Easter Sunday

Easter Sunday turned out to be a blast. My mom and dad were both up in Seattle helping out Heather's little family of four, so the rest of us siblings were left to fend for ourselves for the holiday. Brent and I decided to take the initiative and invite my younger brother, older brother, sister-in-law and niece over for Easter dinner. In my mind, this was kind of an initiation event for me; it would be my first time ever hosting a major family holiday on my own.

I spent all of Saturday cooking and cleaning for Easter and watching Lost with my poor sick Brent.

On Easter, instead of two morning services, my church offers three, the first starting at 7 am. My family has a tradition of attending that sunrise service, going to breakfast someplace nearby for the second, and then returning for our Sunday school classes for the third service. Although Brent was feeling too sick to attend the early morning service with me, Hunter and I planned to meet up for the first service at 7 am.

I got out the door on Sunday morning a little late, and was greatly perturbed when I found myself behind what I thought was a dillydallying car. It was going WAY TOO SLOW for a Sunday morning when you're late for church. I got out from the behind the car into the lane next to it, slammed my foot down on the gas and roared past the car through an intersection. As my car was gaining speed, I felt a little conviction, and I asked myself, "Would God want you to be on time to church so badly that He would want you to break the law by speeding there?" It was a rhetorical question that I didn't want to answer, but before I had time to slow down, a cop on a motorcycle pulled up right behind me and flashed his lights.

So, yeah, I got my first speeding ticket. 51 mph in a 35 mph zone. Ouch. Lesson learned.

Church was really good. I always look forward to John MacArthur's resurrection sermons, but this year his Easter sermon was a little different from normal. He took us first to 1 Peter 2:21-24, where it says, "For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps." John's question for us was this: In what way is the death of Christ an example to us? We cannot die for someone else's sins; what aspect of Christ's death are we to repeat?

John answered in part by saying that Christ's death, in the sanctifying sense, must be repeated by all Christians. He answered in more detail by taking us to the gospel accounts of Christ's suffering, and showing us Seven Lessons from the Words of Jesus on the Cross. I won't go into detail for all of them, but I thought some of you would enjoy at least getting the main points:

1. He died praying for forgiveness for those who were His enemies, Lk 23:34.

2. He died focusing on His evangelistic mission, Lk 23:43.

3. He died expressing compassion, caring for those who belonged to Him, Jn 19:26-27.

4. He died understanding the seriousness of sin, Mt 27:46.

5. He died understanding the suffering of being human, Jn 19:28.

6. He died having completed the work that God gave Him to do, Jn 19:38.

7. He died trusting in the promises of God, Lk 23:42.

After the service Brent met Hunter and me and our good friend Masha at Denny's for breakfast. We were all about to get an Everyday Slam for $4, but the waiter informed us that for $3.99, we could get an All-American Slam that came with sausage AND bacon, not one or the other. So of course we all ordered the meal with more food for a penny cheaper.

Brent and I rushed home after the second church service to put last minute things together for the Easter celebration. Hunter and the Hays' arrived promptly, and we all played games and chatted while the ham was cooking. I think we finally sat down to eat at about 3 pm, and this was the feast that was before us:

And here are the deviled eggs:

Thanks to suggestions from Aunt Missy and Cynthia, these deviled eggs were quite the success. Aunt Missy provided meticulous directions for boiling and peeling, and Cynthia gave suggestions for the filling. I must admit, this time around I was nervous about ruining the eggs, so I went with the most simple ingredients possible: egg yolks, mayonnaise, and salt. That was it. No paprika (mostly because I didn't have any), no nothing. Blending the mixture with a hand-held mixer made the filling the PERFECT consistency, and the simplicity of the mayonnaise and salt gave the yolks a most delightful tangy taste. Next year, now that I'm confident with my method, I'll have to try new seasonings and toppings.

