My Husband's a Ninja

New ninjas with supportive family and our instructor, Kevin Stuart

For months Ryan has been questioning whether or not he's ready to take the black belt test. "It's brutal," he'd tell me. "Yea? It can't be that bad. You're one of the best in the class. And look at all those other people who've got their black belt--you're in better shape than them," I'd tell him. But it's true--he was right--I said all those things before I ever saw the black belt test. If you ever thought P90X was intense, this is like doing 3 or 4 of those workouts back to back. It was crazy. 

It started with various exercises, every other set of which were push-ups of some sort. I swear they did over 400 push-ups. And it was non-stop. For about an hour and a 40 minutes. No water breaks, no chance to really catch your breath. I think it would have reduced me to tears after about 30 minutes. The closest thing to a break was when they demonstrated their forms and self-defense techniques.

After this insane workout, it was time to pad up for 20-25 minutes of sparring. They were in groups of about 6 and one person had to spar everyone, one right after the other. Then they'd rotate out and get in the line up to spar the next person. It was so much sparring. Good thing Ryan loves a good sparring match. In the end, Ryan and his brother Michael both came out victorious as newly minted Black Belts. 

Exhausted, but completing that test put a smile on their faces. 

Doing, Instead of Just Learning

Over 2 years ago I graduated BYU with a BA in Humanities. "Cool, so what does that mean?" seems to be a fairly common question. Well, as I spent 4 1/2 years working on it, it actually means a lot more than I'm able to explain to people in the short answer they want. In a very, very small nutshell, I studied the arts. Not DOING the arts, just learning ABOUT the arts. It typically sounds like a useless major to people who don't understand that what I really learned was how to think, how to look for connections, how to see the way things fit together, how to formulate ideas, how to communicate effectively, and how to write. Really, there was so much good, useful stuff I learned that makes me such a better human being. That being said, what this post is really about is not the validity of my college major, but rather the fulfillment of a dream I've had for a long time. Sometimes it felt that while I spent all kinds of time in classes and in the library learning about the arts, and it always made me itch to learn how to create art.

I'm lucky to have made a good friend here in Virginia who is an artist, and she and I worked out a great deal. She wants to learn to play the piano, and I want to learn to paint. We are swapping lessons with each other to reach our goals. I've been working on a painting for a couple months and I've finally finished. It's an irregular size, so I'm still working on a framing solution. But it already has an intended place on a wall in the master bathroom.

This painting went through a few redos. Here's an early version:

 While this was looking ok, and I was happy with parts of it, in the end, the background was just WAY too drab for me. So I very carefully did a repaint of the background which I was much happier with!

This was done in acrylic on a piece of masonite. I found that the acrylic was more difficult to work with than I expected! It takes time to mix the colors and get them looking the way I wanted, but the paint dries SO FAST! It was always a struggle to know how much to mix up and how fast it was going to dry because it's super difficult to match the color if you try to mix it up again. Though it's far from perfect, I'm proud of my first project!

Summer Squeeze!

It's Mid-August, and I'm sitting in my front room at 5 pm with the door wide open because it is the most gorgeous day outside. Clear blue sky, a light breeze, and I'm in shorts and bare feet. I wish everyday could be like this. Even the business has been a little more mellow today. Stuff to do of course, but sailing rather smoothly. It amazes me to think that summer has come and almost gone. It's been such a busy one that I haven't even had the chance to squeeze in post about some of the really fun things we did!

At the beginning of June I bought us tickets for half price to see The Mikado at Wolf Trap. We doubled up with Curtis and Melinda and hung out on the lawn. We packed picnic dinners and staked out a spot early to get a good spot to see the show. Although visibility isn't as great on the lawn, it's good enough and it's nice to enjoy the weather with my handsome man.

We've also been dying to go to the drive-in movie ever since we found out there was one near Winchester. It's always a double feature for $8 a piece. What a steal! Especially in this area. They change the movies every week, so it's hard to find a week we are free AND that we want to see the movies they are showing. When we did go, they were showing Despicable Me 2 and Monsters University. We loved them. They were really fun shows. I forgot to take any pictures of us at that date night.

