It feels so good!

Personal Timeline

6 months: Learned to walk. I can only walk while holding onto this gross-looking, frog thing. If I drop it, I will fall down.

Already my sense of fashion is behind everyone else. It will take me until college to catch up.

3 years: I astound my mom by finding Peppy Taco in the midst of a chest full of toys. For the rest of my life I will know where Peppy Taco is.


6 years: I open crayons as my stocking stuffer gift on Christmas eve. I hate them and cry. For the rest of my life I will feel bad about being so ungrateful. My parents will give me crayons every Christmas after that.


Taken from the book "No One Cares What You Had For Lunch: 100 Ideas for Your Blog" by Maggie Mason

Conversation at work today:

I wish people would stop coming into work when they are sick.

I am washing my hands every time I talk to someone. I don't want strep.

We need to get the company to buy a large bottle of hand sanitizer and put it next to the community candy dish.

Let's be honest. What you really want is for people to get sprayed with a shower of Lysol when they walk into your office.

THAT WOULD BE AWESOME!

A Bershon Christmas

My mom sent me some pictures of our ginger bread house competition. We would set-up tables in our garage and turn on heaters so we didn't freeze to death:

We'd invite all of our home school group over to make gingerbread houses out of a graham crackers. Eventually it grew to be so big we had to rent out a skating rink and hold the competition there. I think that they still do it. My mom has left a legacy!

It was a lot of fun, but I certainly wouldn't let on:

I was just too bershon for that!

Easy Spinach Pie

There's really nothing pie-like about this dish except that it is cooked in a pie pan. I mean really spinach and pie shouldn't go together. You certainly wouldn't want to scoop ice cream or whipped cream on it.... I shall rename it Easy Spinach Casserole!

2 T. butter 1 package of spinach, finely chopped 1 small red bell pepper (I used a yellow one. The grocery store was out of red. Does anyone else try and spell grocery like grochery? I do. How else do you get the "shh" sound in it? Otherwise it should be pronounced Gro Seri. And they were out of red peppers too so that doesn't help me.)
3/4 C. milk
2 T. all-purpose flour
1/2 t. salt
1/8 t. nutmeg (Does anyone have a measuring spoon that measures 1/8? I sure don't and I'm not in elementary school anymore and really shouldn't have to divide fractions. In the 5 recipes I have made, I have never seen measurement of 1/8. We hates the 1/8 around here.)
3 Eggs (Must be pretty brown eggs)
CHEESE! (I love me some cheese)

So as you can see this really isn't a vegitarian recipe so much as it is a meat-less recipe. We can work with this....

1. Heat oven to 350 F. Grease pie pan, 9 1 1/4 inches (I forgot to to do this which is why Ben is now in the kitchen scrubbing the pan... sorry sweetie!)

2. Melt margarine in 12-inch skillet over medium heat. Cook spinach and bell pepper for about 5 min until spinach is wilted and pepper is crisp-tender (the phrase crisp-tender makes no sense and yet it describes it so well.)
3. Beat remaining ingredients except cheese until smooth (or as I did, until the flour clumps and your arm gets tired); pour into skillet. Stir mixture; pour into pie pan.



Side note: Everyone needs to go buy one of these spoon rests from pampered chef. They are amazing and take up such little room!

4. Bake uncovered about 30 minutes until center is set. Sprinkle with cheese! My "pie" tried to take over the oven and quite possibly would have gone for the whole world like some spinach blob... but I beat it back and it calmed down.
Before:

Cool vintage pie pan huh?

After:


Yum!

City

Tonight Ben preached at the urban church we go to. He did a great job. He had an audience of about 40 teenagers and 6 adults and he kept their attention most of the time. He's awesome like that.

The more we are involved with this church the more we realize how unprepared we are for all of this. There is so much pain in this neighborhood that I alternate between choosing to ignore it and crying over it. When I read statistics of child abandonment, illiteracy and crime in the city I can feel pity but continue on my life. When it's my friends and the people I worship with, it hurts.

And right now all I can do is pray for them. Please pray with me.

