Why, hello there!

09 Friday Nov 2012

Posted by in art, business, career, crafts, DIY, life, my-husband-is-awesome, Nuestras Manos

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So, it would seem that it’s been a while since I’ve blogged, my apologies.

To be honest, things got so hectic after we got back that I haven’t tried to make time to write “for fun.” I keep having this nagging feeling in the back of my mind, saying “you need to update your blog, you need to do this, you need to do that…”

As anyone with a mom knows, nagging doesn’t lead to productivity. It may lead to dragging feet and eventually completion of a task, but usually while giving a nasty look towards your mother’s back (I NEVER did that). So recently blogging has seemed like more of a chore than a joy, and for that reason I decided to wait until I really WANTED to write.

So here I am. :)

Since I last gave an update here, things for Jeff and I have changed just a little bit. No house or babies, but kind of a big career changer. We came across a wonderful opportunity, and decided to jump on it no matter how crazy or stupid or irrational it seemed. You can read all about it here.

So yeah, we’re business owners! How’s that for a new title? ;) As crazy as it sounds, it’s quite a perfect fit for us. We’ve both been able to put our best skills and talents to use. Jeff is super handy, artsy, crafty, and just effen talented. To that end, he’s supplying our our shop with amazing wood prints and art, and creating some amazing signage and what not. He added an awesome little design touch to the exterior of our camper, which looks beautiful, he designed a large sign that has helped attract customers that would otherwise just walk by, and most recently he hand cut every single one of the letters of our store name, including sanding and fine running, and we hope to get those on the camper tomorrow. It’s everything he was absolutely made to do, and he enjoyed doing it–which is the greatest part.

As for me, I’ve never been a huge shopper, but I’m finding that I’m quite good at shopping for our store. I absolutely love the adventure of finding new and exciting items to add to our shop. My years of customer service from working at Starbucks and as a receptionist are coming in handy with all of our clients, and unless I’m starving I absolutely love interacting and getting to know them all. My organizational skills have been useful in keeping track of sales and what not, and my legal skills….well, I have those around, haha.

I haven’t completely given up on the law thing, but it’s definitely shrinking as I find stuff that I enjoy doing more, and that Jeff and I can do together. It’s been an INSANELY busy month, but we’ve loved every part of it and find everything to be really exciting so far.

I’ll try to start blogging regularly again, including the Charity of the Month section. I haven’t had time to compile a new Holiday Shopping Guide, but it’ll just include additions to last years, so feel free to check that one out of you’re already looking for inspiration.

Thanks for sticking around :)

Game of Thrones Reading Frenzy

08 Monday Oct 2012

Posted by in book review, books, OCD, reading

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Our good friend Julian let us borrow his kindle during our trip to Germany, and recommended we start reading the Game of Throne series (since we’ve talked about the show before).  Actually, it was given to Jeff….and shortly after he started reading it on the flight there, I started reading over his shoulder.  Jeff is amazing enough that he doesn’t care, so we even had a little system worked out to signal when he could turn the page.

As we well know by now, I tend to get obsessive about reading.  And I need to know the ending.  Which is difficult with this series because each book is, how you say….fucking long?!  Half way through our road trip, I realized I could read to Jeff while he was driving, since each of our drives were at least hour drives, and a couple that were 3-4 hours long.  It was a pretty great system, and we were just bummed we hadn’t been doing this from the very beginning of our road trip.

The other great thing about reading this trip in Germany is that it’s so easy to imagine these scenes when you have the perfect scenery in front of you (not to mention reading while staying in a castle-become-hotel).

Anyhow, it wasn’t too long before I just had to keep reading on my own so I could finish the book…and I finished the first book a couple days after our road trip while we were relaxing in Hamburg.  Then we got home…and I bought book two…and I couldn’t put it down either.  I breezed through it, and secretly bought book three (at this point, my reading obsession was embarrassing), but I finally had to break down and tell Jeff.  By the time I finished book three, I was in desperate need of a break, and to get other things done with my life other than sit around reading all day.

Every day I’m tempted to buy book four, but I’m trying to hold off until I take care of some business and get caught up on all the work I neglected last week….yikes.

Reading obsession aside, the books are great.  They are a lot easier to read than Jeff and I thought.  For a while we thought it would be all “wherefore art thou” kind of language, but it’s super easy to follow along.  It’s interesting to see where the show diverts from the books, but also great to see how well the casting was done with each of the characters.  It also gives me a MUCH better understanding of what is happening in the show: when we watched it, half the time I had no idea what was going on because there are a million different and intricate story lines.

Musings on Germany so far

13 Thursday Sep 2012

Posted by in travel

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Specifically, Hamburg, since that’s where we’ve been for the last nine days.

