My attempt at cooking Korean food

Having gone out for Korean food last month, I was kind of excited to have it again. That opportunity presented itself when I had about a pound of round steak left. This isn't regular round steak. It is home grown from my aunt and uncle. So with a pound of if left, I didn't want to waste it on something not tasty. So I decided to try Bulgogi. This is a Korean dish that is basically marinated and then quickly stir fried beef. I just so happened to most everything I needed. So I attempted. It turned out pretty well. I think I will make it again in the future, though I will likely try to slice the beef thinner. I would also like to try a cast iron frying pan. But that's another post for another day.

Dinner and the theater

On Saturday Nick and I had the pleasure of having dinner with our friends Paul and Kim. They took us to Hoban Korean Restaurant in Eagan. It was very good. We had man doo, bulgogi, kimchee bokum, shrimp tempura and dolsot bibimbob. Everything was wonderful! This place is also pretty cool because it is next to a karaoke place. There are 3 or 4 separate rooms that are equipped for small groups to make fools of themselves in front of a small group rather than a bar full of people, I guess. Maybe some day....

After stuffing ourselves (at least Nick and I did) with awesome food we headed to New Life Academy in Woodbury to enjoy their production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Some friends from church were in it, so we wanted to support them. I ordered tickets online in advance as the recommendation of these friends. Good thing I did as it was a sold out show. It was really good! Our friend Steve played the oldest brother, Ruben. He sang the lead in "one more angel in heaven" and was very good. He had us convinced he was angry about Joseph and his coat.

It was a great night and we were glad to share it with Paul and Kim.

Dear Fellow Commuters on 494,

I would like to take this opportunity to remind you of a few driving particulars that will make things a little more enjoyable for all of us.

First off I just want to state, for the record, that I can not go faster than the car in front of me. This is impossible. Perhaps you could think about this in more personal terms. Does ride up on me make you go faster? No. Try as I may, I am limited by the speed of the car in front of me. Perhaps you could try to leave 3 minutes earlier, so you wouldn't feel so pressed to make up those little seconds by trying to inch the rest of us faster?

I would also like to remind you of a pretty important rule that goes along with that. Two things can not occupy the same space at the same time. Now, this is a simplification of it, but this really is a rule of physics. If my car is right there, your car can not be. This is an important rule!

Blinkers are helpful in letting the rest of us know your intentions. If I know you are trying to switch lanes, I can avoid doing so as well. Remember, we can not both occupy the same space at the same time.

This next tip applies to most Minnesotans: when merging, as tempting as it is to slow down, don't. When you merge, it goes so much better if you get up to the speed the other groups are going. Also, kindly let people in as they attempt to merge. If you are exiting as I am entering, do you NEED to be in front of me to prove something? You are leaving, allowing the subtle slowdown to allow others in as they merge acts as a nice buffer don't you think. If you speed up to cruise in front of them, only to have to slow down to avoid rear-ending the car in front of you, almost causing the car you "beat" to rear-end you....remember, two cars can not occupy the same space at the same time.

Lastly, flashing lights on the shoulder do not mean you need to slam on your breaks and proceed at 20 mph. You will not get pulled over if someone is already pulled over. Chances are, at 20 mph you still will not get enough of a glimpse to discern if it is someone you know or why they are pulled over. It's 494, always assume they were speeding and move on.

Please consider these friendly reminders as we commute together this week.

Thanks!

Happy Birthday Daddy

My dad turned 60 on Saturday. After all the getting old jokes were told I realized, again, that my parents can't possibly be the age their birthdays give them. In my mind there is no way my parents should be getting senior discounts, no AARP, and why is my dad golfing in the Senior division? (which he has a few trophies in) For whatever reason, in my mind my parents stopped aging right around my moving out of the house. That was about 10 years ago. Perhaps it has as much to do with them not acting like they are aging. They certainly don't act like "old people."

Whatever the calendar says your age is, Happy Birthday Dad.

Red Lobster for the seafood lover in you!

We went out to dinner with my parents and some friends of theirs tonight. We went to Red Lobster. When you live in MN, that is seafood. I realize that when you live on a coast, there are many places that are much better, but for MN, Red Lobster works for me. It was definitely one of the better recent experiences we have had there. Not that the others have been terrible, but it was very good tonight.

I hung out with my mom today, so I was in Waconia. Nick had to work so he came from CG to meet us for supper. I left a bit earlier than my parents and their friends to secure us a table at peak dinner time (6:30ish by the time they got there). When I got there they said 20-30 minutes. About 7 minutes later I was being seated. The waitress promptly took my drink order. Nick arrive about 4 minutes later, and again, very promptly took his drink order. When the rest of the party arrived, drinks were quickly ordered and brought to us. She did take a minute or two longer to get our food order, but still not bad. She brought our salads and the cheddar biscuits in what seemed like a regular amount of time. But no sooner had we taken our first bites of salad our food arrived. Wow, talk about speedy. The problem with this was that our table was pretty small for 6 people, and to have salad and dinner plates really crowded the table.

Everything was brought to us, tartar sauce, extra drinks, etc. Two people ordered the endless shrimp so they placed a second order. About the time we were half way through eating, the waitress came over and explained her error making the food come out at the same time as the salads. It turns out this was Homecoming for her daughter and she stopped in just as she placed our order. So she spent a few moments with her daughter before making our salads. This delay, she said, was totally her fault and she was soooo sorry and she takes full responsibility for it. Since that was the case and she felt so bad, she was giving us a few little extras to take home with us. The guys with the endless shrimp each got a few to take home, and there were even a few extra servings brought for others to take home.

We told her we appreciated her honesty and accepting responsibility, and really, we didn't need the extra servings. She insisted and was grateful we were so understanding.

We ended up with two servings of shrimp scampi and some broccoli and cheddar biscuits. Yummy! I hope Nick is willing to share them with me!

So, we did ask and the waitress's daughter goes to the "new" school that was formed by the merger of Concordia Academy in Bloomington with a few other Lutheran schools in the area. She was pretty chatty, but very nice.

My tummy is filled with yummy shrimpy goodness and a cheddar biscuit to help sop up the butter. It was tasty!

Gym Rat

I spent almost 2 hours at the gym today. The surprising part was that I didn't realize it was almost two hours until I went to stretch.

Today is also the three week mark of membership at Snap. I am a little bit surprised at how much I have enjoyed working out most days. Perhaps its the ability to shake things up if I want. Perhaps it has to do more with my perception of improvement.

My first week going I was able to do about 20 minutes on the elliptical or treadmill. I am now consistently doing 40 minutes on the treadmill. Today I did 40 minutes at a speed equal to a 19 minute mile. This is quite the improvement for me. I have also added a little biking in with my cardio routine a few days a week.

I am averaging strength training 3 to 4 days a week.

I have discovered that the best way to make the time go by is to read a magazine, listen to my fun ipod mix and occasionally watch football when it's on. The downfall to this is I have read all of the magazines I have, most of them at the club and even a few of the books for the classes I am teaching. This is a good problem I suppose, but it also means I run out of things to read. I have read a lot more celebrity gossip than I enjoy. People Magazine aside, I rather dislike reading celebrity gossip. From reading the weekly gossip mag at Snap I have learned that many of the celebrities are idiots.

I also learned that according to some psychologist, when you set a goal you should not share it with people because it gives us a sense of accomplishment to talk about it, so we don't work as hard to achieve our goals. Um...ok. I have found that sharing my goals with people, including on here, helps keep me accountable. If Nick knows I am trying to lose weight, he is so much less likely to suggest going out to eat, or is more likely to suggest a walk. If that goal is never externalized, how do I hold myself accountable? If that goal just stays in my head, I can change it or amend it to be able to justify anything. That's no good.

What's the difference between a boyfriend and a husband? About 30 pounds. - Cindy Garner

Ok, that isn't a crack at my husband, more an observation of our past 3 years of marriage. I don't know about Nick, but I certainly have put on a few more pounds than I care to admit. My Snap membership is just one of the ways I am trying to remedy this. One of the other things we are doing is eating better. The combination of the onset of fall (the body's desire for comfort foods) and the desire to find tasty meals that are a bit better for us has given me the bug to look and find new things to try. Here are a few things I have tried and we like.

