The life of Me :)

Vacation! (The End)

2011-09-14T19:00:00.000-07:00

Thursday morning it was POURING rain. We went out for breakfast and then headed to Shedd Aquarium. After walking in the rain, we were thankful for our City Pass when we saw how long the line to get in was. We went in a separate door and went straight in. The aquarium was PACKED, mostly with kids. It was hard to see the animals and wasn't a very enjoyable experience. The 4D Planet Earth show was neat. We ate lunch at the cafeteria which wasn't too busy when we got there, but got very busy very quickly after we got there.

After lunch we headed to Adler Planetarium, which is right by the Aquarium. It was a longer walk that we expected, but not horrible. The planetarium had a much smaller crowd so we could actually see the exhibits and have some space to walk around. It was much more enjoyable than the aquarium.

When we left the Planetarium, we went to Gino's East for another round of deep dish pizza. It felt good to sit after walking around most of the day. The pizza was good, but I preferred the pizza we had earlier in the week at Giordano's.

Friday, our last day in the city, we started the day at Willis Tower. This is the building formerly known as Sears Tower. The building is BLACK and we went in the main entrance at first and quickly were asked what we were looking for. The security guard was nice and let us know there was a separate entrance for tours.

At Willis Tower we went out on "the ledge" for a unique view of the city. There are glass boxes that stick out from the building so that you can look straight down to the city below. It was a pretty neat view of things. Heights don't bother me so I thought it was neat, but a lot of people were afraid to go out in the boxes.

From there we headed to Millennium Park and saw "The Bean." It was pretty fun to see all of the random reflections in it.

After walking around the park, we had lunch at yet another pizza place. This time we had thin crust and it was amazing. Probably the best pizza we had on the trip and we picked it because it was where we were, not because it was recommended like the other pizza places we went.

Once we were full, we headed to the Field Museum. This is right by Soldier Field, Adler Planetarium, and Shedd Aquarium. Needless to say, we were familiar with the area. It was a decent walk from public transportation, and I read that you could take a bus from the train stop to the museum, so we tried that. Bad idea. Our bus headed way north. Eventually we got off and walked back to the train and chose to walk when we got back to the right stop. An hour later, we were where we wanted to be. The field museum is huge. LOTS and LOTS to see. We didn't come close to seeing it all, but hit the highlights since we were there near closing.

Our final stop in the city was US Cellular Field, home of the Chicago White Sox. We shared some helmet nachos before we headed to our seats. See the word "Sox" in the guacamole? The white sox were playing the red sox, so it was appropriate for either team :)

US Cellular is also a newer stadium. It wasn't as impressive as Miller Park, but was nice and again the weather was nice.

One thing I saw there that I hadn't seen before, was a walk around Margarita vendor. It was hard to get a picture, but see below. He work a "backpack" full of margaritas that had a tap so he could fill cups as he walked around. He was very popular.

We sat by a bunch of Red Sox fans. After the game, which the WHITE sox won, there was a fireworks show.

Saturday we made the long drive home. It really isn't that far, but we ended up sitting in construction and driving in circles near Moline, IL/Davenport, IA. We were glad to be home, but sure enjoyed the time away!

Vacation! (The Middle)

2011-09-13T19:00:00.000-07:00

Tuesday morning we headed north of the city to Milwaukee. It was about a two hour drive, so not bad at all. When we got to Milwaukee we headed to Miller Brewery. After having to wait FOREVER to tour Anhesuer-Busch in St. Louis last year, I wanted to get there as soon as possible so we could go do something else while we waited. Of course, there was about a 15 minute wait for the next tour so we did that first. It was a nice tour, much more laid back than the other brewery tour we'd been on.

After the tour and samples we headed to a casino for lunch and to do some gambling. The casino was huge, but kind of hard to find slots that were open and weren't too expensive. After playing there for awhile, we went and checked in to our hotel and unloaded our stuff. Tuesday evening we went to another baseball game and saw the Brewers take on the Cubs. Miller Park is fairly new and very nice. It's much different than Wrigley :) It's one of the cleanest, nicest ball parks I've been to. The parking situation is kind of a mess, you literally drive in circles around the Park to park. It was a beautiful evening for baseball which didn't hurt either :)

Wednesday we had breakfast and heading back to Chicago...in the pouring rain. About halfway back we stopped to tour the Jelly Belly warehouse. We had to wait quite a while and the tour was just fair. We rode on a train in a circle around a small warehouse and watched videos. Not really worth the wait. The Jelly belly shop was fun and we bought gifts for several family members.

When we got back to Chicago, we drove along Lake Shore Drive and headed straight to Navy Pier. We went on an architecture boat tour which was very informative. We learned about different buildings old and new. Brandon enjoyed being out on the water the most :) When the tour was over we walked around Navy Pier and rode the ferris wheel.

We were originally planning to stay for that evening's fireworks, but it was looking stormy so we headed to our hotel instead. While driving to it, we ended up driving by North Park again. This time I made sure to take a picture :)

Vacation! (The Beginning)

2011-09-12T20:59:00.000-07:00

The last week of July Brandon & I spent in the Chicago/Milwaukee area. We drove so we could explore both cities, but mostly took public transportation around this city. I only sent us the wrong way once...not too bad.

The first day (Saturday) we went to Soldier Field to see Chicago Fire take on Manchester United. Soldier Field is pretty impressive. Very old originally, but has been mostly updated and seems new. On part of the stadium, they left the old original seats and columns. They're outside of where the current seating is, but pretty impressive to see. The soccer game was also a lot of fun. Brandon was VERY excited about it.

After the game we we to Giordano's for deep dish pizza. The pizza was delicious, but our waitress was quite annoying. After dinner we went and checked in to our hotel. The lady at the front desk told us there had been some damage to the hotel and we would see workers on our floor. We said ok and checked it. We had learned earlier in the day Chicago had a massive rain storm that morning. We took the elevator to our floor (4 of 5), and as soon the doors opened we heard the fans. This is looking down the hall on our floor:

It was hot and very noisy. Our room was at the end of the hall, so we had to navigate our luggage around all of the fans. It was a pain, and when we complained at checkout the man at the front desk didn't seem to care. The room we were in was very nice though and didn't have any damage.

On Sunday we headed to Wrigley Field to see the Cubs play. Wrigley reminded me a lot of Fenway, since they are both very old. Our view was a little weird. We were in the very back of the "second" level.

After the game we headed downtown for dinner at Ed Debevic's, a diner where the waiters are rude to you on purpose. And you get to wear fun paper hats.

To end our evening we headed to the John Hancock tower to watch the sunset. It was pretty neat to see the city transition from light to dark.

Monday we stayed near our hotel for the day and had a more laid back day. We went to Legoland Discovery Center in the morning. We mainly went there because my husband, the Lego Master Builder, is quite fascinated with Legos. But to be honest, a lot of the stuff there was pretty neat. Parts of it were very kid oriented, but there were some impressive sights to see as well.

We also went to a mall nearby, that had a Lego store, and walked around some. That afternoon we drove to North Park University, the Covenant College. I grew up in an Evangelical Covenant Church and every preacher we had, and some of their kids/my friends went to school here. It was neat to see. It was in a busy part of the city, so it was tricky to get a picture. We went out for dinner near our hotel that evening and just kicked back at the hotel for the night.

A weekend with the Pikes

2011-08-25T18:21:00.000-07:00

For 4th of July weekend I headed to SW KS to my aunt and uncle's house. Heading from one corner of the state may not sound like a fun drive to make alone, but with the speed limit increasing to 75 from 70, the trip seemed much quicker. I used to spend about a week at my Aunt Leanne's house every summer when I was growing up. Sometimes I went alone and sometimes I went with my siblings. Leanne always planned crafts for us to do. We often played Bingo with prizes from the grocery store or went to the pool with a Blue Jay, their high school mascot, painted on the bottom. My aunt also had a couple baskets of books w/ books on tape and I'd sit by the stereo in her dining room and listen to books. One of the last summers I went there I learned how to knit, something I did a lot in college and still do some from time to time.

I arrived at my aunt's Friday evening. 2 of my cousins were already in town and another one came after I got there. That night we hung out in the backyard and talked. This group of cousins are ones that I don't see as often as a lot of my family. One of the couples lives in the middle east, one in arizona, and the other in dallas. When I do see them, it's usually when our whole family is together, so it was nice to have more one on one interactions.

Saturday morning when I got up my aunt was making Swedish Pancakes, pretty much a staple in our family. A staple I need to learn how to cook, btw. We spent most of the day at my aunt's house relaxing. That evening we went to a pool at my uncle's niece's house...not my cousin, but cousin of my cousins. It felt great to swim :)

Sunday we went to church and I talked to the vet's wife...her husband and my dad went to school together and our families keep in touch. After a HUGE lunch, my mom & sister got there. Sunday evening was Benda night at my aunt's house. All but one of my aunt's was there, so it was a pretty packed place. Luckily the weather was cooler, so a lot of us ate outside.

Monday was the 4th of July.

My aunt made her famous biscuits and gravy for everyone. Then we hurried and got ready and headed to the parade. A few of the family members were in it and the rest of us watched.

The biker in the red, white, and blue skirt and the two kids in the wagon are kids of 2 of my cousins. The couple in standing by the wagon are one of my cousins & his wife.

After the parade, we headed to the grade school for the turtle race,

snow cones, money dig for kids, and bought our ducks for the duck race. For the duck race, they flood part of a street and let out hundreds of ducks that are numbered.

The first 10 or so to the end get prizes. There are obstacles for the ducks to get around/get trapped at. Pretty fun to watch. My duck didn't win, but one of my cousins had 2 winners!

Right after the race I headed back to my aunts, loaded my car, and headed east. Fun weekend and lots of extended family time :)

June, part 2

2011-08-09T19:25:00.000-07:00

The last weekend in June we went to visit my family. It was a busy weekend in their small town with the car show and rod run. We went home on Thursday and got to see my brother & sister play softball. Town team, co-ed. Nothing fancy. But it was fun to see them play :)

Friday morning I spent the morning with my sister while Brandon golfed with my mom. After lunch, Brandon & I went and visited both of my grandma's and spent some time at my aunt & uncle's house. It was a lot of country driving, but good to see them all. I took a slight detour on the way home and almost made us late for dinner, but we weren't the last ones home so it wasn't a big deal :)

Saturday was busy with the car show. My mom & sister entered my dad's '75 Chevelle Malibu Classic...the same car Brandon & I left the church in after our wedding. It was hot on that street and I runied a pair of Teva's due to the tar on the street, but the day was fun. In the morning we walked around and looked at cars, in the afternoon there was a poker run around town. We ended up with a decent hand, but didn't win anything. Later in the afternoon were the awards. My parents' vet clinic was a sponsor so they gave a sponsor trophy to their pick..a yellow truck. While they were taking pics for it, they announced that my dad's car won a sponsor trophy from another business. My mom didn't hear and didn't realize what was going on for a little bit. That night were the drag races at the airport. My sister's boyfriend, S-Dogg, raced his Camero and Mary rode with him. His car is the silver one on the left.

At the end of June we also finished painting our office. This was the hardest color to choose of the 3 rooms we've painted. I decided on purple pretty early on, but couldn't decide if I wanted all purple, or purple and grey. I grew up in a K-state family, and am very familiar with all of the different shades of purple that exist. Blue-purple, grey-purple, pinkish-purple, k-state purple...the list goes on and on. Now imagine all of those in paint chips. Oh my, that was not a fun decision. We ended up going with a color named something about grape juice. I'm pleased with our pick. I'm planning to hang our diplomas and other K-state items in here.

June, part 1

2011-07-31T15:16:00.003-07:00

Another month is almost done and I'm still behind on blogging...maybe someday I'll be caught up again :)

June...along with the rest of the summer so far was HOT. and DRY. Hot isn't so weird for eastern KS, but dry certainly is.

We spent most of the first weekend of June at KS Speedway. Brandon got free tickets to the see the "big boys" race on Sunday and we ended up getting free tickets to the truck races on

Saturday as well. Saturday we sat in the shade so the heat was bearable, but Sunday was pretty toasty. I lathered on the sunscreen and managed to avoid a sunburn.

A view of the stands from the middle of the track:

Brandon and his parents before the race:

Brandon's mom retired from working at a church the weekend before, so this was the first Sunday of her retirement. She enjoyed the day very much :)

Two weeks later, we had another busy weekend. We started our last house painting projects. Our office looked like this when we moved in:

The pink and white stripes are also leopard print. And this is what it looked like with a coat of primer:

You'll have to wait for the next post to see the actual paint :)

That same weekend we lost a tree to storm damage.

Because it broke at the trunk, we had to have the entire thing removed. No more tree in our backyard. We'll replant in the fall when it isn't so hot and dry. We are very fortunate that it didn't fall on our house or our fence.

To end this busy weekend, we went to Brandon's parents' house for Father's Day. We got to see our cute (and growing!) nephew again:

We gave him those sweet threads. Gotta start early!!!

Here's Brandon & his dad:

The rest of May

2011-06-23T20:20:00.000-07:00

The rest of the month wasn't quite as busy as the first week, but we still had plenty going on.

The second weekend in May we headed to Sublette for my cousin Anna's high school graduation. We got to see a lot of my family and helped get ready for Anna's party. She was one of the 4 valedictorians in her class so we got to see her speak :)

While we were in Sublette for the weekend, my office moved from downtown KCMO to one of the buildings on the Sprint Campus. I have a pictures from the first day there that will come in another post. Brandon and I ride together to work 3 days a week, are both at home 1 day, and I go to campus another while Brandon works from home. Due to changing my hours to 7-3:30 I'm now home around the time that I was leaving downtown. I love having longer evenings!

The weekend after graduation I played Corporate Challenge Softball for work. My team t

ook 2nd and I did a stellar job in right field ;) I was pretty pleased with my batting and went several at-bats before striking out. On Sunday we played 3 games in a row to fight our way back to the championship. It was an tiring weekend, but a lot of fun.

Memorial Day weekend was another busy one. Brandon's birthday was mid

-week so we celebrated just the 2 of us on his b-day with dinner at Zio's. We went last year, but I had strep so it was not an enjoyable experience for either of us. This year was much much better :) Memorial Day weekend started with a "Bless Your Heart Cindy" celebration on Friday night. It was a fun night to celebrate all Brandon's mom has done for her church in her years there. The committee put a lot of time in to it and Cindy loved it. We had dinner there as well. The church basement was decorated like a wedding reception, so they really went all out! Sunday we went back to Leavenworth for her last Sunday as organist and music director. It was a great service followed by a church potluck. It had been quite a while since I'd been to one of those, and boy have I missed them! Monday we had all of Brandon's family over to celebrate his birthday. We had a burger bar with all sorts of toppings. It was also another chance to get to hold and play with Willem :)

I was the cake decorator this time. Caden, our nephew, started calling Brandon "Donkin" since the first time he met him. It look him quite a while to figure out his real name. Brandon's whole family now calls him by the nickname.

A Week with the Whites..aka the first week of May

2011-06-22T20:20:00.000-07:00

The first week of May was a very busy one and we saw a lot of Brandon's family.

Tuesday we went to see my brother-in-law's high school choir's spring concert and awards.

Thursday we went to our nephew's 1st grade concert. The picture is kinda blurry, but he's the cute one rocking the white sweater vest :) The concert was super cute and they sang some clever songs. My favorite was probably "Soap and Water" to the Tune of Beyonce's "Single

Ladies."

Friday our nephew Willem was born. We decided to wait until Saturday to go meet him and visit his excited family.

Saturday we headed to the hospital to meet Willem. That day was the first time Brandon had ever held a baby. He was nervous but did just fine.

Willem has a VERY proud big brother.

We spent the night with Brandon's parents so on SUNDAY we could celebrate Mother's Day. We went to church and then had lunch with his parents.

We were planning to head to the hospital after that and then head home, but as we were finishing lunch we found out my sister in law and Willem were going home that day. We headed to their house and were there to welcome them and help them get settled.

April

2011-06-21T19:50:00.000-07:00

Three months and no post..I'm a blogging slacker. I'll write a few posts to catch you all up and then hopefully become a little more regular at posting.

April 2011 in Review

We started the month visiting my parents for my mom's birthday. We went out for dinner and went bowling, then went to the pasture near their house for some VERY windy stargazing with Brandon's telescope. We also had lunch with my Grandma Benda to celebrate her birthday as well.

