Lost & Found

So yesterday, my day was normal for about a half an hour. I got ready for work, then went outside to my car....which wasn't there! Uh oh. I called Dan to ask if he had moved it, but he hadn't. He could neither confirm nor deny that my car had been in the driveway when he left bleary-eyed for work earlier that morning. He just hadn't noticed. So I called the police and had the following conversation:

Police: Please state your emergency.
Me: I'm calling to report a car theft.
Police: Oh, is your name Deborah?
Me: Er...yes...
Police: We've been waiting for you to call. Your car was stolen last night but the thief has been caught & arrested and your car is waiting for you at the towing lot.

How's that for a miracle?!?! The guy who stole my car tried to drive it to Mexico, but the border patrol caught him and he was in jail and my car was back in San Diego before I even woke up! God is infinitely good to us! Most people never see their cars again because the thieves take them apart before crossing the border and then just sell the parts. My car wasn't damaged at all, except the ignition may have been stripped some when they forced the car to start without the key. We had to pay to get my car from the towing company, which was expensive but still a relatively small price to pay. And I had my car back within three hours of finding out that it was missing! I love that beat-up little CR-V! It's taken me 200,000 miles all over the country and just keeps on truckin'! It's not worth too much dollar-wise, but it's priceless to me. :)

Taking advantage of a natural car wash in Glacier National Park

Mexican Comedy Birthday

For my birthday this year, I wanted to check out an improv comedy club in Old Town San Diego. We waited a week after my birthday, so we could plan it during the MLK 3-day weekend. A bunch of friends came to dinner at Fred's beforehand to enjoy tasty Mexican food and a rockin' Coldstone's ice cream cake that Dan picked out for me! Just to make you jealous, it had layers of red velvet cake, sweet cream ice cream mixed with brownies and cookie dough, and was covered in chocolate fudge icing. All my favorite desserts rolled into one amazing cake...I'm still dreaming about it...

Anyway, we were running a little late for the comedy show, but luckily they started a few minutes late, which gave everyone time to find street parking & seats just before the show started. Many of their improv skit ideas were literally pulled out of a hat, so the actors had no time to prep beforehand. It amazes me how they're able to think on their feet and still be funny! Plus it was a family-friendly show, so if anyone made an inappropriate suggestion (in the audience or the cast), they had to wear the "brown bag of shame" over their heads. One poor lady got to the show too late to hear that rule and yelled out a curse word (really loudly) as a suggestion to the cast. Everything screeched to a halt and they made this huge deal out of putting the bag over her head, so she was really embarrassed and had no clue what was going on! hil-arious!

It was a great night with great friends, and a fun way to kick off my 32nd year!

Around the table from the left front: Ann, Paul, Chris S., Cynthia, Eric, Jenn, James (Eric & Jenn's baby), Ian (Chris & Judy's baby), Chris, Judy, Me, Dan, and Adessa. The 2nd picture from the other side of the table turned out really fuzzy, but oh well, here it is anyway.

2010 - the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

So far 2010 has been pretty dramatic for us. Besides the national & worldwide catastrophes (the U.S. economy & health care sagas, the Haiti earthquake, etc.), we've had a lot of unexpected personal drama. We like amusement park roller coasters, people, not emotional ones. Oh well, here's our January so far.

Family
The Good: We loved seeing our family during the holidays and my parents are coming to visit us in Feb! Also most of us are in good health and have stable jobs or retirement set-ups that are providing well for us.

The Bad: Dan's dad had a heart attack last weekend. All the Jesters (except us) live in Williamsburg, VA, so we felt especially helpless since we couldn't even be there for moral support. The good news is that they put a stent in, and he's been doing great since then! We're very thankful! We also just learned that my uncle on my dad's side has leukemia, so we're waiting to find out more about his treatment options.

Work
The Good: Dan's had a really exciting & positive year - probably his best year yet as high school principal.

The Bad: My company kicked off the new year by laying off employees, including 50% of my department. We're definitely down to the bare bones & we can feel it! Also, we're now all required to keep an 8-5 schedule, thus killing my morning workout time, since I was waking up to work out at 6:45 and going into the office at 9. I'm not getting up at 5:45. I have my limits.

General Life
The Good: I had an awesome 32nd birthday! (I'll write a separate blog on that) I used my birthday money to join the YMCA that's across the street from our new corporate office. They have really good classes and it's nice to belong to a gym again. The spinning instructors are punishing me for every cookie I ate during the holidays.

The Bad: I work out during lunchtime, so I have to shower in the gym locker room before going back to work. Eeeeew.

There is no more bad - so that's good. :) It just seems like the past few weeks have been extra emotional, with few breaks in between. But we know that God is using it all for His glory & our good! We're praying that we can truly rest in Him, no matter what the circumstances!

Happy New Year from Michael Tait!

I just wanted to pass on a New Year's wish from Michael Tait. He was singing a little personal concert to Dan and I last night right before the ball dropped, so we asked him to give a shout-out to all our family & friends.


Okay really, we went to the Knotts Berry Farms New Years Eve extravaganza last night, and it was a great time! They opened up most of the roller coasters and had line dancing instructors and the Newsboys rang in the New Year. They were fun - they did a mix of new songs, old Newsboys songs (Captain Crunch, anyone?), Michael Tait originals, and even threw in a little "Jesus Freak" for all those old school DC Talk fans. We ran into some staff & kids from Dan's school when we were in line for the roller coasters, and got to watch the countdown to midnight with them. Knott's was a full minute late, which everyone knew because they were watching the clocks on their cell phones (darn that modern technology - it ruins all the suspense!). But they made up for it with a pretty cool fireworks show. Anyway, here are a couple of photos of our New Year's party. We wish everyone the best in 2010!!