• Hotter than Bret Favre Tuna Salad. Thanks Amy & Heidi for the name inspiration and Nick for bringing it up. It is Tuna and Artichoke hearts with a touch of mayo, cilantro, onion and hot sauce. It is not spicy (hot) but still hotter than Favre.
• Grilled Tuna steaks. YUM-O! A little EVOO, salt and pepper and grill them up to a rare medium-rare. Excellent with salsa, pesto, portabello mushroom caps, horseradish crusting or with nothing at all.
• Stuffed jalapenos. Jalapenos stuffed with seasoned cream cheese, wrapped in bacon and grilled. (You might be thinking, bacon isn't healthy....well, when carbs are your enemy, bacon in moderation is great!)
  
• Salsa. So this isn't a new recipe, but eating it sans chips is rather new. I found this salsa is great on most anything. And, in the process we found a new tortilla chip that is tasty, and a bit better for us. Trader Joe's Flaxseed and Soy chips. Really pretty tasty. Good crunch, good amount of salt and no funny taste of healthyness.
  
• We also tried a few cheeses a couple weeks ago. We had wine, cheese and a few accents. Very tasty!! Trader Joe's has quite the selection of cheese.
  
• Speaking of Trader Joe's, it was recommended to us to try the Whey protein if were in the market for a protein powder (vanilla is better than chocolate...I can't believe I just said that)

So that is just a little glimpse of some of the new things we have had at our house. So far, eating better has tasted pretty good around here. Now how to make tater tot hotdish and keep it healthy?

No TV!

Well, after a few weeks of gingerly "wiggling the wires" on the back of the TV in order to help it straighten out, it seems it has at last bit the dust. Now, I'm not particularly surprised. This TV was a new purchase when I bought the house. That was June of 2001. 8 Years is a pretty long time in the TV world these days (at least from what I hear). Now the question is....do we try to find a cheap tube on craigslist, upgrade to a newer flat panel that will still fit in the entertainment center, or move the 13" upstairs and deal with it? I am not voting for option #3.

The Great MN Get Together

Nick and I went to the State Fair yesterday. This was the first time since 2005. The past few years budgeting has gotten in the way of our enjoyment of the fair. This year Nick volunteered to take blood pressures in the U of M building. His reward was 2 free tickets to get in. YAY! He also has a friend that grew up very close to the fairgrounds, so he worked it out with her to park in her parent's driveway. That saved us paying for parking or the bus. YAY!

Of course we still paid for the food. We did try a few new things. Some were great, some were a disappointment.
Lots of people at the fair.



Cheese curds...the very reason for going to the fair!


Mmmmm....fresh, fried, greasy cheesy goodness!



We tried the Texas Tater Dog. It was NOT worth the $. The potatoes were nothing special. I'd stick with the corn dog or pronto pup!



Yes, this is Joe Mauer on a stick!


A thoughtful wooden man pose.


Spamburger with cheese! Yum-O!

My approving bite.


We did find a few twins players "hanging out" but I wish there would have been more. Talk about the photo-ops!



Definitely worth the money was the Norwegian Banana Split. Ole and Lena's also has hotdish on a stick. We did not get that. This Banana split was amazing!! The banana wasn't mushy and the "fried" wasn't soggy. It was great! I would recommend getting this.



A shout out to EcoLab, and they had free samples of yogurt.



Nick with MN's Largest Boar. He was big!



I am pretty sure this is one of the "MN famous" Heldt goats.



We saw Micah, Taryn and Michael and Aimee for a few minutes before we headed out. They are sharing cotton candy.



Hand stamps in case we wanted to return later in the evening. We did not return.

"...And Snap, the job's a game!"

After a summer of "I should do something to get into better shape" and weeks of "I should join a fitness center," I joined Snap Fitness in Cottage Grove on Thursday. Not only did I join, I enjoyed my first work out. I did some cardio and a full circuit of the strength training equipment. Later in the evening, Nick and I went for a walk. Lots of exercise in just one day. (To be fair, we have been walking most evenings.)

Friday I also enjoyed a work out. My muscles were pretty sore, but I pushed through and did it anyway. We also went for a walk in the evening. I felt bad because I was kind of lagging behind. I almost felt like Nick had to pull me along.

Saturday I decided I would go and only do some cardio. My muscles were very sore and weak, so I decided to give them a rest from strength training. Today was a tough day to get out the door. One of those days that could make or break your week. I wanted to nap on the couch, but I went. I did my cardio and then I focused on an upper body work out. Amazing how not strong my arms are. For someone that used to do an awful lot of dog and cat wrestling, my upper body strength sure has faltered over the past 9 months. (Has it been that long since I have worked in a practice??) Anyway, I feel much better having worked out. My plan for tomorrow is cardio and legs. In high school when I was a weight room user, I used to hate leg days. The machines they have make it a bit better these days...not so much just squats and lunges. Ick.

If it doesn't have a tail it's not a monkey.

Nick and I had the honor of hanging out with our nieces today while their parents both worked. I am amazed how much they grow and change even in the 1-2 weeks between our seeing them. Taryn continues to grow and do new things. She is a very active, one year old that walks, runs and babbles and of course, holds her own with her big sister. Micah is almost 3 1/2 years and with that has developed the habits and attitude of a 3-4 year old. This isn't always a bad thing and often leads to funny stories.

Today while Taryn napped Micah was watching a Bug's Life. She did get kind of scared with the big bad bugs, but Uncle Nick was there to protect her. When that was over she wanted to watch "Bob" (veggietales) so she looked though to see what she wanted to watch. Maybe singing Bob? She decided on Larryboy and the Yodle Napper. Micah was explaining to us that it was Larryboy. She liked watching Larryboy. Micah: "His name is Larryboy but sometimes I call him Rowl." Me & Nick: "Um, what?" Micah: "Sometimes I call him Rowl." Nick: "You call him what?" Micah: "Rowl, thats what I call him." It sounds like growl with out the G, not quite Raúl. It is just so funny to hear a 3 year old tell you so matter of factly that she calls him a different name. Its almost as if he was a life long friend of hers. Which, I guess in a way, he kind of is. He is among the first movies/shows she watched.

Celebrity gossip

I will admit that I do enjoy a good flip through of People Magazine now and again. I will also admit to actually reading People Magazine while on lunch breaks "back in the day." Over the past 6-9 months, however, I don't tend to pay much attention to celebrity gossip. I do hear some, as people are prone to talking about it. I also usually have an opinion, regardless if I know anything about it. (That is just my nature though) All that being said, when a household lacks cable television, as ours does, weekend options for watching are pretty slim pickings. Celebrity gossip or "news" is usually what I default to. Tonight I happened to turn on the TV guide channel or perhaps Access Hollywood. The "story" they spent a fair amount of time talking about was one of the affairs of Jon from Jon and Kate plus 8. This girlfriend Kate somebody was appealing to all the gossip shows and magazines regarding the affair he claims didn't happen. So, ok, really I don't care. The part that makes me a little crazy is her playing the roll of the victim. "I never thought he would hurt me like this." "We were falling for each other and he broke my heart." "I gave up so much for him, and he turned out to be a liar and a cheater." Ok, here is a little lesson that I have learned by paying attention: If you are the "other woman" that means he is cheating on someone he married, exchanged vows with, had EIGHT children with and you are surprised that he is a liar and a cheater? Really? Really? The man cheating on his wife with you turned out to be less than a stand up guy? Shocking!

I think I need to find other things to watch.

My dad is a funny man

So, I don't know the "details" because my dad told my mom who told me...but dad and Punky (one of his sisters) were watching (insert name of golfer here) during his practice the other day. He was sitting "so close, as close as I am sitting to you" (he says to my mom) and I tried to take a picture of him. (He does not know how to work the cell phone camera, therefore did not get the picture) So after he sunk the ball my dad says "great shot" the golfer says thanks. My dad says "I have a question for you if you have a moment." Guy says sure. Dad continues to tell him about his son-in-law being a cancer survivor and how we are involved with the RFL for the American Cancer Society and asked would he be interested/willing to donate $ or something to be auctioned to help raise money for our event. Guy says sure, just contact the following......yeah, dad forgot the contact info. He is sure his sister will remember though... This makes me laugh so hard. And really, my dad is always thinking. I wouldn't have thought to stop the random golfer who's wife is battling cancer to make a donation for our Relay, and I am a co-chair! Go dad!

