Cooking adventures! Chicken with lemon-garlic green beans

26 Tuesday Mar 2013

Posted by in cooking, eating, food, recipes

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In an effort to change our menu up a bit, I looked through my Pinterest cooking ideas board last night to come up with something different.

We decided on a simple chicken with lemon-garlic green beans.  You can find the recipe here.

Here are some pictures from my cooking adventure:

Coating green beans in olive oil and garlic

Coating green beans in olive oil and garlic

photo 2

Could probably have used a few more slices for this picture :)

photo 3

Looks super fancy, doesn’t it?!

photo 4

Forgot to take a picture before I put it in the oven, but here it is going in!

And of course, I didn’t take a picture of the final project because I got carried away serving it up to be eaten, haha.

My tips:

  • Make more of the coating if you’re using gigantic chicken breasts like I did—my end product wasn’t as covered in it as the picture in the actual posting.
  • The potatoes cooked perfectly, but the green beans were still a little hard.  If I make this again, I will steam them separately for a bit before throwing them into the baking dish.
  • The green beans were also a little toooooo lemony, so although it looks nice, I would forego the lemon slices on the bottom.

Other than that, it was delicious and pretty easy!  Fixed a tomato, avocado and onion salad to go along with it, and voila, dinner served!

Aside

Discussions on Development: Trial of Efrain Rios Montt

26 Tuesday Mar 2013

Posted by in Discussions on Development, Guatemala, Justice, politics

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For the last week or so, I’ve been wanting to post something on here about the historic and on going trial of former Guatemalan dictator Efrain Rios Montt. It’s historic because it’s the first time that a former head of state has faced charges for genocide and crimes against humanity. And in Guatemala, none the less. In Guatemala. A country where people usually get off the hook with a bribe to the judge, or the prosecutor, or maybe because they harass a few witnesses. But this trial is actually happening. After years of stalling, and appeals, and motions by his lawyers, Efrain Rios Montt is in trial. I’m still not certain that we’ll be happy with the outcome (the prosecution itself has admitted it has no direct evidence linking Rios Montt, but is relying on hundreds of witnesses testimony to establish a chain of command to link Rios Montt to the murders of almost 2,000 indigenous Mayans during the country’s civil war).

The reason I haven’t posted anything yet is because I couldn’t really offer any more insight than what news channels already have. But today I came across a blog that I thought was worth translating and sharing.

Before that, though, I do want to say that I’m extremely happy this is happening, and incredibly proud of the current Attorney General of Guatemala. She’s kind of my new personal hero.

Without further ado…

“The Hour”

The trial is a murmur on my computer. I don’t understand much of the legalese, but I understand that they are doing what they can to avoid the genocide charges against him. The voice of the judge is strong, a brave woman behind the name of a flower. I think about the importance of those small gestures, the preponderance of the every day, what you almost don’t see. I think about the ixil women who are following the trial, who sit all the way in the back, silently and fully absorbed. It’s not hard to imagine where their thoughts fly to, maybe they go back to a time before the war, before the violence tore their lives apart, before the house burning, before the persecution, before the violation, before the death, before the fear, before the general, who is now deaf, old, and ruined, gave the order to exterminate the Ixil village. I see the pictures of the audience, and in the front row is the daughter of the genocidal man and the son of the government minister of the time, impeccable, serious, worried. Rigoberta Menchu is also there, with all her dignity on her back, dignity that hurts the cowards that hide so they don’t have to face the past. I don’t see two sides, I don’t see the good guys and the bad guys. I see the weight of history falling on us. I understand that the crimes against humanity are not forgiven. I see a unique opportunity for guatemalans to construct peace, illuminated by justice. I don’t know if justice is that intelligible murmur that comes out of my computer. But I know that hearing this stories from the victims can sensitize us more than a thousand ProGuate campaigns.

New title, new chapter, another beginning.

18 Monday Mar 2013

Posted by in adventures, business, career, family, finances, future, Jeff, law, law school, motivation, my-husband-is-awesome, non-profit, planning, thankful, title, titles, updates, volunteer, work

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Well, I’m not quite sure what the title is exactly, but I do know that starting April 1st, I’ll be starting a new full-time job.  A REAL job.  Like, with benefits, and paid time off, and paid holidays, and….a PAYCHECK every two weeks!  I’m still hoping it’s not a cruel April Fool’s joke, but being that it’s with a church, I’m pretty sure that’s just my paranoia.