Enough about deviled eggs. As for the rest of the menu, we had a half ham (Btw, who needs pre-spiral sliced ham with brown sugar coating that costs $40? I got my $8 ham from the grocery store, and that's just what it was: a ham. Nothing on it, not sliced, and it was WONDERFUL. Because HAM is wonderful. You don't need any sugary coatings for it.), cheesy potato casserole, spinach salad with strawberries, pecans, feta cheese and raspberry vinaigrette, rolls (thanks to Hunter), a delicious Russian salad with rice, corn and crab meat (thanks to Vika), and clementines (thanks to Harrison and Vika). It was quite the feast. I was stuffed after my first helping.

Eventually we brought out the desserts. I had prepared these creamy lemon crumb squares (very good, maybe a bit too tart?) and dark chocolate covered strawberries with coconut. Some friends from Harrison and Vika's church had sent them with a box full of gourmet individual desserts as well, because Brent and I had invited them for Easter but at the last minute they weren't able to make it. The memory of the dessert display just made my mouth water, as I sit typing this. Everything was so enjoyable and delicious.

We played games for the rest of the afternoon/evening, and then when we were all gamed out, we chilled in front of the first Harry Potter movie.

Oh yeah, and much of the day was spent by munching on this little girl:

When her cuteness catches me off guard, she makes me want to start a family. NOW. Precious babies can be dangerous.

Church, breakfast out, chillin' with sibs, Easter feast, games, fruit desserts, lazy movie, munchable baby...aw, it was a GREAT Easter.

Oh wait...there was a speeding ticket somewhere in there. It was a GOOD Easter.

Nah, the ticket didn't affect it that much. It was a GREAT Easter.

If you haven't laughed yet today...

...please read this post. It makes me giggle every time.

Cahuengas: A Letter of Explanation

Dear Reader,

Two close family members have come to me privately in the last day to lovingly express their alarm over some of the content of my last post, "How come Disneyland never gets old?" Specifically, the content surrounding cahuengas. I am afraid that there has been a gross misunderstanding here, and I need to ask your forgiveness for being extremely vague about the definition of a cahuenga. The two close family members were under the impression that Holly and I had defined cahuengas to be something acutely unmentionable, so very unmentionable that I will not repeat it here. I can assure you that lewd definition is NOT what we had in mind, and again, I am so sorry if my vagueness surrounding the subject of cahuengas caused your mind to lead you to a definition we did not intend.

"Cahuenga" was never explicitly defined in either Holly's mind or mine. The closest we ever got to a strict definition was that it was an African word for "buttocks." (Racy, I know.) However, we both promptly discarded that definition because it was far too exclusive. In my mind, a cahuenga is anything big, round and bulbus, so very big and round for its size that you are afraid it is going to explode. When you look at it, your mind thinks, "Ca-HOOON-ga!!!!"

My big toe is a cahuenga. So is the big red bulb of my bulb baster. I wish that when I squeezed the bulb of the bulb baster, it would make an old-fashioned car-honking noise that sounds like "Ca-HOOON-ga!!!"

{Interestingly enough, at Disneyland there are cars that go up and down Mainstreet that DO make that old-fashioned "Ca-HOOON-ga!!!!" honk, and Holly and I laughed so hard when we looked for the horn and it did, in fact, look just like the top of a bulb baster. The driver has to squeeze it to produce a honk. Perfect.}

Again, I apologize profusely if my earlier post caused your mind to wander somewhere completely uncomfortable and unmentionable. I would have just removed all references to cahuengas from my previous post, but I didn't know how many of you had already read it, and I felt that everyone who had read it deserved an explanation.

Love,

Hayley

How come Disneyland never gets old?

I cannot count the number of times I have been to Disneyland since December 7, 2007. And yet, each time I go, I find some new enjoyment in the park. Each and every Disneyland experience is distinguishable and memorable. That place will never get old.