After a little bit of research, I am guessing this golfer was Phil Mickelson. So far, I still haven't heard word on the contact info. Come on Punky!

The long awaited update...

When people chat it is pretty often the question comes up "what's new?" and most often people (including myself) reply "not much." Well, that may be the answer you get, but it is far from true.

I don't think I can reasonably update my loyal readers in chronological order, so I will instead just ramble on about a few of the things that have been happening lately.

Of course Relay For Life is a big event that recently happened. Our humble little event managed to pull out 16 teams, 200 participants and right now we are hovering right around $35,000 with an expected total of $40,000 when all of the sponsorships come in. This year I was not only on a team, and not only part of the planning committee, I was a co-chair. Cyndie and I worked pretty hard to make it a successful event. Our measure of success was not the number of people or teams or funds, our measure was - did people enjoy the event and will they come back. Overall, I think people enjoyed it and the opinions I have heard said they will be back. This is great news to me! Those of you that are familiar, last year we canceled the event at about 8:30 due to storms containing lightning and tornado warnings. This year we had nearly ideal weather. It was a tad windy for the start, but that died down. We did get a bit of rain for about 2 minutes and then for another 2 minutes right around 10 pm and 10:45. I did stay awake all night. I had speaking rolls in all the ceremonies (6pm, 9:30 pm and 6am) so rather than be groggy and crabby, I just stayed awake. If you are interested, there is still time to donate to our event. Just click HERE.

Nick's family was in town last week. It has been two years since all four of the kids and their parents have been together. (Steph's wedding was the last time - in 07). Of course, now there are three grandkids too. We hadn't seen Aaron for almost a year. It was great to see all of his siblings and their families again. What a blessing we were able to work our schedules to be able to get a little time with them. We got to celebrate our anniversaries (yes, 4 anniversaries 6/30, 7/10, 7/15, 7/19) and the first birthdays of Aaron and Taryn. Lots to celebrate!

In the past four weeks I have been to 4 baby showers. Yes, it does seem that everyone we know is having a baby right now. Crazy. That does bring me to an interesting topic. Nick and I have started the very beginning of the process of adoption. This is much like announcing we're pregnant the day you pee on the stick, but even worse. Basically we have signed the paper and paid the registration fee. That just means we have signed up to be able to fill in the paper work for the application. Once that is approved we will being the home study process. Once we are approved there, we start the process of being approved by the US and the other country to approve us. Then there are more and more steps to follow. There sure are a lot of hoops to jump through to adopt. After a fair amount of research, we are following an international route rather than domestic. Our country of choice at this point is Korea. While the process is long on its own, we are taking our time to try to match up the expected placement date for after Nick is finished with school. Two years to go..... Lots of prayers for all of this would be great!

We are on week two of our "early fall" quarter for school. I am teaching 3 classes this quarter. So far I am enjoying the classes. This quater is shorter (10 weeks rather than 12) because they gave everyone a 3 week summer break. It was great to have 3 weeks off, but some of the classes it is tough to cram into 10 weeks. I am enjoying this teaching thing though. Next quarter I plan to resume taking classes in persuit of my bachelor of science in veterinary technology. Yup, I decided to switch out of the career path towards human medicine and stay working with the furry medicine. It was after much thought, debate, consulting with peers and instructors and of course a pretty good amount of prayer that I decided the veterinary field is where I should stay.

Nick is working hard. He is currently working in a "research assistant" position. He does a lot of different things. Doesn't that just explain it all? He is also working every other weekend at Walgreens.

I think this is where I will end my updating for tonight.

Making the history books...

...literally.

Today the Alley (our church) was officially welcomed into the LCMS, MN South District. The District president came to welcome us and present a plaque. The congregation president and the secretary also sign the "official book" that records the churches with the dates they were accepted into the district. This book dates back to the 1950's and now includes my name! I am, after all, the official secretary for the Alley. How cool.

We have lots of babies!

Over the last few weeks we have been doing some "yard work." I say that with quotes because we live in a townhouse and don't really a yard to speak of. We do have yard outside our door, but it is yard that is "cared" for by the association. I saw that with quotes because they don't really take care of it. The last few years the association has been struggling financially, so they prioritize the projects they spend money on. Apparently maintaining the lawn in anyway more than mowing is too expensive.

So we came to the rescue! There were several large patches of lawn that were brown and dead. I blame the dog, ice melt and lack of care. I took a jaunt over to our friendly neighborhood Mendards and talked to the nice man in the grass seed isle (yes, a whole isle with nothing but grass seed). I told him what I was looking for, the sun/shade conditions, the fact we have a dog, and I showed him using arm spans the size of area we needed to cover. The guy was very helpful and didn't try to sell me the $50 bag of grass seed. We agreed on the $7 bag of "turf builder" type seed where the mulch and moisture helper come right along with it.

We raked the areas and then used the metal rake to break up the soil a bit. Then we laid down the seed mix. It felt a bit like laying cotton down on the grass. I took up the task of watering it every day - mostly. I have been watching it everyday. I was so excited when last weekend we started to see little baby grass blades appearing. Today we are starting to see the results of our labor with large patches of grass growing in. Yup, I am beeming like a proud parent over my grass seed growing in. :)

This year I am also determined to have tomatoes. In years past I have had a plant and harvest maybe 3-4 tomatoes. This year, I have 3 large pots with plants and again have been watching and watering daily. So far so good, my plants about doubled in the last two weeks! I am hopeful with the plants doing well the fruit will also do well and I will have tomatoes this summer.

Before-its hard to see, but the planter box is looking pretty shabby and starting to sag apart.

I am also taking great pride in my new planter box. My brother-in-law surprised me by building a new planter box for me for my birthday. We have talked a few times about what it would take to get a new one...and surprise, it happened. YAY. So Michael and Nick worked for an evening to build it. (While I watched my nieces and watched the American Idol Finale!)

The guys hard at work on the planter box. What an improvement. And they made it work with out disturbing the plants. I have some of my Grandma Blanche's Fern Peonies that I would really like to keep alive.

Memorial Day weekend my parents came over and helped to fill the rest of the box and plant some more plants.Here is the finished product with the tomato plants. It's hard to see how fantastic everything looks, but really it does look great!

Adding to the list of things we are growing, Nick has Rhubarb that apparently LOVES where it is planted. Here is the pre-harvest picture of the "plant" that has taken over the rock patch.

Kris who?

I have been reading a few "news" articles about the new American Idol being crowned last night. Funny thing though, if I hadn't watched the show, the only thing I would know is that Adam didn't win. So, if Adam didn't win, who did? See, there is this whole other contestant named Kris Allen. He DID win. I have read more about Adam in the last 20 hours than I have about Kris. "Adam was robbed." "Adam deserved it more." "Everyone liked Adam better." If all of that is true, why didn't Adam win? I don't think it is because America isn't ready to crown a "rocker." I think it's because people didn't like Adam as much as "everyone" thought. Sure, he was fun to watch for 90 seconds. I wouldn't buy any of his songs. I would buy songs by Kris and Danny, maybe even Allison.

I do know there is always a lot of discussion on who it should have been, but it's gotten a bit out of hand when the winner doesn't get recognized as the winner. If I were the voting type, I totally would have voted for Kris. Go Kris!

The most precious thing ever!

This evening my nieces came over (with their parents) to wish me a happy birthday. It was so cute! Micah brought me flowers and a princess balloon. She was pretty sad that she couldn't keep it. Micah sang Happy Birthday to me, all by herself. It was so cute. What wonderful nieces (and in-laws) I have!

Damnit Jim! I'm a doctor, not a physicist!

This weekend is our "birthday weekend." My Birthday is tomorrow, while Nick's is next Sunday. For the past three years we have celebrated our birthdays together. It is already May 16, and we haven't planned a birthday party, nor do we have the time during the month of May. Since Nick finished finals yesterday (yay! for the end of year #2 of 4) and our birthdays are coming up, we decided a hotel get away was in order, so we are in far-away and exotic Burnsville. Thanks Marriott rewards points!

Friday before leaving we discussed getting a laptop. Happy Birthday to me! We purchased a pretty inexpensive lap top yesterday. Since we made this purchase, I agreed to go see Star Trek with Nick in celebration of his Birthday. Yup, laptop for me, Star Trek for him-sounded like a fair deal to me.

