3 weeks...

well... only about a billion and a half things have happened this past week and a half...
but most importantly... Mr. I came to visit! It was a flippin blast having him here and of course, the weather would cooperate for him. It's been cloudy literally EVERY DAY this summer and then the day he lands it's nearly 80* right up until he left again this morning.
Friday I gave him the grand tour of Enumclaw (that took 5 minutes...) and got ready to volunteer at my parents Ragnar Relay Race up in the Bellingham area. We got back super late and slept in Saturday morning. Then he kindly reminded us that it was our mother's birthday that day... (seriously, all the kids forgot. how great are we?) so we flung ourselves into a tizzy cleaning and decorating for her. It was my friends' pre-wedding bbq that night so we went there and ate delicious food :) Oh, and then we went and saw Captain America! It was a really great movie!
Sunday he got to meet everyone in the ward and then right after Sacrament meeting we loaded up our Suburban to go up to Lopez Island in the San Juans. We crabbed, kayaked, hiked, fished and camped until Tuesday night. We split our Seattle adventure into 2 days Wednesday and Thursday. Wednesday we hit up the Freemont Troll, Ivars, the Arboretum and Japanese Gardens at UofW, Ballard Locks, and then this delicious restaurant called Poppy. Thursday we met my uncle at the temple to get his work discount card for the science center and spent some time on the grounds there. Then we loaded up and went to pike place, the infamous gum wall, the aquarium, the space needle, the pacific science center, the imax theater... HARRY POTTER 7 in 3D baby! and then this delicious restaurant called Tokyo; it's the type of place that makes the food right in front of you and lights things on fire :}
Friday the whole family went up to the Sunrise trail at Mt. Rainier and did a wonderful hike there to Shadow Lake. (Have I mentioned that my state is BEAUTIFUL?!) and then we went to another bbq for my mom's work. After the bbq we ended the night with a glorious showing of the original mission impossible :}
Saturday was slightly nuts... we met up with jillian and liz for a wonderfully waist-band-popping breakfast at the kettle, then I enlisted Mr. I's help in running around trying to help Carol and Scott get things ready for Grandpa Decker's 70th birthday party bbq for a while. We got ready for the bbq and then went to it and afterwards my parents took us to see Cowboys and Aliens. (also another good movie :D)


His flight left super early this morning and yeah it was hard, but it's only 3 weeks until I'm back down in p-town again for school.
Oddly enough, the summer seems to have flown by. I remember the first week of being home I thought August would never come. 4 months was a REALLY long time to wait! Now looking back on it... I'm beginning to panic slightly at where the time went. Seriously? Where did it go? And how much of it did I spend moping/waiting for the next big thing?
I'm determined that I will make these last 3 weeks spectacular for not only myself, but I think more importantly for my family, chloe and safiya. (No one likes a grumpy nanny! :P)


Anyways, here are a couple of pictures from this last week. Mr. I got most of them honestly, but I did manage to capture a few!

that time again...

I'm actually having a really hard time coming up with a bunch of A&A moments... It's like my life is so pathetic I don't have any AWESOME moments, but so awesome I don't have any awkward moments too.
ANYWAY.

Awesome:
- Chipotles :) Carol, Chloe, Safiya and I all went to eat there on Friday... The Scott Decker family has officially lost their Chipotle virginity :)
- Safiya FINALLY pooped in the toilet! I really don't think I need to explain this one, but let me just tell you that no one will appreciate this as much as those who have had to change little kids' outfits 5+ times a day due to accidents.
- Jack Bauer or more generally, 24. Mr. I has been hooked on this show all summer long, telling me the latest Jack Bauer-ism every time we skype. Lucky for me, mom has a netflix account soooooooo, I've slowly started my "conversion" into 24. It's so intense!
- having my hair re-colored. So unnecessary.... yet so awesome.
- ummmm THE HARRY POTTER PREMIERE!!!! And the fact that our entire family breakfast conversation was comprised of breaking down the details of the movie and listing what we liked and didn't like. It truly was the BEST movie of the series... although it is fairly sad now that it's over. It's like the last tiny bit of my childhood has completed and I'm now officially an adult. ew.

Awkward:
I actually have one of the greatest awkward stories for this section...
- My Aunt Erin's youngest child Kaia was participating in a soccer camp this week and as part of the camp the parents of the participants were asked in advance if they would be willing to put up the coaches for the week. Erin volunteered to do so, and on Sunday the Decker's had a big family dinner at their house in which we all met Rick and Dan, 2 British soccer coaches. Yes, British. Anyways, too make a long story short, Dan asked if I wanted to go on the quad with him around the trail that was in the big field behind the house to which I said yes (because I love 4-wheelers :D). Well, after like the second loop around the trail, he stopped the quad in the middle of the field. I sincerely thought that something was wrong with the quad, but I was VERY wrong. He turns around to face me and says...
Dan: So how many other British men have you met?
Me: Well, during club soccer my coaches would sometimes have British trainers come in to help us out a bit...?
Dan: But, I'm like... the only one you've had a legitimate conversation with right?
Me: ummm, I think so...

