Sunday, December 16, 2012

Oregon/Washington Part 2

....SORRY for the lack of posts lately. Life happens and we have been going at a million miles a minute!! It's a good thing, totally a good thing.

I did want to finish my post about our trip to Oregon and Washington. So, here goes...

One of my very favorite aspects of our trip up to the NW was spending time with my parents in Portland.  Neither of them have spent time in Portland and my dad being the foodie, wine/beer/coffee lover, chef that he is had no business missing out on such a cultural driven, foodie city!!

First things first, off to our FAVORITE coffee shop. And lets be honest, Andrew and I are obsessed with coffee. So, for us to say favorite is a huge deal!


Doesn't get much better then this!

After consuming some of the best coffee at Barista we made our way to Powell's books. A HUGE book store that I could easily spend all day in.

We are total tourists
We hit up my favorite store next Anthropologie my mom bought a candle and I just drooled over the extravagant home decorative items, dishes, comforters and candles.

After a little shopping we went to Rogue for a little beer tasting and then hit up an amazing Mexican bistro in the Pearl District for dinner.



On Saturday we spent the day remembering Andrew's grandma. Her memorial service was a great time of reflection. Grandma Prebble was one of the most loving women I have ever met. She never spoke badly of anyone and was committed to loving and praying for all of her grandchildren.  She will be missed dearly and we are so greatful that she is in a better place now!

There's really no smooth transition from the last paragraph to this next part but here goes.
On Sunday morning my parents were set to head back to Spokane around noon so we took advantage of a few more hours in Portland.

First stop...




Voodoo doughnut is it's own beast. World famous for its bacon maple bar, this place is hoppin'. We took our doughnuts over to Stumptown coffee down the street to load up on coffee! My [vegan] chocolate peanut butter doughnut was to die for!

Stumptown



Social media is taking over our world :) gotta check-in, instagram, text etc. 

My wonderful mama!

It was hard to say good-bye to my parents. Of course. Although the circumstances were kind of crappy it was great to see my parents and Andrew's family as well.





Last but Certainly not least. Andrew and I went to Salem after my parents left and got to see some of our great friends and former house-mates, Nate and Kristi from Pasadena.


 Little David wasn't too excited about taking a picture. Nate and Kristi were so sweet to come to Church on Sunday night to see Andrew and his family lead worship.  They are expecting their second boy in early May! 


Vera and David became little buddies at Chruch.
It was so sweet to watch them  play together!!
All things considered, we had a great trip to the Northwest!! It was really hard to leave, but we are getting even more settled here in Atlanta!


Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Oregon/Washington Part 1

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving holiday! As I shared in my previous post Andrew and I traveled up to Vancouver Washington for Andrew's Grandma's memorial over Thanksgiving.  The circumstances weren't ideal, but we made the most of our time there and it was wonderful to be around family for the holiday! Since so much happened and I took A LOT of pictures I will fill everyone in with two posts instead of one long drawn out post!

We arrived in Vancouver on Tuesday and spent the afternoon grocery shopping for Thanksgiving dinner and spending time with Grandpa!




On Wednesday Drew and I drove to Salem to spend the day with Daniel (Drew's brother), Bethanee (his wife), and Vera (our beautiful niece)!! On our way into Salem we stopped and had coffee with some of our dear friends that we met (and lived with) in Pasadena! The best part of our coffee date with Kyle and Lahela was finally meeting their daughter Lucy!

After 8 months, we finally met Lucy! Cute huh?

Happy Family of 3!

THANKSGIVING DINNER:

  • turkey
  • mashed potatoes with gravy 
  • roasted brussels sprouts with almonds currents and rosemary
  • arctic Freeze
  • roasted yams and sweet potatoes
  • stuffing 
  • homemade rolls
  • traditional green bean casserole 
DESSERT:
  • apple up-side down pie
  • apple streusel pecan pie
  • sweet potato pie with ginger snap crust
  • chocolate cream pie


It was a group effort to create this Thanksgiving menu and it was so yummy! My favorites were the stuffing, roasted yams and sweet potatoes and the brussels!

Working hard to get dinner on the table!














Mr. Chef sauteing the brussels sprouts.  Although they weren't the crowd favorite (what do people have against brussels sprouts anyway) I LOVED them :)
















Our favorite Thanksgiving treat...

Vera and I
Uncle Drew and Vera

Thanksgiving was yummy, filling, and loud, the way it's supposed to be. We sat around talking, drinking, laughing, eating, and just enjoying each other's company!

Part 2 of our Portland trip coming soon!


Wednesday, November 14, 2012

Warm Welcome

Since the minute we arrived in Atlanta we have been taken care of and in a lot of ways spoiled by all the people we are meeting.  From dinners, drinks, a house to live in, and tours of the city we feel our welcome couldn't have been warmer.  A couple weeks after we got here Andrew's Aunt Evette flew to Atlanta for a work conference.  I was so excited when I learned that she was going to be here because I knew it would feel good to see family so soon after moving away.  Evette treated us to an amazing dinner in Buckhead at Bistro Niko.


