Friends and what-not...

I don’t know why it has taken me so long to write this blog. I had one written, but apparently my computer did not like it and decided to erase it. I thought it was actually a good one.

I wrote it at the time of graduation, the time when many emotions overtake you. You can’t get over the fact that your friends are all going their separate ways. Some of you will reunite in the fall and others are taking their diploma and moving on with the days of their youth. It’s also a time for reflecting on the memories that you have made over the year. The original blog was full of all this good stuff. But now after having a month to get past the first shock of “Ah, summer is here! What am I going to do without everyone!!?”, I have a much better perspective on things.

I feel that at the close of each school year I always look back and say that it was somehow the best year of my life. Maybe I was never as genuine in the past as I feel I am when I use that statement to describe this year or maybe each year is truly getting better and better. Whatever the case may be I feel that it applies to this past year.


This year I met a group of people that have sincerely touched my life. Unknowingly they have each shown me what it looks like to serve others and to serve God, to love others and to be passionate about the things of their heart. They’ve shown me that the time spent in fellowship with one another is priceless. My best friend, Saryl, has taught me the meaning of being who you are and loving who you are. She’s shown me the beauty of life and the beauty in other people that I had so easily overlooked. This year each one of my friends taught me something new.


The most important thing that I took away from this year was this:


Love. Love those whom you live with. Love those people that smell a little strange when you pass them in the hall. Love. Love the beautiful creation that you may take for granted when you’ve forgotten that there is such thing as sunshine because it’s been raining for 12 days straight. Love your God.


Invest relationally. Take time to be in fellowship with those you care about. Too often we fall into a fast-paced life and we forget what is truly important. Be sure to put those you love first.


This year has been such a blessing. I know that life now calls us in different directions and we may not be reunited for quite some time, but man do we have some amazing memories! When we are reunited, it will be so sweet.

Spring Break

It's not Spring Break without In-n-Out

In the average college student’s vocabulary the word Spring Break holds a variety of meanings. Spring Break for my friends and I was not filled with beaches and volleyballs or anything that has to do with being active. For my friends and I, our break was spent on a couch; we were the epitome of lazy. I know that sounds awful, but it’s actually all that I had aspired for.

The details of the trip are fairly short, so it won’t take long to explain to you the extent of our week. Two of my friends, Saryl and Karlee, along with myself, drove from Portland to Karlee’s house in Redding, CA. The first day we awoke to lovely Easter presents from her mom and then went to church with her family. We had an amazing Easter lunch; her mom makes the best Tator-tot casserole!

Lunch on the way to Redding

The next day was spent completely on the couch. Within this 24-hour time period we watched a plethora of movies. I have to give us some credit for the rest of the days. We did get off the couch a little.

One day Saryl and I went hiking at Castle Crags outside of Redding and the next day we went to San Fransisco. The other days are hard to recall, I assume we were lying on the couch. –I know that it sounds absolutely pathetic, but this is really all that I had longed for over Spring Break. I wanted to be lazy and enjoy being lazy.

Overall, Spring Break was wonderful. I was in the company of two of my best friends for an entire week. Sometimes we all just need to unwind and give our bodies a rest.

Saryl and I after walking up Hyde Street in San Fran

All That Jazz

Winter Formal took place about a month ago, but I’m just now getting to it. Lucky for you my memory is superb.


I wasn’t originally planning to go to formal. All of my roommates were going, so I thought it would be nice to enjoy a quiet house and have a date night with myself. I actually had it all planned out; Mexican food, Across the Universe, Dead Poet’s Society and either Shall We Dance or You’ve Got Mail (I couldn’t decide between the last two). --Now that I’m writing about it, I know what a big loser I looked like. Anyway, my friend Daniel asked me to go, so I scratched loner, loser date night and prepared for formal, “All That Jazz.”

If you’re familiar with Portland, the words Crystal Ballroom and McMenamins carry significant meaning. If not, the Crystal Ballroom is a beautiful, vintage ballroom that transforms at night to host multiple concerts. McMenamins: all you need to know is that they have some of the best food in Portland. With that said, winter formal was hosted above the Crystal Ballroom, McMenamins catered, and a live Jazz band provided the music.

We couldn’t find a parking space anywhere downtown, so we wandered for a good bit of time until God himself provided a parking space a mile away. By this time we were about 40 minutes late. Luckily the 4 of us who came together are the coolest people at Cascade, so the party didn’t start until we arrived. This is a little bit of a stretch, but at least the food was still relatively warm!

The night carried on with great music and “dancing.” I only say, “dancing” because if you’re anything like me dancing is absent from your list of talents. Someday however, I will learn how to properly “Cut a rug.”

By the end of then night we were pooped, but it was well worth it. Looking back, I’m ashamed to say that I almost skipped this opportunity for a night of laziness. Thankfully Daniel saved me from the epitome of patheticness. I love Shall We Dance, but Richard Gere would not have been this much fun!

Two Years and Counting...

Two years ago I came to visit my brother and attend Summit at Cascade. It was on this weekend adventure that I met a goofy girl named Danelle. I had no idea at the time that she would turn out to be such a dear friend.


I remember our first meeting as if it were yesterday:
–I walked into Sanders Hall to register and as I began to fill out the paper, the girl sitting at the table said strangely, “Haven’t you already registered?” I gave her the same strange look and said, “No.” She then proceeded to tell me about a girl who had just registered and could have been my twin. After this I was attacked by Roni, who said that my new best friend was at Summit. To make a long story short my “new best friend” and twin, Danelle, and I hit it off great. Actually, it was more strange than great. Providence perhaps? Danelle and I found out that we had been placed to room together for that weekend. As we began to talk throughout the weekend we found out how parallel our lives seemed to be. I have to admit it was a little creepy.

