Jitsu and Hiking and Daring......oh my!!!

Time for a real update!

This week started off pretty well! as many of you might know, Ryan and i are both taking classes in Krav Maga and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. We have classes most nights of the week, and Monday, Wednesday and Thursday during the day. Krav is teaching us quite a bit about common sensical (if that's a word) defense, where as Jitsu is focused more on techniques of rolling on the ground and submitting opponents with choke holds, tweaking major joints and defending against the other person's offenses.



Here are some action shots of Ryan grappling with our classmate, Miles.



Our Jitsu instructor, Ray Stevens (above) is a lot of fun and often refers to Jitsu as a big game of chess. Beyond being tons of fun and a great workout, we get to wear the latest fashions in Gis!! Here are some examples....:)

Tuesday brought about Spanish class in the morning and relaxing in the afternoon. We had a "Christmas in Jul--August" because Linda was kind enough to send us a lot of our wedding gifts!! Ryan was SO excited to see his shop vac, and I couldn't wait to use our new coffee maker and glasses! THANK YOU LINDA!!!

Ryan checkin out the booty

Nikki was able to completely demolish a half wine barrel in the name of moving it closer to the house to use as an herb garden. So much for that idea. But at least we have some neat metal hoops and scrap wood now!

We got to go hiking this week, FINALLY!! We went up to Mount Hood, in Oregon. We found the hike in Ryan's Backpacker, and they pointed out that this specific hike was great for looking for Huckleberries. For anyone who has ever tried to pick huckleberries, you know how "fun" this can be. Suffice it to say, we gave up looking for ripe berries (of which you can find about 1 in every bush...) after about 15 minutes. We had some BEAUTIFUL views,






and after Umbrella Falls, we pretty much bug free. (Thank goodness)




We came back with only a handful of huckleberries, but 4 pints of raspberries we stopped to pick on the way home. Yum!!

The rest of our week has passed somewhat uneventfully with a lot of baking and grilling. Ryan made amazing hamburgers and Nikki made Zucchini bread and Foccacia bread. Our house was smelling REALLY good! :)

This week we have started on a dare given to us by the lovely and sweet Ruth
couple - Larry and Pat.



The book is called "The Love Dare" and so far it has challenged us to do things like eliminate all negative words towards each other, get each other an unexpected gift, and do unexpected acts of kindness. So far we are on day 4 of 40. We are being challenged to stay positive and really focus a lot of time and energy on our relationship. It has been refreshing and informative so far, and we are both excited to see what this dare will bring in the next 36 days.

To finish out the week, Ryan took the dare of doing something kind and unexpected for Nikki by going grocery shopping for her!!! Woohoo! He even went after work on Friday, which made him even more tired. What a nice guy! :) After work on Saturday, we met at the gym for a quick lifting session. Following a shower (boo sweat), we headed down to Portland, OR to watch the UFC 101 fights. Some interesting fighting ensued, and after much shaking of our heads and yelling out the names of Jitsu positions we recognized, it was time to go home and go to sleep. Whew.
All these events bring us to this morning, when we got up, made pancakes and talked about our dare for the day. Welcome to a week in our lives!! Look for an update next Sunday!