I Hope They Call Me on a Mission

Yesterday was such an exciting day!  Our brother Jake got his mission call to serve in the Mexico Villahermosa mission.  He will go to the MTC July 10th.  We are super excited for him and for the opportunity to learn Spanish since that wasn't exactly his favorite class in Junior and High School.  He will be amazing.

My cute cousin Jessie also received her call to serve in the Rome Italy mission.  I can't think of a more appropriate place for a film major who loves learning new languages to go.  It is possible she will be around for the temple dedication as well, which would be such a cool experience.  She will be the first Clarke grandchild to serve a mission, which I think is pretty sweet too.

Que Hora Es?

We went to the beautiful Brigham City temple in December when we were home for Christmas.  It was fun to see it finished.  As it was being built we would often stop by and see it on our way home from the Bear Lake Cabin to see its progress.  A sad thing happened though, a watch my parents gave me when I graduated with my Masters was accidentally left behind in my locker.  I called the next day and they couldn't see that it had been turned in, four more attempted calls later I gave up figuring that it must have accidentally gone home with someone else.  Then this week, my parents went to a ward temple night there and my mom stopped to check lost and found just in case it had been overlooked.  To my great joy it was there all along, with a December 26th sticky note in a baggy.  I am so happy to have it back.

Newting

Agatha Trunchbull: It's a snake! It's a snake! One of you tried to poison me! Who?! [Matilda puts her hand up] Oh, Matilda. I knew it.

Matilda Wormwood: I just thought you'd like to know, it's not a snake. It's a newt.

Agatha Trunchbull: What did you say?

Matilda Wormwood: It's a newt, Ms. Trunchbull.

Agatha Trunchbull: [sharply] Stand up, you villainous sack of goat-slime! You did this!

We had a lot of errands to run today including groceries, I was able to talk JD into going to Tualatin Hills Nature Park that I pass every day on my way to and from work.  It was so much fun.  The last time we came JD was sorely disappointed to not find any newts like the warning signs at the entrance indicated.  This time however, we found four newts, ducks, worms, a squirrel, geese, and giant slugs.  We made it through 3 different rain storms on our adventure.  It was so much fun wondering around looking for the newts and just hanging out.  I wish we had more time to do this during the week, unfortunately most of our time is devoted to school or work, but the weekends are wonderful. I liked the bottom picture. We got a bit of hail before it turned to rain and the cute newt took refuge in the bend of JD's shoe.

Tyron Creek State Park

We went and walked around Tyron Creek State Park after church today while our dinner cooked in the crock pot.  It is about 20 minutes from our house, 10 minutes outside downtown Portland.  I loved seeing all the ferns growing out the sides of the trees.  It was nice to get out and enjoy the sunshine too.  This park didn't have very many conifers so we will definitely be coming back when all the trees have sprouted their leaves.  We saw a lot of buds, we know that spring is coming, it will be fun to see how different the park is during the spring/summer compared to winter.

Family Valentines

Our moms are awesome. We have been receiving some great Valentines. From the Hewlett's we got a dragon kite with a 6 ft wing span which should be fun to try out at the beach. We also received a package from the Speths that contained treats and JDs favorite hoodie that was left behind when we visited Utah. We love our Valentines and our moms.

The Temple is Closed

We drove to the temple and to our great disappointment we discovered that it is closed for cleaning. It is a little different not having another 4 or so temples to go to instead while Portland is closed. Medford is 4 hours south, Seattle is 3 hours north and Boise is 6 hours east. Not quite as convenient as Logan Brigham Bountiful Salt Lake Draper Jordan or Oquirrh. I took the picture as we drove back home in sadness that we won't be able to come back until the very end of February.

Early Valentines

Since I have work and JD has a hard class section coming up we did some early Valentine's celebrating tonight. We went to a delicious restaurant called La Fogata. We ordered a what we thought would be more of a sampler plate to try new things and were brought out huge platters of food that resulted in a lot of left overs. Afterwards we went home and watched an IMAX movie off of Amazon Prime. We both fell asleep around 9:30 PM. What a romantic night, right? I am grateful to be with my best friend and that any time spent together is special. He is pretty great.

Tualatin Hills Nature Park

There is a 'park' by where I work that JD and I went and explored a bit today. You know you are I a cool place when at the entrance there Is a sign that you please share the walking trail with the newts. We didn't see any but JD was looking the whole time. We have actually been pretty dry here since we got back in December to the point I find myself missing the rain. It is usually a bit warmer when it is raining and it just a nice sound to fall asleep to at night. That doesn't mean we don't get any rain. We still have little showers throughout he week but also a lot of cloud breaks and sun.

February

I find it funny that after a long January filled with rain, fog, and clouds that the first two days of February have brought sunshine and 55 degree weather.