Back in January, Jeff and I decided I needed to start looking for a full-time job.  As much as I’ve enjoyed being my own “boss” the last two years, I haven’t been very good at it.  For the effort I put in to having my own firm, I think I did pretty well.  I got a lot of experience, although each step was terrifying.  I realized pretty quickly, however, that family law wasn’t something I wanted to do long term.  And I slowly realized that maybe law in general wasn’t something I wanted to do (this isn’t exactly new news).  That’s a tough conclusion to accept when you have $200,000 in loans riding on it.  And it makes motivation hard to come by.

Thankfully, I have an amazing husband who’s been incredibly supportive from the beginning.  Whether it’s taking on another volunteer position, or going to yet another event that I committed ourselves to, or telling him I don’t want to practice law, he’s never judged me or forced me to do or be someone I’m not.  I can’t even begin to tell you all how amazing that is.  Maybe it’ll be our financial downfall someday, haha, but for now, I just love that he loves me no matter what I do.

That takes us back to January, when I was starting to seriously look for jobs again.  I would occasionally check the legal job listings, but realized a) I wanted to puke any time I read a legal job description, and b) I wasn’t really qualified for any of them.  Being that I’ve bounced around a bit since graduating law school, I don’t have the typical experience a law firm would expect of someone that’s been out of law school for almost four years.  I’ve done many a thing in the past four years, but that has never involved a trial, trial preparation, researching and writing motions, etc.  And what’s a lawyer without at least some of those skills?  Honestly though, I have no desire to attain them either!  So, that ruled out legal jobs.

Then I looked at non-profit jobs, which is where I really think I could thrive.  The challenge there is that although I have plenty of volunteer experience in doing random little projects and volunteering with a handful of non-profits, I’ve never had a long term position with a non-profit where I can show that I’ve achieved certain goals.  All the jobs I looked at wanted someone who’s consistently been in the non-profit arena for 5-7 years, can prove that they’ve raised over $10,0000 (or more), have previously written and attained grants (which I haven’t, but would like to at least for Haiti Scholarships, but…haven’t yet), etc.  Reading the qualification requirements was just depressing, especially because they were jobs I really wanted.  The other challenge with a lot of these jobs is that they’re mostly in Los Angeles.  I’ve never been a fan of having to spend 3 hours a day commuting, and much less now that we have a baby on the way.

Which takes us to another challenge I was facing in my job search: assuming I DID find a job that suited me and I felt I was qualified for, and that they didn’t dump my resume straight into the trash can, and I got an interview, why on earth would they hire someone who’s 3-4 months pregnant?  I know, I know, legally they can’t use that as a reason not to hire me, but we all know how that would go.  There would be someone else who maybe didn’t charm them as much as I did, but who’s probably in her/his early 20s and doesn’t even have babies on their radar.  And the choice would be made–not “technically” because of the baby thing, but they’d come up with something, like “they live closer,” “they’re willing to accept a lower salary,” “they’re more qualified.”  Who knows.

I’d also have to explain why I was applying for this job when I have a J.D. degree and have the potential to make three times as much in a legal career (which I did have to do during my interview to get this job).

Anyhow, taking all of this into mind, I sent out an email to a select group of people I know that work in or with various non-profits, asking them to keep me informed of anything they saw that might be of interest.  I got an email back that same day from my former youth group leader, whom I’ve known since I was about 14 or 15.  Turns out she’d just found out there was an open position in the office, and wanted to know if I was interested.  Given how long this post is turning out to be, I’ll save the details of how it all went down, but….I got the job!

So what is it?  It’s primarily an administrative job with the School of Religious Education at a Catholic Church (the same church that I was in the children’s and teens’ choir in, as well as did my confirmation and attended endless youth group meetings, retreats, and events).  Although I’ll miss the flexibility of being my own boss, I’m so excited to be settled down at a job, to have something consistent day in and day out (I know, to most people that are in consistent jobs, this probably sounds like a drag, but for someone who has had her days constantly changing for the last two years, I can honestly say that I’m ready for a little routine).  Not to mention, the excitement of having a steady paycheck every two weeks without having to harass clients for a payment.  Plus the schedule is still flexible; it’s full-time, but I’ll be working Monday through Thursday only, and having lighter hours during the Summer.  It’s also with an organization I’ve known for years and would honestly love to be a part of.