Not long after we got home from their house, it starting hailing:

Luckily we didn't have damage.

We continued removing the pink rooms from our house and tackled the bathroom.

It went from this:

To this:

The month ended with my birthday and several celebrations for it. We started on Easter, celebrating with Brandon's family, then I celebrated with friends from work, then Brandon & I celebrated, and we ended with my entire family coming to town to stay with us and celebrate. We went out for dinner and to a Royals game :) Then we came back and had awesome cake that Brandon made and decorated.

Busy month, but lots of fun and celebrating!

Projects

2011-03-12T19:52:00.000-08:00

In the last month we've been tackling some projects around here. My mom came President's Day weekend and took down wallpaper in two bedrooms and a bathroom. The weekend before last, Brandon and I painted one of the bedrooms.

Bye Bye Princess Room...

Hello Yellow!

The other project I've been working on is getting ready for my sister-in-law's baby shower. She's due in May and my MIL and I threw a shower for her last weekend. One of my contributions was a diaper cake. I'd helped make a couple, but this is the first one I'd made on my own and I'm pretty pleased with it.

77. Post to my blog every day for one month

2011-02-11T19:40:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...what it's like to post every day for 31 days. Today is day 31. It's been a good experience, but also kind of hard. Some days I struggled with a topic, but then I'd get a comment and it would be worth it. I won't be updating every day going forward, but I will but updating more than once a month. Hopefully it will be at least once a month, but no guarantees.

I put this on my list of 101 in 1001 to kick start being a better blogger. It has accomplished that. I will continue to blog, even though I know there aren't a lot of people that read it. We'll go with quality and not quantity of readers :)

Auditorium

2011-02-10T19:48:00.001-08:00

Today I learned...what the auditorium at GEHS looks like. Brandon & I went and saw the high school production of "You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown." The high school was built in 2000 so the auditorium is nice and new. And big. This show has a very small cast, 6 students, but they did a good job. This is the 3rd high school I've seen this performed at and it's neat to see how each director handles the set and such.

Versatile Blogger

2011-02-09T19:10:00.003-08:00

Today (or a few days ago) I learned...that I won a Versatile Blogger award :) My friend and former roomie Lindsey at Moylan Mayhem gave me this award, thanks LM. Lindsey & I met in Boyd Hall freshman year and have lots of memories from waiting in line with the line nazi JP and random times in the dorm. Even though she got married and left us after first semester of sophomore year, we've stayed good friends due to e-mails, group chats, blogs, weddings, and a lunch date in KC. Proof that friendships can last even if you live miles apart :)

Since I've been tagged the rules are to tell 10 things about myself that people may or may not know. Then I pass the award on to 7 other bloggers. I google searched this and apparently there are several variations of this award, but I'll stick to the rules from LM.

My 10 things:
1. Although I am a very proud Kansan (just as some of my Missouri co-workers), I was born in Missouri. I only lived there for 18 months before moving to KS where I have lived, other than one summer, ever since.
2. I read the post on LM's blog the day she posted and have been struggling with both lists. Since my blog links to facebook, I'm not sure who actually reads it, but there are lots of possibilities. This also limits the things that people won't know about me. People from Oberlin would know some things, people from KSU others, and people from KC even more. A very few would know all. I decided to not think it out and just write what comes to me. Could be an interesting post :)
3. I have a facebook, twitter, and blogger account. I do a good job updating 2 of the 3. Which two varies...currently blogger & twitter seem to be winning. Seriously though, if you have twitter AND facebook, how do you decide what to tweet and what to use for a status update? Should it be the same? Personal struggle right there.
4. I've been married almost 2 1/2 years and have lived 4 different places with my husband. The apartment B lived in before we were married and for the first few months of our marriage, our first house, my in-laws while we were in between houses, and our current home. I do not plan to move for a long time. I said that when we bought our first house, but two moves later I'm much more determined to stay where I am!
5. I adore my Grandma Benda. She's a caring and wonderful lady. I lived within 20 miles or so of her until I went to college. I used to see her every Sunday at church. When she & my Grandpa decided to move to town from the farm, they bought a house across the street from where I lived. I'm named for her...my middle name Eulaine (you-lane) is her first name. When I was in grade school everytime I had to write a paper about someone I admire or something along those lines, I wrote about her. She makes the best fried chicken and Swedish pancakes. I have a lot of memories of spending time at her house when my parents were out of town. She has dementia now and although she still knows me, she is not the same person that I have so many great memores of from when I was younger. My husband doesn't know the Grandma that I have memories of and my children certainly won't. She's still great to be around and says some very funny things. They're mostly funny because she says what she thinks now and doesn't hold back. I'm rambling. In short, I love my Grandma Benda :)
6. I still drive the car I drove in high school. My '99 Olds Alero gets me from point A to point B. I bought it the summer before my senior year of high school and still have it almost 9 years later. Pretty impressive since it was used when I got it. It certainly has some flaws...like the heat/AC only work on the highest two settings, but nothing major. When we got married we decided that I'd keep it until something major happened. Nothing major has happened so I still have it. It helps that I take the bus to work most days and it's helping us save money and pay down other debts.
7. The second thing that crossed my mind when my husband proposed, after "I can't believe this is happening now." was "Has he asked my dad?" This was followed by an inner debate of...do I ask? No, because you don't want your answer to his marriage proposal to be "did you ask my dad" Then I realized Brandon was still in front of me, on his knee, with the ring, waiting for an answer. Whoops...sorry again for the pause :)
8. I took piano lessons for 11 years and taught lessons for 3. I used to be pretty good, but I am very much out of practice. We have a piano in our house and it's kind of frustrating to play because I can't play the music I used to play with no problems. I'm being patient and playing more because I enjoy it a lot.
9. I know how to be a really good CVS shopper. I can play their game and buy things that you get extra bucks for and use coupons to get $20 of merchandise for less than $1 and get extra bucks to use the next week. It takes some planning, but I quickly accumulated extra shampoo, soap, medicine, and cleaning products that I paid very little for. It really is a game and I feel a sense accomplishment when I see the total drop when I hand over my coupons and extra bucks.
10. I'm learning to love our smart pot crock-pot. I'm away from home around 12 hours most work days. I love being able to prep a meal the night before, throw it in the crock pot in the morning, and come home to a cooked meal in the evenings. It gives me more time in the evenings and makes for better and healthier meals than if I tried to quickly get dinner together once I'm home.

And here are the blogs I've chosen. I don't follow a lot, so I'm stealing some of LM's since these people haven't done their posts yet.

1. JP from Me Jenny is the line nazi I mentioned above. She controlled when we got in line for b-ball games to ensure we would have our front row seats. Because of her I've traveled to Europe and also watched the ball drop in Times Square. She's also somewhat responsible for Brandon and I dating. I stayed with his family the night before I flew to visit her on the east coast and shortly after we started dating. The rest is history.
2. JCF, formerly JCA, from The Backwoods Arkansas Veterinary Times. Jackie was my college roomie my first 2 years at K-State. Of the 4 roomies, we lived in the same town the longest. I was one of her bridesmaids last fall and it was probably the most fun wedding party I've been a part of. And I've done the bridesmaid thing several times.
3. Anna from Life on the Green Line. We both grew up in NW KS and I knew who she was in high school due to speech, but didn't really become friends with her until college when we were in the same bible study and lived in the same dorm. She was roomies with C who later was my roomie and then married my cousin :) Lost yet?? Anna lives in Boston now and has a very fun blog.
Yikes, that's all I have. The other blogs I read regularly are photographers and coupon/deal blogs.

Thanks for the award and challenging me to think LM!

Another One (Maybe) Bites the Dust

2011-02-08T18:47:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...Curtis Kelly is being investigated for a potential violation. There aren't a lot of details out about this yet, so it may end up being nothing. If he ends up leaving, that puts K-State down 3 players from the start of the season. Not the best of news going in to the KU/K-State game on Monday.

Good Day

2011-02-07T18:04:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...what it's like to have a very productive day in invoicing land. I have to have everything done tomorrow afternoon for signatures. Today I got so much done that all I have to do tomorrow morning is format and print. I stayed a little late to get to this point, but it will make tomorrow so much easier. Yay for a good day during busy reporting time!

Super Bowl

2011-02-06T19:18:00.001-08:00

Today I was a good American and did my taxes. I also watched the Super Bowl of course :)

Here are a few things I learned today.
1. Pizza Hut's Big Dipper is pretty good. The pepperonis weren't lined up like on TV, but it was still tasty.
2. The Packers won the Super Bowl.
3. Jordy Nelson (former K-Stater) scored the first touchdown. It's fun to see a small town boy and former K-Stater do well.
4. There is a Captain America and another Transformers movie coming out later this year. Lots of other movie previews, but I already knew about most of those.

A W for the Cats

2011-02-05T20:52:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...that K-State's b-ball team can play an entire game close and come out with a W. This season hasn't lived up to the pre-season hype, but it was good to see that we can battle an entire game and not fall apart at the end. I'm not expecting us to win out, but we have a Big 12 road win so hopefully the Cats are back on track. Tough games ahead, so we'll see.

Work

2011-02-04T21:16:00.000-08:00

A little background...At my job, my group (FDIC) has to have our reports/invoices done by the 7th business day of the month. This generally is around the 9th, depending on how the weekends and holidays fall. The non-FDIC part of my team gets busy around the 11th of each month. Usually we go from crazy FDIC reporting to helping with the rest of the team's crazy reporting.

Today I learned...that my group probably won't have to help with the non-FDIC reporting this month. This is very exciting to me. I can do my work until the 7th business day and then relax some and deal with all of the things that were put on the back burner during the busy part of the month. Now I just have to scramble until Wednesday to get my stuff done. I'm two days down due to snow, but hopefully after working a couple of hours tomorrow I'll be back on track. THURSDAY :) will be an excellent day.

Snow Removal

2011-02-03T18:14:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...that the greater KC area can do a pretty good job clearing snow after a massive blizzard. I was pretty impressed with how clear the roads were on my way to work this morning. Lots of snow on the side of the road of course, but no issues on the road. It was much clearer than after the last snow storm, which was about half the amount. I was not impressed that day. I'm sure it helped that hardly anyone was out right after the storm.

Power Shovel

2011-02-02T18:50:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...how to use our power shovel. We went out this afternoon while the sun was shining to tackle the rest of the driveway. The first 7 business days are the busiest time of the month for me at work and I have now missed 2 of them, so it's important that I get to work tomorrow. Anyway, Brandon started digging out the mound the plow left us at the end of our driveway and I worked on the section we didn't do last night. I got to use our power shovel. We didn't use it last night because it was windy. It was pretty helpful, but the snow was deeper than the power shovel could handle, so I had to hold it up to get the top half and then go back with it on the ground to do get the rest. It made for sore arms and back, but was MUCH quicker than shoveling it all.

SNOW

2011-02-01T20:21:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...what a foot of snow on my driveway looks like. We got all the snow that was expected and a little more. We may have more in the night, but nothing crazy. Work is already cancelled for tomorrow which I am SHOCKED at. Today we all knew the snow was coming and the office was open until 12:30. I didn't go in at all...I didn't want to deal with getting home and wouldn't be too far behind by missing. I stayed in my house and documented the crazy storm hourly...check out my facebook album for pics.

Android

2011-01-31T20:47:00.001-08:00

Today I learned...how to post to my blog from my phone. Not a huge feat, just something I haven't done before. I had installed an app but apparently also deleted it.

I came very close to forgetting to post today...hence the update from my phone...while sitting in bed...watching conan. Night!

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Weather

2011-01-30T18:16:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...(see picture)

I live in the dark grey/10-13 inch area. That lovely snow is supposed to be here Tuesday and Wednesday. Between now and then, we're supposed to get freezing drizzle, light sleet, and light snow. Is it spring yet? Looks like my "floating holiday" might be a "snow day."

Neighbors

2011-01-29T20:18:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...a little about one of our neighbors. It was in 40's here today and I took advantage of the warmer weather do trim up some of the plants in our yard. This should have been done in the fall, but since we moved in at the end of November and it's been quite cold since then, this project didn't get done. I didn't do anything major, just trimmed things away from our house and cut back mums. While I was out Brandon took advantage of the rocking chair we got from his parents for a housewarming gift. One of our neighbors came over to introduce himself and welcome us to the neighborhood. We learned his name and the name of his wife, who was at work. We learned they've lived in Gardner 12 years and that they have 5 kids. Nice guy. I think he'll be a good neighbor :)

Bob Barker & John Glenn

2011-01-28T19:38:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...that both of these people have been to Gardner, KS. The New Century Air Center on the edge of town was built as a Naval Air Station. Both of these famous people trained there. John Glenn was in the first class to be trained at it.

Go Blazers!

2011-01-27T19:40:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...the words to the GEHS fight song.

Fight fight fight, we're gonna win tonight!
Blue and white, we're gonna win with might
We're gonna win, win, win, and that is why we sing,
And shout our praises to the sky, high, high, high
Roll, roll, roll, we're gonna roll some more
Roll, roll, roll, up the score!
V-I-C-T-O-R-Y We're gonna win this game tonight!

Next up...the alma matter. But I'm not as excited about learning it, because it's the same tune as MY high school's alma matter. I think I'll just keep singing the wrong words :)

Randomness

2011-01-26T19:27:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...the new NASCAR rules. My husband isn't too excited. I have no opinion. I also learned, that my parents are staying where they had the press conference for the PGA. My parents were on the same property as Tiger Woods. Think what you want about Tiger, that's pretty cool.

Ergonomics

2011-01-25T18:09:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...how to have an ergonomic workspace. When my company moves to our new location, we're all getting new workstations and furniture. They had a lady from Humanscale come talk to us about the features of our new desk. The talk was a little long, but for the most part good and I learned a lot. Two main things 1) our current workspaces are awful for productivity and 2) the most important part of an ergonomic workspace is....NOT a good chair, it's a keyboard tray. This keeps you from hunching over your desk and lets your chair support you instead of you holding yourself up. We also got an anatomy lesson on carpal tunnel and learned about lighting and monitor arms. Pretty informative stuff.

Productive!

2011-01-24T19:24:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...that I can spend 3 hours in meetings at work and still accomplish everything I wanted to without working extra hours. When I got to work I made my to-do list for the day and then checked my calendar. 3 hours of meetings. Even though this is our "slow" week at work, I made the most of my time and got my stuff done.

NO snow

2011-01-23T17:51:00.001-08:00

Today I learned...that we did NOT get the 5 inches of snow today that was predicted earlier in the week. Yesterday it looked like we were just going to get a couple of inches, but when I got up this morning...no new snow on the ground. I kept looking out expecting snow, but thankfully it never came. So far there's no snow in the forecast for the rest of the week, but I've lived in KS most of my life and know how quickly that can change.

10 days!

2011-01-22T21:04:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was my 10th post in 10 days. That is certainly a record on my blog. Today's been a pretty lazy day, but I wanted to post, so I'm going to use a topic that I didn't really learn TODAY, but have over the past 10 days. Cheating...probably, but since I made the rules I can break them. Or not, because there really aren't any :)

Today I learned...that there are a lot of things I learn every day that I can't blog about. Some are confidential work things. Some are work things that would take way too long to explain and would be boring to my readers. Some would reveal something about someone I know that they probably wouldn't want posted on the Internet. This can make it tricky to come up with something to blog about. Not impossible, but it takes some creativity. When I say "Today I learned..." I really mean, I learned a lot today, but here's the most interesting and blog-appropriate thing I've learned.

All Alone

2011-01-21T19:21:00.000-08:00

Today I learned what it's like to have an afternoon to myself at the office. The rest of my team was in meetings that I didn't need to attend. Since I work in cube world it makes a huge difference when people aren't around me. At first the quiet was really weird. I didn't have a ton to do, but I made the most of my time and worked ahead on some things. Hopefully next month's "busy time" won't be as insane as last month. One can hope. I'm not sure I can live through another two weeks like that.

BONUS

2011-01-20T19:48:00.000-08:00

BONUS lesson today!

Today I learned:

1. What a "late start" day is like in the corporate world. Due to the crazy snow yesterday our office didn't open until 10am. It was glorious news to discover at 5am after I'd decided I was staying home because it still looked very snowy out. I braved the roads at 9am which were clearer (I'm guessing) and with a lot less traffic. Took an hour to get to work. Much more managable than the 4 hour ride home last night.

