Hi there …
If you are looking for updates on our trip to Europe, check out:
www.kulbesineurope.blogspot.com
Bren
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We’re leaving, on a jet plane!
In two and a half weeks, we’ll be getting on a plane, and heading for land over seas! Or as some people like to refer to it as, “the other side of the pond” … but this is one big pond! 
All these different things are going through my head on what I need to pack with us, what really isn’t necessary to take, and what will make me distraught if I just absolutely don’t have it with! We have decided that we are going to pick up the necessary toiletries when we get there, since we’ll have a grocery store right around the corner; according to google maps its about a 3 minute walk! But yet there are certain things we use day to day that I’m not sure we’ll be able to find quickly or easily in Amsterdam that I’ll be packing along.
I’ve also decided that I’m going to pack along a “prop” for picture taking purposes. A friend recently posted some pictures with Barbie in them, and someone else suggested that we are going to be like the Travelocity gnome – that’s what got me thinking of taking something with to photograph. I have yet to decide what. It’s going to be between one of my little stuffed giraffes and the pink gorilla we have. I love giraffes, and have collected them for a number of years, and someday when we have kids, the baby room will be decorated in a giraffe theme. The pink gorilla goes back to the days when Aaron & I were dating; he occasionally “threatened” to send a pink gorilla singing telegram to me at my office. So one birthday I found a pink gorilla at a toy store and gave it to him. :) The giraffe will fit better in my camera bag though, so we’ll see what comes with.
Has anyone else ever done that on vacations?
Stay tuned to the blog to follow our story, and I’ll post a link to our online album as well for pictures, since I’m sure there will be too many for posting here!
Bren
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The near future …
For this all to make sense, I need to back up a bit…
A few months ago Aaron came home from work very excited and could barely wait to share something with me. His boss had asked him how he felt about international travel. Aaron LOVES international travel, so he was extremely happy when his boss asked if he would like to go to Europe for three to six months. Being the great husband he is, Aaron said “yes, as long as my wife can come with.” So plans waffled back and forth between Denmark, The Netherlands, and Spain. The time frame changed from immediately (like May/June) to this summer, to our final time of this fall.
The plans are all lining up to fall into place right now, with us leaving the end of August for two months in Amsterdam, the Netherlands!! I am very excited and can’t wait! Two weeks ago we got our plane tickets, and this morning the housing was nailed down!
I am looking forward to soaking up some of the Dutch culture and of course the pastries and dropjes!
If you want to come visit, drop me a line … we have some room!
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Lately …
what’s been happening lately?? lots again!
{Working on getting pictures to work … maybe in a few years I’ll master this page!}
My parents came to visit for a long weekend in April! It was a lot of fun! We took them to the coast, as well as to The Tulip farm in Woodburn.
May saw us seeing our 1st anniversary! Wow I can’t believe a year has gone by already … it just doesn’t seem possible! Aaron arranged a nice dinner in for us, cooked by one of the ladies from church that is a chef. It was absolutely delicious!
Shortly after that I left for Canada myself. I headed up there to finally get to meet my great niece Sierra! As well as be there for my niece Ashley’s wedding. Sierra was adorable! of course! Looking at my pictures on my little camera when I got back, I realized that I only took pictures of her!
After I got back to Oregon, we headed out to the coast, to go to the last day & a half of our churches Family Camp, and spend some time with friends at the beach. It was a beautiful two days … so beautiful that I burnt to a nice crispy red … in a t-shirt, sadly! So hopefully the weather will co-operate this week and I’ll be able to sit outside and get rid of that!
Now we are sitting around waiting for our next adventure …. 
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Book Signing
This past weekend, The Pioneer Woman, Ree Drummond came to the Northwest! She had a stop at Powells bookstore in Beaverton. I was lucky enough to be able to go and see her and get my cookbook signed!
This is a portion of our group that went.
We all had a great time! And she is such a sweet woman!
(Thanks to Ellen W. for the pictures!)
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Spring! (and in effect totally skipping winter! :) )
So yeah, I’m really bad at this blogging thing … sorry to the two or three people that read it …
So my last post was about fall … and now I’m onto spring … we didn’t really have winter as I know it! (for which I’m ok with!)
So what’s happened since my last post? LOTS!
We moved in mid November to a three bedroom apartment in the same complex. It’s so nice to have the extra room, as well as the LARGE linen closet/pantry! If only they would have taken a little bit of that extra square footage and made the kitchen a little bigger.
December we didn’t do a whole lot, just settle in and celebrate the birth of our Saviour.
January we got to hang out with one of my sisters and brother-in-laws for a day up in Bellingham & Lynden WA, since they were visiting his family in BC. It was great to see family, since it had been since our wedding that I’d seen any of them … other then via Skype.
February I got to see more family, when my other sister her daughter came for a long weekend! We took them to Cannon Beach and Astoria on the coast and had great weather! We also took a trip up Mt. Hood, but it was cold and snowy up there … enough snow for me for the winter, and normal for them, since they have lots at home! It was a great weekend and having the chance to wear sandals was wonderful too! We all thoroughly enjoyed the weekend!
March brought me rushing to finish off a wedding present of guest book and church programs for good friends of ours. It was a wonderful day! They are such a cute couple!
The same weekend of the wedding was the time change too. So lack of sleep, lack of sleep, busy days and late nights. Monday morning we had to be at the airport by 4:30 AM to catch our flight to Denver. Aaron was going there for business, to learn a new product line for work, and he nicely let me come along, so I could hang out my great wonderful friend from back in Ontario, Nancy, and her family. A great week was had by all, though sadly we had to cut my time with Nancy a bit short, since they were forecasting snow, and I wasn’t really too keen on driving over the pass in snow again!