ALSO, it’s a non-profit, which means I qualify for the Federal Loan Forgiveness Act, which means that if I keep working for a non-profit for 10 years, my student loans go away!  Granted, there’s a lot of fine print around this, but I think I can make it work.  I also think I’ll be able to work in a lot of the things I’m interested in: fundraising, event planning, sharing cool non-profits with our youth group, etc.  I think this is the perfect beginning I needed.

I’m also excited to be productive again.  I’ve mentioned before that I’m way more productive with my time when I’m busy.  Lately, I haven’t been busy and I haven’t been productive.  I can already feel that this job will make me more active in so many other aspects of my life.

My only worry now is how to respond to people who are taken aback by my refusal/unwillingness to get a legal job, after I went to law school and went through the terrifying experience of taking and passing the bar exam.  I’m still pretty active in a local bar association, which means I’ll be organizing and attending events where the question “so what do you do” inevitably comes up.  I’m still working on my response, but there’s one thing I do know: the one person who’s opinion really, truly, matters, is ok with what I’m doing, and that’s really all that matters.

Jeff has always said that he prefers that I come home happy rather than with a big paycheck.  I’m sure the skeptics will say “just wait, that’ll change,” but here’s why I think they’re wrong.  We’ve been living paycheck-to-paycheck, or below paycheck-to-paycheck, for years now.  Given our job roller coaster situation, we always have been.  But you know what?  We’ve always managed to be happy.  Sure, we can’t afford a lot of stuff, and we can’t always do or buy what we want, but we’ve always had each other, and as cheesy at it sounds, it’s always been enough.

I know, I know, “but you’re having a kid.”  And we’ll figure that out as we’ve always figured things out.  Every parent wants to give their kids what they didn’t have, but the reality is that neither of our parents raised us with much, and we turned out just fine.  Sure, high school was difficult because we didn’t have all the cool stuff that other kids had, but we both grew up in happy households, and that’s what really matters.  Our children may not come home to a four bedroom home, or get a car when they turn 16 (or 18…or 20), but they will come home to happy and loving parents.

I’m sounding like a broken record here, I know, but I honestly can’t thank Jeff enough for sticking things out with me these last few years, where I’ve been bouncing around quite a bit.  Although my income was never consistent or nearly what we needed, it allowed me to experience and do so many things that I wouldn’t otherwise get to do.  I started Haiti Scholarships, I went back to Haiti, I got to test my business management skills with both my firm and our shop, I got to be a stay at home wife (which I will miss quite a bit, I have loved being home when Jeff comes home for lunch), I got to volunteer my time where I wanted, I got to have endless lunch dates to catch up with friends, and attend endless meetings for anything I wanted.  So, thank you boo bear: ti amo.

Cheers to the next chapter in our lives!

Discussions on Development: How did I end up working in Haiti?

14 Thursday Mar 2013

Posted by in development, discussion, Discussions on Development, Haiti

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Guest post by Diego Alfonso Martin Clemente.

I heard about Haiti after the earthquake happened, I started doing some research and what I found was an enigmatic and attractive country. After the Spanish gave over the island of Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic) to French imperialism, the country became the first producer of sugar cane and one of the richest colonies.

After their independence from the French colony in 1804, Haiti was the first Latin-American country having the capacity of auto-governance and was an example of freedom and dignity for other colonies.

Haiti had an important performance on the international level, participating on the signature of the treaty of Versailles and becoming one of the exotic destinies for vacations.

According to the United Nations, Haiti is the poorest country in Latin-America and the second poorest in the world. After I learned more about Haiti and its link with the Latin-American countries and France (because I was doing my masters degree’s studies in France and I’m Mexican), as well as the situation in which the Haitians were living, I wanted to move to Haiti and help them out. I searched for an NGO who works with Small and Medium Businesses and I found All Hands Volunteers. A friend of mine put me in contact with them and 15 days after I was landing in Port au Prince.