2. That I've already written more posts in 2011 than in did in 2010. What a slacker I was last year. When I read the comment telling me this I literally laughed out loud.

I think I'm going to turn off the auto-feed to facebook for my blog. If you're reading this in facebook only, you're going to have to go to my blog or sign up for it in an RSS reader. Any objections? (And yes...this is a test to see who is reading this on facebook and not my actual blog.)

Never Ending Bus Ride

2011-01-19T19:00:00.000-08:00

Today I learned what a 4 hour bus ride home is like. VERY LONG. It took about 2 hours to get from downtown, through crown center and to interstate. Then another 2 hours to get the 30ish miles from interstate to Gardner including 3 bus stops. Pretty helpless feeling, but I was very glad I rode the bus instead of driving today. I read about 10 chapters of Little Women and spent a lot of time watching the snow fall. At first people on the bus were frustrated, but then people got stir crazy and pretty funny. It's still snowing like crazy and is supposed to for most of the night. I'd guess we have about 6 inches now and could get up to 9.

More snow's a-coming

2011-01-18T18:13:00.000-08:00

Today I learned that we're getting more snow. A LOT more snow. And I am not excited about it. Lots of snow on the weekend I'm fine with, but lots of snow in the middle of the work week I'm not so fine with. Luckily, I can take the bus tomorrow so I won't have to drive in it. I've heard KC is getting anywhere from 2-9 inches. NBC action news says 4-8 now. Getting home tomorrow could be interesting!

Oh Cats...

2011-01-17T17:31:00.000-08:00

Today I learned...it looks like the rest of the college basketball season could be pretty long for K-State fans. I'm not giving up on my Cats and will continue to watch, cheer, and wear purple, but it's not looking nearly as promising as it did at the start of the season. I thought after Saturday's game we were back in it, but after today...I'm not so sure. I would LOVE to be wrong about this, but I'm not holding my breath.

New Recipe Fail

2011-01-16T18:41:00.001-08:00

Today I learned...the Chicken Stroganoff Pot Pie recipe in the Betty Crocker cookbook is not very good. I've been trying out new crock-pot recipes and due to my husband's love of pot pie, thought I'd give this one a shot. It was bland and high on veggies, low on meat. We won't be making it again. We ate it, but didn't keep the leftovers.

Have any crock-pot favorites to share?

Advice from the Price Chopper Checker

2011-01-15T17:55:00.000-08:00

Today I learned this bit of advice as I was paying for my groceries:

Have fun, but not too much fun
Be responsible*, but not too much
Because too much of one means your aren't doing enough of the other.

Well said Price chopper guy.

*I can't remember the exact word he used here, but this still gets the point across.

Please stay sitting

2011-01-14T20:49:00.000-08:00

Today I learned that when attending a GEHS basketball game you sit...the entire time. No standing for a "crowd cheer" led by the cheerleaders during time outs. No standing when an exciting play happens (such as an alley-oop dunk...yep, saw it happen tonight). No standing to yell when you disagree with a call. No standing when your team comes in before the game or after the half.

All of these times one would stand when attending a DCHS...or any other NW KS b-ball game (pretty sure that's a safe assumption)...you remain sitting. Weird. Not that people aren't in to the game. I saw a very physical game tonight and the crowd was totally into it...while sitting. Is this an eastern KS thing? A KC metro thing? Apparently, I have more learning to do on this subject.

English, Speech, Drama Club, and DCHS

2011-01-13T19:06:00.000-08:00

Today I learned that one of my high school English teachers passed away.

Miss Davis was diagnosed with leukemia in December and lost her battle last night. She was a teacher, coach, and director to me. She taught several of my English classes and college speech. She coached me as a member of the DCHS forensics team. She directed me in 4 all-school plays.

I've spent a lot of time today reflecting on memories I have of high school that involve her and the impact she's made on so many students that have passed through my high school. She was one of the toughest teachers in the school. To survive senior year at DCHS you had to focus on two things...Senior English and Government. Senior English was a lot of work and not a whole lot of fun, but my writing skills have Miss Davis to thank. Due to that hard work, the writing classes I took in college weren't very hard.

I spent a lot of Saturdays around Miss Davis when I was on the speech team. Speech meant early mornings and long days...which also meant seeing the best and worst of people. We made Miss Davis angry...enough to turn very red and earn the nickname "The Killer Tomato" and very proud...by earning first place at multiple tournaments.

Miss Davis was a great lady and a wonderful teacher who will be missed by many.

Something new

2011-01-12T19:28:00.001-08:00

2 things

1. My blog design is under construction. I needed something new, but haven't had time to fully re-do it. Expect more changes soon :)

2. I'm adding a new post type to my blog. You can thank my father for this and hopefully it will mean more (daily?!?!) updates from me. Growing up my family had dinner together almost every night. Either at dinner, or when he got home from work my dad would ask "What did you learn today?" He never expected a grand answer, but it was open-ended to allow for conversation. When we were home for the holidays, Dad asked this question when he saw us in the evenings. I'd been thinking about changes to the blog and thought I'd give this a try....don't expect long posts, but hopefully they'll be a little more frequent.

Today I learned...my office isn't moving to "The (Sprint) Campus" until mid-May. It was supposed to be March, and then April, and now May. Hopefully we'll be in by Christmas!

80. Advance to a higher position at Key

2010-11-22T18:06:00.000-08:00

In September I accepted the position of Investor Reporting analyst at Key. In basic terms, my job is exactly what it sounds like...reporting to investors. But as with any job, my day to day functions are much more complicated than that. Key entered a contract with the FDIC to service (ie monitor) loans for them so the majority of my workload is getting things ready for the FDIC. It's been a serious learning curve, but I have learned a ton about how our systems work (and don't work..), how our reports run, and commercial loan servicing in general. Unlike my previous position where things were pretty predictable, I never know what a day will bring in my new job.

51. Clean out my room at my parents' house

2010-11-22T17:54:00.000-08:00

This item happened by necessity, not just because I wanted it to. This summer my parents moved from the house I lived in since I was 3 to a new house in a new town. They moved about 30 miles south where my parents and the other partners of their vet clinic bought a new practice. I went home to help them move and also got to clean out my room, which was pretty empty other than my closet. I have some boxes that were moved to my parents new house, but nothing like all of the things I had pre-move.

Farewell Oberlin house.

Hello Hoxie house. I haven't been there since the big move weekend in July, so I'm sure it has changed a lot, as it was pretty full of boxes and chaos at that point.

67. Attend a NASCAR Race at the KS Speedway

2010-10-03T15:21:00.000-07:00

Record time for crossing an item off the list and then blogging about it. This afternoon I went to the Price Chopper 400 at the Kansas Speedway. Brandon got 4 free tickets from Sprint so today the two of us and his dad and brother spent the day at the races.

Here we are on the track before the race...
The guys I spent the day with....Brandon and I at Victory Lane...During Pre-Race Activities we saw Frank Martin. He was very calm and relaxed.
At our seats just before the start of the race. We sat up high in turn 1. Section 245, row 47 to be precise :) For all of you non-NASCAR fans...the higher the row, the better the seat...unlike every other sporting event. We had great seats (esp. for being free!) and could see the entire track.

The weather was perfect! In the 60's with a breeze. Hopefully I won't have too much of a race tan, but we'll see tomorrow :)

Kansas Weather at its finest...

2010-09-26T17:57:00.000-07:00

I have attended K-State football games for pretty much as long as I can remember. During these games I've braved (or suffered through...lets be honest) all sorts of weather...extreme heat, bitter cold, wind, pouring rain, you get the idea. This Saturday I experience a new type of weather during a KSU FB game...lightning. Not even 3 minutes in to the game they stopped playing for it. And asked everyone to evacuate. New weather experience right there. All it took was one glance of the sky to see why. It had been cloudy all morning, but just your typical rain clouds, not this scary wall cloud in my picture. We evacuated to the vet school emergency room waiting room. We waited until the rain slowed some and went to my parents hotel room to wait and watch on TV. When we got there (after buying some game snacks) play had resumed. We watched the rest of the first half at their room and then the sun was out so we headed back to the stadium. Crazy game, with a great finish...just what we needed...slowly moving the ball down the field to score and not allow UCF time to do the same. Yay Cats! Pretty excited for the next game..Nebraska...with my roomies :)

#7-Switch to reusable bags for our grocery shopping

2010-04-08T19:15:00.000-07:00

The living green/sustainable living movement has piqued my interest for awhile. I'm not sure why exactly, but I have made some changes to my lifestyle to be a greener citizen of the planet.

1) The item on the list...switching to reusable bags for grocery shopping. After being married, and especially after moving in to our house I quickly realized that we were accumulating a lot of grocery/target/walmart sacks. I started being greener by saving them and taking them to Wal-Mart when I had a bag full. As reusable bags became more popular, I thought about making the transition to using them and actually put them on my Christmas list. I received some fun bags...not the basic solid colors you often see at the grocery store. I've learned that you can fit a lot more in a reusable bag than in plastic one (no real shock there) and they are a lot easier to carry around. We leave them in both of our cars so we always have them ready when we make a run to the store. Now several stores pay 5 cents a bag when you bring your own instead of using disposable, so there's even more incentive to use them! CVS has the best deal as far as these bags go. I bought a "green bag tag" for $1 and every time I use my bag they scan the card. Every 4 times I use it, I get a dollar back to use at CVS. There's a CVS in my building at work, so I'm there fairly frequently :)

2) Use Public Transportation. We live about 20 miles from the building I work in downtown. When we moved to our house, I noticed a sign for "The JO," (Johnson County Transit) across from a church about a mile from our house. Eventually I checked out their website and discovered that I could catch the bus there and end up one block from my office downtown. I tested it out a few times just to see how it worked and starting in July, I became a full-time bus rider. One of the big drawbacks of working downtown is that I have to pay for parking. The garage I used to park in was $70/month. My bus pas is $63/month and I only get gas about once a month instead of once a week :) I'm saving money & saving the planet. It takes a little bit longer to get to and from work, but not a huge difference.

3) Recycle. Another perk of living in Olathe is that we have bi-weekly recycling. When we moved in, we had to pay a monthly fee to participate, but now it's included in our regular bill so we'd pay for it even if we weren't using it. We don't have to sort by type of item either (paper, plastic, etc.), we just put it all in our bin and take it to the street and the city does the rest! We can recycle paper, plastics #1-#7, cardboard, chipboard (cereal boxes), aluminum/tin cans, and telephone books. We can't recycle glass through the curbside service. We could take it to a drop off site in town, but we aren't doing that so far. We don't have a lot of glass jars so it hasn't been worth it. We fill our bin in the garage and take it to the cart outside as needed. It has cut down on the amount of trash we put out tremendously!

UPDATE-I thought of one more. 4) Paperless bills & online bill pay. To reduce the amount of paper in our house that would end up in the recycling bin or filed away somewhere, we have signed up for paperless statements for all of our accounts and also pay all of them online. The only checks we write on a regular basis are to our church and to the scholarship fund in Oberlin.

What are you doing to be greener??

Catching Up #11, #24, #54, #57, #73

2010-04-06T16:28:00.001-07:00

I've really been slacking on the posting, but I have still been working on my list! Here are the tasks I've completed since I last posted (in December, yikes!)

#11 Make Spritz
Spritz or "press cookies" are little fancy cookies. I grew up going to a church that was started by Swedes and every October we have a Swedish Smorgasbord with lots of Swedish food. Spritz are just one of the many Swedish foods we have there. You have to have a cookie press to make these cookies. They aren't too tricky, but take some time. Once I got the hang of my cookie press it was pretty smooth sailing. I made these before Christmas for us to enjoy.

#24 See the Nutcracker Ballet
Brandon & I went to see the Kansas City Ballet perform this the weekend before Christmas. Neither of us had been to a ballet and weren't sure what to expect, but it was a great experience. We will definately be going to see this again!

#54 Get new bedding
Although we got bedding for a wedding present, it wasn't great quality and the comforter had totally flattened out. We got the new bedding in October. It's from Target & JCP. The comforter is a blue quilt. We've had flannel sheets on our bed since then, but it's time to go back to cotton!

#57 Organize my closet
When we moved in to our house I never really took the time to organize my closet. The clothes hanging were organized, but the floor below and shelf above were a mess. Unfortunately, having mice in our house gave me extra motivation to do this as they were in the room that my closet is in. My closet is much more organized and more mouse proof, although the mice haven't really been a problem since.

#73 Get new glasses
I got new glasses last fall and it was quite an ordeal. When I got them, I couldn't see as well as I could with my old ones, so I had to go back to the eye dr. I tested the same, but she strengthened my Rx anyway. It took a little time to get used to it, but I could see much better! Check out the Easter pics I posted on facebook to see them :)

82. Re-read all the Harry Potter books

2009-12-10T19:32:00.000-08:00

This summer and fall I read all the Harry Potter books on the bus to and from work. I think I'd read the first 6 before, but not the last one. I remembered a lot from the first few books, but not the later ones. No picture for this one...

I chose this because I planned to go back and finish that last book ever since I bought it when I came out, but never did. Several of my tasks are things like this. This list is just the extra motivation to hopefully complete these things (finally!)

#17 Use our wedding china for a special dinner

2009-12-10T19:21:00.000-08:00

Brandon wanted to have a Thanksgiving Dinner just the two of us, so we cooked a turkey the Saturday before Thanksgiving. I thought our first cooked holiday meal was probably worthy of breaking in our new china so I unboxed it all :) We bought a frozen turkey, thawed it for a few days, baked it and Brandon carved it. We also had break, stuffing, potatoes, gravy, and sparking beverages. Oh yes, don't forget the pumpkin pie :) It was fun to cook and have a holiday meal just the two of us.

I chose this task because I wanted to actually use our china and not just have it sit in our cupboard. I don't have a great place to store it so it's kind of a pain to get it out, but it was well worth the effort!

BTW, get excited...lots of updates to come as I've been working on tasks, but haven't done a great job of blogging about them.

#34 Get a drivers license with my new address

2009-11-01T18:11:00.000-08:00

I didn't work on Friday because I went to watch my sister play in state VB in Hays (her team took 4th). I didn't have to leave until mid-morning, so I went to the license bureau that morning to get a new license, with our "new" address. I changed my address online shortly after we moved, so I'm legal, but it's a pain when I show ID and have to explain that it doesn't match my current address and such. In 7-10 business days I'll no longer have that problem!

I put this on my list to remember to go and do it. Since I don't work in Johnson County, it's tricky to get there during business hours. Friday gave me the perfect chance and the line wasn't too long at all.

Sorry...no picture for this post. You'll just have to trust me!

88. Go to one of my aunt's/uncle's house with Brandon

2009-09-21T18:17:00.000-07:00

Last week Brandon and I traveled to Sublette, KS, just south of Garden City to my Aunt Bev's house. The trip wasn't planned and unfortunately we were there under horrible circumstances. We were in Sublette for my Uncle Mitch's funeral. Mitch was in a 2-vehicle accident out in the country last Monday and didn't survive. I was in a meeting when my dad called to tell me. When I saw the voicemail on my phone, I expected it to be about one of my grandparents, and was shocked at what he told me. Mitch was 51 and left his wife, Bev and two kids-Paul, a sophomore at K-State, and Anna, a junior in high school

The funeral was Friday morning and we decided to leave Thursday morning. Brandon had some car trouble on the way home Wednesday night, so we ended up taking my Alero for the 1,000 mile trip. I'm not sure when the last time I was in Sublette was, but it's a small town so finding my aunt's house was no problem. My mom came out and talked to us in the yard before we went in to see the rest of the family. My aunt was talking to some friends but came over and told us thanks for coming and talked to us for a bit. We talked to other family that was there and talked to others who came after us. My brother came with some other K-State students not too long after we got there. That evening all of the family (Mitch & Bev's) had dinner at Bev's house and spent some time chatting. It was my sister's 18th birthday, so we had cake for her too. Her boyfriend plays football at Garden City Community College and came down for the evening too. Brandon & I hadn't met him, so it was nice to finally get to.

After dinner at Bev's, we went back to the hunting lodge where we stayed to let her open presents.