You never know when that will come in handy...

I just sat through 1/2 hour of PBS programming. I learned how to install lighting in kitchen cabinets. Ben just reminded me that I am getting old. He's probably right.

It's the most wonderful time of the year!

It's the day after Thanksgiving which means.... Christmas season has officially begun. Christmas music can be played. Gifts can be purchased. Decorations can go up! Snow can fall! It's Christmas!

I celebrated the beginning of the Christmas season like every good American and went shopping. I bought a coat for myself.

Tonight Ben and I went to the Grand Illumination downtown. I enjoy going downtown for events. I am always reminded of how much I love the city. The life, the people, the pain, the joy. It's a great place to be.
We got to see the ginger bread house display while we were there. If we were staying in the area I think I would try and get some friends to join.

When we were growing up my mom would host a gingerbread house competition at our house. We would use graham crackers instead of gingerbread and a special icing my mom would make. Everyone would bring some candy to decorate. At the end the parents would judge the houses and give out awards to everyone. The awards would be something like most creative or most life-like. It was a lot of fun. Although we never made anything as elaborate as the houses we saw tonight.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope your day was filled with food, family and gratefulness.

Mail

When we got back from our trip to Kentucky, we found a note from our neighbor stating that she had caught some kid trying to steal our outgoing mail. Specifically the check for our water bill. We went to go get the check and the story from our neighbor and sure enough there was our shredded bill and crumpled check.

She said that she saw a kid, who was with the cleaning guy, throwing the bill in the trash. Thinking it was her bill she yelled at the kid and threatened to call the police if he didn't give the check back. Now here's the part that I don't understand. What was some 13 year old kid going to do with a check to the water company? Chew on it? Try and pass himself off as a representative of the company? Frame and brag about his heist? I don't really get it.

Anyway I explained what happened to the apartment complex office and they said that the guy described isn't from their cleaning company. GREAT! I feel so safe now.

This kind of thing would never happen in Kentucky. That's God's country.

Meh

Today was a CRAZY day at work. It involved several of us running into walls like chickens without heads. My brain is mush. I wish I could write about it. Some of it really was interesting.

Instead I'll leave you with this Dilbert.

One step closer to moving

We are back. We talked to about a million people about housing down in Kentucky. We saw 4 rental properties with varying rent prices and quality.

The two bedroom duplex that looked perfect on paper looked dumpy in real-life. I mean really, carpet that is 10 years old should be replaced. Also, olive green CRACKED counter tops should go as well. Dark cabinets, open laundry rooms and weed infested lawns don't advertise well. Even at $425/month it wasn't worth it. MOVING ON!

The next rental property was a three bedroom house that was beautiful! Wood floors, colors on the walls, new carpet, friendly landlord, and a great location. It was renting for about what we pay for a one bedroom apartment in Ohio. Very tempting. But it turns out that in general the jobs in Kentucky pay less than jobs in Ohio so $625/month was out of our price range. Such a bummer!

The next place we looked at was an older two bedroom apartment on the third floor. It had a spacious floor plan, cheap utilities and a great location. The current tenants couldn't say enough about how much they liked it and the landlady. The only downside was that there was no washer and dryer hook-ups which would mean we would have to get rid of ours. The on-site laundry facility was convenient, but not as convenient as having the washer and dryer in your apartment. Although at $400/month it's our best option so far.

The last place we looked was a newer two bedroom apartment that looked like all new apartments around Ohio. It had a nice open floor plan although it was smaller than the other apartment. It did have a dishwasher, which was nice but again no washer and dryer. So for $525/month the older apartment was still the best option.

The trip was good in that we got a good idea of what to expect and what we could afford. I also got some tips on jobs. Hopefully we will have things nailed down soon.

Kentucky!

Today and tomorrow Ben and I will down in Kentucky looking for places to live when we move there. Hopefully I will have more interesting stories when we get back.

My sister graduates today!

Congratulations Sarah!

Winter. Finally.

So my license picture looks a little bit like a mug shot, huh?

