Most of my readers know this, there are probably a few of you out there who don't, but I used to make frequent trips to Russia in my early twenties. I also lived there for a year and half about 7 years ago. Oft times I will be going about my day when a random memory of my time there pops into my head. Because I really wasn't all that consistent in keeping a journal of my experiences there I thought it might be a good idea to blog when I have a random Russian remembrance. Here is one that I had recently:
A friend of mine from India who was temporarily working in St. Petersburg had a really nice apartment in the center of the city. He also had a satellite dish which meant that he could get 4, yes 4, channels in English! That is very exciting to someone who liked to watch countless hours of television. The channels were BBC News, a sports channel (wasn't ESPN, I didn't spend anytime watching it), CNN World, Cartoon Network/TCM. Cartoon Network was on from 9am to 9pm and Turner Classic Movies was on from 9pm to 9am. I would find ways to just pop in and watch television. I even offered to cook him dinner just so I could watch his T.V. The channel I watched the most of, besides the news, was Cartoon Network. The shows that just happened to be on in the evenings was Samurai Jack and Teen Titans. If you haven't seen Samurai Jack you are soooo missing out on a clever cartoon. Watching Teen Titans prepared me to be able to carry on a conversation with my husband about, well, the Teen Titans. And for those of you who don't know my husband he is a major comic book nerd. (By the way in case you didn't know the Teen Titans are superheros, I won't tell anyone that you didn't know that, although I don't think most people do.) One day about a year after I had moved back to the States I was watching the Teen Titans and my husband, who was not my husband at that time, came over and noticed I was watching Teen Titans. He told me the other day that he feel even more in love with me that day.
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Monday, May 17, 2010
Whew!
This past weekend was a very busy one. There was a baby shower, a birthday party, a meeting of new family, a bible study, church, new furniture, getting a dog run half set up, a movie, and wedding cake tasting. That last one (the cake) kind of was today, Monday, but it just seemed fitting to tack onto a busy weekend. Tomorrow evening we just have to finish up the dog run and I need to plant some flowers, other than that we don't plan on doing a whole lot. I am excited for this coming weekend, we don't have anything planned, not that I am complaining about how busy we were, just stating that we were busy. I enjoyed all the things we did this weekend, my favorites are a toss up between the new furniture and the wedding cake tasting, yummmmm.....Now I am off to bed and thus ending this very short post. But don't worry I'll be back tomorrow, or Wednesday with a post that I've been thinking about for a few days.
Friday, May 7, 2010
Weekly...er...Monthly(?) Granola
Sorry that I haven't been posting my "Weekly Granola" series. Once again I have all these posts in my head, but they never seem to make it onto the blog. So here is a little bit of granola for you.
Two years ago my husband thought that it would be a good idea that we got a lawn mower of our own. He had be borrowing his brother's lawn mower for the previous 5 years. The more frugal side of me came out and I thought that it would be a great idea to get a push mower with the blades that spin when you push it. We used to have one of these at the house I grew up in. It worked just fine while mowing until a stick got caught in it and then you ran into the thing and just about broke a rib. I did remember those painful experiences while mowing the lawn as a kid, but I figured since it was my husband that would be mowing the lawn we could get one. The idea was vetoed pretty quick. Instead I bought the cheapest motorized lawn mower I could find. When my husband went to put it together the screws that came with it wouldn't fit in the pre-drilled holes. We finally figured out that they sent American screws when the holes were drilled for metric screws. He finally got it put together with the help of some zip ties and a hammer. For two years my husband mowed the lawn with a mower that had a wobbly wheel and a loose handle. After every mow my husband came into the house smelling like he had just took a bath in gasoline. Yeah, this mower was pretty bad. Last week the cheap little red mower bit the dust, I was actually surprised it had made it this long. I told my husband that we could splurge a little bit and get a better mower, one that would start (hopefully) and wouldn't make my poor husband high from fumes. We went to the store and looked around. I picked one out that I thought would be decent. When I turned around my husband wasn't behind me. He got distracted by a mower that I totally thought he would not be interested in. My husband, who doesn't have a single granola bone in his body, picked out an electric mower. His comment to me was: "I don't want to smell like gas and I want the darn thing to start." I still secretly think that the push mower with the blades, I think it's called a reel mower, would've been the best option, but this one will do.
