Christmas Fun...and snow!

We were blessed to be able to spend the holidays with family in Hood River, Oregon...we celebrated a late Christmas on the 28th, and
we were so excited to receive a "white christmas"!
The snow kept falling, and we actually had to stay a day later than planned because of a big storm coming through...
but this is one time when we were happy to stay put!
It was a fun week filled with laughs, Wii, sledding, baking
(which of course means eating!!),
games, and just enjoying time together as a family.

The Pichura kids all lined up with their "big gift" -- Red Sox jerseys!

Caleb and his new outfit...too cute!

Faith seems to be in an ongoing Broadway production...it's always drama with her!

This was the main attraction throughout the week--
"we" played a lot of Wii!! :)

David's dad and our nephew Titus.

This dog has patience like I have never seen!

The infamous Gingerbread contest has begun!! Get ready for some crazy pictures! I don't know where the Parker's get their "talent" :)

Paul's masterpiece...I'll let you guess.

As you can see, Andrew was really getting into the Spirit of Christmas with his gingerbread man.

Bryan's left us speechless. :)

Micah's Star War's gingerbread man.

Mom Parker's adorable gingerbread house...I think she could start a business!

My entry-- orphan Annie and her dog Sandy.

Grace's amazing gingerbread house...she is becoming quite the artist!!

David's finished product...he spent a lot of time on the Wonka house, and I thought it was pretty cute, but, apparently, others didn't, because he was knocked down to second place this year...the new championship title went to:

Kristin's cute clown!

Mery Christmas from the Parker's!!

Merry Christmas!!

We hope you all have a Merry Christmas celebrating our Savior!

Merry...Thanksgiving!

These pictures are just a tad bit late, but I wanted to post a few pictures from November before Christmas pictures roll around! David's parents and brother Andrew made the trip up from Oregon, and my parents were here for the week visiting,
which made this Thanksgiving extra nice.

Starting the morning off with a healthy dose of cinnamon rolls! :)

David's brother Andrew enjoying some snacks.

The star of the show: the turkey fry!

Table set and ready to go!

The Parker men and their technology! ;)

(Some) of the Parker's! It was great to spend some time with everyone!

Mom and Dad Come to Seattle!

My parents have been patiently waiting for the "opportune time" to fly out and visit...they were trying to avoid all the rain that welcomed them on their first trip! :) However, circumstances didn't work out for a summer visit, so they decided to take their chances with November, which is usually one of our rainiest months!! I must say that all things considered, I think they had great weather...and a great week!

We had a really fun time visiting with them, and showing them around our lovely city. The first time they visited, we had only lived here for 3 months, so we were still figuring things out for ourselves...This time, it feels more like home, and we actually own a home, so that was fun to show them for the first time! I think by the end of the trip, my parents probably felt like they needed another vacation, as we had them moving around a lot! :) They flew in on Thanksgiving Day, which is probably enough to exhaust anyone! Then we took them all around Seattle, and even did some day-trips...We had a great time seeing new sights with them, and are so thankful they came out to visit us!

We took a day trip to the picturesque town of Leavenworth. It's a Bavarian-themed village nestled right below the Cascade mountains...definitely a tourist town, but we loved it! :)

We had to try a soft pretzel in Leavenworth!

Another "must" in Seattle: the Space Needle!

We went to a Christmas Party for my work, with lots of different Christmas Trees...this was the German themed tree-- my Dad's favorite!

I think this was my Dad's favorite part of the trip. We went to a Japanese restaurant in West Seattle, and it was a treat! Dad said it was the best Japanese food he's had since Japan!

Mom and I tasting some chocolate gelatto and hot chocolate at a fun shop downtown called "The Chocolate Box"...yes, it's one of my favorites! :)

Dad and I overlooking downtown Seattle.

We're Back!

We just wanted to let you know we're back from our trip! We had a great time and saw many beautiful places...more to come after we sort through the 2500 photos!!! :)

Summer "Fun"

As you can tell, we kind of went on a blogging hiatus for a few months. We really haven't had a lot of "blog-worthy" adventures this summer...well, we have had 2, but obviously those lived up to their name, since they're, well, on the blog. :) Other than that, a few short day trips have been the extent of our summer. Not that I am complaining! We have enjoyed this summer, but it has been busy...mostly with people and books! ;) David has been quite busy training people, as our church started a Discipleship Program, and also helped launch a new campus of Mars Hill. Since this is what he feels called to do, it is a blessing that he has been able to spend most of his summer equipping leaders for the sake of the Gospel. David also started a Master's Degree level program at our church and I have been going through a biblical counseling training, so it definitely hasn't been a summer of relaxing on the beach...although we have been blessed to enjoy a few relaxing days on the water. It can be tempting to look back at this summer and feel like it was "wasted" because we didn't get to enjoy the warm weather as much as we would like...but as soon I think that, I realize this summer was far from wasted. It has been spent impacting people for Jesus, which is the furthest thing from a waste...in fact, it's the only thing that's not.

With that said, I will attempt to do a blogger "unload" of what memories we did make this summer. I've realized that if I don't transfer them onto blogger, the memories transfer from my mind into into the dark abyss of the hard drive :) So, if you care to read, make sure to keep scrolling down because I will probably may make separate posts in the next day or 2 to make things easier to find (I may back-date them to keep them in some sort of order).

#8

It may be hard to believe, but September 1st we celebrated our 8th Anniversary! We enjoyed a very nice night out, doing two things we really enjoy...eating good (cheap!) food and watching a beautiful sunset. We were talking about how crazy it is that it's been 8 years, and even crazier that this is our 3rd anniversary celebrated in Seattle! We are so thankful that Jesus brought us together, and that He has kept us together! He has definitely grown us both a lot this past year, and we are ever more
thankful to be serving Him together.

The happy, handsome husband.

Yum! Nothing beats happy hour prices. We practically ordered the whole menu for under $30!

The view from the bottom.

And the view from the top.

8 years...

The Lightrail...public transit or new date night?

This summer, Seattle unveiled it's new "state of the art" public transit system. Drumroll please...announcing The Lightrail! We decided that it might be fun to try it out for a date night excursion-- Take it till the end of the line, then grab dinner and go to a free concert at the Space Needle. See...it sounds more fun that you thought, huh? :)

We actually had to drive out of the way to get to the station, so we decided it's not very practical. And we discovered it takes at least twice the time to get downtown than driving by car, but hey, it's still a fun ride and very cheap entertainment (we're easily entertained obviously...but, we're not the only ones doing this for fun. My residents at work took a field trip to ride it too!).

Can you feel the excitement ?!

It looks so much like a big city rail system when you look at this picture...but, it's not.
But it's trying reeeaally hard. :)

Part of the rail goes underground, which was by far the coolest part.
They had all this crazy neon artwork up on the ceilings!

What?! You don't have any of these crawling up your ceiling?

We made it! Not that I was worried or anything...you can't really get lost on this thing.

Sometimes you get what you pay for...but
there was one band we enjoyed.

Lightrail date night complete!
Well, almost. We still had to take it the whole way back! Not quite as entertaining the second time around, but still a fun trip.