PSA: Best Diet Dessert Ever!

I'm sitting here enjoying my new favorite discovery: Weight Watcher's SmartOnes Chocolate Cookie Dough Sundae. It doesn't seem that exciting from the picture on the box, but oh-my-goodness, it really is super delish. And only 170 calories and 3 grams of fat. I'm definitely not a diet girl and I eat my fair share of ice cream...but I can't go without something sweet while watching tv so this is a good way to cut back. Just had to share!

The New Black

I was walking around the mall today (as I do 3-4 times a week these days) admiring all the new fall fashions and quietly beckoning the cool air to come visit so that I can wear my new cashmere sweater (it was on major sale, I swear!). Most everything in the stores was varying shades of pine, teal and eggplant. And then it struck me—these hot new colors weren’t paired with chocolate brown. The multitudes of basics (pants, skirts, shoes) were all displayed in varying shades of black. Black?!?

Let me take a time out to explain a simple fact about the fashion, for those that need to be enlightened (as my sweet, yet clueless fiancé needed to be). When a color is said to be “the new black” it means it is the “it” color, the color that just has to be had for the season. It’s the color with which every other color goes, and every basic line of clothing will surely include that color. In recent years, brown has been the new black. Chocolate and espresso could be seen in every store and on every catalog page. Before that it was gray—everything from stone to charcoal invaded stylish American closets.

As a big fan of brown and one who owns quite a lot of it (my new sweater in fact—no wonder it was on sale) I’ve been a bit nervous about the time that brown would cease to be the new black and be replaced with something else. I’ll have to go naked from now on, I guess, because it’s official—black is the new black.

Working Hard...Or Hardly Working?

While I’ve decided to revive the blog, don’t expect any thoughtful prose or witty comments on life. Just anticipate some random updates and photos of my latest craft projects. In an efforts to post something—anything—about what’s going on, I’m mostly sticking to “just the facts.” I’m saving my witty prose for the blog posts for work (see blog here.)

Speaking of work…I love my job. Well, if I were going to choose between going to the mall and going to work, of course I would choose the mall, but if I have to spend 40 hours of week somewhere, at least I get to surround my self with really sweet and creative people and look at scrapbook pages all day. The new job is a vacation compared to my old one, especially considering that reading home decorating and craft magazines is considered professional development. Plus, I get free scrapbook supplies. In fact, yesterday we were cleaning out the collection of rubber stamps and each of us got to take a few home. I took five, which if purchased in the store would have been about $50. Plus I often get paper and stickers and copy ideas out of our books. I’ve learned that scrapbooking is an expensive hobby, but I can do all my shopping for free at work. Such a sweet deal!

Wedding Update

You’ve all received your wedding invitations by now (and if not, then I guess you’re not invited…sorry) so you can guess where I’m at about now. I’m so ready to be married! First of all, driving home from Paul’s every night (or vice versa) it rather tiresome. Plus, I’m tired of spending my free time working on wedding tasks or, if I’m relaxing, wondering what wedding tasks I should be working on.

On the upside, we recently got our engagement pictures from my wonderful photographer and friend Jennifer Disney (of Jennifer Disney Photography at www.jendisneyphoto.com). Here’s the link to our slideshow and a photo sneak peak. Jen is awesome!

http://www.jendisneyphoto.com/_clients/paul-kristin/

Playing House

Adding to busyness and stress of life, Paul and I are trying to get the house ready for me to move in. We’re pretty much sticking to the essentials at this point. But things like redoing the hard wood floors and painting are so much easier to do without furniture so we’re trying to complete them now. A while back Paul sanded and sealed the wood floors in the living and dining room; last week he did the two bedrooms. He did a fantastic job!! I’m so proud (and thankful I didn’t have to help) and the floors look awesome, like brand new. Here’s the living room:

We also finished painting the office bedroom a vibrant, organic green. My vision for the room is to make it the “garden room”; furniture and textiles will be mostly black and white with colored botanical prints. I want it to be my crafting sanctuary and a place for Paul to harvest all his plant seeds during the winter. Here’s a picture of the before and after:

Diary of a Lazy Blogger

I’ve been horribly neglecting my blog. I’ve actually had several things to write about lately, but no time to write them. So I’ve compiled some brief synopses of intended blog entries.