A couple of days ago the temperature dropped around here. It was in the high 60's which is freaky for Ohio weather in November. It made me feel uneasy. Things weren't right. Which may explain why I woke up feeling all BLAH on Wednesday. I hated my hair, it just hung there and my clothes were all wrong and annoying and no matter how quickly I got ready for work, time marched on even faster. I left the apartment grumpy, late, and hating the day and the cold.

Then it started to snow. Just a light snow flurry, but it was the first snow of winter. And you can't stay mad in the middle of the first snow of winter. You just can't. It starts to feel like the holidays. Christmas is now just around the corner. The blanket of leaves on the ground is about to be replaced by blankets of snow. The first snow is a happy snow.

I got to work and I told the girl who I am training to replace me that it was snowing. She FREAKED OUT. She had never seen snow before. She'd never lived anywhere that had snow. She ran outside and danced around and called her mom to tell her that it was SNOWING!

The rest of us stayed inside but still rejoiced at the falling flakes. Call us crazy, but when you are raised with the snow it's a happy sight. It's creates stories and community (get snowed in somewhere and you will see...). Snow makes winter bearable and we were all happy to see it.

Welcome winter.

5 Months!

Yesterday marked being married for 5 months! To celebrate I finally went and got my name changed on my driver's license. Not only did I do that, but I am now listed as an organ donor. Everyone, please tell Ben what a wonderful wife he has and pat me on the back!

Here's fuzzy picture from my license:

Team Building... or something

He was in our building for a short time. He stopped by the cubicle I was in to help out. He visited other offices just to say "hi" and then he was gone, but behind him he left the smell of a thousand farts. It dazed people enough to stop their work. Oh it was bad. I have never smelled anything quite so strong.

Jayme at the end of the hall quickly yelled, "GET THE SPRAY!"

I turned around in time to see Carol sprinting down the hall spraying air disinfectant.

Now that's team work!

Sounds I love

• Leaves crunching under my feet. I can't walk between the buildings at my work without stepping on at least one leaf. I look like a crazy who can't walk in a straight line, but the complete fallness of crunching a leaf is worth it.
  

• Walking through a city by myself. It's noisy and quiet all at the same time. There are sounds all around but none of them are directed at me, so in the midst of all of the noise there is silence. I kind of image that that's what peace sounds like.

• Snow under foot. It's unlike any other sound. It's a mix of a zipper, a crunch and a rustle. It reminds me of walks in the snow as a kid.
  

• The roar of people at a party. If you take a break from playing Taboo and listen, it's interesting. It's loud and yet you can distinguish individual people's voices. It's a mix of everyone and yet no one is heard alone. It's the sound of community.
  

• Rain. It puts me to sleep.
  

Paris

I spent one day in Paris in July of 2005. We stopped there on the way back from India. We had spent the previous day touring the Taj Mahal, took a red eye flight to Paris and flew back to the states the following day. It was an exhausting trip.


I enjoyed Paris but I was tired and we didn't see much. We spent most of the day trying to read a map and find food. We ate in a McDonalds for lunch. I hated my team for that, but I got over it because I was running out of money and was happy to eat something.

My team was tired of seeing the sights so we decided to play one hand of Euchre at every stop we made.

We played at Sacre-Coeur Basillica:

On the subway:

At Notre Dame:

At the base of the Eiffel Tower:

At on the top of the Eiffel Tower:

That was our head nod to being tourists in Paris. Maybe some day I'll go back and really experience the city but for now I can say that Josh and I won a game of Euchre in Paris.

It's better if you don't read it. Really.

I know this isn't really a surprise to anyone, but my posts on the weekends are lame. Stupid NaBloPoMo makes me do it.

So here you have it. A lame post for the sake of posting.

And a pretty picture of fall:

Cranium

I love me some group games. Catch phrase is my favorite, but I haven't played it in a long time.... Last night Ben and and I had dinner with some other couples and we all played Cranium. It was such a fun game, but I didn't contribute to the team much. I couldn't spell Khaki backwards or act out "hormones". Ben did a great Kramer impersonation and another team member got frustrated acting out "Gone with the Wind".

