Celebrating 22 Years of Fun

This past Thursday was my wonderful sister Amber’s birthday! So today when she came down to visit (because she’s nice and comes to me since I don’t have a car) we had a fantastic excuse to eat a special lunch at nearby Gourmandise.

Because it was a special occasion we treated ourselves to tasty white chocolate & fresh strawberry frappes…

and delicious sandwiches. I highly recommend it!

It was kinda funny though because since it is so close we decided to walk and while on the way there it was a beautiful perfect fall morning…

On the way back it was a little different!

A good rainstorm can always be refreshing though. Overall, a beautiful day! And it isn’t even over yet.

Thanks for being born, Amber!

*song of the day = Ghosts by The National Parks, Amber’s friend’s band!

A Japanese Hike: Mt. Maruyama

After a long wait, I am back with another lost entry about Japan! Coming up this time: my last p-day.

For some reason when I left on my mission I had the image of p-day equaling mountain hiking. It took me until the end of my mission to finally be able to fulfill my dream (I was always in a far away area. Or it was snowing. Pesky snow), but it was worth it and I feel like I definitely need to share!

We climbed Mt. Maruyama, which is in the huge Maruyama park in Sapporo. It wasn’t too long, but fairly steep and provided us with a great view.

We started off at the mission home…

Journeyed through the park to the starting point…

Walked up and up and up…

And got to see a great view of the city of Sapporo!

Maybe we played a little up there too.

And made it back down with a mission hiking goal accomplished! (There are many more mountains though, so I might have to go back…)

In case there weren’t enough pictures for you:

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