February 20: The cheesiest place on earth: What’s your guess? Vegas? Disneyland? The Midwest? Nope. It’s Pigeon Forge, TN (home to Dollywood if that explains anything). We went to Pigeon Forge because it is the base of the gorgeous Smoky Mountains, where we were going to go hiking. Pigeon Forge has all the cheesiness of Vegas without any of it’s sophistication—like Celine Dion, the Bellagio light show, or PF Clang’s. There were neon lights everywhere in Pigeon Forge begging us to visit dinner shows with names like Dixie Stampede and Black Bear Jamboree.

February 21: Speaking of hiking: It snowed in Tennessee so we didn’t end up going hiking. I felt horrible (because it was Paul’s anniversary present) but I was also secretly glad about it. We drove through the mountains and it was breathtaking. I love the mountains, but I am perfectly happy simply driving through them. I don’t need to work for the view. And that was when I realized it—I don’t hike hiking. I don’t mind it--spending time alone in nature with your loved one is nice--but I was fooling myself into thinking it was a favorite pastime.

February 25: We are family: What do you get when you put two parents and their daughter in one small apartment for five days? Yeah, exactly.

February 28: Something’s fishy: I was listening to the radio the other day—some Arby’s commercial highlighting its two new flavors of tartar sauce. And it dawned on me that I’d heard a whole lot of fish sandwich ads lately. Weird. What’s up with all the fish!? And then I realized it is Lent and Cincinnati is very Catholic, and then it all made sense. Are there fish ads in California too?

March 1: Shopping around: I keep complaining that I don’t have any friends to shop with. I kep meeting people, but no one likes shopping. But I don’t even like shopping with other people—I prefer the solitude. What I want is someone to talk about shopping with.

March 2: I love the Bureau of Motor Vehicles: No, not a typo. Okay, I don’t love it—like I love TV and shopping--but I went there yesterday to get new license plates and it was a remarkably pleasant experience. Hardly anyone in line, and the workers were so incredibly friendly and helpful. Welcome to the Midwest!

A Thought

It's definitely bad when you don't leave the house for two days. What's worse, is when you don't even realize you haven't left the house for two days. Maybe I'll venture out come spring...

For the girls who went to Paris...

Want to know what 5 degrees feels like? Remember how cold it was in Paris, those first couple days? It's about 20 degrees colder than that. Yeah. Brr. I'm ready for spring! 50 degrees, here I come!

Going postal

Literally. I had a little freak-out session yesterday while attempting to pick up my mail from the post office.

To begin, let’s go back to last week when I opened my mailbox to find a hand written note from the mail guy telling me my mail was taken back to the Murray Station post office, and also he was begging me to pick up my mail every day. (For the record, it had only been 2 days.) It was sunny on Saturday and I thought it would be my last chance to get outside in “nice” weather. My usual PO (post office) is not Murray Station so I had to look up which one it was. One listing online said “Post Office—CPU Meijer Murray Station.” Great! It was right next to Target, where I was headed anyway. How perfect. What a great day! When I got there I discovered that the PO was inside the Meijer grocery store. Weird, I thought. But the internet said this PO was Murray so this has to be it. I go inside and ask the girl for my mail. She give me a “you’re nuts” look. She’s like “We don’t keep mail here we just accept packages.” I’m trying to explain to her that I know it’s strange but my note from the mailman said Murray Station and I looked it up and this was it. And she’s like, “This is Marburg Street.” And I’m like, “I know, but it’s Murray Station.” They didn’t have my mail. Ugh. So I left and thought, Great, all the POs will be closed by the time I get home and now I have to go outside on Monday.

