaiser Urgent care, Passing out, blood test, ambulance ride, AV hospital, not good news, transfusion, ambulance ride to panorama city, confusion & another transfusion, ambulance ride to woodland hills, a great hematologist, two more transfusions, iron levels, getting well enough to go home & still no reason why her hemoglobin's/red blood cells were a quarter of what they should be. Sounds like a desperate situation? Nope...not at all. People have asked me a lot this week how I am doing. Was I scared, yep, was I worried yep, did I need to be nope. Kira has always been and will always be in God's hands not mine. This situation could have been SO much worse. I am thankful to God for my sister...she's pretty much awesome, she had a good attitude and could still laugh, joke, and smile for a picture this whole week. Funny enough this week reminded me of how good God is, no matter what. We still don't know what we are going to find out when all of the tests come back in, but I do know one thing, I will trust in the Lord.
Psa 13:5-6 "But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing to the LORD, for he has been good to me."
Psa 18:2 The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge. He is my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.

Friday evening: Ok so as if the rest of the week wasn't already weird. Friday night we went to a Bryan Adams concert. Lol, we were definitely the youngest people there. Why, you must be wondering? Well Alan actually really really likes Bryan Adams. Weird, huh? I will have to say I don't love Bryan Adams but I did really enjoy the concert.

Sorry all of these were taken on Alan's phone. They don't let you take camera's in. Although it seemed like everyone had one. Anywho, I didn't bring mine because I knew you weren't allowed. So hopefully that explains the the pics & the video, bad lighting, people talking and singing all around us. Speaking of the people there, man there were some weird people there! Who knew Bryan attracted such an eclectic group. My favorite must have been when this ummm older woman got up on stage and started dancing (nothing bad...well she was a bad dancer but nothing gross, ya know) Alan just shuddered and said eww, you know that's some one's mom. Believe me it was pretty funny. Sorry I didn't get a picture of that to show you guys, I know that would have got some laughs. It was definitely an interesting experience...but we had a fun night.

This is for you Hallie...tehe :D I know it's your favorite.

Grandma's Birthday!

2008-11-29T18:00:00.000-08:00

It was Alan's Grandma Dunn's birthday on Saturday. Some of his Aunts, Uncles, and cousins came into town on Friday and we had a birthday dinner for her. Happy 83rd Birthday Grandma!

A Lot To Be Thankful For

2008-11-29T17:27:00.000-08:00

We had a great Thanksgiving at Alan's parents house in Bakersfeild. It was a great day with some of his family. We really do have a fun & funny family.

An uncle sandwich
She is too cute...and knows it.

Andrew, Carolyn, me & Alan

Carolyn & her mom

Six little monkeys in the bed. Ok, so I don't really get this let me explain it to ya. So the girls were watching a chick flick...and you know the boys could not watch it with us so.... I guess they felt more manly watching a disney movie? Hmmm...nope, I still don't understand. :) At least their cute.

I love Kung Fuuuuuu

2008-11-18T23:20:00.001-08:00

I know your impressed by our sheer awesomeness!
Hiiiiiyaaa
Sorry if you haven't seen Kung Fu Panda, you probably won't get the whole awesome thing.

We went to the Huntington Garden, it was beautiful and we had a lot of fun. In fact I think Alan was surprised at how fun it was. He wasn't too excited about going, but he's a great hubby, so he said we could go because I wanted to. But it was a great day, followed by some yummy food at the Old Spaghetti Factory...mmmm

This is where the European art collection, I loved it :) It was also on an episode of Alias...I knew you were wondering.

I wish we had our own personal photographer to follow us around so we could actually get decent pictures of us together.

Don't worry there is no charge for awesomeness...

The Berthiaume's D-Day

2008-11-07T14:57:00.001-08:00

Sorry, there haven't been very many posts of late. We have been busy! Man who knew so much went into moving almost half way around the world? I didn't...yep I can be naive...I know your shocked right? :) Well, there are a lot of things we'd like to do before we leave sunny CA, which our list is to long (and expensive) to actually conquer before we go, but we are going to do as much as we can. So this past week we went down to the Discovery museum in Santa Ana. It's pretty fun, we of course were like the oldest people trying out the exhibits :) But it doesn't take a lot of time so we decided hey we're like less then 10min away from Disneyland...so this is a picture story of our Discovery/Disney day...or D-day.

Alan air guitaring to Chicago (the band not the musical) Um...I love it. At least we entertain the other people on the free way, or we just scare them I'm not sure which :D

Alan is using his mad skills with "The Force". I know Jayden would appreciate this. Speaking of...this week I was watching some kids at church and we were talking about our favorite songs. All of them were typical little kids church songs, except for one...and oh Cari I knew your kids were cute, but Jayden took it up a notch. He was the last one to speak up about his favorite song but he was very excited to tell us that his favorite song is the Darth Vader melody. Yep and then proudly sang it for us, you know the Da Da Da Daaaaa. It was so cute.