Honestly, I did enjoy Star Trek. I have never seen an episode of Star Trek or a movie. I knew the very basics, likes there were guys named Spock and Kirk and Scotty, there was a lot of space involved and things blow up. Oh yeah, and Scotty "Beams people up." So I went in with pretty low expectations, virtually no knowledge and hopes of not being bored for the whole movie.

I was pleasantly surprised that I enjoyed it. They made it so that a person knowing nothing about it could follow along, for the most part, and true fans would still be entertained and kept interested. The humor was pretty good. Some of the characters were pretty hilarious! The movie really did combine character development and blow-stuff-up plot. It was a good mix that did keep me entertained. Many of the "old school" lines were brought back and well placed. I laughed a lot.

I did not feel like my matinee ticket was wasted. Even if we had paid full price, I think it would have been worth it. If you like action movies, I think you will enjoy Star Trek.

oooooooooo Shiny!

Last week I was out running some errands and thought, I will run into the local auto parts store to ask for some advice. I approach the counter and explain to the nice man that the plastic rivet on my seat belt that keeps the latch from falling all the way to the bottom of the belt has fallen off. Is there a way to replace that or remedy the situation with out using duct tape? "I was gonna say just duct tape it." awkward laugh.... "You could just sew on a button. That piece doesn't serve any real purpose, just convenience. Or you could get one of those riveter things like they use for jewelry and decorate it will a bunch of those sparkly gem things." I'm like, you mean a Bedazzler? "yeah" um, ok, thanks. I wonder if his seat belt is Bedazzled? Since I don't have a Bedazzler, and don't know anyone that does, my seat belt latch continues to fall to the floor most every time I take off the belt. Oh well, I've only broken a nail once and jambed my finger a few times.

My nieces are getting so big!

It had been two weeks since I had seen my nieces last. I babysat for them yesterday. A lot changed in the 2 weeks since seeing them. When my sister in law dropped them off she also brought the pack-n-play. "Taryn doesn't sleep in the car seat very well anymore, and she will just crawl away. OK.

Taryn is 8 months old. When we last saw her she was struggling to crawl and got frustrated and would just roll over to where she wanted to be. Not anymore! She is a crawling maniac. Guess its time to Taryn-proof the house. In addition to crawling, she is able to pull herself up to stand along things. She stood and "walked" along the couch and ottoman and end table. She only fell a few times. Let me just say, she is quite proud of herself when doing these things. She does the wrinkled nose, snorting like a pig smile allowing us to see two very nice teeth that hurt like the dickens when she bites! Now that she crawls, there is no stopping her. She can have a pile of toys near her, however she would rather have the one paper book on the other side of the room that Micah left behind. Changing her diaper was not easy. Rolly Polly wanted nothing to do with putting a new one on or gettind dressed again. She wanted to GO!

Micah at "four" years old keeps being cute. She is three, but when asked holds up three fingers and says that is four. We count them, then she corrects it and says "free" and giggles. We have a large collage frame on the wall behind the couch. We used it at our wedding. It has pictures of myself and Nick growing up and then pics of us together. Micah has learned that "the little boy" is Uncle Nick. She was asking about a few other of the pictures in there. Who is that really little boy? I would say, "if this is Uncle Nick, and this one too, who do you think that one is?" She would look at me and very quietly say "Uncle Nichowas?" Yes! "Who is that baby?" I would respond the same (gotta work on problem solving you know). After some thought she asked if it was Taryn. Nope...."That's Uncle Nick too." "Uncle Nick was THAT little?" It totally blew her mind when we were talking about the picture of Uncle Nick as a little boy holding his new baby sister and it was Aunt Stephanie!

Micah wasn't feeling well yesterday. She had a stuffy nose, cough and fever. She had some motrin before coming over. She did nap a little bit, on and off. She was only a little bit hungry. She want grapes (we always have grapes at our house) but when I looked for them, saw that Uncle Nick at them all. "Why would him do that?" Because he likes grapes too. "But my wanted some "dapes." Sorry, you can have an apple. "green apple?" Yup. she was happy with that, but wanted to know if it was cut up for "Uncle Nichowas's lunch box." yup, sure was. Smart girl!

So, not feeling well ment we watched a lot ov videos. I have some disney videos and DVDs, a few Veggie Tales and Shrek and scooby doo. She pulled all the videos and DVDs (that she could reach) and lined them up by size. Then picked what she wanted to watch. Shrek. Then from the pile (she made a big tower and then carried them) she picked Beauty and the Beast. We went for a little drive because two crabby girls needed some sleep. When we got back Micah wanted to watch Veggie Tales "silly songs." Very close to the end of it Michael arrived to pick up the girls. Micah looked at him and burst into tears saying "my don't want you to be here yet." It was pretty cute.

I guess it was pretty good practice for having kids of my own some day.

what a difference a week makes

Sunday it snowed. Today the birds have been out in full force and the grass is starting to turn green. Tulips are poking through the soil and I just got to school and the Leopard Frogs are back in the near by ponds. What a glorious spring day.

As the saying goes, If you don't like the weather in MN, wait a day, it will change. It's often true.

My first day at a new job

I survived day one. Tuesday is my "long" day. Long in the sense that I got up at 5:15 and left the house at 6:30. I got to campus at 7:15. I made some copies and had my first class start at 8:20. I have 7 students in that class (basic hematology). We did the first day of class stuff then moved on to the first "lecture." Nick worked really hard to put together a Power Point for me. I only changed a little bit of it. It took a while to go through. I gave them home work and sent them on their way (only running 5 minutes over). I had from 10:15-1pm to prep for my Lab and exotic animals class and eat lunch. I found I probably needed a bit more stuff to talk about, but we did pretty well. I did have to break out the phrase "life isn't always fair" but over all it was pretty good. Class got out ten minutes early at 4:40pm. I packed up some stuff...got a few things together and hit the road about 5:30. I was home at 6:30. Not too bad for rush hour traffic on 494. I think I will go back on Thursday.

After awhile, I did get tired of listening to myself talk...I will need to work on lecture/presentation times so I know when and how to break it up better.

If you know anyone with rabbits, guinea pigs, hamsters, gerbils, ferrets, etc....let me know. I'd love to invite them to class so the students can practice restraint and handling them.

Theology with a three year old.

I took Micah with me to Half Price books. She was excited to go look for books. In the car we were talking about books. She said she needed new books. I asked if we could keep the new books at my house, since she has lots at her house, and I don't have very many. She said no. Then she offered to maybe bring some of hers to my house. What a darling. I asked her what kind of books she had. Very thoughtfully she replied, "princess ones, pink ones and the Bible." Oh, great! I asked what the Bible is about. "It's about Jesus. He died on the cross." I of course, was excited by this answer (today is Sunday, so I am sure this was recently talked about in Sunday School.) I asked Micah if knew why Jesus died on the cross. Her reply "It was a pink cross." To that I say, "Oh, but do you know WHY?" "No, why did Jesus die on the cross?" Ok, I can answer that..."He died on the cross to forgive our sins because he loves us very much." I am very proud of my answer. "My wants a pink cross." was Micah's response. Then she started talking crosses for Mommy and Daddy and other family members. To that, of course I say "Jesus died on the cross so we don't have to." "My think it was pink."

Birthday Girl

Micah turns three on Monday. We celebrated her birthday on Wed. In this picture she is showing us how old she will be. Three fingers, but she tells us four.


She got to blow out the three candles on her princess cake. She wanted Sleeping Beauty, so Grandpa delivered a Sleeping Beauty cake.


"Membory" is one of the gifts Uncle Nicholas and Aunt Alesha got for her.


Grandma and Grandpa got her several things including a box of princess stuff and a princess "sweeping bad"


Micah got to cut her own cake. She did a pretty good job considering it was with a butter knife.



Princess Micah shows off her moves.

It's been a week

and what a week it's been.

This week was especially busy with Nick's parents in town. Sunday they came to our church with us. We were excited as this was their first time at The Alley. I believe the did like it. The comment I was told was that it didn't feel like a pep rally. It was worshipful even though it isn't a traditional service. That meant a lot to me coming from a retired Pastor. We had lunch with the whole family which was so fun. Micah and Taryn enjoyed the time as well. Taryn tried lemons and oranges.

Monday Night I had new faculty orientation. It was a lot of information thrown at us. I have a meeting with the Vet Tech coordinator on Monday to get a little more specific info.

