Life's Little Adventures

Knitting Away

2012-01-29T16:32:00.000-05:00

I've completed a few knitting projects that I thought were especially cute that I wanted to share with you!

The first project was three hats, commissioned by my sister-in-law for her two kids (my niece and nephew) and her sister. She told me what she thought would be cute and shared a few pictures on Pintrest, and this is what I came up with!

There was a zebra, a koala, and a dinosaur. I was able to take a few pictures of the kids modeling their hats during Christmas Cabin.

The other two boys are wearing their Christmas hats from last year. :) Yay!

The next project I cast on was for an adult sized sweater. I'm making Tea Leaves Cardigan using Cascade 220 Quarto yarn, a present from my mom from Christmas. I made my first ever swatch to make sure the sweater was not either too huge nor too small. I've cast on, now, and I'm 29 rows in. I'll keep you posted on my progress.

Last but not least, I knit my nephew Ben a dino hat for his first birthday! This was the third attempt at a hat this winter, and this time, finally, it fit! The problem wasn't Ben's head, but rather that I didn't use a pattern any of those times. The final time I based it on a pattern, but I was still doing some improvisation, but fortunately it fit. Phew! A picture of it on Ben's adorable head is forthcoming.

And, on a related note, I'm thinking about starting a little shop in Etsy to sell knitted children's hats. I enjoy it and it might let me make a little extra money. I'll let you know when I make the plunge!

Looking at 2012

2012-01-16T11:20:00.021-05:00

The first time I remember making a resolution for the new year was when I was in middle school. At that time, The Brink -- our middle and high school youth group -- did an all nighter at the church. It pretty much involved lots of pop, pizza, movies, and silly dares such as running outside in bare feet. Yet in the midst of the craziness, probably before we popped in our traditional girl movie, Little Women, I pulled out a new journal to record my goals and aspirations for the year.

A new year always brings a feeling of quiet anticipation, just like before my pen hits the first page of a new journal. The story of my life will soon be written there, but I don't know what it is yet. If I were really awesome, I would try to coordinate a new journal with each new year, but my rate of filling pages ebbs and flows over the course of the year, and I inevitably finish a journal mid-year, with a new journal to start on an inauspicious day such as March 13 or September 25.

This year I didn't really make an resolutions. Recently I made a 30-before-30 list, so that gives me some goals to work towards over the next few years, but I didn't want to make a resolution just because the clock was ticking. But last week, I was challenged to pick a word that would highlight an idea that I would like to dwell on this year. The word that has emerged from my contemplation has been humility.

Humility, synonymous with lowliness, meekness, submissiveness, an antonym of pride. Yikes, right? In our world, humility is not a valued trait. We'd like athletes to be humble, but as for us, the regular folks, we want to be revered and loved. We're encouraged to endorse ourselves, to highlight our best characteristics, and to be blunt about our best qualities. But as someone who is not of this world (1 Peter 2:11), I'm called to live a life of humility, mirroring Christ's humility.

"In your relationships with one another, have the same attitude of mind Christ Jesus had: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing, by taking the very nature of a servant..." (Philippians 2:5-7)

There are an abundance of verses about humility, and I could copy a bunch of them down, but let's be honest: if Jesus exemplified it, that's what I need to emmulate. Enough said. For me, as this year begins, humility means thinking of others more than myself. It means using my gifts and talents for the glory of God, not for my own gratification. It means serving others, day in and day out. It means making myself nothing that He may be glorified.

When all is said and done in 2012, I want to look back and see how the year was characterized by the indwelling of the attitude of humility in my life. I'm praying that it grows within me, even though that's a terrifying prayer. Growth is worth the discomfort, and I'm anxious to becoming more like Christ each day. Life is fleeting, much too short to remain stagnant. Therefore, let 2012 be filled with growth!

Epic Dodgeball

2011-12-21T16:45:00.005-05:00

Tap, tap. Does this thing still work? Sorry for the major break in posting. I've been too busy having fun to post about it over the past few months, but today's experience was just so epic that it calls for a blog post.

As many of you know, I teach seventh graders. In light of the holiday season, our school collected cans for a local food pantry. I announced it to my fourth period math class, and for the first six days of the can drive, we had six cans. The six I brought in. Then, all of the sudden, we picked up steam! Kids started raiding their parents' pantries for legitimate items, and at the first count, we were in first place! Then things started getting competitive. Due to the (supposed? actual?) peanut butter shortage, jars of peanut butters were worth 5 cans. Other fourth period classes started to catch up and pass our total. At the next count, we were in sixth place.

Now, middle school students are altruistic, but much more generous when they have incentive. And this was the carrot we were dangling: a dodgeball tourney for the top 6 teams. My kids were psyched to be in the top 6 teams, but they knew their position was precarious, so the day before the final count, one girl implored all of the other kids to bring in peanut butter. Another kid offered to stop at Aldy to buy it if they gave him money. (They also had their dander up because a couple of 8th graders came into my room pretending to count cans for student council and stole them from my class! Fortunately they were caught and their cans were returned. Anyways, that made my students pretty mad, once the word got around school.)

So the kids brought in more cans, more jars of peanut butter, and more swiped goods from their cupboards, but on the final day, when an email was sent around school, it revealed that we were in 7th place, one place short of qualifying for the tournament. Oh well, I figured. We wouldn't have gotten too far anyways.

But then, my telephone rang. It was the principal (not principle, how most of my kids like to spell this position), weighing the option of expanding the field to 8 teams, having two rat-tail matches on the morning of the tourney. I knew my kids would be pumped, so I readily agreed.

Pumped they were, once the principal announced that the top 8 teams would qualify. On Monday, we picked a team color to wear (black) and a table of boys dreamed up strategies on their mini-white boards between math problems. I really did not think that my class had any chance of getting out of the rat-tail match, but it was fun to be silly with them. Other classes were taking it to the top with tie-dyed tee-shirts and pow-pows of planning.

Fast-forward to this morning. We were playing the art teacher's class, and can I admit that I was a little relieved to note that a good athlete was on crutches? (Get better soon, kiddo!) The rules were stated, the horn buzzed, and our team took them down! My kids did look pretty intimidating with their eye black on and their black outfits, granted, but I was amazed at their athleticism! Throwing, dodging, catching, all with grace and ease! (Note: I wish they could be so amazing at math.)

So, they made it to the next round, which I wasn't able to watch. We were up against 8th graders (yikes) so I figured that was it. But... following the next round, we had made it past both of our opponents, and we were facing the tie-dye-tee-shirt-making team, in front of the whole school at the end of the day.

The game was on, Team S---- vs. Team B-------.

Following 7th period, I walk into a packed gym, wearing my high school soccer jersey since it was the right color for the tourney. (Thank goodness I bought that 8 years ago! I've used it sooo many times.) The kids were talking strategy and getting themselves all riled up for the game. As the crowd filled in, chants started. My personal favorite was "Let's go Sahli." Clap, clap, clap, clap, clap. "Let's go Sahli." Clap clap clap clap clap. Granted, they were cheering for my class, but I felt like a rock star.

The game began, and for a while, it looked like my team had the right strategy: get out the best players on the other team ASAP. I was cheering like a mad woman. But then the tides turned, and we were down to one player. The other team was hurling balls at her from the 3 point line and she dodged, admirably. Then, lo and behold, she caught one and our best player was back in!

I thought we had a chance, but then she slipped while dodging a ball and it hit her hair. OUT. One kid left, against five formidable opponents. But all of the balls were on his side of the line and he became the aggressor. He made them back up to behind their 3 point line and bam! Bam! Bam! Several throws letter, they were OUT. Our class was the school champs!!!! High fives ensued, but I was immediately torn away: the victors had to face the staff team, which I had agreed to play on, hence why I was wearing my black FHS soccer jersey.

I figured I could be a double agent, or at least I would be an easy out for my kids. At the same time, I didn't want to be the first out, so my strategy was to hide behind the big guys on my team. I was just goofing off, scurrying away from the throws, squealing whenever anything came my way. And then, miraculously, I caught a ball.

Now, most of you know that I am not a star athlete. I didn't earn many points on the soccer field or running track. My first year of being on the varsity soccer team I was the back-up goalie who didn't even play when the goalie was out! I'm fit, but I am not an athlete. (Hence why my parents were shocked that I won an award in high school for being a scholar athlete! "Really? YOU?")

It must have been the combination of fats and sugars from my last day of school parties, the florescent lights, and the previous chants of the crowd, but I was on fire. I caught balls. I dodged them using an amazing spinning move. I blocked them using a dodgeball I just caught. I was UNSTOPPABLE.

Until I launched a ball at one of my students, first ball I threw of the game. My kiddo looked like she caught it (apparently she didn't), and I turned away half-disappointed, half-hoping my kids would win. Then two more balls smacked me and I was out. For a few moments, it looked as if my kids might be able to withstand the attack the staff was mounting, but soon, it was all over. Staff was victorious, and I was high-fiving my kids, telling them great game. They were disappointed, but they knew they had done an outstanding job.

As the principal was giving the pep-talk, my fellow teammates awarded me MVP, an honor I am not accustomed to receiving for my athletic endeavors. And on the way out, I felt like a rock star again. I high-fived at least 100 kids, fist bumped the opponents from Team B------, got smiles and cheers from 6th graders I don't know but hopefully will have next year, and generally felt loved and admired by all.

It was an awesome day. I think I still have an adrenaline high.

Even better? Now we have break.

This IS my first rodeo...

2011-07-21T19:41:00.007-04:00

Some of you may have been aware of my late evening hatched decision to participate (I hesitate to use race) in a triathlon via the facebook, but if you weren't aware, I participated in a triathlon last night. I will start from the beginning, which is actually around September 2009. My friend Ryan convinced me to go to Madison to watch the Ironman Wisconsin. He wanted to check it out and Madison is a good place to eat/visit, so we went. Ryan had in his head that he wanted to do an Ironman, he still may, I don't know. As we stood around the finish area we watched as folks came down the chute with big smiles on their faces, after swimming 2.4 miles, biking 112, and running 26.2. I saw some folks who didn't look like they should have been able to do it, but you know what? They did. They got to hear the announcer say, "Mr. or Mrs. So and so, you are an Ironman" As the announcer kept saying that to those folks after moving themselves 140.6 miles I got some goosebumps. I also realized that to them, that race was the easy part, the training is what was crazy hard. It was nearly 10pm and those people had been moving since 7:00am. It was then and there that a crazy idea hatched inside my head, "I want to finish an Ironman", maybe my heart said that, either way, something inside of me thought it was cool. After leaving Madison I still thought it really cool, and even thought it cool before I went, and I had done some informal training with a guy at work who has done Ironmans. He showed me the swim stroke, gave me some practice cards, and that was about it. I never did even a little triathlon. I didn't swim, but I did start running. I had already been road biking. Enough of that, onto yesterday.

The triathlon started Wednesday at 6:30pm, a small local race ran by Speedy-Feet, a local timing company. I decided to do this race around 9:00pm on Tuesday. A 1/2 mile swim, a 20.7 mile bike, and a 3.6 mile run. I messaged my friend who had done triathlons before and asked if he had tri shorts as I didn't want to swim in my bike shorts. He had them, and goggles. Oh ya, goggles, those would be useful. They will be on the porch he says, I plan on picked them up in the morning. I go to bed knowing that my lunch hour tomorrow will be spent getting my bike ready, figuring out what to wear, and learning where the heck this race even was as I had never even been in the area before.
In the morning I drive to said friends house to grab the shorts and goggles. He was leaving for a run and wished me luck. If he was more awake he probably would have laughed at me, as he thought I was going to drown/pass out. At lunch I get my things together. I come home from work at 5 and practice changing my shorts with a towel rapped around me as I decided to swim in one pair of shorts, bike in bike shorts, and run in running shorts. The tri shorts that were lent to me had a hole in them, and the elastic wasn't working so well. All is well. Hilary got home at 5:25, I load the car, and we leave. (we only have one car) The race is at 6:30 and we are about 45+ minutes away.

I race there in the car, find it, pay my fee, and line up. People had already left but this was a casual race with no mass start. I put on the chip for timing on my ankle and hope it doesn't fall off. I ask about the swim course and start, no worries, no butterflies or anything. I had no time to worry.

I swim, trying to practice my triathlon swim, minimal legs, jet into the water near your ear, and hold the long stroke. Someone passes me. I keep swimming, looking up to make sure I am going the correct way. I turn the buoy and head back. I pass someone, nice. I swim keeping the guy in the red swim cap to my right, making sure I can stay with him. Soon I exit the water, big gut and all.

I change into my biking shorts, put on my shoes, eat a fun sized snickers and drink some water. Onto the bike course. I think, "I sure hope it is marked well, I don't have a clue where I am going". My legs are tired, but turning. I focus on keeping my elbows bent and my head up. I pass a few people before I get out on the road. I refuse to look at the mileage on my bike computer, just the time. At the 5 mile marker painted on the road I am going slower than I thought I could go, but by mile 10 I've passes another 5-6 people and I'm feeling good, legs loose, high cadence. I pass more people. At mile 15 I'm going downhill and loving it, booyah racing! I shift as I'm feeling great and high tail it back to the transition area, passing another 5-6 folks, nice bikes included. Both of my bottles are empty.

I wanted to slow down because I knew I still had to run, but felt great and going fast is fun. The run is only 3.6 miles, I can suffer through it. I was a bit worried as it was super hot out.

I exit the transition area and start running, grabbing water to pour on myself and one to drink. Thank you Speedy Feet for having cold water in cups. I run for 6 minutes and pass the two mile marker, realizing that I have to do two laps. I drink water at about 1.5 miles at the other water cooler and keep running, passing people. I start lap two and realized I might finish in under 2 hours like I thought I could. I pass one other guy who is walking. I tell him he can do it and he runs with me for a bit. At mile 3 I hear footsteps behind me. "not know I think, all this way not getting passed and it is about to happen". I make the turn into the finish and realize the person on my tail had another lap to do, "Nice" I think to myself. I finish, soaking wet, not totally tired, thirsty for something other than water. Hilary comes over and congratulates me, "way to go Dan". Yeah, way to go Dan.

And for those of you that just wanted this information...

Swim...18:20
T1...3:22
Bike...1:06:20
T2...1:41
Run...29:00

Total...1:58:45
Finished 38th

And for those of you that don't get the title...fun people say, "This ain't my first rodeo" instead of "I know, I've done this before"

Marathon Thoughts

2011-06-16T14:24:00.007-04:00

90% of me wants to run a marathon.

10% of me wants to sleep in on Saturday and Sunday mornings, relax on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, to forget the stretching and the warms ups, the strength training and the cool downs.

I ran a half marathon as part of a relay team with my brother, way back in 2004, as a sophomore in college. I was young enough and confident enough to just do it. I didn't really train for it. I had run 10 miles around a lake on summer vacation and 10.5 miles on Thanksgiving morning without any training. So I figured, what's another 3? My training runs were on trails, up hills, no miles, just time. I went on one long run, 7.5 miles, on country roads around my college. Was I worried about not training? Uh, nope! In fact, my dad, some of his running buddies, and my brother's girlfriend were all running the full. It felt like Andrew and I were just wimping out with the half marathon.

So I did it. I came home on October Break, packed a bag, and hopped in the family van for a trip to Columbus. I picked up my goodie bag with my way too huge tee shirt, ate carbs, and tried to get a good night of sleep. I got up, ate what Shelley ate, jogged to the starting line, and tried to stick with her 8 minute mile pace. And I did, for about the first 5 miles. After that, I lost her and just kept running along. Racing normally makes me nervous, but I didn't have any expectations for myself. I was just doing it to do it!

I'm not exactly sure what my time was. If I remember correctly, there was some disparity between what my watch said and what the split was recorded as. I think the posted time was 1:52. I attributed that to the fact that I had to untie the chip from my shoe with stiff, cold fingers in order to transfer it to Andrew's shoe. Then I kept jogging until I found my mom. When I found her, the first words out of my mouth were "Thank God I'm done." If you know me, you know I don't take the Lord's name in vain, but it just popped out. Truly, I was thankful that this run was done, but I was so embarrassed that I said that! I was exhausted, freezing in my shorts and long-sleeved shirt, and I wanted nothing but to sit in a blanket and sip hot chocolate. I think I was even crying a little bit. My mom congratulated me and gave me my warm clothes and probably even got my hot chocolate as I hobbled around on stiff legs. We watched the rest of the racers come in, my dad and Shelley both qualifying for Boston.

If only I had known that running 13.1 miles was really an accomplishment. With other people in my life who had run so many complete marathons, I felt like my half was hardly noticed. (Typical middle child for you, huh?) And, without really training hard for it, I guess I felt like it didn't deserve to be noticed.

And, if only I had known that my overall pace of 8:30 minutes/mile was really quite decent. I look back at my 19 year old self who ran 8:30 minute miles without thinking much of it and wish that I could get some of that speed back. In my memory, it was effortless, although I'm sure something about running up and down the Houghton hills had just a bit to do with it. Now, a few years wiser, I realize that 13.1 miles is crazy for some people even to contemplate. It can be a huge accomplishment. My husband recently ran a half, as did two sisters-in-law (one on each side), and I think of how proud I was of them!

So I'm talking myself into running a marathon. No, I don't think it will be a fast marathon. I'd need to do a lot of speed work for that. No, I don't think it will compare to my dad if he does the same marathon, or my sister-in-law who is gearing back up into marathon shape after the birth of their first baby. No, it wouldn't compare to Dan, who is also considering running the same marathon. But it would be my first marathon. It'd be my declaration that I can achieve my goals, that I can be that woman who follows through with a training plan, that I can run 26.2 miles.

I'm just about there. The visit to this website to sign the next 4 months of my life away.

But I really just want to know: what does the tee shirt look like?

Dan's Best Ever Kale

2011-06-14T20:07:00.003-04:00

Just in case you get some kale in your own summer vegetable adventures, this is how Dan prepared it.*

Saute some chopped sweet onion and red peppers in a tablespoon or two of olive oil. Add a partial package of frozen green beans. Stir them around. Dump in a few (too many) red pepper flakes. Search the cupboard for some chicken stock and add a cup or so. Throw in a few raw almonds for crunch. Let the concoction simmer for a few minutes. Meanwhile, wash and stem your kale and toss it into the pot. Saute until the kale cooks down, about 5 minutes. Enjoy!

*Confession: I tried to micromanage him through his recipe after I asked him to make it. It's a bad habit of mine -- asking Dan to do something and then jumping in to take over. These were various sentences that a fly on the wall might have heard: Aren't you going to use a whole package of green beans? Why did you add whole almonds? There are slivered almonds in the freezer! Don't you think you should wash the kale? The salad spinner is in the fridge. How are you washing it?

I need to show Dan that I trust him in the kitchen, and with a few more experiences like these, I'll zip my lips in anticipation of the tasty results.

CSA: Week 2

2011-06-13T16:20:00.005-04:00

Week 2 for the CSA rolled around, and I have to admit, I was dreading it a little bit. The problem was that we still hadn't eaten some of our CSA veggies and yet other store-bought veggies were hanging out in our refrigerator too. It was one of those goofy weeks when we ended up not eating as many meals as I had planned -- out to dinner, leftovers, and a meal not on our original menu. Added to that, this week the entire box was ours because of M & M's generosity, although we still shared some of the bounty. So there were no tears because the box wasn't overflowing. In fact, I was a little relieved.

Our haul on Wednesday included:
1 bag of "chard"
1 small bag of broccoli
1 bag of kale
1 bag of garlic scapes
1 bunch of green onions
1 qt. and 1 pt. of fresh strawberries

The strawberries were beautiful, ripe the entire way through, perfectly red and juicy. As I had spent an hour in the blazing heat on Monday with Bethany picking about 10 pounds of strawberries (and had spent the previous evening making them in to jam and strawberry cotulis), I knew that I couldn't hoard these berries. We made a date to share them with Mike, Mary and their boys over some strawberry shortcake with freshly whipped cream. Can we say delicious?