Friday was the funeral, and a hard and emotional day. Because it's a small town and Mitch was very well known, the service was in the high school gym. Mitch grew up in Sublette, and had severed as the Mayor for several years. He was also involved with his church and a coach for different sports for his kids. We got to the school around 9:15 and saw more family members who had just come in town that morning. First was the flower service with just the family. Then we cleared out of the gym while everyone else arrived. The funeral was good. The pastor knew my uncle and his family very well, so it was personal. He talked about Mitch and gave a great message. However, the highlight for me was when my Aunt got up and talked. We were all shocked and I was impressed. She thanked everyone for all of their support and care over the week, talked about how she knew that this event brought up heartache for others, was thankful for the 13 years she's had with Mitch since his first heart attack, and talked about how deep down she knew she wouldn't grow old with Mitch. She was matter of fact in her speech and didn't cry at all. She ended by quoting my Grandpa, who wasn't there because of his health, but told her: "We never know what a day will bring, but God is in every day."

At the cemetery people shared memories of Mitch which varied from fishing to coaching to guys who had grown up with him. The weather was great, and it was fitting that we were facing a corn field for this service since Mitch was a farmer.

My family used to do a lot with Mitch & Bev's family. We traveled together and just got together at each other's homes. I have a lot of memories of Mitch. At my cousin's wedding in May, Mitch & Bev sat at our table and we got to talk a lot with them. Mitch is the first close relative I've had pass away. My great-grandma died when I was a freshman in college, but of my grandparents, cousins, aunts & uncles, he's the first. I know there are many more funerals to come, because I have a large family.

Here's a picture of his family and my grandparents at my grandparents' 65th anniversary celebration in June. This was the last time I saw him.

Hopefully we'll get to go back to Sublette or to another aunt/uncle's home for a happier occasion before the 1,001 days are up. It was really good to be back there, even though the circumstances were less than desirable.

I put this task on my list because I had a lot of good memories at many of my aunt & uncle's homes. We don't travel to their houses much any more because my grandparents are all in Oberlin and not able to travel. I want Brandon to see their homes and make memories with family aside from at holidays in Oberlin.

#29 Go to a movie at the downtown KC theatre

2009-08-19T18:15:00.000-07:00

My first task is complete! Last night after work a couple of my co-workers and I went out to dinner in the P&L. After dinner we went to see Julie & Julia at the new AMC in downtown KC. This theatre opened in May and is pretty nice. AMC's headquarters are in KC, just downtown the street from this theatre and across the street from where I work. This movie experience was unlike any other. We had assigned seats, nothing too amazing about that, but I've never had those for a movie before. The bathrooms had separate sinks and hand dryers in each stall. The theatre had about 70 seats and there was a foot rail in front of our seats. Finally, the chairs were super comfy---much better than those at the AMC 30 in Olathe.

The movie was cute and made me want to read more about both of the main characters. I don't have any desire to cook through Julia Child's cookbook, but she does have a pretty amazing story. Some of the food looked pretty amazing, but a lot of it just seems like a ton of work!

I chose this task because I ride past this theatre on the bus every afternoon and didn't want it to just be something I ride by every day. Plus it gave me a good excuse to spend some time with work friends outside of the office...other than going out for lunch. Ok, 100 more to go!

101 tasks in 1001 days

2009-08-01T10:53:00.000-07:00

The Mission: Complete 101 preset tasks in 1001 days
Start Date: August 1, 2009
End Date: April 28, 2012

Church/Service
1. Join a Church
2. Attend a service at COR's Olathe campus
3. Participate in a COR ministry event
4. Attend an Ash Wednesday Service
5. Sponsor an Angel Tree child at Christmas
6. Donate money to 3 charities
7. ~~Switch to reusable bags for our grocery shopping~~ completed January 2010
Cooking
8. Bake a pie completely from scratch
9. Make Swedish pancakes
10. Bake Goldie's Pound Cake
~~11. Make spritz~~ completed 12-2009
12. Make fried chicken
13. Bake cinnamon rolls
14. Bake a cake from scratch
15. Bake scones
16. Cook one thing from every cookbook on our shelf
~~17. Use our wedding china for a special dinner~~ completed 11-21-09
18. Bake and decorate sugar cookies
19. Cook 3 meals in a crock-pot
20. Use all 20 spices in my spice rack (not at the same time)
21. Make a pizza from scratch

Entertainment
22. Watch all the movies we own that I haven't seen before
23. Watch 10 movies off the AFI top 100 list I haven't seen before
~~24. See the Nutcracker ballet~~ completed 12-2009
25. See 3 live musicals (1. Wicked 12-6-09 2. You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown 2-10-11)
26. Go to an NFL game
27. Update the music on my ipod
28. Go to a live concert
~~29. Go to a movie at the downtown KC theatre~~ completed 8-18-09
30. Attend a dinner theatre
31. Watch the Anne of Green Gables movies
32. Finish Legos Star Wars on PS3 with Brandon

Financial/Organization
33. Buy a new car
~~34. Get a drivers license with my new address~~ Completed 10-30-09
35. Scan documents and put originals in the safe deposit box
36. Backup my computer
37. Scan all of the cards in my wallet
38. Determine how much we should keep in savings and build it to that level

Hobbies (new & old)
39. Get all pre-wedding scrapbooking done
40. Make wedding scrapbook
41. Organize post-wedding photos
42. Finish my "seasons" cross-stitch
43. Re-learn how to play piano
44. Take one photo a day for a month
45. Knit something
46. Sew 3 tablecloths
47. Color an entire coloring book
48. Go geocaching
49. Finish my 50 state quarters collection

House
50. Get the rest of our wedding presents from Brandon's parents' house
~~51. Clean out my room at my parents' house~~ completed July 2010
52. Landscape our yard
53. Frame and hang our KSU diplomas
~~54. Get new bedding~~ completed October 2009
55. Purchase name art for our front room
56. Organize my jewelry
~~57. Organize my closet~~ completed fall 2009
58. Make tie backs for our curtains
59. Get rid of boxes/gadgets in laundry room
60. Frame and hang wedding pictures
61. Acquire DVD versions of the movies I still have on VHS

Exploring Kansas City
62. Go to a T-Bones game
63. Go to the KC Jazz museum
64. Eat a 3 BBQ joints I've never been to
65. Visit Johnson County Museum of History
66. Shop at Zona Rosa
~~67. Attend a NASCAR race at the KS Speedway~~ completed 10-3-2010
68. Try all of the Mexican places in our neighborhood that we get coupons for
69. Visit 20 of the KC fountains

Personal Enrichment
70. Build a snowman
71. Build a gingerbread house
72. Read the manual for my cell phone
~~73. Get new glasses~~ completed October 2009
74. Write 12 handwritten letters
75. Make an address book
76. Try 5 new drinks at Starbucks
~~77. Post to my blog every day for one month~~completed February 2011
78. Write in a journal every day for one month
79. Update the pics at my desk every six months
~~80. Advance to a higher position at Key~~ completed September 2010

Reading
81. Read all the books I own, but haven't read
~~82. Re-read all the Harry Potter books~~ completed November 2009
83. Read 10 books off the BBC Big Read List
84. Read Little Women
85. Read the New Testament
86. Read 10 current popular children's books

Travel
87. Visit 2 new baseball parks with Brandon (1. St. Louis Cardinals Sept 2010)
~~88. Go to one of my aunt's/uncle's house with Brandon~~ completed 9-17-09
89. Go to my church at home's Swedish smorgasbord
90. Spend a weekend in St. Louis
91. Visit Bryan, Ohio
92. Stay at a B&B
93. Visit 5 states Brandon & I haven't been to before (1. California)
94. Spend a day in St. Joseph
95. Spend a weekend in Branson
96. Send 5 postcards

Wellness
97. Exercise 3 times a week for 6 weeks
98. Lose 20 pounds
99. Drink only water for one week
100. Wear my contacts 3 times a week for 6 weeks
101. Take a vitamin a day until the whole bottle is gone

Vacation!

2009-07-12T17:29:00.000-07:00

Brandon & I survived our first summer vacation :) We drove to Virginia for a family reunion and so I could meet some of Brandon's family and see where they live. (Note: both of Brandon's parents grew up in VA, but moved to KS before Brandon and his brother were born.) Here's the run down of our trip...pics are on facebook.

Day 1

We got up like a work day, grabbed donuts on the road and drove all the way to Lexington, KY. Not so much to share for this day :)

Day 2

We drove to Suffolk, VA-where Brandon's gma lives. We got there just before dinner. His parents & brother and family had been there for a couple days already. We had tacos at his gma's and spent the evening getting settled and relaxing.

Day 3

We went with the whole family to VA beach for the day. In the morning we went Dolphin watching...and saw LOTS of dolphins, which was pretty neat. After lunch, we went to the VA aquarium. It was a lot of walking, but fun. Then we went to a HUGE seafood buffet. We ended the day with duck pin bowling. You use a small ball...kind of like a shotput. It doesn't have holes either. The pins are smaller too. There aren't many of them left in the country and they don't manufacture the equipment for them either. We had fun, but it's a lot different from normal bowling. I beat the whole family and made my "nephew" cry :(

Day 4

This day we went to the family reunion...the main reason we all went to VA in the first place. It was for Brandon's dad's family. I met his dad's only brother and his family for the first time there. We also met a bunch of other extended family. The food was really good and the reunion didn't last too long. We got the award for the longest distance traveled.

Day 5
We went to church with Brandon's gma. It was a smallish church and the preacher mispronounced Bible names. Brandon's dad & I pulled out the Bible's in the pews to make sure. After that we had lunch out in Suffolk and I had the best chocolate eclair cake ever. My MIL, SIL & I went for a walk around the neighborhood and chatted. When we got back, Brandon's Aunt Sylvia & her husband Glenn were there. We spent the rest of the evening with Brandon's mom's family and I met more people I hadn't before.

Day 6
We split up for the day. Brandon & I went to Norfolk. We started the day at Nauticus, a nautical museum, with a lot of Navy exhibits. Next to the museum is the USS Wisconsin, a navy ship you can walk around. You can't go inside, but it was still really night. One of the highlights of the trip. That afternoon we took a harbor cruise on a sailboat. I'd never been on a sailboat before. I got slightly sunburned, but not bad.

Day 7
We left Virginia this day and headed north to Baltimore. We were planning to spend the afternoon at the Inner Harbor, but spent it in traffic due to a fatal motorcycle wreck. We got there in time to eat at the Inner Harbor and walk to Camden Yards. I really like that ballpark. We saw a crazy game too. The Orioles played the Red Sox and were down 1-10 in the 7th and after a rain delay came back and won 11-10. It was pretty exciting, but made for a late night!

Day 8
We drove to Lancaster County and spent the morning in Amish Country. After lunch we went to Hershey to Chocolate World. The rest of the day we spent driving to Ohio.

Day 9
We drove to Cincinnati for an afternoon game. I wasn't quite as impressed with this park, but the game was fun. We sat in the outfield, so it was view I'd never had before. This game was close too...Reds won 3-2 in 10 innings. After the game we drove to Louisville and ate at White Castle & went to a real putt putt golf course.

Day 10
This day we explored Louisville. We started the day at the Louisville Slugger bat factory which was pretty cool. We got a personalized bat. Then we went to Churchill Downs, home of the Kentucky Derby. It was neat to see, but not a very good tour or gift shop. We had lunch there and I had a Kentucky meal....Mint Julip, Hot Brown, and Kentucky Nut Pie.

Day 11
We spent the day driving home...we got back to KC early evening and went out for mexican food (on the 4th of July) and then watched fireworks at the Great Mall. Pretty impressive show, but it took FOREVER to get out of the parking lot afterwards.
We

Update

2009-05-23T20:48:00.001-07:00

Don't worry, I'm still alive :) I don't have any great excuses as to why I haven't posted lately. I've been busy, but no more than usual. Here's a pictureless :( post to update you...pics to come soon though!

My first big project post-last post was sewing curtains. We had all the windows in our house replaced in April (yay new homeowner tax "credit"!) which we are loving. We didn't have all the hardware for the old ones, so we were afraid to open them. This nice spring weather has been great for sleeping with open windows. After they were installed I made curtains for 10 of our 13 windows. It made me feel like quite the housewife, but it was kinda fun. I battled the sewing machine some, but I'm pretty proud of how they turned out. (pics soon) I had a couple of weeks between the time the windows were done and when Brandon's family all came to our house for my birthday. I made it, but it was close!

My birthday was good. We went to On the Border with Brandon's family the night before and the to our place to show off the new windows. On my b-day Kurt came and we went to Red Robin and I opened gifts. My big present from Brandon was a bread machine. I wanted to register for one, but there weren't many out there to register for...maybe none, I don't remember exactly. Anyway, I have one and a great bread machine cookbook. So far I've made basic wheat, blue cheese potato, and peanut butter. It's pretty easy and works great.

The day after my b-day, Kurt, Brandon & I flew to Colorado Springs for my cousin Drew's wedding. It was at the Garden of the Gods, which would have been beautiful had it not been misty and foggy. We didn't see the mountains until we were leaving on Sunday :S The wedding was fun. My cousin & his wife are doctors in the air force and are currently stationed in Japan. We hadn't met his wife (Ginny) before, but she's super cute and nice and has a great laugh :) The day after the wedding Ginny's parents invited all the family at the wedding and several friends to brunch at the Broadmoor hotel. I had the best coffee and waffles ever. I don't want to know how much coffee I consumed that morning. Apparently you can only get it at the hotel. Again, we were pretty much in the mountains but couldn't see them. Most of the time we couldn't see the next buildings outside the massive windows. That night we went to the Melting Pot to celebrate my b-day.

Life at home is good. We're pretty settled in our house and are currently working on a plan for our yard. We're expanding our driveway in June and hoping for landscaping advice from my mother...that is her degree after all ;)

Tomorrow is Brandon's b-day so we've been celebrating that this weekend. Last night I gave him night and the museum on Blu-Ray and tickets to see the new one in IMAX today. We watched the movie last night to prepare. This morning I made him egg casserole (my Aunt Connie's amazing recipe) and french toast. We ate out on the deck since the weather was so nice. We relaxed at home this morning and then went to Hooter's for lunch (Brandon's choice) and to see the movie. I'd been to Hooter's before, but had never had the famous wings before. They were pretty good, but we thought the medium sauce was pretty mild. I'm not a spicy food person either. Then it was off to the movie, which was pretty good. It has a lot of the same characters as the first one, so there wasn't a lot of character development which made for more plot. A good summer movie. When we got back I made dinner-Salisbury Steak, Mashed Potatoes, his mom's Mystery (blue cheese) rolls, and chocolate peanut butter pie. Then he got the rest of his gifts. The main thing he wanted was a harmonica, which I gave him. We'll see how good he gets, but he isn't half bad to start.

Tomorrow we're going to Brandon's parent's house to celebrate and watch the Indy 500. I'm so glad this is a 3 day weekend. Work has been super busy lately. We acquired some loans (ie work) from Wamu/Chase and it's made things hectic and not fun. Monday Brandon & I have tickets to the Royals Game. It's Buck night & $5 upper deck tickets. I hope it doesn't get rained out!

Ok...off to finish new moon. I already have Eclipse in my possession. Not enjoying New Moon nearly as much as Twilight, so I hope the last 2 are better. I'm loving reading again though. Oh how I've missed it!

Movies

2009-04-11T20:42:00.001-07:00

Wow, who'd have thought Twilight would make my facebook page so popular! Anyway, Brandon & I watched the movie last night. We were both curious as to what all the hype was about, so I borrowed it from one of my co-workers. It was.........interesting. Not wonderful, but far from horrible. I didn't have many expectations going into it and wasn't disappointed. If I had more time I'd probably read the books, because the plot is kind of intriguing, but I'll probably just stick to watching the movies.

Today Brandon & I went and saw Monsters vs. Aliens. We made 3 attempts at 2 theatres to see it in 3-D, but it was worth it. 3-D is fun and I'm glad more movies are coming out in it...too bad the theatre near us doesn't have a 3-D projector. It was a cute movie and a fun break to shopping today.

Family

2009-03-09T20:14:00.001-07:00

This weekend my family (mom, dad, and Mary...Kurt had to stay in Manhattan to help with a FH rush weekend) came to visit us. It was the first time they have been here since we moved. I think they were pretty impressed with how settled we are. It was fun to have them around here too. Here's the recap of my weekend....