Tuesday I had a bit of time to myself to prepare for my finals. I also did a little busy work around the house and got some Relay fundraising stuff out. I took my composition final and turned in my final draft of my research/argument paper. The feedback I got from my rough draft was that the paper was strong and well written (to the point she recommended getting it published???) but needed some cleaning up. So I did that. I took the final and got 79/80 points. After looking at my grades so far, I need to get 60 out of 105 points on my paper to maintain my A in the class. Basically as long as she can grade my paper (it meets the minimum requirements) I will get an A. Yay me!

Wed was a stressful day for me. It started very well, but I had my Patient Care final at 6. I had attempted to test out of the blood pressure part last week, but did not succeed, so I was very worried about it. Before that though, we celebrated a certain birthday girl's birthday. Micah turns three on Monday. We all gathered about 2pm to celebrate. We had presents and "princess cake." Grandpa made a beautiful sleeping beauty on on the cake. It was "so petty." I never did get my jumping cake though. Micah got great presents and had so much fun. I also had a good time taking blood pressures to practice my technique. (Thank you to all my guinea pigs over the last 12 weeks) I then headed to school to meet with some of the vet tech instructors from the Woodbury campus. They were allowing me to borrow material and share lesson plans. I got a lot of information and some great tips on teaching and not letting students get to me. By the time I finished getting pointers and material, I had just enough time to run to the bathroom before class started.

Then class started. I was so nervous. My instructor tortured us by making us participate in a discussion about bmi and how to calculate it and why....Then finally it was time. I went first (of 4 people) and had a class mate as my patient. "Nothing fancy, just get your values." So I took pulse and respirations. She questioned my resps, but then did them again, and I was right. Phew! Then I took her blood pressure. My instructor took her bp and I was exactly right! PHEW!!! I passed. I passed on the first try. This of course means I maintain my A in that class in addition to passing.

Yup, that's me, Mrs 4.0

Thursday was a day to chill, kind of. I took time for me, to just sit and watch judge shows and not think about class, or school, or work, or cleaning, or other people. I did do a little bit more Relay stuff and then headed over to my in-laws to hang out. And that is what we did. We had BBQ pork sandwiches for supper and they were so good! We had banana split cake for dessert. I had never had it before, but I knew my husband loved it. He had it for his birthday cake quite often growing up. It was very tasty. I will likely make it. Maybe add some chocolate though...

Today I jumped out of bed realizing I should have been up 30 minutes ago for a meeting with someone from the Lions Club and Relay people. So I got to caribou a little late. The meeting went really well. The Lions have already voted to be involved. We have formed what I think will be a mutually beneficial relationship. The president had all kinds of contacts (personal and professional) that she was willing to share with us and some great ideas of places to ask for involvement. I left there very excited!

I did a few things around the house and then Nick and I went to pick up Rollie and Sue and we all headed out to my parents house for supper. We did a tour of Waconia while it was still light and then had a wonderful meal with my parents. It was a great night and we were glad to have some one on one time.

Tomorrow we are planning to finish assembling and installing my new computer (we meaning Nick) while I find things I want to do.

I really wanted Thai food.

After spending the day enjoying the weather, we had a wonderful supper. We watched the girls for a little while this afternoon. We took advantage of 60 degree weather and went to the playground near Micah's house. Taryn enjoyed the view from the front seat of the stroller while Micah walked and sang at the top of her lungs about loving the playground. While there Micah did make friends and play with a few of the other kids. Back at the house we finished watching the DVR-ed Food Network episodes on Pad Thai. Michael knows about my goal of finding an awesome Pad Thai recipe, so he DVR-ed a Good Eats and a Bobby Flay throwdown episode about it. After watching it and being a bit hungry, we decided to try a new place I happened to pull a coupon for. Supatra's Thai Cuisine is in St Paul on West 7th just off Randolph. It was easy to get to...already a good thing.

The place is small, with only 13-15 tables, depending on arrangement. When we arrived we were seated immediately and brought water promptly. The menu had a lot of options. Most of the items had good descriptions which is great when one isn't familiar with Hor Moke or even Crying Tiger. The very polite and attentive Thai waitress suggested Mieng Kum for an appetizer. We figured, what the heck, we can get cream cheese puffs anyplace. It is a variety of flavors and textures that you spoon off the plate into lettuce leaves and then top with their sauce. Yum! The flavors were distinct, but blended well. It was tasty.

For our meals Nick had the Pad Thai with shrimp, I mean, we watched over and hour of pad thai on TV. I had the Coconut noodles. They were both wonderful dishes. The Pad Thai was very good. My noodles were very messy as the coconut sauce was abundant, but tasty. As Nick pointed out, sometimes coconut sauce goes on the "subtle" side for coconut, this one did not. It was very good. Portions were great for the price. (~$12 per entree)

We decided on dessert, which isn't something we often do, but bananas with coconut ice cream sounded way too good to pass up. It did not disappoint. Nick decided we should get deep-fryer so "we" can make them at home. Very tasty!

Overall, the service was very good, the food was great and brought out quickly. The prices for the portions were quite reasonable. We will go back. Supatra's Thai in St Paul, check it out and let me know what you think.

Spring Fever

On Monday we babysat the girls. I say "we" because Uncle Nick had spring break this week, so he enjoyed the company of the girls as well. I am amazed every time I see them at the growth both of them have experienced in as little as a week, or even a few days in some cases. On Monday Micah was very excited telling me about her upcoming birthday. "Dama" and "Dampa" are going to be here and "Dampa" is going to make a princess cake. It will be pink with frosting and princesses. He is also going to make a "jumping" cake. She explained that that cake would be for me, but also has frosting.

Taryn slept for a bit, and then was very entertained by toys. She did let Uncle Nick hold her while I finished supper. She tried to take his plate off the table with moderate success until it taken away from her. She is so very strong and I expect that crawling will happen soon. She likes to laugh and is starting to enjoy the sound of her own voice.

After we ate supper we took the girls for a walk and then stopped at the playground. We have the hand-me-down single stroller from when Micah was the only baby. Micah was ok with letting Taryn ride while she walked with us. When she walked with me, she held my hand and jumped over each puddle, line in the sidewalk and sometimes just for fun. Soon she was jumping rather than walking. When Nick and I traded off, Micah wanted to "skate" down the street. Like in Wizard of Oz..."OH, you want to skip!" so they did. It was very cute to watch. Uncle Nick did more skipping while Micah ran and hopped now and again. Taryn happily rode in the stroller giggling and laughing to herself. We stopped at the playground and played for about half an hour. Micah has no fear! She runs and attempts and plays on all the stuff. She climbs and slides and runs all by herself and only requests that you watch. There was a little boy that joined us. He is just a tad younger than Micah but not nearly as brave. She pushed him into doing some things by being the "winner" going down slides and climbing back up to do it again. She was proud of being the winner.

After a while Taryn was getting sick of not doing much, so we headed out. We loaded up and headed back to Micah and Taryn's house. We had two tired little girls on our hands, but it sure was fun!

St Paul Grill

Nick and I celebrated my getting a job by going to eat at the St Paul Grill. We had a gift card which meant this particular trip wouldn't cost us anything. That's celebrating! The restaurant is much easier to get to and get back from than many places, especially since I know St Paul so much better than Mpls. We also went on Sunday night, so we were able to park for free on the street. (yay) When we arrived, we were both a little disappointed with the ambiance. I think we were expecting more like Capitol Grill and this did not live up to that. It was nice, but not what we were expecting. There were a few tables that had dirty dishes sitting on them still. Maybe when you aren't busy the turn over process goes slower, but still....

We were not at all impressed with the service/server. After we sat for about ten minutes this younger gal stops at our table and asks what we would like to drink. She didn't greet us, tell us her name or give us any indication she was more than a drink girl. She did keep coming back asking us what we were going to order and such. I guess she did turn out to be our waitress.

We did enjoy our food. It was very good. We had calamari for an appetizer. It was pretty good. I have had better, but this wasn't fishy or too chewy. I had the roasted chicken. It too was quite tasty. Nick had the walleye. his comment: "that's not fish, that's a pancake." It had a maple/brown sugar type sauce. It really did taste pancake-y but it was good. Nick also had baked mac-n-cheese. It was also tasty. My au gratin potatoes were good, but not great. I brought quite a bit home with me. We did have dessert which was also tasty.

