Friday, April 23, 2010

My Newest System: Becoming More Domestic

It's 2am again and guess who's blogging...me! A lot of nights I fight sleep I really am tired, but once in a while I'm awake and productive. Tonight is one of the awake and productive nights.

I am my mother's daughter in so many ways. Yes, we have a lot of differences, but I love creating new systems and methods of organizing things. My most recent new system involves another one of our similarities: a love of food! Cooking dinner has become one of those chores I don't look forward to, and after thinking about why, I think it's because I want to be good at it without practicing (sounds like my years of playing piano and flute all over again...haha).

Anyway, numerous family and family friends that I consider talented in the kitchen have given me all sorts of cookbooks over the years. I should be using these resources! So, this past week I pulled a couple cookbooks out and thumbed through, writing down the entrees that I wanted to try (I intentionally skipped over the desserts). Then I did another one of my favorite things: created a spreadsheet! I organized the meals into two categories: "30 minutes or less" and "over 30 minutes." After the spreadsheet was complete, I had Matt pick out six meals for the next two weeks, created a list of groceries to buy and scheduled cooking into my calendar. I'm really excited about trying the following recipes:
  • Balsamic-Glazed Pork Chops
  • Beef and Broccoli Stir-Fry
  • Beef Teriyaki
  • Big Beef Burger Stack-Ups
  • Chicken and Sweet Potato Curry-in-a-Hurry
  • Chicken Schnitzel
On a related note, another fun tool I'm excited about is an application on my phone: OurGroceries. It allows me to create a shopping list on my phone that I don't have to worry about losing, but the coolest part: I can share it with Matt so either of us can add / take off anything. That means if either of us goes to the store, we just have to pull the application up to see what's on the list. Isn't that fun??

Saturday, April 17, 2010

Mom and Dad Come to Town

I've been intending to write this post all week but just haven't found the time. My parents came up and visited! We had a lot of fun with them while they were here.


The first thing we did was find the train station since they decided to ride it up as opposed to driving or flying. It's actually really close to where we live - only about 5 minutes away. They completely sold me on wanting to take the train down to California sometime, even though it takes longer and seems to always be behind schedule. It sounded much more comfortable than flying and more leisurely than driving. 


After hanging out with us for the night, they went up to visit some family friends on the San Juan Islands. It looks BEAUTIFUL there. I can't wait until Matt and I have a chance to make it up. Not only did they come back with gorgeous pictures, but my mom also found a really cute jacket and an extremely soft alpaca hat and set of gloves. Just from the way they told us about it, I could tell they had a lot of fun visiting.

Over the weekend they were here we did a few different things with them:

Visited Experience Music Project and the Science Fiction Museum. Both were pretty cool and worth checking out. I'm my father's daughter, so I liked the Science Fiction Museum better than the music part, although the room where you got to try different instruments was pretty cool, as were the band pictures we got to take!


Wandered around Pike's Place Market for a while. My mom even found this guy selling ocarinas and discovered her favorite ocarina back at home was made by his father. She talked to him for a while and even got to try out one of his flutes.

Finally at ate Ivar's. A few years ago when my parents were dropping me off at school, we took some time to head over to Bainbridge Island to see my dad's cousin. He saw Ivar's from the ferry and decided we should eat there. Of course, we didn't have time that trip since we ate dinner with his cousin on the island, but he remembered it when we were talking about what to do in Seattle, so we took them down to the waterfront so my dad could eat at Ivar's.


Played a rousing game of Scrabble. Back when I was in high school, my mom and I played Scrabble and I won. She refused to play with me again, which just shows how competitive she is. Apparently, she didn't know she was refusing to play with me again and the only reason we didn't play again was because we never got around to it...needless to say, my mom won, but only because I had so many Os. You can't make any good words when you have four Os, two Es, and a U.

Ate at Daddy O's, The Ram, Brewery City Pizza and Safura's  Mediterranean Cuisine. Yes I'm my father's daughter, but I'm also my mother's daughter. I really enjoy eating, so where we eat is usually a highlight for me. The four restaurants above are some of our local favorites. I would also add Koibito to the list - we just didn't have the time to take them there, too.