Friday I left work a little early, because things were REALLY SLOW which is rare for my office, but I took advantage of it! On my way home I bought Krispy Kreme's from a very nice older man. When he said "Be sure to come back!" I thought, I sure hope you're working when I do! It took some serious restraint to not eat those warm, fresh donuts, but I didn't give in. I beat Brandon home, something else that never happens, and we finished a few things around the house and watched some Unwrapped on Food Network while we waited for them to get here. We met them for dinner at Red Lobster. They had obviously been in a van for 6 hours and were a little loopy which made our dinner conversation entertaining and random. I had my favorite-coconut shrimp & fries and an orange smoothie. We came back to our house and helped them unload and showed them around. Then we ate dessert that I had made-Brandon's mom's chocolate bar pie and fun brownies. We got a gift card to Williams-Sonoma for our wedding and bought the neatest brownie pan ever. Both turned out pretty well, nothing to be overly impressed with, but no where near flops either.

Saturday Brandon & I made waffles and an egg casserole for breakfast. While I was getting ready, Brandon showed my mom around our yard. Her degree is in landscape design, so having a whole new yard to "design" is fun for her....if only she lived close enough to do all the work :) It was a little embarassing to have her walking around our yard in her zebra print pj's, but oh well. After breakfast Brandon & Dad stayed at our place to do a few house projects and Mary, mom & I went to find Mary a prom dress. We went to a dress shop near our place, but they were having a bridal sample sale, so they didn't have any dresses on the floor. My mom was kinda angry, but we left and went to plan B---Group USA in the Great Mall. The store had TONS of dresses and was pretty empty when we got there. Mary tried on a bunch and got her dress. It was fun to help her. With all the trouble I had finding a wedding dress, I sure knew how to get those on and off of her! We met the guys for lunch at Pizza Street, then took them home and we went to the mall and then got haircuts. We headed to the plaza for dinner at Hibachi Japanese Steakhouse. If you haven't been to one of those before, you need to. The food is good and the cooking is entertaining. It's a show at your table :) Mary hadn't been to one before, but the rest of us had. She was pretty funny and took pictures of all the food. I didn't think it was as good as Stix at the Legends, but it was still good.

Here's us at dinner:

From the Plaza we went downtown to show them my office. Cube world on Saturday with your family is kind of entertaining...especially with rubber band balls on all of our desks. I took us by the Sprint Center to show Mary on our way out, but as we got there the PBR let out and it took a long time to get back to I-35. Oh well...it provided some good people watching!

Sunday we went to our church and lunch at Red Robin before they headed back. We had a really bad waitress there, but the food was yummy as always!

Progress

2009-02-18T19:18:00.000-08:00

Well I updated my blog, thanks to some direction from my friend Anna. The picture is obviously from our wedding, but the more I look at it the more I love it. Here are the reasons (so far) that I love this photo.

-It's from our wedding day, one of the most fun days of my life. Honestly, how often are most of your friends and family in the same place at the same time to party down and celebrate? I felt so blessed and loved that day.

-It's in the middle of the street in downtown Oberlin. I love our brick streets. This shows you how hoppin' Oberlin is on a Saturday late afternoon/early evening. Our 2nd photographer stopped people from getting in the photo...about 2 cars while we were there.

-My siblings are there. Apparently, they have the same weird posture I do. When I wear heels, I often stand like Mary, with all the weight on the heel and the rest of my foot in the air. When I'm wearing flats, I stand like Kurt, with my foot rolled on it's side. This probably is part of the reason for my ankle trouble, or due to the fallen arches I have (thanks dad).

-Two of my best friends are there, Alicia and Kelsey. Although I don't get to see these wonderful ladies much anymore, they will always be close friends. I have tons of memories with both of these gals and they've been there for me at some of my lowest points, as well as some super happy times!

-We're all being random. Posed pics are good, but random is so much better.

-The wind is blowing just enough to see my blue shoes. I loved those shoes and got lots of comments on them. They were fun, even if they did turn my feet blue when I was breaking them in.

-My dad's car is there. My dad has 2 restored cars, this one (the same type he had in high school and at my parent's wedding)-a '77 (I think) Chevy Malibu Classic and his mom's high school car, a '37 something. The '37 was supposed to be restored for my junior prom, but wasn't done until my freshman year at K-State, so I didn't get to take it to prom. My dad did let Brandon drive it from our wedding. The fact that he let him drive it isn't too big of a deal, but the fact that he let it go on country roads kind of is. It was fun-AND big enough to get my dress in :)

Whew, that's a lot for one picture!

Day off

2009-02-16T19:43:00.000-08:00

Working for a bank has perks like getting government/banking holidays off :) It was nice to have an extra day to my weekend. I finally got our non-professional wedding pictures ordered and spent some time with my hubby who was working from home today. We watched Batman Begins, which neither of us had seen. Pretty good flick and it makes me want to watch Dark Knight again. Luckily, we have it on Blu-Ray so it won't be long!

My Valentine's was good. We went to Granite City Friday night for dinner, exchanged gifts and hung out at home. Dinner was wonderful, first time there for both of us and I'm sure we'll be back! We celebrated early because we spent Valentine's Day in Manhattan. My dad bought my family tickets for the KU-KSU game, but forgot to call when you could buy individual tickets, so we all sat separately, but the game was still pretty fun. We met my family (mom, dad, and sis) at the condo and then went to Old Chicago to meet some friends for lunch. The game was disappointing, but a good time. After waiting a long time to get out of the parking lot, we headed to Famous Dave's for dinner w/ my bro and one of his friends. Since the game was at 2:30 we were done with dinner around 7:30 so we went to Target and then headed back to the condo and my parents, B & I watched fireproof. Pretty decent movie...2 of our pieces of furniture are in it which was kinda interesting. I've seen our couch several places, so apparently it was popular in the day.

This week is gonna be a little crazy. I'm only working 3 days since I'm going to Manhattan for the career fair on Wednesday, but I'm still gonna have plenty of work to do. Our work system wasn't working right on Friday, so I couldn't work ahead like I planned. Oh well, such is life...I'll just do what I can!

New furniture :)

2009-02-09T19:22:00.000-08:00

Today two new pieces of furniture were placed in our home. First was our guest bed care of Nebraska Furniture Mart. They were having a pretty big sale last weekend so we stopped in on our way to Brandon's parents for the super bowl. We got a great deal on a bed and it was delivered this morning...it's nice having a spouse that works from home one day a week to do stuff like that :) It's pretty comfy if I say so myself. Once we get bedding on it I'll post a picture. The second piece was our DVD shelf from Wal-Mart. It was quite a bit cheaper online than in store, so we site-to-stored it and after getting lost the first time, we re-ordered and got our shelves. We built it last night and put it up against the wall and realized our floor is not straight...it had a pretty major slant that we fixed with furniture pads. Tonight while Obama was giving his press conference I organized our DVD's. Two more boxes unpacked!

I finished my mom's wedding album online over the weekend so my next big project is ordering our wedding photos. We have the ones in our album from the professional photographer and a large portrait for the wall (that needs a frame), but that's it. Ordering prints is going to be a huge task because we have literally hundreds to choose from. I'd trying to figure out the best way to do it, but we'll see how that goes. I'm ready to scrapbook, but I need photos first!

Lazy Day

2009-01-31T20:27:00.000-08:00

Today has been the perfect recovery day for my crazy busy week. I had some reports due at work on Friday and have a few more due Tuesday, so after Tuesday at 10 things should FINALLY slow down. I love what I'm doing, but everything seemed to take twice as long as it should this week...not so great when there's way to much work to be done!

Anyway, this post isn't about my week, it's about my day...well, weekend so far. Last night I met Brandon & his friend Bill for dinner at Oklahoma Joe's. Bill took us to dinner since we took car of his cat when he was out of town recently. The food was great and it was fun to hear about his trip. Afterwards Brandon & I went to Target...I think it was the first time I'd been there since we moved. We used to live right by one at the apt. and drive by all the time, but now it's a little out of the way, so we frequent Wal-mart instead. Wal-Mart just isn't as much fun...sure, we get what we need, but they don't have the "extras" they do at Target. We bought a few odds 'n ends and headed home. We got several movies for Christmas and decided to watch one when we got back. While we watched I transferred the files from my old laptop to my new one. I changed my blogger photo, but not for long. This pic is from our honeymoon. It was the last stop on our Grand Canyon tour...and was at some ruins...we walked around a little, but weren't too intrigued so we sat and took pictures. I was cute, until I realized B wasn't. The pic is fun, but I hate that my sunglasses make me look like I have a unibrow :S Ok, back to this week, we were up late watching, and slept late. A couple weeks ago we discovered we live very close to an ihop so we decided to go there for endless pancakes this morning. They were amazing-good and hot too! Our waitress was cute, but pretty scripted. Since the weather was finally warm I washed my very dirty car...along with all of Olathe. The lines were long, but it was worth it. When we got home I impressed my husband with my leaf gathering/bagging skills. We were getting them out from along the fence so there was minimal raking-guess all those years of Halloween cleanup paid off! We filled 10 bags and decided that was enough for today...Brandon had done around 20 before too. After that we came in and watched Moulin Rouge & the amazing K-state game...but not the OT because we recorded it and it was cut off :S I also did some digital scrapbooking--the album for my mom and dad from our wedding. It's much easier and more efficient to scrapbook on computer, but I'm not ready to switch completely. It's been great to lounge around and just do what I want. I love days like that!

Our house...part 1

2009-01-25T18:41:00.000-08:00

Ok, here it is! The first of two posts about our new home-with lots of photos. I know you've been waiting so I'll get right to it.

This room is right inside our front door (on the right). The furniture is from Brandon's bedroom at his parents house. Brandon & his parents hung the blinds...the only real blinds in our house, the rest are temporary since we're planning to replace all the windows this spring.

This is an extension of the room above. The door on the right is our garage and basement. The door with the window goes to our nice big backyard. The open area on the left is our kitchen.The kitchen :) Fun new appliances and freshly painted cabinets.

The upstairs hallway. On the left is the laundry room and then our bedroom. The right is the kitchen, my bathroom, and the 2nd bedroom.

The laundry room/room where we're storing kitchen gadgets to get rid of. Some of these include a quesadilla maker, magic bullet, smoothie maker, sandwich maker, small George foreman. Any takers? They're free :)The pantry in our laundry room. It was just a closet, but we hung shelves since we needed shelves more than clothes space :)

My bathroom2nd bedroom. The futon/bird/scrapbooking room.

Brandon's bathroom...off of our bedroom.And finally...our bedroom.

We still have to hang stuff on walls, but the upstairs is pretty much put together thankfully!

One month!

2009-01-18T19:09:00.001-08:00

We have been homeowners for one month! Nothing too crazy has happened...we did have to replace the garage door opener, but that wasn't too dramatic and only took a day to get someone here to install it. I love love love having a house. I knew it would be more space than an apartment, but I didn't have any idea how much I would enjoy having a house. It's lots of small things, like being able to do whatever you want with the space, not having to deal with weird smells from neighbor's cooking, being able to vacuum in the middle of the night, etc. etc. I have spent way too much time (and money!) at Lowe's in the last month, but we've come up with some great options to "problems" in the house. I was hoping to take pictures this weekend, but that's probably going to be a next weekend project. We have random stuff all over for projects we're hoping to get done tomorrow. Soon, very soon, my friends you can see where we're living now...the interior :)

Here's a quick rundown of my goals and the status of each:
1. Not so great on the blogging this week...I'll try to do better :) Any help on where/how/what to do to make my page look more custom and less template would be much appreciated!
2. Not much progress here...my stuff is all in boxes from the move. I'm trying to come up with a way to get it out of boxes and easier to use...some kind of cupboard or organization something that's fairly cheap. My pictures are either on my camera or my old computer...the cables to transfer both to my new laptop haven't been unpacked yet :)
3. This one is going well. I've kept it under 50 and have unsubscribed to a lot of store emails for stores I rarely, if ever, go to.
4. No progress here, although one of Brandon's friend's came over Friday and cooked for us, so I ATE a home cooked meal from our kitchen :) Doesn't count I know...our cookbooks are unpacked and we have plenty, so I need to read through some and pick some recipes to try. Any suggestions?
5. I read a book about KC I got from my in-laws for Christmas, but it was mostly photos so I'm not counting it. It was good to read about my new city and it's history. A lot of the buildings are downtown near where I work. It makes my drive to work interesting looking for them on my commute.

8o'5

2009-01-07T21:00:00.001-08:00

In honor of our new home...located at 805 something in Olathe, KS....if you need it let me know...I'm going to name you 8 things that have happened since I last blogged, 0 about right now (sorry...had to put that 0 in there somehow!) and 5 goals/resolutions/hopes for the New Year.

EIGHT!

1. We spent a very cold winter day changing the locks on our new home. Although the locks were pretty new, we didn't end up with all the keys and the seller wasn't the most trustworthy. I don't think my husband or I will become locksmiths anytime soon, but we can lock AND open our doors :)

2. We went to my in-laws house for Christmas on December 23rd. It was kind of a rush to get there after work, but it was a fun evening...holidays are so much more fun with kids around.

3. We went to my parents house December 24-28 and celebrated 3 Christmases while we were there. It was busy, but we still got some much needed down time too.

4. In Oberlin I went to a funeral for an infant. I've been to several funerals in my life...coming from a small town and having a large family, probably warrant that, but none like this one. Amazing message, and super sad.

5. We rang in 2009, our first new year as a married couple, by packing up things in our apartment and watching the ball drop in Times Square. Watching that ball drop has an extra special meaning to me, since the trip when I went to see it live with my friend JP is what brought about me & B talking more...then dating...and you know the rest :)

6. We moved last weekend! With amazing help from my in-laws almost all of our stuff is in our house. We don't have to be out of our apartment until the 19th, so we can go get the random stuff that's there and clean later.

7. Being in our house that isn't all unpacked and settled...I feel more at home than I ever did in our apartment. I'm glad we have this new start so soon in our marriage. The apartment always felt more like B's place than ours.

8. Our house smells too new. I'm not sure what the small is, but it's filling my clothes and I'm not too fond of it.

ZERO!

FIVE!
Hopefully these will be SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timely) goals...you be the judge

1. Be a more dedicated blogger by blogging once a week or updating my page (which needs to happen in the next month)

2. Work on something scrapbook related once a month (order photos, actually scrapbook). Ideally I'd like to be caught up by the end of the year, but we'll see how that goes. A high priority is to go through all our non-professional wedding photos and get them in an album. We have a couple thousand so ordering them will probably be the hardest part of that job!

3. Keep my gmail inbox under 50 emails at all times. To do this I need to unsubscribe to a lot of the auto-emails I get and immediately delete and reply to emails as I get them instead of waiting until later.

4. Start cooking dinner once a week...real food, not just something frozen or from a box. This will require some planning and thought on my part since I get home around 5:30 or 6 most evenings.

5. Read 3 books...any 3, as long as I read them from start to finish. I used to read ALL the time and now I rarely do. I have a ton of books that I've started, but haven't finished, and I work right by one of the KC libraries, so finding something to read shouldn't be a problem!

Our House :)

2008-12-18T19:11:00.001-08:00

This was a big day in the life of my husband and I...we closed on our first home! This picture is from the day we went house shopping...I'll add more interior pictures once we take them :) The ones we have now have the seller's "staging" furniture in it.

We looked at houses the Saturday before Thanksgiving and started the buying process the next day :) It's gone pretty quickly, which is good. It's exciting, but also kind of stressful.

Anyway, our house is in Olathe, near the Great Mall & MidAmerica Nazarene University. It has 3 bedrooms & 3 baths. It's one story with a finished basement and has a nice fenced backyard. We have some massive trees so we'll get plenty of exercise from raking come fall :)

We're planning to move over New Year's weekend-weather permitting.

