Happy Birthday to my Love

Aaron turned 24 on October 16th. I met him 5 years ago... and my life was turned upside down. What an amazing man he was, is, and continually strives to be. He is an incredible husband, more than I could have ever asked for or dreamed of... and I know he will be the best daddy in the whole world.

I am continually in awe of God's grace to me in giving me such a gift as Aaron. My greatest desire is that I honor the Lord in my relationship to my husband. He is the most important person on this Earth to me. Happy Birthday... may there be many more to come. I love you husby.

Keith Urban/John Mayer @ The Gorge

My parents bought Aaron and I tickets to come see Keith Urban & John Mayer at the Gorge a few weekends ago. They are probably two of Aaron's favorite artists (mine too) and we had a great time. If you haven't been to the Gorge, it's a beautiful place! Behind the stage, is a cliff that overlooks the Columbia River.

We arrived very very early to get good seats, and it was a beautiful day. It started out really hot & sunny, and cooled off to be a perfect evening! It's getting darker, the show is about to start!

This is my beautiful mommy!

And so the shredding begins...

Aaron would make little squeaky noises.... as he was utterly shocked & in awe of these two amazing guitar players! I almost enjoyed his reactions more than the show!

I decided to capture the moment. Ha ha.

They were so good together! What a fun show.

We were so thankful to be able to spend some time with my family, and enjoy some great music too! Thank you Mom & Dad for an extra special weekend!

*I know we won't be able to do much of this sort of stuff next summer... although, Analynne will DEFINITELY be an Urban & Mayer fan!!*

New CAR for the Dicksons!

Or should I say SUV? Yes, it's official. I have my OWN car! Wow, at 23... it feels PERTY good... ha ha... let me tell ya. =) Alright, well here goes the story. Aaron has been faithfully and very diligently searching through Craig's list every night this last week. He probably emailed at least 30 people. We literally were google-ing any kind of SUV ever made. It was kind of funny (and a little repetitive.) Anywho... we got many responses, and probably 85% of them were scams. Let's see... "my husband died," "i'm moving to my parents who are old now," "I'm a sergeant in Iraq"... etc.... "We can use the EXTREMELY safe E-Bay payment online so we are BOTH protected"... "and the car will be shipped from CANADA (or Texas, or something crazy)." Hm... No thank you! Aaron proceeds to email these people back and say, "you're a loser." Oh husband.

Saturday morning we proceed to sleep in until 10:30 or so, and first thing Aaron does is check his e-mail. And yes, there was a response to a Dodge Durango in Renton, WA. Next thing I know I'm flying out of bed and driving 2 hours South to check out this car. It was quite an excuse for getting out of an outside work day at the in-laws. But man was it random! The man who was selling it picks up abandoned cars all the time. It's his job. Sounds a little sketch? YES. Well it was worth the drive! Turns out the guy is pretty legit. We take the Durango to a sweet little body shop, of which the staff was 95% Asian and pretty hard to understand. But they were awesome. A thorough check up was originally quoted at $70 and we walked away handing them a 20! Praise the Lord!

Aaron had quite the experience getting two different opinions from two different mechanics, and going on two different test drives. It was a LONG day. So enough of the nitty gritty, we got the guy to drop $500 off his price and we walked away with a beautiful FIRE ENGINE red Dodge Durango! Seats 7, or the back seat folds down to give our little Eli LOTS of room to grow! Has AC, a CD player, all wheel drive and has a tow package (for our imaginary boat we are pulling around)! Perfect for MUAH! We are praying the work that does need to be done will be successful and allow us to use the car for quite a few years. It is ten years old but for the price, we had to take it. I'll have pictures up soon! Right now Aaron is having fun and working hard to fix it up and make it all clean and sparkly for me =) What a sweet hubby.

Off to California we go! This Wednesday I leave to return to The Master's College to attend my graduation!! Praise God for strengthening me and providing a way for me to complete my education. We have plans to hang out and catch up with friends (and babies!) so hopefully I'll have many pictures to post when I return!!