Took them to church. They decided to stay through the weekend so they could check Life Pointe out. I love how the week they visited, the sermon started with the play as an example of how something might seem over, but it's not. I would have been excited about that any Sunday, but the fact that my dad was there, too...there were two happy Cal fans sitting in that cafeteria.


Needless to say, Matt and I had a great time with my parents. We love it when people visit! Especially people that want to take us out to dinner...although that's not a requirement =)

Saturday, April 3, 2010

Late-Night Ramblings

For some reason I like to blog late at night. I guess it's the night owl in me. I just don't like going to bed. Once I'm there I love it, and the rational part of me knows I should go to bed...but it doesn't always happen at a reasonable time. I blame genetics.


Tonight we went out to dinner and a movie with a friend from college. It was really fun! Good food, good conversation, good movie. We saw How to Train Your Dragon in 2D (I'm not a fan of movies in 3D). I won't give anything away, but I will say that it is definitely worth seeing. It's a solid story with the perfect amount of humor mixed in.

I'm excited about Easter coming up on Sunday (I guess that's tomorrow, technically). I love Easter - it's my favorite holiday. Sadly, I won't get to attend the sunrise service and have french toast served to me by teenagers this year, but I did get to help fill Easter eggs and paint the backdrop for pictures earlier this week, and tomorrow I'll get to help pick up garbage and put sandwich board signs together. Plus, on Sunday, I get to help hide Easter eggs, assist with the toddlers and set up/tear down for church. I really like helping, which I've been having fun with. 

As much fun as I have with the annual activities, it's the meaning behind it that I really love. Easter comes but once a year, I wish it could be more. Maybe then we'd have more time to think of what it's for...wait, something about that doesn't seem quite right. Haha. Anyway...I think about the sacrifice Jesus made, and that he's alive and conquered death throughout the year, but I love taking time to recognize it once a year, too. It's really easy to get caught up with everything that needs doing to prepare, but I hope this weekend provides time to really think about why we celebrate, and time and energy to celebrate.

On that note, I really need to get to sleep. If I don't have a chance to blog again within the next few days, have a wonderful Easter - he is risen!

Thursday, April 1, 2010

A Much-Needed Update

I know I've been completely ignoring my blog lately and it's been over two months. I've been meaning to post for weeks, but unfortunately haven't found the time. Here are a few quick updates, until I have a chance to really expand on my thoughts:

Matt and I got cell phones! I now have an HTC Driod Eris and completely love it. Last night I finally personalized a bit and made the Firefly theme my ringtone =D I missed having a cell phone during those months we didn't have them. Now with my smart phone I can use Twitter, Facebook, Gmail and Google Calendar right from my phone. I've also gotten into Foursquare and Yelp, too! My new challenge: creating boundaries for embracing social media and being connected online vs shutting it off and being connected with people face-to-face. The good part about that is Matt has no problem telling me it's time to put the phone down.

Side note on Yelp: it's been especially useful in discovering local places to check out. Last week we found a Mediterranean restaurant with Delicious gyros and reasonable prices. Win!

My new favorite board game = Talisman. Our friend Josh introduced us to it, and it's really fun! It's kind of like Dungeons & Dragons, but it's a board game and limited to a few hours (I don't have the attention span to actually play D&D, although I'm not opposed to the concept). We've played it twice so far, and both times were great - except for that part where I was turned into a toad...

It's fun using work skills for personal interests. I'm really excited that I get to help out with marketing at church and use skills I've learned for work to get the word out about Life Pointe. As with all marketing, it takes time, so we've put together a strategy that uses more of a slow and steady approach, but I've been having fun exploring options, and am excited to see how everything unfolds over the next year.

Okay, I know there is a lot more to say, but I also know it's getting late and I should start thinking about going to sleep...I'll try to update more regularly, though, and will include more in my next post.