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First of all, my birthday was on Monday and even though it wasn’t technically the first day of fall I like to think that it is. :) We celebrated by going to the local orchard to pick apples and mums to bring in the fall.
And even though the pictures don’t show it we enjoyed this day with our friends Mandi & Jesse. They are visiting from Missouri and are here until Saturday! It has been so nice to have some old friends around and especially since they were here over my birthday.
I’ll have to take share the mums once I arrange them on our porch but with the apples on the kitchen table and the mums outside our door, fall has moved in to the Endicott household.
-Shannon
Earlier this spring we had an amazing day of weather. The day had been fairly cool with a ton of rain. In the evening the rain finally let up and the air warmed a bit with some afternoon sun. Lucas and I noticed lots of fog outside and decided to take an even stroll. This is what we saw…
Keep in mind there normally is no water around the golf course…
I’ve never seen water here before…
And just to give you some perspective, here is shot I took a few days earlier…
…and that evening…
Again, before…
…and after…
And don’t worry, by the next day most of the water had cleared out.
-Shannon
Each and every spring I am absolutely in awe of nature. For a solid month or so I will comment on each tree every day. Lucas gets pretty sick of it and says that I act as though I’ve never seen spring happen before. But to me spring is always different and it always makes me so excited when it finally comes.
I feel absolutely invigorated walking through the woods by our place and seeing each new sign of life. And now that the green has finally taken over, it is even more amazing to me how quickly we adjust to seeing it. I’m almost past the point where it catches my eye and the green becomes the everyday color just like brown was through the winter.
Hopefully even though the heat of summer is quickly approaching I’ll still remember to enjoy my new world of green.
-Shannon
After all the snow we’ve had (not that I’m complaining) it has been nice to have these lovelies sitting around the place. We actually bought a potted plant of tulips hoping that they would wait to unfold until spring but once they got into our cozy apartment they decided spring had sprung. So we cut them before they all fell down and set them out for all the world to see.
-Shannon
I know, I know…three posts in one day? Let’s just say I’m going to keep at it while I have the motivation. Plus now that I have all the Christmas catch-up blogs done I feel like I can share about everyday life again. So here is everyday life for the past few days…
We have had moments of snow during this winter but nothing that really lasted and nothing that came close to covering the ground. After these pictures were taken it snowed again about an inch. So the ground is fully covered and it is beautiful. These pictures were taken just outside our back window and they remind me that we live in a great place.
The canal by our place…
And our lovely bridge all covered in snow…
Thank you snow for coming and making our world clean and bright.
-Shannon
This year was the first year we included a Christmas Letter in our Christmas cards. And since I couldn’t send a Christmas card to everyone I know and love I thought I would share our Christmas Letter with my lovely blog world. As an added bonus you get to see a picture for every month…and let me tell you how hard it is for me to only pick one pictures for each month. :)
Merry Christmas!
We pray this letter finds you well as we are in the midst of the Christmas season! This past year has brought many changes for us and we thought we’d share with a month by month report.
In January we spent part of the month home in Missouri as we celebrated Christmas before heading back to Vancouver where Lucas and I were both finishing school at Regent College.
February brought the news that Lucas had been accepted into Princeton Theological Seminary and we enjoyed time on Galiano Island with friends from Regent.
The month of March brought many baby related events as several of our close friends welcomed new babies or news of upcoming arrivals.
In April we celebrated as Lucas and I both graduated from Regent College, a place that formed us in ways seen and unseen.
May was a month of goodbyes as we left Vancouver, the city we called home for 2 1/2 years. There were many tearful goodbyes but it only reminded us of the wonderful friendships we developed while we were there. We then made the 40 hour drive home to Missouri to spend the summer with family
During the month of June Lucas was at Duke as a summer research fellow. In his absence my mom and I enjoyed a girls weekend in Branson and I spent a lot of time by my pool.
July was spent catching up with friends in Springfield & Tulsa as well as celebrating the 4th in West Plains and Kansas City.
In August we celebrated 5 years of marriage by taking a trip to Mexico with our good friends Spencer & Abby.
Early September we made the 18 hour drive to Princeton, NJ and set up our new life. I found two great jobs and celebrated my birthday with a day in NYC.