It was a good night!

P.S. In case you hadn't seen enough pictures of Ben and I all dressed up, you can see our professional pictures from our wedding celebration here.

Interview

I had a phone interview yesterday. It went really well. I think that there is a good chance they will offer me the job. I'm just not sure I want it..... I've never had this problem before. At least we have this weekend to think and pray about it...

Car

We decided to sell the Honda CRV. Selling a Miata right before winter just didn't make any sense. We can always try and sell that in the spring if we need to.

It was a hard decision to sell the CRV. Neither one of us were really thrilled about trading either car down to a powder blue Olds. And yet, now that we've made that decision we are excited about it. We had figured that going into ministry probably meant that we would have less stuff and need to live more simply. There will always be people who need our things more than us and at times God may ask us to give it to them.

We try very hard to hold our possessions with an open hand. To enjoy them while we have them, but not mourn for them when they are gone. To treat them as things and not part of our worth. It's hard to do this. It's so very easy to get attached to so much stuff. Cars, furniture, clothes, random junk. It's very easy to view all of it as though it were ours and we have keep it. In reality it's God's stuff. He can do with it what he pleases. He will always provide for us. All we need to do is trust Him and be good stewards of what he gives us. The key is that a steward doesn't hoard things, he uses them for things that he thinks the owner would use them for.

So selling the car feels good. It feels like we are one step closer to where God is calling us. It's helping us take serious our commitment to live simply and without debt. We are doing it. We are making one more choice to get to where God wants us to be. And as much as I hate that old blue car, it feels so freeing to let the CRV go.

Please help me out and tell me I am right

When you put your resume on-line to a site such as CareerBuilder.com or Monster.com what do you do?

Do you SUBMIT your resume? (as if they were to review your resume and see if you are good enough.)

OR

Do you POST your resume? (as if you are placing it on a virtual bulletin board for all to see.)

I'm not going to tell you which one I think it is, but if you choose Ben's definition, we aren't friends anymore.

Never a dull moment....

Just when I thought I had run out of things to blog about, last night happened. Ben and I were sitting eating dinner and here's how things went down:

Me: ummm... my eye kind of burns. I think I got something in it.

Ben: I have some saline drops if you think that might help.

(I get up and put 2 drops in my eye. I also put 17 drops on my face trying to make it in my eye.)

Me: OW! IT BURNS MORE!

Ben: What burns more?

Me: MY WHOLE EYE BURNS. BEFORE IT WAS JUST THE EDGE OF MY EYE AND NOW MY WHOLE EYE BURNS. AHHHHH!

Ben: They are just saline drops they shouldn't burn.

Me: THEY ARE SALINE DROPS OF FIRE! IT BURNS!!! AHHHHHH! I'M GOING TO FLUSH IT WITH WATER.

Ben: They've never burned my eyes before.

Me: WELL THEY ARE BURNING MINE. AHHHHH! IT'S SPREADING!

Ben: What do you mean it's spreading?

Me: AHHHHH! FIRST IT WAS THE CORNER OF MY EYE AND THEN IT WAS THE WHOLE EYE AND NOW HALF OF MY FACE IS ON FIRE.

Ben: That's weird. I wonder what it is.

Me: I HOPE I DON'T GO BLIND.....OH IT HURTS!!!

Ben.... do you want a wet wash cloth?

Me: HEY! Go try the peppers in the salad. Tell me what they taste like?

Ben: Whoa! Those are spicy!

Me: Crap! I got pepper juice in my eye. I thought that was a green pepper.

For the next 20 minutes I alternated between rationally discussing things to my face bursting into flames. There was nothing that I could Google that offered any help. Lots of places said not to get the juice in your eye, but not what to do if you did.

And in complete fairness our CSA box always claimed to include spicy peppers, but they were always sweet, so I'd just lump them all together. What a day to be wrong!

Painting

Painting my Grandma's wall was a success. Even if I did step in the paint pan once. But I knew something like that would happen. I always get paint all over me. Never on the carpet. Just over me.