From that moment and still to this day, Danelle and I know that it was all apart of God’s plan. It’s fun to look back now and see where our friendship has come from and and what we've come through. We’ve been through the freshman dorms together, broken a dorm window or two together, shared laughs too numerous to count, and many other wonderful memories that I thank God for.

I think we’ve only been in a fight once. –One year ago on our first anniversary. We were so mad at each other that we managed to ignore each other for 3 days. If you ask us today what the fight was about we just laugh. We can’t remember.

Danelle spent this last semester in Vienna with the study abroad program while I was here on campus. Luckily we were able to save a spot in our apartment/dorm for her, for when she got back. It’s not the same as it was last year, but that’s okay, it’s not supposed to be. It's still great!

We’ve both come a long way in the past year, both individually and together. We have an amazing friendship. It’s hard for me to look back at the “coincidence” of our first meeting and not give thanks to God. He knew what He was doing.

-This year, in celebration of our 2-year friendship, first meeting and our ridiculous fight, Danelle and I celebrated with a lovely breakfast and dinner.

She is a truly amazing friend and sister. My life has been so very blessed because of her.

The Gorge

I love to be outside. Perhaps one of the reasons I love Oregon so much is because of the alluring outdoors. During the rainy season, which is the majority of the year, the sun peaks it’s head out and we are blessed with a few rain-free hours. During this time Portland is flooded by people who wish to enjoy what limited time we are granted to enjoy the sunshine.
Spontaneity is called for in moments like these in which you must drop all that you’re doing so you can enjoy this sparse gift. You could go virtually anywhere in Portland and not be disappointed. However, to stand in complete veneration of creation, the Columbia River Gorge is where it’s at.

On a day such as this, some friends of mine called and asked if I wanted to go hiking at the Gorge with them. The next thing I knew the adventure had begun and we were on our way. As we were driving to the Gorge the sun began to retreat into the clouds. Upon the arrival to our destination what was left of the sun was microscopic. We decided that we would continue on our adventure into the sun with what time was remaining. Amazingly enough, as we began hiking the sun reappeared.

We hiked to a waterfall. I’m not sure which waterfall, so we will just call it “Gorge Falls.” It was a rather cold hike filled with occasional mists of rain; nevertheless it was a good hike.




Moral of the story? Enjoy the sunshine. Enjoy the outdoors. The end.

More New York Pics....

New York!

Central Park Emily and her hot dog
Good Morning America!
The famed "Naked" Cowboy
Emily's 21st birthday "party" on the airplane!

New York City

Rosie Thomas once said, "New York is lovely in the winter time."

I couldn't agree with her more. About a week ago my friend Brittany and I decided that we were going to take a weekend trip up to Mt. Hood to ski. One thing led to another and the next thing I knew we'd canceled our ski trip and had bought 3 CHEAP tickets to New York City.

The anticipation killed us last week as Emily, Brittany and I waited for our incredible weekend adventure. However, before our trip could begin we had to first drive to Seattle to catch the flight. So, at 3 a.m. our trip began.

From the very first moment of trip everything was quite bizarre, which made for one interesting adventure. When we first got to the airport and to the security gate, Brittany discovered that she had left her wallet in her car that Sarah, a friend was now driving back to Kent, WA for us. We called our Sarah and she turned around and drove back to the airport to give us the wallet.

After making it through security with Brittany's wallet and ID, we were off to find our departure gate. This is when we met a new friend. An Asian woman stopped us to ask where to go. Well, I think that's what she said. She didn't speak one word of English. As we looked at her ticket we discovered that we shared the same destination, so we motioned her to follow us. While walking to the gate she insisted on caring Brittany's bag that was almost twice the size of this petite woman. We tried to figure out her name, but were unsuccessful. She followed every inch of our shadow. She was quite the woman. She waited for us to sit down on the plane, helped us put our bags in the overhead compartment, took our bags down from the compartment after we'd landed, waited for us to get off the plane, and once again insisted on caring Brittany's bag. After walking through JFK airport, we made it to the baggage claim and parted ways with our friend. Then it was time to greet New York City.



We met Brittany's Uncle Sal, who we'd be staying with, and whom Emily and I believe to be in the mafia. The first night we were there he took us all over the city and then treated us to dinner at his favorite Italian restaurant. Over dinner, we sat next to a woman who'd grown up in New York City and she presumed to tell us about her entire life. It was quite interesting, but by the end of our conversation I was convinced that she might be insane. However, it did make for a fun dinner conversation.

After dinner we continued to venture around the city until we were too tired to stand. We then made it back to Uncle Sal's house and crashed there. The next morning Uncle Sal dropped us off in the city (he lived in Queens) and we began the day's adventure. I would tell you detail by detail of the day, but that would take far too long and it's one of those things, "You just had to be there", to fully understand what went on. We covered miles of the city and enjoyed every minute of it. For dinner that night Uncle Sal met and treated us to dinner again at his friend's Greek restaurant. The food here was amazing and I think I still dream about it at night. By the end of the day we were pooped; we'd been going non stop for the past 15 hours.

The next morning we decided to take the subway into the city early enough to make it to the filming of "Good Morning America." We were running pretty late and were a little concerned that we wouldn't make it on time. We were right, we didn't make it on time. However, when we got there the woman said that she wanted us to come from the back of the crowd to the front because we were young. She also chose our friend Emily to cut onions on the cooking segment. It was quite an experience. After the show we proceeded to run around the city until we had to catch our flight home.

If I had the time I would share with you every minute of our trip, but words are simply not enough to describe the extent of our stay in New York City. I have so many beautiful memories that will stay with me forever. This was one of the most amazing adventures that I have been on and I hope that you too will have your New York City adventure someday.

**More pics to follow!**