The Newsboys

Featuring Michael Tait as lead singer

Happy New Year!! Whoo hoo!!

Flashback to last year. I don't think we've changed much yet.

Merry Christmas!

As always, getting to spend time with our families during Christmas week was one of the very best parts of our year. We went to Weatherford, TX for the first half of the week to visit my parents & brothers, who had also come "home" for the holidays. We've gone to Texas almost every Christmas of my life to visit relatives, but this is the first time my parents have called Texas home in about 35 years! They seem to love it - especially because they're able to see their siblings much more often now. We got to visit their church and take a guided tour of their new town & surrounding area. We also had a delicious meal & fun get-together with my mom's side of the family - it seems like it gets harder & harder to get everyone together each year, but we love spending time with our extended family!

The second part of Christmas week was in Williamsburg, VA with the Jesters. We have three nephews on that side, and they are the life of the party! Our days revolved around playtime, good food, more playtime, naps (those were primarily for us!), more playtime...you get the picture. After the kids went to bed, the adults would break out the games and continue playtime late into the night. We got to attend Christmas Eve service and Sunday morning service at Dan's folks' church, and several family friends joined us for Christmas dinner. Dan's mom made filet mignon and salmon this year for Christmas instead of the traditional turkey dinner, and it was as delicious as any gourmet restaurant!

We wish that our holiday time was unlimited, but we loved every minute we had! We're so thankful for Jesus' birth, his perfect life, and his sacrificial death, through which we have the gift of salvation and adoption as God's sons & daughters! We're especially thankful this time of year for the blessings he's given us, like our wonderful families, good health, steady jobs, and a loving marriage. 2009 has been such a good year, and we're already looking forward to what 2010 will bring!

I forgot to take pictures during our visit to TX, but I did get this sweet photo from our extended family get-together. My great-aunt Merle turned 98 years old this December, so we celebrated her birthday. She's sitting in the rocking chair with her daughter, Berle Ann, on the left and my Uncle Brian and Aunt Margaret on the right.

Our incredibly cute 9-month-old nephew, Aaron

Our nephews Nathan (front) and Benjamin were so much fun to play with! This was their gingerbread house masterpiece.

The house was demolished as the days went by. We blame Bumblebee.

The Jester Family

Happy Birthday to Dan!

It's Dan's birthday today!! Although our trip to Canada and the hockey games were all one big birthday party as far as he was concerned, he still managed to do a lot of celebrating today. The staff at his school went all out with balloons, streamers, doughnuts, cake, Chinese food, more cake, a special song, cards, gift cards, etc. And of course the kids heard about it, too, so he got lots of "happy birthdays" and random offers of food from their lunch boxes. When we got home from work, he was on the phone for at least an hour talking to family members who wanted to wish him a happy birthday. And then I took him out to dinner at the only good BBQ restaurant we have in San Diego, and made his favorite chocolate cream pie for dessert. After all that food, he says so far he feels a little fatter this year than he did last year. I say he looks better than ever.

At the end of the day, there is no doubt how much he is loved. Especially by me. :)

A Canadian Thanksgiving, Eh?

This Thanksgiving, we took a trip to the motherland of hockey - Canada! Dan wants to see games at every NHL arena in his lifetime, and we got the chance to watch hockey in Calgary, Edmonton, and Vancouver during the holiday weekend. It was also fun to see the areas of Canada we'd never visited before. Dan loved it, of course - the whole culture there revolves around hockey. Kind of the way Americans love football.

Although we were in another country, it didn't feel like it. Except they had "washrooms" instead of restrooms and they're on the metric system. They had many of the same hotels, restaurants, and stores that we have, and the driving laws were similar. The one big difference is that people actually follow the rules there. For instance, people drive at least within 10 miles of the speed limit and only use the left lanes of the freeway when they're passing someone. And when the road merges from three lanes to two lanes, no one uses the right lane that they know is about to end to cut off all the cars that are waiting patiently in line. We were in awe.

Anyway, we had a great time and got to see a lot of places in a few short days. Plus, it actually felt like winter there, so it was easier to believe that the holidays have arrived! Below are some photos of our whirlwind trip.

We started in Calgary, which is a beautiful metropolis in the middle of farmland.

Watching the Calgary Flames play the Phoenix Coyotes

We spent Thanksgiving Day in Banff National Park in the Canadian Rockies. It was so beautiful, and reminded us of Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado.

From Calgary, we drove to Edmonton, where it got REALLY COLD.

Look! No cars in the left lane! (except for us because we were passing someone at that very moment, I swear!)

Dan brushed snow off our car for the first time in about 5 years!

We spent several hours walking through the West Edmonton Mall - the largest mall in North America. They've got all their entertainment rolled up inside the mall, including the ice skating rink above.

And a giant wave pool/water park

They had several animal shows going on during the day - we saw the sea lion show.

They have a huge pirate ship in one of the mall sections

And last but not least, they have an entire amusement park inside the mall! We rode the biggest roller coaster they had there, and it was so funny to go up the hill towards the ceiling.

Dan ordered a local specialty - Poutine, which is made of french fries, gravy, and cheese. I guess it's no worse than chili cheese fries, but I thought it was weird.

After a full day at the mall, we watched the Edmonton Oilers play the San Jose Sharks

After touring Edmonton, we flew to Vancouver for our last hockey game. We had a few hours before it started, so we drove to Stanley Park and found the exact place where Dan proposed to me over 7 years ago! Definitely one of the best spots in the world, in my opinion!

Our final game before heading home was Vancouver Canucks vs. Edmonton Oilers. We both love watching hockey live, and if we move to a city with a hockey team, we'll definitely get season passes!