Tag! I'm it :)

2008-12-01T17:26:00.000-08:00

After reading a few "tag" blog entries, it's probably about time that I got tagged myself. My friend Chris of La Brisa Photography tagged me (hi Chris!). Anyway, on to the fun stuff :)

So here's how the game works:

link to the person that tagged you (done!)
post the rules on your blog (um...you're reading them aren't you)
write 6 random things about yourself (done...and harder than I expected)
tag 6 people at the end of your post (done)
let the blogger know that he/she has been tagged (done)
let the tagger know when your entry it up (done, after I publish this)

I love going out to eat. It doesn't matter if it's fast food or something fancy or something in between, some part about going somewhere to eat brings me joy. I think it might have something to do with the fact that in college going out for a meal usually meant meeting up with a friend I hadn't seen in awhile.
I really like my car. It's nothing fancy (99 Olds Alero) and I've driven it for 6 years, but I still like it quite a bit. It isn't always the most reliable, but usually gets me from point A to point B.
One of my goals in life is to go to all 50 states. I've already been to over half so I'm well on my way. Of course, I've been to the "easy" ones that are near Kansas, so the rest will take more planning and effort.
I am a counter. I count things all the time...letters in words, steps, people and usually I try to group them in 5's. I'll blame this one on being an accountant being obsessed with making numbers balance out.
I'm good at starting projects, but not so good at finishing them. I have a whole tote of random crafts that I intend to finish someday. My current project is a cross-stitch that I bought almost 2 years ago. I worked on it some then and then brought it back out is summer. My "unfinished" projects include my scrapbooks, a crocheted blanket, and some random things I'm not remembering because I haven't seen them in awhile :)
I like planning trips. I would love to be a travel agent. I love the travel part too, but I like coordinating flights, shows, transportation, hotels, the whole bit. So...if you ever need help planning a trip---let me know!

Now for the tagging. Hopefully you'll all join in the fun! Jenny P, Anna, Confetti, B in Real Life, Rachel, and Jackie.

Happy Thanksgiving!

2008-11-27T07:22:00.000-08:00

It's been WAY too long since I've posted. I could give a whole list of reasons why, but I'm not.

I am going to quickly bring you up to speed on that last couple of months though :) I hope to post a little more regularly, probably by going back to the 52 weeks of awesomeness.

Anyway, I left off with wedding rehearsal, obviously that was followed by our wedding day. It was a lot of fun, and didn't have any major setbacks. After a day of opening gifts and then driving across the state to our apartment, we headed to Vegas for a week. It was pretty hot, but we had a great time. We were in Vegas Tues-Fri, then the Grand Canyon Fri-Sun, and back in Vegas Sun-Tues. If you're going to Vegas DO NOT eat the buffet at Excalibur....not so impressive. However, the one at Luxor is pretty amazing.

After our honeymoon, Brandon went back to work and I spent a couple weeks organizing our apartment and getting things settled. September 22 I started my real job as a Surveillance Analyst for Key Bank Real Estate Capital in downtown KC. I spend my day reviewing financial statements for businesses that are collateral for loans. I mostly look at operating statements and rent rolls for apartment buildings, retail spaces, hotels, and storage facilities. I could go in to much more detail, but it would probably make me look like a huge nerd :) If you want to know, just ask! I really like the group of people I work with. We are currently understaffed, so we're super busy. I don't like that part so much, but I do like the work. If you are/know of any econ/acctg/finance grads in the KC area looking for work let me know!

Now I spend my days at work, my evenings with Brandon at home, and do various things on the weekend. I haven't done a ton of KC exploring, but we did go to City Market in October and bought some yummy fruits & veggies. Tomorrow we're going to see the Plaza lights.

For Thanksgiving we're at Brandon's parents house in Leavenworth. We came last night and are hanging out this morning, watching the parade. My mom's coming tomorrow to shop and visit for the rest of the weekend. I'm excited to have 4 days of work, yay! I hope you have a happy Thanksgiving, where ever you are!

Rehearsal

2008-10-05T15:56:00.000-07:00

Friday, the day before the wedding, was a fun day. My dad had tours around Oberlin planned for the guys in town that day. They met at our house just after I had gotten up. That morning I went walking and relaxed at home. For lunch my mom had invited all the ladies...family and bridesmaids...to lunch at the B&B in town. More people had come to town that I hadn't seen, so it was great to chat with all of them. The food there is amazing...especially the dessert :) I can't get my pictures to upload...but I have a great one of all the great ladies there.

After lunch I went to the hair place with 2 of my bridesmaids to look at hair books. Then I had time to kill until rehearsal so I went home. Brandon called and asked if I wanted to hang out since I had hardly seen him since he'd been in town. We got ready for rehearsal and I went and picked him up and we spent some time chatting before we drove to the church.

Rehearsal was fine...a little chaotic, but nothing horrible. Having a lot of people involved in a wedding is fun, but requires a lot of question answering :) I was glad when it was over and I could relax at the dinner. Our rehearsal dinner was at the museum in Oberlin. The caterers did a great job and both of our dad's gave toast that weren't too embarrassing to either of us. We passed out the gifts for all of our helpers and then a group of my friends went to my house and hung out and drank smoothies and chatted until we all headed our separate ways to sleep. It was fun to chat with all of them and we laughed quite a bit. I got to bed later than I should have, but not super late. It was all worth it.

Wedding Week!

2008-10-05T15:52:00.001-07:00

I decided to write several mini-posts to get caught up instead of writing one huge one. Here's the first of my attempt to get caught up and fill you in :)

The week of my wedding was busy, but a lot of fun. The wedding craziness began on Wednesday. My parents and I went to McCook to get all the stuff we'd rented then headed to the church to decorate. We spent the afternoon getting the church all ready. My mom had made most of the decorations ahead so it didn't take too long. Dad worked outside in the yard and mom and I worked on the sanctuary. Some ladies from the church stopped by to say hi and helped some which was fun. I don't have any pictures from this event....sorry! Wednesday night family started coming which was a lot of fun.

Thursday we spent the morning doing random odds & ends. At noon my parents, me, my sister, and 2 sets of aunts & uncles went to the Gateway (reception hall) to decorate. The arena is a huge concrete room, so we had our work cut out for us. We had a plan and plenty of help, so that all went well. Brandon & his parents & gma came that day and we had to call them to buy some light bulbs, but that was the only real setback of the day. My job was to give my opinion and float around and help. It was a little stressful answering all the questions, but went well.

That night we all went back to my house for Mexican buffet. Brandon's out of town family came that evening so I got to meet them and spend some time getting to know them.

It's been a month...

2008-09-22T19:46:00.000-07:00

I'm going to write a massive post this week, but thought I'd give a mini update tonight. Life has been busy and packed with changes over the last month. Good changes, but a lot of change which is something I don't usually do well with. Things really couldn't be much better. In the last month I've lived at home with my parents, gotten married, been to Vegas, Hoover Dam & the Grand Canyon, moved to KC, AND started my first "real" job. I'll give you detail later and hopefully have some pics. If you wanna see wedding pics (SEVERAL hundred of them) while you wait, check out:
http://olsonwhite.shutterfly.com
http://olsonwhite2.shutterfly.com

More soon!

Topic #12...Household Items

2008-08-22T15:32:00.000-07:00

I love it when I get to mix part of my daily life with these "weekly" topics. Lately I have been getting a lot of new household items at my bridal showers. It's been fun to see what different people choose and I've only gotten a few duplicates. Brandon and I unpacked and put away stuff in his/our apartment last weekend and determined the kitchen doesn't have nearly enough storage. We did some rearranging and it's all there, but I know we'll have an even bigger job after we get all our wedding gifts. Here's a pic of one of my favorite gifts:

My Grandma Benda (my mom's mom) collects chickens. She used to have a special shelf for them in her kitchen. I got a cutting board shaped like a chicken from her :)

This next picture is me and both of my Grandmas. I've been lucky enough to grow up within 30 miles of both of them, so I have a lot of memories growing up with these wonderful women.

On a personal note...it's one week and a day until my wedding! Things are going well. I'm mostly excited for people to start coming so the event can happen instead of just talking about it all the time.

Topic #11...My favorite Color

2008-07-28T21:27:00.000-07:00

If you don't know the answer to this, you don't know me well at all. I'm pretty sure I've posted about it before too. My favorite color is YELLOW! The brighter the better. To prove it, here's a couple pictures of my bedroom when I was in high school:
In the past year or so, my mom has redone my room..it's now kind of a pale teal color and not as much fun, but much more grown up. It feels a lot more like a "guest" room to me than my room, even though I still have stuff in it.

Topic #10...Things that make my life easier

2008-07-20T15:02:00.000-07:00

These aren't super creative answers, but at first thought, 3 things that make my life easier are cell phones, the Internet, and electricity.

Electricity powers a majority of what I do. Being without it during finals last December quickly made me remember how much I take it for granted. Studying wrapping up in a blanket by candlelight, was less than ideal. Luckily we weren't without power for long, but we did keep people who were for a few days.

The Internet is my source of all kinds of information...both useful and not. It's also how I learned a great deal of what I have about my fiance. Even when we lived across a basketball court from each other, we spent a lot of time talking online, something that hasn't changed much since. It helps a lot now that we're 2 hours apart. It also helps me keep connected with lots of friends and family, and has been very beneficial for wedding planning.

Cell phones are great. I use mine all the time to talk and text with people I do, and sometimes don't, want to talk with. When I was in Europe a few summers ago, it was kind of weird to not carry a phone and know that help was only a phone call away.

Topic #9...Objects that tell something about me

2008-07-09T14:44:00.000-07:00

If you know me very well...or have ever lived with me you'll know that scrapbooking is one of my hobbies. It's where my creativity comes out. I don't stay as caught up as I'd like, but I'm working on that this summer. Right now I'm finishing up last fall. I have pictures in my album through Thanksgiving, but I need to go back and do some writing.

Since I don't stay caught up, I do a lot of reflecting when I'm creating my scrapbooks. They remind me of things I've done, people I was with, and how I felt at the time. It's crazy to see how much things change in a year. One year ago I was living in Texas with an amazing woman, working at a beef plant, getting ready for my parents to come to the Cheeseburger Festival. Today, I'm getting ready to leave Manhattan, KS after 5 great years here and preparing to get married. This weekend I'm going to two weddings. One I'm in, one of my best friends from high school & K-State and then my cousin's.

My mom has scrapbooks of most of my life since I was born. I say most because she isn't quite done with my jr. high & high school books...maybe some day I'll get them. I have made my own since jr. high pretty consistently. I have a book or two from grade school things like Girl Scout trips, but most of my life since high school is well documented with photos, stickers, and safely stored under page protectors. My little sister is probably the other person that has looked through all of my books, aside from me. It's a little daunting to see a shelf full of them, but they show a lot of where I've been and what I've been through. Care to look?

Topic #8...One for the road (and pictures!)

2008-07-08T16:58:00.000-07:00

This topic seems to describe my summer. From people traveling to see me, trips to KC and home, and weddings to go to I'm spending a lot of time on the road this summer. I'm going to recap and add a few pictures to catch you all up on where I've been!

To recap...Graduation weekend I had graduation in Manhattan, then traveled to KC. Brandon took me to Buca di Beppo to celebrate. The food was great, of course, but the highlight was the free piece of chocolate cake we got (B had a coupon.) It was HUGE, and AMAZING, and we ate the entire thing :)

The next weekend I went back to KC for Brandon's b-day and got to celebrate with him & his family at a very fun Brazilian place (but no place for vegetarians or small eaters!). Memorial Day weekend I went to Oberlin to see my family and work on some wedding stuff. Sorry...no photos for that :)

June started with Brandon in town for pre-marital counseling and ordering our wedding bands (which haven't come in yet, but should be here soon). My friend Kelsey's bachelorette party was this weekend too.

The next weekend my parents, Mary & I went to KC to show my dad where I'm going to live after we're married. Saturday night we went and played mini golf, then went bowling. We also had a father's day lunch with Brandon's family. The next week Brandon & I went to Denver for Wes & Chandra's wedding. It was a lot of fun to be back in Denver. My family used to go there all the time (it's the closest major city to Oberlin), but it had been awhile since I'd been there. Most of my family and several of my friends were there so I had a great time. I have a TON of great photos from this event...but I'll just put up one here.

The day after the wedding a bunch of my extended family went to watch the Rockies. Here's my family pre-game.

The last weekend of June was my bachelorette party on Friday and my friend Camilla's wedding on Saturday. Alicia & Ramon came and stayed with me for it.

Last weekend Brandon & I went to Oberlin for the 4th of July. I haven't gotten the pictures from my mom yet. I also had a tupperware shower that was lots of fun!

Topic #7...One subject from different angles

2008-06-12T08:50:00.000-07:00

This topic is very photo-oriented (which makes sense because that was the intent of this list), so I can't really write about it. Instead, I'll write about my last 5 days.

Sunday
Brandon was in town and we went to church, where I was recognized, then we both were since they were talking about the job opening in for my position. After church we went to get a few things at K-Mart and went to lunch at Sirloin Stockade. Brandon and I went back to my place for awhile before he headed back to KC. After he left I started working on a 1,000 piece puzzle of Times Square I've had in my cupboard since Christmas 2006 on my new table :) I bought the table the week before in KC on a really good sale at LNT. I love that store, and now it's going out of business :( While puzzling I had the b-ball game on, but didn't watch too intently.

Monday
I started my day at work doing normal Monday stuff. Then I went to Justin Hall to start my summer class "Human Development and Aging." Online it says we're meeting for 2 hours Monday-Friday, June 9-July 3. When we got the calendar in class, we found out we aren't meeting on Wednesdays and the last class is July 1st, yay! We have a chapter of reading a night, but our only points are from 2 tests, which are open book & open note. Gonna be rough ;) There's 10 students, all girls in the class. Luckily there's another MAcc student. The difference between a business major and an FSHS major is pretty obvious. After class I worked and came home and FINISHED my puzzle. 1,000 piece puzzle in 2 evenings, I'm pretty proud of that fact.

Tuesday
Work and class. My boss is gone for the week so work is really slow. After work I worked on organizing photos and started getting an order together. I also figured out which ones I need to get from others. Tuesday evening I went to LIFE Group...small group, but good discussion. It's a good break to my week.

Wednesday
Most of my day was at work since I didn't have class. I ran some errands and got some work done. When I got home I re-arranged my living room and got out my scrapbooking stuff. I watched "The Bucket List," talked to my friend Bayley, and was about to call it a night when I heard a weird whistling noise. I turned off the TV and realized it was the sirens. I turned the TV back on and flipped through the news channels, but none of them had coverage yet, just the rolling bar across the bottom of the screen, so I turned on the radio. They were talking about the tornado in Salina and said all of Manhattan should take cover. I looked outside and it was calm and totally dry. It was dark, so I couldn't really see clouds. I live on the 4th floor of a condo building so I took cover in my bathtub. I have several texts and calls and moved the radio in the bathroom. My lights flickered a little, but I never lost power. I stayed in my bathroom until the storm was over and then made a bunch of phone calls. I had the radio or TV on for about an hour listening to the storm reports around town. It was tempting to go look, but I knew I shouldn't, so I decided to wait until morning and headed to bed.

Thursday/Today
This morning I woke up early to texts and phone calls from Oberlin people. I got up and replied to them all and looked out at the damage. I couldn't see much from my place except a cop restricting access to campus. I got dressed and headed out to see the damage. I drove around on campus a little and saw quite a bit of the damage. Then I headed over to Seth Childs, not sure what I'd be able to see. Traffic was moving kind of slow, but I could drive past the damage at Waters True Value, Little Apple Toyota Honda & the surrounding area. Some parts were really bad. Here's the link to my pics: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2195790&l=b9fe9&id=17000417. After exploring I went home and got ready for work, and now I'm here blogging :) I apologize for the delay in updates, I'll try to do better!

Topic #6...Botanical

2008-05-27T17:13:00.000-07:00

The word botanical makes me instantly think of my mother. She got her degree at K-State in Landscape Design and loves plants and going to botanical gardens. This is not a passion that was passed on to any of her children. When we were in Dallas a couple of years ago we all entertained her and went to the Dallas Arboretum. My mom was in heaven, but the rest of us were pretty bored. Because of my mom's love of plants and all, we have one of the nicest yards in Oberlin. It's one of those yards that people drive by really slow to look at. It's kinda weird when we're out in the yard or something, but also a little neat.

I do not have my mom's green thumb, but I do love daisies :)

Topic #5...Sports

2008-05-09T18:31:00.000-07:00

Whew, back to an easier topic. I would not consider myself an athlete really, but sports do play a pretty big part of my life. Here's more lists :)

Sports I've Played...actually on a team

Baseball/Softball 1st grade-now, I played in summer leagues every year from 1st grade until sometime in high school. It's been kinda hit or miss since then, but I did play some intramural games at K-State.
Volleyball 7th-12th grade. My best year was probably my jr. year. I'm no volleyball star, but did well playing JV. My senior year was mainly sitting the bench...at least I wasn't the only one.
Basketball 7th & 8th grade. Once again, I had fun on JV, but didn't love the sport enough to play in high school. I did go to every game as a statistician though...and still keep stats on a program when I'm at high school games.