Sometimes the stresses of the business can really get to us, and especially to Ryan as he bears the brunt of any difficult situation. It's not an easy job, by any means. We miss doing fun things because we don't have time, and when we do have time, we are usually too tired. But a couple weeks ago, Curtis and Melinda called us up and invited us on an impromptu canoeing adventure. We actually were free, so we jumped on it. The canoe struggled to hold all 4 of us afloat, and we struggled in the shallow areas as we put so much weight in the boat we couldn't get over some of the rocks! We canoed down a tributary to the Potomac and then found a place to dock and explore. As we were doing so, we could see the sky was getting dark, not only with evening, but with oncoming rain. The lightning started and we decided we ought to head back to our starting point. We struggled with the shallows even more this time as we were going upstream! Melinda and I ended up pretty wet from having to pull the boat and the guys ended up getting a pretty good workout rowing the boat both ways for us. We made it back and got the canoe back to the house just before the storm broke and the rain started to come. It was exactly the kind of adventure we needed that night.

This last weekend we did a camping trip with some of our friends up at Harper's Ferry. Harper's is probably one of my favorite places to go from where we live. It's only about 45 minutes away, and it is absolutely beautiful! The first campsite we tried was a total fail. It ended up being a big muddy field at the end of a street of houses! We drove around and ended up asking in at a bar where the nearest campsite was. We camped that night in Antietam, the site of the civil war battle. I'd have loved to drive around and explore there, but I got outvoted. We headed into the town of Harper's and Ryan and I took the crew to see this old abandoned hotel that we found last year. It's absolutely beautiful and it sits on an overlook right above the Potomac River. It's a shame it's fallen into such disrepair. Ryan has been dying to explore it, so we poked around it a little more than before. We also found some other old abandoned houses that were super fun to explore around. Everything is locked up of course, but it's fun to look in the windows and stuff.

Then we went into another part of the town and grabbed some ice cream and walked around. We found a tunnel that the guys were quick to scale a wall to reach. I'm curious what it was for.

Shoes are not necessary to scaling rock walls

Why would a tunnel possibly dead end 18 feet above the ground?

We crossed the river on a foot bridge that parallels the train track. There was so much left to explore still, but time got late and we all had to head back home. Though the trip was short, it amazes me how helpful and necessary it is to sometimes escape everyday life and have an adventure to clear out stress and feel rejuvenated.

Tim, Alisha, Curtis, Melinda, Shauna, Ryan, Dan, and Erin

Family Fun in McCall

What beats a beautiful mountain resort on an Idaho lake? Being there with my whole family of course!

The last week of July we went out to Idaho for a family get-together in McCall. We would always go there every year growing up, but I hadn't been again since my mission. The only problem with the trip was that is wasn't long enough!

Dan, Ryan and I flew out to Boise together and we had a 3 hour layover in Minneapolis. I had no idea that Minnesota was actually so green and beautiful. A pleasant surprise! We decided to take the train downtown from the airport to check it out. Honestly, not much to see right off the train, but it was fun to get out. And there were some cool buildings.

Downtown Minneapolis

After arriving in Boise we grabbed lunch, Dan met Erin to get their marriage license, and we headed up to McCall. It was late when we arrived, and we'd been up early to get going, so we were pretty exhausted but it was so fun to see everyone that night!

We spent our time there doing the usual: tennis, swimming, puzzles, fishing, and this time we even rented jet skis! Jet skis haven't usually been part of my trip there because we've usually gone in October when it's too cold. The jet skis were probably the highlight of the activities. I was a pretty lame driver to begin, and I was a wimp when Ryan was driving, but then I got used to the rhythm of it all, and by the end, was feeling like a pretty rockin' jet skier. It was a blast!

Thursday morning we went to the Pancake House, as always. You can't leave McCall without one of these cinnamon rolls!

Who doesn't want a cinnamon roll the size of a baby?!

It was really fun to play with Matt and Hilary's kids. Seneca is such a cute little girl, and Jason is so fun now that he has so much to say! I can't lie, I love being the favorite uncle...yes, uncle.

It was also great to have Dan's fiancee, Erin with us in McCall. She's great and I am so happy to have her as a sister in law in a few short weeks!

Ryan caught his very first fish! I was so proud of him. He'd never been fishing before (what a shame!) so I taught him how to cast the pole. He did a great job and brought in a nice fish for us, which we ate on Sunday.

He's a keeper!

There was one more surprise at the end of the trip that was pure luck! Saturday I said to Ryan, too bad Byron and his wife are in Moscow, or it would be fun to see them. Well that night, the whole family was sitting out on the back lawn chatting, when the doorbell rang, and who else was there but Byron himself! He came into town at the last minute and thought he'd stop by to say hi to Mom and Dad, but didn't know any of us were there! Sunday I finally got to meet Byron's wife, Amy. The vacation was a much needed break from the stresses of the business, and we had a wonderful time!

