A Crisp Autumn Day

I have always had this love affair with the fantasy of Maine. I think it started when I was young and read "Sarah Plain and Tall." The images of a rocky coast, with the cool blues and grays of the ocean have always been in my dreams and this lighthouse was the perfect spot to experience them in real life. 

The night before we found some young locals in an all night diner who told us we had to go visit Portland Head Light. This was the most picturesque spot, and a wonderful way to start out the morning, listening to the waves wash up on the rocks and taking in the crisp, cool air. From now on, when I think of Maine, this is the new picture I have in my imagination. 

We left the coast of Maine pretty early, and drove northwest into New Hampshire's White Mountains, where we heard one could experience the most vibrant fall colors anywhere in the United States. Our drive took us by gorgeous lakes and through amazing scenery painted with beautiful colors. While driving through the White Mountains listening to an audio book we simply pulled over whenever we found something interesting to take pictures of, or hike through.  It was a spectacular way to spend a crisp autumn day, we even got to see some snow flurries up on the mountain tops. 

Our road trip took even us by the remains of The Old Man in the Mountain. As is the way of nature, the centuries had taken their toll on the Old Man's face, he started sagging a few years ago - and then all of a sudden he completely lost it. Now, you have to picture him in his former glory. We missed seeing his regular visage by just a couple years. 

And finally, what would a trip through New England be if it didn't involve a covered bridge or two? We found this on serendipitously while we were trying to find our way on some old country roads (trying to find our way sounds so much better than "Had to turn around because we missed our exit, due to not being able to properly read the map.")

We drove across this old covered bridge at the legitimately posted speed of "No faster than a slow walk." 

An exercise in spontaneity

At Vinces request this vacation was a totally unplanned, unscheduled adventure -adventure for Vince, exercise in stress management for me. You see, I am my father's daughter. I don't go anywhere without doing the research first. I like to plan, map out, schedule and otherwise beat out the spontaneity of even the must relaxing of vacations. So, I was convinced to set aside the plans this once and "see what happens." No, prior research, no mapping out the best route, no hotel reservation - yes thats right - no hotel reservations.  This was going to be a whole new experience for me and I wasn't sure that I would actually survive.

Day 2 started and we woke up early for breakfast, and then headed up the Massachusetts coast, thru New Hampshire with the vague goal of making it into Maine by evening.

We found some of the cutest villages, quaintest homes, most beautiful views and even a medieval castle overlooking the ocean that we spent most of the afternoon exploring. All of this accomplished without a plan or agenda. I was thoroughly surprised!

This really was the most relaxing of days, I never knew how enjoyable and refreshing spontaneity could be.

I think I'll go to Boston...

The rain stopped. The day turned out to be an absolutely beautiful, brisk fall day. We started the morning with a cup of coffee in hand - wait - I started the morning with a cup of coffee in hand, as we followed the Freedom Trail through Boston. We got to visit some of the oldest churches in America, Paul Revere's home and grave, the sight of the Boston Massacre, Bunker Hill, Faneuil Hall and so much more. 

It was a great day wondering through a beautiful and historic city, stopping occasionally at little coffee shops, an incredible bakery with absolutely amazing canolis, and ending the evening with a cute little Italian restaurant.  We even got to experience real Bostonian drivers at rush hour - I have never seen so many people yelling and flipping each other of at intersections - and I lived in LA for several years. 

I could have spent days in Boston, it had so many great places to visit, so many historical sights - in fact there were so many historical sights and buildings that the whole city seemed to be covered in plaques.  One little brownstone home had a plaque out front reading "On this location in 1823 absolutely nothing important happened." 

But we couldn't stay long - we had lots more to see. 

And it begins

Our vacation started out on the humorous note, but isn't this what makes a trip more memorable? Our first mistake was to schedule a flight that landed in Boston at close to midnight, which didn't seem like it would be a problem since our bodies were used to the West Coast time zone. What we didn't know was that our flight from San Diego, with a layover, would NOT have a layover due to delays, which meant no food till our second flight landed at midnight. 

So, we landed in Boston at midnight, in a torrential rain storm, not having eaten since bright and early that morning. No problem. We would find someplace to eat on the way to our hotel. Wrong.  At 2am, with our stomaches audibly growling for the past 4 hours, we finally gave up and stopped at the only place open - a gas station. And let me tell you - we loaded up. Have you ever tried eating dinner at a gas station at 2am? We made it back to the hotel with chips, cheese dip, Ben and Jerry's, Cup O Noodle, and peanuts. I'm sure the clerk thought we were potheads, oh well.  

And so with arms full of junk food, soaking wet and laughing we started our New England Adventure.