Holly Schultz and I went to Disneyland together yesterday. Here I will document our adventures in the happy wonderland. We had fun at the end of the day recounting all the ways that God had blessed us during our D-land adventure.

When we arrived at the park, we went first to guest services so that Holly could put the value of the ticket that she was in possession of toward a renewal of her annual pass. The ticket was worth $70. As we stood in line waiting for someone to help us, she noticed that the ticket she was holding had expired on January 4, 2010. As a single college student, she was worried about the possibility of forking out an extra $70 out of her own pocket. We decided to ask Guest Services anyway if she could still use the ticket to put toward a pass. To our surprise, they said yes! We praised and thanked God that even though the ticket had expired almost two months ago, Disneyland still agreed to use the value of it toward her pass.

One of the very first things we noticed as we got off the tram in Downtown Disney was how vibrant so many of the trees were this time of year. Take a look at these beautiful shots we got of God's creation around the park.

Our first order of business was procuring a Fast Pass for Space Mountain. After it was acquired, we decided to try something new, the 3-D tribute to Captian Eo. Right now, instead of "Honey, I Shrunk the Audience," "Captain Eo" is playing in the theater in Tomorrowland. It's a space odyssey/cheesy music video featuring Michael Jackson. We had fun laughing at it and making fun of it all the way through, as well as taking pictures next to the advertising poster.

Every trip to Disneyland deserves a pic with Walt and Mickey.
We exited Disneyland at this point to go check out the excitement at California Adventure. Unfortunately, when I used my pass to get in California, the guy told me that my pass was blocked out that day. I told him that I had gotten in to Disneyland, and he replied that they shouldn't have let me in, because I was blocked out, but if I had gotten into D-land once they would probably let me in again. He could not let me in to California though.

I was a little huffed when I got out of line. I whipped out my handy-dandy iPhone to get online to the Disneyland pass blockout calendar in order to prove that guy wrong, but sure enough, it was a blockout date. My goodness, it was time to praise and thank God that He had let us into Disneyland that day, because both of us had forgotten to check whether or not I was blocked out before we drove all the way to Anaheim!

Before entering Disneyland once again, we did a little window shopping in Downtown Disney. The most fun we had was at Island Outfitters, where we saw the most darling '50s era dresses that we just HAD to try on. Here they are, so sorry about the quality of the pictures.


Aren't they adorable? I wish women still dressed that way on a regular basis. So feminine, so flattering.

When we went back inside the park we got Fast Passes for Indiana Jones. The Fast Passes scheduled us to ride it between 8 pm and 9 pm. It was only about 1 pm and I was already kinda feeling tired, so imagining staying that late just to ride Indiana was daunting, but we kept the passes just in case.

As we stood in line at a candy shop waiting to order an Apple Pie Caramel Apple, I just thought these character Caramel Apples were too cute.
I was cold, as I had been all day so far. I was wearing a long sleeve tshirt, a sweatshirt, and a windproof jacket, and I was still frozen all day. And the high was 60. I know, I'm a Californian wimp. Anyways, even though I was frozen all ready, Splash Mountain sounded too fun to pass up. Especially because I haven't been on Splash Mountain since before December 7, 2007, I don't think. My husband and his family don't like it all that much. I love it, and I was willing to risk getting drenched on a cold (for me) day because of the intensity of my love for it.

Holly and I were seated in the back of our log, and surprisingly enough, we only got a few drops of water on us throughout the entire ride. The people toward the front of the log were absolutely drenched, but Holly and I were dry. We were pleased with the outcome. Not that the people in front were drenched, but that we were dry. :) Later, as we were praying for our dinner, I thanked God that He had kept us dry on the ride, because it kinda had been brazenly foolish of me to go on it knowing the probability of getting soaked and the fact that I was freezing to begin with. He protected me even through my rash stupidity. :)

Here we are on the Casey Jr. Circus Train. This was right after Dumbo, the ride on which we spotted Justin Guarini (runner up to Kelly Clarkson in American Idol Season 1). I noticed him first and asked Holly if it was him, and she agreed that she thought it was. I whipped out my handy-dandy iPhone again to double check his picture on IMDB, and the picture confirmed that whoever the guy was that we spotted on Dumbo, he was the spitting image of Justin Guarini. The fact that we noticed a Disneyland worker escorting him and his group was another confirmation that we had, indeed, spotted a star (so to speak).

