Yakima Trip

Written, Monday January 9th.

This past Saturday Paul and I drove down to Yakima, Washington. Paul’s bible college roommate had gotten married in December in Georgia, and they were having a West Coast Open House. We decided to make a day trip out of it, instead of spending the night, as we really wanted to be able to sleep in on Sunday and wake up in our own bed…especially since we’d have had to leave really early Sunday since I was “hosting” the service on Sunday at church (3pm) and running a meeting after church (for the upcoming L.A. Campus Harvest trip, wahoo!). The drive is about 5 hours each way. Since we were in the good ‘ole USA we decided to make the most of it and stock up on some groceries (and hit up Dress Barn for me. We meant to leave our place at 6:30am but were delayed by half an hour since we couldn’t find Paul’s passports – both his American and Canadian Passports seemed to be missing. We finally rmember that we’d had them out to work on our Nexus applications, and located them with that paperwork. Phew!

After a much needed Timmies stop (and McDonalds because I far prefer their breakfast sandwiches) we were off! With a brief stop in Marysville for Starbucks we made it to Issaquah in great time. We were stopping there to hit up Trader Joes.

We could have really stopped at Trader Joes at any other point along the way, but to make me happy we stopped at Trader Joes in Issaquah as it is located at the same exit that I used to take for many years going to the kids camp I grew up going to. Every summer from 2 until 19 (as a camper and later staff) I’d make the trek over to Issaquah, through town and towards Camp in Enumclaw. This turn off was where the reality would hit for my sister and I that AFTER A YEAR OF WAITING IT WAS FINALLY CAMP TIME!!!!! From that point onwards, for the final 45 minutes of the trip, my sister and I would be in the back seat, squirming, laughing, shrieking, pointing out all the familiar landscapes, and holding hands to try and keep the excitement in. I can’t see that exit without feeling a thrill of excitement.

After Issaquah we headed to North Bend to stop at Dress Barn. North Bend was a super cute little town – even their factory outlet malls were cute, and surrounded by trees. It felt like a town in a movie.

After that we needed to hall ass to make sure we’d make the reception in time – those few stops seemed to add so much time to our trip! The drive was beautiful. One moment it was all green, mountains with ice on top, the next it was ski hills and then on to dry dessert land. Beautiful. We had fun laughing and talking in the car, talking about our upcoming road trip this summer through America and dreamt about the future. It felt like an almost date. It was lovely!

We made it to Yakima and their hours right on time – casual open house from 2-6 and we arrived at 2:15. Perfect. It was a great time there – the food was wonderful, the people were kind and the house was homey. It was great to meet Nick (the groom) and his new wife. It was cool to see how touched Nick was that we’d come all this way, especially obviously that Paul was there. You could see that while they were very different, there was a core of friendship come from late night dorm room talks. It was neat to see that. Nick’s mom and aunts were bustling about the house refilling food and making sure everything was going smoothly. They were kind, funny and you could tell they really enjoyed each other. It reminded me of watching my aunts working together, but even more functional! It made me excited to be a mom with my sister in the future – and have kids growing up together and make holidays feel like home.

They also had a sweet cake made for them:

I left the party for a bit to hit up Costco before it closed so I could stock up on dairy and meat (and beer). And oh my, it was awesome. Except that the directions I was given were 98% correct, minus one last turn so I wasted 45 minutes driving back and forth through Yakima. Finally a sketchy looking guy at a Texaco station directed me properly and I made it just before they closed. By the time I got back to the party I was 45 minutes longer than I’d hoped to be and Paul was starting to worry – being in a new town, without phones always makes him nervous…understandably so.

By the time I got back a bunch of Paul’s Bible College friends had shown up and it was so great to meet them! I’d heard stories from Paul so it was great to put faces to the names. It was also fun to see how much people clearly enjoyed Paul – at school and now. Paul and I grew up fairly similarly, facing rejection and dealing with insecurity. We were both different than most people (in very different ways from each other though) and that made making friends tricky. I love seeing that despite all of that, God has given us friends – that have seen past where we’re different to love us anyways. Now it’s pretty easy for people to be our friends, and they generally like us right away…but especially as kids and teens that was not usually the case – so I love meeting people that took time for Paul and saw how great he was, despite insecurity and awkwardness. I love the man that he is. He is amazing. And I am so thankful that other people have seen that too.