As for the garlic scapes, I decided to make them into another pesto, similar to what I did with the garlic greens. I've decided I like basil pesto more, but since I needed to use these, it worked! It's a pretty strong flavor, but it jazzed up our pasta.

The green onions went into our Pasta and Italian Sausage Veggie Extravaganza. That was solution to the way-too-many vegetables conundrum, and oh my goodness -- it was fantastic! Pasta from the cupboard, asparagus languishing in the fridge, red peppers purchased for a dish we couldn't make (see next paragraph!), green onions, leftover garlic greens pesto, and some bulk italian sausage, all topped with some Parmesan cheese made a fantastic dinner. (We ate the broccoli as we prepped for this meal, after a short 13 mile bike ride.)

And the chard, a whole bag of which we still had from the previous week? Well, last week it was called chard, but it looked a lot more like lettuce and much less like the pictures of chard that were posted online. And in this week's newsletter? It was dubbed lettuce. We were much more willing to eat that, and most of it was consumed in our chicken salads on Saturday evening.

The kale is wilting in our fridge for a few more minutes, but I'm going to give it a whirl in a variation of this recipe. Dan searched for "best kale recipe ever" when he learned that we had gotten this in our share, and I think that mixing the kale with beans (but skipping the mushrooms, of course) will make it a bit more palatable for the two of us.

The last thing in our share was a bunch of flowers. Dan was probably right when he called them weeds, but they have been brightening up our apartment all week.

Hope your adventures in summer eating are as delicious as ours have been!

CSA: Week 1

2011-06-04T15:26:00.003-04:00

School is out for the summer! And now that I have some time to myself again, I'll report on life here in Dayton.

Dan and I, along with our friends Mike and Mary, joined a CSA this summer. A CSA, for those of you who don't know, stands for Community Supported Agriculture. We sent a farm a check before the growing season began, and they use those funds to operate their farm. Then, every week from May to September, we get a crate of fruits and veggies, which we split between the two of us. It's a great way to support local farmers without the hassle of winding my way through the Second Street Market every week. It also forces us to get creative with veggies that I wouldn't usually buy.

So this Wednesday, I stopped by the pick-up location and met George, a guy with dreads who I assume to be the farmer. He handed me a crate filled with this stuff, which we split, as best as possible with M&M:

A bunch of garlic greens
Green onions
Swiss chard
Chinese cabbage (all ours)
Boston Lettuce (all theirs)
Strawberries (mostly theirs)
Granola (all ours)
1 dozen eggs

He assured me that the crate will fill up with additional veggies as the season goes on, but after all the rain we've been having, they are still light on produce. That's why we got the homemade organic granola and the farm-fresh eggs.

So, how am I doing on using things this week? Well, so far I really haven't (oops!). Dan ate the granola for breakfast, so that's gone. I used one green onion in my quesadilla yesterday. But here are my plans for the rest of it.

Sunday: Eggs & Bacon for breakfast. (I love farm fresh eggs. They are infinitely better than store bought.)
Garlic greens pesto (They had some on the table when I picked up the crate, and their newsletter provided the recipe. It was delicious and a very vibrant green.)
Monday: Stir fry with the Chinese Cabbage and Green Onions
Tuesday: Something with the chard! Maybe this, although sometimes the texture of sauteed spinach grosses me out and it's kind of the same sort of things. And by that time, our chard is 1 week old. But we've to eat it. I'll let you know how we use it up.

What the heck?

2011-05-23T18:29:00.002-04:00

I wanted to take a brief moment and let everyone know that all of this rain stinks.
Mountain biking this Spring has been very difficult. A series of Wednesday night races have been postponed, rescheduled, pushed back, and officially cancelled for the Spring. No racing.

The two main areas around here are closed whenever the trails are too messy for riding, which is both good and bad, but they also have been closed. No mountain biking.

The 270 miles of paved off-street bikeways are located along the river corridors, so guess where they have been? That is correct, hiding their faces covered up by water. When the water levels do go back down the wonderful paved off-street bikeways are then covered with layers of mud. They dry up and eventually get cleaned off, but still...no bikeway biking.

Road riding you ask? You bet, but that too has been challenging this year. It has been raining a lot, and I am sick of it. The next few hours will sure to be wet. Check it out.

Lord, you said you wouldn't flood the whole earth again, which I am thankful, but could you save some of this rain for July, August when we need it and it is 1000 degrees outside? Thanks.

3 things plus

2011-03-21T20:48:00.013-04:00

I was just sitting around the other day and was thinking about all sorts of things. Three things really. One of the things I was thinking about was pride. I think the thoughts started in small group, but it stuck in my head nonetheless. Pride: How we all struggle with it and how all sorts of folks are prideful, myself included. I thought about how facebook is basically one big pride statement, sure they call it status, but we basically type what we want others to think of us. And this is the weird disconnect part...I also decided the other day that people like great stories, we like to hear what other people are doing (facebook), what they are listening to, taking picture of, and how they are feeling. All of these things can happen on facebook, which is probably why it is such a great success. And this leads me to the third thing that I was thinking about, I like to read some blogs. I like to read what other people are doing to keep them inspired, what great adventures friends are taking, and how they are coming along. This led me to think that some folks also just like to read about the general day to day, which gave me the idea that I should document my work day via photographs. I enjoy knowing what other folks are doing from day to day, so hopefully someone enjoys seeing what I do from day to day. So...the following is a general day in the life of day, hopefully with no prideful "I wonder what people think of me" thrown in. I will even through in some thoughts that go through my head.

Part of my breakfast. I generally eat fruit, homemade granola, and hot tea. Juice if we have it as well. Sometimes I get crazy and eat some frozen waffles.
Then Fido gets to go for a walk. He hates the camera and tries to hide when it comes out, but he does love treats, so I held one above the camera with my free hand. He likes his walks in the morning. I try to get in 40 minutes, but sometimes it is only 10.

And then I suit up and get ready to go to work. Work is .8 miles from our front door, so sometimes I bike and sometimes I walk. I generally bike though so I can come home for lunch and have more relaxing time.
And this is the outside of our office building. The big graphic makes it really easy to give directions, "Yep, just turn left and our building is on the left with the big outdoor graphic on the front" It is rather nice, but these are also the only windows in our first floor cave office building.

My desk/cubicle. I have no neighbor right next to me, but I do have some folks over the walls. I spend a fair amount of time in here, but I can always go outside and work, even if it is on office stuff. My chair is my favorite color, but it doesn't stay up at the correct height. It leaks air or something and sinks down by the end of the day. The office safety team says my chair should be at the correct height for proper office ergonomics, but my chair sinks throughout the day. Maybe I should shed some extra pounds. It is annoying.

And this is the inside of the Second Street Market. I had to go here as part of work to promote cycling and man the MetroParks booth. It was a welcomed change. I enjoy getting out in our parks and meeting new folks.

This is the booth I was working. I was there to promote cycling in general but specifically our new bike hub downtown. It offers secure bike storage, shower facilities, lockers, and close access to downtown businesses for the bike commuter. (Did I sell you on it?) It is a nice facility, come check it out sometime. I was glad to work the booth, but I was hungry as I sat here over lunch. I forgot my lunch at home and I had no money to purchase something, so I waited and went home afterwards.

And this is where I got sick of taking pictures. My afternoon was filled with me finishing up a presentation and setting up for that presentation. My day is filled with all sorts of random things, but most days I do go home for lunch. I let the dog out and watch trash TV or the news. I then bike back to work and finish out my day.

I know this is weird again, but I just posted about my day and talked about being prideful in the same post, talk about irony. I do hope you enjoyed seeing what one (half) of my day looked like.

Now I must go research more about Subaru's and their tire oddities, but maybe more about that story will come tomorrow.

Sunday Morning Pancakes

2011-02-06T09:09:00.000-05:00

As a kid, one of my favorite nights was when my mom would let us have reading suppers. This would involve everyone bringing the book they were currently reading down to the dinner table and reading through dinner. Even my parents would join in, and secretly, they were probably glad to have a dinner time with no fights.

The only way dinner got any better was when we would have breakfast for supper. There's nothing like pancakes, bacon and/or sausage, eggs, pure maple syrup, and a big glass of cold milk enjoyed at dinner time. Apparently, Dan didn't like breakfast for dinner as a kid. He thought it was cheating, but he's changed his mind after we got married. PHEW. There's almost always what we need for breakfast-for-dinner in our cupboards, fridge, and freezer, so it's a good thing he doesn't mind when we indulge in this delectable meal for dinner.

Although this time we didn't enjoy these pancakes at dinner, I love this recipe for its healthy spin. They are hearty and wholesome without tasting too healthy, and sprinkled with a few blueberries (picked this past summer and frozen in bags) they are a great start to the day. Hope you enjoy them!

Whole Grain Pancakes*

3/4 cup whole wheat flour

1/2 cup oats

1/4 cup wheat germ OR 2 tablespoons flaxseed meal & 2 tablespoons oat bran

2 tablespoons sugar

1 tablespoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 1/3 cups milk

1 egg

2 tablespoons oil

Combine dry ingredients together. Mix wet ingredients and add to dry. Let set for a few minutes as the griddle heats. Sprinkle with blueberries when cooking pancakes on the griddle. Enjoy!

*Perhaps this recipe is courtesy of Aunt Amy? The baked oatmeal wasn't (oops!), but I think this one is. Tell me if I'm wrong.

Knitting Project

2011-02-05T14:40:00.000-05:00

I've come to realize that knitting is not exactly a cheap way to make gifts for others. The most cost-effective gifts are the small ones, like the hats I made for my family at Christmas. Nice yarn costs a good bit of money, but instead of seeing that as a downside to my hobby, I've embraced the fact that quality yarn creates a lasting gift.

As my friends have started to have babies, I've vowed to make at least one hand-knit thing for each of them. That is, each of their first babies. I can't vouch for my ability to knit gifts for an unknown number of kiddos, but I think I can swing at least one hand-knit gift per friend. I had no idea how many gorgeous baby items I can (theoretically) make. I'm loving the challenges I find in new patterns. Knitting for babies is so quick, too, and I don't need as much yarn, which is why I was able to splurge on yarn with gorgeous colors for Natalie's baby.

Natalie and Brandon didn't know what gender baby they were having until he arrived (hi baby Wesley!), so I didn't choose my pattern until he made it safely into the world. My friend Kate (whose daughter was the recipient of my first ever baby blanket) advised me to make something for a year or so into life, when the abundance of baby shower clothes had diminished, so I decided upon the Chunky Monkey by the brown stitch. I purchased the yarn after driving all about the Miami Valley on one of my recent snow days, and after finally landing at The Yarn and the Needle, I found a navy tweed (Cascade 120) and a buttery yellow, perfect for a boy but equally as perfect for any future kids they may have.

So without further ado, the final results!

And another shot:

I hope baby Wesley loves his vest when he can wear it, in about a year.

P.S. This present is not to its recipients yet. I'm hoping that Natalie will be too busy with the baby to read this post. And if not... Natalie, this is your gift!

A Weekend Visit

2011-01-21T07:53:00.000-05:00

One of the best parts of living in Ohio is that we live relatively close to our families. We live close enough that they were able to help us pack up our moving truck (and oh shucks, I had to go to a bridal shower while that was going on) and Dan's parents were gracious enough to drive out to help us unload all of our possessions. My dad and mom have visited once, and then my mom and sister came out for cookie weekend in early December. Last weekend we were graced with a visit from the Aiken family, who win the award for our closest relatives, at 3 hours away.

A few years ago, right after we were married, we lived in rural Western New York. The Aikens came and visited us there, too, and while I was organizing pictures for this blog, I stumbled upon a few pictures from that visit. The big activity from that trip was a visit to Houghton College's climbing wall. My, how they have grown since these pictures were taken!

Living in Dayton has afforded plenty of activities for us all to enjoy, and we took the Aikens ice skating on the outdoor rink in Riverscape MetroPark and to the US Air Force Museum. The boys loved the big airplanes at the Museum, and we all enjoyed ice skating. The boys were fairly new to ice skating, so there was, alternately, a lot of hand holding and falling, but we made it through without any tears and celebrated with lots of hot chocolate at home.

Thanks, Aikens, for coming to visit us! We loved having you!

Baked Oatmeal

2011-01-12T09:45:00.000-05:00

I like warm food. It's so much more comforting to have a bowl of warm soup than a cold sandwich. Or melted cheese on crackers, instead of just cheese with crackers. A tuna melt instead of a tuna and cheese sandwich. Toast instead of cereal, and so on and so forth.*

But in the morning, in the rush to get out of the door for school, I don't have time to make eggs + toast unless I plan it out ahead of time (which would mean exchanging hair-time for cooking-time). In general, I stick to quickly made foods. Unfortunately, that means I sacrifice my warm food for a bowl of cold cereal quite frequently. Unless, of course, I make baked oatmeal in the evening and then heat it up in the microwave as I'm tossing my lunch in my lunch box.

I read somewhere that the longer oatmeal takes to cook, the better it is for you. Hence, steel cut oats are the best for you. If you haven't ever seen them, they look like little pellets of oatmeal, but they take forever to cook -- an hour, according to the outside of the can. Then there are rolled oats (old fashioned) and instant oats, whose cooking time decreases in that order. I don't mind the kind of instant oatmeal that you buy in packets and put in the microwave, but I so often get little crunches of yucky sugar/salt/flavoring that grosses me out. In any case, there is quite a lot of sugar and salt in those little packets!

So in the interest of my warm breakfasts and healthy start to the day, here's my very favorite oatmeal recipe. A note: If you like your oatmeal the consistency of snot, this isn't for you -- it's a very solid oatmeal. But that's what Dan and I like about it. It also keeps me full until lunch. Thank goodness!

Baked Oatmeal, recipe courtesy of Aunt Amy

Bake for 40 minutes at 400 degrees; Serves 6

2 1/2 cups regular rolled oats

1/4 cup oat bran

1/4 cup flaxseed meal

1/4 cup steel cut oats

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

2 cups milk

1 egg, beaten

1/3 cup applesauce

1/4 cup veggie oil

1/4 cup white sugar

1/4 cup brown sugar

2 cups fruit (1 15.5 oz can of peaches, drained and cut into small pieces; blueberries; some combination of the two, or anything else your heart desires)

In a large mixing bowl, stir together rolled oats, oat bran, flaxseed meal, steel-cut oats, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. In a medium bowl, stir together milk, egg, applesauce, oil and sugars. Add to oat mixture and stir. Turn into a lightly greased 2 qt. casserole dish. Bake, covered, 20 minutes. Stir in fruit. Bake 20 minutes more, uncovered, or until lightly browned. Spoon into bowls. Top with yogurt, milk or cream, or eat it as is.

*This does not apply, of course, to my all time favorite food: ice cream.

Hat Family Christmas!

2011-01-11T06:49:00.000-05:00

Sometime this fall, I got the bright idea to knit each of my family members a hat for Christmas. Not only would this include my family, but Dan's entire family: his siblings, their spouses, their kids, and his 'rents. You see, I was unemployed at the time, and the idea of knitting 19 hats sounded like fun. I visited ravelry.com to find my pattern inspiration and began with the stash of yarn I've accumulated since I started knitting. Now, I don't have a stash like some people, but I had enough to make about 5 hats without breaking a sweat. For the rest, I ordered yarn from Knit Picks and began knitting until my fingers were sore.

Here's Dan's family, modeling their hats for us!

I started with this owl pattern for the 3 little boys, each knit in their own color.

Then for K, I made a headband based on this pattern and embellished it with a few leather flowers.

For Miss E, I made a flapper-inspired hat embellished with a purple flower, but alas, I need to a.) block it and b.) knit earflaps so that her cute little ears stay warm! This was my only project that seriously needed to be fixed so it was useful. (And that's my project for my snow day -- today.)

For all of the adult males, I used Jared Flood's Turn A Square pattern, which I was 100% satisfied with. I loved the decreases and once I decreased my needle size by one, it was the perfect hat for guys. They each got their own colors -- for Tyler, a Brown's inspired palate; for Mike, cool colors; and for my father-in-law, a little bit of everything.

The women got individual chosen hats, based on their preferences! For my mother-in-law, I used a pattern that was similar to a scarf I had knit her last year and used the same color yarn. For Kristy, a simple hat knit in a bulky yarn which ended up being one of my overall favorites. And for Colleen, who was super supportive and excited about the entire project, I made a black beret embellished with tea roses in shades of cream.

For my side of the family, I knit all of the women the same pattern: a cute, loose hat embellished with a button. They had all liked my own hat in this pattern, so I thought that I'd stick to simple and do the same for all 3! For my brother, I knit the same hat as for all the guys in Dan's family. I also knit his soon-to-be-born son a simple, rolled-brim baby hat in a beautiful gray-blue alpaca. Matching hats for the boys! And for my Dad? Well, he rarely wears hats, but I think he was a little disappointed that he didn't get one. So maybe I'll knit him one for his upcoming birthday. It didn't occur to me to take a picture of the in their hats, so perhaps when we visit after Baby Ben is born, I'll get a few pictures.

Last but not least, I just had to knit a hat for Dan. His was the last completed, but at the same time, was the most important that I finish. He opened it on Christmas Eve and loved it. (I'm showing off the huge candy bar that was my Christmas Eve gift.)

So what's next? First, fixing E's hat and mailing it off to Pennsylvania so she can actually use it. Then something for my friend Natalie who just gave birth to a baby boy yesterday, a hat for my friend Ashley, and something for myself. A scarf? My own hat? Learning how to crochet adorable flowers?

Only time will tell. :)

Pondering...

2010-12-21T10:18:00.001-05:00

I'm thinking about running a marathon.

There. I said it.

In fact, I've moved past thinking about a marathon, and I've started planning to run a marathon. I'm debating between the Pittsburgh Marathon and the Flying Pig Marathon. There's a difference of 2 weeks between them, and one happens to be located significantly closer to our home. However, Pittsburgh has family nearby, and I'm pretty sure they'd come to cheer me (or possibly us) on. (Dan is thinking about training for one too. He just hasn't informed me if he's doing it or not.)

Why a marathon? Why now?

Part of it is so I can join the other family members who have run marathons -- my Dad, brother, sister-in-law, and multiple relatives.

Part of it is because I want to know that I can run a marathon. The Biggest Loser finalists can run marathons -- I'd better be able to as well!

Part of it is because the timing is right.

Part of it is because we have amazing bike ways that I can run along, located not a quarter mile from our apartment, with drinking fountains at convenient intervals throughout.

Part of it is just that I want the challenge.

And the last part of it is because I've been eating way too many of these:

And these:

And I've made toffee and hot fudge sauce and caramels since. Uh oh. Training, here I come.

P.S. The bottom spritz cookie is a camel. How cool is that?

Thanksgivingness

2010-11-29T21:25:00.000-05:00

Mondays after long weekends stink. Since this isn't PA you do not get off of work. In PA the Monday after Thanksgiving is the first day of buck season, so in PA, you get off. The students are even off. This is because most people in PA over the age of 13 will be hunting, and even if they weren't, I'm pretty sure every single bus driver in PA is also a hunter. Anyway...

We do not live in PA, so I had to go to work today and it wasn't any fun. Tomorrow will be better though, the first day back is just rough.

This past weekend we traveled north to visit family and friends. Due to traffic it took us 5.5 hours instead of 3. There was a lot, a lot of traffic, but we made the best of it by listening to Christmas music, talking about previous Thanksgivings, and stopping for fuel and hot drinks. I borrowed a neat little video camera from work to recored the events of the 5k, but the 5k was postponed a year due to pouring down rain and 35 degree temperatures. I did manage to capture the inside festivities though...so here you go.