Alan doing an impersonation of...a raptor I think?

Me inside of a big kaleidoscope that had tons of little fingerprints on it... pretty sweet :)

Alan and kiddo there apparently didn't get enough candy during Halloween.

We went into CA Adventures for only one ride, but it's the sweetest ride there...that's right Toy Story Mania. It might be Alan's new obsession. I like this pic, mickey mouse just got a whole lot cuter.

Apples to Apples

2008-10-23T21:12:00.001-07:00

My mom, my sister, the Waters girls and I went apple picking in Tehatchapi this past wednesday afternoon. It was fun, more because of the company then the apples. We also stopped at "The Apple Shed" on the way home and got some fudge.

Pumpkin time...

2008-10-23T20:50:00.000-07:00

Alan holding the chosen one

...pumpkin that is.

I love the rows upon rows of pumpkins at Lambardi's ranch.

A cow...for good measure

Yep...this batch is where we got our pumpkin

Instead of carving it I...well I don't what this is called. But it was fun and it should last longer because we didn't cut it open. There is an owl on one side and a typical pumpkin face on the other...but I like the owl.

Chi-Towm

2008-10-04T17:49:00.001-07:00

We were in IL for 3 weeks for some international training...the midwest is definately a different culture :) We had a blast on our trip, we loved training and loved visiting our friend Alex in Chicago! He and his girlfriend Rochelle took us around all day and showed us the sites. It poured for most of the day, so Ididn't want to bring my camera, but I also wanted pictures so these are all from a disposable camera, that's why their quality is lacking. Our trip into Chicago was super fun...as you can see, I liked the bean.

This is The Bean...it's not really called that, but everyone does call it that...does that make sense? Oh well...it's a quirckly peice of "art" right buy millenium park.
This is the four of us from the left: me, Alan, Rochelle, and Alex. This is our reflection in the bean thingy.
This another quirky peice of "art". They have two cubes (I'm standing next to the other one) they can put different faces on them and it's like a video recording of the faces so they smile and wink. Sometime one face morphs into another one, they can also spit out water like that...
The magical mile (that's really what it's called). It's like the shopping district in down town, it has some good stores!

I think this is the sears tower up in those clouds, it was really rainy and cloudy so we didn't go up, we couldn't have seen anything.
They were having a Celtic festival, so we watched some of the festivities.
At the celtic festival we saw a Scottish strong man competetion, and lots of celtic things to buy, some bag pipers piping, and also a herding demonstration (see above) it was a sheep dog, with ducks...I know weird right. The dog still did a great job...not sure why they didn't just use real sheep but whatever, I am sure they have ducks in scotland.

She's here!!!

2008-09-23T11:19:00.000-07:00

This is Emmie Kate Jackson and she's pretty much the most adorable baby ever! I cannot wait to meet her and give Rachel a big hug! She was born this morning at 9:24am and she is 7pounds and 24inches long. I love her already and am ready to meet her!!! Please be praying for the Jackson's as they bring her home and Rachel is recovering.

When boredom sets in...

2008-09-20T21:43:00.000-07:00

When boredom sets in this is the result... I am living in Elgin IL for the next few weeks, with pretty much nothing within walking distance. So we have been going a little stir crazy. One evening I decided to go for a walk this is what I found...

Yay! Fall is coming! I really wish more of the leaves were turning colors.

This river really makes me want to go Kayaking

"But I will hope continually, and will praise You yet more and more. My mouth shall tell of Your righteousness and Your salvation all the day, for I do not know of their limits. I will go in the strength of the Lord God; I will make mention of Your righteousness, of Yours only."

Psalms 71:14-16

To infinaty and beyond...

2008-09-03T23:12:00.000-07:00

Alan and I got to go to Disneyland this week for two days, it was wonderful! We have definate;y gotten use out of those season passes. We both got our highest scores ever on the Buzz Lightyear game of course he still kicked my butt. We rode on the new ride Toy Story Mania, I don't want to spoil it for you...but it was awesome! I didn't take any pictures while we were there. For some reason when it is SO hot outside I don't want to take many pictures, that and I'm still a tad bit bitter at our computer for going bersurk. Anywho, Disneyland was awesome! I highly recomend going while school is in session and during the weekdays! Today we walked onto Pirates of the Carribean...I know! Alan and I are off to chicago this Saturday, so maybe my next blog will from the windy city! Jeesh we can't get away from the wind!

SUPRISE!!!!

2008-08-21T19:23:00.000-07:00

My favorite sister spent the summer in TX and I missed her so. While she was gone my mom and I decided to update her room. These pictures do not do it justice! Especially if you've saw it before... shudder... We painted it tan with randomized pink stripes and got new decorations too. It is hard to get a decent whole room shot, but hopefully I can get one soon and post it. She had no idea waht we do, so when we brought her home from the airport she was a tad bit shocked, it was great! I am SO glad she's home!