Our Business Baby

Summer is flying by so fast! Mostly I think that's due to this crazy adventure we've set out on of owning a painting company. What a job! I have to say it has been harder and so much more work than we ever bargained for. The potential in this is great, but so is the price that must be paid. Many days we wake up to the buzz of text messages or phone calls right around 7 am. Just like a charm. Customers and painters alike are looking to the head honcho for answers to their questions. Days are spent running logistics and solving everyone's problems, not to mention trying to meet new customers and make sales for the next week. As the evening approaches there's finally time to start answering emails and returning other phone calls. Dinner at 9, try to clean up the house a bit, and then back to bed. It's a grind, no doubt.

There are days I feel like we must have been crazy to have bought this thing. The pressure can just crush you. I am continually amazed at Ryan's ability to press forward. I can't say how many times I've thought to myself that this just isn't going to work. But I have more faith than that. We both felt confirmations that buying the business was the right course of action, so I went into the whole thing pretty calmly, and actually excited about what we were doing. The business has definitely taught both of us a lot about our strengths and our weaknesses as we are often pushed to our limits. The best thing in the world is that we are doing this together and can help each other through the hard days. Luckily we don't usually both feel discouraged on the same days. What I love most about working this company is that I get to see or at least talk to Ryan frequently throughout the day. It's great to feel so connected on something like that.

Ryan has some natural gifts with running a business and we've definitely seen the effects of that. We are making sales like crazy! I'm keeping the books and it's incredible to see how much money has flowed in and out of the bank account this year. We've had a lot of struggles, but I'm happy to say that July was our most profitable month thus far, and I think August is on track to be really good as well. When people say we have so much free time because we don't have any kids yet, I just tell them that we do have a baby. Our baby is a painting company. It takes all our money and all our time. :)

No job, New job

The painting company has gone gangbusters and is growing like crazy. We can hardly keep up. Every night Ryan and I are working til 10:30 or 11:00 and falling into bed exhausted, just to do it again the next day. And still, we were missing things, making mistakes, and having problems. We decided we needed to make a scheduling change. For the last year, I've been teaching ESL at a school about 25 minutes from our place. I'd teach 9-1:30, then most days I had 2-4 piano lessons in the afternoon, then I'd work the painting company with Ryan in the evenings. It was just too much.

At the beginning of June, I left my teaching job to have more time to work on the business with Ryan. It was sad to leave my students and some of my co-workers. I've never had such a great set of co-workers as I did at Columbia College. I loved talking with them and hanging out during our break time. And the students all work so hard and I got such validation from them. I'll miss that too. There's something great about being told by your class full of Asians that you are the beautiful teacher and that you are their favorite. (I've always loved being the favorite!)

The painting company is a LOT of work, but what I love most is that I get to spend most everyday just working with Ryan. We love that aspect of owning our own business! I'm getting a hands-on business education as we discuss marketing ideas, operations problems and solutions, finance, profitability, sales, and on and on. Although it was a leap of faith for me to leave my job, we felt like it was the right thing to do. Since my job was only part time, it wasn't that much income and we decided that working together we could probably produce enough of an improvement in leads and profitability to make up for what I would no longer bring in. It's a challenge, but we're learning together!

Green Belt!

Ryan has had a long-held desire to be a black belt and be awesome at martial arts. So about 2 1/2 years ago he decided to enroll in a Tae Kwon Do studio. They've got this great deal at Top Kick where if two people in a family join, the rest of the family gets in free. So Ryan's whole family decided to join shortly after he did. When we got married, I became part of the Nokes clan and therefore became eligible to join for free. This is something I never in my life thought I'd be doing, but I am now an intermediate belt in TKD. 

Demonstration of our blocks at graduation

I recently advanced from the gold stripe belt, which is considered a beginner belt still, to by green belt. I've been going to the intermediate/advanced class all along because that's where Ryan was anyways, but now I'm officially supposed to be in that class, which is great. The classes are actually a lot of fun, and a pretty good workout. I've done more push-ups than I ever thought possible!

Here's a demonstration of our form:

Never mind that I messed up a little bit in it. Also, contrary to how it looks in the video, I am NOT the only female adult in the class. We have several women who come. This particular graduation ceremony we seemed to be missing quite a few of the women. At the end of the demonstrations, we received our new belts. Happy to be moving up the ranks!