Yesterday turned out to be sunny (10 degrees, but at least bearable from of the sun). I decided to look at usps.gov again to see about the whole Murray Station thing. There it is again--“Post Office—CPU Meijer Murray Station.” Obviously my mail is not there so where the heck is it?! I call the number the post guy left me and the nice lady tells me they are located on Murray Street 2 miles from my house. I look on the web again, and this time scroll down a little further...and I see “Post Office—Murray Station,” which is located on Murray Street and not inside the Meijer grocery store. Oops. Guess I should have looked more closely. Anyway, great!, close-by, easy-peasy. Right? Wrong! I found Murray Street very easily and proceeded to drive up and down the street several times trying to find a building that looked like a post office with cars in front and stuff. Where is the darn post office?!? I finally see a sign that says “entrance,” which I take to be the PO because none of the other buildings turned out to be the PO. I turn in and see what looks like the back of a building and lots of little postal cars. Well, this must be it. I follow the customer parking sign around the building…and around…and around…Where is the customer parking?! I follow another sign and it dead ends at a one way driveway. Hmm… I can see a parking lot behind the building, so I drive the wrong way and park. And then I look around and discover that the opposite side of the building also looks like the back of a building. And there’s a sign that reads “Must Have Employee ID.” This can’t be right. Where do the customers go?!?!?!?! So I drive out again, back to Murray Street, drive around, and drive back to the PO, hoping the PO has magically changed into something I can figure out. I drive back through the one-way drive, and park again. I sigh…and start screaming to myself…potential tears… Where is the post office?!? I need to get my stupid mail!?! I’ll never get my mail!!!! Cincinnati sucks!!!! Out of options, ideas, and resolve, I give up and drive back out the one-way drive (this time the correct way). I look around once more before I leave…and I see it. Four small parking spaces and a tiny, unmarked door. This can’t be it. Can this be the customer entrance? I was so confused. I parked, went in, asked for my mail and two seconds later a load of post was in my hands and I was on my way home. Apparently Murray Station is not a real post office, but the distribution center for the area. Would have been nice to know that.

It's 5 degrees outside right now...

That's all. Nothing much else can be said about that. Except...BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!

Updated wedding ideas

I figured out what was wrong with the links! Also added some new photos...

IDEAS

Flowers:
http://tinyurl.com/yw5adj
http://tinyurl.com/29pevv

Bridemaid dresses:
http://tinyurl.com/2xum5l

Cake
http://tinyurl.com/2c6mt9

Invite inspiration
http://tinyurl.com/2dwylb
http://tinyurl.com/2d2spa
http://tinyurl.com/yu5lup

STUFF I HAVE DONE!

My Save the Date Cards:
http://tinyurl.com/2bahx8

The Place:
http://tinyurl.com/25zs9z
http://tinyurl.com/293zqm

Wedding ideas

I know you’re waiting for me to post something—anything!—about wedding planning. You’re thinking, “Stop writing about the stupid weather!” You photo whores (to use a term from the Knot) want to see some ideas. Am I right? Well, I’ve been spending a lot of time on the Knot. In fact, I’ve made friends with the girls on the Orange County message boards. (Which made me sad when I realized they were in Orange County like all my other friends =( ) So wedding ideas were the last thing I felt like posting about. I’m feeling pretty calm right now, with all the major stuff taken care of: booked my place, the caterer, the DJ, the photographer, and got the Save the Date cards printed.

So damn cold!

When Paul and I left Cincinnati for a little road trip on Saturday morning, it was so warm we didn’t have to wear our winter coats. I’m talking like 50 degrees. Wow! So you can imagine our surprise and discomfort when we arrive in Chicago, at a mere 20 degrees, sans gloves and hats. Winter is always bearable in the warmth of a heated apartment, gripping a hot mug a coffee. And then you find yourself walking around the Windy City (and I mean windy!) and you think "I’m never moving to Chicago!!” The walk from the train back to the car was so painfully cold; I’ve never been so cold in my life. We had a really fun weekend visiting Paul’s twin and his new wife, eating Chinese and deep dish pizza, and seeing downtown. But I was excited to get back to sunny, warm Cincinnati. So you can imagine our surprise and discomfort when we arrive in front of Paul’s house, at a mere 19 degrees, sans gloves and hats. What the heck?! I was practically crying the whole drive back to my house I was so uncomfortably cold. It’s still 20 degrees out. Like I need more motivation to not leave my house...