I hope you liked it, more to come in the future.

Thanksgiving -- Hip Hip, Hooray!

2010-11-24T12:03:00.000-05:00

Today we are off to Dan's sister's house so we don't have a crazy hectic morning tomorrow, what with the 5K and all. I volunteered (or was asked?) to bring pies and rolls, so I've been preparing since Monday.

I made two different kinds of rolls on Monday. First I made potato rolls, melt-in-your-mouth delicious and a reminder of the Fredonia establishment The Upper Crust. Later in the day I made oatmeal rolls, complete with some white whole wheat flour (love that King Arthur brand!).

Yesterday I made pie crusts and put them in the fridge, and this morning I finished up the pies. Chocolate pecan pie and apple with a crumb top. My motto is that cooking/baking ALWAYS takes longer than you think it will. And I was right. The kitchen looked like a war zone even with that step out of the way, and I spent all morning making the fillings for 2 pies.

Now they are cooling on the counter (and the kitchen is cleaned up), so I have some time to reflect on the past few Thanksgivings.

In 2007, our first "married" Thanksgiving, we went to Pittsburgh for Thanksgiving #1 and then to Fredonia for leftover Thanksgiving #2.

In 2008, the first year we were in Wisconsin, my parents and my sister made the long drive out to Williams Bay, and we celebrated with my Aunt Faith and cousin Frankie, too. That was the first Thanksgiving I was somewhat in charge of, although my parents brought a turkey, stuffing made and frozen, and some other Thanksgiving essentials (including recipes, which I now have safely tucked away). I made cornbread stuffing (I think?), Dan made mashed potatoes, and I also made the most amazing crescent rolls, if I do say so myself. It was also the first year we tried Chocolate Pecan Pie, and I fell in love.

In 2009, we did a pre-Thanksgiving celebration at Halloween with Dan's family because my student-teaching break far too short to drive all the way to PA. It was fun to have Thanksgiving with everyone and then go trick-or-treating. I loved it.

Then, for the REAL Thanksgiving, Andrew & Shelley drove out to WI to celebrate with us! They got totally lost in Ohio, but made it out to Williams Bay. It was my first Thankgiving without any parents, so I was (overly) prepared. I made a list of the menu, complete with what dishes the finished food would go in. As I was student teaching, I had to go to school on the day before Thanksgiving, and Shelley and Dan did most of the prep work for the big meal. It was like having a sous-chef.

On the day of Thanksgiving, we were joined by our friends Ryan & Virginia (and her amazing sweet potato casserole) and Jay. It was awesome -- I absolutely loved everything about this Thanksgiving, and apparently had so much fun that I didn't take a single picture. Of course we missed the family members who weren't there, but it was great to have friends and family to share the day with.

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. You spend lots of time making delicious foods, which are laced with memories of years gone-by. You get to sit around eating and talking and laughing with family and/or friends. And then you can relax for a few hours, only to get out the leftovers to enjoy them again. So excited for the memories that this Thanksgiving will create.

Giving Thanks #16

2010-11-23T15:41:00.000-05:00

My friends from college are as dear to me now as the day that we graduated. (An appropriate picture to insert would be one from graduation, but I am unable to find any. ANY. We took like a billion pictures, jumping in our gowns, and yet I have not a single one. Digital pictures are great, but I need to start printing them and filing them in an organized manner. So as a substitute, here is some of my wonderful friends at Kate's wedding. But I digress from the real topic at hand.) Our lives have taken unexpected twists and turns, and we've grown more unique in the years since our time at Houghton, but I still rely on their words of wisdom, their encouragement, and their own stories of growth and change.

These words are from the journal I kept freshman year, when college was still new and terrifying and exciting and overwhelming. I think I can be forgiven for the bit of drama infused in this entry.

My memories of summer fun, of laughter, of joking around and of camaraderie are haunting reminders that everything is different now. And I'm scared I'll never have that again, that friendships like those were for one brief moment in my life. It is so foolish, but I am afraid I will never have friends again. Who is Kate, then, and Adrienne? Sure, they are my friends. But are they the same friends as I had in high school? Am I expecting them to be the same friends? No, but I think I am longing for the closeness and ease of jest and the fun we shared.

Friendships are not made in a day, or a week, or a month or even two months. But I wish they were.

Even then, the makings of amazing friendships were underway, with more to be formed in the months following this entry. I could write an entry on each of these women and how they have impacted my life, but suffice it to say I am abundantly grateful to God for them.

Giving Thanks #15

2010-11-22T21:30:00.000-05:00

I'm not burned out of being thankful, but I am tired of making a daily post giving the details on what I am thankful for. That's why I skipped yesterday.

Today on Facebook I declared that I was thankful for a healthy body and to celebrate, I was going to run! And run I did, my hair blowing in the warm breeze, dog pulling me onward.

On the topic of running, I am super excited for Thanksgiving. Dan has organized a Family 5K. Here's the reminder email he sent out today:

Dear Registered Racer,

Race day is only a few days away, so are you ready? Have you been running? Walking?

I wanted to take a moment and cover all the basics so that you can arrive ready to go. If you have been looking at the weather you maybe thinking, "maybe I'll just stay inside and not go to that race", but before you make any crazy rash decisions, think of this...you probably won't remember the day you staying inside on Thanksgiving morning, but you will probably remember the day you got up to move yourself 3.1 miles with friends and family. The race director and his staff have also gathered supplies for the race and made beautiful finisher medals last night, so please come.

Cold water will not be provided anymore, so please bring a water bottle for yourself. Hot chocolate will be at the finish line instead of cold water.

WHEN: Thanksgiving Day, Thursday, November 25, 2010. The race starts at 8:30am. Don't worry about showing up too early but we will start promptly at 8:30. The racers meeting will be about a minute long and it will start at 8:29. The race goes at 8:30!!!!!
PARKING: Parking is available at the Cuyahoga Valley Towpath Trail, Brecksville Station parking lot.
Directions: For most of us....go North on Route 8, turn left onto Route 82. Go 3.8 miles and turn left onto Riverview Road. In .2 miles turn left onto Valley Parkway. Parking lot is straight ahead.
COURSES: The 2010 5k course is an easy, flat out and back route.
Follow the link below in order to see the route. http://www.mapmyride.com/route/us/oh/brecksville/783129047809255458
AWARDS: Finisher medals will be awarded to all finishers.
RACE RESULTS: Race results and photos will be posted online at danandhilary.blogspot.com following the race.
If you have any questions email me or call me.
Looking forward to seeing everyone!
Dan

Thursday, here we come!

Giving Thanks #14

2010-11-20T21:46:00.000-05:00

Dan is a pretty cool guy. I think he already got his own "thankful" post, but what is to stop me from giving thanks another time for him? (I'm such a rebel.)

Interesting facts about Dan:

1.) He likes pottery. He purchased a birthday mug today -- thanks Grandma B! This is good for me, as he has too many mugs to use on a daily basis, so I get to use parts of his collection for my morning cup of tea.

2.) He is more artsy and creative than he would seem on first acquaintance. Again, this works in my favor when he helps me when I bite off creative art projects that are larger than I can chew.

3.) He does fun things like take footage from our adventure today in order to share it with others. (There's a moment of bike lust in the middle of the footage. Can you spot it? I think it is a common trait shared among cyclists.)

MVMBA Chili Ride 11/20/10 from D Bawler on Vimeo.

So that was a taste of mountain biking at John Bryan State Park. If you chose to watch, I do feature in the video, going very slowly. My previous mountain biking trips have resulted in scarring and bruising, so I decided that I needed to focus more on staying upright than going fast. I'm still working on that steering thing...

Giving Thanks #13

2010-11-18T21:51:00.001-05:00

Today, I am thankful that I got a phone call from a school, asking me to be a long-term sub for a 7th grade math class. Woot woot!

Giving Thanks #12

2010-11-17T19:38:00.000-05:00

Dan has a job. It was a long search to find the right one, and I am so glad that he persevered through the waiting period, actively searching for a good fit, not giving up even when he didn't have much hope. We are so glad to be where we are.

Giving Thanks...

2010-11-16T16:58:00.000-05:00

I'm glad my conscience was clear this weekend: my previous post covered me for the weekend. I had no time to blog while at my parents' house! However, even though my posting was absent for the weekend, I had an abundance of joys.

1.) Lots of giggling with my sister. And boy, did we have time to chit chat. Chocolate covered animal crackers take some time to make! (We were so amusing that we distracted my mom from her first batch of chocolate cupcakes. Whoops!)

2.) Jo and I were roommates this weekend, too. Nothing like staying up for a half an hour talking about the doo-dads of childhood that still decorate her shelves.

3.) Seeing my brother and sister-in-law, who are pregnant with their first child. They are going to be excellent parents. Seriously. And Shelley looks so cute!

4.) An amazing shower to welcome Baby Ben into the world. It was also a lot of fun, with family, church family, and friends to share in their joy!

5.) Spending time with my wonderful parents. I had such a great time that I teared up when I left Fredonia. (True story.)

6.) Sunday afternoon: lunch with my aunt + uncle and my favorite mother-daughter-sister activities of reading magazines, pointing out silly ideas/products (Real Simple wins the prize for that one) or things we like.

7.) Visiting with friends from Houghton! They were really Shelley's friends first, but I got to join in on the friendships during my time there at college and in the year following.

8.) Watching Mama Mia with my amiga Ashley. Ashley has overcome so much in the past 3 years (and I don't say that lightly). Her attitude and sense of humor are remarkable.

9.) Walks around Fredonia. I love small towns. Multiple people at church said, "Oh! I saw you walking yesterday!" So great.

10.) MEAT. My parents have a meat emporium in their basement, and until you've tasted Brautigam Bacon (raised by an uncle) you haven't LIVED! :) Not to mentioned the other cuts of fantastic meat that I brought back with me. We're set for a few months now. Not only do they give it to us (so kind) but it's all raised locally (well, local to Fredonia). I'm fairly sure that the farmers, 4-H students, and nearby meat processing plant all provide conditions that are much more humane than the industrialized meat farms, so my conscience doesn't have to suffer either.

I had a wonderful, fantastic weekend, but I was also so happy to come home to my sweet husband Dan. I missed him this weekend, but we were able to celebrate his birthday (the big 2-7!) together when I returned home. Excited to enjoy another piece of blueberry buttercream cake tonight for dessert.

Giving Thanks Ten

2010-11-13T21:04:00.000-05:00

This is Dan. Hil is off at her parents house this weekend. I have no new photos, so I will describe my thanks w/o pictures.

Hil left Thursday morning, so I have been doing meals on my own since then. Tonight I made salad, and it is that which I am thankful. The order of making things if you wish to copy...Dan style.

grab a skillet, start heating it up. Pour 3 full gobble fulls of veggie oil in that skillet. Grab a large potato and wash if it off a bit. Take your sharp knife and cut that guy down into fry size shapes, long style. When the oil starts smoking drop all those little guys in there and let em' cook. In the meantime, get out all your salad fixin's. Chop up the lettuce or whatever green you have. Add a chopped pepper, carrot, and cucumber. Stir those fries a bit, flipping them over to get them browned and evenly cooked. Grab a large happy glass bowl and put all the fixin's in there. Now take those fries you just made and put them on a paper towel so some oil gets soaked up. Grab the chicken breast you had marinading all day in the fridge and cut it up and put it in the hot skillet. Let that cook while you salt, season, and sample the fries. Dump the rest on the salad and cover with your favorite dressing. Once that chicken is cooked put it on the salad and pour yourself a large glass of milk. Sit down and enjoy it, knowing you only have to wash one knife, one bowl, one skillet, one fork, and one cutting board, all because you remembered to cut up all the salad parts before the chicken. Booyah.

Add a BAM of allspice if you want, or whatever seasonings make you smile like a Halloween night trick-or-treater.

THAT was my dinner and it was awesome. You know what Hilary will find funny though? I totally forgot to put cheese on my salad, and I always get grumpy when Hilary doesn't put cheese on salad. Growing up cheese was ALWAYS on salad in the Sahli house, but not so in the Brautigam house. I knew something was missing tonight...I missed the cheese, but I miss Hil too.

Tomorrow will be Macheese w/ meat and something green.

Giving Thanks #8

2010-11-10T17:26:00.000-05:00

This "thankful" post will probably last through the weekend. I'm going to be visiting my hometown in order to help throw a friends-and-family shower for my dear sister-in-law, who is pregnant with their first kiddo. I'm pretty sure I'm going to be busy. Thank goodness that I currently have 5 nieces and nephews I'm thankful for, so that should last me through Sunday.

The oldest is K. She is full of sweetness and loves to give hugs to anyone who is deemed a friend -- and most everyone is. She is intelligent and enthusiastic and most definitely a people person.

Our other niece is E. E can be quiet and shy around strangers, but she is charming and goofy with the people she loves! Dan particularly loves how she can look like an angel but say tomboy-ish things.

Then we have the three holigans, described in age order from left to right. C is a super athlete and he loves school. I mean LOVES. He also is a talented artist (I think he can draw better than I can) and would play outside all day if he could.

V is one of the funniest kids I know. His mom tells me that he is most commonly described as daper. He has personality coming out of his ears! When there aren't other kids around, V will entertain us all day, but if the cousins are together, I'm lucky if I catch his attention to say hi!

C is the littlest of the guys, but does his best to keep up with his various buddies (Pap, V, the uncles, etc). He loves monster trucks and loves to pretend. I think that a cartoon character could be based off of him -- he has the perfect mix of big features and adorable chubbiness.

Giving Thanks #8

2010-11-09T15:57:00.000-05:00

Back in August, when the call came offering Dan a job in Dayton, Ohio, it gave us some pause. We were on the way back from picking up the textbooks at the school where I would be teaching. He had four job interviews lined up over the next two weeks, some in more exotic locations. He had done the interview over a month prior, so he was a bit fuzzy on what the job entailed. And last, since his interview was via Skype, he -- and we -- had never visited Dayton.

But after we weighed our options, we made the decision to move to Dayton. Dan arranged a visit to his job site in order to get some of the formalities out of the way, and we decided to kill two birds with one stone. I'd come along and we'd find an apartment together. We knew it was optimistic to hope that we'd find a place to live in one afternoon, so we decided to spend the night and continue searching the next day.

So we arrived in Dayton and had a whirlwind tour of the city, driving around the hip and trendy Oregon district, driving over the dam, and stopping for ice cream at Graeter's (the highlight of my trip). After our three-hour-tour was over, we drove to a grocery store to change, grabbed a free paper with only a few housing options listed, called one or two places from the car, and then realized we needed to drive around looking for the FOR RENT signs.

Keep in mind that Dan and I were at the end of a long period of limited employment, so we were attempting to be as frugal as possible. To that end, we had hardly any minutes left on our cell phone, but we were wary of bumping up our plan. We also had noticed the air conditioning in our car dying, but it's not exactly a necessity. And we decided to camp outside for free instead of stay in a hotel.

After we drove around Dayton and surrounding suburbs for several hours, making phone calls and being astonished by rent prices, we decided to drive up to the park where we were camping out for the night. There we also made dinner. Yes, so frugal that we brought our own food to cook. We were a bit discouraged, but we knew we had an entire day in front of us in which we would certainly find something, or at least have several decent options.

The next morning, full of optimism, we headed out after eating our cereal in lukewarm milk (yum). Today was the day! We drove down to the city of Dayton. And drove. And drove. And drove. The temperatures soared toward 95, and our car's a.c. would work for 5 minutes at a time and then putter out for 15.

The entire day is now somewhat of heat-soaked blur. I know that we looked at several sub-par apartments on the edge of a great neighborhood, one apartment in a bad neighborhood, and the upper apartment in a good neighborhood on a busy road. Somewhere in the middle we made ourselves pb & j, the makings of which were also brought from home.

After lunch, it was my turn to call the number on the sign, and boy, was Dan lucky! I spent 15 minutes on the phone with an elderly woman. I learned about her pets, her husband, and the things she expected from her tenants. I finally got off the phone with her, after extracting a promise that she'd show us the apartment later in the afternoon.

I'm not sure what Dan and I did between the phone call, but we were sitting on the steps of the apartment at the designated time. We waited. We waited some more. Dan called his mom. We watched cars go up and down the street. I eventually called the number again to see where the landlord was, and her husband assured me that she had left the apartment at least 20 minutes ago. Eventually, a Saab put on its right turning signal and ever so slowly pulled into the driveway. A slight, withered elderly woman ever so slowly got out of the car. (It probably took her 2 or 3 minutes to get out of the car. No joke.) She then pulled out a baggie of keys, which she handed to Dan, saying that she was not good with keys. So we made small talk as Dan attempted to open the front door. After every key was tried and some were retried, she declared that we could go through the back door and while we were at it, look at the downstairs apartment.

As Dan and I had been there for 45 minutes with nothing to do except look at the outside of this house/apartment, we knew someone was occupying the downstairs. We informed the lady of this, and she was shocked!

"Well, I told him he needed to be out of there three weeks ago," she said, as we stepped over filthy plates, clothes strewn all over the floor, and sidestepped between the couch and the door leading up to the second floor.

We admired the older apartment the best that we could, but both Dan and I knew that this probably wasn't going to be the best situation to become entangled in. So as politely as we could, we told her we'd call her if we decided to rent it and made our way out into the hot safe-haven known as our car.

Then, dejected and overheated, we decided to find a hotel, get some dinner, use the Internet, and resume our search in the morning. We cranked up the a.c. in our room, ate enough to go into a food coma, and attempted to search the internet for additional options. Eventually, we made a game plan, which included looking further outside the city and in big apartment buildings.

So the next morning, we set out again, still hoping that something would open up. This time, our game plan (differing from the previous day by having actual places to visit instead of just driving aimlessly around the city) showed a bit more promise. I had been watching the addictive channel HGTV, and especially the show House Hunters, far too much in the weeks and months preceding this move, so the options of the third day were narrated by Susanne Wong, with a script that went something like this.

Do they want the older town home outside the city in the need of some adjustments?

The trendy loft inside the city, but without parking?

Or the basement apartment with unique features in an old school building?

Find out when we return.

And our choice was... #3!

I am so grateful that we found something during our whirlwind trip, and I am even more thrilled that it is working out wonderfully for us. It's a great location for work and a really neat apartment.

Giving Thanks #7

2010-11-08T22:19:00.000-05:00

Thank goodness for sunshine in the morning again! I'm much more cheerful when there is sunlight streaming into our apartment while I'm eating breakfast. I also didn't mind the nice long morning on Sunday -- made the whole day feel very relaxed.

What made Sunday even better was that Dan and I were able to spend some quality time together. We drove to the town of Yellow Springs in order to hike in John Bryan State Park. I love spending time outside on Sunday with Dan.

Dan is all about teaching Lander to jump up on things, although he has to put himself in the same positions to convince Lander to follow.

Fun day in the woods!

Giving Thanks #7

2010-11-07T21:04:00.000-05:00

I am abundantly grateful that we found a church on the second Sunday we were here in Dayton. We were immediately drawn to the welcoming atmosphere. As the pastor said, "We want to be a place with sticky on our hands," and we are evidence of that goo.

The second week we attended, we decided to take the plunge and sign up for a small group. Our life group has just started recently, and while we're not all in the same places in life, almost all of us are new to the church or the area. It was a bonding experience to share our stories and learn that all of us are searching for connection, from one of the new pastors on staff to two military families to other transplants. We've only had three meetings, but since we've started getting together, we've seen friendly faces every Sunday. It's so great to know names to put to those faces and a little bit of their stories. I am thankful for this community.