Two years ago my husband thought that it would be a good idea that we got a lawn mower of our own. He had be borrowing his brother's lawn mower for the previous 5 years. The more frugal side of me came out and I thought that it would be a great idea to get a push mower with the blades that spin when you push it. We used to have one of these at the house I grew up in. It worked just fine while mowing until a stick got caught in it and then you ran into the thing and just about broke a rib. I did remember those painful experiences while mowing the lawn as a kid, but I figured since it was my husband that would be mowing the lawn we could get one. The idea was vetoed pretty quick. Instead I bought the cheapest motorized lawn mower I could find. When my husband went to put it together the screws that came with it wouldn't fit in the pre-drilled holes. We finally figured out that they sent American screws when the holes were drilled for metric screws. He finally got it put together with the help of some zip ties and a hammer. For two years my husband mowed the lawn with a mower that had a wobbly wheel and a loose handle. After every mow my husband came into the house smelling like he had just took a bath in gasoline. Yeah, this mower was pretty bad. Last week the cheap little red mower bit the dust, I was actually surprised it had made it this long. I told my husband that we could splurge a little bit and get a better mower, one that would start (hopefully) and wouldn't make my poor husband high from fumes. We went to the store and looked around. I picked one out that I thought would be decent. When I turned around my husband wasn't behind me. He got distracted by a mower that I totally thought he would not be interested in. My husband, who doesn't have a single granola bone in his body, picked out an electric mower. His comment to me was: "I don't want to smell like gas and I want the darn thing to start." I still secretly think that the push mower with the blades, I think it's called a reel mower, would've been the best option, but this one will do.
Saturday, May 1, 2010
Big Decisions
This past Tuesday a guy in my office brought in some foster pups that he was helping the local shelter with. Me being the animal lover that I am immediately fell in love with the puppies. I took a picture and sent it to my husband, whom mysteriously did not reply. I started asking my co-worker all kinds of questions about the puppies and found out that the mother was staying with him as well. I went home after work and told my husband about them. I also asked if we could go see them. For some odd reason he agreed. My husband really hasn't ever had a dog before although he said that he has always wanted one. The next evening we went and visited 4 Siberian husky puppies and 1 mother. The mother came right up to us and just kept coming back. The puppies could've cared less about us, they were content with wrestling with each other and stealing each other's toys. After about 30 minutes of debating and conversing we decided that we would get at least one of them. We really hadn't decided at that point whether or not we would get a puppy or the mom. We filled out an "application" and told my co-worker we would get back to him about which one we wanted. So without further adieu I introduce to you...Nissa the sweetest Siberian husky around.
We went with the mom.
Isn't she just beautiful?
Here she is being put in her place by Walker, the bully.
We are excited to have her apart of our family. (Please disregard our very overgrown backyard.)
Another decision that we made on Wednesday evening was that we plan on taking our house off the market. So if you are one of the many people praying that it sells you can stop now and thank you for praying for us while we went through the process of trying to sell it. It won't officially go off the market until Monday, but we don't anticipate any offers between now and then. One of the reasons we decided to take it off was that I feel that the Lord is teaching us to be content with the things we have. Also He has blessed us tremendously with this house. We have a good fixed rate on our mortgage, we have a decent amount of equity. We have a ton of space and because of our low mortgage payments we can afford to fix it up the way we want. I know you are thinking: "Why in the world did they want to sell it in the first place?" The answer is: YARD WORK! We abhor it. My husband more so than me. We have hired some people to trim our massive tree in the back yard and remove a 10 year old wood pile that seems to have grown. After that we are hiring someone to come and put in a new fence for our new dog. Then maybe we will like our yard a little bit better...maybe. Then again I could just hire someone to do all our yard workl...hmmm...that might be an option...