After a grand time in Fantasyland, we made our way over to one of our favorite restaurants in Disneyland, Cafe New Orleans. Holly just looked so cute in her beanie and scarf that I had to take a picture.
We ordered Pomme Frittes, French Onion Soup and Ratatouille. (I CRAVE Cafe New Orleans' ratatouille even while away from Disneyland.)


It was a heartwarmimg, energy-producing meal. Enough energy to last us the rest of our evening. Before we got up from our table we discussed whether or not we wanted to hang around for our 8 o'clock date with Indiana or if we just wanted to brave the line for it immediately since we had already pretty much done everything else we had wanted to do in the park. For some reason we decided to kill time with other attractions until 8 o'clock instead of just braving the line. I'm glad we did, because the rest of the night proved to be a blast.

We stood in line for Space Mountain again (only a forty minute wait...pretty good for the ride). I whipped out my handy-dandy iPhone again and found some two-player games to make the time go by faster as we waited for our ride, and we entertained ourselves playing air hockey and hangman, iPhone style. Hangman, oddly enough, kept us entertained and laughing for a good half hour. I love my iPhone.

We then trudged over to Thunder Mountain, a ride for which a couple had just given us Fast Passes. We were able to skip most of the line with the passes and had a wonderful time on the wild west train.

Finally, it was time to redeem our Fast Passes for Indiana Jones. It just so happened that as we were approaching the front of the line for Indiana, in walks Justin Guarini and the rest of his group. Apparently he and his group didn't have to wait in line, they were escorted to a car right away. The girl who told Holly and I what row to sit in whispered excitedly at us, "You get to sit in the car with the guy from American Idol!!!!" Poor girl looked like she wanted nothing more but to abandon her current responsibilities and go ride Indiana Jones with Justin herself. Sure enough, Holly and I were directed to sit right behind Justin and his group of friends.

As the ride was pulling to a stop, Holly and I were whispering back and forth as to whether or not asking for a picture with him would be appropriate. We concluded that it would be. As soon as we got out of the car and were walking in the direction of the exit, I approached the American Idol star and said, "Excuse me, Justin?" (Um, Hayley, since when are you on a first-name basis with a guy you've never been introduced to?)

He turned toward me and said "Yes?"

"May we please get a picture with you?"

"Oh yeah!" He glanced at the flood of people trying to exit the Indiana Jones attraction as well, and said, "Can we do it outside?"

I probably blushed with embarrassment, as I usually do around famous people (I get hopelessy starstruck, even with people like John MacArthur), and said yes, then hurried toward the exit of the attraction.

Ok, so Indiana Jones has the LOOOOOOONNNNNGEST exit hallway of all the attractions of Disneyland, so it made for a very awkward walk with Justin Guarini and his friends right at our heels. I couldn't speak. (Why? It was just Justin Guarini. I've never been anything close to a fan of his....I was just starstruck because he was kinda sorta famous.) It was quiet. And awkward for the most part. Holly was much more relaxed, and soon after we had gotten out of our car she gave him a hard time for getting us into such a mess during our ride (he was in the driver's seat of our car). He teased back and said, "Oh come on, I got us through in the end." But besides that interaction the long walk out of the attraction was awkward. And it was made even more awkward when I broke the silence to turn around and say, "If we take our picture with you will EVERYONE be asking for your picture?"

What was he supposed to say to that? Why did I think that was necessary? Haha. He just shook his head and said no. And then the awkward silence began again.

