Our Anniversary...

Yesterday was Clay and my 8th anniversary. Wow. That sounds like such a long time, but it doesn't feel like it's been eight years. It feels more like three or four. But 8 it is and I am so thankful for it. I've learned a lot about life, a lot about love, a lot about myself, a lot about being a parent, and a lot about being a wife in these last 8 years. And Clayton has been here for all of it. He's grown with me, mellowed with me, had fun with me, cried with me, relaxed with me, encouraged me, and loved me through all my ups and downs. And I love him all the more for it.

So this weekend we went out of town sans children (thank you Gran and Grandad!) for an adventure. Clayton had tried to plan out a romantic weekend, but I vetoed that idea for a more spontainous getaway. I was needing to get out of Bakersfield and just be somewhere pretty. (Bakersfield is not the most visually appealing town unless it's one of the 9 days or so a year where the air is clean and the sky is actually blue and you can actually see the mountains all around. Then it's quite pretty. But alas, those days are few and far between.) And I didn't want a schedule that we needed to stick to or a place we had to go to or anything like that. I just wanted to go wherever we felt like going at that precise moment in time. So we did!

After dropping the kids off, we headed out of town via Highway 33 towards Ojai. Man, that is a pretty drive this time of year. Everything was green and there were wildflowers everywhere. I wanted to get some pictures, but the road was very windy and my sweetheart drives very fast. Haha. Anyways, I had never been on Highway 33, but the last time Clayton was on it, he had his now infamous motorcycle wreck and I have never had the nerve to go see where it happened. So he showed me the approximate area. Let me just say, "Thank You God for protecting Clayton." He was very high up and crashed near a VEEEERY steep embankment/cliff. So that was interesting to see.

We ended up driving through to Ventura. It was so nice to just drive with no real destination. Seriously. We stopped and ate at a nice local restaurant called Winchesters. Mmm. It was good. And then we went and drove around until we found a hotel we wanted to stay in. (The Mariott in Oxnard is quite nice if you're ever in the area. It's very clean.)

The next morning after some shopping at Fryes Electronic Story a.k.a techno geek heaven, and some furniture store shopping (we desperately need a new dining table and chairs) we headed over to Solvang, the Dutch capital of the United States! It's a nifty little tourist driven town where all the buildings have a dutch look to them and there are windmills and TONS of cute little shops for everything from quilting to kite-flying, and lots and lots of bakeries. We hadn't booked a room in advance and unfortunately most of the hotels had no vacancies. Except this one...... The Viking Inn.....

Don't ever stay here. Just trust me. Ha ha. Yeah. Moving on....

I was trying REALLY hard not to be obnoxious with my camera and hence didn't get any good shots of Solvang with the exception of an AWESOME antique store near the town's center. This place was A-MA-ZING. Seriously.

I love old things. They had all the cool old pocketwatches. Check out the price on pocketwatch with the painting on it....Yikes!

And there was gorgeous old jewelry just a dripping and glimmering everywhere....

There were even jewels dripping off of lamps and chandeliers.....

Lots and lots of jewels..... Yes, I am such a girl. =)

There was so much stuff in there I could have spent hours and hours. They had this really neat cabinet thingy that had two violins in it and you put a coin in and I think it makes the violins play. I say I think because I was plumb afraid to touch it because if was one of only 4 in the whole world and was priced at $174,000. I'm way to clumsy to stay in close proximity to something that expensive for very long, so no photo.

This is the window outside the antique shop. Isn't it pretty?

Basically, we had a great time. And I'm happy that we've made it eight years.

Thanks for reading if you've made it this far! =)

I have a big decision to make....

Today I was presented with an opportunity to do something that I've been longing to do for a long time now. I didn't think it would even be a possibility for at least a few years, so I honestly hadn't even considered doing it anytime soon.

This afternoon a friend was talking to me about this topic and I told her I would love to do that....someday. She asked why not now? I told her that certain things that I thought were really unlikely would have to happen first. Not five minutes later the biggest of the things I had mentioned to her happened. And all of a sudden it seems like doors that I thought would be tightly shut have swung wide open.

Ack! I have a big decision to make and a deadline to make it in. I need God's guidance in a serious way. If I do this thing, I want it to be God's will and not just mine. ('Cause mine says yes automatically.) If it's just my will, then I don't want to do it. And if it is His will, He will make a way. This I know.

So I'm going to seek Him out these next few days and listen for His voice.

I know I've been really unspecific on purpose (which for me is not normal), but if you think of me, will you pray that I would hear clearly what God is saying to me? I struggle with that sometimes. I need clarity.