« No body can do everything but everyone can do something »

All hands volunteers its an organization that was born after one man, Mr. David Campbell, decided to move to Thailand in 2004, after a tsunami hit the country. His motivation was to make an effort to reduce the disastrous effects of the natural catastrophe. There, he found people who shared the same interest and they created Hands On Disaster Response organization (All Hands Volunteers at that time). This organization worked in different countries helping clearing devastated zones.

All Hands Volunteers arrived in Haiti, just a few months after the earthquake (January 10th of 2010) and after one year of hard working they cleared the ruble in more than 209 houses allowing families to move back and leave provisional camps and shelters.

After one year of the catastrophe, the UN deployed a survey to analyze the social, economical and political situation in Haiti.   The majority of the population still had difficulties in maintaining a sustainable livelihood. Employment opportunities were usually with wages below those necessary to live, in precarious conditions and with little to no permanence. Independent income-generating activities were usually carried out as survival strategies, with minor access to services, credit and other kinds of support. In this order of events AHV decided to implement a livelihoods program, aiming it at Small and Medium Businesses located in Léogâne.

The program is an endeavor, which began in April 2011. The program sought to increase decent employment among the population in Léogâne by helping the local Small and Medium Enterprises (SME); By giving training and the necessary knowledge to increase and improve incomes and profits of the business. The program provided intensive business training and mentoring to 8 participants throughout a period of approximately three months.

Consulting sessions with local and international mentors help participants to understand the course material, further put in practice the knowledge and implement the systems and tools they have learned. The frequency of mentoring sessions increase as the participants move through the program, allowing them and mentors to set individual objectives for their progress.

As the first intern of the livelihoods program, my tasks were unclear, however as long as the program moved toward the general objective of “creating decent employment” my objectives were getting shape and the daily activities during either the training or the consulting became simple and smooth. My mains tasks as an intern included providing hands-on guidance to the owners and managers, so that they could improve the efficiency and effectiveness of their enterprises. Working side by side the local mentor we gave advice and guidance to the participants on best business practices, as well as addressing and solving day to day business challenges. I met this incredible mentors guys, Djemson Jeudi ( Mr. Positive) and Jean Frusnert, both were highly qualified for international standards. They though me so much about humanitarian programs and much more about the Haitian culture.

Because of the hard work of all of us (Livelihoods team, internationals and locals), the program was able to accomplish its objectives. Some times the living conditions and the way of thinking of some Haitians participants the progress of the program was block and we had to deal with frustration. But not even sleeping in tents, taking baths in communal showers, eating the same food over and over, getting stomachaches often, listening the roosters, cows and goats making sounds early in the morning, stop us from helping the participants to improve their businesses; on the other hand, the commitment and gratitude of some participants, the contact with the nature, realizing that as a human being surrounded by  “poverty” makes understand the fact that we don’t need as many things as we thought, gave us the courage to continue the program,  and in my case to stay for 8 more months after my internship finished.

All along the course of the program I could develop and gain old and new skills, I learned how to manage and address different people from different cultures (as I worked with, Americans, Haitians, Brazilians, French’s and Mexicans). I learned to write down all sorts of paperwork needed for the development of the Business Improvement program.

I “learned” Haitian Creole and I improved my proficiency of both written and spoken French and English in technical and interpersonal settings.

Collaborating as an intern with All Hands Volunteers opened me the entrance to the world of NGO’s in the economic development field.

As a result if we put together, my contribution to the program (labour, time, knowledge etc.) and what my participation in the program gave in return, it would be unbalanced because what I gained was way more (once in the life time experience).

At the end of the pilot program, could we truly say we help the economic recovery in Léogâne, Haiti?

As I mentioned in the prior paragraphs we worked with eight businesses and only four  of them really used the knowledge and put into practice the given advice. When the program began, we didn’t have a starting point. The businesses didn’t have a normal control of incomes and outcomes, nor even mention a control of stock or purchase previsions. By the end of the program four of them had a regular control of cash flow and control of stock. The other four, had problems using the general business tools and/ or keeping up with the control which made it really difficult some times to accomplish the set goals.

As a conclusion I could affirm, mwen renmen anpil Haiti (I love Haiti so much).