Weather Fluctuations
Our first walk around Hamburg, if I didn’t take my sweater on and off at least twenty times, literally, I didn’t do it once. Mike gave us some story, not sure about it authenticity, about Germany getting two different weather fronts coming in constantly, and that’s why the weather changes so much. This day the weather changed every two blocks. I should point out that the clouds seems to keep up with the cars on the autobahn: they move ridiculously fast! So when the clouds block the sun, it’s freezing, but when the clouds move out of the way, one block later, it’s hooooot.

Dogs

They’re everywhere! In the metro, in the park, in the streets, in cafes. Everywhere. And yet, theres little poop on the streets, which is impressive. Another thing is that most dogs are off leashes, and yet they’re totally fine. You rarely hear them bark at each other or people walking by, and they rarely stray too far from their owners. I find this really interesting.

Running

People rum, a lot. I know we have a lot of runners in the U.S., but they’re EVERYWHERE here. It’s cray cray.

Breads

They’re fresh, they’re delicious, and there are so so so many more choices then back home (this goes for fruits and veggies also…it takes one trip to Germany to realize how sad our supermarkets are). White bread is not very popular, but instead you have amazing wheat and grain bread–which isn’t dry at all, but delicious!

Bikes

Again: they’re everywhere! This city moves on bikes, and it’s great to see. Uli and Mike don’t have a car, and yet they get around everywhere they need. One of their bikes has an awesome car seat attached, as well as a “kinder wagon” that hooks up to the bike so Henry can sleep while we bike or go wherever we need to go. It really makes me wish that where we lived was more bike centric and with an actual public transportation system.

Anyhow, we’re heading to the airport to catch our flight to Munich! More musings on Germany and our travels whenever we find spare time and free Internet :)

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And we’re off!

02 Sunday Sep 2012

Posted by in adventure, adventures, baby, business, career, family, family law, Jeff, law, life, Merry Ministers, travel, work

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Well, these past few weeks have been incredibly stressful, and the last three days have probably been the slowest days of my life.  But, after one more sleep, we are off to Germany tomorrow!!!  Jeff and I are gonna go visit his brother, Mike, along with his wife, Uli, and their adorable son, Henry.  We are so, so, so excited to see them and spend some quality time with them.  We’re also taking off for about a week and going on a road trip through most of southern Germany–we can’t wait!  We fly into Hamburg, spend time with the fam, then fly to Munich, spend two days there, pick up our rental, drive to Fussen, and then start driving north through a bunch of little towns along the Romantic Road, ending and turning in our car in Cologne.  And finally taking a train back to Hamburg to spend our last few days in Germany with the family.

Along the way, we’ll be staying in a castle, a cool apartment in Cologne, a room with a castle view, and a winery.  I have a feeling something is gonna go wrong along the way, but I’m pretty excited about all of our stops!

When we get back, we’ll have our work cut out for us.  For one, bills will have to get paid after a month of not working, which should be interesting.  I have a few checks that should be waiting for me upon our return, so I hope those will cover most of it.

Then I have four weddings booked with The Merry Ministers, so I’m glad I have that to rely on.  And Jeff and I are really gonna start working a lot more on promoting his photography, my firm, and officiating business.

Speaking of my firm, that’s crazy.  I never knew how stressful it would be to leave things wrapped up for a three week vacation when you work for yourself.  You can’t just clock out on Friday and jump on a plane on Monday.  It’s been almost three weeks of prepping stuff, letting opposing counsel know I’ll be gone, leaving clients semi-happy with where their cases are (of course, all issues come up the week right before we’re set to leave), preparing bills early so they can go out on time, leaving detailed summaries for my emergency contact attorney in case anything is needed, and setting “out of office” notifications for all emails and phones.  Phew.

When I get back, I definitely have my work cut out for me on these family law cases, since most of them are reaching the point where negotiation settlements have stalled and we basically have to move forward with trial preparations.  Yay.

But the work keeps coming, which is great.  I actually have two potential clients waiting for when I get back-and I can’t be more thankful for that.  Family law has it’s challenges, but it’s allowed me to keep working on my own, which I love.  In October I need to turn that into a financially feasible plan so Jeff and I can figure out what our future holds.  Babies, apartment/home, and so many other things that will need to be addressed as soon as we get back.

But for now, I’m just taking a deep breath and forgetting about all of it, and just looking at the clock ticking…waiting for Monday at 5:30pm…take off!

What Education Is, by Y. Haroutunian

17 Friday Aug 2012

Posted by in education, poetry, reading, volunteer

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Today I had the honor of participating on a panel presentation for a group of young women from WriteGirl, an amazing organization in Los Angeles that empowers young women through the written word (definitely a future Charity of the Month!).

