So, McCain has chosen a pro-life mom of five to be his VP. I'm not sure how this sits with me yet. On the one hand, I'm excited that he chose someone who is pro-life not just in record, but in application. She chose not to abort a down syndrome baby earlier this year. I also dig that a 'larger' family is in the news without being slammed for having more than two kids.

However, my real big hangup is that this woman belongs at home. She has a young child to care for, and by putting her in office I will feel like I am condoning her choice to stick her baby in daycare (or nanny-care). I'm not comfortable with that.

And the vote this November gets even more sticky. Thankfully, I don't have to make a decision. In the end, I will vote for whomever my husband feels is the best candidate. And no, I don't have a problem with that. I don't care how hard women worked to get the right to vote, I'm not going to vote against my husband. In the end I tend to agree with the oldschool concept of giving the heads of households the right to vote.

But that's just me being old fashioned... :)

This blog will be silent for a period of mourning for the family of Dozer, aka Christian Drews. My heart is simply broken for this lovely family, and I am going to spend the time I would use for blogging in prayer for the Drews family.

Tami

This post is in the celebration of the life of Dozer, also known as Christian to his family. Marsha and David, my heart is just broken for you. God is a mighty God, and I am lifting you up to Him.

As I was reading through the blogs about Dozer's home-going, I was listening to my iPod, and the song that was playing was, "I Miss You" by Miley Cyrus. It was written in honor of her grandfather who has gone on to be with the Lord as well.

Tami

Our friends, Rob and Lacey, had their 10 month old quadruplets dedicated Sunday.

Here's Lacey, Rob, their daughter, 'B', and the three girls, 'V', 'W', and 'M'..

The whole family.  Son 'M' is holding little brother, 'C'...

Some friends of ours went in bidding with us on a wine tasting for 10, at a winery ,about 2.5 hours from us.  We won the auction and spent last weekend with four other wonderful couples.  'A' and 'R' got to spend their own fabulous weekend at Dado and Dada's.  They went to the Museum of Flight, learned how to salsa, and ate paella!

Here's how the 'big kids' spent the weekend...(Leigh, David, Scott, Liann, Christine, Steve, Lacey, Rob, Scott, Lisa)

We could only spend one night because everyone serves at church on Sundays.  Because of this one night limitation, most of the properties would not let us make a reservation.  We had two options.  One was a plush resort, with rooms starting at $200.00, or a motel at $85.00.

With the spirit of adventure and thrift, we chose the motel (AKA "The Bates Motel" by the guys).  The rooms were pretty horrid, BUT, there were two silver linings:

1. We literally had the whole place to ourselves.  A family checked in around 1AM, Saturday morning (yes, we were still up), but until then, we were the only ones.
2. Since we were by ourselves, we had the whole deck to ourselves.  And, here was our view:

Not bad, huh?!

Here we are, Friday night, for the wine tasting...

Apricot Tree

After the tasting, we had a tour of the property.  Here is the guide showing us how they bottle and label the bottles.


We had planned on going out to dinner, but everyone wanted to get back to the deck and enjoy the view and friendship.  So, some had already brought treats, others had to track some down.  There was no grocery store nearby and our only option was the Shell gas station.  Now this gas station was an amped up mini mart, with fresh produce, but our table was pretty ecclectic.

Scott and Liann...

Rob and Lacey...

The girls...(excuse my red-eye.  I can't get rid of it!)

Scott and Lisa...

(Bummer, I thought I also had a couple shot of Steve and Christine, but I don't)

The largest jelly fish I have ever seen...

The next morning, we walked into town for coffee, then drove to a church fundrasier, a "Corndoggle".  It was a rummage sale, and you could have lunch there (a hot dog and an ear of corn, etc., hence, 'corndoggle').  We chose to not eat there, and everyone went their own way home.

At the Corndoggle

David and I took a different road home.  We crossed a bridge and saw a bunch of fly fisherman.  We got out and walked around a bit, enjoying the view.  The salmon were HUGE!!

We stopped for lunch at the plush resort that we chose not to stay at.
The Alderbrook

Lunch was fabulous, and the server was slow to bring us our lemonade, so she comped the drinks and took 20% off the bill.  No complaints here!  We had this amazing appetizer, 'Sweet Chili Chicken Wings' with cucumber-peanut slaw.  There was this unique breading on the wings, but the chef would not divulge more than 'flour'...

I would definitely recommend coming here for a romantic Northwest getaway.  It is lovely.

Driving over the Tacome Narrows bridge.  What's up with a $4.00 toll?!  Whatever  happened to $.25??  Mount Rainier in the distance to the left.

Fun weekend with great friends.  Too much fun!