Ryan did an amazing job with the limited time that he had and produced some amazing photos for us.  We highly recommend them.  Here’s a wonderful photo that he was able to capture for us at Muir Woods.

More photos here: http://forgedinthenorth.com/james-catherine-married-san-francisco-california/

Short Film: Kale Salad

This is more than just a picture of a tasty cocktail and a pair of glasses. Instead this photo represents a moment in our marriage of struggle, tension, disagreement, sadness, grief, expectations, silence, confusion, and heartache. Marriage is tough. I often feel it is like going through fire. What doesn’t kill you just makes you stronger. So for all of you married couples we understand. Thank you to those that have been an encouragement and support in our marriage. We love you! #marriedlife #letsgetreal

Some of you know that we went on a short mini moon to Palm Springs to get away from the cold SF weather and enjoy the warm desert weather immediately after our wedding.  (We highly recommend Palm Springs for any getaway)

We decided to postpone our honey moon until December because most places don’t have good beach weather in the fall: hurricanes, monsoons, etc.

We’ve decided to blog about our travels in hopes to share things that have blessed us, and tips to help others not make the same mistakes we’ve made.  So here is our first post.

ITINERARY

Our original plan was just to go to Vietnam and Taiwan.  Taiwan was to see my Grandmother and relatives.  Vietnam was to learn more about Cat’s mother’s culture and enjoy the warm weather, and relax on a beach.  Although, after researching prices, I found it to cost the same price to fly round trip to Japan from SFO, and have small connecting flights from Japan instead of flying leg to leg between locations.  Here is our insane Itinerary.

SFO to SEA

SEA to NRT (Japan)

NRT to SGN (Vietnam)

SGN to NRT

NRT to TPE (Taiwan)

TPE to NRT

NRT to Portland

Portland to SFO

BLESSINGS

Every moment of our trip has been a blessing from God.

Tip #1:  Give yourself at least 3 hours time to travel to the airport (You probably already know this).  In our case we needed more time because it was raining, and in SF people don’t know how to drive in the rain.  Also, flights can change.  In our case it did, and this was a blessing.  Our original flight was supposed to leave at 8:45 am.  It ended up being delayed.  If not we would of missed this flight since we were already an hour behind schedule.  By God’s grace we were rerouted to LA.  We took the last two seats on the plane, and made it to Seattle for our connecting flight to Japan.   But if we were just 10 minutes later to the ticket counter, they would not have been able to reroute us.  So our tip, be extra early and be ready for changes in the itinerary.

JAPAN

This was Cat’s first time to Japan.  Even thought I’ve been to Japan three times before, it is still fresh and fun for me.  We both love Japanese culture, people, the food!  I think we had like 3 bowls of Ramen in our first couple days.  Most places will serve a really good bowl of ramen for only $5-7 opposed to getting ramen in Oakland at Ramen Shop for $16.

In Japan for places to stay, I would choose between three options: AirBnB, www.agoda.com, and the hostels.  They are all about the same prices, but they offer all different amenities.  We picked this awesome AirBnB near Asakusa station which was a custom built, classical Japanese apartment.  It was only $70/night.  The also stayed at a really nice Hostel in Japan.  It came with a private bathroom, nice cushions, towels, and tons of free information.  It was the nicest hostel both Cat and I have stayed at.  Agoda.com is best for booking hotels, so the last place we booked in Japan was the Asakusa View Hotel.   The website had a special deal so it was only $70/night.  We both highly recommend staying here.  They have a rooftop restaurant and bar with view of one the Tokyo Skytree Tower.  Its very romantic.  They also have free luggage storage.  So we have been storing our luggage their for the past week.

Shopping

We found that most of the shopping is around Shibuya, and Harajuku, but also at the Airport!  We actually spent 5 hours at the Airport shopping.  Mainly, because of convenience.  They have a lot of cool stores there.  So if you have time before your flight go shopping.  Only one thing, you can only go shopping out side of the security.  So plan on that.  You can easily spend 6 hours here.

Internet

They have wi-fi almost everywhere in Japan, but I think if you have internet access just for GPS, its worth it.  So I found out that at the airport they rent out a wi-fi hotspot unit for only $12/day.