At the end of the month, each panelists was handed a swag bag by one of the WriteGirl interns, all of whom put the even together.  I have to add that they did an amazing job: the panelists were all from such varied and interesting backgrounds, and the little details of presentation for the sign in table and snack table were beautiful.

Back to the swag bag.  Inside, I found a delicate piece of paper, rolled up and neatly tied with a ribbon.  One of my fellow panelists encouraged me to open and read it now: it was a poem written by one of the interns, and it was specifically written for ME.  Each intern researched a little about their panelist, and wrote the poem based on what the panelist does.  I was so incredibly impressed by the talent of Ms. Haroutunian, that I just couldn’t wait to share it!  It honestly got me a little teary eyed as I read it.  I hope you enjoy it as much as I did :)

DIY 50th Birthday Celebration

10 Friday Aug 2012

Posted by in chocolate, crafts, creativity, DIY, events, family, flowers, party, photography, planning

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This is extremely delayed, since my mom’s 50th birthday party was in May…but hey, better late than never, right?

My aunts and I started planning this party way in advance, and I started stalking ideas on Pinterest as soon as I had a rough idea of what I wanted to do.  Although not perfectly executed, I think everything came out pretty nice :)  Below you can see the original idea (as found on Pinterest, but I’m linking to the source), and then my attempt at it.

1. Chalkboard signs made from dollar store food trays

I did these in three different colors: purple, pink, and black.  I used one as the menu board for the desserts, another for the guest book signing table, and this last random one:

2. Assorted flowers and vases

Definitely not the best picture to showcase what an amazing job our volunteer florist did, but the flowers were amazing and I was really happy with the random assortment of vases we had.  I still have most of them, so if anyone needs to borrow them for a certain even, just let me know!

3. Trough’s for the bar

I couldn’t find one that big, especially at an affordable price, so we went with several small ones.

4. Raspberries with chocolate chips!

Not bad, huh?!  Ha.

5. Chalk board signs for photo props!


6. Photo background

This one was used more as an inspiration since what I ended up making is quite different…

7. Number 50 made out of photos

And a final one, just because I like it:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“I’m in a hurry to get things done.”

10 Friday Aug 2012

Posted by in accountability, addiction, lists, Uncategorized

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I don’t know why.  It’s just how I am.  I constantly need to be doing something, or have plans to do something.  If I don’t have a list of things that need to get done, I start to go crazy.

I make list after list after list of things that need to get done.  If I don’t have a list made, I feel my anxiety start to creep up as my mind constantly goes through a mental checklist of the things I have to accomplish that day…the whole time freaking out that I’m going to forget something.  Once it’s down on paper, I’m fine.  I could accomplish one of ten things on my list, but it’s ok: it’s on the list–it’ll get done at some point but at least I won’t forget it.  Once my list is made, I’m ok with being an over achieving procrastinator.  Things can wait.  As long as the list is made.  I also make lists just so I can have the satisfaction of crossing things off of it, I don’t care whether that’s good or bad.  Once the list is written, I definitely feel like I have accomplished something, and flying a kite doesn’t sound like a bad idea.

This need for structure and busyness often has the ability to ruin perfectly good weekends, when I should be happy that I have nothing to do and can spend it all day doing whatever I want with Jeff.  But my mind just goes bananas.  I start getting anxious that I should be doing something, or thinking of things that I could or should be doing instead of just sitting at home.  At the same time, I don’t want to do any of the things that I probably should be doing (hence the “procrastinator”).

I came across an article in the New York Times that seemed to hit the nail on the head. The title is “The Busy Trap,” and the article talks about how we, as humans, choose to be busy…we make ourselves busy.  No one tells me that I need to have lunch and keep up with people from various networks…I just do it.  No one requires that I participate in several different organizations that require my time and attendance at meetings.  I chose to participate in them.  No one forces me to attend weddings, birthdays, social hours, etc., on weekends.  But I do it–either because I want to or because I feel it’s the socially acceptable thing to do.

I realize that the busy lifestyle I have is one which I have created for myself.  The problem is that I’m never happy: I’m either stressed out about having overloaded myself with things to do, or I’m unhappy about not having anything “to do.”

I really wish that I could just let things go, relax, and enjoy my surroundings.  I’ve definitely gotten better at living in the “now” since I met Jeff, but I know I can be a lot better.  I just don’t know how to get to that point.

Blog Updates

09 Thursday Aug 2012

Posted by in health, home, updates

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Remember that blog a while ago about whether our generation has failed to launch?  If you don’t, you can read it here.