Giving Thanks #6

2010-11-06T11:43:00.001-04:00

Last night I planned on what to be thankful for today: deep dish pizza.

We've recently joined a small group, and we've been reading John Ortberg's The Life You've Always Wanted, on spiritual disciplines. One of the chapters is on the discipline of celebration, and in that chapter, he encourages us to practice having joy, giving thanks for simple pleasures. So yesterday, when pizza was on the menu, I decided to amp it up to Deep Dish Pizza, which makes regular pizza pale in comparison. It was, as always, delicious -- stringy cheese, crumbled sausage, a crisp and flavorful crust, and we even had a bottle of Henry Weinhard's to share. Then we rented a movie -- The Ghost Writer -- because we had listened to the book during one of our car rides from Wisconsin to PA or NY and really enjoyed it.

I'm happy to say that we practiced the discipline of celebration to the best of our abilities yesterday. I'm thankful for good food, an enjoyable movie, and the company of my husband.

P.S. I'm even more thankful that there are leftovers for lunch today!

Giving Thanks #5

2010-11-05T09:22:00.000-04:00

Dan recently ran a 1/2 marathon. I was so proud of him!

A short list of some of the things I have loved about my husband in the last 24 hours:

1.) He washed the dishes after I made dinner.

2.) He covered me up with another blanket after he got up this morning.

3.) He generally comes home for lunch.

4.) He suggested that we have a big breakfast on Saturday (one of my favorite things!).

5.) He laughs out loud at t.v. shows with me.

6.) He gladly eats all the sweets in our house so I don't have to.

I'm thankful for my sweet husband.

Giving Thanks #4

2010-11-04T13:20:00.000-04:00

Several years ago, I was home from college on Christmas break and, as with every break, I was hanging out in the living room, going through all the issues of Country Living, Better Homes and Gardens, and Martha Stewart (affectionately called Martha Stew-Stew in our house) that had arrived since I'd been gone. I was fascinated with the December issue of Martha Stewart and the knitted items featured. Dan knew that his mom knew how to knit and offered her services. The next time I was in PA, his mom graciously showed me (and showed me and showed me) how to knit and purl. I was smitten.

The number of items I knit fluctuates from year to year and season to season, but it is a hobby I enjoy. I think it stems from my favorite phrase: I can do it myself! There is such satisfaction in creating something usable out of a couple of sticks and a ball of yarn.

Giving Thanks #3

2010-11-03T08:43:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I was issued my Ohio Teaching License! It is a huge relief to know that I am able to teach in our new home state. The certificate is in the mail, arriving in the next few days.

Now I just need a job to go with my skills. I can hope that that will be a thankful post sometime this month.

Giving Thanks #2

2010-11-02T08:08:00.000-04:00

One of our apartment-neighbors has taken the responsibility of beautifying our apartment building with gorgeous planters. They have been breathtaking since we moved here, and I've enjoyed them daily while outside with Lander. I was worried that they would be left to turn brown and die in the cold, but fortunately, she moved them indoors, with two of them in close proximity to our apartment door!

This plant has large, light pink flowers and perfumes the air with its scent. In fact, that's how I knew the plants migrated inside -- I could smell it. The neighbor told me that they are native to Jamaica, so I guess that tells you about our summers if they bloom and grow here!

And this plant has astonishingly large leaves. Dan likes to say that they'd make good group T.P. (Outdoor guy, obviously.)

I'm thankful for this neighbor and how she adds beauty to my life, and I'm thankful that the Creator wasn't satisfied with one or two flowers, but created the stunning variety of plants, some of which I enjoy daily.

Give Thanks #1

2010-11-01T10:22:00.000-04:00

I've been inspired to give thanks for something every day this month. It's really something I should be doing every day, regardless of the month, but somehow it seems especially pertinent during November. So while we work our way up to Thanksgiving, I'll be posting a daily thanks.

Today, day #1, I'm thankful for energetic walks with Lander on crisp fall days.

(So this picture actually just shows Dan + Lander (boy + dog = bff) in our backyard, but I wasn't up for faking a picture of me walking Lander.)

Walking a dog makes me more open for greeting the people I meet while outside. I'm not freaked out that they'll harm me, as I do have a rather uncontrollable dog whirring around me, and I've exchanged more pleasantries with my neighbors about Lander than I would have by myself. It also gets me out of the apartment, which I need. Fresh air and Vitamin D have become part of my morning routine. I might not be so thankful for this come snow (if we get any), but for now, with these beautiful crisp mornings, it's something I enjoy.

Life Lately

2010-10-29T10:09:00.000-04:00

1.) We discovered that a local grocery store carries our ultimate favorite, the splendidly delicious Henry Weinhard's Root Beer (and cream soda!).

2.) Dan ran a Halloween 5K, along with 3,749 other people, or thereabouts. He dressed up as a Chilean Miner. He did an awesome job, especially when you consider that he hasn't run since his half marathon.

This picture isn't focused on Dan because I was really taking a picture of the Star Wars dude behind him. As I took the picture, though, I realized Dan was right in front of me.

3.) You know you've lived in Wisconsin when you think that PacMan is really a hoop of cheese with a wedge cut out of it.

4.) This costume was creepy, but strangely eye-catching.

5.) I liked the bouncing udder in this costume. Added some verisimilitude to the costume. Poor cows. (Once, during college, my friends and I went to a diary and helped do the milking. It was quite the experience!)

3.) We're dog sitting this weekend. I'm pretty sure the other dog is going to be sick and tired of Lander's incessant play. I get a little freaked out -- those teeth! those yips! those jumps on top of each other! -- but I'm doing my best to remain calm until Dan gets home. Then I am off duty.

Sister Sister!

2010-10-12T11:03:00.000-04:00

This post is for one of the bravest people I know, my little sister. Although she probably wouldn't characterize herself as brave (after all, she doesn't like rock climbing or heights!), she certainly goes out of her comfort zone. She's been in more countries than I have and regularly tries things that scare her silly -- like zip lines in Costa Rica. Fresh out of college, Joanna decided to use her gift for teaching and her big heart to volunteer with AmeriCorps, in the heart of inner-city Buffalo. She is working at the King's Center and when not at school, she is reaching out to her neighbors. She lives in Buffalo with a group of Houghton alum, and these individuals gather together for shared meals frequently. Yesterday she bought a slew of chicken to make into White Chicken Chili (yum), and I told her that this might be a cheaper way to feed her friends. So this post is for her.

Cheap Chicken

Start with a fryer chicken, which cost 89 cents a pound for me. If you want the chicken and broth to have a little more flavor, you'll also need an onion, some celery and a carrot.

I peel the skin from the onion but otherwise leave it whole. I don't peel the carrot, but I do lope off the top, and the leafy inside stalks of the celery are apparently great for soup.

Next, fill a large pot about 2/3s of the way. Rinse off the chicken (I guess this is an optional step, but sometimes there is gross syrupy stuff that has been injected into the chicken and comes oozing out, so I do it), and make sure you dump out the stuff that they shove inside, like the heart and gizzards and a sheet of fatty yellow fat. (I forgot that once in Belfast!) I'm not sure if one should drop the innards into the pot with the chicken, but yesterday I did (but not the fatty piece). Then throughly wash your hands and bleach the sink.

Then toss in the carrot and celery and onion, and bring to a boil. Once it reaches a boil, set the time for an hour and fifteen minutes, and reduce the heat to a gentle simmer. As it starts to cook, you'll notice some yucky scum on the top of the pot. I use a spoon to skim it off and I did not take a picture of it. It was yucky, as I mentioned before.

It'll boil happily on your stove, and your apartment will start to smell like chicken noodle soup. Yum.

Once the timer goes off, take two big spoons and wrestle the chicken onto a plate. You'll have to let it cool there for about an hour. Otherwise your hands will be really hurting as you try to shred the chicken. You could always use rubber gloves if you were in a big hurry, but I'd recommend waiting for awhile.

I shredded the meat, discarding the skin and throwing the bones back into the pot of broth. (I continued cooking the broth for several hours with the bones, onion, carrot, celery, and a half tsp of salt to make stock. I probably should have added more water, as I probably made a rather condensed stock, but I forgot. Oh well. Currently it is sitting in the fridge, waiting for me to skim off the fat that has risen to the top, and then it'll be ready to freeze or whatever.) As you can see, I got about 5 1/2 to 6 cups of chicken from a 5 pound chicken, plus at least 2 quarts of chicken stock.

Shredded chicken can be used for a whole variety of quick meals, freezes well, and can be defrosted very quickly. So... do it to it, sister! Love you lots. :)

Things I'm Considering...

2010-10-01T12:56:00.001-04:00

I already revealed my deep desire for my house (or currently, our apartment) to look like it belongs in magazine. It still looks pretty much like it did a few weeks ago and will stay looking like that for the foreseeable future. But, having a lot of time on my hands, I can't help but plan what I might someday buy for our apartment. So here is the current list, with items picked from stores which I would, in reality, probably buy from. Although I absolutely love looking at expensive pieces in magazines, catalogs, and in stores, it won't happen, at least not now.

A cart for our television and DVD player. Our set-up is such that to be watchable, the t.v. has to be pulled out from the wall, in the living room space. However, it looks ugly when you walk in, and blocks the flow of the room. I'd like to buy some sort of rolling cart that we could easily wheel in or out, depending if the t.v. was in use or not. There are plenty of expensive carts, but this one is pretty economical.

Fabric Cubes for Storage: Dan made an inexpensive solution to our kitchen storage issues by screwing together several pine boards into shelves, which we then painted white. My crockpot, rice cooker, food processor, kitchen aid, and cookbooks are all stored there, as well as other kitchen essentials, such as ziplock bags, light bulbs, and paper towels. I need some baskets in order to hide some of the essentials that don't look quite as nice as the appliances. I'm thinking these (but perhaps not in bright green):

Shoe Rack: I have a cute, hot pink, back of the door shoe storage thing to corral my shoes. Dan does not. He (we) need something to control the shoe chaos, both in our closet and by our door. This would do the trick.

Sheer Curtains: Some privacy, please! Our apartment is on ground level, so it is really easy to see directly into our apartment. It's only the dog people that are out back, so it's not like we're on a major highway, but I'd still like to have a little more privacy without always having to keep the blinds down. Curtains can be super expensive, but I think these are pretty (and in my price range!). I'd need to hem them, and perhaps would still pair them with a heavier curtain, but it'd be a start.

Carpet: Let me just say, for a brief moment, that I have seen this area rug a couple of times in different magazines, and I just love it (in blue multi). Just do. A rug would help define our living room space better, but I'm pretty sure an $800 rug is out of the question. So, what about carpet squares? I could reconfigure them when we no longer live here, and in any case, I like Martha's take on them.

I also like the look of this for under our table, which is located on carpet, again defining the area for eating.

Any opinions on these choices? My only concern is that our apartment has a very neutral wall color and all of our pieces are in pretty neutral colors -- is it going to start looking boring? Or did I pick enough color in the carpet to help spice it up? Just a query.

And now, I need to stop dreaming, and perhaps start looking for a job. Otherwise, our apartment is going to stay exactly as is. And if does, that's fine: learning the lesson of contentment is ultimately much more valuable than furnishings.

An (unsuccessful) Interview

2010-10-01T11:08:00.000-04:00

Even if you have earned a Masters of Arts in Teaching and (as my Grandma B points out) you have some experience, which is wonderful, moving as the school year begins isn't fortuitous for finding a teaching job. As of yet, I'm still unemployed and half-heartedly searching. It's a half-hearted effort because my Praxis score won't be available until 10/19, so I can't get certified to teach quite yet, so I'm not actually very employable. In light of that, I took my mom's advice to look up the closest Ann Taylor store. I happen to love Ann Taylor's clothes -- well made, versatile, and a perfect staple for a teacher wardrobe. Lo and behold, I found one about 20 minutes away, and they were actually hiring!

I drove over about 2 weeks ago and discovered that it is located in one of those new-fangled shopping areas, designed like a small town and with limited (parallel) parking spots which are all metered. Not only can you shop there, you can live there (gasp!) so you can shop whenever you want.

Not exactly my cup of tea, but a job is a job. And the associate's discount is 50%. So I was pretty psyched.

I filled out an application and completed an online survey to determine my "hirability" (their words), and soon after got a call from a manager to come in for an interview. Sweet, I thought. I'll wear some nice (AT) dress pants and the job will be mine.

On the day of the interview, I arrived about 10 minutes early and then flubbed parallel parking. I think I need to go practice with my Dad again. Then I only had one quarter, which only bought me 15 minutes, but I figured it'd be a pretty quick interview. After all, it's a job in retail. It is not rocket science. The customer is always right. That's the main rule, correct?

The first part of the interview was filled with typical interview questions. Tell me a little bit about yourself, tell me about a time when (insert scenario). All of the questions were relatively easy to answer. Although I wasn't thrilled about committing to work the day after Thanksgiving or the week of Christmas, I was cognizant of my need for a paycheck and the perk of filling out my wardrobe.

And then the interview took a turn for the worse.

Interviewer: Imagine a valley-girl, cheerleader*, ditzy voice. "And to work in retail, you have to be a fashionista. So, now I'm going to ask you some questions about your style."

Me: Seriously? Fashionista is a made-up, pop-culture word, you dummy. Okay! Great!

Interviewer: In two words, describe your style for me.

Me: Shoot! I'm not trendy, for sure, and I really only wear comfortable things. Ok, comfortable is a decent word. Comfortable, like, I don't like to wear heels and um..... Oh no, what else can I say? Should I say modern? But that's kind of a lie. What other words describe style? Ugh. Outdoorsy? No no, that's not a good word for AT. How about like organic or natural? Natural! Noticing the woman's strange look, I attempt to explain. Like I like organic fibers and not a lot of synthetics. Sort of. Whatever. That was so the wrong answer.

Interviewer: Slowly says, Alright. Now, where do you find your fashion inspiration?

Me: Inspiration? Oh no. Well the Internet, of course.

Interviewer: Like where on the internet?

Me: You know, websites. And also magazines.

Interviewer: Which ones?

Me: I used to flip through People. Only at Grams and only because it was on the table, but she doesn't need to know that.

Interviewer: Okay. What is your favorite cosmetic product?

Me: Oh gosh, I don't know! I don't really use that much makeup and I just buy whatever happens to catch my eye and use it until it runs out! The only really branded thing I have is... My Clinique moisturizer. It's just so great, lamely attempting to give my answer some merit.

Interviewer: What is one style that you've wanted to try but just haven't had the guts to?

Me: What style? Seriously? I don't know! What IS in style? Anything, Hilary, think of anything that is in style. You haven't tried any of it. Like a flow-y dress with a wide belt around the waist. I think it looks really great on other people but I don't know how it'd look on me. Oh, that answer at least got some recognition. Yes. Maybe I'm redeeming it after all!

Interviewer: What is one product that you never home without putting on?

Me: Oh dear. Back to the slippery slope. I have lip gloss in my purse, or maybe I should say mascara because I do wear that when I do wear make up, but I really leave the house without it a lot of times. Like 90% of the time right now. I don't put anything on to take the dog out, and I sometimes see people out there. I just can't help but say the honest answer.... Chapstick!

Interviewer: Giving me a pitying smile, and no longer even trying to respond to my answers. What are you favorite stores to shop at besides Ann Taylor?

Me: Looking around the room, desperately attempting to recall some stores that are cool and that I own something from. Anything from. The only store I can recall purchasing anything from is Old Navy and Kohls, both of which are kind of like Wal-Mart when compared to AT. Even in my despair, I recognize that these are not stores I should admit to purchasing clothes from in this interview. I remember walking into Gap recently, and in the past I have purchased clothes there, so Gap! it is. And where else, let's see... Hmm, I can't even remember buying new clothes since I've been married**. Oh wait, I did buy something on super sale from Eddie Bauer, and that pops out and then I sink into the floor and disappear and relieve myself from finishing this embarrassing interview.

Oh wait. That didn't happen. Instead the interviewer explained to me that they like to be a "really genuine stylist" for their customers, making sure that they don't only have the top, they have the bottoms and the scarf to make the outfit and so on and so forth. (People actually buy entire outfits in one go? They don't just buy what they need to have a decent wardrobe? Hmmm. Maybe I won't fit in here.) She then ended the interview by saying, "I still have some other people to interview, so I'll be in touch." And then, as I picked up my brown purse, her eyes saw it and my black shoes and I was toast. Just like that.

It's been a week, and I still haven't heard back. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that my stellar interview really sealed the deal, and Dan no longer has to worry about me spending my entire paycheck at my place of employment.

*Just stereotyping, sorry if it offends.

**I really have purchased new clothes in the past three years. T.J. Maxx baby! And a couple of times I've visited various outlet malls and found some good deals, but none of this sprang to mind.

Moral of the story: When interviewing in retail, attempt to be current with something. Anything. It might not help you get the job, but it will save you some glowing red cheeks and laughter/tears as you explain your interview to your hubby.

Staying Busy

2010-09-24T13:26:00.001-04:00

Dan is about three weeks into his new job, and he is really enjoying it. (Praise the Lord for that!) He's been working some pretty long days, as fall is a busy season for his organization, so I've been trying my best to stay busy. We've pretty much finished settling in, so I've been doing quite a bit of reading. Our public library is a 15 minute walk from our apartment so it's close enough to go as often as I need new books! However, I've also been re-reading from my stash of books in our hallway (no bookcases yet), attempting to convince Dan that many books = happy wife. Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House books are some of my perennial favorites, and while I was working at the HC campus store, I snagged full color collector set copies of 4 of the first 5 books. (I still need to find Farmer Boy in the same edition; I love Almanzo's adventures growing up! And I see that the publisher has some of the later years in the same addition. This is going on my Christmas list!)

Anyways, Dan has never read them, so I can't wait until we have some little girls and we read them out loud on a family adventure. I really think he'll be impressed by how ingenious and industrious Pa was. The stories are so amazing. They had so little but they were so happy and content with what they had. And Ma was an amazing wife. She never failed to support Pa, no matter if they were sick or smashing grasshoppers or doing chores in a blizzard. So very many lessons to learn from the Ingalls family.

One thing I've adopted in my effort to make time pass quickly while Dan is at work is by completing a chore a day.

Ma's chores went like this:

"Wash on Monday,

Iron on Tuesday,

Mend on Wednesday,

Churn on Thursday,

Clean on Friday,

Bake on Saturday,

Rest on Sunday."

I decided to modify a bit:

"Bills on Monday,

Kitchen/Living Room on Tuesday,

Grocery Shop on Wednesday,

Laundry on Thursday,

Bathroom on Friday,

Bedroom on Saturday,

Rest on Sunday."

I guess one could say I'm a person who thrives on schedules.

(Becoming) Home

2010-09-13T14:36:00.000-04:00

I love looking at people's homes in magazines. I love admiring how they've decided to arrange their rooms, the curtains they chose, the art displayed on their walls, what the color of their teapot is, and how their quirks are expressed. In my ideal world, my home would be of the caliber to be featured in a magazine -- with a housekeeper to keep it neat and tidy.

Our apartment building totally has potential to be in a magazine. It's an old school building near downtown Dayton, and some of the rooms have some of the original school-house architecture, like the stage for the auditorium or blackboards that used to be on the wall. Our apartment, however, used to be the bathrooms for the kiddos, so most of the original got ripped out (thank goodness!). To me, though, our apartment is perfect, but I hate to admit how much time I spent trying to ready our apartment for a few pictures. Besides the regular straightening up to make it picture worthy, I also needed to wash the windows. We're in the basement/ground level, and the windows were filthy with dirt and dust. The smudges wouldn't have been visible in the pictures, undoubtedly, but when you aspire to magazine greatness, you have to be pretty picky. While I washed the screens and the windows (both inside and outside), the light from the morning passed me by, so I was left to take pictures in the darker afternoon.

