(we went backpacking this weekend! more on that, along with pictures, at the bottom of the page)

This past week has been quite the social one! We had friends and family over almost every other day this week! Sunday, we had Jake’s parents and youngest brother over for dinner. Cindy cooked MaPo Tofu for everyone. That was her first time cooking for family. She was so scared she was going to food poison everyone… thankfully, no one was food poisoned (that we know of). After dinner we walked over to Sawtelle Japantown and went crazy at Nijiya (a Japanese market). All of us bought handfuls of Asian snacks. It was a fun evening of catching up with family and eating Asian snacks. Tuesday, we hosted dinner for a couple of good friends (the couple who married us). They’re leaving soon, to be missionaries, so we went all out on the dinner we made. Jake made large scallops for the first time ever! We had been wanting to buy scallops for a while, but couldn’t justify making them for just us. Then, Wednesday, Cindy’s good friend came over and hung out all day. They made, and then ate, some really delicious lemon bars.

And that brings us to our backpacking trip! We went on a short weekend backpacking trip, with our good friends, to Mt. Lowe on Echo Mountain. The trail followed what used to be a railroad track. All along the trail, there were little posts with fun little facts about Mt. Lowe Railway. And the actual campsite used to be a fancy lodge! It burned down a couple times and was eventually demolished. Spooky! Here are some pictures from our weekend adventure!