Transportation

It can be a bit expensive traveling to and from the airport.  Wish I found this website earlier.

http://tokyocheapo.com/travel/transport/cheapest-transport-to-and-from-narita-airport/

Next up Vietnam and Taiwan

To be continued….

For some odd reason the night before the wedding, I remember getting an email from a videographer that found us on www.honeyfund.com.  I told Cat about him that night, and we decided to hire him at 10:00pm, literally less than 24 hours before our wedding.  So we sent him a text message, and he responded!  We confirmed everything via email, and the next morning Morocco Lee arrived at the Schneider Residence ready to go! (which some of you know isn’t very easy find).   Looking back, it was one of the best decisions we’ve ever made, and we truly believe that this was part of God’s plan.

I hope for those of you that attended our wedding it was also a special day for you.  For those of you that missed our wedding, this video is an opportunity for you to share in our special day. Thanks again for your love and support!

Foot washing and Prayer

Those of you that are not familiar with the Christian faith, foot washing and praying for one another are both examples of showing agape love according to Jesus Christ.  If you are curious you can read these passages in the Bible.   Footwashing and Prayer.   Foot washing is a sign of service and humility.  Prayer is asking the Jesus our mediator to hear our needs and requests in hopes that our Heavenly Father will listen and give us our requests.

Short Version

Extended Version

****Just in.  All of the the photos from the photobooth have been uploaded to www.photo-matica.com.

We both thought to ourselves: Find my iPhone App!  We quickly tried to figure out how to use it.  After 5 attempts to recover Cat’s icloud account password, I was able to login.  I clicked on the locate button, and it started searching.  I stared at the screen patiently.  After about 30 seconds, we see a dot pop up with all the details of where the phone is!  Oh my gosh, the phone is in Berkeley!

Not knowing what to do, I decide to ask for help.  Kind of like phoning a friend, I decide to ask facebook.  (You can see the chain below of all the help that I got.)

We soon decide to call the police.  The first response, “Did you file the phone as lost or stolen?” Thats why we called the police.  It wasn’t an emergency so we had to go online and fill out a report.  I did it as fast I could.  Once we submitted the report it says that it won’t be processed for another 5 business days.  That’s when, we both decide we need to take action, so we hop in our car and started heading towards the destination of the phone.  On the way we call the Berkeley police one more time, this time we had a police report number, so they were able to assist us.  We told them our plan to get the phone through Find my iphone and they were on board.  Three police officers rendezvoused with us at the address of the phone.  To our surprise we found the location to be a senior citizen residence.  We were slightly relieved.  All these thoughts started going through our minds.  (Hopefully, its just a senile elder that took the phone by mistake.  Worst case senario it could be a juvenile child that stole the phone and is hiding out here.)  Long story short we got the phone back.*

*Since our post on facebook everyone and their mom has been wondering what happened.  So when we arrived at the senior citizen residence the police asked us what we wanted to do.  We didn’t really know, so we showed them where the phone was on the map.  One officer decided to go solo and try to find the phone.  Then, one of the officers, Hunt had a brilliant idea and decided to have Cat log on into his iphone through Find My Iphone app.   That way he could just trigger the phone to make an alert, and they would just follow the sound.  By this time, all of the officers went looking for the phone.  This was about 9:45pm.  We kept waiting and waiting.  45 minutes had past.  We were a bit worried.  I kept checking on my phone, and all of sudden the location kept jumping around.  What’s going on?  Soon enough, we see a young male walk out of the building.  I was hoping he was gonna come out and give us Cat’s phone.  Unfortunately, he had no clue what was going on, he was just working there maintaining the facility.  Finally, one of the officers came out of the building.  He gave us a thumbs up!  We were kind of happy, but confused at the same time.  He told us they found the phone on the 3rd floor in the room of very senile man who apparently had a mid western accident.  The phone was found by the man near the post office near our house.  So we think Cat must of left it on the counter there and the man picked it up for some odd reason.  The officer told us that the man had no clue how to operate the phone, and that it just kept ringing and beeping, and he didn’t know what to do.  He must have been really senile.

So there it is.  The mystery of the missing phone.  Three officers, Find my iPhone, a Senior Citizen Home, and 28% battery life was all it took to save Cat’s phone.

This is just one of the many photos that were saved in Cat’s phone from our Minimoon.  Thank God! #salvationmountain