 

30 Before 30 Update

07 Thursday Mar 2013

Posted by in accomplishments, accountability

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Back in November, 2011, I wrote a blog about certain things I wanted to accomplish before I turned 30.  I’ve been putting this off mostly because it’s a little embarrassing how many things I didn’t accomplish (although the attorney in me will try to reason every single one of those failures into a success anyway), but I figure I owe it to be accountable either way.

So, here we go:

1. First and foremost, I want to be settled into a job. No more uncertainty of what I’m doing…whether it’s working somewhere, or working on my own, I want it to be legit, I want to be able to get pregnant if we decide we’re ready, I want to have health insurance, I want to feel financially….hmmm….not-on-the-verge-of-being-broke? I know this is a lot for #1, but I think they all are part of one big package.

Weeeeeeeell, I’m still having some ups and downs on that one, but I do think I’m gonna turn it around this year!  So, maybe while I’m thirty I’ll accomplish this one.

2. Travel. There are too many places I want to go to: Germany (Mike, Uli & Hank!), Spain (Isa!), Hawaii (again, self-explanatory, but I want to be consistent with the parenthesis), Guatemala (grandma), Haiti (self explanatory). I’m not expecting all of these to happen before I turn 30. I’d be happy with one or two.

ACCOMPLISHED!  I only made it to one of these places, but that’s really all I was shooting for anyway, so this one I can confidently cross off the list.

Jeff and I biking in the English Garden in Munich, Germany.

Jeff and I biking in the English Garden in Munich, Germany.

3. Become serious about some sort of work out: whether it be walking/hiking, or picking up rock climbing again, which I miss doing.
Well, that’s just a failure anyway I look at it, no legal rationalizing out of this one.  I’ve had more down time in the last year that I’d care to admit, and yet I’m still too lazy to go for a walk or a run every day.  I’m not sure why.  The only thing that comes to mind is that I really do better at time management and doing stuff when I have too much on my plate than when I don’t have anything on my plate.  Weird.

4. Develop my blog. This includes moving to WordPress, as well as figuring out how to make Adsense make me more money. I think since I started blogging two years ago (almost exactly!), I’ve made about $12 bucks. I’m not saying I’m not happy with my earnings…but I’m also not saying I wouldn’t mind more. I just need to figure out how to do that without changing what I write about or plastering my blog with ads.

This was half an accomplishment, since I did move my blog to WordPress! However, I never got around to making more money off this blog, which is fine.  I think my priorities in this have shifted a little, since I’m trying to find an actual job instead of trying to become a real blogger ;)

5. Develop Jeff’s art: portfolio, more art shows, website, you name it.

Again, I’d say half success on this one.  We did get his website going, and we’ve worked a few weddings since my original blog post on this, plus, we’ve been doing the Art Walk at The Camp for the last three months, and we’ve done a few other shows before that.  The reason I still give this a half success is because I think there’s a lot more I could’ve done on this front, BUT, I do think we’ve had some big accomplishments either say :)

6. Earn my blue shirt from Corazon

Nope.  Not even close.  Although I did work very hard on our annual Meeting and Fundraiser, I didn’t do nearly enough to reach the blue shirt status.  With baby on the way, I don’t see me going on any house builds anytime soon either, so this one will have to be on the back burner for a bit!

7. Make it to Arizona to Visit Courtney

HUGE SUCCESS!  Jeff and I went out there last May for her wedding.  We got to see their new home and dog, catch up, and then I got to officiate their wedding.  It was awesome!

court n rich

8. Develop Haiti Scholarships into a successful nonprofit

I guess this one depends on your measure of success.  We did finally obtain our 501(c) certification, which was HUGE. But there are still a lot of things I want to work on to make it run nice and smooth.  On the plus side, we did offer the greatest number of scholarships yet this year, so again, HUGE.  I guess my worry is sustainability, and because of that I don’t think I’ve quite reached the point I’d like to reach.  But, it’s all a work in progress, and as long as we’re moving forward and not backward, I’m pretty happy about this one.

9. Jump out of a plane.

Nope, not even close.

10. Go camping.

Another absolute failure.  For someone who went camping on her honeymoon, I can’t believe it’s been over two years since we’ve been camping.  I honestly think about being at our campsite in Bishop or Yosemite at least once a week (no, I’m not kidding).  What IS exciting, however, is thinking of adding a little boy into those imaginary pictures, and making that a reality someday soon-ish.