So overall, food was good, service was not. It may be someplace we return to, but given a celebration again in the future, we will likely pick someplace else.

Movie Review

Nick and I had a Friday night that we didn't have anything happening. I made manicotti and garlic toast and we watched Prince Caspian. I bought this movie about a month ago at Circuit City when they first reduced stuff for their going out of business sale. Tonight was the night to watch it finally.

I was excited to watch it, though admittedly I don't remember Prince Caspian, or any of the books very well, except the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe. We have the series, I will have to re-read them again.

Overall, I did enjoy this movie. Nick was able to point out a few places that just weren't in the book, and how two minutes into the movie we were 10 chapters in. I did get a little distracted by the similarities to the Lord of the Rings Trilogy (in movies anyway). There were a lot of scenes in this movie that I thought "hmmm, I think that looks just like a scene from LOTR. The trees...very similar, the army marching to battle, yup...the music in the "death scene" was very similar. Even the "river scene" was quite reminiscent of LOTR. Now, don't get me wrong, I did like this movie. Like I said, I was a tad distracted. I will admit I was a little more anxious during PC, not knowing exactly what is supposed to happen and when.

Not having an official rating system, I will give it a "glad we added it to the collection" and enjoyed watching it.

A prayer of thanksgiving!

I interviewed for a teaching position yesterday. As some of my very loyal readers may know, since November I have been fruitlessly trying to find a job. I have applied for most anything and everything I am qualified or more than qualified to do. Then I started school in January at the Woodbury campus of Globe to be a Medical Assistant. I have continued to apply and look for work. I found a posting for the Shakopee campus (Globe/MSB) looking for a Vet Tech instructor. Well, I can do that! I completed the online application on Thursday around 9am. By 11am I had a call from the Dean of Faculty wanting to set up an interview! YAY!! So I called back when I got home from volunteering at Regions. I left a message. A short time later the Associate Dean of Faculty called and we scheduled the interview for Monday at 5pm. Oh, and "prepare a teaching demo for us. It can be on anything you would like." I was pretty freaked out all weekend about this teaching demo. What are they looking for? Will I do ok? What if my power point isn't good enough. Will there be 1 or 8 of them? I really didn't know what to expect.

Well, I went into the interview with my teaching demo about Roundworms all ready to go. The Dean was a very nice lady. I felt very at ease with her. I didn't feel like she was judging me or critiquing my every move. After about 20 minutes she gathered a VT instructor the Associate Dean and the three of them listened to my presentation. I got about half way through with the two had to leave. The VT instructor was very impressed and told me as much. She also said she looked forward to seeing me again soon. (That's a good thing right?) The Dean told me flat out she was impressed with my teaching demo. After a few more questions she told me they would be making a decision by Thursday and let me know.

Well, apparently I was really good, because they called today and offered me the position for two open classes they have. Starting in early April I will be teaching the Exotic and Lab animals class and the basic hematology class. Tuesdays will be a longer day 8am-11 and then 1-5, and Thursdays just 8-11. I am excited to be working again, and I am excited to get to teach the up and coming to be "super techs!"

I am excited to be joining the ranks of the employed again, at least for a few more years.

Thanks to everyone for your prayers, support, love and well wishes. Please do continue to pray as we enter this new journey of my being employed...a teacher and a student.

YAY

A lesson in gender roles

On Monday I spent several hours with my favorite nieces. Micah has a hard time accepting that not all "babies" are girls. I can totally see where she might get the idea, but she doesn't believe us that Simba, Bambi, Thumper, and Flower are all boys. The only baby she admits is a boy is Baby Jesus (and I think that took some work.) So in the car Micah was telling me she is a princess. Then she told me that girls are Princesses. I asked what boys are and she first tried to say Princes, but I think it sounded to much like princess to her, so she said, they are a prince. So we had to go through the whole list of family and friends that she knows and she told me if they were a prince or a princess. I was excited to know that I am indeed a princess. :)

Snow in February?

Yes, there is snow in February in Minnesota. I don't know if it is because deep down people hate the weather in Minnesota or if it is wishful thinking that "global warming" has finally come true, but there were an awful lot of people that seemed surprised that it was going to and then did snow on Thursday. It was also "the biggest storm this year." I think that because I didn't have a job that required me to clear the sidewalks every 30 minutes, or have to battle the storm on the drive home...it didn't seem like that big of a deal. I was out in it for a little bit, but it just didn't seem like it was that bad. We got about an inch an hour....or a little less depending where you live. I was excited to get the snow. This time of year is always hard for me because I want winter to be over, yet I know in MN we have a few more months of it. And then we get warm ups that melt the snow and make everything look brown and dingy. I don't like that part. I know it will be the end of March or early April before we start to see things come back to life...so I say, let there be snow. It isn't that cold this time of year (highs are above zero and almost always in the double digits) and the snow wont last forever. So I say again, let there be snow. (and drive safely!)

"that's not me"

Funny story...I had trouble sleeping the other night. Nick was snoring, which almost never happens ;) (I love you Nick!) Usually I can say "you're snoring" and he kind of responds, moves and it will be better for a while, at least long enough for me to fall asleep. Well this particular evening, he was snoring quite a bit. After the fifth or sixth time of gently touching him and telling him he was snoring he kind of responded more. I said "Nick, you are snoring again." He said "what? oh, sorry." a few moments of near silence ensued, followed by "that's not me, that's the dog." As frustrated as I was about not getting to sleep and that Nick, blissfully unaware of my troubles, was contently snoring away since his head hit the pillow, I couldn't help but laugh a little. He doesn't remember any of this. (the dog was snoring a little bit, but it could hardly be heard over Nick)

When did I find time to work?

This week found me pretty busy. Monday I watched our nieces for 8 hours. I enjoyed this time with them.

Tuesday I was very productive in my job search. I applied for a lot of positions, both retail and other. I also did a lot of cleaning around the house. Dishes, vacuuming, getting up a few stains in the carpet....etc. Then I headed off to class. We had a sub as our teacher was at a writing conference. We had the "pleasure" of watching An Inconvenient Truth, the film by Nobel prize winner, Grammy winner and inventor of the Internet, Al Gore. I was very frustrated with this film. We were watching it because it was a "good example of research and argumentative reasoning." I found it all a load of crap. The only research that was sited was "science has proven" and "my friend discovered," and look at this fancy chart of predictions. As for argumentative reasoning, the only thing he argued was he should have been president. So after two hours of being forced into watching that...we got to have our library instruction. This meant that for the second week in a row I got to listen to our assistant librarian go though what the library has to offer. Not really a big deal except she has a very very thick accent that is very though to understand and apparently has many times when she is thinking of the correct word and fills the gaps with ahhhhahhhh. She read us the power point presentation. Including the steps to writing a research paper. Step 1. We can have lots of fun! totally kidding, I hope you got the reference..... Step 1 - topic formation. Step 2 - research your topic. Step 3 - your working bibliography. Step 4 - Develop tentative thesis. Step 5 - Focus your research. Step 6 - Fine tune your thesis. Step 7 - Write your outline. Step 8 - Write your rough draft. Step 9 - Revise (ask friends and family for help, but make sure you are writing the paper). Step 10 - Turn in your paper. Yup, that right there is how to write a research paper in 10 easy steps. Then she showed us how to use the internet and library service associated with the system. Yeah, an hour of this was awesome. 3 hours of my life I will never get back.

Wed was a busy day. My night class met during the day because we had a guest speaker. So I had class at 9:30am. The guest speaker was a gal that "specializes" in complimentary medicine. She is a firm believer in alternative/complimentary/Eastern, what ever you wanna call it medicine combined with Western medicine. She was an amazing woman. I loved having her speak with us and took a lot away from the experience. From there it was rush off to Regions to volunteer for a couple hours. I had two wonderful patients I was able to help and chat with. It was very fun and quite rewarding. I came home and got to spend some time with my hubby....very nice to do so. Then I made 48 cupcakes.

Thursday I met with a friend to close our her Creative Memories Party. Then I had lunch with a friend which was awesome. We had Chinese. We ate at the buffet next to Rainbow Foods in Oakdale on 10th St. The food was ok. (the wantons were really good) but the service was not very good. After lunch I headed to the American Cancer Society office to help stuff packets for our Kick Off meeting. I stuffed away and got some other needed literature. I was there for about an hour and a half. I headed home to do a few things before our Kick Off. I grabbed the 48 cupcakes and headed to church for our meeting. I was disappointed by the turn out. But it seems as I have been talking to some Team Captains that Thursdays, and this past Thursday esp. are not good days. I am hoping that is all it is and our Relay For Life will be a fantastic success this year.