Here is the tour:

This is our entrance to the building, with beautiful potted plants lining the sidewalk. One of the residents loves to garden, and we get to enjoy her labor!

If you skip down six wide concrete steps, turn to your left, and then open the door on the right, you'll most likely be greeted with Lander, making sure you're acceptable.

Our door opens into the living room-kitchen-eating area, but because I don't have a wide-angle lens, you'll get it in stages. Here's the living room:

Notice the couch we bought before leaving Pittsburgh. It's pretty big, but it works really well in this space! Also, notice our t.v. sitting on a chair. I'm pretty sure I've never seen that in a magazine, but you know what? Works well for now.

Also notice the presence of an exercise ball. Where do people put their exercise balls when their house is being photographed for a magazine? I bet they throw it in their basements. Me, I leave it out. More real that way.

Another really neat feature of our apartment is the two foot deep windowsills. They are marble or slate (it varies), and so beautiful. They are also south facing, and I'm hoping to keep my herbs alive all winter. Our windows look into the backyard -- something that Lander particularly likes. It allows him to keep tabs on when the other dogs go out to play. I'm thinking that we could use some sheer curtains, especially as our dinner was interrupted yesterday when Lander and a yellow lab had a stare off.

Our kitchen is just dandy. It's pretty simple, without tons of cupboard space, but what we sacrificed cupboards for was a dishwasher! I love it. To supplement the kitchen area, Dan let me use a shelf that he built for his backpacking stuff (behind the table in the previous picture). We're going to add another couple of shelves and paint it white, and then it will look a bit more polished than it does now. We'll also try find a couple of stools or tall chairs for counter, but right now our shoes are happily living there.

Our hallway is lined with books -- we need to buy another bookshelf. If you peek in the door on the left you'll see the bathroom.

(Boring!)

On the right you have our storage room -- and theoretically a guest room. It's where Lander sleeps, our off season clothes reside, our chest freezer freezes, and our outdoor gear lives. Give us a few days before you decide to swing by. This room needs some work.

Our bedroom is at the end of the hallway. If I were a designer, I'd make some snooty comments about needing a headboard to give the bed some weight, some more art on the walls, etc. As is it's fine for sleeping in. And it has a nice big closet (no picture; I was tired of making things neat and tidy).

I'm still waiting for the magazine stylists to arrive, with accessories in hand, but until they do, I'm happy with our lovely apartment. I'm sure I'll make small changes -- rugs, curtains, pillows -- but you'll have to come see them for yourselves! We're excited to be settled in Dayton and even more excited for all of the adventures that lie ahead.

accepted a job and moving to a place we have never been to...

2010-08-15T11:48:00.000-04:00

Since I was once told that Facebook was the easiest way to communicate I have decided to write a blog post about this to prove him wrong, but link it to my facebook account, so I have decided to use two dimensions of the electronic digital world.

I found a job, probably close to 150, I applied to a lot of them. For this specific job I interviewed via Skype webcam, I gave up hope, I was wrong. They called me, they told me they decided on who to offer the job to, they told me the offer was for me. I was excited, a bit bewildered with the humor of Christ. I accepted the job, and then cancelled 4 of the interviews I had lined up across the country. I went to one of the interviews that was local: the reason, to wear my new suit that I picked up the night before.

Hilary and I will be moving to Dayton, OH.

I have accepted a job as Outdoor Coordinator-Cycling for the Five Rivers MetroParks.

I will be coordinating, planning, running events, activities, trips, etc. I believe I will help with all aspects of the Outdoor Recreation department, but my focus is cycling related.

We don't know where we are living or anything. We have never been to Dayton, so details will be forthcoming if you want to help us move. Hilary hopes to get certified in OH to teach, so she'll be busy doing that.

If any of you have been to Dayton and have suggestions of what part/area to live in, that would be great. We are driving out next week to check it out.

I start in around 2-4 weeks.

Thank you for your prayers if you have been praying, keep it up...lots of people desire employment.

Reasons being unemployed stinks that no one else thinks of...

2010-07-19T17:18:00.001-04:00

Letterman style....here goes.

10. You have to delete files on your computer so you don't send out the wrong cover letter or resume

9. tea doesn't taste as good as if you made it at work

8. it takes all day to do 3 things on your to-do list because you lack motivation and desire

7. the bag of chocolate chips seems to have learned how to feed themselves to you

6. you look forward to going to bed early so you can get up early to check email

5. weekends aren't any fun because it just means you have to wait until Monday to hear back from people and look for new jobs posted

4. you don't even want the phone to ring, because when it does, it is never the person you want it to be

3. walking to the mailbox is depressing, not exciting like it should be

2. you use a lot more of your own toilet paper

1. you get so bored sometimes you stage pictures of yourself. Pictures that you would find on the front page of the newspaper titled "Frustrated that you haven't found a job?"

Sowing Seeds

2010-07-08T16:44:00.000-04:00

One day way back in April, while walking accompanying Dan on a mission to find dog food at Tractor Supply Co., I spied a display of seed packets. Last year was my first attempt at sowing seeds directly in the ground, and I was amazed when they actually grew. This year, I decided to attempt starting some cilantro and basil. At $1.50 per packet, I figured it was worth the try.

While my attempts to grow cilantro have now failed two times, my basil is growing like mad. It looks fantastic! I have three plants in a pot and four more plants in the ground, next to my two tomato plants.

On my to do list for tomorrow: pesto.

Why my wife needs work, by Dan.

2010-06-25T08:55:00.001-04:00

'Nuff said.

Beach Bum.

2010-06-23T16:31:00.000-04:00

Just thought I'd share.

Coming Home

2010-06-22T11:53:00.000-04:00

Last week, Dan and I went to the Outer Banks, NC, for a family trip to the beach. It was a lot of fun and quite relaxing. I'll post some pictures and stories from that trip, but I have more pressing things to share.

Sunday, when we got home, our fridge was barren. Empty, except for the end of a half-gallon of milk and the ever-present condiments. When Bruce and Sue dropped off Gram, we ordered Chinese take-out, so we were saved for the night, but the next morning the reality of our empty fridge struck: I found a piece of bread in the freezer to make toast and Dan used the last cup of milk for cereal, but other than that, we really needed some food.

I've been hoping to find fresh produce somewhere besides Giant Eagle, so I googled "local produce" and "Gibsonia, PA" and landed on a website that pointed me to the Dillner Family Farm, located up the road. They do a CSA program, which I'd like to try some year, but they also have a farm stand. I drove the several miles to the farm and was instantly in love. It's a serve-yourself and pay-before-you-go kind of place, and it was FANTASTIC.

I bought fresh lettuce, $2.

1 bunch of onions, $2.

1 head of fresh garlic, $1.

4 red tomatoes, first of the summer, $2.50.

1 pint of unshelled peas, $2.50.

1 container of thyme and 1 container of rosemary, $2 each.

2 quarts of ripe strawberries, red through to the center, $7.

And, just because I could, 1 zucchini, $1. It wasn't on the list, but it looked so delicious, so fresh, so summer-y that I just had to. So I did.

Flowers

2010-06-11T16:24:00.001-04:00

As of tomorrow morning, we will be enjoying our vacation. Outer Banks, here we come! We'll be combining family time with a wedding and several birthday celebrations, so I'm anticipating a week jam packed with excitement. The only bad part about our vacation is that I'm going to have to toss these beautiful daisies that Dan picked for me. We'll be gone until next Sunday, and by the time we return, they will no longer be cute and perky. I snapped a few pictures so that you could enjoy them for me!

It is my turn Hilary

2010-06-09T13:07:00.001-04:00

As most of you know I have been applying to jobs for quite some time. By quite some time I mean a year. If you are applying to jobs at schools, colleges, and universities, you end up doing the same thing a lot of the time. Cover Letter, Resume, and then what I call crap. You have to do all this crap to apply. You get to enter the same information multiple times online. Here...

notice the fun red print. Does that make sense? Seriously. I can't even say anything more other than I hate it. I'm applying to four jobs today, and three of them require this crap.

Goodbye.

A Few Cute Kids

2010-06-08T16:28:00.000-04:00

Before Memorial Day, Dan's sister Kristy, her husband Tyler, and their three adorable kids visited Pennsylvania for a different family event -- a birthday party -- and we capitalized on their proximity and invaded my in-laws house to enjoy their company! We spent the warm afternoon with them in the pool, climbing trees, and playing Kub.

I might be a bit biased, but I do think that they are some of the cutest kids in the whole wide world. Please witness the following:

Caleb eating a popsicle. (Later in the day, Caleb said, "Tell me all about what life was like when you were little, Aunt Hilary." How cute is he!?)

Kylie hamming it up. (I'm not sure how she managed to only cross one eye, but it does make for a crazy picture, which is what we were going for.)

Athletic Craig climbing a tree. (He's got some skills!)

One of the best parts of marrying into the Sahli family (and there are lots of great parts) is that I had ready-made nieces and nephews. Besides the girls making adorable flower girls at our wedding, they bring lots of excitement to family gatherings and make me laugh more than I thought possible! We're spending all of next week together at the beach, and I'm sure I'll have more pictures of them when we return.

The small things

2010-06-07T19:12:00.000-04:00

Today I'm thankful for our printer. We bought it a day or two before my interview at the Ellis School, so I could print off the rest of my portfolio. Since then, I've used to print off recipes from my mom, scan things from books, and for proofing and completing multiple job applications, including one today. And today, I used it to scan multiple documents into a job application for a local, one-year substitute position. I don't know what I would have done without it!

So today, I'm thankful for this small thing.

Family

2010-06-06T21:02:00.000-04:00

I like living close to family. After living 10+ hours away from my 'rents, it's nice to be within 3 hours. Even better, we can meet for lunch halfway, as we did on Saturday. We picked Meadville, PA (home of Allegheny College) to dine, and eschewed a cute cafe (deemed by the gentlemen to be one of those places that only give you 5 bites and call it a meal) for a delicious Mexican cantina. Afterwards, we walked through building that housed a few vendors and picked out delicious desserts.

The women folk picked Walnut Brownies by the Cookie Lady.

Dan chose pineapple bits (plus a few bites of brownie).

And Dad went with his perennial favorite, maple candies.

Thank you Meadville, for your tasty treats and your perfect location.

2010-06-05T20:43:00.000-04:00

I'm not sure how many 88 year olds use video games, but Dan's Gram owns a Wii. This is the first time in my life that I've lived in the same house as a video game unit, and accordingly, I mostly forget that it is there. We play maybe once a month. My little sister Joanna is visiting for the night, and to entertain her, the ladies decided to play a couple of games of Wii Bowling. To give you some background, Gram is pretty good, I'm rather mediocre, and Joanna uses her unique "double-pump" method. During our second game, Joanna revealed that her first time Wii Bowling she had scored 240 points!

Well, during the third game, as her strikes mounted up, we thought she might beat her score, and...

Yay Joanna! Now that she has experienced such success here, I'm thinking she'll come back to visit again.

Baklava!

2010-06-04T14:41:00.000-04:00

I discovered baklava while visiting the beautiful country of Greece after my freshman year of college. My friend Kate and I were in Athens, bone tired from an exhausting semester, but determined to explore the city. We spent our first day there trying desperately to stay awake, but failing miserably as we rode the subway around the city. However, after our first night of sleep -- which was at least 12 hours long -- we were ready to take on the city. We saw the Parthenon, observed dogs roaming the streets, ate moussaka, and then tried to find a piece of baklava. We had no luck on our own, so finally we resorted to asking perfect strangers for their help. We ended up asking a nice young woman who spoke perfect English, and she led us through dark alleys to a nice, bright bakery that we would have never discovered on our own. She did, however, correct our pronuciation of the treat -- baklaVA, not BAKlava. We each bought a piece of the sticky, nutty dessert and walked up to see Athens from rocks that were outside the main part of the city.

While on these rocks, licking our fingers as we ate our baklava, Kate observed that we were probably in a spot quite similar to the location that Paul once stood, as described in the book of Acts. We sat there, looking over the city, and flipped through our Bibles to the passage. That I was standing where Paul once stood was an amazing realization. There are Bible tours of Israel and Jerusalem, but I don't think they can quite compare to making that connection on your own.

Anyways, since that day, I've had a special affinity for baklava. I've contemplated making it, but all that phyllo dough and butter and nuts and syrup has scared me off. However, when I was shopping this morning, a Greek Orthodox Church was selling plates of baklava for a fundraiser. I was more than happy to buy five triangles, snap a picture, and recall fond memories of traveling in Greece. Someday I hope to return, husband in tow, and enjoy the sights, sounds and tastes of Greece again.

Lake Erie & An Anniversary

2010-06-03T13:32:00.000-04:00

Dan and I have been married for 2.5 years. We dated for a year and were engaged for 9 months. All that time together means that he has spent quite a few days and nights in Fredonia, NY, my hometown. Yet somehow, he had never been to Lake Erie until two weekends ago, when we were visiting to celebrate a wedding and my mom's birthday. After cake and presents, we loaded up two cars for a visit to Point Gratiot. We (illegally) took the dogs for a walk on the beach and enjoyed the sunshine. (We justified it by observing that no one had cleaned up the park yet for the summer.)

Since we had our cameras, we stopped for a few pictures on the way back. Here's one of my mom and dad, who celebrated their 34th wedding anniversary on May 22. I am so thankful for them.

It's a Wonderful Life (and I'm not Jimmy Stewart)

2010-06-02T16:09:00.000-04:00

Does anyone even read check this anymore? Gosh, it doesn't even really deserve to be linked to anyone else's blog -- Dan and I are not cut out to be bloggers of any repute. But in reality, the reason I haven't posted is because I keep hoping that we'll have something newsworthy to post. Mostly like a permanent job (or even two!), but that still hasn't happened. So we're still in the waiting place, hoping and praying and trying to remain positive, even when life doesn't turn out as expected.

The waiting game provides plenty of time for introspection, I've found. There have been many wonderful days since moving in with Dan's Gram, but also many stressful moments and tears of frustration. It is easy to point a finger at a specific circumstance in my life and to believe that as soon as that problem is resolved, I'll be totally content. But the problem is, human nature isn't ever content. I always want something more. When we were in Wisconsin, we wanted to be close to home. When we were in Belfast, I wanted a different job. When I was a senior in college, I wanted to be married and done with school. And the pattern continues further and further back. And you know what? I'm tired of being discontent with my life. I have a wonderful life.

So I'm choosing contentment. And I'm going to document these moments, creating a visual journal to match the written memories of this time. Here it begins.

This is from over a month ago, on a fateful day when Dan attempted to teach Lander to run alongside his bike. Lander was making good progress when suddenly his boxer-brains took over and he ran in front of the bike. His paw was hurt. (Dan felt so bad about it that he bought him a Kong and made him a Kongsicle, and Lander has been enjoying his toy ever since.) Anyways, Lander wouldn't leave his wound alone, and my husband, being the very resourceful person that he is, made him a cone out of an old Halloween bucket. I'd like to imagine that Lander was rather indignant about this, but he was probably just confused.

He has since recovered from his collar of shame, but I like to look at it every once in a while to feel intellectually superior. I'm so glad I'm not a dog.

The softer side...while up in the air.

2010-04-13T19:08:00.000-04:00

It has been quite some time since I have last posted, so read and enjoy. I have not worked for about 5 months now. Hilary and I are what some would say, "Up in the air", and some would be correct. We don't really know what we are doing next. Hilary does have her teaching position until Mid-May, but after that we just don't know. We go to the beach in June for vacation and a wedding, have another wedding a week later, and then we are back to the grind. The grind being the unknown. It is possible to know what we will be doing when we get back from the beach, and that is in our prayers. The other day I found the pictures that you will find below and I wanted to post them...here is why.

This was an adventure.

You can just see the handle in this picture.

You can see it better in this photo, it is the small black thing above my head over my right hand.

The adventure portrayed in the photo happened probably about 9 years ago. It was the brief adventure of me going off that ropes swing. From looking at the picture, and my memory of falling, I was right about 50 feet off the water when I let go. The cliff-like shoreline is where I launched from, actually, a rickety old platform in a rickety old tree up on that cliff. I had to of stood there for 20 minutes or so, long enough to freak myself out and talk myself back into it multiple times. Long enough for many boats to show up to watch. As you can see, I did eventually step off the platform. What a rush.

This brief adventure is different than the adventure I am on now, but I am on an adventure. I don't know if it is an adventure of faith, or an adventure of economic downturn times, but whatever it is, I hope it is coming to a close. I hope that this adventure ends so that I can start a new adventure. A Donald Miller style adventure. A story with purpose. (If you aren't gettin the Donald Miller story reference, check out this.) Soon we will find out what we are doing, we just have to continue to have faith.

And a poem from my old blog while I was at Houghton, pre-marriage, pre-bachelors, pre-knowing the next step.

Waiting, thinking, praying leads me to this....

I come to this place
not knowing what to do
but I know one thing Lord
I am here because of you.

I am here up on this hill
a very quite place
searching, searching for you Lord
please show me your face.

It's here Lord, all around
Your joy, your love, your grace
I feel it Lord
as I walk a quiet pace

I lay here Lord,
the stars, the moon, the skies
I lay here Lord
search me, here my cries

I come to this place
not knowing what to do
but I know one thing Lord,
you will lead me through.

Have a great day. Create a great adventure. Drive fast. Take risks.

Reunion, Take Two

2010-02-21T16:38:00.000-05:00

I loved Houghton College even before I went. Visiting campus with my parents to their own class reunions, attending soccer camp, and seeing my big brother shave his head as part of the men's soccer team helped me realize that Houghton was a special place. Nestled in the hills of Allegany County, it's definitely rural, but the absence of stores, malls, and even a grocery store forces the student body to bond. At least, that's how it worked for my closest college friends. An amalgamation of Highlander friendships, FYHP attendees, and roommates, we shared a special bond that grew strong and deep during our four years together. In fact, it was such a strong connection that we all felt the separation post May 2007 down to our cores. I know I was surprised to be so lonely without these women.

Despite the distance that separated us, our friendships continued to grow. We instituted a monthly email, intended to keep us from becoming Christmas-letter-only friends. It works, with some of us writing on time, some of us writing late, and some of us procrastinating for a month or two. (I fall into the last category right now.) We've also managed not one but two reunions -- more if you count the three weddings that we've shared. Not everyone has been able to make it to each of these events, but oh boy, have them been wonderful! Last February we met up in Chicago. We crowded together in a hotel, froze in the city, and made a joyful memory.
This year, spurred by the quick stateside visit of one of our (currently) international amigas, we decided to meet outside of Washington, D.C., the first weekend of February. Not to be outdone by the frigid temperatures experienced in Chicago, this trip happened to occur in the massive snowstorm that blasted the East Coast. We all managed to arrive and leave safely, including Kate and her baby daughter, who flew in from Minneapolis, MN. The feet of snow that we got ensured that we had lots of time to sit and chat, but unfortunately also mandated that we dig out our cars.
This was the Sub, part way through its unearthing. It really wasn't much fun to shovel out our cars, but fortunately, everyone pitched in (except for the baby, but I guess we can't blame her). It actually provided a decent way to work of some of the calories we ate (and ATE) during that weekend.

And although next year we vowed to meet in Vegas, this reunion proved to become another unforgettable memory. Being able to talk, eat, laugh and pray together was another reason I'm thankful for the time I spent at Houghton.

Our Gracious Host

2010-02-01T16:07:00.001-05:00

On January 9, 2010, before 6 a.m., Dan and I bid adieu to Williams Bay, Wisconsin. The car was crammed with our earthly possessions, absolutely jam packed. The car was so full, germs had to sign up on a waiting list to get in. I had lampshades on my lamp, food at my feet, toiletries filling the empty space between my right thigh and the car door, and Dan and I both rested our elbows on the pillow that was between us. I slept as to forget how uncomfortable I was.

