Apple Picking

We had a blast a few weeks ago picking apples with our new friends Michael and Elizabeth-a young married Christian couple who actually live literally down the street. It has been so nice getting to know them and to just walk over for a bbq or a visit. This time we made our way to New Jersey for some fun! The apples really sparked some romance, and as you can see boys will be boys-they had to explode a few apples on the fence posts.

And for the final results….a rustic apple tart. Done all by hand, from stratch. I was really excited about this as I am more of a cook than a baker, and it was nice because we had our dear friends Matt and Teri over for dinner that night!It has been such a blessing to share this season of my life with my highschool friend Teri; who knew that two friends from bako would end up in the big apple.

City Kids

What have we been up?

Lots..

Enjoying the city for one. Here we are exploring our beautiful and wondrous city!
This morning we were out for an adventure in one of our favorite neighborhoods the West Village-and of course on this journey we had to do a mini photo shoot-look how handsome Mike is! We had a yummy brunch at the Owl (if your in NYC check it out).

Then here we are heading down to the San Geronimo Festival in Little Italy, to be honest I still don’t get the whole saint thing, but the festival was fun, there was a lot of good candy and interesting sites…some actually disturbing...we will get to this later.

Anyhow on our way to Little Italy we passed through China Town, I don’t know about you but the last thing I want to do is buy fish from these sidewalks-and look carefully at this next photo do you see my arguing with this vendor-so his fruit stand said 2 lbs of bananas for a dollar-and I was like yes!!! So because we were still adventuring through the city I only wanted what I could fit into my purse so I asked to buy 2 bananas and this guy said that it would be a dollar. Ok for those of you who know prices, that would be the most expensive bananas ever. I tried to explain to the guy that the sign said 2 pounds for a dollar not 2 bananas!!! But he wouldn’t listen, so I was out of there.

Ok lets take a vote-there is a way to set up voting on blogs, I will have to figure this out later..but talk about upsetting. ..

We were having a blast at the San Geronimo fest, walking through blocks and blocks of non-stop fun, then we turned and came upon a 19th century freak show booth-maybe I am naive or just a HUMAN being, but I though those were outlawed over one hundred years ago. OK actually I just wikipediaed it: “Today, freak shows are outlawed in a number of U.S. states,” I guess I am not soo extreme.

So there was this booth as you can see in the picture and an audio track announcing “Little Thumbelina, a real live woman, two feet tall, smallest woman alive, little Thumbelina” And I was like “Ok Mike they did not just say this, it’s probably a scam to get everyone’s buck and its probably like a little doll.”

So I had to go in, NOT to gawk at the smallest woman alive but to really see if in this day and age in, what ppl call the “center of the world,” New York city, where there is a huge concentration of non-profits and human rights groups, if right here in front of my eyes this could be real-that it could be acceptable to exploit a woman’s deformity/disability in this way.

So I gave this Caribbean man my dollar bill and walked behind the booth to find indeed a two foot tall woman sitting on a little chair propped up on a platform like a display. Wow it was unbelievable; it was true. I stopped and said, “Do you travel around doing this, do they think this is really ok, is this ok to you?” And she pointed to a sign that read, “ I am from the Caribbean and speak only a little bit of English.” Soon after I walked right back to the man collecting the money and said, “Are you her friend, do you think this is ok to exploit this woman in this way.” I wanted to go back in and take a photograph to somehow expose something that as the police later told me was “ a New York norm” and the man said “no my boss could fire us.” So I sent Mike back in with a scripture that I had happened to have in my pocket.

Wow…Even if that woman is ok with that, I mean she is there and she probably does make a ton of money, is it ok? How many of us have friends and family who do things that they choose to do but that is damaging to their body, mind, soul etc…All I can say is that is not ok-it is never ok to exploit a human being.

5 years!

Today is our 5 year anniversary!!!!!

I created a special gift for Mike-rather a few gifts (which by the way turned out amazingly, just as I had invisioned them-all praise to God really, because I wasn't exactly sure how to realize the vision, but he is in the details) -and upon doing so I came across this photo from our wedding day...wow what a special day, to enter into a life long union bound together with the Lord excited for the adventures ahead. I remember how happy we were and giddy. Celebrating with family and friends, on our day!!!