Friday morning I printed directions into and out of Minneapolis, took a deep breath and headed to Randstad in Nicollet Mall. I got down there, parked and found my way through the city center building (I think thats what it is called) and got to the right building, and found the place with NO PROBLEMS! I filled out all kinds of paper work and then chatted with one of the job placement reps (Randstad is a temp agency type place). We decided that the original position I applied for was not the job for me. Remove the staple, scan the pages and set aside, remove the staple, scan the pages and set aside, remove the staple, scan the pages and set aside, remove the staple, scan the pages and set aside....for 8 hours for more than a day or two...I would go crazy. Yes it is a pay check, and I shouldn't be that picky...but I don't think my sanity could handle that. So after discussing things I might like to do and talking about where I am at in life, etc...I will call her back on Tuesday to see if she has found any matches so far. I left the building, successfully found my car and left the parking ramp (for $17!!!). I was able to successfully LEAVE Minneapolis with out having to turn around or take 94W and loop back. YAY! (that is a first I think). My nieces came over for a couple hours. We watched Wizard of Oz and Micah got to have a cupcake because "it's so beautiful." Who doesn't like chocolate cake with chocolate frosting and colored sprinkles on it?

Nick and I were planning to go to his classmate's bonfire/sledding party. We opted out because we were pretty tired and content to spend the night hanging out with each other on the couch. And it was snowing. So I did more job searching.

Today I spent 10-3:30 at Fashion Bug in CG as an American Cancer Society Volunteer. They were doing a special event bra fitting and "women's health fair." It was pretty fun. I got to meet a few fun gals and I applied to work there. I met and talked with the store manager, so I think I will at least hear back from her.
We met my parents for supper at Timberlodge in Bloomington. We met there at 5:30. That is really early for us to eat. Nick and I got there early and were seated. When my parents came in, SURPRISE, my brother came with too. It was nice. In the past he was always working on Saturday nights. Now he isn't so he was willing and able to come out with us. It was fun.

Its been a busy few days... the next few may be the same. I don't plan to watch the Oscars tomorrow.

"they grow up so fast"

Yesterday I got to spend time with my nieces again. It is such a blessing that they are close by and I get to see them often. During the few months when they were in SLC I realized I should have spent more time with them (as a family, not just Micah). So now I enjoy the opportunity to spend a day a week with the girls.

Taryn is getting to be such a big girl. She is actually getting tough to hold on to while doing things. I am sure Aimee has a much easier time as she has more practice, but man the girl is getting heavy. And she is so strong. She has amazing leg strength that equates to "good luck putting her down or holding her in a manner that she doesn't want. Uncle Nick got home around 6:30 and I handed her off so I could finish the turkey and the potatoes. Well apparently Uncle Nick is a scary guy 'cuz she screamed most of the time he held her. I put Uncle Nick in charge of Micah. That worked pretty well. It is nice to feel loved though, and apparently Taryn is more comfortable with me than she was when they first moved back.

Micah was of course her adorable self. Trying to herd them into the car I said to Micah "hurry up ms thing" she said...my not thing, my is Micah. Ok. Noted. She told me a little later on that she was going to color a picture for "Uncle Nichowas". This isn't a bad thing, as Nick's family does call him Nicholas rather than Nick. It's sad though, because Micah transitioned from "Nicko Nit" to "Nicko Nick" (my personal favorite) to "Uncle Nick" and now Uncle Nicholas (pronounced Nichowas). Certainly she does other things that are just as, if not more cute than previous things...but it was just one more reminder that Micah is a big girl.

Happy Valentines Day!

Nick and have a history of not celebrating V-day on V-day. Since the first time we were together to celebrate it, we weren't together on the day, so we celebrated when we could. It has kind of been that way since. Rather than make a big deal out of going out to eat when it's really crowded (esp a Sat night) and we are guaranteed to pay too much and wait too long, and be kind of disappointed with the whole evening, we hung out with some friends.

After Nick got home from work we did a mad dash clean up of the house to prepare for a few classmates of his coming over to study tomorrow. Then we headed to Kim and Paul's house. (Yes, it should probably be Paul and Kim but in my mind it has and will always be Kim and Paul. Sorry Paul!) They made their awesome homemade chili. Having mentioned in an earlier post, I am picky about my chili, I think this chili may be one of the contributing factors. It is great chili. I made cookies this week, so we brought some with and had some wine to go with them. Yummy. Kim's brother John was there for a while too. He is in a Nursing program, so the three of us had a chance to ramble on about medicine and learning about medicine. Nick pharmacy word vomited all over him. I felt bad, but was secretly glad someone else got to learn from him.

After dinner and chatting for a while, we decided what better way to celebrate V-day (all together) than to watch a move. We selected Zach and Miri. I refuse to include the whole title in hopes that my blog wont show up in Google searches. Since I haven't done much movie reviewing, I don't have a rating system or anything, so I will just say that I did like the movie overall. Being a Kevin Smith film, the language and subject matter were expected. However I was quite surprised by some of the content. Not surprised that Smith put it there or that some of the actors went along with it, surprised that it made it into the film for viewing. It was pretty graphic. There was even full frontal male nudity for long enough to realize it was there, not just the flash that might happen in other movies where you have to think about it...this was obvious.

Moving past the surprising bits, it was a cute, "romantic comedy" type movie. I enjoyed the return of some of my favorite K. Smith movie actors. We decided to stick around for the deleted scenes. WOW! there was a full hour and a half of deleted scenes. Most of them were pretty funny, some were kind of pointless to include. Justin Long was great, but some of his deleted scene should have stayed deleted.

Like I stated, I have no official rating scale or anything, but I enjoyed the movie. It was a fun evening with awesome friends. What a great way to spend V-day!

Even better, its free!

Today was a long day, but offered many things to blog about. Yay!

I was trained and "worked" my first shift as a Volunteer in the Cancer Care Center at Regions. It was pretty interesting. I learned a bit about medicine and patient care. I also got to talk to some great people. Some of the benefits of being a volunteer is they comp the parking. Yay! I don't have to spend money to volunteer. The other is they give everyone a $4.50 voucher to use in the cafeteria. Today was a little odd because I started at 11 and was "scheduled" to stay until 4. I ate brunch before I left home. It was a filling pasta dish. I didn't actually get hungry until about 3:15. I decided at 3:30 it would be appropriate to leave. There were only 2 patients left in the "infusion area" and they were both well cared for and given drinks and snacks and blankets and pillows, there was no more for me to do. So I headed out. I went back to the volunteer office and collected my belongings and then headed, voucher in hand, to the cafeteria. Of course, they stop serving lunch at 2pm and don't start serving supper until 4:30. I decided the salad bar would be fine (it stays open). I got a decent salad and it rang up as $4.48... yes, I don't have to pay, and then headed to school.

I got to school and ate my salad. I saw a friend and chatted for a bit, then did some review for a test revision that we had today. This week is mid-term for Globe University/MSB. This being the case, they had "special stuff" happening a few days. Today was Baked Potato day. They provided (for free) a baked potato with many options for fixin's including chili and broccoli & cheese. I chose the broccoli and cheese because I realized recently I am pretty picky about my chili. Anyway, I had more of a meal for free, including the drink and cookie. We also got our registration packets for next quarter. Registration starts next week. Wow, that is quick. 6 weeks of school down already! This also means we got mid-quarter grades in. I have and A in composition and an A in Patient Care. Yay me! I am pretty proud of myself for doing as well as I am in both classes.

Once in class we had the chance to revise a test from a couple weeks ago before correcting it. I knew I missed several things so I had been studying them for the past few weeks. The test was 158 points. I got 150. Overall the class did not do so well, so I am very proud of how I did. With out the opportunity to revise, I would have missed 5-10 additional points. My instructor is pretty cool.