AND THEN HE KISSED ME.
awkward? yes. unwanted? YES
After getting home from the dinner, I check my facebook and I see that I have a friend request from Mr. British. Turns out he's listed as married....
LUCKILY I questioned him about it and he says that it's just a really really close friend from back home.... but I'm still wary of it.
since then he's been unfriended and blocked though... and now he's outta sigh outta mind. BUT... the whole thing was essentially my only really intense awkward moment of the week and henceforth deserved some mention here.
- I really have a hard time taking compliments.... Carol had some friends over this week from Ohio and I was needed to help her play hostess. She was explaining to them who I was and listed some of the things I've done and overall just painting a really flattering picture of me. It was odd for me to stand their as her friends appraised me because I felt like they were getting a false impression of who I am (hello, I'm NOT that girl she's talking about... I've made WAY more mistakes than she's giving me credit for!) but I also didn't want to contradict Carol because well 1. that would've interrupted her and 2. I didn't want to seem ungrateful for her words. So I just turned red with embarrassment instead.
Honestly that's all I can really think of right now. This week was really exhausting because of everything that Carol & co had going on but it's been nice being so busy because it makes time go by faster.

5 more days until Mr. I is here!!!

The travel bug really IS a chronic condition and while I haven't been bitten as much or hard as she has been, I've still got this itch to leave the US and TRAVEL. The older I get the more I realize exactly how ignorant I am. History has never been my forté and I wish that I knew more about different cultures. People fascinate me. I love seeing the interactions between groups and trying to riddle out why they respond to each other the way they do. I am really excited to take my sociology class in the fall for this very reason. Liz recently told me about this International Language Program that allows you to travel to 4 different countries (depending on the program you choose) and teach English for 4 months to the children there. AND it's only $2,500! (room, board and airfare). I'm seriously considering doing that next summer because the timing in between school would be PERFECT.

So that's my current state of events. Nothing too exciting here!
have an awesome and NOT awkward week this week... I know I will! :)
ps: did I mention Mr. I is coming this week? yes? oh... I did. ok just checking :)

A & A Saturday!

awkward:
- At Silverwood Ethan and I ended up waiting for the other family members to get done with their rides. As we waited, I took him to go get some Dippin Dots and we ate them sitting on a rock nearby the roller coaster mom and dad were on. In comes one of the grounds caretakers with his broom & dust pan contraption. He stopped in front of us and said, speaking to Ethan, "oh isn't that nice, your mom is willing to share her dippin dots with you!" Ethan and I looked at each other, and he must have caught the glance because he quickly back-tracked and said "unless this is your sister..." People... do I really look like a mom?
- I bought some aviators a couple of weeks ago but this week was the first time the weather has been cooperative enough to let me wear them... so I did. I wore them to Carol's house and immediately after I got in the doorway Safiya and Chloe come up to me and proceed to tell me I look like a puppy with them on. WHAT?
- being stranded in a public restroom.
- it is unbelievable what you see at a public swimming area. Silverwood is also a waterpark and while there I quickly learned exactly how popular my name is. I went to go use the bathroom (where awkward moment mentioned above occured) and as I was walking back I heard a somewhat familiar voice start saying my name but I couldn't see the owner of the voice due to the crowds, so I started to walk in the direction of the voice. The crowds literally parted and I was able to see the owner and I realized I was 2 feet away from him. It was NO ONE that I recognized. Worst off, this guy was HUGE, with long greasy I-haven't-seen-a-shower-since-I-was-a-baby hair that hung down in silver, stringy sections all over his head with a matching beard and chest/back hair. The beer belly this guy was sporting made him taller laying horizontally than he would be standing up and he was wearing shorts so short they should have been made illegal. AND I WAS STANDING THERE 2 FEET AWAY JUST STARING AT HIM.
- awkward facebook im'ing silences. FB has launched this new update and it allows you to add people to your im'ing conversation... liz, jill and I experimented with this last night and I often found myself waiting to type anything because I was sure one of them would say what I was thinking. This led to an increase in "awkward silences".


awesome:
- my tan/burn line I got this weekend!
- ummm hello? It was the FOURTH OF JULY... > yes that's my favorite holiday. I love fireworks :)
- I started working full-time for Carol this week. I really do love going over there to help everyday. Plus I get a nap-time too when the girls go down to sleep :)
- Speaking of the girls... as Chloe, Safiya and I were driving to pick-up Carol from hand therapy, Chloe asked me to play a "rock-out" song. So I flipped through my iPod to the techno playlist and put on some Daft Punk for them. Within 5 seconds Chloe turns to me and says "Daft Punk? nice... do you have this song?" (she actually named a song there but I forgot it) and proceeds to rock out in her car seat as Safiya starts chanting "daft punk, daft punk" in a tune much like Agnes sings in Despicable Me. Imagine my surprise! This kid is 4 years old!
- Goodwill thrifting. Liz, Jill and I have become quite the thrifters these days :) Why spend more then you have too right?
- Mr. Incredible comes to Washington in 12 days!!! :)

my happy list

1. family dinner's where all we do is go from one movie quote to another- laughing hysterically all the while.
2. piecing together new outfits.
3. black and white photos of ANYTHING.
4. trendy blogs with trendy people.
5. being productive. being lazy.
6. my quote wall and quote book I share with these gals: Liz, Jill, Nat, Carly and Kimmie.
7. going through old photo albums of my parents' lives.
8. no make-up days
9. vacuum lines in the carpet. (I got so OCD about this once that I crawled all over my bedroom furniture just to avoid ruining them).
10. finding that perfect quote that captures not only what you're thinking but what you're feeling as well.