The Happiest Place on Earth

So Thursday was the day...Disneyland day. My friend, Will, who had the free tickets, called me up and off we went. I've never been to the California Adventure park so we hit that park first. Wondered around until we found a roller coaster that made me feel sick to my stomach looking at it. Very fast, very steep and even a loop the loop. But this is about adventures so I bit the bullet and on we went. I HATE the feeling of falling...and there were lots of opportunities on this ride. I gritted my teeth (never been much of a screamer) and held on with white fists. And to my surprise I found myself laughing. Took me a little while to find my feet afterwards, so we wondered over to another ride called Soarin over California. You sit in a swing type contraption and it's a bit like a flight simulator where you feel like you are flying over the state of California...and they even pump through smells to make it a bit more authentic, like pine when you are going through the snow fields in the north, and oranges when you are going through the orange groves of Orange County. A pretty cool ride and you get to see lots of California. Next was lunchtime. And then we made the mistake of going back on the rollercoaster straight after. Our tummies had a more interesting ride than the rest of us. I tried to convince Will to go on a raging river ride with me, but he refused, saying he hates being wet...this coming from a surfer. So I called him a baby for the rest of the day and we were even stevens. We decided to pop over to Disneyland to have a look around. Went on the Indiana Jones ride, Pirates of the Caribbean (this was really just an excuse to be able to sit down for a while), and finished off by waiting in line for over an hour for Space Mountain. By this time we were so exhausted, our feet and legs were aching and because both of us have been to Disneyland multiple times, we decided to call it a day. It was Grad Night for a lot of high school students so the park was getting more and more busy. Off we trotted to the car and got some dinner on the way home. Was such a fun day. No pictures of me at Disneyland. There are a couple of lame ones below. I kept forgetting that my phone has a camera on it. As a side note...my favourite ride ended up being the scary rollercoaster. Lesson learned: sometimes the scariest things turn out to be your most favourite and exhilarating.

Yesterday Ilene was going to a friend's house to make baby shower invitations and asked me to come along and help. So off I went to put my craft skills to use. We finished all the invitations and then Ilene said that there was a pizza party at the Refinery at Saddleback Church (this is a building where the youth ministry is housed and has recreation and eating places). A new pizzeria has opened up so they were giving out free pizza. I'm always up for free food so off we went and I got to see Tom and Chaundel Holladay again, briefly. Ilene had a PEACE meeting with Bob and a potential missionary so we went over to the office where I was introduced to a few members of the PEACE team. I ended up talking to for quite a while to a guy called Matt. He loves travel and told me his story of how he came to follow Jesus less than a year ago and is now on paid staff on the PEACE team. An exciting story to hear. While I was waiting for Ilene to finish, Will called and said he was around the corner and did I want to hang out. I thought it was a better option than sitting around an office where everyone was trying to work, so we went off to the movies to watch Monsters University. It was a matinee and I felt very old in a cinema filled with primary school children. But the movie was a lot of fun. Dinner to follow and then we went and hung out at Starbucks where Will told me all about his upcoming trip to the Congo.

Today I am on piano receiving duties. Bob's mum has gone into a nursing home so they are clearing out her house. Ilene has always wanted a piano and Gogo's was up for grabs, so while Bob and Ilene are out at missions meetings this afternoon, I am waiting for the huge grand piano to arrive here.

And that's my life for the past couple of days. Feel free to email me what is happening in your lives: rosiekbryant@gmail.com
Photos: Will...happy waiting in line at the happiest place on earth, Walt Disney statue.