Speaking of my pretty cool instructor, when the instructor from the massage therapy class asked if the 5 of us could be used for practice for a massage tonight, she said "yes, we will end class early so they can be practiced on." Yes, I got out of class early and took advantage of the free massage. The fact that they were students wasn't a big deal to me. They were far enough along that it wasn't just the basic how to class. They were in a sports massage class. This meant the massage incorporated stretching too. It was really nice. It was free. What a great perk for being a student at a Globe campus that offers Massage Therapy. :)

Just another manic Monday

I had the pleasure of hanging out with my nieces today. I had the morning to myself, so I got groceries and started on some of the prep/cooking that I needed to get done today. As mentioned in an earlier post, this week is Pheed the Pharmacists, so I had a little extra to prep. The girls arrived at my house around 2. Taryn was very tired and slept peacefully for a while. Micah was excited to watch Aerial until I mentioned that I had cookies to make. For the next half hour all I heard was "My wanna hewp make tookies." I finally got things cleaned up and set up to where we could start. We washed our hands and got the bowls and measuring cups and spoons...and of course the ingredients. Micah was so excited to make "tookies." She did help pretty well and I was surprised as the help of an almost 3 year old only made a slightly bigger mess than I usually do on my own. Her favorite was adding the cocoa powder. "My wove chocolate!" and then her favorite was adding the chips. And then her favorite was adding licking the spoon which of course I let her do. She fell asleep on the couch while the cookies were baking, but boy was she up and ready as soon as I told her cookies were done.

Like I mentioned, Micah is almost 3. Today I learned, no less than 8 times that she has a birthday coming up soon. She also explained that she has a birthday soon. She is going to Grandpa's so he can make her a Dora cake. I think she told me this 3 or 4 times. The next few times she told me about this great upcoming birthday, it was a princess cake that Papa was going to make for her. I asked her about the Dora cake she mentioned earlier. Her reply, "he can make boff of dem." I don't know if there really is a plan for Grandpa to make any cake and be here (or for them to be at Grandma and Grandpa's) but Grandpa has made the cake for her first two birthdays, why would this one be any different?

Despite hearing many stories many times, I really did enjoy my time with both of my nieces. Its fun to spend a day "playing."

new recipes

One of the things that you may or may not know about me, I like to collect and try new recipes. (blame that one on my Grandma) This isn't "weird" or "different" except I have quite a collection of recipes I have tried and like, and a huge collection of "new" recipes that I haven't tried yet. Despite this collection, I keep looking. I guess hoping to one day find "THE RECIPE." Anyway, I frequent Allrecipes.com to get ideas and new recipes and maybe a new twist on an existing recipe.

Tonight I was looking for a rice recipe. This week Wednesday for Pheed the Pharmacists (where I cook lunch for up to 10 of Nick's classmates) I am making enchiladas and wanted to make a Mexican rice with vegies in it. When searching, I almost always read the comments made on each recipe. I realized there are basically three types of people that post comments.

1. These people look at the recipe, make something that kind of resembles the original and then comment "this was a great recipe. I followed the recipe exactly except......." I always enjoy these comments as this gives me a great place to start when I make it.

2. The people that comment "this was great" or "This was no good" That's all they say and I have no way of knowing what was great or bad about it.

3. The third type of person is the person that says "This wasn't as good as I thought, I will keep looking for a better recipe." Now, I know there are a lot of people that don't cook like I do. I don't claim to be a wonderful cook, but Nick does claim that, so I will go with it. More than that though, I LIKE to cook. Sure I am disappointed when it doesn't turn out quite right, but I tend to find a way to improve it then. What would make this better? Maybe more of this, less of this or add some of that. I don't understand giving up totally on recipes if they don't totally hit the mark.

My exception to giving up on recipes has been Pad Thai. I have been searching for a little while to find a great recipe. I have one that is pretty darn good. I have tried 3 or 4 others. I am usually able to say what I don't like about those others...and move on to try another. If you have a GREAT recipe for pad thai pass it along.

MMMM.....Fried Fish

Today Nick and I headed out to Carver County. My uncle has been fishing a lot over the last two months. That would be ice fishing for those of you that may not know how a Minnesotan might catch fresh fish. He has been stock piling them in his freezer and invited some of the family to enjoy them with him. They were SO good. I believe he said there were 120 filets, which were consumed by 12 members of the family. They were awesome with the homemade tarter sauce, with buffalo hot sauce, and plain with no sauce at all. And being the wonderful German, Lutheran family we are...there was plenty of other food: baked beans, German potato salad and cheesy potatoes, cole slaw and two types of dessert. It was nice to see the family for a little gathering. We also watched Smokey and the Bandit part 2 and the start of part 3 before we convinced the rest of the family that part 3 wasn't good, didn't have Bert so it wasn't worth it.

There and Back Again: A Hobbit's Tale

Ian McKellen: [explaining how he acts so well] Case in point: Lord of the Rings. Peter Jackson comes to me in New Zealand and said to me: Sir Ian, I want you to be Gandalf the Wizard. And I said to him: You are aware that I am not really a wizard?

Ok, so I am like, 80% finished with Lego Indiana Jones. I really don't have much left, I just haven't purchased all the extra characters yet. I decided I don't like on free play mode when they give you a bunch of characters, and they are all different versions of the same guys, and then extra bad guys that look a like, but don't all do the same things. I like to keep it simple. My favorite characters are Thuggee and the bazooka guy. I didn't like the bazooka guy much until I got invincibility and I stopped blowing myself up. I dislike that it takes so long to load, you have to "travel" to each spot on the map before you get to "walk around" the spot that the level you are playing is located. I would say I like Lego Star Wars far better, however this game isn't bad. What, you may ask, does this have to do with Lord of the Rings? I am glad you asked!

Last night as I was starting into my cold fighting drug induced stupor called sleep, I recall asking my husband why there isn't a Lego Lord of the Rings. His reply "they would be too long." Well, yes, there is a lot of "paring down" that would need to be done, but think of the possible levels there. Wow. Each of the 3 could be a "complete saga" all on its own. You have a huge variety of characters and you could give all kinds of cool things. Gollum could could have all kinds of crazy cool powers. Elves of course could get into magic places speaking languages. The dwarf could dig and yield his ax. Hobbits would of course be the "shorty" characters. Wizards, well they of course have "the force" like powers. You have endless possibilities for bad guys.

Any way, you get the point. I think there should be a Lego LOTR. I would totally get it. Just so long as it was superior to Star Wars, and not rather dull like Indy.

Are these the kind of ideas that other people get when they are on cold medicine?

Free Latte?

The last two days have been spent running several errands. Yesterday I decided that I would stop at McDonald's and utilize their dollar menu. (Yay for dollar menus) I ordered my 4 nuggets and small fries, paid my $2 and change and proceeded to the next window. I was promptly handed my greasy deliciousness and was asked "would you like to try a free latte?" I heard free and said yes, then realized I am not a huge coffee fan, but there it was in my hand. I drove to Inver Grove Heights (to shop at Aldi) and realized I hadn't yet tried my slightly larger than a shot glass sized free latte. I decided, what the heck. You know, it wasn't bad. I'm certainly not saying that I am a convert and will be drinking coffee all the time now, but I could at least finish it.

Week 2 of class

This week in composition we had a workshop with our papers. My group wasn't very helpful in critiquing my paper. I don't know that means mine was that good, or they just didn't have any ideas. After that, we did a review of the 8 parts of speech. Yeah, here is me, 30 years old, in college, talking about what a noun is. I wasn't so amused. So I was the obnoxious, know it all.

Tonight I had Patient Care. Worthwhile class. We have learned how to do height and weight measurements, Temperature, Pulse and Respiration and blood pressure. Yup, I now know how to take a blood pressure. Kind of. I think. My partner wasn't very cooperative. She moved and was talking, so I had a hard time telling when the sound went a way. I was excited though, because I finally understand at least what we trying to hear and when we should and shouldn't hear sound and what the systolic an diastolic numbers mean. Yes! I have learned something.

We don't check blood pressures on animals all that often. We started to towards the end of my working at the clinic, but it wasn't that reliable. We had a doppler. I only used it once. Not exactly lots of practice. The other way we could measure bp was to use our anesthesia monitor system. That was kind of like a human machine. We wrapped a cuff around a furry little leg, or sometimes a tail and pushed a button. It filled the cuff with air, slowly released the air and then beeped with its 2 numbers. Yup, that was pretty simple. As far as accurate, who knows?

I have "the biggest test of the quarter" in Patient Care next week. My final draft of my paper is also due. I am glad I only have 2 classes.