Horseback Riding!

Since we first met, Juan Carlos and I have been looking for somewhere to ride horses. Everything seemed to fall through. Now, 5 years later, through a connection at work we finally found someone who let us come out and ride. We went last night (the rain didn't stop us!) and it was wonderful!!

It was strange how after looking forward to it for so long, it just felt like "coming home"- it was so natural. It really affirmed our hopes to have a ranch and horses of our own in the future. In the meantime, this is such a blessing to enjoy! I will try to post pictures after we go again...

16 miles

A couple weekends ago, on August 1st, Juan Carlos had the awesome idea of going for a bike ride down the Chehalis Western Trail. He had gone with some friends a couple years back and they went far enough to find a river, where they all went swimming (this is the river that Juan Carlos wanted to walk to to propose to me until he realized it was a lot farther than he remembered since he was on a bike when he went and we were walking!!)

I had not been on a bike in probably 12 years (I know that is really sad, but true). We went to my parents' house and pulled the bike down from the ceiling of the garage and Juan Carlos borrowed a bike from a friend.

We made it a goal to reach the water and 8 miles down the way we did it (I was close to giving up but really wanted to get there)!! We went swimming and then rode 8 miles back. I couldn't believe we rode 16 miles after not having even been on a bike in so long. Our bums did not recover for a couple days but it was really fun. It's so important to me to continue to have new experiences together and I love taking advantage of summer and doing active things like this. Definitely something to make a habit of...