June

Wow! The whole month of June has flown by without me having written a single blog post. I'm such a slacker. This month has been extremely busy and extremely rewarding with a little bit of fun and silliness in between.

Brian was promoted from Jr. Analyst to Analyst with a pay raise the first of the month. I am SO proud of him. This has been a long time coming (six months), and he has had to learn the ways of corporate strategical maneuvering to get them to actually give him this well deserved promotion. There was a lot of time, energy, work, stress, sweat, deliberating, etc. over the last few months. I'm happy to announce that all of this effort has been met with success! This means that for the time being, we are still going to be New Yorkers. Good news for all of you who are still planning your visits! Time is on your side (hint, hint)! We are nothing if not accommodating. ;)

My work is still plentiful which we are extremely grateful for. This job has been such a blessing for us. I'm still the primary chorister and LOVING it! I love the kids in our ward. They have taught me so much and are so fun to work with. I'm also the assistant den leader for cub scouts. This has been an adventure to say the least. I don't know much about scouts, but I am learning lots. I also get to work with the best ladies and am grateful for their friendship, patience and support.

Brian was just released from his stake calling and the same day was called as a Gospel Doctrine teacher. He was so excited when he told me. This has been the calling he has wanted for as long as I've known him. He is an excellent teacher and has such a way with words and explaining concepts and ideas, that I have no doubt he will do well.

Summer has officially hit New York. Yesterday it was 98 degrees and today it was 91 degrees by 11:30. We our putting our little air conditioner to good use and although it is not large enough to keep the whole apartment cool, it keeps our bedroom a pleasant 78 degrees. 

We haven't done much on the sightseeing front this month. Life has kept us fairly occupied. We did make it to the Museum of Natural History where we got to see the Willamette Meteorite from Oregon. A little taste of home in our big city. However, why is it in New York and not Oregon?

We loved the animals they have there. We found a whole new section of Asian animals that we hadn't seen before.

We also got to learn about Japanese style block printing. They had a whole exhibit illustrating how it is done. It was very interesting how they create one image through layers and layers of stamping different images and colors of ink onto a a piece of paper. We loved it!

The finished image was gorgeous.

We also went back to Coney Island for a second visit. It was warmer this time and we had fun wading in the water and collecting sea shells. We found mostly large clam shells, but were lucky and found a few smaller, spiraling shells. I collected a handful of sand and am going to put it along with some of the smaller shells into a clear, round Christmas ball to have a beach ornament for our Christmas tree.

While we were at the beach this seagull kept walking around us. I snapped a picture of him and I kept thinking of the song "Freebird." So I present to you my awesome photographic skills of our friend (ignore the grey dot in the center of the photos, I think our camera is starting to give up the ghost).

"If I leave here tomorrow, would you still remember me?"

"Cause I'm as free as a bird now, and this bird you cannot change."

  "And this bird you cannot change."

 I know you are going to go and listen to Lynyrd Skynyrd now. You're welcome. Hope you all had a marvelous June!