Visiting Grandmas

So yesterday I had a very authentic California experience of spending the majority of my day on LA freeways in traffic. You really are not experiencing LA if you don't get stuck in traffic. Ilene, Kari and I drove to the north of LA to where the grandparents live. Both of Lisa and Kari's grandmas live in the same nursing home and they even share the same room. It was fun to see where they live and how well looked after they are. It is a house that has been converted into a nursing home where they only take 6 patients at a time. All the staff are Christians and see it as their ministry and they take such good care of everyone. It was nice to visit a nursing home that smelled like a home and not like a hospital! We then drove back to Grandpa Hiepler's place where we had lunch with some cousins (FYI Lisa: Nicole, Natalie and Sarah and Aunt Doreen was there too). Ilene was spending the night there so she could spend some quality time with her sister and dad, so Kari and drove all the way home...a LOOONG 3.5 hours in bumper to bumper traffic.

On the way home we stopped off at Kari's grandfather's old ranch in Malibu. It was sold after he passed away but Kari wanted to have a little look to see what had been done to the place. She knows the owner so it wasn't too creepy of us to snoop around. The house looks great with a fresh coat of paint. We went out the back to check out the horse stables and were treated to a pony show. The owner is in the midst of training Sammy, a little pony, to do some tricks. Was very cute.

We then went on to Dana Point where I met up with Will to hang out while Kari caught up with her best friends who she hadn't seen since her return. An evening of mexican food and Point Break. A classic that Will, James, Amy and myself used to watch a lot of when Amy and Will lived in Perth for a year. Good memories.

Tuesday I had a relaxing day of reading etc. In the evening we decided to take our dinner and go and visit Isaac, the adopted son of Bob and Ilene, who lives in Laguna Beach. His front porch has an amazing view of the ocean so we hijacked the table and he was able to join us for a bit before he went off to dinner with his girlfriend. Was lovely watching the sunset and some crazy people swimming in the cold night air.

Crazy Bird

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.
This bird for the past 3 weeks has constantly been flying into the window, headbutting it. Birds in Cali are crazy!

Life in Sunny So Cal

It's been a fun week since I posted last, catching up with Bob and Kari who returned from Rwanda. It's been interesting hearing from Bob and Ilene of all the work that Saddleback Church has put into the restoration of Rwanda. It has taken a long time to get to the point where the country is moving forward. It's hopeful to see something so broken, now moving past the past and into the future. Ilene said that the preschool they have been helping out have talked to the local school and they are a little concerned that the preschool kids will get bored when they get to Year 1 as they seem to be getting such a great education at the preschool.

I've been able to hang out at the beach a bit. I go with my friend who is a surfer and sit on the beach and read, or watch the other surfers. It was almost warm enough to go in the water today but unfortunately the beach with the good surf is covered with large rocks. The surfers tentatively walk out very slowly until it's deep enough to swim, and honestly I'm not that desperate to go in the cold water. It's lovely just to relax and see the horizon and get some fresh air.

Yesterday I thought I'd go for a walk on some of the horse trails around the house where I am living at the moment. I got completely lost but had my phone with GPS on it so it told me where I needed to go. Much more interesting that just walking around the streets. My hips, which have been bothering me since Hawaii, seem to be behaving themselves too. I googled my problem and the internet seems to think that the biggest problem is the way I walk, so I've been concentrating on my gait and it seems to have helped.

This weekend was Father's Day in the US so we celebrated it on Saturday as Bob, Ilene and Kari were away for a family wedding for the rest of the weekend. We had waffles for brunch and it was nice to sit outside on the back patio and enjoy the cool morning. This meant I was on horse-sitting duty, making sure the horses in the backyard were fed. I was also supposed to go hiking this weekend, but my hips were bothering me, after a long walk to the beach the day before, and my friend who I was going with cut his foot open while surfing. So us walking wounded ended up not doing much at all.

So my life here is not necessarily that exciting but it's been good to reconnect with people and just catch up on what others are doing and learning. Lots of down time and I feel very much in holiday mode. I wonder if it's going to be very hard to go back to work at the end of 4 months. Who knows where or what that will be. For now I'm enjoying the ride.
Picture: Me at the beach today and the backyard I get to hang out in....when I am talking with people I get so engrossed in the conversation that I forget to take photos of people. Sorry, I'll try to remember.