Spring Break

Spring Break has been wonderful! It started out great with Mom visiting for the weekend. She got in late Thursday night due to a delayed flight, but it was so fun to see her! Friday morning I had to go to my building to finish up some things for clinic before the quarter ended. Mom took a nice walk around the Greenlake. When I came home we were ready for lunch and then head downtown for some fun. Here is us at Pike Place Market. It wasn't too wet. Isn't my mother beautiful? I love her in her coat:).

This next photo is us by the water outside of Pike Place Market. You can see ferries in the Puget Sound in the background.
After Pike we went to Westlake Mall and then enjoyed some hot chocolate at a Starbucks as we had great conversation and watched the rain fall outside. It was so fun!

We were so lucky to have a BEAUTIFUL day Mom's second day here. We got up and got ready for the day moderately early to catch a ferry to Bainbridge Island. What a perfect Spring day for a ferry ride! ...A little windy, though.
I am going to miss Seattle so much!
We ate lunch at a Thai restaurant by the marina. There was only one other party in the restaurant by the end of our lunch, a couple young with a little boy sitting behind us. We started talking and found out that they were LDS, too, and were soon moving down to Prescott, AZ for a physical therapy job. It's amazing how many Mormons you can run into:). Here's Mom and I outside the restaurant. It was great being able to smell the salt water! I still can't believe how nice of a day we got. I was hoping we'd get one for Mom!
After lunch we walked around Winslow, the town the ferry docks at. We walked through a lovely candle store, browsed through an art gallery, had fun looking at the yarn store and all its knitting projects, enjoyed the quilting by numbers store, sat through an interesting video with footage by Ansel Adams of the Japanese internment camp and walked through Bainbridge's historical museum, ate some yummy homemade ice cream from Mora Iced Creamery, glanced at the chocolates in a candy store, and enjoyed a waterfront walk.
It was so fun to have Mom here! I look forward to other family visiting soon:).

I also got a new haircut this week. I've been thinking about getting it cut shorter since before Christmas and finally got the guts to do it. The day I got it cut I started having doubts and wondered why I did it, but now I'm happy with it. I got my haircut at VAIN in Ballard with Alexis. She was wonderful! She seemed to really understand curly hair and in my opinion gave me a great cut. She even asked me what ethnicity I was to get a good idea of how my curls behave:). I was a little nervous about the comments that I would get with my new hair style, but I've been getting great reviews! Here's me posing with my new cut after church.
All in all, Spring Break has been great! I can't believe I have only one more quarter left of classes. I'm moving up and up!

A few temple trips

I looked though old photos to get some ideas of what I should post about in this blog entry. I passed though some photos I took during my last trip down to San Francisco as well as some photos from a Vancouver trip and thought I'd write about temples I've most recently visited. The photo below is a picture I took of the Langley/Vancouver temple when I went up there for its open house April 2010. Isn't it beautiful?That day in Vancouver for the open house was very special for me. It was the first time I had ever walked through a temple and had ever been anywhere besides the baptismal font, chapel, or waiting area. I remember feeling the spirit so strongly in that not-yet dedicated building. I felt the love of my Heavenly Father and Savior and was continually thinking about ordinances, eternal families, what it will be like to make and keep temple covenants, and of Heavenly Father's wondrous plan.

At the beginning of the quarter I got to go with my bishop and some of the young single adults in my ward to the Seattle temple for baptisms for the dead. What a great trip! I hope it happens more often. One of these days I'll need to take my camera when I visit the temple.


I recently went down to San Francisco for some externship interviews and was lucky enough to meet Dad there for the weekend. While there we made sure to visit the Oakland temple. We spend some significant time there patiently waiting to meet up with my cousin who was then serving as a sister missionary in the temple visitor center. Although the weather was pretty gloom (it was rainy and so foggy that we couldn't even see the temple when we pulled into the parking lot right in front of it!), the calm, peaceful feeling of the spirit was still evident. After viewing the "Reflections of Christ" exhibit, we made a few rounds about the temple. The weather had cleared up a little so that the temple was visible. We managed to take a few pictures.








The groundbreaking for the new Gilbert temple was yesterday. I found this blog entry that had great photos and descriptions of the day. I've heard the temple will be finished in about two years... I guess that will be right around the time I graduate:).

Latest highlights...

So, it's been a while since I last posted. Some of my recent highlights have been:

• Going on a spontaneous date with my Hannah-Banana to Walgreens and ending it with "single" scoops of yummy organic ice cream in a waffle cones for $3.50.
• Going on a few runs around Greenlake in just shorts and a T-shirt.
• Learning that my iron level is doubled:).
• Making and eating yummy Indian food.
• Finishing my proposal for my research methods class.
• Going to Vancouver during the Olympics.
• Talking to a good friend on the phone.
• Seeing all the beautiful blossoms everywhere here in Seattle.
• Working with cute kids in clinic:).
• Getting excited for Spring Break and seeing my family!!!

my Seattle friends = crazies

I have crazies as friends. However, sometimes their craziness serves me well. Maybe this time it will, too.