Anyways, we made it to Pennsylvania without incident, and after spending one night with Dan's parents, we began the arduous process of moving in. No apartment for us, not a farmhouse surrounded by cornfields: this time we are bunking with Dan's Gram, qualifying us in many ways as people hit by the recession. (There's a commercial about what people are doing to cut back: living with my parents, eating less meat, becoming a one car family. Check, check, check!) But really, we're absolutely blessed to be living with Gram, besides the obvious economical benefits.

Gram is gracious, funny, and growing older. She benefits from a little help in the kitchen and the company that we provide. She often wears a gray-purple hat, much to the family's annoyance, always offers to bring ice cream to family functions, and likes her fair share of salt on, well, everything. One day I witnessed her butter her wheat-thins; it must be a generational thing to butter one's crackers.

I'm also teaching Gram how to use the computer. We've gotten her an email account and she is beginning to get the gist of how to reply to emails. The computer is still a great mystery to her, but I'm impressed that she has the gumption to try. Today she received an e-card, much to her delight, that she chuckled at the entire time it played.

I am learning that growing old, elegantly, is a lofty goal. It takes style, a relaxed attitude, and a good bit of humor. My own grandmothers display a good bit of pizazz, and getting to know Dan's gram is another example of how aging can be beautiful. Spending time with Gram sometimes makes me roll my eyes, and other times smile so hard that my cheeks are sore. My favorite part? That she will ask Dan, when he is giving her grief, "Do you like where you're sleeping?"

And to that, I laugh and say, "Oh, Gram."

Really? Me?

2010-01-24T13:18:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, we enjoyed an evening with Dan's parents, two grandmas, and niece and nephew. Ice cream was on the menu for dessert, and Dan plopped the cartons in front of his nephew.

"Go ahead open it up."

Vohn strains to pull the lid off the vanilla ice cream. He gives up. Dan says, "Come on! You're not getting any ice cream if you can't get the lid off."

Vohn gives Dan a disbelieving look, but decides he better pull again. I aid the three and a half year old by hold the bottom of the carton. Finally, with a smack, the lid pops off, much to Vohn's delight/surprise.

Dan hands Vohn the ice cream scoop. "Alright, get yourself some ice cream." Again, the little guy doesn't quite know if he should believe him or not. He decides that, again, Uncle Dan is not kidding, and goes to town.

Uncle Dan is crazy!

Does he know that I love ice cream?

Oh yeah... I gotta hang out with Uncle Dan more often.

crispness and frost and hot apple cider...

2009-12-03T18:22:00.000-05:00

Quilt square on a country barn at an apple picking festival.

Delectable cider doughnuts at the festival. (Worth every calorie.)

The amazing colors of fall.

Hot apple cider, per request.

The beauty of the moment.

Anchors for the soul.

These are for you, my homesick friend.

Family, Friends, Dogs, and Giving Thanks.

2009-12-02T11:36:00.000-05:00

I am sitting here on this cold Wednesday with absolutely nothing to do. I have been without work for 3 weeks now and I'm not sure the house can get more organized or any cleaner. I do have permission to start packing up the house now that it is December, but I think I will save that until next week. As of January 9th, we need to be out of this house. Where are we moving to you ask? The answer is we don't know yet. Hopefully we move to the PA/NY vicinity. We are thinking of moving in with my Gram Sahli, she is lonely and we would love to live at her house for awhile.

Can you tell I have nothing to do?
Anyway, last week was the Thanksgiving holiday, and Hilary and I had some visitors. Here they are.

As you can see, we had a lot of fun. They came for the whole week because Shelley was off because of hunting season in WV. Apparently bus drivers won't show up to work on the first week of rifle season. PA schools are off for one day for the same reason. Anyway, we had a lot of fun. We ran the dogs and ourselves, we ate good food, went hiking, and enjoyed each others company relaxing. Andrew and I went biking, Shelley and I made food for Thanksgiving day early so Hilary could relax, and we ran on Thanksgiving morning. Then we ate.

In attendance was Andrew and Shelley, myself and Hilary, my friend Ryan and his wife Virginia, and a guy from work, Jay. No parents allowed. We ate turkey, two types of stuffing, mashed potatoes, carrots, sweet potato bake, homemade bread, and three pies. It was wonderful. We did miss the rest of our families, but due to Hilary working and her limited time off we couldn't make the trip. It is our prayer that we will be living close to them all very soon.

That was last week. This week I am applying to jobs, getting excited for the future (although nervous), and Christmas shopping online.

Today I am posting a blog update, eating, doing one load of laundry, and maybe just reading. Before I go I must upload some pictures, so enjoy.

Fall Fun

2009-11-14T15:09:00.001-05:00

I apologize for the utter lack of posts for the last few months. Can I say that life got hectic? Not a very good excuse, I know. I'm continually impressed by how some bloggers manage to post daily! I can't even imagine that! Maybe I could try weekly at some point in my life.

Two weeks ago, Dan and I took a brief trip to Pennsylvania, land of the Steelers and Heinz ketchup. While we were there we had our first Thanksgiving of 2009, followed by trick-or-treating. Kylie was a hippie with some awesome hair, Craig was Batman with a super cool mask, Caleb was "Super Caleb", Ella was the Little Red Hen, and Vohn was "Super Vohn Chicken"! At least, that's what Vohn declared as his name partway through the evening.

The little guys got tired on the way back to the house, so Super Caleb used his super-powers to fly home.

Super Vohn Chicken's wings weren't quite strong enough, so he got a little help.

Please notice his awesome chicken feet. My sister-in-law gets some mad props for their costumes.

Fall is nearly gone here, but it was beautiful while it lasted.

It's Monday...

2009-09-21T21:59:00.000-04:00

Life is a road that I want to keep going, love is a river that I want to keep flowing.

I think of this song, a refrain from my freshman year of college, because teaching is such a journey. Here's where I am tonight.

I'm feeling tired on this Monday evening. It was a long, long day, filled with teaching, meeting, and helping, as well as watching students play in a girls' bball game and shopping for groceries. Fortunately, Danny boy was the ever helpful husband, making dinner and being my partner in crime at the store. All this AND I had him worried because I forgot to tell him I wouldn't be home until late, due to the faced-paced basketball game I was watching.

All this, and I remain encouraged. Teaching is truly a joy -- even if I feel like I'm already playing catch-up with this brand new week. I am thankful to be in this place, in this situation, learning and growing and maturing. And I am thankful to the giver of these blessings.

"Even to your old age and gray hairs, I am He, I am He who will sustain you. I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you." -Isaiah 46:4

Mountains, Animals, and Miles on the Car

2009-09-02T21:03:00.000-04:00

DBS and I spent two wonderful weeks touring a smattering of the western National Parks, including the Badlands, Grand Tetons, Yellowstone, Glacier, and Theodore Roosevelt. We slept in our tent a total of 12 times, which made us even more grateful to the people we stayed with (Dan's high school pal, Dan's former boss, and one of my college roomies). We splurged on a hotel only once, but on ice cream several times. We saw a bull moose, a grizzly bear, hundreds of bison, and mountain goats. We got slap happy in the car on our way to Idaho, were 20 miles from being in Washington State, and drove over 4000 miles.

We had a blast.

Now we're home, and we've hit the ground running. It's back to OWLS for Dan (although it has moved to a different location), and on to student teaching for me. Welcome back to the real world!

Summertime

2009-08-04T10:51:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, I plucked the first ripe cherry tomato from our garden.

Pure heavenly bliss on the tongue. Dan just might be converted to a tomato lover this summer.

I'm excited to try out Brandywine tomatoes. They have an awkward lumpy look that makes them really unique -- and I've heard they taste amazing. They are slow to ripen this year because of the cooler temperatures. But good things come to those who wait.

A Day in Madison

2009-07-28T20:30:00.000-04:00

Lucky for us, my dear sister has come to visit! Joanna flew in on Saturday morning and is hanging out with us until (very early) next Saturday morning. Dan and I wanted to do something unique while she's here, so yesterday we headed to Madison, WI, capital of the dairy state, home to University of Wisconsin-Madison, and one of the most bike-friendly cities in the U.S.

In the afternoon, Jo and I walked around shops while Dan either browsed patiently or waited on a bench outside. We both scored not quite perfect shoes from Land's End (another WI attraction), which will be excellent for student teaching. We went into tons of interesting and eclectic stores. I saw this adorable doll house. Now don't read into this folks, but I'm hoping Dan's dad will make one for a little girl someday. (Catch that word someday.)

We also went out to eat at The Great Dane Brewing Company, in search of deep fried cheese curds and other dinner deliciousness. The beer-battered cheese curds were excellent -- not as stringy as cheese sticks, but just as tasty. Joanna wanted to have a true Wisconsin dinner, so she had the Wisconsin-Style Mac and Cheese (complete with beer in the cheese sauce).

Dan had a hearty hamburger-bratwurst combo on a pretzel bun. (Along with cheese and beer, brats are wildly popular in Wisconsin.)

The food I choose had origins nowhere near Wisconsin -- falafel and fried sweet plantains -- but my dessert sure did! After a walk to a bike shop, we stopped at Ella's Deli, a tourist attraction and a site at which a horror movie could possibly be staged. At least 100 figures flew on wires attached to the ceilings, filling the Deli with whirring, clicking and clacking. It was kind of creepy, we all agreed. But the decor didn't distract me from sampling an ice cream delight: homemade espresso ice cream on grilled pound cake topped with hot fudge.

Now this is what Wisconsin is about.

Husband of the Year!

2009-07-12T20:30:00.000-04:00

If you haven't heard, Hilary got a new camera for her birthday. A Canon T1i. Here are my favorite pictures taken thus far.

Take a good look at that picture and tell me what is missing? Cancer survivors attitudes are amazing. That girl has one leg and went up the firecracker ladder. Next time you consider whining...suck it up.

Click Click Click Click Click...

2009-07-04T21:09:00.000-04:00

You're a model.

For my birthday, I got numerous awesome, stupendous, fantastic gifts, but one stands out above the rest: a Canon Digital SLR. Whoa.

The new phrase around our house is "click click click click click you're a model."

On road biking.

2009-06-14T21:11:00.000-04:00

So this was my ride today. Since the wife and I go to church on Saturday evening Sunday mornings are rather quite open. Hilary also had to work today at 9am, so I woke up with her and got ready for a bike ride. Turns out I have an intermediate level pace for riding by my lonesome. I really have no base for this, but I did happen upon a group of riders and passed them all when I found out they weren't going the same direction as me. Road biking is a new love for me. My poor mountain bike has sat since Mother's Day. In that month I have ridden 244 miles. Once I get a second set of pedals I will ride both bikes more often. Since I've come to love the road, I have learned a few things. You get it in list form because that is the easiest and requires no wittiness or tough grammar.

5. 92% of drivers are idiots, the other 8% are probably road bikers. Seriously, pretty much every driver thinks they must pass right when another car is coming. No need to apply the brakes and wait, oh 3 or 4 seconds and then pass safely. Then, right when they get next to you they must floor it to show their superiority in their vehicle while they struggle with little man syndrome. Jerks.

4. Roads are bad places for birds. I saw at least 10 dead ones today. All dead. And some animals. Poor little guys.

3. Wisconsin has a lot of road bikers on beautiful, sunny, 75 degree Fahrenheit Sunday mornings. I honestly think I saw more roadies than cars. It was rather inspiring.

2. I am still scared to go really fast. Every and any time I see my speedometer creep up past 3-0 my father-in-laws broken rim sitting in his basement somehow enters my mind. At that point I say a little prayer and shift into my big ring and put the hammer down. Booyah. Going fast is fun.

And the #1....

I really like road biking. It is helping me get fit and lose weight for the big "I'm on a boat" summer at the lake season. Not really so much that last part, but road biking is my lifetime sport. The purchase was (is) so worth it.

And now some random pictures taken over the last month or so.
This was the triathlon I went to last Saturday to watch and scope out how triathlon's are organized. Thinking about doing a tri in September.

Our next door neighbor, from a walk with Hilary.

the friends from our side yard...blurry due to a fully digital zoomed lens.

Swinging into Summer

2009-05-31T18:09:00.000-04:00

Welcome, summer. Officially, we've got some ways to go, but it feels like summer here. After all, there's a countdown until the end of the year on my whiteboard at school, boats are invading our lake, and it stays light until after 8 o'clock at night. We've grilled our dinners, slept with the windows open, and applied sunscreen. It's a wonderful time of year.

But even though it's a wonderful time of the year here in Wisconsin, I think I can safely say for both of us that our hearts are not really here anymore. Summer screams "family! friends! camping! Camp of the Woods! Big Dipper! Kinzua!" and we're about 10+ hours from all of those things. Our location is just a by-product of this season of our lives, and now we both know that we're not really destined to live across the ocean or even across the country. We want to be closer to our roots, able to visit our families and friends and participate in day-to-day life with them. So next summer, we're determined to be closer.

But for now, we're making the best of Wisconsin. Our garden is growing, still safe from any predatory herbivores who would like to munch on the leafy greens that are emerging from the ground. It is truly amazing to toss a few seeds into the ground, water them, and wait... then wallah! Lettuce! Or zucchini! Or beans! I'm thrilled.

We've also dragged our lawn chair into the lawn to enjoy the sunshine. Dan took a little rest there before we went on a walk this afternoon. We've been going on walks in the past week (tearing ourselves away from the allure of the Netflicks subscription that my mom gave us for Valentine's Day).

In light of our wonderful weather, we've been staying outside a good bit more. Earlier this week we took a walk around Yerkes Observatory. It's a famous place right down the street which we haven't even taken a tour of (yet). But it is lovely.

Today, we walked on the Lake Path around Geneva Lake. We managed to find a spot to park in the small village of Fontana, but I guess from here on out we'll be walking from our house or the college! It's already packed, and we haven't seen nothin' yet! The lake is still quite cold, but there were plenty of families sunning themselves on the various beaches -- tanned, fit and toned parents admiring their adorable children as the kiddos squawked and chased each other. We walked on the south side of the lake, the side of the lake resplendent with various country clubs, boat launches, and huge houses. It's enjoyable to walk along the shore and admire the houses, although sometimes it's a challenge for my Christianity, as I know that I oscillate between envy and superiority while strolling by. But it's still a cheap, lovely date, walking hand in hand with Dan.

I'm sure there will be many more challenges this summer besides thinking about the houses that line the lake, but Dan and I will survive. And in the meantime, we'll miss all of our friends and family who are far away geographically but close to our hearts.

Precipice of Death - A Day of Bikes

2009-05-10T21:14:00.000-04:00

Since this blog is meant to update family and friends about our life, I suppose I should give a rundown of the past week. Our garden that you read about last week is doing well. It now has a net over the whole thing to keep birds and deer out. It also has carrots, lettuce, onions, and broccoli planted in it. By the end of this week it will probably be the home to tomatoes, peppers, potatoes, zucchini, and cucumber, well at least the plants and seeds of that variety. Since you last read we have also completed our spring semester. I am completed done with my coursework, and Hilary has two more classes to take this summer. Once I am done with my internship and get a grade, I will be done with school. This fall we are staying in these parts so Hilary can student teach at Lake Geneva Middle School. I will continue to work for OWLS, although it will be under new ownership. That was pretty much it for the week. The weekend held more exciting adventures.

Saturday we slept in, cleaned up the messy house, went to buy some little things (DVD's to back up pictures, and strawberries for daiquiris), went to church and watched the Penguins lay the smack down. Today, Sunday, we went mountain biking. That is right, we. Here is what I have to say...Hilary did great. We went on a 4 mile loop and other than the gigantic, enormous, thrown in the middle of the trail mound of dirt that happened to throw Hilary into the bush and crash, it was a great ride. Here are her remains...

After that we went to Whitewater and got some lunch and ate it in a park we found. Then we were off to look at a road bike. Not my old road bike...
The road tires I got for my mountain bike so I could go fast.

As much as I enjoyed going fast on my mountain bike I also have been looking for a road bike...which leads me to the "looking at a road bike" part.

That fast beast is happily sitting in the living room. I have yet to name her but I will soon enough. I do have to change the rear tire because there is a gash in the one on it. The previous owner gave me a new tire so I should change it, or at least I should. What do you all think?

Now I must be going...I am tired from the bike rides and am wanting some tea.

The Fruits of Our Labor

2009-05-04T17:04:00.000-04:00

Welcome to May! Spring has been arriving rather stealthily, but after four days of rain, it has announced its arrival! The world is green and the sun's rays are warming our part of the world. Just in time, too, for Dan's parents flew from Pittsburgh to Wisconsin to visit us. I picked them up at the O'Hare International Airport on Friday and Dan and I dropped them back off just today, so we were able to spend the whole weekend with them.

The main reason they came was to watch Dan's Pinning Ceremony, the penultimate ceremony that acknowledges all of the hard work Dan has put towards his master's degree. Officially, he doesn't graduate until August, and there's a ceremony down at the main campus next week that would more officially mark the end of his coursework. But as far as Dan's parents and I were concerned, the pinning ceremony was what we wanted to see.

The pinning ceremony didn't take the whole weekend, but we managed to stay busy. On Sunday, Bruce and Sue helped us with our garden! After deciding on where we'd put our garden, the real work began. Dan started by raking the area.

Then we all took turns turning up the dirt. The cornfields here in the Midwest aren't misplaced, after all. We turned up dirt that was dark, rich, and free from rocks. (We think it had been used for the cornfields in year past that surround our house, but it hadn't been used last year.) Actually, we only took less than a dozen rocks out of our 18' by 7' plot. Not too shabby! I think the Sahlis were a bit jealous, to be honest. Apparently their Pennsylvanian soil is a bit rockier than here.

Then, to protect our future plants from herbivores, both large and small, some folks drove some posts into the ground, while others of us took pictures.

Dan had found a couple of rolls of abandoned snow fence sitting around the barn, which he brilliantly re-purposed as garden fencing. We attached it with wire and zip ties. Because not all of the herbivores would be dissuaded by this, we also had to buy poultry fence and attach it along the ground with yet more zip ties.

In yet another moment of re-purposing genius, Dan found an old gate and made it our new gate. Granted, the fencing is a little rag-tag -- a bit reminiscent of the garden fencing I saw in my drives around Allegany County -- but it was brilliant and (best part) cheap!

When all was said and done, our garden was ready. Thanks, Bruce & Sue, for all of your help!

A Monumentous Haircut

2009-04-29T12:47:00.000-04:00

You probably won't believe it, but I actually did it: I gave Dan a decent haircut!

If my life were recorded in a book, this event would have had some foreshadowing. Remember the time when I convince my little sister to let me cut her Barbie dolls' hair, in the t.v. room? (Joanna, the good little saver, always had enough allowance to actually buy additional Barbie dolls. I believe she bought a Skipper or two, in addition to her hand-me-down Barbies.) If you've ever cut a Barbie's hair, you'll know that their luscious blonde locks frizz out a bit when you trim off some of their imaginary split ends. Not so pretty.

Or the time that Mark, Andrew's friend, visited us and needed a trim. He had great faith that I would be able to use his trimmers and create a decent product. He got a trim along his neckline that was a bit high and a bit crooked. It looked better than did the Barbies' haircuts, but not by a whole lot.

Of course, the man I married is too cheap to go out to get his haircut. Fortunately, our good friend Jaynie is a pro at such spatial things as cutting hair. She just chopped away and WALLAH! A nice short FREE haircut for Danny boy! This happened for a good 3 years, without many interruptions. (The one non-Jaynie haircut came from his parents a few weeks before our wedding. Dan wanted a trim; I wanted his hair curly. His parents tried to mediate by giving him a little hair cut. I had to leave the room in fear that his head would have to be shaved before our wedding.)