Right now we don’t have any more trips planned … well actually we’re going away for a day next week, but its not far.
I have my Green Card interview on Monday morning … nervous? yes! Everyone keeps telling me it’ll be ok though …
Well I’m having issues with pictures, since they all seem to be too big to upload … I’ll work on it and see what I can do about getting some pictures up …
Hope you three are all well!
B
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Fall in Oregon …
As I sit here in the office on this rainy last Monday of October morning, I see green grass, red & orange & yellow leaves, and a bunch of green leaves too. It doesn’t really seem that October is coming to a close so soon, it isn’t cold enough according to my body. I went to Church yesterday with bare legs under my skirt, and just a thin sweater over my tank top. Fall in Oregon is different!
We bought Photoshop a while back and I’ve just started to play with it and learn some of its fun features. I’ve been mostly playing with it for doing digital scrapbooking right now. I’m making a guest book in a scrapbook fashion for some friends of ours getting married next March (and I think I’m almost done already!). I was playing with a few features with pictures too, that I found to be quite cool!
So those are two things that I have been learning lately … its been quite fun! Next I’ll be starting on doing the whole wedding album … yea!!
oh, and packing! Did I tell you that we are moving? We are moving across the complex to a three bedroom unit that became available. Its going to be busy that week … A is in Boston from Monday till Thursday… I’m probably going with a friend to visit other friends on the coast… its A’s birthday on Friday the 13th… my niece is due that week… another niece has her birthday that week… and we move on that Saturday! AAAHHH I guess I best get busy packing some things up!
hope you are all well, enjoying fall!
Brenda for the Kulbes
Posted in Life, Love
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… this, that and the other thing … :)
Well okay I really don’t have a this, that and the other thing to share … just thought it’d be something to grab your attention … if there is anyone’s attention to grab that is … is there anyone out there reading this??
Well if there is, then you are probably someone that knows pretty much all that is going on in our life via facebook or just talking with us … Aaron was diagnosed with Type II diabetes a few weeks back. Thankfully we are going to be able to control this with diet, exercise and they have put him on medication for now as well. Yesterday he went and saw his doctor, after being on the medication for about two weeks, and the doctor is very happy with the progress! We have been slowly getting into a good walking routine, starting off with about a mile and we’re building bit by bit. The diet hasn’t really changed much since I started cooking for us, its just more about portion control, less carbs, more protein!
We don’t really have any other things going on in our life, other then general life. No trips planned for the foreseeable future … but that can change in an instant… We have been known to wake up on a Saturday and just go … to the coast, to the mountains, to wherever …
I haven’t really taken the camera out anywhere interesting lately … or found any good shots really lately, so no photos to post this time .. maybe next …
till then …
Brenda for the Kulbes
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Life since our wedding …
Well I guess I am not being so faithful with this blog either! I really do want to do better at this, to keep people updated, but yeah … not something that really happens … I’ll try better, I promise!
Since we got married, we’ve been semi busy with things …
We went and spent a weekend in New Mexico for a friends wedding. Was a wonderful time meeting friends from SGS (www.sovereigngracesingles.com) who were as blessed as us to meet our mate and carry on the Godly sanctity of marriage in His name. The fun part of it was, that we had only ever met Daniel and Elisa online, never face to face. So the night before the wedding was the first meeting, and it was great! Congratulations to Daniel & Elisa!
While we were in New Mexico, friends of ours back in Portland, welcomed there third covenant child into there family. Esther is such a cutie, and looks so much like her siblings, its adorable! Congratulations to Eli & Amanda! The LORD’s blessings as you raise these children in His covenant ways and to His honor and glory.
Shortly after that, Eli’s sister Leah and her husband Ryan welcomed there first covenant child, Patrick, into there family. He loves to snuggle, and twice I’ve got to snuggle with him, and I’m really looking forward to more chances to do so! Congratulations to Ryan and Leah as well, and many blessings from our Heavenly Father as you start your family and raise little Patrick to His honor and glory!
This past weekend we drove from Portland to Boise Idaho to visit Aaron’s daughter Andie. It was a very fun weekend getting to know her, trying to keep up with her active 10 year old body and enjoy time together swimming, building a bear at “Build-a-Bear” and riding the bumper cars!
Now its back to a life of not traveling for a while. We are working on getting my green card so that I can travel outside of the US, specifically back to Canada. Hopefully I’ll have that by Christmas at the latest, so that I can go spend some time with my family, as well as meet my first great-niece or nephew! I am very excited about that! I can’t wait!
Till next time, which hopefully won’t be as long! I should do a post of wedding pictures and honeymoon, as well as of our home, shouldn’t I? I think I’m going to play with the video’s as well as magazines I’ve gotten on Photoshop for a bit before I do those … so I can have some fun shots!
Brenda for the Kulbes
Marriage and other great things …
Well as my new husband pointed out in his last post, we FINALLY got married on May 29th, 2009!!
We enjoyed a week down in the Clear Lake area of California, just relaxing and hanging out together. We then headed back up to Oregon to start our married life. By the time we got back, we got word that the truck was going to be here with my things … yea!!! No more wearing the same 6 outfits!!! That and I was missing my pillow! Also, I could work on making the bare apartment more into a home.
Since then Aaron has worked from home for two weeks on-call, and spent most of one week working from home, because he wasn’t feeling that great. So this coming week will be a test for me on lonliness and getting into a routine of some sort!
I will be working on posting some pictures here in the next few weeks, as well as posting the wedding video. I am also going to hopefully post more often here about our life here in general. So if you want to know, check back!
Brenda for the Kulbes