We went with the mom.
Isn't she just beautiful?
Here she is being put in her place by Walker, the bully.
We are excited to have her apart of our family. (Please disregard our very overgrown backyard.)
Another decision that we made on Wednesday evening was that we plan on taking our house off the market. So if you are one of the many people praying that it sells you can stop now and thank you for praying for us while we went through the process of trying to sell it. It won't officially go off the market until Monday, but we don't anticipate any offers between now and then. One of the reasons we decided to take it off was that I feel that the Lord is teaching us to be content with the things we have. Also He has blessed us tremendously with this house. We have a good fixed rate on our mortgage, we have a decent amount of equity. We have a ton of space and because of our low mortgage payments we can afford to fix it up the way we want. I know you are thinking: "Why in the world did they want to sell it in the first place?" The answer is: YARD WORK! We abhor it. My husband more so than me. We have hired some people to trim our massive tree in the back yard and remove a 10 year old wood pile that seems to have grown. After that we are hiring someone to come and put in a new fence for our new dog. Then maybe we will like our yard a little bit better...maybe. Then again I could just hire someone to do all our yard workl...hmmm...that might be an option...
Monday, April 26, 2010
T.V. Update
My husband reminded me the other day that my blog is actually about our lives without television. He seems to think that my posts really haven't been about that. Hmmm...I gently, okay bluntly, reminded him that it's my blog and I can blog about whatever I want. But it did get me thinking that I should probably update on what our lives have been like since giving up the T.V. three months ago. I find myself making dinner more often. We also sit down to dinner and look at each other and open our mouths and converse. I know it's weird. We used to just eat our dinner in front of the T.V. and never really talked to each other. We read more. We went out and got library cards and actually check books out. Although sometimes I have a hard time returning books in a timely manner. We also find that we hang out more with friends or do more things at church. After the first couple of weeks it just kind of seemed like we had always lived this way.
There are times when I feel a little bit out of the loop on things, but that's not neccesarily a bad thing. I totally missed out on the 24/7 coverage of Tiger Woods. It was a few days into the whole ordeal before I knew what was going on. Then becuase I wasn't reminded of it every minute of the day I forgot about it. I figure if something happens that I need to know about someone will be talking about it and I can make the choice as to whether or not I want to look it up on the internet. I do scan the headlines every couple of days to make sure that I don't miss anything important. I've also felt sheltered from all things political. For those of you who know me real well know that I am kind of a political junkie. But it's kind of been nice not having propoganda being spewed at me left and right. Sometimes I get: "Hey have you seen...? Oh wait no you haven't, you don't have a T.V., nevermind." It's kind of funny. My co-workers still don't understand how we could possibly live without television. Well we are still breathing, we have survived this far.
There are three positive things that I've noticed since giving up the television, there are actually many more but I think these are the most important. One thing is that I have time to concentrate on living more healthy. I can spend time researching exercise equipment, food and just living a more healthy lifestyle. Another positive is my husband and I communicate significanlty more. We did communicate before when we had a T.V. but no where near the level that we are now. We talk to each other during dinner and afterwards. Sometimes we just sit down and talk. We never seem to run out of things to say. Our improved communication has also lead us to a more fufilling spiritual life, which is the third positive. We find that our topics of disscussion revolve around God. We talk about the bible, or we talk about what we are studying in our bible study groups. I feel that since we have given up the T.V. we have drawn closer to God, and I think because of that it was more than worth it to give up the television.
