I'm Baaaaccccckkkk ....

Ok, here's the plan. Update the blog at least once a week - hopefully this will prevent me from being absent for months and months and months at a time. Yikes! I can't believe I have been so absent! So many things have happened in the last year, where do I start.

Here are some highlights to get the ball rolling.
1. I've been at my job for almost a year now and am working hard, but enjoying it for the most part.
2. Eddie is interning for the City of Seattle and seems to be loving it.
3. Eddie started his program at the UW and is loving that even more.
4. We put an offer on a house in March (short sale) and we should be moving in sometime next month!

Other things to note are that I'm loving the website www.pinterest.com. It's super cute and crafty and inspiring for me. There are so many things I want to try!

I've also started reading the book, The Help. I forgot what it was like to read for fun - and to read a book that I'm really interested in and not just reading because I should because it's on a list or something (Anna Karenina was my last major read). I find myself excited to get home so I can read. It's funny. It's been years since I've felt this way about a book. I am hoping I will continue this streak!

Yummy

Today for lunch was a chicken pesto sandwich. Toasted homemade bread, homemade pesto, mozzarella cheese, sliced tomatoes, and grilled chicken. Yum!

Homemade pizza is on the menu for dinner while watching the Golden Globes. :)

Sent from my Samsung Mobile

A New Year

As always, I am delinquent in my blogging, but in all fairness work (the time when I usually do my blogging) has become quite busy and it seems like it's 5 o'clock before I know it, just about every day. Anyway, I thought I'd do a quick update about a few things on my mind lately.

First of all, I am so thankful for my life. I have a wonderful husband and extended family (which has grown this last year) as well as friends who love and support me and I have a job that I enjoy which challenges me and pushes me to grow. Life is busy with Eddie being in school, both of us working full time, and still trying to find time to spend together and with other friends, but we are so fortunate to have shelter and food and love. We truly are blessed.

I've been appreciating the little things lately and the thing that keeps being put on my heart is the beauty of Seattle. I seriously do not think there is a more picturesque city and I get to see it every day! The perk of living a bit outside of the city is that when I drive in I am able to see it's glory. Driving to work on the viaduct on a clear day is probably one of my most favorite ways to start the day. To the right I get to see the city and to the left are the amazing snow capped Olympic Mountains! Especially during the dark mornings, it brightens my day. No matter how bad traffic is or how cold I am, the beauty of it all makes me sit in awe as I drive into town. I love how the dark sky makes everything look so dramatic. I'm so appreciative for these views and the fact that I get to enjoy it so freely.




I didn't take these pictures, but they are glimpses of what I get to enjoy. I hope you enjoy them as well!

World Series Game 1

Like most Americans, I grew up watching the Super Bowl. Unlike most people, we got up to get our snacks, had conversations, and muted the TV during the game. We cared more about the new commercials than anything else. As far as other sports went, my only memories of watching them on TV were when my grandpa or uncles were around.

Since Eddie and I have been married I think that I have seen more sports games than I have the rest of my life! I don't hate it by any means and I sure am learning a lot of really random tidbits that most other people learn much earlier in life. I am thankful that of all the sports Eddie's favorite is baseball because it's the one I probably know the most about.

Since tonight is the first game of the World Series (Texas Rangers vs. SanFrancisco Giants) I decided to make it a special event. We had beer brauts with garlic potato fries. Then for desert I made sugar cookies decorated like baseballs. It's been a fun night. Now if the Rangers would just pull it together and win this game it'd be a great night!

Sent from my Samsung Mobile

Friday

As of Friday afternoon, I became unemployed. My temporary job at SPU finally reached it's end, though they would have kept me if they had the money. It's good to finally have a definite end to this position but hard to lose the paycheck and familiarity of the job. It's strange to me that I have spent the last eight years at SPU (with the exception of the six months from when I quit working in Conference Services and was hired in Security). That is a really long time to be somewhere and while change is good, it scares me, in some ways, to try and reach beyond what I know.

I don't think goodbyes have ever been easy for me. I remember moving to a new house (one of many) when I was 6 or 7 and walking through the entire house saying goodbye to the walls and stairs, the garage doors, windows, and even the plants outside. I distinctly remember the feeling of loss I had as I realized that the memories I had of that home were all that I had left. Sure I could return years later and knock on the door, explain that I lived there as a child and ask to come inside, but that house, my house, would never be the same again.

I am probably being overly dramatic about this house. (A house that I lived in for probably two years when I was 6. A house that has come to be one out of the 19 places I have lived so far in my life.) But I share all this to point out that, in a way, my feelings are nothing new. Driving away from SPU at the end of each school year (and even sometimes during breaks) I always felt like I was leaving a part of me behind, like things would never be the same again for me.

When I left campus on Friday, I didn't have the same empty feeling I have had before. When I quit last August I was headed toward something new and exciting. Working that job (or any job for that matter) could not live up to what I was headed toward with my travels and relationship with Eddie. New adventures awaited me and I was anxious for them. This time when I left there was nothing specific ahead of me. I don't know what the future holds - I feel like I've been saying the same thing for the last year now - but I know I'll get where I'm supposed to go. Maybe I'm more at peace with myself now and maybe there really is nothing left for me at SPU. I'm not sure and only time will really be able to give me that answer.