Sports I've watched

Football...at the kids, jr. high, high school, and collegiate levels
Basketball...at the kids, jr. high, high school, collegiate, and professional levels
Soccer...professional level
Volleyball...kids, jr. high, high school, collegiate levels
Cross country...high school level
Wrestling...kids, jr. high & high school levels
Track...kids, jr. high & high school
Baseball...kids, jr. high, high school, collegiate, and professional levels (my dad is a Red Sox nut, but loves baseball in general, so anytime we vacation to a town with a MLB team, we usually go. For many of these trips the home team was playing the yankees...which is how the yankees became "my" team. My dad's so proud ;))

My best K-State sports memories
*Note: this list is not all inclusive...that would take way too long

Storming the court after beating Texas in B-ball my freshman year
Waiting in line before the KU game freshman year...we were close to the front and got to wait between the two doors of Bramlage. One of the guys in there was reading, seriously reading Playboy...
Waiting in line with my friends from Boyd for hours and hours
Trips to KC, Columbia, and Lincoln to see the women's b-ball team play
Having most of the women's b-ball team living on my floor
Beating OU in the Big 12 championship...I was there with my dad :)
Beating Texas here my sr. year and storming the field...even though my group got separated and we searched for Bayley for hours
Finally beating KU...in Lawrence and Bramlage
Sitting in the front row at nearly every game (men's and women's) my freshman and sophomore years
Being Big 12 champs in 3 sports my freshman year: FB, VB, and women's BB

Topic #4...Water

2008-04-27T20:09:00.000-07:00

Well I'm now past the easy to write about things. I've thought about writing about water several times, but haven't sat down and made myself do it. Here goes nothing...

Water makes me think of rain, which we've had a lot of recently here in Manhattan. I don't mind occasional rain, but I'm getting a little tired of it. Especially on days when I have to walk to the other end of campus...not so fun. I do love the smell of rain, and the coolness that it can bring in the spring/summer. Growing up in a small agricultural town, rain was a constant topic. Farmers always talk about needed it to come, or needing it to stop. Personally, I think farmers are some of the biggest gamblers out there. Sure, there is a lot of science and method to farming, but so much of it is dependent on the weather being what you want when you want. Dry enough to plant, wet enough to grow, dry enough to harvest. Obviously, we wouldn't have much food if there weren't farmers, and it isn't exactly something you can do indoors, so there aren't really other options. Ok, that's enough of my "farmgirl" thoughts for today :)

Note....my next three weeks are pretty crazy since it's the end of the semester, so my posting may show that. It may also double because I need a break, we shall see :)

Topic #3...Show us your Hometown

2008-04-17T18:15:00.000-07:00

Since you learned in my last post that I love traveling, I'm going to give you a visitor's guide to my hometown of Oberlin, Kansas.

Location
Northwest Kansas, intersection of US Hwys 36 & 83. It's about 4 hours from Manhattan, 2 from Hays, 4 from Denver, and 6 from KC.

Population
1,800ish

Lodging
Frontier Motel...built in the 1950's
Landmark Inn...a B&B that's in a restored bank on Main Street

Food
A&W
Pizza Hut
Frontier Restaurant
Teller Room Restaurant, inside the Landmark Inn (this is the "fancy" place in Oberlin. It's a really neat place and they have good food and AMAZING desserts)
Re-Load (our town bar) home of some great pizza

Transportation
There is a city bus that will take you around town, but it's mostly used by elderly people. You have to call for pick-up...sorta like SafeRide, but they'll take you too and from places, not just home. Oberlin is about 4 hours from a major airport (Denver), and 30 minutes from a train station (McCook, NE).

Attractions
One of the biggest attractions in Oberlin is our annual county fair. It takes place Tuesday-Saturday the first full week of August each year. It's home-owned and operated, i.e. all done by volunteers. Lots of my family comes back for it each year and last year was the first time I hadn't been to it since I've lived there.

Oberlin is far from exciting, but it's home :)

Topic #2...Introduction of yourself to [everyone]

2008-04-12T11:57:00.000-07:00

I could take the easy way out and give you the link to my facebook page, or just tell you to keep reading my blog to learn about me, but that kind of defeats the purpose. I did a little searching for one of those annoying forwards with lots of questions to answer about yourself, but I'm not coming up with anything too promising, so I'll just write. We're going list style again, because I know this is going to get random. I'll go with 22 things one for every year of my life, but in no particular order.

About me:

I am in my last few months of school...ever. I'll finish classes July 3rd, but I get to go through graduation in May.
I am engaged and getting married in August. Which means I'm also busy wedding planning, but it's more fun than work (at least so far :)
My favorite flower is a daisy. One of my birthdays I got 3-4 boquets of them, it was great!
My favorite color is yellow. My bedroom at home used to be bright yellow. My mom's redone my room since I've been in college, but when I think of my room at home I still picture yellow.
I am from a small town and I love it, but I'm not in any rush to move back there.
I have had a job/role in 10 weddings so far....maid of honor once, bridesmaid 3 times, candlelighter twice, flowergirl once, gift table once, handed out programs once, and handed out wheat to throw once....and I'll be in two more this summer (aside from my own!). I've also been to plenty of wedding I just attended. I've learned all sorts of random trivia at these I've kept in mind when planning my wedding, both things I want to do and things I want to avoid.
I have been to 31 states and 8 different countries...basically I love to travel!
When I have large blocks of free time at home I often spend it scrapbooking. I'm constantly playing catchup, but I love doing it. I'm considering switching to digital scrapbooking for my post-college books, but we'll see.
I am the oldest child in my family and have a younger brother and sister.
I was born in Missouri...St. Joseph to be exact, but moved to my hometown when I was 18 months old, so most people assume I was born there.
I am a Christian and grew up in a family of believers.
I taught piano lessons in high school and took lessons for 11 years, but you probably wouldn't know it since I've hardly played in the last 5 years. I hope to get back in to that when I have a house and can have a piano again.
My freshman year I was at nearly every KSU sporting event, and was in the front row for most women & men's basketball games. I loved it then, but now it seems a little crazy to me that I spent so much time in line :)
My favorite Disney movie is The Little Mermaid, followed closely by Mulan.
I do not have my wisdom teeth.
I am very blind without my glasses or contacts and hope to have Lasik someday.
I'm moving to Kansas City in September.
My name "Sarah" is after one of my mom's favorite dolls. My middle name "Eulaine" (you-lane) is my mom's mother's name.
My Grandma, my mom, and I were all born in April.
My parent's wedding anniversary and mine will both be in August.
When I get married, I will be the same age my dad was when he got married (23) and my dad will be the same age on my wedding day his dad was on my parent's (49).
I like making lists :)

Topic #1....Free for all

2008-04-07T19:57:00.000-07:00

Two posts in the same day...pretty crazy :) Well, the first topic doesn't help me too much with my "writer's block" in the blogging world. I've been sitting here trying to come up with something to write about, but I'm not pleased with any of my choices. So I'm going to do what I often do when I need to be productive and don't want to be...make a list. I do this in class all the time. It makes me feel like I'm accomplishing something, but it usually isn't what I should be doing.

#1: Things I'm looking forward to in the next few months

Getting married in August
Moving to Kansas City
Graduating from K-State (again!)
Being done with school forever...I will not come back to get my PhD.
Being a wife

#2: Things I'm not

Moving away from so many good friends
Finding a real job
The actual moving process...packing, cleaning, hauling, unpacking
Writing Thank You's for wedding gifts
Leaving my job and co-workers at NHC

That's all the creativity I have for this evening. Hopefully this will keep me more motivated to post!

52 topics

2008-04-07T19:44:00.001-07:00

I'm getting a little bored blogging about my daily/weekly happenings, but I want to keep blogging. I love reading my friends's blogs and feel like I should keep one going to return the favor :) So to solve this problem, I'm borrowing ideas from the blogs of a couple of my friends. They are photographers (the first two links on my page) and are photoblogging "52 weeks of awesomeness." Each week has a new topic to take photos of and post. It's fun to see their new pictures nearly every week. Ok, I'm not a photographer and don't aspire to be one...I'm leaving that to my fiance. But, I'm going to use their topics as much as I can. I'm obviously a few weeks behind, but that's a-ok with me. Some of the topics are really photo-oriented so I'll see what happens in terms of writing about them. I'm excited to do this, so hopefully it works out. Feel free to join in on the fun :)

Whew!

2008-03-29T19:31:00.000-07:00

This week has been pretty busy. I didn't expect it to be too bad, but things sure picked up. I had two phone interviews on Friday for positions in downtown KC. They both went well and the ladies I talked with said they'd recommend me for a site interview. It may be awhile until that happens, since I don't want to start until late September/early October (post-wedding). I'm really ok with that though. It gives me the freedom to look other places, but a couple opportunities to go back to in August if nothing better works out.

I spent a couple hours out at Meadowlark Hills will my consulting group interviewing staff for our communications project. It's a pretty neat place out there. Two of the people we talked to were great and two were just ok. Regardless, I think we have a good starting place for the rest of our project.

I got my tests back from right before Spring Break and I am pleased with my grades. I usually slack off mid-semester and don't do very well on my tests, but that doesn't seem to be the case this semester...I'm glad I finally have that figured out. I enrolled for the last time EVER on Monday. A little weird, but pretty exciting too!

I was supposed to go out of town with my LIFE Group last night for a retreat, but several people got sick so we cancelled. It was disappointing to not get to go, but honestly probably better for me. Those of us that are healthy and in town met for dinner last night. My mom was in town for Kurt's house's Mom's weekend so she came with me.

Today has been pretty relaxing. I slept in, went to the Post office to pick up a package and spent the rest of the day scrapbooking, ordering pictures, and organizing my scrapbooking stuff. I got a bunch of pictures from my mom that I need to work into my book, so I did a little of that. Hopefully I'll get to do a LOT of scrapbooking this summer. I'm a little over a year behind and have some stuff to go back and fill in too. My goal is to have my books caught up when I move in August, but we'll see.

Spring Break Part II

2008-03-24T18:50:00.000-07:00

Today was back to school and work...no fun, but I did have 2 messages to return about jobs and I have a phone interview on Thursday! Now for the real reason for my post...the rest of my break which was a little less eventful than the first half.

Day 8-Friday (aka Wedding Planning Day)
My mom and I spent most of the day working on wedding stuff. We started by meeting with the lady at the reception site. She gave us a lot of good tips about decorating and setting up the room which was great. We're using a caterer, not their staff so we talked about details of that. We can use all of the stuff in the kitchen...including all of the dishes so that will be great! After that we headed north to McCook and met with the lady at the rental place. We elimated a couple things and added some more. I'm getting table decorations, and some bigger things for the church and the reception. She had a lot of ideas too, but wasn't as overwhelming as the first time I met with her since I have more of an idea what I'm wanting now. From there we took a break and had lunch with my sister at Taco John's (yum---I LOVE that place and their potato ole's) and went to get some stuff from Sears for my dad & brother. Our final wedding stop of the day was Rye Printing, where I ordered invitations, thank yous, and napkins. Brandon and I had made most of the decisions from their website. They're supposed to be sending me a proof in the next couple of days to review and then they'll be ordered. It was a productive day, but I was tired and ready to go home and relax some.

That evening I went to Atwood and saw my friend Angela. She took me to dinner at a great Mexican place in her town and we caught up on life. I hadn't seen her since right after I got engaged so there was a lot that had changed. It was fun to catch up and I got to see her wedding proofs too. When I was driving the 28ish miles back to Oberlin I saw deer 3 different times..but only had to slam on the breaks once. No damage though, thank goodness, especially since I was in my mom's car. Two of my aunts were in town so I went to my grandparent's and talked to them some when I got back.

Day 9-Saturday
This was a pretty lazy day. I did a little packing and organizing, but other than that I lounged around and watched b-ball. The sad K-State game and KU. Mary and I spend a little time playing Rock Band too.

Day 10-Sunday (Happy Easter!)
My family had breakfast together and then got ready for church. Church was pretty full, so even though we were there on time we sat further back than we usually do when my mom plays the piano. The lady who was the youth group leader when I was in jr. & sr. high was back visiting her sister so I talked to her for awhile after church. It was good to catch up with her some. Then we came back to town and got ready for dinner. I packed up and then helped get ready for dinner. My Aunt Patti & Uncle Gerald and all 4 of my grandparents came over for dinner. The food was great and we were all stuffed afterwards. Then we sat around and talked some before Kurt and I headed back. The four hours in the Tahoe seemed like nothing compared to the 1,700 miles we'd put in earlier in the week!

Spring Break Part I

2008-03-20T19:05:00.000-07:00

We survived the long trip from Massachusetts, but more about that later. Here's how I've spent my spring break so far.

Day 1-Friday
I drove to KC and did a little shopping while Brandon finished working. I got to his place and unloaded my stuff before he got home. We went to Chipotle and got food...behind some guy with the most random takeout orders ever...which we took back to his place just in time for the KSU game. The game...well, certainly less than desirable.

Day 2-Saturday
We slept in a little bit and got up and ready and went to IHOP for breakfast, yum yum! We had planned to spend most of the day watching b-ball, but weren't too excited about that after the KSU loss, so we headed to Harrah's for some slot action. I won $9 on a penny slot pretty soon after we got there. One of the older lady came up and told me that if I'd done the max bet (90 cents) I would have made $100, would have been nice, but I manage to break even for the day which was fine with me. We went to Petco and Brandon bought some guppies for his nice clean fish tank. Then we went back to his place and watched some b-ball and some Heroes. For dinner we went to BD's Mongolian BBQ. I'd call it something like a stir fry buffet place. Lots of meats and veggies and sauces you take and watch have cooked. It was pretty fun and the food was great. After that we went back and watched more Heroes before heading to bed for the night.

Day 3-Sunday
We got up and went to church and were planning to eat at CB in Paradise for lunch, but it was CLOSED! so we went to Uno's Chicago Pizza instead. The food was really good, but our service was horrible. Our waiter came right away and took our drink orders, but from there it was pretty much down hill. There was a big group in the main room and all the attention was there, not on the other tables. We went and bought some groceries for dinner, and supplies for dying eggs. When we got back we started hard-boiling eggs and picked up some. After the eggs were cooked and cooling, we exchanged Easter baskets then dyed eggs. We didn't have enough vinegar so I had to make a quick trip to the store to get more. Luckily B lives right by a Target. We got dinner marinating and watched the bracket selection while we dyed our eggs, so they were pretty bright in color. We had fondue for supper...both a broth and then chocolate, yummy! I was really hungry so it was a little slow at first, but the food was good, a lot better than the last time we made fondue. After dinner we worked on our wedding invitations which went pretty well, other than choosing wording. There are SO many choices. We got it done though.

Day 4-Monday
I spent the day shopping while Brandon was at work. I got some new spring clothes and some dresses for all the weddings I have this summer. Brandon & I met back at his place and I packed up and we went to Outback and met my mom, brother, and sister for dinner. Then he headed home and I went to the hotel with them.

Day 5-Tuesday (The adventure begins!)
Kurt and I got up around 3:45 to get ready for our flight. We took the 4:30am shuttle and got to a very dead airport. We waited about 20 minutes and went through security with no problems. As we were getting in line to board, I saw one of my friends from church and her daughter who were also heading east to get a vehicle. I slept most of the flight, then got Cinnabon during our layover and headed to Connecticut. The guy from the dealership came and picked us up. He was nice and told us stories about other people he'd sold vehicles to online. When we got to the dealership, the Tahoe was there and looked pretty nice. He gave us the keys and we went and looked it over. Then Kurt filled out some paper work and we headed west. The interstate in NY is really boring to drive. You don't really go through any towns so they have lots of service areas to stop at. We finally made it across the state and headed in to Canada to go to Niagara Falls. We got there just before dark. It was really neat...and wet and cold :) After taking some pictures we headed in to town to grab some food before driving through Canada. That probably wasn't the smartest idea since the speed limit is only 100 kmh...about 60mph. It was rainy & foggy too which wasn't too fun. Eventually we made it to the Michigan border and made it through customs fine. I drove the last leg of the night, which was SUPER foggy for about an hour, then cleared off. We stopped in Michigan around midnight for a much need break and some sleep.