There are times when I feel a little bit out of the loop on things, but that's not neccesarily a bad thing. I totally missed out on the 24/7 coverage of Tiger Woods. It was a few days into the whole ordeal before I knew what was going on. Then becuase I wasn't reminded of it every minute of the day I forgot about it. I figure if something happens that I need to know about someone will be talking about it and I can make the choice as to whether or not I want to look it up on the internet. I do scan the headlines every couple of days to make sure that I don't miss anything important. I've also felt sheltered from all things political. For those of you who know me real well know that I am kind of a political junkie. But it's kind of been nice not having propoganda being spewed at me left and right. Sometimes I get: "Hey have you seen...? Oh wait no you haven't, you don't have a T.V., nevermind." It's kind of funny. My co-workers still don't understand how we could possibly live without television. Well we are still breathing, we have survived this far.
There are three positive things that I've noticed since giving up the television, there are actually many more but I think these are the most important. One thing is that I have time to concentrate on living more healthy. I can spend time researching exercise equipment, food and just living a more healthy lifestyle. Another positive is my husband and I communicate significanlty more. We did communicate before when we had a T.V. but no where near the level that we are now. We talk to each other during dinner and afterwards. Sometimes we just sit down and talk. We never seem to run out of things to say. Our improved communication has also lead us to a more fufilling spiritual life, which is the third positive. We find that our topics of disscussion revolve around God. We talk about the bible, or we talk about what we are studying in our bible study groups. I feel that since we have given up the T.V. we have drawn closer to God, and I think because of that it was more than worth it to give up the television.
Monday, April 19, 2010
A Bit of Randomness
I realized this morning that it has been awhile since I have posted. I have actually been working on a post in my head, but it is not quite finished. Of course by the time I actually go to write it I won't remember anything that I was going to say. In the meantime here is a bunch on random things that have been going on.
Weight loss
This has been on my mind lately and I have been diligently keeping track of what I eat and making more of effort to exercise. This morning I had a very strange thought as I was getting ready for work. Usually in the mornings I am not thinking about a lot of things so this really surprised me when I thought it: "I can't wait to get home tonight so I can work out." What? Where did that thought come from? I was so surprised by it. I have been going through a boot camp dvd and I am ready to go onto the next level, obviously it is kind of fun otherwise I wouldn't be looking forward to it. I have never looked forward to exercise. I'm not sure what is wrong with me. It could be that I have been praying diligently that the Lord would give me motivation and the will power to exercise more and eat the right foods. Hmmm... seems to be working.
Speaking of weight loss, last night I lamented to my husband that I have a muffin top, to which he replied: "I like muffins, I also like muffin tops too, they are just as good as the rest of the muffins." My husband really makes me laugh. I'm sure that it's not as funny when you are reading as it was at that moment, but just take away from this little story that I really appreciate my husband and that I like the fact that he makes me laugh.
Savvy Blogging
I received an e-mail last week letting me know that I was invited to the Savvy Blogging Summit in July in my beautiful native state of Colorado. This particular summit is limited to 60 people and you had to submit an application. They did not, however, check out your blog, which is a good thing because I don't think I would've been accepted. They accepted me based on my answers to the questions. They were your typical application questions. Still not sure why I was accepted, but I am happy to be going. I'm excited to learn more about the blogging world. I told my husband that they probably only had 40 people apply so by default they had to accept me. He told me it didn't matter they still invited me, they didn't have to. I think my husband is a keeper. I guess I'll let him stick around for another 5 years.
By the way, does anyone out there know of anyone attending this event? The hotel rooms are a bit on the expensive side and it would be nice to find someone to share a hotel room with. If you know of someone please let me know.
Later this week I will be posting what I have been composing in my head, that's if I can remember it.
That's it for the randomness, at least for the time being.
Weight loss
This has been on my mind lately and I have been diligently keeping track of what I eat and making more of effort to exercise. This morning I had a very strange thought as I was getting ready for work. Usually in the mornings I am not thinking about a lot of things so this really surprised me when I thought it: "I can't wait to get home tonight so I can work out." What? Where did that thought come from? I was so surprised by it. I have been going through a boot camp dvd and I am ready to go onto the next level, obviously it is kind of fun otherwise I wouldn't be looking forward to it. I have never looked forward to exercise. I'm not sure what is wrong with me. It could be that I have been praying diligently that the Lord would give me motivation and the will power to exercise more and eat the right foods. Hmmm... seems to be working.