I came across a blog recently with an entry titled “No house for you! 8 reasons why you shouldn’t bother buying a house.”  Given some of the comments that came up on my blog about whether it’s even a smart idea for our generation to own a home or not, I thought I’d pass it along.

I also came across an article that related to My Soda Blog.  It’s not anything crazy informative, but I did find it interesting that as people are becoming more aware of health issues surrounding how much soda we consume, the soda industry is busy trying to find new things to get us to buy instead.

Discussions on Development & Music Corner: Mexico by Mexican Institute of Sound

07 Tuesday Aug 2012

Posted by in development, discussion, Discussions on Development, entertainment, Mexico, music, music corner, video

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I heard this song on NPR’s Alt Latino, and thought it was a great sound for both Finca’s Music Corner and Discussions on Development.  The lyrics focus on the violence of drug cartels in Mexico, with a powerful lyric claiming that the government of Mexico is making money off of the drug cartels.  I thought these lyrics were worth with typing out and translating.  Enjoy.

Cuanto tiempo va pasar                                  How much time will pass

Para que pueda mejorar                                  So that things will get better

Todos somos víctimas                                      We are all victims

De un estado conquistado                                Of a conquered state

Por un gobierno involucrado                             By a government involved

en las ganancias de el narco                             In the profits of narcotraffic

Es una nación podrida                                      It’s a rotten nation

Con la poblacion herida                                    With the population hurt

Mexico

Mexico

Mexico

Mexico

Mexico

Es Mexico                                                                  It’s Mexico

Mexico

Ra, Ra, Ra

Interlude

Son los zetas o es el chapo                        It’s Los Zetas or it’s El Chapo

Tus hijos ya con sicarios                           Your kids are already hired hit men

Muerdete la lengua                                  Bite your tongue

Que hay treinta muertos en Vera Cruz      Because there’s thirty dead in Veracruz

Es todo un placer y orgullo                        It’s a pleasure and an honor

Saber que el turno es tuyo                        Knowing that your turn is next

Que quizás mañana                                  That maybe tomorrow

Ya no llegues vivo a tu casa                      You won’t make it home alive

Mexico

Mexico

Mexico

Mexico

Mexico

Es mexico                                                                     It’s Mexico

Mexico

Ra, ra, ra

Mexico

Mexico

Mexico

Mexico

Es mexico                                                                     It’s Mexico

Es mexico                                                                     It’s Mexico

Mexico

Ra, ra, ra

Verde de mota                                                   Green for weed

Blanco de coca                                                    White for coke

Y rojo tu sangre                And red your blood (colors of the Mexican flag)

Estado fallido campeón                                      Failed state champion

Orgullosos patios traseros                                 Proud backyards

Al sonoro rugir del canon                        At the resounding roar of the cannon

Y se siembre con tus manos la hierba     And be planted with your hands the herbs

Al sonoro rugir del canon                       At the resounding roar of the cannon

Y se siembre con tus manos la hierba     And be planted with your hands the herbs

Al sonoro rugir del canon                     At the resounding roar of the cannon

Mexico

Mexico

Mexico

mexico

o

Es mexico

Mexico

The new album is out today.  I should give a huge thanks to wikipedia which is chock full of helpful information on a plethora of lyrics from this song.

Music Corner: Fly Over States by Jason Aldean

25 Wednesday Jul 2012

Posted by in entertainment, music, music corner, video

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Some of you know of my odd obsession with small town USA.  Especially Robert* since I keep threatening to visit him in Tennessee as soon as he moves back with his fiance (will you leave already so Jeff and I have an excuse to go to Tennessee???).

I can’t tell you where this obsession came from or why it has persisted so long, but I can tell you that this song gets me giddy every time I hear it.  I would confess that it even gives me goose bumps some times, but that may be unforgivable.

“Miles and miles of back roads and highways,

Connecting little towns with funny names,

Who’d want to live down there in the middle of nowhere,

They’ve never drove through Indiana,

Met the man who plowed that earth,

Planted that seed, busted his ass for you and me,

Or caught a harvest moon in Kansas,

They’d understand why God made those fly over states…

On the plains of Oklahoma

With a windshield sunset in your eyes

Like a watercolor painted sky

Take a ride across the badlands

Feel that freedom on your face

Breathe in all that open space

Meet a girl from Amarillo

You might even wanna plant your stakes

In those fly over states…”

I want to see the harvest moon in Kansas, and feel that freedom on my face…and breath in all that open space! But until then, the song will have to do…

*I don’t think I’m allowed to mention Robert in a blog without directing you to his twitter account.  Follow him.

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