Props for Peacemakers

As many of you know, I used to work for Peacemaker Ministries as their Annual Conference Coordinator. Now, my parents and older brother work there. Peacemakers just finished their annual conference, which has grown from around 300 during my last year in 2002, to around 900 this year!! Partly because of my dad's AMAZING people skills!!!! (at least that's what I like to think, because my dad is awesome! ;)If you want to read his info, he's Rick Friesen on this list (not Gary, that's his brother, my uncle).

Anyway, this year they had Randy Alcorn (author of the book Heaven, which I just grabbed off my shelf to start reading this week) as one of the main speakers and he has a blog where he mentioned his love for peacemaking and his support for what Peacemaker Ministries is doing, also his experience at the conference and his decision to say "YES" to speaking this year. Check it out.

One of these days I should post a blog about all that peacemaking stuff.

Interesting side note, it appears that Randy Alcorn also uses Blogger ;)

Enchilada recipe

Upon request of Janet, I'm posting the Enchilada recipe I mentioned in a previous blog.

Laurel's Chicken Enchiladas

1 cup ONION. chopped
16oz can TOMATOES. chopped. undrained
8oz can TOMATO SAUCE
1/4 cup GREEN CHILES. medium
1 clove GARLIC. crushed
1 tsp CUMIN
1 tsp SUGAR
1 tsp SALT
1/2 tsp OREGANO
1/2 tsp BASIL

2 CHICKEN BREASTS. poached
2 cups MOZZARELLA CHEESE. reserve some for the top
1 1/2 cups SOUR CREAM
8-10 CORN TORTILLAS

1. Combine onion, tomatoes, tomato sauce, chiles and spices.
2. Mix chicken, cheese and sour cream.
3. Dip each tortilla in tomato sauce mix, then put chicken mixture in center of tortilla and roll up. Place in greased baking dish.
4. Pour sauce over the top of totillas. Garnish with cheese. Put some salsa on top if more spice is desired.
5. Bake 350 until bubbly, about 40 minutes.

NOTE: I made a few modifications by adding extra onion and garlic and using mexican style shreaded cheese instead of mozzarella. I also felt like it could have used a little more sauce so would definitely pour some salsa or mix a little extra sauce next time. But then, I like sauce ;)

ENJOY!!

Life and Running

I feel like I keep blogging about the same things, life is fantastic!! I'm sure you may think to yourself, "how can life really be that great?" Well, right now it is!! Yesterday morning after I dropped Mark off at the bus stop and drove to work, he sent me this text message, "I am so very much in love with you! I can't even believe it's true." I wrote back and told him I felt the same way and how sometimes I feel like we are like little kids playing house ;) Married life is better than I imagined!! It's every day things with your favorite person! So it makes everything every day so much better!! There are the not-so-wonderful moments (we had one last night), but then we work it out and are good again, it's cool!

One thing that I've been very encouraged by is that we've remembered to pray together every night before we go to bed. It's normally after we are in bed with the lights out and we don't make them real long prayers or anything, but we talk to God about the events going on. It's been really cool since that wasn't something we remembered to do before we got married.

Last week I made waffles! I was going to post a picture but since we don't have Internet at home and when I'm home, I'm normally distracted by life with my amazingly handsome husband, Internet is far from my mind. I made yummy waffles with walnuts in them and Saturday upped the anty a little by adding chocolate chips to the batter as well. I also doubled the recipe so I could have extra to freeze. So for breakfast every day this week I've had frozen waffles. They are VERY good!!

The marathon is a week from this coming Sunday and I feel like running is not as much of a priority as it used to be. I am still making sure to get the same amount of workouts in during the week as before we got married but suddenly I feel like I'm hardly doing anything. We've also tapered down on our distance runs so last weekend only did 12 miles and this weekend are only doing 8. I don't really understand the concept of tapering down since we did high mileage for 3-4 weekends in a row this summer and didn't need to rest or taper down. But this is what all the training plans and guides say to do before a marathon, taper down. So we are. Last Saturday I noticed a strange shooting pain in my knee. It would get worse when we'd walk and start running again so towards the end I just kept running even when Trisha needed to walk a little, I'd just jog slowly next to her. While running Tuesday night, the pain came back, though not as bad. I went a little easy that night and didn't run as far and then iced it a couple times when I got home. I also skipped my workout last night for the sake of my knee to let it rest until Saturday's 8 mile run. Maybe the lower mileage will help it a little. I'm not sure what else to do but am a little worried it might mess up my marathon plans!! We also signed up for a half marathon 2 weeks after the full, to keep us moving. So I can't just stop after next Sunday.

