Hurray!

I can finally post why I haven't had time to post!

WE ARE MOVING! IN LIKE 2 WEEKS!

We are finally moving back to Ohio. After being in transition for FOREVER... we have jobs and things are in place to move. We just made the final decision yesterday and I start my new job in 3.5 weeks. Today Ben found us a place to live while we look for a home to buy!

So much is happening at lightening speed that it is hard to keep up.

We are super excited. We'll be working with a small church plant in an urban neighborhood. I am excited about the community development opportunities and Ben is excited about the discipleship opportunities. This is what we have been waiting for for over two years and it's nice to take a big step towards it. My husband is going to be a for real, no kidding pastor. I'm so proud of him. He's going to make a great pastor!

Hopefully there will be just one more trip to Ohio and then we will live there! I am so excited!

I hope you had a great Independence Day. Ours was filled with trips back to Ohio to visit family. Yes. I know. We spend so much time in Ohio we should move there. We are working on it.

We spent some extra time at my parent's house helping them clean for the cookout they were having. My sister, Sarah, and I got to go through some boxes full of stuff from our childhood in the process. Whoa. There was a lot of highly entertaining items in those boxes. Lucky for you all I took some pictures before I tossed the stuff!

First up - Self Portrait, Age 7

Apparently I still had blond 80's hair then and had lost a tooth. Also I was rocking the multi-colored turtle necks. It took me a while to figure out what was so "off" on this drawing but Ben helped me out and pointed out that my eyes were all wrong. Which just goes to show that even at 7 I thought my eyes were just that blue.

Next - Illustrated story. Date unknown

The story was something about how I was thankful for my mom, my dad, God, food and flars. Which, from judging by the picture, means flowers. My favorite part of this picture is my mom's chicken feet hands and my dad's butt hands. Not sure where I got that....

Next, I was reminded why I disliked swimming lessons so much. I sucked at it. Here's a report card from 1989 (age 6):

I needed work on everything except for floating and sticking my face in the water, and yet I still got a GOOD JOB! comment. Please notice which class I should be in next - Polliwog I.

Now, let's jump ahead a three years and see the report cards for Sarah and I in 1991:
I am STILL IN THE SAME CLASS. Except now my little sister is in there with me. Awesome. I really enjoyed spending 3 years in the same class. There goes my parent's hopes and dreams of me being an Olympic swimmer. Also, let's read Sarah's comment: "Sarah is a very eager pupil. She will soon be a fine swimmer." Let's read mine: "Andrea tries hard and has a desire to learn...." But obviously I wasn't learning... It took 2 more years for me to make it through Poliwog II and to get an instructor who was tired of trying to get me to swim with my face in the water and just move me on to Minnows. Then we stopped taking swim lessons and there was much rejoicing. Now my idea of swimming involves laying on floating and relaxing. I've got that down.

I also found my preschool evaluation and learned that even back then I had a hard time not interrupting people could only recognize numbers 1-5, 7 + 10. But doggone it, I could share and play well with others. Take that stupid swim class....

Father's Day

It is only fitting that I got one of the worst sunburns ever on the first day of summer. Yesterday we celebrated Father's day by taking my dad to a putt-putt golf course. Since I am a genius I forgot sunscreen and probably just aged my skin eleventy billion years. Now that I am 26, which is closer to 30 than 20, I am very concerned with this. I feel like they should publish books titled "your changing body" to explain what happens to your body as you get older. Suddenly my body is REQUIRING me to exercise to stay fit. What is up with that? I can't even imagine what it's like to be pregnant when you body completly takes on a mind of its own....

Anyway, putt-putt was a lot of fun. I got a hole-in-one, but still managed to come in last place. I blame the sun.

So seriously, what's up with the crazy blue water? Do people really think that that's how water should look?



Happy Father's Day Dad! I am very blessed to have a great father like you! I love you.

I like sleeping in my own bed...

Whew! We just got back from Washington D.C. where I sat in a class and learned about contract law and Ben sat in a hotel room and researched laptops to buy. Which we did and we have a shiny new computer that doesn't emit a high-pitched screech or randomly freeze. Hurray! We also traveled up to Ohio last weekend for my sister-in-law's wedding. It was just as crazy as family weddings should be. But it went well and was beautiful and they are now married!

