12 Week Baby Bump

Happy 12 weeks baby...

Ruidoso

Ruidoso, New Mexico, is where we go to get green.

El Paso has beautiful mountains that I love to see, but sadly it is lacking in all things green.  As my pastor said last week, anything green you see in El Paso was imported.  Honestly, I don't think I appreciated green  until I moved away from it.  It is good to know it is not far away...

A couple of weeks ago Alain had 2 days off in a row, which is such a rarity, it probably won't happen again until Christmas.  Alain came up with the brilliant plan "escape" to the Escape Resort in Ruidoso.

It was 60 degrees there.  I got to wear a long-sleeved hoodie again.  We walked in the woods.  It was so wonderful.

We started our time by eating a delicious lunch of sandwiches and soup at The Village Buttery.  We ate outside on the cool of the patio, which is surrounded by all sorts of colorful flowers, and watched the people around us.

Then we went window shopping down Ruidoso's main street.  We had seen it all before, but loved taking the time to just walk together, without anywhere to go, or deadlines to meet.

Then we went back to the Escape, which was our own private home resort for the night.  We put on our comfy clothes and ate sausages and ice cream and cinnabon, watched football, and just relaxed together. It was just what the doctor ordered :-)

Trips!

I've been going through some old photos on Alain's camera, and I realized how many great memories we have already made in the short 3 months that we have lived here!  It is hard to know where to start.  Alain doesn't get much time off work, so we always try to maximize the time when he does.  Early on after we first moved here we too a trip to New Mexico to see Heart of the Desert Pistachio farm and Carlsbad Caverns.

At Heart of the Desert, we took a tour of the whole Pistachio plantation, from the trees to the packing factory.

The highlight of the tour was the pistachio ice cream at the end :-)

Then on to Carlsbad Caverns...

Alain & I love National Parks, but I think that we both decided that we love outdoor parks better than caves :-)  It was very pretty, but it was also very cold!

Fun day trips here in El Paso!

Blog Introduction...

Hi all,

Alain & I have decided to start a blog, primarily to keep our family & friends who are far from us updated on all that is going on in our lives down here in El Paso.  I'm not an eloquent writer by any means, so probably a lot of this blog will compose of photos, which will tell our story better than anything I could write :-)

The title of the blog was Alain's idea, originated by a photo book that he gave me for our first Christmas together in 2008.  In May of 2008, we had our first "date" (although at the time, neither of us would have called it that :-).  Alain's intentions at the time were to get to know me better as a friend, since he was about to take his board exams, and then leave for 4 months for various hospital rotations, so he didn't think it would be a good time to start a relationship.  But as we spent more time together over that first month, God began to draw us closer together, and fast-forwarded Alain's plan, so that at the end we began our long-distance courtship.  By that Christmas, God had confirmed to both of us that we wanted to be married, which is something neither of us could have imagined in May 2008.  We were married in May 2010, and Lord willing our first baby will be 1 month old in May 2011.  It amazes us how kind God has been, and how far he has brought us.

I definitely never imagined that I would ever live in El Paso, TX, but now that we are here, I love so many things about it.  The first thing I fell in love with here was our little apartment

These pics show the dining room & the kitchen of our little apartment, my 2 favorite rooms :-)  The dining room options up to our back patio, and has large windows that let in a lot of light.  We have been able to entertain a lot of people in there, which is something we absolutely love.  For the kitchen, Alain set up the shelves on the left soon after we moved in, which definitely helped me with storage space!  I love cooking & baking in there for my hubby!

Our back patio features my flowers, and Alain's grill, which we use often!

The best part about our home is our proximity to Alain's workplace, William Beaumont Army Medical Center.  WBAMC is the tall grey building, and our home is in one of the small, uniform  brown buildings at the bottom of this photo.  Alain is able to walk 5 minutes to work, which is a huge blessing to us both since he works such long hours.  Another great thing about our home is that we have mountains right across the street.  When my good friend Sarah Simmons was visiting for Labor day weekend, we took a tram up to the top of the mountains, where I was able to take this photo.  

In futures posts, I'll show you pictures of Fort Bliss, and our friends at Cross of Grace Church, our other blessings that give us much joy here in El Paso!