11. Go wine tasting.

SUCCESS!!  Phew, it was starting to get depressing, wasn’t it? ;)  This one is briefly catalogued in my 2012 wrap up blog.  Suffice it to say: mission accomplished.

Wine tasting at Wilson Creek Winery in Temecula, CA.

Wine tasting at Wilson Creek Winery in Temecula, CA.

12. Eat healthier, regularly.

Another big failure.  Another one that is mostly due to my being lazy.  Being at the store now makes that a little more difficult, but still not impossible.  Plus that’s only been since October, so there’s really no excuse.  I just have trouble thinking outside my usual “recipe box,” that I just throw in the towel.  Not to mention that Jeff’s parents cook most of the time, and that’s just too convenient to turn down!

13. Travel to Portland or Seattle

Again, negative.  But I do feel like this WILL happen.  Some day.

14. Learn to say no, when necessary.

I think this has been a success.  I haven’t had as much going on lately that would necessitate me saying no, but I have been much, much better about thinking things through before just going for it.

15. Have a romantic getaway weekend with Jeff.

Again, another half success. We did go to San Francisco at the beginning of July for a friend’s wedding.  Although I wouldn’t term this a “romantic” getaway since we spent most of the time with friends, I would call it a getaway, and we did have a very nice time.  We also did some exploring on our own and had a great time, so in that sense: SUCCESS!

Exploring Point Reyes

Exploring Point Reyes

So if I’ve learned one thing from this little exercise: be realistic when making your list! Or…be more determined to accomplish them :)

Birthday Challenge Update

04 Monday Mar 2013

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Well, I still can’t believe it’s true, but on February 28th, 2013, my Birthday Challenge was complete!

In 28 days (after numerous outreach emails, tweets, and Facebook updates), 35 people came together to donate to Haiti Scholarships, and together raised $880.00.  I still can’t believe it!  That’s almost three FULL scholarships for students in Haiti :)  That means three students are guaranteed scholarships this Fall: they’ll be able to enroll and attend school.  That’s pretty damn exciting.

Thank you to all of the following amazing individuals:

  • Jessica K.
  • Jen B.
  • Annie
  • Patty
  • Adri
  • Kristina
  • John M.
  • Dan S.
  • Mark
  • Eileen
  • Jim
  • Jim in honor of Jeff Peterson
  • Jim in honor of Marge Mahar
  • Caitlin
  • Valerie
  • Mary
  • Darcy
  • Dan
  • Emily
  • Sarah T.
  • Jenn A.
  • Katie S.
  • Charlie
  • Sheena
  • Christine
  • Katie T.
  • Billie
  • Bhavini
  • Patrick
  • Isabel
  • Abby
  • Cisco
  • Diana
  • Lupita
  • Melissa

You’ve all made a huge impact on the lives of three young students in Haiti, an impact you can’t even imagine.  THANK YOU!

30 for 30!

01 Friday Feb 2013

Posted by in birthdays, Charity of the Month, education, Haiti, haiti scholarships

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So this month I reach a pretty big milestone: I turn 30! I’m still having some trouble grasping what that all entails, and although I’m on the precipice, I haven’t gone over the edge yet in over thinking where I expected to be at this stage in my life versus where I’m am (I figure that’s what we all do when we turn 30, right?  RIGHT?!). But I figure there’s plenty of time in life to worry about that!

I do, however, want to take advantage of me getting old and do something useful with it, so I’ve decided to try and raise some money for Haiti Scholarships.

My goal: get thirty (30) donations for Haiti Scholarships throughout the month of February. This effectively means that my birthday becomes a month-long celebration!

I want to be clear here: I’m not asking for 30 donations of $30 (although if that’s your desire, by all means!), but simply 30 individual donations of any size. Yep, even $1.00 counts.

What will your donations be used for? This school year (2012/2013), we have helped 27 students in Haiti enroll in school, and pay for their tuition. Our goal is to at least keep these 27 students enrolled in the 2013-2014 school year, and hopefully with larger scholarships. This means raising over $8,100 between now and September. Thanks to our monthly donors and a generous fundraiser from Grace United Methodist Church in Oelwein, Iowa, we’re off to a good start with current funding for the 2013-2014 school year at $2,200.00.