Speaking of weight loss, last night I lamented to my husband that I have a muffin top, to which he replied: "I like muffins, I also like muffin tops too, they are just as good as the rest of the muffins." My husband really makes me laugh. I'm sure that it's not as funny when you are reading as it was at that moment, but just take away from this little story that I really appreciate my husband and that I like the fact that he makes me laugh.
Savvy Blogging
I received an e-mail last week letting me know that I was invited to the Savvy Blogging Summit in July in my beautiful native state of Colorado. This particular summit is limited to 60 people and you had to submit an application. They did not, however, check out your blog, which is a good thing because I don't think I would've been accepted. They accepted me based on my answers to the questions. They were your typical application questions. Still not sure why I was accepted, but I am happy to be going. I'm excited to learn more about the blogging world. I told my husband that they probably only had 40 people apply so by default they had to accept me. He told me it didn't matter they still invited me, they didn't have to. I think my husband is a keeper. I guess I'll let him stick around for another 5 years.
By the way, does anyone out there know of anyone attending this event? The hotel rooms are a bit on the expensive side and it would be nice to find someone to share a hotel room with. If you know of someone please let me know.
Later this week I will be posting what I have been composing in my head, that's if I can remember it.
That's it for the randomness, at least for the time being.
Friday, April 9, 2010
New Goal
I woke up January 9, 2007, looked at myself in the mirror, looked at the clothes in my closet and thought to myself: "I need to lose weight." I seriously had no idea on how to go about doing that. Of course I knew that I needed to exercise more, who doesn't know that? But I had never counted a calorie a day in my life. So I did what I normally do when I become more interested in something...I research. And boy did I research. There is a ton of information out there. I first started off on ediets.com. I paid for a three month membership and was able to start a foundation for my weight loss. After my three month membership was up I thought that I could research some more and come up with my own meal and exercise plans on my own for free. By August of 2008 I had lost more than 50 pounds. Before you congratulate me and say: "Way to go!" I must admit to you with some embarrassment that I've gained 15pounds back. Now you may not think that is a whole lot, but if you've just spent almost 3 years of your life working hard to lose and maintain that lose it's kind of a bummer. I know that I am not anywhere near where I used to be. I am still active and I still eat fairly healthy, but I know I could be more active and eat even better (read: Now that Easter is over I have to stop eating Cadbury Creme Eggs mmm....). There are two weddings coming up in my family in which I am apart of. One is in September and the other is in November. I already know what we attendants will be wearing for the November wedding, let me tell you my arms need a workout in order to look fabulous in that dress. When I originally started losing my weight I decided that I should lose between 70 - 80 pounds. So minus the 50 pounds lost add the 15 pounds gained that puts me at 35 - 45 pounds I need to lose (GULP) before September. Okay I know it's probably not realistic to lose that much weight before then, so I guess 20is pounds before September...maybe...? The reason why I am sharing this with all of you is because it will help me be more accountable. Maybe if I have everyone asking me about it I'll not want to let you down and actually do it. And maybe I'll use that gym membership that I pay for every month but haven't stepped foot in in over a year. I know, not very frugal of me. Also helping me stay accountable I've enlisted my cousin Ashley, who is also on a weight loss journey of her own, to be my accountability partner. I have also turned to sparkpeople.com to help me with keeping track of what I eat. It's a lot easier just to prepare and eat what's on a list then have to keep a running tally of calories in my head; I tend to "forget" some calories that I've eaten. So that is my new goal. By the way I want to say congratulations to my brother-in-law Sean on his upcoming wedding (September) and congratulations to my sister-in-lay Heather on her upcoming wedding (November). I'm so excited for you both!
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