For now, I'm here. I'm applying for jobs and trying to figure out what to do with my life professionally. I'm cleaning the apartment, doing dishes and laundry, and trying to finally get things set-up around here. I'm finishing Thank-You notes, watching movies, bonding with Daphne, and learning how to cook a little better. Life is happening and I'm trying to be in the moment.

Update

I'm a bad blogger, I know. I've been super delinquent in my blogging lately - it's kind of been a theme for the last several months, pretty much since I got back from Europe it seems. Hopefully that will change in the near future, but we'll see.

I guess the update is pretty straight forward. Not much is up. It's a lot of the same old, same old happening here. I'm working at Security (temporarily - though I have been saying that since March) and Eddie is working in a contracted position through next Spring. Eddie is also going to school full time and we're both trying to get into a better work-out routine. Between all that and trying to see each other and our friends, life is busy, very busy. It's a little overwhelming at times - ok a lot of the time. But we're learning to deal with it and we're still enjoying facing it all together.

We have no complaints about being married - at least I don't and he says he doesn't (haha) - which I think is pretty amazing considering all the one-on-one time we've had driving around and visiting different places and people. We took a road trip in September to Glacier, Yellowstone, and Grand Teton National Parks - driving over 2000 miles. Then this last weekend we drove to and from Vegas. Basically, lots of time spent together in my little Volvo and no major fights. Knock on wood.

We are both anxious to move out of our Tukwila apartment and into a better neighborhood that doesn't have police, fire trucks, and ambulances present on a regular basis. Since we've been married we've seen the Medical Examiner twice. This last weekend while we were in Vegas the house behind the apartment (which we can view from our bedroom) caught on fire and someone died. We even saw the body bag pulled out of the house from our window. Between that and Eddie's truck being broken into and the smell of smoke drifting through the floorboards we are anxious to leave.

This coming weekend will be our first night apart since being married and as Eddie told me last night, "I'm sure it wont be the last." It's not a huge deal, but just strange to think about. I've gotten used to him being around all the time.

Well, I guess that's it for now. Hopefully I'll remember to post some updates next week after girls weekend. :)

Appreciation

I used to roll my eyes at a friend of mine and her husband. Whenever they would drive somewhere he would open the car door for her before she got into the car. Being the "independent" woman that I thought I was, this always seemed a little chauvinistic. I mean, I can open my door myself, I don't need some man to do it for me. Now, I'm not saying that my friend's husband was doing this because he thought she was incapable of such things or that he is chauvinistic - I'd actually say that he is quite the opposite and very supportive of my friend - but it simply was not a practice I ever saw myself participating in. Basically, I thought it was cheesy to do it every time she got in the car, and while I love to eat cheese, I am not always a fan of watching it play out before me.

This gesture was something that I declared I would not want to be done for me all the time and I told Eddie just as much when we started talking last May. He responded that he thought it was weird that a guy wouldn't open the door of the car. So when we met in person for the first time and he opened the door for me it was weird. We laughed and joked about it but he continued to do it. Now it is normal practice and if he doesn't open the door (which happens on occasion) it's weird. I've started to take it for granted that he'll be there to open the door for me - even though I sometimes have to roll my eyes at how cheesy we are with each other.

I was thinking about this the other day when I read an article from Time magazine about violence against women in Afghanistan. The picture with the story shows a woman who had her nose and ears cut off by her husband because she ran away from him and his relatives, all of who beat her. The article goes on to talk about different instances of women being abused and mistreated and how the country has changed since the Taliban was taken out of power. One woman who grew up in Canada has returned and now has a talk show (in one place they said to think Oprah meets Hannah Montana). She had a guest who told a joke about a small Afghan town where a woman was seen walking in front of her husband down the street. This was odd because the Taliban required that women walk six steps behind their husbands. When the man in the joke was approached by foreign relief workers to be congratulated on his progressive thinking they were told that the area was a mine field so he forced his wife to walk in front of him.

Even though this story is a joke and isn't necessarily real, I have to wonder if it isn't based on reality in some way. I was left with chills as I finished the article and an overwhelming sense of gratitude for my husband. My husband opens doors for me. My husband walks between me and traffic. My husband doesn't want me taking the dog outside when it is dark out. My husband protects me and keeps me from harm - even when we both know I can take care of myself. He cares for me and loves me and would do anything for me. Even in his dreams this is true (last night he had a dream that I was bit by a zombie and he stayed with me and the rest of the zombies instead of going off to a safer area with the uninfected people). He is amazing and even after being married for only two months I take that for granted sometimes.

I was humbled after reading the Time article. There are such horrible things happening in the world and I should not diminish the things that are good. It may be cheesy when a guy opens a door for his wife or girlfriend and it may be ridiculous or seem old fashioned and chauvinistic of him to step in harms way to protect her but that is how it should be. I'm not just talking about men treating women well, but women treating men well - people in general treating other people well. Genuine love and kindness in the world can be a rare thing to find and it should be embraced - not mocked - when it is found. I worry about the world that my children will grow up in but am glad to know that their father will be there to set a good example for them even if I do roll my eyes on occasion.