Day 6-Wednesday
We didn't make it as far as we were hoping on Tuesday, so we had about 1,000 miles to drive Wednesday. We got back on the road at 7:45 and drove through Michigan, Indiana, and part of Illinois before stopping for lunch and gas. We had more rain, but not so much fog which was good. The more we drove the better the weather was. I drove from the middle of Illinois to Des Moines and then Kurt drove to Lincoln where we made our last stop for supper and gas. We got home about 11pm and were tired of hearing the same songs on the radio and being in the Tahoe. It's a really comfy vehicle to ride in though.

Day 7-Thursday
Today I've just done random things at home and watched b-ball. Go Cats! That was a very fun game, and certainly worth skipping Maundy Thursday church for.

Falling behind...

2008-03-14T07:19:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the lack of posting lately. I either haven't been inspired or haven't had time. I hate taking long breaks like this because that makes it pretty hard to start again, but don't worry. I am :) I'm going to do updates by topic. Enjoy!

Wedding- I ordered my shoes and the candlelighter & bridesmaid dresses yesterday, which is a good thing to have done. I talked to the shop about my preggo bridesmaid and they recommended getting her the maternity dress in the same color that the company offers, so that's what we're doing. Now Brandon and I are working on choosing invitations. I'm meeting with the print shop over break so we'll work on that this weekend. We're close to picking the invitation, but need to choose wording.

School - Two tests this week, Monday & Tuesday made for a rough start to the week, but a much slower one at the end. We started a big consulting project for Meadowlark Hills on formal e-mail communication among employees. I think it will be interesting and kind of time consuming, but not too hard. I met with the Dean to get approved for my last class ever (yay!) and I enroll right after break. K-State is switching some of their computer systems and the dean was having trouble, so I'm not sure if I'll actually be able to enroll or not, but he told me to call if I have any trouble.

Job Search - So far it's pretty much that...a search. I've applied for a few positions, but nothing overly great. My time frame is going to hurt me, but I'll figure something out. I don't want to start until October 1. That may mean doing some sort of temporary job for a little while and searching post-wedding, but I'm ok with that. I'm still searching the CES site almost daily though and giving it all I can.

Spring Break - starts today, yay! I'm going to KC after class and will be there until Tuesday. This weekend will be filled with b-ball and watching Heroes and relaxing. Tuesday morning I'm flying to Connecticut with my brother. He bought a Tahoe on e-bay and we're going there to get it and drive back. We'll drive a lot of I-80, but I think it will be fun :) After that I'll be in Oberlin doing some wedding stuff and hanging out. I'll post pre-trip and maybe include some pics...we'll see.

What a week!

2008-02-24T20:06:00.000-08:00

This last week has been full of growing up things for me....Tuesday was the career fair. I have decided I DREAD them. Even after I was all dressed up and ready to go, resume's in hand, I really considered not going. But alas, I went and it was fine. I talked to some potential employeers and have had some emails and phone calls since. I need to do some actual applying now, but there's some potential. The job I'm probably most interested in is in Topeka...not KC, so we'll see what happens there. I'm not really in a rush since I don't want to start until mid-late September, but having an answer to "what are you doing after your wedding?" would be kind of nice.

Saturday B and I went and looked at some houses in KC. It's kind of weird doing that, but it was good for us to see what's available in our price range, and realize that we are happy with some of the homes. The realtor we worked with was really friendly and not pushy at all. We'll do some more looking, but probably not buy until I have a job or we're married.

I did some pretty great eating this weekend too. Friday night we went to the plaza w/ Brandon's parents and ate at Bocca de Beppo. It's a really great Italian place...and where I want to be in a tornado since it's all underground. Saturday we ate at Perkins for breakfast (home of some amazing mammoth blueberry muffins) and then we met Brandon's friend Bill at Red Robin for dinner. Bill's super nice and one of the groom's men in our wedding. And Red Robin is pretty much amazing...burgers and all you can eat fries, yum!

Today I learned that one of my bridesmaid's is expecting. It's super exciting, but will be interesting to have a bridesmaid who's 7 months pregnant :) Luckily her mom is a pretty great seamstress so we'll figure out her dress somehow!

Saved by the Siblings

2008-02-15T20:35:00.000-08:00

Leave it up to my brother and sister to make Valentine's Day feel like Valentine's Day. When I got home from class I had a card from my sister, with a gift card to Sonic-yay. On our front door was a note from Acme Gift saying they'd missed us and to call the store. So I did and gave them both my and my roommate's names. I totally expected whatever was coming to be for her since I'd already gotten things from my parents & Brandon, so I was surprised when the lady said it was for me. I was confused and said I'd come pick it up. I got to Acme, which was insanely busy, and told the lady I had something to pick up and she asked my name, but didn't find anything. Then I explained something had been delivered for me and she said, "oh, I need to look in a different place." Then she replaced one of my flowers and handed me a fun vase with 3 gerber daisies (my favorite flower). I knew it was someone who knew me well and headed out while quickly opening the card. The flowers were from my brother :) It made me smile and I called to thank him and had a good chat with him. Although I don't talk to my siblings a whole lot, it was great to feel their love yesterday!

Warning: Mushy Post Ahead...I mean, it is Valentine's day after all...

2008-02-14T12:38:00.001-08:00

Once again I'm blogging instead of doing homework. I've really been struggling with motivation for school that past couple of days. Usually I can blame not doing things on my busy schedule, but that hasn't been the case lately. I've had plenty of time, but have spent a lot of it doing nothing...which is nice for awhile, but I'm one of those people that needs to be doing something.

And today is Valentine's Day. One year ago today I was getting ready to drive to Topeka for my first date with Brandon...my how much has changed since then! I could write plenty about that, but today I'm more focused on us NOT being together today. I knew it was going to be this way, and am doing ok with it, but it's a lot harder than I expected. He was in town last weekend and we cooked an excellent meal together and exchanged gifts (I got some beautiful roses, candy, and a certificate for a massage from BodyFirst, which I intend to use soon), basically did the whole Valentine's/anniversay celebration early. Which was great, but it makes today feel like any other day. Sure, Brandon told me Happy Anniversary and Valentine's Day this morning, but since we've already gone through the motions of celebrating it doesn't make this day as special as I want it to be. I'm jealous of all the girl's I've seen with flowers today and the couples that get to celebrate together :( I know I'll get to spend the rest of my Valentines with Brandon, but that isn't helping my funk today...is it tomorrow yet???

I am excited about my plans for tonight though. I'm having dinner with two of my close girlfriends and then we're going to see Juno. I've heard great things about this movie so I hope it lives up to my expectations!

Is it spring yet??

2008-02-12T17:34:00.000-08:00

I know it's February, but I am tired of winter weather. Well, I'm tired of one day of winter and then one of spring. And what's with the snow on Tuesdays & Thursdays? I noticed simply because that's the day I have to walk to the other side of campus and it's never fun. Of course, with this crazy weather comes illness, which I am a victim of. Not full blow flu, but a cold with different symptoms every day. Yesterday...headache and coughing, today...sore throat and runny nose. Maybe tomorrow I'll be well...I've been getting extra sleep and taking medicine.

The hunt ends!

2008-02-04T19:44:00.000-08:00

This weekend I bought my wedding dress! It was quite the ordeal, that's for sure. In December my mom and I looked in Manhattan and Topeka. I quickly realized how tiring and how much work wedding dressmy favorite. Not too long after that, I learned that the store that dress was from was going out of business and wasn't doing anymore ordering. My mom called and got the info on the dre shopping is, but learned what I liked and didn't. After seeing the pictures, one dress really became ss and found out the closest place to order it from was Joplin, MO. Seems a little ridiculous to go all that way just for a dress...so I decided I'd do more looking before that really considering that option.

Saturday my mom, my sister and I went searching again. We started in Downs, KS, a really small town that's halfway home for me from school. My aunt and one of my parents's employees got their dresses there and recommended it. The shop was a little weird, but had quite a variety of dresses. The lady who owns the shop now had it for several years, then sold it about a year ago, but that owner left so she just ended up with it again. She was a little scattered, but very nice. I tried on several dresses, and found one I really liked. It was a lot different from the first dress, but elegant. I wasn't ready to declare it "the one," since I knew I had a couple more appointments that day, but it certainly eliminated the Joplin option. I had them write down the information on that dress and in that time, the owner realized the dress was discontinued! She felt horrible and I was kind of disappointed, but knew I couldn't do anything and had to move on. So we headed on to Salina. We went to a dress shop downtown, where I tried on like 3 dresses. The lady was really good and knew my size and helped find a veil and all, but after I'd tried on the few in my size she acted like we were done so on we went. A little weird, but fine. We stopped at another shop, but it was crowded and most of the dresses were ones I'd already seen that day, so I didn't try any on. We had a couple of hours before my last appt. so we went to the mall and did some shopping for my sister. It was nice to have a break. I was kind of frustrated by this point and wondered if I'd ever find a dress!

We got to David's Bridal a little early and had to wait a little bit, but then they had me look through the book and pick a few dresses I liked. The first one I put on was neat (and the dress my sister and mom ended up liking the best), but I wasn't going to stop at just one. At some point my mom told the workers the whole drama of the day and they felt horrible and said they'd help me find a dress there. I was hoping they were right, but wasn't sure about it. I tried on 3 more dresses and didn't like 2, but loved 1. It's the one I ended up getting...complete with all the accessories aside from shoes & jewlery. My mom says it's a very "Sarah" dress, which I think is a good thing :) I really love it, and didn't just pick it to be done. I can't post details here since Brandon reads this...sorry!

Chillin' with Staff

2008-01-29T17:26:00.000-08:00

I've spent most of the day in meetings and with staff members. This is quite unusual. Usually when I'm in the office no one else is in, or someone drops in for maybe an hour. Tuesdays are the exception since we have staff meeting and everyone's in and sticks around for awhile. My day started with a finance team meeting...we're reviewing compensation guidelines and have a pretty mixed group so it keeps thinks interesting. Good interesting since we all have different perspectives to bring.

After that I headed to staff meeting at Panera...in the blowing snow!! It was in the 60's here yesterday, Kansas weather is so crazy. It was the last staff meeting for one of my co-workers. We listened to him talk about what's going on in his life right now and caught up with one another some. For some reason I felt really connected to the group, a lot more than normal. Afterwards I went back to the office and ended up going to about a 2 hour lunch with most of staff and some spouses and other friends. It was good to rehash things with staff and get perspective from the meeting. Things will be interesting at work, but hopefully changes for the better will take place.

Work and the biblotecha

2008-01-24T13:14:00.000-08:00

This week seems to be going so slow! It's probably because it's the first real week of classes, and I'm working a lot more hours at the church. I love my job, but wow, 25 hours in 4 days, plus 12 hours of class sure is catching up with me. I would be elated if I didn't have to prepare another all church mailing in the next 6 months...lets see, that would be July, right before I leave. Yes probably enough time to forget how long and boring they are. I've prepared 3 letters to the church in the last 2 weeks or so. No so fun. And we're running out of letterhead and envelopes. 290 letters at a time consumes a lot of resources, including my time. It's ok, it's my job and that's definately admin. related. Since Christmas I've had minimal "there's nothing to do, but I need to look busy" time at work. It's nice, especially since I haven't been to overwhelmed. I survived preparing financial statements with only one call to Susan, the lady who used to prepare them. They were a mess last month which caused me a lot of stress. The church staff has changed a lot in the 1 1/2 years I've worked there and we're about to face a new change, one of our pastors is leaving. He was on sabbatical when I came back in the fall so we all kinda know what it's like, but it'll sure be different. Not impossible, just different. It'll be interesting to see how things change in the next few months.

I'm in a really random mood right now. I should be reading for class, since I am sitting in Hale library after all. However, when I sat down to read, I just thought about things to blog about, none of which are the things I've actually written. I've kind of been pondering one of the things my intersession class teacher mentioned. We were talking about web-based classes and how we're moving towards online universities. Then he said something about not understanding why K-State would spend money to build a new library (granted...it was done like 10 years ago or something). I kind of agreed at the time...you can learn tons online, so why have a building full of books? But being in the library today, I'm quickly realizing that this is so much more than a building of books. Lots of people, like me, come in to do a little homework, check e-mail, and kill time between classes. It's a great place to meet with groups and pretty centralized on campus. Of course, computers and meeting places are all over on campus, in the union, in Calvin Hall, but something about being in the "library" makes me feel more motivated to be studious. The union seems like a place to go kill time...and visit the ATM, but not really be productive. So, yes, I think the library is important and that K-State was/is smart for adding on to it.

An Oberlin Weekend...and some great food!

2008-01-21T17:27:00.000-08:00

It's Monday night, but really feels like a Sunday. The extended weekend was great, and for the most part it felt like a four day weekend to me. Thursday Brandon got here after work, not too much after I was done with class. We went to dinner at one of my favorite places in Manhattan, So Long Saloon. B had never been, and we luckily got seated right away. We had their wonderful raspberry black bean dip and then burgers. He thought the meal was good, but doesn't quite share my enthusiasm for the place. Afterwards we came back to my place and hung out with Wes & Chandra a little bit before we headed to the Stewarts. I thought our first real pre-marital counseling session went well. They had an overview of our sessions and then we made post-it note timelines of our lives. Brandon shared his and it was certainly the most I'd heard him talk without interruption ever. It was interesting to hear his story, although I didn't learn a whole lot hearing his thoughts, and especially T&J's feedback was interesting. We were there almost an hour longer than we expected, but it was a really good session. I'm sharing mine next month...hopefully I'll remember the things I was thinking Thursday!

Friday we started with breakfast at IHOP, yum yum. I had pigs in blankets, one of my favorites. We were there with mostly retired people :) It was the 3rd time we'd considered going there, but the place was packed the other two. I had class at 11:30, which will be another post topic, and then we headed to Oberlin. Our drive was pretty uneventful, except for my botched Sonic order. I ordered a CB with ketchup and mustard only and definately got all the veggies, blah. And my tots had about double the salt. We headed straight to my alma mater, DCHS for my little sister's game. We watched her team lose, but it was pretty fun to see her play. Brandon took pics with his new camera and I relived my high school statitican days by keeping score on my program. After her game we went to the new ReLoad for pizza with my parents. Great food and we talked with several people.

Saturday I slept in some and we hung out at my house until Mary's game at 2:30. Her team was playing for 4th and Mary had a great game, but the team lost. They hung in until the 4th quarter and then had foul trouble and such. We went home to watch the 2nd half of the K-state game, go Cats!! Then it was back to the HS to see Mary & one of her classmates sing the ntl. anthem before the girls final and then watch the game. It was close and the team we wanted to won which was fun. Saturday night we ate dinner kind of late and B & I, my parents and my brother sat around our table and talked for like 3 hours. Mary joined in after the tourney was over. It was fun to catch up, but we certainly could have been sitting on more comfy furniture!

Sunday was church and my parents had a meeting after so my bro, sis, B & I went to Atwood for lunch at Park Hill, which makes some great Mexican food. Afterwards we went home and watched football. Mom, Mary (my sis) and I went to McCook that night to see 27 dresses. It was cute and fun to see with them.

Today we just got up and drove back. We had some snowy sections, but weren't too delayed. We ran some errands and then B headed home, apparently in more bad weather. I went to Target and am kicking back and catching up on things before another week starts.

Back to Blogging

2008-01-17T09:27:00.000-08:00

Happy 2008! It's still January so I think it's fine to say that. I haven't posted on here or xanga in quite sometime, but I kind of miss it and am finding lots of free time at work so I think blogging's a good way to fill that void. Of course, I don't know if anyone will even read this, so we'll see how that goes...

Today is the first day of the spring semester. Manhattan got a few inches of blowing snow last night so I was really hoping for a snow day, but no such luck. My spring schedule isn't too bad at all. 12 hours and classes in the afternoons and evening. Throw in 23-25 hours of work a week and that's my weekdays.

My intersession class, stress management, wrapped up yesterday. It was certainly the easiest 3 hours of graduate credit I'll have, and maybe the easiest 3 hours of my college career. I learned quite a bit of useful information....for example did you know that your body temperature rises when you're relaxed? That is the opposite of what I expected. So the "cool as a a cucumber" expression and thermometers bursting when people in cartoons are angry aren't right at all.

Brandon's coming tonight and we're starting pre-marital counseling with Todd & Jennifer. Could be interesting, but I'm excited. Tomorrow after my class we're going to Oberlin for my sister's b-ball tournament and to see my family.

In my class we talked about making changes and setting up a plan for all of them...my blogging plan is to post 2 x's a week for the next month and then decide if I'm going to keep at it or not. Ok, there's my motivation...be back next week!