As soon as we made it out of the attraction, we got our picture as quickly as we could. I just wanted to take a picture of Holly with him, but Holly protested, saying she wanted to take a picture of me with him. After 3 seconds of nice fighting, Justin stepped in and said, "We'll just take two pictures."

So here they are. And I'm doing my typical, extra-wide, cheesy starstruck smile.

Holly and I talked and laughed about the encounter all the way to the tram, and had fun recounting all the circumstances that God had previously ordained that had made the timing possible for us to ride in the same car with Justin Guarini on Indiana Jones. It's cool to realize that even in silly, frivolous things like that, God is in control. :)

That was our day.

Mammoth

Two weekends ago Brent and I joined my family and some friends in Mammoth for a weekend of playing in the snow. I think the above photo pretty much sums up our adrenaline experience with the snowy slopes.

And the next sums up the enjoyment we got out of it.

The most awesome sledding would profit from stringing 6-7 people together on two or three sleds and rushing down the hills in a train fashion. These trains were incidents that culminated in laughter, mangled bodies, and bruised tail bones. And then more laughter. Note the progression of the following four photos.

We see Harrison...

Uh-oh, no Harrison...

Mangled bodies...

Sorting out the wreckage.

Mom was a bit too hesitant for the probable devastation of the train sleds, so she slid down on her own a few times.

Me and my bestie.

Me and my BESTIE bestie.

We even made a snowman!

And with Brent around, playing with the camera was inevitable.
He got some cool portraits while the rest of us continued risking broken bones on the slopes.

Brent actually had me pose for this next one. When he gets inspired behind the camera, I will always and forever be his model.

When we got back to the cabin, I took a hot shower and got all refreshed and cozy. As I emerged from the steam-room I had created in the bathroom, Brent called me to look at the little doll of a niece we have. A little snow angel:

The snow angel turned into a happy snow bear.

Brent got a few nice shots of the family of three.

This is Rusty.

I like to think I became his best friend while we were in Mammoth together. He is a one year old lab that is full of energy and puppyish curiousity. I want a dog JUST LIKE HIM when I grow up. Or...when God provides and Brent says yes. :)

He was pooped after our snow adventures. He couldn't build up the courage to get on a sled with his Daddy, Eddie, but he always ran close behind Eddie as he slid down the mountain, barking all the way. Pooped out dogs are so...so...kissable...munchable. Snackable.
His people, Eddie and his wife, Angela, had to go to the pet store after the snow excursion to buy him some protective doggy boots, as his poor little paw-pads had become raw and a little bloody from romping around in the icy snow. He looked so stinkin' cute tromping awkwardly about the cabin in those silly boots. :) Should have gotten a video.

As Brent and I were driving home, he suddenly got inspired about twenty miles out of Mammoth to pull off the side of the road and take some shots of the magnificent mountains in the distance.

The above two pictures are accurate in coloring to what it looked like out there to the naked eye. But look what my brilliant husband can create by taking an HDR photograph and doing a bit of editing in Photoshop:

When Brent climbed out of the car with his camera, I climbed out with him. I picked a wildflower as he began shooting into the wildnerness, found a pretty rock and sat on it. And then I used all my feminine powers to be beautiful. A minute later, I hear Brent say, "You suck!!!" I look at him and he's pointing the camera right at me, taking shots of his wife.
"You always make me want to take pictures of YOU!!!" exclaimed Brent.
I responded with something to the effect of, "I'm just sittin' here, I can't help it if your camera is attracted to me."
I like it when Brent takes my picture. Is that vain?

After we got back into the car, we discussed with excitement our plans for becoming a photography team together. He wants me to help pose people when he takes portraits or family photos or wedding photos. In addition, he's going to train me in the ways of the camera so that someday I can be his second shooter.

I'm so proud of my hubby. He has really demonstrated that he is a natural at this photography business. I'm sure it's gonna be a second job for him someday.