Ideally we’d like to increase the number of students we help each year (especially since we get applications from students all the time, that unfortunately we have to decline due to lack of available funding).

So believe me when I tell you that your money will be going to a really great cause :)

Ready to make my birthday challenge a non-challenge? Just click here, then click on the PayPal link. We have a couple different donation options: you can sign up to be a monthly sponsor, or make a one time donation.

As out letterhead says: “No one can do everything, but all of us can do something.”

Thanks for doing your part!

Meeting with students in Haiti in March, 2011.

Meeting with students in Haiti in March, 2011.

2/3/13 Update: Four donors so far and $100 raised.

2/10/13 Update: Seven donors and $170 raised.

2/11/13 Update: ten donors and $310 raised.

2/12/13 Update: sixteen donors and $435 raised.

2/19/13 Update: seventeen donors and $465 raised!

2/21/13 Update: twenty donors and $540 raised

2/25/13 Update: twenty five donors and $660 raised

2/26/13 Update: twenty six donors and $670 raised

2/27/13 Update: THIRTY DONORS!! and $765 raised!!!

 

THANKS EVERYONE!

Cha-Cha-Cha-Chaaaaanges

25 Friday Jan 2013

Posted by in adventures, baby, business, career, goals, kids, Nuestras Manos, titles

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Well, lots of stuff going on lately.  Most importantly, Jeff and I are both adding new titles to our resumes: parents!  Yup, we finally decided to take the plunge, so here we are, two and a half months preggers :)

We’re excited to be over with the first trimester, but things seem to be going well so far.   Our little one is due August 18, 2013, and it just seems so far away!

This is how we made the announcement to our parents on Christmas!

This is how we made the announcement to our parents on Christmas!

With that in mind, we’ve been thinking long and hard about what we need to do to finally get some financial stability in our lives.  As much as we’ve enjoyed getting Nuestras Manos going, now with a baby in mind it just doesn’t seem like the best idea ever, haha.  When we were thinking of purchasing the business, it was easy for us to think we could bring a baby to work (since we owned the place and all), and it would be perfect.  Thinking about it realistically, there’s no way I could take our baby to the shop for 6-8 hours a day!  There’s no crib, changing area, food, etc.

The other issue we’ve had with the shop is trying to increase our profit.  We haven’t operated at a loss yet, but definitely not making enough money to support either one of us (much less three of us), and it takes upa lot of time.  I know we could make more money if we were able to invest more in what we sold, but that’s hard to do when you don’t have the money to invest in the first place, haha.

So, it seems that we’re back at square one.  The other day I also started thinking about why I’m trying so hard to do an “alternative career,” and not get stuck in a 9-5 cubicle job.  Sure, having the liberty of doing your own thing is nice, but as much as people may be jealous about my independence, I’m really jealous of people’s financial stability and their ability to buy a home and make payments on their loans (or take a vacation and actually have paid time off).  So I asked myself: is it really so bad to work a regular job if I can get all the perks I want?  Health insurance, a 401(k) (that’s how you know you’re a real adult, right?), paid time off, paid holidays, etc.  I’m starting to think that the answer is no.

Which reminds me of a blog I wrote almost three years ago:

My question when I see folks who are older than me is: what was it like when they each realized they weren’t going to get exactly where they wanted to go? I’m assuming we each have a time in our lives where we start realizing that the realities of life get in the way of the ideals you wanted to pursue, and you start to adjust to those new realities.

I think I’ve reached that point.  So, I’m trying to wrap up the contract work that I have, and start focusing again on finding a full time job–but one with no shady bosses, and one that has potential for the long haul.  I’m not sure how it’ll go down when I say “oh and by the way, I’m three months pregnant.” but I guess we’ll worry about that when we get there!

 

To the End of 2012!

01 Tuesday Jan 2013

Posted by in adventure, beer, beginning, birthdays, business, family, friendship, haiti scholarships, holidays, Jeff, Nuestras Manos, photography, the gang, travel, Uncategorized, wedding

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About this time last year, Jeff and I were saying to each other “2012 is gonna be our year.”  And it was.

In many ways there are things in 2013 that we still hope to accomplish.  Mainly having a steady and higher source of income.

But in so many more ways, 2012 was our year.