A New England Autumn

Vince and I just got back last week from a few days in New England enjoying the fall colors.  It was a beautiful trip filled with American history, a real life castle, tons of lighthouses, amazing scenery, and some very quirky New England personalities! 

Should have some photos of our little adventure soon.

Letter from Home

I got the best letter in the mail today! My brother, Andrew sent me this letter with a great hand drawn winter scene on the bottom. It makes me so eager to be home again! Only 50 days to go....the count down has begun. 

I can't wait to be home for Christmas - it has been a couple of years since I was home on Christmas day, so this year is going to be wonderful.

Thanks for the letter, Andrew - it is up on our fridge now beneath our Durango magnet. Love you so much. 

Homes of Hope Trip

Homes of Hope 2009 from Lorissa Medrano on Vimeo.
Vince and I went on a trip to Ensenada with our church to build a home for the Talavera family. This is the 42 home that our church has built over the years! It was amazing to see how fast a home can be built when a group of people works together. All in all it took us 2 days.

Monday at the Zoo

Last week Vince and I spent our day off at the San Diego Zoo, and the next day my legs were incredibly tired from all the walking....up hill, down hill, up hill, down hill. The zoo, though, was a lot of fun. We saw some incredible animals, watched a bird show, saw hippos kissing, took a guided zoo tour, rode the overhead gondolas and walked through the zoo's new Elephant Odyssey exhibit.

Among the cutest animals we saw that day were definitely the hippos (my camera died before we got to them) and then these guys - the koalas and the panda bears, both of which were napping! The San Diego Zoo just had a new baby boy panda born this summer, he isn't out in the panda habitat yet until he grows a little more, I can't wait to go back and see him - who doesn't love a baby panda?

Homes of Hope

Jesus brought us to Ensenada early Friday morning.... no, really, Jesus brought us on his bus.

Once we arrived we unpacked at the YWAM compound and found our rooms - we girls got a great view of the ocean from our bedroom window.

Our church brought down 21 people, ranging from 8 years old to....well, we'll just say grandparent age! Men, women, youth and children all of us with the objective to build a home for a family in Ensenada. Some of us were mechanically inclined, several were construction experts, but most of us were amateurs, or worse!

Then, it was off to the job sight where we met the family that we would be building a home for. They were wonderful, I fell in love with the girls and their cousins by the end of the weekend!

Unfortunately, the first day I did not take many pictures of the construction process because I was busy with a hammer most of the day. I was able to help build the framing, put up the siding and install the drywall - oh, and did I mention I got to operate the gun/hammer that shot nails into the cement foundation? It was pretty fun, I had to install at .22 cartridge and then BANG shoot it off into the foundation... Hopefully I will get some pictures of the house going up from Dick Johnson who was our official photographer for the trip.

The second day, 5 of us from the team put on a toned down version of a VBS on the side of the road next to the job sight. We had crafts, face painting, games, food, puppet shows and best of all, a pinata!

We weren't sure how many kids would show up, but within minutes of setting up we had dozens and dozens of children racing over to us. Final count was upwards of 50 kids!

By the end of the second day, we had a completed house. This is the 42nd home that our church has had the opportunity to build with Homes of Hope in Ensenada - the first for Vince and I, and we can't wait to go back again.

Back from Mexico

2 days later, one house built, 50 children fed and played with - and we are back home in San Diego. We had an amazing trip down in Ensendada. The first day I helped frame the house, put on the siding and the drywall and the second day I played with all the neighborhood children while the rest of the team finished the roof and the finishing touches. I was amazed at how fast a team of people can accomplish an entire house when we are all working together. It was a blessing to be able to partner with our Father as he provided for his children! 

Now, I'm off to bed, hopefully to sleep off whatever little bug I picked up while we were gone (nothing serious - just a bad cold/sour throat/cough thing). Tomorrow I'll see about loading all my photos and writing a new blog posting to show you all - I got tons of fun pictures with all the beautiful and hilarious children, oh, and pictures of the house! See you all tomorrow then. Goodnight. 

Off to Mexico for the weekend. We are building a house with our church - this will be our 42nd house! I'll update you all first thing next week - hopefully with some pictures if the family and their new home.

The Girls... and Joel

Living in California I don't get to see my family as much as I would like - so I was very excited when my little sisters, Anna and April, let me know that they were going to be in the LA area for a girls conference.

So, friday morning I drove up from San Diego to meet them at Huntington Beach.

From the beach we headed over to a shopping mall to meet up with Joel and Emily for an afternoon of goofing off... we ate, we laughed, we ate some more and even rode a carousel... if only we all lived a bit closer!