Then we moved, far far away from Fillmore, NY. Dan didn't cut his hair from August to Christmas, when we went back for a visit. Jaynie to the rescue! But this time? There was not a chance that we could visit NY for a haircut. At Christmas, my sister-in-law Colleen had reassured me that I could definitely handle a haircut. And Jaynie gave me a lesson while cutting Dan's hair. Plus, Dan seriously needed a trim. So last Sunday, Danny boy and I went to our neighborhood goods emporium (aka Wal-Mart), bought a pair of color-coded trimmers and hair cutting scissors, paid for them, and made the drive home in silence, apprehensive of the things that would come.

Well, maybe not that apprehensive. But Dan kept saying things like, "I don't work tomorrow! Maybe I'll shave my head and then sit out in the sun all day so I don't have a funky tan!" Apparently, that was his vote of confidence AND his back-up plan.

So, after watching an instructional video or two on YouTube, I sat Dan down in the kitchen and went to work.

It took a long time, but in the end, it finally looked pretty good (if I do say so myself).

P.S. It looks better now, actually -- better than in that picture. Of course, I still have some room for improvement (as you can see!).

Catching You Up to Speed!

2009-04-18T10:17:00.000-04:00

It has been a while since either of us has posted, and I've had a lot of things I've wanted to say! We're three weeks from the end of the semester, and Dan is only two weeks from his Pinning Ceremony. (Pinning Ceremony sounds kind of "Bye-bye Birdie" to me, but it's what Aurora does for it's GWC graduates.) We have just made plans with Dan's parents for a visit -- they are going to fly out to celebrate Dan's graduation with us! Hopefully, the weather will be as lovely as it is today. Believe it or not, it is 70 degrees.

So, a few pictures to sum up what April has been like.

A few weeks ago, Dan was informed that he was being honored with an award. Being the modest guy that he is, he didn't even want to tell his parents that he was voted Recreation Student of the Year! I had to spread the news. We went to an award ceremony where Dan received his award. Here's the proof:

Congratulations, Dan!

Last week, the school that I sub at had a spring break for an entire week and a day. In my sudden abundance of time, I went to a yarn store in Madison, worked on projects, took a Praxis exam, and made Dan an apron. Here he is wearing it.

He's actually cutting up our Easter ham. Easter was the first major holiday we celebrated by ourselves in our married life. We tried to fill it up with church. In two days we went to 3 services -- Saturday community, the sunrise service, and regular old church on Easter. A beautiful, beautiful day filled with hope. Compared to our normal family celebrations, it was quiet -- and there wasn't quite as much food. Thanks to self timer, here's a picture of the two of us.

As you can see, Dan is starting with the apple pie.

There is still more to come, but I need to start on my homework. Alas. Soon and very soon I'll have a more peaceful schedule.

my new road bike

2009-04-04T21:04:00.000-04:00

Since I live in the Mid-west I figured I should indulge in all of this flatness and purchase myself a road bike. In order to fulfill this road enjoyment my wife and I went off to a bike expo last night. This bike expo. It was a hard decision, but I think I made the right choice. Can you guess? Pick one!

If you picked either of the first two you just happened to be wrong. Since we are saving to go on a sweet trip out to Glacier, TD Roosevelt, Idaho, Yellowstone, Tetons, Lander, Devil's Tower, Mount Rushmore, Badlands, etc., the wife has talked me out of a road bike...for now.

So to satisfy my road bike desires I purchased two $10 700x35c commuter tires, and two $4 tubes, which happen to have the wrong valves. I also bought a SS water bottle cage and a $2 leg reflective leg strap for my friend. All told, I spent about $50 on my new road bike. When I get the correct tubes I'll post a picture or two of my new tires on Cheyenne, which happens to be the name of my mountain bike.

I am trying to not constantly want more.

Happy trails, and happy Easter week.

A Wee Bit of a Rant

2009-03-25T19:20:00.000-04:00

Subject: Profs and Technology.

Well, I'm sitting here waiting for class to begin. It's 19 minutes after class should have started, but wait? Didn't I get the message via my worthless-piece-of-expensive-technology account? You know, the message that was hidden behind layers of different tabs, to a page where why the heck would I ever go there anyways? Oh, that message? Why no, I didn't get it. You could have mentioned it in oh, let's say, an email. In fact, you could have mentioned it in the email exchange we HAD on Monday ABOUT this class. But why would you do that, considering I have this awesome piece of technology that obliterates the much more user friendly and useful email? I mean, we're going paperless here people, so let's only use this worthless-piece-of-expensive-technology for communication, not other paperless forms of communication.

By the way, this worthless-piece-of-expensive-technology is confusing (heard of user friendly? let's call it a user-enemy), not used by the rest of my professors, and still hasn't finished loading the syllabus. Which I don't have, by the way, because she only put it on this program/website. And I don't have a printer, except at school, and that's when the Internet is slow. So I didn't know that we're stinkin' presenting a final project. Because I don't even know what the final project is. Hence, I haven't started it. Oh yes, and a different professor actually created the final assessment, and it doesn't match what we've been learning in our course, taught by a different professor. The irony of this situation: this is an assessment course.

Sigh. Golly gee. I just love school sometimes, don't you?

Welcome to Spring!

2009-03-21T17:27:00.001-04:00

Officially, spring is here, and today actually feels like it! It was a gloriously springy day -- in the 50s and sunny, with only a light wind. It was also a perfect Saturday. We slept in, watched The Office in our p.j.s, and did various straightening and cleaning chores. (Some of you may remember pictures that we posted earlier this year on our blog, which showed Dan swatting many flies, who died rather bloody deaths. Unfortunately, the descendants of these original flies have worked their way into our weekly chores: they expire all over our floors, especially upstairs in the closet, and lie there, lifeless, until one of us vacuums them up. Read about our problem in more detail here if you're bored.

After our relaxed-pace morning, we decided it was time for me to try out my new bike, purchased from a local Christian camp sometime last month. We pedaled around Williams Bay, soaking up the Vitamin D and cringing at the sound of my very squeaky brakes. It was nice, but as I haven't ridden a bike recently, we didn't go far. Once we rolled back into our driveway and were standing around in the sunshine, Dan suggested going to the hardware store to buy a bucket and a sponge so he could wash his bike. Inspired, I volunteered to wash the car, and we hopped into the Subaru.

Lo and behold, when we pulled into the hardware store, I spotted something so wonderful, something so amazing, something so spring-like that it MUST be taken advantage of. It was the sight of many mini-vans parked next to the Dairy Ripple, with a line of small children accompanied by their mommies and daddies, queuing up at the window, each ordering whatever was their ice cream fancy! "Look Dan!" I said, "Looks like the Dairy Ripple is open!"

Amazingly astute husband that he is, he got my hint. After our small purchase, we walked over to the window, ordered our treats, and waited with glee. I think I was skipping, and if I wasn't, I was on the inside. When our order was up, we had our first ice cream of the season, sitting outside in the sunshine. I ate my chocolate-vanilla twist with great delight, and even stole a bite of Dan's Reeses Pieces Flurry. Today was the perfect early spring day.

a very good literary term

2009-03-01T21:50:00.000-05:00

Ever since I was a little boy I have enjoyed being outside. I think it is because I pretty much grew up outside. We had a swimming pool when I was little and I would always be outside swimming. My gram taught me how to swim when I was little and I just enjoyed being out there. If I wasn't swimming I think I was probably climbing trees. Trees with leaves, trees with thorns, and trees with needles; it really didn't matter what kind. I also enjoyed riding my bike. I tell you all of this to say that I think the main reason I have began to enjoy running is because of a simple reason. I enjoy being outside. We enjoying being outside. Friday night we went to Luckey's for dinner, and then we went to host Wii night. I bowled some, but mostly I studied for my accounting mid-term. Saturday Hil and I ran about 4 miles and went to church, which we enjoy immensely.

Sunday was our 10 mile run. We are training for our run around the lake. So we trained running on the lakeshore path. Now just pictures. Enjoy.

A little house on the lake

The power of water

Ice fishing done right, check out the grill

Another small house

wifey at mile six

the south end of me at mile eight

Our Wisconsin Winter Is Not Over

2009-02-21T15:42:00.000-05:00

We're back to snow storms. It's snowing and blowing outside, and thankfully we weren't planning on running today. The roads are periodically plowed, but a plow hasn't come by recently. Things are looking a little bit yucky, in short. We braved the snow, however, to visit Panera this morning (which is why the car is cleaned off). We had a Christmas gift card to use, so bagels and drinks it was for breakfast! It was a great Saturday morning date. Normally we sit in our p.j.s and watch The Office, but it wasn't a new episode this week. Panera was a good substitute.

On our date, besides planning on making our own bagels, we plotted our trip out West. Dan has actually done quite a bit of planning on the trip so far, getting mileage, driving times, and information on backpacking and camping fees, but we were talking about the really important stuff this morning: food and gear. For our anniversary, Dan got me a cookbook filled with recipes that lend themselves perfectly to camping, and we borrowed a food dehydrator from his parents, so we just may have a plan! (Dan just made a scathing comment about how I'm not going to use either of those things. Just because I haven't happened to use them since I've gotten them, does it mean that I'll never use it? Ha! I'll show him!) Our potential trips would include stops in Minneapolis, Theodore Roosevelt National Park, Glacier, Yellowstone, Teton, Lander, WY, Mt. Rushmore, Custer State Park, and the Badlands. We'll be adventuring out way throughout these parks, camping, hiking, biking, climbing and maybe even horseback riding.

The reason that we're planning this potential trip is that we're contemplating staying here for an extra semester. I could student teach here in Wisconsin, Dan could continue to work for OWLS if he chose, and we could live right here in our little farmhouse. So if we're sticking around and not moving, we're going to take a little trip out west. Anybody want to join us?

...I just might jump off a bridge if everyone else was

2009-01-30T14:54:00.000-05:00

Recently I watched a video about how blogging, youttube, and Facebook have forever changed the way information gets around. This is true because someone on facebook came up with a facebook forward. This particular Facebook forward (you know, the ones that generally say if you don't forward them your children will die or your friends will leave you?) was not that creative or anything, but it has caught on. So, in proving that people long to know about people...

25 random facts, habits, skills, etc., about me:

1. I think CJ-5's are 100% effective at curing the blues.
2. I want to learn how to fly fish and then do it with my dad.
3. I you gave me a plane ticket to anywhere, I'd be in New Zealand tonight.
4. Dogs were meant to be in my life, but currently I can't have one.
5. I can memorize movie lines better than anyone I know.
6. Grad school is amazingly thought-provoking, enjoyable, and, hopefully, beneficial.
7. Designing and building my own home is a dream I hope to fulfill.
8. Bigelow Constant Comment Tea is my favorite hot drink.
9. I think everyone should do a NOLS semester.
10. I enjoy playing cards.
11. My wife subbed 5 days this week which is awesome.
12. I killed Jesus.
13. I am currently refurbishing an old oil lamp to work on electricity.
14. I am blessed to be adjunct faculty as soon as I sign my contract.
15. Hilary and I are hoping to go out West in August for 2ish weeks.
16. I am a bike commuter, although I only have to go 7/10th of a mile.
17. Wifey and I are going out for dessert.
18. I secretively want a ridiculously large TV with Bose surround sound.
19. I don't have a passport.
20. I get excited about little things like a little boy at least twice a day.
21. I was stupid once and drove much faster than legally allowed just to see how fast I could go until I was scared.
22. I have a pocket dictionary for when I go backpacking just in case I don't know a word someone uses.
23. Another country will one day see Hilary and I help its citizens build houses.
24. I think the Steelers are going to win.
25. The North Country Brewery has some really good brews.

Three Dead Mice, Three Dead Mice

2009-01-17T11:56:00.000-05:00

The impetus for this post comes from several months ago, if the truth be told. My parents hinted at this story in their yearly Christmas letter and some have heard the whole story, but for the rest of you, here it is.

One day after we were here a couple of months, I was sitting in our living room, chatting with my mom on the phone. It was shortly after Dan's parents' visited, and during that visit, we had talked about mice and the fact that fortunately, there were no mice in our old, drafty farmhouse. Well, as I talked with my mom on the phone that night, my eyes were roaming the room, and what did I see except an itty bitty mouse run from underneath the closet doors where our washing machine is housed into the living room. I'm sure I screamed, but I don't really remember. My mom's eardrums are now damaged, though, so I'm pretty sure I did. I do remember standing on the couch, yelling about the mouse and for Dan.

My mom, I'm pretty sure, let me go so I could deal with the problem, which for me looked like standing off of the floor on chairs/sofas/stools and making my way upstairs. (I'm adding this in-enjoy-from me, Dan)

Dan assured me that my screams had frightened away the mouse, but I wasn't so convinced. The next morning, I was called in to sub, and Dan graciously walked downstairs first to "scare away the mice." After school, when I had safely made it through the day without seeing any mice, I went to Wal-Mart and bought a "friendly trap." You know, the kind that allows mice to run into it and munch on the cheese & peanut butter cracker you left for them. Then, of course, you dispose of the mouse in a humane manner by bringing it to -- I don't know -- maybe a farm where mice can run and be happy and not sneak into houses.

I set this up by myself, even though Dan scoffed at the contraption. I also let the college know about my problem (with the mice in the house, not my extreme fear of mice), and they brought over a bag full of sticky traps, which are like fly paper for mice. Like that's not the grossest thing I've ever heard of. Get a mouse stuck to a piece of paper so it can either a.) gnaw its little feet off or b.) rot to death on a sheet of paper. They also sprinkled some poison around the basement.

For a while, our rodent problem seemed to be solved. No droppings were seen, no scampering was heard, no mice were spotted. I even commented on this to our RA. I shouldn't have opened my mouth, because – that very night back in November – I was sitting in the bathroom, on the toilet, going potty, and looking at the corner of the wall and tub. When we moved in, they replaced the tub, but they didn't do a great job, and left about 3" of wooden floor exposed, and for the last two inches, there is a gap under the tub. After the first mouse scare, I would look at that spot and think, "I wonder if a mouse could run through there?" And I assured myself that a mouse couldn't get through there. So I'm sitting on the toilet, checking out the spider which took up residence there, thinking that I should go smoosh it as soon as I'm done peeing. And as I'm looking at the spider web, it moves, and a MOUSE sticks its head out.

I screamed bloody murder for Dan, who was fortunately home. He came running in, but of course, by that time the mouse had left for the basement. I was freaking out – crying and practically hyperventilating. In the course of screaming and freaking out, I put my legs straight out in front of me, which in turn caused the already fractured toilet seat to totally break under my bum. I quickly wiped and pulled up my pants and then sat on the counter, which in turn caused the counter to pull out of the wall. (Excellently constructed house I live in, eh?) I was crying and my heart was racing and I was also laughing at the havoc I was wrecking on the bathroom. I stayed in the bathtub as Dan bravely went into our creepy basement to put these sticky mousetraps on the ground.

Anyways, for a while our solution was to put duct tape over the bathroom hole, along with a 5 pound weight. Also, Dan took up checking on the status of the basement mouse traps. Once day, when Dan went down to check on the status of the mouse traps, one had totally disappeared. So there's probably a mouse hopping around the house, all of its feet stuck to a little piece of paper. It gives me the shudders to think about it. Yucky.

Eventually, we removed the 5 pound weight from in front of the hole along with the duct tape, and Dan put a piece of wood trim along the side of the tub, making it look a lot better and forcing mice to find another way into our downstairs. My fear that a mouse is going to pop up has greatly diminished, although after we got back from our three and a half week sojourn, I was a bit worried that they would have taken over our house. But no! No mice did we see.

Now to this lazy Saturday morning. When we woke up, I came downstairs for a normal morning bathroom visit and everything was normal. I started on breakfast, pouring cereal and milk and heating water for tea. Dan came down and attempted to rinse out his mug with warm water and realized that we had no water in the kitchen sink! He's been working on that for the rest of the morning, capable man that he is, which has taken him into the basement with a headlamp, looking in the crawlspace and setting up heating contraptions (which includes my hair dryer). It's been a while since he's been down there (I don't go there due to my phobia), and we would like to provide an update:

Three dead, frozen mice.

This makes the score Mice 2, Dan & Hilary 3.

Cold? Oh please, I sunbathe in this (round 2)

2009-01-14T23:32:00.000-05:00

An update...

Since the last post I haven't done anything exciting but nail a thermometer on the back porch. I got chilled in the driving wind at work moving a hundred pair of cross country skis. I haven't biked to work because my wifey drove me there so I could run on the treadmill and get to work early so I could leave early and spend more time with the wife in the afternoon. Today I walked to work and then she picked me up after she was done running.

These (new) shoes were made for running...and hopefully that is what they will do (on my feet).

Hopefully it gets warmer so we can run outside again.

Sorry for the boring post. Hopefully I get creative or sentimental like my sister-in-law.

Cold? Oh please, I sunbathe in this

2009-01-12T17:58:00.000-05:00

Today was my first day back to work in a little over a month. I honestly think that has been the longest period in my life that I have gone without working (getting a paycheck) since the summer of 1997 with the exception of my time at NOLS. There was much work to be done and I didn't accomplish a lot of it. We have two new GA's working with us so we showed them around and got them oriented to life in the office, hence, little real work. I have had many days of work since the summer of 1997. I did work before the summer of 1997, but not full-time. I have worked growing up since I was probably around 9 years old. I mowed the grass of two neighbors during the spring/summer/fall and shoveled snow in the winter for whoever would give me money after I shoveled their walk and driveway. Clever huh?

Speaking of snow, the last few days here have been amazing! We have been graced with multiple inches of snow and there are advisories for the rest of the week! We are to get a few more inches of snow and the temperature is going to drop.

The possibilities...

I only live .8 miles from work, but the next four days I get to bike to work in those temperatures.

Dear Lord, please let the car start for Hilary and please allow me to live in those temperatures. Amen.

Snowy Wisconsin

2009-01-10T21:35:00.000-05:00

After a month of neglecting our blog and nearly three and a half weeks of traveling, I’m sitting at the computer, trying to decide on what merits an inclusion in a blog post. I’m not really sure; I could talk about the highlights of our trip, which took us to Macedonia (Ohio), Mars (Pennsylvania), Houghton, Fredonia, and Panama (NY). I wish some of you would be fooled into thinking we visit exotic spots on our vacation, but that would be a little less than true. While we loved all the places we visited, not too many people would include them in the ‘exotic’ category. For us, they fall into the category of home – and yet, as we grow older and more independent – they aren’t entirely home. They are the places where our families live, and in a sense, that makes them part of our home. We love going back and visiting and sharing time together, don’t get me wrong. But really, home is beginning to really be where Dan and I live. Last year that was Belfast. This year it is Wisconsin. It’s nice to be (sort of) settled, as we are right now. I guess I’m a little surprised that what was lonely Wisconsin has turned into our home, at least for this year, but it has. And it’s nice to be back. Since we saw most of our readers over Christmas break, I won’t fill you in on the ins and outs of our trip this time. Maybe another day.

When we arrived here – home – there were a few inches of snow on the ground, and it was light out for at least 15 more minutes, compared to when we left. That was a nice change! I like sunshine. However, the next morning, when we finally dragged ourselves out of bed, it had snowed about 3 inches, and continued snowing throughout the day! The snow continued through today. I’m not sure of the exact number of inches we have outside because of the drifting, but I will take a gander and guess that there are about 16 inches of snow on the ground. (Is it are or is? My grammar class is failing me right now.) I’m glad we put our snow tires on the Subaru. Our maintenance men, who also happen to plow our driveway, like to plow us in, as opposed to out. Dan had to shovel our driveway today after they pushed a big pile and left it right in our way. We don’t really understand this.