January began with a pretty memorable at-home wine tasting.  Although the order was filled completely incorrectly and to this day has not been resolved, the actual event was pretty fun.

cheese

In March and April we tried to relive our Epic April of 2011, where we went on a hike or did something outdoorsy every weekend.  We didn’t quite accomplish what we set out for, but we still saw some pretty great places.

hike hiking alex hiking jeff

April also brought a very special visit by Will from Peru!

will

As well as a very colorful 5k! Although our team name was overlooked by many of the youngsters at this event, I still think Team Never Nudes was priceless (especially combined with the cut off jeans).

color run

May brought a pretty epic “Before Christ” theme birthday party for Brookie, as well as a great 50th birthday party for my mother (inspired mostly by Pinterest ideas)

bc part mom

May also brought the wedding of Courtney and Rich in Phoenix, Arizona.  I was incredibly honored to be their officiant :)

court n rich

May also brought a great weekend of wine tasting in Temecula with some fabulous ladies!

wine tasting

June brought a great visit from and boat expedition with the Arizona Armstrong’s.

boat 1 boat 2

The end of June brought the union of two great individuals: Dana and Aaron.  I was so incredibly blessed to be a special part of their day. I also still tell stories about how their friend Joey introduced the bridal party to hilarious, and fake, stories about each person in the bridal party.

July brought a farewell to a great friend who left us for warmer waters in Cabo San Lucas, but not before a wonderful bon voyage pool party.

pool posing

This is also the pool party where I saved Brookie’s life…

saving brookie

The last weekend in June was the wedding of Dana and Aaron, which I felt incredibly lucky to be a special part of.  I still tell stories of how their friend, Joey, introduced the bridal party to wild and crazy (fictional) stories, which were embraced with roaring laughter and tons of applause.

July took us up to San Francisco for a weekend, to celebrate Billie and Ethan’s wedding, and also served as a mini UCSB reunion. Plus we got to hang out with Sarah and Kyle, so much fun!

billies wedding

4th of July brought an all American BBQ at the Armstrong residence, along with the most adorable strawberry desserts!

4th of july

June and July also brought some pretty great events for Jeff Armstrong Photography.  We were able to be a part of two memorable weddings, both of which turned out amazing!

chelsbry jca_4018

August brought a boat trip thanks to Annie and Dan, in which I’m not gonna lie, I felt pretty fancy!

boat

The Fall also brought a new high for Haiti Scholarships, as we obtained both our state and federal tax exemptions.  We also disbursed the most amount of scholarships in one semester yet.  My hope is that 2013 will be an even better year for Haiti Scholarships, although I feel like the challenges of raising money for the organization just keep growing.

September brought a pretty epic and much awaited trip to GERMANY!  We got to visit with family and explore some new and awesome areas of Germany in our 400 mile road trip from Fussen to Koln. Most of our trip involved drinking beer and seeing lots of awesome churches!

beer church

Throughout our trip, we kept talking about how once we got back home, we really had to figure things out and make some kind of big moves.

A couple weeks after we got back, we made what I would say was a HUGE move, and bought a business.  In case you missed it, you can read it up on it here.

nuestras manos

October was also a very busy month for The Merry Ministers.  So far I have two weddings booked for 2013, and I’m excited to keep growing this little side business.

Before our trip we had applied for Patchwork, and found out as soon as we landed at LAX that our application was approved.  So November brought our first experience as retailers at an arts and crafts festival.  The highlight: our booth!  It was all designed by Jeff and crafted by both of us (although mostly Jeff).

patchwork

November brought a first for Friendsgiving: we all actually sat around a real dinner table!  Usually it’s an assortment of picnic tables and random tables and chairs that we can find, but Kadota’s parents were generous in letting us have Friendsgiving at their home, which came with a huge dinning room table!

And December brought one of our most memorable Christmas’ yet, surrounded by so many amazing family members.

This year hasn’t been without it’s challenges, and I know next year will bring it’s own set of challenges, but I can’t help but look through these memories and think of how incredibly fortunate Jeff and I are in our lives.  For one, we have each other.  For two, we have incredible families that love and support us in all that we do.  For three, we have some pretty amazing friends.

2013 is certain to bring some major changes to our lives, and we welcome them with open arms.  Happy New Year every one!

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