This past weekend some of our new friends took us out to an AMAZING dinner at Rathbun's.  If you haven't learned it yet, Andrew and I are total foodies.  We love eating, cooking, going out, reading & writing new recipes, and watching the Food Network.  So, we were so excited to go to such a well acclaimed restaurant like Rathbum's. The owner and executive chef has competed against Bobby Flay on Iron Chef.  The food was to die for and we felt so spoiled to eat at such a nice restaurant.  I took a few photos at dinner. It was extremely dim lighting so some of the pictures aren't that great. We started with an appetizer of bone marrow that you spread on crusted bread with plum preserves and maldon salt (a finishing salt).  It sounds disgusting, but it was pretty tasty.  And yes, like a stellar & committed vegetarian, I tasted it.  Totally worth it.

Here's a look at some of the food we had...

Drew's Pork Chops with Corn Bread Pudding

House made pasta with lobster,
edamame, and saffron Parsnip Cream

the 4 of us shared dessert.  The Toffee cake and
carrot cake doughnut were my favorite
Thanks Laura and Kevin for an awesome dinner and tour of downtown Atlanta!!

We will be heading to Portland next week to be with family on Thanksgiving (awesome) and to attend Andrew's grandmother's memorial service (not awesome). We are so thankful for the church members that used their airline miles to help us fly back to the Northwest.  It will be fun to see family, but we wish it wasn't under these circumstances.  I will have lots of pictures and updates after our trip.

Cheers!!

Thursday, November 1, 2012

Stops along the way

This will be the last post of all the wonderful friends who saw us off to Roswell!

Saying good bye to Bethany, I will miss living so close to her! 
 


My Best Best Best friend Janelle drove from Seattle to say good bye! 

Our first stop on the way down was in Denver to spend some time with Rachel! We got the royal treatment while staying with Rach; A comfy bed, a homemade soy latte, a walk in Washington Park, taco lunch, wedding-magazine reading, tasty wine, and great conversation!


A walk through Washington Park!


Lunch at Marg's Taco Bistro

Drew, Rach, and I went to dinner at Cora's (my Young Life leader from High School)! It was so fun to be with Cora, we hadn't seen her since she flew to Spokane to be in our wedding in '09!

Cora and her adorable son Grant

Our 24 hours in Denver were wonderful, and after spending 18 hours in the car we needed an entire day to relax!

Nashville was our next destination! Nashville was almost 1,200 miles from Denver. We left at 5:00AM and arrived in Nashville just after midnight.  Needless to say it was a long day! We decided to drive that far to avoid staying in a hotel. Josh and Lauren, our very close friends that we met in Pasadena live in Brentwood, TN so we were so excited to stay with them and catch up on life.


Josh, Lauren and their youngest Maddy

It was fun enjoying brunch with J & L and seeing both their girls, Sophi and Maddy! We are looking forward to future trips up to their place. Since Nashville was the city we set out to move to (before Drew got this awesome job) we were excited to have some time to see the city.  I really wanted to go to Jeni's ice cream shop but it was going to be out of our way. I was bummed, but as we were driving away from brunch figuring out our plans and this is what I saw...


A Jenis food truck! It was awesome, and even better it was free scoop day to celebrate being voted best ice cream in Nashville. This is hands down the best ice cream I've ever had.

Enjoying some brown butter almond brittle and dark chocolate ice cream!


We were welcome to Roswell with excitement and Love! Thank you everyone who helped make our travels as easy and cheap as possible!

Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Good Bye Spokane

Our last couple weeks in Spokane were filled with food, family, friends, celebrating and tears of both sadness and excitement.  We were able to see both our families before we hit the road. Andrew's parents came up for a little visit and to attend Mark's wedding (Drew's best childhood friend)! This post will most likely be a big picture bomb of the fun times we had just before we left for Roswell!

My mama and I at Manito Park


Golfing with my dad



Our close friends Jim and Joelle threw us a going away party! Fun night of drinks, conversation, and ice cream sundaes!
The girls...and only three of us aren't pregnant. Yes, you read that correctly 5 out of 8 of us are prego! 

Prego friends!  So hard to leave these girls!


One of the reasons we didn't leave for Roswell sooner was so that Andrew could be a part of Mark's wedding.  They go way back to their days in San Diego at First Presbyterian. Mark's parents were so wonderful to us when we were preparing to be married, they even threw us a wedding shower down in San Diego. Needless to say, we were so happy to be there to support Mark and Rachel!


Rehearsal Dinner (Drew and Mark)


Mark and Rachel had their dogs in the wedding, Andrew got to walk down the isle with Grizz!

They're married! Congrats you two :)




On our last full day in Spokane we went to brunch at a new restaurant in Spokane called Cover, it was amazing. The best part was that both of our families got to be there!




                     Andrew and his brother and parents














My ginger lime mint soda, I plan to replicate this someday. I will let you know if I am successful. It was delicious!!!









I think I have added enough photos for now! We miss our family and friends dearly, our new adventure and life in Roswell has gotten off to a great start!



Monday, October 22, 2012

A New Chapter

As most of you know, the Esqueda's have relocated!! We are very excited to be in Roswell, Georgia (Atlanta suburb) and feel very blessed that God has provided Andrew with such an amazing job and community at Roswell Presbyterian Church!! We arrived in Roswell on October 14th after a long three day journey across the country.  I will post more pictures and stories of our driving adventures.


Welcome To Georgia!