Anyways, we’re gearing up for next semester, which starts on Monday. We both have evening classes Monday through Thursday, which will obviously limit the amount of time we have together. We’ve designated Fridays as our date night, which we kicked off yesterday by watching Marley and Me at the Showboat Movie Theater, complements of the college. It was the perfect date night movie – no bloody shooting scenes, no awkward “comedic” moments, no awful language. Although I did shed a few tears, I loved it. It was a nice family-type movie, a good end to the season of family visits, and a touching portrait of a couple who sticks through thick and thin.

An Advent Sunday

2008-12-14T18:47:00.001-05:00

Nothing much new to report here. It's Sunday -- the Steelers are playing (currently losing, but attempting to tie it up), we did some baking (flaky cream wafers), and it's getting increasingly closer to Christmas. It's Advent season! Unfortunately, the church we've been attending doesn't do the traditional Advent candles, and I've missed it. Oh, for the days at CCC when Mrs. E does a children's message.

So, yesterday Dan and I decided to go to the 5 o'clock "contemporary" service at another church. I was really hoping for candles and a Christmas season message, and boy! Did I ever get it, and more besides! We actually attended their annual Christmas concert, which was an amazing production. There was a choir of about 50 adults, a string and brass ensemble, skits, images, a toddler "Jesus" who looked like he was going to bolt from the stage, and even a live sheep. It was a great Christmas celebration.

Our favorite part of the whole evening was "Mary Did You Know." Having the whole choir really added to the song. They could actually communicate the urgency of the questions, the majesty of the concept, and the overall simplicity of the song. It was awesome. (The choir also did Emmanuel off of MWS Christmastime CD, which was exciting.)

We are so excited to be leaving Wisconsin for a few weeks. Nothing against Wisconsin, you know, but we are looking forward to celebrating Christmas with friends and family. We have presents piled on the spare room bed, cookies made in a plastic containers, clean clothes waiting to be packed, and lots left to do! Dan's finished with all of his schoolwork, but I've got a bit left. That and I would like to make two loaves of bread, pack EVERYTHING I need (for 3 weeks, it's a lot!), wrap Dan's present(s) so he doesn't peek at them, sweep up crumbs so no mice take up residence, tidy up the rest of our house, pack snacks and lunch for the car, go to class, and... well. I guess that was all. Maybe I won't sub tomorrow.

Dan is cheering for the Steelers to not tie it up, but to win! And I am going to go finish dinner so we can attend a Christmas concert at GWC tonight. Although the beautiful snow which was covering the buildings and trees has (unfortunately) melted, I am still in the Christmas spirit.

In light of that, Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

somewhat boring.

2008-12-09T20:30:00.000-05:00

Have you ever had a blah day? You know, the one were you really don't feel like you did much? Today that was me. Yesterday that was sort of me too. This is the first week of me not having to go to work. It also has been cold and windy outside. So much that classes have been canceled for two nights in a row. No work and no class. I did work on some homework for awhile, but that was boring and wasn't all that difficult. Final projects are sometimes just pulling other things together and formatting. Did I mention that I have been bored? Hilary did make some cookies the other day so I have been busy eating those, but other than that I haven't been doing much. Tomorrow I vow to be productive or go to the gym and lift for an hour.

Here are some of the cookies, although these are the boring non-decorated, non-iced, non-sugared ones.

And the reason for the elliptical and stationary bike yesterday...

I think I just may have to get me one of these! I know I won't, but it does look fun to try. Maybe I should just look around for used cross country skis for the winter months, oh, and a parachute to pull me around. All this wind would sure make it easy, I think the house is going to fall over. Hopefully tomorrow is more exciting!

The goose is getting fat.

2008-12-06T20:43:00.000-05:00

After only 2 full days of me actually considering running in this 22 mile run I have come up with an excuse/dilemma/problem: the average high temperature doing the crucial training period which I consider after Christmas until the end of April is approximately 41 degree, the average low, vientitres. Now that I have posted this I am sure my brother-in-law (no pun intended) will be sure to comment on this while my sister-in-law thinks the temperature is no big deal.

I do want to do this, I think. There is another thing that adds to my decision making. I have a weight room with equipment and a treadmill. Granted those things aren't awesome, those things also happen to be not what I was talking about. Recently I have managed to land a few pro-deals from some companies that makes running, in my opinion, somewhat affordable. Now I know running isn't expensive compared to biking or climbing, but when it comes to running things, I have nada. I could land gore-tex trail running shoes, nice winter running tights, and a nice hooded, thumb hole shirt and a mid-weight jacket for right around $150. If i just got the shoes and tights it could be $90. But, either way, that is green that I would rather spend on these, laced up with some 355's.

In reality, I think I'll be running. Maybe the half-marathon?

In other news...I am done with work for 2009. I've given up, thrown in the towel, paused for a month long work free, unfortunately, pay free vacation.

Proper Prior Planning Provides Positive Picture Posts

2008-12-02T22:58:00.000-05:00

This was me unwrapping Hilary's creatively wrapped pre-present.

Late Fall=International Harvester=windy house=super drafty windows=slippers and blankets

A cold, cold morning looking out towards Yerkes Observatory, the view from our back door

Thanksgiving 2008! Although this is not a very good representation.

A cold run, Dan prep run #1. A 22mile run May 9th? Graduating on the same day? Sounds like it could be something, now I just have to convince my right ankle.

All in a Morning's Run

2008-11-04T12:17:00.000-05:00

I've been running a bit more frequently since we moved here, for a couple of reasons. For one, there's really no good reason NOT to run, as I'm working only part time. Also, Williams Bay is a great place to run. People keep their dogs on leashes or in fenced yards, and this is a very big deal to me. Another reason? There is a trail around the lake.

This trail has varying levels of maintenance, due to the fact that property owners are mandated to have some sort of trail that connects from neighbor to neighbor. In other words, it's up to the property owners to decide what kind of trail they choose to install and maintain. In some places, homeowners have brick paths; in other spots, it's a dirt trail. I normally run through a couple of beaches, on some dirt, and along gorgeously maintained paths with mansions alongside.

On Halloween, the weather was incredible -- the kind of weather parents wish occurred on every Halloween. It was warm (in the 60s), sunny, and there was a nice warm breeze. No parents had to force their child to wear a snowsuit underneath his or her costume. I'm sure parents were happy, and kids were happy too. I was so excited to go running, in fact, on this beautiful day, that I skipped down the stairs in our house and smacked my head on the door frame, resulting in a cut tongue and a painful bump. I almost let that deter me, but as I was all ready -- my shoes were even on -- I wasn't able to excuse myself, so I set off for a run.

On this day, I decided to run downtown and along the other side of the bay. Normally I run immediately to the lake and run along the trail on one side of the bay, but I had my adventure on. And here is the following run, in pictures.

Happy exploring! Dan and I are off for an adventure this weekend -- camping in the UP of Michigan. We'll let you know how our adventure turns out.

A weekend away

2008-10-25T13:40:00.000-04:00

Last weekend I was at a conference in Baraboo, WI. It was a CAA conference at a cool place with some cool folks. It is always good to be around people who value and love what you value and love. It was also a great networking time, I even got a quazi-job offer, which at this time we are not sharing. At the conference we watched a video and talked about the disconnect that students in college are feeling these days. We talked about the idea that college students don't know what the heck they are doing in school and how they all feel pressured to do it just because. Now not everyone of course, but some. And now, the video...

So, what do you think? Creative, different, challenging, curious, or stupid?

We discussed if we as outdoor education professionals are part of the solution, and if so, how to get there.

Anyway, Hilary went to visit Kate and Jon in Minneapolis so on Sunday after the conference was over I went for a walk in Devil's Lake State Park, right across the street from where the conference was held. As a one car family, I had to wait to get picked up, but I had 5 hours, so a long walk. Some pictures so you can appreciate the beauty.

Does it look like those rocks would move apart? They do by the way, I was there the previous day helping teach an anchor lesson and we moved the rocks with only 2 people.

mmmmmm...fall.

Next on the agenda, eating lunch, going out to do some running around, and finding Hilary a bike by Spring 2009.

Sunday

2008-10-12T20:57:00.000-04:00

No, your eyes aren't broken, you saw the price per gallon. We did have $0.38 off per gallon though, but still.... Why the low gas prices? (We appreciate it!) Why do I think just under three bucks is cheap? Anyway.

This week has been busy. Last weekend my parents came out to visit. It was fun seeing them. We went out to dinner, went to church (my second time since out here), watched the Steelers win, and went fishing. I almost caught myself a delicious bass. I had it in and close but it swam under the dock and snapped my line on one of the posts. I really want to catch that fish sometime. Maybe it lives nearby. I do feel bad for my parents as it rained almost the entire time they were here. I am glad they came though. Hilary made a delicious apple pie that was amazing!

Don't you want some? I am home alone tonight. Hilary went to a concert tonight with the youth group because they needed an extra driver. I hope she is having fun at the meet and greet with the BarlowGirls. Some pictures to finish this off.

Different strokes, confusion.

2008-10-01T22:22:00.000-04:00

Tonight you get to go inside the mind of Dan. His thought process sometimes goes like this.
While thinking about Christmas present ideas for himself, he thought of a tool box, which he really does not want after some thought, but it led him to look at the best tools around, SK I figure. Guess how much these tools cost, the complete set...go ahead, I'll give you time...
you are wrong by the way, try $1,468.03, nice try though. And in my sick mind I thought, I could use those, why not have the best? Crazy, unless your a mechanic I guess. Hilary and I have been thinking a lot about how our country and lives revolve around money more or less, or at least how Americans value money, expensive cars, and good schools and neighborhoods. Huh? So my brain is scattered. I sold my car last night in less than 30 minutes. He showed up at 6:45, I drove it with him down the road, he drove it back, he offered me money and pulled it out of his wallet. I went inside, signed over the title, wrote a little letter saying I sold it for X amount of dollars to Y person and we both signed it. I then emptied my truck and took off the plates. He gave me the cash, I gave him the title and the keys, bye bye Jetta, you will be missed. German performance gone. Jeep maybe in a year!?

something else I stumbled upon doing research for class that I like and it may make you think, maybe not. I am of course a recreation administration major who loves experiential education and hands on learning, an advocate of non-academia type testing, nature, and all things adventurous/wild. I'll let you try to make sense of my thoughts, because I have yet to do it. A little video.

I have no questions for you. I have no answers.

367 Days of Marriage

2008-10-01T12:43:00.000-04:00

On Monday, Dan and I celebrated our one year anniversary. It has been a wonderful year of ups and downs, dreaded decisions and unexpected adventures. And we've happily made it thus far, but only because God has been faithful to us through it all!

We decided to spread out our celebration, beginning on Friday and continuing through Monday. Dan, ever thoughtful, informed me that we were going on a surprise date on Saturday. A surprise! I spent a majority of the week guessing what we were going to be doing -- hiking? a picnic? walking around the lake? Apparently, at some point I actually guessed what we were going to do, but Dan was so convincing with his offhanded "maybe" that I forgot what I had guessed when he told me (on Saturday) that I had already guessed it.

Anyhoo, the surprise was not ruined. After lunch, we hopped in the car for our surprise adventure date, and ended up at an Apple Festival! I LOVE apples. Crisp, beautiful, tasty, delicious, nutritious... I could go on and on. (In fact, one of my professors at Houghton wrote me a little poem about an apple after I jokingly left one on his desk during Modern British Poetry. Unfortunately, I think it was deleted along with my email account at Houghton. Otherwise, I would include it for you today.) Alas, Dan has some issues when it comes to eating uncooked apples (have you ever heard of someone's lips getting red and itchy when eating one?), but he loves me so much that he brought me there.

But just perhaps it was also the allure of fresh apple cider doughnuts and apple cider, both of which we sampled/devoured. We also picked a ten pound bag of apples, mostly Cortlands, which I love. (Duh.) I've been steadily diminishing our stock since then, but Dan made me promise to bake him a pie. Maybe that was an ulterior motive as well. It was really fun to pick our own apples. I don't think I've picked apples since I was a little girl, visiting Uncle Dave and Aunt Amy. Every time Dan and I go to pick fresh produce, we dream about having our own land with fruit trees and bushes and a big garden. Last year we made and froze many quarts of applesauce, something we'd like to do again on a regular basis in the future!

There were tons of people at this festival. Wisconsin gets a lot of visitors from Illinois, who like to take advantage of all of the "country" activities. We saw at least ten red wagons hauling kids and apples and pumpkins. A bunch of kids who were really too little to pick apples were carrying around their own apple picking bags (which could hold up to 10 lbs.). I know they were too short to reach the apples on the trees, so I guess it was just to let them feel included. But, as Dan and I were walking between rows of trees, we saw one mom call out to her child, perched in a tree, "Honey, I'm glad you're having fun, but I can't find your apple bag anywhere." Yes, there were so many kids having so much fun that they forgot to continue carrying their bag of apples. Sigh. We were hoping to find the bag, but unfortunately, the kiddo hid it so well that we were unable to. I just had to settle for snitching an extra apple to eat while we picked.

I haven't made the apple pie yet, but I plan on doing so when Dan's parents visit this coming week. (Yay!) I have many more pie crusts to make until I can compete with my momma, who makes a seriously beautiful pie crust.

Our first anniversary was a beautiful time to remember where we were one year ago and the commitments we made that day. (In case you weren't there, you can still check out our pictures on www.donhillstudio.com, under Dan and Hilary's Wedding. While you're there, check out my cousin's gorgeous pics under Eric and Laura's wedding.) On our actual anniversary we laid low, ordered deep dish pizza and wings, ate some still awesome wedding cake, and watched the Steeler's win. Thank you to all of you who have encouraged us on this journey. We love you all!

Grouchy Golfers and Their Balls

2008-09-26T17:47:00.000-04:00

Daniel Bruce apparently has a passion for creeping through the woods in order to find abandoned golf balls. I didn't know this when I married him, but I discovered it because of our rather recent move and our subsequent proximity to the golf course. Our house is approximately .4 miles from the local golf course (although we could just go through the cornfield and emerge onto the course), but I prefer to go the path more traveled in this case.

Anyways, on Wednesday night, Dan's evening class was canceled and so we decided to go on a little excursion. Days are getting shorter, so we drove over (as to not be hit by a speeding Caddy on the way home) and parked near the climbing wall, where Dan brings groups!

So, we jumped into the woods and started searching for golf balls. Dan--having more experience in this game--was winning handily, when a man in a golf cart drove by. Being the friendly (western) New Yorker that I am, I waved. Apparently, it would have been better to not attract his attention. He drove over to the edge of the woods and, while still on the seat of his golf cart, asked, "What are you doing?" I looked at Dan, Dan looked at me, while the gentleman waited. Dan told him that we were just looking for golf balls, to which the many asked another question: "But are you golfing?" Dan, much to my amusement, replied that we were not currently golfing. (Neither of us have any firm intentions of golfing on this course ever, really, so the word currently was a bit of a white lie.) "Well, you really shouldn't be here," Mr. Grumpy Gills replied.

Dan and I were a bit dumbfounded. Obviously, no one was really very interested in retrieving their balls. Otherwise, they'd be out there poking around the woods. So Dan tried to reiterate, saying, "But we're just looking for lost golf balls." Mr. Cranky-Pants was not appeased and drove off, but not before he told us again that we really shouldn't be there.

As many of you know, I am a law abiding person. I don't like getting in trouble and I don't like to be reprimanded. But, in this case, Grumpy Gills the Grandpa Golfer did not persuade me to give up. In fact, I was being a bit of a whiner before he came, but after he left, I was very enthusiastic to continue our search. He didn't actually tell us that we HAD to leave, he just suggested it. To which end we surmised that he didn't have any authority whatsoever to tell us to leave. Besides, we pay tuition so he can golf on the public, college-owned golf course.

In total, Dan won the golf ball search with eight and I lost with only four. Now we only have 88 more golf balls to find before we can sell all 100 online for about $15 on ebay! As this not only was a fun date but an opportunity to be entrepreneurs, we would suggest this activity for a date when you don't have any money to spend. We'd give it four and a half stars out of ten for fun activities. Mr. Grumpy Gills made it even better, so we cannot guarantee that you'll have the same great experience! If you do try it, make sure and let us know! (But by then we'll have so many golf balls on sale on ebay that yours won't be worth anything.)

Midwest, Midweek Climbing

2008-09-18T21:48:00.000-04:00

So I had a few days off mid week this week, so we used those days up American style. We had excess, so we burned it away. I welcome you to Devil's Lake State Park, Baraboo, WI.

Some scree on the approach. It reminds me of climbing the Grand Teton. Hilary liked the trail and said it was gnarly [HS: yes, you know me and the climbing lingo!]. She also said hiking in Crocs isn't recommended on gnar-nasty approaches [HS: true. Also, don't get dehydrated and wear Crocs. I almost slipped on the steep descent!]. We climbed a little bit because that is what we went to do. Two of my work buddies came as well, Noel (the guy version) and Ian (nicknamed JP for Junior Protoge), oh, and Noel's daughter and friend came too! Ask me sometime and I'll explain the situation if you care to know. (It is a bit weird) No good pictures of us climbing, so the walk out. [Dan ordered me to stop taking pictures of him while he was belaying, otherwise there would be some amazing pics of him staring at the bottom of the cliff.]
Also in this blog I would like to tell you about my awesome wife, you may know her, her name is Hilary. She made one of the best pizzas I have ever eaten. She first spent about 1.5 hours making mozzarella cheese with a kit she got awhile back. Then she sat on her butt for .25 seconds. Then she began making a deep crust pizza dough, which required boiling and mashing potatoes as well as making a quasi-normal bread dough. While this lazy butt sat around doing homework [sleeping?] the wife then also prepared the pizza, but then screamed [oh please] for help when she needed sauce made, cause I'm a mad awesome sauce maker. For real dog. [For real dog.]

It is about the time during the show where the actors get tired and want to go eat ice cream soaked [I suggested choosing the word covered] in chocolate, which is what I am going to do. [Me too. Love you guys!]

We killed them ALL!

2008-09-11T21:45:00.000-04:00

Blogging Rule #1- Come up with a good title.
Blogging Rule #2- Contents must be accurate.
Blogging Rule #3- Contents must include humor.

We try to follow all three of these rules but sometimes we fail. We shall begin.

Once upon a time, in a land far far away, there was a couple who lived in a small little white house on an old farm. At odd times of the day, small little creatures with wings would hatch, and fly around and around. This couple did not really enjoy the small little creatures with wings flying around their kitchen at odd times during the day, so they did something about it. Que awesome fight sequence music. At the odd times during the day, the couple would silently sneak up on the little creatures and study their flying patterns. They would calculate their flight plans using complex algorithms laid out on the dining room table with the help of two, yes two, TI-89's. Weapons would then be gathered and ceremonially cleansed. Then, they would wait.

And wait.

And wait. Until all was still and the moment was right. And then...

they would strike!

And then, until suddenly, there were no more.

Dead Fly Total for today- 20!

Sore shoulders from swinging the towel so much-1

Towel we have to clean because
Sir Knight Dan is amazing- 1

Pictures with amazing detail- 1
(see below)
I double dog dare you to click on this picture to make it bigger.
Tonight we had a showdown and the humans won. Hilary says she had a showdown today at lunch with these nasty creatures with a broom, at which she also destroyed. The broom is fine in case you were concerned.

Stay tuned for more awesome adventures.

Next adventure planned...

a short mountain bike adventure with the wifey. She gets to borrow one of my co-workers full suspension Schwinn. Hopefully it does not rain tomorrow.