Snow day!

It finally snowed! Real snow. We had several inches (3 or 4) overnight on Saturday and we woke up to a beautiful winter wonderland! Plus, snow doesn't get plowed until noon, so we had a snow day from church! (should I be less excited about that???). Paul and I went for a late breakfast and then on a snow walk near my house. Here are a couple pics:

Happy birthday to me!

I can see some snow flurries falling right outside my window. A birthday snow just for me! (Hope it doesn’t snow too hard…I have to drive to my birthday massage.) No matter how old (or how depressed) I am, I always get excited on my birthday. Birthdays are special. I feel special on my birthday, and feeling special is hard to come by. I want attention on my birthday, even though I claim I don’t. I like that I’m the only one getting presents. (And honestly, I’m still a little bitter about my sister opening a wedding gift on my birthday. Well, ha! It’s my turn now.) I was thinking yesterday how funny it was, the dichotomy of birthday feelings. There’s this conflicting mix of feeling incredibly excited and special and also feeling fairly depressed. Birthdays remind me of how much I haven’t accomplished, and, frankly, that I’m closer to death. But I think it was Paul that reminded me that just because I haven’t done something by the time I’m 29 it doesn’t mean I’ll never do it. I could argue, What if I die tomorrow without doing it? But then, when I’m in heaven I’ll probably have better things to think about.

When will it ever end???

It’s been raining nonstop since Friday night at 10pm. Nonstop. I don’t think people in California realize what this means. When Californians say it’s been raining constantly they mean there have been intermittent showers during the night, or that it’s been raining heavily for an hour. Here in Cincinnati it has a completely different meaning. While it hasn’t been a constant heavy downpour, there has been water falling from the sky without ceasing for almost 60 hours. Okay, so 60 hours doesn’t seem like that much when you put it in other terms—2 and a half days. But on the third day of waking up with bright hopes of sunshine (or least not having to don--again--ugly black boots), and your dreams are shattered, then 60 hours seems like an eternity. Oh precious rays of light where are you?!

Friends

For someone shy, making friends is an endeaver, one not to be executed easily. And I’m learning that older you get the harder it is to make friends. In elementary school and high school, it’s your purpose in life to make friends, to “hang” out, tell each other secrets. In college, everyone is in the same place—friendless—and meeting people is easy. But in that post-college, post-right-out-of-college stage, not everyone is looking for a best friend. In fact, people’s friend-meters are about at their limit, and even having coffee with another person is more than they can take.

So making friends is hard. But then you add making friends while wanting to spend time with your fiancé, making friends as a couple, and making friends in the same life stage (married, no kids) and the task seems Herculean. I was reminded this morning how great it is to have friends in different life stages—it reminds us from where we’ve come and gives us perspective on where we’re going. I was also reminded that it’s okay to feel lost, or confused, or overwhelmed when life switches stages. And that God’s love and grace mean we don’t have to handle it well. I don’t have to “handle it" at all. That said, is it too much to ask to meet one married person who doesn’t have children?

I was talking to an older friend the other day. I told her that a certain guy doesn’t understand how I feel, and she said get used to it—he’s a guy and he’ll never understand. It’s true—with each other, guys talk about topics (sports, theology, movies, etc.) So they can relate no matter what stage of life they’re in. But when girls talk, they share their life experiences (school, guys, kids.) So it’s a lot harder to relate to someone when you can’t share their experiences. And it’s hard for a guy to understand why I need friends without kids.

I cherish those friends that I will have and love no matter how different our lives are. And I know I'm not being entirely willing and open-minded. It just would be nice to have a friend who doesn’t need to find a babysitter every time we get together and meet a group of girls whose conversation isn’t centered around diapers.

