Our Visit to Missouri and Arkansas

This summer we had the opportunity to travel back to Arkansas, my place of birth and were both of my grandparents live. For all of our years of marriage, we have had school year round, so taking long vacations were hard to do. This was our first full summer and we thought that we would go to visit. My sister and her new husband were planning the same trip, so we thought it would be fun for all of us to go together and to show our husbands all of the childhood memories that we have in Arkansas and Missouri.

Here are some of the highlights of our trip:

#1 Bass Pro Headquarters--the camping, hunting fishing mecca ---


#2 Shooting off fireworks---
Our husbands had a blast buying fireworks and shooting them off. Definitely something we can't really do here in AZ. Let's just say that there were a few close calls with fireworks misfiring, but thankfully no one got hurt!

#3 Visiting the College where my parents met and the church that they were married in.


#4 Visiting with all of the family and friends. I wish that we lived closer to every single one of these people...




#5 Fishing, canoeing and admiring the green scenery





#6 Seeing the sights:
A beautiful resort in Branson, MO

Lambert's Restaurant "home of the throwed rolls" ---they literally throw hot rolls at you!

The Branson Landing--an outdoor shopping center that is right on the water.

#7 Walmart.
Why is it that when you visit small towns you shop at Walmart almost everyday?


These were just the highlights, there were so many other fun memories from the trip. We had a blast with my sister and her husband and I hope that we are able to go back soon.

June 9- Our Anniversary

We celebrated our 4th wedding anniversary this summer. On that thursday we went to dinner at Hillstone by the Biltmore. It was DELISH! I loved the atmosphere and the food was good as well. I had the Thai Steak and Noodle Salad and Shaun had the French Dip. Yum!


Over the weekend we stayed the night at the Hyatt Gainey Ranch. We had stayed there for our second anniversary and really loved it! We laid out by the pool, ordered Pei Wei and had dinner on our porch, got up and had a wonderful brunch at the one of the resort's restaurants, and then laid out by the pool some more. It was so relaxing!

May 2011

Let's start with an recap with what happened in May....

My brother Philip graduated high school. It was fun to have family in town to celebrate his graduation from Pinnacle. Below is a photo from one of his graduation dinners where we had a low country boil. YUM! The reason I don't have a photo of him in his cap and gown is because he actually got the flu a couple hours before the graduation ceremony and he didn't get to go :(



My littlest sister, Hope, graduated from 8th grade. This marked the end of the Dickison kids attending Paradise Valley Christian Prepatory. I stared PVCS in 3rd grade, that means that there have been Dickison's there for the last 14 years! We all thought it would be fun to get a group photo with our principle....

It's about time I updated this blog.....

There have been some MAJOR changes around the Palmer house. If you bear with me I will update the blog over the next few days.


I think I just got tired of blogging for the last few months... but I will fill you all in shortly.

Volunteering

At the age of 18, I took a trip to Africa to work at an orphanage with over 200 kids. I can not put into words all of the amazing things that happened there...all I can say is that it changed my life!

I knew before I went on that trip that I wanted to be a nurse and after I came home I had a strong desire to go back there on a medical mission. Ever since I have graduated (which as been over a year now...can you believe it?!), I have thought about Africa a lot more frequently. I know that I want to use my training as a nurse to help those who are unable to receive or afford medical care. We aren't in a place were we can go on an oversees adventure right now, but I dream about that day and I am always looking for things I can do here in Phoenix to help.

A few months ago I met one of the Doctors who started the Neighborhood Christian Clinic in downtown Phoenix. It is a volunteer driven clinic that provides medical and dental care the the uninsured, underserved community. Just last year they saw over 7,000 patients at the clinic. Along with providing medical care, they also share the gospel and pray with the patients at their visit. After he told me all about it, I immediately knew that I wanted to get involved there.

I have been volunteering there twice a month since January and I enjoy it every time i have the chance to go. Most of the time there are 3 Doctors and 2 Nurses there for each shift. While I am there, I get to use skills that I learned in school to help those who are sick and in need. A lot of the patients that we see speak spanish, so I'm having to either grab an interpreter or try and use the little spanish that I learned in high school (along with a cheat sheet of medical-spanish terms) to try to communicate. I tend to use a lot of non-verbal communication and smiling as much as I can when talking to most of the patients. It's hard, but I am hoping that I can pick up some spanish along the way.



If you are looking for a place to give financially or if you are in the healthcare field looking for a place to donate your time this is a great ministry!
www.thechristianclinic.org

Day Trip to Snowbowl

Shaun and I decided that we wanted to go snowboarding last weekend. We put everything together last minute, packed up the car early Saturday morning and drove up to Flagstaff.

We had SO much fun!

We are both new to snowboarding. My family went skiing every few years when I was growing up, but it has just been the last few times that I have tried snowboarding. Shaun has just started learning to snowboard, so it is great that we can learn together.