And now here we are five years later-from San Francisco to New York, we are in new soil expanding our roots deeper-growing more and more in the Lord and allowing his purposes to have his way in our lives-which has been exciting so many of our dreams are unfolding in unique ways!

It has been amazing to be apart of eachother's lives for soo long 9 years now!!! And to watch eachother grow and mature, and just the gift of being able to share so many amazing memories along the way. A special part of marriage has also been the added family-for me to be apart of the Cohen family and have more people who love me and know me and care about my life, and me there's.

I am blessed and honored to be Mike's wife-Thank you Aba Father for selecting such a special man to love me just as you desire. He is an amazing husband, with a servent's heart, a gentle nature and a strong spirit...and he is filled with million gifts and talents that are expressing themselves in new ways every day!!!!

I can't wait to see what the Lord would have for us in this new season-our fifth year of marriage!
(some are praying for a baby...especially mike....but don't hold your breath):)

P.S. for those of you who are wondering what we have been up to I will be posting some photos soon of our nyc adventures!!

CALIFORNIA-start at the bottom (my sisters grad)

Now for the final leg or our journey we spent time in San Francisco with friends and my sister.
First stop was lunch with Diana and Jill. Diana is a very good friend of mine and we used to meet weekly and go to lunch and coffee and walks, but now we just have to limit it to once a year:(. Jill is a friend from Cole Valley that I met when I first started working at the cafe.
Next was a visit with another baby-man this is the season :) This time it was Victoria's precious Paloma-which means dove, a perfect name, dove is the symbol of peace and the symbol of the spirit of God. She is definitely a blessing from God. Since I have known Victoria that has been her desire to fall in love and to be a mother-God answers prayers! She is doing great and will continue to be a great mom, she is super nurturing and present and fun and loving. I miss you Vic! :) Congrats Vic and Gary!
Then it was a fun filled weekend with Britt and Neil-we went to our fav restaurant fresca and unfortunately got served our favorite dish but burnt, so we returned it and the second one fixed our craving! Then it was up to the river for a party-how special that they through us a party with some of our friends from church. Thanks gusy. It was nice to see everyone and to catch up, eat good food-like pear pie, and canoe, and laugh our heads off. Ahh all I know is when me and that girl get together all we can do is laugh and the boys are always saying "all we can hear is you guys laughing your so loud." Don't worry that never stops us.
Of course we went to Cornerstone sun morn and it was good to get alot of hugs, and then we spent the day with my sister-we went to our traditional breakfast at the boulangerie and then for mani/pedis at lavande-It was soo good to see her, and yet a bit sad to realize how much you miss those little traditions, the reality that weekly has turned into yearly. But praise God for technology bc we always have text, cell phones and emails and oh blogs to keep up with everyone. So we also got to meet her new boyfriend. As a big sister I want to one day meet a man who just adores her and loves her as much as I do, so I am praying for her match.
So that is that, that was our adventure.
It feels good to be in NYC-you all can pray for me I am really pursuing photojournalism and am working on some of my own documentary projects, the Lord is really blessing the work of my hands, I am excited to see what he will do, I have a feeling God has a BIG surprise up his sleeve, and I am trying not to get discouraged in the waiting.

Straight from there we drove to Nana’s house in Palm Springs for quality time with the Cohen’s-lets just say I love palm springs, its so relaxing and I love being with family-and I love how nana treats me like I am one of her own-sitting on the couch together she took my hand and said “I don’t know why but I just love you.” Then we were off to LA for a few days of fun, lets say we experienced the LA trend “krav maga” basically a killer workout class, as steppo said I was walking like a penguin for three days. Again no pictures, I am a photographer but it takes so much focus that when I am doing other things I don't often like to take pictures. Oh here is one from our joint family lunch. I like when everyone gets together, its funny because we see everyone so much we forget that they never see eachother.
OH I FORGOT TO MENTION MY NEW HAIR CUT- so cute, and it was so a funny LA moment, the salon I got it cut at was the same salon the britany spears shaved her head at, random right?!