We painted paneling and I've never done that before. I got the best primer and paint I could, so hopefully it sticks.

Here are the before pictures:



After:



And me and my Grandma:

Halloween

The painting job is taking a little bit longer than I had thought. So those pictures will come tomorrow. Today! I blog about the Halloween party I went to. I don't really like Halloween; I just don't understand why people would want to celebrate evil and death. I also don't like that it seems like the culmination of Fall becomes Halloween. No! It's Thanksgiving! Fall doesn't end until Thanksgiving. Put those Christmas decorations away.... we still have leaves on the trees! But I do like hanging out with people so I went to a Halloween party last week.

I went as the movie theater floor:

The winners of the costume contest were Mr. and Mrs. Monster Head:


Jen went as a witch but didn't have a nose with warts, so I'm not sure her costume counts.

Oh Yeah!

Last night I finally got a call about my resume! They want an interview! I don't know if I could be more excited....

Today I am painting my Grandma' living room. Pictures tomorrow...

Ramblings about cars, babies and stomaches

Well it's back! Woo Hoo! My stomach again has decided to revolt. It's much milder this go around but it still sucks. Also, it's less scary. It's like driving an old car. The first time it breaks down you freak out, because you just know that you are going to die right there on the side of the road. Never mind that it's in the middle of your college campus - you will die. But then you don't. The towing truck man comes and tows your car away and you live and your car lives. So the next time it breaks down you are less likely to think you are going to die, you just worry about walking the 2 miles in the snow in heels. And then the next time it dies the towing guys knows you by name and you brought a book and your all "ehh… it builds character."

That's how these stomach problems feel. I'm not thinking about dying or tumors this time. My attitude is that of an old car owner. It happens, you just have to go with it and maybe jiggling some wires will help. Freaking out will not change anything. You still have to walk those two miles in the snow. Have fun. The only problem with this go around is that anytime I mention that I don't feel well people assume I am pregnant. No one did that a year ago because I would have killed them with my eyes. This year, however, any mention of nausea is received with raised eyebrows and a polite "ohhhhh".

It's not that I hate babies and pregnant women, it's just that I would rather people think I am pregnant when I actually am pregnant. And I'm not. So it's weird and I'm not sure how to handle it.

Also, back to old cars…. Ben and I are thinking about selling one of our cars since my parents have offered to give us their old one. Now Ben has owned exactly 2 cars in his life. Both were newish. I have owned 5 cars in my life and my Miata is the only newish one I've owned. Ben has never experienced the joys of owning a car that doesn't have A/C. Or a car that you can't put the drivers side window down. Or one where you can see the road through the floor boards. Or one where the trunk latch doesn't open so you have you access the trunk by folding the seats down. These are fun, character building cars. I think just for the experience we need to own an older car, although this older car is kind of cheating. It has leather power seats, A/C, and a self-dimming rearview mirror. Also, it's a powder blue Oldsmobile 88. Not only is it an old car, but it's an old car for old people. OH YEAH! We will be pimping it out…

Maybe you could help. Which car should we get rid of? The goal is to decrease debt but still have fun.

A. 2000 Honda CRV. It has 117,000 miles on it but no major problems. We owe about $2,500 on it. The problem is that neither one of us really like this car. It's not very comfortable and Ben is too tall for it. We could sell this one for roughly $6,500

B. 2001 Mazda Miata. It has 58,000 miles on it and no problems. We owe just over $8,000 on this car. We both really like this car and have fun driving it. It's just not good in snow (but we are moving south!) and it's tiny. We could sell this car for roughly $10,500.

We know the financially wise thing would be to sell the Miata. But then we would have two cars that we don't like driving, which doesn't make me happy. What do you think? Which car would you sell?

Just Made It!

So I've always wanted to participate in NaBloPoMo, but I've always realized it was November after November 1st (I'm slow). So this is the year of NaBloPoMo! I will post every day in the month of November! Let the fun begin.... tomorrow.....