We woke up Sunday morning with some bruises and a lot of sore muscles, but it was all worth it!

I am hoping that next winter we can go on a big trip up to Colorado for a few days :)

Dancing in the Minefields

This week at church (Scottsdale Bible) we talked about marriage. Shaun and I have been married for almost 4 years now. We aren't experts on marriage, but we do know a lot more than when we started.

This music video was shown on Sunday. If you havent watched this....you must watch it!


Here are some reasons why I love this song:

"We went dancing in the minefields, we went sailing in the storms" - Life is not easy, actually it can be really hard at times, but marriage is about having that person there with you through those times. "For better or for worse" were the words that we vowed to each other.

"to the end of all my days" - Marriage is a LIFE LONG commitment. Shaun and I stood up at the alter and in front of God and our friends and family vowed to honor and love each other until death. Our vows were not something we took lightly.

"because He promised not to leave us and His promises are true" - God should be first in your marriage, and each other second. Jesus Christ wants a relationship with you. A daily, lifelong relationship. Along with your spouse, Christ can be there to help you through life's journeys, good or bad.


On the same topic about marriage, but not about the video:

Shaun and I live in a town house, which means we share walls with 2 other homes. In the last 6 months we have gotten a new couple to the right of us. Almost on a daily occurrence we can hear them yelling and arguing with each other. Every time I hear them, I cringe. I thankfully was not raised in a home were I ever heard my parents yell at each other, so hearing this couple makes my heart hurt. This makes me so grateful for the wonderful example of marriage that my parents set. This past December they celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary.

Bowling

Last weekend we went bowling with a group of Shaun's coworkers.

Here is the only reason why I am blogging about us bowling.....

....Do you see???
I beat him in bowling!!!!!

:) HeHe

Holiday Festivities

For the last 2 Christmas', Shaun and I have used a fake tree. I grew up in a family that went out every year and got a real tree. I love the tradition of going out to pick up a tree, getting it home on the car, hauling it inside and wrapping it in lights. With my fake tree it would take a total of ten minutes to bring it out from the garage, put the three pieces together and plug it in. There was just something about it that didn't feel like Christmas.
This year Shaun and I decided to get a real one! I was elated with joy! Because I could hardly wait, we went out the weekend of Thanksgiving and picked one out. I was a little concerned that the tree would die by christmas day, but thankfully it was still living by Christmas.
Taking it home on the car. My elf helping me string on the lights :) Ta-Da! I loved looking at it all month! It made the house smell and look beautiful! I don't know if I will ever be able to go back to having a fake one.

Holiday Parties:
Now that we both have non-serving real jobs, we had work parties to go to this year.

This one was at Cafe Boa in Tempe. Shaun's work took over the restaurant for the night. It was great food and fun to meet all of Shaun's co workers.

Disneyland at Christmas time

A few weeks after Thanksgiving we headed off to our annual trip to Disneyland with the Palmer family!! It is one of our favorite trips of the year!

Some of the highlights of the trip:
-Celebrating Shaun's Mom's birthday at the Blue Bayou for dinner
-Watching Drew be so excited to see to characters and ride certain rides!
-Watching the holiday firework show and fantasmic.
-Becoming annual pass holders. We have wanted to every year, but it has never worked out. We can not wait to plan our next trip!

Shaun and I in front of Tom Sawer Island Outside thunder mountain railroadBoth couples and Drew waiting in line for its a small world. Shaun, his parents and I played some of the boardwalk games in California adventure. Shaun with all of the stuffed animals we won at the games. Okay, so honestly Shaun won most of them :)Shaun gave Drew some the animals that he won. He is such a good uncle, Drew loved them!

For the last 4 years, we have always walked through the Grand Californian Hotel in Downtown Disney admiring how beautiful it is and hoping that one day we could stay in it. For my birthday, Shaun is going to take me back and we are going to stay there! I can not wait. It was such a sweet gift and I know that he will enjoy it as much as me. The picture doesn't do it justice. It is more beautiful in person. Just talking about it makes me eager to plan the trip!

Thanksgiving 2010

We had so much to be thankful for this past year!

I'm sure you could guess what was on the top of our "what are we thankful for list" this year.......
Being done with school and having jobs!

Thanksgiving day was spent at the Dickison home:

The Dickison family, minus the newlyweds, playing Petanque (Bocce ball). Our tradition on turkey day.

Hope and I riding home from the park in the jeep after our family football game.


I was a horrible person and didn't take any photos when we went down to Tucson for the rest of the weekend to visit the Palmer side. This was our last Thanksgiving in Tucson because his parents are fully moving up to Phoenix in a few months. We had a wonderful time visiting with them and going to the Gaslight theater to see the Christmas production. Going to the Gaslight is always a favorite tradition of the Palmer's.
I'll leave you with the only photo that I have that was taken that weekend...
Drew and his Uncle Shaun and Nay Nay (as he calls us) at the Gaslight theater.