I got my new Social Security card in the mail yesterday! Which means I can now get a new driver's license, passport, and change my car title... and on down the list. It's actually a much smoother process so far than I thought. I'll try and hit the DMV next week for my license and title and mail in my passport. Fun to have updated documents!!! Now we need to visit our banks and add each other (and me with my new name), among other things.

More wedding pictures ;)

I posted a few more pictures of the wedding (some not in the other 2 locations), on my facebook account. You can get to them here. I'm really loving all the pictures!! The more I look at them the more fun memories I think of from the day!

Also, my friend Marla is helping me with my blog "look" and banner, that's awesome!! She rocks! Thanks Mar!!

I'm hoping to post the "real" wedding pictures online in the next few weeks so if you are interested in seeing them, check back!

Last night I made a new recipe, Aunt Laurel's Enchiladas. They were SO good!! I also made little breakfast sandwiches that I froze for us to have for breakfast sometimes. You just heat them in the microwave, we had them today and they were very good!

Last night we also went over to Barb's for some hangout and tv time. It's one of the few times I can get online (hence the posted pics). I'm still struggling with the minimal Internet in my life and can sometimes log in to the neighbors at our apartment. But I also kind of like not having the option of getting online in the evenings.

I ate frozen wedding cake for dessert. A few seconds in the microwave and it's as good as new!! We were also fairly happy with the result of The Last Comic Standing. Although our favorite person got voted off a couple weeks ago, Amy Shumer.

Mark has been SO good at remembering to pray at night when we go to bed. I've been very impressed with that. It's really neat to pray together and something we always forgot to do before now.

What does the perfect husband do?

He takes Monday morning off work and away from his early morning men's group, even when he was really looking forward to going back after a break, and gets new tires put on his wife's car and buys her flowers (just because he loves her), and then takes her to a little lunch at one of his usual lunch places. Yes ladies, I'm so sorry for you that the perfect husband is no longer on the market, but I'm so happy that I was the one who snagged him!!

I LOVE my new tires!! Mark got me some really good ones but assured me this doesn't mean I can drive crazy because, "you're still my wife and I want you to be safe", as he would say. My old ones were quite treacherous when it would rain. I'd peel-out when trying to go from a stopped position on a slight incline. These are WAY better!!

Yes, I'm still in a blissful newly wedded state of mind! I wonder how long this will last? Hopefully forever!!

In the mean time, Mark and I are trying to set a few goals for our first year of marriage in terms of our spiritual growth as a couple. What are some things that you did with your spouse then (or now) you felt were the most helpful? We're planning to join a couple's caregroup, but not right away.

Stacey & Michael's wedding

This week was a little busier with Stacey’s wedding festivities starting with a bachelorette party I went to on Thursday night, the rehearsal and dinner Mark and I both went to (he was an usher and I a bridesmaid) on Friday night, and the wedding yesterday. It was a really nice wedding and Stacey was absolutely gorgeous!!

The rest of my life has officially begun ;)

2 weeks and about 4.5 hours since we’ve been married and life is better than I ever imagined!! I’m not entirely sure what I thought it would be like, but it’s been SO fun! We laugh all the time, still can’t get enough time with each, enjoy our new morning routine, have enjoyed setting up our new apartment, and in general have felt like everything has been fantastic!! I’m more in love with Mark today than I was 2 weeks ago, if that’s possible ;)

The wedding was beautiful!! Everyone looked great, were so wonderful in helping the day go smooth and treating us like we were the most special people on earth for that afternoon. Thanks to EVERYONE who came, helped, and just showed us love throughout the weekend and wedding day!!

Vegas was perfect!! Well, Vegas isn’t perfect but we felt like our time together was perfect. Between “quality time” in our hotel room, a couple walks along the strip, a little gambling, seeing David Copperfield, and a lot of great meals, we just couldn’t have had a better time!! We were both pleasantly surprised to discover we were always in complete agreement about how to spend our time each day even though we never had an agenda. We didn’t strike it big in terms of money, but we did strike it big with our first 5 days together!!

We got home late Friday night the 7th and enjoyed 3 days at home unpacking and setting up our new house. All our gifts from showers and the wedding were wonderful and definitely gave us a little leg up on our new life together. Our bedroom doesn’t have any pictures on the wall (we ran out after the living and dining rooms), and the small second bedroom is piled high with stuff, but otherwise it’s looking very cute and homey.

Since returning to work on Tuesday, we’ve discovered we love mornings together, even if they are only long enough to get ready for work, put coffee in a to go cup and head out the door. Going to bed with each other and waking up next to one another is a highlight!!

That’s it for now. We don’t have Internet at our new place but I’ll try and keep things as updated as possible. We’ll try and post all wedding pics in a central location, but for now you can view some my friend Noell took here or some my brother took (mostly pre-wedding), here.

Honeymoon pics!!