October brought our friends Ryan, Vanya & Ciara to us all the way from Vancouver. We also spent some time exploring our new surroundings.
In November we had another visitor when my mom came to stay with us. We also celebrated Thanksgiving as Lucas roasted his first turkey…it turned out great
December brings Lucas’ birthday! It also brought our friend Katie all the way from Scotland. We will stick around Princeton until Christmas Eve and then drive home to be with family for a week.
It has been a great year and we look forward to the New Year to come. Always know that you are welcome to come and stay with us if you are in the area. Again we wish you a very, merry Christmas!
Lucas & Shannon
A couple times I’ve tried to capture some of the beauty of Princeton…but it’s been raining or cloudy outside. And while I really can’t complain about the weather, since normally it’s pretty gorgeous around here, I have been looking forward to having my camera along when some nice days are happening. Yesterday happened to be one of those days. Lucas and I planned to meet up after his classes got out and we headed to downtown Princeton for an afternoon walk.
I patiently waited for Lucas to finish with class by taking pictures of a gorgeous yellow tree…
And let me remind you of the building Lucas has some of his classes in…not too bad if you ask me…
The downtown area of Princeton is essentially next door to PTS and Princeton University so we wandered through the University to get there…
We ended our lovely walk through campus at the chapel. I had never been in the space before and it was pretty amazing. I’m thinking I need to spend an afternoon here sometime soon…especially on a sunny day…
By this time the sun decided to say goodbye to us so I have no pictures of the old buildings downtown. But it was still a wonderful afternoon and a great day to be outside in the cool, crisp air.
-Shannon
Last weekend we went to Washington Crossing for our first time and enjoyed it so much that today after church we grabbed a quick lunch and headed there again. Thankfully this time I didn’t bust the lens on my camera like I did last weekend. :) We went there just to hike so we spent lots of time in the forest and I couldn’t help but take some pictures. The weather has been wonderful so we enjoyed another sunshine-filled day…
After our hike we headed down to the landing area where the old buildings are…
-Shannon
This past week I received my new lens in the mail! It came really fast and I was glad to have my camera fully functional again. :) So the night I got it I had to go check it out…not that it’s much different from my other lens. So off I went to take some shots around our place…
I love the coloring of this bridge with the rust…
As you can see fall has already been peeking its head out. Just this morning I glanced out the window and saw leaves falling and geese flying overhead…I love fall. :)
PS-Yes Lucas made a wonderful pie from some of the apples we picked last weekend. Unfortunately he made it and we devoured it during the time without my camera lens. But don’t worry because I know he’ll make more pies and I’ll be sure to share that with you. :)
-Shannon
This past Saturday we not only enjoyed the apple orchard in the morning but we also took some time to explore Washington Crossing State Park in the afternoon. This park highlights the place George Washington and his troops crossed the Delaware River on Christmas night 1776. First we stopped by the visitor’s center and were surprised by the collection of historical items they had there. It seems like everything around here is steeped in history. Washington himself…
Some of Ben Franklin’s bifocals…
A medicine chest used during the Revolutionary War…I thought the bottles looked pretty cool…
A Princeton University diploma from 1771, formerly the College of New Jersey…
And if you know me then you know I love maps so I was pretty enthralled with this map of the US from the 1770’s…
After enjoying the visitor’s center we hiked some trails for awhile. First we stumbled upon this…
And then we just enjoyed the nature…
Fall has definitely been creeping up on us here in New Jersey and you can already see so many leaves on the ground. I thought this shot turned out nice because I accidentally caught Lucas in the background…
At this point I would love to show you some pictures of the Delaware River and the old buildings in the park, but it was at this point in our day that I dropped my camera and broke the lens…UGH! When it happened I started crying because I was so mad at myself for being so careless and I was upset that I wouldn’t be able to take any more pictures. I was also worried because we’re still settling in here financially and I didn’t think I would be able to get a new lens right away. But thankfully amazon.com came through for me and I was able to find a new lens (although not identical to my original one) for a good price. So I’m now the proud owner of a Canon 28-90mm lens. Basically it is just like my old one but it zooms in a bit more…
So sometime we’ll have to venture back to Washington Crossing (which won’t be hard to do seeing as it’s only 25 minutes away) and I’ll be able to show you some more pictures. :) Until then…
-Shannon
