Long time no chat

Hey there, people.
Sorry we've been on the outs for a bit. Sad day, I know. You've probably been checking the blog hourly for updates, but to no avail. My deepest apologies. :)
Even though we don't have exciting travel news to update you on, as this blog was originally intended to do, we will be keeping up with it, letting you in on what we are up to in the far away Northwest. So we're just changing directions a bit, but we find that this is a really good way to keep all of our distant good friends updated on the goings-on of the Strickland-Swift household.

We've got our last few days of nothing-ness this week-- Brian starts doing school stuff on Thursday, meaning I am going to have to find ways to entertain myself! AH! But really, since we finished getting stuff for the apartment and doing other random tasks, we do actually need things to do with our lives. So this will be a good change. Yesterday we acquired some (really cheap) bar stools, so our home is looking even more "home-y" than it did before, which is just lovely.

We went exploring downtown last week, which was fun. We've found some good places to take you people when you visit (hint hint). Much to my little brother's pleasure, we found out that one of the fishing boats from "Deadliest Catch" gives tours during the summer time... Enticing, right? I know.

We also spent time with some new friends this weekend! Yay! We watched a Sounders soccer game with them, which was great because we won 4-0 and saw some Sounders history being made. PS, if you didn't know, I've become a pretty big fan of soccer since the World Cup. A sport I like to watch! Hooray!

Yesterday we trudged out in the rain (it's rained A LOT the past few days but it is sunny as I write this!) and went to our first church service here. Ladies and gentlemen, we are definitely not in the Bible belt anymore! It was an interesting time, but we enjoyed it. The most attractive thing about this church is that they are big into homeless ministry (which we have a lot of in our neighborhood). They run a weekly soup kitchen and have apartments built into their actual church building as part of a program to get people off the streets and into a home of their own, where they can be a part of a community and get their lives on a better track. How many churches do you know who would, instead of just giving money or food, actually give the homeless a home within their church doors? Awesome. We love it. I also just finished a book called "Irresistible Revolution" by Shane Claiborne, where he talks a lot about what the church should be. He focuses a lot on how we spend money on buildings and shiny things to attract people, but forget that God has called us to use that money for the poor far before the attractive things. It got me re-thinking the way we worship and simply live our lives, so this is a really cool thing that we will hopefully be a part of. I suggest you pick up the book and expect to change your thinking.

Speaking of changing our thinking, we have also discovered that Brian and I are such students. In our time of travel and moving and rest, etc. we have started a netflix account and used it (besides to rent seasons of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia) to watch documentaries. We've gotten really into the ones about food, which has been fascinating and inspiring. Some that I recommend are "Food, Inc." "King Corn" and "No Impact Man." If you have netflix, they are conveniently ones that you can instantly stream to your computer or tv. They've really gotten us thinking about what we put in our bodies, what it's made of, and where it comes from. Did you know that the average food item travels 1500 miles before it gets to your table?! Talk about dependency on oil. Did you also know that most of what we eat in some way has corn in it? Talk about disgusting. Anyway, in a world where diabetes is thriving and our generation is predicted to not live past our parents, we are seriously re-thinking what we eat. Not only for our personal nutrition, but for the environment. This might result in a little experiment that Brian and I are currently scheming up... So stay tuned. It could be interesting...