We had a great trip in D.C. We had time to do some sightseeing while we were there. I was pretty excited that I got to see the U.S. Constitution, the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights. Viewing these documents was pretty crazy because some security guard who wanted to go home decided no one needed to wait in line and made it a giant free-for-all. We went from some kind of order to just rushing into the rotunda to try and get a glimpse of these famous items. The people there who were visiting from cultures that do not wait in line definitely had an advantage. They could figure out how to get up to documents while the rest of us American's just stood quietly in line not sure what to do. So I think I saw half of the Constitution before I gave up and moved on.

We also got a tour of the National Gallery of Art which included the only painting by Leonardo da Vinci in the Western Hemisphere. I almost got us thrown out of the museum because of that piece. I was posing next to it and, according to the guard that yelled at me, almost touched it which would have set of an alarm and wow... that was embarressing. So here's a picture of me keeping a safe distance from one of our country's most priceless peices of art:

I have to include this one because I find it hilarious that the flash edited it the way it did:

We also got to visit the National Museum of the American Indian. The architecture of that building is amazing. Once you walk up to it, it doesn't feel like you are in D.C. anymore. Very neat museum.

We saw many great things and met some very interesting people in D.C. I love the diversity there. We tried Spanish food for the first time ever at a tapas bar (you have to make sure you stress the A in there or people will think that you went to a topless bar, which is completely different. Everyone had their shirts on at this restaurant.) We listened to a jazz concert in a park and all around had a great time. It made me wish I was living in a city.

The only downside was coming home to a broken dryer. We just fixed this thing a couple of months ago. AHHHH!!!!! That's just how things go right? You buy a laptop and a major appliance breaks. If only we had gotten the laptop that also dried clothes....

On the brighter side - today is our 2 year anniversary. Which we are going to celebrate by not leaving our house and grilling out. Have a great day!

Congratulations

Way to go Ben! You worked very hard for your Master's of Divinity. I am so proud of you. I can't wait to see what the future holds for us.

Flowers!

So last year, my flower garden only made it through part of the summer. Today I replanted it and am trying again. Here's what it started as:


An here's what I ended with:

I still need to work on the last one. I may get another tomato plant and pot it or I'll plant some more flowers... I just ran out of plants today!

My Mom is an awesome gardener and I wish I had taken the time to learn more from her while I lived at home. HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY MOM!

Pants and then some..

My pants have continued to not fit. Which makes me grumpy and irritated and in general a joy to be around. So this past weekend I went pants shopping, which was about as much fun as doing our taxes. One thing I learned: Express is DEAD TO ME. Here's how it happened...

In 2006 I bought some jeans from Express for $40 that made my butt look amazing. I got compliments at the grocery that they were that cute. In 2007 I bought some more jeans from Express for $50 that were one size bigger than I had bought before. Odd, since I didn't actually gain any weight. Must be anti-vanity sizing or their sizes rose with their prices. Anyway, in 2008 I bought Express jeans at a thrift store and was happy. In 2009 I gained some weight that seemed intent on sticking around and went up one pant size. I went to Express to try on $70 jeans that didn't fit. According to their jeans I went up two sizes. And there is no way I am going to pay $105 million for jeans that say I am fat. No way. So Express.... YOU ARE DEAD TO ME. Also - the jumpsuit should die. Please stop selling it. No one looks good in a jumpsuit.

I really think that you should be allowed to count pants shopping as exercise. I did the equivalent of 700 toe touches while trying those pants on.

I stopped by the bathroom while I was at the Mall and I experienced on of the grossest things ever. I even debated sharing it on my blog... but it was just too crazy not to. So stop reading if you don't want to know my gross story. I was in my stall when someone entered the stall next to me. Before I knew it a small piece of poop landed on the floor between us. I stared at it for a while, not believing my eyes. There was a POOP PELLET on the floor. A foot and a half from my shoe. As I stared at the poop pellet I had just one thought, "I hate shopping."

Thankfully the day got better after that as I found cute pants at Old Navy. Which did not cost a million dollars and were correctly sized. Thanks Old Navy. You saved that day.