My extremely generous mom bought me a sewing machine right before I left for Ohio. I immediately put it to use making a laptop bag for myself. I had all this extra fabric as well as a lack of laptop bag. Plus I had never made a purse before and wanted to give it a try. I have to say that I’m pretty dang impressed with myself. The bag is far from perfect—there are no right angles and my uneven stitching is pretty obvious. It could never pass for store-bought. But fortunately, I’m not a perfectionist nor am I looking for extra cash, just a creative outlet.

As cute as the bag turned out, I vowed never to make another laptop bag again. I had to re-sew every seam five times. Why? I completely lack spatial intelligence. I would think that I was sewing sides together correctly, but they always ended up backward or inside out. I just can’t think that way. But I guess now I’ve worked out all the kinks. Just in time because my sister immediately asked for her own bag. But don’t get any ideas...

Winter wonderland

We finally had our first snowfall. It always amazes me when I go to bed and the world looks one way, and then I wake up with it covered in a blanket of snow. When I look outside in the morning and am taken aback by the fluffy white, I smile, and get all excited, and run to look out every window. I’m so eager, much like a five year old on Christmas, to see the new world from every angle. The excitement of a first snowfall will never get old.

Luckily, here in Cincinnati it’s too warm to get much snow or for the snow to stick around (no pun intend) for very long. Already it’s melted in the streets. (But it did stay long enough for me to have an excuse to skip going to the gym.) At the same time, that is the saddest part--when the snow melts. Instead a sense of wonder, with a soft, white veil making the world seem pure, you start to see reality. The world begins to look unclean, slushy, bleak. And you go back to work and get on with your adult life, leaving the child in you behind.

Revisiting Bloomington

I visited "Adventures of a Heckler" today, hoping for some inspiration along with an update. It came through! Heather was talking about Biola and I was inspired to write about my college. As is happens, this past weekend Paul and I visited Bloomington, Indiana, the home of my alma mater, Indiana University.

IU is about 2.5 hours from here, a nice little drive, mostly two lanes through small towns. Paul and I had a fun afternoon together, just walking and driving around, soaking up the incredible sun on our cold-chapped cheeks. We visited the local winery—free tasting!—and then went for a “hike” near Monroe Lake. It was really nice to share such a huge part of my past with Paul. I got so excited telling him everything about all the buildings on campus, and showing him my apartments and my church, and taking him along the paths I walked to class. It made me wish that Paul was with me when I was at IU.

I revisited Bloomington for the first time about a year after I graduated. That trip was a time of closure for me. I was really reluctant to leave school—for all the things I didn’t like about being there—and had not quite gotten over that until I went back and really said goodbye. This time around, I had some realizations, among them how much the experience at IU was worth it. Because I had been thinking that maybe I regretted going there. But walking around campus and around town and seeing all the things I loved and all things I had never visited made me realize that what I regretted were the opportunities I missed while I was at IU. If you can, just imagine a more reserved, fearful, hesitant version of myself. I had not yet learned the virtues of risk, of stepping out and meeting people, trying new things, and reaching beyond my comfort zone. I tended to only a few close friends and many hours alone with some books. So, I missed out on many things.

This recent trip also made me realize that even with my regrets, I wouldn’t exchange IU for anything because of what I did experience there. Foremost, it is the place and moment I personally encountered God. I became a Christian my sophomore year at IU through Campus Crusade. And then there was the independence I gained at school. I could never put my finger on why I went so far from home. But I needed that escape, that refuge, and that break, and I needed to force myself to rely on me. Bloomington is a bite-sized city, easily navigable, underwhelming, and centered on IU. It gave me the training wheels I needed to become an independent adult. And, of course, there are the friendships I would never give up, the closest of which ultimately led me to Paul.

I’m just now realizing that the regrets from school have prompted me to pursue things since then. I have experienced so much in the last few years for fear of having more regrets. And the Bloomington trip reminds me of how I need to experience life here in Cincinnati, despite sometimes feeling overwhelmed and alone. Because if I ever leave, I do not want to leave a trail of regrets in my wake.