We left the house around 6:30 with promises to call if we got too tired to drive all the way home (they have family all along the way home that we could have stayed with) and a platter filled with chicken skewers and the best, most softest, buns in the world. We made it smoothly over the Snoqualmie Pass, listening to Rap and then Country (can you guess which music type was for who?) – and singing along to the Dixie Chicks. We stopped again for gas in Issaquah and then hauled all the way to Marysville, arriving there around 9pm. I was able to go grocery shopping at WinCo – you’ll see pics below of my AMAHZING packing job in the car. I wanted things to be neat and orderly, and not flying all around back there…and to be able to see out the back window – which with $400 worth of groceries is no easy feat!

We made it to the border by midnight and were home, unpacking and organizing by 1am. It was a victory of epic proportion since our original ETA was to be unpacking and organizing by 3am. Team Morgan FTW.

Sunday morning we slept in until noon, enjoyed a leisurely afternoon at home, got to babysit my nephews for an hour (curled up with them on the couch – so cozy and warm) and head off to church by 3. I was hosting the service, which means that I was the face of the day – up front welcoming people to church, doing the announcements, praying for the congregation before sending us out at the end. It is a job that I find terrifying but I know it is something I am good at, and feel called towards…and it’s a great opportunity to help get rid of that fear of man that I struggle with so much.

After church our lifegroup wanted to bless us. Usually we have them over fairly regularly and feed them. It’s something we love to do. This time they decided they’d all come over but they’d buy the food. They brought Pizza and Cheesy Bread. We provided coffee and pop. It was perfect. We left loved, got to be in our own home, and got to hang out with people we love a lot. It was a perfect end to the weekend – especially since they all happily let me kick them out at 8:30 when I was just too tired to sit up and talk anymore!

This week it is prayer and fasting week at church. Our whole church fasts for 5 days, meets regularly to pray and seek God together. We are also doing 24 hours of prayer for 5 days. For our family choosing to just not eat doesn’t work. Paul ends up in a super depressed state and I get so fixated on hunger that I spend no time with God. What we finally realized was that fasting wasn’t about following some rules to earn brownie points – so we prayed about it and came up with a system that involves sacrifice, that gives space to seek God more, and actually turns us to Christ. We eat toast for breakfast, salad without meat for lunch, and plain rice and veggies for dinner. We eat just enough to not be hungry (especially since Paul does construction, climbing on scaffolding and needs to eat!). We choose not to watch TV or movies for the week. Paul fasts from all music, I just listen to Worship music. I still blog, but I don’t check my google reader to read other people’s blogs. We also make a point to pray together and separately throughout the week. For the 24 hours of prayer, I signed up for this morning at 5am. I thought it would be a good way to start the week. It was really great – I spent 35 minutes just with God – prayer, worship, devotions. I spent 15 minutes praying and worshiping while putting together our salads for lunch, bringing God into the food making process. And lastly I spent the last 10 minutes curled up next to my sleeping husband praying for him and our marriage. Then at 6am I promptly went back to sleep until 7:20 when I had to get up for work. I woke up feeling at peace and rested. It was lovely.

Tonight we have a Deacon’s meeting, and then there is as Men’s prayer meeting. I’ll obviously not be attending that prayer meeting so I’m having a date with one of the girls from church. Tomorrow night we are joining with our old lifegroup to have a worship and prayer night together during the fast. And before that I’m having bible study with two girls from that lifegroup. Wednesday night is the Women’s Prayer night but I have an out of town friend coming to visit and I can’t’ wait to see her! Friday night is the night to join with the whole church and worship/pray and then head out to restaurants to break our fast. It will be a good, but full, week.